The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Astros Crush M'S. Are 2nd Opinions Ever Better Than The 1st? Thunder Beat Up Wolves Again.

Episode Date: May 23, 2025

Astros Crush M'S. Are 2nd Opinions Ever Better Than The 1st? Thunder Beat Up Wolves Again.

10-01 in H-town. Good morning and welcome to a Friday edition of the Matt Thomas Show with Ross. We're live at Gallery Furniture, 6,06, 545 north between 10 and Wall and Parker, and this is Sports Talk 790. It is an anything goes Friday here on the Matt Thomas Show with Ross. Yes, it is, Matthew. We are here at Gallery Furniture. Jim McInvell and his crew are just opening up their doors in the last.

A couple of minutes. Come on by, say hello. Memorial Day sale going on. There's more sports memorabilia in this building than any other part of the city. Houston. It's impressive, honestly. I mean, it's every team. It's local teams.

It's national heroes. It's, I mean, beyond getting great furniture deals, it's like a walking museum of sports memorabilia. Yeah, you get James Hardensigned stuff, Carlos Correa, Alex Bregman, Tracy McGrady. I mean, I saw. P. Rose autographed jersey. Wow. Yeah. All the stuff.

It's a lot. So we are here today until... Is that one of the World Series trophies? Yeah, one of the trophies is here. That's got to be a replica, right? Yeah, but I mean, still... It looks good. I don't have one of those in my house. I know. I'm going to walk out with that bad boy.

I had a wonderful morning today driving over here. You did? I did something that you're going to be very disturbed by. Oh, man. I thought you were going to say I was going to be proud of you. No. Now this sounds more accurate. All right.

So, like many of you out there, We're going to get to sports in a second because the Astros did crush, but the previous four hours did the loss sports. We're going to go one little offbeat thing here. So I've been getting a lot of spam risk telemarketer phone calls, and I automatically put them on silence. So you can't call me unless I know who you are. That avoids a lot of that. That's what I have a little function on my phone to do that. So today, I said, you know, I'm going to turn it off.

And I'm going to take my 45-minute drive from Kingwood over here to 6,006,000, North, freeway and I'm going to turn them on and I had three people telemarketers call in that 45 minutes three yeah well that's a lot oh they happen about every 20 to 30 minutes like by the time the show will end I'll have 10 calls that I've made it sounds like your phone number is in the dark web yeah it is what you've been getting yeah what you've been doing Matt you got malware on your phone I don't know what it is but I don't listen to them I mean I the silence is on so it's not like I can't I can get to them but I turned it off today so here's how I here's how I fight traffic in Houston I turned it off, these three telemarketers called,

and I answered their opening questions, and then after I get past the automated person asking my age and what my income is, I talk to a live person, and the guy says, my name is, blah-da-da, I'm calling you from this, this, how are you today? I swear at them profusely. And then what do they do? They hang up on me.

Oh. It feels great. I told you. You got to keep the scam going. That's the way I do it. I mean, I don't just say, go to hell. I use the most vile, disgusting phrases I can possibly tell another human being. And how do you feel after that, Matt?

Terrific. I'm in a fantastic mood. Where do you think this anger comes from, Matt? I just have a screw loose. Okay. But I'm just telling you, now we're going to get to sports, but it was the best 45 minutes driving because I hate to drive. You know that.

I hate traffic. I hate driving. If I could work every day from home, I would. But the bottom line is this, it just was awesome. I told three people how I felt about them and not even knowing who they am. It was the best way to get through the traffic. All right. And that's my anything goes Friday moment.

Thank you, Matt. Sounds a little disturbing and I'm worried about you. Yes and yes. Again, I have issues, and that's fine. Yeah. I told you, I got to get you watching that guy that messes with the scammers for hours. I don't have that kind of time. I think I want to get in and get out quick.

I want to verbally abuse them with swear words and then have them hang up. I don't even hang up with them. I wait for them to respond. Okay. Because I'm hoping they're going to respond back to me, but they don't do that. They just simply just hang up. They're like, you're wasting my time. All right, you did not waste your time last night doing the 10th inning show

is the Astros, I mean, demolished. demolish the first-place Seattle Mariners. Yeah, I was thinking last night, man, good thing we weren't still in Lake Charles. Because George Kirby v. versus Lance McCullors Jr.? All right, we got to call somebody out. It's anything goes Friday.

Dan Matthews is a friend of our show. Why are you going to put him on blast three minutes into the show? Well, you know what? We'll save it for our NBA segment. First of all, he's being... But Dan, I know you're listening. He's bringing us equipment. He's being helpful.

Dan, you're going to get... Is he still there? No, I think he just lived. That's why I was, he's in his car. Dan, in about 15 minutes, we're going to destroy you. Lovingly, of course. Wait until he gets here. I guess we could.

But that'd be worse, embarrassing right in his face. It'd be much better do something backhanded and around him and not being in front of us. Yeah, why wouldn't you be a man, say to his face? Yeah. Put your name on it. I'll say it with your chest. You know what, I'll do it. When Dan gets here, I'll do it.

But he missed on an NBA prediction yesterday, and he gave us some incredible logic that did not work. Nobody's perfect. I was wrong. I thought the Astros were going to lose yesterday. He won 9 to 2. Jose freaking Altovae with two home runs. Neither one of them cheapies. I mean, they were blast.

Yes. He's back. Fast swings on the bat tracking? I'm feeling good. Yeah. The bat tracker works. It does. Bat tracker don't lie, Maddie.

No, the bat tracker don't lie. By the way, I was looking on Facebook Reels. Oh, no. Speaking of bats, do you know that Adam West? who played Batman. Yes. Once told Bert Ward, who was Robin.

I'm going to let you finish, but I just want to say real quick, you're telling a Adam West Bert Ward story in the middle of us talking about Jose L.T. You said Bat, Bat, bad watcher. It's truly in anything that goes Friday moment.

He once had relations with multiple women in one day. Okay. Eight. That I'm calling BS on that. I am two. Back to the Astros. I just had to go back to the segue out of that.

Now, all at once or eight sessions? No, eight sessions. Eight different women? He says, I can't believe what I did in the 60s. And he said it was a really time of tremendous sexual freedom. Is he a porn star? Well, I mean, there was a guy from Hogan's Heroes that had the porn thing going, too. Bob Kramer, Kramit, something like that?

There's Bob Kraft, I think. No, I think it was not Bob Kraft. All right, so the Astros win. We're segueing. Huge win. Boy, I'll tell you what. Joe Espada tried to get Lance to go to five innings. Tried everything you could to get that first victory of the season.

First victory in two and a half years, unfortunately could not do that. So while, again, Lance was good for four and change, you didn't get to the fifth. And the reality is it might just be a situation where if you get Lance to five innings in a particular start, you're going to be in a very good spot. That the thought of six, seven in his future

certainly won't be a part of 2025. Well, the good news is he threw 91 pitches. He did. You can throw 91 pitches and... But he doesn't... Go five innings. But he's also a guy... But he's also Ross, a guy that's never had the history of being quick inning guy. I'm telling you

it's possible. I understand. I'm not telling you it's going to happen. Because the Lance McCuller's Jr. experience, always, even when he was great. He's racking up walks. He's a little wild. He's getting a lot of wiffs. It takes a lot of strikes. It takes a lot of pitches to strike someone out. He's not

pitching a contact racking up a bunch of ground balls. So he's racking up strikeouts and walks. Those are going to be the two longest plate appearances that you can have. So he's always done that, but I am encouraged that he threw 91 pitches and after the game he said he had more in the tank

and he said he's feeling good. That's the most encouraging sign. I do feel like, yes, he has to turn up the efficiency and a couple of notches and he can get you five. He can get you on a crazy day six. I'm not asking for seven. That would be, that's well down.

I'm asking for five. How about small victories here first? Get the five. He got the first out, and then he got Cal Raleigh to O2, but unfortunately he battled back, got a single. He got Randy Rosa Rana to O2. Then he just hits a single on O2. And then Joe's like I got to do.

Yeah, you got to pull him. You got to pull him. So he was close to getting you five. He threw 91 pitches. As often as it happens on the show, Matt, I'm going to be glass half full. You know what? 91 pitches.

That's the part of the show we love is your glass half full mentality. I'm really life in general. It is an anything goes Friday here. We're at Gallery for Inter at 6,06 I-45 North, of course between Taylor and Parker. Well, they will save you money. The big Memorial Day sale going on. We'll tell you about a few things about that as the afternoon progresses. Anything goes, meaning you call about anything you want.

It can be sports related. It can be Bert Ward related. It can be Adam West related. It can be related to just about anything. We will accept it. You get the longest leave. in the radio market today right here between 10 and 10. Nobody else, as Matt Thomas would say,

nobody else in the marketplace is talking Bert Ward's sex life. No, or Texans off-season stuff. If you want to get into that, 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-790. When we return, is a second opinion ever better than the first? It is 10-13. Sports Talk 790 live today from Gallery Furniture. Doc 790 from Gallery Furniture at 6,06945 North between Tedwell and Parker.

I think if I meant memorized for, I don't know, 40 years, Ross, give or take. Yeah, that sounds about right. Legendary space, of course. And Jim is already here. He gave away a bunch of mattresses today to the veterans, a big Memorial Day event that he did this morning. So he's already up and at him, and it's nice to have him and his crew here working. and we appreciate them. He literally on the phone

like the whole time we've been here, right here at the front desk working, you can come in and say hi to him. Yeah, very, very approachable. 713-212-5-790 if you want to join us.

Again, we're at 6,0006i-45 north between Tibmo and Parker. There are three locations, but we're at the main store on the north freeway. All right, so yesterday you get to the ballpark and Joe Espada announces that Renele Blanco is going on the injured list

with the elbow soreness. And apparently Joe. Elbow inflammation, I believe. Oh, okay. Ooh. Is that worse? Probably. We discussed a few weeks ago whether a...

A soreness or discomfort was worth. Or sting or an owie or what we had to put the parameters of what is... Inflammation sounds way worse. Soreness is... Sorness means you just sleep one night and take some amyprofen. Inflammation means you need to really go see somebody. Soreness means he could have hit his funny bone. Inflammation means it's second opinion time.

All right. I want to ask this generic question, and maybe there's no answer to it. In life, forget about baseball, forget about the doctor's office. Have you ever gotten a second opinion on anything that was better than the first? Now, I believe the answer to that is absolutely yes. Like, how do I handle the situation at work? Where you ask one person and then you ask the other person, that second opinion probably helped out. but as far as us is sports radio host and people that talk about sports 93% of the time on this show

I don't remember many times not saying if any but many times that we've ever heard of a wow thank God XYZ athlete got that second opinion because the first one was lousy yeah or if you have this sometimes it's been a situation it feels like where the second opinion is oh you can just rehab it and then the guy in of needing Tommy John anyways. Correct. Like a month later. Like I've heard before, hey, we're trying to avoid surgery.

Let's get a second opinion. Can they happen with Verlander? Yes. Because Chandler Roman broke in the story that he was going to need Tommy John, and then he can't. Justin Verlander did a whole press conference. I wouldn't say that the reports aren't accurate. We're exploring all our options.

Then literally he tried to rehab it and needed time. Yeah. 90% of rest, ice, and ibuprofen winds up eventually going under the knife. Yeah. And I'm going to, again, was Joe asked? what the first opinion was or did they say yes he was and he he wasn't very forthcoming uh basically he just said inflammation looking for a second second opinion and that's it he's having tommy john surgeon that's what it's that's yeah yeah because if the second if you're looking for a second one

that means you refute the first one right or you don't like what you heard i could just should say refute you don't like the first opinion yeah what if you get a call from somebody's like hey grandpa's looking for a second opinion. That means something isn't good. Yeah. But I mean, think about it, in your life. Now, I may have given you some good advice or I've given you some bad advice. So you've had to go to a second opinion. That's different, right.

You know what I want to be? I want to be second opinion guy. I think second opinion guy, more times than not back except first opinion guy. Yes. And especially when we're talking about something, it's an MRI, it's muscular tendons, whatever. It's pretty. The point. The results are.

You're not going to get a full-pop. A lot of gray area. The margin of error is minimal. Oh, you know what? Turns out he has got planter fasciitis. Yeah. We got to, why did you go to the, why did you go to the dollar general of MRI machines? Exactly.

You know what I mean? No disrespect to dollar general, but they went to the FedEx Kinko's use their machine. Yeah, you can't use the Xerox machine there at Kinkos to get to the MRI. No, my thought is that it's, yeah. It's coming. And then that, we can basically just go from there. What does this mean for the Astros? And we talked about it yesterday.

Could this mean the season could be slip sliding away? Thankfully, they won yesterday. Absolutely. As big as a mid to late May series can be. This is a big one. Right. And also the encouraging thing, you're going to need Lance McCullors Jr. I'm sorry to put this on him.

He's supposed to be kind of a fringe, fifth, sixth, maximum fourth guy. Correct. But until Ergetti gets back, they need him as a three guy. Well, here's also another problem that Dan is going to put into. If he's asked, which he will be asked, whether it's on these radio airwaves or at media, whatever, they're going to go have to get another arm if they want to compete in the division this year. And that's a problem when you go into the trade deadline, Ross, thinking, what do I possibly need? What could I use?

Could I use an extra arm? Could I use a second baseman? Could I go get another arm? You know what I'm saying? Maybe that's a good thing. Maybe it's a luxury. The Astros right now must go. It's not, there is no room for gray air in this.

The Astros must go get a solid starter if they think they're going to win the division and or make the playoffs. And it's nothing an indictment against the Gordons and the Gustos and the other folks. but they don't have any track record. They've never done this before. They're not going deep in the games. You've had this wonderful bullpen this year that all of a sudden the wonderful bullpen becomes an average bullpen

to becomes an overused underperforming bullpen when it is overused. Dana's going to go into the deadline and every other team, the 29 other teams in Major League Baseball, no, he's calling for a starting pitcher. And the price is going to be very high. And the question is going to be for Dana.

for this team for 2,025, what are you willing to give up to go get? I'm not just saying fringe. I mean, you've got to get somebody that's got to get you some lengths, too. You cannot continue to throw pitchers. And it's, again, through no fault of Joe's spot, it's no through no fault of the young arms that are in the rotation right now. But nobody has been built, has a track record of going 105 pitches and seven innings in a game. There's not one person.

Well, there's two. Hunter Brown has done it. Framber Valdez has done it. The rest of the crew has not done it. Not even Spencer Ergetti for the matter has a long track record of going deep in games, even when you do get him back. Yeah. The thing is that you're going to have to have those conversations, like you said,

but it's May 23rd. It's going to cost you more. Most teams still think they're in it. How many sellers do you even have right now? Oh, this is not a conversation for the next. two weeks. You know, you're going to have to, that's why I'm saying it's a tough spot because you want to make a deal. But if you do, the other teams are going to like, wait a minute, you want to deal right now pre-July 31st? That's desperation. That's desperation. And what happens when you hear

desperation on the other side of the phone? You raise your price. Absolutely. So it's a bad spot, certainly, for Dana Brown to be in right now. I mean, can you convince yourself that McCullors and these other guys can hold the water until Aragetti gets back and convince yourself that Brown, Valdez, Aragetti, McCullors isn't the worst four and then five is a wild card. Well, the thing is, it's not even a situation of convincing. It's a performance.

But that's if everything goes great. Yeah. And that still doesn't sound like, that doesn't sound like a division winning rotation with the way that the hitting is right now. Unless one of those guys, the Colton Gordons, I mean, they step up and they surprise us. I mean, look, Arrogatee got better as a season progressive.

but Erigani was also considered a much higher prospect than the guys that right now in this rotation. Colton Gordon was good the last time out. How long is that going to last? Ryan Guston, I mean, it's advantage pitcher the first couple of starts. That's why Ryan Gusto is starting to get hit a little bit more, right? So it's advantage Gordon in his first couple of starts,

but what's going to happen as the book gets out, people see how he's throwing, and then you go from there. So, yeah, it's a tough spot. 713-212-5-7-90, but the positive of last night was that Hoselle Tuve hit. Everybody, everybody hit last night. What's that? Oh, okay.

Also, you got near Diaz, got some hit. Christian Walker got him. Jake Myers, starting two-out rallies. You haven't even mentioned him? Yeah, but that's why I leave that material for you. Thank you. It is, and anything goes Friday at 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. In one hour, you have 60 minutes because you're going to be doing some I'm sorrys.

You need to apologize to people. Ross, you're right at the top of the list. And I am not going to apologize that hag sitting next to me in Lake Charles. You should. I'm not doing it. She was a sweet old lady. You know what I'm going to apologize for? That I should have told her to get off to take that wig off because it was awful.

And she probably bought it in 1978, but it's, you know. I should have apologized. She should apologize for me for hitting a 14 against a 4. That was pretty bad. And then she got Delta face card, which would have been my 21. Sorry. 713, 212, 5790. 3-212-5-790

7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-90 if you want to join us on anything goes Friday we are live at gallery furniture at 6,006-I-45 north between tidwell and parker you guys know where this place is you've driven by it i don't know nine million times uh also uh we've got i'm sorry's come up 1130 we've got the news anew we'll wake the strippers up i don't know if they people here at the gallery understand what's going to happen with in 12 new when I wake him up. Yeah, probably not. Be a little shell shock.

That's okay. It's fine. Somebody's got to wake up the strippers, man. That's where you step in. All right. Thank you for your service. Thank you for your service. All right.

Last night, besides the Astros game, we had the NBA playoffs Western Conference Finals. It was frankly a dud. I kind of lost interest probably early second half. Oklahoma City is going to win the whole thing. and I hope the NBA is ready for it. Yes, they are. I think it was Bill Simmons

is already talking about them as if they win the championship where they fit as far as one of the greatest teams of all time. They had the greatest point differential of all time. But they did lose more games, I think, than like the 98 Bulls and some of the other great teams, but they're basically

climbing close to that conversation, just with how dominant they've been, despite getting pushed to seven by the Nuggets. Yeah, I think, look, Denver wasn't a bad basketball, team. So if you have to get pushed to seven, you get pushed to seven. But they're really good. Minnesota didn't, can't shoot anymore for some reason.

They're three-point shooting has been horrible. Anthony Edwards was one for nine. You had a game one. What, Nas Reid was over seven. Yeah. Some of that is obviously suffocating defense from the thunder. Some of that is them shooting themselves in the foot. But they're great, Sheigild is Alexander, 13 to 15 from the free throw line.

Yeah, I mean, he was, what, six to six in the first quarter, I think, is something crazy like that. You, it's funny because I used to live in Minneapolis, St. Paul, I lived there for three years, and really enjoyed my time there. The weather is absolutely horrific. I'll never live in a cold city ever again. I mean, I'm not leaving Houston ever again, but how many years did you live there? Three. Okay. That was you, like the first year, you were like, I'm done with this at some point?

Yes. Yeah. The second year was like, am I ever going to get used to it? The answer was no. The third one is, I've got to get back to Houston. So I did. But I enjoy my time. People were nice.

It's a very tough place to live if you're not from there because they don't want to hear about how miserable you are. Because they've grown out so in they know. Right. You don't want to like chit-chatting, walking, like, oh, it's a cold one out. It'd be like someone that lived in, that grew up in New Hampshire saying, oh, these hot summers in Houston. You know, no blank. We get it. We've lived it.

Nobody wants to hear that. So once you get past, stop talking about how miserably cold you are, it's not a bad spot. Okay. All right, to my point, if you think Houston sports fans feel like they've got it bad, I got news for you. Minneapolis has it way worse than we do. The twins have won like no playoff games in 25 years, despite going every year. That's true.

The Minnesota Timberwolves are about to get bounced for the Western Conference finals for the second consecutive year. Before that, they were bad for a long period of time, since Kevin Garnett was playing. The Minnesota Vikings go to the playoffs every year, and they've gone. on to two championship games in loss in dramatic fashion in both in the last 20 years. The Minnesota Wilds suck.

They're high, they're Minnesota Golden Gophers who are really representative of the whole Minneapolis-St. Paul area. They don't do, they finish every year seven and five in football and they win like 17 games in basketball. You think you got it bad in Houston. Minneapolis is where it's at when it comes to sports fertility. That sounds pretty bad. At least Atlanta had the Braves for a long stretch.

I would say we could go pound for pound with them before the Astros started. Before the Astros, you could go pound for pound. After the two World Series Championships, even though the first one had the, you know, it is what it is, you can't compare the futility of Minneapolis to the futility of Houston, Texas. I know that people don't want to hear that, but it's, having lived in both cities, I know these things. Okay. And they're getting beat up for the second straight time. Western Conference Finals, it's huge accomplishment, right? Yeah, it's great. I would love for the Rockets to be in the Western final. I would take it. It was painful when they would make it and lose, but.

But at least you feel like you had a good season. Yeah. All right, let's go to the phones. And anything goes Friday, 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Mike is with us on 7-90. Mike, good morning. Good morning. How are you today?

Good. Hey, listen, quick question. I'm driving, so I apologize for the word. Sure, that's all right. Let's see you guys exclusively, traveling everything. Thank you. I want to know your thoughts on Trevor Bauer. I read all the stuff, all the crap on the Internet.

I really want to know, I mean, the guy can't pitch. He was proven innocent. He may be a jerk, but he can pitch. And we need pitching, and that's it. And I'm just curious to know what is your feel on why we don't at least give the guy a look. I mean, if it didn't work out, cut him in a month. So I'm going to cost you much. He's never playing in Major League Baseball again.

It's just not going to happen. The storylines of who he is as a human being, he's, and I hate to use this term, which is a terrible term, but he's literally a cancer, Mike. He would be a cancer two-way clubhouse, and the book is written on him. And all the things you're saying are right, he's playing Japanese baseball, which is, again, consider what I think it makes between AA and AAA is what the peeps tell me. He's just a bad guy at the end of the day, and in today's world of baseball, Mike, when you're in a 26-man clubhouse and you are with each other for,

seven, eight hours a day, six to seven days a week. You have to have, not I'm not saying you can't have a diva or two, but a pure, pure, bad human being ain't going to cut it, no matter what. And again, he's 34 years old. I mean, it would take him a significant amount of time to ramp up to what he has been doing at the AA, AAA, AAA level known as Japanese baseball to what he's seeing as Major League Baseball. It's not a foregone conclusion. and the risk of creating a media circus around a guy that might be good for four weeks,

ain't worth it, says 30 major league baseball teams. Okay. I mean, I trust your opinion. At least you said it straightforward. I said to him all and about it. Then listen, we'll just hope we can stay close when the trading deadline gets here. If it's close, I'll make a deal. It may not be willing to lie, but he will make a deal.

Yeah. Yeah, and that's the one thing Dana's done. Thank you, Mike, for the phone call. And he will do painful deals. The you say Kikuchi trade was painful. People hated it. Wanted Dana Brown out. Should we get a Lope-Berfito update?

Well, Jake Gloss updates can involve, is he Tommy John or is he? Oh, really? Yeah, he's shoulder hurt, too. Oh. Well, it's elbow, yeah. That's a shame. Let's see. Loparfito has no played appearances on the Major League Club.

That's going to happen. How's Will Wagner doing? Hold on. let's see I'll look up Jake Bloss Oh you know if he's doing all right He's hitting 260 with a 750 OPS in AAA All right

Jonathan If you have that Trevor Bauer PSA That we recorded last year Go ahead and play it Does he have it? There are 30 teams in Major League Baseball None of them Have called about the services

Of Trevor Bauer for a reason The reason is he's just a bad guy His spin rates dipped significantly When Spider-Tack was cracked down upon He was under investigation in 2021. A separate woman in Ohio sought a temporary order of protection in 2020. A third woman accused Bauer of sexual assault in 2022 and 2022. There are 30 teams that can get his services and all have declined to do so so far.

He crushed the Astros when he was in the big leagues. He has got a terrible reputation for being a bad teammate. He goes in that Astros Clubhouse who'll be hated immediately. no one will like him. No one respects him. You have to have a good clubhouse culture for every single day of the baseball season. Trevor Bauer does not bring it. Trevor Bauer will not be in the Astros Clubhouse. Yes. My name is Ross Villarreal and Trevor Bauer will never be a Houston Astro. My name is Matt Thomas and what Ross said, I say as well. Trevor Bauer never an astro. I'm sorry for repeating myself. that was from a year ago by the way yeah and i feel like it's the obligatory a Trevor bower call we get once per year or maybe sometimes twice but obviously

people are like trying to find an answer to figure out what the starting pitching situation is going to be all right uh 1043 on sports talks are really fast since dan is here dan matthew so you heard this morning uh dan came to us late and said you can book it we're going to put us turn turn his microphone on real quick here so we can properly embarrass him What did you tell us yesterday about that Minnesota Oklahoma City game? Oh, the fix is in. You got Scott Foster, you got Tony Brothers on the call?

This is happening. Yeah. So what did Ross say you to do? Oh, he told me to bet my life savings on the game. Yes. And did you do that? Well, now, Ross, I kind of need to talk with you about something. I pay you back an installment.

I got a fold-out couch for you. Okay. Fair enough. All that wedding money you had is gone now. Yeah, I got you. Hey, you know, I know that we were saying we were going to do a small ceremony. Well, now it might be no ceremony. You mean the JOP is what you mean.

That's it. That's it. So, yeah. When you go to the fixes in, that means go to Vegas and make sure that you're on the other side of that fix so you can get it right. And, yeah, Oklahoma City was, didn't go along with your little storyline. If Scott Foster could have helped the Timberwolves not shoot 28% from three, that would have been helpful. Well, maybe, I mean, it was all fine until the jump ball and somebody elbow them right in the face. I mean, maybe after that, that's true.

He was kind of like, you know. That's it. That's it. Yeah, he said, oh, you know, I was going to help you guys, but now I'm not. But now I'm concussed. Yeah. All right. Yeah, maybe he was concussed, so he didn't make the proper calls.

Dan, thanks for bringing our speaker by, and I'm glad we could properly tease you for about 30 seconds. Well, and I heard that Tuesday you're buying Waterburger, so there we go. Hey, I'm done with that, too. Let's go. I guess I could, yeah. That sounds great to me. I'm out by lunch occasionally. All right.

But we don't, we can't eat it during the show, so why would I? What are you talking about? I just scarfed a sandwich down and been in between a break. All right. 113-21-2-5-7-190. 7-1-3-2-190. Our buddy Stunner is going to call on about the Knicks. Is he a Knicks fan?

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Where's a Jet fan? What's his name? New York Sports Radio. James and Garden Oaks. James and Garden Oaks, you've been awfully quiet these days. I miss him calling me the governor. That was weird. I liked it. Yeah. You're not making any elected office.

You don't know that. All skeletons you got digging up dirt. That's true. 713-212-1-2-5-7-90. It is the Super Savings Memorial Super Sale right here at Gallery Furniture, 6,06, I-45 North between Tim Will and Parker. Save up to $1,800 on Simmons Beauty Rest Adjustable Sleep. Save up to $1,000 on a temporepetic adjustable sleep set, which I have in my house today. Thanks to got my furniture. That's a big savings, Matthew.

Yeah, you saving over $1,000 Memorial Day. Get over here. Can't argue with that. 6,06 North Freeway. between Tibill and Parker. There we go. All right, 713212-5-790. If you need to apologize for something,

and I know that you do, because I know many of you. What are you talking about? By the way, why are people winging out about DMs on Instagram today? You know what happened? Something's going on. Are they being made public?

No, I would hope not. Why not, Matt? Because I say some things about people I shouldn't say. Okay. Why, what's going on? Are they broken? No, I think there's expanding the, You can record video to DMs, I mean, and audio to DMs now.

Just saying. That's special someone. Well, that would be my wife. She's the only one that's the photos. That's, that's, oh, man, we don't need to hear about that. Well, I'm just trying to. But you could follow me on Instagram. At Sports RV.

Your numbers aren't really going that much higher. Actually, we're doing great. I've gone from like 500 to almost 700 in the last couple of weeks. All right. Follow SportsM. No, will you shut your mouth for one second? You got enough. influencer initiatives at IHeart.

Please follow Sports RV on Instagram. I have 32,000 followers on Twitter. I'm going to get some people to follow me on IG. I'm going to put a tweet out. Say, follow me on IG. Wow. You won't be disappointed, unlike other accounts. I feel like you might be a little disappointed.

I don't think very much. We'll see. Stunner. 1053, 790 the floor is yours. Stunner, thanks for waiting. What's going on? What's up? What's up?

You're at you, Thomas? You. Amazing. Well, I'm not a Knicks fan. I'm not a Knicks fan. I hate the Knicks. But I'm happy because they got Kuhnay-H. Smith Hot because, you know, how he doing Cowboys every day.

Watching him with his face all bring it up on TV, it's been a great feeling. That's why I'm following the Knicks right now. That's the, I'm just, hey, calm, man. is a piece. And I'm loving before the Knicks blow to move all of my

ESPN haters. Just look like they want to move out of New York. So that's my, that's my feel sorry for the rest of the

fan. So you're hate watching the Knicks because of Stephen A. Smith. Exactly. I'm just. the same thing. I don't think I've ever rooted for anything in Indiana in my life, but I'm Team Pacer right now. Because I do want him to, maybe it's just a bit for him

Stunner. Maybe Stephen A. just does it because he knows that people get mad. I don't, I think he's too much of an actor to be that irate about the Knicks. The New York Nix. They've been failing since 1973. It's like you should be used to it at this point.

I'm mostly, I'm rooting for Tires Halliburton because he got named the most overrated player in basketball. I like watching him flourish. I'm just glad because I'm looking at all the, all of them mixed fans that's on the ESPN. You can just see all these things. It's just not even.

I mean, when they went to the Eastern Conference finals, oh, my God, it's just like, that's all they show was the Knicks. Like, hey, this is the greatest thing since sliced bread. But, hey, you need some jelly on that bread. Mmm, Peenburn and jelly sounds good right now. Thank you,

sending for the phone call. Yeah, I'm voting. I'm rooting for the Pacers. Because even if there's a little bit of fandom in Stephen A. Smith, I want him to suffer. I'm all for it. I want the Wolves to win game three.

I just want long, good series. The basketball fan of me wants that. But I'm very curious how America will treat Oklahoma State versus Indiana if it happens. Well,

and not the time. It's going to be a two- And that the television should matter at all because it's what you enjoy. And it's not like, well, it's different. If you love this, like, for instance, there's some people that I know that love the TV show Arrested Development. Did you ever watch that show? I love it. Great show.

People loved it. Uh-huh. The people that I knew that would tell me about it. It did not do well ratings ever. No. So if you are someone that loved the show Arrested Development, you rooted for that show to have good television ratings so that they ever advertisers would go into it and keep the show alive. It never happened. We're going to get the NBA next year, regardless of whether there are 19 million people watching the NBA finals or there are 9 million.

You know what I'm saying? I mean, television ratings don't dictate anything. The new TV contract goes into action next year. So the NBA doesn't care who watches. But I'm just curious what American sports fan will do with two. Like if you have the two small market teams in the NFL, if the Panthers were to play the, who would be the smallest AFC? market, Jacksonville. Hundreds of millions of people would still watch it because it's a Super Bowl.

Remember the Rangers versus the Diamondbacks World Series a couple years back? No one watched it. There was no name recognition. Not the Dallas and Phoenix for small markets, but they don't have any national cash. Oklahoma City is an exciting, fun, interesting team. Indiana is gritty and has plenty of stars. I just would like to see for how the world treats it, but I kind of know the answer already, I think. That's okay.

Arrusted development's great. Maybe it's not for the casuals. Pacer's Thunder would be great. Maybe it wouldn't be for the casuals. But if Arrisset Development had good ratings, the show would still be on this day. Because that's how television networks run. That's okay.

They base it off a television rating. I understand that. Sometimes good shows don't get good ratings. I would have to completely agree with you on that. I know one in particular. That is amazing. All right. 1057 here on the Mad television show

with Ross, we have about three hours left to go. We're going to ask you to apologize in 30 minutes because you've done some things and you're frankly embarrassed about. 713212-570. 7-1-3-212-5-790. We are live today at Gallery Furniture at 6,06 I-45 North between Tim Will and Parker. It is the Power Motion Super Sale.

It's the Super Memorial Day special on mattress and so much more. Mattress Mac and his crew here to help you out at 6,06 I-45 North. the 8 on 790. Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of IHeart Women's Sports Network. According to multiple reports on Thursday, owners of the New York Liberty sold shares in the WNBA

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We recognize the importance of dreaming big and achieving more. IHeart Women's Sports Network is brought to you by Novartis, makers of Kisgali Ribococlip, supporting all women who strive for more in sports and in life. Hey, yo, Houston, we're back. Yeah, that's right. The Big Three is back. Season 8, some in the city. Hey, town!

It's the big three. I get supposed to be played. Fast-paced and physical. With legendary players and Coke your Ice Cube, talk to them. Hey, yo, Houston, come see the whole league. Four games for the price of one. But this time, you got your own home team. Welcome your Houston rig hand.

With Gerald Green, Hurry Brewer, Darling Green, and coach by Calvin. I'm last ticket. A Jay, Jay! Doug Pike here for Shooters Corner, Palmer Highway at 29th Street down in Texas City, owned by Jerry and J.T.K,

two of the best gunsmiths I know and two of the best North American big game guides I know. The store is all about the shooting sports, about self-defense, about hunting, about competition. If you need it, They've got it when it comes to the shooting sports. And if you wear a badge for a living, you get a discount.

That's pretty cool. The Shooters Corner TX.com. The Shooters Corner TX.com. Al-Tubey drills and hits it goodbye. A two-homer game for Jose Al-Tube. This one, a two-run shot, and the Astros lead eight to two. Altube has driven in four tonight. Oh, what a day for our favorite left field or favorite second baseman,

and Frankfurt B.H. The greatest Astro of them all, except base running. It is the Matt Thomas Show and Ross. Astros 9 and the Mariners, too. And thankfully, that horrific hex that George Kirby has put on the Astros is over. Yeah, it was. Look, who cares? It was his first major league start of the season. So you were able to get to them, especially there in the third and fourth innings. Altovae hitting home runs, like you said. How about a couple of hits for Yiner Diaz? It would be nice to see him. Start heating up as well.

Back into the lineup was very good, including three hits from Victor Caratini. So nine runs. It is possible. Still to the... I'm going to tell you something, Matt. As you call it, say, peel behind the curtain. Please.

I had a tweet ready in the drafts to say this is the first time the Astros have scored double digits since I think it was April 11th against the Angels. We're talking about a month in change since they scored double digit runs. And while they didn't do it.

Well, you know, actually, you got close. You remember last year when the Astros would score double digits the next night they had to get two hit? So I'm okay with that. Well, that happened against the Angels. The next day they scored one run. But still, they had that 14. Remember, did the 100 Diaz had like two home runs in that game or something like that? And so they've had nine runs at least a couple of times, but I don't even want to comb through all the teams, but the offense has not been good.

but let's just say nine runs last night, we will take it, especially in a George Kirby start. Yep. Good day as well for Jeremy Pena, one for three with a couple of ribbies. He had a triple yesterday. I mean, he was running through the base pass quickly. Booking it. Mariso Dubon with a couple of hits.

Cam Smith won for three with a couple of runs scored. Also drew a walk. I mentioned Christian Walker got the hit, which was nice, but it was a one for five days, so his batting average remains at $199. And I talked about this. tagger yesterday. 50 games in. I do believe that if the entire team was hitting,

except Christian Walker, then he would be wearing it out like... Under Microwo. Yeah, but since there's so many other guys that aren't performing as well, he can kind of not necessarily hide on the radar, but he's not by himself in the woeful offensive category. Yeah, it's bad.

And I don't even know what to say. Like, we keep saying it's going to turn, but 50 games is not enough example. 50 games pretty significant into the season. Well, put it this way. Let's say he batted 300 the rest of the way. He's looking at 250 probably as an average for the season, and you're paying good money, not spectacular money,

but really good money for a first basement with power. You didn't expect him to come in and bat 250. Now, you can get a couple of weeks where he's hitting like, you know, Jerry Payne's done over a couple of stretches. First couple of weeks, Jose was hitting 350. So you get a stretch like that. That's where you really start. Thornaut.

Do you think... You try to bring those numbers. Will Christian Walker ever bat 2.51 season? Uh-oh. Are we picking... I'm having flashbacks. Hold on. I'm getting blown away by deja vu right now.

I won that last bet, by the way. Yeah, but he was a career 290 hitter. Christian Walker's not that. Okay, but he's not 250. I mean, I mean... Yeah, I'd have to go look that up. But... I don't know.

I don't know what to say. No, I mean, I don't think the math would allow that. So, I mean, unfortunately, He needs to get above, let's get above Mendoza first, then we can worry about that. He's a career 247 hitter. Wow, I didn't realize it was that low. Career 782 OPS. So to put the numbers in perspective here,

when he gets men on base and he will produce, he does have a huge slug because the batting average is doing himself no favors. Right, yeah, he's a power guy. Last three seasons, 36 home runs, 33 home runs, 26 home runs. What are his last three years? By the way, that's a decline. Stop. But gradual.

Well, he's got five now. All right. So what is his betting average the last three years in Arizona? 242, 258, 251. So that's who he is. So he's going to be probably, Ross? It's 250 on the nose three years before this year. He's probably going to bet 25 to 30 points less this year.

That is a significant drop. That's fine. I don't care about his batting. average. Get those home runs and get those extra base hits up. Yeah. And get on base. Yeah, I wonder what his batting average would be with runners in scoring position. That probably is the number that probably

aggravate you. I can find that. Do you want to tell us? Are you going to hold off for a while? Do you want me to tell you? I want me to tell us. Give me a moment. I would have to think it's probably in the 150 to 175 range. 178. Okay, so I was off a little bit.

Heart of the order. 45 ABs. Okay. 21 strikeouts. Oh, he doesn't even advance a runner. Oh, and that's the problem is I like Christian Walker. Oh. Let me tell you something, Houston, Texas.

Christian Walker is a guy you can root for. He's very pleasant. He has, I told me that other day when I talked to him, I said, you've got a career in broadcasting when it's all said and done. You tend to kiss up to the players. Oh, no question you have to do that. I love being kissed up, too. Why wouldn't the players love it?

If you're not kissing ass, you're not doing anything. Right. You're right. I'm not doing it right. One that's 78. 580 OPS with the runners in scoring position. I mean, he could be a complete D-back, and I wouldn't say that to him. But he's a nice enough person.

He's got successful. Yeah. 12 RBI. R's B.I. R's B.I. Just saying it right away. Oh, God. You're that guy.

I'm just kidding. So let's put it. Let's rephrase then. Forget the 250 I told you about. Does he hit 230 this year? Yes, sure 21 points, even though we've still got 100 games left And he does play a lot

It's not like he takes a lot of days off You know what it is? I'm going to chalk it up to What? That oblique. Okay, let's do that. And if the oblique is 70%, I think you can play on the less 100% oblique

But it's probably sore in the mornings After games It probably doesn't give him And look, Father Time remains, I hate to use this term, it's hit me for it. Father Time reminds. father time remains undefeated.

A lot of cliches are cliches because they're true, Matt. Yeah. So at this point, get him to 225, 2.30, which means he'll have a better last two-thirds of the season than he had the first two-thirds, so he'd take that. Anybody else dramatically, I mean, honestly, Jose L. Tupe, despite the two home runs yesterday, is well under his normal batting average.

I mean, the guy is always a cuspur 300, 275, at least the last couple of years. but his numbers are dramatically down. I think Yarnier Diaz is kind of how Yarnier is. Karatini's not going to play for you six days a week. Jake Myers is not going to provide much pop, but he is well above his performance. Baller.

You are using a brand new right fielder, and I'm going to presume that Kyle Tucker he's playing every day for the Astros on right field would not be batting 238 with a slug of 361. And Mariso Dubon's kind of who Maricio Dubon is. I mean, a light-hitting utility guy. You don't want to necessarily play him six days a week, but he's going to get some playing time.

and when he comes in, he helps you out, but there's not much to luck with his numbers either. So realistically, if you look at the lineup, the two huge, come on, let's go guys, are Christian Walker and Jose Al-Tube. If they go up to even say 80% of what they've normally done over their career,

is this Astros offense performing up to, frankly, expectations? You need Yordon. You need Yordon back, for sure. You need Yor-I'm back to play otherworldly. Jeremy Payne to keep this up. I'm not saying the other shoe's going to drop. It looks legit to me, but guys have been hot for 50 games, and we have some of a career, a track record,

to where he is hitting above his head. I don't think it's going to go down. I think it's real, but that doesn't mean I'm going to be right. And I feel much more sure that Jake Myers' numbers are going to go down. And so where are you? Right now they're 18th in Team OPS in baseball. That was a big day yesterday. They went from 21st to 18th.

So you have a couple more big days You can get middle of the pack And you know what? Do it against the right team I mean you have a team right in front of you The Seattle Mariners Win at least one more game And when you are Let's think this, let's be honest

This team is ailing right now And I don't mean to be Splitzer O K guy But I'm going to be splits or okay guy At this point with this rotation And the number of injuries And the fact that Yorna Alvarez still is nowhere to be found In terms of getting back in the line

You get two out four against the first place team in this division frankly take it at this point of the season. Yeah, that's fine, and we can take it one game at a time and all this stuff, but I mean, with all these pitching injuries mounting up, you're counting on a lot of unknown factors and the, and the hits aren't, the bats aren't

there. I'm concerned. I'm the most concerned I've been all season long. You should be concerned because this team right now is currently constructed, even with Yordon coming back, needs at least one starting pitcher. To win the division. I've been able to tell

myself it's early. I've been able to tell myself it's early. I've been able to tell myself this things will turn, but it's getting late, Yordon's still hurt, Christian Walker still not hurting, Hayden Winskkin, Ronald Blanco just went down. I mean, yeah, hitting. I'm concerned, Maddie. Talk me off the ledge.

I don't need to because we're not at a point where we have to have that hard conversation. You're three and a half out with 100 games left to play. I can't do it at this point. In a wild card mix. In the wildcar mix. for sure. 713-212-5-790 if you want to reach this program today.

We come to you from Gallery Furniture at 6,06 High 45 North between Tivel and Parker, where you can get solid wood American-made furniture. They have it in stock. Delivery is free today. That's right. Free delivery today. All right. We know the history of Tommy John's surgery.

It's 12 to 16 months. Unfortunately, everybody that's been an astro 12-month guy has never been around. So we have to start thinking 16 months, which it essentially means. two seasons. Matt Ross with you from Gallery Furniture at 6,006, High, 45 North. If we find out the real situation involving Renel Blanco, which they will tell us. I mean, I don't think they're going to hide it for a significant period of time. I just hide it forever, for whatever reason.

Whatever. But I don't think you can, especially when you say, we're going for a second opinion. I mean, you can only continue to ask for a length of time. I think Renel Blanco is an aster's over. just like when Jose Arkiti suffered his injury, I said that's over. When you have guys that don't have long-term contracts that are so arbitration eligible

that are finding to get to that sixth year of free agency to become a free agent, you're not going to pay that person or any player, for that matter, any kind of money to stick around when you know at the end of the day, it's going to be probably two years free seeing him back on the mound again. This is actually surprising me.

He doesn't hit, he's under team control until the 2029 season. Boy, I didn't realize. He has that little major league service time? Yeah, so he'll be bad. Okay. I don't know. I also didn't realize this. He's 31.

I thought he was younger than that. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Boy, he must have really got off to a late start. So, okay, so let's put this in perspective. you're going to put arbitration money behind a guy that's been gone. And this is the thing it sucks about. You make it a model. It would be a low offer, arbitration offers.

He could accept it, obviously. But it is a cruelty of the business. That when you are not, when you've not served your six years of service time, you're at the behest of what the dollars would be on arbitration. Well, he won't get an arbitration until 2027. So, yeah, he'll be here. That's good. He'll be older.

I mean, he'll be 30, what, 32, 33 by the time. and off Tommy John, so we'll see what he's got. So let's do this. Forgetting the name Renal Blanco. How many 33-year-olds come back from Tommy John and are performing to 90% of what they were before? I'm sure there have been some. Was it Tommy John for DeGrom?

What did he have? But DeGrom was a special arm going in before. Yeah, but he's still pitching. Yeah. I mean, it's possible. I would just say that. Justin Verlander, he was good after the Tommy John surgery. And he was in his late 30s.

Uh, yeah. I'm just, I wouldn't, if you, if you have that Ronell Blanco jersey in the back of your closet, I would probably not worry about holding onto it. How many of those are in this city? Blanc, I bet there's more than you think. I think part of the charm of going to games is seeing people wear jerseys you don't expect. Okay. Like, stretch, Suba?

Like, if anybody goes to an Astros game and is wearing a Scott Feldman shirt, jersey, I'd have mad props for that. That's not happening. If any of you are bump... Unless you're in the Feldman family. If you're bumping around on Luke Gregerson, closer's jersey? Oh, stop.

There's nobody with it. It's got to be like one... People didn't even like him when he was pitching. Is anybody go to games with Matt Dominguez on the back of their jerseys? No. Now, I remember a few years back when we were at Astros Fest, they were selling old jerseys of people.

You and I should have scooped up on those. Yeah. You can get old ones. They had Mike fires. You get a Javier Bracamante. I'm not wearing a Mike Fires anything. That rat, no chance, no way, no. Why not?

Because people would boo and throw things at you. All he did was tell the truth, Matt. The truth will set you free. Yeah, no. All he did was he was a rat because the truth did not set him free. The truth was a bitter bit of vengeance that he had after they asked for him to shut your bum ass out of our organization. Then they shelled him in 19, and he thought they might still be cheating.

Doesn't matter. If he signs a contract and is back in the rotation for the following year, Mike Fires doesn't say a peep. He's a hypocrite. No, no, no, that's what I'm saying. He went away, and then they shelled him. Yeah. That's when he went to.

Yep. Yep. So, yeah, we should have done a better job of that. Like, what is, I don't wear other guys' jersey's last names. Every jersey I have of mine has my name on the back of it. That's great. I'm just trying to think, what is the most obscure? Now, I will say, I did see a Hashim Thabit Thunder jersey, I think.

Okay, I thought you could say you saw a Rockets one. That'd be really niche. Right. It is kind of crazy how sometimes you can get this. I do, I think it's kind of, it makes you take a, you do a double look is what you're right. You know what I mean? You go, what was he? What was he really wearing?

Poor Hashim the meat. Remember he got bullied into changing his Twitter handle from Hashim the Dream? Well, he should have. That was a ridiculous. He was a stiff coming out of college. He was trying to play, oh my, no, he was a number three pick. People thought he might be good. Nope, I, I called some of his college games.

I thought he was terrible. Okay. We need to get you on the staff. To work him out? No, evaluating a pick. I am on. Rafael has called me often to give me his thoughts about college players that I've seen. That's not true.

I'm lying. That's one of your ten lies a day. Yeah. This weekend. Actually, he was second overall in 2009. Oh, 2009. What an absolute bust. He's still playing professionally.

Where? Tanzania. Big basketball league there. Huge. He's playing for Dar City. Anything about Dar City, how are you looking this year, Matt? They're crafty. They're a little undersized, with exception to the beat.

They've got some good wing players. They're looking for a better low post threat because the beat doesn't bring that to them. But I would say they go seven or eight deep. Yeah, but they play with an energy and toughness, and you can bring that every game. They don't turn the ball over. Shooting's not going to be there every day. They have great late game strategy, and they're probably one of the better zone defenders in the French League. Oh, okay.

Or the Tanzanian League. Oh, by the way, former Taiwanese league rebounding leader as well. Yeah, because he's going against the Taiwanese guys that are like 5-9, right?

Well, he's not Taiwanese. I imagine the whole league's not Taiwanese. Dwight Howard was over there for a while. He raked it in two. Yeah. All right, anyways. Why are we talking about his sheep to be? I don't know.

We're talking about obscure jersey names of people. Anything goes Friday. Anything goes Friday. That's why you have to listen to the show because you don't know what we're going to get into. For better or for worse. All right. So, yeah, I'm not encouraged about the Blanco situation,

especially because, again, every time I hear 12 to 16 months, I'm like, I would like to see, and sometimes it's not necessarily just the Astros. It's everybody. When are guys coming back at 12 months? It's like a minefield out there, man. Yeah, guys aren't coming back. No, no.

We should actually be stopped saying that, Frank. Yeah, he's not going to be here. Because you're giving false hope to people. Yeah, we're lucky if you're pitching in 20, 26. It's like Wisnowski, Dana Brown said yesterday, he still hasn't had his Tommy John surgery yet. What? I thought he was up in Dallas.

Maybe he's vacationing first. Do you think he's, when you have a Tommy John, did you think it's sore him just walking around? Do you think it's what? Soar just him walking around? Right now, probably. Are they waiting for, they have to wait for swelling to go down? I don't know. Yeah, but that's been a few weeks.

Yeah. Maybe there's a waiting list. That could be very well the case. I actually could. How many people in this country? The Astros have their own waiting list. You would think with all the Tommy Johns, you'd get like VIP status. I think 10th one's free.

That's terrible. I mean, it may be true, but it's still terrible. No, I think if we were doing Oriol talk or we were doing Blue Jay talk or Angels talk, we'd be talking about the same thing. Tom, the arm injuries, the forearm, the elbows, the shoulders. By the way, the injury with Jake Bloss is a UCL surgery that he had. Oh, Chris. So that's another season ender there for sure.

Oh, gosh. The human body wasn't meant to do it. No. And frankly, if you were able to survive as a major league pitcher with any sort of success and not have to have some sort of major injury, consider yourself blessed. Because even the greats of the grades of the grades have had to have downtime because of that. I mean, look at Justin Verlinder. I had to come back from his.

I mean, it's almost like, and the thing that sickens me a little bit is you hear that high school kids are getting it now more than ever. And when they get it, they're like, that's fine. I'd rather get it now than get it when I'm a major league pitcher, which so few high school pitchers get to a collegiate level, much less any sort of success at the major league level. Yeah, there's so many factors, I think. And we were talking about it actually with Mattress Mac before the show.

It's what you said. It's the kids. It's the emphasis on spin. It's the emphasis on velocity. Right. I think also sports science has gone so far to where we are maximizing our bodies so much to where, you know, from like, you know, even 20 years ago, back to 40, 50 years ago. We're so much better at getting bigger, stronger, faster, but that's going to lead to more injuries, I feel like, for like tendons and ligaments and stuff like that. I have no, no science to back this up.

This is me talking out loud. But it feels like you get these major injuries because the body frames can only handle so much. And we're getting pushed to the limit, basically, is what I'm saying. Bodies are getting pushed more and more and further, further into the limit as sports science approves. You're correct, by the way, Ross. Oh, hey, I got a D1 athlete backing me up. So just like to clarify for the audience, like the same thing, if any track runner were to run so hard, like, essentially the tires will pop. And you, like, okay, I'm going to get better tires, better tires, I'm going to do this.

But you only have a 4B4 engine or whatever, you know. You're going to end up. Yeah, your body is your body, right? You can only change so much. you can only alter so much. No one always told me it was about his legs. The more pressure you put on your knees and your lower body, the better acceleration you get off your pitches.

Well, he's also built like a horse. Everybody can be Dolan Ryan, unfortunately. And I think he is the one-off. He is not the common person. He's one of the exceptions to the rule. I mean, of all the pitchers in history, I mean, what a freak of nature that dude was. All right, it is time for you.

I'm talking about you, Houston, to apologize. Ross, I know you got to apologize to some people. Really? 1202 H-town. What about Thomas Show with Ross? Live from Gallery Furniture. This is Sports Talk 790. Write that down.

Matt has a gut feeling. Man has a gut feeling. On the on. You didn't write it down. I saw you nothing tight at all. Wait, you're in the room? I can't lie to you as easily. No, you're a much better liar when I'm on the road.

And you're seeing me proud of that, I'm not proud at all, Matt. These are, these are a lad. This is the laughter of shame. Laughter of embarrassment. Let's look at yourself. You're a pathetic self with you are. My son is...

Yeah, Cameron Brinkles in the S-I. She's super tall. Did you hear Matt Gass? I should turn my microphone off. That was terrible. That would be a fantastic movie. A couple of single... You know, like wedding craters.

Like wedding crashers, but older. Volleyball. debtors, pressures. What can we name the movie? Two bros. Miltf money. But instead, it's on the 4 U-Tam. By the way, I mean, to give credit what credit's

to do, that may be... Ryan Clark's wife's attractive and RG3's wife's attractive. Okay. Why would you throw that in there? Where are you going with that? No, there's no way to go with it. It's a declarative statement. That's like her. That's what I would do. They didn't bother me. Oh, really?

I don't feel like a lot of people got scared by the flying monkeys. I don't disagree. And then what happened? How do you get rid of the witch? You pour water under? Is that what it was? Yeah, it seemed pretty simple. It's like the war of the worlds.

You're telling me a bottle of those. Build a relationship with the raccoon. Just a squirrel trying to get a nut, Matt? Girl squirrel or male squirrel? Both? They all got to eat. Well, I mean, it is what it is. We don't judge here on the show.

Girls got to eat, too? So you've been around a homosexual squirrel? What? It makes the war go around. 790, the station that we are today. I am obsessed with saying a yay, yay! It's getting disturbing. A yay, yay, yay!

Wow, I can't stop saying it. I'm trying to be better about it. I think I've only done it like twice so far today. I'm proud of you. When is this event, August 2nd? Yeah, we got like two months left. Oh my gosh, it seems like they've been ramping it up, which we appreciate all our wonderful sponsors here.

For sure. They chose the right place to advertise the big three. Yeah, we will try to eliminate the yay-gays to a minimum. Until we get Ice Cube on the show and then we'll do it for like two straight hours. I bet you Bunn, get me. Bunt and Ice Cube tight, are they okay? I imagine. They're probably at least acquaintances.

I mean, one's a West Coast rapper and actor. And Bun, of course, is an entrepreneur. Southeast Texas. Morgal. Southeast Texas mogul. Yeah. And, yeah. Houston slash, well, from Port Arthur, which they represent proudly, UGK.

Okay. RIP to Pimsy. Absolutely. May he rest? How long has it been? I want to say early 2000s. We will spend more time on that, obviously, as the show, progressive. But right now we present to you every day at around this time.

Opportunity to catch up on the news headlines the day. 12.06, time down for the news at noon. And we will go to the Wayne Dahl. Al Trifino of Houston Sports News Media. It's Ross, Little Reale. Oh, I forgot. I was supposed to cut some audio for this, but I got very busy. With what? Just setting everything up and making sure everything's running smoothly over here, you know?

Getting here early. Rolling my sleeves up. We are at Gallo of furniture, by the way, if you want to come by and say hello. Yeah, the 6,06 North Freeway location. Well, of course, we will start with what happened last night at Dyken Park. Big four game is set with the first place Mariners in town. Astros in second place entered the series three and a half back, but after last night's victory, nine to two, they are now just two and a half back. Lance McCullors Jr. started off shaky, walked the first batter, but then struck out the next two. Ended up with eight strikeouts on

91 pitches, Matthew. Could have gotten through five if he were just a little bit more efficient, but at least a step in the right track. And I like the fact that Joe was spot, I gave him an opportunity to at least try to get that but then he can get the victory. Yes. Unfortunately, he was unable to do so. Isn't it funny? He throws four and a third, doesn't get the win. Sean Dubin gets two outs.

He gets the win. Yeah, that ain't fair. It is a little funky to rules. Because why does the guy who barely comes in and finish it up deserve it more so than the guy that did most of the heavy lifting at that point? It's stupid. Baseball wins are stupid. But then O'Kert came in, Brian King.

Caleb Orch shutting it down for six outs as well. Most importantly, though, Bats nine runs scored. Jose Altuve leading the charge with two home runs, four runs batted in. Average up to 243. Step in the right direction. Right. OPS, the Mark of the Beast, 666.

Oh, we got to get that up quickly. We're down. Just off a 666. Yeah, it can't stay where it is. As a matter of fact, probably unless he goes zero plate appearance, is it can't go, it'll be off 666 today. It's fine. Long as he's in the lineup, it'll move around somewhere.

Also, Jeremy Payne with a 2 RBI triple. Karatini with three hits as well. And don't look now, Matt. Jake Myers, still your Astros leader in batting average, hitting 304 after a 1 for 4 night. He had a single that started a two-out rally for the Stroes. Three for nine with runners in scoring position. Home runs from Jose Altovae.

It was a good night at the play for the Stroes. for once, even though Christian Walker was one for five. All right. So with all that said and all the things we've talked about over the first two hours, and for that matter, the first two months of the year, the Astros with the win last night, find themselves two and a half back of Seattle for first place in the AL West. Yes. So that is good for the Stroes. And the Rangers continue to lose. The A's have lost like nine in a row.

Angels don't look like a threat. So at least if you can really at minimum split, maybe even go for a series win now that you've won the opener. It would bode well for the Astros. That's all I want is a split. I would take a series win, but we cannot ask. We need one more win in the next three days. It's very possible.

All right. Elsewhere in sports news, Shea Gilgis Alexander awarded the MVP award before the game two Thursday in Oklahoma City. He scored 38 points in or out to an easy victory for the Oklahoma. City Thunder now up to nothing on the Timberwolves and then tonight you have the Knicks and Pacers Game 2. Knicks at 5.5.5

points favorites in that series. Is it a must win for New York? Nope. Okay. Because look, we have seen teams lose two games at home and go back on the road and win them too. I mean, it's not out of the ordinary. But I will say for the mental health of the New York metropolitan area, and probably for the safety

of any Pacer fan bumping around Madison and Scour garden, you kind of need that victory. or it's going to be very, very, I mean, Indiana is going to be feeling like, I mean, to be up to O. And look, Cambridge Fieldhouse has been very good to the Pacer so far this year. We also mentioned this briefly yesterday, Matt. The college football playoff committee has decided they will go with straight seating. So no automatic bids or revolting in the top four for teams like Boise State and Arizona State. So if it were like last year they would have done the straight seating,

it would have been number one Oregon versus 8, 9, Boise State, number two, Georgia versus 710 SMU. Number three, Texas could have faced Ohio State in a first round matchup. Well, first second round. Yeah, that's right. By round matchup. And then Clemson or Notre Dame would have played Penn State. Oregon would have loved to have seen this bracket rather than what they had to go through last year.

Yeah, I just think there were so many people that were turned off. by a group of five school getting a home field over a power four school. Because the power four schools are going to say, look, if it ain't for us, this thing isn't moving. We're going to make sure that our best get a home field over what you think your best is. By the way, Notre Dame also a big winner of this, too. They under the old rules could not host a game. They now can. Oh, good for them.

I didn't know that, Matt. Thank you for bringing me the news at noon. Yeah. elsewhere. Well, let's go back to baseball real quick. Now, they did host last year in Indiana. I'm talking about a guaranteed top four spot. Oh, okay.

Yeah. Now that's all water under the bridge. Rockies have played 50 games, Matt. Yes. You know how many wins they have? Seven? Eight. Oh, okay.

The worst start in baseball's modern era, which starts after 1901. You have to go back to the 1895 Louisville Colonels, who started 7 and 43. to find a worse start than what the Rockies are doing right now in baseball. Can you name four Rockies? Is Charlie Blackman still there? See, I can't. I'm going to flat out tell you.

I don't follow National League anymore, and I certainly still can't tell you four Rockies. Okay. Nor can I don't think people in Denver can name four Rockies. I don't think so. Now, I'll say this, the only, the nice thing about Coors Field is the field itself. Summer Day in Denver, Colorado. The field is nice. Hey, I bet the tickets are cheap now.

Yeah. Value plan Yeah they should start giving two first If you're the Colorado's Rockies marketing team What are you doing? How do you spin in this bad boy? I forgot what do the Astros do 10 years ago When the Astros were not very good

What are they doing 2012, 13, 14, 15 to get people in the building? They didn't get them in. They didn't get them in. Didn't they do like bundles and stuff? Yeah, stuff like that. I don't know who any of you Wasn't one of the campaigns for the Astros

Root, root, root. Remember that? Yeah, it was terrible. terrible. They didn't have out. Man, I don't know who any of these brothers are. Kyle Freeland. I mean, I've heard of him. Hermann Marquez. I know him.

Okay. Angel Chevely? Why not? Hunter Goodman? Everybody has a negative war on this roster. Mickey Moniac? I've heard of him. This is terrible. They fired their manager by Black and it has not turned out to be.

Wait, it wasn't his fault, turns up. Yeah. Wait, Chris Bryant is on the Rockies? The Chris Bryant? No, not the 35-year-old Chris Bryant. He's only 33, apparently. This is incredible. Rocky or not coming up on, believe it or not?

We're not doing believe it. Are we doing believe it or not that? No. Okay. All right, that, my friends, the news at noon. I got a question for you that we'll come back and discuss at 713-212-5-790. Remember, it's an anything goes Friday here on the show. We haven't done something in American basketball in seven years.

You know what that is? Think about it. I had an MVP without a tattoo. I mean, with tattoos. I think that's nine years. Nine years of NBA MVP's with no tattoos. Last one was Steph Curry, I think, or something like that. Yeah, is that true?

I saw that on Twitter, yeah. Oh, that wasn't when I was going on. Isn't that crazy? That is kind of crazy. Yonis, Shea Gilges Alexander, Russ Westbrook, James Harden. So tattoos, the lack thereof hurts MVP chances. Yes.

All right. More on that a minute. It's 1215. We are coming to you today from Gallery Furniture at 6,06 I-45 North between Tiville and Parker. We are with you today until 2 o'clock. Galleries open every day from 10 o'clock until 10. And when you buy from Gallery Furniture, your delivery is free, free, free. Old furniture can also be hauled off, delivery within three to four hours in a Houston area home,

all during the Super Memorial Day sale going on right now here at Gallery Furniture. All right, anything goes Friday continues here from Gallery Furniture. Furniture at 6,006, I-45 north between Tibble and Parker. Real quick, I tease this before the break. We haven't done something in American basketball in quite some time, and that is vote on American MVP. Oh. The last American MVP was James Harden in 2017-18.

Since then, Janus, Janus, Yokic, Joel Embed, Yolkid, Yokic, SGA, who's from Canada. I mean, Embedd's American, though. He plays for America in the Olympics. From Cameroon, though. Yeah, I know. Any thought on that or total difference? The international game has been great. It's been, I think quite frankly, it's what the NFL wants to try to go for and build.

Yeah. With this Olympic stuff and these international games. And I think it's great. I think it's great for the long-term health league. These great players, the more great players you can have in the league, which I think is as talented as it's ever been, because of the world and how it's grown and all these foreign players that you have. and it's a great mix.

I think it's good. There is a part of me that would be concerned about it, but I'm going to say I'm not because of one simple thing. These international players, their American fan base, has translated to being fans of theirs. Does that make sense to you?

I love Nicoliyokic. There are 10, 11, 12-year-old kids that are wearing Janus jerseys. There are 15-year-olds that are wearing Yokic jerseys. I don't think that basketball fans, especially youth, particularly care where they're from. I don't think anybody's ever going, I'm not going to watch a particular NBA basketball game because Joel Embed is from Camero. You know what I'm saying? It hasn't hurt.

Now, sometimes if you get too much international persuasion, you can't have players that would relate. But do you think there's anybody in Oklahoma City that's not the biggest diehard fan of Shade Gilders Alexander and doesn't care that he's from Canada? No. There's not a single person that does. Yeah, we can go down the list. I mean, like you said, Noot, Yolich in Denver, I don't know, Dirk Novitskyy. Hakem Olazian ones in Nigeria. Nobody cared here to use it.

Nobody, we didn't care. We don't care. So I would say it doesn't hurt. Now, if you are a, does it indict the American basketball game? It could. I'll just bring it up the voting. The top three is some of those guys you're mentioning, Shaggildjus, Nicolioch, Yonkich, Janus. But then it's Jason Taten, Donovan Mitchell, LeBron James, Kate Cunningham, Anthony Edwards, Steph,

Jalen Brunson, James Harden, Evan Mobley. All Americans, I believe. Right, that's right. That's right. All right, let's go to the phones and talk to Cameron on the Astros at 1223. Cameron, good afternoon. What's going on? Hey, good afternoon, gentlemen. Happy Friday. Same to you. Our player could be from North Korea. Yeah, thank you.

Our player could be from North Korea, as long as they're putting up points. I don't care where they're from. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. I just wanted to pick your brain about possible free agency pickups this season for the Astros, specifically with the rotation because, man, we're just getting killed left and right. And also on a, anything goes Friday, I would like to elect a shut-cho bum ass up to the sun

because I can only make it 20 minutes on the playground playing with my kids before we're all dying. And with that, I'm out. Oh, you know what? That's fine. It is anything that goes Friday. You want to blame the sun? That's that time of the year.

Now, if you tell the son to go away, the more all dead. But so I'm going to be respectful to the sun to a certain extent. Yes. That's the reason why God, created sunglasses. Hmm. He did?

Or manufacturers. I mean, companies. Okay, pitching prospects. You know what? It was interesting. Look at the 2025 free agent class for pitchers. Well, what does MLB trade rumors? Actually isn't a bad website for that kind of stuff.

They're a great website. But I'll say this. I found that amusing that there was Paul Scheen's rumors of him moving leaving Pittsburgh that were quickly shut down by the pirates and they have to be. Now, Paul Skeens is going to leave Pittsburgh. It's not a matter of if it's going to be when.

It's going to be, does he have one year left on his contract? Does he have two years left? Is he going to sign with the Yankees or is he going to sign with the Dodgers? I mean, if the pirates were smart, they would buy out every arbitration year he's got coming up and they would sign him to a 12 to 13 year contract. But they're not going to do that because

the Pittsburgh pirates have never done that before. They continue to be a what was me organization, and thus the reason why they have been largely irrelevant for the last 25 years. Has Pittsburgh been relevant since Barry left? I'm sure there's something I'm sure there's some playoff appearance.

Some more in the mix. It's not coming to mind. It's not coming to mind. Point being, he's not there long for Pittsburgh. They're going to go get a haul of players. One of the most forgettable franchise, the most forgettable franchise in baseball right now?

No, the Rockies would be. See, but the Rockies are at least notable. They're bad you talk about them. Nobody talks about the pirates. Well, I mean, they're not by themselves. You could put the Cincinnati Reds in that mix. I'll put the Reds in that mix, too. You could put, I wouldn't say the Guardians because they've been the playoffs.

The Twins are on the playoffs. I'm going to say one of the bottom three most forgettable franchises. Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh Pirates are still. Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Colorado, Miami for sure. They had a little wild card run 13, 14, 15. The A's are large and forgettable. I mean, the reason why they were talking about the A is because they're moving to Las Vegas.

That's what I'm saying. It's like in the conversation, if we looked at it, we went through the tapes and we put the last year of this show, which baseball teams we brought up the least. Pirates, Rockies, except when they were playing the Astros. Well, you know what you can do? You can also go to MLB.com, but you could go ask them McTaggar and say which of the 30 websites are doing well on traffic, and they would give you an indication. My guess, the Yankees, the Mets, the Dodgers, the Cubs do very well when it's web traffic.

Astros frankly do pretty well in there. But I'm going to assume that... Nationals. I'm sure... Nationals.com probably not moving the number too much. So to give the Cameron's question, at this point, there aren't teams dangling pictures out there. But as you get closer to the July 31st deadline

and you start to figure out who is going to separate themselves from being, hey, we got a shot at this to, hey, we got no shot at this. Then you have to look at the contract years. And then you'll start... I would think probably Rossi by June 15th, the Buster Olney's, the Jeff Passies, the other folks that cover the national game, the Rosenthal's, we'll start throwing some names out there. But at this point, I've seen nothing except for the ridiculous Paul Skeens

might be available conversation that I've necessarily seen that would move the needle in terms of pitchers that come in here and make an immediate impact. Looks like there's a lot of names of some guys that are going to be free agents. I brought up the MLB trade rumors looks like you were talking about. I mean, we're going to go through every guy, but I mean, Dylan Sees,

Chris Bassett, Shane Bieber, Jack Flaherty, Lucas Gialito. Flaherty was brought up a couple of years ago, was he now? Last year for the trade deadline. Clead Kershaw,

Michael Lorenzen. I mean, there's guys, Seth Lugo. I'm skipping over a bunch of names. Oh, Dustin May is going to be a free agent? The Dodgers? But I've got one terrible problem for you. The Astros.

Do you know how hard it is for for Dana to pull out minor league prospects? I mean, it's painful to him. I know. Here's what Dana's got to think about, gang. He's got to say, are we one pitcher away from winning the division

and bowing out in the first round of the playoffs? Or are we one pitcher away and maybe a second baseman better bat, whatever, position is from not only winning the American League West, but legitimately challenging the Yankees and who else would be a

challenge in the America League? I don't count Seattle's a challenger. I don't count. Detroit Tigers, Franklin. They're ahead of you right now. They're whipping your ass. That's true. Tigers. Tigers. Are they legitimately,

are they one to two players away from beating the Tigers in a five game or seven game series? Are they one away from beating the Yankees or whatever the case may be? that's where Dana's going to have to go, what can I give up, how much are I willing to give up just to win the division and keep the playoff streak alive, or how much do I have to give up in order to be a legitimate World Series contender? And it's almost how much do you want to balance to keep, quite frankly,

the fans invested, to keep selling tickets, to keep interest up in the team, to keep things financially afloat. Because, yeah, when you know you're going to take it on the chin and you're going to lose, you know, when you're in a full-on tank, You know that going in. So that's what the Astros have to decide, too, because right now, the expectations of the fans are that the Astros are going to win the division and come back to playoffs. I mean, I'm going to tell you something really brutally honest right now. We feel it here at the station.

Yes. We feel it in our bones. We don't have tangible evidence of it. But we feel like that y'all have lost a little interest in them. Interest, conversation. The attendance hasn't been great, really. I mean, this could be a fickle town to where it happened last year at the start with a bad start of the start. season. The crowds were down. They started winning. Crowds come back. It's a very simple game.

You win. If you build it, they will come. But unfortunately, our city has a larger checkout factor than other sports cities. Yeah. And on Dana Brown and making a trade, I mean, um, everybody thought that they gave up the world for you say, Kikuchi, but if you could make a similar type trade, where I mean, Joey Lopofito is still in AAA. Will Wagner's hitting 186 for the

Blue Jays, and 267 for Buffalo. And Jake Blas has UCL injury, yeah. But of course, I mean, you don't know that going into the trade. These guys had some semblance of value. Right. But can you make a trade like that where it's a couple of guys? And you make a move because you need starting pitching help at the major league level. You do.

1231, Sports Talk 790. Matt and Ross with you from McGowanery, Furniture. We're with you for another 90 minutes here on Sports Talk 790. 713212-2-5-790 7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-90 let me ask you this question why have you and your bros started to not back off but disengage a little bit with the Astros does the record is it just the record it's got to be just the record right because I still see people come into gallery furniture today everybody still wearing Astros gear that's true I'm not saying that you guys I already bought the gear I'm aware it yeah but I mean we've I would say 50% of the people that have

in here have worn Astros gear. So we're still at Astros Town. We saw Astros gear all over the place in Lake Charles the last couple of days. That's true. But it just feels like the tide of indifference is starting to roll in. Look at you. Wow. May I copyright that?

Sure. 713-212-5-7-90. All right. As you know, if you've listened to the show for any length of time, I don't follow a tremendous amount of current singers. In fact, the answer would probably be none. Oh, you love George Winton, the Masked singer, I thought. I've never watched one episode of that horrific show.

I did on accident. It looks like it's the lowest common denominator of viewers, excuse me, that you'd ever want to find. What? I hiccup because you brought me a squirt. No, no. Excuse me? You brought me a squirt. It's delicious.

Listen. Yeah, I went to the back here and got you a squirt. Yes, you did. To my point. My music tastes are basically 1970 to 1984, give or take. There's a little bit of exceptions after and certainly before the Beatles. Anytime I find one of my all-time faves getting older and or sickly, it bothers me. Why does it bother you?

Because. It's natural, Matt. This is natural. It doesn't mean not to enjoy it. Billy Joel is canceling all of his concerts. He has a brain disorder diagnosis. Yeah. Not a good sign.

Now, to be fair, he's lived five lives. Yeah, wouldn't he drinking pine sall? He's ingested about and smoked and drank so many things that would kill so many other people. It's been a good run. Well, I mean, he's not dead yet. He said it's been a good run. You heard him. What?

That's so interesting. He is, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I'm being realistic. He's 76 years old. Okay. So, and made hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. Mm-hmm.

And is one of the best performers of the last 50 years. An all-time, Billie Joel is an all-time great. Give me one of his, your favorite songs. Oh, there's too many to count. Like, of yours. You start with piano man. Piano Man, uptown, not uptown girls, horrible. Uptown girls are horrible.

My life, she's always a woman to me. Just the way you are. Just where you are, the longest time. Down Eastern Alexa, we didn't start the fire. I mean, you go on and on and on and on. I mean, it's just unbelievable. But he's 76 years old, and you have to slow down. Unfortunately, he's not slowing down because he wants to.

It's because his body is telling him he has to slow down. But it's just tough. I'm sorry, Matt. That's all I got. I just wanted to say that. Why does it make you think about your own mortality, Matt? No, not at all. Why is it so tough for you?

Because he's one of my favorite all-time performers, and thankfully I was able to see him in concert at Dykin Park a couple of years back. What do you think of the best strategy to tackle these feelings, Matt? Going on with the rest of my life? Okay. I think that's correct. Thank you. But I will be sad when he passes.

And I will listen to the Billy Joel channel on my phone for about seven consecutive days when he passes, whenever that is. Hopefully it's time for a long time. But my guess is, if you were planning on seeing Billy Joel, it's probably not going to happen. Well, good thing I saw him at Minut, maybe a couple years ago. Yes, you did. I was there with you and your brother. I tried to furiously sell the tickets, couldn't get a good value. I thought I was going to be able to flip them. Yeah, you didn't. You lose.

Good day, sir. I went to the show. It was solid. It was very good. Me and Amclan went with our wives. We had a fantastic time. Yeah, I went with my brother. What a good time? Okay, so before go the phones. What? Put him.

Where is he on your list? If you were to describe a list. I don't put him behind the velvet rope of the grate of the grates to me. But if he's there for you, that's okay. Thank you. I'll leave it at that. Now, record, he's no Kendrick Lamar. I get it.

He's slightly overrated to me. I'm fine words. Let's go talk to some people. John in the Beltway, 1231 on 790. John, thank you for holding a good afternoon. Hey Matt I know this is probably an ignorant question but I'm going to ask it anyways

Let me tell you first of all John We take ignorant questions all the time Number two it's anything goes Friday So you have extraordinary long leash John take your time and ask the stupidest question You could possibly ask go ahead Okay I appreciate that makes me feel better

Sure There's the rash of Tommy John surgery is happening for the Astros. I just want to question if there's anything happening with the Astros, like pitching coaches, pitching staff. There was a huge emphasis on like increasing spin rate and things like that, and they've been extremely successful, granted, with a lot of the pitchers that they brought in and developed. but has

is there any chance that that's had any effect on the amount of Tommy John surgeries we've had or is it random? Granted, I'm just grasping for straws at this point. No, no, no, and by the way, that is not a stupid question. So what I'm going to, and I don't want to put words in your mouth here, are you asking me, do you believe the Astros medical organization,

part of the organization, and or it's pitching coaches or anything else, are perhaps a little more dangerous when it comes to watching over arms and have maybe perhaps above normal injury rate than, say, the other 29 teams? Yeah, I think not so much the medical staff, but maybe just the approach to pitching with trying to really increase that spin rate. And, again, like, I'm ignorant to how that happens with arm movements and everything. but if that's a factor into.

Yeah. And by the way, John, I've been doing this for 30 years. That was not even close to an ignorant question. Thank you for the phone call. Okay. Not that. You know, let me go to a break. Let me go to a break and we'll answer that question because I think it's fair to do it that way,

because it's going to take a little longer. 713-212-5-790. We'll come back and answer that when we come back. 7-1-3-212-5-7-9. We're here at Gallery Furniture, 6,06, I-45, south between Tidwell and Parker. It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. This is Sports Talk 790. All right, Jonathan and Ross, I've found my non-floor story.

It comes to you from Pennsylvania. We'll have it for you coming up at about 40 minutes from now. All right. To our previous caller Cameron, I have to be measured because I don't know 90% of the answer. And the question was, are the Astros doing things with spin rates? Are they doing things with their medical staff? but I think most of it was about the what was about the pitching staff.

So I don't know much more than you do. All I can tell you is spin rates are very important to every major league baseball team. So I would say, and maybe I'm being naive, Ross, and if I am, I apologize. I don't think the Astros are doing anything out of the ordinary of other 29 teams that would all of a sudden add to the increased number of arms within their organization that are suffering with arm ailments because of what is being taught? Yeah, I think they take it slow with guys. It's not like they're putting guys out there for 120 pitches and overtaxing them.

And the emphasis on spend rate and velo is league-wide. It's not only league-wide. It's in college sports. It's in high school sports. It's everywhere. It did a lot of it start with Jeff Luno and the spin rate. revolution, this organization did have a lot to do with it, but that we're talking 10, 12 years ago at this point. Everybody's caught up to that game. So yeah, is there anybody in major league

baseball in their pitching staff, whether it's in the minor league level or at the professional level, that don't talk about spin right? And they say, hey, don't spin it. Yeah, there's no chance of that. All right. So now the question becomes, once the player gets hurt, are they doing things to make sure the process? I was listening to Channel Romis' podcast yesterday after I left Italian to brewing. And basically, he said a couple of years ago that James Click admitted that they brought, I can't remember who the pitcher was, but they brought somebody back sooner than they were supposed to.

I don't know if it was Garcia or not, but somebody came back fast than they were supposed to, and that maybe if there needs to be an adjustment within the Astros organization, it's watching over the recuperation process. Yeah, I mean, Luis Garcia got shut down. Lance McCuller's Jr. got shut down. I think Jake Myers, when he first came back from the shoulder. older injury. Yes, the labrum injury, yeah.

Was brought back a little bit too early as well. So if there is something that maybe the Astros could do a little digging about, it's about who gives the go-go to accelerate the recuperation process or slow it down properly. That probably is more of an issue than itself. Astros instructions. But the reason why I'm being measured about it is because we don't talk to the trainers. they don't make them available. Not that I would go chase down the Astros train if I wanted to,

but there are beatwriters on the team that want to get questions about their recuperation process, and the Astros as an organization have said, we don't let our trainers speak to the media. So you're kind of a guessing game. You're in the dark. I mean, yeah. Some organizations want to be more transparent. The Astros don't elect to do so.

And that's their right. No, and they're not the only ones. Doesn't mean I like it. But it does it? Because I always believe that the more you don't, talk, the more you hide, and I would never want to be known as someone like that. Now, you don't have to give out all company secrets. I get that.

I respect that. I just don't, I would not want to be an organization that would be known as what we're trying to hide facts from its audience. And again, you are dealing with personal people's personal medical situations, but this is a little bit different. This is a sport that people, everything, all of the good and bad is out there to be discussed. Trying to compare a sports team to your family's medical situation as two different animals.

So, yeah, I would say generally speaking, I don't think the Astros are doing anything out of line. But some of that we can't answer because we don't hear from the... We're not in 30 meeting rooms. We're not in 30 coaching pitching coaching staffs. We don't necessarily know. But on its face, everybody prioritizes Velo and spin rate these days. And it has been a rash of bad luck, it feels like.

But, I mean, there are guys who are undergoing... Tommy John surgery all over the league. It's been a storyline, especially since the pitch clock has come into Vogue. It's something that the players' association has been monitoring. It's something that the owners and the Major League Baseball side

is monitoring, and probably the players think it's a little bit more of the pitch clock than maybe the owners do. That's something I really hope that Manfred or anybody in the baseball side doesn't turn a blind out of this. Because I just don't want shoulders being shrug going, well, that's just how baseball works.

Because there are too many people. There are, and here's the thing, Ross, you got too many baseball teams that are spending money on guys that aren't pitching. Do you, I mean, even though we feel bad for Lance McCullors, is Lance McCullors injuries because of the sport that he plays, or is it because he's not getting proper instruction

or his body just doesn't cooperate? There's still millions of dollars of money being paid out by owners for players who are not playing. Yeah, I was kind of looking into this when we were talking about yesterday, The only article I could find from last year, Tony Clark, who was head of the Players Association, basically released a statement saying,

hey, we got to look at this with these injuries. And then, of course, Major League Baseball side, nothing to worry about, actually, if you look, numbers are down because they're factoring in minor league, which a pitch clock has been there for more years. Right. So when you bring in those guys, the injuries maybe have been less, but also we're a year behind on that data now.

So who knows? Let's go to Sheena at 1255. Hi, Sheena. Hi, good afternoon. So yeah, I was just calling in about this topic. So, you know, from what I've read and, you know, I've tried to look up a few things about this over the years, but it's not as much about spin rate, but just overall workload and then strength and conditioning of the arm, not like conditioning with more and more pitches, but conditioning in the gym and certain exercises to kind of get that arm strength and conditioning up.

And I'm wondering for Blanco if what contributed to it some is his workload last year, his innings pitch was greatly increased from 2023. I think 2023 had like less than 100 innings. Well, he was also a full-time. Sheena, you know, he was a full-time starter for the first time in his career too. So that goes a long way. So, yeah, I'm wondering if just, you know, obviously it's like Javier, I think 20-22, 20-23 seasons were closer even with his workload pitching.

And I'm not blamed the Astros for Blanco's pitching a lot more last season. He was good, and it was out of necessity. We needed him in the rotation. So, you know, I'm not blaming them for that. But was his arm really conditioned and ready to be pitching like 162 innings or something like that? That was. It's like just that increased kind of, you know, more of this was injury and issues from last year that have just now started to show. But because of last year's workload and that he wasn't really conditioned and ready for this.

his arm structurally. Well, if that's the case, you know, if that's a good call there. If that is the case, then manually baseball's got a big problem because these athletes, these pitchers are not going to get the compensation they want because their shelf lives are going to be much more limited

because part of their careers, Ross, are going to be spent on the injured list because of forearm strains and Tommy John. You know who also, this is also a problem for, running backs in the NFL. They say these guys only have certain shelf lives. Maybe we need to start conditioning ourselves to major league pitchers only being able to go a certain number of innings for a certain period of time. Wasn't there a period last year where they were kind of monitoring him or keeping Rinal Blanco on an innings or a pitch count?

Or maybe they skipped him a start or something like that. They definitely skipped him a start. He threw 167 innings last year and that's not super high. I think they were keeping an eye on him, trying to monitor him, try not to overwork him. And they do that with all their pitchers. So let me ask you this. Why were guys in the 70s and 80s throwing 200 innings and not thinking twice about it? And now we all of a sudden wig out over guy that throws 167.

I think that's a little bit of it's called survivorship bias. If we can get it. I know. You are the king of biases. I know. But explain yourself if you want to. Go ahead. Okay, for example, your grandmother has a toaster that she's had for 30 years.

You're like, man, they don't make toasters like they used to. This toaster lasts 30 years. Well, the 10 toasters that failed, your grandmother doesn't have. You never saw them, right? So we're biased towards the survivor. So the 100 pitchers that got 200 innings, we remember them. All the pitchers threw 200 innings. What about the 100 guys who blew their arms out?

What about the 100 guys who got Tommy John before there was Tommy John, and their careers were over as prospects, as A ball players, AA, AAA, and young major league players. We don't remember those guys. While your bias is accurate, it still doesn't give me the answer of why were there so many that did it. and now throwing 200 now in 2025 is such an abnormality. Because they're trying to limit those injuries. Because they're trying to prevent those guys.

But if you tried to limit Blanco, it didn't help. Yeah. In 20 years from now, when we're telling our kids about the old Astros back in the day, we're not going to bring up Renal Blanco. So he doesn't exist in our mind. But we're living through it now. We're talking about it now. Yeah.

You ask me an answer. No, no. You are the bias, man. Billy Joe says sing a song Your Piano Man. A bias, A bias man. Piano Man is a fantastic song.

All-timer. By one of the all-time grades? I mean, the all-time grades. 12-58, all-time. 7-13-212-5-790. I don't know. If you're asking pitchers to go from 70 to 160 and they want to be a starter,

are we going to get rid of starting pitching? Are we going to say starting pitchers can only go five innings? Is that what we're going to try to save them? I mean, if that's the case, then you're going to have to expand pitching staffs. You're going to be burning elbows and four arms of relievers who pitch three times in four days. I mean, I don't know. Like I said, I think it's a combination of things. And also back in those days, guys weren't throwing as hard.

And the emphasis on spin and the emphasis, you got more guys pitching to contact back in the day. I mean, it was just a different ball game. All right. One of the guys that has had a lot of injuries is Lance McCullors. And we'll hear from him starting the final hour of the Matt Thomas. the show with Ross. 713, 212.1.790. We're happy.

7132-1-2-5 is 790. 105 on Sports Talk. 7-90. We'll get back on the phones in a little bit, but right now, after the win yesterday for the Astros 9-2 over the Seattle Mariners, we had Lance McCullers on the mound, going to the fifth inning. Joe Spotted trying to get his starter of victory. It would have been first in a couple of years, and unfortunately could not get out of the fifth, which meant he did not get the victory, but he did speak to the media after

the game. Ross, what did he have to say? Yes, I actually didn't prepare Jonathan on this, Matt, so this is my fault. But Lance McCullors Jr. said he was feeling good physically. Jonathan, if you can go to KBME and have that ready, just let me know where you have it. But he spoke at length to media. And normally, Matt, I know you do post-game shows as well, and you don't like to play like super long post-game availabilities.

But good stuff from Lance McCullors, Jr. He's got a lot of thoughts on where he is at physically and wanting to pitch deeper in games, knowing that there is pressure now with Ronell Blanco going down like he did and Hayden Wesniewski as well and he this rotation's got holes to fill and Lance McCulley's Jr. knows that he is part of that. Yeah. Just tell me when you have that, Jonathan. This is my fault, Matt.

I should have talked to Jonathan. I'm going to take all the blame on this. I'm sorry. All right. Follow Matt, SportsMT on Instagram. Follow SportsMT. If we could have the McCullors feeling good physically, it is in the KBME audio whenever you're ready.

He's even paying attention to the show right now? I hope so. I hope he is too. Well, it sounds like he may have stepped out, and that's okay. Anyways, how are you, Matt? I'm good. Basically what he said, he's feeling good physically. He says he has more in the tank,

and he got up to 91 pitches, could have gotten to five innings. So all sounds good. Of course, we'll just keep on plowing forward here, and he's going to keep going on the mound, as long as he's not embarrassing himself, like he did in that red start where he only got one inning and gave up seven earned runs because the Astros need him now.

The leeches got longer. They have no other options. They really don't. I think if this were more, if Wazneski and a world with Wesneski and Blanco are ready to go, you could have had maybe a few more starts where they really have to start making a hard decision

like you've got feeling what was the last week. Yeah, and the hard decisions is, it will be for Dana Brown, it looks like, because here's the thing. And it's not an indictment against Lance, but it kind of deals in the reality. Lance McCuller's is your third started right now. Excuse me?

Erigetti's cast is off, probably at least what is Dana Brown said, until July until we see him. Wisniewski is done for the year. Who else has we got? I'm drawing blank on the two other pictures that have thrown lately. Who are the two pictures? I'm sorry. Jesus. I was texting.

Stop. I hate that. Now I'm blanking. You're making me blank all of a sudden. I'm sorry. You're talking about it. Colton, Gordon? Gusto and Gordon.

Gusto and Gordon. Geston and Gordon, yeah. Those aren't your thirds. Those are in rotation, out rotation, guys. Lance McCullors is your third start. Those are your third start. For spot starts. I felt like I will stick to this.

They should have addressed. Something should have addressed in the off season. No, but see, I disagree with you. You just lost, you're losing three stars. There is no team in baseball that can withstand three starting pitchers. No, yeah, but even then, you're going to Ryan Augustine, you're going to A.J. Blueball, and you're going to Colton Gordon.

But what else you're supposed to do? You can't just have five guys. You can have six starting pitchers, a guy who's a long reliever, or a veteran are ready to go, yeah. Because this isn't, it's not, if it's when with these pitching injuries now. So you're telling me, another pitcher with an area of five who was a spot starter would have made you feel better about the rotation? I'm telling you, if you go into the season saying these are our five starters and this is, we're going to hold on for dear life.

That's a bad plan. Well, I think Blueball is considered a guy they want to use wasn't ready just yet. Okay. Gusto was a guy they thought highly up before the start of the spring. Okay. I mean, again, look, there's plenty of the criticisms the Astros about. I just think crushing them right now, I'm not saying you're crushing it.

I'm not crushing them. That any team loses three-fifths of your starting rotation for any length of time. Now, Erigone will be coming back. Yes. Is going to suffer. And I think that the Astros right now are suffering because of, not because the depth wasn't nine deep, it was because you lost 60. percent of your starting day rotation.

They used like 10 guys last year, whatever it was starting. It was like that the last couple of years, it's you never, you never have to go to just five guys. So yes, I would have liked a veteran, some veteran guy on like a $10, $15 million deal, whatever it would be. Another option. Yeah, I don't know. What if that guy would have been terrible.

I mean, and, you mean, he could have gotten hurt. I mean, you could also, I mean, if you're spending $6 million for a guy's going to area of five and a half i mean put it this way you know what you wanted i know what you wanted you wanted them to three sign uh you say kakuchi yeah that sounds great although he got a kind of a big deal from the angels he got a super big deal from the angels i mean yeah that type of guy i mean i'll have to go look and see what free agents were signed in this off season but i mean did you want did you want jordan montgomery to come here no i didn't want i'm not i'm not calling for that okay well but i mean he was coming off a terrible season he would have

been probably a better value. He probably would have. You say Kikuchi, I'm looking up his stats right now. He is on the year. Oh, is he got a win yet? Let me look here. I mean, I'm not serious. Oh, yeah.

He's 0 and 4 with an area 3 and 1 half. So he's obviously getting zero run support. His whip is 1.44. That's not great. No. He's losing. So you would have spent. No.

$17 million a year, because that's what the Kakucci, he got crazy money, did he not? He wanted to get multiple years for a guy who's pitching 10 games. He's owing four with an earning of $3.50. Again, criticize what you want. If you want to criticize, I'm not saying you per se. If you want to criticize them not finding a legitimate everyday starting second basement when the decision was made to move Jose to left, I'll give you that.

If you want to criticize moving Kyle Tucker this year, I'll give you that. if you want to say that you spent too much money on Josh Hader and that maybe you should have spent that money elsewhere, I give you that. But 60% of your starting rotation, Gonzo, you were going to have to be left with what you're seeing right now. And praying. All right, here's some pitchers who signed one-year deals in this last off-season.

Justin Verlander, Charlie Morton, Andrew Heaney, Kyle Hendricks, Clayton Kirschall, Shane Bieber, Max Scherzer, Patrick Corbyn, Jose Cantana, Michael Lorenzen, Alex Cobb. I'm asking for just one of those types of guys. $15 million, veteran guy can get you some innings. Obviously it wouldn't hurt, but I don't know. To me again. Chris Flexen was on a minor league deal.

You've lost one guy for a month and going to lose in front of two. And you've got two guys that aren't going to see the field probably until 2027. That's tough. Let's go to Dave in spring at 112 on 7-Hunting. Hi, Dave. Hey, guys, enjoy the show. I'm with Matt, first of all, and Billy Joel. I've got to put him on the A list there.

If nothing else, being married to Christy Brinkley during her prime, puts him on that list. For singing? Well, for whatever, just for everything he's done. Billy Joel's a blessed life, put it that way. Well, I didn't say he didn't have a whole thing hit list. Certainly have. About the pitching, I was listening to you guys talk about how guys in the old days didn't seem to get as many of these kinds of injuries.

And, you know, I'm an old guy, so I'm remembering, like, Tom Seaver and Steve Carlton and Jim Palmer. And I don't remember those guys throwing tons of sliders. I mean, they were fastball, curveball, change-up guys. And I think that's part of what's happened with the modern baseball is, you know, introducing all these, you know, are these pitches that have, you know, that put so much torque on the arm. And you look at, you know, I know he threw the screwball, but an example would be Fernando Valenzuela. You know, throwing a pitch. that makes you unhittable for a period of time,

but then just ruins you physically. Rest in peace, by the way. So anyway, just throw that in there about the changes and the pitches. All right. Thank you very much. I do think the sliders hurt. You are throwing violently with an awkward angle to your arm and your forearm and your elbow. I think, yeah.

But let me take it. Slaughter just get you paid, Ross. They just do. Changeups don't get you paid. And sweepers. Hey, changeups are becoming vogue the last couple of years. I love the change up. Along with the split change.

Which people like. You don't throw enough of Ephus pitches anymore, Major League Baseball. That wouldn't have pretty wear and tearing your arm? I threw a nasty Ephis pitch. Yeah. I threw a nasty Ephes pitch back in the day. Of course, I was also called my fastball. Take my wife, please.

7-1-3-212-5-7-9. That's terrible. 713-212-5-790. Our host today has been Jim McIntybell, the savior of our community. Yes. You had 200 people, veterans combined in and get some beds, did you not? We did. They were all great, and they lined up about 3 in the morning and camped out.

They weren't afraid of camping out on the north side, so they all got a great match as they're happy, and we're happy for them. God bless the veterans, otherwise we wouldn't be here. Well, thank you for having us out here today. I am fascinated by the sports aspect of your career, and I was just telling the audience earlier today about how much sports memorabilia is in here. What is your... I know the Astros winning the World Series,

huge on your list. Give me that list of two to five of your greatest experiences in terms of just being around either sports people or being around the sports part of your business. Probably number one would have to be... You know, I played on the national championship team in Texas, 6970.

All right. I was on the... bench but I played that was quite you were on the score sheet I was not quite an experience the uh vince is 2005 Super Bowl I mean Nashville you were there for that yeah I was there okay

and um the Rock is 94 95 I was there for that as you were you were yeah when they practiced there at west side that was quite the time yeah the tennis Masters Cup where roger Frederick was 10 and though at west side tennis club that was good dang you know my favorite moment for you you don't remember this

Ross, Mac tried to bring the Olympics to Texas in 2008. Oh, okay. And we went to Atlanta in 1994. Was that London or Beijing? I can't remember. I don't remember who it was. Yeah, we missed what it was. It wasn't Houston.

Yeah, that's fine. So we were doing some shows. Mack got an area in a Centennial Olympic Plaza, and he brought all these Olympic athletes, and he brought Carrie Struggan on a sofa, or whatever it was. And he says, Matt, he says, where are you staying? I said, well, I'm in this small dorm in a college.

And the person sleeping next to me is really snoring a lot. Because I'm an Olympic employee. And he goes, hold on a second. You open up this sheet. A little sheet you put on a bed. And he goes, all right, you're going to stay at this hotel, this, this, this day, and this day. You're going to stay at this hotel, this day, this day. So that was the nicest thing you ever did for me.

And I, again, I've told everybody for years and years and years, how you saved my life. I got a good night's sleep, even though I was in Atlanta. And the best part was all the rooms in Atlanta were tied to a food bill. too. You had to spend money on food. So I went downstairs. He said, go eat whatever you want. If you want steak one day, pancakes and eggs, do it. So here I am. One day, I got Lee Brown, who was the police chief at the time, maybe even the mayor was there. He, me, Lee Brown, and Carl Lewis are knocking back breakfast together. Wow. Amazing experience. That's great. That's pretty cool.

So was that, that Texas 2008, was that a learning experience or like, I never should have done that to begin with? Was the Olympic experience just a hot mess? That was fun. My daughter was a gymnast for Bella and Marta, and we supported Bella and Marta for 30 years, so that was part of it, and it was fun all the way around. Wouldn't trade it. Yeah.

And you mentioned Westside Tennis Club. Are you still involved with that? Yeah. My wife runs it. It's now more of a family-type thing, not so heavily tennis-oriented, but it's doing very well. Yeah, and you were involved in the horse racing for a little bit of that as well, and Kentucky Derby.

Do you know people there? I just, yeah. Oh, here it comes. He's been bringing this up for years. He wants to go to the Kentucky Derby. My wife wants to go. I guess the Kentucky Derby. Yeah, but I mean, I didn't, I don't want to go for less than $15,000.

I'm thinking of that. He's got to stay in Lexington and drive over. I know. As I'm saying, there's nowhere to stay in Louisville. Well, that's for sure. So what do you got going on this weekend? We're having a big Memorial Day sale, inviting everybody out. We started out for the great veterans' mattress giveaway,

and we're glad to have you guys out here from 790 talking to people. Come out and buy that recliner to watch the upcoming football season not far away and watch the Astros get hot and hopefully win the World Series. You know, Jim McAville, a frequent caller to the 10th inning calling show. Yeah, he has. Yeah, I've talked to him as well. He called the nightcap for one time as well. I think I was yelling at somebody.

My wife tells me not to call when I'm angry. No, no. You should. That's the raw emotion. You're just like everybody else. Then I'll be one of the ignorant and mean callers. Are you walking back in Philadelphia anytime soon? Yeah, I'd love to go back to there.

That was a lot of fun. What are the Astros' World Series odds right now? Probably get a good price. Like 25 to 1, yeah. We don't pay attention to such things like actually. The Rockets, believe it or not, when they were down, was it 3 to 1? 3 to 1 at Golden State, yeah. They were 200 to 1.

Could get that game 7. 200 to 1. We ever going to get gambling? Texas, you think? Well, you know, the guy that fixed the lottery recently and he won $20 million twice, he did it legally. I know that guy. And he's from, and that killed gambling Texas for a while. It wasn't a good look. Yeah, Ross and I just got back from Louisiana. And so we always, you still go, you see every license plate in Texas and gold medal. Astros gear. Astros gear and Texas license plates. Did you all have fun? No.

Could have been more fun. Did you get fleeced? A little bit. The woman to my right who had a wig on was hitting 14 against four. And I don't hide my emotions when it comes to bad blackjack playing. Is that right? Yes, sir. He's very upset.

I know some of the greatest blackjack players in the world. Where are they? They come with me and hang out in Lake Charles for a couple days. They're all banned everywhere. That's right. All those gambling plays. Well, that is not banned. They love when you lose.

They hate when you win. All right. So give out the hours. people come to see you this week out of the morning of 10 at night every day gallery furniture north freeway gallery furniture grand parkway and west belford and highway 99 plus uh gallery furniture yeah the gallery and call me anytime i sell numbers 281 8441963 you want to buy one of those max z clonters that's selling like hotcakes it saved my life when i was down there at method is that and the good lord and the great doctor so you need a max z cliner give me a call if you need a

tempidic mattress call us we'll deliver it free free free today today today and we want to to say thanks 790 for coming out. Thanks Eddie wherever you are. All right. Thank you, friend. That's Matt. Still got it. Still got it. It's like watching Picasso paint. I love it. I love it. Jim McAville with us here on the program. I love that. All right. 127 is our time. Rossi is time for some non-Florida stories. Oh, yeah. We find interesting stories that occur outside the state of Florida and share them with the people of you. It's time for All right, here we go.

132 on Sports Talk 790. We are with you from Gallaudet of Furnt. And thanks for Mac having us over here today. Hey, Ross, time now for some non-Florida stories. The only requirement is any story we bring must be A, interesting, and B, not from the state of Florida. And I will go first. You okay with that?

Okay. All right. When you were a kid, when you went to elementary school, remember you'd have days where some people would bring cookies, some people would bring iceies. these little frozen things, maybe some bubble gum, maybe a Jolly Ranchers. It's just a kind of spread of the class. Okay.

Well, there was a kid that in Johnston, Pennsylvania that brought a treat. Oh, I saw this last week. Oh, go ahead. A kindergartner in Johnston, Pennsylvania brought alcoholic jello shots to school and shared up with classmates. Was this, this wasn't in Louisiana? No, it was not Louisiana. It didn't happen outside of Western Kentucky University either for that matter.

I guess it... I'm sorry, Jonathan. I guess if it happens in Lafayette, it's actually not even news. I just call that Tuesday. They call it what's required. The young student distributed the jello shots. Small cups containing alcohol to at least three other students. According to the district account, school staff were alerted and quote immediate action was taken.

One of the teachers said, I'll have two or three. No, I didn't say that. I'm saying to that. The children who consumed the shots were evaluating. by the school nurse, then transported to a local hospital by emergency medical services, quote, out of an abundance of caution. Their parents met them at the hospital. The officials did not say how much alcohol the children may have ingested or whether any of the students showed signs of intoxication.

One of them did jump on a table and said, fire up. They were all hammered, all three. You give a jealous shot to a kindergarten, and they're feeling good for a couple hours, right? I have no data to support this, Matt, but I'm going to trust you on this. The police say, the superintendent of the school district said, we want to assure our families of the health and well-being of our students is our top priority. Counselors and support staff will be available for any students who may need assistance processing today's events. This, we got word that 20 to 23 kids who didn't get the alcohol, like, why weren't we lucky enough to get it?

This is ridiculous. Overreaction. Let the kids have a couple of pops. That's a way to ease your way into a gentle shot, right? I'm staying away from all that. All right. No, we don't endorse that we're just kidding. My name is Ross.

I have no comment on you. Actually, I'm going to say something bold. Children shouldn't be drinking alcohol. That's right. Children should not be drinking alcohol. The reality is also this. My guess is this was a mix-up that the shot... We used to do ice cubes.

We used to put jello in the ice cubes and freeze them up and whatnot. Not an alcoholic. My guess is mom and dad just mixed them up. Could happen anybody. Three students were buzzing during ABC. Did you ever make your own jello shots? I have never made a jellowshells. I've had one, but I've never made one.

We did it in college with whatever. Mine came out horrible in college. Yeah. Now, we used to do this. We would take Hawaiian punch, put ever clear in it, and then pour them in the ice cube trays. Put a toothpick in it and put them in there. Would it freeze?

It would freeze. We had to put enough punch, I guess. Buff punch, you put a plastic layer over it and then a tooth pick, and you have your own little freezer pop, a lollipop. I'll tell you what else I used to do. I used to get a cup, fill it with Everclear, and dump a bunch of Sour Patch kids in there, leave it in the fridge for a day, and then eat those.

Ain't that a blip. Would that do anything? I don't know. I think it was the excess. I don't think it really soaked it up. I think the excess Everclear drip is what really got you drunk, but I was getting buzzed. Okay. We've been...

Johnson, I think we're giving our audience terrible ideas how to consume their beverages. Always drink responsibly and always plan for a safe rite. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. All right. Ross, what are you on if you're not in Florida story? Well, Matt, of course, as you know, it is graduation season. You went to a graduation yourself.

I did. With the Fighting Texas A&M Aggies. Yes. Did you hear who did the commencement speech at the University of Maryland? Did you hear? No, I did not. tell me. It was Kermit the Frog. I would go to that.

He gave the commencement speech to Maryland's class of 2025 as they received their diplomas. And he spoke, apparently Muppets creator Jim Henson, graduated from Maryland in 1960. So there is a bronze statue of

Henson and Kermit sitting on a bench in a well-known feature of the College Park campus out there in Maryland. And Kermit, the frog did the commencement speech for the class of 2025. My son Peyton last week graduated. Now, granted, they had eight graduating classes over the weekend. He did not have a speaker at his.

Now, he had the president of school say a few words, and the alumni guy said a few words, but there was no general commencement speaker. There wasn't? I did not walk when I graduated from University of Houston. I just said, give me the diploma. I'm getting out of there as fast as possible. That's because you were on probation. I mean, I got a D-minus to pass.

If that gives you probation, sure. But I think, do people miss out on that? I mean, I would have thought that if I was a Maryland graduate and Kerman spoke at my funeral, I mean, my grandson, I think it would be pretty cool, actually. I'll take your word for it. All right. So what's, is there anything anecdotal about what Kerman had to say? Yeah, you want me to read some of his speech?

Please. As you prepare to take this big leap into life, I'm still recovering from Tommy John surgery. I'll be back with the Yankees as soon as possible. I didn't realize you had Garrett Cole speaking. Oh, I'm sorry. Rather than jumping over someone to get what you want, consider reaching out your hand and taking the leap side by side because life is better when we leap together.

A, that was great. B, can you do a piggy? No, I don't think so. That's on you. You want to hear my piggy? Yes. What in the world? Wow.

That was incredible. I can do a fossey. too, you ready? That was your best impression ever. Here's my fuzzling. Oh, waka, waka, waka. Thank you, mad. Incredible stuff here.

You'll be contacted by the Jim Hintz's Company. Here's the Swedish Shed. I think I'm done. I think I'm done with my impersonation. I can't do a gonzo. Sorry. I recently, this past Christmas,

watched a Muppet Christmas Carol for the first time since I was a kid. With your nieces and nephews? It's quite good. No. You just by yourself? I was trying to. watch Christmas movies. Were you doing jello shots during this or what?

No, it was a eggnog. Okay, very good. A little brandy. Is eggnog good? All right, Jonathan, what is your non-floor story from this week? It is from Australia. Nath Wilde is a star at Magic Man a strip club. Okay. He was until he discovered a more lucrative line of work. Metro News reported on February 10th that Wilde makes about 20 pounds a year by posting videos of himself, passing gas.

on TikTok. The one-time Carpenter joined OnlyFans in 2017. 20,000 pounds? 20,000 pounds? Maybe? I said 20 pounds? 20,000? I apologize.

20, there you go. He's making 20 bands for a joint only fan in 2017. Soon made enough for his X-rated videos to quit his daytime job. About two years in, he got a request for a fart video, which he initially refused and was blown away, no pun intended, by the demand and had been making them ever since. Wild said some want to see my facial expressions and others just want to see it from far away.

He said the custom videos he makes he starts off bloated as part of the process and then the vehicle goes longer he feels lighter by the end and he's been doing this for so long to know everyone's doing their own thing and it's cool and his family supports him. And that is my news and my non-floor to speak.

Not for a story, thank you. I'm more of the silent but deadly guy. In the video? No, in life. on your only fans I don't have the only fans I mean maybe I should no I don't think you should

I'm gonna sneak up on you as I'm gonna do when you're not ready for it all right yeah that's why we call you the duster you you must actually do it

because you're laughing way too hard no he called me the duster that was when I was laughing about there um okay I don't really know what to stay beyond that except

uh congratulations I guess. Who would pay to, I mean, what kind of value do you put on those things? $49, $79? It's up to the market, Matt. You let the market decide. And the video length, I guess.

Oh. I mean, my... Four seconds? Mine would be about six to seven tops. I want you charged for six or seven. I don't want to talk about this anymore. Okay. We're exiting this conversation.

Thank you. I'm uncomfortable. It's fine. All right. There you have it. Those are a non-flooros stories for this week. Thank you, Matt. Thank you.

We have a final segment left to go here on the program. Now, once we're on location today, we will not be playing hellier or not. Much of the dismay of the prize stores that are already locked and load on the phone lines. Our friend Biscuit wants to get in his little... He says Barbershop talk. Okay?

I love Barbershop. It isn't anything goes Friday. So we'll talk to Biscuit about some barbershop talk, and we will get to you to wrap up this final segment. We come to you today from Gallery Furniture at 6, 6,06, 945 north between Tivel and Parker. during the Super Memorial Day sale. Remember, if you buy it today,

you'll deliver it tonight at Gallery Furniture. Hi, it is the Matt Thomas Show with Ross. We're coming to you from Gallery Furniture at 6,06 I-45 North between Tidwell and Parker, and we say hello to a man who's at the barbershop right now getting himself a shave. Biscuit, what's going on? Hey, what's up, my brothers?

Hey, Ross, you know, I'm not a gambling man. But I've been, I was. put a whole chunk of money down that caller you had earlier to say about the spin rate he can't be an average avid listen to the Matt Thomas show if he thought that was a bad question I'm I can make money on that one Ross okay I promise you that but let me say this Matt this is this is the word on the street man okay Matt you're familiar with Gary Owens Gary Owens the former host the former guy on laughing No, yes I am.

Santa Sharp, bow wow, Ocho Cinco. Oh, that Gary Owens. I got you. I got you. What are the streets telling you at the barbershop? They said a Houston mat ranks number one in one category. Women.

What do you think that might be, Matt, Thomas? White women. It's a particular set of women. It's the sisters, Matt. They say Houston, hands down. They say Miami for Hispanics. Oh, black women Houston, number one. I thought it was white women.

No, it's black women? It's black women, Matt, hands down. I mean, I can't argue that. Listen, Matt, they got a thing coming this weekend, cigar weekend. And there's a lot of young brothers and sisters coming to town. Matt, the word on the street is, are you familiar with the term chocolate city? Houston has become. come the new chocolate city.

We didn't knock the land off the map, Matt. So that's what the word on the street is. I just want to get a lot of when you see a... Let me tell you, before I let you go, Biscuit, is there a cross street we need to go to to go to Chocolate City? Is there a cross? What's the cross streets? Oh, well, you can try blot it and emancipation.

That's a good start right there, Matt. If you were going to say Hillcroft and Biss and that, I would have a hard pass on that. No, no, no. That's another story, man. All right. Thank you, Biscuit for giving us an update on Chocolate City. I appreciate that.

I did see a blur. You learn something new every day of the day. I did see a blurb on either Facebook rules or Twitter reels that Shannon was doing some, in one of his podcasts and one of his buddies, they were talking about how great the women are of Houston. Women are great of Houston. I love our ladies. I cannot.

argue with that at all. We spent a day and a half in Lake Charles and they got work to do there in the old southwestern Louisiana. Where a lot of those ladies from? Shreveport. Do you say Shreveport? Boisier City. Alexandria. A lot of Houstonians in Lake Charles. That's true. Maybe more Beaumont. That's more of a Port Orange crowd. Port, Port, Arthur, Orange crowd, yeah.

Viter, if you will. We knocked back some lunch at the old D.C. Q and butter, did we not? We were there very quickly, though. I got in, got out. A word of advice, I would pass on the corn dog. That's what she said. So the Astros are playing game two of their four-game series today.

Yes. Is it a must-win game for the S? Okay, good. It is not a must-win. All right. Real quick, let's do this. Ryan Gusto, how are we feeling? Let's see.

Ryan Gustav, over under on innings pitch, I will put it right at five. That's a good line. I'm going to go over. I'm going to feel optimistic. All right. Pacer's Knicks, game two of that series tonight.

Who do you like? Was it, Nix minus five and a half? They're a Nix minus five and a half. But forget about the points. Pruddis, who do you like? No, no, man. We ain't going to the bedding window. No matter.

I might. Okay, we'll get on going. Let's go. Another close one. Knicks eke it out, but the Pacers cover the five and a half. What's up? All right, and look at the referee assignments tonight because I know Dan Matthew's in his car. Uh-oh.

James Capers, Mark Davis, and Kevin Scott. Uh-oh, must be looking for a split. What does that even mean? Nothing. I'm just good. NBA officials don't have anything to do with it. By the way, Mark Davis getting dropped down to referee. That's interesting.

Oh, that's just something for my own personal. And then game three of the weekend series, I believe it'll be on Saturday. will be to Oklahoma City and Minnesota. Do the wolves get a game on their home floor in game three? They get one, losing five. My original prediction was Thunder and five. And they were the ones that had the longer rest going into the playoffs before. Because remember, Oklahoma City, it just finished that seven game series of the Nuggets

and then it turned right around and play game one. Now, granted, they were at homes. That was a huge difference. But the turnaround, a little overrated. The excuse of playing every other day, over the little overrated. They also are the youngest team in the playoffs? Are they the youngest team in the NBA? think.

Yeah, they were youngest in the NBA. Them and the Spurs were until Chris Paul got there. So I think Oklahoma City took over. Chris Paul ages anybody. That's exactly right. All right. What else we got going on this weekend? We have Chocolate City big convention this weekend.

Looking forward to going to that, whatever that is. You said what, blotgin and what? I don't remember. Okay. Should listen to show more often. Blodgett and emancipation. Oh, Blossent emancipation. Okay.

Avenue. with Sterling Don't you think if you're Sterling Sharp, you take a back seat and you stay away from all this for a while? I mean, I'm stunned that he's... Shannon. I'm stunned Shannon's still doing his podcast. I mean, I know there's money attached to it,

but my God. There's money to be made. What do you mean? But I mean, aren't you if you're the limelight for what? Evidence? Man, if you had a scandal right now, would you not go to work? He's had many scandals.

I've had a lot of scandals to survive them all. Thanks for asking, Jonathan. I mean, look, I'm a survivor. People forget what happened. two weeks ago, let alone two months ago. You should keep going. Yeah. Clearly, Bar still keeps going.

Yeah. Pat McAfee, after they basically told that's a erroneous story about the girl having out relations with both the dad and the son. Oh, yeah, what's going on with that lawsuit? That's called Lawsuit City, baby. That's called Defamation City. Yeah, that's exactly right.

All right. What else we got going on? We mentioned that. We've got basketball, Astros, Baseball. Crowds will be good this weekend, I'm going to assume. I think so. I think so.

A weekend. Kids are out of school now. We should get a bump in crowd. Yesterday didn't feel great. I was at the ballpark. How was it? A lot of empty pockets. Thursday night, final day of school.

There was big baseball. By the way, shout out to Kingwood softball and baseball for both winning yesterday. Wow, incredible stuff. Hey, Kingwood walk it off, 2-1 victory. Yeah, that's what I said. Incredible stuff. Yeah, you don't care. I can hear the disingenuous bones running through up these.

What a way to start my weekend. Great news. Thank you, Matt. Well, that's what I'm here for. You're not getting this information anywhere else. I'm really not. All right. Next week, we're going to get into a deep dive on the Texans tackle situation. We'll get that going on the show tomorrow. We're going to run through the list of Major League Free Agent pitchers who signed one-year deals and how they're all doing. And you're going to come up with five. I already did just come up with five, I think.

Well, all fair. Haney, Corbin, Lorenzen. I can't remember. There was a couple others. Well, then add two more to your list. We need seven then. Some of them signed for $5 million in under, by the way. Thank you, Timatra's back on the crew here at Gowler. Furch you for having us out here today. Thanks to all of you for listening and calling and being a part of the day.

Anything goes Friday. Up next, it's Wax. Clayton. It's the A team right here on Sports Talk 7. From the...