PTI - Tarik Skubal's Dodgers Era Begins

Episode Date: August 5, 2026

Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser break down Tarik Skubal's Dodgers debut, Stefon Diggs joining the Commanders, and more of the day's biggest sports stories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Green Peppers, Julius Peppers, Sergeant Peppers. Now, that's not true. Sergeant Peppers would blow away the others. I like red peppers. Here's my peppers ranking. It's right narrowly ahead of pickles. You don't eat peppers. And you've never had a pickle in your life.

You've claimed this. You've never had a pickle. Never had a pickle. I grow peppers in the garden. What? And I grow red peppers. And if you let it, all you have to do is let a green pepper go and go and go and it'll turn there. You live in the city.

Yeah. What are you doing growing pep? You have no grocery stores in your neighborhood? I also grow potatoes. I'm growing potatoes this year. I'm hoping for a big run. I'm going to go to a farmer's market and try and have a second job.

Welcome to PTI, boys and girls. In today's episode, Kevin Durant assesses the Sixers. Stefan Diggs joins the commanders and Jeff Passon joins us for five good minutes. But we begin today with Tarrick Scouble, making his Dodger debut last night and throwing 85 pitches over six innings, giving up four hits, two earned runs and striking out six. Scouble left the game down two to one to the Cubs who eventually won five to one. This was the Dodgers' fifth consecutive loss, second to the Cubs. Well, Bon, how should Scoobelin Dodgers feel after his first start with this team? Just fine.

Comes over to a new team. He goes into a difficult place to pitch against a team with, depending on the metric you're looking at. One of the three best offenses in the game, he gave up two earned. I know his strikes to balls ratio was not what it usually is. That's right. It's worse in the last couple of years. So he gave up two earned. And so, you know, again, I guess it's a terrific club lineup.

So, no, they have every reason to feel great about Scoobo. Does he have a sea legs? It was interesting to hear Scoob will talk about the atmosphere at Wrigley and how he loved it and how it seemed to him like a postseason atmosphere. And by the way, those two teams could meet, whether it's in the divisional round or the NLCS, and it seems like now they're both armed for great series if they play each other with the two leading MVP candidates in the National League. But they should feel fine about school. Did you say the NLCS, so you got them going ahead of the league?

the Brewers? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I got them catching. You are rooting for the Cubs. Again, the most Chicago-centric show in the history of the ESPN.

Good. I would love to disagree with you. I do not. I think Scuba should feel fine. He gave up two runs in six innings. That is a quality start by any measure. It's not his fault that they didn't hit. You know, he gave them what he's supposed to give them.

I mean, if you're a manager and you're told your starter is going to give up two runs in six innings, you're happy with them. And as you say, it is a hostile atmosphere. He was booed. It is a hostile atmosphere. My sense of this is that the Dodgers should feel worse than Scoobles should feel.

Because the Dodgers since July 1st are under 500. They have also, I think at this moment, I understand an afternoon game today, but going into the afternoon game today, they had lost seven out of their last 10. I mean, everybody says the Dodgers are invincible.

There was a plane that flew over Wrigley yesterday with a sign that says the Dodgers ruined baseball. But if they have all these great players, how come their record is what it is? And one of the reasons is, at the moment, they don't have a catcher. Will Smith has been out for a while.

He's not coming back until September. Their substitute catcher, the second guy, Dalton Rushling, do I have that name somewhat correct, rushing? He tore a UCL. If they have all these great players, what are they going to do? They're going to sign Johnny Bench? Because you You can't do this.

You can't win every game. Even if you have great players, baseball's not that sport. I give you credit for mentioning this yesterday. It's not the NBA. No, it's not. Where you play four out of seven all the time, and the better team almost always wins.

Not that game. And by the way, and this is an important fact to say, the Dodgers are losing games to playoff teams. The Red Sox swept them and the Cubs. These are exactly the kind of teams you see in the playoffs. The Dodgers are not invincible. By the way, Cubs, Brewers, Padres, they should not be in.

in fear, living in fear this summer, the rest of it, or the fall of the Dodgers. Go out there and playing. I'd add the Phillies to that. And the Phillies. And the Phillies. And the Braves. The National League's loaded. You know, they really are.

American League, not so much. Let's move to another player debuting with his new team, Louisa Rise. Philly's interim manager, Don Mattingley, inserted his new high average but power challenge second basement into the traditional sluggers spot of cleanup last night. Mattingly said, quote, you figure he's coming up with men on base doesn't take a home or to drive in a run. A base hit drives in a run from second, close quote.

Which is exactly what happened in the RISE's first two trips to the plate. Tom, what do you make of Maddenly's logic in hitting a rise fourth? As you would suspect, because the Nats were playing that game, I watched every single pitch of that game. I mean, you know, here's the, I saw the Nats score no runs. The Washington Nationals were on a road trip at Atlanta, at Philadelphia. They're 0 and 6 at the moment. In those six games, they have been outscored 34 to 14.

And in the seventh and eighth innings, the bullpen innings, they've been outscored 12 to 4. You know, so the Phillies got 11 hits last night. Doesn't matter where Arise would have batted. But yes, the point to be made is the first two times up at bat, Arise showed you why you got him. He had an RBI single head and RBI double against two different pitchers.

Now, he doesn't look in the first and the third innings. He doesn't look like a traditional fourth batter because he's not a power guy, but I agree with Mattingly. First of all, he makes contact all the time. Even the two times he was out, was a fly-out and a ground out. He does not strike out.

If you put R-I-S-P out there, he's going to knock somebody in. I mean, he's that kind of player. Listen, you know my first love in sports, my first love in my life is baseball. And yet I hate baseball. Because baseball has gotten to a point where too many people try to tell you things like,

well, runs better than it don't really matter. matter. And I just want to smack somebody across the face for saying that. Don't tell me that a guy who gets on base, not just gets on base, but who hits his way on, 33% of the time, is the same as a guy who's batting 216. I don't want to hear that.

That's garbage. And so you get a guy like Louisa Rice. You can bat him anywhere you want. And I like madingly saying this too. You can hit him first because he gets on. Oh, you got a guy like Schwarber who knocks the hell out of it and drives him in. You have Swarber and Turner and Harper and Arise.

Figure it out. You're going to get one. Yes. I know you've been down on Harper. I've got to say something good about Harper. Harper volunteered to play right field last night. He had not played the outfield. On the first ball hit.

He had not played in the outfield since 2022. He had been at first base. He's an MVP player and he said, if you need me, I'll go out there. Not what Raphael Devers did, okay? I think that he did that. One of the reasons he did that is to say to Dave Dumbowski, thanks for getting a rise on this team. This is exactly what we need.

Listen, the Phillies got to figure this out. They're not the only team in Philly. We'll get to the one in November, which has a bunch of new guys that's figured out. This batting order, Maddeny's got to take a couple of weeks, and he'll figure it.

He's Don Mattingly. You stick those four guys in a row. It doesn't matter what order is in. Let's move to basketball. And Kevin Durant, weighing in on LeBron, James, going to the 76ers, that other team in Philly. Yeah.

Durant said he was excited about seeing them, and he called them contenders for the NBA title. Durant said, quote, last time they put 320 points scores on a team, they said it was unfair, unquote, referring to Duranel. Durant joining Steph Curry and Clay Thompson on the Warriors. Then on social media, Durant indicated these 76ers are far better than those warriors writing,

quote, Joelle Embed, MVP recently, Jalen Brown, recent finals MVP, Tyrese, All-Star in the last three years. We all know what Braun does. Clay Thompson, never an MVP candidate in nothing. I don't get how the Warriors team is better on paper, unquote. He wrote that. Well, about how did Durant's remarks sit with you? I don't pay attention.

I don't. And I'm not saying I don't pay attention to Kevin Duran. I've had the chance, the privilege of having conversations with Kevin Duran going back to he grew up here for years and years and years with Kevin Duran. And those conversations are fine in Kevin Duran. But when he does this, they're agendas. Social media carries agendas. He does it.

Braun does it. They almost all do it. Kevin Duran is essentially saying, you guys criticize me for glomming on to the champion warriors. And I don't hear that same criticism around. this Philly. He's fine. Somebody Joe thinks it was Draymond Green. It was a funny line. He said Durant didn't realize he was

not using his burner cell. It's a great line, great line from Draymond. I don't. Life is too short. Can I start with one thing? What a shot at Clay Thompson. Let's go through this again. I don't think he meant it that way. Really? Clay Thompson was never an MVP candidate

in nothing. I wonder what the highest Clay had ever finished. What prompted that? What prompted that? When you have an agenda and your agenda is to defend your You know where I stand on Durant. Yeah. Okay. I have always thought that Durant is sort of unhappy and unfulfilled.

I have used the word miserable at times to describe him. I know he's a great player. I know he loves basketball. It doesn't seem he loves the players he plays with most of the time. He's running around now chasing a title and he's not even coming close. I don't mind chasing rings. I'm okay with LeBron doing it. I'm okay with Durant doing it.

But when you say that the Sixers team is so much better to the team, you'll hold on a second. The team that you were on. At one. You know, before, after, and during Kevin Duran, they won. They won 73 games without them. They won two titles without them. They got three guys going to the hall.

Clay Thompson's going to hall of things. Draymond Green. He played with the two greatest shooters at one time who've ever played. And, by the way, anybody on this Philly team as good defensively as Draymond Green? Answer, no. What are you talking about? What are you talking about? Let it go.

I'm not letting it go. Let it go. Let it go. Let's take a break. Coming up, why the Red Sox suddenly so good, we're going to ask Jeff Tasson. We'll also ask him why Paul Skeen's is struggling so much lately. He is obviously stung by the criticism of eight and ten years ago. He was always stung by that.

But the Philadelphia 76 is we don't know. You don't even know if Jaylen Brown's going to be happy there. He was traded there. He didn't go there in his own volition. We don't know if Joel in B. Is ever going to play? No, no. No.

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the Rye and Sprye, ESPN baseball analyst, Jeff Passon. Let's start with this. The Dodgers were under 500 since July 1st. So many people have pointed to a Dodgers title as absolutely inevitable. So why are they struggling so much right now? The easy answer, Tony, is that it's baseball and that even really good teams go through bad stretches. There are though questions about the Dodgers offense. You know, they're missing Will Smith right now. Mookie. Betts is not having the kind of season that we expect of Moogie Betts. Andy Paez has seen his OPS fall from over 1,000 early in the season to under 800 at this point. But the reality is the Dodgers aren't panicking because not only did they add Tarek, scubal, they're getting

Blake's Snellback as soon as next week potentially. Tyler Glass now is going to be rejoining the team at some point. They've got Edwin Diaz back already. The reality with the Dodgers is very simple. They really don't care about the regular season because they know that they are so talented. They're going to make the playoffs. What they want to do is get ready for October and have all of their guys rested, healthy, and ready to go to try to become the first team in National League history to win three consecutive championships. Well, the team with a better record in the National League than the Dodgers would be the Brewers and their manager, Pat Murphy, said the notion that his team did not try to get Targ Skubel is erroneous.

But, Jeff, do you think the Brewers did enough, given their position and what they've got at stake this regular season? Mike, Dustin May has had a very good season this year. And Jojo Romero is a solid left-handed reliever to add to that bullpen. And Antonio Sanzatella has been one of the better right-handed relievers in baseball this year. That being said, it still feels like a hollow deadline for the Brewers. because we've seen them go after the great rental player before.

A left-hander, in fact, in 2008 with C.C. Sabathia, and he was absolutely brilliant for them down the stretch. And the notion of pairing Tarek Scoubel and Jacob Mizorowski together was just so tantalizing. You know, everybody in baseball is looking for ways to beat the Dodgers. And you can argue that having the two best pitchers in baseball in your rotation is a pretty good way to do it. But the brewers look at it like this.

They've gotten to the point that they are right now because they have followed a process. And that process does not include overpaying significantly, especially for rental arms. And so it came down to this. The Tigers wanted a pitcher back. And the pitcher they wanted from the brewers was Logan Henderson, who already is in their rotation,

who's got five plus years of club control. and who is precisely the kind of player that the Milwaukee Brewers believe is going to help them win in 2007 and 28 and 29 and beyond. The issue with baseball's economic system right now, guys, isn't necessarily that the Dodgers spend so much more than everyone else. It comes down to something at the deadline where teams like Milwaukee and like Tampa Bay aren't able or willing to go and push all their chips in because they believe it will be deleterious to their future.

And it's a shame because if any team right now needed Tarek Scouble, it is the Milwaukee Brewers. All right. Speaking of high profile pitchers, let's go to Paul Skeens, who's head of struggles. He's back on the mountain night against those brewers. His ERA in July was over six and his velocity is down. Jeff, what does that suggest to you? Could be a couple of things, Mike. When you see a drop in velo, you wonder if a guy is hurt.

I don't believe Paul Skeens at this point is hurt. I mean, you know, guys as they get older tend to lose a little bit on the miles per hour. So there's age as well. And we're talking about a guy who already was one of the hardest throwing pitchers in baseball. But I think it's probably mechanical. I think that Paul Skeens at 6'6 and 250 pounds, there are a lot of moving pieces in his delivery. There are a lot of moving parts. And sometimes even if something gets an.

inch out of whack, that's enough to lose a mile or two off of your fastball. And nobody works as hard as Paul Skeen's. I feel confident in saying that. The man is an absolute machine and animal when it comes to the gym, when it comes to his body, when it comes to just the things that it takes to be an effective pitcher. And so is he ever going to be back where he was when he came out of college? Maybe not. But I anticipate he's going to find his fastball going to ripe himself and going to look like the guy who won the National League's High Young Award last year. We will get you out of here on this. We will ask you to be quick as well.

The Red Sox was so bad early in the season. They fired their manager. But after yesterday's win over the White Sox, Boston is 29 and 5 in the last 34 games. The greatest 34 game stretch in franchise history. Jeff, what change for the Red Sox? And again, quick, if you can. The pitching has been incredible. And Chad Tracy has been a revelation as manager.

He has brought a clubhouse. together in a way that Alex Cora had not. And I think the Red Sox finally understood, even if we have Garrett Crochet and Roman Anthony out, there's still enough talents in this room to be good. This good, I don't think anyone anticipated it, but hey, they will take it along with Abley-Rutchman, Tony. Yeah, oh, absolutely. They're the best team in baseball right now. Thank you, Jeff. As always, thank you. Thanks, fellas. You can catch more Jeff on his baseball podcast. Sources tell Jeff Bassett. Let's take one last break, but still to come Stefan Diggs. the commanders.

And less than two months after the Spurs lost the NBA finals, Wimby and, you know, his guys are back on the court. Guess where they are? Las Vegas. No. Where? France. Oh, okay.

Why not in Vegas? I go to all basketballs played in Vegas in the summer. Would you rather be in France in the summer than Vegas? Nah. Come on, you would. The first ever, All-Electric, 2026 Subaru Trail Seeker is the EV-F4. is the EV for the trail obsessed. With up to 444 kilometers on a full charge

and DC fast charging from 10 to 80% in about 30 minutes in ideal conditions. Plus, ample ground clearance and symmetrical all-wheel drive make the 2026 Trail Seeker the most capable EV Subaru has ever built. Test drive it at your local Subaru dealer or visit Subaru.ca.

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afford them in the 18th round in 2011 by the Texas Rangers. Came up with the Rangers in 2014. Since then, Martinez has pitched for the Padres and Reds and spent four years pitching in the Japan League. Working on a one-year deal in Tampa, he's having his best season. Martinez is 10 and 3 with a 265 ERA, leading the raise and wins and ERA.

Overall, Martinez has a 58 and 62 record, 399 ERA, 739 strikeouts in 1,063 in 163 inings. There's such obsession over the Yankees in the socks. Anybody realized Tampa's leading the damn division? Yeah, they're the best team. And Peralta, they got their boggment at that pitching staff. Come on now. Just look at my shirt.

Happy anniversary Cleveland baseball. On this day, 25 years ago, Cleveland tied the record for the greatest comeback in the history of Major League Baseball. Down 12 runs to the Mariners, the best regular season team in the league. Cleveland scored three runs in the seventh, four in the eighth, five more in the ninth to send the game into extras. I will ask, parenthetically, who was pitching for the Mariners, the Washington Nationals bullpen? In the 11th, Holbert Cabrera finished the job with a walk-off base hit to win 15 to 14, much to the delight of the hearty souls who stayed around Jacobsfield. Previously, the 1911 Tigers, the 1925 Philadelphia A's came back from 12 down as well.

I was at a more important game in Cleveland, a game seven. If they'd won that game, you'd think that'd be a bigger comeback, which they almost pulled off against the Cubs in 2016? It would have been. I am surprised it's only 12. I would have said 15 or 16. I would guess that. Well, you were your PJs.

No, no, no. This is the Hawaiian shirt from the Nats. Happy trails to the Preakness Stakes being two weeks after the Derby. A new deal with NBC now places the second leg of the Triple Crown three weeks after the Derby instead of two. The hope is that this will make owners and trainers less reluctant to skip a race that has had such a quick turnaround. But the Belmont stakes are now stuck just 13 days after the Preakness is Sunday running,

and there's no word as to whether the longer and more grueling Belmont will now switch dates. Yesterday we did a story on how Churchill Downs and the New York Racing Authority were not including the Preakness in a new six-race competition. But this NBC deal appears to have saved the second jewel, and if you're confused, join the club. Tony doesn't make any difference. The key phrases of words were owners and trainers. That's right. They still have to decide. They think it's worth it because the last two out of three years, they've skipped over the Preakness.

The Preakness is trying to now pressure the Belmont to go deeper into June. They go deeper. And again, there's no commissioner to tell people what they have to do. I don't know if it's going to work. I think the Triple Crown is in tremendous jeopardy. But let's get back to Pimlico and back to Belmont. It's been in Laurel. It's been in Saratoga.

It's funny way it was for two. All right, let's go to the big finish. Let's do it. Stefan Diggs is joining the commanders. Is that a good fit? I hope so. He was sneaky good last year. But coming home can really swing it one way or the other.

And this is his home. Falcons edge rusher, Jalen Walker, out for the season with the torn ACS. It's terrible. It's a big loss. It is. And the Falcons are in recent years and underachieving team all the time. Second year. All the time.

Victor Wenbaniama is holding a midsummer minicamp in France for eight to ten spurs teammates. Your thoughts? I mean, I know that you think the Slovenian. Yeah, he invited everybody. He invited everybody. He makes a lot more money. I invited everybody. Four Frenchmen.

What is he, what is he, 30 million? What about the two or three or four guys on that team that don't get invited? Maybe they're 10 day guys. Really? Two-way guys. I don't know. The Live tour announced a term sheet with a new lead investor. Is that significant?

My sense is that that's going away, that all we ever hear is live is going away and the PGA tour is dominant again. John, I'm back. The Akron Zips will offer a season ticket holder the chance to help script the team's opening drive against Robert Mars. Okay, by you? No. You bring these people, you let them be honorary captains, you give them a helmet and a coin. You bring them the center of the field and say, good night now.

Hey, good night now. You know what city of Robert Morris is in? Do you know? Pittsburgh. Good job out of year. We're out of time. We're out of time. We'll try to do better than the next time.

Thanks for the shirt. I'm Tony Corny. I'm Mike Wilbon. Same time tomorrow, knucklehead. Stephen A. You and I, trust me, we're not. Not anymore. I'm gonna wear the shorts next week.

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