The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - ASTROS ON FIRE Can They Keep It Up? NBA Playoff Game 2 Is Tonight! Will Houston Take Away This "Must Win" Match Up?

Episode Date: April 23, 2025

ASTROS ON FIRE Can They Keep It Up? NBA Playoff Game 2 Is Tonight! Will Houston Take Away This "Must Win" Match Up?

It's unfortunate. They killed him, man. You know that. Oh, here we go. Oh, here we go. Okay, first of all, who is... We're talking about Michael? Who is that?

There is a conspiracy that they killed. The both of them. Prince and Michael. Why was Prince murdered? Now, I know the theory is that Michael... He won his masters. Yeah, I know that one... I thought Michael Jackson was over the Masters or over the publishing for...

He had the Beatles Publishers. What does the golf term have to do with this? Yeah, all right, man. He's not at Augustine. He's not the A-Men Corner, Matt. Okay, sorry. Okay, I didn't know Prince wanted his master's too. Back, too.

I think he got it back and then they killed him. Do you think Paul McCartney killed Michael Jackson? Yes. No, no, I'm just playing. Yeah, Paul McCartney did it. He killed him both probably. Well, you know, Tommy DeVita, right? He was jealous of the more talented artist, I imagine.

Well, you know, Paul was like, Michael's like, I'm going to buy your collection. He goes, yeah, okay, whatever. Does I own you now? And then he really did. I own you, Paul. Is that your Michael Jackson impersonation? Oh, my God. Give me a one to ten on that.

Try it again? No. Let me hear it. Let's hear it again. Let's go out here. That's ignorant. I own you, Paul McCartney. Wait, that's not bad. Not bad.

It's awful. It's about a 2.5. J.K. likes it. Well, his taste are... I like his opinions better than yours. Whatever. On many things. Good morning, everyone.

It is a Matt Thomas, Joan, Ross. As your squad is above 500, the Astros are for the first time since the opening weekend of the series when they beat the Mets, two out of three. It is... They've won four out of five. And back-to-back games giving up two hits. I thought they had Bo Bichette. Oh, they do.

Oh, they had Vlad Guerrero Jr. Oh, they do. George Springer. They had a Will Wagner who the aster's were going to regret giving up. What happened all that? Actually, we should do a quick Will Wagner, Jake Blas, Joey Lopofito check at some point in the show. We already have the Bregman update, Lockdowne.

I didn't see how he did yesterday, but he's been doing quite well. I mean, the OPS is significantly above 800. Yes. I think I originally said 850, then I backed down to 800. I did back you down. And then I think I'm going to want to be well north of 800 when it's all of a sudden done. He's got a week to slump, so we'll see. That's true.

It's a really small sample size. It can happen. It can dive bomb. Look at Jake Myers' numbers in the last three days. Oh, your boy, Jake. Goose and I eat two straight games. I told you when he gets his hot streaks, we've got to pump him up because I know it's going to come back down. Because remember last year it was the great month of May that he had.

And then after that it was not much. And it was the first, what, three weeks of April that have been good. And then the last couple days have been not so hot. Alex Spragman yesterday had two hits, three R's B-I. Mm-hmm. He's hitting 302 with an OPS at 897. Oh my God, I should have stayed with 850. Why did I stand to?

It's my fault. Blame me. I'm going to blame you. It's still a gut-feeling hit, though. Well, I didn't put my name on it because I was like, it's Alex Brinman. Yeah. No, nobody would have done that.

April, but. All right, so we do have some good news on the local front as the Astros again. Boy, I'll tell you what. Rinelle Blanco, he loves face in Toronto, earning of under a 1 in his four career appearances against him. And was dealing six and two-thirds yesterday. Bullpen was fantastic.

And King got it out. And then you had Abreu do his thing in the 8th. And then Josh Hayter on the 9th. Astro's getting another crooked number early. I was at 3 in the first thing, I think it was what it was last night. And that Chris cruised along, four out of five. Feeling good.

Love it. And Angels lost yesterday. So the Astros gained some ground on them. I believe the Rangers, I went to bed before the Rangers' A's game was done, so I don't exactly know how that turned out. But do you know the A's are one of the worst home baseball teams in baseball so far this year? I mean, they've always been bad. How the crowd's looking in Sacramento? You know, that's a great question.

Glad you asked. Rangers 1 8 to 5. They played yesterday at whatever the name of the minor league field. It's a corporate sponsor. They had 10,059. It's called Band-Aid Field. This is a Band-Aid until they get to Vegas. Basically, it's a glorified softball park.

It's called backup plan side piece field. Well, it's funny because we had Tim Roy on the other day. The Warriors announced. I was like, why aren't people Sacramento? Like, because the A's suck, the terrible ownership. And Sacramento is their bitch for three years. Yeah. They know they're just staying until their lease is up.

Yeah. Until they can sign their lease at the new place. Yeah. I don't know. If, look, I'm not going to get in their business. But if there's other cities that would embrace the A's in immediately. and we start building a stadium tomorrow and not think twice about it. I mean, I think the a chance just want to be in Las Vegas

because it's become this new sports metropolis of professional teams. I thought the Las Vegas economy was in a bad shape, though. Clearly not. And now, I mean, the Raiders move there and now the A's are going there. And they drew 61,000 back-to-back nights for WrestleMania. I mean, the stadium is paying for itself and conventioneers. I mean, think of how much money that the city of Las Vegas made just in the last weekend with WrestleMania being there.

So, you know. Especially with all that 6 to 5 blackjack. But anyways. You're lying about that. What did I tell you that was 3-2? I was somewhere recently. Arizona. Aero Phoenix.

We're going to Phoenix. That may be our jam. They have a book. 3-2 Blackjack. Yes. It's actually more pleasant. I'm thinking about with this new schedule we're off at 2 every day. I think it's time to get back into golf.

I'm ready. I miss golf. What made you get into the golf conversation? We'll play golf on Phoenix? Yeah. You going with me? No, I'm going to play a casino. We'll go eat some balls in Memorial Park.

It's five minutes away. I'm going to go to the casino. What do you casino? in Texas and we'll be done. What's going back going anywhere? We're going soon. In Texas? Oh no, we're going to Louisiana next month. Well, hopefully we're not. We're going in a month. Stop.

All right. That's fine, I guess. Let's just wait a while. I've been put it in pencil in my daytime, right? I did not put it in pen. Okay. So, game two tonight, by the way, 830 will be the, well, 835 on the positive end, 845 on the negative end, if they push the game back 10 minutes tonight. They didn't have a slide dinner night, which was good. Yeah, it's heat calves is right before. Oh, no, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Magic Celtics.

Blow them out by 30, so we don't have to get slide slid back the game. Yeah, we don't need any more of a slide back. No backsliding around here, Maddie. Well, there's other sliding going on at ESPN, but it ain't about that. It's not us. And Club Shay-Shay? Oh, Shannon. You know what, Shannon? You're probably just going to need to go ahead and submit your resignation. 25K a cheek. What does that even mean? He offered her 10 million and she said no.

First of all, I didn't realize he had 10 million sent in the piggy bank. I mean, he had, he hadn't played in a while. I mean, it's been a bit. Yeah, but he's got a lot of money from ESPN. And then didn't he just get a $100 million offer for his Club Shaysay podcast? That I don't know. I don't go to the podcast game because they usually go in and out pretty quickly. Much like Shannon, apparently.

And 1013. All right. I'm going to write that one down. On the show today, Brian Bogasevick at 11 o'clock. Yes. Tom Tolbert, former Gold State Warrior, former long-time NBA player, former ESPN analyst. He's on the Warriors broadcast now. He'll join us at 1130. We're going to push, shut your bum mess up to 1230 because Tom is doing his podcast in the spot.

So we're having him at 1130. He said, ain't nobody at time for you. I've got to do my podcast. And that's okay. And we got, believe it or not today, I will handle believe it or not, is NFL draft related. Okay. So that's what I'm here. That's the gift I'm giving you today. 713-212-5.790. Excited about the local nine? Four out of five. Back-to-back two hit performances. And Rossi, knock on, what is this? What is this made of?

Is this for mica? This is important. It's not even for mica. This is, uh, I mean, they pulled out all the stops when they built these studios. Okay, whatever this is made of. Knock on whatever it is, the Astros pitching has been absolutely phenomenal. For the most part, this entire homestan. Mm-hmm. And back-to-back two-hit games, back-to-back games where your starters went deep in the contest. Ryan, Guston tomorrow. Today, yeah. I mean today. Yeah.

I'm throwing off. Sorry. And it's a 640 first pitch. So if you're going to the game, it's a little bit early. That's good. So you can actually split up in your sports consumption tonight. Get the Astros for a couple hours. You get the Rockets a little bit later.

Love it. It is a must-win Wednesday. 7-13. The Astros? Well, not really. more so for the Rockets. You don't want to be down on 2, but we will do a musical tribute to the Rockets. What do you want to do that at 1 o'clock today?

Sure. Because we have, yeah, Bogus Epic 11, that wouldn't make any sense. We have the news at noon. We can't do that. So 1 o'clock today, we will get you fired up with some music to get you inspired for hopefully a Rockets game to win to even the series at a game of piece. We did see that last night in the NBA in one of the series. We'll get to all that. 713-213-2-2-5-790.

7-19. 7-190. 2-5-790. Our time is 1015, and we thank you for hopefully joining us all the way to 2 o'clock today here on Sports Talk 790. I love whenever there's a best of seven series, because then I get to hear my favorite sports reporter question, would you consider this a must-win game? You know, they always feel like they have to say yes. Yeah, we want to win it. It's very important, you know. Got our uniforms on anyway. Anyway, might as well try. but it's not always the right answer, man. It's a math question.

I wish I would answer that question, honestly. It's a best of seven. You're down one game to nothing. Would you consider this a must-win game? No. No, we can lose tonight. We can lose tomorrow night, too. We don't want to, but that wasn't your question.

You asked if it was a must-win game, and if you'd ever taken a rudimentary. math class, you'd already know the magic numbers three. When you're down three, then you must win them or you're out. Very funny. You play that at least once a year on the show, and it's always funny. It never disappoints. And you're in theory correct, but I don't literally think of things every time I figuratively think of things. You think of a lot of figurative things. 187 votes are already in. Wonderful. Again, this, I put this poll question. out like 37 minutes ago.

Mm-hmm. And usually with any poll question, you can get typically a 60-40 lead, sometimes a 75, 25, 25. I think you got crushed on biscuits and gravy. Rarely do you get a 96 to 4. I think it was around there for biscuits and gravy. I like gravy.

You know I like gravy. I don't like the gravy on top of my biscuits. It's just soggy and gross. I don't care how many people want to be wrong. I mean, if 96% of people want to be wrong, that's great. So I have a poll question out. Is tonight's game for the Rockets a must win? Is it a must win game?

Go ahead. 187 votes are in 96% say yes, 4% say no. So there's a 4% that have the right arm raising the hand and say, we are Team Ross on this. That's good. That's all right. That sounds about right. I figuratively think you lose the first two home games,

going to a place like Golden State that has won a plethora of playoff games over their last 10 years. Okay. I think you've got to win this one. So tonight, my friends, I speak to you with open arms and emotions and say tonight is a must win

for the local basketball team. Whatever. Back to Matt Thomas and Ross Villarreal. On Sports Talk 790. Okay, we didn't necessarily need that, but that's fine. I told him to play it after the bit, but you'd started talking.

Oh, that's my fault. That's my fault. It's okay. It's not your. fault. It's nobody's fault. Okay. But mine. So we'll put in the poll question. By the way, we have a pair of tickets for tonight's game. We want to give away for the Rockets and a Warriors game two.

Yes. Why are you looking at me with Dumb Founders? I was zoned out. Okay. Now, the key is, unfortunately, you have to communicate with Ross, and I'll let Ross further explain. What's the problem? All right. So we have a lot of entrance already. We are giving away tickets to Rockets

Warriors game number. two tonight. So if you want to win tickets to that, you make Sports Talk 790, your number one preset on the IHeart Radio app. You can't send me a screenshot. You can't take a picture of your radio in your car. I'm sorry, it's not going to work that way.

So make Sports Talk 790, your number one preset on the IHeartRadio app. Take a screenshot of that. Email it to me. Ross at Sports790.com. Ross at Sports 790.com and you will be entered to win the drawing.

We're going to draw it at 120, Matt. Yeah, I'm okay with that. 120. You haven't told me. And we're not doing it. So you can't say, hey, help hook your brother up or hook it. Oh, we're not? No, Gordy's doing it.

Oh, okay. Unless he's going to take a nap or something. I didn't know if he was going to be here. I mean, we're going to use a random number generator. I didn't know if we were going to do it on air or what. Which I didn't think there was really existed. We really do have a random generator. Yeah.

So you can't like say, hey, you guys are the best show ever. People are emailing, hook me up. I can't do it. We already know we're the best show. I say honest and true on this show. So everyone's got a fair shot. Email me a screenshot of the Iheart of Sports Talk 790 is your number one preset on the Iheart radio app. Ross at Sports790.com. Drawing tickets to Rockets Warriors game two at 120 today.

And very simple. Iheart radio app. Sports Talk 790 is number one preset. Boom, Shukalaka. We're done. And send it to Ross at Sports790.com. Yes, thank you. Okay.

So it should be. I think it's going to be an interesting sports night. Look, the Astros have a chance to go for a sweep, which we've not said yet so far this year. They have not put together a three-game winning streak. They do have a pair of two gamers. We got that nicely going. The Astros, Yarnere Diaz,

got us a nice two-run knock yesterday for the local nine yesterday. Christian Walker had three hits. The day off to reflect. He's looking good. His head's clear? Yeah. Clear eyes, full heart, can't lose. Let's go, Christian Walker.

One of the 10 greatest sports phrases you'll over here in movie or indoor television history. More important than it's in the hole. I'll let you pontificate over that. I'm done. I'm just going to let that one hang. You've let a lot of things hang in your life. Okay, back at it. So we've got the Rockets game last night.

We have the NFL draft. Do you know there are some rumors out there that have the Texans potentially moving up in the NFL draft tomorrow? That's out shocking. I honestly haven't been through this a lot in my life. As a sportscaster, this is all, Now I'm missing that Casero won't make him deal because if there's been anything about his history

as being a general manager, he likes to shuffle the deck a little bit. He's going to do his due diligence. But it feels like to me this is the let's throw that out there to say, hey, let's see what's out there. Maybe somebody can give us a deal we can't refuse. Yeah. But

it would be, in my mind, Casero, I think he woke up this morning, had his bowl of oatmeal and water and no coffee. I actually had black coffee. He didn't put anything in the coffee. He probably said, himself, I could just as easily keep the pick as going up or down. I don't think he's got his mindset going. I've got to improve something right away by trying to get up into the top 10 or top 15. Shouldn't every general manager be doing this? He's going to call people up at 20 or 15 and say,

hey, if my guy falls to you, what's it going to take to move up? Yep. Yep. So I don't take it much out of the Albert Greer's and other folks saying, yeah, Casero's calling people. Well, of course. I mean, isn't every general manager calling people today? I hope so. They're doing their due diligence. Even if I'm Tennessee, I'm fielding phone calls. If somebody wants number one pick that damn bad, what do you want to offer? Because look, even if Camor goes number one in Tennessee, by the looks, things, they're going to need a lot more than just getting a brand new quarterback in there to shake things up. So I believe it's not lip service, but it's more, let's just throw things out there to get people on the scent.

Okay. All right. So I think he will move. up or down. He just feels like that's how he rolls. He's like he's got an itchy trigger finger basically. Okay, I see that. As I said, in my gut feelings yesterday. But he's more of a guy

to me that just likes to shuffle third and fourth round guys, to have additional picks. That's where I think he probably does as most of his damage. 713-212-5-790. Let me ask you all a very simple question. Are you feeling better right now about the Astros and you did a week ago at this point? I am. Absolutely.

The hitting is coming around a little bit. A little bit. The pitching has remained very consistent. The bullpen has been excellent so far this year. And according to baseball savant, which is an Uber dork website, love baseball The Astros are second in the club

defense above average. Outts above average. Yeah, out's above average. Jake Myers is out there racking up the outs above average, Maddie. And unfortunately, it's racking up a bunch of Ks as well. Hey, we didn't bring that up. All right. He's a rough go of things here. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90.

10-36. It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. We are with you till 2 o'clock today. Brian Bogus-Evick's going to drop by at 11 o'clock. Tom Tolbert, 1130 will be with us. News at noon, and we have shut your ball mess up today at 1230. I will handle a very Googlable edition of, believe it or not, today, at 150. 7-13-212-5-7-90.

If you want to come in and say hello or not, you can, you know, we're here. for you. 713-212-5-7-9. You know, one of the things we brought up on the 10th inning show last night, which I know you listened to because you're a huge fan of me doing the post-game shows. I didn't catch it. The defense has been really good this year. Yes.

Way better than I think anybody thought it was going to be. First and foremost, you had two corner outfielders that never played before, and they're playing at an average level. I would say Cam Smith is above average at this point. I feel like he's getting more and more comfortable. He's just an athlete. It's with his athleticism. I was about to say the exact same thing.

But he also, I mean, he's getting good. jumps, good reads, he's got a good arm multiple times. Guys have had the opportunity to run on him and they've been held up. I mean, he can throw, I think his fastest throw out of the alpha has already been 93 miles an hour. That's elite. Yeah. Oh, I think he'll grow into the position. I mean, when you fast track from going from Florida State to being a first round pick to Major League, you've got something in your DNA that says you're going to be a Major League baseball player. So not worried about that. Jose's going to be Jose.

It's going to be all right. But I'll tell you. what? What? Brendan Rogers slash Mauritio Dubon. That's greater than Jose Al Tuvei at second base. It just is. It may not be for the immediate first month of the year, but over the long term, I think the defensive wind

totals, whatever you want to call it, percentages, amount of space covered throwing areas will all be better off with those two guys playing second base, more so than Jose Altuve. And again, you didn't have anybody that was willing to take the bull by the horns in the left field. You didn't want to play an alvarez out there in left field.

except maybe once, twice a week at the very most. So you found a spot for him. You're seeing Jose playing occasional DH here once in a while, occasional second base. And all things considered, the biggest surprise to me, and I brought this up on the show last night, Isaac Paredes is playing some really good third base. There was very mid-level reviews of him when first talked about it, spring training.

And I think he's well beyond exceeded expectations at this point. Yeah, the range is a bit limited. But he does a really good, one of the things you have to do at third base is handle the hot shots. They call it the hot corner. And he does a really good job of smothering. He dives on balls, smothers. He covers things up.

He doesn't like a lot of things buy him. Yeah, the range is never going to be great. I don't think foot speed's ever going to be one of his attributes. Case in point when he runs a basis. It's a little difficult to watch at times. But you've got him. Pena is a former gold glover. You get a gold glover at second.

In Rogers, you get a three-time gold Glover, Christian Walker at first. Yonner, not throwing people out, but frankly, Ross in 2025, not a lot of catchers are throwing out people to begin with. Not, yeah. Not on this Astros team anyways. The reality is,

this part of what made the Astros so good for as long as they had been so good, it's because they've been able to rake, get good pitching, solid hitting, and their defense has been good. It's taken a little bit of a drop the last couple of years, even though you had Alex Breggman playing spectacular third base. But this year, defensively, as we said before, if baseball at Savon says you're the second best when it comes to Altsabon, average, you take it. You do.

And it's been very good. It's been, I think it's going to continue to be good. Yeah. Lance McCuller's just going to throw a Mono League rehab appearance this weekend. Caleb Orts is going to be coming around pretty soon as well. Let's go. Forrest Whitley, you now got back after throwing two frames a couple nights ago. Like in Forrest Whitley. You've got a potential,

and I hate to use the term, log jam. But you might have a long jam here. It's been one of the best bullpins in baseball already. Yeah. As is, and it could get better. Feeling good. And the division is mid. I'm going to say below.

The division is bad. It's, I would say, look, if the Rangers are 14 and 9, so that's not like that's chopped liver. I mean, they're not barely about 500. Do you see Jack Peterson's offense the last week or so? No, what did Jack Peter? Oh, I think I did see that. Is he 0 for 40?

I want to say he's in that 0-440, 0-43 range somewhere. He's now batting 0-52 for the year. His OPS is 141. So Yiner Dia says, suck it. I'm hitting 155 now. Jock, by the way, you should have a K at the end of your name. If you're going to be a jock, you're going to be J-O-C. This J-O-C thing is so Metro.

He didn't name himself, Matt? Well, that's, then I blame the Peterson family. Yeah, I talk to the Peterson's. Yeah, so Peterson's, I'm calling you out. What a damn K at the end of your son's name? I think that's worse. Like, Jock Landale? Or Jock Ewing?

I don't know who that is. Don't worry about it. No, J.O.C. is very uncommon. JocC. But then it's like, it's like someone's jock. Jock strap. I don't like it. I don't know.

There's, Jack. No offense to the Landale family. Great, great dude. Calls me mate every day. Him and Steve Adams. Oh, really? Calls your mate? Yeah, I know.

And that's a stunner. Oh, you guys must be close. We are close. I told you there's, I don't think there's a single rocket that knows my name. That's fine. I mean,

I'm comfortable with it. Mm-hmm. Let me guess. Calvin Murphy calls you boss? No. Hoss. Hoss, that's right. Jabari calls me boss.

I've met Calvin Murphy like eight times and he's always like, hey, man. Yeah, yeah. There's zero percent chance of Calvin knows my name. He has no idea who I am. That's okay.

That's fine, too. Because I love Calvin. I mean, I see Calvin 40 times a year at home. I have dinner with him probably 80% of the year. it's fine. It's all right. Where we're going with this? I don't know.

So you want to talk about Jack Landell? Jack Peterson is just absolutely terrible so far this year for them. Yeah, by the way, a Jewish Sports Hall of Fame inductee, Jack Peterson. Very politically incorrect. Funny, funny, funny moment in the movie airplane. Okay. It's great. A Jewish-American.

athletes. They were reading it on the plane. And it was a pamphlet. It was even a magazine or a book. Can't do it now. Sandy Kofax? You can do that now. No, I mean, you couldn't pull the joke off now because it's really frankly anything from the movie airplane you just can't run. Maybe the most politically incorrect movie. Blazing Saddles.

Blazing Saddles pretty good, too. You're right about that. But yeah, she's like a... The kid says, you want some light reading. It was a pamphlet of great Jewish-American athletes. Come on, that's not nice. By the way, congratulations to Alex Breggman's dad. Speaking of a fine Jewish-American athlete, his dad's running for governor of New Mexico.

What? Isn't that crazy? What background does he have for political office? Former district attorney, I believe. Oh, really? Yeah. I had no idea. Well, that's the things you learn on the show.

The Bregmans are doing great. Yeah. Son's making great money. Got two grandkids now. Making 40 mil and OPS and 900. He's doing all right. Do you think he really, and again, we've got several months before the end of the year. Do you think he pulls out and says, ah, let's go see what else is out there?

Oh, if he OPS 900? But, dude, 40 million is a lot of money for him. He's opting out. Are you sure? He's opting out of money. Yeah, but it's only two more years. So you want two years, 80 million? You're thinking he's going to get 40 million for five years somewhere.

Yeah, six years, 250 or whatever. Okay. Not 250, but. Maybe he tears it up and says, hey, I love staying in Beantown in Beantown, the monster's my best friend. Let's go. He could very well hit the market. And then he could, the Red Sox will be free to renegotiate with him as well.

That's true. All right. 1044 sports talk 790. I think there will be one small change in the rocket rotation tonight. I'm not beginning. It's information. Just a gut feel on this. Okay.

And we'll also check the poll on. Is tonight a must win for the rockets? 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-9. 1050. Sports Talk 790. It is a Matt Thomas show with Ross. Brian Bogussevick with us at about 10 minutes from now. You may join us now if you so choose. 713-2-5-790. 7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-90, just like Chris in Jersey Village is joined us here on a Wednesday morning. Chris, thank you for holding a good morning to you. Yes, good morning, Matt. So technically, yeah, Ross is right by the numbers. This is not a must-win game. but I'll tell you why it's a must-win game. We are a young team that does not have a playoff-winning record for the team yet. We're not the Michael George's Chicago Bulls or the Larry Bird, Boston Celtics,

so we need every advantage possible. And as Ross said last week, NBA thinks home field or home court is a 7 to 8 point edge when playing at home. So I do believe that the Houston Rockets, as young as they are, we need as much help as possible. And the facts just back this up, and it's a must-win game. Look at their home and away splits. I think at home, they're 27 and 11 this year. And on the road, I think they're 21 and 15. So that being said, this is a must-win game.

Be luck, Matt. Thank you. Yeah. They're going to, I mean, obviously, if they want to win the series, they're going to have to win a game in Golden State. and they've done so this year. That was a very impressive win too late in the season. Golden State was playing well.

Had won, I believe, five or six in a row prior to the Rockets winning there. Steph Curry was held to three points, and Steph's like, I'll get you back, and he certainly did. Yes. With two shots, eyes closed, chucking from 35 feet, falling out of bounds,

and going right through the nylon beautifully without a touch of the rim. That's what he does. He's the greatest shooter ever to walk the planet. And when you say greatest shooter, And we think of, I don't know, Steve Kerr was great, but he was knocking down wide open threes. Reggie Miller. Other guys we can think of.

Reggie Miller, I don't know, like Brent Berry or whoever, those are great shooters because they were great wide open, boom, you get it to him. What makes Steph Curry the greatest shooter of all time is the level of difficulty of shots that he can make. And length of time he's in it. I mean, for 15 years he's been doing this. People draped all over him, stepbacks, fallaways, 35 footers, 40 footers. He just makes them all. He just makes them all. He's the greatest shooter ever.

You know I've had this debate probably about a year ago. If he's the greatest shooter of all time and the sport is about shooting, you cannot win a game unless you can shoot. Or defend. You cannot win a game with zero points. It is physically impossible to do that. You can be the greatest defensive player of all time, but you must have to put the ball in the basket at some point. That's true. Why don't we put Steph Kerr in the top ten of all time?

Well, defense is part of it. And overall offense. And he's arguably top 10 all time. I don't know. I don't see enough lists that say Steph Curry is a top 10 all time player. When you and I knew just a few weeks ago we were talking about who were kicking off the list. We were we were constantly kicking off Larry Bird.

KD. Steph Curry's not making my list because he's not a defendant. KD was a really good defender in his prime. He's not right now. But those Hampton's five lineups worked when he was at Golden State Warriors because he was their rim protector. because of his length and size. So he was a good defender for his time during his prime. LeBron James should have won the defensive player of the year that Mark Gassal won,

and he's multiple time, first team all defense. Same thing for Kobe. That's why have Kobe ahead of stuff? That's why, I mean, obviously, and then the other is Michael Jordan and stuff. Because it's a two-way game. That's what makes basketball so kind of unique and beautiful. So if you play both. Yeah, so if you define as the 10, if you're one of the 10 best to do anything,

it's not just about being awesome at one facet of the game. Because tonight, part of the key to victory to me is, we've talked about this ever since the game this past Sunday. Whoever is guarded up, matched up defensively against Curry, has got to attack him. Get him into the paint, neutralize him. Yeah. Wear him out and make him work.

But it is somewhat unfair for a subjective poll to have something because Steph's the greatest and you can debate who's the second greatest but the drop from one to two in the shooter category is significant in my mind. I would agree

because I go Clay Thompson or Ray Allen or maybe Kevin Durant somewhere in there. Or again I'm throwing just Reggie out there. I mean we're talking about just Larry Bird. Larry Bird just can put down

60 and not think twice about it. Everybody has Larry Bird in their top 10 and he wasn't a great individual defender. No. Everybody always uses It's kind of like, oh, well, he's a great team defender. Yeah, he got all those steals. He was smart, but he wasn't a great defender either, though.

Same thing with Magic Johnson. I'm worried about Larry Bird getting kicked out of the top ten list. We got a new... What happened in Boston, Maddie? Larry Bird! We got to make room for Nicola Yokich. I'm sorry, we do, Stu. Ooh, Nicole Yokes is busting that door down. You know what I'm saying, though?

Yeah. We're talking about this. Somebody's got to get out. He's seven foot. He averaged a triple double. Why is nobody talking about him? averaging a triple double. Insane.

Insane. And doesn't even look the part. He's not lean. No, he doesn't want to even be there. He doesn't. He'd rather be working on his horse farm in Serbia. He'd rather be scooping up horse poop with a shovel than out on the basketball floor. That's insane.

God gave him this incredible ability to shoot 26 footers like they were layups. I mean, and I mean, some of the greatest passing vision of all time, he does it all. I don't even want to I don't even know who we're squeezing out of the top 10 but Yokic is a deserving. Is he a two or three-time MVP? I think he's going to SGA is going to win it this year because of voter fatigue

because Nicolioch is the best basketball player in the planet. Well, LeBron's like, hold my beer. I've been the best basketball player on the planet for a long time I didn't win. He's not anymore. But I'm talking about right now. Okay.

No, I, having seen both and look, you're talking about filet mignon and. splitting hairs. I would lean not even towards fatigue. I would just say that what SGA has done, team accomplishment is someone of the tiebreaker. That's the name of the game.

That's fine. The number of 30 points. He wakes up at 35 points a game, just like Franklin Nicole Yokic is in a lot of two. I would lean SGA in a very small 5149. But the difference between those two and whoever's third is a massive drop-off. And they're both fantastic players and hopefully the Rockets will

dispose of one or both of them. Russell Westbrook, won an MVP for averaging a triple double as a six seed. I guess it's now it's just old news that you average a triple double. So that's, I mean, it's fine. It's a narrative-driven award. Yeah. Michael George should have won it every year for 15 years. Then LeBron should have won it every year for about 12 years.

And you just give it to others. Well, you're asking human beings to separate years and you just can't do it. I, because I am a educated, well-versed NBA connoisseur can do that. and I can say I love Nicola Yokic, jealous of him immensely. You said big man averaging triple double, who cares? Give it to SGA.

Who has a better team around him? But SGA's had a slightly better season in my mind. I disagree. 51, 49. Yeah, that's fine. You know what else? I'll even get him closer to you. I'll go 50.1, 49.9. Make you feel better.

Let's get to a Brian Bocas epic next here on Sports Talk 7iting. Thomas Show with Ross. We always enjoy our Wednesday visits with Space City Home Networks, Astros Radio analyst. Brian Boggis-Evick with us here every Wednesday on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Bogie, it's Matt and Ross with you. Good morning to you. Two game winning streaks. Who'd have thought it would have happened in one homestand?

No, I didn't know it was possible. I thought it was against the rules to win two games in a row. I thought you had to go back and forth and alternate. It's nice to see some consistent play. It's been a long time coming. I don't even know if you could draw it up again in the next 10 to 15 years of any baseball team. If you could go win loss, win loss like the Astros did for basically a month. No, because we were talking about it on the show that one day, it's frustrating in that you're not putting together a win streak and you're just going back and forth.

But it's also pretty impressive when you don't put together losing streaks. You also have to be good enough to not lose like four in a row. So, yeah, at one point I'm kind of pulling my hair out thinking, man, when are we going to turn the corner and see, you know, three, four wins in a row. But at the same time, I'm like, you know, if this is the low, if this is what it looks like when, you know, your offense isn't hitting, if this is what it looks like when you can't put it all together and you're just kind of hovering around 500. I mean, I think you'll take that as your bottom, right? Oh, no question about it. There are so many, and superlatives may be too strong of a term, but there's too many good things I like right now about the local nine, especially the last week. week or so. First and foremost, getting your

starters to go deep in the games, back-to-back two hits affair. I know that the Toronto's offense is probably underperforming compared to years past, but that's still a team that's got a plethora of guys that can hit the ball out of the yard. And so, kudos to not only the starting pitching the last two days, but the entire bullpen for the way they've been

able to curtail the Toronto offense. No, it's been great. You know, obviously, you love to see dominating starting performances. What Hunter's done all season has been incredible. Rinell was really good last night. That's definitely his best start. So those big time starts are great. But, you know, there's so many things fall into place when you get consistent

starting pitching, when you can count on those guys to go at least five, you know, usually six or more innings. And, you know, they keep you in games. It's easy to feel energized coming to the ballpark every day. It keeps the bullpen in order. You know, you're not throwing Brian Abrae you and Josh Hater in situations where you just need to fill innings because you had, you know, back-to-back starts where guys went two innings. So it keeps the bullpen in order. It keeps the offense not pressing, even though, you know, you're maybe going through a stretch where they're not scoring a ton of runs.

It's just everything gets smoothed out when you have consistent starting pitching. And that's the one area. You can really build momentum at it. Momentum is really hard in baseball because, you know, it starts and ends with tomorrow's starting pitchers, whether that be, whether that's, you know, your guy not having a good game or running into a buzzsaw from the other team. But you can really build momentum when every day out you get a good start. Brian Bogosevic with us here on a sports talk 790. Christian Walker with the day off bounces back with three hits. See anything different with him? He had some hard hit contact or just the breather did him

well and he's just looking fresher? No, I think I think the day off did more for him mentally. I I think it gave him a chance to just kind of slow things down and see like, hey, that looks like the game that I know and not this, you know, sped up mess that I've been seeing at home plate for the last couple of weeks. It looked like he finally let the ball get to him a little bit. I mean, his first hit, you know, they shot that ball up the middle. It was a sinker in, and that's a pitch when if you're struggling and you're just fighting with yourself, you're going to spin off of it, you're going to get long because you're trying to pull it because the pitch shows up inside. You know, he trusted his hands, stayed inside, hit it hard up the middle.

Obviously, when you get rewarded for it with a base hit, it feels a little bit better. But all of a sudden, it just looks like he trusted swinging. He's not jumping at the ball. He's relying on the fact that I'm going to recognize spin and still be able to catch up to the fastball. And then, you know, fast forward three or four at bats. He gets a mistake pitch and he just smokes it into the left center field gap. So, yeah, it looked like a guy who the off-day, did wonders for him from a mental standpoint and just being able to relax a little bit.

Jeremy Pena also had three hits last night. All season, we've been seeing very high, hard hit rates, barrel rates, stuff like that, but the results haven't been matching it. Looks like that's coming around. Do you think the breakout season we've been waiting for from Jeremy Pena could be here? I do. And the reason I think that is if you look at some of the underlying stuff, right? Like some of the best predictive numbers in hitting have to do with how you handle the strike zone.

And his strikeout rate is as low as it's ever been. His walk rate is as high as it's ever been. His chase numbers are way down. So he's really controlling the strike zone, which means he's getting good pitches to hit. If you're getting good pitches to hit and your swing is right, which his swing has looked fine, you know, ever since spring training, long term that says you're going to have the results. and things, you know, things will level out over time, and they also level out when you're a threat to beat out any ground ball that you hit. So, yeah, there are a lot of hits to be had when you add together how well he's putting together at bats and just how, you know, freakishly athletic he is with his hand-eye coordination and speed as well.

Brian, the trademark of this Astros' great run beyond the fact great pitching and great hitting has been defense. I thought it took a slight turn back the last couple of years. It feels like it has become an asset again for this baseball team. Is there anything you attribute that to? I think Paredes has been a pleasant surprise at third. You know Brendan Rogers is going to do his thing at second and obviously all the gold gloves that Christian got at first base. But it is one of those underlying things that separates teams,

I think especially if you're going to have a log jam at the division race in the year, that one or two games could be decided by what you do defensively. I think the Astros, at least so far, have been able to hold. their own in terms of not giving up an extra bunch of extra runs. Yeah, I completely agree. We've seen for years when talented teams would come into play, but they weren't good defensively, you know, teams that could really pitch, teams that could really hit, and then they'd be kicking the ball around and they'd be throwing the ball the wrong base, and you're like, man, that doesn't look like what we see every day.

And I think there's been a recommitment to defense organizationally. I mean, Joe Spada, his background is in player development. an infield defense. So it's important to him. I think a huge thing is bringing in Tony Peres-Chika, the third base coach, who is an in-field guy. He's the guy who was working hand-in-hand with Christian Walker turning him into a gold glover. And we've just seen a lot of improvement.

You know, Aesach Parades was known as kind of like a solid glove guy, but all of a sudden he looks really good with his feet. He's a little bit more rangy than expected. He's moving side to side. He's coming in on balls really well. The work that's gone on in the outfield, I mean, Cam Smith looks like a guy who's been playing, you know, outfield in the big leagues for 10 years, not a guy who's been playing outfield for 10 minutes.

So, yeah, I think it's a commitment from an organizational standpoint, but also a commitment from the players to be willing to put in the work that the coaching staff wants from them. And I think there's definitely been an uptick in quality of defense from, you know, what we've seen the last, you know, year, maybe two years. I have a very inside baseball question for you. We've seen Jeremy run through a couple of stop signs at third base and successful on both of them. What is the balance bogey on that between I can go get that 90 feet that my coach doesn't necessarily think I should go for or can make as compared to going, you know what? I got to start listening to my coaches.

What is the dynamic behind it? Is it you keep doing what you're doing until you get called out and then you get called out by the coach and the manager? or what is that like having to balance? I can get those X-90 feet as compared to. I need to listen to what my coaches are telling me. Well, some of it has to do with the play. You know, when you're running the bases, there are certain times when all of the information that you need

will be in front of you and you can put it all together and you don't need a coach. And sometimes, you know, the plays in the right field corner and you're blind to it and you've just got to totally rely on him. So a lot of it has to do with, you know, Jeremy's rounding second and the plays in left center field, and he's doing the calculus on all of that, and he's going to make his own decision. And, you know, if you have trust in your players to make sound decisions, you let them go on it.

I think it also has to do with where you're at offensively. You know, if you're not tearing the cover off of the ball and you know that it's a struggle to score runs, you've got to make up for it somewhere. So, you know, if your team's hitting 2.30 as a team, what's the point of stopping at third base with two outs? If it's a 50-50 chance, you take that because it's a 25% chance that the guy's going to get a hit behind you. So I think a little bit has to do with, you know, while we're struggling to score runs, we're going to push it on the bases. Maybe they start killing the ball and they back off a little bit and you hand it over to the bats. But, yeah, I think with what Pena specifically has proven that he can do on the base,

it's a guy that you just turn loose. And maybe every once in a while in a situation, you know, you go over and say, hey, let's tone it down here because, you know, I got something going with the bats that we want, but I would let that guy just run wild right now. Brian Bocosevic was here on Sports Talk 790. What have you been seeing from Yiner Diaz so far this season?

Real, really big struggles earlier. A couple of hits here and there. What does he need to work on and improve? He's super jumpy. I mean, there are, gosh, if he gets four at bats in a game, there are probably, you know, six to eight swings where it looks like he's swinging as soon as the ball comes out of the pitcher's hands. And that, you know, that is kind of the default. A guy like him, a guy like El Tuvei, who they've always been able to rely on their back-to-ball skills,

they're going to default to, I'm swinging, and I'm going to try to figure out how to hit it as it's on its way. It's just the nature of the beast with those guys. if he can slow it down a little bit, it'll be better for him, you know, let the ball travel a little bit. And there's nothing wrong with his swing because when he does run into balls, it's quality contact. I mean, he had he hit an O2 breaking ball, you know, out away from him and he raked it into the left, you know, the left field corner for a double yesterday. So the swing works when he, when the ball is into the hitting zone. He's just not getting bat and ball into the same place at the same time. So he's got to back his contact point up a little bit, and that's just a feel thing.

And it's a hard thing to find during the season because you really have to just back off a little bit. And for a guy whose nature is to be aggressive and when things go wrong to be more aggressive, it's hard to back off to find that feeling. For a let you run, Ryan Guss was going to pitch today. Is this for you a test of you want to be in the starting rotation? here's your opportunity. Toronto struggling offensively, or do you think maybe as you look at Guston, again, there's a very small sample size

that maybe he is perfect for that middle relief, two, three-eaning guy in case a particular starter struggles on a certain night? You know what? I think he's shown that he can be what you need him to be. The way that he's pitched as a starter

hasn't been any different from the way that he pitched as a reliever. I mean, he's out there, He's going to throw his fastball in the zone. He's going to attack guys. You get some runners on base. It doesn't seem to bother him. He's going to continue to attack

and either get the big swing and miss or get the ground ball to get him out of it. The stuff is good enough to tick up a little bit to play in the bullpen. He's shown the ability, you know, from his first start to a second start, he threw a little bit more off-speed stuff early to keep guys off balance just a little bit.

So I don't know that it's necessarily in audition because, look, you get Erigetti back healthy, and we know how that's going to go. Erigetti's going to slot right back into that spot, probably same with McCullors when that happened. So I think it's more of just, here's another opportunity for you,

a guy who we probably didn't think was going to be on the team going into spring training. You impress us in spring. You impress us early in the season. Here's another chance to impress. So when it's time to make some roster decisions, we can't live without you one way or the other. Great stuff. always, friend. Thank you very much. Looking forward to seeing you back on television very shortly

and back with us next Wednesday here on the program. All right, thanks guys. Hey, big doubleheader tonight with the Rockets, too, huh? Who do you got? Who got in game two? Come on. Tell us the truth. Don't lie. I think young guys have to look better in the second game than the first game. They look a little, they look like young guys playing their first games. All right. That feels fair. You know what? You're saying amend, Thompson's your pick-to-click is what you're trying to tell me then. sure yeah come on

four by four tonight bogey thanks for the visit is always appreciate it all right thank you Brian go bogus drop a little NBA knowledge on us I love it obviously a huge man

Thompson guy if he's gonna score it's gonna be on more putbacks and getting found on a few more of these basket cuts he made some good ones and wasn't found in game one I imagine that's on film

he's gotta be very aggressive tonight I think he's got to be aggressive I think Jaylon the Green's got to attack against Steph if on the matchup but everybody backs up on because he can't shoot. So, yeah, he's got

to score another way. It's going to have to be some of that mid-range, and it's also going to just have to be basket cuts and putbacks. And that's what I'm in. Thompson's very good. Hang out of that dunker spot, as a kid's saying. Let's go. All right. Thanks to Bogie. Great stuff, as always, from Bogus. We appreciate him joining us. Oh, me. He's so good. He is good. Hey, we'll talk to Todd Pobord of Warriors Radio at the bottom of the hour. I know. We don't mess around

on this radio show. How? What a show. 713-212-790. 7-1-3-212-790. You have two hours left, just two, to potentially win a pair of tickets to see the Rockets in Golden State today. How do you do that, Matt? Well, I'm glad you asked. I guess I'm supposed to ask me. Ross, how do you do that? Sorry, this is rehearsal.

Yes, Matthew, send me an email of your Iheart radio app screenshoted with Sports Talk 790 as your number one preset. And you're entered. Ross at Sports790.com. talking about game number two, Rockets and Warriors, tonight. Send an email, Ross at Sports790.com of your screenshot of your IHeart radio app with Sports Talk 790 as your number one preset. You are going to be entered. We already got over 100 entries. So appreciate all of you that have been entering.

But more of you want to get in, we'll be doing the drawing at 1.20 p.m. Are we doing that on air? I don't care. I mean, it's up to y'all. bottom line is you have a one and about 150% it's a shot and it's a better than zero in a lotto. I mean you can go buy the tickets

but we're giving them away, you might as well win them if you Yeah, if you'll know by 120 if you get in for free and then you can try to go win you can go buy something. Yeah, yeah that's exactly right. Uh, poor question today which is getting a little more steam on your side of things. It is?

I mean, you know, I'm glad the smart people are listening now. Uh, yeah. The question was, is tonight's game for the Rockets and must win. I mean, this is just a setup poll question number one. And you know what you're doing. And I'm not stupid. But what do you mean? Uh-huh. Yeah, but that's fine. I'm still right. I don't care.

Literally you're right. I've never argued that. But we live in a figurative world. Okay. Is that a Madonna song? No. That's a material world. Oh, I thought it was figurative world. Close enough. 93% say yes. 7%? 7% say no. 7% baby. Let's go.

Comments. Anthony. Going to over. Oakland down O2 is a massive hill to climb. Well, we're not going to Oakland. We play in San Francisco now, but I understand. Jolten Joe's sports show says not literally, but figuratively. Yeah, there we go. You sure as hell don't want to go down in O2. Gosh, you always want to start a semantics fight in this show.

I am. What do you, Adam Clinton? They call me Mr. Semantics. Ross, can you repeat your email address? I have someone needs to be. Ross. R-O-S-S at Sports790.com. Yeah, that's it.

Also, if you can't figure it out, just go to my Twitter account. at Sports RV, it's my PIN to tweet. Although my PIN tweet says tomorrow. So let me go ahead and change that. Change it up a little bit. I'd like the edit feature. You know what?

I'm not paying for it. I might pay for it. I'm not paying for the free site. I'm just not. I'm taking a stand. Because I feel like the reason why I don't want to do is because we do give it a lot of promotion. Yeah, we do.

And then everybody... It is an active part of our show, and I give them credit for allowing that to happen. I don't wait for us to communicate. But it's a give and take. I shouldn't have to pay for it. I know, you're right. Our company should pay for it.

What did you say? I said our company should pay. Okay, that was funny. What did you think I said? Well, I don't know. You said our company should pay for it. That's what I did say. Our company should pay for it.

Okay. Vincent Company should pay for it? Anybody should pay for it. No. But yeah. What's I going with this? Oh, yeah. So it's a part of a show.

And it allows us to do poll questions of which 93% say one thing over there, which is still one of the greatest discrepancies in all-time poll question of history. That's not true. You got crushed on biscuits and gravy. I can go find it, I guess, though. I mean, you could. It's probably close now that I got up to 7%.

I mean, 7% of people want to be right. And that's fine. No, we're all 100% right. No, you're wrong. 100% wrong. No, no, no, no. Okay, so have you thought about this? I thought about what, Matt?

In your mind, what's going to happen tonight? I don't know. Rocket shoe better from three. They continue to play good defense. Steph Curry doesn't go off as much. Jimmy Butler probably still gets his because that's just what he's going to do. Maybe Brandon Progenzky or somebody gets a couple of open threes, but rockets are going to make theirs.

They're going to win comfortably. You heard it here first. Not comfortably, but like 10, like what the Warriors did. They won by 10. Not that Vegas determines everything, but the Vegas has the rockets. I thought I saw it two and a half point favorite, I think. Okay. Yeah, they normally, and I don't like this.

They give an extra point for the desperate team. Now it's up to three and a half, actually. This actually makes me worried. Don't let Vegas worry. Don't do that too. Vegas worries me all the time. They're very good. But they're not always right.

You're right. They were right yesterday if you had Oklahoma City giving the 14 and a half to the through Memphis. That was done rather easily. They went by 19, yeah. Got a little close. And Dean Laird came back and the Pacer still won, huh? I think. And we won't spend a whole lot time on this.

I like Doc Rivers for some reason. The NBA players don't. What did he finish? The NBA players don't want. And I don't think at the end of the day he's ever going to be considered a great basketball coach. I think he has had tremendous amount of talent and a tremendous amount of disappointment of come playoff time. Now, he does have what, two titles of his name, right? I think one.

08 Celtics. I thought he'd won somewhere else too. But you're probably right. But he's had teams that on paper were saying. significantly better than the opposition and we're able to, unable to close it out. Yeah, one time, well, oh, you were thinking of the NBA Cup championship, Matt. Oh, is that what it is? Okay. You know, those NBA cups are important. NBA champion in 2008, that is it. Yeah, with the big three.

Mm-hmm. That was the first year of Ray Allen, Garnett, and Paul Pierce. Yeah. But, man. And Rondo was on that team, too. If they, if they peter out, guess who's going to want out of there? Doc Rivers? No. Oh, Janus? Janus. There are tremendous rumors about Janus wanting to go play for the Brooklyn Nets.

Come down to Houston. Janus, I would take over KD. Simple because of youth? Yeah. How old is Janus? I think you have another non-shooter on the team. That'd be bad. You'd have a sub-35% three-point shooter?

What's your? 26, 27? Is he older than that? Oh, he's 30 now. I'd still take him. All right. Tom Tolbert of the Warriors Radio Network joins us next. 1128 here on Sports Talk 790. 1132 and it's a Matt Thomas show with Ross. Sports Talk 790. Game two tonight. We'll feature the Golden State Warriors and your Houston Rockets. I'll have the call with Adam Clank. We'll be over on our sister station News Radio 740 KTRH. Our launch pad coverage, I believe we'll start at 730 tip time, hopefully just past. 830. There could be a 10-minute pushback, depending on it, the early game goes a little bit later. Right now, joining us seven-year NBA veteran, longtime successful Bay Area talk show host. You saw him on television with NBC and ESPN, and now he's a part of the Warriors Radio Network.

Tom Tolbert with us here on the Matt Thomas show, Ross. Tom, thanks for coming. Hope you've enjoyed our city so far. How are you enjoying these days off in between games? Too many. You got that right. Too many days off. They really stretched the first round out. But that was cool. I got a chance to get out and get a walk in yesterday.

I actually walked to a movie theater and then watched the movie and walked back. So I saw a movie and got my steps in. So all good. What did you see, my ask? I saw warfare. It's pretty intense. Thumbs up or thumbs down? Thumbs up for me.

But it was intense. it looked like it was pretty a portrayal. So, yeah, it was, it was good, though. I was going to go see that or sinners, and sinners was too long. I was like two hours and 30 minutes or something, but I'll go see that when I get back home. So, yeah, I've just been getting out walking.

There have been some, you know, nice neighborhoods and good restaurants that I've eaten at so far. So, yeah, I've had a good time since I've been here. It's great to have you with us on the show for the very first time. Tom, let me ask you about Steph because he was, held in check when we saw you guys a few weeks ago, one for 10 against the Warriors in San Francisco, one three-point basket.

I don't think he carried that over into game one. I think it was the playoffs. It couldn't have been, it wouldn't have mattered who he played. But some of the freakish shots, and you have been witnessed to so many of them, how does he still do it at this age? How does he still catch and shoot in rhythm 35-footers?

He's Steph. I mean, there's really no other way to put it. It's just, he's one of, one when it comes to that kind of stuff. I mean, he hit three shots in the second half of game one that were just absurd. Of course, the one over Jalen Green, where he's falling out of bounds, drifting right, and drills that one. Then he drilled the probably 35-footer from the right side.

And then he drilled one where the shot clock was running out, where the ball was in his hands a nanosecond, just like flipped it up there. And that thing went as well. And nothing really surprises me with him. And I've always said with Steph that he makes the extraordinary, like ordinary. I've seen it so many times over and over and over again that I guess I'm a little jaded. I don't get all that bays by what he does. I mean, those three shots were pretty wild, even those ones, you know, raise my voice a little bit.

But that's just who he is. I mean, he does it, and he does it over and over and over again. So I just kind of shake my head and go, that's Steph. Yeah, unfortunately, I've called so many on the other side of that. I have the exact same opinion. Tom Toverwood is here from Warriors Radio. Tom, when you found out the Jimmy Butler interest in Golden State, your initial thought, and I would have to assume,

even though he has been really good Jimmy has as a playoff guy, he's had his issues in a variety of places over the years, that you're thinking, how long is this, honeymoon affair going to go. Well, so far, it's gone very, very well for him wearing golden state gear. Yeah, I mean, because they were interested in Durant, and Durant made it clear he didn't want to come here, and then they kind of shifted their focus to Butler.

So I don't even think the Warriors knew what they were getting exactly with Jim Butler. And when I found out about it, my initial thought was, nah, you know, okay, I mean, Dean Butler's a good player. How's he going to fit in here? you know, he doesn't really stress the court, doesn't give him another guy, he can shoot. And then you watch him play every day,

and that's the thing I always try to impart on people. Like, it's so funny when you need, like, MVP voting and all that kind of stuff. I'm like, you really never know how good a guy is until you see him every day. You know, you don't know his flaws, you don't know his strengths. And there may be a lot of things

that don't show up in the box score that make the player who he is. Well, that's Jimmy Butler. Jimmy Butler is like having another Draymond-like character on the team in that they get the game. They're ahead of the chains mentally. They make the right play way more often than not. And he didn't really have to stretch the court. Like he doesn't shoot.

He's shot decently, like recently, but it only shoots me, one or two, threes a game. But he gets to the free throw line. You watch him make the right pass. You watch him switch off at the right moment on defense. he gets the ball ahead when he rebounds it like it just now I get it like I watch him plans like now I get it and he's really good too like I mean the tangible stuff he's still really good at that but under I Godalo is probably the best in the league at that where he'd have eight points four rebounds four assists and be a plus 18 consistently because plus minus can

be one I you know that could be an aberration once you know once every now and again or maybe if you added up a weekly, but when it's his career, like that's who he Godala was. And I see a lot of them, Jimmy Butler, like, there's a lot of stuff that you don't see in the box score that shows up and helps you win basketball games. He's been really good. A lot better than I thought it was going to be. I've got to be honest. Ross, with you as well here, Tom, and just curious your observations, game number one,

things that you saw maybe offensively defensively, rotations, and anything that surprised you and that you're keeping an eye on for game two? Well, look, I mean, Jalen Green and Bambly are going to shoot the ball better. And that's just a law of averages. Jailen Green, I think the words did a great job of keeping him to his left, didn't let him get to his right. And I think for him, he was kind of stuck in between. Should I just shoot it or try to get all the way to the rim?

And when he tried to get all the way to the rim, I think the worries had a really good job of collapsing on him. and forcing tough shots. And then, you know, sometimes you get in your own head a little bit. And the playoffs are different. Playoffs are a different feel, and there's a little more pressure to each possession when it comes to the playoffs. You get up to a slow start sometimes.

It's kind of tough to dig yourself out of that hole, and I'm sure he felt the pressure. And then, like, let's be honest, Van Blythe doesn't shot at well all season. I mean, she's under 40 from 2, or overall, I should say, and shoots around 35 from 3. You know, he's going to shoot it better. I have no doubt about that. Offensively on the glass, they killed the Warriors, killed them.

And I think they beat him up pretty good this year, too. I want to say in the five games they played previously, they averaged 17 second chance points. The Warriors averaged 10. And the Warriors are pretty good offensive rebranding, too. But the Rock has just dominated that game. So the question for me, and I've had this with the Rockets all season long, is do they shoot it well enough?

Are they a team they can shoot it well enough that once they get to the playoffs and teams can really lock down on them and really formulate a game plan on them? Because that's not something you really do during that regular season. Are they going to be able to hit enough shots from the outside? They were, oh, excuse me, they were seven for 37 outside the paint in game one. You can't win that way. It just, I mean, you can't. Nobody can.

So they're going to have to shoot it better, and they're going to have to continue to do what they do on the offense of glass. but defensively they played fine. I mean, they got into them defensively. The Warriors, I think, only assisted on 55% of their field goals in game one, and they led the league in that stat. They assisted on 71% of their field goals in the regular season. So the Rocks did a really good job of making them go one-on-one.

Steph hit some crazy shot. Jimmy hit that crazy shot from the left side, about a 20-foot or toward the end of the shot clock in the first half. So their defense was fine, and they played. played hard. It wasn't like they didn't play hard. They played hard. They just have to hit a few more shots. And if you don't, you're just not going to win.

But I suspect they will, but can they hit him consistently and not throughout the course of the seven-game series to give them a chance to win? We'll see. Tom Tolbert with us here on a Sports Talk 790. You mentioned the boards, and it seemed like that's where the Rockets' advantage

was, was down low with Alpern-Shingo and Stephen Adams doing their thing. Do you think Steve Kerr kind of just lets that rock? or do you think we see a little more Kavana Looney or Quentin Post? Well, that's a good question because, boy, Adams, wow. He'd be my number one pick if I needed somebody at a foxhole from the NBA. Not that right. He scares me, big time, big time.

He was just tossing dudes around. I mean, that guy is, I mean, he is insanely strong. But, you know, him and Shangood, I thought a lot of the problem, though, wasn't just him. It was the warriors weren't boxing out. the wings because the rockets, I mean, they have really athletic wings. I mean, Thompson doesn't get any more athletic than that. Jabari Smith, Jr., Ethan, I mean, they have some guys that can get after it on the glass. So the wings got to do a better job of at least checking their players before they go and

pursue the ball. Because a lot of times, they get caught along with a lot of other NBA teams, get caught ball watching on the perimeter. And if you do that, the offense is going to beat you the offensive glass. So I don't know if there's a whole lot they can do about it. I mean, the Rockets were number one in the league this year in offensive rebounding percentage, so it's what they do. You'd like to limit it a little bit,

and you'd like to make them pay the price for crashing the glass. If you do get the offensive rebound, you've got to go and try to get something in the open court. Speaking of the open court, the worst did a good job of that, keeping the Rockets out of transition, because they're really good at that as well. But, yeah, I mean,

I don't know. I don't know if he's going to play. They won game one, so I'm thinking, you know, you don't change a whole lot. But, yeah, you'd like to limit their offensive class. And I think what he would like to do is maybe take advantage of that double big lineup on the offense event. Try to involve them in some more pick and rolls. Although I thought Shingoon and Adams did a good job on the pick and rolls, they stayed with Steph. reasonably well, enough time for the point guard to get over.

Then the rotations are pretty good. The problem the words have sometimes that Dremont's not set in the pick and roll, then Jimmy and Dremont are your spacers. And they're not really spacers. They're not really guys you're put in the corner to space the floor. They're kind of in the dunker spot. So the floor can get a little compacted sometimes. Udo does a real nice job with his defensive strategies too.

like he kind of forces the warriors to do some of those things. But, you know, if the wars can take advantage of it on offense, then maybe they can force, you may, to take them off the court. If not, then they're just going to, you know, the rockets may be able to go even more too big tonight and just try to hammer the warriors into submission on the glass. But it's always kind of fun to see just a little adjustments. There's never these wild adjustments, right, from game one to game two,

because even if you're the Rockets, you don't want to change a lot of stuff. I mean, you won 52 games this year. You don't want to panic because the players are like, what are we doing? We lost one game. It's not that big a deal. It always seems like it is, but it really isn't.

You got to get to four. The worries still have to get to four. Yeah. So can you do what you do and just do it a little bit better? We'll see. God, it feels like to me to try to dump down our industry, Tom. The Rock has just got to hit shots. I mean, there's really no other way around it.

The back court has got to hit shots that they're going to make this a game tonight. you, my friend, for coming on the show. Enjoy on midday nap. I'm assuming you're going to be having here after your show, and we'll look forward to seeing you and Tim later at the arena tonight. Thanks for the time. We really appreciate it. Well, I look forward to seeing you tonight.

All right, thank you, Tom. Brie. Tom Tolbert with Warriors Radio with us here at 1144 on Sports Talk, 730. All right, the news and noon is coming up in a few minutes. Thanks again to Tom Tober for joining us here on the program. A little perspective on the Golden State side of things. By the way, the game five has been an announcement. announced start time, and we're going to play a game five. If not, I'm going to be in a clinical depression mode for a while.

Game five, I'm personally guaranteeing there will be a game five. I'm going to take you up on that. One week from tonight, normally we get screwed out of the start time. We're going to be playing the game at 630 on Wednesday, one week from today. Really? Yes. What happened? Well, there was NBA TV, which helped.

Oh, wait. It's an NBA TV? No, no, there are three games, but they... I was going to say, yes. say they're going to stick the Warriors. Yeah, they're not putting in the Warriors on a BAT TV, no chance. Yeah, so we are the early attractive game. So there's

a West Coast game that night. I think it's probably going to, my guess would be the Clippers. Let's take off that pesky if necessary asterisk tonight. I'm telling you, I will be in such a good mood tomorrow, Ross, if we win this one tonight. And tomorrow, I mean,

I'll wake up and I'll do the show and everything, but it won't be in a great mood. Oh, if they're down? It's not going to happen. They're going to win. You calling your shot? Put your name on it. Was that a whimper that you just had of the show? You don't usually whimper very much.

That would mean there would be four series squared at one apiece. Yeah, I mean, look at the Lakers beat up on the wolves last night, so it can definitely happen. It could go seven. Well, I mean, Indiana and Milwaukee could go seven too, but right now it's two zero. That's true. Just throwing it out there. Especially Dame Lillard back. That didn't help for them.

No, he wasn't very good. But my guess is they'll be significantly better than Milwaukee than they were. What are these giant uniforms? Jesus, what are we doing? What are we doing with these city connects? I like the Astros ones. I love, I don't like the Astros ones. I love them.

I went from they're solid to, I like them a lot better and having them in person. I'm warming up more and more and more. Yeah. Kim wanted to buy me some socks that Jose Al-Tube was wearing. I said, can I wear him in all occasions? Yeah. She's like. Do you mean the ones that he, they're the giveaway ones from Sunday?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. Where'd she get them? I don't know if she says, I'll buy you a pair. I'm like, I'm okay. Well, there are giveaways. I don't know if they're for sale.

Oh. I know you like to wear funky socks with Hershey Kisses on them. I do wear the Hershey Kisses socks. If you're saying, what are you talking about? I was looking for a dark pair of socks and I didn't want to spend $65 at Rack's revenue so I went to a drugstore and sent I got a pair of Hershey Kisses socks that were $14.

Good job, man. Hashtap value. Let's talk to Bleacher Dave. Has he called before in the past? I think so. He is a ultimate Golden State fan. joins us here on the show. Bleacher Dave, long time, no talk. How are things? Long time, no talk, my friend. I'm flattered

you remembered me from our last playoff tilt tobacco. We tend to remember the really bad calls. Oh, that's not nice. It may be true, but it's not nice. I'm just kidding, Bleacher, Dave. What's up? I know you're just kidding.

I can take Not Nice. And I just want you to know, we have a GoFundMe ready for your mental trauma therapy after you guys don't play Game 5. So I heard those comments. Just know I'm here for you. Thanks for having my dude, Tom Tobridon. Tom is, you know, an icon around here. I know you guys respect. Look, first, you know, all jokes aside, you guys have a super exciting young team.

It's fun to watch the energy. there. You know, my family left Houston a long time ago. I love him. Madouca. So, you know, enjoy your way up. You still got a little bit of way to go. Just a couple comments about tonight and big observations about last game. So, you know, I think this is as predicted, you know, who's going to score down the stretch in clutch situations in half court for the Rockets in the battle of that super jumbo lineup, which brought their rockets back in the game before Steph Curry started doing his magic there at the end. I think is where this thing goes. But here's what we got to talk about.

I heard from every Houston maniac in the world how Amin Thompson is going to pick up Steph Curry full court and not allow him to touch the ball. But we know what happened. He went 12 of 19. He gave Amin at work. He gave Jaila Network. He gave Eastern Triumph. He gave him all some work very efficiently. And what we didn't talk about, Steph Curry.

and isolated, and when he was a primary defender, held his dudes to four of 16 shooting. 25%, the lowest percentage of anybody in the playoffs so far. I'm not going to try and tell you that Steph Curry is a defensive player and your candidate, but when the Rockets tried to attack him with multiple players, he moved his feet and did not let them get by him. It was a stunning and stellar defensive formance by a guy who was known for offense first. So let's have a fantastic.

the game tonight. I wish you guys good health and bad luck. But pull out your umberlis because it might be raining in the Toyota Center tonight because we know how we get down. It's going to be splashy. Let's stay wet, babies. Wow.

Thanks, Bleacher Dave. Was that Bleacher Dave or Shannon Sharp? Oh, that's totally different. All right. I don't think we've made that comparison anymore. Yeah. All right, quick thing from Bleacher Dave is, yes, a lot of Rockets fans are like, oh, Moon Thompson, he's going to have he's going to have step

Curry in the torture chamber I'm going to be honest with you folks if you're somebody who's calling out and saying him in Thompson is just going to lock down Steph Curry you're high number one because that's impossible to lock down Steph Curry for a seven game series number two it's 2025

basketball they're going to find switches it's going to have to be some jalen greens have to be some some Dylan Brooks they're going to run pick and rolls this is not 195 basketball where it's like this guy guards that guy and that's it we don't have any rules we don't switch anything around and we have like or like little league when you're playing of ymCA basketball you wear a red what do you call it wristband and then you find the guy in his red wristband you have to guard him the

whole game that's not how it works so men thompson's not going to be on him every time and so people i saw rockets fans saying that i'm like you're just not paying attention to basketball he's not going to be on him every single possession that's not how it works it's going to take good team defense and being physical with step kerry and going around a million picks and communicating well on those to do your best to limit him. Your mouth, the basketball God's ears. And they were very physical, and a lot of that video is out there.

So I'm hoping the referees continue to allow that. He was getting mugged on a lot of those plays. I'm just being honest. You mean, Steph Curry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure. Here, yeah. Well, both places, but he was able to slip through that.

I think a man, to me, it's got to hit those elbow jumpers, got to be at that dunker spot, got to be able to finish, got to make the free throws. and the one thing I didn't pay off on the tease earlier, I wouldn't be totally shocked if we see a little Aaron Holiday, especially if the perimeter game, the three-point shot does not drop. Just for a change of pace.

I'm not saying major minutes. I'm not saying difference maker. Yeah, five or six. But I think you have subtle adjustments in every game of a series. Uh-huh. And I think that would be the subtle adjustment the Rockets might go to, especially at the perimeter game as as wellful as it was in game one. Yeah, it might be.

But if you start off hitting your threes, you don't need Aaron Holliday. No, you don't. They might have needed them a little bit in game. one. And by the way, go look at the NBA playoff game so far this year. Rotations are eight or nine players. Yeah, except Steve Kerr played a bunch of people for whatever reason. Well, two of the guys play less than nine minutes. So it's

essentially eight. Sometimes you get to a ninth, but and by and large, with the way the spaces, like the rockets don't play again until Saturday. So you can go play your eight guys if that's what you feel like maybe Aaron being your ninth. The news at noon is coming up in a matter of moments and we

have shut your ball ass up in a half an hour right here on Sports Talk 790. Lunch timers This is the Matt Thomas show Okay well I'll let you decide Okay Because I was one I had yesterday We said and it was perfect

And I can't think of it I think we won't back down It's a banger Yeah For that Yeah It gets the 62 year old white dudes going You get under 62 going

May Tom Petty rest I like the song I like Tom Petty Properly rated Properly rated Not under Certainly than over All time grades, but very, very, very good had a lot of hits.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. 12.9. But we got to get to it. We got to shut your bum ass up at the bottom of the hour. You get some people to shut their bomb asses up? Yeah, I do.

Don't get me every time I ask you that question. All right. Let's get to The News at Dude. And with that, we go to the Jerome. What's the guy's name of Channel 11? I don't know. Jerome Gray. I don't watch local news.

Jerome Gray of television news. I think he's off that show too. I mean, he's retired. We speak of the one and only Rossville. Well, we wish you well in retirement, Jerome Gray. Yes, Matt, as you mentioned, the Astros won the first two games of the series against the Blue Jays.

How about our guy, Ronell Blanco, six and two thirds, with one earned run given up? And then the bullpen going the way you would want, Brian King, Brian to pray you, And then Josh Hader closing things down. Three hits from Christian Walker, very encouraging. Three hits from Jeremy Pena. He is on a 13-game hitting streak.

And his average very slowly moving up. It's going up. Well, in this, over this 13-game hit streak, it's gone from 154 to 253. That's actually quite a quick rise. That's pretty good. How's Jake Myers-Betting average lost two years? We're not talking about that. And as you heard from Brian Bogusevic talking about the

breakout possible. The barrel percentages matter up, hard hit percentage as well. XBA's looking good for Jeremy Pena. Could be a breakout season for him in 2025. Hey, break out the barrel. Yes. You like to break out those barrels, especially if you're torpedoing with them. We don't know if it's working for Duboni hasn't been in the lineup. But anyways, as you mentioned, yes, fine. We can bring up some negatives if you want to. No, I don't want to. No, it's fine. You want to be a jerk? That's okay. Not true. Three hit game for Jake Myers on Friday. He also had multi-hit game on Sunday, but since then, 048 with six strikeouts.

OPS down to 643. That's fine. He's going to bounce back. You know, we got to get Cam Smith out of a ninth spot. Where was he yesterday? Batting ninth. What was he? We got to put Jake back in his normal position.

The position of comfort. That's fine. Another game, by the way, with Yordon Alvarez. in the two-hole. I personally love that. Astros go for the sweep today. 640 start here on Sports Talk 790. over on our sister station news radio 740 KTRH will be the Rockets taking on the Golden State Warriors line holding. The Rockets were one and a half-point favorites in game one up to three and a half in game. Number two. So if you ran to the Louisiana State border, what would you do? I personally, and as somebody who's been

wagering friendly wagers for not money, Matt, on the playoffs and the NBA for many years, I personally think Vegas overrates. If there's been no injury and it's a two-point line move, personally, if I took off my rockets hat, I would like the Warriors.

Because nothing's changed. Why is it a two-point difference? It's only mental that in our heads that, oh, the rockets have their backs against a wall. And I think it's too much of a line shift just for one game. And if you think the Achilles and heel is the rocket shooting,

it's all of a sudden they're not going to become a 60% three-point shooting team. I mean, they could because shooting can be sporadic. But if you look at some of the parts against the Warriors this year, Jalen Green's worst game of the year

have come against Golden State. By the way, Jalen Green, 18 and a half, we're going more than, as the kids say. Oh, really? That's already locked in. Okay.

18 and a half? That's free money, Matt. please don't call me on this tomorrow. And even if it's maybe in volume shooting, I'll still take it. Yeah. He's going to get 18 and a half. My pick to click tonight, Amen Thompson plays a significantly better game,

both offensively and defensively tonight that he did in game one. That's my pick to click. All right. Well, better be them basket cuts in the dunker spot, like you're saying. And some steals, like Tar Eason had a couple. Because everybody knows. Once he's dribbling towards the basket, they just pack the paint. And also don't turn the ball over as much.

That's another key. Oh, how about you want to really call your shot? Say how about one corner three for men, Thompson? Don't need it. Okay. I thought you were going to do it. You pumped faked me. I did.

I shot faked you. Yeah. You did a lucidantage pump faked. Speaking of that. The Lakers were able to defeat the Minnesota Timberwolves last night as well to square their series at one apiece, Matt. Your thoughts? I like the Lakers in the series. And by the way, I think Anthony Edwards now with the $50,000 fine yesterday is up to...

What did he say? He said my D is bigger than yours. Which we said that quite a better on these parts. We don't get fined Gs for that. Okay. I think he's up to $375,000 in fines this year. Nice. How much in child support?

Over a million. Okay. So he's, he has Venmoed a million and a half million dollars. Do you Venmo child support? I think he's... They got to go through the courts. Do you Venmo the NBA? Can you get the automatic clearinghouse on that?

I don't know. That's good question. And that's your news of noon, man. All right, there you go. We have shut your bomb ass up at the bottom of the hour. We have ain't nobody got time for that. 713212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90.

Rumors about the Texans moving up in the trade world. A couple different folks have that. We'll talk about that coming back. 12-15. Sports Talk. 790 with And we'll have draft coverage for you tomorrow. Wexler and Cole Thompson are going to host a show right after the A team,

giving you pick by pick, layer by layer, selection by selection. Love it. Analysis, breakdown, thoughts, beliefs, prospective trades. Will the Texans stay at 25? I say no. I say yes. I say that there are kicking of tires. I say stay.

You say go. No, you're saying you're going. No, I say goodbye. Oh, Jesus. You say hello. Oh, my God. I crack myself up. The unnamed, unsponsored draft show tomorrow night, 6 o'clock sports talks.

It's an official sports talk 790 draft show. Well, it's compared to unofficial. Yeah, it's the official one. You're hosting the unofficial one. Oh, I'll be hosting an all right from my office watching TV. Mm-hmm. To me, it's a television sport. It's the drama of the warm embrace between the commissioner and the first round pick.

But if you want to hear great local breakdown on what the Texans may do at 25 and the pick, here on Sports Talk 790. Correct, 6 o'clock tomorrow night. Come check it out. Yeah. What else we got going? Astros, by the way, have the tomorrow off, so it's a perfect day for that to happen. Rockets also have the tomorrow off as well.

Oh, so Albert Breyer says the Texans are kicking tires. I'm moving up. I don't doubt that. I mean, I don't think I'm a bridge making that up. I also believe that everybody's trying to kick the tires on moving up and down. You know. Yeah. And, I mean, Nick Casario, have you ever seen him sit in place?

No. He always likes to be moving and shaking and making trades. And that's okay. That's good. It helped get some players in the past. I just think it makes sense if they're in love with an offensive lineman that they can get up and get, and people think it might be Kelvin Banks from Texas, that he should do that. Was he as dominant as the NFL draft profiles are selling?

No, I mean, to me, Kelvin Banks is, well, first of all, some people want him as a guard and have him listed as a guard. But he's big, he's strong. He's still very young, by the way. I mean, he started as a true freshman and it started three years. So he's got a lot of room to improve. He's not as big as like the 65, 6, 6, 6, 6 type of guy, prototypical guys, but he does have very long arms. So I think he's going to be really good. and he would be a guy that would be in that top 15 range.

He's not, yeah, he's not necessarily like a can't miss, no doubt about it, tackle prospect, which there are none in this draft. Well, the last time the Texans reached for alignment, that guy is gone. Uh-huh. And you're talking of Kenyon Green. Yeah. Who was, let's be brutally honest, was a bust of a first round pick. Played, he was.

Hurt, underperformed. Mm-hmm. Texans can't afford that, nor for that matter, anybody can't afford to have a first round bust. So if you're going to go move up in the draft, you better have a guy earmarked as I'm doing this for this particular player. Yeah. I think Nick Kassari has a list of guys.

He'd be thinking if they fall to a certain range, he's well prepared. Nick Kassari is going to be well prepared. Now, do I expect him to hit on every pick? No, we do have a history, especially with the offensive line, of him not doing a great job evaluating on that. side of the ball. And I think that's a thing. That unfortunately is a byproduct of where this organization is right now. When you miss on picks in multiple years and one particular spot on the

field, you're still chasing those dreams. And that's why I think they've gone with a variety of guys coming in on short-term contracts, previous success, maybe coming off of off-season. I mean, that's, I don't think, do you think the offensive line is settled today? I think my guess if the Texas go with the first round pick, that that first-round pick should absolutely be ready to start week one of the season. I think so. A lot of people have Josh Simmons, the Ohio State tackle, falling to them as well.

Which if you can get over the injury concerns, you're talking about a guy who was supposed to be a top five, top 10 type of pick. So we'll see what happens. One of the thing I want to bring up, and it's not related to the Texans. Tom Pelliserro, a long-time NFL writer for USA Today? NFL.com?

He's been an NFL network. Maybe he was USA Today before, I don't know. He's been an NFL network for a while. This guy dove climate is an aggregator. Oh my God. Mute him, please. Well, I mean, he doesn't put up fake stuff. Yes, he does sometimes. Well, that's terrible if he does.

But he attributes Tom Pell Serre to this. Oh, good. An NFL assistant coach on Shador Sanders. Quote, The worst formal interview I've ever been in my life. He's so entitled. He takes unnecessary sex. He never plays on time.

He has horrible body language. He blames teammates. but the biggest thing is he's not that good. So the initial thought I would have is, man, that's a terrible recommendation or lack thereof. But it also could be just, again, one hellacious smoke screen. Let's badmelt the kid. So he drops a couple of spots if anybody happens to believe him. And then our team, who may have forwarded that out there, can scoop him up and grab him at a certain position, at a certain number on the draft board.

Here's the thing I say about this. that's why I don't get into a lot of that draft preview take down kind of stuff is because I don't believe half the things I read. I shouldn't say that. I don't believe 80% of the things I read. Nor should you. It's smokescreen season. That's how it goes. That's why when the Albert Brewery report came out about maybe the Texans are thinking about moving up, I'm thinking, well,

Casero's like, yeah, that's not inaccurate, but I'm also thinking about maybe moving down too. You can't find anybody that consensusly says the Texans absolutely have got to find themselves in the top ten. You're hearing they're exploring. And that's why much of this pre-draft stuff to me is in one ear and out the other. That's why I don't focus on it. I like the event itself.

I'm very much vested in the first round. Couldn't care less but the second and third round. But that's where the great GMs do most of their damage. I'll be paying attention. Not like I get super into the draft. I haven't watched the Combine or anything like that. But I want the Texans to improve as battle. I'm kind of curious how Green Bay looks.

Green Bay? The Packers? No, the weather. Oh. All right. What is it in April these days in Green Bay? That can't be that bad. You're getting close to May. Didn't you have a big snowstorm in the Midwest?

When I was in Minnesota, it was snowing in May several years ago. Minnesota? Yes. When you're up there in Great White North? Mm-hmm. You're doing the Fargo bit. I don't know what you're talking about there, Matt. Yeah.

You're doing Garrett Cole in... Oh, geez. It's really cold. All right, tomorrow's forecast. Yeah. High of 56, low of 44 with a 35% chance of rain. That sounds nice. 7 o'clock at night, Greenberg.

That's shorts and T-shirt weather in Wisconsin. Actually, that is true. That doesn't sound fun. And then Friday's forecast is a high of 51 with an 85% chance of rain. Okay. You ready to host a draft? No, I don't care. Let's do the Discovery Green.

Okay. Well, we'll do it at the brand new Texan Stadium. There's not going to be a brand new Texas stadium. Okay. They're going to try to renovate. Try is the term. They're going to try to pass a bond for a lot of money. It's going to fail, and then they're going to pass one for a lesser money.

That's my prediction. That's my gut feeling. Meaning that they're going to go ask for the moon and then have to eventually write a check. Yeah. They know that too. They know they're probably not going to get it eventually. I mean, at first try.

That's your gut. My gut tells me they want, they're going to go for a new stadium somewhere outside of Harris County. I know. I think you might even put it in your name on it, that they want to get outside of Harris County. I don't think they want to. They're going to have to. I think they would like to get a plot of land in Harris County.

I think Harris County is going to tell them to shut the bar messes out. There are already a billion dollars still in debt to Harris County. They can't move. They can't go rack up a bunch of other debt somewhere else. That's why I think Harris County is going to tell them to shut their bum asses up. Speaking of that, what a good segue, Rossi. Let's tell some people to shut their bum asses up. You ready for that?

Sure. All right, you're mad at somebody for something they did wrong, something they rudely said. I had a terrible, terrible nightmare last night that has changed my philosophy about texting. You're an interesting human being. I would agree with that. So if you want to tell somebody to shut their bum ass up,

713, 212, 5, 790. Okay. 713, 212, 5, 790. 1229, you want to tell the IRS shut their bum asses up. Also, I want to tell me nobody got time for that. Ain't nobody getting time? Hey nobody getting time for that. Hey nobody getting time for it.

Hey, nobody getting time for it. Have you got time? If you're mad at somebody, we are here for you to call 713-212-790 and tell them to shut their bum asses up. Usually we put the sound about it right after that. Shit your bum ass up, man. bum ass up, man. Now, bless Josh Smith for giving us that bite.

If you got something out there that's just talking your head off and will not leave you alone at the grocery store trying to get your groceries, you're getting a 10 items or less, and they're just talking about their kids and their activities, you say, hey, Mildred, anybody got time for that? Mildred. Shit your bum ass up, man. No, you don't tell Mildred. You say nobody had time for that either.

All right. To the listener who sent the email to Ross saying that Ross carries a show. guess where you won't be a night. So I'm telling you to shut your bum ass up. Oh, come on. It was just a joke at an email. Shit your bum ass up, man. You can joke all you want to.

You won't be winning them tickets. Yeah, he will. No, you will. He already put them in the, he's already put them in the winner's bracket. No, I got, I got, I. There's only my five favorite people in. No, I'm just kidding. It's only called the leak key.

It works. Nope. No, sir. That's the duplicate key. I've made them enter five times now. Appreciate you, Cal. Guess what? You'll buy your tickets.

Not going to buy it. I'll tell you who's carrying the show. Getting you hooked up. 713-212-5-7-90. To my own mind. Okay. My own mind shut my own bum ass up. I had a terrible dream last night at 3 o'clock in the morning that woke me up.

Okay. I sent a text ripping somebody and I sent the text to that person. To that person. Which made me think for about an hour today, I need to stop being so mean on text. So I decided that I'm going to be nicer on text for the rest of my life. Really? Shit your bum-ass up, man.

I'm so proud of you, Matt. So my own mind. Here's how it went. I'm going to give you a hug. I'm not going to tell you who it was. Okay. You know this person, but you don't work with them. Okay.

Is John McLean? No. I sent this person, I sent a group text which I thought was the group. to the person directly. I said, must be nice for this person to get this job. He only had to use his wife to get this job. Wow.

Now you're trying to give this away. That doesn't really help me. You know what? Ain't nobody got time for you to be eating in the middle of your sentence. What are you doing? Hungry. So, I understand 10 to 2 is a little different.

So I'm done being mean on text. Okay. So maybe there's an indirect positive result. of me telling my own self to shut my own bum ass up. Okay. Ain't nobody got... Shit your bum ass up, man. Anything else, Matt?

No, just chew your food. Please stop. I'm good for now. I'm going to send Adam Glenn a picture of you spitting on that microphone. What's matter with you this week? Um... I had something. What was it? I'll do one. Okay, go.

Just generic Steph Curry fans wearing Golden State gear in Rockets at the Toto Center tonight. Anybody got time for that? Yeah, I was going to go with the Warriors and I was going to go with the Warriors fans. They were complaining about the refereeing on Monday. What? I'm sorry, Sunday.

Hello? Did you not see Draymond Green knock a ball out of bounds and it got called off of Stephen Adams? Did you not see Brandon Projimski with a clear travel that didn't get called? I understand, like, first of all, Rockets fans too. You're complaining about the referees in game one. The referees did not dictate what happened in game number one. Shut your bum ass up. Shut your bum ass up, man.

If any team in the NBA should not be complaining about officiating, it's the Golden State Warriors. Pound for pound get more home calls than any of the other 29 arenas I go to. Oh, Kyle's emailed in. Love you too, Matt. See, look. All right, Kyle, you're back on the good graces. Stick to your guns, Kyle. Yeah, Kyle.

Don't be scared. Don't be scared. Don't be scared to get your credit card on and pay for the rocket tickets. Oh, my God. Gosh, you're so ridiculous. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-9-0. Want you to call in? Complain? Yes.

We are cathartic. Are we not for people? I mean, we could be. Could be. What else, Matt? I think I'm good for now. John, that's what about with you? You got anything wrong in your life?

You know what? I actually am pissed this week. I went to the game last week Yesterday Astros game Yeah And this is I brought my girl

This is my first Her first time Ever going to any MLB Like stadium in her life We get there And it's dollar dog night Right Yes

She's 51 And you know And so we got like five You know And she doesn't She never understood The people How mad people get

These sport games We don't get their food Dude we had these Old Like rich guys Like I got a drink for her And I can't

back and they were trying to cut in front of her like talking like talking mess like to her like and I got there as soon as they saw my face they got a quiet but still was trying to buck and trying to cut in her hand trying to cut in front of her like and getting mad at that she had a spot in there so to all those old rich people we got the same as you shut your bum ass up man oh shut your bum ass up man where was she at i'm confused a little bit yeah i don't understand we're at the astros in section 18 oh and they're in the line in what line and the dollar dog line they were trying to cut They were trying to cut her? Yes.

And tried to talk mess because she was in line. She had, did she already have five hot dogs in her? Yeah, it was a whole big tray. Like, it couldn't even hold anything. I was so pit. I was, I was irate. Wow. Were you scrapping in the concourse over there, John?

I couldn't. I couldn't. That's right. You better know. By the way, to my wife, Kim Thomas. Uh-huh. We went to a dollar dog Mac last year. She got the chili and cheese on it.

Guess what? What? They had a dollar at that point. No, that's, Still a good deal, though. I don't want to add $2.75 for crappy toppings? Yeah, those chili and the cheese is not good.

Get the mustard and the raw. Yeah, you just got a raw dog. Excuse me? What? He had to have the raw dogs. We only and raw dog at home. We don't a raw dog at the stadium. No, you get, they're talking about the dollar dogs. Don't add chili and cheese to your dog. Yeah. Cost you extra. Now, if it's on a non-dollar dog night, then that's fine.

Why is it fine? Because if you want to spend the money. It costs extra either way. Yeah, but don't, but the whole value, the whole thing. thing I'm going to dollar dog night. You're not going to $3.75 dog night. You're not going to $3.75 dog night. Also, I wanted to say this, Matt, it happened last week. And I already 100% know you're going to be on board with me. What happened last week, Matt? It was a one-run ball game. Brian O'Brien was on the hill in the eighth inning. Dumbass wave. The wave breaks out.

Be a good sports town and engage in the game when it is a one-run ball game. It's impossible. Matt and I differ because I say if it's 10-1 in the 8th, whatever, that's fine. But it's 3 to 2. Watch the game. Cheer for every pitch. Cheer your guys on. You're there for a baseball game. Not to drunkenly throw your hands up anytime the wave comes around.

You're stupid. Ain't nobody got time for that. You're stupid. You're wearing shorts. You probably need a haircut. Get that chewing the back out of your mouth. And act on a darn ass fan. Yeah.

And pay your child support. Yeah. and don't ask her to forget it I was gonna go to wow you will bet your tongue for once on this show

I'm so proud of you I bet it I was gonna go with a Shannon Sharp cross reference but please no Shannon Sharp references for the rest of the show it looks so bad

I'm so disappointed to him I'm gonna ban you from mentioning Shannon Sharp I'm I remain silent of these things Jonathan 1241 on 790 Jonathan what's the matter with you

man my kid My kid yesterday, my 11-year-old son, told me that I had gotten so fat, and I barely gained any weight. I think I've gained like maybe five pounds over the last, like, month. And on top of that, we had hot dogs last night. I brought my plate to the table. You know, I loaded up a chili dog with some cheese. And he goes, oh, look at dad.

He's got his type two diabetes plate going on. Oh. And I just wanted to look at him and say, shut your bum ass up. Shut your bum ass up, man. Vanessa Richardson just texted me. Okay. She told me to shut my bum ass up. She says, you are not being done mean on text.

Vanessa might know me. Yeah. But I responded back to her. I'm done. I'm a saint now. You're going for personal growth, Matt. And it took a long time, but I'm proud of you. I literally woke up at 3 o'clock in the morning in a cold sweat.

What did you send? Well, I said, I told you what I sent. I sent a text. Like, what was in the text that made you in the cold sweat? Because I had the nightmare of this guy. Oh, oh, wait. He outed me. He blocked me.

And then he sent the text that I sent to him by accident to all of his friends and go, God, Matt's a douche. Oh, yeah. Okay. I get that. Now, I have been very. lucky not to send the incorrect text. What did Larry David

Wass want you to do the accidental non-accident text? I don't know. I didn't catch that episode. Oh, my God. That's when you want to send a text to somebody to say, oh, I didn't mean to send it to you. Like, he would send it to a girl. You look so beautiful. And you was meant to send it to your mom, but you sent it to the girl

that you're going out with instead. The non-accidental text? I don't know what it is. Whatever. All right. Anthony and Bill's got something? What does Bill and Katie have been mad about? His life's good. All he does is call the game, believe it or not, lose. The prize-horring Hall of Fame. He is a Price Hoar Hall of Famer.

I didn't text that, though. 1244, Sports Talk, 790. 7-13-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Speaking of it, she's a huge Tom Petty fan. We're going to put some rocket highlights behind a Tom Petty song to honor the Rockets. And there must win game two tonight. Very important game It's so important

I consider it a must Extremely important It's must Ain't nobody getting time Ain't nobody getting time For that I gotta lay that on to mine I'm staying in a hotel tonight

Where I was going to But they just sent an email So the water's been shut off For the entire hotel Anybody got time for me To go to a new hotel So shut your bum ass up Shut your bum ass up

You're in the hotel room tonight? Yeah I'm gonna go take me Naps. Well, staycation? Well, it's an 8.30 start time and dad needs his rest. Okay. You got to book into somewhere else or whether they set you up with another place? I'm going to about find something. A sister

property? Yeah, I'm all in for that. Yeah, you've got enough. You've been points whoring for years. You should be all right? I'm not points hoaring. It's points loyalty. Pints horning me, please give me points. They don't give them to you just for blank and giggles, Rossi. You actually have to spend money at these hotels to get the points. So shut your bum ass up.

Shut your bum ass up, man. Okay. I live a lifestyle that requires good points. Does I pay for them? Okay. I may go down, I'm making another Roury, though. You never know. Hey, Roury's nice.

They feed you. I don't get the points of them, Roury. Let's go to Anthony on 7.90. Anthony, what's the matter with you? Hey, guys. So I do have to tell somebody to shut their bum ass up, but first I got a gut feeling for y'all. 60 points will be scored between Jalen Green and Alpi tonight.

Woo! I love it. I don't think you're going to be right, but I love it. I am 100% going to be right. They've got no answer. They've got no answer for Alpi, and Jailen Green's not going to have two bad games back to back. I was at the Astros game yesterday,

and when the PA announcer introduced George Springer, the Astros fan next to me was booing. So if that was you, shut your bum ass up. We don't boo George Springer here. Shut your bum ass up, man. Yeah, why would you boo George Springer? He's a sweetheart. Did a lot for the stuttering community.

He was always came on here and did great interviews. Lovable, wonderful. And he's never winning another world series. We could. No. Not as a Toronto Blue Jail. Well, you could say Jose Al-Tuvay's never winning another World Series. But he's got deuce.

He's got two. Yes, he does. And should have had a third. Only was one win in Washington. Well, they didn't. Or one in Houston. Actually, they could have four. They won in Washington.

They won in Houston. Yeah, one in Houston. And one also against the Rangers in 23. They could have four rings. But they also were not the best team in 17. So it washes out a little. A little. The best team doesn't always win.

Exactly. What the 2019 Washington Nationals say, of course not. The 2020 Rangers say, you're right. It's baseball. Best team didn't win in San Antonio either. Yeah, Duke did lose. Houston lost two. Oh, that's what you meant. Yeah, Duke was better than Houston. The Houston was better than Florida. Split them.

Tough. I'm sorry, Matt. I'm not going to get over this. I have a shave. I lost a national championship in the last minute, and I got COVID right after the game. Oof, that is horrible. I'm sorry. I don't want you to get sick, Matt. You poor baby.

Sucked. All that travel, flying weird-ass hours. And that's what I got in return. A loss, two turnovers and the vid. Sheesh. That's a tough week. And you had to be in that dirt town San Antonio. I don't disagree.

I used to like San Antonio. Now I just think it's mid at best. Although if you go to La Canterra, that's nice up there. Just regular old downtown. I'll take your word for it. Their barbecue scenes terrible. I do want to... San Antonio food seems terrible.

I want to go to an expended. I haven't really... I've only been to a couple places. I like Mendez Cafe, which had some good breakfast tacos. I haven't spent an extended amount of time eating their food, so I can't really judge. I can judge. Okay. I've been to San Antonio's 75.

five times. Yeah, but your food opinions are a little squirly as you would say. Oh, squirly. Yeah, did we learn that yesterday, right? Whatever you say, five dog over there, you back off. By the way, we didn't discuss... You don't act like you wouldn't crush five dogs. Get out of here. It's $5. Yeah. Five dogs for $5, sign me up.

Why don't you take the girl out on a night where the dogs don't count a dollar. You know, you're a cheescape. The marg's with $20. Let him be a cheapskate. You know, what did you have? We don't pay him anything. The marg, the marg we got was $20. It was looking. It was, look, he a lot. Would you rather have one margarita or 20 dogs?

One margarita. 20 dogs. What are you talking about? Can you feed a whole family? Let's go back to the margarita thing. One margarita or two? Two. I was going to say y'all didn't get one insured with straws. Yeah, I don't like, you know, I'm a straw guy. I don't, you know, it's okay. The drink

tastes better when you add a straw. I'm pro straw too. Okay. I don't think it's, I think people, men get made fun of drinking out of straws. I love straws. I don't, you know, think anybody gets made fun of for drinking out of straw. I don't think anybody thinks about that. They take their own straws out.

Like, you know, more than the girls would make of them. I don't normally drink a straw with, like, a regular glass at a restaurant. But I will use one. I don't remember anybody getting made fun of. Does this happen? It may have happened once or twice. I've never heard of anybody saying, oh, look at you, bro. Why are you using a straw?

By the way, paper straws? What do you want to drink your drink? I think God we're back to plastic straws. Paper straws suck. It depends on where you go. Who has good paper straws? No, I'm saying, well, there are better paper straws and, yeah, some of the ones that they make out of the, it's like plastic, but it's plant-based.

You know what I'm going to do? Rockets are going to win tonight. I'm not going back to King one. I'm saying in the city. I'm going to go for a congratulatory margarita. Okay. With a real straw. Cool.

And maybe. You're going to get it stuck in a turtle's nose, Matt. You're sick. Where are you salt, sugar at Tahin? None. Frozen over rocks, by the way. I'll drink the rocks. You know what actually is the good power move?

50-50, frozen and rocks. Really? Try it. How do you feel about the beer inside the margarita? The beer garitas? Yeah, that's for alcoholics. I feel like your liver would just erode right in front of you. Yeah, it's like an alcoholic's tricks.

Like, hey, this is cool. No, you're just trying to get drunk. You, sicko. I've drinking a lot of them. So you're speaking of experience. I got you. All right. A little Tom Petty with some rocket highlights.

Okay. Let's get people farted up. By the way, we've got to make a big announcement. One last chance for you in the next 20 minutes. Oh, yes. We'll make that announcement after we hear from Tom Petty and from me on the Rockets. After we also tell you about Uptown appliance repair. Lunch timers.

This is the Matt Thomas show. 92 to 8. That's worse than the Teresa poll. Yeah, but this is funny because. Because 8% of people want to be right. 100% of us are right. What does that even mean? It means that literally it's not a must win.

Figuratively, it's absolutely a must win. I'm glad you agree, so it's not. So it's going to go 1-1, and then game 3, guess what we will not be putting out there? Game 3 will not be a quote-unquote figuratively must-win. Oh, what if they lose it will be? Oh, I don't want to go down 3-1. It's a must-win game. And then lose that one.

You don't want to. And then game 5 is a must-win because you're going to be eliminated. And then if they win that, then game six is a must win. And then game set, you end up with five must win games. I didn't realize Jerry Seinfeld was bringing in the NBA playoff breakdown there. Five must win games and one seven game series. Let's go. All right.

713, 21, 212, 5, 790. No, I'm just saying. I don't bring that out. No. Must win. Is it a must sweep game tonight for the Astros? The answer is yes. Of course.

If you want to sweep the series, you must win the game. Every game is a must win game. Let's go. In your world. Got to climb up those American League West ladder. Sure, why not? It's a must win game. Would you go with a deep, dark voice on that?

They must win. You know what? We got to get you on the Afrina floor for the big hype tonight. What do you mean? Because Jonathan Sanford, the PA announcer did it later night and it didn't work. Yeah, it's true. It's all got to find somebody else. Yeah, we've got to go with me.

Oh, let's get you out there. I'm ready. I'll get 18,000 people. fired up. No, you're the only one. PA and championships in this town. You got that right. Ain't for me. There ain't no championships in this town. That's absolutely true. Me, Elijah,

you wanted. You and Robert Ford, or Bob Ford. Yeah, me, yeah, Bob's got some two. Bob and I could both hype it up. I'll be busy calling it. Did you get a ring mat? I did, two rings. Not real ones. But they were rings. They were cubics. Cubic zirconious.

Still haven't, they're still valuable to me. I think it's great. Well, I was such. What do you do with them? You're going to put them on your hand in your funeral? They're in a safety deposit box. No, I'm saying. What's going to happen to it? That's a great question.

Now, when I was... You want to be buried with them? I don't know. I mean, do I... You got three children, so you got to cut somebody out. I do have comets rings, too. Give those the girls. Okay.

You got four comets rings? I don't know. For what? Were you calling the game? I called some games, yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah. I want to say I at least got two of the four.

I want to say. You were the king of calling defunct franchise games. Rockets aren't going anywhere. No, they'll be fine. Now, Thunder Bears went somewhere. Thunder Bears, see you later. Hot shots. You hot shots.

Bye. Comets. Bye. I never did a rough next game. I mean, they're theoretically dead. They're still alive. Yeah, barely. People were saying, no, I didn't catch it.

I guess the Rock was on Pat McAfee for like 40 minutes and didn't mention the UFO once. That's because he's like, this thing sucks. I'm embarrassed. I mean, if you're half owner of the thing or way, however much he owns, you think he'd bring it up. Yeah, that's true. All right, let's, oh, real quick, let's promote. We've got a contest.

Now, you've got to get in, we basically get in, like, very quickly. If you want to email Ross atSport 790.com, we were giving away two pair, I mean, sorry, one pair of two tickets to the game to tonight, Warriors and Rockets. So email a screenshot of you having Sports Talk 790 as your number one preset on the Iheart radio app. On the app, don't seem to be a picture of your car radio. So screenshot it At Sports Talk 790

As your number one preset Email it to Ross ROSS At Sports790.com And you'll be entered We'll be doing the drawing shortly And I found a way I think we can do it on air

At 120 We'll do it in 10 minutes By the way Vernon Maxwell has chimed in on tonight's game Oh okay I know Rocket fans are still trying to get over the game One loss But rest assured things could be worse

Imagine being a jazz fan sitting at home With no internet, teeth or electricity And by the way, is that a must win Wednesday? It's a gotta win Wednesday. Okay, sure. That's Martin. Aaron. Thank you, Aaron.

Thank you, Aaron. Let's talk to... Take Aaron? No, just playing it. Oh, okay. Henry, may you rest? Yeah, he did pass away. I didn't get to talk to him.

The true home run king. I don't disagree with you on that. When I think of the homerang king, I think of him. Maybe that's not the right answer to say, but that's just what I think. Let's talk to Roger on 7-9 at 110. Roger, good afternoon. Good afternoon, fancy, Matt. Who's the Matt?

Just Matt. Hey, so my wife was wanting to know if you still guys had any, shut your bum ass up t-shirts. Yes, I'd like this one-one. So you get those made? Excuse me. We never had them made. Do we need to get some shut-your-bum-ass-up shirts made?

Oh, for sure, 100%. Wait, man. Who am I talking to her or am I talking to you? What's going on with you? the two of you. What are y'all doing back there? Yeah, it's a double team. Y'all got a nooner going right now? We're at lunchtime. We're at lunchtime.

Oh, okay. What do you all have for lunch? What a burger? A chicken, grilled chicken sandwich. Yeah, that's awesome. Why would you go to a runner burger for a grilled chicken? It's actually pretty good. It's fine, but if you're going to go, you might also get the fat and stuff, right? Oh, no.

Get away. We've already got all that. We've spent a little bit of time in Louisiana, you know what I mean? Oh, okay, eat the fattening food in Louisiana. I got you. All right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

If we get any such a bum-ass-up shirts, Roger, you and your bride, I'll definitely get one, I promise. Appreciate you that. We'll see you later. Look at your girl back there just screaming and yelling. Get over and get some of this chicken sandwich. And chomping on some chicken.

Chomping on chicken, huh? Yeah, what? I've never quite heard of that way. Am I wrong? What's the problem? Maybe that's a little catchphrase. Let's go home and chopping some chicken. Yeah.

Whatever you're into. We all call different things. All right. All right. Let's take a timeout. We come back. Are we going to bring Gordine here to help us decide the winner? I don't know.

I can do it. I figure it out a way. Get the rando generator going. And somebody's going to wear a pair of tickets to see the rockets take on the hated Golden State Warriors tonight after you get people fired up and get their energy as high as humanly possible. As high as human as possible. If you've been dragging, you've been thinking about it,

and you even heard me, be like, yeah, I need to have this energy. Yes, I didn't do my new year's resolutions. Yes, I haven't gone to the gym. But you're staying in that rut. Get out of that rut. Go to fix my lowtie.com. Synergenics is the answer to your testosterone issues. Right now, during April only, we basically got a week left, so you got to do it now.

The consultation is free. Don't wait for these online services. They're going to mail you stuff. Then you mail them. And then it's like, no, it's a waste of your time. Visit one of the conveniently located synergenics clinic. see a medical provider and feel great today. And again, that consultation is free during April. You're also going to get the benefit of having treatments tailored specifically to you.

There's clinics all over town. It is very convenient. It is covered by most major insurances. That's why you go to fixmylote.com. That website again, fix my lowtie.com, where you can feel like you again at fixmylote.com. I am so excited Keeping it red It's a lot of fun Potential NBA championship In the age Unbelievable

And in the clutch Be the world champion This is how champions are made We are red nation Go Rocket We're all in this together And we all believe We are sports talk 790

The whole city of Houston I'm about some Rockets You're home for Rockets Playoff Basketball Wait anything. Now, the drive. Sports Talk 790. Traffic.

Good afternoon. Clear Day, 45 North Freeway, Southbound wreck at Little York. And that's unwinding from Westbounded Houston. Now, we do have one on 249 reported Westbound at Veterans Memorial. So that's going to cost a couple minutes there. And Baytown, a wreck on I10 East at Shoalander. And that's solid back from Garth. I'm Katie London and the 24-hour traffic center.

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Keeps that smell away Keeps that sweat away Secret every day Clinical Stay fresher under pressure Terris and your money But we just offered our thoughts On the most recent episode

Of the How To Money podcast Let's say you do it live in a state that gives you a tax break on $529, that's great. But don't invest those dollars once you put them in. We're all about investing in a $529 plan typically, right? You want that tax advantage money to grow. But as you get close to needing to spend the money, de-risking is crucial. In uncertain financial times, how to money is here to help. Open your free IHeartRadio app, search how to money, and start listening today. More Matt Thomas show with Ross. Now on Sports Talk 790. Since we announced this contest yesterday, we have 188 entries.

Woo! Appreciate you, folks. Thank you very much. The generator is in. This is a legit thing. This is a legitimate. I put all the names of I made an email filter, so I got everybody who entered via the email, and then I put them into a random spin the wheel thing. So we're just going to spin a random wheel.

I'm going to click it whenever you tell me to, Matt. All right. Click it. Oh, snap. This is actually intriguing. It's spinning. It's spinning. And it landed on.

Natalia Garza. Natalia Garza. Come on down. You're going to the Rockets game tonight. Yeah. How about that? So now I just have to find Natalia Garza. We're going to get your information.

Remember, if she takes any shots at me, delete her account. Okay. No, man. It's not about you. Here, I'm going to forward this. All right, Natalia, Garza. I'm sending the email. You're going.

Natalia Garza, congratulations. And maybe we do this, hopefully for game five. You don't know. There's got to be a game five first. We're going to guarantee game five. Let's go and do it. Let's guarantee game five. Yeah, I'm guaranteeing game five.

All right. I like it. Hmm. By the way, if it's a game five, it's one week from tonight at 6.30. But tonight's game's at 8.30. Over on KTRH, News Radio 740. So please listen to Adam Clinton and myself. Am I supposed to forward this to Gordy?

I forget. Or are people in promotions. Send it to a bunch of people. All right. I'm going to send it to Jonathan Allen, Gordy, and our promotions people. Oh, Marvin. Marvin Moore.

Just send to the general public. All right. I'm sitting it to all these people. You cannot put on their WhatsApp girl, by the way. Get that off the top of us. I didn't do that. Are you sure you didn't put that? Yeah, I put you were the winner in all caps.

Congratulations to Natalia Garza. You are the winner. Natalia Garza. Congratulations. You saw it. I just did the random spin. You did. I love the random spin.

All right, 713-212-5-7-9 if you want to chime in and you join us here. We've got the Brian Bogus Epic replay. If you missed it earlier today, that's a great conversation, by way. We're very happy to have having with us every Wednesday. We'll have Brian McTaggart on tomorrow. We'll also have EMA Adoka on the radio show tomorrow, Rossi, hopefully celebrating a game two victory. Astros go for the sweep tonight.

We have the NFL draft tomorrow. We've got the draft shows. We've got a lot of things to kind of hustle and bust around these streets right now. It's a good thing to have the local teams. doing well, especially with the Astros giving up just four hits in the last two games of the series against Toronto as the Astros

try to get two games above 500. They have not done that yet this year. They won two out of three against the Mets to open up a year, but have not won since then. And by the way, you know me, I am a standings of watcher. I have a problem. I fully admit it. The Astros are now bumped their way to third place, Rossi, in the American League West.

They are now behind Texas at 14 and 9. Seattle at 12. Oh, actually they're tied for second. Both the Mariners and the Astros are at 12 and 11 on the season and are two back of Texas for first place in the American League West. How about this? The Texas Rangers are five games of 500 in first place in division,

and they have a negative run differential of 11. Wow. Astros, meanwhile, after being down bunch and run differential this year, are a plus nine. In fact, they have the best run deferential in the American League West. Same as a chance for some positives coming up. Looking good. Feeling good.

Let's go Shros. It's kind of nice for I had them peel out of that little early funk because I think there were some people legitimately concerned about where the season was going to go. Losing Bregman and Tucker still going to be huge losses. People were concerned about whether or not the starting pitching was going to be as good as it was a year ago. concerned about Jose O'Brien O'Brien of Brayune, the number of appearances. I think he's now got old 11 so far. He's still pacing pretty high.

He still got a lot. But yesterday was an economical performance for him. Let's go bats. Got three hits. Face three batterers, truck out two. Roll nice and clean. It's good for him. Josh Hayter's also been very good too now.

There's a lot of money being spent on this Astros bullpen. namely when your closure's making an obscene amount of money that he's making. But again, we generally speaking don't really care about how much a guy particularly makes unless, A, he is not good for your team right now. And B, does it hurt you somewhere else? He's worth every penny right now. Josh Hader has been one of the best relievers in baseball. He's been amazing and was hoping for a bounce back year from him so far.

Because every team, look, every team spends money at a position probably over dollar value, right? I mean, maybe some teams spend more money on a third baseman than an average. I mean, look at the money that the Astros are saving at third base. Yes. They put that money into the Relief Corps, namely the closer. So if you were to diagnose and look at every team's roster, you'd say, why do they spend all that money in that first baseman or all that money in that outfielder? Well, look, the Astros are still, I think I saw an MLB network, their top seven in payroll.

Even with No Tucker and even with No Bregman. They're still spending money. They haven't been cheap, and Jim Crane has not been cheap. They just also haven't spent like the big dogs. Well, they spend on some big dog money. And that big dog is in Miami relaxing. The big dog is sleeping. The other big dog is with the Braves.

Yeah. In which they're paying some of the money for him to be there. A lot of that money. Yeah. But there's still good money being spent on Halt Tuvei. Good money being spent on Alvarez. Christian Walker didn't come cheap. No.

And at least he got three hits yesterday. Yeah, and the day off on Monday certainly helped him out a little bit. For one day, we can stave off the declining first basement contract talk. That would be a bad little recent run if that continues. Hopefully it's not. I mean, look, I don't think anybody thought would Christian Walker sign here that was bad money spent. No, we all like the Abrae U deal, too, when it happened, by the way. We liked the Abraeur deal.

We were a little concerned about the extra year, as I think that. And that would be fair to say. Well, apparently it was three extra years. Well, Jeff Bagwell's like, I don't care. We'll just keep paying you and paying you and paying you. Oh, goodness. I mean that whole thing a year ago where they went to send him down to spring training to go back and get his swing adjusted. We kept hearing his wonderful things about his swing and he came back and he was the same player.

Yeah. And then they let him go, as they should have. And they were searching for a first baseman and they said, you know what, we're not going to open the year with John Singleton and or Victor Caratini playing first base. even Yonair Diaz, we're going to go find a legit first baseman. And they did so. But they're saving big money, Cam Smith and Wrightfield. I guarantee you Brendan Walker didn't cut. Not Brendan Walker.

Brendan Walker. Brendan, who's my second baseman? Rodgers isn't here on an expensive deal. Jeremy Payne is still well under arbitration control. Paredes under arbitration. Diaz. I mean, you've spent money on a half. handful of players, but you still got a lot of guys that are locked up at a relatively low dollar

amount, which means it should give Dana some flexibility come potential trade deadline time. You're saying the future is bright. I'm saying the future was, the doom and gloom was way too premature. I didn't realize this. Jose O'Brien played in the Puerto Rican Winter League. And how do you do? 95 played appearances, five home runs. OPS is 716.

221 average. Not great. Is that double A comp? Puerto Rican Winter League? Yeah, probably around there. Let's talk to Alex and Garden Oaks at 127 before we hear from Brian Bogus. I think, Alex, you're on seven. Go ahead, Alex.

Hello, Alex. Well, let me tell you what I've noticed, and I bet you a lot of fans have noticed this. The team was not clicking in the early part of this season, but I've noticed now that when anybody does something good at the play, runs come in, somebody hits 100, there's a lot of enthusiasm like the old Astros. I love that. That camaraderie between the teammates is very important, in my opinion. Thank you, Alex.

We can't, but see, Alex, we can't judge that because we're not in the clubhouse. I mean, I think they all hate each other. Yeah, I mean, we're not talking about the 1975 Yankees. They didn't walk out there and argue with each other in the middle of the dugout. I mean, you're asking us to try to justify something we can't justify. They hated each other early in the season and now they all love each other. I don't believe it to be. No, no, no, don't, don't let that happen.

Don't go to there. No, they're all fine. They all get along. They don't, they have ebbs and flows. Alex is our good friend that called us all last year wanting Joe a Spotify. Well, how does he feel about them now? I don't know, probably still hate them. Do you remember these colors?

You have like a sheet you put down to like. No, I don't have a sheet. I just. that's crazy we remember these people yeah we just do yeah no dude let's not get into the they're getting along better now they're always got along and maybe they still you know what on the other side of it ross maybe they hate each other whatever it is they're working yeah it's working all right borgas for the last five borgia conversation is next 128 here on sports talk seven where i still have to remind you that it is still past tax day but do you think you're in the clear no if you

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You go to Toptax Defenders.com to get that help that you need and the expertise that you need. That's Toptax Defenders.com. This report is sponsored by Rapid Radio's. Rapid radios are instant push to talk walkie-talkies offering national LTE coverage and no subscription ever. Business owners can now keep in touch with up to 200 staff. members at one time. Go to rapid radios.com now for up to 60% off and free shipping. Sometimes it feels like the world is moving at hyper speed and you can't keep up because it's one thing than another and don't forget the meeting and the yoga class and the dinner

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Advisory services offered through Trasion Wealth, LLC, an SEC registered investment advisor. The new IHart app just looks better. The best feature of a car radio on the app. It's the presets. Super easy. And thank you for keeping it free. Get in on what everyone's talking about and get the new and improved free IHart Radio out today. This is Javari Smith.

Javari for three. Sips. Stay clutch with the IHart Radio app. Hear every Rockets game on Sports Talk 790. Brian Bogus-Evick was a guest with us earlier today on Sports Talk 790. You missed the conversation. You get a bonus opportunity to catch some of the best of that visit. And the Space City Network analyst and I and Ross talked about what it was like seeing this team put together a pair of two game winning streaks.

No, I didn't. I didn't know it was possible. I thought it was against the rules to win two games in a row. I thought you had to go back and forth and alternate. It's nice to see some concerns. consistent play. It's been a long time coming. I don't even know if you could draw it up again in the next 10 to 15 years of any baseball team. If you could go win loss, win loss like the Astros did for basically a month.

No, because we were talking about it on the show the one day. It's, you know, it's frustrating in that, you know, you're not putting together a win streak. And you're just going back and forth. But it's also pretty impressive when you don't put together losing streaks. You also have to be good enough to not lose like four in a row. So, yeah, at one point I'm kind of pulling my hair out thinking, man, when are we going to turn the corner and see, you know, three, four wins in a row. But at the same time, I'm like, you know, if this is the low, if this is what it looks like when, you know, your offense isn't hitting, if this is what it looks like when you can't put it all together and you're just kind of hovering around 500. I mean, I think you'll take that as your bottom, right?

Oh, no question about it. There are so many, and superlatives may be too strong of a term, but there's too many good things I like right now about the local nine, especially the last. week or so. First and foremost, getting your starters to go deep in the games, back to back two hits affair. I know that Toronto's offense is probably underperforming compared to years past, but that's still a team that's got a plethora of guys that can

hit the ball out of the yard. And so kudos to not only the starting pitch in the last two days, but the entire bullpen for the way they've been able to curtail the Toronto offense. No, it's been great. You know, obviously you love to see dominating starting performances.

What Hunter's done all season has been incredible. Rinell was really good last night. That's definitely his best star. So those big time starts are great. But, you know, there's so many things fall into place when you get consistent starting pitching, when you can count on those guys to go at least five, you know, usually six or more innings. And, you know, they keep you in games. It's easy to feel energized coming to the ballpark every day. It keeps the bullpen in order. You know, you're not throwing Brian Bray you and Josh Hader in situations where you just need to fill innings because you had, you know, back-to-back starts where guys went two innings. So it keeps the bullpen in order.

It keeps the offense not pressing, even though, you know, you're maybe going through a stretch where they're not scoring a ton of runs. It's just everything gets smoothed out when you have consistent starting pitching. And that's the one area. You can really build momentum at the event. Momentum is really hard in baseball because, you know, it starts and ends with tomorrow's starting pitchers, whether that's your guy not having a good game or running into a buzzsaw from the other team. But you can really build momentum when every day out you get a good start. Brian Bogusevich with us here on a sports talk 790. Christian Walker with the day off bounces back with three hits. See anything different with him? He had some hard hit contact or just the

breather did him well and he's just looking fresher? No, I think I think the day off did more for him mentally. I think it gave him a chance to just kind of slow things down and see like, hey, that looks like the game that I know and not this, you know, sped up mess that I've been seeing at home plate for the last couple of weeks. It looked like he finally let the ball get to him a little bit. I mean, his first hit, you know, they shot that ball up the middle. It was a sinker in. And that's a pitch win. If you're struggling and you're just fighting with yourself, you're going to spin off of it. You're going to get long because you're trying to pull it because the pitch shows up inside.

You know, he trusted his hands, stayed inside, hit it hard up the middle. Obviously, when you get rewarded for it with a base hit, it feels a little bit better. But all of a sudden, it just looks like he trusted swinging. He's not jumping at the ball. He's relying on the fact that I'm going to recognize spin and still be able to catch up to the fastball.

And then, you know, fast forward three or four at bat. He gets a mistake pitch and he just smokes it into the left center field gap. So, yeah, it looked like a guy who, who the off day did wonders for him from a mental standpoint and just being able to relax a little bit. Jeremy Pena also had three hits last night. All season we've been seeing very high, hard hit rates, barrel rates, stuff like that, but the results haven't been matching it.

Looks like that's coming around. Do you think the breakout season we've been waiting for from Jeremy Pena could be here? I do. And the reason I think that is if you look at some of the underlying stuff, right? Like some of the best predictive numbers in hitting have to do with how you handle the strike zone. And his strikeout rate is as low as it's ever been. His walk rate is as high as it's ever been. His chase numbers are way down.

So he's really controlling the strike zone, which means he's getting good pitches to hit. If you're getting good pitches to hit and your swing is right, which his swing has looked fine, you know, ever since spring training, long term that says you're going to have the results. and things, you know, things will level out over time, and they also level out when you're a threat to beat out any ground ball that you hit. So, yeah, there are a lot of hits to be had when you add together how well he's putting together at bats and just how, you know, freakishly athletic he is with his hand-eye coordination and speed as well. Brian, the trademark of this Astros' great run beyond the fact great pitching and great hitting has been defense. I thought it took a slight turn back the last couple of years. It feels like it has become an asset again for this baseball team.

Is there anything you attribute that to? I think Paredes has been a pleasant surprise at third. You know Brendan Rogers is going to do his thing at second and obviously all the gold gloves that Christian got at first base. But it is one of those underlying things that separates teams, I think especially if you're going to have a log jam at the division race in the year, that one or two games could be decided by what you do defensive. I think the Astros at least so far have been able to hold.

hold their own in terms of not giving up an extra bunch of extra runs. Yeah, I completely agree. We've seen for years when talented teams would come into play, but they weren't good defensively, you know, teams that could really pitch, teams that could really hit, and then they'd be kicking the ball around, and they'd be throwing the ball the wrong base, and you're like, man, that doesn't look like what we see every day. And I think there's been a recommitment to defense organizationally.

I mean, Joe Spada, his background is in player development, and infield defense. So it's important to him. I think a huge thing is bringing in Tony Peres, Chica, the third base coach, who is an infield guy. He's the guy who was working hand in hand with Christian Walker, turning him into a gold glover. And we've just seen a lot of improvement. You know, Isok Parades was known as kind of like a solid glove guy, but all of a sudden, he looks really good with his feet. He's a little bit more rangey than expected. He's moving side to side. He's coming in on balls really well. The work that's gone on in the outfield, I mean, Cam Smith looks like a guy who's been playing, you know, outfield in the big leagues for 10 years,

not a guy who's been playing outfield for 10 minutes. So, yeah, I think it's a commitment from an organizational standpoint, but also a commitment from the players to be willing to put in the work that the coaching staff wants from them. And I think there's definitely been an up-pick in quality of defense from, you know, what we've seen the last, you know, year, maybe two years. I have a very inside baseball question for you. We've seen Jeremy run through a couple of stop signs at third base and successful on both of them. What is the balance bogey on that between I can go get that 90 feet that my coach doesn't necessarily think I should go for or can make as compared to going,

you know what? I got to start listening to my coaches. What is the dynamic behind it? You keep doing what you're doing until you get called out and then you get called out by the coach and the manager. or what is that like having to balance? I can get those X-90 feet as compared to. I need to listen to what my coaches are telling me. Well, some of it has to do with the play.

You know, when you're running the bases, there are certain times when all of the information that you need will be in front of you and you can put it all together and you don't need a coach. And sometimes, you know, the plays in the right field corner and you're blind to it and you've just got to totally rely on him. So a lot of it has to do with, you know, Jeremy's rounding second and the plays in left center field, and he's doing the calculus on all of that,

and he's going to make his own decision. And, you know, if you have trust in your players to make sound decisions, you let them go on it. I think it also has to do with where you're at offensively. You know, if you're not tearing the cover off the ball and you know that it's a struggle to score runs, you've got to make up for it somewhere. So, you know, if your team's hitting 2.30 as a team, what's the point of stopping at third base with two outs? If it's a 50-50 chance, you take that because it's a 25% chance that the guy's going to get hit behind you. So I think a little bit has to do with, you know, while we're struggling to score runs, we're going to push it on the bases.

Maybe they start killing the ball and they back off a little bit and you hand it over to the bats. But, yeah, I think with what Pena specifically has proven that he can do on the base, it's a guy that you just turn loose. And maybe every once in a while in a situation, you know, you go over and say, hey, let's tone it down here because, you know, I got something going with the bats that we want. But I would let that guy just run wild right now.

All right, that again is our friend Brian Bogus. I think every Wednesday live with us at 11 o'clock here on Sports Talk 790. Let's play, believe it or not. Rossi, it is highly Googledable. It's about the NFL draft. Is that a coach Sark on a show? show promotion there? Yeah, what do you mean? Let's go, Coach.

Big fan of the show. Back-to-back playoff appearances? Let's go. You're going to fire off the audio. I can't get the callers on my screen. What are you? What are you? What are you doing over there, Matt? I would like to be able to just use a computer and not have major issues every time. Why are you signed on to the Starbucks Wi-Fi? What's going on over there, man? Come on. Is that what it is?

It's too far. Look, I'm trying to use the, I cannot, I cannot get out of this. You spill all those filetal fish crumbs inside of the laptop. It's not going to perform well. Don't slam it. It's going to be all right. Deep breaths. Tomorrow, Brian McTaggart.

I may docker tomorrow. I just don't get it tomorrow. Please. Complete run down to the Astros win against the Blue Jays. Yes. Complete rundown of the Rockets went over the Golden State Warriors. Please, coach. I don't want to interview coach.

They're down oh two. I really don't. It wouldn't be fun. I mean, I'll be honest with you. Now, he's even killed no matter what for the most part. He's not going to panic. But it'll be a lot more fun if they bounce back in the way. I'll be in more of a panic mode.

Coach! Oh, by the way, let's take a look at the official. I didn't even look at the officials for tonight. Oh, oh. I really didn't look. Stay on. NBA referee assignments. Thoughts and prayers.

Okay. David Guthrie. Courtney Kirkland, Sean Corbyn. I don't know them, brothers. That's good. And sister. No, they're all male. Oh, what?

You said Courtney. Yeah, Courtney's a guy. Oh, okay. Like Courtney Lee? Yeah. And Andy Nagy is the backup official. Okay. So yeah, David Guthrie,

Courtney Kirkland, Sean Corbyn. I don't know if they'll keep control of the game, but they will not let their egos stand in the way of the game. Okay. At least I hope not. Five minutes left to go on this show. What should we do? We should play America's fastest growing sports radio game show. We simply call it B. Believe it or not. And here's how it works. You'd call 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-790. Today's edition of Believe or not is very simple.

Is this player, Ross, I announce, where he went to school in his position, is he considered a a 2025 NFL draft prospect. If he is, you'll say this. Believe it. If he's not, this person won a Tony Award in 2024.

Okay. Thus you will say not. Was that you or the machine? Both. Okay. We're in unison. Two in a row. We're in sync. Win you a prize. What are you playing for today? Jonathan. We got a sports talk 790 T-shirt and a pair of tickets to see Alice Cooper

and Judas Priest live on October 23. at the Woodlands Pavilion. All right. We'll start with line number one. That's you because my computer's not working. I can handle it. John on 790. John, you're ready to play, believe it or not?

What can we do? Yeah. Jonathan Groff is a safety from Ohio State. Believe it or not. Jonathan Groff. Believe it. No, he's a leading actor in the musical. Winning for Merrily, we roll along.

Duh. Tom, on line two. What was your favorite part of today? Send the two radio show. We're talking about the Astros defense. Jeremy Strong, wide receiver, North Carolina, a draft prospect. Believe it or not? Believe it. No, he won for leading actor in a play for the play, an enemy of the people.

Duh. Martin, on 790 Martin, you ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. Dylan Gabriel, quarterback, Oregon. Believe it or not? Believe it. There you go. Name number two for the win. Caleb Johnson running back Iowa. Believe it or not? Believe it. That's it. Congratulations. Line number five, Mike on 790. Mike on 790. Mike, are you ready to play? Believe it or not?

Believe it. Mason Taylor, tight end, LSU. Believe it or not? Not. Yeah, he was. He didn't listen to Lockdowne SEC. Sorry about that. Dave, line four, Dave on 790, ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. Justin Peck, offensive tackle, Illinois, NFL draft prospect. Believe it or not? Not.

That's right. He actually won best choreography for the play Illinois. How about that? Oh, Illinois? Yeah. Is there E on the end? Yeah. Statement number two for the win. Kenneth Grant, defensive end, Michigan.

Believe it or not? Believe it. There you go. Congratulations. The other winner. Line one. No, Greg's been holding. He was accidentally put it as a winner.

But go ahead, Greg. All right. Greg on 790, Greg. You're ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. Barrett Carter, linebacker, Clemson, draft prospect.

Believe it or not. Believe it. Yeah. Name number two for the win. Tom Scott, running back, Marshall, draft prospect. Believe it or not.

Believe it. No. He won a Tony Award for Best Scenic Design of a Musical Cabaret at the Kick Cat Club. Oh, okay. I love that one. Did you like that one? It was a good one. Mark on 790 Mark, your favorite part of today's 10 to 2 radio show. I found that. Ross likes Virugas. Ross, you do like Barry. Everybody loves. Trey Amos, cornerback, old miss, draft prospect. Believe it or not? Not.

Oh, it is. I'm sorry. He is a draft prospect. We did have two winners today. That's nicely done. Let's also tell you about a winning thing you can do by going to Two Creeks Crossing Resort and enjoying some outstanding atmosphere. At 8 o'clock, 8.30 tip time over on KTRH. A team is next.