The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Joe Espada Joins The Show After Astros Big Weekend vs Dodgers & Yesterdays Loss vs Guardians

Episode Date: July 8, 2025

Joe Espada Joins The Show After Astros Big Weekend vs Dodgers & Yesterdays Lose vs Guardians

Quality minutes with the manager of your first place. Houston Astros, a six and a half game lead over the Seattle Mariners in the American League West. Joe Espada, getting ready for game two tonight between the Guardians and the Astros. Skip, first of all, thanks for joining us. Number two, how's our friend Mr. Gordon doing? That was a pretty big bump he took last night. Yeah, thank you for having me.

He's doing okay. You know, we kept an eye on him last night. he went through some concussion testing and everything checked out well. We'll see him. I'll see him here in a few once he gets to the ballpark. Yeah, you know, how much of a conversation? Did you have to go through kind of a test and say, do you know who you are? Do you know where you are?

That kind of stuff. That has to be scary for at least a short period of time. He went out there and he conducts that test. and then he asked him to through two more warm-up pitchers, and then he went through another sequence of questions and to make sure that he was able to get back and to get back in the game and finish that inning, yes. If he says who's your favorite manager of all time,

he doesn't say your name, you definitely have to pull him out at that point, correct? No, we ask him where he was, you know, ask him who hit the ball, questions like that. just to make sure that he was aware of where he was standing at the time. Well, hopefully all is well when you get the report later on the day. Hey, what a phenomenal trip. Look, I don't care about yesterday. You want to get all those victories, but this baseball is a crazy sport, and it's going to happen.

Hopefully you'll get back on the winning track with Hunter tonight. But just the road trip at all. Take us through. First of all, you beat the Dodgers to a pulp on Friday, and that's the greatest loss they've ever suffered. And then just to get consistency, great defense. You got some hot hitters. Christian Walker played well.

Your starting pitching did good and your bullpen was lights out. It couldn't have gone any better for you guys in Los Angeles during those three games. Yeah, and I think that's been the story for the last month. I think we have found consistency on both sides of the ball. You know, everything starts with our starting rotation. They've been doing a remarkable job, keeping us in the game, us getting big hits, doing the game and be able to hand the ball to our back end of our bullpen to close to the deal.

Consistency, you know, throughout, you know, a whole entire lineup. We got some different guys stepping up every single day. We got into a group here, what we all believe in one another. We understand that they could be a hero, a new hero, every single day. And that's contagious. And we find ourselves playing really good baseball. and I'd be super proud of our effort, you know, going through L.A. It's a hostile environment and, you know, the way we play with the energy and the passion

and be able to, you know, sweep them there at home. It was a great, great feel. And Al-Tuvae, of course, had a great weekend there. What is it like for you as a manager? You've been around him for so long, and he's given us so many wow moments. But at the same time, he just continues to do stuff. Are there moments where you're like, you almost feel more like a fan, You know, like, I can't believe what I'm seeing.

100%. I'm his biggest fan, especially when we go to stadiums where he receives, you know, that kind of treatment. I'm there looking at fans on the top step, you know, behind the on-deck circle, saying things that I would never even imagine saying, especially in front of kids. And he just goes out there and hits homers. He walks by them. Doesn't even acknowledge them. He's professionalism, his toughness, his mindset.

You know, honestly, I don't, I know how he does it, but I could not imagine anyone else being that tough. Astros manager, Joe Espada, with us here. What is your just mentality, especially as it comes to a lineup construction, coming down the stretch here? You have so many different guys out, so many different mixed parts,

also wanting to keep guys in a rhythm. What has that challenge been like for you recently, especially with the injuries continue to pile up? Yeah, just trying to, you know, just trying to, obviously very important is the guys who are playing every day, our everyday starters, you know, trying to give them off their feet, but also some of these new players who are in, put them in a position where they could match up well

against their starter or their, you know, their bullpen, whatever the case may be, trying to keep pieces on the bench where I can, you know, deploy them laying the game and trying to keep defense in the game late in there. There's so many moving parts right now, but these players are responding very well. I'm communicating with them, the roles that they're in right now, and just trying to piece it together while, you know, the Jeremy Pena's and the Jordan Alvarez. and those guys are sitting on the sidelines. And once those guys get back and we could be on full force, we could, you know, we can run those guys out there and give us another boost.

I want to ask about the intelligence you get about your own players. Look, Joe, you have seen these guys through the system. You saw them in spring training. But when you leave from West Palm Beach, you worry about the 26 in front of you. You have had to go to the ball to the minor leagues a bunch. I mean, your lineup yesterday was especially back half of guys that weren't with the team to begin with. You don't need a refresher, but what is it like when you get a new player?

Who do you trust? Who is the guy on your staff that says, all right, here's what I've seen. Here's the intelligence reports tells me. Here's what we can use this new guy to our best advantage. Well, it starts with me building a relationship with those guys when they're in West Palm. I've seen a lot of the players who came through the system. Like, for example, Ken, Ken, Corona. someone that he's been around for the last couple of years.

So I have a relationship with Kennedy. I don't want that relationship. I don't want the first time he gets to know the manager is when he gets to the big league. No, he's in big league camp. I go down in the minor leagues and watch him play. When we play a night game and, you know, the monosolics are playing during the day. And so we have reports from our player development where I get them before a player. Once the player gets to get to the big leagues, we have a full report.

what the players been working on, you know, drills that the players is doing both offensively, defensively, so we can hand that information to our coaches so we can continue their development process at the major league level. And we have a pretty good idea of what the, you know, the areas they're, you know, they're controlling offensively, they're doing well offensively, things that, you know, I need to be aware of, not to expose certain things. And I get all those reports once those players get here. So I have a pretty good idea on how to use those players in different times during the game. Taylor Tremel, the offense has not come around for him much, but the big home run for you yesterday,

defensively, you always knew he was a major league guy. What's it like for him to get a second chance, knowing that his glove work's never been the issue. It's been a consistent bad. That's precluded him from having a longer major league career. Yeah, you know, I'm trying to put him in, you know, against pitching that I know he can handle certain areas of the plate really well. I'm trying to match him up against that type of pitching. And then once he started getting the hard contact, I did yesterday, then you can start building up from there and you start building up confidence.

We know he can control the strike zone. We know he's super strong. We just need to get him to make more constant solid contact. And once you do that, you get the projection that we got from him that you saw last night. And with the injuries we talked about in guys like Taylor Tremel and others stepping up, you have a guy in Victor Keratini who's stepped up in a huge way. What is, I mean, how does this happen to where, you know, guys are going down and people are stepping up. And Karatini, what is it about him that just allows him to thrive in the way he has?

Yeah, and he did it last year. I've got some huge hits for us, especially off the bench. And I feel like the more he plays and more confidence he gets. He really has learned he's swing while works for him, what pitches he needs to stay away from both sides of the plays. He's having some success. And also the job he does behind the plate, fill him in for Christian Walker,

what he's at home with his family, can provide some coverage staff, Of course, Presbyritini can do so many things to help us win games. A couple more minutes here with Joe Espada, getting you ready for game two of the series tonight against the Cleveland Guardians. Look, you took on a Cleveland team that had lost 10 in a row coming in. It's baseball. You can get no hit one night and score 13 the next night. But there are some fans that go, oh, what happened to our squad?

Take us through that because we're not in a dugout. We're not playing the game. that even though teams that record-wise are the worst can play better, teams that aren't long losing streaks, I guess my point is that people are like, well, how could the team be a letdown? I didn't think it was a letdown. I think it was just a force of, you know what,

you had some guys out, you just finish a long road trip, and baseball is not a game where you win 15, 16 in a row on a regular basis. Oh, man, I wish our fans will understand that you're not going to win every game. We wish we can. I hope we can't, but it doesn't work that way. Number two, you're talking about the Cleveland Guardians who are lost 10 teams. You know, let me just remind folks that, you know, this team went to the CS last year against the Yankees.

You know, it is a really good team going through a tough stretch. They have a pretty good lineup. And it happens. Any given night, any given night, pitcher can have a good day. Gators can have a tough, a tough night, and it happens. But one thing that I'll tell our fans is that we are a team that we know how to turn the page. We're going to get ready to compete and give everything we've got tonight and try to even the series back up. All right.

We won't talk to you next week because you'll be on an all-star break. What are you guys going to do? Are you going to stay in town, run out of town for a few days? What's the plan? No, I'm staying in town with the girls and, you know, reset and then get ready for a second half. All right. Please tell Jeremy Pena, he can go, but he can't play. I mean, I just want him bubble-wrapped.

I don't want, I mean, look, I know it's hard for an athlete to get that kind of accolated and not be able to play. But there's some bigger fish to fry here at this point. Yeah, we, you know, our focus is to get Jeremy back on the field. So we, we, all our energy is, it's on that right now. And hopefully we could get him back here pretty soon. And lastly, Jake Meyer, should we be overly concerned at this point? No, I don't, I don't think so. you know, once I see him, he's going to do some running in the outfield,

and hopefully he's able to, you know, be in there today. But I don't think we should be concerned about any of that. Not right now, at least. Skip, thanks for the time. As always, congratulations on the great run. We'll talk to you later on this week. Thank you. That's Joe Spada.

Joining us here on Sports Talk 790.