PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - PHNX D-backs Post Series: Unearned trust

Episode Date: April 25, 2022

On this episode, Jesse and Derek are together live at the Ainsworth! They are discussing the D-backs losing their three-game series to the Mets, how good the starting pitching continues to be, and the upcoming series with the Dodgers. 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 to the PHNX D-Backs podcast right here at PHNX. My name is Derek Montia, occasionally known as your mayor of PHNX, and I'm joined by this guy sitting next to me. Look at this beautiful baby boy. We're actually here together. It's for here in person. It is the one and only vice mayor, Thunderstick Jesse Friedman here. Derek, you're a real person.

I know. I am a real. I'm not just a screen that's two-dimensional. I can also speak to the t-shirts that you wear that you're famous for. Yeah. This guy's going around telling people, you know, Derek, with the crazy. shirts. Right.

Yeah, he's getting way too much. Uh-huh, about that. And I don't like that. Your shirt today is a little bit lackless. I did this for you. I thought you want me to be perfect. I wore cheese for you. My shirt is more exciting than you was today.

I don't like this. I don't like this. It's because the internet. It's because of the internet. But of course, thank you guys so much for checking out the show. We are brought to you by the fine folks over at the Draft King's Sportsbook app.

Go download the Draft King Sportsbook app now. New customers can get down on the NBA round one playoff action. Bet $5 on any team to win and get $100. and get $150 in free bets instantly, no matter what, no matter who wins, you win at the Drap King's Sportsbook. Unfortunately, the Arizona Diamondbacks drop another series. They did not win, despite the fact that they had a very fun game on Saturday night that

made us believe that this team could do more than we really expected to see out of them this year. Yeah, yesterday's game was really fun to watch. It was one of the few just complete games with the Diamondbacks that played throughout the season. It felt like from beginning to end, they were just hitting on all cylinders, Umberto Castiano through a really nice game yesterday. The offense jumped on things early in the game, and the Diamondbacks pretty much led all the way throughout the entire game, which is something we haven't seen much from the Diamondbacks.

It was their first wire-to-wire win of the year, right? Yeah, yeah. It seems like if they have been winning, you know, it's kind of a desperate comeback in the last couple of meetings where things come together for them. So yesterday was a big day. Today, not so much. Today things were kind of flipped the other way,

where the Mets jumped out to a lead at the beginning of the game, and they wound up holding that lead ultimately throughout the entire thing. If you want to be hopeful in a loss, which we try to be, we try to accentuate the positives around here, and there was a lot of, once again, mistakes being made. And I don't know how you particularly want to view mistakes being made, but those initial runs weren't necessarily scoring just on hits off of Madison Bumgarner, which once again, he had another great outing.

The lack of earned runs, he has zero, even though they did put up some, a run on him in his outing. But again, another weird outing where things just didn't seem to go right. They weren't defensively sharp at times. No, they were not. The Mets scored their first run today as a result of an E5. Sergio Alcantara made an error. Right off the bat.

Right after yesterday's game ending with an incredible play by Sergio Alcantara. That's just sort of how this game works. That's how baseball works. That's why it's the worst and the best. Right, exactly. So that's how this game started off. That led to a run in the first inning. The Mets second run came on an E2. That was an errant throw by the catcher Jose Herrera. Their third run came on a walk with the bases loaded. Later in the game, their fourth run came on a hit by pitch with the bases loaded. And then to cap it all off, the Mets sixth run also came on an error as well. So it was a rough game defensively. It was a rough game in terms of just the kinds of mistakes that we've seen the Diamondbacks make. Right. They just need to find ways to eliminate. I mean, it has been, it has been rough for them throughout these first few weeks of the season.

They're not playing the brand of baseball that I think Toro Lavello wants to see out of them. Here's the thing is Tori Lovolo talked about the talent, and I don't think he was trying to diminish the talent that they have. I don't think he was trying to undercut them. But at the same time, we've talked about the, he said that they have to play perfect baseball, basically, if they want to compete. That's a high bar. It's not only a high bar, but they're not, it's not even like they're not, they're not, they're not, they're not, they're not, they're not, they're not. even close to perfect right now when it comes to their execution defensively. They're just not even close to their opponent's execution.

Like we're seeing great defense out of these teams that they're playing. The Mets have the best record in, I believe, all of baseball. Is that right? They're, I don't know their record off the top of my head. They're up there. They're up there. They're 12 and 5. If not in all of baseball, they have the best record in the National League.

So it's not to say they're a slout. You can't make these mistakes against one of the best teams in baseball and not have it culminate in a loss. But what we saw there, what you just read, was five of their six runs were essentially scored on errors or mistakes that the Diamondbacks made. And the Diamondbacks scored two runs. So if you take those mistakes out of there, this is a two one ball game in favor of the Diamondbacks, if I can be hopeful and nice in this situation. Obviously, a lot of other things could happen. But those mistakes really are at this point the things that are compounding to cause this team to lose.

It's also compounding to give this starting pitching the best ERA almost. in baseball the whole other thing that we need to talk about, right? But right now, the Diamondbacks are just in the toughest division in baseball. We already knew that. There was no doubt in our minds. If you're a Diamondbacks fan, you knew what an uphill battle. People just didn't think it was going to be this bad. No, I thought it would be this bad.

Well, by this bad, I mean this good. Right, by this good. The NL West is the only division in baseball with four 10-win teams. Four. The rest of MLB has two, two, ten-win teams. So basically four of the six best teams in baseball all play in the same division as the Arizona. Well, at least three of them and the Rockies. Zing, zing.

But, yeah, I mean, is this one of those things where, like, at least right now in series like this and some of the other series that we've seen, is the hope here that we can at least not get swept? Is that what we're hanging our hat on as far as at least being happy with this team and some of these series? I mean, I don't know. they haven't been swept yet. So you're saying, are we at the point where it's a success if the Diamondbacks don't get swept in a particular series? Is that too dramatic to say? I think that's a little dramatic to say. I mean, there are some teams that the Diamondbacks really should be beating, right?

I mean, they just played the Washington Nationals. And we talked about how that's a team that they line up pretty well with. They should be competing against the Washington Nationals. But, I mean, you got the Dodgers next, Derek. And I think with a team like that, you might be right. where, you know, if the Diamondbacks find a way to not get swept in a series like that, if you can win one out of three, maybe find a way to get two out of three. That's probably a pretty good outcome.

Yeah, two out of three, I think in some of these series against the Mets, again, because they play, this is, this is, they're at least done with the Mets now. That's, that's the two series. Yeah, we've had a lot of Mets over the last, right? Right away. I've seen way too much of my Mets fans friends. Let me tell you that. Shout out to you, Tim Fiervante.

Are there Mets fans out there. It's unbelievable. They're their Mets fans. There were quite a few of them at Chasefield. Yeah, for sure, for sure. But I will say that as we're going to talk about some of the starting pitching, looking forward, we do have the Diamondbacks matching up well in that Dodgers series with the starting pitching. I know, like you said, as the season goes on, we don't typically worry about the number ones

matching with the number ones and things like that. However, though, it is good to see that we have like Merrill Kelly going out against Walker Bueller because Merrill Kelly has just been outstanding for this team. And as far as having a competitive chance in the series against the Dodgers, he's the guy that you want to see on the mound in game one. I talked with Meryl today in the clubhouse, and he talked about just how his success this season, he doesn't even think is as much due to his stuff as it is just his mentality,

just that he's going out there, just expecting that when he throws the ball, he's able to get major league hitters out, and he doesn't really doubt his ability to do that anymore. And, you know, facing a lineup like the Dodgers lineup, of course, you have to have a mentality sort of along those lines. Absolutely. So, yeah, I think that's a good matchup starting. starting this series there against L.A.

And the Diamondback starting pitching has continued to be very, very affected. I mean, in this series, the Diamondbacks lost two out of three to the Mets. They had three very good outings from their starting pitching. So that wasn't the issue in this series for them. But you can get more information about Jesse's little interview is time with Merrill Kelly. My little interview. You have to belittle me like that there. Oh, my God.

Because you're here. And I just can't believe. I'm so proud of Jesse being here. Most importantly, though, I'm proud of your argument. I think they're outstanding. And I think you should get a chance to read those over at go p hnx.com. He will have that piece up with Merrill Kelly on. Merrill Kelly's return from his thoracic injury last season or was it,

or was it, 22 is when it was, right? Yeah, yeah. And just how good he's been since that injury, which isn't very common. No, no, yeah. I guess we're giving a full-on preview here. I'm giving a preview.

So, yeah, Derek's just trying to throw out my content. Hey, see, that content's out there, so you can go out there, get ready for it. It is, yeah. So in 2020, Merrill Kelly had thoracicic outlet surgery. which is a pretty intense procedure. He was in the hospital for a few days. And people don't really recognize the drastic outlet surgery in the same vein that they

recognize Tommy John's surgery, which of course is a very well-documented. It's like the household name injury for pitchers, I would say. Right, exactly. And the one you don't want to hear because that means it could be career-threatening. Right, yeah, thoracic outlet surgery is not necessarily viewed in that same vein by most people, but it probably should be. It's ended a lot of guys' careers or at the very least. it's taking guys who were effective and after the surgery, they just weren't really the same

pitcher. And Merrill Kelly had that surgery back in 2020 and he's come back and been extremely affected. He's been arguably, we've talked about it a lot. He's been arguably the Diamondback's best starter over the last few seasons. So, yeah, more coming on that later this week. It should be a fun story. Absolutely. And if you're not already a member at go phtnx.com, prepare yourself for that wonderful content by signing up now to become a member. You can be like our friend Evan Thompson and get your annual membership, which will get you your free t-shirt over at PHNXLocker.com. Evan chose the Southwest Bias shirt. How do you feel about his choice?

I'm furious. I'm so mad at him. He's appeared on this show. He's a big fan. He listens and watches all the time. Went with Southwest Biased. I don't know what that's about. I can't disapprove.

I guess it's a good shirt. Still not as good as our PHNX Rattler shirt that you can get brand new shirt over at phtnx Locker.com. And you can get that for free by signing up for that annual membership. If you're not interested in the annual membership, you can also be like Evan by starting off with the annual or the month-to-month membership, and you'll get your first month for just 50 cents.

So do that. Join us. Not only will you get this wonderful content from us, but you'll get all the wonderful content from our friends here at go-pHNX.com. Gerald, Craig, there's some amazing writers here that do some amazing stuff. Not to mention all of our new beats. Owen over at Phoenix Rising is absolutely killing it with his articles as well and his coverage of our local football team,

as we like to call, as he likes to call it, I should say. But anyway, get down on that. And you'll not only get members-only discounts over at the PHNX Locker.com, but you'll also get access to our members-only Discord. And, yeah, we're going to be there all summer long watching this team and crossing our fingers that we can at least take away one out of two of these three-game series because we need at least something to hang our hat on. But starting pitching, like you said, continues to be excellent for this team.

Madison Bumgarner, even though he had another somewhat short outing, still was very effective in his outing. And again, it's the guy that we want to see. They manufactured a run and did a good job of capitalizing on an error by the Diamondbacks in the first inning. But Madbub was able to hang in there and give a pretty good out of it. He was. He was. I mean, five innings, four hits, one run, no earned runs, no walks, four strikeouts. We've talked a little bit about Madbum on past shows, talking about how, you know, he has a 1.38 ERA,

but he also has more walks than strikeouts. Is this really for real? but today I think he took a big step in showing us that this is for real. I mean, four strikeouts, no walks, five innings that probably should have been scoreless innings. This is a really big game for him. The thing that sticks out to me the most, though, Derek, is that he only pitched five innings. I'm curious what Tori has to say about that after the game.

We'll have to find out and see what he has to say. But Bumgarner only had 78 pitches. And at this point, you know, a few weeks ago, we could chalk that up to pitch counts and whatnot and guys not being able to pitch that. The short spring training. Right, the short spring training, all of that stuff. That is no longer the case, right? I mean, 78 pitches is you're expecting to get more than that out of Madison Bumgarner.

And the Diamondbacks have been very cautious across the board, not just with him, but with other guys. That third time through the lineup, it seems like Tori is backing off his starters and going to the bullpen a little bit earlier than we're used to seeing. Do you believe that part of that is to kind of build confidence in a starter so that they don't stay out there to the point where they give up the game? and then they have that lack of confidence in their own ability and their confidence to get the job done, essentially. That could be. I mean, I'm sure if you ask a guy like Madison, Bumgarner himself, I don't think he would tell you his confidence he's boosted.

I think he would tell you that he's pissed off, that he wasn't still in the game, right? Right, right. So I don't know what the player's standpoint on that is, but, I mean, numbers are clear. Pitchers are less effective when they go through the lineup for the third time. And I guess a guy like Madison Bumgarner, as he continues to age,

maybe he's out of place in his career, where you don't want to take that chance. You're okay getting five innings from him that are effective rather than trying to push him into that extra gear. The only problem I have with this is the Diamondbacks bullpen isn't excelling in a way where you want to rely and put the games constantly in their hands instead of starting pitching. I mean, Zach Gallen has been out. Everybody was outstanding in the series.

Umberto Castiano's in the spot start was outstanding, right? Yeah, he was. That's really where the Diamondbacks actually excelled against the Mets because the Mets had a bullpen start essentially in that same game. and it fell apart from them very early on, and the 9-backs were able to come out of that game with a win. But starters have allowed one home run in the DeBack's last eight games. Wow.

That is incredible. And that even includes Madison Bumgarner making two starts in those last eight games, which is very impressive as far as, especially Bumgarner's, you know, kind of notoriety for his track record for giving up the home run. But on the flip side, runs continue to be unearned at an unheard of rate. Right? So it's like this ERA situation with the Diamondback starting pitching, it continues, in I think both of our opinions, to be smoking mirrors a little bit, right? A little bit. Yeah, I think there have definitely been times where, yeah, the number of earned runs that a guy has given up has not necessarily been, you know, has not necessarily accurately reflected how he pitched. Right.

And so, yeah, I don't know if Madison Bungarner is going to have an ERA of 1.00 for very long. But it's hard to argue. We'll take it while we can get it. Yeah, yeah. Entering today's game, the Teaback's ERA was 2.54 for their starting pitching. 2.54. That's really good. Across the board for starting pitching.

Even when you factor in like Caleb Smith's five run outing and some of the other like, you know, at least what happened here. There haven't been very many. I mean, there have not been very many starts like that. And that's why the number is as low as it is. They came into the game, fourth best ERA for starting pitching in Major League Baseball, which is crazy because now it's only going to go down because Madbun had no run runs today. You just had the one under and run. So that's not going to help the confusion about how good the starting rotation is right now.

But it's all about confidence, right? So if your rotation can continue to maintain a low ERA and continue to believe in themselves, that's going to roll and continue to be successful, I think. I mean, I think like you said, Merrill Kelly has a different perspective. now coming into the clubhouse. And it's the same thing we've heard from people about the entire team, right? Successful teams come into the clubhouse knowing that they're going to win, even if they don't. Well, they still have the 1-0 T-shirt, right?

They still have the 1-0 shirt before the games. It's the 1-0 mentality, right? It's the win the day. We used to hear that last season a lot. Win the day, you know, not concern yourself with the series, not concern yourself with the 14-game losing streak. you came into this game with. Just focus on that one day.

I think that's Tori's philosophy. It has been for a while. You can't get too high on the losses. You can't get too low on the losses. It can't do low on losses or high on the wins, right? So you've got to maintain that. But right now, the starting pitching continues to be excellent. That can only help this team have confidence that if they can put together some more

offensive outings like they've had, which even in this series, like today's game, yes, two runs. They didn't look great. There wasn't much. Yeah. Tyler, which I can't fucking believe he makes me say his name that right. Tyler McGill was excellent against the Diamondbacks. They couldn't do much against him.

So you got to give credit where credits do. However, you know, they have had some things rolling pretty well offensively coming into this game. They really have. Yeah, things have started to really look a lot better for them at the plate. And I know we've been talking about for a few weeks about how the approach that they had at the plate was bound to transition into some actual success at some point. It just was crazy that it wasn't, right? Because they were having good at bats. Like, you know, Yoni Hernandez was taking some long, nice, like, at bats that were just, I mean, again, it didn't get a hit, right?

But he'd take 10 pitches in a bat. That's the exact kind of thing. And that kind of carried over. We started seeing those long at bats. And I think, you know, again, after you informed them about their problems, they'd take a look at it. And I think they made some changes. Once they read my article, it was only a matter of time at that point. Of course.

I mean, the problem is now other other teams. are reading your article too but uh yeah no i mean once they kind of got out of that mindset right and i mean even today we're still seeing that you and i saw strike three today call that we just couldn't absolutely believe that he took stent like standing there staring at a ball go straight down the plate it wasn't a didn't it wasn't a cutter it wasn't a slider it was a fastball right down the plate and there was just this passivity still there of looking for the the the ball so that you can walk instead of trying to not only earn that hit get that hit but make that pitcher work and you know have anything that comes that close to the strike zone, trying your best to foul it off.

I would much rather see a swinging strikeout than taking it when it's a big knee pull down the middle of the plate like that. I think everyone would. But yeah, credit to Tyler McGill, who did have an, I mean, he was excellent today. From the very beginning of the game, he was just dotting the strike zone. And you could tell Diamondback sitters were, you know, it felt like it was 0.2 every single hitter. And so, you know, in those situations, you are going to be locked up at some, you know, it's hard not to be locked up at certain moments against a pitcher like that looking at a called strike three because the diamondbacks just didn't really have a great feel for him and they never really did throughout the entire game they were never able to establish any kind of comfort hitting in this game and fortunately christian walker you know hit that home run that kind of got things off the ground for them early in the game but um they had a really hard time building off of that at all throughout throughout the rest of the game that was an incredible home run by the way the third one tied for third longest in major league baseball this season.

But we'll get to Christian Walker and his performance shortly, but we want to tell you guys about, obviously, our friends over at OGsgummies.com. We're partnering with a local Phoenix company, and we love our friends over at OGs. They have an amazing selection of delicious gummies for everybody to try out. And again, you know, I'm not going to bash the Diamondbacks on a day like this, but maybe this is an afternoon where you want to forget this game, and OG's Gummies is the exact brand to go with if you want to do that. They just announced their mini OG's 3 milligram microdose option for those not wanting to dive into the regular 10 milligram option that they have.

These will be available on May 3rd, but for right now, if you're interested, you can check out OGs.com to find OGs near you. That's OGEEZ Brands.com. And they have an amazingly delicious variety of OGs. Here's the thing. Watching a three-game series against the Mets can only be made better by enjoying OG's delicious variety of gummies. And of course, if Michaela was here, she would tell you once again how much she loves the orange cream sicle. But we all love the orange creamsicle because it's delicious. Well, except Jesse.

Jesse's a good lad. I haven't tried it. So I can't. We're going to get Jesse non-medicated samples so you can at least try it and eat the candy because I don't know. I've tried edibles before and I will say that it's a, it can be a gross experience. It can be a shocking experience about how little they care about making that thing taste good and just want to. That's not why people take it. That's not what people are there for.

But hey, you know what? Yes, we are. Look, I don't care what I'm eating. I want it to be delicious. And that's something that everybody should live by. But of course, again, check out our friends over at ogsbrands.com to find OGs near you. And Jesse, we have a difficult schedule coming up. Let's take a look at the calendar because of Diamondbacks.

It gets no easier for the Diamondbacks today after facing off against New York Mets. We have the Dodgers coming up for three at home. And then we go on the road. But so hopefully maybe those road series, again, the Diamondbacks might be able to eke out some wins against teams that aren't as good as the teams they're playing. But of course, we'd love to see them shine in that series against the Dodgers coming up here starting tomorrow. This is really the Diamondbacks have almost made it to the end of this hellish start to begin this season. They've got this three game series with the Dodgers. And then after that, yeah, they're on the road against St. Louis.

They're on the road against Miami. Those are respectable teams, but not teams that you're fair. as much as you're throwing a team like the Mets of the Dodgers right now. Sure. And then they have the Rockies after that. And let's face it, Derek. The Rockies are, there's some reason to be skeptical there. There's a lot of reasons to be skeptical there.

I don't know if Connor Joe is going to be able to hit $450 the entire season. I don't understand what is happening with that team, but it is wild. I mean, trust me, I'll be the first one to say, we mock their Chris Bryant acquisition heavily during the off season. Like, what the hell are they doing? And you know what? Maybe they knew exactly what they were doing. But the one thing about that Dodgers series is that it really does have the Diamondbacks match up well, I think, in that Dodgers series.

We have Walker Bueller going up against Merrill Kelly. We have Tony Gonsolin going against Zach Davies. Tony Gonsolin has been very, very good this season. And Julio Urius going up against Zach Gallen. So when you talk about the matchups, those, and I'm not going to, outside of Zach Davies, that's the exact guys I want. And Zach Davies, honestly, has been very good this season. And so I don't feel that same sense of, well, I wish it was somebody else besides that gave you. So far, he's been solid for this team.

I mean, it's all relative when you're facing the Dodgers, right? When we say, like, you match up well. It's like you match up as well as you can. So, yeah, I mean, it's, there are matchups that you feel the Diamondbacks at least have a shot, right? You feel that in all of those games, they at least have a chance to win. You especially like Zach Gallen lining up against Julio Urias. And, yeah, I mean, the Diamondbacks have shown the ability. to stay in games, at least from a starting pitching standpoint.

It hasn't really ever been, they have not been the issue for them this season. I think the big question in this series is going to be the offense. Is the offense able to get going early in some of these games and hopefully have a little bit more production than what they had today against the New York Mets? Well, the Dodgers absolutely brutalized the San Diego Padres who we struggled with. So by properties and math and, you know, exponential things. It might be pretty bad. But I think that's what exactly you can look for in this series.

Even if they don't win, if they can keep these games competitive and close, kind of like they have with the Mets, I don't feel like it's as bad. Like today's game, to me, it was a mess defensively for the mistakes that they made. And not just defensively, you know, the hit by pitch and walk in, the walking in a run, just everything. They were just, they were making mistakes all over the diamond. But again, I guess this is like. Oh, hey, if they were perfect.

But if they could have played cleaner baseball, not had all of those mistakes, we could be looking at a completely different ballgame than this one. Yeah. It wasn't like the Mets really did much more than, again, capitalizing on those mistakes and scoring when the Diamondbacks did. Yeah. I mean, the Mets are 12 and 5 for a reason. They've been able to capitalize on mistakes of opposing teams.

And that's kind of all they did today. The Mets didn't beat up on the Diamondbacks today. Like that score, like a 6-2 final score, suggest at the end of the day the diamondbacks just kind of shot themselves on the foot over and over again and that's something that we've seen a lot of this year right there have been a lot of games that they very well could have won but they just made too many of those types of mistakes and it made it really hard for them to stay in the game and unfortunately for them that's what happened today and you know what you're seeing is exactly what tori lovolo kind of talked about when he talks about playing clean baseball and winning the inches right they're capable they can do it but they're not. They're not winning the inches right now. They're not playing clean baseball, right? So, like, you can see in these games how close they're staying,

but the mistakes really are the things that are setting them apart. And the other teams are playing those clean games. They are playing, they are winning the inches against the Diamondbacks. Right. But you kind of get what Tori's saying. It's kind of like when we made those references to the offense waking up. They were having great at bats, but it's hard to say it's a great at bat when you're looking at a team that has like a 136 batting average, right?

Like, what great at bat? Where are these great abats that you speak of, right? But they really were having some great approaches. It just, again, the patience versus passivity kind of idea there is like a tipping the scale a little bit too much on the passivity side, right? But we have seen some guys get back on track. And even in this series, we did have our draft king, king of the series, which is a guy that we wanted to see get back on track as far as power is concerned. And that is the one and only Christian Walker. Christian Walker is our king of the series with his two home runs and his four RBI.

The offense in these games were kind of spread around, so nobody really had a single outstanding performance. But there were a lot of guys that had good performances in this series, and it's kind of that it's that team thing, especially in the win on Saturday that got them there. It was everybody contributing and kind of working together to put some runs on the run. Christian Walker had a good series offensively, and he's honestly had a much better season. than his batting line will suggest. He's hitting 167 with a 700 OPS. That doesn't really jump off the page, right? But if you look at some of the batted ball data,

Christian Walker is actually kind of knocking the cover off the ball. And it seems like some of those batted balls have just found gloves. That is far more than you would really anticipate happening. So I think it's very possible that this is a springboard for Christian Walker to hopefully get things back on track a little bit. It's been a rough season for him in terms of the actual outcomes. But I think there's some really good things happening in his swing and in his approach at the plate. And he talked about it after the game yesterday, how he felt it's only been a matter of time before things would start to switch offensively for the nine and backs before they'd start to figure things out. And I think that's been true for him as well.

It's only been a matter of time before he was going to start, you know, clicking offensively and a 467 foot homer is not a bad way to get that. The third longest Homer in baseball this season. He had the hell out of that ball. Well, at first he told me third longest in MLB history, and then I was a little bit skeptical about. I think that's, I think I said season the whole time, but Jesse here's what he wants to hear.

I don't know. But absolutely, it was, it was a moon shot that he hit, and it was great to see him get that, right? I mean, I don't know. The Diamondbacks haven't had a lot of power this season, so that's something that they've been lacking. So anytime you see a home run, it's exciting. But realistically, what it's about is, you know,

our power hitters like Christian Washington, that we've seen have good seasons before, put up big power numbers, do it again, get back on track, right? We're going to need that. And also, I mean, I don't know. I think that this team offensively is going through something similar that they went through in spring training. We saw them wake up then, and we saw them put up some big runs, some big numbers and games. I think we're going to still see that. And I think we're kind of in the middle of that transition.

That's why people, I think people thought we were crazy when we were talking about the good at bats. because again, it's how do you call it a good at bat? How do you label this or that? It's hard to say, but you just know when someone's up there, you know, doing, you know, everything they can to be patient at the plate, to work the pitch count, to do all of that. But it's still just not getting that, you know, hit that we know they're capable of hitting by waiting for that pitcher mistake or waiting for a good pitch of it.

Right, right. But again, not to give Evan Thompson, he doesn't deserve this much airtime. I'm talking about this much. But speaking of what you're saying about Christian Walker, he kind of keeps stats sometimes where he puts a little star next to the player's name at a Matt when they had a hard hit ball, but a spectacular play was made by the defense

in order to rob them of a hit. And looking back on his score sheets, Christian Walker's had a lot of those. A lot of little stars next to his four threes and his lineouts and stuff. Are you like Evan Thompson today? Like I thought I was hosting a show with Derek County. I don't know.

I feel disgusted just giving him, like I said, shout out chops. We love Evan Thompson. Again, Christian Walker, two home runs for RBI are Draft King of the series. And again, if you haven't had a chance to go sign up at Draft King's Sportsbook, I don't know what you are waiting for, but you should absolutely go do that now. And you should use our code of PHNX to sign up because the NBA first round action is amazing. Today we had an incredible game between Golden State Warriors and the Denver Nuggets. And of course, new customers can get down on this action that I'm describing by betting $5 on any team to win and get $150 in free bets instantly, no matter if the team you bet on wins.

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But also, what we want you to do is bet the Suns because right now we are here at the Amesworth. We haven't even talked about that. We are here live at the Ainsworth. We're excited. The P.JNX Suns guys are sitting over here waiting for us to shut our mouths and get done so they can get over here and take over the spot. The giveaway is the Rally the Valley sign. Yeah, that's what we're doing. That's kind of giving away.

But, hey, rally, the valley, that goes for everybody in the valley is what we're saying. But of course, you can get down on that action. Sons, of course, Espos here, so I have to say it because he pays me $10 every time I say it. But the Phoenix Sons are the best team in the NBA. And you can bet on them over at the Drafking Sportsbook app. Download the Drafking Sportsbook app now. Use our promo code of PHNX and get $5 on any NBA team to, win their game during the first round of the playoffs.

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See drafting sportsbook or dot com slash sportsbook for detail. And guys, that's all we got. We got the Dodgers coming up. We'll be here for this. This guy's sticking around. We're going to watch some baseball. We can't wait. But we hope you guys Check it out. We hope you guys tune in tomorrow. We'll have another live show right here, right here at PHNX. And of course, you can be Ainsworth. Or are we at the Ainsworth? No, I don't know. We, we, I spent a lot of time at the Ainsworth now. The waitress knows me by name. And that's amazing. And I'm excited about that. But of course, you can get us on Twitter. I'm at cap underscore caveman with a cave. My man, Jesse is at Jesse and Friedman. Our show is at PHNX underscore Dbacks, but all roads lead to at PHNX underscore sports on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. listening to us right now on your favorite audio podcasting app be sure to subscribe to us

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And that's not going to be fun. Right. This is a little better. This is a little better. Yeah. And I mean, I'm telling you, this guy's killing it on content. So if you haven't had a chance, please go over to go PHNX.com. Sign up to become a member and check out all the stuff that he's writing. I do stuff there too. That's whatever. But we thank you guys again so much for out the show. We appreciate you on behalf of Jesse and myself. Thanks for your time. And remember, kids, baseball is fun, but it's so much more fun when you bet on baseball.