Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - New York Baseball Is STRUGGLING!

Episode Date: August 11, 2025

This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at https://betterhelp.com/TALKINBASEBALL and get on your way to being your best self.Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app and use promo code JMBASEBALLUse code TALKIN2025 for 10% off your next SeatGeek order*: https://seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/TALKIN2025. Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discountBook your next trip at https://www.bestwestern.comCorona. La Playa Awaits. Be sure to get yours at https://OrderCorona.com  Talkin’ Jake and Coach Trev break down the weekend series including the Padres sneaking up on the Dodgers, the Mariners nipping at the heels of the Astros, Mets & Yankees struggles and more! 0:00 Intro3:00 AL Burn9:55 Astros / Yankees17:45 Rays / Mariners24:22 Phillies / Rangers32:12 Guardians / White Sox36:25 NL Burn43:55 Mets / Brewers49:00 Mets struggles50:50 Cubs / Cardinals55:23 Red Sox / Padres57:25 Roman Anthony contract59:40 Red Sox picking up on tells from Robert Suarez1:02:30 Blue Jays / Dodgers1:07:45 Standout Performances1:20:40 Guys who are struggling1:22:30 IL Update1:24:30 Awards  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome to Talking Baseball. We're brewing up the best baseball with Seattle's coffee and Milwaukee's beer, and we're brewing up the worst baseball ever in beautiful New York City. Let's talk ball. Kyle Luigi, Savannah Bananas. William Contrera, still a homer. Him? Marcelo Zuna's hot.

Yeah. Graves are out. Hello and welcome to Talkin' Baseball, presenting you by Seat Geek Code Talk in 2025. I am Jake Storelli. That is Trevor Plouf. Bobby Golfs is producing Dog Day season. Trev knows a little warehouse weekend for the boys.

I was in San Diego getting my game tight, scouting some Padres. Padres are getting hot again. How do you like that? Along with the Roman Empire in Boston. Trevor, how are you? Ships crossing in the night, you and me? You think we cross each other on the plane? right home. That's what you're saying? Yeah. Okay. I'm doing great, Pop. Obviously, I was in New York,

in the city, uh, for a floor ball battle, which my body's a little beat up, but I'm the greatest warehouse athlete of all time, so I'll be okay. Um, I'm excited to talk about the state of New York baseball. The twins all of a sudden are a young, energetic team, something we've been asking for forever. Uh, don't know exactly what that means, but it is the talking baseball ball this week. I think we got to mention that too, Twins Yankees. Nobody cares. Nobody cares. I'm just here to tell you.

But we're getting here, Pop. I don't know if it's a dog days. I don't think there's any such thing as the dog days anymore. Bro. I'm out on the dog days. I'm out. Go watch a Yankees baseball game and tell me it's not the dog days. That's their problem.

I'm out on the dog days. They need to be out on the dog days as well. Literally, the best chance. to save their season might be hosting their first ever bark at the park and having an actual dog day. Because right now everything's so bad there. Them and the New York metropolitans who are both barely holding onto a wild card spot. Make sure you tune into the standings later.

Trev's going to walk you through the best in the biz. And yeah, man, Milwaukee. Awesome. Awesome. Seattle mentioned those on the way through. And yeah, I don't, we're starting to hit, I guess it's fight or flight territory, man. Going back to, I guess was it the Tigers last year? When did they kick into gears?

Right around now? It was right around this time. And they're kind of like figuring out if they're going to have to do the same thing. Right. Scoob's in the bullpen. Scoobs, Guardian six games back. Yeah, they're insane. We'll talk about that.

I don't want to spoil the standings for the people. Let's get into it Let's get into some American La Liga baseball. Oh. Look at this. The Houston Astros, a very good baseball team in franchise, took on the New York Yankees,

where they won two out of three. First game went to extras. Ah, who do we got in the pen? Let's try Devin Williams. Taylor Tremel. Into the bleachers. Astros take the first game. Thanks. A dominant win in the second game where they blew it.

Or they absolutely blew it and hang on by a thread. Luckily, Trent Senior Slee, Grisham saved him. Oh, and then Jason Alexander, with no hit. 7-1 Astros win. They take the series. Two games out of three. The Phillies. Hey, the Texas Rangers back in the mix.

Not after this. The Phillies sweep them. Christopher Sanchez continues just being unhittable. and baby Jesus and Zach Wheeler follow, thanks to a little Harrison Bader robbery on Seeger. Phillies sweep them up. Texas, the mid and the mid and the Mariners are not a part of that because they sweep the Tampa Bay Rays.

Cal Raleigh, you heard of him, he homers in all three games. My God. Luis Castillo, hasn't been talked about enough this year. He has a good start. And the Tampa Bay Rays are sprinting too bad. Sprinting too bad.

The Detroit Tigers, they take two out of three from the Halos. They take the bread games. Matt Veerling, pinch hit, home run. Then he heads to the IL that oblique. Trev, you know what to do. Halos took that middle game on Taylor Ward and Joe Adele Homers. but Jesus was a carpenter. And I guess Riley Green, maybe he was too, because he homers as well.

The Kansas City Royals and the twins played in those mighty, mighty Minnesota twins. Luke Keishel, Treb, they wanted him up. And he's playing some of the best baseball in the league, along with his walk-off home run to take the series in 11 games. Ryan Jeffers now in the heart of the lineup, I don't know. travel talk about it and we'll turn our ears off. But we need to start talking about Chris Rose's Guardians again because they are in the mix.

They take two out of three from the Chicago White Sox. They end up dropping that less game because these bitches love Sosa, Lenin Sosa, and Colson Montgomery hits one almost out of the ballpark in Chicago, which I didn't know that was possible. C.J. Kaffis, I think he's a cousin of a friend of mine that I went to high school with. some some analytics there uh manzardo turning on balls all series in your last american league series did you watch as the a's take two out of three from the baltimore orioles shale angioliers needs to be talked about more because he's gone nuts this second half and i think he's on pace for 30 again

otherwise i don't know laurence butler should have been out on the game winning run but the catcher didn't squeeze it so he just scored aes take two out of three that's what happened in the american league People say we don't say Shay Langeliers name right. I don't think I do. Langalears? I think it's Langeliers. Langeliers.

Yeah. I don't know. He deserves it. You said he deserves it. You said he deserves to be talked about. He's really good. He's, I think, 80 career homers. Nice, Jake.

Cool stat. Yeah, I got that, too. 5.9 war. I got the standing spot. Let me give them to you. I don't care if you want him. You're going to get them. Okay.

We're going to start out east, the Toronto, Blue Jays, 69 and 50 on top of the ALEs. They're four games above the Yanke. No, the Red Sox, 45 and 54. Yankees six and a half games back, 62 and 56. Tampa Bay Reyes, as you mentioned, kind of spiraling downward. They're five games under 500, 57 and 62. And those Orioles, 53 and 65.

In the Central, speaking of spiraling down, the Tigers had a huge lead on those surging guardians. now it's down to six games. They're 68 and 51, Guardian, 61 and 56. And then does anybody care about the rest of the teams? Royals 58 and 60, twins, 56 and 61, and the Chicago White Sox, 43 and 75, yikes. Out west, it's getting interesting. The Houston Astros, 66 and 52,

excuse me, a half game ahead of the Mariners, who have won seven in a row, nine of their last 10, 66 and 53 for them. The Rangers, one game over 500, threatening in the wild card, 60 and 59, Angels 56 and 62, and the Athletics 53 and 67. Jake in the wild card. As of today, the Houston Astros would host the New York Yankees in a three-game wild card set. The Mariners would host the Red Sox.

The Mariners are in first place in the wild card. and a half games up on the Yankees, only a game up on the Red Sox show, the second place wild cards, 65-54 for them. Guardians, half game back, Rangers, two and a half games back. And I think that's all I'll mention. Royals, you're under 500. Can't talk about you right now, even though you're only four games back. Those are the standings in the American League.

Well done, Trev. The Astros hosting the Yankees, Carlos Correa, wearing number one. What is happening? What could go wrong? was AL-2. Two first-inning homers. The standings and the ale recap are brought to you by Seekique.

Go see your team. Go see your team. I might, again, I've seen a lot of concerts. Jonas Bros. and Demi Lovato? That was all over my instantgram this morning. You could go see whatever you want with Seekek. 28 million downloads. The number one rated ticketing app.

The scale of 1 to 10, so you know if you're getting a good deal, or if you look, I don't know, green means good, red means bad. So if you're out on numbers, you could just use that system. And whether you've used a code or not,

code talking 2025 is going to save you 10% off your next set of ticks. So if you're going to a concert, you're going to a game, whatever you want to see, it's saved 10% with talking 2025 at Seekek. Trev, let's rip the Band-Aid. It's the first series mentioned, and there is a first place team involved, the Houston Astros, like you said.

And as you mentioned, Carlos Correa playing third base, turning double plays looking fantastic over there, a couple RBI in this series, Altuvae, a couple first inning home runs. And, yeah, the Astros are a pitcher or two away from sweeping this. The Yankees are a decision or two away from, I think that's, well, there's a lot of frustrating parts for New York right now. But if you go back in their past three series, I think they have an extra inning loss. Or just games that they are massively blowing with a combination of bullpen and defense.

So I guess I do want to start on the Houston side of it. Oh, there's Correa, almost going second deck, Trev. But he couldn't get that. Preserved. Yeah. That's rare air. I guess talk about Houston. It's, I mean, look, they are, they're coming up against it.

The Mariners are playing such great baseball. We know Houston, you know, they've been going with, I'm not going to call it a makeshift roster, but it's not like their planned roster for the year, and they've been doing that almost all year long. So it's can Houston continue to hold off the Mariners? I think it's kind of the talk here. Correa's been great.

I was wondering why he was wearing number one. And then I saw that Hesu Sanchez had it on. And Carlos apparently had number one as his first number with the Astros, which I did not know. I'm used to C4 in a twins uniform. And now I don't get to see that anymore. It upsets me immensely. Talk about the Astros. I mean, it seems to me, Jake, like we're looking at, we've always given the Astros organization a ton of credit for being able to develop

baseball players, guys that can come up and get the job done in a plethora of different ways, but I think we're really seeing that more so this year than anything with the guys I've mentioned coming up and kind of just having them hold court right now, I think, is a good way of putting what they're doing. I know that we just saw, who's coming back for them? Javier. Javier. Yeah.

Javier is coming back. So, like, we are getting trending towards being healthy. But they, I mean, they come into town and take care of business. I know the Yankees aren't playing well, but, you know, a series win in New York is not an easy thing to do. I don't care what time a year it is. Is it dog days for the Yankees or not? Yeah, I think a couple things of notes, note from this.

Josh Hader goes multi-inning 36 pitches, which I'm a big believer. Like every postseason we see this that I understand you can't regularly do it, but you should be doing it, I don't know, once a month or something like that. So when the postseason comes, you're a little more familiar with that. That was huge in them getting that first game. There's an argument. Houston's four of their top five relievers are lefties, which just interesting and good for matchups.

And dude, I know there's some Yordaun news. He's, you know, he continues to grind and he's taking some BP, but they're going to take it slow. Houston is so right-handed, which for these Yankees, their two best starters are freed and Rodon. So if they were to match up in a three-game playoff, it'd be a little bit of a nightmare. And those guys haven't been as good as they were the first half.

And that's, you know, a huge part of the story for the Yankees is their bullpen is worn out because their starters aren't giving length. And it just seems glaring. Judge has come back and he hasn't been judge yet. and if there's anybody you shouldn't bet against on the Yankees, it's that guy that, you know, let him take a few games to tune up. And Joel Sherman just wrote an article on this if you're looking in to get some more Yankee hate fuel going today.

But the Yankees have just been fueled by these heroic individual performances, going back to Judge and Soto last year, Cole, freed the first half of the season. Like, it was one of the cool stats. It was like, oh, Max freed the stopper. 10 and 1 in Yankees games after a loss this year. Well, now that that's changed, it's, it's really rough.

And the whole product is rough because they don't really play baseball. They just try to outslug you and hope everything else falls into place. And it hasn't for two and a half months. I thought we were supposed to talk about the Astros. I'm glad you got that off your chest. You know, I like, I think we didn't

really talk a lot about the Astros' deadline, which is, you know, prove like, what's the word I'm looking for? Furtuous? Fruitful? Fruitful? There's another one. Rituous. Fertuitous.

It's not a word. No, it's not a word? Definitely not. I think it might be. Jeremy Pena's back playing. We have Sanchez, as I mentioned. I think Carlos Correa being there in general is huge for the Astros. I got to see. him up close and personal, obviously, with Minnesota and kind of what he brings about.

There's just something about him being back in that lineup, and he's had a nice start to his second stint there. I think it's, we have to talk about them pulling the trigger and bringing him back. I know Minnesota ate some of that money, but for them to have the foresight to go in there and hear, hey, yeah, I'd go back to Houston and then for them to get it done. Like, we're going to be watching Carlos Crane in the playoffs, like hit bombs. win games for the Astros like that's going to happen

so you have to give credit to them because the bullpen has been excellent all year long they have an argument for best bullpen in the big leagues so that's helped them you know write the ship when we've had a lot of these position player

injuries like they've held leads they've done really good job with that you know if they hand the ball to the bullpen they're getting the job done and now yeah you're starting to get a little healthy in the lineup you're getting your guys back Tramel with a huge huge horror off.

What's that? After Korea battle with two strikes and got the knock off him as well. But yeah, it's you know, they're a team who I think is just they consistently make the right moves.

Yeah, and their depth can't be undersold. You know, every team has their injuries at this time of year. But, you know, Ronel Blanco, Christian Javier, Lance McCullors Jr.

Wesnese. Right now, Essoc Paredes, Yordon Alvarez, Jake Myers, that, you know, they're digging through the cupboard a little bit. And, you know,

Jason Alexander twirls, you know, five innings of no-hit ball yesterday. That their organization, I know it, going back a couple years, it was critiqued for the cheating stuff. But they have proven time and time again

that they are a step ahead of you and a lot of other different facets of the game, tapping into pitching and tapping into other positions that they're leading the West in front of a tough Seattle team who's coming on right now and looks, I mean, Cal Raleigh is on God mode. Julio has kicked into another gear that the AL West race, I mean, I'm going to look up when is that next series

because I want to see that. You want to talk? Are we talking Seattle? right now? I think that was a nice transition for a lot of other shows. For a lot of other shows, they'd be like, wow, that's perfect. And for us, we're like, I don't know. Do we do it right? God mode for Cal Raleigh, 45. What does he have? 45 and 98 right now? It's August 11. That's just an absolute joke for him. Gosh, darn it, man. Yeah. Is he, should we have put money on him to win MVP when Judge was like minus 2000? What's it? I wonder what it's at right now.

on it. Bob's on it. Give us the, give us the odds, Bob. Mariners sweep, the raise. And yes,

you can talk about those two guys you did. Cal at homering in every single game. That's going to help. That helps. That helps. You mentioned Julio. Hulio keeps getting put on all these lists. You're like,

who else is on this list? He continues to be, I think we don't ever credit him enough. And sometimes early on the season, or like, come on, Julio, get it going. And that becomes like the, that becomes what we say about him. In reality, like this guy is like a five war player every single year.

Like, let's just relax on him. Everything is going around. Putting Naylor into that lineup has changed things for me. The depth, the length. We continue to see it throughout, you know, after the deadline, and into this series even as well. But I think one of the coolest stats going in baseball, right now is that Brian Wu has pitched six innings in every single start.

That's insane. That is so cool. It hasn't been done since Clinton Kirshod did in 2019. I think I saw the stat. But that is, I don't know, man, there's something about that. It doesn't walk guys, pitches deep into games. It's just really impressive. They got a bunch of guys on that team who, I mean,

I mean, I don't know what I'm trying to say here. A bunch of guys on the team that I feel like aren't heralded as much as they should be. Interesting. And I don't know if that's a product of being like in Seattle on the West Coast. And sometimes those games get lost because they're late. And a lot of the populations doesn't get to see them. But like go up and down their roster right now. It's legit.

Yes. Wow. Cal rallies minus 105. Aaron judge is minus 125. Wow. I mean literally, I think three weeks ago. Wow. Wow.

Yeah, and you know it's nice seeing in that last box score, Nailer goes yard, a Johanio with a two-run single, that insurance run late in the game. It just feels different when you can have that type of depth through your lineup and you're continuously putting pressure on the opposing defense. I mean, just there is like, you know, the ball starting to roll downhill, gaining momentum. That's what it feels like.

with this Mariners lineup at times. Man, they, a little, little East Coast trip for Seattle, Baltimore and the Mets, and then it ends with Philly. So let's survive that for a week and a half. Or, you know,

survive that. They might thrive in that, because any team playing in New York right now is faring well. And we know what Baltimore season has been about. And yet, like, some of Cal's, the numbers that are popping up, and I was debating doing,

this for my award, and it's just something you know, but you forget about because you don't think about it every day. The fact that Ichero and Randy Johnson are both 51, that actually, I love that. Just having your two legends, in a way, couldn't be more different,

but in a way are also just these cerebral, like perfect mariners figures, like, each row's the coolest guy who's ever lived. Like, he has an argument for that. Yeah. Randy Johnson is just one of the most, like, he's baseball shack, who has decided, I'm going to be a photographer now.

And, like, show up what I want. Because Griffey's doing that, too. Is it a Seattle thing? And him in the catcher's gear is all-time comedy. That's a crop. That's like something you would wear right there. Is that Cal Raleigh's gear and he's just so much taller than Cal? He's just, he's one of the biggest humans who suffered lived.

They showed him playing catch in the tunnel before. By the way, if people don't know, Eitro is literally at the field every day throwing. balls from the outfield. Like he is playing baseball still every single day on T-Mobile Park. And he is there doing it. And just do a flashback and think about the different personalities. Like if when I don't remember the storylines at the time at all, but like when each row comes over, could you picture Randy Johnson being like actually, no, I was 51 and we're going to retire that. Instead, that's not what happened. And now you have these two legends that are

kind of united forever. Is there a story behind Eastro choosing 51 that I don't know? I mean, I think it was his number. And Ichro, again, has an argument for best hitter, coolest guy ever that, like, it becomes very much like, no, I'm a dude. And this is the number I wear. Isn't it an iconic number in, like, the Japanese league? 16 or 17. I forget which one of it is. that's like the number for like the guy well the pitchers i i think are they that what it is yeah that's it okay if you're like the ace you wear one of those numbers okay research on the fly people are going to be mad at us i don't wear 51 oh god i typed in 541 and now the a i i don't like that it's such it's such a bad it's such a bad shirt i bet we have rob look it up and we

talk about the fillies sweeping the rangers 51's not specifically a Japanese cultural symbol in baseball. He was assigned 51 by his Japanese team simply as part of the roster process and only later did it gain personal significance for him through his career. So that was his 51 is iconic for obvious reason.

18 is the the ace number. Okay. Okay, look at us. Culture guests. I was around it. I said, I said 16. Yeah, I think they were 16. The only reason I know that is because Corey Provost,

we were in LA co-in-the-games. He was mentioning about Otani, like, not wearing it, but close to it or something. Right. That's good for you and Corey Provost. Philly Sweep, Texas. Again, this, this, this A.L. Wildcard race, where the Rangers have tortured me all season.

They're now two and a half games back where they've had the best pitching. They now have an L-4, so every time it feels like the click is going to have, and it seems to not. My Yankees, obviously, in the mix down there with the guards in between. They get swept by the Phillies. And, like, Christopher Sanchez, the Cy Young talk,

although Skeens hasn't slowed down at all. But what he has done this year and the Phillies, I mean, I guess, you know, it's not really AL talk, but with what the Mets, you know, the Mets kind of had the NL East. And then it was back and forth for a little while. And now it's, it's not. Yeah, the Phillies are playing complete baseball. I love their deadline additions as well.

They've been playing great. I mean, Harrison Bader's kind of rejuvenated that outfield as well. The home run he robbed against Corey Seeger. I thought the visual was so funny. Like Nick Cassianos is just like next to him like, you got that dog. You're there. I want to get like, he's stopped. He's like, no, I'm good.

Like, that's not where he's supposed to be. He's not supposed to be there. He's supposed to be playing the caram off the wall. like ready to like you know get that ball and he's just like watching baby you can see him right here I think what is just there is baiters hair a mullet is it just long is it's kind of it's kind of a mullet like he's like such a like a fashion like guy but I will say this sure um one of like the most fundamentally sound outfielders you're going to see yeah like unbelievable footwork and the twins had two of those guys like Carlos care at shortstop now for basement close gray some of the

best footwork you're ever going to see in the infield. Harrison Bader, like, just watch him out there. Routine fly balls. Like, he ain't catching him like this. No. Like, he's getting behind the ball, setting up, like, it's just what he does. He's been great. And this Philly's team is relentless.

I mean, they just tear it open in game one, crush it. Trey Turner has a great game. Talk about him later. Game two, they get to Jacob de Grom, my guy, Max Kepler, and Stott. Like, again, a lineup that can kind of beat you up and down it. And then game three, you look at kind of who was, who was doing it for them,

Abundo Sosa, Weston Wilson, Brandon Marsh. That's, that's amazing. You sweep and those are your guys getting the job done. You know things are going well. Um, Schwerber's Homer off the pole was awesome. He's just like one of the one of the prettier swings in baseball. They're, they're firing right now. They are firing on all cylinders. And you know what? Good. I want to, I want to see the best version of Philly's baseball in the playoffs because it's that's a treat when we get to see that how many guys are going to hit 50 this year like what otani cow schwabes swarbs like let's see what let's see what goes on with swariz's his finger right is he still yeah swar's got to be there let's see judge missed he missed too much time okay raleigh has 45 otani and schwartz both have 41 judge and swariz are at

37. So they would have to... Judge can easily hit 50. Easily. I mean, both of them could. I mean, you just have to have a strong finish, which those guys clearly had a strong first few months. After that, it's then Junior Caminero, who we didn't mention Tampa, but 32 homers for him. He had a bomb.

It's true. Nice swing by him. Wow. Philly's sweep, first sweep since the Blue Jays. A little over a month. month and a half ago. And yeah, there's, it's going to come out again. I think we've gotten far away from it and I think it's part of the New York team struggles.

But if you don't get that starting pitching length, I just think it's so hard to be sustainable with how much use the bullpen and then the bullpen gets worn out. Duran gets another save in this series. Yeah, if you're not getting that, I guess Texas Rangers on the other side would say, well, hey, we get that pitching out. Well, you just can't have the worst offense. You can't... When you play a team above 500,

you can't have a 621 OPS. That's the worst in baseball. That just doesn't get it done. Doesn't get it done. Jocks hit a little bit. But I don't know. I don't have this on my radar, so here's another thing that the Rangers,

I guess you can be happy about. They lead the league in defensive runs safe. We're pitching. playing defense. I mean, they had some incredible catches during this series. Adelis. Yeah. Oh, my God. That was a bull. I mean. A trick shot catch. I didn't have this for them. Okay. Dude, perfect Adelis Garcia over here. That was, I was shocked he caught that. I guess it makes sense with Simia. I do, Seeger deserves some love for his defense. I know that's not what he's known for. But I remember his free agency was like, you know, maybe one or two more years at shortstop. It feels like he's gotten better.

What's Kyle Seeger up to? Kyle Seeger, we've done this. Is he on a farm or is he on a boat? Okay. He's killing animals. By land and sea. Yeah. Maybe air too.

I would kill an animal right now and like, I don't really not a butcher, an animal, but I could YouTube it. I, uh, I'd like to see you, what do they call it when you get a, when you get a, when you you clean a deer. Clean a deer. Yeah, but then you cut out the meat and stuff. Anyways. You got to get the organs out. I know that.

You got to split it, get the organs out right away. This episode of Meat Eater, Pete Alonzo. I have watched some lately, haven't I? Treve, I'll be honest. The rest of the A.L. Doesn't have a ton of juice for me. Tiger. Oh, I had one thing, though.

Okay, yeah, I agree with you. It's August. It's August. Angels, Tigers, series. Yeah. Guy that I didn't have in my book. Need this for you from Robbie right now. Okay.

Homer off scobs, which, by the way, was kind of cool for the Angels. Compero. Gustavo. Need that video of. Okay. Because are you sure that you were in San Diego?

Hmm. That's a trap. Are you sure you were hitting homers off of Derek Scuba? You know, you could say the same thing about the Cardinals catchers on Sunday night baseball. Bahas and poho, man. Those are. I was, when I saw Comparo hit a homer off scobs, and it was like, you know, he's hitting ninth. I think it was a two-strike pitch.

I was like, that baseball is so awesome, dude. So good. You can be built a lot of different ways. and still contribute at this great game. We'll have Bob dig for that. Do you want to give... There he is. I mean...

Kind of the same swing, too. What's he listed as? He's got to be 5-6. Gustavo Campero. I did... I stayed at a few hotels under that name in the late 80s. That's a nice swing. Oh, 5-6-183.

Put it in my veins. Oh, my God. from Columbia? I gotta, okay. Add them to the team. It's not fair that we don't talk about the Guardians. You're right. You're right.

It's the white socks, but you're right. It took two or three, but they're surging. It's such a weird thing. Okay, because I talk to Chris Rose by the Guardians all the time. So I feel like I'm pretty in tune with what the freak is going on. You mentioned KFIS. Yeah. Chris Rose seems to like this guy.

I'm like, this is another guy that's just like, no one's going to talk about, but he's going to have like a bunch of like clutch heads. It's going to be great. So they've scored I have it up right now I was going to give them my award but I'm not going to anymore Good that's that I'm talking about right now

Okay Last five weeks And this is from an article Written by Zach Meisel It's in the athletic right now Last five weeks They are third And run scored

Okay This is the Guardians we're talking about The two teams in front of them You're like yeah Toronto crushing it 304, 369-502 Milwaukee, 286, 354, 449. Those teams are like juggernauts right now.

And then it's the Guardians. Their slash line doesn't look the same. 244, 322, 423. But what, like, they're just getting the clutch hit. Right. Like, that's exactly what's happening. Timely hitting is what they're doing. They're walking.

They're not striking out. They're getting guys to like, to step up because Jose Ramirez kind of went in the funk for a little bit. It didn't matter. Quon's been in the funk. It doesn't matter. Like they're getting these guys like a rochio coming out from AAA doing it like a Cephas, Manzardo is doing it. Like they, it's just like such a crazy form of baseball. They lost two relievers, including Emmanuel Class A to a gambling. Yeah, scandal. They traded away a starting pitcher like the people clearly believe in and Shane Bieber

who's like been dealing at AAA. I don't know what that means people, but he has been. They traded him away. Like all signs were pointing to them just like kind of riding off finishing the year, you know, probably second in the central but out of the playoff picture. And here they are a half game back because they're just good at playing baseball.

Like they don't make mistakes a lot. They're not going to walk a bunch of guys. They're going to put the ball in play. They're going to get hits with runners scoring position. They're going to move runners over. They're going to play small ball. Every once in a while, they'll get a big homer. They are, it's

it's hilarious because it feels like we say the same freaking thing every single year the guardians are out of it then they just go on a heater and they're back in it and they might sneak in the playoffs and guess who you don't want to face the guardians in the playoffs you just don't like are they going to win the whole thing probably not but like i would want to face them like that team chugging along into the playoffs that they're like the scariest teams to play yeah my only counter to that would be that's like the only team that the Yankees have had success against in the playoffs. Don't always bring it back to the Yankees, okay?

I'm just giving a counter argument with information to what you just said. The Yankees have beat them, so that means everyone can beat them. Yeah, no, all that Ardians postseason success we always talk about. I'm just saying a team that gets hot like that at the end of the year you don't want to face. I feel like that always happens to them. Their bullpen has been throwing the ball really well. and we should mention because we did miss it

without Friday's episode Gavin Williams Gavin Williams has been incredible their fifth uh excuse me fourth and team ERA over the last five weeks which makes a lot of sense for them

I'm uh I'm excited to see what the next five weeks have to offer us because I mean if the guardians keep this rolling you're right they turn into last year's tigers real quick you know shout out Nick Enright

yes oh Like, we love the bullpen Golly, dude Tim Heron got sent down And now here's Matt Festa lighting it up Go Guardians, man Carlos Hernandez in that bullpen

Always liked his arm talent Let's go to the NL Before I talk more arm talent Are you nowhere has arm talent How about the Milwaukee Brewers The best record in baseball by far And they sweep the New York Mets And how did it end?

Oh, you know, the Isaac Collins walk off home run. A minor league rule five guy. If that's not Brewer's ball, the Mets are losing a lot of baseball games while the Brewers have won nine in a row. Trev mentioned it early. William Contreras is going off. Just a reminder, that dude finished fifth in the MVP last year.

There's so much good. We need to talk about this a lot as the Mets lose their seventh straight and 11 out of 12. Cubs and Cardinals teed it up this weekend for the 200th year in a row. And the Cardinals, they take two out of three that ends on Gray Day. Some of these sunny gray stats. His team, when he pitches, has been the winningest in baseball. That's kind of a stat. Cubs took the second game.

Matt Shaw playing really well. Well, note that down for the postseason. Michael McGruevy, sick shut piece after taking a liner off his chest. Good for you. Ada boy. The Padres took two out of three from the Boston Red Sox. Sox and Walker Bueller came in and shut him down on that first night. Walker Bueller's been doing that for years.

But it was Padres the rest of the way. Michael King is back. And they walked him off that day. Ramon Luriano with the Baltimore chopper over third base. And then Dylan ceased and arise. Tatis. Padres, they are playing some winning baseball of late. Speaking of the Dodgers and the Blue Jays, pretty uniforms, pretty colors of blue, and the Dodgers take two out of three.

They take the first two games. Kershaw versus Scherzer. We love the old warriors. Kershaw gets the best of them, six innings, one earn run. Blake Snell is back for the Dodgers, okay. five innings, 10 punchies, obviously. Blue Jays, you know Ernie Clements homering late. That's just what's going to happen.

That's how they take the final game. The Braves took four out of five from the Marlins. Did you watch? Double header day, Braves take both of them. And Marcelo Zuna is going nuts. And again, why was he not traded? Jerickson ProFar maybe makes the catch of the year as he almost goes flying into the bullpen.

I'll be honest. Marlins, their hot street comes to an end. We don't care. The Reds and Pirates teed up for four. They end up splitting it. Although the Reds, they've got a big stretch coming up for them. Skeen shuts them out in game one. Chase Burns keeps striking everyone out,

but they got outlasted by Pittsburgh. Nick Martinez with a big boy start, and then the Reds offense goes nuts in that final game to split the four games. Gamer. Nats take two out of three from the Giants. Giants head in the wrong direction. C.J. Abrams goes pole dancing. He turns on one off Verlander. That was one. Oh, I was going to have a joke, Kway Tang, and Matt Gage was the opener for him. I was going to make a joke about a 10 gauge? I don't know. And the Rockies get swept by the Diamondbacks. Lordus Gurriel with the

walkoff double in that second game. Adrian Del Castel. Dio, is he on the all Jake Storelli team? He could be. He could be. Oh, I forgot to mention this. I kind of fucked up. The Nationals are your best Western road warriors. Brought to you by Best Western Hotels and Resorts.

Life's a trip. Make the most of it at Best Western Hotels. The Nationals have won a series at Oracle Park for four straight seasons. That's kind of nice. Kenzie Gore recorded 10Ks for the third time this season. His first since April 19th. Remember the start he got off to? And how do you like a traditional leadoff hitter?

Six foot 10 James Wood led off in all three games with the 1.214 OPS. And that's what happened in the National League. You're perfect in my book, Pop. Yeah. Yeah. I have the standings for the National League. And I'm going to start, let's start out West because I want to. I'm back here.

I'm back out west. We're the Dodgers. I have a two-game lead over the San Diego Padres. 68 and 50 for them, 66 and 52 for the Padres. The Giants now sit at 500 again, 59 and 59, Dimebacks 57 and 61, and the Rockies, 30 and 87. In the Central, as you mentioned, best team in baseball, the Milwaukee Brewers.

I checked. We both have them over. Oh, yeah. obviously. Oh yeah. I placed a bet I wasn't proud about when I looked at the number before the season and now I'm very proud of it. I'd like to know what it is. It's $2.50. I'll be honest. Like I'm not, I'm not swimming in it, but that's a fucking bet. That's like a four or five unit. It's too many. I regretted it when I looked at it later, but I don't know. During TPP season, we kind of start losing our minds that, yeah.

Oh, man, TPP season is a lot. Crazy. 73 and 44, I believe they're on pace for 100 wins right now. Let's go get it, Brew. They're 9 in 1 of the last 10. They've won 9 in a row. Six games up on the Chicago Cubs. Pat Murphy, what does that feel like?

Just kind of like me laughing. It feels like pocket pancakes. That's what it feels like. 67 and 50 for the Cubs. 62 and 57, 4, the 6.5.4. Cincinnati Reds who are still in the race in the wildcard. 16 and 59 for the Cardinals and 51 and 68 for the Pirates. Now let's go to the NLEs where the Phillies have a commanding five and a half game lead.

Seven and three in their last 10 for them. They're sitting at 68 and 49, five and a half up on the Mets. We're one in nine in their last 10, 63 and 55 for them. They've lost seven games in a row. Sheesh, the Marlins, 57 and 61, Bray's 51 and 67, and the Nationals are 47 and 70 in the wildcard, Jake. As of today, the Los Angeles Dodgers

would be hosting the New York Mets in a three-game wildcard set. Wow, didn't know that. Chicago Cubs have the number one spot, the Padres, number two spot, and then the Mets hanging on to a one-and-a-half-game lead over the Reds. And I will mention the Cardinals

were three and a half games back as they are one game over 500 and then the Giants at 500, four games back. That last wildcard spot could go anyway right now. And those are the standings in the National League. Well done, Coach.

Yeah, I have some Reds fodder coming up in a little bit that they can ruffle some feathers there. But let's start with the Milwaukee Brewers because this series had everything. I mean, even on the other side, Pete Alonzo ties Darryl Strawberry for most Mets homers ever, which that's...

I'm a huge Pete Alonzo fan now. Me too. Meat eater. But the brewers are unbelievable. And when things are going well, things are going well. William Contreras flies out to right. Ump comes out and says pitch clock violation. And then homers.

Like that's when, that's when things are just going too well. and he is going nuts right now. And he hadn't been, he had been fine. He had been solid, but William Contreras, the bar is in a different area. I mentioned it on the way through fifth in MVP last year. And now he's playing that way. Brandon Woodruff, seven innings to earn run.

Like these Brewers have added, like, new best players to already the best team. Well, talk about like a long lineup. This is one of the longest lineups and not a bunch of names that you're going to recognize. That's just facts people. Like, you know, we talk about them. So I understand some of these guys. But if you're going, you know, best lineups in baseball, longest lineups in baseball, I don't think people have the Milwaukee Brewers like ready at the hip.

Then they should. Because they got a bunch of guys doing it. You talk about Isaac Collins what he's meant to that team. It's the walkoff homer against D.E. they went, okay, so we have Blake Perkins throwing out a guy at home to end the game. So you have your defensive highlight there. You got William Contreras taking advantage of a mistake. So you got, can we bounce back?

Then you got this big comeback in the last game against Helsley and Diaz. They got Helsley twice in this series. You're doing it against premier relievers and you're winning in a plethora of different ways. I mean, that is why the Brewers have the best record. in baseball. They don't make mistakes. They capitalize on mistakes. They have late inning heroics. They have good starting pitching. They have bullpillar. Like they have

it's as complete as it gets right now. It's it's so much fun to watch. I feel like we've talked to a lot of Brewers lately because they've been playing such good ball. But if you if you haven't like tuned in yet, like you got you got to. Like they play a really, really fun brand of baseball as well.

Not just here's the throw from Perkins to end the game. Like how cool is this? This thing's an absolute seed. Got him. And remember when his manager was talking about him after the game, saying he's like the best human I've ever met, and I love that guy and crying. Pat Murphy,

the toughest man in the world crying with pancakes in his pockets. That's got to feel pretty good for everyone involved. It's just they're a treat to watch on a day-in, day-out basis. People might not like this. Batting average, which has become less and less popular, here are the top six teams in batting average, the Blue Jays, the Astros, the Brewers, the Dodgers, the Phillies, and the Cubs. There's a lot of stats out there.

There's a lot of good stats. There's a reason I'm leaving out the athletics in the seventh spot, but they also play at a fake ballpark and have horrible pitching. Because then it's the Red Sox. But with the state... Say what you want to say. Don't be afraid of people coming out of you. You like batting average.

It's okay. It's a stat. The fact that we're like, you can't like batting average or else you don't know a ball. What? Of course you can like batting average. Let me tell you what batting average does. You ever heard of confidence? No.

I promise you, I promise you, a guy going up there that's hitting like 280, 290, 300 likes that a lot more and is more confident than a guy hitting 220 with homers. Like on a day in, day out basis, like that guy is going up there more confident, more like more at the ready for a big hit than the guy that pops one out every once in a while. And can the values be similar? Yes. I guess. Yes, they can be. Okay.

I understand that. But like getting big hits, give me the team, give me the team with the batting average, right? Like, does that not make sense? There's some logic to it. And it also, the other thing I would just add is how many of these teams do we talk about them not playing great defense anymore? And if you're putting the ball in play, you're constantly putting pressure on them. And I don't know. Obviously, OPS is one of the best all-around stats.

But, you know, ask a reliever coming out of the bullpen. If there's a guy with a 750 OPS and there's a 280 batting average or a 220 batting average, guess who they want to pitch to? Like the 220 guy so easily. So that's just a normal. It's fine. Let's just put that PSA for people. It's okay to like batting average. I might make that a shirt.

It's okay. Patrick. It truly is. Okay, I'm done with it. Do you like what the Mets are doing lately? No, I don't. I mean, like for the Mets fans, obviously, obviously not at all. We're just, you don't want to put yourself.

in a position where you're scrambling at the end of the year. I mean, this is a team that has been, I think they've probably been in the playoffs the entire year, if I had to guess. Like firmly, this is, the Mets are now only eight games over 500 the season. It's the fewest games they've been above 500 since

April 20th when they were 15 and 7. Is there time to write the ship? Yes. Is this a very good baseball team? Yes. Does it have some flaws? Yes. Okay. Yeah, Edwin Diaz talking about he shook off Alvarez and gave a homer And he's like, well, I'm never going to do that again

Yeah, this is I mentioned this theory before And the other New York team has it a little bit But since June 8th, David Peterson is the only Met starter Who's completed at least six innings They have not gotten length from their starters Their offense has gone absolutely cold Cold It's yeah I mean that's talk about two things that'll lead you to losing games

Starters not giving you innings and your offense not being able to put together any sort of a rally That hurts and you play those boys from Milwaukee right now You mentioned offense shutting down A notable Cubs trend man The Cubs they had a 9-11 OPS in the month of May which is just insanity and shouldn't be the bar. 714 in June. That was about league average.

6.81 in July. That was a little below. In August, a 472 OPS as a team. This was after the first game. And then they ended up splitting the next two. But I don't, I don't know. The Cubs are starting to Milwaukee's putting some space between them.

And their story of their season is changing a little bit. I saw, I watched Sunday Night Baseball last night as I was coming home from New York and a lot of the Cubs, Pete Crow, even Ian half, like a lot of quick right now. Like the hip is going. Like they don't look comfortable at the plate. Not seeing the ball. Results are showing in that regard as well. As you mentioned all the team stats right there. But yeah, it seems to me like they need like a chill pill, like a relax at the plate. You got to let the, you got to be able to let the ball get deep. That's what I saw. from them.

I think you had to give credit to the Cardinals who are still hanging in this damn thing after I feel like we've been counting him out all year long. I know they had a big streak along with the twins early on in the year, but they've continued to do it. And they tradeaway, hellsie, all these things happened.

I thought it was cool that Jordan Walker stole second base and ends up, you know, scoring for the go-ahead run. Like, I like that small. Didn't know that Jordan Walker had that in him. And then there was a kind of a crazy play there at the end of the game where Bertie steals

second base looks like he's in there but like his sliding mitt came up off the bag like I've never really seen that like once you got your hand on the bag it's usually pretty secure but it kind of bumped off there a fun series but here it is

he's safe like he gets his glove in there they call him out initially and they show it the replay shows his hand beating the tag so there beats a tag but it comes up off and the Cardinals end up throwing him out.

That's... That's tough, man. Look at this. I don't know. It's crazy. I don't know. I'm not a fan of that. I think we've talked about it on the show before.

It's like, did he beat the throw? Look it right there, yep. Yeah, you kind of do have to call that. I don't know where I'm at with the oven mitt. I know it's a safety thing, but it's also just bizarre. You think if he had his first. fingers there he could have corralled the base a little bit kind of i mean you're literally in an oven we call it an oven mitt like interesting i don't know i have those uh like slide with your feet

i like i'm like such a fan of like feet first sliding too scares the shit out of the uh the guy making the tag too right there was a in this series uh is is in the game last night uh wilson contraris head first, dive to first, while Bush was going back feet first. That looked like a recipe for disaster. Cardinals, are they alive? They're alive. And shout out, you know, we talked about the Cubs offense being crap, but right now Matt Shaw has putting it on.

And that was a big, he had those couple hot weeks coming out of the break, and they were supposed to be a third base team, and now he's the guy keeping the offense afloat. So yeah, Cardinals three and a half back. And if the Mets keep playing like that, why not? Why not baseball? I know you shouted out Sunny Gray, but like, since I played with him, I have this like, you know, he's played for so long.

And he's just like still getting it done. Just getting absolute crazy swings and misses too. And he doesn't, this is what I feel about Sunny Gray. I feel like I've said this before in the show. I don't know what pitches he throws. Right. They all just like move a little bit. Yeah.

There's like 10 pitches that just kind of like move just a little bit enough. You got big breaker, great. But like every other thing, like there's nothing straight. Well, that was the other fun part of last night and they talked about on the broadcast. But him and him and I'ma, I mean, you're fastball sitting at 91. Oh, but they know how to pitch and they locate. Like, I don't know, man. I don't need to go on another old head rant that stopped throwing the ball so hard.

But there's a lot of ways to get out. It's very cool when you could throw the ball hard. Padres take two out of three from the Red Sox, Coach Trev. And we did miss the Roman Empire. Roman Anthony gets his similar to Corbin Carroll extension that now the Red Sox have a whole lot of their young core locked up for a little while. That being said, Padres come back.

Padres getting healthy. Cease, King, Povetta, and Darvish are all active together for the first time this year. What did you see? This is a fun series. You know, Walker starts it off really well against. I mean, it's two of our favorite pitchers right there, Moxie Kings, Walker Beeler and Nick Povetta.

Walker goes, six things pitch, no one runs. It's nice for them. Red Sox sound like cruise to that first victory. My guy, Willier still doing his thing. And the Padres with like a gritty win in game two. Michael King comes back, kind of get to Gialito a little bit. But then the last game, cease. I think him stepping up and putting that outing is, like, that's what they need.

That's what the Padres need. And it was a good series for them. I think, you know, against Bayo, there wasn't a ton of hard hit balls in the inning. He gave up some runs. But, you know, putting the ball in play, works. And, yeah, like, there was a great series for the Padres. And they're hot. The two games back of the Dodgers right now, they're getting.

contributions up and down the lineup. Our guy Jake Cronerworth, the big swing. Love him. Great series for the Padres. And for the Red Sox, shake it off. It's a tough place to go and play. I don't think they played particularly bad or anything. No, after winning the first game, I think the Sox had won eight out of nine. Padres have now won 11 out of

14 after the final game. Bogartz, Zander Bogartz, swinging the stick. Yeah, he's coming through. Tatis had a couple clutch hits. I did not. I did We'll talk about Roman Anthony. Sure. I don't love the deal for him.

I'd love the deal for him. Anytime you get a chance to have $100 million, I think it's fine. But he was going to be a free agent at 26. Right. I know it's hard to turn that down. And I guess I'd never tell anybody to turn that down because you never know what's going to happen. And that's like he's set forever, his family's set forever. But I feel like, man, he's probably left a lot.

I can't say. I was going to say, I don't like the deal. I love the deal. like the deal. I like the deal, but I just think about being a free agent at 26, like what those guys have been getting. Soto just got $800 million. Right. Vladdy just signed a $500 million deal. And there's there's some real escalators in there for like MVP type stuff. So that that number can can really believe. I think it's a great deal for the Red Sox. And I also think, you know, happy for Roman. Yeah. I DM do a video. Yeah. Instagram. I was in

San Diego. How come the boys didn't hit me up? That wasn't, I don't think they were in San Diego because that video was posted on July 15th. I don't know how it got into my feed. The computers know, man. The computers. Instagram fed me a video of the Red Sox rookies walking into a bar with a bunch of chicks. I was like, this is okay, when was this? Oh, July 15th. Was that the All-Star break? Why would Instagram give you that video?

I have no idea. Weird. It's weird. What did you think about the whole, I know this is a little Chris Rose baseball today, but the whole Robert Suarez with the pictures of him on the iPad and the dugout game on? Yes. I'm curious.

I've said this before. I don't want, I don't even like the non-uniform personnel doing it. That's what happens in the bigs right now. They have guys like just sitting back there looking at videos. I don't like if it happens like, it can't be software. I can't say that enough.

And I don't know how you combat. I don't care about this. This is great. You have it. If it's done the right way. We have to find some way to not allow like an AI program. I don't know if I said that right. You can't just put in video to software program and have it like spit out what's going on.

Like I don't think that should be legal. I don't know how you combat that, how you stop that. I'm not saying that's what happened here. I'm just saying that kind of went through my head a little bit because that to me is cheating. But I don't mind if they get something on a guy, you got something on the guy. Okay.

Yeah, that's what I thought. No, it's, you're right. It's just to what extent is everything going on? I know there were some Red Sox rumors a couple weeks ago and they were like leaning into it and like loving it. Like beautiful core in the Red Sox. Like I hope they think we're fucking cheques. because that means we're kind of in their head.

So, yeah, as long as you got it the right way and we're transferring the information properly, there's a little bit of old in me that's like iPads in the dugout. Do we really, do we need that? But again, it's kind of helping hitters and I think more hitting is good. So I don't know. They've limited a ton of what you can have on those iPads.

Right, right. I didn't know you're allowed they have like that. Right. That's kind of, yeah. It's kind of cool when it like a pinch hitter's coming in the game and they just they were looking at the reliever stuff on the iPad like I kind of think that's cool. I would have loved that. You would have loved that. You would have feasted.

Like you know, you back in the day, you were racking your brain. Okay, what does this guy have? This is all the pitches he has. And like it's just nice to see it. Right. I did want to say, this is like so stupid, but to me it meant a lot. Like Ryan O'Hern had a sack fly where he's like buried his nose in and like just got the job done. I believe it was that bottom seventh, game three.

Maybe you get the video later, Rob, and show us. But it's just like, get the job done, dude. Like the swing is not his good swing. You know, we talk about like A-s-Men and have other clubs in the bag. Like, this was like his other club in the bag. Like, this was his relief wedge. You know what I'm talking about? Yes.

Maybe Trev, maybe we start a new segment. Because August gets gnarly. It's dog days and teams are dying. maybe like the worst contributing swings. My guy said Jacey on the Cardinals had one that led to that. There was another guy. Someone just threw the bat head out at it and they got a hit. And it's like two strikes.

Bring back two strike approaches. I'll say it. I'll say it. Look at that. Look at them bury the head right there. Got the slow mo's even better. I think you're saying everything you're. saying right now.

Oh, no, man. I just love that. I love the swing because I know what he was trying to do, and he did it. Treve, I think the last series that has meat on the bone here are, you know, argument for World Series favorites, the Blue Jays and the Dodgers. Dodgers head to L.A. I mentioned it on the way through. Blake Snell, five innings, 10ks.

That's noted. Glass now has a weird winless streak going on. which is absurd because he, I don't, the Dodgers have been a weird exercise this year. And we just talked about San Diego and they're starting to play better ball and they're getting healthy. The Dodgers, like, Mookie Betts, the home runs are starting to come. It's nice. That's really good. Muncie's back.

It's the homer. What he means that lineup can't be understated. It's for the Dodgers, it's been. like the bullpen, which we thought was going to be just unstoppable. It hasn't been. We saw Trine hang a pitch there. I think he went to Vladdy and Vessia doesn't get the job done. So, I mean, a little bit of credit goes to the Blue Jays, but it's been happening all year

long for the Dodgers in that bullpen. I know they've dealt with injuries and they've thrown more innings than any bullpen in baseball, but, you know, this was supposed to be one of their calling cards and just really hasn't been for them. That's something to watch as we approached, you know, October. Dodgers, they don't want to be in a wild card set. No team does. And they, I mean, we expected the Dodgers.

We talked about them ruining baseball. We didn't, but people were talking about that with the roster that they put. And now we're talking about them being in a freaking wild card series. So like next time this happens when a team goes out and gets a free agent and you're not happy about it, don't say like they're ruining baseball. Look at what's happening right now in the game. So stop with that. Stop it. Yeah, I think Dodgers, great series, do your thing.

I think this was a really good series for the Blue Jays, even though they lost two out of three. To come back and win that last one is huge. I might not have been saying that if they won the first one like that, then the lost the last two. But because of the end of the series with the comeback, Clement, Barger, gladdy, getting the job done at the end was awesome.

So I think they can walk away from that series being like, all right, like, not our first two games, not too great, but we came back and showed some resilience in that last months. It's good for them. You think it was a better flight home to Toronto from L.A. after the late comeback home runs? Huge. Huge for them. I believe in that.

And, and, oh, wait, I didn't even talk about this. I mean, our guy flew hardy. Yeah, I'm glad I shouted him out a couple of years ago. He's one out. Shohei Otani, like 10 pitch it best. Eltoni looked horrible, that entire bat. He was ass out swinging. I couldn't believe it.

That was a strike. They didn't call that one. They were pissed about that. He went for sure. Schneider seems to agree. He was pissed. Schneider. The guy next to,

he was fired up the whole game. Who is that guy? That's crazy. He looks like a baseball lifer. Flew Hardy comes in, ends up striking Otani out and then gets, did he get bets as well? or did somebody else come in and get him?

I forget Hoffman came in and walked five guys but got the win. Yeah, he just couldn't find the history. That's happened. So you never know what you're going to see at the ballpark. God, they used eight pitchers yesterday. Yeah, that was awesome. Yeah, there it is, yep. But the Otani Flewardi, that was cool.

Fluardis got funk, man. Sometimes pitchers just, you. You could tell guys that his, something about his legs and his arm and how that ball comes out. It's got the funk. Okay. Let's go on to standout performances. It's time for standout performances. Stand out performances.

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Our listeners get 10% off their first month at BetterHelp.com slash talking baseball. That's BetterHelp. H-E-LP.com slash talking baseball. We're too, boss. I don't love my standout performer today. I mean, I know I actually really love him. Oh. But I think I probably should have went somewhere else.

But I'm going, Trey Turner. Game one on Friday goes two for four, double homer, five runs driven him. Basically wins the game offensively by himself. And he hasn't been playing that well on that offensive side as of late. So it was good to see him kind of get going. And his swing is just so pure.

That's what got me is I watched those swings. And when he pulls the hands in, He's got that long finish there. I don't know. There's just something about Trade Turner. You know I have something for him. So I'll go there. Second one, can I give like a 1B?

Yeah, absolutely. Carlos Santana still doing it for the guardians. Like still getting big hits, still turning on the baseball from the left side. On Friday as well, he went two for four, four runs driven in. They got it off Savale early in the game. And Carlos Santana was a big part of that. So I'll give 1A1B right there. Yeah, there was a good Carlos Santana stat in there with our guy, C.J. Kaffis, that I think the first, him and Rokio, so Kaffis and Rokio,

were the first Cleveland players with four extra base hits, including a homer in their first seven MLB games since current teammate Carlos Santana in 2010 was involved in it. 2010. Okay. It's 2025. Not a joke. He's been playing a long time. And he's playing in shorts. And everyone just moved on.

He has them hemmed to short length. Great, great follow. Baseball pant trends need to be studied. I mean, I was in the baggy pant era, and that was something else. Now it's no one's in the baggy pant era. It's like those mid-rise, tight pants. Mani Ramirez with some of those baggy pants. I mean, he was.

There's some great baggy pant looks from backy pants. in the day. Who else? Who else stands out for you? Baggy pants? Jason Worth had big old baggy pants. Gosh, another good big baggy pant guy. Cici. I mean, Cici was wearing. Who's the Johnny Gomes, big old baggy pants, yeah. Okay. Trev, great double standout.

There's a lot of, I don't want to tease the people. A lot of people coming up on Enfuego. But I went with Nick Martinez. I said I was going to get to some Cincinnati Reds, Pittsburgh. You mentioned that NL Wildcard. And right now the Reds are a game and a half back of the New York Mets. And I think a lot of listeners of this show know my, I don't want to say I love-hate relationship with the Reds,

but kind of. I bought in a couple years ago when all that young offense was breaking out. Now they've become a pitching team. Hunter Green comes back this week. Nick Martinez. I'll do a little talking baseball dushy side of the show. His seven innings, one-earned run against Pittsburgh. Post-game presser, beer in hand.

Oh, I saw that, yeah. A little throwback to the Trevor Plouf days of playing baseball. Like, yeah, I had a good start. That doesn't happen, like, very much at all anymore. No, everyone's, like, healthy and playing Fortnite or whatever. Nick Martinez, you know, the hairline's going on them. He doesn't care. Is it?

Oh, no, it's better. than I thought. I'm sorry, that was a bad angle for a second. You just got a summer cut. Yeah, no, that's great. Fordham product. We love that. Getting his money pitching later in life. He got that QO last year. And Trev, I just like that, and I forget, I might have given him a standout or an award recently, but he's, Tito's been moving him around. In this era of we treat pitchers like babies, you know this better than anyone. you've been the number one person fighting against it. You know, this hasn't been Nick Martinez's dream season.

He had a 3-1 ERA last year. He's at 4-49 this year. Now that has gotten skewed by two absolute duds. He's got a 10-earn run and a 7-earn run. That if you take that out, it's not too bad. But there's been twice this year that Tito has used him out of the bullpen just to, like, get through. He did that.

His last appearance before this start, was 2.1, 2 Ernie's, not great against the Cubbies, bounces back with seven innings. And he might be out of the rotation. Hunter Green's coming back. And right now, again, this Cincinnati team, I understand, and I've been there. There's a reason you can fall in love with this team.

Andrew Abbott, Brady Singer, Chase Burns, can't stop striking guys out. They traded for Zach Lattel, and if Hunter Green comes back, I get it. A big stopper start for them in that series to help salvage it and get back to a split against Pittsburgh where you don't want that, but you'd rather that than lose the series. And they just have a big week coming up.

They have Philly and Milwaukee at home that let's see. Let's see. I love the pieces in Cincinnati, and I want to believe my guy Miguel Anduhar turning on balls, why not? Big start by Nick Martinez. and yeah, I got suckered in by the post-game beer. I'm into it.

I mean, I love that pitching staff. It might be one of my favorite pitching staffs in all baseball. When they're all healthy and going like that, and I'll say this about our guy, Chase Burns. I, this is a hater coming right now. Fantastic. I was interested to see how he was going to do.

There's a lot of videos out there of him, I believe his Wake Forest, correct? Yeah. Dealing and just, you know, the college guys, they get crazy. They do a lot of things. because he was always screaming and I was like he can't do that in pro ball and he hasn't I saw a little bit of it in his last start we started to feel it like I feel like maybe he's

getting real comfortable because he's striking like a lot of people out he's had some tough starts but some really good ones as well um I'm a fan of his like I'm I'm in as much as I wanted to be a hater I can't when I see a guy like that like make the adjustment and just basically I I mean, he's, he's got the stuff to be like. He has, like, how many aces do the fucking Reds have? I mean, okay, if we want to genuinely do this, Chase. In same. Chase Burns is very young.

He was second pick in the draft, right? So, like, he obviously has that talent. Hunter Green. Yeah, he is an ace. And Andrew Abbott's been better than all them. Andrew Abbott's been an ace, which is like, maybe you don't think so because doesn't throw hard, but like, his numbers will suggest that he is an ace. And yeah, I just, I want to, this stat is a,

very good one from the doc today. Chase Burns has struck out 10 plus... Chase Burns has struck out 10 or more and four of his last five. The fifth start was the Speedway series Rain Push Start. So like, that is elite. That's on a list.

He joined Fernando Valenzuela and Bob Feller as the only major leaguer since 1893 with 10 or more in four of their first... Eight starts. Bob, go back to that video you just had up. You see it just at the end. He wanted to go nuclear.

His college ball is showing. Let's see. Strikes out O'Neill Cruz. Yeah. Yeah, that's fine. We can have a little yell. There was a really cool play. Did it end the game when,

and I think it did it end of the game when Ellie caught the liner and threw to steer to get O'Neill Cruz. Ellie. A little double play to end it. A little bounce pass. It's pretty cool. I don't know. Shout out the Reds. I want the Reds to be good. This is a big week for them.

Philly's Brewers. This is a big week. Yeah. And it's always a big week. There's Ellie. Jesus. I mean, it's almost safer for him to bounce past it instead of throwing a hundred. There's a picture of O'Neill, Cruz, Ellie. Yeah, Matt McLean. And he's just like, what the fuck?

That was. That's tough. Baseball's the best. Baseball's the best. Shout out 5-8 Matt McLean. Just getting goofed on. He is. They're probably like,

what's that little guy? Does it get cooler than, I mean, not to be rude to Matt McLean, does it get cooler than Ellie and O'Neill Cruz? No. I mean, my goodness. I forget if we mentioned it,

O'Neill Cruz rolling into, I think we were at the CAA party at All-Star game, and he was just in the, the track suit, just being the king of the weekend. Like, okay. I'm looking up something right now real quick. Okay, interested in that.

Because I love baseball so much. Let's, uh, while you look that up. Okay, I was going to say, how many homers does Matt McLean have compared to those two? He's got 11 homers. Ellie's got 19, a little bit more of bats, but. Let's do some Corona and Fuego. Dirt nasty's on Fuego. That means I'm on fire, baby.

Like Waco. And Fuego is brought to you by Corona, the official servesa of talking baseball. We'll start out with Marcel O'Zuna. Marcel, Marcel O'Zuna, six for 15. Four homers, though, eight runs driven in. He's crushed the Marlins, 333, 368, 833, and nine games versus them this year. He's also crushing it over his past 12 games. William Contreras, we talked about him, a bunch, four for nine in the series with three homers

and five runs. driven in, Jose Al-Tuvae went into New York like he always does. He hits everywhere, people, not just Yankee Stadium. Six for 11, two homers, five runs driven in. He became the 11th player whose primary position, Jake, is second base to reach 250 career homers. Pretty nuts. Another guy that's like, you know, five, six, and he hits homers, and he's amazing.

How can you not root for Jose Al-Tupe? I get there's some people that still hang on to that. He didn't use the system. I got to keep saying it. Yeah. Okay, Yankees fans. Bretton Doyle went five for 11, two homers and four runs driven in. Shout out, you're on in Flago.

Not sure how that one snuck in there. For the week, Josh Nailer talked about him. He went seven for 14, two doubles, three homers, five runs driven in. Also five stolen bases? The first player in MLB history with four or more home runs and 10 or more stolen bases in his first 15 games with a franchise. What? Guess Josh Naylor stolen base total on the year.

I don't know. 15? 22. Oh, my gosh. Josh Naylor. Just a refrigerator running around the beachers. Listed 510, 235. Pick them up and put them down.

Insane. Isaac Collins from Minnesota, baby. Let's go. We love our own. 10 for 21 for the week. week, two doubles, a triple, two homers. His first career walkoff hit was that walkoff homer. It's his first career walkoff homer in any level of play.

So congratulations. There's no better feeling than that. Very, very happy for our guy, Isaac Collins. And also Minnesota, Luke, Kishaw. Look, he's coming back. I believe he had T.J. Then he broke his wrist. Kyle Hendricks broke his wrist early on in the season.

season he comes back and he's been incredible to start his big league career 10 for 22 and during the week three doubles two homers 10 runs driven in he also hit the walk off homer little opo side johnny in target field not easy to do uh he's reached based in 12 straight games to start his career carlos carrea number one 12 for 25 two doubles a homer five runs driven in he has five straight multi-hit games he's got an eight game hitting streak uh since his ofer and his astroa debut. He's been awesome, man. A lot of respect for that guy. Yankees fans hate me right now because I'm giving

credit to Carlos Correa and Jose L.2. Deal with it, people. Ernie Clement. One of the better stories of the year. 12 for 30 for him, two doubles, a triple and three home runs. He's been going off for them. Big clutch hitting for our guy, Ernie Clement.

And that's, uh, that's who's in Fuego. Well done, Coach Trev. It was a great in Fuego this, this week. kind of stepped on our toes a little bit for standout, if I'm being honest, because those guys are really in fuego. And you know what? Also, on Isaac Collins, okay, 5-8, my king, when he hit the walk-off, the look on his face is kind of like,

I know I hit a walk-off, but no way I just hit a walk-off, right? A little hang slider from Dio? Just like full extension got it. Like, I think I just hit a walk off Homer. They're so crazy. I am more so the guys who are struggling. Get into that, yeah. Again, the goal here is to get them off of this list in two and fuego.

Dylan Carlson, this one is tough. Oh, for 33. That'll start to wear on a man. Routing for you, Dylan. Dane Myers, a 2 for 27. If you go out to his last 50, the numbers get even worse. Sorry. Sean Murphy, there was kind of fake trade rumors.

By the way, Drake Baldwin is hitting a lot. Three for 34, that's an 088, yipes. Nathaniel Lowe, a guy that thought was going to get traded, maybe. He's in a 4 for 35. Having the worst season of his career, that's tough. It's tough. Austin Hayes, 6 for 45 for Cincinnati. Hasn't homered since his two homer game on July 18th.

Ain't that baseball. Hey, let's get you boys off the struggling list. Let's get you to Enfuego. We'll see you there soon. And then things get even worse because we head over to the aisle. Colton Couser, moo. in Baltimore. Concussion I.L.

We're waiting for the timeline on him. Midnight Johnny, Johnny DeLuca, four weeks with a hammy potentially. Logan Henderson for Milwaukee, right elbow inflammation. We talked about him a lot last episode. Tyler O'Neill and Baltimore right wrist for a couple of weeks.

They're going to be cautious because of his previous injury history, sure. Luis Severino for the A's. Left oblique. He's had some of that in the past. They'll be careful about that. And then how do you like your versatile guys? Ahmed Rosario for the Yanks and Matt Veerling with that oblique for Detroit. Send the text, Trev.

But we have guys coming back. Like we mentioned, Christian Javier. It's supposed to be coming back tonight for Houston. Michael King came back for the fathers. Ryan Mountcastle for Baltimore. Shelby Miller now in Milwaukee. Just what they need another weapon. and Jake Berger in Texas.

Let's give out some awards. Oh, wait. Well, thanks, Kels. Awards are brought to us by Draft Kings. Today's episode, sponsored by Draft Kings. And it's all baseball right now, people. The playoff chase is on, and you can get in on the action with the Draft King Sportsbook.

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Age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction. Void in Ontario. Bonus beds expires seven days after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gaming resources, see dkng.com slash audio. Trev? First of all, Kelsey, I got to see her over the weekend. Shout out. She's eight episodes behind talking baseball.

Okay, she's catching up. What I wanted to do was, let's put this in to see if she actually catches up. Kels, if you listen to this, you got to text Jake. I'm finally caught up. If she doesn't text you that, we know she's not. Well, if she stays like eight episodes behind, she wouldn't be fully caught up. She'd be caught up to this.

I'm curious when, yeah, she gets caught up. Okay, I got you. I got you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, so I pivoted for my award. Pivot. And I have one that's like perfect for this. I'm calling it the I told you so award.

Jake, you know I have my guys. Right. My guys, so I'm like, listen, put this guy on your team. he's going to make you better. It's been Nathan Yovaldi. Maybe my number one guy. Put him on your team, he's going to be great. I think he's leading the AL in ERA this year.

ERA is not a real stat. Yes, it is. Sorry, it really is. Justin Turner, not having a great year this year, but as far as a leader, a guy that you want, I do think he makes you better. J.D. Martinez was another one of those guys I always had on there.

Hey, like, this guy is going to give you a good at bat. Go sign him. It costs nothing. At the very worst, he's a coach. They can help your young players. He's been around some of the best to ever do it. Put this guy on. The other guy that I've always talked about,

David Robertson. And he is back in the big leagues with the Phillies, like they need another weapon. Yeah. And that's exactly what this guy is. There's some hilarious quotes. about him. And actually there's one I really like.

This one's not that funny, but it's true. He said this. First of all, he's his own agent. He doesn't have an agent anymore, so he's like doing his own things now, which I love. But last month he was talking about when he signed with the Phillies.

He goes, I mean, the league hasn't told me yet that I'm not good enough to play anymore. And I haven't been told to go home. So if I got the opportunity to step between the lines and give everything I've got,

I'm going to fulfill that itch and try to win some baseball games. I love that he's like, yeah, I'm like still good enough to pitch, obviously. This guy's 40 years old. You know what he's done over the last three, age 37, 38, 39 seasons. Yeah. Okay. He's averaged 62.7 games. He's averaged 67 innings pitched, right?

To a 282 ERA. Like he's getting, he just gets the job done, Jake. Now he's back in Philly, third stint in Philly, 2019, 2022, And now 2025, they have the same team from 2022 when he was pitching in the playoffs for them. So this is like nothing for him. Meets him in Texas where he pitched last year, goes back into the clubhouse. Bryce Harper's like, hey, I didn't even know you were going to be here. He's like, yeah, he was just like sitting there. Imagine Bryce Harper's showing up and there's just David Robertson doing a crossword puzzle

in the middle of the clubhouse. Like, yeah, I'm back. Like, yeah, am I 40 years old? Yeah, it doesn't matter. I'm still going to get you out. I just, there are some guys, man, who have that. longevity card, I didn't have it. But some guys who just have men, they just keep their body and shit, keep throwing. And just knowing he's back and with the Phillies is so perfect. So I wanted

to make sure that number one, people knew he was back. Number two, he's still really, really good. I don't know where he's going to pitch in that bullpen. I don't know what leverage situations. I know initially Toppers talk about having him in some low leverage stuff, which makes sense. he's working his way back, you know, this season. But would it surprise you if this guy was throwing high leverage in the playoffs? Wouldn't surprise me at all. So shout out, David Robertson. I told you guys.

I told you so. Last year in 72 innings, he had 99 strikeouts throwing 90% cutter and curve. I think he was 63% of a 93 mile per hour cutter. and they ain't hitting it, so I'm going to keep throwing it. He's filthy, dude. I'm telling you, I know his game has changed a little bit.

He used to throw that ball at the bottom of the zone that just looked like it was going to be a ball the entire time and they would just stick at the bottom of the zone for a strike. And, you know, I don't know, he's just, he's good.

He just knows how to pitch. Knowing how to pitch matters. Good award, Trev. I will go I'll Chris Roses I'll give out the seeing his believing award because Trev

we see a lot of stuff on the baseball field Isaac Collins saw his first walk off this weekend and I have highlighted every short king that performed this weekend because I am short

and that's just the facts of it I've come I came to grips with that a few years back um Trev, we saw some first around baseball every day. That's the old baseball saying, right? We saw a first that mattered a little more.

We saw the first female umpire in Jen Powell. And, hey, let's be on, we make a lot of jokes on this show. Her first pitch getting called that looked like a ball. She called a strike. Guess what? She's like every other umpire that's, They all do that. Every single one.

I told you, I got mad. I was moving and groove in the past couple days that I saw Andrew Kittridge had an emaculate inning, which I flip-flop on that. Sometimes I think it's impressive. Sometimes I don't. Very impressive. Right. But his first pitch was called a strike and it was a ball.

So like, was it an immaculate inning? It was because that's what went down. I remember a few years back, Vanderbilt, go doors. they had a female kicker Sarah Fuller and there was a lot of commentary around that that was like, hey, we got the first. Jen Powell go down as the first. She won't go down as the last.

I think we had some female umpires in the stands like celebrating her. And yeah, hey, if I'm going to go around and masquerade and celebrate every short person that does something good on a baseball field, Well, there's a lot of female baseball fans out there that are looking for more representation. And I'll tell you what, from what I've seen from every umpire I've ever seen, I know damn well a female can do that job.

So congrats to Jen. And I know, you know, not to get super sappy at the end, but, you know, we've hired Swilly works here now that we've had on talking baseball and a lot of jam baseball videos. and there's been comments on those videos that are like, my daughter loves seeing Swilly and anything because it's, you got to see it to believe it a little bit. And Jen Powell didn't. She didn't see it.

But now people have seen her. So congrats. Is that what you say? Of course, congrats. It's awesome. Yeah. And Chris Guccione, who's on her squad, I believe he's the crew chief.

You know, he had some really awesome words in the press conference about, about his daughter looking up to her. and seeing it. And I've said this before. Like, representation matters, like you're saying, like being able to see something

and saying, okay, I can do that too. That matters. It truly, truly does. So I'm very stoked for Jen. It's awesome, man.

Love that. Good for the game. Good for the game. She a short king, though? Short queen? Oh, interesting. Jen Powell Height.

Didn't think we'd end there. And what's a short queen? because a short king is like 5-8-and-under. Short queen's got to be 5-3 and under. I'll let the people comment. I don't feel like I should be the authority on that. Maybe I should be. I don't know.

Libby is 5-3, and I don't know if I consider her a short queen. I don't consider live a short queen. She says she has a tall presence. Wow. Wow. Jen Powell, I believe, according to this, is 5 foot 4. She can't be a short queen. That's not a short queen to me.

That's like pretty like good average height. I tried. I tried to lump her in there. 5152. Comment below. We haven't asked for any baseball comments today. So you tell us your thoughts on height. Thank you guys.

It's good to be back. It's dog day season. We'll see you with the midweek. Maybe we get a little funk going on in there. Good to be back, baby. Let's talk ball. Stink. Jake's up.

I miss this music. It's just nice. Take that whole thing in your mouth. For the podcast only. Oh, we don't need that. I love a banana. I cramp up a lot, so I think I'm, like, full in the banana game. Love that for you.

Thank you.