PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Lourdes Gurriel’s HISTORIC Start Powers Diamondbacks To Commanding Series Win Over Rockies

Episode Date: April 1, 2024

The Diamondbacks first series of 2024 went pretty well, taking three out of four from the Colorado Rockies. We discuss the franchise records set by Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and the D-backs offense, our takeaways from the series, and what the prospects have been doing in Reno. We also have answers to your Mailbag Monday questions and more!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/phnxdbacks50Arizona Lottery: Visit http://www.AZAdventure.com for more information on how you can take an adventure with the Arizona Lottery and for a chance to win $1 million in cash and Arizona travel prizes! PrizePicks - Download the PrizePicks app today and use code PHNX for a first deposit match up to $100! Pick more. Pick less. It’s that Easy!Desert Financial Credit Union: Open a free checking account online with Desert Financial Credit Union and get $200 in bonuses https://www.desertfinancial.com/200Empire: Schedule a free in-home estimate with Empire Today! Receive a $350 OFF discount when you use the promo code PHNX. Restrictions apply. See https://empiretoday.com/phnx for details.Gametime: 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. Someburros: 20% off your order of up to $100 when you use code PHNX at checkout for the whole month of March at https://www.someburros.com/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.

Welcome in to another edition of the PHNX D-Backs podcast right here on PHNX. I'm occasionally, you're mayor of PHNX. This man next to me, of course, occasionally as your vice mayor, always known as my thunder stick, Jesse Friedman. We got Charles Willow Pike in the house. We got Damon Dog in the house. It's a full house. And we are excited because the Diamondbacks absolutely put it to the Colorado Rockies in their

first series of the year, winning the four game series by a score or a count of three to one, three games to one. And as far as the runs. are concerned, beat them by a whole lot of runs. And of course, you know, we want to get excited about it, but we're going to tap the brakes a little bit. Before we get into that, though, we did want to welcome you welcome you into the PHNX Diamondbacks podcast presented by Factor Meal Kit, head to factormeals.com slash PHNXD

Bax 50 and use code PHNXDbacks to get 50% off. Ski to you, ski to the Diamondbacks and no ski to the Rockies. But the Diamondbacks did do exactly what we thought that they could do. I mean, we discussed what would be a successful series here against the Rockies. And I think taking three out of four is pretty much the best possible. I mean, you could have wanted them to sweep the series. But that's very hard to do in four games against a professional baseball team. I mean, are the Rockies a professional baseball team, Derek?

There were moments. Tava is definitely not. Yeah, Tovar, yeah, rough series for him defensively. Rough series for a few Rockies defensively. Yeah, I mean, I think a sweep was not. I don't think that's way, way too much to ask against the Rockies. But I don't think people are disappointed taking three out of four. D-Backs outscore the Rockies 32 to 14.

It's not like they were just barely getting by. They really did dominate the series despite what happened on Saturday overall. In the big picture, they really took it to the Rockies. And it's hard to, yeah, hard to feel, hard to really hope for anything different than what happened over the weekend. Well, we do have some takeaways, five takeaways, in fact, from the Diamondbacks opening weekend. And of course, the first takeaway, of course, being that the Rockies are very, very bad. They're very horrendous. I think that's the main point here.

As much as we want to get excited about everything going on right now and the way that they have played against Colorado Rockies, it's still the Rockies, right? And nice try, Marcos, but we're not following for, we're not falling for any of that shit today. Anyway, back to the Rockies. You know, you want to get excited, obviously. you want to feel like this team is exactly as, I guess, as powerful as we saw them be offensively in this four-game series. But it's just against a team that isn't really good. And, I mean, we saw them make a lot of mistakes in the series that led to the Diamondback scoring as many runs as they did. So I don't know if you want to get too excited.

They do have a pretty substantial test here against New York Yankees coming into town. And I would gauge their Diamondback season a little bit more on what happens in this Yankee series versus what happened against the Rockies. I mean, the Yankees just swept the Houston Astros, which is a pretty big deal. I mean, going in and doing that to Houston and the first series of the season is pretty impressive, especially not having Garrett Cole makes it all that much more impressive. So, yeah, this is a big test for the debacks upcoming. We'll talk about that a little bit more later. But yeah, the Rockies are possibly worse than I thought they were.

In my head going into this series, the one thing that I felt fairly good about with the Rockies was their defense. Having Brenton Doyle and Center Field, Jones with a cannon and left field, Ezekiel Tovar was a gold glove finalist to shortstop. Ryan McMahon is a really, really good third baseman. Tovar did not look like any kind of anything. Tovar, yeah, Tovar was. Minus four out above average, I believe is what I saw in one series. He had minus four outs above average in one series. I can confirm that.

That is correct. That's correct, right? Yeah. Wow. They showed, they made a highlight reel every single time the ball got hit to him. I guess you could say a highlight reel, but it was just a real. I mean, that puts them on pace for like minus 162 OAA, which is pretty, that's pretty wild, right?

Yeah. And Nolan Jones and left, man, like there were a few fly balls in foul territory that feel like most left fielders get to. And I know he doesn't have a ton of experience playing. at Chase Field, but he just couldn't make those plays yesterday. We saw him clank a routine flyball that was in fair territory that was as routine as you can really get. And it wound up cost in the Rockies two runs.

That is a really bad baseball team. It is a very, very, very bad baseball team. We talked the other day about where Calquantrol would fit in the diamond back starting rotation depth. Like maybe he would be eighth or ninth. You could have the same conversation with Kyle Freeland, their opening day starter, right? Like, does Kyle Freeland even make the diamond bar? back's rotation.

Would he be their number five guy right now? I'm not necessarily sure that he would be. So it's a very, very, very bad baseball team, possibly worse than I even, you know, I even anticipated. Well,

Elise says, yeah, the Rockies did have some decent arms in the bullpen. She also said a little while ago, known baseball GM, Elise, of course, that they still lost the game

to the Rockies, right? And, and again, that mostly, I think, amplifies the reason why the Diamondbacks right now

very much are missing Eduardo Rodriguez and could be why they added Jordan Montgomery. You know, we've talked about the reasons why we know that we've kind of heard some dissenting opinions on it, right? We've heard for the most part that the Erod injury was never bad enough that they actually went after Montgomery due to that reason. I think it might have just been a little coincidental as far as the timing is concerned and when he was available on the shorter term deal.

Like we saw from Scott Boris, he said that once the, once it was known that Jordan Montgomery was going to accept like a one-year deal almost everybody was all in on him a bunch of baseball sure wanted to be all in on him but what we saw to Tommy Henry wasn't great four earnings pitched he allowed five earn runs he walked two struck out four gave up six hits and I mean obviously you know the Diamondbacks it's it's not to say that they they didn't you know come back and give the option team a chance to win you know the bullpen was not great in that game either Luis Friest gave up two earn runs Bryce Jarvis gave up two earn runs so that was rough it was a rough game all the way around. But you could definitely see that the Diamondbacks are, you know,

they have, you know, three games out of the five that are taking care of. But there's definitely some question marks when Tommy Henry is in there. And we still don't know what we'll see out of Brian Nelson tonight against the New York Yankees. So the addition of Eduardo Rodriguez back to the starting rotation is going to be a very, a very pleasant one. Because I think even with how bad the Rockies were, you saw what they could do against Tommy Henry. Tommy Henry is still very good. And I don't think all of his outings are going to be like that. You can just see, though, the significant drop-off, you know, from starting pitching from Zach Gowan and Merrill Kelly to Tommy Henry there in the three-hole.

That's a big reason why the Diamondbacks. I think it might have just been the fact, honestly, too, that one injury to Eduardo Rodriguez suddenly makes this rotation that looked really good and not look so solid, right? So it's like you kind of feel like that could happen at any point to any of their starting pitchers you needed to go out and get somebody else. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think it's just a matter of just a matter of, of adding depth, right? And depth is always always a good thing.

Eduardo Rodriguez being injured even just for a few weeks. Yeah, I mean, if you have a few weeks with Ryan Nelson and Tommy Henry in your rotation, the reality is you don't really know what you're going to get. Nelson looked pretty good in spring training. We'll see how that translates to an actual game today. Henry, I still think is a pretty decent starter. I, you know, I think if you gave him 25, 30 starts, I'd, you know, I still think he could be a decent back-end starter in this league, but the Diamondbacks are obviously going for it this year, right? And they don't want to put themselves in a position where they're counting on players where they don't, they don't really know what they're going to get. So yeah, I just, you know, you think back or you think ahead to a few

weeks from now when theoretically Montgomery is in the rotation and Eduardo Rodriguez is in the rotation, you know, maybe you actually do sweep the Rockies because you have a better starting pitcher, you know, and maybe starting this Yankee series, like, you know, how good would you feel if Jordan Montgomery was on the mound against Luis Gill tonight, right? Like, it just, it changes the dynamics of everything. So knowing that that's right around the corner, you know, certainly gives DeVax fans something to look forward to. Groundhog Mama legitimately made me laugh when she said, don't tell cogs, I'm here and not listening to a show. We won her over against her own son. So that makes us your sons now, Groundhog Mama, we're your favorite children. Now, two BMC has a

good point. He said, honestly, not sweeping was a mild disappointment. Yeah. I don't know if it was a, you could say that, but I will say, splitting the series would have felt like a huge disappointment. That would have been like a big disappointment. After the first two games, if they would have come in and lost the final two, I don't know how, I guess, positive I would have felt about going forward. But that brings us to our next point, which is that Lordus Gueriel is absolutely on fire.

I don't even, I didn't have to dye my hair purple this year in order. to make it happen. He is 8 for 17, slashing 471, 526, 1.118 with a 1.644 OPS, three home runs, 10 RBI, six runs scored, tied a record with Luis Gonzalez and O'Dog

for the most runs scored through four games, set his own franchise record for most RBI through four games at 10, and set a team record with the most home runs through three games with those three diggers. It's pretty good. Kind of glad we brought him back.

Kind of glad we brought him back. We were talking about his war today. He's on pace to already kind of outpaced his war from last year by next week, it feels like, based on how he's doing. Pretty close to that. Yeah, he's on pace for a 24.3 war season. Now, granted, that's him playing all 162 games. We should probably dial it back, maybe 23 and a half.

Be a little bit more reasonable there. Maybe getting ahead of myself. But, yeah, an outstanding, an outstanding series from Lord of Spariel, Jr. year. And we talked with him about this in the clubhouse the other day, just if kind of his familiarity with the organization coming back for a second year, is contributing it all to him just really. In spring training, he looked good. He obviously looked good in this series. And he talked about one thing that he really likes about this team is that there's not that much pressure on any one player, specifically on the position player side. And that's so true, right?

Yeah. Like if Lordus Gurriel has a bad week, the Diamondbacks can still win. games that week, right? If any one player, even if a couple of players in this lineup, you know, really struggle for, for a week or two or whatever, like Corby and Carroll didn't do that much in this opening series. But it doesn't necessarily matter because there's enough depth in this lineup that other guys can help fill in those gaps. And Tells killing it. He set a record for most, most three hit games to start his season. I mean, the records are being set everywhere by this team in the series and given. Yes, you want to say it's only the Rockies like we did. But right, it's still doing exactly, it's taking care of business.

It's doing exactly what, you know, yeah, me, we thought you could do, but I mean, even bigger and better than we thought, right? Currently, ranks second in baseball and F-WR at 0.6 behind Mookiee, or as Damon would pronounce it, monkey bets.

Yeah, yeah. And he's played two more games than him, or at least one more game. I don't know. Did they have a four game series? Yeah, yeah, two more games. Yeah, two more games. And Lourdes is currently on pace, Jesse, for a hundred and twenty-two home run season. 405 RBI and that 23 24.34. We could like you said, dial all of those back.

Yeah, maybe 100. I don't think he's going to get to 122 dingers. Maybe 100. Yeah, maybe 110, 105. That seems way more reasonable. Yeah, that's more realistic. A lot of this damage has been coming early, and that brings us to point number three, or takeaway number three, about this series.

And that is that the Diamondbacks have been first inning assassins in this game. I think it sets a tone that the Diamondbacks are able to come out and thump their opponents the way they are as early. in these games. Dback scored two runs in the first inning in each of the last three games of the series and then three, three games in the first three games in the series. First three games in series and then three runs on Sunday. Yeah. It's a lot. Yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot. And it just does so much for, you know, fans in the stands who are like just sitting down, just getting comfortable and, you know, teams already up to nothing or three nothing right

away. You know, it, there's nothing better in baseball than just kind of getting out to a, to an early lead and playing downhill baseball, as Tori Lebella likes to say, and the Veebacks did a lot of that in these four games. And I mean, you can say as far as a negative goes is that they haven't been scoring late in these games. And that's one thing that's a concern. However, when you go up early, you know, it is a little hard to keep your foot on the pedal the whole time, I guess.

And I mean, that's something probably we want to see them doing. That's something it would be nice to see. But at the same time, they're giving themselves such a substantial lead early on that it's making it, you know, essentially kind of easy for the starting pitcher at times to go out there and take our business. Really, with Tommy Henry, it was his third time through the rotation, which typically Tori Lavello tries to prevent. But, you know, with these guys that are getting a starting opportunity, it's not the playoffs.

It's not Brandon fought in the playoffs. He's going to let them go out there and see what they can do. We definitely saw. I mean, I think, I think Tommy, if I'm remembering right, I think you only faced one guy the third time through it. Right. I think it was, I think Charlie Blackman got a third at bat against Tommy Henry and doubled. It wasn't pretty big.

It wasn't pretty big at bat. But yeah, he wasn't great in his start. But yes, going back to the Diamondback scoring a whole bunch of runs to start games and not scoring runs at the end of games, I guess you give them a pass in the 16 to 1 outpour that happened on Thursday where I think everyone, once it was 16 to 1, I think people are just like, all right, let's just go home now. Like the Rockies hitters weren't necessarily doing much.

The Diamondback's hitters weren't doing much at that point either. You know I leave here, and most of you might know this, and I'm sorry to be pulling the curtain back on the rest of you that don't know this, but I have to leave in the middle of the game to come here to the studio, start working with Damon Dog, getting the show ready. Meanwhile, Jesse stays at Chase Field. I left in the bottom of the sixth or the top of the seventh, right in that area. It was very difficult to get out of the stadium.

Let's just say I by far was not the only person leaving on opening night during the sixth inning, which frustrated me quite a bit because it makes my job harder of getting over here to our office. But I think it also illustrated that people who could easily leave that game knowing the Diamondbacks were going to walk away with the win with how much they were up. And as we kind of discussed and some of you even said, that game even got a little boring. And I'm sorry, when your team's this very good, sometimes games are going to be boring. Yeah. They're going to go up early. Get used to a D-BACs fans.

You're just going to have to be bored like 30 or 40 times this year. Getting ahead to our fourth takeaway from this game or from this series, a couple of newcomers for the D-Backs. got off the really, really strong starts. Eugenio Suarez, six for 14 in the series. He did hit his first home run as a member of the Diamondbacks. He only struck out twice, which also stood out to me. We didn't really see a lot of the dreaded swing and miss that people talk about so much with Aeohenio Suarez. He was making content.

He was spraying singles like all over the place. Or Jock either. Jock too. Yeah, Jock did not strike out at all. Strikeouts are less of an issue for him. He walked. He got hits. He absolutely tormented Tovar.

Like that just everything about it and I think that's the greatest part is that these guys made an immediate impact There was no doubt after seeing I mean Jock went four for four in his debut like the way that these guys came out and immediately Contributed to this team. I don't know how you can't get excited about the additions you know that four for four. There's a there's a bit of master's on that four for four don't you dare. Don't you dare do that. Don't you dare. I think the first one should have been a hit. That was the double that was that was in the gap. Nolan Jones did a pretty good job getting over to it and then it bounced off his glove. I think you could give Jones a pass on that one. But yeah, Jock Peterson should have had no more than one hit in his first game on Friday. So just just making that clear. But still, yes, he did have some pretty good at bats and maybe he shouldn't have

spent five for seven at the end of the series. But still a good start for both him and Eohenio Suarez for sure. And again, the final takeaway from the series for us is that the depth for this team is pretty damn good because what we've seen out of the guys that got sit down to Reno so far is very encouraging. And of course, we know that inevitably Ryan Nelson and Tommy Henry or Bryce Jarvis, I don't know what combination. I don't know who's going to end up down in Reno. But when Montgomery and Rodriguez come back, obviously there's going to need to be some changes made. And that is just going to, I think, add to the AAA depth and add to this, this Reno team being very good. But Slate Sacconi, excellent in his debut.

Yeah. Christian Mena, also excellent. Neither guy gave up a run. Jesse, Sikoni, five innings pitched, no hits, no runs, two walks, five strikeouts, Mena, five innings pitched, two hits, zero runs, one walk, six K. Yeah, got to love it. I think the Diamondbacks AAA rotation is going to do some, some serious damage in the Pacific Coast League this year, especially.

We don't know exactly how things are going to look once Erod and Jordan Montgomery are ready to go. But I guess the baseline assumption is that Nelson and Henry go down to AAA and sort of his depth. Maybe there's an opportunity for Nelson to jump into the bullpen. I feel like that's less likely for Tommy Henry. Maybe they would go down that road as well. I think we have a mailbag question about that later. But yeah, I mean, just Christian Mena and Slate's.

Sikoni, those two guys got off to really good starts. The Reno Aces outscored their opponents 19 to 4 in their opening weekend. I think they had a rain out, so they went 2 and O. But yeah, that AAA team is really, really good. Kevin Newman is back there. He opted out of his deal with the Diamondbacks, but it appears that he signed back on a minor league deal. So he's going to play down there.

Kyle Garlick was in spring training in camp trying to earn a job. He's down there hitting the ball hard as well. So the Reno Aces are going to be a pretty darn good team in the Pacific Coast League this year. Well, not all was good. Not everything was good. We do have some bad notes, I guess, some bad takeaways. Sure. Alec Thomas left Sunday's game with left hamstring tightness.

That's not great, nor was it great the way he was swinging the bat really in the last two games. Like it felt like we were seeing a different Alec Thomas in games one in game two. And then in games three and four, it really felt like Thomas took a step backwards. I'm not sure if that hamstring had anything to do with his swings, but it definitely looks like he was uncomfortable when he left the game on Sunday. Yeah, I feel like this does happen with Alec Thomas. Like I think back to the postseason when Alec Thomas, I think it was like the first game against the Brewers. He, his at-bats were just terrible, right?

And even the second game, I think the beginning of that second game, Thomas did not look good at the plate either. And then suddenly he hit a really big home run. and we saw him be pretty good throughout the rest of the postseason, right? So he is someone who I think can go from looking just miserable to looking great, to, you know. And some of these mechanical changes that he's made, maybe his old habits catch up to him every now and then. Like Lea kick? Yeah. The kick gets pretty big at times, man.

Yeah, yeah. So I think maybe he still has to shake off those old habits a little bit more and that contributes to that. But he's always been a guy in my mind where, you know, he can look terrible in his first at bat and then come back and actually have a pretty good plate appearance the next time around. As far as the hamstring is concerned, yeah, we don't really have an update on that yet. It sounds like Thomas is going to have imaging. So hopefully we get an update on that today. And hopefully it's not too significant. What do they do without them?

We talked about this exact scenario. Yeah. I mean, is this where Jake McCarthy takes over and becomes every day? Like, what's the center field? I mean, I think this is why Jake McCarthy was on your opening day. roster right with if alex thomas goes down and you're moving corbin carol to center i don't know if you want to be putting jock peterson in right uh so so uh so yeah jake jake is totally able to step in and play the corner's he can play center field if you need him to as well so alec is the best center

fielder on this team there's no question you're going to be taking a hit uh defensively but jake mccarthy's a player where you know if mccarthy's in there playing a corner and corbin slides over to center and you've got McCarthy's bat instead of Thomas's bat. I do think that is a bit of a step back, but I don't think it's huge. I don't think that losing Thomas for a few weeks would be something the debacks couldn't overcome. All right. Well, another thing that we're not too sure about is what's going on with Zach Gallen.

It's hard to judge Zach Gallen based on a number of factors right now. The biggest being that he was in an absolute blowout victory in game one. So we don't really know what he was going, what he's going through, right? if he's just kind of, you know, kind of in cruise control because of the lead he had or what. I mean, he still had himself a great outing. It just was very un-Zack-Gallin-like when it came to some of his numbers, including his V-Lo on his fastball. We also had the fact that Zach Gallen did mention that he wanted to get out there

and hit at one point with the way things were going on. In honor of that, I need to change hats because Jesse got me an incredible birthday present. It's this beauty right here. This is my birthday present from this wonderful man. I didn't think it would go with your outfit very well, but I think it might be okay. I guess it's just the like the teal versus the turquoise. It's not an exact match. It still looks pretty good.

It's still looks pretty good. One of the batting practice cap because we're going to talk about Zach Gallant, the hitter, obviously. No, what we are going to talk about, though, is are there concerns about Zach Gallant's performance and where some of his numbers are at? Or do you think that this might be attributed more to his short off season, the number of innings he pitched last year, just a little bit of fatigue. I think some people are probably surprised we're even talking about this. Like gallon through five innings and gave up one run and it looked fine.

What's the problem? Yeah. Yeah. So it's nothing too alarming. But I dug a little bit deeper on some of the numbers from his outing on Thursday. We noted during spring training that his stuff was down a little bit. The Velo was down a little bit. And getting him in an actual game and kind of seeing what that looked like.

The velocity didn't really take up. Galin average 91.8 with his four seam fastball, which I don't have it in. front of me. I think that's either like the third lowest or the fourth lowest, of any start in his career. When he first came up back in 2019, his VLO was a little bit lower. Those were the other, the other ones that were below. I think there was one start from 2021 where his fastball v. low was lower. And the other thing that really stood out to me was that his vertical ride on his four seam fastball was about a full inch lower from where we saw last year. So again, it's a subtle thing. It's not something that I'm necessarily too too concerned about at this point.

Unless it carries on, right? But if it carries on, yeah, like, I do have some real questions about if Zach Gallen with a 92-mile-an-hour fastball and an inch less of ride, I think that could be a problem over the course of a full season. Not that, like, Zach Allen would suddenly become terrible, but I'm not sure that Zach Allen would be a number one starter if, or would be like a, you know, like a Cy Young caliber pitcher if, if those numbers carried on. So it's still early. We know what he went through over the off season, the short time that he had to get ready for this season and whatnot. So I'm not overly concerned about it yet, but it is something to monitor. I was a little bit alarmed when I saw those numbers. Gabriel, in the chat said he started two weeks late.

This is still spring training for him. You think that is a fair statement? Absolutely. Yeah, I do think that is fair. And that's why I'm not overly concerned about this just yet. but it is something where if those numbers don't tick up, like his fastball was so big for him last year. I mean, there were a lot of starts where Galen didn't really have the feel for his other pitches. And he would just throw like 60% fastballs and no one could hit his fastball because it has such great life.

And the Velo last year he averaged about 93 and a half. So yeah, I mean, Gowan is he's such a smart pitcher, right? I mean, he's so cerebral. He knows how to get hitters out. So you get the sense that he would figure out how to make do with kind of any situation. But that fastball is really important for him. So, well, it's just something to kind of watch moving forward. Well, of course, another thing to watch moving forward is this baseball team.

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Well, we thank you guys for being here in the Ph.NXX-ROT's YouTube channel right now. If you haven't subscribed to the channel yet, sign up, do it now. Sign up for notifications. That way you don't miss whenever we go live. be here all the time. Drop us a like. Gabby loves it when you do that. And I know we have a question about Gabby, which we'll get to shortly here. But of course, if you're listening on the audio podcasting side, make sure you're subscribed over there. Leave us a review. We always appreciate that feedback. Well, you guys know what today is. And, you know, we've been busy. This has been a wild spring training season, but things are settling down. And we're getting back to what we know. What brought us to the dance, what we are at our core. And of course, what that is, is, is, is, well, every year is our year, right? Every year is the year of the snake. Every month on this show is Black History Month.

Every month on the show is Women's History Month. And every month on this show, you guessed it, Black Women's History Month. Every single week is Shark Week. Every single day is Transvisibility Day. Every day is April Fool's Day. Every day is April Fool's Day, of course. And every day is Earth Day. But on Mondays, damn it, on Mondays, we go to the mailbag.

Damon, let's go. Always something interesting in my mailbox. I try to get to everything in my mailbox. And then once in a while there's a... Wait, coyotes are doing mailbag Monday? Yeah. It's a really original idea. I wonder where they got it from.

I'm going to sue some people around here, that's for sure. But, of course, let's get to some mailbag Monday questions. What do we got, Damon Dog? First question comes from Adam Fox, the Adam 027 on Twitter. And he says, what will happen first? Lord is 10 home runs. Corbin 20, stolen base. is Kelly, 40 strikeouts, the Fox moves back to Arizona.

Well, this is just, this is promotion for himself, I feel like. Is that what this is here? I feel like Lordus 10 home runs is going to happen before any of those things. Lordus 10 home runs might happen before the end of the Yankee series. Yeah, I'm trying to, you know, of course, take my very mathematical approach to this. So, so Lordus, you know, if you project Lordus hit 30 bombs this year, which would be a really, really good season for him. 10 would theoretically happen at about the two-month mark of the season, right? Corbyn, if you project him to be at like 60 stolen bases, that also happens around the two-month mark.

Merrill Kelly, 40 strikeouts, I think that's going to happen a little bit earlier than the two-month mark. You're probably expecting him to get close to 200 strikeouts by the end of the season. So 40 would be, I think, a little bit earlier than that. So for me, it's between Merrill Kelly, 40 strikeouts or the Fox moving. And I think I wouldn't lean toward the Fox moving 40 strikeouts after one month. is a little bit ambitious. At least he'll get to see all of it in person by moving. He'll get to come here and see these games.

That works out for him. All right. What else we got? Corb Carroll. Hey, Corby and Carol, hey, is this his burner account? What's happening? Corby and Carol asks, the biggest weak point of the team still appears to be the bullpen. And you've got to pronounce it there, bullpen.

What relievers out there seem like they would be a good fit at the deadline? And who could you see being shipped out mid-season in return? for those relievers. I want to say that at least addressing that second part we brought up on the show last week about how some of the, you know, some of the things that were said by both Mike Hazen and Ken Kendrick would lead me to believe that the ones that are in jeopardy of being traded are in the minor league system right now, right? obviously you know you'd have to account for roster positions and a lot of that so it doesn't doesn't mean the guys that are currently on their roster wouldn't potentially be part of a trade package or something like that but it definitely was addressed that we would be looking at potentially

some of those young young players being the ones that could be shipped off yeah yeah i think um i think the diamond backs bullpen i do agree that the diamond backs bullpen is probably their their weakest link at this point not to say it's going to be terrible or anything but particularly without Paul Seawald. At the back end, it might be a little bit harder to piece together some of these close games. If you got Ginkle going in the ninth, then, you know, who's, who are your six, seven, eight? If, you know, if your starter gives you five innings, those are, those are some pretty

big questions that we don't really have answers to. But yeah, in terms of guys that could be out there, we'll have to see how that takes shape. I mean, so much of that is dependent on which teams are in the race and which teams are not in the race, which it's pretty early to say that at this point, you know, a manual class A of course, would be a highly, highly desirable reliever to trade for at the deadline. But of course, that's if the guardians are not in the mix, which I think they very much could be in the mix. They got off to a really, really good start this past weekend as well. So we'll have to see how things take shape there.

But, yeah, I think it is likely that the Diamondbacks, if they are in good position at the trade deadline, that they will be looking to trade for a reliever. And it's hard to pinpoint who the prospects would be that they're giving up. But yeah, it's not going to be guys off the major league team, you wouldn't think. It's going to be guys coming from the minor league system. We'll have those conversations more as the deadline gets closer. And again, it doesn't mean that certain guys that are even on the roster right now, you know, couldn't be part of that. But look how quickly.

Yeah. For instance, Jake McCarthy, who was, you know, a player that the Diamondbacks were reportedly getting phone calls on. Look at how important he is right now with the loss of Alex Thomas. Hopefully it's not a significant injury. but if Thomas loses some time, if he misses some significant time, like you're going to be very, very thankful that McCarthy is still part of this team and that you didn't consider accepting one of those offers during the offseason. Yeah, yeah, that's a good point.

Horace Barossa, I guess it would be next in line there. And I'm pretty curious what Brosa can give the diamond backs in the majors. But he's another guy where you don't really know what you're going to get. So there's something to be said for McCarthy, who even though he wasn't great last year, right he's still kind of trying to find his way back to to that latter half of 2022 when he was just very very very good and hitting third for the diamond backs basically every day but there's still something to be said for just knowing what you're going to get with McCarthy where he can give you some good at bats he can get on base we know the impact he can have once he's on base and he's a pretty good defensive outfielder as well all right what else we got damon the next question comes from blake allen at blake part two on twitter and he says hazen has talked about tap in the farm system to make improvements at the deadline. What do you think the most obvious, what do you think are the most obvious areas of improvement? I say left-handed believer, what say you guys?

This goes right along with what we were just talking about, obviously. But, yeah, right now it definitely feels like pitching is the main concern. I don't, like depth in a couple of positions isn't great, but it's still there. And as long as it's not a catastrophic injury that the Diamondbacks, you know, experience, then they, for the most part, are fairly solid at a lot of positions around the diamond and even in the outfield. Obviously, Jake McCarthy, like we said, big help there having him because without him, you really start tapping into those young guys.

But I feel like pitching is the key. It's what wins championships. And what we saw from the bullpen last year was the reason why the diamond backs not only made it to the playoffs, but had the deep run they had. If you watch snakes alive, Brent Strom directly says the bullpen is the reason why, in his opinion the reason why they made it as far as they did and it's hard to refute that right but uh right now things don't they things still look pretty good scott mcuff outstanding so far uh and again he's a guy that we were missing so it's great to have him back and and for him to be as productive as he's

been same thing with a few of the arms there in the bullpen it doesn't feel like we're going to miss seawald a tremendous amount but well we'll see we'll see you we'll see you about we got to have these close games actually happen yeah Yeah, right, right. Yeah, I would also, again, say, yeah, bullpen is going to be the thing that I think they're pretty clearly going to want at the trade deadline. It is almost hard for me to see them really needing anything else, which may, I mean, maybe that's an outrageous thing for me to say.

It kind of is, but barring major injuries in the rotation, I mean, I mean, why were you looking for rotation help, right? I mean, if you've already got Jordan Montgomery and in Warder Rodriguez over the offseason, I don't really think you're going to need that. position player wise i mean i guess you could you can always add some more thumb to the lineup but like what position does this person play right you already have jock peterson and randle grishick as a platoon in the dh slot i guess if there was an injury there you know maybe you'd want to go get some big slugger for the for the dh slot um but yeah i mean i guess it's just going to be

based on injuries like they they might need other things based on what happens over the course of the season but right now the bullpen is really the only thing that's like Yes, you're probably going to want to add there at the deadline. Absolutely. All right. What else we got, Damon? Next question comes from Jacob Schultt 05 on Twitter. And he says with two starters coming into the rotation, which two-thirds, Ryan, Tommy, and Bryce get sent down.

Also, does this give them leeway to turn Nelson into a one-inning guy? I think that there is a little bit of an issue with that. And that is the fact that Ryan Nelson and Tommy Henry are already stretched out as starters. and I don't think that they really want to convert them to bullpen arms, but I don't know what their vision is for their future. I think, like, again, due to depth, you're going to want to keep those guys stretched out. You're going to want to send them down to Reno

and have them continue to be able to give you significant innings. But one of them might be very valuable as part of the bullpen, and that might be the opportunity they have to contribute to this team and be a part, you know, to be, be on the major league roster. Yeah, I think that with Montgomery and Rodriguez, like you're certainly not going to move anyone to a bullpen role until those guys get back.

But once they do, I do think that it could give them. We talked about Slate Sikoni, the Diamondbacks apparently are maybe interested in using him as a reliever moving forward. I think they're going to probably keep him in the rotation in Reno for a while to be there starting rotation depth just for these next few weeks at least. But maybe he's a guy that they would. move into a multi-inning bullpen roll. That's kind of what Tori Lavello had been outlining a few weeks ago.

And Ryan Nelson is the other guy that really stands out to me as if you put him in a short, you know, if he's in a one inning or two-inning stint at a time, does that 95 mile-hour fastball suddenly become 97? And even though the secondary stuff, there's still some questions there, I think, moving forward. But I think there's probably enough there from a secondary pitch standpoint. where he could just sort of let the fastball eat and just kind of throw, you know, throw the other stuff here and there to keep hitters off balance enough.

Ryan Nelson, he closed in college. He does have some experience pitching in a bullpen role. I could see that being a route they go once we get to that stage a few weeks from now where Montgomery and Rodriguez are back and you feel a little better about the rotation depth. All right. Well, according to Braden in the chat, as well as Nicholas Dalton can confirm that the Diamondbacks outfielder, Lourdeskiriel Jr. has been named the National League player of the week.

Juan Soto from the Yankees has been named the AL player of the week. So this is a big series. The two best, the two best players in baseball. Two hottest players in baseball, I guess we can say. Well, one of them is the best. The two best. Yeah, two best. Yeah, right.

All right. What else we got there, Damon? Next question comes from Justin McDermott. McDermott. McDermott. Deermont? Deermont. I don't know.

We're bad at names sometimes. How concerned should we be about Gabby's rough start? You know, not very. I mean, this is still, we're still so early in the, in the regular season that I'm going to be hesitant about being concerned about much of anything at this point. It's just, it's just too early. But I will say the, the bats haven't necessarily looked great. I mean, I think so much of what Gabby did at the end of last season was just make

better swing decisions. And we've talked a lot about how his hit tool is so good. that it can get in his way sometimes where he can chase that like slider low and away and still put it in play. Like he's one of few hitters that can get to almost anything. But in order for him to really do damage, he needs to lay off that slider, right?

Like he needs to lay off those pitches that are on the edges and really work counts and wait for his pitch. And we haven't seen him do that particularly well early on. He's hit a lot of ground balls. That's been another thing with Gabby, where he can be a bit of a double play liability at times because he just sort of, you know, hits grounders to show the short stop over and over and over again. We saw a little bit of that this past weekend.

So it's too early to read much into it. You know, Gabby could have three really good games against or maybe two really good games against the Yankees. And suddenly his numbers are looking pretty good again. But something to watch for sure. I don't think that Gabby Moreno like 850 OPS is something I would lock in just yet for people who are like expecting that for him this year. hitting 167 with a 481 OPS. I think by my Gabby leading the team in home runs that you're not feeling so good about that. Crazy bold prediction that we did.

But if it makes anybody feel any better or any worse, the Cubs are currently up five to nothing on the Colorado Rockies in the bottom of the eighth. So they're just a bad baseball team. Yeah, we'll see what happens today. People are really excited about show that Imanonga's first start against our first major league start with the Cubs. but it came against the Rockies. By the way, you nailed his name. It's Justin McDiermont. So there we go, Justin.

Thank you for confirming that. Justin's been a long time, long time listener, viewer. Long time. We owe him that. The respect of getting his last name. At least getting an honest effort like you did that for sure. All right. What else we got?

Let's do one more. And then I got read some ads. Ryan Hanley, Hanley, at, you can figure it out there. I'm not spelling that out. Hanley asked, if you were shagging balls during batting practice, Would you be giving Max effort barely moving or just having a conversation? I don't know what kind of question this is. What does he even mean?

I mean, it's, wait, go on. I'm giving nothing but Max effort. Are you kidding me? I might be shagging balls. But in my mind, in my mind, Damon, it's a tryout, right? They're going to be like, look at the effort this kid's putting it out there. And that's just, it's just a compliment to be called a kid in that scenario. But Derek would be doing, you would be doing what you did at the Fall League Home Run Derby that we attended where you were like, like, bulldozing children.

I was not. I was purposefully not. That was the problem. But if these kids are getting out in my way in the outfield, like during a home run derby, I am knocking them all over. I would embarrass myself on national TV. I would try to get to every single ball. Left field, right field, center field. It doesn't matter.

I'm all over the place. And I'll probably catch none of them. But Max effort is the only way. Doing Alan Ivers and stepovers ever after he knocks a kid over on the ground. Yeah. Going you're too small. Doing this to the kids. The one thing I learned from the Arizona Fall League home run derbies,

those kids aren't all innocent. They're out there giving max effort too. I saw him swinging elbows like they were Charles Barkley. Me and my friends, when we played ball, we were just kind of just mess around the entire time. You're shagging. You're not, you don't need to put in that much effort. If Derek got the opportunity to do that, like, during major, like when major league players were taking batting practice, he would really feel the need to rise to the occasion. Of course I would.

We should see if we can get you in there for the home run derby. You can be like one of the kids, like chasing all of the. I'm telling you. Chasing all the like softliners in the last field down. Those kids are gone. Let's dress Derek up like a little kid too. Like put him in some overalls and like a cap with a little propeller on the top of it. I shave this beard off.

I definitely look younger than you. you would expect me to, that's for sure. But of course, yeah, no, Max Effort is the only way to go. I know, I know you would, you would be making it look like you were trying, but you really wouldn't be, I feel like. Yeah, I, yeah, I would put in a reasonable amount of effort. But I wouldn't, I'm not like, I'm not leaving my feet. I'm not going to be crazy.

He's, he's not going to ask how high. He's going to question why, theoretically, you would ask him to jump and what would be the purpose of it? And what would we accomplish by having him jump? And then if he did jump, he's only jumping once. That's it, right? And not even a fool. Like, he's not doing like an NFL combine draft thing where he's trying to see what

his vertical is. He's just giving you a little hop. That's the most you're going to get out of this man. Of course, he also does a terrible job at feeding himself, as do I. And that's why we love Factor meal kits because Factor meal kits. I haven't eaten anything today, Dave. I have also not eaten anything today. See, this is the problem with us.

Factor sent me some amazing, like, boosts that are also part of their food. food program. They're kind of like immunity boost, which I, again, those are things that I don't, I don't usually buy those type of things to feed myself, but they're trying to take better care of me than I am. And God bless the good people at Factor Meal Kits. Eating is stress-free when it comes to Factor Meal Kits. They have their delicious ready-to-e meals that are fresh and never frozen. And it's chef created, dietitian approved, and ready to eat in just two minutes. And they are bangers. Let me tell you, I can't express how important a good sauce is with a meal like this, but every single sauce that they have with like a chicken breast or whatever like the

protein is, it's always out of this world. Plus, they always have solid sides with it and they just do a better job at taking care of us than sometimes we can. If you're looking for gourmet meals, you can try meals that feature in premium ingredients like filet mignon, shrimp, truffle butter, rockolini, and asparagus. So of course, Factor is the perfect solution if you're looking for fast premium options with no cooking required. And they celebrate Earth Day all month long too. Every day is Earth Day with Factor Meal kits. Look out for Earth Month Eats badge on the menu for their lowest carbon footprint meals. Head to factormeals.com slash DBAX, PHNXDBax 50 and use code PHNXDBX 50 to get 50% off.

That's code PHNXDBX 50 at factormeals.com slash PHNXDBX50 to get 50% off. And of course, if you forget your factor meals at home, which we tend to do, can also feed yourself over at Illegal Piz. That's where you will find Damon. That's where you will refine, find reverse nachos. You'll also find the strongest margaritas in Arizona at Illegal Pete. Their irresistible drinks and mouthwatering food will fill all of your heart's desires. And right now, they are bringing you a win with their legendary sound check deal. You can bring in a ticket stub from any ticket at event and get a draft beer or house margarita for a penny. Illegal Piz wants to celebrate with you, whether it's a pregame or postgame

party. They got you covered on all your game day needs. Must purchase an adult entree to redeem illegal Pete's sound check deal. Illegal Pete's your go-to spot for burritos, buddies, and beer. And also, of course, if you are a diehard, make sure you check out our new shirts, get your discount. If you're not a diehard, go join us over at go p.nx.com, become a diehard. And you can pick out whatever shirt you want over at the p.nx locker.com, including our two brand-new gorgeous shirts right here, the defend the pool, which we will be doing on July 31st in person, as well as Sunday, Sunday, an absolute personal favorite of mine.

I love T-shirts that, I have so many black T-shirts, Damon. I have so many black T-shirts. I can't. I love to defend the pool one, but this teal job, oh, my God, I'm going to wear this all the time. So whether you're going with Defending the Pool Sunday, Fund, or both, you can get those at the PHNX Locker.com. And again, if you join us as a DiDard member, you can get one of those shirts for free, along with discounts on all of your purchases over at the PHNX Locker.com. discounts with our partners, discounts on our events. It pays for itself, not to mention all of the wonderful content you get from Jesse and myself

and everyone here at PhNX in our Discord and in our written pieces. So join us today and become part of the family. What else we got, Damon? We got some more Mailbag Monday questions. Next question comes from our guy, Tim Ankenman. And Tim asks, I got my wisdom. Sweet sweet, sweet, baby Tim. Tim says, I got my wisdom, teeth pulled an hour ago.

how much should I milk it to do absolutely nothing for the next two days but watch baseball and eat ice cream? First of all, Tim, delete this tweet because you've already left a paper trail. You're totally blowing your cover with this, right? You might think the misses or your boss doesn't follow you on Twitter. They use burner accounts, my man. Get rid of that evidence. Second, you better milk it for longer than two days. Your wisdom teeth got pulled.

My man, jaw sore, can't do anything. gotta take pain pills they make you very drowsy not safe to do chores or work must lay on couch speak like that too that might help too kman speak when you're hurt always works yeah yeah i don't really have anything to that i mean to the max yeah right nihilistic bat says for two days you can melt that for a week let's milk it for a week let's watch this whole series let's go on the road with these wisdom teeth clean pool baby you know that's that's best i got for you don't don't don't ever uh let anybody like we don't often get parts of us removed right when you get something removed from your body milk it for all it's worth uh and a z baller says don't eat ice cream i don't know why but i need more

information on that is that like bad for your sockets or something i bet it is yeah see thank you tim go right of it right now all right else we got damon nathaniel kosher uh at nathaniel kosher asked is it possible that kevin ginkle wally pips seawald oh that's an old term yeah what what's the what's the Wally Pip story again. Wally Pip was a first baseman for the New York Yankees back in the back in the old days. You don't know this, Jesse? Oh, yeah. This is shocking.

Yeah, Wally Pip. You're Mr. We discussed this before the show, so I am aware of it now. But for those of you that might be unfamiliar, Wally Pip missed a day of baseball with a headache. He asked to be removed out of the lineup because he had a headache. And then that ended up resulting in a man named Lou Gehrig. taking over his position at first base, to which Wally Pipp never saw the light of day again

when it came to playing first base. So you don't want to get Wally Pipped in baseball when that comes up as a term. But I mean, it's a good question. We've talked about this. We've even considered it. We know that Kevin Ginkle is most likely this team's closer of the future, but is that future now. With Paul Seawald out, Kevin Ginkle is most likely going to assume that role. We know that Tori might go with someone else on occasion based on matchups. But for the most part, he did say that he only had conversations with Kevin Ginkle about taking over the closer role. That was important because we had to like ask three questions to get Tori to admit that part.

And you had to ask it in a very strategic way for it to come out. But he eventually said when asked if he had conversations with anybody else about the closer role, he said no. So meaning Kevin Ginkle is their guy. Now, I think if he does succeed, it makes it hard to go out there and disqualance. disrupt what's going on. I would see Tori maybe, uh,

maybe trying to ease Paul Seawald when he comes back, back into the role if, if we saw Ginkled just really on a roll. But I mean, if he like has a bad outing, even in his like first or second, which we saw him when he first joined this team, kind of not have a great outing.

Uh, Paul Seawald could, could be moved into a different role. I doubt that, uh, because I feel like Tori is going to just go kind of with his solidified, you know, back end of his bullpen once this all comes.

together. It's just, I don't know. What I've seen out of this team at least is that the guy that deserves it lately. And this kind of goes back to when they moved on from Mad Bum last season, the guy who deserves it is getting the role. And they did that with several positions last year. Sure. And I think that took a while. It took a while. Right. Yeah. Like you're not going to, I mean, I'm probably the worst part about what I said is probably saying like, oh, Paul Sewell has one or two bad outings. No, it would probably take Paul Sewell having a month of, of, of, of, some pretty poor outings in order for Tori to pivot. But I mean, I think that if Kevin Ginkle was was on a roll,

he might be willing to pull that trigger even a little bit faster, considering this is an important season, and they are all in this season on, you know, with what they're doing. I mean, I think on paper, if you look at last season, like Kevin Ginkle had a better 2023 season than Paul Seawalt, right? Correct. Both were good. Both were absolutely good.

But if you look at the regular season numbers, Ginkle ZRA was about a half run lower, maybe more than that, maybe a little more than that. And if you look at the postseason, Ginkle also was better than Cewald. I mean, he didn't give up a run, right? It's hard to beat that. This just comes down to a role thing for me.

Paul Cewald was acquired to be the Diamondbacks closer. And Paul Ceywald is going to be the Diamondbacks closer until, as you said, if like over an extended period of time, he showed that he wasn't, you know, he wasn't fit for that role, which is something we don't really expect to happen. So I fully expect that Paul Cewald, whenever he is ready to go, will supplant. Kevin Ginkl as the closer really regardless of how good Ginkl is. Ginkle could not give up a run and convert every single save opportunity over the next two months. And I still think Paul Seawald will become the Diamondbacked closer when he gets back. That's the reason he was acquired. And it's not like you're losing with Ginkle not being the closer. Ginkle being the eighth inning man and being really, really good is also very, you know, a huge asset for the team. So yeah, I don't I don't

really see any possibility of Seawald losing this role before he gets back. All right. What else we got there, Damon? From Travis Moore, more for me says, is the upside still there with Drew Jones still seems like a lot of prospect evaluations have soured on him given his swing issues? Yeah, I mean, it's fair. It's fair that some people have soured a bit, but this is what being a prospect in baseball is. I mean, you're working on things.

you're being coached. I think the raw talent is still there with Drew Jones and the Diamondbacks have an excellent coaching staff. I don't feel like as long as he is coachable, as long as he is a guy accepting of coaching and is working to get better, I don't see him not working out. But it's baseball. Baseball is what it is. And sometimes guys, no matter how gifted they are, no matter how bright their future might be, some guys just don't put it together. I don't see Drew Jones as being one of those guys. I really don't. I just think he's struggling right now because of some setbacks that he's had with his health. Sure.

And, you know, he's behind. Baseball is just that game that, like, you draft a kid, you get excited about him. And then he, like, disappears for five years before you ever hear about him. These days, we get to know about prospects much more than we used to, just with all the reporting and all the information available. But still, I think that Drew Jones is still going to be somebody that lives up to the hype. I really do. Yeah, I mean, Drew Jones. only 20 years old, right? I mean, the outcome hasn't been, he hasn't done the Jackson

Holiday thing. So I guess in some ways he'll always be compared to Jackson Holiday because he was taken right behind him in the draft. But that's not really a fair comparison. At least they didn't pass on Jackson Holiday to draft him. That's a whole different story. Yeah, that would have been a different conversation for sure. For me, Drew Jones, the question with Drew Jones is not what his ceiling is. It's more so what his floor is, right? His ceiling is as high as it's ever been in my mind because there's still a chance that Drew Jones figures out a very, very real chance, I think that Drew Jones figures out how to hit, you know, professionally and figures out these swing issues that he's had, the stepping in the bucket and kind of bailing out all these issues that we've,

that we've discussed. He's so young. And as you said, I mean, he's been through so many injuries and whatnot at this point. He hasn't really had a lot of time to iron out these problems. So the ceiling is as high as it's been as it's ever been. I don't think a ceiling. going goes down just because of one season where he doesn't really put things together. But the floor is still a question and we'll continue to be, you know, is he's going to be such a good defender in center field that that gives him, you know, at least I think the floor of being like a useful major league player, but is he an everyday player? Is he an all-star?

Is he a MVP candidate? You know, those are still questions that we're not going to get answers to for a long time. Well, one question we'll never get an answer to is what the Diamondbacks would have done if fucking Josh Van Meter would never have won that goddamn baseball game and they would have ended up with the number one overall pick. That's true. I still think for the record, I still think they would have picked your Jones. I know.

And that would have made it look so much worse. Which would have made Diamondbacks fans in retrospect. So let's not even get started on bad decisions when it comes to that. But maybe Elijah Green can still be good. Yeah, it might be. Books not closed there. It's not closed on any of these guys because it's baseball, right? Baseball is pretty wild like that.

What else we got there, Damon? Next question comes from Nikki Nick at Real Native Nick, and he says, what would have to happen for this season to be considered a success? We've been asked this question a few times, but we thought we should address it considering the addition of Jordan Montgomery because I think we both feel like Jordan Montgomery

has completely changed the expectations for this team. I'm not going to use the goddamn word standard. I'm talking about expectations now. You can call it a standard all you want. You can try to label it anything you want. The expectations are now through the roof for this team. And it's hard for them not to be considering how good this rotation is and how much money the Diamondbacks went out and spent this offseason to make this team this good.

Right. Yeah. The front office, Mike Hazen, the ownership, Ken Kendrick, they did their job. And they did it well. They did it well. Mike Hazen made some deals that were incredible that we didn't expect them to make, including Lordis Gurriel, which we thought was going to be a free agent that signed with another team at the end of the season. And we didn't really predict him coming back all things considered.

And that is proving to be one of the best moves that Mike Hazen made so far. Right. But I think that the expectations are there that this team is going to not only make the playoffs but succeed in the playoffs. I think it has changed to the point where an early exit in the first round might be considered a bit of disappointment. How deep do they have to go? I don't know. I don't know. Like I would have just accepted the playoffs.

Is a second round exit? it like is, you know, say they're in the wild card and they get out of the wild card, but then they lose in the division series. To like the Braves or something like that. Yeah, yeah, something like that. Sure. Is that a disappointment or is that okay? It's hard because if you're losing to a team that's significantly better than you on paper,

like the Braves or the Dodgers might be considered, then I can't imagine it being a disappointment. But I wouldn't lie after what we saw this postseason, my eye level has changed, right? So it's like, once they get there, I'm going to lose my goddamn mind. I'm not even going to be a person of reason at that point. And for me, it's world series or bust. Not me. I'm going to be very level-headed.

You're going to be a disappointment. You're going to be real. Yeah. Yeah. He's going to be real even. For sure. That's going to be a maniac. We're going to have to literally call people to help us contain him.

We might get a small cage in the office. I don't know. As long as we don't lose to the Phillies or the Dodgers, I'm straight. I don't want to lose to those two teams. You need to lose to a new team. Because owning those fan bases has been like everything to me. Yeah. No, that's true.

It has meant the world. It has absolutely meant the world. I feel like if they lost the Dodgers or Braves in the division series, people would get it in a sense, but people would still be disappointed, right? I mean, there's been enough hype around this team over these last few months with the World Series run and what they did this offseason. People are going to be probably really disappointed no matter, you know, what round they were to lose in, you know, regardless of when it was, even if it was in the World Series again. But yeah, on paper, like what would be a successful season for the franchise as a whole? I still would probably just set the bar in making the playoffs. If you make the playoffs and I would maybe add to that improving on last year, like winning more than 84 games, I still think that that would be successful in the grand scheme of things.

But if people want, you know, people are like, no, I need them to not only make it, but not be a first round exit. Like, I get that. Gabriel says winning the World Series or nothing. I think Damon's a big fan of that. There might be, yeah, I don't, I don't think he would be alone in that at all. Ryan H says, hashtag finish the story. He's really trying to hit me in the heart with that one. That's a pro wrestling thing, Jesse, as well as.

That's a great, maybe we should start using hashtag finish the story for the Arizona Diamondbacks this season. Because obviously last year was a story, right? It was a storybook, a goddamn movie, you know, this Snake's a Live series, which we still haven't gotten part five of. So I'm fairly certain someone cut shirtless Derek into that and then someone saw a final edit of it and was like, that guy can't be in there. It's my fault. I'm sorry, you guys. But, you know, it has felt like a finishing the story kind of thing with this team.

And I don't know. Like last year was just such a magical season that it's going to be hard for anything short of the World Series to not feel like a disappointment to a lot of people. Yeah. I think what we want, though, is for this team to be competitive. competitive annually, right? We want to watch this team and we want to know that every single year, you know, at least for the foreseeable future, that this core and the pieces that they can add each season

is going to be a team that is a playoff contender. And I think that makes it less of a disappointment, you know, when you start seeing your team make it, you know, year in and year out. It's hard. It's hard to get there, right? Especially with the Dodgers being in our division. It almost feels like we're always kind of set, you know,

for a wild card spot. However, there is one team leading the division right now, and it ain't the Dodgers baby. Yeah. It's your Arizona. No, sir. Technically. Technically, technically it is. I'm sorry?

Technically? Well, because the Dodgers aren't behind the Diamondbacks in terms of games behind. Technically, they are. They have a better win percentage than the Dodgers. So technically. I'm not doing this. I'm not doing this with you. I'm just stating fast.

I'm just a reason to get all angered. I'm curious with you. Technically. Let's go. What do we got? Michael. Michael says short hair Corbyn Carroll or long hair Corbyn Carroll. I don't know. I want him to be the most efficient, effective Corbyn Carroll. I've thought about this question entirely too much, Jesse. You know why? Because okay, short hair Corby and Carol, more aerodynamic, right? Less time

maintaining his hair. Or does he? I don't know. Maybe longer hair. Maybe long hair don't care, right? Maybe long hair don't care. And maybe short hair involves him putting that, you know, junk band on in a little different way. Maybe he's spending too much time. Maybe with the short hair, now he has to spend too much time at the barbershop during the season to maintain the short hair.

Oh, I had thought about that. You haven't thought about that. The long hair, he can just do whatever the hell he wants. You know, this is a very important question. You know what? I would prefer maybe. Shaved Head Corbin.

Wow. Completely aerodynamic. As fast as he could possibly be. Not to mention, no trips to the barbershop, because he can just pick it himself. Yeah, get one of the boys to do it. You know what I mean? Like, we're talking about efficiency here.

Corby and Carroll doesn't have time to worry about how handsome he is. He's just naturally handsome. That part's taken care of. He needs to go and play baseball as much as possible. So, anyway, that's Ernesto says Mullet Corbyn. I'm, I'm intrigued. I'm, I'm willing to hear out, Mullet Corbyn. I just feel like in baseball, I hear what you're saying from the aerodynamic.

perspective but i just think in baseball hair is so important derrick flow flow yeah like let us how let us how many times do we talk about guys and we and we leave the league and flow are you kidding how many times on this show gives us such an advantage yeah lord you have lordis on your team you already skyrocket to top 10 but it doesn't matter who else is all right Alex hair is absolutely gorgeous you got jac McCarthy when he cut his hair it was like like the world had ended for me gabby gabby dye in his hair going the same route as Lordus? Maybe it wasn't.

How did we not mention? How did we not talk about Gino's hair? Oh my God. Gino puts us over the top. Like that was an unnecessary ad. It's like adding George Montgomery to the lineup. You know, we didn't really need Gino's hair, but that solidifies that we have one of the best,

you know, flow lineup. It's top one. Maybe it wasn't just the power of friendship, Derek. That's all I'm saying. We have top one hair in the league. You have Lourdes and Gino on the same team. I'm sorry. Conversation is over.

Yeah, you're not wrong. Do we have the probabilities for this week, Damon? Let's take a look at the probabilities for this week. And thank you guys all, obviously, for your questions for Mailbag Monday. It wouldn't be what it is without you. But here we are what the Diamondbacks have to deal with this week against the New York Yankees for the next three days here at Chase Field before they go on the road. They go on the road to Atlanta, I believe. They do go on the road to Atlanta.

So this is a very big weekend series coming up. They're coming up. But the Diamondbacks have Ryan Nelson going on. the mound against Gil. We got Gown against Cortez, and we got Merrill Kelly against Carlos Rodon. Yeah, pretty thankful that we're not getting Garrett Cole in here. And these Yankees are looking pretty solid. But if the Diamondbacks, I think the Diamondbacks, if they win this series,

I don't know if there's any more question about, you know, if this team is who we think they are after the way they beat the Colorado Rockies. This is a series where if you go out and perform and you succeed, then now people I think will start giving them credit you beat the team you're supposed to beat this is different this is one of the hottest teams in baseball right now so I feel like this is this is much different apparently uh the the Yankees first starting pitcher the starting pitcher tonight his last name is pronounced heel heel heel heel heel just a court yeah just straight up which which which does not heal so that works it doesn't really track in my brain very good guys right remember remember

Paul C Walt said that good guys Diamondbacks, Yankees, the heels. So, of course, they have to heal. There you go. Yeah, the diamondbacks benefit enormously from the fact that Garrett Cole is injured. He would have lined up to start against Zach Allen, which as a baseball fan, I would have enjoyed. I would have enjoyed. But the Diamondbacks benefit from, I guess, they're facing Carlos Rodan in the series instead of Garrett Cole.

That's sort of how it works out in my head. Two lefties? Right, Nestor Cortez and Rodham. Yeah, back-to-back lefties. Heal is a righty. So yeah, this is a big series for the debacks, for sure. The Yankees are not only a much better team than the Rockies on paper, but they are a very, very hot team.

You know, a four-game sweep of the Houston Astros is not easy to do at all. The Astros, I think, are one of three teams that has not won a game yet at this point. The others being the Marlins, who are kind of like a middle-tier team. And then we also have another team who's alluding me right now. I can't think of. I'm broken. I had it. I don't know where it went.

It's not the dog. But yes, it's one of the worst teams in the league. Obviously, it's not the Rockies, but it's one of the other very bad teams around the league. And yeah, the Astros are one of just a few teams that has yet to win a game. And it's because of what the New York Yankees did in that series, which was really impressive. White Sox? Yeah, it's the White Sox. Yeah, it's the White Sox.

So you've got one team that hasn't won that's very bad. You've got one team in the Marlins that's kind of okayish. and then you've got the Astros who are very good and also have not won a game. So the Yankees really, I mean, the Yankees really had an outstanding first series. Cortez didn't necessarily pitch all that well. Carlos Rodon didn't necessarily pitch all that well.

It's really just the Yankees offense going crazy. Juan Soto, we talked about. He obviously just being named the AL player of the week. He was outstanding. He is my MVP pick for, I just think that he is going to be very, very good. So, yeah, well, We'll see what happens here.

If the Diamondbacks win this series, it doesn't necessarily mean that they are going to win 95 games or whatever. But it is significant and it will prove a lot more about them than, you know, beating the Rockies. Well, Jesse's heading over to Chase Field right now to check that out. Make sure you guys check it out as well. Love to see you guys out there tonight because, again, we need the, we need the fan support. Everybody got to come out. Chase Field has been rocking all weekend long Sunday. Understandable.

It was a little less there. It was Easter Sunday. So but let's let's get that building rocking tonight. Of course, in the meantime, you can follow us on Twitter. I am at cap underscore caveman with a K. Jesse is at Jesse and Friedman. Of course, the people's producer, Damon, is at Damon dog. That's D-A-W-G.

We are Damon's dogs. Bark, bark. Of course, our show is at P-H-N-X underscore D-Backs, but all roads do lead to at PHNX underscore Sports on Twitter. Instagram. Instagram. I'm broken as a person, too. I can't say we're.

Yeah, also I forgot a team. The Mets also have not won a game yet. I'm really, I'm really broke. Reese Hoskins broke the Mets, by the way. He owns them, not Stephen Cohen. It's Reese Hoskins. Yeah, Reese Hoskins owns the Mets now. They're going to build a stadium or statue of him out front.

He just proved you can't take the Philadelphia out of Reese. You can take Reese Hoskins out of Philadelphia. You can't take the Philadelphia out of Reese Hoskins. Fucking wah, by the way. That's an all-time great slander move there. And I love it. but I also love that we already got a base clearing in the very first week of baseball. So God bless this game.

Of course, God bless all of you. Thank you guys for stopping by. I hope you have a wonderful evening. We'll see you tomorrow with a post-game show after game two of this series with the New York Yankees. Again, in the meantime, have yourself a wonderful evening. And remember, kids, baseball is fun, but it's so much more fun when Lourdes-Guriel is on your team.