The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Brian Bogusevic Joins The Show After Devastating Game 2 Loss vs Guardians

Episode Date: July 9, 2025

Brian Bogusevic Joins The Show After Devastating Game 2 Loss vs Guardians

11.03 Sports Talk 790. It's time for us to spend 10 quality minutes with our friend, Byrne Bogus Sevik, working the last couple of games for Space City Home Network, and joins us here every Wednesday on the radio program. So, Brian, when you hear the stats about that ball would only have left one ballpark, does that go, does that irritate you, or does that make you go, well, that's what Dyken Park is, or are you completely indifferent to hearing things like that? you get pretty numb to it when it's your home park right you know if when you go into

different stadiums as a visitor and the quirks of a stadium kind of play themselves out it'll drive you crazy a little bit but when you see it on a day and day out basis and you kind of get a feel that you know every you know sometimes you get burned on it and sometimes it helps you out you just kind of get numb to it and it is what it is you know it stinks when a game gets decided on something like that but, you know, it could have just as easily been a ball that went in the Astros favor. Brian, it was a rare off night for Hunter Brown. I mean, everything was hit hard.

It felt like the guardians were seeing the ball very, very well, and that always comes up with the, well, is he tipping pitches? You have been out of the game for a while, but you were obviously in the game for much of your adult life and childhood life. When do you, as an analyst, see that there's something peculiar going on? And was it different that if you were watching, and playing the game itself in terms of, oh, I see something going on that helps me figure out what this guy is throwing. So here's what I look at.

Like, it's always on your radar, right? Especially when you're throwing the ball as well as Hunter has been. And then all of a sudden, guys are on everything. But I think, you know, the first thing you have to look at is what are the pitches that they were hitting? You know, where were those pitches located? That pitch that Jose Ramirez hit, that was a change that got yanked right down the middle. The pitch that Rokio hit for the home run, the nine-hole hitter, It was a cutter that landed right in the middle of the zone.

So I think, you know, first and foremost, you've got to look at quality of pitch, and that will tell you a lot. Now, if you're just dotting up your pitches and if you're throwing nasty sinkers that guys are staying on and if, you know, bats are beating you to the top of the zone on well-located four-scene fastballs that guys don't usually hit, then you might look a little bit deeper and say, oh, man, am I tipping something? Do they have something on me? I think it's just one of those nights where, you know, there wasn't really a consistent amount of well-located pitches, especially with the off-speed stuff. And, you know, you chuck it up more to that than I'm doing something that's giving it away. Staying with pitching for a second. What did you think of Cade Smith intentionally balking to get Dubon off a second base last night? Interesting.

I understand the logic of it. if you think somebody is able to pull something out of your glove, then you don't want to risk that being relayed at the same time. I mean, he threw a wild pitch the following inning. I don't know that I'd be too, you know, quick to put guys on third base when I'm, you know, spraying 98 and bouncing sliders in there. But, you know, I would have to imagine that's something that they discussed before the series and before the game, certainly,

of there's certain guys that we think might be able to pick stuff up or maybe he thinks that people have been picking it up on them in the past. So it's a different strategy, but, you know, whatever makes the pitcher feel comfortable, I guess. You know, and on both of those things, the tipping and the kind of picking, trying to pick up grips, what exactly are you looking for? What's some examples you can think of in your career that you saw? I mean, we've seen people talking about the way the glove is held or certain cadences or, if you could just give us like specific examples and then also kind of explain the looking for the grip thing as well.

Right. So it used to be when you were at second base, you used to be able to pick up signs and see if you could decode the signs. That doesn't exist anymore with the pitch comp. So really what you're doing is you're focusing on the glove and the set position of the pitcher. And first thing you're looking for is do they do something different on, say, fastball versus off speed? Is the glove turned a little bit differently? Is it a higher set or a lower set? Something that you could pick up that maybe the hitter can't see. The other thing that you can look for is if a pitcher's glove is open to you, right? They don't have it closed tightly to their chest. You can sometimes pick up the hand positioning on the ball.

And specifically a change up where they'll throw three fingers on there, or if a guy throws a split finger or if they have a distinct curveball grip where maybe they spike their finger or something, you can pick those things up in the glove as they set the grip. And if you can get it early enough, you can then relay that to the hitter. So, you know, a lot of times you'll see pitchers as they come set, they'll be turned around looking at the runner, seeing if the runner's peeking in. They'll be trying to really close their glove off and keep it tight to the body. But there's a lot of guys who are really good at peeking in there.

And they might not be every pitch that they get, but there might be, one particular pitch that every once in a while will give away. And, you know, sometimes that's all it takes. Brian Bogusevich with us here on Sports Talk 793 hits yesterday for Cam Smith. We've been kind of talking about his progression throughout the season with you. So what have you been seeing from him lately as he just continues to get better and better? Well, a real understanding of what his strengths are, a real understanding of what he needs to do to continue to progress. we've talked about the adjustments that he's made.

But, you know, one of the things that is the most difficult thing to get better at is how quickly you can adjust, how quickly on the fly you can make adjustments to what either pitchers are trying to do to you or what you did wrong the day before and try to, you know, take an 0 for four and not turn it into an 0 for 10. And, you know, what he did yesterday was making an adjustment day to day, which sometimes it takes hitters, you know, a week to make an adjustment. He got pounded in with sinkers in the first game against Cleveland. And a lot of times a young hitter, you start to feel that fastball in on your hands. What are you going to do? You're going to try to get quicker.

You're going to try to get the head out. Okay, I need to pull that ball. I need to get around on it. But he immediately went back to what do I do well? And that stay inside the baseball, hit it the other way. His first at bat, he got that fast ball in, but he really kept his hands in tight, got the barrel inside of it, shoots the line drive to right field. Then he does the same thing with the break.

ball, shoots it to right field. And, you know, how quickly you can get back to your baseline of what makes me good minimizes the downs of the ups and downs of the season. And, you know, that's, that's the key to hitting. That is the key to being consistent over, you know, a 600 plate apparent season is how often can I be either good or great and not be in a slump? From your eyes to what you've seen the last couple of days, and that's obviously the Guardians putting up a lot of runs. The lineup card has been an interesting one to say the very least, especially back half of it.

A lot of it's because of paternity. A lot of it's because of Jake's ailments and Pena still. If I was to surmise or have you summarized the last two games, was it, you know what? You're coming off a huge series winning in Los Angeles, natural letdown. Is it that maybe the back third of the lineup is kind of acting as advertised? Or is it a case where maybe you've got some guys that are. just trying to crawl to the All-Star break to get some time off. What do you think it is?

Could be a combination of things or could all be none of those things? Yeah, honestly, what I think it is is it's baseball. You know, one day you can be a world beater and the next day a team on a 10-game losing streak can come in and beat you. And, you know, every team throughout the course of the season is going to have to fight through some injuries. They're going to have to, you know, dip into the depth of the organization. And, you know, fortunately, the Asteros have gotten themselves to, you know, to a spot to where they don't have to force the issue.

They don't have to try to rush guys back. They can be cautious with Jake Myers. And if his calf is feeling tight, give him a couple of days. You know, the back half of the lineup, they've actually gotten production out of there. You know, Taylor Tremel has had a couple of big games. You know, not everybody's killing the ball down there, but that is rarely the case. I think it's just, you know, it's just the natural course of the season that things can turn very quickly. And, you know, you look at the game yesterday.

The Guardians put up 10 runs on Hunter Brown and Josh Hader. If those two guys are going to get beat, the Astros are probably going to get beat, and that's just the way it was yesterday, and you move on. I don't think that you can really point to the lineup as being an issue for any of these last couple of games. It's just the way it is, and sometimes you take your lumps and move on. Well, Bogie, final game of the series, and Texas comes in.

Could you be thinking? should you be thinking, look, you know Seattle's not going away. Cala Raleigh is having a great season. Mariners have good pitching, never going to be killing it with the bats. So can you put away a team in late July if you were to take two out of three or do you not even think about it as you get ready for the All-Star break? No, it's too early to say putting a team away, but you can put a lot of pressure on them. You can force them to kind of play out the rest of the season in a way that a team doesn't

want to, which is, you know, pedal to the medal for the last essentially two and a half, three months of the season. That is a long time to be full go. And the Astros were in that situation last year where they got behind it from basically mid-May on. And it takes a lot out of a team and it's not easy to do. So, no, you can't put them away and say, okay, these guys are going to be out of it, especially a team that has the quality of pitching that they have where they can just rip

off a bunch of really good starts every day. But you can really force them into a spot to where they're. having to go out there and execute and be good day in and day out, which is difficult thing to do. And the All-Star break coming up, and it's just four days off, Brian. What do you think about that? Do you think that's enough as far as complications with getting pitchers in and out of rhythm and stuff like that? Or do you think it should be a little bit longer? No, four days is enough.

Honestly, four days feels like a lot. When you're used to playing every day and maybe having one day here or there, four days off is a lot. And honestly, by the time you get back and you have that, you know, I think it's an optional workout day now. It's needed. You know, you need a day to get back into it. So now, four days, four days is plenty. Thank you very much. And we're going to give you next week off.

What are you going to do? Oh, gosh. I don't know. Nothing. That's my typical all-star break plan is I do nothing. Well, then we're calling you next Wednesday then. Nothing new. We're going to call you, right?

We'll talk about the home run derby. Yes. And how many Astro pitchers get to pitch in the game? next Tuesday night. We'll have a game. We'll have a game. We're going to ask you to break down the All-Star game like no one's ever broken down an All-Star game in the history. So we're calling you next Wednesday. You're not off the hook. Then I'll have to do something that I don't often do, which is watch the All-Stark. Just watch three innings. And you can go to MLB.com and watch it on speed.

Thank you, friend, as always. We'll see at the ballpark tonight. Thank you for the time. All right, okay. You got Brian Bogus Civic. We just put them on assignment.