The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Joe Espada Joins The Show Giving Us His Insight Sitting 3rd In AL West

Episode Date: May 6, 2025

Joe Espada Joins The Show Giving Us His Insight Sitting 3rd In AL West 

So let me get the manager here. Joe, it's Matt and Ross. First of all, good afternoon. Secondly, when you're five minutes late to a segment, we have to talk about our all-time favorite women of all time. So I'm going to pose a question at you. Who is the most gorgeous woman in the world not name your wife right now? Oh, man.

My daughters, my two girls, Viviana and Eliana. They were not my wife. You are such a nice person, seriously. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a diplomatic manager. You've been well trained, Joe. Did AJ get a hold of you? And I don't want to, you know, got to be careful what I, you know, I'm saying my wife.

I'm on the air 20 hours a week, Joe. I'm not careful what I say. I get away with it. So trust me, once in a while you can be human. I'm just saying. Okay, okay. Hey, let's get to Yordon first. Did the hand all of a sudden rear its ugly head Saturday in itself,

or was this something that was kind of building the last handful of days? The last handful of games, and, you know, he's been trying to play through some of that soreness in there. And we just thought that the best way to handle this is just a pause and, you know, pause and just get him to see our doctors and give him a few days. But, you know, the last few days, he's gotten better. But we need this to go away. So he's actually seen doctors this afternoon. He flew to Houston late last night. So we'll get more information once you see the doctors this afternoon in Houston.

Is that just, you know, look, everybody as an athlete has ailments, whether it's a knee, a back or a neck or whatever. Is there something with the grip? Is it a glove? Is it the bat handled? Tell me, is there anything that they could be possibly aggravating them? Because it's not the first time he's had his hand situation. No, yeah. And I think it's just more, you know, once he grips the bat and he's going to release the barrel through the zone, There is, you know, there is like a little pain in the side of his hand, which it just bothers him. You know, once you commit to the pitch, you're going to release the hands. And if the pitch any action, late action on the pitch, and you want to hold you swing, that's where he feels are the most. So it's almost like he's got a predetermined swing the bat and let go.

And some of those cows, you know, causes like bad decisions when he comes to swinging at bat pitches. And we don't want your Don to be in between. We want Yoron to be locked in and have confidence and, you know, swinging the bat whenever he wants to. And if he wants to, you know, out of take and hit with two strikes, he can do that because he feels like he's 100%. And so we're just trying to get him there. In a way, this does offer you some flexibility as far as lineup construction to get other guys at the DH spot. It was Altuve yesterday. Is your plan going to be to mix it up at that spot?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll have D.S.D.H. today. And, you know, it gives me an opportunity to play, you know, the younger outfielder's in the corners with more regulatory. Also, you know, that provides an opportunity to get guys a few more at bats here. But yeah, today, today, D.S will be, will be a D.H. And, you know, hopefully we can, you know, we can get some of these guys more, every, more, you know, more looks and, you know, hopefully get them going. Joe Espada with us here on Sports Talk 790.

I've told you this before, Joe. I am the president of the Jake Myers fan club, and the fan club had a pretty good week. The fan club had a pretty good week. Yeah, he did. And, you know, he's having, he's having some really good at bats. he's a really good spot swinging a really good bat driving the ball I've been very impressed with how hard he's eating the ball

you know the quality of these out bats have been really really good he's putting himself in good haters' counsel he's not missing being patient you know when you're confident you could kind of prolong your bat and your pitch selection gets better and right now he's in a really good spot

and we need to keep him going Let's go back to the Sunday rain situation. Now, help me out. It's up to the ball club before the game starts and then it's up to the umpires after. Is that correct how that works out? Yes, that's how it works. You know, umpires, MLB kind of take over the decision once the game gets past, you know, once the games start. Yeah.

We don't really have much of a say on that, yes. Now look, you needed your bullpen to be better, and I get that. Everybody knows that. But they didn't get any favors. I mean, it was really raining hard. You could clearly tell the. guys were having a difficult time gripping the baseball. Was there, how much can you kind of not necessarily needle the umpire?

But hey, like, hey, this is not fair to my guys out there. Yeah, no, and it sucks. Yeah, I'm with you, you know, and we know, I'm over here screaming, you know, when we're going to get, when we're going to put the tarp on and, and why are we allowing these players to play doing these conditions? You know, why not put the tarp down and weight it out a little bit? but, you know, once it starts raining and once the umpires have, you know, the ball is on their side of the court, it's their decision. And it sucks because, you know, we still have two more chances during that game.

So, you know, when you hear the decision is something that it really sucks for your clothes. So help me out here. I don't even know the answer because you guys, look, you bus to Milwaukee, they had to go to Kansas City. How much rain was there after they eventually put the tarp on there? Could you have eventually played or do you think it was at the end of the day too much rain? You know, Matt, good question. It rained, it rain, you know, even when we got on the bus, it rained all the way to we barely, you know, to we got to Milwaukee. So it rained for a while. They told us that, you know, the forecast was for two plus hours. And, you know, by the time we shower, we got out of the area, we continued to rain. It rained, it ran, you know, it ran all the way until we got almost to be walking.

So, you know, we look at the radar and I understand the call, even. dough, and he not going our favor. But, you know, I get it. I understand as well. Hey, last night, eight singles, one double, a little bit of action in the sixth inning. And again, this is a team that has, last time we talked at least a couple weeks of for you and me, there were some crooked number innings going up. And if you were to judge this season so far, if you were to consistently break down the offense, there hasn't been enough of that. And look, you cannot predict these things. They come. coming bunches, but generally speaking, from a macro perspective on this, Joe, why haven't we

been able to see the two, three-inning run innings on more of a regular basis from your squad? Yeah, so, you know, I mean, I look at it in different ways, right? You know, yes, we all want crooked numbers, but I start with looking at the quality after-out bats, and the quality of our ab-bats have gotten better. You know, we're walking more, we're getting nine, ten singles. It's like, yes, we do want the extra base sets, but I've got to look at it as a whole. And we are doing things better than we did early in the season. Now, the crooked numbers happen once you consistently put those good at bats together in one inning,

that's when you get the big double. And, you know, yesterday in the six inning, we were one swing away, right, from getting back in the game. But as a whole, I feel good. about the direction that we go in individual abats as a team. Now, we got to be the weekend. We be better with many scoring positions, and that kind of stuff? Of course, but now it's more, it's more that it's just more controlling your,

you know, relaxing at the plate with scoring position, not changing your approach because now the abats potentially means more. Now you change your behavior. Now you're trying to do more. And now you have less of a positive result. That's where we try to help our players, listen, you know, same approach, same, same at bat as you previous that bad, just because the basis of the loaders, just because it's running on second and third doesn't mean that you need to try to do more. No, same approach. Try to hit the ball the back, you know, back up the middle, try to, you know, and walk counts also.

You know, that's the message that we try to, you know, try to get our players to understand. To relax and just let the, just let the game come to you. Last question, Skip. Monday, you obviously went with Lance on Sunday. When he walked in the clubhouse on Monday, did you call, text ahead? How you feeling? Because, man, your pitch, he went 87, which was way more than I ever thought he was going to be. A, that's got to be surprised to you.

And B, what was it like having that conversation when you said, how are you feeling, Big Right-Hander? Yeah, yeah, we actually talked to him post-game. And first thing in the morning, I texted him. And he said, Joe, I feel great. He came in my office. I said, Joe, I feel really good. You know, we wouldn't have let them be out there for 80 plus pitches. It wouldn't feel comfortable about, you know, letting him be there.

He showed no signs of, you know, not being in a position to do that. In between innings, so he pitched through trouble. And in the second, he had a quick third. And we felt pretty good, you know, they were following a tone of pitches off. So the quality of his pitches were good, you know. Felt fell behind some right-handed hitters, but

the quality of his pitchers were good. I think he's going to be better his second time around. So we were really excited and happy for him. Since he worked, he stella off to get back to that start in Chicago. Great visit, as always, man. Thank you very much for the time, and we'll see you back in town and end of this week.

All right, Matt. Take care of you guys. All right, take Joe spotted with us here on Sports Talk 790 for our weekly Tuesday visit. always a good conversation.