The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - KD IS A ROCKET! Astros Win The Series 2-1 vs The Angels Dominating The AL West Sitting 45-33

Episode Date: June 23, 2025

KD IS A ROCKET! Astros Win The Series 2-1 vs The Angels Dominating The AL West With A Record of 45-33, Should Altuve Continue Playing 2nd Base?

Ross v. Real's is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. 10-01 in H-town. Good morning. And welcome to a Monday edition of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. This is Sports Talk 790. Welcome to our house. It's our house, Ross. It's not just my house.

Yeah, it's the house that Stevie built. Let's slow that roll down a little bit. I've never bought it that narrative under any circumstance. Okay. I appreciate Stevie Franchise, but who doesn't? That team was like 36 and 46 and 42 and 40. You don't build houses after mid-records, right? The house that Stevie built will house Kevin Durant.

It is held and housed many a star. Dwight Howard, James Hardin, Chris Paul, Joe Chi, Russell Westbrook. You let me sneak that one in without saying anything? That's fine. All right. Wow. What an interesting last 24 hours for sure.

I've already done like two radio shows. I've got two more after the show today. I'll be doing this radio show with you for the next four hours. Wonderful. And we will get to all things. Obviously topic eight today is do the Texans have enough people in the secondary to take care of their past defense? Hmm. I think so, Matt.

one of the best secondaries in football they're going to have. All right. Is the pass rush good enough? No, no. Stop. Stop. Okay. Kevin Duran is a Houston rocket. I want y'all to just sink your teeth into that for a second. Hell yeah.

There you go. Perfect. I would say, and I was asked about, I was on a Phoenix radio show coming to work this morning because obviously they're wigging out. How are they doing? They want to know a lot about Jalen Green. Would you tell them? I said, got better. Little by little every year.

Incremental improvements. Would never be considered a efficient shooter. It's more high volume. On the cusp of being an all-star. But yet to have reached it. And you're going to like him. And the seven-game series against Golden State was not a great resume builder for him. Because six of those seven games, he was...

No. He just didn't show up. He should have leaked out that he had food poisoning the whole time or something. I mean, that was just... It was horrible. Some sort of virus thing. Like an UTI or something. I don't know.

You know. Some cranberry juice. I don't know. I was throwing something out there. It can happen. I could have said flu. But Jonathan, I'm trying to be different.

You know how it is. It can happen. So the bottom line is this. The trade that had been talked about for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks, I knew it had to happen before the draft. So let me give you what's going to happen on Wednesday. I just show you how to screw the NBA is with their calendar

and what you can and cannot do. The Rockets have the number 10 pick in Wednesday's draft. They still do at this point. And they're going to draft somebody. And that person's going to put a rocket's hat on. But we'll never wear a rocket uniform on, well, at least for the foreseeable future. It'll be a Rudy Gay, Shane Badiah situation. But it is kind of weird that they would go through all that.

Yes. That that young man's first opportunity, whoever it may be, to put an NBA hat on, to play for a team in the NBA, worked all of his life. and the hat is meaningless. Yeah, well, maybe he'll feel weird about it, but then he's going to get a giant check. He'll be all right. And he'll recover quickly. Yes.

All right. Do you want to put the poll question? I don't know. Do you want me to do it? What's that? Just Katie thoughts. KD., how we feeling? I think I did a poll question yesterday at SportsRV. And how is, should I retweet it? Let's see, if you want. I said the Kevin Durant trade, good for the Rockets,

bad for the Rockets. And isn't it funny? Didn't I tell you we did the one last week where it was, do you want Kevin Durant? It was like 60% no. and I was like, as soon as Kevin Duran is in Houston Rockett, everybody's going to be like, oh my God, I can't believe this. 82% good trade.

And it's funny because I was asked about this in this Phoenix interview that I did literally like a little half hour ago. Are you happy that he's there or are you happy that you didn't give up the future to get him there? And I said it's kind of both. First of all, you and I were in agreement, regardless of age and injuries and whatnot, he wakes up scoring 25 points a game. Yes. He just does.

He immediately helps your, his, he's an efficient two-point shooter for the most part. Okay as a three-point shooter right? What would you, what would you, is it higher than okay? He's one of the greatest three-point shooters of all time. But I'm talking about 37-year-old. I mean, what has he been the last couple of years? He shot 43% from three last year. Then I love him now.

He's better than okay. He's glorious as compared to what it was around here. Come on now. I mean, the rockets were 28th, 29th, or 30th in three-point shooting last year. Yes. That didn't change. For his career, he's 39%. Last year, 43%, the year before, 41%.

How many attempts is that per game? Six and 5.4. Okay. So it's not a huge part of his game. Attempts? Six a game is pretty good. Attempts or makes? Attempts?

Six attempts isn't crazy a number. That's got to be probably top 20 in basketball, right? A game? Six a game? I don't know. I can go look. Yeah, that's fine. Point being is this. I'm happy that he's here. It's funny that some people have said you gave up too much.

That's not what you didn't give up. When you didn't have to bring Jabari Smith on the table, when you didn't have to bring Tari Issa in the table, when you didn't have to bring up, for that matter, Cam went more into the table. Part of me thinks that Cam can really flourish into this new situation that he's in. Part of me thinks that maybe they still aren't done with their off-season. What more do you think they would do?

I would say they're close to done? Well, it sounds like to me that the Phoenix Houston deal may not be completely done. They have to get a third team maybe? No, there's some like some salary issues, a little bit here, very minutia kind of stuff. Okay. That might involve an expiring contract of some sort or a one-year deal left. Something I don't, that I can't tell you. That'd be more for the NBA nerds that can give you that.

But at its core, the trade was Dylan Brooks and Jalen Green for, you know, one of the top 75 players in the league, who, again, downside of his career, but if the downside of a top 75 player is probably better than 80% of the guys currently in their career. Yeah, I think especially in the case of Kevin Durant, where his game, especially even last year, not predicated on elite athleticism, it's just, I mean, I just want to call him a bucket getter. Like, he's basically a seven-footer who can rise above anybody and shoot over anybody,

and when he does and lets it go, he's one of the greatest shooters of all time. By the way, yeah, 6-3s a game was, I mean, it was less than I thought. I got it, 60th in the league, around guys like... But you know, when you say that, when you say that to me,

he's a smarter player. He's not just jacking up shots to take up jack-up. I mean, the reality is, to me, Kevin Durant kills me at the elbows. Mm-hmm. He just, and I've called a lot of Kevin Durant games,

obviously not wearing a rocket, uniform. That to me is the 15-footer, I mean, just doesn't miss. He's one of the greatest mid-range shooters of all time, if not the greatest. Be him, Chris Paul. I mean, that's where I would start my list. At least, you know, if we're talking about all time, we're talking about recent, of course. All right, so let me give you the phone number today, and we want you guys to join us at 713-212-5-790. That's 7-1-2-5-790. If you want to follow us on Twitter, You can follow us there at SportsMT, at SportsRVee.

And I will retweet. Is you still have time of your poll question or where are you on that? So what are the numbers right now? 82% good trade. 18% said bad. Yes. Okay. And again, the number one thing I'm finding that it's not about losing Jalen per se.

It's what does Kevin Durant have left in the tank? Yes. That's what I don't mean to paint with a broad brush, but that's what I generally feeling is, why are you trading for a 37-year-old who is in the down part? of his NBA career. And Jalen Green, and who's probably not going to play back to backs, you're going to have to load manage, where Jalen Green you're playing for 82 games. And there is value in that.

The Rockets are not a two-seed without Jailen Green being the leading score on that team and playing 82 full games. Correct. Yeah. Well, I mean, if anybody wants to besmirch Jalen Green overall, that's not fair to him. He's had a really good Houston Rockets career. The question is, does he ever be? become a great NBA player. And I think Phoenix will have to find out about that if they keep him.

Boy, there were a lot of conflicting reports yesterday. Some said that they were going to spin him off. And some said, no, the Rockets, the Suns do not want to spin him off. They have five, two guards, it feels like, unless they put Booker and Green together in the same back court, unless Bradley Beale is going on somewhere else either. There may be a buyout situation. But they got Grayson Allen's over there, too. I know Royce O'Neill's not per se, too, but they've got a lot of wing players.

As a buddy mind said, if the Phoenix, I think Suns had a six six six six team or less. They might be the best team in the NBA. If you had like height limits, if it was like weight classes, like in boxing, if they had height limits, they would be really good. Do you think there's leagues like that? You can play in a league at six, six and less. Rockets did it in 2020.

That's true. They're starting Robert Covington at the five. Well, when Chuck Kays was started at the five, that was way back in the day. Yeah. So let us know how you feel about the trade. Good, bad, or indifferent. I can't imagine you being indifferent to it. But there is obviously an energy that is.

isn't with this organization that wasn't here yesterday. And the reality is Miami, the Phoenix Suns won a lot of their young players who are already in uniform. And Miami said, hell no. Rocket said, we'll give you Jalen Green. Dylan Brooks is a guy. Valuable, valuable player for this Rocket team the last two years. Again, hated him when you was wearing somebody else's uniform. You'll probably hate him as a Phoenix son and start booing him again.

But that guy was a huge asset of this basketball team. Yes, he was. Replacable, 100%. And the rocket said, we don't think Jalen Green is going to be a superstar. Yeah, that's the bet they're making. That we need to win now, and as we said the other day,

this is championship or bust, right? I don't think you make this just to win the second round of the series. That's the question that was answered. And that's what we talked about last week. Are the rockets going championship or bust? And this is it, yes. Your Houston Rockets are going championship

or bust? Your thoughts on that. Plus the Astros get two out of three. I don't get a gut-feeling win because they lost the game on Saturday. He got their ass-cake, unfortunately. I'm sorry. But didn't win the series and still have a five-game lead. We have to talk about LSU paying off the umpire in the college world series game yesterday. Yes. Is the title tainted? I say yes. I say that LSU was gifted the... I don't know. I don't say that. We'll get to that. But that coastal Carolina poor coach and that first base coach. Hell, they want to throw the water boy up, but they couldn't. They couldn't find him.

713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. Please join it. 7-13-212-5-7-90. So, Katie, is a rocket. And the lines are full already. Good to see. 10-20, Sports Talk, 790.

Ross. It's early, Matt. Some people have gotten into work. Other people are settling in. Stoneers haven't woken up yet. I will say Gin Z and Because I graduated right over here in Fort Bend, Travis. I have a lot of people not liking the trade.

Like, a lot of people. Why? You guess they're Jalen Green guys? Big Jalen Green fans? He's young and he like bought them out the slump. Like we used to suck. We went out here. Like sentimental. And it's a lot of people.

So he was the girlfriend that was with you when you had no job. And then as soon as you got like a nice apartment and a nice car, then they traded them away. It's like basically you could actually elevate at one level, said that's your first wife. And then you go find, you make a lot of money, and you go find a trophy wife who's younger. Uh-huh. Well, older.

No, you find a younger wife. Well, Kevin Durant's old, though. Yeah, that's true. Well, you go for a cougar, I guess? With a lot of money and experience? And fakes? Just saying, throw it out there. The analogy doesn't work. We'll rework it next segment.

Yeah, we got time to fix that analogy. Yeah, we have four hours. We're here for four hours. We're not going to go anywhere. At least until they pull us off the year. 713-212-5-7-90. Just your gut feeling, your initial thoughts. I'm necessarily a gut feeling, but initial thought.

Yeah, gut reaction. My gut reaction is I'm still kind of stunned. I still can't believe, even saying it out loud, Kevin Duran is a Houston rocket. It's not processing for me. I really, really, really thought San Antonio was going to pull the trigger. I thought they were thinking, all right, we've had back-to-back rookies of the year. We need a veteran guy.

We got a nice core around him. I thought they would have given up. maybe they want to hold on to that second draft pick and Phoenix said we've got to take it from you and they said no Miami apparently had Jaime Hakez and all these different guys their young team Kalil Ware Miami's like no you can't have these guys

sometimes you have to say what are you willing to give up and if you continue to make that same phone call to Phoenix in San Antonio they keep saying no no no you gotta go somebody says well here's what we have five second round picks does crack me up a little it's pretty funny mine's thrown six maybe seven.

Yeah. So basically the Rocket's second day draft party is going to be minimal the next half dozen years. I would think so. Although I did read somebody say, I think it was, it's like four or five of the Thunder rotational players are second round picks. So Sam Presti's been finding some value there. I want to say Cason Wallace is one of those guys. Sure.

Why not? Kendridge Williams seems like a second rounder to me. Oh yeah, there are second round guys littered throughout the league. Was I mean, was I, hey, Isaiah Hartenson even drafted yesterday when he was out of college? I don't know. Rockets legend Isaiah Hardinstein. What about Lou Dort? Did you see his son yesterday?

Who's son? Isaiah Hartinstein's? Yes, falling asleep at the game. That was funny. It was one of the most adorable things I've ever said my life. He wasn't sleeping. He was like in a deep rim. Like, I don't care if 18,000 people are yelling.

I need to get my night night time. And he was laying on dad's lap on his shoulder and just zonked out. You got to respect it. You do. The little man was sleepy. Yeah. Probably the smallest Hartnstein jersey you can find in the sixth grader Oklahoma City area. So we will get to a little bit of the NBA finals from last night.

But again, today is mostly about Duran. It's about Astros winning two out of three, holding a five-game lead. Dana Brown giving us more intel about basically they need a left-handed bat in the worst way, which they obviously took care of yesterday, yesterday, with John Singleton signing a minor league deal. Oh, they took care of today as well with Taylor Tramel. Tramel. Not Tramel.

Tramel. Tramel. I'm trying to say it for myself, too, so I can remind myself. That's fine. Tramel is correct because we interviewed him. Taylor Trammell getting called up. He's a lefty bat. And Shea Wickham sent back down, who they clearly don't think is that great.

She's like, do I get mileage back and forth and 59 between downtown Houston and Sugarland? He should get something. Every time you get option in the major leagues, you should get like some kind of gift basket or something. Well, I just feel terrible that, you know, not only you're going from climate-controlled comfort, chartered planes, nice hotels, good for D.M. To Sugarland where you're going to McMillay. And McMillay is fine. It's fine. But it's different than going.

They got that nice square over there with those restaurants and stuff. Yeah. I mean, it's a nice ballpark, but it's outdoors. It's a little steamy. It's June 23rd. Yeah, that can't be fun at all. But you know what? Shea's accruing service time. He just is. That's true. So, yeah, Taylor, Wickham sent down, Taylor Trammell is sent up, left-handed bat, outfielder. And by the way, should the Astros retire John Singleton's number? I mean, for many years he's been here. Maybe the Space Cowboys can. That's true.

I can slug at the AAA level. Yeah. Actually, the Mets didn't think so much. No, they did. I don't know what he was doing. I can pull it. You want to find his numbers? Eventually.

That's not like a top priority at this point. All right. So the starting five next year, a men and Fred of your guards. Oh, okay. This is an interesting discussion because I saw Adam Wexler arguing with, not arguing, but just talking to people about it. Go ahead. I'm presuming here.

Okay. Grant and Jabari and Alper, right? Is that your starting five wars of a debate point? I'm curious. I believe Wex had Cam Whitmore, which I don't think is going to happen. But it makes sense positionally, but I don't think it makes sense with the way that Udoka feels about Cam Whitmore. Now, the light bulb can turn bright for Cam Whitmore. First of all, two things have to happen.

One, he's got to stay here. So if he's not being moved in another trade or some sort, because again, you don't, you don't, you can also make other trades happen. You can also include things in if it helps out with some salary situations. But number two, he's got to buy into what EMA wants. And I feel like, and again, nobody's come to me and said, Matt, the reason why we're not playing Cam's because he doesn't care about defense. I think if you watch him play, that defense is not a huge priority to him.

And if Eamandok is your head basketball coach, you can jack up all the shots you want. You can wake up and score 21 points a game. But if you're giving up 24, you're not going to play. and the Rockets still with Raffel Stone, just like every of the 30 NBA teams, have analytics about how you do on both ends of the floor. And obviously the numbers on the defensive side and the spacing are so bad

that he just can't correct, it didn't crack the rotation the last couple of years. I got a sneaky one for you. Oh, please. Tar Eason, depending on leg health. You've got ball handlers, you've got shooters. That's sneaky. his three-point shot

I mean it has been up and down in his career but I think overall it's been good I have to look it up but he's been around 35 36% and you need somebody who is a good switchable defender with Kevin Durant out on the court you need as much defense as you could possibly get

and the only thing is with Jabari Smith out there you could I mean potentially run into some matchup issues where you need some guys who can be more win defenders. If it's Shingoon, Durant, and Jabari, that's, you're really tall and you've got a lot of length,

but if the opposing team is only playing one big or going small, that's going to be a tough defensive lineup, and it makes it easier. But Taris not tiny, but he's just, his spacing is a lot better than maybe, what would you say? I mean, Jabari's professional defender? Yeah, yeah, I like Jabari too. But I think Taris would be a little bit better as a wing defense.

Jabari can guard one through five. See, I kind of like... He can hold his own, but it's not like he's going to be locked down. I kind of like tarry off the bench just because it's that offensive rebound, second chance opportunity, a little bit of moxie coming off that bench. I'm in the second group. I'm going to tell you this.

It could be matchup dependent. That's true. Yeah. Honestly, you can't fight it either way. Let's see. And if Cam Wentmore buys in, how about giving... How about Cam Whitmore being a 15 point per?

game off the bench guy. Yeah? If he, yes, if, if he can mature some. Tari shot 36% from three his second year, but then last year he was back down to 34.2%. So career 34.5%. All right, so let me ask you this. How much do you value? Who in your mind is a better score, Ysson or Jabari?

I think, yeah. If guys are going to the bench and you want somebody to come off and score, Tari is more of a like a fast break score but Jabari and a half court maybe a little bit better but with the I mean he's he's got a limited bag as the kids would say

How about this? How about that make this a little early gut feeling for tomorrow? One of those two guys takes a significant leap in scoring next year That'd be huge. Tari you kind of needed to right? Tari averaged 12 points per game in 57 games

that's good that's significant Yeah you wouldn't want much more than that from him 12 points per game and 25 minutes per game That's great for Tari Yeah I think Jabari probably Not forgotten about

But when a men took over that starting spot Kind of was like How's Jabari doing? And then when Jabari would come in There was a little bit of gas to him's game Yeah, I like them both Yeah All right 1030 on Sports Talk 790

If you'd like to chime in Again lines are completely jammed at this point 713 2 1. No they're not they're wide open Matt If you want people to get in There are actually we don't have a single person. That upsets me because I think we do have listeners, right? It does upset Matt.

If you want Matt to feel a little bit better and you want to talk some Rockets Ball, how are you feeling about Kevin Durant being a Houston Rocket, baby? Let's go. This is a super big time move. And don't we want our local teams, whether the Texans, the Astros, or Rockets to make super big time moves? Rockets are swinging for the fences. I like it. I don't mind being busy this time of year.

Me either. And you know what you can come with me. NBA finals, you stay in my room. Where are we going? The finals. Okay. Yeah. I'm a rob cop saving this audio. As God is my witness.

If we're going to the final, Western, you know, Western finals or more. What about my airfare? 2-211-1 is a little tough. We need 2-3-2 back. 2-3-2 makes it a little easier. 2-2-1-1. I hope you enjoy those two games. I don't think I'll send you back for a single game.

1030 on Sports Talk 7-diting. Kind of a blog game 7 last night. A horrific ending to Tyree Taliburton season. Not only does his team lose in a game seven, but he ruptures the Achilles. And that's a year recovery, right? Oh, yeah. He's probably gone all of next year. We talked about this at the end of last week. The calf strain, we brought it up with

Kevin Durant. Somebody saw on Twitter, if you have a cap strain, don't play. Just sit out for weeks. The calf strain and the Achilles? Yeah, they're interconnected, intertwined. So this year it's Lillard, Kyrie. Cairo was ACL. Okay, ACL. Lillard.

Tatum. Tatum. Halliburton. And somebody noticed they all wear the jersey number zero, Matt. Didn't know about these things. What is happening? It happened in threes with the jersey number zero. Conspiracy.

And another thing I noticed on Twitter yesterday, we're done with Stephen A. Smith and Kendrick Perkins yelling. at each other on pre and post game shows. Oh, that's a shame. I've never seen a collective basketball universe so happy for inside the NBA going to ABC, ESPN next year. Because they'll have them the shows. And Kenny and, excuse me, and Ernie Johnson won't let it get out of control like that hot mess of a studio set was yesterday. Yeah, they're still going to be yelling.

At least it's just going to be more entertaining. Yeah. When Shaq and Chuck yell at each other, the analysis isn't getting any better, but at least it's going to be funnier. And you can put them on like ESPNU. Stephen I get to do your show. Yeah. Yeah. It's, and I'm not a big pregame guy,

but I turned it on because I was like, there was nothing else going on. I mean, we saw that Coastal Carolina got screwed and winning the World Series because LSU paid him off. Yes. Astros had been done, and they were up in A187, but I was like, I need something, I'm kind of in the, because I was in a basketball move yesterday.

I want to hear what some of the experts had to say, and all they did was yell, yell, yell, yell. It wasn't, you know, like, There's funny yelling sometimes. I think we do a pretty good job of funny yelling here occasionally. Yeah, no. Sometimes you and I yell at each other, but, you know, it's authentic. We don't do it for four straight hours.

Correct. If it were Stephen A. Kidder Perkins, it would be four straight hours. Right. It's like, we've got to relax some. Yeah. They're always looking to make a moment that will go viral on their social media. And they're trying to do it at all times.

And as you say, it becomes inauthentic. And it's just tired. I'm just tired of it. Yeah. I think America's tired of it. I think I can't, I mean, Kendrick and Perkins to me isn't,

I mean, I don't believe how things he says, but he's got the southern accent and the draw and whatnot. It's, from Beaumont, Texas. It's not the worst thing, but him and Stephen A together, it was just a hot mess.

And it was uninteresting and hard to watch. And Bob Myers, the former GMs up there, Malika Andrews got, you know, bless her soul. I mean, it just could not control it. It was just a mess. But Kendrick Perkins, I mean, I don't know.

I think he's one of the worst analysts in sports, on TV. He flips almost every single thing. When he came out and it was like I would be locking down Yokic and then they play video of rookie Yokic cooking him? I mean, it was ridiculous. Yeah, it was not good. Let's go to some phones and talk to people. We'll start with Aggie Doug at 1039.

congratulations on your SEC team. The LSU Tigers winning. SEC. SEC winning the College World Series, ADD. What do you got today? Oh, Aggies don't cheer for tigers or longhorns, no matter what conference they're in. So that's just always a thing.

I understood. But, guys, so everybody's killing us right now. And Jonathan's right. There's a lot of people that are younger people that are saying the rockets got screwed. We got three starters for KD. you know, y'all, you know, so this is the way I look at it.

It's basically a green for KD swap because you don't know what's going to happen with Dylan Brooks next year. And also, you don't know what's going to happen with this 10th pick. Worst, I mean, best case scenario, Cooper Flagg somehow falls to the 10th pick. And then now all of a sudden it's not a good trait. That's not going to happen. So let's move on from there. Dude, I was just digging in a little bit to what KD is done over his career. the dude averages over 37 minutes.

He averages over 50% from the field. He averages over 40% from 3. Point. He averages over 5 assists a game. He averages over 7 rebounds a game. What is anybody complaining about? I mean, the dude plays 36 minutes a game on average. Hell, if we just get 30 minutes out of him, he's still a superstar for us, correct? He'd be a superstar for anybody.

The reality is, 80, there are going to be some fans of any player that are going to say you got rid of them one year too early or you didn't give them a second chance to rebound. And look, there are moments that Jalen Green was the best player on the basketball court. We just didn't see enough of it, I think, to satisfy the Rockets for putting the ball in his hands and saying, go win us a game. six out of the seven first round series games against Golden State hurt really damages reputation

fairly or not it just did well it should because obviously you know they were double teaming him and any smart player is going to be able to find the open guy Jayla just couldn't find the open guy he was almost in like a panic

whenever they would send two and three guys at him Katie's had this happened to him his whole career so he knows exactly who's open so I think that that's the other thing that the Rockets get is that they get the experience of a Hall of Famer, a guy with the ring. Somebody that, I mean, obviously, Freddie's got a ring too, but I mean, this is somebody that

you know, Amen and Tari Isan, those guys can start to adapt their game around. I mean, because they're the same body type. So you got basically three KDs on the court at one time. And that's Ross, if we're, if we're trying starting lineup, that's exactly who I would go with. I would go with

Van Fleet. I would go with Amen Thompson. I would go with KD at the three, I would go with Tari Easton at the four, and then obviously San Goon. But think about your second team, guys. That's what I'm so excited about. You got Reed Shepherd, you got Cam Whitmore, you got Jabari Smith, you got Stephen Adams, and then whoever you want to throw in there who's playing well at that point. I mean, that is a solid eight, possibly even a damn good nine.

That could be nine. If Cam Whitmore is a part of the mix, it's nine. It's pretty good. I mean, I'm telling you guys, it's going to be stupid for the rocket slides. year, I mean, this year, because of the fact that everybody got so excited about last year, and they're just going to floor it past the last year's team this next year. I have no idea what's going to happen with Katie in the future, but this next year is going to be a damn good ride. Thanks, Adi, for the phone call.

It's nine if it's, if Cam went worse or Marne of the mix, right? Yes. And if, well, Reed, first of all, we're all presuming that Ray Shepherd. I mean, Reed's got to take a size. I mean, Cam and Reed, with those guys not being a part of the. trade, that's a huge side to say, hey, we think you can crack our rotation. And in fact,

in Reed's case, Reed needs to crack this rotation. This team needs better perimeter shooting. I'm concerned about Reed, Jeopard. For sure. I am. I'm going to go incomplete, and I would do that even if I wasn't an announcer for the team. I think one year is way too early to make a decision on that.

Yeah, I'm saying I want to see some more, and I'm concerned. I didn't say his career is over. That would suck if it's a third pick in the NBA draft can't crack a rotation in his second year. Well, they said it was one of the worst drafts in basketball. Oh, yeah, they did. That's true. Under five points per game.

He played 52 games. A lot of that was, of course, garbage time. Yeah, of those, how many meaningful minutes do you probably have? Probably meaningful minutes in 40 of them. Well, and Thompson got meaningful minutes as a rookie. Jalen Green

got meaningful minutes as a rookie. Can I be bullish on Cam and Reed Shepard? If you want to be. You know, I need him to be. Because they've loved him, Ross. They absolutely loved him. He's young. He's only 20 years old. Got a wispy stash.

He'll be 21 tomorrow, actually. Ooh, let's get him a gift. Had him a birthday, Reed? You know, I'll get him a gift. You get him a gift. You get to stay in Houston. I'm not going to get him a gift. He's made like $12 million last year. All right, 713-212-5-790.

1051. a show with Ross. I'm concerned about something, Ross. Mike Greenberg and Stephen A. Smith think their Katie trade is unbelievably good for the Rockets and their instant title contenders. We're screwed. Oh, gosh. Oh, well, out in the first round again. What a buzzkill this is going to be.

Oh, dear. I don't need those guys on our side. Well, they probably both picked the Thunder to win the championship and they did. By the way. For real. What's that? He's with you there.

No, there's not something wrong. I don't respect those guys. But they're supporting the trade. But I don't respect those guys. Like, I cannot wait for Stephen A. Smith to nominate himself to declare his campaign for presidency because he's not going to get worn out. And you think sports fans are bad? Imagine that people who don't know what Stephen A. Smith knows when they starts talking about

politics. No way, no how. Put my name on it. He's not running for president. He's not. No. I just told you that. Okay.

Okay, thank God. Really, really happy about that. All right. Never mind. What was I going to say? I don't know. Yeah, I don't need ever... Who do I trust?

I like Tim Legler from ESPN. Okay. I'm trying to think who else would be out there at NBA minds that I really go, man, I learned something from that guy. All right? It makes a lot of sense. Has Hughie Brown heard the news yet? Did it hit the newspapers? I'm surprised you didn't say.

Did he hear about it when he was in the home? It's getting the Western Union telegram. Stop. Your U.B. Brown hate is just... That's not true. I love U.B. Brown. I'm just wondering if he's heard yet. Gosh, almighty. Just terrible.

All right. 713-212-5-7-9 if you want to get in. We'll get into some Astros chatter come up at the top of the hour. They did win a series against the halos. I took calls on Fridays slash Saturday morning's 10th ending show to 1 o'clock in the morning. Yeah, I heard that. I mean, I wasn't listening. There's no chance you're going to relax.

I know you better than that. I actually turned it on for like two minutes. I was curious if you were getting calls. I probably had at least 10 calls. Now, granted, they had a loss. I had zero. Now, how many day drunks were there? I mean, night drunks.

It wasn't bad, actually. I was actually pretty pleased. That's good. I want to say that wasn't a dumb call in the mix. Yeah, people love Matt Thomas in the Postgame show. You know, they love that I give the effort, unlike others. Yes. Attendance is part of the grade.

It is. Dan on 7-9 at 1054. Dan, good morning. Good morning, Matt. You got the best show out there. I love to hear you every day. Well, that's nice to you to say that. Please include Ross. He's awesome too. Oh, thank you. Well, of course, Ross is included. There you go. What's what you got today? So I don't think that the five second round draft picks is that big of a deal.

I'm not even sure about the, I think it was the 10th, the 10th, pick in this round. I guess my biggest concern for the Rockets, regardless of getting KD or not, was it seems like the, this is the, I've been watching the NBA in the finals for, oh gosh, I don't know, I'm 50. I've been watching it since I was eight or nine years old. I've never seen a finals ever where teams pressed non-stop and had such stifling defense. And I'm curious what your thoughts are because it seems like if Oklahoma City remains in the mix, which there's no reason to guess that they're not. Correct. If we're going to be able to get past that that press, which is so impressive because you just don't see that in pro.

ball. And even if we can, I think a lot of hay is made in the half court. And I just wanted to get your thoughts on, well, really, their defense compared to our offense and then our defense compared to their offense. Yeah, I think, Dan, thank you for the phone call, the nice words. I think the model is Oklahoma City. I think a man, Thompson can do that. I think Jabari Smith, to a less than can do that. It's not like Isaiah Hartnstein is a terrific rim defender.

Chad Holmgren can block a lot of shots, but you can still bully your way past Chen Hong Green. Yeah, you can pick on it, but yeah, even if you get past him, he can recover with his lengthen block shots. I mean, look, they're the best defensive team in basketball, and there

was a lot of a ball pressure. And the reason they do that, first of all, yeah, they do get some turnovers out of it, not a whole lot. Most of it is between things. Last night was terrible. Passing lanes. But also, it's, you spend seven, eight, ten seconds getting past all that, and then it compresses the amount of time you have. And then you're talking about great on-ball switchable defenders

that they have with Oklahoma City. So yeah, it's going to be tough. General Williams can play. Caruso gives it a really strong workman-like efforts. Yeah, they are the dragon that Rafael Stone has to build a team to try and slay, unfortunately. And the problem is, and we've talked about this in Mozium, It's not just them.

It's, I mean, what does Luke and LeBron be like next year? Will the wolves do something? Will the Spurs take the Super League? When's Denver going to go away? Never, as long as Nikolokia, unless he gets an injury in his horse barn. But just to show you, the Rockets are the fourth, what we say? Fourth of light, most likely team to win the NBA championship next year? Yes, according to Vegas.

According to Vegas, yeah, the Thunder are the favorite. nine to four, basically two and a half, yeah, two and a half ish to one. Right. Cleveland and New York are basically eight to one. Rockets are nine to one. Meaning you put down ten bucks, you get 90. So again, not that Vegas determines everything. They don't.

But Vegas has leapfrog the rockets over the Lakers, over the wolves, who have been in the back-to-back Western Finals. You don't know what's going to happen with Dallas, obviously. Leapfrog the Denver Nuggets. And championship odds are greatly influenced by. recency bias as well. So this trade just happened, so they lower the rocket's odds. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. All right, we'll talk to Koso. I didn't talk to Koso in a while. We'll talk to him coming up the top of the hour. We don't name our listeners after side dishes, but Not normally. I mean, if your name is, if your nickname is Sour Cream, come on in and be a part of the

program. Okay. If you're salsa, you're more... Spinach dip. I don't know. Has everybody called themselves spinach dip? Oh, okay. Yeah, well, this one girl we knew in college. Really? How'd you get the nickname? Oh, no. Off air. 713, 212. See, Jonathan, he won't tell us stuff on air. Lame, Ross.

You got to tell us, man. You need a girl, spinach dip. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. And if you want to join us via the X platform, you may do so at SportsMT at SportsRV. 1103 Sports Talk 790. It is the Matt Thomas show at Ross.

We thank you for being a part of our show for the first hour. three more left to go. If you like the first 60 minutes, you're going to love the next 180. Ryan Rossi? All we're going to do is talk about good things. Rockets make a huge trade. The Astros win a series, two games to one over the Anaheimers, and they have a five-game lead going into a much more competitive week with the Phillies and the Chicago Cubs. Ooh, ramping up. In the Kyle Tucker, Reneesuring Stick series. Yeah. Kyle Tucker, we'll see. Yeah. Astros of the day off.

and Phillies will be a three-game series Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and then Kyle Tucker's big to-do Friday for the game in Chicago Cubs. I do like the fact that everybody in baseball plays everybody. I just think it's...

Yeah, it's fun. It makes it more balanced, not completely balanced. Miss playing the Cubs. Yeah. I don't miss Astros having to play at Wrigley. I was always worried someone's going to get hurt on that Ivy out there.

But the Cubs play 181 games there? I know. It just scares me. You've been a game of Wrigley? Yes. Yeah. It's very nice. It's really, really good.

Really, really good. I love the in-neighborhood setting. You're like across, there's bars and there. Rigglyville is the best. It's gotten very commercialized in the last decade, but still holds its neighborhood charm for the most part. Go to coaches. They got the Goose Island brewery down there, right off the red line. You hop off the red line and you're in Rigglyville.

It's so cool. So my, my oldest is 20. just turned 25 last week. And when he was in the fifth grade, he and I did a dad's trip. We went from Minneapolis to Chicago to see the twins by the Cubs. I mean, that was during interleague play, and you didn't play everybody ever year.

Is that a drive or a quick flight? It's a long drive or a quick flight. So we flew there. And we did the subway thing and the whole thing. And soon as we get home, we lived in St. Paul from the airport, which is close. Cam walks in and the house. And Kim says, well, how was your trip? Because, Dad, it was great.

It was great. Yeah. He snitched on you immediately? I was like, son, first of all, why you snitch in number two, one in Rome? Yeah, exactly. When you're in Chicago, I drank, yeah. It's not a great tasting beer. No, it's terrible. I had a... But you have to drink it. Yeah, that's the first thing we did when we got there was we stocked up the fridge at the Airbnb with some old style. Yeah. Again, what would be the text's equivalent? A lone star. Yeah, it's probably, yeah, it's Lone Star. I was drinking Lone Star this weekend, baby. Did you? Yes, I did. Ice cold and refreshing. Is it good? I haven't tried to hit.

It's fine. Yeah. Look, this is the thing, though. Most places in Houston will only charge you three, four bucks for a Lone Star. I'm just saying, you're bawling on a budget. Get you some Lone Star. So it is good.

Oh, okay. So let's go to the five budget beers. You ready? PBR. Okay. Lone Star. Lone Star. Bush Light.

Keystone Light. Yes. What's the fifth one? Did you say natural light? 90 light. Oh, yeah. Oh, God, Nattie Light, it's terrible. Natty Light, I had, yeah.

It's bad. That's Lone Star is the go too cheap. I always say this, and I don't want to present any more comment beyond this. If you're looking to lose weight, drink a six-pack of Nadi Light. Hmm. Okay. It's like an epicac. Yes.

I'm context-cluing that very much so. All right. Astros win. We'll get more to that. John Singleton's now back in the organization. Great. There's that Lieutenant Bell we're looking for. Taylor Tramel,

Career OPS is 633. Only, we should stop talking about Brandon Lowe coming here, unless the race fall off the map. Wow, yes. Probably, yeah. I would agree with that. Why, I mean, again, look, the race are... Well, the rays are always looking to sell.

That's true. But do you think... Wouldn't it be in a horrific vibe of the new ownership group if this new owner is trying to make goodwill and figure out to get a stadium, whether it be in Tampa, Orlando, or in Jacksonville? And all of a sudden, he finds out for the great vine that the general manager the guy is trying to

keep his job trade off brand the lot the trade deadline rays are always looking to sell even when they're contending yeah we got the best record in america league oh we could still have the best record get rid of a decent hitting left-handed bat he has a couple pitching prospects they'll turn into good pitchers all right 713212 57 casso is with us at 1107 casea how the heck are you been hey i'm good man hey I work at U of H, and it's always terrible to give you guys a call,

but I listen to you guys regardless. So I just felt like I had to call in about the KD trade. I think it's a good move, not a great move. A great move would be like getting Janice or Jalen Brown, I guess, but it definitely helps the team. But the most important thing about this trade was they didn't mortgage their future. So I know the guys are still really, really young. KD is going to help them with that.

If the KD era doesn't work out, I still think the rockets are set up for the post-KD era with their young guys. And, you know, they didn't even give up that 27 pick to the sun. So they're in a really good position. So on that aspect, it turns into a really great move. I just hope that the young guys are ready to move and get working with Katie. I just don't know if there's another trade coming, I'm really happy with this roster.

And I don't know if you guys would think about adding another player or what do you guys think about, you know, they still have ammo to work on other trades or even past the KD error. They have plenty of draft capital. Their young players are not, granted, KD is going to put them over the luxury tax. Shangoon is an affordable contract. like if you said in a couple of years that Alperin wasn't taking the necessary steps to become the elite player. But they're still loaded with draft picks. Yes. Through a variety of trades.

So, and that seems to be a huge, isn't it strange? We kind of make fun of the NBA draft Ross, but yet the Phoenix Suns needed five second round picks to make this happen. Yeah, I don't understand if that was like some kind of salary value. Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City's got four first rounders, what, in the next couple of years? Yeah. I mean, they're filthy full of first round picks. Well, they've got to do something. I mean, you can only get 15 on the roster. Well, here's part of it is that some teams need that capital, that draft capital,

okay, so thanking for the call, because you can't acquire for agents. I don't think that's going to be an issue here. I think EMAIDOCA is very well respected around the league. I think the Rockets have shown they're going to go over this first round of the April. Maybe you do it in subsequent years. They've not been afraid, even with Tim and running the team, that go out and get stars. so I don't necessarily think you need as much draft capital. Now, you got rid of your draft capital when Darry was, Darrymore was running things,

and all of a sudden you ran into a trouble. You kept your draft capital and you were able to get it with Jabari and Jalen and Amen Thompson and Reed Shepard and whatnot. So it's kind of a nice, delicate mix right now going on for the rocket. So I would say this. I believe Rafael Stone values the draft more than Darryl Morey ever did. But sometimes you've got a whole lot of those picks in order to go get that veteran player, especially the coach says, hey, I hear this guy wants to go and leave.

Like, Jalen Brown may want to leave any season or so. Things in Boston implode. Maybe Jalen Brown and Emaidoka worked together in Boston, won the Eastern Conference together. Just throwing that out there. That would make a lot of sense. Yeah, it just depends. There's a ton of flexibility moving forward for the Rockets. And you only had to give up the 10th pick, which, again, I don't know who the 10th pick's going to be.

But my guess is, with this team as loaded as it was, even if during the 10th Grant wasn't here. It was going to have a hard time crackling rotation. Yeah. I mean, he gave a Dylan Brooks, who is a really good perimeter defender. Not as good as, I don't think as he was the last couple years, but he was your best three-point shoot. Large effort guy, best three-point shooting

guy, yes. So, I mean, he was an asset, and then Jalen Green was your leading score in a 52-win team. That was something. They didn't give up nothing. You know, I've told you this five million times. I'll tell you five million and one. It has to hurt. Gone of the days of the only teams that don't hurt are

the teams like we're talking about the race. Trading for prospects don't hurt because you don't hear about those guys for two or three years. NBA trades have to hurt a little bit. It's funny to me how differently we'd be viewing this, or especially Rockets fans, if somehow Jalen Green, they were still out in the first round, but he averaged like 20 a game. That 38 point game, if he'd have done that couple more times.

How differently, just from that little sample size, we'd be talking about this trade. Because let's insert Jalen Green, and kick out Fred Van Blitz productivity. Let me ask you, I'll give you a strange one for you. If Fred has a terrible series, and as much as EMA loves Fred, I think it's no head in fact on that.

I think coaches love veteran point guards, loves his moxie, loves the fact that he can be a big-time score when necessary. Is there even a consideration that Fred's contract gets picked up for next year? Or do they say, you know what? That seven-game series kind of told us who Fred was in the playoffs. Yeah, that's an interesting conversation too.

We'll never know because I think Fred's going to work on. My guess is Fred's going to get an extension beyond what is next year. It should be announced, I think. Maybe is it today where they can announce it? I can't remember. Very soon. Yeah, it's really weird. It's so weird how the NBA does it.

Like I said, on Wednesday, I'll be down at the draft party with some members of our 790 team. And the Rockets have the 10th pick. And they're going to trade. They're going to announce a player that's never going to wear a rocket uniform. Well, if you're going to do this, if you want, you know what you got to do either one or the other. Start the league season today or after the game seven or say there's nothing you can do, touch even, you can't make a phone call for 30 days or 24 days, whatever the case would be. But it's just weird that we're going to have this draft and this guy's going to put a Phoenix Sun rocket cap on and never wear it for a team. It is what it is.

They'll be fine. Get over it. And that's what I'm saying. it sounds like to me there could be some minutia involved in this trade that may not be beyond just what was already happened yesterday. Oh, what if there's some kind of, what if the deal falls apart somehow? I don't think he could. I wouldn't even throw that out there in the radio sphere. Okay.

Ross is the king of jinks, and I'm learning that now. What? I agree. Just in general. Tyrese Halliburton. Did you jinx him? I mentioned that calf. I'm sorry.

I laid out a fact that calf strains can turn into Achilles tears. You know what I thought about before the Halliburton injury yesterday? Because you know they had a one point late at halftime. Remember we were talking about opening odds? Mm-hmm. Weren't the Thunder a minus? Six and a half. And I'm talking about the series price.

700 something. It's like 720. And what was Indiana to win it? Like plus four something, four or 50 or something. That would have been a nice ticket to cash. But it wasn't. No. Got to win four.

They only won three. So no matter what you do in terms of giving them odds, the better team typically wins. And man, the Patriots go from this team that could tend to, if Tyrese Halliburton's gone for a year, does that mean we're going to see Obie Topin shooting as much as he did? You know what? Just got a lot better?

The Desmond Bain trade. Oh, Orlando's feeling great right now. Yep. I like Jonathan just jumping in with some sound effects. I like it, too. I got to let you know what it's. Yeah, he likes my point. If you're questioning something, you should definitely say,

oh, no, then he's never going to stop every time you talk. Oh, oh, there's a sound effect right there. Once again, it took an hour 15 to be rude to me. That's fine. Me? Yeah, well, actually, probably short than that. I was going to say, that's fourth of a second. Yeah, it's like a record.

It's one of your better work, sir. 713-212-5-7-90. If you want to chime in, we've got some folks on the line. We'll get to you guys coming back. 7-1-3-2-1-2-7-90. Coming up on the bottom of the hour. we'll have to tell the truth, and we'll have it for you. Rossi Wood got into Maricio DuBond.

Four home runs on the trip. Hercules! I don't know what's going on. Now, each of them cleared the fence by about half a foot. Did they clear the fence? They certainly did. They shut up then. Whoa.

Well, he's sitting there going. He's in a Dubon fan club. Yeah. That's okay. That's okay. Doobie. He got his OPS over 700. Man, we're just nothing but.

It was like 560-ish a few days ago. So good for him. You know who else is raking? Rake Myers. Rake Myers, baby. He's hitting 310 with a 776 OPS. What's up? They doubted the fan club, Matt.

Y'all were telling me it was a June slump for him. I don't. Yeah. That's what Matt said. No, I said we got to avoid the June slump. That's what Hater MT was saying. And we did avoid the June slump. Yes, sir.

No, actually, you had a gut feeling. You showed confidence. Yeah, I did. Thank you. You said his, your gut feeling was, by the end of June, he'd still be over 275. Yeah. You're going to be good on that. Thank you.

How's my Christian Walker gut feeling prediction? What's he bad in today? He's 218. Okay, well, I had a couple hits. I had him at 2.50. I wasn't like I was asking for a lot of progress. You had him at 2.15. You're like, he's going to charge up the leaderboards, folks, at 2.15.

648 OPS. Christian. Let's get him to the All-Star break. And do what? Get him rested. I don't know these days off. Get him to a Cancun? I don't care.

Cozumel, wherever. Des Moines, Iowa, get him out of Houston. Get him clearing his mind. Some will get him on a darkness retreat with Aaron Rogers. Yeah, what do you do? Do you just go away for a few days and turn your phone off? He may and be an All-Star. So, man, I was so excited when he was acquired by this team.

I was excited with the Jose-A-R-R-R-Uruder deal. Jose-A-Bray-U-Sign. I'm like, oh, yeah, this lineup's going to be unstoppable. Christian Walker, we were all excited. Maybe we're just cursed in first base since Yulee Guriel. Well, don't worry. Big John Singleton's back in the fold. Kenny and downtown 1123 of the Matt Thomas show with Ross.

Kenny, good morning to you. Hey, gentlemen. How's it going? Good. Thank you. Hey, last week, you know, I always catch you on the podcast. I'm always like a day behind. So I was able to finish up on Saturday. But last week's shows were classic. You know, everyone's called in about it's cheeks, right?

Yeah, cheeks to hand. hamster, yes. Yeah. Rest in peace, cheeks. Yeah, I kind of had a little, I kind of can relate to that. My nephew, he was at UT at the time. And he drove back in the middle of the night to come back and have like a proper funeral here in Houston for his hamster that, you know, unfortunately passed away. So I know the importance of it.

But last week, you know, Ross, you know, you took it kind of heavy last week. you know, Matt, you know, for 15 years, you know, you've tried to give a name for Ross. And I think last week, you know, you finally coined it. And I'm not going, you know, with, I think it was Frank that I called him the backup, which was pretty funny. But when you said Thirsty RV, that's because he's getting to sliding to people's DMs. That's ridiculous. It's not true. That was awesome.

I mean, that's the one we should go with. I mean, I know it's taken 15 years. No, no, I don't think I can. I'm hanging up on you, Kenny. Kenny, thanks for the phone call. Anything else from you? No, sir. Y'all have a good.

All right, thank you. Yeah, I like thirsty RV, but I don't. The worst. Trevor ruined your name and one phone call. That's fine. I didn't send any DMs, not once. Not this entire weekend. Oh, not to hurry.

to his girlfriend. No, yeah. She follows me on Instagram now. See? I will not send, I will not send our listeners, girlfriends, IG DMs. Never mind. I'm not even talking about this situation. I moved on. No, we've, we've, we've determined that you're, if you're being playful. Playful? Mm-hmm. What is that? That sounds weird.

No, but you would, there was nothing, there was nothing malicious in your DMs. There was nothing in there. When you said, what up, girl? That's not true. Nice outfit. it. When you send the fire emoji back to her. When you send the

picture, the emoji of the face with two hearts, the eyes. With the tongue out? The tongue out. We didn't interpret those anyway. That didn't happen. See, you're fake news, Matt. I don't.

Just kidding. But yeah, it's a good, you know, look, honestly, I have been smiling ever since a train went down. I have been in a ridiculously good mood because, I mean, I have a vested interest in this. I like to call winning games. I mean, it's fine.

No, it's great. Who does? Yeah, I like to do pre and post game shows for teams. You want people to care about it. I want people to care about it. I mean, I've done, I've been on shows. I went on National Radio yesterday, the Mad Dogg on the Sirius X-M channel. Oh, you talked to Mad Dog?

No. Oh. I went on with Phoenix this morning. I'm going on for San Francisco and Austin as soon as shows over with today. Ooh, which Austin outlet? The Craig Way Show. Oh, really? Yeah.

be on Craig Way? Or is it that feeling guy? No, it's Craig. Because he actually texted me. I feel guilty because we've had Craig on numerous times, but he's never, he's never needed to have you back. It's like, you know, what, you still? Are you going to quiz him about mascots of various high schools?

That's not nice. I'm just, you've done that before. I have. And he's hit it every time. He's an encyclopedia of Texas high school sports. Yeah. All right. 1127 on Sports Talk 790.

It is a Matt Toma show with Ross. If you'd like to join us, we got a line open for you at 7. 1712-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. You know what we got time for? To tell the truth. And we'll do that after Ross tells you about synergenics. So I never know why you don't go how.

Ross, actually I do. And in fact, listen to me, both of you, Jonathan and Ross. This takes usually three minutes of a show. We don't will never get back. All right. I'm looking you straight in the eye and listening. I believe three of these things. So only one lie.

I'm lying about. It's easier to tell me how many times you're lying. I'm lying once. Okay. I think I've got this nice knocked out, right? Okay, yes. It's one lie. Three truths. Three truths and a lie. It's like a game. We call it to tell the truth.

Number one. I know there's a lot of excitement in the air for John Singleton signing a minor league contract with the Astros. Oh, goodness. The Astros, in my opinion, need to get a left-handed bat at the deadline. I'm not sure about what Yordon has when he's coming back. It's going to be at least after the All-Star break.

I don't even know what he has. Career's not over. This season might be over. Oh, stop. They need a left-handed bat. You hear me? I didn't stutter. No, I understand that.

Okay. Regardless of whether Yordon is back or not. Well, should be he'll keep him back. But trust me, I ain't hold my breath on when Yoron's back. Number two. Please no more Jose Al-Tuvia at second base. it is becoming more and more difficult to watch him defend that position. And one of the things about this team that is so good in 2025

is the fact their defense has been good. The reality is there's a reason why they thought about moving to the left field for a reason. And I love Jose Altufe. He's my favorite astro, greatest of all time. But I'm done to him playing second base. Number three. With the way that now Kevin Durain is in the West, and the West is super, super loaded.

If I'm Janus, I tell the Milwaukee Bucks, I'm Stanemiliwake. I think Janus should stay with the bucks and not ask for a trade. Because even if you ask for one, doesn't necessarily mean you're going to get traded to a team in the Eastern Conference.

And if you're Milwaukee, why do you want to help another team in the Eastern Conference do something that you think you can do with a healthy Janus? And number four, when the dust settles, ladies and gentlemen, your Houston Astros will win the American League West by at least five games. It will not be an issue the final two weeks of the season.

The Astros will be your AOS champions with a winning margin of at least five games. Which one of the four am I not telling the truth? A. Okay. The Astros need to acquire a left-handed bat. B, please no more, Jose Al-Tube at second base. C. Yon, should stay with the B. The Astros will win the American League by at least a lot.

five games. Which one am I not telling the truth? Hmm. These are actually pretty good. Thank you. I thought I had it in the bag. I mean, the Astros need a left-handed bat. Unless you're big on Taylor Trammell. Or he's big on keeping until Yordon run. Until he gets back. They still need another left-handed bat. I mean, you can only play. Once the D.H. spot is taken up by Yordon, you don't have,

it's more difficult to squeeze keratinie in there. I'm done with Altuva at second base, personally. The Astros said that in the offseason, too. So he could believe that. Okay, so this is one lie. There's no way you don't think Janus is staying. But it makes sense. That's the one I kind of gravitate too as well.

So there's three Astros takes and then Janus and Milwaukee, and then there's a Milwaukee Bucks take. Right. That's the same option. Hey, we're in the summertime. guys help me out here okay robust college football conversation going on

I think I'm a settle for it I'll go with number three two three as well the bucks are really bad right after literally just Tori stuff yeah the east is wide open if somebody could get him in the east

I'll go with that number three final answer final answer I love Jose Altuve and he's playing second base by necessity in large part But it's very difficult to watch him play there. And ultimately, and ultimately, if the Astros can get the first thing on my list, a left-handed bet, maybe that could be an infielder, you never know.

It knocks that out. So I think the Astros need to be done with Jose Al-Tuvian at second base. The Astros need a left-handed bat. The last week of the Astros season, they play the A's and the Angels on the road, where they just finished. They will get fattened up and they will win the division the week before

and they'll have a winning margin of five or more games. So yes, Gianna should stay with the bucks is not what I believe. Yes! Good job, Jonathan. Now, the question is,

and I did bring this up, if you're Milwaukee and you think you can get some parts back, you're going to be getting a large haulback, why would you want to send him to another Eastern team?

You might as well send him west to me. make his life as difficult as possible so the fans in the east, so Milwaukee can't go, look at, look at you did. You helped the team, you helped out a very, not vulnerable east, but perhaps a more wide open east. Get better right away. I wonder, yeah, who are even the, I mean,

I would imagine Milwaukee doesn't want to trade him to the east. But again, it's going to come down to ultimately who gives you the best haul. Draft picks and probably players that are in the league. You can't. Oh, yeah. You have to get proven players to go to Milwaukee. Well, you're going to have to match that contract, too. That's true.

So, yeah, that's, sorry I didn't mean to get three Astros and Randoy Janus on you, but again, a little more slim pickings here. It's all right. We're still flustered from the Kevin Durant trade. I thought you're going to have a KD. I thought you're going to say, I guarantee the Rockets make the West Finals or something like that. Well. And whether you would believe that or not, I don't know.

Yeah, I mean, I selfishly I'd want that for numerous reasons, sports RV. Oh, you know what you could have said? I got one for you. Yeah, go ahead. But I couldn't help you because I have to guess. Right. If the Rockets don't make the finals, the season is a failure. I don't, you know we would believe that because we've talked about championship robust multiple times.

What is the, what is? I would say it's not a failure if they don't make the finals. Western finals? The NBA finals. If Kevin Durant is here for, let's say, three years, he signs a two-year extension. That's three total. They got to make one finals. They got to make one final, right?

That would be a failure, correct? I would say, Yes. The West is so tough. The West is so tough. But that's why you made the Durantio. Absolutely. You try to separate yourself.

And again, not that Las Vegas says everything, but Las Vegas did say you're separated yourself. A little bit at least, right? Mm-hmm. You go to that list. You have that list of the favorites? I can find it. Oklahoma City is the favorite.

Yes. And the next West team is the Rockets. Who's behind the Rockets? Minnesota and the Lakers are 14 to 1 to 1. at all. Rockets are nine to one. That's a pretty significant drop-off, would you not say? So, and again... It's going to be okay, see, I think. Well, can I give you one take on this? And I think this was brought up by somebody on the social media platforms. Okay. I think health is 75% of the game right now.

It's huge. I mean, think about it, would... Now, granted, Boston was down when Tatum got hurt. So maybe that's a bad example. But Halliburton, you could come back from 3-1 with Boston, with two games at home for Boston. Yeah. They could have come back in that series. And tell me that Tyrese Halliburton, if he didn't have the quad injury before that and the Achilles last night, they had just as much. It was an even game. It was a one point Indiana lead at the half.

And he only had played, what, seven minutes? The Cavaliers had three or four players playing on ankle injuries. I think they had three of them missed like game two or three that series. Donovan Mitchell was playing through it in an ankle. injury and then Evan Mobley I think got hurt in that series. But isn't that, don't you think that maybe when you have a season

that goes as long as it does that if you don't have an injury bug, hit your team, you've just been blessed by the NBA gods? We can go through the history. First of all, we can start here in Houston in 2018. Don't do it.

Great example. You can go 2019 Raptors win it all when Kevin Durant ripped his Achilles. You can, I mean, there's some more. Who else? Did the, oh, there was one of the times the Spurs went through after Russell Westbrook got hurt in a series, and I think maybe even Serge Abaka.

Okay, so on paper, the Oklahoma City Thunder are the favorites next year to win another championship. On paper doesn't tell you that a particular player could get hurt. SGA could go down. Jaylon Williams. Hartinstein goes down. Or Lou Dort. Or you're going to tell me, Chad Holmgren's going to be 100% every year in the playoffs. This is a weird thing for a heterosexual to say.

I looked at his legs They're like potato sticks And I got skinny-ass legs I know what skinny-ass legs are So it takes one to know when you're saying Exactly He doesn't He needs to gain some weight

He still gets thrown around Maybe he can't How many times? How many times? Three times He had that Well he missed his entire First season He missed the whole first season

With the Lies-Lé-Fronk injury And then he had the He had the fractured his pelvis this year And he missed significant time But yeah, look, the rest of the team, the Thunder are uniquely positioned to take on that type of injury because he can get hurt as long as he wants. They're so good.

They still had the highest point differential in history. And then as long as he's healthy for the playoffs, the Thunder are good. But do you look at his body? I mean, it's thin, it's thin, it's thin, but it's really real thin. Well, why did everybody cheer when we were at the Rocket's draft party when he went ahead of Jabari Smitjee?

Everybody did. And that's the only reason for health. Not because he couldn't want to skill player because he can't. He can knock down a three. He could block a shot, but he just looks really. I mean, would it be fair to say that he's going to be injury pro? His NBA career?

I think so. Because of his build. I think so for Michterbignano as well. Yama. Okay. We come back. The biggest honk in LSU baseball history joins the show. Oh, man.

And we're going to defend Coastal Carolina because they got screwed by a terrible, terrible LSU graduate behind the home plate last night. I don't want to hear about any of this. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-9. It is absolutely Criminal Ross what I saw in the College World Series. First of all, on Saturday, that number one draft pick, apparently, of the LSU baseball team, threw 195 pitches.

I mean, his arm was literally dragging on the Omaha turf. Kid wanted to go back out there. Last game in an LSU uniform, playing for pride in the title. You wouldn't know much about that, but playing. for a title. Your championship, you do whatever it takes. And then as soon as the game was over with Ross, he went right to the medical center and had Tommy John. Do you imagine

Rockets to play for a title this year? It's game seven. And they go, you know what, Durant, we need to save him his energy for next year. You know, it's a long off season. It was basically child abuse, is what you had in game one. And then game two, you bought the umpires off. You gave him some

Boudan, some cracklins, some Shafalaya, and... Some Gator Butte. some Gator Bites and you say, you get to New Orleans, we'll get you a room in the quarter, whatever you want, and we'll get you some of Louisiana's finest girls with or without teeth. And you ejected the coach in the first inning. Shame on you, LSU. I celebrate you none.

I don't know how LSU got the coach ejected when the coach was the one being an ass. I'm sorry. Oh, here we go. Are there rules? Are there rules? We enforce rules. You know what, unless he called you a racial slur, let him bitch and moan at you. A racial slur.

Yeah. It's the college world series. You are such a minority on this. You cannot argue balls and strikes. They gave them a warning twice, two warnings. Nobody can hear that warning. So get your ass back in the dugout. And he kept doing it.

I don't know what you want them to do. Look, I do agree. They probably should have just let it slide. But again, he was being a cocky ass. He's the same one two weeks ago who was telling people how to pronounce chanta clears correctly. Like, get over yourself. Is it chanta clears? Whatever is.

Chanticleers? No one even knows what. it is. Pick a, pick a, the bears of the lions. Pick a easy basketball. Tagas. You're really original there in Baton Rouge. Oh, hold on now, Houston Coogers. Well, we were the worst one.

We were the first one. We were the first ones. Oh, yeah. Can be named our older Cougar. The coastal Carolina Cougars. I like the alliteration. Yeah, congratulations. Really thrilled for your squad. I'm sad that they have eight. Is it eight championships now? It is eight. A few more than Texas.

has six. Texas still has the most college World Series appearances. Yeah, and when's the last championship? Augie Grino's been dead buried for many years. 2005. Schlosh is bringing the championship His bones have faded to ashes. Shlosh needs, hey, Garino's still Augie's alive, right, or do you know? No, he died recently.

Or Skip Berman still alive, I didn't realize that until he was out there, the former coach, former athletic director at LSU. Anyways. No, it's good. U.S.S. Lose is still the best. In a regional. I'm sure that's going by championships then USC's the best of all time. Yeah, when's their last one been?

They were like 74. 87 was their last World Series. No, they won one in the 90s, but prior to that it was 78. Like their magnificent run was in the 60s and 70s. Still the USC. Got the most championships. Okay. Yeah, and the Cowboys are still the pinnacle of the NFL for their championships.

No, Steelers have six Super Bowls and the Patriot Test Six. That's the Cowboys roster wasn't born yet the last time they won a title. So the narrative out of the broadcast, the best, two weeks in sports. What broadcast? The college world series broadcast. The best two weeks in sports. As soon as Carl Ravage said, I said,

March Madness is saying, hold my beer here on this. Yeah, the first two weeks of March Madness, for sure. They need to get Ravage off those broadcasts, by the way. You can't be calling MLB all year and then come in to call college and you don't even know how to pronounce the kids' names. What names was he mispronouncing? Oh, the Kajunian. Oh, the Kajun one. You know not say

a boo-drow correctly now, babe, but it made me say. So you're telling me every last thing with EUX that he had problems with it. He was just getting everything wrong. I don't understand how we go through all year. And it's Ben McDonald and Tom Hart and all these people calling the games. And then they get to the college world series.

They go, we need Eduardo Perez and Ravitch. Like, why? What was Ben McDonnell? No, Chris Burke was calling former Astrobray. They did the early game. No, Chris Burke, were yesterday. They did. It just, yeah, it's just, it's silly.

So where? Mike Detilié on the broadcast. There was a watch party here in town yesterday? Or did y'all just like makeshift one? The LSU alumni group, yeah. Where do they go? Several hundred people out there. Big screen TV and they're all

like, they're all putting together. They put together a big pot of money and they sent it to the umpire from yesterday's game. Well, what's funny was there was there was one table of coastal fans there. And I'm like, of all the places to go, why would you come here? You know you're just asking for trouble as they were doing $5 jello shots.

Well, did anybody get in any scraps? We got out of there before that happened. So what do the coastal people look like? because I know what y'all look like. Not attractive. Wow. So basically he just stereotyped an entire campus off of four people that he saw at one, Houston availability.

I guess so. That's fine. Local 9 won yesterday. Way closer than it should have been, correct? It was a weird game. It was like the momentum swings. Dubon. Don't bond coming up clutch.

Yeah, it was a little, Delo Harry when Hader gave up the solo shot. That's too strange. He's giving up home around. It's not great. The one before was in a tie game. Remember, that was the whole thing last year. In tie games, haters kind of iffy, but when they got the lead, he's good.

Right. That's fine. I don't think it's a chink in the armor or anything. Brian, I agree, he was outstanding yesterday. So that was good. But, yeah, I think a little lucky to come out of splitting the four-gamer with Oakland and take it two out of three in L.A., you're lucky to kind of come out of that. It's crazy because we've been asking for the Astros' offense to kick it into high gear,

and they had to go to three high, you had three high scoring games on the trip and you only went four and three. Well, here's my problem is, we were playing with House Money for a couple weeks with the Colton Gordon's, the Ryan Gustos, the Brandon Walter. It was bound to hit a, you know,

the clock was going to strike midnight on Cinderella. Like, this can't continue. And they got roughed up. Gusto gave up five. Walter had his worst outing yet. So they left Walter out there Saturday just to just take it for the team on that one. I mean, like, he got six and Gusto got six, so I give them credit.

At least they're stretching out a little bit more. But, yeah, I just, I'm looking at Aragetti. I'm looking at McCullors going, guys, speed this thing up. We need you back. Yeah. Well, you know, my philosophy on injuries from here on out. What's that? When they come back, they come back.

Okay, good. I don't believe any of them. I think McCullors was throwing off a mound, or they say the back. Okay, flagged out. Flew. Flew. Through on Saturday and I think we're supposed to do on Sunday, too, or something like that. Okay.

Another update from Joe Espada tomorrow at 1230. Yes, we will. All right. We need an update and what we're going to do tonight if we're just sitting back enjoying a fine summer evening. Well, it's going to be a nice, beautiful evening here in Houston, Texas. Might I suggest you grab you a Crawford Bach from our friends at Carbock Brewing? And tomorrow back at the ballpark, Diken Park, where you can enjoy an ice cold Crawford Park while you're watching your stroes. Pairs perfectly with Astros baseball.

Whatever you have in there at the ballpark, whether it's peanuts or popcorn or Dollar Dog Night, It is always a good night when you're enjoying the Crawford-Bock from Carbock Brewing. And again, watching the Astros win. We'll be out there tomorrow night. All right, that's Gordy with us every Monday and Friday here on the show. Guess who's in town, Rossi? We welcome a new rocket to our house. Oh, we'll do that next, plus the news at noon, 1158 on Sports Talk 7.8.

The Matt Thomas Show with Ross. Let's welcome Kevin Durant to our house. Sports Army. All right, we got the news at noon to get to. And then at 1220, we're going to play some Brian Winhorse audio that kind of gives us behind the scenes on the trade. And then we've got to make a decision. Is it my goal? Is it my responsibility to get you and Katie to be pals?

No. I don't think he necessarily wants to be pals with media people. It's not that kind of guy. But you can be affable. You both share love of UT. you haven't washed your hand since he shook yours back in the day. Yeah, that's true. I got some sores. I got to clear up. And he's a guy that you have been nonstop in love with, basketball-wise, not figuratively.

He's one of the greatest players of all time. Yeah. Who do I fawn over more than any other athlete on this show? All the years have worked together. I don't think I've got one. Martinado. That's not a hit at all. Jose Altuvae.

I just call him the greatest astro of all time, but he's the worst base one I've ever seen in my entire life. Got picked off again this weekend. Man, that does happen a lot, unfortunately. I don't think we can kid with him about it. I think he would take it so personal. Eric Gordon. You fawn over Eric Gordon. Aaron Gordon of them nuggets?

Eric Gordon. I like EG. That was my card player with it. EG for three. EG for three. All right. Let's get to the news at noon, please. All right. The Brian Winhorse commentary about the trade coming up at 1220. Wonderful.

And I like Brian, right? We can play his audio. I trust him. He's connected. He's good. I would agree with all of this thing that you said. It's shams and it's really a distant third for everybody else, right? Yes.

Yes. Or, I mean, not a distant third, but a sizable distance. Yeah, there's a, yeah. All right. We want to hear from you. Are you happy, elated, sad, indifferent? give up too much. Not a huge fan of 37-year-olds.

Let me know. 713-212-5-7-90. How, listen literally, how are you feeling? Pour your emotions out to us. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. But first, we present the news at noon. Yes, Matt, it is Kevin Durant to the Rock. It's going back to Phoenix.

It will be Jalen Green, Dylan Brooks, the number 10 pick in this year's draft, and five second round picks, including, I believe, the second round pick, the number 59 pick in this year's draft. The trade cannot be formally completed until the new league year begins on July 6th. Kevin Durant, finding out while he was on stage at Fanatics Fest in New York,

when the trade agreement broke. Fans were surprised by the announcement, but Kevin Durant is a Houston rocket. Jalen Green? What do you think happens for the rest of his career? How many all-star appearances? And you can start with zero. He'll make one.

I'm feeling like one or two. If he makes two, that means he's a significantly better player today than he was when he was a Houston Rocket yesterday. He's only 23 years old, Matt. People don't peak at 23. But the NBA, see, been a league. a long time, relatively. Not a long time, but he's been in there long enough. I got him Rossi as about a, what he is. 20 point score. He'll never be known as an efficient score. He's a volume score.

Will he have as bad of a postseason as he had with Golden State? No, I think his postseason future is brighter than what it was as it left against the Warriors. But do I think he's ever going to be an alpha dog for an NBA team. No, he could, I think his max could be the second best player in a basketball team. On a contending team. He could be the best player on a bad team.

Yeah, I mean, the Wizards would love to have him. Exactly, exactly. All right, elsewhere, Matt, we mentioned as well. The Houston Astros, 8 to 7 victory over the Angels to win the series. They are now 45 and 33. That sounds pretty good. The hits keep coming for Jeremy

Pena and Jake Myers. multi-hit game for both of them. They're hitting 326 and 310 respectively. Offense yesterday, the lineup people were worried about. I mean, you had Cam Smith in the cleanup spot. Jake Myers batting second.

By the way, Cam Smith had plenty of games batting in a nine hole. How many teams in baseball have been a nine-hole hitter eventually he'll batting cleanup? Yeah, it's kind of rare, but he has been turning it around and he's been pretty good played overall. He's a good rookie. But I mean, you had Hummel, Dubon,

Giorme. I mean, that was a mismash lineup and they still scored eight runs. Congratulations to them. And the Astros have a five game lead over the Seattle Mariners, the American League West. King Abraeu Hayter, the 789. The latter two each have the same ERA 1.83 on the season. 19 holds for Brian Abraeu. 19 saves for Josh Hayter. Bolt pin continues to shine for the and Astros. Bullpen's been good. Defense's been good. A little bit of leakage on the starting rotation, but that's not surprising be based off the type of arms

that have been going out there every day. Also, in Astros note, they have reinstated Taylor Tramel from the injured list. Shea Whitcomb sent down. Overall in his career, just a 633 OPS for Taylor Trimel, but an outfield left-handed

bat for the Stros. Need one more. I like a legit one. What do you mean? It's Trammell season, baby. He's ready to go. He had a calf injury for a long time, right? I think it was a calf. You know what those caps will do for you. Speaking of which, your NBA champions are the Oklahoma City Thunder. Tyrese Halliburton hasn't been officially confirmed. It is officially confirmed within the last minute.

Oh, okay. Tyrese Halliburton, it is a torn right Achilles tendon. Going to miss a year plus. They couldn't get it done. Thunder win 103 to 91. won their first NBA championship in Oklahoma City. And our good friend Softie from KJR in Seattle does a radio show there. I go on his show.

He comes on with us. Absolutely annihilating the ownership of the Oklahoma City Thunder for that team who still has Seattle. Cionics roots to it wins a championship there. Shea Gildjus Alexander NBA Finals MVP. He is tied Stefan Curry who also has won finals MVP in his career.

There were some people asking that could Caruso have won it? Caruso no. All 11 people that voted for the MVP award chose Shade Gildesell. I thought Jalen Williams was making a case in the middle of the series. By the way,

imagine being Pacer Radio today, Indiana Radio. You lose the championship and your star player is going to be probably out for the foreseeable few years. future. Not necessarily a bright and cheery day in the old Indianapolis metro area. East, man, the West just continues to be a gauntlet, and then the East continues to get weaker now.

But that's what I'm saying, and I know that Janus, that's three of their top five seeds from this playoffs. I don't mean to backtrack off mine to tell the truth, but why wouldn't Yonis stick it out? Because a little bit may be gone for year and everybody, they're getting old? Yeah, Cavs and Knicks are going to be the East. top contenders. But if you're Milwaukee, you cannot train him to an Eastern Conference team, correct? Magic could be sneaky. Could the Detroit Pistons make another leap?

If they stop blaming officials for all their losses. But three of the top five seats, Celtics, Pacers, Bucks suffering major Achilles injuries to star players. All potentially out for the 25, 26 season. They're going to be going. Yeah. Crazy. Is that the news at new? That's your news at noon, Matt.

Thank you very much. Appreciate that. All right. We're going to take a short time out. we got Felipe and Jesse want to get in. If you want to chime in, we got two lines open at 71321-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. We're going to let you hear what Brian Winhorse had to say about behind-the-scenes on a rocket deal.

We'll take more your phone calls. Believe it or not, today is obviously KD. And it is weird. I've spent my entire MBA career, Ross, downgrading Kevin Durant baskets. Oh, Durant for three. one made. And now he's my bestie. Funny how that works. That's how the craziness of the NBA goes. 713-212-5-7-90. 12-21, Sports Talk, 7-9. We'll get to Stephen and Jesse in a matter of moment. So here is Brian

Winhorst. Jonathan, you can play that audio for us. This is this morning on ESPN. Again, I don't like to play a lot of their stuff because they're just a bunch of talking heads, talking on their ass. But Brian Winhorst is connected. And this is, Brian giving you a little bit behind the scenes. It's about two minutes, but it's a good listen to tell you how exactly things came down. And ultimately, the decision was made by Kevin Durant, largely that he was going to be a Houston rocket. For Houston, we don't have a problem. Actually, we're the opposite of a problem. So last summer, the rockets made it a very interesting trade. A trade we've never seen before.

They traded some of the picks that they owned from the Nets back to Brooklyn, which cleared the way for them to tank, which they did this year. They got the eighth pick. And they got picks of the sons. They got three, two, two picks and a swap. And as soon as that happened, people said, I think they're trying to get Kevin Durant. And all year long, the Rockets said, not really. We're not, you know, we love Kevin Durant, but he's in his mid-30s. We got this team in the 20s. We're not really going for him. And some people thought, oh, it's because they really want Devin Booker. I believed, I believed Raphael Stone when he said this. By the way, he said this publicly. He said it privately, too. He said it publicly. Because

I believe that he wanted to have his young team grow. But something happened in the last few weeks. One, you're dead on. Ema Yudoka, who had him in Brooklyn, Rayal Ivy's on the staff. He was his teammate of Texas. He wanted him. He went to ownership and said, and front office and said, can we get Kevin to get him?

The other thing was they couldn't say no to the price. The price was just so low they just couldn't say no. It's meant to say, look what they still have on their roster. So they now have optionality. They can say, let's keep let nonmen. Thompson developed. Let's keep letting Jabari Smith. By the way, Tari Isan, they love Tarry Isan there. He could be the guy who replaces Dillard Brooks as an key defender. So now they can get Kevin Durant, get themselves better, and still have these pieces that they can keep portrayed.

So the Rockets had this happened because Kevin Durant controlled this process. Last winter, the Warriors were ready to trade for him. And he said, I don't want to go there. and they backed off. Last week, the Timberwolves were on the verge of trading for him. I don't want to go there. I don't want to go there. Ed Edwards, and Ed Edwards could have tried to talk him into it. He did not.

He said, this is not my place. K.D., you do what you do. And so the price came down, the rockets moved in. That's how you elevate yourself as a team. You buy low, and you have a great opportunity. Good stuff there for Wendy. Let me, let me, can I just tell you, isn't it nice? and I think all three teams kind of have this right now,

but we didn't all have this 10 years ago. All three of our sports teams in this town I think have a pretty good amount of respect among front offices in sports. I think David Brown's made some savvy moves. Cacero's done a pretty good job overall. Yes. I mean, we got some offensive line issues still need to be discussed. What do you mean? They're all good.

Ariante, Rsiuri. Okay. Now, again, you get two receivers that are great this year and the offense explodes. That's going to further cement Casario. And EMA want something, goes to ownership. General manager is okay. We'll figure out what to do.

I got to keep my core because you know if Rafael had to fight for the core. Yes. General managers fight for first run core players they like. Not out of the ordinary. And it also helped the Kevin Durant's like, no, I don't want to go to Minnesota. And I sure, apparently, he sure is held twice told the goal. own state workers, I don't want to go play for you. I wonder why that is. Do you think? Any reason why?

I don't know. Too old, maybe? Maybe. Maybe. He wants to be surrounded by more young players. But this... That's what San Antonio would be and that's what Miami would be at this point. Not that I need Kevin, Brian Winhorse to make me feel good about this, but it's just listening to that. That's the first time I've organically heard that. I was like, man, we're in good shape. I like winning. I like, I trust.

my general manager, I certainly trust my coach, and I like that with all the teams that I do love. And I got one here. Got a duel here. Yeah. Well, one small correction is the early 2000s Texas basketball historian here. They were not teammates, Royal Ivy and Kevin Durant, but of course they both went to the same school. Now, DJ Augustine, now in the Rockets front office is got tech. There's Texas ties all over the place here.

Hookham Horns. The storied history of Texas basketball 2019. NIT champions. And are you ready for this? Jeff Green and Kevin Durant were on the same Sonic team when they were both drafted. They're still the only two remaining left Sonics, correct?

That is correct. So, yeah, the price getting too low, and that's what I thought too. When we were going through trade proposals, and we talked about one being for Jabari Smith with Jalen Green, and we talked about one with Dylan Brooks. It's basically this exact trade package

without swapping 20, They don't get 29 back, the Rockets. And it was like from some random blog, some Sons fan blog, so kudos to that guy. And I was thinking last week, I was like, I don't think the Sons would accept that trade. But clearly they did because, as Brian Winhorst said, the price got too low. They were running out of candidates. They had no leverage because everybody... And the drafts on Wednesday.

And their grandma knew that they wanted to get rid of them by the draft. So they were in a spot where they didn't have a whole lot of leverage. And this is, it's while they're still swinging for the fences and giving up Jalen Green, it is lower risk long term. Jesse is with us on the Matt Thomas show with Ross at 1226. Jesse, good morning. Good morning. Hey, guys. I was sick when I saw for the trade. I guess I'm probably, that 37 years old that constantly getting hurting concerns about.

I thought we should hold pat with a year under our belt, growing young guys, you know. So, but I guess if you got to roll the dice and you're in a hurry, I guess you can do this. But I personally would have preferred to keep everything the way it was. That's fair. There's going to be a certain segment of the population. Thank you, Jesse, for the phone call. I don't think it's the worst thing to say, I don't want the deal. It's not far from a no-brainer because, again, if you're worried about KD at 37, that's fair.

If you're worried about Achilles' injuries in the NBA, that's fair, because guess what? They're happening all the time. But what Kevin's, how many, how many played last year? I think it was 65 or 60, I don't know, how many games? Yeah. It was like 72 and 65 the last two years or something. I'll pull up the exact numbers. Now, granted, you can drop up.

That doesn't necessarily mean. 75 and 62. Okay. So he is playing in back-to-backs. Oh, he was two years ago. I don't think he will with the Rockets. No, I had to give him. Yeah, I think they're going to, they're bringing him.

for April plus. Just get into the party, get in there. First of all, I think seating to us this year, it didn't make that big of a difference. Look at Indiana. Look at the rockets. Look at the rockets. You were two seed and you lost.

But also, that was a team that made a big trade in February became one of the best teams in basketball. So it's kind of a tough draw for the rockets there. And I get Jesse's point as far as the team could have grown and got better. but the question was, could they have grown and gotten better enough to the point to where you are challenging for the Western supremacy? The issue is, and we do not have the answer today, what did the rockets give Phoenix? Did they give them a 20 point per game guy who shoots about 40% from the floor and about 32% from three? or do they give him a guy in a year or two that shoots 45% from the floor,

37% from three, and shows them in the playoffs. We can't be foolish for anybody to judge this right away. First of all, we've got to judge in both directions. Kevin Durant comes here, plays 26 games, and has hurt for 80% of the time, and Rock can struggle just to get in the playoffs and get bounced early, the trail will be doomed to failure. This is championship robust, or I should say championship, finals are busts. Was that fair?

I think they're trying to go, look, if you get to the, if you get out of the West, you're winning the finals, I think. Unless maybe Cleveland? Unless Cleveland just runs serving, but, you know, run serving. If Orlando and Palo Bencaro can make that next leap with Desmond Bain and that would be a stepiest sleep for pick, yeah, absolutely. I'm telling you, for me, watching this postseason in particular, it's about who's healthy in April. 1230, Sports Talk, 790. We'll take some more phone calls next. 713-212. 5.790. 713. 212.570. All right. 1233. If you are an astro fan, your squad went

4 and 3 on the road trip. I don't know if that's disappointing or it is what it is. Disappointing. Slightly. Slightly. Slightly. But I'm not. Look, you still got a five game lead. It's not a disaster. It's disappointing. No. We'll get some more on the Astros coming up over the next hour. So here's what we got since the postseason. Kyrie Irving, torn left ACL. Damien Lillard, torn left Achilles, Jason Tatum, torn right

Achilles, Tyrese Halliburton, torn right ACL, and Dejante Murray, a torn right Achilles tendon. That's all, oh, that's just season. I don't know if it counts just the posties, but it's this season. I forgot about Dejante Murray. There are, everybody's trying to figure

out what you do on that. I think Colin Coward, a friend of the show, I guess. Suggests the five-game NBA finals. I don't believe that to be the case. All right. That's ridiculous. That's absurd. I don't even know if you shave six games off that regular season, does it make a different?

I mean, 40 minutes. 40 minute games. 40 minute games. 40. He said, never know where no. I'm going to go, never know. I'm going to stay with it. Never, no chance, no how, no way.

Okay. LeBron was pushing for it. pushing for a little bit. Now. In the international, he wanted the international 40 minutes and the international. Goaltending. That's a piece of cake. That is the best.

You can take the bowl. anywhere off the room if you want to. Zero problem with it. I would do it. Because then you can leave the subjective viewpoint of a goaltending out of the way. Exactly. And it would lead to more scoring. Yeah. More putbacks. Yeah. I just can't see.

Oh, man. I don't want to fall on my sword on this one. You can rescind it. It's fine. No, I'm not going to. I think it's too much money. I think there's eight lots minutes to sell a beer in an arena. That's true. And it makes drink. Guess what?

They're going from $18 to $20. These cocktails are getting crazy in arenas and he's in ballparks. I told you, we have a tradition. The Mavericks broadcasters and I, we drink at each other's buildings. And it's always my turn to get it in Houston. And I get that bill and I'm like, damn, I need like a discount card or something. Yeah, you can talk to Tellman about it. Devils are like $40 a pop.

Water bottles are free. And when you ain't flying a plane, you don't worry back, you know, flying back to Dallas. you're okay for a while. Plastic flask under your armpit, free. Would that be rude if I just handed him a six-pack and said, I got you guys got you something ahead of time? Yeah, you should do that, actually. That's crazy. Six-pack a lone star?

Yeah. I'll get him a higher-in beer than that. You know, I'll get him a little four-pack over. I go to Tyler. There you go. A little craft brew. Hey. You haven't brought me, Annie.

I owe you some don't I? Yes, you do. We'll go down. We'll go sit in there and drink and eat barbecue. Let's go. All right. Let's Talia Brewing, if you want to check that out in sugar lamb. Okay, so

how do you, if we're not getting rid of 48 minutes and we're not reducing games because if you could promise me those two elements would help that I would maybe bind it a little bit more, but I can't do that. I can't, yeah, I can't promise you anything. I don't know what the solution is. They're not

going to want to go away from 82 games. These NBA teams, and let's talk about all sports. Forget about basketball. These NBA teams spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a year on sports medicine, millions of dollars in their facilities. We have a traveling group, Ross, six, seven people for a 12, 15-man roster.

I mean, the rockets, and we're not in the minority in this, the rockets and the NBA teams travel huge amount. Massage therapist, sports medicine, tissue specialist, doctors, we have a doctor that travels with us. So, I mean, they're all there to help recuperate, but they're also there for preventative maintenance too. Maybe just the game is in itself is just super, super physical.

And that's just going to be a part of the problem. Everybody's bigger, faster, stronger. Everybody is pushing their bodies to the... We talk about this with pitching injuries. Yeah. And, I mean, and we go through this, it feels like every year with NFL injuries. We were talking about this last year, about the 17 game season and, you know,

people in their fantasy teams. And remember what was the, like, the week 17 or, 18 starting quarterbacks. It was like a crazy list. It was terrible. And it is, I think, in my very unscientific opinion, that everybody's pushing their bodies too hard because that just became the nature of the game.

Back in 1970s, the guys in the offseason, they were selling insurance or just smoking cigs and sitting on a beach. Can I tell you a stupid thing I have? Maybe we're too physically fit. Yes. I think within the span of basically a generation, everyone is pushing their bodies too hard and it's the stress on the muscles and the ligaments

and everybody's pushing to the limit because that's just what it is now and that's how I'm working out with your teammates in the offseason you're working out with your buddies around the league they're all working a year long we go to the Rockets facility right now there's guys putting up shots right now as we speak I guarantee it it's not their fault it's like you know what hey

if you're not working out of the off season you're not a good teammate you're not it's not like to get yourself better like Shaq back in the day who would just show up and play himself into shape. And that's, I think it is the stress that is put on these bodies, even with better and improved rest and recovery, it just feels like

it's happening everywhere. But thinking about this, if Halliburton, I don't know how many games he played during the regular season, but he probably, when he played it almost, he played in every postseason game, right? So, they just finished off about 20 postseason games, 82 games of a regular season. Let's say he played in

70. And that's 90 90 games plus practices. 73 games. 73 plus, you see, basically played about 95 games in seven months. Going hard, and especially the last 25 of them, balls the wall super hard, no letdown, no gimmies. You're playing for a championship.

You're going to go out there and do what you can. You're going to go out there and you're going to play it less than 100%. The game was played in January. He's sitting out for two weeks, but you can't predict injuries and you certainly can't time them properly. either. Yeah. And I just don't know what the solution is, unless they're reducing minutes or games. Well, the easy thing is if you reduce minutes that 40, that guy that plays 40 minutes a game is now playing 32 minutes a game and that less time on the floor would then mean a smaller chance of sustaining injury. But he could suffer the Achilles injury working out and during a practice. Yeah, it could happen at any time.

If it snapped, are the players, yeah, we need some more data and research and all this. And it's also for any kind of change should happen, it's going to take somebody to say something needs to change. And that would either be the owners or the governors, as they call them, an NBA, or the players. So I wonder how the players' union feels about this and the players in general. I'm sure if you talk to 100 players, you're going to get 100 different opinions. Right. But what does the union feel about this? And what do the owners feel about this?

Because even if you shaved, if you went from an 82 to a 7. any eight game schedule. You're just taking... If you're going to shave, you're going to shave 48 to 40. Yeah. I mean, look, like right now, the Oklahoma Sun,

City Thunder, they don't care. I mean... They were healthy all year long, relatively speaking, except for Chad HomeGham. Chad Home got hurt and, I don't know, the occasional whatever injury

from whoever. But it's like somebody's got to win anyways. The easy answer is, Ross, it's just flukeish. Yes. And the more you play, the better chance you have of getting hurt, but you're not going to give up

the opportunity to take your body to the next level in order to win the ring. But it feels, I mean, how many different series that we can point to were affected by injuries? The Steph Curry got hurt and affected that one. Aaron Gordon for the Denver Nuggets got hurt and affected that series. We mentioned the Cleveland Cavaliers. They had three, four guys.

I mean, look, anybody can turn an ankle. But they had like three, four injuries in that one. In the Buck series, the Achilles injury for Dame Lillard, in the Celtics series, series and Achilles injury and then the finals in Achilles injury that started off as a calf injury. There could be even some injury that I missed. Yeah.

Yeah. Oh, Jimmy Butler in the first round series. Yes. He yeah, and he never, he couldn't fully recover because there wasn't this time. Are we just recency bias? Are we just did this happen every year? No, this didn't feel like it did.

We don't have the memories of that. Three Achilles seems like a lot. The three star player Achilles injuries, feels unprecedented. So we've figured it out here at 1242. Let's get athletes a little fat. Let's put a little fat on those bones. What if you could do a moratorium? Like once the league year ends, nobody can work out.

Nobody can work out for six weeks. No working out for six weeks. Take it, take it easy, guys. You cannot get back on the practice court until you gain 15 pounds. Yes. A blubber. Your body mass index has to go. Full blubber, right?

The body fat percentage. I don't know what the solution is. Like I said, fewer games or fewer minutes. But you go from, think about this, you're going from not even winning the, think about it, you don't, you didn't win the championship. And you can't even celebrate because your guys on crutches. He was outside the locker room on crutches. It was sad. And I don't have a dog in the fight.

His family was there. And like, she's like, oh, you know, you got to watch your son on the floor. pounding the floor screaming no. It was heartbreaking. And he knew it exactly when it happened. He heard the pop. 1243. It is the Matt Thomas show at Ross. 713-212-5-7-90.

Hopefully all these things we're talking about donate to Houston, Texas in the next 12 months. Katie is a rocket. The Astros split the win two out of three against Anaheim. There's anything else going on? Coastal Carolina got screwed by a terrible, terrible umpire. and we had a PGA tour golfer who almost won his first event, Ross, until he choked late. We've used the word choked a lot in sports, haven't we not?

The last has been happening. Yeah. I started in early April in San Antonio, but I don't want to bring that up. And so I won't. 1244 on Sports Talk 790. All right, real fast. We'll go back on the phones. Does name Tommy Fleetwood do anything for you?

Tommy Fleetwood. Is that the golfer? That's the golfer. That's a great name. Oh, it's a great name. It's not like he works on a rock band. Tommy Fleetwood. He has a world record. He is 0 for 84 in PGA tour events. Okay. I mean, hey, it's hard to win PGA tour events.

He would agree with you. Keegan Bradley won yesterday. Okay. What was the tournament? Uh, the Travelers Championship. Oh, I love the Travelers. It's one of my, what's the one of my top six? What, what? Nobody cares about the chop five.

I'm just kidding. So, uh, Keegan was three shots behind the final day. Now again, three shot leads are not insurmountable. So clearly he got it. Missed a pair of putts in the six foot range twice over the last five holes to lose the owing. Oh, six footers? Twice? Twice.

A professional? I always alike when professional golfers miss easy shot. You do? Yeah, it makes you feel better about your game, right? Like, okay, this guy does this for a living. He's a multi-millionaire, and he's out here scuffing putts, just like I would. So you weren't, not that you were watching, but you wouldn't have been rooting for a guy who went ill for 83. I'd be rooting for him.

To lose. No, I wouldn't. Are you sure? Yeah, I don't think so. You just said he wanted to miss a couple six-foot puns? No, I just mean golfers in general. Okay. So if Mick Fleet, Mick Fleet, man.

If Tommy Fleetwood... If Tommy Fleetwood is the all-time individual loser, who else is on our list? Who else is on the all-time loser list? First of all, teams that don't win Super Bowls, that's Minnesota and Buffalo. The Bills, yeah. The Bills is the first thing I was going to say

that came to my mind. Bills, individuals. Steelers. I mean, Bills, Vikings. There are, I mean, there are like tennis players who hover around like 20th in the world and they just rack up money and they just never win a tournament. because I'm guessing Fleetwood's made some good money during his life.

But to go... Now, see, it's hard to compare this to a team event because you're never going to be favored in a lot of events per year unless you're like the number one golf in the world. But Rossi, he's over 84. That's not that much. How many events are they doing a year? That's a good question.

I mean, you can do it, 20, 30, 40? No, not that many. You can play all year long if you want to go to, like, the Philippine tour. You could probably play what 15? Yeah, 15 events a year. So let's say he's in that. No, they probably play more than that.

Don't you think? Well, you know what? I'll look at his record. But I just saw that and I was like, poor guy. I mean, granted, he's also making a lot of money. Now, he is 34 years of age. He's from England.

AI from Google says most tour pros play 20 to 30 tournaments a year. Okay, I'm trying to look at his results. Yeah, remember, you... The Masters, he finished tied for 21st, so that's... Yeah. That's still a good chunk of change, right? It's not bad.

It's not bad. I'm trying to think when he first started playing. He first started playing... Looks like 2010. Yeah. He finished tied for 60s. of the check open, tied for 68th to Johnny Walker Championship. He was on a partial tour in 2010.

He started playing full-time in 2011, missed a bunch of cuts. Yeah, you got to also assume he's got to be making all these cuts, too. That's true. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. That's a shame. Mickey Fleetwood. What's it? No, Tommy.

I'm sorry. I wonder if it related. Could be. It's not a common name. Not a lot of flea-old. Fleetwood's running around there. Sounds kind of cool. Yeah, it sounds important.

Like if I was Matt Fleetwood, here's the voice of the Rock. It's Matt Fleetwood. That does sound good. Well, it sounds like a guy you bring in from like, hey, guys, sales are low. We're bringing in the big gun. We're bringing in Tommy Fleetwood.

Oh, he's a motivational speaker. Yeah, exactly. We got a big, we got a special guest coming in to talk to us to get our goals. Tommy Fleetwood. Yeah. He's trying to shill his book for 25 bucks.

Actually, Tommy Fleetwood, you wouldn't want him to come to a sales meeting. He's over 84. He ain't a closer. You wouldn't want him, no. Yankees Keith is with us at 1255. Hi, Yankees, Keith. What's going on?

About Katie's, what in the last season when we played the son? Didn't he go out with an injury? Yes, he did. So is he here now for a physical? I'm sure it's been part of the process. But again, the deal can't be consummated until July the 6th. Yeah, I'm sure he's fine. He was at Fanatics over the weekend and he was walking around just fine.

I thought that makes a difference. But yeah, I don't think it was such a, it was a severe situation that's going to cause him a long-term injury. What's the backup plan if something happens to him? Praying. Right? I love the trade, man. You what? The trade, but I don't feel sorry for Jalen because if he didn't pump out in the playoffs, he may not have got trade.

Yeah, I really believe if. If Jenlin did not have the series that he had, that this would be a non-conversation piece. If Janeline Green scores 28 points a game and falls on his sword and does everything he humanly can, why would the Rockets want to move him? He would have taken that next step. That's crazy.

Right? It's crazy that seven games. Now, look, I mean, six games determine his future. Six bad games, yeah. But it was six games where he just didn't want to break through the wall. It looked like he kind of didn't want to be there. And that's what you play basketball for. The 82 games against Charlotte and Men's,

and Philadelphia, you're cool. But, man, you've got to beat a team that has been your nemesis, and you need to be the hero, and you fought all your way to be the second seat, and you got to play Golden State, and Golden State's old, and Jimmy Butler's hurt. I mean, Jimmy Butler was hurt for a game and a half, and it didn't make a difference. It just didn't. What do you all think would have happened if Jaylen would have performed well? Do you think we still would try to get KD and who would just, who do you think that we would have to give up?

I don't think he's here, I think even if the Rockets make the second round. Let's say they win game seven. I think they beat the Timberwolves. I think they're better than the T-wolves. I think they make the Western finals, and this is a non-star. This is a non-discussion. Isn't that crazy? I think a post isn't going to do that.

We see coaches getting fired. Timitoo got fired in New York for not one in the east. We are in a heavy, thanks, Yankees for the phone call. Rossi, we are in a heavy results. What have you literally? done for me, not lately, but just last week? Yes. What have you done for me last week? It's crazy.

And in the last two weeks of Janeline's rocket's career, Ross, it wasn't like he went one for 11. He didn't even take 11 shots. And I think that bugged the hell out of the rockets. It was bad. And clearly they said, if they think he's blossomed

into a superstar, you do not trade him. But they did. Crazy. So here's what I can't answer. was that Jaylen was the moment too big

and will always be too big or did Golden State put the clamps on him defensively to levels that we didn't even anticipate they could do and that by the time they spent seven games

making sure that Jalen Green wasn't a factor they were tired out from Minnesota do you have an answer for that? If you don't, you don't. I guess I don't.

I don't, I think Jalen Green can be better than what he was. But the question, the question is, and right now will be how much better? We have a four-year sample size of him being four years under league average at three-point, four years under league average at field goal percentage. His last five games. Oh, don't even, don't even do it. Eleven shots. Oh, God.

He took 11 shots in the last five games. that can't be right. Or averaging. No, no, no. 426 would be game two of the series. Game 2 11 shots. Game 3, 8 shots. Game 4, 5, 5, 6, 7.

Game 3, 11 shots, game 4, 8, game 5, 8, game 6, 11. He took 46 in the 5 games. And 8 shots in his last game. In 30 minutes. He may even try to get him, stay out there on the court to get involved. I'm telling you this. series forced the trade. It just did.

Because why would you give up on a guy that was scoring 24 points a game, giving you five or six rebounds, two or three assists for what you hope, what is a 37? I mean, Kevin Durant's 37. That's going to be part of his resume. He's 37 years old. It's undeniable. What's also undeniable is Jalen Green was given plenty of opportunities.

30 minutes. 32 minutes, 28 minutes, 25, played 39 minutes in game 3 and took 11 shots. Given an opportunity and did not take advantage of it. Final hour, the Matt Thomas Show with Ross is next. If you want to join our conversation, 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-9. The Matt Thomas Show with Ross.

105 Sports Talk 7-90. Matt and Ross with you for another 55 minutes. If you enjoyed the show so far, we're going to give you more great entertainment, more insight, more analysis, than any other radio show in the marketplace. Would you agree on that? I don't know how I wouldn't agree.

That's good. That's good. Astros win 8-7 over the Los Angeles Angels. Houston at 45 and 33, 12 above 500. Sounds pretty good to me. On Pace Guy? What's on Pace Guy saying?

91 wins. Wow. Can't believe they're here. Can't believe it after all these injuries. And that means, they're going to win the American League West by five games. It feels like we always do this, but what is the, what if I told you in spring training, Matt? Christian Walker would be terrible.

Yordon would you be missing two months, basically at this point? Oh, and you traded Breggman and you traded, got rid of Breggman and traded Tucker. We knew that. I mean, in spring training, but like Wesnet, we were hopeful about Wesneseke, Ronel Blanco, all down with Tommy John, Spencer Erigetti missing multiple months with this thumb injury, and you are 12 games above 500. You have not seen Yorn on a number. Alvarez play in...

You said May 3rd, was it? May 3rd, so what is that? About 55 days, give or take? Pretty good. And they're winning it home? On the road's a little bit more of a struggle. Oh, by the way, Josh Hayter's earning now is at 1.83, even after giving up the run yesterday. You have a sub-2 ERA with Josh Hater, who had a good season last year for the local

night, but not a great season. Bray's ERA is the exact same as well. They're both at 1.83. How about that? And your favorite... Pitcher Ryan Gusto now is 5 and 3 on the year. Had to work his way through six innings but got there.

Jake Myers. We'll talk about Jake Myers and the fan club, Maddie. We're having a great year. Jake Myers, OPS is now at 776. Beautiful. Just beautiful. Look at all these OPS numbers that have started to really rise. Payne is now

above 800. Myers almost at 800. Altube is at 754. Cam Smith at 739. That will skip Christian Walker. Karatini will worry about later. Hummel's short sample size.

Maricio Dubon's slugging in OPS is at... He's over 700 now. He's over 700 like in a weekend. Of course, he's hit four home runs. Yeah, I mean, that's pretty good weekend. And Luis Gourmet, Luis Gourmet is OPS's three... 300, 301. You said OPS is 301 or his average?

No, his OPS is 301. And we got some work to do, Luis. A little bit. Nine play center. But he got a hit yesterday, scored a run. Okay. Yeah, literally last week, it was 571 OPS for Dubon. In a week, he went from 571 to 717.

That's what four home runs in one week does. That's crazy. I'm telling you, he needs to bet third when the Astros go back out to Sacramento. Right. Hey, get two home runs there. Come on now. Last week of the year, the same exact road trip the Astros just went on. They'll be their final one of the season. They'll go out to Sacramento and to Anaheim to close out the year.

Will you pop in champagne there? Nope, they will not be doing it. They'll be doing it at Dyken Park because they will win the division before that last road trip. If you say so. I feel pretty confident about that. See what the Mariners are doing. And the Astros, again, in the amount of incredulous things I tell you, are three and a half games out of the best record in the American League?

Can't believe it. Still can't believe it. I mean, do you as astro fans understand how shell-shocked we are? This team for what? Seven weeks? Kind of hanging around? 500? Couldn't get over the threshold of 500?

Winning, but they kept winning two out of three. Two out of three. And then dropped two to three. Remember there was a 13 straight games. They were doing win. loss, win, loss, win, loss. And now you're sitting there. You are a half game behind the Yankees who have the second best record.

You're tied in the win column. Astros have one more loss. Now, as I say these things, the wildcard team is Tampa Bay, and they're only two back of you. So, American League Baseball is pretty tough this year. You've got this, even Kansas City who's under 500, and the Rangers are under 500. They're only two out. Minnesota's two. all the three teams are within three games of the wild card.

That's going to potentially hurt at the deadline. Now, there'll be some thinning out over the next month and change. But it feels like to me, and maybe if I went back a year ago at this point, we're in the same situation. But we're talking about Ross now, 12 of the 15 teams in the American League could go on a hot streak and gather a playoff spot. That's why they added the third wild card. And I know some people are mad about it I think it's a genius move I still don't like the dilution of the playoffs

But I do like the overall It's good for the overall health of the league Fewer sellers is good for more Fanbases It also keeps people vested Yes Because fan bases vested keeps teams vested When you have a huge checkout factor

It's been thinking about this If we had an Astros team That did not do well We'd have a sucky summer We've been there And trust me I've done it You've done it We've all done it.

By the way, Matt, did you know the team with the weakest remaining schedule strength in terms of opponents' win percentage is still your Houston Astros? You've mentioned that quite a few times. I'm stunned by that because you have still, you have to go to New York. You still have New York home with you. You still have. You have three with the Tigers. The Tigers. Three with the Dodgers and Phillies.

Now, you do have five with. with the Rockies. That helps. Six with the Rockies and seven with the A's. Seven with the Orioles as well. Now the Rocky, now these are, yeah,

the numbers are really being dragged down by six with the Rockies. That's for sure. Six the Rockies. Oh, I forgot. I didn't see that last one. Six Rocky games. They better go five and one.

Yeah. Again, there's going to be some people like, if you, like losing the A's, it ain't great. But remember, The worst teams in baseball, not including Colorado,

wins 65 times a year. And some of those 65 wins are against good teams. So if you run into a fan, I won't mention names. But if you run into a fan, I can't believe we lost to the A's, it's going to happen. Trying to figure out of you're referencing, I don't know. But still the weakest schedule. You have Seattle is the 19th weakest,

and then the Rangers have the eight. The Rangers have the eighth toughest. Start popping the champagne. interesting. Just saying. You don't want to tweet that out at SportsRV. Are you really? Are you looking to get retweets or just likes? Both. Okay.

How does the Instagram account coming along? At SportsRV. We're at 700 followers, I think. We're doing a followbackathon. Follow me. I'm following you back. At SportsRV. Oh, that's dangerous. Why? That's too much. I'm going to do it for the next 100 people. At SportsRV and Instagram.

You really want to do that? It's fine. I can mute people. So let me just show you how disingenuous that was. What? He's going to follow you in number only, but he's not going to really look at your stuff. I mean, if you're putting a bunch of weird stuff out or something, that's what I'm saying. You know, is it funny that I can, you know, you can tell who's muted you and who's not? How? Because you just know.

Oh, you can? Don't you know, no? No. When you put a, like, I put out a Instagram story yesterday. Uh-huh. And a lot of people that are my friends saw it And a lot of people that I thought were my friends And I look at their stuff

They don't look at my stuff What? Yeah, I know What if they just didn't click on your name for a day? They're, these are IGaholics. They're looking at it every five seconds. I just know how they are. Okay, Matt.

Just saying. It takes two to tango. They're out to get you, Matt. No, to get me, it's just, they need to reciprocate. I can't. Thank you very much. I know what you're saying. I'm staying out of it.

You know, you just say. You said you're going to mute the people that just followed you back. First of all, I was joking. Mm-hmm. When do you joke on this show? What? 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-790.

Are you, as an astro fan, as astonished as we are? I mean, that's a legitimate question. Are you pinching yourself? Because everything to start this year was no Javier, no Bregman, this Cam Smith characters out in right field you set Jose Al-Tube to left field Mm-hmm

Yes And your 12 games about 500 And a five-game League West At almost the halfway point And the weakest Remaining schedule of baseball Time to cool in the game

Celebrate 713-212 570 You put your name on it? Tomorrow Yeah 1130 713212 570 You really got 20 new photos an IG. Oh, people are going to be so disappointed.

I got two. Shout out to Scouts Revenge and J. Kyle Manuel. Those aren't bots, are they? Let's take a look. Man, love you guys. Followed you all back already. I can't guarantee that. At Sports RV on Instagram. I mean, if I think you're all a cool, I will, and I'll give me some time. I can't, I can't make a

right decision just yet. Okay. But if you follow me, you got a great chance being followed back. Great great chance. 100% Such a fraud. Oh, look at you. I'm going to follow you, but I'm going to meet you right back.

That's not true. People just heard you say it. I haven't muted one person yet. I followed them all, though. You'll be doing it by 3 o'clock. That's not true. Okay. Y'all, you'll just, you know,

here's the test in about a month. Put a bunch of photos up, and we'll see if Ross likes your photos. And if he doesn't like him, it means he is not looking at you true. Oh, it's absolutely true. I don't normally like things. You hear that?

I'm on low, like, and, like, and latency likes. digging your hole right now, man. Digging that a hole. What did I do? Just being you. AdSports RV. I appreciate all you. Man, you guys are awesome.

There's another one. Boom. Followed back. Come on. Done. What? At SportsMT. Way more fun, interesting stuff.

Way more. Come on, peeps. Don't let this man. What? What? What are you got? How many you got now? Yeah, you know what?

I'm going to try to pass you one day. I'm at 2,000, no chance. You got like 20,000 more than me on Twitter. I'm at 2644 on Instagram. I'm at like 700. You don't work to do. Dang it. Follow sports empty.

Don't follow. Unfollow sports empty. No, you know what that's rude actually. Even though you were saying that apparently when I was out. Did I recall that Matt? No. He's lying.

You said it. I don't think so. And I heard it from multiple sources. I was very disappointed in you, Matt. Not that I was surprised. Hey, I, oh, we got Gerard Cohen. This is Groh, Golden, maybe let's go 713

212 5 I'll be back Eric not yet Eric on 790 good afternoon to you thanks for holding How you doing? Good, how are you doing? All right, over here in Daytona Beach You're doing what? Big fan. I'm in Daytona Beach

where the Daytona Beach Astros used to play Oh, Daytona Beach, a great great place to hang out. Yeah, so I just wanted to disagree on Altooby. I think we need him a second and not out there in the outfit I think he's making way too many mistakes in the outfield. The teams don't trust his arm.

And we got young guys who want to play out there, so I think he'd be better soon as second. And also, what's probably doing wrestling guys with the vision of opponents? Shouldn't he be resting against the National League teams? No, it makes no difference what league you're playing. And it's about how many games. I mean, think about it, they just finish off a stretch of 13 consecutive games. Guys are going to need days off.

Yeah, I know, but it seems like we need the division opponent games more than we would. Like, the Cubs are Phillies. No, either you're going to win or you're not. Division opponents will not make that big of a difference. And as far as Eric is concerned, Eric, they've been trying to move Jose for a while. I mean, that's the case of moving into the left field for a position they were playing in, because it's not like he can't, he just can't cover the same territory than he once did five or six years ago, and they needed to decide to make a change.

The reason why he's playing is much second base, not because they're, miss him at second basis because Brendan Rogers is hurt and Maricio Dubon is not a guy that should be playing six or seven days in a row. Yeah, all right. Well, have a good day. Thanks for the phone call.

Shout out to Daytona. And you're getting fewer opportunities out there in the outfield. Yeah, he doesn't have a great arm. He doesn't, you know, he's not going to make a bunch of crazy grabs. Well, he's made some good plays out there. But it's about having fewer opportunities, fewer, you know, turning double plays, all that type of stuff.

fewer involvements and that's kind of what they wanted to stay in this career. I'm sorry, former Gold Glover, great all-time Astro. It is what it is. It is what it is. He's in decline in the field. But I think there was some communication saying, hey, we're putting you in left field. It won't not be permanently. It'll be getting some second base.

And I think I'm bringing this up to whether there's McTaggart or Borgessevic. It feels like he's playing a lot more second base than I think they probably wanted him to. Well, I think it's a lot of that's what you're on out. And then kind of figuring things out with the outfield and the fact that Brendan Rogers hasn't, I mean, was bad and then now hurt. Yeah, I can't anticipate Brendan Rogers. They probably said take your time.

Yeah. Oh, that oblique. Yeah, make sure you rest that one. Make sure 110% before you come back. You know, obliques can turn into Achilles injuries just like that. Oh, I don't know about that. The oblique bones connected to the Achilles' bones? Well, I'm just thinking it's a possibility, right?

I don't think so. All right. let's go to our buddy. Gerard at 125 on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Gerard, good afternoon. How are things? Everything going well, man. How are you guys doing? We're doing great. Thanks for asking. All right, man. Good news, man. Rock has got

number one option. That's what they've been looking for. They got a lot of good pieces, a lot of strong pieces, but it was clear as day in the playoff. They didn't have that one guy that could get them a bucket when things got stagnated. Now they got a pure bucket getter and Kevin Durant. I think it was a great pickup. They didn't have to give up a lot of assets. They gave up again, like you guys said,

there were Jaylen Green and the number 10 pick in Dillian, Dillian, Dillian Brooks. They gave up five second round picks, which was, you know, they got, Phoenix did get something out of the deal, but they didn't have to give up too much of their top assets. So it was a win-win. I think for both teams, you know, Phoenix can try to still be somewhat competitive next year. In my opinion, right now,

the number two team in the West. You know, you got to give OKC the credit of winning the championship. They're a team to beat. I think the Rockers are right there, Knicks, as far as top contenders for OKC's Crown and the NBA. So I like to move. I think that's starting to find out being Van Fleet. And Amin Thompson in the back court,

you have Tariq Easton, he'll be at the three, he'll have Durr at the four, and you'll have to goon at the five. I think that's going to probably be the starting lineup with Jabbar Smith, Reed Shepard, Stephen Adams, and Ken Whitmore, and coming off the bench. That'll be your top nine. in the rotation as far as kicking the season off.

You know, they'll better match up with OKC, when OKC goes big, too. You know, OCC, has Hardinstein and my boy, Chet Hoagrum. They'll be able to, you know, put Jabari in there and go big, and they'll still be able to match up with a team like OKC and still go small with teams like maybe go to state and go small with two weeks and in the lineup. So the team has a lot of versatility,

a lot of different lineups that they can go with, depending on the opponent man. I just like, I just like them, was just bringing in a guy that can be a number one option. They had a bunch of guys, in my opinion, that were number two and number three options in Sagoon and Jaylon Green. Now they've got a bona fide number one option. The number two option is the go,

and then we'll see who develops as a number three option, whether it be a Van Fleet again or maybe a Maine Thompson, man. But I like to move by the Rockets, and I think they are a top two team in the Western Conference. I think we should be looking at them as getting to the Western Conference. That should be the goal. At least get to the Western Conference finals next year. If you were able to do that next year, then that would be a success.

Or what you got to think about that. Thank you, Gerard. We'll have a chance to chew on everything you just said and come back and discuss it. Deconstruct it. Peace by piece. 127. If there's anything you want to argue about with what Gerard said, let us know. 713-212-5-790.

Our I-Hard Radio Music Festival. Presented by Capital One is coming back to Las Vegas. September 19th and 20th. streaming live only on Hulu. And you can be there. For a weekend full of superstar performances. Never before seen collaborations. And once in a lifetime artist moments, you'll have to see to believe.

Tickets are on sale now at AXS.com. Get your tickets today at AXS.com. And we'll see you at our 2025 IHeartRadio Music Festival. Presented by Capital One. This report is sponsored by John Moore Services. Call John. Get More Stress Less. Need AC, plumbing, or electrical service? call John Moore. Our technicians give you a full, honest explanation of the problem and an estimate for the work. Free.

Call John, get more. 7302525. Every success you've had began with a great opportunity. Now there's another one. Last eight year, University of Maryland Global Campus awarded over $21 million in scholarships to qualified students, including community college students, service members, veterans, and working adults. Now is the time to move your career forward with an online and accredited skills-based education. Learn more at UMGC.edu. Certified to operate in Virginia by Shelf. Coverage varies by plan. View contracts and exclusions at endurancewarranty.com.

If you have a 2004 or newer vehicle that's out of warranty or about to be, endurance is urgently notifying U.S. drivers about their low-cost vehicle coverage plan designed to save drivers thousands on rising vehicle repair costs. Those who qualify can pick their plan, coverage, and repair. shop, roadside surface, towing, and rental cars included. All covered repairs get paid directly to the repair shop for you. Call now for your free quote. Call 8006908974. 800690-79. Hey, yo, Houston, we're back. Yeah, that's right. The big three is back. Season 8, some in the city. Ice Town! It's ice cubes. It's supposed to be played. Fast-paced and physical. With your favorite big three stars like, Dwight Howard, Lance Stevenson, Michael Beasley, ISO Joe Johnson, Timber Walker, 2024, 24, Big Three, champion Gary Payton.

Yo, Ice Cube, talk to him. Hey, yo, Houston. Come see the whole league. Four games for the price of one. But this time, you got your own home team. Welcome your Houston, Red King. With Gerald Green, Garland Green Johnson, Javier Carter, and coached by Calvin Murphy.

And don't forget the Big Three Commissioner. Hall of Famer Houston legend. Clyde and Clyde Drexler. It's a family affair. So bring the kids. Saturday, August 2nd at the Toyota Center. Get your tickets now. At big3.com slash tickets.

Oh, yay, yay. for takeoff because Academy Sports and Outdoors is your new home for Jordan. Gear up today and take flight. On the court, off the court, and above the court, make your play in the latest head-to-toe Jordan gear for the entire family. Available in store and at academy.com.

Elevated shoes and styles for everyone. Unstoppable value every day. Unleash your greatness with Jordan at Academy Sports and Outdoors. T-A-C-L-A-39-8-1-E I'm a little confused, Mr. Morrow. What's bouncing around your brain, fella? Well, that company says I need a new air conditioner,

and this company says I need a better one than that, and then the other company says I need an air conditioner that's made of gold. Whoa, there, it sounds like you're getting the big squeeze. I just don't know what to do, Mr. M. Mind if one of my amazing technicians takes a look at your AC? You better believe it, but won't I just be back in the same place? You're forgetting what makes amazing Morrow so amazing. We believe if a system can be fixed,

it should be fixed. I should hope so. Now, sometimes it does make sense to upgrade, but we think we have some pretty snazzy fix-it folks who've been around the block a few times. Gee whiz, Mr. M, if my system can be fixed, why would those other companies want me to spend all that money with it? Oh.

If you really do need a new system, we'll talk about one that is energy-efficient and super comfortable. Do you know how to reach us for a second opinion? That's easy. Online at Amazingmoral.com. You've got an app for your music But what about your favorite morning show, sports team Or live local news and weather

Something starts to change Yep, there's an app for all that too IHeartRadio Download the number one app for radio The free IHeartRadio app Hey it's Craig Ackerman 4 3! Yeah! Listen to the home of the rockets on your smart speaker

Just ask Hey Google, play Sports Talk 790 on IHartRadio DJ Kahn! 133 on the Matt Thomas show with Ross Believe it or not today Now we've done Kevin Durant before Are we freshening up Katie or what? So far I've written I think five questions

All of them are new I guess I can borrow from the old Yes my archives go back to 2016 And first I must have been when he signed with the Warriors We had to have been Kevin Durant right believe it or not in 2016 Yeah I have 10 years of

We were doing this show way too long 10 years of archives on these. It's crazy. Jonathan, I'm going to peel the curtain back here. What you have to understand is the great radio stations have stability. That's true. Stations in this country

that are the legacy radio stations don't make programming changes. I got news for you. You're stuck with me for the majority of the rest of your career. Yeah. Great. It's depressing as hell. I'm sorry.

Who's not? I'm going a happy hour at 2.30. Who's coming with me? 230. Why are you waiting 30 minutes? Gotta get there. I gotta get home and then Uber out. Oh, you're really drinking. You know what he's doing? He's drinking to celebrate all the time we've been together.

Here's a couple that I won't use from 2016. Kevin Durant's middle name is Wayne. That's a believe it. That is correct. Kevin Durant suffers from ophidio phobia, which is the fear of snakes. Don't we all believe in that? Believe it or not? Not.

Yeah, I made it up. What's the fear of armadillos? That's what you have. Armadillo phobia. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. They give you lupus. Or no,

lingles. No, it's not lupus. Let's, yeah, leprosy. Lepracy. Lepracy. Yeah. I am petrified of armadillos.

Kevin Durant was nominated for a goal. Golden Raspberry Award for Worstress actor for his performance in the 2012 film Thunderstruck. Believe it. None made that. You know what? I'm going to use that one. That'll be a gimmie. Is it because they roll? I'm actually really... Because they just exist. They don't touch them. They give you leprosite.

I'm not going to touch them. I touch very few things. And don't ever go to South Lano State Park. Thanks for the heads up on that. A chronic infectious disease caused mainly by type of bacteria. Yeah. Same. Okay, you know, this is a very valid fear. That's disgusting. Thank you very much. I appreciate you backing me up.

I'm going to get to this Renatics event they had this past week. Did you say, you rhyming? Did you see who was all there? No. Everybody and their mother. Okay. Kevin Durant was there. And Kevin doesn't mean like going out, I think, in public. Well, they must have made a, he must have cut a nice check.

Tom Brady was there. Eli Manning was there. There were wrestlers there. Oh, they're cutting the check. That's where all the money's going because they're making these cheap-ass. jerseys. I don't think I've ever purchased a Renatix jersey. Have you? I have no. But remember that was the whole thing. Everybody was upset with the baseball last year. Everybody was sweating through their jerseys. The numbering and the lettering was terrible. They're cheap. So they can afford the appearance fees for Tom Brady and Kevin Durant. What do you think the appearance fees? I would probably think they're a quarter of a million dollars apiece.

If you're going to get Kevin, you're going to get Tom Brady to come hang out? What do they do? What was it for a weekend? For a day? Yeah, it's called Fanatics Fest, I think, is what it was. I have no clue what it is. I'd never heard of it. And they're just giving away memorabilia? Like, what is the point? I don't know what it was once you got in.

It was kind of like a showcase. Okay. With all these, with a variety of sports celebrities, wrestling was a huge part of it. I mentioned Brady. Oh, that's it. You got to get them to come out to New York City? Woo!

That's got to be too fitting, right? God, it cost you something, man. But Renatics is killing it, though. Oh, you mean for, oh, hold on, to get in? Well, I mean, I'm talking about just. Anybody that, I mean, what? Oh, 250K. Yeah, for appearance fees.

Joe Burrow was there? Yeah. There was, I mean, celebrities. Rob Grunkowski? Yeah. Keep going. All sports. Tyreek Hill?

Yeah. Micah Parsons? Yes. Oh, they're dropping. Tyree Kill and Cody Rose are hanging out with each other. Millies on Millies. Yeah. Wow.

We should do our radio show from there. We get some people on. Yao Ming was there? I'm just kidding. I made that one up. You ain't y'alleming out of just some rando? I don't know. As far as you didn't say, Catino Mowgli.

Tony Yusaybio was there. He was not. That's right. They couldn't afford him. He would, he'd go for like $20. You better stop. Oh, stop. Astro Clipper.

Put him in the Astro Hall of Fame now. I'm getting an Astro Hall of Fame before he is. Where do I start? I'm going to start a Twitter account. You put Tony Usabio in the Astros Hall of Fame. Astor Clipper. Yes. Might be taken, though.

Have you worn your Yusebio Rockies jersey yet? I have not. When am I going to wear a Tony Usabio Rocky's jersey? I have it. Then frame it then. You're right.

A listener came, it's an autograph. It actually gives two craps about you and brought you the jersey. I know. It was very sweet. And you did nothing ever turn.

You didn't get a buy him a lunch. It was the middle of the day. It was like 11 in the morning. I was going to buy him a drink. We were at Big City Wings. They drink at 11 o'clock there. Do they not? Yeah, well, I think they have some

some beer specials that are like a $1 for a pint from $112 or something. You could have done that. It seems like a bad idea. Didn't do it though. What do I know? What do you know? Nothing.

All right. It was very nice, very sweet. And I mean, I still have it. It's not like I threw it away. You should either wear it or have it framed. And by the way, thanks to all my new followers at SportsRV on Instagram. I'm following everyone back until I get to 500 followed. What's up?

I have no comment. Appreciate y'all. You guys are the goats. It's funny, folks. I'm watching him go to his account right now. He's muting everyone. He's a liar. He's a liar.

My hand's not even on my mouse. I just hit followback on Popagator 22. Appreciate you. Where's your hand? Up in the air. You tell me where my hands are. Why are you bringing up number 11s? Anyways, what happened in Finan Effect?

Look, oh, here we go. Three-day pass was $150. bucks. Now what does it get you just to walk in and see these? Because they were they're huge crowds and they were walking in like wrestling style. Then there was VIP and VIP Platinum. It doesn't have a price on those. That's crazy.

Do you think memorabilia is as popular as it ever was? I think yeah. I'm sorry, finish. No, that's it. Because to me, I have memorabilia in my office, but it was given to me as gifts. I don't ever go after any. But also we're in the bit. We're

very lucky and privileged, you know what I mean? in all the likelihood we're going to get to interview Kevin Durant. That's cool. But it's like... Let me say, if the A team does, we're going to have a serious problem. Really? Yeah. Why?

I don't know. It's easy to say that. Okay. They don't deserve it. No, they do a great job. Those guys work real hard. Why are you... Nothing. Go ahead.

Why you scoffing? No, we're very lucky. We're around athletes and stuff like that. So memorabilia is a little less special, I think, to guys who are lucky like us. It's like I've got about maybe 10. maybe 10 bobbleheads in my office. But they're random. There's no particular, it's like someone gives them to me.

Yeah. I probably could sell them, but I'd realize, it's a nice part of my office, but I don't live to look a, wow, look, like I have a Jalen Green bobblehead in my house right now. Well, you better get rid of that bad boy. Is it worth anything at this point? You're going to, what do you think? I don't know.

You'll find a Jalen Green fan. There's a lot of them on Twitter. By the way, speaking of this, the Rockets are smart for variety of reasons. Kevin Durant's going to wake up scoring 25 for you a game. Yes. Number one. Number two is going to fill your building too. You're going to, I don't think that's part of the reason they did it. Oh, I think it's a silver lining.

It's an indirect benefit, for sure. Yeah, what's the opposite of collateral damage? Collateral goodness. Do you know, did you hear that Toyota Center is going to change the color of their seats? They're going to black seats. A little more of an ambiance, you know, a little more of a, nighttime kind of vibe to it. They should keep them red.

Why? Because when they put the red playoff shirts on there, they look full. I'm just saying, I'm sorry. You can get mad at me. You're getting your credential revoked. I'm serious. You'll be watching from Section 400. Wow, it looks like the crowd's really full. And then you look kind of as you squint and you look at it. Oh, no, wait, though. Those are just red playoff shirts.

Those people are not going to understand. Such hate. Oh, and it's getting. game seven and it's still like the second quarter. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. They're not. If I'm lying, I'm dying on this one. You are lying.

No, I'm not. You know I'm not. They were full. Don't make me check the tape. They got it literally in 4K. 830 games that help a little bit. A little bit. 630 wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be.

It's more about, look, you're going to. It should be better now. There's an indirect. It's going to be a much hotter ticket for sure. All right, let's play Believe it or Not. You want to? It's all things about Kevin Durant.

Yes. And we'll get that in right now at 713-213-212-5-7-9-0. 7-1-3-2-7-9. If you want to play Believe it or not, we'll have it for you coming up next. A reminder of the A-team coming up at 2 o'clock. Tomorrow we'll have Joe Espada at 1230 among our guest plus gut feelings where I will put my name on something tomorrow. Rossi at 1130. That's tomorrow.

but up next, believe it or not, Sports Talk 790. 148, Sports Talk 790. It is a Matt Thomas show with Ross. Tomorrow's program will feature again. Gut Feelings at 1130. Joe's spot at 1230. And NFL Rewind. Is there anything going on in the NFL?

You have to really search for some NFL rewind stuff because... We'll figure that. Everybody's a little rest. Is Antonio Brown still on the loose? On the loose? I don't know. On the lamb? Further proves to you, whoever's running his Twitter account. It's not Antonio Brown, right?

Of course not. Come on now. It's a pretty damn funny account. I haven't muted. Oh, that's a mess. I'm not missing out. No, it's not a miss. I don't need those ridiculous jokes,

and also there was some misinformation put out before, so. That's true. I'm good. That's true. All right, well, we have no Astros game tonight. What are we going to do tonight? I'm taking a nap to a plug. Are you?

All right. That's good. So we'll break down Ross's nap tomorrow. I'm just kidding that two 30. I'm just kidding. Can I give you, I need a 60 second dream evaluation. 60 seconds? Go ahead.

It's like a short time before we put it or not. I'm on a plane going to Hawaii. I get on towards the very end, but I get an upgrade to first class. So I lay the chair back. This is literally last night. Flying at 30, whatever. And we start to get into a bunch of clouds. Uh-oh.

And we decide to descent quickly and we land. in a grassy area along a freeway. We get out of the plane and the cops are waiting for all of us. We have to stand against a curb one by one by one by one by one. And that's how my dream ended. I didn't get a chance to finish the dream because I woke up.

Wow, you didn't even finish the dream. No. It's like you're starting a journey. But you didn't get to complete the journey. Correct. Because I woke up. This is about your time at North Texas. Is it really?

No. Well, help me out then. What could it have been? Have you recently tried to do something or make a life change and you were unsuccessful or didn't keep up with it, Matt? Nope. A dream you never could pursue? Ooh. Yeah, maybe it's about your umpiring career. Ooh. I want to be an umpire. But I was really enjoying first class. Then we landed. I'm surprised you remember your dreams every time you talk about.

When you were going back to Hawaii, were you going to finally pay that bill you walked out on? That's a loaded question for another time. We're short on time. We can't even do it. That's terrible. Five minutes left to go on the show. What should we do? We should play America's fastest growing sports radio game show.

We simply call it B. Believe it or not. And here's how it works. You call 713-213-2-2-790. 2790. Today's edition, believe it or not, is another one of about Kevin Durant. I'll read your statement about Katie. The statement is completely utterly accurate. You'll say this.

Beliebittance. The statement's erroneous. Fulibon can made up. You'll say this. Not. Two, believe it or not, it's in a row when your prize. What are we playing for today? Jonathan. We've got three prizes, of course, a sports talk 790 t-shirt, a pair of tickets see Alice Cooper and Judas Priest Live on October 26. Tickets are now on sale at Ticketmarkster.com. Ticketmaster.com, yes. And, of course, we got a four pack of tickets for pit passes to Monster Jam on October 18. at NRG Stadium. Tickets are on sale now again at Ticketmaster.com.

And then Ticketmaster.com can be your friend. Paul, oh, Paul hung up. Oh, well, sorry, Paul, let's go to you first. Let's talk to John on 790. John, you're ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. Kevin Durant chose to play basketball for the Texas Longhorns.

His second team, he thought, was, he thought I'm about going to play in Kentucky. Believe it or not. Believe it. No, he wanted to go to me. He's thinking about North Carolina. Sorry. George on 790.

You ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it. While at the University of Texas, Kevin Durant's major was undeclared, believe it or not? Believe it. No, it was education major. If you've said it once in a thousand times,

you've got to know what your favorite basketball players play their college and what they want to study while they were in college. Let's go to Joe on 790. Joe, you're ready to play, believe it or not? Yes, man. Growing up, Kevin Durant won AAU National Championships alongside future top. draft pick Michael Beasley. Believe it or not?

Michael Beasley? Yeah. Ooh, you play for us. Believe it? Yes. Believe it. Statement number two for the win. A TV show called Swagger aired for two seasons on Apple TV. It was based on Kevin Durant's life and he served as an executive producer. Believe it or not. Believe it? There you go. This drought is over, my man. Congratulations. Some heavy pauses there from Joe.

I'm suspicious. No, there's no chance. Very suspicious. Chris on 790, what was your favorite part of today's 10-2 radio show? Ross's misconnections, of course. Did you hear that, Ross? Love it. You want me to bring it back? That's a little OG there for you. Kevin Durant has a superstar collection worth over $4 million. It includes luxury brands. Supercar. Supercar, what I say. Superstar. It's a superstar, supercar collection. Worth over $4 billion. It includes luxury. brands such as Ferraris, Bentley's, and more. Believe it or not? Believe it. That's true. Believe it. Statement number two for the button. Kevin Durant has four NBA scoring championships.

Only Michael Jordan and Walt Chamberlain have won more. Believe it or not? Hurry. Believe it. There you go. Two wins. You're taking way too much time here. You're getting a little suspicious in here. A little suspicious.

Let's go to Andy on 790. Andy, ready to play, believe it or not? That's there. Kevin Durant has stated an interview. he is an elite Madden online player but will not reveal his game tag in order to keep his anonymity. Believe it or not? That is correct. Statement number two for the win.

Kevin Durant was nominated for a Golden Raspberry Award for worst actor for his performance in the 2012 film Thundersruck. Believe it or not. That is also correct. Congratulations. We had another winner today. Somebody got the guinea that we mentioned earlier. Yeah, pays to listen to the show. Absolutely.

All right, Ross, go ahead and enjoy a nice nap. Yes. I'll be joining you shortly in napping, not joining you literally. I'll be a little bit. I'll be a big spoon. That got awkward quickly, and you can save it for Friday at 10 o'clock. And you said that not me. Thanks, everybody that joined the show.

We had a good show today. Move quickly. Grad, there's some rocket happiness in our community. Astro happiness or community. Texans happiness in our community. Cougars happiness in our community. community? LSU don't care. Have a great

rest of your day. Up next, it's Wexler, it's Clinton. It's the team on Sports Talk 790.