4/11/24 - The Mo Egger Show w/ Rick Ucchino

It's a No Holds Barred reunion as Rick and Tarren reunite to talk some professional wresting. AEW's Swerve Strickland joins the show as well as James Rapien to talk NFL Draft and Jeff Carr to talk the state of the Cincinnati Reds.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
No one covers the Bengals like ESPNfifteen thirty, Cincinnati's sports station. What
is going on, everybody? Hopeyou're enjoying a very rainy, cloudy,

(00:21):
just nasty day here in the QueensCity. And you know, if you
were looking forward to going to thebaseball game today, Unfortunately that did not
happen. Reds and Brewers rained out. But you know what, after the
last two nights, maybe the Red'sgonna use the day off. They might
have been able to squeeze that gamein today. By the way, because

(00:43):
like the radar wasn't that bad thelast time I looked at it. But
whatever, They're not playing today.They're off, so was Moweger. By
the way, I'm Rickyu Chino.I will be with you guys until six
o'clock tonight. I am not alone. By the way, it is a
reunion today for the first hour threeto four today. My man Tarren Bland,

(01:03):
who you guys know him, Youlove him. He's on with Moe
every single day. Taran, ithas been a hot minute since we have
had a chance to to host someradio together. Back in the day before
the world ended, we used tohost a pro wrestling program on this station
called No Holds Barred and we arewe are. We are getting the band
back together for the first hour herebecause I I'm I'm not gonna lie.

(01:26):
I am fresh off of my tripto Philadelphia last week. We're WrestleMania forty,
the largest WrestleMania ever, the greatestWrestleMania ever. At least that's what
Triple H brow beat into the media, which we called you when you were
there telling the Phillies Rays game.Yeah, going to talk about that coming
up here in a little bit.There's a couple of things that happened in
that that Philadelphia trip I want totalk to talk to you guys about today.

(01:49):
Crossed a few things off my sportsbucket list, got to check out
some really nice stadiums. Uh,did something I've never done before. Had
a really awkward e sh change.There's a lot that we could dive into
today, honestly, but I dowant to talk a little bit of pro
wrestling, because if there's one thingthat I've learned over my fifteen year career

(02:10):
in radio, let's talk about whatyou know, talk about what's fresh in
your mind. And honestly, afteran eight day trip to Philadelphia, pro
wrestling is what is on my mind, and that is what I have paid
the most attention to. But neverfear we're going to get into the Reds
as well. They lost seven totwo last night to the Brewers. They
dropped the six and six on theyear. Hunter Green struggled last night and

(02:34):
appears to be the next target ofReds fans impatience. Six innings pitch,
six inns runs, a walk,nine strikeouts last night. Did give up
two home runs as era on theyoung season, now up to four eighty
six, the Reds are right aboutwhere I thought they would be at twelve
games. This is a young,flawed team, but it's so abundant with

(02:58):
talent. There's so much there withguys like Matt McLean and TJ. Friedel
hurt even with Noelvee Marte suspended forthe first eighty games of the year.
You like the prospects for this team, excuse me, and the talent coming
together for them to be competitive.But I just needed the first part of
this season to not be disastrous,right Like I did not need a three

(03:21):
and eighteen start to the year likewe got a couple of years ago and
the season was basically over before iteven began. The season shouldn't be over
before the NFL Draft. Tarn andthe Reds are right in the mix,
and I think they're going to bein the mix. But I also understand
the impatience. One of the thingsthat I saw last week while I was
in Philadelphia was the doom and gloomtweets around one Elie de la Cruz.

(03:46):
Hunter Green appears to be the nexttarget of that, and I understand it
to a certain extent because all wehave heard about for the last few years
is twenty twenty four, twenty fourto twenty twenty five. That is the
competitive window that you know, theReds we're going to get back into.

(04:08):
That's when we can expect this teamto start to compete. So there are
expectations now, especially after all theyoung kids came up and got them when
I think they were within a gameor two of the playoffs last year.
So you wanted them to take thatnext step forward at the same time,
and this is something that I haveI have developed more now that I'm I'm

(04:30):
a father of five years now.Patience. Patience is the name of the
game, especially early on. It'stwelve games in to one hundred and sixty
two game season. There's also somecomps for Hunter Green by the way,
that I'm going to get into herein a little bit. But coming up
at the five o'clock hour, JeffCarr, who has been focused primarily on

(04:50):
the Reds and nothing else for thelast two weeks while my mind has been
elsewhere, while my work has beenfocused elsewhere, He's going to be joining
us in for the State of theReds address coming up at five o'clock.
He's going to join me for theentire hour breaking everything down. James Orpen
will be joining me at four o'clocktoday from Allbengals dot com. We are

(05:12):
officially two weeks out from the NFLDraft. Everybody is throwing out there.
They're they're mock drafts and I'm seeingthe Bengals taking a defensive tackle. I'm
seeing them taking an offensive lineman.I'm seeing people saying they're going to take
a wide receiver. I'm seeing themthey're going to take a tight end.
Where does James think that this teamis at right now? I saw a
segment that he did with Paul DaerJunior or the Athletic where they're talking about

(05:36):
maybe it might be offensive line orbust. So we will get James's thoughts
on everything going on with the NFLDraft coming up here in about two weeks
and whether or not there are twoguys on this team that are are being
overlooked a little bit and what theircontributions to it might be in the upcoming
NFL season between now and then,Taren my Man, I'm curious. I'm

(06:03):
curious because me being there in personand enjoying this WrestleMania was was one thing.
You being back here watching it,getting to enjoy the pageantry and the
commentary and everything like that. Thiswas a lot of hype around WrestleMania this
year. What did you think ofit as as somebody who was watching from

(06:25):
Afar? From Afar, I wasfor me, like at Night one was
kind of disappointing. I knew wehad great matches thought the night, but
for me, like I put somuch stock in the one match so and
the one match didn't live up tothe hype in the matter I'm talking about,
is Jimmy Verus a Jay. Yeah, a lot of people seen now
we didn't get. Like me personally, I didn't think that that match was

(06:47):
was that bad? In person,but I haven't watched it back yet.
Yeah. I had so much expectationsfor that match, and despite what happened
on the rest of the car,like when that match soured, that kind
of like sourth the whole night forme because I was brother versus brother,
twin versus tween, Like you wasthat build up. You really didn't even

(07:08):
need a build up. You werejust waiting for it, and no I
got was a super kick party.Uh yeah. See, for me,
there was one match on Night one, and thankfully it was the one that
they kicked off with. I wasso looking forward to Becky and Rhea,
and I thought that they absolutely torethe house down. Becky Lynch having her

(07:28):
her Michael Jordan flu game with strepthroat and one hundred and two degree fever,
and I saw her at her booksigning on Tuesday. That's when I
got into town on Philly. Iwent to her book signing and I got
to talk to her for just ajust a few seconds, and I could
tell, man, she was exhausted. She was absolutely exhausted. You're talking
about a woman who went from theWhite House one Sunday to main eventing with

(07:51):
Naya Jackson an last woman Standing matchin a different city, and it was
in doing another book signing the nextmorning in another state, like just non
stop going media for her book thatcame out, and then WrestleMania, and
then she ends up getting sick andshe's not getting any sleep, and then
she still goes out there and putson that performance with Rhea Ripley and shout

(08:11):
out to Ria by the way,who had a panic attack before she went
out there, and they still absolutelydelivered the first night. Though for me,
from beyond that match, it wasall about the Rock, right,
Like there was so much that wasmade about The Rock coming back and wrestling
his first real match in over adecade. And I thought for being fifty

(08:33):
one the mate, you could tellhe slimmed down a little bit, like
he cut down on his black Adammuscles, right like the superhero Big just
adding on as much size as hecan. He slimmed down because in the
wrestling business it's it's mostly about Cardioand whether or not you can stay with
it. I thought it was thethe Empire strikes back moment where he beat
Cody in Night one and Cody comesback in a celebration of WrestleMania on Night

(08:56):
two. It was so good tomake The booking made sense, the storylines
made sense, and this is kindof what I wanted to get into,
you know, on this show,because we outside of the Reds right now.
Once the NFL Draft comes and goes, it is like, really it's
it's the Reds. FC Cincinnati playsyou know, once or twice a week.

(09:20):
Like if you're a sports fan,if you have fallen out with professional
wrestling, if you used to watchit and you didn't watch it anymore because
it got bad, trust me,I was almost there. If it wasn't
for like one or two performers,I would not be covering it today,
which I do for for Espanation andfightful dot com and several others. I

(09:41):
would not be a fan where Iam today if it wasn't for a few
performers and I stuck with it,and you know, because of people like
Becky Lynch and Adam Copeland and BrayWyat God rest him. You know,
I ended up getting into the wrestlingmedia thanks to this man on the other
side of the microphone here, TarrenBland. We started the journey together and
it created some some avenues for me, and I've been to the last four

(10:03):
WrestleManias now, which were bucket listitems for me. I watched Dwayne the
Rock Johnson wrestle in person for thefirst time in my life. Jealous bucket
list item for me two years agoit was Stone Cold Steve Austin bucket list
items for me and Tarreen. Idon't know how you feel about it.
You've been a wrestling fan your wholelife. I've been a wrestling fan most

(10:24):
of my life, falling out withit a little bit here there, like
when I went to college or what. I just I didn't think it was
that great. I remember when Edgehad to retire, you know, I
kind of like lost touch with itbecause that was a big Edge was a
big part of my childhood. AndI'm like, dang man, I don't
know if I can keep up withit. But then people like Bray showed
up and Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrosealso named Cincinnat's One, John Moxley now

(10:46):
in aew Becky Lynch showing up,Bailey Charlotte, Sasha Banks, like they
kept they got me into it,and we started this journey at twenty nineteen,
which was WrestleMania thirty five. Mygirl wins the title in the main
event, Your boy Koche Kingston kofeMania. It was serendipitous. It like
it was meant to be at thatpoint. But let's be honest, the
last five years have not been great. Vince McMahon, for a lot of

(11:09):
reasons, needed to get out ofdodge, and he is now out of
Dodge, thankfully. And one ofthe big things that I could take away
from the post media scrums for theseevents was everybody is all in on Triple
H's vision and everything that they aregoing to be doing. The storyline seemed
to be better. They have moremain event caliber talent than they've ever had

(11:30):
before, and I believe more ofthose those talent, those performers are going
to get an opportunity to be inthe main event. Guys like Damian Priest
his story of what he told uswhere he was homeless ten years ago.
Now he's the world heavyweight champion,the first man of Puerto Rican descent to
hold a world title since Pedro Moralesover fifty years ago. I don't think

(11:54):
stuff like that happens under Vince McMahon. I don't think EO Sky is a
WW Women's champion heading into WrestleMania WrestlingBailey one on one. Evince mc mann
is still around, so like this, this seems to be like there's not
going to be any of these arbitrarythings that are going to be holding performers
back anymore. If you fell outof it, man, from my perspective,

(12:15):
now is the time to jump rightback in. And that's what I
felt like at the end of Nighttwo when after Cody finished his story and
he told he basically said he wouldn'tbe back in w W if it wasn't
for two men, Bruce Pittrick Pritchardand Triple H. And I was just
reflecting, like Triple H almost dieda few years ago he did, Like
if I mean, God bless him, glad he overcome that. But if

(12:37):
if it went the other way,man, I don't know if wrestling would
have been what it was, whatit is now without Triple H. Yeah,
man, And look, thankfully,you know you got somebody like Ari
Emmanuel with TKO who bought the companyand has allowed Triple H to just enact
his vision and everybody has bought in, and man, it's exciting, like

(12:58):
it's it's genuinely exciting to be awrestling fan again, and not just because
WWE is good, but because youhave AW. You have direct competition,
which, by the way, withoutAW, there is no Cody Rhodes finishing
his story. There's no story.This is a company he helped start,
by the way. And I bringup AW because they're going to be in
town this weekend. NKU Truest ArenaCollision, Battle of the Belts ten show

(13:22):
starts at seven o'clock on Saturday,and the man who could be the next
AW World Champion, Swerve Strickland,we'll be joining the show at four thirty
five this afternoon TAR. And Iknow you're hype for that one, Yes,
sir, I know you are hypefor that one. I'm looking forward
to chatting with Swerve again. Wegot James Rapeene coming up at four o'clock.
We got Jeff Carr coming up atfive o'clock. But I want to

(13:46):
dive into I mentioned this already.Bucket list items. I got to knock
off two of those in Philadelphia,and I'm talking like strictly like sports bucket
list items you got him. Iwant to hear from you. Five one,
three, seven, four nine,fifteen thirty. Again five one three
seven four nine, fifteen thirty.I'm gonna open up the phone lines early.
If you want to talk a littlepro wrestling, you want to talk

(14:07):
about the Reds game last night,you want to talk about sports bucket list
items. I'm here for you,Rick Uchino, you can follow me on
Twitter, by the way, hitme up there at Rick Uccino R I
C K U C C H IN O. I'm here till six o'clock
tonight on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati SportsStation, Cincinnati. Well, if you're

(14:35):
not ready to just go on likea ten mile run right now, I
don't. I don't know what elseI can do for you. Maybe you
know it's a dreary, rainy day, but you know what, Maybe you
feel like you want to get out, stretch out. Maybe I can motivate
you here a little bit. Let'sgo. He hop on treadmill, Just
hop on the treadmill. Just justgrab your phone, grab your earbuds.

(14:56):
Tune into ESPN fifteen thirty on theiHeartRadio. We'll just do this together.
I'll jog in place for you.Let's go. Ricky Chitto went from Mowagger
today until six o'clock. Coming upat four, we'll talk to James Repenoldbengals
dot com. We are officially twoweeks away, ladies and gentlemen, two
weeks away from the NFL Draft.It is almost here. We are officially

(15:18):
in the dog days of NFL Draftseason where there is nothing going on in
free agency unless you are a franchisetag player not named T Higgins. You
guys are getting deals, but youknow I diggress. We'll talk to James
about that coming up at five o'clock. Stay to the Reds address from Jeff
Carr and the Inside the Reds Lockedon Reds podcast. He's going to be

(15:41):
joining me for the entire hour yourReds six and six to start off the
year. Today's game rained out.If you missed it, that's whether or
not in action right now. They'regoing to be doing a split double header
on Friday, August thirtieth instead,So that first game is going to start
on at twelve forty. The originalgame is gonna be played at six forty.
If you had tickets today, theyare still good for that game.

(16:03):
If you cannot make it to thegame, you can exchange them at the
Red's ticket window or by calling theReds box office, so you're taking care
of there. The reason why Iwas playing the Rocky theme. By the
way, this is something that I'vebeen thinking about all week because I got
back into town late on Tuesday yesterdaywas Hey, I'm right back into work.

(16:26):
I'm trying to figure out what's goingon in the news world because my
day job is the morning news anchoron seven hundred WLW. If you're wondering
if I'm the same guy, yes, I'm the same guy, you know.
So I'm trying to figure out whatI had missed over the last week
because for the last week I've beenin Philadelphia covering WrestleMania for SB Nation,
for Fightful, for the other outletsthat I cover pro wrestling for, and

(16:48):
I missed a lot. I havenot been able to watch a lot of
the Reds games, although I attemptedto. We'll get to that coming up
here in a little bit. ButI got to cross off to my big
bucket list items as a sports guy, and yes I count pro wrestling as
that, and yes I count thingsthat I've seen in movies as well.
I am a big movie guy.I'm a big sports movie guy, and

(17:11):
I got to watch Rocky Dwayne theRock Johnson wrestle in person for the first
time ever in my life. Hemight be the final performer outside of the
Undertaker, that I've never seen inperson wrestle. So I'm very grateful that
that actually happened. And then,of course, Taren, if you go

(17:32):
to Philadelphia, this is my firsttrip to Philadelphia, what do you gotta
do. If you're a sports fan, You've got to go check out the
Philadelphia Museum of Art. And yougot to run the steps, right of
course, which you did. Idid, and there's actually a video of
it if you want to scale mytimeline, my chunky butt jogging up the
steps. Here's my complaint though,Boy, they hollywooded the heck out of

(17:56):
that scene. They If you watchRocky now, granted sliced alone in the
seventies, he's running like ten tofifteen miles you know, beforehand, right
like, and he's trying to that'shis big climax to his run. And
he's gonna run up all seventy eightsome odd steps to the Philadelphia Museum of

(18:18):
Art. You would think it isthe toughest thing on this planet to do
until he finally did it. Thatwas the big thing that he had to
do before he was ready to fightApollo Creede. In that movie, he
ran up the steps. He's doingthe shadow boxing up at the top,
he raises his arms up. Theygot to They put a statue there for
that scene. That was the bigclimax in the first ever Rocky Montage training

(18:42):
section of the movie. I getup there, I'm in jeans and a
sweatshirt. I stretch my quads outa little bit. I jog up it
with no problem. And I amnot an athlete. I am not an
athlete whatsoever. I'm not gonna lie. I was kind of disappointed. I
ended up doing it like twice becauseone of my buddies didn't believe that I
actually did it, And then Idid it again with EA like I was

(19:04):
barely even winded. I'm not gonnalie. I'm kind of disappointed. But
they definitely hollywooded the crap out ofthat. It was still a great like
a great spot. They've really developedPhiladelphia, by the way, since the
seventies when that movie came out.It does not even look like the same
area. They're actually doing some constructionwork on the Museum of Art right now,
So it was it was a littlebit of a cluster. But yeah,

(19:26):
man, they weren't even like fullsteps, tarn. They were like
those little half steps like they talkedabout how it's like seventy eighty of them,
but like any normal person not joggingor running could do two at a
time, no problem. Yeah,but as you said earlier, try try
running from where he started and thenrun up the steps like that. I'm

(19:48):
good. I'm good. I don'tyeah, yeah, you're fresh, just
just visiting, I said, stretch. I didn't do nothing before. I
know. Yeah, yeah, it'seasy to do it, I know,
or something before then try to goup some stuffs. But I know,
but I've talked to other people whohave done the same thing that I did,
and they were like, oh,yeah, this looked way harder.

(20:08):
They made it look out like itwas way harder than what it was actually
going to be. But it wasstill cool, man. So it was
cool to get to cross that offthe list. Did you get a picture
in front of the statue? No, because I actually I couldn't find it
because it's no longer like at thetop, and then I didn't notice it
until I was across the because theymoved it off to the side. Oh

(20:29):
damn. So yeah, because itused to be at the top. Now
I thought, I remember reading somethinglike they moved it out to like where
the stadiums were, so I wasgonna look for it later. And then
literally, as my buddy Graham isdriving me around, I'm like, oh,
dang, there it is. Wewe should have got a picture of
that, but no, some missedopportunities. So now I know for the
next time when I go back,and maybe maybe then I'll like run a
mile, Like I did a fairamount of walking in Philadelphia because it is

(20:52):
an expensive city. I mean expensive, Like it was forty dollars to park
everywhere it was. It was worthit to me to just walk, walker,
take an uber. It was cheaper. I mean, I think WrestleMania
played a huge part of that.You'd think, but it was actually cheaper
parking at the stadiums for WrestleMania thatit was parking at the convention center for
WWE World. That don't make nosense. That does not make a lick

(21:18):
of sense, but it did.Like I'm sitting here and I'm wondering,
like, what else do I haveleft? On my bucket list. I
had been a lot of my likesports bucket lists items I have been privileged
enough to cross cross off over theyears because a lot of them have been
you know, wrestling related and coveringmultiple WrestleManias. That crossed a lot of

(21:40):
them off. But I'm sitting hereand I'm like, outside of like going
to a game at Fenway and Wrigley, outside of walking the corn at the
Field of Dreams and seeing the Bengalsplay in a Super Bowl in person,
I don't I didn't get a chanceto go obviously out to La. Other
than that, I don't know ifI have anything left at this point,
and I feel like I need toadd more to that list. Is there

(22:03):
anything that like you want to do, you want to see that you haven't
had I had the opportunity to doin your life. Is there anything on
that sports bucket list for you rightnow? Well? You kind of crush
my one, I said, seeingthe Rock perform, So I'm hope hopefully
everything goes right. Uh Summer slamsin Cleveland. I can make it up
there and maybe he can challenge ColyRose in Cleveland. My fingers crossed on

(22:26):
that one. There there. There'ssome talk that that might be held off
until Mania next year. Oh man, Well but rocket Rock seeing Rock perform,
that's that's one. Or just seeingjust seeing the rock live in person,
like even even doesn't wrestle, likecut a promo anything. Yeah,
yeah, that's that's a bucket listfor me. Like, And I was
ten feet from him at the pressscrum on night one, and unfortunately I

(22:49):
was in a bad seat and Idid not get to ask him a question.
Another than that, I mean,other than the usuals. I mean,
like I would like to maybe likeattend Super Bowl, but we know
those ticket prices for that. Yeah, that's the problem, Like I see
with attending a super Bowl if Icouldn't, like I obviously I would try

(23:10):
to get credential being in media,right, but part of me would want
to sit out and actually like getto root for my team, you know,
if they're there. I don't wantto pay all that money. I'm
torn on this because I don't wantto pay all that money to go out
there and watch a Super Bowl ifmy team's not in it. But I
also don't want to like pay allthat money to go out there and watch
my team in the super Bowl andthen if they lose like that just seems

(23:34):
like, uh man, if theywon, it would be worth it.
But that is a big gamble andI am not great again. If you
heard me on last Some Night withTony Pike, I ain't want to bet
since November. I'm not good atthis, so man, I don't know.
It's tough. The other thing Iwant to do tear and I'm trying

(23:56):
my damn just to get it done. Like I'm talking to city leaders and
county leaders and anybody, but Ican to get this done. I want
to attend a WWE pay per viewevent, a big one here in Cincinnati.
I'm still salty that Cleveland got SummerSlam. I am very salty on
that. Yeah. I was talkingto one of our co workers here and
we were talking about that. Hopefullywith the I guess the renovations coming to

(24:18):
pay Corps, hopefully we can getsomething here soon. Renovation. My hope
is, my hope is that likeonce the convention center is done and once
the hotel is built, maybe justmaybe that might be like the good time.
So maybe like twenty twenty sixth SummerSlam. I'll see why that couldn't
be a thing. I don't seewhy it couldn't be a thing. But

(24:40):
we'll we'll, we'll see. Iam curious though, if you have any
of these major sports bucket list itemssomething that I haven't thought of. Like
I said, walk in the cornfieldof dreams. I just feel like that's
one of those. You know,especially if you're a baseball fan, if
you know you're remember you know,you and your dad, you know,
growing up watching the game, Ifyou have any of those kind of memories,
I I feel like that's a bucketlist It him for a lot of

(25:02):
people. But if you if yougot one that we didn't talk about,
and give us a call. Iscratched off because I scratched off off my
basketball. Like I've seen Kobe play, I've seen Lebron play. There you
go, I said, maybe likethe NBA Finals into the NBA Finals game,
that's probably next I've seen a player. I went to a Cleveland Cavalier
playoff game and Lebron had a gamewinner in that game. Was that the

(25:25):
one at the top of the key? No, this was when he played
against the Raptors and hit the littlerunner off the window and Travis Kelcey and
then we'll sitting courtside out out.That place was crazy. That would be
cool. Actually, actually, II've never attended in an NBA game.
That might be one I would putup the list. Really, to be
honest with you, Yeah, Imight need to hurry up, but I'm

(25:48):
gonna watch Lebron play. I mightneed Yeah, yeah, you're running out
of time. When do the Lakersplay the Pacers? That's the closest dry
Well, you just missed it.They actually played them two weeks ago.
In of course they did. Yeah, of course they did. Yeah,
all right, well I got toadd that one on the list. Hopefully
he doesn't retire. Well, o'brianni'scoming, so you got time. Oh
yeah, that's right. He wantsto play with the sun. Yeah,

(26:10):
I got some time. I gotsome time to have with that. If
you've got any of these bucket lists, that and give us a call.
Five one three seven four nine fifteenthirty Again five one three, seven,
four nine fifteen thirty. Ricky Chinoin for Moe Egger today And just like
mo, I am terrible with theclock. We gotta we gotta take a
break, gotta come back. Checksports headlines, and look, there's one
thing I got to get off mychest. One last thing. While I
was out in Philadelphia. I didsomething I have never done before, and

(26:34):
I'm a little bit ashamed about it. But at the same time, I
also just feel like it's one ofthose things where it's one of those things
you just do if when you growup you got other priorities going on.
I don't know. I got mixed, I got I got mixed emotions about
that, and I will take callsas well. Five one, three,
seven, four, nine, fifteenthirty Rikuchino in from Oweger on ESPN fifteen

(26:55):
thirty Cincinnati Sports Station, Cincinnatis.Is might, okay, Taren, when's
the last time you saw Jay Ussoperforming person? Uh? So much?

(27:18):
The SmackDown before Dayton last year?So much lamp? All right? So
what is that before he started doingthe whole crowd handsurfing thing that he does,
he was doing, he was doingit then, he just didn't have
his own music by then, Okay, Cause I'm telling you what, man,
when you get inside of a stadiumor an arena when there is sixteen
thousand people or seventy thousand people alldoing that at the same time. It

(27:44):
is a sight to behold. Itis really freaking cool what he's where he's
been able to get at in hiscareer. Welcome back ESPN fifteen thirty.
Rick Uccino, here with you infor mo Eggar today until six o'clock.
Got to get a check of thesports headlines. A service so of Kelsey
Chevrolet home of lifetime powertrain protection andguaranteed credit approval from their family to yours

(28:06):
for life kelseyshev dot com. Today'sReds game rained out will now be made
up as a split doubleheader Friday,August thirtieth, So today's game that was
supposed to happen will be played attwelve forty that day. The original game
that day will remain at six forty. If you had tickets to the game
today and you want to go onthe thirtieth, great, you don't need

(28:29):
to do anything. If you cannotmake that day and want to switch out
your tickets, you can exchange themat the ticket window at GABP or by
calling three to eight one Reds.The Reds did fall to the Brewer seven
to two last night. They nowdropped to six and six on the year.
Hunter Green struggled in his start aboutfive runs early, I believe three
batters into the game, Christian Yelichwas going deep and the Reds had a

(28:51):
deficit that they would not be ableto overcome, and he is now sir
planted La de la Cruz as thetarget of Reds fans in patients on social
media. Last night, he wentsix innings, six ear in runs,
one walk, nine strikeouts, gaveup two home runs. His ERA on
the year after three starts is foureighty six. The Brewers, though,
were red hot, like red hotcoming into this They lead Major League Baseball

(29:15):
right now with a three seventy threebatting average with runners in scoring position,
including hitting darn near five hundred overthe past four games, So they were
they were cooking coming into to thatseries. So maybe it's a good thing
that they got the day off todayand Nick Martinez did not have to deal
with that. Elie de la Cruzdid hit an office field home run last
night. He's now hitting three toeighteen on the year with an on base

(29:37):
percentage of three seventy five. Goodnews for UC fans. Dan Skillings Junior
is announced he will be returning tothe UC Bearcats for his Junior season.
Of course, the New Heights podcastbeing recorded live at Fifth Third Arena tonight
a sold out crowd we'll watch futureWWE superstar Jason Kelcey and his brother Travis
chatted up with the likes of JoeBurrow or Brown Junior and others. What

(30:00):
did you think about Jason Kelsey's appearanceat WrestleMania forty and will ray Masterio be
at Fifth Third Arena tonight? They'relike best friends now, uh, no
Waymisteria would not be a Fifth Third. But I immediately knew that was Jason.
I just I just can't tell thatwas Travis Knet. Yeah, that
was my guess, I thought,cause Lane Johnson lost like twenty pounds for
that, which is incredible to mebecause what did they do? Like they

(30:26):
like my buddy Sean rossat for fiveledot Com reported that both Lane Johnson and
Jason Kelsey went through like extensive wrestlingtraining for that appearance. They hit one
guy with a chair and then jumpedon the top rope and took off some
eagles Luja masks like I'm sitting him, Like did they need to go through
extensive training for that? Like Iappreciate the respect for the business and wanting

(30:48):
to do it and hop into that. And there may be more down the
line that that Jason could do,especially now that he's retired. But yeah,
I had no idea who that waswhen he took the mask off,
like he was bald, and I'mlike, dang, did Travis shave his
head? What's going on? LikeI thought it was Travis. I genuinely
thought it was Travis, but itturned out to be Lane Johnson. Tonight's
event, by the way, atFifth Third Arena is sold out. It

(31:10):
was supposed to be at Nippert butif you looked outside, you know why
they they moved that inside. Thesearch for a new basketball coach at the
University of Kentucky continues, CBS Sportsreporting earlier that Scott Drew turned down an
offer to take over the Wildcats program. He will remain at Baylor. Of
course, John Calipari was introduced asa new head coach at Arkansas on Wednesday.

(31:33):
Miami University had football coach Chuck Martinhas agreed to a five year contract
extension, keeping him with the RedShawks through the twenty twenty nine college football
season. Of course, the Mastersnow underway in Augusta, and it is
Bryson de Chembo leading the way.He's now six under on round one through
sixteen holes, and Danny Willett fourunder in second place. Right now John

(31:57):
Rahm he is two under. ScottiScheffler also to under. There is a
nice big cluster here at the topof the scoreboard. And if you are
wondering Tiger Woods, his tea timewas actually postponed today due to the rain,
so he's getting set the tee offin about eight minutes or so,
which Terren, that is not gonnabe good for Tiger because he's very likely

(32:17):
not going to finish his round today, which means he could be playing upwards
of twenty four holes or so tomorrow. And for a guy who's got back
and knee problems, and God knowsthat there's gonna be any more other weather
delays that that could be, thatcould be an issue, that could be
an issue. The Browns and runningback Nick Chubb have agreed to a reworked

(32:39):
contract for the twenty twenty four seasonthat will lower his base to just under
twelve million dollars. So there yougo. There are your sports headlines.
By the way, playing it Augusta. That would be another one. Tern
that's a bucket list e for menow not watching. I know like Lance
has been trying to get tickets tothe Masters for years, and I know

(33:00):
that is a big bucket list fora lot of people is attending the Masters.
I just don't get a whole lotof joy out of watching guys golf.
I can watch the highlights and bemesmerized, but give me a couple
more years to get you know,get my iron game worked out. I'll
put playing at Augusta on my bucketlist. I'll do that. We do

(33:22):
have Dominic on the line right nowfor ESPN fifteen thirty. Dom if you're
there with me, because I don'tactually have control over the phones because I'm
having some technical issues on my end, but I appreciate you calling in.
What's going on? Man, Ihear you, loving clear. How are
you, guys. I'm doing good, just sitting here getting to talk to
talk some sports on a beautiful Thursdayafternoon, No holds Bard a couple of

(33:45):
times as well. Well. Welcomeback the reunion tour. The three of
us together again. I love it, so, you know, aside from
you know, World Series or SuperBowl bucket list things, you know for
the Reds Bangals to go to that. I've been to Wrigley Slid, Griffy
Junior Homer in person the only timeI got to see him Homer in person,

(34:07):
and I think he and Dunn wentback to back, but I may
be wrong on that, but Idid get to see Griffy Homer. I
know for a fact he did.I want to go to one of the
big four WWE pay per views,but specifically I'm a Royal Rumble guy.
Oh yeah, so Royal Rumble ismy biggest, like Trump's WrestleMania. WrestleMania
is probably a close second, butI think Royal Rumble is is the best

(34:29):
for me. And then my wifeand I have a co bucket list item.
We want to spend a weekend atWhole sixteen at the Waste Management when
they build the grand stand and it'sjust a party and it's like the only
hole in golf where people are drinkingand encouraged to yell and throw stuff at
a hole in one. So wewould really like to do that because we're

(34:51):
both kind of golf fans. Soyeah, I'm That's what I got.
I'm with you on the Royal Rumble. By the way, I was lucky
enough to cross off the last thelast two years, I was able to
go cover the Royal Rumble because theywere both within as far as I'm concerned,
they were within driving distance. Tampa, Florida was sixteen hours, but
heck man, it's get on seventyfive, get off seventy five. It's
about the easiest long distance drive youcould possibly have, except, you know,

(35:14):
the city of Atlanta was an absolutetraffic nightmare. But regardless, it
is such a cool event to goto in person and experience the atmosphere of
that. And as far as I'mconcerned, Cody Road should be paying to
have me at every single Royal Rumblebecause he is undefeated at every single one
that I have been in attendance at. H So you know that those are
a lot of fun. I get. If you ever get a chance,

(35:36):
you need to attend It's it's sucha cool event to be a part of.
It was really these last two years. The last two ones have been
really good. I was supposed togo to the one in Saint Louis.
There was an absolute debacle. Luckilysomething else came up. I could not
go to that one. But yeah, man, for sure, I'm with
you on that. I appreciate thecallment. Thanks for taking yep, yep,

(35:58):
tarn. We got anybody else onthe line right now. Now we're
good. We're clear from now.Okay, we are clear from now.
Well, we will take your callsthough. Bucket list items you want to
talk about, reds, one hundred, green struggles. Coming up at four
h five, we will be talkingNFL Draft with James Rapeenollbengals dot Com just
two weeks away. Do you thinkJames watched WrestleMania? Say that again,
do you think James watchedst watched WrestleMania. I think he did. I'm willing

(36:20):
to Betty did he? He willsend me. He's like one of those
like closet WW fan. I knowhe's a big Jeff Hardy guy, and
so maybe on his bucket list itwould be like watching Jeff Hardy wrestle or
meeting Jeff Hardy or something of thatnature. But I know, uh,
I know. He texts me everynow and again and asked me some questions.
So I have a feeling he watchedWrestleMania, and if he didn't,

(36:45):
I'm going to be highly disappointed inhim, but he'll he'll be joining us
at four or five to talk aboutthe draft, which, by the way,
the draft is actually coming to CincinnatiFriday, the twenty sixth of April.
I'm not talking about the NFL Draft, talking about WWE Draft nine one
Heritage Bank Center, So if you'reinterested in that, i'd go check that
out. I'll be there, hopefullyI'm working on it. We'll see.

(37:07):
I did do something in Philadelphia WrestleManiaweekend that I'm not necessarily proud of,
and it's the first time I've everdone it. I'll tell you what that
is next. Coming up ESPN fifteento thirty three fifty four here on a
rainy, dreary, cloudy, ominouslooking Thursday afternoon here in Cincinnati. Rickyu

(37:28):
Chino went from mowagg Or today untilsix o'clock tonight. Coming up at four
oh five, we will talk toJames Rapine Allbengals dot Com. Two weeks
out now from NFL Draft Night one, I'm seeing the Bengals take everybody from
a defensive tackle to a tight end, to a wide receiver to an offensive
tackle in all of these mock draftsthat are starting to come out because everybody's

(37:51):
got a mock draft, because it'sthat time of the year. We're in
the dog days of NFL free agencywhere nothing's going on and we're just waiting
and everybody's just putting out mock draftbecause there's nothing left to do but actually
get to the part where the commissioneris reading off the name. So where's
James. You know, what's thepulse of the Bengals right now, what

(38:13):
they might do at eighteen. We'lltalk to him coming up at four five.
But Tara and I, I said, there's something I did last week
in Philly that I've never done before. I have always prided myself on being
that guy who will and for whateverreason, I don't know, stupidity,
call it pride, called whatever youwant to call it. I'm always that
guy who sticks through, you know, the bad weather delays like the I

(38:36):
don't leave games early. I don't, you know, I don't. I
don't sit here and say, oh, it's starting to sprinkle, you know,
So I'm let's beat it, youknow, Let's let's get home before
things get bad here. I wasalways that kid that loved, like absolutely
loved playing in bad weather, whetherit was soccer, whether it was basketball,
whatever I did as a kid,like if it snowed, if it

(38:58):
rained, if it was muddy,I was all in. And believe me,
I was all in. And Ithink my dad hated me, hated
me for that. But I've neverleft a game early due to weather until
I was in Philadelphia, and youguys know, I called into this show.
I called into this show from aCitizens Bank Park. I got there
like two minutes before they put itinto a rain delay. And Tara,

(39:22):
when I tell you, it wascold, it was wet. It was
windy. The wind was blowing throughthe halls, these narrow hallways of Citizens
Bank Park, and it like Ihad a coat on, I had a
hoodie on. It did not matter. It was my phone said it was
forty two. It might have beennegative forty two. The way that that

(39:43):
wind show was. I was miserable. Got a great view of the ballpark
as I walked around it for twoconsecutive hours. But finally, at six
o'clock, I said screw this andI left. I left. I've never
done that before. But there waslike no information whether or not this game
was even gonna get in, nopromise whatsoever. I felt like it was
a worthy enough gamble for me toget my money back. I didn't pay

(40:06):
much for the ticket. I twentybucks down the third baseline. I was
really looking forward to that seat.So, you know, between that and
my ubers, that's that's what Iended up losing. I was hoping maybe
it would get rained out and rescheduledfor another time and I could just resell
it on stub Hub and get mymoney back, or maybe even more if
it's a prime game later. Butman, I just maybe it's me getting

(40:29):
old. Maybe it was the factthat I had on a lot of events.
I wasn't I wasn't gonna be willingto get sick for I don't know,
like something just in me. I'mfinally like, screw it, I'm
out of here. And then ofcourse they end up playing the game at
eight o'clock. Yeah, two hours. That's just too damn low. It's
too long, right. I thinkI'm just old. You know, I'm
thirty six on Saturday. I feellike I'm fifty six sometimes. I lost
a lot of weight within the lastten years, so my like two things

(40:50):
went away, my ability to handlethe cold and my alcohol tolerancy just completely
disappeared after that happened. So I'ma little ashamed of it. Granted,
did you have any What did youdo after? Oh? You know what
I did? Tern I did themost amazing thing ever, And every dad
out there right now can understand howawesome this was. I went back to

(41:13):
my Airbnb and slept for fourteen hours. It was amazing. It was the
most fun thing, believe me,I could possibly do as a man who
has been going on max four hoursof sleep a night for the last five
years. Oh. I woke upthe next morning. I was refreshed.
I'm like, heck, yeah,let's go to WWE World and do some

(41:35):
media. I was ready rock androll. That's I'm a dad. I
am a dad breugh and through whensleeping for fourteen hours might have been the
best thing and the most fun Ihad WrestleMania Week in Philadelphia. But I
did feel a little ashamed leaving thegame early before it even started, two
hours before it even started. Isaid screw this and I was out switch

(41:58):
gears here. Coming up, we'lltalk about the Cincinnati Bengals. Two weeks
out from the NFL Draft, JamesRipen will be here to kind of get
the pulse feeling what this team maybe doing with that eighteenth overall pick and
beyond coming up right here on ESPNfifteen thirty. This is fifteen thirty w

(42:20):
Sqmong the fifty thousand, Orange andBlack home of the Cincinnati Mange. Cincinnati
ski has Brent fifteen thirty. I'mDoug Brown. In the first half of
his life, OJ Simpson was afootball star, a popular actor, and
successful pitch man, but most ofthe second half of his life was spent

(42:40):
as a murder suspect and a prisoner. O. J. Simpson has died
in Las Vegas of prostate cancer.He was seventy six. He Pei Mitsuhara,
shohe Otani's former interpreter, now facesfederal bank fraud charges. US Attorney
for Los Angeles, Martineztrada, misterMitsujara used and abused that position of trust

(43:01):
in order to take advantage of misterO'tana. Mister Mitsuhara used and abused that
position of trust in order to plundermister Otani's bank account to the tune of
over sixteen million dollars. US attorneyMartine Strada, who also says there was
no evidence Otani had any knowledge ofMitsuhara's gambling. First round of the Masters

(43:22):
continuing right now live on ESPN.Bryson Deshamba, the leader at seven under
by three over a group of threegolfers including Danny Willett. Tiger Woods just
started his first round, feeling great. Starts with a great shave, and
great shaves start with Barbisol shaving Creane. That's Barbasol's shaving Creane, an American

(43:44):
classic for over one hundred years.Close Shave America, Close shaved Barbisov,
ESPN fifteen thirty, Cincinnati's sports station. Well, let's just dive right in
hour number two here, Rick Uccinoon ESPF fifteen thirty in for mo Egger

(44:07):
today, no Reds game today,rained out is going to be part of
a split double header now August thirtiethagainst the Brewers at Great American Ballpark.
If you have tickets to today's game, you can exchange them if you would
like. If you can still makeit to the thirtieth game in August,
that's a Friday afternoon, twelve fortyfirst pitch, You don't have to do
anything. It's all good and asred hot as the Brewers bats have been

(44:31):
today may have been. You know, it might be a little silver lining
for the Reds not having to playtoday, and hey, guess what they
get the abysmal White Sox this weekend, So maybe things will start looking up
for your six and six Cincinnati Reds. We are two days out. Excuse
me, two days. I wishit was two days. We are two
weeks out, believe it or not. From Night one of the NFL Draft.

(44:53):
We have reached the dog day periodwhere there's not a lot going on
in free agency and we're just waitingand we're chilling, and everybody and their
brother is throwing out a mock draft. One guy who always has his finger
on the pulse of the Cincinnati Bengals, my dude, James Rapine from All
Bengals dot Com, Locked on BengalsPodcast. James, I know this is

(45:15):
your time of the year. Iappreciate you joining me here today. We're
two weeks out. Man. Whereare you? You pumped? You excited?
You ready to get to this thing? How are we feeling? Well?
This thing? Honestly is that thinghappening in Clifton tonight. So that's
where my head is at at themoment. But yeah, as far as
you're just hoping to see Taylor Swift, Like, don't even lie, you're

(45:37):
you're hoping Taylor's in the building tonightfor sure. Yeah. I see Joe
all the time. That's not new. You know, I've talked with Travis
and Jason. I'm not worried aboutis Taylor here or not? That's why.
And I'm not talking about Zach eventhough everybody I just mentioned you know,
it's respectful there. But yeah,Taylor Swift is the star, so

(45:58):
hopefully she's there. I'm just wonderingif if Jason's new best friend Raymisterio uh
is going to be there, uhafter he helped him get his big win
at Wrestling forty. That's that's that'swhere my mind uh is at right now.
I would be excited about Ray too. Yeah, just to be clear,
Yeah, absolutely pretty excited. James. I remember hearing you on Lockdown
Bengals UH when free agency started up, saying that you know what this team

(46:25):
needed to do, you know,fill the holes as much as possible,
with the hope of they would becomfortable heading into the draft knowing that they
can just let the chips fall andtake the best player available. That they
didn't have this massive hole that theyhad to they had to worry about,
And had they been able to retainDJ Reader, I think I'd be here
right now waiving a giant mission accomplishedbanner. But as of right now,

(46:50):
I think most people would say thethen they need to bolster the de tackle
room somewhere. Byron Murphy from Texasis believed to be the best interior path
rusher in this class. The questionis will he be there at eighteen and
if he is, will the Bengalspass on one or two or three of
the offensive tackles that might be availablethere two weeks out here? What are

(47:13):
you thinking? What's the Bengals pulsetelling you when it comes to the plan
at eighteen here? Yeah, Ithink offensive tackle is certainly the favorite.
But if you wanted to name anon offensive tackle that they could take at
eighteen that's realistically going to be there. I think Byron Murphy leads the way
and it starts with him. Now, there's a real good chance that he's
not there. If I had tosay, it'd probably be fifty to fifty.

(47:37):
And there's also a real chance thatthe Bengals pass on him because of
this offensive line class and how valuableit would be for this team not just
this year, but this year andbeyond to secure a franchise tackle that's on
a rookie contract, because I thinkthey have one in Orlando Brown Junior.
But they've spent a lot of moneyin the trenches, and sometimes you've had

(47:59):
to over spend for an adequate play. It would be nice to hit a
home run out of the park.They're paying for some of those mid round
picks that they've used, whether it'sthe Jackson Carmen pick, the Deontay Smith
pick. They haven't had much lessdrafting offensive lineman. That needs to change,
and what better way to do itthan with the eighteenth pick where there's

(48:20):
almost certainly going to be a talented, potentially starting caliber right away offensive tackle
available. Yeah, and look theygo out and they signed Trent Brown,
So I mean, they wouldn't necessarilybe leaning on them to start right away,
but it would be nice to havea backup plan because Trent Brown hasn't
always been healthy the last few years. And look, we've seen this offensive

(48:42):
line take hit after hit over thelast few years. It cost them a
Super Bowl championship a few years ago. But you know, I digress the
defensive line for me though, andit's part of the reason why I keep
going at it because I look atthe loss of DJ Reader and I'm wondering,
Okay, how does this team planto stop the run when they struggled
at times with Reader on the fieldlast year. But I'm also wondering if

(49:05):
there's gonna be some kind of philosophicalshift here with what they're going to be
doing defensively. They signed Sheldon Rankins. He's known more for his ability to
get after the quarterback than his rundefense, but he is confident in his
run defense. They've not really hada consistent pass rusher who could apply pressure
from the inside since Geno Atkins washere, So that's pretty much the entirety

(49:30):
of the Zach Taylor era. Havingthat kind of a presence up the middle.
Now, combined with what we knowthe guys on the edge can do,
assuming he stays healthy, what doesSheldon Rankins and his ability allow Luna
Ruo to now do with the restof the guys on defense. Yeah,
that's part of why I don't thinkthey feel compelled to go with a Johnny

(49:50):
Duton or a Byron Murphy right away. Neither of those guys are DJ Reader.
And that's what I think people lookat at Byron and think, oh,
well, if you take him ateighteen, he's going to be the
run stumper. He's not. He'stwo hundred and ninety seven pounds. And
and so Sheldon Rankins at three ZHOthree or so is giving you some of
the same things. Now I'm notsaying it wouldn't be valuable to have Byron

(50:12):
Murphy Johnny Newton alongside Rankins, butRankins is going to give you that pass
rush on the interior, which isgoing to free up, hopefully Trey Hendrickson
and Sam Hubbard. Yeah, formore pressure. Of course, it's going
to make life easier on DJ Hilland it's going to give them something that
they really haven't had since Lariogunjobi.And it sucks losing DJ, but getting

(50:34):
a guy like Sheldon Rankins is certainlygoing to help. I think he's got
the right mentality, the right mindset. Obviously the talent is there. And
so I said, they're going toaddress defensive tackle still in this draft,
maybe as soon as eighteen, asearly as the first pick. At the
same time, Sheldon Rankins was ahuge get for them and really a need
that they were able to fail by. Adding it was the what was it

(50:57):
about tier Tart that wasn't the fithere in Cincinnati. He ends up signing
a veteran salary benefit deal with theDolphins, so money doesn't appear to be
the issue in the case. Whatdo you think it was that they just
didn't seem to want to hop onboard when it came to him. Yeah,
I think a couple of things.It's one how it ended in Tennessee
and then he goes to Houston anddoesn't really produce there down the stretch.

(51:22):
We knew that there were some attitudequestions because of that, and so the
fact that he's just kind of outthere hanging out there and I don't know
if they offered him or not,but the offer wasn't substantial. But when
he finally did sign with Miami,he was out there for weeks after the
Bengals brought him in for a visit, and when he finally did sign with

(51:42):
Miami. There were multiple teams mentionedas in the hunt for tier Tart,
and the Bengals weren't one of them, So I think they were comfortable with
letting him go, not signing him, letting him leave town. And yeah,
on paper, it makes a tonof sense, and I think he's
a talented player, but clearly somethingrubbed them the wrong because one thing we
do know over the past four yearsor so is to get them to the

(52:05):
state dinner. Usually that free agentdeal gets done, and for whatever reason,
it didn't get done with Tierre Tart, it didn't get done with Mackai
Becton. I think part of thathad to do with the fact that Trent
Brown was still out there. Intier Tart's case, I think it's simple
they weren't comfortable with whether it's theattitude, the character questions, the fits,

(52:27):
whatever it was, they weren't comfortableand so that's why the deal didn't
get done. The Bengals have spenta lot of premium picks the last two
years. If memory serves correct,their top three picks the last two drafts
were all on the defensive side ofthe football. I get the sense that
might be the flip this year withneeds at right tackle, wide receiver,

(52:49):
and tight end. Let's go fullchaos here, James. By some miracle,
brock Bauers is there at eighteen,What do the Bengals do. Well,
I'm telling them to take and soif Zax's listening now or Duke,
and I'm sure they are taken,take him because you give number nine another
weapon like that that's dynamic. Well, the last time you did that,

(53:09):
what happened Jamar Chase's rookie year.I think we know what happened. So
yeah, I totally think they shouldtake him. Will they take him?
I think they will. And partof the paths to him following is some
of these top tackles, including aByron Murphy, including the top offensive tackles,

(53:30):
those guys would be off the board. There's only so many round one
guys, and so a lot ofus think, all right, well one
of the offensive tackles will be therebecause there's so many, or maybe Byron
Murphy will be there because the cornersgo and some of these dead rushers go.
But to me, the path forBowers to follow is to somehow make
it past the Jets at ten.The Colts have to have someone ranked higher

(53:52):
on their board than Bowers. Andif those two teams, if he gets
past those two, I do thinkthere's a real shot that he's there.
At eight and so yeah, Ifull chaos. If that's chaos, Rick,
give me chaos, give me rockPowers at eighteen, James. It
is also the year of the Day. Two wide receiver, Jerome Simpson,

(54:13):
Mohammed Sanu, Tyler Boyd, THiggins. Every election year this happens,
and I'd be stunned if history didn'trepeat itself this year. There are a
bevy of options available this year.It's a deep wide receiver draft. I
think it just all depends on whatit is that the Bengals are looking for
in a wide receiver. You know, what do you think they are looking

(54:34):
for in a wide receiver? Theyneed to find someone that can come in
right now and contribute right away.And in the wide receiver conversation's pretty interesting
because obviously they drafted Charlie Jones andandre Yo Sabash. Last year they resigned
Trenton Irwin. But you lose TylerBoyd and they're not resigning Tyler Boyd.

(54:54):
I would be stunned if that happens. T Higgins. I'll break the news
right now at training camp at leastpart of it. With his contract situation
being the way it is, andso you need bodies that one are capable
because T Higgins and Jamar Chase havedealt with injuries Higgins's contract situation, but
also because you lost Tyler Boyd andyou have unproven guys behind him in the

(55:15):
role that you would have to askthem to play. So I think they
want to get more versatile and finda receiver that can play outside like t
Higgins, but also move inside likeJamar Chase does, and have that flexibility
and from a long term standpoint,be able to move Chase around and move
wide receiver to be named on Daytwo of the NFL Draft move him around

(55:37):
as well. So I think thatthat's what they're eyeing, and there are
some guys that fit that label,But to your point, I think a
lot of them are going to begone early. And that's why the Day
two element matters is because you maylook up and in the middle of round
three you see a bunch of slotonly wide receivers. Really talented guy still,

(56:00):
but if you only project them asslot wide receivers, well, that's
what you had with Tyler Boyd.You want to be more versatile than that.
You want to have a guy thathas an inside outside twax. The
Bengals did resign Trent Irwin. Asyou said, they're still going to have
Chase and we think t Higgins isgoing to play insert draft pick here.
It would not at all shock meif MIKEA. Sicky is utilized as a

(56:20):
highbrid receiver and SI's targets out ofthe slot this year. You mentioned Charlie
Jones and andre Yoshivas. Where doyou think they fit into the mix?
Especially Jones, he seemed to meto be drafted kind of like that air
apparent to Tyler Boyd. But youknow, he played through a few injuries
last year. I know he torehis labram and tried to play through that.
He ended up going on ir fora little bit. He does seem

(56:42):
a bit like a forgotten man though. Yeah, I certainly think he's in
the mix, but you can't bankon that because he didn't get the show
enough. I think he had underthirty offensive snatch total last year, and
so you just don't know what he'sgoing to bring you. And he played
in that final Cleveland game, butthat was basically a preseason game where it

(57:02):
was good to get him reps,you know, And so I think he
could be your future slot and alsothat's ideal because if you take let's say
you take a Troy Franklin out ofOregon, or you take a Roman Wilson
out of Michigan or insert whatever widereceiver you end up with, Well,
that guy can play on the outsidemost of the time. And if Charlie

(57:23):
Jones develops into this stud slot receiverwhere you can put him there, and
then you have a guy andre Josabashthat can play outside and they certainly are
confident in, well, maybe he'syour fourth wide receiver moving forward. And
that's how it looks next year whereit's a draft pick this year, Jamar
Chase, Charlie Jones, and andreJosabash. As you're one through four.

(57:45):
That's not crazy to me, andI think it's realistic. So as wild
as it sounds, wide receiver iscertainly in need, and it's one of
their bigger needs, I would saygoing into the draft, James, great
stuff as always, man, Wherecan people fall along with all the wonderful
work that you're doing. You mentionedthe Lockdown Bengals podcast. There daily Cincinnati
Bengals talk on YouTube and SI dotcom for all the Bengals coverage. Appreciate

(58:08):
you good sir, Thank you somuch. Thanks Gret, appreciate you.
Yep. I hope you get tosee Taylor tonight. Thank you very very
much. New Heights Podcast Live,Fifth Third Arena tonight. There's rumblings,
there's rumors that the better half ofTravis Kelsey is in town for that show.
So we can confirm Dona Kelsey isthere. Well, there we go,

(58:28):
of course you would be why not, proud mama there. We got
to take a break, a littleof extended break. We'll come back.
We will get a check on yoursports headlines. And then this Saturday night
at Truest Arena on the campus ofNKU Austin Elmore Country, it is all
elite wrestling, three jam packed hoursthat includes two hours of AW Collision and

(58:52):
then Battle of the Belts. TenAw's Swerve Strickland, the future AW world
champion tarn be joining us as well. Coming up here. About five thirty
five, Ricky China went from Owegoron ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati's esp hit a
check ears sports headlines, a serviceof Kelsey Chevrolet, home of lifetime powertrain

(59:15):
protection and guaranteed credit approval from theirfamily to yours for life kelseyshev dot com
rececucino here on ESP on fifteen thirtyin for Mowegar, today Today's Reds game
rained out. It will now bemade up as a split doubleheader Friday,
August thirtieth. Today's rescheduled game willbe happening at twelve forty, so that'll

(59:36):
be an early first pitch, andthen the originally scheduled game for that Friday
will be six forty in the afternoon. Fans with tickets to today's game who
can make it on the thirtieth,great cool. You don't need to do
anything. If you need to exchangeyour tickets for another game because you cannot
make it to a twelve forty startime on a Friday afternoon, you can
exchange them at the window at GABPor by calling the ticket office at three

(59:58):
eight one. R d S redzew fall to the Brewers seven to two
last night. That now dropped tosix and six on the year. Hunter
Green, he did struggle last night, gave up two home runs early.
It was five to nothing before youcould even blink an eye, and he
is now the target of Reds fansimpatients. Last week it was Elie de

(01:00:20):
Lacruz. This week it is HunterGreen. He went six innings last night,
did strikeout nine, gave up sevenruns, six of them earned.
He walked only one batter, gaveup the two home runs as era on
the young season now up to foureighty six. But Milwaukee did come into
the game and this might be thesilver lining. But for today's game getting

(01:00:40):
rained out, they were white hotwith runners in scoring position three seventy three
average so far this year thirty eightfor one oh two with runners in scoring
position. They were batting darn nearfive hundred the last four games, so
let's hope they cooled down a littlebit when they play that game in August.
Dan Skillings junior has announced he willbe returning to the University of Cincinnati

(01:01:06):
for his junior season for the UCBearcats basketball program. So some good news
out of Clifton today. Of course, it's a big day in Clifton,
down on the campus in the Universityof Cincinnati. New Heights podcast being recorded
live at Fifth Third Arena. Tonight'ssold out crowd gonna be watching Jason Kelce
brother Travis. They're gonna chat withthe likes at Joe Burrow, Orlando Brown

(01:01:27):
Junior, some some rumblings that theremay be some other people there, Taylor
Swift possibly, who knows. BotFor those who have tickets, good on
you because this was supposed to beoutside in Nippert Stadium originally, but it
was moved inside due to the rain. Today, the search for a new
basketball coach at the University of Kentuckywill continue. CBS Sports the first to

(01:01:51):
report that Scott Drew turned down anoffer to take over the Wildcats program.
He will remain at Baylor, wherehe has been very successful throughout his career.
He also turned down Louisville a fewyears ago, so yeah, he
is not moving to the state ofKentucky. John Caliperry, of course,
introduced as the new head coach atArkansas on Wednesday. Miami University had football

(01:02:12):
coach Chuck Martin has agreed to afive year contract extension and will keep him
with the RedHawks to the twenty ninecollege football season. The Masters are now
underway in Augusta, and your leaderwho has now completed his round Bryson de
Chembo seven under on the day andopening round sixty five. Danny Willett not

(01:02:36):
that far behind, but there isa bit of a gap. He shot
at sixty eight today, so hefinished the day four under. Ryan Fox
right now through seventeen is three under, and then there are a bevy of
dudes who are tied at three underand then two under. It's really really
close for those who are wondering aboutTiger Woods. His tea time was actually
delayed until three fifty four today,so he's very likely not going to be

(01:03:00):
finishing his round. I'm not surewhere he is there he is. He
is one under tied for fourteenth rightnow. He has only played two holes,
so so far, so good.But it's gonna be interesting to see
because if he has to play twentyone, twenty two, twenty three,
twenty four holes tomorrow due to weatherdelays, it's gonna be interesting to see

(01:03:22):
if his his back and his kneeshold out. This was an interesting story
that came out late in the dayyesterday. The NHL, excuse me,
it's preparing a contingency that could relocatethe Arizona Coyotes to Salt Lake City,
Utah, as soon as next season. Sources told ESPN and others. The
league is skeptical about the Coyotes' newestplan to build an arena in Phoenix,

(01:03:45):
and has prepared a backup option thatwould sell the team to Ryan and Ashley
Smith, who owned the Utah Jazz. This shadow plan includes the NHL preparing
two schedules for next season, oneinvolving the Coyotes being in Arizona and another
with the team in Utah. Thisis how Cincinnati, by the way,
will get an NHL team or anNBA team. If you build it,

(01:04:09):
they will come, whether that bean expansion franchise, which I don't think
is likely for the NFL because they'realready at thirty two teams, or a
team relocating like a team out inPhoenix, which is a major market.
They have all four major sports rightnow, but maybe not for long.
Got to figure out the arena situationfirst, which appears to be very very

(01:04:29):
much down the line, and theNFL has now revised its uniform policy they
will allow teams a third helmet design. This expansion was offered to teams that
were going through the redesign process forthe twenty twenty four season, and it
is now open to all clubs fortwenty twenty five. No word on whether
the Bengals plan to utilize this newallowance of a third helmet. But this

(01:04:53):
definitely creates an avenue for those whohave been begging for those old nineteen sixties,
nineteens, seventies throwbacks or maybe evenan entirely new design. Hey,
how about like have some fun withit, you like a fun fan contest
or something like that. And alsothe big news coming out broke earlier today.
O J. Simpson. He's passedaway at the age of seventy six.

(01:05:15):
His family made that announcement that hedied after a battle with cancer.
Former football star and actor, ofcourse, most notably acquitted a murder the
nineteen ninety four deaths of his exwife Nicole Smith Simpson and Ron Goldman.
Back in the day, Taren,do we have our special guest on the
line yet? All right? I'vebeen told to hold on just one quick

(01:05:39):
moment again. Coming up at fiveo'clock. Five o'clock today, we will
be doing the State of the Redsaddress. Jeff Carr locked on Reds podcast.
He will be joining me for theentire third hour today to break down
where the Reds are. Where theReds are now at six and six and
he concerns about Hunter Green, ChristianIncarnassi on strand, Jamer Candelario Jeff Carr

(01:06:02):
will break all of that down rightnow. But first things first. This
Saturday night Truest Arena on the campusof NKU. It is all elite wrestling,
three jam packed hours that includes twohours of AW collision, then Battle
the Belts. Ten Oh Love Thissong one of the final stops before AEW

(01:06:24):
Dynasty Sunday, April twenty first inSaint Louis, where my guest. At
this time we'll be taking on somemoa Joe for the ae W World Championship.
Swerve Strickland joining me here on ESPNfifteen thirty. Swerve. I can't
thank you enough for the time.Man. How's it going? How are
we doing today? I'm good man. It's still in West Virginia right now,
at a misflight this morning, alittle mishaf so I'm just still in

(01:06:45):
the hotel wait for my next flight. I got you, I got so
you will be at the You willbe at Truce Arena this weekend. Then,
yes, sir, all right,I'm looking forward to that. I
love attending these shows. Anytime AWcomes to town, I always make sure
to get there. But the bigday for you is coming up on the
twenty first. It is a oneon one shot for you becoming the AEW

(01:07:06):
World Champion. And as anybody whohas watched you over the years, especially
these last few months on AEW TV, whether it's been Dynamite or Collision,
they know how important this is toyou, and you are. You are
right there. You can touch it, you can darn near taste it.
That championship belt look damn good onyour shoulder last night at Dynamite. Being
on the verbe Let's just had alot of practice over the years of my

(01:07:28):
career holding championships, so I've workedout for it, being on the verge
of accomplishing a life goal such asthis, after all the years of hard
work, after all the sacrifice,you know, how are you processing everything
and how are you attacking these finaldays before you head into this big bout
with Simojo. My first and foremostis my health. My health, and

(01:07:50):
it's my mental Those got to beintact before anything else comes into play.
Those are probably the most difficult,most challenges, challenging things that any competitor
goes to and the higher you go, the harder it gets. So the
higher the prize, the more challenges, the more doubts, the more criticism,

(01:08:10):
the more challenges are thrown at yourway, the more like, the
more definitely like the vocalized, likelittle jabs and subtle things, they get
a little louder and they come inabundance. So blocking out those things to
be able to perform and compete,and then and also train my bodies at

(01:08:31):
tip top conditioning. Ben took myworkouts and my dieting to the whole new
level overall all of twenty twenty threeand then going into twenty twenty four,
so I'm I'm physically ready there.I've been doing a lot of things for
AW and put in AW primary first. You know, I want to be
the leader of this. I wantto, Like it's hard not to be

(01:08:54):
motivated with you see the influx oftalent coming through, and you got to
compete with those guys to the leftand you and the women too. So
this is where I want to be. That's where I want to be a
top of I said at the topof the show today pro wrestling is the
healthiest it's been in decades, andAEW deserves a ton of credit for that.

(01:09:15):
Success for the business across the board. You know, competition in any
medium, any market, it's goingto lead to a healthier product or a
healthier business altogether. It's great forthe fans, it's great for the talent.
You know, there's only so manyspots available so to see you know,
so many really talented people be ableto find work and feed their families
and do it on a grand stage, you know. I mean, you

(01:09:36):
guys are on TNT and TBS everysingle week. You guys are continuing to
grow the product. It's a it'sa beautiful thing to watch and it's been
a beautiful thing to watch you know, you grow, you know, honestly
throughout the project. It's not reallya question there, but I mean it's
just been great to watch you andthe product grow over these last few years.
Thank you man. I can identifywith the AW in a lot of

(01:10:00):
ways because, like when I firstcame in AW, like a lot of
people didn't look at me. It'slike to be in the position that I
am now. You know, consistencyand growth and staying focused and staying out
of a lot of bull crap reallykept me going and progressing and moving forward,
putting my ego aside like following alot of humility and just being like
a team player and like understanding wheremy position is, where I want to

(01:10:24):
go, but also understanding when it'slike no, I'm ready, knowing when
it's time to push the limits alittle bit. That's what AW was all
about, from like when I waswatching and seeing it from like you know,
twenty twenty one and two down twentytwo. When I came in,
it was about like pushing those boundaries, challenging like the authority and the structure

(01:10:44):
of how progressing is, breaking thosethings a little bit and creating and making
things your own and then proving thosenaysayers wrong and doing things your way,
you know, And like there wasa lot of doubt, and there's a
lot of things, there's like alot of criticisms and face and still faces
to the day, you know,And I still face those things to the
day too. So's I can relateand see a lot of like myself and

(01:11:05):
what AW is, and so Ifeel like that relationship is what's bringing me
to the forefront of for wrestling rightnow, especially as an African American man.
We already face a lot of thesecertain criticisms with moving goalposts and certain
things like which discussed about, butit's always there. Those little those those

(01:11:26):
little talks are there and we seeit and we've here and I feel it.
But it's to break the mold,you know, And that's what I'm
here to do. It's worth Strickland, the future ae W World champion.
As much as I love Samoa Joe, I feel like this is this is
your time coming up on the twentyfirst, It should be your time.
AW Dynasty. Uh well, we'llget to Samoa Joe here in a second,

(01:11:48):
because there's something like I got toknow about Samoa Joe. But for
for those people who you know,haven't checked out AW here here in town,
they haven't had a chance to gocheck out a show, and maybe
they're used to watching WWE or TNAor whatever whatever whatever their flavor is.
Because everybody, hey, it's okayto like what you like, all right,
but what can they expect out ofan AW show they may not get

(01:12:11):
anywhere else. The variety, thetalent, the international talent, the new
wave of like the new homegrown starsthat have been like making a market for
wrestling at such a young age,you know, like I think we are
set up for the future of forwrestling and is one of the best ways
possible, like a lot of theyoung talent, but also a lot of
like the familiar talents that you've beenintroduced to for the last ten, twenty,

(01:12:35):
even thirty years. You know,like you just had Dustin Rhodes face
out against the Mojo for the AWWorld title on Dynamite this past Wednesday.
You know, like Dustin Roses hadjust put in for wrestling for years.
You know, Mercedes coming in Okadafrom one of the greatest international new Japanese
stars from like to the past tento fifteen years, you know side of

(01:12:57):
AW he was on the show lastnight, and you know myself just watching
my climb from like you know,being let go from the like from one
of the lowest of lows you canbe at in the industry to climb all
the way in the last two yearsto being like a headliner of a pay
per viewing dynasty in Saint Louis comingup in the twenty first of April.
That those are those are big storiesand that's big talent that you're just not

(01:13:21):
going to see go with the routethat they have in anywhere else. You
know, you know, WW hasbeen entrenched in a lot of people's DNA
for like forty years, forty tofifty years, you know, and you
had that relationship with them. You'relooking for something that's a different type of
relationship, something that's a little morefast paced, a little more like variety,

(01:13:42):
a little more hard hitting, andyou just like you want to truly
invest in something that's just like wantto definitely be the new wave of a
new style of things and just adifferent culture all the wrestlings where you want
to be, especially like men,women, like ethnicities, action, like
all of it. You mentioned thewords hard hitting, and your opponent on

(01:14:03):
the twenty first is Samoa Joe,who, for my money, is the
most physically imposing performer in the gametoday, and he's been one of them
for years now, just taking upresidents at the corner of f around and
find out right like this. Thisis a man who has told me on
several occasions he just loves inflicting pain. This is somebody who you have been
in the ring with great triple threatmatch that I had a chance to watch

(01:14:25):
in Greensboro, North Carolina a fewweeks ago. You get him one on
one. You know, is itAre you able to describe what it's like
to be in the ring with SamoaJoe? Words truly can't describe it.
It's more like actions and like pictures, you know, like I I'll think
you want last last week, thatcontract signing. I'd never been hit that

(01:14:47):
hard by anybody else in my life. And I've been wrestling fifteen years and
I've based off been in some heavyhitters. You know, Joe was probably
one of the most punishing beatdowns I'veever received. And and this is coming
after I faced off agains him inthe Triple thread Mash for the world title.
You know. Yeah, so likenow that's one on one, focus

(01:15:10):
all the attentions on me, allmy attentions on him. There's a lot
of punishment that's going to be inflictedboth ways. And then you just saw
a preview what I can do justthe last night on Dynamite here in West
Virginia. Like, I'm not afraid. I've been hit hard and I've gotten
back up every single time, andthat's what I got to continue to do.
I got to keep getting back upand keep jumping into this man's face,

(01:15:33):
showing them that I'm not afraid ofthem, and that I'm willing to
hit just as hard, if notharder. You know, Saint Louis is
two weeks away, and I gotto keep showing that. That's like I
said, it doesn't get easier asit gets closer, and the higher you
go, it gets harder. AndJoe's going to be hit harder just to
keep that championship. And he's beendoing a fantastic job the last couple of

(01:15:54):
weeks. I've been based off againstlike the hardest hitters and port wrestler with
Takeshta a couple of weeks before thenJoe. You know, so my jaw's
feeling it a little bit more,but I'm still up and still here and
I'm still like you know, promotingaw roic wife, waving the flag and
you know, trying to make historyhere, you know for sure. Swar
Strickland joining me here on ESPN fifteenthirty for a couple more minutes. Ricky

(01:16:15):
Chino in for Moe Egger today,and you know, I'm not jealous of
you for you know, the thebeatings that you've had to take, but
you are a multi talented person.You know, you got your hands with
the professional wrestling business. You alsohave a very successful podcast, and what
I am jealous of is your nextguest on the Swerve City podcast. Because

(01:16:36):
growing up a wrestling fan, Ithink I started I've told this story before
to others, but like ninety sixninety seven's like when I first started watching
guys like Edge, who goes byAdam Copeland now Christian the Hardys. Those
were my dudes, like I grewup as their career blossomed, and Adam
Copeland is forever going to be onmy interview bucket list. I hope I

(01:16:58):
get to check that off. ButI know you were also because we're roughly
the same age. I know youwere also a big Edge Adam Copland guy
growing up. To get to sitdown and have that interview with him,
to get to sit down and justconverse with him and have him now in
the ae W locker room, Imean, what does what has that been
like? Because it has to bea dream come true, and absolutely it
absolutely is. Like when I startedmy wrestling career fifteen years ago, eighteen

(01:17:23):
seventeen years old, I was likestudying taste and I studied a lot of
like Edge DVDs, and matches andstuff. I was truly entrenched in like
the triangle latta matches and the youknow, the pocs and stuff. But
also is like in ringwork when hebecame like a singles world champion and stuff
and doing a thing, and Ijust loved everything about him. I felt

(01:17:44):
like we were very have a lotof similarities. Like ten fifteen years ago,
I was thinking that. So whenI was able to meet him at
NXT and stuff and really talk withthem, he was just tremendous. He
was everything I envisioned him to beas a person, as a human being,
and like I was like, man, I'm proud to be a fan
of yours, proud that you know, you were the one that influenced me

(01:18:04):
to take this career path. AndI tell him that all the time.
But then like him coming over toAll lad Wrestling, he's even more like
we just yelled even more, youknow. I you know, I just
asked this man, like last night, I was just like, hey,
I want to do the podcast.He was like absolutely awesome. So so
it's just and it was just andthat's the cool, how how simple it

(01:18:27):
is dealing with him, and that'swhat you want. You just want like
somebody's just simple and cool like that. So I was really I'm really fortunate
and proud of that, you know. So those are things I actually want
to talk to him and tone tohim the podcast. I don't think I've
ever actually broke that kind of informationto him, But he's tremendous, incredible

(01:18:47):
talent, gifted and gifted performers.Still to this day, fifty years old,
I still look up to him aslike a big big brother, great
best friend of mine in a likelike I said, probably one of my
personal favorite additions to AW. Yeah, man, just seeing him and the
work that Christian are still able todo, especially when you know they look

(01:19:11):
like they'd never be able to stepfoot in the ring again. Same with
Brian Danielson, all members of AllElite Wrestling SAMO with Joe until very recently,
you guys had sting that was awesomewatching his final match. Uh but
swarve, excuse me, Swerve Stricklanda name you want to look out for.
This man's the next AW world champion. Swerve. I am out of
time. I really appreciate yours andUH look forward to seeing you know on

(01:19:32):
Saturday, and uh, good luckSaint Louis on the twenty first against them
with Joe. Thank you very much, Thank you for having me appreciate it.
Man. Subscribe to the sourclypodcast YouTubedot com back last sorc City podcast,
check it out. Thank you.I forgot to ask good man.
Look, it's always about self promotion, folks. If you don't promote yourself,
no one's gonna do it. Iappreciate you following me up on that

(01:19:53):
one. So take care, goodluck. Thank you very much. H
again. Saturday night, Trust Arenaon the campus of n all Elite,
resting three hours. It's Collision followedby Battle of the Belts. Ten tickets
are available now on Ticketmaster or youcan go to the NKU box office as
well. Coming up at the topof the hour, it is all Reds
Baseball Jeff Carr locked on Reds Podcastinside Thereds dot Com. We are going

(01:20:17):
to be doing our State of theReds address twelve games into the season.
But next it is Brenneman and Joneson Baseball Here on ESPN fifteen thirty.
This is your thursdayu oh. Noone covers the Bengals like ESPN fifteen thirty.
Cincinnati's Sports Station boy Ton just flieswhen you are having fun. It

(01:20:45):
is already five six here on aThursday afternoon. Hey, it's looking a
little better outside. It's not asdoomy and gloomy as it looked earlier.
I think I might even see ahint of like light out there. I
thought it was still six am forthe last, you know, eleven hours.
Ricky Chino here on the SPN fifteenthirty, filling in for mo Egger.
There was no Reds game today.It was rained out. That is

(01:21:08):
the bad news. But the goodnews is my man Jeff Carr is in
the studio Locked On Reds podcast insidethe Reds dot Com for Sports Illustrated.
This is something that we always tryto do. I'm on the air hosting
sporadically, but you know, betweenyour schedule and my inability to stay healthy

(01:21:29):
in the month of March, wecould not find time to get together and
talk some Reds baseball for an hourbefore the season started. So, in
the spirit of Governor Mike to Wanegiving a State of the State address yesterday,
I brought Jeff in today and we'regonna do a State of the Reds
address for the next hour and closethings out. Jeff, I appreciate you
coming in. I'm sorry you didn'tget to go to the game today.
Yeah, me too. And youknow, eleven games in everybody's matt which

(01:21:50):
is on part you know, they'reabove five hundred. I don't know what
else people are. They're six andsix after last night's game. Six and
six, that's right. Yeah,but they're at five hundred. And really
that's the key for me is thatthese first two months, when you get
to Memorial Day, just be fivehundred because these first two months are crazy.
It's a gauntlet of a schedule.They're going to hit this long West

(01:22:10):
coast road trip here as we getinto May and things like that. So
just keep this rolling and then youget on a roll at the right time
of the year. You don't wantto be on a roll right now.
You don't want to be where inMilwaukee and Pittsburgh are right now. It's
too early. Yeah, you can'twin the season in April and May,
but you can definitely lose it.And that's something that we have seen over
the last few what was it twentynineteen when they started off three and eighteen.

(01:22:32):
Yeah, they want Opening Day andwe're like all excited and stuff,
and they lost like eighth straight,and they end up being like three and
eighteen, and the NFL Draft hasn'teven happened, and the red season is
already over, and we're like,they were supposed to be good, but
they aren't supposed to be that bad. Yeah, exactly, and then we
all got excited for twenty twenty andthen the world ended, you know how
it is. But this team,honestly, right here through the first twelve

(01:22:54):
games, now, they're about rightwhere I thought they would be. You
know, they're a young team.You're gonna get inconsistent hitting to start the
year, You're gonna get inconsistent pitching. But they're a flawed team, right
They're a team that's still developing.They are a team that are gonna make
mistakes. Elie de la Cruz isgonna punt a ball every now and again.
It's gonna happen. He's gonna strikeout every now and again. But

(01:23:16):
he's a guy that's gonna go outthere and hit home runs from both sides
of the plate, including it insidethe park home run and put together a
performance has never been done in thehistory of baseball, which by the way
goes all the way back to whateighteen sixty eight or whatever it is,
So people have been playing baseball fora hot minute, especially in this town
Aldost professional franchise, so it's likethey're young, they're inconsistent. My whole
big thing for starting off this yearwas just don't lose the season in the

(01:23:42):
first month, and so far theyhaven't done that. Yeah, you'd like
to see them beat Milwaukee, butright now Milwaukee's on fire. They're beat
in like five hundred rods of thescoring position this week, right and that
is such a fickle stat that itcomes in a ghost and that's not something
that they can rely on all seasonlong. I feel like they're exactly where
I thought they would be. Ithink that this is an eighty five to

(01:24:02):
eighty eight win team with the injuriesthat they're dealing with, and hopefully,
you know, the optimistic reports sowe got about Matt McLain, hopefully they
are true. I hate to saythat this team is pretty optimistic with a
lot of injury reports, and theyhave proven to be over optimistic on most
of them. So I'm hoping thatthis one is right on the money.

(01:24:24):
But there's so much talent, andlike you said, the youngness and the
unpredictableness of this team doesn't quite jivewith the hunger the need that Red's country
has yeah to have a successful team. We want a contender, We want

(01:24:44):
a World Series contender like yesterday.And that is why there's just so many
reactions to this team of just like, well, why aren't they there yet?
But guess what, you can't winthe World Series in April. You
build up to that. And Ifeel like they are starting in the right
spot with most of these guys.And you mentioned Ellie. I mean,
he's got three games now without strikingout. That's everybody's favorite stat with him,

(01:25:08):
right, Like, he's the fastestguy in the world. He hits
the ball of country mile, he'sgot the strongest arm you've ever seen.
And you've got you know, youryour buddy over there at the at the
office sitting in the corner office goingyeah, he's striking out like forty five
percent of the time. He's notreally that good. Huh wrong, He's
like the weirdest player ever when itcomes to strikeout rate, because he's hitting

(01:25:28):
over three hundred and get on basealmost thirty eight percent of the time.
Yeah, he's look again, whathow many professional games has he played?
I know Moe was talking about thison less than a full season. Yeah,
less than a full season of professionalbaseball games. It's like, can
we give this man a minute?We give a lot of can we give
a lot of these guys a minuteto just develop, like and not go

(01:25:53):
imagine any kind of profession, Like, Oh, my goodness, I cannot
tell you, Jeff. Now,you and I we both worked at this
radio station for a while, butI was here a few years before you
got here. Okay, I'm verycomfortable saying this now. My first three
years at seven hundred, Wow,I sucked. I was genuinely bad at

(01:26:15):
what I do. I like rightnow, after doing it for eleven years,
I can confidently say I'm one ofthe best morning news anchors in the
country. Like, humbly speaking,I can say that, and confidently speaking,
I can say that that was notthe case when I first started here.
It took me a lot of timebecause I had no news experience.
I had like one semester of journalismunder my belt at the University of Cincinnati.

(01:26:40):
I left journalism school because it wasboring, and I went to broadcasting
school and I ended up being ajournalist. Anyway, this is how this
stuff works in life. It's weird. But if it wasn't for Jeff Henderson,
our news director at the time,giving me a shot, which I
don't know how he hired me oneoff of my demo. I heard it
like three years later. It wasawful, But he hired me off my
demo. And whether or not hehad faith in me, whether he saw
something in me, whether he wasjust desperate, I don't know. But

(01:27:03):
he brought me in and he stuckwith me because I was bad, And
now I'm here eleven years later andI made a career out of it.
Like, well, this happens everywhere. Get people time, and what is
the difference between a professional and anexpert, Like professionals get paid, experts
have done at like ten thousand differenttimes. Like, yeah, he's we
need to give him a minute.We need to give most of these guys

(01:27:24):
a minute, like Christian and Carnascioand Strain. Everybody's like are we should
we should we be worried about him? Is this who he is? No,
it's not who he is. He'sjust sending that going Yet Baseball is
a sport that requires a groove.You have to find that comfortability. And
there's a lot of guys in thislineup, and there's a lot of guys
in the pitching staff that I haven'tfounded yet. Yeah, one of those
guys who did struggle last night waswas Hunter Green. And this is a

(01:27:46):
guy who I think is going tobe under more scrutiny than than anybody else
on the team because he's the guywho's got the extension so far, right,
Like he's basically the new Joey Voto, right he and and look,
there are there are reasons for peopleto be skeptical. He hasn't stayed healthy,
he hasn't pitched a full season,and he hasn't lived up to the

(01:28:10):
massive hype that you know, weall had for him. But at the
same time, he's twenty four,right, Like, he's still young,
and I got I got some comparisonshere for you, all Right, twenty
two years old is when he madehis major league debut pitching the twenty twenty
two season. He went five andthirteen that year. He had a four
to forty four RRA and twenty fourgames like he struck out one hundred and

(01:28:34):
sixty four batters. You know,he walked a fair amount, but you
know, you saw the talent thatwas there. Last year ends up four
and seven and win lost record,doesn't you know, whatever it is,
what it is. But four eightytwo, that era goes up, still
struck out one hundred and fifty twobatters and less sinnings because he got hurt.
Obviously, durability is the concern there. But there was this other pitcher

(01:28:58):
who his first year in a Red'suniform, he was twenty two all right,
started nine and fourteen, had afour eighty one ERA with less strikeouts
and more innings. His twenty threeseason he went eleven and eleven with a
four forty one ERA, less strikeouts, in more innings and walked more batters.
And then in twenty ten twelve andseven he went three and sixty four

(01:29:21):
or three sixty four ERA, andthen after that he was sub three for
the rest of his Reds career.Now it's not a direct comparison, but
I see a lot of similarities betweenwhere Hunter green Ad is at right now
and where Johnny Cuato was early inhis year, early in his career,
and I two thousand and eight,two thousand and nine, twenty ten,
I was not in I was notin sports talk radio at that time,

(01:29:42):
so I don't remember if if JohnnyQuato was getting the same early career hate
that that Hunter Green is. Maybeif I know this town the way I
think I do, he probably was. But I mean imagine if they had
cut bait with him then, butthey stayed patient with him, right,
A great comparison, And Johnny Cquatodid have one benefit. You know,
he pitched before Twitter. But whenit comes to when it comes to Johnny

(01:30:04):
Quata, though thinking about him,like he went, he underwent a huge
mechanical change and that is what helpedhim out. And I don't necessarily think
Hunter Green needs that, but it'sit's pointing out the fact that, like
what Hunter Green needs to do andwhat Johnny Quato did to become as good
as he was, I don't thinkit's as drastic. Like he just needs
to get used to at least athird pitch, and we saw four pitches

(01:30:28):
last night. He did throw hissplitter a couple of times. He threw
his curve ball a couple of times. He's getting more and more comfortable with
those two pitches. But it isclear he's got to add those in because
commanding just the first two pitches isn'tenough to be a good starting pitcher every
five days and go six innings andthrow one hundred and five hundred and ten
pitches and be good. Because Imean we saw it last night. He

(01:30:49):
had nine strikeouts. You can lookat part of his line and you can
say six innings, nine strikeouts,one walk, that's pretty good. Six
and and runs. Two homers,allow, yeah, six hits. They
jumped on him early, they gotfive runs. And then the you know
the Reds, goodn't they do whatthe Brewers do? They're two strike hitting
all this other stuff. So it'sit's one of those things that he's just
got to find that that that pitchhe can drop in and be like,

(01:31:12):
look, they're falling off the slider, They're they're laying off the fastball.
Let's get out of this at batwith a splitter. Yeah. I remember,
and maybe I'm misremembering this because I'vesaid this already on this show.
I have a terrible memory. ButI was at Johnnyquato's first start, and
you know, he did not haveas cool as hair and his first start
as he did a couple of years. No, God, I think he
had like a yeah, yeah cutor something like that. Yeah, and

(01:31:34):
then I'm pretty sure he just nevercut his hair after his major league debut.
But yeah, Like I remember watchinghim through that first year and that
second year, and I just keptgoing, Man, if he could just
figure out a way to like it. To me, it felt like he
was trying to strike guys out andput guys away, and they kept falling
off, and he kept throwing alot of pitches early in the game.

(01:31:56):
And then like once he decided,like, you know what, I'm gonna
take the the Frankie Atas approach here, or maybe the Frankie Mantas has taken
the Johnny Cuato approach here. I'mgonna try to pitch for contact and get
outs as quickly as I can,and the strikeouts will come all And he
made obviously the mechanical changes as well, but he put all that together,
and I think that's the step thatHunter Green needs to take, and it's
like, just look, find away to get an out. It doesn't

(01:32:16):
matter if you cool even strike ninedudes out. I'd rather you go seven
innings and strike four out and onlygive up two runs, right, And
I think that's the key difference herewith Hunter Green and with some of the
other young pitchers. You can seethat and Andrew Rabbit starts as well,
where it feels as though they getto two strikes and they're just like,
all right, I gotta make thisso you can't hit it. They got
to change that mindset and just belike, you're not gonna hit this,

(01:32:38):
I'm throwing it like it feels asthough they are trying to work around something
when they just got to go rightat it. That's what so Montas was
doing. And you know, Montaskgot kind of brewered a little bit that
third inning where he got the twostrikes, with every single dude that ended
up hitting a single, getting awalk or the one double that he gave
up. It was just like reallyannoying little stuff. And there's this voodoo

(01:33:00):
magic that I think the Cardinals usedto have somehow the Brewers stole and and
now we have to get past thatin Cincinnati fans. But for the most
part, I really think that hehas the exact right example in front of
him. So as he emulates whatFrankie Montas does, he's going to take
that next step. Yeah, JeffCarr Lockdown Reds Podcast inside the Reds dot
Com with us until the end ofthe show today. I'm Ricky Chino in

(01:33:23):
for Moweger. I do believe Mowill be back tomorrow in his normal three
to six spot. Red's Game ofcourse rained out today, but hey,
maybe the silver lining is they cancatch Milwaukee and a doubleheader later on the
air when hopefully they aren't hitting fivehundred with runners in scoring position, and
in August after the trade deadline,who knows, see, yeah he does.
Yeah, and maybe by then,you know, maybe Mat mcclean's back,

(01:33:44):
you know, noelbe Martine will beback. Knock on what Yeah,
Reds are a little healthyj PJ.Fridilli back, they'll jive in. Obviously
those injuries have made have had animpact. We'll talk about that and so
much more we'll talk about in Karnassion strand. We will talk about Jamer
Candelario and a play that that hehad last night that just had me scratching
my head, and so much moreof that in the Red's got some pitching

(01:34:06):
decisions they got to make coming uphere soon, so a lot more to
dive into with his Club. It'sthe State of the Reds address here on
ESPN fifteen thirty. See this iswhat this is what Tarn does when Moe
is off, He's allowed to playWill Smith? Is that pretty much?
What? What? What are youallowed? Is that the rules there?
Tarran, It's it's no, it'sno Will Smith when Moe's in, right,

(01:34:29):
and no Will Smith after nineteen ninetyone, Wills when mosey? Okay,
after nineteen Wait did Will Smith doughmusic after nineteen ninety nine? Oh?
What you're listening to is after nineteenninety nineteen. I heard nineteen ninety
nine. I'm just sitting here.I'm like outside of like that men in
Black theme like that he did likeI don't know or while while West maybe
he did do music after ninety nineas well. Okay, okay, oh

(01:34:53):
yeah, you know what. Iit's all coming back to me now,
It's all coming back to me now. Yeah, all right, I got
my Will Smith timeline together again.All right. But yeah, I'm cool
with Will Smith. I'm fine withthat. Chris Rock might not be cool
with Will Smith, but you know, I'm I'm I'm fine with the Ricky
you know in from Oaggar today hereon ESPN fifteen thirty, Jeff Carr locked
on Red's podcast, joining me hereuntil six o'clock tonight when we have to

(01:35:15):
say goodbye to you all. Red'sgame rained out today, Jeff, And
you know you were walking up tothe gate when you found out that they
were not going to be playing it. I almost feel like they could have
played, though, Like the radarseemed to like open up a window there
between like one and three point thirtywhere they might have been able to get
that game in. Yeah, andI think that there was a little bit
of just weirdness with the forecast thatthey just didn't want to deal with.

(01:35:35):
And since that's the Brewers and notanother team that they won't see, they
I think they just decided to pushit back. I don't know. The
other part of it was like thefield had been taken a lot of rain
for the last whatever twelve hours,twenty four hours, something like that.
Yeah, that field conditions might haveplayed a role in that for sure.
But you know, regardless, we'retalking about where this team is sitting here

(01:35:59):
now and again, it might bea silver lining that they don't have to
play the Brewers again. As hotas they are hitting right now, and
maybe they get a colder Brewers teamwhen they have to play again. It's
gonna be a split doubleheader Friday,August thirtieth. You can exchange your tickets
if need be. If you canstill attend that game, You're you're perfectly
fine. You can you can go. You don't have to do anything else.
Last night, Reds fall to Brewersseven to two. Rough time for

(01:36:23):
Hunter and Green. We talked abouthis struggles and what he needs to do.
There are a lot of guys inthis lineup though right now, Jeff,
who aren't hitting very much, andof course that is the three and
four hole hitters. Most notably thata lot of people are gonna have their
eyes on because hey, they're hittingthree and four in the lineup. One
of those guys is jaymer Candelario.With the injury to Matt McClain, with

(01:36:47):
the suspension of nouelbe Marte, withTJ. Friedel being out as well,
I think this is a guy thatthey were hoping that they could really lean
on, and he was a guywho you know, a lot of us
went they signed him, at leastI did. I'm sitting here, I'm
like, all right, well,what's the fit. Well, this is
why they signed him right in casesomething went wrong, because something always tends

(01:37:09):
to go wrong, or maybe someof these young guys don't play right away.
At least there is a veteran thatthey can lean on. Well last
two months of the season. Lastyear, Candelario wasn't who he was early
on in the season. He struggledin spring training. I think he's bat
in the bucks bucks sixty eight sofar this year. For better or worse,

(01:37:30):
Red's manager David Bell is going tobe very patient with his hitters.
He's confident that Candelario will be ableto turn around. Candelario says he's not
worried about it. What have youseen? Should they be worried about it?
He's got a really odd stat andI love using the website Baseball Savon
to kind of get an understanding fromthe periphery of what's going on with hitters,

(01:37:50):
because they have things like exit velocityand launch angle and barrels and all
this other stuff. He has zerobear so far this year. He has
not hit a barrel yet, andI think that that is not sustainable.
I mean, you're not going togo in an entire year without hitting a
barrel. You're not going to goan entire year hitting very very little amount

(01:38:11):
of barrels. If you're a hitterlike Jamber Candelario, who has a profile
of a line drive guy, reallyNick Castianos esque with the way that he
hits the ball, and I feellike that's going to come about. It's
just seeing that right now he's hittingas many ground balls as Tyler Stevenson does.
It's it's very concerning because Okay,you're making contact, but your contact

(01:38:32):
is very ineffectual. Yeah, itdoesn't help him either. If the guy,
well, he's hitting fourth right,so he's not getting a I think
they could do with a shuffle,like yeah, and that's the That's where
I was, That's where I wasgoing. Well, you can't mention at
this point, but like, that'swhere I was going with it here.

(01:38:53):
Because you have Christian at Canossio Strandwho is struggling, you have Candelario who's
struggling. You got basically like twoguys right now who are ripping the cover
off the ball, and they're yoursixth and your seventh hole hitters. Are
you kind of surprised and listening toDavid Bell talk. Listening to David Bell
talks, he doesn't look like he'stoo eager to shoffle the lineup around.
Is it concerned that Steer and dayLa Cruz won't be hitting as well if

(01:39:16):
they're not in the six and sevenhole, or is it just you know,
being confident that sooner or later thehits are going to start coming for
the guys who are struggling. Ithink it's I think it's a little bit
of the confidence side, right,Like David Bell has always been a player
manager first, he has always managedwith understanding guys egos and knowing how to

(01:39:38):
kind of work with those things.I just I really wish they would just
flip them right now, like putCees sixth or sorry fifth, and then
Candelario sixth, and then you haveEllie and then Spencer Steer, Like give
more at mats to the guys thatare giving you the most production right now,
right and in fact, like Ellieis a guy if he continues he's

(01:40:01):
got a three seventy five on base, like he continues that stretch put him
in the leadoff, Like I knowwe got TJ. Friedel coming back,
and Jonathan Indy is actually getting onbase almost forty percent of the time right
now. But if you're telling meyou've got the weapon known as Zellie de
la Cruz getting on base that much, he scores last season at a rate
of fifty five percent of the time. If he gets on base, he

(01:40:23):
scores fifty five percent of the time. I think that might be more in
the tiny sample size that we haveright now this year. It just goes
to show that if he is onbase, the Reds are more than likely
going to score, no matter whatbase that he starts from. Yeah,
I've obviously he's got more tools thanBilly Hamilton, but I always looked at
his speed as like, man,what Billy Hamilton could have done if he

(01:40:44):
had gotten on base, Like ifhe could actually get it, Oh my
god, could you imagine how manybases Billy Hamilton would have stolen if he
could have got on base at athree seventy clip, if he could have
got on base at a three twentyclip, if he could have got on
base on a three hundred clip.Can you imagine how many stolen bases he
would have They didn't play a hundredand six two games in Dayton, but
he stole one hundred and two basesfor Dayton whenever he was there. He's
just could have went crazy with thatand right now and I haven't. There

(01:41:09):
might have been a bit of achange in this, but right now Ellie
is on pace to score to steallike ninety five ninety six base. He
says he wants to do eighty.So right now he's on he's on a
good pace and he's going to havea better success rate stealing base as long
as he doesn't overslide the bag.I remember what it was a kid's kids
opening day. Yeah, he overhe over slid, slid the bag and
got called out, even though Ithink he was safe. But whatever,

(01:41:30):
the challenge called him out. Regardless, he's going to have a success rate
just because of the freak athlete thathe is. David Bell is going to
be again, for better or worse. He's he's going to be aggressive on
the baits pass and that's I thinksomething else that that really has cost them
a lot this year. We sawlast night Jamer Candelario gets tossed out to

(01:41:51):
end the fourth inning trying to goto third and he he it wasn't even
it wasn't even close. That wasa weird play. It was a really
weird play. They're they're going tobe aggressive, and I'm all about that.
Utilize your speed, be aggressive,manufacturer runs like that's they all count,
right, And this is a teamthat played a lot of close games
last year, but they also don'tcount when you do stupid stuff like are

(01:42:13):
they being too aggressive? At thispoint, I feel like there's a couple
of guys that you could put intothe category of they are going to help
the Reds when they're on base.And Jamie Candelaria is not one of those
guys. Like they think that he'sfine, he's not slow. I think
he's faster than you know, TylerStevenson, you know Jesse Waker, He's
not Yeah, yeah, he's definitelynot Jesse Waker, but he's definitely I
mean, Elie India Fairchild, maybein Spencer Steer as well. Are your

(01:42:42):
guys that you know you can keepthe green light on because they're going to
make it. Guy like Jamier Candelerea, I think you need to be a
little bit more judicious with And itjust feels like they have this all encompassing,
one size fits all playing on thebasis he is a Jeff Carr locked
on Red's podcast on rick Uccino Inframowaggertoday. He'll be back tomorrow from three
to six after Austin Elmore on onsince he three sixty here on ESPN fifteen

(01:43:06):
thirty. Reds are going to havesome interesting decisions to make. They got
some pitchers who are ready to comeback coming back off of rehab assignment.
Nicolodolo is going to start on Saturday. We'll talk to Jeff about that.
It does appear that they have madea a rotation decision with Nickolodola coming back
off, so we'll talk about thatcoming up. We also got to touch

(01:43:27):
on sports headlines. A lot toget to before the end of the show
today. Stick with us. It'sthe State of the Reds address twelve games
in ESPN fifteen to thirty. I'ma little behind here. It's five forty
on a Thursday afternoon. I swearI almost saw sunshine for like a second.
There doesn't look that bad out rightnow. Rickycchino in for mo Egger

(01:43:49):
today. Mo will be back tomorrow. Got to check on these sports headlines.
A service of Kelsey Chevrolet home oflifetime powertrain protection and guaranteed credit approval
from their family to yours for lifekelseyshev dot com. Today's Reds game rained
out look like there might have beena window that could get in him.
The radar was really weird today.It's gonna be a split doubleheader now against

(01:44:11):
the Milwaukee Brewers Friday, August thirtieth. That game is gonna start at twelve
forty. So if you could attendthat game, if you had tickets in
today's game in twelve forty on Fridaythe thirtieth of August works for you,
great. You don't have to doanything. If you need to exchange those
tickets for another game, you cando so. I believe you have until
the end of May to do that. You can switch those out of the
GABP ticket window, or you cancall three eight one Reds. Reds did

(01:44:34):
faulted the Brewers seven to two lastnight, drops them to six and six
on the year. Hunter Green didstruggle. Gave up six earned runs in
six innings. Pitch that's a lotof sixes. Flip it upside down,
that's how many strikeouts he had ninelast night. Did give up two home
runs. His RM the young seatsnow up to four eighty six. Ellie
day La Cruz did hit it offas a field home run right now,

(01:44:55):
So for all the slack he gotlast week, he's now batting three eighteen
with three homer seven ocked in andan OBP of three seventy five. That
dog will hunt. Dan Skillings Junioris announced he will be returning to the
UC Bearcats basketball program for his juniorseason. So some good news out of
Clifton. Doors are set to openhere in about twenty minutes or so for

(01:45:16):
the New Heights podcast that will berecorded live at Fifth Third Arena tonight.
A sold out crowd to watch JasonKelcey and brother Travis chatted up with the
likes of Joe Burrow, Orlando BrownJunior. A few others are gonna be
there. Maybe Sauce Gardner will bethere, that's a rumor I heard.
And hey, will Taylor Swift bethere? Well, we'll see every other
thing gets underway at seven o'clock tonight. Again the door's open. Oh

(01:45:38):
sorry, the door's open at five, So they're open. Now, get
down there. I screwed that up, but again sold out, so parking,
get there early, Get there early. Search for a new basketball coach
at the University of Kentucky's going tocontinue CBS Sports. The first two report
that Scott Drew turned down and offerto take over the Wildcats program. He's
gonna stay at Baylor, where hehas had a ton of success. John

(01:46:00):
Klipari introduced as the new coach atArkansas on Wednesday. Miami University had football
coach Chuck Martin has agreed to afive year contract extension. He'll stay with
the RedHawks through the twenty nine Collegeof Football season. Of course, the
Masters underway at Augusta and Bryson deChambo. He had a heck of an
opening round as sixty five. Heis seven under to be your leader right

(01:46:25):
now, but Scotty Scheffler is comingon. He is five under through fifteen,
so he's got a chance here overthese last three holes to catch up.
He's shooting a fifty six so far. For those wondering about Tiger Woods,
he is even right now through six. His tea time actually got delayed
until three fifty four today due tothunderstorms that they got going on in Augusta,
Georgia today, so he is notprobably going to finish his round today,

(01:46:48):
which means he's gonna have to playextra holes tomorrow, and that is
not good news for a guy witha bad back and bad knees. So
we'll see how that shakes out.Interesting news that broke late yesterday the NHL
preparing a contingency that could relocate theArizona Coyotes to Salt Lake City, Utah,
as soon as next season, sourcestold ESPN and others. League is

(01:47:10):
skeptical about the Coyotes' newest plan tobuild an arena in Phoenix, and have
prepared a backup option that would sellthe team to Ryan and Nashley Smith,
who owned the Utah Jazz. Theyright now are preparing two schedules for next
season, one of all thing theCoyotes in Arizona, the other with the
team in Utah. The NFL hasnow revised its uniform policy to allowed a

(01:47:30):
third helmet design. Third helmet design. Does that mean we are going to
get throwbacks or a completely new design, We don't know. Bengals haven't said
anything yet, but the option isnow available. Browns and running back Nick
Chubb have agreed on a reworked contractfor the twenty twenty four season that will
lower his base to just under twelvemillion dollars, but he in rapaport.
The NFL network says they'll have achance to earn his money back through incentives.

(01:47:53):
Chubb, of course, working hisway back from a serious knee injury
that cost him much of last season, and then the new that broke earlier
this morning that's been making headlines acrossthe nation. Oj Simpson passing away today
at the age of seventy six.His family made that announcement, saying that
he died after a battle with cancer. Of course, former football star Heisman

(01:48:14):
Trophy winner ran for twelve thousand yardswith the Buffalo Bills, later turned into
an actor. That's how I knewhim as a young kid, of course,
most notably acquitted a murder in thedeaths of his ex wife and her
friend Ron Goldman in nineteen ninety four. He was later found to be liable
for their deaths in civil suit.And look Jeff Carr Lockdown Reds podcast joining

(01:48:35):
me here. How you're a littleyounger than I am, aren't you?
Slightly? Yeah? Slightly so.I've talked about this on the show already
today. There are so many thingsI don't remember. My memory is bad.
I can maybe count on one handthings that I can remember from like

(01:48:56):
pre thirteen, like specifically, Andone of those, perhaps maybe my earliest
memory I have, is sitting inmy second grade classroom as my teacher wheeled
in the old tube TV with therabbit ears on it that still had like
the snow and you had to likeadjust to find the channel to listen to

(01:49:19):
the OJ Simpson verdict in like thefall of nineteen ninety five, like one
of the very few things that youremember where you were when it went down
OJ Simpson nine to eleven. Thoseare like two things I will always remember
where I was second grade classroom nineto eleven, eighth grade history classroom,

(01:49:41):
Like I just remember where those thingswere. And here's the thing, this
is how young and dumb I wasat the time. I only knew OJ
Simpson is Nordberg from the Naked Gunseries because I had older older siblings.
My sister's six years older than me, My brother is four years older than
me. So I was watching stuffthat I shouldn't have been watching when I
was the younger kid because I wantedto hang o around them. So I
at seven, six or seven,however old was old at the time.

(01:50:04):
Uh yeah, I was a bigfan of the Naked Gun series, and
I remember thinking, man, Ihope he gets lost so they can make
a fourth movie out of this.That's how stupid I was. But later
it was my dad who told me, oh, yeah, he was a
football player when I started getting intofootball later. But yeah, do you
do you remember any of that,the trial, any of that, the
White Bronco Chase anything. I definitelyremember a lot more about Naked Gun and

(01:50:27):
his appearance on Family Guy and ohyeah, things like that. No,
yeah, I cannot say that Iremember the trial or anything like that.
I was too young. Yeah,man, Tarn do you remember any of
that? You were probably too youngas well, were you. I don't
think Terren's listening. That's fine,it it doesn't matter at the end of
the day, it does not.But the big thing is, did you

(01:50:49):
take Nick Cassianos to Homer? Becauseno, whenever things happen that are in
tragic, if the Phillies had played, I think this news broke at ten
thirty this morning. So if thePhillies were playing at ten thirty and Nick
Castianis was up to bat and theywere making the announcement over the air at
the time, that oj Simpson hadpassed, Yes, I would have immediately

(01:51:12):
logged on to my Draftking sports bookand bet on Nick Castianis to hit that
home run. Did the Phillies likeannounce it during the game? The Phillies
broadcasters like set it up, like, Oh, I got this story,
all right, We're waiting Casianis isgonna be up to the bat. Then
you tell that story. Yes,exactly, exactly, because the legend,
the legend just never dies. Ithas to it has to continue. Uh
So there you go. There areour sports headlines for the day again a

(01:51:33):
service of Kelsey Chevrolet. Log ontoo, Kelsey chev dot com. Jeff
car Locked on Red's podcast Inside theReds dot Com. Weve got a few
more minutes here doing our State ofthe Reds address here six and six after
twelve games. We both agree they'reright around where we thought they were.
It's not a perfect polished team.They're making mistakes. Defense is a liability

(01:51:56):
from time to time, but wehad a feeling that would be the case,
and hopefully the the talent will bethere where these guys are gonna develop
and they start gelling toward the endof the year. Pitching has been inconsistent.
We talked about one Hunter Green earlier. They get a bit of a
boost in the arm on Saturday withNicklodolo, who's coming back. I alway's
facing the White Sox and they areabysmal and they're also hurt, so like

(01:52:18):
three of their best players are outright now. But man, it's hard
to it's hard to know what you'regonna get out of Nicolodolo. I just
feel like if he makes it throughsix six innings, if he gives up
twenty runs and goes through six inningsand like just doesn't have any foot paint,
I think I'll consider it a winat this point. Yeah, And

(01:52:39):
I was even thinking just give mefive because I want to see him healthy.
Like this rotation, I wouldn't sayit needs him super much, but
like it is so much better withhim than it is without him. We've
seen good nick Lodolo, Like hewas their best pitcher in twenty twenty two,
and he really struggled with injuries lastyear, missed most of the season.

(01:53:00):
So when you get him back,what version of Nickelodolo do you get?
You're right, it's the right testfor him, It's the it's the
right opening opponent for him to kindof get his feet wet and get into
this season. And it was interestingthe announcement that they made, you know,
kind of in congruence with how therotation is going to shape out with
the with the rain delay and allthis other stuff. The game posting back

(01:53:25):
No Nick Martinez, Yeah, heI wonder because we've been trying to figure
this out with Nicolodohlo coming back?Does Nick Martinez move to the bullpen?
Does Andrew Abbott go to tripa A? Now, Andrew Rabbit is going to
start on Friday, But I wonderif that now means that there there could
be an interesting movie because there's nobodyelse with options other than Fernando Cruz,

(01:53:50):
Andrew Rabbit and Graham Ashcraft and HunterGreeny, you're not sending down Graham Ashcraft,
Hunter green and I think you senddown Fernando Cruz. Then you're also
looking at Ian Jebou and Sam Mallcoming back. Yeah exactly. So like,
man, are you looking at aguy like Justin Wilson who they who
they brought in maybe the you knownumbers game, Buck Farmer, Like it's

(01:54:13):
it's gonna be interesting to see becauseyou cannot unless unless there's like a phantom
I l stint, but it seemsa little early for that. I don't
know. Now have they made again, I only saw I'm assuming they already
made a roster move with TJ.Anton. Yes, yeah, they caught
up Carsonspires, which he'll he'll godown probably for Nicolodolo and then you have

(01:54:34):
Fernando Cruz probably for you and Jeebou, and then sam Mall will be the
interesting one. Yeah. And theywhen sam Mall wasn't ready, that's when
they brought in Justin Wilson. Sothat's that. That seems to me like
he might be the odd guy outthere. Uh, you trade one lefty
for another. But you know,again, we'll we'll see. I like
Justin Wilson. I think he's agood depth signing. But it also just

(01:54:56):
shows the depth of the bullpen aswell. U real quick before you saw
there was a question that you hadfor me that you wanted to ask,
but real quick, scale of oneto ten, How concerned are you with
alexis Dish zero point five? Okay, I'm not concerned all right, because
it feels like everybody who it's eitheryou're on that side of the spectrum or

(01:55:18):
you are like ten point eight,like all the crap, Let's send him
down, let's let's get him onthe eye. Hell, let's figure something
out. He is the quintessential closer. He's got a power fastball, power
slider, doesn't always command it verywell. Like really, that's that is
the profile of a good relief picture, is that there's gonna be some days
that you're a little bit annoyed withhim, like the the whole coming in

(01:55:41):
and walking guys and stuff like that. But yeah, he likes to do
with Francisco Cordero routine. Yeah,the Coco. I go through all these
different Edie Guardado, oh every dayEddie, Yeah, all these different guys.
Like it's it's like you can't notmake it interesting whenever you come out
of the whullpen. And that's kindof know how he pitches. But at
the end of the day, Ibelieve that he is the best option out

(01:56:03):
of the pen that the Reds havenow, depending on who he's throwing to
on a given basis. Is somethingthat you have taken a key eye on.
Yeah, And this is something that'sintrigued to me a bit because I
don't think there's a controversy, andI think that, you know, we're
just trying to wade out Stevenson.He's got to you know, he's hitting
two fifty. It's all singles rightnow. His slugging percentage is low,

(01:56:25):
but I'm still seeing a lot ofstuff that he's still hitting the ball on
the ground a lot and all thisother thing. Then you've got the way
that the Reds manage him and theway that the Reds managed Luke Maylee.
Is there a catcher controversy in Cincinnati. I'm not ready to say it.
After twelve games. I think,you know, if you can take it
easy with with him, Luke Maylee'sa serviceable catcher. He's a good number

(01:56:46):
two catcher. I don't think he'sa he's a starter. I think he
can swing it a little bit.I think he can work with some young
pitchers. I think he's he's justfine. But maybe it's an it's an
endurance thing. Maybe you're just tryingto limit, you know, early on
in the season and see see reallyhow healthy he is, because he hasn't
been healthy for a while. Jeff, I appreciate it. Working people fund

(01:57:09):
your stuff. You can find meon Twitter at Jeff car with three f's,
and you can find the Lockdown Redspodcast everywhere you get your podcasts,
including the iHeartRadio app, and goto si dot com slash MLB slash reds
for my written content. I appreciateeverybody joining me here today. Rick Uchino
in from Moegger. You can followme on Twitter, by the way,
at Rick Uchino r I c kU c c h I n oh.

(01:57:30):
Moe is back tomorrow thanks to terrorand Bland. It's been a blast.
I don't get to do this veryoften. Hopefully they invite me back.
ESPN fifteen thirty. They're modern dayconartists and they're