The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Altuve Sees Action In Left Field, Rockets At Thunder, Greatest Heel Turn In Sports

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

Matt Thomas and Ross Villarreal of "The Matt Thomas Show with Ross" recap the Astros spring training matchup against the Washington Nationals on Saturday that saw Jose Altuve make his first plays from left field. Matt and Ross also:preview the Rockets going on the road against the Thunderreact to John Cena turning heel at WWE Eliminationdebate the greatest heel turn in sportsplay "To Tell the Truth" and more.

Launch timers. This is the Matt Thomas show. 10.1 in H-Town. Good morning, everyone. And welcome to a Monday edition of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Today, I come to you from Oklahoma City, where tonight the rockets will take on the thunder. We have Astros baseball today here on these airwaves that we call Sports Talk 790. In fact, it's a half edition of the show.

We're giving you the appetizer, the main course. She will not get a side dish or a dessert from us tonight, but we're going to give you an hour in 55 minutes of the best sports radio commentary ever. Would you agree with that, Rossville? Ever? I think that's a bit of an oversell. Well, I mean, I think we should sell it hard. Yeah.

Thank you. How much of the Oscars did you watch last night? I did not watch one second of the Oscars. Me either. It's crazy. Zilch. I saw some clips. You know, you catch a few clips on social media.

That's about it. That's what I do. All I know is is that, Demi Moore looks amazing. Apparently, she was in a movie that was horrific in terms of just grossness, but she was very hot in it. So that's good. If you like nudity and Demi Moore, you're probably going to be enjoying that one.

I don't know if she won, don't really care, but it's good to see Demi Moore back on the stage, back in the limelight, if you will. Yeah, I had it on my short list, Matt. Did you really? Uh-huh. For best nude scenes. Who won the Oscar for that? I believe you were going to the Avian Awards when you had that, Ross.

Not the Academy Awards. my bad. You ever been to the A-B-Ns? No, I have not. They're in Vegas, right? They are. I mean, we could go, cover it. You want to get a credential?

I mean, there'd be worse things to get credentials for. Pound the pavement with some hard-hitting coverage. You're coming right out of the game with those, huh? What did I do? 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-99-0. as we come to you from Oklahoma City where tonight the Rockets will take on the Thunder.

The Rockets, I don't know if you saw this, Ross, the injury list is quite expansive. Yeah, I saw that. Are they just going to go Ted and tank this game? Well, I mean, again, just because you're on the injury list does not mean you're not necessarily going to play. Correct. There is a back-to-back.

Tomorrow will be in Indianapolis. So my guess is there will be some guys that will play tonight and some that will not play until tomorrow. But those of you're just playing at home, you've got Fred Van Vleet is definitely out for tonight's game with the right ankle strain. Apparently he hurt himself very early in the game when he ran into an official and stepped on an ankle or an ankle referee stepped on him. I don't know what I never saw it. No one mentioned it to me.

He played through it, but he is out tonight. Stephen Adams is questionable with the left ankle sorens. Dylan Brooks has a right knee contusion. He's questionable. Tari Isan is questionable with left leg injury management. Alperin Shingoon is questionable with left. questionable with lower back soreness. A man, Thompson is questionable with right shoulder

soreness. And tonight at Oklahoma City, Reed Shepard has set the NBA record for single plus-minus. He was a minus 86. Tonight in Oklahoma City. Unbelievable stuff. That feels rude.

I mean, I'm not going to lie. Then doesn't sound great. By the way, the Thunder did play last night in San Antonio. and it was a game for like two and a half quarters and then the Thunder are like do you know how good we are they put up 146 points

in 48 minutes I mean the Spurs just say you know what the hell with defense pretty much especially with Wemby out Jalen Williams now there are two of them yeah so it's very confusing yeah Jalen Williams 8 J. Williams 6 if you listen to the radio tonight there'll be two of those

Jailin Williams 8 scored 41 points She killed his Alexander just had a measly 31 How's Chad Holmgren doing? You know what? I got to see. I don't know how he did. Has him been hurt again? It's funny.

That's one more thing you think about is who's hurt. He did not play last night. And I don't get an injury report on him until 1 o'clock on games until they play back to back. So I don't know what the status is on him. But yeah, that's not fun. In Indiana, I like to score a lot of points, too, Ross. This is going to be a tough little one-two back-to-back punch here.

I'm going to have to lock-in defensively, Matt. Me or anybody that's put in the uniform? I don't think, no, and we're not counting on you a defense. I did see Jeff Green in the hotel lobby last night. I said, Jeff, you don't have to play it much tonight. He goes, why? He goes, if he's in the injured list and I shut up my phone, he goes, I'm ready. Okay, that's good.

He's always ready. We appreciate that. That's all the salty veterans do. That's what the salty veterans do, Ross. They're ready when necessary. All right. Again, we're with you until 1155 today. We have to tell the truth at 1130.

And then we're going to send it over to Jupiter, home of where Robert Kraft suffered a rather embarrassing moment in his life. But that's not here nor there. It's about the Marlins and the Astros. Oh, my God. You said Robert Kraft. And I heard Robert Ford. I was like, what? Well, I mean, Robert Ford isn't entitled to do what he wants to do.

I mean, I'm not going to be judging McJew. judge but you know it gets lonely that month out there in spring training matt it's not a month bro it's six weeks i mean that could that could be taxing now robert is a free agent he's entitled to do what he wants to do but you know i'm just saying all right we don't judge we don't judge in the road that's just saying that right all right uh okay um okay we got that going on we have a wholesale two they played left field this weekend and actually friday in a game that we did not carry we People got mad that we didn't. He played basically six innings and didn't touch the ball.

He didn't touch the ball over the weekend, and we will get a little reaction to that from Jose coming up to the next segment. Also, Rossi, we have Dibeau Samuel. What was your favorite almost Debo Samuel's a Texan moment? It was never happening, it seems like. I don't get the feeling that that's the kind of deals that Nick Casario was going, whatever, make. We can play the game. Fifth round pick should the Texans have done it.

Well, we talked about the fact. I think I said six. You did. You're close. I'm proud of you. That's fine. What I've learned is guys over the age of 30 that are down don't offer much. And that's the thing Ross, and again, I don't want to, you and I argue about this.

But that's why the second round pick, these NFL teams, and I'm talking about all 32 of them, really, really, really value top three selections. When did I argue that it didn't matter? That draft picks don't matter. tell me it's an extra pick. I'm telling you it was an extra pick, so that's why he used it and went all in. I didn't say it was a good choice. Okay. God, you always trying to put things in my mouth.

103? Actually, 10.08. Are you okay? You're having a stroke? No, I'm just five minutes behind. I'm on a tape delay. You're five minutes behind. That seems significant.

That's fine. All right. So that's why I think that's, you know, let me ask you this. Do you try to save Grace on that second round? pick by trying to sign them to another deal, a short-term deal to say, all, we did get them after all for a couple years? I mean, does that come into the play, or do you go if a loss is a loss is a loss? I mean, you do what's best for the team going forward.

I don't think you care about the second round pick. The second round pick was an overpay to go all in for last year. Unfortunately, I didn't work out because everybody got hurt. I think a fully healthy Texans team could have beaten the Chiefs who represented the AFC. They probably wouldn't have beaten the Eagles, but you could have gotten, I think they could have gotten to a Super Bowl fully healthy. You know, it's funny, as poor as Kansas said you played in that game,

it does make you pause and go, what if the Texans were at full strength, what if Tank Dell was out there, what if Stefan Diggs was out there? Is anybody else I'm trying to think of it was missing? I don't think I'm on the defensive side that was really out. I don't think there was significant defense. Oh, Jaylen Petrie.

Jaylen Petrie was gone. Yeah, that's true. But every team's missing people. Nobody has all 22 starters healthy. That's right. That's exactly right. All right. That is to be discussed on the show.

Ross, your thoughts about John Sina's heel turn. Now, go ahead and say what you want to say, and I'm not going to judge you. I'm not going to say anything. I just don't understand. I don't follow it, so I don't know. Is this like an earth-shaking all-time moment that happened? It's an I just don't get it, so you can explain it to me. I would like to explain it to you. I also want to see if there is a sports parallel to it. Oh, okay. That's what we do. We talk sports on the show 24-7. Well, no, although other sports aren't scripted.

So John Sina has been, for 99.9% of his career has been what they call a face. Either a face or you're a heel. Now, why do they call them faces? Baby faces, but, you know, short for that. Good guy. That's weird. You say good guy, bad guy, they call it face and heel. Okay.

I believe he was a heel when he first started in professional wrestling, but when he got to the WWE, he was a face and has been that way up until this year. year where he announced that he was going to be retiring at the end of the 2025 calendar year. Now this is the guy that wears jorts in a backwards hat and he's like in his 40s and dyes his hair. Yes and he's also got a bald spot. Did you notice that too? No, I didn't. I saw like a clip. I'm going to tell you, I think it's because of you that my algorithm for you does think I'm into wrestling sometimes. You're welcome. All right. So with 10 months left in his supposed career, whenever he retires, it's not like literally December 31st,

whenever he competes for the last time. He was trying to, obviously, either reinvent himself or add drama or do something for sizzle. Well, on Saturday night, he was in the ring with Cody Rhodes, the champion, and the Rock was in there, two, and the three of them were kind of shooting, we're just shooting the, you know what, and the Rock told Cody, told John Cena to ambush his buddy Cody Rhodes, and he beat the crap out of him, allegedly. I mean, this was obviously all set up. You're chuckling, and I get while you're chuckling on this.

Go ahead. But Ross, it's still trending in the scripted sport. It's still trending in Twitter. It's still one of the most viewed Instagram posts and Twitter posts in the history of those two algorithms and those two different. You're making that up. No, I couldn't make that up, no chance. And people, even, that are not even wrestling. fans are like, what is this infatuation with John Sina?

Now, the thing that crossed my mind to this, and those of you that are wrestling fans, you should thank me for this because no other radio show on the marketplace is going to give you a deep dive into this. Yeah, probably they shouldn't, but go ahead. The one thing you don't know, Ross, is that John Sina is hands down 100% the most requested professional entertainer slash athlete in the history of the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

and it's not even close. Okay. So while this yesterday was interesting or Saturday was interesting and obviously creates good drama, it's a good, it's a human soap opera involving a grown man. Okay, I get that. He can't do this very long because make a wish to be like, man, these kids love you. They adore you.

They want things done the right way and you basically turn your back on a friend and beat the crap out of him. Allegedly. So that's why I hope that John was able to lob an email to, you know, somebody at make a wish.com and say, look, what I'm about to do here is just theatrics, send your kids to me. I still love them. They still love me, bottom, bum, but it is interesting that one of the most popular sports entertainers, especially who does so much charity work, decided with less than a year left in his career, in his, at least wrestling career, decided to character change. I mean, don't wrestlers turn heel like every week? In theory, you're right. But he doesn't. He's been doing this for like 20-something years and has never done this before.

That's why it's such a big deal. Okay. So, I want to ask a question to you. Have we ever had a heel turn in sports? No. Think about it. Probably. O.J. Simpson?

Um, that wasn't a character turn. That was a criminal act. He was a face, though. He was the face of Hertz. Oh, the face of other. You know what? As much as I wanted to dismiss that right up the top, he was in movies. Mm-hmm.

He was on television. Yes. He did do commercials. Yeah. He was a ladies man on the streets. Yeah. And then he turned heel. He turned heel of a kitchen knife.

It's, man. I mean, I think you're kind of right, actually, than I think about it. I didn't mean to dismiss it so quickly. Thank you, Matt. I would hope the next person that calls in or gives us an identification of someone who turned to heal would not have killed two people. But, you know, to each his own. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90.

Is there anybody in sports, and flip it the other direction? Was there somebody in sports who was a heel that turned face? somebody we absolutely despise and now we love. Now, I'm not talking to guys like Pat Beverly or Dylan Brooks because everybody still hates those people. But when they're on your team, you love them. I'm trying to think of somebody universally loved or adored who's now universally hated and vice versa.

That plus Jose Al-Tube speaks on playing in left field. All part of the first hour of the show, 1130 today. We have to tell the truth. It's the Matt Thomas Show with Ross. I'm here in Oklahoma City for Rockets and Thunder tonight. at 713-212-5-790. I want to tell you about Uptown Appliance Repair. I hope that all your appliances are working to perfection

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Uptownappliancerepair.com. That's Uptown Appliance Repair.com. That's Uptown Appliance Repair.com. This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross on Sports Talk 790. Ross, and your ruling, our friend Kenny and Katie just sent me an email said Aaron Hernandez. Hill turn. Is every athlete that kills somebody a hill turn, I guess, right? I think if, well, you followed his entire life, he was always a heel.

Yeah, I don't think he was ever a good guy. Of course, he ruined the Texans in one playoff. game, but that's on here or there. Yeah. Yeah. I can't think of anybody, like Danny Angel is always a bad guy. I can see LeBron going from good to bad to good to bad a lot.

Yeah, Yon Easy tweeted us that. The decision is the heel turn. Oh, yeah. Trevelyn returned back to face. Yeah, that's Yon Easy. Shout out to you, my man. Good job. People still hate him, Will. Hey, Yon Easy or LeBron?

Both. Okay. But mostly LeBron. Yeah, most of Bron. Like Shm Adam Shamanton, big LeBron Hater. Yeah, he's great. LeBron's second greatest player of all time.

And apparently getting worn out for his thoughts about whether or not he's the face of the league still and all that kind of stuff. Well, yeah, he took that opportunity to say, actually, that's what I was talking about. When I was co-hosting with Adam Clanton on Friday, on the A team on Sports Talk 790. Didn't hear a word of it. That's okay.

We don't expect you to. We know you don't support us, but that's okay, Matt. anyways what was I talking about oh yeah LeBron yeah we played those comments and of course Adam Clinton was very upset with LeBron

clearly LeBron didn't really even answer the question he just wanted to talk about the he wanted to bring up the negative the negative toxic way that people approach discourse when it comes to the NBA which we've talked about on this show multiple times

yeah you know what Ross it's just organic and whether LeBron likes the responsibility or doesn't when you were anointed King James as a high schooler and you did all the things you did and oh by the way you're the second greatest player of all time

you get to have that responsibility whether you want or not and I don't particularly care I mean I don't think people are going man waking up in the morning I can't wait for this rocket thunder game but who's going to be the face of the game tonight just won the game no yeah it's a made up topic and it's something that

nobody anoints anybody anything. You either are the face of the league or not. Nobody decides you are. You just have to be that good for that long. You have to have a certain level of charisma and success. If we spun the wheel and went to five sports bars in five different cities and we walked in and said, give us three names in the NBA. LeBron's going to get mentioned 75% of the time, correct?

Correct. Maybe even higher? I don't know. Probably. By the way, got an email in. Matt, I know what it's like to suddenly be the heel, signed Visa Lins. We have political leaders listen to show Ross. Vislinsky?

Oh, is that the, oh, okay. Is that the Ukraine guy? Yes. Is he a heel now? Apparently. Apparently didn't wear a suit either. That's not good. I thought it was common for people not in wartime to not wear suits.

Are people in war time in not wear suits? I'm talking about the White House to meet anybody who met with President is Ross? I'm putting a suit on. That may be lululam in pants, but it's still going to be a good-looking suit. I'm just telling you. Let's talk to some people. 713-212-1-2-5-7-90. Freddie, Paralyand, Texas at 1024.

Freddie, good morning. What's on your mind? Hey, good morning. I was thinking of the topic, and I thought of a face-turn-heeled, Dennis Rodman, possibly, in as late with the Spurs when he started throwing tantrums and throwing himself out of games. But from heel to face, I think Bryce into Shambo is a great example. I think he was super hated.

No one really likes us. and then he started doing the TikTok deal, won the U.S. Open. It just has really become a good guy again. You know what? Those are two excellent examples. Because let's go back to the first one, because I know that more than, I don't follow golf really closely, but DeCampo's office has been a name. It's been both positive and negative.

So Rossi, when Rodman and Prerio backed this up, when Rodman was a piston, he was hardworking, grab rebounds, do this kind of thing, was great. and then he goes to what he goes to chicago from there is he go to san antonio from there i'm talking about which way he went san antonio are you sure no no chicago is next okay he goes to chicago and obviously they're winning championship still does a lot of reboundertonio and then chicago oh sorry freddie you're wrong uh san antonio he goes to google dot com yeah yeah google's her friend but fred he goes to san antonio and he's a Malcontent can't get along with anybody.

He kicked the reporter and the nads, right? Correct. No, the video, what do you call it? On the baseline. Cammerman, camera, yeah, yeah, yeah. And hurt the guy very, very badly. And then he goes to Chicago, and he's with lovable Pippen and Jordan and part of that great team. And all of a sudden it's just Rodman being Rodman.

So that's actually a really good example. Nicely done. Sorry, but you're mixing your teams up, but that's fine. We can do that. It's okay. And DeCampo, I don't know much about it. obviously, but I know that he is, he sparks a lot of debate on both sides. But yeah, TikTok for these kids, Ross can be your friend.

You can be a really mean, bitter person and people will love you immediately. Oh, is that true? I'm going to think about going to TikTok. Okay. Isn't Wex big on TikTok? Oh, he loves the TikTok. That's great. They call him TikTok Wexler.

Keeps him young. Two things I will never go on. TikTok and Snapchat. You're already on Snapchat. Yeah, but people send me stuff. I don't send them stuff back. Hmm. Okay.

Ryan and Montgomery at 1027 on the Matt Thomas Show Ross. Ryan, good morning. Howdy, guys? So I want to preface this with growing up in the 90s being a passive wrestling fan. Heels were always the badass. I always thought they were cool. Now being said, Carlos Correa was the poster child of like gold glove awesomeness at shortstop. And then after the cheating scandal, he told the beloved Dodgers to STFU, shut their bum ass up,

and just turned into just a badass looking at his watch, hitting bombs and bat flips. And he just basically told the league to kick rocks. And never once really had that apologistic attitude. And I loved it. And I thought that was a pretty solid heel turn. The only reason why I would disagree with that, Ryan, is because that's kind of, of kind of who he always was. I don't think he was,

he was getting older and more mature and knowing his role as a leader. I don't necessarily think that was something that was like a character change. I think he was just that way at 16 or 17 years old. It just was different because it was in front of a bunch of microphones.

But I kind of go, I understand we're going with this. I want to give you guys one, Ryan, and you jump in on this. What about the heel turn that Garrett Coleman when he put the Scott Boris cap on after the Astros lost the World Series?

He won that cat pregame. Doesn't matter. It's a hill turn. Oh, my God. I feel like... For Pete's sake, I was always a good guy. That's a heel turn for... That's a heel turn for Astros fans where we start hating him.

I guess my thought of prize us on the Kareil one was everybody in the league liked him and then just Astros fan. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, the Kareil ones better than Matt's, Ryan. Good job. Ryan, I'll give you credit to. You know, and Ross is always going to take the other person over me. That's not true. Did Bregman make a heel turn?

A little bit, but I think he even went a face turn. I think he was more of a heel younger in his career. And then after this cheating scandal, he became more of a face. Oh, how about that? Or how about what's not a face, but what is it just, like, disinterested? Like he retired from the game. He went from heel to retired and going into 100% ABC player speak. Yeah, he did.

Remember when he came into the office and he wore a robe? Yeah. That was pre-2020, wasn't it? And he took the, yeah, it was 17. because I went and looked at the photo photo that we took. And then remember when he used to carry the Whirlboro in the clubhouse or not the clubhouse, but on the dugout? I mean, all that's gone. Now he just like just fist bumps guys.

Maybe he'll be a heel when he comes back to Houston. I hated you Astro fans. I hated Jim Crane. I hated the fact that you guys didn't respect me. Oh, yeah. Maybe we should have some people do heel turn. It'd be more fun to cover of sports teams. Hmm.

Chandler Parsons is at a heel turn for us. Remember how much he loved Dallas and ripped down to Houston? That was a hill turn. Let's see. When did the Red Sox come? Is it May?

Mm-hmm. His season might be heating up by then. Like I'm watching ESPN right now. They're showing a photo of John Cena hugging Cody Rhodes. The Rock tells him to, he slits his throat and he's going to go after him right now. Wow.

Unbelievable stuff. Great theater. Kicked them right in the ads too, apparently. Wow. This is great. And by you see who was in the ring with him, Ross? No, I didn't. Travis Scott.

Like, what is Travis Scott doing up there? Missouri City legend? I don't know he's a legend, but he's definitely up there. Why was Travis Scott there? That's a great point. He was to promote something? I don't know. But he was beating up Sina too.

He jumped in on it. Travis Scott was? Yeah. Oh, okay. He's very unprofessional. He's like five foot six. I hope that Travis Scott suffers terrible record sales because of this. Hmm.

Google says he's 510. I don't know if he's that tall. All right. Travis. 713. 212. 5.790. Speaking of tall, Jose Altovae in left field,

some audio from him next. As the Matt Thomas show with Ross continues, after he sent it back to Houston for Ross. And a word from one of our great 790. Yes, a great 790 sponsor would be Centergenics. That is exactly where you need to go if you've been thinking about getting better. I'm thinking about turning your life around. about getting out of that rut that you've been in when you've been lacking energy,

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I love the new presets. Make 790 your number one preset and get Houston sports. You certainly don't want to miss. Instantly. Low at second, Wood at first. No score. Two out to top of the first. 2-2. Head off the end of the back, ground it to the left side.

And through the legs of Giorbe, moving. who is left. Around third coming home low, Al-Tube picks up the throw to the plate, is up the line and not in time. Goes to the backstop, gets past Caratini. That will allow Wood to go to third base, and it is one-to-nothing nationals. Probably two errors will be charged in that play, one to Guillermo for having that ball go between the wickets and one on Al-Tube for the throw that got past Caratini. Uh-oh. Now, we need to be fair and balanced here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross because that's what we do Ross we are fair and balanced

of course um that was was that yet that was yesterday correct I know there's no way he went to Tampa let's see yeah they were two errors in the play I'm looking at the box score right now um he didn't make up for it

and let's give you that was the low of Jose's throw and again a lot of people that were there said that maybe Caratine did not play the ball very well off that throw but Jose did come back later in the game and make up for it. Two and one. It's this one the left pretty well. Altuve's got a shot.

On to the warning track reaches up makes the catch in front of the fence. Made the catch and hit into the fence right away. And he tipped his cap to the guys in the bullpen who let him know that he was getting close to the chain link. And he was thankful for that guidance from his teammates. in left field. Ross, hashtag Go Glove. He's got my vote.

You don't get a vote, though. Oh. Public opinion do, though. That's good. I do get a vote of the public opinion, Matt. Yeah. We're going to be in for a little bit of a

little bit of a learning curve with him, right? I mean, there's just no way we're not going to just microscope that everything he goes out there in that direction. No. Doesn't look like the worst throw ever. Could have been better. Yeah. Now, in fairness to him, these ballparks in the spring training don't have the, you know,

the little strange nuances that Major League ballparks have, for the most part. I know that where the Red Sox play, they have built, recreated the monster in left field. Fenway. But most of these ballparks are, there's no, you know, like 3.30 down the lines and 357 to one area. I mean, there's regular old ballparks. So he's going to cover a lot more territory in left field and, in West Palm Beach than he would say if he was doing it at Minutemate Park. Yes.

Yes. That's great, Matt. He's going to be a fantastic at left field. Let's go. That's why they call you glass half full of Villarreal. Yeah. Sounds like he's going to be out there a lot, according to our friend Joe Spada. You want to read the code?

Do you want me to do it? I want you to do it. All right. He spoke to the media. I think he was either, I'm assuming it was either this morning or yesterday about how much is going to be out there. And I want to pull up the exact quote here because I don't want to get it wrong. When asked, he still plans to give Jose Altube game reps at second base this year, this spring. The Astros are still not coming to anything, but this, I believe, is the first time Espada has publicly said could play a majority of games in left field this year.

Spottis says right now the plan is for him to play the majority of his games in left. And the days that he plays second base, opens a door for Yorda maybe getting a start in left field, someone getting a a D-H-Day. So this move allows us to be creative and do stuff like that. What am I, to tell the truth, is going to be about Jose Al-Tubei and what he does with his glove in 2012.

Oh, okay. D-V-5. I was going to say, I was going to use it now, but I'm going to save it for 1130. That's good. Professional radio T's. Yeah. I'm trying to look, I'm trying to remember when Craig Bizio made the move to second base,

what year that was. It had to been early 90s, right? It was O-2, I think. Was it that long? He was behind the... Oh, I'm sorry. To second base? I'm sorry.

I thought you meant to outfield. Yeah, to second base was early 90s. And even early in his career, he played in the outfield. Did Bizio. So O2 was the transition to center field. And I was a young sportscaster, but I remember talking about it. Honestly, Ross, I got to be... I remember saying almost the exact same things we're saying right now.

A, do what's best for the team. B, he's a professional athlete. C, he's caught pop flies before in his life. What could be so bad about it? Okay. Until we saw him play. Full center field for Bidio was 03, actually. I was a year off.

And then full to from off a catcher was 92. Okay. Any defense metrics you can look off of what you're seeing right there? A few percent. Yeah. How many? errors. Just 12 at second base.

What you're talking about when he went to O'field? Outfield? Yeah. Just one error. And I'm assuming that's going to be on a throw. It's hard to get an error not catching a ball unless the ball just literally drops in front of you.

You can't see it. Okay. But the thing that I remember most about Craig playing center field was that he just couldn't care couldn't cover as much field as other center fielders with the Astros than previous years. So I think we're going to find ourselves in a very similar situation.

And that's why Jake Myers has got to keep a professional bat, Ross, on this team, get going. So he can cover as much territory. He had an RBI single over the weekend? Yeah, I did. His OPS in spring is moving up nicely. After O for 9 with a bunch of strikeouts. Yeah, he's doing better. Yeah. And we'll see.

But honestly, Ross, this is going to be something we're going to be talking about every single day. Because I think back in 0-203, we talked about Craig Bichaud playing center field every single day. We talked about, remember, there was Tows Hill back then. So he had to go, like, how is his second baseman who's a catcher who's lived in the infield his entire life going to adjust having to go backwards and climbing up a hill? Can I tell you something right now? and I love Enron to Astros to MinuteMade

to now Deichen What the hell are we thinking about Tals Hill out there? I love to Tals Hill I know I'm in the minority You are in the minority I get why you like it because it is so 1957 It's so stupid it's hilarious

But it's really stupid That you would take a part of the field And artificially add a bump to it The reason you hate it is the reason I love it Why the hell is there of mound in the middle of sitter field. And the flagpoles are in play.

There's a flagpole in play. It makes no sense. It's completely ridiculous. I love it. It's like me putting a hill in the middle of a basketball court somewhere. It's a three point line. Climb up the hill and take it. You can get a better look at a straight on three.

Let's put an obstacle course in right center. You know, like tires, people got to run through to go get a ball. Or a hundred yard football field at the 30-yard line, you have to, there's like a zone where you can't have to go around it as compared to going straight. It's like, let's go ahead and play rock and jock basketball, a baseball in the middle of the National League. It makes no sense.

Yeah, the reason they did is because during when Minutemay Park was built, or Diken Park, excuse me, when Diken Park was built, it was during the heyday of nostalgia and old school. And they thought, well, you know, Talsman, they've been around forever, and that they wanted to try something different that was kind of an ode to what baseball parks did back in the 40s and 50s. Well, not everything in 1957 Ross was cool.

And I will be honest with you, my guess is, when I was young sportscaster and, oh, my God, we're getting out of the Astrodome of this brand new downtown palace, I probably liked Salis Hill. But now that I've grown up a little bit and aged and, you know, think about it a little bit, it was stupid. It was unique. And thankfully, nobody really got hurt. Yeah, see, it's all right. People had iconic plays running up there. Ask Lance Berkman. I don't think last program puts that on his resume on his real tape. I don't think he puts that up there. 713-212-5-790 if you want to join the radio program today.

7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Things we've talked about so far. We have the Rockets against Oklahoma City tonight. Again, many, many injuries will hopefully get an update on that coming up a little bit later today. Also, we have the heel turn of John Cena in the WWE. That, frankly, is moving the needle in the Twitterverse. We have the Astros and Jose Al-Tubay on left field. He'll be in left field again today as a take on the hated Miami Marlins at 1155.

We'll be the start time of that broadcast over here, right here, on Sports Talk, 790. 713-213-212-5-790. 7-1-2-9-0. Want to tell you about the Shell Federal Credit Union right now, shellfcU.org. Shellfccc.org for the great folks at the Shell Federal Credit Union. 9% APR for up to 36 months on a new auto loan, whether it's for a new vehicle, maybe something that you have purchased through pre-owned, or you want to refinance a vehicle that you're currently in, all with the Shell Federal Credit Union.

ShellfcU.org, and you can stop by one of their 13 locations as well, where you can get $250 in cash back, a couple of skip a pays a year, and deferred payments are certainly an option. I finance a vehicle through them, great customer service, grand interest rate, and a very easy process, all from ShellFCU and ShellFCU.org. Matt and Ross return. Return on Sports Talk 790. Matt Ross with you till 1155. So it's just over an hour left to go on the radio program today.

We're talking a little bit about Jose Altovae and his playing left field yesterday. And also on Friday and Ross, we have a little bit of audio coming from West Palm Beach this morning. Yes, Matthew. First of all, Jose Altovae. How about that catch on the wall? And I was kind of like a dead fly ball right on the fans, but made a great play. Yeah, good to be the first one. Yeah, kind of like, I saw the ball going high.

And I'm like, okay, that's going back. And then I saw the wall. I saw the ball. I'm like, okay, it's going to be interesting to see. So I got it, and then I hit the wall. But it was a great play. Like I said, I saw the ball. I saw the fence.

I know they were getting close to his shoulder. And in the last second, I was like, oh, my God, I got to catch you. I thought he was like, boom, boom. Boom, boom, Matthew. That's all he does. Mm-hmm. I don't have much say, except it's isn't like he's bitter. I mean, I think he's like, you know what, I'll try this, why not?

I mean, I'm in the tail end of my major league career. I think he'd love to get to 3,000 hits. I don't think he's going to come a little bit short. I hope I'm wrong about that. He's got to be really, really good for still a pretty good length of time. But I think he's smart enough to realize that. that his days covering a lot of ground at second base are long gone. And you know what?

You got to reinvent yourself sometimes later in your career. Change is necessary sometimes, Matt. Adaptability is important. Yeah. Ozao Tubei says every play he makes will help his confidence. It feels like every fly ball I get or every play I made is going to be helping me to get confidence to start the season. So hopefully I get a lot in spring training.

and if, you know, some matter and error or great plays learn from that and anything that can help me for the season, you know, it's going to be, obviously, positive. Yeah, nothing overly crazy about that comment. Thank you, Jose. He's getting more confident. Repetition.

It's going to be good. Yeah, repetition is everything. It's got to get reps. It makes law sense. Mm-hmm. He's saying all the right things. Anything else? That's it.

Okay. Yeah, I mean, I would say the number of confidence controversial things Jose Al Tuve has said as a major leaguer is probably a condone on one hand with two fingers to spare, right? I can get you a Joe Espotic comment on Altuve's throw to home. Let's do it. You know, I also like when he came in and he made that strong throw to the plate. I thought, you know, we show arm strength and, you know, one hop. I wish we would have done, you know, a better job of finishing the play and backing up home plate.

But I like, I like the aggressiveness. He came in. He knew what to throw the ball. All those things, you know, he's, again, to himself properly looking in and asking feedback from the coaches every every inning you know Joe's going to be in a tough spot here because people are going to be looking to nitpick everything that Jose does in left field so I think anytime it's going to be asked about it and this won't include when he joins us on Tuesdays

during the year Ross I think he's going to have to be overly how would you say it kind he's going to treat him with kid gloves Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's how Joe is in the first place. He's positive. Right. Right. But I think especially with a guy that was asked to do something that he wasn't probably,

I don't know if he, like, when he put the glove down for the final game of the season against Detroit last year in the Walker, I don't think he was thinking, man, I don't come back next year's a left fielder. I mean, it sounds like to me the conversation took place a lot sooner than maybe a lot of his thought. But to ask somebody who has played one position his entire major league career to all of a sudden adapt, That can't be easy. Some guys flat out will say no. I mean, Ross, there are a lot of guys that have caught for many, many years.

Like, I'm a catcher. And you move me to first base is not acceptable. I don't want to do that. The good ones make those adjustments. And thankfully, I mean, look at the situation with what's happening in third base with the Red Sox. I mean, who's the guy that was with Bregman right now? I'm trying to name blank on that. Devers?

Yeah, Raphael Devers. He's like, no, I'm a third baseman. Jose never did, never said that. Yeah, the Red Sox told Devers to shut his bum ass up. Yeah. I haven't looked at a lot of box scores, but I'm assuming that Breggman's going to probably comfortable be at third base when the dust settles. Because if there's anybody in Major League Baseball that gives zero Fs about what a player

I think is probably Alex Cora. I think he was born with a red ass. Yeah, he was. Let's see. Breggman in their last game was at third base? Devers not in the lineup. And I'm sorry, Ross, but you know this as well as I. I do. You can't platoon third base for a guy making

40 milly. You just can't. No. So, are we going to spend a lot of time on the Red Sox? I think we're going to. A little bit. Maybe more than we normally would. Yeah, Breggman has been at third base the whole time there, basically.

Here's how it's going to work. People are going to be like, I don't care what he did. How did you last night? I agree. I think that's a lot of people like that. Like, oh, I don't care where he signs. Nobody cares where he went. Okay, oh, he went 04. Ha, ha, ha. Well, it's like your ex-girl.

friend. I don't care what she's doing. If she's dating somebody else now, and you look at a picture on Instagram. That may be my great analogy of the week. I'm going to go ahead and chalk that up as a win for me on that one, actually. You might want to go ahead and bank that one and not make any more analogies all week. The rest of them are going to suck. They just are.

You're doing great, man. Jose? Alex Breggman is the ex-girlfriend that left you, but you don't care about her, but you ask about her all the time. It's like when you have a couple, Oh, you said you weren't going to do anymore. You're right.

You know what? I'm stopping right where I'm at. I'm one for one. Into 15 seconds before you to try again. I try, and you stopped me. And for that, I thank you. I thank you very much. To tell the truth is coming up in 30 minutes from now.

We have another 55 minutes left to go in this radio program. If you'd like to join us, we would love to hear from you. We are on with the shorter show today. So if you want to come in and say hello, 713, 212-5-790, 7-1-3-2-1-2-1-2. 25790 on Twitter. You can follow us at SportsMT, at SportsRV, at Connerdy McGovern. We have the next hour, Rockets, a little chatter on that. The Houston Cougars are taken on Kansas.

Did you see what Bill Self did yesterday, Ross? I did not. Well, we'll tell you what he did and how peculiar it was for a coach of his statute to do such a thing. We'll also get to the Astros a little bit if you want to. Some Texans chatter for the Combine is in the books. and also two schools in the ACC told the conference

you need to pay us more or we're going to sue your ass and those schools basically told the conference what to do and how they need to be spending more on them and the conference said, okay, you may have a point. 1058, Sports Talk 790. This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross

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This is the Matt Thomas show. It is 1103 on Sports Talk 790. Matt Thomas with you here from Oklahoma City. Ross back in our Houston studios, and we welcome you to the second hour of the show. We're going to 1155 today, so please, if you're like, hey, I miss talking to Matt and Ross. Why don't you call in? Say hello. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-790.

If you're on Twitter, you can follow us there at SportsMT, at SportsRV, and at Connor D. McGovern. Rockets against the Thunder tonight. Numerous players on the injured list. necessarily mean they're not going to play, but it feels like to me that with a back-to-back tonight against Oklahoma City, tomorrow against Indiana, that the Rockets will be

not at full strength on either tonight or tomorrow. Ross, they were full strength on Saturday and lost the Sacramento Kings. It was not pretty. What is it to do? What's to deal with the Sacramento Kings? Oh, and three? I've had enough of the Sacramento Kings. Demarta Rosen's had enough of the Rockets. Actually, he wants to find more

of them. You can be a lot. Picking fights and whatnot? Terrible. Offense just wasn't good enough. I don't... Do you think there's a problem with the rockets turning the engine on and getting to 60 miles an hour really, really quick? I just think...

I don't know. Everybody that they have on offense is good, but nobody is consistent. And nobody is, let's say, like, match-up proof. Jalen Green sometimes can just kind of sleepwalk through games. Not that he did that on Saturday. Alper and Shingoon can struggle, and especially

at the free throw. He missed seven free throws on Saturday. You lost by 10. That's pretty significant. And you're not expecting him to go 100% to the free throw. No, no. He doesn't have to. You're looking at four points at least you left on the board, maybe even five. Because Alper and Shangoon, beginning of the first two months of the year, Ross, was

shooting about 75% for the free throw line. Now he's down under 70. So that's a pretty significant drop over about a three-month span there. And then, yeah, everybody else, I think men's, when's the last time he went off for, well, I guess he had 25 points a couple games ago. Right against San Antonio, I think. Yeah, I guess San Antonio. But his scoring, when he first hit the scene, he was scoring like crazy. Remember, he was scoring like almost 20 points a game.

And then everybody, everybody knew not to let him score and not to let him score. I mean to back off and let him shoot, but I think it's more drilled into the rest of the league. Hey, keep an eye on in this guy. And everybody backs off of him completely. And he's got to score with, you know, he's got to start putting pull-ups in the middle of the lane. And he's got to get a little bit more creative.

And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Well, the thing, and I've asked this to EMA several times. And I think a man Thompson has tremendous basketball IQ. I mean, I think he's well advanced for his young age and his young experience just being in the second year in the league. But tell me I'm crazy. To go from playing point guard to power forward and back and forth on that and moving around and different things,

I don't know if it's going to wear on a guy because he's such a smart player, but I think there's got to be a little bit of, not awkwardness, but it would be like if you were a baseball player. You played third base one day. Stay with me on this. You played third base on Monday. You were in right field on Tuesday, and you caught on Wednesday. I mean, there'd be a little bit of adjustment.

Something would have to suffer because of that, don't you think? I don't think it's that big of a deal in basketball in 2025. It's mostly positionless. Like how we were talking last week, Tori and Prince is a forward, but he was listed at guard. I mean, he's not like he was guarding there and cross-matching. I mean, Thompson generally isn't guarding the power forward on the other side, depending on how things are going.

And, I mean, generally on matchups, you're going to have Dylan Brooks guarding the bigger, bulkier guys on the other teams rather than I'm in Thompson. He's normally going to be guarding against wings. So just because Fred Van Viet's in there, it does change when you're more of a primary ball handler and you have to get other guys involved, maybe offensively, but I don't think it's something that should be wearing him down much physically.

Okay. I don't know. I just feel like that he played so much in January and February because of Fred's absence and that there were nights where he just, the ball just wasn't coming out of his hand particularly good, where if he was playing regular minutes and knew what he was playing and did it at one particular position, would that make a difference? Again, the Rockets as a coaching staff,

do a phenomenal job of preparing him for the individual matchup coming up. There's no, he doesn't walk on the court at 4.30 and go, man, what am I doing tonight? So I give him credit for that and to give the coaching staff for that. But I just, I don't know, I would just think if you did that in baseball, and again, basketball and basketball are two different things. I think that you'd have some slippage, maybe not on the offensive side, but certainly from a defensive position,

if you're playing all over the spots in different nights and different games. Let's see what else is going on. We mentioned that. The Lakers are playing really well. They have bumped up to their now percentage points behind Denver for the number two spot in the West. The Lakers are third. Rockets will have again tonight, Oklahoma City tomorrow. Yeah, Lakers are second, actually.

You know what? I keep seeing that, but the numbers tell me on my differently. 644 percentage Lakers 639 Nuggets is what I see I just have the ESPN page pulled up Oh you know what they changed since this morning Because Denver I woke up at 4 o'clock this morning And Denver was a number two spot So yeah

By percentage points The Rockets were to start the playoffs today Memphis At Memphis Named scared It's not about being scared But come on man Beat the Kings

Beat the Jazz got to win these games, man. Still time. There's still time, but these are all must-win games down the stretch, man. No, they're not. Rockets get to 50. They'd have to go 13 and 9.

Easy. So, without going through every game, you still have two more with Utah, two more in New Orleans. But you do have two more with Oklahoma City, two more of the Lakers A Clippers game. Clippers aren't great anymore. You have one more of Golden State.

18th. Most difficult schedule remaining. Lakers are three, Denver is four, Memphis is 10. So you get the weakest schedule remaining of all of them. Let's go. Come on. Getting that top four. Rockets only a game and a half out of the two. Honestly, that's not bad either. Two would be nice.

Two would be dream scenario. You know what's nice, though? And I know that maybe this isn't resonant with a lot of folks. Us talking about playoffs is going to be fun. Rousey, it's been a while. And for you not to enjoy basketball, it's kind of nice. And then we're not having to, you know, like, oh, it's April 12th. There was another NBA season of the books.

So there you have it on that. What else is going on in sports? I'm missing anything? I mentioned Rockets, Astros playing against the Marlins. We did a deep dive on the John Acina heel turn. We're all good. people are legit up on the scene of hill turn huge it was big

yeah I know I'm agreeing with you you know what you're gonna wind up watching some WrestleMania that is zero point it's a pay-per-view in it people have been it's on Netflix it'd be fine

don't you have to pay for it on Netflix I don't think it's a special Netflix pay no you honestly think I'm going to end up watching WrestleMania why don't you come to the house that's the last time I watched WrestleMania was it your house

we'll have a well have a wrestling I got told to never come back. That's not true. That was a decade ago. You're a lot back. Your tenure sentence is over. Okay. I've done my time.

Yeah. Just don't make fun of our cheese sticks like you did at Teresa's house. Look. They were flavorless. I know. They were. You know that you had them. Never find my eye in Jordan.

If I'm not mad, if I ever host a party and I'm selling this and serving you flavorless food, let me know. I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to be rude like that. It's not being rude. No. It's giving a public service. Sometimes you just say nothing at all. Yeah, but sometimes you've got to let people know.

I don't think, I don't think honesty is always the best policy. It's not like she's back there hand-bredding them. They were frozen out of a box. Just buy the box next to them next time. Get the different brand. It's like, okay. I'm going to give you some advice. If you go to somebody's house and something doesn't taste good,

sometimes just don't say. I'm going to let them know. You are going to let them know. Yeah. I got you. All right, 713, 212, 5, 790. Kansas coach Bill Self and his Jayhawks are in town for the Houston Cougars, and they put on a really peculiar release.

I don't know why he did this, but we'll discuss that coming back in a minute. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-2-790. Please join us. We have to tell the truth coming up at the bottom of the hour. Right now, I want to tell you. about Scott Callahan and Associates. If any of you have been involved in an accident through no fault of your own, or you know

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and when they do, you need to call Scott. He'll take great care of you. 713-888-9,000. We HelpTexus.com for Scott Callahan and Associates Principal Office, Katie, Texas. The Matt Thomas Show with Ross continues on Sports Talk 790. It is Matt and Ross with you.

I'm here in Oklahoma City for tonight's game with the hated Oklahoma City Thunder, hated because they're ridiculously good. Look, I want the Rockets to go to the NBA finals and win the whole championship, even when they were losing 60 games a year. I mean, it wasn't theoretically possible, but I mean, I make no bones about it. Oklahoma City Ross versus Cleveland, if those two teams, and they have been number one in their respective conferences all year long,

if they want up being the representatives for both the east and the west, it might be the least talked about finals, but it may be one of the best finals. Those two teams will play seven. knock down, drag out on the edge of your seat games. Yeah, it'll be fun to watch. For some of us. For a few of us. For not many of us.

I think Boston still makes it, even though they're way behind in the standings. But I don't know. Maybe it's dumb to doubt Cleveland at this point. I don't know. Boston was up 25-3 over the weekend to Cleveland, and they're all beating their chest, and the Cavalers came back and won at Boston. Mm-hmm.

So I'm just saying. Okay. We got to tell the truth coming up at the bottom of the hour. So people are idiots, Ross. I don't know if you realize that or not. Yeah, it's rule one of life for me. There is a Zeke Mayo who plays for Kansas. And unfortunately, he has been the subject of threatening and racist messages on social media.

This after Texas Tech went to Lawrence, Kansas, and beat them 78 to 73. What happened? I'll repeat it again. Zeke Mayo, the subject of threatening and racist messages on social media after Texas Tech beat Kansas in Lawrence, 78, 73. Well, a tech fan was saying racist stuff? No, no, no, you're not understanding. It was probably Kansas fans doing it. Oh, was Kansas fans?

I guess I am. Yeah. Apparently, Mayo posted a sample of the messages on social media in which fans called him a racial slur, made veiled threats and incited self-harm among other things, and he posted a few of those messages and also issued an apology for not playing better. Man, Kansas fan, you got to check yourself. So the odd thing about this whole situation is if I had one of my players do that and tell me that some of my own were posting messages about such hateful things over something silly like basketball. At the end of the day, it's silly.

It's sports, okay? So Bill Self went out and published a release on this. And I don't want to read the whole thing, but the reality is this. In the second paragraph, he said this, we competed, we tried it. Speaking of the game against Texas Tech, we came up short, and I'm proud of their efforts, and I'm also proud of their preparation to be ready for the game. We haven't had the overall year that we had hope for ourselves, nor the year that many other people have expected. but it hasn't because of lack of caring.

I can do a lot of things better. We can all do a lot of things better, but I'll roll with these guys every day and I'm proud of it. Any criticism about the team should be directed at me. I'm the head coach. Now, while I applaud that in him taking the responsibility because he's the one that's getting paid, I mean, gazillion dollars with a coach of Kansas,

if I'm going to put a release out after one of my kids on my team said that he was getting racial slurs directed out of him because of his play, I would say either you're with us or you're against us. And if I ever find out any of you have said any of these things, I found out who you are, you'll never get to go to a Kansas

basketball game again, and I'll do everything in my power to expel you. It was just to me a nice thing to do but an odd thing to do, that he would basically say, look, if you want to make cracks at us, do it at me, not the kids. So, you know, I just,

I would have zero tolerance as a coach to be polite to anybody that was hurling such nasty things at one of my players. I don't understand exactly what he's trying to accomplish with this

statement. Obviously, he's not saying, if you want to hurl insults doing it to me, nobody wants that. I mean, I guess it is I applaud him for saying, for going on and defending his player, but he was just too nice.

Yeah, he didn't say much of anything. Yeah, it was just kind of vanilla sort of, hey, we're trying our best, and if there's any problems, you can put them at me, don't put it on our players. Well, first of all, players can be subject to criticism now, especially because they're being paid like professional athletes. I think hands are off now.

If you want to criticize college basketball players, especially that are highly compensated, I'm all for that because they're having to grow up because they're having to have a financial responsibility. But no matter if he was making a half million dollars or zero, using racial slurs and attacking people's personal characteristics or anything about him is unacceptable. I don't think Bobby Knight, as crazy ass as he was, Bobby Knight would not put out a three-paragraph, polite sentences statement,

basically if one of his players was having racial slurs hurled at him. Be like, why don't you come in here and say it to his face? Yeah, it's also, I mean, this anonymous online world that we live in, this is just going to happen. It's just the reality of it. It shouldn't be that way. And part of the thing is like just ignore it. You do the best you can to ignore it.

It's what you do, right? Yeah. And the reason I bring this up is because Kansas is here in town the night for the Cougars. It's a big Monday game on ESPN. But yeah, they're not having this. I mean, look, the Cougars one up there in one. Texas, Texan one up there. Kansas is just mid this year, which is strange to say because you never thought

Kansas would ever be mid in anything, especially basketball. But I just, I first of all, I feel sorry for the kid. but secondly man I would have zero I would not be polite at all towards anybody that was doing that to one of my kids yeah I think it's a bit of a weak

statement from Bill Self and as far as the comments and stuff like that it's unfortunate that I have to kind of feel like it's kind of par for the course in 2025 yeah

yeah this is people are just yeah people are idiots they don't know they're doing it's because it's because they can go on their burner and then nobody's going to know they're not going to use their face, and then when you give people this anonymity, they can say anything.

It almost makes more sense for him to say, for Zeke Mayo to say nothing at all, then none of us are known about it. Yeah, I don't even know. But I feel back, but I... Just because something is going to be that way, I don't know, that doesn't mean, I guess you can't try to combat against it. Yeah, I mean, I feel bad for the kid. I do. And he's still a kid.

I mean, they may be compensated, but it doesn't matter. I don't care if you're making $30 million a year or $3,000 a year. You got to be better than that. America's got to be better, but social media is allowed anonymity. And I'm not going to let an egg emoji on an avatar at Kansas Jayhawk fan for life throw terrible things at me and go, oh, I should feel bad about this. Just block them. Block and mute, folks. Block and mute is your friend.

Block and mute. And then when you're done with that, block and mute some more. Yeah. We should get T-shirts made. Block and mute. I like that. Except for at SportsMT. I mean, I know who's muting me.

You do? Absolutely. I don't know there's no website I can tell me, but I can tell when people don't pay attention to what I'm saying because they'll ask me things and they'll like, man, if you would unmute you, you'd be able to see what I was talking about. Oh. I'm not naming names. Oh, okay. But it's like somebody asked me about my daughter the other day, and I think I put up a few posts about my daughter. And if you follow me on Twitter, you'll be able to figure it out.

Well, maybe they missed them, Matt. They're not always all there. They're always on Twitter when you're on Twitter. This person never likes any of my stuff. I know who this person is. Don't worry about it. It doesn't even live in town. Don't worry about it.

I'm not worried. Good. All right, you're ready for some tell the truth? Yeah, absolutely. Why are you chuckling back there? I'm not. Okay. Oh, I have four topics.

Three of which I believe. So you believe three this time? Yes. One I do not believe. It's very confusing. It's not confusing. I'm very clear what I tell you this every single time. Got it.

How many are you going to believe, Ross? I'm going to believe. How many are you going to believe? You're only going to believe three of them. There you go. You figured it out. I like it. I like it.

1127 on Sports Talk 790. To tell the truth is coming up next, where Connor and Ross will decide which one of my four takes. I do not believe. Right now, I want to tell you about Big City Wings. The food selection always is awesome at Big City. wings. The wings tonight are always good, Monday through Sunday. The chicken tenders today are especially good because they're $1 a pop. And now they have crawfish in season. They also have

shrimp boil. They also have amazing hamburgers. They've got big, tasty salads. They have huge chicken sandwiches. They've got amazing appetizers. The fried cheese, a fried macaroni are my family's favorite, the chicken avocado egg rolls. And the desserts are not fat-free. They're full of sugar, but they're delicious. And once in a while, you deserve a little treat. So, if any of that sounds good to you, by the way, you can watch the Rockets game tonight while you're at Big City Wings with all 13 locations with wall-to-wall big screen TVs for the $1 chicken tenders. And if you're looking for a cold beverage, how about a 550 big brew tonight? 34 ounces of delicious beer of your choice for $5.50. At any of the 13 big city wing locations.

To find a location near you, you go to bigcitywings.com. That's bigcitywings.com. Four takes, three of which I believe. I'm telling the truth on three of them, one I'm not. All right, here we go, boys. Good luck to you. Take number one. If you're an Astro fan, I highly suggest you not watch the Boston Red Sox and Alex Spregman this year. Ross and Connor, he's going to crush it at Fenway Park.

Oh. I don't know what the exact numbers are going to be, but it's going to be. a major storyline for us as a baseball connoisseurs about how good of a season he has, top to bottom. And that includes having a much better late March and April than he ever had with the Astros. Okay.

Okay. Number two. The Giants need a franchise quarterback, and there are a lot of rumors that they could be moving up to the number one overall position. The logical thought for them in 2025 is to sign Aaron Rogers to a one-year contract.

it makes sense for Aaron he'll get good money B he doesn't have to move and C there'll be a little pressure on him to succeed and anything he does will be beneficial while the other quarterback is ready to go and Aaron Rogers will be for the first time in his career he was ego checked

and if he gets replaced in the middle of the year he's got to live with it because one of the things that he always complained about back in the day was that Brett Farb never wanted to teach him anything he will be the opposite Aaron Rogers should sign a one-year deal with the New York Giants. Number three, the automatic ball strike system is so good in the limited games that I've watched it that if I was major league baseball, I would say, get ready, 2006.

The ABS is ready to go. And we got a whole year of minor league baseball to work on any other nuances and any other logistical issues that at the end of the day, it's moving along nicely, it's not delaying games. ABS should be in play for 2026 Major League Baseball. With the challenge system, I imagine. The challenge, yes. Yeah.

Okay. Ross, your dreams of every pitch is never going to happen. I wouldn't say never. I'm going to say never. And number four, this is not what I want, but I think the fascination with pickleball is growing and growing and growing

knowing what I know about the Olympics, Ross, and how they put goofy-ass things in there, I think pickleball is going to be an Olympic sport event in 2008. I don't know why it's come, because again, it's just basically quarter of the tennis and less effort and less sweating. It's got fast-paced action. We've seen goofier things like three-on-three put in there

and handball and beach volleyball. Pickleball is going to be a 2028 Olympic sport, and if they can't do it by 2028, it'll be by 2032. So you better get ready, pickleball will be a part of your Summer Olympics in the near future. Which one of the four do I not believe? Bregman's going to crush. Rogers should be a giant for one year.

ABS challenge system should be in playing 2026. Pickleball will be an Olympic sport, if not for 28, certainly by 2032. I got to give it to you, Matt. These are some horrible take, so I don't know where to go. Oh, I think I know. Oh! Usually, I don't know, but I feel like... You got a good feel, you got a good beat on this one?

I think so. Conna McGovern? No, I say that, and I'm going to be wrong, and you're going to win, like always. No, it's fine, I might agree with you. It's not about winning. It's about winning. No, it's about winning. It's about winning and Connor losing.

I don't care that much, but he cares about it so much. It makes it that much more fun if I win. So you care about it. Exactly. I don't care until you care than it makes me care. Okay. What? I follow.

I think it's got to be two. He doesn't believe the Giants should sign Aaron Rogers. Hmm. I feel like everything else Matt could believe. Even though Pickleball is kind of ridiculous, I believe Matt believes it. I think the ABS challenge system will be implemented. Uh-huh. And then, yeah, I think Matt thinks Bregman will crush at Fenway.

So it's got to be two, in my opinion. Okay. Uh, that was, I mean, to me, the three is the most believable one. Yeah. So I'm going to throw that one out. After that, I mean, I'm just going to go with number four. All right. Guys, we're going to be really pissed off.

Alex Brevin is going to crush this year. I don't know that for a fact, but my, in my... Why do you think that? Because I think that left field is going to be his best friend. That short porch. He had a short porch over here in Houston. but he always mashed at Fenway and some guys just like playing in certain ballparks

and I think that there's going to be 40 million reasons now he's already got the 40 milly but I think he's looking I really think he wants to get out of this new contract I think he wants to be a one and done in Boston because if that was the case if he didn't want to be the one and done he would have signed a three year deal and called it a day

because that's $40 million is great money I think it was so sure he was going to mash he would have gotten a big deal from somebody I think he's going to mash and I think we're going to be really pissed off So number one, I believe. Number two. The ABS.

I love it. And I've only seen a handful of games for it. Now, again, we can't see it in West Palm Beach because they don't have it implemented there. But the games I've seen on MLB Network and the games I've seen when the Astros are on the road. Ross, I think it's fantastic. I really do. Now, it's 100% efficiency at this point. I don't know.

I've only seen it a very small sample size. But give Major League Baseball an entire season of working out the little kinks on this. we're going to get ABS in 2026 and I hope we do. I really do. I think it's great. Last, Aaron Rogers is not done playing football. I don't think he's going to retire. I don't think he can get anything more than a one year down anywhere else.

He might as well go somewhere where you're going to at least play for a year until the other quarterback's ready to go. And the Giants need to have a quarterback hit on this one, whether they move up to number one or get something else. I think Aaron Rogers signing a one-year deal to stay in New York to play for the Giants. would be the best of both worlds. You're not ready to win yet. Aaron's not ready to retire yet.

Wait for that number one pick to get ready to go. Aaron Rogers should sign a one-year deal with the Giants. The one thing I don't believe, pickleball sucks. It just does. I mean, it's fun to play with your bros when you're 55. But I don't want to see 24-year-olds playing pickleball at the Olympics. That's absurd.

So please, Olympics, don't put pickleball in the Olympics. Because if that's the case, then you ought to put a game like backgammon or a game of dominoes in the Olympics. See, Connor, you had to pay attention for this one. He was crushing pickleball last week. I know he was, but I feel like he was so, his takes are sometimes so ridiculous that he actually leaves it. Don't say this in front of me. Yeah, don't get me wrong, Connor. There was a lot of bad takes on this one.

I thought I overanalyzed this one. I was overthinking it. I was over calculating. I thought Matt would believe the most ridiculous one of the bunch this time like he sometimes does. I think it's ridiculous to say that Bregman is just going to crush as a red sock. Well, that's fine. But we'll see. I mean, I hope.

I don't hope. I don't care. I'm not begrudging pickleball as an event. I have a lot of friends. Seems like you are. I have a lot of friends. But let's not oversell what it is. Does anybody burn 100 calories playing pickleball for two hours?

Yes, you do. Are you sure? Yes. Now, please don't bring this up to email because he loves it. I'm going to bring it up. No, you're not. You're trashing pickleball. I'm not trashing.

I'm saying, because if I trashed and he found out of it. He's like, let's get out there, Mel. Let's go out there, Matt. Let's see how you do. I want to do that. I want to face embarrassment by an NBA head coach. Because you know what? He would dog cuss me.

Once you figured out what that meant. I know what it meant. He didn't know what it meant. No, he does. Matt, would you rather have Sam Darnold or Aaron Rogers? Oh. Ross is this an obvious answer? That's a me, I think.

All right, I would go with Sam Darnold. I agree. I don't know this is super obvious. It's not the worst question ever. I'm going to go with Darnold just because he's younger. And there was signs that he did good play. I mean, I don't think Aaron played really great at any point for the Jets, but granted, he also had nothing around him.

I mean, Devante Adams is a step slow. Running backs couldn't stay healthy. And Carol Wilson's good. They got decent tied in. They got two good running backs. It's terrible. Nothing going on over there. Why were they so bad?

Do you think Aaron Rogers's reason why they were so bad? If they were, tell me. I think it was mid. I mean, how many games do they win? Not many. Beat the Texans. Well, yeah, they did that one. Yeah.

Look, I want to make sure I'm clear on this. I'm not anti-pickle ball. I just don't. The national fascination with it is crazy. Matt hates you, and he hates pickleball, folks. I just thought Matt would believe it because in 2020, it'll be in the U.S. It's like a pick-a-ball. It's like a U.S. thing.

So I thought about it. but I was wrong. I lost. But you know what? You were very diplomatic about it. And for that, I appreciate it. Maybe your partner over here could learn a little bit. Take your L, Connor.

I'll take it. Take that L. Sorry. So rude. All right. Real quick, before we get to this next time out, do you see Florida staying in Clemson a few months ago, Ross? Remember they were suing the ACC?

Yeah, what's going on with that? They're going to bow out of that. They're not going to sue anymore. You know why that is? They get more money or something? They're going to get more money. than everybody else in the conference. That makes sense.

So there's two different pies, and I didn't not read the whole story, but just to summarize real quickly, there's a pie that gives that 40% of the other schools will equally distribute among the 14 ACC schools, whatever that dollar amount is. Then there's another set of money, which I believe is tied to television that is 60%,

and that of that 60%, Florida State and Clemson are going to get more of it because they're saying, honestly, what if ACC football is on, what are you watching? Are you watching Florida sitting Clemson? Are you watching Wake Forest versus Louisville? Okay. So Florida State and Clemson sued and said,

we're better than you. We don't care for in the same conference. It doesn't matter. And we want more money. And apparently they're going to get it. Always comes down to money. Isn't it interesting that that's how you're going to keep these conferences alive because if they would have not done it,

I would have, I would have, me, I didn't give them Florida State a blank check. I mean, another football program is, you know, look, last year was terrible, but two years ago they were almost in the college football playoff. And Florida State has a huge national name,

at least in my opinion. And so Judas Clemson, for that matter, football-wise. So if I'm the ACC, and if all of a sudden Virginia Tech call me and say, what are you guys doing? Like, bro, nobody's watching V-Tech. Sorry. These television dollars are being,

like in the, In the SEC, you can say Auburn and Alabama and Georgia. Who else? Florida. They all have these huge fan bases that draw huge television ratings. You didn't mention Texas? Texas. Oklahoma, A&M.

I mean, big television dollar. I mean, nobody's watching Vanderbilt, but they're the outity. I'm going to have some slapies in there. Yeah, and the ACC, who you watch it? I mean, Miami probably has the biggest contention on this. Yeah, you have a bunch of programs. programs that kind of, I don't want to call them sleeping giants, but if Virginia Tech used to be really good and people got into that, same thing. Like Georgia Tech had its runs here and there.

UCLA, Boston College. I think Miami's going to be pissed about this at the end of the day. Pitt. I mean, like, Pitt has had some history. Pittsburgh. But none of them are, none of them are up to par of where they could be, including Florida State and Clemson right now. Yeah. So if you're Miami going, why are you getting Florida State all this love?

they won like three games last year. Feels like the ACC could be a really, really strong conference with these brands, but none of them are up to par. You know what it is? They all can't stay on top. Or the SEC, even Alabama with a slight dip this year, was on the precipice of making the top 12. George loses a couple games, and yet people still think they're really, really good. I mean, I don't know.

It's what I've learned over the last few months is that Ross, at the end of the day, It's the Big Ten, it's the SEC, and it's everybody else fighting for third. It really is. And I think that the Florida State, I think the AC is like, I mean, we've got to stay relevant. If we can't lose those two schools, if you lost Florida State and Clemson to another conference, you would dramatically weaken their football. Even though you mentioned Miami's been good for a while. V-TEC's had some run.

Louisville's had some run. Those don't bring the sets that Florida State and Clemson do. All right. Final segment of the Matt Thomas Show at Ross is coming up next. 1145 here on Sports Talk 790. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-2-5-7-90. One final segment.

Come and say hello to us. 7-13-212-5-7-90. The Matt Thomas Show with Ross continues on Sports Talk 790. Rossi, three quick things. I just put a tweet out with a funny. I mean, ridiculously funny sketch from S&L on Saturday. It's called A Couple of Beers. I've seen it.

What do you think? It's hilarious. That's one of the ones like I was showing it to my brother, and he had people sending into it like him. I think that's one of the more shared ones. It's one of the funnier skits in the last, I don't know, a couple decades, really. Just go watch it. You'll laugh your ass off. Who is the guy that's on that show?

Who is it? Am I missing who this guy is? He's just a comedian, right? Shane Gillis? Yeah. You don't know who he is? I really didn't know much about him until this episode. What's he known for?

He's really famous comedian. He was on SNL briefly. You got fired from SNL. He got fired from SNL. He does Bud Light commercials. He does a pretty popular podcast. I would say you're a little bit out of touch if you don't know who Shane Gillis is, Matt. I know he is now.

That's good. By the way, real quick, this was a question. This is a statement that Chad Johnson man on ESPN first take today. Get your quick answer on this. What is more difficult? Here's his quote, and you get in the answer. The two most difficult things in life are hitting a baseball and keeping a woman happy long term.

Ross, which one and two would you say is more difficult? Hitting a baseball. I'm going to go with hitting a baseball as well. I mean, how many plus hitters are there? in in in in America with a OPS plus of over a hundred okay there's 25 roster 26 guys 30 30 man 700 pitchers half of that probably 75 hundred maybe yeah exactly there's more than a hundred people keeping their wives happy right yeah oh yeah for sure so the actual I'm gonna go with hit a baseball but the actual act itself hitting a baseball 95 miles an hour or keeping her happy

we keep her happy by good move good music good food let's start with money and money you know Ross that can keep me happy too honestly all right we got a minute left the WWE Ross never misses anything what do you mean they just filed a trademark

something I didn't do many years ago which I should have oh Jesus you know what they trademarked no break a wish as an ode to John Sina going heel and remember all that we were talking about it before he's the most asked for athlete

celebrity in make a wish history. Okay. Thanks to RSJRDK for sending that to us. Incredible stuff. Keep us updated, Matt. On the John Cena heel turn. I'm having a WrestleMania party, and you're invited.

I don't think I can make it. I'm very busy that weekend. You know what? You are going to be busy that weekend because it's a Rockets playoff weekend. Oh, yeah, I'm definitely, but it's on Easter weekend? I believe so, yeah. Two days in Vegas. I think Clayton's going, but he's not.

John Cena will rise again. He's trying to get a media credential. No. Hashtag team's game. That's fine. Up next, Astros baseball. Back with you tomorrow at 10 o'clock from Indianapolis, here on Sports Talk, 7-9.