Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 17 | Sept 2nd | No-Hitter and Get off My Mound

Episode Date: September 2, 2019

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We are officially into September this time. It's not a joke. It's real. There is only four weeks left of regular season baseball, and there is still a ton to be determined that this week end, help figure any of that out. We'll get into it. Talk some baseball.

My name's John Boy. I'm coming to you from New Jersey. I got my best friend and co-host Jake here with me, and we're going to talk about the weekend that was. the Labor Day weekend, what happened, who made moves, who fell on the standings, who gained ground, who threw a no-hitter? Imagine some of you listen to this and you don't know who threw a no-hitter. That would be bizarre. But Jake, how are you doing?

It's likely, man. Still not a lot of people use the social medias and join their Labor Day weekend. I think we're going to break some news to some people. So I'm doing well, man. you're right i mean we eased into september at the end of august but it is september it's kind of go time i might have accidentally stumbled into a uh maybe a potential midweek talking episode for us jim it's kind of something that's been on my head lately um kind of like the last deciding month like i've got one guy in enfuego where depending how his final month goes it could

change his out his complete outlook for next season. So I thought that might be kind of a fun topic because at the same time in Yankeesland, you and I had a good debate the other day. Can Jayap do anything to salvage his year? So I don't know. It could be a fun one, but I'm doing good, man. Had an all right working weekend. Our Yanks did some fun stuff. We'll talk about that. Like you mentioned, no hitter. We had some good hitting, some good pitching. I bet there was good fielding too, Jim. How about that? Maybe.

Maybe. Don't. No spoilers. Don't act like there was if there wasn't. That's a big thing. That's true. How are you doing? Well, to be honest with the people, I'm the grumpiest I've been in months, and I'm really pissed off.

And I'm going to try and play through it and not let it affect this episode. But if I seem perturbed, I fucking am. A lot of behind-the-scenes stuff making me very very. very angry today. Anyway, these people didn't make me angry. These people made me very happy over the weekend. These are our proud sponsors of this episode of talking baseball. And it starts off with a bang.

Tawad Al Hardin. Tawad. Tawad. Tawad. Tawad. Tawad. I don't know. John Sten. I know how to pronounce that one. John Sten. Todd Emanuelli. Like that. Uh, Jivas.

Jivas. Jivus. Javis. Matt Engel. Matt angle. Sounds like a football player. Why? Matt angle.

I don't know. Get the angle. Cody Mays. That's a center fielder. Cody Mays. Graham Cowfield. That's a corner outfielder. Zach Clark.

That's a shortstop or a pitcher. Nathan Myers. What do you got for Nathan Myers? Did you just go coffee? Caulfield, the corner outfield, because it just sounds like corner outfield? Graham Caulfield. No. You kind of just went Coffield, corner outfield. It just kind of sounded like the corner of a corner outfield name. It is a corner outfield. Yeah.

Zach Clark, what do you got for Nathan Myers? What position Nathan Myers is going to play? Myers feels like a pitcher. Myers coming in out of the bullpen. Got some good stuff. He's got to tighten it up a little bit. Chandler Riley. Not to be mean, but you're not on the field. Ooh, tough. Tough. Chandler Bing effect there, huh? Yeah, it's tough Chandler Bing.

That's basically it. I don't think I've ever met a Chandler. Like, I don't think I've ever come across a Chandler in real life besides Chandler being from friends. So good for a chant here. Yeah. Thanks, Chandler. Yeah, I mean, Chandler Parsons, good NBA player for a little bit. Tyson Chandler, that's the last name.

That doesn't count. Yeah. Josh Carmel with a K, nice, Sean Weiss, Cullen D.C., Todd Emanuelly, again, how'd you sneak on here twice? Wow. And Rachel. Thank you very much. Those are our most recent Patreon supporters and subscribers. And if they got in before September, before September started, they are on the raffle for August.

Two people will win a jersey of. their choice from affordable jerseys.com. And you get some behind the scenes access besides today because the computer's messing up on me and I don't know how to fix it. But usually you get to be in the live chat and watch on YouTube and be part of the action with us. Unfortunately today, that's not going to happen. But thank you to our Patreon sponsors.

We appreciate it very much. Jake, let's go into the baseball. Let's do the baseball stuff then. Let's do the baseball stuff. A lot happened, man. Quick moving game. Yeah. Someone said that yesterday.

They were like, I've never heard someone say baseball moves fast. I'm like, there's a game every day. Yeah. The NFL, there's one game a week. You talk about it for six days. That's so slow. If your NFL team loses to the dolphins, but then they beat the Patriots, you know, those are two weeks of two very different emotions.

Baseball, you could have that day to day. In less than 24 hours. Yeah. Well, the National League report is going to be brought to you by Jake Storelli. He's going to be giving it to you, but it's really brought to you by our friends at Roosevelt shirts, R-S-V-L-T-S. We got a box full of them.

You know what Jake and I got? We got the Major League from the movie Major League, Indians. you and I both got a pair of those different style, but that's what we both got for ourselves. They're super comfortable. They're fun, conversation starter shirts. A lot of baseball players wearing them, like Judge went viral for wearing the Sandlot one.

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Okay. I didn't know if that was. I thought you had more coming. All right. Maybe I lost you on the Facebook. time there. Jim, welcome to Atlanta where the players play. They played where the Braves. They welcomed your Chicago White Sox little Interleague. Brave scored double digits in the first two games. Freddie Freeman big series, Dallas Keikle with a two RBI single, NL Baseball, his first hit

since his rookie year. Atlanta just does what they do. They sweep again. The Nationals trying to keep up with Atlanta to stay in reach somehow. The Nats. sweep the Marlins gym. Your guy Strasbourg is working his way into the NL. Sy Young Conversation. The New York Metropolitan's, they take two out of three in the Ilydelf. The Toddfather, Wilson Ramos doing some fun stuff for Los Mets. Philly salvaged the final game.

On the King's Order, Scott Kingery, bass is clearing double for them. Good for the Mets, going to Philly. And again, a couple wins, bad for Philly. in the Central. The Cardinals and the Reds played four games in two days. Back-to-back double-headers. Cards won the first three Reds win the final game. St. Louis keeps on, keeping on. Jim, a pair of walk-offs by the carpenter, good with his hands, I suppose, and a hairy bader. I had one of those removed by my doctor. The South Siders hosted the brew crew. Cubs won game one, but they lose the remaining two games of the series. They get shutout in both of them, Jim, and kind of brutal shutouts.

There was no dominant individual performance by Milwaukee. Seven pitchers in one game, five pitchers in the other. Tough for the Cubs. And your pirates, Jim. Oh, my God. They sweep my best friend Tim Melville's Rockies. Congrats Pittsburgh, but more so. Holy crap, my Rockies. They're now the second worst team in the National League.

Jeez, Christmas. And then speaking of those Rockies in the NL West, you heard they're a dumpster fire still. The Dodgers went to the desert and get snake bit by the Diamondbacks. Debacks win three out of four. We had a ball. Eduardo Escobar going off. The Dodgers, they only win the last game due to some late.

heroics by some guy named Bellinger and young jock and extras. And finally, the fathers, Los Padres, they take three out of four in San Fran. Wheels are off for the San Francisco Giants. Hoo. Well, tough for the Giants. Magic completely wore off, huh?

Completely gone. They're, uh, I told you once, I told you. A couple episodes ago, they dropped under five. 500 and I was like, oh, that's the big red flag for San Fran. Once that goes away, it's all coming off. And there it is. Yeah. What about the Mets? Is there magic on? Well, Jim, you know, you and I, you have your Mets. I have my Diamondbacks. They're three and a half and four games out,

uh, respectively D-backs up the half game. Uh, I mean, it depends what hat you have on, Jim. I mean, like, like we've been saying, there's a lot of. teams to jump. Jim, we are getting to the point in this wild card chase that's like the Cubs, Cubs or Cardinals would have to significantly falter to kind of give these other teams a shot because it's two and a half games, sure. But I mean, if you start, if you include the Phillies who are two and a half games out of the wild card, Milwaukee's three, Arizona's three and a half and the Mets are four. So it's kind of, is everyone included or is nobody included?

Yeah. Well, it all depends on schedule and stuff like that. I mean, it's good for these teams that they get to have an exciting finish. I don't think they'll, I think it's, Milwaukee's on a slide, though. And Philly just lost two out of three to the Mets. But I think that it will be Cubs. Nats, Cardinals. You know, whoever doesn't win the NL.

The whoever doesn't win the NL Central between the Cubs and the Cardinals, one of them will be in the wild card and then the Nationals. Yeah, and I mean, there's there is a chance that, because again, those NL Central teams still play each other a decent amount. So, I mean, maybe, you know, a couple sweeps here and there and maybe Milwaukee's back in that NL Central talk. But, I mean, the Cardinals right now, they're six up on the Brewers. They seem pretty gone.

The Cubs are three back of the Cardinals. But again, you get one big series, and you're right back in it. But yeah, Jim, I mean, right now, I guess what the National League is rooting for, and I think they're one of the bigger teams, so I think the National League could get behind it. But I think the National League is just looking for the Cubbies to slip. Because Washington has run away with the first wildcard spot. They are four and a half up. If the Cubbies can come back to Earth a little bit,

it really does bring in Philly, Milwaukee, Arizona, and the Mets again. I don't know, man. For me, I see them all as out, not in. So it's done. NL is decided. No, I mean, a lot can happen, but I wouldn't. I'd be more surprised if it was something. if there was a big change, then not.

Yeah. The craziest thing about the NL report is that the Cardinals and the Reds played four games in two days. Yeah. I know a lot of people joke about all baseball. You just stand around. They're not really athletes. Go stand in the sun for eight hours back to back days.

You'll be tired even if you don't move. Even if you don't move an inch. You'd just be exhausted. Be more tired if you don't move, to be honest. Yeah. I mean, that's just an exhausting fucking two days. And the Cardinals almost won all four games. That would be demoralizing.

Thank God the Reds won the last one just for their sanity. Yeah. Because that's almost torture to go play two games back to back and lose all four. We'll talk about torture. Two of those were walkoffs. Matt Carpenter and Harry Bader. So, yeah, I mean, that's almost, if they're, was another, if all three were walk-offs and then coming into that last game, it kind of would

have been the definition of baseball torture. Reds end up getting the last one. And Cardinals, man, they, uh, they deserve some golf claps. We, um, I don't know, I picture a couple weeks ago, we're like, yeah, the brewers are kind of fun. They'll throw the kitchen sink at you. They got Yelich. The Cubs, they're obviously the Cubs. They're trying to add some more to this Joe Madden, Chris Bryant, Rizzo, Baez, all those guys. And we're like, the Cardinals, I don't know, it's Carpenter, Ozuna. Who else do we like? Jack Flaherty's been huge and they're starting to separate in the Central.

Yeah. And then the other big news is that the Brewers and the Cubs faced off. And the Brewers had lost two series in a row and really like kind of started to dig a hole. They beat the Cubs, two out of three. On the road, right? This was in Chicago. in Wrigley and they shut them out the last two games. The Cubs are a bizarre team.

It must be very hard to be a Cubs fan right now. I mean, well, I don't really mean hard, but like it seems, you know, one series they're doing great. The next series they're losing. Like you can't ever, there's no balance. They seem like the most volatile team in baseball. Yeah. And they should be like the playoffs. And maybe they're doing this thing.

we're like, hey, you know, like we're good. If we're just get in the playoffs, then they turn it on. If you're a Cubs fan, that's what you're saying. Like, you just need to get in there and then we're good enough to turn it on. But also the pessimists are saying, like, if we can't string together three series now, how are we going to do it in the postseason? So the Cubs are kind of on this seesaw ride that will end them getting into the playoffs, but it is probably super frustrating as a Cubs fan.

I'd be like, what are we? Yeah, and they welcome the Mariners in town for two. so that's that's kind of funky and then they've got the brewers and I think it's it might be a four gamer uh so yeah I mean we could be but by this time next week we could be saying very again we don't know with the cubs we could be like wow the cubs came out and they were back at it they're going on the road to Milwaukee where they've been terrible I don't know man they uh I'm interested to see what we're saying a week from now about the cubbies yeah all right All right. And then nothing else really matters.

Pirates and the Rockies. I know that's tough for the Rockies, but that's not of interest to a lot of people. And the Dodgers are kind of not of interest to people. Like last episode, we didn't even really talk about the Dodgers because they're just on a get to the playoffs mode. They went, what do they lose? Debacks went three or four, but does it affect a thing? No. No.

I mean, three of four, the big. thing. It's, I mean, a couple fan bases pursuit for the best record in baseball. Right now, the Yankees have it. But yeah, the Dodgers technically, they've lost two of their last three series because yanks and debacks, but they don't care. They're very much, very much the Yankees, Houston, and the Dodgers are all in. Right now they're in one, let's be healthy, two, yeah, win. But those teams are just trying to get to the playoffs healthy. Yeah, and I'm trying to see who the Dodgers had. They had Ryu, but we talked about that last episode, because that was the Thursday game, where you got lit up in game one against

the Diamondbacks. So that scares Dodgers fans a little bit, because that's two back to back. We talked about that. Then they had Tony Gonselin, the cat dude, and he actually pitched fine. I think that was, he pitched fine, but bullpen didn't really hold it. There's the balk off. I'm trying to see, like, who pitched here? Clayton Kershaw, five innings pitch five earned runs. Damn, so that's two losses with Ryu and Kershaw back to back. That's kind of, you got to think about that a little bit if you're a Dodgers fan.

Yeah, some good Dodgers. If this was talking Dodgers, there'd be some good pitching fodder right now. How do we want to line up our rotation? But I guess that's been a fun convoy for. them for a while. Then the Dodgers bullpen did good in the last game. So I don't think they're really, whoa, Dustin May came out in relief after stripling and recorded one out and gave up four hits and three earned runs.

Not ideal. Not good for the young redhead. Damn. Bummer. That's NL Central's the story still. It's going to be crazy, man. Yeah, Central's still the story. And yeah, I mean, if the Cubbies can bring it back to Earth a little bit,

I mean, we make the Phillies and that's series that just happened would be more of a story. My baby Diamondbacks, we were talking about, hey, does this matter for the Dodgers at all? You know, again, if those Cubs can come back a game or two, it brings four teams into the wildcard chase immediately. So I'm sorry Cubs fans, and I know we've got a couple big ones that have followed you me from kind of the start. I'm sorry, but I think I'm kind of rooting against the Cubbies.

Wow. Chaos. Give me chaos. I'm rooting for chaos. Always. That's more fun when you're an outsider. Always. Like the NL Central is way more fun to me than the N.O. West. And that's not even up for debate. Right.

It's crazy. All right. Want to hear about the American League? Need to hear about the American League. You know, who's brilliant? Didn't watch a single game. Liar. bringing us the American League report. Squints apparel. Squints apparel reached out to us.

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I like that a lot. It says it feels like you're wearing clouds themselves. Someone actually said that to the guy. You like that? Someone said like, oh, this feels like I'm wearing a cloud to the guy. And he's like, I like that line. I'm going to run with it. They got hats, shirts, sweatshirts.

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Use discount code Johnboy. You get 20% off. And here's the A.O. report. The Cardinals had two walkoffs like Jake told you. Well, you know who else did? The Yankees. They beat the A's two out of three. The A's were leading in almost every inning besides the two at the very end, two walkoffs in a row.

Last game had a game tying home run and then a walkoff home run back to back. The Astros battling the Yankees for Best Record in the American League. They took two out of three from the Blue Jays. Burlander threw a no-hitter. That's exciting. Minnesota Twins trying to fend off the Cleveland Indians. They were playing the Tigers. they took the first two of three from the Tigers,

but they are playing game four today on Monday, so we'll see what happens. The Indians trying to chase those twins, Jake. They get swept by the rays. Oh, no. Cleveland drops to six games back in the division, and the rays jump them in the wild card race. Big series sweep for the raise.

Texas and Seattle split a four-game set, which makes sense because I don't care about this series, and the outcome didn't matter, and it just all move on with our days. The Mariners had a ninth-inning win, then the Rangers had a ninth-inning win, and it all just kind of was like a mirror series of nothing. The Royals took two out of three from the Orioles. Need not say anything else, and the Red Sox, they still got faith, they still believed. They took two out of three from the Angels, which brings them to five back in the wild card spot. It was six before this weekend. The first game went 15 innings before the Red Sox

got the victory. So the Rays are now the top wild card spot in the AL with Cleveland below them and Oakland just barely out. Yeah, and Jim, it's a one of the stories the American League I think is rooting for would be the Red Sox getting back in it. That would be big for baseball. If they don't, Jim, because they basically need two teams to falter while getting extremely hot, which, you know, the Red Sox have been waiting for that all year. Maybe they find it. Maybe they don't. Jim, I think what's becoming the fun story in the AL with these three wildcard teams, it's A, who's not going to get in, and then B, who's going to get the home field in that one-game playoff? I mean, we just saw Oakland. That stadium goes nuts. Imagine the Vuvuzuela's and people just going

crazy in the stands for a one game playoff in Oakland. Tampa. Um, okay. Maybe Tampa might be rooting for a road wild card game. Is that rude? Like we want, I brought, if I'm Tampa, I think I'd rather go to Cleveland and have that stadium rocking and be like, all right, this is cool. Oh, man. Shots fire. That is the, I mean, no, the Raz are a good team. And I'm sure they have a lot of diehard fans, very respectable fans, they don't have a good stadium, a good environment, or good fans that show up. And that's a fact. It's not even taking shots. Yeah. Like on average, their games have less people than a high school football game in Texas.

Like much less. I mean, they probably probably the state championship of Florida high school baseball gets a bigger crowd than the race, an average raise home game. Easily. Yeah. So, man, I'm actively rooting against that now. That's one of my, besides the Yankees, well, getting home field advantage because I'm a Yankees fan, the race not hosting a wild card game is like high on my priority list. What a terrible look for baseball.

That would be. And Jim, not for nothing. The raise actually have, uh, I'll spin this. as Jakey Spinzone can always find the way. Rays have a better record on the road than at home. Well, even their own players don't like playing there. So, yeah. Win, win, win,

Tampa, if you make the wild card game, you have to make sure you don't get the home game. That's a big, big what to watch for for the final month of the season. Don't do it to us. Yeah. Man, that'd be, that'd be, I'm just like, I'm just picturing,

so you give me Cleveland or Oakland and picturing that atmosphere and the night sky and the light shining down and the HD cameras and people kind of bundled up because it's October and it's a little cold out and that playoff feel

and the stadium's fucking rocking and then you picture the trop and a bunch of people sitting in air conditioning this is intense the power just went out again oh damn man don't Give me a wild card game.

Wait, which catwalk did that just hit? Oh, this is awesome baseball. God damn. Going to be low ratings because honestly, like, the casual, casual observer, that doesn't grip them at all. No. Damn. Okay. Wow.

Huge rooting interest for me that I just stumbled on to. Tampa cannot host the wild card game. So let's, Jim, let's kind of, let's hit up these wild cards. card teams really quick because I think they are kind of the story of the AL in a couple ways here. I kind of want to give a little golf clap. Did the Minnesota Twins just win the AL Central? No. Still six games against Cleveland.

Okay. They may have just like, I wouldn't be against Twins fans if they're like, we just locked it up because we have faith in ourselves. Right. But, I mean, if Cleveland goes out and sweeps now, which they can, they're still a very stacked team. And the twins only win two of three, then it's a five game lead with six to place. And the Indians currently have more wins against the twins and the twins do against Cleveland. So we're still, we're close. There's like one more series of buffer.

Okay. But, but yeah, we're getting to that place where the Indians don't want to. And again, keep telling them, keep trying to tell them, you want to keep it within five before you play them. Yeah. And as I'm giving the twins love and a little pat on the back, I mean, that Jose Ramirez injury for Cleveland, I mean, it's, it, this sounds too professional for what I want to be. That's a funny sentence. But Jose Ramirez, it's no surprise that when he got hot, the Indians became one of the best teams in baseball. and now he gets hurt again

and now they're scuffling a little bit. He's a top five MVP type guy when he's right and they lost him again after his putrid start. I mean, but they're not like scuffling that bad. They got swept in one series. They swept the series before. They got four against the White Sox now. They should be able to take three or four against the White Sox

before going to Minnesota. And I mean, that would be huge. Like there's still, I don't think it's, It's a bad result. I don't think it's damning yet. Now, if they don't take three or four from the White Sox, then that's bad. Well, that's what I'm saying. And we got to see it in their five and five in their last 10 while the other, I mean, all the other teams minus Oakland right now,

who just jumped to that after what the Yankees did to them. But all the other teams are moving up. So I don't know. I mean, Cleveland is, it's on watch time for them. I'm not saying they're out of it or they're dead in the water. anything but um man twins have a tough stretch coming up i mean they got boston cleveland washington cleveland there you go so that's it's not it's not dead in the water yet but uh jimmy east coast bias um i guess just talk about your yankees what they do this

weekend probably probably nothing people actually care about but let's hear it uh the yankees beat oakland they threw maybe one playoff starter out of the three games and they stayed away from their good bullpen as much as possible. Oakland, Oakland's good team. I think I like what Oakland is. Liam Hendricks, if you haven't tuned into him closing games, it's so impressive. They leaned on him for two innings and he kind of he gave up some runs in the eighth and then they just sat on his fastball, which is 98 miles per hours. 94 last year. Yankees sat on that fastball towards the end of the game and hit two back-to-back home runs. But yeah, Yanks keep winning. They're getting healthy soon, so that's good.

Yeah, Jim, they back-to-back walk-offs, dramatic fashion yesterday. They go home run to tie it in the ninth and the next hitter walks it off. Brett Gardner and Mike Ford, you know, just the Yankees household names, all those overpriced guys, the Yanks always throw. out there. Oakland kind of won the series, but they did not. The Yankees ended up on top of the final two games there. And yeah, I've got a little

bit of a, the A's are a really good team. Matt Olson, man, you know how much I'm swooning for him. That whole A's infield is awesome. If Chris Davis gets it going for them, they can be really scary. Jim, I've got kind of a hot take on Hendricks, because his stuff

and his season has been absolutely electric, but I think the Yankees seeing him back to back so recently, I think that definitely helped with their at-bats against him. And the games I've seen Hendricks this season, because a lot of the late-night games, I'll flip over, and it's a late Oakland game, and I see Hendricks. And he kind of, he peppers that fastball, and it's awesome. It's 98-99. But I think you can hunt for it a little, a little bit, like you said the Yankees were doing. So I don't know. I think if the athletes do find themselves in a five, seven game series at some point.

I have a little bit of concern about Hendricks just because his past playoff stuff, because especially if you get him once, that past stuff comes back to life. And now he's a concern for them, even though he's been incredible this season. Yeah. His stuff is cool. When he has the fastball and the slider going off that, it's really good. Ford got him into a three two three two count

and then it sat fastball Gardner Gardner no pitchers are going to throw them fastball because they think they can just easily they think they can easily throw fastballs past Gardner and Brett Gardner turned out a 98 mile per hour fastball pretty fun

I was looking at who I was looking at who the Indians threw against the race Jake Bieber Bieber pleatcoe and Plesack no Clevenger and no Savali who's who's really been really good for them last six games or so. I think you gave them on Fuego.

So they, so two of their best pitchers didn't go in that series. I'm sure they would rather have Beber Clevenger's volley lined up. Now they got a win. So that's two wins they should get against the White Sox. They got to get another win. I think Bieber's going to go. So they'll have their three guys going against the White Sox.

Maybe they lined it up for the twin series. We'll see. And the other thing, I mean, it was my award at the end of the show last week. But Carlos Carrasco return, he pitched out a bullpen for them. So there was some emotions going on. But yeah, I mean, if they can get him going a little bit.

How do you do? Tampa, we've mentioned it too, but Tampa's looking to get some of their arms back. So the September arms race. How did Carasco do? I'm trying to bring it out. Let's see. He did my 8. guy um one innings pitch two hits one run run there you go well not the best not the worst

not not great whatever getting ready for the post season ideally ideally all right you want to go on to some segments i mean we do have uh some big topics that are coming up but i think they naturally land into some of our segments so yeah i was going to say our our our astro fans might be mad about us, but they know it's coming. They know what's coming. It is the standout performance. Who gets to go first? Standout performance, I believe Mondays are Poppy Patron.

NL goes first. Jim, I am giving out my standout performance. And I put a light twist on performance because this guy performed all series against the Dodgers. Eduardo Escobar for my diamondbacks. You know I've been on the diamondbacks all year. No, I'm just giving you guys a hot time. But Eduardo Escobar, Jim, he homered in three straight games.

He goes eight for 18 with five runs, six RBIs. And Jim, again, I know we were mocking the snakes a couple Eps ago, but if these cubbies do slip, they are just, they're with these other teams. They are right there with the Mets and the Phillies, that second tier of playoff teams. but they, no respect, man. East Coast bias. Jim, I've got a couple, you know, I've got a couple recurring themes that come up in an episode.

We'll get to one of them. A, Eduardo Escobar, Venezuelan, man. I'm falling in love with all these Venezuelan men. Put that on the soundboard. Ronald Acuna. Oh, girlfriend was in the other room, just gave me a funny look for saying that sentence. And I've got some more Venezuelan love later.

Jim, he was a part of this twins team. that imagine if he was still on there. And Jim, you know I like to give out kind of seasonal awards as we go, too. Do you know Eduardo Escobar's kind of stat line on the season this year? What? Do I want to know it? Or like what kind of year do you think Eduardo Escobar's happen? Oh, I mean, absolutely zero. I wouldn't guess.

Okay. So Jim. I wouldn't know what's good for him, what's bad for him. I just know he's funny when he yells. So, Eduardo Escobar, 32 home runs on the season, 109 RBI playing third base, second base for the D-backs. He's going to end up with 70-plus extra base hits. I know you and I ended up down that road last year with Anduhar a lot.

And Jim, the dude's just got some crazy pop in his back. He's having one of his best seasons ever. He was a decent prospect. He was traded for, was it Yo? for Liriano back in the day in 2012, and then the twins flipped him last year to the debacks. He's hitting. He's on a pretty team-friendly contract,

and he's trying to lead the snakes back into this wildcard race. So I'm giving it to Edwiro Escobar. Is 32 home runs, has that compared to, like, the league? But, you know, I'm just trying to say, like, is that juice ball, but even comparing to the rest of the league, is that impressive now? I think 32 is still an impressive. I think what we're going to see at the end of the season, Jim,

I think we're going to see a couple guys with 30 that we're like, okay. But I think Eduardo, I mean, he's got a good chance to land at 40, which juice ball or not, I'm not sneezing at 40 home runs ever. We got, I'm trying to see how this goes. We got, if you have 27 home runs, you think it's pretty, pretty like you can say, those guys will have 40. Those guys will have 30 at this point, three home runs in the month. So in the National League, there's 25 guys with 27 home runs right now.

That's crazy. I want to compare it to, let's do 2016. How many guys ended with 30 home runs? 11. Yeah. So double. 2008, 30 home runs, 13. Yeah, I mean, I'll say this. Eduardo, if he has a strong last month, he could finish top 10 in the NL and home runs.

And Jim, I mean, that list is pretty strong. Right now it's Muncie, Donaldson, Bell, Aronado, Akuna, Freeman, Eugenio Suarez for Sinci, Yelich, Bellingerlanger, and Alonzo. So, I mean, as long as you. you finish high enough and you're still amongst the good names you'll be good but there definitely will be some home run tiers this year that we look back and we're like oh well in 2014 i'm just poking in random years in 2014 guess how many players had 30 home runs or more in the national league this is just national league um nine three wow and we're looking at 30 this year juice ball baby six in 2015

I mean the numbers are like when you really like you know you hear juice ball juice ball you know when you really look at the numbers they're staggering well and that's the part that's so crazy because Jim I Eduardo Escobar leads to league in triples by the way so how about that everyone but we did see baseball kind of have this revolution of pitchers are throwing harder guys are trying to hit home runs and we had that developing which which was cool. It was like this natural evolution of baseball.

Now the juiced ball has made it a not natural evolution of baseball. Yeah. Well, 2017 was the first, like, juiced ball. And we had 13 people with 30 home runs. And then last year... I don't even think that was... I don't think that's fully linked to the ball. The ball really changed this year.

I don't know. No, no. The ball changed in 2000. It was the same... It wasn't as much as this, but all the players... were saying the same exact thing, and then last year it corrected.

Now this year it's even worse. In 2017, like, to knock out the change his grip, Verlinder were saying, when you sign the ball, it's just slippery as hell. And then remember the postseason, the Dodgers and the Astros,

and it was just like home run, home run. And they were like, these balls aren't real. Yeah. It was 2017. It was the first, like, inkling,

corrected, and now it's terrible. Yeah, but if we're saying, if you're sitting at 27, you're going to get 30. We're looking at 25 guys. 2014, it was, Three. Changing game.

That's crazy. Escobar's 11th most in the NL, so. Yeah. So, I mean, again, he could easily with a good September, end up 40 home runs and kind of leading these diamondbacks. I mean, they traded Goldschmidt in the offseason. They traded away Grinky at the deadline, and they're still involved. I mean, good for the debacks. Yeah, good for the debacks.

All right. My standout performance. Who's your guy, Jim? I can't believe you missed this one, Jake. Yeah, I gave you the gentleman's knot on this one. I stole it from you. I got there first. Total oversight.

I could have it right back. That'd be illegal. Typed it in. Whoever types it in first gets it. Burlander, man. Yeah. A lot of Yankee fans hate Verlander. Jake and I have openly talked about how much we enjoy watching Verlander pitch.

It's better when it's not against the Yankees. and I'm sure any non-astroes fan will say, yeah, I like it when it's better when it's not my team too. But dude, he is so dominant. Throws the no-hitter, third of his career, as we all know. It's his second complete game in his last three starts, Jake, and the one that wasn't a complete game he got ejected from. So he can always say, huh, could have been three. He's got that to fall back on. Could have been three in a row.

We never know. this was a dominant dominant performance. In the first inning, he walked Cabin Bigio. And it wasn't any, I like went and watched it. It wasn't any borderline pitches. He was just missing a spot high. It was a real walk. And that is the only base runner to reach base.

No error. No anything like that. Because he just fucking dominated the rest of the way. 8-1-2-3 innings. He was touching 97th in the 7th. I did a breakdown to an overlay of some of his curves and fastballs. They're incredible. We've called this.

We've called it a fuck you fastball for like three seasons now. But people that listen and follow are just hearing that term for the first time because a lot of people were like, oh, what's that? But he'll throw right down the middle of fastball and just say, fuck you, you won't hit that. And they don't. It's crazy. It's that late life he's got that spin rate. It's nuts. But yeah, man, it's so impressive.

And then I had a lot of people commenting on YouTube or replying on Twitter like, it's the Blue Jays. They suck. The Blue Jays can hit. They're pitching sucks. Yeah. And I did the math on it, Jake. In the month of August, the Blue Jays averaged eight and a half hits a game, a game, eight and a half hits.

So it's not a lowly offense. No. Zero hits for the Blue Jays against Rolander. I mean, it's the most standout performance we've had on the show. Yeah, and he deserved it. No hitter. His third no hitter, I want to say the years were, I want to say the years were 0711 and now 19, or it's 0714 and 19. They're spaced out pretty well. Guys's been pretty good, huh? And yeah, Jim, I think fuck you fastball. Maybe that might be an episode at some point, like our top five guys that if it was a 3-1 count and you know the heaters coming, who's is the most unhitted. I think Verlander's still number one. And it's not due to miles per hour. Well, his mile per hour still help.

But you're right. It is he's got the movement. He's going to put it there. And he'll dare you. I'm Justin Verlander. Hit it. You know, I'm going to. I'm trying to think.

There's got to be a lot of others. I mean, even someone like Eraldus Chapman when he's peppering in it. But Verlander still. Like there's just not an ounce of fear. And you've heard me say it multiple times. I think he's our generation's Nolan Ryan. I think he's not slowing down, Jimmy. He's not slowing down.

And I don't know. I think it's so funny. He's just going to be someone that you and I, I think, talk about in a special way for a long time because there's something in sports that when you see it regularly, you remember it. And he, Justin Verlander, is always going to be our Nolan Ryan. I'm sure 20 years from now,

there's going to be some kid, twirling it that looks awesome and he has a fuck you fastball and i'll be like ah you should have seen nolan rott or you should have seen burlander dude i i tweeted this out and uh it's it's it's recency bias to the t but i think when i close my eyes in 10 years and and imagine verlander i'm gonna my first memories are going to be the world series and him in an astros uniform yeah Which kind of sucks. I was like, that sucks for Detroit fans. And some guy was like, sucks for you when he's going to go into a Hall of Fame as a Tiger.

And I was like, well, of course he's going to go in the Hall of Fame as a Tiger. That's an entirely different point. And that won't sunk for me at all. I don't care about that. I'll hold your horses. I think Verlander's got a lot of innings to still throw. And if he were to get another ring in Houston, I mean, doing the neutral hat, I don't think that's out of the equation at all for Justin Verlander.

I mean, I know he has racked up a lot of stats. I think he's got more to go. He's 36, so how much more do you think he's going to go? Dude, I'm just saying, I think even if he can, I think he can make it to 40. I think he might be able to make it past 40. Like, just look at the environment, man. He's in Houston. Like, they did the Clemens stuff.

Like, Verlander, he can still dial it up. Like, he throws the game. Like, what's the, there's a. term for it in baseball. There's max effort guys. Justin Verlander isn't a max effort guy. He just rocks, deals, and throws it in there. And I just think, I'm not going to say he's just getting started, but I mean, do you think he can make it to 40 if he wants to? Yeah, but that still would only put him at six years in Houston, 13 years in Detroit. Yeah.

Sy Young MVP in Detroit. So, I mean, I still think there's no way Detroit is not part of his Hall of Fame hat. No. But I, and I think it will be Detroit. You know, maybe he signs a contract and finishes his career as a Detroit Tiger like in his last year. And then that would really solidify him being a tiger. Sure. He could pitch another five in Houston.

I don't know. It'll be interesting to see how it winds down, especially if he does get another ring or something, because I saw your tweet about it, and that's what a lot of people were saying. I mean, that ring, man. Jimmy, right now he, okay, this, Jake, use stats when you can, Jake. Jimmy, Justin Verlander, in this age 36 season, you know, he's coming downhill. He leads the league in game started, in ERA, in strikeout. out, innings, ERA plus, and whip, and hits per nine innings.

It's not stopping. Yeah. I think he'll stop eventually. Everyone hits a wall. I mean, it has to, but he's like replicating last year. I don't know, man. It just looks so free and easy. Hoof.

Well, he's a standout performance. Let's get into some of the opposite. it. Slump watch, Slump watch. We had a lot of people on Slump Watch from last week that we have to update a ton. And the first one is Rochned O'Dor. I think this is his third week in a row on Slump Watch. He went three for 14 with two doubles. He had a hit in three of the four games and two walks. So he was on base five times in the four games. It's not a clapworthy off, but I'm taking him off. Yeah, he goes off with the tip of the hat. You're off. You did enough. Enough. Next up, Daniel Vogelback from the Seattle Mariners. He was in a bad way. He goes off.

Yeah. In this Rangers series, in the four games, he went four for 13 with a home. run and four walks, which gave him a 471 on base percentage in the four games. I'm clapping from my boy, Daniel, Danny V. He's off slump watch. Good job. Good job. Next up, Ozzy Albies, six for 11, two doubles, three walks, one RBI.

Oh, it was actually four walks. So there was an intentionally walk. His slash line was a 545 batting average is 643. on base percentage. Not only did Ozzy Albies get himself off slump watch, he went from shame to flame, Jake. That's a big time collapse. That's a serious shame to flame.

Bigger claps than Danny V. Sorry, Dan. And Jim, if you remember, I think last episode, Ozzy was close to getting off, and we said, no, like, you want to be Ozzy Albies, get off.

And he, uh, he proved it. In bad news. Yeah. Trevor Bauer, another bad start, man. four innings pitched seven hits six earned runs three walks what's going on did if if he was still with cleveland and things still mattered do you think he'd be pitching better do you think this

was natural do you think it's a change of scenery it is his first trade and if you listen to players they say like change of scenery is real just like your routine is real and like janc carlos stan said that when he came to the yankees or he he said it like in so many ways but you know ceccey sabathia said like when uh when you don't know like what time you get to the stadium who you say hi to where you go and everything's kind of off because there's such creatures of habit i think that might be what's going on with bower because he's still good pitcher the results just suck yeah and i i think there's probably a little bit there's a little bit of everything going on new environment he did he did get traded as when he was a young prospect

with the Diamondbacks to Cleveland. It was that D.D. Gregorius trade. But, yeah, no, and I mean, Bauer, he's a character. You never know. I mean, he's the kind of guy that he had two good starts mixed in with Cincinnati. So maybe it's a comfort level. Maybe it's not being a part of the race. He seems like, you mentioned creature of habit.

Trevor Bauer's a creature in a couple different ways. Hopefully he's just finding his bear. because that would be a and honestly does Sinti really care that much? No, I mean, they're just hoping it doesn't carry over, you know? Yeah, exactly.

So just stay healthy, figure it out a little bit. I will say if I'm Sinci, I'm like maybe they're pitching to ask Castillo Sunny Gray to like do this again next year when like hopefully it matters more.

I guess a bit of tall. order. Yeah, that's tough. Athletes don't really have that mindset on. I don't think. Athletes think they're going to do it again or they're going to do it better next year, you know? Well, I don't care about what the athlete thinks. Right. It's hard for athletes to do that. So as a fan, I'd be like, damn, we may have wasted some really good seasons here of Sunny Gray. Yeah, maybe. Jalen Beaks, you threw him on here. And this is a weird one, Jake. He was struggling. So the raise used him as the bulk. guy. They had an opener go. Then they brought Beaks in and he goes three innings pitched four hits

zero and runs and then they took him out like he only threw like 40 or less pitches by design. So I like this is off slump watch but the fucking rays ruin everything with their weird baseball because like I don't know man dude was supposed to be like a starting pitcher who does really good for you or you know throw like 90 pitches a game and you threw 40 and it was good. But. but it's not what anyone wants. So whatever. Rays piss me off. Yeah, I'm good with Jalen.

You did your job three innings out of the bullpen. I'm all right with you. That's not what he's supposed to do, though. Yeah. Supposed to be a starter that throws 100 pitches. It's not how it works anymore. And then Ryu did not pitch. Boy, he did pitch.

He's bad. So he's still on. Justin Upton was on here. This is good, Jake. Justin Upton went three for 10 with one home run against the Boston Red Sox. He had two starts in the first game. He pinched in the eighth inning. And he hit the ball off the pitcher's ass.

It ricocheted to third base. He gets a single to load the bases. That's how you get yourself off slump watch. The whole crowd, the fans, the managers like finally caught a break. Nice. Billed off this. And then he did. He got two more hits in the series and a home.

run later on. I mean, you just got to get the right break and hitting the pitcher in the ass and getting that nice break and that bounce did it for him. A smart. A smart play by Justin. Yeah, that's a good chapter in the How to Get Off Slump Watch by Justin Upton. Josh Hayward just he started he started one game. Jason Hayward, yeah. One start two games, 0 for six, two strikeouts still on. Stays. All right. Did you add a bunch of people? The other update was Charlie Morton. He goes five innings, five point one innings, four hits, one earned run, three walks, eight strikeouts.

Charlie Morton, good job. You guys swept. You're off. Who'd you add? Yeah, Jim, Jim, so we had a lot of guys come off, which Slump Watch, if you're coming off, you got to have guys coming in to replace you. So I'll, uh, and Jim, this was actually my guy, uh, that I mentioned at the start of the show who he can change how, how he is looked at coming into 20.

2019 in a big way. Juan Mokata for the Chicago White Sox, second base, third base. Jim, he had a tough weekend and he's three for his last 33. Dudes having a great year. And Jim, like, if he finishes strong, they can look at Juan Munkata and be like, man, if he takes another leap, he could be a special guy for us. If he finishes with a bad September, they can have some questions about Juan Moncada again. So I threw him on Slavwatch 3 for 33. No, Bueno. Jim, our guy,

Yahya Pueig, the wild horse. He goes one for 12 this weekend versus Tampa for his Cleveland Indians. He's one for his last 19. Pueger, they're throwing you in the middle of the lineup. Jose Ramirez out. They need you. Jim, four, those, Cincinnati, Reds,

Freddie Galvis, I was freaking out that the Jays just released him and didn't trade him for anything because he's going to have 25 homers from the shortstop position. He plays a good shortstop too. He is won for his last 26 for your Cincinnati Reds. Wasting Sunny Gray's good year. And then, Jim, I wanted to get a couple arms on here because sometimes it's tough to work in the arms. For those same Chicago White Sox, Dylan Seas, big time pitching prospect. Jim, in his last three, 13 innings pitched, 16 earned runs, 11 plus ERA in those games.

He was the 21-ranked prospect coming into the season. It's part of what makes baseball beautiful and a six sport is that he's coming up and he's getting rocked to the tune of a 692 ERA. He had a couple good starts before that, but baseball Susan. And then Jimmy finally, your guy, Dr. K, Caleb Smith, his last three, 16s innings pitch, 16 earn runs. We're not a math podcast, but that's a 9 ERA. Jim, he was having a really nice year.

We saw him as a Yankees young guy coming up. He was always looking for that third pitch as a starter. It looked like he kind of found it this year. He had an ERA of 382 in this juiced era of baseball. That was three starts ago. Now he's up to a 4-3 ERA. He's a guy. If he has a good September, you could look at Caleb Smith and be like,

wow, that was a really nice year. We can build off that. If he has a tough September, ends up with an ERA over four, five, I mean, that's a brutal break after he had such a good, like, four-fifths of a season of baseball. It's hard to put together a four year. In the dog days of August, when you're in Miami,

and nothing matters. And you can kind of say, like, hey, I had a good year. And then you mentally just kind of take some starts off. And bam, now your year's not looking that good anymore. So if I'm a, I was going to say if I'm a Marlins fan, I'd still think of Caleb Smith as a good asset moving forward, but I don't even know if Marlins fans care. You guys couldn't see it, but when John Boy said if I was a Marlins fan, he got shivers all over his body. I was, well, this is what it is and someone can correct me if wrong. I was trying to address any Marlins fan that listens to this.

Right. Like, I don't think there is. Wow. So if you are a Marlins fan that you listen to talking baseball, reach out. Thank you very much. Let's talk. Yeah. I just think like John Carler Stan, when he got traded, he said, be a fan, but be a fan from afar for a while.

I don't know if anyone's tuning in this much in Miami. Dirk nasty's on Fuego. That means I'm on fire, baby. Like Waco. Ooh. I, I ran the Enfuego section. this week and I got so many guys here Jake. A lot of guys having had great August and had great series to end it. Anthony Rendon, I know you had him on here a little earlier. This weekend he went

seven for ten, seven for ten with three home runs. Seven for ten with three home runs. Crazy. He ends his August, the 394 batting average of 450 on base percentage. Pretty good month. August for Anthony Rendon and the Nationals. But like we said, kind of have that wildcard spot solidified. Leading the NL in batting right now, Jim. Yeah, well, his teammate, Juan Soto, who's 20 years old, 2-0 in his second MLB season, he has four multi-hit games in a row now. And in those four games, he is nine for 16 with five.

five doubles, a triple, and two home runs. That's five plus one is seven plus two is nine. He didn't hit a single in his last four games. He's got nine hits, none of them singles. Holy moly, Juan Soto is growing off. God, he might have 40 homers. He's nuts. Yeah.

J.D. Martinez for the Red Sox. In his last nine games, he's got a 524 on base percentage and a 441 batting average. But in his last nine games, he has 18 RBIs. That's what really stood out to me. The Red Sox need, you need, the Red Sox want to win. They want to make this a real thing where they actually can get a wild card spot. You can have a really good batting average. You can have a really good on base advantage.

But if you're not scoring runs yourself or drive, driving in runs, it means nothing to the team. And 18 RBIs, I don't even know how many runs he scored, but he probably says a lot of those as well. So J.D. Martinez is doing what he can. Might be too little too late, but he's doing what he can. This one's an odd one for Enfuego, Jake. Cavan Bizio. Three hits in this last series, only three hits, two home runs, but only got to reach base during the no-hitter.

and that means he's the most on-fire Blue Jay. That's a, yeah, I mean, that's a big win. You can really peacock around the guys after that one. So home run in game one versus the Astros. Home run in game two versus the Astros got on base, game three, only one to do it. Basically a home run. Yeah, and I'm rooting for Cabin, man. He's totally an on-base percentage guy, which I know baseball has to come to grips with.

or some some people are struggling his batting average is 214 on base 345 so i don't know i i i'd like to see cavan get a couple more hits in there get that batting average up to like 230 what's his uh what's his ops slugging 388 ops 733 so he needs uh a couple more hits and make him hard just turn it up a little bit babe you know speaking of the baby jays uh boe Bichette. Yeah. He swings too hard. He swings too hard.

I don't know if anyone's like watched a lot of Blue Jays or we have a lot of Blue Jays. I'd love to see him just dial down his swing like a notch. Yeah. Okay, man. You don't need to swing that hard. It sounds a little old man yelling at Cloud, but no, it's real. Like I know I watched a couple swings and I was like he's going to hurt his knee. Yeah.

Like it's just violent. Yeah. Todd Frazier Yeah He had a good series He was slumping so bad The Mets are not happy With signing Todd Frazier

Cano Diaz Birdie van GM's moves Are all not really the greatest Jed Lowry It's like they're all kind of not hitting But Todd Frazier Friend of mine Not really

Follows me on Twitter And he's from a town over From where I live right now And I like Todd as a guy A lot He had a great series 6 for 11, 2 home runs, 8 RBIs, 615 on base percentage in the three games set. So good for old Taddy, Todd Frazier, doing Times River proud.

Oh, here's another fun one, Jake. Anthony Santander from your Baltimore Orioles. Santander. Santander. He went 12 games without a multi-hit game. and during that 12-game stretch, he batted 102, which is bad. Tough. Then, in a game against the Tampa Bay Rays, he unloaded for five hits in the game.

Since then, and that's six games since then, he has a 520 batting average. It goes five-hit night and then multiple hits after that, after hits off that, six games, four home runs, 11 RBIs, 520 batting average. So he's going off after a quiet spell. Nelson Cruz, he has been in Fuego almost the entire season. And the stat that I pulled up that I love about Nelson Cruz is that in his last 17 full games played, because he had some where he pinch hit, somewhere he started, but came on early. I didn't count those.

In games where he got his four at bats, 17, full games played, his last 17, he has more multi-hit games than one or less hit games. He has 10 multi-hit games and seven with one hit or less out of his last 17. So when he's hitting, he's hitting like, I'm here for the long haul of this game. Like, oh, pitcher, you just let me get one hit. I'm going to get another on you. Big game, Nelson Cruz. Yep.

And then like you, I wanted to find some pitchers. Strasbourg had two games in a row with double-digit strikeouts and three good starts in a row. So good for you, Strasbourg. A lot of nationals on the Infrago section kind of adds up. And then Kichel, dude, Kikl has four starts that are really good in a row. Six innings pitch, zero-earned runs, six innings pitched one-earned run, seven-ings pitch, zero-run runs, six-nings pitch, two-earned runs, a one. 0.08 ERA in his last four starts. I'm sorry if I just hit you with too many numbers at once,

but a lot of guys on Fuego with cool things to be talked about. Kikele, though, good pickup. Yeah, Jim, and that was funny. I know he had one blow-up game, and I saw Yankees Twitter freaking out, like, oh, this is the guy you wanted? Guess what? He's got a 372 ERA.

The Yankees would basically beg for that from a starting pitcher. if you take out Kikl's one start. I know some people hate when I do this, but if you take out one of his 14 starts, he has a three-flat ERA for the Braves. He's been great for them. Jim, a couple episodes, we asked who was going to get the ball for the Braves in the playoffs.

Keikle's getting one. What if you take that, make that start and just make it, how many runs did he give up in that start? So he went, his one bad start is 3.2 8-earn runs. Oh, never mind. That's bad. Yeah. I don't like when you take out the full game,

but if you were like, if this was like a normal start, this is what he's here, it would be. Like, if this was his average start, like if you gave him a quality start instead of the terrible one,

but that's so bad, you can't even do that. Yeah. I mean, it's one bad, it was against, it was at Miami, so maybe he just didn't care about the game.

Everything else has been great. It's good. It's been good for them, got a nice beard. Hey, we were talking earlier, like if we thought Keiko was going to get a ball in the playoffs. And I think we were like,

I don't know. if he would get, you know, top three started, but looking like he may? I don't know. I'm not that interweaved. I would have to ask a Braves fan. I think nine of his last 11 starts have been quality starts. I think I did that right.

That's pretty crazy. Now, this four-game stretch, and it depends how you view the Mets. They're all against not top-tier teams. It's like Marlins' Mets, White Sox Mets, I believe, something like that. Yeah. So who's the Braves top three then?

Braves top three? I think you're looking at Kikl. He's not your game one. You're giving it to Soroka game one. And then you've got Tehran and Freed are both having solid years too. So I think you've got four, depending how the series is going. Is it Freed? It's Tehron.

And I thought it was fraud. Fried fried fried max oh fun name yeah fulton new it's not he's not he's not not doing now he's not getting it uh gossiping not getting it so yeah soroka though dude i feel like he's not talked about enough at all not nearly enough 244 era he doesn't have the strikeouts people of the k's baby i don't i'll be sarah's biggest fan i don't give fuck about strikeouts there you go Jimmy Sorroca. You're a big strikeout guy. They're there.

They're a stat. It's like the rest of them, baby. No, you value a pitcher who strikes guys out over a guy who does it more. Yeah, a little bit. Yeah. Dude, 2-4-4 ERA is pretty good. It's really good. He's only had one game where he allowed more than four runs.

So if we were to do my John Boy stat, he'd be off the chart. And you value strikeouts too. No, I don't. If the Yankees, I'll give you a perfect example. If the Yankees were facing a starting pitcher that had a 3-5 ERA and he had 200 strikeouts or the Yankees were facing a starter pitcher that had a 3-5 ERA but he had 100 strikeouts, which guy would you rather face? There would be other factors that go into it.

I do not, like, I do not when it comes to Cy Young, and we'll do this later on, more strikeouts don't give you a notch up if you, if in Cy Young voting, in my opinion. Right. But how many times on the pregame show this year have you seen a strikeout guy against the Yankees and you'd be like, oh, that's, that's, that's more of a tough matchup. But if they're not a strikeout guy, you're like, well, that's, that seems to favor the Yankees just a little bit more. I don't know, maybe. I feel like Homer Bailey

and pitchers like that are scarier Is he a strikeout guy? He was last start against the Yanks Yeah Yeah But no like I don't think strikeouts Are more valuable than when you look at Sy Young and I'm in the vast minority there

But outs and out Like when Chin Ming Wong was Not even like in contention for Sion Because he didn't get a lot of strikeouts I was like that's bullshit outs and out And when you don't strike everyone out and you get ground balls, you can last longer in the game. So, like, they should be awarded, not taken away from a pitcher.

It's a better strategy. So that's that. That was my last in fuego. Yes, sir. We got, who did the Oriole? I still don't have this Gary Thorne sound bite. Damn. But the Orioles didn't really get anyone hot.

You have two names in here, but I don't really count them. Yeah, it was. I mean, the Orioles, they were playing Kansas City, which again, talk about a tough watch. Hey, Orioles and KC fans. But I wanted to give the two guys that did get some hits for the Royals, Mabris Villoria, the young 22-year-old catcher, and Adelberto Mondesie, I think I just want to say the names. They're 22 years old and 23, respectively. They combined to go 7 for 12. But the Orioles technically, I don't think they get claps, but they didn't really get anyone's significantly hot.

Our dude, John Means, had a good start. Seven innings pitched, five hits, two earned runs for the Orioles. So I think it's more celebrate that.

Mondesie just came back from the IL. We're just got called up. He was his first start in a long time. And he went four for five in the one game. Baby Royals.

He just been hot. Yeah. The next up, what's the next one we do? Jim, you got a big, a big who got mad. What in the?

You gotta be kidding me. That is so bad, that is absolutely brutal. That is unbelievable. That is totally absurd. I love that sound bite. Who got mad? Dude, there was a lot of ejections, but so many of them suck.

Renteria got ejected, bad. Vladdi Jr. gets ejected for the first time. I made a breakdown of it. It's rather boring and benign. Reese Hoskins. I have the breakdown ready to go. Same thing. And all these are the same thing.

Lewis Brinson, same thing. Yasmani Grandel, same thing. They all got ejected for arguing balls and strikes, which you're not allowed to do. A majority of them, the pitch was a strike. There's this big turn recently, Jake, where the ums are getting these calls correct now. And I think we spent all of July,

June and July, with the umps getting calls like really bad and the players being correct. And all these ejections lately, the umps are right. And they're like fine calls. They're not egregious. Now, the umps still are making egregious calls. But these ejections, like Vladdy was complaining about a strike.

Hoskins, Hoskins just, it was a really wide zone. Like the dude called a low strike, then called a high strike right after. And they were borderline pitches, but Hoskins was just like, what the fuck? Like, what am I supposed to do? Lewis Brinson, I think that one was actually not a strike. Gizmati Grandel, they were strikes. And they're just saying like one or two words and the umps just tossing them out real quick. It is funny when you do watch college football or any other sport and you see how much players yell.

And like an ejection is not part of it. They get like a penalty or a fine. But because the MLB doesn't have penalties or fouls or any like detriment to gameplay, like momentary setbacks, it's just ejection you go straight to ejection like there's not a penalty box there's not you get pushed 10 yards back you lose a play it's just you're out of the game forever uh so it's i don't know what they like i don't know whatever it it's too quick they're getting ejected too fast but players are players were whiny this series more so than ums being bad yeah and it seemed it seemed like it's almost like there's a little over correction

going on in baseball right now where the guys saw the umpires being pretty atrocious for a couple months and they're like well if i get a borderline pitch even if it's kind of a strike people are going to have my back over the umpire so i might as well might as well make a little action out of it but uh yeah and the uh i don't know you you noted it well jimmy but the the vladdie junior ejection that's kind of an all-timer all-timer yeah just walking it off doesn't really It was cool. Yeah. He's like,

all right, whatever. Whatever. I'm not playing your game. I'm not yelling you. Well, that dude, Mike asked to Brooke. He ejects a lot of people.

Yeah, but it's just so funny. Normally the player getting ejected, you see them like gear up and like, all right, I'm going to put on a show. Flattie Jr. It's just like,

oh, out of here, dude. Yes. The Reds hitting coach got ejected. Brad Osmus got ejected, and it was different reasons. He was arguing that Brandon Workman, pitcher for the Red Sox was balking. He was like,

it was like the scene from Remember the Titans. His line of, up off stads. And Brad Austin was like, that's a balk. He's balking. And then the third, they like, weren't calling it. He wasn't coming set. I think by rule it kind of seemed like a balk.

He was just kind of letting his left leg, the workman dangle and never really come and set. And Austin was going crazy. And then the third base, something just ejected him. And he ran out. He's like, he's balking. He's balking. And then the fun one is, uh, Miles Michaelis. He got mad at Freddie Galvin.

for walking on the mound. The old unwritten rule that nobody knew about. Like when Dallas Braden got mad at Arod for this, Arod was like, I'd never heard of that. And majority of people in MLB never heard of it at that time. Remember, it's a big thing. Did you know of this one? Did you know of this one?

And a lot of players were like, no, never heard that one. Michaelis is kind of crazy. A, to Lizard. I don't know if you saw that. a live lizard i put that in the breakdown video freddy galvis was like an innocent deer he was like what dude he didn't even walk like over the pitching rub or anything just kind of like one foot on the base of the mound

this is uh michaelis was losing at the time this isn't an unwritten rule this is like hothead pitchers and dallas braden isn't a hothead off the field he's awesome hilarious dude but i think when he pitched he had to have this like fuck everything tenacity to him, which leads to being mad about something so dumb. Yeah, and what should be the unwritten rule

because it starts getting into, like, danger and player health and stuff, is that you can't walk over the part of the mound, like the landing foot area and stuff like that. Because that's, I mean, that actually is dangerous. We've seen when the landing area for a pitcher gets messed up, like, guys are slipping and sliding, and it becomes, like, genuinely dangerous. Galvis meant nothing.

He came across the front of the mound. He had no idea. So if you have players coming across where the pitchers are trying to land and stuff, that's actually bad. But if a guy bumps the, like, literally one foot in the front circle of the mound or the back circle of the mound, like, get out of here.

Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah. Call up watch. You go into the show, kid. Hey kid, you're going to the shop. Pack your bags. Don't you get your bags packed and get out of here. They need you tonight.

Then a bind. Jim, we had a couple call-ups. Actually, only three in Jim. I thought it was funny because September call-ups obviously happened. But, I mean, September call-ups nowadays with how much roster movement and guys on the 40-man and stuff, I think for a lot of teams, September call-ups are guys that you're already familiar with and have been called up. It's not bringing up a lot of the young, new guys. It's like, oh, yeah, this reliever's taking the bus 10 times this year.

He's coming back up. But for call-up watch this week, we had three debuts. David Bednar, pitcher for San Diego. Wow. Bednar, huh? Ben-Norke's ex-girlfriend's name. College girlfriend had that last name. So David Bednar gets a call.

He has a clean inning. Jim, he was from the Lehigh Vassette. We're talking Lafayette College. Good for you, Dave Benner. October 10th birthday, a day off. He's 24. He'll get some relief innings for the Padres. Has some okay minor league numbers, whatever.

Jim, my guy that I really want to talk about. Bruce Star Gratterol. Excuse me? Bruce Star Graterall. Jim, pitcher for Minnesota. He's 21 years old. He's Venezuelan baby. so you know I'm on the bus with them.

Jim, he was a pretty big prospect. He was ranked 33 before this season by baseball prospectus, a 248 career minor league ERA. And Jim, I think this is a guy that the twins are looking to have that kind of extra spark for this team. Can he bring it to the major league level? Could he be a weapon for them out of the bullpen in the playoffs? Sounds like a college night.

Bruising Adderall. Yeah. So what we need, because Jim, you saw this with a guy in the Yankees, Bravick Valera. We instantly realized he needed to go by Vic Valera. Yeah. If you want a baseball name. We need something for Bruce Darradorol. Because I don't know if we got to call him Bruce or Dar or something else.

Brew. Brew? Because right now Bruce Dar Graterall, that's a lot going on. You think that's how it's pronounced? I mean, probably not, Jim. Yeah, I'm going to try and find how it's actually. That's the kind of name you don't find out how it's pronounced until three years later. Oh, we got it.

Oh, on baseball reference, they don't even give like how to say this name. Not famous enough. Three years once he's good. Brousdarol. I don't know how else you would say the last name. Right? There's not a lot of letters in there that you can really train. Brustar?

I don't know. but twins fans reach out give us the bruce dark graderall nickname and scouting report all right is that all there one more final name jim is a guy you saw this weekend uh sheldon noisy looks like it's spelled like noose uh Oklahoma sooner boy he's playing some second base for the a's got his first major league hit after going 0 for eight or oh for nine it was a sloppy double that thought was going to win them a game scratch that reverse at yankees walked up congratulations guys guys guys for getting the call. He didn't have a hit for a while, right?

Yeah, I think he was 0 for 8 or 0 for 9. It's a bigger dude, too. Yeah, he's a thick second baseman. Yeah, his body type is not that of a second baseman. Body doesn't scream second base. No. Maybe there might be a new thick second base revolution coming, Jim. Guys like Muncie, Sheldon Noisy.

Muncie's a third baseman that sometimes plays second base. Well, I mean, that could be what Noisy's doing here a little bit too. Oh, it could be. I just mean like Muncie fits what you're saying because he just looks like a third baseman And the first baseman. You see when Judge was staying next to Moncee,

how short Muncie looked? Yeah, that was rude. It was Judge's six eight. How tall is Moncee? Because he looked like me next to Judge. I mean, Muncie's a tight package, but I had to guess. Dude, Muncie's six feet.

Yeah, I mean, I think that's a thick guy, six. I think Muncie's looking at a 511, 510. Dude. Aaron, go look up the pictures of Aaron Judge standing next to Max Muncie and then... I tweeted it out when it happened. You did? Yeah. It's crazy.

Damn, that's nuts. Monce feels like a 510 and a 510 and a half six feet tall. Okay. You want to give out your awards? You go first. I will give out my award, Jim. I've got kind of a somber award today. Somber's not the right word.

And Jim, a shout out to Stephen A. Smith following in his footsteps always. Jim, I am giving off, giving up the stay off the weed award. Very prestigious, as you well know. and you and I have been getting a lot of weed laughs lately because people that stumble on your Twitter are like, yo, how high are you? And you're just like, no, my eyes. I just, I look at a computer screen all day.

I can't do everything I'm doing crazy high. Jim, the stay off the weed award goes to my Colorado Rockies as a team. Jim, they got swept by Pittsburgh. four games at Coors Field. They dropped to the second worst record in the National League. Jim, I had to go back in the standings because I remember when you and I were getting ready to do talking baseball. We were getting our research on and we were seeing, you know, looking at some teams and some players and some different things. Jim, the Rockies were firmly in the NL Wild Card.

They were 44 and 40. I want to say on July 1st. 44 and 40. Jim, since then they are 15 and 39. They went from Wildcard. Hey, how can we make some noise in this playoff? We've got some great guys, Blackman, Aronado, some young pitchers, Marquez, 15 and 39, that's one of the worst stretches of team has gone through this season.

And, you know, living out here in Denver, tough for my Rockies. and it's just, it's crazy. It's, again, one of those things that's beautiful about baseball, but not for the Rockies right now. So, yeah, I just thought that was shock. Rockies, come on. Bad. They're bad.

So bad. 44 and 40. Now they're going to be 15 and 40. If they lose today. Has our dude, Melville pitched us third start yet? Yeah, Melville pitch yesterday got knocked around a little bit, the Jakey Jakes. Oh, the Jakey Jinks. I got lunch.

I got some lunch, got some BBQ with Timmy Melville. And yeah, so Jake Jinks is on. Wow, dude, first pitch of the game, home run. That is the Jakey Jinks to a T. Yeah. Kevin Newman took them deep. Newman should have been on Enflago. Yeah, well, it would have been rude to our friend Tim

because then Newman got a single in the second inning. Yeah, you're right. Who's getting your award? Jim. My award is the John Boy Award. Holy smokes. Yeah. Yeah.

It was also known as the Too Old Too Fat Award. Oh, boy. There's a video of when Jake and I did spring training in 2018 of me running around the bases. And I broke it down. First time I watched myself run around the bases in a while. And there was like, whoa. I aged out of that. Yeah.

And Jared Hughes, relief pitcher, been around for 10 years now. His thing is being a weirdo and kind of a geek and sprinting from the dugout to the mound and making all these faces like he's doing some sort of like terribly,

terrible hawka. Getting amped up in a weird white guy tribal way. Yeah. It's never been like a cool look. No. No one's ever seen him in like that Jared Hughes guy. He's cool. He's always been like, oh, look at this geek.

So he's aged out, Jake. He's too old, too fat, too John Boy-esque to be running dead sprint to the mound. And J.T. Romuto's face rolls his eyes out. I'm like this fucking guy. It's crazy funny. Breakdown's really funny. he had to throw a pickoff because he was so gassed. Yeah.

I just can't catch his breath. And J.T. Romuto said, oh, it's just bad timing. I was just rolling my eyes at something else. I was like, okay, good call, J.T. We know that's not true, J.T. But we appreciate you as a teammate. So Hughes, you've aged out of those antics. If you haven't seen it, I mean, you need, if you're a baseball fan,

you need to look it up, sprints in from the bullpen. And he's gassed on the mound. It's not like, it's not like I just ran because he says it's to get his blood pumping. It's not like it's very clearly not juiced up. It's gassed. Yeah. You know what? Get a little sniff of a smelling salt before you enter now and then like briskly jogged to the mound and you'll be there.

You'll be there. He gave up a, two pitches, gave up a three run home run walked off. Not great. I think he did come out the next day and strike and like get it. higher the side and sprinted again because he always sprints, but like J.T. Remodo's face says it all. Oh, man. I'd love to see if, I got to see if he pitched at Cores this year because with the altitude, he must have been big time gassed. All right. Last segment of the day. We are doing elevator talk. Coming up. The Dodgers. Oh, wow. I mean, if you're a Dodgers fan right now,

there's the positive Dodgers fans and there's the Dodgers fans that just are so disappointed. Oh shit, I didn't even know Dustin May had pitched one inning. He got struck in the head by a line drive. I forgot about that. He took a shot to the head. So that's scary. That's probably the biggest topic.

Are you worried about Ryu and Kershaw? I mean, if you really wanted to ask people, you would say that. And some of it was like, no, bad starts happen. They're really good pitchers. They're going to overcome. two bad starts. Then you have the other people who are really worried about it. That's something you can say in the elevator.

What else? I mean, does anything else, madam? I think you lean in. You're kind of being silly. You're like, do you see Max Muncie next to Judge? He's, what, 5.10 and a half? I think you start there. I think Dodgers fans, you love talking about the lineup.

Hey, should we move Bellinger up in the lineup? because he's one of the best hitters in baseball. Yeah. I don't know. I don't get what they do with their lineup. They got some platoon stuff. Muncie's on the aisle now. He's got a wrist injury,

so you start there and then you say the height thing. Yeah, man, I don't know. I think the big conversation is Ryu, Kershaw, Bueller. Oh, yeah, if you're, you got to get hot for the last two weeks. Like you can say, I don't care about these next couple weeks. We just got to get hot before we go into the postseason. Yeah, health is most important. I think a good elevator conversation,

I think you just go Ryu-Kershaw-Buehuler, and you're like, what do you think, man? Would you split up the lefties with Bueller? I guess that was a little grudonyy. But, yeah, I think you go there and then Maxmon C-5-10-5-5-5-5-half. Yeah, I want to do. I guess Ballinger for MVP is still a thing, right? Yes.

That's very much the thing. So you talk about that? I want to see how many times Bellinger hasn't gotten that bat in the first inning. I know that I'm fixated on this, and Dodgers fans are like, shut up, dude. But, uh, oh, he didn't play that game. That's why I didn't happen. I want to see how many, how many first inning at bats has he missed? Because they go down one, two, three.

All right. So in the, in the Diamondbacks game, the last two I looked at, it's one for one. He probably gets in that bat a lot. because the Dodgers are good. And that's probably why they do it. But, yeah. I don't know.

Two and two now. And the last four that he started, two of them, he didn't get an at bat in the first inning. Two, he did. Yeah, I don't get it. I don't get it.

I would just, he's, if you have the MVP in your lineup, get him an app bat in the first inning. But I already did that whole spiel. Dustin May got hurt. Kershawn, were you at bad outings?

How worried are you? The bullpen? Is that a concern? They balked in the winning run against the diamondbacks, which doesn't really matter, but Diamondbacked fans are such thorns in their side that Diamondbacks fans are not going to laugh at them. And they're going to be like, but we're 16 games ahead. You can't laugh at us.

But really Dodgers fans are a little embarrassed and kind of upset that they gave them any fodder to talk shit. Yeah, it's tough. Yeah. And I don't know. My last thing would just be there's a couple guys on this Dodgers team that I mentioned. I don't know how to label them last month of the year guys that can change their season. A.J. Pollock, he was hurt. He's back now.

He's got a 780 OPS. Corey Seeger playing shortstop. He's got a 787 OPS. You have a bad September. You end up having like a 750 OPS. That's kind of pedestrian for those two guys. You have a good September. You end up in the eights.

And guys are circling you in the playoffs. Yeah. All right. Good. Hey, Jake, real quick. I'm putting you on the spot. I do terrible at this. So I'm going to top 24 all-time Dodgers players,

according to war. How many can you name? Top 24. Well, I could do top 10, but I don't think you're going to get it. Kofax. Kofax is number nine. Nailed it. And that's all we got on talking baseball.

Thank you guys. Thanks, guys. Kershaw number one. It's pretty nuts. Then Don Drysdale, then Peeley Reese, then Duke Snyder, then Jackie Robinson. Some good guys. Good guys. We're out.

We'll see you guys on Friday. Sorry about the delay today. Sorry about no video today. But thank you very much for tuning into the podcast and listening. See you later.