OverDrive - Kratz on the Blue Jays' prime consistency, Kirk's season mastery and the trade deadline outlook

Episode Date: July 7, 2025

Foul Territory Podcast Host Erik Kratz joined OverDrive to discuss the headlines around the Blue Jays' winning streak, the joint collaboration of the roster, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. heating up, Alejandro Kirk making the All-Star Game, the team's trade deadline approach, Cal Raleigh and Aaron Judge's MVP race and more.

Unmistakably Canadian. It's the music that raised you. The artists raising the bar. Hi, this is Bryan Adams. Hey, my name's Brett Emmons. I'm from the Glorious Sons. Hi, I'm Nellie Furtado. Made in Canada.

The station that champions Canadian music. Loud, proud, and all yours. No passports required. Just press play. Tap into Made in Canada now on iHeartRadio.ca or the free iHeartRadio app Different looks on different nights different people are heroes. What's your take on that? I mean isn't that what you want as a

What one as a fan base but two as an organization? Like if you have to go out and buy every single one of your players, you're never going to, you're never gonna have sustained success. Now, something that the Blue Jays have had a tough time doing is maybe living up to expectations, but a lot of it was surrounding the guys coming up from their minor leaks, you know

Gavin Gavin bizio you had boba shed you had Vladimir Guerrero and it was a lot of pressure on those guys and They reached the playoffs which was like, okay. Here we go. This is the time and then it's kind of fallen It kind of fell back. I mean it was bleak, no offense. Those guys were the guys that, you know, the reason they went out and got all that pitching. So when you say the Blue Jays are winning games from everybody, contributions from Tyler Heineman, contributions from Ernie Clement, from David Schneider, you're like, okay, I kind of can get behind this. And as a fan base, you're like, I love this

because Davis Schneider is one of us. You know, Tyler Heineman is one of us, you know, a working class hero who gets an opportunity to do something cool in the big leagues and taking advantage of it together as a team it's so fun to watch. So Eric, one of the amazing things about this run is Vladimir Greer Jr. the 500 million dollar man has not had great power

numbers this year. He's hitting the ball hard and getting on base a lot and scoring runs and of course Anthony Santander the big offseason power bat they brought in hasn't been a factor in this run at all it was you know the the Blue Jays real upturn in their fortunes coincided with Santander sitting down on the IL. What do you make of that the idea that Vladi hasn't really caught fire yet and Santander hasn't given them anything of that the idea that Vlad has really caught fire yet and Santander hasn't given him anything what does that mean to you as they approach the final 66 here? You guys aren't on, you guys don't have any Yankees fans that listen to your show do you? No, not at all.

Because that means the Yankees are cooked. If that's the case, if they're doing all this without those guys, that is a great thing for Jay's fan. That is a great thing for this team. Now, are some guys going to regress back to the norm, to the mean? Yeah, absolutely. But that doesn't mean it's going to happen right when those guys get back. Look, a threegame lead right now is nothing to sneeze at. I always I always laugh on the show when people are like

oh man you're not giving them enough credit. You know they're they're only four games back of the wild card and I'm like what? Like four games back after like a you know a three-game sweep of a team and you expect your team to be doing good, the J's are three games ahead of the division right now. And to me, if you're getting those guys back, they're going to hit. They're going to hit Dingers. Maybe Fladdy's not gonna hit Dingers,

but he's kind of a chameleon. He needs, he does what is needed. If he needs to hit a ball to the gap, he'll do it. He needs to hit the ball to right center field, he'll do it. It's not just all or nothing, dingers or nothing, we got no chance, that kind of thing. But you sit there and you go,

Don Tondare is going to come back. But you sit there and you go, Tom Tondair's gonna come back. Even if he has a down year, he's gonna end with 20 homers. I'm sure you can find 20 homers to help a team win. Like that is, that's guaranteed. And it's not, you know, he's up and down. I don't think, I didn't expect 40 homers from him just because he did it before.

Like you say, all right, you know, if he has up and down years, we can deal with when he comes back, finishing the season out with 20 dangers. Like this team's riding high if that's the case, but the team is building defense and pitching and they've been doing that without Dalton Varsho that's my biggest when Dalton Varsho is back and fully healthy that's my biggest person that's going to come back to bolster what this team's already doing. There's just so many things that are working well for the Jays the one that we talked about was they seemed to have a two and a half year run where they couldn't score a run when they needed to and now all of a sudden it happens at a nightly basis. How does that turn around?

Believe me, if I knew, I would not, you said NBA guys make a lot of money. If I knew that, I would be making a lot of money. That is for sure. I wouldn't be selling hot air like my dad says I do being on our show. But it's one of those things that if I'm gonna lean towards something, it's really based on your stars. I mean, when George Springer's in and out of your lineup, it creates an inconsistency that you can't find somebody to take the level of success that you need from George Springer.

Like what he's doing just adds a fear in the lineup for pitchers. And pitchers would never, they would never admit to it. But they're like, I don't care. I'm just throwing one pitch at a time. The reality is if you have George Springer hitting like he's been hitting not just clutch but driving the baseball you're you're more apt to say okay I know it's four batters away I'm facing the eight nine spot But I can't lose Tyler Heineman I can't lose Ernie Clement I can't lose Andres Jimenez So they have to kind of give in to those guys a little bit because of who is Behind them and it's really your stars George Bo

Vlad E Those are the guys that make the other guys better and they've been doing that all year so far. Eric, another guy that's an all-star this year for the Blue Jays, Alejandro Kirk. We've had people on this show making the case that he ought to be the Blue Jays MVP, given how We've had people on this show making the case that he ought to be the Blue Jays MVP given how You know if you really want to take the MVP literally like they like he's valuable But because he's hard to replace right like to find a catcher that can hit like he's hit to have it You know be among the leaders on the team and OPS and a lot of other key stats He's been indispensable. You've been a guy who's you know crouched behind the plate and tried to make a living as a hitter at the same time

Oh, what do you make of Kirk's? Kirk's season to date I Mean if you really dissect the numbers you'd be more impressed with the fact that What he's doing like his back-to-ball skills are an anomaly in the game right now like ball skills are an anomaly in the game right now. Like the other strike out puts the ball in play and now he's starting to do damage too. Yeah, there's a lot of doubles, but he's hitting some dingers that you're sitting there going, Oh wow.

Like didn't, didn't think he was going to hit a homer in that spot. And he's not hitting a lot of homers, but they're big homers and he just has a knack for putting together at bats unlike guys in the game put together at bats right now I sit there and I go who makes lineups turnover that's different than aircraft carriers who make pitchers afraid who makes lineups turnover and I look at guys like Max Muncie in LA if he can ever have the highest numbers the highest OPS no, can he get really hot? Absolutely, but what they do is they don't swing and miss they don't give hitters

They don't give pitchers too much of a, you know, an area to breathe. Alejandro Kirk right now, I'd still take Vlad E, but Alejandro Kirk right now is a close second place for if you're in game seven of the world series with runners on with bases loaded and all you needed to hit. Alejandro Kirk's the guy. Like if you need to get off of a deserted island, I don't know how I got to the deserted island, but if the only way off is somebody makes contact for me,

it's Alejandro Kirk. The fella does it. And I was kind of, I was kind of skeptical of giving him an extension because his defensive numbers went down last year a little bit. But he's worth every penny and they got to steal. A lot of people in this marketplace have already gone to the end of July. It's the trade deadline.

How do the Jays approach that? By taking, I don't know if you guys have ever played poker, but I feel like when they signed Vladdy, they said, you know what? We have a big, we have a big bet here. We got a nice hand. We're going to push it. We're going to push some of our chips in time to push them all in. I couldn't be more of a, I am not in a Ross Atkins or Shapiro corner at all. And I'm not fans of them. I don't think they've handled things very well since they've been with the Jays. I don't think they've handled people very well, but this is their chance.

If they want to keep this job that I don't know how they've kept it this long. It's time to go all in. that I don't know how they've kept it this long. It's time to go all in. It's time to go all in and you not only bolster your strength. So when you go to pick guys up, you go pick defense up. That's bolstering your strength. I think that'll cost you a lot less

than getting that power back. Bring the long lost son home. Josh nailer needs to be a blue j I get it there. They already have a first baseman, but how can you get? Left-handed power with quality of that Josh nailers Walk rate has gone up and his strikeout rate has gone down this year. It's a concerted effort for him to Improve that and And you say, oh, well you can't, you can't replace Vlad. He ended up, listen, this is two months rental plus a month for the playoffs. If you go get senior Josh Naylor, this team, this fan base

that's already behind this team will flourish because I've never heard anything bad about him as a clubhouse guy. You're bringing the native son home for two months and like to me it's a no brainer to me that's where they go and obviously everyone's going to everybody says the same thing starting pitching and relief pitching. Right. I don't think you guys really needed to hear that. Everybody knows that's what every team wants. But you bolster your defense

and you go and get Josh Naylor. That's fascinating stuff. Hey, we wanted to hear your take, Eric, given your background as a catcher. Interesting MVP debate in the American League with obviously Aaron Judge, the perennial candidate. The perennial candidate. The perennial candidate and Cal rally the catcher with Seattle Mariners who was having a hell of a year leading With 35 her months to judges 33

Where do you stand on that debate? Yes, don't I knew you guys would ask me this We had a I had a big a, I had a big argument. I had a big argument on our show with AJ Przezinski and I said, the question was posed, who is the first half MVP? And I said, it's Aaron Judge. Aaron Judge is the first AF MVP because, one, there's no such thing as a first AF MVP. Two, he hasn't,

Cal Raleigh has not broken any records yet. He hasn't done, and I am the strongest, I am the strongest proponent of catchers getting awards because catchers one are underpaid to they are underappreciated. And so I'll stand up for him. But when Aaron judge is done, he's the first day of MVP. If Cal Raleigh continues to do what he's doing, he will be the MVP of the league.

So maybe I'm talking out of both sides of my mouth, but to me, I think you guys are sponsored by Sandal. That's what it said. When I came on, I think Cal Raleigh is coming out at like plus four 50 some places plus six 50. Yeah. I would say go and get some Cal Raleigh stock because this man has done nothing but historical things and I think the way the season is going to go he'll end up winning the MVP which will be a huge upset over Judge having another ridiculous ridiculous year. Eric will leave on that.

Thanks very much. Appreciate it. You're welcome. Thanks for having me on, boys. Eric Kratz, foul territory host and former Major League Baseball player. podcast for you. We break down the latest in the world of video games, from basics to beyond. The hottest gaming news, insight and industry leaders, and more weekly. Join me, Naomi Kyle, and stay ahead of the game with all the latest updates. Even if you're a total newbie. Stream This Week in Gaming on the free iHeart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts.