PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Josh Van Meat Sauce

Episode Date: December 28, 2021

On this episode, Derek and Jesse are discussing MLB players signing overseas during the lockout and the options the D-backs have for third base in 2022. 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 the PHNX D-Backs podcast right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Montia, officially known as the mayor of PHNX. And of course, I'm joined by my vice mayor, my friend, my co-host, the one and only Thunderstick, Jesse Friedman. Derek, you've got a, the valley hoodie on today. And it's a sorrowful day for Suns fans because they're just dropping like flies right now, man. Yeah. This health and safety protocols thing is really, uh, really kind of a bummer.

Things aren't great, Jesse. Things aren't great. They could go the route, though, of the WWE, which apparently announced today that they are just no longer going to test their talent for COVID. Now, WW is fun like that, right? Just denial. Like, if they don't come up positive,

then we don't have to worry about tests, right? Or we don't have to worry about holding them out of events. It's wild because WWE typically tries to follow the same protocol that sports do, even though obviously it's not a real sport, right? But then there's these instances like this, you know, like providing health care to their, you know, athletes, to considering them actually employees.

There's a lot of things that WW just decides that they're not going to do, right? Yeah. This is another one of those things. And the worst part about it, Jesse, is that one of their main stars is, has a compromised immune system. So I can't imagine how good of an idea. that's horrible. It's just horrible, right?

And see, here's the problem is now even with sports, right? It's turned and it's taken this direction where for the most part, I think athletes, I mean, obviously there's some high profile ones that aren't vaccinated and have been against the vaccination and I've been against a lot of things. There's still kind of this general sense that like this is just, you know, a hurdle, right like there's no actual danger for these guys this is just something that's gonna oh man now this either this game's gonna get canceled or we're gonna be short-handed but it's it's no longer like a dangerous thing like it felt like it was at one time despite that

there's still deaths uh you know there's still hospital numbers are back to being you know at all time highs the deaths are occurring all of that so like this entire situation is awful i wish it wasn't happening, you know, and I am very much not, I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised to see it come back. I think I'm even guilty of, you know, being fairly, you know, kind of free once, you know, once we reached a certain point with this pandemic, even though we weren't out of it, you know, so. Well, soon enough baseball season is going to roll around, Derek, and baseball is probably going to have the same problem that these other sports are.

You're not wrong. You're not wrong. Spring training is going to be another thing. You know, again, we don't know how this is going to alter the season. We don't know now if we're going to enter yet another season where we might either not have fans in the stands or have limited capacity in these venues. Right. And we also don't know if we're having a season.

We don't even know if we're having a season. But anyway, Jesse, I would be remiss to not go back and remind everybody that this podcast is brought to you by the fine folks at the Draft King Sportsbook app. Go download the Draft King Sportsbook app. Now use our code of PHNX and bet $1 or more on any NFL game at all. And you will get $100 in free bets once a single point is scored. That's it. All we need is a single point scored.

Go download that app and use our code again of PHNX. And that is for new users only. But Jesse, it's weird because now we're having this situation where we have a pandemic going on, obviously. we have a lockout going on. This all affects, both of these things affect MLB in their season, very much so. And now what we are seeing is notable MLB free agents are starting to do that thing we discussed, you know, I think a month or so ago where they are turning to overseas teams in Korea and Japan during the lockout to play baseball.

And it's kind of interesting because it's not, there are some, you know, there obviously is the Yaseel Puegs that you can. could question if Yaseel Pueig was going to be able to, you know, make a major league team, you know, currently. So it's kind of a smart move for him to go over there. But Freddie Galvis has signed with one of the Asian league teams. Yeah, he was decent last year. Freddie Galvis was not a bad player in 2021.

So that, for me, that's the one that's really telling. I mean, you see guys who have, you know, whose careers have not really turned out the way that they wanted to. Sure. And they go overseas. And, you know, like Merrill Kelly, they try to. find their way back on track and maybe someday they wind up back in the majors. But Freddie Galvis is a player who totally would have a major league contract, you know,

at some point sitting in his lap, hopefully in a few months once things get back in order following the lockout. But people are just getting impatient, right? They don't want to wait for that kind of stability. If they have the ability right now to go and sign a contract that they can be confident in right here in December, they're going to do it. and Freddie Galvis is one of those people. I completely understand those bubble players that might not even make the major league roster,

even if they do get picked up by a team, right? They have, they do have that Merrill Kelly blueprint to a degree now to look up to. And Merrill Kelly, obviously, not the first player to go play in Korea, the KBO or an overseas league, kind of raise the stock up a bit and come back. But as of late recently, he's probably the most notable one who has had the, the most notable career in MLB. His success in Korea translated over to MLB, and he has found success. Like you said, he's one of your picks, you said this yesterday on the show,

to possibly be pursued via trade or something for another team where he really can be, you know, like a part of a rotation that needs a solid third or fourth starter and is, you know, potentially a contending team. Yeah, yeah, Merrill Kelly is kind of the blueprint for all of this stuff, right? Sign overseas and then find your way back to the majors. And he has been tremendously valuable for the Diamondbacks. And I'm just, I'm trying to picture what it's like for them, Derek, because like this isn't just a baseball decision for these guys. This is a decision of like, do I want to pick up and move to Korea?

I mean, that is that is a big, big decision, something that I certainly would. didn't take lightly. I'm sure they don't either. But, but, but I mean, I mean, maybe for some of them, it's kind of fun. Like, yeah, I'm going to live in Korea for, you know, a year or two or however long it winds up being. Man, let me, let me tell you. I mean, we talked to Jack Summers, who talked about kind of falling in love with overseas once he moved over there, right? And, yeah, uh, you know, again, you know how much I like to bring things back to wrestling. Uh, that's, that's a big thing for pro wrestling because, again, Japan has a different level of reverence for pro wrestling over there. So it's kind of like here.

You know, it's a joke. You kind of get could make fun of. Oh, it's fake fighting. Oh, it's, you know, pretend. It's this or that, right? Japanese fans don't view it in that same light. They, they actually take it very seriously, mostly because their wrestlers just actually smack the shit out of each other. And it's not really pretend with them. But, um, I, I know guys personally who have gone overseas and just loved it.

You know what I mean? Like, they loved everything. about it. They enjoyed being over there. It's such a huge cultural change, you know, but it's just, I think it's kind of fascinating for some people. It's beautiful. It's especially, I don't know, like Japan, I'm not super familiar with Korea, but I have, I have friends that have been to South Korea and they liked it very much. You know, I've, I've friends have been, it's Thailand and that entire area and have said it's some of the best vacations they've ever taken, right? So, yeah, I could definitely understand, you know, uh,

And especially with the minor league system here doesn't necessarily translate over sometimes for guys to continue to get better and get an opportunity, right? Sometimes guys just get stuck in the minors. You know, you start seeing 32, 33 year old guys on the minors. And you just kind of know, unfortunately, for them that it's probably, it's probably not going to work out, you know. But, you know, people can still learn and get better anywhere. I think Korea just gives guys more of an opportunity, for instance, to play kind of at a high level in a very popular baseball league where they feel like they are, you know, still big stars or big parts of, you know, major teams, right? So there's a lot there. Henry Ramos signed overseas as well.

Yes, he did. Yeah. He's a deback that I liked very much. I liked the way he played. I liked everything about him. And I was sad to see him go. I think that some guys are just seeing the writing on the wall as far as what's going on here. and they want to take their career somewhere where maybe not necessarily following the Merrill

Kelly blueprint, but just going somewhere else where they're going to enjoy playing baseball. Yeah, and Korean barbecue. That too. Oh, God, Korean barbecue is the best. Yes, I love Korean barbecue. You're not wrong about that. Well, and I don't know, man. I mean, my dad and I, the other day at dinner for Christmas, we're talking about how good some of the restaurants that

would be considered kind of shabby chains here in the United States were in Puerto Rico when we lived there, right? Denny's was off of the hook and Church's chicken had a line that went outside and down the block. Really Church's chicken? Yeah, now mind you, like, these are like, Puerto Rico is such a small island, right? But it's comprised of all these cities, right? So, each city kind of has very few options. You're not going to get, you're not going to get all the American chains everywhere. So do they only have Denny's and Church's chicken? What else made its way over there?

In this, well, I mean, no, there was, like, there's still McDonald's. There was still because there's no restrictions because even though it's not a state, it's still, you know, it's still territory of the United States. So there's, right. There's no restrictions for businesses to go over there. It's just kind of a matter of like traditional, you know, island cuisine versus letting, you know, fast food places move in, but just like any place, you know, they've taken over all over.

but there's just not, you know, there's not that many options. So if you want to McDonald's, for instance, you might have to drive an hour to go get it, right? And that's the part that you're like, no, no, thank you. I will have my churches in town, right? But a big part of it was how the quality, you know what I mean? It's like the people that work there took it seriously and they made good food. They didn't think of themselves as working at Denny's, you know?

They didn't think of it as being a bad thing. They were happy to work there and they produced good. food because it wasn't like, you know, kind of like the stigma like it is here, right? Like Denny's is kind of not known as like a, you know, shitty diner and it's kind of going to have okay food, but nothing you're going to write home about, right? Right, right. I mean, that's really based on the people making it. And as the people making it do a good job making it, then it's going to be a good restaurant

that provides good food. I don't hate Denny's for the record. I don't either. I don't either. I don't either. I went there on my birthday. I had breakfast. and I stayed for lunch.

There you go. I enjoyed Denny's the day that I went there. I don't know if I would order a burger at Denny's. There are some things on the menu that I'd be a little wary of. But the breakfast items. Yeah. They're legit. Right.

So, I mean, and that's my metaphor here that I'm trying to link up to my story. Is that like, you know, sometimes when you play in the minor leagues, you kind of think of yourself as being a failure, unless you're a young kid that's on his way up, you know, progressing through your career, going up through the system. but if you're an older player, you tend to kind of think of it as being like not reaching your dream, but being close or whatever, right? Yeah, you got held back a grade in school. Exactly.

You're kind of behind somehow. Yeah. But then, you know, you go over to somewhere like KBO where, again, baseball is revered. It's love. You've arrived. Yeah. You've arrived. You're playing.

You have a chance to be a completely new person. And honestly, it's, I totally get it. I totally get why guys would do it. But like you said, it is a big lifestyle change. I'm just not surprised with the uncertainty right now in baseball. We talked about payrolls going down. We talked about minor leagues getting condensed, you know, teams getting excommunicated, if you will, from the minor league system. And then suing MLB, we've talked about all that stuff.

So it doesn't feel right now like baseball is expanding here in the United States. It feels like it's just getting a little bit smaller. It's literally shrinking with the lost minor league teams that we talked about the other day. Right. Right, right, you know. But yeah, I totally understand it and I get it. And I wish them the best. I hope they do have whatever success they're looking for,

whether there's success that they're looking for is just something to do until this gets figured out or if the success is looking to get like you seal quig, you know, getting back to a point where maybe a team here is looking to pick him up if he can get his game back to the level it was at at one point. You know, so well, and I want all of you guys to get your game up to where it needs to be on the Draft King Sportsbook app. Go use our code of PHNX. Start off by just betting $1 in any team to score and you'll win $100 in free bets.

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a bunch of people presents this holiday season. Again, that code is PHNX on the Draft King Sportsbook app, 21 and over only Arizona only gambling problem dot 100 next step new customers only eligibility restrictions apply see draft kings.com slash sportsbook for details. Jesse, I have a question. Yes. Are you, do you have any plans at all on playing third base for the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2020? I might need to, Derek. I'm thinking about it. I'm thinking I was just wondering. Are you keep your skills sharp just in case they get a phone call because I have no idea what they're going to do. I have no clue what this team is going to do. Obviously, there is a lot of

baseball, you know, transactions that could still take place once we get the new collective bargaining agreement in place and we're out of this lockout. However, I do remember Mike Hazen saying, when asked after the Mark Malanson signing, about pending moves that they potentially had. And he didn't hesitate to say that there was there was nothing on the docket like there is no there was no current pending like people they were pursuing or anything when it came to free agency obviously he could be lying his ass off and i would not be surprised for that to be the case but doesn't doesn't really sound like the free agency market is where they're going to turn for this third base issue probably not Probably not. Yeah. I mean, I'm kind of looking through all of the Diamondbacks different options. And frankly, there aren't really, there aren't really many that stand out as like, oh, that's clearly what they should do. It's really, that's the one.

Yeah. No, it's, it's kind of a, it's kind of a dumpster fire. I think, I think what they're obviously going to start with, what we do know for sure is they're going to look internally at what they already have. And they do have some guys who they used last year at 30. base who are still in the organization. Drew Ellis is probably the first name that comes to mind. Drew Ellis has been, you know, one of the team's top 30 prospects for a number of years, broke into the majors last year. He had a buck 30, Derek, and he struck out kind of a lot. It wasn't exactly, it wasn't a very compelling audition. But Mike Hazen did say at one point during the season that he is the truest third baseman on the roster, meaning in terms of his defensive ability, he is probably the most competent third baseman defensively that the team currently has. So I think Drew Ellis will certainly get a shot out of spring training. I think he's

probably in a perfect world, Drew Ellis becomes the prospect that, you know, we've been looking forward to for a long time. And he's able to hold down this role for a number of years to come. But there are, there are some reasons to question that, right? I mean, given his lack of success last year. The power has been compelling for Drew Ellis. I think that's probably his biggest calling card. I don't know if he's ever going to hit for a super high average. The defense is generally seen as being pretty adequate. So he's, here's definitely where it all starts for me. Again, though, here is why I hate Reno. And no offense to the fine people that live there, nor to the organization known as the Aces. Drew Ellis hit nearly 300 in 2021 as a member of the Reno Aces.

and not in a small sample size in a pretty big, nearly 300 at bats, over 350 plate appearances, he hit 294 with a 615 slugging percentage, 20 home runs, 73 RBI, right? That sounds like the real deal. Yeah.

A 1.014 OPS, you know. And then, then you come down to Phoenix. Then you start hitting at Chase Field. And yeah, like you said, 130 batting average, one home run, 203 slugging percentage, 480 OPS, just abysmal numbers as far as, you know, everything's concerned. And yes, it's a much smaller sample size, 83 plate appearances, 69 at bats, but still, it's just such a dramatic drop off from their production when they're in Reno. And this is another case of that, where this would make me want to hit a

Gatorade container with a baseball bat a whole bunch of times after the season was over. You know what I mean? Like just give me five minutes. I need to go let off some steam because, you know, when you start as a general manager, as a member of this front office, when you start seeing this, it's just like with Alec Thomas. How can you not get titillated? How can you not be excited by what you're seeing out of this player, especially considering that you traded away

Eduardo Escobar. You kind of knew you had this, you know, going to have this opening at third base. And I'm sure that Drew Ellis, this was, this was probably the time. This was probably the moment.

You know, it felt like they were going to have this guy come up. And again, it's his first season. You know, you talk about like the deer and headlights kind of thing

with a young player. And that could be absolutely what we saw with Drew else. Yeah. Maybe next year. That's why you give him a shot, right? When he comes up,

for spring training. Drew Ellis is, you know, if he shows you something, then he very easily could be the guy. I think what works against him is. He didn't hit less than two 30, 227 in a season, right? I mean, that's not a great number, but like, his numbers totally improved. Yeah.

He's not, he's probably not going to hit for that high of an average, even if he does pan out. That's not. Correct. But like you said, the slugging percentage is very high consistently. and I think he's somewhat somewhat of a power guy. And I think that, you know, again, like you said, you give them that shot.

I just don't know what they do if they, they can't put all their eggs in that basket, right? There's no way that they can fully rely on this being their third baseman without really somebody waiting in the wings, at least in the minor leagues that could also be the next third baseman. I don't really see a prospect ready for third base in their top 30 anytime soon. they have a j vukovic who is probably i would say he's an even better third base prospect than drew ellis probably has ever been but he's a little bit further down the line he's still in single a so stay tuned on on j vukovic but yeah i mean internally derrick beyond drew ellis it's josh van meter who we saw a decent amount of last year at third base he's still

in the organization i don't know if the team is very comfortable with him defensively i think i don't think josh van meeter really is a third baseman and I think the Diamondbacks, after what happened last year defensively, we talked about how they were the worst defensive team in baseball. After that, I don't think they're trying to go out there and put a guy at third base that they know can't play there or it just ideally doesn't belong there. I think like we've talked about, they want to start putting guys in the positions that they're actually going to play long term.

And that's probably the same issue with Josh Rojas. He also got time at third base last year. But is that really where you want? Josh Rojas playing day in and day out. Probably not. I don't think that's really his true position. And so that's why you're kind of left looking outside the organization at this point, because while there's something that could happen internally with Drew Ellis, as he enters his, I guess it'll be 27. Or no, check that. He just turned 26. So he'll be 26 throughout the entire, the entire 2022 season. But maybe something happens there where he takes a step forward.

If not, though, like you said, Derek, you probably want a backup plan. You probably want someone else. And so that's where we get into, do you make a trade? Do you sign a free agent? They're going to need to look elsewhere. One thing I wanted to point out, I was today, I was today years old. When I learned that Josh Van Meter's nickname is meat sauce. Really?

Meat sauce. I like that. I don't think I've ever heard that. I've never heard that either. myself but baseball reference has it listed as his nickname so that makes it real makes it official okay Josh meat sauce van meter where would we put that in would it be meat sauce Josh van meter would it be Josh meat sauce man meter Josh van yeah I like it is I like it as a middle name yeah it rings best that way also I also like just adding van to it and being Josh van meat sauce right

like that's ah there you yeah yeah I mean I don't know again he's a Didn't he have like the biggest hit of the season in the final game? Oh gosh. Oh, gosh. He's a hero, Jesse. I'd forgotten that for a moment. You're right. Josh Van Meter is the reason the Diamondbacks are likely getting the number two

overall picking the draft. We've been over this. But yeah, so Josh Van Meter is probably not the guy either. So you're looking outside of the organization. And in terms of free agency, we let off with this. there aren't really any super compelling free agents at third base unless you're about to go sign Chris Bryant, which the diamond backs are not. Right.

I mean, really, that's what it comes down to, right? There's this elite level and then. And then there's everyone else. Kind of a drop off, right? Yes. You know, you start getting down and you start getting down too low on the free agent list for third basement. And it's just a bunch of former debacks. But that's never good.

That's never good. good. I mean, but you're, again, you're probably not going to be in the market for a Chris Bryant or a Jonathan Valar or Matt Duffy. Jonathan V.R is the one guy I would bring up that I actually could kind of see happening. He's not, they're going to have to pay him a little bit, but he's, he's mid 30s at this point. I don't think you're going to get him on. Is he 31? Is Jonathan V.R. only 30. Wow. Okay. All right. Well, Jonathan V. VR is 31. Either way, Jonathan VR is not this.

We know who Jonathan VR is at this point. There's a pretty limited ceiling there. I don't think he would cost that much. I could maybe see Jonathan VR stepping in as Drubel Cabrera-esque role. Which speaking of, as Drewbill Cabrera is also a free agent. And they could bring him back. And that would kind of make some sense as a stopgap type as well. Or they could go super.

he's the oldest third baseman free agent in MLB. As Rubo Cabrera? Yes. Yeah. No, that sounds about right. No, you're right. Jonathan VR came in the majors really early in his career. So it makes sense.

He's not actually that old now. And I mean, there's a bunch of names in there that are definitely as long as as long as it's not a big contract or anything that's super detrimental to the future of this team. But there's some young guys in there, Franco. Yeah, Michael Franco. Yeah, I mean, there's Starlin Castro. So, I mean, Yeah, Starlin Castro is, he's another guy who came in the league

at like 20 or 21 years old. So, yeah, but he's been around for 20 years and he's 32 years old. And he's not, he's not bad. Like, he's, he's okay. He's generally played shortstop, but third base at this point might not be a bad fit for him. And see, this is the level, again,

kind of like Mark Malanson, right? this is the level of free agent that I think the Diamondbacks need to target. But I do think that at some point, they need to start looking at the lack of personnel, right? There's only so many positions you can fill and there's only so much you can do. It's not to say that once again, offering one of these guys a one-year contract is the worst thing. If you do want to let someone like Drew Ellis develop behind them or just get, you know, time in, you know, but I don't know. it's just so weird because I think I think of this team spending money. And then I'm also like, but why?

Why would you? I mean, because I just don't feel like, and I think that's, that's the way they feel, right? Like they don't want a shit team on the field, but they also, I don't think, believe this team is going to be competitive in the NL West this season. I think like, like, that's the part. if you if you want to be you know reasonably good in 2022 have at you would think you would spend money right like generally speaking spending money makes your team better but to your point i think the counter argument is like okay if we're really building towards the future we don't want to block any of these younger players that are you know hopefully going to be making a difference in the

years to come and so i think you only want to spend money in positions where it's like all right we've got nothing like we don't have some young prospect who's coming up there let's find a stopgap to just kind of hold that position down for the time being and it's possible third base is that kind of position because like we've said drew ellis is a little bit of a wild card and so you know going outside the organization kind of makes sense what they could do derrick is they could go ultra crazy and like you mentioned earlier there's a number of former diamondbacks who uh who have played third base for this team before or could play third base who are also free agents. So you want to bring back Jake Lamb or Ildamaro Vargas or Chris Oling's or what are you doing right now? What are you doing right now?

Brandon Drury. They're all out there, Derek. They're all out there waiting to sign with the with some team and who knows, maybe the diamond backs are of that. Do you remember when Jake Lamb left, what was it for the Oakland A's and then all of a sudden realized that he like could hit again? He could Yeah, he was for a short period of time. He was really good for a little bit there, but it didn't, unfortunately for him, it didn't last. Which is weird because that's him in a nutshell, right? Like, he's good for a little bit. He just doesn't have that sustainability.

He was really good in the first half of the season. He was one of the best in the first half. Or like super hot out of the gate, even if he didn't have a great first half, you remember him like, man, his April was good, though. You know, like something like that. And then it's just this drop off, right? Yeah. And I don't know what,

I don't know what causes that. I don't know what causes that in an athlete. I don't know if it's fatigue. I don't know if it's. Yeah. I think with Jake Lamb, the thought is that the guy had shoulder surgery in 2018. And that's sort of the time when his career has dropped off.

He's really never been the same sense. His numbers really dropped down after that. Right. A guy like, I like that not a lot of people talk about is a Dominican dude, Hanser Alaberto. He played for, the Kansas City Royals last year.

Yep. He's another guy. He has a great war. And I just think that he really could be an inexpensive option. Wasn't Al de Verto the guy who, remember when we were looking at that map of the most searched player? Oh, yeah. And I think Aliberto was like, what is he doing?

Yeah. Was he Mississippi? Was he one of the, I don't remember. I think it was one of those ones that. we were just like, what? We were super confused. Yeah, yeah, maybe there's something there that we're not recognizing, I guess. I don't know.

But there is, it is an argument to be made that maybe, maybe probably not Jake Lamb. I mean, I think that ship is probably sailed at this point. But maybe the Diamondbacks try to bring in a guy who was really good a few years ago. And maybe with this new coaching staff that we've talked about, maybe they're able to get someone back on track. And so you look at maybe a guy like Jake Lamb or there are other guys that come to mind too. I think that the big thing with the Diamondbacks really is that they can't pass up major league talent that they could acquire. You know, it kind of reminds me of Eduardo Escobar. Eduardo Escobar was added to this team.

And it wasn't like he was a no-name guy. He was beloved in Minnesota. But he just wasn't a very well-known player. And like just he was just such a perfect fit for this team, right? So if they could target potentially a third baseman that's a bit younger, that could be the future for at least the next like three seasons or so, you know, like a sub 30 year old guy, Jose Rondone, one of those kind of guys, like just somebody that's not going to cost them a ton of money,

but could potentially be a guy that they pay more to, you know, and becomes a part of this team. I just, I think at this point, looking, again, looking at how far some of these guys are away and such, I don't really know what they're going to do at third base. But we will definitely have some more information about this. I'm sure we'll have an article up on it in no time because this is kind of compelling and something that's going to develop,

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And, you know, we're going to keep up on this situation. There's a lot of things developing. And even though, even though we're in a lockout, it doesn't mean that there aren't stuff happening every single day, especially with the minor league system. So we'll see what continues to develop with that. And honestly, I can't, I can't wait to get back to free agency, Jesse, because there are so many there are so many gigantic names left on the board um you know maybe unfortunately they're probably not coming here but right right you know but look at hey the diamondbacks that like like just

hear me out they need a third baseman they need an outfielder Chris Bryant solves both of those problems have them play both at the same time you can there you go right yeah I mean come on he can play what left field a third at the same time I don't see a problem with that but thank you guys so much for watching this show and, you know, humoring me. You can follow us on Twitter. I'm at Cap underscore Caveman with a K. Jesse is at Jesse and Friedman. Our show is at PHNX underscore DBEX, but of course, all roads lead to at PHNX underscore

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There's a lot. There's a lot. It's hot. The NHL is at a standstill. So the Coyotes show, they don't know what to do. They're in a meltdown mode. They're over there just stealing our ideas. They're just doing mailbag Monday. Jesse knows. They're stealing our mailbag Monday idea. Next thing you know, they're going to be using the Megar-Meggerand song. It's all off the charts right now. I don't know what's going on, but you stay tuned. to them. I'm sure at one point, PD is in fact going to start playing hockey just in, you know,

in the studio. On the show, yeah. On the show, the, it's guaranteed. And pretty soon, we're going to, we're going to be out trying out to play third base for the Diamondbacks, Derek. That's right. It might just come down to that. So. By the way, I get invited every once in a while by the Arizona

Diamondbacks to come hit on the field for media day. What? Yeah. I have discovered that I am not very good at hitting a baseball. Wait, that's an actual event? That's an actual event. That's an actual event.

By the way, Nick Picoro from AZ Central fucking rakes. Okay? That guy, Nick Picoro can hit the shit out of a baseball. This guy doesn't mess around. Wow. Okay. There's a few people that come out there like jokers like me that kind of get put in our place in this situation.

Who like is this is a coach pitching to you or is? Oh, no, it's a machine. It's the machine. I mean, how what Velo are we talking about here? I don't know. I don't know. I'm thinking too fast for me. Too fast.

Too fast. Casey is operating the machine a lot of times and he has this kind of evil, sinister. Yeah, yeah. He's putting the baseballs in. I really feel like the purpose of this is just to like in your face baseball to us. I think it's to. Oh, it's so easy. Right.

Yeah. Be careful about what you write about our guys because you suck at this sport. I just want to remind you how bad you are at it, right? But then someone like Nick Piccolo goes out there, hits the shit out of a ball, and then we'll still criticize your players. Maybe it's Nick Picoro. Maybe he's the next third place.

I don't know. We figured it out. Nick, we got you a new job. We thank you guys again so much for listening to this show. We appreciate you. And remember, kids, baseball is fun, but it's so much more fun when you bet on it.