PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Arizona Diamondbacks shortstop Nick Ahmed is back & we ponder if the D-backs are in fact bush league
Episode Date: March 7, 2023Are the Arizona Diamondbacks a bush league organization? One announcer seems to think so. We also discuss the battle for the final spot in the pitching rotation, Zach Greinke continuing to be a menace..., and your Mailbag Monday questions.BUY D-BACKS TICKETS HERE: https://gametime.hnyj8s.net/c/3442941/1410622/10874 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube: https://bit.ly/phnx_youtubeALL THINGS PHNX: http://linktr.ee/phnxsports PHNX: Our next PHNX Tee Party at Dobson Ranch is LIVE! Join us on Friday, March 24th for a night of golf, food, drinks, contests, prizes, and more. Come hang with the PHNX crew, fellow Suns’ fans and Diehards as we watch KD, Booker, and the Suns battle in the final stretch of the season as they take on De'Aaron Fox, Domantas Sabonis, and the Sacramento Kings.Checkout https://www.eventbrite.com/e/phnx-tee-party-dobson-ranch-presented-by-four-peaks-brewing-co-tickets-558125557567 to reserve your spot today. And Diehards, check Discord for your exclusive discount link!DraftKings: Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app now (https://bit.ly/3Jl1dMX), use promo code PHNX and make your first deposit of FIVE DOLLARS and get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS INSTANTLY! Gambling Problem? Call 877-8-HOPENY/text HOPENY (467369) (NY), If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, crisis counseling and referral services can be accessed by calling 1-800-GAMBLER (1-800-426-2537) (CO/IL/IN/LA/MD/MI/NJ/OH/PA/TN/WV/WY), 1-800-NEXT STEP (AZ), 1-800-522-4700 (KS/NH), 888-789-7777/visit ccpg.org (CT), 1-800-BETS OFF (IA), visit OPGR.org (OR), or 1-888-532-3500 (VA).21+ (18+ NH/WY). Physically present in AZ/CO/CT/IL/IN/IA/KS/LA(select parishes)/MD/MI /NJ/ NY/OH/PA/TN/VA/WV/WY only. VOID IN ONT. Eligibility restrictions apply. BONUS bets: Valid 1 per new customer. Min. $5 deposit. Min $5 bet. $200 issued as bonus bets that expire 7 days (168 hours) after being awarded. See terms at sportsbook.draftkings.com/basketballlterms.Circle K: Text code “PHNX” to 31310 to win a $500 gas card! Limit one entry per person—limit of one entry per phone number. The offer is valid for Arizona residents only. Must be able to verify the place of residence. This contest is administered at the discretion of the Grand Canyon Division of Circle K Stores. Circle K Store Inc. is a part of Alimentation Couche-Tard. You must be 18 years of age or older to win. For questions about this contest or our stores, text ”CARE” to 31310.Rotowire: All the best fantasy news and updates at https://rotowire.com/phnx OGeez!: Learn more about OGeez! at https://ogeezbrands.com//. Must be 21 years or older to purchase.Four Peaks: Drink, eat, find, and experience Four Peaks at https://www.fourpeaks.com/. Must be 21 or older. Enjoy responsibly. Bad Birdie: Use code “PHNXBB15” for 15% off your next order https://glnk.io/7qnq/phnx-sportsMor Furniture: Save up to 50% all through the holidays! Check out https://morfurniture.comRoman: Go to https://ro.co/PHNX today to get 20% off your entire first order. 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.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Are we really doing this right now, Barry?
The bullpen cart's here.
It's ready.
Welcome in to another edition of the H&XVieback podcast.
My name is Derek Montia.
Of course, I am your driver of the bullpen cart.
When Michaela isn't available, this guy over here, he's the vice mayor.
He's also the thunderstake.
The one and only, Jesse Friedman.
I think the people listening to us on audio only need to.
be aware of what you just did to start the show. I just drove out a little bullpen cart replica. A little
bullpen cart replica that we got, a little on track bullpen cart replica. And I just crashed it into
Jesse's water cup. And the sound effects. Yeah. The sound effects were key. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's not
the same without the sound effects. But welcome on in. Of course, this show is brought to you by the fine
folks at the Drafking Sportsbook app. America's top rated sports book app. Could you imagine if the
bullpen car was actually that noisy? Like if it had like this like this like six cylinder engine.
It's really.
Yeah.
All, give it to me.
I wrote in it, sadly, it does not make any of those noises.
Is it electric?
I guess it's probably electric.
It's definitely electric.
We're probably not going to put a gasoline engine on the field.
Nick Ahmed is back for those of you that celebrate such things.
And it's actually great to see Nick out there, his first start since May 15th, 2002.
And it didn't take long for Nick Ahmed to get tested out there in the field.
The very first, I believe,
pitch of the game.
Very first pitch to a Royals hitter.
Yeah, to a royals hitter right back at Nick and there's a beautiful picture of his
extension there.
First game of spring and Nick Ahmed's already stealing hits.
Yeah, we're thinking he's back.
It was great to see him back.
And honestly, he came into the clubhouse with a sleeveless shirt on, showing off the guns.
And I think he was already in the mood to kick some ass.
And that's what we saw out of him today.
Yeah, he was one for three with a couple of strikeouts at the plate.
I'm sure it'll take a little bit of time for Nick to get his timing back and whatnot.
Defensively, the biggest question is going to be his arm after the shoulder surgery last year
and some wrist issues coming into spring this season.
We need to see like does Nick Ahmed still have the elite level arm strength that he's shown
in the past.
We didn't really get an answer to that question today by my tally.
He only got one ground ball the entire game and it was a pretty routine play.
So we didn't really get to see that today.
but something to monitor moving forward.
Well, it was another Dre Day, and Drey Jamison was on the mound.
Did not have quite the success that he's had in the past got nicked up quite a bit.
He gave up a home run.
He got nicked up?
Nicked up?
Yeah.
That's the thing.
When you say the line in the movie, that's the title of the movie.
But yes, no, Drey Jameson, not a great day.
But he did show, I think, a lot of positives.
His strikeouts were rolling.
and he was pulled out of the game after an inning in a third, I believe, or two-thirds?
Enning in two-thirds.
But then he came back in the third inning and actually looked really good in the third inning.
And he kind of credited it to the fact that he wasn't mixing up his pitches well enough in the first inning in two-thirds.
He felt like he was really just going out there and attacking the strike zone too much with the fastball and not really given the batters any other pitches to look at.
It's crazy how quickly things can change, right, with the starting pitching battle that we've been talking about for a while, this competition for the fifth spot.
And that's not to say that Dre Jameson went from like the frontrunner to the last man on the list or anything.
I actually think he pitched okay today.
There were a few 98, 99 mon hour fastballs that actually got hit by the Royals, which is something that I think happens with Dre Jameson.
He doesn't have the crazy level of vertical ride that Ryan Nelson has on his foreseamer.
The movement on the pitch is not terrible, but it's not incredible either.
So once guys kind of figure out the timing of the pitch, I think it's maybe a little bit more hitable than you would expect something coming at you that hard would actually be.
But yeah, I think he looked, he definitely looked a lot better in that third inning after the debacks got him back out on the bench.
Carlos Vargas came in and got the last out of the second inning.
He came back in the third, and I think it was a one, two, three, ending on nine pitches with a couple of strikeouts.
So he definitely finished this one on a high note.
The big thing was that he, like I said, said he wasn't throwing his curveball early on.
He also wasn't throwing a change up.
And it has been said that, you know, he does have a good change up.
And Dre said, as you'll see here in this clip, that he really wasn't confident in his change up.
He just, there's times where he doesn't, he's not feeling it and kind of worries that throwing
it may be a detriment based on it just being a big old meatball down the middle of the plate
if he doesn't have a good control over it.
Yeah, it's a pitch that I definitely need to throw and trust because it's a really good
pitch and my confidence behind that pitch is just not there.
And I need to build the confidence on that pitch because ultimately it's a really good
pitch and I think it's going to be very crucial for me, you know, deep into games to throw that
pitch but early on in games I don't really I don't want to use it if I don't have to and after that
second inning I had to use it and I probably should went to it a lot earlier than I did so it's
definitely a crucial pitch that I need to I need a buy-bye and just throw it and I definitely get
what he's saying about he went on to explain about throwing it up in the strike zone the same way
he's throwing his fastball basically just makes it hang and he needs to make sure that he's locating it in
order for it to be effective lower down in the strike zone. Yeah. But yeah, once he was throwing that,
he, you know, he definitely had more success against batters. Yeah, I mean, he only threw one changeup the
whole game. And I guess it was in that one curveball. Yeah, I think it, I think the change up might
have been in that third inning. But yeah, it sounds like the Diamondbacks coaching staff really
likes Dre Jameson's change up. And the question is more about does Drey Jameson like his changeup?
and does he feel comfortable enough actually using it in games?
When I talked to Dre back at the beginning of spring training,
he told me that that was a point of emphasis for him over the offseason,
was trying to get that change up to a better spot
where he can feel more comfortable using it.
The key for any change up is going to be maintaining your arm action.
You want it to look like it's a four-seem fastball,
as you were talking about earlier.
And it's tricky for Dre because he throws that four-seamer
to the top of the strike zone a lot of the time.
And so I think for him,
him, it's tricky kind of replicating that motion, but kind of driving that pitch down in the
strike zone. Maybe it's something that we'll take a little bit more getting used to. He told us
that in a recent bullpen session that he threw, he threw 75% changeups. Like, that's kind of a
really big thing for him. And it appeared today that he's still just not quite there, hence why he
only threw one in his entire outing today. Well, in other starting pitching rotation news,
Brandon fought was good again as well.
He threw three innings over the weekend, gave up one hit, no runs, walked one, struck out four.
And so again, there obviously is two guys that have kind of emerged, I think, as frontrunners, being Dre Jameson and Brandon fought.
Did you read an article by chance, Derek?
I might have said that.
Over at go pHNX.
I think it is.
I think it is over go phtonx.com.
I think Gerald wrote it.
Yeah, Gerald and Craig.
it was a
wonderful collaboration
from our two other writers here.
But no,
Jesse definitely has
some great information on that.
And of course,
he cursed Drey Jameson
with that.
Yeah,
yeah,
I kind of figured that would happen.
But I maintain
that Dre Jameson wasn't terrible today.
I mean,
he still struck out five.
I thought his stuff looked pretty good.
He left a few pitches
and some spots that he shouldn't have.
But it wasn't a terrible outing for
Dre.
James.
More importantly, it's the way he bounced back.
He joked about never having been put back
into a game before after having been
pulled out.
Usually that's not how baseball works.
That's usually not how baseball worked.
But he very much showed that he has that ability to bounce back, right?
Like that's something I know Tori's talked about in the past, and it's something that
he said he's looking at when it comes to these guys as far as being starting pitchers.
Can you give up a home run?
Can you have a bad inning?
And then come out and reestablish yourself and get back on track.
That's very big for looking at someone to be a part of the starting rotation.
They're not just trying to fill a hole.
They're hoping that whoever they add as the fifth member of the starting rotation will remain there for the rest of the season.
Obviously, injuries and everything else could impact that.
But it's something Dre Jameson talked about.
He talked about wanting to also stick around and not get sent up, back down, back up again.
He wants to stay on the major league roster as something every mindly player, I'm sure, wants to.
But a lot of them are a bit more understanding about that they are going to be sent up and down.
Whereas Jameson sounds like he wants to do everything in his power
to make sure that that doesn't happen,
that he just stays around.
Meanwhile,
when it comes to Brandon Fought,
it sounds much more like Brandon Fought,
unfortunately,
might not really be in the consideration
despite how good he's doing.
I don't know.
Are we looking too deep into this?
I think we need the people to judge for themselves on this.
We have an audio clip that we'll play here in a second.
But basically,
Tori Lavello was asked after Fott's outing
which was, again, very good.
Five scoreless inning so far.
Two hits, two walks, six strikeouts.
As good as you could ask.
Pretty darn good from Brandon Fought so far through two appearances.
And Nick Baccaro from Aze Central asked Tori Lavello, you know,
obviously you're not winning a competition, you know, at this stage of spring training,
but has Brandon fought done what he would need to do to kind of put himself in the middle of that
conversation, at least at this point?
And this is what Tori Lavello had to say.
Yeah, I mean, I think anything's possible in this game.
And I want everybody in that locker room to come to the ballpark,
and especially on days of their working,
and try and impress them to do something spectacular.
And I think he's doing exactly what we hoped he would do.
And, you know, I don't know where it lands with all of our young starting pitchers.
I just know we've got a lot of good ones, and it's going to be a lot of fun.
It's going to be fun to watch.
We're not a tough decision to make.
Yeah, I think it's probably a little too early for me to even make comments about who's going to win that spot.
But it's nice to see that he went out of executed.
It's just the way that it's just the way that Tori said, I mean, yeah, he kind of backed into the manager speak as he, as he tends to do.
But the way that he started this quote, he said, you know, I want, I want guys to believe that anything is possible or something along those lines, right?
And when you put it like that, it kind of makes it sound like it's a far-fetched thing.
Like you're dangling a carrot that can't be reached.
Yeah.
Like if Brandon fought was really in the center of this conversation, as one would expect him to be with the numbers that he's put up so far, you would expect Tori to be able to come out and say at least confidently that like, yeah, he's in the mix, you know?
But his first comment was, you know, I like to believe that anything is possible for these guys.
And that kind of sounds like, you know, you're talking about the guy wearing number 94.
for, you know, who's, you know, coming in as a non-rosster invite and doesn't really have a shot.
That kind of sounds more like you're talking about one of those guys than a guy who has pitched as well as Brandon Fott has so far.
Speaking of those guys, the Diamondbacks did reassign some guys down to minor league camp, including Slade Sacconi.
I still think it's.
I think it's.
I think it's.
I think it is.
I know.
That's why I've been saying it the whole time.
Davidson de los Santos, Bryce Jarvis, Jordan Lawler, Blake Walston.
No real surprises there, but obviously I'm sure there's some people that are disappointed that Jordan Lawler is being sent down. That was going to happen no matter what.
Yeah, Jordan Lawler could have hit 700 and I think he would still get sent down.
Because Bryce Jarvis has done as about as good as they could have asked of him. I don't think those words were in the right order.
He's done about as good. I understood what you said. It was very country. No, he has done as good of a job as you could ask of him.
and he's still being sent down.
So I think, again, with those guys,
there's just certain guys that are not at that point
in their progression where they're even being considered
for the roster, no matter how good they're doing.
And they want to make sure that they don't do anything
to slow them down.
They need these guys playing games,
being in competitive matchups,
playing against other live baseball teams
and doing everything they can to get ready
should they get moved up in the system
and should they get called upon.
But one guy that is ready is Ketalmarte,
who deaked Padres infielder Tim Lopez off the bag
on a stolen base attempt
and it was incredible.
I'm sure you guys all saw it.
That game was televised.
And it was a viral clip on top of that.
Like everybody in Major League Baseball was like,
look at what Catel's doing.
And I loved it.
It was right out of Little Big League,
one of my favorite baseball movies of all time.
Oh, I still haven't seen it.
Oh, that one.
We're going to have to give them that one as an assignment.
But yeah, it was incredible.
And you know what?
Random Fought was quite thankful
about that. Let's hear what he had to say about
Cotel making that play. Is it helpful
having Cotel make that crafty play
behind you? For sure. I was like, thank God.
At first I didn't really know what happened.
I was like, wait, he's out.
So things like that.
Just a bonus and
got all the runners off base. Give me two outs.
So it was a huge play.
It really was a huge play.
I love that. That's such a wholesome response
for Brandon Foggling. Oh, thank God.
Oh, thank God. Yeah. The only thing I did
Mike about it is I need Kutel to keep shit like that for the regular season.
We need to keep it under wraps.
Yeah, we asked Carson Kelly.
I asked Carson Kelly about it as well after the game.
And Carson said like, yeah, he was impressed.
He's never seen Ketel do that before.
But he was also wondering, like, shouldn't we be saving that for the regular season?
This is top secret stuff.
Yeah, like, why are you giving that away in spring training?
Tori also said after the game that he's seen Kattel try that 45 times.
And this is the first time that it was.
It is true.
The rest of the time it just kind of looks like a casual
joke like he's just messing with the runner or whatever.
But he wasn't messing
with anybody. He was trying to get it out is what
he was trying to do. Madison
Baumgartner made his debut over the weekend
that was on Sunday. And it
wasn't so horrible. I guess
again, I don't know if
I don't know what's... I mean what's the
threshold for horrible like what are we
what are we talking about here? He went out there and pitched three
innings. He gave up two
of everything. Two hits, two runs. Two runs.
Two earner runs, two walks.
But unfortunately, two hit, two hit by pitches.
Two hit by pitches, zero strikeouts.
So not two of those.
But, yeah, Mad Bum was dictating the pitch call through the pitchcom, which was interesting to see.
Yeah, yeah, apparently it's.
With Gabriel Moreno.
Yeah, it's something that apparently is not officially legal to do in actual games yet.
I think that players might still be waiting to see if that's going to be a possibility come the regular season.
but it's something a few debacks pitchers have started experimenting with,
where they're the ones initiating the call to the catcher
rather than the other way around.
The idea is with the pitch clock,
you don't have time to, you know,
shake off three signs from your catcher anymore.
You got to make sure you nail down what pitch you're throwing earlier in the pitch
clock so that you can actually throw the pitch in time.
So Madbom experimented with that in that game,
and it sounds like he kind of traded places with Gabriel Moreno
where he called some of those pitches as well, like you said.
Interesting, though, because I don't know.
Do we want pitchers calling games?
Do we want a half and a half thing like this?
It's real interesting.
I mean, it's like that's the way that baseball's been run for forever, right?
Like the catcher is kind of in charge.
And of course, the pitcher has some say in what they're throwing as well.
There's some communication that happens there.
But the catchers call games, right?
And the problem now is, is you can't shake off a guy like you used to be able to.
Right.
Because you don't have that kind of time, right?
I mean, I think that's one of the reason why pitch Tom is going to be critical.
Yeah.
Yes.
But you know what?
Who, for Madbom, it might be something positive because maybe he is somebody that wants to kind of take a bit more of charge there when it comes to that.
And honestly, if it leads to him having a better, you know, better outings, I don't know if you want to call the three inning.
It wasn't, it wasn't great.
It wasn't great.
What I want to see for Madbom is for.
the man to get guys to swing and miss a little bit.
Because that part of his game is really faded since coming over to the debacks.
And it's not to say he needs to strike out 250 guys or something a year in order to be effective.
But once you get down to like 6Ks per 9 or something, I think he was a little bit above
that last year, it's pretty tough to be an effective major league starting pitcher.
And the fact that he didn't strike out anyone makes me think that, you know, he got some
soft contact.
I think it was mostly ground balls,
but you still need to start fooling some guys with your stuff
if you want to be able to last deep in games.
And Matt Bum didn't really show that.
Michael in the comments is there's also the aspect of Moreno and Bumgarner
being new to each other, which absolutely is the case.
That is true.
Matt Bum does get,
he seems to adapt to the catchers pretty quickly, though.
And when he finds ones he likes,
he likes to work with those guys.
So hopefully Moreno is that guy.
So that no knock to Carson Kelly,
but that they have a reason to give Moreno more plans.
playing time because so far we've really liked what we've seen out of out of the young gabby moreno
yeah what we don't like what we've seen though out of another uh player with the last name m is mark
malanson and that's why this guy's here uh mark malanson continues to be very very bad uh and it's a bit
heartbreaking because milanson does take it very hard so no matter again how hard twitter can be on him
uh you you have nothing you have nothing compared to how hard the man is on himself maybe that's
part of the problem. I don't know today I saw
Strom having a meeting with him
before the game and it didn't seem
to have too big of an impact
because he had another really rough
outing. Yeah, I mean, I don't know what they were talking
about, but yeah, Mark Malanson didn't
pitch well today. We were in
the clubhouse interviewing Dre Jamison
during most of his outings. We didn't get a chance
to actually see it for ourselves.
But yeah, it wasn't
good. Opposing hitters
are 9 for 14 against
Mark Malanson in his two appearance.
with a home run and a double against him.
In spring training.
Yeah.
They're not even trying that hard.
No one's trying that hard.
It's not,
it's not necessarily that they're not trying.
It's that some of these guys that Mark Melanson is facing
aren't going to make the Royals opening day roster.
And last I checked,
the Royals are not exactly a juggernaut of an offense.
Although the Royals are a juggernaut of a spring training team.
I will tell you that, they're 10 and 2.
10 and 2.
No shame in getting crushed today for the deback.
They give them the trophy.
Give them the Cactus League trophy.
Whatever, I don't know.
The bigger problem, though, obviously, and that's a question we're going to get down to later, is what to do with Mark Melanson.
What are the D-backs realistically going to do?
How far do they go, let's just say hypothetically, and he can't get things back on track?
It feels like he doesn't look good, Derek.
It feels like he's going to be on the roster regardless, right?
And I don't, I've talked about this in the past that I don't like the idea of harming the team.
or having someone on the team that you can't utilize them as a reliable option that you have to pay a bunch of money to.
I would much rather that you just do something to part ways with these individuals, pay them the money out and let somebody else that's currently a part of your organization have that opportunity that can help you win baseball games instead of this.
And again, this is about as drastic as we can get because it's two outings in spring training.
So the reality of the situation, no matter how much people have said this to us on Twitter,
Mark Malanson was actually pretty damn good to start off the year last year.
I think things went the opposite way with Malanson, right?
Wasn't he pretty good out of the gate and actually had a decent spring?
Things didn't start looking bad for Malanson until we got like down the road.
I don't know if I would say.
Malanson's Velo was down last spring.
That's true.
I don't remember him pitching super well at the beginning of the year.
about the 97 miles an hour.
He did get it back up to like 92,
but then we're seeing it down again this spring.
And I think more than anything,
he just really looks like he has no clue
as to what the answer is, right?
And I don't know what the answer is either,
but unfortunately it's one of those things
that the Diamondbacks don't really have the ability
to let him figure it out should he continue to cost him games,
especially if he's going to be used in high leverage situations.
Yeah, as much as I want to say,
it's two outings and it's early in spring training, which both of those things are true,
the man gave up nine hits.
Like nine hits and two innings is a lot of hits.
So it's not to say he can't bounce back, but I mean, like, how can you?
Like, if he throws five consecutive hitless innings at this point, he's still at nine hits
allowed in seven innings and a whole bunch of runs.
Like you can't really recover the numbers at this point, but I guess this stuff could look
better the rest of the way and that's certainly what the debacks are hoping for let's go over uh all of
his at-bats or not his at-bats but all of his uh pitch sequences uh gave up a single a home run a
strikeout single single single single single single single double sack fly ground out it's not
it's not great it's not great i'm just turning the bullpen around for our audio
Pull pin card.
Injury updates really fast.
Kyle Lewis came away fine from his season debut on Sunday.
Should be back at DH tomorrow.
Pavin Smith is still day to day with lower back tightness.
Seems to doing fine.
Be doing fine.
And then we'll go over some of the other pitching stuff.
But in other Giants news, I guess other giants-related news,
John Miller seems to think the Arizona Diamondbacks are a Bush League organization.
Here's the audio clip from an actual spring training game that a professional broadcaster said.
I'm guessing, I have to guess, the D-backs decided, ah, the heck with the big leagues.
Let's just not be a big league team for the split squad.
Here's the one-one pitch and a fastball swung on a miss by Bryce Johnson.
It's one and two.
They have sent no public relations people over here, no information about who the manager is,
or anything at all about him.
If they don't want to be a big league team,
we'll just treat them like a sandlock team.
And give us no information about anything.
So one of those guys on a red shirt managing
and a right-hander, one of their right-handers on the mound.
And there's a ball up and away.
Three and two, the count.
I mean, there are certain things that go along with being a big league team.
Like try to act like a big league team.
Three and two, the count to Bryce Johnson.
Here's Sacconi.
And the pitch is bounced to second over to his right, backhanding it, Castillo,
and he throws out Johnson at first.
See, I even had names.
A little homework on what little we have, which is nothing whatsoever,
from the Bush League debacks.
We go to the third inning, the Giants won, Arizona Nothing,
on the K&BR, Northern California, Honda Dealers Radio Network.
Oh, my God.
He didn't say that on an actual spring training broadcast.
Did he dare it?
Like the mic was hot, but he didn't know it.
That was a hot.
No, he was calling the game, Jesse.
I'm not sure if you heard that, but he was calling the game.
My man, are you, are you a major league announcer or not?
Which one are you?
Because I don't care what happens.
Like, isn't there a sense of professionalism?
Isn't there your ability to overcome adversity when someone not provided with the information?
This is the sheet that he's complaining and bitching about right here.
This is like the PR sheet that has all of the information about the players on it, right?
But see, here's the other fucking thing.
This is a goddamn computer, which we all have and everybody can look up.
And also, this little thing is also a fucking computer.
And you know what you can find on here?
All of the information about the Arizona Diamondbacks lineup and the players that were playing that day.
You could also just make an attempt to be a little bit professional.
So I don't know who's fucking Bush League here, but I would say it's the guy that decided to air all
his grievances about work that day on a broadcast when his job is to be calling the game and not
bitching about not having the notes that he should have. Now, here's the thing. I'm not defending
the Diamondbacks, whether they did or give them the notes, right? Like, we know that we walk past
a little table on the press box every single day and it has a neatly lied out pile from both
teams that has tons of information, way more than any of us need and everything that a broadcast
team would need in order to put, you know, put this stuff together. I don't know if this information
wasn't walked over to these people, or if it just wasn't put out.
This might totally be on the Diamondbacks.
But I'm also going to say it's on you for being unprofessional going out there on a
fucking spring training game.
Like it's the end of the world that you don't have the information and complaining like
that openly about the team's PR staff not bringing you information.
Like that's Bush League to me, if you ask me.
Yeah, as Gabriel said in the comments, it would have been a great time for Nick Castiano's
home run.
man while he's going on his little rant there yeah that would have been perfect would have loved
it what a loved it yeah john miller is the for those asking like who this guy is i guess you
might not be familiar with that voice john miller's been uh a giants broadcaster for a number of
years he might have he might have done some stuff with some other teams he might be beloved as far as
we know yeah that i know bashing him isn't going to get me he definitely comes across as kind of a
kermudgeony you know sort sort of guy who's you know well i mean it wasn't like like like
Granted, the D-backs, that was a split squad day.
This is talking about Saturday.
So the D-Backs were playing at Salt River Fields.
They were also playing at Scottsdale Stadium.
Brandon Fott was on the mount at Salt River Fields.
That was kind of the game that all the D-BACs PR people, it seems, were at and the game that
certainly I was at covering because that was probably a bigger story.
But it wasn't like the D-Bex, you know, just started all minor leaguers or anything that day.
Corbyn Carroll was on that game.
Corbyn Carroll was the D-Backs leadoff hitter, Jake McCarthy,
he played, Emmanuel Rivera as a name that, you know, you should be somewhat familiar with.
He's played for both the Royals and the debacks at this point.
Jose Herrera was in that game.
And the other guys, you know, Seth Beer played in the majors last year, Dominic Canzon,
Blaise Alexander, not guys that will necessarily make the opening day roster,
but guys that it's not that hard to find information about.
So I agree with you, Derek.
I mean, regardless of how you think about, you know, the Diamondback side of this,
I think we can all agree that coming on the year and saying what John Miller said is just is just
unnecessary and inappropriate.
No matter even if mistakes were made, even if they didn't do their job, right?
Like there's it's it's how you react and honestly more than that it's it's the fact that you're
putting an entire organization on blast because you didn't get your notes when let's be
honest.
There's plenty of information available to you if you just try to put forth a little effort.
There's a scoreboard with every single player's name in the order that they're hitting.
There's it's not like this is you know.
I get it.
And again, we don't know the case.
We don't know if the information was put out.
So we're trying to play devil's advocate here and say,
okay,
maybe there wasn't a single member of the media staff there.
And maybe they didn't put out any documents at all.
It still doesn't give, I think, an announcer the right to go off like this.
But you do you, boo.
If you want to be unprofessional and you want to do that on a broadcast,
then go right ahead.
Like I said,
I'm sure there's people that loved it and thought it was hilarious.
Whereas I think that it's just a crummy move.
You're a bozo.
And that's what I think.
You know what?
The craziest thing about it, Derek, is the Bush League debacks beat the Giants that day nine to five.
They sure did.
And guess what?
They're going to do that during this season.
So stay tuned.
But one thing that you need to make sure is that you are fueled up with snacks like my delicious little wriggly sour worms right here.
If I go on a road trip, I'm buying multiple packs of these.
And this is how I'm staying awake for the entire drive.
and you can get wonderful snacks like this
at our friends Circle K all over the valley.
We are very excited to partner with our friends in Circle K
to get your local best coffee, beer, and snack selection
and premium gas over there.
We are excited to kick off our partnership
with our amazing friends over there
that we are teaming up for an amazing giveaway opportunity.
Text PHNX right there on your screen to 310
for an opportunity to win a $500 gas card,
which we know we all need.
See show notes for details,
but of course get down on that.
Sean in the comments says Jesse,
that colored green looks great.
I agree with you?
I'm half.
I'm half.
I'm half Irish.
So I look good in any shade of green in my book.
I don't like this.
What you're saying about that that Circle K gas card does sound nice
because I'm pretty sure I'll have driven the entire Loop 101.
He did.
Today.
I think I'm putting over 100 miles on my car just by going,
from my place to surprise stadium, driving on the 303,
which is a highway that I should never have to drive on.
I tried to tell them.
And then coming downtown to the studio.
So here we are.
Gabriel says,
Circle K brand hot potato chips replace the hot lays shaped hole in my heart.
Yes, they do.
And honestly,
their Wrigley sour worms are better than any name brand
and Wrigley sour worms you can get.
And I will stand by that.
Also, my favorite beer, four peaks.
Grab yourself some four peaks.
We have all sorts of wonderful stuff
through the month of March to celebrate
and to drink to, and you should do that with the wide variety of beers that our friends at FourPeaks have.
Also, they got your beer week entertainment covered, so make sure to check out their calendar over at
4Peaks.com slash events.
And grab your tickets for Four Peaks Amazing Spring Beer Dinner at FourPeaks.com slash events.
More information over there on that spring dinner as well.
But trust me, the food at the A Street pub is not to be slept on.
It is not to be messed with.
It is not to be second guest.
Everything is good.
There's never been a single, like this guy does not stray from the chicken tendees.
When it comes to chicken dendies, he's the, he's the most loyal.
Although next time we're out at Four Peaks, I might have to, I might have to experiment a little bit.
I'm told they have other things on the menu other than chicken tendees.
I'm not, I need to figure out if that's true or not because I'm not sure.
They hand him the menu and he's just like, I'm good, dog.
Chicken Tendys.
But make sure check out our friends over at Four Peaks.
must be 21 years or older to enjoy and enjoy responsibly.
Sean DePas says,
Derek,
I don't compliment you for the same reason.
LeBron doesn't win MVP every year.
I don't like that comment.
I can fucking get it though.
I get it.
Gabriel is absolutely right.
The gas did go up by like 40 cents overnight.
I don't understand how that happened.
I'm really regretting not filling up my ting like two days ago
because I think it would have made it a substantial difference.
Yeah, it really would have.
But you know what we do on this show.
Every day we worry about gas prices.
Every week is Shark Week.
Every day is Earth Day.
And every Monday, we go to the mailbag.
Damon, let's go.
My mailbox.
Always something interesting in my mailbox.
I try to get to everything in my mailbox.
And then once in a while there's a letter that makes me go out.
All right.
What do we got for questions?
First question comes from our man, Gabriel.
Gabriel asks, do you have any opening day traditions?
Well,
I don't know, Jesse.
I feel like getting kissed on the street by a stranger is now my opening day.
Let's not make that a tradition.
Let's go.
That does not need to be.
I need a hot, drunk woman to stop by and kiss me.
My wife's already said it's okay.
I will be out on the streets in front of Chase Field.
I know opening day is on the road, but I'll just be out there.
You know what I mean?
I'll just be out there waiting.
That could only happen, though, of Seth Beer.
It's another walk-off home around opening day.
Yeah, that's another opening day tradition we have.
is that beer hitting walkoffs.
That's what we got.
We haven't been around very long.
This is going to be our second opening day.
So I don't know.
That's true.
We need to establish some new opening day tradition.
So you guys can help us do that for sure.
We are, by the way, going to be hanging out with our friends from Four Peaks.
We are going to be broadcasting live from downtown Phoenix on opening day at Chase Field.
So make sure to stop by.
Say hello.
Hugs.
I have foam fingers to give away.
We have all sorts of great stuff in store.
So make sure that you.
you stopped by but I don't know.
What are we?
Yeah, I will say that when I was a teacher, my opening day tradition was trying to convince
my boss that we should just let the kids not come to school that day and hence let me not
have to work that day.
That's fucking brilliant.
Yeah, it was great, but the tradition never really paid off.
Unfortunately, my boss was not on board with that.
No, I imagine not.
I used to have an opening day tradition of always trying to find the commemorative pin, which
got harder and harder to find.
mind as time went on.
First, it was very easy.
Like, you could just, I mean, I think you could.
What commemorative pin?
So they have a pin that they make for opening day and they'll have both teams on it.
And it's just usually sold on opening day and you can only get it on opening day.
So I did not even know.
Yeah.
So there was a time where I had every single one of these.
And I, like, even if I wasn't going to the game, I would try to find my way down to the team shop and buy the opening day pin.
So I assume it would be like for the home opener.
Yeah.
So like even if the Dback's open on the road.
Right, right.
Yeah, it would be the home opener, correct.
So, but yeah, that's pretty much it.
We'll have to start.
We'll have to start some new traditions.
I go polish my brick.
The Derek won this brick for $25 in the ground over there.
Derek paid $25 for this brick is what it says.
I go make sure it's clean.
I check it out.
Get a little toothbrush in there, get the grout around and stuff like that.
That's one of my opening day traditions.
What else we got?
Ball and wall, Ben, I'm sure, I know that Ben,
Ben, 0564 on Twitter.
he says, what's your hypothetical trade package for a Diamondbacks Otani deadline acquisition?
Oh, my gosh. Ben's been enjoying our friends at OGs.
I don't know.
Can I talk about how absurd it would be for the Diamondbacks to actually do that?
Like even if ever, like if the Diamondbacks are on pace to win 100 games at the trade deadline,
I'm not sure that you want to go trade for show Aotani because you're not just going to gut like your farm system depth.
you very well might have to trade pieces off your pieces off your major league team as well.
And even so, do you want to gut any part of your organization for half a season of Shohei Otani
when he's about to become a free agent? You're going to have to pay $500 million or something
ridiculous to bring him back. It's sort of a non-starter for me, Derek. I have a hard time
entertaining even the thought of trading for Shohei Otani. Nobody's going to trade for Shohei Otani
at the trade deadline. The price is just going to be entirely too high. And I don't
think the angels are going to want to do that anyway.
Now I'm sure I'm going to eat my words.
In fairness to you?
Sean DePaz says really who is off limits?
So many people, Sean, are you kidding me?
Who is off limits?
Like, you're not going to trade Corby and Carroll for half a season of show a Otani.
I think there's only one player that's off limits for show a Otani.
Who?
Corby and Carol.
I would trade every single other person.
No.
I don't know.
You guys, it's not a fucking sign and trade.
It is a half a season of Otani.
You're all drunk.
I need you guys all fucking sober up.
This is nonsense.
No, there are so many people.
Six years of control of like Jordan Waller instead.
No, we're going to get a half a season of Otani.
Yeah.
No, I will riot in the streets.
Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen.
All right.
What else we got?
We're gone, Ben, you did bad.
We're upsetting.
Chris is trying to set me off tonight, Jesse.
She says, what is Luca?
Well, you know, sometimes, Jesse, you got to give the people what they want.
Are we his son's show again?
Yeah, would you allow me to, excuse me?
Let's hear.
What is Luca?
Luca is a whole asshole.
You know what Luca is.
A whole asshole.
I hate Lucas so much that I don't currently have anybody that, like, relates closely to how much as a fan.
I hate Luca.
I hate Luca for all the right reasons and even some of the wrong ones.
But I just hate Luca and that smug-ass look on his face.
Oh, yeah.
But we actually have a question.
in regards to this that Jesse doesn't think is even slightly and something we can answer.
But related, who is Luca to the debacks?
Yeah, I don't know.
Meaning which player?
I just don't know who like who is the baseball equivalent of Luca Donchitz for the Arizona
Diamondbacks.
There is like there is no one like that, right?
There's a lot of there's a lot of depth to the story with Luca because the sons obviously
probably should have taken Luca Donchich instead of taking DeAndre Aiton.
And when I think about the past with the Diamondbacks,
like is there one player that was right there for them
that they should have had that they passed on?
And then they like formed beef with later on.
I don't know.
I don't think that player exists.
Am I wrong, Derek?
You are wrong.
Okay.
All right.
Enlightened me, please.
Jazz chisholm.
Interesting.
Jazz chisholm.
Hmm.
Right?
Who gets that gallon fired up?
Okay.
All right.
I don't hate it.
Right.
He was a deback.
He was a deback.
I don't think it's a great comparison.
But it's a better comparison than I had in my mind.
It's as close as we can get.
It's somebody who is an exciting player.
That's the talk of the league,
even if his stats don't quite stack up to.
He's on the cover of MLB,
the show.
So clearly he's beloved in the public eye a little more than he should be.
Kind of like Rukka Donchich.
Right.
Right.
Yeah, I get it.
He has a connection to the team where he could have been part of our team.
It was a trade.
It wasn't a drab, but pretty close.
He was part of the debacks.
And you could have stayed here,
but instead they opted to trade.
for Zach Gallen, right?
And yeah, that's
that's pretty much it.
Sean agrees with me.
He said, yes,
he's answered.
I was thinking Danzby Swanson,
but I don't hate Danzby Swanson.
No,
there's no beef.
There's no beef.
No,
there's no.
There is beef with Ryan Braun,
but you don't have the part of the story.
Like the,
I don't think the D-Backs
were ever going to get Ryan Braun.
Mani Machado is kind of despised
by a lot of fan bases,
but I don't know if the D-Backs necessarily
have a huge beef with him in particular.
Everybody hates me.
I guess the debacks were rumored to be interested in trading for Manny Machado a few years ago.
So there's like maybe some connection there.
Not quite the connection.
You're done pretty good, Derek.
You done pretty good.
I'm not going to lie.
Jazz Chisholm is not a name that came to my mind.
And I think that's a pretty darn good answer.
Luke is still a whole assho.
What else we got?
Chris, back again.
This one comes from her son, Aidan.
And Aidan asks, how do you define sports movie?
example varsity blues isn't a football movie because if the main character didn't play football it would still be about the same movie versus movies like the sandlot blind side white men can't jump where the movie couldn't exist without the sport i don't know i mean i think that there's a lot to that of what you just said uh i goes back to our debate about what makes a christmas movie right like is die hard a christmas movie or not yeah yeah no i mean it really does come down to i don't think there's a lot of movies where the sports aren't
an integral part of the movie, but there are some where it's just kind of a background factor.
You know, they're, they're, they're, they're, they're an athlete in some way, but sure, not really.
I, I, I think that he's spot on with his assessment there as far as like movies like varsity blues where it could be any profession.
But I don't know, varsity blues still feels very much like a football movie.
I mean, there's, there's some movies where it's more about the business and not the sport itself.
One of my favorite movies of all time is Blue Chip, starring Nick Nolte, because it was such a good,
Like, because I was young when a lot of the, you know, cheating, like paying athletes to be a part of college teams.
And it was a, you know, obviously it was a not allowed.
And so like there was a lot of cheating scandal stuff that was explained in that movie that helped me like understand it.
But also, Shaquille O'Neal was just delightful in that movie.
And I love him.
It's probably his best performance besides Kazam, obviously.
But Gabriel Ferris says, Jerry McGuire.
That's a perfect example.
Jerry McGuire, sometimes I even forget about that being a sports movie.
I don't think of that.
I have no idea what you're talking about.
Jerry McGuire.
Yeah, no.
It's a Tom Cruise movie where Tom Cruise is a sports agent and his client is a wide receiver on the Arizona Cardinals, in fact.
Wow.
So there you go.
All right.
What else we got?
Is there a chance Malanson just gets DFA'd?
And this comes from our friend Jacob Giacoma at Giacoma, at Giacoma,
on Twitter, it will cost to do it,
but would be worth avoiding
the losses he might cause.
Jacob, I'm kind of with you.
I don't like that idea
and I don't like the idea of giving up
and I don't think that the Diamondbacks
as an organization are going to give up
on either of these guys this year
when it comes to Bumgardner or Moulanson.
Despite their performances,
I don't think they're going to give up on a lot of guys
on the team despite the fact that, you know,
obviously the guys with options,
that they can send down, that's a little bit different.
But unfortunately, I think win, lose or draw, these guys are going to be part of both the
starting rotation in the bullpen.
It just depends on how they're utilized and how Lovolo decides to go to them.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's hard to say.
I agree with you that the Diamondbacks are probably not going to move on from Mark
Melanson, at least at this juncture.
I just think it's too early for the team to commit to that.
Whether or not they should is another question.
I don't think they're going to do that, though.
Tori Lavello has already talked about Melanson after his first outing,
which he very much struggled to give up six hits in his first outing.
Tori said afterwards that he's not going to treat Melanson like a guy who's fighting
for a spot on the team, basically implying that it is a foregone conclusion that
Malanson is going to be part of this team.
Now, we don't know what role of that necessarily.
is, you know, it doesn't sound like it's a back end reliever necessarily.
It could be in more of a mop-up capacity.
But if you are using Mark Malanson in a mop-up capacity, eventually maybe you get to the
point where it's like, yeah, maybe we'd rather have someone else stepping in that role.
Like, in some ways by using Mark Malanson in a mop-up role, you've kind of already given
into the fact that he's just not going to be the player that you wanted him to be.
Right.
And you might just be willing to be like, okay, we have other guys that we want to get some
innings for, you know, Justin Martinez, Carlos Vargas, Corbin Martin, right?
Some of the younger guys who you're a little bit more excited about as far as the future is
concerned.
Maybe you want to give those innings to those guys instead and see if they eventually develop
into a role.
Whether that happens anytime soon, though, I don't think I see it.
I think it's probably going to be a while.
I think the debacks need to see Malanson in the regular season.
And if he continues to struggle, I could see them moving on during the season.
It's just one of those things like making a mistake and then compounding it by not admitting that you made a mistake and continuing to go, you know, you bought some device to trim, you know, your bushes out front.
But it's way more hassle than just a good old fashioned, you know, like, you know, pair of hedge clippers.
But because you spent $300 on this device, you're going to use.
use it. You can't take it back.
You can't take it back. You're going to use it now. Right? Like there's things like that that I
understand the amount of money invested in these guys kind of requires you to utilize them.
But if it, we're not talking about, you know, like, oh, him and Justin Martinez are comparable,
or Justin Martinez. They're comparable, right? I'm not like, it's not like it's just a little bit off.
We're talking about Melanson right now being completely ineffective. And we're just talking about
spring training games like Jesse said.
against Royals players that aren't even going to make the big league roster.
It's not to knock them.
It's more to knock Mark Melanson, obviously.
But it's also to say, right, like if this is where he's at now,
where is he going to be when he's facing major league hitting on a, you know,
nightly, weekly basis during the regular season?
Yeah.
Hopefully he can get back on track before then.
This is a great time to be bad spring training,
especially when you're not fighting for a job.
You're really just trying to work stuff out and get yourself back on track.
But it's concerning and the most concerning part is the lack of their commitment or not the lack of commitment.
The disturbing is their commitment to him based on the financial finances that they're paying him.
It just doesn't look like they're going to part ways with Melanson if he continues to be ineffective.
It like just everything Jesse said sounds right.
So basically, hopefully what we can hope for is that he gets gets back right.
that's really the only thing, really that's going to, I think, turn this thing around.
Regardless, he's going to be pitching.
He's going to be coming out of the bullback.
Yeah, I still like, I do have to say that part of me wonders if the Diamondbacks are going
to speak publicly like Mark Malanson's role is not at all in question.
And if there's just a smidge of possibility that it actually might be in question and that
maybe the team doesn't want to talk about that.
They're not going to, you know, go on the record talking about that at this point,
which is understandable.
But you have to believe it.
I mean,
if Mark Balanson continues to just be utterly ineffective in spring training like he's been,
there has to be some level of poor performance where you're just like,
we just can't do it.
You know,
maybe it's maybe it looks like a mystery injured list stint at the beginning of the year
where the debacks can,
you know,
try to work with him a little bit more.
Maybe it's that instead of,
you know,
just a straight up you're not making the team.
But I don't know,
man, it's hard for me to believe that the debacks don't have at least some willingness to
reconsider when it comes to his role this year.
Yeah.
I, I, I agree.
Hopefully.
What else we got?
Last question comes from Ryan Hanley.
Hanley writes, what is the best ballpark food at Chasefield?
Hmm.
I know we've answered this before, but the season's right around the corner.
So we want to help you guys out.
We want to remind you of what the good.
food is. And the best place at Chase Field is Hungry Hill. That's the answer. Hungry Hills,
meatball sandwiches, their brats, just everything they have there. It doesn't matter.
Italian beef. Everything they have at Hungry Hill is delicious. There's two stands, I believe there's
two stands on the main concourse level. And, you know, honestly, there might be some better options
this year. I wasn't thrilled with the options last year. I got to admit, there was a lot of the same,
A lot of chicken tennies around the ballpark, which I know this guy is thrilled about.
Four peaks.
Four pique.
Yeah.
There is a difference.
There's all cold beers and cheeseburgers open now, and I actually had their hamburger
with Saul not too long ago, and it was delightful.
So that's a really good option, too.
But Salt River Fields also has some decent options as well.
I know that there's the Island Noodles location is my personal favorite, but everything in Salt Riverfield seems like it's a bit expensive.
It's a little expensive.
Yeah.
I mean,
hence why I don't think I've consumed anything.
It's Salt Riverfields, at least not this year yet.
Sean Paz says,
Gonzo's chicken and waffles.
The waffles are top class.
I didn't know they sold waffles there still, to be honest.
I thought they took them away after they changed it to be gonzo's and remove the waffles.
So see,
even I don't know everything.
There's like a little Mexican food cart at Chase Field.
I don't know if you know what I'm talking about.
Oh, yeah.
The name of it is eluding me, but that was very good.
Yeah.
I had that once or twice during the season.
season and I was I was pretty dang impressed.
The tortas at Latranza are fantastic too.
Like up in the top corner up in the upper deck.
Those are amazing.
And Gadsukes, the enchilada place.
Oh, wait, is that what I'm talking about?
Maybe is it the enchilada in the little thing.
Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm talking about.
There we go.
So Gatsukes was something I did not think was going to work.
And I got to tip my cap to them because they've done everything.
Like, they actually blew my mind with their presentation and how neat and edible they make
enchiladas in a ballpark setting, which I thought we're just going to
to be an absolute fucking mess and they weren't so I got to say I was wrong on that one and
yeah they are definitely a great option I like food options like that I like the versus hot dog I like
a lot of the stuff they've done I just I think we need more of a variety you know that's one thing
yeah the ballpark could definitely use I think I had the pirates versus dog and I was it wasn't
it wasn't really that yeah it was just like an expensive hot dog their coleslaw and french fries
on top yeah yeah yeah that's not good uh Sean DePaz said
Scoopwell's cookie dough and ice cream.
Yeah, they're new and they are excellent as well, definitely.
All right.
That's all we got for Mailbag Monday.
We thank you guys so much for your Mailbag Monday questions,
but you know it would be good at Chase Field, a spaghetti shack.
That's what would be good.
ASU alum owned and operated in Tempe, Arizona.
And they brought us some delicious spaghetti and meatballs that is actually,
Jesse and I had a wonderful Lady in the Tramp style dinner.
We did not do the spaghetti thing because, you know, Jesse, he refuses to do stuff.
like that with me, but they do serve a menu starring spaghetti, meatballs, garlic bread, and a few other
fan favorites. And their mission is to provide quality affordable food as quickly as possible
so that you can spend less time cooking and more time with your loved ones. So thank you to
Spaghetti Shack for their wonderful food. And again, see, a spaghetti shack at Chasefield would
kind of be fire because what I'm looking for is a variety, right? I like, like ballpark food,
but Jesse and I are there a lot. Eighty games is a lot of time to be at a place and eat. I'd take some
spaghetti in that joint.
Yeah, exactly. So let's see if we can do that.
But the spaghetti shack is a community focused to go pasta concept started right here in Tempe,
Arizona by five lifelong friends.
We are currently serving Tempe and Queen Creek and hope to come to your neighborhood soon.
So keep an eye out for the spaghetti shack.
Big thank you to all of you guys for being here in the chat.
Whoever gave us that thumbs down, I'm pretty sure.
I'm pretty sure it was Ben.
And I'm sorry, Ben, if that helps you get rid of that thumbs down.
Because, you know, it affects Jesse's.
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Jesse, Zach Granky is still a menace.
He is in the best way possible.
In the best possible way.
He faced a man that was on Los Angeles Dodgers who wasn't actually allowed to swing the bat.
Fractured pinky.
Fractured pinky.
Yeah.
Why is he in the lineup?
Why is he in the lineup?
He's in the lineup apparently because he wants to track pitches.
Like as part of kind of getting your timing down early in spring, it's still helpful to be in the box
and, you know, be up there seeing different pitches that the pitchers will throw at you
or in the case of when you're facing Zach Granky, you just have a pitcher who's trying to mess
with you the whole time because he knows that you can't swing the bat.
And Granky did a phenomenal job of that the other day.
not only did he do a phenomenal job of that
he he he didn't even
give Miguel what he wanted he didn't give him real
pitches he just no
threw pitches in the strike zone
he threw he threw the ball into the strike zone
he didn't throw pitches he just threw the ball
into the strike zone and uh it was quite hilarious
he missed it once right yeah he did he did throw a ball
he did throw a curve ball a little inside
but other than that I think it was a 92 mile an hour fastball
that was just kind of right down the middle
and then he just kind of lobbed something else up there.
I'm not really sure what exactly it was.
He was just playing catch with the catcher at that point.
It was pretty fantastic.
But this does have a tie-in back to the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Unfortunately.
Unfortunately.
Because when we talk about competing for that final starting rotation spot,
Ryan Nelson is one of the young pitchers who is currently competing for that spot.
And Ryan Nelson faced Miguel Vargas.
And we aren't sure 100% if Ryan Nelson knew Miguel.
Vargas was in this particular situation with a fractured pinky and inability to swing.
But the results, two at bat's was that Nelson walked Vargas both times.
Yeah, that's pretty rough.
Like, you know a guy can't swing the bat and you're still not throwing strikes.
Like, that's not a great look.
I still wonder, number one, there is like, did the debacks?
Did Ryan Nelson actually know that Miguel Vargas was in this situation?
which I don't know how they wouldn't have
because it was like floating around on Twitter.
Twitter knew.
Twitter knew, yeah, I kind of feel like they would have.
But number two, there's also the aspect of like
would it have even changed Ryan Nelson's process?
Like, it's spring training, the games don't count, right?
So like in a regular season game, of course,
just throw three strikes, get them out.
In a spring training game as a pitcher,
you're trying to work on some stuff.
You're not necessarily just trying to like get everybody out
as fast as you can.
So maybe it wouldn't have changed anything.
Maybe Ryan Nelson did know about it and was trying to locate some secondary pitches or whatnot.
And it just didn't go his way.
But it's still not a great look at the end of the day.
Sean DePaz is trying to make us feel better by saying everyone is walking.
Yeah.
I don't care.
He's walked in like at one point it was half.
I think like four of his first eight plate appearances of the season.
What is going on?
Which, yeah, maybe you're just really nervous.
Like when you know that a guy can't swing, it like kind of gets in your head a little bit.
I don't know. I don't know how to explain that.
Oh, man. Well, in other Nelson news, he was actually scheduled to come out of the bullpen,
which didn't look very good for his chances as far as competing.
I wouldn't necessarily read into that too much.
But that was the plan on paper was to have Ryan Nelson pitch on back of Zach Gallen tomorrow.
Zach Gallen's making his spring training debut on Tuesday,
DVAC's were scheduled to have Ryan Nelson pitch on back of that outing.
But instead he'll pitch in a B game against the Texas Rangers back at Surprise Stadium.
Thank God I don't have to drive out there for it.
So we have another game in Scottsdale to cover.
So I'll be over there.
I'll never go to Surprise ever again.
But anyway, yeah.
You don't even live that far from Surprise, Derek.
That's what's so frustrating about it.
It's so close, but yet so far away.
That's why I get so frustrated.
We need a freeway that goes right to downtown surprise is what we need.
Or right to the stadium.
That would be preferable.
Like you said, Gallen is scheduled to go three innings, 45 pitches tomorrow.
Yep.
So great to see him out on the bump.
And, of course, Ryan Nelson now starting in that B game, gives him, you know, again,
keeps people like me from speculating on if he's out of the competition or not.
Whatever.
I'll speculate all I want.
It's his job.
It's a little early for anyone to be out of any competition at this point.
You know what?
It's also a little early for you to not have – actually, it's late, I should say.
I was wondering where you were going with that.
Your apartment decorated yet or have your furniture purchase.
But, of course, Jesse needs all the help he can get.
And the place he can get it is at MoreFurniture.com.
They have a wonderful variety of furniture.
Some of the best you can get in Valley for some of the biggest value you can get.
And they also have their white glove delivery service where they will not only bring your furniture to your house.
They will help you get that couch in the door without you needing to figure out how to do it.
And they will set it up for you as well.
So make sure to check out MoreFurniture.com.
save big on the best furniture in the valley when you head to more furniture.com.
Also, shout out to our friends at Draft King Sportsbook.
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Getting those bets in.
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Well, that's all we got.
Guys, tomorrow, we have a staff meeting, so we will be out.
I'm going to beat Jesse in some sort of trivia game on a game show type thing.
So I've been looking forward to that.
We're not on the same team for that.
Shouldn't we be on this?
Somebody has to be on my team.
And I feel really bad for whoever it is, because I, whatever kind of a game.
I don't know what kind of a game show this is, but generally game shows probably don't
tailor to my skill set very well.
Unless it's like a Wheel of Fortune game show, I'm pretty good with words.
Are you know?
I mean, are you going to know pop culture references and phrases and quotes?
Pop culture references, no.
No.
But if you give me just like a general category and a puzzle to solve, I swear to God, Saul
Bookman, if you put me on the team as Jesse tomorrow, I will not, I just won't play.
I will just fucking leave.
Do you understand me?
Anyway, I'll just hide out at Salt River Fields
Yeah, that's what you guys don't have to worry about me
You really does want to be there more than anywhere else in the world
So make sure to follow him on Twitter for all updates on the Arizona Diamondbacks
He's at Jesse and Friedman. I'm at Kapp underscore Kman with a K
Our show is at PHNX underscore Dbacks
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We thank you guys so much for being here
And so much for your time on behalf of Damon
Jesse and myself, we always appreciate your time
And remember kids, baseball is fun, but it is so much more fun when you're not a Bush League announcer.
