OverDrive - OverDrive - April 24, 2026 - Hour 1 - Keegan Matheson

Episode Date: April 24, 2026

Join Bryan Hayes, Jamie McLennan and Dave Feschuk for Hour 1 on OverDrive! They dive into the Senators on the brink of elimination against the Hurricanes, the Maple Leafs' hockey operations search and John Chayka and Scott White being finalists for the role. MLB.com Blue Jays Reporter Keegan Matheson on Jeff Hoffman's removal as the closer, Trey Yesavage and Jose Berrios nearing returns and Vladimir Guerrero Jr.'s inconsistent start to the season.

This hour of overdrive is powered by Fanduil. Fan Duel, bringing you everything from the opening line to the final score. All right, here we go, overdrive, off and running. TSN 1050 on the TSN app, your home smart speaker, up on TSN4, up on YouTube live, Brian Hayes, Jamie Noodles, McLennan, Dave Festruck of the Toronto Star. How's it going today, guys? How we feel in this afternoon? Got to love this single-digit weather spring, guys.

Yes. That's fine. That's okay. The dome will be closed tonight, right? Closer by committee with the dome closed. So it's the gardener this weekend. And the gardener. I saw that.

That is so typical of our city, unfortunately. The Jays are in town. The rappers are playing a playoff game. The Marleys are playing. There's massive events all over the place. Let's shut down the gardener, right? Why would anyone want to be able to get from one side of the city to the next? So how are you going to get in there?

Wow. You've got to go to Don Talley. Yeah, you're taking the streets. I mean, you're taking Richmond and Adelaide and King and Front and Queens Key and Young Street and university. I mean, it's just, there's different ways to get down there clearly. I guess we could take public transit. You know, that is possible. Maybe people want to use those bike lanes up.

The people. Maybe get the bike lanes going this weekend. I could be a big part of the plan. I don't know. It's disappointing that gardener. I love the gardener. I know a lot of people hate on the gardener. I think it's a brilliant passageway through the city.

I love driving down to Gardner. Love it. I've been living here 15 years. Has it ever been clear? Has it ever been not been worked on? It's always been worked on. Like there's always something. You'd be in a cab at 2.30 in the morning heading home, and there's traffic because they're working on it somehow.

Like these people work 24 hours a day on it? I don't know. But what do they work at? There are ramps that have been closed, I think, my whole life. Like, honestly, there's certain ramps where you're like, Oh, yeah, this's been close since 1982. You know, and I guess we're just not opening that or we're not going to work on that. Crazy.

And, yeah, it is perplexing as to why they're always, it's like parliament, man. You go to Ottawa, there's always cranes everywhere, scaffolding. You're like, this is a big part of kind of the whole country and the vibe. Can we get this thing figured out? Can we clear it on like Canada Day at a minimum and try to make it pop? But I guess that's not the way infrastructure works. Anyway, good to see you, Dave. Good to see in noodles.

We've got, again, the Jay's back in action. Today, Keegan Matheson later in the hour. Ross Atkins, just speaking, giving somewhat of a raw Sackenzie type of press. So not a ton of detail, but Hoffman is officially relieved of his closer duties for now, and they will be closing by committee. Closing by committee moving forward. I don't know how you feel about that day, but, like, what is the information process here? Do they have to, like, call them in and go, we're not?

you're not the closer anymore. Can you just be like you're taking out of the rotation and that's it? But it's news and they can put them back in next week if they want it, correct? It's a matter of his play, correct? He'll get up with other opportunities, right, Dave? If he pitches well, they'll give him more opportunities, of course. I think it's just, you know, it's not like you're going down to Buffalo and you're never coming back. It's just, hey, man, maybe this role isn't quite for you.

We're going to try and work a few other guys in there, see who it suits a little. better and we'll see how it goes from there. But isn't it funny, fellas? Like, you know, Ross Atkins was on this very show about a month ago and I think it was you, Hayes, that asked him you know, you just spend the off-season looking for a closer, given what happened,

you know, in the World Series where the closer kind of blew it for you? And what was Actions phrase? You want to hear the clip? I want to hear the clip. This was Ross before, it seemed like a very appropriate question, considering what was up with, you know, Jeff Hoffman last year and the fact that they didn't really do that

the offseason. Here's what Ross Atkins said to say about the closer role, Hoffman, about a month ago. Yeah, I mean, we're going to share it across more than one arm in the short term. And, you know, we may get back to a situation where there is someone named our closer, but in the short term, that responsibility will be shared. That was today's clip. Do we have the clip from the show? We, yeah, like our show. That's the one that we're looking for is the show. It's called Overdrive. It was a month ago. Ross was on it. But that's what he had to say about it today.

We'll see if we can find that clip. Well, it's going to be by committee, though. Like, isn't that always the blanket statement? We're going to do it by committee. Right, exactly. Like, that's what you say, right? Do it by committee. But hopefully they've got to do it.

They've got to get their act together. Well, listen, they're in one here early on in the season with injuries. And it sounds like Springer could return probably not this weekend, possibly, but probably early next week. And they get the Red Sox coming up next. week and you're finally going to start playing teams in the American League East and Boston's had a dreadful start as well. You know, Hoffman has really struggled, but the rest, the rotation is struggled outside of Gosman and C's for the most part. Shurs is on the mount tonight. I'm not as

worried about what's going to happen in the ninth inning as I am. What's going to happen the first inning or two? Three innings, yeah. Yeah. So, you know, there's a lot of fires they're trying to put out here, but they did win the series in L.A. against the Angels. So that's something that had to happen. They had been losing a lot of series. And again, Akin speaking today, we'll get more details on that with Keegan in about 25 minutes. Jays and Guardians, Rappers back in action

later this weekend as well. If they're a big win last night, we'll get into that. We got Montreal in action tonight. We've got Edmonton in action tonight. And I think we're dealing with a sweep here. I think we're dealing with sweeps likely in Ottawa, likely in Pittsburgh, likely

in L.A. Maybe one of them. Stave it off. Maybe one of them. but I don't know, noodles. I think two of three stave it off. I've been, we all know Colorado was going to win that series. I just didn't think it was, you know, I thought L.A. would steal one. Doesn't look like it. You know, the Ottawa senators, man.

Like, I just, I feel bad for them. And, you know, somebody said this, we were talking off air. If this was Toronto, like, if you just took Carolina versus Toronto last year, How much fire would there be for top players? Oh, they'd be getting crushed. Exactly. And they should. I thought Brady Kachuk was horrible last night.

I thought that's as bad as I could, I've seen him play. And I thought Stoetslow was asleep. And honestly, like, Kachuk is, Kuch always gets treated differently. Because for whatever reason, he's got this image of being this young guy. Everyone loves Brady Kichuk. Everyone loves his energy and all that kind of stuff. he's been in the league for eight years. He'll be 27 in September.

This is not some kid that just, oh, I'm making it in the playoffs. I'm 19. I don't know what I'm doing here. Right. I will go back to the first puck drop of game one. I thought it was a horrible decision by him to drop the gloves. If anything, I would be fighting to start game four, but he's played that card. Game four makes sense for Brady to drop the gloves and say, boys, we're not quitting.

I'm fighting. Come fight with me. dropping the gloves in game one to me was a terrible decision. He's still pointless. Some of the plays he made with the puck last night were absolutely outrageous for a superstar player. Like crazy how bad he was last night. So we were on the panel, me and Frankie and Dregs and James, and we're sitting there watching that.

And it was almost like the injury to Sanderson, they get a five on three, and you see Sanderson walking down the tunnel. And you're like, that is not good. and that was like an omen because they started doing some weird stuff on five on three. Now, I'm sure we have it, but Brady passes it to a linesman. What is he too? They come over the blue line, and I think out of the corner of his eye, watch his play. He passes it.

Watch the linesman. Get out of the way going, I'm not a player. I swear to God he saw legs or something there and threw it to him. And then, you know, he did have a chance. That's the one thing. Chukka's had chances. Stutzlis had chances. They just haven't been able to beat Freddie Anderson, or they've hit the post, or they've missed the net.

It's unfortunate because somebody... It's not good enough. It's not good enough. You're down 3-0. I'm sorry, the series is over, unfortunately, based on... But it's not like they've played horrible. They just haven't been able to break through, and the star players are the top players on both sides. what were the question marks for Carolina coming into the series, Dave?

What was Freddie as usual? And Freddie's the number one goaltender in the playoffs right now. Like, you know, statistically, I believe. I think Wedgwood is there too. But, you know, and we all love Freddie. He's a great dude, and obviously Lee fans were a little let down in some big moments by the man, and that's why he remains a playoff question mark. But, guys, I mean, is it really the Carolina goaltending when Ottawa goes 0 for 5?

on the power play with four shots on goal combined. You know, they get a five on three, they get one shot on goal. They're 0 for 12 in the power play in the series. I mean, there is some goaltending aspect of that, Jamie, but, you know, that seems to me, like, you know, passing to the linesmen who happens to have black pants and you're wearing black socks is not exactly a game plan. No. Yeah.

And that is the, I think, I'm sure what is really frustrating for Sends fans is that all year they played really well. and the story was we just can't get goaltending. If we had goaltending, we'd be one of the best teams in the league. If we had gold tending, we'd win the division and we'd be a cup contender. They've had great goaltending through three games. So something doesn't add up. You can't sit there and say, well, no, it's not us.

You know, we're a stoots as a stud, and Kichuk's a big game player. And I'm telling you, wait until you see Pinto in the playoffs, Allmark's pulled his weight. Allmark has more than pulled his weight. And these guys cannot break through. You're not wrong. Like, I really wonder how they're going to react. And I'm not talking about the fans.

I'm talking about the organization. Like, what do you do moving forward here? Because this is two playoffs in a row where I didn't think Kachuk and Stootsler were very good last year. They were okay. You know, they were okay. But I didn't think they were great last year against the leaves. And now here you go again. You're down 03 immediately.

And yes, Carolina's a really good team. Like, there's no disputing that. They're a very good team. And I thought they put on a clinic. in the third period last night. Unbelievable. Their play leading up to one in the third, it was brilliant the way they controlled the play

and just never made mistakes. But, you know, I look at Kachuk because I expect a lot out of them. I said it yesterday, we all agree. I'm like, I want to see this guy be just a bowl in the China shop tonight and be all over the game and takes a kind of weird, silly penalty in the third

and just never got going. He's, you know, blowing up the door on the bench. It's just bad energy around Brady. And I felt bad because you're right. The narrative was give us a goalie and or give us some goaltending and we are. And I don't disagree, but I come back to when we had Greenie on, what do we have them? Two weeks ago? We had Greenie on.

Last week, yeah. He goes, we've been on the barbecue for months. And I remember O's saying when Greenie got off, he said, they're either going to be a team that just has been playing playoff hockey for months and just keeps it rolling for the next two months or they spend everything. thing to get there and they just don't like i i think they've played good it's just carolina is beating them at you know not their own game because carolina has their own game but carolina's just been better like they they're you know they they've been more detailed their penalty kill has been

ridiculous and and and freddie's given them saves great uh-huh erin korelnick stunt double those are deaf players yeah it hasn't been the a ho sphachnikov show you know it's and and and and then again you can Sanderson gets hurt and now he's not going to play tomorrow they've announced that. That's big trouble. It's massive because we know that Shabbat's

just coming back off a broken arms. This guy has surgery. You know he's not 100%. They can't, you know, Cleven's coming back off of injury. I'm not laying that for excuses. But going into tomorrow's game, they will be missing their top pairing

in Sanderson and Zubb. Shabbat's not 100%. And you're just hanging on to try and look for something for somebody to drag you out of it. And I said this, and I've got to stand by it, when I laid both of these teams side by side on paper, I thought the three separating things the Ottawa Senators had. And that was Sanderson, Stutzler, and Brady Kachuk. If I was drafting a team out of both of these teams, I would start with those three and then spread everything out after that.

And they haven't been difference makers, unfortunately, in the positive way. and I think they're down 3-0 because of a lot of different factors. So, like, if you're reviewing this, what do you make of it? You know, because, you know, we went through it in Toronto with the core players here where now you look back after a decade. You're like, they just don't have what it takes in big games. Yeah. You know, they just don't, unfortunately, don't have it.

And you look at Stutzelah, he took a lot of heat last year. It was more amplified because it was the Leafs. It was just louder and crazier in Ottawa, first time in the playoffs in eight years. But, you know, he's had chances. for sure. But I, you know, he had that weird interaction with Green on the bench where the lip reader, it sounded like he was saying there's just no room or looked like he was lip, you know,

lip reading that there's just no room out there. Like he's showing his frustration. Yeah, that's the playoffs. Right. Like, that's the way it goes. That's exactly right. Stankgover, there's no room for him either. He's scoring.

I think that the bottom line is, like every team, there's always going to be change. and whether it's changed by the players saying, you know, I need a different scenario or change from the manager. Regardless, if you, there's 31 other teams that's going to have change. And even the team that wins always has changed because guys get contracts and they move on and stuff. But I look at Ottawa. I'd like to see them. I do not think they're going to get swept, but I thought they were going to win last night. And they didn't.

So I might be wrong. So I do think I'd like to see some pushback. The unfortunate part, they push back against the Leafs to make it a six games series, but they ended up losing anyways. I don't see them beating Carolina four games in a row, but I would like to see some pushback and see tomorrow if they can make somewhat of a series of it. Well, it's fascinating, isn't it? Because the whole conversation, the whole season was about the goal-tending.

And now it's about for the second playoffs in a row, but the goal scoring. They've got three goals combined in three games. Yeah. You know, in each of their four losses to the Leafs last year, they scored exactly two goals. Like, how good does your goal tend to be if you're going to score two goals a game? You know, and in this case, one goal a game in this series on average. I mean, Thutzla and Kachukh both zeros, zeros, zero, zero, Sam Mitchell's stats across the board. I mean, it's not a good look.

Yeah, it's too bad. It is, and again, the power play has been a big issue, and they've obviously all acknowledged that, but they're still going to go over the boards, and it's too little too late now. So they're Ottawa down 03, L.A. down O'3, the Penguins down O'3. So one of them, I do think we're going to see at least one sweep. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw multiple sweeps. As for the Leafs, you know, in the GM pursuit it, the reports are indicating we're down to two guys. You know, John Chaka and Scott White.

White is the assistant GM down in Dallas. They're still playing, obviously. So here's a question for you. I'm hoping it's one of those two or whatever, let's just say, and. Like, and somebody else. Let me ask you this. John Chica, here's the keys to the car. You know, what is your credentials of you?

You ran Arizona, which was run by the league, basically, because that team had no money. He cost them a first rounder because, you know, the incident would call. Scouting Combine. The Scouting Combine and that. And I think he's a smart guy, and he's a stat athlete's a good company, all of that type of stuff. I'm not saying he's not qualified. What qualifies you to take over this billion dollar empire? Like I think you need and something John Chaka and six assistant GMs?

Well, not six. No, I think they need to streamline. What they need is who else is coming in above him? You're saying above him is right. I'm saying like there is, if it's Matt Sundeen or Gary Roberts and. Matt Sundeen and John Chiker. Like I would, I think, and maybe I'm wrong in this, I was thinking about this today. If you believe that, let's just say Doug Armstrong was available, he probably cost you, what,

$6 million or more, like, you know, $10 million, whatever it is. There would be a big price tag attached to somebody like that. They might say if we were going to get Armstrong for this type of money, let's spread $6 to $10 million over three people and bring in a, committee and that's a president, hockey ops, and a general manager. Because if Scott White and or John Chaka is taking over

just in a singular version, I'm saying what else is coming? That would be my question. What if nothing else is coming? Then what's your reaction? White, I've said this before, so I've got to be consistent. White is at least trained under one of the best general

managers in hockey in Jim Nill. He's coming from a winning organization. He's coming from, you know, Like, if you've trained under Jim Nill, this is one of the gold standards in the National Hockey League. So he's been an apprentice and watched it firsthand. So I think if he wants to apply some of that knowledge, it's a good hire. Chica, I believe, you know, smart guy. We all know he's a smart guy, but, you know, does he have a winning pedigree?

Is he coming from somewhere? No, I mean, you know the answer to that. So that's a rhetorical question. So that's what I'm saying. So the track record, it looks different on one than the, So that's why I keep saying if there's a committee, then I have no problem with it. Okay. But again, if it's not, are you saying it's a disaster if they just hired John Chaker?

I don't think it's a disaster. I'm just saying like I think a lot of people will believe it's a disaster until proven otherwise. Right. I mean, let's call what it is. John Chica, again, he, they, he was a young guy in Arizona. It was a tough spot because they just didn't have resources and all that. Right.

And, you know, youngest GM in history, but his exit was weird, right? They basically suspended him from the league. Like I said, you're just, what are you doing? You've got to go away, yes. Yeah, because he tried to get out from his contract and allegedly maybe he was trying to get other gigs. It was a murky exit. Cost him a pick, I believe a first-round pick, setting up scouting combines away from

legislated combines by the league. So, yeah, I mean, his history is not a positive one, the one spot he's worked out. So if it's Chica, I will reserve judgment on what his plan is and what it's going to be. and I would assume he interviewed great, you know, and he obviously wooed Pelly. But if it's Chica at the top and then he fills out his staff below, there is going to have to take some time. They're going to have to prove this isn't just Keith Pelley saying,

I'm picking a guy that I know I can, this is still my operation, right? Because when Laiwiki was here, LeWiki was as loud and boisterous and as gregarious and over the top as anybody, Much more than Pelly, much more than Pelly. But when he hired Shanahan, it was like, all right, that's Shanahan. And then Lou came in. It's like, this guy's not around. Like, I know if Shanahan and Lua here, Likki's not poking around saying, what are we doing with this?

What are we doing with that? If it's John Chica on his own and then he fills out his staff, I think there's going to be a lot of speculation on Pellie's role in this moving forward. Go ahead, Dave. Yeah, no, I think, look, I mean, I think it's pretty clear the attraction of John Chiker, right? When you listen to Keith Pelly and what are people calling him, I got a kick out of what somebody in the business called me the other day, Keith GPT. Keith GPT called for data-centric decisions and evidence-based decisions and the use of AI. And, you know, John Chik has been at the forefront of that stuff, right? He's put his name for the decade plus it's been around.

He's been right out there as one of the self-styled leaders of that movement. So it's not hard to imagine why he would have absolutely wowed Keith Pelley in the interview room. But the thing I have a problem with guys, how many times have we heard of people wowing executives in an interview room that have no substance once they get into the gig? Right. And the bottom line is you talk about evidence-based. I want evidence that you know how to run a successful NHL team. And when it comes to John Chica, there isn't any.

Well, this is the one thing that I'll kind of climb off of what Brian said is we're not going to know. Say he gets hired today. You know, it's a news dump at 7.30 tonight. I wouldn't be shocked, but that would be so typical leaves. Which I hope that's not the case. I know. But let's just say he gets hired over the weekend. We're not going to know what he's capable of for months.

And that's the, I think as a fan base and in the media, whatever, I think that's what's scary is because he's going to come in and rightfully so. Whoever comes in is going to go, I need to clean some stuff up here. And it's going to take me time to do that. Brad Tree Living was drinking out of a fire hose. The minute he was hired because he had to sign Matthews, he had to do all these things. and it was hey the drafts right around the corner i've got to get up my staff going like this is

going to be the same thing so you know what the first five interviews are going to be like is like yeah i'm just getting the lay of the land and it's rightfully so it's going to be new to whoever comes into this situation so we're not going to know any of these questions that were answered are the answers to these questions that we're asking for months no for years ultimately i mean really years until you can look back and say that was the right player the wrong place. That's just a reality of hiring anybody. Right. Like if you're hiring someone to run your operation, you can

have faith in them, you can believe in them, you can give them all the resources in the world for them to flourish, but it will ultimately be on them. And that would apply if they hired anybody. Listen, this team hasn't won a cup in 60 years. You'll get Bill Zito, Julian Breezeball, and Kelly McCrimmon as a three-pack to run the team.

It doesn't guarantee anything. You still got to do the work and you've got to hire the right people and sign the right people. And, you know, further to that point, Noodle, it's like, Craig Baroube is still just the coach of the team. You know, is he going to be the coach? Is he not? Is that tied to this?

Where does Pellie stand on that? Where does ownership stand on that? Pellie did say, during the presser, if anyone's moving off the coach, that's going to go to ownership. But ownership's going to be involved in a decision like that. Right. So, you know, we'll see if it. And again, with Scott White, I don't know enough about him. And I don't know enough about John Chike in terms of, you know, boots on the ground.

I know his history in Arizona, and it was not a positive. one, but it's an incredibly difficult place to work, Arizona. It was a disaster. Like the coyotes were a mess. I don't think anyone could have success there. So, you know, I'm not painting a picture of what I know was going to be the future, but of what I'm aware of in the past and what I'm skeptical of in terms of the Leafs and where this is all going.

It is, you know, this is a crown jewel team, and it's like, we started this a month or two ago, be like, maybe they'd call Zito, maybe McCrimmon, maybe Doug Armstrong. If it ends up being a guy who hasn't been in the league for a long time because he kind of got run out and it was kind of a mess when he was there, they're going to have to really sell it. Here's something crazy. Really sell it to their fans. So, again, this isn't up to us, but we had heard Mike Gillis's name.

Who would you rather have? Mike Gillis or John Chica. Neither one of them have been in the league for a while. That's my point noodles. This is why I, listen, I know Scott White, and he's a really, really smart hockey guy. But again, I don't think Jim Nill is going, hey, I want you to move on. Like, Scott White is a big reason why Dallas has had success.

Like, you need smart people in the room. And I think Jim Nill is brilliant. I think Scott White is brilliant. I think, like, Dallas has a really good setup down there. Well, and to finish that point, that's an easy sales, easier, right? The Leafs are in disarray right now a little bit in terms of where they're going. But if you sell Leaf fans, hey, we're, bringing in a guy who's a huge part of that team in Dallas.

Right. Okay. Like, wow, they've got a lot of young talent. They're a really good team. They're competitive every year. Wow, I can get down with that. Let's do that. Let's go down that road.

It's a pretty serious fork in the road in terms of that and Gilles, that and Chica right now, if it is just those two guys. Mike Johnson on this and more in just over half an hour. Game three back at the Bell Center. Havs, Lightning will start Tia Nat up. J's in action. Rappers with a big win last night. We'll get to that.

Overdrive continues. TSN 1050 and on the TSN out. Mail it in Friday is brought to you by Boston Pizza. This playoffs, BP, is summoning the hockey gods to tilt the ice in Canada's favor. Join us and feast like a hockey god on our new playoff menu. See you for Puck Drop at your local BP. All right, Mail it in Friday, brought to you by Boston Pizza. Canada's favorite sports part of this playoffs.

BP is summoning the hockey gods to tilt the ice in Canada's favor. join us and feast like a hockey got on our new playoff menu. See you for puck drop by your local BP. A few games in the Stanley Cup playoffs tonight. The NBA playoffs continuing, the NFL draft continuing, right? That'll continue tonight and throughout the weekend. Raptors back in action on Sunday after a big win last night. And Scotty was great.

And CMB was unbelievable last night. That gives me hope, Dave, that Barnes and Murray Boyles are here. And you find a way to make that work into the field. future. Yeah, I'll tell you what, man, that 20-year-old kid's CMB, I mean, he's tough. Like, he's got a banged-up thumb. He's got his thumb is taped. He's undersides. He's going against a team with two great big men, and he's down there in the trenches shooting 73% from the field. I love it. This kid is unbelievable. Yeah, he fights. He fights. And Barrett had a great night last night. And, you know, Ingram, after a win, it doesn't matter as much. Just not even involved.

He melted into that, like, they, yeah. He's not a storyline. It's not. It wasn't him last night. It was Barrett that picked up the slack for the most part offensively. The joke was like Cleveland didn't want to get him into foul trouble because they'd take them off the floor. You know, like don't, you know, don't let that happen.

Let's keep them out there. Right. Exactly. Exactly. But yeah, Scotty was great. That was a big one last night. And Vladdy was there. Vladdy was in attendance last night, which was cool.

And Kea Nurse was down there. And Fester, you're going to have a five pack for us in terms of. the faces of Toronto sports coming up a little bit later this afternoon. And I have to think Vladdy's high on that list. And that was cool to see him last night. And he'll be, of course, at the Rogers Center tonight. And so will our next guest from MLB.com and TSN. Here's our main man, Keegan Matheson.

How are we doing, Keegan? Doing well, fellows. We're back. How's everything going? Yeah, it's great. Good to see you. Ross Akin speaking today. Is there anything in particular that you took out of that that would be considered news

Worthy. What was the biggest piece of news from Ross Atkins this afternoon? Big one guys being what we expected today, which is Jeff Hoffman being removed from the closures role. Now, they are framing this as they're going to move to a group effort here. This is going to be a closer by committee and everyone's going to get a crack at it. Louis Varland, I expect Braden Fisher, maybe Mason Flew Hardy, Tyler Rogers. But the big news out of that is that it's not Jeff Hoffman's job right now. And the reasons are extremely obvious because we've talked about Jeff Hoffman. probably the last five times I've been on.

And if you're talking about a closer, it's rarely because we're saying, damn, isn't the closer really good? So we've been talking about the closer for too long. This is where it's ended up, guys, and it's the right decision. And this allows Jeff Hoffman to go pitch in the sixth or the seventh inning and figure this out.

Last year, his problem was home runs. This year, the problem has been that on top of walks, hitting batters, the control is not there. So this is a step back. In July, August, September, we might be talking about him closing games again, but for now, he is out, and you're going to see a lot of different guys in the ninth inning.

So, Kagan, you just talked about a lot of different guys in them doing it by committee. Is there somebody that you would circle that might have the inside track or you believe could get to that next level to take over that role? Yeah, Noodles. Louis Varlane is their best reliever.

Outside of Mason Miller, he might be one of the best relievers from Major League Baseball right now. But I don't think that means he's the closer every single night. So what I mean by that, guys, is that I think question number one, if you're John Schneider and you're Pete Walker and you're Ross Atkins, every single night going into a game, is how can we get Louis Varland, our best reliever,

in the most important spot of the game? That's probably going to be the ninth inning, a lot of nights, but there will be nights where it's the eighth inning. Their one, two, three hitters are coming up, you're trying to hold on to a lead. That's when you use Louis Varland, the biggest spot for your best pitcher. And then I think you feel good about Braden Fisher,

Fleurty, Rogers, whoever it is in the ninth inning. The role of the classic closer has gone away a little bit. It's a bit more flexible across the league. It's another reason to use the word collaboration, fellas. I'm always excited to find a new reason for people to collaborate in this sport. But it's going to be a little bit of everybody. And I think Louis Varlane gets the first bite whenever it's possible. Higin, you talk about, you know, it's a reset for Hoffman,

and he can go and figure things out and get back to who he thinks he can be. given where he's been and the scar tissue mentally that may or may not exist after this man had the World Series in his hand and it slipped away, is it even feasible that if this team believes it's going to be a playoff team, it's going to snap out of this early slow start and get right back to where it hoped it could be and it will be in the playoffs?

Is it feasible in your mind that this guy could be your playoff closer again given what happened last playoffs? Yeah, a lot's got to change, right? It's similar to the conversation, guys, we've had a bit about Brendan Little. Like he went down to AAA and he's looked great, but what happens when you bring him back? So even if Jeff Hoffman goes out and has 10 scoreless outings in a row,

and he's striking out a ton of batters, what's going to happen when he comes into the ninth? And the light show plays for him, and the game is on the line there. That's the great unknown. And at the trade deadline, there are going to be closers available who you can go out and go get.

It's the most important factor, I think, in this, is how you handle the mental side. and Jeff Hoffin, we've seen him thrive as a closer and bounce back from bad outings. But I think that's something that even me sitting here, I need to recognize it. If I have a bad day and write a crappy story, maybe someone tells me I had a typo, but life doesn't get much worse than that, okay? When Jeff Hoffin has a bad day, we're talking about him all day. Everyone hates the guy. Everyone's pissed off, but the closer blew the game. It is one of the most high-pressure jobs in sports.

And when you do the job, you don't always get the applause. get, okay, that's what you were supposed to do. The closure's supposed to save games, all right? So that's a major hurdle. It's a big one. And I think that the Blue Jays closer come August, September, October, might not even be on this roster right now. If there's one area that probably gets talked about leading up with the trade deadline, I know we're way down the road, but it's the back end of the bullpen, and there's always somebody available. With Keegan Matheson, Jay's Guardians down at the don't tonight. Atkins didn't really give any concrete answers on Barrios or you, either, Keegan, like Barrios is close, and maybe you can join soon, but they're not sure,

and you're savage, you've got to think of a lot of things. How do you interpret the Atkins dance on those two in particular today? Thankfully, I'm experienced interpreting, fellas, not to practice. But right now, it feels like Berrios is the normal rehab, and Yassavage is the strange one. Because right now, Berrios, I know there's nothing normal about pitching through a cracked elbow. I'm still amazed this is working or happening at all. credit to him. He's making it happen. He is going to pitch again Tuesday in AAA Buffalo. If that goes well, and if he gets up to 70 plus pitches, no reason his next star can't be in the big leagues.

Like, as long as everything looks good, Berrios is, when he's good, he's just such a normal, predictable pitcher. And I think he can get back to that. Yassavage has been a little more of a wildguard in all of this. Each of his last two rehab outings, I thought, were the last ones. But there have been a lot of conversations with YSavage throughout this. Sounds like there's going to be more of those. His results have not exactly been there. And guys, if you are Bereos or Kevin Gosman and you have an ugly rehab start, I don't care.

I really don't. But if you're Trey Savage, you haven't fully established himself in the big leagues and the routines and the boring things that go into true greatness in the big leagues, you want to see some results. And they haven't gotten those from you Savage. So we should know more tomorrow. But one way or the other, a couple of weeks from now, they will have a couple of healthy pitchers coming back. I think that's a very good thing. You can bump Lauer to the bullpen in a long roll. Maybe we'll see how he likes that.

I'm not sure. But things will get better pretty soon. So, Keegan, I was down at the basketball game last night, though. It was a bit of a slow start for both teams, a really sloppy game. And the biggest cheer until probably the fourth quarter of the Raptors exploded and won the thing was for your guy, Vladie Guerrero Jr. When they showed him on the big screen, probably the most popular athlete in Toronto right now. And I'm wondering, like, he's about to play his thousandth game as a Blue Jay. I think it's like, what is a short list of maybe 12 guys that have played more.

But is it, you know, and yet, and yet, and we know how great he was in the playoffs. And yet, is it too early to start wondering, like, is he still a singles hitter in the regular season? Or what's going on here? Yeah. Yeah, when I look at the records, guys, I was going through it today because of game 1,000. He's going to own every record forever in this organization. and he's a lot closer to the games played and the hits and runs scored, walks, all of those, than he is the home runs.

Within three or four years, guys, he is going to knock off Delgado, Bautista, Tony Fernandez, Vernon Wells, for all of those counting stats. And I think he's going to do it pretty easily. And we'll end up just having the conversation of does he win a ring or not for the greatest of all time, et cetera, et cetera. But home runs, it's a little further down the road. You're probably, if he's hitting 30 a year guys, like he has been, you're probably looking more six, seven, eight years down the road. To catch Carlos Delgado.

And I think about Delgado's peak guys from 98 to 2003. He was hitting 40, 42 a year. And that's what I think of when I think of a power hitter. I know that Flattie's always been more of a hitter than a power guy naturally. But when I look at him and see how he is built. And when I see what he can do with one swing of the bat, it's hard to get excited about singles. And I know they still matter.

I know they're not an out. I get it. But when you see a guy that wins the home run derby, who looks like if you walk past Vladdy on the street, you're looking at the guy saying he hits home runs. The dude's built for power. The Blue Jays could benefit from that so much more right now. And I know he's not getting pitches to hit.

Neither are any of the great hitters. Okay, I don't like that as an excuse all the time. You think the guy's winning home run crowns every year getting cookies? No. So I think they need the Vladdy that's hitting 35-38 home runs, not the 25-28. There's a huge difference there. Yeah, I mean, you look at the lineup tonight. Lucas had a much better weekend.

Like the last handful of games, he's starting to come around. But they got Lucas leading off, Clement hit in second, Sanchez, 4th, Lenin Sosa 5th. Like, it's just a wild lineup right now. Right? With Springer and Kirk and Barger out. It's just a wild, wild. looking lineup.

What do you expect until Springer returns and until Barger returns? We know Kirk's going to be further down the line, but like they've got to play some small ball here, I think, to put runs on the board. It's amazing to look at this lineup, guys, on April 24th. You know, like, it's, it once again brings me back to the idea of what the hell am I doing in spring training all those weeks. So, so confidently predicting how the season will go. but this looks like a lineup that needs to figure out some way, somehow.

And guys going back to what we just talked about with Vladdy, a big home run from Vladdy takes care of all this. And we don't talk about anything else until George and until Addison Barger are back. But I didn't expect to be talking about Lenin Sosa this year, especially not as the number five hitters. I didn't expect to be talking about a revolving door in the lead-off spot. What made the Blue Jays great last year was that they figured out a way. They were creative.

and that can be something that's difficult to attain year over a year. There's some magic to it. It's hard to grasp. But the easiest solution to every damn question the Blue Jays are going to face these next couple weeks until they're healthy again is Vlad. It's the easy answer. Maybe it's the lazy answer out. But if he has a big game or two, everything else that's strange about this lineup suddenly

looks like a great complimentary supporting cast around the superstar. And these are the times they need him more. than ever. Yeah, you're right. He gets on a heater right now. It might be the time you need it over the course of 162. Like get on a heater for two weeks and then, you know, take it from there. Jay's Guardians

tonight throughout the weekend. Great catching up with you, Kagan. We'll do it again soon. Thank you for this. You got her, fellow. There he has. Kegan Mathis at MLB.com. Wow. Vladdy is at two home runs. Yeah, he's got two home runs. He's on pace for under 20 home runs this year. So similar to last year. Like he's

He's hitting a boy. He had a pretty good weekend. Like his numbers are okay. You know, he's hitting over 300. He's got like a 900 OPS and, you know, Vladi. That's to be expected, though. You're also getting paid a lot of money. His contract has kicked in now.

You're one of the four or five highest paid players in baseball are real close to it. So go do your thing. I mean, I expect him to play well. But the lineup, like Hazu Sanchez hit a clean up and Lenin Sosa hitting fifth is not something I had on my bingo cardamont. Not what I was expect. That's back to the old hoojays. Yes.

And listen, at times it was like that last year, I remember we'd come on noodles, especially when they were hot, like, down the stretch, and we'd be like, man, you got Nathan Lucas hit in second. You got, you know, Schneider leading off here. You got all these different players who were factoring. Baird-Barrick, exactly. It was factoring insignificantly. They'd have kinder for lef in the lineup.

You're like, all right, I guess he'll contribute tonight. And that's, I think, what Keegan's saying. You get the big boys playing the way they're supposed to and other guys can filter inappropriately. The issue is when you're asking someone who's not capable of doing it to do it. You can't ask a guy who's not capable of hitting, you know, in the cleanup spot conventionally to do it consistently. It might give you a few games here or there, a series here or there,

but he can't do it over the course of 15, 20, 50 games, 100 games plus. And obviously that will not be the case because Springer will return pretty soon and Barger, hopefully, not far behind him. All right, Mike Johnson in 20 minutes. Dave, you get a list for us. We've got our best bet still to come. Overdrive continues up on YouTube live. All right, Mike Johnson in 15 minutes.

A few games in the Stanley Cup playoffs again tonight. Big win for Buffalo. Alex Talk looking good last night. Big win for Buffalo down in Boston. A couple adjustments, too, right? They went with Alex Lion and Net. They just didn't panic. They just was like, okay, we're going to go with this guy.

You know, a few adjustments here or there. Oslin, I think, went in, and that was it. I mean, I didn't think Boston played particularly well, but Buffalo deserves a lot of credit. Going to Lion, I like that, right? That's the tandem goaltending. Tandem goaltending. What do you got for us?

You got pulled. You're out for game three. Yeah, I just read a comment of how Jared Bednour says during his availability today. We're not locked into one goaltender. We have two. It's going to be on how they play and their rest and the schedule type of thing. So if you have that, you've got to go to two. If you don't, then you're with one.

It's funny, noodles, because it feels like, you know, for a long time, like when we were growing up, there was always this thing, like coaches wanted a number one. And it was like, if you got two, you don't have one. And now it seems like so many coaches are just, hey, man, the more the merrier. Like, can we get three? Because this guy can't play. And then guess what?

If this guy can't play, we're going to need another guy. This guy might get hurt, too. We may need three. It speaks to that. there isn't 25 number one goaltenders in the world anymore. There's 6, 7, 8. Everybody else is a tandem goaltender. They're all, you know, all are good goaltenders, but there's no, you know, there's

Vasilevsky, you know, name them all. There's Ottinger, Swamen, there's guys like that. That'll play 60 games. Outside of that, everybody else is a tandem. So you are going to have to juggle. Depends on how it goes. Well, and listen, if you're Colorado, you have the advantage of saying that now, right? Maybe we'll put Blackwood in now because we're 3-0, you know, just a toy with L.A.

But, you know, and like you said, Wedgwood's been pretty good. And UPL was good game one, you know, it was just game two. It got away from them, and they put Lion in there, and both them were really good all year. You don't win your division with a tandem goaltending unless both of them were really good. You know, that's how the least won the division last year, stole our sandwall, we're both really good. So you didn't have to rely on one guy or worry about one guy. But you know what was interesting in that Colorado game was they called another embellishment on McKinnon.

Like these star players are getting clipped. Did I miss something? Like did Betman issue some statement prior to the playoffs that he's sick and tired of diving? I thought last night was kind of a weird one because McKinnon got up pretty quickly. You know, like he definitely sold it a bit, but he didn't lay there.

He got up. You know, I don't know. I was a bit surprised they called that on him. I think refs have just had enough of like, okay, like play the game straight up and don't make us look bad. We, again, we say it all the time. We have the luxury of watching it 25 times and replay and rewinding our TV, all of that. They're watching it live.

And if they think somebody goes down soft, I don't mind that the refs are pushing back on that. And I agree. I don't think McKinnon like laid there and flopped or anything. Like Sid's was more egregious, I think, than I before in terms of kind of sound of. but that's Sid and McKinnon in back-to-back nights. Let me ask you guys this, away from those penalties, did you think that Taylor Hall on Sanderson was a major? I mean, that was, he had his elbow tucked, but it's still a head shot.

He got him in the head. He definitely did. He definitely got him in the head. It definitely could have. I don't think it was worthy of a suspension, which it's not going to be. But, you know, he's in a vulnerable spot. He's kind of reaching for the puck, and Hall commits to it and gets him. You know, yeah, I think that would have been reasonable in the moment to call him for five minutes.

Okay, so Michael Annalauer went after, you know, and rightfully so, said, hey, like, that should have been a major. That's a joke. Travis Green was pissed. They've announced that Sanderson's not playing, said he wasn't feeling well. Did he hurt his hand or did he, does he concussed from that hit? Like, that's either way, he's not playing. Right. You know, Otto was in big trouble because of it.

So, yeah, I mean, ultimately it doesn't matter as much because they're down three nothing. If it was 2-1, this would be a much bigger story. I think Hall has played pretty well in the series, too. I think he's been pretty effective. Five points. Yeah, he's been, he looks good, man. Like, he's still got wheels and he plays aggressively. And he fits in very well in Carolina.

He's played well. So that would be big to lose him. But it may not matter at this point. Mike Johnson coming up, Jay's back in action. Rappers going to game four on Sunday. They've got themselves a big win last night. More on that into the next hour. Overdrive continues.

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