PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - In Defense of Torey Lovullo

Episode Date: September 18, 2021

On today's episode, prosecutor Derek Montilla and defense attorney Prof. Jesse Friedman present their cases for and against moving on from Torey Lovullo as manager of the Arizona Diamondbacks. 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.

and welcome to the PHNX D-BACs podcast right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Montia, occasionally known as your mayor of PHNX. Also, I'm going to throw another title out there, fashionista as Espo has named me, the fashionista of PHNX. So thank you so much to Espo for yet another title. And of course, thank you guys so much for joining us. We are brought to you by the Drafking Sports Book doing great things right now. We're having a lot of fun with it here.

in Arizona now that we can use it. So go download the Draft King Sportsbook app now. Use our code of PHNX and for betting $1 on any football game this weekend at all. College, NFL, doesn't matter. I don't think your friend's backyard pickup game is on there, but, you know, real games are on there. And then you'll get $200 instantly in free bets

for making that $1 bet. So check out the Draft King Sportsbook app now. Again, thank you guys for joining us. I am joined by my friend, the very well-dressed professor Jesse Friedman over here. Not Thunderstick tonight. He's coming as the professor tonight. Jesse, how you doing? Well, I had to dress for the occasion. I heard it was an audio podcast, so I, you know, I had to look good. It seems excessive. It seems excessive. I know we're going to have a mock trial tonight, but I feel a little intimidated. I am here in a tank top

because it is tank season. I wanted to match Baxter from our graphic. So I am not prepared. and here I was claiming to be the fashionista and you show up in a suit, man. What the heck is going on? I wanted to talk about some of the Diamondbacks news. Obviously, they were off yesterday, Thursday, but they did have some news today before today's game. They started a game with the three game series with the Astros on Friday with Madison Bumgarner on the Hill in game one. They reinstated Cole Calhoun from the injured list and they put Seth Beer on the Astros on. the 10-day IL.

So what are your thoughts on Calhoun coming back before the end of the season? Did you think you were going to see him again in the right field this season? Honestly, I kind of forgot that Cole Calhoun plays for the Diamondbacks. Well said. Yeah, I mean, he's played 36 games this entire season. And we are almost, you know, we are almost to the end. He's missed over 100 games with injury. But I think it's just so fitting, Derek, that the Diamondbacks get Cole,

how Cole Calhoun back. And of course, Seth Beer goes on the injured list in return. It seems like they've never taken someone off the injured list without putting someone else on. Right. Right. It's like this weird balance where, okay, you can have this guy back, but in turn, we need to sacrifice this guy's hamstring.

There's a lot of hamstring sacrifices for this team this season. Or shoulder dislocations. Yes. Whatever it is. Right. Calhoun is hitting 238 this season in. 130 at bats. Like you said, not very many at bats,

10 RBI. I think at times he's been exclusive. I think that he's been very fun to watch in the outfield as well. I think I didn't know what kind of defense we were going to get from Calhoun

when we picked him up. But I've enjoyed him out there when he has played. It has just been that factor of him playing. He was great last year. He was probably the best hitter on the team last year. But I mean, you add together, I want to say he played 48 games last year, 36 this year. The guy has like barely played 80 games with the Diamondbacks, even though they signed him to do a

two-year contract. It's just crazy how he just hasn't been able to stay on the field, even though he's really been a pretty durable player throughout most of his career with the Angels. He was pretty reliable for them. But like we talked about yesterday, the Diamondbacks are cursed and these are the kinds of things that they deal with, right? I'm glad you got on board with that so quickly. The team does have a team option for 2022. Do you think they're going to pick that up on Calhoun? We could maybe do a podcast on that. That's a really interesting topic because Calhoun, I mean, it's not, he was really good last year, as we said, this year he's been hampered by injuries. The Diamondbacks could use some more outfield depth. He's left-handed. This team is

very, very left-handed. So I think that kind of works against him, but I definitely wouldn't count it out. I think what we brought up the other day, because we're doing a lot of questioning about whether guys should be brought back and a lot about whether or not the Diamondback should proceed with a rebuild or, you know, at the very least, parting ways with some of the guys that have been the core of the current team and moving on with the future core of this team. I think the one thing we brought up that still makes the most sense to me right now is this team isn't deep enough to even be considering that, right?

it's it's one of those things where they kind of need to keep as many of these position players and add depth as as much as they can rather than looking necessarily to move on from their current roster at least at this point yeah we want them to clean house but like not yet yeah they kind of they kind of need to bridge the gap to you know some of these young guys that we're getting excited about i'm not sure if they're all necessarily ready for a super full-time workload so that's where you know david David Peralta, Nick Ahmed, like we talked about the other day, and Cole Calhoun could be in that group as well. I think his team option is for $9 million, I want to say, which feels a little high for a guy who's probably going to end this year playing about 50 games or maybe less than 50 games. Sure. So maybe that winds up being too steep in the end for a team that, as we've seen, doesn't really want to spend a whole lot of money right now. But he's the type of player you would want on your team next year. I think the bigger thing about it is it's hard to look at this year's numbers and make a decision. If you look at last year's numbers and think about paying a guy that

produced like that for $9 million, you probably would in today's market, even if it's just for one year. The debacks are big about that, and I know that that option has to look good as far as it just being one more year. They would probably go out and do a one-year option with a veteran-type player anyway. You might as well bring Calhoun back, in my opinion. I just won me. I just won I wonder if Calhoun goes to the open market, what kind of money do you think he gets? I don't know if he's a free agent that someone's going to drop $9 million on a guy who's coming off of 40, 50 game season. You don't want to overpay.

It's tricky, but he's a type of player that I want for this team going into next year. He could be potentially another guy, though, that we watch go away and then regain his form, come back to the way he was in 2020. Don't start. And then we're doing, you know, we're doing the X's bit on them, you know. We're spying on him then. We need more content. That's fair.

Well, we'll take it. Exactly. It's tag season. Jesse, it's tank season. A tank season update, by the way. The Orioles and the D-backs are currently tied. And when I say tied, I mean tied. I don't know if the Orioles game today is over yet.

I don't believe it is. But as of the start of this show, both teams had a 47 and 99 record with the pirates pulling up in third, a distant third at 5492, a respectable 54.92, but the debacks and Orioles locked in a dead heat right now for that number one pick. And I'll tell you, man, the more I'm doing research for a piece that's going up on go-PhNX.com right now, the more excited I get about Elijah Green and his potential. he has been called at times the next Mike Trout and I am starting to buy into that just a bit.

Well, so have a lot of guys who did not become the next Mike Trout. I'll throw it out there. It's not the first time the cop has been made, Derek. I love the car. No, no, don't do that to me. We need that comparison. I love the comparison. I need the next Mike Trout in our franchise, right?

Which isn't even a great comparison because what you're telling me is we're going to draft a really great player that's going to be good on our team until the end a time, but the rest of the team will not be, right? Like, if that's what happened with the angel, I don't want that happening. Yeah, yeah. Well, your tank season update, we're recording this on Friday evening. So as it stands, as we record on this Friday evening, the Orioles are losing, and the Diamondbacks as we speak against the Astros are currently tied to zero zero here on Friday. So we'll see how things pan out. But as of right now, it's not impossible that both of these teams could lose number one hundo here on the Friday evening.

evening, which, what a lot of me? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the race is heating up. See, they talk about the playoffs. This is just as exciting as the playoffs. Tank season is just as exciting as the playoffs. Madison Bumgarner, like I said earlier, is on the bum the night for the DBEX. The DK. Sportsbook app, the Draft Kings, excuse me, I'm using, you know, abbreviations over here because I'm really familiar with them, you know, but the Draft King Sportsbook app had his strike out over under tonight at four and a half. And it was really tantalizing to me. It really was. But then I remembered, Bumgarner doesn't really strike guys out that much. And five strikeouts actually started to seem like a bit much. He did come out in the

first inning and get one strikeout, though. So, you know, it is what it is. I'm just analyzing everything now. And I'm taking a look at, I'm just, I'm all in now, Jesse. I'm all in. You know, I'm having a lot of fun with the Draft King Sportsbook app. And you can too, because again, you can download that. And to add the excitement, Draft King is giving all customers an exclusive no-brainer offer. On top of the using code PHNX

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Draft King's Sportsbook app for any information I can find potentially on Toy LeVullo possibly staying with this team. There's no app, there's no, there's no player parlay. There's no special up there yet, but I wouldn't be surprised

to see at least some people taking some sort of action on this. The talk has really heated up. It's been on everybody's mind at this point, and obviously it's because of the contractual situation with the Diamondbacks and with Tori Lovolo, as well as other factors, but really it's been the losing that everybody right now questions him as manager and whether or not this team should bring him back next year. Jesse and I have decided that based on Jesse's

reception to his article about keeping Tori Lovolo and why the debacks would be wise to do so on go p hnx.com. We are going to have our first edition of night court. We're going to night court, folks. Jesse has no idea what that is, by the way. That is a reference that has aged me 100 years in his eyes, and I will never forget how old he made me feel on this day. With that being said, we are going to now debate the case of whether or not

the Arizona Diamondbacks should debate or excuse me, should retain Tori Lavolo. The Honorable public is presiding. The prosecution is myself, Mr. Derek Montia. The defense of Mr. Tori Lovolo is Mr. Jesse Friedman. Jesse, please, I will allow you to have the floor first. Are you ready for this, Derek? I'm ready for this. Blow my mind. My mind is ready to be blown.

I don't think you're dressed for this. I have my gosh. Obviously, I'm not dressed for this. You came in a suit to a audio podcast. What kind of monster does that? I lost it. I lost before this case even started. This all started, by the way, for all of you listening,

because I, you know, I just posted my article today. I think it was yesterday. I wrote an article called, you know, should the Diamondbacks bring back Tori Lavello? And I simply posted the article with a very brief caption on Twitter. And it was like I'd murdered everyone's children. Everyone hates you. Everybody hates you.

You are the worst. It was the dumbest idea ever. So I'm hoping that everyone listening, I'm hoping that, you know, a fair amount of you are here because you agree with me. But I'm also hoping that some of those haters are here among us. And like my friend Derek,

are also going to learn their lesson here. Oh, so here we go, ladies and gentlemen. Let's go. I'm going to let my article do most of the talking here. It is, you know,

It is already up on go PHNX.com. Go check it out. Basically, here's my case. I am not here to say that the Diamondbacks absolutely have to bring back to Roy Labello. I don't think that he is, you know, someone who, you know, has earned so much respect and, you know, has gotten all of these great results to the point where we have to bring him back, right? But what my research said, and I went into writing this article with a very open mind, what my research has led me to believe is that he is not.

the problem with this franchise. You look at the things that Tori Lavello, a manager has direct control over, which granted is not many things, right? There's not that much that a manager has direct control over in the game of baseball. I will confirm that that a lot of people, I think the manager does have more to do with the transactions and the players being called up, sent down, all of that type of stuff. Like you said, he actually has very little control or even input on that. I'm sure his input is valued by Mike Hazen, but that's the front office's duty to make those calls. So basically, you already agree with me, Derek. I'm already, I'm already sure to have you on board. Wait until you're my counter. All right. All right. Here we go. So,

so let's look at the things that Tori Lavello does have control over, right? And there's not many. But one of the main things, of course, is pitching changes, right? This is the most tangible thing that a MLB manager controls during the game. And this is actually, I think, a point of critique for Tori Lavello when he first became manager. A lot of people thought that his hook wasn't quick enough, right? That he would leave guys in and it would backfire for the team. He should have gone to the bullpen earlier, right?

If you look at the numbers, the numbers confirmed that. Tori Lavello allowed over a thousand, allowed his starting pitchers to face over a thousand batters the third time through the order in his first season on the job back in 2017. This year, that number is down to 648, and it has steadily decreased basically every season on the job. So his hook is as fast as it's ever been. And not only that, but this season, despite the disaster that we have seen in those situations facing opposing hitters for the third time through the order, the Diamondbacks pitching staff has actually been pretty middle of the road, which for them is a positive, right? They're not really a middle of the road pitching staff.

But in those situations, when Tori Lavello has trusted them to do that, they've actually performed in a way better than they normally do relative to the rest of the league. So that's one thing. Other things that managers have control over, right? On some level base running, right? You know, how aggressive are we going to be? When are we going to choose to send guys? That sort of thing.

The Diamondbacks have a 79% base stealing success rate since Tori Lavello got here. A lot of that is probably due to our good friend Dave McKay. who's one of the best in the business. But even he hasn't been around for this year due to an injury in the clubhouse that happened back in March. And the Diamondbacks have still, despite the disaster of this season,

have been one of the best base running teams in baseball. And the last thing I'll bring in here, Derek, before I let you have a word in this conversation, is the defense of this Diamondbacks team. And I am fully willing to acknowledge that there have been many moments where the defense this season has not been pretty, there have been people bumping into each other.

There's been all sorts of embarrassing things that nobody wants to see a major league level team do, right? But if you look historically over Toro Lavello's tenure, the Diamondbacks have consistently year over year been one of the best defensive teams in baseball. And I remember when Madison Bumgarner signed with this team, one of the main reasons he brought up was that the Diamondbacks played more fundamentally sound baseball than basically any other team out there. And I think we can all agree the Diamondbacks this.

this year have played a number of players out of position, right? Dalton Varshot's playing center field, Pavin Smith's playing center field. They've got all these guys playing positions that they just don't have a whole lot of experience with. And for me, that's a pretty decent explanation why so many of these mishaps have happened. Tori Lavello's talked about it.

He's dealt with it. He's done his part. And I think he is overall, if you consider his entire body of work here, the diamond backs have been very fundamentally sound in the aggregate, just looking at his entire body of work. So, Derek, I'll turn it over to you. Good luck.

Well, thank you for giving me the floor, Mr. Friedman, Professor Friedman. I don't want to disrespect you. Now, obviously, with everything you said, I cannot debate the facts. The facts are what they are. I will start off by addressing the court and saying this. I like Tori Lavolo very much. I like him as a manager. I respect him as a manager.

And I like him very much as a person. I've covered this team now for 10 seasons, and I think he is one of the best human beings I've ever been around that's been associated with this team. He's sincere. He's just a great person. To even have to take this position against Lovolo kind of hurts me a little bit because he knows my dog. He knows my dog's name. They're friends. So I don't want to sit here and put Tori Lovolo on blast.

I will be the first to say that it has literally been a series of unfortunate events like we talked about in the very first episode of this show that has occurred to this team. We've talked about it feeling cursed. We've just talked about everything going wrong for this team. It's frustrated me to watch Tori LeVolo as a manager change his decisions and question himself as this year has gone by because of how difficult this season has been. LeVolo at times has been like a driver stuck in traffic where no matter, what lane he picks is the lane that's backing up. He gets in the middle lane, that fast lane backs up and starts going. He gets back over the fast lane. Now that one backs up and the middle lane starts going. It doesn't seem like he can make any right calls, no matter which direction

he goes. Like you said, I've seen him make calls where he pulled a pitcher that was doing well out because they were, you know, getting high in their pitch count and the bullpen came in and blew it. I've seen him leave guys in because they were doing in the very same series because he just questioned himself from the night before, and then the starter stayed in too long, and they blew it. It's probably been the most frustrating year of his life, period, especially with all the things out of his control. But with that being said, that doesn't change the fact that there's a good chance this season is going to end up as the worst season in DBAX history. Record-wise, they set the longest losing streak in team history. They set the longest road losing streak in

MLB history dating back to 1900 in the modern era of baseball, it's been an absolute embarrassment. And I will be the first to say that not all of this is Tori LeVolo's fault. But as you brought up, the mismanagement of pitchers, the mismanagement of information and giving guys too much information, I think like Bumgarner revealed, I think at times that Dan Herron, as an analyst for this team might at times be doing more bad than good with the type of information that they're putting out. I don't know. At one time, he was heralded as being, you know, an analytics genius and the information that he was providing was really helping this team. Now what we've seen is pitchers like Robbie Ray and others leave. I know you pointed out like

Taiwan Walker's numbers this season are comparable to when he was here, even not as good. So he's kind of come back down to earth. Ray is still up in another strategy. And so are other pitchers and players that have left here during Lovolo's tenure. That's a reason why I know that's out of his control, but still, I just can't understand watching someone like Ray here for as long as we have, watching him go off and, you know, basically become the Cy Young Award winner where he never looked like he was ever going to be that while he was here. I never even had, you know, like he was a strikeout guy.

Robbie Ray was fun to watch like we talked about on yesterday. episode. He was their one A guy projected there for a while. He just never really lived up to that, and he was never consistently like he has been this year. I don't know how to explain that other than there has to be something with this coaching staff in some way, shape, or form. The other thing I will bring up now is just this franchise's history. Bob Brenley was fired midway through the 2004 season after winning a world series for this team. After bringing the state of Arizona its first major championship in our history, Bob Brenley was not given more than halfway through that season because of the performance

of the team that year. It's understandable for them to part ways, but if someone like Brenley didn't make it longer than at least the end of his season, I will say that Lavallo has not done enough for this franchise in order to qualify for him to stick around any longer. I will say that his time here hasn't been that much of his success for him to end up being the longest tenured coach manager. Excuse me. I know coach isn't a word we want to use with this.

Manager in DBAX history. But my final thought is the fans, right? This team changed directions in its first year because of the, attrition of season ticket holders. That's the reason why they pivoted from a long-term plan of building a farm system and making this team a winner eventually to knowing that they didn't have that grace period here in Phoenix with fans to want to watch a losing product from an expansion team. They pivoted and they made this team a World Series winner in three seasons.

The reason was because of the attrition of season ticket holders. The Diamondbacks at this point need to listen to their fans as consumers, right? If they want a change of direction, then that's the direction the franchise needs to go. And I don't think at this point, continuing to put Tori Lavolo out there would retain fans or get people to come back to the stadium next year. I know it's, I know it's harsh, but it's a business. And when you walk around that stadium and see how empty it is, they need to do everything they can to try to rejuvenate people's belief in this organization. and bring fans back to that stadium. That is an imperative.

I've said it many times, but the visiting fans right now are keeping the lights on in Chase Field most nights. So I really think that the Diamondbacks need to do things with the idea of getting fans back excited about this team and in the building watching it as much as possible. Unfortunately, it seems like at least on the Twitter, that's my only sounding board,

that most people want Lovolo fired. And I think, or not fired because they would just part ways with him after the season. They just don't want the debacks to bring Lovolo back after the season. I think it's fair. I think it's respectable to mutually part ways after the contract is over rather than firing him. I think they could have done that at some point in this season. People have asked, who would you bring up? I'd probably bring up Cron, to be honest, from AAA Reno and have him, let him get a

shot at managing. He has a relationship with a lot of the youngsters that are already going to come up to this team. You have to admire what he's done in Reno and how guys develop very well there. I don't have an answer for what happens between Reno and Chase Field, and it can't be all the thin air of Reno. It's got to also be the fact that, you know, there's some transitional managing things that Crohn might be a little better at than Lavello. I don't know at this point, but I am convinced that this is the direction they should go. I thank you for your time. Are we sure you're the mayor of PHNX?

Is that real? All I know is that an election was held at one point. Votes were cast. I was notified. I didn't make it up, you know? That's an accusation I don't like is the making it up part. But you're right about the PHNX part. If people want to get quality content like your article

and my article coming on this whole, very, very relevant curse situation, you can get that at go phtnx.com. And there's no better way to do that than to become a member. Becoming an annual member gets you access not only to our written content, but it gets you exclusive members-only deal. And you get a free t-shirt for signing up for an annual membership. You can check out those t-shirts over at p.hnx locker.com. You'll also get access to our members-only.

scored where you can get away from the social media BS and just talk with us and your fellow PHNX members. If you love what we're doing over here and want to support us on this journey, become a member of the family today and either get your free t-shirt for your annual membership or if you just want to try us out, you'll get your first month for just 50 cents, depending on which option you choose. So check us out. Like I said, Jesse's article has caused quite the stir, not only on Twitter, but everywhere. And I hold it up to you guys to listen to this podcast and tell us who you believe in. Obviously, it's me, but I don't want to influence in any way, shape, or form. Okay. I get to respond, though, right there. Please, please. Okay.

So I'll make this quick. So your first, one of the first main points you made was in regard to Robbie Ray and, you know, the list of Diamondbacks players who were, you know, just okay under Lavello. and then, you know, they change teams and suddenly they become stars. This is one argument that I've seen quite a bit on the Twitter, and of all the ones, I have to say, it's maybe the most irritating because I don't think it's true.

Derek, can you name for me, other than Robbie Ray, can you name for me another player or maybe another two players that fall under this category? Wade Miley. Wade Miley did not play under Toro Lavello. Really? No. No way.

It was, way sadly hasn't been a diamond back for years. I know. I thought he played under Lovolo. How about Andrew Chafin? Sure. So Andrew Chafin is the one other name that people brought up on Twitter. Andrew Chafin was like okay when he was a diamond back. He wasn't great, but sure, you know, he went over to Oakland and now he's with the Cubs and he's been better.

His peripheral numbers say he's probably not that vastly improved, even though his ERA is super good. His ERA was 8.10 in 2020 with Arizona, and it is currently 1.52, Jesse. Are you okay? All right. So I'll acknowledge Andrew Schafen. I still stand by the fact that over the course of his Tori Lavello career, Andrew Schaffin was a pretty good pitcher. And now, yes, he's sort of stepped it up a notch. But other than that, it's really, it's really just those two guys. And on the flip side, if we're going to blame Tori Lavello for, the guys who, you know, have vastly improved. We also have to let him take credit for the guys who were not that good and then came here and became stars. There's this guy named Catelle Marte, Derek. I'm not sure if you've heard of him.

I've heard of him. He came here and was just, you know, he was a decent prospect. Nobody expected much. And he is now a superstar. He is not just an all star, but when he is on the field consistently, he is a superstar. We've seen Josh Rojas take big steps forward this season. We've seen Dalton Varsho have a monster second half this season. Tori Lavello has had players come here who were not necessarily very highly thought of

and have really, really thrived under his leadership. So I don't know if we can safely say that Tori Lavello necessarily has a hand to play in any of these guys' careers. I think it's probably more likely that they just sort of did this on their own. but if we are going to blame him for Robbie Ray and Andrew Chafin, we also have to credit him for Catelle Marte and Pavin Smith and Josh Rojas and Dalton Varsho and I could go on, but I don't think I need to because I think you understand what I'm saying. All I'm going to say is my,

I think my biggest gripe with Toro Lovolo can be summed up in an Albert Einstein quote, which is everyone is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid. And I think at times, Tori Lavallo just makes guys change positions, and I don't know the reason why. I don't feel like it's because naturally,

we think Cotell Marte will be a better player at center field than he was at second base. I don't think that's the reasoning behind that. I think it was a need, situation. And I think that's a lot of his adjustments to guys playing out of their natural positions that they would probably be best at. That to me, I don't believe is for the benefit of the player. I feel like it's a mismanagement of a roster and you're forcing guys to play different positions. I will concede, though, on your point about the former players,

far too often, we lump them all into one big lump thing and act like they all happened last year or over the last three years, right? Like Max Scher was a D-Backs yesterday or something. You know what I mean? So it's really just a trait of this team, unfortunately, but it's also a trait of small market teams. They are usually in a position to draft guys that are better. They are usually bring guys up from the farm system and make them a good player, give them reps. And that's where they kind of get to a point where their contract might be too expensive.

for that small market team. Someone else picks them up, and now they're a superstar on the Dodgers and they're making the Oakland A's look stupid or they're making the Mets look stupid by picking up guys like Justin Turner and Max Muncie off the scrap heap and making them into superstars in L.A.

That's why baseball is such a fickle game. I think that's why the draft doesn't matter that much in baseball because you really never know what you're going to get. Oh, I thought it was pink season, Derek. I thought we had to have the number one overall pitch. Historically, the number one draft pick in baseball is pretty good. Like, when you go back the last 20 years and look at all the number one draft picks, except for the ones over the last few years, obviously, that haven't yet kind of come up through the system,

they are all really good players, but there's a lot of all-stars and great players there. I just want, at the end of the day, the debacks, to have their pick of their player, and that's really what it comes down to. I just don't believe I don't know. I don't know if I want Tori Lavolo to be the man managing those players when they come up. And I know that would be way down the line, but, you know, this is where we're at right now. So you guys decide. I think Jesse made a compelling argument, but he's, again, of course, wrong when compared to me.

Do I get a final statement? Please. I'll let you have the floor with your final remarks. Okay, okay. So I think all I'm saying overall in the end here is that if you want to, let Tori Lavello go. You can, right? As you said before, this is sort of a clean time to do it, right? His contract is over. You can mutually part ways. It doesn't have to be, you know, this big thing, right? You save some ugliness. The Diamondbacks have a horrible record this year,

which I don't think is really his fault. But sometimes that's how baseball works, right? We make sort of, we make the manager the fall guy for a bad season. That's sort of how this game works. If you want to do that, fine. I just think you have to be open and say, we're doing this because Tori Lavello is the fall guy. We're not doing this because Tori Lavello is incompetent or has, you know, has proven that he is incapable of doing his job. So that's, that's my argument. I think it is okay to let him go. I don't think they have to bring him back. I think there's something to be said for having, you know, a new young voice in the clubhouse to usher in this next generation of players, as I wrote in my article. But if you're going to let him go, just call it what it is.

We're sort of letting Tori Lavello be the fall guy for a season that has gone really, bad and I'm sure he has some part to play in that but he is going to be snatched up very quickly by another organization that wants a you know a manager of his caliber that wants a leader of his caliber and someone that players still look very very highly highly up to and then we're going to be spying on our exes all over again aren't we all comes down to that we may Derek we may Tori Lavello may be the next oh man I don't know if I like this idea anymore I think you might have convinced me we'll see Thank you guys for checking out the show.

Before we leave, I just wanted to give you all the draft king's pick of the week from the PHNXDBACs podcast. I know we talked a little bit about the over-under on the strikeouts for Madison Bumgarner. And I know we're a baseball podcast, but I still have to come back to football for this weekend for my pick of the week. You obviously have to take the one point bet. I'm just putting that out there because if you like to double your money, you can do that on that bet. that's easy free money. But another thing about that game is the Cardinals right now are four point favorites on

the Draft King Sportsbook app over the Vikings. And I'm taking that action. I think that the Cardinals have proven to be an explosive team this season. I think that the Tennessee Titans are much better team than the way the Cardinals made them look in the first week. And I watched every minute of that game because I had one of those parlays. I'm new to all this. So don't think that I'm going to know what I'm talking about when it comes to like

parles and such, but I hit one. So I guess that qualifies me now as an expert. But I would definitely take the Cardinals as a four-point favorite over the Vikings. I think that they will at least win by a touchdown over the Vikings. But you can find great content, not just bad picks from guys like me, but we got the PHNX Betts podcast over there and you can check out the guys, Shane and Johnny, they are giving you good information. And, you know, if you're catching us right now on YouTube, you can make sure to subscribe to us on all of our other podcast services.

You can get us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast, make sure to subscribe to the PHNXDbacks podcast. And if you're listening to us on one of those apps right now, we want to remind you that we are cranking out awesome content all the time. I love the content. I know I'm biased, but my family is doing good content over here at PHNX Sports. So make sure to subscribe to our YouTube. channel so that you don't miss any of our shows. Last, of course, you can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

My Twitter account is Cap underscore Caveman with a K. Jesse's account is Jesse and Friedman, but all roads lead to P.HNX underscore sports. That's on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Jesse, you make a compelling argument, sir,

but more than anything, you look great in that suit. I just want to tell you that. You look pretty good in the tank there. It's state season. You know, it is what it is. Thank you guys so much for listening. And remember, kids, baseball is so much fun. But it's even more fun when you bet on it. I promise you.