The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Lance McCullers Goes Crazy For Six Innings, Astros Are Officially #1 In The Al West Winning 7 Out Of Their Last 10 games.

Episode Date: June 4, 2025

Lance McCullers Goes Crazy For Six Innings, Astros Are Officially #1 In The Al West Winning 7 Out Of Their Last 10 Games.

10-01 in H-town. What's happening? Houston? Yes, I still get in the habit of saying what's happening. Lunchtomers, but no, we are 10 to 2 here on Sports Talk 790. It is a Wednesday edition of the Mad Thomas show with Ross without Matt Thomas. He is out today and tomorrow. I didn't know if you heard, Dan. He's on a darkest retreat with Aaron Rogers.

Is he really? Yeah. Is he going to get into Ayahuasca? Yeah, I think he's going to be doing that. Any kind of hallucin, he's going to be licking poison toads, any kind of. hallucinogen you can get into he's going to be doing for the next two days. I was going to say, I mean, there are some people who believe that psychedelics

are therapeutic, and it would be kind of interesting to see Matt get into psychedelics. I think there's a lot of research backing that up with people, with medical people, brain injuries or anything like that. But I didn't know we were going to get into that less than one minute into the show, but here we are, Dan.

Dude, I mean, why else do you bring me here? You know that, you know, me finding a way to either with a movie quote, or in this case right here, getting into Iowa of being able to find a way to get you there. The official hallucinogen expert of Sports Talk 790. Dan Matthews is here for an hour or so. I'm going to be honest.

Is it Adam Clanton today or Adam Wexler today? I don't know. It's one of the Adams. Which one will it be? Check it out. One o'clock. We have that coming up. Chances are.

I mean, Wex is listening right now. So, I mean, he probably would just show up. You still need me? Yeah, I do still need you. Wex. I appreciate you. Then I'm going to fly solo for a little while. We got the news at noon with Jonathan Allen.

The News at Noon with Jonathan Allen. Look at this. I actually told him in time to have something ready. You ready, Jonathan? You know, I can't prepare this morning because I knew you're going to do this. Oh, man. What's your spot start? That's that hilltopper education.

This kid's going places. I appreciate that. You're a WKU guy. My cousin played football at WKU. He ran track there. I know he ran track. I just didn't know that you ran it because I've seen you wear the WAC sweatshirt, WAC,

not with a K at the end. I had the Conference USA and WAC when I was a conference USA when West Kentucky was done there. Okay, so we got an athlete in our midst. But you spot started them once? Like you basically, like he showed up to the ballpark and you just sold him, hey, you're getting the start that day. Yeah, it was basically

11.15. Now, well, Matt was out and I was like, oh, by the way, you're doing the news at noon. He's like, what? Excuse me. I had like 10 seconds to pull up. Yeah, 10 seconds to pull up all the top news headlines of the day. Those will be coming up at noon. It also is Wednesday. That means ain't nobody got time for that slash shut your bum ass up coming up at 1130 and anything you guys want to get to 713-212-5-790 is the phone number 7-13-212-5-790 you can send tweets to at sports RV and you know

what yes shameless plugs for my Instagram that I'm trying to build up all day long at sports RV help a brother out you know what I'm saying Dan influencer initiatives up at I heart media get that if you could help me out with the Instagram at Sports RV I would appreciate it dude anytime I mean, that is something that you, you know, want to be able to have because we all, you know, want to be influencers. Like, what is it? That the number one career hopes that Gen Z kids have now is to be some sort of influencer. Yeah, it used to be everybody wanted to be a sports star. Now everybody wants to be an influencer.

And, well, I'm looking to get to Livy Dunn numbers. Well, hopefully you just don't have people stalking you to your airport, like she said. Which, by the way, when I heard that story where she was like, I'm being stalked by middle-aged men, You probably make more money than God now. Like, how are you not flying private at this point? I don't know if she's making more money than God. It's not like she's a billionaire. I mean, how much is a hair care product, Instagram ad paying you?

I don't know. Well, I mean, there's so many different things that she has out there. That's, I mean, this just didn't. How do you know, Dan? This just didn't young pretty people get paid a lot of money. And she's both of those things. Yeah, that's true. Well, she's an influencer.

Maybe I'm not going to get up to those levels. but her boyfriend, Paul Skeens, took the L last night. How about Paul Skeens? I mean, is it possible to feel bad for a 6-foot-6-250-pound horse, who's one of the generational phenoms of pitching in baseball, who's going to make a half a billion dollars when he gets his next contract? And he's going home to Livy Dunn. Is it possible to feel bad for him?

I did a little bit last night. That's how bad the pirates are. The pirates are so bad. that we're talking about this guy who goes home to Livy Dunn and he's going to make half a billion dollars, and I feel bad for the guy. I wouldn't say I feel bad for him. I mean, there will never be any disparaging comments out of my mouth about a guy that gave me one of the greatest college baseball seasons that I've ever seen in my entire life of being an LSU sports fan. I mean, it was pretty much equivalent to 2019 Joe Burrow.

Like, that's where I hold Paul Skeens, but to say I feel bad, well, well, poor guy. Eight innings pitched, just one earn run given up. It was the solo shot off the bat of Christian Walker, 8Ks 99 pitches, ERA of 205 on the season, and he's four and six. Win-loss records are so ridiculous in baseball. Now, this is going to hurt your heart,

seeing how you are the charter member of the Jake Myers fan club, but one of our listeners... Oh, you're talking about Jake Myers with the extra base hit off of Paul Skeen's? He did have that. Yeah, he did have that in his first app bat, but Rob Friedman, the pitching ninja, Paul Skeens, in a video attached. Disgusting 99-mile-an-hour sinker movement. What are you supposed to do with that?

And our listener, Kurt, responded, I wouldn't suggest asking Jake Myers, because the video is Jake Myers swimming up on top of it. Yeah, but did you see that movement? I saw that last night, too. I follow pitching ninja. It's always good stuff there with pitches with nasty movement and stuff like that. I mean, come on.

Nobody's hitting that thing. That's ridiculous. Dude, I mean, the guy was 90 pitches in, and he dots up 99 on the outside corner. just like, this guy's a horse, man. Like, he's unbelievable. And it might not be right now because he's not even into his first full season

of his major league career. But you talk about conversations next year at this time. I think those trade conversations do start to happen. Really? That early? I mean, they, how many, I wonder how many years in was Juan Soto

before he got traded to the Padres? I think it was his fourth year somewhere around there. It was like 30 fourth. A year with the Padres and then a year with the Yankees and then he hit free agency and got three quarters of a billion dollars. Well, but I mean, it's also too an organization that realized they weren't going anywhere anytime fast, which the pirates

have been doing that for the better part of our entire lifetime outside of the early 90s there with Jimmy Leland. But, I mean, it takes an organization to kind of have some awareness of, hey, you know, we're kind of wasting this guy right now. We could maybe make ourselves

better, but it doesn't seem like the pirates ever are in that rush to be able to reach that conclusion. Pirates. They're sad. They're going to continue to be sad. And you almost feel bad. It's like Paul Skeens, we're giving you all these wonderful gifts and you're going to have this great Hall of Fame career as long as your arm holds up. But the penance you're going to have to pay is going to be drafted by the pirates for the first four to six years of your career.

I think his last five starts, he's given up no more than a single earn run. And he's one and two in those starts. What was it? 19 earned runs. I think I saw Codify Baseball put out early. 19 earned runs given up all year throughout his 13 starts. He's got a losing record.

And they've lost eight of those games. Oh, God, I love those Pittsburgh Pirates. Well, on the other side, it was Lance McCuller's Jr. Since giving up that huge, giving up all those runs, what was it, seven earned runs in a third of an inning against the Cincinnati Reds, he's been nails. And we're also talking about, well, not nails because he wasn't going on quality starts, but at least back-to-back quality starts from him.

And as we talked about with Dana Brown about half an hour ago, we'll bring you guys a little bit of that conversation, sprinkle it in here and there. Much needed. I mean, you were thinking coming into the season that you need Lance McCullors, Jr., all right, yeah, we got the one through five, Lance McCullors Jr., Luis Garcia, then we're talking about six, seven,

we're adept and all that type of stuff. All these injuries, you need him to step up and be your three guy, and he's been that for back-to-back starts. It's been huge. Oh, it's been massive for you and, you know, I just saw the number of what he has looked like in his last few starts since that Reds blow up a 1.88 ERA in 24 of his last innings. Yeah, that's incredibly good. And especially, too, with what you mentioned about you need him to be your number three right now because you don't have a choice, number one, but number two, I mean, you lost a good one in Renel Blanco. And you're trying to find somebody to be able to at least match his production.

and I would venture to say the last few times that he's been out there. Yeah, he had that third of an inning, but four innings, scoreless ball against the Rangers. Two runs given up against Seattle in four and a third, and then the last two quality outings. He's been better than what you could have expected back from him when he hadn't pitched in over two years. Yeah, it's crazy where we are.

But there was a host who boldly predicted that Lance McCuller's Jr. would be an important contributor to the 2025 season. remember who it was. They're very handsome and talented. That's the only thing I remember. But anyways, uh, he's got the best hair on staff. If I, some, some have said that. Not everybody's saying that, but some have said that. Uh, so if it does happen, I mean, it's, it's crazy the journey that he's been through and not even, even for the, the death threat stuff and all the hate he gets on social media and all that, but just for him as a person, I mean, think of the, the mental fortitude it takes to have the,

and the injuries that he has to keep on going out there, to keep on pushing through, and now seeing it paying dividends with these couple of good starts. I'm just really happy for Lance McCullors Jr. the person, let alone for the fact that he needs to step up on the field for what they need if they want to win the American League West Championship. It's a significant added bonus. I mean, for what I just laid out for one of the guys that you just lost recently, but for all of the guys that you have out. And he hadn't pitched in over two years. So to expect this type of performance, I don't care if it's the pirate. I don't care if it's the athletics. I don't care if it's the Savannah bananas.

But to be able to go out there and do what he's done these last couple of times, well, at least the acrobatics are fun. But to do what he's done these last couple of starts and to hope that you're going to get that because here's the other shoe is, can he make it all the way through? I mean, that's a legitimate question.

No, that's a legitimate question. And unfortunately, that is going to be something that is going to be attached. I mean, it's implied. It's inherent. Anytime he goes out there, It's going to be kind of hanging. How much of it is in the back of your head?

How much of it is in the front of your mind is up to you, the person? I try to put it further back because it's something that we can't control anyway, so why spend time worrying about it? But that is something that will hang over him. Really, I mean, unless he goes, you know, back-to-back years of 35 starts and then maybe even then some, that's going to be the question mark and something that's going to be at least somewhat in the back of your mind

every time he goes out there. Well, I mean, there's a reason why I kept throwing out bullpen with him. And I mean, he even was asked about that during spring training. He gave his thoughts again. He gave a very diplomatic, no, those guys work really hard. It's not easy. And that's not even the issue. I mean, I think it's the issue with him. It's, well, you've proven that you can't get through an entire season as a starting pitcher. So when does that thought creep into your mind of maybe I do need to go that route? Because I do have good stuff and I could get guys out. Well, usually those guys are in the bullpen. As we know, he has a bit of an ego on him. He wants to be a start.

and as a practical matter, if you're team building, you don't want to pay $18 million a year to a reliever unless it's one of the best relievers in baseball. And as him on the mound, as we've seen already, even in these starts, Lance McCullors Jr. Baseball is high pitch counts, running up a lot of walks, getting a lot of danger, but also working out of that danger.

And that's not really what you want out of a reliever. You want a guy to come in and throw strikes, come in and unclean innings with a couple of guys on. like Lance McCullors Jr. can't really do that. He's got to work out of his own jam. So him is a starter. Barring health, of course, if we always talked about, that's the big, you know, that's always the big cloud hanging over it.

He's best suited to be a starter. And he's, you know, already gotten over 100 pitches, 96 pitches or something like that. Yeah, he was 96 last night against the Pirates. Yeah, he went 102 to the last time out. And, I mean, the walks have gone down, at least his last few times out. He had one against O, against the A's. so, you know, force a habit. One last night against the pirates.

Okremento. Yeah, Okremento. There you go. I liked it. I liked what Matt said. It almost sounds like like a spreadable cheese for a cracker. The guy that usually sits in here with you. I'm not familiar. Yeah.

Some people call him SportsMT. You know, besides the point. But, I mean, he hits a batter last night with a backfoot breaking ball. But, I mean, those have gone down, too. So, I mean, if you're able to get him, in and around the zone and you can get some of those swings and misses well then you get performances like you've gotten the last

couple of times out 19 strikeouts in the last 12 innings that he's been on the mound. Yeah and I also will say I mentioned this earlier and I need to stop doing this. I keep thinking of the A's as a bad offense. They're not a bad offense this year. They've actually been pretty good. They're well ahead of the Astros.

Right now team OPS 8th. Now, of course, the pirates are 27th out of 30, so that was a bad offense. but carving up the Oakland A, excuse me, the Sacramento A, the way that he did, it's not anything to sneeze at. We're getting 12Ks in that game, too. Well, I mean, it's a game that he had to grind through, too. I mean, he gives up a couple of runs in that one inning,

and then he gives up the home run to Wilson there towards the end of the start. But, I mean, that's what you were getting again, you know, bringing up Rinal Blanco, because the comparisons are so there. Rinell Blanco, his starts were five, maybe you get six, Every once in a while you'll get that, you know, gym of an outing like he had the time before. He went out where he gets you seven plus innings or, you know, he can throw you a no hitter. I'm not saying that Lance is going to, you know, fit that trend. But, I mean, still, for the most part, you were getting five, six innings, two, three runs given up in that start.

Like, you get that, you're in a good position. Yeah. Also in the last two starts throwing a lot of strikes, like you mentioned, not getting those walk numbers up as much as they were. where three walks apiece, well, three out of the first four starts, just one walk apiece, the last two. All right, we are overdue for a break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Matt Thomas is out today and tomorrow. That means we're going to still have some fun, though. Dan Matthews is here hanging out.

You want to get in, you can't. 713, 212, 212, 5790. 713, 212 5790. Brian Bogusevick is coming up. We have shut Joe bum ass up slash ain't nobody got time for that. It is a fun show. the Matt Thomas show with Ross until 2 o'clock and we'll be back right after this short break.

10.22 in the a.m. here on Sports Talk, 790. As the big voice man says, it is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. The Matt Thomas part is out. Dan Matthews is hanging out for a little bit. Do still have a lot of stuff coming up. We got the news at noon with Jonathan Allen. We got ain't nobody got time for that slash shut your bum ass up coming up at 1130.

And at 11 o'clock, Brian Bogus have a great conversation. with him always week to week look forward to that so that's coming up here on the matt thomas show with ross you guys can get in at 713212 5790 and i do have a question for you if you want to get on the phone lines and i'll pose it to you as well dan how close is lance mccullers junior into getting into the circle of trust for you as a starter to where you see him in the probable pictures and you're like you know what we're going to win this one today or at least we're going to have a very good chance. Maybe not to Hunter Brown level or Framber Valdez level, but

feeling like we got a pretty good shot. How close do you feel like you are to saying that? 713-212-5-790? And Dan, I pose the question to you. Coming up this weekend, Astro's got a three-game set, and you see on Friday, Lance McCullors, Jr., how we feeling? He's next in line. Like, he's right up there. You know,

like you go to a place, you order from a counter, and you're waiting for somebody to wave you over, or you know, shout out next in line. line or something like that. That's where he's at. He's right there on the cusp of getting there. Yeah. Yeah, he's in the hole. He's maybe not quite on deck, but he's approaching it because, I mean, yeah, what you got last night and you got the start before that, you at least see the longevity is there. You at least see that he's got that ability. He can do that. And he keeps missing bats. Then he will be next in line.

Yeah, I'm with you. He's not quite there. We need to say a little bit more. But it's crazy to where we are, even from, I mean, not even a month ago, was that Cincinnati start. And he only got one out. And it was seven-heard runs. And it was a complete disaster. It was just, could it have been any worse? He had struggled a little bit against the Chicago White Sox. He didn't give him any runs, but he was, I mean, he was striking guys out, but he was also running up walks, getting into trouble. And you're sitting there like, oh, this is, we would have liked this gone a little bit better, but it also could have been a lot worse and then the other shoe dropped against Cincinnati and then you're just sitting there thinking

this guy's about to get DFAed. Like I'm texting some of the people that we have on weekly here on on sports talk 790 saying like how long do you think he's going to have? And one person told me I think he gets three more starts. And that's like that's how dire it was looking to where a guy making $18 million could have been off the team within three starts and then now it's been four since all won by the Houston Astros. I mean, coming out of that red start, even though you know you have Joe

afterwards, it's going to take time, all of those different things. You don't have time. You're in a division race. You're in the thick of it against teams that in the Rangers case, they've been struggling, they continue to struggle and against the Mariners who pitch like nobody's

business. And oh, by the way, Cal Raleigh seems to get a home run every single night. So I mean, that's what you're running into. I think that he probably bought himself some time once Rinal Blanco went down because you already knew you weren't going to have Hayden Wisniewski and you're already without four other guys in the starting rotation at the moment. So that helped him because the look at, you know, at him is, well, we know he can get out. We just need to see him be able to get outs. And then once you were short on numbers, now it's at a point where you don't have a choice but to have him run out there every fifth day. Yeah, it's pretty crazy because you even think about this.

Let's say the unfortunate that we kind of feared happen. Let's say at some point during his rehabs, and he was with, God knows who, AAA or the Corpus Christi Hooks or whatever, if there was a minor setback and it was like, okay, it's going to be a couple more weeks. Where would the Astros be right now? It would be A.J. Blue Ball?

Yeah, it'd be A.J. Blue Ball. It'd be Brandon Walter. It'd be any of those guys getting the start that you're like, I don't know if I ever want to live on a planet where this is happening. Although Walter, the start he got, he was aces for you. You should have won that game.

So it's just funny to me because we have, if we go back and look through the years of this Astros run. It's happened a number of times where, and that's any team that has any success, especially in baseball, you've got to get a little bit lucky. I dare I even mention the name of Mike Fires,

but was it like 2017? There was a bunch of injuries and then he kind of held the rotation together for a little bit. J.P. France, a couple of years ago, came out of nowhere, held the rotation. Brad Peacock. Yeah, Brad Peek, like random guys. Now, Lance McCullers, Jr. is like, how was this guy winning games?

This guy's just like, they're in a bunch of injuries and this rotation's in Chambles and this guy Brad Peacock is getting things going like Ronell Blanco and what he did a couple years ago. I know last year actually I mean there just seems to always somehow be some guy who was like you're the you're the astroses your backs against the wall you got nowhere else to go with starting pitching this guy's got to be it and right now that guy is Lance McCuller Jr and he's stepping up well I mean for the longest time the credit was going to Brent Strom well yes they're doing that this because of what this guy's doing.

Oh, I can't get rid of Brent Strom. He's going to go to the Arizona Diamondbacks and it's going to be all over. Well, now he's one of the pitching coaches for the pirates. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, and he's got a pretty good guy to work with where it's basically, hey, you throw 98, 99. Yeah, keep doing that. And keep working in some of that sick off-speed stuff you've got.

Yeah. I mean, that's real coaching right there. How's fire Josh Miller guy doing? I haven't heard from him in a while. I was going to say, I remember he's been pretty quiet. I took a call on that last. year and I rarely am ever stunned silent. I mean, usually I have something to say, but when I heard that, I was like, of all the

things that I could be perceived as an issue with this team, that's your top issue with this team right now? Yeah, fire the pitching coach. What's his name? I don't know. You got to fire him. He's got to go. He's not Brent Strong.

Yeah, it only been one of the best pitching teams in the last decade, basically. They've been outstanding. And then, yeah, since Brent Strom has left. You made the playoffs last year because of how much your pitching staff overperformed. You won the World Series in 2022 because of the pitching staff in the bullpen. And you're in the position you're in right now because of how good this pitching staff has been. Because the batting order has not been awful. It's not been great.

It's been right there in the middle. I think they're still like 15th. And I'll go look. But I mean, that has not been the reason that for the most part you're winning games. Like me and Sean talk about it all the time. Is there going to be a show this year when we come in and say, man, the bat, carried this team. Like you don't have those guys. You don't win that game yesterday. I think it's been since 2019, but that's when you had Verlander and Garrett Cole going for

Cy Young seasons. How did they not win the World Series that year? I'll never figure that out. All right, quick break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. How close do you have Lance McCullors, Jr., to the circle of trust? Is he nowhere near it? Do you need to see like 10 more of these, or maybe even a full season? Or is he getting a little close in your eyes? 713-212-5-790 is the phone number 7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-90. Brian Bogussevick with some great stuff on the Astros coming up at 11 o'clock on your home for the Houston Astros. 1034 at the a.m. here on Sports Talk 790 on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. No Matt Thomas. Brian Bogussevick is coming up, though, at 11 o'clock. Always good stuff with Bogey. Make sure you stay tuned for that.

we have been talking about your Houston Astros and the 3-0 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates. A couple of angles still to get to yet. And I'll go ahead and start with who came out in the seventh inning for the Houston Astros. That would be one Sean Dubin. You asked Dana Brown about him last hour when we were able to have him on 10 pitches, eight strikes, and another hold for him. Brian King and now it was a heavy right-handed pocket of the lineup for the Pittsburgh Pirates

but Sean Dubin getting the nod in a 1-0 game in a leveraged spot that's pretty interesting and pretty happy that it came through. Start the hashtag HLSD, high-leveraged Sean Dubin. That is one that could be seen. I mean, because you even talked about it right there. You had a right-handed pocket of the lineup and it's not about going away from your confidence in Brian King. If you got left-handers in there, Brian King's getting that spot right there.

But it's pitching yourself into that position because Dubin, before he gave up the Earn Run run on Saturday, hadn't given up a single earn run, 9 and 2 thirds innings, that he had been flawless out there on the mound for you. A couple of walks here, there, but nothing too crazy. So he pitched himself into that spot where, I mean, I talked about it last night on the 10th inning, Ross. You're going to get to a day where Brian Abraeu is not available. Somebody's got to fill that inning.

Josh Hater is not available. So then Brian uprey is going to kick into that spot. So then you need other guys that you can be able to fill those spots. And Dubin's a guy that's pitched himself in that opportunity. And he made good on it last night. And even the outing where he gave up the one earned run, he still had a chance to give up more and left the guys on first and third with one out. Yeah, he's just been so good.

And it feels like maybe last year or was it a couple years ago, he started off the season really hot. And then he kind of started giving up runs. But there had been times where if, feels like he's been pretty reliable. Somebody you can count on for stretches. And right now he has been that guy. And it's been great to see.

And you mentioned Josh Hater, 16 saves and 16 opportunities. We talk about getting lucky that Lance McCullors Jr. is here to kind of pick up the pieces with a rash of injuries with the starting rotation. Where would they be without Lance McCuller Jr.? Where would they be without Josh Hater? He's got, I believe, one win. and then of your 33 wins, he saved 16 of those.

Strategy has also played a huge part of it. I mean, where last year, it was pretty much any high leverage spot there in the ninth inning, you brought him in. You're down by one? Well, then he's there. You need a couple of innings? Yep, you're going to go ahead and throw that guy out there a couple of innings. You're in a tie ball game.

Same deal. And even he had some blown saves in there, too. So I think that's probably been a lesson learned from last year as be strategic on when you use Yeah, so with the 16 saves and the one win, that's 17 of your 33 wins that he's been a factor in. He's been massive for you. And I mean, it's the old saying he's that guy. Like he looks like that guy again. He is that, dude.

Yeah, he's got the, I mean, he's got the confidence. He's got the full flow, gets all angry out there. I mean, he is just a, well, I mean, most picture, picture perfect closers aren't left-handers, but Billy Wagner would disagree. but it's just everything else it's just it speaks closer he's like from closer central casting and he's been nails well I mean and that's you know let's not have you know too shallow a memory here

too much of a short term memory when it came to how we viewed Ryan Presley in that spot I mean 2022 Ryan Presley was in that game was over that you weren't going to score off Ryan Presley especially in the playoffs playoffs he was great and I mean and that's that's the huge reason

of why you know he became such a beloved figure here, and it sucks to see the kind of the fall off. I mean, 23, he started to share some cracks there, and then 24, you move him out of that spot because you bring Josh Hater in, and he still struggles. He was rough. He got hurt, right? With the Cubs, he was struggling and then got hurt. I don't know

exactly what's going on. I'm not sure. I haven't been paying much attention to the Cubs. I just put Ryan Presley Presley and Google, and top stories. Cubs predicted to cut ties with Ryan Presley. Shows you how things are going. I mean, I don't wish no. I don't wish you a will.

lot of them either. It's just, whof, that things aren't going so hot, I guess, with old Ryan Presley, with the Chicago Cubs, appreciate. And I think the guy that they got back for him was like pitching well in the minors. Dana Brown might be working a little bit of magic with these, yeah, was it Juan Bayo? I'll have to look that up. But anyways. You mean that Dana Brown knows how to evaluate talent? Weird. Yes. Especially, it seems like pitching talent. He's a friggin wizard with that. I mean, definitely. All right, 713, 212, 5, 799. is the phone number. Let's go out to Gary in Montgomery. I want to talk

some strokes. What's up, Gary? Hey, buddy. How are you doing? Doing great. Hey, I wanted to see, if you guys caught something in the eighth inning, the Astros were pitching, and then the last few pitchers, somebody blew an air horn, like right when the pitcher was pitching.

I thought it was absolutely crazy. I don't know if that's allowed. Did he get kicked out of the game? You know, I don't know what happened there, but I was That is definitely not allowed And definitely not an ejectible offense But I didn't hear it

I'm going to be honest I was watching the game then But I did not have the volume on at that point of the game And snooze to me Yeah I have no idea about it Okay, yeah, announcer didn't say anything But I thought it was just absolutely classless man It was crazy

I've never heard that in a game Maybe it was somebody down the street Your house Gary Yeah maybe so Maybe so Well thank you guys for the input I'm just curious about that Thank you.

Yeah, if somebody wants to tweet us, like I said, I didn't have the volume on in that part of the game. I do know there were a lot of Astros fans there last night. You could hear them. With air horns? Maybe not with air horns. I mean, that's one of the trips you've got to make throughout the season, I feel like. I mean, PNC Park looks like a gorgeous baseball Taj Mahal, and I haven't been there yet, unfortunately. But if I'm ever going to knock Pittsburgh, which is way down off the butt, way down on the bucket list,

it would be specifically to go to that ballpark. Yeah, I mean, I've said that PNC is on the list. Petco, San Diego. I was going to say, I mean, and if I'm not mistaken, I mentioned this last night. That's why San Diego's not so bad either. Yeah, I mean, you know, you mean I can go watch baseball and sit in ideal weather where basically I'm sitting in pretty much the, you know, feeling of an air-conditioned room while watching baseball?

Oh, weird. I'm not sure that I would want to be able to do that. But did I also read that Petco has like the best beer selection in all of baseball? Is that true? I was crushing Miller lights. I don't know. I'm just kidding. I don't remember what I drank there.

Loganitis, I'm not trying to make a blackout drunk drink a joke either. But yeah, I don't remember. But we did go to Gasland before and after, so maybe I had a few minutes. I mean, you know, who's to blame you? That was nice. You're a young guy. I thought there and have to go on.

I'm just kidding. Thank you, Dan. Out in right field. It was nice. It was a good time. San Diego's gorgeous. Just don't be like a guy next to me once here. And then you head over to Tijuana, get a couple of street tacos.

No, I wouldn't recommend that one. Why not? It's not that bad. I had a good time. Maybe guys like me shouldn't head over. No, you're fine. You look like you could be from, yeah, from Argentina. I was going to say, hello.

Me yamo Dan. I'm Spanish. How much Spanish do you speak? None. Yeah, you'll be fine. Let's get some street tacos. Just say, uh, three tacos al pastor, por favor. See, you can say that.

Okay. Yeah, it's fine. That's easy. Yeah, some of the best tacos and tamales ever had. All right, anyways, we're going to take. take a break on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Dan Matthews is here. Matt Thomas is on a darkness retreat with Aaron Rogers. You want to get in. You can 713, 212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Brian Bogus 7 coming up at 11 o'clock. That'll be some great Astros conversation. Don't go anywhere.

The Matt Thomas show with Ross without Matt Thomas. Dan Matthews here hanging out for a little bit. Brian Bogussevick coming up. You guys can get in at 7-1-1. 212-1-2-5-7-90. 7-13-21-2-5-7-90. I've been talking a lot of Astros, but anything you want to get to, we can get into OTA stuff with the Texans. And the off-season rumor mill continues to churn for the Houston Rockets, Mr. Matthews.

Yes, it does. I mean, I could get into that in just a second, but here in the studio, we've got the U.S. open of axe-throwing happening. You got Sam Carter against a guy named Mike. Kump. K-U-M-P. Hey, watch your language. Come on, now this is a family show. What did I say? I'm just kidding.

Yes, so okay. As one certain host of this show would say, peel the curtain back. So this show, for many, many years, was on 12 to 3. And so we like to watch sports here. It is Sports Talk 790. So normally, if you're going to get live sports, especially during the summer,

it's M-O-B network. hopefully somebody's got a day game Wednesday Thursday, Tuesday maybe, but Wednesday, Thursday, and then the occasional Cubs on a Friday, you're good. So we could always, for the most part, watch some live sports going on. You would have the occasional European soccer or whatever. Now that it's a 10 to 2 show, I mean, it's just talking head shows that are on right now with perhaps the occasional European soccer, or you got to go to like ESPN Plus and it's like the ladies lacrosse whack championships.

That's basically all we get. So yes, during the break, Dan and I were just kind of searching for something to watch. And then it popped up on this guide. We've got the direct TV stream here or Marek Meevi stream here. And the Ocho is back. How long is the Ocho back? I guess. I mean, I think they do it like once a year.

Then slippery stairs. There's a slippery stairs competition. Like who can keep their footing running a who can run up slippery stairs? fastest, I'm going to be fascinated. I don't know. I'm going to have to have you handle the bogus havoc interview because at 11 o'clock, I'm going to be locked into slippery stairs. It's kind of, you know, you want to, obviously, humans don't have web footing, but you want to, like, try to give yourself as best, like the web footing as possible. So you try to, you know, put your feet out to the side right there, because you're

going for width, not for the length at that point. You've got bouldering championships coming up. And, yeah, more rock climbing. Oh, yeah. It's about to be a few, and then, spike ball, which I don't know what that is. But I'm going to be locked into the Ocho, is what I'm saying? That's the, where you, the little trampoline on floor, and they spike it down with that yellow ball, and they were going a circle on a field. It's like a frat boy game, but like. But what's the point?

Like, is it like basketball? Is there a goal of volleyball? And like ping pong and tennis are the same. Volleyball, ping pong tennis, and trampolings. Like, so you're supposed to hit it. So you have a teammate. Okay. And you spike the ball down to the little trampoline, okay?

Oh, you spike it into the trampoline, you bounce it over. And that other team has to get that before it's the ground. Yeah, that's drunken frat boy stuff. It's like old four square almost. That was a, hey, man. Hey, I was at the five-billed house last week. Man, they're playing this thing called Spikeball. That's what happens.

Okay. Yeah, drunken frat people came up with that. There's no doubt in my mind, for sure. And then they all got in fistfights. Anyways, after drinking, after chugging a bottle of Boone's farm. So I'm locked into the Ocho today. As you mentioned, it is, did you know, U.S. Open was on today. You didn't know that, did you, Dan? It's the U.S. Open of

Axe throwing. $5,000 in the championship round. That's kind of low. What's airfare to get over there? All right. Well, anyways, we're locked in on the axe champs, axe throwing championship. But I was talking to you about what we were talking about. Rockets trade rumors. Yeah, I mean, the trade rumors are out there. Kelly Iko coming out with a piece yesterday of, you know, what the rockets could be involved in. And, I mean, interested in the honest, but availability and also pricing are a huge part of that. Brooks Lopez as a possible Stephen Adams replacement. If you don't bring back Stephen Adams,

an increased role for Reed Shepard, but this was an interesting one this morning from Mark Stein. The Knicks are expected to show interest in IMA Utoka and Jason Kidd, while Johnny Bryant, who has been an assistant and Jay Wright, also considered presumed candidates. We were talking about earlier me and Gordy were on the Sean Salisbury show, which you can catch every single weekday morning, 6 to 10 a.m. but E. May has two years left on his current deal.

Making about $7.5 million a season. It was a four-year $28.5 million deal that he signed when he joined the team back in 2020. This, to me, has nothing more than it's ramping up to a week from now, two weeks from now. Hey, guys, just want to let you know in this press release that EMA DOCA has agreed to a new four-year contract extension with the Rock. what this feels like. This feels like, uh-huh, yeah, they have interest. Jason, Kidd and Ema Doker are two names who intrigue the Knicks. Okay. Well, but Kid is an interesting one. That is one that I might meet you on because he did sign an extension this time last year. Uh-huh.

But what also happened between this time last year and right now? He traded away as best player. And then you made him awkwardly sit up there with Nico Harrison trying to explain why you traded Luca. when you could clearly tell two things. A, he didn't want to be there, and two, he didn't agree with the move. So wouldn't it be any better F you to that organization for Jason Kidd to say, oh, the Knicks, you're offering me this. I got a guy that I used to have here that you also traded away in Jalen Brunson. And I've got a team that just went to the Eastern Conference Finals.

And I'm not in danger of having my best player traded away anytime soon. Yeah, guess what? See ya. If Kyrie Irving, I don't know what the whole situation with him opting in and coming back in the middle of the next season and stuff like that. But if he's there and Anthony Davis and Cooper Flagg, I mean, that's a pretty decent situation there in Dallas for the Mavericks. But you can be intrigued all you want. E. Medi Adoka's not going anywhere. The Houston Rockets organization is not going to have that.

This is this big market mentality. And I'm not necessarily accusing Mark Stein of this because if he heard it from people, he heard it from people. Like, we're the big bad New York Knits, Knicks, who by the way, haven't won a championship. since the early 70s, the rockets have been more relevant than the Nix over the last 10 plus years or so. So no, it's not happening. Ema Doka ain't going anywhere. I think you're exactly right. Coming up soon will we hear about some sort of multi-year with a pay boost extension signed by Eme Doka?

If not, I mean, I wouldn't be shocked at all that happened in the next couple of months. Well, and then also, too, I mean, talking about a place that you could go to where they are irrational. They are, you know, reactionary in terms of making moves like this where, yeah, you just lost to the Pacers, but you weren't supposed to beat the Pacers. Anybody with half a brain in their head knew that the Pacers were a better basketball team than you were. I mean, you hadn't been in this spot since 2000, 25 years since that team had reached that point of the NBA playoffs. And you say, oh, well, it's not enough. We're moving on at this point. I mean, I didn't know of any perceived, you know, rifts inside the playoffs.

the locker room, you know, being annoyed with his coaching style or anything like that, even if it's the case, work it out during the off season. And if next season doesn't go the way you hope, then that's when you make the move. Yeah, all right. Well, I got to get rid of Tibbs, unfortunately. His thank you for taking them to heights they hadn't seen in years was getting fired. But no, you can have Coach Udoka. Now he can do what?

Now maybe he can finally get rid of whatever hair he has because, man, he's been fighting the struggle with that one where it's just like, dude, just get rid of the hair. and if he does, then he'll absolutely look like grew. Yeah, his entire life has been basketball. He's 67 years old. Probably doesn't get another head coaching job anywhere else. And for somebody who lives and breathes basketball, it would be interesting to see what happens with him.

All right, time for another break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Dan, appreciate you hanging out, man. Thank you. Man, buddy. Oh, that was great. Filling those shoes expertly with Matt Thomas out. He'll be out today and tomorrow. I'm with you now. We got Brian Bogussevick coming up at 11 o'clock.

Ain't nobody got time for that slash shut your bum ass up coming up at 1130 as well. With you until 2 o'clock. It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Back with Brian Bogusavik. Hour number two of the Matt Thomas show with Ross here on a sports talk 790. Ross Vireel with you. Matt Thomas out today and tomorrow. We've got the news at noon coming up. We have ain't nobody got time for that slash shut yo bum ass. up coming up at 1130, but right now, pleased to be joined by one of my favorite guests on the week of the whole station.

Brian Bogusevic, Space City Home Network, joins us Wednesdays at 11 o'clock. Brian, let's just start with what we saw last night on the hill. Not the Paul Skeen side, poor guy, eight innings, a one-run ball, and you pick up the L. But Lance McCullors Jr., back-to-back, quality starts. How about that from a guy who's been through such a long journey? Yeah, it's been a ride, hasn't it? I think it's, you know, very important to remember that once a guy is deemed healthy and active, that that's not necessarily he's the guy who is going to be.

You know, that's kind of the last step in the process. There's still a lot of progress to be made once somebody returns to action because, I mean, we've seen Lance, you know, over, what is it, six, starts now, however many, continue to get better and better. And incrementally, right? Like sometimes it'll be a little bit of the velocity, either being up a tick or just maintaining velocity a little bit deeper into an

outing, or, you know, having a little bit more sharpness to a breaking ball, or having both versions of the breaking ball working at the same time. So there are steps to take even after your, you know, quote-unquote, healthy and back into the rotation. But, no, it's been great. I mean, he continues to get the,

better. He's really got a feel for the off-speed stuff. And, you know, you had to be fairly certain that, you know, given health, eventually that feel for the breaking pitch, the feel for spin and varying the shapes of the breaking ball will come back because that's kind of always what he's been a master at. And it's, you know, it's been a lot of fun to watch, you know, a guy who's just able to go out there and compete because that's what he does. You know, at his best, what Lance McCullors does is he goes. He out there and he figures out a way to compete. And it's enjoyable to watch. Yes, it is. And it's just,

to me, it's such a fascinating story. I mean, just, it feels like you could, like, write a book or a movie or both about this. It's just so fascinating and intriguing to me. The, where he goes, to rehab, to miss those two years. Can you just, I mean,

speak to what it takes internally from Lance McCullors, Jr., it's impressive to me, the mental fortitude, to battle back the way that he has, to fight off, I mean, in the back of his mind, it's always got to be, when's the next shoe going to drop? When am I next going to feel some discomfort? And he keeps pushing through that, and now he's being successful on the mound,

getting out at the major league level. No, it's crazy. I mean, just the determination and the willingness to stick to it and to keep trying and keep coming back and have setbacks and restarts. that says a lot about him personally. It also says a lot about how much the guy loves baseball and loves the team, right? There's a lot of people in his situation who would say, you know what, I've had my success, I've made my money.

I guess that's just over, but it's a guy who just wants to go out there and play. I think one thing that people don't realize about players when they are rehabbing is it is a completely different experience from a player who is playing in terms of you are very often removed from the team. Not that you're not welcome around the team, but your work is going on early before the rest of the team is out there doing their work. You know, sometimes you're staying behind at a spring training complex to do your rehab. And once the seasons start and the affiliates start, those places are cleared out. And there's a lot of time in an empty clubhouse by yourself. And when you're in an empty clubhouse and you're sitting there with an ice pack on your elbow and you're just there with your thoughts about, man, I've got another injury, you know, another six months, another throwing program started again.

And, you know, you can start having some thoughts that you don't want to have about where you stand in the game. And to be able to fight through that, along with the physical stuff of trying to just get your arm back healthy and get your body back healthy to be able to go out there and get out at the major league level. It is a long, long journey. And, you know, that's why you'll see it throughout baseball is when guys come back from long, set, from long injuries, right? Tommy John stuff, knees things, you know, where they miss a year. everybody across the game is happy to see them back. And there'll be guys giving them a little nod and a little, hey, you know, good for you because they realize what it takes.

Last bit on Lance McCullors. 102 pitches, two starts ago, 96 pitches and a last start. Do you think that's a function of there has been some starting pitching injuries and we maybe need to push him a little bit? Or do you think independent of all that, this is where he would be? I don't think they would push him to a place that they weren't comfortable doing just because, you know, all of a sudden there's another injury and we're going to throw you to 100 pitches instead of 80 pitches. That wouldn't be a safe thing to do for him. I do think they're willing to take him to his limit a little more and maybe expose him to a lineup, you know, a third or fourth time or expose him to a matchup that maybe they would fire on.

and to the bullpen given full strength in the rotation just because that's what they need. I mean, they absolutely, not only do they need a quality pitcher to go out there and get outs for them, they need people to eat innings. And you know what you're going to get from Hunter and Frumber in that sense. But at the back end of the bullpen, back into the rotation, you don't really know what you're going to get.

So when you've got a veteran like Lance who, you know, he can go out there and he'll figure out how to get through an inning and he'll figure out how to maybe, you know, he'll give guys a different look the third time through than maybe you gave him the first time. So there's probably just a little bit more trust in if we've got to push somebody, he's going to be the guy that we're going to do it

versus, you know, the rookies who are just trying to figure out how to get out from the big leagues for the first time. Former Astro and Space City Home Networks, Brian Bogusevich, with us here on Sports Talk 790. Josh Hayter, 16 saves, also has a win. The Astros have 33 wins. he is factored in that way in 17 of them. Obviously huge.

And what do you think has been the difference for him this year? You know, I don't think there's any difference in his stuff, right? His pitches look pretty much the same. He is executing them very well. That's needless to say. There's probably just a little bit more comfort. You know, obviously second year with the team, you'll be a little bit more comfortable even for a guy who was coming back to an organization.

So you hit the ground running day one. I will say this. There's a little bit of a different pitch mix. He last year got very fastball heavy and for good reason. You know, it's one of the best pitches in baseball. And his batting average against on it was, you know, 160 something. But there's a little bit more of a 50-50 split between the fastball and the slider. And, you know, if you're facing.

Josh Hater as a hitter, you almost have to guess, right? If you're going to give yourself a chance, you've got to guess. And if he can, you know, tip the scales just a little bit more to where, you know, it's not 70-30 and it's 50-50 and you're going to guess wrong a little bit more often, he's going to be that much more effective because, you know, both of those pitches are as good as individual pitch as there is in baseball. You put them both together and you don't know what you're getting at any given situation. Good luck.

and, you know, hitters haven't had a whole lot of it against him this year. I'm interested on your perspective in the whole Yordon Alvarez saga. The way that it played out and it seemed like they weren't forthcoming with a lot of information, then it sounds like he's coming back, and then, of course, now it's a fracture. How much do you feel that this is possibly on the Astros? Dana Brown admitting that they may have rushed him back from the initial hand soreness. How much of this is a kind of a freak accident thing that could happen to anything? any team, and especially with the context that we kind of went through something similar with

Kyle Tucker last year? Yeah, I think all of those things put together makes for, you know, a lot of people who are unhappy with the situation all around. I'll say this. I'll start by saying, I had an injury at one point in my career where an x-ray showed no fracture, and then two weeks later, an MRI showed a fracture. So I've been down that road and I know that that happens. I think probably from the outside looking in, fan standpoint, you're probably most frustrated with the communication.

But, I mean, the fact of the matter is besides designating an injury when a team puts somebody on the injured list, teams don't owe anybody anything to say. And I know that's frustrating, but that's just kind of the way it is. I think from a player standpoint, from what I would think Yordon is feeling, the worst thing to have from an injury standpoint as a player is not knowing, right? Feeling that something is wrong, but not having a diagnosis, not having a definitive timeline. And at least now that it's been found and they know, then, you know, he can kind of be at ease with where this process is because, you know, going out there and saying, man, it just doesn't feel right. and then hearing from the training staff that, well, we think it is right. It is really frustrating. But, you know, hopefully we've moved past all the ambiguity, and it's defined.

And because, I mean, we just need the guy back. And that's the bottom line. And he wants to be back. The team wants him back. The fans want him back. And once he is back, hopefully we can just put it all the rest. Yeah, and I was also intrigued by the angle I saw in the Channel Rome article about Yordon getting a second opinion through his agent. Is that something that is very common, or is that something that we should raise an eyebrow on?

No, it's very common. I mean, a lot of times when players get second opinions, it's because their first opinion, they didn't like it. You see it all the time when guys are having Tommy John, they're getting a second opinion because the first one said they need a Tommy John, right? But players do that just because, again, you want to know. And if things are coming back inconclusive or, you know, you're hearing it might be there. or it might be that, you know, there's a lot of really good doctors out there. And the more people you can have looking at things, the more different sets of eyes and kind of different experiences that you can have looking at it, the better.

Because the end of the day is we want to get it figured out so that we can figure out how to fix it. And so, no, I don't really take a whole lot away from players getting second opinions, because until you know something definitively, you want to have, you know, as many people looking at it as possible. Very short sample size so far with Jacob Melton, but a couple of good A.Bs last night, including working that walk against Paul Skeens.

No, absolutely. And that's the, you know, from an offensive standpoint with him, everybody's always talked about the tools and just, you know, controlling the strike zone more to allow the tools to play. And, again, like you said, very small sample size. But if he can do that, I mean, if he puts the ball in play, he can really run. so he's going to get on base.

He's a strong kind of explosive athletic guy, so there's going to be popping that bat. And if you can not chase pitches out of the zone, he's got some tools that will play in the zone. And, you know, having another left-handed option is huge for this team. Having a guy who can really go out and run him down in the outfield, you put him out there with Jake Myers and Cam Smith, two other guys who can really go get it.

Yeah, it's a really good addition. the roster. Brian Bogussevik. Appreciate the time as always. Space City Home Network's own and a weekly guest 11 o'clock Wednesdays here on Sports Talk 790. Brian, appreciate it. We'll talk to you down the road. All right, thanks, guys.

All right, there you go. Great stuff with Brian Bogusevick. As always. You're on a rack to anything. He had to say good stuff on Lance McCullors, Jr., Josh Hader. Yordon injury as well. You can get in. 713-212-5-790 is your phone number. 713-2125-790 coming up at noon we'll have the news at noon with jonathan allen uh we also have coming up at 11 o'clock it will be excuse me coming up at 1130 it will be ain't nobody got time for that slash shut joe ball mass up it's all here on the matt thomas show with ross with you

until two o'clock here on sports talk 790 coming up in the next segment if there's something you've got to get off your chest. There's somebody that has been bothering you. There's something someone said that, well, you just don't agree with. And they need to shut their bum ass up. If there's something happening, you just ain't got time for. That's coming up. The best segment of the week at 1130 here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross.

Phone lines open now at 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. thanks to Brian Bogussevic. Great conversation with him talking Astros as well. And did spend a lot of the time talking about Lance of Colors Jr. But I just continue to be fascinated with the track that he is on. And the story is not written. It will continue to go on the mound and will continue to gather more data, as it were,

and get more of a sample size and figure out where he is and where he's going to be and all those things. But to get back to where he was. and all the hate, and I'm not even talking about the death threat stuff. If you haven't heard, that was uncovered that it was somebody, it was a foreigner who was inebriated, and of course gambling related with the death threats that he received. I'm not even talking about that.

I'm just talking about everybody making, him becoming the butt of every joke. Anytime you heard anything that he was doing, whether he was rehabbing or whether, I mean, he was literally at, like, he had that, what, that coffee shop that he was doing, coffee and cocktails. It was called Maven or something like now, and I think it's been bought out or he's in a partnership with someone else. I don't know about the busy dealing side of that. But it would be some puff piece written by The Chronicle or someone else.

And it's like, Lance McCuller's Jr. showing off his coffee and like, oh, did he hurt his elbow? Oh, he's on the IL for his coffee shop. And it's just all that type of stuff, which it's fine. It's fair game. It doesn't hurt anybody. But it's also something that's out of Lance McCuller's junior control. He's not out there trying to rip up his elbow and be out for multiple years. So he's been on this long journey.

He's back out there. I mean, bury me in the age, all that type of stuff. He's been, he's just a fiery guy out of the mound. A competitor loves baseball, as Brian Bogusevic said. You don't paddle back through Tommy John. and then this two-year flexor strain injury with surgery and setbacks if you do not love baseball. He's been making, sitting on the sidelines, $17.5.18 million a year. So he should be financially set for life.

And as I mentioned, get the business stuff with the coffee. Like if Lance Palmer Jr. didn't care about baseball, he wouldn't have to be out there. But clearly he has something to prove to himself, something to prove to others. And it's great to see to him have back-to-back quality starts. Forgiving that the Pittsburgh Pirates lineup isn't very good? But the A's lineup is pretty good. And the walk numbers have been down. He's been throwing strikes.

Good to see him at this point, lower his ERA to 4.44 on the season. And since he had that disastrous start against the Cincinnati Reds, where he only went a third of an inning and he gave up seven earned runs, you are, you're talking about a vast improvement, ERA of 2.21 in that time. So, yeah, he's been rounding into form, has been Lance McCullors Jr. 713-212-5-790 is the phone number. Philip in Pearland is on the phones.

What's up, Philip? Ross, hey, buddy. Yeah, with Lance, it's so encouraging to see him. He must have been frustrated for years to see him come back and the pitch so well. It's really, I mean, I feel that he's got, he's really relieved, and I'm sure he's feeling super great right now, and I'm glad for it, of course. Ross, you fake me out there.

I was all ready for a shut your bum ass up line. You know, I want the Knicks to shut up about hunting down our Rockets coach, Eme Adoka. Please, please stop that immediately. And the other thing was last night I listened to the Pittsburgh radio broadcast of the game, and I heard a lot of booing. Why'd you do that, Phillip? Sports Talk 790.

Is your home for your Houston Astros for free on the I-Hard radio app? Yeah, I do, but I like to hear what the other team is talking, how they're talking about us, too. Do the pirates even bother to broadcast the games? Yes, of course. Oh, okay. I'm sorry, go ahead. What was the, what was the Haps on the Pirates broadcast?

Oh, like when Tommy Sam struck out in the ninth, they booed heavily. There was another, I think right before him. When the guy, I think when the guy got caught at second stealing. Yeah, when O'Neill Cruz and his pain came off the bag? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think they booed then. They were not happy crowd.

No. And it was the TV, the Space City, but I did watch the Space City TV. And I did watch the post game on the rate on you guys, on 790 a.m. Okay, great. But I was tired by then. Yeah, I know. I don't know. And it was somebody else.

It wasn't you, Ross. No, yeah. Oh, if it was me, you would have stayed. I appreciate that, Philip. Yeah. Yeah, I love you, Ross. Thank you, Philip. Who's that Matt guy?

Later, buddy. Never heard of them. Never heard of them. All right, appreciate you, Philip. Thanks for getting in. 713-212-5-7-9. 713, 212, 579. Yes, we on Sports Talk 790 are your home for Houston Astros baseball.

You can also use it on the I-Heart radio app. It's not going to cost you a penny. It is like geo-fence, as they call it. You got to be in the Houston area to make sure you're going to listen to it. But we appreciate you, folks. Listen into your home for your Houston Astros Sports Talk 790. But yeah, I mean, if you're a pirates fan, should you even be allowed to boo?

I mean, you're supposed to boo when someone falls short of your ex-pensate. expectations. Can you boo when it's the pirates? Like in Colorado, even though actually I think they won a series. Don't look now, folks. Colorado Rockies they've won two in a row.

They're going streaking folks. They've won 11 now. Won a series going for the sweep against the Miami Marlins. But anyways, if your expectations are that low, like why would you even bother booing? Why would you pay money to go see the Pittsburgh Pirates?

and expect them to win and then boo. No, it's almost kind of like in the background. It's like you're watching for a fun time. You're watching for like, I don't know, player development. And I guess it is Paul Skeens and they're expecting at least, if you're going to spend money, your hard-earned money in Pittsburgh to see one Pittsburgh Pirates game, it's probably going to be to see Paul Skeens

and then you're hoping he's going to go out there and win. They're like, this guy hadn't pitched in two years, and he's shutting us down, Even then, the attendance was very poor. I know it's midweek, and I don't know when schools get out in Pittsburgh, but 15,891 at PNC Park. You've got Paul Skeins versus Lance McCullors Jr. In one of the most beautiful settings in baseball.

I don't even know what the weather was in Pittsburgh, but I'm going to imagine it's pretty pleasant for summer. And let's see, today it's 82. 2 degrees. All right, that's a little warm. But it's still an evening game. It was a 640 local time first pitch. You can't even draw 16,000 to a Paul Skeen start in Pittsburgh. And then, like I said, how can they disappoint you when your expectations should be so low? You should not be booing Paul Skeens or the Pittsburgh Pirates.

That just ain't right. That's like booing the sixth grade band because there are. off time. That's just how it's going to go. You should basically just expect it at that point. Robert and Katie, go ahead. Hey, Ross, that was a good comparison with the sixth graders. I like that. Thank you. Hey, I wanted to talk about Al Tugabe playing second base last night, how sharp he looked. And I was wondering if he watched his position back and the new guy out in left field

is doing pretty good. I was just wondering maybe our current second baseman might be replaced. What are you thinking about that? Yeah, that's interesting to me, and I noticed that too. It makes a lot of logical sense. And it is a complicated thing to kind of parse through with the Astros and what they're going to try to do. If you made it this big, long off-season story where it was the story of spring training. It was Jose Al-Tuve, who is 35 years old now, and I mean, let's just be honest.

He's on the downhill side of his career. He's given us great moments, one of the all-time great Astros, all that type of stuff. Best postseason Astro, not even close. If you made it this big, this off-season story, you talked about how you wanted to have him out there every day. And then do you do feel a little pressure within yourself to continue to put him back out there in left field? because you've invested all this time and having him go out there and learn the position, but then the way that things broke,

you were hoping Brennan Rogers would win the second base spot. He hasn't. You can throw Mauricio DuBahn out there occasionally, but you also like to use him in a utility role and give other guys days off. You don't want to pigeonhole him in to just being the everyday second baseman, even though he's been pretty good.

Now you do have Jacob Melton up because of a couple of injuries to Zach DeZenzo, Chas McCormick, Yordon Alvarez. So you do have the flage and he's, flexibility at the DH spot. I don't know. My answer to your question is I don't know. It makes sense to me to put Al Tuve at second base and then have the outfield that you had last night, Melton and left, Myers and Center, Cam Smith and right field. But the reason you moved

Altuve off of there, because he's simply not viable defensively as a second baseman. He's just not. I mean, how many times this year do you feel like you've seen a play made by Brendan Rogers or Maricio Dubon and thought to yourself, Jose Altuvae has no chance at 30 years old of making that play. 25-year-old Jose Al-Tuvae? Perhaps. 35-year-old Jose-Ltuve? Not so much. So there is a lot of defensive value lost up the middle.

But if it allows you to put that outfield out that you had last night, do you think of making it long-term? Or you're going to mix and match stuff. Guys are going to go down with injuries anyways. So he kind of just ride that train as it goes along. That's what I figured the Astros will do. the latter of the two. 713-212-5-790 is the phone number.

Dwayne, I see you on hold. We'll get to you. Also have you. If you want to get in, is there something you ain't got time for? Do you want to tell, like Philip, do you want to tell the Knicks to shut their bum-ass up for coming after Coach Udoka?

Anything you would like to talk about, 7-13-212-5-790. 7-1-3-2-1-7-90. Ain't nobody got time for that slash shut-ch-jo-bum-bass-up is next here on Sports Talk 790. Hey nobody get in time. Ain't nobody getting time for that. Hey, nobody got time for that. Yes, that's coming up in a moment. You want to get in?

That's called what the folks call a teaser. 713, 2-1-2-5-7-90. 7-1-3-21-2-5-7-90. Ain't nobody got time for that coming up in just a second. But Dwayne has been holding it to him really quick, but you can get in. 7-1-3-2-5-7-90. What's up, Dwayne? Hey, guys.

Yeah, that was a cool tool intro. I dug that. But no, seriously, my daughter is in basketball, and all this stuff about Caitlin Clark and all the other nonsense is going on. Seriously, she likes them both. But I have a question for you guys. Of the Astros, who's the All-Star?

That's all I got. Who's going to make the All-Star team? All right, thanks. Thank you, Duane. All right, appreciate. Hunter Brown is a lot. certainly. Josh Hader feels like a lot. I mean, no, Josh Hader is a lock as well. As far as guys in the lineup, I think possibly you could see Jeremy Pena as an all star. I don't think Jake Myers is going to make it, even though that was fun to kind of, I don't want to say joke about, but to talk about. Isok Paredes at third base. Let me think Jose Ramirez. Well, Alex Bregman's hurt now. I don't think he's, He's going to make it.

He probably will be on the outside looking in there. But, well, Framer with his last start, it's crazy how, I mean, we are 60 games into the season, but still like one really good start from a starter or a couple of hot days, as we saw from Jose Altovae at the plate, can really turn things around for you. His ERA is 312, so maybe he has a spot. But I would say for sure, Hunter Brown, for sure, Josh Hater, probably Jeremy Pena, although I'd have to look around in shortstop.

Obviously Bobby Whit Jr. would be the starter. But if he can make it in there, I mean, OPS 850 and playing great shortstop. He's been great, has been Jeremy Pena, deserving of an All-Star nod this season. That's where I would go right now for Astros, All-Stars. All right, now it is time for you to say, ain't nobody got time for that slash shut your bum ass up here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. 212-5-790, 7-13, 212-5-790,

if you would like to get in. Phone lines open right now. J.K. Allen and I will start. I'll go first. You have it yesterday with a story coming out that an Astro, excuse me, a Houston Police Department spokesperson describing a better who lives overseas

found as the man who threatened the life of Lance McCuller Jr. and his family. I understand it's fun to get down to parlay. I understand it makes a little bit more interesting watching baseball. But if you go online, and I don't even care, I know the anonymity of social media has really ruined basically our day-to-day lies when we go on to social media. But to the overseas better, who was frustrated and inebriated, although has been apologetic since.

For threatening Lance McCullors Jr.'s family, shut your bum ass up. I mean, grow up people. Shit your bum ass up, man. I know this guy is probably crazy, perhaps schizophrenic, has a screw loose. I don't know what. But to go on to social media, type those words, and then hit send, and then you get found out anyways?

You didn't have the anonymity you thought you had. Dumbass. Shit your bum ass up. Yeah. Shut your bum ass up. All right, Jonathan Allen, you can go. All right. My gut feeling today.

Got feeling. Sorry. Whoa. Hey, shut your bum ass up. Hit yourself for a while. Shut your bum ass up, man. But for everybody that goes into these drive-through lines, and this is one of my biggest pet peeves ever, and you get your food, ain't nobody has time for you to sit there and check every single fall. Look, if you got it right.

There is no point. so inconsiderate to just drive in the front of the restaurant. Maybe if you need to get out and get new food, but you sitting there and waiting for how many people behind you and sitting there, ain't nobody got time for it. You know, people come after me like, oh, I got to check my food. But who cares? Just go. Be considerate. People behind you, and I'm hungry.

Hey, you got to check your food. I would say you get like a 30 second grace period. I would say, I would say 17 seconds class. And if that's that, I'm honking at you. I say it depends on how big the order is. is like, okay, let's say you get like five burgers and ones with like, you don't need to check and make sure this one doesn't have onions, this one has tomatoes, no, if you got five burgers, just take them home.

I'm with you. Like I was at the, I was at the taco place that rhymes with machos. And I got four different, I got four different tacos, breakfast tacos for the peeps. And I just count four tacos. Hey, whatever I get home with it, it's a mixed bag from that point. As long as I get the right amount of food. You can figure it out from there. See, the only time I get mad is when it's something I can't eat.

Like, the other time I was talking about were Ronald's, and they gave me that disgusting cheese, whatever. Oh, dude, that was gross. But anything else, I don't just eat it. What was it? It was a sausage McBiddle. Oh. With, like, egg and in, like, no meat.

No, I just wanted a regular sausage one. But you got a biscuit, right? I got a biscuit. The biscuits are delicious. You're still wrong on that. That's disgusting. No, come on, man. honestly for breakfast biscuits

to me it's Rick Relay and Rick Ronalds those are the best biscuits for breakfast and fast food wise What about Waterburger and Popeyes? Oh yeah you know what those are pretty good Dang you got me you got me on that one Although sometimes the water burger one's a little Overcooked and it's like

It's like a hockey puck You can be a little tough You know that actually happened You know the last time I got a little honey butter See? Yeah See All right it can happen anyways

All right ain't nobody got time for that You know what else I say Ain't nobody got time for that I just did the Lance McCuller's Jr. when I saw this earlier as well. Fandul had to ban somebody for heckling Gabby Thomas

at a track event. Are you serious? All right, look. Now, I'm sure this person, because they posted on X and they were doing it for clicks, and they're like posting a video of them heckling. First of all, all you clout chasers need to shut your bum ass up.

Shut your bum ass up, man. As Kendrick Lamar would say, JK, clout chasing hell of a disease, brother. But for those who don't know, Gabby Thomas is a track runner. A professional track runner. And now we got gambling in track two.

That's crazy. If you are a gambler and you're putting together a U.S. Women's Olympic Trial track parlay, it's time to seriously reexamine your life. Call the number. You need to call, yeah. 1-800 gambler. Seriously. I mean, you're out of control.

What is going on with you? And then buy tickets to go and, sit and then that's crazy. I can't believe that. And you know how hot it is must be at these trackmates to go do that? You must be filled with hate. Yeah, I don't even know. That doesn't make any sense.

I mean, look, yeah, hey, hey, folks. Hi, it's Ross Villarreal. And we need to have a serious discussion. About a lot of you folks out there, now I love gambling. I love going to Vegas. I love playing blackjack, the occasional craps.

I might even get inebrated and toss a quick hundred bucks into a slot machine and lose it in five seconds. So I'm with you when it comes to gambling. And sports gambling, woo, I love it. MLS unders, WNBA first miss shots. You're not sounding really convincing to not gamble down. No, like I said, I'm on board with gambling. And even if you want to make a women's track parlay, you know what? Whatever tickles your fancy.

I'm not going to kink shame your gambling habits. But if you're going to film yourself heckling a gold medalist track runner because you missed your degenerate track parlay, you need to grow up. So you can always gamble. You always gamble responsibly within your means. but to stoop so low as to heckle a track runner, that's a bridge too far.

Stay inside, folks. Stop clout chasing with Gabby. And if you're going to clout chase, you're clout chasing women's track? Figure it out, folks. Grow up in these trying times. Thank you for listening to Sports Talk 790. Almost set a tear.

Thank you. All right. We would have hit break there, but I got to tell you something very important, actually. Welcome back to the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Without Matt Thomas. He'll be back on a Friday with us here on Sports Talk 790. In the meantime, you have me. Dan Matthews hung out a little bit earlier.

Great guest. Brian Bogussevic. You have Adam Wexler joining us as well. I should, yeah, Sean Dubin going to join at 1.30 as well. Very good outing for him. 10 pitches, 8 strikes in that 7th inning roll. So it would be good to talk to Sean Dubin. He has been an important part.

It's funny. I was kind of talking about this earlier how every year there are some unsung heroes, whether it be for a couple of weeks, a couple of months of the season or the entire season, like last year, Renal Blanco. It wasn't unsung, but I mean, just kind of coming out of nowhere, help holding the glue together for the Astros. Where would they have been without him,

especially down the stretch when they won the American League West? And after the trade for Yusay, Kakucci and battling and fighting off the Seattle Mariners for the Division Crown, you know, you've had JP France as well, be a guy who factors in and holding the glue together for a rotation for a couple of months here and there. Brad Peacock, like just random guys and random things that happen. on any given year. Last year, it was Taylor Scott, who unfortunately has been DFAed this year. And right now, the hot hand and a guy who's really been helping out, Sean Dubin for the Stro's.

0.77ERA on the season. He will join us coming up at 130. Phone lines open at 713, 212-790, 7-1-3-212-5-790. Astros bullpen took a hit after giving up a lot of runs over the last weekend to the Tampa Bay raise. think going into yesterday, it would be better today because what? It was three innings of shutout ball from the bullpen yesterday. But they were like ninth in ERA. All season long, they've been around first or second in that neighborhood. But the bullpen's been great.

And that's one of the question marks that we had sitting in spring training in West Palm Beach with myself and Matt Thomas talking about, you know, storylines for the season, expectations, question marks. and bullpen depth after Brian Abrayu and Josh Hader with Ryan Presley being dealt away I was one of the question marks

Dubin's been good of course as we know for the most part Brian King has been very good as well other guys in that bullpen for the stroes have stepped up and it's been despite a bad weekend one of the better bullpins in baseball

so it has just been fantastic to see how effective a lot of these guys have been, including a guy like Brian King, who did have a bad out and you gave up five run runs, but still has a pretty good ERA on the season. Stephen O'Kert, other guys stepping up and doing well for the Stroes. This bullpen has been really good

and an important part where the Astros are. And that just kind of begs the question now, 60 games into 162 game season, where you do have right now, by the way, the Astros with the weakest schedule remaining in baseball in terms of opponents win percentage. 466 is their opponent's win percentage.

Now, that does factor in six games against the Colorado Rockies. It's funny, when you go through this list of teams with the worst schedule or or weakest schedule remaining, everybody's got at least six to 10 games remaining against Colorado Rockies. That's obviously weighing down the opponent

win percentage greatly. But they've got a series left with the White Sox, a couple more left with the Pirates, 11 games left with the horrible A's. This Astros team, which right now is in first place, right now has the best run differential

in the division. They're in the lead right now. They're in the catbird seat. As far as the Mariners' remaining schedule, they only have three games left with the Rockies. they are 20th in terms of remaining schedule strength for the opponents. That's also going to factor in that the angels aren't very good.

The A's aren't very good. That's going to bog down your opponent's win percentage. But hey, you got a lot of games left against those teams. Do the Astros. You have to take care of business. You have to keep this pitching glued together with Lance McCullors Jr. Coming up huge with back-to-back quality starts. And then Hunter Brown and Farmer Val does have to continue to be great.

I mean, you're at the point where you don't need them. It's not a must-were. situation for them every single time they go out, but it's important. You need to have it because Lance McCullors Jr. is a provisional member of a circle of trust. Back-to-back

quality starts looking good, but you know it's always going to be hanging over his head. That will be the injury question. Bullpen's been good. Yordon Alvarez, TBD, and the bats have been middle of the pack. 14th out of 30 right now

in team OPS. And that's fine. They could stick around 10 to 10 to 12, hopefully, maybe even creep into the top 10 and the pitching continues to do his thing. They're going to win this division and I'm really not too concerned about the other teams long term. As long as everything holds together, especially as it relates to health and starting pitching health. All right, 713-2125-790 is the phone number here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. 713-21-5-7-92-922-12-0-1-NH-down. What's happened to lunchttimers? Hello.

And welcome in to our number three of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. We've got Adam Wexer coming up at 1 o'clock. Thanks to Dan Matthews, Brian Bogussevich, joining us earlier. Might have a little conversation for you there as well. From that, some good stuff with Bogie. But right now it is Jonathan Allen with another additional. edition of all the top sports news items of the day, we call it the news at noon. My name is Jonathan Allen and my friends call me.

You got to turn the music down a little bit. Sorry. Thank you. I was going to. It's okay. I'm making him nervous, guys. It's okay. I just wanted to start off.

And of course, we have to talk about Lance McCullors and his amazing six-inning stretch, getting in and out of jams and just working his way out. And it's just amazing to see. All right, Gonzalez on first. there's two outs. Here's the 3-2 to Henry Davis. Breaking pitch. Got him.

Strike three. Ticked it. Just barely. And Carotini's able to hold on. That's the fourth strikeout for McCollors. And we'll go to the fifth inning now in Pittsburgh. Astros, nothing in the Pirates, nothing. Just a little highlight from him.

And Ross, I've been hearing and I've been here for a couple months now, everybody that calls in or you guys talking about it, it sounded like he was never going to get back to he was. I'm seeing an athlete going deep in this bag to help a team, a struggling bullpen that, you know, it's been an injury right now with Blanco and that's good. Well, Jonathan, I hope you should remember. There was a certain host on this show who said they're staying on Lance McCullough,

Colors Jr. Island. And he was going to be an important contributor. Now, he could go out there in his neck start and get hurt, so we'll see what happens there. But just like with the Jake Myers fan club, when he's sitting 300 in May, we got to take credit where it's there. We got to take credit when it's here, too. with Lance McCuller's Jr. Yeah, look, and I understand a lot of it was hate and a lot.

It's just, it's just the nature of fandom is to complain and to make jokes, especially on social media. You know, if we see 10 positive remarks and one negative, we're like, oh, everybody's so negative in social media, and it's not really as much as we think. But yeah, a lot of callers, and rightfully so, with the major injuries that Lance McCullors Jr. has suffered over the last couple of years. very, very pessimistic that he would continue. He would be able to be even in the lineup and be effective

and be on the mound for the Astros. So is he injury prone? Of course he has that label, but if he can keep this up, 102 pitches, two starts ago, 96 pitches yesterday against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Hopefully he will be able to keep this up and be an effective starter because it's much needed for the Astros right now with this. rotation and the state of it is with Wesnesey and Renal Blanco going down

with Tommy John surgery. What else you got, Jonathan? And you know, just before we leave the local 9, just wanted everybody to know. Look at you with the peppering and the baseball terminology with the local 9. I go. I take notes. I take notes back here. That's what I'm talking about.

Let's go. So just even American League with all the bullpen issues, injuries, and you know, the back and forth on what's going on with the Astros, a couple months ago, they couldn't get a win back to back. Now we're getting three wins back to back, back to back, and then they're sitting third in the American, the American League, and of course now sitting first, as you've heard, in the American League West. And just to move on and we'll be done with Local 9.

I will comment real quick on the, yeah, being first in the West, it's good, 60 games into the season now. I agree with, I think Matt was it to tell the truth on Monday. He had the opinion that it's going to be probably the Mariners and the Astros battling out. I mean, it is still early. I don't think angels are going to be in there. The Rangers could become a factor at some. point, but they just continue not to hit. Even though they fire the hitting coach, fire the hitting coach, and then everything's going to be alright.

They've been horrible. Yeah, the angels are going to continue to be bad. But the bats, I mean, they've had some good moments for the Rangers since firing their hitting coaches, but it's also been a bag of meh for their bats as well. So it's not just fire the hitting coaches and everything's

going to turn around. That's just quite frankly low hanging fruit from some of the fan base. But I I digress. We'll see where the Rangers are, but the Astros right now in first place. Go ahead, John. And, you know, just moving on to the NBA, it's not too much about, except for rocket rumors and trade rumors with, you know, everything else. But if you guys haven't heard from yesterday, the head coach of the Knicks got fired right after they lost. And he brought their team to the Eastern Conference for the first appearance in 25 years.

Ross, you tell me more about that. I don't understand what's up with the NBA as a culture, with these, the management, all that stuff. It's kind of weird because as I was, and I was like 13 or so, like it wasn't like this. It wasn't like, you know, you wouldn't train TV and see coaches get fired like that. Well, the funny thing is, it's almost a death knell for you. If you win NBA coach of the year, which Tom Tibado did win, I believe in 2021. I'll go and look it up. You're about to be fired like within the next few years.

Let me, let's go back to some of the- That happened with the Pistons coach that went to Sons, right? That's what it started in. Let's see. Mike, okay, let's go start with 2018. Dwayne Casey won coach of the year with the Raptors. And I believe he was fired that season, right? He was. He was. He was. Yes. Mike Boone Holzer with the Bucks, then won coach of the year.

These are the last several coaches since 2018. Budenholter, coach of the year with the bucks. He's been fired twice. Nick Nurse, coach of the year with the Raptors. He's been fired. He's with the Sixers now. Tom Debitoo with the Knicks, fired. Monti Williams with the sons. Fired.

Mike Brown with the Kings fired. Then the last two are two of the best teams in basketball. Mark Dignold with the Thunder and then Kenny Atkinson won it with a huge season with the Cleveland Cavaliers. But by the way, he was fired by the New Jersey Nets or were they Brooklyn still by then? Yeah, the Brooklyn Nets and it was a horrible coach. All of a sudden he's coach of the year. It's just kind of funny to me. I feel like there is a – the biggest difference to me in NBA coaching is the playoffs when you're making

in game and in series adjustments. But regular season, for the most part, to me, it largely comes down to the players. And it's just funny that all those guys that I ran through, every coach who won coach of the year from 17 to 23, that's not ancient history. It's back to like eight years ago. They've all been fired.

That's just pretty insane to me. So that's what it is. it's almost come to the point where it's like in European soccer, I don't know how much you follow that, JK. I'm a little bit. Okay. They fire coaches like, they go through them like you go through rolls of toilet paper. It's like anytime, unless it's one of the

heritage all-time great coaches like Pep Guardioli at Manchester City. Well, even Carlo Angelo Ancelotti from Real Madrid was let go after this year, after winning the champions like basically every season, but they finished second this year and it's like, all right, you're out. It's insane.

Not quite to that level with NB. but they just, they just shift. It's like a shift change in hockey. They're shift changing coaches all the time. It's ridiculous. But also on the other side of the coin, I do think the Tom Tibido act can wear thin as a 67-year-old cantankerous grumpy dude.

That runs his starters into the ground and his act can wear thin. His very serious basketball, unfortunately this day and age, for whatever, you know, you have to say, unfortunately, you have for the most part coaches who are buddy-buddy with the players.

Now, Emaidoca isn't like that here in Houston. Not at all. But also, you don't have a bunch of superstar players. It's like, Jalen Green, you want to act like you're a superstar and not listen to Coach Edoca. Shut your bum ass up. Like, you don't have guys, you do have to have guys that buy in, but you also, you know, James Hardin and Emeodoka

probably would have been like oil and water. But James Hart has been like oil and water with many his coaches. But you get what I'm saying. It's a star driven league. Coach Udoka, thankfully one of the outliers right now. Hopefully he can stay that way. He does have the respect of his players, but sometimes that kind of act, hard-nosed

taskmaster act can wear thin on NBA players and I think that happened in New York. Yeah, and just last thing for NBA, because I just saw this thank you for dance shooting me this headline, but Adam Silver came out today saying that next year's

All-Star game, he wants to future a team USA versus team world. And I feel like that's not going to do much for the All-Star if you ask me of my opinion. But that's what he's saying to do and get more viewerships and all that stuff. And I don't know, man. You tell me, Ross, I don't think the All-Star game is anything how it used to be when Kobe and all of them were playing. Yeah. Well, also, even back to the day, like in the 80s and stuff, the guys played hard.

But now they make, you know, if you're making $50 million. a year. Why do you have to go in an exhibition game that means nothing? Why are you going to go out there and risk injury, even turning an ankle and missing a couple of weeks and stuff like that? And you're trying to focus on the playoffs. And in the NBA, it's all about ring culture is what it's become. Rings, rings, rings, rings, you don't want a ring, you suck. Oh, you don't have a ring. Oh, you suck.

Oh, you only have two rings. You're the worst. It's just all so ring culture. So everybody's focused on staying healthy for the playoffs. And that's what it's become. draft kings put out a potential starting five for USA versus the world

they got Anthony Davis LeBron James, Aunt Edwards Donovan Mitchell and Steph Curry versus Wimby Janice Niccoliokic Luca Donchich and Shay Gilges Alexander I got Team World there That's exactly what I'm going to say

And by the way Joel Embed was playing for Team USA in the Olympics But he is born Was he born in Cameroon? Or? Yeah. Cameroon. He was born in Cameroon. Yeah, yeah. So would he be USA or would be the world?

Or he would have a flex choice. You remember he picked the Olympics. Yeah, because he's United States citizen. I think that's lame. He's to go to Cameroon. It's like Akim Olajuwon, I believe, played for Team USA in 1996. Even though he was Nigerian, he was United States citizens. So I don't know.

How about this? You got a three-team tournament. You got the flex guys? Dual citizens versus the world. Versus the United States. Round Robin tournament. Round Robin tournament. I'm just kidding.

No, put them all in the back. No, put two, three, four baskets on the floor. No, I don't know. They're going to have to come up with some kind of gimmick. I think initially my interest will be high in something like this. But this is what's going to happen. I'm like, oh, yeah, U.S. Avers of the world. This sounds great.

Then Sunday comes around. Excuse me. Then Sunday comes around and I'm going to forget about it and not even turn it on. And I think what Adam Silverstein to do is showcase the world skill and across the world and say hi NBA has all this world talent because the world is catching up in basketball but I feel like

I don't know I don't know I don't really like that idea but I'm not going to get to sit too much I'll have too much more than yeah yeah we'll see it looks like the world would be a favorite right now all right we are going to take a break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross thank you for the news yeah I'm sorry go ahead

go ahead and lock it out Jonathan my name is JK and that's your news oh yeah look at this the budding radio professional folks. Jonathan Allen with the news at noon. We got Adam Wexler coming up at 1 o'clock. We also have Sean Dubin coming up at 1.30. You guys want to get in. You can. 713, 2125. 790. 7.13 2.1-2-5-790. Dana Brown earlier today with an update on Yordon Alvarez, Lance McCullors, Erigetti, Luis Garcia, and more. We'll bring you a little bit of that. When we come back here on the Matt Thomas show with Rosson Sports Talk 790. Adam Wexler coming up at 1 o'clock. Helping me out. Matt Thomas is out on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Ross, I'm with you. Flying solo until then. So if you want to get in and be the co-host for a couple of minutes, we can go back and forth, talk some sports. We're talking Astros. We've been talking, well, we haven't talked much about the Texans OTAs, but they have some stuff going on over there. If you want to get in on that as well, phone lines open 713-212-5-790. If you have not,

heard also mark stein NBA reporter floating out that the Knicks are quote intrigued by the idea of Jason Kidd or Emia doka like you can be intrigued all you want I mean unless you're really just going to send

a massive draft package or something he's under contract for two more years and it's not like draft picks are going to be very good from the Knicks with how good they are and how good they would be with Emio Doka at the helm it just it seems like a non-starter. It seems like a beginning of June. Nothing story. You can be intrigued all you want by

Aemio Doka. I think Rafael Stone's going to pick up the phone because he says he'll, he always says, I'll always pick up the phone. He might pick up the phone on that, but then he's going to hang up rather quickly on the New York Knicks if they try to call with all that BS. But Gerson Roses is the GM over there and does have a history with Rolfel Stone and the Houston Rockets. But who is the something Rose, the Knicks president of team opera. Leon Rose. Sounds like an R&B singer from the 80s. Leon Rose, going to play the hits, and then he's also

going to try to trade for E-mate, Udoka. 713, 212-579 of the phone number, as I said, if you want to get to anything. Mentioned that earlier today, we had Dana Brown on every Wednesday, 930. Look, we are lucky to be the home of your Astros. We do really appreciate having them, and we're lucky the access that they give us with great interviews.

with guys who are our pretty forthcoming, for the most part, unless it comes to injuries. But anyways, we get Joe Espada, 1230 Tuesdays here on Sports Talk 790. Dana Brown 9.30 on Wednesday. So I wanted to bring you guys some of the answers from Dana Brown and everything going on with the Astros. As they got the victory yesterday, 3-0 against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Of course, we have been talking a lot about the Yordaun saga. If somehow you've been living under Iraq, it was. a muscle strain. Then

apparently he was trying to build back from that. Re-injured it during BP. Turns out there was a fracture. Fracture is 60% healed according to Dana Brown from over the weekend. But where do we go from here and update on Yordon Alvarez

and his injury? Yeah, so he's just going to continue to rest. You know, he'll, he's not going to hit and he's not going to throw. But he'll continue to rest there, but he'll run. He can do

baseball activities in terms of shagging fly balls, but no picking up the bat, let the hand rest, and it should heal, it was at 60 percent healed, and so you know, he's progressing. Okay, so he's still going with the,

so the update, we were wondering, like, we've been talking about this. If it's been a month and he's at 60%, what percent is he going to be at in a week? really it feels like with injuries like going from 20% to 80% is easier than going from 80% to 100%. It's the last percent that you have to build up to where you're feeling 100%. So he's going with 60% and he said it a few days ago. Obviously it's not like he's, well, he is the general manager and talking to players and he's around the team and all that type of stuff.

It's not like he's getting minute by minute updates. So maybe we can take that with a grain of salt and hope that things are progressing for Yordon Alvarez and he can get back in the lineup. I've taken the position like, okay, just kind of wake me up when he's back in the lineup. It's been such a saga. We've been dealing with the Astros.

We did it last year. And I said as much last year as well. It's like the everyday Kyle Tucker update. Is it a bruise? Is it a fracture? It turns out it's a fracture. And they didn't want to release that until Chandler Rome was going to public with it after talking to multiple

league sources. It just became a whole fiasco. I really think that it was a hand fracture the entire time. Either Yordon was trying to push through it and not really trying to get a doctor seen. Dana Brown coming out and saying it's 60% of a hand fracture. Right.

For him to say that means that maybe they knew about it before. I can believe that. But we did have Brian Bogusevich on. He talked about the same thing that he had a hand injury and then imaging x-rays with the swelling. kind of puffing everything up and distorting the picture, a little bit tougher to find the fracture and then a couple of weeks.

So it could be true. At the end of the day, it's like, why would you lie? If you just say hand soreness and a muscle strain rather than a fracture, who cares? Just go out there and rip the band-aid off. It's like, you know what? Just come clean and then go from there. It's like when you get an F on your report card with your parents, You're going to make it worse if you lie.

You try to cheat. You try to like turn the F into a B or if you say, oh, the dog ate my report card. Eventually, parents are going to find out. Eventually, because there's a lot of good beat reporters in this town. The truth will come out. The truth will set you free, Houston Astros. So it's like, that's why I'm trying, I'm trying my damnedest to believe that they're not out and out lying. because it doesn't make sense.

It doesn't make sense for an organization to say, oh, no, guys, he's got a fracture. Let's just tell him muscle strain and hope for the best. No, then it becomes a longer story, and then you just get egg on your face when it does become public. It's ridiculous. Doesn't make sense.

Dana Brown, have you learned anything from this? Would you handle injuries any different going forward? I think one of the things that, you know, we're going to do here more is get more imaging. you know, sometimes we get this imaging early in the injury. And, you know, there's so much inflammation and fluid on some of these injuries. And so, you know, the thing here is if we could continue to do multiple imaging, and then maybe you get a better look and a little more clear view of what the actual injury is.

And I think that's one of the things that we're going to do more of going forward. So there you go. They're learning. That's good. like that they're kind of coming clean. They were more forthcoming with details when it comes to the Zach DeZenzo injury, if you had not heard. It's like a capsule strain, and he will go under, they're going to rest him for two weeks

and then undergo further imaging from there. I'm sorry, capsule sprain, I should say, in his left hand. So he's going to rest and undergo reimaging. Like, that's more forthcoming than the Astros have been about an injury recently. And so, yeah, they're learning maybe not about rushing guys, maybe about getting imaging at the right time. So that's good. I mean, you just don't want a situation where players are getting frustrated

and we haven't heard anything like that. And I'm just kind of thinking out loud on that. But it would be nice if there would just be a little bit more transparency. And I agree with something that Brian Bogussevich had said and something that we've brought up a couple of times, we're not necessarily owed anything. It's not like, we demand to know. the specific injury and timeline

down to the hour right now. Tell us right now. No, we're not really that. But it is a baseball team. And injuries have been part of the sport and part of public knowledge for basically as long as it's been around. And you can either not be forthcoming

and not say much or you can be. But when things turn out to be completely false, that's when I take issue. When you're lying about a spring or a bruise for Kyle Tucker and the only reason you make it public that it's a fracture is because it's about to be reported publicly. Yeah.

That's an I just don't get it for me. All right, quick break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. You guys want to get in. You can't. Where do you stand on all this injury stuff? Is it just not any of our business anyways or the ashore's fumbling this one? We also have to get updates from Dana talking about starting pitching depth, asked him about trade market right now. It's June. Obviously, things will heat up more in July and later with teams that decide to become sellers. But with this third wildcard, more teams want to be buyers. So we'll hear that from Dana Brown. We also have Adam Wexer coming up at 1 o'clock. And we have you as well, 713-215-790. 7-1-3-2-125-79.

Matt Thomas Show with Ross rolls along. Middle of hour number three. We'll be joined by Sean Dubin in our number four, as he was very efficient last night for the Houston Astros. Ten pitches, eight of them for strikes, one inning pitched, no runs given up. He was a part of a good pitching performance. Now, okay, we do have to qualify. It's the Pittsburgh Pirates.

But hey, they're major leaguers too. They might be 27th in Team OPS, but Astros with back-to-back shutouts against the Rays and the Pirates, this pitching has obviously been the backbone of their success this year. 33 and 27 on the year and now a half game in front of the Seattle Mariners in first place in the American League West. So one hint given up, but still very efficient from Sean Dubin, a 0.77 ERA on the year. He will be joining us here on the Matt Thomas Show. with Ross, but without Matt Thomas, but with Adam Wexer coming up at 130.

Speaking of Wex, he'll be coming on at 1 o'clock. Phone lines open for you at 713, 212, 5790. 713212-5790. Lance McCuller's Jr. had the start. We've been talking a lot about him today, and it is because, I mean, to me, maybe it's just me, but I just find it such a fascinating story to miss all this time, to fight his way back. to get on the mound.

And the last hurdle, all these hurdles that he's cleared, right? My arm, I can, you know, lift a coffee cup. Now I can grip a ball and throw. Now I can play catch. But now I'm throwing off of a mound. Now I'm throwing BP. Now I'm throwing live BP. And it's to this, all the way to rehabbing.

And the last hurdle that he has to get over and will have to consistently be over is getting outs at the Major League. level, despite a bit of dip in velocity from the last time that he was out. Still running some sinkers up at about 93 miles an hour, but for the most part, sitting around 91, 90,

but getting out, getting swings and misses. And if he can do that consistently, that's it. Like, he's back. He's not there yet. It's been back-to-back quality starts. It's been four good starts that the Astros have won in all of those games. We're not good,

but solid enough. After the disaster. Speaking of bumps in the road and hurdles a climb. The disaster against the Cincinnati Reds, not even a month ago. To where we were thinking like, how much longer is this guy going to even be on the team? And he is where he is now. Feels good. Now, he could very well go out and get Sheldon his next start. And then we're kind of back to the drawing board and down from scratch as far as our confidence level in him.

But 19 strikeouts in two starts, both of them quality. pretty good stuff. I don't like he was like, you know, wheeling and dealing and completely shutting down the A's. He did give up three runs, but that also is the Sacramento A, sorry, the Okramento A's. One of the better offenses in baseball, top ten in terms of team OPS. But really looking good in the last start, 102 pitches and 96 pitches in his last start. So that begs the question of something we've been kind of wondering about and talking about. Starting pitching depth, where are the Astros now?

As I mentioned the last segment, we played a little bit of Dana Brown, joins the Sean Salisbury show Wednesdays at 930, asked him about that with McCullors doing what he is doing, how that helps, but still down the road, especially if you get closer to the trade deadline, where are you going to be? Are you going to keep going with Colton Gordon and Ryan Gusto?

Spencer Arredgeti sounds like he's a ways away as far as starting pitching. Can you just rely on those guys to hold the glue together the rest of the season until Arrogati gets back? And then it's no guarantee that everybody's just going to stay healthy. It's tough. So here's Dana Brown on Lance McCullors, Jr. And the starting pitching depth and possibly looking externally via trade in the starting pitching market.

Yeah, Lance has been outstanding, you know, over the last five starts. We've won, you know, four. We're four and O in his last five starts. He's been thrown the ball very well, 29 strikeouts and over 20 innings, right at 20 innings. And so he's been really good. I'm on record always saying that we're always in the market for pitching. We know 162 games.

It's a very long season. So you always have to have an open mind to acquire pitching because, you know, the fact of the matter is the season is so long, things happen, guys get hurt. And so you're always in the market. It's very difficult. It's very early right now. Not many teams are sellers. It's still early in the process.

You know, but we won't miss any stone. on term, you know, we won't leave any stone or in turn because, you know, we're always in the market for pitching. So if there's something out there that makes sense for us, we'll definitely be active. All right. There you go. Something makes sense. We will definitely be active. And that makes sense. That's the right response from the Astros general manager. It's like, Dana's going to come on here and be like, eh, we're good. Gasto Gordon. And McCullochee should be fine. Whatever. I'm kicking my feet up. I'm eating a bag of Doritos calling it a day. we're going to go ahead and take a half day today go get a liquid lunch no he's not going to do that

he's going to be somebody who's going to be active and having conversations and looking at their teams and trying to figure things out but the reality is is June 4th and we are basically almost two months a little short of two months away from the trade deadline so the Astros have to hold this glue

together as is right now and that would be until Araggetti into a less extent Luis Garcia could come back. But right now, Lensbekellers Jr., last four starts. 2.21 ERA, and he has been looking good. Six walks, that's fine, 29 strikeouts in the last 20 and third innings.

His strikeouts per nine, very good. Walk numbers, getting lower since the first two starts that he came. He walked three in the first start, first two starts, that he had, including that disaster against Cincinnati when it was seven earned runs given up. And there's also a, I've talked about this a little bit on the Matt Thomas show, it's a metric called Field Independent Pitching. For example,

let's just say one guy goes out there and he gives up 10 rockets hard hit balls, but they happen to hit the gloves of all the fielders. Well, he got 10 outs, but still at the end of the day, if you keep giving up a bunch of hardy contact, eventually you're going to be giving up runs.

So field independent pitching it takes out that and it just looks at like hard hit contact, walks, all that type of stuff. And his number has still been very good there, 2.68, which kind of correlates to ERA. So that would be a really good ERA. That's a really good field independent pitching. So I say all that to say this, it's not like he's been getting lucky. It's not like he's been giving up dozens of rockets and the other team is just having bad luck and he should have given up like 20 earned runs.

According to that field independent pitching metric, he's been good, it's legit. and hopefully it can keep happening for the Astros because they do have to hold the glue until Arrogati and Luis Garcia come back. Here's Dana Brown on updates on both of those guys. Yes. First on Arrogati, you know, Arrogati feels really good. He's, you know, he's throwing flat ground right now. He's also biting at the bit. I mean, we have to slow him down because he's ready to cut it loose.

And so he's got to go through a full spring training. So we have to gradually bring them back because you don't want to see any other injury, you know, other than the thumb because guys start to come back too fast. You know, they can hurt their oblique. There's other things that you have to worry about. So you have to go through a full spring training. And yeah, Garcia, he's going to be throwing live BP's at the end of June. And so we do expect him to get back sometime in August. Okay. So a full spring training on the way for Erigetti, who is basically throwing off of flat ground.

And that's one of the things. It's kind of a blessing and a curse in a way. But overall, it's more of a blessing. These Astros players who want to rush back who are competitors, they want to A, play through pain. And then B, when they get injured, they want to rush back because they're competitors. They live and breathe baseball. This is their life. That's where they want to be. I think that starting with Jeff Luno and the culture that he built with this Astros team, That's been one of their greatest feathers in the cap is that all these players, and it's no accident they've had this winning culture that they've had with all these guys, the Alex Spregmans, the Jose Altuvarez, the Justin Verlanders,

now the Spencer Argettys, the Jordon Alvarez, whoever, of guys who are just basically born ball players. And they want to be out there. And Lance McCuller Jr., I'll throw into that as well. And it's like, if he didn't love baseball, he wouldn't be here. He made a lot of money. He's got a coffee business and does whatever else he does. He doesn't have to be out there throwing a baseball, but he's got something to prove and he loves baseball.

And these guys out there do. And Erigetti is like that too. He's of that ilk. And that's great. But also, yeah, when you're in a situation where he's rushing himself back from injury, hey, man, you've got to slow things down here. Alex Bregman was always like that as well and other guys. So good thing to have, good quality to have.

Overall, a positive. But when you're talking about them kind of coming back from injury can be a little bit of a negative. But Aragutti having to go through a full spring training sounds like August is the target for Luis Garcia, who will be throwing a live BP by the end of the month of the month, according to Astro's general manager, Dana Brown. All right, quick break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. I am the Ross part of it. You can get in as well if you'd like 713, 21, 2, 2, 5. 790, 713, 212, 5790.

Adam Wexler coming up at 1 o'clock. Sean Dubin at 1.30 here on Sports Talk 790. Your home for the Shros. Welcome back. The Matt Thomas show with Ross. Matt out today and tomorrow. Ross via Rio with you. Got Sean Dubin coming up at 1.30.

We have 1 o'clock. Adam Wex are going to join for the hour. Appreciate him hanging out. You guys can get in real quick if you'd like. 713. 212-5-790, 7-13-212-5-790. Mentioned Tom Tibido as a possible candidate for the head coach of the New York. Excuse me, Tom Tibido out, and then Mark Stein floating out that they would be interested in Jason Kidd and or IMA Udoka.

Jonathan, did you see also who has volunteered, a former NBA All-Star has volunteered to be the next coach of the New York Knicks? volunteered? Wait, wait, wait, let me guess. Former NBA All-Star? Former NBA All-Star. He also is a New York Native. Okay. Is it part of, would I know? I think you know who this is. NBA All-Star,

and he's played on the Knicks? Yes, he also told a story about when he was young. He also was, yeah, no, did he play? I don't think he played for the Knicks, but he's from New York. And he also famously told a story about how, where he was playing pickup ball as a youth, and

there was an argument in the middle of the pickup pickup game. Somebody broke off a table leg, wooden table leg, stabbed the other guy in the chest and killed him. I speak of meta, world peace. Okay. Also known, now he's known as

Meta Sandofford Artest. What is this? He changed his name again. He changed his name again. Ronald William Artes, Jr. also known as meta world peace also apparently known as meta sandiford artest one of the craziest human beings but seems like actually really nice guy is almost like a precursor to draymond like he would get on the court and crazy stuff would happen but in off the court he was like a reserved quiet like yeah how's ever you know i'm a meta world peace guys so he was the kawai linderer for drayman yeah but kai lernard at least isn't like a dirty player he's just really quiet and has an awkward death ha ha ha ha ha ha Thank you. All right, Kauai. So what do you think? Meta World Peace as the New York Knicks coach.

I'm on board. Get your filthy mitts off of Imeudoka. Nix. No, you don't get to come up here and be like, oh, well, we're big, bad north. We are the New York Knicks. And we're going to take your coach, Houston. No, first of all, we beat you in the 94 finals. You haven't won a championship since 1972 or whatever it was

when Clyde Fraser actually had hair. And then you've been irrelevant for like 50 years. Yeah, you're built up. Yeah, you're a big brand. Yes, ABC, and ESPN, we're wishing that you would be in the finals because you bring the big market. But no, get off.

Rafael Stone's going to hang up on you. Shut your bum ass up, New York, Knicks. You don't get to get the crown jewel of this rocket's comeback. And that would be, I would say, Emodoca, it all starts with him. Because, look, I mean, yeah, Al-Prin-Shingon was an all-star player this year,

but also his field goal percentages have gone down three straight years, and he was very good in the playoffs, but the efficiency, offensive efficiency, was lacking to a degree. And so outside of him, there's no current all-star players, but you had a really good team, 52 wins, I would imagine, even with this story getting floated out, you'll probably hear very soon some sort of agreement to an extension,

and then who knows what will happen, because it's crazy in the NBA. We went through the list earlier of NBA coaches of the year. Basically, if you end up NBA coaches of the year, you might as well start, like, planning your retirement. You're going to get fired. It's just unbelievable standards for the country. Yeah, unless your name is Steve Kerr.

And even then, I mean, Rick Carlisle, by the way, what he's doing, leading this Indiana Pacers team to the finals. What a job that he's done. Of course, we know you predicted that, Jonathan. and you had, you said it was going to happen. So you believed in Rick Carl all the entire time. I saw him last year. Celtics knew they were in trouble, even though they swept them.

Because Halliburton got hurt in that series last year, right? That's the season, one of those few seasons I actually watched, like, every game. Okay, that's good. I like watching every NBA playoff game or as much as I can. Now into the NBA finals, which starts tomorrow. But we kind of ran through the list. It's like Tom Tibado, Monty Williams, Mike Brown, Nick Ners, a couple of others. Like the last several, outside of the last several, outside of the last,

last two, Kenny Atkins and Mark Degnell of the, you know, the Cavaliers and the Thunder. And who knows? Cavaliers fall short another year. Kenny Ackinson could very well be out. Seriously. That's where it is. Like, we didn't win a championship. Oh, well, time to go. That's the ring culture of the NBA.

You're the New York Knicks. You've got a guy who's won coach of the year who, I mean, was backed by the president, Leon Rose, backed by Jalen Brunson, at least publicly. Perhaps privately, we don't know. Could have been something else. But two time coach of the year. We're twice,

twice in your career. Tom Tibado, they said, this guy is the best coach in the NBA. Let's give him this honor and this huge award that honors him and puts him down in history as one of the best coaches of that year. He's done it

twice and well, both places fired him. Chicago Bulls and then he was with the Timberwolves. Somebody else tweeted that. I was funny. Like, Carl Anthony Towns got Tibado fired twice. I did see that. Hey, come on.

Come on, Cat. What's going on? So, I don't know what's going to happen on with the New York Knicks, but keep your mitts off the rockets. Of course, there have been stories floated about them and possibly things heating up with Kevin Durant. We'll see what happens there. I saw somebody mentioning this on Twitter, and I agree. Unfortunately, I don't remember the source of it. But basically, if Kevin Durant came to Houston, it would be, in all likelihood, not costing you an arm and a leg.

because the market is apparently cooling on him, but then it also wouldn't be long-term. You're not going to be tied or married to Kevin Durant for like five years. Just somebody who can come in and close games and be that alpha dog and take over at the end, especially as a bucket getter. And could it also be the business side? They just need to bring more tickets and...

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't... Like James Hardin was back then. You could bring that angle to it, But I don't think that they would make the decision. I think if Rafael Stone and the Rockets organization makes the move for Kevin Durant, it will be for on-court success. And I think they know that on-court success brings ticket sales. I don't know.

I'd have to go look at the Rockets' average attendance the last couple of years. But it's been way up, at least from last year than it was the previous years. I have to go look that up, but we can take a break in a little bit. But yeah, average attendance way up for the Rockets. Let's see. Two to, oh, no. Oh, this is, no, I need an average. This ESPN thing is broken.

It says everybody's average attendance is zero. That is not accurate. ESPN, give me some better attendance numbers. All right, I'll have to go look that up at some point. But the average home attendance year by year, certainly it feels like it went up last year and upticked after okay now this no I'm not paying for you full access account Statista

never mind all right I wouldn't figure this out this is disaster you know what I want to apologize for us this is what happens this is why I let Matt Thomas talk and then I'll Google something and then we'll go from there but that's all right so we'll figure it out I'm sure it's an uptick and attendance for the rockets in the last

couple of years and that will continue to happen as long as you win games and that's it yeah star power would be nice as well with Kevin Durant but I don't I wouldn't think that'd be factoring in their decision They're looking to improve on the court more than anything else because they were a two-seed. I know they're out in the first round, but by definition, you're a contender if you're the two-seed in your conference. Even if Steph Curry kills you in a seven-game series, like he's been doing basically the last decade.

And he gets hurt. And then he gets hurt from the next year. So you could have been in the Western finals against the Oklahoma City Thunder because I think they would have beat the Timberwolves. And I'm sad again. All right. Thank you. Time for a break. Appreciate that.

You know who's going to lift our spirits? Adam Wixler. He is coming up next. We also will have Sean Dubin coming up at 130. It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross without Matt Thomas. Guys want to get in. Phone lines are open. 713-2125790.

7-13-212-5-790. Yes, it is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Yes, it is our number four of the program. And yes, it is without Matt Thomas. Ross, Vier, we out with you for another hour ahead of, I mean, just a fantastic smashing program. They call it the A team. It's with Adam Clantin. The other half of that is Adam Wexler, who is graciously joining me for this hour. Wex, thank you for coming in. I appreciate you. You got a little five o'clock shadow going on these days. Is this out of laziness, or you're going

full beard on us? Not pure laziness in that I'm actually trimming up a little bit, keep it looking all right. Just one of those things. How does your agent feel about this? My agent feels great about it. He's got me a TV gig each and every weekday afternoon. Everything's all good. Right, you're doing great. All right, Lex is here hanging out. We got Sean Dubin coming up at 130. You can get in at 713-213-212-5-790. So a lot stuff to get to. We've been talking, of course, a lot of Astros. Lance McCullors Jr. last night, six innings of a shutout ball. It's easy to say to me, I mean, judging by one guy got the loss, one guy got to win, Lance McCuller's Jr., better than Paul

What's up? Yep. Just like when Pat Mahomes and C.J. Stroud face each other. I mean, they're not ever on the field together, much like Lance McCullough's Jr. and Paul Skeens. The Chief's defense is what C.J. is up against. The Pirates offense is what Lance McCuller Jr. is up against. You know, Paul Skeen's got to face an Astro's offense that has now gone five consecutive games of scoring three runs or fewer. Three runs is their max?

Yeah. In the previous two games, they scored three runs. they lost. The two wins came when they scored two and one, but now in each of their last two games, they've not allowed the other team to score at all. So you win 100% of those games in Major League Baseball. Lance, regardless of the magnitude of the matchup, which he even acknowledged after the game, he's trying to get guys out, and for the second consecutive start, his stuff was better than the opposition could measure up with. Another 7Ks, had nine more whiffs, got 20 called strikes, and to me, that's kind of what stood out about this game.

In two strike counts, even on some full count pitches. A guy's thought his movement was going to take pitches out of the zone. And they were taking called third strikes that were painting black. Very good. Yeah. So the six shutout innings in the bullpen, which we'll get to, Sean Dubin and part of that coming up at 1.30. But I was asking this of Dan Matthews in the first hour.

So it's back-to-back quality starts. It's encouraging. I think it's like a 2.21 ERA in the last. last four starts since the disaster outing, not even a month ago. It's so funny. Like a month ago, we're like, all right, this guy's going to be off the team in three starts. Like, he can't do anything. Now we're talking about back-to-back quality starts, and it kind of begs the question that I was asking is, how we feel it?

You look at the probable pitchers, let's just say, you know, upcoming next weekend. Doesn't even matter really who the opponent is. I mean, let's see. Let's look at the old Astros' upcoming schedule, which, by the way, is the weakest in baseball in terms of opponent-winning percentage. Let's not go with Chicago. Let's go to like a middling team. Next week against the Minnesota Twins' home series at some point you see probable pitchers, oh, Lance McCuller Jr.

How we feel him? Yeah, 220 ERA, 221 ERA over four starts when each of the last two have been six-inning appearances. I think it's a pretty nice little package of games to look over. He's throwing pitches that hitters aren't hitting. He's got 29 strikeouts over those 20-and-a-third innings, which puts him first. in the majors over the last 19 days

in terms of strikeouts per nine inning. Wait, so he is better than Paul Skeens. Paul Skeens. Suck it, Skeens, you're terrible. Skeens is sitting at 10.05 strikeouts per nine in the same time period, four starts. Lance is at 14 plus. He's been incredible, and it was against the A's and now against the Pirates for these two starts,

but it also precedes those two starts. He's not, I wouldn't say he's figured anything out. What he's done is the execution. is now there. He's throwing more strikes. It's kind of the story of most of his career. I don't know of any pitch of the asteros have had for the last 10 years, from the

elite of elite to nasty unhittable relievers. I still think he might have more movement than any of them. His pitches don't go straight. And I think at the beginning of this season, and I think for much of his struggles during any of the

previous seasons, hitters are just being patient because, well, we're not hit it anyway and the odds of it staying in the zone aren't very good because there is so much movement and harnessing getting the movement to keep it a strike versus sending it way out of the zone i think that's difficult for someone with that much movement we've seen it with the other pitchers here and there like valdez will go out there and it's clear he has really good stuff but it can't get it in the zone it's just rarer for him because he's been able to get to that elite level and we've seen it in stretches for lance we've seen it now for the last two games

they can't hit his stuff very well. I gave up two singles. Yeah, that's the funny, you bring that up, and the funny thing is, and yeah, with pitchers with great stuff, it can be kind of a situation where almost they kind of don't know where it's going, so they're just going to throw out there and hope they get whiffs, and if not, they're going to rack up a lot of walks, and they're also going to rack up a lot of strikeouts,

and that brings me to who you were talking about, like best stuff in the last decade. Also, a guy with that type of issues and long hair, Spencer Arrogetti, comes to mind for me. Yeah, so young in his career, You never know how it plays out, but there were games during last season for sure where guys were just... I'm going to spin it as hard as possible. See where it goes.

I'm going to see where it goes. And the hitters eventually were like, so am I. I'm going to see where it goes rather than swinging at it because it's nasty. And give the Astros credit all the way through the developmental system. And for Lance, we're talking about 10 years plus as an Astros pitcher in the organization. There's some things that they clearly do to help augment that, but they find pitchers also. that have the ability to spin. It's why they add so many pitchers

who may or may not have found their role in other teams' rotations or other team's bullpen. Ryan Presley always comes to mind there. Phil Meaton, to a lesser degree. There are things that you find in pitchers, you meaning the Astros' organizational pitching system, this pitcher has this asset. Let's go out and harness it.

You say Kikuchi similarly. And he's actually pitched pretty well this year. I think we're paying the least amount of attention to him among the five Astros players that left this offseason. Cacucci, Verlander, Presley, Bregman, and Tucker. He plays for the Angels. I think we pay the least amount of attention to him. He's actually pitched very well this season for a team that's not even out of it completely yet,

and better than many have thought. There will be. I think they'll eventually be well about it. I'll go another one for you that popped up in my head. How about for a deep cut? Bud Norris. He had really good stuff, but he just couldn't throw strong. And then they made him a closer.

Was that in somewhere else? Was that Baltimore? It means you have to throw strikes or you cannot succeed. Hopefully they can't hit them. The Astros took care of it. Two games in a row. They got starts of six innings and were able to keep the shutout going over the final three. A similar combination of pitchers to get them there.

Sean Dubin, who you mentioned will talk to shortly, got the call in the seventh inning. Brayu and Hayter able to finish things off again. and it's talking about stuff, I think it's probably pretty clear. And I think you guys discussed it a little earlier over the course of the day. Josh Hader's stuff, quite clearly, at least the execution of it, seems a tick up, at least from last year. I think Hunter, if you're talking like Astros MVP's this year, Hunter Brown, one, I might put Josh Hater too. Maybe Essoc Paredes gets in there or somebody else, Jeremy Pena for sure. But Josh Hader needs to be up there.

They've got 33 wins. he's got 16 saves and a win. I think it's so vital, and I would agree, I would have a hard time not putting Josh Hader at the top of that list. For a team that's trying to get a few games over 500, trying to claim every win they can get when they give the ball to Josh Hater and it's winning time, meaning he's in a save situation, meaning they need three outs and they have the lead and he's got the ball.

He's 100%. Those are the games that those are stomach punch losses. Those are gut punch. Those are killers. Those are momentum killers. They are bad, you know, post game. Unhappy flight games when you don't come through, and he just keeps doing it.

They've got 33 wins this year. Almost half of them are games that they should have won, that he's personally closed out. That's huge. If they were 20 games over 500, it might not seem so large, but they're probably going to be in this situation, a race for the wild card or a race for the division title,

which they now lead, and they need them. The games you've outplayed the other team for eight innings, you'd like to figure those as wins, and he's made sure that those have been wins. And can we say kind of it's been almost quiet in a way? 16 holds for Brian Abraeu. And really the start of the season,

he was definitely going on the track of where he's been the last couple of years of basically pitching every other game for the Astros. 27 appearances in 60 games now. So he's still not far off that pace. But it's almost like you take that guy for granted at this point. He's going to go out there in the eighth inning. Yeah, maybe he'll give up the stray hit or hard hit contact. And he does give up some runs here and there.

But he just goes, if it, An eighth inning guy can be an innings eater. Like, that's what he is. Yeah, I don't think they've had to overuse him. Again, the games versus how many games the Astros have played seems a bit high with those 27 and 60. But even with a 167 ERA, which sounds phenomenal, that's great. I think the best way to describe his season is he's come out of the bullpen 27 times. And 25 of those 27 times he's not been scored on.

Wow. The only two times he's given up runs are the unfortunate two games they lost to Seattle. They blow up game where they had the 5-0 lead and then the 6-4 lead, and he came in in the ninth inning, gave up those three runs on that walk-off Mariners victory. And then when they were here at home, the lone game that the Mariners won, when he came in, gave up the triple and then the homer. That's his whole negative season. I just summed it all up in about 20 seconds.

We've been playing baseball for about two and a half months. Every other appearance has been a shutout appearance. That's crazy. That's why they pay you the big bucks, Adam Wexler. To uncover stuff like that, I appreciate you. Wow. Yeah, I didn't realize that. That's pretty insane.

And, well, it sounds like the Mariners have hacked his pitchcom. You mean like the Rays hacked the Astros bullpen pitchcom this last home series? They definitely, were they just throwing up signals like Zach Grinky just straight to the catcher? Because it certainly wasn't working for the bullpen for the Astros over the weekend. All right. We're going to take a quick break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross, without Matt Thomas, with Adam Wexler. We got Sean Dubin coming up. at 130. You guys can get in if you want. We've been talking Shroes heavily this show.

713-212-5-790 is the phone number. 7-13-212-5-790. Don't go anywhere because we've got Sean Dubin coming up at 130. 118 to the PM here on Sports Talk 790. Rosby Real with you. We've got Sean Dubin coming up in about 10 minutes. And we were talking about the bullpen and we mentioned kind of the ERAs, which is still, of course can be wonky for relievers. As you mentioned, Bray, you even better than 1.67 will tell you

because he's only given up runs twice and 27 outings. But you see, Lance Scholar's Jr. We know that he's had a 2.21 in the last four outings. Sean Dubin, 0.77. Brian Bray, 1.67. Josh Hater 1.3. That feels good.

That feels good that you can go to those guys. And not Brian King, who had been the normal seventh inning guy, was a pocket of Ritees in the lineup for the pirates. But Sean Dubin out there in the seventh inning, was there a little bit of a surprise level for you there?

I don't think so because he had gone back to Brian King since the Ray's blow-up game already. He had the seventh inning of the shutout on Sunday. Phase three hitters, got two of them out, left with a runner on, and Bray got out of that non-jam. So I don't think there's any

a sign of that. I think it's more a sign of confidence in Dubin versus a lack of confidence in King because all you can go with is what you've seen. You've got 11 games out of Dubin this year and he's given up a run one time. He's been very good. He's throwing more strikes this year. That was probably the biggest problem he had last

year. It still could be a little better. He's walked five guys, but not nearly the high pitch count at bats that he was pretty constantly putting together, ultimately, you know, finishing some off and walking others. Brian King's also got a little bit of that

reliever ERA. It's kind of not what you see. I mean, Ryan Presley had the same thing when he gave up nine runs and extra innings the other day. I mean, he's been scored upon only a handful of times all year in Chicago, but one of those games, he gave up eight runs. And in Brian

King's case, in one of his games, the game against Tampa, almost all the runs he's allowed all season came in one afternoon. Five of the nine he's allowed in his 27 appearances. Well, they came in one game. Am I worried that he can't get guys out? Not at all. He had

one day. I mean, even Dubin had a game, in the very same series. He gave up four hits and was scored upon, and that's his whole season of negativity. I have tons of confidence in the bullpen. I like how Joe Espott has used them. It's easier when you have confidence in many more pitchers, because there's five guys right now we could say that about from Ocurt, King, Hater, Abray, and Dubin. Well, if your starters giving you six, you've got five guys to choose from based on rest and health and matchups, that you should be able to get to the end of the game with four guys to choose from to get to Hater, if you will. And that's what you face two of the next three days.

Are you getting six innings from the starter? Gusto goes today and Gordon goes in the second game against the Guardians. Yeah, that brings me to what I was going to kind of bring up and talk about, is this rotation. Lance McCullors Jr., back-to-back quality starts, very good. And I don't think that is an accident. When you look at ERA, I've talked about field independent pitching, that number very good for him as well. Valdez and Brown, you're feeling pretty good. they're there. What about Gusto and

Gordon and kind of the long term if you, I think, well, the 17 games in a row is the longest stretch all season long. But I think they, after these couple of days off, at some point they're going to have a stretch where there would be the potential to them for them to go to a

six man. If they would do that and how we're feeling about the back end of the bullpen, can they, back in the back end of the rotation, can they continue to kind of hold that glue until Araggetti gets back, who's now apparently, according to Dana Brown, throwing off flat ground, but still, according to Dana Brown,

has to go basically through a full spring training buildup. Yeah, I think the schedule's pretty good to them. After this road trip is the one other current or close tough stretch, because they won't have an off day from the 10th until the 22nd. They've got four consecutive series without an off day there. So how do you manage your way through there? Clearly, Aragutti is not going to be a part of that in any way. Brandon Walters probably do for another start.

He's pitched on the same schedule, A.J. Bluebaugh, both of them are healthy and taking their regular turns in the rotation with the space cowboys. I would assume just because the schedule, they need to mix them in there because obviously I have to be concerned with Brown and Valdez. They don't, if they can get them an extra day when the schedule doesn't give them the extra day, I think that they would like to do that. And you need to get something from these guys. It's not just putting them out there because it still puts your team in a bad day. bad spot if they're giving you 11 outs. If they're getting, you know, you got to go get them in the fourth inning. And that's what we've seen from, you know, Gusto for the most part.

He just hasn't been able to get them length. I think he's stretched out enough to do a little bit more than that. We certainly haven't seen it. And I think the numbers are pretty clear for both of them. For a team that has been incredible, they're in the top five and have been all year and batting average against, you know, Gusto and Gordon among pitchers on the roster, period. they're just at the complete other end of the spectrum. Hitters are batting 280 or 268 against Gusto.

They're hitting 289 against Gordon. Both of them have given up many more hits than innings pitched, and Gusto's numbers are even worse if you toss out his reliever numbers, where he was actually very successful. They give up too many hits. They throw too many hitable pitches. They probably flat out throw too many strikes. They're not throwing enough of their pitches when they're ahead in the count.

Well, you know what to help you with that, facing the pirates. Maybe. Hopefully. Pirates hit under 2.30 is a team. Yeah. So you're telling me there's a chance. I was kind of, I mean, I would say a little surprise. I mean, Mike Burroughs is, I think he's only got a couple of starts.

He's been giving up a bunch of runs, which means, by the way, the Astros are going to get no hit for six innings against him. Yeah, he's made three major league appearances to this year. So, yeah, Astro's favorite than this one. Well, minus 125. For those of you don't know, that means you win $100. You got to give up $125. So a little slight favorite. Ryan Gusto, the favorite in Pittsburgh for the Stroes.

I would imagine he's not taking the hill as a starter as a favorite on the road yet in his major league career. Probably not. Today's a day, folks. He also probably doesn't know that. It's going to, yeah, it's fine. You don't think Joe or pitching coaches mention that to him? Not breaking it down? Like the, maybe he is.

Like that trainer, did you see that story? There's some NBA trainer who puts the players. I saw the Brandon Jennings story. Yeah. I can't remember that guy's name, but he trains players in the offseason or whatever. And if they're playing against each other, he puts them in a group chat so they can talk trash. Is Josh Miller doing that for Ryan Gusto or are we all right? Hey, Ryan, Colton got these guys out the last time he faced him.

What are you going to do today? You see what Lance McCullors Jr. did? Guy hadn't pitched for two years. Come on, Gusto. Let's see what you got. Maybe he'll just send Lance out for the mound visit instead of going himself. And Lance can say, look, dude, I haven't pitched in two. plus years. I set these guys down like it was

nothing yesterday. Get it together. Get it together. You suck. By the way yesterday also in the lineup. In theory, if there wasn't this whole off-season talk and then of course it being employed about Altova being in left field, it kind of felt right just to read the lineup card with Altova

at second and then your outfield being Melton left, Myers, Center, Smith, Wright. Smith essentially is the everyday player in right now. Myers, if he's not getting a day off, is the everyday player in center. And with Alvarez out and McCormick out and Desenzo out, if Jacob Melton is here, he should play as a left-handed hitter most of the time they're facing right-handed starters and Willigan today. So yeah, that makes it fairly easy to get two left-handed bats in the lineup.

Carrotini in there, whether he's catching as he did yesterday or the designated hitter, You slide Altuvae to second base, and there's Melton, your three outfielders. He gets the open spot in left field. I think DH, yeah, DH Altuve as well. But I understand one of the, especially Caratini in there as your switch hitter and trying to get him some more of these. Yeah, if you're going to put those three in the outfield, I mean, you can DHL Tuvee if Caratini is catching and you are okay with Yiner being your bat off the bench. That's the other thing. I don't think I've talked about it all year this year.

Karatini getting so much work in the lineup, which is clearly good for the innings one through seven or one through eight, he's your best pinch hitter. And he's in the lineup so much. And he's the left-handed pinch hitter. He's a switch hitter. And for their team, he's their left-handed pinch hitter. He's not been much of an option as a pinch hitter for Joe Espada this year because he's already in the lineup. If Yordaun's back, well, you have to play many more games where Karatini is on the bench.

I'm not trying to limit the kids, the poor young kids, Victor Carrotini's playing time. But it's nice every once in a while in a close game to know that you have someone who's thrived in that role before and does it from the left side, a team that has very few of them. It feels like a couple of the offseason stories have kind of limited when everybody's healthy, a spot is flexibility to where if you want to put Altuvi out and left a bunch, do you want to keep Yorda at DH a bunch that limits the lineup flexibility? 100% it does. And with who they have and what they do, the only late inning considerations that Joe really has this year is, when do I want to take my subpar fielder at wherever position I have him today out of the game? Because he always has good gloves on the bench, whether it's Dubon for any position, McCormick's a plus outfielder. They have options in numerous places, and he's pulled the trigger on those most of the year, even when it's Altuve's bat coming out of the lineup for a late inning defensive replacement.

All right, we got to take a break when we come back. Sean Dubin, Astros, a reliever, will be joining us here on Sports Talk 790. But before we take that break, I need to ask you, how you've been feeling? And you get up and you're hitting snooze over and over. If you're jumping out of bed and tackling it, day, that's great. But if you've been lacking energy, motivation, you've got family activities, it's the summer. You're dreading this stuff because you don't feel like the way that you used to.

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See where they are. Fix my low T.com. I'm telling you, if you put it in your browser, just look at the clinics, see where they are. Think about it, book an appointment or you should book an appointment. I'm going to tell you there's one close to you. Fix my low t.com. Also, if you've been looking to lose weight, you get a free B12 shot when you start prescription treatment. Those offers are all limited. That's why you've got a book now at fixmylote.com. That's fix my lowtie.com. Welcome back to the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Matt Thomas is out. Ross. That's me. I'm here. Adam Wexler here as well. And also, Sean Dubin is here pitching a. stellar seventh inning for the Astros last night in route to a three-nothing win. A lot to get to with Sean, but we'll start off with an easy one.

Sean, is that one of the most beautiful parks in baseball that you've ever pitched in out there, PNC and Pittsburgh? Yeah, for sure. I think it might be one of my favorite parks that I've been to so far. You know, I went to a couple of Steelers games when I was younger, so I always got to see the stadium from outside of you, but it didn't do it any justice on the inside. Are you down with taking us to the other end of the spectrum? What's the worst one you've been to?

Probably Oakland? There's a couple that come to mind. Can't call anyone out about it. It is what it is. But, yeah, maybe a couple of the AAA park. We'll probably take that as a, yeah, I think the West Sacramento Minor League ballpark that we've yet to play and will be on that list.

But we don't have to say that. We'll say it for you. Obviously, it's nice to pitch in a beautiful place like that when your team is able to twirl a second consecutive shutout and you're a part of this, obviously, at even bigger deal. What's life been like out in the bullpen for you this year with the amount of success that you and so many others have found? Yeah, it's been great.

You know, the camaraderie is, you know, through the roofs. Great group of guys, you know, all the way through from the position players and all the way starting pitchers to the bullpen. Everyone jails pretty well, and, you know, we're all there to pick each other up whenever we need it. Who's got better hair? Brian King or Josh Hater? Oh, that's the best one. I might have to give it to King right now.

A hater recently just got a haircut. If you still had that long, or if it was still long like last year, that probably gets to him, but he's got that mullet going. Very good. Would Stephen O'Kert answer with the same or say, What about me? Yeah, he'd probably say, what about me, honestly. Probably could throw him in the mix, too.

I'd probably go King, Ocert, Hater. Sean Dubin with us here on a Sports Talk 790. What's it been like for you this season? Obviously it's been very successful in the early going, had the shoulder injury as well. Just kind of the story of the season for you, where you are right now and where you started with that right shoulder inflammation slowing you down in spring training. Yeah, you know, it's been a little bit of a roller coaster. Definitely not how I wanted to start the year. But, you know, you just got to roll with punches, you know, and just show up.

and, you know, be ready to produce for the team whenever they call your name. But yeah, just going from the shoulders to stepping out on the baseball in Vegas, and then that sent me back like two weeks. So I'm just happy to finally be up here and produce it with the team. That was stepping on the ball in Vegas. We've had a pitcher get hit in the head during BP, but he protected his head by hurting his thumb and all the other unfortunate but typical pitching injuries. This does seem not even halfway through the season.

like the Astros have seen more than their share of injuries weird or otherwise. Would you agree? Yes, you know, a lot of tough luck around this year. You know, myself, since, you know, just some weird stuff happening, but we're a resilient bunch and, you know, I think it just only makes stronger, you know, out of the whole. Out there in the bullpen with the way the group, obviously, you mentioned the camaraderie out there, specifically to the guys you're spending most of the game out there with,

some with a lot more experience, some with similar experience, to you. Are there some guys maybe for a similar role that they have with this year's team like yours that you have had a chance to, you know, pick their brain, talk to a lot, or spend time out in the bullpen that's helped you? Yeah, you know, there's a couple guys down in the bullpen especially, you know, like Hater, Elker, Abrae, guys who have, you know, been around for a while and, you know, had all the experience, just being able to pick their brain as much as possible. You know, it's been really cool.

and you just try to take little things that they say and apply it to your game and see if it works. But just having that outlet and having that ability to do that with some of the guys you have on the team has been a good blessing. What's that like for you kind of building those relationships,

especially starting a couple of years ago in your major league career. Were you a guy that was kind of like, I don't know if I'm going to ask, I don't want to bother anybody or have you've always been somebody that's going to go after everybody and try to pick their brain? Definitely the first one. A little shy at first, you know, especially younger in the career.

You know, you're not trying to step on any toes or, you know, anything like that. But no, yeah, as the years go on, you know, you get a little bit more comfortable. You start to build these relationships with other teammates and stuff. And now, you know, it can ask you guys anything and, you know, vice versa. We're always there for each other. What are some of the things you have been learning, or at least like the last couple of years as well? and picking people's brain and getting good advice. What's some of the best advice you think you've gotten?

I remember a couple that stand out was like two years ago. Ryan Stannock told me not to ride the roller coaster. It's going to be up and down the whole year and just try to stay as even keeled as you can. I still remember that, and I still try to remind myself of that a lot. And then Presley last year always has some good advice. Too much to even really try to pick.

one out, but yeah, you know, like I said, like the veteran leadership guys, like Tater, O'Kert, guys who got the time, they've been great at that. Talking with Sean Dubin here on Sports Talk 790, Sean, is there a difference as you make your Major League debut in 23? You obviously pitch again last year and you're back here this year. Is there a different mindset for you or maybe any pitcher early in their career, like in terms of pitching to prove I belong here versus pitching? like I know I belong here? At first, yeah, I would say for sure.

23 especially, you know, it's being new to the guys in that clubhouse environment, you know, outside of spring training. It's a lot, you know, and just being able to relax, you know, and just remind yourself that you are here for a reason, you know. But, yeah, early on, it's definitely, it was definitely tough to get used to, but I'm happy where we're at now. Do you think your stuff is better this year? execution is better. Quite clearly, your results are outstanding. Yeah, you know, I put a lot of work

into the change-up and the curveball this off-season, and those have been two of my better pitches this year. So, you know, I'm happy with the way things are going. Obviously, there's always room for improvement, but, you know, just going to keep building, keep working every day, and continuing to try to get better. Such as life as a reliever, you've been very good, and, you know, when there is the occasion whether you give up a run you don't want to beat up yourself too much what is it like for you like mentally is trying to stay the course and like you said I guess for like Ryan Stanick

said try to not ride the roller coaster yeah you know there's going to be up and down you can have big games and bad games you know obviously the goal is to not let one outweigh the other but you know if you do give up a run you know live the fun another day tomorrow

you know come back on a mission kind of use it as fuel to make sure it doesn't happen again and just a lot of reinforcement has been basically like the common theme this year for me. Pardon me for my childish thoughts here, but it strikes me is that if you and Ryan Stanick and everybody in the bullpen when you all were together had an off day in a city that had an amusement park, he would absolutely be first in line and say, let's ride this roller coaster. I think you might be right on that, yeah. The off days are a good time, you know, and especially when you get to spend it with a group of guys.

You know, that's what it's all about. and that would be a fun crew to go to an amusement park with for sure. You came out in the seventh inning last night, and for a lot of the season, it's been Brian King. Of course, some Riteys were coming up as well. Is there any conversations with Joe or anybody about your role, or it's just a situation where, hey, I'm going to go out there and when my number is called, I'm going to get up and get ready.

Yeah, the second part, you know. Obviously, you know, guys have their spots, but basically just any time your name gets called, you've got to be ready. And no matter of the situation, you know, try to keep the same mindset going in and, you know, just keeping the score exactly where it is right there and doing everything I can to help the team one. Okay, so you weren't liking me? Okay, I'll get up.

Yeah, it was cool. I have a lot of family and friends in town for this week, this series, and then in Cleveland especially. So any opportunity that I get to pitch in front of that, it's pretty awesome. All right. I'm excited. Yeah, thank you. What's going on back there, Sean? I think I heard, is there a forklift going?

They're driving a golf car. Okay. Don't get run over, man. Watch out back there. We need you safe and healthy. We'll be good. All right. Well, we need you for the rest of the series as well.

Congratulations on your great success this season, Sean, and we hope you keep it up. Awesome. Thank you guys for having me on. I appreciate it. All right, there you go. Sean Dubin, Houston, Astros, reliever here on a sports talk 790. Appreciate his time. I'm going to take quick break.

One more segment of the man, Thomas Show, with Ross. without Matt Thomas with Adam Wexer. We'll be back after this short break here on Sports Talk 790. Thanks to Sean Dubin. Joining the program in the last segment. Thanks to Brian Bogosevic. Thanks to Dan Matthews for hanging out. Thanks to Adam Wexer for hanging out.

What kind of great, wonderful things are planned for 2 to 6 here on Sports Talks? Well, not 2 to 6. 2 to 430? That is correct. 2 to 505? I'll be with you until 505. This last 35 minutes of that will be the Astros on deck show. Clans's going to duck out?

Well, I do want to at least... Oh, wait, he's out. I want to give a hat tip to the people that you mentioned, Dan Matthews. I'll give a hat tip to you and myself. Congratulations for each show producing one host's worth of work today. Sean Salisbury off today, yes? Matt Thomas off today? Yes.

Adam Clanton is also off today. That's that time of year, folks. I mean... I mean, these aren't, you know, real vacations will come and go. I'm not telling people not to take vacation. I'm actually saying the opposite. I just am congratulating those that are here because I'll be taking vacation around the holiday for America. And so will I see.

So I'm sure there'll be people filling it for me just as well. Well, nobody's informed me or asked me yet, so I guess we'll figure out what happens there. It'll all be good. But yeah, we've got a couple hours of the A-Team for you. Aaron Wilson's going to join us at 4 o'clock with the, I don't know what to, I don't know what words to use quite. Is it panic button? Is it what's your concern level? What's your freakout meter in early June for the health of a football player?

Now, it's not just any football player. It is the football player. I mean, the Texans can have the best 52-man roster in the NFL, but if the quarterback isn't top flight and healthy, it really doesn't matter. I think we know that after all these years in the NFL. There's no way around it. So I recognize it's a pretty big story. I'll wrap up their last volunteer.

military mini camp tomorrow and then they have, I keep saying it, voluntary OTAs tomorrow, then mandatory minicamp comes next week for two days. I don't expect them to throw on those two days next week. Can he sidearm it? I know the shoulders hurt. How about a little underhand? How about shovel pass? If you're taking the last two weeks off from throwing,

want to take one whole other two days off from throwing and then take the next six weeks off of whatever program it is that they'll have him on. So when he gets to training camp, they have no concerns. I'll give you this right now. If there's general soreness and there's concerns about it, whether it's tendinitis, whatever it is, I actually expect C.J. Stroud to be limited throughout training camp. Do we get a confirmation on how this happened? Do not have a...

What's he doing the baseball toss at the pleasure pier or something? We don't know how it happened. We know it's a minor shoulder injury, a peckage issue. And it was called specifically General Soreness. That boxing punching game that you do? You try to rack up a thousand points? We're back to the amusement part. I just hurt my shirt.

I just hold my shoulder. Well, you were actually doing it the way C.J. Stroud should do it with his off arm, his left shoulder. Yes. For you, you also can go to work every day with only one working shoulder. That's true. I've been here in a sling before. To his credit, he also goes to work with one working shoulder. That's true.

but he can't perform all of the tasks of his off-season work. Okay. Well, as you're saying, I shouldn't let the Astros, and the way they mishandle injuries or reporting of injuries cloud my mind when it comes to the Houston Texas. And don't you think those two things are separate? Yes, yeah, of course. The Texans are under no obligation to tell anybody anything. That's true.

For that matter, neither are the Astros. If a player gets hurt and they got to put them on the IL, then they make an announcement. Other than that, you don't have to tell people anything. Now, you're putting the people that now have to answer those questions. every single day in a bad spot and the mishandling of it's totally different scenario. And then you say it's a muscle strain or a bruise

and then it ends up being fractures. You brought up that Dana Brown made his appearance earlier today and we'll hear a little bit of that also during the 18 this afternoon should have some of what Dana had to say right at 3 o'clock. He did acknowledge

as he did with Robert Ford on Sunday. Yeah, we'd probably do things differently. He made it very simple today. He said more imaging. It's the same thing we all said when we found out about how the timeline went. Yeah, just get more imaging. It doesn't seem that difficult. Let's go. Fire up the MRI machine. Get one,

you know what? You should get one in the ballpark. They have them. Every team they visit every major league pro sports city. Most cities in America, you can get it done. It's not a lack

of having access to it. They have x-ray machines at ballparks, right, but not MRI. machines? Is that what my understanding? That's a reasonable general statement. Yes. Okay. All right. Well, you get an MRI machine. He's just not going to... Get a 24-hour operator. It doesn't even matter. You can afford it. They didn't make the decision based on, man, this is going to be a nightmare trying to find an MRI machine for it. Those beers are $17. You can afford. Get an an armory machine. Get a guy operating in 24 hours. So maybe in Phoenix, where they play basketball, they might have one, since they have such pleasant, consumer-friendly concession prices on

some items so they can't afford it. Or Atlanta. Yeah, Arthur Blank can't afford one either. So yeah. But in Houston, Texas, they should be fine. It's one of the finest medical centers in the country, in the planet. Or in Chicago or Milwaukee, where most of this basically took place. He went on

the IL while they left Chicago and went to Milwaukee, got the MRI, and they had their answer. So you're saying Milwaukee and Chicago? They went from their White Sox series to the Brewer Series, and that's when this all kind of came to a head of if we need to hold him out. And then ultimately we need to get imaging.

Whatever. It's, yeah, I guess we can just, that's the thing there too. If you just give us a timeline, oh, it would be like with Zach DeZenzo. We're not going to have, nobody's going to ask about Zach Zinzo for two weeks. They said he's got a capsule strain or sprain. He's going to be reevaluated in two weeks and get some reimaging. And I, bang, boom. I tend to believe the announcement, the release of that information from the Astros on both Renault Blanco

having surgery Friday and what they found from the imaging with Zach DeSenzo. this wasn't at a press briefing. It wasn't because they were asked. It's because they put it out on their own as a team that doesn't have to. But I think we might see a change in how they publicly operate with some of these things. The lesson he'll learn here, folks, is that bullying works. I don't know. Who bullied them?

Chandlerone. He's doing his job. He's been bullying them for years. He's been retweeting other organizations that are forthcoming about their industry. injuries and stuff like that. And that's okay. I like Channel Rome on a crusade. Well, think about what I just said and what you're talking about. Okay, so they put the information out.

So guess who's, you said we don't have to ask about it. Yeah. Well, guess who doesn't have to talk about it? Dana Brown doesn't have to talk about it. And now Joe Espada doesn't have to get those questions about it. We already have the answer. Nope. Yeah, we're all good.

Concisely and concisely told us by the team. Crazy how that works. I'm glad that they're figuring out. Well, whether or not, I mean, no matter how long it's going to be until Yordon Alvarez is back. A little bit of lineup flexibility. I haven't seen the lineup posted for today yet. Oh, we'll have that on the A team as well. Oh, look at this. A lineup. Hey. A 540 first pitch will afford us the opportunity to deliver the lineup for you.

I guarantee you they're going to put it out on at Astros and there will be overreactions and the replies from Astros fans. That's what we love to do for sure. All right. Well, on that note, that's going to do it for the Matt Thomas show with Ross, without Matt Thomas, and with various guest. Adam Wexler, thank you for hanging out. You got it. He'll be with you from 2 until 505. We got Astros' first pitch taking on the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Game number two of that series at 540 here on Sports Talk 790. I'd like to extend my thank you to Dan Matthews for joining the show. Thank you to Brian Bogus Sevik and Sean Dubin as well, and all of you for listening. And of course, J.K. Allen, producing, doing a great job

as he always does. I'll talk to you folks next tomorrow. 10 a.m. No Matt Thomas tomorrow as well. Right now, don't go anywhere. It's just one Adam for the A team coming up here on Sports Talk 790.