The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Brian T. Smith On Texans v Ravens and the Astros Cheating Scandal

Episode Date: November 15, 2019

Brian T. Smith of the Houston Chronicle joins Matt and Ross to talk Texans v Ravens and the Astros Cheating Scandal

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brian t smith he is the columnist for the houston chronicle and uh here with us on sports talk 790 so let me punch him up here while i can do that and that is happening right now bt s good afternoon to you we got a texans game against the ravens in a season it's already had some pre-year-oldinged impactful road victories? I believe this would supplant the win at Kansas City if the Texans can go to Baltimore and beat Lamar Jackson on Sunday. Agree or disagree?

Fully, fully agree, Matt. 100,000 percent agree. The win at Kansas City was impressive. It was also earlier in the season. There was a bunch of steak. Patrick Mahomes was 100%. The Chiefs weren't 100%.

And they were sort of finding their way while dealing with some key injuries. This win could become a season changer for the Texans. And if they lose it, it should not be doom and gloom. They're the best in the AFC South, although Indianapolis is getting Jacoby percent back. But this should be a very interesting test for the Texans. I mean, on paper, I think 99 percent of people would be picking the Ravens, Lamar Jackson, along where Russell Wilson looks like the MVP candidate.

But, I mean, what if the Texans go up there after the by week and they have, they really have their stuff together. And Deshawn Watson is brilliant. And they find a way to win up there. I mean, if they do that, they are in the consideration for being one of the top two teams in the AFC. And they still have to play the Patriots and they'll have the Colts during a short week. The following week, up to the Ravens game. So it won't define the season if they lose. But if they can win this game, we will very quickly start to talk about the Texans in a different way.

And here's the thing. I guess we're going to start doing that. And I think everybody has done the next three games or everything for this team. Because the last four jokes, Denver, two Tennessees, and a Tampa Bay. These next three. So let me give you the scenarios. They go 3-0, 2-1, 1-2, 0-3. Describe how we should feel about them in those particular scenarios.

Well, I mean, look, if the Texas go 3-0, and I don't see that happening, I'm glad to be wrong on that. The Texans go 3-0. The Texans are going to be the hottest team in the NFL. I mean, they have the Ravens at Baltimore, Indy on a short week, which at Kobe Bresset back, maybe T. White Hilton back at an energy stadium. They have Tom Brady and the Patriots.

That's not a joke. I mean, if they go 3-0, they will be the hottest team in the NFL, and everyone will be talking about them, and it'll be like, oh, my gosh, Bill O'Brien, King O'Brien, this is working, Deshawn Watson, will be the MVP favorite, along with maybe Russell Wilson and the NFC, on and on and on. If they go two and one, that's still a huge positive.

They're still in, you know, they're still in contention for trying to find a way, especially if they can be Baltimore, to being one of the two teams in the AFC this season that receives a first round by. The Texans have been playing football since 2002, Matt. They've never had a first round by. It's always been a wild card game, even when they've been playing. playing at home. And if they go 0 and 3 or 1 and 2, that will bring us back to what we normally do for the Texans is, you know, it's up and down, it's one step forward, it's two steps

back. This will be very interesting to watch. We're starting to see the next stage of Deshawn Watson, maybe the next stage of Bill O'Brien. We're going to find out a ton about this team in the next three weeks. Well, here's the thing. And again, my audience is only a small segment of the Texans fan base. So I can't say it's representative of how general Texan fan feels. But last year at this time, as the Texans were putting together this 11-game winning streak, I kept saying to the audience, hey, you've got to start believing in this squad. Look what they're doing. And granted, they weren't beating tough competition, but wins are wins. They're never easy to get in the NFL. So I'm of the belief that I think

I've been saying that a lot again. This go-around, this time around, it will be better competition. It'll be a first play schedule. It'll be better quarterbacks. But the problem, Brian, is even if they go say 2 and 1 or 3 and 0, I think there's still a certain group of people that are, you know, listen to my show, reading your paper, or just fans around, they're like,

you know what? I don't care about November or December success. Give me something to chew on in the middle of January, and the Texans with Bill O'Brien have not been able to do it. Yeah. Okay. Let's be clear about this. If the Texans go 3-0 the next three games, they don't automatically win the Super Bowl, correct?

If the Texans go three in the next three games, and you live in the city of Houston, and you are finding some way to hate on that team with Deshawn Watson, you have serious life problems. I will not say if they go 3-0, they're going to win the Super Bowl. Of course, we're not bleepin idiots. They will have to prove it in January. And if just because, if they do all this, just because they end up with the first round by and they're not playing a wild game, but let's say they have a divisional round game at home. And they lose that game. That will define their season. But we have to on some level, Matt, live in the here and now, live in the present moment.

Last year was different. They started a very bad O and 3. Their season was almost over after the third week. And they didn't play a lot of good teams. And when they had a shot to really prove it at Philly, they fell short. short. Here's one thing that should be remembered. The way we value look at teams changes weekly in the NFL. Tennessee looks a lot better after beating Kansas City last week than they did a couple weeks ago, and Ryan Panty Hill makes them a different team, and Mike Grable gets something

out of them, and the Texans have off and on never really been great in Nashville. So they stopped to play the Titans twice. I wouldn't overlook either of those games, especially with Taney Hill at quarterback. But these next three games will define the Texans thus far, and then we will re-evaluate them in January. But if they go 3-0 and you're hating on them, go do something else with your life. All right. Let's get to the baseball side of things.

This has been very hard. I'm almost taking this more personally as a fan than I am as a broadcaster and a talk show host, because this is the team I grew up with. and I got to celebrate in my own way a 2017 World Series after watching the Astros for four decades either get close or not get there at all. And again, I know AJ is going to be interviewed. I know that Carlos Beltron, I don't have a relation with Beltron

or with Cora, so I don't care. But AJ, I do. We all do. We feel like he's a guy that is about as forthcoming as a manager you'll find in baseball. The Astros front office department has had a race. reputation the last few years that people have been trying to knock down, and now the ammunition is there. So I'm going to step out for a second and just kind of let you just speak to what has

turned out to be a very, very tumultuous time when we should still be celebrating a fantastic run of Astros baseball recent history. Matt, you set it up perfectly there, and look, I've just begun to write about this in The Chronicle. I've written about the Astros a lot since I moved to Houston. And I think it was September of 2012. I covered them at their lowest of lows. I covered, you know, game seven at Dodgers Stadium and pretty much the entire last three playoff rounds, also 15 as well, in a disappointing 16 year.

I also, you know, I think we all do. If we're around the extras and you're at the park and you put in the time, you do start to feel like, and I won't even get a difference because everybody loves Jose Al-Tube and everybody loves George Springer and Alex Burtman and Berlander and Cole, et cetera. But Hinch appears to be, has to be in the middle of all this if it ends up being what it could be, right? And that's going to be very odd and very interesting. I will always say what I think pretty much about anything.

That's what I get paid to do. I take a lot of pride in that. I'm not going to, I'm not stupid enough, Matt, to come out right now and say a bunch of, you know, volcano take stuff acting like I or anybody else knows what really went on, if anything really went on. I don't care what the video show you. There's a reason there is an investigation going on. There are actually two investigations going on right now. it's not that much more different than if the government was investigating you for, you know, whatever, IRS fraud or, you know, some type of serious life issue. You can't come out and put it in a tweet.

You can't come out and say anything definitive when this thing is this lives and in the real moment. So I will fully be on board, and if things get really bad, it's going to change. everything. But they could also be cleared, and it could be jealousy, and it could be a bunch of BS mixed in with everybody else doing it on and on. We just don't know, Matt. So this is a very, very tenuous time right now for the Astros, for this recent legacy they've built, for A.J. Hintz, for Jeff Luno, for Jim Crane. And, you know, you know, you know who's going to get this right? History will, right? Not, not in a tweet, not in a dumb column. Not saying, you know, oh, the world, it won't affect the World Series or, you know, there's still the aster's.

No, if this thing is really bad and really ugly, it will change everything. And if it's not, then at some level, the rest of Major League Baseball needs to shut the bleep up. Because if you can't nail them now, kind of like the Patriots, like if you can't nail them on this, then they're doing what everybody else does. And, you know, people are always bending the rules in baseball, let alone the NFL. We'll just have to watch this play out, but there's nothing, nothing, Matt, definitive that can be said right now because there is an investigation going on on a national level. Yep.

And let the investigators, they're going to interview everybody. They're not going to be very diligent. They're not going to not talk to some people and talk to others because this is, if the allegations are serious, and major league baseball people are doing it, Other general managers are bringing this up. They better interview everybody and make sure stories are accurate and not just people going off of, well, I heard this or I heard that.

BTS and a quick, good thing was talking. Go ahead. Yeah, let me just say real quick. I hope this is done the right way. Like if you're going to go down this path, you're going to open up Pandora's box, I hope it's done the right way. And I hope that every angle, not just the Astros,

whether it's the Red Sox, the Yankees, other team. I hope every angle is looked at. Baseball went through this with the Mitchell Report. and it took them way too long to get to this stage. Major League Baseball, no matter what the outcome is, they have to get this right. Yep. Well said.

BTS will talk to you next week. Thanks for the time as always. All right. Thanks for having me all, Matt. Take care. You got it, Brian T. Smith from The Chronicle with us here. You can catch him on Twitter at Cron Brian Smith. Let's make you some money when it comes to football.

That is up next. We'll go to Baltimore in 15 minutes to get a perspective on the Raven side of things as they get ready for Sunday's tilt with the Texans. If you want to join us, you can do so right now. 713212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. The Matt Thomas show today here from the Billiard Factory, FM-1916 and Cutton Road on Sports Talk, 790.