Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 10 | August 9th | Mets Magic, Indians Gaining Ground & Field of Dreams

Episode Date: August 9, 2019

The Mets are 12-1 in their last 13 and in contention for the wild card. The Indians have almost caught up to the Twins for the NL Central. The Cubs secure more room in first place. MLB announced Field of Dreams game and mroe.  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 and welcome to Talking Baseball, another great week of games. How about that? The Indians, Jake, they're catching up on the Twins. The Mets magic rolls on. New York sports teams in general just can't lose right now. You know, Central had some stuff go on. A lot of stuff. Let's do it.

Let's talk some baseball. Talking baseball. All right. There you go. I think we're good on the YouTube machine. I think we're definitely good on the podcast app because that's post-edited. But here we are. We're live, Jake. It's talking baseball Friday episode. How are you doing? Doing well, James. Happy, happy Friday to you. A fun week of baseball. I know you and I have a couple

good things circled for this freak end as well, baseball-wise. But yeah, man, we we had a couple kind of, we had a couple unique series. I think that's an interesting way to label them, like Minnesota and the Braves. You're not going to see that a lot, but that's kind of fun. If you like destruction, the Yanks and the O's was, I don't even know if that was baseball. And we just, we, we had a lot of good stuff around the league. We had some big time performances. I'm doing all right, man, you know? Yeah, that's good. You're doing all right. Your hair looks nice. When do the dog days happen? Are the dog days late August? I think the dog days are July and August. Right.

I haven't hit, but I love baseball. So, like, the dog days never, like, are bad for me. Okay. I think those were football fan, like, other sports fans consider August and July the dog days of sports because they don't enjoy baseball much. I've always, I've never really found myself like, damn, only baseball's on. That's why I host a show called. Yeah, but I think it's a baseball term two for the teams. Like, I think for baseball.

Yes, yes. For baseball teams, it's like mid to late August. It's like, it's been hot for a while. We've been playing baseball every day for three months. Oh, my God. If you are, like, let's look at some of the series right now. If you are, I can't find one. Wow, that's pretty cool.

Okay, here we go. Padres Mariners. Yeah. They got a lot of young guys on them Padres, so they're probably still excited to be playing. Right. Red Sox Royals. Yeah.

We're talking dog days there. They just straight up canceled the game. They're like, we don't care. No, they're postponing it for weather. But that could have been a good joke. Sure. For players, yeah, it's beginning to be like the dog days. We're leaking into dog days.

We saw the dog days leak in for the Orioles this weekend. We'll talk about that. Oh, yeah, wow. How are you doing, Jim or Fredette? I'm good. I'm good. I'm excited. It's been, I have some gripes.

No, not cripes. You're going to listeners, listeners that are new that aren't coming over from talking yanks that are new talking baseball listeners are probably going to find some opinions that I have that they disagree with or whatever because I know you and I are on opposites interleague play sucks all these interleague series this week there's too many of them get them done at the beginning of season I can't stand these two game interleague series series I'm over it I think it's bad give me three game sets four game sets every every week right now like the a's are just going around playing two games versus everyone three games versus the

but Padres Mariners, two games, Reds Angels, two games. There's all these two games in early league sets. I don't like them. Yeah, and this was not in our game plan, which we will post for our patrons, which we'll talk about that in a minute. Yeah, I'm totally different. It's something that I think MLB, well, A, we need to get the universal DH, so it's less. Because like we talked about with Oakland, like they're jumping around, they're playing

home and road games versus NL teams. that's kind of brutal just to change that mentality as a team. For me, it's the NBA, and I was talking about this yesterday, and we talked about it a couple episodes back with Albert Pujose. He made his first return to St. Louis this year. They gave him a standing ovation every at bat. It was eight years. And I just think, okay, so if you use that formula that there's going to be some towns

that don't see a major league star for eight years, that's sinful. Like if you're a Colorado Rockies fan You could go without seeing Mookie Betts or Aaron Judge for eight years I just think that's terrible for the game So I think they need to juggle the schedule more I think when they get the Universal DH It'll be a little easier

And yeah I mean the two gamers They are what they are I think those are easy for working in off days So I think that's why teams like the two gamers Well it's also because like You play your like the Yankees Will go through each division You know one year you go through the NRR

West, which is what the, the NL West and the A.L. East are playing. And then, you know, sometimes the A.L. East will play the NL. Central. It rotates. But you always play certain teams. Like the Yankees always play the Mets. And it's always a two and two. And I think they thought that was going to be fun. I don't like it. I'd rather baseball is a game of series. In two games, it's so easy to be like, well, it's just two games. Universal D.H. Lower some of the indivision games. Roll it. Well, you got to, we're not on a, we're not, this isn't talking Yanks. We're not on an American League podcast, like probably lost a lot of people that like the like pitchers hitting on this podcast, this audience. Oh, the, I think that that, no, that's, that's a national stance.

It's, I mean, there's still people that want the pitcher hitting, but it's, it's going. I mean, I think 2021 or 2022, it's gone. Yeah. So it's, it's all right. There's some fun. I don't get me wrong. I get it. When that pitcher, you know, 11% of the time gets the base hit in that situation. Yeah, it's a good time. But yeah, we don't need to get on the soapbox for that right now. Okay. All right. Well, you want to just get into the National League and American League report then?

I think so. I just want to know who would be bringing us this episode before we go there is what I would say. That's a great call, Jake. It's a great call. It's a good thing. I have the notes in front of me that I'm just avoiding. Yes. This episode of Talking Baseball is brought to you by.

by a gang of awesome people. Javier Vives Jimino. Yeah, that's a, could be Jimeno, I don't know. That's a fun name. Someone gave us, I send us to, someone gave us a less than stellar review,

not five stars. And they said, why do they think it's funny to mispronounce names? Yeah. Just want to let anyone, anyone else that might be thinking that, we don't and we apologize I try my hardest to get every single name correct

there's a lot of names out there it's not in our skill set and this is something we will try to take over from our other podcast when we have someone we don't beg we're not big beg for review guys we try to give give giveaways and stuff like that if we get I mean this was a three star review and they were like sometimes they mispronounce names

and we're like come on man but so if you'd like to If you feel so obliged and you want to leave us a five star and maybe say, hey, they get, you know, they pronounce 70% of the names right. That's huge. Huge batting average. Best hitters ever. You know how often I go to YouTube and like how to pronounce this and I listen to that robot go? Riu.

Or whatever, a lot. Anyway, Barbie K, Barbie's talking Yanks, talking Yanks fan. She's an OG. I always get her home country wrong. It's, um, it's, don't, man. Oh, damn it. All right. Dan Wells, Carly Kinones.

Kinones. Van Pierce, Pierzalowski, a little Polish, Polish, Poland representing? Yeah, Van. I lived in Chicago and I lived in New Britain, Connecticut. That's number one and two on Polish communities in America. So who's more Polish? Me or you, Peersalowski. Jack Carr and Mark Padilla.

Ooh, that's a tough last name. Hopefully not. Yeah, I know you're not a big Vicente Padilla fan. No, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tough, hope he's not related. Yeah. Chase Penzick. Penzick, Gannon, just Gannon.

Gannon. One word. One word. Mark Gessner. I think Mark Gessner signed up for talking Yanks and talking baseball. Gessner, I barely know her. Speaking of, Jordan Bonadona. She's been around since early times.

Yeah, Bonadonna sounds more. fun to me. Banadana. Benadana. Greg sells. Greg sells, I bet. Seashells by the seashore. Has to be a salesman, right?

If you're, does Greg have a sister named Sally? Because her life sucks. Sally sells? Yeah, you can't do that. That's child abuse. Greg, name your daughter Sally. You won't.

Greg, reach out to us. Are you a salesman? Because you kind of have to be. Justin Schoenhardt. Wow. He's always showing heart, man. Oh, yeah. Thomas Nickens. Nickens has been around. Yep. Daniel Shirk.

Gilbert Arias. Yeah. Randy, Salinas, and Tanner. Tanner, one name. Tanner, one name. Who are those people again, Jim? Those are our most recent Patreon supporters. Johnboy Media, patreon.com slash Johnboy Media. $2 a month.

You get access to watch this live with us if you want. I have the chat open. I saw there's a couple people coming and going. watching probably just on background at work, but it is live on YouTube. And if you are watching live and you have some input, we will gladly take it. Someone helped us out with research last episode, which was very nice. Yeah, you, it's very, again, those of us that don't know us from the way back, we're all about engagement and interaction, our promise to you, we won't watch every game. So if you give us something good, there's a good chance it can get on the episode.

I think last time we did the closers. Yeah. Yeah. Butchie had our back doing some stats search for us. Anyway, so yeah, it's $2 a month. We give away two jerseys each month. I just did that raffle yesterday. Congrats to the July winners.

And sign up for, sign up now, and you'll be in the August raffle. And once we get organized, I'm trying to give more and more to the patrons if we can. All right. Yeah, sign up for Patreon. It's a little bit. Helps us out. Jimmy, can you just please tell me what happened in National League Baseball? this weekend. I'd be glad to tell you, Jake.

Well, thank God, because if you didn't, it'd be a terrible show. It would. We need some music. I need my soundboard back. The National League. The Mets beat up the Florida Marlins, Jake. A four-game sweep. Four games in three days, a double-header. The Mets magic, baby. They stole all San Francisco's magic

and are using it on themselves. And the Mets fans, the most funny fan base to watch as an outsider, they're in. They're in. And I love it. The Brewers and the Pirates met up for a three-game set. And the Brewers swept the Pirates, which I'm happy for because the Brewers are in a fun race. I want that race to be fun. Pirates are out of it.

They're out of it. So good job by the Brewers. Reds and Angels met up for a two-game set. Reds won both of those. Angels continue to slip. slide away. Cubs and A's. This was a fun interleague set. Three games in Chicago.

Yeah, there's three games. It's not interleague play. It's a two games series that I'm really against. Okay. Two games and interleague play just seems like what are we doing? Exhibition. It seems like, done shit sandwiches? Cubs and A's. Cubs win two.

They win the bookend games. Some blowouts in the last two games. Braves and Twins. We were kind of excited about this. huge walkoff game one and then huge runs game two and three Minnesota is still doing Minnesota things Jake I don't know what's going on with the weather up there but everything is just bam bam bam braves take two of three which is huge because the twins are in a race we'll get more to that in the American League report Phillies and debacks met up Phillies lost

they're slips sliding away as well debacks win two of three nationals and giants faced each other and the Giants get swept by the Nats officially ending their magic run. Giants made some moves. I believe they got rid of panic. They got rid of our old friend Tyler Austin. They're kind of cleaning up, gearing up for the next stage of things. Cardinals and Dodgers met up and the Dodgers swept them, which the Dodgers are good, but the Cardinals are trying to be good as well.

And I think that might be a bit of a, oh, fuck moment for Cardinals fans. Rockies and Astros had a two-game set. Houston beat them because Houston's very good. Padres and Mariners split a two-game set in a series that no one cares about and the points don't matter. There you have it. Nice, Jim. Standings-wise, Jake.

Atlanta, five and a half ahead. They took two out of three, like I said, but Washington did sweep. So they did gain a game this week. They're five and a half back in the division. Could that get close? Yeah. I'm actually interested now to see how many times those teams play. each other. I will do that after I finish reading this. Cubs have a solid lead again, Jake.

Three and a half up in their division, four up in the loss column. Milwaukee's behind them and St. Louis got swept. They're not four games back. Nothing's really like done. But Cub, that thing is fluctuating every series. I mean, we saw two, three series ago, the Cubs and the Cardinals were tied. Then the Cardinals took the lead and the Cubs take the lead back. And now they have a decent lead. It's crazy. And the Dodgers are 18 games up. Yeah, ever, ever since I gave my Jakey like, yo, the Cubs got to stay up because if they don't, I think things would get louder around them than the other teams. They've been cruising, man. And I think you might hear a little bit about their trade acquisition later, Nikki Castellanos.

But yeah, good, good for the Cubs. They're separating a little bit. Jim, this record against teams greater than 500 stat. I think I think I'm starting to get into. And right now, I mean, it's Dodgers in Atlanta in the National League, man. The recurring theme of this show, and I feel like I haven't given them enough love, and I just say this sentence instead of giving them credit, is that the Braves have stood up to every test. Every week we expect to be like, oh, you know, the nationals, the Phillies,

hell, the Mets now are going to make up some grand. round and they're not really. They go into Minnesota, into Homer Ball. They drop the first game on a kind of a badass walkoff by Miguel Sano. Big meat goes dead center and they bounce back. They take the second two games. Right now in the NL, I mean, everyone's on the Dodgers and that's obvious. I think it's right now the top tier would be Dodgers and Braves. I think they deserve to be lumped with them for now. And on that same note, as I mentioned the Dodgers and you mentioned the Cardinals, Jim, that series was brutal.

The Cardinals had some chances. They couldn't come through. And then I think they had a, I think it was one nothing into the ninth of one of those games. And then the Dodgers put up a two spot to win it and that was game over. It just, it felt like there was nothing St. Louis could do to beat these Dodgers. Dodgers and they're, they're spiraling a little bit. I think they're two and eight in their last 10.

The, yeah, yeah, and there's some key players going cold. So I was watching the Braves, Minnesota games a little bit. Yeah. And I'm not going to be ashamed when I don't know a player. There's 25 guys on each team. So I wasn't too familiar with Mike Soroka. Yeah. Braves pitcher, baby face.

Yep. So I got myself familiar and I'm reading all about him and watching some highlights. 20 years old. He'd made his debut last year in May. When he was 20 years old. What's that? When he was 20 years old.

He's 22 years old right now, yeah. 22. August 4th, happy belated. Happy belated. Anyway, but then he had inflammation or whatever. It went on the DL for a while. Anyway, he's back up. He had, he pitched in the loss versus the snow homer, but he had great game.

Yeah. So I was, uh, I was excited to get familiar with him because I was wondering like who, who's doing this for the Braves pitching wise. I know they got Kaiko. I know I got some other names and stuff like that. But, uh, he's, he's young looking.

Yeah, he's when you sign, he is young. That's, when you type his name, he's Canadian too. When you type his name on Google, the auto fill is age. It's like Mike Soroka age. Yeah. If you want to know.

Yeah. So he, he, uh, Jim, his, his strikeouts won't blow you a. If you're an ERA plus person, there's a little advanced stat for you. If you're an ERA plus, he's killing it there. Jim, he's not a huge strikeout guy. A strikeout per nine innings is 7.2. But what, what big Iron Mike does, he keeps it in the yard.

He's leading the national league. 0.5 home runs per nine innings. So, I mean, for every nine innings, he's only given up half a homer. That's pretty insane with what we've been seeing around baseball this year, the juice balls, et cetera. But, dude, if you could keep it in the park, yeah. Well, his main pitch is a two-seamer that's, like, heavy sink.

Yeah. And sinkers usually ground balls and not strikeouts. But it's an impressive pitch. Yeah. But I don't know, baseball, it almost went away from those sinker guys because all the analytics said, hey, oh, well, a strikeout is better than a ground ball out. And now someone like Mike Soraka, he might be the equivalent to the DJ LaMahue's and the Michael Brantleys who are thriving because they can still hit high fastballs. That might be another rant for the offseason, but we'll go from there. According to baseball reference, it's pronounced Sarroka.

Syroca Michael John Graydon Soroka from Alberta Calendar Canada Make Soroka huh Yeah okay I like it in the Canadian accent That works for me

What else do we like in the National League Jim? I mean I don't know if we're doing I don't know are we doing major headlines Or we just kind of clipping them as we go No we'll do that after the American League report Yeah I don't know man The Mets are nuts

They're 12 and 1 in their last 13 I mean they're the team I was going to talk about is like a major headline because it's the Mets baby they're rolling yeah well yeah we can do a little deeper dive in the major headlines for the Mets I guess the only thing no please who who else matters that's what I'm trying to look at all these all these games that's exactly what I was the only thing I think we need to really circle up on was kind of the NL Central a little more we touched upon the Cubs in St. Louis I think the only team we kind of skipped is Milwaukee who I mean they're on a three-game win streak right now.

Yeah. No, that was a big series. Like, I'm not rooting against the Pirates, but I'm not yet rooting for bad teams to play spoiler. I'm rooting for all the teams that are in the race to just fucking keep winning. I want them to put the pedal down until the last week, all three of those teams. But the Cardinals are blowing it. The other thing that's not a big storyline, but it's kind of interesting, the Phillies, man.

they lose three. They're four and six in their last 10. I mean, they're tied with the Mets. There's a chance that the Phillies could finish fourth in the NL East. And they signed Bryce Harper, and this was supposed to be a young team going to the next level. I mean, we might, there might be a serious yellow, orange, red flag going up in Philly right now

because a couple bad series, I mean, if they were to drop under 500 or something like that, I think Phillies fans have given up. I think they wanted to pennant, and now they don't have the pennant, and they're saying, well, we're not going to beat the Dodgers, so fuck this. Eagle season, baby.

I've got kind of a fun game. What's that? So Cubs, Dodgers, Atlanta. We all kind of, well, Dodgers is wrapped up. I just told you I'm falling in love with Atlanta. I think the East is done. The Cubs do we think are the heavy favorite in the seven, central now?

I don't know about a heavy, but favorite for sure. Okay, favorite in the central. And we're entertained by the Cubs. I guess so the five kind of wildcard teams right now, and sorry to all our Arizona fans, but it's tough to take you serious right now. Prove us wrong, and then we will. But Philly, the Mets, St. Louis, Milwaukee, and Washington,

just on pure teams you'd want to watch in the postseason, how would you rank those teams? Teams I'd want to watch in the postseason. Yeah, just personal, like, just, they'd be fun to see. So it's nationals, brewers, Cardinals, Mets? Philly, yeah. Nationals are number one. Okay.

Because Scherzer's there. And watching Shurz. Like that. Really, that carries all the weight. Psycho Scher. okay and then i have i have i have i have opinions that i don't want to share oh i like that i don't like watching baseball in uh milwaukee stadium like just the aesthetic of televised games in that stadium don't do anything for my

visual damn pleasing my visual eyes and get them out of here and then the mets with de grom like the mats if they're pitching can can their pitching can perform in the play off. That would be a lot of fun to watch. Yeah, I think, I think that's what's jumping out to me. It's the, the Mets. Are you East Coast bias? I know. And that's, that's what I'm saying. I mean, the two pitching staffs on the Mets and the nationals, I mean, that would be pretty wild. Dude, the Mets and the Nats in a one-game playoff, that would be intense. Milwaukee would be fun. I like, I like, I like, a lot of guys on

the team. And that's, that's what I would say, too. And Milwaukee kind of does it. They do playoff baseball fun. I guess maybe that is our Yankees bias leaking in because, I mean, they can go to that bullpen and they can push Hader for three innings and they can try Jeffers for two and they, they try, like they're trying to do anything to win. It's not like, all right, Walker Bueller, go out there for six and twirl a kid like Milwaukee's scrapping and clon. So, okay, interesting. All right, let's move on. What I wanted to look at that I said I was going to look up is how many times the nationals and the Braves play each other. We did this last, last episode, because

the twins and the Indians have like 10 games. They have seven. They only have seven games and it's a four game set in Atlanta. So if you're the nationals, right now it's five and a half, that still puts it up to you, kind of. You'd like to get it under four before your seven games against them take place. If you're a nationals. You got to get hot and you have to assume their line.

up their pitching and they're going to get Scherzer, Corbyn and Strausberg in as many games of those as they can. So that could be a lot of fun. It could. So the Braves goal is to just keep it at like six or above seven before that series, which is likely. It's a while away. It's September 5th. But we'll keep an eye out for it. All right, Jake.

Let me know what happened in the American League. Why don't you? Jimmy, in the American League, your new. York Yankees viscerally destroy the Baltimore Orioles. Just unfair. They break all sorts of different home run records. With the usual suspects for the Yanks, Tockeman, Urchella, and Higashioca, to name a few.

Jim, the Rays versus the Jays in Tampa, and the baby Jays win the series. Couple strong pitching outings and Zilong Ball. The Red Sox split a three-game set with the Royals. The final game was suspended. due to weather in the top of the 10th. And Jimmy, I mentioned those royals, and they'll bring us right into the AL Central.

The Minnesota Twins, as you talked about, they lose the series at home to Hot Lana after that dramatic Miguel Sunou, walk off in game one, right on their tail, the Bileveland Indians. They do the reverse to the Walker, Texas Rangers. They get shut out and lose game one,

but they win both games of a double header following that. El Central is getting very tight-ish. The White Sox, they win three out of four in Detroit, and honestly, I don't really want to talk about that series. Sorry, maybe elevator talk. In the Wild, Wild West, you know the Rangers lost their series to the Windians. The Houston Astros win both games against my Colorado Rockies. Houston scores double digits in each game, so yeah, they can do that too, huh?

That's good, great, grand, wonderful. The Oakland A's dropped two out of three to the Coveys and Wrigley. John told you about that. They lose game one by one run. The next two games were blowouts. And the Halos, they scored four runs in both their games against Cincinnati, Jim. Fortunately, Cincinnati scored more both games. They lose two more.

And the Mariners split with the fathers from San Diego, ending a six-game losing streak. They ended a losing streak. Good job, guys. Good job, Mariners. Good job. Good job, good job. Yeah, so what stands out here for me is, thank you to the Jays as a Yankee fan.

Yeah. Thank you to the Jays for helping out. The Rays are now 11 games back in the AAL East. And as a Yankees fan, that's nice, sitting a little pretty. I like that. A lot of nothing in the A.L. Right now, there's three wildcard teams. So there's a lot of, a lot of guys.

The biggest thing is Cleveland and Minnesota. Cleveland and Minnesota is going to be great. We obviously have the series coming up this weekend. And, you know, spoiler, we do do this on Friday. So Cleveland took game one. So it's a one game need for Minnesota right now. So that's, that is exciting news in the AL. Yeah, Jim, I mean, it's going to be the AL Central.

And right now it's Tampa and Oakland fight. for that final wild card spot. And Jim, we kind of got my parallels going between the Yankees in Tampa, Houston, and Oakland again. Both teams kind of stretched out their lead, and those teams are fighting for the second wildcard. It's going to be wild to see if Boston can play their way back in it. I mean, Boston is five back on those guys. And Chris Sale, again, it won't be talked about because it's the start of their next series.

He twirled a gem yesterday. But can Boston really get it going? We don't think Texas can get hot enough. Maybe they can prove us wrong. The Angels are officially 10 games back of the second wild card. You guys are done. We're sorry. And there's a new Mike T emerging in baseball that we're going to talk about later.

But yeah, Jim, I mean, right now it's the NL Central and it's can Boston play their way into that Oakland, Tampa Bay conversation for the second wild card. Yeah, they don't play each other this season again. the raise and the A's. The raise. So it all depends on what they do themselves, you know, or what the other team does, which is kind of, I wish they had a series against each other would be more fun. But I love Cleveland coming for Minnesota.

Minnesota has been in the lead all season. And Cleveland's now saying, we can try. And I know we're not supposed to talk about the next series, but it's one game. It's one game. They're facing each other four games set. I'm super interested in it. one game, I think that's, I don't think, I, I think that's a shot to Minnesota fans if they lose

first place. Definitely. Definitely. They've been sitting pretty. In Cleveland, man, Jim, it's something that kind of got, I don't want to say missed in the Bauer trade, because I think Bauer was pretty well liked by the guys in Cleveland. I mean, he's, he's an odd egg. But he was, he was his own presence.

in the clubhouse and out goes Bauer, in comes Yaya Pueig with the energy and the ferocity of 10,000 men. And I don't know. I think it kind of stretched out their lineup. They believed in their pitching. That's why they were able to move Bauer. And right now they're a team with great energy going on.

So, I mean, Cleveland is coming. It will be interesting to see how Minnesota can fight them off. And again, both my new record against five teams with greater than 500 records. Minnesota is now 26 and 29 after the Brave series. Cleveland is 19 and 24. So these teams are going to be able to beat up against the bad teams in their division. It's basically, Jim, at this point, a one game lead, it will be decided in how they play against each other. Like, that's kind of it.

Yeah, which is really fun. I was looking at the Red Sox lineup. they do have three games against, they play the angels who are sliding away. And then they have three games against Cleveland. Those would be tough at Cleveland. But then Baltimore,

two against Philly, San Diego Padres, Colorado Rockies at Colorado, and then the Angels again. So that is a West Coast trip, but it's three losing teams. Yeah. So I was ready to count the Red Sox out from the wild card,

but they could have a real, really good West Coast trip against the Padres, Rockies, and Angels and maybe find themselves back into the thick of things. But we will see. Yeah, I mean, and they, you know, there's a couple key pieces to the Red Sox that if they turn it on, I mean, those, those guys are special. Chris Sale is one of them, and I think it was eight innings pitched 13Ks or 15Ks, something like that. And he looked, he looked like that, that Randy Johnson, Chris Sale, that people are shy to compare them to because they pitch differently. And it's like, well, you know, that's still not a bad thing, guys.

You can be okay with that comparison. We're saying nice things. Yankees have a tough schedule. After, after, uh, oh, no, they don't. The Yankees, shit, we play Baltimore again. Three games, four games against Toronto and then four games against Baltimore at home. Wow. But then Cleveland, Oakland, Dodgers.

That'll be tough stretch. For anyone listening, I know that Jake and I are Yankees fans. but I have to let you know how, how sad this series this past week against the Orioles was. Yeah. The Yankees hit five home runs in every game by guys that could be on the Orioles because the Yankees got them traded for cash considerations or traded relievers that no one wanted for them or just like little back end moves. They're all our second string guys, the Yankees second string guys. and Baltimore so sad. We can move a little into major storylines

because I think Chris, well, that's who got mad actually, Chris Davis. Yeah, that's who got mad. I'd say the major storyline would be, I mean, what the Yankees did to the Orioles. I mean, they broke the most home runs at a visiting against an opponent ever in a season.

They broke that record with more games to play, as you just mentioned, which is scary. I mean, it was just, it's kind of unfortunate timing for Baltimore, which is a great baseball city. But they have the worst pitching staff ever assembled, and the Yankees have figured out something in advanced stats and hitting where they're finding these guys and they're improving these guys, that it was just an absolute massacre.

The Yankees are shattering. I think it was only the second time in Major League history that a team hit five plus home runs and three. straight games against the same opponent. There's all sorts of home run records we're getting broken. And the story that's now kind of leaking through baseball Twitter is that it is these Yankee guys that no one knows. And Jim, I saw the first person say, I saw someone say the Yankees were cheating.

Oh, nice. Yeah. So the Yankees are cheaters. Brought to you by talking baseball. That's great. That's like when people say Houston Astros, they just give the pitchers pine tar and cheat. I'd love to have that. Right.

Yankees do for quadruple a hitters what Astros do for pitchers. Yes. So the number that was crazy is that the Yankees have hit more home runs in Camden Yards this season in like nine games than the San Francisco Giants have hit at their home ballpark in 60 games. I think more than Tigers, too. I think there's two teams up there. Yeah. And yeah, Jim, I'll do a mini little baseball rant on it. And it was tough, man, because you're right.

You mentioned briefly that a lot of these guys could be on the Orioles. Mike Talkman, who were going to talk about more, he was a Rockies kind of quadruplea guy, never got his run. Yankees traded a minor league reliever for him. He was getting knocked around right now. Mike Talkman's been one of the best players in baseball for over a month. So it's just one of these things like Detroit and the Orioles, you know, my reach out to you guys is you've got to figure something out. Like I know you're rebuilding and I know you got to, you know, it takes a while with baseball.

You know, you have guys that could be five years down the line. But you can also take chances on guys. And it's just, it's kind of mind blowing that, you know, Renato Nunez is having a nice season. And this was talking Orioles. But outside of that, like, you guys should be, there's more chances and talent to be had out there. And again, I know the Yankees are doing something unique, so you can't do a perfect cross comparison.

But I don't know, man. Like, give some guys chances, bring up some young guys, but maybe take a chance on a 28-year-old AAA guy who's raking. Because maybe that guy's hungry, and maybe that'll ooze through the team. maybe he's good and you can trade him for something. So that's out of my system. My favorite stat from the weekend is that the Orioles had more outfielders take balls to the face than they did wins.

Yeah, that was your analytics. You got into the analytics game this week. I got pretty deep into the analytics, yeah. That's good. And Jim, seguing us out of Yanks, the field of dreams announcement. That's pretty cool for baseball. Yeah, it's cool.

I was starting to think about it and I was like, this is weird because it's like, it's so fictionalized. I'm excited for it. I want to try and go. I think there's only $8,000 or there's not a lot of seats, so it's going to be so expensive, but it'd be cool if we can go and make some videos

and cover it in a way. But my dude, Craig Calcutera was like, this is like nostalgia for something that never was real. Right. It's almost like, it's almost like how like people like make quidditch games like to go play.

That's from a movie. It's fake. Like there was never baseball in Iowa. But it's, make anything real if you want. This is going to feel like Americana nostalgia, but like it's not. It's completely manufactured, which is fine. I'm excited for it. I think it's going to be a really cool visual. Yeah, you're going to end up in so many field of dreams fights in the next 12 months. Oh, I already said my piece. Yeah. Well, it's not going to stop. But yeah, I'm excited. I think you and I are going to end up out there.

and I think we're going to have a lot of fun with that. So cool. 8,000 people watching baseball in Iowa. I'm way more for this than London. This is exactly what I said to you when they went to London. Londoners do not care. You know where they need to spread the game, America. They need to get Americans excited for it.

And now we go to the Midwest where there's no baseball. There's no professional baseball in Iowa. And you have a professional baseball. baseball game coming. That's kind of, I mean, granted, not a lot of people can go, but it's going to do great for that town's, uh, economy. Yeah. It's almost like when the Rangers went to a mystery Alaska. It's almost.

Um, yeah, I, uh, I don't know. The whole London thing, I mean, you're, I think you're using business differently there because I mean, if they can, if they can grow baseball in London, that's a massive market. So that's what they're trying to do there. They cannot. I mean, they're going to try. Like, it's not going to stop. Oh, I know. Well, that doesn't change my opinion.

It's not going to work. Londoner do not care. All right. It's just dumb. Enjoy the Cardinals and the Cubs next year. There you go. Maybe make Americans like your sport again, is what I would say. They already do.

That's the problem. They just aren't tapping into it. Yeah, they have so many problems. Anyway, I'm excited for that. I think it's going to be cool. Someone's like, it's not on the real stadium. It's not on the field from the movie. Well, of course not.

No. That's a guy's backyard. Yeah. What do you think? We're going to play in our limits to get 8,000 in there. They're going to play in front of no one? How could you be upset about that? I mean, I would personally like that, but.

How many people, like, it's Yankees, White Sox. Do you think anyone's going to, like, if Nick Swisher was there, he'd walk into, oh, are they going to? I got to finish some thoughts here walk into the corn stalks and act like he's dying but then I was thinking they're probably going to put a real fence out there which I think you can't I think if you play this game

you can't have it's got to be like the Ivy and maybe like a baseboard so like rollers don't go other than that you got to make some ground rules and just have the cornfield you got to be able to make a catch in the cornfields they're going to mess this up you know I'm a hot take guy but I will I do think they're going to put up a fence.

I do as well. I'm saying they should not. Well, I don't. How much cooler would it be if they didn't have a fence? Not cooler. I'm not into the no fence. You can make a catch into the

corn fields? Corn hurts, man. You ever run through corn? Of course. What? My huge corn maze guy. You run through the corn. Oh.

I used to go hide in the corn and scare people. That was like my thing to do at the corn maze. Still not running into corn. Well, I mean, what are we? How does that not count? I know how hard corn is. I've been running and zigzagging in between corn before. Doesn't feel good.

Why have you run into corn before? It's my favorite hobby. Yeah. Wire. That's how I got tough. You're not tough. Ooh, I'll knock you out. See, that's what that's scary.

tactics. Zero toughness. Wasn't even scared. Let's do it. I can't. You're in Denver. Put on a set up a camera. I'll be there soon, baby girl. It's funny that the Yankees go to all these things. They're the Yankees. I know. I wonder if Yankees players, like they're always on Sunday night baseball.

They get excited for these ones. Some points like, yo, can you send another team to do this stuff? Yeah, the Sunday night baseball stuff is tough because you're right. That's like a travel day. and it's like recovery time. This stuff I think is fun. It's good publicity, blah, blah, blah. Jim, I think we do have to talk about the other team from New York, my man.

Mets, they're 12 and 1. 12 and 1 in their last 13. The Marlins are pretty bad. So, like, I'm not, if the Mets were trying and playing well, they should sweep the Marlins. But they're half game out of the wild card now. And if they make the wild card and if they win, they have the pitching staff to, like,

really scare some opponents in the playoffs. Yeah. They are the Mets. So a collapse is very likely. If history repeats itself, which it tends to, you'd think the rug will come out at some point. As in now, it's awesome, man. I know you were cackling over there at Brody van GM's speech,

but right now you got to give it credit. Right now, things are working. Yeah, right. Even Alonzo had a good game. And the fans are totally bought in, which winning will do that. But I still think like all the social media stuff is weird. Whatever.

But yeah, this, here's the thing, Jake. Right. If we come out of this. So the test starts today, Friday, August 9th, because this is a great winning streak. But four games against the same. Francisco Giants. Well, they lost three of those, so didn't even count that. Okay. Three games against the Padres losing. Sweep of the Pittsburgh losing. Swoop of the Chicago White Sox losing team.

Two out of three from the Pittsburgh Pirates losing team. Sweep of the Miami Marlins losing team. So there is a chance that in this next set when they play Washington for three, Atlanta for three, Cleveland for three, Atlanta for three, Cubs for three that we come back and say might have been an ease of schedule type thing going on. There is a chance of that. I don't want to rule it out. Yeah. Oh, absolutely.

And I got to speak for my Mets fans and tell you, hey, we're just playing who's on the schedule, buddy. I'm a big fan of that. You got to play who's on the schedule. Mets fans are coming into this. Like, it's their time to shine and maybe it is or they could crash and burn pretty hard. But they do not have

the easiest rest of the way. Washington, Atlanta, Cleveland, Atlanta, Cubs, Washington, Dodgers, and then they end three against Atlanta, which may be easy because Atlanta may not be trying their hardest in the final games there. But we'll see, man. There's still a lot of teams clogged up. It's fun. They do have magic right now.

I do have to put some grains of salt on it with, the schedule when I look at it though. Ooh. And then, yeah. Your dude Yamamoto took the loss. My guy. Yami. And then, yeah, we had the AL Central down there,

but we kind of talked about that, and my symmetry thing isn't really a storyline. So I don't know. Do we keep it moving? Let's get on to some segments. Some standout performances. Could you tell me your standout performance from this last

series of baseball? I had a lot of trouble finding a standout performance that I wanted. I was going to do just New York teams because the Mets and Yankees are 22 and 2 in their last 24. East Coast bias. Yeah, but I didn't. There was not many, no complete games thrown this week. There was one hitting performance that I was going to use, but you snagged it before I could. So you will get that.

So what I did was I gave it to Z. Zach Wheeler. Yeah. Eight innings pitched, zero earned runs, but what I like most about this is it came after the double header. So you needed to give the bullpen a breather, because I believe five bullpen arms pitched the game before, the day before in the two games. You need that.

Weirler's got two good outings in a row. And it's kind of on every Mets pitcher right now to keep this magic going. You know what I mean? Like, you cannot go out there and give up six. in the first two innings right now, or you blew it. You blew out the candles on this magic cake. But Wheeler did not.

Eight innings pitched, zero runs, comes after the double header, saves the bullpen, gets the win. And with Stroman there now, it's, you know, de Grom, Cinderguard Stroman. Wheeler dropped down a second tier.

He's not the third guy. I think Stroman kind of replaced him, but Wheeler's going to be coming for that, in name alone. in the way you'd talk about it. His stats may be there of late, because I know there's two good ones in row. But good job by Zach Wheeler.

Yeah, he does have a couple good ones in a row. And it was funny because when they did the Stroman trade, everyone was like, oh, and hey, maybe Zach Wheeler could become a bullpen option. And you're Zach Wheeler. You're heading into free agency this year. You were this big-time prospect. They trade for 5-7 Marcus Stroman, and you're going to be a bullpen guy now.

So, yeah, he now. He now has, I mean, he went seven in a inning shut out last time, eight inning shut out this time. Should be in Fuego. I guess he technically gets a better stage than Enfuego. He gets the standout performance. And, yeah, man, I know you and I were living in fear that he was going to go to the Astros because he is like, he's like the prototype for them to go to Houston and lead the league in strikeouts next year, which still might happen in free agency.

But good for Zach, man. and good for the Mets. I'm happy for all our Mets fans. Yeah. So Wheeler, last year, he threw a lot of two seamers. And he just dropped that this year. Or no, it was two years ago. And he's throwing a lot of four seamers now,

which is doing higher average velocity and better. It's funny when like, hey, throw that good pitch more. Yeah. The high fastball that's changing baseball. He's got a really good mix. So he throws his four seamer 44% of the time, Jake. And then all of his other pitches, there's none more than 20. So, and there's a curveball, a split finger, a two seamer, a slider.

Those four pitches all land between 10 and 20%. Well, and Jim, I'm looking at his game log right now. And I don't know, Wheeler's always been a guy that they've been like, yeah, he's never been able to fully figure it out. I don't know, man. If you look at Zach Wheeler's game logs, he's got three. blowups, he's got two sixes and a seven. Outside of that, Jim, this guy is your kind of pitcher. He pretty much gives you, he's giving them a game every time except those three blowups

starts, which, again, we might have to start looking at pitching a little differently because his ERA's down to 420. You know I already do. I don't like ERA for that reason. Yeah, I mean, maybe we have to make the John Boy starting pitching staff. I don't know if we want to call it the John Boy, but how many times you gave your team a chance? Yeah. I don't like looking at ERA that much. It really, like you look at 420 ERA,

you think he's having a bad year or just not a good year. A mea year, yeah. A meh year. But then you look at the game log and what I like to do is how many times, and this, like, I think people think of in terms of fantasy, and this fantasy baseball, this isn't that good, but how many times was it for earned runs or less? Yeah.

And how many times did you give up five or more? So five or more, I consider that you dug way too deep of a hole. You lost the game as a starting pitcher. You didn't win the game for him, but you lost the game. And it's one, like you just said, it's two, it's four times out of 22 starts. So in 18 of 22 starts, he's given them a performance that they can win on. Also, I like to think how many times did he complete five innings? There's only one where he didn't.

So he's not really, what's that? It was against the Ys. Well, and the Nats got him earlier this season. Sorry. It's not really killing the bullpen. And then how many times was it three or less? And we're looking at a lot of those. Three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fourteen,

fourteen of twenty two. That could be higher. But again, he has not been burning the Mets with his four-20 era would say, eh, he's been helping them a lot more than hurting them. Yeah. And who's to even say, again, Hey, if you're a Mets fan reach out to us. Everyone knows about the Mets bullpen struggles.

How many times did Zach Wheeler have to throw a couple extra bullets to try to get through it? How many times did those extra bullets hurt them? So that's interesting. Zach Wheeler, it sounds like my man's about to get paid in free agency if he has a couple more starts to end the year. Nice pick, Jim. Thanks. Really good pick. Kind of handcuffed.

I didn't really like anything, but I'll give it to Zach Williams. Good conversation. That's your handcuffed. Jimmy, I'm going to do my standout performance If I have your blessing Go ahead I was mad at you for snaking this from me But good job by you

Well, thank you Jimmy, I am taking Yuleiguriel You'll remember him Well, on your Houston Astros And you'll remember him from Enfuego A few episodes back Maybe one of the first eps we dropped, Jim Yuleguri

Jim, my guy He went two for four weeks the run in a homer. That's a nice day. I'm talking about him, though, because he had eight RBI, which is a Houston Astros record. Again, it was against my Colorado Rockies, which is tough, but it's still an amazing day. And Jimmy, by the way, the other game in the two-game set with Colorado, he went two for three with two home runs and a stolen base. So, you know, if you're just a pure home run guy, you could have leaned the other game. But if you knock in eight, runs for a team, that's a good way to get the standout performance, Jim.

Yeah. And his brother just got hurt. Yeah, Lordus. And Jim, the other thing... He's playing for two right now. He's like a pregnant woman eats for two. Yuli's playing for two. I like that.

Jim, in Yulee Gereal's first 61 games, the first 61 games of the season. So two plus months, you know? 253 batting average. 2.83 on base. Boo. 665 OPS. More boo. Four home runs and 29 RBIs.

So that's 61 games, Jim. In the next 46 following. So think about it. There's people on Astros' Twitter. Gueriel's done. We got to get this guy off the team. He's hurting us. He doesn't look right.

I see something in his swing. He doesn't look right. Yuli Gurriel after that, his next 46 games, so 15 games less, 357, 395 on base, a 1.136 OPS, with 19 homers and 52 RBIs. Yuli Guriel had a good half of a, he, Yuliguriel had a great half of a season in 46 games following a bad first 61. And that's, I mean, that's baseball, Jim. There it is.

He's the only one. So I was looking at, again, how standouts were hard this week. I was looking at, like, people had good series, and we'll get to those in Enfuego. But of all the people who had a good series, no one had, like, crazy good games besides this Uly, Gereal 8 RBI game. Yeah, a few Yankees did,

but it was against the Orioles, and I think we're going to address that in Enfuego. Yep. All right. moving on moving on Trump watch Slump watch

Slump watch We got some updates for you Jake I wrote these down I do not know your decision But here we go Merrill Kelly's been on slump watch He had two games in a row

With seven earned runs Pitcher Four Diamondbacks Six innings pitched Three earned runs One home run That's a quality start

By definition Yeah, he's off. He's off, okay. He's off, yeah. Congrats, Merrill. Get out of here. Bam. Okay, next up, Ricky Purcello.

Pretty Ricky, six innings pitched, one earned run. You're off, Ricky. Congrats, Rick Purcello. Yeah, good job, man. Yeah, Merrill didn't get a clap for his performance. Ricky does. All right. Devers, three for 12, one double, one home run, one walk.

I think it's a off, but you're not getting clapped. Because you wouldn't say you're slump. Yeah, this is tough, man, because I mean, you didn't take judge off for his one for Fiverr with those walks. I think there could be a case of Boston fans saying, hey, we expect more from Rafa. I think he gets off. Yeah, I think he's off. All right. Whoa.

Whoa. What's the next one? Heimer Candelario, my guy. He went on the IEL, which I think gets him off. It's a tricky way to do things, but I think he's off. You don't get claps. You do get a tip of the hat, though. That's not a bad way to get off slump watch, my man.

No, pretty good. All right, so Candelario's off, Divers is off, Purcello's off, Merrill Kelly's off. David Price did not pitch. But if he wants to add to that great outing by, sale. Yeah. He's got to do... He's set up to get off, I believe.

He's got to do your pass-the-baton starting pitcher. It's on to him now. Yeah. So he hangs out for now. He doesn't get in any more trouble. We had the Red Sox on there. Do we take them off? Factoring in the sale game?

I mean, they split with the Royals, but... Factoring in the sale game? No. Okay. Not yet. Not yet. Got to win a series to get off. Yeah, that's...

That's always what we've been said. Okay. Jack Peterson, Jake. Anyways. That's the rain out stringier. This is huge. This is huge. Jack Peterson was Ofer in his last series.

This series against the Cardinals, 5-4-11, 455 batting, average 500 OBP1.318 OPS, 1-3-1 home run. Jake, is this our first official? And I forget who gave us this name, but it's perfect. Shame to flame. Did Jock go slump watch to Enfuego? Yeah, I'm trying to find our guy that said that because we do have to give them credit

because both of our eyes lit up when we saw this. Yes, almost just because we want to use it so bad, which is fine. But yeah, Jack Peterson, you go from shame to flame, my man. Excited for you. Yeah. Good job, Jack. It was from at Matt underscore Donnie underscore ASAP Donnie.

So thank you, Donnie. Matt, Matt Donnie. Asap Donnie. We appreciate it. Who's next after Jack? So, Jim, we have Glenn Sparkman on here, which I think, I want to say you and I are going to be on the same page on this. He went 4.1 innings pitched, four earn runs, three walks,

five strikeouts and a homer. It's not good, but I think, unfortunately, Glenn Sparkman has gone into the other way you get off of Slump Watch, which is just not being that good. Yeah, you're on Bad Watch. Are the Rocky still on Bad Watch, or have they worked their way up to Slump Watch? No, they got out.

They won a series a little while back. Oh, that's not how they got off Slump Watch, though. But good for them. Yeah. Good for them. All right. anything else? Who are we adding?

There's a lot of additions, right? Dude, there was a lot of, there was a lot of offers this, this week. I didn't add all of them, but there was a lot. So we cleared a lot of space, Jim, so we got room for these guys. So let it rip. Hothnodor.

Yeah. And that's a perfect pronunciation, so you can go, uh, tell our friends. Hachnad, Odor, Rothned, rognet, rognad. Rognid. It's not roganid. That was a joke, my man. I'm laughing at it. O for 13, 15 played appearances with no hits.

It's not good. It's not good. Bad. You're welcome to Slump Watch. This next one's interesting. Adani Echavaria. Your guy, man. He is a glove.

Is a defensive wizard. It's not known. One of the most fun gloves you'll find, by the way. He's great. So because they played four games in three days, the Mets, it's on the Mets. They used him. He played at second. He played at third.

I believe he played at short. He started three of the four games, Jake. All right. But he didn't get a single hit. No. But he's not in there for his bat. He's in there for to spell the guys and be a glove. But he didn't get a single hit.

Oh, for 12 on the week. He's two, he has two hits. in his last 40 played appearances. So I don't know He has two hits In his last 14 games I don't know Jake If this is Slump Watch

Or just bad with the Batwatch So Jim, I think it's both And I think he goes on Slump Watch But he is going to be one of the rare cases I think one hit he's off That's how good he is with the leather Okay So his next hit he gets off Slump Watch

Okay Kind of a lot of pressure for a day. A lot of pressure. A lot of pressure. Yeah. Next up, a guy who's been in Fuego was in Fuego like two weeks running. This is a big name. Paul Goldschmidt. We need a term when like a big fish gets on Coldwatch. Caught a big fish. We caught a big frozen fish. Big frozen fish. Okay. If you can want up that again, tweet at us. It'll get on here. You can one up. We caught a big, Frozen Fitch. Paul Goldschmidt, dude.

I mean, he was crushing it earlier, like six home runs in six games. He's 0 for 14 in this series versus the Dodgers. Cardinals are sliding, and I'm sure him being nothing didn't help. No hits in his last four games. Slump watch. Yeah, Jim. And again, we touched on it quick, man. That Dodgers Cardinals series was brutal.

They had Ozuna up in one of the games with a chance to take the lead. And they just didn't have the heart in another game. They won nothing and then they just got beat. So that's brutal for the guards. And yeah, especially when Goldie's not doing it for them. That's tough. Yeah. And you had some names on here.

Who'd you add? I threw a couple Nombres on here, Jim. Jim, this first one, tough. You see I put the words, cruel world on there. There's a guy we got so excited about a week ago. Adam Duvall for the Braves. He jumped on in Fuego.

Awesome story. Former All-Star. He's buried in the minor leagues. He comes back. He's raking. Jim, the sweet sport of baseball, came back. He is one for 17 in his last four games. I mean, I'm sorry, Adam.

We openly were rooting for you. But you got to go in slump watch, dude. Just take a moment. moment, go hang out on Slump Watch. It's all right. Like, we're not mad at you, but it's kind of how it has to be. You are mad at this next guy. Oh, so mad.

I'm not mad at this guy. You're mad at this. I saw your notes. I saw your diary. Oh, my God. Oh, my diary. Yeah, Jim, so my next guy, I like throwing a pitcher on here, too, because it's easy to get wrapped up in the over as the hitter's gone.

Jimmy John Lester, not Jimmy, John Lester. Jimmy, comma, John Lester. Johnny got knocked around, four innings pitch, nine earn run, and his last four starts, 35 hits and 22 innings pitch to the tune of a seven-plus ERA. The Cubby's starting pitching had been pretty strong for them. They've been focusing on trying to get their bullpen right. Johnny Ells needs to stop living up to that name, whack it,ish. Smackety-do.

All right, Lester's on slump watch. Lester on slump watch. Let's confirm. Moving on. What's the next segment, Jake? Dirt, Nasty's, and Fuego, Jim. Means on fire, baby. I threw my dude.

Your guy. This literally is your guy. Ivan Nova. He had a complete game shutout a little bit ago. He's still doing it, Jake. Yeah. I don't know what he dipped into, but he goes eight innings pitched, Zior earned runs versus Detroit.

So maybe that's what he dipped into. But he was my standout a couple weeks ago for a complete game shoutout. And his last four starts. And Ivan Nova's last four starts. Who's he pitching for these days, Jake? It's pitching for your Chicago White Sox, Jim. 28 innings pitched, two earned runs. Yeah.

On fire. which has brought his ERA on the season down to 4-8, so he was kind of having a tough go there for a little while. He's settled down, Jim. He actually, you know, the John Boy stat we're talking about. He had three blow-ups in the first month. Since then, he's only had two, so he's been giving Chicago a chance.

I mean, when your ERA heading into May is 833, the fact he's at 4-8 now. But yeah, we're excited for the big guy. Jim is 10th year in Major League Baseball. Good for him. It's nuts. It's got me beat. I remember when he debuted. Yeah.

2010. Yeah. Good for Big Ivan. Jim, you got another big guy on here. Pete Alonzo. Pete Alonzo had been in a slump since the homeradurban. He goes out in this, this, this four games versus the Marlins.

He hits three home runs, 357 batting average, 438 on base percentage in the four games, three home runs. Good job, Pete. Yeah. And his, like, I'm probably not going to describe this well, Jim. He's got a miss home run swing

that at City Field is perfect. Like, if he doesn't catch all of it, but he turns on it enough, he's got this kind of line drive, pokey swing that he's big and strong enough that it just gets out at City Field. And he had a couple of those this week. And yeah, man, if Big Pete gets it going for him,

I mean, Mets fans are going to be out of control. They already are. He already got it going and they're already out of control. I like that. That's right to happen. Jim, we've got a couple fun names. I'll let you keep rolling with my dude Ozzy Albies. Ozzy Albies got to play in the biggest hitters park in baseball Target Field, which Minnesota fans are upset because all the park factors say it's not the blah, well, watch a game at Target Field.

I commend any of you guys who have not watched a game in Target Field this summer to go watch a game at Target Field. The ball fucking flies. Yeah. Flies. And we had two games where there's more than 20 runs scored again. Yeah, there's a, there's a vortex level. Like maybe what's, what's the second level of a stadium called? The mezzanine or?

Yeah, sure, yeah. The mezzanine level of the twin stadium, if the ball gets in that area, it just goes. It's like there's, there's a blower, that whole level. If you hit what would normally be a pop-up in there, it's going to hit a weird piece of wall. I called it the paper toss. The fans are blowing it out. You just toss it up there and it blows out. And people are like, it's just this Yankee series.

It's a weird season. Twins fans got so upset with me. Like, well, I don't think so, guys. Because I've watched more highlights, and it just fucking goes. It's crazy. Can I put you on the spot? Yeah. Do you like the name Ozzy Albies?

Yeah, great name. Okay, good. How could I not like the name Ozzy Albies? I don't know. There's a lot of vowels going on. I didn't know if it was going to be too much for you, but I'm glad you like it. He's got two names to choose from.

You call them Ozzie, call him Albi. They're both fun. Yeah. Two of the more fun names attack. I thought, so, yeah, the two, I thought it might have been too much, but I'm glad you're in on it. But what do you even do at Minnesota, Jim? Nine for 16, two home runs, five RBIs,

563 on base percentage, without any walks. Because why would you take a walk when you're playing in a home run factory? Yeah, got to pad the stats. which again, we're going to talk about that in a minute. But, yeah, Ozzy, man, his contract, that one still is mind-bottling. I guess we'll do some of that in the off-season. It's not time for that. But enjoy being hot, Oz.

Yeah. And Jim, a little teaser, industry, industry term. You might hear a little more about Ozzy later. That's just a tease, baby. I don't even know what you're talking about. What are we got coming up? You'll see. I'll find that.

Jim, and the rest of Infuego, I put Nick Castellanos on there. Jimmy, he's joined the Cubs at the trade deadline from the Tigers. And Jim, he's had a hit in every game since joining the Cubs, 424 batting average, 457 on base in a 1.336 OPS, and Jim cheating a little bit. They started a series against Cincinnati. He hit two homers last night. But Nick Castellanos, Jim, we went before the trade deadline. We went on our big discussion about how big trade deadline.

headline pieces can be. Right now, Nikki C's living up to it. He wasn't officially on Slump Watch, but he is shame to flame. His six games before getting traded, he had a zero, he had a 083 batting average.

He had two hits in his last 24 played appearances when he was, before he got traded. And they traded him, he went to the Cubs, and he was like, oh my God, a winning culture?

Dude, just imagine being on the Tigers as the worst team in baseball and then going to the Cubs? Fans? You guys have fans here? Yeah. These games matter? Holy shit, am I excited? And he goes off. And I, while I'm here, I want to give Cubs fans. Actually, I want to give all baseball fans a little pat on the ass gym. I was, after one of the games this week, I was hopping around to the different games that were winding down.

I caught the Cubs game winding down. That crowd was awesome in the 6-5 game to start that series where David Phelps close it out. And then in the Dodgers Cardinals game Where I talked about Ozuna Paul DeYoung made out Ozona they couldn't get the rally going That Dodgers crowd was good So a little love to some of the fans Good job fans

Yeah And then we do have the two Yankees on here So this is a I had the light bulb go off It also happened that it was while our Yankees there But I think we want to put a little Asterisk in the Enfuego category And it's who did the

Orioles get hot this week because they are on pace to give up the most home runs in baseball history. So, Jim, they did it to two of the biggest names on the Yankees. Mike Talkman. Everyone learned this name, Mike Talkman, because he's awesome for baseball. Gio or Shella? Geo to God. Mike Talkman, the Yankees traded. They had a minor league reliever, Philip Deal, had a good spring training, and they flipped

him for Mike Talkman, a 28-year-old or 27-year-old outfielder that was blocked in Colorado system that just lit up AAA but never put it together in the majors with the Rockies. A lot of times it's hard for them to break through because they just get pinch hit appearances when they get called up. Same thing with Luke Voight last year. And then G.O. Rochella, the Yankees traded for G.O. Rochella for cash considerations from the Blue Jays at the end of last season. Since the All-Star break, Mike Talkman's OPS is 1.269. G.R. Shell is 1.283. Mike Talkman, if you go back to May,

has some of the best numbers in baseball, which is not a lie. They just hit the ball hard. And it's been crazy. But the Orioles got everyone hot. If we're doing the new section called Who did the Orioles get hot is everyone. I mean, Astros coming to Baltimore now,

so everyone's going to get hot again. And Jim, over the last. four days, only two players, and this, again, is skewed from a different series coming up. Only two players in baseball have four home runs over the past four days, Mike Talkman and Gio Orchella. Only one player in baseball has two stolen bases or more, and it's Mike Talkman. So, yeah, and again, and this is a little behind the scenes for you guys. We genuinely, truly don't want to be like a Yankees bias slash baseball podcast. we've kind of been hiding Mike Talkman from you guys.

He's been awesome. Definitely check him out. And Gio Rochella too, it's been insane. But the Orioles are a total asterisk for the rest of this season. Talkman also did rob a home run. I think probably a top five home run robbery this season. I haven't checked all of them, but I would guess it's top five. It was full extension, armpit at the wall, brings it back.

So yeah. I think that's in fuego, Jim. I think that brings us to Who Got Mad? Who got mad? Who got mad? Speaking of asterisks. Dude, Chris Davis and Brandon Hyde got mad. That was great.

Did more information come out on that? I didn't get anything. Nah, our dude, John Mioly was trying to ask Hyde. I recognized his voice. I damned him. I was like, did that was you? He didn't want to give you anything. He was like, yeah.

Hyde didn't want to talk about it. But it was weird because, so Chris Davis made an error that led to an unearned run scoring. on a home run. It wasn't really an error. He didn't make the scoop. And then there was a, I miss this in my breakdown, but there was a ball that landed in the first row of foul territory and Davis didn't even really move for it. So I think Hyde was just like giving him shit. Like what the fuck, man? You're not trying anymore? And Chris Davis snapped back. Then he took Chris Davis out of the game. They're not supposed to win this year, but I don't think they were supposed to be this bad.

And I think it's really starting to get to him. Yeah, and that's the whole Chris Davis dynamic, it went from, oh my God, how are they letting this happen with the hitless streak? And then he got some hits and he was actually playing good baseball. And it was actually, it was almost a good story for the Orioles. It was like, this guy who, yeah, he got paid. But guess what? Everyone's been shitting on him for a couple years now because he's been awful. And he's still putting in the work and he's trying his best.

It was almost like there was a nice lesson for the young Orioles players. Now that things are spiraling again, it's not so bueno. Yeah, yeah. It's tough times. Couldn't figure out anything that was said or they said they were going to keep it in-house, which they should. Yeah. Hyde was like it's just kind of upsetting that it happened where cameras can catch us.

Like, how often does this happen when it doesn't catch? Yeah. Yates. Yeah. And then Vogelbach got ejected. Danny V, baby. In a 5, he was just chirping from the bench. Quick ejection.

Not much going on. But I like Vogelbach because he reminds me of Chris Farley. There's another ejection. I'm blanking on it. Oh, Jared Dyson, the Diamondbacks got ejected. Nice, Jared. Congrats. But a lot of them are just, a lot of the ejections are just like so,

It was Dyson's first ejection ever in his career. Good job. Congrats. Add it to the resume. Yeah, a lot of these ejections are just like you say something to the Ompony objection. Boring. It's basically it. Yep.

I didn't do walk-off watch. I'm thinking about scrapping to walk-off watch. I don't think it's necessary. I didn't ask your thoughts on that. Yeah, the only one that jumped out and maybe it jumps out because I did get to see it live was the snow walk-off was really cool. Oh yeah. Russell Martin had one as well. But Suno's was a fucking bomb.

Acuna didn't even watch it. He just came walking in from center field. That was really cool. Call up watch, though, I like. Call up watch. Ring ring, ring, ring. Bring, bring, bring. Would you like to play in the major leagues?

Haven't gotten that call. Yeah, still waiting. We had a bunch. We had a bunch. and I'm just going to run through them kind of quick. You can grab some if you want, Jake. But Patrick Sandoval, he made his debut for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. He was an 11th round pick.

Young, though, 22 years old. I think they used an opener for him. He goes five innings pitch, two earned runs. Eight K's, pretty good. Good job, Patrick Sandoval. Yeah. I was looking to see if he faced any big names, but the Reds don't have like Votto. He faced Votto.

Yeah, I mean, the big thing I was looking at, I mean, you say the name Sandoval. That's a well-known name in baseball Doesn't look like he's related, so No, no, no, no. From Viejo Cali, Jim. Hometown kid. Kind of. Yeah.

Kind of. Look at that. Kind of. Where did I click that of this? Hold on. They were playing the Reds, right? I said that, and then I was worried I got it wrong.

The Angels, yes. Okay, good. Next up, Kevin Ginkle. Ginkle. That's a great name. Ginkle, Diamondbacks. 22nd round draft pick in 2016.

He's 25 years old, but this is what I like. His first batter was J.T. Romuto. Not a bad first batter to face. Comes out of the pen, I believe, and struck him out. So first batter faced, somewhat of a brand name, strikes him out.

The next game, he came in again, gave up a home run to Bryce Harper. So face another brand name, gives up a home run. That'll happen, kid. Welcome to the show. Jim, who else?

We got Robert Dugger? You think it's Dugger or Dugger? Dugger. Dugger, barely knower. And a couple, he's on the Miami Marlins and the other one who was one of the bigger stories in baseball this week. Isan Dias?

Are we saying that right? We always trash names. Isan Dias is how I was told it was said. And not to one-up Robert Dugger. You please feel free to. say what you want. Eson, he went yard while his dad was getting interviewed. And that was a great baseball moment.

Against a grom. Against agrom was his only hit. But again, who cares, baby? Because that's awesome. And I think I'm double checking right now, but I'm pretty sure. Isan is actually a pretty decent prospect, Jim. There's coming into the season, he was, or coming into 2018, he was top 100.

It seems like he's come down a little bit, but he's supposed to be a middle infielder guy that's got some good talent. Well, he got called up. He started all four games against the Mets. He did go one for 15 with 7Ks, the one home run was off to Grom with his dad yelling on TV. But I think he batted second in the batting order.

So I was looking at it. I was like, oh, this dude must be, have some promise. Yeah. And he was one of the big, I think he was technically the biggest, piece at the time in the Christian Yelich trade gym. It was him, Yamamoto, and Lewis Brinson.

Yamamoto. Yeah. The next one is Devin Williams. The Brewers called Tim up. Second round pick from 2013, 24 years old. He at 1.2 innings pitch, three hits, two runs. Zero earned

runs, though. Error by the third baseman. Come on. Come on, 3B. 3B. Pick it, kid. Making my debut here. Devin. Yeah, right. Devon, Williams. Devin Williams.

So welcome to the show, guys. Yeah. You're going to give out some awards? Jim, I think it is time for awards. You're up first, Jim, and I love the action you got going on here. Yeah. My award is the, it ain't me,

it ain't me, I ain't no fortunate son. Oh, it ain't me. It ain't me. I ain't no billionaire son. I know most baseball fans know about this, but if there's some that don't, they need to be informed. The Blue Jays have three players

whose dads were MLB players. Bichette, Guerrero, Bigio. Good MLB players, too. Good MLB players. players. Yeah. And their lead, they're in the, and, uh, Guerrero, uh, who has a brother who's an MLB player,

those were their top four in their last game. Gueriel. Yeah, Guriel, uh, Yule's brother. That Guriel Guerrero combo three, four in the Blue Jays line of is tough to say those both without thinking of the other name. Yes. But it's just nuts. Think about that.

And I thought maybe like real quick, Jake, choose three players that are playing now. and then their sons, form a son's team. Ooh. A son's team that I want to see 20 years from now or whatever. Yep. Okay. Pueg jumps out. Wow, that's a great call.

Pueg's son, yeah. Okay, I like it. Yeah. Gonna need another Pueg. Oh. See, I thought Trout, but you can't. That's like Wayne Gretzky's son. There's just no help.

There's no help. Michael Jordan. son. They're just too good. You can't follow that. God, I do love Yamamoto. I don't know. C.C., we kind of talked about that the other day, and we know he's a prospect. Yep.

Like, if C.C. has a son that comes in with C.C.'s size and, like, building stuff, that would be really cool. That would. Yeah, like, even Padre Rodriguez's son was with the Giants for a little bit. Yo, Jose Altuva. I want to see Jose Al Tuva in the league. Oh, okay. That's a good pick. I want to be the same height as Altuve.

Okay. I like that. I might, this is kind of a cheap pick. Nope. I want Altuva's son to be a giant. Oh, okay. I want to be like 6-2. Yeah.

It's just a beast. Yeah. 6.3, 240. All right, those are our two. And then we'll come up with third. Al-Tuvae son, Pueg, son. So I'm going to, I've got a cop out, but I really like it. Give me Vlad Guerrero the third, baby.

Okay. Dude, just every, every Guerrero son is just a freak, great baseball player? It's like the Matthews for baseball. Teams start just, like, budgeting in their future? I had someone else, I was thinking, oh, I forget now. Do the Boons have a kid? Does Aaron or Brett have some? sons that are playing baseball? Boone has three sons. Two are adopted. I don't know if that matters in this

world. Right. Because they're the current grandpa legacy family in baseball, right? You mean like, does Matt Sui or Ichro have a son? Oh, Ichiro is a great one. That's our three then. Eachero, Altuve, and Puig. We need all three of those sons on the lineup together. Dude, Ichiro to Ichiro Jr. is a great comparison, Vlad Sr. to Vlad Jr. Like, that would be really fun. Does Ichro have any kids? I mean, he's very fertile and ready to go if he needs to. All right. So that's my award. I just needed people to know that the Blue Jays have three major league sons, very good players at the top of their order.

Yeah. Jim, my award I'm giving out, and it's a long, a similar theme, kind of. I'm giving out the Going Up Top Award. Going Up Top. Going Up Top Award. And Jim, if you've been paying attention, this, what team did I say I'm giving into this episode? The Braves. The Atlanta Braves.

Who did I tell you I was going to be talking about it a little bit in Enfuego? Um, Ich, Ro's son. Ichero's future son. Ozzy Albies. Jim, in the going up top award, there's a couple play on words here. Football, preseason football came back. People were excited about that. Guess what people?

We still got great baseball going on. You could come around to football later. Jim, the Atlanta Braves in that top of the order. I saw you were going triple award with the sons. Dude, I just, I wanted to give some more love, man. Ozzy Albies. Ronald Acuna and Freddie Freeman. I've bought into this Braves team right now.

I have four tier one teams, two from each conference. Conference, who calls it that, Jake? It's a baseball show. Yanks and Houston in the AL, Braves and Dodgers in the NL for me right now. And Jim, something that was so special about that Red Sox team from last year was the top three of that order. you were just not, you were hoping to get through them only giving up a run. That was a win.

If you got through bets, Ben Intendi and J.D. Martinez last year only giving up a run, that was a win. And dude, right now, man, Atlanta has that going, and that's got to be one of the biggest strengths of this team. And I'm leaving out my bringer of rain Josh Donaldson and even young thick Austin Riley, your dude who's on the IL right now. But Jim, if you got to go Albi's Akuna, Freeman to start every game and then you're going to see them probably three more times, that's vicious and that has an effect on a pitching staff.

And that's just kind of my rounding this off, giving them, giving the Braves love and giving those young guys some love. And they all went nuts in Minnesota, which we have a mini asterisk on, but still the twins. Going on up to east side. Did a award. We both gave out multiple awards. You did mine.

You did mine because you did yours because you knew mine. Correct? Yeah, and I think you and I have run into this quam on talking Yanks because we don't want to. But that's limited to 25 guys we can give awards to basically. Here, we're within all of baseball. So if it makes sense, I think it's kosher. Parantheses, it's kind of just whatever we want to talk about. We can do whatever.

It's our show so shut up. No rule. Rules. There's no rules. There's one rule. No rules is so good. Haven't said that in a long time. Next up. Everyone's favorite segment. Talking about going on up. It's the elevator talk. Segway.

Elevator talk. Everyone's favorite segment we think. I have no idea. We don't really pulled the audience that much. We've never. It's our favorite segment. It was our favorite segment coming in. Do people like elevator talk? I think they do. Let's rip it, Jim. Here we go. We're spinning the wheel. If you were caught in the elevator with.

Ooh, the Angels. Ooh, okay. Make my brother-in-law, make my brother-in-law Brett upset. He is an Angels fan. He tells me they're a weird team. They'll go on hot streaks and losing streaks like crazy. They're on a losing streak right now.

That's pretty wild. A team that has been dealt some heart. Ake and tragedy this season. Yeah. But they still have a lot of talent. Jake, they've currently lost seven in a row. The Angels have lost seven in a row. And wow, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen.

They're two and eleven in their last thirteen games. Two and eleven. Yeah, that's tough. I think if you're in the elevator with this Angels fan, you know, you obviously, to go, love watching Trout play, huh? Like, you start there. You know, that's how you ease in. Love to get Trout a title.

That's basically what it is. Yeah. And that's not even Angels fans. Hey, next year, Otney. Next. Don't you think all of baseball fans were like, I'd love to get Trout of title? Yeah.

And Jim, I guess the big thing they have, and, you know, you give them a like, hey, you know, get hot. Let's contest that wild card. It's not happening. Jim, next year, Otani is going to pitch again. That's going to be wildly fun. And he's still a blast to watch at the dish.

So you go there. You give Cole Calhoun a little love. You're like, man, is that guy a gamer or what? His stats aren't all that flashy, flashy. What do we got going on with the pitching, Jim? Jesus. I mean, that's where you go. You say, you tell the Angels fan,

you're like, yeah, man, I just don't know if we're going anywhere until we get a couple arms in-house, because their pitching is atrocious. Yeah. They've been struggling to replace Lestella. Lestella broke his leg. He was doing really well. So who's been replaced them, Rengifo? Rengifo, I don't know, you say that name.

Njifo, I think it said someone yelled to me for that. Is he, is he the replacement? And Thice, they called up Thice, so he's mostly third base. Yeah. So, hey, I wonder how much they put that into play with, like, the pitch, with the, uh, Lestella going down is that, that shakes. And Jim, that should not be what shakes things up. You remember, we, I think there was some point when we were, Justin Upton had just come up for them

and we were excited for that. He's 31. He's having a brutal year. He's only 125 at Bats in and he jumped, you know, come. One of my favorite phrases I heard this year is if you're hurt coming into a season, and it's like trying to jump onto a moving train. So maybe he's about to get it going. But I mean, he's a guy who makes a lot of coin, Jim.

He makes, he's making 18 mil this year, 21 mil next, 23 in 2021. In 2022, he's making 28 mil. So there's some guys on this team just getting paid that might be giving you negative performance. If you're talking about him, pool host potentially, Yeah, I mean, this is kind of sad because you look at their starting pitchers, Jake, and Tyler Skaggs had the most starts, and he passed away in the middle of the season. Matt Harvey had 12 starts.

He was a big plan, and he's been DFAed. Otani couldn't pitch because of the Tommy John surgery. So their strategy, I mean, they didn't really, they were limited. The Skaggs, the Skaggs news hurts them, but that's a much worse thing than a baseball outcome situation. Yeah, and that's, that's brutal. I'm listening to their last starters. Cole Pena, Barrio, Cole, Suarez, Peters, who are these guys? Yeah, I mean, Suarez has 10 starts to a 622 ERA, Cahill 11, 628, Harvey was 12709.

I mean, that's not, that's not even close to acceptable. I don't know. So the elevator has clearly gone sour while you're talking to your Angels fan. My ending line with Angels fans right now is that if they don't figure it out in the next two years, that kids are going to look back at baseball reference, you know, 10 years from now, 15 years from now,

and say, how did Mike Trout and Albert Poolehost play together for a decade and not win a single playoff game? Yeah. They have decent offense, man. I mean, like, Brian Goodwin's having a good season. Is he hurt right now? Yeah, he turned it around. I think they got him from Kansas City, and he's figured something out.

So that's good. He's got an 825 OPS and a 116 Ops plus. Like, he's been good right now. Nice swing, too. Trout's good. Otani's got an 864 Ops. Lestella was doing good. Calhoun is having a pretty good season for Cole Cahoon.

And he's a lot of fun. Zach. Zach Cozart some bad money for them, too? Yeah, I don't know. I'm probably getting off the elevator. You're out? Hiding. You're off the elevator.

I was going to see who they traded Goodwin for. He was selected off waivers by the Royals. So that's a good pick out. Good snag. What's that? Good snack. Good snack. Yeah, that's what you're telling the Orioles to start doing.

Ooh, yeah. All right. Sorry Angels fans. Sorry, angels. I still think like next year should be a winnable season with a tony pitching. You got to get some more pitchers. Houston, Jim. Yeah, but wild card.

I mean, yeah. Yeah. Houston loses Cole. Yeah, they're going to sign Wheeler, though. They're definitely going to sign. They're committed to winning over in Houston. I'm announcing, I want to announce this on today's episode. with Zach Wheeler signs with the Houston Astros.

Wow. That's huge news. Yeah. Everyone credit at Talking Jake, please. At Talking Jake. Send it over, baby. Send it over. All right.

That ends this show. Thank you guys very much. If you enjoyed it, please rate, subscribe, review. If you're listening on the iTunes podcast app on your iPhone, they redid the category. So now there's just a baseball category. And I was late to figure out how to get us into that category. but I think when this episode drops will be in it. I'd love to make a push.

So if you want to support us, you know, just subscribe, unsubscribe, subscribe, rate, review, rate again, rate again, rate again, rate again. Just for one day. I just want to jump up the rankings. Then I don't care anymore. I just want to get up there for one day, screenshot it, then act like that's the screenshot forever. Good strategy. Great.

Great. All right. Thanks, guys. We will see you on Monday. day.