PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - When will the hurting stop?

Episode Date: April 12, 2022

On this episode, Derek, Jesse, and Makayla are discussing Zac Gallen being scratched from his first start of the year, previewing the pitching matchups with the Astros, and answering Mailbag Monday questions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello there and welcome to another edition of the PHNX Debaks podcast right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Montia, occasionally known as your mayor of PHNX, and I'm joined by my friends to talk about some baseball. First, I'm joined by our social media goddess, the one and only Michaela Perkins. Hello, back again. You can't get rid of me now. Yeah, we fed her and we let her in, and now she's just, she's ours now. That's how this works. But also joining us, of course, is my vice mayor and my friend, the one and only. Thunderstick Jesse Friedman.

I'm just devastated because we don't have baseball today, and that just doesn't feel right. It's weird. It's a weird day. I don't know what to do with myself. But I will say this. If there was any team that needed a day off, don't you think it's the Arizona Diamondback? I was going to say, Jesse, I kind of think it's a good thing they're not playing today. We don't have to watch them.

Well, I just think they need, they definitely need a day to maybe get their shit together. But of course, this show is brought to you. We got our shit together here. This show is brought to you by the five. find folks at the Draft King Sportsbook app. Go download the Draft King Sportsbook app. Now use our code of PHNX and get down on the NBA play in action. Bet just $5 and get $150 in free bets instantly for betting on any team.

Don't worry about winning or losing. You'll just get that money instantly. Guys, of course, we have more bad news. You know, the Arizona Diamondbacks lately wouldn't be the Arizona Diamondbacks without injuries, just holding this team down. Right now what we're looking at is Luke Weaver is now on the injured list. And Zach Gallen has been scratched from his first start, which would have been this next game against the Astros due to a cut on his thumb.

Nothing major, obviously, nothing that's going to impede him for the long term. But something that once again, it's like how many small to big to medium-sized injuries can stack up for Zach Gallin. It's never ending with this guy. I feel like I turned my back and he's on the aisle again. And I'm just like, wait, what the heck just happened? You were fine two seconds ago. I just don't.

I think he either has the worst luck in the history of Major League Baseball and he's seriously pissed off the baseball gods or he's more fragile than a China glass. I have no idea. I just don't understand why he can't stay healthy. Like, come on, bro. And I mean, again, we're glad this isn't some sort of agriac. aggravated, you know, injury of his shoulder, like what we saw the bursitis during the offseason. Yeah.

That was what my bigger concern was when I heard that he was going to be scratched. And then when I find out it's a cut on his thumb, it's menial. But again, it's just, like one thing or another. It's such a Diamondbacks thing to happen. It's not, it's like they can't, they can't. It feels like nothing is going right for them already. And again, this might be the, I feel like the ongoing. phrase here is the old wounds that are still healing, but it might be that for us.

Like it feels already like this season is going the way that last season went. Do we know how the cut happened? Like, is this like a kitchen incident or maybe they didn't want? Because that's not really a natural part of like being a pitcher that like you just get cuts on your fingers. On your thumb. Yeah, on your thumb, that doesn't really flow naturally from being a major league pitcher as far as I'm aware. So I'm curious. But when the news first came out, I think a lot of people were mortified

because we didn't initially know the full story of what was happening here. The initial reports were just that Zach Gallen is scratched. And of course, the sky was immediately following for a number of people. Fortunately, a cut on the thumb is about as, as, you know, it's about as much of a best case scenarios you can possibly have in that situation. So he should be out there this weekend against the Mets. and at the end of the day, a couple days isn't really going to make much of a difference. Derek, I'm going to need you to run down a chase field. Find Zach Gallen.

Wrap him in bubble wrap and do not let anything touch him. He must be protected in New York. We should just keep him at the studio. Like, is there a spot in the office where we can just make it. We'll find a spot. Look, we'll kick Espo and Saul out of their office and we will make that the Zach gallon containment. There we'll find some, I don't know, we'll get them soft-edged toy.

toys to play with and a TV that he's not allowed to change the channel on, you know, that kind of stuff. We got to protect him at all costs. I don't know. It's I feel like kind of with this series too, it's something that we have seen, right? The series, just things weren't going the Diamondbacks way, errors, even things that weren't errors that were, you know, plays that guys normally make. They weren't sharp defensively.

They weren't turning double plays. there's just a lot of things to work on and this team right now just overall does not only looks doesn't look sharp but they'd look like again all the bad things are happening to them yeah it's definitely a little scary I'm not gonna say I'm super thrilled with how the season got off to a start but I'm trying to not freak out I'm trying to keep my myself in a realistic place I got a comment for you though I got a comment for you for Mr. Grimm we have the same out of wins as the Dodgers. So hey, shout out to the Rockies. Jesse and I ridiculed your team, Patrick Lyons, for picking up Chris Bryant. And maybe they weren't so crazy to go out and do that.

Colorado Rockies are looking excellent right now. And, you know, again, it's off to them for that. Anytime we can make fun of the Dodgers, I'll take it. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. It's just, just feels right. I was going to say, I feel like that series against the, against the San Diego Padres, this opening weekend for the Diamondbacks, when I was writing my article here recapping the weekend, I really came to terms with the fact that as much as you try to find positives in that series, other than the Seth Beer heroics, it was like, there's almost nothing. The bullpen was fairly bad. Mark Melanson and Ian Kennedy are the two most important pieces down there. Neither of them looked right. the offense was 15 for 116 to start the season. It doesn't get a whole lot worse than that. The starting pitching, we only had one pitcher make it through five innings. Merle Kelly looked pretty good.

Marrow Kelly looked pretty good. Yeah, he, I mean, he only got through four, but yeah, he was effective at least. And Zach Davies was pretty decent too. Caleb Smith, not so much. And then there's the defense, right? And that was kind of a disaster throughout the weekend as well, as the Diamondbacks totally got outplayed on that. end. So for everyone, you know, pressing the panic button already after four games and talking about

how this team is the same team they were last year, I don't think four games is enough to say that for sure, but these four games certainly didn't help us think otherwise, right? I mean, it was pretty much every bit as bad as you might expect. And if it weren't for that Seth Beer bomb on opening day. I mean, you're looking at basically the worst case scenario for an opening series. The Diamondbacks easily could have gotten swept. Well, our buddy, Nick King at Nick King's sports tweeted out, it is early, but the Diamondbacks 15 hits are the fewest in baseball, despite playing one more game than 22 teams. The 129 team batting average also ranks last.

Yeah, that's pretty rough. Hey, Lordy. There's only one place we could go, but up, right, Jesse? Right? I said that. I said we hit wrong bottom last year. Oh, boy. I might have been wrong about that. Their team batting averages 129. Yeah. Yeah. They do have a lot of walks though. I think as of yesterday, they were second in the league in walks because they drew particularly in a couple of the games in the series, one of them being Sunday's game. They just drew tons of walks, even though, you know, they weren't necessarily getting a whole lot of runs across. So I guess that's worth something. Tori Lavello talked after the game about how, you know, You know, he admired the patience and he liked the approach and how they were grinding on at bats. And he seemed to think for, you know, for what it's worth that things would turn around soon. Here's the thing. They were last, they like were one of the worst teams last year in, in, in pitches per at bat, right? So that that's, you can tell it's a learning process, right?

Like they've adjusted, but they've almost over, over corrected, right? Where they're taking a lot of walks, but they're not putting it together with production. and they're not putting it together with the hits. And I think that right now is, you know, is where they're at. That's why I guess I'm still just a little cautiously optimistic that, you know, they're going to put things together here. Certain parts that we didn't think were going to work well, have worked well, like Zach Davies.

Some of the guys defensively have been really good. Just, again, what we're seeing out of this team is a similar team-wide slum. that we saw last year, which is probably the most concerning part about it. And I don't know when we panic, but I don't know. It feels like every day I'm opening the little crystal box, and I'm looking at that button and wondering if we should push it. Now, we do have Bum Gardner on Tuesday and Merrill Kelly on Wednesday, and I feel pretty good about those guys.

But what do you guys think about them now starting on one shorter day of rest, which really isn't because this weird day off today on Monday when we're recording this is a day they should normally have a game. Like they would normally have a three game set with an opposing team that started today and ends on Wednesday like this two game series with the Astros is going to. But now we have Bumgarner and Kelly not really missing any time, but now starting one day earlier. Um, you know, I'm not too excited about watching Mad Bum pitch again, especially one day early. Um, I, I just, I'm having a hard time finding excitement in the idea of watching Mad Bum pitch. And I think the fact that it's one day early isn't going to play to his like isn't going to be good for him. I hope I'm just being extra pessimistic.

but he threw 68 pitches when he debuted and 42 of them came in the third inning. So I guess it's a great opportunity for him to redeem himself. If he's got anything left in the tank to kind of make it through more than three innings, now would be the time to kind of take it into that gear and kind of make the rest of us not as concerned as we all are about him as a pitcher. But I can't say I'm feeling too great about that. I actually think that it might, I don't know, help to get them on track, but I feel like what we're seeing still with this pitching staff is, you know,

them coming out of spring training still in spring training mode, right? That's why the pitch count is reduced. That's why the 46 pitch inning, which probably would have ended his night, regardless of if it was now or at any time later. I mean, that's just a lot of pitches to throw. Yeah. Yeah. So I think Lovolo probably would have.

pulled him regardless of what his end pitch count goal was. He was coming out of that game. I will say that at the very least, neither one of those guys had terrible outings, Jesse. And I'm more excited to see them get kind of in a regular rhythm where we can't have these excuses about pitch counts and such. You know, like once we get to their third start, then I think we're out of that range of the spring training thing being an impact on

on their longevity. Yeah, Mad Bum certainly needs to bounce back in this one. He just didn't, he just didn't look particularly good across the board in his first start. Even those first couple innings where things were promising, he wasn't really getting any swing and misses. It was pretty much, you know, flyouts and a reasonable amount of soft contact. It wasn't like he was getting hit all over the place. But there was really no part of that game where Madison Bumgarner was dominant.

and unfortunately for him and the Diamondbacks, the Astros have a much better offense than what the Diamondbacks just saw with the Padres. Maybe not much better. That might be a slight overstatement. Obviously, Carlos Correa isn't there anymore, but they still have some pretty darn good hitters. And even their pitching staff, it's insane how they can lose guys.

And it just feels like their lineup and their starting rotation. Obviously, Justin Verlander is back this year. So the Astros just, they're just the team that you just can't get them to go down. I don't know, I don't know how they manage to come back year after a year like this, but the Diamondback still have their hands full in this, in this two game series with them. You're absolutely right about that. And yeah, it's names that people might not recognize, but names that have been very, very good for this Astro team. Now, before we move on to that, I did just want to let everybody know to go sign up for our website

at go p hnx.com. Jesse has an excellent article up on the five takeaways from the opening series, and you guys can get down on all of the wonderful content coming out from go phnx.com. Sign up to become an annual member, and you'll get yourself a free t-shirt over at the PhNX Locker.com, and we just launched our PHNX Rattler Design. It was our special shirt drop from the Ainsworth. We got it out there for you guys. Now you can pick it up at phnx locker.com. So if you sign up to become a member, grab you that shirt. I love it. It's one of my favorite designs. So get down on that over at phnx locker.com.

If you're not interested in the annual membership, we totally understand. We want you to still join us. So try us out. Get your month-to-month membership, and you'll get your first month for just 50 cents. That way you get a little appetizer of PHNX, and that way, you know, you know you can't leave once you join our family. You'll get members-only discounts over at the PHNx Locker.com. Not to mention our members-only discord where we're apparently playing bingo, thanks to Josh Hunt, and we're giving away prizes.

So that's what's happening in our D-BACs members' discourse. Are we going to make bingo happen? Is it going to happen tomorrow? We've got to make it happen. We've got to make it happen. So we'll figure out a way logistically to make that happen. And for anybody wants to take part, we'll do it. We'll do it.

But I'm also playing. And if I win, you guys have to send me a present or something. That's the way that this works. It works both ways. Anyway, Mr. Grimm says, positive note, Hummel's first hit was a homer, even more of a positive since there was no one at the game. They easily found the home run ball,

benefit of playing for the D-Backs, that you got me because it started out nice, and then it got mean. But we love Cooper Hummel here at the PHNX-DBX podcast. He's our guy for sure. And it was excellent to see him get that big first career hit. Like, how amazing is that for it to be, you know, your first hit in Major League Baseball to be a home run?

I just couldn't even fathom the excitement about that. The reaction of his family that the Divenbach shared on social was so cool. Yeah, it was very great. It was really great. Very heartwarming. But take a look, like you said, Jesse, at this upcoming Astros series.

Right now, we have Mad Bum going up against Luis Garcia and Merrill Kelly going up against TBD, but it looks like per their rotation, it's going to be Framber Valdez. That would be the next logical start, who was very good in his first start against the Los Angeles. Angels went six and two thirds, gave up two hits, striking out six, walking one really good pitching. And Luis Garcia, this will be his first start of the year, but he was a critical part of their postseason run last year. Luis Garcia is really good.

And Framber Valdez is really good. And all these players who play for the Astros, whose names you've never heard, they're probably really good because that's just how this organization seems to work. I don't know, like I said, I don't know how the Astros maintain this level of performance, season even if even as they've lost a number of key pieces over the years but um chris melton makes a great point we also don't understand if you're not interested in in the p h right what are you

doing it it it pays for itself actually if you really think about it in the long run i don't know how but it does just pays with itself with enjoyment and entertainment and debacks news because that's what we were bringing you all year long and of course that's the that's the thing here is is that taking a look at this objectively, we want to be happy about the debacks. But right now, it's very hard to be. Merrill Kelly was very good in his outing. Again, another short outing for starting pitching. I'm not concerned about either of these guys.

But at the same time, too, neither of their outings, I think, were bad just due to a short pitch count. And they weren't bad, but neither of them were very efficient. And I think that's my bigger concern. Merrill Kelly had seven strikeouts, which is kind of uncharacteristic a bit. for Merrill Kelly, but so is the higher pitch count, which the two go hand in hand, obviously. But, you know, that's a concern right now is efficiency for this starting rotation. It's hard to find a guy that can go six plus innings and give a quality start for this team. And Merrill Kelly has been the one guy that last year was able to do so.

Yeah, Merrill Kelly is definitely a big part of just the longevity of the rotation. He was kind of their innings eater last year. be in a pretty similar spot this season, just given some of the innings limitations that some of the debacks, other starters are going to have. Merrill Kelly is really the one guy who's, consistently over the last few years, made most of his starts at least. So he's going to be, he's going to be huge. And Madison Bumgarner, I mean, getting through more innings is going to be key for the diamond backs as well. At this point, I think we all agree that Mad Bum is not really a top with the rotation starter.

And so a lot of his value comes from being able to go deep in games. You know, if he's not going to have, you know, a sub four ERA at this point in his career, there's still a lot of value in a guy you can go out and go six or seven innings, you know, even if, even if they're average innings, you know, even if, even if he's not necessarily performing like we've seen him do in the past. So I would love to see Madbom, you know, work a little bit deeper into this game as well. But, yeah, I mean, coming off a three inning out. it's a little bit hard to say what that's going to look like this early in the season.

Mack, any concerns there with their efficiency at all with you? Or do you think this is just early season, you know? I don't know. I was actually sitting here thinking about it. And I was trying to rationalize why we're seeing this type of performance from the pitching staff. I was like, well, you know, they have the short and spring training. Maybe they're just not, you know, all the way loose yet. But then I was like, well, we also got.

got almost destroyed by U Darvish and, you know, Mania looked incredible. So they had the same amount of time in spring training as the Diamondbacks pitchers did. So I'm not quite sure if you can make that excuse that they had a short spring training and maybe they're not stretched out. I just, I don't know. I'm having a hard time trying to rationalize why we're seeing what we're seeing from our pitching staff when we just saw the complete opposite from the Padres pitching staff. Obviously, it's different players, different talent.

But I don't know. I think, like I said before, it's Madbom's time to show us that he can at least get us through five innings, hopefully, ideally six. And if he can't this game with the Astros, I think I'm starting to worry a little bit more about Madbom's ability as a starting pitcher at that point. I'm going to say this. I think that to me, I was expecting too much too soon from the pitching staff, not from the pitching staff, from the coaching staff. Excuse me. I think that this I can confirm. Derek was convinced that like day one of the major league season was going to be like that. And all of and all of the problems. Absolutely. Jesse's not wrong. Brent Strom and Joe Mather. But I mean, you know, when you really think about it again, the short and spring training, yeah, whatever.

There's still new coaches. They haven't had a lot of time with these guys. They haven't had a chance for what they've talked to them about and worked with them on to carry over. Brent Strom walked into a meeting with Zach Gallen when they met prior to the lockout with a file folder already on him that he had compiled, right? That's what kind of coach he is. So I don't think it's a matter of the coaching staff not knowing what to do with these guys. I think it's a matter of, you know, that that knowledge they're passing on, that that information they're passing on, actually carrying over and clicking. It's not instantaneous. is it takes a while for, I think, that kind of stuff to help make these guys better. Initially, it's a lot of information.

It's a lot of stuff going on, not to mention the self-doubt and the lack of confidence and, you know, having things go where when the rest of the offense isn't going well, each guy kind of feels that need to get four hits and one at bat. And you have just a bunch of guys, once again, much like stretches of last year, each guy trying to do too much, you know. And Chris Mountain says our enemy time. Yeah, in every way, both for members of our bullpen and right now for getting these guys prepared. I will say I am not very optimistic about this series with the Astros, but I am kind of excited to see.

They can split it. If they can split it, that would be big. You really don't want to be one in five to start the season. How do you guys see this going? What's your prediction? I think Merrill Kelly will win his start. That's what I think. Okay.

Okay. So Maddum lost Merrill Kelly win. Is that what you're saying? I'm not saying that. I'm just saying I feel more confident that Merrill Kelly will win his start than Madison Bumgarner will win his. I mean, if I think if there's an opportunity for them to win, it's going to be, I don't know. I think it would probably be against Garcia because he hasn't had a start yet this year,

so maybe they can take advantage of the fact that he's just got to get his feet underneath him to start the year. But, I mean, he finished second in AL Rookie of the year voting last year for a reason. And he finished the year with a sub four ERA too. So he's an incredible picture. I just, the only, I really, the only opportunity I see for them to win is either to take advantage of the fact that Garcia hasn't started yet this year or to hopefully ride on Merrill Kelly's shoulders on Thursday and on Wednesday and hope that. they can capitalize on a really good start from Merrill. Well, this is,

this, this, this, this all isn't, isn't great. But of course, uh, you know,

we'll see what happens when it comes. I, I will say, I will say as far as my prediction goes, I think the offense is actually going to score some runs in, in, in this series. And I'm not necessarily saying they're going to,

you know, put up double digit runs or something, both games or anything like that. But, I don't know if, I mean, the Diamondbacks don't need to have the best starter and, you know, the better starter in every game in order to have a chance to win, right? This is, this is baseball and, you know, crazy things happen. And sometimes you score seven runs on an ace in the first inning, like these sorts of things

happen. So, yeah, I have a good feeling about the Diamondbacks offense, getting back on track. And, yeah, what exactly that looks like remains to be seen. but I think they'll split the series. And I'm going to be bold and say that the Mad Bum game is the one that they win. And the Merrill Kelly game, I'm going to say that's the one that they drop. So I've got them, I've got them splitting the series one and one. Thanks for getting to do something.

Change just walked into the office with food for literally everyone except for me. Food? I've been here all day. I didn't get food to be fair. Oh my God. I just got excluded, you guys. It's fine. Well.

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to everything in my mailbox. And then once in a while, there's always something in drinking. Our dear, dear friend, Megaran for that wonderful jam. And we are doing Mailbag Monday right here in the chat. We're doing it live. Actually, though, I do want to address a question that came up in one of our tweets the other day that I said we would be discussing. And it comes from one of our Twitter followers, Gabby Deerth, at the underscore real,

underscore Gabby asked genuinely don't understand how they keep going with we're going to compete meaning the diamondbacks who do they think they're fooling it it's a bit insulting to my intelligence and i think i can understand people feeling that particular way just because of the like he said the verbatim that you know they they don't really ever want to call it a rebuild they want to call it a retool or they want to say we just need to add some pieces, but we still think that this team can be competitive. Yet still at the same time, in the same press conference, they will also say that their time frame for being competitive looks to be like 2024, right? So I don't know what you would call this otherwise, but I think that what they are in is still in the middle of a

rebuild. They don't have guys right now that they can count on and trust. They've committed to a couple of guys. They've committed to Merrill Kelly. They've committed to Cotell Marte. Both guys, I think, no matter their faults early on, I think are solid guys to make a part of their core and commit to for the long term. But this consistent, you know, this consistent calling it, you know, not a rebuild sure. Be a bit ridiculous at times considering where this team seems to be. You know, this consistent to be at right now. Yeah, it's tough. I mean, I understand being frustrated with the phrase we're going to be competitive.

And I get, I totally get that. I just lived through another similar situation in Denver when I was with our sister station at DNVR and the Rockies because their owner likes to say the same thing. We're going to compete. Yeah, with who? I mean, I get it. I think a lot of the times when people say that, I like to call that just managerial speak or like athletes speak because athletes have like their go-to phrases.

Yeah, it was a great time. I love my teammates. It's just a generic phrase that they're going to say, they're not going to come out and say, yeah, we're going to suck this season because then if they say that, nobody's going to come out to the ballpark. Like, you want to, I don't know.

I feel like it's just generic managerial speak to try to cover your bases and make it seem like you're going to do everything you can to provide the fans with an entertaining season. So I don't really put a lot of stock into that. And also, like, I think we're going to, compete this year is so subjective. Like, okay, what are you competing with?

Who are you competing with? Because if you're trying to compete with the Dodgers, y'all ain't competing for shit. Like you guys aren't going to come close to competing with the Dodgers. Are you competing with the Rockies for not being in the last place in the division? Because then, yeah, then you're going to be competitive because it's going to be when the Rockies fighting it out for last phase in the NLS. So I guess it's just a subjective phrase that you can decide to apply meaning,

however you want to in your life. The Rockies right now are are kind of out of control. And honestly, I think the one thing all three of us could probably admit is we're like waiting for them to come back down to earth a bit. Right. Like yeah. Yeah. What is that with a baseball team? And when you get early, when you catch fire early like the Rockies have, I mean, who's to say that they don't have that unexpected, you know, successful season like the Giants had, right?

perception is that we as fans, I think, are always going to be cynical because it's easier not to, it's not to put hope into a team that doesn't seem very good and then get your heartbroken. But deep down inside, every one of us, no matter what team, what laundry you wear, what team you root for, I think deep down inside, you're, you, you want them to do like what the Rockies are right now, especially if it's a team that isn't expected to do much. You want them to, you know, just kind of stick their finger up at the world and say, we don't care how bad or good we were supposed to be. Right now, we're very good.

And in our mind, we can win a series against the Dodgers. We can go into Texas Rangers and be on them. And they have this brand new team that they just put together that's worth a, you know, that they added a half a billion dollars worth to, you know, there's a lot of positivity. But again, it's, it really comes down to the success of the team, right? They say those cliches. And if they don't follow through,

then they look like chumps. But if they do, then all of a sudden they look like geniuses that predicted that this mediocre team was going to be better than we all thought. Yeah. I have to say, I don't think the Diamondbacks are rebuilding.

And I know people may be angry at me for saying that, but I don't think this is a rebuild. Rebuilding would be trading Cetel Marte instead of extending it. I agree with you 100%. I don't think they're rebuilding. Yeah. I say they're sitting and waiting. They're holding themselves over.

Yeah, they know that they have, right? They have this farm system, one of the best in the game, you know, top five, probably top 10 at least, depending on who you talk to. And yeah, they're not rebuilding. The Diamondbacks haven't really traded away many key pieces at all other than, of course, Paul Goldschmidt was the big one, but he would, you know, he would have been gone in free agency by now anyway. So I don't really view this as a rebuild.

And I also, I have to be honest, I, you know, I've been in pretty much all these press conferences with Mike Hazen. And I really don't think that anything that Mike Hazen has said is very off base. Mike Hazen has been very upfront and saying like, hey, we know that making up 30 games in one season is unrealistic. The Diamondbacks have not tried to give the illusion that they're actually going to, you know, overtake the Dodgers or anything this year. And when they say, you know, we're going to be competitive.

Like Mack said earlier, competitive is a very generic word. And it doesn't really mean anything. And that's why they are able to use that word because they don't want to promise that they're going to make the playoffs this year. They just want to promise that, you know, hopefully they're better than they were last year. And I think we can all agree that whatever competitive does mean, it means be better than the team was last year because that's not competitive. At least win 53 games this season. Yeah, at least it's a 53. Then we're in, then we're in okay territory.

but I really am not put off by anything the Diamondbacks have said up to this point. I think they kind of know where they're at. You know, there's a reason that Mike Hazen has been very self-critical in a number of the different, the different press conferences that we've had. He knows the situation. Yeah, he's very, he's very self-critical. You're never going to hear anything from Mike Hazen that sounds like he's pumping up stuff that he's done.

He's not that kind of a guy. Mike Hazen will be the first one to tell you, I know, I have a mirror, right? Like he totally is. Right. He's very self-aware. Of the trades that he's made that's worked, how things are being perceived, where they're at.

He's not going out there, signing dumb ass contracts like the Rockies are. At least be thankful. He's not spending ridiculous cash. That's really what it comes down to. And like when he's talked about not blocking the young guys from coming up, right? I mean,

they sound committed to that. And I understand that. But there's also the aspect that they, you know, the mentality of, the baseball players are so different than any other sport, right? You can have all the town in the world, but all of a sudden, not believe deep down inside you can hit a baseball anymore.

And guess what? You won't ever again. Like you'll never hit a baseball at a major league level ever again if you don't believe in yourself, you know, and that's something that can get shook very quickly if you come up too early and you start facing pitching. You don't know what to do with and, again, lose that belief in yourself. That's something that's beautiful about the debacks. arm system is Reno does nothing but build belief in these young guys.

I think the problem is, is that it's kind of like a daydream that you come back down to reality when you get to chase field versus hitting in the friendly confines of Reno. Jaselle asked in our comments, hey, my question is, is this team ever going to be healthy? No. That's a great question, is though. The answer is no. Good God. Lord help us.

I mean, I don't think any major league team is ever like fully healthy, but, but yeah, it'd be nice to not have, you know, Josh Rojas and Nick Named and Jordan Loeplo and Luke Weaver and Zach Gallen not all go down. It'd be, yeah, it'd be nice if that didn't all happen at the same time before we've really played any actual games yet. So here's the thing that I, here's my question for Mailbag Monday. Do you think that like Luke Weaver's injury impacted his ability to be named as part of the starting rotation?

Because if that's the case, then we're looking at essentially. got two two guys that would be starting pitchers on the on the on the or injured right now right i don't i guess yeah i don't it's that's a speculation but it feels like if he's injured i don't this seems like the kind of injury like they put him in the bullpen to see if something that was bothering him was you know you know how bad was the discomfort and now it's to a point where the discomfort is bad enough that he's having a hard time pitching yeah that's a good that's a good question. I think I'm not, I don't have a reason to think that Luke Weaver was removed from the rotation because of a potential injury, but I will say that in his first outing of the season,

when he came out as a reliever, he was not throwing hard. He was like 91, 92. And he normally, you know, is 93, 94 as a starter. And I expected that to take up coming out of the bullpen. So I did think that something was a little off in his first outing. And it seems likely that. It seems likely that, this injury was probably connected to that. Yeah, I don't, I can't rationalize putting Caleb Smith in the starting rotation over Luke Weaver. So it just doesn't work. And it's like, it sucks because here's the thing.

You're good at that thing, man, the thing you're good at, you're, you're good at being mad about not being a starter and coming out of the bullpen. And unfortunately, wow. Well, I'm saying like, no, Derek of the top rope. Caleb Smith is never coming on the show. Right. I don't even want to go to the clubhouse anymore after saying this. No, I'm not, people are good at certain things, right?

And so, like, I don't know if maybe the pressure as a starter is too much for him. And the difference of him coming out of the bullpen is he has just a different chip on his shoulder about it. He was very angry about not being a starter. He wanted to be a starter. And he constantly talked in press conferences and press availability about wanting to, prove that he deserves to be a starter. But I'm just talking, I'm not even like, hey, you suck at your job. No, what I'm saying is the numbers say he is not good as a starter, but he's very good

as a reliever. That's what the numbers say, right? So like, again, there are things in life that I didn't want to do, but they thought, my boss thought I would be good at. So I did it, right? So that's the point. Like, you know, one time I worked at a ski shooting. place with guns and they decided that they decided to put me as a ski setter which means

I was actually actively on the range where people were pointing guns at in a small concrete barrier putting little clay pigeons on a machine that slung them out for people to fire weapons at and destroy. That's an incredible job right there. We get we know where your talent lies. This is where we're putting you, right? That was an assessment by my bosses on what they. thought I would be good at. That made me feel bad as a person.

Didn't you work at, you worked at like a, like a veterinarian office or something, right? I've had a million jobs, Jesse. I've had one million. Wow. So in one job, you were like, you know, carrying around the pets after their surgery and making them feel comforted. And in the other job, you were preparing pigeons to have their heads blown off. Well, they're clay pigeons. They're not real pigeons. Oh, okay. Yeah, let's see. They're not actual birds.

All right. All right. However, there was a giant metal sling blade thing that I had no control over, and it was my job to stick my hands in this device and put a new clay pigeon in there. So if you have an idea of how terrible that job was, I just really, I just wanted to complain about the fact that I had that job one time. I really feel like that was the point of my whole story. But sometimes we get jobs that we don't like, but people feel like we're good at. Brandon Buckingham asked how far are our. are Thomas and Carol, Alec Thomas and Corbyn Carroll from major leagues. And I don't think Alex Thomas is very far away at all. But again, I think I just gave a few minutes ago my reason why the Diamondbacks probably don't have them on the roster right now is he wasn't doing great in spring training offensively. And they probably want him to get some more time in the minor getting some reps. They both have a 2022 projected debut year, right?

I don't know about Corbyn Carroll because he's still in double A's. So I don't know double a. Yeah. I don't know if he. Okay. Okay. Okay. I know Alec for sure had was supposed to be this year.

Yeah. Alec will be up this year, I think. He hasn't started very well in Reno. And it's, you know, it's only a few games. It's nothing to worry about. But I think they'll, they'll wait until Alec Thomas is, you know, knocking the cover off the ball down there,

which it probably is only a matter of time. Corbyn Carroll, I could see as a September call up. I would be pretty surprised if it's anything sooner than that. But he is at double A. And I mean, if you're, if you're a good player in AA, then you're probably just about ready for the majors. We've seen the Diamondbacks skip the AAA level with a number of guys. I think Dalton Varshow skipped over AAA, if I'm not mistaken.

So it's certainly something that we could see them do. Alex Murray in our comment says, I feel like most teams will use the first half of April as the end of spring training. If pitchers weren't ready, keep them in the pen or limited to finish prepping. Right. but the Diamondbacks don't really feel like they had any like everybody kind of felt like they were on the same path except Zach Davies and let's be honest, Zach Davies had the best outing of anybody in their first go through in the rotation. So Jesse and I both kind of figured Zach Davies was going to have the shortest outing and instead, you know,

he proved us wrong when it comes to preparation. I really think once again, though, it was like what we were talking about. It was his efficiency. He was far more efficient than Bum Gardner and Merrill Kelly were. And shut me up real quick. I was not expecting nothing from him. And he was like, he did a great job of just getting out. Yeah.

And like that's the difference was at one part, it felt like Merrill Kelly was going for strikeouts. And like it again, it. Yeah, which was kind of fun, honestly. Like Merrill Kelly probably shouldn't go for strikeouts because that's not really who he is. But I was like, this is cool. He's like striking out like every other hitter.

Even if, you know, even if he has 75 pitches after four innings. Who cares? This is fun to watch. All right. Nick Sutton just gave us the best question, and that is, if you could replace one current Diamondbacks player with any one former Diamondbacks player for the entire year, who would it be?

The former player is going to give you a prime performance, prime year performance. How is it not Randy Johnson? Right? I think that's only. How am I not? But who are you, who are you replacing? Who are you, who are you Nixon?

I'm adjusting a rotation. Randy Johnson goes to one, in his next start. He's going to need to warm up, I'm sure. He's going to need a few backlock games before he's ready. But are you kidding me? Who am I taking? Who are you guys taking? Fernando Rodney. Get out of here right now. Yes. How do I remove her? I remember a little chat like that. That's how I read. She's gone. She's gone out of here. Come me back. Let's watch out. Okay. But let's be real here. They don't just get also anybody. I'm rocking my house. The diamond.

Backs might need a closer at some point this season. If Mark Melanson, if what we saw in that first outing was what it seems, which, yeah, I, I don't know. And that first, in that first game where Ian Kennedy and Mark Malanson both pitched, I look back at it, neither of them got a swing and miss in 42 pitches combined between the two. They were just not, there was very little that it was effective about either of those guys. So I know this this question was meant to be like lighthearted and fun and here I am. Yeah, you're really bumming me out now. I don't like this. Who is your selection?

Are you going with Fernando Rodney too? Yeah, yeah, of course. That was all, I'm going to stay, Fernando Rodney. Just give them all. Give them all of me. The Diamondbacks history in the bullpen is very sad. Even if I was to try to pick like the best reliever they've ever had, I mean, you know, Brad Ziegler or Bollinger.

Young Hung Kim, Matt Mantae, Jose Valverde. Like, the options are JJ Putz, I guess, was pretty good for a couple years there. Jay Putts. Yeah. That was fun. I have Brad Ziggler's shoes under my desk right now. Don't ask me why, but I do. His cleats.

Anyway. Wait, what? You just have Brad Ziegler gave you his shoes? Well, I mean, yeah. Like, yeah. See, I got these are Brad Ziegler's cleats. They're autographs somewhere on them, too. wait i do a lot of stuff jesse i'm around the team of a lot okay i have a lot you mean you have the

same type of shoes that he has and he signed it for you or you mean you actually took the shoes off of fred tigler they're right into a locker room found his shoes from like the uh ran away yeah this is the uh the uh one where they dressed up with the you know they had the uh patriarchal i think it was like the armed forces game or whatever where they have like the camouflage on yeah i have a lot of stuff i brandon mccartney's mainplate from his locker up here don't even ask me why i have all this stuff it's i i have a lot of stuff they let you in the in the in the in the clubhouse derrick i will never it just ends up it just ends up in my house i can't tell you how or why it's fine

uh but we want to tell you guys that if you want to strike it big you got to go over the drafting sports book right now uh get down on the NBA action because of course now is that time of the year uh the in the play in tournament which the sons don't have to worry about out. We'll get you $150 in free bets by betting $5 in any NBA team to win their game during the play and tournament. That's code PHNX, a draft King sportsbook. Of course, like I said, the Phoenix Suns aren't there because Phoenix Suns are the best team in the NBA. Shout out to Espo. Also, Lakers, not there. It looks like the Suns will match up against another Los Angeles team, which, eh, that's not great, but it'll be fun to bounce them. But you get down

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We're back. Are you starting the wave next? she's I think people are mad about the for I'm sorry I love La Fletcha I can't help it I'm a psychopath I love drama no just kidding I actually hate the wave I'm so anti-wave I mean I guess it's fine if the game is really boring but like if there's a pitcher zool going on and like a no hitter and you're doing that okay yeah I'm going to kill you I will literally walk over to you shove you down and make you sit in your seat this is the rule this is the rule right like that's the part that really frustrates me I don't don't it's

It's four three. Why are we doing the wave? This is a good game. Everybody sit down in your seats and watch the game. There's nothing that is getting up greater than ill-time wave. Tendent injuries you can get from throwing your arms up in the air like that. Most of us have no business doing that. We don't properly stretch.

Come on. It's a whole- Don't let Zach Allen do the wave. No, yeah. No, Zach Gallen, no hitting, no wave, no anything.

Back-Gowan probably break his wrist. He's not allowed to do most dances. He's not allowed to do the gritty. He's not allowed to hit any of that stuff. No. No. Allen T and everybody Brinman the wave

worst thing in sports, watch the damn game. Chris says no reason for the way. How is something so universally reviled still part of this? You know what it is? It's casual fans. Ban the shift, ban the way from Alex Murray. I completely agree. I have said the phrase

ban the shift like 15 times already in what four games. It's terrible. Especially when you tell Martin. How to hit. Anyway. final thoughts you guys got anything going in this astro series are you uh concerned yet is this exactly where we're at i think i think i think i skip this question but before we go i think we should ask this one by brandon buckingham so does thoughts on over under change after the first weekend

i'm still around 68 to 70 that's brandon's word there if you if you change yours by like i'm not i'm not i absolutely feel like i should change my what did i say 61 i said say He said, you're very pessimistic about it. I'm sticking at 61. I'm sticking with 82 and 80. I'm sticking with it. You know, insane. I am. I am. 75. 75 where it's out. Jeff Vanister has me ready to run through a brick wall, right? Okay. So like that dude, he, he, he makes me understand the game of baseball more than I ever have, but at the same time. I mean, literally, again, he could, he could coach my life. He could bench my life. He could

bench coach my life because I'd listen to anything he says when it comes to life, baseball and everything. But Alex Murray says under 62 wins. So he's right there with you, Michaela. Alex Murray, you're my new best friend. I don't know. But no, I'm not pushing the page button yet. It's too much of a small sample size.

And I know it doesn't look good. But I think hopefully they'll be able to work some kinks out and we'll be okay. Y'all be seen. Michaela. Michaela already pushed that pant. I mean, 61 wins. It's about,

I don't know what, like, I don't know who's predicting anything lower than. The button's talking. No, it's going to be fine. Everything's fine, everybody.

Nobody panic. Nothing to see here. Everything's fine. There you go. Well, thank you guys so much for checking out the show. Of course, you can follow us all on Twitter.

I'm at cap underscore caveman with a K. Jesse is at Jesse and free. man. Michaela is at Michaela E. Perkins and of course, our show is at H&X underscore Dbacks, but all roads lead to at PHNX underscore sports, where Michaela will happily invite you in. That's on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Also, if you're listening right now on your favorite audio podcasting app, subscribe to us there, leave us a five-star review. Check us out on the YouTube as well over at the PHNX sports YouTube page. Subscribe and sign up for notifications. That way you not only don't miss our show with our post game shows and all these live shows we're doing. doing this is my what fifth one in a row six one i don't even know i've lost count but i love doing it so i don't even count uh but you don't want to miss our show any other shows coming from the phnx sports crew over at p hnx sports on youtube we thank you again so much for checking out the show and be being here with us to vent and ask your questions this was a fun live mailbag monday and hopefully we can do it again next week we thank you guys again for your time on behalf of jessie

macaela and myself we appreciate your time and remember kids baseball is fun but it's so much more fun when you can bet on it.