PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Jordan Montgomery implodes early in first start at Chase Field for Diamondbacks

Episode Date: May 2, 2024

One day removed from being scratched from his start due to bees, Jordan Montgomery finally made his debut at Chase Field on Tuesday. Unfortunately, Montgomery had the exact same debut that nearly every marquee free agent starting pitcher in team history has had at home: a bad one. We have more Montgomery’s night and how the scratch might have impacted him, the offensive woes, and Corbin Carroll’s struggles.An ALLCITY Network ProductionSUBSCRIBE to our YouTube: https://bit.ly/phnx_youtubeALL THINGS PHNX: http://linktr.ee/phnxsports PHNX Events: Get your tickets to Suns Takeovers, Coyotes & Suns Watch Parties at BetMGM, and MORE here: https://gophnx.com/events/Factor Mealkits: Use code PHNXDBACKS50 to get 50% OFF your first Factor box and free wellness shots for life with any active subscription at https://factormeals.com/phnxdbacks50Desert Financial Credit Union: Open a free checking account online with Desert Financial Credit Union and get $200 in bonuses https://www.desertfinancial.com/200Gametime: Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code PHNX for $20 off your first purchase.Circle K:  Join Inner Circle for free by downloading the Circle K app today! Head to https://www.circlek.com/store-locator to find Circle Ks near you!OGeez!: OGeez! is not your average cannabis-infused gummy. Head over to https://www.ogeezbrands.com to find where you can purchase. Must be 21+. Enjoy responsibly. Four Peaks: Follow on social @fourpeaksbrew & @fourpeakspub! Must be 21+. Enjoy responsibly. When you shop through links in the description, we may earn affiliate commissions. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome to another edition of the PHNX DVax podcast right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Montia. Of course, I think I also suck. I might be part of this whole loss tonight. I don't know how I factor in. But of course, I am occasionally known as the mayor of PHNX. That is your producer, the People's Producer, Damon Dogg, on the ones and twos. We're happy to have you joining us tonight after a miserable loss by the Arizona Diamondbacks to the Los Angeles.

Dodgers by a score of 8 to 0. We're going to talk about lots of things from this game. Obviously, pitching was not very good for the Arizona Diamondbacks, but neither was the offense. So I think we're going to get into Jordan Montgomery having a poor performance here, but I want you all to keep in mind that even if Jordan Montgomery had given us six strong innings and only allowed two earn runs in the bullpen kept things locked down, Diamondbacks probably would have still lost this game with the way the offense was swinging the

bat in the way that Yoshinobu Yamamoto kind of kept them in check. But like I said, of course, tonight was all about Jordan Montgomery finally making his debut at Chase Field. By the way, Jesse Friedman will be joining us from said Chase Field here shortly with updates from the clubhouse and more on this loss. But Jordan Montgomery finally makes his debut one day after bees caused him to be scratched from the lineup. And of course, it was a disaster.

much more so than the bees being at Chase Field. It started really well with a one, two, three first inning for Montgomery, but things just spiraled out of control in the second and completely. Of course, right after I tweeted out about how he had the dog in him, the dog in him disappeared quite quickly. He only got three whiffs and three innings of work, and quite frankly, he was just ineffective. And I don't really know.

I don't find this to be alarming. are concerning. Obviously, there is certain things that factor in here not to excuse his poor outing. But like I said, he did look strong in the first inning. And then in the second inning allows five runs. One more in the third inning gives up a home run to Andy Pahas, who is now on Damon's list. He has yet another Dodger for him to hate, Damon. You want to address this? They just can't keep getting away with it, Derek. It's Andy Pahas right now, not Ryan. Ryan Pages is what I'm going with for the. rest of time.

Yeah. What do they feed these guys? I don't know. He's hit, what is he hitting now? He was hitting 316. Of course. Right around there,

man. Three, three bombs like, oh, man. It's gotten, it's out of control. They just, they grow,

he's hitting 291 with an 862 OPS, but still, nonetheless. They grow these guys on trees, man. It's ridiculous. The Dodgers just continue a way to finally, and that's the most frustrating thing about,

you know, this series was, felt like the Diamond Dax did a good job at times against Moogie Be. That's Freddie Freeman. Shohei Otani didn't play today. But it really is the guys in the latter half of the lineup that really kind of did damage tonight. Andy Pahas had the home run.

Miguel Rojas went two for four with an RBI himself. Chris Taylor, one for two with two walks. Chris Taylor is hitting 078 and you walked him twice. There are some inexcusable things when it came to pitching tonight. Jordan Montgomery obviously did not have a good start, did not have a good outing despite, you know, the anticipation of having him start here at Chase Field and make his debut. Three innings pitch. He gave up six hits, six earned runs, three walks, one strikeout.

I guess the question is, how did getting ramped up to start yesterday only to be scratched to then start today? Impact his start. I feel like that, at least for me, is a small sample of, or at least one thing that I will say, like, I will remain cautiously optimistic about Jordan Montgomery. but what did you think about that, Damon, in regards to, like, I mean, it doesn't happen very often unless an injury occurs or something like that where a pitcher does, you know, get themselves ready to go for a start, then they don't play in that game and then they have to start the following day. Yeah, it's a pretty weird circumstance. I mean, Monty might be one of those, like, really like, scheduled driven guys. Yeah, we heard that about Zach.

We don't know. Yeah, Zach is that way, right? So, like, we don't know, we don't know yet because we haven't had as much experience with Monty. I'm not going to assume anything. Yeah. Maybe. I'm going to assume he can't throw fastballs because he still doesn't throw very many of those. Maybe he would tell you that he felt fine going into tonight and it just didn't work out.

I don't know. This team is just broken, man. It's hard to know because, again, there was something to be said about his first start where he, again, did not throw any fast balls. And then tonight, you know, Montgomery, of course, once again, he just, he has to rely at times so much on his secondary stuff. and the Dodgers came in with an effective game plan against him. I mean, that's pretty much what, you know, what the numbers show in regards to Jordan Montgomery. Again, he threw his fastball way more than he did in his other starts.

He threw it 24% of the time. But he also didn't throw very many pitches tonight. Only 63 pitches in his short outing. And I know we'll have some more from Tori Lobello in regards to that. But definitely a difficult day considering that the Diamondbacks absolutely needed, you know, even if it wasn't. going to be a great start from from Monty they needed some length and he absolutely did not give him that and that that part sucks what also sucks and more importantly is how jordan mcgomery

compares to every other marquee free agent starting pitcher that has made their debut at chase field and our very own jesse friedman sent out a tweet that might shake you to your core uh damon i think we have that tweet. This is what Jesse had to say. Jordan Montgomery struggled mightily in his first Diamondbacks home start. Like every other marquee free agent starter, the team is signed. Randy Johnson on April 15th,

1999, went six innings pitch and allowed six earned. Zach Granke on April 4th, 2016 went four innings pitched, allowed seven earn runs. Madison Bumgardner on August 24th, 2020 went four and a third, gave up seven earned runs. And now tonight, Jordan Montgomery, joins this illustrious group by going three innings pitched, six earned on his debut here at

Chasefield. That's gross. That's gross. I don't like that. It's really gross. And it's just like them like making us just like feel bad. Doesn't it? It's like, it's like, yeah, just, hey, guys, why don't, why don't we just like, every time we

sign a big guy for a lot of money, like, hey, he actually stinks. They should stink right in front of the home crowd the first time. So we really think that we made a mistake by bringing them over. Man, that sucks. That like was a fun stat until I read the whole thing out loud. And then suddenly it just wasn't as fun anymore. But something that was fun was Blake Walston getting called up. He had an amazing story in regards to getting called up.

Apparently, our very own Blake Walston, who a lot of you have been asking about. A lot of people were wondering if he was going to be on the Major League roster. He gets called up. He made his debut today. Kind of thrown into the fire here in an unexpected circumstance, but pitch fairly well. He ate up some innings for the Diamondbacks one night removed from them using nearly their entire bullpen. So it was very important that he gave them what he gave them.

And apparently he received the info about being called up while he was at a blackjack table in Las Vegas. Here is the story from Walston himself. We were in Vegas, and I was at the table. All my buddies just started swarming me, and the coach came down there, and threw my last hand out there, lost, and he was like, you don't have to worry about it. He was one of the big leagues, and I was just like, you're lying. I didn't really think it was real, but, man, I'm here now.

Who told you that? Lolly. Blackjack? Black Jack? Black Jack. Yep. Easiest hand you've ever lost? Pretty much. Yeah.

I mean, when 12 against a 10, it doesn't work. Oh, man, that's an incredibly memorable story. Brandon Hughes also told us the day prior that he was at a casino when he was told. I think I think I'm getting that right. He was told he was getting called up while he was also at a casino. So I guess the big question there is, should the debacks have a team in Reno? I don't know. In Reno, Nevada, but what about when the Oakland A's move there?

I don't know how this whole thing is going to work out. But Blake, again, he was pretty good for this team. He got into some trouble there at the end. But at the end of his outing, kind of walk some guys, loaded the bases, and he actually walked in a run. But overall, a pretty decent outing considering what the Dodgers were doing to the Diamondbacks tonight. He went three and two thirds. He allowed two run runs, gave up three hits.

Walked four, which is a problem. But he did strike out five, which that's fairly impressive in three and two-thirds innings. Don't you think there, Damon Dogg? Yeah, I mean, the strikeouts were good to see, right? Like, there feels like something we could build off there. Obviously, not the best outing you've ever seen in your life. Right. Well, there's some swing and miss.

Like, there is, I'm trying to remember who it was against, but he threw a curveball in the dirt that a guy, like, really chased, struck him out. That was, that one in particular, I was like, okay. I mean, if we got that going, like, we got something there. Yeah, I mean, I, Blake, I don't really know what to take from Blake Walsston. Like, he could be really good. Yeah. It could be the fact that the Dodgers just didn't expect him, right?

You don't have a game plan against a guy that gets called up today and then ends up pitching the majority of the game like Wallston did. So, you know, I guess to be a little pessimistic there remains to be seen if he can continue. For sure, dude. We watched Brandon Hughes just cook them yesterday, slice them up at the top of the order. And then today he gave up at least he gave up some runs, right? one or two. Brandon. Yeah,

Brandon Hughes went an inning in a third, he gave up one hit. No runs. Oh, okay. No runs, but he did walk one. He got two strikeouts. So I think that there again,

maybe we got something there too. You know, the biggest thing is that with Tori needing to use so much of his bullpen yesterday, it's just, it was a big help for Walston to come into this position. It wouldn't be a surprise to see him get sent back down as a corresponding move when they bring Ryan Nelson back from the 15-day IL. But we'll see how that plays out.

because that's still to be determined. We do have some interesting news in regards to the pitching probabilities for this upcoming series and some news on Zach Gallen that Damon absolutely hates. But let's take a look, of course. Let's work the count here with our friends from Desert Financial Credit Union. These are the numbers for the series. And again, these aren't great. These aren't great numbers.

But this is definitely another one of those post-series counts where when you take a look at it, This one makes sense why the Diamondbacks drop two out of three. Dodgers outscore the Diamondbacks 19 to 8. They just barely outhit the Diamondbacks 25 to 24, much more efficient with runners in scoring position going 7 for 27. Diamondbacks went just awful three for 24 for a 125 batting average. Dodgers had a 259 batting average. Starting pitching ERA and relief pitching ERA,

both incredible for the Dodgers. 2.81 starting pitching ERA versus a 9. 9.0.00 starting pitching ERA for the debacks, 1.64 relief pitching ERA and 4.50 for the Diamondback. So I mean, three for 24 is just one of the worst things I've ever seen in my entire life. How do you have one less hit than the Dodgers? And this is what happens. And get outscored by 11 runs. I don't know.

Yeah. No, I mean, because the Diamondbacks right now, they just are lacking a clutch factor, to be honest. That's really what it takes. It looks like at times when that like you can say what you want. Like first of all, you got to give Yoshinobi Yamamoto his flowers. The man went six innings today. He gave up five hits, which were all fairly, I think it was all singles except a Kittel Marte double. He walked two. He struck out five. He didn't overpower them, but he looked great. And honestly, the Diamondbacks just weren't able to ever string together what it felt like multiple hits to ever get him in any kind of trouble. It was really bad for my brand.

Yeah. It was really bad for my brand. I bet it is. What I was watching. Well, I mean, I didn't love like, again, this is one of those criticisms of Tori's lineup. I didn't love his lineup construction tonight. And I felt like right away we saw that when Jake gets on base, Lourdes hits into a double play and then Catell smokes that double.

Jake would have scored on that double if Cotel was in the two hole instead of in the three hole. And Lourdes, honestly, I love Lourdes. He's my hair twin. You guys all know that. But he has no business hitting in the two. hole right now with the struggles that he's currently experiencing, you know, and that's the fact of the matter. I mean, the Kattel was hitting in the two hole earlier and the Diamondbacks were

experiencing a lot of success based on the fact that, you know, even with Corbyn's struggles, Cotel was just constantly able to drive in runs or get on base himself. And I feel like, again, that was a big criticism of Tories lineup tonight. We also have the fact that before the game, Gabrielle Moreno was scratched and replaced by Tucker Barnhart. So that impacts the offense. considerably. We do not know if this was just due to the fact that this would have been Moreno's third start in a row because that's what it was shaping up for, or if there is some sort of injury or reason why he was removed from the lineup. So of course, we will check in with Jesse after when he comes in, see if there are any updates on his status or why he was scratched. But again, the offense, you could criticize the pitching. You could criticize the offense. Both sides were terrible tonight. Jock Peterson was a highlight going three for four with three singles. uh, Cotel Marte was one for three with that aforementioned walk or double and a walk. Uh,

and the diamondbacks just really couldn't get anything going tonight. So, uh, really let's take a look at our Kingsnake because even though Jesse told me not to talk about him, I'm just going to give it to Matt Hilton, the beekeeper again, because he's an actual hero.

Uh, and he's definitely the only reason that we won one game in this series. Am I wrong about that? Is that too much to say? No. I think, you know, game,

game goes regularly scheduled yesterday. We probably live. Matt Hilton. He juiced up the crowd. He got everyone going. He's the only reason that we didn't get swapped. I am willing to consider replacing Baxter with Matt Hilton at this point.

So every single game, I mean, it doesn't have to be a real beehive. It can be a fake one that we manufacture, right? But every single game, we can say, oh, this game might not start on time because there's a Bive here. and then the fucking people can go crazy for Matt Hilton getting driven in, can be in his beekeeper costume already,

just cheering and doing this as he comes down, goes up in the lift every game. Maybe sometimes it's the beehive is a pinata. And we can just have him up there smacking it with a bat or something. It could be great times. And I mean, I think that will get the crowd hyped. And of course, he really is the only one that deserves it after tonight's disastrous game. I did want to get it.

Baxter. So Blake Walson. You wanted to give it to Baxter? No, I said poor Baxter. No, no poor Baxter. You just fired him. Look, he's jobless now. He has to go be a bobcat and do bobcat things.

He doesn't make any sense. I've already expressed this theory, okay? Bank One ballpark is long in the past, folks. We're this close to Chase Field being called something else. I've called it the vault. It's the vault, and you are all vault dwellers. And someone gave me a thumbs down for wanting to get rid of Baxter. And that's probably the right call.

So I'm not going to disagree. fan probably. I'm not going to disagree with you on that. No, Maria G is the dot. Well, B.C. is here. So, I mean, I wouldn't put it past him. Maria G. Shout out you for showing up even when you lose. We appreciate you, Maria. Skiy, unlike B.C., who's accusing us of not. Look, we have a set schedule, BC. We don't just wing it on when we do our shows around here, pal. We actually sit around the office till 10 p.m. every single night and just decide when we do post games. Oh, now we're going to do the show. Oh, we won. Let's do a post game tonight.

You sound like Tori, asking me if I do my show out of a garage. maybe sometimes, but not all the time. This is an office, a poorly air-conditioned one at that. But of course, we do thank you guys for being here, even if you're a Dodgers fan right now in the PHNX Sports YouTube channel in the chat. We love you guys being here in the live chat. Make sure you subscribe to the channel if you haven't done so already.

Sign up for notifications. That way you don't miss whenever your art shows go live and drop us a like. I do see from some of your comments in there that according to the broadcast, Gabby, was scratched from the lineup due to some dental work. So does Gabby have like the weirdest assortment of reasons that he does. He does. He doesn't miss his games. Absolutely.

Absolutely. At least he didn't choose to do it on Saturday, which is his bobblehead night, right? Like, because that would be really fucking weird if of all games he misses for like a voluntary procedure would be, you know, and wait,

maybe don't. How do we know if it's voluntary? Maybe he cracked a tooth or something. I don't know. But anyway, drop a light. Gabby would love it. And of course,

speaking of Gabby's bottlehead night. Make sure to join us on Saturday. Of course, we are taking over Chase Field, and you can be a part of that. I think we had some extra tickets that found their way into society. So make sure to check that out. If you haven't had a chance to buy some tickets for that, do so now. If you are a diehard, you will get a discount on those tickets. Of course, and if you're not a diehard, great reason to join.

It pays for itself. And if you're coming out to one of our takeover events, you will save on that as well as our other events. You will save our discounts with our partners. You'll get access to our Discord lounge, which is an absolute asylum of mad people that I love. And it's a great place to be an Arizona sports fan. And of course, you get access to all of Jesse's content, all the content from our website, as well as so much more, so much more. But of course, speaking of partners, we are very glad to have our guys at Shady Ray's back

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Sports teams suck. Our sports fans are great. What? Particularly polarized sunglasses. Yeah, because you think you can get those $5 gas station ones and they're going to do the trick. They're absolutely not going to do the trick. They're absolutely not going to do. Shady rays has the cheapest polarized sunglasses that I've come across.

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They absolutely will. I can guarantee it. I mean, first they might have Matt Hilton come out. And like there's some pros and some cons to that. Matt Hilton obviously going to drive out from surprise. So depending on where you're at in the valley, it's going to take a long time for him to get there. Two, you have to shoulder the guilt of the fact that he left yet another one of his child's

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But of course, a little bit more from this game. I want to say that this game was one of those games that can completely change your view on the baseball season. And we've had that entirely too much lately with the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Diamondbacks have these highs and these lows when it comes to this team that absolutely make you feel like one day

you're on top of the world after seeing Christian Walker get his first walk-off home run of his career. And then there's days like today where nothing went right for this team. And despite the knee-jerk reaction to blame Tori's lineup construction or perhaps, you know, the necessity to change the starting rotation

based on yesterday's B-D-Lay, it still feels disheartening when, you know, this team goes from being a fairly competitive team that can win a game against one of the best teams in baseball like we saw yesterday versus today's output against you could argue a kind of kind of a B lineup from the Dodgers like not oh I said B lineup I thought I wasn't I wasn't going to do any more B puns sorry you can't you can't help yourself I really can't but you know of course not no Otani in the lineup today Bc's taking victory laps about that and rightfully so the Diamondbacks had their worst game against arguably the Dodgers' worst lineup. And that's not a great feeling. It's also not a great feeling that the Diamondbacks, you know, kind of starting pitching savior and Jordan Montgomery comes out and has this atrocious start, you know, especially in his debut at Chase Field.

It feels really bad. It actually feels really bad. You keep saying it's not a good feeling. I'd say it's actually a bad feeling. It's a terrible feeling. It's one of the worst feelings ever because I thought. of this team was going to be really good. And boy, do they play bad baseball.

I'm so, like, I'm just really dejected right now. What, especially after yesterday, it felt like we had like a kickstart game yesterday, right? Like that could maybe like, you know, set us on fire to maybe go on a run a little bit here. And then they just lay an egg, man. There's a lot of discussion in here about Alec coming back. And I mean, I think there's, there's too many times. And we never, we never know if, if Alec or Geraldo Pardomal or whatever would have made the play. when these mistakes happen.

Yes, we do. You know. Yes, we do. Yes, we do. We know that. Let's talk about it for a second, because Corbin has not done this twice in two games. Yeah. Yesterday, I talked to Jesse a little bit after the postgame show and he was like, I don't know if that was, you know, if I would really say that most outfielders would make that, most center fielders would make that catch.

He looks bad out there. Yeah. He looks bad. And I, and like, you don't like that I use the excuse of Chase Field being a wonky place to play. I don't. Right. But I do think that factors in here because I think sometimes when you see Corbyn's route to the ball, his hesitation, him kind of looking around, sometimes it's a lack of awareness about how the ball is going to play out there in center field. Like, you brought it up to me.

Playing center field really isn't that different from playing right field. And Corbyn has played center field in his career. Plenty. This isn't the first time he, you know, has played center field. But his struggles aren't just on the offensive side of the ball, which we obviously see. see and know about and hope that he can it's carrying over now it is and that's the problem but like both can be impacting both you know what i mean i mean i think defensively and then it carries over mentally to the hitting side and then you know vice versa like corbin and bp has been absolutely raking and

and that that can't be said like it's bp right so you don't want to get too excited about it but by comparison to even how he was hitting in the cages and hitting in bp at times earlier this season he's looked much better. He's looked much more decisive. He's using the two-hand follow-through, but even that's kind of been alternating a little bit. I think today there was discussion about seeing him do the one-handed follow-through, but things have been better for Corbyn. It's just, it's just still not, he's still not putting it all together. And the mistakes really are piling up to the point where, you know, he's, he's not a plus net player any longer. You're not really getting a positive output out of him most nights and that's the part that's most frustrating.

I think that there's a lot of guys on this team that haven't been hitting and haven't been playing well. Lordus Guerriel Jr., like I said, that's even though he still has a 246 average with a 704 OPS, most of that was from the first two weeks of the season. And I don't have his numbers lately in front of me, but I would guarantee that as of late, he's probably hitting closer to 200 than that 246. So today, it just seemed like whenever the Diamondbacks would have a guy that was able to get on base one way or another. We immediately followed it up by, you know, no one being able to

add to it to, to, you know, get any, any kind of offensive role going for this team. And it was a frustrating game to watch, as many games this year for the Arizona Diamondbacks have. But of course, there is one guy that helps us stay grounded, helps us stay reasonable. And that guy is definitely not me. You know that. That guy is the one and only thunder stick himself, Jesse Friedman, coming to us live from Chase Field. Friedman, we need to talk about this. What happened? Did he disappear?

Oh, that's all right. There he is. He's coming in here. Jesse, Hi. Hey, there I am. We'll get you in here eventually. Very frustrating night for this team.

I've talked about, obviously, the pitching not being very good, but this was just a night where the Diamondbacks as a whole just weren't good on either side of the ball. or, you know, even even defensively, they weren't very good. Yeah, I mean, they didn't really do much of anything all that well today, right? I mean, you could maybe pick out individual moments here and there. That was something that made me say, whoa, once again, but, you know, outside of that. That was impressive.

Yes, that was impressive. Jock Peterson had three hits. But by and large, this was an ugly game for the Diamondbacks losing, of course, to nothing. That's their biggest loss of the year. I believe they hadn't lost by more than five runs in a game entering today. So it was an emphatic win for the Los Angeles Dodgers. And I mean, they scored five out of those eight runs pretty much right from the get-go in the second inning. This is one of those games. Games tend to be that way when he don't score any runs. But yeah, am I all frozen? Can you guys? You are for a second, but you're back. You're back. We're back.

everybody's back but we are not back there we're definitely not back we're the diamond packs we've never been more day sure that's for sure but uh jesse one thing we addressed earlier was your tweet about uh the diamond backs marquee free agent pitchers historically just having a bad day when they debut at chase field uh obviously you know we're we're not superstitious around here we're just a little stitious but uh what what kind of curse is hanging over the diamond backs when it comes to these starting pitchers debuting at home. There's something about that, isn't there? I mean, every time the Diamondbacks have,

they haven't done it very many times, right? The Diamondbacks haven't signed that many big game starting pitchers throughout the course of this franchise's history. But when they have, day one in front of the home fans, hasn't been great. You know, you said you showed it earlier, Randy Johnson, even Randy Johnson gave up six runs, six earned in his first start.

And of course, what was then, Binkwin ballpark. So yeah, and it's not to say that some of those guys didn't wind up having pretty solid Diamondbacks careers. Certainly Randy Johnson did. Zach Granky was able to turn things around, although his first entire season with the Diamondbacks wasn't all that great. He had a 437 ERA in 2016. But yeah, there's been something about it. I mean, Bumgarner, Jordan Montgomery, Zach Granky, Randy Johnson, none of those guys were good at all in their home debut for the Diamondbacks. Of course, team has had some other marquee starting pitchers come through this organization, but the distinction there being the guys that they signed as free agents. So Kurt Schilling

was acquired via trade, Dan Heron acquired via trade, you know, other guys that the debacks drafted and developed in house and whatnot. But when they've gone out and spent the money, it hasn't been pretty here at home on day one. I don't want to panic about anything. And I do. think there was some encouraging things, but is there any good that you take away from a game like this? I mean, it feels like this one is just like I said earlier. It's just all bad. Yeah, I think the one, the one, I mean, there are multiple positives you could point to. I mentioned jock looking really good at the plate. He continues to be really good for the Diamondbacks overall. Kattel Marte had what was I believe the Diamondbacks only extra base hit in this game.

He continues to be solid at the plate. There are guys on this team who are playing well right now. Blake Walston, his final line wasn't necessarily pretty when all was said and done. But I still thought that it was kind of a gutsy performance from him in his major league debut. D-backs have put a lot of young pitchers in the spot where you're in Reno one day and the next, it's bets and it's Freeman. and you're in a pretty tough, you're evasing some pretty imposing hitters. But Walson didn't seem intimidated, even though he did walk some guys toward the end of this outing. He wasn't necessarily in the zone a ton, but he was still pretty effective in this game.

You said some pretty fun things after this one, which we'll get to later on in the show. And another thing I would mention is Corbyn Carroll, who I think is starting to show signs of breaking out of his slump at the play. We're not quite there yet. He hasn't really put it all together. But he was one for three with a walk in this game. Of course, he had the double yesterday as well, starting to look a little bit better at the plate

for the guy who was the Diamondback's best player just a season ago. We were talking about how bad he's looked defensively at times. And I know, again, some of it, you know, obviously has to do with the fact that, much like Christian Walker at first base, I think we've gotten very used to Alec Thomas being an incredible center fielder, especially at home at Chase Field, with all of those weird angles and the overhang and the porch and all of that stuff, right? But Corbyn, he's just had a couple of moments like he did tonight where he's looked just a little lost out there in centerfield

playing, playing, you know, at home where you would think he would kind of have a better grasp on things by now. I mean, Corbin hasn't played that much centerfield, right? I mean, he did get some reps in last season, but by and large, Alec Thomas, has been the Diamondback center fielder, you know, ever since Corbyn Carroll came into the league. So he doesn't have a ton of reps out there. And he also is better suited for a corner, right? I mean, Alec Thomas is an excellent center fielder. And Corbyn Carroll is a pretty good corner outfielder. You know, he's made some really nice plays out there. Obviously, the arm isn't exactly what you'd want in a corner outfielder. But his range has been consistently above average. In center field, it's just different.

we've seen him get really close to making plays that would be really good plays if he made them. I mean, that ball that clanked off his glove today that went for a double, if he makes that play, it's a really nice play. It's not just like a play that every center fielder should easily make. I mean, Corbyn Carroll's speed is a big reason why he's able to even get to a lot of these balls in the first place. Right. But there's just a kind of a lack of finish where once he gets close to the ball, he kind of slows up or he hesitates. and he's not quite able to finish what what appears to be a play that is totally within his grasp to make.

And I think that it's kind of like what we've talked about in the past with errors, right? You almost are negatively impacting guys that have are more gifted athletically because they can get in the range of the ball more, but it would still take a spectacular play in order to make it. And in some cases, just because they were there and so close, they get hit with an error. when most average, you know, fielders in that instance wouldn't even have gotten there, right? Like, Corbyn's speed allows him to get to balls that most guys wouldn't have even been in the vicinity of. Yet when he makes a play like the ones he made tonight, it does make him look bad. And it makes him look like he's making mistakes out there when, in fact,

it's kind of hard to have body control when you're running as fast as Corbin is to get to some of those fly balls. And also play them, like I said, with some of those weird angles and such that Chase Field has. I want to push back a little bit here. Jesse, I think guys with Corbyn's speed typically are always centerfielders. I don't think that they're, I think most of the time, they're not corner guys. Damon is on the Corbin as a bum ticket right now. He's riding strong on Corby and Carroll is a bum. The bad defense is unacceptable.

I get being struggling at the plate, but the bad defense is unacceptable. I'm not, I'm not going to say that like, oh, most centerfielders might not be able to get to that ball. I think most centerfielders make that play. And I think same as yesterday. I don't think that he's, I think he's playing bad defense because it's compiling from his struggles at the plate. Yeah, I don't really agree with that. I think,

I think that we're just all really used to seeing Alec Thomas play centerfield. I mean, Alec Thomas is one of the smoothest defenders in all of baseball at that position. And, yeah, like, you know, is Corbyn Carroll playing an above average center field right now? Probably not. No. I also don't think he's playing, I don't think he's playing a well below average center field.

I haven't looked at his defense metrics in a little while. I'd be really surprised if Corbyn Carroll was like a heavy negative in center field right now. I bet he's probably right around average. Wouldn't shock me if he was even a little above average out there. We're just so used to seeing Alec Thomas. Like not everyone out, not everyone is Alec Thomas out there. Not every team has a guy like that. And when you see someone else who doesn't have, Corbin does have Alex speed.

He actually has more speed than Alex Thomas. but his instincts are just not quite as sharp out there, and we've certainly seen that. I just think with Corbyn's arm and how much negative value that brings, the only thing he's bringing on defense is range. So when he's not making those catches because it's hitting off of his glove, he's actively bad at defense for your team. So I just like I'm not,

I think that I think you guys were giving them a little bit too much excuses there. I don't think the defense is really acceptable at all. No, you know what I think this is. Corbin, can I just say, can I just say real quick? Corbyn is it he's at plus one he's a plus one OAA so based on based on stat cast Corbin is an above average defender from a range perspective and granted yes the arm is not good and so I think they have him as being minus one there so it basically it basically comes out to league average which of course and you know at this point it's so early in the season to be

looking at these numbers but I don't I mean Corbin Carroll's centerfield defense is probably the least of this team's problems right now in my mind. There is something to be said and people seem to forget or think it doesn't factor in that the Diamondbacks have lost as many players as they have. Right. So like you compound that with the fact that the guys who are here who are healthy aren't playing very well. Right.

And like there's people right now in the chat, of course, that very much agree with Damon and would probably agree with Damon if Damon started on a fire Tori. you know, ticket because... I'm literally defending Tory in the comments. I know you are. I'm not saying you're on that. But I'm just saying it's an easy thing to do because you're writing on emotions and tonight it's easy to blame Corbyn. And yeah, things got started at times when mistakes were made.

But I'm not blaming Corbyn tonight. I just think that all of these issues are compounding on top of each other. And at some point we need to, it needs to stop because it's gotten ridiculous at this point. Well, it's baseball. You can't just make it stop. No, obviously not. I mean, if there was a butt. and they would have pressed it already. They definitely would have pressed it by now.

I mean, you take a look at some of the positives here. Like Jesse said, Jock Peterson continues to rake. Jock is hitting 317 with a 959 OPS. So, you know, that it's not the power hitter we might have thought we were going to see, but it's a very, very good hitter. And it's a guy who is on base a lot, not to mention the fact that he also is taking some very good at bats. And right now you can't say that about the rest of the lineup.

Kattel, excellent hitter, taking some great. great at bats, even on a night where he only had one hit, Kattel still had some really, really good at bats. And you just don't see enough of the rest of the lineup taking those, kind of, you know, working the count, trying to get up there, make the pitcher work, make the pitcher do things. And again, it's easier said than done. I definitely couldn't do it.

So I'm not going to sit here and pop off at the mouth. Like it's that easy. Just like when you watch a pitcher struggle, like we saw tonight at times with their command and you're like, why don't you throw out in the strike zone? Trust me, they're trying to. they just can't. And it's because throwing a ball that far, that hard, turns out it's very difficult. It's very difficult.

It's not an easy thing to do, right? So like sometimes, like Jesse said with Alec Thomas, we just get used to how, you know, good baseball players are across the board. And when they struggle, it seems to not really make sense. The Diamondbacks, though, they just have a lot of guys struggling. And that's what's making this team not fun to watch right now. And it's what's making, I think, in general, like, yeah, mistakes make it harder for you to go up and have a good at bat, right?

So if Corbyn Carroll is making defensive mistakes, I'm sure it's mentally, it's impacting him because he cares. He cares so much about his performance and success and wanting to help the team win a baseball game. So I'm sure it's hard for him to go make a mistake like that in the outfield, not make that catch. And then just go sit there and flush it and then go have a good at bat. Those things stick with you, especially when you're struggling the way that Carol is right now. He is struggling. Yeah. But, you know, as I said earlier, I think there are some positive signs there.

He worked a good at bat in right up toward the end of this game, managed to line a single into left center field. And then with that rocket into the right field corner that should have scored Gabby Moreno and, you know, went down as the game winning hit in the game yesterday. You're starting to see some positive signs there offensively. But yeah, I mean, it's still what a 547 OPS, you know, just over. 30 games into the season. That's that's not exactly what you're looking for from player who is, you know, the best guy on this team last year. So we do have Blake Walsden making his debut today. And he did get a little bit of an unnerving phone call down there in the bullpen waiting for possibly his opportunity to come into this game. Is that right? Yeah, yeah. This is Blake

Walston was asked after this game what his initial reaction was when, when, when the bullpen phone rang and he knew he was getting his first major league opportunity, and here's what he had to say. Man. It's a fucking goat. That's my first thought. It's like, all right, no more, you know, having fun. Let's go.

Just kind of snap your fingers and try to flip the switch. I like that. I like that about him, Jesse. I really like that response. Yeah, I figured you would. anytime there's a there's an f-bomb reference in post-game scrums there's it's got over it but it's gonna make me jump through that wall you know the you know the way this works blake yeah blake was um that that was that was i think the last question that he was

that he was he said he had a he said he had a lot of fun and and understandably so i mean even though as i said earlier the final line for for waltston wasn't great tonight he still kept the diamond i mean yeah it's hard to keep the keep the diamond in the game when you, you know, you come in and it's already six to nothing, but he at least held it right there. Yeah, gave him nearly four innings. Yeah, you know, if the D-backs had managed it a three-run homer or something in those middle innings, like it becomes a game and maybe you go to some of your higher leverage relievers for the latter few innings. You know, if they're still down, I'd imagine probably not. But he pitched

pretty well. And we didn't really, I didn't personally expect to see Blake Walston pitch potentially this year at all for the diamond bags, if I'm being honest, I was a little bit, a little bit surprised, but I probably shouldn't have been because the diamondbacks were in a tricky spot with the bullpen today. They needed some length in case Jordan Montgomery couldn't go super deep, which wound up being the case. They would have been in a very difficult spot if Blake Walston were not with them here today. And yeah, you know, Christian Mayna has been thrown well down in Reno, but he hasn't been there for very long at all. I think he's still made fewer than 10 AAA starts in his career.

Walston's at least spent quite a bit of time at that level. You know, he has more experience at the upper levels of the minors, and the Diamondbacks went to him today, and he pitched pretty well. And I think, honestly, he, even though he, this might be his, is only, you know, outing or appearance during this stint in the majors, I think he definitely showed that he has, you know that that kind of veteran feel for for a young guy making his debut right he seemed to have the confidence and the excitement about being here didn't look scared didn't look nervous and in fact we showed the video earlier of him talking about getting that news while in Vegas at the casino so

a lot of things about him that already seem seem very cool meanwhile a question that we talked about earlier that really has no answer is how you know scratching jordan montgomery from yesterday's start impacted him today impacted this start and this performance but you have more for monti from the clubhouse on on yesterday and and that delay yeah this is montgomery was asked after the game uh just how how it might have affected him what what yesterday was like and here's what he had to say about that i can't control bees so um It's frustrating. I was ready to go yesterday, but I was ready to go today, too. So there's just really no excuse.

Did you get what they were thinking with pushing you back? I mean, yes, it's early. It's not worth staying, having to stay loose for, I mean, they were thinking it was going to be two hours and risking anything. So, I mean, I hated putting the bullpen in the position they were in and did it again today. so I just got to focus what I can focus on and try to be better next time. I respect Montgomery taking on the fact that he doesn't really want to place the blame on anything other than him just not performing well today. Yeah, he was very adamant about that throughout the interview with other questions as well. There was no excuse for today based on what happened yesterday or anything that this was his game and he should have been able to keep the Diamondbacks in it and he was not able to do that.

He basically just said out of the gate, like, I didn't have fastball command. My change up, he said he was cutting his change up. So he wasn't getting the arm side movement on that pitch that he normally does. It was a change up that Andy Pah has hit for a two-run homer, which is the Dodgers, you know, scoring their first couple of runs of the night. So his stuff wasn't, his stuff just wasn't great today by any stretch of the imagination. He's a guy who has to be locating well, has to have good feel for his pitches in order to be effective. and that just was not there at all.

And I don't, I mean, I like the fact that he feels bad about putting the bullpen in the position that he did. There's just, there's a lot of things there that are encouraging, but what wasn't encouraging, obviously, was, you know, to start today and how much the Diamondbacks needed, you know, kind of him in this situation to step up. It does sound a little bit, though, like he would have preferred to just go yesterday, even though he admits it was probably the right call. but it definitely sounds like he would have rather just go yesterday. Yeah, he, I think Tori had told us yesterday that he was good in warm-ups. And I had, I think, a shorter than usual warm-ups. So Tori was confident that he had the bullets in there to come out and make this start today,

even though he did throw a little bit yesterday. He joked about maybe he threw all of his, all of his good pitches yesterday and the bullpen getting ready for the game. But, yeah, he did also. was also asked, what's the longest delay that you've ever dealt with in a start? And he said that there was a game back when he was with the Cardinals where he was pitching in Pittsburgh, and there was a rain delay for about an hour and a half. And he'd already pitched four innings. And he came back after the hour and a half and pitched two or three more innings, he said. So he's, he's been through something like that before, but he understood the debacks not wanting to risk it, given his weird ramp up

this season, the fact that he didn't have a normal spring training, and the fact that it's still pretty early in the season for everyone as well. I think that other incident happened more toward the end of the year where he would have been in, you know, in midseason form at that point. Did he blame his performance today on Zach Granky's presence in any way? Just curious. No, he continued to take over. Shockingly, that didn't, that didn't come up. Yeah. I was just curious. I'm just curious literally ghosts of past terrible starting pitcher performance. his debut in Chase Field were present looming over him while he was trying to get a win against the Dodgers.

I'd blame him a little bit. Randy Johnson, Randy Johnson works for the Diamondbacks. He was also there. Oh my God. Maybe he was in here. Maybe Madison Bumgarder was here too, Derek. Who's to say?

Kevin Nash was at Monday's game and that's a whole other thing with being a big mysterious looming person in the background. So wouldn't be surprised if he was there in a cowboy hat pretending he's Mason Saunders. Of course, another big discussion that we've been having, including you being here, is Corbyn Carroll. And Tori had this to say about Corbyn and his performance. I think his day one was a couple days ago, be honest with you. You know, when you're talking about day one when it starts to move that way,

I got a good feeling from just watching him pass on pitches that he might be swinging at, good rhythm to his to swing some really near misses and then today's out of out about was pretty impressive his last half bat stayed on a two strike back

door breaking ball and hit a hundred mana or line drive in less center field that was pretty impressive bad so yeah I thought his day one was a couple days ago I think the storm's coming and like I feel like I've just been cautiously optimistic about that

in watching some of his BPs and some of his you know some of his hits that hit the other night that got caught and would have been a home run in like 17 out of 30 ballparks. Like there's just been times where you feel like Corbyn has been getting a little unlucky, yet lately at least over the last week, it's definitely felt like things are trending in the right direction of him getting the

barrel on the ball and getting some harder hit balls out there. We noticed in batting practice today, and it's hard to, you know, really read into batting practice much, but it did look like he was driving the ball more where, pretty much everything he was hitting was a pulled home run or a pulled double at least, you know, something that banged up against the wall. So for whatever that's worth, he seemed to be making better contact there and he's been making better contact in games as well. So, you know, Tori seems to believe that good things are right around the corner.

And we've been saying for a while that with a player as talented as Corbyn Carroll is, and I know it's not a long sample of being a great major. league hitter at this point in his career, but he still finished fifth and MVP voting last year. That's not something very many guys ever do. And I still feel confident that in time, Corbyn Carroll is going to figure this out. And does that mean that he has an 870 OPS at the end of the year? I'm not so sure about that. I mean, you kind of dug yourself a little bit of a hole here with a with a sub-550 OPS in the first month or so of the season. But, you know, what's happened is how really care about moving forward is how Corbyn plays the rest of the way.

And if he can be similar to the player that he was last year, that would be a really big boost for this Diamondbacks team. I'm only laughing because you made Damon Dryhee with that comment on Corbyn's OPS. Just the mere mention of the number. Like I was just like, it almost got bad back here. Yeah, it was almost bad. But shout out to our guy Nicholas Gruders with his super, chat. Nicholas says, is it just me or does the team feel lifeless? Last year, the team looked like

they were having fun even when they lost too much pressure on themselves. Expectations. Expectations. Last year, there were no expectations. So this team could have fun. They could go out there. They could just play baseball. They could kind of find their identity. They had no idea they were going to make the postseason. They had no idea they were going to win in that first series. They had no idea they were going to beat the Dodgers and make it to the World Series like they did, right? So yes, of course, expectations have changed things. Much like Damon said earlier, and I know he was half joking and very much half serious, was, I thought this team would be better than this.

And there are people that want an answer and they want Tory to pay and they want people to pay. They want someone, they want justice to be served. And really, at the end of the day, it's just like what I said, a loss of personnel, a lot of key personnel. mixed with the fact that the guys here right now just aren't performing very well. And the ones that aren't getting enough support because you still have Jock Peterson could tell a few other guy. Randall Gritchick has been pretty good for this team. Like you have some guys that are performing, but for the most part, it's not enough of them right now

for them to get on a winning track. And that's the part really that has made this not a really fun season to watch so far. Yeah, just so much inconsistency, right? I mean, Lordus Guriel, just what, two weeks ago was near, you know, near the team leaders at the very least, near the major league leaders in some categories offensively as well. And now you look up and he's got a 704 OPS, I think is on base percentage is probably below 300 at this point. And he's still in the two hole in the lineup. Yes. It's pretty tough when you've got a guy in the two hole who's getting on base less than 30% of the time.

Lourdes has been a streaky hitter. We've said it time and time again. you do sort of expect this to be the case from him. And that's why having someone like Lourdes in, you know, your top two or three hitters is not necessarily an ideal arrangement. Because he's going to, you know, he's going to live up to that standard in stretches, but he's not necessarily going to do that for all that long. And in moments like this, where he's in a little bit of a rut offensively,

you can kind of kill you offensively. You can kill some of those rallies with double play. and, you know, some of the strikeouts and whatnot that we've seen. So getting him back on track is certainly going to be big for, big for this team. And that's part of the lifeless part that Nicholas is talking about. Like it doesn't even feel like you can get excited at times with this offense and the way they're performing because even, you know, all right, guy gets on single, no outs. And then nothing.

They don't even advance them to second, you know, or hit into a double play, you know, whatever. And I feel like we've seen that entirely too much this season. And again, these are all the things. things that are making this not a fun baseball team to watch right now. I think early in the season, go ahead, Jesse, sorry. I was just going to say, I mean, looking up and down the lineup, there's just not the only guys who are really consistently giving you offense are Catelle Marte. Christian Walker, I would say, has been pretty consistent by and large, and Jock Peterson,

who of course is only starting against Ritey's. Outside of that, there's been a lot of up and down for pretty much everyone else and probably more bad than good with most of them. Shout out to Scurvy Boy for his super chat. Thank you for your super chat. And of course, also be calm, see clearly. I think asked with his super chat, if the Diamondbacks need to,

if he needs to give the Diamondbacks the tongue. I don't know what that means. No one does and let's not ask any more questions. We're not going to. No. What I will say is that whatever needs to be done, take it upon yourself to do it. If that's what it takes.

If that's what it takes. And you're willing to give. That's what it is. I was just going to say that I think early in the season, everything went wrong for this team, whether it was like, you know, injuries or like balls being this far foul or this far fair for the opposing team and stuff.

And it's just evolved into the point where every big hitting situation, they're in their head about it now because it just seems like every way that they can lose a game they do. And I just, you know, I don't think that necessarily it was like that early on. But nowadays they're just situationally, they're not playing good. The defense is bad.

Like it's just really snowballed out of control. And they need to reverse the course. It's starting to get a point to, Nicholas says the body language too, though. They just look lifeless. It's starting to get a point where like, I don't know,

like when you start losing a lot, you start feeling guilty about having fun and being out there and, you know, doing some of the fun stuff that you see in the dugout. It doesn't feel right and you don't feel like having fun, you know? So I can understand how,

Sometimes we don't see this team having all the joyous moments that we had last year. But I will say from an inside source that I was told the whole bee thing sticking around. They're adopting this. This is not a moment in time. This is a movement for the Arizona Diamondbacks due to the luck that bees are supposed to bring. So according to a source, don't be surprised to perhaps see a beekeeper helmet used as a home run celebration in the very near future? No team has ever needed a home run prop more than this team right now.

And they need to commit to it. Oh, don't bring it in and then only hit one home run in a week and be like, oh, we got to fucking burn the hat. Like, no, stop blaming the item. The item is not the problem here, folks. They need to want it. They need to want it.

I want them to wear it. Exactly. I want them to go to sleep at night thinking about how I want to wear the beekeeper helmet tomorrow. I can't believe I didn't get to wear the beekeeper helmet today. I'm going to wear it tomorrow. Jesse did mention earlier the good things are around the corner, and hopefully they are for this team,

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sponsors. Shout out to Four Peaks. I'm not drinking a victory beer tonight because I don't feel like, I don't, again, we lost. So, like, again, like the Diamondbacks not having a fun time in the dugout. I'm not over here enjoying a delicious hop-knought IPA or a bad birdie, juicy golden ale, which I went to a friend's house this weekend for a birthday party. And when I opened up the fridge, just nothing but bad birdie, juicy golden. It was like a dream come true, Damon. I got to paint a picture of my wife while drinking entirely too much beer.

And I had a great time. I had a great time. You drew a good picture, too. I did paint a good picture. I didn't know I can paint. You guys, I can paint. I can paint.

I found that out this week. Have we seen, have you seen this picture, Damon? Because I have not and I am very skeptical. Damon has seen the picture. It does look like Derek's wife. It's a pretty good.

It's a pretty good audition. I definitely bested her and her Herm Edwards. Oh, she drew me. She made Derek. She made Derek look like a like an alternate world where like people are just completely different. They're aliens with moustaches and stuff.

I was just going to say that I walked into the beer cave out of Circle K. Yeah. And all of a sudden, here's the shining golden light, like it's from heaven. Exactly. On the bad birdie, juicy golden logger. Oh, my God, Derek. It's so good. 18 cans and they're all gone.

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Of course, I have told you guys time and time again that I am a notorious liar and I'm not to be trusted. But that's only because the numbers, they tell the truth and they do not lie. So let's take a look at numbers don't lie for today. Jesse, what do you have for us from today's game? Yeah, circling back to Jordan Montgomery, our number is. is 94.4. This is Jordan Montgomery's average exit velocity in his

three innings of work. Yeah, it wasn't great. That is the, yeah, 94.4. It's very, very high. Out of 144 career appearances in the major leagues, that was the sixth highest in Jordan Montgomery's career. So, yeah, not great stuff there. Eight of his 13 batted balls,

or eight of the 13 batted balls against him more 95 or higher off the bat. So, yeah, all the way around, not a great outing for Jordan Montgomery. You don't see this too often from him, where his command just is not right. And his feel for his pitches is also not particularly good, especially with that change-up. But as you saw today, Jordan Montgomery, when he's not going to overpower guys with his fastball or anything, he needs to be able to command stuff. And he just was not able to in this one.

Well, we have, of course, some news today in regards to all of these starting pitchers being squeezed down and moved over, right? The bullpen started. It seemed like the Diamondbacks were just going to move everybody out one day. But that is no longer the case with Zach Gallen. It would appear that he is going to miss essentially his turn in the rotation. And should hypothetically be back for the next time he pitches? Is that what's going on? Yeah, that is exactly what is going on.

at least as of right now. I mean, Tori Lavello had told us after last night's game that Zach Gallen would be starting on Friday. And then he told us today before the game that that was in fact not happening. And he said after the game, the Galen will start on Tuesday. So Gallen is basically just missing this turn through the rotation. As you said, it's as if he's being skipped. Diamondbacks, of course, used a bullpen game yesterday, which sort of allowed them to do that. They also have the off day as well.

so they're in a decent spot right now as far as days for starting pitchers go. But yeah, you're not going to see Zach Gallen until next week. And Tori described that as being basically a situation where, hey, we have the opportunity to give Zach Gallen a start off. And even though there were no new developments with his hamstring, Tori was adamant that his hamstring was fine, but they have an opportunity to give him some extra time and they decided to take it. So Gallen will start on Tuesday.

And then Tori also said just now after the game that Ryan Nelson will probably, it's pretty likely he will start on Sunday, which is basically Tori's way of saying that Ryan Nelson will start on Sunday. He's just not on the active roster right now. So they can't make that move official until then. Yeah, so they have a TBD in there, but we do not do TBDs around here. We throw people in.

So here is our probable pitchers for the upcoming series with the San Diego Padres. We have Slate's Coney going against Dylan Cese in game one. Brandon Fott going against King. Ace on Ace, by the way. Can I just say for the first game? Yeah, ace on ace there for sure. The dueling 2.25 ERA versus Cease's crazy high, 2.780RA. Brandon Fawkes.

Advantage Cicone. Yeah, Advantage Sclade, for sure. Facts. And then Nelson, if everything goes as planned, we'll start against Waldron in game three. Yeah, you've got Dylan Cise, who's been so good for the, for the Sandy Pagos this year, of course, he was acquired in a trade and has been outstanding since

that trade was made. Michael King has had a couple of really good outings. Michael King, one of, probably the centerpiece in that Juan Soto trade coming back over from the Yankees. King has had a couple of very good outings, but his full body of work, as you see there with his five ERA, not been especially great. And then Matt Waldron, one of the few, possibly the only remaining knuckleballer in all of, in all of Major League Baseball.

So we'll see some knuckle balls in that Sunday finale here at Chase Field. There was a fun moment on the broadcast where they were talking about it. Bob and Steve were talking about it where I forgot who it was, but someone was saying, like, how do you hit a knuckleball? And it was someone's like advice was like, you wait for it to stop moving. And that's how you hit knuckleball. I thought that was pretty funny. Bob was like, that's just one of those old baseball things where like it kind of means

something, but it really means nothing at all. Like. And we have a conversation now comparing what's better, the knuckleball or the Roger Bessions football slider, of course, as you all know, Roger Besson football slider, the official mascot of this show. So the Diamondbacks don't need to adopt that. J.J. is sick to his stomach right now. We get out more than one mascot. Let's calm down here. All right. Let's not act like Rat Leon doesn't exist, folks. But I did want to ask before we get out of. of here, Jesse, when it comes to Zach Gallen, do you think that this is a case more of Zach,

maybe still feeling something in regards to the hamstring injury? Or, and this is pure speculation, because I know you have no confirmation on this, or do you think this is more about him, it being easier for him to stay in his routine by missing the start? I mean, Tori told us that if Zach, if what happened yesterday had not happened and Jordan Montgomery made that start,

he said Zach Gallen still would have gone today. This was, according to Tori Lavello, purely the product of some weirdness happening yesterday. You push Montgomery to today. The debacks felt good about that. And then suddenly you don't really need Zach Allen to make this start, this turn through the rotation. And Tori also, you could just kind of hear it in his voice where so many bad things have happened for the Diamondbacks this season, you know, situations where maybe you didn't think an injury was all that severe and then it winds up being worse than you expect. We've seen this time and time again in the early stages of this season.

And you can tell Tori has been, he's been through a lot already. And he just wants to make sure. You can tell like got him in the back of his head. There's an image where Zach Gallen goes out. And in the first inning, he tweaks the hamstring again or whatever. And he's removed from the game. He's out for four weeks. You know, based on what the Diamondbacks injury luck in the early part of the year,

I think it's kind of rewired how, how Tori's brain works a little bit in some ways. So, yeah, you can understand the Diamondbacks wanting to be cautious with, as Tori described it, and one of the best pitchers in the National League is one of the best pitchers in the National League. And we want to be careful and make sure that he is able to continue doing that for us throughout the remainder of the season. To the flip, I guess the flip side of that or how this also impacts someone else is,

how does this impact Jordan Montgomery? Because I feel like there's now two off days in between his next start, which means that, that he's going to be on quite a bit of rest. I mean, any concerns there in regards to, you know, when he's going to pitch next? Yeah, I want to say I would line up for the eighth, because you're right, there's the off day tomorrow, then there's also an off day on Monday.

So, yeah, Montgomery is going to be pitching on, I guess that's six days rest going a week from today, which some starters maybe not huge fans of that. But it does happen. I mean, that's not necessarily a quirk with what the debacks have done with the rotation. that's just having two off days in a close, yeah, in a close span of time. If he would have started yesterday, he would have been off even more time, right?

Because, I mean, he probably would have still pitched the next day. I'm not, I'm getting too far into the weeds with this. But yeah, you're right. Yeah, that I'm not sure about. There's times where, like you said, this is just a natural byproduct of having, you know, multiple off days and the way that they handle the schedule. So interesting to see how the Diamondbacks can bounce back. but I still think, you know, based on their performance in game one, game two,

there's still some things to be encouraged about in regards to them playing, you know, this well against one of the best teams in baseball. But today, not very encouraging, not a lot to leave from today's game with. Other than Blake Walston looked pretty good. And considering he was thrown in the fire here, I thought he did a pretty good job. Things just fell apart for him there at the end. But you got anything else before we get out of here, sir? I see a question from JA in the chat.

How bad is that Kyle Nelson surgery? I saw mixed views on it. Yeah, it's not great. I mean, it's thoracic outlet syndrome, which is one of the harder things in baseball to come back from. There are guys who have basically lost their careers to thoracic outlet syndrome. Steven Strasbourg, I might be getting confused. The one I'm more confident about is Matt Harvey. Matt Harvey had thoracic outlet syndrome and was never really the same.

Steven Strasbourg, I think there was maybe something else going on there. Of course, he had more injuries than just about any great starting pitcher you can imagine. But yeah, it's not an easy thing. Yeah, right. But this is a surgery that Merrill Kelly had back in 2020. He was having a started off really, really well in that shortened 2020 season. And I wrote a story about that a couple years back, which you can still find online. I talked to Dr. Gregory Pearl in that story, who's the same doctor.

the same surgeon who is doing Kyle Nelson's surgery. So he had an interesting perspective on how thoracic outlet compares to Tommy John. And he said that thoracic outlet, although the recovery time is theoretically shorter than Tommy John, it's a less predictable rehab process. Tommy John at this point, so many guys have had it. There's so much history there that guys have been through the rehab enough and know what it takes to get back. Whereas thoracic outlet, there are still guys who, it's better than it used to be. be, but there are still guys who have that surgery and are, you know, just not really able to

get back to where they were before. So all the best of Kyle Nelson, I do think it's likely he's going to miss the rest of the 2024 season. But hopefully for him, he's back in 2025 and, you know, better than he even was before. Merrill is a great source for him, obviously, having gone through it and being a teammate, right? But Merrill also had a really interesting perspective on it, where Merrill didn't seemed completely convinced that he needed thoracic outlet surgery is is that right i think you're i think you're yeah that well i'm glad you brought that up i think you're thinking of ryan thompson right who we had on we had on this show and ryan thompson was very yes very it was very interesting ryan thomason had thoracic rib in a in a in a necklace that you saw and and i i held it yes

you held it it gross it's disgusting but uh or maybe i know i don't think i did i think i think i think I kept a safe distance. But he did bring it into the clubhouse and showed it to me, which was pretty funny. But yeah, Ryan Thompson had that surgery and after the fact regretted it and thought that he actually didn't need it, even though he's been able to eventually come back and has to push them very effective for the diamond back. So there are, I guess there are some mixed views on this. But Ryan Thompson, I haven't heard that from like a bunch of guys.

I don't think it's a given that it's not necessarily controversial to have thoracic outlet, you know, from what we know about Kyle Nelson's situation. That's just what it's going to take. And hopefully he's able to get through the rehab. And it's not, it's a more significant surgical procedure to have. I think you're there overnight. The, you know, immediate effects are a little bit more significant. They're literally removing a rib, which is not, I mean, that does not sound pleasant. So all the, all the best to Kyle Nelson here, especially in these next, in these next few weeks. But following up on that, we've most likely lost Kyle Nelson for the season, right? He's out for the season with the surgery and could miss more time, even extended beyond that.

That's unfortunate. Yeah, I think that's likely. He should be theoretically, should be fine for the start of next season. But, you know, Merrill Kelly, when he came back in 2021, he didn't look the same as he did in 2020. And I don't think that's necessarily just due to thoracic outlet. But I mean, at that point, Merrill Kelly hadn't really established himself as being a frontline starting pitcher yet. But there is a possibility where you come back and you're able to pitch and you're healthy. But the effectiveness might lag a little bit behind that.

All right. Well, that's all we got for tonight. I'm going to cut this guy off so he can actually get out of there at a decent time, unlike last night where we all got home around 3 a.m. But we do thank you guys for being here tonight, even after tonight's loss. We will be back tomorrow at 1 p.m. with our normal afternoon show. So make sure to join us on an off day. We don't know what we're going to do with ourselves either, but join us. We'll get together and figure it out.

In the meantime, you can follow us on Twitter. I am at cap underscore K-Ban with a K. Jesse, of course, is at Jesse N. Friedman. The people's producer, Damon Dog, he is at Damon, D-A-W-G. We are Damon's dogs. Bark, bark. We almost got it at that time. We're going to get it one of these days remotely.

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