Yordan's Out....WHO COULD HAVE GUESSED!?!?

On today's epsiode of The A-Team, Wex and AC break down the Yordan Alvarez update, Texans news and more!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Two lifelong Houston sports guys named Adam, raised.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
By Earl.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Nolan, volted by the magnificent roller coaster ride that is
Houston sports. Chill lage down for the only homegrown afternoon
team is talking your teams. Adam Clinton and Adam Wexler

(00:35):
are the eight team.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Always great to be with you on a Monday or
Friday coming back from the weekend.

Speaker 4 (00:49):
The A team here with you.

Speaker 3 (00:51):
That was a wild one Thursday to Sunday. Romber Valdez
and Hunter Brown were spectacular.

Speaker 4 (01:00):
Their bullpen was not.

Speaker 3 (01:01):
Luckily those days they didn't need a whole lot of
help from their bullpen. Yesterday they needed a handful of innings.
They got them, and they split a series. The Astros
who I'm speaking of, though, they got outscored by twenty
one runs. And all that being said, a wild weekend
of games. A game you allowed sixteen runs, a game
you allowed thirteen runs. You're sitting a half game back

(01:23):
of Seattle. You've played into a happy flight yesterday into
today's off day. And that's probably not the number one
Astro story we'll discuss here on the A team back
from the weekend, where there was major news about number
forty four, our first opportunity off of social media and
onto Sports Talk seven to ninety to weigh in on

(01:44):
where things stand, which still, as per usual when we
have injury discussions, that's really all that matters. Where do
things actually stand with Jordan Alvarez returning to baseball and
helping this team get back to first place, which they
have done, they just don't currently sit there as we
get for play on Tuesday, with both the Mariners and
the Astros off until then, both of them winning similar

(02:06):
games over the weekend and sitting well above the rest
of the teams in their division. It's week two of
OTA's for the Texans today, tomorrow and Thursday. We'll be
out there tomorrow. We do have a couple of updates
on that. Also, much like the Jordon Alvarez injury situation,
there's a little bit of a mystery surrounding the CJ.

(02:27):
Stroud situation, but some little bit of clarity coming and
not from the team in this case though, nothing that
they did wrong at this time of year, but very
interesting where that information comes from.

Speaker 4 (02:39):
So obviously we'll have that for you.

Speaker 3 (02:41):
And now, as we knew we would heading out and
now into the week ahead. We know who's playing for
the NBA Championship. We know the teams that are in
off season mode, who might be looking to change locations,
get a new address, maybe leave the States, but stay
in the NBA. Yeah, that story came out today. All

(03:01):
of that on the table as we get started here
on the A team East Coast Baseball for the Astros.
So I hope you like today's show your loan full
show of the week. I'm sure we'll hear it from
mt but we don't care. We're here for you now.
And throughout seven one three two one two five seven
ninety seven one three two one two five seven ninety
we will hear from Dana Brown, who spoke obviously at

(03:24):
length in front of the media this weekend, and then
again as he usually does on Sundays on Astros Radio
in advance of yesterday's Hunter Brown finale. So I want
to let you hear all of those things as we
share our thoughts about where things are with the Astros,
the people who are supposed to be handling these things,
the players role in it, management roles in it, and

(03:44):
everything else that goes into They did not welcome back
yard on Alvarez to the lineup this weekend, and they
will not have him in the lineup tomorrow, which because
of our lack of clarity and are absolute nothing but
guesswork abilities, because we don't have any other informational work
off of anything that you might have heard on Friday
from me or others that jord On Alvarez would be

(04:06):
in the lineup against Pittsburgh on Tuesday. It's not happening,
of the two of us, it's just in yeah, it's
not happening.

Speaker 5 (04:12):
We are.

Speaker 6 (04:13):
We're four minutes and fifty five seconds into the first
show of the week, after all this crap has happened,
and of the two of us, you should be demonstrably
far more angry than I am. And I'm pissed at
the Houston Astros, right, you should absolutely be livid that
you were saying the types of things you were all

(04:33):
leading up to the weekend.

Speaker 4 (04:35):
No, you had no reason to cover sports for a
few years. Yeah, but you had no reason too.

Speaker 3 (04:39):
But I know how, I'm not a doctor, although I
know a lot of doctors.

Speaker 4 (04:43):
I even know some of the team doctors for some
of this city.

Speaker 6 (04:46):
You even have an alter ego using your face on
social media.

Speaker 4 (04:49):
It's a doctor.

Speaker 3 (04:49):
It's probably out there somewhere there at a time there
was a fake doctor Wexler account, and we talk about
it all the time. I'm not a doctor, but I
play one on the radio. But the simplicity of what
we do know, he was hurt, he stopped playing. He
feels better. They tell you he feels better. Everything's pointing
to this. Well, what would point to him making a

(05:09):
return playing baseball with the hurt part of your body.
If he had a knee injury and he was running
the bases, I would take that as a sign that
he's passing steps. He's getting closer to returning. If he
has a hand injury, that's not allowing him to swing
well when he gets in the batter's box in front
of us, which he did on Friday, took swings in

(05:32):
the cage or Thursday, and then took swings against minor
league pitchers that they brought in special had him flown
in to see him on the field at Diykin Park
taking swings. They'd already told us about him taking these
steps behind closed doors. He's been in the cage. He's
doing this, He's swinging better, he's feeling better. I'm just
using my eyes in my brain, I don't know what's

(05:53):
wrong with him. That's what I'm most upset about. Because
this isn't the first time it's happened. I know you'll
hate this. I'm trying to wait as long as I
can before I say.

Speaker 6 (06:02):
Feel the bandid off because I'm already mad at my wife.
So let's just get it on today. What happened is ridiculous.
The way that they handled it is poor.

Speaker 3 (06:12):
Their idea that we didn't need imaging at so many
different steps along the way, no matter what the player said.
Very poor, incredibly bad decision making. Not the first time.
And I really could go on and on and on.
But since you said take the band aid, we're spit off.
What we didn't know for weeks, we now know. This

(06:32):
is the whole point of why. And it is obviously
very Kyle Tucker like. And I was like this then too.
Why is Jordan Alvarez not playing baseball because he has
a broken bone in his hand?

Speaker 4 (06:44):
He has a broken bone? End of sentence.

Speaker 3 (06:46):
Yes, he has a broken bone in his hand either
at whatever point in time they didn't go to find it.
All the reasons why are bad. Everything we're going to
talk about it for hours today on end, and we
welcome you into the conversation. You're part of it. But
I have my answer the answer that I'm you know,
nuts and bolts guy. I want to know why and
why what did I tell you that was so bad

(07:07):
about this injury to begin with? Why did I say
last week, just before this new information? When he comes back,
what's he gonna be the rest of the season a problem,
not for the other teams, for the Astros, because he's
gonna play three games, then he's gonna be hurt again.
Because he's gonna play two games, then he's gonna be
hurt again because they didn't have surgery. They didn't fix it,
even though something is so clearly wrong. You don't have

(07:30):
inflammation for a month on the same hands that you
never had surgery for in the first place, on unless
something is wrong and they just wouldn't say or had
not found even though well why would they find it.
They weren't looking for it. That's what imaging is for.

Speaker 4 (07:46):
But either way now we know the answer.

Speaker 6 (07:49):
Yeah, but either way the answer is unacceptable. You're talking
about a multi million dollar athlete on a team that
you yourselves, If no one else does fancies itself some
sort of if not a contender, then at least a
playoff contender, if you don't look at yourself as a
championship team anymore. I don't know what the inner workings

(08:10):
of the Astros think about their current roster. I would
say that, you know, given what we've been talking about,
I think that you know they're they're playing a whole
lot better than maybe we thought they would be at
this point, given how they started and the roster turnover,
which did include the aforementioned Tucker who used to have

(08:30):
a broken bone that was misdiagnosed or ignored or I
don't even know anymore.

Speaker 4 (08:36):
I'm tired of trying to figure it out.

Speaker 3 (08:38):
And there is a pretty to me and again not
knowing all the information, but I think Dana did a,
if accurate, gave a pretty good description of how this
particular one went. I do think there's a massive difference
in what's taken place with Kyle Tucker and jord On Alvarez.
Kyle Tucker's timeline for return was unaffected far as I

(09:00):
can tell by their inability to make it public or
find it on a time whenever they found out, Yes,
the fact is not a deep bone bruise.

Speaker 4 (09:08):
It is a fracture. It didn't impact his time.

Speaker 3 (09:11):
He wasn't doing things that made it break, that forced
him to miss more time, that slowed down the recovery.
We click, this is the weirdest thing to say. We
clearly have lack of clarity on did some of the
things that Jordan Alvarez did over the last month and
even the ten days prior to them even putting him
on the al and finally going to have imaging the

(09:34):
last forty five days were the things that he was doing,
continuing to try to play through it, continuing to try
to get better the last month. Did that make it worse?
Did it have it prevented from getting to one hundred
percent fixed? It's a sixty percent fracture. I have tried
it to that number. I really want to know that,
especially when he's again, we shouldn't be getting this information

(09:56):
from him solely.

Speaker 4 (09:57):
We should be getting it from the medical people.

Speaker 3 (09:59):
You would hope, But that to me, where I look
at both of these situations, and at least in that regard,
that's that is one significant difference.

Speaker 4 (10:06):
That's the that's the basics of it.

Speaker 3 (10:08):
Kyle Tucker got hurt on X day, and he returned
on Why Day and in between. I don't think he
did things that prevented his return from becoming Why minus
whatever number of days.

Speaker 4 (10:17):
That's fair.

Speaker 3 (10:18):
I can't say that with much confidence about Jordon Alvarez.

Speaker 6 (10:21):
Although that is fair for you to say, it doesn't
mean that it's true because I can't listen. You you
people out there that listen and get so upset about
the things that Chandler Rome says and tweets and puts
on video and on and N and N. And now
you're mad about Justin Verlander. You were mad about Kyle Tucker,
and now you're mad about Jordon Alvarez. What did he

(10:42):
say that was untrue? Trust is finite, right. You can
only have so much and be lied to or misled
or incompetenced.

Speaker 4 (10:53):
However you want to look at this so many.

Speaker 6 (10:54):
Times before there's a next major injury to a member
of the ASTROS organization. And I'm gonna say, I don't
believe you, like Ron Burgundy, I don't believe you.

Speaker 3 (11:03):
We we like we said. This is for your discussion
as well. We will hear from Dana Brown at length
next segment. Just to kind of put a baseline out
there of what he said over the weekend, get a
handle on where they stood at what time. And you know,
it was an extended timeline that he discussed. Johnny and
James and the others that want to get in here.
We'll hit our break here. We'll come back and bring
you into the conversation seven one three, two, one two five,

(11:24):
seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (11:25):
We have a lot to discuss.

Speaker 3 (11:27):
The Astros are still battling as they usually do for
best in the division. There is a huge logjam of
teams right outside the top two in the American League,
and your Houston Astros are in it absolutely today and
likely over the next one hundred games. This is going
to be a little bit different run to the end
of the season, and we're here for it.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
The a team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 7 (11:55):
It wasn't right.

Speaker 8 (11:57):
I mean, like I said, he felt good enough to
hit home run and drive the ball, but it just
didn't feel right for him. And so the good thing
is that there was no fluid or anything like that,
and so we were able to see this very small crash.

Speaker 4 (12:15):
There's a lot more from Dana.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
That was the end of a very long opening commentary
on this past weekend when he sat down with the
media once they had this information, after he'd swung the
bat with the minor leaguers pitching to him. We'll give
you an extended version of that momentarily. Wexay seeing Cole
here with you on the A team. Obviously, the baseball
itself was fifty to fifty over the four game series

(12:39):
with Tampa. It was seventy percent good over the ten
game homestand they won seven of the ten games. They
did not lose any of the three series that they played,
and they need to play well on the road, which
is something they still have not really done yet. They've
had a heavy slant towards the home portion of their
schedule as they hit the road for three games in Pittsburgh,
three games in Cleveland.

Speaker 4 (12:58):
Cleveland is basically the same as Houston.

Speaker 3 (13:01):
Their team, This team, three or four other teams in
the American League have all gotten off to roughly the
same start through sixty games, so these could turn out
to be very important games. They're three games to start
this road trip in Pittsburgh. A little bit different. Pirates
are already in who can we showcase in trade mode?
There are sixteen games under five hundred. The only player

(13:22):
that's clearly worth trading for he pitches tomorrow. Paul skeens
he is not going to be traded yet by the
Pittsburgh Pirates, but that will be a big challenge for
the Astros, and of course, as they come out of
a Hunter Brown start on Monday, they go into a
Lance mccullor's junior start. He gets the opening start of
this road trip tomorrow night in Pittsburgh, a little bit

(13:42):
early start time for each of the six games or
each of the four games during the week of this
road trip Tuesday through Friday, so we'll have Astros on
deck for you each and every day the remainder of
the week. Mention, we want to get you guys into
the conversations. Obviously pretty large news that the Astros had
this weekend regarding yourd On Alvarez, his stint on the
ten day will obviously be extended to an undetermined date,

(14:04):
been there since retroactively placed there on the third. He
did not help the Astros produce a huge uptick in
offense in May. He went zero for four in May
in his one game, and the rest of the offense
clearly picked things up pretty dramatically.

Speaker 4 (14:18):
In the second month of the season.

Speaker 3 (14:20):
We'll see what the third month of the season, much
of it, if not all of it without yord On
Alvarez in our future. But Johnny is there with us
and we appreciate you joining us. Johnny, Welcome into the show.
What do you have on your mind this afternoon?

Speaker 9 (14:33):
Well, I just was talking earlier and I must.

Speaker 10 (14:37):
Be really really in the minority here, but I mean
from the morning show through the afternoon show to you guys,
I mean, you guys, are I feel like you're wearing
out this yord On Alvarez thing.

Speaker 9 (14:48):
To me, it's a it's unemotional. First of all, it
is what it is. He got hurt in spring training.
They were let him get back at his pace. He
was telling the coach, which is when he wanted. He
felt like he felt better. They were on that progression,
and we got some news that hopefully he would be
playing pretty soon. He felt a tweet and you guys

(15:11):
are kind of making out like it's some conspiracy theory
that the Astros front office organization treats the local media
or it's fan base differently than other media markets. And
I think you guys know this better than I do.
Every professional franchise has the antithesis of supporting and telling
the truth as soon as they know it. There's not

(15:33):
a city in the world where they do that, especially
the big markets. So I just maybe I hear Adam
Clanton really emotional, and you should be so upset and
so mad, and we misrepresented a story. It just is
what it is, and so I'll hang up and listen.
But I just don't see the emphasis you guys are
putting on this.

Speaker 3 (15:50):
All right, Well, appreciate you joining us, happy to have
you involved in more of the back and forth, but
you can hang up and listen. There's a bunch of
different ways to take what you said, and I'll take
it this way.

Speaker 4 (16:00):
I'm not I'm personally not upset.

Speaker 11 (16:02):
I don't.

Speaker 3 (16:03):
I don't hope it didn't come across like I'm mad
at them because I looked bad. I'm just telling you
without the information I'm I don't. I don't feel like
I look bad at all. I really don't. I'm just
telling you here are the reasons why I said things
that obviously turned out to know the bad case. You
look misled like everybody else, and the problem the misleading.
Part of that's that's a again the way I'm describing it.

(16:26):
All I was misled by was their process, which I
can't believe they allowed to happen now in hindsight because
I don't have the information, but they did. What I'm
talking about is, how could you let this player go
this long and really treat him like his name was
doctor Alvarez. That's not how major league sports franchises I

(16:47):
don't believe should operate. You have to listen to the player, obviously,
but you can't not go to the doctor. You can't
allow the player to say and when you That's why
I want to hear more from Dana so you guys
can understand what he's now telling us, because his timeline
of it just screams of how can you hear this
from the player? How can you see what's taking place

(17:10):
and know his history and not go to more imaging
another doctor, a fifth opinion anything. You're really just not
doing any of the things that seems so obvious. Yeah,
any sports team who is when I get sick, I
don't I'm not liking a player. They get fluids, they
get treatment, they get treatment during the game, they do everything.

(17:32):
They can to get back on the field. They have
access to everything when they have a minor ailment on
a Friday night, randomly, like a Texans player, like they
have people they can call that I can't call, that
you can't call that Johnny can't call.

Speaker 4 (17:45):
They have the best medical they get immediate.

Speaker 3 (17:47):
Attention, and sometimes, like Kate Stover this last year with
the Texans, he had an emergency appendectomy pretty much only
because he has access to NFL medical people at the
blink of an eye, at the one number dial. And
that's what Again, this was not an emergency situation with
jordn No. But I'm literally trying not to overreact to this.

(18:10):
It strikes me as odd that it feels I shouldn't
feel okay to anybody that this is not a new
issue with this team they've had. And I don't care
about the public stuff. You guys have heard me argue
with Adam about this so many times over. It's more
about you guys have got to do a better job
for your players, I think, to make sure they can

(18:30):
get back on the field sooner that they aren't forced
back on the field too soon.

Speaker 4 (18:35):
And this is when we would.

Speaker 3 (18:36):
Start talking about all the other players that they've obviously acknowledged.
James Click acknowledged we did it wrong as a medical
staff with Jake Myers. Dana Brown admitted it, we did
it wrong with JP France as a medical staff, and
each one of these individual injuries is clearly different, but
the team and their process isn't. And this has happened multiple.

Speaker 6 (18:57):
That's why if Johnny wants to call me a emotional,
that's fine. I call it unaccepting of incompetence because there's
been one constant through three GMS now with these injuries
we've been talking about, and that's the medical staff, and
that's the training staff, and that's how they go about things.
So if you want to say that makes me emotional,
that's fine. But according to your logic, Johnny, if you

(19:21):
had something.

Speaker 3 (19:21):
Wrong, you had some physical ailment, or you're you know,
waking up in the morning and you're.

Speaker 4 (19:27):
Peeing blood, eh, you know, it just is what it is.

Speaker 3 (19:30):
Man.

Speaker 6 (19:30):
You don't go to the doctor. You don't need to
get it checked out. Oh you have stage four prostate cancer.
But it is what it is according to Johnny. Thank
God you're not my doctor, Johnny.

Speaker 3 (19:40):
Because what you call emotional, I call the exact opposite
of accepting incompetence, and that's what this has been.

Speaker 6 (19:47):
I see people all weekend long. Well, this doesn't sound
like lying. It sounds like incredible incompetence. He took live
BP on a fractured hand that they didn't know about.
I have other people saying respectfully, and like Steve and
the LC says respectfully, perhaps they knew know what's going
on and just didn't choose to disclose such information because

(20:09):
they don't have to. We aren't entitled to all of
that information. Well, to people like Steve, I would say
this if this were the first time and not the
fourth fifth I've lost count. You just mentioned JP France,
I mentioned justin Verlander last year, it was Kyle Tucker.
Jake Myers took like two years to come back because
they kept screwing it up.

Speaker 4 (20:30):
I don't even really care about the process.

Speaker 6 (20:33):
All I know is that the result is the same
every single time, and this is the latest example of that.
So if they want to get mad at me for
pointing that out, if they would to get mad at
Chandler Rome for pointing this out, or if Johnny wants
to call me emotional about it, that's fine.

Speaker 4 (20:46):
I'm not the one on the wrong here, you guys are.

Speaker 3 (20:49):
Yeah, it's not about some of the again public information,
because that is accurate and it's no different than the
football side of it during the off season.

Speaker 4 (20:58):
Like CJ.

Speaker 3 (20:58):
Strout's not throwing the football. Clearly there's a reason, and
I have my doubts that it's he. They don't want
him throwing in late May now early June. Why not
like right now, because clearly something is wrong, But they're
under no obligation to tell us, just like you can
claim that the major league teams who only have an

(21:19):
injury report when you're on it, they don't have to
give you an injury update on players that are in
the lineup on the roster, even players that are now
on the i L.

Speaker 2 (21:29):
That's it.

Speaker 4 (21:29):
He's on the il. We don't need to update you
on that.

Speaker 3 (21:31):
What you're getting to that is this is why I
think people want to call into question how they're doing things,
because I think most believe there's something they're missing, something,
something's not adding up something. The path to get to
where you want to go, which is a healthy player,
you're not taking the right path on that, and that
is what you said about taking BP, and then Stevens suggesting, well,
maybe they didn't tell you because they didn't know, or

(21:54):
maybe they don't have to tell you, or maybe they
didn't want to prevent. Why would they not want Why
would they want yourd on Alvae to take VP on
Thursday on the field and then again on Friday on
the field if they knew he had a sixty percent
fracture in his or a forty percent fracture. That's sixty
percent healed in the fourth metacarpoal in his hand, they

(22:15):
wouldn't historical question, you would not I don't think that's
any path to getting him back by saying, well, can
he play through this sixty percent? I don't think that.
I don't think that's how you would do it. I'm again,
I'm not a doctor, but that doesn't make any sense.
And we all know I'm being super nice saying there's
no reason for it. You would wait till it's first
can he.

Speaker 4 (22:34):
Play through it?

Speaker 1 (22:36):
Sure?

Speaker 4 (22:37):
The game against the Rays on Saturday was not Game
seven of the World Series. It's a random game in
the middle of a season which you have a chance
to be in the postseason, have a chance to win
the division to have a chance to be among the
final twelve teams, the final eight teams, whatever number you
want to say. So getting him and the rest of
the team to that point, when you watch the first

(22:57):
month of his season be one of the worst stretches
of his career, likely as Dana described with his timeline,
which we'll share with you, well, they clearly were related. Well,
and here's the thing.

Speaker 6 (23:09):
It opens you up to more scrutiny, which again, according
to these something people like Johnny, people like Steve, it's
not your right, it's not your right to know. You
don't have to know. Okay, but here's the thing. You're
also asking us to trust. The fact that Lance mccullor
is taking nearly, you know, two and a half years
to come back was all because he wasn't right. He
had to go back and have another procedure. You trust

(23:31):
this same medical staff to give you the best treatment
and the best timeline to getting back to throwing for
Luis Garcia and Christian Xavier and people who aren't back yet.

Speaker 3 (23:40):
Because I don't now, and why should I. You know,
you don't owe me anything.

Speaker 6 (23:43):
I also don't owe you the trust that you supposedly
think I should have in you because you have a
medical professional license or doctorate or whatever.

Speaker 4 (23:51):
I don't have to do that either. It goes both ways.

Speaker 3 (23:53):
So again, if you want to say I'm emotional about it, well,
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (23:56):
Call me crazy.

Speaker 6 (23:57):
I don't like being lied to by a sports about
some of the most prominent players on the roster when
they have gross incompetence and it's it's like easy for
everybody to see who has open eyes to it.

Speaker 3 (24:09):
Yeah, I'll try to make it a little more of
the focus on this particular injury because it's much more
close to us time wise and the timeline provided to us,
which we will do starting a little bit later. We'll
give a little pause to this because we've made it
halfway through our number one. He's we got to hit
the best of X. Next, we'll hear from Dana Brown
shortly at length as he walks through things that went

(24:32):
down to get to where they were Saturday when they divulge,
there is a fracture in that hand for your Don Alvarez.

Speaker 1 (24:39):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (24:46):
Did you all see this putting out?

Speaker 12 (24:48):
Between five and fifteen posts, four hundred people were arrested
for things that they said on social media.

Speaker 4 (24:54):
History repeats itself. Type Bengals succeed ever doubt.

Speaker 2 (25:00):
You're the one to pus no one.

Speaker 4 (25:03):
You're the best. Nothing's gonna ever top you know, yo, the.

Speaker 3 (25:09):
Best posting ever seen.

Speaker 13 (25:12):
Mole Day.

Speaker 4 (25:13):
You know you're the.

Speaker 3 (25:14):
Best, the breaking the entire engine. So much good stuff
here and we appreciate you kind of getting us off
and running here on a Monday edition of The A Team,
our first show of month six in twenty twenty five.

Speaker 4 (25:34):
What do you got planned for June?

Speaker 3 (25:35):
Wex They're so fun, they just go by so quickly.
Always some good dramatic topics to discuss. I got some big,
big plans for June. We'll learn about what it's gonna
take for you know, the Rockets to say, all right,
one of our core players is gonna have to go
for somebody else to come on it or not.

Speaker 6 (25:53):
It's draft month. I bet they don't use that pick.

Speaker 3 (25:56):
It's draft month for the Texans or for the Rockets.
It's the last of the off season program for the Texans.
Mini camp this week not mandatory, voluntary. I keep saying
minicamp OTAs this week like last week, which is voluntary,
though only in the attendance portion of it. Next week theyrendatory, Well,

(26:19):
we were talking about that at length during the break.
It is what it is. Portion of it is is
what I.

Speaker 4 (26:25):
Like about it. We know the information now.

Speaker 11 (26:28):
Now.

Speaker 3 (26:29):
The bad part about it is it's only now that
they have the information, and it's how you got to
Why is it only now because they didn't have the
doctors involved at points that seem so obvious to have
them involved. But I don't know how many people were
best of exiting this conversation.

Speaker 6 (26:48):
And people like to go through life just blind. It's
more comforting. Ignorance is bliss.

Speaker 3 (26:53):
You know, method to the madness, your your path to it,
and justifies the means.

Speaker 4 (26:58):
There's all sorts of ayngs to it. I don't go
to the doctor. I don't need to see thold people.

Speaker 3 (27:03):
But there's probably more reason to it. Uh, you gotta
it's ok It's okay to to question things, and it's
okay to discuss things and not just all right, moving
on astros a lot.

Speaker 4 (27:15):
You know, well, people clearly.

Speaker 3 (27:18):
Question They literally, I mean now I can use that word.
They literally question the government. Do they not how many
briefings a week do they have when they're questioning the person,
they get to ask questions.

Speaker 6 (27:27):
People like Johnny probably think that if you do question
the government, you're just a conspiracy theorist, when really you
just want to know some answers.

Speaker 4 (27:34):
Yeah, you want what where things at? What information do
you have? There's how much taxes we're going to take
out of your account every month, somewhat like the government.
There there are no they don't have to give you.

Speaker 3 (27:43):
I don't know why the astros are not obligated to
give this information. And that is one other point. Best
of X, best of callers, we can all mix it together.
Johnny is our best caller today by far thus far.
So they aren't obligated to give you that information, and
that's something that he brought up.

Speaker 4 (28:02):
It's not untrue.

Speaker 3 (28:05):
Teams are not obligated in you know, different sports and
different issues. Will stick to baseball here, they're not obligated
to give it to But by no means are they
like the other twenty nine teams. Some teams are like
Houston and give very little information out, and some teams
are not like Houston and they give you access to
the people that have it, you know, the medical staff

(28:26):
or performance people, doctors that are on staff there and
or they also issue information, send out releases on a
regular basis or specific to the player. Updating you is
on their status. They are not obligated to do that,
but it allows in their mind. I would think, well,
this prevents the other people involved, the twenty five other

(28:47):
teammates and the frontmen for our organization, the manager and
the general manager, Well they don't have to get these
questions all the time. I mean, Dana Brown comes on
with the Sean Salisbury Show every Wednesday morning. Brown goes
on ASTROS Radio every Sunday afternoon. And for those of you,
and we appreciate you those that listen to that on
a regular basis, the vast majority of it is injury updates,

(29:11):
not what else are you looking at? Where can you
augment the roster? What you've just signed this player and
you brought this minor leaguer in, and what's the progress
of Bryce Matthews or Melton or any of the other players.
It's more about can you get us an update on
Zach Decenzo, what's going on with Shae Whitcomb. Will you
mentioned stuff about jord On Alvarez. I understand Luis Garcia
is at this point where do things stand with Christian hobby.

(29:31):
I mean, it's just a parade of that. And if
those pieces of information are just flat out typed up
and posted, sent out, sent to media, posted on their
PR site, there's a lot of different ways you can
do it. And again they are not obligated to do it,
but that would be one way to keep your general
manager and manager from constantly, only and repeatedly, because of necessity,

(29:55):
being asked about those things which they may or may
not really have the final information on. They're not the
Joe Spots wake up and go throughout his day on
a day game is not all right. I'm gonna wake
up today and all I'm going to focus on is
yord On Alvarez's health. He has other things to do.
He's the manager of the baseball team. Jord On Alvarez
is not among the players he can use today. He's
on the injured list.

Speaker 6 (30:16):
Since this is Best of X and we're talking about
injuries and what Chandler Rome puts on social media, among
other things, I thought I'd put it all together because
this is a nice concise, put a bow on it.
Example of all of these things wrapped up in one
hilarious tweet right around three zero five yesterday, And you
probably remember this point in the game. Curtis Mead just
lost his bat on a swing and it nearly hit Orbit.

(30:38):
The last thing anyone needs is discomfort to Orbit.

Speaker 4 (30:42):
That's good stuff right there. That was from Chandler. M hm.
It was met with a quote tweet that one.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
Uh, well, there are several, but I a very specific one.
It's from a handle that I think most of you know.
It's at Orbit Astros uh huh. And it's a picture
of Orbit hugging Chandler Rome at a bar. He must
have been making an appearance.

Speaker 6 (31:08):
Well, he probably was a lot happier than Chandler during
that photo than he was during the video when they
showed him throwing his hat at Curtis behind the safety nets.

Speaker 3 (31:16):
Both Orbit Permanently and Chandler in this photo only are
smiling and he quote sweeted it and saying, oh him
so sweet he is?

Speaker 4 (31:27):
He is? They're both sweethearts. You just got to get
to know both of them. Yeah, it was.

Speaker 3 (31:30):
Well, it was an interesting weekend for the Rays above
and beyond the mashing the Astros bullpen twice not being
able to hit either of the Astros' aces, and he
even win the series and then go with the helmet
tap in the ninth inning of the finale yesterday.

Speaker 6 (31:48):
You know what, I want to get to that next
segment because I feel like I will be out of
character for me and I'm going to come to the
defense of an opposing ball player against the Houston Sports franchise.
We'll do that when we return and keep complaining about
all this stuff that we can't control here on.

Speaker 1 (32:07):
The eighteen, the eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety, Will
drows her.

Speaker 4 (32:19):
The loose today seeves my life, all right?

Speaker 6 (32:25):
So you brought something up that'll give us a nice
reprieve from all of the Oh, are you being so
mean to the Astros?

Speaker 4 (32:31):
I'm Johnny? What that was my impression of him? What?

Speaker 6 (32:35):
He's perfectly pleasant. You said it yourself. He was our
best caller today, seven one, three ninety. Rank you guys,
we do today?

Speaker 4 (32:43):
I do. I rank you. I will rank you today.
I will judge you. We've done it every show in June,
all one of them. That's the thing.

Speaker 6 (32:51):
If you can judge how I react to something, I
can judge what you sound like when you call into
this show and say it is what it is.

Speaker 4 (32:58):
You can judge us. There's three of us. It is
what gonna come in third.

Speaker 6 (33:00):
That's the funniest thing ever. If you just think about
that phrase. Sorry, Matt Thomas, here we go. I'm going
in on you. If you just think about that phrase,
first of all, it makes nose.

Speaker 4 (33:09):
It's fine.

Speaker 6 (33:09):
That's a better phrase, because it is fine. It's fine
e the way. There's nothing you can do. But it
is what it is. No, just it is. That's the phrase.
That's what it should be. Not it is what it is.
That's redundant. And if you're talking about an injury like this,
it's not it is what it is. Now you're talking
about we have to go through this whole crap again.
When's he coming back? We don't know, but it is
where it is.

Speaker 4 (33:29):
Just gotta deal with it. I don't want to just
deal with it though. I think the hope is.

Speaker 3 (33:34):
He will get the necessary X rays, imaging whatever they
need to see the fracture, small fracture and the metacarpal
fourth on his right hand, and they'll be able to
say it appears to have healed, and he feels like
he can do some things, and we're gonna have him,
you know, go about baseball activities because we can tell

(33:56):
you because we went in and looked, because we have
doctors on staff, and we did the things we should
do to to mark the progress of an injury situation.

Speaker 4 (34:07):
And now he's healthy.

Speaker 3 (34:08):
And to me, all this other nonsense aside, break away
all the garbage. The simple part of it is, I
just I am having a hard time with the lack
of medical involvement. This we can pull old Joe as
spot a sound he can play when he tells us
he'll be out there when he says he's ready, because

(34:28):
that's literally what they were doing, or John was acting
as his and it's okay to get the player's input.
How is it feeling? Where does it hurt? What is
better now than it was a week ago or a
week before that? That's great, that's the patient. Where's the doctor?
Let me ask you this. We're not gonna get to
Taylor Wolves.

Speaker 14 (34:47):
Why not?

Speaker 6 (34:48):
Because if you're Dana Brown, you too should be upset
at what you have been made to look like in
this whole scenario. Because if it weren't for and I
don't look, I don't know who decision it was, but
it sure looks like if we're just oversimplifying because we
have to because we're not giving given any more information.

(35:08):
If this were up to Jordon, like just think about
that concept in and of itself. Think about if it's
up to any athlete. I mean, Michael Jordan was trying
to play on a broken foot too soon in his
second year in the NBA, and they if you've watched
the last dance, you know how much went into that decision.
You were told, okay, you will have this minute restriction

(35:29):
and they're pulling him off the floor. And you know,
because he takes everything personally, how competitive that guy is.
But with just any run of the mill athlete, they're
not gonna not want to play. Of course, Jordon wanted
to be swinging the bat and going out there. It
doesn't feel great, but just you know.

Speaker 3 (35:45):
He didn't want to play with a broken hand, right,
He wanted to play with a healed muscle strain.

Speaker 4 (35:51):
Right.

Speaker 6 (35:52):
But that's what we're getting at because they were a
mission diagnosed for the second year in a row. A
broken bone wasn't found, or we're led to believe it
wasn't found until later in the process of this particular
fill in the blank player healing to try and get
back to play.

Speaker 4 (36:08):
This is two straight years we're dealing with this.

Speaker 3 (36:10):
Sounds embarrassed to finalize your Matt Thomas segment.

Speaker 4 (36:14):
It is what it is.

Speaker 3 (36:14):
You're basically just saying they need to clean the lens.

Speaker 6 (36:18):
Yes, when you're going to take pictures for social media
and then post them with your name on them, don't
make it look like you're underwater.

Speaker 3 (36:27):
The machine was unable to sift through the inflammation and
the swelling and other things that were there.

Speaker 4 (36:37):
That's all we're saying. It's simple stuff. It is what
it is.

Speaker 3 (36:40):
It was an injection in yesterday's game. We'll get to
that at some point. It was something that I imagine
we're going to be on different sides of. Since you
say you're backing the player, that's very interesting.

Speaker 6 (36:50):
Well, I'm backing the initial I understand why he didn't
get the call wrong. Well, that's true. You just said
it right there. We don't even have to go any
further after that. If what he was supposedly hinting at
in the eyes of the officials already.

Speaker 4 (37:07):
Well you know, it's up for interpretation.

Speaker 6 (37:09):
Unfortunately, the only guy that can throw people out interpreted
it one way and if look, if he was doing that,
I'm not even mad at him. He's right, get the
call right, and I don't have to erupt. Like Mount Vesuvius.

Speaker 4 (37:21):
Didn't erupt over the call being wrong.

Speaker 6 (37:22):
He got he erupted because after the call was wrong,
the official did what all bad officials do. They get
the call wrong and then they throw the player out
for protesting.

Speaker 4 (37:32):
He wasn't protesting, Oh he wasn't.

Speaker 3 (37:34):
He was already ready to continue his bat until he
did something that they've been expressly told.

Speaker 4 (37:38):
Not to do. What tell him to clean his eyes?

Speaker 3 (37:41):
When managers come out to argue, and the umpires like,
don't come out here.

Speaker 4 (37:45):
Don't do it, don't come out here. Oh you did
come out here, You're gone.

Speaker 6 (37:49):
I did like the fact that Kevin Cash kind of
tried to push him aside, like I got this, I'll
get thrown out too late. Look, it's this is this
is why people like me get so incensed about that
particular line of events happening.

Speaker 3 (38:07):
Don't compound the fact that you're bad at your job.

Speaker 6 (38:10):
While, by the way, there's technology that could improve what
you do, too bad. The players don't want to I'm
sitting here in a radio station where AI is threatening
jobs all over the place.

Speaker 4 (38:21):
Why should I be any different?

Speaker 6 (38:23):
I mean this, this umpire is clearly just insecure about
the fact that a computer can do his job better
than he can.

Speaker 3 (38:29):
Let Walls be mad at him, He let him yell
at him, He let him be frustrated with him, and
he was ready to continue bat with no harm.

Speaker 4 (38:36):
No fouls, yelling until he was thrown out. Uh, that's
that's probably a parable. You raise your voice.

Speaker 3 (38:43):
I was yelling again, up for interpretation, just like his
stupid zone. It was a gift to Josh hater the astros.

Speaker 6 (38:53):
Yes again, I'm i him on the side of an
opposing astro or opposing player to the astros.

Speaker 4 (38:59):
That's a strike. One didn't have to be. I love see.
That's tk's way of saying he sucks. That's what that was.

Speaker 3 (39:05):
I've listened to enough others out there. That's a very
common phrase said by broadcasters. Didn't have to be trying
to be nice about how it went down, and totally understandable.
As promised Dana Brown's lengthy explanation about where things are,
we will have other things to discuss, we promise you
can join us.

Speaker 1 (39:24):
Next the A Team on Sports Talk seven ninety two
lifelong Houston sports guys named Adam Talking Your Team's Adam
Clinton and Adam Wexler are the A team.

Speaker 4 (39:53):
Deep Breath, Houston. It is the A team.

Speaker 6 (39:56):
Sports Talks seven to ninety three o'clock hour underway and
now the simulcast has begun over on Space City Home Network.
We are taking you until six o'clock tonight. Astros with
the day off, and maybe that's a good thing. The
dust can settle after both on and off the field.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Drama.

Speaker 3 (40:18):
I did some of the work statistically speaking on how
ridiculous that weekend was.

Speaker 4 (40:25):
Keep this in mind.

Speaker 3 (40:25):
The Rays and the Astros and a host of other
teams in the American League brought this up an hour
number one and really never explained it. Astros are a
half game back of the division leading Seattle Mariners.

Speaker 4 (40:39):
Astros are thirty two and twenty seven.

Speaker 3 (40:40):
Mariners got a second walk off in as many days yesterday.
They're thirty two and twenty six. The standings in the
American League after the three division winners technically including the
same record because there's no difference. They just happen to
be a three seed because they are a division leader.
Other base no difference between a bunch of teams. The

(41:02):
Astros are among those teams the Guardians, Astros, Twins, Jays, Royals, Rays,
six teams each separated by exactly one half game. From
thirty two to twenty six down to thirty and twenty nine.
Only two and a half game separates those six. Obviously
a half game each. The Astros on the correct side

(41:25):
of the wild card picture, and that they are right
behind the Guardians, who are one of the two cities.
One of the two teams they will face on this
six game road trip. The Rays are at the bottom
end of that. The Rays are one game over the
thirty and twenty nine. They have the third best run
differential in the American League at forty one runs on
the plus side. More than half of their plus forty

(41:49):
one came Thursday through Sunday against the Houston Astros, more
than half of their season long plus side of their
run differential. They outscored the rest of Major League Baseball
by twenty runs in all of their other games combined.
They outscored the Astros by twenty one runs in four days,

(42:11):
sixteen to three victory a thirteen to three victory even
had a run taken off the board after a review
when the Cabriira home run was deemed to have remained
in the ballpark or else it would have been a
plus twenty two. But why Do I Love Baseball? Chapter
one billion was written over those four days they split

(42:33):
the series, one of the best games you'll see pitched
all season, especially after the second pitch was thrown by
from ber Valdez. Eighty one pitches, twenty seven outs and
no trouble after it was won nothing two pitches into
the game.

Speaker 4 (42:47):
He got the complete game.

Speaker 3 (42:49):
They did score the necessary run thanks to Yainor Diaz,
making it a two to one win real quick.

Speaker 4 (42:54):
That was good Fromber just to pish you off.

Speaker 3 (42:56):
Well, that's the thing is as long as he gives
those other games where he's not awesome and for a
month he's been awesome.

Speaker 4 (43:02):
Yeah, there's bad this year.

Speaker 3 (43:04):
There's not a bad Hunter. He's had a couple of
not awesome outings. But he's had nine quality starts in
his ten appearance or his twelve appearances ZR. Now at
three to one two, they really had a chance to
win almost every time he pitched this past month, and
then a Hunter Brown yesterday without his best execution, you know,
and listening to him talk about his stuff, it didn't

(43:25):
sound like he was displeased with the quality of his
pitch arsenal and that they were so bad. He just
wasn't executing them in the zone. That's why he walked
for guys. That's why he kept opening up hitters with
one oh two oher counts because he kept trying to
bring in some of his soft stuff and it just
wasn't bending into the plate. He wasn't complaining about the umpiring.

(43:45):
They weren't strikes, and he just wasn't quite executing the
way he wanted to. And yet he left the mound
having allowed one hit and no runs over six innings.
If that's not a sure sign of an elite pitcher,
I don't know what it is. He did not have
the best type of day and the other team couldn't
do anything with him. There's almost no hard contact. And

(44:07):
in yesterday's game, unlike the two games where they asked
their bullpen to pitch this series preceding it, other bullpen
did their job. Brian King got a couple of outs,
Brian o'brah came in to clean up the end of
the seventh. He got into his usual trouble in the
eighth when he walked a bat her on four pitches,
but had no trouble getting out of the inning, especially
since the positioning of Esak Perettis was brilliant on the

(44:31):
line drive with two outs that nearly was an inning
ending double play, and Josh Hater was not in any
danger in the ninth inning. He was just part of
the drama of the game. And that what we were
talking about with Taylor Walls, well that occurred. Well, Josh
Hater was out there. Fifteen save opportunities for Josh, fifteen
converted saves for. They are twenty two and twelve at home.

(44:52):
They started two and four. They're twenty and eight in
their last twenty eight games at dyke And Park. They're
going to win a lot of games when they play
at home. They need to do something about being ten
and fifteen away from Dyke In Park. There's basically four
teams in the American League with awful road records. One
belongs to an awful White Sox team, one belongs to

(45:14):
an awful Orioles team. One belongs to the other team
in Texas and one belongs to the Astros. If it
doesn't get fixed by Houston, it is going to be
very difficult for them to win the division and maintain
a wild card spot. They don't have to be a
bunch of games over five hundred, but they can't be
this bad. They need to win more than forty percent

(45:35):
of their road games, which is what they're currently doing.

Speaker 4 (45:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (45:38):
Well, by the way, you're talking about something that is
the one billionth reason why you love baseball you just
never know.

Speaker 4 (45:48):
Yeah, well, did you love it? It doesn't make sense sometimes
for the same reasons.

Speaker 6 (45:51):
Did you love it when they couldn't win a home
game in twenty nineteen or twenty twenty three in the
World Series and ALCS, respectively, Because that's the same principle
we're talking about.

Speaker 3 (46:01):
I only didn't like it because the players helped promote
the idea that the reason we didn't like it and
the reason they couldn't win at home was because of
the batter's I well, yeah, that was just come on
now that again, this goes back.

Speaker 6 (46:16):
To just some of the for a run of dominance
and winning in general, even if it wasn't dominant winning
that the Astros had been on for the better part
of the last decade or so.

Speaker 4 (46:29):
Just some of the weirdest things to come out from this,
for sure, and all that.

Speaker 3 (46:33):
You know, it was painful in both instances when they
couldn't win a World Series because they weren't able to
win a home game, was really painful in the first
time that it happened, and that they went to Washington
and destroyed three non competitive blowouts to turn a series.
You were down two games to none into a series.
You were riding the happiest flight of all time.

Speaker 6 (46:53):
One of those that used dominant rookie performance by jose Urkeaty.

Speaker 4 (46:57):
They were just great.

Speaker 3 (46:57):
Their offense was great, and their defense or their pitching
was sensational. And then they couldn't win here. They had
just won a World Series at Dodger Stadium. What they
do in game seven, obviously they won. What they do
in game six, what they do in game two, I mean,
it happens. It's why it's different than every other sport.

Speaker 6 (47:15):
Should have won Game six. And I was at that game. Actually, no, yeah,
I was at that game. It's two three two.

Speaker 4 (47:21):
I forgot. They should have won that night.

Speaker 6 (47:23):
George Springer's early home run Justin Verlander was good until
he Wasn't.

Speaker 4 (47:27):
She see George Springer this weekend? I know I should
be so.

Speaker 3 (47:31):
A fairly famous viral softball video has been making the
rounds for years. This player reached third base safely. It
was a young player, a girl, not a college softball player,
a younger player, and she was very excited so as
she stood up, so he jumped up and down, was
cheering for herself and in front of her teammates. All
these smart third basemen who had the yellow ball well

(47:53):
tagged her. Because when you jump up, your feet leave
the ground or in this case, the base. I didn't
think i'd ever see it again at George Springer did
that this weekend and was called out upon review because
of it. He was happy he jumped up off of
the base.

Speaker 4 (48:09):
Were they at least leading at the time.

Speaker 3 (48:10):
They didn't need that run they had, They've been killing
it offensively, so it was yeah, it is what it is.

Speaker 4 (48:19):
It's fine. Which fun do you like better? When Matt
says it, I don't spends what the context is. What
were we talking about?

Speaker 3 (48:25):
Do I want the conversation to continue? Do I really
want more from you? We need more discussion. I don't
want to hear it's fine.

Speaker 4 (48:32):
I don't hear.

Speaker 6 (48:32):
That that's the best part about it, though it's not.
He's ambivalent, he doesn't carry it away. He's ready to
move on, or you're always ready to move on? How
can you not like that? Oh, maybe I'll start using
it unbelievable? All right, So again after I know you've
kind of alluded to this, but it sounds to me

(48:54):
like it's fine for you with this whole injury situation,
because now you know like we've gotten to the end game.
But again, how we've gotten there. I have a much
bigger problem with when it comes to the astros.

Speaker 3 (49:08):
Let's say what what Morgan thinks about it? Seven one
three five seven ninety Morgan joining us here on the
A team. If you would call punch him up so
we could speak.

Speaker 4 (49:17):
With him, all right, I'll do it. Let's see. Hey, Hey,
what's going on? Morgan?

Speaker 11 (49:24):
Hey guys, Hey, man, I'm so happy, man I.

Speaker 7 (49:29):
Call.

Speaker 11 (49:29):
I talked to Sean sometime and man, so the first
time I've talked to you guys.

Speaker 4 (49:34):
Man's welcome here. Have a great show.

Speaker 11 (49:37):
I'd like to say, Oh, I had him planning, Uh,
this is a personal confession. You used to just get
on my nurse man. Right, I'm like, I used to
be like with this guy. Well he just shut up
to stop talking.

Speaker 4 (49:57):
But you're like my wife. You grew on you know, man,
you grew on me?

Speaker 11 (50:03):
Man, and I really did.

Speaker 4 (50:05):
Can I can I ask you a question about that? Yes, sir? Yes, sir?
What was it that made me grow on you?

Speaker 15 (50:14):
Oh?

Speaker 11 (50:16):
I knew that you were you were genuine. You know,
I knew that I after a while I could tell
you wasn't just showing it for a fact.

Speaker 4 (50:26):
That's just the.

Speaker 11 (50:27):
Kind of like the way you know, the way you are.
So that's that's that's the way I That's what I thought.

Speaker 6 (50:33):
See, if we can get my wife to say that,
then everything's gonna be.

Speaker 4 (50:36):
It's just the way I am.

Speaker 5 (50:37):
Man.

Speaker 7 (50:39):
Yeah, yeah, I mean you grew on me.

Speaker 11 (50:41):
I was like, I was like, Oh, this cad, that's
just kind of how he is. I was like, Okay, I'm.

Speaker 12 (50:46):
Gonna leave him alone.

Speaker 4 (50:47):
But what I.

Speaker 11 (50:48):
Want to say is that as far as you're done,
and I'm to get you guys opinion on this, I'm
gonna just say it.

Speaker 4 (50:57):
It seems like to me.

Speaker 11 (50:58):
This guy that he's just like injury problem maybe. Oh
and so I had a question, what is it possible
that when he comes back that he could just only
be a designated hitter, you know, and and Sony, you

(51:19):
won't get hurt so much. So what do you guys
think about that?

Speaker 3 (51:23):
First of all, we have to address you, Morgan, and
we will do that on the other side a little
bit past the break here, So our thoughts on yard
On and our thoughts on are new best caller of
the day coming back here on the eighteen.

Speaker 2 (51:35):
The age on Sports Talk seventeen.

Speaker 4 (51:41):
Lots to discuss.

Speaker 3 (51:44):
Most immediately, some thoughts about what are last caller shared
with us? Jord On Alvarez related Yes, a popular topic today.
I'm sure sometime before tonight's game one of the I'm
sorry tomorrow night's game, I'm sorry Wednesday night's game one. Nope,
we had a couple of days before we gets to
Game one of the NBA Finals and if it goes
the distance, and do you know how.

Speaker 6 (52:06):
A long time I am that the two markets in
this finals are Indianapolis and Oklahoma City.

Speaker 4 (52:12):
Just from the standpoint.

Speaker 6 (52:13):
Of if they end up having a great series, like
aesthetically it maybe it doesn't go the distance, but whatever,
they go six games even, but if it's a well played,
entertaining series, yet the ratings aren't what the NBA would like,
it's not going to matter to the league office.

Speaker 4 (52:33):
And you and I both know that.

Speaker 3 (52:35):
The NBA's age of dynasties is over. Will that hurt
its business? A small market finals, That's what this entire
article is written about. I figured it would come up today.
We don't have to necessarily get into it.

Speaker 14 (52:47):
Now.

Speaker 3 (52:47):
Written by somebody we know, So Ramona no, somebody we know,
and like.

Speaker 6 (52:53):
We know that because we know it's not her, because
if the Lakers aren't involved, it basically doesn't exist.

Speaker 3 (52:59):
Now someone we know because they covered Houston Sports for
a short period of their writing career. As we head
into a small market NBA finals week, here's a story
I wrote last week about what this means for the league.
Is it actually bad for business? Which is essentially exactly
what we're talking about. So she's covered the Texans and
then she covered the NBA, and then obviously this written

(53:20):
about the.

Speaker 4 (53:21):
NBA got her name on the tip of my tongue
and I can't think of it.

Speaker 3 (53:24):
Just say Tanya Gang there we go, So we'll get
to that maybe when we get to the finals themselves.
Heavy heavy favorites are the Oklahoma City Thunder. The one
game we had this weekend was kind of entertaining until
midway early portion of the fourth quarter. Nicks just didn't
have enough to keep up basically with the Pacers. They

(53:44):
couldn't get any stops, and that was kind of the
story of most of the games they lost, even the
game that turned the whole series around, when they literally
couldn't get any stops at the end of a game
they had a huge lead in in the fourth quarter,
ultimately lost in overtime, and I don't really think they
truly ever recovered even though they extended the series two
to six games. It's New York, so of course the
question is about how badly they're doing, how badly this

(54:08):
team is put together, how they have the wrong coach.
All of that comes up immediately after the game. The
last question to Jalen Brunson was a tibbs is he
the right guy caliber question. He answered it politely and
it's like, come on, man, and put the mic down
and walked off. Although he spent plenty of time with
the media it's maybe something you'd see in many places.

(54:30):
The Knicks have been trying to get further than this
clearly for decades. Well, they've been just trying to get
this far for decades. You can surely look at your franchise,
all twenty eight teams currently, and we'll add one name
to the list in a couple of weeks and think, yeah,
we can probably do something this offseason that makes us better,
whether it's a move or they expected improvement, or a

(54:52):
tweak with our.

Speaker 4 (54:53):
Coaching staff, or a tweak with the head coach in general.

Speaker 3 (54:56):
But man, don't be looking at this like we're doing
it wrong. If you're doing what they did to get
to this point. I don't know that it was really
truly only the Jason Tatum injury as to why they
were able to beat the Celtics. It certainly was a
factor late in that series. They lost one game to
the Celtics without them, and then they pummeled them in
the second game without them.

Speaker 6 (55:17):
Well, don't you look at I mean, this is what
I thought when I first saw the final score, and
I knew that it was like you knew that that
series was over. Basically, I don't know, three games in
I felt that way, and but the first thing I
thought of was, well, they're just they're the Rockets in
the East.

Speaker 4 (55:33):
They're just a little they got a little bit further.

Speaker 6 (55:35):
They don't In other words, from the standpoint of I'm
not saying they're the same type of teams or anything
like that. What I'm saying is, I don't know that
you need to go out and make major changes to
anything Nicks involved, because unlike the Rockets, they do have
a guy that you can put them. You have two
guys really you can put the ball in their hands
when you need a basket and the clock's winding down.

Speaker 4 (55:58):
You know.

Speaker 6 (55:58):
That's where they are different from the Houston Rockets, and
that's where if the Rockets made a deal this offseason.

Speaker 4 (56:04):
But they're similar in that you don't necessarily want.

Speaker 6 (56:08):
To rock the boat just for the sake of change
because the playoffs didn't go your way. It doesn't go
your way for twenty nine teams every single year.

Speaker 3 (56:15):
So yeah, definitely can put the ball in the hands
of two guys for their team, and those same two guys,
unlike as you said, the Rockets pretty much don't have
a prayer of stopping whomever they're defending.

Speaker 4 (56:27):
That's the difference.

Speaker 3 (56:28):
That has a huge, huge, huge difference Towns. For as
big as he is, when he's not, he doesn't have
anybody to defend basically. I mean, he can defend Myles
Turner a little bit, but Miles Turner shooting threes. He
can defend Mitchell Robinson a little bit, but Robinson never
has the ball on offense. So if anybody needs to
do anything well, they just get Towns in a switch

(56:49):
and blow right by him. And in Brunson's case, they
were hunting mismatches all series long, and there were so
many of them. He's caught in the paint. He was
in foul trouble constantly because of it. Well coached by
the team that won. Rick Carlisle, former Dallas Mavericks head coach,
is now looking for a second championship with a second team,
largely because of what he's been able to do as

(57:11):
the head coach of that team. I mean, there are
two stars here. I'll stick with the nixt one. Last thing,
do they have a number one though? Do you feel
like Jalen Brunson is a playoff caliber team on his back?

Speaker 6 (57:24):
Let's go yes, I do too. I mean, the only
people that don't are the Dallas Mavericks. Well, I'll trust
their assessment of anything.

Speaker 3 (57:31):
There are people coming out of this series that are
pointing at some of the shortcomings that I gave just
now and saying this is why he's not. I just
you can have some shortcomings. It doesn't mean you're not
the guy that is supposed to be put. You know,
top fifteen player, All NBA caliber player, offensive league gifted,
so familiar, what a beautiful in Dallas sounds like James Harden.

Speaker 4 (57:53):
You're describing James Harden.

Speaker 6 (57:55):
He can't defend anybody, and he's otherworldly offense, Top fifteen
elite player.

Speaker 4 (58:01):
Is he the guy to lead your team? Blah blah
blah blah blah.

Speaker 3 (58:03):
We heard it all, except my answer for Harden was different.
My answer is no, because I have so much more
information and he can't do it because he's he as
the number one guy, has had many more opportunities than
Jalen Brunson as the number one guy. And the same
thing happens in every series. It happened again this year.

Speaker 4 (58:21):
Yeah, but far be it from me to defend James Harden.

Speaker 6 (58:23):
Here in twenty twenty five, after all the times I've
just crucified him since he left town the way he did,
And ninety nine point nine percent of that is because
of how he left town the way he did.

Speaker 4 (58:34):
But it's not his fault.

Speaker 6 (58:35):
Chris Paul got hurt and we all know that the
narrative would be changed on him. That's part of why
I'm so bitter about that series. I don't know if
James Harden ever does anything after that for the Rockets.

Speaker 4 (58:46):
He might not.

Speaker 6 (58:47):
Maybe you know, he and Chris Paul don't get along
the next year anyways or whatever. But like Chris Paul
ripping his hamstring at the tail end of Game five
with the Rockets having a three to two series lead,
is all about so much more than just them losing
the series because the second best player on the Rockets
was unavailable the rest of the way.

Speaker 4 (59:09):
It is about the narratives.

Speaker 6 (59:11):
It is about James Harden's legacy because I don't think
I mean, outside of maybe San Francisco that year, if
you watched the Rockets, they were the better team I thought.
I mean, they had Kevin Durant on the Warriors, they
had all of that going, but they weren't the ones
winning sixty five games, they weren't the number one seed,

(59:33):
and that game was played in Toyota Center for Game
seven because of what the Rockets had done in the
regular season doing large part, the biggest part to James Harden.

Speaker 3 (59:42):
Yeah, I mean, I do admit some of that's probably
a pretty fair assessment. He hit for thirty two to
get specific on that series, thirty two points in each
of those final two games, Game six and seven, fourteen
turnovers and those two games combined six for twenty five
on threes, and those two games combined they won Game five, right, well,
he went zero for eleven from three in that game.

(01:00:04):
He went five for twenty one in that game, a victory,
which helped him go up three games to two in
that series. So that's probably the best way to refute
what I'm saying. But there's a lot on the side
of what I have said, just so many series that
have gone. The further they go, the less helpful he becomes.
But yeah, I think that's a reasonable comparison. I think

(01:00:26):
you can win a championship if you have a very
good team around Jalen Brunson with him leading the way,
and the difference with the defense is Jalen Bruns is
not a bad defender because he doesn't care. He's a
bad defender because he's the smallest player on the court.
James Harden's a bad defender because he doesn't care. Yeah,
but he only cares if he's playing post defense.

Speaker 4 (01:00:47):
Well, there you go.

Speaker 3 (01:00:48):
That's where they can hide him, which he actually excelled at.

Speaker 6 (01:00:51):
They weren't even hiding him necessarily. He was playing good
defense in the house, right, But he's a guard.

Speaker 3 (01:00:56):
Guards don't play in the post unless you have to
play them there because they can't chase anybody around on
the perimeter because they're not interested.

Speaker 4 (01:01:01):
In doing it.

Speaker 6 (01:01:02):
That sounds like you're saying that he's jose Al Twove
in left field or anybody in left field.

Speaker 3 (01:01:07):
Like, like, I don't know the defender post, but I
don't know that their team defense was any better. His
individual ratings on defense were better. Did it help your
team defense? Well, yeah, because he wasn't on the perimeter anymore.
To a certain extent, it did. He could put better
defenders out there.

Speaker 6 (01:01:21):
But that's that's almost that's almost as disingenuous as saying
they missed twenty seven straight threes.

Speaker 4 (01:01:28):
That's why they didn't win.

Speaker 6 (01:01:29):
Well, that's just that's a surface argument that doesn't actually
it tells me you didn't watch the game.

Speaker 3 (01:01:35):
Yeah, there was an element in that series specific that
really changed things. No element like that in this series.
Indiana was better than the Knicks. That's the element. Indiana's
just better than them. There's there's really nothing else to it.
They outplayed them four times out of six, they won
the series, they advanced. I don't think there's much debate
about which of those two teams is better as we
sit here today. There's obviously is no debate in the West,

(01:01:55):
considering that was a four games to one series victory
for the Oklahoma City Thunder'll be a couple of days
before they get on the court together. There'll be multiple
days off in between all nearly all of the games
of this series, however long it goes, and then full
fledged Who aren't the Rockets taking when they don't draft
at number ten?

Speaker 4 (01:02:12):
According to some.

Speaker 1 (01:02:15):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 6 (01:02:25):
It is the a team Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (01:02:30):
What's that book called Men Are from Mars, Women Are
from Venus?

Speaker 3 (01:02:34):
I believe that is accurate among the many many books
I have not read.

Speaker 4 (01:02:37):
And won't be.

Speaker 3 (01:02:38):
Yeah, same here, wonder it's a book, no offense to
that particular book.

Speaker 6 (01:02:42):
Oh, no, mine is because it's it absolutely is the
offense to that book that doesn't explain anything. Oh, they
think differently, Yeah, no kidding. Welcome to society, Welcome to
being a human being. Everybody thinks differently. Just because you
wrote a book that every about something everybody already doesn't
make you like some genius. Oh you think men and

(01:03:04):
women look at basically any situation completely differently. What a huge,
inspiring and original thought there made some books. That's my
way of saying that the missus and I are having
domestic bliss that was personal.

Speaker 3 (01:03:18):
It's just it's uncanny to me. How well you know,
I deal with it with you all the time. Yeah,
but men are from Earth on this show, right, both of.

Speaker 6 (01:03:27):
Us, and we're looking at sports situations differently.

Speaker 4 (01:03:30):
Well, you too are from Earth, as are each of
the other.

Speaker 3 (01:03:34):
Any conversation we've ever had, including yourself, I'm actually from Mars.

Speaker 4 (01:03:40):
What did you read the book? No, my gosh, I'm out.
I'm different. Let's just be real. You go that at
this point.

Speaker 6 (01:03:50):
All right, So there was a little bit of I
don't want to call it good news that came out
from the astros over the weekend.

Speaker 4 (01:03:57):
Why not? What was it?

Speaker 3 (01:03:59):
Well, it probably was good news. If you don't want
to call it good news, I don't think it's good news.

Speaker 4 (01:04:03):
What is it? It's just news. Okay, it's an update. Okay,
I told you.

Speaker 6 (01:04:08):
This is not me saying I told you so, but
it does remind me of what I said.

Speaker 4 (01:04:13):
I said.

Speaker 6 (01:04:13):
There's no way someone's making death threats to Lance mccullor's
junior and or his family unless gambling was involved. And
it turns out that was exactly the case. Didn't tell Well,
it wasn't just gambling. It was overseas intoxicated gambling. Apparently,

(01:04:34):
according to the Houston Police Department, an intoxicated bet or
I like Kelly put the or.

Speaker 4 (01:04:40):
I don't know, I feel like it spell it. It should
be er. It just should There's nothing better about it.
It's a better yeah, but you put never mind, I'm
not doing this right now.

Speaker 6 (01:04:49):
An intoxicated better located overseas was behind social media threats
directed last month at Lance mccullor's junior, according to the
Houston Police Department. A spokesperson for the department Monday, declined
to identify the suspect or his location, and said no
charges had been filed. The spokesperson told ESPN that the

(01:05:11):
man admitted he had been gambling on an Astros game,
lost money and was frustrated and inebriated when he sent
the threats to mccullor's. The man apologized and asked that
his apology be relayed to mccullor's and his family. According
to the spokesperson, the case remains open while charges are considered. Well,

(01:05:32):
it's so nice of him to make sure that he
apologized and told them to pass it along to Lance mccullors.

Speaker 4 (01:05:39):
Rush. Just it doesn't surprise me.

Speaker 6 (01:05:42):
And yet all of this has happened because some guy
got drunk while he was betting on a game.

Speaker 4 (01:05:50):
Unbelievable. It's very very twenty twenty five. Well, it's you're
taking this story to be truthful. Well, I mean, what
am I supposed to They're the police. I'm not.

Speaker 3 (01:06:03):
This is nothing against them, obviously, but as it's being reported,
the statement put out by HBD is really the information
they have from the person they were investigating. Glad that
they found him, Glad that they have an identification. I mean,
we just believe or they just believe, and I don't
know if they do or not yet. Well it's he
was he was drunk. Well that's again, who can you

(01:06:26):
know me of all people?

Speaker 4 (01:06:27):
I hate it.

Speaker 6 (01:06:28):
I hate it when people are like, well, I was
drunk and you did.

Speaker 3 (01:06:31):
That, right, that's the thing, Like you should an excuse
any behavior, right. So maybe that's literally the only reason
that information was given by the betor to the police.
Maybe it will make me sound less vile, make me
people will think not quite as less of as little
of me because I was drunk. Maybe I should use
that as the excuse. Everybody knows who Lance mcculler's junior is. Everybody,

(01:06:55):
a lot of people know who his family is that
has been threatened here, and nobody knows this guy is.

Speaker 4 (01:07:00):
That's the problem I have with this.

Speaker 6 (01:07:02):
I mean, he as a grown adult, presumably, and had
the he he was. He was well within himself to
make the threats. In other words, he was big boy
enough to make the threats. You should be big boy
enough to have everybody know who you are, whether you're
here in the domestic US or abroad apparently overseas. We

(01:07:23):
don't know his location so I dont even know what country
he was in doing this, just not this one, apparently
not if.

Speaker 4 (01:07:28):
He was overseas.

Speaker 6 (01:07:30):
If you're overseas, what are you doing betting on an
Astros Reds game? There's better things to do. I'm sorry.
It's not even a thing. It's not It's no offense
to the Astros Baseball.

Speaker 3 (01:07:39):
Why do you think that is? Because if you're overseas,
I just feel like there should be better Exactly like
he's on vacation, I think he was. You can live
somewhere and live the rough similar lifestyle, and part of
your day to day activities are drinking and gambling.

Speaker 4 (01:07:53):
It happens. Yeah, I just feel like if I don't
know there's such a thing as a professional game.

Speaker 3 (01:08:00):
Yeah, that's even funnier, both the sports variety or cards variety.

Speaker 4 (01:08:05):
That just means to me, you do it more, or you're.

Speaker 3 (01:08:08):
At least successful enough at it to maintain a living wage.

Speaker 6 (01:08:14):
The term professional gambler to me is just comical professional
poker player.

Speaker 4 (01:08:19):
It's comical why because it's all gambling.

Speaker 3 (01:08:22):
I'm not trying to speak up for the unnamed here.
What makes you a professional because you.

Speaker 4 (01:08:27):
Do it more at it and a lot of it.

Speaker 3 (01:08:29):
I'm a professional sports talk host. One of the reasons
is they pay me to do it. Now, they're not
paying him to play unless he's good at it. But again,
you only make money when you're good at it. As
a fellow successful a pro sports talk show host, this
isn't a job. It's it's it's uh, it's exactly. You're
in the same Again, I say this.

Speaker 6 (01:08:49):
A million times. We're not curing cancer here, We're not
doing anything important.

Speaker 3 (01:08:53):
Even if we're playing doctors on the radio, we wouldn't
be doing that.

Speaker 6 (01:08:56):
Yeah, that's it's the same principle here. I'm gonna be consistent.
Professional gambler. That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in
my life. How is it that literally exists? I know people, really,
somebody was dumb enough to say, yeah, that's fine, I'll
go with it. Well, why you just do it more?

Speaker 3 (01:09:11):
No, There people who gamble a lot and lose, like
shohe Otani's interpreter. I here, right now, I would call
him a He's a professional loser.

Speaker 4 (01:09:21):
He's a professional incarcerator.

Speaker 3 (01:09:22):
Professional gambler, you need to be on the plus side.

Speaker 4 (01:09:25):
Professional incarcerated. Let's put it this way, there is people.

Speaker 16 (01:09:30):
There are people out there who will tune in to
ESPN News and ESPN two to watch an actual poker game.
So they're getting a revenue and they're getting rating space
off of that. In my opinion, those people would qualify
to be considered professional gamblers.

Speaker 6 (01:09:49):
Well, the people you're talking about are actually called professional
degenerates because they're watching that programming.

Speaker 4 (01:09:54):
I'm not disagreeing with you, but those professionals a lot.
You're a degenerator.

Speaker 3 (01:09:58):
I know who Phil Ivy is, Phil helm Youth is
And okay, what about pamiel Lebrano?

Speaker 4 (01:10:03):
Do they count in your opinion professional bowlers? Yeah?

Speaker 7 (01:10:05):
Don't.

Speaker 4 (01:10:06):
Who do you think you are? I am They're playing
an athletic activity.

Speaker 16 (01:10:09):
It was his name, Pete Pete Rose.

Speaker 4 (01:10:12):
Do you whatever?

Speaker 3 (01:10:12):
Pe not Roselle? Good, good job. It was not Pete Roselle.
Wasn't Pete Rose either, who was.

Speaker 4 (01:10:19):
A professional gambler. Technically, the moral of this segment is
that I was right.

Speaker 3 (01:10:24):
Obviously the moral of this segment is we can't cheat
you out of hearing from Steve Sparks, who joined the
Sean Salisbury Show earlier today, as he does each and
every Monday at eight a m. So we will share
some of his thoughts on the Astros weekend with the
Rays we come back here on the show, right here
on a Monday edition of the eighteen, The eighteen.

Speaker 2 (01:10:47):
On Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 3 (01:10:51):
Let's get right to it here on the eighteen as
we continue through the second hour of our program. Many
hours ago, those of you listening to Sports Talk seven
ninety heard Steve Sparks asked radio analyst is weekly visit
at eight am on with Sean Salisbury's show, Dan and
Chris earlier today want to share a little bit of
his thoughts with you. That I interview in its entirety

(01:11:11):
can be found at Sports Talk seven ninety dot com
or via the iHeartRadio app, where hopefully you're a subscriber
to their podcast, the Matt Thomas Show with a Ross
Podcast and of course our podcast, the eighteen Podcast. And
quite simply, you have the opportunity on your presets to.

Speaker 4 (01:11:28):
Go bake space.

Speaker 3 (01:11:28):
Sports Talk seven to ninety number one makes it that
much easier for you to get to us and listen
to us throughout your day right there on the palm
of your hand via the iHeartRadio app. Make Sports Talk
seven ninety number one on your presets. The conversation with
Sparky begins with something We've discussed a little bit ourselves,
and I'm sure everybody has since this weekend four game
series with the Rays concluded. How weirdly the games seem

(01:11:53):
to go very very few runs, ace level pitching on
both sides, and well some lopsided games late. That was
an odd series with the Rays.

Speaker 7 (01:12:03):
You know, I don't think any Astros fan has seen that.

Speaker 17 (01:12:06):
I had one of the media relations guys look it
up yesterday and minus won twenty one run differential in
a four game series has never taken pace at a
place in Astros franchise history. The record was minus thirteen,
So by eight runs. The Astros scored less runs or
got beat up by less runs in this four game

(01:12:29):
set and came away winners in two of them.

Speaker 14 (01:12:31):
That was pretty remarkable, no for sure, But I mean,
as I mentioned, Thursday and Saturday not so great for
the bullpen. Any level of concern with you, like, do
you feel like that the innings are starting to rack
up for those guys or do you just feel like
it was a bad series.

Speaker 17 (01:12:45):
I don't think the innings are really racking that day,
and I think, you know, sometimes guys have bad games.

Speaker 4 (01:12:50):
Is there a level of concern.

Speaker 2 (01:12:53):
There's always a level of concern.

Speaker 4 (01:12:54):
When a guy does it in back to back games.

Speaker 17 (01:12:56):
Brian King bounced back yesterday from a tough one that
he had a couple of days before. But when a
guy has a couple maybe three, just from past experience,
just knowing that what that feels like. Man, you get
on in a rut as a pitcher, sometimes it's tough
to climb out of it, so you do get concerned.
You're looking for ways and times to get them in

(01:13:17):
that game so you know they can.

Speaker 9 (01:13:19):
Clear that hurdle like King did yesterday.

Speaker 17 (01:13:22):
You know, sometimes you're not playing in lopsided games, so
you can't get them in there for eight or ten days,
and then that problem gets worse and worse because.

Speaker 4 (01:13:31):
They get rusty as well.

Speaker 2 (01:13:32):
So, man, it's such a mind game.

Speaker 17 (01:13:35):
It's such a tough game when you don't have full
confidence to go out there and pitch it your best ability.
So we'll see, you know, if guys get an opportunity
to get in there and get on a little bit
of a role, we know what can happen.

Speaker 4 (01:13:48):
Friday night Fromber Val does.

Speaker 14 (01:13:50):
He was awesome yesterday seam deal with Hunter Brown just
unable to go nine innings like Fromber did on Friday Night.
But I mean, you know that Friday game, I mean
that had to be one again. That kind of feeds
into this series just being so weird of not only
how good Fromber was, but how quickly he worked.

Speaker 17 (01:14:08):
Eighty three pitches, so that tied of Astros.

Speaker 7 (01:14:11):
Franchise record at nine inning game.

Speaker 17 (01:14:12):
Fromber and Hunter Brown are legitimately.

Speaker 4 (01:14:16):
They're two aces.

Speaker 17 (01:14:17):
So they have two aces and they're spread apart in
their rotation right now, which is beautiful.

Speaker 9 (01:14:22):
You know.

Speaker 17 (01:14:22):
Not to have them back to back allows you to
kind of catch your breath with the bullpen guys, and
for Joe, a spot of being able to like kind
of put the gas pedal on one of those guys
in a particular outing to get a little deeper into
these games is great for what they need right now now. Lance,
the way he's pitched last couple of games looks like

(01:14:42):
they've legitimately got three guys who can go out there
and really pounce on some people. Fromer, I think he
had an ERA below two. In May, he was perfect
four to zero in his five games. I just can't
say enough about him. We know that things have gone
sour every once in a while, you know, maybe in
opportunity times. But man, when you look at the total
body of work for farm ber Valdez, and when you

(01:15:04):
watch him when he's really good, you understand that he
is a He's a matchup nightmare for anybody. He can
tell you, and I save his on the broadcast by event.
He can tell you any one of those three pitches
are coming, so it in the strike zone is still
get weak contact or a swing and miss. And I
don't think you can say that about anybody else in
baseball as far as three pitches go.

Speaker 15 (01:15:23):
It's funny yesterday Jacob Melton makes his big league debut,
gets the monkey office back. We've seen that a lot
with these guys who you know, these hitters that remember
Bragman didn't take like a couple of weeks for him
to get his first hit. It seems like a lot
of these guys they call up and they they get
their first hit in their first game or two. But
the thing that stands out to me, Sparky, is how
many times in the last two years or so you

(01:15:46):
guys have had to say on the broadcast making his
big league debut. This guy called up making his big
league debut, and it's just been amazing.

Speaker 14 (01:15:53):
I know.

Speaker 15 (01:15:54):
That's why Dana was kind of brought in here to
be the GM, was to repool this farm system and
get it back going. But it's just been amazing how
many rookies the Astros have had the last two years plus,
and yet all these guys seem to come up and
contribute and play a big role.

Speaker 12 (01:16:09):
You know.

Speaker 17 (01:16:10):
I attribute some of that Chris to the culture that
they have in the locker room twenty five years ago.
I mean, guys who were coming into the locker room
and you were expected to say absolutely nothing.

Speaker 2 (01:16:21):
You didn't really feel like you were part of.

Speaker 17 (01:16:23):
The team until year two, really, to be honest with you,
And I think it's a tribute to what the Astros
have been able to develop when they had guys like
Korea and spring Are coming up to the big leagues.
I think that the Astros recognize that those guys were
going to help them win games very quickly. So to
be able to as simulate, feel like they were part
of the team right away was going to be paramount
for the team to turn it around. So I think

(01:16:43):
that culture has remained. So I think it's been ten
years that the Astros have welcome young guys into the
clubhouse and said, all right, let us help you. You know,
we're all about winning here. We don't care about this
tenure or what you say or what you don't say.
We want you to help us win baseball games. I
think as soon as guys come to spring training, I
think guys like Jacob Melton and Camp Smith feel like

(01:17:05):
they're part of the team.

Speaker 3 (01:17:06):
Couple things there, both of those big topics that were
discussed in that portion of the interview. Among those things
you saw right there on the graphic those of you
watching on Space City Home Network, the innings pitched for
Fromber of Valdez and Hunter Brown. Fromber's number two in
the majors with his seventy eight innings pitched over his
twelve starts, and the only person who's ahead of him

(01:17:27):
has thirteen starts, Garrett Crochet. He's the only pitcher in
baseball he's made thirteen starts. So among pitchers the thirty
plus of them that have made twelve starts, nobody's throwing
more innings than Fromber and Hunter Brown is in the
top ten innings eaters. When we talk about that, it's
almost like it's a bad word. If you're following the
Astros to the first fifty nine games. The innings that

(01:17:49):
have been eaten by Fromber, of Valdez and Hunter Brown
are paramount to the Astros surviving the first fifty nine
games of this season. They have to have it from them.
There's pressure on them, Elite. You have to give us
six innings. If you can give us seven, that would
be awesome. If you could maybe throw the entire game,
as each of them have now done a combined three times,

(01:18:09):
not all nine innings, but the entire game.

Speaker 4 (01:18:11):
It's a complete game. They've done that three times.

Speaker 3 (01:18:13):
They have to have it because nobody else on this team,
nobody else on this team is giving them length. Lance
has thrown six innings once and again, we recognize the
situation he's coming from. But all of these others, which
takes us in that second thing that they were discussing
there at the end. The Melton debut yesterday as a
major leaguer. That was number six in twenty twenty five

(01:18:34):
for the Astros. Melton and Cam Smith the position players
that made their major league debuts this year, and four
pitchers have made their major league debuts this year with
the Astros. That's a lot for It's a huge number
for a good team. Youth is served.

Speaker 6 (01:18:51):
But yeah, that is even for this team that has
brought up young guys that have produced.

Speaker 4 (01:18:57):
It wasn't anything like this.

Speaker 6 (01:18:59):
So I did like the fact that Cam Smith was
by far the most tenured outfielder in that game. Who's
the other outfielder, Well, Melton was making his debut and
as outfielders, oh.

Speaker 4 (01:19:13):
As an outfielder, Yeah, Dog and Jose, I got you.
I wasn't Doggingham. I was just stating facts difference.

Speaker 2 (01:19:21):
The A Team on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 1 (01:19:23):
Ninety teen lifelong Houston sports guys named at him Talking
your Team, Adam.

Speaker 13 (01:19:34):
Clinton and Adam Weckler. The eighteen.

Speaker 6 (01:19:41):
Four o'clock hour underway here on a Monday edition of
The A Team. As wex mentioned earlier, we are into
June the calendar flying by here in the year of
twenty twenty five. As Astros had a very interesting weekend
that we've been discussing elements of all show long booke

(01:20:02):
ending what was the final count by the way of
runs thirty to nine to nine. Yeah, you split a series.
And by the way, you were dead accurate about some
teams just have your number.

Speaker 4 (01:20:14):
They play a certain style.

Speaker 3 (01:20:16):
It's pretty rare in baseball for a team to be
able to take advantage of another just simply because of
the way they play. Most baseball teams, twenty of them
play the same way, but there are a few teams
that play differently. Surprising they were able to hit the
ball all over the yard like they were for two
of the games, and also surprised against who it came,
the Astros Bullpen. I kind of made a post about that,

(01:20:38):
considering they only played the Rays seven times. Thankfully they're
finished with them. The game in Tampa, Hunter Browns had
one bad start. It was that one, and a lot
of it had to do with the ballpark, But nonetheless,
he gave up five runs in that start, so the
race scored five runs against him. They scored five runs
in back to back innings in their victory, their first

(01:20:58):
of their two victories this series. They had a six
run inning in the second of their two victories, and
they did it against King and they did it against Duben,
and they against SUSA. They also did it against Ort
and Whitley, but these are all other than Whitley guys
who have been extremely successful this year.

Speaker 4 (01:21:15):
Good to see Brian King yesterday.

Speaker 3 (01:21:17):
Like Steve mentioned, Steve Sparks mentioned when we replayed a
little of his visit this morning, he bounced back and
pitched much more like the Brian King were used to.
But you know, I actually think even though Jake Mangham,
a player who joined the team during the series, hit
a homer and was a factor with his defense, kind
of did him.

Speaker 4 (01:21:35):
I'm all for not.

Speaker 3 (01:21:36):
Seeing Chandler Simpson anymore because the Astros don't realize you
can't put him on base because he's gonna run all
over you. But most of their guys do. That's how
they're built. They're not built to hit the ball over
the fence all game long, and they're not built to
score ten runs on the backs of back of big slug.
They're built to get guys on base. They go the
opposite way. They have some very good bat handlers who

(01:21:58):
if you if this is where you're pitching it, that's
where I'm going to hit it. You know, one of
the games in Tampa or two of them, Jonathan Randa
was not out there for He's had a super quiet,
super loud season, if you know what I mean. Nobody's
paying attention to the fact he's been awesome offensively, and
this totally came from out of nowhere.

Speaker 4 (01:22:14):
They're right with Houston. They are one of those six
teams any given day is sitting in a wild card spot.
They're all separated by a half a game.

Speaker 3 (01:22:22):
This is a good baseball team, and I don't know
how good Pepio and Lttel are gonna end up being.

Speaker 4 (01:22:27):
I don't think Tash Bradley.

Speaker 3 (01:22:29):
Is all that good he is against the Astros, but
they got three pretty awesome pitching starting pitching performances. And
that's with me even saying that, like Boz's was bad,
it wasn't bad. The Astros scored nine runs in four days. Yeah,
that's not good. No, it's it in Bradley.

Speaker 6 (01:22:45):
I only say that because the last two times he's
faced the Astros, that series in Tampa and this one here.

Speaker 4 (01:22:51):
You know, it's awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:22:51):
How about the you don't see this often, you know,
Sparks is saying, I wanted them to look this up.

Speaker 4 (01:22:56):
Here's the pitch hit, here's the pitch hit. Here's the
pitch hit.

Speaker 3 (01:23:00):
I have straight pitches to open the game, and the
Astros swung on all of them and put it in
play on all of them and scored a run thanks
to Christian Walker's two out single and obviously the errors
how they benefited from that on the opening swing.

Speaker 4 (01:23:12):
And then that was it, and that was it. Well,
you mentioned the what was it?

Speaker 6 (01:23:17):
The the Yesterday was the first time all series long
that the I believe that the Astros put a leadoff walk.

Speaker 4 (01:23:28):
On and he didn't come around to score.

Speaker 3 (01:23:30):
Because the other times they didn't have Hunter Brown to
overcome it.

Speaker 4 (01:23:33):
Right, He's so good, He's just ridiculous.

Speaker 6 (01:23:37):
And I was it was killing me watching that game
because I was like, man, there's gonna be some stupid
run that comes around, either tie this or whatever. And
believe me, the fact that why am I drawing a
blank on the guy that killed them all series long?
Was the last at bat yesterday, the head dude, he
hammered whoever was pitching for the Astros.

Speaker 3 (01:23:56):
And I know they said it a couple times during
the two series. They've Robert and Steve and I definitely
heard it yesterday from Todd and Jeff and Julia, it's
so obviously true even without the numbers. Sometimes Junior cam
and Earra is a top bat speed in the American League.

Speaker 4 (01:24:11):
No kidding, are you watching this? This is outrageous.

Speaker 3 (01:24:14):
How hard he's trying to He's not trying to go
we say he's trying to destroy the baseball. He trying
to hit it for No, he's he's trying to make
the baseball break.

Speaker 6 (01:24:22):
Yeah, yeah, I mean he's He kind of reminds me
of a young Jordon in that way. And obviously that
kind of transitions to what we were talking about most
of the show, especially early on, about the miss diagnosis. Diagnosis,
that's the way that that's exactly how we should term
this because.

Speaker 3 (01:24:42):
Now it's missed because they didn't see it initially. Yeah,
but he could also be termed as a misdiagnosis because
they did not go back to look when it hears
they should have, like before he's swinging the bat. I
know you thought it was a muscle strain the whole time.
Well that's great.

Speaker 6 (01:24:58):
You know what makes me want to check sure if
Jordan hadn't said anything about the discomfort, would they have
even looked, because, like you said earlier, it. Basically, the
onus became on the player to even take a lookxie
at this from a medical professional.

Speaker 3 (01:25:16):
I want to say no, because that's the path, and
we did not bring that up the first two hours
of this show. If jord On Alvarez took VP Thursday,
and he did, which then followed a BP session on Friday,
and he'd hit off in the cage and off the
tee and off the machine prior to all of this.
The Thursday when we saw him doing it was not
the first time he'd been taking swings throughout this process.

(01:25:38):
But you're asking if he had gone Friday up against
minor league pitching on the field at Tigan Park and
not told them I don't feel right or not told
them it hurts, would he have then been activated.

Speaker 4 (01:25:55):
Because that's what all signs were pointing to.

Speaker 3 (01:25:57):
A sign do point to that is it possible that
he they felt so good about his self diagnosis after
they had seen what they turned a muscle strain, they
didn't feel the need to go back in and get
another MRI before he started swinging. We're not asking that question.
That is literally sorry, that is what happened. They did
not go back in for more imaging. His commentary his

(01:26:19):
progress indicated them off the initial diagnosis of a muscle strain,
that we don't feel the need to go back and look.
Would they have felt differently if he continued to not
tell them anything was wrong before they activated him. I
can't tell you that. I can give you what all
of what Dana Brown essentially had to say, and I've
been meaning to do this the afternoon. Have a little

(01:26:40):
bit of time to do that here. So what Dana
Brown had to say, and I've shortened a little bit
of it, but did not take out anything pertinent. Dana
Brown when he met with the media on Saturday about
Jordon Jordon.

Speaker 8 (01:26:53):
Back in the Chicago series. May second after the first
game is when we shut him down. Probably about ten
days prior.

Speaker 7 (01:27:01):
To that, he felt some discomfort in his hand.

Speaker 8 (01:27:03):
He started really fighting through it, and it was unlike
any of his other hand injuries, so he felt like,
you know, I'm okay, I think I could fight through this.
So we fought through it for probably about twelve days
or so.

Speaker 7 (01:27:17):
It didn't feel like it was getting better.

Speaker 16 (01:27:19):
You know.

Speaker 8 (01:27:19):
We got the imaging shortly after that Chicago series when
we went to Milwaukee. We got the imaging and it
was diagnosed as a muscle strain, and so he had
a lot of inflammation fluid in his hand. Look, he
felt like, you know what, Okay, now this makes sense.
I think I'm gonna be all right. Started to rest them,

(01:27:42):
it started to heal. We were excited, you know, started
feeling better. So we started giving him baseball activity, thinking like, okay,
he's ready, he's coming back. He's just about there. Even
up until yesterday, he felt like, wow, this is this
feels really good. So we got pitched here because we
were trying to get him back for this weekend, actually

(01:28:03):
because he said he felt so good. Part of the
reason why he felt so good is because a lot
of the inflammation and the fluids were gone, and he
took some swings. He hits, you know, hit a couple
of balls out and a few balls opposite field line drives.

Speaker 7 (01:28:19):
Looked pretty good, but still felt a little bit of discomfort.

Speaker 8 (01:28:23):
So what we decided to do was, Okay, if it
still feels uncomfortable, you feel that discomfort, let's just go
get more imaging.

Speaker 7 (01:28:33):
We went and got more imaging yesterday.

Speaker 8 (01:28:35):
Because of all the inflammation and fluid was gone, we
were able to see that he has a sixty percent healed,
very small fracture in his in his hand, and so
he's really because now he knows like, okay, that's that's it.

Speaker 7 (01:28:55):
So the muscle strain was real.

Speaker 8 (01:28:58):
I really think that when he was fighting through those weeks,
knowing that it wasn't the same feeling as some of
his hand problems in the past, that he was just
trying to fight through it, and maybe that's when you know,
he may have caused a little bit more damage.

Speaker 7 (01:29:15):
And so we didn't see it.

Speaker 8 (01:29:17):
Of course in the May sixth I think it was
imaging because of all the inflammation and all of the fluid.

Speaker 7 (01:29:26):
But now that it's subsided.

Speaker 8 (01:29:28):
And it started to heal, we can see in this
most recent image that there was a calcium build up,
so which tells us that there was a fracture.

Speaker 6 (01:29:42):
So just that last part right there is important because
and I don't know this because I'm not a doctor,
and you don't know this because you're not a doctor.
But inflammation, fluid, et cetera, et cetera is apparently like
the lead to Superman's X ray vision when it comes
to finding a break. I'm not even being like, that's

(01:30:03):
if I'm to believe what he just said, they couldn't
see it because of all that in the way, is
that how imaging works?

Speaker 3 (01:30:10):
In this instance, he's indicating it made it not The
fracture that he believes was there was not seen at
that time because.

Speaker 4 (01:30:18):
Of those reasons. And I still want to know.

Speaker 3 (01:30:20):
Okay, so then in a week or two, why don't
you look again, Yeah, to confirm the muscle strain.

Speaker 6 (01:30:25):
But I also want to know, and I'm not kidding
when I say this either, how do you get to
the sixty percent number?

Speaker 4 (01:30:30):
This is what? This is?

Speaker 6 (01:30:30):
The sixty percent healed. I'm sure there's some sort of bast.

Speaker 3 (01:30:34):
Probably with the deposits there and things of that nature.

Speaker 4 (01:30:37):
I think help you.

Speaker 3 (01:30:38):
Sixty is probably a very finite number that probably best
served to say more than fifty and less than seventy
five percent.

Speaker 6 (01:30:45):
At what point was Spencer Aarraghetty's finger sixty percent?

Speaker 3 (01:30:48):
That's like he may have given a finite number there,
which he did.

Speaker 4 (01:30:51):
I don't know that. It's like dead on, like he
can be saying what the what the doctor told him?

Speaker 3 (01:30:55):
There's something else from there that again probably needs additional discussion.
Definitely wanted you guys to hear all of what he
said there, which is why we gave that to you there.
It's what he met with the media with He made
something added some to that yesterday when he.

Speaker 4 (01:31:08):
Spoke with Robert Ford.

Speaker 3 (01:31:09):
So we'll have a little bit more on that discussion
when we come back here on the eighteen.

Speaker 1 (01:31:14):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 6 (01:31:28):
Real quick, you said he had something else to respond
to Dana Brown's extended comments about the Jordon Alvarez injury.

Speaker 3 (01:31:36):
Yeah, a little bit on the timeline mentioned and we
know this, the reason for the il stint came up
date wise in that Chicago series retroactive of the third
that was the Saturday of the series in Chicago. Sixth
was the day they did the MRI ultimately when it
showed at that time to them the muscle strain. But
he also indicated that he was he Jordon was fighting

(01:31:59):
through it prior to that ten to twelve days whatever.
The well obviously was not exact about that, but that
takes you back to mid to late April, which means
there was about twenty games maybe of season that had
been played. Twenty games of Jordan Alvarez not being predictably productive,
followed by ten to twelve games of him trying to

(01:32:23):
hit with what we believe now was a broken bone
in his hand, that fourth metacarpal. It's the finger, second
closest to the outside of your hand, away from your thumb,
your ring finger, if you will, in the palm of
your hand, not among the fingerish portion. That's why it's
called a broken bone in his hand. It is in

(01:32:43):
his hand. But that would seem to explain, like this
is the good information of it. One of the reasons,
if not the almost whole reason he was unsuccessful, is
because he wasn't comfortable swinging the bat because it hurts because.

Speaker 4 (01:33:00):
His hand was broken.

Speaker 3 (01:33:01):
No, I'm glad that in returns right whenever that might
be expectations that he won't be among your lowest ops guys,
which I never thought would be a possibility. Well, hopefully
that's no longer a possibility, because that's what he was
as a twenty twenty five Houston astro. It's also still

(01:33:24):
hard to believe. He gives you that timeline of ten
to twelve days he was fighting through it. How much
they knew at that time, I don't know, But at
some point during the early portion of this whole process,
they clearly were aware were made aware of his uncomfort
discomfort in this situation, and yet still the immediate words
from Joe Aspada on the third or the fourth or

(01:33:45):
the fifth before it ultimately was sent for an MRI,
did come back to Houston for it. I don't think
we need imaging on it. That's what Joe said, And
I don't mind saying that. I mind doing that. You
can't do these things. It's not the doctor's fault to
miss or make You can't miss it. If you don't

(01:34:07):
look for it, you can't do it.

Speaker 4 (01:34:09):
How can you not look? No, I don't understand it.
Can't you take it? Is there a cost involved?

Speaker 3 (01:34:16):
Is there is there a We don't want to send
him back to Houston early, which they did.

Speaker 4 (01:34:20):
They ultimately he got it done here.

Speaker 3 (01:34:22):
I think he got the MRI done in Milwaukee after
they are played through all this scenario. They were in
Chicago for that period of time, and they went from
Chicago to Milwaukee. He went on the injured list retroactive
to the third while they were in Milwaukee where.

Speaker 4 (01:34:37):
He got the scan.

Speaker 3 (01:34:39):
You should be able to do this anywhere you should
be able to you know, I just had someone post
something on X to the show about what we had
just discussed. Okay, fine, you didn't have it before the complaints,
you didn't have it during the complaints, you didn't have
it before he went on the IL Okay, but between
May sixth and Saturday or post Friday is BP? How

(01:35:01):
come there wasn't more? How do you let him take
up pick up the bat and if he does his
comfort then well why is that? Like I'm not trying
to tell you guys were doctors, but over the decades
we've followed baseball teams, or football teams or basketball teams.
Medically speaking, well, we went in there and looked there's

(01:35:24):
a lot of inflammation, there's a lot of swelling or
before they go in, well we're gonna let the swelling
go down and then we're gonna take a look at it.

Speaker 4 (01:35:31):
How about Ronel Blanco, I'm getting a second opinion.

Speaker 3 (01:35:35):
Well that's that's the that's I don't like what I heard,
even though I know they're right. So I'm gonna get
a second opinion with my all of my fingers crossed.

Speaker 6 (01:35:42):
Well it doesn't work, I know, But like you didn't
get the second opinion here, or at least another opinion later,
not that much later.

Speaker 3 (01:35:49):
Well, second opinions usually come with the magnitude of the injury.

Speaker 4 (01:35:53):
I'm quibbling with words and verbiage, but I I just
they wanted.

Speaker 3 (01:35:56):
The same opinion with the same doctors. Let's just go
look at it again, and we want it. We're saying,
why would.

Speaker 4 (01:36:02):
Yeah, that's the make to me, that's the issue.

Speaker 3 (01:36:04):
I think the emotions and the incompetence these words are getting.
This seems very common. What they did seems very uncommon
and improper. Why would you want your operations to work
this way? You just take another look, Take another look
before he picks up the bat, take another look after Thursday,
before Friday's second session. It's fine to listen to the player,

(01:36:26):
but it's not fine to not also use that information
along with what we're seeing. If he's telling us this, well,
let's make sure what we image matches that.

Speaker 6 (01:36:35):
And it's to me, that's why it's so disingenuous to have,
you know, colors like we had in the first hour.
Johnny and others say, well, you just being emotional about this, Well, no,
because when you've done this, maybe not this exact pattern
of you know timeline here. But when you've mismanaged, and
I don't think that's too strong of a word to say,

(01:36:56):
when you've mismanaged major injuries, ether it be from the
pr standpoint or from the actual diagnosis like this, and
like Kyle Tucker last year, that's just what happens. If
you want to call it emotional, fine, I just call it,
I don't know, being accountable, not doing things the wrong.

(01:37:17):
Like we talked about, Oh, well, you don't deserve this
amount of information or these teams. None of these other
teams would have done that. The caller was saying that earlier.
I mean, this is why I was laughing at Chandler
Rome's tweets, because he was like retweeting medical personnel from
other baseball teams, just giving basic fundamental knowledge about what

(01:37:38):
type of injury it is and juxtaposing that with what
the astros do, which is that he has some discomfort
in his hand. Yeah, I'll say it's broken, and you
didn't know that because you did things the way you
did them.

Speaker 3 (01:37:49):
Well, again, I think those are very separate things. This
most of this segment had nothing to do with what
they did or didn't tell us it had only to
do with how they went about trying to diagnose a problem. Internally,
I think there's a lot of disagreement with how they
did that. Sunday, the day after Dana said what he said,
which we played for you last segment, he obviously made
his visit with Robert Ford on the ASTROS radio broadcast
during the pregame show. He does that every Sunday, and

(01:38:11):
Robert asked him if there was anything he wished he did.

Speaker 4 (01:38:15):
I think the big.

Speaker 8 (01:38:15):
Point here is, you know, when he had the first
entry in terms of the muscle strain and the hand,
you know, maybe we we we shouldn't have let him
fight through that because he said it wasn't the normal
pain that he usually gets in his hands, so he
thought maybe he could grind through it and it was
just just soreness, and maybe at that point we probably

(01:38:39):
should have shut him down, maybe for a week, given
it a chance to heal, and and not let him,
you know, try to fight through it and potentially cause
more damage.

Speaker 3 (01:38:50):
Seems like that would have been the course of action
you would want to take, especially he even notes it there.
It's not a first time for Jordan with his hands
and injuries. Just a little curious as to how they
handled it this time. I'm sure a lot of it
was well, not only is it not his first time,
well that means he's been through it before.

Speaker 4 (01:39:09):
That means he might be able.

Speaker 3 (01:39:11):
To feel like, well, I think I know what this is,
so I think I can play through it. It's just again,
listening to him only takes you so far. Just go ahead,
you have the means to find it. If there was
no break at that time, and there wasn't an enormous
amount of swelling and fluid at that time, well yeah,
you could have shut him down for a week, like
Dana said, and probably taken a look at it, and
maybe you would have seen a muscle strained because maybe

(01:39:34):
the broken bone didn't exist at that time. That's the
part of the the actual hard news portion of it
that isn't cut and dry. Did his persistence on trying
to play through it, grind through it create what was
initially this injury a minor injury, a lesser injury, a
non bone fracture injury, and then it became that as

(01:39:56):
he went through it, I don't know. I would assume
the pain from the very get go was be because
he had a broken.

Speaker 4 (01:40:00):
Bone in there. But I don't know that. I don't
know if they know that.

Speaker 6 (01:40:04):
Yeah, I just if it weren't for Kyle Tucker last year,
if it weren't for see, here's the problem. Kyle Tucker's
break in his leg is the only thing that you
could really compare to this, simply because we're talking about
a small fracture that they didn't initially see, so it's
very similar from that standpoint. My problem is for anybody

(01:40:26):
that's watching how this is unfolding, fair or not, the
inclination is for a lot of people is going to
be not only to look at how they're handling this
situation and how it compares to Kyle Tucker, but then
go back and scrutinize every single major or minor injury
that we've seen from this medical staff. I guess throughout

(01:40:50):
this run of them being the ones that are in
charge of diagnosing, handling whatever any type of injury is.
And that's why I'm like, well, is part of the
reason that Lance McCullers Junior took so long after two
and a half years to throw his first pitch in
a game because they mismanaged that injury it might not be,

(01:41:10):
but I also don't think that's unfair to ask for anybody.

Speaker 3 (01:41:14):
Yeah, we know he had setbacks. He's acknowledged that, they've
acknowledged that. The reason for the setbacks can always be questioned.
Sometimes you feel like maybe the player pushed too far.
Sometimes the information give it to him, and the plan
that they had in place is more to blame. That's
definitely hard to discern. We were getting to the point,
like Kyle, over the weeks that it had been with
jord On if his hand, if there's a muscle strain,

(01:41:35):
we're four weeks out, five weeks out, isn't it supposed
to be healed by now? That's when I was questioning
it right here on the air, like there's something there,
go find it, Go look and see what it is. Ultimately,
it took him taking VP and saying it doesn't feel
right for them to go look and tell us and
find out for them what it was.

Speaker 2 (01:41:55):
The age on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 1 (01:41:57):
Ninety now the good, oh good, the bad that's not good,
and the ugly.

Speaker 4 (01:42:06):
Don't make me good?

Speaker 2 (01:42:07):
With the A team, we're selling you the.

Speaker 4 (01:42:10):
Good the bad.

Speaker 3 (01:42:13):
Signature segment time mondays bring the good, the bad the ugly.
Three of us run through what's taking place over the weekend,
or at least up until four thirty three pm on
a Monday, and file it away is where it fits,
the good, the bad, the ugly. AC will finish things
off with the ugly. I've got the bad. Cole gets
us started with something good.

Speaker 16 (01:42:32):
Maybe this is because of how much negatively we've talked
about Pro Football Focus and the way that they address
the Texans, whether it be CJ. Stroud as the fourteenth
ranked quarterback or they give a D for the overall
off season. But recently the publication was actually pretty nice
to Houston because they came out with their way too

(01:42:53):
early rankings of rosters in the AFC, and naturally for
eight roster that seen a ton of turnover, losing a
Pro Bowl left tackle, losing multiple wide receivers, putting a
lot of emphasis on younger players taking that step forward,
you would think that maybe, well, they're gonna fall outside
of good graces. They'll be the number six roster, the

(01:43:16):
number eight roster, number nine roster. Well, the first roster
in the AFC is the Baltimore Ravens, the second is
the Kansas City Chiefs. The third is the Buffalo Bills.
And still despite all of the negativity, all of the schematics,
all of the hard press, CJ took a step back

(01:43:37):
last year. Defense is gonna have to bail them out
of trouble. Texans are still the number four roster in
the AFC, which I agree with as of right now,
still ahead of Denver, still had a Los Angeles, still
had a Cincinnati. All teams that maybe feel good about
their quarterback situation, but the Texans with the top five defense,
a probable top five wide receiver in Nico Collins run game,

(01:44:01):
and maybe a little bit of a different feel with
the new offense coordinator Nick Kayley. I give my tip,
I tip my hand to PFF. They did a good
job of saying, hey, we've been hard on this roster,
but they still are built to be one of the
more competitive teams in the AFC that's coming fall.

Speaker 3 (01:44:16):
And as we try to point out, they got a
lot of people working there, so a lot of different people,
right do the write ups on pieces like this. So
we talked about their offensive line commentary when they had CJ.
Stroud fourteenth among starting quarterbacks in the NFL. They list
the biggest weakness in twenty twenty four for the Texans,

(01:44:37):
who have the seventh overall roster, Cole mentioned they were
fourth in the AFC seventh overall. They said their biggest
weakness in twenty twenty four it's their offensive line.

Speaker 4 (01:44:46):
CJ.

Speaker 3 (01:44:47):
Stroud experienced a slight regression from his incredible rookie season,
most of which can be attributed to his offensive line's failures.
Texans dealt with the league's eighth lowest graded offensive line
last year.

Speaker 4 (01:44:59):
Making matters worse.

Speaker 3 (01:45:00):
The team traded five point Pro Bowl tackle left tackle
Laromie Tonsel, so all of the obvious things were amazed
that anybody can't say they said them all. They're totally
cognizant of exactly what happened, because as they get to
this point of their breakdown, they're not necessarily only they're
telling you what they saw. Their eyes were not deceiving
them here. This is why they are where they are.

(01:45:21):
And when you look at their overall roster. I saw
this last week and again looking at the AFC, which
is what you brought up. They've been the fourth best
team the AFC for two years running. As they hit
the rest of their offseason in training, camp and likely
all the way up until they open the season against
the team directly ahead of them, number six, the Rams.

(01:45:44):
The Texans probably have the fourth best team in the AFC.
They might have the fourth best quarterback in the AFC.
They probably have the fourth best chance to win the AFC.
All these things are right where they've been. It's taking
the next step they've yet to do. I don't think
we're like waiting forever for it because it just started.

(01:46:04):
It's only been two years. It's not like he's in
his ninth year. He's in his third year. Will Anderson's
probably taking a jump this year in year three. Demiko
Ryans has already fired a coordinator. He's only entering year three.
But they got to be better than Buffalo, Kansas City,
or Baltimore.

Speaker 4 (01:46:24):
It would seem at least to make it to the
conference side.

Speaker 16 (01:46:29):
And let me ask you guys this, Let's say that
they change the warding of this instead. And it wasn't
the top thirty two rosters. It was we're gonna place
you in tears, and let's say tier two capable of
going to conference championship. And then you mentioned the Rams,
and you mentioned whoever is at number eight, they can
throw in the Broncos. I think you feel completely different

(01:46:51):
about where the Texans stand because of the competition that
they're surrounded with. Some people are gonna hear oh Rams
are better than the better than the Texans, just like
Verse is better than Will Anderson. I don't think it's that.
I think it's more so when you put them in
the same level of context, you feel a little bit
better about what your changes are going into the year
and the way that the overall public eye views here.

Speaker 3 (01:47:13):
Yeah, and specific to the Rams, they didn't bring back
Cooper Cup, but they did bring in Devontae Adams, and
both Fisk and Jared Verse are a year behind Will
Anderson Junior. I mean they're making their step from year
one to year two. Maybe that as most would like
to think, that's a big step, But yeah, I would

(01:47:33):
tend to agree. There's probably a pretty nice tier and
it's probably the top five in Tier one overall in
the NFL. Bill's Chiefs, Ravens, Lions, and the champs the Eagles.

Speaker 4 (01:47:47):
That's Tier one. Fair Texans are in Tier two.

Speaker 3 (01:47:50):
The bad for me also football because it's not ugly yet,
because it hasn't necessarily impacted any decision making, yet coaches
had to talk about it. His offensive coordinator was available today,
he had to talk about it, and he was at
practice today for his new team, wearing number eight. Here's

(01:48:11):
offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels on it's the fun dis he's.

Speaker 5 (01:48:16):
Here today and we're excited to have an opportunity to
work with the guys that are out here and available
to us. So I know he's staying up on the
information and the material. I'm not concerned about staff.

Speaker 3 (01:48:29):
And looking that regardson It's definitely not good, but I
also think it's definitely not ugly. I don't know that
we need to recreate a fourth item for the good,
the bad, the ugly. It wouldn't make any sense, does
not roll off the tongue, but I just put it
in here. It's probably not advisable for these things to
be so public. The activities that have taken place away

(01:48:50):
from the field. He continues to rehab. He was on
the field today. He's in uniform in helmet participation level
TBD obvious, but he was out there catching passes. He's
preparing to contribute early in the season for the New
England Patriots and as soon as I think the actual
football season, training camp, et cetera begins, I don't think

(01:49:14):
much of what we've seen from him on video, on
the water and elsewhere will matter at all.

Speaker 6 (01:49:21):
Well, he'll be there, That's what's key. That's where the
ugly come in comes in. If you have the Eagles
repeating as super Bowl champs, you can go ahead and
put that in the rearview mirror because Sakuon Barkley is
on the cover of Madden, and that is a very
ugly thing for their best player, because we know what
happens when you get on the cover of Madden.

Speaker 4 (01:49:41):
Your season's basically over.

Speaker 3 (01:49:43):
Without doing any of their research, just a knee jerk reaction.
Because I know what my knee jerk reaction is is
the Madden cover curse Jink Jinks over.

Speaker 4 (01:49:57):
I think I do too. How long has it been.

Speaker 3 (01:50:00):
Since someone who was there on the cover had a
catastrophic injury or rights season?

Speaker 16 (01:50:07):
Jim, It was Mahomes and Brady on the cover at
the same time. I think that was the year, so
that would be twenty twenty one.

Speaker 4 (01:50:14):
And they wound up facing off against each other in
the Super Bowl or that. That was right after they
face off against each other. Okay, well Brady had to
retire and a season sucks, So there you go. It's
still alive.

Speaker 1 (01:50:26):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 6 (01:50:36):
It's the eighteen Sports Talks seven ninety, Space City.

Speaker 4 (01:50:40):
Home Network astros with an off night.

Speaker 6 (01:50:46):
We've pretty much beaten that dead horse as it pertains
to the Jordan Alvarez injury. I know all of you
aren't sitting here listening to all four hours, although most
of you probably are, but it is okay to deviate
every now and again. And since we're on the subject
of injuries, what.

Speaker 4 (01:51:05):
Nothing. You can't do that and say nothing.

Speaker 3 (01:51:08):
Let's get Carl in here, see what he has to say.
What's going on? Carl, welcome into the eighteen.

Speaker 11 (01:51:14):
Hey, thank you.

Speaker 12 (01:51:15):
Before I talk about McCormick and the joy of seeing
these young guys coming up, I wanted to put my
two cents in Hornward and Albarez being a guy that
has a broken leg now for four on your lips.
And I actually reset my doctor's appointment for when money
instead of a month from now, because little things can
happen as far as you think stay normal.

Speaker 7 (01:51:37):
I mean, I'm not.

Speaker 12 (01:51:38):
Swinging a bat like a maniac, like your downalysis. If
you're knowing, it's really easy. MRIs and X rays are
cheap sos. But heaven's you know, being able to do this.
But injuries can happen so easily with the by the homes.
But anyway, I'm pish him back as soon as you
can get back. But I can feel full at home
because every day I think I'm a little bit better

(01:52:00):
one day and it's like what what's the matter of
the next So it's the healing process that's slow, especially
at seventy getting But he's a young guy.

Speaker 4 (01:52:09):
He'll be back. Sounds good. Hopefully you'll get back.

Speaker 3 (01:52:13):
We have a very poor connection unfortunately, but I do
appreciate you joining us.

Speaker 4 (01:52:17):
We want to share with Cole. If there was anything else.

Speaker 3 (01:52:19):
If I cut you off, I apologize, But you're absolutely
right the anything could happen, Anything could have happened along
the way. We don't have definitive details on that for sure.

Speaker 14 (01:52:30):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:52:30):
That's why I kind of go back to what Dana
said from a timeline perspective, we're not sure what happened
when it's just more a matter of okay, helping to
figure it out means just go ahead and look at
it some more.

Speaker 4 (01:52:41):
You know, maybe you weren't certain on what you thought
you saw.

Speaker 3 (01:52:43):
Maybe you felt like there was something in the way,
the swelling, the fluid, et cetera. All right, we'll go
look at it. It just seems like a very normal process.
Knowing sports the way that we do, you you go
in and you take a look at it. Every so off,
you take a look at it at certain benchmarks of
you think the recovery's going, even if you're under the
belief it is a muscle strain.

Speaker 4 (01:53:05):
At some point in time.

Speaker 3 (01:53:07):
Clearly, several weeks through this, the team and Jordon felt
it was a muscle strain. And when you heard from
Dana earlier, he indicated, well, yes, now that we know
it's a fracture, Jordon is relieved to know what it is.
So obviously they were operating for a long period of time,
all the way through his second on field BP session,

(01:53:27):
which was probably his fourth or fifth BP session to
begin with that he had a fracture which at some
point got from zero percent healed to as Dana said,
he said, sixty. So I'm sorry somewhere in that neighborhood
didn't really give a timeline, nor should they certainly not
them on when he will return, that's the real question. Well,

(01:53:49):
Jordon's now when this series concludes with Pittsburgh, that'll be
a month of baseball he's missed. His last game was
played the early stages of May. He won't play in
this series or next won't be available. I wouldn't suspect
when they get back home after that. Are we talking
about an All Star break return again?

Speaker 4 (01:54:05):
I don't know that.

Speaker 3 (01:54:06):
I'm not asking for a definitive timeline, but we were
discussing the other day about how much he's time he's missed,
the injury prone label, which an earlier caller had brought up.
He's gonna end up missing more games than this season
than in any other season since he made his debut,
other than the COVID season, which is kind of an
interesting one to point out, he missed all but two games.

(01:54:27):
I don't know how many games he would have missed
if that injury happened at the beginning of the year,
probably one hundred and sixty because of the severity of
that injury, but I'll throw that year out. He'll end
up playing in little less than one hundred games this year.
Somewhere in that neighborhood. Maybe they did this last year.
They played a huge chunk of the season well without

(01:54:49):
a big left handed bat, and they took off during
that period of time and have had won over ninety
games in their last one sixty two, which coincides with
Jordon me a month and Kyle Tucker missing about two
months of that time in different teams.

Speaker 6 (01:55:05):
Fair a half came out of first and not ten
games back or eight games back or whatever it is.

Speaker 3 (01:55:11):
Yes, they're absolutely in a totally different position. They definitively
we were just learning they had a second ace at
this point last year. With Hunter Brown, we don't have
to wait and see. And you know, his start yesterday
was the fifth of his this season for him at
home and his ERA is still well under one when
pitching at dyk In Park. Talking about Hunter Brown, it's

(01:55:33):
been incredible in this ballpark, how well he's pitched.

Speaker 6 (01:55:37):
There is no point during the month of May or
into June last year either where the Astros even had
a day in first place like they did this weekend.

Speaker 4 (01:55:48):
Yeah, that was one cool day.

Speaker 3 (01:55:50):
The way the Mariners picked up victories. We've been talking
about it, not at length, about the Taylor Walls ejection
from yesterday's game when he was unhappy with a call
that he should have been unhappy with. He discussed it
briefly with the umpire and as he got back into
the box, readjusted his helmet and then tapped it and
looked at him, which is the sign for can we
get a review on that, which is not available at

(01:56:10):
Major League Baseball. He got ejected for it, and I
think players know that that would happen. They were told
that before the season. What we didn't talk about was
Carlos Correa. Carlos Correa got ejected from the game this weekend,
a game that they ultimately lost via walk off from
the on deck circle. He and his team unhappy about
some calls, and he let the umpire hear about it,

(01:56:31):
and the empire turned in his direction as Carlos was
already making his way closer to home plate even though
he was not up to that yet, and he tossed him,
and then he tossed Roco Baldelli and his spot in
the order multiple times, and that extra ding game came up,
which he was obviously no longer available.

Speaker 4 (01:56:46):
For great job umpires as usual.

Speaker 3 (01:56:48):
Yeah, earlier in the series, he hit a go ahead
home run an extra inning.

Speaker 4 (01:56:52):
It gave in part, well, it helped give the Astros.

Speaker 6 (01:56:55):
That one day lead in the division, but they went
ahead and squaded that the next night when they give
up sixteen runs mostly from the bullpen.

Speaker 4 (01:57:04):
Do you still feel good about this bullpen? Sure? Do?

Speaker 3 (01:57:08):
Okay, I mean, look at what who gave up the
runs that you're so worried about. Which game just Brian
King Well, like Caleb Ord gave up. Yeah, he's your
sixth best reliever.

Speaker 4 (01:57:22):
Well, I'm not going to sit here and rank all
of the relievers.

Speaker 3 (01:57:24):
Well, their top four relievers I have zero concerns about,
and only one of them got touched up.

Speaker 4 (01:57:28):
I mean, Oker did give up a homer.

Speaker 6 (01:57:30):
I guess I'm just not used to seeing the bullpen
get this touched up.

Speaker 3 (01:57:35):
Exactly why I'm unconcerned. You're not used to seeing it
because it's not normal, and I don't expect to continue.
You might have some questions about, Okay, well, how do
we finish out the bullpen? Now we've seen multiple Whitley
appearances happen to be against the Rays where he can't
he's not getting guys out.

Speaker 4 (01:57:51):
Yeah, and that can be a problem.

Speaker 3 (01:57:54):
Now, Caleb ord I really didn't like that outing for
a different reason, but it's the same thing we've been
talking about all day. He threw a pitch, clearly there
was something wrong.

Speaker 4 (01:58:05):
Joe A.

Speaker 3 (01:58:05):
Spotta and the athletic training staff went out to visit him.
He told him everything's fine, and he continued to pitch,
and it didn't appear that it was affecting him dramatically,
but his velocity was noticeably down. I thought you could
see him reaching for his hand again or flexing it again.

Speaker 4 (01:58:20):
I could be wrong. I doubt he was something.

Speaker 3 (01:58:23):
Probably was a miss, probably not something dramatic and significant,
and he's about to go on the IL, but maybe
it did seem like, well, let's go ahead, and they're.

Speaker 4 (01:58:32):
Kind of stuck.

Speaker 3 (01:58:33):
So many guys think, yeah, I'm curious when they will
go to him again for that very reason, absolutely.

Speaker 4 (01:58:39):
Because if something is wrong and then we see that,
oh it's going to be, there's.

Speaker 3 (01:58:44):
Gonna be a lot of backlash. Hopefully it's not. Hopefully
I don't know. Again, I don't know about that. They
kind of quickly went to jazz One on the IL
with his swing created issue. Descenzo went on the Aisle
immediately after hand discomfort. That's why Jacob Milton got the
call and he had to have a review, but he
got his first out. By the way, in my opinion,

(01:59:07):
ty goes to the runner. Did not look like a
tie to me. Okay, all right, we will get into
the five o'clock hour and some football conversation next.

Speaker 2 (01:59:16):
The A team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 13 (01:59:22):
Adam Clinton and Adam Wexler are the A team.

Speaker 4 (01:59:32):
You know what those drums mean.

Speaker 3 (01:59:33):
It's football at five here, final hour of the program.
Five o'clock brings us football at five each and every
day except Friday's channeler Rome joins us at that time
or sometime throughout this week with early Astros Baseball. We'll
be getting you into the Astros on Deck Show. They've
got Pittsburgh for three starting tomorrow. They've got Cleveland for
three throughout the weekend Friday, Saturday and Sunday. But the

(01:59:54):
Houston Texans back on the field three days this week
for their second week of OTAs tomorrow. Media, well, I
think we got the invite for tomorrow, so we'll be
over there tomorrow morning check in on how things look,
how they stand.

Speaker 4 (02:00:08):
CJ.

Speaker 3 (02:00:09):
Stroud has been standing throughout all the practices that we visited,
two of them last week of the three, he's been
moving around at all the practices we've attended. He's even
been handing off at the most recent practice that we attended.

Speaker 4 (02:00:21):
But he did not throw at either of those.

Speaker 3 (02:00:23):
We talked about that quite a bit last week, so
did his head coach, so did his offensive coordinator, Aaron Wilson.
Over the time since then, reported a peck injury of
very small nature, not of great concern, nothing that would
impact them, and that certainly matches impact them when they
play football games still ninety plus days till they do that,

(02:00:44):
games that count in standings, when they open the season
at so far against the Rams, nothing that they believe
will impact that in any way. It certainly seems like
he would be ready to throw even as early as today, tomorrow,
or Friday, or on the eleventh when they have mini camp,
or at any point in time before they get to
training camp. And to that end, you're familiar with dream Con.

(02:01:09):
I know you've participated in Comic Palooza. Believe you've I
don't know if they call it wrestling con when WrestleMania
takes place.

Speaker 4 (02:01:17):
Yeah, I've gone to several of.

Speaker 3 (02:01:19):
Those, so dream con Are you familiar with that? No,
that's right here in Houston. It just took place over
the weekend. GRB among the places you can go for
some of what they have to offer. They had a
celebrity or influencer or hip hop all the celebrity basketball

(02:01:40):
event over at for Tita Center over the weekend. Tarry
Easton was there. Texans quarterback number seven c J. Stroud
was there shooting baskets and seemingly fine.

Speaker 6 (02:01:51):
So his peck is okay. According to doctor Wexler, I didn't.

Speaker 3 (02:01:56):
Want to play amateur doctor without the information on yourd
on Alvarez, but I will. He'll absolutely do it.

Speaker 6 (02:02:01):
He It is supplemental info to have. And instead of
just saying he's fine, I saw him well.

Speaker 3 (02:02:05):
During the first forty eight hours or so of covering
Texan's voluntary OTAs we were there for a practice, we
had a chance to talk to Tamiko Ryans. He divulged
nothing and again he's not he doesn't have to. He
can say what he wants. His answer was more along
the lines of everyone's on a different schedule.

Speaker 4 (02:02:25):
Guys do what they need to do. We're not. We
move on.

Speaker 3 (02:02:27):
You know, some players are I deal with The players
were fine, and then it's fine.

Speaker 4 (02:02:32):
They had a practice that we said it like Matt Thomas.
They had a.

Speaker 3 (02:02:35):
Practice which we did not see, So who knows what
CJ did. No video evidence of him doing anything more
than what he did that day. That was the first
forty eight hours of covering their off season, so to speak.
But the next forty eight hours were very, very different.
We got to our second practice, he participated in the
handoff to running back portion of team drills, which showed

(02:02:57):
his knee was probably fine, his ankle was probably fine,
his core was probably fine.

Speaker 4 (02:03:02):
His hand is fine. His hands were fine.

Speaker 3 (02:03:04):
Although there was a mishap on a snap and a
pitch the ball hit the turf, the knot grass as
they were inside.

Speaker 4 (02:03:11):
Blame the running back.

Speaker 3 (02:03:13):
It did look like the blame was properly placed on
the running back by those that were involved.

Speaker 4 (02:03:18):
Yeah, it was, but.

Speaker 3 (02:03:19):
There didn't appear to be anything physically wrong with any
of the areas we could discern from this particular activity.
Both Cole and I were out there that day. From
then we went to our conversation with Nick Cayley, and
he said I'm not concerned whatsoever. And he's totally up
to spued on everything. He's into everything, he's totally locked in.
And then we have the shooting three pointers College three

(02:03:41):
Pointers video to go with it. Over that second forty
eight hour period Friday and Saturday, Wednesday and Thursday, very
little information. Friday and Saturday similar lack of information with
all sorts of signs pointing to certain things. Plus Aaron
Wilson's report of the minor peck injury of little concern.
But I had said it already last week. He's not

(02:04:03):
on a pitch count, they're not watching his throws. There's
a reason he's not throwing, but it doesn't appear to
be serious.

Speaker 4 (02:04:09):
I'm gonna go ahead and stick with that. Well, it's
also June second.

Speaker 3 (02:04:13):
It's also June second, just went under one hundred days
until the opener.

Speaker 4 (02:04:19):
Yeah, so if there is something wrong, he's got plenty
of time to get over it.

Speaker 16 (02:04:22):
Look, I was on with Matt Thomas last week and
I asked him, or he asked me, what's my concern level?

Speaker 4 (02:04:28):
And I said point zero zero zero zero one.

Speaker 16 (02:04:31):
Now he asked me, what if he doesn't throw on Thursday?
Point zero zero zero zero two, it's one hundred days.
Let him breathe for a second, especially after taking fifty
two hits last year, your body is not going to
be completely back to normal.

Speaker 3 (02:04:47):
I was with Tom, he takes one hundred this year.
What if I asked C J. Stroud about that and
gave him that number? Do you think he would be
very angry that I am trying to tell him he
only got hit fifty two times last year? Yes, Like,
what do you think the real number is? Without going
back and look, we know they sacked number and some
of those are hits, and some of those are running

(02:05:07):
out of bounds, running plays where he gets hit on
if he's on the move on a scramble, if he
gets hit right after the throw, you know there's a
QB shits goes away.

Speaker 6 (02:05:16):
What is the exact number of these responsibility of the
offensive line?

Speaker 4 (02:05:20):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (02:05:20):
Well, well first you got to get to the number.
What do you think the real number is? Every single
game that they had offensive line issues? I believe the
times he got hit number on average is probably between
about fourteen and twenty.

Speaker 4 (02:05:32):
So.

Speaker 16 (02:05:33):
According to Pro Football Focus, he was the number one
pressured quarterback in the NFL. He was number three in
total hits. So again we're talking about a guy who
was definitely hit over eighty times last year.

Speaker 3 (02:05:46):
Do they have a number? I'll try and find it, Yeah,
because I know that they do track the number. He
would indicate over seventeen weeks he played in all the
games games. That's a lot of very low hit games
for it only to be in the eighties.

Speaker 6 (02:06:04):
That's just that's sound. I know you're not trying to
do this. That just sounds to me like your sugarcoating.

Speaker 4 (02:06:10):
No, sure, I'm not at all.

Speaker 3 (02:06:11):
I'm saying because Cole just said the number fifty to
of my immediate reactions, he got hit way more than
fifty twos.

Speaker 4 (02:06:16):
Right, And that's and that's why do I have a
number to begin with? I just realized something.

Speaker 6 (02:06:19):
Though you and I were within i mean whisper distance
at some point of C. J. Stroud, we we are
derelict in our duty. We could have just walked up
to him at any point when he was attending Game
seven and asked him, hey, well do you think about
what the Texans did in the draft?

Speaker 3 (02:06:40):
I mean, I was a lot closer than than you
were lucky enough to be on the on the floor. Yeah,
you actually you had more. It's it's all about the scheduling.
I must have caught a video of him walking right
by me.

Speaker 6 (02:06:51):
Like, in all seriousness, I do wonder what he thinks
when he sees what they did.

Speaker 3 (02:06:55):
He was quoted publicly on what he thought about wanting
to go in having a talk with Nick Cassario after
some of those moves have been made, including the Larimie
Tunsel trade, trying to hear their perspective on it, because
he's going to know more about how he believes it's
going to impact him and their offense. And I think
when you add it all up, that's why I think
he's fine with where there are, where they are. But

(02:07:17):
he's like everybody else, even Kole Popovich should think this,
even Nick Kaylee, even Dimiko, even Nick Cassaria should think this.
There are ways they're going to have to figure out
how to be better at left tackle, at plays that
require their left tackle to do his job in a
certain way that they can't do anymore. And they can't
leave whomever it might be Cam Robinson or tay URSII

(02:07:39):
or whomever in a situation they would have previously left
Laramie in because Laramie could handle it if it was
a pass block in it request.

Speaker 6 (02:07:47):
They also served as a reminder, and I know you
have you got to clear all the cobwebs and get
rid of all the legal issues. To remember, not that
long ago when we actually had a unique and genuine
I think reaction to a bad or at least in

(02:08:09):
the case of a quarterback, not promising personnel move that
the Texans made. Remember when DeShawn Watson got the news
that DeAndre Hopkins had been traded and his videoed reaction
was posted wide and far on social media, Like I
think it was his trainer that came up and told
him what had happened. He just looked at the camera

(02:08:31):
like really, GM bell O'Brien, Well, was this.

Speaker 4 (02:08:34):
Fair for me to say? I have to ask that.

Speaker 3 (02:08:36):
So we've had quite a few discussions about things like this.
Is it fair to say CJ's losing one part of
a very bad unit, a good one, but a very
bad unit. And Dion or DeShawn was losing his best weapon,
the best part of a unit that was reliant on

(02:08:56):
him to be successful.

Speaker 4 (02:08:58):
Right, Okay, So I have a number for you guys
for the hits. Yeah, okay, okay.

Speaker 16 (02:09:02):
So his sack percentage last year and in his NFL
career is at eight point h three percent, which is
currently third in the NFL. Pressures last year on sixty
one point two percent of snaps hits allowed last year ninety.

Speaker 6 (02:09:19):
Nine, so he was pressured on nearly two thirds of
every single time he dropped back to pass.

Speaker 4 (02:09:28):
Yes, that's not good.

Speaker 3 (02:09:31):
I'm not gonna lie to you. I fell short of this.
The Weschler research team got away from me during the season.
I did a little bit during his rookie year, but
it came up much more often last year. So I
really actually put it together. I charted all this stuff
strictly off the actual official game book, and then I
was going elsewhere for the pressure rate, how many QB hits,

(02:09:51):
how many tackles for loss, which was an indicator that
they were in your backfield.

Speaker 4 (02:09:55):
Obviously, the sack total and the pressure rate.

Speaker 3 (02:09:58):
And later in the season, obviously, like I'm saying, I
didn't follow through, but you could see it right in
that fourth fifth week of the season, right after their
four and one start, the numbers started to skyrocket, and
the regularity in which he was seeing a pressure rate
that's totally out of control. You know, ten plays each
of quarterback hits and tackles for loss. Far too much

(02:10:18):
activity in the Texans backfield that Bobby Slowak was running
out of plays in his playbook to try to combat
it with. And it's the same point in time we said, well,
this offense is no better, has not improved over last year.
They're not as successful. They're actually going in the wrong direction.
It's all those numbers are very indicative of what they
were unable to do, which is why whether it works

(02:10:40):
or not, we're not going to know until they probably
play a chunk of this season a month, let's just
say a month. They do recognize it was not working.
They've made a lot of changes to every area.

Speaker 4 (02:10:50):
We've talked about.

Speaker 1 (02:10:53):
The age on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (02:11:04):
It is the A team.

Speaker 6 (02:11:04):
It's Sports Talk seven ninety because I know how much
WEX likes articles like these, and because it came up
last week in a conversation about this particular skill position
for the Texans. What if I were to tell you
that the Texans could pursue a sudden blockbuster trade for

(02:11:29):
a Pro Bowl weapon for one CJ.

Speaker 3 (02:11:31):
Stroud, All right, Texans blockbuster deal, they need a weapon
for CJ. There's running backs, there's tight ends, there's wide receivers.
Wide receiver one is Nico Collins. I love to replicate
that caliber player, but they certainly could use someone next
to him, even though I think Christian Kirk's going to
be fantastic. Definitely could use an upgrade at tight end.
We talked about that a little bit with the jihon

(02:11:53):
O Smith possibly being moved not to Houston likely though.

Speaker 4 (02:11:57):
And running back. You worked Joe Mixon's deal so we.

Speaker 3 (02:12:01):
Would not be become a free agent for the twenty
five and six season. And while he's not participating due
to a minor injury. Believe Aaron Wilson mentioned he was
in a boot. Not real concern there. Blockbuster deal. They
did gain a little less than nine million in cap
space today, being that is June second, and the June
first designated release for Shaq Mason has now been executed

(02:12:24):
and calculated, and this is expected for the I believe
there are nine or ten teams that had a June
first designated release or two, and thus that money is
now available to them or cap space is available to them.

Speaker 4 (02:12:37):
I'm intrigued.

Speaker 3 (02:12:39):
I'm all forgiving Nick Kayley all the possible weapons he
can get.

Speaker 4 (02:12:44):
Do tell well, then I'll shoot it down. Yeah, I know,
I figured as much. The build up is as follows.

Speaker 3 (02:12:52):
You want to start with the source first set my
mood SI dot com.

Speaker 4 (02:12:57):
Well that doesn't tell me much.

Speaker 3 (02:12:59):
I know that SIM employees almost zero NFL reporters, so
if it's from the Texans specific site and arm of
Sports Illustrated, probably lands more on the aggregator. I'm writing
articles and get paid off of how many.

Speaker 4 (02:13:16):
People read them, So.

Speaker 3 (02:13:20):
That way there you go. Okay, so it's the latter. Yeah, okay,
so I'm setting it can still be fun. I'm all,
I haven't shot it down yet.

Speaker 4 (02:13:29):
Oh it's coming. No wet blanket yet. Cale knows it's coming.
I do. What are the Texans offering? Uh?

Speaker 3 (02:13:36):
Well that part? Oh no, all right, just hit me
with it. I'm ready. I'm this is more about seated
the fact that a guy is being dangled.

Speaker 4 (02:13:47):
Nice, let's go get him Texans. I want to win.
I want to score points.

Speaker 3 (02:13:51):
You know, this might be easier with other co hosts,
but not this one.

Speaker 4 (02:13:55):
Do you want me to stop talking? Kind of?

Speaker 6 (02:13:57):
All right, just for thirty seconds the Texans getting Jaden Higgins,
Jalen Nole, and.

Speaker 4 (02:14:04):
Woody Marks in the NFL draft.

Speaker 6 (02:14:07):
It's they're talking about some of the moves they made
as fringe moves.

Speaker 4 (02:14:11):
That's how they're describing these. But after c J.

Speaker 6 (02:14:15):
Stroud struggled so much during a sophomore campaign, you just
can't help but think Houston needs to get more aggressive
and surrounding him with more weapons, which again they've kind
of done, but a blockbuster trade for Falcons tight end
Kyle Pitts see.

Speaker 4 (02:14:32):
I couldn't even get it out before.

Speaker 6 (02:14:34):
He's just so they've been receiving Apparently the Falcons have
been receiving trade inquiries on him, but they haven't the
while Atlanta has not been quick to act on any
of them. Moving the former first round pick makes sense
because of the fact he's entering into his final year
of his contract, which again would be very Stefan Digg's

(02:14:57):
trade of them, although I don't anticipate that. Well, maybe
they would immediately rip up the contract and do something different,
but I would assume that if they were to go
get Pits, it would be to keep him for a
while and not rent him for a year.

Speaker 4 (02:15:09):
Like the Techtans did with Digs. All right, go ahead.

Speaker 3 (02:15:11):
So the moratorium on me talking on my sports shows,
I know, and I barely was able to give that
to you. I mean, those of you watching on Space
City Home Network know the exact moment I wanted to
speak and it was just barely over thirty request.

Speaker 4 (02:15:27):
Into that sour Lemon.

Speaker 3 (02:15:28):
So, Kyle Pitts is heading into the final year of
his contract. It's your five of his rookie deal, which
is the fifth year, the option year that they picked
up after they extremely very very smartly geniusly level thousand
genius mensa candidate like said, hey, with the fourth pick
in the draft, we want a tight end. His name

(02:15:49):
is Kyle Anthony Pitts. He's a unicorn. He's going to
turn it all around for us. And then they paired
him with Arthur Smith's mustache. Did not work out very well. Okay,
So he's head into year five. He's gone from sixty
eight catches to twenty eight catches, to fifty three catches
to forty seven catches. And just today I actually had

(02:16:09):
found out some interesting information on Kyle Pits, not knowing
this would come up here on the show from our
friends over at SI. Rahee Morris, speaking today, says they're
being extremely cautious with Kyle Pitts from a physical standpoint,
with their OTA practices, you won't see him out on
the grass. He wouldn't specify what the injury is. It
is being reported as a leg injury, a hamstring injury,

(02:16:34):
or I should say a leg or foot injury.

Speaker 4 (02:16:36):
I'll leave it at that.

Speaker 3 (02:16:38):
It doesn't even matter under no circumstances what I want
Nick Cassario to make a play for Kyle Pitts in
this scenario, he's either going into his final year, so
whatever you've given up is down the drain, or you've
already decided this is who we want longer term and

(02:17:01):
you're gonna lock up an extremely disappointing player.

Speaker 4 (02:17:06):
Maybe he just needs to change your scenery. I see
you know that.

Speaker 16 (02:17:09):
I like to play on both sides of the line
with you too. I like to give even keel answer
at times, and most of the time I agree with you.

Speaker 4 (02:17:19):
I won thousand percent agree with wex.

Speaker 16 (02:17:22):
If Nick Cassario trades a single pick a Day three
seventh rounder that could eventually be used for, say, I
don't know a wide receiver, that's gonna cost you fifteen
million dollars.

Speaker 4 (02:17:34):
I will lose my mind for Kyle Pitts.

Speaker 16 (02:17:37):
It's absolutely a no shot, no questions asked, whatsoever.

Speaker 4 (02:17:42):
Get that out of the deal.

Speaker 16 (02:17:44):
Throw that trade proposal deep into the trash and never
look at it again. If I throw up on it
a few times, that's how much I would despise this trade.

Speaker 3 (02:17:52):
If there's any chance if you gave fifty percent of
the snaps over a ten game stretch to Rerevin Jordan
in the Atlanta Falcons offense part with Kirk Cousins, part
with Michael Pennox Junior, you don't think it is any
way over that ten game span where he saw fifty
percent of the snaps in those ten games fully healthy,

(02:18:15):
you think there's any way he could catch the ball
twenty two times. If Kyle ped ten consecutive games a
total of twenty two catches, for all the amazing moments
where he was absolutely wide open and creating tons of
separation and just showing off his unbelievable NFL caliber, I'm
better than you athleticism there, Kyle Pitts is a huge

(02:18:36):
example of why you had better Like.

Speaker 4 (02:18:40):
Well, I was gonna ask to put the words together.
So I thought I knew it was pretty hard. No, no, no,
you know how bad it is. Who do you think
went next of somebody that's awesome? Yeah, Jamar Chase. Who
do you think went after that? Oh?

Speaker 16 (02:18:51):
Jaylen Waddell? Who went after that? Pennae Sewel who went
after that?

Speaker 4 (02:18:55):
Jac Wore? Is this Demetrov who made that pick? That
was still? That was what's his name? Current guy?

Speaker 16 (02:19:00):
Terry fought knot that was his first pick ever, and
that was a Terry font to not pick, which is
why he is so adamant of holding onto it because
he doesn't want to be wrong.

Speaker 4 (02:19:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:19:11):
I don't know who came up with the idea of
that the Texans should make a play for him. I
can understand the idea that the Falcons and his very
large fifth year option year salary would want to get
rid of him because he's a run of the miller. Hey, Ac,
he's a he's a. I mean, I don't know how
else to say. If you want him to play well,
then you have to throw them the ball. If you

(02:19:31):
need to throw them the ball, then he needs to
be open. Then he needs to be able to catch
the ball. He's not a difference maker. He's just some
of these gms. Man, I don't I don't understand it.

Speaker 16 (02:19:39):
I think I know who came up with this ac.
Do you have the tray perposal up? Because I think
I know who this was.

Speaker 3 (02:19:44):
Uh, I'm actually scrolling down to the actual I don't
even know if he even gives.

Speaker 16 (02:19:49):
He does if it's who I think it is. It's
for a twenty twenty five fourth round pack. I mean
twenty twenty six to fourth round pack. Your asset cost
is a Day three pick.

Speaker 3 (02:19:58):
Not awful, but I'm not interested in paying a tight
end of what I believe is that caliber. I've got
four years of tape of him not being a game breaker,
and I do blame some of the pack or the
Falcons offense, their coach Pryor, and the offense he was running.
I do understand there's some of those things there. And
prior to this year, when you had both Cousins and

(02:20:19):
Pennix as your quarterbacks, they've had some bad quarterbacks. They've
had some bad quarterback play. We're talking about Desmond Ritter
and some other These aren't NFL caliber.

Speaker 4 (02:20:28):
I get all that, but there's the reason why.

Speaker 3 (02:20:30):
Drake London could go out there and have some unbelievable
performances because he is a difference maker at wide receiver.
And there's a reason why Jon Robinson should have the
ball in his hands minimum twenty times every single game,
both out of the backfield and as a pass receiver
out of the backfield. Kyle pitts, I don't want the
ball in his hands more. They have better players. Put

(02:20:51):
him on the Texans. I will say it would be true.
I'd rather him throwing the ball to other people or
handing it off to somebody. They said that, he says,
it's Matt you Schmidt. He says wow.

Speaker 6 (02:21:04):
He says that uh, or he at least alludes to
the fact that he would provide Stroud with some extra
with some extra blocking up front.

Speaker 4 (02:21:12):
Oh my god. And the funny I know, I know.

Speaker 6 (02:21:14):
The funny thing about that is he couldn't even written
that if he felt like they did that by addressing
the offensive line this offseason.

Speaker 4 (02:21:22):
He doesn't think they did.

Speaker 16 (02:21:23):
You have one mid tight end, congratulations, you want to
add a second one for double the price?

Speaker 4 (02:21:28):
No, thank you? Ahead of him, and he doesn't in
their salary structure because he called Dalton Schultz underwhelming. That's fair.

Speaker 1 (02:21:38):
The on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 3 (02:21:43):
Full show today. So undoubtedly that just gave us more
time to miss things. In case you missed it, can
clean that up. Wexay see here with you and Cole delivers.
In case you missed it, what do we have?

Speaker 16 (02:21:53):
So as much as I'm not excited or very much
excited never to see Kyle Pitts whar a Houston texaniform,
I'm probably even a little bit more excited to know
that the Texans may feel really good about where they
are at the cornerback position because Ronald Darby, veteran cornerback,
after ten years and after three practices at OTAs, it's.

Speaker 4 (02:22:13):
Calling it a career.

Speaker 16 (02:22:14):
Former second round pick by the Buffalo Bills sign a
one year deal this offseason with the Texans. Has informed
the team that he is retiring over four hundred and
forty seven total tackles, nine interceptions, fifty six pass breakups,
calling it a career after ten years with the Washington Commanders,
Philadelphia Eagles, Devin Broncos, Houston Texans, Jacksonville Jaguars, and Buffalo

(02:22:36):
Bill's Jalen Smith. Now's your opportunity to kind of prove
that you are the next big name al Htown.

Speaker 3 (02:22:42):
I would suspect the Texans will be signing a veteran
cornerback sometime, either before training camp begins or in the
very early stages of training camp. Treymont Smith, who can
play corner if asked, probably would not be if their
roster was as they'd hope, and he will be more
of a special team's demon, which he was for them
once and then has been since he left and now
he's back. But otherwise they just basically don't have any

(02:23:04):
veteran help there. Miles Bryant might be an answer. They
played quite a bit of g'angelo Ross last year out
of necessity. I don't think they would be eager to
begin the year where he is the next guy in line.
Derrick Stingley, Junior, Kamari Lasyer phenomenal duo. I think Jalen
Petrie technically is the third member of that cornerback starting
d duo who plays there on the slot.

Speaker 4 (02:23:26):
Obviously he's a safety, but that's where he is.

Speaker 3 (02:23:28):
They're in unbelievable shape and their top two corners basically
don't ever leave the field. But they brought in Ronald
Darby for the same reason. I think they will end
up bringing somebody else in. In this case, he was
a participant in their OTAs last week saw him out there,
just obviously felt like it was time to call it
a career. Not the only walk away from the NFL today,

(02:23:50):
This one probably of larger magnitude considering where he played,
the level he was playing at, and it was a
much shorter career than most would have.

Speaker 4 (02:24:00):
Interesting is that.

Speaker 16 (02:24:00):
I remember freaking out and my jaw dropping when guys
like Luke Keikley and Andrew Luck decided to walk away
from the game, and I felt the exact same way
when Detroit Lions All Pro center Frank Ragnow, a four
time Pro Bowler entering his seventh season, announced his retirement
on social media today. I've listened to my body and
this has been one of the hardest decisions of my life.

(02:24:21):
The Lions organization absolutely incredible throughout this process, and I
can't emphasize enough how great I am for this team
and for all the fans. It was absolutely an honor
battling for you, battle through multiple injuries. What's really kind
of the selling point here is that rag Now was
that anchor for the rebuild of this Lions team was
bought in underneath Dan Campbell and Brad Holmes signed a

(02:24:43):
four year contract when his negotiations were up. Really was
the foundation of the new build offensive line that eventually
led to the Lions winning back to back division titles
and competing for their first NFC Championship appearance in over
thirty years seven seasons. A low at FARTI short, but
this was a move that is I think really going
to alter the pissona of what we know about the

(02:25:05):
NFC or franchise.

Speaker 3 (02:25:07):
I tend to agree is when you couple it with
the loss of Zeitler, who left in free agencies. With
the Titans now their offensive line and even probably adding
their usual tackle eligible Dan Skipper, they were really good
one through six and they could usually overcome one short
term injury. They have to replace two mainstays, and probably
the last four years, barring the one year that he

(02:25:28):
was hurt, he's been one of the two or three
best centers in football, and this past year he was that.

Speaker 4 (02:25:34):
Now he won't be there for Jared.

Speaker 3 (02:25:36):
Goff, who's also lost a few other things off the field,
like their offensive coaching staff, essentially in its entirety.

Speaker 4 (02:25:44):
Yeah, I'm just I'm I can't decide if I'm.

Speaker 6 (02:25:48):
Surprised or not that this there aren't more guys that
I mean, obviously, the number of these types of situations
has increased in the last ten years.

Speaker 3 (02:25:57):
When was the Concussion movie Ish that was about twenty eighteen,
and that was really the start after because if it
was eighteen was keek Lee and nineteen was Luck. As
they continue players that aren't Luck because Luck's the quarterback,
but all the other players as their salaries continue to
get bigger and bigger and bigger, which afford a better
opportunity to say, well, sure, I'd love to continue making eight, ten,

(02:26:19):
twelve million, but I've made thirty thirty five forty million.
More importantly, maybe I can step away without the lure
of I mean, who wants to walk away from that
amount of money? Well, someone who has that amount of
money can also. I think it helps you make a
decision like that. This is a seven year player.

Speaker 6 (02:26:35):
Right, And I guess offensive Lineman, because we've talked about
this before, that surprises me the most because it's not
to say.

Speaker 4 (02:26:41):
They're not I mean, they are literally collisions every.

Speaker 3 (02:26:43):
Since they start fighting every week to stay on the field,
and usually they get on the field, and they shouldn't
be When you think about how many offensive linemen average
the length of careers that they do, sure, it's amazing.

Speaker 16 (02:26:57):
Also think about this for a second. What's the movie
can cushion based off of who is the main player
that the doctor was studying. Mike Webster one of the
best offensive linemen of the Pittsburgh Steelers and the hits
that he was taking ultimately led to the tragic end
of his life.

Speaker 4 (02:27:12):
So when you have that type.

Speaker 16 (02:27:14):
Of money saved a way, you can kind of feel
very comfortable that you did your job and now is
the time for you to make sure that your body,
your mind, and really the entirety of your life that
is head is a priority at this point.

Speaker 4 (02:27:27):
And speaking of money, a.

Speaker 16 (02:27:28):
Lot of money is going to be earned by this
next guy. And thank god that the Astros are dumb
playing the kans City Royals, because they just called up
top prospect Jack cag leone after less than a year
of choosing him with a six overall pick. In his
first full professional season after dominating at Florida for three years,
he has fifteen home runs fifty six RBIs across fifty
six games at Double A and TRIPA, hitting three twenty

(02:27:50):
two with a five ninety three ops. The Royals offense
has been struggling in the entire month of May, where
they ranked dead last in majors in the majors and
runs for thirty four and they're tied for twenty eighth
and run score with one hundred and ninety four. This
is a really good hitter that is going to add
I think exceptional value. And the Royals are playing in

(02:28:10):
a division right now to where anyone I think you
kind of pull away. This may be that spark. And
if you look at the Fandel odds this morning, he's
already at forty to one to win ar Rookie of
the Year simply by just being called up.

Speaker 4 (02:28:22):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (02:28:23):
Fifteen home runs, huh, almost as many as Shay Witcomb,
but not even close. Wow, that's pretty good. Wet blanket
fifteen homers. Way to go, dude.

Speaker 4 (02:28:32):
How many different segments have you wet blanketed today?

Speaker 3 (02:28:35):
Is there any green home runs this season for Shay Whitcombe.
Prior to his call up to the Astros this past weekend,
he's played six different positions ready to help the Astros
wherever they need him. This gentleman that Cole speaks of
is going to be Bobby Witt junior esque. Unfortunately, Yeah,

(02:28:56):
he's called That means they'll probably trade him soon.

Speaker 6 (02:28:59):
No, they they gave us any other Bobbywood junior a contract.

Speaker 4 (02:29:04):
Yes, I tend to believe.

Speaker 3 (02:29:05):
That he's going to play in a way that says
they better. Unfortunately, not good for the rest of the
Central or the American League.

Speaker 6 (02:29:12):
But they're a small market team. There's no way where's
the money coming from.

Speaker 3 (02:29:15):
Small market teams could make it all the way to
the NBA Finals. On the basketball side, you can also
win the World Series and make back to back appearances
like the Royals did last thing.

Speaker 16 (02:29:24):
Before we get on out of here, if you haven't
been paying attention to the College World Series race to Omaha,
it's been awesome. Not only has the sec that have
thirteen representative been dismantled, the top two seeds went down
in stellar fashion to UTSA and Right State.

Speaker 4 (02:29:43):
Right State, which had a five to one lead.

Speaker 16 (02:29:46):
Gets its return style against number one seed Vanderbilt, and
unfortunately for the station that we claim the text long warrants,
they lose to UTSA, who advances to their first ever
Super Regional SEC needs to get their I tell Roland
because of thirteen teams and they only have right now
two going to the supers.

Speaker 3 (02:30:06):
LSU and Tennessee could face a similar fate as they
play today. UTSA and UCLA will play in the Supers
for a trip to Omaha. That's very impressive for the Roadrunners.

Speaker 2 (02:30:21):
The A team on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 6 (02:30:24):
Night, we're you gonna watch tonight, wex.

Speaker 3 (02:30:34):
There's college baseball to be watched. As he just mentioned,
the last remaining spot in the championship best two out
of three finals on the softball side has yet to
be claimed. It will either be Texas Tech or Oklahoma,
and they will then lose two out of three to
Texas for the national championship. Longhorn Softball won their game

(02:30:56):
earlier today, didn't allow any runs. Can't lose when you
do that, and they will play for the national championship
in that best two out of three. Already beaten Oklahoma
in this postseason, and Texas Tech would have to be
beaten by Oklahoma today and tomorrow or else.

Speaker 4 (02:31:11):
They will advance and that will be the matchup.

Speaker 3 (02:31:12):
So maybe I'll take a little of that in there's
other baseball non top of the al West to be
played tonight. There's also the college baseball that Cole mentioned.
I was going to bring something up. News in May
always comes out at this time of year, but June
first is another relatively important date here in the southwest
region of our country.

Speaker 4 (02:31:33):
Do you know why?

Speaker 6 (02:31:36):
Because it's the anniversary of back to back championships won
by the Rockets in this month.

Speaker 3 (02:31:41):
June one, specifically through November thirtieth, marks the twenty twenty
five Atlantic hurricane season.

Speaker 6 (02:31:51):
Oh good, can't wait for the next five hundred year
storm this year.

Speaker 3 (02:31:56):
So tell me when you think you hear the name
of the story you're most concerned about.

Speaker 4 (02:32:01):
This is not coming list. It came out in May,
so I'm not acting like it just just hit the airwaves.
Just under the gun we've got.

Speaker 3 (02:32:09):
And again, you can stop me at any point or
just let me keep going when you feel like this
is the storm we should be most concerned about. Okay,
Andrea Barry Chantal.

Speaker 4 (02:32:21):
No, no, what, no way? Is that a good one?

Speaker 16 (02:32:26):
So that will be a bad storm. That's the one
I wantn't be concerned about. Chantelle, Come on.

Speaker 3 (02:32:29):
I'm asking for the one you're most concerned about, not
the random ones that won't do anything. Okay, dexter aerin.

Speaker 4 (02:32:39):
Fernand, is it Aaron? Is it a male or a female?

Speaker 3 (02:32:42):
Well, it's e R I N It's obviously they alternate.
I shouldn't say obviously they do alternate female male as
they started with Andrea. Okay, so Fernand Gabrielle, you go
right there. So you're afraid of Gabrielle. Okay, it sounds
like say no thankfully, which allows me to continue. What
does it sound like?

Speaker 4 (02:33:02):
It sounds like that.

Speaker 3 (02:33:03):
Some older girl is playing a high school student at
West Beverly High.

Speaker 6 (02:33:07):
Yes, yes, Andrea carteris of her of hurricanes is going
to be a monster.

Speaker 4 (02:33:14):
You know what's funny about.

Speaker 3 (02:33:15):
Gabrielle Zuckerman, gabriel Montes was such an easy going person
before we go on, because we haven't gotten to the
actual presumed answer yet.

Speaker 6 (02:33:24):
Before Ike hit back in two thousand and eight, I
was on the air with Andrea Ware and I don't
even know if that if at that time it was,
it had kind of because you remember the start is
like storms out in the Atlantic, and that.

Speaker 3 (02:33:43):
Was a couple of storms after Gustav and a couple
of storms before Josephine and Kyle.

Speaker 4 (02:33:47):
Yes, as we all know.

Speaker 6 (02:33:49):
Yes, anyway, I'll never forget what Andrea's first reaction was
when we were actually talking about this topic, and he said,
if I know anything about Ike, it's gonna hit.

Speaker 4 (02:33:59):
It's very well else unfortunately, very well said he was
making a very poor taste joke. Love Dedre, but he
was right.

Speaker 3 (02:34:05):
Okay, so we're the roof off of the stadium after Gabrielle,
we have umberto okay, Emelda, No, Jerry, is that like
the nicest storm ever? That seems like somebody who would
show up at your door of milking cookies, Jerry or
Jerry Karen? Yes, yes, you're most concerned about tropical Storm Karen.

(02:34:30):
Generator installed yet because Karen is gonna be such a
bad storm. Kind of sure that we will see this
meme if we haven't already. Tropical Storm Karen wants to
see the manager.

Speaker 6 (02:34:40):
Dude, Please let this be the most uneventful nothing burger ever.
I cannot take a hurricane Karen ruining my summer.

Speaker 4 (02:34:51):
I can't either, but I'm a little When did they
get to the case.

Speaker 6 (02:34:55):
I know, I know, I know that for me to
just on average, when is the letter range in you know.

Speaker 4 (02:35:04):
I just because time of the year when we might say,
like a storm is when we have our worst storms.
So I'm trying to June, July.

Speaker 3 (02:35:11):
August, September, November. That's the span five months.

Speaker 4 (02:35:15):
Because August twenty ninth or twenty seventh or something like that.
So you're already making plans to not be here. Well,
k's right before H.

Speaker 3 (02:35:25):
Well, I'm gonna get you right after take you to
try that again, you know what I mean. I'll get
you further along the list and see if you think
this could possibly happen in twenty twenty five. The way
the male female names go the tropical storm for t
is a female name begins with a T.

Speaker 4 (02:35:43):
Does it have an H in it? It ends with
an A yeah? Does it have an H or not?

Speaker 16 (02:35:47):
No? H?

Speaker 6 (02:35:48):
Well, then it's not the real deal, Holy Field, it
is not if you don't spell it with an H
like like.

Speaker 3 (02:35:55):
The it's not and it's not Terresa, it's actually Tanya.

Speaker 6 (02:36:00):
You let me know when there's the list that comes
out that has Teresa rock face on it, and that's
when you're gonna have the world end.

Speaker 3 (02:36:05):
Guess which tropical storm Little Nico would be afraid of.

Speaker 4 (02:36:11):
Tropical storm Van.

Speaker 3 (02:36:12):
I thought you're gonna say Van, tropical storms suits if
we get so there you go. People, be aware if
we ease through hurricane or tropical storm Jerry, just be
aware of what is right now.

Speaker 6 (02:36:26):
Gabrielle is a sleeper. It sounds like an exotic hot female.

Speaker 2 (02:36:30):
It's not.

Speaker 4 (02:36:31):
It could be.

Speaker 16 (02:36:32):
So you're saying that Gabrielle is the succubus of hurricanes.
Sure do you even know what that word means? No,
sucks the life out of you, but it looks really
hot while doing it.

Speaker 3 (02:36:40):
I mean just like it sounds. Yes, that's exactly what
it sounds like.

Speaker 6 (02:36:44):
And you know these storms do produce rainbows, so that
could actually be accurate.

Speaker 4 (02:36:49):
It's not an imaginary demon. That's what a succubist is.

Speaker 3 (02:36:53):
Assuming female form. Yes, okay, that's what Gabrielle is.

Speaker 4 (02:36:57):
It's a demon. It will be a demon of a storm.
Tell your doing it.

Speaker 6 (02:37:01):
Once we get through whatever they named Gabrielle, that is
when we're going to be on the other side.

Speaker 3 (02:37:06):
Keep in mind how this program has evolved. We finished
like this.

Speaker 4 (02:37:10):
We're gonna draft hurricane names later this we.

Speaker 3 (02:37:12):
Started with a lot of discussion on yard on Alvarez
and the Houston Astros, a lot of emotion, a lot
of callers weighing in. Astro will be back on the
field tomorrow. We get you into the rest of your
evening a little bit easier way into it with this
instead of more angst about any of those things and
how they were handled. We'll be back on the field

(02:37:33):
tomorrow with the Texans.

Speaker 6 (02:37:35):
Shout out to Johnny the caller. I hope I grow
on you.

Speaker 3 (02:37:38):
Johnny and Morgan and Carl and others who called. Unfortunately
didn't get all of you in, but many of you did,
all weighing in on that topic. We always welcome in
the conversation here on the show. Glad to be back
here for another week. We'll have short ter shows as
the week presents, with the early start times for the
Astros and the Pirates, Paul Skenes.

Speaker 4 (02:37:58):
And the Lance McCullers Junior.

Speaker 3 (02:38:00):
Tomorrow, the Astros and the nine runs they put on
the board over four games against the Tampa Rays will
be put to the test against Paul Skeens. Its gonna
be awesome and Lance out pitches him. Lance would love
a red jim of his most recent performance. And then
we'll have to again. They've got to find some others

(02:38:20):
to get him into the latter half, just the latter
half of the game. McCullers, Gusto and Valdez expected to
get the ball Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. We'll see Hunter Browns
Saturday afternoon as he continues his all star push for
Cole for ac Wex here. Cole will be with you
as the nightcap as one night's airing this week.

Speaker 4 (02:38:42):
That's tonight that comes your way.

Speaker 3 (02:38:44):
Next, we're back at it tomorrow beginning at two o'clock
right here on.

Speaker 4 (02:38:48):
The A Team. We will talk to you then

Speaker 1 (02:38:51):
The AE on Sports Talk seven ninety