Dodgers Territory - Shohei Ohtani Injury Scare, Bullpen Help Needed?

Episode Date: June 12, 2026

Alanna Rizzo and Clint Pasillas dive in to the Los Angeles Dodgers series with the Pirates and the latest news with Shohei Ohtani who exited the series finale early with a knee issue. The hosts discuss the team's level of concern and their own levels of concern. (6:12) Will Smith was placed on the injured list. How long will his neck injury keep him sidelined? (11:00) The Dodgers' bullpen has struggled in recent weeks. Will the front need to be busy at the trade deadline? Or will internal reinforcements be enough? Breaking down the latest injury news with Brock Stewart, Bobby Miller, Ben Casparius and more. (36:54) Plus, a look ahead to the series with the surprising Chicago White Sox on this edition of Dodgers Territory. 🌶️ Use our code for 10% off your next order of MLB tickets on SeatGeek*: seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/TERRITORY10 Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discount Subscribe on YouTube!https://www.youtube.com/@DodgersTerritory  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.

Suddenly, a guy who was not the shape of Shoahe Otani. He was the shape of Santiago Espinall comes up, but he did exit the game, did Shohei Otani with what the team pretty quickly announced was left knee inflammation. Welcome to a brand new episode of Dodgers Territory. I am Alana Rizzo. That is Clint Paseas. Katie Wu is on assignment. We are psyched that you guys are here with us.

Thank you so much, guys. Rate us five stars, like, subscribe, all of the different things. anywhere that you get your podcast, Apple, Spotify, YouTube, as we try to make our way to 20,000 subs. All right, let's get two lots to talk about on this show. Let's get to the big ticket. All right, Clint, Pirate series. We took two of three.

They easily could have swept them. The game on what is today, Thursday. The game on Wednesday was a, but they could have swept it. Left a lot on base. They scored a ton of runs, left a lot on base. your overall thoughts between the Dodgers and the Buccos. Yeah, scored a lot of runs. Damn right there.

28 runs, Dodgers scored. I don't know how you score 28 runs and don't sweep the lowly Pittsburgh Pirates. They're better than they have been in recent years. But yeah, they also left a lot of opportunities on the basis, but the big story is the bullpen. We're going to talk a lot about the bullpen later on in the show. Bullpen struggled pretty mightily. My guy, we talked about it here on Wednesday night. the Kyle Hurt game. My guy Kyle Hurt did not have himself a great game. It happens. The important thing is you still take a series. I don't care if the numbers look inflated. It's nicer when everything isn't all inflated. But even so. We've got to talk more about the big story, though, of course, late in Thursday's game. Sorry, yeah, late Thursday's game, Shohayotani. We're on the show Hey, Otani watch because suddenly a guy who was not the shape of Shohei Otani. He was the shape of Sancho.

Espinall comes up. Hey, RBI single, I think, for Espinall in that moment there, but he did exit the game, did Shohei Otani with what the team pretty quickly announced was left knee inflammation. The update after the game, thankfully, was positive. Dave Roberts said his level of concern with Showy Otani's injury is, quote, not high, and then he feels good about Otani being back in the lineup tomorrow. Now, Riz, as you noted, before we started talking here. in front of the fine people. When the doctors tell you, give you some sort of update that's positive, you kind of pause a little bit. Well, remember when Blake Snell's issue was not an issue? Remember when Tyler Gladznow's issue was not an issue? Remember when Will Smith just had like kind of a neck issue? And then it was like, eh, maybe he's going to go on the IL.

And now he's on the IL. And then we find out that Will Smith had to be decapitated. Like that's basically how it goes with the Dodgers. And I can appreciate them wanting to keep things close to the vest. It's none of our business. But I don't know that they would like kind of jerk us around though with Shohei. Because everyone in their mother like in 14 different countries is going to be on this. So I do hope that we did truly dodge a bullet with Shohei Otani.

But I do, I do pause. I do have some caution when it comes. to the Dodgers talking about injuries because, you know, he left early with some knee inflammation and no big deal. I hope not. No big deal. But we always wonder a little bit. I think it's also just the moment in which he left. Like the game was far from over at that point. Right. It was still a close game. The Dodgers end up tacking on a couple more insurance runs that proved to be important, you know, in their pursuit of not having the bullpen just absolutely crap. the bed two games in a row.

And you also know, like a hat tip to Dylan Hernandez who pointed out on social media as well, that knee, that left knee was surgically repaired back in 2019. Otani's left knee. So you have a little bit of pause when you're a little bit of, you know, your heart starts to flutter a little bit with fear. But it's also, Shohay's had such a heavy workload. He did, it was a humid day and that Wednesday start, hot, sweaty, nasty, you know, gets, pitches into the seventh inning, got on base a whole bunch in the series.

And when they're not all homers, you know, you actually have to run and put in a little bit of effort. I think stole a couple of bags was running. Like, it's, it, ideally, thank God they won the game. Ideally, you don't want him, you don't want him aggravating it. So taking some caution there is, is perfectly fine. That's the biggest thing. With Shohei Otani, it's all about caution.

Like I don't care, you know, listen, they have a relatively large lead in the NOS. You're not going to push it to the limit against the Pittsburgh Pirates. No disrespect to the Pirates, but this is not the NLCS. This is not like a wild card game what we need to, you know, advance. Like this is a June 12th game, mid-June game against the Pittsburgh Pirates. And you're going to be more than cautious with your star player, with the face of the franchise, with the face of the sport, all of the things. The Justin Rebleski injury, like, I'm not super concerned about that.

Like, I'm not concerned about a hamstring contusion. Like, hamstrings are pretty big. Like, as far as, like, you're the part of the body, like, if you're going to have a contusion, like a hamstring is a good place to get one, right? Like hamstring, your buttox, if you will, that's a place to get a contusion. Like, if it's your shin, you know, or as a pitcher, if it's your forearm, like, you know, that's a little bit different. So I'm not, I'm not worried about Justin.

And I think the whole thing with Show Hey is just more precautionary. What I'm worried about is Will Smith and where we go, because Dustin, Dustin, good Lord, Alana, Dalton rushing cannot catch every single day. Says you. I mean, come on. Like, that's a lot. Like, I'm sorry. Like, that's a lot to catch a game every single day.

is a lot. So he has an inflamed disc in his neck. Will Smith does place on the aisle as we knew, even though they said it wasn't going to happen. And I joke about him being decapitated. But I honestly think like he could be decapitated. And the doctor's like, no, he's fine. Everything's fine.

But the thing is, though, like, okay. So they pulled up a catcher. They brought up a catcher, a 31-year-old that had, you know, played in a game last year. But I'm a little concerned about the catching position. Um, I, listen, I like Rush and, and I think he is performing admirably at the moment. I, I also don't think, like, him playing more. I don't think he's going to be at risk of being exposed or anything like that. Um, I just kind of from a fatigue standpoint. Yeah. I mean, we, we saw this early last year, or two years ago, I think, as well, where, uh, Smitty had had some issues with the ribs. And it was a little touch and go there with, uh, you know, Barnesy catching a lot of it. And, and, that I forgot the other kids. Some dude, like straight out of nowhere, um,

it was a former, uh, Colorado Rocky catcher whose name I do not recall. But you know, I feel about former Colorado Rocky's catchers. Watch it. Watch it. I just.

I just. Anyways. Um, I'm fine with rushing. He's young. He's spry. Um, and,

you know, if, if it was not getting better for Will, it's better to just kind of, nip this in the bud now and and hopefully he gets himself a hashtag good pillow because Dave at some point said that it was a bad pillow. Yeah, bad, I had sleep. I opined that that he's waiting for a prime day.

That shit is real. I woke up this morning. Now I'm twice Will Smith's age, but I woke up this morning. I was like, what did I do? Because I swear I pulled a muscle in my back, my back, my neck, my neck and my back. Anybody that watches Friday knows what that reference is. But I woke up and I was like, what on earth? So maybe he did have a bad night's sleep.

It happens. It happens. I have a bad night's sleep. Most nights. Shout out sleep number. Sponsor your boy. Anyways, that's our thought there. Again, like I said a little bit earlier,

there's a lot to talk about when it comes to the state of the bullpen. First, I would, if you would not mind indulging me, Alon, I would like to tell people, to find people here about seat geek because we got some things going on. The Dodgers definitely have some things going on next week. They do return home to Dodger Stadium. They got a six-game set road homestand. We're going to get there, I promise.

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I don't give a shit you feel good. There's four months. It's up there. You got to love it. Every time I hear it, we've seen it a thousand times, but there's something about Tommy LaSorda and that mound visit front end that we love. All right, a 70 game report card, Clint.

Today we're focusing on the bullpen. bullpen for the most part has been really really solid this season a little bit of a rough stretch lately but there are some reinforcements coming i'm just kind of kind of pull it up because there's a lot of guys coming some guys honestly that i have even forgotten about there's eventual help on the way but will the dodgers need to be active at the trade deadline for a bullpen arm let's talk about this for a hot second brock stewart tell me more yeah that's one of the things you mentioned the rough stretch by the way er a approaching like seven and a half over the last couple of weeks but then you also mentioned there was a stretch where they were very, very good. So I'm very hopeful that

those guys can come back. But you mention some of the dudes on the IL. Let's talk about Brock Stewart because it's been a little weird with Brock Stewart. You know, he came back, he came back from the injury, pitched two games and then was placed right back on the IL with, I think they said, bone chips in his left foot. Then he made a little bit of progress and it felt like there was a bit of a setback. So from what we're gathering there is not really progressing at the moment. I don't know. Should I just kind of run through these? What do you think in here? No, I think we go through the list, right? Like Brock's going down the line, kind of give our folks, our viewers, our listeners, and a thought of like where they are in their progress

and how they can help for sure. I feel bad for Brock. Let's start with, let's start with beef. Let's go. Yeah. I feel bad for the dude because like, I mean, this is a guy who's traded back here, had a real nice stretch run there with the Minnesota Twins. Then all of a sudden, he just cannot stay healthy. So, I mean, the hope is that he, you know, at this point, like, he's still going to be shut down for a while. Like, let's say he starts throwing tomorrow. There's still going to be a throwing progression. There's still going to need to be a rehab assignment at this point.

So, like, if we're talking about help in the immediate, he is not one of those guys. one dude who I think could help pretty soon is our friend high leverage honeybund friend of the show Evan Phillips because Riz he's throwing right now at AAA he's on a minor league rehab assignment as of the time we are doing this made three rehab appearances at Oklahoma City and are you thinking next month are you thinking like a July return like he's close right yeah he is he's just past the one year mark from having his Tommy John surgery pretty much went out on rehab or I think he faced hitters on the one-year anniversary of his Tommy John. And I mean, Riz, this is a guy who was closing games for this team more often than not for

a couple of years. You know, they entered that 2024 postseason with him kind of as, you know, penciled in as the de facto closer and, you know, moved. Things had to move around as much as they could with the struggles with the starting rotation there. So you made it work. You win that World Series. and then, of course, he gets hurt last year.

But, yeah, you mentioned a month. I mean, I think a month is kind of the long end of this. If we're already a few games into the rehab, you know, we've got to progress into maybe an up-down, you know, a back-to-back or two in there. But within- I don't even think it's a month. I think it's next month.

We don't even know if it's like a full month. We don't even know if it's July 11th. It's next month, which is exciting because we had talked about before the, before coming into the season, point. We're like, all right, great. We'll get Kike Hernandez back at some point, which we did. And then he ended up, unfortunately, having another injury. But then we're like Kike Hernandez, Evan Phillips, and we're to the Evan Phillips point. And we had thought like All-Star Break, right? Well, like, that makes sense. The All-Star break is a month from today. Like a month like, I'm heading to the

all-star break on July 12th. That's a month from today. So like that's happening, right? So like, he's on that trajectory, that timeline that we thought he was going to be. So that's great. You know what I saw today that really shocked me? There was a Bobby Miller sighting. Yeah. Like, okay, so what's going on with him? Let's talk about Big Game Bob there for a second. Somebody, the kind of forgotten, I'll pull up some numbers here for Bobby Miller here,

kind of the forgotten dude in that kind of bullpen mex. Last year they did move him to the bullpen, taking him out of the starters role, because he was just horrible. He was abysmal. This year he has battled some back issues, some shoulder issues. Seems to be where everything is finally in a good spot. He reported when the Dodgers were in Arizona last week. He reported showed up, you know, paid a visit to his teammates, his friends, and said, hey, you know, I'm getting ready to start throwing.

And then I see him posting a video of him getting off a mound at Camelback on his Instagram page. So, you know what's funny? I've long been pretty low now. on Robert Miller. But I think he's one of those guys who could suddenly sneak. He can't be Bobby anymore. He's got to be Robert. If he wants to come back and be like a dude for this team, he's going to have to be Robert Miller.

And that's, this is what I've decided right now. I anoint him Robert Miller. And he could be somebody who could have a sneaky impact, sneaky positive impact on this bullpen. Maybe that's just wishful thinking on my part. but the trials and tribulations this kid has gone through i would love to see him get a win because the stuff is good and we talked about it a lot last year if you if you just hone the stuff if you just focus on two pitches make these pitches badass and go try to strike dudes out he doesn't need to have three other mediocre pitches to turn to so i think the biggest

Keep an eye on that. Robert, if you're nasty, that he would do was figure out the mental, right? Like, figure out, like, how to, like, harness the mental and how difficult this game is and be able to translate that into, I'm going to find my location. I know what my bread and butter is, whether it's my two pitch mix that has made me successful. I don't need another two, three, or four pitches in my arsenal. I know what's gotten me here. Let's focus on that. But fix what's in between the ears. I think that's always been his bigger bugaboo.

It's never really been about the stuff. It's been more about the mental piece of things. So perhaps this time away from the big leagues has allowed him to harness that. So if he's going to be elevated to Robert, I would hope certainly that that has been a part of the maturation process. All right, Edwin Diaz, which is obviously the biggest loss of the Dodgers bullpen when we found out that he got hurt. Obviously, in my opinion, he was the biggest get, the biggest signing, the biggest addition, and then he got hurt. And then, but to the bullpen's credit, they have really done an amazing job in his absence. But he has started a throwing progression.

But where is this dude? Like, what is, where is he? Yeah, that's been one of those ones. It's weird how little we have heard about Edwin Diaz while he has been sidelined. we did see him throwing at Dodger Stadium last week when the boys were in town, a friend of the show, David Vasse, collecting some video there. And again, we do hear that the throwing progression is beginning. Let's also take a step back with Edwin Diaz.

He did not undergo the nanoneed the same way Blake Snell did, the same way Terrick Scouble, who is days away from returning for the Detroit Tigers did. he underwent more of a traditional arthroscopic surgery to have those loose bodies removed. So this seems to be on par with the original timeline projection of about four to six weeks. I mean, I forgot when he went on the IL at this point. You know, if I was better at doing some research instead of being tired, I might have looked that up. But here we are. It feels like it's been a couple months.

Like that's not on you. Like it's been a minute. It's been a minute. I'll find out right now. But it's been a minute. But again, my big thing has just been like, where the F is this dude? And this is where I feel good. You know, we entered this section of the show with the exercise of will they need help at the trade deadline?

So far, we've rattled off several names. And we've got a couple more to still to come. But rattled off several names that could show up, still show up and make an impact for this team. And, you know, not every. everybody currently in the bullpen, like I said a moment ago, is going to be asked for the rest of the season. They are going to figure some things out. You know, Kyle Hurt going through a rough stretch right now. It happens, like we talked about, a couple post games ago.

Who else? You know, Henriquez has been really, really good, gave up a run in the Pittsburgh series. For the greater part, Alex Vescia has been nails as long as, you know, defenders are catching the baseball for them. I have faith in Tanner Scott has kind of struggled at points but have faith that he will get back on track and will feel better when he's not in that closers role which he kind of

had to sort of reassume with the loss of Edwin Diaz but anyway I mean honestly I have to say that I feel like by the way he went on the IEL on April 20th so like basically right after the regular season started I do feel like this Dodgers bullpen is really helpful

their own in the absence of, in my opinion, the best free agent clothes are that you could have gotten. So the way that they've handled this situation, I think has been very admirable. There's going to be blips in the road and there's going to be some times where you're like, oh, man, the bullpen, but that's the problem with being a reliever. Like, I remember there's like shirts that say relievers need love to or relievers or humans too or whatever the heck it was. But the problem is, like, you never ever give the bullpen praise. It's very easy to rip on the bullpen, right? Like, it's just that's just the nature of the game. But they have been unbelievably solid in the absence of Edwin Diaz.

There have been some lips. Like we get it. We've talked about it. And that's fine. But again, they have been pretty good in the absence of one of the better closers in all of baseball. All right, Ben Casperius,

like you had to put it in our rundown, Clint, a guy in no man's land. Like, what are we doing with him? What's happening with him? This is a dude who kind of feels like he's in witness protection right now. Like,

I think he went down with, shoulder inflammation and he has just been he has just been completely you know gone and this was a guy and we talk about going back to about this time a year ago where he was arguably the best reliever in that Dodgers bullpen to open the season and then they started effing with him a little bit they started maybe trying to put him in the starting rotation never really did put him in the starting rotation and then this year was like no just focus on on bullpen and the season just just never really got going, you know, got into a few games. And then the injury bug also got to him.

I'm very curious to hear something about Ben Casparis, because I still like the stuff. He still have a 99-mile-an-hour capable, you know, right arm there, a nasty change-up. And we've seen him be elite at the big league level. So that's one of those guys. I would love to see just kind of re-emerge. For sure.

I mean, it was basically the same time frame as Edwin D. is like he kind of had that whole shoulder inflammation issue on mid-april let's say okay so he had the shoulder inflammation in mid-April he was transferred to the 60-day IL because of the shoulder inflammation inflammation was currently cleared to begin a throwing program but no specific date has been announced where is the throwing program I don't know or what do you throwing like I don't know so again this is the stuff that we can try to break down because these are the these are the are the only holes. Nobody, listen, like, the teams that are struggling to get wins are not talking about, like,

where this random dude is in their bullpen that has been put on the IL, the 60 day. But that's just the way that we are fortunate to be able to talk about this stuff because our team is in first place and we can nitpick, right? Bruce Ruggiero. I mean, he's done for the season again. And I said this the other day. I mean, it was a couple of, I mean, it could have been a couple of months ago at this point, But I don't know that we will ever see Bruce Dar as a Dodger.

I really don't. I don't know what the situation is, but he's been more hurt than he hasn't. So I love the dude. I appreciate, like, I appreciate the, the fight. Really, the desire. The desire, the intentionality of wanting to get back. But I just don't see a situation where he's really ever,

I mean, I don't know. He's been hurt more than he hasn't, and that's problematic. Yeah, over the last few years, I mean, at this point, even if he did, and I talked about this in the off season, even if he did show up, it would take a long time for me to fully trust him. So I wish nothing but the best for the bazooka. Hopefully, maybe, you know, he does return on like some sort of minor league deal or something like that, because it has been a while. You know, the past glory is now three, four full seasons away from him. And he's always kind of had nagging injuries. And, of course, his whole Dodger tenure began because an injury because of not botched

medicals, but because medicals flagged medicals by the Red Sox, they stopped that part of the mokey trade. I was still the Dodgers sideline reporter when Brews Dark came onto the scene, right? It was basically 2020, really 2019. And then 2020 was the COVID year. So everything was short. And like we were in, we were in spring training in 2020. I remember just like how much his like fastball, the movement on the fastball.

I was like, oh my, like, oh my. This guy's like really something special, right? Effortless too. The situation there, let's just assume it was 2020. The situation there was like the movement was insane, but there was like not necessarily a location. So it's like it's fine. If you have the velocity and the miles per hour and all those things and you have the stuff, but if you can't look, that was the situation in 2020.

Fast forward six years from now. And obviously he's like. harness that a lot, a lot. He's had a lot of growth and a lot of development, but he's constantly hurt. So I just don't know. And now with the surgery, like that's going to set him back. As we said, he's out for the year again. At a certain point, like the return on investment just isn't there.

And it's not because he doesn't want to. It's just his body has failed him in a lot of different situations. So will he like legitimately be a Dodger? Will he legitimately be in make an impact? I don't know. but it's unfortunate because you want the guy to perform. You're cheering for the dude. It's just not working.

For this season, yeah, no impact. Do not expect anything. If he starts even getting off a mound, then I would be shocked. One last guy to mention here in this run is a guy that people are going to be like, who? There's a fellow by the name of Jake Cousins who is on the 40-man roster. the Dodger signed him. I think it's just heading into spring training was

with the Yankees in the past. I think with the Brewers in the past has been good at the past and he is also right at the one year removed from undergoing Tommy John surgery. One of those perfect Andrew Friedman type of like, yeah, you know, let's throw a couple

million dollars at you. Or in this case, I think the deal was $900,000 and he can get up to a million in like incentives or something like that. But he's one of those guys that, you know, they tried it with Tommy Canely in the past, and then he came back and wasn't very good, and then went back to, you know, his ex with the Yankees and so on, so far. Thank you, Tommy Canley. He helped us win a World Series in 2024 in a Yankees uniform.

But Jake Cousins, the whole point of this is just someone, this is a guy you could start to hear about in a few weeks. Keep an eye on him. Keep an eye, keep an ear out for the name Jake Cousins. because as soon as he starts getting out on his rehab assignment starts to make, make some waves there, people will start talking. Unless he's just, you know, outright booty, then disregard everything I'm saying here. But I have faith that Jake Cousins will be a sleeper, like kind of dude to keep your eyes on for this team this year to help out. Yeah, I mean, right-hander. I mean, he's got a decent ERA. I mean, four seasons in the big leagues, parts of four seasons, right?

26, 27, 28, 29 years old. The first three years of his big league career were with Milwaukee, as you mentioned, in the New York Yankees last season. But, I mean, he's pitched in 88 games. No starts.

He's a reliever, right? So he's pitched in 88 games, and he has a 270 ERA. That's not terrible. I mean, I'll take that. You see it there on the screen, yeah. So, listen, you're right. I mean, who knows?

I mean, Andrew Friedman is gold at finding these, like, diamonds in the rough and allowing guys to just kind of be who they are and figure it out. And again, it takes so many more than the 26. It takes so many more than the 40. And perhaps Jake Cousins is a big piece of that coming up. I mean, this is all suspect on our part, but he's in the system for a reason. He's in the system for a reason.

He has decent numbers. And the guy's young. He's only, I mean, everyone's young to me, but he's 31 years old. You know what? We'll see. Jake Cousins, who knows? Maybe he ends up being a, he comes out of the bullfell. pen in the World Series and he's like he dominates like Nathan of all he did in 2018 for the

red sox i don't know but the point is like you're to your point like this guy could be coming keep your keep your mind on that let's see what happens there so again the the whole point of this dodgers are playing their 70th game tonight against the white socks and the bullpen has struggled so now the question is we'll go back do do they stay the course do you do they stay the course do Do we think they will need to be active? Will they need to add arms or can they kind of stand pat? Let some of these dudes come back. Evan Phillips is going to be a massive one for sure.

Brock Stewart is starting to enter that kind of, listen, if you do something, then we'll let you come hang out with us. But for now, you know, we've called you to come hang out and you flaked on us too many times. I'm, I mean, that's a solid point. I love beef, but I'm iffy on Brock. Again, he's another one that's been more hurt and not as productive as he needs to be. You know what I mean? He came over last season, it was like, oh, okay. Like, that was an interesting acquisition.

I love the dude. Good person, good people. But like, I don't, I mean, he's not the, he's not an answer to me by any stretch in the boyfriend. I mean, he's a compliment, but he's not a weapon. But again, to answer your question, will they ask? I mean, we're basically a month and change, five weeks away from the trade deadline. Let me know how everybody else is doing. What is the health of this team in five weeks?

Where are we at with the starting rotation in five weeks? Is it Blake Snell back? Is it Tyler Glass now back? Is it where are we at with this? I don't know. Yeah, people really, of course, want. A lot will be determined based on the health of the starting rotation and where we're at in the standings.

I mean, as they sit right now, they're sitting. pretty. I mean, they have a seven and a half game lead in the division. So we're, we're in the postseason, right? Like the season ends today. We're in the postseason. The frippe, the frippin, what is that? The frippin. The flippin, Padres aren't even in the postseason right now, you guys. Like, basically they're like, we're tied as the, they're in as a wild car, right? In the Arizona Diamondbacks are a game and a half out. But again, there's a lot that can happen in five weeks. So I can't answer that right now on June 12th, as we start this series with the, or we have the series with the White Sox, but again, this is why we

can nitpick all of this stuff, because we are in first place by a large margin. And the thing that's also great is Dodgers are an incredibly advantageous position, as they always are, because they need to go get somebody. They got a butt ton of outfield prospects they can trade. On the pitching side, they are a lot more thin than they have been in recent vintage, but you could trade, let's say, I mean, I don't even want to say at James Tibbs III, but you could trade at JT3 for a reliever somewhere. Let's say Joe Ryan is available, you know, in a couple of weeks or something like that.

But I agree with you. For the people that want to already start talking trade deadline and whether or not this team will be active or even need to be active, we need at least another month. We will know in a month, which is pretty much All-Star Break, like you mentioned, calendar is a bitch sometimes. That's when we'll start to really have a strong feeling of how busy are they going to need to be. And I don't know. It depends on it depends on where we are in the standings.

It depends on they know the health of these guys. They know when these guys are coming back. They know what they can expect. I mean, whether it's a Tibbs or whether it's a Ryan Ward, which I am not trying to trade Ryan Ward. But my point is if Ryan Ward can give us a. help with a reliever that we need and then that allows Ryan Ward to get every day playing time. I'm sure Ryan Ward and his camp will take that. Again, like, this is a business.

Like, what is the best situation that you can put yourself in to win another World Series? Like, this is not like, I'm going to make, I'm going to try to like, like, coddle your feelings. Like, that's not what this is. And the Dodgers are the best at that, right? Yep. Right now, Ryan Ward gets a World Series ring. Tibbs will get a World Series ring when they win this thing because it takes the whole gamut of folks. So again, I don't know if they're going to, they're definitely going to buy.

They always do. But what are they going to buy in six weeks? I don't know. It depends on who's coming back. It depends on who's healthy. It depends on the biggest need at the time. Yep. Facts.

Facts. The thing is, they're good right now, and like you mentioned, they got a strong lead in the NOS. They're also, have the second best record in baseball. They're in a good spot. They are in a good spot. There's a lot of bullpen talk for you guys. There's our amount of visit for today. Like Chris said, we are going to next look ahead to that white sock series.

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bangers, plus personalized and curated playlists like back in the day Pride. celebrate with you anytime, anywhere. Just ask your smart speaker to play IHeart Pride Canada. Stream us on your phone or listen now at iHeartRadio.ca. All right, guys, I always appreciate you letting me talk about some pups that need a home and Nacho and Millie need homes. Now, we have learned a couple of things about them. They were found together bonded as strays in La Puente, California. But the thing is, they don't necessarily have to stay together.

They are obviously bonded because Millie in the back, if you're watching us, she is Nacho's mother, which I know they don't look alike, but we did the DNA, and in fact, they are related. So Millie is a terrier mix, and Nacho is her son, but he is like a short stack pity mix, so Dad obviously was a pity. They are bonded. We would love to keep them together, but as we have gotten to know them a little bit better, they don't have any sort of separation anxiety when they're separated so they can be separated independently.

Again, it is our preference to keep them together. It is not a requirement. Both of them need adopters. Okay. So if you're interested, please reach out to giddreysguardian.org and help Nacho and Millie find their forever homes. It's so funny looking. So I was trying to get somebody to adopt a dog.

They were looking for a dog and they had a right. They did adopt, thankfully. but they already had something lined up. And I still at least showed, you know, your website. And they're like, these dogs are related. I know. I don't think so. And then once you started telling that story, it's like, oh, crap.

Yeah, that is hilarious. They don't look anything alike. But in fact, Millie is his mom. And we have the DNA test to prove it. It's funny. I know dad was a rolling stone. And there you have. But there you go.

But anyway, they both need. adopters. So reach out if you're interested. All right. Let's look ahead. A very interesting series coming up. The White Sox are not ass anymore, Alana. What is going on? Well, it's funny, too, because I had a conversation recently with Ken Rosenthal on Fair Territory with Ken Rosenthal. We talked about at the time the first place White Sox. And again, I know people are going to say, oh, it's the AL Central. It's not that strong of a division. It doesn't matter. Like, it is what it is, right? And even if you're in a weak division, don't you want to be the first in the division versus last in the division like the Kansas City Royals are at this point? I mean, I would not have thought at any point at June, whatever, mid June of 2026 that the Chicago White Sox would have been first in the division over the guardians, over the twins, over the tigers, over the royals. So good on them, right? So again, Clint, this is this cannot be an overlook series that cannot be a trap series. Montgomery is all the. rage now that the young man that just made his major league debut and have the walk off home run and

all of the things um is this a world series team no but are they a playoff team right now they are so you know this is again an opportunity to take advantage of a team that on paper even though they're in first place you should handle the white socks but good on them good on them like no one's telling the white socks that they're crappy they're like okay that's fine stranger teams have made made waves and made it to a postseason and made it to a world series. You know, sometimes you just got to get hot at the right time. And I think back to, what was it, the, the 05, no, no, the 06 cardinals. Was it the 06 cardinals or those seven cardinals that made it,

they made it with like 83 wins and won the World Series or something like that, you know? Like, it happens. You can, you, all you got to do is get to the dance and maybe you could bring home a, bring home a model. But yeah, looking at the series, you know, the, as of the time, we are here talking about the series, the White Sox don't have their starters listed, but the Dodgers have Roki Sasaki, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, and all of a sudden, we don't feel dread about Roki. And by the way, the White Sox are doing this right now without Murkami.

Yeah. You know, like he's out too. So yeah, and I don't, I don't, it's a good feeling not to have dread about Roki Sasaki. He continues to make that incremental improvement that we're talking about. So that's, that's a good. That's a good, that's a good feeling, Roki, good job. So still, three game series, I feel like sweep is is on the table. Two of three needs to be just the floor.

Like you can't lose two games against the White Sox. I don't care if they're in first place. I don't care if they have a decent enough. record five games over 500 at the moment you got to beat them that's that's I I agree but I do appreciate the fact that the white socks aren't just like like rolling over and laying down because we the pontificators the experts were like this team is terrible there's nobody more excited about the situation right now than a j pretzinski our guy on foul territory who obviously played for the white socks one old series with the white socks he's like white socks everything yeah I mean like

I said they're doing this out without Munataka Murakami who's on the IL. And you know what? They don't have a lot of huge name guys. I mean, I'm like, poor Miguel Vargas. I just want to like hug him. I just want to hug the dude. But you know what? He's in the first place right now.

Yeah. He's having a pretty good, you know, decent season. There is an argument that Miguel Vargas could be an A.L. All-Star. Like, he's having a good enough season. I would be so happy for that dude because I'll know. never forget his face when he got traded to the white socks from the Dodgers and he's like sitting in the dugout like up against the wall like what just happened to me that was tough that was tough

the white socks not the same laughing stock they have been for years guys that is going to do it for this edition of Dodgers territory appreciate you guys hanging out with us if you want to support the show further go buy yourself some merch dodger territory shop dot com scan that QR code or click the link in the description below. There's a whole bunch of cool stuff. There's hats, mugs, babies. Everything is for sale. The babies are not for sale, just the onesies and the baby here.

Let's be very clear. Let's be very clear. We have a bunch of new stuff. Dodgers Territory Shop.com. Yeah. Or you can just scan the QR code. Don't forget Clint become a member. Yeah, you get also a discount in the store.

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