PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Is Geraldo Perdomo Arizona’s shortstop of the future? We grade his 2022 season & look ahead at 2023

Episode Date: January 18, 2023

The MLB offseason rolls on as the number of available free agents continues to dwindle. We also take a look at how many D-backs players are on Baseball America’s Top 100 prospects list, and we hand out report cards for Geraldo Perdomo’s 2022 season.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 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 FREE BETS INSTANTLY! Gambling Problem? Call 877-8-HOPENY/text HOPENY (467369) (NY),If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, crisiscounseling and referral services can be accessed by calling 1-800-GAMBLER (1-800-426-2537) (IL/IN/LA/MD/MI/NJ/PA/TN/WV/WY), 1-800-NEXT STEP (AZ), 1-800-522-4700 (CO/KS/NH), 888-789-7777/visitccpg.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/PA/TN/VA/WV/WY only. VOID IN OH/ONT. Eligibility restrictionsapply. Free bets: Valid 1 per new customer. Min. $5 deposit. Min $5 bet. $200 issued as free bets that expire 7 days (168 hours) after being awarded. See terms at sportsbook.draftkings.com/footballterms. No Sweat: Valid 1 offer per customer per day of NFL 2023 Wild Card Round. Opt in req each day. First bet must lose after opting in. NFL bets only. Paid as one (1) free bet based on amount of initial losing bet. Max $10 free bet awarded.Free bets expire 7 days (168 hours) after being awarded. See terms at sportsbook.draftkings.com/footballterms.OGeez!: Enter the “Flavoring Life” sweepstakes. One winner will receive 3 bags of OGeez, an OGeez! Hat, a PHNX shirt of your choice, and a PHNX annual membership. Sign up at gophnx.com or visit https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfIplqDYsxYeiotn5Zc6hRahaX0a5qG99eHVzkhOlGZDRdgUA/viewform. Must be 21 years or older to purchase.Underdog Fantasy: Sign up for Underdog Fantasy today! Go to the link https://play.underdogfantasy.com/p-phnx and use promo code “PHNX” to receive a deposit match up to $100Four Peaks: Last Wednesday’s are back! Join our PHNX crew at the 8th Street Pub on January 25th as all of our shows are live and in-person throughout the day. Enjoy $3 beer specials and come say hi to us. Must be 21 or older. Enjoy responsibly. Bad Birdie: Use code “PHNX_SPORTS15” 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.comFOCO: FOCO has you covered with the best Arizona Merchandise. Head on over to foco.com. For all non pre-sale items use the promo code “PHNX” for 10% offChitown Cornhole: Go check out their website chitowncornhole.com and make sure to follow them on Instagram @chitowncustomcornholeboardsWhen you shop through links in the description, we may earn affiliate commissions. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, friends. Welcome on in to another edition of the PHNX D-BACs podcast right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Monti, occasionally known as your mayor of PHNX. This guy is the Thunderstick and your vice mayor, the one and only Jesse Friedman. The one and only. Yeah, well, no. Actually, that's not true because if we Google you, we found out that there's some terrible, terrible results that come up. It turns out that some other people.

with my same name, have done some really unfortunate things. But I assure you that person is not me. Allegedly. Allegedly. Don't do this to me, Derek. Jesse Friedman, that's all I'm saying. Anyway, welcome in, guys. This show's brought to you by the five folks at the Drafking Sportsbook app,

America's top-rated sportsbook app. We are very excited, of course, as you all know, since you're Arizona Diamondbacks fans. Our prospects are very good. They're very, very good. But how good? Maybe we didn't even know that they would be this good because baseball America has released their top 100 prospects list for 2023 today.

And things are looking pretty great for the Arizona Diamondbacks, Jesse. Things are looking pretty great. Gunner Henderson is number one. So Corbyn, that's the one like bad news thing here. Corbyn Carroll is not the number one overall prospect in baseball, according to baseball America. But he is number two. However, would you trade in?

a number one for five. Yes, five of the top 30 prospects on this list. Five of the top 30. So we've got Corbyn Carroll at number two. We've got Gabriel Moreno at number 12, who is still considered a prospect by baseball America, although he doesn't have rookie eligibility,

so he won't be on MLO. Yeah, you probably won't find them on most other list. Yeah, baseball America plays by different rules, I guess. They all play by their own rules. It's baseball. You got Jordan Lawler at number 13. You've got Drew Jones in number 24.

and honestly the biggest surprise of the mall. Brandon fought at number 27 in all of baseball, which is pretty wild. That's pretty exciting. Now, I think it is a bit interesting. I think Drew Jones feels a little low on the list just by comparison to where he's been on other prospects list. I mean, it's pretty wild that he's at number 24 after, you know, he literally has like one workout. Yeah, he came out. He threw out a first pitch at a diver back's game and his prospect ranking went up.

But you're right. I mean, it is kind of wild considering, you know, they haven't seen him play very many professional games. Yeah. Well, I mean, he hasn't played. Like, he literally had like one workout and then, you know, the shoulder thing happened. And he had surgery. And that's been his professional baseball career so far. And he's still number 24 on the list.

I guess, you know, being the son of Andrew Jones and being a very, very good prospect in his own right, that'll go pretty far. Now, I will say this, though. I have no concerns about this injury, and the reason why is because so far all of our best players have been injured when they were around this stage in their career, it seems like. I know not everybody is going to utilize the time as well as like Corbin Carroll did. For instance, we know about his time sitting with scouts and trying to use his time when he was injured to just understand the game of baseball better and use the time that he had to make himself a better player and a better person when it comes to, comes with baseball. But, yeah, Jordan Lawler and Drew Jones both kind of experienced these injuries around the same time. Jordan Lawler now doing much better. Actually, you talk to our friend, Nick Ahmed from the Arizona Diamondbacks,

and he had some very nice things to say about Jordan Lawler and his progression. He did. Yeah, yeah, I'll be writing about this soon. I think we might release the video version of the interview as well if you guys are nice enough to us. You got to be nice. Maybe if we hit 5,000 followers, then we'll do it. I don't know. We have to come up with some sort of way for us to get.

Yeah, they have to work for it. You just keep giving us away for free. Right. No, Nick did talk about his relationship with Jordan Lawler a little bit, and you'll get some more details on this when the interview actually comes out. But yeah, they worked a little bit on some things defensively in the fall league when Jordan Lawler was here in Arizona for that. And it sounds like, you know, Nick had nothing but good things to say about Jordan and is very, very high on his future. and what he could be not only offensively but defensively as well.

You said that Brandon fought being in the top 30 surprised you a bit. And I guess I guess I understand that and we can get into that. But did it surprise you to see this many prospects on the list in the top 30 from the Arizona Diamondbacks? Or was he just the main outlier that kind of you weren't expecting to see ranked that high? Yeah, I think like these are the guys I would have thought would be in the top 100. I just didn't think that Brandon Fott would be as high as number 27. Of course, we could also talk about who is not on the list, right? Which is Drey Jameson, Ryan Nelson, Davidson, Delos, none of those guys made this list,

which I'm not hugely shocked by. I think it's possible that, you know, in the athletic and MLB pipeline, when they come out with their list, maybe, you know, you see one or both of those young pitchers come up and actually show up on those lists. But baseball America didn't have those guys. but apparently they're extremely high on on brandon fought which is which is also exciting to see uh i think yeah obviously we know about brand and thought we know about what we what we are expecting out of them we're very excited to see him however uh i was going to say does this uh excite you about the team's future or does this is this just kind of arbitrary you know when it comes down to things um i mean

this is this is incredible right this is incredible from from a deba like no other team i actually I guess I should be careful here. I didn't do a tally, but I'm very, very confident that no other team has five in the top 30. I mean, that's insane. On average, there are 30 teams. So in the top 30,

each team on average is going to have one guy. The deep backs have five. Like, that's insane. That's absolutely insane. They don't have anyone else in the top 100, like we just said. Why do you need that anybody? Why do you need them in the top 100 when they're all in the top 30?

Yeah, exactly. It's like if a team has five in the top 100, that's above average and it's. But if you have five in the top 30, it's like, yeah, I mean, there's just a lot of elite level, potentially elite level talent in this organization, especially from a position player standpoint, right? All of these guys except for fodder position players. And that's exciting moving forward.

I mean, we've known this for a while. This debacks farm system's in a good spot. And baseball America just confirmed that fact today. Look, and I know Ryan Nelson and Dre Jamison, they're going to have their ups and downs this season. People can say what they want about them. All I know is so far those guys, there wasn't very much, there wasn't very high expectations for them to perform the way that they did last season. To do it at a major league level is so much more important to me than where you fall on some list or some prospect ranking, right? I would be thrilled to see them even close to what they were

doing when they first arrived. And that enough for me is, that is good enough for me. That is good enough for me as far as them being in those starting rotation or at least being a critical part of this team. Mark Salar says 30 is better than 100, Jesse. Yes, we covered that. We know that. We get that. But what might be better than 100 is Corbyn Carroll getting an 80 when it comes to run on a 20 to 80

scale, meaning he's just the fastest human being in baseball that you can imagine. More surprisingly, on the same list they gave him. Except for Drey Jameson. Yeah, Drey Jameson. Drey Jameson can beat Corby Carroll to foot race. We know that. When we see the new scouting reports come out on Drey Jameson, I know they don't normally put run on there for a picture, but we need to see the 80 run tool for Jay Jameson.

But Corbyn Carroll is given a 60 on the power tool scale, which is. That's bullish. Shockingly surprising. You don't see kids who are at least listed at 510-165 getting a 60. And I know like... There's a girl of my daughter's sixth grade class that's that side. So I'm just saying, I'm not saying anything else about it. I'm just saying there is a sixth grader out there that's as tall and weighs as much as Gordon.

I want to like, I want to make it clear just like how crazy that actually is a 60. And this took me years to really figure out. You have a 20 to 80 scale, right? So 50's in the middle. And actually 40 would be in the middle, wouldn't that? 20? No, no. No, one of us was a math teacher a year ago, Derek.

And it wasn't you. It wasn't me. 20 to 80 scale. 20 to 80 scale. 50's in the middle. So that's average. Yeah. So 50's average.

But it's not like, oh, 60 is like basically average. Like 60 in scouting terms is actually a pretty prestigious rating to get for a particular tool. I've heard and I'm going to go into the crazy math talk here. But generally speaking, if you're 60 instead of a 50, there's a few people. I know, I know at least Chris is interested in what I'm. I have to say. A 60 is considered like one standard deviation above what would what an average player would be. This is, yeah, I know. I'm already, I'm already down this road. But all that to say,

if you know anything about statistics, one standard deviation is not a small amount. You're well above average in that category. And I don't, honestly, I think it's bullish. I don't know if I would give Corbyn Carroll a 60 in power. He's above average at a lot of things. I don't necessarily know if power is one of them. But I mean, he slugged 500 last year, right, in his brief stint in the big league. So, you know, maybe they're looking at that and that's, that's their, their view of his power situation. I'm a bit worried they're looking more at the minor league statistics potentially in some of the dingers that he had down there. Yeah, his power numbers in the minors were consistently very impressive. But it's also, again, the teams don't want to acknowledge

it. The managers don't want to acknowledge it. The players don't want to acknowledge it. It's the two most hitter friendly ballparts pretty much in all of the minor league baseball so it's really hard to gauge exactly where you're at until you get there's also the fact that like for corbin carol and i think we saw this a lot with jake mccarthy given how insanely fast he is uh slugging percentage is not all about power right it's also about can you yeah it's total basis it's can you stretch a single into a double can you stretch a double into a triple those things also make your slugging percentage play up and Corby and Carol is very, very good at that. So I wonder if maybe that kind of factors in like if you look at some of those slugging percentages, you might be convinced

that he's a 35 homer guy. I don't necessarily think that's the case. But I mean, they're looking at exit velos and that kind of thing too. So from a batted ball perspective, maybe there really is something to what baseball America seems to be seeing there. Well, we thank you guys, of course, for being here, being here in the chat. We always love to see all of our friends here. If you haven't done so already, make sure to subscribe to the PHNXports YouTube channel. Sign up for notifications. That way you don't miss when we go live or any of our wonderful shows on the network go live. Also, leave us a thumbs up.

That's like our favorite part. Forget all the other stuff we just said. Just thumbs up. That's all Jesse wants. Ben said he left a thumbs up earlier. Yeah. Well, he did that so that you would watch. We would post the video.

But that's not the way it works. I don't care what the motive is. If people do it, if people do it, then that's all the matter. If you're listening to us on your favorite audio podcasting app, We appreciate you doing so. Please leave us a review there as well. Five star reviews make a smile. Anything less causes a meeting between me and Jesse.

And you don't want that. You don't want Jesse to be in meetings all day long with me, asking him why people are giving us four star reviews. So help us out there. More importantly, if you haven't done so already, grab yourself a PHNX diehard membership over at go phtonx.com. We always appreciate you guys doing that. Somebody hit a thumbs down and I can't even.

Now, I'm crushed and I can't even go on with my day. But of course, if you get that membership, you will... And that happened yesterday, too? Yeah, they did, right when we were saying the thing about liking. I should stop asking. I should stop talking about liking stuff, I guess. Of course, if you guys make sure to get that diehard membership, not only will you get 20% off over at the PHNX Locker.com.

You'll also get a free piece of merch every year that you're a member. You'll get 20% off on our events, special invites to members-only events, access to our die-hard Discord lounge, as well as so many other things, right? We got just these di-hound. A lot of things. Jesse locks his stuff behind a paywall sometimes. Not all the stuff. Not all the stuff.

Just a couple of things. The best stuff. Just the best stuff. He does. He's very discerning about which pieces need to be locked. And you should see the conversations we have. He's like, you know what? This one didn't cut it.

This one, I'm going to have to put this one for free. Make sure to check out all of his wonderful writing, though, whether it's behind the paywall or not. Grab yourself that membership. Join us for all of our wonderful events because we're always doing fun stuff. And we want you guys. to be there with us. We enjoy doing this stuff with you guys. We've had a lot of fun so far.

So it's not even very far into the new year. And I feel like we've hung out with a lot of our PHNX members a lot this year. So things are going great. Speaking of things going great, last year, the Arizona Diamondbacks had a much better season, I think, than we, you know, expected them to. Many people expected them to. I said 75 wins and you said 82 wins, if I'm not mistaken.

Anyway, well, some of us believe more in the team than they believe in themselves. However, one of the situations of Diamondbacks did have to deal with last season was Geraldo Prado taking over the majority of the reps at shortstop. As Jesse said, he talked to Nick Ahmed today, who was feeling great. Feels very, very ready to get out on field, but definitely Haraldo Perdomo was a big part of this season's success because he was able to step in and take over that role, even though he wasn't really projected to play nearly as much as he was kind of forced to last season. And so maybe got a bit more playing time.

And we saw more of Pardomo last year than we would have otherwise. But I think it was a great opportunity for him to not only get reps at a major league level, but for him to progress and kind of find ways to help this team win ball games. Yeah, like if Nick Ahmed was healthy last year, I don't know if Heraldo Pardomo would have spent that much time in the big leagues, to be honest. It was kind of out of necessity that he was just sort of thrown into the fire. And it was like, all right, Nick Ahmed is out for the season. with shoulder surgery.

We don't really have any other short stops. So good luck, kid. And I think he handled it well, all things to consider. It was a lot to ask of a player as young as Geraldo Perdomo still is. I believe he's going on his age 23 season. He's still very, very young, younger than, you know, some of these young prospects that we're talking about. He's, you know, he's still right there.

So there's a lot of room for him to improve and progress. and he showed some good signs last year, but I don't think he was really developmentally in the place that he needed to be for being an everyday big league short step. It was out of necessity, and frankly, it was a little bit unfair of the debacks. No, I guess they didn't have much of a choice,

but it was unfortunate that they had to force him into that role when he maybe wasn't ready for it. Let's be honest. That's the story of the Diamondbacks and their poor performance over the last multiple seasons, not just going back to last season, not just going back to the disasters 2020 one season, but even prior to that,

the injuries have crippled this team at times. And I say that because this year they finally feel like they have the depth to handle potential injuries. They even have the depth at certain positions where we have asked why, you know, why they're pursuing this player or that player in particular? Why are they adding more to their outfield roster when their depth is so? Because honestly, with the DH, with guys having versatility to play other positions,

and based on what they've gone through in the past, I don't think that there is a number of guys that's too many guys to have at any one position right now for this team. I don't think we'll see them carry three catchers again like they did at one point a few years ago. I do see this team doing everything they can to make sure that they don't have to literally go scrambling to the waiver wire or to available DFA candidates from other teams

in order to fill up their roster and field a team that can play every day in a 162 game season. It's just it's not something that they have been very successful with in the past. Luckily last year, the one thing is that they did have a lot of young players ready to be called up from the minors and ready to go. And that part of it did allow them to not only give guys playing time maybe a bit earlier than they thought they would get, but also for guys to come up and take a role that they might not have been available to them otherwise. Jay Jameson and Ryan Nelson are perfect examples of that. Who knows, maybe those guys get their debut in the bullpen instead of as starting rotation guys.

They were able to show us what they can do and build confidence in themselves and in the organization about what their future might look like with this team. But Raldor Podromo was interesting because we often joke about him being our risk king. And even though his numbers there aren't great offensively for a lot of categories, he did have some special thing that a lot of guys on this team didn't have. which was truly the ability to be locked in with runners in scoring position where that was actually a big problem for for this team offensively yeah it's wild we tweeted this out a while ago but heraldo perdomo 22 with runners in scoring position it's a hundred and 22 plate appearances so a decent sample size he hit 283 376 404 three home runs 38 rbi so that's about a quarter of his plate appearances for the season.

And he hit, you know, three homers, 38 RBIs in that span. Without runners in scoring position, this is 378 plate appearances, 169, 256, 220. I mean, it's, it's, it's bad. It's really, really bad. So, yeah, I don't know if there's necessarily anything to this. We, of course, asked Pardomo throughout the season, like, like, what's going on here? Like, you're really, you really excel in these high pressure situations. He didn't necessarily have an answer, you know, other than just like, yeah, you know, I feel confident up there in those spots.

He doesn't seem intimidated by the moment. But, but yeah, it's, it was an interesting sort of tale of two seasons with, with Pertomo. For sure. With runners's coin position versus without. I don't know if I've ever seen a disparity quite that big with runners is going position versus without. It's pretty crazy. Well, Professor Friedman over here took it upon himself to give a report card as we do. and I did as well.

As we do. So let's take a look at Jesse's report card for Geraldo Pardomo for 2022. Not a lot of good on there, but, you know, he excelled. Like you said, once he get past the first two, it looks pretty good. Offensively, he was atrocious. We can laugh and joke and have good things to say about him offensively with runners in scoring position, but looking back at his numbers from last year, it's not great. It's not great.

Yeah, so minimum 500 plate appearances, which is the exact, member of played appearances that Perdomo had, he had the lowest OPS in baseball, 547. Yikes. The lowest OPS in baseball. So there's no way getting around this. I didn't want to give an F because that just doesn't feel right. But I have a D plus for hit. I have a D for power.

The D plus for hit, the reason I'm going maybe, I mean, D plus isn't great, but I am giving him some credit for the fact that he walks a lot. He had a 10% walk rate, which is above average. He had a below average strikeout rate. So his problem is not swing and miss. It's that he tends to be a little bit passive offensively. And when an opposing pitcher does give him something to hit, he just didn't really do any damage. And so he kind of throughout much of the season, it looked like he was up there just kind of trying to draw walks and, you know,

trying to get on base without actually swinging the bat, which is good to some degree, but he took it way too far to the point where, you know, if you throw a guy a meatball in the big leagues, you have to be able to do damage on those pitch. pitches. Perdomo really struggled to do that. And then for power, I have a D just because, you know, I think you had the third lowest isolated slugging percentage in baseball, which is kind of a measure of like extra base hit power. So again, just really, really poor performance there. But he's so young, you know, there's room for improvement. The other ones are a little bit better, Derek. I have an A minus for run. He actually graded out as one of the 15 most valuable base runners in baseball, roughly.

According to Fangraph's run value statistic, very good at taking extra bases and whatnot. Didn't necessarily steal a whole lot. But there's a lot of value there. I thought as fielding improved throughout the year, I'm giving him a B. Defensively, durability, he was available, giving him an A there. And then Dogging him, you know, given that he is the risk king, as we call him around here, I felt like an A was appropriate there. So those are my grades.

We're relatively close. We disagree on a couple of things there. I know you're not going to like the dog and him that I rated at. considering what he does with runners in scoring position. But let's go ahead and take a look at my report card. I gave him a C for hit. And probably I could have gone to a D plus there as well for all the reasons. You listed.

Same with power. Power was more concerned. He hit a 195. Like it's hard to make a case for that. For that, right? It's hard to make a case that he's even average. He's definitely below average in that category. But I, you know, the thing that about it was he was still very good at walking.

There's still things about his approaches at the plate that were very good. and again, as we discussed with his ability to hit with runners in scoring position, I had a hard time giving him a D because of the fact that it's the most valuable time when you can get a hit. That's true. There's something about that. Again, like we talked about, we don't know what that factor is. It's probably the dog in him down there that I gave him a B that he probably deserves an A for, but there's something to be said about your ability to show up in those big situations,

even if you can't show up when, you know, when the pressure is off. Power D minus. His average exit velocity is in the third percentile. His maximum exit velocity is in the 17th percentile. And his hard hit percentage is in the second percentile. Like Jesse said, with OPS, he is the last, as far as 500 played appearances, he is dead last. It checks out. It checks out.

There is something there. Run. I'm actually surprised about his sprint speed. And that's the reason why I gave him a C. He's in the 48th percentile, according to baseball savant for sprint speed. He's not that fast, but like, I was surprised by that fan grab stat. Like, he's really good at, like, taking extra bases and whatnot. That's almost like a baseball awareness thing, too, right?

Like, it's knowing when, based on where the ball went, who's fielding it, how long it's going to get there about taking base. Like you said, he doesn't even have that many stolen bases. So it's really about his base running ability there. Durability in A, again, he stepped up in a situation where he was not planning or anyone was really planning. on him being there every day shortstop and did an excellent job at being there for this team. I mean, again, he's a young kid. He is, you know, basically like six months older, I think, than Corbyn Carroll. So it's hard to, it's hard to remember how inexperienced he is and how immature he still is as a baseball player.

I think that he took a lot of steps forward as far as his maturity and stuff. And then dogging him again, I think that it, I really want to give him. him that A plus for his ability to come up big in those situations, come up big with runners in scoring position. But it's also hard considering that there's such a big difference between his batting average with runners in scoring position versus without that like, yeah, the dog in him might step up in big situations, but then the rest of the time, what is it just napping? Is it one of those dogs that sleeps most of the day?

And then just barks really loudly for like 30 minutes at night when the neighbors are coming home? I don't really know, but that's the most I could give it. That was a very analytical dog in him. Yeah, yeah, that was one of the more analytical dog in him answers. It was, that one was difficult because trust me, every, every fiber of my being wanted to give him an A plus. He's our risk king. I mean, I don't think I've given anything lower than like a B plus and dog in him. I just don't, I just don't have the, don't have the mental stability to do that to someone. I don't know. I feel, it feels mean. Well, looking ahead at Harold O'Prodom. Projections for 23.

You know, again, we don't know what's going to happen. And I know we posed the question as far as if Perdomo is the future shortstop of this team. Obviously, we know Jordan Lawler is the actual future shortstop of this team, but we're just still not sure when we're going to see him at a major league level. Hualdo Perdomo is more of a stopgat for now. But is he going to end up being their lead shortstop? Or would Nick Ahmed back, is he going to kind of resume that role as being the everyday on field, you know, not only leader of this team, but everyday shortstop with Geraldo Perdomo backing

him up. What are your thoughts? Because you talk to Nick today. Nick seems very open and Nick seems very much understanding that he's coming to spring training camp to still fight for his position, which I think every player on the team kind of feels right now. Yeah. Yeah.

I think so too. If you're coming into the 2023 season thinking that Geraldo Perdomo is going to be the everyday shortstop, I'm not going to say it's impossible. I know a lot of people, a lot of fans seem to want that just because it's kind of like, yeah, we know what Nick Ahmed is. You know, he's a free agent at the end of the year. Let's get this young guy some more opportunities. I don't think the debacks are leaning that direction unless something, you know, if in spring training, Perdomo is not going to cover off the ball and Ahmed is struggling in his return from that shoulder procedure,

maybe that's something that they would consider. But yeah, as far as the projections go, neither steamer nor zips are particularly bullish on Perdom. No. Neither are the bat X or the bat or anything. Nobody really is a good shot for Dome. None of the projections look great, which is fair. I mean, he had the lowest OPS in baseball for 500 plate appearances last year.

With a 195 batting average. Yeah. So Zips has him at 221, 313, 308, and 0.8 wins above replacement over 500 plate appearances. So basically the same season he just had a little bit better offensively. It looks like steamer. has him a little bit better 227, 313, 333. That's the highest you're going to get

as far as projection goes, that right there. Yeah, I don't think anyone's going to have him higher than that. Well, that's not great, but again, at the very least, Nick Ahmed returning obviously impacts his progression. He means less played appearances, less at bats,

less starts. It means like just less pressure. You're not going to force Perdomo to do something he's not ready for yet. Yeah. And, and, and, And that's fine because to be honest, maybe with the plain time that he's received and now kind of some competition there as far as, you know, fighting for his position and maybe wanting to be the everyday regular shortstop of this team. There's that ability to get better. Competition always brings out the best in these guys. Yeah. It's one thing that the Diamondbacks had going for them back when they had some tremendously talented young starting pitchers.

A guy named Patrick Corbyn that you might remember. a few other guys. Tyler Skagg was part of that group as well. And it seemed like that competition really brought out the most of that group. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. It made them push each other and really did kind of have especially Patrick Corbyn kind of stand out who wasn't really projected to be part of part of that group.

But yeah, I mean, at the very least, I think it gives the Diamondbacks once again options. And as we talked about just a little while ago, maybe kind of can do away with how shallow they were depth-wise last season because it was uh even though they even though they did a good job at times it definitely felt like they needed a spark from somewhere else and couldn't really get it at times they had to turn to the minor leagues in order to try to try to get that but my my sense is that the debacks like heralda perdomo um and if you think back to what they did a few years ago they traded their number one overall prospect at the time in jazz chisham who is kind of looked at as the shortstop of the future i don't think the debacks make that trade

unless they felt strongly about Perdomo at the time. Because they didn't have Jordan Lawler yet. They didn't have Jordan Lawler yet. Perdomo was like, hey, we've got Chisholm, we have Perdomo. Maybe they did like Chisham more, but he obviously had so much trade value. You got Zach Gallen, you know, in that deal, and you still could keep Perdomo in that move. The debacks like Perdomo because of some of the things we talked about. He doesn't strike out that much.

He doesn't swing and miss that much. He walks a lot. He has a good approach. He checks a lot of those boxes that you're looking for in a young. player, he just hasn't taken that next step of like, okay, now let's impact the baseball. Like now let's do damage and be a little bit more aggressive in the box. That's the next step for Geraldo Perdomo. Well, if you guys haven't had a chance to sign up for Underdog Fantasy and you are a fan

of daily fantasy sports, Underdog does daily fantasy sports differently. You can draft your team against five of your friends and the highest scoring squads for that night win cash, money, and bragging rights, of course, but that's something that everybody wants over their friends, make sure to check out our friends over at the Underdog Fantasy app because it's so easy to get started. And once you get in there, there's a variety of ways, including pickums, as well as the daily fantasy games for you to get down on some money. Go to underdogfancy.com or download the app. Sign up with our promo code of PHNX. An underdog will match your first deposit up to $100, Jesse. And actually, when I won my little $1,000 on picking pitch counts, by the way,

higher or lower on pitch counts, which is my favorite thing to do. I was down to like my last $20 from underdog's free promotion, you know? It was like basically my last attempt to win some money back. And man, did I. So remember, the more when you do the pickums, the more selections you add, the bigger the payout is. So check out. You get the award for the most obnoxious usage of the underdog fantasy app. You got it. Yeah, I'm just, I'm just going to bet on pitch counts. That's right. That's right. That's cool. Hey, I love it. I love it. I love that. You have no idea how many times I did it either. So, of course, that's a fun way to get down.

Look, hey, look at you. Look at you judging my usage of the underdog fantasy out. Here's the thing, Jesse. That's why it's so great. You can use it however you want to use it. Do you normally go higher or lower? Huh? Do you normally go higher or lower?

Oh, you think it's that simple? No, Jesse, I analyze their last six starts is what I do. Okay. I take a look at where they've reached. I take a look at the season, what their maximum pitch count was at one point. Don't get me wrong. The people just like deciding the number, they also look at this stuff too. But I do my research, yo.

Anyway, also, and I do my research about beer. You know that. You know I love beer. And I can't wait to do my research on the Four Peaks Brewing Company's brand new IPAs. They have a brand new recreational juice dank IPA, which I know I'm going to love. Because whenever the word dank is in there, that means it kind of tastes like marijuana a little bit. And you know I'm a fan. Also, there's the staycation super juicy IPA.

So check out those beers over at four people. Brewing Company and make sure to join us. We're going to be out there on January 25th. Last Wednesdays are back for PHNX and our entire, all these guys, all these maniacs out there. They're all going to be down at the 8th Street Pub on January 25th and all of our shows are going to be live and in person throughout the day.

Enjoy $3 beer specials. Come say hi to us. Eat some chicken attendees. Have a blast over at the 8th Street Pub. And if you can't join us, make sure to grab some beer wherever you grab your beer and enjoy remotely in spirit. Remember 21 and over only for those beers.

and join responsibly. Jesse, before we get out of here, the offseason does not stop. The three, should I say the $3.8 billion off season does not stop. Adam Duvall signed with the Red Sox moving from the Braves. One of the few people Braves couldn't tie down forever their entire career. Third baseman Brian Anderson from the Marlins, signed with the Brewers. And basically, if you're looking for available free agents, good luck is what I'm saying. Because there are-

The pickings are slim. The pickings are slim. Nobody wants him, Jesse. Nobody wants him. He's working out for teams. There are teams that are showing up. There are people who believe that Diamondback should be one of those teams showing up. I don't believe that they should be.

It's just like I don't believe that they should be in the Trevor Bauer sweepstakes. Well, that one's, I mean, I guess Chapman has his, you know, a skeleton in the closet too, but Trevor Bauer is a little bit on another level right now. Chapman, however, is a great example of how with time we slowly forget these transgressions. That's true. That is true. That's how these guys get back into the game when most people don't want to see them get that opportunity again. However, like I said, there are a lot of former D-BACs players available out there. You're interested in that kind of thing.

You could almost put together an entire team worth of D-BACs players. It wouldn't be a great team. It would not be a great team. The team would not win many games. It would not. But currently it would be led by David Peralta, who's still available. Yes. We can vouch for him.

In fact, we like David Peralta a lot. and actually he has the highest war of any remaining former debacks player on the market, which, you know, you can't say a lot about it. I saw, I don't remember where I read this. Someone said, like, oh, David Peralta could be a good fifth outfielder for a team. I'm like, I don't know about fifth outfielder. Like, I don't think he's an everyday guy anymore. But if he, if David Peralta gets 300 plate appearances or something.

Yeah, I mean, against Ritees, he's still probably a slightly above average hitter. I know he's continuing to. age and it's possible he's you know he takes a bit of a step back this year but yeah i i think he's maybe being a little undervalued right now i could see that and i also will say that david parolta there's there's there's an x factor there about how much better your dugout and your clubhouse is going to be yeah he's so fun he's a great great guy to have around in your clubhouse for sure uh currently of the other diamondbacks players available andrew chafin is probably arguably the next most valuable player available i think chafin's more valuable than peralta well yeah yeah

Yeah, I'm sure you feel that way. Zach Granky, also available. Justin Upton, D.D. Grigorious, Dallas Keikle, Archie Bradley, Evan Marshall, Tyler Clippert, and Chris Owings, just to name a few. But the one thing I like looking back on most of these players is there isn't a lot of regret there, right? Like the Diamondbacks, when you look at players that the organization has parted ways with and that have gone elsewhere, obviously Goldschmidt is going to always be the standout. He's always going to be the one that makes you truly sad. But for the most part, percentage-wise, and especially looking at this particular group of players,

I don't even understand how we won a wild card game with. You know, this definitely doesn't make you regret too many of their moves. Yeah, D.D. Gargoreas is the one guy that you just mentioned, and I'm like, he was pretty good. He was pretty good. For a little while. I mean, for a number of years, right? 2015 through 2020.

I guess he wasn't that great. He wasn't that great in 2015. He wasn't that great in 2019. All those other years, he was an above average offensive player. And, you know, we all know about the defense. He was pretty good there. He got an MVP vote in 2017 and 2018, apparently. I don't know if I really, I doubt he really deserved that MVP vote, if I'm being honest.

I guess in 2018, 27 homers, 86 RBI, 829 OPS for. a guy who plays pretty good defense. The Yankees got a good one there for a few years in D.D. Gregorius. Andrew Chafin, to me, is the guy that when you look at this group, I would want back. I still want the Diamondbacks to kick the tires on. I have a feeling that he's probably might be costing maybe too much for them at this point for what they're trying to spend.

Yeah. It just still kind of blows my mind that Mike Hazen made the comment that they're, they'll probably add via trade at this point versus free agency when the market for relievers is. There's still a few hours. There's still a few out there. Few quality guys that could really help this bullpen improve. Yeah, I mean, Chafin, I know we've talked about in the past that at least I personally believe

that the narrative that Diamondbacks players, you know, instantly improve when they go elsewhere. There's that narrative floating around in the fan base. I don't personally buy it, at least not to the degree that a lot of people think it's true. Andrew Chaffin is one guy where, yeah, the D-Bachan traded him and Andrew Chafin's been really freaking good ever since he left the Diamondback. In 2022, Jafin had a 2.83 ERA, 67 strikeouts, only 19 walks. That's kind of the biggest thing is Chafin just doesn't really walk guys anymore. And when he was with the D-backs, that wasn't like he was walking six per nine or anything, but it was, you know, it was a weakness of it.

It was a weakness. And that appears to no longer be the case, even as he enters his age 33 season at this point. I like that we have one person in the chat commending me for saying we shouldn't have chat. in here. And then we have another person in the chat saying, or all this Chapman, please, and all caps. That's baseball. I get it. I think those are the conversations that like teams are having internally right now. Like all the front office people at the desk. Some people are like, oh my gosh, yes, we have to have her office jab. Another people are like, no, I'm not touching, you know, bringing back her all this jabmen at this point. There's discussions

to be had. There's risks and reward to be there, right? And honestly, I mean, I almost made a joke about it. It's not even really a joke. You can, you kind of have to know your fan base. You can, you kind of have to know your fan base and how your particular fan base is going to react. You're not going to please everybody. But in some cases, there are teams that are weighing bringing in Chapman or a guy like Trevor Bauer because they still have a lot to offer athletically as an athlete as a part of a team. It just once again goes to the question, the moral question, the debate of should these guys be allowed to come in and make millions of dollars playing a game that you really should rightfully kind of earn a chance to play versus be given one just because you can throw a ball hard, right? So I don't know.

I think that it sucks because there is some team that's going to give them a chance no matter what. Yeah. So then that factors in as well. You as an organization can sit there and try to take the moral high ground, but you're also going to find yourself saying, well, what if what if the Reds take them, you know, or what if the guardians take them? What if this team takes them? Then it's going to make you feel like you're missing out on an opportunity that your team, your franchise could potentially jump. How do you gauge whether a fan base is like,

I don't know, that you're saying some fan bases would maybe be more welcoming of that type of player than others. I don't really have a read on that. Like, which fan bases do you think would maybe be more accepting of that kind of a play? I don't even want to get into that. Because I don't know fan bases and I feel like I'm just going to be insulting fan bases

by saying that, right? I guess you could say, based on the United States, like maybe more Midwestern type places that like I don't know where where certain kind of behavior like that isn't as seen as outrageously unacceptable as other places. I don't know. And I hate this. I hate being in this position because I don't want to just say Milwaukee, right?

I don't want to see that. That's what I'm saying, really. I'm saying like twins, you know, enjoy your new pitcher Trevor Bauer. But what I'm saying is like they know their fan bases and they know how people are. And I don't want to factor in things that people say like wokeness and shit. But, I mean, there are things that matter to some fan bases more than others. And obviously, Los Angeles didn't want to take that risk, that reputation risk on bringing him back. So they're eating the money that they're going to have to pay him and some other team.

That's the thing is even if he doesn't play baseball, he's still going to get paid millions of dollars. You're talking about Chapman or Bowler? I'm talking about Trevor Bauer. He's going to still get paid from the Dodgers regardless. So it's kind of a moot point because this guy is still going to get rewarded despite what his actions were. But it's sports. And I mean, it really comes down to people preferring their team to be good rather than worrying about moral issues like this at some point. Yeah. Isn't it just crazy that like Trevor Bauer is going to make $22 million from the Dodgers?

Any might pitch somewhere else? And also make more money on top of it, which I guess it must be more like the league minimum, right? Yeah, that other team is going to make. to pay in probably, you know, 750K. And the Dodgers are going to be paying 95% more than 95% of what he would make. And he would be pitching for another baseball team against the Los Angeles Dodgers. I hate it. I hate it.

Actually, you know, I don't think that so much. I don't hate that back to a bit so much. The fact that it's the Dodgers. I figured you might not. I'm still petty. Don't forget that. But I do like to have a fun time. And one of my favorite places to have a fun time is at Octane Raceway.

And Mavericks, of course, I kicked everybody's ass in bowling, so that's why I'm such a high. Unlike Jesse, who talked a big game about his ping pong game and came up short. Now, did you actually, I will say, did you actually bowl well that day? Oh, yeah, I don't remember that. The top score that day, for sure. I remember, I backed up bringing my own ball and shoes that day. I think I also had the top score at my, in my lane. But we were kind of, we kind of embraced the identity of being like the B team.

Yeah. So our scores were probably like lower than all of your scores. But I do think I was either at the top or pretty close to the top. So I felt pretty good about that. I remember. I remember where I finished because I finished at the top. And you could finish at the top too by taking your family to Mavericks and Octane Raceway because they will love you for it. Today is Wednesday.

And of course, every Wednesday is winning Wednesday. Half price arcade games all day. What better day to go? Maybe this weekend when they have 50% off signature bowling on Saturday and Sunday before noon. But if you want a fun place to spend your Super Bowl, That is the place to be because they have Super Bowl packages that include food, game cards, laser tag, and more. Jesse, when you go watch the Super Bowl either at your house or at someone's party and it's two teams you don't give a damn about, do you like watch the game or are you like, are you eating chips and chatting and stuff? What's your position usually in a football Super Bowl event like that?

Yeah, I would watch the game. Yeah. I would probably watch the game. Yeah. I mean, I don't honestly care that much about the Super Bowl in general. I feel like if I'm at a Super Bowl party of some sort, then I will definitely watch it. But if I'm not, I might not even really care and just be doing other things. So it all depends.

Yeah, yeah. I remember one of the blowout Super Bowls that like we didn't even make it through the first quarter before we were just outside, like bouncing on a trampoline and barbecuing. Just don't bet $1.4 million. Yeah, don't do that. Don't try to steal money from freaking, you know. No matter what the score is at halftime or whatever it was. Do not that...

Don't think you're smarter than the odds makers. But one thing that they're doing over at Mavericks is they have these four quarters of feast for the Super Bowl where every quarter there's different food brought out to you. Just magnificent courses one after the next consisting of buffalo chicken, cassidias, barbecue sausage bites, crudette. I love crudette. I'm a huge fan of crudette. Spinich, artich tip, and more.

That's just the first quarter. And then second quarter, third quarter, different courses that come out. By the way, I used to not only do, not only do... I grade players, but at one time of my life, I used to grade snacks. I used to give snacks a rating. Oh, you did. That's right. I used to have a snack podcast, and I rated a crew to tape very high, by the way. So I'm not promoting that show or anything, but just know that somewhere out there, there's a snack podcast I'm involved with. Watch the big game at Mavericks with dozen of 4K televisions, 20-foot jumbotron, 5,000 square foot restaurant featuring all of this great

food, craft beers, custom cocktails, and more. It's going to be a fun time. So join us out at Mavericks. book in advance at maverick.com slash the big game. And also give Jesse some ideas on what furniture he needs to purchase from more for his new place because right now it's just nothing but Chase Lounge is everywhere. And I really think that that's a mistake. Jesse, that's like a dream come true for him. He can't wait to fill his home with the same piece of furniture. The Chase Lounge is just such a versatile piece of furniture, though.

You can take a nap on it. You can take a nap on it. You could sleep on it. You could make it your actual bed if it's big enough. Like, if I come over to your house as a guest from another state and you have a chase lounge. Yeah. Don't even pump up the air mattress. Like, I'm good, son.

I would take a chase lounge over an air mattress. Oh, without a doubt. I'll take most couches over an air mattress. I would take some floors over an air mattress. By the way. Depending on the air mattress. I had one that had a tendency to deflate. To deflate during the middle of the night until you wake up.

Yeah, I had someone staying at my place. And apparently in the middle of the night, he was basically on the floor. Yeah, air mattresses can be great. But go get some real furniture. Yeah, go get some real furniture. That takes me back to my days of like staying at my friend's house when I was a kid and you would like fall asleep with no blanket, no pillow, and then wake up freezing in the middle of the night,

just wishing that someone was awake to help you out. But you save big on the best furniture in the valley when you head over to morefurniture.com. Make sure to grab yourself something other than a Chase Lounge, of course. But they have a wide variety of furniture for you to choose from. And also they have their white glove delivery service where they want. bring it in and set it up for you. They hooked me up. They asked me where I wanted my couches at. I've never had anybody. Like, you know, most places they come in, they don't even take it out the box. They just bring it in your door and plod. There you go. Like, they were like,

how do you want this arranged? What's the best way to see your TV from here? I was like, these guys care. So get that over at morefurniture.com. And we care. We care because you guys care. And we love you guys for being here. Thank you so much for checking out the show. Of course, between now and the next time we do this show, you can find us on Twitter. I'm at Kapp, underscore caveman with a K. Jesse is at Jesse and Friedman. Our show is at PHNX underscore D-Backs, but of course all roads lead to at PHNX underscore sports on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. We thank you guys 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's so much more fun when

five, five of your prospects are ranked in baseball America's top 30. Let's go!