Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 19 | Sept 9th | Dombrowski Fired & Rays getting healthy

Episode Date: September 9, 2019

The Red Sox parted ways with Dave Dombrowski, The Diamondbacks and Brewers crept back into the wild card race and the Rays are about to get a lot of arms back.  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.

Welcome to talking baseball. It is September 9th. Dombrowski gets fired from the Red Sox. The brewers are scratching their way back in, as are the Diamondbacks. Let's do it. What's going on, everybody? It is September 9th. It's talking baseball. We are getting closer and closer to the finish line, Jake. Now, we had some big things happen. I was looking at the changing and standings. And there's a lot of fun shifting going on. We have the big news with Dombrowski. We got a lot to talk about. It's actually kind of a packed show in a way. But first, you got to let you know who sponsors this show and our new patrons,

Salvatore Corasanidi. Corrasonidi. Hey, oh. Corrasonidi. The most Italian name going, Jake. Do you have a grasp on how you say that? I mean, you just, you keep saying syllables

until you find the ending vowel. Salvatore, Coruscini. Yeah. And then the next guy is Buck Johnson. Hell yes, he is. That's like a buddy cop movie. You got the Italian and you got like the farm boy Buck Johnson. That's good.

They need to be friends. They need to find each other on Twitter or whatever and become friends. Yeah, yeah. Those are our most recent Patreon. Supporters, they get a chance to win Jersey each month. I have to do the raffle. People have been messaging me saying I'm behind. I know I'm behind if you took a little.

at my schedule you would understand. It's crazy. But I'm going to try and do it today and get the raffle for the August winners. Join now to get in there for the September winners. You can be part of the chat, which makes you part of the show in a way. We got Joseph, Jason, bacon steak to go and Andrew hanging out with us right now. We just got started. So go to patreon.com slash johnboy media if you want some perks, some benefits, and some behind the since stuff.

You also get our episode notes. So you can see where our research is. If you're like, wait, what did they say? You can go check it out. Watch me misspell Cincinnati every time. Makes me mad. Why don't you just use the little, whatever, grammarly? Or change it.

I mean, it pops up wrong. But every time I type it out, it pops up wrong. And I'm just so disappointed in myself. I'm like Cincinnati, I should be all over that. Spell it wrong every time. Cincinnati. Two T's? I mean, I've always had trouble with that.

If there's double T's double ends, I don't know. A lot of the same vowels at the end. One T, two ends in the middle, three ends overall. See, you'd think it would be two T's, right? Yeah, you can see that Jake does his notes like, you're big at just putting Y's, like a lot of Y's at the end of words. Sure. Like you have Saturday.

What's an example? You have Yelik had to walk off on Saturday. Like three Y's. You do that a lot. Yeah. It's that you like... You'll see it in the performance. You like type with that vocal fry, like a Kardashian.

You like how to walk off on Saturday. Whoa. Very rude. Well, I'm just saying. That's how it reads. Well, anyway, go get the notes. You can see it. How you doing, Jake?

I'm good until that Kardashian thing, man. I mean, football was back this weekend. Come on, Jake. Are you kidding me? Yeah. Oh, wait. Is this not a football pod? Two episodes in a row you open talking baseball up with football.

This isn't a football pod? Cut the shit. I thought we were doing talking football. That's my bad. No, man, I was going to say, Jim, we actually got accented by the weekend ended for everyone in Boston. The Red Sox stopped defending their world title as the Patriots began defending theirs. And it was, there was just a lot of good baseball. this weekend. A lot of a, I mean, we had a pitcher hitter with a walkoff. I don't know. Like you said,

when we get separated from this for like three and a half days, or we get separated from part of it, and then we dig in to see what we missed. And you're like, oh, shoot. Like, we actually had a couple things, like, things changed this weekend. The N.O. Wild Card card got a little more real. So yeah, man, I'm doing well. Kardashian thing still has me mad. How are you doing? I likey vocal for a... Yeah, so you got it all wrong. Yeah. How are you?

I'm good. I'm doing well. I am, uh, I don't know. I'm busy and flustered, but I got a nice breakfast. My girlfriend and her parents are in town and played some disc golf yesterday, got out and about. What in the ocean. It was really nice. So I had a good day.

But like, you know me. I like being able to hunker down and kind of get into a zone and work. And I can't dabble. like, oh, I'm going to go to my office and do two hours of work. And then I'll be back for lunch and then go. It's like, no, I do 15 hour days or like half ass a day. Right. So I'm itching to like do an actual work.

But we have a big meeting coming up for the company. If there's anyone that cares about John Boy Media as a whole, a lot of meetings coming up. I got to go get a sports coat tomorrow. Yeah, come on. Come on. I don't want to go take time. to buy that. But other than that, I'm good. Baseball had me excited. Sunday night baseball dragged me out last night. I'm that broadcast, man. Were you listening with the volume on last night? Yeah. I almost wanted to set a timer

to see how long they went without saying something. And I don't need a broadcast full of silence, but let the, just let it breathe. Dude, they were, they were just competing for airspace. and I like Arod and I like Vaskerzian when he's like doing play by play. Oh, man, it was brutal. It's brutal every time. It, uh, yeah, it's what ESPN thinks should be representative of baseball, and it's totally wrong. And that's, that's normally where we land on that. So, yeah, and I mean, for me, man, it sucks.

And I don't know. I feel like we land here a lot on the Monday show, so I won't, deep dive into it. But yeah, I mean, I basically watch it. A-Rod is like comedy for me. And then the rest of it, I'm like, I've already shut my brain off to. That's usually how I am. I couldn't, I couldn't tune them out last night. And everyone's like, why don't you watch it on mute? And it's like, dude, if everyone's jumping off a bridge, I'm jumping off the bridge. I need to be in the know and know what people are talking about, whether it's good or bad. I'm going to sit here and watch a game on mute and then not be able to converse or talk about what's being said.

and just be a loner on my couch watching a game on mute. Come on. I'd rather be miserable with people than happy alone. Put it on the tombstone. That's actually not a bad quote. It's not bad. Misery loves company. I'd rather be miserable with people than happy alone.

I don't think that's true for me. No, that's not true. I was going to say, yeah. I think you're going to come back and hate that quote. But yeah, no, it's good. Let's go into the National Report, which is brought to you by, Jake this week, but also it is sponsored by our friends at Roosevelt shirts.

The Roosevelt's. We got a box. I wore one the other day in one of our videos. I like them because they're super comfy and I'm a guy that sweats a lot so cotton can be a bad mix for me. Like, you know, once you start sweating and then the cotton's wet. And these shirts are not like that. They're actually perfect for like summer outside times or just dressing up. Jake, I think, you know, one of these.

silly shirts with a blazer over. We might look real silly in a good way, which is what these shirts are. They're conversation starters. They got Ron Swanson cooking sizzling bacon. Aaron Judge elbowing Lady Liberty. Roosevelt's is your brand if you want to wear loud, fun shirts that get people looking at you and say, ooh, I like that shirt, whether they mean or not. They're offering John Boy Nation 20% off your next order. Just visit RSVLTS.com slash Johnboy. That's R-S-V-L-T-S dot com slash Johnboy. Dare Mighty Things. They put, they gave me a whole like bullet point full of stuff. And I, I hit them all usually. And then at the end it just says dare mighty things, which I really fucking get that to be honest.

It sneaks up on you. It's like, what am I saying? Dare mighty things. Yeah, we might. We'll, we'll talk to the Roosevelt's people because we're, we're all in on everything. Dare mighty things were a little hesitant. Maybe there's something we're missing. I don't get what it means. Like, be daring. I think it's like fake dramatic. Yeah, it's like, yeah, dare to try things.

Like even our shirt, which it's like, okay, it's a shirt, but it's a fun shirt. When I hear Dare Mighty Things, I think truth or dare. So I think daring other people. And then I think you better make it a big dare. And I'm like, I dare you to jump off a bridge. Like, that's where I'm, that's where my mind goes. So I'm just, I just go to Rose. Check out all the shirts.

If you go to the Johnboy site, it gives you a lot of the baseball options. Let's hit that boogie. James Vincent Michael O'Brien, the beast of the East in the National League. Your my Atlanta Braves win the first three of their four games set. They lose the final one to the Washington National Gims. Wow. They won the first three games by a total of four runs. Nats win the final game behind Soto and Mad Max Scherzor.

But yeah, Jim, the Braves roll on. They fought off Corbin. Yeah, go Braves, baby. The Phillies, the Fightens, they take two out of three versus the Mets at City Field. Drew Smiley twirls a gem for the Phil's. How about that? Death taxes in the Mets bullpen getting rock. The Marlins and the Royals play three in Miami, L.O.L.

Brutal. K.C. takes two out of three. Both teams got shut out at one point in the series in the Central. Your St. Louis Cardinals win the final two games after dropping the first to the Pittsburgh Pie Rats. Jack Flaherty, Jim, lives in Fuego, another eight-inning shutout in the rubber match, cheese and rice. The Cubs win game one, but lose the remaining three to Milowah, K. Hey, make the NL wildcard race great again. Sorry, Cubbies.

Kind of rooting against you. Yellich had to walk off on Saturday, Kardashians. Cincinnati, spell it right, loses the series to the upstart Diamondbacks. One and a half games back of the Cubs now. The snakes just miss the sweep, but they get walked off on by newly found two-way player Michael Lorenzen for the Reds. Speaking of those Diamondbacks, Jim,

The best of the West, the Dodgers have another mini letdown. They lose two out of three at home to San Francisco, lost both games by one run, including game two, a one-nothing final. We like that. Interesting times right now for the Dodgers and my Rockies. They win game one behind my best friend, Tim Melville, twirls another gem. Then they lose the final two, and that's obvious. No team in this series scored more than that.

three runs. Yikes. Yikes. Indeedy, Jake. I was looking into the Cubs to see, like, what is going on? I can't figure them out. I think at this point they're not that good. We thought we thought contraris over coming back. We give them a kick.

But Lester and Hamels just completely get blowed up by the Brewers. There's a good start in the middle there that got lost in extras. Like you said, the yellow trip to walk off. I don't know what's going on. Darvish had the good start. You did mention the Rockies, and I did want to say this. This was a patron sent this message. Alex Peter Rose said a dumb Rockies tidbit for talking baseball.

Rockies have three wins in the past 22 games, and Tim Melville started all three wins. The Melville Meteor, man. we're lunch buddies excited for him to come back from the road trip so we can spend nice days in the park or something like that yeah man he uh the Rockies it's unbelievable i i met up with the the Rockies podcast through their their writer Drew Creeceman the other day and he was like in a bad state man yeah i mean imagine covering that team every day i mean we have we run into some bad times that the Yankees run into like a cold series and a half.

They've been doing it since right before the All-Star break. So more tough times for my rocks. Not my best good friend Tim Melville, though. No, he's winning them games. Yeah, it's all he knows. Get it, Timmy. Get it, Timmy. I was pretty, the Brewers were like five and a half games out, Jake.

And now they're two and a half. I probably don't have those numbers right. but they climbed pretty decently back in. The key was bringing the Cubbies back, man, and that's what I kind of said last episode that I'm rooting against the Cubs, just because it's better for baseball if this NL wild card is exciting.

And Jim, the Cubs just continue to be atrocious on the road. They're 29 and 42 on the road. It's very bad. That's not even like, oh, yeah, they kind of, they've been mad on the road, just bad on the road. No middle area. And they play four at San Diego. And I mean, that's going to be a real test for them.

I mean, they'd be happy with a split at this point. And you wonder if maybe the Padres can rally a little bit and be like, hey, we could really have some fun and ruin their day. They're terrible on the road. Let's get some dubs. But yeah, man, Arizona sneaks up to a game and a half out. Milwaukee's two and Phillies two right now. even the Miracle Mets are at four.

They're out. Obviously, they'd need pure chaos, but yeah, I mean, they kind of blew it against the Phillies this weekend. But we ended last show with how hard the Phillies remaining schedule is. Right. They won, you said, their series. So they took two out of three at City Field, which is a solid. Shut out the Mets and then put up a 10 spot. It's pretty good.

And their loss was a walk-off, so they were in that one. Right. Well, Edwin Diaz also invited them back into that one, because that's what he's been doing all season. Yeah, I was. But no. There was, so I don't know if I lose followers here, but I was, we like analytics, Jake and I.

We just don't like people that only rely on analytics. And the funniest thing to me is that these people that just rely on analytics. They're saying Edwin Diaz has just been unlucky. Like, it's just all bad luck. And I'm like, well, you think like tipping pitches

or other teams like having good scouting reports or or like just like lack of confidence? Like that all in the analytical only world just boils down to bad luck. Nothing else could be a factor here. It must just be. lock, like just the whole season riddled with bad luck.

There's nothing else that it could be. Yeah. It makes me laugh. Like his numbers say that he's unlucky. He's expected ERA, he's expected all this stuff, you know, say he should be better than he is. Well, clearly, because it's been so bad. Right. And I mean, at some point, Edwin Diaz is going to be really good again.

But probably not this year. Like baseball seasons kind of happen. It's just funny when they're like, well, we can't explain it. So it just must be luck. Bad luck. I'm like, oh, that's because you guys completely invalidate the state of mind and all the things that you can't count. Yeah. I love it.

No, let's get a quick analytics rift in because I got into a fight with people. I love analytics. I like expected stats and predicting future and hard hit rate and barrels and Wobah. and I like all that. But you have to understand that these are a game of humans, and it's all a mixture. Yeah, and I think one of the big things for me, I got into it with defensive analytics people.

Oh, I'm out on those. Right. They've never lived up to, like, the eye test once. And that's the funny thing, is that, I mean, even the analytics great Zimborski, I mean, some of the guys around baseball, they acknowledge that, I mean, defensive analytics are flawed. And what came out yesterday was that Gio Orchella and Raphael Devers have the same defensive war.

And I was like, well, this is example one. I mean, Gio Rochella looks like a Machado light. And Devers has made strides at third base, but he's not a quality third baseman by any means. And I was just like, well, if you didn't believe it, I mean, you have to use your eyeballs and acknowledge this and the defensive analytics people came out and we're like well you know no no no no no no no no no no no no no no this this isn't a discussion um i i'm i'm telling you so all right quick analytics rip we like analytics too but you you it's a piece of the puzzle not the whole puzzle yeah i mean we do a whole talking yank show that is just just analytics yeah we're in there we're in deep all right what else we got so the

what else in the n l chin what else am i'm looking at well i was good i had nick uh castellanos up here is the only consistent thing for the cubs he is still going crazy he had four he had five hits in this four game set two doubles a home run um it's like the best thing that happened to the cubs but everything else is bad yeah and it's it actually was a good segue off of analytics because there was a whole thing that like he was against analytics and they're like no like he does a ton of analytically good stuff um um and Yeah, man, I don't know. I'm oddly excited for a midweek Cubs Padres series.

You're rooting for the Padres, huh? Oh, yeah. I'm sorry Cubs fans. Like, I love Chicago as a sports town. I even like the Cubs. I mean, if they're in the dance, I support the Cubs. But as a right now, I'm rooting for anarchy. Are you worried about the Dodgers?

Not really. because I think the thing was, because there was a conversation this week, are the Braves going to catch the Dodgers? Dodgers are still up three in the loss column. And, well, A, more so I'm going to pat myself on the back jab. I jumped on the Atlanta train at the perfect time. I mean, they were good, but they've taken off. They're nine and one in their last 10.

Their young pitchers have seemingly come up another level. I think they're 17 of the last 20. And, like, Donaldson started to go off. It's very much been a top four of that lineup after I gave my whole speech about the top three in that lineup. They're really good. The Dodgers, no, because I mean you're in the playoffs, and you're still 90% you're going to have home field throughout the National League. For them, it's not spring training mode. And, Jim, we've been doing this with our Yankee stuff.

It's similar to spring training, though. But the most important thing is getting guys right. Like they're skipping a Ryu start, and they just need to get a couple good starts out of Ryu before the playoffs, because you can't have that being a question mark. I mean, the Dodgers, Jim, if the last week of the season Walker Bueller, Kershaw, and Ryu throw good starts and everyone's healthy, who cares, you know? Oh, exactly. This is what I said to you. one of our very first episodes,

if you've been with us from the start, you may remember that I said, I hope the Yankees don't ever get above 10 game lead. Yeah. I said, once you get into that 15 game lead in your division, it's so hard to come to the park every day. And in September, you're literally playing for nothing. And it's just like a drag.

And maybe this is, I mean, I'm not worried that this is, indicative of how the Dodgers will play in the postseason at all. They just need to flip the switch back with a week to go, like you said. Yeah, I mean, it'll be interesting. I mean, maybe they flipped the switch earlier, and because the Braves are sneaking up on them and they start playing some good baseball again,

maybe there is something there. I mean, maybe they can't just hit that on button because that's not really how sports works a lot of the time, and the Braves are just hot and rolling right now. It would be fun if that becomes a thing, but we're another bad Dodgers series or another bad Dodgers week away from that. And it's tough to believe that with how good they really are.

Yeah. I think that about rounds up the National League. Yeah, I'm trying to think if there's anything else. No, wild card is back in. Diamondbacks, Jim. Give him love. Kattel, your guy. Kettle.

Kettle. Yeah, yeah. Let's move on to the American League, which is brought to you our friends at Squintz Apparel, who gave me the perfect ad transition in a breakdown video that could ever be had. Sorry. Video of JD Martinez slapping that woman's boobs.

It's checking for pulse. Squints was all over it. They sponsored that video, led to Squintz and Wendy Peppercorn kissing. if you haven't seen it. It's one, some of my best ad, ad reads ever. I don't know how this one stands up. Squintz apparel has shirts, hats, sweatshirts.

And my favorite, the Legends Never Die Bomber Jacket, which Jake and I said, we don't have the body type to pull off a bomber jacket, which is a little upsetting for us. But if you want to go get the Legends Never Die bomber jacket or the Wendy Peppercorn hat or the Squintz shirt, Legends Never Die shirt, they also, I think they're from Kansas City. They had a pop-up shop in Kansas City recently.

So if you're a Kansas City fan, Chiefs or Royals. What? Not a football podcast, man. I wasn't talking about the football team. Go on. I was talking about the Native American chief from Kansas City. If you're a fan of Native American heritage. If you're a fan.

And all the Chiefs. I'm a fan of George Washington. I love reading about him. So if you're a fan of the Chiefs from the old tribes in Kansas City, Right. Go to squince apparel.com. They might have some stuff there. And you get 20% off if you use discount code, John Boy.

It's beautiful. Very beautiful. And with the bomber jacket, Jim, we were saying it's not for us. But, I mean, if you want to put out that Rudy vibe, I mean, knock it out of the park. It works for Rudy. Every day, Sean Ashton, Stranger Things. All right.

started this report out pretty simple, Jake. Here are the results of the series that we do not care about. The Texas Rangers took three out of four from the Orioles. The Royals won the first two games against the Marlins but could not finish the sweep. The White Sox took two of three from the Angels. Moving on to the games that kind of matter, but not really. The Yankees have taken two of three from the Boston Red Sox. The fourth game of the series and the final game between the two teams this season plays tonight. The Red Sox also parted ways with Dave Dombrowski. They fired him after the game last night.

The Astros swept the Mariners in a four-game set. They won the fourth and final game by a score of 21-to-one. Hot, damn, the Astros are doing good. Had a couple four-game sweeps in the AL. All right, now to the games that matter a lot. In the Central, the Indians, went to Minnesota and took two out of three from the twins. Game one went to extra innings with Cleveland scoring four runs in the 11th to seal the victory. Michael Pineda was,

Michael Pineda tossed a nice start, Jake, and then got tossed out of the league, popped for PED use. I don't know how much that hurts Minnesota moving forward. Our dude, Bruzdar, Gratterol, came in and blew it for the twins. We had a lot of fun with that name, so I figured I'd mention that. Game two was close. all the way up until the bottom of the seventh when the twins tied it and took the lead. And in game three, Clevenger and the Indians took the lead early and kept it. What is this result in? The Indians gaining one game on the twins.

They went from six back in the lost column to five back in the lost column. Not much, but good for the Indians that they, like, we can play with you. It's just you blew it earlier getting swept by the Mets and shit like that. Come on. The Rays and the A's are in. race for top of the wildcard. The rays swept the Blue Jays in a four-game set. The baby Jays, Jake.

I had so much hope. I had so much hope that they could be spoiler and they are not. Two-way McKay made his return from the IL for the raise and gave them 3.2 good innings and Blake Snell has a return date set. The rays are getting healthy and that could potentially be very scary. The A's could not get the four-game sweep of their own. They only take three out of four from the Tigers, which is. good but when the rays are doing sweeps you got to do sweeps so the rays are now ahead of the

wild card by a game with oakland one behind them and the indians behind them and that is your a report beautiful stuff john boy beautiful stuff um jim i'm gonna do well no i was i was gonna say i was going to do a sandwich compliment yeah the the baby jays man i mean they're they're fun they're still like a good baseball team. All right. They went on a stretch for like a two-week stretch where they were scoring like six runs a night. Yeah. Remember they averaged eight hits a game?

They were scoring a ton. And that was like, damn, these guys are going to be spoilers. And then they're just like not. No, yeah. I mean, the pitching isn't there. They had a young guy made a debut. We'll talk about him in a little bit. But yeah, it was funny when we were doing some of the schedule stuff and it'd be like,

yeah, they got to play Cleveland, the twins. I got to play the J's. And it's like, well, Jay's still got to figure some stuff out. But I think this story kind of in the AL that's not normally the story, is those raised, Jim? Because you mentioned two-way McKay comes back. Blake Snell has a date. Jim, the guy you didn't mention who's probably the best of them right now,

Tyler Glassnow came back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that dude, when he's right, he's like, he's like sure's or shit. Like it's it there's times when you can't do anything. So the raise, um, they jump, they jump back on top of the A's and they have, I mean, you just named three pitchers that could be impactful for them, especially I think McKay had another, had a, had a good performance for them.

Yeah, he only threw 50 something pitches, but he was good. But yeah, like check this out, Jake. The rays have Charlie Morton. They just got back. McKay, who is a two-way McKay, he hits and pitches. I don't know if they're going to have him hit. I'm not positive. He didn't hit in his return here.

They're going to get Blake Snell back on September 13th, right? Trino's, and you just said Glass Now is back. And Chorinos, who had become a starter, they used him in the bulk guy, open bullpen days, and then he kind of graduated to be like, no, I'm a starting pitcher, start me. He did so good that they were like, all right, we'll just start you then. He threw a 20-pitch bullpen session and is like a couple steps away from returning to the raise. I mean, that's four starting pitchers.

So I hope they lose the wild card game because I don't want to face those guys. And Jim, more importantly, you and I have been doing this song and dance for a little bit with the Yankees and Luis Severino. And it's how far can they get them stretched out and how are they going to use them, et cetera, et cetera. Jim, the other thing here, I mean, the raise will try anything, and they've got a lot of good arms in that bullpen too. The guys you just mentioned, if McKay can go 50 pitches, if Glasno can only get up to 75, if Snell can only get up to 75. In playoff baseball, I mean, you can piece it together.

And the raise, if they have those guys available to them, and it's like, hey, Glassnow looks good today. Let them go for three, four innings. All right. let's send it to the bullpen. They can be a crazy dangerous team. Glass now came back and he struck out the side. Like dominant struck out Boba Bichette to Oscar Hernandez, Routi Tellez.

Pretty like, you know, one, two, three, one, two, three, four, and then, you know, five pitch strikeout. But then in his second inning, walked Vladdy and then gave up a home run to Gritchick. strike out walk pop fly strike out and he's done so it's uh it's his first start so i'm not saying to say anything uh yeah at all but he only threw he only through 41 pitches i believe mackay only through 50 something pitches um 59 pitches for mackay Blake Snell is coming back on the 13th. How stretched out?

Is he going to be in Torinos? And just like we were saying last week about the Cardinals, there's a giant wall up. And like if you're a raise fan, A, your starting rotation's awesome, when healthy. And like the Yankees have one question mark,

Severino. Like, what are we going to get at a Sevee? Because he's going to be stretched out. He's like, this is basically a spring training in September ball. Is he going to be able to get it going? for the playoffs. The Rays have that about four guys.

Yeah. Like, great, this is awesome. But who are they going to be? What are they going to do for us? And the funny thing is, Charlie Morton's getting the ball in the wild card game, right? Well, I was just running through that in my head, Jim. I think you start with them. And I mean, it's wild card slash playoff rules. There's, you obviously only get a limited leash. But I think the Rays would be all hands on deck. I think Morton gets the start. And then I think St. I think Snell.

I think Snell, Glasno, Yarborough. There was someone else we missed him. Oh, well, Chorinos, we mentioned him before. Yerboreau was the one that we didn't say before. I said him now, but Yarbrow's having a really good year. And then they've got guys in the bullpen that are really good too.

I mean, Pagan, Castillo, Oliver Drake gets Josh. So, I mean, that wild card game, if it is Oakland, Tampa, I mean, you're going to see a lot of different arms. It's going to get ugly and I don't know. It's who, who, it's basically, Jim, I think it's funny that playoff baseball comes down to, you know, Arod always gives his speech about how like speed, contact and small ball. It always comes out in the playoffs. And it's like, well, unless you hit home runs. And I feel like the leash is so short on pitchers.

now that it's like, okay, if you give up a hit and a walk, you're getting pulled from the game. So it's almost like, all right, if you give up a hit and then a two-run home or that's how you score. We've seen it in the Yankees Red Sox series this weekend. You can only break so much if you're willing to use everyone at all of your pitchers. Yeah. I'm kind of getting excited for this Ray's Oakland wildcard games. I'm getting excited for wildcard games now that I'm not have to be a fan of a team in it. Is Cleveland dead? Are they going to sneak up on us at some point? No, I think they may. I wouldn't be shocked. I don't think they're

fully dead. They did win two out of three in Minnesota. I mean, if they lost two out of three, we'd be sitting here saying Cleveland's dead. Yeah. But I don't think they're fully dead yet. They're only a couple games out of the second wild card. So, we'll see. It looks like they're going on a little West Coast. They're going to play the Angels, which It's on the West Coast, but the Angels are also bad. Damn.

Tampa's going to win 90 games again. It's got to be the first time the raise of won back-to-back 90 game seasons, right? Well, I'm on that part of their baseball reference page, which is surprising. No, they won Jim. They won 96 in 2010, 91 and 2011, 90, 90 and 12. 92 and 2013. They were really good. What? Yeah, Joe Madden, David Price, Longoria.

But they never did anything. Like 2008, they went to the World Series. How did those years fizzle out? So one of the 90-win years, they finished third and didn't make the playoffs. They lost the LDS three times. And then, yeah, they had the One World Series trip. The Rays were in the S. LDS three times. Yeah.

Why am I, why is that, why can I not, I have a good memory. Why can I not remember that? Bad Yankee years and to college. Who'd they play? Okay, deep dive. This was post-college for us. And 2010, no, because I mean, this 2010, 2011, 2012, I mean, the main years we're talking about here.

So the Texas Rangers. Okay, zero memory of that. And then I'm going to guess it's the Texas Rangers again. Yeah. So Ray's Rangers met twice in the LDS 2010, 2011, and then in 2013, Ray's Red Sox. Cool. Don't remember any of that.

Yeah. Wash it out. It probably would, maybe there's too many games in the trap. I just try to blank those out right out of my brain. drinking. The, kind of the major storyline here comes from the AL. And it's that Dombrowski is out as president of baseball operations for the Red Sox. I don't even know where to like get into this conversation.

Because I know that you, I know you have a lot to say on it. I think, I think I'm team Dumbroowski here in a way. Okay. one, he got them a World Series. So, right, that trumps everything. Yep. Two, it seems like Dombrowski. So if you don't know,

Dumbraowski won a World Series in 97 with the Marlins. Marlins. And he has a record and a history of he'll go become your GM or whatever and give out a ton of contracts. He did it with the Tigers. And then your team's bad. You may have like your window. You attack the window.

heart fucking hard. The tiger should have won, but they never did. And then you're bad for a little bit. And that's what happened with the Red Sox. Now, here's my thoughts. The Maraos gets fired in the middle of the season. The fact that they didn't wait until the season ended, something had to happen behind the scenes.

There had to be some big fights. There had to be some nastiness. There's no way this is amicable. If it's amicable, you ride out the rest of the season, which is three weeks, and then you say, we're changing pace, we're parting ways, you know? The fact that you do it, in the middle of the season and you announce it after Sunday night baseball when your team

is on the national stage, there was some big blow-up that is not like an amical parting. They wanted to make Dombarowski the scapegoat or something. My other thought is the Red Sox didn't go after any free agents this offseason. And that was under the thought process that they went over the luxury tax to win the World Series. they gave out a lot of contracts. They had the best team in Red Sox history. And they rolled the dice and said, let's do it again. And this time, let's stay under the luxury tax.

And I thought that was a decision from ownership because that's money. That's not, Dombrowski's not like, hey, let's not spend money. Like, his job is to spend money. Right. So, and that's what his whole history is, is spending a ton of money. So the fact that he didn't spend money, my brain told me that comes from up top. They told him like, hey, were not going over the luxury tax so don't spend money and then in the and then at the deadline

he doesn't get anything i didn't think that was i thought that it seems like those decisions came from up top and they're getting rid of dambroowski now who just gave him a world series and the same exact team they didn't have injuries the pitching staff is basically the same rolled it back the bullpen's worse and we know that and it's been bad but you know rolled it back and the players didn't come through i think don't Browsky's getting fucked here. So yeah, there's a lot of different dynamics in play. And Jim, I'll start off combining a couple things that you and I have been on.

And I feel like we are tiptoeing a little bit because we're Yankee fans, but we won't. And these are honest thoughts and tell us if you think there's some biased stuff going on here. A, you've always been a person that when a Red Sox season goes wrong, it goes wrong and it goes downhill fast. They're going to fire Dimbabowski. Something falls apart. That's what I said when I was on Desobey. zone with Cessmas Family Barbecue. They're like, you think the Red Sox have a chance?

I said, no. And this was back in like August. This was back in like early August. And when the Red Sox have a bad season, they have a bad season. Like things go wrong. So yeah, I did say that. Good job by me. Thanks, Jake.

And with something that you won't want to put in that same thing is what I've been saying is I've been looking for the ceremonial ending of the official Red Sox season. And that was it. The Yankees Sunday night baseball. They fired Dombrough after the game. That's what I was looking for, and it happened. See ya. Back to Dumbrowski.

Jim, you started off with the most important thing. They won the World Series. And this is what I ended up getting into fights with people about, because Dumbrowski, yes, he's got a ring with the Marlins. They didn't get it with the Tigers. He comes over to the Red Sox. He gets it. Jim, for me, from a GM standpoint,

and people talking about Dumbrowski, it's like, yes, I know he should be well respected in baseball circles. But the guy gets to play a GM on like a video game easy mode. Like literally Jeff Pusson hopped on Scott Van Pelt's evening sports center right after it happened after the Sunday night baseball game. And Scott Van Pell was like, is there going to be a market for Dumbrowski? And Jeff Bassan said, and this is pretty much verbatim, well, if there's an owner there that's willing to spend a lot of money and trade away all their prospects, then Dumbrowski might be the GM for that team. And it's like, well, God damn, that should be, like any GM should be able to do that. And I know there is some skill to it.

You have to make sure you get the right guys. You get Chris Sale and he does the performance he did. But, like, if GMs had the permission to do that and sign David. price to a giant contract and signed Jady Martinez to a giant contract? I think a lot of GMs could come out looking pretty good for that. So that's my Dumbrowski thing. With this, you're right. The Red Sox ownership, where is the disconnect?

Did they say Dumbrowski couldn't spend this offseason? Which, again, that ties into other things. But to stay under the luxury caps, because we've seen the Yankees do this. We've seen a ton of teams do this. And now are you penalizing him for this? And then it starts spiraling into, what was your guys planned? Because, Jim, I made an error a couple episodes ago. I said Zander Bogarts was going to get paid, paid this offseason.

I forgot he got a big contract before the season, six years 120, something like that. So okay, was that Dumbrowski? Was that ownership? I mean, combing into this off season, would the Red Sox not give Zander that contract? he's had an incredible year, but because of that contract, it's led to all the conversations in Red Soxland we're having now. It's, do they have to pick between J.D. and Mookie? Is Mookiee, is J.D. going to pick up his option?

You'd think so, just because how bad the free agency market looked. So now, I mean, have we lost Mookie Bets? Is the Boston front office just realizing we've essentially lost Mookie Bets by giving out these other contracts? So you're right. there is a Dumbrowski did his thing Dave Dumbrowski did what Dave Dumbrowski does

and he got them a World Series So at this point Did you not know you signed up for that Or what's the disconnect? Because I don't know And also I think that the fact they fired him During Sunday night baseball Something went wrong

Right That's the spur of the moment thing You don't plan out to release a guy and publicly release him during Sunday night baseball. And you wonder what it was. Did they say like, hey, we got to have an offseason discussion now? And Dombrowski said, yeah, let's re-sign Mookie and JD. And we'll go out and we'll sign Garrett Cole too.

And they said, oh, wait, we can't just sign everyone. We're not an unlimited bank. That's not how being a GM works. That was a little shot at Dombrough. But you're right. I mean, something else has happened. but it's a disconnect between ownership and what's going on because you're right. I mean, Dumbraowski did what Dumbrowski does.

So where was the disconnect? Dude like spending money. So you can't pin not spending money on him. That would be weird. I mean, and I'd have to go through the Red Sox quotes this offseason and his quotes. But, yeah, I mean, I'm trying to picture what he was saying this offseason to the media. But, I mean, no, I'm sure Dumbowski would have loved to try to sign Patrick Corbyn. Craig Kimbril or whoever it may be.

I mean, look at the bullpen. Just look at the bullpen and ask, is that what Dave Dombrowski wanted if he had an unlimited budget? And I think you'll find your answer. Big baby David, who does work for us at Johnboy Media writes at johnboymedia.com, and he wrote a little piece on this,

just to kind of sum it all up. I'm going to read this. Just, I think it's information if anyone's, if anyone doesn't know, uh, this is what this is what Dombrowski did. in his tenure. He signed price to a $217 million contract.

He signed sale to a five-year $145 million deal. And traded big prospects for Chris Sale. Big prospects for sale, and that begins next season. He just signed Zander Bogarts to a rather team-friendly, six-year, $120 million deal. And of Aldi to a four-year deal, $68 million, who's now like their closer. That one's kind of...

In-year-one, it's not going great. He also let closer Craig Kimberl and Joe Kelly walk in free agency without rebuilding the bullpen. And going forward, J.D. Martinez can opt out of his contract and become a free agent this year. Mookie Betz is set to become a free agent after next season. And there's likely no room to bring both back. And Devers will eventually need to be paid as well. So good job by our dude, Big Lou David, right in that last night. setting it all up and shit like that.

But yeah, I mean, I don't know, we can probably move on from that conversation. Dombrowski got them a World Series and then kind of ruined thereafter, which is his M.O. So, like, you have to know that. They had to know that going in. And maybe they did.

And maybe they said, you know, we're going to get them once, we're going to build us World Series. And then we're going to bring in another GM that can help rebuild. Yeah. But the fact that they announced it on Sunday night baseball live tells me this was not amical and something went wrong quick. Because a good organization would just let it the three weeks go and then peace.

And they're not even holding a press conference. Nice. They announced we will not be holding a press conference to discuss this decision. It's done. It's crazy. Yeah, it's bizarre, man. It's bizarre. And, yeah, again, those final piece.

I haven't been a big Dombrough guy. the Tigers were the first game to first team in the Major League Baseball to lose 100 games and that's I mean still some of the reeling effects of him All right Let's move on to Jake

We are moving on to Our standout performances And Jake you get to go first today Who was your standout performance From The Weekend. Jim, James, Johnboy, you know I'm a proud Connecticutian. Is that the right word? Connecticut.

Whoa, hey. Whatever you call me, man. Connecticut. Connect. Connect. Cutter. Some cutter. No one really knows.

They all suck. There's like five versions and they all sucks and no one knows. A nutmeger. I'm a proud lad from the state of Connecticut. Connecticut and Jim, I've got a CT guy who, by the way, I think we're going to be linked up soon with because one of my friends from Central is really good friends with this guy. Los Angeles, Dodgers, outfielder, A.J. Pollock. Jim, if you want to get a standout performance, a good way to do that, hit three home runs in a game. And that's what AJP did.

All solo shots, and that's fine. He decided he wanted a little more of the glory, and there's no problem with that. Jim, A.J. Pollock, and we already did a little bit of talking Dodgers earlier, A.J. Pollock's a guy who got some pretty good money this summer to come in and be a starting everyday outfielder for them. He's making a cool, well, actually, they backended the contract a lot. He's making 15 mil next year, 18 mil the year after that, so we got to really become tight with AJ Pollock. Former first round pick did a lot of things in Arizona. Has a history of being a little injury pro his one season he put it all together he finished 14th in the MVP in 2015 how many votes this year um i can click on it jill he also won the gold glove that year um let's see 14th he got 5% share of the votes

um 21 21 votes oh shit okay okay sometimes little hit when you go to baseball reference and they say like finish 19th in the MVP award then you click on it and it says one writer voted for him. And it just cracks me up. Like, okay, okay. You had a friend. And yeah, Jim, he, I think analytically, he did better than some of his stats that year, too, that if he had, I think he finished seventh in war in the NL that year.

So I think it could have been higher if maybe it happened more recently. But anyways, AJ Pollock gets hurt this year. He does have a little bit of a track record on that. He's come back in Jim. We'll see if it ends up happening. I think it's too late, but I thought it was pretty funny coming into September that there's a lot of guys that can really change how their season has looked like. And AJ Pollock, man, he's kind of there. He's hitting 261, 324 OBP, a 795 OPS. Those numbers are a little bit below, a decent amount below his career averages, but also he got hurt for a while.

And it's not easy just to jump back into a season. But if he can get it going for those Dodgers, and we know how they do their platoon stuff and all of that, and that's more of a me and Jimmy thing. But, I mean, A.J. Pollock's an impact player. Both sides of the ball. Again, he won the gold glove playing center field for Arizona in 2015. He's playing center field and the corner, mostly the corner recently for the Dodgers. But he's got the range out there.

And he, I mean, he's a piece that during this Dodgers' impressive season, they haven't really had him yet. So again, he's a guy. If they get him going for the playoffs, A.J. Pollock. A.J. Pollock. Hit two home runs. We're off Samarja, and then I think his third was off Will Smith. And his one out that game was a lineout. I think a hard lineout to left. Making good wood. Ram High School in Connecticut used to play them in soccer gym. Ram? Capital R, capital H, capital A, capital M. Where's that? It's in Hebron. Ebron.

Yeah. Is that Eastern Connecticut? Yeah, it's kind of like middle of the state. Sticks. Yeah, a little bit. Cool. All right. Well, my standout performance is a pitcher.

He got a lot of attention earlier in the season. His name's Alex Young. Why did he get attention earlier in the season, Jake? Because in his second ever career start, he threw no hitter. only got six innings of work in because they pulled him at like 79 pitches because it was only he would like been like a reliever starter and the minors he wasn't fully stretched out through six no hit innings gets pulled that was his second ever start third game of this season well he just had his best outing of his career most k's in a game most innings pitched in a game he threw eight innings pitched of two hit one walk ball 12 strikeouts versus a Cincinnati Reds. Pretty impressive for the young rookie pitcher, who's part of this climb with the Diamondbacks now.

He was in a pitching duel with Luis Castillo for a little bit, and then Castillo blew it. And, dude, this guy's been good. Where'd I put it? In his last four starts, he's got a 2.28 ERA. Yeah. Alex Young, probably a smart move to not have him blow his arm out in his second career start.

That is smart. Now he's helping them climb it up. Diamondbacks, Jimmy. He's 7 and 3, 338 ERA. TCU guy from Carmel High School in Indiana. That's where the picolos were going to go there. They live there for a little bit. Talking Nick, shout out.

How about that? But yeah, man, I saw his name pop up. And with this Diamondbacks climb, I'm like, who have I been missing? And this guy's one of them. Um, so good for young Alex Young and Jim most importantly, and I think this is the second time this has happened on talking baseball. Today's Alex Young's 26th birthday. That is the second time.

That's bizarre. How about that? If that happens again, I might be officially freaked out. I mean, it will. birthdays. We all got them. A couple times a year. Slump watch.

Slump watch. Jake, you did slump watch today. Jimmy, I slump watched it up for us. Let's get a couple off of the bat. Trevor Bauer, DNP. He's not getting mentioned. Okay, he just did. Ryu for the Dodgers.

He's getting his start skip, Jim. I don't know. We've mentioned there's a lot of different ways to come off slump watch. I don't think a skip start counts, right? It's not injury related, right? It's just like extra rest. Extra rest, I think he was nicked up, but I mean, if it was a playoff game, he'd be pitching. And Rich Hill returned so it allows them to do it.

Yeah. So, no, he's still on Slump Watch. Yeah, he stays. That's what I thought, but I wanted to get there. All right, let's get into the guys that played some baseball. Jim, Jason Hayward for the Chicago Cubbies. He made the Slump Watch. You were having some deep internal debates about this because he's a defensive-minded player.

I mean, is he potential bad watch, even though he's been having a pretty solid year? Jason Hayward, I think he gets an honorable discharge. Three for 10 with a homer in a couple walks. That's a solid series. I mean, yeah, that puts him out like a 400 on-base percentage. Yeah, it's like a golf clap for me. I mean, the Cubs, it didn't help. Cubs lost.

No. No, but good for you, the Jay Hay kid. Jimmy, a guy, a guy, you. you laid down the law with a bad watch, Freddie Galvis. We said this was going to be his last time on there for now either way. Freddie Galvis, the middle infielder for the Reds. He goes one for eight. There's a walk.

It's a yikes by, man. Good luck, Freddy. Hopefully you get a couple dingers to finish the year. Yeah. See you, Friday. Sorry. Don't care about you anymore. Jim, an old friend of yours.

Caleb Smith for the Marlins. He goes six innings pitched, four hits, zero earned run, eight-ks. It's against the Royals, but I mean, that's good stuff, Caleb. Good stuff. Get out of here. Marlins versus Royals. Are you kidding me? Yeah, that's tough. Are you kidding me? But Jim, I will say this, and this is something, again, that, like, analytics would

never be able to mention. Caleb Smith, going through a rough patch, we were talking about how he can kind of dictate how his whole season has looked at. To see the Royals come up on your schedule, that's huge, man. They got a bunch of track stars that don't have play baseball. Like, if that came up and his next start was the Braves and you're struggling and your season can kind of be dictated, I mean, that can change a whole season. So the calendar gods helped out young Caleb, good for him.

Chris Davis, Chris with a K on the Oakland Athlete. Jim, one for eight. He gets two RBIs. His one hit was a double. Well, that's what he keeps doing. He keeps having one big hit. And you think like, that'll do it. It's like, nah, dude.

I think he stays, Jim, just because I want to keep track of him. Because he's such a huge piece for Oakland. I agree. Let's keep him on there just so we can keep tabs up on Crush Davis and what he's doing for Oakland. One for eight ain't going to get you off Slump Watch. No, I mean, it can't. Can't play with him.

can't do it. Jim, this is a guy that I might make a little push for bad watch. Schlatch, he's using his creativity to try to get off. Jake Cave, our guy for the Minnesota outfield, the Minnesota outfielders, that's not a team. He's an outfielder for Minnesota, mostly. Jim, he goes one for two. He hasn't been playing a lot. He's got some groin tightness. Tell me about it. Right? Take them off. I don't care. Yeah, I think we, Jake Cave he ran his course with us. So those were our remainders from last episode Slump Watch. Jim, we've got some new guys to add to the list.

Give them to me. Who were we watching? Jim, a guy that I know you dove into his stats this weekend and you were guffawed a little bit. Andrew Ben and Tendi for the Boston Red Sox. Jim, oh for his last 13. And just having a bad year. Jake, I let my old back.

I think I'm pretty. pretty good at putting my bias aside when it comes to the Red Sox for this show. And in general, I just like, I got into some debates with Yankee fans who are, we need to bury the socks. Like, why? I don't care about, like, I don't care that the Red Sox have been better than the Yankees for the last five years. Like, some Yankee fans have grown this inferiority complex.

Like, I don't give a fuck. Yeah. Why would I be scared of the Red Sox? I was like weird way to live your life. Like you're, this guy was, I was like, you sound like a Red Sox fan telling me to be scared of them. Like I'm not, I don't care about them. Ben Intendi, I used to make fun of him a lot because I just think he's a nerd. Like I think he's like, honestly, I haven't met the guy, but they've seen him in interviews.

And I just think he's a nerd. So it's like kind of a bully. I'm just like, dude, that guy. The Red Sox used to tell me how much swagger he had and like swag. And I was like, that dude ain't putting anything on the table in that. genre of like personality. He's a nerd. Anyway, he had a good year last year.

Every Red Sox had a good year. Jake, he had a 776 OPS in 2017. He's working on an 800 OPS. He's this a guy. He's a good average guy. Red Sox fans were making him out to be this god. And I was trying to find comps in 2017. Like, well, who's he comparable to?

And there was Brett Gardner on the Yankees. And everyone, everyone, Red Sox fans got so mad at me. Oh, yeah, Gardner sucks. I'm like, their stats are comparable. Guess what, guys? Their stats are basically comparable again, except Gardner has seven more home runs than him. Ben Intendi, I don't, I think he's an average ball player.

Yeah, I mean, he's a little above average, Jim. I mean, the other thing he's got going. I mean, he's still, he just turned 25. He turned 25 in July. When he came up, he was pretty young. I can't speak to what he's going to be. I'm talking about what he's done. Right, but you can understand when the Red Sox had a 22-year-old who finished second in the rookie of the year, you get excited about that guy.

And he got better from his rookie of the year season. He was a really good war player, blah, blah, blah. He took a major step back this year. And our Red Sox fans haven't been shy about that either. I mean, this has not been a banner year for Benny. And it's, Jim, the thing that's really shocking is, and I know it's not what his game is. I mean, he's a guy that he can beat you on defense. We saw that play he made in the postseason.

He can give you really good at bats. But Jim, in this juice ball season, when we're seeing guys, a couple guys are going to finish 40 with home runs that have no business being there. Andrew Benintennie is 13 homers? I mean, he plays in a ballpark that doesn't suit his swing, which kind of is bad for him. but yeah I was shocked he only has 13 home runs but the road games do um and I mean you know usually a lefty especially with his skill set they we give them credit because they

can play wall ball at Fenway um I don't know man he he took a step back this year I mean last year um 2018 he was 23 24 he improved from the year before you can see why you're getting excited about that but he definitely took a step back and maybe it's baseball I mean we probably could have been doing the same thing about Gary Sanchez last year, Jim. And maybe Benny has been nicked up. Is he injured? Yeah, there's a lot of injuries I don't know about then, sure. Who knows?

And that, like, I don't think you and I would be surprised if Benny came back and had a year like he did in 2017. But he's had a tough season. Well, it's still that year in 2017 isn't winning you any like silver sloggers or MVP's or it's a slightly above average player. No, he's a, he's a guy that. that if he has a really good first half, there's a chance he could make an all-star team,

but he's not, I think this would be taken in the wrong contest, but he's not special. Yeah, that's basically what I'm trying to say. Yeah. Like, I think average is slightly rude, but I think not special is very fair. Okay. There, that's what we landed on.

Okay, cool. So, wow, Benny, deep dite. He's on Slumpwatch, O for 13. I'll bang out the rest of these guys. The biggest thing is he's usually a big threat. Like the way I talk about Benny and how I actively put him down is because I've been scared of him for years because he would crush Yankees. And now he's not even like he comes up and it's not even a threat.

Yeah, the past two years, if you saw him in a big spot, you were like, oh, damn, he's going to give us a tough out. This year it hasn't felt that way. But, I mean, maybe he'll bounce back. Red Sox got a lot to figure out this off season. Eddie Rosario, Jim, for the twins. He's won for his last 17. He's another guy, Jim, that these last couple weeks are going to dictate how we view

his whole season. Eddie Rosario, his batting average dunked under 280, which it had been above that for most of the season. Right now it's 275. I don't know. I think you kind of look at those guys differently. And his OPS was above 800 the whole season. It just dipped to 787.

He's high off his game-ending throw. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And I mean, he's another guy. He's going to finish with 30 plus home runs. But yeah, the past two years, his OPS has started with a dot eight. Right now he's dipped below that. A couple good weeks, though, he's easily back on that.

And that would look like what you'd expect Eddie Rosario's season to look like. Jim, a guy that I had to put on here because for how often he ended up on Enfuego. Aristides Aquino, our talking baseball favorite, the young slugger for the Cincinnati Reds. He's won for his last 15. Is it a little slump on his end? Have they found the hole in his swing? That's going to be fun to watch the rest of the way. And Jim, a guy that could arguably be on bad watch,

but the Red Sox died, so I'll throw him on here. Rick Porcelo for the Red Sox. A Cy Young winner. Don't get me going on that. Jim, his last two games started, four innings pitch, six earned runs. That's bad. And Jim, I wanted to chop up his season. So his last 14 starts where things really fell apart.

69.2 innings, 95 hits, 60 earn runs, a 775 ERA. His last 14 starts. And it's like, okay, this is where I was doing the slump watch debate. Like, should I just fully have written off Rick Purcello? Jim, the 14 starts before that, 86 innings pitched. He had a 402 ERA. He was having a very solid Rick Purcello season, especially in this juice ball season where the pitchers ERAs are up a little bit.

And I mean, the wheels just fully. came off and I mean he was a part of the finale on Sunday night baseball. Suck it pretty Ricky. Damn. Atastidus. I like that name. Are you interested in finding out? Like, if you had to bet today, is Aristides going to like finish the rest of the season

like kind of struggling, like low 200 batting average? Or do you think he gets hot again? Let me look at the schedule. I think he gets hot again. Okay. I like it. We like Aristides. Yeah, I like him.

So I'm rooting for him in a way. Right. And like he's a guy that's got stuff to play for. Dude, he's going to Seattle. Houston just put 21 runs up on Seattle. It's true. He's, uh, Cincinnati, they got Seattle, Arizona, Chicago, the Mets, Milwaukee. Cincinnati's got a run of teams that are like desperate for wins.

Arizona, the Cubs, the Mets, and the Brewers. Yeah, Seattle, he kind of needs to get his hits in. Otherwise, he could run into some tough matchups. Yeah, that's cool. Hey, Cincinnati, they got a chance to play spoiler for a bunch of teams here. Yeah, I think Adestis gets another run at it. They're like, you know, big, big couple swings. All right.

Like Waco. Dirt Nasty is on fire. So is Mitch Garver. Actually, not really. I typed this in because he had three hits in the Cleveland series. They were all home runs. They had a multi-hit game. And I was like, damn, on fire.

And then, like, all, everything surrounding that's not really there. But I thought it should be mentioned. Mitch Garver for the twins. He had a nice series versus Cleveland, three home runs in the series. Really on fire. Matt Joyce, Jake, for the Atlanta Braves. Four games against the nationals. you about. He went five for nine with a 600 on base percentage, one double, two homers, and a walk.

And I went back even further in his last 21 games. He's got a 390 batting average and a 486 on base percentage 1.1.130 OPS. So Matt Joyce for the Atlanta Braves is currently in Fuego doing good things. Good job. Joyce. Chicago White Sox. One-time All-Star. What's that? One-time All-Star, Matt Joyce. Congrats.

Chicago White Sox haven't been making headlines that much. But Jose Ibrahim, since August 1st, he's got a 417 on base percentage in a 1.031 OPS. That's 37 games since August 1. He's got 11 doubles and 9 homers. You got 20 extra base hits in last 37 games. And he had a hit every game this weekend and two homers. So good job Jose Ibrahim, finishing strong. They need some motivation to get Timmy Anderson back into the batting title and get them to win.

That's kind of what they're playing for. Let's get Timmy some at bats. Come on, Tim. Christian Yelich. Yelly. Big guy having an absolute great season. He had a good series versus the Cubs, which they needed. But there's one stat here that really blew me away.

Maybe not blew me away, but stood out. I was like, oh, I want to talk about that. So four games against the Cubs, he has a 632 on base percentage in four games. I mean, big players got to do big things in big series. And Christian Yelich, 632, probably pitching around him a bunch. They had three runs and four RBI. So he combines for, you know, he's part of seven runs in the four games. Four stolen bases, Jake.

Four stolen bases in the series, he's now got 30 bags on the season. I had no idea he was. is stealing that many bags. His career high was last season at 22. He's already at 30. Currently leads the league. This is a separate. He's ready at 30 stolen bases. The four in this series. That kind of blew me away. And then he currently leads the league. We were talking about, you know, how many stats you can lead the league in on your baseball reference. On base percentage, slugging, OPS, OPS plus, and total bases. So five categories. He is a league leader. He had a good weekend. He's having a good season. Did you know, you have any comment about the stolen bases?

Pretty cool, huh? Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't have guessed 30. I probably would have guessed over 20. That's, it's incredible. I mean, we're, it's starting to get at the point where we're going to look back at some stats this season at some point and have a good laugh. But, I mean, Christian Yelch is special. He's really close to leading in home runs, too, Jim. So, I mean, he's going to finish 50-30, which I mean that's insane damn dude get him to the 40 club 40 40 40

oh you so you want them going nuts on the basis yeah the last three weeks okay just still four in a series yeah I mean I'll root for it I mean absolutely Jim I want a couple things I want to hit quick that you just mentioned Matt Joyce A Matt Joyce was on that 2011

Tampa team we were talking about so good for him and he's having a really good year, dude. You would love Matt Joyce's stats. 296, a 403 OBP and an 891 OPS. 111 games. This guy was like really bad last year and a few years before that. Good for him. Jim, Mitch, have, do you know Mitch Garver season stats? No. What are they? Jim, Mitch Garver, the catcher for the twins who started this, 82 games played. I know he's a lot of home runs. 29, Jim, in 82 games. Yeah, it's nuts. He's got a one dot OPEs.

Yes. Mitch Garber. Last year he had seven home runs. Last year he had seven home runs in 102 games. So maybe Mitchie and Michael Panette have been making out. I mean, it's his age 28 season. He, uh, I don't know. I'm not saying Brady Anderson, but.

The stats read Brady Anderson is what I'm saying. I mean, that's, I'm not saying Brady Anderson. I'm saying the stats read Brady Anderson. They have to at this point. Maybe he figured something out, but. It plays in a fucking windmill, Jake. Windmill. Which Twins fans still get mad every time I say that.

The park factors actually. Okay, I got eyes. Garrett Cole, Jake. Eric Cole. Five starts in a row with double digit strikeouts. Eight of his last 10 starts have double. digit strikeouts. In his last 10 games, he's 9 and 1 with a 2.13 ERA. In Fuego, just doing amazing things for the Astros. He had 14 strikeouts in his last three starts or something

like that. Someone tweeted that at us. I got an inside scoop. He's a free agent, and I put 55% stocking in this. I'll share it with everyone that Garrett Cole's going to sign with the West Coast team. Right. That was my inside scoop. He's from there. That was his only thing. Like when he's a free agent, he's signing with the West Coast team no matter what. That was the scoop I got.

I put 55% stock into it. You do with it. Yeah, I only put partial just because I'm trying to think of West Coast teams with money to spend. I'm not sure. A lot of people are saying, I read other things saying the Angels are almost a lock. I mean, they could use it. I hope they got more money in that piggy bank. Yeah.

Otani, Cole coming to help out that trout pitch. Be good. And I was looking for another pitcher to put her on here. There's others. Burlanders going off. There's a bunch of pitchers going off. But I thought this guy would be good because I don't know how to pronounce his name either. Joey La Chessie.

I think it's Lucchese. I think it's Italian. Padres pitcher, he has a 1.57 ERA in his last four starts. He doesn't go deep in the games. it's a lot of five innings. But he's putting a nice run together. They're four in O in his last four starts. And if he keeps us up,

his season, stats will be a little more. So it's on fire. There's nothing compared to Garrett Cole. But I don't give the Padre some love. They're an angry bunch. Yeah, and he's made strides in his second season. You can see almost across the board, he's just gotten a little bit better.

And I think factoring in juice ball and stuff, I think that means he's even gotten more better. The Padres have so many young guys, a lot of young arms they were going to be seeing in the next few years. He was one of the first ones they gave the call to. And he's like, I feel like he's the Dallas Keikle of the San Diego Padres when they first called him up for Houston. Okay. I like that. It was kind of neat.

Next. Way back up and I don't even know. Goodbye home run. I mean Who did the Orioles get hot We have a good one Jake We haven't had a good one In like three episodes

I'm excited It sucks that this This segment gets me excited When it's a good one But this is a good one Oroconed O'Dore He has been on Slump Watch We like took him off Slum Watch

Because we were sick of him He's hitting 127 In his last 19 games 127 Babbin average In his last 19 games Before playing the Baltimore Orioles. In the four games against the Orioles, he slashed 438 with a 500 on base percentage,

two homers, and three doubles. So they literally took a dude who's been on Slump Watch for a month and got him hot because you bring that AAA pitch into town, good things can happen. Good for Odor. Yeah, I mean, that's a really good one. Odora's been batting under, he's been batting under 200 for pretty much the whole season. Oh, he came above 200 briefly in July. But yeah, before Baltimore, he was hitting 194 and now he's up to 204, so keep it going.

Yeah, hell yeah. What in the hell are you absurd? Who got mad? A lot of people got ejected, Jake. there are a lot of boring ejections Charlie Montoya got ejected for arguing balls and strikes He didn't even put up a fight Jake He never left the dugout just yelled from the dugout

Got ejected laughed boring Nelson Cruz same exact thing He was got ejected by Las Diaz for arguing on another On a teammate's behalf But is Laz Diaz's first ejection of the season Which I found interesting Good job Laz Well

Trey Turner and Dave Martinez both got ejected And Trey Turner is having a really good series against the Braves. Tough times for them. They wanted to go and beat the Braves. Braves are like, nah, we're better than you. It was our old friend, Mike Estabrook, umpire who ejects everyone. Look like he made out with a bottle of sun tan lotion.

I said that on my breakdown. I made myself laugh. Just balls and strikes. They were bad calls, I think. And then another one was the Pittsburgh Pirates. Clint Hurdle gets ejected arguing on behalf of Adam Frazier on like a 1-1 pitch. And then the at-bat finishes, Frayers. Casre throws his bat, he gets ejected.

So same at bat, but two different like times of ejections for Pittsburgh. Nothing that bad. So these calls were, a lot of these calls were bad. Not the Nelson Cruz one. That was a strike. And I believe the Clint Turtle Adam Fraser one were strikes. Trey Turner's were bad calls. And Charlie Montoya, Charlie Montoya was strikes, I think.

I forget. I don't care. They were boring. Curshaw got really mad because he got taken out of the game early, didn't have good stuff, couldn't finish the fifth inning, which is like bizarre for Kirshaw. And he threw stuff around. I think I have that queued up to make a breakdown of because it's kind of interesting. Curshaw getting so angry. That is interesting. I was going to, well, I want to check something with Kirshaw, but was Clint Hurdle? Because doesn't, aren't we team Clint Hurdle has a bad reputation this year and we like believe it? Like we're in on it? Well, yeah, well, I didn't realize, but after the whole brawl, like Clinton Hurdle's got a, like, even Pirates fans that I was reading on Reddit and all the forums were like, yeah, this is kind of who Clinton Hurdle is, throws out a lot of players. Yeah, and Jimmy, so Clayton Kershaw's first 23 starts of this season, he went six innings or more, his past two, five innings and four innings pitch. So, yeah, I mean, there's some red flags right now in Dodgerland. It's the same with Ryu. It was the same thing.

Yeah, man. That's got, that's, dude, what a sport. What a sport. Those guys have dominant five months. And then they have two shaky starts and you're like, oh, shit. Is our season screwed? It's crazy. That's nuts.

Hey, kid. Guess where you're going? You're going to the show. Do it was proud kid. Call your family. You've earned it. Call up watch wasn't that exciting. But there was not that many for September.

We had the raise, had a 29-year-old who was drafted in the 25th round by the Indians, then traded over. He gets an inning of work. He got two innings of work, but he didn't record him out the second inning. One, two, three inning. They brought him back out for the second. Walk single walk out. His name is Cole Sulcer. I don't think he's anyone to really keep an eye on.

Yeah, we like anyone over the age of 28 who's going to. getting their major league debut though yeah that's true that's true we have this is a fun one just because of what happened tyrone taylor real cool name tat rod he tyrod taylor jake gets called up do tyrod taylor and tyrone taylor have to become friends oh yeah i think they're brothers okay brewers he's 25 years old drafted in the second around 2012 so he pinch hits for Freddie Peralta in the seventh inning of a tied game. What a moment to make your debut gets hit by pitch. And then the pitcher replaces him.

And that's his moment. That's like his MLB story right now. That's pretty good. He's got hit by pitch. I'll take it. Next one, super interesting. Anthony Kay, he was the Mets first round pick in 2016, played at Yukon. So Jake and I like that.

He was the Stroman trade. was the piece in the Stroman trade that went from the Mets to the Blue Jays, gets the call for the Blue Jays, gets the start versus the raise. Pretty good outing, Jake. He goes into the sixth inning. He goes five and two thirds, four hits, three walks, so that's a little high, only two earned runs and eight strikeouts. That's a good debut against the team that's going to win 90 wins and doing big things right now.

That's a really great debut. That's all you can ask on your major league debut. And yeah, obviously, I mean, first round pick out of Yukon, I like this guy. But Jim, also, our baby rays, I mean, they're hitting the point where it's like, okay, Boba Chet, Vlad, the outfielder they traded for from Houston. You know, they've kind of got their base of what they want their hitting to look like the next coming years. They've got to get some pitchers. So hopefully Anthony Kay, you're right, they got him for Stroman.

Hopefully he can be one of those guys for them. Yeah. You threw the next two on there. You got anything on them? Yeah, Jim, we had a couple guys make their debils yesterday. And I think you're going to like both these guys a lot, Jim. So James Marvel for Pittsburgh, he's a dukey. He might have been there at the same time as Stroman. How about that? Jim, he gets his debut start, five innings pitch, two earn runs for the pirates. And Jim, what I think you're going to like about him, or at least you're going to be interested in him, Jim, he's got pretty good minor league stats.

He's not a strikeout guy at all. His K per 9 is around 6 in the minors. And we just don't see these guys like getting a shot too much anymore. Like a 6K per 9, that's really low. And like those guys rarely, I mean, they don't get looks anymore. So I'm interested to see. Because again, something that analytics has missed a little bit is like, oh yeah, there's like some craft to pitching and getting guys out outside of the strikeout.

So I don't know. I think you and I are low-key rooting for this guy a little bit. Yeah. I like not strikeout guys because people put too much stock in the strikeouts. Give me chin-ming-won. Give me chin-ming-won. An out can be an out. And Jim, this last one is awesome on a lot of different levels.

Danny Holtson, lefty for the Chicago Cubs. Jim, he comes in and you're going to love his performance. Hit by pitch, a guy gets a single, and then he strikes out the next three. And you're like, okay, that's a fun debut story. But Jim, Holtson is also 29 years old, and it's not a grinder story to the majors, yet it is a grinder story. He was the number two pick in the 2011 draft. Number two, Garrett Cole was number one, Trevor Bauer was three, Anthony Rendon was six, Lindor 8, Javier Baez was 9.

This guy was the number two pick. He had two significant shoulder surgeries, I want to say, 2013 and 2016, to the point that he got released and he was making decisions if he's going to stick with it. It looks like I was looking at his AAA stats. It looks like he's kind of figured some things out as a lefty reliever. He obviously, after those shoulder surgeries, he can't do the length anymore,

but he's got a one dot ERA in the miners. He comes out, he strikes out three in his debut. If you're looking for a guy to root for, it's Danny Holson. Okay, Danny Holson, I'll root for you. Unless I find out something I don't like. All right, and this is something bad. And who's this? In the chat, Brian says,

Nico Horner is getting called up by the Cubs since Bias is hurt, and Russell got hit in the face. So good for him. Cubs are set to call up. Top infield prospect. like Nico Horner tweets my adversary John Heyman. That's pretty cool. Yeah.

She's 22 years old. Oh, can I give a message to Yankees fans? Sure. Cut it with the Glaber Torres is only 22-year-old shit. Just cut it out. You're getting worse than ESPN with Todd Frazier in Little League World Series. And as long as Juan Soto exists, no one else can brag about the age of how young a player is. I'm getting sick of Yankee fans

Every time Glaber gets a hit He's only 22 years old Yeah Wonsodor's 20 Pretty good Both good It's too much It's after everything he does

Both good Yeah Both good You're right What's the next thing we do here Is it awards? I had an award lined up

That is very silly And simple Because I knew the show Was gonna run long With the Dombrowski news and it was biggest bubble and it just goes to Josh Reddick because the bubble he blew

the other day. It's the biggest bubble I've ever seen popped all over his face like you have to go Google Josh Redick bubble. It's the biggest bubble. It's bigger. Jake's head could fit inside the bubble.

That's no doubt in my mind your head could fit inside the bubble he blew. Someone in the chat just said oh I don't know who gets your awards so I hope I'm not stepping on it. The Aaron the Barrett story is really cool.

The Aaron Barrett story is cool. If you didn't see it, at 26 years old in 2014, he made the majors for the nationals in their bullpen. And he was also in their bullpen in 2015 through 50 games in 14, 40 games in 15. Got injured. And for fucking four years, 16, 17, 18, like 19, he's had just battling shoulder surgeries, I believe. got back to the maid thought he was back, had setbacks, thought he's back at setbacks,

finally comes back up, throws an inning and just unleashes tears and all the emotion that comes with finally making it back in the dugout. If you're into these kind of stories, I will do a plug for

Find Seen's book where nobody knows your name, life in the minor leagues. It'll really enlighten the journey these guys go through to do this and why they do it, and it's a really good read. And his story would fit perfectly in there.

So he gets the Saturday Tiers Award. Saturday Tears. Congrats, Aaron. Yeah, and it really is crazy. I know, Jim, we've kind of been blinded this year. The Yankees have had so many injuries, and they've still been really good. But just how injuries dictate a player's career.

Think about the stuff you could be thinking about Miguel Anduhar at the end of last season. And he is one of the future best hitters in baseball. He has a shoulder injury one of the first games this season. And it's like, what's that dude's future even? So baseball is a crazy sport that way. Actually, all sports are. How about that?

Sports from Jake. All sports have injuries. Crazy. Crazy. Hot take, Jake. Jim, I've got a fun award that you're going to like the title name. The title of the award is be an athlete. Be an athlete.

being athlete. Jim and I participated in a house Olympics event back in our college days. We had a friend who showed up just to kind of watch. And every time we do an event, he just starts screaming. Be an athlete. We're like trying to eat saltines and stuff, and he's yelling being an athlete.

It was a good time. Jim, there's a guy who's being an athlete for the Cincinnati Reds. Michael Lorenzen, I mentioned him briefly earlier in the show. Jim, two-way McKay got the shout-out, Shohei Otani kind of knocked down the door. Michael Lorenzen has been a pretty good relief pitcher for the past four years now in 288 innings. He's got a 346 ERA. Not great.

It's been better the past two years. It's like 3-1-1. Jimmy, Michael Lorenzen's a guy who can swing the stick a little bit, and he'd get some at bats here and there as a pitcher. It'd be the fun. Hey, we're subbing in the pitcher. he's going to play some outfield. He made a really nice catch earlier this year.

Jim, they've been letting him hit, and he's hitting. I mean, it's limited action, but he's hitting 33. Last year he hit 290. Again, limited at bats, but it was because there was still this stigma, like, that pitchers just aren't allowed to do that. And I think we're going to see this whole baseball world change soon. You've mentioned Russell Martin's pitching stats. I was just bringing up their pitcher comparison.

Jimmy, I just think I think baseball is going to look back and laugh at a certain point because we tried to specialize so much. And I think we've already seen this revolution in NFL and NBA. Like NFL, this is not a football podcast, Jake. But think about it. It used to always be like, hey, you want that defense event that he rushes the passer. Now it's all about balance. guy that he could cover in the flat. He can do this in this set. Major League Baseball, I think we're going to see a revolution of these guys who are athletes that, hey, son, you're a really good

pitcher. We're not going to let you swing the stick anymore, even though you're good at that. Why? Why? Let these guys be great athletes. And I think Otani was the first one that really knocked on the door. McKay coming up for the raise. I'm rooting for him. And Michael Lorenzen, He's doing great things. The defense in the outfield is impressive, too. Let these athletes be athletes. Let's stop limiting them. Who's got a higher batting average?

Michael Lorenzen or Russell Martin? Lorenzen. Who's got a higher... Who's limited up? Who's got a higher OPS? Lorenzen. Who's got a higher ERA? Lorenzen.

Yeah. Russell Martin's got better pitching stats. Lorenzen's got better hitting stats in the most unfair sample. size comparison to ever be done. And I mean, I know we're getting another roster spot next year, but I mean, how valuable would it be to a team if you were a right fielder that, yeah, you also can throw two innings when you need it?

I mean, that's like, that's going to become a role on a baseball team. So good for Michael Lenzhen. Having a really good year as a reliever. All right. Next step. Elevator talk. Going up. Oh, I'm not talking about.

the Orioles. No. Sorry, O's. It's too late. Phillies? Didn't we just do them? I think we just did the Phillies. Yes, we did.

This is our last one. We have to do this team no matter what. Oh, God. The twins. All right, so Pineda gets busted for PEDs. That's your main topic right there. Yeah. You're going to win the division.

Your Rocco Baldelli's got a good shot for manager of the year. You can talk about that. But really, how much does Pineda fuck up their, playoff like he was getting a start in the playoffs am i wrong there no you're right jim and he actually he'd been really really good of late too um like i'm i'm going to his game logs right now but he uh he had turned it up a notch i think in i mean in his last three starts he had been a 17 innings pitch to the tune of a two-one two er a i think barrios and oda rizzi are still the guys they're banking on in their rotation.

But after that, it gets pretty muddy, pretty quick. I guess you just, you open with Brewster Gratterol, right? A Brewster Gratterol. Yeah. What a name. They got a lot of guys on the injured list right now. Marvin Gonzalez, Max Kepler, Miguel Suno, Kyle Gibson, Nelson Cruz, J.K., Byron Buxton.

Dyson. Dyson's important out of their pen. So, yeah, I mean, they're, I don't know, we haven't lumped them together. You say something about the injuries. You're like, hey, you know, I think we can make some noise. We got to get a couple guys healthy. We got to get Kepler back. You know, Suno would be big.

I've mentioned Rosario's on Slump Watch. If you're trying to be in the know right now, be like, hey, Eddie Rosario, he's got to get it going. And then Jim, Mitch Garver, man. The Mitch Garver story's unbelievable. Mitch Brady-Anderson Garver. That's what you say in the elevator. Oh, wow. I'm not saying anything.

I'm just saying the stats look similar. If I had to place a bet today, I'm just saying you'd place that bet on Brady Anderson. That's all I'm saying, Mitch. Damn. Michael Pineda took some. He says that he was taking it for weight loss, but it's those, you know, it's what they, it's like Kno. They take that to cover up the PEDs is what they say. He's eligible for free agency after the season

and would serve the rest of the suspension next year. So that really hurts Pineda's free agency. Damn. Yeah. They need to get all these guys healthy. Like not everyone I said is on the IL, but they're like, you know, got little bits and things wrong with them. Like Cruz missed two games.

But, uh, so you got to get healthy. You're going to win the division. Who do you want to play in the, in the, who do you want to play? Ooh, that's a fun game. That's a fun question right now. And who's your third starter? Who's the third starter?

Someone tell me, it's Barrios Oterizio, one, too, right? Is it Gibson? Is it Perez? I mean, Gibson's on the IL right now. Perez hasn't been very good. I mean, do they bullpen day with one of those guys? I mean, that seems like the conversation that if any of our twins fans are listening, let us know, because I'm not sure.

How many players are going to end with 30 home runs? That's a fun one. because you need Sano needs three more. Eddie Rosario needs two more. Mitch Garber needs one more, and that would be five. Yeah. CJ Kron's got 24. It's pretty wild, man.

The lineup they can put together on a certain day if they get everyone healthy. I mean, that is tough to navigate. And, Jim, I think honestly the name we should be saying a lot more is Nelson Cruz. Nelson Cruz having another crazy year. might finish with 40 in 104 games currently. He's got a 1.0.0PS. He's going to finish with the most home runs this decade, too.

Nelson Cruz, really good. Their schedule, they have the nationals and the Indians, and then the next half of their schedule, Jake, to finish the season is so easy. And it's their division. It's White Sox, Royals, Tigers, Royals. You know what?

I'm going to do the spin zone right here that, like, that's kind of not good. You're not going to sniff competition for two weeks before the playoffs. I mean, I kind of agree with you because not only is that not competition. That's like, it's like dead. Those are spring training games. That's three, seven, ten. That's 13 spring training games leading up to the playoffs. Damn.

It's kind of weird. It's kind of interesting. All right. That ends this episode of Talking Baseball. Thank you guys very much for hanging out with us. We enjoy you. I hope you enjoy us. We'll be back on Friday with another episode to recap and see what has changed, what has happened.

See you guys later. Thank you.