Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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Now you've found Cincinnati's ESPN fifteen thirty.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
All right, it's five oh five. This is ESPN fifteen thirty.
Good afternoon, al Moeger. Thank you so much for listening today.
It's going to be a fun night tonight at GAVP
Reds and Yankees, with Chase Burns making his big league debut.
After a dominant series of stops at Dayton, certainly Chattanooga,
and briefly at Louisville, he is set to take the
(00:33):
hill tonight. Red's looking for a third straight win. This
is going to be a lot of fun. Less than
a year after he was drafted by the Reds and
last year's draft out of Wake Forest, I knew yesterday
morning because I'm sitting down, and I knew we were
going to talk about Chase Burns, and I knew Jonathan
Mayo would have something and lo and Behold wrote a
terrific piece about what to expect from Chase Burns and
(00:55):
really kind of dives into some of the changes he
has made and the improvements he has made from last
year when he was awesome at Wake Forest and taken
by the Red second overall, to what he has done
so far on a series of minor league mounds, and
what we could expect tonight, go read that at MLB
dot com. I've put a link to that on social media.
And by the way, Jonathan also the author of one
(01:16):
of my favorite recent baseball books, Smart, Wrong, and Lucky,
which is an outstanding read and awesome in its own
right for the Joey Vado chapters, So a great summertime read.
Jonathan kind enough during what I'm sure is a busy
time of year for him as the draft gets closer
to give us a few minutes to talk Chase Burns.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
It's good to have you as always, sir.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
How are you happy, Chase Burning Dave.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I'm stoked, and I would imagine you are not going
to temper my excitement.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
I'm not in the slightest not. I am very excited.
I think that. I mean, we were just talking about
this earlier, and it's rare that it's weird to say
this about a guy was the number two pick in
the draft. But Chase Burns is much better, much more
quickly than I would have anticipated.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
So go back a year, because when he was taken
number two overall, I think for a lot of folks
that was pretty surprising. But even those who said it's
maybe not the guy that I thought the Reds were
going to take, he at least represents somebody who has
perhaps the best chance to get to the big leagues
more quickly than anybody else. So I would imagine for
(02:25):
you it's not that surprising that he's going to be
on a big league mount tonight.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Yeah. I mean I think that you know, he was
one of the best orange in the class. There is
the slight pause about some of the staff bof quality.
I'm trying to talk about that, and I wrote a
lot about that in my piece. That kept him from
being considered a top top of the draft trended guy.
(02:51):
It was a little bit of a surprise that he win, too,
But it's not like the Reds reached for a guy
who was like, you know, twenty fourth on list. You know,
we can get a six, and he got the sense
that he would probably move relatively quickly, but you need
to see how it would play on the pro game.
(03:12):
And I think the second actually saw him throw in
spring training and then you know, he hit the ground
running with Dayton. Got the sense that it was going
to be a fairly accelerated timetable and that was just
a question of when and not ask you it gets
per Cincon out of this year.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
So what has he been able to harness without giving
away the content that you put on MLB dot com,
what has he been able to harness since he was
drafted that has allowed him to get through the system
as quickly as he has.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
You know, the stuff has always been good. He could
have gotten big new gears out with the slider right
out of college, and so he comes in with one
of the best breaking balls, tied the best slider in
the minor leagues today, So that's already his back time.
He's got a fastball that hits one hundred miles an
hour routinely, and he maintained the velocity. The thing that
(04:07):
was interesting about the fastball is that it got hit,
especially by left handed hitters in college, not a lot
of discssion. It was a little straight. There doesn't seem
to be that much different in terms of the life
on the fastball. The biggest thing I think it's supports
this change up. It's not throwing it that much more.
He's just executing it better and no one is hitting it,
(04:29):
and he's only throwing it to left handed hitters. But
that was the big issue. The change up was hit
by lefties when he was at Lake Forest last year,
so it wasn't keeping them off the fastball. Now that
he's throwing a better change up and it's always had
good stay to it, it's crazy. Mone He throws this
change at ninety miles an hour, which is the bunkers,
(04:52):
but it's got enough faith and there's enough separation from
a fastball that averages over ninety seven miles an hour
and the works, and Matt left handed hitters off of
his fastball enough where they're not squaring it up and
they just have not been hitting at the numbers. Has
been very, very good against left handed hitters as a
(05:13):
result of that.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Well, what was your take on their plan with him
and acknowledging The draft is later now than it used
to be, so maybe this is more commonplace. But they
take him number two overall and then they send them
to the Arizona Complex. He doesn't pitch in games, doesn't
make his pro debut until Dayton at High A this year.
I guess there's two ways of asking this. Number One,
would you make of what they did with him? Number
(05:36):
two is what they did with him becoming more commonplace,
especially with college pitchers.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, it's pretty common across all thirty organizations. You just
typically don't see guys go out after a long column season.
You know, he threw twenty almost twenty more news than
he ever had before in any given the year, and
that was back as a freshman. He through eighty innings
(06:03):
if you seventy two Tennessee and the sophomore after he
lost his rotation spots. So some of it's monitoring workloads.
There's just no reason after being shut down for so
long to get a guy in this caliber ran back
up just to throw a handful of getting or in
his feet wet. You know, I think you could make
(06:25):
the argument on the draft was earlier if it was
a pitcher who didn't pitch deep into the College World
Series or something like that, that you maybe he'd want
to have him throw some minings or send him to
the fall league. In the Nationals with Steven Strasbourg back
in the day, but it's very rare to see college
pitchers at all but particularly not high end colege pitchers
(06:50):
pitched it off and re Lauder didn't throw a pitch
after he was drafted either. I just it's not worth it,
you know. Let him get a little work in the instructs,
give your off season program, and let him hit the
ground running in his first full season. And that's what
both of those guys did. But it certainly worked for
Chase Burns. And I really like how they kind of
stretched him out, you know, the courses this year. You know,
(07:14):
his first couple of starts in Dayton was pitching once
a week sort of college schedule. Then they kept slowly
sort of shortening up the time in the team while
amping up the pitch counts. They were kind of hoping
to get him to ninety pitches. That he's been too efficient.
I think he hears from eighty eight in the seven
in the game and the plaster f part and his
last starting double A through eighty pitches through sevenes. So
(07:38):
it's a good problem to have. But if he steps
out now it to go deep. The stuff holds up.
There's a ton of strikes, you know, and and he's
met ulpa monitor is workload for the rest of the year. Suing.
He stayed in the big leagues, and I don't think
here going to see him throw nine innings or one
hundred and thirty pitches at any point of time. But
you know, he's already up to a good amount of
(08:00):
total pitches. I think he's at sixty six pitches, So
he's got that far off from what his career high
has been and will be mindful of that.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Jonathan Mayo with us to talk Chase Burns MLB dot com.
The numbers at all three stops, in particular Chattanooga are
beyond impressive. When we've had a chance to watch highlights
of them. The stuff certainly looks like it translates to
the big league level. Is there a concern and if
there is, what is it?
Speaker 2 (08:27):
I have no concerns. I can't think of one. Well,
I usually err on the side of caution because the
old pictures, we'll hit some bumps. But you know, I
won't say he had any bad starts, but once or
twice where he struggled a little bit, he would invariably
come back the next start, and it made adjustments. It's
(08:49):
just it's just such an exciting combination of stuff and command,
which he has always had. He's always thrown a ton
of strikes. Stuff come in and athleticism that it just
like I said, I think the only surprise is that
it quit this this quickly, you know, and it was
(09:13):
shocking because it was all there. I just thought maybe
would take them a little while mate the fast wall
to get hit and we'd have to adjust the kind
of thing, you know. It was a similar criticism for
a Hunter Green that took him a while to adjust
to and figure out. But because I think because Burns
is a better strike thrower and had a larger arrange
(09:35):
now pitches, it helped them to pitch off that fastball
much more effectively.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Ret Louder in twenty twenty three and we had a
chance to watch him late last season. Unfortunately, we haven't
had a chance to watch him this year because he's
dealt with injuries. Chase Burns tonight, wake Forest has produced
a ton of players. What are they doing with pitchers
that other colleges apparently are.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Well, you know there are there that the young man
from LSU pitching for Pittsburgh right now is pretty good.
That's for those of them where he went to Scotts
and they have, uh, they have a potential number one
pick this year in Kane Anderson. For those who watched
the College World Series, that what I'm talking about. Lake
(10:18):
Forrest has a pitching lab. A lot of teams have
some semblance of one. There's been really good where they
just dig into the data and pitch shape and all
that kind of stuff, and it's, uh, you know, a
little a little bit of witch doctor. You know, he
should trying to talk to Chase about it. Uh, he's
(10:40):
the first to admit that kind of out there. But
they really find ways from these guys that success. And
I mean, uh, the big reason why Burns moved from
Tennessee to Wake Forest. I mean he missed out of
winning a national championship. You know, he lost his rotations.
Bottom kind of seen does good stuff with pitchers as well,
(11:02):
but he wanted the opportunity to take the stuff he
had and kind of throw it into their man scientist
popper and pitching a lot and seeing what came out.
And it felt like he's come out with the fast
leave of sudden. They had a ton more scanner life
or ride or anything like that. But I think he
came out of it with a better understanding of how
to use what he has, and he has you know,
(11:22):
his plenty. It might end up being three plus pitchers
were all of a sudden done.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
Uh while I have you and I know you're getting
ready for the draft here in just a couple of weeks,
the Reds picked ninth overall.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
Is this a good year to have the ninth overall pick?
Speaker 2 (11:38):
You know, it's not. It's not the best draft in
the world. Last year was better and up top it's
I think they're in a good position because there is
a I think there's a set eight or nine guys
and they can kind of wait to see who might
drop to this, you know, and there's someone up a
(11:58):
London cut a deal and uh, you know, and one
of the top top guys off down there. They're ready
to swoop. They're not afraid to take anybody. So it
could be a good year to pick nine because they
can wait to see who's there. They're not afraid to
take say high school right hand and like Seth Fernandez,
(12:21):
who you know. I've had the Reds take a time
or two book books and counsel and I have in
armock drafts. I'm working on new Moock right now, and
it might end up that way again, so that would
be you. And he's the best high school pitcher and
probably now continued the second best pitcher in the entire
draft class. So to get a guy like that at nine,
(12:43):
because there are not a lot of teams that well
the dice in a high school, right and that high
that could work out well for them.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
Awesome stuff.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
I know you're you're busy preparing for the draft, but
I wanted your take on Chase Burns.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
I appreciate you doing this, man, Thanks so much.
Speaker 2 (12:59):
That's pleasure.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
Bout what you got it.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
That's Jonathan Mayo, Mlbpipeline, MLB dot com. I tweeted out
a link to his piece, what do you expect from
Chase Burns? He makes his big league debut in less
than two hours Reds and Yankees at GABP eighteen minutes
after five o'clock. I'm Oeger. This is ESPN fifteen thirty.
It is the michelob Ultra five o'clock happy hour. When
(13:21):
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maybe from home, enjoying ice cold mic Ultra Superior Taste
Superior Light Beer five point three seven four nine fifteen
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Speaker 1 (14:02):
Seventy five southbound Hoppole to the Brent Spence Bridge about
a fifteen minute delay.
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Seventy one south MLKA too for seventy one is an
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We do have Columbia Parkway between seventy one and four
seventy one with the roadway shutdown again.
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Could be the vice presidential motorcade moving.
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Through the area, so again plan on slowdowns and Columbia
Parkway at Delta A crash.
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My Rick Shrimp with traffic this report