Steve Sparks Talks Division Rankings, Possible Trades, & Injury Updates

Coming off of the All-Star break the Astros kickoff their three game series against the Mariners. Winning two out of the three games, the Astros are now on top as division leaders for the west. Steve joins in assessing the Astros weekend, player injuries, and possible trades likely to come. 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
I live there for the Shawn Salisburyshow continued that time of our Monday.
It's welcome and Astros broadcaster Steve Sparksyour damned rights it is. He's on
the West coast too. Thought it'searly coffee, little koffeefee ready to go
three gamer against the Oakland Athletics.Steve Sparks joints us coming out of a
series win in Seattle. Steve,how's first place? Sound? Are you

(00:23):
brother? Not bad on a Mondaymorning? Huh? It's pretty good.
Did you just make up a newname for coffee? Yeah? Kofife?
What do you think? Did youjust make that up? No? I
just learned that the last couple ofthree or four years. I've heard it.
Where did I hear that? First? Brian? First, Koffiefe?
You made that? You did?Yeah? That was me? Thank you

(00:44):
and good night? Spell it.Use it in a sentence, Kofiefe.
Yeah, I came in and thebitches have my kofif you ready? Whoa
Steve? Yeah, he's got he'sgot to talk to baristas and call him
bitches early wow? Yeah wow,see no, you're joining it on it
to Steve. Yeah wow, Steveby tough to the man. Tell you
what way to be politically correct?Brian Man, Steve, how you doing

(01:07):
first place? Coffee? Yeah?Thank you. Put some respect on Steve
Smark's segment. Okay, never saida cuss word in his life, all
right, Koffeefe's the word of theday. By the way, Steve,
if I'd have told you six weeksago we talked about June and July moving
like Saturday in augusta moving month,but moving day are we sitting There's no

(01:30):
way you thought we'd be in firstplace right now at that stage right Probably
not, No, I mean,it takes a couple of things for that
to happen. But the Astros,we knew the schedule was going to be
in their favor, but Seattle doingwhat they did in that that timeframe with
their pitching, I was surprised,Steve. How you've talked about no desperation.

(01:53):
You've made that and it's it's sucha great point. With all these
injuries, they're still in first place, which we can talk about all the
struggles they've had, but it's stillpretty amazing, especially after that starts so
right now today not have to butin their minds, just judging from you
as an analyst and a broadcaster anda guy on radio. Do you believe

(02:14):
that they think that they all moveor to makes them a super A World
Series Championship caliber team. Yes,yeah, I certainly do you know,
you start to get to this portionwith just sixty two games left, right,
yep? I think this is gameone? Yeah, I believe so,
yep. I just feel they doneed to make a push. If

(02:37):
they had a starting pitcher go down, they're in real trouble. So I
think things are getting pretty thin rightnow where you where. You've got to
feel like it's gonna it's gonna hurta little bit to go out there and
get one because there's so many suitorsright now for for innings. But I
think they've got to go out thereand find somebody who can get them five,

(02:58):
six, seven innings, you know, on a on a turn,
just to keep everybody else up right, Steve, do you believe? Steve
Sparks joins us for his weekly visithere Astro's broadcasting on Sports Talk seven ninety
Do you, Steve, do youbelieve one move is enough? Or could
you could we use more than onepicture? Whether it's a guy in the
bullpen as well. You've talked aboutsaving those arms as well. Yeah,

(03:19):
I think I think you could usemore than one arm, but I think
I think they really need to goout there and get somebody who can accumulate
some some quality innings, you know, So you know, ideally you'd you'd
want to make sure that you getsomebody for more than just this year of
control. But whatever it is.Right now, I mean you're thinking getting

(03:42):
to the finish line with Blanco,Hunter Brown, Arrogetty, some guys that
are getting into some uncharted territory forthem right now. And I mean right
now you're thinking of Fromber Blanco andHunter, Round is probably your top three
to pitching the playoffs. We'll seewhat happens with Verlander here coming up,

(04:02):
but right now, you just gotto make sure that they get to the
finish line. And they're not.They're not pitching with their tongues hanging out
SAMs, the pitching staff, justthe everyday players. If I say healthy
Tucker whenever that is, We'll getto that in a second. Their everyday
lineup right today needs no moves otherthan Tucker's health. They're a World Series

(04:25):
team with their everyday lineup. Agreeor disagree, I believe so, and
I've felt that way the entire time. You know, you're going to go
through the Loulls Sean and every oncein a while the other the other team's
pitching is going to show up andmake your team look anemic. But I
think this offense for the Astros istop caliber, and I think, you

(04:45):
know, you get everybody clicking andthings are going the way you want.
And I think they have bench optionsright now to to pinch it and platoon
and do some things to score alot of runs. And they're gonna need
to score a lot of runs thisseries, by the way, with Oakland,
who lead the majors and runs scoredthis month by a wide Margin's just
crazy, isn't it, Steve crazy? Huh yeah, yep, they got

(05:05):
to score. They're gonna have toslug a little bit this series, Steve,
are you okay now that we don'tnow let's live in real time?
No, Kyle Tucker, how canthey sustain what they're doing without him?
For he's not doing a little bitof baseball stuff. I don't know,
as are we a month away?Still three weeks? I have no idea,

(05:26):
And there's no timetable on him maybeyou know, and you can answer
that, but can they sustain thiswith him in the dugout? How is
this going to continue to be sustainedwith the batting order, Well, it
makes things tougher. And right nowJaner Diaz is protecting jord On yep pretty
well, which it has just beenvery helpful. But once you get Tucker
in there, then it then itlooks great. You know, you start

(05:48):
spreading things out and get a lotof production. But right now, since
Yer has been doing so well,that's it's eight team's pitch to jord On
at least a little bit. AndI don't think there's any team that faith
that is avoiding Jordan Alvarez as muchas the Seattle Mariners. And yet he
had a he had a cycle againsthim yesterday, and they're trying not to

(06:09):
get him anything. So it's noteasy and it's you know, you scratch
your head wondering how in the worldthe Astros were able to do this without
Tucker, especially the way he startedthis season he was in the MVP conversation,
and to be able to do thisand and in score runs and guys
are contributing a lot of guys throughoutthe lineup. It looks good. Jake

(06:31):
Myers has turned into a guy,Jerry Paine has had stretches, Bregman's itself
again. So it looks pretty goodwith what they're doing offensively. So I'm
I'm in like I'm throwing throwing mychips in on their offense. I think
they can get it done if theythinks are a lot more smooth once once
Kyle gets back. But right nowyou're crossing your fingers that it happens pretty

(06:54):
quickly. Pastro's badcaster c Smith forhis awesome weekly visit with us every Monday
at eight thirty. Steve, Ididn't how close are we getting Kyle Tucker
back in your mind? And Iwould imagine you're probably surprised because we get
fans all the time and listeners tweetingcalling in. This can't be a bone
bruise now, I'm not questioning it. Of course, you protect your players

(07:14):
and the rest of it. Theguy's a durable player. Well when are
we going to see him? Hejust he just hasn't been able to put
weight on it. So I'm nota doctor. I don't under you know,
I'm not pretending to know how badhe's hurt. I see it,
right, you know, I seethe pain of him a couple three weeks

(07:35):
ago, of him trying to putweight on it. And you can't do
anything, you know, if you'retrying to put some weight on that,
especially hidding you know, you're puttinga lot of weights and get that front
foot down the finish. Yeah,yeah, so you know, you just
get You just got to let ittake its course, you know. And
I'm not zero question on his toughnessor grades to get out there, agreed,

(07:58):
zero, agreed. But it's justtaken longer than we've all thought.
So you know, we'll see.You know, if I was to gas,
and I know the team doesn't wantto put expectations out there because you
don't want people to expect him tobe back on August tenth, and if
it's August fifteenth, everybody's raising theirarms. But if I was the guest,
I would say middle of August,which which seems aggressive. But I

(08:20):
think he's trending in the right directionwhere you can start taking more aggressive steps
forward. Steve, we talk aboutthe trade deadline. You've you've constantly mentioned
arms, you trust, the battingorder and obviously with Kyle Tucker, you
know, hopefully getting back when wehit the trade deadline. Will we be
saying in your in your opinion,wow, they are that they believe they're

(08:41):
a World Series team? Or willit be all right? They've added some
depth, so let's see what happensfrom here. Which one will we be
closer to saying as an Astros fan, Probably the first one. I think
they're going to try to make asplash, you know, and I think
I think they want they want towin the World Series badly again. I

(09:03):
think, you know, when you'vegot a few of these guys here right
now guaranteed that you're continuing to makethat push, and you feel like the
division obviously is winnable because you're atthe top of it right now and you've
got to hold some teams off.You know, Seattle and Texas are still
going to make some noise and havetheir good runs as well, you know,

(09:24):
and they're formidable. But I thinkthe Astros, once, especially if
you get Tucker back in there,Verlander comes back to being eighty percent of
his self, you feel pretty goodabout whatever this team rolls out there.
I think, man, we don'ttalk about this very often. But you
know a lot of these trades areinsurance too. Who's going to get to

(09:46):
the finished line right, the mosthealthy, right, you know, and
you have two months left and everybody'sprobably you know, suck suck an air
right now, just to try toget to the finish line. This is
a really difficult party. I don'tthink we've talked about this before, Sean,
but the one hundred innings mark forstarting pitchers, Yeah, there's a

(10:07):
real thing in there where you startseeing guys get dead arm for about a
twenty inning period. Yeah. Andyou've talked about that about Javier in the
past, Steve on this show whenno, not this year. I'm talking
about when he became a full timestarter. He said, we got to
keep an eye on any You've saidthat about guys, and it is as
real as it gets, right.It's not just guarding against who's hurt,
it's guarding against what if? Whatif a guy gets dead armed? Right,

(10:31):
Steven, wrong time to get itwhen you're twenty, you're when you're
tied with somebody trying to deal withit, right, and all these injuries,
so it doubles, it's like adouble dip for them. They have
to deal with this, So whatdo you have to do? Okay,
so once you get to the tradedeadline, then it's very difficult to acquire
anybody past that, right, right, So what do you how are you

(10:52):
proactive in that manner? One ofthe ways to do that. I noticed
what the Ashtros did with Blueball,who's they're probably there their next man up
as far as their starting pitchers intripa A. They had him throw out
of the bullpen the other day ratherthan keep him in the rotation and rack
up innings. They're gonna monitor thisis my guest, right, They're gonna
monitor his innings, you know,and keep him a little bit more fresh

(11:16):
in case, in case he's thenext man up, you know, if
they can't get a deal done withthe starting pitcher at the deadline, those
are the guys. That's who we'relooking at after August first on who they
can bring up. So they've gotto make sure that those guys are going
to be healthy too and primed andready for whatever slot they're in with the
fresh arm and fresh leg. Stevecurious, you mentioned the sting. Do

(11:37):
you believe the sting that will hurtwill be everyday roster sting or a somewhat
deplea. I mean, you know, after what's happened in the past or
minor leader, they're going to giveup somebody or is it a low per
field And I'm not just used I'mjust using names A guy like that on
the big league roster, or acouple of or three prospects that you're like,

(11:58):
damn that one hurt? Which onewill be more saying there big league
roster minor league rosters, I thinkmaybe both. And you start looking where
do we have surplus? And we'vetalked about this. I think they have
surplus in the out yes, SoI'll kind of leave it at that.
I think, I know we'll takecare of those names who we think Steve,
But I get what you're saying,Yes, then we can all we

(12:20):
can on our show. We canread between the lines. I got you.
They have they have surplus for outfielders. I think in their organization,
you start looking around infielders, they'llprobably keep keep those as close to the
vest as possible because they don't havea ton of infield top prospects right now.
So those guys I think they'll probablykeep in the fold. No matter.
What is the American League saying isthat the Indians and Twins just I

(12:43):
want to get out of this divisionfor a second. The records are Do
you believe that Cleveland? I say, the Indians the Guardians. Do you
think they're real? Steve, Imean the record says so. Are they
legitimately a World Series caliber team?Yeah? Probably, you know, I
just don't. I think everybody haswarts right now. You can look at

(13:03):
everybody I think right now and startgetting picky and start to see where things
could go unravel if things don't goperfectly. And right now, I think
the Twins are poised to make apretty good run on Cleveland because of their
schedule the rest of the way.The Guardians have a much tougher schedule than
the Twins the rest of the way, and I think the Twins are really
good. And if they get RoyceLewis back and care Is on the I

(13:26):
l again right now with the Planterfascist if they get those guys back and
they're healthy the last month and ahalf of the season, I think you've
got a chance to overtake Cleveland.So it's going to be important. Let's
start talking about tiebreakers. The Astroshave to run the table. They have
to win three in a row againstSeattle when they play them late this season

(13:46):
at mint May Park to have thetiebreaker against Seattle. They've lost it to
Minnesota already, so the Cleveland series, you know, later on in the
season to the Astros might be important. You know, if it's a wild
card situation and you're looking for thosetie breakers, you're going to have to
start, you know, you know, making the things aware for guys that
like, hey, these games meanjust as much as maybe a playoff game.

(14:09):
So let's let's get after it.Yeah, it's about that time to
start doing it. And man,this trade deadline is going to be a
fun watch and hopefully a fun watchthat the wild factors like quickly. Yeah,
it'll be honest. And you're inOakland. Enjoy Steve first Place,
Houston Astros. It's a good placeto be after all that started. We
appreciate your inside brother, thanks forjoining us, and we'll talk to you
next week with hopefully by then atleast an idea of a little closer and

(14:33):
maybe some maybe some news by thennext week. We appreciate you, my
man, Thank you, you gotit. Thanks for having me. You
bet. That's great. Steve Sparks, we'll discuss me come back. Steve
thinks it's a sting wow factor move, which I like. We'll talk about
it. Sports Talk seven ninety SeanSalisbury Show