Stupid A's, Stupid Weather, Stupid Week of Deaths!| Hulk Hogan Mount Rushmore | MLB Trade Dealine Deals!

Wex and AC recap another injury for the Astros, the loss on Thursday to the As, Texans traing camp, Dave Aranda's weird comments and more! Plus, the guys draft in Hour 3 the greatest wrestlers of all-time

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Two lifelong Houston sports guys named Adam, raised by girls
Nolan vulted by the magnificent roller coaster ride that is
Houston sports. Chill lage down for the only homegrown afternoon

(00:29):
team is talking? Your teams, Adam Clinton and Adam Wexland
are the a team A.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Oh my gosh, it is two to one here on
sports Sox seven to ninety. I wish I could tell
you what I did and said to make Matt Thomas
spit his drink all he legit spit his drink. Fine,
he's still he spit his drink all over the studio.
Oh my gosh, would you get out of here and

(01:21):
enjoy your weekend? Hey, I want a Rhode Island volleyball
shirt very soon. That's what I want from you. Have
a great weekend. Matt Thomas just the most entertaining man
in all of Houston. All right, we will try to
entertain you for the next four hours, a lot more
than the Astros did last night.

Speaker 3 (01:37):
What an absolute abomination. I told you.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
Wex These Peskier's team with their stupid young talent. That's
promising and they're stupid pictures that are better than Jason
Alexander and all this stuff and I gotta watch that.
Let me tell you what I did last night. I
believe it was when the score became four nothing. I
think I can't remember the exact scenario. I was doing
what I know normally do every night. I get home

(02:03):
right just before seven o'clock, by the time traffic's done,
and I eat my one meal and I start getting
the you know, the comatose feeling because my blood sugar
is just getting ratcheted. And I sit there in front
of the TV in the kitchen and I watch the
game if it's a seven o'clock start, and I just

(02:24):
I took the remote control calmly, and I just went
and I turned it off and I walked away. You
know why, because I like my furniture.

Speaker 4 (02:32):
And when they win, we say how did they do it?
When they lose, it shouldn't be like this. I know
how they lost. I know why they lost. The other
team's better than they are. The team that was on
the field last night for the A's is better than
the team that was on the field for the Astros.
It is really as simple as that sounds. And the
longer they get away with it, the longer they're going
to stay in first place. They've been getting away with
it for two months, basically each day in that two

(02:53):
month period, from way back in May to now, more
players have fallen by the wayside.

Speaker 3 (02:58):
So it's becoming more and more difficult.

Speaker 4 (03:00):
You know, the lineup didn't do anything, but it also
really doesn't matter when you're relegated to sending Jason Alexander
out there that is not a major league talent, and
they've been able to throw enough of borderline major league
talent as starters all year. I know he faced that
team earlier and was able to give him six very
good innings, but he's not a very good pitcher, and
the more the times they have to use pitchers like that,

(03:22):
the worse off they are going to be. As could
have scored fifteen runs if the Astros didn't kind of
weasele their way around, throw a runner out at home plate,
and kind of keep the game within striking distance. They
just didn't have the ammunition to do much about it.
Got a few hits from the top of the lineup,
and most of the rest of the lineup, which is
not major league caliber, didn't get hits, and so they
scored two runs. The lineup will be much the same tonight.

(03:45):
The pitching, hopefully will be a little bit different at least.
Ryan Gusto has been a major leaguer all year, and
deservedly so. Remember this is not just some random replacement,
we got to figure it out kind of guy.

Speaker 3 (03:54):
He's been an astro all year. He made the team
out of spring training.

Speaker 4 (03:57):
He was going to make his major league debut last
season because he'd earned the right to pitch for the
major league club. That is a plus as opposed to
last night, when you're clearly throwing a minor league pitcher
out there, and it looked every bit of that. And
some guys are different when you're called a minor leaguer.
He just has I don't even know how he gets
a swing and miss, let alone several of them over

(04:18):
his handful of appearances here at the major league level.
But probably not worth our time over the next four
hours to crap on Jason Alexander, but rather look forward
to what is now clearly underway in Major League baseball.
With the Josh Naylor trade yesterday, the Ryan McMahon trade
or McMahon trade today, there are going to be more
moves made the earlier you make them. The likelihood is

(04:41):
you actually pay a little bit less for them, at
least in terms of these two deals. Reported deal for
the Yankees to add McMahon, which is interesting, and that
he plays third base. I don't know that they're going
to trade for two third basemen. Haineo Suarez plays third base.
I already put him on the Yankees yesterday. He might
have to rethink that, and then the Naylor deal. Prospects
were involved in both of those deals, not top end prospects.

(05:04):
McMahon has club control for two more years. Naylor doesn't,
so there's obviously varying conditions on those deals. But if
the Astros are intent on doing something that gives them
a little more of a relaxed waiting for guys to
come back period of time, the trade deadline is now
less than a week away, and there aren't players ready
to come back in that time period, pitchers or hitters.

(05:27):
So it will be interesting to see if Dana leans
into trying to give this team another great chance to win.
It's all they've ever done. They weren't in a tremendously
dissimilar position last year. They did not look like a
World Series contender, even though at this point in the
year they were clearly right there at the top of
the division, just like they are this year, and they

(05:49):
made a trade for Usae Kakuchi, not a frontline starter
and didn't become a frontline starter here, although he's obviously
very good.

Speaker 3 (05:56):
But they went for it. They always go for it, always.

Speaker 4 (06:00):
Something that Jim Crane wants to pull the trigger on
to try to give this team, in his mind, the
best chance to keep that window open.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
He thought it was open heading end of the year.

Speaker 4 (06:09):
He certainly must feel like it's open now and that
you're still just a half game back of the best
record in the American League, all while you've gotten next
to nothing from jr. Don Alvarez, You've now missed significant
time from Jeremy Pina. You're going to miss significant time
for both Jake Myers and Esach Perettis moving forward, and
we'll see about the rest of the rehab brigade last

(06:30):
night Javier then Arraghetti tonight, Luis Garcia tomorrow, JP France
on Sunday, and then hopefully at some point pitching for
the Astros.

Speaker 3 (06:39):
Well, Brandon Walter's on the fifteen DAYIL. So that's fun. Okay,
that's breaking news. Five minutes ago.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
I just oh, by the way, it's left elbow inflammation,
so it's really awesome promising news.

Speaker 3 (06:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (06:51):
The Astros in there at game notes release noted that
Nick Hernandez is back, but Brandon Walter with elbow inflammation. Obviously,
it dates back to his appearance, his very good appearance
eighty two pitches, and if you go back to yesterday's
conversation the dumbs on the X platform, how could you
take him out of the game after eighty two pitches?

(07:12):
He's not on the IL toe to elbow inflammation fifteen
days essentially what you put a pitcher on every time,
so it's not necessarily relative to the time away. Very
similar to Lance mccullor's junior he's on the fifteen day IL.
Probably according to Joe's spot, it sounded like they were
just gonna see that blister go away, and when that does,
get him back throwing again, and presumably he could be

(07:34):
ready to emerge when fifteen days expires. But this leaves
the Astros once again with two starters. They have two
starting pitchers, Hunter Brown who will throw this weekend. Colton
Gordon is not one of their what I would call
two starters from or Is, but he won't throw until
the Nationals get to town. This season of just keep
adding to the list because players aren't coming off very frequently,

(07:57):
not nearly as fast as players are going going on.
So six games on the road trip they went four
and two. They've now played one game at home, they're
four and three, and he makes it four players that
have gone on the IL just since they got back
from the All Star Break. This is honestly, as much
as we're just kind of talking our way through it,
this is enormously significant. Yeah, Ryan Gusto is a permanent

(08:23):
part of the rotation starting today because of his I mean,
using him out of the bullpen was out of necessity.
You were able to piggyback him with Lance mccullors kind
of having him ready on the days where he pitched
if he was needed, and that worked out a couple
of times. But Gusto, Gordon Brown, and Valdez and Alexander

(08:45):
who wasn't sent down today, are the current only available
starting pitchers that are even on the active roster as
this series begins. TBA has been a very popular submission
for the Astros, even twenty five, four hours less than
twenty four hours before games, with Gusto's announcement that he
would start today, with Walter's announcement the day before he started,

(09:07):
and on and on and on it goes. They have
been able to find a way to the point that
they still have a five game lead in the division.
Mariners were winners last night. That's why the lead went
from six to five. They will have to continue figuring
out away and I hope inflammation is not much more serious,
you know, eight ten days from now, when we find

(09:28):
out he's not going to be pitching. When ten to
fifteen days rolls up, he's not going to be planning
on trying to return after fifteen days. But until Joe
Spota at least addresses it a little bit this afternoon,
about a couple hours from now when he meets with
the media, no additional information, But Walter, who just started
very well again, he's definitely been a huge reason why

(09:50):
one of the biggest reasons of the unknown reasons before
the season started of why this team would lean on
so many different guys, and he's come through at least
as well, if not more so than every every single
other player that's a some sort of surprise addition to
the twenty twenty five astros, and now he's now on
the aisle.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
Yeah, you said just before this news broke that you
didn't know how they were doing it, and they'll keep
trying to do do it for as long.

Speaker 3 (10:15):
As I know. That's just the question. I know how
they're doing it.

Speaker 4 (10:18):
They're getting they're getting surprising performances regularly.

Speaker 3 (10:21):
Well.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
You know, it's funny though, because you were saying it
was not a major league it's not major league talent
that's out there. I would agree with that in last
night's pitcher, But I think some of these guys, even
if they're maybe not ready to be full fledged starter
every day, they're definitely major league talent. I mean, I
don't know that Like Bryce Matthews having three home runs

(10:44):
in that series against the Diamondbacks is not I think
it's more than just a cute story, you know what
I mean. Like, he's got talent, right, he's a hit.
As you mentioned, we'll talk about the rest of the
group that's here. Zach short that's different from l that's different,
Cooper Hummel, that's different.

Speaker 3 (11:00):
I mean, that's John.

Speaker 4 (11:01):
Singleton wearing the lineup except for Humble yesterday. That's what
I mean, and I'm not trying to consult these players,
but they're not on the Tremmell possibly makes this team
out of spring training if he's healthy. Probably not, because
Cam Smith did. There's a point in time during the
first couple months of the season if he were healthy.

(11:22):
He's the type of player you signed for depth for
the very reason we need one other player. Somebody's gone down.
This player is going to be out for a week
or two, so Tremmell comes up. He's he's a four
A player. He's a very thought of, very highly in
the Mariners system for a while and just never really
panned out for him.

Speaker 3 (11:37):
He's twenty seven years old.

Speaker 4 (11:38):
Zach Short is looking for work every year because he's
too good for Triple A, but over the course of
his career he's proven that he can't hit. He's well
below two hundred as a major leaguer. Cooper Hummel's on
his third team this year because he keeps getting DFAD.
People that get DFAD as often as that are the
definition of not major league players. And these are the

(11:59):
players outside of Bryce Matthews, who obviously would not be
here if not for injuries. They're not major league players,
and they fill out three out of nine spots daily,
four out of nine spots a daily, and yesterday was
five out of ten because the pitcher.

Speaker 3 (12:14):
You were using is not a major league pitcher.

Speaker 4 (12:17):
Yeah, great times, in a great time, your first place
five games a half game out of the best record
in the American League.

Speaker 2 (12:24):
Well in that vein the team that is trying to
chase down the Astros got imminently more hateable with the
deal they made. Wex didn't seem to understand why I
had such utter disdain for the player that the Seattle
Mariners acquired. So I'll go ahead and try to give
everybody a refresher, including Wex when we get back as
to why, Well, Seattle got a lot more hateable with

(12:45):
that deal. So we'll talk about that more next here
on a Friday edition of the show.

Speaker 1 (12:51):
The A Team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
It is the eighteen Sports Talk seven to ninety space
City Hall Network. At the top of the hour, simulcast
will begin as we get you into the weekend. I
wish I could say I was in a better mood
going into the weekend, but when you find out that
the eighteenth player has been added to the injured list
for the Astros. And I'll just I'll just repeat what

(13:24):
I said on social media because I feel like I
have the pulse of the city sometimes on this kind
of stuff. I said, rotten, actual hell sports gods. You
know what I got back? I said, yeah, as somebody
said yeah, and music gods too. This week is for
the Birds, man, I'm like Ozzy and Haul Cogan in
the same week, and the Astros injured list is becoming
like we're getting to twenty.

Speaker 3 (13:45):
You tell me Wex.

Speaker 2 (13:46):
Would you honestly be surprised if we get in here
on Monday afternoon and they've got twenty guys on the
injured list?

Speaker 4 (13:51):
I sure would, but it wouldn't be that surprising. Three
players in a three day span, is what you're talking about.
That's what they just did Friday, Saturday, Sunday from seventeen
to twenty.

Speaker 3 (14:02):
When we get here on Monday.

Speaker 2 (14:03):
We got in here on Monday afternoon. How many were
on the injured list? Sixteen, fifteen, it's up to eighteen now.

Speaker 3 (14:09):
It's been five days though you're only giving me three days.

Speaker 2 (14:13):
Well, I'm just trying to prepare everyone for when it happens,
so I can call myself no stra Clanton.

Speaker 4 (14:19):
At some point the number is going to go down,
is it? Absolutely?

Speaker 3 (14:22):
It is?

Speaker 4 (14:23):
When well, Jacob Meltain was in last night's lineup, I
don't imagine he needs a tremendous amount of time to
show that he can be a four A player.

Speaker 3 (14:31):
All the guys in Corpus are on their way back, all.

Speaker 4 (14:34):
Three well and Javier through last night. He's in sugar
Land Corpus Christy. I mentioned this last segment. They're all
throwing this weekend. It's quite at rotation for the hooks,
and it clearly is needed for the astros. But you
got Arogheddi throwing tonight or scheduled to throw tonight. You
have Garcia scheduled to throw on Saturday and France scheduled

(14:55):
to throw on Sunday. They're obviously going to need somebody
to take the spot of Walter, and the first time
that spot comes up, it won't be any of them.
I don't imagine they plan on activating any of them
because of that. It's much more you're going to activate
them when they're ready.

Speaker 3 (15:11):
You would not.

Speaker 4 (15:12):
That's not something to expedite and it frightens me every
time Dana Brown's talking about different players and he's tried
to shy away from it on the pitching side, but
you know, even with your on, even with Jeremy Paine,
you currently you know, if they can do this and
then they can do that, then maybe you we'll have
a chance to expedite them getting back here. And obviously
that's a little dangerous to do, especially with their history
of pushing players too quickly through whatever their rehab process is.

(15:36):
And it's happened multiple times before. It's happened before Dana
even arrived. But that also means somebody like aj Bluebaugh
is probably going to start a game for the Astros again.
Got one opportunity to do that earlier, I'd be I mean,
you can make it work a little bit better if
you figure out offensively how to find it a way
to get it done. You had Yianer Diaz on the
bench last night, and those can be helpful if the

(15:59):
player comes through. I thought it was the right place,
the right time to use him as a pinch hitter.
He's not having a very good year, but obviously he's
a major league baseball talent. And he goes up there
and swings at the first pitch, which is nothing new
for you iin or d As. But he also popped
up the first pitch with a runner on in the
eighth inning, and you know, an opportunity to maybe cut
into that lead a little bit more didn't work out.

(16:20):
Then you got John Singleton his first start of the season.
He did not get a hit, hit the ball well
a couple of times, but it's not what we're looking
for here, and there really just wasn't much going on.
Sevar Reno has had a terrible season as a major
league pitcher, and he's now had three good starts against
the Astros, one in each ballpark before last night, and
then one again last night. Scratched out those two runs

(16:40):
later in his outing, but very little trouble for him
to get through those first seven innings. And that's what, honestly,
I would have expected most major league caliber pitchers to
do against the lineups that the Astros have put on
the court or on the field for the last month
or so. And yet they've they've figured it out, even
when they give up the first run of the game
every single night.

Speaker 3 (17:00):
They just went under five hundred last night.

Speaker 4 (17:03):
In doing that, fifteen straight games they've allowed the other
team to score first. They've won seven of those games.
With this group of players. It is miraculous. But there's
there will be a light at some point at the
end of this tunnel, and it's from this is like
NBA stuff. You know, I don't know how the Clippers
are gonna do this year, but if Kawhi Leonard and

(17:24):
Chris Paul and James Harden and Brook Lopez are healthy
at the end of the year, then maybe things will
work out. I don't know how the Rockets are gonna
do this year, but you know, Kevin Durant's gonna miss
some time. But if he's healthy in April and he's
healthy when the playoffs again, well that's great. We're getting
to that point with the Houston Astros less than sixty
games remaining in the season, essentially two months of baseball
left in the season awaiting the return of I don't

(17:48):
know how many key contributors. It's up to you to
determine what that number is, but it's more than a
handful guys that would be in the lineup every day,
Guys that would be a part of rotation every day
and guys that honest would be filling out your bullpen
to a certain degree, because with all the issues you
might have from your starters, they still don't have a
long guy in the bullpen. Somebody would be that pitcher,

(18:09):
whether it's Gusto or one of the returning arms from
the il their holes all over this team that's looking
down at the Mariners who did execute and announce their
trade for Josh Naylor, a couple of their minor league
pitchers outside their top ten according to all the people
who know everything they're talking about about prospects. But that's
how they land a rental. Josh Naylor was going to

(18:32):
spend one year in Arizona after a long career as
Cleveland's first basement He's having a pretty good offensive year,
top twenty five in batting average and OPS among National leaguers.
Now he comes over and reassumes the position as an
American League first baseman, he helps. You got an eight
hundred plus OPS guy in the middle of a lineup
that struggles when cal Ralely isn't hitting homers.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
Yeah, that's I think what people were wondering, People being
mainly if I'm gonna use my expertise here. The Seattle
Mariners fan base like that very very simplistic stick figure
meme that people always use. Do something that's them every
year to their GM, who clearly has prospects to deal.

Speaker 4 (19:18):
Arguably the best farm system in baseball, and it's just
sitting there waiting to be dealt for real talent, and
it looks like they're finally ready to do that. They
do have players that they've brought to the team, you know,
Cole Young among them, but at some point, you you know,
it's what you know. Jim Crane's made it pretty clear,
and I don't even have to say it. Yeah I
want to win, I'm I will get You get a

(19:41):
draft every year, You get to draft players every year,
twenty of them. If you want, then you get to
sun undrafted players too. And the Astros just completed that
twenty seven new players from the player draft and beyond
because now there's only twenty rounds. Okay, Well, if you
did your job, then some of those players are immediately prospects,
and two or three years down the road, a nice
chunk of them prospects. And the Astros have now had

(20:01):
two pretty full draft classes the last two years.

Speaker 3 (20:05):
Well he keeps in.

Speaker 4 (20:07):
Uh, empowering his general managers Jeff Luno to James Klick,
to Dana Brown, to tell them goodbye.

Speaker 3 (20:15):
You're in our prospects system. So how many hits do
you have this year? No?

Speaker 4 (20:18):
No, I mean for me in the Astros, on the
Astros that been at Made Park in previous years and
around Major League ball. Oh you have none?

Speaker 3 (20:25):
Okay?

Speaker 4 (20:25):
How many outs have you gotten? You're a pitcher, I
understand like I used to be. How many outs have
you gotten?

Speaker 3 (20:29):
Forced?

Speaker 2 (20:29):
Oh?

Speaker 5 (20:29):
None?

Speaker 4 (20:30):
Okay, then you're available. You're available. And even though they
still I mean Bryce Matthews, the number one prospect in
the Astros organization, widely viewed as the number one prospect
couple a couple of different outlets. Jacob Melton is number two.
And we don't even know that these guys can play
at this level yet or permanently. Although I've said it
already many times, nothing has changed.

Speaker 3 (20:52):
The opening day lineup.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
Next year is going to include Bryce Matthews as your
starting second basement.

Speaker 3 (20:57):
But they do not have the blue chip.

Speaker 4 (21:00):
These clear two be stars in their system, and yet
they keep making deals every single year to rip apart
their prospect system. They don't have anymore, right, well, until
they trade more. They do it every year. Keep telling
me they don't have any and how do they keep
getting players every year? And how do they keep winning

(21:20):
this year? Literally with these players.

Speaker 2 (21:22):
Again what you just said about they don't have Like, so,
how does Dana get on the phone and make these trades?

Speaker 4 (21:27):
You find gms that like the guys you have that
aren't named Keith law Okay and Jim Jim Kallis I
think does an awesome job. And I don't think he
hates on the astros in any way, but he's he
doesn't And it's not unfair that they're ranked where they are, don't.
I don't think it's unfair, But I think the idea
that Okay, well their host, I think that gives the
public the idea, Well, they have the twenty ninth rated

(21:49):
farm system, So how are they going to make trades
by picking up the phone? I mean it sounds dumb
and simple, but you're watching, right, every year they make trades,
and every year for the last four years they've had
one of the five or six worst farm systems. So
how do they make trades? They pick up the phone.
You have to call the GMS. You have to figure out, oh,

(22:10):
say no, who likes your eleventh best prospect? That the
prospect rankers that don't work for Major League Baseball teams don't.
All these players make it to Houston, and what happens
when they get here, Well, they can get guys out. Well,
they must be doing something right, So you probably believe
a little bit in their development process, which you then
would want to implement yourselves on your side. And there

(22:31):
are teams that have astros, former executives and scouts and
personnel people working for them. Now, guess who's prospects? They
probably like the ones they know in Houston.

Speaker 2 (22:41):
And that's to say nothing of guys who are already
at the major league level come here and have a
rebirth or correct things, or get better or a combination
of all three.

Speaker 4 (22:50):
Yeah, I can't wait for somebody to come to Houston
and then end up playing somewhere else and saying, well,
I was just happy to get out of Houston.

Speaker 3 (22:56):
Things just were not working out for me.

Speaker 4 (22:58):
It was just a terrible, bad clubhouse atmosphere, bad culture.
Coaches weren't figuring out what I needed. It's bad staff
to work with, just awful. Get me out of there.
I have a breath of fresh air to not be
playing for the Astros.

Speaker 3 (23:11):
Let me know when that happens.

Speaker 2 (23:12):
It didn't this year with yuse Kakuchi, who was last
year's prize.

Speaker 3 (23:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:17):
No, that's what's so funny about everybody hating on the
Astros from the outside, because they have players that come
here and don't say things like that. They say the
exact opposite as a matter of fact, and talk about
the culture and then, oh, by the way, you would
kill to have some of the pieces play for your team,
Just like Red Sox fans and Cubs fans are finding

(23:38):
out this regular sea.

Speaker 4 (23:40):
The heart of the golden era of Houston Astros baseball.
They're still playing baseball all over the majors for teams
other than Houston.

Speaker 6 (23:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:48):
And like you said, though, the Astros keep winning, all right,
Best of X, it's a doozy, especially because well, there's
some shared hatred.

Speaker 3 (23:57):
We'll explain when we return.

Speaker 1 (24:01):
The a team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 3 (24:08):
Did you all see this?

Speaker 7 (24:09):
We should be putting out between five and fifteen posts day.

Speaker 8 (24:12):
Four hundred people were arrested for things that they said
on social media.

Speaker 2 (24:16):
History repeats itself type bang, you'll succeed. Never doubt that
you're the one who bustle no one building.

Speaker 3 (24:25):
You're the best of it. X. Nothing's gonna have a top.
You know you're the best of it. Post an every
single day.

Speaker 2 (24:35):
You know you're the best of it, breaking the entire Internet.
All right, let's get to it. The best of X
Friday Edition.

Speaker 3 (24:52):
Now.

Speaker 2 (24:53):
I have a long and distinguished list of sports hate.
It's known far and wide, or at least in this
city on these airwaves. But occasionally wex peels back to
curtain and reveals he too has a much smaller list,

(25:13):
but no less effective. There are certain names in the
sports world that if you say them, you can get
him going off.

Speaker 3 (25:22):
Kirk Cousins.

Speaker 4 (25:23):
He's keep going with the list and I'll explain what
it actually means to me.

Speaker 3 (25:28):
Bob Costas.

Speaker 2 (25:29):
Okay, it's much smaller because the next name is probably
one of the first ones that comes to mind, and
the one we're gonna talk about.

Speaker 4 (25:37):
Here, non player Bob Costs. That's different. That's legit, just
sports world. That's legit disdain. I can't blame anybody else.
The thing that I dislike about Kirk Cousins and dislike
about Derek Carr and players like that.

Speaker 3 (25:51):
It's more you morons in the front office.

Speaker 4 (25:54):
What are you doing besides signing a piece of paper
and handing it to your owner that says, I hate winning,
but you can keep paying me to be your jam
Joe Ingles. Now, I mean, what are you guys doing.
These players are guaranteeing you will not win. And I
know who we're about to talk about, and he is
the same such player, Joe Ingles. Joe Ingles is too

(26:16):
not a good enough player to fit into this. You
don't like him, well, yeah, but that's only that's that
is more. Bob cost Is like, like, he can't do it.

Speaker 3 (26:23):
It bothers me.

Speaker 4 (26:24):
The people I blame for my hate of Joe Ingles
are the five players on the other team.

Speaker 3 (26:29):
He can't do anything to your team. So if you
make him dribble.

Speaker 4 (26:34):
I know he's a basketball player, but if you make
him dribble, his night is over.

Speaker 3 (26:38):
That's all you have to do.

Speaker 4 (26:40):
He can't do anything unless you let him stand there
like an old man and shoot because he cannot do
anything else. And when he draws ridiculous fake fouls, all
that's ugh. Jose Alvarado like Jose Alvarado. That's that is
not on the GM. That is not on the fans.
That is on the player. He's a Bob Costas hate.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
What about what about SGA? I don't complicated. Yes, you
hate things.

Speaker 3 (27:03):
He does, Yeah, but I don't.

Speaker 4 (27:05):
I don't hate James Harden as a sixer net or clipper.

Speaker 3 (27:09):
You should.

Speaker 2 (27:09):
I can understand his bridge out of town. For some reason,
the organizations.

Speaker 4 (27:13):
Like SGA is the modern day dribbling version of Maddox,
Glavin and Smoltz.

Speaker 3 (27:22):
So that's a strike. So you won on time? Sweet,
that's fantastic.

Speaker 4 (27:26):
You're telling me I can throw a pitch right there,
and you dumb dumb behind the plate, you're gonna call
it a strike.

Speaker 3 (27:31):
Awesome. I'll just keep throwing it.

Speaker 4 (27:33):
The excite So when I drive into the lane and
I push off with my off arm and miraculously, all
of a sudden, out of nowhere space is created and
I can take an uncontested jumper. Okay, Well, then I
guess I'll keep doing it.

Speaker 2 (27:47):
And you're gonna call a foul and the other guy, man,
I'm gonna do it even more. This excites me because
I'm looking forward to him not winning another title this decade.

Speaker 4 (27:54):
Yeah, the the constant great regular seasons and long post
of the Braves, none of them one title.

Speaker 2 (28:02):
Unfortunately, that also means that he's going to be eliminating
Houston every single year in the playoffs. If the Rockets
have the equivalent of in the postseason.

Speaker 4 (28:12):
Yeah, they were a little little on the We don't
like hitting in the postseason during that era. I mean,
ninety bases are loaded and you're at home at the
Astrodome and you need to push a run across with
nobody out, You're probably gonna score, right.

Speaker 3 (28:23):
Nope?

Speaker 6 (28:24):
Uh uh?

Speaker 9 (28:25):
Can I petition for our next eighteen draft after this one?

Speaker 4 (28:28):
By the way, some of the things coming up on
today's show. We will have a Friday eighteen draft today
and we will be taking our lead from the Hulkster,
So we'll give you some deats on what we'll be
drafting through thirty. We'll hear a little bit from Byron McTaggart.
Don't want to give you Brian McTaggart whiplash, Being that
he appeared on the Matt Thomas Show earlier today, they
replayed the interview and he will appear again live on

(28:49):
the Astros on Deck show, but something he had to
say is something worth you guys hearing. Chandler Rome will
join us live at five o'clock this evening. In advance
of Athletics and astros Cole wants to petition what next Friday?
Our first August Friday? A team draft? What's the topic?
Gonna be athletes that we hate for no apparent reason.

Speaker 3 (29:12):
Good topic, good topic, good topic. I love it. That's
gonna that's gonna be. That's gonna take some thought. I'll
start making my list now.

Speaker 4 (29:18):
Merely exhausted the time allotted for best of X and
have not arrived at an end.

Speaker 3 (29:23):
You have five minutes, guys, good good news, Wes. I
also hate Rudy Gobert as much as you do.

Speaker 2 (29:29):
And if you want proof, here's audio of Shack telling
everyone how much he hates Rudy Gobert.

Speaker 8 (29:35):
You're making big money. Play like a big man. That's it.
Play like a big man. Throw some bulls, knock some
people out. Don't be letting little white dudes from Denver
dunk on. Then you gotta grab them by the second.
Come on, bro, that's it. If you're gonna get paid
big money.

Speaker 10 (29:52):
I just want Shack to still be on TV when
Rudy gets into the Hall of Fame, because it's gonna do.

Speaker 8 (29:56):
If Rudy Gobert gets into the Hall of fa Berg
gets the Hall of Fame as dressed to a mother ceremony.

Speaker 4 (30:06):
Obviously not an appearance on Inside the NBA on T
n T or any future entity of Inside the NBA.
Would rather a much more open form like a podcast.

Speaker 3 (30:17):
His bombs were dropping left and right.

Speaker 2 (30:19):
By the way, whose podcast was that? Who was the
other guy talking?

Speaker 3 (30:22):
That was sounded like left goo? I never saw it.

Speaker 2 (30:24):
It's left Okay, He's absolutely right, because everybody gets into
the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Speaker 4 (30:31):
Well, four time Defensive Players of the Year, it helped
are pretty good bets to make the Basketball Hall of Fame,
and Rudy has won. But this is a regular season award,
like all of the regular season awards are.

Speaker 3 (30:42):
So I'm not taking anything away with.

Speaker 4 (30:44):
What he's done to earn, say, a Hall of Fame
invite and induction, because he's going to get it. He
is a very helpful regular season player. Teams don't scout
very much, team don't attack individuals like they will on
the postseason very much, and you can get away with
just he stands back there and he impacts field goal
percentage and you miss shots and you can't get into

(31:04):
the lane. It happened to the Rockets throughout his almost
his entire career in Utah. And then they would play
in the playoffs, and the Rockets would put time and
effort into scouting the only team on their schedule. They
don't have to scout Golden State. They don't have to
scout Minnesota, San Antonio, the Lakers, the Clippers, any of them.
They're only playing Utah. And now it's the only teams
that are are playing Minnesota. And he becomes a this

(31:28):
is a defensive player of the year. That means on
one end of the court and there's only two of them,
he's awesome. He makes your team great. It's like a
twenty five point per game scorer on defense. He's a
as Shaq would say, he's a bleeping liability in the playoffs,
a liability, a on that his coach wants him on

(31:50):
the bench in the fourth quarter, last five minutes. I
can't put my best chance to win team on the
court if Rudy's a part of it, do you understand?

Speaker 2 (32:01):
But see, that's when when people continuously keep voting for
him for Defensive Player of the Year. I know it's
a regular season award, but I like they're separate.

Speaker 3 (32:12):
I don't have any issue with it whatsoever.

Speaker 4 (32:13):
I do he he has played to that level in
the regular season, when teams are playing back to backs,
when teams spend five minutes on the plane scouting, when
teams do a whiteboard before the game, when they go
through a walk through and say, hey, you remember Rudy.
He's tall, he's gonna play in the middle, try to
get around him. All right, what else do we need
to do?

Speaker 3 (32:29):
I mean, with.

Speaker 2 (32:31):
Votes sit down every year and say, all right, we're
gonna vote yokic f MVP, and we're definitely voting Rudy
for DP over. I mean can't we can't. Is that
what they're doing now, baby? You're voting on narratives? Literally, Well, this.

Speaker 3 (32:42):
Guy's antarative with Rudy Gobert.

Speaker 4 (32:45):
He is an awesome, impactful, elite regular season defensive player.

Speaker 2 (32:49):
It matters the least, yes, but that's what the award is, Okay,
So there's no issue with it.

Speaker 4 (32:53):
He also doesn't take shots in the regular season.

Speaker 2 (32:57):
The regular season not depends on defensive player of the
Year because the year is involving the playoffs too.

Speaker 4 (33:01):
If you need that designation, then you're gonna have to
figure it.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
Out like ours needs that because we like some antics here.
I've never thought of the awards a player of the
regular season.

Speaker 3 (33:11):
That's what it should say. I mean Jeremy Panie.

Speaker 4 (33:13):
On the reverse side of it, Jeremy Peney was not
good as a rookie.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
He was a run of the mill player. Quarterback of
the Year award. That's what it should be, only in
the regular season.

Speaker 4 (33:25):
If you want to go ahead, make your petition. I
had not heard this argument before.

Speaker 3 (33:30):
But it's accurate. It's not accurate. How is it not accurate?

Speaker 2 (33:34):
I just took what you said and used it to
apply it to the new names of these awards.

Speaker 3 (33:39):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (33:40):
It just doesn't feel right. It doesn't mean I'm not
averse to change. If you want to change these awards,
I guess you could. But I'm okay with handing out
regular season awards.

Speaker 3 (33:52):
I think it's fine.

Speaker 2 (33:53):
Hey, I like Joe Ingles can only shoot left handed,
but what's the point.

Speaker 3 (33:58):
I mean, his shots go in MT a little less frequently.
You've seen it.

Speaker 4 (34:02):
Uh, that's a good Yeah. I've probably seen it at
one point or another. I don't remember what. Probably more
of a trash can shot like not like cleaning up.

Speaker 3 (34:10):
Out plus yeah, something like that.

Speaker 4 (34:12):
I mean, we have a basket in here, a waste basket,
as nobody calls them.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
I miss it all the time, but it's usually with
cough drop rappers who, if they're not wound tightly up
go rogue very easy.

Speaker 4 (34:22):
Best of X today, ten minutes of it was dedicated
to Shack cursing about Rudy.

Speaker 2 (34:27):
Well, you curse on most of the time, so I
figured i'd let somebody else do it on the show
for a chance.

Speaker 3 (34:31):
Thank you. There you go, all right, and I love
Shack by the way.

Speaker 2 (34:34):
Uh all right, when we come back, let's check in
on Texans training camp today, because I have a couple
of questions for both of these gentlemen that I work
with on the show. And you know, we're going into
the weekend and I'm I'm longing to hear about real hard,
gritty practice, and all I'm hearing so far is the opposite.

Speaker 3 (34:54):
So we'll get it all that.

Speaker 1 (34:55):
Next eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (35:09):
You know, WEX life is a highway and sometimes at
the end of that highway as a wet blanket.

Speaker 3 (35:19):
Okay, I believe you see exhibit A. Just love to
hit for a second.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
Yeah, all right, we are winding down the two o'clock
hour here on the A Team Sports Talk seven to
ninety Space City Home Network simulcast.

Speaker 3 (35:34):
Starting at the top of the hour. You can leer
at us.

Speaker 2 (35:38):
You can be a voyeur if you will, as we
take you until six o'clock tonight, leading you up to
well an Astros athletics contest that will feature eighteen count them,
eighteen Astros on the injured list. Now with the news
that Brandon Walter, retroactive to the twenty fourth, is now
on the il with elbow inflammation. About a great day.

Speaker 4 (36:03):
Yeah, the Astros have an extra bullpen arm today because
of it, so good news. Otherwise they would be a
bullpen arm less because Brandon Walter is not available today
even if he were healthy. But Nick Hernandez is back
with the team after coming up for one day and
not pitching.

Speaker 2 (36:18):
Wait, what is what is the status of Seesar Zalazar
right now? He's doing catching off and on for the
Sugarlands based Cowboys.

Speaker 3 (36:28):
I was just hoping that he was on the major
league roster. Just you we could get an upset.

Speaker 4 (36:31):
Well, Unfortunately, Major League Baseball limits the number of pitchers
and position players you can have. You got twenty six spots,
but we're gonna tell you who has to fill those spots.
Otherwise some teams would do some interesting things. But there's
some method to it. But you have a start, like
right now today, there's Jason Alexander, there's s from ber Valdez,
there's Hunter Brown, there's Ryan Gusto, there's Colton Gordon. Those

(36:53):
are the only five players on the roster right now
that could start a game. Gusto is starting today, Alexander
started yesterday, Brown and Gordon are throwing in the next
two days, and fromber after that. Well, so everybody else
is available out of the bullpen. Had they not made
this move, or had Walter been healthy, I guess I
should say much more clearly, well, they'd have one less

(37:14):
bullpen arm there. Or they could have said, Jason, we
appreciate your terrible effort yesterday. You can head on back
down and we will bring somebody else up. They would
not have the had had the opportunity to bring Hernandez
back up, though he's only eligible to return to the
team due to injury, and there's an injury.

Speaker 3 (37:31):
Respected I did not tell him to do that.

Speaker 4 (37:36):
I mean talking about them having an extra arm available
is actually a blanket that's been in the dryer.

Speaker 2 (37:41):
That's see fair points. Yeah exactly.

Speaker 3 (37:46):
So tell me.

Speaker 2 (37:49):
When you foresee the Texans practice getting nitty and gritty.

Speaker 4 (37:54):
Saturday, Okay, that's eat, that's tomorrow. Yeah, I know Tomorco
will be in the front of the fans for the
first time. There three days of practice basically a ramp
up to that.

Speaker 3 (38:04):
The real ramp up is to Monday.

Speaker 4 (38:05):
Monday, if I didn't tell you that already, is the
day they will have pads on for the first time.
It will also be a practice open to the fans,
and it also comes after their first actual off day.
Today was an off day. Today they practice inside. Not
one hundred percent sure if it was weather related or not.
The clouds were there, it was very dark and it
was already raining slightly, so in an effort probably to

(38:28):
not get lightninged inside or practice unnecessarily in what was
going to be a walk through. Anyway, they plan how
they're going to practice long before practice begins, and it
was going to be a walkthrough, So why bother getting
everything outside and getting all the players outside. All the
stuff they needed was ready to go. They just moved
it inside and it was a walk through pace, walk
through speed, and that's what they did today.

Speaker 3 (38:50):
Helmet's not necessary.

Speaker 4 (38:51):
You can tell that when they're making their way over
and not a single player has a helmet with them,
but all in an effort from a health standpoint and
getting your bodies in the heat for two days. When
Saturday now is your first day and they're still they're
not in full pads. They've got their little spiders on
for tomorrow's practice. But it's always a little bit different
when the fans are out there. And I think the
way that they went about today's practice was try to

(39:13):
get them to this practice and Monday's practice and at
the end of the week. By the way they're leaving,
they have one week left of training camp in Houston
before their trip to the Greenbrier, and the Greenbrier precedes
their game against the Vikings, which almost assuredly would have
already been played without Justin Jefferson now that he has
a minor injury issue, I'm sure it won't be played
against Justin Jefferson. My notes from today, I can empty

(39:37):
the notebook in five seconds. I wrote down the offensive
line that had the first reps during walkthrough, the offensive
line that had the second reps during walkthrough, and then
I wrote down the names and high schools of the
three championship young ladies who represent the Texans in flag football,
just coming off their championship this past weekend, the NFL

(39:57):
Flag Football champions Houston Texans. That's the extent my entire notebook.

Speaker 3 (40:02):
Today. I watched, I took attendance.

Speaker 4 (40:05):
I noted a few things, and I actually mentioned one
of those things in walking out with WEX today. They
went through a walk through which includes you take a snap,
you walk back to your seventh step, drop, you scan
the field to your players walking around, and you loft
the ball to the target you've chosen to throw to,
or in CJ. Stroud's case today, you underhanded to them.

(40:28):
He underhanded a few balls when it was just the
quarterbacks and Demiko lining up. Actually, Ransom walked through dummy
stuff with Mertz and Mills lined up out wide, Slovis
in motion, and Demiko Ryans lined up as a slot receiver,
and they went through the play and he dropped back
and he underhanded the ball to Dimiico, just a little flip, underhanded.

(40:48):
But then he proceeded to do that the entire practice.
I don't know if he was scramping up. There was
nothing really to ask and did not need to fill
the need to ask, Nick Kyley, if you intentionally and
the medical staff intentionally told CJ. Stroud not to throw
the ball, or is just why don't we just use
common set? Why bother with an extra fifty throws for

(41:10):
no reason whatsoever?

Speaker 3 (41:11):
Today?

Speaker 2 (41:12):
I'm sure he'll be out there tomorrow, no problem. But again,
in all seriousness, it kind of is like a ramp
up move, is it not?

Speaker 3 (41:18):
It very much is.

Speaker 4 (41:19):
But I would think nothing of it if he was
a full participant during the offseason program, which he clearly
wasn't due to the general soreness.

Speaker 2 (41:28):
General soreness very Astros of the Texans quarterback with that description.
But we digress. All right, we'll take a quick time out,
we'll come right back. We will reset. We'll get you
ready for more Astros conversation in that before the show started,
they had seventeen guys on the injured list, and now

(41:49):
an hour in they have eighteen that and other topics
as we continue here on a Friday edition of the program.

Speaker 6 (41:55):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 1 (41:58):
Ninety teen lifelong Houston sports guys named Adam Talking your Team.

Speaker 7 (42:09):
Adam Clinton and Adam Wexler are the eighteen.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
Straight up three o'clock here in Houston, Texas. It's a
Friday edition of the eighteen Sports Talk seven to ninety
Space City Home Network. If you want to check out
our smiling faces wex over there, ac right here. Cole
Thompson along for the ride as well. We take you
up until six o'clock. Astros taking one on the chin

(42:38):
in the opener of their four game weekend set against
the Athletics last night. They will go tonight looking to
get their first win in the series and down another man.

Speaker 3 (42:48):
In the course of the first.

Speaker 2 (42:49):
Hour, we learned that the eighteenth member of the Astros
organization has been placed on the injured list. And look
at this point you said it in the open. I
don't know how they're doing it. Ryan Gusto is gonna
be the starter to night, by the way, and I
just I'm looking at the names that are already there,

(43:14):
who the likeliest one to come off the injured list
first is, and then if the Astros during all of
this time can continue to win more often than not,
I don't know, like it's weird because it feels like
when they win games, it's not nearly as much. Oh
my gosh, how are they doing this versus when they
lose games? It's like we can't catch a break. Maybe

(43:35):
that's I think that has to do with the fact that,
as somebody put it, why don't they just feel the
entire space cowboys lineup just for fun? They have half
of them, seventy five percent of them out there every
night anyways, Oh.

Speaker 4 (43:46):
They'd have to dfa some guys in order to get
those guys on the roster. Probably the biggest reason why
the fun of it would not be more important than
the well, I mean, it was fun and all. We
got some people out of the ballpark, but it to
some of our actual players now they're playing elsewhere.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
It's just I'm every day we come in here, I
almost expected at this point and I made a joke
in the first hour. You know there's eighteen now, will
there be twenty by the time we come back in
here on Monday, and you quickly dismissed it.

Speaker 3 (44:17):
I don't know why.

Speaker 4 (44:18):
Yeah, because I don't anticipate that happening. That's the main reason.
Four players on the IL that have not returned were there.

Speaker 3 (44:25):
Brandon Walter is who I was talking about. I forgot
to mention his actual.

Speaker 4 (44:28):
Name left elbow inflammations. Honestly, the eighteenth person on the
list is noteworthy. I'm much more concerned about the actual
injury and to who it is they can get away with,
seeing no offense to Zach Decenzo and Jacob Melton and
Sean Dubin and luiski Ormey and others like that, spending
time on the IL for whatever period of time it takes.

(44:49):
When you have players that are making you good plus
level players, you can think what you want about Brandon
Walder before he pitched for the Astros, but you should
only think about him about how he's pitched for the Astros,
and that is extremely well. He's been one of the
best starters in Major League Baseball for the last five starts,
for the most portion or for the majority of his season.
He's had two bad starts. He's been getting the ball

(45:11):
for two months. He's making them win games or putting
them in position to win games. And I know what
the record is when he pitches, which shockingly is not
very good, but it has more to do with your
team winning when you provide them the necessary start so
you can win on another day when you're not pitching,
because you just gave him seven strong innings. They only

(45:33):
needed two arms yesterday. Seuss came in for the eighth,
Hater came in for the ninth. That's all they needed.
And during a post All Star Break disaster zone that
the Astros bullpen was they need things like that. Brandon
Walter's made nine starts, the Astros have won three of them.

Speaker 3 (45:48):
It's Rry Pittsburgh of him.

Speaker 4 (45:50):
Well, you'll never guess which starter among these seven that
have at least nine starts, who gets the worst run
support by almost a full run. Obviously it's Brandon Walter.
And again it's more than what is their record on
the day he pitches. He's pitched them to victory probably
six or seven times, six innings, one run, six innings,

(46:11):
two runs, seven innings one run, and they may or
may not win those games, but he gives the team
the chance to win the next game. You know which
starter has already made the third most starts on this team.
It's the guy going tonight. Ryan Gusto had zero major
league starts or appearances before the season started. He's making

(46:31):
his third highest total on the team thirteenth start of
the year tonight. This weekend, Colton Gordon moves into the
four spot with nobody else there. He will have made
his twelfth start, the fourth most starts for the first
place by five game, Houston Astros, eleven of your games
have been started by Lance McCullers junior, and he hasn't

(46:51):
been good. I see mctaggern. I did it myself about
a week or two ago. Put the record out there
of this team. When Brown and vale Des don't start,
they're twenty nine and eleven. When they do start, that's
eighteen games over five hundred. Well, the team overall is
seventeen games over five hundred. So clearly you're a game
under when the other guys pitch. And you can use

(47:12):
that stat in a number of different ways. You can
paint the picture of they're in trouble when those guys
don't start.

Speaker 3 (47:16):
It's clearly factual.

Speaker 2 (47:19):
You can also look at it with your incredibly dry
brand new, fresh out of the dryer blanket that I
carry exclusively here. On the A team, they're almost a
five hundred team when they give the ball to aj
blue Ball and Jason Alexander and Hayden was Nesky and
Brandon Walter and Lance McCullers Junior and Colton Gordon and

(47:40):
Ryan Gusto and twice to Spencer Arraghetti and Renel Blanco
no asis, many of them having bad seasons or non seasons,
and after last night they finally fell below five hundred
one game, they'd be a handful of games out of
the wild card spot if those were.

Speaker 3 (48:00):
The only starts they'd had all year. Yeah, it's hypothetically right.

Speaker 2 (48:06):
It's uh And and you were talking about Brandon Walter's season.
Channel Rome sent out of tweet with some of the
numbers three three, five e r A across fifty three
and two thirds innings and nine starts. He'd gone at
least six innings and allowed two or fewer earned runs
and six of those starts. So, like you said, it's

(48:27):
not just a middling position player. This is a huge
loss just for the time that it would be if
it was just a regular stint. But the fact that
it's elbow inflammation just absolutely wonderful news that makes me
want to jump off the roof.

Speaker 3 (48:43):
Yeah, I left elbow inflammation.

Speaker 4 (48:45):
It's pitching on just to be just so you guys,
just on his right, you don't have inflammation on the
arm that holds the glove.

Speaker 2 (48:51):
It's it's the glove's not that heavy.

Speaker 8 (48:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (48:56):
I have the other start that did not he did
not go six innings and still pitched well. He gave
up no runs, and that was in Tampa, a ridiculous,
non major league baseball park. He went five innings, he
gave up no runs at his debut for the Astros,
and has, like I said, he's been unbelievable, as good
as any starter that they've used, including like especially since

(49:16):
he's been here. His numbers are not that dissimilar from
Hunter Browns and from ber Valdez over the time period
since he's been a fixture in the rotation. Four starts
in June and now four starts in July. Wasn't scheduled
to pitch in this series quite obviously with his start
just over the weekend and or just in this last
series gives them the chance to do something else, you know,

(49:38):
the who's coming back portion of this with all those
players that are on the il from injuries that have
taken place during the season. You know, Jacob Melton started
his rehab assignment. I think Jeremy Pania is probably unless
we don't know, something is progressing to the point where
you know, a live VP should be in his very
near future, and if it is, then it shouldn't be
long before he returns. Beyond that, you know, Alvarez, I'm

(50:02):
not going to give you a date on that. That's
a total guess. Esach Peretis and Jake Myers, they're not close.
Brendan Rodgers probably not close. As long as he gets
past his concussion and his broken nose, they can go
ahead and restart a rehab assignment for him. So he
obviously was close, but this injury a concussion total guests
have no idea what that means or from a healthy standpoint.

(50:23):
And then the pitching side of it, I think you
guys have a pretty good idea of what that story is.

Speaker 3 (50:27):
Will give you.

Speaker 4 (50:28):
Brian McTaggart's thoughts on that, specifically as last night, tonight, tomorrow,
and the following day, each of the four rehabbing starting
pitchers that have been there all season, other than Araghetty,
who's been there all season but two games.

Speaker 3 (50:43):
They're all making their rehab starts.

Speaker 4 (50:44):
Last night, forty nine pitches for Christian Javier, thirty strikes,
walked each of the last two batters he faced in
the third inning. It wasn't an out of control pitch
count even in the inning. He hadn't even thrown twenty
pitches in the inning, but he was pulled at that point.
Gave up around a couple of hits, highest VLO on
his fastball just under ninety five averaged in the mid
ninety threes, and not too many whiffs. I believe it

(51:08):
was three whiffs on the forty nine pitches that he threw.
I don't know that he made tremendous progress from his
previous rehab start where he threw forty six pitches. But today,
if there's no ife didn't feel good, or I'm still sore,
or this is unlike what I thought I would feel like,
then he should be about six days away from making
what could be his final rehab start, although probably not

(51:31):
in his case. I think if it were another situation,
maybe they would say, Okay, he's ready. It's probably two
away for him very getty pitches well, honestly tonight or
yes tonight for Corpus.

Speaker 3 (51:44):
I don't know what else you need considering where the
team is.

Speaker 4 (51:47):
Can he get you fifty five sixty pitches in an
appearance for the Astros on July thirty first, August first,
August second. If he can, then that's where I would
pitch him, rather than giving him another rehab start. Get
him all back as quickly as possible, like if your
options are getting blue ball another star, giving the ball
to Jason Alexander again, or having the latest ramp up

(52:10):
start for Arraghetty be against the major league team that
the Astros are facing.

Speaker 10 (52:14):
Just do it.

Speaker 3 (52:15):
Just do it. I mean, yeah, what's the word.

Speaker 4 (52:17):
I don't think you're expediting it to the point of
risking injury unless you're concerned that the adrenaline and the
individual involved will get too worked up. Or we'll say
I feel good after my twenty five pitches in the
first two winnings when he really doesn't. I mean, if
that's a concern, then then by all means, listen to
the player.

Speaker 2 (52:35):
I won't make the pay, I won't make the obvious
joke about the medical staff. I just won't do it.

Speaker 3 (52:39):
It's it's too it's too soon with another guy on
the list.

Speaker 2 (52:44):
And in the middle of all this, two teams that
are trying to chase down the Astros in the American
League making deals. We talked a little bit about Josh
Naylor being traded from the recently swept by the Astros
Diamondbacks to Seattle to uh solidify their first base situation,
and then Ryan McMahon going to the Yankees to solve

(53:07):
their third base woes. When we all thought that au
Haaneo Suarez, also on the Diamondbacks, might be the guy
headed to the.

Speaker 4 (53:15):
Bronx, It's possible they could put McMahon elsewhere on the infield.
He has experienced playing elsewhere. Also, if you were unaware,
and I've got plenty of time, I got ten seconds,
guess where Ryan McMahon is not a very good hitter.
I'll give you a hint. He's played his entire career
as a Colorado Rocky. The answer is everywhere but Colorado.

(53:36):
Everywhere but Colorado. Not a good hitter.

Speaker 3 (53:38):
Good job Cashman.

Speaker 1 (53:41):
The eight on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
Eight team rolling along here on a Friday edition of
the program Sports Talk seven ninety Space City Home Network.

Speaker 3 (54:00):
When the name Dave.

Speaker 2 (54:01):
Randa comes to mind, what's the first thing or when
you hear the name Dave Randa? I guess I should say,
what is the first thing that comes to mind?

Speaker 4 (54:09):
Wex under well, ming as a head coach also weird
in that order.

Speaker 3 (54:17):
I've spoken to him a couple.

Speaker 2 (54:18):
Of times over the years, and his ascension to being
in charge of a football team as their head coach.

Speaker 4 (54:27):
I don't doubt that he knows football. I don't doubt
that he's really good at dissecting football. I think that's
a clear given with what his coaching career has been.
But running a football team, leading a football team, coaching
a football team, and running through a brick wall for
this person who's in charge of that team, I have
my doubts.

Speaker 3 (54:48):
Well, are you Baylor? Yes? Way, yeah, we should. We
should clarify.

Speaker 2 (54:52):
Are you familiar with Nick Harris's work at the Fort
Worth Star Telegram. I assume he's one of the hundreds
of people who covered the press conference today. Well, yeah,
that's where this particular sound comes from. He posted this
video of a Q and A with the with the
with the caption Baylor's Day of Ronda just gave one

(55:15):
of the most bizarre answers to a question I think
I've ever heard.

Speaker 3 (55:20):
We'll just let you hear the exchange and then we
can discuss.

Speaker 11 (55:24):
There's a scene in The Wolf of Wall Street when
they're talking about throwing midgets and it's like, you know, hey,
this midget can he can you roll there? And he goes, no,
he doesn't roll you throwing, you know what I mean?
And they're made for throwing. And then after a while
they start talking in they go, well, you know what
I think if you start talking, if you start, they
may think they know we're making fun of them. The

(55:45):
midgets may think we're making fun of them. So then
I'm gonna start. They may get mad at us. And
then the guys go, well, what we need to do
is make them think they're one.

Speaker 3 (55:54):
Of us, one of us, one of us.

Speaker 11 (55:56):
And I think that's the thing we're coaching, call it
and we're is this that way They talk about a
quiring players getting rid of players just like that, And
the whole thing underneath all that is they make them
think they're one of us, you know what I mean.
And it's like, I don't know, do you have to
do that to win?

Speaker 12 (56:13):
You know?

Speaker 3 (56:14):
That sucks? Okay? When he says one of us, he's I'm.

Speaker 4 (56:22):
Finally getting to the only thing he should have said
when comparing it to Wolf of Wall Street when he says,
one of us, do you guys remember the scene when
those cokeheads they were selling penny stocks and running a
really comfortable, pleasant day to day operations over there with
the Jordan running things. Yeah, at the end of a
very important business meeting, and they were trying to talk

(56:43):
about things that were maybe and then at the end
of it they say one of us, one of us, Yeah,
and he was making a point about recruiting. You know,
do you have to sell the guy on this?

Speaker 3 (56:53):
Are you like?

Speaker 4 (56:54):
You're you're what when you come to Baylor one of us?
But he chose to really get you into that scene
Wolf of Wall Street. You want to reference that during
any time? I mean we reference it here, we have
four hours. We reference it all the time, but we
don't usually reference the things like like that. I mean

(57:14):
we've used his speech hundreds of times. Hey, Tom Brady,
he's retiring. No he isn't. He's not leaving. I'm not
leaving curseword, curseword, curseword, curseword. Dave Ryanda went with that
entire exit. That was almost a minute worth of David
seven talking about you remember there was a scene I
was hoping after he said there was a scene in

(57:36):
Wolf of Wall Street that he was going to a
different scene much much earlier in the movie with somebody
else very closely associated with college football, Matthew McConaughey. But
he chose a different scene to make the one of
us point, I mean, the one of us point. It's
not a bad point.

Speaker 2 (57:53):
No, That's what football teams are, right, they're one voice,
one person, one goal team team to That's what one
of us is all about. But unfortunately, with the analogy
he used and the terminology therein, he got responses. Well,
I guess I should say the tweet by Nick Harris

(58:13):
of that presser got such responses as bro what Charlie
Sheen could never and Mike Leach is that you in there?

Speaker 3 (58:24):
Among others.

Speaker 4 (58:26):
Mike Leach saying the word for word exact same thing
as Dave right there would have been totally different. It's
almost like I'm now in listen. First, we had the
guy that was the opening act over at the improv
and he's new, he's young, he's learning, he just needs reps.

Speaker 3 (58:44):
He's getting up.

Speaker 4 (58:44):
There's probably Open Mike Night more like it, not even
the opening act.

Speaker 3 (58:47):
That's Dave.

Speaker 4 (58:48):
He's not real sure about delivery, not even sure that
this is gonna hit uh. Maybe it will miss its mark.
You'll probably get some looks from the audience like, dude, bro,
we came here to laugh and this is just out there. Man,
I don't know what you're probably hecklers are getting ready.
But later on in the evening, now that the pros
have arrived and Open Mic Night is over, Mike Leech
is at the mic. He could have delivered that almost

(59:09):
word for word. Now it would have been equally as
distasteful too many many people, but he probably would not
have missed the mark because he would have said it
in a way.

Speaker 3 (59:18):
It's still the delivery from the person.

Speaker 4 (59:21):
I described as I don't know if that's the head
coach for me, that's that's who Dave is. He talks
like this about everything after a game, before a game,
during the week, postseason, regular season, recruiting season.

Speaker 2 (59:33):
Maybe that's why another person responded by saying get this
cat some gummies and line up some shots.

Speaker 3 (59:38):
I want to hear what else he's got in that head.

Speaker 4 (59:41):
I mean that that's also that's a pretty good take
on that. Maybe in another mental state of mind, if
you've helped him along with that, maybe maybe some interesting conversations,
wild conversations like could he would he be a different
person if he was just watching this particular movie or

(01:00:03):
if he was in this particular movie. So let's call
it Pineapple express.

Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
I see where you're going. I think I know exactly
where he's going with this.

Speaker 2 (01:00:14):
Another response is this Ai, what the actual bleep is
he talking about in the beginning?

Speaker 4 (01:00:19):
Another like this is this is why now Best of
X has its place right.

Speaker 3 (01:00:24):
This is total Best of X stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:00:25):
This is stuff I would not have normally thought of,
and I appreciate we have so much of this out
there right now. This is my favorite response Jordan and
Margot Robbie just with looking at like, what is he doing?

Speaker 3 (01:00:37):
Well, help me out here? Where is that?

Speaker 4 (01:00:39):
What scene is that from in the movie? Because somebody
college football is following Nick and following this because he's
used a meme from the movie. Yes, where uh, what's
her name? Goddess Princess Duchess Duchesses thank you Cole.

Speaker 2 (01:00:54):
The Duchess of West Duchess is wearing what sixty five
percent of the students women would where the game, and
Jordan is wearing a longhorn polo.

Speaker 4 (01:01:04):
This is a doctored up photo from the movie. But
what were they doing, Like is this when they're oh,
I know what it is. It's when they were trying
to get the guy to admit he stole Jordan's jewelry
and money. They were up in the in the apartment.

Speaker 3 (01:01:17):
Well he has.

Speaker 2 (01:01:19):
He has This guy has photoshopped a longhorns.

Speaker 4 (01:01:24):
Yes, I mean it's all photoshopped up. I was trying
to place the scene. But the Ai portion of it
every every day, Well, it's the party.

Speaker 3 (01:01:31):
He just met her.

Speaker 4 (01:01:32):
She's not dressed like that, right, she's with a date
after all, And he's pretending that his wife isn't five
feet away.

Speaker 3 (01:01:38):
But he's not as bad as Jonah Hill and his.

Speaker 4 (01:01:40):
Wife grow great, great job though as an actor, killed it.

Speaker 3 (01:01:46):
Great job one of his best roles, not even joking.

Speaker 2 (01:01:50):
So when he's choking on the hand, that means he
did a great job. You're supposed to the idiot of
a person in every way, how he talks, how he acts,
how he dresses.

Speaker 3 (01:02:02):
What he did to Brad for crying out loud, Well,
Brad didn't make it. Oh my god. This guy was
the best though when he got out of the hole.
So it's fine.

Speaker 4 (01:02:11):
They know how to treat him. What I was getting
to is, we see so much AI. We do our
best not to ever say. Can you believe what this
guy said today? Hey man, that's a parody. That's AI.

Speaker 3 (01:02:20):
Press conferences and sports are a gold mine for that.

Speaker 4 (01:02:23):
This is Dave at a high school Coaches Association presser
speaking at the podium into a mic. Absolutely could have
been AI. You absolutely could have done this and thought, man,
there's no way he said this.

Speaker 2 (01:02:35):
What is he actually talking about? The first five million views?
The first cousin to serve this is a Wendy's was
another response here, coach, we just wanted to know how
your summer went.

Speaker 4 (01:02:45):
Yeah, seriously, how do you think you guys are seventh
in recruiting in the Big twelve?

Speaker 3 (01:02:49):
How do you think the recruiting went? And this is
what he delivers.

Speaker 4 (01:02:52):
I'm mocking a question, but it was almost assuredly a
question that probably didn't need that time.

Speaker 3 (01:02:58):
Now he's a thinker, Dave.

Speaker 4 (01:03:00):
You can tell by the way he's talking his way
through this and bring the story together. But I'm intrigued
for his weekly pressers now that are not far away
from starting. Every coach has them all across the country.
Weekly appearances by the coach. He'll probably have a radio show,
maybe even a television show in Waco help promote the program.

(01:03:20):
They've got a very good quarterback officially back. I have
found my favorite one so far.

Speaker 2 (01:03:26):
The responses Yes, deliver gen Z modern day Aristotle. I mean,
that's an interesting comparison considering what he says.

Speaker 9 (01:03:38):
Oh, he's fantastic. He gives these type of quotes all
the time. By the way, boys, I'm like, you know,
like I listened to David Randa religiously because I love
him as a coach.

Speaker 3 (01:03:45):
This is not nowhere near far away from up.

Speaker 2 (01:03:47):
As somebody said that that act, that activity is the
name of my new band. What about a fantasy football
team name it probably would play?

Speaker 4 (01:03:58):
And probably I mean, and I've played some leagues where
the names are pretty foul.

Speaker 3 (01:04:03):
Currently.

Speaker 4 (01:04:04):
If you haven't, have you even lived Just for you,
I'll remind you again. One of the fantasy football leagues
I'm in. The team has remained unchanged. Their name has
remained unchanged for least fifteen plus. The name of his
team is marved Backbiters. Who is is that? To an
older person who knows all about Marv Albert in the business. No,

(01:04:24):
this is a separate league from business types.

Speaker 2 (01:04:26):
I don't remember you telling me this ever, And I
need you to reach out to that person and tell
them I love them. You will do all right? We
will wrap up the three o'clock hour. Actually we won't
do that next it's three point thirty here, so instead
we will get to what Brian McTaggart had to say.
And this was before the eighteenth player was added to
the Astros injured list.

Speaker 1 (01:04:45):
That's next, the eight on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 3 (01:04:56):
One of these credible, Yeah, we accept the.

Speaker 2 (01:05:05):
Land.

Speaker 3 (01:05:06):
The meeting's over.

Speaker 2 (01:05:08):
Context, as they say, that's what David Rona was trying to.
Point two just seems such like not good enough to
describe what he was doing there.

Speaker 4 (01:05:22):
Bold prediction with a strong quarterback and with a wide
open big twelve.

Speaker 3 (01:05:30):
This is davar on this last year at Baylor. How
what year is this for him six five. I could
see that time. You need to win much bigger than
you have.

Speaker 9 (01:05:46):
So are you saying it's his last year at Baylor
because he's fired, or his last year at Baylor because
of someone else hires.

Speaker 3 (01:05:51):
Him as a what as a head coach? He's leaving
Baylor for where?

Speaker 9 (01:05:57):
I don't know, but I think that Baylor is gonna
be good this year.

Speaker 3 (01:05:59):
Well that's what I'm say. I'm predicting the opposite.

Speaker 4 (01:06:02):
Even with a very good quarterback and clearly a schedule,
it's a lot of winnable games and coming off of
a much better season than the two years prior. Last
year's basically saved his job. He was fired last year
if they didn't win, and they did. I wonder if
he has enough grace to absorb another poor season an
a year where they're clearly forecast to not have a
poor Seit.

Speaker 2 (01:06:20):
He sounds like you're saying he would be the reason
for that. Yeah, he's not getting hired somewhere else. If
he's not coach of Baylor next year, then he's gotten fired.
Not because he had such a good season. Someone like man,
I really want Dave Ronda. I gotta have him here
unless he has the greatest agent in the world. I
think Jimmy Sexton is called is one of his clients
for being real. Course, well, there's a lot of people
that are bad at their jobs that have good agents

(01:06:41):
to keep getting them hired at places, especially in this business.

Speaker 4 (01:06:44):
See, bad at your job is relative to what your
capabilities are of where you are. They went twelve and
two four years ago, and they went in five last year.
They've been to three Bowl games, although once they went
to a Bowl game without winning more than half their games.
It's just the opportunity to win, I think, is there,
and they hired him to not do this. They could
have anybody to go six and seven and three and

(01:07:05):
nine in two of the last four years. So that's
just well, we'll see how it plays out. And that's
a pretty much out of left field, long before they've
played any games kind of comment to make, But I
don't mind it at all. The Astros had their eighteenth
player put on the current IL A bunch of rehabbing
pitchers throwing yesterday, today, tomorrow, and Sunday.

Speaker 3 (01:07:23):
Brandon Walter is that newest edition.

Speaker 4 (01:07:25):
Earlier today, Brian McTaggart visited with the Matt Thomas Show
with Ross is weekly visit there and one item they discussed.

Speaker 3 (01:07:32):
Wanted to bring you to just that one item.

Speaker 4 (01:07:34):
You can catch his interview in full right there at
Sports Talk seven ninety dot com or via the iHeartRadio app.
But his thoughts on where things stand with the some
of the injured players and the possibility of their respective
returns a host of them rehabbing.

Speaker 3 (01:07:49):
Here's Brian McTaggart.

Speaker 13 (01:07:50):
Yeah, I'm right with you about the third inning. I
called up the sugar Land box score and was sort
of falling along and see what was going on with
Christian Hovier making a rehap start yesterday and through forty
nine pitches in two and two thirds inning. So that's
a pretty good amount through a lot of strikes, through
thirty strikes, give up one run on a sack fly
was touched ninety five with the fastball, so I think

(01:08:11):
he averaged like ninety three something with the fastball, so
that the velo was there.

Speaker 3 (01:08:15):
Only had three swings and misses.

Speaker 13 (01:08:17):
From twenty twenty swings, so didn't miss a lot of bats,
but still look like good amount of volume. It looked
like he was, you know, getting closer to returning him
and Jacob Melton also played in that game and absolutely
crushed two balls, one of them hit off the wall
for a double that was over one hundred and eleven
miles an hour. So you know, he's still a rookie,
but I think he's a guy who can come up.

Speaker 3 (01:08:37):
Here and help you a little bit.

Speaker 13 (01:08:38):
So and then over the weekend, Now we got Spencer
Araghetti pitching tonight at Corpus Christi. You have Luis Garcia
tomorrow on Corpus Christi and JP Franz tomorrow on Corpus Christi.
So hey, look, I mean these guys are on rehabs
at the upper minor League.

Speaker 3 (01:08:52):
Within a week or two we're going.

Speaker 13 (01:08:53):
To start seeing some guys activated. And then the help
was on its way?

Speaker 3 (01:08:58):
Can the help get here sooner?

Speaker 4 (01:09:00):
Oh, they've got four days before the Walter spot would
be open again. Do you think I got four days
before the Alexander spot would be open again? And presumably
Alexander won't be in it. I know he has two starts,
one good, one bad, both against the Athletics. I re
sent you something I said about him the first time,
and I don't know if it made it to air.
After his first start against the Athletics a couple months

(01:09:23):
or a little over a month ago, and I was
watching him pitch at the major league level for the
first time. I knew about him, and I knew of
some of his pitches and what he threw, but I
just hadn't really seen him pitch through a game he
barely had as a major leaguer. And I watched him
and said, Man, this guy doesn't have it.

Speaker 3 (01:09:38):
I believe.

Speaker 4 (01:09:39):
I said his stuff was worse than George Costanza's, and
I was dead wrong in start one, and I was
dead solid perfect last night. He doesn't have major league stuff.
He's too hittable. They cannot start him again.

Speaker 3 (01:09:57):
They might have to, though they don't have to. You
have five starters. Every prediction comes true.

Speaker 4 (01:10:02):
Five starters in your rotation at the minor league level,
many of whom I believe, all of whom have options,
including aj Bluebaugh.

Speaker 3 (01:10:11):
He's next up. In my opinion. If you have to
get it started with you, Lola, then go ahead.

Speaker 4 (01:10:17):
You're trying to win. Why not put somebody out there
you think can help you do that. I don't know
if they will think the way I think after one
bad start out of two, but that's how I would think.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
I don't think I have a chance to win that day.

Speaker 4 (01:10:28):
I don't think I have a chance to save my
bullpen that day, And he pitched in a way that
clearly he was trying to save the bullpen. If this
were another point in the season and you had a
fresh bullpen, he's not out there for six innings. Joe
spot has said, I don't really care how he's doing.
You're pitching six innings tonight. That was not a good
enough outing to have been given eighteen outs. Like I

(01:10:50):
said earlier, it's a miracle they weren't down. More with
how many hits he gave up and how often they
were hitting the ball. I know there wasn't a tremendous
amount of hard contact, but they were hitting ball with
He doesn't have his swinging miss stuff. It's very hard
to succeed in the majors. It's not impossible. There's plenty
of guys that do, but it won't be him without
swinging miss stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:11:08):
Conversely, you need more offense than you got, and it's
hard to expect that from the lineup you're trying out there,
especially like tonight's Cooper Hummel's batting sixth tonight. That's where
the Astros twenty twenty five campaign is at this point.

Speaker 3 (01:11:24):
Until they get some of those healthy.

Speaker 4 (01:11:25):
So here's batting seven, eight and nine because he's that's
probably the right spot for him.

Speaker 2 (01:11:29):
Oh I look, it's and I got to get the
lineup up in front of me.

Speaker 4 (01:11:33):
He's hitting one sixty nine. That sounds like a six
hole hitter. Who's going seven, who's going eight, who's going nine?
Where you got Bryce tonight? I know Taylor's sitting.

Speaker 3 (01:11:40):
Mauricio Dubon is seventh. Okay, that's incorrect. Chas McCormick.

Speaker 2 (01:11:45):
Chas McCormick is eight, that is correct, and zag Short
is your nine hole hitter.

Speaker 4 (01:11:50):
Yeah, Cooper Hummel should be batting seventh and Mauricio Dubon.

Speaker 3 (01:11:53):
That was what stood about to me.

Speaker 4 (01:11:54):
Higher But it's this, I'm not no way you're I'm
not doing that. I'll have a discussion about a probably
on social media. I'm not having a batting order discussion
about where Cooper Humbles should bat ahead of which other
awful hitter in the Astros lineup.

Speaker 8 (01:12:06):
Now.

Speaker 4 (01:12:06):
Mauricio Dubon is not that, especially not recently. Mauriso Dubon's
hitting the ball well recently. That is all that matters recently.
This probably earns him a spot a little bit higher
than the lineup.

Speaker 3 (01:12:18):
But to that same extent.

Speaker 2 (01:12:21):
Why don't you tell everybody who's leading off in the
rest of the order above Cooper Hummel, Cam Smith's leading off,
and then it's gonna be Josey al Tuvay who will
be playing second base tonight. Krattini is the d H
He's batting third, Christian Walker batting clean up, of course,
and then Yaner Diaz will be catching and batting fifth.

Speaker 4 (01:12:39):
So Cam Smith's leading off. Yeah, he's eight for his
last sixty. Well, you don't have to be a wet
blanket every segment, just telling.

Speaker 2 (01:12:46):
You this is what Joe is doing in his office
after games, before the next day's game.

Speaker 4 (01:12:52):
All right, I mean, I gave Cam to day off,
let him clear his head. He got back to Houston,
he got a nice haircut, barely has anything under his
hat anymore in his brain and his skull, and he
just played a little defense in the last game in Arizona.
We'll get him back out there, and he's in a
massive slump. Why shouldn't he that lead off. If Tremel's
not in the lineup, why not?

Speaker 3 (01:13:13):
It's been that kind of year for your Houston Astros.
And yeah, I do wonder if if Brian McTaggart was
thinking as he was giving that interview earlier today on
the station, by the time the game starts tonight, they'll
have another guy in the IL as he was talking
about rehabbing players.

Speaker 2 (01:13:29):
And again another example of what this season has been, like, Hey,
I'll give you a weird way to prove that NFL
players really like money. It's now what you think I'll
describe that next.

Speaker 1 (01:13:43):
The A Team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (01:13:54):
It is the A Team on a Friday edition of
the program here on Sports Talk seven ninety and Space
City Home getting you into the weekend. I think that
it's safe to say most professional athletes love money. I'm
not saying it's their first love. It just depends. There's
a lot of debate about that kind of thing. Who
do you play for the love of the game or

(01:14:15):
now you play for your next contract? In the NFL
that can get even more murky since it's such a
violent game with a relatively low shelf life on average.
But there's certain things that while they shouldn't be doing them,
you gotta ask yourself, WEX does this really surprise me
when I read this?

Speaker 8 (01:14:34):
So?

Speaker 2 (01:14:34):
According to Adam Schefter earlier this afternoon, in a story
that he wrote for ESPN, actually this was someone else
wrote this for ESPN.

Speaker 3 (01:14:44):
He was reporting that it was out there and linked
the story.

Speaker 2 (01:14:47):
At least one hundred players from roughly half of the
NFL's thirty two teams face fines and possible suspension for
allegedly selling there are allotted tickets to this past year's
Super Bowl above face value, in violation of league policies.

(01:15:08):
And before we go any further, this is players are
given in allotment of tickets to the Super Bowl, they're
turning around selling them above the face value price. This
is a kin to, hey, we have all sorts of
gambling advertisements in the league, but we don't want the
players to, uh, we don't want them to take part
in that when we were expecting them not to, and

(01:15:28):
they will absolutely be punished if they are.

Speaker 3 (01:15:31):
Like, this doesn't surprise me at all.

Speaker 2 (01:15:33):
I'm actually surprised this hasn't happened in this like scope
a lot sooner than twenty twenty five.

Speaker 4 (01:15:39):
Yeah, I'm not sure that these things are related, but
this is an instance of you know, they're probably not
gonna find out here are my tickets. They told us
not to do it. We know what's in the CBA,
we know what we were told, and I'm just gonna
do it. Well, I'm not really sure that it's worth it.
I'm not sure that the punishment is there, and I
know what you said that they could face a possible suspension.

(01:15:59):
What it says, under an agreement between the league and
the NFLPA players who violated the rule, will we find
one and a half times the face value face ticket
value and lose their a lot of tickets to the
next two Super Bowls if they're playing in the game. Well,
they'll have the chance to purchase seats. Okay, So I'm
thinking out loud and saying, so they took a couple

(01:16:20):
thousand dollars worth of tickets and turned into a couple
of extra thousand dollars, and as punishment for violating the rule,
you're gonna find them a couple of one thousand dollars
and a half, or you're going to suspend them from
playing in a game, but only to swing.

Speaker 3 (01:16:34):
Yeah, because that made no sense.

Speaker 4 (01:16:35):
I appreciate that first sentence because that gets you reading more.
Those who decline the punishment could be suspended by the commissioner.
So A, if you did it, you're going to take
the punishment because you're an NFL player and it's meaningless financially,
and you're going to move on, and that'll be that.

(01:16:57):
And B you want to find a play for making
a couple of extra bucks on the tickets, you're making
a killing on I mean, if it was in the
rules and it said that, and that's what it are,
I mean, go ahead, decline the punishment. See what happens
if you really want to get suspended for a game.
They're telling you how not to. So just follow along
and you'll be just fine. Financially it will erase. I mean,

(01:17:18):
maybe it was good for you that you got the
money up front and you're able to take care of it.

Speaker 3 (01:17:21):
I needed the money quick. I knew it was wrong.
I did it.

Speaker 4 (01:17:24):
I was able to pay this off. I was able
to turn in some more money. I had this great
investment on the table, so you know, my accountant told
me to put my money here, and I did. I
made some money, but I will definitely take my fine.
I will pay that back and a half and I
won't never do that again.

Speaker 3 (01:17:39):
Well, we assume because they're playing in the NFL they
make a ton of money. But that's not always the case.

Speaker 4 (01:17:45):
It's one hundred percent the case, not a ton of money,
not all, not everybody. You think any of these hundred
players don't make several hundred thousand dollars. I mean, you
could be right, a player who signed late in the season,
pro rated practice squad. They wouldn't fall under that they
make a ton of money. Yeah, but okay, let's say
that this is for the sake of your argument. They
do make millions of dollars. What are you doing for
a few thousand extra? Yeah, And so for me to

(01:18:07):
say what I said, I would have to caveat that,
and I apologize. I could be incorrect players who are
not on the active roster for a long period of time,
who may have only spent time on the practice squad,
who may even in fact be some hundred players. I mean,
if it's only going to cost you the ticket plus a.

Speaker 2 (01:18:25):
Half, well, okay, but since you said that, only if
you I'm not advocating, you're definitely breaking a very clear rule.

Speaker 4 (01:18:34):
This all like this, I would separate this from gambling
completely because one has something most people believe affects the
integrity of the game.

Speaker 3 (01:18:42):
Well, yes, has nothing to do with that.

Speaker 2 (01:18:44):
But I'm just talking about the the accessibility of both situations.

Speaker 3 (01:18:51):
When I say, WHOA, I can't believe this, this happened.

Speaker 2 (01:18:54):
Just for like context on this and this just this
is just one report acording to media reports before the
game that was in New Orleans.

Speaker 3 (01:19:03):
Of course, between the Chiefs and the Eagles.

Speaker 2 (01:19:06):
Ticket prices on secondary sites ranged anywhere from twenty five
eighty eight five eight eight to nearly thirty five hundred
for the cheapest seats, with some tickets fetching over ten
grand a piece. Now, I don't know where the allotment
is for NFL players, whether they're in the game or not.

(01:19:26):
I would assume it's not, you know, the old level seats,
but I don't know if I should make that assumption.

Speaker 4 (01:19:32):
Well, keep in mind the additional portion of the memo
that was set to the league also is it's not
a player only issue. Check coaches, team employees, and players
sold tickets to a small number of bundlers who were
working with the ticket reseller, which is why you gave
that information. It wasn't even necessarily that some investigation turned

(01:19:52):
out the players were going to the secondary market. They
were just getting them into the hands of the people
would then take them to the secondary market to make
even more money off of it, which is again in
and of itself, the amount of money that we're talking
about here dependent on the level of player. Yes, it
wouldn't seem like players that are five years into the
league have signed their second contract. It would seem a

(01:20:14):
little unnecessary to scrape together a couple of extra thousands
of dollars when you're making significantly more than that, when
this is a clear rule violation. I think technology maybe
had something to do with the finding this out and
investigating this. As we've moved forward in our ticket selling
days and the digitizing of all this stuff and the

(01:20:36):
tracking of all this stuff, it may be a little
easier to or a little more difficult, I should say,
to get away with it.

Speaker 2 (01:20:43):
Aren't you just at a pure more big curiosity wanting
to know who the players are there?

Speaker 4 (01:20:48):
It's the first thing I looked for elsewhere because I
know it wasn't in this article. I didn't know if
the investigation itself was to be found somewhere else. But yeah,
I'd be very curious to see the group of players.
If we're assessing it correctly, the money you make, the
less likely it is for you to do this. But
from a gambling perspective, it's you know, I said these
things about Malik Beasley of the Pistons. You're you know,

(01:21:10):
the way you're playing is going to get you another
contract you've already made.

Speaker 3 (01:21:14):
Based on NBA figures, we.

Speaker 4 (01:21:16):
Know millions upon millions upon millions of dollars, and the
amount of money involved in these wagers that you've been
attached to is not anywhere near those figures.

Speaker 3 (01:21:26):
But he was involved in that because we didn't.

Speaker 4 (01:21:28):
You know, the Detroit newspapers found out a lot more
about the reasons behind it. If it's to be true,
there's a lot of background to he was in big
trouble for this reason, and there were money problems for
this reason. His money issues go back way longer than that.
So probably the money that had been made was gone
and he was in a hole, and there were people
trying to collect and I don't have to remind you

(01:21:48):
about my collection process, So yeah, I mean maybe it
makes a little more sense, but at the expense of
a forty two million dollar contract is essentially what happened here.
He could have apparently reportedly gotten a three year, forty
two million dollar deal from the Pistons moving forward, which
would have taken care of those debts playing basketball just
the way he had without any issues there. Different people

(01:22:11):
are in different situations. Sometimes after the.

Speaker 3 (01:22:13):
Fact, we learn a little bit more about it.

Speaker 4 (01:22:15):
Two in two to go a little bit more from
Texans practice, more about what happened after practice, since we
had access to the assistant coaches for the first time
this offseason, most of them, and a few other items
from as they get ready to put the pads on
on Monday.

Speaker 1 (01:22:30):
That's next The A Team on Sports Talk seven ninety two.
Lifelong Houston sports guys named Adam Talking Your Team. Adam
Clinton and Adam Wexler are the A Team.

Speaker 2 (01:23:04):
Welcome into the second half of a Friday edition of
The A Team. It's Sports Talk seven ninety Space City
home Network wexac Cole Thompson with you until six o'clock tonight.
The Astros looking to draw their first blood in their
four game weekend series with the athletics. It did not
go so well in the opener last night, and then

(01:23:24):
they got more bad news today the first hour of
the show, the news breaking that Brandon Walter has been
put on the injured list, making it eighteen eighteen Houston
Astros by far. Now can I say by far the
most before? It was like by a couple right, Yeah,
all right, I.

Speaker 4 (01:23:42):
Don't think Baltimore's added anybody. They were tied at fifteen
and the Astros now have them by three.

Speaker 3 (01:23:46):
He tied at fifteen. It's the saddest game ever.

Speaker 2 (01:23:49):
But yeah, Astros adding him to that injured list and
still waiting on some of the cavalry to come off
that injured list. I think that's the problem. I would
feel better some of these guys are coming off. They
just keep batting, so Astros will look to again get
that first win of this series tonight. And funny last hour,

(01:24:10):
Wex was basically doing an impression of what Joe Aspotted
does when he goes and makes the day to day
lineup these days.

Speaker 4 (01:24:17):
Hey, Omar, what do you think I'm gonna go? Cam
Smith number one? He's give him a chance to lead
off a few times. Yeah, you can do that. I mean,
he does have eight hits in his last sixty at bats.
Whatever you think is best? What do you think I
should go? Taylor Tremmel? He's been pretty good in the
lead off spot. He's gotten hits in eight of his
last fifteen at bats. It seems seems like things are
all right. Yeah, you're right, but you know they're facing

(01:24:38):
a lefty and he bats left handed, and you know
his numbers against left handers aren't aren't particularly good. All right, Payne, no, Perettis, no, No,
should I bump Altuve bat No? Okay, well then I'm
putting cam Smith there.

Speaker 3 (01:24:52):
All right, that's fine. Like they have to have these
types of conversations.

Speaker 4 (01:24:56):
Yes, they undoubtedly staff, but like, how how depressed are they?
Probably not as depressing as having me as a co host,
but I'm sure they get through.

Speaker 3 (01:25:04):
It's not depressing.

Speaker 4 (01:25:07):
It's just they have four hitters on a regular basis,
and if you count yin, maybe it's maybe it's five,
and then you filling the gaps around him. Oh, this
guy had a good day yesterday. All right, Well he's
not batting eight or ninth today, he's betting fifth or sixth.
That's what Joe Spotta has to do on a regular basis.
It has worked to the extent that they've found away.

(01:25:28):
They score on wild pitches, they get walk off hits
from Zach Short, Taylor Trammel, hurts his former team, Christian
Walker hurts his former team, and.

Speaker 3 (01:25:37):
That's really what needs to happen.

Speaker 4 (01:25:38):
And the game where you got five hits from yaner
Ds and Christian Walker, that's truthfully what they need more of.
I mean, expecting Short, Hummel, Trammel, et cetera to hit
more than two point fifteen, that's foolish. Expecting Yiner Diaz
and Christian Walker to hit two fifty, to have an
ops of seven to fifty plus, that's normal. That's what

(01:26:02):
their career numbers suggest they should be producing for you,
and they just simply haven't. Last month's been pretty good
for Christian Walker, very very very noticeable difference between his
months now he's now four months into his Astros career.
His March April awful, and May and June or let's yeah,
May and June almost matched it. His numbers barely changed

(01:26:22):
the first three months of the season. Now they changed
dramatically so far in July, and of course my blanket
wasn't dry. So even when I posted that his numbers
in July were very, very good, I still had to
bring him back down again and say, but each of
the trips the Astros will make to National League West ballparks,
the ballparks he knows best, the teams he knows best

(01:26:45):
coming over to the Astros, well, they all were in July,
and he raked in all of them. He raked in Arizona,
he raked in La he raked in Colorado. They haven't
been to San Francisco yet. They haven't been to San
Diego yet, and I hope that he will hit well there,
and he has good history there. But that's a little
bit of it, familiarity and just he had amazing offensive

(01:27:05):
history at Dodger Stadium and that continued. So is that
why his numbers are up in July? Or things a
little bit better?

Speaker 9 (01:27:12):
Is he?

Speaker 3 (01:27:12):
You know?

Speaker 4 (01:27:13):
I can't help it when I watch him and I
just see the same things. And it happened even in
an at bat where he won the bat against Ginkle
in Arizona, where he drove in the game winning run
in the ninth inning of a game that just got
tied at three.

Speaker 3 (01:27:26):
Apiece.

Speaker 2 (01:27:28):
These pitchers at some point during their at bats where
they're facing Walker, they just say, Man, I'm throwing ninety
five or better.

Speaker 3 (01:27:36):
You're not gonna hit it. And he threw him.

Speaker 2 (01:27:38):
Fastball, fastball, fastball, fastball. He swung a miss at the
first two, he fouled off a bunch of them, and
Giggle just kept throwing it and he finally got one
that he get hit like eight pitches into the at bat.

Speaker 3 (01:27:50):
It just seems like, I don't I've seen his bat speed.
I know what the numbers are.

Speaker 4 (01:27:54):
He can't hit the fastball anymore, like what happens to
a player who's four years from now. He hits it occasionally,
but too often pitchers just say I'm gonna throw a fastball.
He's not gonna be able to catch up to it,
and really good hittable pitches, albeit fastballs, they just go
right by him because he can't it.

Speaker 3 (01:28:11):
When you have this.

Speaker 4 (01:28:12):
Many players in the lineup, the point I'm making is
usually what gets you by and what allows you to
win about half the games is what they're doing. Is
the guys that should be in the lineup are doing
what they can, if not more. And Kartini absolutely is
He's been on fire for about forty days now, and
jose Al Tuve is having a fantastic month of July,
and clearly Christian Walker has picked things up. Cam Smith

(01:28:34):
tough spot. Am I really calling him again? He's eight
for his last six or seven for his last fifty six,
which is technically worse because you know, going one for four.
Let me just bring it up a little bit. Yeah,
you know, I consider Cam Smith a guy who can
do it in a stat I mean, he was this
is the best stretch of his season came right before now,
this worst stretch of his season, absolutely in the mix

(01:28:57):
to finish top three for Rookie of the Year, had
an op yes better than nine hundred for thirty days
for a whole month's time.

Speaker 3 (01:29:03):
Now he can't hit it all. Now, he's watching pitches
that are over the plate.

Speaker 4 (01:29:07):
He just this is the first time he's looked unsure
of himself at the plate. But I do feel like, okay,
so we're still looking at you, coaches, teammates, fans. You
need to be a guy who's going to get it done,
because otherwise I'm sitting here saying it's Zach Short that's
gonna get it done. It's Cooper Humbled that's gonna get
it done. It's you know, guys that I don't expect

(01:29:27):
to get it done. I'm leaning on the guys that
should be on the line. If there's about five of
them these days, those are the guys who got to carry.

Speaker 3 (01:29:33):
This team right now. Whether they can, we'll find out.

Speaker 2 (01:29:36):
Well, every time you say Cooper Hummell's name, and every
time he comes in and he's like the nicest guy
on the planet, but I just it's like the shortest
that bat ever every single time it seems.

Speaker 3 (01:29:46):
Like, well pitchers do the same.

Speaker 4 (01:29:47):
He doesn't swing all he he he swings out a
lot of pitches that are strikes.

Speaker 3 (01:29:51):
Yeah, he just doesn't hit. He just didn't hit it.

Speaker 4 (01:29:53):
He's just no contact. And we're talking about all these
guys that should be here. Chas McCormick. He's when I'm
talking about Coo Hummel and Taylor Trammel and Zach Short
Chaz Sadly and in my case, very very meanly, he's
saying one of us, that's who he is now.

Speaker 3 (01:30:10):
It's unfortunate, it's a shame. What about Yiner Di is
do him now?

Speaker 4 (01:30:13):
Jeiner and Christian Walker. I mean, their numbers are the
same this year. They're they're they're not totally incapable. I
don't feel like there's no chance they're gonna, you know,
get a runner over sacrifice fly, hit it to the
other side and you're gonna move there and bring in
a run on an out. They're not having good seasons,
but Chas McCormick.

Speaker 3 (01:30:29):
Is, he's in a two year slump of not yet.
You don't have had an hit one over the fence
this year.

Speaker 4 (01:30:35):
No, he doesn't have a tremendous amount of it bats,
but there's no pop in his swing. He's hitting two thirty,
which is something. But much more importantly, if I'm gonna
talk to you about Cooper Hummel, his OPS is five
point fifty two. When you fill out your lineup card,
you want zero players in your lineup with a five
fifty two OPS. Chaz Is is five sixty one. He's

(01:30:57):
Cooper Hummel in twenty twenty five player who's been DFA
multiple times to his credit. He's still an elite fielding outfielder,
and Hummel is a consistently replaced defensive outfield.

Speaker 2 (01:31:10):
I'm not even gonna refer to you as a wet
blanket here, because all you're doing is passing along facts.

Speaker 3 (01:31:14):
This is the Astros fault.

Speaker 4 (01:31:16):
Well, I would actually point it totally the opposite way.
I don't we don't like these names. We can't believe
they're playing for the Astros. Think about if Dana hadn't
done what he did this offseason. Yeah, he signed Luis
ki Army, he signed Zach Short, he brought it, signed
Taylor Trump or traded for Taylor Trammeel. He did all
these things, made all these moves because maybe there's a

(01:31:38):
time where we're going to need someone that has at
least they have major league experience. It might not have
been great, and they might have played their way off
of certain teams or situations.

Speaker 3 (01:31:46):
He went out and signed Brendan Rodgers. He's been awful.

Speaker 4 (01:31:50):
Imagine if you got zero at bats from Rogers this year,
I mean you'd be even further down it. These players
haven't been overwhelming quite clearly. But if those players aren't
a part of your organization, and every player I mentioned
is new to the Astros in twenty twenty five, then
the guys that haven't gotten called up yet are the
guys you would have been bringing up and these are
your fifteenth, nineteenth unranked prospects playing at double and triple A.

(01:32:15):
That's who would be here. They'd be worse most likely.

Speaker 2 (01:32:17):
And we're talking about the trade deadline and just trade
season because it's already well under way, as we've mentioned
earlier in the show, and you mentioned earlier about Jim
Crane wanting to go out and just get deals done. Still,
and I wonder about Dana, whose reputation is building farm

(01:32:38):
systems to where they are the high ranked ones that
we always hear about that aren't the Houston Astros, even
though all these guys, like you said, keep coming up
and performing. But it's like, I wonder if he's like, no, no, no, no, no,
let's just can we just not this time, just let
our guys get healthy and let's not make a deal
this time around.

Speaker 3 (01:32:56):
Because to me, like, does the Yankees.

Speaker 2 (01:33:01):
Going out and getting Ryan McMahon make you think that
Auhano Suarez is going to be too expensive or that
it was just a better deal between those two clubs.

Speaker 4 (01:33:11):
I can understand why that might make sense for the
Yankees rather than you know, with some of the other
things they have.

Speaker 3 (01:33:16):
Is Suarez is a rental.

Speaker 4 (01:33:18):
McMahon is now under contract, albeit for sixteen million each
of the next two seasons.

Speaker 2 (01:33:24):
Very Yankees for the Yankees, but he is their player
for the next couple of years.

Speaker 4 (01:33:28):
So moving on from the prospects, it isn't a rental
and it's a player. I'm sure it'll help him. I
obviously gave you some very negative numbers about him earlier,
but I wasn't very specific about them.

Speaker 3 (01:33:39):
So now I'll be very specific about them.

Speaker 4 (01:33:41):
Ryan McMahon at home in twenty twenty five, his home
is coors Field eight fifty six OPS. Guess what, that's
one of the top fifteen numbers in the National League.
When he's not at coors Field, his OPS is five
to eighty nine. From earlier this segment, remember when I
was telling you about Chas McCormick and Cooper Hummels ops. Yep,
that's where Ryan McMahon is when he doesn't play at Corsfield.

(01:34:03):
I don't know if the Yankees have any games left
at corse Field, but if they do, it's not enough.

Speaker 3 (01:34:08):
Not enough.

Speaker 2 (01:34:09):
They do play a lot at Yankee Stadium, though I've
been told that's that's just a little insight right there.
All right, four o'clock hour rolls on here on a
Friday edition of the program. We'll get into this A's
team and why it's been giving the Astros so many fits,
and we'll check in on the Texans as well, plus
our Friday A team draft at the bottom of the.

Speaker 1 (01:34:31):
Hour the AE on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 6 (01:34:44):
You happen to see Chandler Rome's tweet about Mason.

Speaker 3 (01:34:49):
Miller last night about the speed of his pitsch Dam Smith.
It was like, yeah, here it is A's closer.

Speaker 2 (01:34:57):
Mason Miller threw a one hundred and four point one
mile per hour fastball to Cam Smith tonight this last night.
Obviously it matches the hardest pitch of Miller's career, is
the hardest pitch thrown by any Major leaguer this season,
and is the hardest pitch thrown by anyone at Dyke

(01:35:18):
and Park since stack cast began tracking in two thousand
and eight.

Speaker 3 (01:35:23):
And the closer it was fast.

Speaker 2 (01:35:25):
Well, they have, as you have pointed out here today,
some young talent, the likely rookie of the year at
this point.

Speaker 4 (01:35:34):
Yeah, I mean Nick Kurtz is in such a groove
he's good. I actually think he's gonna run away.

Speaker 2 (01:35:39):
With it and it for his case to be Rookie
of the Year.

Speaker 3 (01:35:44):
Well, I was just getting that.

Speaker 4 (01:35:45):
Jacob Wilson is in a bigger tail spin than Cam
Smith is in because it's been for even longer. He
wasn't in the lineup last night. He just can't even
buy a hit. He's been over a month as ops
as well, under six hundred for that time period, and
so his overall numbers have come way down. This started
well before the All Star break, and Kurtz is absolutely
killing it and definitely killing it against the Astros. Jose

(01:36:06):
Ramirez is the only player in the Majors this year
better against the Astros than Nick Kurtz. He's you know
when the Astros just played the Guardians and they kept
pitching to Jose and he kept getting hits.

Speaker 3 (01:36:18):
Well, that's what's happening now with Kurtz.

Speaker 4 (01:36:19):
It happened in West Sacramento, and it happened here in
the first of these four games. I don't know why
I won't continue. He wasn't taking much time either. He
was he was ready and he was ready for the
pitch that was coming. Granted it was Alexander for a
couple of those hits last night before Sousa came in
and he did the same to him. But he's just

(01:36:40):
you know this, the first bat of the game, they
got him out. He only hit the ball eight billion
feet to the wall. They can't get him out right now.
They've been able to get around Rooker. Last year, Rooker
and Butler were killing the Astros, and this year they haven't.
Jacob Wilson had some good games against them previously. We'll
see what takes place moving forward. That's already four of
the nine players in the order most days. Tyler Soderstrom's

(01:37:02):
another good young player. He hasn't done much against Houston
so far, and most of the other players in their
lineup every day now that Langalires is back and in it,
it's just nothing but young talent that is going nowhere.
And a couple of them are under long term deals
now in Rooker and Butler, but these guys all have
club control to begin with Mason Miller, he's a seven
hundred and sixty five K player. He makes seven hundred

(01:37:26):
and sixty five thousand dollars this year and then he'll
be an arbitration next year. And the four arbitration years
that follow this year, the A's have control of him
till twenty twenty nine. He's already been an All Star.
He's already pitched at an elite level. He was already
regarded as.

Speaker 2 (01:37:44):
One of the league's best closers when he was mowing
people down last year.

Speaker 3 (01:37:48):
But a little, only a little less successful this year.
A couple of blow up outings big. His overall numbers
look bad, but you saw last night. That's what he
looks like most of the time for the two years
he's been a major leaguer. There's no reason for them
to be moving on from any player that they regularly use.
Pitchers are different, and Louis Severino. I mean, there's a
couple guys.

Speaker 4 (01:38:08):
Charlie Morton yesterday, Stephen Kwan yesterday for the Guardians, and
Louis Severino yesterday. Kwan had two homers, Morton helped them
win their game with another good start, and Severino had
his third good start against Houston. He's got a multi
year deal, but he should absolutely not be an a
If they find anybody who's interested in the next week,

(01:38:28):
absolutely move him. So one of the reasons you signed
veteran pitchers when your team stinks and you know you're
gonna stink because you can flip them.

Speaker 3 (01:38:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:38:36):
And even though they've had some success against the Astros
are still nineteen games in ER five hundred.

Speaker 3 (01:38:39):
They're still the worst team in the division. There's still
the A's.

Speaker 2 (01:38:43):
But I feel like every single season they find ways
to I get it, you're gonna lose games the bad teams.
The Astros find a way to lose the White Sox
every single year. They've lost to the A's three times. Now,
that's a lot to me.

Speaker 4 (01:38:58):
It's gonna happen, man, And how could you lose to
the A's. That was all over these socials last night
for some of the stuff I posted and the responses
that would come back.

Speaker 3 (01:39:06):
I don't know. It's happened how many times?

Speaker 8 (01:39:08):
Now?

Speaker 4 (01:39:08):
This is the forty third time somebody has lost to
the A's. Ask the other forty two times? How did
it happen? It's not like other sports, dude, or dude,
baseball happens the a lineup. The Astros are trotting out
as greatest team at Astros history, nineteen and they lost
how many times?

Speaker 3 (01:39:28):
Ten?

Speaker 4 (01:39:29):
On average more than once a week. I mean, nobody
puts it like that, you're gonna lose sixty games right
out of the gate. Just give me sixty.

Speaker 2 (01:39:38):
If you're awesome, best team in baseball, maybe we'll leave
it there and you go one, two and sixty.

Speaker 4 (01:39:43):
But you're probably not the best team in baseball. So
that's out another five to ten. You can still make
the playoffs. If you lose seventy games, you're ninety two
and seventy. You're probably gonna make the playoffs. And you
lost seventy times. The Rockets aren't gonna lose seventy games.
It's not it's about the Texas.

Speaker 3 (01:40:00):
We're going to lose seventy games. They're gonna lose a couple.
The Texans lose seven games in a calendar year.

Speaker 2 (01:40:04):
But I can't say this because they're trotting out the
lineup they're trotting out right now.

Speaker 3 (01:40:09):
They shouldn't beating anybody.

Speaker 4 (01:40:10):
Yeah, I said it at two oh five, and it'll
be true again tonight. The better lineup will not be
in the Astros dugout or on the field. The better
lineup will be on the other side of the field.
The A's have a better lineup than the Astros. You
have to hope your pitcher tonight, Ryan Gusto can overcome
their lineup? Will you try to overcome Springs? And Springs
is quite honestly, he's a better pitcher than Ryan Gusto

(01:40:31):
has been.

Speaker 3 (01:40:32):
Doesn't mean we don't need to play. It doesn't mean
I already know the result. Barely a better pitcher just
based on the numbers.

Speaker 4 (01:40:38):
He's also pitching a lot. His four eighteen ra is
his season era, his last seven starts, his last fifteen
starts much better than that, about three and a half.

Speaker 3 (01:40:47):
He's been very good.

Speaker 2 (01:40:49):
Just give him nineteen home runs can get him somebody
I don't know who.

Speaker 3 (01:40:53):
He's far from unbeatable.

Speaker 8 (01:40:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:40:55):
Now, I don't know what I'll say boldly about the
A's next year, but I have thought about it.

Speaker 3 (01:41:01):
They're not finishing last. That's not bold.

Speaker 4 (01:41:04):
It is for them, I don't I don't feel that
it even does a service to how talented I think
they really are. If they do a couple of smart
things with their pitching, and some of that will include
spending a little money, because I don't think they have
the arms in the system ready or the pitchers currently
with the team they can count on. I want to
almost go so far as to say they're not going
to finish fourth or fifth in the division next year.

(01:41:27):
I'm not putting them in the race for the postseason necessarily,
but if you don't finish fourth or fifth, you're probably
gonna win seventy five, seventy six, seventy eight games, which
means you're in the wild card race till the final
month of the season.

Speaker 2 (01:41:38):
Well, that means under five hundred. What's that below or
under five hundred by the end next season. Both of
those are the same, below or under. I've been here
since four year at ornither that's it only took you
two hours to say that.

Speaker 4 (01:41:51):
We should note that it's a very very good thing
to provide your services to the Sean Salisbury Show this morning,
co host out of town for Sean Dan. So you
took in those four hours of elite lead in radio,
because that's all we do here. Either you're the lead
in for Matt Thomas with Ross or you follow Matt
Thomas as well. There's all of our goals here just

(01:42:12):
to do whatever we can for them. So you did
a nice best service for everybody here at the station.

Speaker 3 (01:42:17):
What are you gonna do this weekend? Are you gonna
get an attitude adjustment. My goodness just.

Speaker 4 (01:42:21):
Strictly directed it to the hate listener of our program,
so if he wants to chime in, he can. I
contributed to his program a couple of times this week.
In fact, I was asked to contribute today, but my
notifications had not been turned back on yet and I
forgot to just randomly check my text.

Speaker 3 (01:42:36):
So I missed it.

Speaker 4 (01:42:37):
At or under five hundred, I think it's probably I
would probably play the under.

Speaker 2 (01:42:41):
I think the Rangers or the Mariners are going to
finish fourth.

Speaker 4 (01:42:45):
Rangers are basically the Mariners of last year. The Rangers
have unbelievable pitching, so forget about that happening again next year.
Guess who was healthy all year this year so far?
Jacob deGrom. You expecting a second consecutive season like that.
I'm not, And I hate to say, because I love
watching him pitch when.

Speaker 3 (01:43:00):
It's not against Houston.

Speaker 2 (01:43:01):
I don't pitching and a bullpen that I thought they
tore to shreds hasn't been terrible.

Speaker 4 (01:43:07):
They're not a very consistent offensive team. I mean, they
had to send Josh Young down to the minors. He's back,
and his looks a little bit more locked in, a
little more in tune with this. But what bad year
from Simeon, bad year from Garcia, good but not great
year from Seger. Now we're a year further into each
of their respective careers and what you just.

Speaker 2 (01:43:25):
Said, and I get it. They wanted a World Series
that nobody remembers. So I guess all that money they
spent was worth it if you just get the one
because it's so hard to win.

Speaker 4 (01:43:32):
And everybody always said, I wonder what will happen when
the Rangers finished play says that, I guess we'll never
know until next year.

Speaker 3 (01:43:40):
That's what he is. By the way, it's a weirdo.
He's in the eyes look.

Speaker 12 (01:43:43):
Like I don't.

Speaker 4 (01:43:44):
I think he's like the only one there that has
any reasonable.

Speaker 3 (01:43:48):
Hatred towards Houston. Yes, like Simon lost him a billion times.

Speaker 2 (01:43:52):
Yeah, because you're on the e's Segar lost them in
the World Series as a as a Dodger, that's different.

Speaker 3 (01:43:58):
You know what bothers me a great deal.

Speaker 2 (01:44:00):
Well, you know what I've heard lately from a lot
of people that I trust, Their opinion is that Marcus Simons.

Speaker 3 (01:44:05):
A great guy, and that that pisses me off.

Speaker 2 (01:44:08):
Well, I need him to be a jerk off the field,
so it's easier for me to hate him as a ranger.

Speaker 3 (01:44:12):
Secret's easy to hate stupid brother. I hated him too.

Speaker 4 (01:44:16):
Yeah, probably, I'll probably, And honestly, the the division itself,
the Angels aren't that dissimilar to the A's and they're
also now kind of winning. But they had Kokuchi Well,
they put all their they put all their kids to work,
they're all playing. They brought them up quickly and they
put them out there, and I think it's paying off
and that you know, shan Well was obviously there all year.
Last year, he's here again, Netto's here, Moore has been

(01:44:37):
brought up, and my god, nobody hits the ball out
of the ballpark like the Angels. Everyone's got fifteen homers
or more there in their lineup. It's incredible. This division
is nowhere near as bad as everybody thinks. It is
nowhere near as bad, and it's definitely not going to
be worse next year.

Speaker 3 (01:44:53):
It's going to be better. You know.

Speaker 2 (01:44:54):
I used to hate is when Kyle Sieger would do
nothing against anybody else and then always hit a homer
at least per game against the astros a.

Speaker 4 (01:45:02):
Mount rushmore of wrestlers, an added selection for the A
team draft.

Speaker 3 (01:45:08):
That's the subject that is.

Speaker 1 (01:45:10):
Next the a on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 6 (01:45:23):
Well, he has been a.

Speaker 2 (01:45:25):
Rough week for a lot of us that are in
our age range. Ozzy and Hulkogan in the same week
is a lot to take. If you want to couple in,
you know, theo Huxtable, Malcolm Jamal Warner, if you want
to put in Chuck Manager. Somebody sent me something earlier
today and they shall remain nameless, that Phil Collins was

(01:45:46):
in hospice. And I did a little research and I
found out that I think that's fake news, which is
good because I don't think I would have made it
to the end of the show today if something had
happened to Phil.

Speaker 3 (01:45:57):
Put him in some bubble wrap right now.

Speaker 2 (01:45:59):
But that guy is thinking, with Hull Kogan passing and
what the icon that he is and how big he was,
maybe we should, uh, maybe we should draft some things.

Speaker 11 (01:46:13):
With the first pick and with the second pick, with
the third pick, with.

Speaker 5 (01:46:17):
The second pick, with the first pick Friday draft, like
the greatest wrestlers of all time.

Speaker 4 (01:46:28):
Yep, opening pick, I've got it. I'll take a while
who McDaniel, go.

Speaker 3 (01:46:32):
Are you serious right now?

Speaker 12 (01:46:33):
No?

Speaker 4 (01:46:34):
I do have the first pick, followed by you, followed
by Cole, and I do think there is enough star
power throughout the draft that there's no well you took him,
you win. We'll find out, we'll make four selections. We'll
turn it into a little bit of a so called
Mount Rushmore. But there are a lot of things you
can choose to decide how you're evaluating this greatest showman, entertainer,

(01:46:58):
good for the sport, all the those things that go
into being a great pro wrestler that would get you know,
the mizz or Jimmy Snook into the conversation if we
were drafting like a forty man roster something like that.

Speaker 3 (01:47:11):
We'll draft a four wrestler.

Speaker 2 (01:47:14):
Roster, me Mount Rushmore if you will, you Cole, So,
Cole will get two of the first four selections.

Speaker 3 (01:47:20):
I'll get one of the first five, going first, lucky dog.

Speaker 4 (01:47:24):
But it would have been my selection even if he
were much more happily still alive today.

Speaker 3 (01:47:33):
I would I talked about it yesterday.

Speaker 4 (01:47:35):
For the magnitude of his impact on the sport and
its success and staying power, it for me has to
be the Hulkster, the Holkster.

Speaker 3 (01:47:46):
I get it. It's a good pick.

Speaker 2 (01:47:48):
It's a good first pick, and I actually would have
expected I don't know if I had expected all three
of us to do it, but under the circumstances, it's
a sentimental favorite to maybe push you over the top
in this draft.

Speaker 3 (01:48:02):
Well know, yeah, Tim, certainly it wouldn't have been yours.

Speaker 4 (01:48:06):
I don't think it's an It was obvious what I
said yesterday should have made it. Obviously, that's what if
I had the pick would have made. But I don't
disagree with Cole at all. I just happened to feel
that way. I think there are not even one other
possible first pick. Yeah he's he is, okay, well let's go.
But there is another one, and he's my favorite.

Speaker 5 (01:48:27):
Man.

Speaker 3 (01:48:28):
Gee, who are you taking?

Speaker 2 (01:48:31):
Steve Williams? Oh death Stone called Steve Austin. Yeah, that's
that's a no brainer. That would have been my pick,
no matter what, unless I was drafting third, because I'm
guessing he would have been taken in the first two picks.

Speaker 4 (01:48:44):
You can have Stone Cold Steve Austin. I will all right, Cole,
two for you.

Speaker 3 (01:48:48):
Yeah, I was not gonna take either one.

Speaker 12 (01:48:50):
Of them.

Speaker 9 (01:48:50):
With my first pick, I was gonna take the one
that they made fun of on South Park, that they
make fun of every single time that they ever hap Yeah,
they do all the time. I will go with the man,
the myth, the legend, the one that actually I watched
just at highlights.

Speaker 2 (01:49:05):
Macho Man, Randy Savage is my first overall pick. Wow,
that's a little bit of a dark horse pick. I
did not expect that. But you have two.

Speaker 9 (01:49:11):
Picks, and then number two, gonna go with the man
who came back from the dead on multiple occasions, the
gift that keeps on giving.

Speaker 4 (01:49:19):
Give me the Undertaker, and I do not like how
this is going and not for coal. Go ahead with
your pick, Rick Flair. Yeah, I mean seriously, dude, all right,
we can continue if you want.

Speaker 3 (01:49:30):
I mean, it's over now. You let Rick Flair go. Fifth.

Speaker 2 (01:49:34):
What are you doing? He even said I'm gonna take
the man, and he didn't even take the man. He said,
I want to take the man because if you want
to beat the man, you gotta let the man go.
With the fifth pick to the guy who took stole gold, Steve.

Speaker 3 (01:49:46):
Austin, there are still many good picks for you to
take you. Yeah, I don't even have any thought.

Speaker 4 (01:49:50):
I thought when it came back to me, i'd actually
have to think about it. I wanna take no thought.

Speaker 2 (01:49:54):
We're gonna get this is gonna be the fastest eighteen
draft ever, even though we're making sixteen picks.

Speaker 4 (01:49:59):
I'm taking the Rock, I'm taking John Cena, And it
couldn't be any easier to make those picks. I mean,
is there anyone else even under consideration?

Speaker 2 (01:50:06):
Well, of the ones that are left, that's everybody but
these five.

Speaker 3 (01:50:09):
But these yeah, there's he listen.

Speaker 2 (01:50:12):
I would say it's a two horse race right now,
but look, it's all subjective and at the end of
the day, it comes it comes down to the voters.

Speaker 4 (01:50:19):
I think the next pick, in light of the fact
that Macho Man was taken decidedly too early, is rather easy.

Speaker 3 (01:50:27):
For Yeah, I got two names, but okay, much more
highly of one. But let's see what you got.

Speaker 2 (01:50:32):
I'm actually going to take the hit man, Brett Hart.

Speaker 3 (01:50:36):
Yeah, so, I mean, I know, can you give a.

Speaker 4 (01:50:38):
Little background on why Brett Hart is thought of the
way he is, because it's pretty consistent that most people
would say, at worst he's top twelve.

Speaker 2 (01:50:46):
Yeah, yeah, No, he's well. First of all, he's the
best there is, the best there was, and the best
there ever will be. Good showman, so he could have
been number one. Yes, technical wrestler, super super like family
is legendary.

Speaker 4 (01:51:00):
To this day, big time personality. He seems like he's
not to know that. So to get in echelon of wrestlers,
you've got to be real good at what you actually do. Okay,
and it's not fake that regards. You got Brett Hart,
and you got Stone Cold and Rick Flair, and don't
forget Rick Flair. I tried to try to pretend like
that didn't happen just just a few minutes ago.

Speaker 2 (01:51:21):
I like, I like my threesome so far. I'm looking
for a foursome, all right.

Speaker 4 (01:51:25):
You got to wrap things up here for your four
person greatest Wrestlers after taking Randy Savage and I I
can't what is the Undertaker's name?

Speaker 3 (01:51:35):
Mark Mark Callaway? You can mean Mark Kallus.

Speaker 2 (01:51:38):
If you're nasty in the WCW era, you got two
more pick skull.

Speaker 9 (01:51:41):
Yeah, listen, guys, I don't pay attention to wrestling. I
just go based off of names that I've actually heard before.
And the man that kilt is one that I absolutely
will always go after. Give me Rowdy, Roddy Piper. Absolutely
love the man, absolutely love the fact that he wore
a kilt on stage. Great flair, great fanatics, great ambiance, and.

Speaker 3 (01:51:59):
Let's go with the wild card again.

Speaker 9 (01:52:00):
He ended up becoming a very famous actor on one
television show, and he had a television had so serial brand,
he had an action figure and he was able to
go ahead and kill Apollo in the ring.

Speaker 3 (01:52:13):
Give me mister T.

Speaker 2 (01:52:15):
Wow, mister T who highlighted not one but two WrestleMania's career.

Speaker 4 (01:52:21):
Maxiz participated in for mister T, what's the number at
it's got under ten, under five?

Speaker 2 (01:52:27):
Well as far as pay per views, it's a single digits. Okay,
I'm sure he did some house shows we don't know
about in the mid eighties. Uh.

Speaker 4 (01:52:33):
If I was asking you five minutes ago, if mister
T gets selected, how many picks do you think it
would take for us to get there? If we have
an unlimited series of picks fifty fifty?

Speaker 3 (01:52:48):
I accept this game.

Speaker 2 (01:52:49):
It's okay, Well, I think if I say this with
my max is correct, Yes, And I think he was
the ninth pick, the tenth pick tenth pick Roy Roddy
was ninth, so he's tenth.

Speaker 4 (01:53:02):
Roddy's a good pick. Roddy is a good pick. I
knew we'll take a taking sixteen wrestlers. I thought there
was a chance he I thought there, even though he's
probably not top twenty to a lot of people, I
figured he would go.

Speaker 3 (01:53:14):
We want to hold over for.

Speaker 4 (01:53:16):
Our last two extremely important tip the scales picks, well,
I'm going.

Speaker 3 (01:53:19):
To win this thing when we come back. As the
way to tease this.

Speaker 4 (01:53:22):
Yeah, when we come back, the last selection for AC
to go with Stone Cold, Steve Austin.

Speaker 3 (01:53:27):
Rick Flair and Brett Hart.

Speaker 4 (01:53:28):
And the last pick for me to go with Hulk Hogan,
the Rock and John Cena to close out our Mount
Rushmore's which will be toppled by Macho Man, the Undertaker,
Roddy Piper, and Mister t greatest professional wrestlers. Your input
always welcome on the socials and on the shows We
continue here on the eighteen, the.

Speaker 1 (01:53:49):
Eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (01:53:58):
All right, put a rap on this upon further review,
because I was like, I got this, and then I
was looking at Wex's draft for a guy who now
you're not You're not coal, You're not completely there was
an era where I was totally locked in. It's just
just not a long period of time. But I was like,
it was a while ago. You took the three biggest

(01:54:20):
box office draws in the history of the company.

Speaker 3 (01:54:23):
That's a solid draft.

Speaker 4 (01:54:25):
And truthfully, when I said there was a time where
I was really locked I probably saw more watch more
matches that featured Steve Williams mentioned his name earlier, Doctor Death.
Ted Dbiassi, before he came into some money, became the
real life gimmick of Vince McMahon. Absolutely, I mean long
before he was associated with Virgil, he was just a

(01:54:46):
he was just Ted Dbasse, a wrestler, made a very
good one in a different outfit. I was in levon Erics,
et cetera. That's where it all began for me. And
as it continued into the massive production and money making
machine that it was.

Speaker 2 (01:55:01):
Fence decided to light the place. What a concept. Now
it doesn't look like a smoky old gym.

Speaker 4 (01:55:06):
So you put together stone cold, Steve Austin, Rick Flair,
Brett Hart, and.

Speaker 2 (01:55:11):
Well, it's I don't know that I'm gonna be able
to overcome the trio that you've already selected.

Speaker 4 (01:55:17):
Just take the best available player, don't take, don't take need.
But he doesn't know what that is. He also doesn't
know what the next step would be for this year.
We haven't played that sound bite yet from Wednesday. Boy,
can people talk about the next step? I don't know
what that is? Winning a second playoff game. Advancing to
the conference title game. That is so quite clearly in black,

(01:55:41):
is advancing past where you've been. That is the next
step this team needs to make. I'll make mention of
that to him.

Speaker 2 (01:55:47):
Well, I didn't intend on picking both participants in the
Montreal screw job. Oh no, but that's how it turned out.
Id with my final Well it was true. Well a
whole documentary on it. But yeah, the guy out, Sam Martino,
that was not He was not there that night. I
don't even think he was talking events. Did I say
that wrong? Does it pronounce George the animal Steel? That's

(01:56:09):
also not the guy? All right, ravishing starts right.

Speaker 3 (01:56:13):
I thought about taking him. Really, Rick, who is it
really gonna be?

Speaker 2 (01:56:17):
By the way, Rick Rude a genuine badass, like outside
of the ring, you didn't want to mess with him,
kind of like Heroby talked about Trevor Riza when he
was with the Rockets.

Speaker 3 (01:56:26):
I don't want to see him outside of the ring.
I mean, I know that you know a lot more
than I do about this.

Speaker 4 (01:56:31):
He did strike me because if he was so ravishing
and he played to that uh huh, pretty boy now
I know.

Speaker 3 (01:56:38):
Not even talking like not just fight you.

Speaker 2 (01:56:40):
He had things all right, So who is it gonna be, uh,
mister WrestleMania himself.

Speaker 3 (01:56:46):
The break cad Shan Michael's That's how Vince would have said.

Speaker 8 (01:56:49):
It.

Speaker 4 (01:56:50):
Probably a very good outside the top ten pick for
a widely regarded top ten wrestler.

Speaker 2 (01:56:56):
And if you had told me when I was eleven
in that range, when he was becoming a solo act,
you know, after he kicked literally Marty Jeannetti to the side, Yeah,
and he took him out with the barbershop window, that
he would age the way he has and look the
way he does. We're talking all the stereotypical dad aging

(01:57:17):
type things. It's just it's humble because he was the
epitome of what you just said.

Speaker 3 (01:57:22):
He was a pretty boy back in the day. Not
so much now.

Speaker 4 (01:57:25):
The names to consider for me now that I have
the last pick, snitter, irrelevant, sting, triple h McK foley
a little reluctantly but a little more current, and since
he's kind of a friend of the show because of
his because Paul Hayman, Roman reigns and the person, I think,

(01:57:47):
I'm just gonna go ahead and select.

Speaker 3 (01:57:49):
Pretty Star, Pretty Large, Princess Bride.

Speaker 4 (01:57:51):
The Star of Princess Bride documentary on him is elite,
so good.

Speaker 3 (01:57:58):
It's it's produced one gift for sure that we all use. Now.

Speaker 4 (01:58:02):
Wrestling does involve a lot of time in front of
the microphone.

Speaker 2 (01:58:06):
Not what he did, not his age for sixteen complete seconds.

Speaker 3 (01:58:12):
In a row?

Speaker 2 (01:58:12):
What exactly did he just say? What is he even
trying to say?

Speaker 4 (01:58:16):
Cutting a promo with him involved almost impossible. Yeah, but
I'm gonna take Andre the Giant. That's a strong draft. Like,
I don't see any way you don't win this with
like eighty percent of the vote.

Speaker 2 (01:58:30):
And I'm not even kidding, Like they'll look at mine,
they'll laugh at Cole, they'll look at my list, and
then they'll see yours and be like, geez, so, I mean,
maybe I'm not giving my list enough credit.

Speaker 3 (01:58:43):
Well, I don't.

Speaker 4 (01:58:43):
I think you're selling selling a Cole's list short. If
I'm reading it correctly, he took no selling. He took
the term here that we're gonna use. He took a
minor league baseball player, right, he took a minor league
baseball player. He took a dead guy. He took a
guy that wears a kilt, and he took an actor.

Speaker 3 (01:59:01):
Like the only pick.

Speaker 2 (01:59:02):
And again I say this with all due respect, your
only solid pick was the Undertaker.

Speaker 4 (01:59:07):
And I called him a dead guy only in the
fact that man his name is the Undertaker.

Speaker 2 (01:59:12):
Really, so matra Man not a really solid pick on
this little little early for the fourth for the third
overall thing.

Speaker 3 (01:59:17):
You know what, that is a solid pick. I take
that back.

Speaker 2 (01:59:19):
I want to I don't want to insult Randy Poffo
or his family.

Speaker 3 (01:59:22):
All right, well, there you go.

Speaker 4 (01:59:23):
We'll post that for you, will welcome your contributions via
social and of course voting on it, and we'll give
you the results coming up on Monday and see how
things play out. Have not had a good season on
the Friday A team draft thus far. If things change after,
it seems like it was a well deserved hiatus. By
the way, have been off of the draft for almost

(01:59:44):
a full month.

Speaker 2 (01:59:45):
We need to be make like very certain cold because
you're the one that's going to do this.

Speaker 3 (01:59:49):
Yeah, these have to be posted and honestly.

Speaker 4 (01:59:53):
List A list, B, list C. Who has the best
mount rushmore of.

Speaker 3 (02:00:00):
Professional run And mainly I say that, but if you're
listening to the show, obviously you know who's who and
what happened.

Speaker 2 (02:00:04):
But you probably think that I'm saying that because I
don't want anybody to associate anybody's name with anything. But
really I'm trying to protect a call from all the backlash.

Speaker 4 (02:00:14):
It's probably the way to do it. We try to
do that each and every week. We will get a
fourth voice on this subject. Briefly because anytime we have
something out there like this, and usually on Fridays at
five o'clock.

Speaker 3 (02:00:28):
When we talked to.

Speaker 4 (02:00:29):
Chandler Rome, we've just completed a Friday a team draft.
He's probably got a four. I'm curious what he'll have
to say. But we'll talk Astros baseball quite obviously with
the Chandler of the Athletic when he joins us next
the Astros and Athletics for Game two of the four
game series. There now, this will be the eighth game
of the season series. The Astros only hold a four

(02:00:50):
games to three lead in this season series. They do
have people who have pitched for them for quite some
time set to go over the final three games this year.

Speaker 3 (02:01:00):
He's unlike Alexander last night.

Speaker 4 (02:01:01):
Are these people Ryan Gusto, Hunter Brown, and Colton Gordon
going in the next three games for Houston.

Speaker 3 (02:01:08):
Joe Spott has met with the media this afternoon.

Speaker 2 (02:01:10):
The move to put Brandon Walter on the injured list,
obviously was also made this afternoon, and in Nick Hernandez
is back with the team and probably ready to be
used in this evening's game.

Speaker 4 (02:01:20):
The Astros lost a game off of their lead in
the division to the Mariners last night. Mariners got strong
pitching and little late offense to take care of their win.
The Astros place atop the Major League Baseball standings. My
best team in baseball has sixty one wins. The Astros
have sixty. That's still how it's pointing two things out.

(02:01:40):
They've had a remarkable season and the races in Major
League Baseball are going to be awesome as this season
gets into mid to late September. Because very very little
separating the very best teams. Few teams probably fell out
of it a little bit, but if you put a
win streak to get like the Guardians had before last night,

(02:02:02):
could get right back into it. Even the Rangers at
fifty three and fifty they're tied for the seventh best
record in the AL, which is a just a stle's
throw from a wild card spot. Chandlerome joins us next.

Speaker 6 (02:02:16):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 7 (02:02:23):
Adam Clinton and Adam Wexler are the eighteen.

Speaker 2 (02:02:32):
Just after five o'clock on a Friday, which means we
will be catching up with Chandler Rome with the Athletic
sooner rather than later. He scheduled to join us and
talk all things not just astros, baseball, injuries, trade deadline,
et cetera, et cetera, but maybe even a little wrestling.

Speaker 3 (02:02:51):
Why do I feel like and he's trying to call.

Speaker 2 (02:02:54):
In Cole he's texting right now talking about that, so
hopefully we can get him on here. But why do
I feel like he's gonna surprise with his knowledge of
this topic?

Speaker 4 (02:03:02):
Never know, never can tell, you can't he is there.
He is, Hey, Chandler, welcome to the show. Hopefully you're
getting ready to enjoy your weekend. We got a few
things to discuss. I don't want to forget what I
really want to ask you, But we did just have
our greatest pro Wrestlers of All Time conversation. Each of
us selected four put him on a so called Mount
Rushmore via a draft. What's your knowledge about wrestling and

(02:03:25):
who would you list off as your best of all
time wrestlers?

Speaker 3 (02:03:32):
He said, hello, but now what he there?

Speaker 12 (02:03:35):
He is?

Speaker 3 (02:03:36):
That was even worse than the first one. It's like
such a tease. You got me kind of keep talking.
We'll tell you that's a no. We do not have him.
Let's go ahead and get a restart on that. I'm
thinking it's the phones.

Speaker 2 (02:03:52):
It's been a while since we've been affected by that. Yeah, Yeah,
I'm just I wonder like guys like Chandler, guys and
he can hear us, We can't hear him. So I'm
guessing it's the internet situation. But guys like him that
cover a team going through what the Astros are going through.

(02:04:15):
Guys like him, Brian McTaggart, you know anybody who's who's
routinely covering a team like this, and then you get
the news today that the eighteenth member of the squad
has been put on the IL. They just kind of
sit back to themselves and think, all right, what's next?
So that'll be your first question. Yeah, are you gonna
what's next mode? With the Astros and their injuries because
they keep on coming.

Speaker 10 (02:04:36):
I mean, it's pretty easy for me at this point.
I'm just writing the same story and transposing names every time,
different names, different diagnoses. You're changing what number this is
on the IL. But yeah, I mean it's it's getting
hard to believe at this point, and I mean everyone
is looking for someone to blame, and I think they
are at a point now where they're gonna have to

(02:04:57):
do some pretty holistic soul searching this off season when
it comes to you know, injuries and how they handle things.
But some of this isn't It's not anybody's fault. Like
pitchers are built to get hurt, like that happens all
the time. Jeremy Paine, you got hit in the ribs
by a pitch, you know, Jacob Melton turned around to
watch a homer leave the ballpark and sprained his ankle.

(02:05:18):
Like some of u's just rotten luck. And they've had
they've had a lot of bad luck. They've had just
some organizational dysfunction. It seems like everything has kind of
swelled into one and it's just become a pretty remarkable
series of events.

Speaker 4 (02:05:34):
Yeah, they've had so many guys move away instead of
seeing guys come back. Didn't you mention the absurdity of
the Spencer Arraghetty injury, But in light of the fact
he throws tonight, Garcia tomorrow, France on Sunday, and Christian
Xavier through yesterday yesterday for Sugarland and the other three
pitchers were all throw for Corpus Christy. Could you see
a scenario where we're one rehab appearance after this weekend

(02:05:58):
away from seeing Arragedty back with the Astros.

Speaker 10 (02:06:02):
Judge what Dana Brown has said, kind of reading between
the lines, I wouldn't be surprised if Spencer Araghetty maybe
back here after this start tonight, presuming everything goes well.
They may be cautious with it and give him one more,
but I mean, at this point, like if they can
bring him up here and like if he's only built
up to five innings, that's okay, Like they can they

(02:06:23):
have Gusto, They'll have Gordon they'll have Alexander, have bulk
guys that can go behind him if they need to.
But at this point they need bodies like they need
like healthy or almost healthy bodies to come up here
and fill some innings. And I think, you know, you
could see Araghetty after this rehab start tonight, maybe come
back to the big leagues. I think Javier is probably
right behind him, and then Garcia is probably behind both

(02:06:46):
of those guys. But yeah, look they're getting better, it's
getting healthy. You can see a light at the end
of the tunnel. That doesn't make the injuries more. That
doesn't make that easier to digest, but at least there
is some hope on.

Speaker 2 (02:06:59):
The I feel like it was okay Dana Brown's gonna
be wanting to make a move to kind of try
and bolster what is a pleasant surprise of a first
place team here in late July at the trade deadline.
Now it feels like he's gonna have to do something
simply because of need or is that kind of an
accurate statement.

Speaker 10 (02:07:21):
I mean, I talked to him yesterday and sounds like
they are prioritizing offense, and I don't think that's gonna
change with Brandon Walter going on the aisle because I
just said, like they've got pictures coming back. They seem
to feel confident in those pictures that are coming back.
Now you do run the risk. Like everybody looked at
Christian Hobby or what he did last night. He got

(02:07:41):
three swings and misses all night, didn't miss many bats.
That just goes to show you that these guys are
not gonna come back as Peak twenty twenty two. Christian
Hobvier like it's gonna take them some time. They've been
out a while, so efficacy is going to be an issue.
But right now, I think their priority is offense. I
think you know, a left handed bat that can play

(02:08:04):
somewhere on the infield or somewhere in the outfield is
their preference. A left handed hitting second baseman would be
their ultimate goal. The Rays are not trading Brandon Law
from what I understand, so get that thought out of
your head. I also don't believe the Cardinals are trading
Brendan Donovan. And even if the Cardinals were trading Brendan Donovan,
I don't think the Astros had anywhere near what it

(02:08:24):
takes to get an All Star with that much club
control left, so it could be a guy like Willie
Castro with the twins. You look at some other left
handed bats, you think of Cedric Mullins with the Orioles,
Ryan o'hearne with the Orioles.

Speaker 3 (02:08:38):
Those are both rentals.

Speaker 10 (02:08:39):
So there's names out there, and there's names that make
sense for this team. It's just I think the thing
fans are gonna have to comlish themselves against. Even like
at the top of the market, there's really not that
guy that's gonna come in and alter the trajectory of
this team. What's gonna alter the trajectory of this team
is getting all of their hurt guys back.

Speaker 4 (02:09:00):
I'm gonna go ahead and say it today and we'll
see what happens over the week's time.

Speaker 3 (02:09:02):
The name you mentioned, Willie.

Speaker 4 (02:09:04):
Castro, I'm gonna put him in an Astros uniform before
the end of the trade deadline coming up in the
next six days. I do think that's the player that
they are okay with giving up what it takes to
get him. I think they'll have enough to not so
called be outbid with what they have in their system.
So we'll make that as the Wex play on that one.
We'll see if it pans out that way. With what
Joe said Chandler about live BP this weekend for Jeremy

(02:09:27):
Pannya and the fifty or so swings that Jordan Alvarez
took without any reason to believe there's a setback coming.
Are the possibility that either or both of them will
just go through live BPS, etc. When it gets there
for each of them, obviously this weekend for Jeremy, and
then their return is, you know, days away.

Speaker 10 (02:09:47):
I can't imagine that Alvarez doesn't go on a rehab assignment.
I mean, he hasn't played in the game since May.
Like they're gonna it's gonna be a much slower process
with him, and I don't think it'll be just live
VPS and he's back in the lineup. I think they're
going to take it really slow with him. Payne is
a different story. I think there is a possibility that
if he gets through these these these three days this
weekend and Florida facing live pitching, comes out of it, Okay.

(02:10:11):
Maybe they send him to play a game or two
in the minor leagues this coming week, and then maybe
he meets the team in Boston to start after the
trade deadline. Maybe he meets them there and he's activated.
That seems like a feasible solution. But Joe Spot was
asked today whether Paya would need a rehab assignment, and
he said he's just kind of taking it one day
in a time with him. So they were noncommittal about that.

(02:10:34):
But I can't envision a world where Alvarez only comes
back after facing you know, some live pitching on the
backfields in Florida, Like he's probably gonna have to go
and get into some games.

Speaker 2 (02:10:45):
This is a bit of a crystal ball question for you,
But it's because of the type of season he was having.

Speaker 3 (02:10:50):
You're talking about Paynia.

Speaker 2 (02:10:52):
How confident are you that he can not pick up
where he left off, because that's just not how it works,
especially with the amount of time he's been out. But
you know, get back close to what he was providing
the Astros in this his best season by far.

Speaker 10 (02:11:07):
I'm more wondering what it's going to look like, you know,
defensively for him. I mean, he broke his ribs, like
and at shortstop, you've got to dive, you've got to range,
you've got to make quick motions like I'm more curious
to see how that looks like, is he full go?
Like if it were me, if I got my ribs
broken and I was coming back, I'd be pretty tentative
to like just go ahead and dive on them a bunch.

(02:11:29):
I'd be tentative to like put too much trauma on them.
But that's what all be interesting to see is how
he comes along with that. You know, when he was
talking to us before he went to Florida, it sounded
like it really wasn't the swinging that was bothering him much.
He said he felt it a little bit when he swung,
but it was kind of more, you know, doing everyday activities.
And obviously if he's going to be diving and you know,

(02:11:51):
doing that kind of stuff sliding, that could that's obviously
trauma to the side, so that could hurt as well.
But I think he's I think he's prime to come
back and just step in. He hasn't been out that long.
It's not nothing, but he hasn't been out near the
level that Alvarez or Arraghetti or guys like that. Those
are the guys I'd be a little bit more worried.

Speaker 4 (02:12:11):
About Big Baseball weekend in Cooperstown, Billy Wagner goes into
the Hall a five player class. The third astro to
go in, after Visio and Bagwell, the fourth should be
Jose al Tuve. You run through some of the projections
and there's a chance he gets three thousand hits, which
is a magical number.

Speaker 3 (02:12:31):
But everybody with twenty eight.

Speaker 4 (02:12:33):
Hundred hits or more is in the Hall of Fame
that's eligible, other than Barry Bond's, Rafael Palmero and Omar Visscal.
He's gonna pre right around twenty four hundred hits when
this season ends. He's got four more years of his contract.
Four hundred more hits is obviously easily attainable if health
is there, no matter what level he's really playing at.

(02:12:55):
There are other circumstances. Is there any scenario you can
in that the voters will not put Jose Altuve in
the Hall of Fame?

Speaker 3 (02:13:04):
Is the fourth astro to get there? No?

Speaker 10 (02:13:07):
No, I think he's barring, of course, barring like some
horrific injury that cuts his career short, which you'd never want.
I hope that doesn't happen. Yeah, I think the thing
I think the way it's most likely to go I
think it's way most likely to go is the way
Beltron's candidacy has gone. There were a lot of people

(02:13:27):
that panalized him by not voting for him his first
year on the ballot, and then his second year on
the ballot, all those people voted for him. He didn't
get in this year. He was close. He's going to
get in next year. I think that's probably the most
likely outcome with Jose Altuve. We all know that he
didn't participate in the scheme, that he was against it,
that he didn't want it to happen. We all know

(02:13:48):
that in Houston, that's been reported exhaustively. Maybe that spreads
its way to the voting conglomerate. Who but I mean,
Jose al Tube is not retiring for the next at
least five years, and then he's got to wait five
more years to get on the ballot. So we're talking
like almost at a minimum ten years from now, we're
talking about this like, are people still talking about the
science ceiling scandal? Have are we still on Earth? Have

(02:14:11):
the oceans risen? Are we all dead?

Speaker 2 (02:14:13):
Like?

Speaker 3 (02:14:13):
Who knows? At that point?

Speaker 2 (02:14:14):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (02:14:14):
Who knows? Yeah?

Speaker 10 (02:14:16):
I mean, I mean, have the Texans won a playoff
game by then.

Speaker 4 (02:14:19):
Who like, it's another playoff game? You mean another one
of those years? Oh my god, that's that's a loaded question.
That's a Matt Thomas special. How they look at training camp?
I hear you a loud and there does it?

Speaker 10 (02:14:31):
Does it look like a twenty five point loss to
the Chiefs this year?

Speaker 3 (02:14:34):
Just maybe a twelve point?

Speaker 4 (02:14:36):
So once again back to our opening question, which our
technology botched for us. We drafted the best wrestlers of
all time. Each of us got to select four. Could
Chandler Rome put together an elite list of his best wrestlers?

Speaker 10 (02:14:50):
Moore, So, I'm not a WWE person. My dad is.
So I grew up like with my dad watching it
and I just remember, like being a little kid watching it.
And the first person that like, I just remember and
this is like an indelible memory with my dad is
the Rock. Like the Rock would come on and he
would do, can you smell what the rock is cooking?
Which is really cool. Like that's just like a core

(02:15:12):
childhood memory. So he's probably number one, just off that aspect.
I like Paul Cogan, he was cool. Rick Flair, I
have to say, because Josh Reddick is a co host
of my podcast.

Speaker 3 (02:15:22):
And I don't know.

Speaker 10 (02:15:24):
Andre the Giant, Andre the Giants seems fun.

Speaker 3 (02:15:26):
He'll be number four. I told you he was gonna
surprise us. Andre the Giant seems fun.

Speaker 2 (02:15:30):
And then let me let me tell you how old
I feel when I hear Chandler Rome say.

Speaker 3 (02:15:34):
His dad watch the Rock oh Man good stuff.

Speaker 10 (02:15:40):
Yeah, I know, right, Like I actually did wrestle in
high school, like I did like actual like Greco Roman
and like freestyle wrestling, so like I know, I know
what it is, but I just never got into the
theatrics of the of the w W.

Speaker 8 (02:15:55):
Someone.

Speaker 4 (02:15:56):
If someone was writing up a story or a recap
or a bio of Chandler Rome comma high school wrestler,
what would they be writing about? How would they describe
your abilities to tell skills?

Speaker 10 (02:16:09):
I cut a lot of weight, Like, I cut a
lot of weight to get to like a lower weight class,
to help the team.

Speaker 3 (02:16:15):
I was very okay.

Speaker 10 (02:16:17):
I beat the people I was supposed to beat. The
people that were supposed to beat me kicked my a word,
so I was very okay.

Speaker 3 (02:16:25):
You got squashed. This is what you're saying.

Speaker 2 (02:16:29):
Did you You could cut a meme promo if you
had to in pro wrestling.

Speaker 10 (02:16:33):
Oh probably, yeah, I think if you I think he
gave me the right substances. If you gave me some time,
I could I could cut a great promo.

Speaker 3 (02:16:39):
Define substances. Oh that's not that's not okay?

Speaker 2 (02:16:43):
All right, It is Chandler Rome every single week here
on Friday afternoon at five o'clock Chandler as usual.

Speaker 3 (02:16:50):
You bring it, We thank you, we'll talk to you
next week. All right, thanks, guys, Can you do me
a solid here?

Speaker 4 (02:16:56):
I see, I know he's a professional and he's probably
in his professional work place, so he kind of delivered
the rock line like I might do on the show normally. Man,
I loved his line. He would always come out there
and he would say, can you smell what the rock
is cooking?

Speaker 3 (02:17:09):
Can you, at least as we go to break say
it the right way? If you smell what the rock
is cooking?

Speaker 1 (02:17:19):
The A Team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 3 (02:17:27):
Yep, what's Ace Cole here with you Friday? Here on
the A Team? You should be a sound on a
rap track. But I gotta give him something a sample.
It would either be your laugh.

Speaker 4 (02:17:43):
That was funny that you bring that up. The vacation
took us to I mentioned this the Museum of Pop Culture.

Speaker 3 (02:17:49):
A lot of audios and picture was taken. Yep.

Speaker 4 (02:17:52):
They had a lot of you know, musical history and
how things came to be and why this and that
and the other.

Speaker 3 (02:17:57):
They had a whole area of sampling and it was audio.

Speaker 4 (02:18:00):
So this song from nineteen sixty was sampled by Beyonce
in this song, this song from nineteen seventy.

Speaker 3 (02:18:07):
There's so much in there.

Speaker 4 (02:18:08):
And you know, clearly there are a lot of a
lot of music that helped make the older music that
much more popular again because it was sampled. Here now
getting to the point where we can just call it
sampling and not stealing was also part of all of this.

Speaker 2 (02:18:23):
But like regulators sampling Michael McDonald's how does that go? Well,
Michael McDonald kept singing about for good, but that had
a really good it really had a really good bass
hook line.

Speaker 8 (02:18:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:18:35):
I remember Warren g thought smart sounds like a he
made it work. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:18:41):
So a bunch of interesting things that came and went
with our conversation with Chandler. Joe Spot obviously mentioned a
couple of things he had to say about the moving
forward closer to playing baseball for both Jeremy Pania and
jord On Alvarez. I'm still very curious how much we
talked about the rehab nature of am in need. If

(02:19:02):
he's gonna go get four it bats for the Sugarland
Space Cowboys against Triple A pitching three, four or five
six times before he's ready to play for the Astros
because he hasn't.

Speaker 3 (02:19:10):
Been in the lineup for months.

Speaker 4 (02:19:11):
Talking about Jordan Alvarez, I mean, I just assume he'd
do it here. I don't mind that their rehab appearances
in theory if he's playing for the Astros, because if
he's in the lineup and totally incapable of catching up
to major league pitching, Okay, so what same thing with
four other guys that would otherwise be in the lineup.

Speaker 3 (02:19:29):
Well, and that's the thing.

Speaker 2 (02:19:30):
If he's against if he's trying to hit major league pitches,
then the best way for him to do that is
against major league pitches, not minor league pitches, with especially
with the layoff that he's had, and understandably from a
roster standpoint, it's it's another reason why you wouldn't do it.

Speaker 4 (02:19:53):
And I'm sure Chandler and Joe are on the same
page thinking that, yes, I rehab assignment is almost certainly
in Dana as well in the four in his future
when you activate him, well, obviously he takes the roster
spot of somebody, and they were uster spots for some
of the veterans they've put on the roster that are
out of options. That well, that means that players off
the team, off the forty men ross he's not a

(02:20:14):
part of the organization anymore, quite possibly, and that if
jord On isn't ready and you actually had to go
in the other direction, well now you're looking at even
more unseemly options. Joe Spotty did have a chance to
give a little bit of insight on the move that
they did have to make with Brandon Walter in the

(02:20:35):
bringing back Nick Hernandez. Here's what he had to say
about Walter and Hernandez.

Speaker 12 (02:20:39):
Yes, Nick Hernandez up here came in yesterday kind of
you know, swimp ssar elbow. We would have got some
tests MRI to show some information. So hopefully it's not
you know, we don't think not.

Speaker 7 (02:20:53):
Out for long.

Speaker 4 (02:20:54):
That's the inflammation they were talking about when they mentioned
it in the release. That's why Brandon Walter is on
the fifteen day IL and they will have to replace
him with somebody else for multiple spots in the rotation
or more. Obviously, that is number eighteen for the astros
on the IL. We'll hopefully get good reports on Christianavier

(02:21:14):
days after the appearance. It's one day after his appearance today,
and same thing with Araghetty, Garcia and France. As they
go through the weekend. They will pitch each of the
next three days. I also brought something up with Chandler
briefly because we haven't talked about it much. This is
Hall of Fame weekend and it's third astro to go
into the Hall of Fame. A very good major League
career when you consider the time spent away from Houston,

(02:21:37):
where he had almost two hundred saves elsewhere, had over
two hundred saves here in Houston, two hundred and twenty
five of his four hundred and twenty two. Talking about
Billy Wagner, who joins, he belongs there. He's the first
left handed reliever to get there. And I heard him
talking about some of the other pitchers that are there,
and when you look at what they were able to do,
and you know, he relates it to his own career

(02:21:57):
and where he thinks he kind of fits in everything.
He just brought up the name, you know, Lee Smith,
And obviously I was, you know, following baseball very very
closely at that time for Lee Smith's career as I
was for Billy Wagner's career, and there was no time
when Lee Smith was pitching and when Billy Wagner was pitching,
and I thought, yeah, Lee Smith's probably better than Billy Wagner.

(02:22:18):
He's got more total saves. He's got four hundred and
seventy eight of them in two more seasons. He's thrown
three hundred, almost four hundred more innings than him, and
he's third all time in saves. And after the fact,
when these guys go into the Hall of Fame, I
don't think anybody really pays much, if any, attention to it.
He was on the ballot for ten years. Billy Wagner
he got in his tenth year. Lee Smith was on

(02:22:39):
the ballot for ten years. He didn't get in in
any of those ten years. He was voted in by
the Veterans Committee well after his time on the ballot
was gone. I don't not say disputing whether or not
he belonged in the Hall of Fame. I guess, but
I'm still baffled at the ten years this guy's you're
comparing him to Lee Smith now well, and while it's

(02:23:00):
a different group of voters, because the voters that were
doing it for ten years couldn't get it right, and
you're there to fix it, like he's just better than him.
There's just no other way around it. And it's still
what it was. The knock on Billy Wagner his playoffs
he had.

Speaker 2 (02:23:14):
He was in the playoffs enough where I think there's
a sample size that they regarded it as noteworthy.

Speaker 4 (02:23:18):
And it was bad. He was not a good postseason performing.
He didn't have a bunch of great moments. He had
the opposite Lise Smith. Baary even got there, and when
he did, he was awful. A couple of postseasons, gave
up runs on all of his appearance, but one game
exactly perfectly put. I'm glad he gets to celebrate this week,
and I wish he didn't have to wait this long.
Glad the Astros will retire his number later on this

(02:23:38):
year is their own Hall of Fame weekend comes up
when the Orioles visit town. Absolutely deserving of it. Undoubtedly
one of the best astros of all time, and he
belongs to you.

Speaker 2 (02:23:49):
Most think when it comes to and I'm not even
saying twenty years from now, Throe, do you think that
people will look and see that, like you mentioned the
veterans or whatever that puts these guys in, or you
just see they're in a Hall of fame.

Speaker 3 (02:24:04):
I did not remember that Lee Smith did not get in.

Speaker 4 (02:24:08):
I looked it up to double check my memory to
see if he got in because he was voted in,
which I just didn't recall happening, or if he got
in via the Veterans committee he did not get voted in.

Speaker 3 (02:24:18):
I'm curious.

Speaker 4 (02:24:19):
What if you know the answer to this, you're gonna
love it. The active list saves right now, there are
three people with better than three hundred and fifty saves active.
Billy Wager's at four twenty two. Two of those pitchers
are ahead of him. They're fourth and fifth all time.
Craig Kimberl is fifth. I'll call him active. He's pitched

(02:24:39):
this year, but just barely. If you remember when he
was brought up, he threw an inning and then they
immediately released him in Atlanta. Do you know who the
other current literal actual pitchers active pictures that are at
the top of the list right now with three hundred
and fifty or more career saves.

Speaker 3 (02:24:55):
Well, hater has to be one of them.

Speaker 4 (02:24:56):
Hater's nowhere near that. What hater is it two twenty six? Really,
he's not as old as you need to be to
get to that. He's only thirty one. He's only pitched
for nine seasons, became an elite full time closer just
after his career began. They're two guys you love to
make fun of how not good they are, even though

(02:25:18):
they Kelly Janssen he's number he's number four all time
and number one a Roles Chapman being nail to both,
I thought that hint would be pretty good.

Speaker 2 (02:25:26):
X Yankee's one as an x Yankee one's next Dodger.
Actually he's a current Dodger now a Roldist.

Speaker 4 (02:25:30):
Chapman pitched the ninth inning of the All Star Game,
basically so Josh Hader didn't have to in what is probably,
at age thirty seven, the best season of Chapman's career.
He's been that good this year as another one of
the offseason moves made by Boston, and if the Red
Sox keep doing what they're doing, a Roldest Chapman will

(02:25:53):
be back in the postseason pitching for yet another team.
He's pitched in the postseason for the Reds, the Cubs,
the Yankees, and the Rangers, winning two titles already with
the Rangers and the Cubs, of all.

Speaker 3 (02:26:07):
Teams, Yeah, of the two that you would have said
a rolled at, Chapman is probably gonna join Billy Wagner.

Speaker 2 (02:26:16):
I think he probably won't have to wait ten years
because of who he pitched for.

Speaker 3 (02:26:20):
Stupid voters.

Speaker 4 (02:26:21):
If he keeps, if he has another couple of seasons
like this one, he'll be over four hundred. And that's
you know, Francisco Rodriguez isn't in. John Franco isn't in
of those pitchers to pick knits.

Speaker 2 (02:26:33):
This is why when what Chandler said, as this scenario
comes to pass, Yeah, Jose will get in, but they'll
make him wait one year. If erast Chapman's a first
ballot Hall of Famer relievers get clobbered by the voters
to pitch for those teams though, I mean blue blood
organizations and somehow the Cubs are.

Speaker 4 (02:26:53):
A blue blood organization, which I don't get. They're literally blue.
I think that's the only part of it, because they're
not like the are. We gonna find room for all
these banners at Wrigley Field. All you got wrong for
the one here, You're.

Speaker 3 (02:27:06):
Good to go.

Speaker 4 (02:27:07):
We'll catch you with in case you missed it. Will
remind you that we have tickets to give away again
today to the Big Three and to see The Fix.
We'll give those away in the final segment. For those
of you that have been listening throughout this afternoon, specifically
here in the five o'clock hour, you're gonna have a
great chance to win them. We love helping out the listeners.

Speaker 6 (02:27:28):
The A Team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (02:27:34):
A whole lot of stuff to revisit or give you
for the first time here on the A Team.

Speaker 3 (02:27:39):
Also a reminder, as I.

Speaker 4 (02:27:40):
Mentioned, gotta pay tickets to give away to the Big
Three coming up on August second. Give you full dats
on that next segment we give them away. Also have
tickets to see The Fix live on September third. They're
playing at the House of Blues, so listen up closely
as you have been throughout the hour and we'll ask
you something about something that's been brought up here on
the program. It'll be your opportunity to win a couple

(02:28:01):
of pairis of tickets we have for you to give away.
Am I right, cole as we bring you in for
in case you missed it, that we are now sitting
with just one unsigned NFL twenty twenty five draft pick.

Speaker 9 (02:28:18):
The Cincinnati Bengals are not as big of idiots as
we thought because according to e ESPN's Adam Schefter and
I Thought Network's Tom Pallasio and Kallus others, the Bengals
in number seventeen overall pick, Texas A and M defensive
lineman Shamar Stewart have agreed to terms for his fully
guaranteed contract on a four year deal. This has been
a stand up that has been going on for months.

(02:28:40):
It is now finalized. He is going to be at camp.
He has expected to report now. The problem is this
is only one part of the deal that needs to
get done for Cincinnati, because remember Trey Hendrickson posts a
little bit of a cryptographic going on down in Miami.
Not expected to sign. They're nowhere near conversations on a
long term deal. He's the final year of his contract.

(02:29:01):
But the defensive line is gonna look a lot better
because of the fact that they were able to land
the seventeenth overall pick who did flirt with the idea
of not going back to college but certainly sitting out
for a year, working out and re.

Speaker 3 (02:29:13):
Entering the draft.

Speaker 4 (02:29:14):
The one player now left is the Browns issue, and
the player has the issues as to the reason he's
not signed. Quinch On Junkin Judkins with his domestic violence
charges from July. Earlier in July, that is why he
is unsigned. He's obviously not at camp and there's not
really any clarity on where things are headed from a

(02:29:34):
football standpoint or legal standpoint with that particular player.

Speaker 3 (02:29:38):
What else do we have?

Speaker 9 (02:29:39):
Oh, by the way, the contract is fully guaranteed on
eighteen point nine million dollars that includes a ten point
four million dollars signing bonus. Christian Avier how to performance
last night four innings of solid baseball at Triple A
sugar Land. You want to see him back simply at
this point for nothing more than just the fact of
getting better. When it comes to the.

Speaker 3 (02:30:00):
Fact of your bullpen, your situation.

Speaker 9 (02:30:01):
That's going on right now with how many players are
out and so Earlier today, when asked about the status
of Christian Avier, Joe Spotta gave at least a little
bit of insight on how he felt his former number
three and hopefully eventual number three pitcher will be returning
close to sooner rather than later.

Speaker 12 (02:30:18):
Yeah, you went, well, forty plus pitches up to ninety five,
and he came out feeling good about it, which is
which is, That's what we wanted.

Speaker 4 (02:30:27):
That last part is really the only thing that is
a great significance, very important to know. If he came
out of it feeling good, that's very good. Forty six
pitches in his last rehabit start before last night, forty
nine pitches in the one that got him two and
two thirds worth of work with the Space Cowboys.

Speaker 3 (02:30:43):
All so far good news.

Speaker 4 (02:30:45):
And he's one of the very few pitchers who's been
out with the Tommy John surgery or in Francis case,
the shoulder surgery that hasn't had any setbacks. He's March
twenty or May twenty first of last year when he
last pitched at the surgery. He's been on a normal
twelve to fourteenth month recovery time period and has been
able to pitch without setbacks. And I think we all

(02:31:09):
agree that Arraghetti is closer than he is just for
the injury that he had and overcoming it is very,
very different.

Speaker 3 (02:31:16):
He broke a finger and he pitched.

Speaker 4 (02:31:18):
Well, we'll find out a little bit later tonight and
how he fares this evening, but I would imagine he's
probably pushing close to fifty pitchers or so in his
appearance for Corpus.

Speaker 2 (02:31:27):
Is the minor league situation more captivating tonight than the
major league situation given the rosters.

Speaker 4 (02:31:33):
You know, we don't talk about it much because so
many other things have been at the forefront, whether it's
been good or bad, like with Jason Alexander being the
way he pitched, Brandon Walter the way he pitched very
opposite ends. I think there's a start at some point
this year, maybe it's tonight, where Ryan Gusto is really
really good. I think he has major league stuff. I

(02:31:54):
think he's learning how to put hitters away, not throw
too many hitable strikes, which I think Colton Gordon is
learning too.

Speaker 3 (02:32:02):
But I think Gusto has just has better stuff.

Speaker 4 (02:32:04):
So I'm always intrigued when Gusto gets an opportunities making
his thirteenth start of the season tonight.

Speaker 3 (02:32:11):
Anything else, Yeah, one more thing.

Speaker 9 (02:32:13):
The trade deadline is going to be such a major
issue that people are going to be looking at. We
heard from Chandler Roam. We heard from Brian McTaggart that
the Ashers are looking to add in a right handed bat,
but ESPN's Buster Only is taking it a step further,
saying they're looking for a player who could be a
multi purpose option, whether he can play second base or
left field. And the reason why they're doing that is

(02:32:35):
because they want to have a permanent home for Hoseu
to Bay the rest of the season.

Speaker 6 (02:32:40):
So if you are going.

Speaker 9 (02:32:41):
To keep Hoseal Tuba at second base, they're maybe looking
at targeting someone to play left field. If you're trying
to move Hosee to Bay to the outfield permanently, you're
probably looking for someone at second base.

Speaker 3 (02:32:50):
Will he Caster is a name that was thrown out there.

Speaker 9 (02:32:52):
I think that the Brendan Donovan rumor was always nothing
more than a rumor just because the asking price and
they say the Gus for Brandon Bow. You know, you
look where the team is right now.

Speaker 3 (02:33:02):
It feels like that, even though they like.

Speaker 9 (02:33:04):
Bryce Matthews, he's here for a reason. If they're targeting
a second basement, it's because of their moving hose out to.

Speaker 4 (02:33:10):
Me in the outfield permanently, which we all know is
where he's best serving the Astros defensively. It's hard to
work around it, and I applaud the Astros for how
they've tried to do it.

Speaker 3 (02:33:21):
They go to Arizona, he doesn't play in the field
at all.

Speaker 4 (02:33:23):
Now they're back home in Houston, in front of the
manual scoreboard, an opportunity to put him out there. It's
a ballpark related starting pitcher related to issue they've dealt
with all year this year, and they're probably gonna deal
with for another four seasons as he polishes off his
Hall of Fame resume, and Bryce Matthews and Jordon Alvarez
are gonna play a huge role in that. How much

(02:33:44):
outfield is yord On Alvarez playing in his future and
how much second base with the Astros is Bryce Matthews
playing in his future? We have tickets away the fix
and to the Big Three. We come back here on
the eighteen.

Speaker 6 (02:34:00):
A team on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 2 (02:34:02):
Ninety continuing here final segment of the eighteen before we
get to our tickets to give away and some other
items to finish things off with and turn things over
to ros Vio Real, who's got the Astros on Deck
Show from Deck and Park.

Speaker 3 (02:34:18):
That's what he'll say.

Speaker 4 (02:34:19):
I have no doubt that he will welcome you into
our programming, leading you into Astros and A's both of
us here. We just want to thank people over for
Tita Chevrolet. Great people's people to be partners with, Great
for us to talk to you about them. Both of
us truly enjoy driving our Chevrolets and talking to you
guys about them each and every day here on the show.

(02:34:40):
If you guys, you business owners out there, want to
us myself or Ac or both of us to speak
for you your company, just hit us up, send us
an email, get in control to contact with us, and
we'll be sure to make things great for you, just
like we make things great for all of our partners,
like for Tita Chevrolet. Adam wax all Right at iHeartMedia

(02:35:01):
dot com.

Speaker 2 (02:35:01):
Yeah, send us an email. Adam Clanton at iHeartMedia dot com.
We would love to do just that. We would also
love to give you free tickets mentioned.

Speaker 4 (02:35:10):
We got a couple of pairs to each of the
Big Three August second over Toyota Center. That's not one,
not two, not three, but four games over at Toyota Center.
Big Three Basketball, including Houston's team that's the Houston Righands
Calvin Murphy head coach. Get to see that team right
there in your home, right over Toyota Center. Tickets are
also on sale now Toyota Center dot com. If you

(02:35:32):
do not win them, here got a couple of pairs
for those of you that can answer this question. Also
the opportunity to win a pair of tickets to see
The Fix they're performing at the House of Blues. That
show is September three. Tickets on sale for that now,
also available at ticketmaster dot com.

Speaker 3 (02:35:49):
So your choice of those.

Speaker 4 (02:35:50):
Should you answer this question correctly at seven one three
two one two five seven ninety Easy to answer if
you were listening here on the program just a few
minutes ago. We appreciate you listening, appreciate you being a
part of the show, participating, listening, enjoying us on the socials,
on the TV and on the radio. Seven one three
two one two five seven ninety. Your question from our conversation. Earlier,

(02:36:12):
there was a signing the Cincinnati Bengals signed their first
round draft pick. Was curious about what it took to
get that done. A little upfront money, and then he
agreed to their already indicated contract language. But that leaves
one player from the draft unsigned, just one player mentioned
him by name last segment. Who is that player that

(02:36:32):
remains unsigned from the twenty twenty five NFL Draft? Your
hint it's not a Texan? Nick Cassea would never seven
one three two one two five seven ninety seven one
three two one two five seven ninety the last remaining
unsigned player from the twenty twenty five draft.

Speaker 3 (02:36:48):
You know the answer.

Speaker 2 (02:36:49):
You call in, you get an opportunity to win, either
tickets to the Big Three or see the fix. What
do you think about workers of any kind who strike?
As far as its effectiveness the you know, the end game?

Speaker 3 (02:37:01):
Do you agree with it? Do you think there's better
ways of going about it?

Speaker 4 (02:37:04):
I mean, the way it's set up with unions and
the things that go along with strikes, that's usually the
way to do it.

Speaker 2 (02:37:10):
What if I were to tell you, I get it
that the concession workers at Fenway are striking for the
series with the Dodgers, obviously a huge series, one of
the best teams in the AL, one of the best
teams in the NL. Getting together hundreds of Ara mark
workers at Finnway on strike and planning to stay out

(02:37:32):
for all of the home stand And the best part
is the union officials had a request for fans attending
the home stand We're asking you to not buy concessions
inside the ballpark tailgate before the games. That is I mean,
of all the things I've seen in Major League Baseball

(02:37:54):
with work, work stoppage.

Speaker 3 (02:37:56):
That, I don't think I've ever seen something like this.

Speaker 4 (02:37:59):
They're not against the Red Sox, you know, they're not
against the fans. It's a situation with a concessionaire who's
trying to pay bottom dollar, not willing to deal with
technology issues and frankly and underminds the quality of the park.
First time in the one hundred and thirteen year history
of Fenway Park, this union unite here the Local twenty six,

(02:38:19):
they are on strike.

Speaker 2 (02:38:21):
It's all Jed, haven't seen this before. I had not
seen that before. It definitely has not happened before. Did
you see what they're asking for?

Speaker 4 (02:38:27):
Improved pay, improves conditions, I assume are on the list.

Speaker 2 (02:38:31):
Well, to be specific, the quote is living wages, guardrails
on technology and r eespect.

Speaker 4 (02:38:41):
I believe it's citywide standard wages, guardrails on automation, increased
cetuity for premium workers who serve season ticket holders and others.
And they're hopeful that they can come to an agreement
sometime soon. Negotiating in good faith, they say, and remain
in close communication the two parties.

Speaker 3 (02:39:00):
So we'll see where this goes.

Speaker 2 (02:39:02):
That's a big, big series, not unlike the big series
between the Red Sox and the Yankees, which was featured
in the town when they knocked off Finway Park Ben
Affleck and Jeremy Renner and his crew.

Speaker 3 (02:39:13):
Okay, then have you ever seen it? That's which movie?
The Town?

Speaker 4 (02:39:16):
Yeah, you've told me a bunch of times to see.
If you haven't seen a Town, it's on the old DVR.
Oh my gosh, can you please watch that this weekend.

Speaker 3 (02:39:25):
Jennifer Garner's former husband made a great movie.

Speaker 4 (02:39:27):
I have to see the only one that's it. Wow,
he was out when he was a superhero, No, no,
none of those. What about when he was in the
boiler room?

Speaker 2 (02:39:36):
Nope, there's only one other movie of his that I
actually at his best friend was Will Hunting. Nope, I
would go that. I guess that's the it's a great movie.
I mean, you might not appreciate his role even though
he was when.

Speaker 3 (02:39:48):
His wife fakes her death and then she's gone girl.
Don't know the premise of that movie, but I'll take your.

Speaker 2 (02:39:54):
Words based on a book, and it's absolutely as psychotic
as it sounds, and it's actually a good movie.

Speaker 3 (02:40:00):
Okay, he was gone.

Speaker 4 (02:40:02):
Girl on a Darmis. It's probably good, right, I don't know, Well,
she's in it, right, it's gotta be good to just
put it on mute, all right. Astros Baseball three games
with the A's before we visit with you again, to
Texans practices before we visit with you again. I'll be
sure to update Channeler Rome on what's going on with
the Texans. And they practice Saturday and Sunday in front
of the Saturday and Monday in front of the fans.

(02:40:23):
Monday will be pads first. Say what days do you
want me to talk about? All Weekenday, Friday, Monday. We'll
be back with you on Monday at two o'clock. Here
on the eighteen

Speaker 6 (02:40:36):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety