Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show - Russell Dorsey isn't giving up on Cubs lefty Shota Imanaga

Episode Date: March 2, 2026

Leila Rahimi and Mark Grote were joined by Russ Dorsey of Yahoo Sports to discuss the latest Cubs storylines, including left-hander Shota Imanaga's rocky outing in a loss Sunday in Cactus League play.

This is an Odyssey Sports Minute. Alice Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has fans excited saying that he's willing to, quote, bust the budget to spend in free agency to improve the team's defense. But remember a couple years ago, Jones said the Cowboys were all in on the 2024 season and then really didn't do much to improve the roster. So talk is cheap. If Jerry's able to do it, then credit to him. But I think Cowboys fans should be skeptical of what their owner is saying.

I'm Nick Costos. Russell Dorsey. My eye is on which version of Pete do you get? in 26 because if you can get, we'll call it 65% even 70% of the first half, Pete Crowe Armstrong offensively with that same high quality defense that we saw from him since he's gotten to the big leagues, to be honest. Then you still have a high quality player. Insider and analyst for Friday night baseball on Apple TV Plus.

Hey man, postseason, we're a show hey. And in the biggest moment, on the biggest stage, the best player to walk the face of the earth showed us exactly where he was. Russell Dorsey. On 104 3, the score. That God. That's Russ Dorsey's music. I should do better than that. In the honoring of JR, it was Elimination Chamber weekend at the United Center,

and that wasn't my best. A lot of people there. Yeah, including Janus. Janus. And let's not forget about the Nazis. People always say, he was like he wasn't there by himself. So Dan eviscerated

Thanassas one day on this show And I don't know That we've ever Recovered as a society He was like He can't play basketball By all accounts

I hear he's a very good guy See And that's important And that gets you a long way In life Being a good guy Like it's kept him On NBA rosters

Outside of being Janice's brother Like if he was Janus's brother But a bag It would be a lot harder to keep him On a roster

I would like to Counter the Wonderful things Russ is saying that I'm sure are very true with this line from a Freddie Gibbs song on his most recent album from last year where he has a diss line where he says you're Shacked in like the Nassus. Oh my God. That is amazing.

That is an amazing line that I always think of. Alfredo 2. Very good album. That's the album. Very good album. There's one of the songs on there where he has that line. It's amazing. Big Chicago Bears fan, Freddie Gibbs.

Knows about 820 the score. Yeah. Bears. Oh, okay. So his sibling reference point would probably be Casey Erlacker. It was always on the bear. Oh, Casey Erlacker is on the roster. Oh, not anymore.

What did Casey do now? At the very least, at least Patrick Mahomes' brother doesn't play football. You know, we don't see him much these days. Yeah, something happened there. Some PR machine got to him. Big Pat, we might have to do that same thing. He gets himself in large. But neither here nor there.

Funny. Russ Dorsey, in studio with us, we are timing Russ's schedule because he's a man who needs to be in many places. So he showed up early with us and then I was practically doing jumping jacks to try to get your attention and say hi. But you were focused,

you kept your head down and then you're kind enough to join us for this segment. So we're really, we want to pick up where we left off yesterday. Cubs and socks play each other in spring training. I got two themes for you. Okay. Number one,

we're going to be watching out for show to Emonogical. as home run propensity all season yet again. Yeah. Number two, the dudes who you expected the White Sox to hit bombs produced. And that is a good thing as well for that young core. Yeah. Let's start with Shoda.

The thing I will give him, if I'm going to give him some leeway here, it's March 2nd. Yeah. The ball flies in Arizona. And a lot of times guys are working on different things. and so you can't take Arizona results and that just be gospel. Got to take it a little bit with a grain of salt. For sure, that was showed his issue.

We talked about it at length going into the postseason last year. Like his last 11 starts, including the postseason, he had given up homers. No bueno. So that's going to have to change. I imagine that they worked very hard to try to combat that this season. But if you're Cubs fan out there and you're saying, woof, here it comes again.

Relax. The ball absolutely carries in Arizona. If that happens the first week of April and into May and June, then we can talk about it, but I wouldn't be concerned about it today. Not fully concerned about it. I mean, I think that I was going to say, I think people are allowed to be concerned about Shota considering what last year was, considering the fact that he wasn't necessarily even supposed to be on this roster.

You're right, Groves, because I was the person that talked about it. So let me rephrase. If I say scale one to ten, my concern for Shoda Homer's allowed is like a three. Okay, so there is concern, but not that much yet. Concern only because we've seen it and that was an issue going into this year. But it's not concerned because it happened in a spring training. Concern meter is higher for me. I'm going to put the concern meter about Shota Imanaga giving up home runs at like six.

Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Maybe seven. Wow. Because that, because he's done it. I mean, Mark, we're. I'm probably, I'm probably closer to you, Leila. I'll go 5.5. Here's the thing, though, is I agree with you, Russ, on the fact that it's being clear what his directive is.

You've got to get the VLO up. If you're going to, if you're going to throw that ball out of your hand and you're trying to tunnel it with your splitter, get the VLO up. Okay, well, if I'm going to do that, it's going to require some trial and error as to how I perfect both the fastball and the splitter. That's it. And you better do it better than you did last year. So I understand that that's going to be a bugaboo in all of this. Yeah.

I'm going to continue to say a three. But the points you guys make are valid. I'm just not ready in a start on March 1st. Now, if it's happening on May 1st, then we got issues. But on March 1st, I'm not ready to say. saying, Shoda, you're out of here. That's fair. I may still be thinking about game one against the Brewers and the D.S. I get it.

Maybe I am. It's the most recent evidence that we have to this on an issue that lasted for five months. I get it. Well, this is a good time, too, for me to bring something up from yesterday. And we've talked about a lot. The velocity is up for Shoda and I go. Good, good. And Marquis did a great job yesterday of showing

a graphic with all of his different pitches that are up a couple miles per hour. Again, absolutely great. I don't know if this was just me, and maybe it was, because I haven't heard anybody talk about it at all. They did not have the radar gun in the scorebug on marquee yesterday. I don't know if either of you guys noticed that, but the theme of the broadcast was, mentioned four times justifiably. It's a good story and good on Marquis and good on Elise Mecky.

and Alex Cohen, who did a great broadcast, but nobody was telling me what the velocity was yesterday for him at any point in time. I'm like, well, where's the velocity? I don't see it on the graphic. I don't hear them talking about it. So I guess my question to you is like, is that a spring training thing? Yes. It is.

It's spring training for everybody, including broadcasts. Like, there are some ballparks, and I don't think Sloan is one of them or, you know, Camelback Ranch, where I guess, the access to radar guns isn't as widely available. Okay, so that's on the stadium. It's on the logistics, not necessarily. But also, like, if it is in the ballpark, but you just don't have it, you didn't make an effort to have it on the scorebug, that's something that could be put back by the next

game. You know what I mean? Okay. So, like, it might be something as small as, hey, yeah, it got taken down. It shouldn't have. It could be, there's actually no radar that we can see in the ballpark. Well, I do know that the radar was, some radar somewhere was picking up on the pitches because they're on MLB.com game day. So you can see pitch by pitch what the speed of the pitches were.

This is real inside, but hear me out on this. So having covered spring training for regional sports networks and like being part of the broadcast, there are oodles of broadcast crews and trucks in one spot where there aren't normally. So I remember doing one of the games out of a Big Ten Network truck one time because there are only so many production trucks and they're all covering these games at once. Not to mention other sports are going on right now where you've got you've got basketball in season. You've got college basketball really heating up. So because of that and you've got hockey. So because of that all these, the reason why they're trucks is because you can take them across the country and you use that truck in its whole production anywhere, anywhere you want.

want to go. So there's there's a shortage of trucks at spring training. Additionally, you might not have the same equipment that you normally have for all of them. So maybe that factored into this situation. I mean, can't have that as the theme and then not telling me the velocity. I agree.

I wanted to know how hard Jordan Hicks was throwing for that matter. You could throw 105. You can assume he throws 100 miles. You can assume all those pitches were 100 miles and out. A hundred percent. Yeah, I was going to say 105 maybe at this juncture in his career. not the case, even though that's what he busted

out onto the scene with. But that's the first thing I thought of when I saw Jordan Hicks still. I'm like, oh, now I don't get to know how hard he's throwing. So, I saw a text here says, it may just be me, but it's amazing how much Russ sounds like Charles Tillman. Do I, do I like Charles Tillman? I mean, I'd have to listen more. Off the top of my head,

no. Okay. Not necessarily. I'm not saying it was like crazy, but give me some time on that. I love that. So that any peanut comp I can get is great. Yeah, that's a pretty nice compliment. You put you. You actually, the last time when you and I did a show, or maybe you were a guest with Marshall and I, when Layla, was not here, you said Charles Tillman, he should be the next bear to go into

the hall of the game, I did say that when we were over in the performance studio. That's right. Good old number 33. Yes. When the move that you created is now taught as best practice across the league, wouldn't that indicate that you changed the game? In high schools. He's got his own punch.

Yes. Yeah. It is now taught as best practice in football. So when that's the case, don't you think that therefore you should be in the Hall of Fame? That helps. Yeah. That helps. You talk about changing the game in terms of like with basketball.

Like, all right, Steph Curry changed the game of basketball. You could make a great argument that Peanut Tillman changed the game of football. That's it. He saw it differently. And now you've changed football. Yeah, you deserve to be in the Hall of Fame. Question for you guys. Can I make a White Sox point before we move on to our next thing?

Love it. Love it. Can you make it? it after our break? Yes, I can. I can because I want y'all to hit y'all bricks. You got told no. Well, Ray and I, well, Ray,

Grotty and I, what you don't know is Grotty and I betrayed Ray at the top of the hour and we were late to Gonso. So we'll make it up to Ray and go to break on time. And then I want to hear your White Sox point because they look pretty good yesterday. So more with Russ Dorsey. He is, of course, the baseball insider.

He works for Apple TV Plus. That season is starting up soon. so we're thrilled to have him and more for us, more spring training talk on the score.