PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - After their Postseason run in 2023, are the Diamondbacks destined to follow the Phoenix Suns’ path?

Episode Date: November 16, 2023

The Arizona Diamondbacks’ young core of future stars helped propel the team to an unexpected World Series berth in 2023. But will the success cause a change of direction by the front office similar to the Phoenix Suns after their run to the NBA Finals? We are also discussing MLB owners unanimously approving the Oakland As move to Las Vegas. Even though the move is terrible for Oak Town, is it ultimately good for baseball?An ALLCITY Network ProductionSUBSCRIBE to our YouTube: https://bit.ly/phnx_youtubeALL THINGS PHNX: http://linktr.ee/phnxsports PHNX Events: Get your tickets to D-backs Takeovers, Knockout Nights & Suns Watch Parties at BetMGM, and MORE here: https://www.eventbrite.com/o/phnx-56002330273 Desert Financial Credit Union: Open a free checking account online with Desert Financial Credit Union and get $200 in bonuses https://www.desertfinancial.com/200Get 10% off your first order of Hero Bread at https://www.hero.co/ by using code PHNXSchedule a free in-home estimate with Empire Today! All listeners can receive a $350 OFF discount when they use the promo code PHNX. Restrictions apply. See EmpireToday.com/PHNX for details.Check out all Gila River Resorts & Casinos has to offer from fine dining to Arizona’s largest casino sportsbook. Visit https://www.playatgila.com to learn more.Go to https://saturdayneon.com and use code PHNX for 10% off your order today. Free shipping for orders over $200!Gametime: Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code PHNX for $20 off your first purchase.Pins & Aces: Check out https://pinsandaces.com and use code PHNX to receive 15% off your first order and get free shipping.Circle K:  Join Inner Circle for free by downloading the Circle K app today! Head to https://www.circlek.com/store-locator to find Circle Ks near you!OGeez!: Score 25% off a bag of your favorite OGeez! Fruits or Creams. Go to https://zenleafdispensaries.com, add a bag of OGeez! to your cart, enter promo code “PHNX” and pickup at a local Zen Leaf Dispensary. Must be 21+. Enjoy responsibly. Four Peaks: Follow them on social @fourpeaksbrew & @fourpeakspub! Must be 21+. Enjoy responsibly. When you shop through links in the description, we may earn affiliate commissions. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome to another edition of the PHNX T-Backs podcast, right new on PHMX. Of course, my name is Derek Montia, occasionally known as your mayor of PHMX. I'm joined by the Valley Sports Tsar himself and our king of content. None other than the one and only Espo. Look, can I give you an introduction? Because you always get interdoct.

You always have to give the introductions. Would you please? But I want to say, the man, the host, his name is big Derek Energy. Derek Montia. I like that. Jesse, you're fired. We're going to, Tespo's here permanently. Of course, Jesse will be back next week, but I'm excited to have, well, maybe not.

I'm the czar. I make that decision. He is the one that makes these calls around here. But I'm very excited to talk about things with this guy because there's some interesting stuff going on in baseball. and it kind of relates back to what we've seen here in the valley over the last 20, 25 years, right? There's a lot of stuff going on. But the biggest thing here today, the biggest news in the baseball world,

is that the MLB owners have voted unanimously for the Oakland A's to relocate to Las Vegas. And I know this was something that was coming. We were kind of expecting it. It's not like this is a huge surprise. It's just now that it's happened, it feels like this sucks. Well, it feels like that MLB is, kind of treating the symptom and not the disease here because the problem is in Oakland. The problem is ownership in Oakland and the approach over the last handful of years and beyond that

in trying to get a new ballpark thing. Right. I don't feel like this has ever been the fans. I know that they've drawn poorly over the last few years, but if you gave me the crap that you were putting out there, I wouldn't go there as a fan either. I don't blame the fans necessarily. Their approach to finding a ballpark, not looking at some of the hurdles that were going to happen. You have to understand that politically.

And then the owner not being willing to put the money either in the ballpark or in the team is problematic. And what worries me the most, and sorry, I don't mean to step on everything you probably have to say. But they ran a study in Major League Baseball and said, financially, they're not sure Las Vegas is viable, right? So if you're looking at that, and I can, I'll read from, this was from an athletic piece,

but said, you know, the report was spoken about by someone who wasn't authorized to speak publicly, but they said it called the viability of Las Vegas iffy in large part because the success for the A's would be highly dependent on tourist visiting.

Of course. That work. for the NFL. I can go, hey, guys, you won't go to Vegas for a weekend, catch an NFL game, get drunk, play the slots, go home. Yeah. The benefit of the Golden Knights has been that they've been really good. Yeah. So you drew the hometown crowd because they came out the gates and were surprisingly good. Very similar to the Diamondbacks that won that title so early in their existence. Not quite as early as the Golden Knights, but yeah, it's almost a necessity because you need people to take notice in a town like that, just like here in Phoenix, and people there

like a winner. So if you can make them a winner early on, it's going to immediately build that fan base of kind of like dedicated diehard fans because you won right away. Well, and you know that, you know, that John Fisher isn't going to put the money in to have that happen. Yeah. Yeah. So then you're talking about, okay, Major League Baseball plays seven days a week. Yeah, you get an off day every once in a while in there. but this isn't going to be where tourists are like, hey, you want to go on a random Tuesday to an A's game? We'll fly to Vegas.

Right. In the morning, we'll fly out the next day. We'll have a good time. It's not going to work that way. Well, and that also seems like a really terrible way to build a sports franchise because we here have that problem in Arizona, but not to that extent, right? Like, we're not, we're not necessarily a tourist town as much as we are kind of a transplant city, where people have come from all over the place and they tend to hold on to their own fandoms.

But, like, you cover the suns and you. you've kind of seen it grow over the years where the sun's been around long enough that we don't really have that transplant fan as much in the sun's community as much as we do in baseball, considering we have spring training here and that the Diamondbacks have only existed for 26 years. Yeah, I mean, even with the Suns, when things are bad, you're still, you're not selling out. You're drawing a much smaller crowd. It's a lot quieter. You're getting the opposing fans in there as well.

So to me, this, also, the ballpark being on the strip. And I'm a guy that working in the NBA, I spent weeks at a time in July in Vegas, all right? And for Summer League, and I just, if you want to build something that's really going to grow roots there, I wouldn't have built it on the strip because people that live in Las Vegas don't like going to the strip. Yeah, it's going to be right off where like the Tropicana is right now. It's right across from the MGM. Yeah. It's just, it does not make a lot of sense to me.

me the way they're looking at this. So if your whole plan's tourists, you're going to wind up in the same spot. You're going to have a half full ballpark with an owner that's unwilling to spend money. It's interesting you say that because I went to Las Vegas during the postseason run on a little weekend trip and prices were outrageous simply because there was a home or there was a Monday night football game and the Packers were in town, which we know the Packers are a team that their fans travel well. But like, you know, like that, for instance, even, right?

Like, are you ever going to get that? Are you ever going to get where so many fans from an opposing team come in that they literally alter the prices of hotels in the area just due to how many opposing fans are coming to town? I don't think you're ever going to get that in baseball. I mean, unless it's playoffs, then maybe I could see that where, hey, the, you know, the angels are playing the A's in the playoffs in Vegas. Yeah, let's hop over there for two games and spend some time.

But regular season, you're not. Yeah. And if ownership's proven anything, they don't spend money, so you're not going to see the playoffs. Right, right. You know, so I think it's a bad. The only benefit we're never going to hear the Arizona Diamondbacks are flirting with Henderson or flirting with Vegas.

That's a fact. Yeah, that is at least taken out of the equation. And I know that there's still some, like, there's still some groups around. the country that are looking to bring baseball, like to Nashville, for instance, and things like that. Portland, yeah, right, in Portland, right. But I mean, and I know this sucks for Oakland. This really sucks for Oakland because this is a community that has now been robbed of all of

their sports teams, essentially, right? And their major sports teams. And seeing them all go to Las Vegas, too, that's like kind of the worst thing is like, your teams are literally all relocating to another city. But is it good for baseball in any way, considering? that that stadium and that whole situation had just become so bad. I mean, like, I don't like it because, like you said, it's really treating, it's not, it's not treating the actual problem, right?

And the problem here is that teams essentially need to make this commitment to, or owners, ownership groups, they need to make this commitment to a team to constantly, you know, upgrade the facilities to work on it. I mean, right now we know of some of our, you know, sources telling us about, the stuff going on in Chase Field, which is great because Chase Field doesn't feel necessarily like it's unsalvageable at this point. You just need to maintain a professional ballpark or stadium and have it constantly, those upgrades are constant. It's not just something that you can do one time because you built a new stadium and then just kind of keep it clean after that.

Well, I'm sorry, but if you're Fisher, if you're any of these owners, and this isn't a political thing because I but if you don't have the money to pay for it yourself and you're crying poor and the city goes well I don't know that we can do this that's on you bro you're the one that bought this that's a part of you that's a part of your team it's a part of uh you know what will keep you uh making money a part of your lifeline I I don't blame them for for the city of Oakland going why would I give you all this money when you haven't done shit with this team It's also, at what point do they pay the money back?

At what point when the city helps a team get up on their feet or get whatever they need in order to renovate or whatever, like we don't ever get to see the owner's books. We don't ever get to see how much these teams make. So it's like they can just manufacture that they're out of money as much as they want. Meanwhile, we have no idea how much they're actually making. Yeah, I mean, what happens here is, you know,

he gets to move to Vegas. They give him $380 million to subsidize. that stadium and it's a windfall for him and and the city of Vegas you know gets another attraction yeah you know but you're never going to actually be able to gauge what that does you're likely never actually making that 380 million dollars back right as a city right but you're just you're just doing it with the idea that it's going to bring in enough commerce into a city that already brings in plenty of tourists and plenty of like there's never a night that lost Vegas isn't busy.

There's never, I've gone on a fucking Wednesday in the middle of February and there's shit going on. Like, there's never not something going on in Las Vegas. When you think Major League Baseball, you don't think Las Vegas

is it. You're not drawn in that kind of crowd. Look, if I'm, if I'm... Road trips are going to be electric, though. We go. We're going to go. We're going to have some road trips.

But I mean, our fan base is a little different. The traditional MLB fan base isn't quite that. But if I'm, if I'm Robman, And thank God I'm not. But if I was, I would look at Oakland and I go, let's find an ownership group and give an expansion team to there. And part of my deal with the A's would be you got to leave the name there.

Yeah. You got rebrand in Las Vegas. And then we're going to get that expansion fee in Oakland. We're going to get a new ballpark there. And the A's can remain there. And then everybody gets a piece of it. The other owners are happy because they get their expansion fee. you go there, you go either Portland,

Nashville, the Montreal. Back in the day of the pilots that became the brewers, like that one situation kind of set all of this stuff into motion where that's why Tropicana Field exists to this day is that they were just building ballparks in cities to lure a major franchise away to come play there. Didn't they almost get the giants?

Wasn't that? Oh yeah. There were a lot of things that almost happened because of things like this. And so like that I was going to ask you, as much as, you know, is there any good for baseball in this? And I guess the idea here is that, you know, it rejuvenates a franchise that a lot of people have lost interest potentially in. And it gives them a chance to grow in a new city if that should happen.

But it feels like there's much more bad than good, including the fact that this like, this plays into that whole narrative where franchises, ownership groups now can make this threat and be like, look what happened to the A is moving to Las Vegas. And if they don't get what they want, you know what I mean? like can actually potentially uproot their team and move it. And like you said, in some situations, it's unfair because they're just asking for the city to pay for things on behalf of a team that is not sharing those revenue with the city. For a sport that all we ever hear about is tradition.

And you can't do this because of tradition. You can't add a pitch clock. You can't make the bases bigger. They're moving a team that's been there since the 60s. That's tradition. Raleigh Fingers playing there, the Bash brothers. Like there's tradition with the Oakland A's and you're crapping on it because Las Vegas is bright and shiny.

You're crapping on it because you happen to get in bed with a guy that wasn't smart enough to figure out how to make money with a professional baseball team. And then I had to cry poor and get a handout because really he just tanked the value of his asset in Oakland so he could get more money in Las Vegas. That's not what a traditional, sport should do. They should be trying to protect a heritage city like Oakland. I get it. They came from

Philly originally, but they've been there since the 60. This isn't a team that won one single championship. This is a team that won nine world series titles. And I know that that doesn't have any impact anymore when it comes to the sports world. But I really feel like it should. Like you said, there's just so much history. And it's it's a slap in the face to the sports fans in California. California and Oakland. I mean, don't get me wrong. Those people at times are spoiled with how many teams they have in that gigantic state of theirs. But I do have a bigger overall issue here. And that is, do the Diamondbacks now become the Oakland A's NL rival? Or is it still the San Francisco Giants? Or is it just the people in Oakland? The Las Vegas A's now as far as being close?

Like, aren't we the closest team now to them? I mean, I guess since now the whole NL hail, it does. doesn't really matter anymore. It doesn't. Yeah, it doesn't matter. I think they do become a arrival because now it's another team in a desert city. It's right. It's five hours from here. You know five hours. Three hours and 50 minutes. Depends. Depends on if you want to get a ticket or not. Oh, that's a low blow. That's a low blow. Did that yes or no, yes or true, did that happen the last time that you went to Vegas? What's that? What's that? You're Mr. Three Hours 50 minutes. I did get out three hours of 50 minutes.

How much is it cost you? How much did it cost you? $279. Yeah, see, there you go. You could have flown for 45 minutes for that. He's not wrong. But yeah, I think it does become a rival for a lot of reasons in that. And I'm very interested to see how it plays out. That's the weirdest thing with the way baseball's changed and the NL and AL not really

being split anymore. Everybody kind of playing everybody is it does open a. up for, because traditionally they wouldn't have been rivals. Now, there's an opportunity. Jay, Jay's right. He says, I can't even watch the movie Moneyball the same anymore. You're damn right about that. That's not going to be possible. Or it's going to be like a historical

piece at this point. Remember when they were in Oakland? Remember when they were poor still, but they figured out a way to make it work in Oakland? Those were good old days, but speaking of good days, we thank you guys for being here in the PHNX Sports YouTube channel. As always, it's always a good time with you guys

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We always appreciate you, leaving us a like. And of course, we thank you guys for being here. And if you're listening on the audio side, Derek and I are both 145 pounds and ripped. Just absolutely ripped right now. It's the best shape of our lives. It's incredible. We look like the Bash brothers from back in the day. That's right.

That's right. Also, you know, again, Jesse, you're fired. Espo's the permanent replacement. Me and Espo are going to take our boys' trip without you and Damon to Heela River Resorts and Casinos, by the way. No one does it better. I have a sick Rav 4, but it's from 2019. There's no Ox Court. We have Bluetooth and my sickerab 4. You see, we're stepping our game up here. And you should step your game up to when it comes to staycations here in the Valley, luxury,

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Can we move the A's down to? Yeah. That would be over there. There's lots of space over there by Wild Horse Pass. So we can do that for sure. Again, they also have the BetMGM out there. If you don't want to go all the way out there to get down on the sportsbook, you can download the BetMGM Sportsbook at now and use our code of PHNX.

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I forgot I'm going to guess. That was a different direction all together. Connor Mormon says PHNX takeovers in Vegas. Yes, yes, let's do it. Let's go takeover Las Vegas. I'm fine with that. I'm down with that for sure. There's definitely some precedents set there by the Raiders about how fun it can be to go to Las Vegas.

So I'm not against that. But here in the Valley, there has been a precedent set here as far as sports teams go, the success that they have. And that would be the Phoenix Suns, obviously. We know that they went from, you know, struggling there for a number of years to, you know, the Bubble Sun's years to everything that they've done in the playoffs and making it to the finals. And now when you look at the Arizona Diamondbacks, they are kind of following in those footsteps just a bit, right? And so I'm glad you're here to talk about this because they've kind of followed that path of the bubble suns.

You know, they went from having one of their worst years in franchise history to the, the next year being close, you know, making it back to like close to 500, close to the playoffs, but respectability, right. And now, you know, the next season, here we are unexpectedly in the NBA or in the championship game, like you guys were in the NBA finals. But, and you could say a few crafty vets helped them along the way. So there was a lot of similarities as far as like how they got to that next level. But now, you know, there is kind of a pitfall here when you look at what happened with the suns

and where the Diamondbacks are at. because like the Suns used to be constructed, there's a lot of young talent on this team. And now maybe to get to that next level, the Diamondbacks might need to start trying to do what the Suns did and bring in those superstars from other franchises. I think there's a distinct difference here. The Diamondbacks have drafted so well over the last, what, five years?

Yeah, I mean, the Phoenix Suns had one very good draft pick, or one great draft pick in Devon, or one very good one in McHale Bridges and one good one in Cam Johnson. And it really wasn't necessarily sustainable success with it. I think that's why they made the kind of moves that they did. I think the dime backs are set up for long-term success with how well Mike Hazen is drafted, how they've built that farm system. There is a dearth of young talent.

The sons didn't have that. They had a handful of guys and you knew there was, okay, we could try to grow with these, you know, with these couple of guys, or we can flip the two pieces we really have, leverage the future and go that way. I feel like even if you deal one or two guys on the Steinbeck's, you know, from the farm system or some of the fringe younger guys up in the majors, you still have such a solid young core that they'll grow still together, that there's multiple years of success. Right now, the Phoenix Suns are in, you know, boom or bust.

It's win it in the next two years or likely you're in salary cap hell, which obviously you don't have to worry about in baseball. No, that does not exist. And then so really you have such a small window. The Diamondbacks, I think, just open. and an entire, you know, those sliding glass doors that have like four, a wall of glass. I feel like the diamondbacks opened a wall of glass. The suns kicked open half a window when they did it.

That's fair. I think the dime backs are very much set up for long-term success, where the sons, I don't think, ever truly were. And it was you had to leverage it to go all in because the one guy you have in Devin Booker was in his prime. Right. And see, the thing here that we've talked about in the past has been like, when you are building a franchise to that championship level, there are those like steps along

the way. And then first important step is establishing who the core is that you're going to build around. And it's like as much as I'm sure they wanted to build around their young core of McHale Bruges, Devin Booker and Cam Johnson. It's like you said, it's a matter of assets and it's a matter of really trying to get, you know, to that next, next level, which is where you add those pieces to that that core. Like, that's what the Diamondbacks had established in one single year. And then they also moved kind of to that next level of also while establishing who their core is to build around for the future. They also made a championship run, you know? And so, like, it feels like, especially with Mike Hazing sticking around for the long term with his extension, Tori Lavello being here with his

extension, that they're not going to do anything as far as like get off path, get crazy. And with it, start trading away some of these young pieces that help them get to the World Series. But it does become kind of a tantalizing, you know, period of time where some of your guys' value because of the playoff run you had might be at an all-time high. And you pair that with the fact that, you know, maybe they do find an opportunity to bring in what they feel like is that one piece that's going to get them up to that next level. I mean, they've got some shortcomings around their lineup and in their starting rotation. right but it's not like they're that far away from from being a fairly complete team but think about

last off season they they obviously had more gaps than than this year that they needed to fill and mike hazin was smart took a young player in dalton varshow turned into gabby morano and lordis and like and you see that and you go that's the way you leverage young talent to find other young talent that better fits the whole that you have and you have a surplus of outfielders they had a surplus of catchers the deal just made sense no matter how much Toronto Blue Jays fans are going to kind of have some some pains and some anger over you know losing Moreno and seeing him do what he did here you don't even know if he was going to do that in in Toronto because of the opportunity that's what I'm saying because of how stack they are catcher yeah like I don't need to see a Zach

cranky trade I don't know or a move to get Zach Branky I don't see need to see a move to get Madison Bumgarner uh somebody in the Aalise mentions the Dansby-Swanson trade. I don't need anything like that where your mortgaging future for guys that were really good at one point but aren't necessarily going to be that guy anymore. Yeah. Take a shot on a guy that could become that guy.

Give me another Zach Gowan type move where you're like, okay, I see this guy in the next year being that guy. He's been on the precipice and now I want to go do that. That's the way I want to see him fill holds. That doesn't mean you can't go get some select veterans, but you don't leverage, you know, a loller or anybody of Jones. You don't leverage those guys that will be a key part of the future or guys that already are here part of the present just to go chase some 30-something year old guy. Yeah. I mean, you don't need to do that.

I have to say from a fan perspective, I miss McAle Bridges so much that I can't even stand it. You know what I mean? So it's like there's guys on this team. Because obviously, you know, Corby Carroll isn't going anywhere. That's not even a concern, right? But when you talk about guys like Alec Thomas,

when you talk about guys, even like Jake McCarthy, even though he obviously wasn't part of the postseason run due to his injury, it starts to get, it starts to feel a little upsetting to think of them not being part of this team. And sometimes that's a sacrifice. You have to make in order to get better. You're not going to be able to hold on to everybody at times and also make your franchise better But yeah, there's times where no matter how good this son's team is

It's hard to look over at macaille having so much fun and and and not miss him and not want him to be a part of the team, you know So can we get so that the pavement Smith for Aaron judge isn't No, that's not on the table. No, it's not on the table. No I think to Aspo's point earlier though like we the thing Hazen's done a really good job bat is not trading like young players for like an older player that's a star he's flipped other younger players for like at the time equally valuable pieces yeah like varsho for merino and ghariel or or chisom for gallon and gotten back better value long term that's that's a that's a great point because even the jazz trade for zack galen wasn't super popular at the time because people

weren't familiar with zack galen and then he came over here and he set an m lb record for the most starts with giving up three runs and less. And jazz was getting way more popularity early on and everybody was like, why would the debacks train this guy? And honestly, now Zach Gallen was a Salyan, you know, candidate. No, no, no, you know, throwing shade of jazz, but his numbers weren't great, but he still was an electric part of a Marlins team that made the playoffs themselves. Derek, I know I'm just a guest here and I don't know baseball real well, but I don't think

jazz chisholm could have been up for the Sall Young. I'm just, I'm just, did I say jazz? No, no. Well, you said, Zach, but then you're like, put, yo, jazz with it. Just giving you shit. That's fair. That's fair. I'm glad.

I'm glad you know that, though. I know little things about baseball. I promise you. Speaking of which, Blake Snell did win the Sigh-Young for the National League, which was no surprise. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it is what it is. But Ken can argue with what he did this year. But it's, yeah, it's the award season. It's been sad ever since the Roy Award, because it's just a bunch of awards we knew.

We weren't going to win. And especially, like, the manager of the year award yesterday with Tori, that was crazy. Because seeing how the boats were all over the place and having it come down to, like, a guy that essentially did what Tori did without the significant run in the playoffs is a little maddening. But. Tori doesn't seem like a guy that needs the hardware to be happy. He was living his good life at the rookie of the year. He just needs a tent, a bottle of whiskey, some ice cream from coal. Oldstone and its sons, you know, to, you know, face-time them every once in a while.

Can I go in a little run? The way MLB does these awards is so bad. Everything they do is so bad. It's like the word, like when, what was it, the golden gloves that they announced it, like 930 on a Sunday night? I don't get it. Yeah. Like who goes, hey, you know what? What we should do?

We should announce these awards during Sunday night football. You know what we're going to do? We're going to have our draft during the All-Star game. That's a great idea. Can I interest you in a rookie of the year award presentation when there's NBA basketball? Why not make this some big event like the other leagues do? I don't know. And honestly, I don't really think that there's this need to stretch it out over the course of a week.

They have a condensed offseason anyway. We could just have one award ceremony and get this stuff out. The problem is that all these awards are from different companies essentially, right? You got the Rawlings Golden Glove. You have the Baseball Riders Association of America, rookie of the year, manager and all that. You know what? We need to start our own then.

We need, if anybody can have their own awards and just hand them out and baseball recognize it, why can't we? Who's saying we can't do that? The official PHNX mascot of the year award? The Nuckies. Let's go. We need a Nuckie award right now.

Garrett Stubbs, Mascot of the Year. of the year. He's up for contention for sure. We're going to make this happen. This is shoe it. This is genius. I think we do need the mascot of the year award, and I think we're the right place to do it. I mean, JJ is going to definitely be up for mascot of the year. That's for sure.

Curse world of the year and then Major League Baseball as well. That could be ours. Let's go. All right. Jesse's watching this going, what has become of my beautiful baby? My show. Never let this man on my show. You want to talk some war?

Yeah, yeah, we'll talk We'll talk The stat, not the actual Just got to be clear The stat war No, we're gonna, yeah, no, that's all with you. Of course, big shout out to all of our sponsors, but

Jesse right now is taking care of things around the house And one of the things that I know he needs to take care of around his house is his flooring situation, but he's not going to get around to it because Jesse never stops worrying about baseball. That's all he ever does. He says,

He's going to take care of stuff, but he's not. You know what you get in his house then? Some hardwood. Some hardwood. That's right. You're not wrong about that. And the perfect company for that, of course, is Empire Today. They keep shopping for floors simple because they allow you to do it at home when you don't have time.

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a manufacturer's phone number, get a hold of someone. you know, 12 states away. None of that stuff. That stuff's the worst. I hate, I hate when you don't know who's responsible for, like, fixing your stuff. And then they're just passing the buck around. That usually means nobody's responsible for it. They just want you to go away.

Empire doesn't give you that. They take care of you. Yeah, exactly. You can schedule a free in-home estimate today. All listeners will receive a $350 off discount when they use promo code PHNX. Restrictions do apply. See Empire Today.com slash PHNX. details. Empire today. There we go. Nailed it. We would normally be throwing shade with our Shady

Rays on when we throw shade. We threw a lot of shade in this episode. So of course, we should have those sunglasses on, but you also should have a pair, especially if you live here in Arizona. Shady Rays is an independent sunglasses company with a world-class product that's just as good as the expensive sunglasses. They have durable frames, extremely clear optics, and of course the craziest lost and broken replacement plan in all of iware if you lose or break your pair even on day one they told us they will send you a brand new pair no questions asked no shame heaped upon you no guilt jesse doesn't believe me jesse was like there's no way they don't ask questions they don't ask questions except what your shipping address look no no shame by them we will give you

that's for sure in the building if you lose that but not shady raise yeah this group around here very good at shaming you especially like there they'll be a pair of Shady Raes here in the office that they don't know who that belongs to. And they'll just shame everybody about it until somebody finally owns up to who sunglasses. We give people a hard time. They call me Mike Hazen around here. Hey, hey. Dattemax jokes.

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Can I give out one more award? Is it for a jersey perhaps? No, no. It's the Dodger fan of the year award. Who are you giving that to? Bob Costas. Anyways. Oh, hey-oh.

Hey, I've been holding all that time. Yeah, he's got a list of singers. He's been waiting to get out. Maria G. Yeah, right, yeah. That's cool. I mean, we know Mo's not up for that. No.

Mo's a coward. We know that. But this jersey looks really good on you. We know this thing is going away soon enough. But I wanted to get you. Not this one. Not that. You're keeping that one.

I thought you're going to steal my. Jersey. The whole talk of the town yesterday was the fact that sounds like the Diamondbacks, even though we have no confirmation, we'll be getting some New Jersey's, maybe nothing drastic, no El Valle jersey at all in their future. That'd be very confusing. But, I mean, you know, again, you guys with the sons, we've been seeing these New Jersey's every year. They're always awesome. It always makes me mad when they tell me this year's is going away. And then the next year's one is awesome.

That's the brilliance in the market. It's incredible, right? Yeah, like it's, but I mean, you know, I know we talked a lot about like players, jerseys not being available. No, but Gabby Moreno, no Alec Thomas at times. And if this is true, it kind of means that maybe they were just kind of holding off to make that stuff available, not wanting us fans to buy jerseys that were just going to become obsolete the next day or the next year. I mean, it makes a lot of sense to me because Derek Hall is very much about the fans. This would have been a business side decision, obviously, depending on,

what the inventory is having seen that on on the sun side and how that's handled it would not shock me if it was a a cognizant decision to go hey let's pump the brakes on producing too many these because we're going to have the new ones and we don't want fans upset you know that oh i bought this last year now corbman carroll or gabby moreno is going to be wearing this different style for for a majority of their career and you know you get fans can get bad out of shit I would be pissed off. Yeah, I mean, there are jersey insurance programs that allow you to return it should your player get, like, traded or whatever within a certain amount of time. But, yeah, I mean, at times it did.

It felt a little short-sighted because, like, even with the WBC, the popularity of Alec Thomas, I don't remember seeing any team Mexico, Alec Thomas jerseys available. And I don't know. Like, I brought this comparison up, but like the Josh Dobbs situation in Minnesota where after that incredible game he had, this first start for the team, there were jerseys of his available in the team shop. And I just think that like even if that's the case, it does feel like you kept people from spending their money on something that they would have happily spent their money on. That's fair.

I always feel like baseball jerseys are a little different because basketball football, you do that cheap heat press on a blank jersey. That's a good point. You don't really get those. You don't get the silk screened jerseys anymore. You might get the shirt that looks like the jersey or whatever, you know, but. But I feel like, yeah, baseball jerseys, they take a little bit more pride on it. That's a valid point.

That is a valid point. But, like, what are your thoughts, though, overall on them changing jersey designs? And from the rumors, it sounds like it's nothing too drastic. We talked a bit about, like, as you call it, the Disney D is possibly coming back. And that it's still going to be a similar color scheme just with more teal, but not fully going back to the old, good old purple and teal and copper. Look, I don't, I don't know why we all kind of expect that's going to happen. Because we want it so bad.

I get that we want it so bad. And I understand that. But you also have to look at the reality of it. And the owner who put those colors in place had a rift with the owner that is currently owning the team. That's fair. And the fact that people, people are people. We all have, can get hurt emotions.

When you hear a fan base clamoring for that and it's like, yeah, because that harkens back to this guy, you're probably less inclined to do it. Now, I like, I like that they've tried to meet in the middle with adding teal into this. It sounds like there may be more leaning to that as well. Like red, red teal, you know, so black. Like, I like that. I really do, I really do like that. I think it's a good compromise. It's a very unique look in sports.

Red and teal, there's not a lot of it out there in sports. So I'm fine with that. Studies even show that purple, you know, I know everybody clamors for it because of the nostalgia, but that it's not necessarily the most popular color, which was why a lot of these teams had shifted from it at one point. I love the purple. I'll defend that. But I like that they're going to try to go in this new direction.

I don't think any of us particularly were huge sand fans. No, no. No, except piece of Yoshi, of course. A piece of Yoshi is a fan of all things that the rest of us don't like. That's why we clash so often. But see, like, I don't mind it in the Serpientes because it was like embrace this kind of color. As an accent, I'm like, it leaves a little something to be desired. It just looks like you forgot to color in the rest of what you're doing.

It's like off white as an accent. It's like other things as an accent. And like, I think the teal and the red really, like, make things pop. And I think, like, when they do it around black, I brought up yesterday that in 2020, their low steve-back jersey had the red and teal outline of the letters. And it just, it looked like neon-y. It looked like it was, you know, like, it looked like a cool effect. But, yeah, I don't know.

I'm just saying, like, when it comes to the Jersey situation, I do think that the time is right to do something new. I think it's fun, you know, because with, you know, the World Series, the interest, everything like that. It's a good time to try something new without doing something too drastically different away from what you knew. But they are going to try to fit the whole goddamn word diamondbacks on a shirt. I'm here for it. Are you? Why not? Like, look, I always hated D-backs on the jersey because every uncreative human being that wanted to insult your team called them the D-Bag.

So it's like, real creative, you jackass. It was just right there. Yeah, so I like that, you know, the rumors are that that may be on the outs, which I'm okay with. It depends on how you make the Diamondback look. You know, if they want to go back to the Big D energy on uniforms, fine. I'll take that. Like, I'm down for it. Let's see how it looks and try.

But what I really like is this young group that's going to define. the next 10 years of Diamondbacks baseball get their own look. Why do we love purple so much? Because it reminds us of Randy Johnson, Luis Gonzalez Kurt Schilling to a lesser extent. Jay Bell, you know, Craig Counsel,

all the guys, Tony Womack, I don't want to leave anybody out if they're watching and hurt their feelings. But I probably could go all 25 of them. David Miller, let's go all. No, I'm with you though. I mean, it's, and from what I've heard, from what

I've heard and it's an interesting description is this is what I've heard. Alec Thomas and Ketel Marte are going to have so much swag in these new jerseys and I don't even know what that means. Has the word Riz been used? I don't know, but maybe we'll start

to throw Riz around a little bit. If I get some Riz as well, I'm all in. We say Ski-E on this show but we can get Riz and thank you. But yeah, no, I mean, yeah, it's interesting. The Diamondbacks apparently is going to be on a red jersey. And the jerseys are that we heard the color red might be changing a little bit.

There's a lot of things that still. It's not a donor red? I don't know. Yeah, we'll leave that. Look, because I've seen, I've seen a couple of different reds, but we also see all these different alternate hats. Like I said, the one weird thing was, like I see on like Hat Club and other websites, the D still, like when they do redesign hat.

The spring training, I own the one that they had last year. Right, but this year they got rid of it all together. and like now all of a sudden I'm seeing on their team shop like the retro one with the copper come back and stuff like that so I feel like things that the rumors are very true

of what we're hearing and everything is pointing in the direction of it again not being a full on you know reboot of any kind but you know bringing back like we talked about it yesterday the Diamondbacks do have some of the best jersey or logos in baseball the D the A

the snake with the ball in the mouth Everything but that DB that just, yeah, that one. You never like the DB with the slah? I thought it was clever. It looks like a cross section from a health class book, all right? That's all I'm saying. It just did. It was clever, but also it looked like David Blaine's logo.

Get your mind out of the government. Oh, yeah, that's true. And you really don't want your baseball team having a logo that looks like a guy known for disappearing. You don't want that. That's probably a reference to their offense, I would imagine. But of course, we. have a fashion shoot to go to with the way that we're dressed in. Ironically enough.

Yeah, ironically enough, we're going to go take some pictures in our brand new shirts. But the first thing being this guy are going to do, we're going to go fuel up at Circle K and you should too. I am thirsty and I need to get this thirst quenched and it's America's Thirst Stop, as you may know. But they also have their Inner Circle

membership program, which I've been talking about extensively, which will get you so much free stuff. Can we pause for a second, Damon? Did he just say he's thirsty? That's all I wanted to know. I'm thirsty. Yeah, he's the thircest guy on this podcast. So Circle K, the Thursday, right? Thirsty, yeah.

Well, my car is thirsty. I know that, and gas is still not cheap. So you can save yourself 25 cents per gallons. If you join that Inner Circle program on your first five fillups, you also save three cents per gallon every day after that. You also get buy five, get six to one free on a selection of Circle K products like pizza, coffee, ice cold, fountain drinks, and more. So join the Inner Circle for free.

you by downloading the Circle K app today. Terms and conditions apply at participating locations. Visit CircleGay.com for details. Something to foot at the Circle. Something, yeah. Strange things. Strange things. That's right.

I misquoted it now. That's right. Now, yeah. See? You shamed me. Just get out. Just get out. Jesse wouldn't even know what movie that was from.

No, he absolutely. I don't even know if Jesse knows. He wouldn't know it's filmed here. Yeah, Jesse doesn't know there's a movie called Bill and Ted's excellent adventure. But what Jesse does know is baseball. And the other people who do know baseball as our friends at Focco because they are a leading manufacturer of sports and entertainment merchandise, but the thing they do better than anybody else is baseball collectibles.

There are limited edition bobbleheads. I was saying this yesterday. You don't even know what they look like yet. We just get to see a description and an outline of it. And they're sold out. You can't even buy it. People didn't even need to see what they look like. All they need to know it was Alec Thomas, Corbyn, and Gabriel Moreno together in one bobblehead.

And yes, it's sold out because that's a limited edition. One out of 25, one out of 50. It's like blind bags like the kids love. But for adults like us. It has been of disposable income and love baseball and collectibles. So check out the best officially licensed gear for all sports and fandums over at Foco. Of course, right now, like I said, it's all about the bobbleheads. Get those limited edition World Series bobbleheads.

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Can I bring up one other thing? It's not on the wrong, my friend. Yeah. I am in search for old obscure ASE Falling jerseys. I went down a rabbit hole the other night. Do these exist as something you can purchase? I'm trying to find a place that I can and or have them made. Because I want a Chandler Diamondbacks because we were talking about Diamondbacks being across the chest.

The Chandler Diamondbacks that Derek Jeter played for that I used to go see when I was a kid had Diamondbacks across the chest. I want a Scottsdale Scorpion, Michael Jordan. Okay. Like I, there's a market for, for nerds like me that would totally buy these. It has to be. There's a market for like fictional jerseys from movies and television shows, which I know you are aware of because we both shop at the website and buy these things. But yeah, you're absolutely right.

I mean, that's because you're, you are a huge jersey fan. I am. You are a huge jersey fan. And that's why, like, I wanted to talk to you specifically about the jersey stuff because, like, I don't know. Obviously, this was a plan that was set in motion before, right? Before this happened, this wasn't like a reactionary thing due to them making the World Series. But the timing couldn't be better as far as like you said to like now give this generation of Diamondbacks their own look.

Yeah, Nike usually takes about two years with a team to develop a new look and then implement it. This wasn't a this wasn't an overnight, you know. No, this is a cruise ship, not a special. speedboat when I comes to these things. So yeah, it wasn't some, hey, we just made the world series. Let's some slap some shit together to go sell it to these people as new uniforms. No. So, yeah, but I'm a huge jersey nerd.

I've always loved. I was one of the rare people that loved the, what was it this? It looked like the scale pattern on the jersey. Oh, yeah, the gradient pattern? I still have the hat with the black and the red diamonds. So, yeah, I'm a real. unique stuff you like to turn the jersey turn the clock back jersey i want the turn ahead the clock jersey so bad i almost i once almost got an authentic one and lost out on it on eBay it was

the most frustrating moment and i've noticed that like what you're talking about with the Arizona fall league stuff i've kind of like fantasized over the uh the minor league jerseys you can get especially for the particular nights like the aces had like a a peanuts night where it's just the Charlie Brown and the Peanuts characters that are on their jersey and I'm like, I need that. I need that. Am I going to wear it? I don't know. I just need it. I need to own it. It needs to be in my house. Can I look in the... I know...

Please. I know our friends at the Sod Poodle's watch and I so badly want a calf-fry's hat or jersey. It has been high on my list and I'm too cheap to pull the trigger. So... The only reason I came on this program

today was to put the call out. Can you guys help me because I know you love this show and and I just had to leverage the platform of the mayor to come on here and you know just poorly, cheesely ask for a handout. There you go. It is almost, I turn 40 in two weeks. Does that count? Yeah.

Something. No? All right. I want to leverage ESPO. I want a Tucson sidewinder jersey. I need it like oxygen. Honestly, I've wanted one too. Can I, another quick story.

I know we got a photo shoot. But I was down in Tucson when they won the PCL and AAA championship. I got sized for a ring. I was working for the team. What? Sised for the ring. Went to the jeweler, got sized. I never got the damn ring.

I was even going to pay for it and never got the damn ring. Let's go. I'm so angry. I look on eBay, no lie, once a month to see if somebody's selling one. because I am even willing to buy one that doesn't have my own name on it. Is it 11 and 5.8s? What is it? I don't care. I will have it resize. I don't care. But yes, I love those jerseys, and that has been on my eBay deep dive list as well.

It's because of this man, I own a Mark Grace 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks slot machine. And when I say that, I mean, it's literally specifically designed as if it was made for Mark Grace with pictures of Mark Grace on the front, little autographed Mark Grace baseballs as some of the things on the spinners, his jersey has one of the things on the spinners, and an ashtray, which tracks all for it being owned by Mark Grace.

But after a conversation with him, he said, and I quote, I've never seen that thing before in my life. Did you know, did you ever notice the brand on it? No, because it's like a custom-made one. No, I look very closely. Oh. It's a slump buster.

Ah. Ah, that's it. We're wrapping this show up. There's no better way we can do it than that. Of course, you can follow us on Twitter. I'm at Cap underscore K-Man with a gay. This man, inexplicably, is just at ESPO. Because...

The perks of working in the NBA, what I did. Of course, we are all Damon's dogs. Of course, you can follow Damon at Damon Dog. That's DAWG there at the end. He is the people's producer. But our shows at P.HNX underscore D-Backs and all roads do lead to at PHNX underscore Sports on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. We appreciate you guys being here.

We appreciate you dropping likes. Thanks to Gabby for stopping by. We know that he's got a busy offseason, but we appreciate you all being here. If you're not a diehard member, go get that diehard membership right now. You get yourself a free t-shirt from the PHNX Locker.com. We're about to go show off all the shirts that we have. Look at this one. This shirt, I have deemed it today, is the jersey shirt.

This is the specific best compliment for an openly worn. diamondbacks jersey that you will ever find anywhere on the market and you can get that as p hnx locker dot com if you become a diehard member you will get it for free or whatever shirt you want including our brand new rookie of the year king the corb him shirt over at the p hnx locker dot com get jesse's newsletter access to our discord lounge so much fun stuff so we hope to see you guys there we hope to see you rock in the new gear and again we appreciate you for stopping by we thank you for your time and remember kids baseball is fun but it is so much more fun when your team doesn't reload to a different city.