The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Joe Espada Addresses Pitching Woes and Injury Concerns

Episode Date: April 7, 2026

Joe Espada Addresses Pitching Woes and Injury Concerns

1230 on Sports Talk 7.90, the Matt Thomas show with Ross, Matt, here in Phoenix, Rockets and Sons tonight. And Ross back in Houston, let's say hi to our friend, the manager of your Houston Astros, trying to get a victory tonight in Denver. Skip, it's Matt and Ross. Good afternoon to you. My guess is when the dust settles, you want to come back and play in a regular ballpark. These thin airs of Denver and Sacramento, they're making your team kind of quirky the last couple days. Oh man, they're not easy Not easy to You know Playing this kind of elements and

Yeah you know Seem some wild ones here in Colorado Throughout my career in Sacramento Has become one of those ballparks where You know it's just challenging But you know we have to We have to find a way to To get the job done

You know and if not You know it's You know both both teams are playing on the the same element. So we just got to find a way to win. Joe, take us through, and we'll I would say ask you about a hunter in a second, but just since you found out about a hunter's ailment, what did you do with your

intelligence, with your pitching coaches about who's starting, who's coming out in a back-to-back situation, the thought about the six-man rotation, where have you settled, if you have settled anything at this point about how your pitching rotation is going to look for maybe the next week or so?

Yeah, you know, and we still, you know, still work in progress, right? You know, we do have some guys that we know are going to start for the next couple of weeks. We also have a bullpen, which we still try to put it together and develop some of these guys who haven't really have those roles in the past, really good arms. We also got to be careful. Some of them have not been back to back very often in their career.

And we also been into a few, a few games. here where, you know, it's been hard for our starters to give us, take us deep in the game, which puts us in a really tough spot. So as we try to answer all these questions, we try to keep in mind, you know, the health of our pitchers and also try to communicate with their roles and how we need to execute and give our offense, which is doing a phenomenal job, opportunities to winning close-out games. I will say this, if there is a silver lining during these last few days, which I've obviously very frustrating, is that your team has been able to show the ability to come back.

And I don't think that's lost. Hopefully you and I, when we're visiting about this team, saying July and August, are still talking about this comeback ability. So even though the pitching staff has been roughed up the last handful of days, you do have an offense that has been able to really top to bottom, give you the enough offensive production to win most nights, even if the pitching staff, unfortunately, has not to be able to come through for you. Yeah, and that's been, you know, we, that's been the character of our team, you know, we'll

fight until the end, you know, even last year when we didn't have, uh, the, the, the full arsenal of our offense on the field at all times. We always find ways to, to fight through the end and, and, and, and give you a run for the money. And that's, that's who we are. Right now, we have, we, we have an offense in which we, we, we understand what makes us successful. We're going to grind up bats. We're going to make pitchers work for every pitch. We're not going to give a bats away.

We have from one through nine giving you quality of bats, and our offense is clicking. Now, we have to keep that going. And at the same time, you know, understand that, you know, the pitching is going to come around, right? So, you know, we had some really good arms. We went through a stretch where we were able to roll, you know, bullpen out there, and we got some clean innings and stuff like that.

It's been challenging the last couple of games, but, you know, but I do have confidence in these guys that don't turn it around. And, and, but I'm very pleased with our offense and just being able to fight and keep us in games. Feels like there's a ton of guys we can highlight that are hitting well for you. But let's focus on Cam Smith. What have you seen from him at the plate? And how about that shot he had last night?

Bomb. So it was a bomb. You know, in that game, you're done hit one straight center. You know, I think walk with someone else in another ball where I thought these balls have a really good shot of leaving the ballpark and he didn't. But once he hit his, it was like a golf ball. It was like a tee off. Like he tee off and it was just an absolutely bomb. You know, he's driving the ball to right field for homers.

He's driving the ball in the air straight center. You know, he's pulling the ball with confidence. It's just that bats are really good. His presence, his confidence has been really, really good. And, you know, we know what this guy is capable of doing with time, with experience. And hopefully we're starting to tap into his. into his talent. Astros manager, Joe spotted with us here on Sports Talk 790.

How has Jeremy Pena been coming along? And do you have a plan about as far as in terms of integrating him daily? Yeah, I think, you know, we're getting to a point where you guys will see him there every day. We are in a position where he's built up pretty good. We'll continue to, you know, keep an eye on him and not only him, but the rest of the guys, you right? We've been playing some really long ball games. I want to make sure that we give not only Jeremy but other starters some time up their feet. But he's in a really good spot.

You know, you mentioned Hunter. And I'll be sharing some information today with the media. You know, once I meet with the media at around 4 o'clock mountain time. So, you know, you stay tuned for that information. Wait a minute. We're your friends, Joe. You can tell us. We won't tell anybody.

Just to ourselves. I know, but you know, everybody's listening to your show. I thank you. I appreciate that. You know. Esock's back off of Reavement. How much time does he need to get ready for you to start plinking him back in the lineup here? Yeah, he'll be in there tonight.

You know, I wanted to make sure that, you know, he was at home for a couple of days, and I wanted him to get back to Colorado, get a full day of work, do some sprints here, And temperatures are cool here, so I didn't want to rush him on the field. Last season, right after the All-Star break, he played in that first game in Seattle, and that was the injury happened. So I want to make sure that we do it the right way, get a day of work in the waitroom and all that, and then, you know, he's able to get back in there today. Before I let your run, Skip, Brian did not perform well for you in that game on Sunday,

and the ERA is inflated. Obviously, it will go down with some better performance. is coming up hopefully. You know, there are some will say, you know, does Joe need to be thinking about maybe making some changes and maybe altering the late games leverage situation? The reality is this wherever you put him in with the way your pitching staff right now and the way your bullpen is going to be used a lot because the starters haven't gone as long as you want to.

You need to go to Brian. Whatever your conversation has been like with him as he left the mound on Sunday. You know, he needs a clean inning. And he needs a clean inning in your mind, I would think. But he also needs an inning where he's not overtax in terms of a number of pitches. being thrown. Yeah, no, no, you're right. And, and, you know, I've talked to Brian about it and, you know, some mechanical issues that he's been working through here. And, you know, and I've, like I told him and some of the late inning guys, just to be ready to pitch any time late in the game.

You know, I want Brian to, you know, potentially be open to, you know, doesn't necessarily got to be the ninth inning. There could be leveraging the eighth of pocket where he can clean inning and throw that 8th and, you know, I do have Brian King. I do have 10 guys that could throw laying the game. I have Bluba who can also be deployed laying the game. So I want to be looking at ways to get him going

because we, obviously, we need him. He's been so good and so valuable to us for years. That for us to get him back, probably get him in some situations where he can go in a little less leverage and get a little less leverage and get a clean inning and get him going. Mike Burroughs on the mound for you. And, of course, I mean, well, we'll see what happens.

You do want some length from him. What are you kind of keying in from him from him in the first start to the second start now to now what you'd like to see in Colorado? Yeah, you know, obviously, you know, like you mentioned, Lent, but also, you know, he's change up. It's a big pitch, though, you know, the Rockies will throw out there, five, six left east in there today. He's going to need that change up to be, to be a,

effective. You know, they, they're a ton of free swingers. Maybe we get some early ground balls, get some early contact, get some quickouts. You know, we, we expect them to go deep. We need them to go deeper in that game. You know, we do have a fresh bullpen today. Hopefully we can, we don't have to

use a ton of those guys and be in a good position, you know, win the series, winning today and then position of being a winning series tomorrow and then off day and four games, four big games in Seattle. So, you know, I expect Mike to go out there. He understands the situation that we're in and expect him to go out there and give us a strong outing.

Very last question. ABS, the process in challenging, finding it to be smooth, we're still rough, work in progress. Where do you put it? No, I think, you know, it's going to be, you know, working progress. We're learning from everybody, we're getting reports where are the umpires, missing the most and where are players challenging the less and we're finding out that the top of the zone is where a lot of the pitches a lot of the players don't really feel comfortable challenging that pitch that upper rail right there some of them are that pitch is up and they go and actually

look at it and they're like oh man that pitch actually clicked the top of the corner same thing with our catcher so we we are learning we getting information throughout the league and Right now, it's that top of the zone is where a lot of the pitches have been, umpires I've been missing, but also the players are on the size, if they should challenge it or not. But I feel like, you know, the umpires are locking it in and they're trying to get every pitch right. And, you know, strategy-wise, you know, are guys to be more aware of when to use them, when not to use them. So this is going to be work

in progress, but so far, my players actually like it. You know, they like the fact that they could challenge pitches and have that, you know, that tool in their tool built. Skip, thanks for the time. I know you have some news to announce in a few hours.

We're going to have to speculate, unfortunately, since you won't tell us now. But best of luck in Denver, enjoy the off day and have a great weekend in Seattle. We'll talk again next Tuesday. Thank you for the visit. All right, fellas. Thank you. Thank you. We'll see you later. That's Joe spotter manager of the Houston Astros.