Dodgers Territory - Catching Up with Will Smith! Smitty Talks Roki Sasaki, ABS, and More

Episode Date: June 1, 2026

Three-time World Series champion catcher Will Smith joins Alanna Rizzo, Katie Woo, and Clint Pasillas on this edition of Dodgers Territory!  (00:31) "America's Catcher" shares his assessment of the Dodgers' season so far, Roki Sasaki's growth and increased fastball velocity on the mound (1:30), and shares his thoughts on the ABS challenge system (5:07). He also recalls how he felt following Game 3 of the World Series after catching all 18 innings, talks Clayton Kershaw taking in a game in the stands and much more! Be sure to check out Will and Cara Smith's charity "Catching Hope"https://www.catching-hope.org/ (17:48) Alanna, Katie, and Clint look back on a successful month of May. Are the Dodgers hitting their stride? Clint shares his thoughts.  (20:18) Katie shares her insight on Justin Wrobleski and how he judges his growth as a starting pitcher. (25:30) Andy Pages was HIM for the Dodgers in May. 🌶️ Plus a look ahead to the 4 game series with the Diamondbacks. Subscribe to the podcast!https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dodgers-territory/id1737867013https://open.spotify.com/show/6DeDDNG60w1hfnNa5N9oTH Follow our social media channels for more content!https://x.com/LADTerritory https://www.instagram.com/ladterritory/ https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61578546105253  Check out DT merch at https://dodgersterritoryshop.com Support Guidry's Guardian at https://guidrysguardian.org Find Clint on YouTube at https://youtube.com/@alldodgers Follow Katie's work at The Athletic https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/author/katie-woo/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Hello, everybody, and welcome to a brand new episode of Dodgers Territory. We are live for the next 30, 40 minutes. My name's Alana Rizzo. That, of course, is Katie Wu, catcher at The Athletic. Make sure you're reading all of her stuff. And, of course, Clint Paseas. We're going to skip all the pleasantries, guys, because we have a great guest on the show today. We are so excited to welcome three-time World Series champion, three-time National League All-Star, an ABS wizard.

Will Smith joining the program. Will, great to see you. Happy that you are kind enough to take a few minutes to be with us. All right, so two months into the season, how would you assess it so far? What grade would you give your squad? I think we've been decent. I don't think we've been playing our best baseball for two months. We've had our ups and downs, had some good games, obviously.

You know, guys are going out there doing their thing, and we're seeing great things. But, yeah, I still think there's room for improvement like there is every year with guys. You know, but it's a long year. I think we're in a good spot right now. Yeah, winners of 14 of your last 17, I believe, and then a pretty big series between the D-backs. They just got swept by the Mariners four-game set.

But they've been playing some good baseball as well. I thought so the one of the guy that we're not going to see this series on the mound is Roki Sasaki, but we saw his best fastball on Saturday against the Phillies. You were behind the plate. Roki's been a work in progress, and we know this. What did you see from Roki lately, especially with the fastball Velo that has you encouraged about it? Yeah, he continues, you know, to work really hard on his, on his days in between starts. He's getting a lot better.

I mean, he's also gaining some confidence. The more he goes out there and the more success he has. But yeah, I mean, as far as this fastball, I think he's just putting in better spots. He's more convicted with it. I'm sure he's cleaned up some mechanics things to get the VLO a little bit back up to where, you know, we're all hyped to see him when he came from Japan. His slider's going along great. His splitter has been really good. You know, he's just attacking guys and, you know, letting this stuff work.

He's been really good at the last few starts. A guy who was really good over the weekend for you guys, particularly was it yesterday. Ryan Ward hits his first career home run. I'm a big Wardo guy. I've had him on my show in the past. Love that guy. Happy he's getting an opportunity here. I know how it goes in those clubhouses,

obviously being a former ball player that I am not. What kind of crap do you guys give Ryan Ward there after he hits his first home run? Is it a lot of champagne, beer, throwing the soap at him, throwing him in the laundry cart? How did that go? Yeah, a little beer shower. There might be a few other things mixed in. It's getting a little out of hand. But yeah, no, we're all excited for him.

You know, he's, he's been through a long road. So we were just excited to, you know, enjoy that moment for him yesterday. I want to ask you kind of the same question, Will, about Justin Robleski. He's kind of come into his own as well, too, just really the maturation process that I've seen over the course of time that he's taken the ball. What have you noticed about his development in particular? Yeah, he's been, he's, he's having one heck of a year. You know, I think he's just, he's just, uh, just, just.

really dialing in his pitches. You know, he's really convicted in what he's doing. He's always has been ever since he got called up. But I think, you know, he's got a really good feel of, of the strike zone and you know, how to get the ball in and out to lefties and righties. And slider's been really good. You know, we're mixing in some curveballs, some changeups.

We just mixed the speeds, you know, staying off the barrels and just, just pitching really well. So, well, Dodgers territory is a pro Dodgers reliever show. We were a little apprehensive when Edwin Diaz went out And we were like, who's going to come out on the scene? Clint's been a big Kyle Hurt guy. He's been on Kyle Hurt since the beginning. We're all on the bandwagon now.

But as you look at your bullpen and you see a bunch of these names come in, you just had that scoreless streak in May, 38 Indians, I believe. Who has stood out to you that maybe you weren't expecting or weren't, I don't know, totally familiar with their stuff, some of the young guys that have really helped solidify this bullpen in May? Yeah, I mean, I feel like, you know, Kyle Hurt's been awesome, obviously. And Garter has been really good. I think he's still got a lot of room for improvement.

I think, you know, this guy's the ceiling for him. You got, you know, you got Vesia. He's kind of anchoring the bullpen right now, trying in as well, a veteran guy, leaving the guys. Tanner Scott's been phenomenal this whole year. Probably missing a few guys. But they've been really good. You know, they step up when their name's called.

Obviously, Will Klein's been really good as well. He's been getting the ball in some leverage situations, eating up some innings. But yeah, I think, you know, they're just, they're just really attacking hitters. You know, they're really confident right now. So that's, you know, my job, Dalton's job, to keep them going. You know, they got a catcher usually behind the plate, whether it's you or whether it's Dalton who are helping out with the challenge system and all that.

You're a couple months into ABS and the challenges. How has your opinion about it changed at all? Because I don't think it was in the minor leagues when you were down there way back when. How's your opinion kind of evolved? over a couple of months of having a challenge on it. Because you're good at it. The numbers tell you you're pretty good at it. Yeah, I like it.

I think it's good. I think the umpires are having to kind of step up their game to bring their head game every night because they can get challenged any single pitch and shown on the big board. But I also think, you know, we're all on the same page now, what the strike zone is the ABS zone.

You know, there is always some gray area what was on TV, what, you know, the umpires were getting judged on and then probably a third or four. with the report that was coming out. What's a strike? What's the ball? So I think it's good. We're all on the same page. Obviously, it's nice if you're hitting and you get a challenge or catching and you get a sway of count with the pitch. So I think it's good overall. I don't think it's a perfect system yet, but it's been pretty good so far. Well, there's some folks on different teams that are not allowed to use ABS. They're not allowed to tap their head because their managers have said, nope, you don't get that privilege. What is your mental checklist that you need to know? when you're going to go ahead and challenge. Is it, you know, a certain amount of outs in the inning?

Is it when runners are in scoring position? If it's early, late in the game, what do you go through to determine if you're going to say, hey, I need to, I need to check that. Yeah, I mean, obviously the ones that are for sure, you know, strikes that they miss, you're going to challenge that. I mean, even then you're, I'm usually pretty confident when I do it. And sometimes I'm still wrong. So it's, you know, bigger situations, you know,

men, scoring position, obviously, you know, two, three ball counts as well. Yeah, I think there's some pitches that are, there are borderline that you can flip a coin, but you might be in favor of with certain pitchers. But yeah, just kind of feeling situation out, feeling, you know, sometimes the pitcher might need a strike. They're kind of struggling and there might be a time to try to get them back in the zone

by getting it called, you know, reversed. So it's just a lot of thought. It's a lot of reactionary, but just well thought out kind of. pre i guess we were i think one a bs challenge shy of the record yesterday nine against home plate empire sean barber so that that added to the three plus hour game on getaway day that i'm sure everybody loved but don't rushing had a nice first inning two successful challenges got two punchouts for yoshinobu yamamoto and cameras captured dave roberts hyped celebrating dalton in the dugout it's been a work in progress for him dalton's also been kind of in the limelight a lot as you guys know

the first couple months of the season, but you guys work so closely together. What have you seen from Dalton's growth, especially this season? Yeah, he, you know, he works, he works so hard. He's always, you know, catching out the machine, working with the catching coaches. He's always in the batting cage, you know, swinging, working on swing, trying to stay ready. It's a hard job, not playing every day, but trying to keep timing. But, you know, he's a competitor. He's going out there with fire. He's going out there trying to win a ballgame and try to, you know, be the best catcher back there for our pitchers that he can. But yeah, it's the big leads.

Everything's a learning process from just anything and everything. So he's he's been doing all right. He's been doing good. You know, we're lucky to have him. You know, we haven't brought up. Of course, we talked to you at spring training. We talked about the World Series then. Haven't brought up the World Series yet.

Congrats three-time World Series champion. You're running out of space on that hand for rings. But you had to work your ass off. during that World Series, man. Who do you think was more worn down? Or what do you think was more worn down? Your legs or Yama's right arm? Because you guys put a lot of it.

Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I was that 18-in-a-game took everything out of me. I was kind of struggling after that. But, yeah, what Yoshi did was incredible. You know, I still go out there, get out. You know, I just got to just squat back there and catch the ball. He's got to actually make pitches, change speeds, you know,

still throw the ball hard. It was incredible what he did. And yeah, it was the soreness for a few weeks after it was a lot more enjoyable with the win instead of, you know, a lot. It's still weird for me, Will, to see Clayton Kershaw in the stands enjoying a baseball game as a fan with two of his kids. What's it like for you guys to see Kersh on the other side of things? Obviously, there he is enjoying life with Brad Paisley, Lon Rosen behind them there in the owner's seats. It's just weird, but good for you. him he went out on top the way he wanted to what's it been like for you guys in that clubhouse

yes you know it's definitely you know presence is missing um he was he was he was special you know obviously on the field but also as teammate um keeping things light in the clubhouse each and every day as the season goes goes along but uh yeah the other day i didn't really know he was going to be there and then went on deck my first second abast saw him said hi um yeah i didn't really get to talk too much but uh he was enjoying it he was kind of you know he came by the dug out said some words at some points. But yeah, it was good to see him just enjoying the game. Chiron us on. Hey, I got a quick follow on that one. I mean, obviously, Kirsch is the mastermind behind

shirtless Sundays. Those still living on there in the clubhouse or we retired that? Yeah, they're still going on. Yep, for sure. Thank. That's awesome. Katie, what are you got for? Let's, you know, the real journalism that we need to know is always here on Dodgers territory. Well, we're both here in Arizona. It's hot outside. It's June. I feel like we were on the road for all of May. Maybe it was that three city trip. But I'm always curious to know, what's your favorite road city and what's your ideal off day on the road look like? Are you a golfer?

Are you, like, going to just chill inside? What's it like for you? Yeah, no, I'm definitely going to probably be on the golf course if my family's not there. But yeah, favorite road city? I always like going to New York, you know, just good restaurants. There's always stuff to do. There's good golf courses around. New York's fun.

Chicago is great as well. San Diego is always nice. Just, you know, perfect weather. You've got the beach. Good golf as well. Families usually in San Diego, which is nice. Yeah, there's definitely some good spots. Arizona's nice.

Get to go home and enjoy that. Okay. Flipside. Least favorite road city. I came from the NL Central, so I have some do these. Oh, man. Least favorite? I don't know.

I don't know. Some of like most people's least favorite have like some really good golf courses. Okay. See, there's a silver lining everywhere we go. I like going to Pittsburgh. They have great golf courses there. But most guys that aren't golfers probably wouldn't enjoy it. Same with St. Louis.

Some good golf courses there. Where else? Where else? I don't know. I don't like hate going, you know, anywhere, honestly. I'm just happy to be here. Are we all? That's exactly what.

That's exactly what you want to hear. So the other day, a couple months ago, we had Brad Paisley on the show. Obviously, you know he's a massive Dodgers fan. But we were talking about Netflix as a joke. And obviously this year, Ken Ken Young was on with you guys. Cedric and the entertainer has been doing it before. Obviously, this is all for your foundation and stuff. But Brad said that you're not funny.

Is there something? I mean, he was obviously joking. Okay. I don't want to start a war. But he was like, really? He did that. And he's like, I'll go on that show with Will. I'll go do something.

with him and he was joking that you're not funny. So I just wanted to throw that out there. What's that been like for you? Because you're funny, your personality is just kind of like an even keeled dude, right? What you need to be as a catcher, just an even killed guy. How did you get involved in the comedic scene

with this program? Yeah, so we obviously wanted to do a fundraiser for our foundation. And Netflix actually reached out to us. And we just kind of jumped on it. We generally know what we were getting ourselves into. But obviously a big company like Netflix, you know, they're going to do a good job and help us out a lot. So, yeah, we've done three of them now.

We get, you know, great comedians, A-list comedians, which is awesome. And it's just a fun night. The guys love coming out with their wives. It's like a little date night for them. We get a lot of people there that come and support us and donate. We're able to, you know, raise a lot of money, which is fun. But, yeah, I'm not getting up on stage. doing any comedy any comedy he's got a tight five it's a tight five good sorry

we will leave key k out of this because he's the easy answer but who is the funniest guy in the clubhouse uh i'm gonna go with miggy you know i think he's great on the micke's always keeping it like he's always joking around um so i'll go with that one i see it i see it micky's good micky's good He's one of those guys. We've had some people on the show here, some of your teammates who talk about the importance. We've probably talked to you about him in the past, the importance of Miguel Rojas being a unifier in that clubhouse. How has he kind of been, you know, it feels like he's a little wishy-washy on whether or not is this going to be his last year or not? How has he been this year in terms of, you know, bringing together a different group?

A lot of you guys are obviously the same, one, two titles in a row. But every year's different. Every clubhouse is just a little bit different. bringing in people like Kyle Tucker, different guys in the bullpen. How has Miggy evolved in becoming a leader? And of course, eventually a manager somewhere in the big leagues, probably the second he hangs up those spikes. Yeah, he's great.

You know, he's the same guy every day. You know, he's consistent. You know, he's competitive. Even when he's not playing, he's competitive. He's trying to, you know, help us win a ballgame. He's great with, you know, he sees something he's going to tell somebody, you know, they should have done this. that in that situation, a great job, nice play. You know, he's just always watching. He's always

paying attention. He's making sure, you know, guys are doing what they need to do and doing it the right way and, you know, playing good baseball and just kind of holding everybody accountable. And then off the field and stuff like that, he's just, he's fun to be around. You know, he shows up to everything. You know, he keeps everything fun and it's just a great guy you want, you want on your team, you know, helping lead you along. Before we let you go, how many times do you replay the game-winning home run in your mind? I would have it on repeat in my house, like a ticker everywhere. Just watching it. How many times do you relive it?

Not that often, honestly. You know, I think back to it all the time. But, yeah, I'm not, I'm not like rewatching it a ton or anything like that. I remember when Kirch won the first one in 2020, he would, he continued to play, We Are the Champions by Queen, like out his door in Texas. Like he just kept reliving it. And then, of course, he has two more after that. Well, you are a three-time World Series champion.

You are so good behind the plate. Managing a game, obviously, you can hit a little bit too. Congratulations to you and your beautiful wife, Kara, on baby number three on the way. And best of luck against the Diamondbacks and the remainder of this season, we appreciate you very much. Yeah, thanks guys. Thanks for having me on. That's America's catcher. Bill Smith.

Love that, dude. Love that, dude. Appreciate him very much. coming on. We love having players. We really do. So thank you, Will, for coming on. And thank you, Katie, for arranging that with Juan Dorado of the Dodgers PR staff. All right, let's take a look at the store. I want to tell people about the store. Yeah, let's do the store really quick. So guys, we're still working on getting this updated. We appreciate you for your patience. But scan that QR code or just go to Dodgers Territory Shop.com. That's where you'll find all of the goods,

beanies, t-shirts, golf. Will Smith likes to golf. He could take some Dodgers territory stuff out on the course with them. By the way, Pittsburgh, sneaky great city. I love going to Pittsburgh. Yeah, so go to Dodgers Territory.com and check it out. It supports us, supports the show, and it certainly supports the Fowel Territory Network. All right. Next, we're talking about the month of May. It is time for mound visit. Pride is like love. You feel it in your heart. IR radio. Canada's number one streaming app for radio and podcasts, including IHart Pride Canada, your favorite hits, and must have party bangers, plus personalized and curated playlists,

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Nope, it's podcast time. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked. questions. Hey Jonas is available now and their first guest is a big one. Paul Rudd. You know, Steve Carell is a great singer. Can you tell you not to audition to the office or something? I told him. Whoa. We were filming Anchor Man. Clearly

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There's four months. It's up there. I always appreciate Tommy here. I just never gets old. All right. So Dodgers in the month of May, taking two of three from the Phillies. Katie, what was your overall opinion on the Phillies series? I thought it was a pretty competitive series,

and the Dodgers ultimately did what they needed to do. I thought it was notable that all three starters had an uptick in fastball below. We talked about a little bit with Will with Rokie Sasaki, Justin Robleski, Mr. Oh, I don't have any swing and miss. Just kidding, nine punchouts all on the heater with his best fastball velo of the season. We wrote about it on The Athletic Today. Shameless plug. Go check it out.

And then Yamamoto came out, and I don't think he was thrilled with his command, but still any time that you can walk away on the rubber match and get the win, especially over the Phillies, who I know the start of their season wasn't the best, but are certainly playing much better baseball. It was, again, good teams win series. The Dodgers have done a lot of that.

I don't want to make too much of the loss. Tanner Scott had been stellar. He's allowed to throw one bad pitch in May. he had up until the eighth inning on Saturday, had not allowed an earn run since April 24th. So let's all calm down about Tanner Scott. He's been lights out for the Dodgers so far this year. Yeah, the Tanner Scott thing.

I'm curious, Alana, we've talked about this kind of stuff before. We saw the vitriol shared amongst the awfulness that can be the internet sometimes. Just quick thoughts and maybe a PSA to people from our elder statesman here the great Alana Rizzo, I'm not calling her old. I'm saying she's wise and she's dealt with a lot of shit online. Like, tell people just to chill that out. Just stop doing it. Stop being cruel and insensitive to players' families. I mean, I think any player can take you talking negatively about their performance, but when it crosses the line and you start talking about players' families

and wanting to make sure that their five-year-old doesn't even see their fifth birthday, that he wakes up in his dad's blood, that there are, you know, death threats to your wife and your children and your parents and that you know where these people live and all. It's a baseball game. It's a baseball game and get over yourself. And again, these people are players or excuse me, they're people before they're players.

And anybody that thinks it's okay to be a keyboard warrior where you're likely sitting in your mom's basement and to be, think that that's okay to attack the players You're not a fan. You're an asshole and knock it off. Like, just stop. Yeah. All right.

Let's get back on track into positive things. I want to talk just a hair about Roki Sasaki and the pitching over the weekend. I mean, Yamamoto's great. He's always great. Roki Sasaki, we're continuing to see that evolution there as a four pitch pitcher. The fastball is getting better and all that kind of stuff. But Katie, we needed to also see something with Justin Rebleski in his Friday start. And we did, and you wrote a column about it as well.

The evolution kind of we've seen with Robo in this first year as a starter. Tell us more about your findings with Rebleski. Yeah, I think the Dodgers even dating back to spring training had said, we believe in Rebleski's long-term outlook as a starter, but they just weren't sure what their rotation was going to look like. They ended up sticking with the six-man to start the year, obviously still doing it, and Justin Reblesky had an opportunity, and he seized it. And the way that he did it was so interesting.

I sat down with him in San Diego a couple weeks ago, where he detailed his whole self-evaluation model. You can't find it on baseball savant. You can't find it on fan graphs. You can only find it inside Robleski's mind. He has an Excel sheet where he essentially assigns values to each of his performances based on a number system he's created in his head.

He doesn't share it with the front office. He's not gonna share it with fans, obviously. It's just for him. And it's allowed him to kind of break down each outing and qualify what is important going forward, what he did well and what he needs to do better. He talked a lot about swing and miss. We talked a lot about swing and miss because there were virtually wasn't any in April.

He had one of the lowest whiff rates in all of baseball. And we said, is this sustainable? Obviously, the numbers on paper looked fantastic, but there is such a push for whiff rate, chase, swing and miss throughout the game. And it's a big question, could he continue with these numbers without the strikeout? And we saw him get hit a little bit. Every pitcher that relies on pitch to contact, soft contact, runs the risk of bad luck and Babbeth. We've seen it. And we saw him get hit a little harder. But to his credit, and this is what

I think makes Justin Rubusky a special pitcher, he doesn't change how he approaches each lineup, no matter the game plan. We saw him unlock the swing and miss and the velo against the Phillies. Those things are obviously interchangeable. But whether he has the fastball velo and whether he's pitching for the strikeout or whether he's pitching for quick contact, quick outs, it's the same way. He's tenacious in the zone. He's aggressive. All he wants to do establish an 0-1 or a one-two count. and get hitters to a place where they feel uncomfortable. And he's going to do that by attacking the zone, hammering the strike zone.

We've seen it, have we seen him do it all year? And when I was talking to Justin about how he continues that kind of mindset, he goes, it's just very easy. It's what I do. There's a time in place for swing and miss. There's a time in place for the quick contact. It was really fascinating to see how his mind kind of evaluated these things in real time,

and then how he charts his own analysis with his evaluation model. It's very unique. Haven't heard of a lot of guys doing that. Katie, that's fantastic stuff. And great insight on what makes Justin Robleski tick. And make sure you read about it. Katie's article, of course, in The Athletic. That's her real job, by the way.

I hear she's a catcher there. Yeah, ooh. Are you catching straight? No, no, that's not what he meant. No, no, usually. At the top of the show. Sorry, go ahead. Overall, month of May, Clint, it was a good month.

I mean, 18 and 10, despite losing seven of their first 11th, So I'm going to take that as a positive as a nice rebound. Yeah. Turns out all of those shows we had to do, those therapy sessions we had to do for fans, for us, really, were unwarranted early in the month of May. The Dodgers weren't the worst team in baseball. They weren't going to be a terrible ball club. It just turns out over the course of 162 games, there are highs, there are lows, there are injuries you have to deal with. And there's also a team trying to find its identity.

You know, I've never won a World Series, let alone back-to-back World Series. But I imagine, as one of the things we were talking about, or I mentioned with Will, you know, the clubhouse changes and evolves. And you guys have seen it as well being in those clubhouses as you have been over the years. A team has to find its identity along the way coming off of whether or not you win a World Series, coming off of the previous season. And my opinion of this, the 2026 Dodgers found their identity in May. And yeah, it's not the final version of what the identity is going to look like because you are going to get back. Kike full time. You're going to have Teo back.

You're going to have Blake Snell, Tyler, Clas now. Both those guys missed the entire month of May. But you always feel like you're escaping that previous iteration of a team early in the season. I think they found it. And I think they're pretty locked in now into the dudes they are now. Yeah, I think also, you know, we forget sometimes how long this season. is and you mentioned the identity that was found. Sometimes it takes a bit of a groove. And not to mention, we've had some pretty key injuries to some pretty key people. You know, obviously Blake Snell is still

not back. Tyler Glass now is on the aisle. Edwin Diaz is, you know, that was a huge blow. But to Katie's point, the bullpen, they have been the bullpen docks and they have had guys that have stepped up. So we've done a lot of good without some of the key pieces. Rokey's coming into his own, Robo's coming into his own, all of the things. So the best offensive player in May, we're telling you with today's fan duel daily dinger. All right. Now a team with Sho Hayatani on the roster. You'd assume he was the offensive leader

just about every month. But for the Dodgers, guys, it was actually Andy Paez, eight home runs, 15 extra bases overall, an 8.79 OPS, 25 runs batted in. Andy Paez leads all of baseball. I never thought I would say this. Leads all of baseball with 50 RBI this season. Katie, he is.

is the straw that stirs the Dodgers drink? Well, now I want a margarita at 12thirty on a Monday, but that's fine. I think Andy Paa is outside of Shohei Otani, because Shohei's always going to be Shohei, has been the most important Dodger because of what he's done for this offense. And also the fact that he's shown he can be their next star. Again, we've said this before on the show. If Andy Paw has played for any other team, he'd be the face of the franchise based on these numbers and the production. He's an elite center fielder now based on metrics. And you're seeing him come into

his own on both sides of the ball. He's been so fun to watch. And as we go through the top of the lineup, guys like Muki Betts, Kyle Tucker, not feeling their best. Show Hay has looked a little better, but still not show hay numbers offensively. Having Andy Pa, Andy Pa is sliding up in the top of the lineup and then into the two hole, which is often reserved for your best overall hitter, especially when Dave Roberts was a little, rightfully, hesitant to do that earlier in the year and seen him thrive in that spot. Andy Paa has looks like a surefire all-star to me. He's been, I think, the most fun Dodger to watch in term of consistent production throughout the first two months of the season. Really excited to see what he can do with a full season of work. I know the last year or the

last month of last season, he hit that slide. Now, it's really important for him to bounce back and show that he can produce all season long. Obviously off to a good start here. I expect him to be one of several Dodgers in the all-star discourse, which should start pretty soon. Yeah, he, this guy, Andy Paa, has his is the straw that stirs the Dodgers drink this month. I just said that. Yeah. I know. He said it because I wrote it.

So I'm saying it again. He is the most important Dodger in that lineup right now because you need somebody in the middle of that lineup to be a different run producers. Somebody that the other teams weren't really expecting in the early parts of the season. And after games six and seven, I'm not going to do the hand gesture. But after him getting bench in the World Series for him to come back, Okay, I'm going to do it. For him to come back and put together the season he has thus far and continuing to, you know, not really get into extended slumps.

Like when the league adjusts, he's making quick adjustments back. He is an incredibly hard worker going to Arizona, no reason to think that he's going to cool down. That is the reason Andy Pahez is this week's pick for our Daily Dinger. You guys know the MLB season is in full swing. FanDuel is giving you a chance to call your shot with Daily Dinger's. They are a presenting sponsor here with Dodgers territory. Joining the action is easy. Just make your free pick on who's hitting a home run in their game.

And if you're right, you'll get a profit boost to use on your next bet for a chance at extra winnings. Riz, why don't you tell them more? Yeah, it's easy. Head over to fendual.com slash podcast to get started. That's fanduel.com slash podcast to opt in for daily dingers and make your free pick on who's hitting a home or play ball and swing for the fences on FanDuel, an official partner of Major League Baseball.

And this one you are reading, by the way. Yeah, I was going to get there. No purchase necessary. Often required bonus issued as non-withdrawable profit boost tokens. Restrictions apply, including any token expiration and max wager amount. See terms at sportsbook. Fandul.com gambling problem, call, or text 1,800 gambler. Still more DT to come, but first we want to remind you, Clint, promote the members.

Let's go. Yeah. Katie, you know, don't you tell people about the members because we have a happy hour coming up. Yeah, speaking of drinking

on a Monday, come hang out with us Monday, June 8, seven days from now. You must be a member to do this, but we are super excited to host our first ever

happy hour for new members to our channel. We'll talk everything, Dodger, we'll talk whatever. If we're doing shots, I have no idea what the discourse will be. I imagine it won't be bored.

But again, you can sit with us unless you are a member to our YouTube channel. Please, please, please consider subscribing. We appreciate all of the love. All right. I'd say we'd go ahead and get to Last Licks. And we got a couple of super chats and we got a look at that Diamondback series. So here we go.

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Nope, it's podcast time. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Hey Jonas is available now and their first guest is a big one. Paul Rudd. You know, Steve Correa, is a great singer. Can you tell you not to audition at the office or something?

I told him. Whoa. We were filming Anchor Man. Clearly I was the idiot. Thank God he didn't listen to him, right? Listen to Hey Jonas on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, guys, I'm going to introduce you to her again.

This is Caroline. She needs an adopter. She is such a sweet pup. She's an itty-bitty, a little lady. She is healthy. She is happy. She is sweet. She gets along with other dogs.

She's great with kids. adults, all the things. If you were interested in adopting this little terrier mix, please reach out to giddreysgardion.org. We certainly appreciate it. And as always, we can certainly take any donations, a dollar, $100,000,

whatever you'd like to give. We appreciate it very much. All right, baseball thought for the road, guys, D-Back series preview. Katie, this is a very different Diamondbacks team than the team that the Dodgers faced in the opening series of the season. This is a team that now told me to hold their beer

when I said that the NL West was just a two team race between the Dodgers and the Padres. Seems like the Diamondbacks have something to say about that. What are you looking forward to? Yeah, I like this DeVax team. I've liked them even coming into this season. And I think when you look at just the depth of their roster, look, the Dodgers have done a obviously nice job in the NL West so far.

But I don't think you can take this DeVax team lightly. They have the probables. They have the veteran experience in the rotation. They have a bunch of guys that can mash. I'm personally here for the Nolan Aronado Redemption Tour. He's looked really good over the last month at third base for the Diamondbacks. So I think they're a good ball club. And this should be a pretty good test.

You have Emmett Sheehan going tonight, Eric Lauer, Tuesday. Shohei on Wednesday, still no decision if he will hit or pitch. My speculation, though, guys, given that we are in the middle of, I think, 10 straight games, and that Thursday is the series finale, it's a four-game series. I wonder if this is one of these starts where Dave Roberts says, hey, we're not going to hit Showing in the lineup because they played a lot of games, maybe this is just a pitching only start. He's hit in the last two pitching starts, so I would not be surprised.

And then we have Justin Robleski on Thursday for the rubber match. But this tonight's game in particular, Eduardo Rodriguez, he's been lights out. He was really nasty against the Dodgers in the first series of the season. Should be a fun one here at Chase Field. It would be a good game. A couple of good teams here. A lot of people like to look at that Diamondbacks team, talk about that hot streak. They won 10 of 11 games.

Then they got swept by the Mariners. Those 10 of 11 games, we're all against the Giants and the Rockies. So, grain of salt. Those teams are two very, very bad teams there. But Dodgers should be able to take three or four in the series. Very, very easily, he said, he said. Two and two sounds okay, honestly. But maybe I'm higher on the debacks than most.

I've been wrong before, barely. I mean, there's some guys who are definitely going to want to get back on track. I mean, Zach Gallen is not having himself a good year at all. I don't know how he's been of late, but the numbers in total. You know, an ERA over five, that's not Sack Gallen. Like, I expect this team to try to stick it to the Dodgers. You know, they got swept to open the season. They want to try to get back on track.

I mean, they always try to stick it to the Dodgers. I think every team already, you know, tries to stick it to the Dodgers. But you can't take anything away from the fact that it's Rockies and Giants. I mean, you play the schedule that you're given. The Dodgers lost the series to the Rockies. Did they not? No, they swept. Oh, Rocky, sorry.

No, they slipped. I wasn't listening. I wasn't listening. Yeah. So they split and then they swept. There we go. Okay. There you have.

At least one of us knows what we're talking about. Some super chats that we would like to get into. One person is hooking it up. B B unicorn? I don't know who it is. But they are a fan watching us from Korea, which is awesome. We got Mr. and Mrs. and Mrs. Worldwide here. We're not married.

But there are four, 10,000 Korean one super. chats we appreciate if i had a button we'll just do this appreciate the support here uh b boonikorn 7 uh said came here from the youtube algorithm arrived near the end of the will smith section i'm a south kane otani fan subscribing and liking we appreciate that is what we're here for that's what we thrive on that's awesome thank you so much wanting you know winning the series same as me what three is four in the series oh let me let me fix this here because it's in the wrong spot they're very specific though They're very specific with Otani starting a scoreless third game to secure his sixth win of the season. They're very particular about the demands that they have.

I like it. I like it. Also, here's another one. At the time they sent this, it is 4.30 in the morning in Seoul. Wow. So they're going to go back to sleep very smartly. Another one saying they're done with other Dodgers channels. I've decided on this one.

Thanks, everyone. We appreciate that. That's my favorite one. A good taste. final one, another one that just came in, the fifth 10,000 Korean one chat, which I think is like six bucks American. So homies got money here. We'll take it. That's a coffee. Asking, what time is a live stream here? How many times a week? So we are usually live three times a week. Two of them will be Monday, Thursday at 12 p.m. Pacific time. And then Alana and I are usually live for a

post game on either a Tuesday or a Wednesday. So we appreciate the support. This week, this week It's going to be a Wednesday, B B Unicorn. So join us on Wednesday evening for Post, and then the three of us will be back on Thursday at 12 Pacific. Yeah. We appreciate everybody hanging out with us here, as they always do. Tell a friend, Will Smith was here. He is America's catcher.

Everybody needs to watch Will Smith. I had people wondering, are you guys going to be able to get personality out of Will Smith? Hell yeah, we're us. I thought we did really good. Yeah. He did great. He smiled.

He chuckled a couple of times. It's a good dude. And his probably the best. case for him is he's guaranteed that I leave him alone for the next week. I'm on Dodger territory. You won't have to talk to me for the rest of the road trip. That's my new, my new friend. That is what we're looking for.

Guys, appreciate you all watching. Be smart like be B B unicorn. If you're not subscribed, subscribe to the channel. We're getting closer to 20,000. We're getting closer to 17,000. Help us get there so we can stop talking about it. And then, you know, move the goalpost and ask for higher numbers. You got Alana Rizzle, you got Katie Wu, you got myself for,

some reason and we will see you, Riz and I will see you postgame Wednesday. Okay, correct. That's it. That's it. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye guys. Hey, guys. It's us. The Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast. Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it. But, you know, tired and sick. Tired and sick. Tired and sick. Tired. sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. On Humor Me with Robert Smygel and Friends, we help make you funnier on this episode. My guest's Bob, Odin Kirk, and Kids in the Hall's Bruce McCullough try and help the Kazoo Kid and Tayson Day be famous again.

What if there's an alternate universe show where you guys are incredibly popular? Well, and they could travel up the land, doing meet and greets. They're constantly needed at malls. Listen to humor me with Robert Smygling Friends on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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