PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - The Arizona Diamondbacks made some surprising moves in their bullpen as we approach Opening Day

Episode Date: March 25, 2023

As the Arizona Diamondbacks continue to trim their roster down to 26, they made some roster moves in their bullpen that will surprise many people. Meanwhile, Zac Gallen has been named the D-backs Opening Day starter in Los Angeles to the surprise of nobody. We also discuss baseball video game news, including MLB the Show 23 adding a WBC mode and OOTP Baseball’s projections for the D-backs this season.WATCH YOUR FAVORITE TEAMS HERE: www.fubotv.com/phnxBUY D-BACKS TICKETS HERE: https://gametime.hnyj8s.net/c/3442941/1410622/10874 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube: https://bit.ly/phnx_youtubeALL THINGS PHNX: http://linktr.ee/phnxsports PHNX: Our next PHNX Tee Party at Dobson Ranch is LIVE! Join us on Friday, March 24th for a night of golf, food, drinks, contests, prizes, and more. Come hang with the PHNX crew, fellow Suns’ fans and Diehards as we watch KD, Booker, and the Suns battle in the final stretch of the season as they take on De'Aaron Fox, Domantas Sabonis, and the Sacramento Kings.Checkout the PHNX Tee Party at Dobson Ranch Eventbrite to reserve your spot today. And Diehards, check Discord for your exclusive discount link!Circle K: Text code “PHNX” to 31310 to win a $500 gas card! Limit one entry per person—limit of one entry per phone number. The offer is valid for Arizona residents only. Must be able to verify the place of residence. This contest is administered at the discretion of the Grand Canyon Division of Circle K Stores. Circle K Store Inc. is a part of Alimentation Couche-Tard. You must be 18 years of age or older to win. For questions about this contest or our stores, text ”CARE” to 31310.Rotowire: Get your free trial and unlock all the best fantasy sports news and analysis at https://rotowire.com/phnxOGeez!: Learn more about OGeez! at https://ogeezbrands.com//. Must be 21 years or older to purchase.Four Peaks: Drink, eat, find, and experience Four Peaks at https://www.fourpeaks.com/.  Must be 21+. Enjoy responsibly. Bad Birdie: Use code “PHNXSPORTS_15” for 15% off your next order https://glnk.io/7qnq/phnx-sportsMor Furniture: Save big on the best furniture in the Valley when you head to https://morfurniture.com!Roman: Go to https://ro.co/PHNX today to get 20% off your entire first order. When you shop through links in the description, we may earn affiliate commissions. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What's up, everyone? It's Tori Lavello manager. The Airs one of Diamondbacks. Thanks for checking in. Hope everybody's doing great. It's time to kick off happy hour. And Clue Haywood says it's time for Friday beers. Let's go.

Friday beers time. Welcome into the PHNX D-BAC podcast. Right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Montia, occasionally known as the birthday boy. This guy over here, he's my vice mayor that obviously didn't get me a cake. It's the one and only thunderstick, Jesse Friedman. Not yet.

Not yet. The tea party hasn't happened yet, Derek. You don't know what might be waiting for you at the PHNX tea party. I don't. I don't. You're right. There's calamity waiting for us around the corner over there. But what's waiting for you, Jesse Friedman, is a beer to have with me on my birthday.

Oh, thank you, sir. There we go, sir. I appreciate it. I appreciate you. Thank you so much. Cheers. For always annoying me in a way that only you can. And for being.

That's what I'm here for, for being my co-host, for being, for being the co-captain on this thing. But the Diamondbacks made some eye-raising moves today when you talk about things we expected to happen when it came to their bullpen and who we expected to see on the roster and opening day.

A couple of names that we did not expect to see the Diamondbacks part ways with, especially considering if you watch yesterday's episode. Yeah, I feel really dumb. I'm pretty sure. These are wild. I'm pretty sure that Mike Hazen heard yesterday's show and was like, Oh, Jesse Friedman said it was basically locked.

The jury's familiar was going to make the opening day roster. Let's send him out early Friday morning. That's exactly what the Diamondbacks did. They optioned both Luis Frius and Kyle Nelson to AAA Reno. They also reassigned Jury's Familia to minor league camp. I don't, we're not that surprised about Friest. I think we all kind of expected, as we talked about yesterday, Luis Frius had a really rough out in against the Cubs. It seemed like that might be it for him as far as potentially making the open.

opening day roster, but both Kyle Nelson and Jerry's Familia, both were guys that we had on our radar. So pretty big, pretty big surprise for both of them. Well, Familia, I mean, again, it's kind of wild because we've talked about things like Jordan Lawler could do everything right and not make this team. Same thing with Brandon Fought. He was pretty damn good. And he was still sent down, even though his numbers are arguably better than the other options right now that they have for that

final rotation spot, right? What could Familia have done more than a sub 2 ERA and come in here and just kind of been impressive. I mean, he did, he did have that, the pitch clock walk, pitch clock walk yesterday. So maybe, maybe that sealed the deal. I don't know, but it was pretty interesting considering how well he is pitched that they decided to part ways with him. And then there's another layer to that because his contract stipulates that if he is not on the opening day roster for the main, you know, for the debacks, then he can opt out of his which it's looking like he will do now that he's been reassigned to minor league camp. Right, right.

Yeah, I mean, Tori Lavello was asked this question today. Like, what did you need to see from familiar that you didn't see? If I'm recalling correctly, he mentioned swing and miss. That was the first thing that came to mind for Lavello, just not getting enough enough whiffs, which is fair. It's very possible to come into spring training and have a good ERA or whatnot, but not necessarily have good peripherals. and whatnot to go with it. We said they don't look at that stuff as much as they look at other things that Lavello talks about, but you just don't normally think of.

When you look at like an ERA like that, I think it was 1.83 ERA for Familia this spring training. 1.35. I had those little reverse there. He had six strikeouts in six and two-thirds innings. It's not like you didn't strike anyone out. I don't know off the top of my head, you know, how many of those were swinging strikeouts versus looking or whatnot.

But, yeah, I mean, Familia did have an ERA over six last year. So I do understand from some standpoint, you're not just looking for him to look pretty good. Like you're looking for Familiar to come in and look like a different pitcher than he was in the past. Because the pitcher that he was last year, you know, with the Phillies and with the Red Sox was not a major league caliber reliever. And it's been a while since Familia has been, you know, the elite closer that we saw back in the mid-2010s. He just hasn't been that guy for a few years. So you can kind of see where they're coming from here. but surprising nonetheless.

Tori also was, he had some comments on Kyle Nelson. He was torn up, man. He said he sounded pretty broken up about it. Yeah, we have a clip where Tori Lavello basically talks about sending down Kyle Nelson and how difficult a decision that was for him. Man, that one stung a little bit. He was somebody that we all counted on last year, you know, He had a one-nine average for the first half of the season, whatever it was.

Something ridiculous. I think it's banged up and then tried fought to get back out there and do his thing. And he had some good and bad moments, and he started to show that same consistency here in spring. But maybe the consistency is getting very particular. I know it's there when he's right, and he was working to get right. So just trying to be picky right now, maybe the fastball command, the secondary stuff off of that, getting ahead. I just remember every time looking up, me and Joe Manspie were 01 on every hitter.

And we need to get back to that with him. Well, with, again, with the already open positions that we thought, we're going to be there based on the injuries. And now these send downs, we don't know how this bullpen is going to shake up between now and opening day. We have our guesses because some of these guys have been pretty damn good so far. But the guys that we know are going to be there, Jesse, Who do you got that you know is a lot for the bullpen at this point?

Pretty much same guys that we talked about yesterday. Mantiply, McGuff, Castro, Gingle, Chathen. Okay, you can pretty much,

I'm really scared to say this today, but I think you could take it to the bank that those five guys. Why would you say it that way? Because there's not that many guys left here. Like at this point, there's so few guys left. You just said, I'm cautiously optimistic.

Unless you're bouncing Joe Mantiply for Peter Solomon, I think you can be pretty confident in those guys. By the way, As Joe Mantiply lost a bunch of weight. Have you noticed that he's kind of slim down too? I mean, there's not a bunch of weight because it's not like we've not noticed that. But it's kind of like what we talked about a bit with Bumgartener. A lot of these guys look like they're in really, really good shape.

I've discovered that that is just not a skill of mine as a journalist. Like some guys are really, some people are really good at like marching into the clubhouse every year and being like, oh, this guy looks slim down. This guy looks like he's in not as great shape. And I was saying that I just go in there and I'm like, hey, they look like the same players as last year. So I'm not the right person to ask you about that. But Jomey Apply hasn't pitched particularly well this spring training. I don't think the Diamondbacks are super concerned necessarily about anything they've seen. But that is, I guess, something to monitor here as the season approaches.

So who makes it then? Who else fills out this bullpen? Because now it's really looking like some of those options that you kind of talked about there might be the guys that are still around. Carlos Vargas, Peter Solomon, Cole Solcer. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's, so you need three more guys, right? We named five that we feel pretty confident about.

There's three spots left. And according to our calculations, the Diamondbacks only have five guys left in camp who are viable candidates for that. So you're picking three out of these five, essentially. Carlos Vargas, Peter Solomon, who hasn't pitched in a couple weeks, but has not been sent out yet, I don't believe. So he's still technically in the mix. Ryan Hendricks, who pitched, I believe, is scheduled to pitch today.

I don't know if you might be pitching as we speak. Cole Solcer, a name we talked about a little bit yesterday. He's had an excellent spring. He's had a really good spring. And then the last one would just be whoever doesn't win the fifth rotation spot out of Ryan Nelson and Dre Jameson. Do you really think they could do that? Do you think that's the plan? I think they might do that.

Really? In fact, and I'm going to be cautious with my predictions at this point. But Peter Solomon hasn't pitched in a couple weeks, like I said. I don't know if he's really in the mix at this point. He's not a guy that we've talked a whole lot about. Ryan Hendricks, the numbers, he has 11 strikeouts in seven innings, so he struck out some guys, but he's also given up three home runs in seven innings. I don't know if I really see him as being a firmly in the mix for that final spot.

If it's not those two guys, then you've got to take the three. You've got to take the other three that we named. Carlos Vargas has some electric stuff. Yeah, Carlos Vargas has some electric stuff. If it's swinging miss stuff, he's got it. Yeah, yeah. So I think it's Vargas. and I think it's Cole Solcer.

We talked about yesterday. We thought yesterday had a good chance. I think that's pretty much a lock at this point. And then it's whoever doesn't win the fifth rotation spot. It sounds like it's going to be either Dre Jameson or Ryan Nelson opening the year in the bullpen. Wow. That's wild.

And Tori Lavolo talked about the possibility of that today. He did. Yes. Yeah, we've been discussing a lot of different options with every player that's still in camp. So, yeah, it's a consideration. If it happens, I'm not sure of yet, but we've filled in a lot of gaps over the past 48 hours. You can see the numbers probably can start to piece it down yourself.

And where that takes us, we're not sure. But anything's on the table right now. That's wild because I really didn't think that that was going to be an option for them when it came to those two guys specifically. About a week ago when we asked Tori about whether the guy who loses out on that, spot would be an option in the bullpen. He basically said it was a discussion that they hadn't really had yet. He didn't rule it out, but it didn't really sound like there had been much conversation on

that front. We wondered at the time, like, what happens if one of these deback starters needs to get yanked in the second inning and you kind of just have to piece it together with the guys that you have with no real long man? Maybe those concerns kind of wait on them a little bit. And they were like, oh, you know, we might wouldn't, we wouldn't mind having a guy who's actually stretched out to open the season. Because Jessica keeps asking about it.

I asked about it once or twice. No, what I'm saying. Like, it's funny to wonder sometimes if, like, those thoughts, then, you know, like, sometimes they haven't crossed their mind. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? Or, you know, it sounded like. Yeah, the Diamondbacks are out here making decisions because the reporter asked him a really good question.

Hey, hey, Tori loves his questions. But, hey, I mean, don't put it past it. Like, sometimes, you know, again, the weird part about it is to think of their, you know, obviously they're having these conversations and stuff. but a lot of this stuff is happening in real time. And they're noticing it at the same time that we're noticing it, right? Like we're there at these games as well. So it's easy to kind of pick up sometimes on who's doing well.

And, you know, that's why the familia decision kind of was surprising. Like maybe in some cases his ERA was determined by some good defense behind him instead of necessarily having the best stuff. Maybe it's just a situational thing. And the Diamondbacks can have analytics to tell them that, right? but yeah they do have some other positional things that are positional decisions that they have to make uh and it might have a backup first baseman there right who might not he might not have to be paving smith

let's hook let's go well because kyle lewis should not be sent down and we know that because the man continues continues to rake including today but what uh what do they have for a backup at first base yeah so i guess i'll i'll let tory do the talking here we asked troy basically to just list out who are the options that you guys have at first base in the past when we've asked this question. Tori is named guys like Emmanuel Rivera and Seth Beer, who don't look like they're going to actually make the team. Seth Beer, certainly not going to make the team.

And yeah, I don't think Emmanuel Rivera is going to make it either. So those seem like guys that weren't going to be real viable backup options at first base because they weren't going to make the team. But today, Tori had a little bit more lengthy of an answer to that question. Haven, Rivera, and you'll start to see Gurrie all over there in the next, 48 hours. 11 games there last year. Got him

a number of ground balls yesterday. I'm sorry, today in early work. Herrera will be another candidate. Somebody we're going to work in over there. So for right now, we're still trying to figure out when he'll get his first

innings over there. So I don't know. Higgins has also been over there. Wow. Jose Herrera, the first Baseman. Wow. I don't, I don't want to take a shot at Jose Herrera, but go for it. He might be the most light hitting first baseman that has played on the Diamondbacks

and quite some time. I don't know if he's a guy you want to give a whole lot of it bats to you over there. But this is really like the Diamondbacks need a first baseman for emergency scenarios and for very occasional days off for Christian Walker. Right, because Christian Walker is very durable. In fact, I believe he played 160 games last season. Sounds right. Yeah.

I mean, obviously, it's the emergency like Jesse talked about. The Vax didn't give Christian Walker a day off for a span of three months or something like that. But he also, they did winning D.H. Yeah, you can D.H him. So you can still get him at the office feet. And that's what the Diamondbacks need is. If you want to give Christian Walker at least at the office feet, you need somebody to go over at first base. And yeah, it sounds like that Gurriel is the big one there.

We've talked about his name a lot. He played some games with the Blue Jays last year over at first base. we figured that might be an option. And it's something we suspected might happen. It's not, if you need a guy to go over there and play first base, you don't necessarily need him to start getting reps back on March 5th. You can kind of do this with guys where it's like, all right, we know you've played there in the past.

So we're going to get you a couple reps over there before the season starts. That's probably enough for a guy like Gurriel has already played there to be ready to go by the season starts if they need him to fill in over there. it's just the fact that they don't have a solid option. And honestly, what's even a bit more concerning is the fact that when you start looking into their minor league system, there isn't a guy really ready should they need to call upon somebody. Like Seth Beer would probably be an option at that point. I mean, I think Rivera would maybe be a guy they would call up before they would call up Seth Beer.

And again, Rivera has the flexibility. Like as if you can even if you even if you're not hitting above 220 If you can come in and play two positions for Tori Lovolo He will cherish you Yeah and Rivera was a good defender like he's a really good He was really good at first base too And he had just an awesome stretch for them offensively But then kind of fell off after that

Yeah came back down to earth Speaking of coming back down to earth We know Corbyn Carroll isn't human We know he's an alien we know he's an extraterrestrial You don't need any proof for that other than looking at him run, right? Like normal human beings don't look like that when they run. They look like that when they go through like a weird wind tunnel test or, you know, they're in a convertible going 175 miles an hour.

He tripled again yesterday at Sloan Park. We didn't even talk about that yesterday. Yeah. I don't believe he's still home. No, I don't believe he's still home. But basically every time Corbyn Carroll, triples, it goes viral on social media. Because it's electric. Because it is electric. It's never an actual triple.

None of them have been actual triples where other baseball players would have gotten to third base. They're all mostly stand-up doubles that Corbyn Carroll stretched into a triple. And I think that's the thing about Corbyn Carroll's game. But we did find potentially a weakness in his game. We've talked about it a little bit. It's not earth-shattering. It's definitely not earth-shattering. But it's been kind of, I would say, magnified a bit in a very small sample size this spring training.

because his splits versus left-handed pitching and right-handed pitching are noticeably different. Jesse, noticeably different. It's pretty big. I had kind of had this thought a few days ago. I was like, huh, because Corby and Carroll's sitting like 400 in spring training. So you don't even really think to check his splits. It's like, yeah, he's probably doing pretty well against both lefties and righties. Leave him be.

But we have seen Corbyn take a few not great swings at times against some tough lefties in spring training. And so, yeah, last night. I went over to MLB.com and looked up some splits here in spring training. He is hitting 154 against lefties. He's two for 13, 214. 21 slugging percentage against Ritees in spring training. He's hitting 462 with a 600 on base percentage and an 846 slugging percentage. He is hitting over a thousand.

His OPS is almost 1,500. It's crazy. Yeah, his OPS literally a thousand points different. the spring train versus Ritees versus as opposed to versus lefties. Over a thousand. Yeah. So, I mean, it continues a trend. This isn't a new thing for Corbyn Carroll.

It's something we've talked about before. Yeah. Last year in the regular season, I want to do the full slash sign. He had a 590 OPS against lefties compared to 917 versus Ritees. And even in the minors last year, he had a 777 OPS against lefties, which is not terrible. Yeah. Not great in the very hitter-friendly environments that he was playing in, but not terrible. but compare that with a 1052 OPS against Ritey's.

So there's a thing here, Derek. The man has had fewer than 800 professional played appearances, so you're not sounding the alarm bell just yet. Sure. He's probably had about 150 professional career plate appearances against lefties, which is insane that he's already in the big leagues and he's already signed an extension for over $100 million. That's not normal.

But it's something to watch. It's something to watch because if, there's any knock on Corbyn Carroll's game, it's that he has yet to prove that he can really hit lefties in the big leagues. Way too early to say he'll ever be any kind of platoon player. Yeah. Because his value is too high no matter what, right? Like, even if you struggle, you want him out there.

Right. You're not calling him Jake Lamb at this point. It's not, it's not. Or ever, or fucking ever, Jesse. Yeah, I mean, Corbyn, I'm talking strictly offensively. I'm not obviously, Corvin Carroll brings a whole lot to the table with his defense and his base running and so forth. But yeah, I mean, Corbyn Carroll could be a really good player, even if he always struggles a

little bit against lefties, just given everything that he brings to the game. But it is a big variable. If you're going to be a superstar, which the Diamondbacks sort of paid Corbyn Carroll, like he's going to be a superstar. Superstars don't have huge platoon splits in general. You don't really, like, you go through any big name in this game that you can think of. If you look up their splits, they'll have splits. Sure.

But it's not like their offensive value is completely nullified against lefties. Lefties, right? And yeah, and I don't know if Corbyn Carroll is necessarily at that point, but it's something to monitor. He's so young that it's hard to say that. And so an experience when it comes to playing professional baseball, really, in the grand scheme of things. Yeah. It's like Mike Hazen said, he rocketed through the minor league system, you know. Yeah.

And it's just something you don't normally see. It's hard not to, it's hard to hold somebody that was at his level at every minor league level back in any way, right? Like he was performing at such a high level that you want to keep advancing him. And I think that he's going to do great at a major league level. But that is part of the learning process is figuring out how to be more effective against the pitching that really kind of you struggle with. Right. And I think the Diamondbacks want him, you know, getting the main. Major League coaching on that.

That's another thing about it that's going to help him come along, I think, as long as he just doesn't press on it and make it too big of an issue, he'll be fine. He'll come around. Yeah. It will be interesting to see if the Diamondbacks hide him against lefties at all. Right. I'll be curious to know, and we're going to talk about this later in the show, Hulio Urias is starting opening day for the Dodgers.

So you got a tough leftie on the mound. Does that mean Corbyn Carroll is batting lower in the lineup than he otherwise would? Interesting. Does that mean he's not, I don't think they would. bench him entirely. I think he's just too big a part of this team at this point to do that. Does he hit lead off when you know he's not going to find success at the plate against him? Tori tends to run out pretty different lineups out there, depending on whether there's a left or righty or righty on the mat.

So I wouldn't be surprised if Carol was batting seventh or eighth or something like that in that game. Yep. It wouldn't be the worst idea, especially opening day, right? I mean, it just makes sense. And then it takes a little bit, a little bit of the pressure off of him early on to try. just go out there and play baseball and find success at the plate. Could you imagine the rioting among Diamondbacks fans that would happen if Corbyn Carroll was not in the opening day lineup? Oh my God.

I don't. No, I don't even want to imagine that. What a nightmare that would be. Anyway, if you guys are watching us right now on the PHNX Sports YouTube channel, thank you so much for being here. It's, of course, a wonderful day. It's my birthday. It's also the Undertaker's birthday. So we share that.

There you go. I know Jesse needed to know that information. If you haven't done so already, subscribe to the PHNX Sports YouTube channel. Sign up for notifications. That way you don't miss whenever any of our shows go live. And leave us a thumbs up. Again, it's my birthday. You should feel obligated to.

And I don't want to make you feel obligated to. But just saying you should feel obligated to you. If you're listening to us right now in your favorite audio podcasting app, please subscribe to us there if you haven't done so already. Leave us a review. We always appreciate the feedback. Speaking of feedback, the Diamondbacks didn't need any feedback or any information from anybody. And nobody, there's no surprise when it comes to this.

But Zach Gallant is going to be the Arizona Diamondback. starting pitcher on opening day. Shocker. Much to the surprise of nobody. But it's interesting because Zach Gallen has kind of struggled a bit in spring training. He struggled again today, didn't have a great outing today. And I know that this was already like there, again, there was probably nothing he could really do to not be the opening's day starter.

But is there any concern? Are you concerned yet? Am I should I? I know you don't get concerned. You stay unbiased and neutral. should I be concerned, Jesse? About Zach Gallen? About Zach Gallen?

Should I be concerned? A little bit. Oh my God, don't say that. I'm going to say a little bit. I'm not going to say a lot. I'm not saying sound the alarm bell. I'm not saying you shouldn't be the Diamondbacks opening day starter. You absolutely should.

You earn that. But Zach Gallen has just not really looked like himself in spring training. Today against the Cincinnati Reds of Salt River Fields his final tune-up before the season starts. Five and two-thirds inning, seven hits, five runs, one walk, three strikeouts, gave up two home runs. He's not really getting the swing and miss that we're used to seeing. That's the biggest thing for me. It would be one thing if Gallen was still getting a lot of swings and misses, but, you know,

maybe he's missing a few more spots and, you know, guys are making a little more hard contact against him than normal. He's not really getting the swings and misses that we're used to seeing. Gallon has only 10 strikeouts in the Cactus League over 16 and two-thirds innings. I'm still not going too crazy about this. His velocity ticked up a little bit today. I think it was around 92 and a half on average. It was 91 and a half in his last start.

So that's a positive development. But be interesting to see what he looks like next week at Dodger Stadium. You like to believe that he can turn it on and maybe he's just kind of been working on some stuff. And, you know, this isn't really him going as hard as he could possibly go. But we'll have to see. That's my question is I feel like certain guys when they're at this point in their career don't want to go out there in spring training and show that everything that they can do just yet. Right. Yeah.

I also don't know because Zach Gallen hasn't had many starts against an actual opposition. And I don't know, like, I'm not saying he's actively going out there and not putting in an effort. but we know that guys at this stage in their career tend to be working on something specific, and they don't really care about the results. They don't care if they're giving up homers. They're literally trying to throw a certain pitch, you know, almost every bat to try to work on it, right?

So, like, obviously that could be the case here with Gallen, but... That has definitely been the case to some degree. He has talked about that after some of his outings, you know, experimenting with different pitches and different spots or whatnot. You'd rather screw up now and see what does and doesn't work and see what, you know, I mean, but there does come a point where you kind of want to see Gallen, like, dialed in and you want to see him kind of the way that hopefully we get to see him, you know, in the regular season. So there does seem to be a bit of concern. But Tori Lavello, uh, had a little bit more information today.

To switch to switch gears, here's Tori Lavello talking about why Zach Gallen unequivocally deserved to be the opening day start. Without a doubt on Tori, on Tori's side. I don't know. He's just, he's earned it. He's, he's. He was one of the top pitchers in the National League last year. He anchored our staff all year last year. And I just think he deserves it. And it's an exciting moment for him.

It'll be his first opening day start. And I know that honor only happens to 30 pitchers in the big leagues, and he's one of them. And he deserves it. That's the only thing I can come up with. But I couldn't think of a better candidate. somebody's going to be ready. Thomas win a baseball game.

That's the bottom line. Clutch Canuck with an interesting comment about being concerned with the pitch clock with Zach Gallen, don't have the stat, but he seemed to take his time with players on base last year. He absolutely did. He absolutely did. He was one of the slowest workers in baseball last year with runners on base. He also, I believe if you look at the difference between his pace without runners on base versus with runners on base, he had the largest difference of anyone in all of baseball,

at least among starting pitchers. So, yeah, once he gets guys on base, Gallen does tend to slow the game down a lot, and that's something that he's had to adjust on. He hasn't been able to do that. With the pitch clock, you can't slow the game down to the degree that he has in the past. You also can't throw to first base six times in the bat

like we saw Zach Gallen do at times last year. I'm not necessarily convinced that his spring training struggles have much to do with that. It hasn't at least visually looked to me. Like that's been that's been bothering him. But, but it's possible. You never know.

Yeah, you never know. And especially he's not going to admit to it. But we do have, we do hear a little passive aggressive comments from everybody. I don't like, I don't know too many people that have like, that play the game that love the pitch clock or like completely back and fully.

Right. There's either the attitude like Tori has, which is basically what's the point of. even having a like what's what's the point of having an opinion on it we're going to do it and we're forced to do it and it's a rule so we're just going to do it and some guys that seems to be the position they take like if if you kind of listen to them uh you know talk about it they'll they'll just say whatever it is what it is the minor league guys that have been through it like dray jameson and tommy henry they don't seem to mind it at all like the guys that have played in it don't really

have much like complaints about it which is interesting to me because again it feels like one of those things that you're, you're more mentally upset about than you are once you actually start doing it in the game. So, but we'll see if that impacts that Gallen once the regular season comes along. Hopefully, uh, my,

my crazy conspiracy there is the case. And hopefully Zach Gallen is just kind of working on stuff and not, not given that full effort because he doesn't need to at this time of the year. I don't think it's that crazy. I mean, that's a pretty normal thing. And Gallin has talked about that some. So yeah,

that's why I'm not, I'm not that concern. Like if Zach Gallen goes out there against the Dodgers and, and go six scoreless innings or something, and be like, yeah, well, that's kind of who's that gallon is, right? I mean, you made out of 2.54 ERA last year, and you figure when the bright lights come on, he'll be able to turn it on.

So it's more of just a thing to monitor something to watch. I did look at his spring training numbers in years past, just to compare. He only pitched in two games last year. Obviously, it was a really quick ramp up. Looked good in those games at a 1.42 ERA. pretty good in 2021 as well. If you go back to 2018, though,

Zach Gowan, this was before he actually broke into the major, so I think he was kind of the young minor league coming up, wasn't expected to make the team. But Zach Gallin in 2018, four in a third innings, 15 hits, 18 runs, three home runs, eight walks, three strikeouts.

That was Zach Gowan in 2018 in spring training with the Miami Marlins. So he's been through worse, Derek. I guess that's what I'm trying to say. Like that poor kid, the Dodgers, served up to the Diamondbacks in the first inning the other day. Poor guy. A 37.3A. That's rough, man.

That is rough. You're right. Things could be worse. Today is a great day. Not only is it my birthday, but we're going out to have a fun time at Dobson Ranch for our PHNXT party tonight. I hope to see so many of you guys out there. If you're a diehard already, we thank you guys for being a diehard, for joining us,

being part of the family. If you haven't gotten that membership yet, grab yourself a diehard membership. Not only do you get discounts on events like this, you also get exclusive invites to members-only events and members-only discounts with our partners. You get a free piece of merchandise from the phnx locker.com every year. You're a member as well as 20% off all future purchases. You also get Jesse's newsletter full count and all the wonderful writings from all of our writers here at go p hnx.com you also get access to our members only discord lounge as well so many benefits

to being a diehard member so join the family today uh and get in here uh join us tonight it's going to be a fun time on your way out there of course stock up at your favorite on all your favorite stuff uh at circle k it's the best way to get yourself ready for tonight bring uh you know we're gonna golf right so make sure to grab yourself some gatorade stay hydrated i'm gonna need an energy drink definitely between then and now and i do know that they have uh the mom that I love, the 12 ounce ones, two for $4.50 or three for $6. I don't buy them anywhere else because when I do, I feel like I'm just losing money. And sometimes I do it out of convenience, but CircleK is so convenient.

They're located all over the valley. And of course, you can find them on their store locator over at CircleK.com slash store dash locator to find the Circle K near you. Make sure you're not missing out on all this great stuff and be stocked up on March Madden. fuel all month long here from Circle K. While you're there, make sure to grab yourself some Four Peaks beer. That's what we're drinking today. Again, cheers to my friend, Jesse. I have to call them that.

I'm obligated to call them my friend on this show. But of course, shout out to Four Peaks. Our favorite local brew, make sure to grab their beer wherever you get your beer. Grab it at Circle K. You can also check out their 8th Street Pub, Four Peaks, Eighth Street Pub. They have tours all month long in the month of March. They also have their events calendar where you can get all their beer week entertainment at 4Peaks.com slash events. And got Boe sitting over here, Bo in the House.

Cardinals here, we are very excited about what the Cardinals future looks like. Hopefully, like Jesse said, Jesse took a knock at them yesterday saying, Are we? The D-backs, the D-Backs were there one point. Now that's where the Cardinals are. The draft is always big. The draft is always huge. And of course, new coach, new GM, Cardinals,

the third pick in the draft. It's a big opportunity for Arizona and the best place to take in this pivotal moment and the rest of the NFL draft on April 27th is the Four Peaks 8th Street Pub. Must be 21 years or older to enjoy responsibly. Before we get out of here, we got lots of baseball video game news, which is really what

I wanted to make this podcast. The best kind of news. It's all I wanted to make. That's all I wanted to talk about video games. A power wash simulator. That's pretty much it. That's what I wanted to make the show into. Jesse wouldn't let me. But we do have, of course, MLB the show 23 dropped today. I guess for people that pre-ordered it.

You guys are lucky devils. I don't get mine until March 28th. But people are loving it so far, Jesse. So far I've seen. I haven't seen, like usually when a video game drops, you will see a wave of either complaints or compliments about it. Yeah, everyone's just angry for at least about a month. Because we...

And then it cools off. Look, here's the thing with video games. We all get made into beta testers now, even when we're purchasing a game. They have the ability to actually let you beta test games. So they could do that. But instead a lot of times you go out there, you pay the money for the game, and then you become the beta tester figuring out the bugs

and all the things wrong with it in the first like two months, while the rest of us wait for the price to drop, and then we buy it at a reasonable time. I mean, MLB the show has zero competition. No, it really doesn't. It's always a little dangerous. I mean, it's kind of the same deal with NBA two pay. Yeah, right. Like who exactly is pushing you to make this game better year?

But they did. But yeah, it seems like MLB the show is people are enjoying it so far. I had some fun tuning into some live streams late last night, seeing people poke around. Yeah, we're definitely going to do. Oh, we are absolutely doing that. Yeah, for sure. We got to see Derek lose to a team on rookie at some point. I'm not going to lose to a team on rookie.

All right. We got to see Derek narrowly win a game on rookie. That's fine. That'll probably happen. But they did include a really cool update, which is that the World Baseball Classic teams are going to be featured as well as the teams or the stadiums where the games were played in. So you'll be able to play in Taiwan and Japan as well as Chase Field. Will the, will the roof be leaking?

The roof will be leaking. It leaks on the on the on deck circle, yep. And in section 126. And it doesn't open if people are in the stadium. That's part of the video game. But in the video game, the players aren't smart enough to know to like get out of the way when the water is dripping. So Mike Trout just walks up to the plate and he's just drenched. And then like it affects you a bat, right?

You're slippery now and it's not going to be a effective. The realism is incredible. But in other video game news, another game that this guy over here absolutely loves and a lot of people do is the Out of the Park Baseball Strategy game franchise, which has released its 24th edition of the baseball simulator. And to celebrate its release today, the team at Out of the Park baseball ran 1,000 simulation of the 2023 MLB season to get a fill for what fans can expect this year. And Jesse OOTP predicted the Arizona Diamondbacks would edge out the Philadelphia Phillies by one game for the final playoff spot in the National League.

Hey man. Let's go. That's what we've been talking about. We've been talking about the Philadelphia Phillies being the team that you kind of got to beat if you're going to get in there. Correct. You know the Mets are going to be in there. You know, the Braves are going to be in there.

That's where a wildcar team in this situation. And so were the Padres. Dodgers won the division. Cardinals won the division and the Braves won their division. I just love the optics of the Mets being a wildcard team. Isn't that wild? How much money? It is wild.

So they match up in this simulation. They match up with the Padres in the playoffs. We would match up with the Cardinals. And then the Dodgers and the Braves would have a buy in the first round. Cardinals, Diamondbacks historically, has gone very poorly for the Diamondbacks. According to the simulation. play well against that baseball. In 103 matchups, the Cardinals dominated the D-backs in the first round of the National League playoffs, winning up, picking up a series victory 63% of the time.

I mean, that's not so high, right? I guess you got a better than a one-third shot of winning it, right? In the, in the, like, I guess in the averages, that's a pretty big, that's a pretty big margin of victory. That is pretty, yeah, that is pretty big. I will say if you got the Cardinals in a three-game series, the Cardinals starting pitching, is kind of the weakness. It's not a team that necessarily is built for the postseason, I wouldn't say. Not to say the Diamondbacks, you know, I mean, you feel pretty good about Gallin and game one.

Sure. I don't know. I don't know about the, you know, who you got in the second and third games of that series if it went that far. Drey Jameson. Drey Jameson and Brandon fought. There you go. Let's go. Let's go.

I love that idea. I feel like it would be fascinating if the Diamondbacks were in a postseason series because they would have to figure out whether, like, how to use Madison Bumgarner. Because, because the man is a postseason legend. He is a more legendary postseason performer than anyone in the Diamondbacks roster. Yeah, but does that matter at this point? Like, is he that guy anymore? It might not.

But it might. I don't know. I mean, if you're Tori Lavello, are you going to look Mad Bum in the eyes? One of the best postseason pitchers of all time? Tell him take a seat. Sit on in potty. We might have a, you know, an inning for you in the fifth. if we're down by seven runs or something.

I don't know if you're going to use that man in a walk. That's a sick burn. Because he's not, I don't think the Diamondbacks would consider him as one of their, one of their three best starting pitchers. Nor their five top relievers. Yeah. I don't know. Where would he factor in?

I don't know. Although Madbom is slated to start the third game of the season. It lines up as Gallin for game one, Merrill Kelly, game two, Madbum, and then Zach Davies as the fourth starter. and then, of course, whoever wins the fifth spot after that. Don't like that. Don't like that one bit. But again, this is the reason why when you look at some of the bullpen things that are happening, you should be probably a little bit more excited about it because Kyle Nelson is a really good pitcher, for instance.

And for them to pass up on Jerees Familia's experience and Kyle Nelson, knowing what they can get out of him and how reliable he's been for them in the best, I think it shows that there's some exciting new arms on this team that they think are going to be, able to help them win baseball games more than some of the names that we've seen already in the bullpen last year that honestly at times just like it's it's it's no attack i mean jo man to ply was this team's only all-star and even he dropped the ball at times when it came to coming in and being reliable especially yeah in the second half of the season so i think that all this change is good for the debacks and it just goes to show that they're really not holding on to any you know of these old players

just due to familiarity or due to the fact that you know lovolo at one point you know he's could trust them. It sounds really like they're trying to bring in the best talent, whether it's a veteran or whether it's a guy that's, you know, just coming up out of the minor leagues. Yeah. I mean, you feel like last year, familiar with the spring he's had probably makes the team. And you feel like Kyle Nelson, you know, technically Kyle Nelson didn't make the team last year. He lost out to one Oliver Perez. Oliver Perez. He did not last long.

Who did make the team last year. Let's not forget that. A few games before official. entering retirement. But, but yeah, I think the bar has been raised a little bit in the bullpen. We're not here to say the debacks have a top, top 10, even like a top 50% bullpen at this point. But I think it's, I think it's better and it's different at the very least than what they had last year. We have a brand new sponsor. And we are very excited to be partnering with our friends from Fubo TV. By the way, yes, Fubo TV. 140 plus live channels of sports, shows,

movies, and news. Cut that cord and get over to Fubbo. TV, stream live TV from any device. Watch the most Arizona sports for the lowest price. And you can start watching immediately with a seven-day free trial, no contract, no cable, no hassle. Just sign up and start watching. They actually have thousands of hours of cloud DVR space included at no extra charge. And you can watch your Arizona Diamondbacks on Valley Sports with Fubo TV. Use the link in the description to sign up for 15% off your first month of Fubo Pro.

I wanted to throw in there for now. Because we have no idea how long you're going to be able to watch ballet sports. But in the meantime, Fubo TV's got your back because whether it's Bally sports or anywhere else, they will be broadcasting that. And if MLB.com doesn't end up broadcasting those games and Bally sports continues to do so, make sure to catch all of that action on Fubo TV. Weak, let's see, what we got. Watch your local teams while traveling to. That's another big thing that you can do with Fubo TV. And also, when you guys are ready to check out some baseball games, again, we've tried to tell you.

Spring training was here. It's gone now. Well, Saw Riverfields, that part of it is gone, which is really sad. It's very sad. I knew he was going. I shut it to here. I shed it to year when I left Saw Riverfield. He's so upset.

He's so actually. It's so beautiful. And I tell him, like, imagine, but you don't know what you're watching games in June is like there. And I imagine it would be absolutely miserable. It probably would be. Yeah. But I still, in the press box, we have air conditioning. Yeah, maybe.

I believe they have air. conditioning in the press box. So the players would be miserable there. We would be fine at Salt River Fields in the middle of the summer. Actually, that's a good point. And you know, I only care about myself, but I care about you guys when it comes to saving money

on baseball games, sporting events, concerts, and all other events that you want to attend. Make sure to grab your tickets over at game time. Do not pre-plan. Procastinate, right? We have no idea what you're going to be doing sometimes when these events are coming around, but don't have, you know, don't miss out at the last minute.

you see a show you want to go to, wait until the last minute and save big, save up to 60% on tickets when you buy them last minute. And the best way to support us is by buying your tickets through the link in the description over at GameTime. And that's GameTime.co or on the GameTime app. So make sure to grab that. I will need to wrap this up, Jesse. I got a birthday to go celebrate. And apparently I don't get enough of these people around here because that's where I'm spending it tonight over at Dobson Ranch for the PHNXT party. And I want to see this guy win some pitch.

ping pong game. So that's my birthday gift to you there. That's going to be the highlight of my night. But you can follow us on Twitter. I'm at cap underscore caveman with a K. Jesse is at Jesse and Friedman. Our show is at PHNX underscore Dbacks. But of course, all roads lead to at pH and X underscore sports on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. We thank you guys so much for joining us. Thank you so much for the birthday wishes and the chat. You guys are the best. On behalf of Jacob, Jesse and myself, we always appreciate your time. And remember kids, baseball is fun. But it's so much. more fun when you realize the answer to life, the universe, and everything is 42.