Jim Deshaies on The A-Team: Cubs Have Also Had Some Tough Late Inning Losses

Former Astros pitcher and broadcaster Jim Deshaies joins The A-Team, ahead of the Astros-Cubs series in Chicago. Deshaies is now part of the Marquee Sports Network in Chicago. He talks about the way that the Cubs have lost games this season. He also shares his opinion on what he's seen from the Astros this season. Plus, what he's thought of the jobs done by managers Joe Espada and Craig Counsell. 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
A pleasure to be joined by avery familiar voice, face and pitcher to
our Houston fans here, Jim Deshayse, who handles the TV side of the
analyst work for the Chicago Cubs,and of course we all know him here
for the work he did doing thesame here in Houston and throwing from the
left side on the bump here inHouston as well. Jim, It's always

(00:20):
great to catch up with you.Great to do so here in the early
portion of the season, and fora lot of the people are involved with
the Astros, it's just simply greatto be making for them to be making
a visit to Wrigley Field for thefirst time since twenty thirteen. Does it
feel like it's been that long sincethat team has been in that building.
Yeah, it's weird, isn't it. Even think of an ear League play
it would have happened more frequently.It does feel weird, And I think

(00:44):
al Touve and Brena are probably theonly two Astros that have played here.
I'm sure well Erlander, It's probablya couple others, But yeah, it's
weird. I'm excited. It shouldbe a fun series. I look forward
to it. Always good to checkin with the Astros. Well, we'll
start on with your team. Howdo you look at the first twenty two
games of the season for the Cubs. It's been mostly good. You know,

(01:08):
they've had some heartbreaking losses, They'vehad some issues late in games,
so it could be a lot better. You know. Al Adbird Alzlai,
who's been the closer, given upfour really critical, gut punch home runs
of cost games, so he's he'skind of out of the heat right now.
Craig Council is going to kind offigure out a little different plan with

(01:29):
the bullpen in the near term.I don't know long term what it will
look like, but mostly it's it'sbeen a pretty resilient group. Justin Steele,
the opening day starter, went downon Opening Days, so he hasn't
pitched since then. Jamison Tyn startedthe year on the il say a Suzuki
got hurt, so they've had anumber of their main guys banged up a
little bit. The narrative that theAstros are very familiar with as well,

(01:51):
But by and large, they've playedwell. They're playing winning baseball and it's
a very appears to be a verywinnable division, so sets up to be
a pretty exciting year. Did youmention heartbreaking losses and issues late in games?
Jim sounds familiar. I mean,my goodness, this is even on
the worst case scenario. Let's mapout how this could be a disaster season

(02:12):
for the Astros. I don't thinkanybody envisioned this. Yeah, and you
know, the guys out there inthat bullpen have got track records and you
know, so you know, it'sprobably just a matter of time before they
get things turned around. It's alwaysjarring earlier in the year when guys that
you're expecting to be really good strugglea little bit. But we're still dealing
with small sample sizes. I think, you know, as I look at

(02:35):
the Astros, it's kind of anoutsider. I think they just need to
get their starting pitching healthy. It'sit's amazing how many injuries they've had to
the pitching staff. You know.The problem they have is that they're in
a pretty deep division, and ifyou dig too deep of a hole,
it's going to be awfully difficult tocrawl out. When you think about pitching
now maybe versus pitching then when youwere doing it and obviously covering the astros

(02:57):
and working on that side of itfor so long, but pitching, you
know, one hundred and eighty two, two hundred and fifty innings, making
every start going out there thirty plustimes was just what everybody did. It's
clearly changed in this day and age. But now the aspect of so many
different things leading to pitching injuries,nobody can pinpoint just one thing. Pitch
clock, the spider tack and stickystuff, a number of trying to increase

(03:21):
velocity. How do you look atwhat has happened with major league pitching injuries?
Yeah, it's it's probably a combinationof a lot of things, but
I think mostly it's probably you gotguys that are capable of throwing the ball
ninety five, ninety eight, sometimesone hundred miles per hour and that works.
That gets big league hitters out,so they're incentivized to do that.

(03:43):
So the challenge for baseball is howto how to take care how to take
care of these arms so that theycan, you know, have long,
healthy careers. And they're trying everythingthey can in terms of load management and
limiting innings in the minor leagues,very conscious of consciential of pitch counts,
and I'm sure there's all kinds ofother measurables that they're using to try to

(04:05):
monitor workload for pictures. I don'tknow the answer. I think, you
know, whether it's six man rotations, you know, some you know,
there has to be some way toprotect pictures so that they can have lengthy
careers. It feels in some wayslike the way running backs have gone in
the NFL. You know, youget him out there and you get the

(04:26):
best of them for four or fiveyears, and then you assume they're gonna
break down and you have to moveon to somebody else, and that's that's
not good news for pictures. So, you know, I think if I'm
a pitcher's agent, I'm gonna I'mgonna have my guy be very conscious of
how he's feeling, monitor the health, you know, try to protect his
arm. It's it's not great forthe game, because the game is better.
I think when you have frontline startingpitching that can pitch eight nine innings

(04:50):
on occasion. But I just thinkwe've probably gotten to a point where that's
I think of the past, doyou think the pitch clock or the disaster
at times, increasingly behind the plate, calling balls and strikes is more tackleable
of a subject for you today.Yeah, I don't pin a lot of

(05:10):
it on pitchclock. I know somepitchers have had issues with the pitch clock,
but I'm hesitant to buy into thatargument. And I don't think it
has anything to do with umpiring.I think it's mostly guys can throw the
ball really hard and that puts alot of strain on their arms. But
again, they're incentivized to throw hardbecause that's how you get hitters out and
that's how you get paid. Sohow about the locker room aspect, the

(05:33):
clubhouse aspect of a team that startedseven and sixteen? Talking with Jim Deshayes
here Cubs is a broadcaster, obviouslypreviously Astros broadcaster and pitcher, a team
that started seven and sixteen that hadperfectly reasonable aspirations to get back to the
league Championship Series for an eighth consecutiveseason. Plenty of guys were part of
many, if not all, ofthose teams. What could it be like

(05:57):
in there? Obviously you're not inthere, but what are the things that
you need from leaders, players,management to keep them going out there thinking
they can win. Yeah, youjust pretty fresh outlook. Every day,
you bring energy to the ballpark everyday. You don't dwell on things that
have gone the wrong way, youknow, you know, you just take
care of business in terms of yourpregame preparation. They've got a lot of

(06:19):
professionals that have been through it fora long time over there, so I
imagine there's no real panic in thedugout. You know. I go back
to was it oh four when theAstros started fifteen and thirty and the Chronicle
had the headline with the tombstone andburied them and then making the postseason?
It might have been oh five,But you know, so there's you know,

(06:42):
a track record with this group ofplayers that gives you a sense that
they're going to turn things around.Now. It's gonna be hard. There's
no guarantee they're gonna end up winningninety games again, but they're capable.
They just need to get healthy.And as I mean, I think that's
that applies to so many different scenarios. But the one exception might be Josea
Bray. You have you ever seena situation like that? And I don't

(07:05):
mean an aging former MVP. That'syou know, fallen on hard times because
of probably his age. I'm talkingabout a guy that had that kind of
money, you know, committed tohim, and everyone is trying to give
him every opportunity to get out ofit, and it's just not happening.
Yeah, you know, I'm sureI have. I've played with a lot

(07:27):
of guys that on the downsides oftheir careers, and at some point,
if it doesn't turn around, theclub has to make a tough decision and
maybe eat some money and move onto somebody else. And how old is
Osey now? I mean, that'sthat's the thing, right, he's late
thirties. So the fact that he'sin a pretty good decline, it's not
surprising. But they are going togive him, I'd assume a lot of

(07:50):
opportunities because he's making a lot ofmoney. He's doing to make a lot
of money next year. But atsome point, if it doesn't turn around,
then you have to move on.Talking with Jim DEAs here on the
A team Astros and Cubs, firstof three first trip to Wrigley Field for
the Astros since twenty thirteen, wetalk a lot about Cody Bellinger here over

(08:11):
the years because of his Dodger days. A second go round with the Cubs.
How has his time there been whatyou'd hoped, what they've hoped?
Well, certainly last year he wasoutstanding and I didn't know what to expect
because he's coming off a couple ofreally down years in Los Angeles, and
I didn't realize, you know,how versatile a player he was. He's

(08:33):
a very good center fielder, he'san outstanding first base. Then he slugged
for us last year. He woreout left handed pitching. He had a
great year, and after a littlebit of a slugg start this year,
he's turned it on here of lateas well. And they love him in
the clubhouse. He comes to playevery day. He's kind of a baseball
rat. You know. Their aspectsof his game that I wasn't aware of,

(08:54):
and that's part of it. Ididn't know how much is impact he
could have in the clubhouse just beinga you know, a real solid guy
and a guy who loves to playthe game, that brings good energy to
the ballpark every day. Yeah.So, you know, he's been a
great pickup for us last year andthen again this year. What about managerial
changes? This series is two firstyear managers with their club. Obviously,

(09:16):
Craig Council brings a very good resumealong with him. The manner in which
he was brought in not the typicalway with a manager essentially still in place
when it happened in the Astros obviously, with Dusty Baker moving away from managing
now working with the Giants and Joea spot, I having spent all this
time in the organization taking over asthese two first year guys work their way

(09:37):
through, how do you assess eachof their jobs thus far? Yeah,
you know, I haven't really youknow, spent a lot of time on
the Astros. And Joe, Ijust know he has a really good reputation
around the game. He had actuallyinterviewed for the Cubs job before David Ross
was hired after the nineteen season,and I know he's interviewed for a bunch

(09:58):
of other jobs, very highly regarded. It's tough break for him to,
you know, to get what's expectedto be a really good team, to
struggle out of the gate the waythey have, So that will tell part
of the story how he responds tothat. You know, he's been around
the game a long time, soI suspect he's doing okay. Council has
been great. Crag is really smart, super prepared. He's one of those

(10:20):
guys. When he asked him aquestion, there's always a pause before the
answer because he's very thoughtful. Buthe's a smart of baseball guys. I've
been around you know. It's stillyou know, I haven't been around him
a ton yet, but a littlebit I've seen of him, I've been
really impressed. Jim Dea is hereon Sports Talk seven ninety. You know,
I think I told you this lasttime, but in case I didn't,
we always we have Jeff Blum onwith us once a week, and

(10:41):
we always tell him that he andTodd Callis have a great booth and it
is a big compliment to them thatthere was no drop off from the prior
booth that you were a part of. So we can't compliment you enough.
We mission here in Houston on thebroadcast, and so many memories of you
guys calling those games. But goodgood to catch up with you, and

(11:01):
good luck the rest of the waythis season. Hey, thanks so much,
guys. I had a great rundownthere with Brownie. I've been really
lucky in my career I've had alot of great partners, and there's a
lot of things about Houston that Ithat I really missed, and I wish
them. I always wish the Outshowas well. I would echo the same
thing, Jim. My favorite partof both broadcast duos is the exact same

(11:24):
thing. I couldn't get enough ofyou making Brownie laugh, and I can't
get enough of Blum making TK laugh. Well, Brownie was so good to
me because if he knew I wastrying, he was just gonna break up,
whether it was funny or not.If you knew I was trying,
he was gonna he was gonna giveme a little Ed McMahon chuckle. He
was good for those, Jim.We appreciated and enjoy the series this week.

(11:45):
All right, guys, good tobe with you. Good Jim dechaz
here on Sports Talk seven ninety,Good to catch up with him.