PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - REPORT: D-backs MOTIVATED To Move Ketel Marte This Offseason

Episode Date: November 10, 2025

JOIN THE SUPPORTERS CLUB ➡️ https://tinyurl.com/yc6km2r4Here we go again… trade season is here and somehow Ketel Marte is the latest name being tossed around. We talk about whether the D-backs would actually do something this wild, what they’d even get in return, and what it says about the front office’s plans for 2026. Spoiler: we’re not ready to see Ketel in another uniform. Plus, two MLB pitchers have been indicted by federal prosecutors on charges involving sports betting, and we discuss how stupid getting involved in a scheme like this is.An ALLCITY Network ProductionSUBSCRIBE to our YouTube: https://bit.ly/phnx_youtubeALL THINGS PHNX: http://linktr.ee/phnxsportsMERCH https://store.allcitynetwork.com/collections/phnx-lockerALLCITY Network, Inc. aka PHNX and PHNX Sports is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by the City of PhoenixPHNX Events: Get your tickets to PHNX events and takeovers here: https://gophnx.com/events/ALLCITY — including us here at PHNX — is teaming up with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America for an exciting three-year partnership. To learn more, visit https://www.bbbs.org/allcity/APS:  Find instant rebates, discounts and special offers on smart thermostats, energy-efficient appliances and more at https://marketplace.aps.com/default/heating-cooling/smart-thermostatsBranded Bills: Use code BBPHNX at https://www.brandedbills.com/ for 15% off your first order!Husband & Wife Law Team: If you’ve had a serious injury, Call The Husband & Wife Law Team first at 602-783-8841 or visithttps://husbandandwifelawteam.com/?utm_source=allcity-padcasts&utm_medium=digital-phx&utm_campaign=allcityShowNotesCrown Royal: Visit crownroyal.com/PurpleBagProject to learn more!Chicken N’ Pickle: Family friendly fun awaits! Visit chickennpickle.com to plan your visit today!Access Auto Insurance Agency of Arizona, LLC (Access Auto) is a renowned agency offering personal and commercial auto insurance options to Arizona residents. If you’re on the hunt for a new policy, call Access Auto today at 1-480-400-0546 or get a free insurance quote by visiting our website www.access-insurance.com.Visit https://www.macu.com/accounts/checking/mystyle-checking?cid=ea-PHNX-AZ-mystyleAugust2025-checking to learn more about their MyStyle Checking Accounts!bet365: https://www.bet365.com/hub/en-us/app-hero-banner-1?utm_source=affiliate&utm_campaign=usapp&utm_medium=affiliate&affiliate=365_03485317 Use the code PHNX365 to sign up, deposit $10 and bet $5 to get $150 in bonus bets!Disclaimer: Must be 21+ and physically located in AZ.  If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-NEXT-STEP, text NEXTSTEP to 53342 or visit https://problemgambling.az.gov/Gametime: Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code PHNX for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply.Shady Rays: Head to https://shadyrays.com and use code: PHNX for 35% off polarized sunglasses. Try for yourself the shades rated 5 stars by over 300,000 people.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!Monarch: Use Monarch to get control of your overall finances with 50% off your first year at https://www.monarchmoney.com/phnxWhen 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. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Are we really talking about trading Catelle Marte again? We have all the reasons why reports point to the Diamondbacks being motivated to trade Cotel Marte, and we give our reasons why it's still a very, very stupid idea. Also, we're going to answer your mailbag Monday questions and talk about being indicted for federal betting charges as a MLB pitcher. Otani? No, not Otani, Damon. Maybe next time. All this in 30 seconds, don't you go anywhere?

Well, ski and happy Monday to you all. Welcome in to another edition of the PHNX Diamondbacks podcast live from Studio K, presented by our friends at Circle K. My name is Derek Monti, occasionally known as your mayor of PHMX. Thrilled to have you guys joining us here on another beautiful Monday morning here in Phoenix, Arizona. Of course, this show is brought to you by our friends at game time. Make sure to download that app right now. Sign up and use our code of PHNX to get $20 off your first person. terms do apply over there.

I am joined, of course, on the ones and twos today by the incomparable Damon Dogg himself, Damon Farrell. Damon, we have big news today, including Cotel Marte trade rumors and a pitcher being indicted on federal charges involving gambling. Sounds like we got him. Sounds like we finally got his ass, Derek. I didn't. I don't know why I phrased it that way.

I specifically led you into that. It's not him. Wait, what? You're not talking? We're not talking, O'Tani. We're not. talking Otani. We're talking about Emmanuel Classe and Luis Ortiz. Criminal still out there on the streets, Derek. Well, they're cleaning it up. They're trying

their best to clean it up. It feels like every day now something happens where the FBI or federal investigators are looking into sports in some way, shape, or form. This has been an ongoing saga for a while with Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz. They were suspended a while back based on some allegations about them and being involved with a gambling scheme more than just gambling on baseball, more than just gambling on sports. And I just have to ask

what in the hell are we doing? Like, Emmanuel Claisse is one of the best relief pitchers in all of baseball. To get wrapped up in something like this is actually the dumbest thing I've ever seen, especially considering the amounts of money

that he was allegedly making over this. but Guardians pitchers, Emmanuel Class A and Luis Ortiz have been indicted by prosecutors in Brooklyn. Once again, that Brooklyn office is doing a lot of work lately. Prosecutors in Brooklyn on charges involving sports betting, according to Jeff Passon, and others that have reported on this. Ortiz was arrested on Saturday at the Boston International Airport. Meanwhile, Class A is not currently in custody, and they have been charged with wire fraud, conspiracy, honest services wire fraud conspiracy, conspiracy to influence sports betting by bribery and money laundering conspiracy for their alleged scheme to rig bets on pitches thrown.

The indictment details an alleged scheme that involves these two pitchers, purposely throwing balls so gamblers could bet on pitches being balls or strikes. Like, first of all, I don't even know where to go with this. even know where to start with this. Obviously, this is something that can be easily manipulated. And the very idea that strange bets coming through and guys winning tons of money on something as minimal as balls and strikes, which is just such a unpredictable, crazy thing to be hitting on, that I mean, I don't really know. I don't know why you thought in a million years that you would get away with this. The allegations from prosecutors in the indictment say that on June 15th, Ortiz

was paid $5,000 for throwing an intentional ball, and Classet, meanwhile, received $5,000 for orchestrating and facilitating it. Co-conspirators in the scheme, according to this report, won at least $400,000 on fraudulent wagers relating to these two pitchers. excuse me, relating to Class A and $60,000 relating to Ortiz. And then Ortiz, at one point received, and this is my favorite part of this, Jeff Passan wrote that Ortiz received a payment of 90,000 Dominican pesos, which is approximately $1,400 U.S. dollars. Class A directed him to lie about the purpose of the money, if asked,

and say this payment is for a horse. according to prosecutors and O.R.T. We applied, okay, perfect. I mean, honestly, $14,100 for a horse, that's not even very much money. I won't lie. My dad used to own a racing horse. That's not a lot of money. This is just so insane when you think about Emmanuel Claese being one of the elite relief pitchers in all Major League Baseball,

one of the best closers in the game, and now he and Ortiz are facing up to 65 years in prison if convicted on all the charges that I listed earlier. And MLB has contacted federal law enforcement at the outset of this investigation and has fully, excuse me, this was a statement from ESPN, that they, MLB contacted federal law enforcement at the outset of its investigation and has fully cooperated throughout the process. We are aware of the indictment in today's arrest, and our investigation is ongoing. That was according to the league, according to MLB. Ortiz was placed on non-disciplinary paid leave in July,

and then Class A followed later in the same month. The pitchers had their absence extended until further notice at the end of August as the league continued its gambling investigation. This is such a ridiculous thing to get caught up in. And I know that goes without saying overall. Like there's no need for me to sit here and wag my finger. I think most of us can all agree that, this is despicable.

This is the reason why, you know, things like sports gambling have all of these dangers and all of these things that feel unfair about it. Well, when you have people manipulating the game for the purpose of them making money and bribing the players to take part in it, then, yeah, it's literally not. It's not fair. It impacts so many, you know, aspects of this, which is already a volatile area for a lot of people, right? But again, the fixing of games and taking bribes, that's something that, you know, I think that in general, you would be naive to not think would come along with how popular

sports gambling has become, sports betting has become in this country. What's crazy, though, is I can understand, and shortstack goblin, absolutely right. This was happening long before legal sports gambling. This was happening when sports gambling was illegal. This was happening just to fixed games in general, right? So you're not, you're not wrong about that. But I think what's crazy about it is when you start looking at the sums of money, right? Class A received $5,000 for facilitating the one incident on June 15th, right? That's a one-time payment. Emmanuel Class A was on a 4.9, was being paid just in 2025 alone from the Cleveland Guardians, $4.9 million. He did not pitch the full season due to the disciplinary action against him.

But if you take the amount of money he made of $4.9 million and do some simple math here, he made $105,000 plus for every out he recorded. What in the world are you doing risking that career, making that much money per pop fly, per groundout, per strikeout that you are achieving on the mound as a pitcher? To go off and get involved with a scheme like this, it's crazy. And it impacts baseball far beyond everything that, you know, of course, is going on just with this particular case. It impacts, you know, all of Major League Baseball, right? And most importantly, like, just for a second, imagine the Diamondbacks being in a position like this, especially late in the season with not losing their top reliever, not losing like A.J. Puck and

you know, Justin Martinez due to injury, losing them due to a gambling scheme. You know what I mean? Like, especially considering how good the Guardians were and what was on the line for them as they lost those two guys. It's just crazy, you know, and again, this is kind of this, this, what's the point of it? Well, the point of it is, is that two baseball players and not just, especially in Manuel Class A's case, like just a no-name baseball player, nobody knows. No, one of the best pitchers in baseball has been arrested on these, indicted on these allegations. And that's, uh, that's going to have just a huge impact here as, as we go forward. And again, just a huge impact on that Guardian's franchise. It sucks for them.

Um, but also, uh, well, Killer X, again, wants to compare this to Salfrank. Salfrank bet, uh, on, on baseball. And I'm not going to say that that's right. Um, it's not right. Um, it's not right and they know it players know not to bet on baseball uh not exactly the same thing as being paid to fix games so i wouldn't put those two in the same category however wasn't sol frank like betting on like the d-backs when he was in like single a and stuff like that i mean kind of the vibe of what was going on yeah for sure and again you're not wrong about it being very similar in the fact that you you know it's wrong and you did it anyway i will say in the case of these guys they were getting paid money. Meanwhile, Saul Frank was betting a very minor amount and risking his career

for that. Like that's... Like 13 bucks. Yeah, exactly. Like not to knock it or, or, you know, diminish it because it's, again, he did break the rules and you're absolutely right. He was suspended for it. But... Well, and we don't unit shame on this podcast. What's that? We don't unit shame on this podcast. Yeah, no, for sure. We do not unit shame on this podcast. But again, it is dumb and it's something that you know is, against the rules and there's no reason to risk not only your career for something as stupid as that, but especially in this case, you know, no one, no one's going to go to jail for betting on sports if they're a baseball player. They're just potentially going to lose their job or their career. They are now facing up to 65 years in prison if convicted on all charges.

That's not the only thing that we're mad about here that don't involve the Diamondbacks. Damon's very angry. We're mad about Catea and the rumors, but Damon's mad about the Dodgers now not hiring or not spending on guys, right? Is that it? Or is it more of the fact that the Dodgers are essentially going to release some players that they don't plan on bringing back and somehow freeing up nearly $90 million in payroll space for themselves? Yeah, here it is, Derek.

According to Bob Nightingale, our friend Bob Nightingale, of course, the Dodgers will be as aggressive as anyone in free agency this winter. I know that's a shock to all the people in this chat. The Dodgers have freed up $87 million, Derek, with Clayton Kershaw, Michael Confordo, Chris Taylor, and Kirby Yates coming off the books this winter. Now let me read those four names for you one more time.

Clayton Kershaw, Michael Conforto, Chris Taylor, and Kirby Yates will be coming off the book. this winter, Derek, and that will be $87 million in the pockets of the Dodgers, just burning a hole, just ready to go, ready to spend, ready to get Kyle Tucker, ready to get Maracama. Let's make this team better. Yeah, we need to make this team better. This team needed to make massive improvements on last year's roster on the year before that as well, obviously.

What a world we live in, Derek? This is what I tweeted when I first saw this. What a world we live in where the St. Louis Cardinals have the 16th highest active payroll in all of baseball at $86.9 million. The Los Angeles Dodgers freed up $87 million of payroll by letting these four absolute bums walk out the door. And guess what? Welcome to the Kyle Tucker sweepstakes. Welcome to the Bobichette sweepstakes. Like they're going to be involved in every single big free agent.

because they have the money to do it. And meanwhile, the Diamondbacks are sitting up here going, well, I don't know if we could afford to pay Cotl Marte with this pitching staff. We might have to cut some corners and try to get better at pitching and get worse at hitting in the process. Here's an idea. How about, you know, baseball, all teams are just trying to improve on what they already have, you know? It's just we're playing by different rules than our biggest competition. It's brutal.

Yeah, you're not wrong. But again, it's the reason why we talked about it the other day. and as much as we want to scream about the Dodgers spending, we also have to scream about the pirates not spending and the White Sox not spending. And it's needing a floor to encourage these teams to pay more so that they can be the ones that swoop in and get these free agents instead of the Dodgers being the only ones

that can afford to pay them or willing to open up their checkbook. Again, the most frustrating part about the Dodgers is the fact that players don't even have to take a discount to go play for them. No. Sure. You want to go play for a contest. gender, you want to play for a winner, the Dodgers are a great choice. However, in other situations in the past, historically, if you wanted to do that, especially

a team that has committed as much money to their roster as the Dodgers have, you would have to take a pay cut yourself and do it more for the glory of getting a championship rather than for the most amount of money you as a player could achieve. And that was always the debate. Like, how much of it are, how big of a sellout are you that you just want to go join another team that's already winning championships instead of doing your own thing? conundrum as killer x puts here in the chat right right um but again it's like if you can also afford to get paid by that team more than any other team can afford to pay you then where's the downside right

you get paid the most you get to win the most you get to live in you know i know people hate l a but as as jason armstrong puts it here in the chat when you're rich you is living in l a when you're rich living in l.a is pretty sweet you get to live in you know calabasas or something or O'Honnie was living in, I think, Woodland Hills. Yeah. So, I mean, it's like, you know, I think it's just, there's no downside for the players to sign with the Dodgers.

And honestly, right now, Derek, what I'm, obviously I hate the Dodgers as much as anybody, but I'm more mad about baseball and how they've allowed this to capitulate and snowball into what has happened now where this kind of thing is happening because I'm not going to, like, why do you fault the Dodgers for trying to, to improve their roster year in and year out, doing it within the constraints of the MLB rules.

They're allowed to pay Otani $2 million and put $70 million on the back burner and wait until 2045 to pay that because baseball has allowed that to happen. Let me ask you this, though, just to flip it around, right, with the Dodgers being as good as they are and the distance competitive, as far as competition goes, being quite a far distance, right? What motivates a team like the pirates to even get better versus just raking in money as a business and just worrying about that, right? Like, again, there's a reason why sometimes franchises just kind of give up and that's because it's easier to not compete and just run your team like a business that's meant to make money off of the fans and off of people coming to your stadium,

especially a gorgeous stadium like they have there in Pittsburgh, rather than actually trying to build a competitor and retain your players, keep your stars there, get new stars in, spend your money a little bit and add to your roster, right? I just feel like sometimes teams feel like they're not even going to be competitive and, you know, why try? Why even try? That's one thing you have to give the Diamondbacks credit for is they've never fallen into that. No matter how ridiculous the signing is, no matter how much it doesn't work, you can at least see that this team has continued to try to keep up, tried to be competitive. It's as we've said before about the front office and the ownership group.

You cannot blame Ken Kendrick for not opening his wallet and spending these past two off seasons to try to add to the winner that we believed we had here after 2023. Unfortunately, those moves for us didn't work out. And unfortunately, we don't have the money to financially recover from them in the same way that the team like the Dodgers can, right? But you're not wrong. The league is at fault at the end of the day for everything that's gone on here. And as the balance gets wider, as the divide gets wider, you know, it's hard not to feel like, you know, again, there won't be more teams until you make them not just not spend.

There will be more teams that continue to not spend. Yeah, no doubt about it. It feels like the Diamondbacks have really tried to make an effort in terms of adding to that payroll, bringing in, you know, big time pieces that they really could improve the team. And like you said, it hasn't worked out. I do think that here we are and we'll get into that here in the next segment on segment two but like it seems like Derek

we're kind of in the territory now where Ken Kendrick can now all the goodwill that he's built up could go right out the door with one move. Yeah. And in the name of like trying to save some money potentially

right or fix the pitching staff at the expense of trading away essentially an MVP candidate. And you're in a fan favor in the face of the franchise over the last half decade and all this stuff, right? So as much as Ken Kendrick has earned goodwill, I think that we are now marking a very, very dangerous place here with the potential sale of Catel Marte. Well, we are going to talk about that on the other side of this break.

If those rumors actually hold water and why we think it is the dumbest thing that Diamondbacks could do, we're going to do that here in a minute. Don't you go anywhere? You're watching the P.HNX Diamondback show. Well, it's never ordinary to be an Arizona Diamondbacks fan, obviously. but of course, as you know, it's never ordinary over at Bet365. Whatever the moment, it is never ordinary. Bet365.

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Marte rumors and Cotel Marte possibly being on the trade block and why it was a ridiculous idea at that time. And here we are, less than one month later, with a new report, according to Bob Nightingale and his latest piece over at USA Today, that Cotel Marte is on the MLB trade block. Or is he? Because this falls under, I think, an article Bob wrote about 10, you know, you know, 10 questions about the MLB offseason, and this particular section was under MLB, on the MLB trade block, essentially, is what it was proclaiming.

And per Bob, the Diamondbacks will ask a lot in return, but they are definitely motivated in moving Cotel Marte with $71 million remaining on his contract through 2030. The biggest reason, according to Bob's report, these goddamn 10 and 5 rights, once again. And I don't mean to discredit Bob because I do feel like Bob is well connected, especially with the Arizona Diamondbacks team. And I do feel like when he's reporting this, that this comes from a place that just goes

beyond deducing that based on Cotel Marte and his 10 and 5 rights being up in 2026. According to the report, if they don't move Marte by mid-April, Marte will have 10 and 5 rights and a full no trade clause provision. So again, if those of you that might have not seen our report on this, before, what are 10 and 5 rights? 10 and 5 rights refer to a player who has been in the league for 10 or more years and has spent the last five consecutive years with the same team. That player is then automatically granted the right to veto any trade regardless of whether

they have a specific no trade clause in their contract. So that's essentially giving Cotell Marte from this point on from mid-April beyond full control over any trade that the Diamondbacks might attempt to make with it. Now, that is a good reason to consider trading Cotel Marte if you deemed Cotel Marte to be a disappointment or a player that not has fulfilled what you thought you were going to get out of him. I would argue, as most fans would, that that is not what has happened here with Cotel Marte.

I know 2025 was a tumultuous season for him. I know we had a lot of questions about. him and I guess, like just to just to be the voice of the critics, right? You have people that felt like he was soft because of the way that a heckler's insults about his mother affected him. And people felt like he was a bad teammate because of what happened after the All-Star break when he took time to go to the Dominican Republic and not tell his team and essentially not be available for games that they did in fact win without him being a part of. So again, it's almost like making a mountain out of a mole hill a little bit when you're simply talking about the results

of those games. However, I will concede that I completely understand people being upset with Catelle-Marté for not being with his team and essentially taking an extended vacation during the All-Star break to go back to the Dominican Republic, despite so many of us thinking that it was due to a robbery at his home. It was not an easy season for Cotel Marte. And again, not one of his best either. Statistically, he missed time. He, you know, again, wasn't the MVP candidate that he was in previous seasons. but he still was one of the best second baseman in all of baseball, and he won a silver slugger this year to prove it.

So when you're talking about Cotel Marte and his numbers from 2025, there's no reason to start suggesting that Cotel Marte is not worth the money left on his contract. In 2025, Cotel Marte had a 283 batting average. He slashed 283, 376, 517 for an 893 OPS. He had an OPS plus of 145, which honestly is one of the best of his career. 2024 in his MVP caliber season, he had a 154 OPS plus.

In 2019, he had a 149 OPS plus. So even with having somewhat of a down year, as we might consider 2025 to be for Cotel Marte, he still put up some of his best numbers of his career. So why in the world would we even consider trading him? And again, my problem with this seems to be the fact that Cotel Marte doesn't really have, there doesn't seem to be a viable story here besides a contract,

not even a contract situation, a right that all major league baseball players get. So by deducing, by connecting the dots from here to there, you're figuring this, the diamondbacks are motivated to trade him this off season. Now, don't get me wrong. I've said it before,

outside of prospects that the diamondbacks may not want to lose, but I have a feeling they're willing to trade unproven, minor league prospects far more than they're willing to trade Cotel Marte. Cotel is the one player on this team that you would even consider trading that would get you an absolute haul in return. And as we've said, the Diamondbacks need to figure out a way to get out of this particular situation that they're in this off season with their lack of starting pitching to start the season and their limited budget that they have.

So in regards to that, there are some things that make sense to a Cotelps. Cotel Marte trade, as there would be for any team in baseball to trade away one of their big stars. And I'm not saying that the Diamondbacks aren't in a different position as those teams. They absolutely are. Right. The D-backs are not in a great position right now. They are in a position where, you know, again, a trade like this featuring Cotel-Marté could shift the future of this franchise dramatically, right? You just can't say that the Cotel-Marté contract and what they're paying him is some sort of

albatross around the neck of this franchise. Like, he's still on a very friendly team deal compared to what other players that produce the same level that he does are getting paid. Right? And not only that, but he's at the peak of his performance. Marta has been one of the most consistent hitters in the lineup. And he's capable right now of doing everything, hitting for average, hitting for power, maintaining a solid on-base percentage.

Right? He has been clutch, as we've seen time and time again this season. And again, he's just, he gets on base. He drives and runs. He does everything that you could ask of somebody that would essentially be the leader that could tell Marte is for this team on the field. And again, I will say that the off field stuff this season is, it wasn't a great look for him.

And again, I hope that he learned from it. And I hope that this was something that's in the past. I feel like it is. But I also still don't feel like what he did was egregious enough. to say I don't want him as a part of this team any longer. Damon and I will just quit doing this show, by the way. So if you do not enjoy the PHNX Diamondbacks podcast, root in favor of a trade like this,

because quite frankly, we would rather go, like, change oil. No disrespect to guys who change oil. It's a decent living. And Damon and I have considered it many times while doing these podcasts. But we'll just- Every mean comment gets us closer to you, actually. Every single YouTube comment moves us that much closer, right? But I mean, Damon, this is crazy.

I know, again, I know Catell Marte, you can't really consider him with the things that have happened, like a huge leader in the locker room. But I've been around this team quite a bit. I don't really feel like Catell has ever really been that. Right? So it's like he's not a guy who you're suddenly disappointed in that by a great deal because he lets a lot of people down. Marte in general, based on what I've seen out of him is kind of a guy that, you know, he is very friendly with his teammates and loves everybody a lot. but he also keeps to himself quite a bit. And again, he's your prototypical superstar in certain ways, right?

It's just what in the world could they potentially get back in a trade that would be worth trading away Cotel Marte? And what would really make the Diamondbacks want to do this? Yeah. Yeah. What would make the Diamondbacks want to do this? I think that's the big question, right? And I think that everyone's answer would be a combination of. of maybe they're sick of his attitude,

which seems a little bit over the top because... Yeah. And that's coming from, and Killer Rex will attest to this, somebody that was not happy with the Catele-Marté situation. I was being told that I hate Catele-Marté because of me being upset with him for taking a vacation in the middle of our baseball season.

I think that he needed to be held accountable for that. And like you said, Derek, like lessons needed to be learned, hopefully moving forward. But for me, that's not... close to a reason to want to trade this guy. You know what? You saw it with Geraldo Perdomo the way that he stuck up for him. Not to cut you up,

but you can be mad at him and also not want to trade him. Both things can be true. Absolutely. We can try to hold players accountable and still be like, that is our superstar face of the franchise and we can't lose this guy. And I don't, you know, I think his teammates probably were upset with him over that situation. I had heard that Geraldo Perdomo was one of those teammates, Derek,

that was upset with Ctele Marte for the situation. And then guess who stands up in front of the media? to defend him. Heraldo Pardomo. They don't want this guy gone. So why should the front office want him gone? If the players and the people in that locker room are on team Cattel, they think that this is something that we can work past

and that this is not a relationship that's too broken. For me, it comes down to one thing. I've been a fan of this team my entire life. I was at, you know, when I was born, the first home playoff game, Derek, two months after I was born, sitting in the crowd with my family. I'm about as D-backs bread as it comes. I do not.

They baptized you in the pool. They did. They did baptize me in the Chasefield pool, the Bob pool at that time. But yeah, I mean, it was, it's a, I have seen this team sell off its best players consistently. And they never, ever get the value back that they need to. That. They never, ever get the value back. There's no certainty that the trade will bring you back the return that could tell Marte ever was as a player because you're going to trade.

for young controllable players that most likely are not proven at a major league level or maybe they are. I mean, you'd have to be. They'd have to be in order to be included in a trade for Cotel Marte, but it just brings back those bad memories of trading away Paul Goldschmidt. And even then, that made far more sense

considering he was at the end of his contract rather than having essentially four seasons still left on it. Just signing an extension. And you just signed an extension. Like what would make you suddenly turn? Like literally that that transgression that happened at the All-Star break is enough to make you not.

not want him on your team any longer. Again, I felt like he took accountability for that, was very apologetic about it, and actually showed kind of a lot of maturity and growth that I really haven't felt like I've seen and could tell. So I applaud him for the way he handled it afterwards, despite that being a pretty crappy thing that he did to his team and his teammates, right?

But again, what is the return going to be? It's not going to be Paul Skeen's, Michael in the chat, is suggesting. Yeah, like, if it's Paul Skeens, then sign me up. Sign me out. If it's during Scoob. and we give them an extension, then I guess I'm listening, right? But I'm getting a lot of people saying Hunter Green in my comments right now, Derek.

I've seen that. Shockingly, there's a lot of debacks fans who are actually pretty on the team of, let's get rid of this guy. And I find that pretty surprising because I tweet out something like, to the extent of basically what is put here in the chat by cool bro, who says, attendance keeps growing every year since 2023.

If you trade him, that attendance goes back. Marte is a fan favorite. He is one of the fans of this franchise or one of the faces of this franchise, right? If Hunter Green, Derek, is the piece that you bring back from a baseball perspective. He's a young pitcher. He looks like he has ace quality stuff. He would be if he stays healthy, big if, especially if you're a debaq's big, you know, acquisition at starting pitcher, health is seemingly against you from the jump. But if he stays healthy, he would be maybe the best compensation you could get.

Here's the other deal with that. The casual Arizona Diamondbacks baseball fans who you are trying to get out to the ballpark who you have seen this steady increase in attendance for, they have no effing clue who Hunter Green is. And they love Catelle Marte. Yeah. Well, and I mean, I think that trade specifically was floated out there by Jack and Jesse over at the United States territory, right?

And again, they've gotten a lot of thumbs down on that as well. And that is because fans are very much against it for that exact reason. Hunter Green, despite his performance, isn't that marquee name that you feel like is enough to move Catelle Marte. However, I don't think asking for more than a Hunter Green, who is a very good starting pitcher and is the exact thing the Diamondbacks would be looking for in return for Cotel Marte. I don't think asking for more than him is realistic. Because, again, this is the difference between starting pitching, which wins you baseball games and a position player who can easily go down and value as his years go on and kind of, with a new team, right? And again, that could happen here. It's another reason to say Cotel Marte, trade him, yay. But that could happen with any player. You signed to a long-term deal.

So there's no, there's never a time to really say, bring that in as a factor. That's just a risk of any athlete that you signed to a long-term deal. But the debacks are trying to build a consistent, competitive core. We have talked about the core so much, right? Because the core is the only way that championship franchises win, unless you are talking about fluke teams that figure out a way to somehow put things together, which many have called the Diamondbacks 2023 run a fluke run because of their run to the World Series. And quite frankly, it might have been, right? But that's baseball. That's baseball. That's the way the playoffs work and there's no real flukes. They won, they won handedly and they got hot at the right time to make it all the way to the World Series.

When you figure out after a run like that, who your core is that you're going to build around, that's a very important step to try to make a team competitive for years and not just have a one-time run like that. And again, the core of this team was determined at that time to be guys like Geraldo Pardomo, Cotel Marte and Corby and Corby and Carole. They've decided to build around those guys, and those guys have rewarded them with being as good as they have been, including last year. last year's record and the losses are not on these three individuals. Look at these numbers that these guys put up. Hashtag the core.

Top five offense and baseball, thanks to these three guys right here. But what you do with your core is you have to build around them. You have to add to them. You have to find step two is finding consistent pieces that you add to the franchise that aren't the core, but can help this franchise win for years. And then step three, once you feel like you have a win, winning team, that's when you go out and you add the splashy signing of a Corbin Burns or Jordan Montgomery. And it felt like the Diamondbacks were at that point. And that's the reason why

logistically it made sense for them to try to bring in a Jordan Montgomery or Corbyn Burns. Unfortunately, it didn't work out for this team, but trading Cotell Marte wouldn't either. It would be a short-term gamble for long-term pain, long-term pain of watching Cotel Marte go be an MVP-Caliber candidate elsewhere the way we did with Paul Goldschman. Paul Goldschmidt should not have signed with another franchise. Paul Goldschmidt should have been a diamond back for the rest of his career. And I know we joke about me hating Goldie and all of that. But all of that stupid stuff aside, which may or may not have some value there,

I will say Paul Goldschmidt should have never left his franchise. And what he signed for in St. Louis and what he was for that team proved that he should never have left the diamondbacks. Right. So this is a situation where Mike Hazen still to this day talks about that being one of the worst deals. he's made and it makes me believe that there's no reason why Mike Hazen would do it again here with Cotel Marte. Definitely not. Definitely not for prospects, Derek.

No, that's the main thing. Definitely not for prospects. It's got to be a top of the line front arm that gets brought in for Cattel Marte or else there will be riots in downtown Phoenix. You know, as Coolbro says here, like what kind of message would it send to your fans to get this Chase Field build done? Oh, yeah.

And then right around the corner, you trade the best hitter on the entire team right like that thanks for the votes you know thanks for the support meanwhile the dodgers have their entire core in place and 90 million dollars burning in their pocket to add to their roster it's like that what a slap what a slap in the face to your fan base yeah no 100% and honestly again not to discredit bob nightingale he didn't say anything in this article that he had sources telling him the diamondbacks are going to move could tell marty or anything i think he's just logically deducing that the diamondbacks are in trouble and they don't have a lot of

that they want to move or can move that will bring back the value that someone like Cotel Marte would. You pair that with the 10 and five rights thing and it makes sense that the Diamondbacks would at least be willing to hear teams out. But to think he's actively being shopped or that Cotell Marte will actually be traded this offseason, I think is far from the truth. I don't believe that that is the case, but I could absolutely be wrong. And again, I think Mike Hazen has said in the past that he's open to trading anybody if someone was willing to offer him a deal that absolutely blew him away. that was the time where he named guys like Corbyn Carroll and Geraldo Perdomo and me and Damon again wanted to light light torches and get our pitch forks ready right I wonder somebody brought this up to me as well like oh Mike Hazen has been you know talking a lot about well we need to flip some offense take a little bit of a regression on offense to gain some pitching and I understand that thought process when your team is you know here and here but like for me my and that's that's other way there you here and here but When you're, for me, it's like, I want to keep the offense here and I want to get the pitching from here to here. Like, make the pitching average.

Just a little bit better. With this elite offense. And what kind of team are we talking about here? How hard is it to find average pitching? I mean, I know that there's a lot of injuries and things that have happened. But to me, it's like, I don't think that you get closer to your goal of winning a championship by trading the guy who is the NLCS MVP two years. Bingo. Bingo.

He's your best, he's your best clutch hitter. he he mean well i mean haroldo perdoma exists he's your second best clutch hitter well i mean he's your best hitter hitter overall like he perdomo thrives in the clutch situations but could tell marty especially this season delivered time and time again especially in the ninth inning he was like somebody you don't want to you just didn't want to pitch to him at all right but i mean you're you're a hundred percent right just in regards to marty and and again i i think this is logical deduction i don't think that the diamondbacks are actually here uh trading could tell but uh uh I don't know, man.

Again, I think that Mike Hazen's comments, I felt, in my opinion, were more towards what they're going to do in free agency. I think what he meant about taking a step back offensively was, we're not going to go out out to Gino Suarez to this lineup again. We're not going to go out and add one of the best power hitters available on the free agency. Yeah, Benscher. Yeah, right, as much as you like. Yeah.

But a reunion with Paul Goldschmidt, far more reasonable, right? Far more reasonable. And then you have the possibility of Ryan Walschman and Goldschmidt being on the same team. and then I'll change my name to Derek Schmidt or Montez-Schmidt or something amazing. I think Mike Hazen, part of what I was going to say, and I didn't round out my point, I think Mike Hazen says a lot purposefully. I think it's a designated purpose. I think he tries to say a bunch of things so that a lot of GMs around the league are also listening to what Mike Hazen saying and going,

what the hell is Mike Hazen doing? He's talking about Corbyn Carroll potentially being talked about in trade talks. I think he's deliberate. I think he's deliberate with his action. I think he's doing that on purpose. It's like when he says that he doesn't talk about trades that he missed on or free agents that he missed on. And then he gives you a reason. They're like, yeah, that makes sense.

Like, why would you admit that you failed when no one needed to know that you failed? Why do I need to tell my wife, I broke a glass? When she's not going to know that glass is missing, she'll never say, why should I admit to a crime that I'm going to easily clean up the scene and make sure there's no broken glass left behind? I'm not telling her that, not at all. She'll hold that over me for a week. But definitely, man. I mean, I think that I still feel like this worries me. I feel like this idea being out there concerns me.

And again, like this, like what we're saying, the fact that this story exists might just be Bob Nightingale deducing based on logic. It also might be out there for a reason. Again, the Nick Piccaro story might have been out there for a reason. There might be, they might be trying to lay the groundwork to actually make a move. to trade Cattel Marte and the best way to do so would be to make sure people knew about it and that it was coming before it happened rather than to just shock people out of nowhere Pulling the chair out from under everybody Just our player however I'm still just very doubtful that we will actually see a move and I still feel like this is just

You know again logic but not logic backed by sources or anybody saying they're actually trading Cotel Marte I think it's posturing I think it's your point I think it's posturing I think I think it's a Dback's being like yeah we could We could trade him. And then Bob's putting two and two together with this, you know, the no trade clause that would happen. Yeah. If, if Cattel got kept. And it's, I think he's, I think that's why he's, he's bringing that up is because it's like, well, there has been some rumors that the D-backs have been looking to trade Cattel. And this is happening.

Yeah. So the Diamondbacks would be motivated to get rid of them. Exactly. And it's a really good report in terms of doing exactly what it's doing right now. They are motivated to get rid of them. Will they do it? I think that's highly unlikely. I think that's highly unlikely.

And I've even seen contradictory reports prior to this one coming out saying that Ketel Marte will not be moved this off season. So again, it's just reports. We don't know what actually is going to happen until it happens. So we'll keep our eyes, obviously, on this is the biggest developing story this offseason for the Diamondbacks. But we will be back here in a few minutes. Wait, let's, BCSC is here.

Yeah, we got BCSC on a non-post game show. I thought BC. I'm a little scared. I thought BCSC was like. a, it was like a vampire that only came out at night. And like the daylight, the sunlight is very bad for BCSA skin. His profile picture has a little bandana that might have to pull over his eyes. The daylight came by on his face as a known vampire.

You can't have BCSC out on the streets in the daytime. That's a fact. The world's not ready for that. No. But he says, rumor has it. He ain't got they love anymore, Hidal. By the way, when we did title the thumbnail this, Kevin Thomas did play that song. and now it's been stuck in all of our heads this entire time.

The whole office is singing in the Dell. Also, I want to say, Derek, shout out our guy, Johnny here. What's up, Johnny? We just met him on the streets. Literally 14 minutes before the show started on the dot. Derek and I are walking, grabbing a coffee, doing some pregame little brainstorm and session. Right. And a cookie, a coffee session.

And our guy, our guy Johnny walked straight up to Derek just walking down downtown Phoenix and goes, are you Derek? I'm hard to miss. And Derek wearing his, of course, the most Diamondbacks, purple and teal outfit of all time. Yeah, for sure. It's just like, yes, I actually am in fact, Derek. Nice to meet you. But appreciate our guy, Johnny for watching the show, tuning in today.

And it means a lot whenever we meet anybody in person. It really does. And they come up to us. Like, I know it sounds so like self-serving and stupid. But it never gets old. It really doesn't. It really doesn't. It's super cool.

an honor to meet real people that really watch the show. And again, especially- Because it feels like all these people here are fake. Yeah, no. These feel like fake people. We know Killer X's AI. He is absolutely a computer program designed to hate Toy Lovalo. And he is very good.

There's a lot of resources being used on Killer X. Killer X said he's going to run up on you one day, Derek. Yeah, no, I do not want that. I do not want that. That would be jarring. Hey, what's up? I'm Killer Rex. Yeah.

And I do. I remember meeting Michael Dixon in Costco. We did meet while we were... Just straight... Just fight. Yeah, just square up immediately... Yeah. What's up?

What's up, bro? I think that would... It would have to be that way, but in a friendly, in a friendly sense, like, you guys would have to, like, wrestle or something immediately. At least. At least. You know, I love to at least lock it up with guys when I first meet them, but... Of course, Ryan's saying he wants to shake your hand, Derek.

He hasn't done that enough as he comes to every event. That sounds like the guy on the air on the air. airplane. I was just yelling, I want to shake his hand. I want to shake that guy. I don't know if he really wants to shake my hand. But we're going to take a quick break. We're going to get more into your guys' comments because it is Monday. And you know what we do on Monday, especially this Monday. We're going to celebrate the guy that sings that Mailbag Monday song. All of that on the other side of this break. Don't you guys go anywhere? You're watching the P.HNX Diamondback Show. For more than 15 years, Access Auto Agency, excuse me, Access Insurance Agency of

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And every time you visit a Rally House, you're guaranteed to find something new, unique, and that matches your gameplay vibe. Find your local Rallyhouse location, shop their entire product assortment online at Rallyhouse.com today. Well, Damon, it is Monday. And as you know, we do the same thing around here every Monday. And that's not just because we're lazy and we're hung over from the weekend and it makes our jobs easier. That's because there's nothing we love more than hearing from you guys and getting your questions in our mailbag. And as you know, every year on this show is the year of this guy right here,

the year of the snake, our year. Every month on this show is Black History Month. Every month on this show is Women's History Month. Every month on this show is Black Women's History Month. Every month on this show is Hispanic Heritage Month. And every month on this show is Black Women's Hispanic Heritage Month. Every week is Shark Week, every day is Earth. day because Damon and I recycle and on Mondays we go the mailbag.

Damon, mailbag me. My mailbox, always something interesting in my mailbox. I'm trying to get to everything in my mailbox and then what's in the wild. Let's start. The very first question I'm getting to, Damon. No, not that one, not Travis Moore, Emily Williams, who will never relent on the Jersey list. Emily, boy, do I have an offer for you?

Thank you for your super chat. She says, Derek, you're going to work on the Jersey list. I'm not going to just work on the Jersey list. list, Emily. This very week, Damon and I are going to have a live re-ranking of the jerseys on this podcast, just for you, just for Emily, who we have been putting off on updating the jersey list for entirely too long. So hopefully that rectifies this huge mistake I've made, Emily. So thank you. Yeah, we'll be doing like a tier ranking or something. It'll be fun. Yeah, we're going to have a great time and it's all thanks to you. Also, congratulations on never

relenting on the bit. I've never seen anybody more did it. Maybe Killer X and his hatred to the Tori Lavallo. Maybe only second to that. Yeah, that's top two bits that are going in this chat, for sure. What do we got, Damon? What's in the mailback? Our first question here comes from Travis Moore, of course, who asks, first off says, sorry for missing another mailback Monday last week,

and he's got to get out of this slump. But a bit of a personalish question this time. I don't believe there is a definitive answer yet. Now that I live in Minnesota, how do I watch all the debacks games, Derek? I believe the easiest way, obviously, is still going to be the debacks like broadcasts like they haven't made an official announcement yet as far as what they're going to do for a subscription package now there let's we're going to talk about legal ways to watch it that's all that i have to talk legal ways to watch it of course but of course uh dbacks

dot tv can be cheap especially if you're a student or a veteran tomorrow's veterans day so that's just a great thing to bring up i think it's sixty dollars uh i believe if you're a student or a veteran. But again, DBAC's TV probably going to be your best option and you won't have to deal with where you're living and like blackouts and such, I think, at all unless they're, they say

Minnesota, so unless they're like maybe playing the twins or something, but I don't even know if that's the case. Blackout rules are stupid. It's the dumbest thing ever and I feel like that we should all be able to sue anybody that doesn't let us watch 100% of the team's games when we subscribe to their service. It's a platform I ran on to become

mayor and it's how I won this office. So remember, blackouts are dumb and let's make sure that we can watch our teams. And that one's, that one's pretty simple for you. But again, it's ever changing, right? And that's the one thing that, again, is could be impacted here as time goes on, is the Diamondbacks broadcast and who's in control of that and how that's available. It feels like MLB still trying to get a lot of teams all under their control. But, you know, you could have some provider come in and swoop in and suddenly be the new provider for Diamondbacks games and such. I wouldn't be surprised to see that change with the ever-changing landscape of streaming and

broadcasting and everything like that. All right, well, else we got it even. Our next question here is from Krobin Carroll enthusiasts who asks, if you could add one player to this debacks team to ensure that they contend, who would it be? Anybody? That's crazy. Okay, so anybody. Obviously, we're talking about living human beings and not dead. ones we're talking about active MLB players and not bringing back Randy Johnson right so okay

let's knock that out right uh obviously the biggest thing that's going to change this franchise is starting pitch Damon I don't think that there is a way that you could argue the only problem with that in concept is that a starting pitcher still only pitches every five days so no matter how good your one starting pitcher is it still reliant on the other pitchers and the starting rotation also be good in order for your team to find success. I'm not really sure. This is an excellent question. I feel like because of that, I immediately land with like Framber Valdez.

I feel like Framber Valdez has been such a consistent starting pitcher. I feel like he has so much playoff experience, anybody that was on that Astros team and that run seems to have like 80 playoff games under their belt. So, I mean, I do feel like Framber Valdez is the kind of starting pitcher that could change this franchise. However, in years past, I might have said the exact same thing about Corbin Burns and Jordan Montgomery. And I'm not bringing that up just to make me feel sad, which I do now. I do now feel sad.

I wasn't sad a minute ago, but I'm sad just saying that. But again, it is just a starting pitcher. And as we've seen, a starting pitcher not only can be lost due to injury, but a starting pitcher, again, does not pitch every single game, you know? So it's hard to say that there is a particular one player and Killer X brings up that Valdez wants to kill his catchers. Yeah, there's that too. But again, it's like maybe, maybe again, another guy that's right up there. I think Dylan Cease is asking, asking a lot, but he's been very good in his career. As far as position players are concerned, I don't know,

Damon. I don't really think of any position players available right now on the free agent market that would transform this team. You know, I mean, quite frankly, cool bro is right. O'Tani is the easy answer if you're talking about any player in baseball and damon is just going to get up and walk out of the room now uh but again it's because otani uh i mean he is like i said they need a starting pitcher but they also need somebody that adds to the team offensively so legitimately and fortunately as much as it pains us as much as we attack this man any opportunity we get it's it's pure jealousy it's It's pure jealousy. Nothing of this is anything other than pure jealousy on our behalf towards the Dodgers

because we would love to have Otani as with any single team in baseball and anybody telling you otherwise is a bold face liar. No matter what, no matter how good any player is, no player in baseball offers you what Otani offers you, period. And that's even playoff Otani. So anyway, what else we got? That disgusted me, Damon. I left a bad taste in my mouth.

I don't like it. Well, I think you made your own bed on that one. We got Jarmie here asking a question, as always, what should the win-and-loss record be before the All-Star break knowing that reinforcements would be coming off the IL at that time? It's interesting question. How many games below 500 could we be before we are completely out of it for the second half of the season? It's funny you say below 500. I was going to say 500 exactly. I think that's the target.

It's sticking around 500, keeping relevancy. I think that's an easy answer, though, right? being one or two below, but like you can't be too far behind 500 because the trade deadline's on the horizon and we know what this team does when they're not really in contention per se, but the trade deadline is happening. It's going to be, yeah, you're going to have a very short amount of time to quickly make an impact and show that this team is still alive beyond the trade deadline in order for them to not trade away pieces.

However, they don't have the expiring contracts next year the way they did this year. I think everybody forgets that. like the diamond back just didn't go crazy trading away guys just to trade away guys. They traded away guys that weren't going to be here at the end of the year. And they knew their payroll situation. So they knew they weren't going to be able to bring back a Gino or Josh Naylor or any of those guys that they ended up trading away. The only guy that's feasible to think they would bring back is Merrill Kelly. And I can sit here and talk about that, but I'm 90% sure we have a mailbag Monday question about it.

So I'll do that then. But what I will say here overall is that the next season, again, you saw what the record needed to be this year in order to make it into the playoffs, right? You're not asking for a team to be 20, 30 games above 500 in order for them to make the playoffs. You're pretty much asking for them to be 10 games above 500. So I think reasonably 500 is right where they would be once those reinforcements come back, if you wanted to feel really good. If this team has a somehow has a positive winning record, even if it's just one game,

when the Corbyn Burns returns, when you're going to, you get Justin Martinez back when you get AJ puck back. You have to feel very good about that, right? And again, there's a possibility, which we'll talk about tomorrow, that the Diamondbacks could land a starting pitcher that is capable of starting, but could still end up in the bullpen, like a Chris Bassett, who we saw dominate in the postseason there for the Toronto Blue Jays, right? Is it too much to think that maybe Chris Bassett at his age could be signed to a short-term deal here with the Diamondbacks and fulfill a starting pitching role? to get them to that point and then be perhaps an elite reliever and make this Diamondbacks bullpen along with those two guys really, really good. It's not out of the question to think that that's a move that they could make, right? But I will say that I think that if you start slipping beyond five games below 500, it's hard to imagine making up that ground overall, you know, and again.

Here's another factor, though, Derek. Mike Hazen and Tori Lavalvoa, we've talked about it. They could be coaching and GM and for their jobs this year. Got to pull out all the stops. And maybe there's a level of aggressiveness that comes with that at the trade deadline, even if they are below 500. Yeah, because they have those reinforcements. And it's all dictated by how they start playing once those guys come back, right? Yeah.

We are getting into the weeds here. And we have so much more in Mailbag Monday. So we're going to head to overtime right now. If you're watching over it, go wherever you're watching, whatever app you're watching on, come on over to go phnx.com. We're going to keep the party going over here. And we have a ton of more Mailbag Monday questions to ask here or answer. as well as, of course, letting you guys know about the PHNX

newsletter right now. You can be the smartest Arizona sports fan you know with a inbox little delivery from our guy, Alex, Dagostino, who is now running it and doing an excellent job. His opening remarks on today's inbox letter immediately made me regret ever being an Arizona Cardinals fan. And he was very nice about it. However, it's miserable sometimes, isn't it?

It's completely free. And again, you just got to go to go phtnx.com slash newsletter to sign up right now and get that delivered to you. Alex says a great job of covering all the things happening in Arizona sports, including our Phoenix Rising, making a surprising little playoff run that ended with a little bit of heartbreak this weekend. Oh, my God. Derek. Tulsa. I don't mean to just derail this, but like I got to just like vent for a second to you.

This is like an off-air conversation, but I don't even care. People will love this. I had plans to go to the Honda Rodeo festival on. Saturday after the U of A game was over. And I had my tickets. I was ready to go. Kevin reminded me, oh yeah, Damon, you're on the Rising Post Game show tonight. And I was like, okay, that's fine.

I'll get that done and I'll head over and it'll be fine. I'll probably miss all the rodeo. I'll get the concerts. It'll be a good time. I, that game was a, it could not have gone worse for your boy here. 120 minutes, two shots on target,

and the last kick of the game loses Phoenix Rising their season. Last kick of the game. After 120 minutes, it took Tulsa 120 minutes to kick one at the damn goalkeeper. And it finally went in. It's like, you guys couldn't have lost in 90? Please. You guys couldn't have won in 120? No.

You had to lose in 120. The arm backs have to make us believe before they- 100%. The dinembacks have to sell off their team, go on the hottest run of any team in baseball, claw back to a game back from the wild card, and then not make it at the end of the season. Arizona Sportsman. Still too soon. Still too soon. Cool bro asks, does Lourdes out the whole 2026? Basically, not the whole 2026.

But again, remember when these injury estimates come out, there is a time frame. And unfortunately, we always tend to be like, okay, it's 12 to 15 months. He should be back in 12 months. Well, in some cases, it's 15 months. And should that be the case there with Lordus, I believe he would absolutely miss the entirety of the 2026 season. So that is unfortunate for this team. And another reason why, again,

they're going to have to get very creative with filling the roles that they need to fill. And again, it's also still stupid to me that Cotel Marte is even thought of as being traded, considering that that just creates yet another problem for this team. I guess maybe Jordan Lawler can step in, but do you want Jordan Lawler's bat replacing Cotel Martes? I don't think so.

What else we got there, Damon, in the mailbag? Our next question comes from El Gaio, who wants to know how the Diamondbacks are positioning themselves in the Japanese market. That's such a great question. I mean, there's, I'm sure they're doing things that other Major League Baseball teams are doing. I'm sure they have scouts, agents, people in Japan. I'm sure they also have them in the KBO for the Korean, or Korea for the KBO. I just, I don't know if they're doing enough.

quite frankly. And again, it feels like an automatic assumption when you see all of these great Japanese players being discussed about as being posted and coming to the United States, come to Major League Baseball, that they're all going to go to the Dodgers. The reason for that is the global dominance that the Dodgers have over every other team in baseball,

as Damon and I have discussed in the past. They have done an incredible job of growing their franchise overseas. And Japan right now is producing some of the best baseball players in the entire world, as is the Caribbean, Dominican Republic. Cuba at one point was producing some great players. Everybody wanted to get a Cuban player. But the Dominican Republic, if you will ever Google the Dominican Republic,

there is not only an academy for the Arizona Diamondbacks in the Dominican Republic. On that same street and that same block in that same mile radius, there is an academy for every single Major League baseball team. Because, yes, that's how you grow the game, and that's how you find next level talent is by essentially scouting these guys at a young age, giving them a start on their baseball career, and hoping that the result is a sense of loyalty to the franchise that help them make it to this level. Not only that, but international drafts and things like that all factor in here as well.

But they're not, I don't think they're doing as good of a job of positioning themselves in the Japanese market for going after Japanese players, quite frankly. nor could you maybe say any other team right now in baseball has even as good of a chance as, you know, the Dodgers do based on their dominance right now in that country, their popularity, everything, right? Hopefully the days come along that players want to come to the United States to defeat Shohei Otani and Yamamoto rather than join them. But for now, the one factor here is that it's very difficult to be an international player of a, you know, that maybe doesn't speak the language. and comes to the United States and has a team full of players that do not speak his same language and he's not familiar with, right?

So it truly is a big reason why teams that have already added Japanese players to their roster and have multiple Japanese players will also have an advantage over the Diamondbacks based on guys being comfortable. You know, I mean, again, there's there's the idea that certain cities and certain, you know, certain teams are just going to be more friendly for a player making that leap to jump across, you know, across to a different country and, you know, again,

be on a team with a bunch of guys that you might not be able to communicate with or, you know, have much in common with, right? So R.A. says snakes seem to be more focused in Taiwan. And you're right. Again, part of that connection is that Yumen Lin, a player within the organization is also already a very popular player in Taiwan. Corby and Carole. Corby and Carroll.

Right. Exactly. So, I mean, again, there is some benefit here to having players already on your team that can attract future players from that country, right? But again, with the case of some teams in baseball, it's far more than that because they'll get to share a locker room with guys that they've admired for years and I've always wanted to play with. Plus, like, again, if you come to the Dodgers, just think about this much. And Damon's going to hate this. Come to the Dodgers as a Japanese player, you get to be friends with Shohei Otani. Like, what Japanese player that has looked up to this man wouldn't want that, right? And especially considering you both speak the same language, you know you have an in with him that most of his teammates don't already have. He can get you in on his criminal enterprises, maybe make a couple money, some bucks on the side. I thought it, I thought like I took way too long for you to make that comment. You were setting me up. I really was.

You were volleyball setting for me to just spike that one home. Jason Armstrong in the chat says, I overheard a combo during the last fall classic that the debacle. that the debacks are uniquely friendly team to new players and their families, where teams like the Marlins don't even pick you up at the airport. Yeah, that's crazy. That's crazy. I will say, though, at times I've seen minor league players for the Diamondbacks catching an Uber outside of Chase Field to go to the airport

after being sent down, and that, for some reason, didn't feel right. But that was also years ago. So hopefully that's in the past. But what else we got in the mailbag, Damon? Our next question here comes from Karen with the C who wants to know everyone keeps talking about bringing back Zach Gallen. What about Merrill Kelly? He should be quite affordable on a two-year deal.

Yeah, you're not wrong. Plus, he has a familiarity with this team, the familiarity with the Valley. And, I mean, again, he's just a guy who, quite frankly, at his age and everything shouldn't be a long-term deal for any team. Right. But again, bringing him back here feels more important for the Diamondbacks because he is the exact kind of thing they need.

They need another pitch. here to try to make the starting rotation for the final, for the rest of Corbyn's contract, they need to try to make this starting pitching rotation as good as possible, right? A big problem with getting a long-term pitcher that's going to be here for, you know, a decent chunk of his career is the contract it's going to take to do that. The debacks kind of have to maneuver on shorter-term contracts and shorter-term deals, and part of that is going after older pitchers that might not be expecting to get that long-term deal. at any point. But I feel like Meryl goes beyond that. Merrill is a guy, once again, like we described

with Cotel Marte, that this fan base loves. And Marl is just, I don't know, he's our guy, it feels like. And he came back here from Korea. He performed extremely well in his time for this franchise. He quickly became one of the best statistical pictures in the organization's history. And I just want to see him back here. Like there's a lot of reasons why bringing Merrill back makes all the sense in the world. I don't know if people are talking about it more or less than that gallon. I think that gallon, it's just still kind of up in the air. Many people believe that it's a slam dunk that he's going to turn down the qualifying offer. He's going to move on and get a free agency deal elsewhere, and the diamondbacks will get that draft pick. I don't feel like it's

that simple. I do think that the qualifying offer is enough to make Gallen consider coming back here for one year, trying to have a rebound season, and getting that long-term deal at the end of 2020. 26. That, however, is very, very risky, you know, because he might not have a rebound year. He might just confirm that he's a 4.5-4.50 ERA pitcher, and then nobody wants to offer him that deal. At least right now, there's some intrigue about whether or not he could, if he's this or if he could be what he's been, the majority of his career. Plus, you factor in how, I guess, unknown the 2027 season is and what's going to happen with that, year in baseball and again it it might yield towards gallon not feeling like he can get that long-term

deal next off-season due to all of those you know all of the labor negotiations going on and that is best opportunity to get a multi-year deal might be this offseason right but overall uh you know again it's because the the deal is on the table for gallon where merrill kelly we have no idea if there's any negotiation going on we feel like there is and we feel like we've heard both hazin and Kelly kind of bring up the idea of a reunion. We just don't know how likely that is. Hazen also has said that they are looking for young controllable pitching, which is not easy to get and is not cheap and is definitely not Merrill Kelly.

And it's typically not really available on the free agent market. Yeah, for sure. It's definitely more of a trade piece type of situation. And it feels like if the dive backs want to do that, that they're going to be trading some of those top prospects that we've been talking about Derek in order to make that happen, whether that's, you know, Jordan Lawler or a guy like Walsh Schmidt. But I do think that like this is a good comment from Cool Bro, who's been killing it today in the chat. Kelly should, you know, if you sign Merrill Kelly, like that almost means that you definitely shouldn't trade Cattel Marte.

You're trying to win baseball games. If that's the point and how does that help you win baseball games? It seems like trading Cattel would be for a long-term vision plan. of we want a young controlable pitcher for the long-term future. We don't necessarily think this makes us better year one. If you bring in Merrill Kelly at 37 years old, you better be trying to win now. Right. You're not just filling a spot in the rotation.

Also, Corbyn Burns, right? Yeah. We only have him for a short amount of time, and I believe the final two years on his deal, I believe our player options. So he could be gone after three seasons, if I'm not mistaken. If that's the case, then Corbyn Burns, we can't squander his time here. We just can't. We need to do everything we can to push all of the chips in for this next two seasons, essentially,

and try to be as competitive as we can be, as long as one of the best pitchers in Major League Baseball is a part of this starting rotation. Right. So also, Flee ball says, what about the milk commercials? Are they staying or leaving too? They are gone. They, the milk commercials are gone regardless of if he stays or goes. We need new milk commercials, and we need Zach Allen to, I don't, I don't.

know. If we need more from him? I mean, the man lifted weights in a milk commercial. I don't know if we need more from him. We need creative to get involved and we need to rework these commercials. Maybe Zach Gowan in a milkman costume complaining about how stupid the concept of the commercial is. And yes, I said milk. Milk. I think you guys say milk weird. That's what I think. What else we got, what else we got? Speaking of Ryan, you guys are the problem. Ryan says, what's the best food to bring to a company pit potluck Baja Blast Pie? Absolutely not. Absolutely not.

That Baja Blast Pie is the same color as parts of this hoodie that I'm wearing. It is made out of radioactive material that I think is anti-freeze and should not be consumed by human beings. I believe on the outside of the pie box before you ripped a little tab, it says not for human consumption in there. Hazardous materials included. Yeah, like you're taking your life in your own hands simply by opening that box and getting your face anywhere close to that pie.

All right. Not only is it a bad idea, but it's a cream-based pie at a potluck. You know no one's going to refrigerate that properly. No one's putting it in to the refrigerator and then getting it out. That's what's going to happen, one or the other. Either it's going to stay out and it's going to melt and it's going to get gross, which is already gross, so that's going to just be grosser. Or they're going to put a refrigerator people are going to forget about.

Then you're going to have to eat it a week later when you find it in there while you're trying to scrounge for lunch one day and you're going to be just hungry enough that you will eat it and you'll regret it every day and for every day, at least for the next three to five days. At least for the next three to five days. Now, best thing to bring to a company potluck, I will say that we've had some pretty good potlucks around here. And there are some pretty good items, I think, that go relatively far, but it's tricky. Company potluck, usually if you bring an item, you might have to bring like a crock pot to keep it warm in. I know Max does that with his wonderful matzabal soup. I know that a few people bring in various items. I try to usually bring in,

like, I brought in Tostones in the past. I've tried to bring in stuff specifically for my culture. But as far as the best item to bring, it's like one bite brownie or cheesecake bites. That's it. It's the little one bite. Oh. The little one bite circle. Little ones. Yeah, just the little ones, right? nobody wants a whole sweet nobody ever but they will eat a dozen cheesecake bites that are two bite cheesecake bites two like little brownie bites those brownie bites are there's crack cocaine in those brownie bites they are absolutely addicting and more so again like i said like you're going to roam around maybe you're going to get sick of eating like savory things like uh you know someone oh someone brought lasagna and someone brought some fried chicken and someone brought this right that's all

great. But eventually you're going to get sick of that. And you know what you're not going to get sick of? Those two bite cheesecake and brownies. That's no, you're not going to. You're just going to those a million of those. And like they're never not bad either, right? Like they're made by various companies. Sometimes they're made by the supermarket you purchase them and some, for some reason, as bad as sometimes various treats can be from the store, those hit every time consistently, like Cotel Marte in his career. Right? Maybe undervalued a little. little bit. Maybe when you first step into the party, maybe people are like, why'd you go out and trade for two-by brownie bites? But once those bad boys are laying on the table, they are

going to be gone because everybody's going to eat them. And you don't have to do any work. I will say that homemade items typically get me more than store-bought items, except in this case. This is the few things that I'm like, why are we leaving the lid on that thing? Crack those bad boys open. They're going to be gone before they're dry. I promise you that. And Jason Armstrong is asking Kattel is a brownie bite now. Yeah, right. Sean McFarland is also calling BS on the limited budget, saying the owner could borrow tax-free against his card collection,

and we could compete with the Dodgers. And he's not wrong about that. Also, hilarious side note. The Diamondbacks did have, like, I believe, like a Halloween party or some sort of costume dress up either day at work or a contest. It looked like it was a function, maybe an event for the good people that worked behind the scenes there at the Diamondbacks. and some of the employees showed up as Ken Kendrick's baseball card collection.

It was amazing. It was amazing. Hats off. Hats off to the wonderful people that the Diamondbacks are dressed up as his baseball collection. Damon, we got one more in the chat before we get out of here and then look at it in the mailbox? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, from Perloin. All right.

I think that's, I get that right? Perloin. Yeah, Perloin. Is it possible to have a Roblox game like regular? Regrettivator. Regrettivator collab with the diamondbacks. A hundred percent. This is a dare question.

I'll throw this to dare. Yeah, because as this is a dad of a daughter who plays Roblox and constantly makes me spend money on it. Robux. Robux. You're familiar with the robot. Oh, yeah. I am too because I've spent a small fortune on the Robux. Actually, I heard that that's where all of your pH and X checks are going straight to.

I'm just going to say this. In regards to this stuff, as dumb as it is for us adults to see anything like. this and think what the hell is this like cool bro is asking here in the chat i'll say like the diamond back is getting involved with dumb things like baseball in general getting involved with dumb things that kids like is such a key to oh a thousand percent still building this interest in baseball i mean so many of us were raised on backyard baseball video games and all the stuff that you know like when i was a kid they actually had like cartoons featuring baseball players and such they had saturday morning shows which they still do like we see with the nfl broadcast having spot

SpongeBob characters on the thing on Nickelodeon and stuff. Like they still do a good job of that. But as as they, yeah, see, Coolbro said they had a Minecraft theme day. They did. They had Minecraft day. And that was great. I think that's great. Honestly, I think the Diamondbacks need to do more stuff for that kind of generation,

no matter how stupid those of us think it is. Five Nights at Freddy is still very popular. Believe it or not. Five Nights of Freddy's incredibly popular with the young folk. But anyway, maybe we get that. Maybe we get Baxter as one of the Five Nights at Freddy's characters. That would be terrifying, especially if he's still, if he placed those human eyes that are already scary enough with the robot eyes from the movie. It's great. It does sound stupid. I think, Derek, with for a lot of older fans, but like, you're so right. Especially it's part of what goes into my Catell take about why you have to keep Cotel Marte. 100%. A hundred percent. Cultivating this fan base in Arizona is so damn important. We are still, even with the added like, you know,

fan support that we've gotten since the World Series run, of which there has been a steady climb and trend. Especially younger people. 100%. That lived and died with that team through the playoff run

and are now fans forever. You want to piss them off? Trade the most notable player on the entire team. Maybe Corby and Carol, but it's one of those two, right? Trade the guy that had the longest hit streak in postseason.

Exactly. You want to, you want to help continue to build this fan base. Do all the stupid little kid things that you can make little kids want to be like, I like the Diamondback. I want to ask my parents to take me to the Diamondbacks game.

Like that is so important to what we're trying to build here in this city. You're so right. And like again, I just made that comment about the Robux, right? But I'm not joking about that. I have lit up between that and what's like I don't even want to get into giving away free ads for all these apps that my daughter makes me buy stuff for her in. Right. But again, the reason why I do that is the happiness of my daughter. and I know that at times that's what she wants more than money.

That's what she wants more than anything, right? So I will do as a father anything for my daughter. And if the thing she wanted to do was go to Diamondbacks games, that would please me so incredibly much, right? I'm like, I love that too, right? It's kind of like when we do have those moments, especially with Marvel movies where our little interest bubbles cross. And she's like, I want to go see Fantastic Four tonight.

I'm like, bro, grab your coat. We're getting popcorn. I'm about to see Fantastic Four, right? Well, that's a treat for Derek as well. So is going to baseball games, right? Absolutely. For parents, yeah. For parents that, again, if you get the kids interested and they want to go, then

the parents are happy to go because it's not only a wholesome family activity that we get to do together, but if it's going to make you happy and me happy, let's buy them tickets, right? Let's do it. Let's go. We are not here for a long time. We are here for a good time. And the good time part sometimes is about taking your kid to do something that, right,

like that you both want to go do. I just started this new thing, Derek. It's called YOLO. Yeah. It stands for you only live once. You don't say. I just came up with that on the spot right here. You should put that in songs and on T-shirt.

Yeah, I think I might start doing it. I mean, I know this goes without saying and everybody already knows this, but like, they're so, this is such a transplant city. And everybody here is from a different place. And this is the first generation of like, well, I mean, I guess I really am when you consider that like, you know, when I was a baby, that was when the franchise came here. You were baptized in the pool. discussed earlier.

From people that are my age, mid-20s and younger, these are people that are all they've ever known is the Arizona Diamondbacks. For the first time in, you know, this franchise is history. Yeah. And you've got to take advantage of getting those people locked in because that is how your long-term fan support will continue and grow and get better and better is by the people that are like me passing it down to their kids

and vice versa, right? Because there's a lot of people here that are Cleveland Guardians fans. You know, it's shocking how many Guardians fans are here when the Guardians play at Chase Field every year. It's, I mean, like, it's, it blows your mind the amount of Midwest people that are here. And this is like getting kids involved is the first step towards building and growing your own fan base that cares about your franchise. So I'm all in on all the little kid stuff, even if it is a little bit annoying. It is. It is sometimes.

But again, not everything is for all of us. Just like all of these different heritage nights that they have honoring, you know, honoring, you know, honoring. honoring fans from across the world, right? And, and like, again, there are people that just are, you know, are citizens of the United States that might question why any of this is important, you know, but it's like me and my friend Penny lost our mind when they had Puerto Rican Heritage Night and there was a, you know, Diamondbacks jersey available with a Puerto Rican flag on it. So those little things are very important. And even sometimes if it's not important to you, it's important to a big group of people that the Diamondbacks should be catering to and wanting to bring in.

They should be wanting every fan that they can get to come into that building and be fans of this team. And again, doing stuff for the kids is, like you said, it's a big step in building the fan base for the future and beyond. Right. But also, Deborah says spring training is oftentimes during kids spring break. Temperatures here during spring break. Amazing. People do come. And like, yeah, again, you take kids out there for spring break, get them or spring training, let them see those baseball players up close, get those autographs.

It's a great way to get them hooked. and they start paying attention to baseball. I will say time and time again that video games had a huge impact on my love of sports because that's how I felt like I got to know every guy on the roster versus like, you know, just kind of casually watching sports at one time in my life, right? So it's like all of these things. Baseball cards. Oh my God, reading the stats, memorizing stuff, quizzing my friends, like all things that got me into baseball.

You don't know Carl Crawford's 2007 average off the top of your head? That's funny. Obviously you don't know ball. You don't know ball, but we thank you guys. You guys know ball. We thank you so much for being here. As I've said in the past year, your time is your most valuable commodity.

Damon and I thank you for sharing it with us. You can follow us on Twitter at cap underscore caveman with a K. Damon is at Damon dog with a D-A-W-G at the end. We're all Damon's dogs. Bark, bark. I'm going to war for Cattel on my Twitter right now if you guys want to help. And he's not, he's unrelenting. We right at dawn.

We will not relent. Yeah. Also, Emily Williams, thank you so much for your super chat. She says, Derek, going to eat tacos. Uh, maybe. Maybe. I usually reserve tacos for Tuesday, so we might wait till tomorrow, but uh, I, I hope I'm, I'm allowed to get them today, Emily, because she said no tacos for me last week. But we appreciate you guys. Love you guys so much. Make sure follow our show at PHNX underscore D-Backs, uh, but all roads as always lead to at PHNX underscore sports on Twitter,

Instagram and Facebook. Please leave a like before you go. Helps us out tremendously. Let's everybody know that you like this and want to watch a video, want other people to want to watch the video. So thank you guys for that. And of course, as always, we appreciate your guys time. We'll see you back here tomorrow at 12 p.m. noon with more on some free agents that the Diamondbacks should maybe be going after this offseason, including Chris Bassett, as well as more on everything going on in the MLB world. So again, we thank you guys for your time. Hope you have a wonderful evening. Behave yourselves, Ryan, and remember kids, baseball is fun, but it's so much more fun when you don't do stupid things to sacrifice fans and your own career.