The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Final Day of Spring Training Coverage! Christian Walker & Dana Brown Join The Show

Episode Date: February 18, 2026

Final Day Of Spring Training Coverage! Christian Walker & Dana Brown Join The Show

is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. 10 o'clock at H-town. And welcome to a Wednesday edition of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Day number three, our final get-together here from West Palm Beach, Florida, for Astros' 2026 spring training coverage. Today on the show, you will hear live visits with Astros' general manager Dana Brown. Christian Walker's going to come by as well. I had a chance this morning to catch up with Jeremy Panyl.

You'll hear that coming up in the first hour of the show as well. And some of our best stuff in the final hour of the show. As we continue to bring you, we hope to be a very successful 2006 Houston Astros baseball season. That is one that was a quagmire 20 minutes ago. Now a delightful sunshiny day in West Palm. This is the epitome of Florida weather. Rain.

Yes. hard for about 10, 15 minutes, and then you don't see a cloud in the sky. There's clouds, but it's definitely starting to brighten up here. It's beautiful and breezy. It is breezy. Yeah, we had to get our, the media scrum with Joe Spada under the canopy. Right, right. Under the tent.

Feels like you want to get like a George Benson song on, don't you? It is breezing, yeah, a nice R&B soulful George Benson song. Basically, one of the pioneers of yacht rock, a George Benson type there. He takes the royalty checks. No, that he does. He is no rock artist. Oh, he loves being on the Yacht Rock Channel. I know that for me.

He's not a yacht rocker. Is he still alive? George Benson. I will say yes. Don't look. I'll say yes. We do believe it or not next time. We'll use George Benson as a believe it or not.

Too late. I'm too curious. Okay. Yes, he's alive. 82 years young. Okay. So he's still got time left for going to tour if necessary. Mm-hmm.

All right. We are here again from West Palm Beach where honestly not a whole lot going on today was video was a photo day where the guys put their uniforms on take the photos that you'll see in publicity promotional ads the game programs the you know the life the wall-sized thing against dyke in part that kind of stuff gets shown up that way so they haven't done a whole lot they've had to alter their practice schedule a little bit today because of the weather which obviously is just cleared up beautifully so maybe they will be getting back on the fields as they thought they were going to but a lot of stuff was going to be in the cages

and all getting ready for Saturday's opener. Spring training against the Washington Nationals, which is here at Cacti Park. Again, for those that don't know, the Astros literally share a complex with the Nationals. The Nationals are, their practice facilities are on the first base side. We are on the third base side where the Astros are. And so they'll play each other, I don't know, 11, 12 times it feels like during spring training.

It's a chalk pick. It's easy travel schedule. It's a seven game set between the Astros and the. Washington Nationals. They don't play for you like a silver boot or anything, do they? They should actually. Play for the Palm Beach. Yeah, like a Palm Trophy.

Yeah. Yeah, I like that. That's a good idea. You know what? You're an idea, man, man. I'll let those marketing people know. You should. All right.

So we will again have the live Astro guests coming up. And far as headlines are concerned, there wasn't a whole lot going on in sports yesterday. The NBA still in their All-Star break. So we have to get back to baseball. And something that kind of dropped late in our, before the show started, early moments was unfortunately yesterday was supposed to be the day

that Tony Clark the Major League Baseball Players Association Chief, the Union Chief, was supposed to start his rounds around Major League Baseball. He goes to every ballpark in spring training, all 30. I mean, he's got to be done in 30 days,

essentially, to kind of get the lay in the land of the labor situation. Well, yesterday was supposed to be the Cleveland Guardians Day, and they canceled it, coming to find out that he was, expected Tony Clark was expected to resign. Then a report comes out from Jeff

passing a little bit later after that saying, well, there are some improprieties with some investments that the players union had made with a variety of business ventures. And there was maybe some, the books were being cooked a little bit. Yes. They're being investigated.

And then a little bit later after that, Rossi, we come to find out that Tony Clark not only may be cooking some books, but he's cooking his sister-in-law. Oh, come on, man. You don't have to say it like that. How would you let me say it then? They're not cooking, Matt.

Oh, they're doing some heeing up. Some marinating. Making a rue? All right. That's enough. I'm sorry. Yes. Union chief, Tony Clark, in an inappropriate relationship with his sister-in-law, who is also a union employee.

Okay, so that added. additional layers to it, making it a much more salacious story. And the first thing out of people's minds, at least in the social media streets, and certainly those that were talking about it was, okay, that's terrible, but was it his wife's sister? Or was it his bro's wife? And come to find out, it was the sister's wife. Or the wife's sister, I should say. I'm going to pregnant pause.

Go ahead. You're okay? I'm great. Oh, man. It feels like we need some soap opera music for this. Yeah, Jonathan, give us Nottias theme. It is the theme song to the Young and the Restless. If you can find Nottiest theme.

Nottiest theme, okay. When you find it, just start playing it because we'll wait here just a second. It's a very popular soap opera song. Yes. Instantly recognizable. Yeah, I mean, even if you don't watch Young and the Restless, The great Henry Mancini. Yeah.

And once performed on the Mike Douglas show by David Hasseloff. He actually put words to the song. I don't believe you. Go look it up on YouTube. My son actually found it. Okay. Because he thinks not any of his team is a banger. Really?

It's a jam. I mean, not like in banging form of bang. Well, Tony Clark thinks it's a banger too. Okay. Here we go. There we go. He found it. Good job.

So, not that there was a right thing. to do on this. It feels all wrong. But the prevailing thought was if he was going to have an issue, oh God, this sounds even terrible to say. Go ahead. The lesser of two horrible evils,

is that okay? That's right. If you aren't. The lesser of two horrible evils was that it was his wife's sister as compared to his bro's wife because that's blood, right? I guess.

That's what I'm saying. I think there was a lesser of two horrific acts, and he chose the lesser of the two. Well, I don't know if he had a choice. I mean, I don't know. Did he try to make a pass at his brother's wife? I don't know. I don't know if his brother's married. His brother apparently played basketball at University of Washington.

Okay. Go Huskies? I don't care if they go or not. So not only was he working on some shady financial deals with some other companies that Yes, allegedly. Allegedly. He allegedly was having a relationship with his wife's sister. And thus, the young, and apparently in Tony Clark's case, very restless.

These are the days of our MLBPA lives. I was going to say that wrong show. It's close enough. Let me ask you this question. Why are we running into so many league players association deals with unsubes unsavory leaders. The NFL PA guy had to let go

because he was spending money on strip clubs. Remember that? I do. I do remember that now. What is up with that? Why do these players, I mean,

players, excuse me. It's the MOB Players Association. It's what they're saying now. Oh, stop. You were thinking that too. I saw that on Twitter. I chuckled. Why can't we not behave ourselves

with our team's finances and trying to get away with things? This is because they had this high-powered position? Well, you eventually get caught. You just do? I mean, I would say in general, there's corruption. Oh, put it this way. With people in power?

My guess is there are other unions in America that have had shady financial deals. Yeah. This is not foreign to just NFL and the Major League Baseball Players Association. Are you bringing up Jimmy Hoffa? Is that what you're going on? No, I'm just saying that, and again, I don't know if UAW has these issues, but my guess is UAW has been far from

If I typed into Google search, Union leader resigns in disgrace. How many hits am I going to get? You'll be quite a few. Probably most of them not sports related. Politician designs resigns in disgrace. President designs in disgrace.

Illegal campaign funds. Yeah, I mean, it's a lot of places. This certainly feels like an all-timer. It's your wife's sister and an employee of the union. and you're getting investigated. And how is a Thanksgiving dinner going to go this year? How about family functions?

That's, yeah, I don't think the sisters are going to be Christmasing together or vacationing. You know what? That's Easter Sunday? Yeah, I've got to pass. There is a sadness to it. I mean, obviously those sisters, I don't think the sister would say, again, everybody's relationships is different, but I would imagine the sister would not say let bygones be bygones. I accept your apology.

I mean, my guess is that's not not going to. Unless the marriage was not great to begin with. Maybe at some point she will forgive, but she will never forget. Oh, God, no. So there is a dissolution of a sisterhood. That's, that's, that's tragedy number one. And a marriage. And a marriage.

And Tony Clark's got that long, frothy white beard going, that apparently he's going to find himself in some legal and moral, ethical questions underway for sure. Wow. The day he's supposed to meet with the Cleveland Guardians. So when Tony Clark's name was brought up yesterday on the show, I thought, I said, Ross, I said, we're not going to give us

a whole lot of time because I don't think the average person really knows what Tony Clark does or necessarily particularly cares. He is a union chief, and we're going to obviously find out more about the union chief whenever it comes out. But this was not the headline. I was expecting 24 hours after we first brought this up. It got even more salacious.

I mean, it was pretty major that he resigned day he was supposed to meet with the team because of an investigation. That was, yeah, that was bad enough as it is. Yeah, this is not even icing on the cake. What is like a second cake? Well, apparently Tony Clark had his cake and ate it two. Here we go. I saw your gears turning.

That wasn't as bad as I thought you were going to go. What did you think I was going to say? I saw folks, I saw Matt look up. I saw the hamster wheel turning. I'm like, he's going to say something. He shouldn't. But that wasn't bad. The key to the show is pregnant pauses occasionally to make sure you don't say something that's going to get you in trouble.

Oh, goodness. All right. Well, there's your first segment of the show that is. Yes. We're going to hear from a Jeremy Payne to the bottom of the hour. Love it. Talk about his impending marriage. Good for him.

Yes. And WBC a little bit. It's breaking hearts all over Houston, unfortunately. And I did ask him towards the end of the conversation what you want to listen to. You know, look, you and I have talked about it. You more, me more so than you. I'm anti-WBC. Jeremy is fired up for WBC

So we'll let you have a chance To hear straight from the guy who's going to be a part of the WBC 713-212-5-790 If you want to get in today 7-1-3-1-2-5-7-90 Apparently former Houston Chronicle beat writer John McLean is basically saying If CJ Stragg gets traded he will run naked

Through a major intersection in Houston I will not be there intersection. I don't want to be within, I don't know, 150 miles of it. Okay. I can. I don't know why John wants to feel like the need to get naked for any reason. I mean, obviously, showering would be one of the reasons,

but not to go in public with it. So, yeah. Let me just give you a little behind the scenes. Don't do anything that would Uber embarrass yourself. I've been guilty of these things before, and I've learned my lesson. That's why I make food bets. Okay. Instead of painting your head.

Correct. That was a good time. Once you do that, people will never get that out of their minds. And no, we'll lie. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-21-5-790. Matt and Ross with you from West Palm Beach. This is Sports Talk 790. It's West Palm, baby. This is yacht rock.

Stop, 790. I thought it was. Oh, there it is. Matter of fact, We're driving back to the airport today You can listen to Yacht Rock? No. Because I can pump it into my channel.

You listen to the same 400 Yot Rock songs your entire life. That's correct. So for one hour, you can step out. You know, I'm actually going to pick something. What are we going to put on a good kid Mad City from Kendrick Lamar? No, I don't want that. That sucks. It sucks.

Yeah. It literally was named one of the top five albums of all time. By whom? By Apple Music. I don't trust Apple Music. Matt music says it sucks. Okay. Well, it's in the top

albums of all time, I think, on the roll with stone list too. Pet Sounds, Beach Boys, followed by Kendrick Lamar. Yeah. What? He won a Pulitzer Prize, Matthew. 27-time Grammy winner.

You know what? There's a lot of Academy War movies out there that suck, too. I don't care. I don't need awards. How about it if I like it? It's what I... Okay.

How much have you listened? Many hours? Yeah, none. I hear it on rocket planes all the time. I mean, do you see how you're being closed-minded here? All right, you're going to put it on for five minutes, and I'm going to say it sucks, and I don't like it, you're going to get mad at me.

That's how it works. I'm not going to get mad at you will. Yeah, you will. Not any more than normal. All right, it is the Matt Thomas Show at Ross. We are here in West Palm Beach. You'll hear from Jeremy Payne, bottom of the hour. Love it.

Right now we're going to go, I don't know, have we ever talked to an Ebenezer before on the show? No. Okay, before we get to-Ebond? He wants to talk about the Astros. Is this, are you really Ebenezer? Yes. How old are you Ebenezer? 45.

First of all, thank you for calling the show. Secondly, I'm assuming you don't run into a bunch of other Ebeneasers when you're hanging out with friends and family, correct? No, but I'm the only one. Okay. Ebenezer? Fire away, my friend. What do you got today? I got a question.

Is Kevin Biggio, is that just wishful thinking, or did they see something in him that he hasn't displayed already? honestly Ebenezer I think it's just a camp body would be my guess where is they going to start out is he going to start out AAA or where's it going to start out they have not said it yet he would have to have an incredible spring to make the team and apparently from what he said a couple of days ago when he first arrived he's two weeks away from playing games so I don't know if he's just behind schedule with all a variety of minor ailments but this to me was a let's try to catch lightning in a bottle, he plays multiple positions, he has some majorly experience.

It just has been not the kind of career that I think has been able to, you know, stay with a team for a long period of time. So, yeah, I think it's a camp body. And if somebody gets hurt, death doesn't hurt, doesn't make any kind of money. Plus, the bigio name certainly doesn't hurt either. Right. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Ebenezer.

That was not a name that crossed my mind when I was thinking about naming my boys. You didn't? No. You didn't in the top five? It was on a finalist? Yeah. Okay. I don't think it was.

I mean, I only know of one Ebenezer. Well, two. Scrooge and Ecobon. Oh, that's true. And now we have a third. We have a listener. So thank you, Ebenezer. You're always welcome to call the show.

45 years old, too. All right, there you go. So mom and dad were thinking something outside the box back in, what is, 45 years ago, 191? Yeah. Okay. You called beef retort? Ebs?

I like that. Okay. Why about just easy? Like, it's an easy E? Kind of. Okay. May he rest? Yeah.

Eric Wright. Got you. All right. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know much about him except that he's just been just a guy as a major league. And that's, I don't mean to be, we're not trying to be disrespectful. It's just, the name carries a little clob because of the last name. We brought up his name.

First of all, we felt old because of how old he is, but also. that'll tell you how much of a sought after sought after he's not some young up-and-coming prospect. Right. You think of that because we think Craig Biggio's son, but Kevin Biggio's been around a long time. He's also taking the Astros deep, though, at one point in April. Yeah, that is so crazy. I know. You know, when I was first calling NBA games to be able to say that I called Kenyon Martin's senior

when he was a college student Cincinnati, and then I'm calling his son's game in the NBA. that made me feel old. Watching Tim Hardaway Jr. and Tim Hardaway Senior play at the same time, but watching them both play. Yes. It makes you feel old. And then Kevin Vizio, who I remember helping to win a state championship for the private schools for St. Thomas when dad was coaching there, made you feel old.

LeBron James is on the team with his son. It's ridiculous. Yeah, but that's, that's nepotism. Okay. He's still on a team with his son. That's true. His son is of NBA age. His son is 12.

That would be odd if they draft him when he was 12. Well, there were some kids that were recruited out of the fifth grade, apparently, way back in the NBA age, and they used, like, the 55th pick. Yeah, yeah. All right, we're going to let you hear from Jeremy Pena next. He is going to be a husband soon. He'll get to a thought or two about the Astros season, the differences in the clubhouse, and WBC. That's all straight ahead. Oh, we're actually early.

I thought it was 1029. My mistake on that. You're all right? We're going to stay here for a minute. Well, I can't see the screen very well. That's okay. It's fine. What?

Nothing. What else we got? I just laugh at you saying it's fine. It's just figure your cat phrase. It is my one of my headphrase. Oh, everybody does. Yeah. It is what, yeah, it is fine.

What else is going on in headlines wise? There was nothing in sports going on. I was college basketball, but that's never going to move. Well, I mean, well, you want to spoil. The news at noon is the 90 minutes away. But I would say the top of sports news items would be, an item would be Patrick Mahomes restructuring his big deal. And it was a huge deal back then,

but there have been deals that have been Trump since then. then? Yes. 54 million of his salary is restructured into signing bonus. So his cap number is now reduced to 35 million, basically. So that's probably not even a news item except for it. It's just moving around accounting numbers. Look, it's, the average person's like, okay, what does this do for me?

Does this mean he's going to play longer? Does it mean that opens? Now, obviously, quick deduction means deducing that means there's probably going to be some cap room that the chiefs currently have now. So, but that's all I can take out of it. We'll get to Mick Cronin later. Oh, we got to talk about McRonen. We'll play that probably in about 20 minutes from now.

Mick Cronin, for those who don't know, it's a coach of UCLA basketball team. He's a jerk. Always been a jerk. No matter where he's coach, he's been a jerk. And you can be a jerk, Rossi, when you win. When you get your ass kicked and you're still a jerk, you're going to feel the wrath of the social media streets.

Yes. Does that feel about right on that? Yeah, absolutely. So we'll let you hear a little bit from that as well. As again, he's just... He ain't a sweet fella. So when a guy gets ultimately fired, which he will be, there'll be very few tears shed at Pauley Pavilion. What happened to UCLA basketball?

What happened to UCLA, period? Football teams sucked. They're in one of the most beautiful cities in the world. They've got a glorious campus, excellent academics, and it used to be basically in the West Coast. was UCLA and USC fighting for everything, and then everybody else got third and fourths. Well, Oregon said, I'll take some of that money. I'll get some of those athletes.

Washington started to get involved. The Arizona schools got going on a little bit, too. So, yeah, but, yeah, UCLA basketball is not what it used to be for sure. All right, as promised, Jeremy Pena, up next, 713212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-790. Welcome back to the Matt Thomas show with Ross here on a. Sports Talk 790. Matt Thomas and Ross, via we are with you until 2 o'clock.

Broadcasting live from West Palm Beach, Florida, and Astros spring training. We've got some great interviews coming up for you later on the show. We should have Astros General Manager, Jada Brown. Christian Walker, unfortunately, had something pop up yesterday. Couldn't make it. He should be joining us later today. And also, earlier today, Matt Thomas caught up with Jeremy Pena. So some great stuff with J.P.

P3 talking a number of different things, including the WBC, the upcoming season for the Ashows, but started off talking about a personal announcement from one Jeremy Pena. First of all, congratulations. The engagement. It's going to put an offseason for you. What made you decide ultimately this was the time to do it? I mean, it's something I've been going to do for a long time. And, you know, I was in season.

She was in season. I feel like the off season was only the only appropriate time. I didn't want to do it when she was still playing. I wanted her to focus on her season. And then once her season was over, it's green light. So who's handling all the marriage plans? Is that going to be after the season? Are you guys going to try to talk it out during the year?

I will talk it out during the year. We'll definitely plan it during the year. And we're kind of both going back and forth, both giving inputs, but she's doing most of the work. I haven't married a long time to let her do all the heavy-lip thing. I swear, my man, it'll work that for you. This camp, I mean, you're now one of the older guys in the team. Is that kind of crazy that you can make about it? It doesn't feel like that.

You know, I still feel like I'm that young kid, you know, with, you know, coming into my first spring training. You know, I have all the energy in the world. I have all the ambitions in the world. And, you know, we have a great team. And I'm excited to be around these guys. You know, I still, I get excited to be around some of the guys, you know, learn from them, pick their brain. Yeah. So, yeah.

It had to have been, I think it was thrill for everybody, especially you guys. it's October and you're not playing games. I mean, how long did that take to sink in? And was there a level of frustration, disappointment? And I got to get back on the field as soon as possible. I mean, I feel like our goal is always to get into the postseason and make a run in the postseason. You know, we didn't achieve that last year,

which was tough for us as a whole, as an organization. But at the same time, you know, it's time to turn the page. You know, we're in spring training. And, you know, we have a new season upon us. us and it's time to bounce back you know it's time to get back into the playoffs and make a run how is it it looked like to me watching you guys that your relationship with with carlos at their base was amazing i mean it took no time for you guys to transition together right right you know carlos has been great to me since the first day i got to the organization you know spring

training 2019 you know i got to hang out with the team quite a bit you know i joe espada kind of took it upon himself to get me playing time with the MOB games in spring training. So I would come from the minor league side and hang out with the big leaguers. And, you know, it was pretty cool, pretty cool. Does that happen a lot? I mean, that's a pretty special situation for you to be able to be with those guys so early in your career. I mean, guys usually get the opportunity to come up and play back up some games. But I feel like Joe was make me back up almost every single game.

And I feel like I was barely in minor league spring training. And I feel like I was old. And I didn't play much. You know, I would come into the eighth inning, get one at bat. I would come in the ninth inch, just play defense. But just being around those guys, man, it was special. Because you get to pick their brains. You know how the big leaders think, you know, and it's exciting for me.

So do you look back at that and go, man, I made some mistakes when I was younger? Or I just kind of just soaked everything in? I mean, I try to soak everything in. Yeah. You know, if you look back at the team we had 2019, like, it was unbelievable. You know, I had guys like Michael Brandley around me. You know, I had guys like Jose Al Tuve around me. It was special, special for sure.

Do you find young guys coming? Do you ask those same kind of questions that you were asking four or five years ago? I feel like they asked better questions than I did. I was just quiet, you know. I feel like these guys are very confident. You know, they know what their game is. You know, they love picking people's brains. But I was more shy.

You know, I was kind of just there looking, trying to learn by scene. You know, I was never. want to just approach someone and ask them a question, you know. But if they open that door for me, then I felt the confidence to, you know, keep talking about it. A couple more questions here with Jeremy Pena. Jose is back at second base primarily. And look, I think what he did last year in volunteering himself to the left field, everybody's going to do that. And maybe 10 years down the road, they may ask you to go to third base, something like that.

What is that like watching a guy like that go to a new position for the good of the team? But you know, in his heart of hearts, he wants to be at second base. I mean, it says a lot about the type of person he is and the type of player he is. You know, he's a player that's always going to do what's, you know, best for the team. Like, he wants to see the team do good. You know, he wants to see the team win. You know, he's been here through the ups and the downs of this team, you know, from when he first got to the big leagues to win in multiple World Series.

You know, so I feel like Al-TUva is very, Altuva is very inclined to helping this team win. And, you know, Atouva is a player that, you know, he tries to make everyone better. And if that meant last year trying to move to left field and makes the team better, then, you know, he's a guy who just put in the lineup and he's going to find a way to help the team. What do you want to get accomplished here? I know that Joe mentioned a few weeks ago that maybe some of the older guys won't have to play as much in spring training. Have you kind of mapped up a schedule what you'd like to see done for yourself in terms of playing time?

I mean, I'm going to have to play quite a bit. I'll be playing pretty early spring training. of the World Baseball Classic. So, you know, I'm preparing a little earlier than I usually do. But, yeah, I'll be playing right away. Join my Dominican Republic team and go from there. How amped up for you for that. Because here's the thing we argue about this on my radio show about the importance of it.

I can't be in your skin because so many your guys like yourself and other countries have said this is such an important event. So to wrap this up, what makes this WBC, even though it's every three years so important for guys like yourself? I'm a special. It's special. I feel like you grow up admiring these guys that represent our country. You know, you admire the Arapujos, you know, the Miguel Tejadas. You know, and they never had a problem with putting on that uniform and represent our country, you know, and, you know, what they did in 2013, I believe, when we won the WBC, when we won the WBC, the whole country. It was like a big celebration, you know, and I remember. I was in I was in high school and that's a vivid memory it was a vivid moment for me you know core memory you know Robinson cano like I admired all those guys you know and they brought the trophy home and it was special for us and I hope to you know kind of give the country that same glory you know we have a great team to do it and yeah we're going to go enjoy ourselves and compete that's okay thank you very much I appreciate thank you um I

We can't live in their shoes. They don't live in ours. We don't live in theirs. The competitive juices for national bragging rights and pride is immense. I can't find anybody, even with among Team USA players that just aren't completely amped about this thing. I'm just scared to death. I think it's abnormal for a spring training to be interrupted by such high-level games. There isn't a good time for it.

But I don't like it, but we do a segment on Thursday. It's called I Just Don't Get It. I get it. I get it. Yeah. I mean, it's not our decision to make. We come from the lens of Astros fans. And we also come from, we've been burned before to where Jose Al Tuve,

unfortunately, had a situation where he broke his hand, and it could happen in spring training. It could happen anywhere, but it happened in the WBC. So because of that, we're scared about our Astro players getting hurt, but they are human beings with their own thoughts and feelings. and wants and desires to play for it to represent their country which i totally get and so they a jeremy paine wants to do that apparently you know korea and altouvae wanted to do it as well but they ran into some insurance issues and and all that stuff and jeremy paine is going

to play for the dominican republic i wish him the best and i wish him health yeah that's the last thing you want is for a guy that's going to be giving it as all diving for a ground ball to her a strain of rib muscle or anything like that. Just come back healthy. That's all I got to say. I just think in fandom for what we can, you know, how people sometimes get mad when a certain player goes out after a big loss. Like, yeah, they're human beings.

They're going to go, like you've talked about as well, Matt. Like, these guys don't wear things the way the fans do. Not at all. And when they're not wearing an Astro's jersey, it's just, it's hard to maybe wrap our heads around about them playing. for Dominican Republic and having the desire to do that because we're just seeing it from a different lens. Well, I'll say this, and to the argument that has brought up all the time about, well, this injury could happen in a spring training game. That indeed is accurate. But there's

something less, I mean, flip it. More reassuring to say, well, at least he was in our camp. At least it happened while he was wearing our gear as compared to going to somewhere where that was just truly optional. And I think that's what the mentality should be, is that, you know what, if Jose Al-Tuva pulls a hamstring while running the bases in a spring training game, you're upset about that, clearly. But at least he's doing it because he's getting himself ready for an astro season. These WBC have way more elements of here and now in championship and playing hard.

When you're going to use that kind of energy, Ross, you want that energy to be used for playing for your home team. not necessarily for the country in which you are from or you're representing. That's what the Olympics are for doing that. It's just these guys love it, and I'm still trying to comprehend it. They love it as much as it does. It's hard for me to find them to some love something every three years, but then the Olympics has loved every four years.

Yeah, it's newer and it's different. I mean, the first WBC was, what, in 2005 or 2006 or whatever? And the Olympics have been around for 100 years. So that's more ingrained into us. But it's ingrained into him. He talked about it. He had this core, he said it called it a core memory of Albert Pooholz and Robinson Canoe and the boys bringing the trophy home to the Dominican Republic.

They like it. So what can we do except just say, go have a good time, play your best, and most importantly, come back healthy? And stay safe. And stay safe. But they're going to love it. And they'll be games in Houston that you will see a firing belly in those teams playing in March that you would never see at any point because they are playing it like it's a Game 7 of World Series.

I'm going to try to tune in more. Because it looks like it's pretty intense and a lot of the fans get into it and stuff too. I will say this, while I have not watched much of the Winter Olympics, just because it just doesn't resonate with me. Yeah. I have watched a lot of BBC.

Not like I will make an appointment setting, but if there's nothing else on, I'll put it on to see how it goes. Yeah, what was it? Mike Trout versus Shohei Otani. That was good theater last time. There is some theater to it. I just don't know.

And maybe the answer is, you know what, Matt, suck it up once every three years. There's just never a good time for it. You don't want to do it during the All-Star break. You certainly don't want to do at the end of the season when the guys are either in the postseason or they're just plum-tuckered out. Let's get back on the phones.

We'll talk to Stan. We'll talk to you at 713, 2-1-2-5-790. I'm going to you on Sports Talk 790. 7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-7-1. 97-1-3-21-2-5-7-90. If you want to visit with us through Twitter, you may do that as well. At SportsMT, at SportsRV. Our Instagram account has been moving along.

I need three people to get me to the magical 3200. Wow. You're going up and up and up, Matthew. Great job. If you feel like it's a great day to be alive, an appreciative of the things that are important to you, whatever would be following me on Instagram. Oh, okay.

People are going to like you more at the office. You see the false promises. There's a chance you go to the drive-thru to your favorite Rarrux and get a free coffee because of a person in front of you bought. And all you had to do is follow me on Instagram. Is that ever happening? Never in my life. Oh.

Have you ever bought for somebody behind you? I have. I have not. At McDonald's. Really? That's nice. I don't think I'm against it. I mean, I would do it.

I just have never done it yet. So, again, if you think, the person in front of you might buy you a coffee, the key to that would be following me on Instagram at SportsMT. False promises at SportsMT. Let's talk to Stan on 790 at 1150. I'll make it 1051. Hello, Stan. How you're doing, Matt? I was talking about the WBC and the injuries. If I remember correctly, not every pitch or the pitch for the Astros in the last one ended up injured and on the DL during the season because

I think it's Luis Garcia or Katie and Frumber all had arm problems that year. I'm more concerned about that because they get ramped up and they're throwing harder than they normally would be at this time of year. You know, Al-Tube that's a freak deal.

Position players, that is. But the starting pitching and pitching is where it seems to have impacted the Astros more than anywhere else. Frumber started 31 games in 2020. Finish 9th in the Sy Young voting.

I don't think he was very much expected by the WBC. No, I don't believe and again, not that we can paint with a broad brush on this, John, a saying, excuse me, there is no correlation to guys playing hard in the WBC

and having a struggle. It's a maximum of seven games, or at least if I'm going off, I don't know if they change the format. In 2023, you play four group games, and then you go to the knockout rounds where you can play

quarter-final semis Simi's champions. So that would be three games. If you make the finals, you're playing a maximum of seven games. It just seemed like there were some arm injuries that year for the Astros. I don't remember correctly, but I know Al Tubei was out. It seemed like there was a couple of other guys that either struggled after that or they had arm injuries, and it seemed to affect the Astros a little bit more than normal

for the first couple of months into the season. That just may be me. I may be wrong. Orkidie played for WBC but that that injury did not happen as soon as early I don't have a correlation and Stan if there is one I will be happy to look that up down the road

or maybe somebody can correct us on it and I will give you your flowers you might have gotten hurt I think Luis Garcia got hurt as well Framber was fine Frommbre was fine Frembr also seemingly always fine Yeah how many innings did Jose or Kiti throw in the WBC. I don't know.

I just think, Stan, it's just one of those situations that maybe you saw somebody that got hurt and maybe that was a one-off, but there has been no frank trend among any baseball players that says WBC competition adds to a possibility of getting hurt early in the year. Oh, yeah, I know. Well, I think that one is the year that Diaz got hurt as well

for the Mets, the closer. You also remember this too. this WBC will be done, and they'll go back to their respective teams and have another week and a half, two weeks of playing. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, I know. Yeah.

Oh, I know. Just with the way everybody is condling their pitchers nowadays, it's kind of interesting for them to let them go, you know, do this when they won't let them, you know, pitch a certain number of innings, but they'll let them go, you know, do this. So it's interesting. In 2020, thanks, Dan. Okay.

The pitcher that pitched the most in the WBC innings, wise in 2023 was Shohei Otani. He pitched 9 and 2 thirds innings over seven games. That's not even very much, honestly. That's what you would... Now, the only difference is you could pitch 9 and 2 thirds over 7 innings in a spring

training game and you're working yourself back into playing. When you put the 9 and 2 thirds innings into 7 WBC games in theory... I don't know how many games you play. I pitched. I mean, I'm sure you didn't do 7. No, no. But I mean, those are going to be more stressful performances. is you are doing something to your arm

and asking your arm to do things that normally would not be doing that time of year. But Shoah's had injury issues for quite a bit of his career. Even in non-WBC years. He's had Tommy John twice, right? Yeah. Look, I'm not going to change my stance on this.

I'd rather see my Astros not involved in it. You know what, after realizing it's only seven games. Yeah. Okay. It's not ideal. But clearly, if we're up to me. But clearly, the insurance is either too high or they're not going to pay it, meaning if those guys get hurt, they'd be in a difficult spot to get their money as a major league.

So they're not going to take that risk either. Well, yeah, I mean, insurance is always going to screw you. They're going to overcharge you. Carlos Corrie could say, well, forget the insurance. I'll take my chance. You don't want to do that. Why would he do that? That's what I'm saying.

The BBC is important, but not that important. Right. you don't want to cost yourself. Yeah. The risk of ruin is too high. Yeah. All right. 713-212-5-7-90.

We're here in West Palm Beach, where it is ridiculously breezy right now. Feels good. I like it. It's not nearly as toasties it was since yesterday. Got a little sun on the legs yesterday. Not much. Still pasty white as I'll get out.

That's good. I'm glad you didn't go lobster-style. They do call me the pacey gangster. Uh-huh. We'll hear from Christian Walker coming up in the next. hour, I believe, because he was supposed to be done at the cages at, he's going to hit in the cages at noon our time and then come over and say hi to us. Wonderful.

We'll get Dana Brown. And we'll have our final hour of the show because we've got to bug out early to go to the airport. Yes. We're going to play some of our best stuff over the handful of days. It's going to be great stuff. So be ready for that. So lots of spring training coverage between now and 2 o'clock. It is Madden Ross with the word for Big City Wings.

And we have a wing story to get to today on the show. We do. Yes, we do. Did you see it yet? No. Okay. What? It was like a national story?

It is a national story? Is everything okay? I mean, with the chicken wings, of course. But why would you want to worry about a national chain that serves crappy wings? When you get a Houston-based wing joint that's going to deserve delicious wings to you. And that's big city wings with 14 Houston area locations. This is the Matt Thomas Show with Ross. Continue with the Matt Thomas show with Ross here from West Palm Beach.

Our time is 1102. We have a couple of live guests coming. up with us in the next couple of hours. By the way, all of our favorite things we'll like to do during the week, the gut feelings and the Shut Your Bowmanass is up. We're going to push back shut your bum ass up to tomorrow in the show.

As I will be coming to you from Charlotte, you'll be back in the warm, cozy confine to the Houston Studios. Yes, can't wait. And then Friday I'll be with you from New York City. So three cities and three days. That's beautiful, Matt. That's why they call you America's

Travel. person. You wanted to say whore. No, I was going to say demon. I need a gambling. It's been a while. Getting the itch. You'll be all right.

That thing is going well for you, okay? They're doing really well. Okay. You mean the itch or just the gambling? The gambling. Okay. Yeah. You're saying away from the craps table, right?

Oh, yeah. That's good. Prada. Yep. Keeping you away from the craps table especially. Oh, whatever. You, I did not play with you for multiple years, and you swore off craps at least twice since I've not

played with you. So if you're blaming me, you need to look internally, Matthew. That's fair. All right. Real quick before we get to the phones, and we were just a distant a commercial for the great folks at Big City Wings. There is a ruling that I've been sent no less than a hundred times. Really? It concerns... Oh, I'm going to guess it concerns boneless. It does concern boneless. Okay. So, let me make sure. I want to get the story right here, by the way. Let's give out the numbers again if you want to join us 713 212 570 719 713 212 570 now

Ross and I have our have we argued about this much I don't say it's wings I say you can call it whatever you want I don't call it but I don't make the menu okay I don't sit there and say hey Big City wings which says boneless on their menu it says boneless wings

hey whatever wing joint you can think of yeah I don't write boneless I order boneless depending on the situation of course because it is, in my opinion, a higher quality cut of chicken. It's easier to eat, and it's delicious, and it's more consistent and crispy fried. And I've never had a weird, dark vein and bone with a bunch of weird stuff in my boneless. I love the bone.

I've never had a boneless wing with a feather on it. Okay? Now I've had bone in with feathers on it on accident and other weird stuff going on there. Feathers stop. If you want to munch on chicken elbows, that's great. You can do that. I'm not going to hate you. I like to eat them too.

I like the crispy skin. But I like to go boneless when, you know, seven times out of ten. So we're not arguing about that. We're arguing about the fact there was, here's where the legal system needs to just kind of check themselves a little bit on this. A judge, and my internet is going down here. So this is not working. Here it is. Apparently, Ruffalo Raw Rings, which is a very below mid-ploid.

Oh, the service is terrible. The food sucks. It's heavy. It's very expensive. But Ruff roll Rowe rings can keep calling its menu item boneless wings after a lawsuit that claimed the name amounted to false advertising was dismissed. It was a 10-page ruling, apparently. Ten-page ruling. By some judge in Illinois, allowing the chain to continue calling its menu boneless wings.

After a Chicago man filed a lawsuit, accused an arrest. restaurant of false advertising, saying the boneless wings were overpriced because they're essentially chicken nuggets. Now, there has been only one person in America that calls them executive chicken nuggets. I think it's a great name. And I feel like I should trade mark that. You honestly need to now. That is a, I think it's a great name. It's way better than whatever that other stuff you're trying to trademark. Trademark, crush shitty thing, Astros took it for a decade. Remote for you. dot biz, terrible name. Remote for you.

Dush City is the wife and the orioles anyway. No, it was not. And so, I mean, the executive chicken nuggets is an actual good idea. Tharp in the report and his judge Tharp said the following. Hamlin, that's I guess the dude,

did not, quote, drum up enough factual allegations to state a claim. The way he is standing to bring the claim because he plausibly allege economic injury. He does not plausibly allege that reasonable customers are fooled by Ruffalo Rha Rings, use of the term boneless wings.

There is not a single human being that believes there is such a thing as a boneless wing. If you're eating a boneless wing, you know you're eating a chicken nugget. You just do. Unless you're like seven. Yeah. No one goes to it. And look, our friends at Big Cities do the boneless too. Everybody, I mean, they do.

They're delicious. All white meat, hand-bredded sauce and tossed the way you love. Oh, delicious. and fried crispy. Yeah, they're excellent. And I like him too. Ross and I have gone many a time to have boneless day. Because sometimes Ross is tired of taking the bone.

Yeah, you like bones. Matt loves the bone in, all right? Matt can't get enough of the bone in. He loves bone in, and he says, give me some more bone in. I like bone-in wings. Yeah, you like getting boned. No, I'm not getting bone. I'm eating the bone.

You like the chicken. You like it boned. And that's fine. I'm not here to judge. Here's more of the report from the judge. Boleless swings are not a niche product for which a consumer would need to do extensive research to figure out the truth. This judge is like, you wasted my time. I'm going to give you 10 pages of this.

Bowledless wings is a common term that has been existed for over two decades. This judge annihilates him. I like it said, he did not drum up enough factual allegations to state a cleats. claim. This guy, Tharp, says, a reasonable customer would not think the foods chain boneless wings were truly debone chicken wings. Reconstituted it into some sort of Franken wing is how he's describing it. Oh my God. So there is no deception coming from any chicken joint, even as mid as Ruffalo Raw rings is. Oh, this is a good one too. A boneless swings on a menu would not leave the restaurant was

warranting the absence of bones in the items and believe the items were made from chicken wings, just as a person eating chicken fingers would know that he had not been eating severed fingers. For instance, does this eliminate the fish sticks? Uh-oh. Complaint coming up.

Uh, no. They're not fish fingers. Or fish wings. You can fish fingers. Fish. Fins. Steak fingers, also not the fingers of a cow. That's right. You're not eating cow fingers. You're basically

taking a chicken fried steak and cutting it into slices. It's a little bit of a different argument, though. I mean, if you just want to be super mega literal, I understand the lawsuit. What I want to know is, this dude sues the

chain. The judge has to hear this, and then the judge has to put together a 10-page essay on it? Yeah. How about get you bum-ass out in my courtroom and pay the legal fees? Are you saying we're too much of a litigious society, well, I'm saying that that judge probably has bigger fish to fry.

Oh, I see. Or chicken to fry. Yes. I think we're done with our puns for the day. Probably not. You're right. But come on. Why would that dude do it?

You, you, chicken, boneless wings was not just invented three years ago. It is, I guess, the judge to the last couple decades. I don't remember from way back of the day. No, but I mean, like, I don't remember. Fahitas as a kid? I grew up here and I didn't I don't remember Fahitas until about

1985. Yeah. What were they cool? No. What did people call Fahitas in 1979? They called them Fahitas, I think. Were they invented around then? What they called like a skirt steak and somebody chopped them up instead? Let's call them Fahas

absolutely. I mean, it was just a look. It's a lesser cut of steak that has gotten commercialized and is now well overpriced. And essentially, here's the bit. They cook the steak on the grill. It comes off the grill okay. Yeah. But they take the pan, not the pan,

the grill they bring to your table, they pour some water and make it steam, so it comes across, oh, hot the fajitas just serve for you. It's performative. They've probably been sitting there 10 minutes. Yeah. Scam. It's all in a marketing scam. I don't normally order fajitas, unless I got a gift card.

I do like the carneasada. I just like to make it one as a strip steak itself. And I can sizzle it myself. It used to be cheaper at the store. Same thing with, I mean, lobsters used to be, they give it of prisoners. It was prison food. Don't get me started on how much brisket is nowadays. I know all the barbecuers out there are not in their head.

It's two super fatty muscles of a cow slapped together that you need to cook, you need to at least cook for 12 hours to make it edible. And does the reason why? It's just okay to me. No, that's fine. You just describe it perfectly why it's just okay. Oh, here we go. No, but when it's done correctly, it's delicious.

It's amazing. But I'm not going to wait 12 hours for a single meal. No, because you're not eating because it takes you 12 hours to make it. That's why it's cheap. Yeah. Not because it doesn't taste good when it comes out. Matt. Yeah, it's good.

I mean, it's fine. Whatever. Yeah, you know, you're a brisket hater. And that's what makes you the worst, Mr. You know what? You can be Mr. Florida before you mean Mr. Texas. I'm team ribs. That's fine.

Okay, go to Memphis. All right? We don't need you in Texas. I like Texas ribs. I like Texas smoked turkey. I'll meet you in Kansas City. All right? You're in Texas, you eat brisket.

All right? Yeah, okay. And we know you love sausage. All right. Mick Cronin is the coach of the University of California, Los Angeles. Yes? He's not a nice dude. We'll give you an example that next.

It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. We are expecting live astroc. My man, it's compared to dead Astro. Live AstroGastro guests coming up in the next hour or so. 713212-5-790. If you want to chime in on our conversation, as meaty as has been. All right, we're going to Aggie Land for a minute.

You're okay with that, sports RV? Going to Dixie Chicken or what? You know who the first radio show ever done on the Dixie Chicken was? No. Me? Is that true? Are you sure about that? 100%.

100%. Who was it? Is it like John David Crow? No, it was, I want to say that I do the show with Darren Jones or Jim Cosmar. I forgot I was when it was, but it was in the 90s. First ever morning radio show ever in that to bar. A special guest, Dante Hall. No, I think it was like the assistant AD for parking or something like that.

That sounds huge get. Sounds great. Try to get R.C. to come over and do it. Busy coaching. It's fine. Juan is in Agueland. Gig of Juan. What's going on?

Hey, so I listen to the radio when I get to work, and the little kid on the show before you guys, he makes me mad, so I'll turn him down. And now I listen to y'all, and I'm trying to find a good bet, so my wife doesn't get mad at me for betting money. And now all I hear is chicken nuggets, bones or no bones, you guys getting bones or not getting bones, what's up with that? I need give me an underdog to bet tonight. Thank you. Oh, you want Why do you want an underdog tonight? There's no basketball. What are you looking for?

College basketball? Because I'm down like 150. You're down $150, that's it? $150K? Yeah, and I need to buy some Pokemon cards. What?

Juan, do you take some gummies too? Juan? Are you hanging out with Revely too long? Revely, man. I was there. What's the name Bivo would stick Revely? I wear my Texas hat around here or my Sam Houston had around here. What does that get you? Where are you? I work for Texas A&M. Brian. But where are you now?

I'm at work. Oh. And you're not, let me tell you something. You are not wearing. in Texas gear at work. There's zero chance of that, so you're lying to us. Okay, I'll send y'all a picture. No, you don't have to. I don't want to send you to a girl in, send me a picture. There's no way. Give me a minute, Matt. That's why I listen to you.

That's right. You should. One, let me tell you work for you, do you work for the school or do you just work for our company and Brian? No, no, no. I work for Texas A&M. Agriolize. Yeah, there's no chance you're wearing a Texas hat. Zero chance. You're out. You're fired. No chance. Hey, I'm a Marine veteran, and I can do what I want around here.

Yeah, you damn well can. Thank you for your service, my man. Thank you for the phone call. He needs a bet. Probably also needs a nap. Sleep that off, Juan. Yeah, Juan. Well, Ross, why don't you give a college football selection?

You are a college. You know what? I'll go with Creighton plus it's 15 and a half. Were they playing? Yukon. Creighton plus 15 and a half? I'm sure. Why not?

The game is where? Is it Omaha? It's in stores. Oh, no, no, no. Stay away from that one. You know, Juan? Go ahead and make something up. Actually, no.

This is actually the formula, folks. We've talked about this, Matt. Matt's random bets hit about 80%. Yes. Listen to me, Juan, very carefully. Listen to Matt. Now, I cannot bet and give you NBA selections because as an NBA employee, I can I do that.

But I can give you a college basketball selection. Okay, let's go. After deep consideration, I'm going to go with... Oh, my God. Come on. Hold on. Drama building. Okay.

I guess the drama is building. Ladies and gentlemen, yes. The MT on a recorded line. Lock in the week. Kansas giving the six and a half at Oklahoma State. He said he wanted an underdog. Oh, well, that doesn't do me any good. Underdog?

You want Kansas giving the six and a half? I want Kansas giving the six and a half, but he wants an underdog. He wants another dog? I'll give another dog. Yeah, who's your dog of the week? I'll give a dog of the week. I'm going to go with, okay, is it my dog of the week on a recorded line? USC plus the nine and a half against Illinois.

Oh, my. Okay. There it is on a recorded line. I'm writing this down. Seriously, everybody write this down. I gave you two picks. Okay. I gave you tonight, Kansas, minus six and a half at Oak State.

That's my favorite lock of the week. I'm the dog favorite of the week. Yeah. Is USC plus nine and a half against Illinois. I swear to y'all. We'll be in Vegas. I'll be like, I got the pirates in the first five innings. I'm like, who's throwing?

I don't know. Yeah. I have an insatiable thirst. It does hit. It hits. So I'm just saying. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right.

Matt's Randot Lock at a week. What I will not be betting on is you say. UCLA basketball. So Mick Cronin went to, took his UCLA Bruins to Michigan State yesterday. Yes. And they got beat like a drum. That's unfortunate.

One of UCLA's top players, and I don't know his name, it doesn't really matter for the sake of the argument. Got a flag or foul. No, no, there's nothing to do with that. Oh. One of UCLA star players is a former Michigan State Spartan. Oh, okay. The student section at Michigan State was calling out the guy's name,

saying we're kicking your ass, you're playing at UCLA, your team's second. Steven Jamerson the second? Okay. That doesn't really matter. Point being, you had an ex-spotting, now playing for the Bruins, and the Spartan fan base was yelling at this kid during the game. Reporter covering the game between UCLA and Michigan State asked Mick Cronan about the student section at Michigan State, and here's how it went. What was your thoughts in the student section, Channing Booker's I could give a rat's ass about the other team's student section.

I just bet the overall the way that you would like to give you a kudos for the worst question I've ever been asked. All right. Did you like to the should take it? You really think I care about the other team? No, I don't mean. Are you raised your voice at me? No, I'm sorry. Yeah, you are.

Yeah, you are. Come on, dude. No reason. Come on. Yes, you were. Everybody's standing here listening to you. Everybody, this is on camera. They can hear you.

I answered a question. I could give a rat's ass about the other team's student section. I coach UCLA. I don't care about Michigan State students. Who cares? All right, Rossi, that's the first time you heard is I wanted you to hear it organically. Thank you.

What are things going through your mind as you heard that interchange between reporter and UCLA basketball coach Mick Cronin? I think the first part, I mean, it's pretty normal, the first, cutting off, like, I don't care about the other team's student section. You're talking about a guy who just got his ass kick by Michigan State. First of all, I wouldn't call that over the line, but that's rude for sure.

To cutting off a reporter and saying, I don't give a rat's ass what you're asking about in the first place. It's very rude. But where it really got out of hand, not out of hand. No, he also said it was the worst questions that ever been asked. That's the worry. He's obviously very pissy and very angry, calling it the worst question it's ever been asked, which I 100% doubt that's the worst or stupidest question he's ever been asked. Right.

So then that pushed it further. And then the cue's the guy didn't raise his voice. He's not yelling at him. He's speaking a little bit louder like, okay, I was going to ask him, or whatever the guy starts to say. And then he's, that's the thing that I don't like. And that's what people do far too often. Where you came after this guy, you said you don't give a rat's ass about his question,

and then you say that you, it's the worst question ever asked, and then you go to the victim card. Oh, you're raising your voice at me. Everybody can hear. You're yelling at me. You go on shield and immediately flip it to the victim. That's where I have a bigger problem with what McChronin just did right there. That is weak sauce.

That is terrible. And that is something that happens way too much in life, in politics, with these coaches and these players to where you come after a guy and you say you don't give a rat to ass about what he's talking about. And then he does, he's got a little bit louder. But he wasn't yelling at you. he wasn't calling you an idiot like you just were to him, and then you play the victim card.

That's ridiculous. I 100% agree. Mick Cronin, if you didn't give a rat to ask about it, you would have said the one thing and then moved on. That would have accentuated what you said originally, but instead you came back at him and wanted to make sure you wanted to embarrass the guy. Now, look, I don't know what kind of reaction he was supposed to give,

but it was a little bit of the storyline of the kids at Michigan State yelling at the former UP Michigan State Spartan. It's an ass and answered. It wasn't the dumbest question. It's not going to lead a sports cast. He wasn't trying to bait him. He was simply saying, my presumption was that tough on the kid to have to hear his name being talked about by the school

in which he was once a student of and play basketball. Exactly. You don't even let the guy finish his question. You cut him off. Okay, that happens. call it, I mean, then you're really pushing it, calling it the stupidest question you ever heard. Like, you know, Matt, if you and I are talking and you disagree with something I was saying, or I'm disagree, like, we're just going to, we're going to go, we're going to keep talking. I'm going to say, well, how could you say that about me now?

Or now you're raising your voice. Like, oh, everybody's, everybody can hear you. Like, no, you, he put his dukes up. What Mick Cronin did was he put his dukes up and he threw a punch, okay? And when he's about to get countered, then he went and cowered in the corner and went to the year raising your voice at me card. No, sir. If you're going to start something, stand on that business and be ready to argue. Don't do that and then play victim.

That was weak sauce. So when Mick Curen said, that's the worst question I've been asked, and he goes, I'll take that. And he goes, I'm sure you will take it. I mean, it was just, it was combative. If you want to start something, let's go, Mick. Don't stand in the corner. You know 5'5 foot six, bon, I won't kick you here. I'm going to do right now.

That's what I'm going to do. Let's go, let's go throw hands. Don't start something and throw it. You know what that is? That's like you're in. class somebody throws something at the back of you, and then they cower away when you're like, all right, who did that?

Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. You want to argue? Let's argue. You want to discuss you on your team, got your ass kick by 30 points? Is that what you'd rather discuss? You're raising your voice at me.

Everyone can hear you raising your voice. Come on, man. That was hilarious. I didn't know that happened. Yeah, everyone heard you. What do you mean? Yeah, we did hear it. It wasn't raising his voice.

He elevated it, but it was a, we know, to raising of a voice. Yeah. I raise my voice. Yeah. That's hilarious. Oh, Mick. May you enjoy your future career at Albany State

coaching your next spot? Because you ain't long for UCLA. All right. 1129 on the Matt Thomas show with Ross 713-21-2-5-797-190. Ross, No, go ahead. This is funny.

You said wow, and when someone says wow to you, especially the person within one foot of you, you turn and you go and then you put your hand up in there. It's nothing. I can tell you. So this, I am very much a person. This happens to me with everyone. Not with you only you mad. It's anybody that I do your life. I can, I have like, you know, I don't.

Tourette's obviously a serious mental affliction. I'm not talking about. But I sometimes just say things out loud without thinking and realizing that I'm talking out loud. I got you. So, yeah. Right before we came on and said, wow. But we could talk about it. Jalen Brunson is eligible to sign a five-year $418 million extension.

That's what made me say, wow. So, yeah. I'm not going to move the needle, but I get you. It's nothing. Yeah. So, yes, this always happens to Matt, to where we're sitting together. I'm like, oh, my gosh. Or wow, or I laugh to myself.

And Matt's like, what, what is it? And I was like, oh, it's nothing. But that's, but you're not the only person, does it, too. Okay. Yeah. You walk around and say, oh, oh, damn. Everything okay? Oh, it's fine.

I was just thinking I forgot to turn the coffee maker off. Exactly. What? Okay. It's generally something innocuous that I don't want to even spend time talking to you about. Like, for example, the fact that Jalen Brunson is eligible for a $40. That's $20 million. That's not going to move the needle here on a Houston sports radio show.

Okay, that sounds fine. So I understand. We're like, oh, what happens? Everybody okay? Did somebody get hurt at camp? Is there some Eastside Pratis get traded? No. Just Jailen Brunson's extension.

That's more on me, Matt. I'm sorry. No, that's okay. That's okay. But, I mean, it was the raw emotion coming out of seeing an NBA player making $80 million a year. So I don't know enough of the deeds on this,

but Mark Cuban basically, over the last couple of days, said it's okay to tank. That why is the NBA getting all mad at the Utah Jazz and Indiana Pages for tanking when the way the NBA structures its roster if you lose a star player or you want to, the only way you really get better is by getting younger players. So what's the point of being 30 and 50 when you can improve your draft chances if you're 15 and 67? Yeah.

They are playing the game the way the rules are set. The rules are set by especially if you are Utah, if you are Sacramento, if you are one of those teams that isn't going to be a major free agent destination, nation or to where you can even afford to overpay well into the luxury tax, you've got to get a top pick. And you're going with this draft and you're going with this lottery, so you've got to accumulate as many ping-pong balls as you can. And if you have a high-price player that gets hurt or underperforms, you're stuck.

You can't get out of it because you can't move that player. It's impossible to be guarantees. Yeah. You can't NFL. You can't rid them. You can't release them prior to their contract. Yeah. You can't eat dead cat money.

that's what you were so to choose. There are some things about the economics of sports that I really embrace and get into. That, to me, they dug their own grave on that. That's never and I don't get it. When a team is tanking, when you talk about the Utah Jazz sitting everybody out, I get it. It's supposed to be a stacked especially top of the draft this year. They're talking about five legitimate NBA stars in which one of them will be in Houston, Texas, or is right now, Kingston, Fleming's. But, way, we're going to have

Dana. Kelvin Sampson joined our show on Friday at 1.30 looking forward to that. So, yeah, you've got five guys that are, I mean, that means any one of the five could be stars. Legitimate franchise-changing stars, and you get them on the cheap, relatively speaking. Yes. You're not paying for heavy 40, 50 million.

It's just like quarterbacks. NFL teams have to thrive if you've got a star quarterbacks. quarterback and he's on a rookie deal. You need to thrive if you've got a young player who is making off of his rookie contract. Absolutely. It's very, very simple. And especially, especially in the NBA, one franchise player can, I mean, what's the value of the San Antonio Spurs been the last few years now that they have Victor Wimbunyama? I don't even know. We'll put it this way. If the Rockets were to lose Kevin Durant for injury or his career was to sudden, to take a downturn.

The money that is being spent on him hampers the roster construction because you've got so much money spent on one player. Now, you can still win. You can still hopefully get something in the draft or hope that the guys you have paid for that are still on their rookie deals like amend Thompson. You know, maybe you don't break the bank on Tarisen. Maybe, you know, you're happy that Jabari Smith is relatively cheap. Alperin's making really good money, but it's not bringing it.

but if you have one or two megas, one gets hurt, one doesn't perform to that. It cripples your franchise. The only way you get out of that is by tanking, having a high draft pick, and hoping catching a lightning in a bottle. Yeah, and it's not only making you better, it's changing the, how much more valuable are the Detroit Pistons now since they got Cade Cunningham? No, you have to build around and they have to be good and you have to hit on the pick. But we talked about the rockets.

could, if you went by worst records, the Rockets should have Kate Cunningham and Palo Ben Carroll. It'd be a different complexion of the team. Right. You have to get these ping pong balls, or Victor Wimonyama. Were they for worst in Victor Wemba? I can't remember.

There may be second worst or something like that. So, I mean, yeah, this is the way to change your franchise, and especially in basketball, one impact player can change everything and then you go from there. listening as you were to the A-Team on our IHeart Radio app after the ball, after the show a couple days ago.

And the question was brought up, why doesn't the NFL have this issue like the other two sports do? Well, mainly basketball. The worst team in the NFL gets the number one pick. But we never worry about teams tanking. I think we do talk about it a little bit. Not to the level of the NBA. I mean, we're talking about when the Jets and they were, what was that the name of that terrible quarterback? Cooper or something or a...

What was that jet they were trotting out there? It was terrible because they were trying to lose. And they're calling it when the Giants, Giants were playing late against the Raiders, I think. There were some talk about them tanking. I think it has been discussed. Remember, how about this? When the Texans and Lovie Smith went and beat the Colts

and everybody was upset about that. But the problem was the Texans didn't follow the rules. They got their Dreamboat quarterback, CJ Stroud. Yeah, I think maybe, especially the play. players, you can't, can you not sit everybody, I guess? You can sit some. The players are out there, are going to try. I'm not exactly sure what the difference is, except for for sure.

One of the big differences is 82 games is way different than 17. Because the jazz are tanking right now. I feel like. You don't have guys sit and benching everybody week eight. In the NFL. Well, you can bench players in the NFL. I just, I don't know what it is. I can't put my finger on it, but I think they're,

is a tangible difference in the intensity of a team that is 2 and 13 when I watch in the NFL than when I see a basketball team who's 20 and 57. I just see it. I just do. I don't know if it's because guys are fighting for spots the next year or if it's not guaranteed contracts or they're trying to play for playing time. Everybody always plays hard. Even if you're tanking in basketball, I mean, Christian Wood was playing hard.

Kevin Porter Jr. is playing hard. That's just not very good. Yeah, but you made a conscious decision to not assemble a team that you knew could win on a day-in-day-out basis, and if teams have injured players that have forced you to go deeper to your depth chart, know that you can't win, then, you know, those guys are going to play hard. Yeah, Brady Cook. That's who they were going with. Who was the Jets?

Who was the Jets quarterback that was... Especially Justin Fields or Terad Taylor, and then they were going with Brady Cook. Who was the BYU quarterback that was having relations with? with all of his... Zach Wilson? Zach Wilson with all his mom's friends. I don't know if that's the correct characterization. I think it was 100% accurate.

I think it was alleged that it was one of his mother's friends. One. You know more about this than I do, apparently. What is your question about him? Question was whatever happened to him? He was backing up in... Where is Zach Wilson? Where was he backing up?

Somewhere in the West... I feel like. Was it, oh, never mind. No, he wasn't with the dolphins before. Last year. Oh, he was with the dolphins last year. Zach Wilson was? That's right. Okay.

Sure, why not? Behind Quinn Ewers. Yeah. Be careful, Quinn Ewers, buddies. Longhorn legend. Longhorn legend. All right. 1144 is the time. It is the Matt Thomas Showwood Ross.

713-212-5-797. Analyst for Turner. NBC, ESPN, Peacock, Yahoo, it'll be someplace for you to go. Far down the road. Far down the road. He wants to club another 150 home runs

where he calls at a career. Ooh, that'd be nice, huh? How many you got all together now? I don't know, to be honest with you. Yeah, how about this? You look it up, and then we're going to try to guess and see how close you did. I know I got 150 over the course of last year

during the first half. This is a terrible guessing game now. I'd say one 171. 174. I'm glad I guess that's close though. That's good, yeah.

Didn't guess something. They've been weird if you said 450 or something. Then you've got to get the 200 this year. That's that's low-hanging fruit right there, right? That's first half. First half stuff, baby. Come on now. Yeah, let's hope so. Okay. So I asked you in the clubhouse how you lost the weight. And grown-ass men usually don't do that. Okay. But we just did. So did you make it a concerted effort to say, I'm carrying too much weight. I want to drop 10 pounds? How did you decide, you know what?

I'll go a little leaner this off season. Yeah, I mean, a little bit of both. Step one, I was having a baby. We had a baby last summer, so first offseason with a kid. You weren't losing baby weight. She was probably a little right. Dad strength. Apparently men hold on weight, too, because there's some hormone if your body's prepping for sleepless nights or something.

Really? I heard some. Yeah, I was like, oh, that's my excuse. Sounds like a cheeseburger's 1130. I don't want to go with that. Yeah, yeah. but wanted to embrace parenting and not I feel like so many people survive and you know obviously the baby's behavior has so much to do with that more than you know we think but just just wanted to really make sure I had a grip on my discipline wanted to make sure I was eating right sleeping right hydrating training to benefit obviously myself but to be in a good spot to be a dad and to be a husband and you know parenting is a fun thing. So that was at the forefront of my brain. And it wasn't necessarily to, like, lose weight or I thought I was playing too heavy last year.

But, you know, me playing at 215, 220, I think, is a much cleaner spot than, you know, maybe mid-220s or something like that. Have you noticed it so far running some of the drills out there at this point? Yeah, I think my foot works a little cleaner. Hard to tell. It's, you know, when you spend time with it, it's you don't see the big changes as much. But, yeah, I think long-term, too, maybe a little less weight on the legs. and help and recovery and all that. All right.

Christian, your first and second half numbers were significantly different. Tell me about the first half. Tell me about the oblique and how much that put you behind the eight ball in terms of getting off to a good astro career start. Yeah, I think, you know, as much as I don't want to admit it or using it as excuse, I think it's very much a thing. These abatt's during spring training are important. Having these, you know, low-stress environments to explore some timing things

and feel a different direction and play with your approach at the plate. You know, I felt competitive when I came back, but I think there's the being able to compete side of things, and then there's trusting your body and proven that you have the reps and you've built up volume. So I think, you know, looking back objectively, maybe I was caught in between. I felt like I was in a spot to help the team win, but maybe not just quite as, you know, competitive as I wanted to be, right? It was an embarrassing first half. I'm not sitting here trying to justify it or make excuses or anything like that. But it is also part of the game.

By far the slowest start I've had to a year. But, you know, to be honest, I'm proud of myself for still putting up some okay numbers. And the slug came back around. The average climbed a little bit late. And I've seen a lot of guys start with a really slow first half like that and, you know, give up and pull the shit. shoot and I wanted to finish strong and I did that I proved to myself that I could bounce back even with a really tough start so um you know overall I'm proud of of you know how it finished

do you feel like you you learn something about either either both physically and mentally with those those struggles that you went to what would you learn about yourself I think um there's always time you know I think it's okay to have some stretches that are slow that the baseball season is so long. You have a really good month. It's like no matter what you do, you're going to have a really great month and you're going to have a really bad month, right? And then those handful in between, it's like, are you on the 280 side of things or are you

on the 220 side of things? So I think just being really, you know, realistic, I think giving myself some grace. I'm hard on myself naturally. I take this thing really seriously. So I think look at myself in the mirror and saying it's okay. Like, you're working as hard as you can. You're preparing the right way. The game's tough.

Yeah, was that something that you do that more in season or maybe more as you look back? I think I was forced to in season. Yeah. Because I felt great about how I was preparing. And I felt ready to compete. I felt prepared to play and help the team. It just wasn't showing up on the field as consistent as I wanted it to. So you asked yourself like, okay, what can I do different?

Like, I'm not going to sit here and feel bad for myself. So how do I get out of it? How do I make it better? What should I be doing differently? And when I prepare the right way and I train the right way and I feel like I'm living right, there's not much else to do but weather the storm. Trust the work, trust yourself. Know that, you know, hey, I got another 300 at-bats on the table.

I can do a lot of damage in that amount of time. You came into camps that I want to play 150 games. That's what you normally have done for most of your career. You've won the gold gloves. You get an outstanding resume. but, you know, look, Twitter streets may not be accurate, but the reality is, names get brought up, yours was brought up a little bit here and there, do you take that with a grain of salt, do you go, all right, I got to change things a little bit, do you go, you know what, unless my agent hears something,

or I talk to Dana, I'm not going to worry about any of that outside noise. I'm in the ladder there. I applaud you for that because he and I have terrible self-esteem issues, so congratulations for that. No, no, no. I've done my fair share of armchair GM and for sure. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, honestly, it just, it gets exhausting for me. It's, it's, there's so many scenarios, there's so many possible outcomes, and none of it is in my control. Like, yeah, if I would have come out last year and hit 300 with 40, like, probably wouldn't be talked about getting traded, right?

So that side of things is in my control. But, right, the business side of game is, of the game is very real. So for me, I actually, I deleted all social media off of my phone for a while, like, jealous. Yeah, not avoiding things, but it's just a smoother day-to-day if I'm not aware of all that stuff. I trust Dana. The line of communication between me and Joe and me and Dana is pretty solid. I think if something had some traction, you know, I'd expect that somebody would reach out, and I understand it's not personal.

It is what it is, but never heard anything serious, so I just kept on with my business. Your off-season is in South Carolina. That's not the epicenter of media in the world, so can you really decompress? from everything. Frating about looking at Europe, but just, what is it like for the news cycle? I mean, do you watch the World Series? I don't know if you're running to a Columbia sports bar and eight or nine

playoff baseball games around, you know what I mean? You're hard on SEC territory there. Yeah, it's very much Gamecock football season when I get home in the fall for sure. But I love high-stakes sports. You know, obviously the tide of baseball is there. I enjoy watching the postseason. I think it's something that we've

grown to appreciate. I got a taste of the World Series in 23. It was a big part of why I came to Houston. I think it's fun. It's why the Olympics are fun. I don't know the rules of the half of these events and sports, but I'm into it. I'm like, I'm hanging on every moment. When you're playing with something on the line, it's just fun to watch. And I think as a professional athlete, I just, I really respect something about that. All right, so you've lost the weight. Two stolen bases last year. Eleven career high. What are we thinking for 2026? I'd like to sniff double digits again, but I think what's important about last year is Parades had zero and I had two.

Okay. Just got to remember that as long as I steal more than Pratis, then he can't talk crap to me. So who is the slowest player on the team? Uh-huh, depends he asked. Not counting catchers because they get a free pass. That's crazy. Catchers. Man, it might be Paredes.

I like to think I'm faster than I look, but. Maybe we need a race, you know? Well, we can probably find the feet per second. Yeah, it's the max at least. We got a big metric guy here. He'll find it. Don't worry. He'll do some dollars.

Let's just keep you trotting. Hit it over the fence and then you can trot. Ground rule doubles, we love too. We had zero issues with that. Jose is going to let you run. Jose, it looks like he's going to be back at second base. He's not going to say it. We're going to interpret it as, you know, he did what was best,

what he thought was best for the team. But I think naturally, you know this too. Guys want to be in their natural. positions, what will be like to have consistency within that infield, at least for 2025? Yeah, it's important. That consistency, I think just as a player, I've tinkered with learning a new position. I played a little bit of left field in the minors coming up. I think it's like one of two things that either really frees the guy up and they think like, well, there's no pressure because I'm not supposed to play this position and it can really help. I think the other

camp is like, oh, no, I'm learning a new position. I don't want to be the reason why we lose a game or I give up runs for my pitcher or something like that. So, you know, I've seen both things. I think Jose did a great, great job of flowing into a new position in the big leagues. Like the guy has done something at an elite level for so long, and then you ask him to do something new. His mentality never changed. His energy never changed.

He was embracing left field for us. And he helped us win a lot of games. That's another huge bat to have in the lineup. And if he's willing to do something like that, that's, you know, as far as like a team captain and a leader, that's, I mean, that's everything you're asking for. Anything else, my man? I think I'm pretty good I mean I look we're rooting for a lot of success

He's ready to go I know I know it's a little awkward with all the talk here and there I just you guys You were so close Do you think about One game or do you think

It's such a macro sport in which you play You can't go to one game Go man if we would have just turned that double play Or if I had just got that key hit Or we would have scored that last run The 9th do you think about that Cause it was such a close Separation between you and Detroit

Yeah, I think it's easy. You could probably pick out some spots. To be honest, I think when I look around the clubhouse at the team we had last year, I feel like it shouldn't have come down to one game. We should have been a handful of games out in front of the division, right? We had plenty of talent, plenty opportunities to win the division last year. Not taking any credit away from Seattle and these other teams. They did a great job, right?

They did what they needed to do. They're cocky, though. Yeah, it's good. You know, you should be. You won the division. Like, good. You know, it's, it's, we had a target on our backs. We have a target on our backs. We're, we have a reputation. Yeah. I want other teams to come in and try to, try to knock us off the pedestal. But, you know, to answer your question, no. I don't think it's fair to anybody or ourselves to try to pick one spot. The season's long for a reason. You got nine guys on the field for a reason. It's, it's very much a team sport, and we're playing the long game. Lastly, playing in West Sacramento, is that like playing in AAA, like PCL? Like, I can swing with one hand and hit the ball 450 feet. That place looks like that he and I could hit a home run in that ballpark. I love it. Yeah, it's awesome.

I wish that we played twice as many games there. No, it's a hitter-friendly part for sure. I don't know what it is other than that. If it's good wind, I don't know if I don't know where the altitude is. If you're really grown, you should switch on the other side of the plate running at a home-run. I'm trying to make a hit a home-run. I'm trying to make. I got a couple already.

I love it. Christian, thank you for the much for the time. We wish you to know the very best. Congratulations on the baby. Enjoy that beet juice. You ever had a beat juice, Rossi? Yeah, it's, it gets you going.

Nitric oxide. I know what's going to get me going. We'll not be doing it in the show much longer. Christian Walker here to start the final hour of the Matt Thomas Live program. We're going to be with you until 2 o'clock today here on Sports Talk, 7.9.

Thanks, gosh. Thanks. This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Madden Ross with you here. Final hour live. We're going to go to the best of our stuff in the 1 o'clock hour. You'll hear from Joe Espada. You'll hear from Jeremy Payne. You'll hear from Spencer Araggetti. And you'll hear from Hunter Brown all in the final hour of the show.

Right now, we are joined live by the general manager of your Houston Astros. It is Dana Brown. Dana, thank you for the time. I don't know how many other general managers get talked about in other 29 cities. But my man, you have carried a lot of conversation for the Houston Sports Show known as Matt and Ross. So we thank you for that. I love it. I love it, guys. I'm excited to be here. Let's talk some baseball. All right. So I can bury it towards the end or I can put it right in the beginning.

I'm going to go right in the start because there's other things I want to get to. You didn't used to hit that hard show. You're right. I've usually signed a soft play, but not not this time around. I've got a segment of a population. Okay. Dana, you've got an extra great hitter who doesn't have a spot. Why would you get rid of them? Because the nature of the beach. piece of a six-month baseball season says somebody's going to get hurt. Then I got a segment population that says, how do you keep a guy like that, not in a position?

So I don't know what's going through your mind. You've not let me look at your text messages, your phone calls. You're probably not going to. But state of the still crowded infield at this point is you see it today here in spring training. Yeah, so this is what I would say. It's always good to have depth, and it's always good to have power, you know, with that part of that being depth. You know, part of that being depth is your power.

So look, we know we have extra infielders. We think that it's going to be very competitive. You know, if we get an opportunity, you know, when we can make a move, we'll talk about it. But right now, as it stands, we welcome the depth. You never know when you're going to hit up an injury. We think that we can get these guys a lot of playing time. there are you know we got some older guys on our roster that we have to you know kind of give a breather to

and I'm just not excited about trying to give away a really good hitter and so look if there's something that's a match you know maybe we'll consider it but other than that we'll just roll with the depth you have that you've got a lot of young outfielders I mean I'm we play GM on the radio all the time I would think that if there's a deal involving somebody in the outfit that could obviously be a guy. You always been talking about a left-handed bat. That may perk your interests up a little bit. But let's get to the outfield a little bit.

Zach Cole had a great September. Cam had a great March. I've said this before. I've heard it from a lot of baseball people that I trust. You don't trust March. You don't trust September a whole lot. So tell me about what you think and what is expected of those corner outfiters in particular, knowing that you don't have a lot of people behind them fighting for it, but maybe that situation that could obviously change.

So look, let's talk about. about the left-hand bat first since you brought it up. So it would be nice to get a left-hand bat we would be excited about, right? If we get that opportunity, I think we would probably move on it because I've been talking about a left-hand bat for a long time. It's just, it's that hard to acquire a left-hand bat. They're not growing on trees, and no one's trying to give up a good left-hand bat. It's just very difficult to do, and you probably have to give up something to get a left-hand bat.

So is there a chance? that we can get a left-hand back? Sure, there's a chance. That's why we're having conversations. Now, as it relates to the lefty, the young outfielder's, I would say, look, we're going to give them a good look in the spring and see what it looks like. We have some things in our thought process

that we feel like those two guys have to make adjustments, Cole and Smith. And so we're going to give them a close watch and see who makes the adjustment from last year that we think that they needed to make. and so if they make these adjustments they could be part of the club if not you know it's not too bad to have a guy start in triple a and build his way back up so both talented enough to certainly make this team and I would be excited if that happens that means they're lighten the ball up so you know we welcome that but you know at the end of the day we want to see them make adjustments that you know that's fitting for the major league level and you know that they're going to be, you know, pretty good offensive contributors. You mentioned both Smith and Cole, and of course, as a general manager, you know,

things don't always go according to plan. But the plan would be for Cam Smith to find what he did early in the season and continue. And then the plan would be for Zach Cole into the season to keep that going. How do you just talk about both of those guys? How do you get them to do that? Yeah, I mean, look, we got two new hitting coaches. We kind of got a new voice down in the clubhouse. One of the guys of veteran in Rodriguez, we really feel like he's going to make a big impact with these young hitters.

He's got a roller decks of working with a lot of good Major League hitters. And so we feel like he can make the necessary impact. And we'll really be leaning on him a lot for getting these guys over the hump. They both have teachable spirits. They're both

really good athletes and they both want to get better. So we think it's a perfect match now we've got to see them execute it. And so there's a good chance we see, you know, exciting young players this spring that both could make the team and we'll be all thrilled if that happens.

You've enjoyed a surplus in the infield right now as we speak. I think we were teasing this to Joe a couple days ago. If people want to go see some future Major League arms, you don't hear the commercials about that with the Space Cowboys, you're going to have at least three or four that you would probably make 90% of Major League rosters, not front-end, but certainly back in. You've got 10 guys here at least that I could see being a starter

for the Houston Astros in 2026. Yeah, pitching, pitching is what Jim Crane and I talked about a lot this off-season. And, you know, we wanted to stock up, right? And we wanted to be able to get through this 162, win a lot of ball games, get back deep to the postseason. And so that's why we did what we did. You know, we added four starters and two relievers. And so, and we're fired up about all, all six of them.

And so all of these guys throw pretty hard. They have really good stuff. They have some deception. And so, you know, when it comes to the starting pitcher, and we feel like it's on, right? And so, and that's going to be led by Hunter Brown, you know, got him at the top. You know, you've got Javier coming back with some experience,

and we're looking for him to take that jump. And then, you know, we got some guys that we added that we feel really good about. Emi, when did that conversation come into play? Obviously, the DR has been something that's been important for this organization for the long period of time. We've been fans of this and we were kids. There hasn't been a Pacific Rim connection to this. So when it was first brought up, what did you think? And then how did you then implement scouting, getting people involved in your department to say,

is this really a guy worth putting some money in his piggy bank? Yeah, so the big thing is, you know, Jim Crane had the vision of, you know, getting more active. the Pacific Rim, you know, we partnered with, you know, Diken. Right. And so we were thrilled about getting over there. You know, we sent, you know, our special assignment scout to John Watson. We sent over Charles Cook, who's an assistant GM. You know, we've had a few of our area guys over there, see EMI.

And so, you know, when reports came back that this guy is pretty good, we looked at the data and the information. You know, you guys saw how the makeup is. He's a competitor. and, you know, so he checked off all three of those boxes, you know, makeup, data, and, you know, scouting eye. And so, you know, we were thrilled to jump in there. We started talking to Boris, you know, early in the offseason, and then things heated up, you know, right there at the deadline when we got it done, like, on New Year's Day. So we're fired up about him. He's fired up about being here.

And so we're looking for some big things out of him. Astros manager, a general manager, Dana Brown with us here on a Sports Talk 790. Speaking of the pitching, pitching, more pitching. What was it like for you going through the team building of knowing all the injuries last year, hoping that that's an aberration and not necessarily the new normal, but not wanting to overreact, but also being prepared for the possibility of more rash of pitching injuries. Yeah, look, the pitching injuries last year were excruciating. I mean, it was really, really tough to watch.

The injuries in general were excruciating. And so, you know, we wanted to be more prepared with depth. And so, you know, when we look at this and we, you know, we felt one game short, and we know that we had a ton of injuries. You guys have heard me say multiple times that at one point we had our one, two, and three hit her out. No other team experienced that in the course of the season last year. and then you experience that along with some starters getting hurt and you come up one game short. So, you know, it's not an excuse.

It's just a reality that, you know, the injuries pretty much cost us to the postseason. And so we wanted to make sure that, look, let's stock up and, you know, let's be prepared that if anything goes down, we have the coverage, right? And so, you know, that's where we are. We're locked in. The pitching is a big part of it. If you pitch, you're in every game. and then it's a matter of getting a big hit here, a big hit there, and make a nice play on defense, and you're victorious.

So, you know, that's kind of like what our thought process was, and we wanted to stock up. For a let your run, you mentioned Scott Boris. Have you invited him down for dinner this spring training at this point? Yeah, I believe Scott owed me a nice bottle of wine. I'll tell him that, too. No, we've had dinner. when we did the my signing at Jim's Place at Patente,

very good dinner, very good wine. And, you know, so we got a chance to fellowship a little bit and talk about, you know, even some future things that we may be doing with Boris. But, you know, ultimately, you know, we got a bunch of guys that are going to be a big part of the winning season this year. We're excited.

We're fired up. Boris happens to have a few of our candidates. So we're locked in and we're fired up. The guys are fired up. up the energy around the spring, around the cages, and, you know, just having conversations, it's off the hook right now. So we hope these guys keep that type of energy. They're locked in, and we're ready to go.

The crystal ball for Dana Brown in two years when we've got a new labor agreement, whatever that may be. I said two. Hopefully it's one. Hopefully, it may be two. Who's, is it going to have, you have to redefine how your budgets look? going to redefine how contracts look? Will there be as big of adjustments

for the teams or for the players, do you think at the end of the day? Yeah, I have no idea. We talk about it, and it's tough to speculate. We have no idea. We'll cross that bridge when we get there. The one thing that I'm quite sure about is, you know, Jim Crean is definitely

dedicated to putting winning product on the field. We're going to be involved in whatever it takes to get players signed. And so we're, you know, we're hoping for the best. and we're locked in about that as well. But we have no earthly idea how this is going to play out. It's almost like you have to take a new math class or something like that

because there could be salary camps. There could be all sorts of things there. Dana, thank you for the time. We really appreciate it. We'll see you back in Houston. Wish you know that would be the very best this entire season and look forward to hearing from you often on this radio station. Absolutely.

Thanks, Matt. Thanks, Ross. Appreciate you guys. Dana Brown, joining us here from West Palm Beach. Matt and Ross continue here from our coverage of Astro Spring Training in a moment. on Sports Talk 790. Week in News and Noon, Rossi, at 1224. But first, the News and Noon today is sponsored by our friends at Affordable Tree Service.

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Martin Spoonmore at Affordable Tree Service. 713-699-2663. 713-699-2663 for affordable tree service. What's going on headline-wise sports rb? Yes, Matthew, there's a lot of really big, heavy-hitting news going on in the sports world right now. Tony Clark. Okay, fine. If you want to get it.

It's a headline. It's a headline. You just love drama, man. I do love drama. Fine. Tony Clark, yes, was dismissed or sorry, resigned yesterday as the director. He was dismissed all right by somebody else. Major League Baseball Players Association.

The first thing we heard about was there was an Eastern District of Unoric investigation about possibly, or I'm sorry, an inquiry into what is going on with a couple of corporations that are partnered with the Players Association. And then, yes, Matthew, the latest would be Tony Clark and a relationship with his sister-in-law. Apparently, while they were romancing each other, the song We Are Families in the background. That's, Matt, come on. they're not listening to sister sledge at the time okay no you're right i got all my sisters with me what is that there's another song sisters are doing it for them so there a song like that too i don't know i think there is not the family matters theme either oh that's true there's a song about sisters i swear to god there is we wouldn't play it'd be ruined to be a toning de clarke has resigned after

the internal investigation revealed an in a relationship with his sister-in-law, who is also, by the way, hired by the union in 2023. So we've got some kind of nepotism. Yep. And some kind of, well, I guess it's not incest because they're not related. But no. In-law cest? No. And an investigation by the district attorneys in the Eastern District New York. So things going really well for Tony Clark right now. Yeah, he's, yeah, he's, they're checking his final. And they're checking his hotel stays.

Yes. All right, Matt, this actually relates to something we were talking about earlier today. Canada's Sydney Crosby leaving the Olympic quarterfinal with an injury. Of course, not playing for the Pittsburgh Penguins. He got hurt with Canada as he suffered a second period lower body injury and was ruled out in the game against Chechia. Canada did advance in the semifinals with a four. to three victory in overtime, but Crosby's right leg appeared to buckle when he was bracing for contact on a big hit from Chechia defenseman Radco Goudas. Minutes into the second.

The Olympics are a little bit of a God, I don't want to sign a hypothetical or two side on this. I don't know, the Olympics have been around for hundreds of years. The World Baseball Classic's 15 years. I think I can, but also, too, the Olympics are in the middle of the season when The athletes have already been fine-tuned and doing, they've already been playing a handful of, lots of games. So you're asking WBC players to amp it up when they had been in camp about two weeks. I think there's a difference.

Okay. Plus, the heritage in the Olympics and the legacy of the Olympics is significantly stronger than the WBC at this point. By the way, did you know, do you know how old Sid the kid is? 37, 38. That's pretty close. I remember when he was a young phenom. What happened? He still plays the penguins?

Yes. Okay. Yeah, sinner and captain, the Pittsburgh Penguins. Okay. He is not the Sid the Kid anymore. No. All right, elsewhere in the news at noon, Matt. The Kansas City Chiefs have reworked Pat Mahomes' deal to create cap space,

converted 54.45 million of his salary for the next year into signing bonus and lowering his cap number to $34.65 million. as this move will create $43.65 million in a cap space for the Kansas City Chiefs. 57 million over the cap were the Chiefs heading to the offseason. So some cap relief and Pat Mahomes converting some big money into a signing bonus as he has been reworked. What does this mean for Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift? We don't know yet. Yeah, I was thinking that Travis would leave the field down to one leg,

but he's got the things to worry about in his life. He's got a marriage to get to a big wedding to plan. Yeah. Not far from Carter. Over under on five years of that marriage. Five years? Five. I'll go the over.

Seven and a half. Under. I think you're right. All right. Mike Evans plans to return for a 13th. How insensitive it to radio. Two radio jimokes like you and me. Hey, I'm no jimok.

Going on a radio show and guessing how long someone's going to stay married. Hey, I did that for radio jimokes we know. How'd that turn out? They hit the over. I've been very transparent about that. Good for them. What else you got? Mike Evans is going to be returning for a 13th NFL season, but his destination has yet to be determined.

Well, he's texting. Let's discuss it. you won't too. Galveston Ball's own Mike Evans and Texas A&M Aggie, Mike Evans. Could he be Matt? A Houston Texan. One year deal, go bring him here. That's fine. I don't care. I just hate it when everybody gets released. How does he fit the Texas plans? You know what? I mean, if there's a team that would take a one or two-year fix on a guy, it'd be the Texans. That's how Nick Cicera does his contracts. But we've got to stop. doing that.

So, I mean, will he listen? Of course. But do I expect that Mike Evans that was a star for the Buccaneers to come do the same things he did in Houston? Not likely, just like Christian Kirk was just a body for the most part coming out of playing his days in Jacksonville. All right, well, you want some lighthearted and happy NFL

news. Robert Woods signing a one-year, or excuse me, one-day contract to retire as a Los Angeles Ram. Yes, he didn't want to do it in Houston. He didn't play anywhere last year, by the way, in an NFL game.

Now signing a one-year contract, two years in Houston, and it was five years in Los Angeles, four years with the Buffalo Bills. But a ram for life now, Robert Woods. Texans legend. A legend is a strong turn. He had 629 yards in two seasons. My point, exactly. And that is the news at noon. Anything you want to take away from what Dana Brown had to say, I have one.

Oh, I'm curious to hear it. It's not super big. When we come back. But it just further pushes my agenda that I think that is the theme of this year's camp. Interesting. Even though they're not going to obviously say it publicly. 7132-1-2-5-7-90. 137, Matt and Ross with you.

Final hour of the show will be featuring our best stuff. Joe was awesome. I'm rooting for Joe Hart. I want him to be around. I like him. I think the players like him. Yes. The results are in a business.

Of course. He needs a clean slate with healthy players. I think health will be a lot of the reason why this team will be successful this year. As is the case of the most baseball teams. I think love will keep the Astros together, Matt. All right. You'll also hear in the hour from Hunter Brown, the staff ace, the opening day started. We'll talk with him.

Let's go. I like hearing you say that. Astros ace, Hunter Brown. It's good. Jeremy Payne will be a conversation. this morning with him, so we'll play that for you. And then Spencer Argettich, we can get him in that rotation every fifth day.

He's a good talk or two. It was just good conversations. We didn't gut feeling, but I'm to lock it in. Spencer Argeti's in the rotation. And I don't want to predict an ERA or anything like that, but barring injury, he's in the rotation six-man or otherwise for the year. All right. What's up?

So, I'm scared. Back to the conversation. We went right to Dana, right for the, not the jugular, but this is the theme of too many infilters. The phone is going to be turned on. The phone, he's not going to get ridiculous request. He's going to get, hey, we see value in Paredes, but what do you want? And I think that's the tug-of-war that you're currently going through right now.

It's no secret the Astros would like to make a move. It's no secret the Astros have. at least on paper a very undetermined unsettled outfield. I'll say this. I think of something I get away from, it feels like to me, again,

Cam and Cole and Zach don't have guaranteed spots. That's pretty crazy. No, he even, Dana said, making the team. So that would make a lot of sense. What you just said is what kind of takes away some of the leverage from Dana Brown,

and he's trying to win that back by making people wait. The leverage just goes away when teams think you're desperate to make a move and think you're desperate to figure out something with this infield launch camp, they're going to try to pray on that. And that's fine for them to do that.

And I think it's a good idea for Dana Brown to wait for a possible right offer if it is going to come. And that's why it was silly, frankly, for me to say, oh, by the time the team breaks game or by the time the team gets the opening day workouts, he's got to make the move. That goes, I think, without saying, but he doesn't have to make the move

just to make the move at a start. certain particular time. Yeah. It's interesting to see how we've been talking about it for months and months and months. And it just keeps on becoming a storyline that Dana doesn't want, you know, we have Christian Walker on. He doesn't want to be talking about. Everybody wants us to be resolved and it just keeps you ready.

And the reason for it is, you got to remember, these are professional athletes. We mentioned us a few days ago that have been playing ball since they were seven years old, six years old. They had been at the best of their position or in their sport for a long period of time. They have made into the major leagues. They have been highly compensated. And when you get to the big leagues and you make a lot of money and you want to continue to make a lot of money, the only way you make a lot of money and do successful things is you actually have to be in the lineup card. Yes. And if you're having to take an extra day off a week because you've got one too many arms or one too many bats, then it becomes a little bit of a tricky

situations. That's why, I mean, Lance McCuller is moving into the baseball side. Lance didn't want to go to the bullpen. He knows that his future, if he was to stay in baseball beyond the end of this contract, is I can be a journeyman middle reliever making $3, $4 million a year. I want to be a starting pitcher. I want to be a double-digit guy. Yeah. They have their egos in sports, and you could never forget about that. Team is very important, but right behind it is I. It's built in, though. I mean, it's, we're, we, we're, we, we're, we're, we, we can't. We, we

We talk about certain people who rise to the level of politicians or what we were talking about Tony Clark. You have to have a certain something. And to be an athlete that is of the millions of baseball players in this country and in this world to be the elite of the elite of the elite. Yeah, you absolutely have to have this great belief in yourself, these great abilities and all these different things that come with that. It be like us. Matt, there's three of you that host this show in the middle of the day. we're going to give one of you an extra day off a week. If you want to be on radio, you've got to have an ego.

I mean, yeah. I mean, look, I've given you a good ego. You were just like, I'm happy to be here now. You can act that way. You can act like you're the boss. Yeah, I got a bit of an ego. We all do. Oh, my God.

If you don't have an ego, you ain't surviving anything. That's the thing that sales. You don't want to share accounts. You want them to be your accounts. That's, yes. It's doggy, dog world, Natty. It's just. stockpiling and putting an awesome player in Layaway.

I mean, it sounds awesome. But if the Astros had six starting pitchers that were all legit starting pitchers that had no issues about why they should be a starter, you'd have the same exact thing going on here because somebody would be pulled to the bullpen. I guess they would do it, but they wouldn't want to do it. I guess at this point, Eastside Prater's a big guy that would not want to be a rotation, a utility guy or moving around.

If Christian Walker struggles in the month of March, he doesn't want to be that guy. Nobody wants their positions when they jump on a plane and go to camp. They want to know exactly what they are. And then you deal with a surplus. The question is, how long is it going to be before I start rolling or guys going, I don't like this. Joe could easily get irritated by this as well because he's going to have to consistently be a therapist for these guys.

I think especially Christian Walker could get into the crosshairs, because you talked about, you know, as soon as somebody's in, if they make a trade, as soon as somebody's injured, why did you guys do this? If they don't make a trade, what if, you know, Christian Walker wants to start the season great? It was a slow start last year. He doesn't have the oblique thing, so I'm hoping he hits the ground running. But what if he starts off like two for 16? Why is Christian Walker out there?

It's just, there's a number of ways this can go haywire, and it'll be interesting to see what we're even talking about coming today, opening day to where we're having a completely different conversation about the infield and possibly completely different conversation about the outfield as well. All right. If you want to join us, 713212-5-790, 713212-5-790. We'll get back to more of our normal shows starting tomorrow. I'll be in Charlotte with the Rockets.

We'll be back in Houston. And so we will also do our shut your bum ass up tomorrow. Don't know the exact time on that because we're worrying to book a couple of things. You're coming after the Palm Beach Airport? Lady. I don't blame her. If you missed the show on Monday, we found the crankiest person alive,

and that's West Palm Beach Airport Police Girl. She... Pick up traffic. She wanted zero part of you sitting there waiting for your loved ones. Well, I got one for you. It was a CF. Really quick. Ain't anybody got time for that.

Will you go pick up somebody at the airport? Save the hugs for it when you get out of the airport when you get home. Ooh. I'm sorry. You have to be disciplined to do that. I'm going to tell you that I don't normally do that. Well, that's good. No, I'm saying I normally hug.

Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That policewoman would have had you. No, it's not like you're making out. If you're a grandfather, you're picking up your daughter. Okay. And they're three kids. Yes.

And your son-in-law. Uh-huh. That's five hugs. Okay. Now, I'm not saying that. So, hold on. So you're saying I'm going to hug one person. I'm talking about what I do.

I'm not a grandfather with four kids. But there are grandfathers here in Florida. I am single and I don't have children. There are grandfathers. I get picked up by one person and I hug them. The rule is you can kiss and hug one person, but it's got to be quick. If it's time. Okay.

Don't stick your tongue down her throat. Ooh. Well, a little church tongue. I think I'm right about this. You can be right. I'm just telling what I'm going to do. I'm just saying a family of five. Either you hug a ball.

I don't have them. I'm not picking up. But if I'm picking up a family of five, something has gone extremely wrong. What if you picked up your sister and their kids? Yeah, I probably wouldn't hug all of them, no. Well, if you only hugged one. Well, I'll probably stay in the car and let them load up. Wait, you won't get out of the car and load up.

Well, for husbands there, if it's just her, she's married. Oh. Husbands can handle it. Oh, he's got back issues. I'll get out and help. Oh, nice of you. 1246. Yeah, I would hug them all.

Suck it. And thus delay traffic. Oh, five. You know what you are? You're the airport huger. I'm not picking him up in sweaking. swooping them around the whole concourse. Airport

Hugger. Let me, I can, let's see, it's probably four to five seconds maximum per hug. That's 30 seconds, and you think that airport cop is going to like that? She's going to crush you. Well, she could shut her bum ass up. I'm hugging my family. Sorry. 713-212-5-790.

7-13-2. I think I brought up sort of a hornet's nest of this one. No, this is great. 713-212-1-2-5-7-90. This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Welcome back to you. I'm going to a poll for it. It's okay.

Welcome back to the Matt Thomas show with Ross here on Sports Talk 790. What are you putting a Twitter poll up about, Matthew? Here's the question. Because yesterday, or on Sunday when you picked me up, there was a grandfather that was hugging the wife, the three kids, and the woman and our agitated airport employees. He was like, hurry it up.

My question is. She said something? Crowded airport pickup area. You are the one picking up a loved one or a friend. Do you hug? Yes, Quicky, no, got to go. I mean, if I'm helping them with their luggage, most of the time you stay in the car.

I would say most of the time. I would say most of the time, when my wife or my kids pick me up, they stay in the car as well. Yes. If you have to get out to help with a bunch of luggage or something, then yeah. You get a kiss.

I get a little squeeze. Been out of a full makeout session, basically. You hug with one hand, squeeze with the other? What are you squeezing? Cushing. Okay. Hugging a squeeze. You never heard of that?

A hug and a squeeze. Let's talk to Roger on 7.90. Hello, Roger. Yeah, sometimes you have to categorize these hugs, especially airport hugs. very, very, should we say, at a premium. So if you're, if you got a lot of what is coming from across seas and he's military and he just came from overseas after a long, after a long tour, then yes, hug is applicable then. A family member who maybe was just kind of a surgery who was very sick, I haven't seen him in a

while, hug applicable. But if that, you got to keep it moving like, you're at a, like, like you got teammates at an all-star again. You're fist-bumped it. That's why the fist-pumped was created. You got a fist-bump, put it in there. We'll talk about it later. Put the luggage in the back. Let's roll, baby. All right. You've got to update your categories, man. You've got to update

that stuff. I don't know if I ever a fist-bump my wife. I'm sorry. Roger, you don't let me, Roger, are you married, Roger? If I am married. What's the last time you fist-bumped your wife? Right after

right after a marathon sex, maybe. No. Oh, Jesus. I knew that was coming. Excuse me. I didn't mean to say it. Whoa, geez. Sorry, sorry. That was the wrong choice of words.

That was terrible. Oh, dear. Adam Spolane says no, because then you have to help with bags. So he's avoiding helping with bags. What many bags are we talking about? Yeah, if you're talking about a two-week vacation from Japan, Ryan says airport pickup area will be far less crowded of learning how about the cell phone lot is exactly right.

It feels like a week. in Dallas. I mean, Rogers makes a good point. Weekend in Dallas rather than like, I don't know, three weeks in Japan or something. It's a little bit different. That is true. So everybody should say, hey, I've not seen my spouse in this many days. Yeah, you hold up a sign. Okay.

It's been two weeks. Just wear a shirt. It's been three weeks. All right. So far, that 18 votes are in. Yes, a quickie. No, 28%. Oh, I think you're, you're on the don't hug. No, I'm on the, it depends on the situation. Okay. Yeah.

It's got to be, but if you're going to do the, if you're going to hug, it's got to be fast. I mean, super fast because you don't want, I'm telling you, Interagantial Airport has mean guys, too. They don't meant women. They just mean cops, period. Yes. The meanest cops in Houston are airport cops. They're pretty chilling hobby. Well, that's because you live in the hobby world.

I love hobby. All right. Hobby's my jam. It's closer, faster, smaller. It's great. Okay. All right. Best of our interviews start in four minutes. Oh, man, I can't wait. Well, get ready. We're going from Joe Espada, Jeremy Pena, Hunter Brown, and Spencer Irrede.

Beautiful. After I'll tell you about Uptown Appliance Repair. Please do. All right, uptown appliance repair. They're not going to be quickie for they're going to take your time. Love, they're going to make sure all your appliances are taken care of when they're needed repairs the first time. 281-758-9978. 281-758-9-9-78, whether it's a washer, the dryer, the refrigerator, the ice maker, the wine cellar, the wine-coolers, whatever, anything you've got appliance-wise.

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This is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. It is the final hour, the Matt Thomas show with Ross here on Sports Talk 790 from West Palm Beach and Astro Spring Training 2026. Astros will get underway with games coming up this Saturday against the nationals. And this hour, we're going to let you hear from some of our best interviews while we were down here the last handful of days. And we'll start things off this hour. with a visit with manager Joe Espada.

We talked with him a couple of days ago, and obviously the number one topic of conversation is the congested infield. But first things, first, something's going to be very special with his Astro team in terms of depth in their pitching staff. In fact, we tease Joe about how good the Sugarland roster would be when it comes to guys not making the Major League team and eventually heading down to AAA to start this season. But it's good depth, says Joe, among other things, in our visit with the manager of the Astros.

Yeah, and that's the whole idea behind it. Create a line of defense. If something happens at the major league level, these guys can come up and perform. We added a ton of your pitcher. Even the guys from NRI, they're good arms. Some of them have a major league service, and that was the whole idea behind it.

Do you feel like you've got to set a date in your mind? You don't publicly say it, but in your mind, I want to have my rotation set by a certain time. Yeah, you do. I think for that last week of spring training, you do have a pretty good idea of how your rotation is going to look like. And you start lining them up so you know who are you going to, how you're going to, you know, line them up not only for that first series,

but against the Red Sox, right? And then there's an off day. And then we do have a stretch of games where we're going to be facing the Mariners. So we want to make sure that we line up certain pitchers to face some of those teams. I think the biggest question is going to be more the middle of a bullpen. Some of the long guys, some of those, that's where we're going to be spending most of our time. So if you don't use your starters a lot during spring training because they don't need to be burning. How do you get those middle guys in when everybody needs to get an inning?

No, but there's plenty, there's plenty of innings. You know, even the starters, you know, at some point you get them throwing 60, 80 pitches. But there's plenty of stuff that we do in the backfields. You know, we do want to get them facing guys on the, on the, on the, main field but we could create some live BPs and try to get them built up that way but you know you have to be creative

you just don't have enough innings here sometimes to answer some of all those questions sticking with the pitching Christian Javier is an interesting one to me how what do you see from him where he is now and how do you get him back to the guy that we know that can be somebody that can go out there and throw a bunch of no hit innings

which we've seen from that you know historically pitchers who come back from Tommy John they usually come back and happens what happens to have here towards the end you start seeing his stuff trying to come around and he has some decent outings

but then once they have a full off season of you know full strength live BP's he was in the DR throwing bullpents up to 40 pitches now you see some health now you could start you know

planning ahead and and you start seeing a good version of him again he's going to be big for us he's going to be really big for us um we get that christian heavier which i know it's in there that 22 christian heavier watch out we had spencer again about 20 minutes ago what what spencer again it's going to show up do you think you hope i should say yeah and again you know i think spencer last year after that injury and the the pause there in the middle just kind of you know you know messed up his rhythm and and and it sucked because

we had high expectations for him we really really like this stuff and once he gets going he could be pretty dominant but I expect him to come in and and be good he's stuff is so good he could create swinging misses looking for guys that could take us deep into the game man that's going to be that's going to be key for us we have discussed about the six-man rotation because you've got plenty of arms in the schedule certainly would dictate that right is is it harder to give those guys an extra day when they're feeling good and feeling like they can go every day because it throws their rhythm off. Or is it harder because you have to know you've got one less middle reliever if a guy is a tough day.

Yeah. So, yeah, let's tackle that one first. Anytime you have a six-man rotation, that is one less guy in the pen. So any hiccup from your starters, now you start, you know, asking some of your high-leverage relievers to start throwing in down games and stuff like that. So you try to avoid those things. But you do your six-man rotations for at the time. the end, you know, June, July, and you start getting into August, you want those arms to be

fresh. So you are proactive in the front end, try to be smart about it and be patient about it because you know in August, September comes around, you're unleashing them and you're asking them to throw, getting to the 105, 110, right? Like we did a few times to Hunter last year. So it's tricky. You just got to be patient, and that's why bringing all these arms is important. So we can, so we feel good about our depth. Astros manager, Joe Spott, it's here on Sports Talk 790. I'm not going to ask you who's playing where. But just at a general human standpoint.

You know, you as a manager, you have many different roles. You have to be psychologists. You have to build relationships. You have to talk to all these guys. What is that challenge like for you trying to just, because everybody wants to play every day, which is a great thing. And so competitive. Yes.

Yes. But then try to figure out a way to kind of figure this thing. out with the personal with the human element of it man i tell you the toughest part of my job right we have a super competitive group of players who want to play every day and if there were not like that then i'll be scratching my head like what the heck what's wrong with this guys right but they're not like that they all want to play every day they're all everyday players right um and i've learned that even working on there some great managers sometimes you're going to have tough conversation with players and they're not going to like what you say, right?

And there's a level of respect there that ultimately I'll make that decisions and I understand that they're not going to like it. But we have to do what's best for the team. So if they all understand that we're doing this what's best for the team, our players knowing that, listen, I am doing it for what's best for the players. It's not personally, it's just best for the team. And it's tricky. It's difficult.

especially when you have a ton of dudes. I just want to go out there and ball and play good. And they're good players, All-Stars, Silver Sluggers, Gold Glovers. Hall of Favors. Hall of Fammers. There you go. Shooting Hall of Amers, yes, exactly. You know, we got them all.

So, Zach Cole is going to have every opportunity to win that left field spot for you. You got Jank and Center. Corner outfield spot is supposed to be power hitting. Yeah. How long do the leash of those guys have? have. You know what? They're going to, I'm going to play them from the get-go here.

They're going to get a ton of our bats. And we're looking for some of those guys to step up. Really will like some of those guys to take over that everyday role. And we know that camp, it's really close doing that. Last year he got to a good start. Second half the season did not go ahead as good, but we know he figures some stuff out. You know, he's definitely in that competition there with, you mentioned, SAC. We just got Loper Fido, Jake, excellent center fielder.

So it's going to be interesting because I just don't think right now as we speak today that I don't really know exactly how that's going to shake up. I'm hopeful that everything that we are planning turns out that way, but these are young players and we need to be patience and they'll let us know. crazy thing and I've mentioned this to my audience for years covering all these spring trainings. I don't trust numbers in March and I don't trust numbers in September. You've got one kid

who had killed it in March last year who look at up and downs as you would admit, but defense with it great. And then Zach was great in September. So the brighter lights are in April. They count the same amount of time. You know what? And what I like about what you just said that we do have a sample size of what March looked like.

So we know that March won't we have enough seen on players that, okay, March, this player could be a really good March player. Yep. Right? We saw this get in September, but we also saw he did it in a pretty high leverage spot. So he has some really good at bat, some big home runs in a big moments. So that stuff matters when you are evaluating players.

So we learn a lot about from both of those players. So now moving forward, we'll see what this takes us. You got one, I got one. Okay, sure, why not? You've got to feel good about defensively, certainly. It's almost whoever you pick out of, and not out of a hat, of course, but whoever you pick to put out there, the outfield defense is going to be improved. Yes, athleticism. Guys can go and, you know, take care of balls in the gap.

Whoever is not starting, you know, say, for example, if you're done and starting left, I got enough, I can replace defense and you feel really good about. about any of that stuff. But yeah, that's been our goal this off-season trying to stay more athletic and we've been able to add a few guys that helping us do that. Here it comes. That question.

Here we go. You move an ESAC around. Tell me as much as you're willing to tell the city of Houston, we have hundreds of people listening right now. I wish it was thousands, but it's a holiday. What is a holiday? Isak walks in, you hug him out, say, hey, how is your off-season?

I'm sure you've talked to him before then. Yeah. Is he going, okay, I'm here. What do you want me to do? I mean, give us as much as you can. Okay. He didn't ask what you want me to do. He already knew going in here what we wanted him to do.

But he's real, you know, once you get here and now, you know, to start moving in first, second, some third. I have full confidence that he could play all three. he can do it right we love to bat but the question is always how are we going to make all these work and that's where I come in

and we have the conversation you know this will play out let's just give it time and see where it takes us and you know it's just not easy for players to they want to know right now and you got 35

egos on it yeah and I and I get it but you know and they're all really good players and that's where it's a good problem it's the greatest utility player in the baseball today you've got the greatest pinch hitter available for you today but you know another thing i don't want to look at him as a utility player because you know because you know but this is the thing about about when you think about a utility player you think defense first this guy is one of our best hitters so you know that's the reason why we're like okay but you know but But, you know, I know our fans ask you these questions all the time.

All the time. And it's fair. Fair enough. Just every day. It's fair enough. Twice on Sundays. And I get asked the same questions. And I'm going to continue to answer the same question. Let's just give a time and we play this out.

And that is my biggest job. It just makes sure that those guys stay focused on the mission. It may not happen here in spring training. But ultimately, I think the Astros will make a move to decongest this infield. We hear from a guy who will be the open. opening day starter for the Astros. It's Hunter Brown. He'll join us next here on Sports Talk 790. The Matt Thomas show with Ross continues here on Sports Talk 790. We had the pleasure a couple days ago to visit with the staff ace of the Astros pitching staff. Of course, it's Hunter

Brown. And Hunter and I, along with Ross, sat down and visited about a variety of things, including finding out from him when he found out he would be the opening day pitcher for the Astros at Dyken Park. So I flew in on, I think it was Monday. you're in trouble right yeah that was a joke that i guess uh i don't know that's terrible you've been dFA you gotta work on your stand-up no you're yeah i know right just you know usually when you're in the building for it was i think about 30 seconds and then uh joe's like yeah come see me i was just like oh man you know it's like it's like when you're in school what did i do already kind of no i'm kidding so you okay let's be brutally honest you knew what the conversation was about right come

on, don't lie. No, I actually, I didn't expect that. Oh, okay, well, that's fine. Camp hadn't started. I didn't really know. It could have been anything, you know? Joe could have just been like, hey, what's up? Yeah, like, let's play some golf or something like that guy. Who knows? You know, so but now, then he broke the news. I was obviously really excited and

you know, just got to get through the next couple weeks here and in Roland opening day. So is there literally a Hunter Brown calendar that I'm doing this this day? I mean, even if you didn't know your opening's day, do you have have a specific counter about what you're doing every single day leading up to that opening back?

For the most part, you kind of just know what games you're projected to pitch in, you know, what your lives and bullpens look like. Usually you get that when you get to camp. So, yeah, I mean, every year they kind of have it, you know, maybe TBD here or there, but for the most part, you know. And then especially as a starter, it's like, okay, well, if I'm throwing alive here or in a game, more than likely five or six days from now, I'll be doing it. again. Did you

give Fronbarnie Detroit Eats locations to go? No, I just told him if he needed any, did let me know? Justin could hook him up. That's right, and that's right. I told him he's got that and then obviously all the other guys on the team, but I said, hey, I know a lot of people over there if you need anything, let me know. Now,

you're a Detroit guy like myself. You went to Wayne State. My mom went there, so shout out to Wayne State. Oh, wow. How about that? Have you gone to the Spite Hot Dog Store in Detroit? No, I have not. Downtown Detroit. There are two hot dog places. Okay. They share a same wall.

Their families and they've gotten a fight like 50 years ago. Wait, you're talking about Lafayette and American? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a Lafayette guy. Are you really? Yeah. Is it like you have to pick a side type of thing? Yeah, you're kind of committed.

You know, when I was younger, my dad and uncle, they just always did Lafayette. I think Americans probably a little bit, a little bit better aesthetic, if you will. But, you know, Lafayette is where I go. All right. So what's the number one eat for you in Houston, Texas? Houston, I've been doing Blue Dorn a lot. I like that place. Nice call.

Yep. They're great over there. They treat me well. I think you can't really miss with anything there. I like, I mean, ironically, I like Gold 2, Tony's Detroit-style pizza. It's a good spot.

I love Gold 2, Tony's. Do you have Jet yet? Yeah. That's more of a chain. I'm just throwing it out there. I'm sorry, go ahead. And then I'm trying to think of what else. Last thing,

in a very Detroit. Yes. And then we're down. of this. Do you like Vernors? Yeah. What is it? What is it? Ginger soda. It's disgusting. My mother grew up on it, so I can give it a shot.

It's not great. Put some whiskey in if it's bad. That's right. All right, back to baseball. We're having, we got to Hunter Brown for like nine minutes. I've got to be focusing on food for the first three of it. It's good stuff. You've got a lot of bros now in your, are you getting introduced yourself? And you guys have to get name tags? Name tags.

A lot of new arms. It is, it's new. It's exciting. It feels depth-wise. Hunter, not the thing bad last year was bad, but it feels like there is going to be some greater competition, especially at the back end. Yeah, I mean, I think we've got a lot of guys that are, you know, coming in, ready to compete for a job. I think, you know, every year, including myself. You know, this year is a little different with being named that, but I think every year you come in trying to, try to protect your job or get a new one. So I think, like you mentioned, there's a ton of new faces, and then there's a lot of guys who maybe, you know,

maybe didn't have the year that they wanted last year or, you know, can build on doing some really good things. You know, I saw a blue ball throw a ball pen or throw a live VP today. You know, he had a great end of the year. Alexander had an awesome, awesome 10, 12 starts for us. So, you know, the door's open for a lot of guys to come in and make, you know, earn a job. What is that like for you now to be named the opening day guy? And, you know, we've had you on for the last couple years here to where you were the young pup. You were the sponge soaking up everything from everyone else.

Have you seen a little bit of a changing of the guard of that? Or what is that like for you? Just as being one of those guys in the clubhouse? Yeah, I mean, I think guys ask me, you know, already. We've only been in camp for a week. But guys definitely ask me a few more things that, you know, maybe I'm like, oh, I remember doing that. You're like, I'm the big dog now. I remember asking that question.

No. But I think, I think that's how our clubhouse is. You know, it's pretty, it starts with, you know, with El Tuvae, right? anybody he's he's so great and open about anything and it's kind of the transparency of that throughout the clubhouse it's uh you know open door policy which is about everybody so um you know from the coaching staff down to the players so you know you're open to those questions and and guys guys let you know fire away you've had a chance not to playing all the different ballparks i want to ask you about west sacramento it was tough to watch games there uh that ball they should do something

because i felt like every game i watched between you and the aes are like 11 to 10 or something or something crazy like that. Yeah, it's I mean, just call a spade to spade here. It's not a great park. You know, you play in big league parks, and it's the big league,

so you should be playing in a big league park. That's kind of where I stand on it. I'm happy Tampa's going back to the drop this year. That would have been weird too, huh? That was. Yeah, that was, I mean, I think I gave up a home run at 50 degrees that, you know, off the bed, I thought Altuve would catch it at second

and went over the fence. but yeah it's just something we got to deal with until they get over to Vegas if they do but yeah it's definitely not it's not one of your circle on the calendar and say can't wait to go there you try to change anything i mean what can you do like you don't want to get it in your head too much pitch the lecture maybe yeah no i think it's more just like it's more of i'm trying to think of like the the best way to put it your time we're on for another hour and a half and we're roasting You know, when you go to Fenway, go to Yankee Stadium, when you're pitching in Diken Park, you know, there's at an eight, like, all right, this is, you're ready to go, whereas there it was like, there was just no, no vibe. And like, for us at that point in the season, when I pitched there, at the end of the year, it was like, this is kind of, this is a biggest series of the year for us at this point.

And, you know, you kind of got to bring your own juice. and you don't need that from outside factors, but, you know, the stage sets itself, right? So I think that was something that, you know, I thought about going into it and was like, all right, I need to kind of turn up the energy a notch before that. You're one game away from making the playoffs last year. Seattle obviously got to you guys late to win the division.

Tell me I'm wrong if you can. It feels like there's going to be some extra sizzle if there already wasn't when the Astros and Mariners, even playing April coming up this year. Yeah, I mean, I think all in-division games kind of bring that. But, yeah, I mean, it's fair to say that we are not happy that they won the division last year, and we won it back. So had some good series, obviously, like you said, you know, I mean,

even though they swept us, it was, for the most part, a good series. We just didn't go our way, you know, didn't come out on top of the games that we needed to. so they ended up win the division and like I said we want it back so do you spend a lot of time I mean you collect it by yourself but collectively saying hey if we'd have gotten that series or that game the margin of error is so thin even after you play 162 games no because you can look back at you know maybe whatever miscellaneous game in April and if you would have won that one right you know so it's hard to pinpoint it but you know in the moment that it's hard to it's hard to not say that too at the same time of like okay well this is the one that at that moment that we had the chance to

and it just didn't go our way um but but you know how many how many games throughout the year do you do you win that you maybe on paper shouldn't have won you know that you come back all he wins out exactly so and you play 162 of them hunter brown with us here on sports talk 790 what about you you personally obviously opening day starter had a great season last year uh what do you want to do more. There's certain things you're trying to refine. Like, how do you get better? Because we know you're a great competitor. You're always looking for an extra edge and doing whatever.

What was the off-season like for you to where you don't want to get complacent, which I know you're not going to, but you also don't want to push yourself too far? Just your mindset, I suppose. Yeah, my mindset was more so, and I've tried to take this together the last couple of years of stacking them together. I don't think it's really hard to make an overhaul in three months. especially when, you know, I threw a bunch of innings last year, excuse me, the last, you know, the last three years I had career highs.

So it's something necessarily that you can't, you can't overdo the amount, the workload. So you try to stack them up over, okay, maybe this is my two-year plan, this is my plan for this season going forward. You know, how is this off-season going to help me for next off-season and into the next one? You know, you want to pitch for a long time, you want to play for a long time. So this offseason was kind of just stacking those together with the couple years prior. And then as for the baseball stuff, you know, just trying to perfect what I do. And then, you know, you can take it on a scale of like, okay, I probably walked too many lefties,

probably fell behind more guys than I wanted to. I always have room to improve my slider. You know, my slider is cutter is slider-ish. So, you know, would love the two-plane break on it. You know, I've been chasing that, well, really, since I got into pro ball. So, you know, and then you just try to refine those things and then be able to apply them in the season. Last question. The easiest way to calm you down, if you've missed a pitch or you're in a run,

where you've given up two or three in a row, somebody coming up to the mound talking to you, the catch are doing it, or stepping off the rubber and just walk around and kind of give me yourself a second. What's the easiest way to settle you down? Yeah, I mean, I think it's internal for me. You guys might see me, you know, I think most pitchers I can speak for. If you throw two balls or you give up a home or something, the first thing guys want to do is grab the rosin bag or, you know, take a couple extra steps behind the mound, you know, kind of re-center yourself,

I think is kind of the easiest way to go about it, especially because, you know, when things are going wrong, that's the number one thing you want to do is slow it down. Okay, get back to what I need to do. get ahead of guys, execute pitches, things like that. You know, when Josh comes out, you know, for the most part, it's talking about what to do next. Whereas, you know, maybe a catcher comes out.

They got a little bit more of, hey, I think you've been doing this. You know, Josh does say that, but he's more about the next hitter that's coming up, whereas, you know, a catcher or even, you know, in years past, it's Breggie, now we got Carlos comes into the meetings and stuff like that, and they can say, hey, okay, need to. need a big ground ball here however it is that you're going to do that and then that's where Josh can kind of say hey so-and-so hits a bunch of ground balls on this pitch maybe maybe we lean into that to set bat but um yeah I would say I would say all those hopefully hunter will not need many

moments to decompress over the course of the 2020 season more of our coverage here from spring training and west Palm beach continues in a moment as you listen to sports talk 790s the Matt Thomas show with boss continues here on sports talk 790 earlier this morning at a chance of with Jeremy Pena in the clubhouse. First of all, to congratulate him about his upcoming marriage. I mean, it's something I've been wanted to do for a long time. And, you know, I was in season. She was in season.

I feel like the off-season was only the only appropriate time. You know, I didn't want to do it when she was still playing. You know, I wanted her to focus on her season. And then once her season was over, it's green light. So who's handling all the marriage plans? Is that going to be after the season? Are you guys going to talk it out during the year? Oh, we'll talk it out during the year.

definitely playing it during the year. And we're kind of both going back and forth, both giving inputs, but she's doing most of the work. I haven't married a long time to let her do all the heavy lifting. I swear, I mean, it'll work that for you. This camp, I mean, you're now one of the older guys in the team. Is that kind of crazy that you can make about it? It doesn't feel like that. You know, I still feel like I'm that young kid, you know, with, you know, coming into my first spring training. You know, I have all the energy in the world. I have all the ambitions. in the world and, you know, we have a great team. And I'm excited to be around these guys.

And I still, I get excited to be around some of the guys, you know, learn from that, pick their brain. Yeah. So, yeah. It had to have been, I think it was surreal for everybody, especially you guys. It's like topper and you're not playing games. I mean, how long did that take to sink in? And was there a level of frustration, disappointment? And I got to get back on the field as soon as possible.

I mean, I feel like our goal is always to get. into the postseason and make a run in the postseason. You know, we didn't achieve that last year, which was tough for us as a whole as an organization. But at the same time, you know, it's time to turn the page. You know, we're already

spring training and, you know, we have a new season upon us. And it's time to bounce back. You know, it's time to get back into the playoffs and make a run. How is it to, it looks like to me watching you guys that your relationship with Carlos at their base,

It was amazing. I mean, it took no time for you guys to transition together, right? Right. You know, Carlos has been great to me since the first day I got to the organization. You know, spring training in 2019. You know, I got to hang out with the team quite a bit. You know, Joe Espada kind of took it upon himself to get me playing time with the MOB games in spring training. So I would come from the minor league side and hang out with the big leaguers.

And, you know, it was pretty cool, pretty cool. Does that happen a lot? I mean, that's a pretty special situation for you to be able to, be with those guys so early in your career. I mean, guys usually get the opportunity to come up and play back up some games. But I feel like Joe was make me back up almost every single game. You know, I feel like I was barely in minor league spring training. And I feel like I was old.

And I didn't play much. You know, I would come into the eighth inning, get one at bat. I would come into ninth end, just play defense. But just being around those guys, man, it was special. Because you get to pick their brains. You know how the big leaders think, you know? And it's exciting for me. So do you look back at that and go, man, I made some mistakes when I was younger, or I just kind of just soaked everything in?

I mean, I try to soak everything in. Yeah. You know, if you look back at the team we had 2019, like, it was unbelievable. You know, I had guys like Michael Brandley around me. You know, I had guys like Jose Al Tuve around me. It was special, special for sure. Do you find younger guys coming? Do you ask those same kind of questions that you were asking four or five years ago?

I feel like they asked better questions than I did. I was just quiet, you know? I feel like these guys are very confident. You know, they know what their game is. You know, they love picking people's brains. But I was more shy. You know, I was kind of just there looking, trying to learn by seeing. You know, I was never one to just approach someone and ask them a question, you know.

But if they open that door for me, then I felt the confidence, you know, keep talking about it. A couple more questions here with Jeremy Pena. Jose is back at second base primarily. And look, I think what he did last year in volunteering himself, the left field. Everybody's going to do that. And maybe 10 years down the road, they may ask you go to third base, something like that? What is that like watching a guy like that go to a new position for the good of the team? But you know in his heart of hearts, he wants to be a second base. I mean, it says a lot about the type of person he is and the type of player he is.

You know, he's a player that's always going to do what's, you know, best for the team. He wants to see the team do good. You know, he wants to see the team win. You know, he's been here through the ups and the downs of this team, you know, from when he first got to the big leagues to winning multiple World Series, you know, so I feel like Altuva is very, Altuva is very inclined to helping this team win. And Artuva is a player that, you know, he tries to make everyone better. And if that meant last year trying to move to left field, it makes a team better, then, you know, he's a guy who just put in the lineup and he's going to find a way to help the team.

What do you want to get accomplished here? I know that Joe mentioned a few weeks ago that maybe some of the older guys will not have to play as much in spring training. Have you kind of mapped up a schedule what you'd like to see done for yourself in terms of playing time? I mean, I'm going to have to play quite a bit. I'll be playing pretty early spring training because of the World Baseball Classic. So, you know, I'm preparing a little earlier than I usually do. But, yeah, I'll be playing right away and join my Dominican Republic team and go from there. How amped up for you for that?

Because here's the thing we argue about this on my radio show about the importance of it. I can't be in your skin because so many of your guys like yourself and other countries have said this is such an important event. So to wrap this up, what makes this WBC, even though it's every three years so important for guys like yourself? It's special. I feel like you grow up admiring these guys that represent our country. You know, you admire the Arvapujos, you know, the Miguel Tejahas. You know, and they never had a problem with putting on that uniform and represent our country. You know, and, you know, what they did in 2013, I believe, when we won the WBC. Mani, when the Fogne, when we won the WBC, the whole country, it was like a big celebration, you know,

and I remember I was in high school, and... That's a vivid memory, it was a vivid moment for me, you know, core memory, you know, Robinson Canoe. Like, I admired all those guys, you know, and they brought the trophy home, and it was special for us and I hope to, you know, kind of give the country that same glory. You know, we have a great team to do it. And yeah, we're going to go enjoy ourselves and compete. So even though I may not be the biggest fan of the WBC, you can clearly hear in the conversation that Jeremy and I had that he much appreciates the time he gets to represent his team in the upcoming WBC. More here from West Palm Beach in a moment as you listen to Sports Talk 790. Final segment here of our coverage from

spring training 2026. We'll focus on a visit we had a couple of days ago with Spencer. Araggetti, obviously a terrible set of injuries last year that precluded him from having much of a 20-25 season. So we obviously had to ask him when we visited with him a couple days ago. How was the off-season? How was the rehabilitation? No, it was good. My off-season was good. I took more rest. So I got three opinions when I had the elbow thing pop up just to make sure that, you know, everybody was on the same page. And it was Meister, it was Kremtrak. It was our team doctor at home. And everybody's recommendation was just give it a break. let it scar up a little bit. There was some inflammation, just like a little bit of, like, no tears anywhere,

but like a little spacing that shouldn't really be there. You know, it just seemed like there was some wear and tear happening from the way that I was throwing the ball that wasn't supposed to. So shut it down, start at square one eight weeks later, played catch for eight weeks, low intensity, and the next eight weeks after that, ramped it up, and that was the whole offseason right there. So for me, it felt normal.

I don't really try to throw hard when it's not time to. Right. But I also never take eight weeks. weeks down from throwing. In the past, I'll get myself three to five days and then, you know, just light toss three times a week. So that was the hardest part for me. It was just showing up to the gym every day knowing I can't play catch and I just got to do my rehab stuff. But it was the best thing for me. Shoulders feel healthy. Elbows feel really healthy. So that's really what I care about at this point. And things are starting to feel really smooth on the mound again, which is what I'm

used to. And I feel like I'm right in stride. I got a live tomorrow for the first time, or actually second live this off season. I threw one at Dyken before we came down here, and I'll throw one tomorrow, another 20 pitch live, so just kind of slowly building back into it. I think I'll have live bullpen live, bullpen game, so I won't throw the first week of games, but I'll be right

back in there in the second week of games, and I'm really excited for it. You've got a lot of competition, my man. We want you back to where you were a couple of years ago, but there are guys chasing after you right now, and that's healthy and cool, but you still want to be a part of that opening six, five or six-man rotation. 100%. I love competition, though. I mean, I feel like

that's been my whole career and my whole life up to this point is just proving that I'm one of those guys that should be taking the ball when we're starting games and that is exactly what I'm here to do this spring training is prove that nothing's changed. Prove that I'm the same guy that I was in really the second half of 24 is what I'm the most proud of in the big leagues and that's exactly what I'm chasing is just be that guy again. How do you get back to that guy? What is that like? It feels like it's kind of very unique journey for you as you said here in the second half of the

24. Then of course what happened last year. where are you right now as opposed to where you were around that time both mentally and physically? That's a tough question to answer. I mean, obviously over the course of the season you kind of you gain some and lose some certain places. And during the off season, you're trying to sharpen everything. So right now I feel like everything is sharp. I feel like my velocity is very normal, definitely a little bit higher than it was last year coming into spring training.

So I'm excited by that. I was not excited about how hard I was throwing when I was. I did come back from injury last year, but again, it's tough to shut down for eight weeks during the year and then get back up to where you were before that. So the thumb thing was, again, I chalk it to bad luck, but it was tough to overcome that. And the fact that I was able to get back quickly and pitch for the team again was something I was really proud of. Granted, now I look back at it and I realize I wasn't fully prepared to be doing that, neither mentally or physically. So this offseason, I feel like I did a lot of, you know, more things than I would normally do. in an off season to make sure that my body was going to be ready and going to be fully prepared.

And I think it's been good for me. I got a much more regimented arm care program this year. And in the past, like, before I got called up, like, it sounds crazy to admit this on air, but I wasn't doing arm care. Like, I was never one of the guys doing forearm exercises. Delete this part of the conversation. No, honestly, don't, because it's part of the growth. Like, I'm proud of it now.

Like, I've got the, I've got the wherewithal to know. Like, I can't pitch 30 times in a season in the best. big leagues if I don't do this stuff. So it's really, it's really good for me. I have a fantastic team of people at DST in Houston that helped me find exactly what it was I needed to do day in and day out to feel good and to be ready to take the ball. So yeah, I'm just excited to get down here and compete. Yeah, you've talked about growth and one of the things we've had you now on just about every year the last couple years and we talked about being more into numbers and spin rates. And then after your first lengthy year in 24 kind of backing off that a little,

bit? What's your relationship with the kind of the, finding the harmony between using both the numbers and just the field? So I think during rehab and during the post rehab throwing, it was really important for me to like dive back into the technology again and make sure that the release window was the same as it was and the extension and the shape on all the pitches. Like that was good for me to like check off those things post rehab or post shutdown, I guess. And now that I'm back competing again, I'm trying to kind of ignore. the computer programs a little bit. You know, obviously I'm taking what our analytics team says and trying to apply it to what I like to do. And I think that that's the happy balance is I got to go out there and play my game and pitch

my game. But I also need to listen to the guys that know a little bit more about the hitters. And they get paid to sit there and do research about the hitters. So anytime, I don't know if you guys are familiar with Holden, but he's the guy that we work with on the pitching side for the most part in the analytics team. And anytime I have a question about, like, hey, like, is this pitch better or is this pitch better to this hitter? Like, I'll go to him because I can't just watch the video and know that.

I mean, I can go in there and I can look at all his numbers and stuff. But we have so many things that go into what our game plan is that I've got a give and take. You know, like if I feel strongly convicted about something, that's what I'm going to do in the big moment. But when there's opportunity for me to like learn something about this hitter or that hitter, I need to take the chance to do that too. So I think it's just, I'm somewhere right in the middle now, just kind of the same as the last. time we talked about it. Spencer, getting with us here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross from West Palm Beach. Has the skip told you guys don't even bother challenging on ABS or is he

what has there been an official message? I think it goes without saying, dude. I think everything's a strike. That's the real problem. My eyes move a lot and the ball stays in the same spot. So I don't think I could ever possibly tell you with a hundred percent certainty like on borderline pitches, whether it was in or out. So in my head, I will never once put the hand on my hat. You know, I'll leave that to the catchers because they're really, really good at knowing the strike zone. And obviously the hitters are as well. So I really think that's what it's more for is for the guys that are confident in whether it was over the plate or not. I think up and down is going to be a learning curve.

Like the, I don't know if you guys have watched AAA games in the last few years with the ABS, but it gets a little inconsistent at times. It's right. Just a little bit. And I think that some of that was intentional, like tinkering to try to. to find the strike zone. But it now seems like they've got a pretty good algorithm where it's like relative to your stance height, relative to your load height.

Calibrate it okay. Yeah, like I think it's in a good spot. I think it's probably, I don't think they would put it in the big leagues if it wasn't ready for us to use it. So I think. You're glad you don't have to face Altovae. No. Yeah, no, I am really glad about that.