The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Matt & Ross In The Morning Debut! Dana Brown Leaves Town????

Episode Date: August 24, 2026

Matt & Ross In The Morning Debut! Dana Brown Leaves Town????

This is Matt and Ross in the morning. 22 in H-town. Moss in the morning. Energy is shaking when the roof is tight. The ice is cold, but the energy is bright. From the profit boxes to the open lane, we play for the glory and we love the pain. The me goes on the sideline called the play.

All to zap the play. Let the bat lead away. If you need the stats and you need the truth, we're talking to the legends and the rising. Yeah, the debate is good. Walking, scared, reaching for the sky. Hell is this? You leave her alone.

We were going to play this this morning at 601, but, you know, things happened. By the way, we were here. Yes. I just make sure we didn't, we were not late. For the record, multiple texts asking if I, did you not get up in the morning, Ross? Are they holding up the show because of you? No, it wasn't me. Wasn't Jonathan.

It wasn't Jonathan. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. The board, the studio completely died this morning. So I think we're good now. And Rod Ryan, what an a-hole he is. He's coming to here and laughing. You're an a-hole. Rod Ryan is he?

We just started. Dead bored. How are you? The M is the way to go, man, get out of here. I haven't seen Rod Ryan in 16 years. I know. God, he's aged. Yeah, it looks good, though.

All right. Go bills. Enough about what that was. We're moving forward. Straight ahead. I like this, Matt. moving forward Matt and Ross in the morning

Okay for those of you that don't know We will be with you every morning From 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. 6. Sharp from now on this. Yes, yes, we're going to be here. Okay. We are Matt Thomas. To my right is Rossville.

Yeah, we are Matt and Ross in the morning. We've been around for quite a while But in different spots. This is my, I was thinking about this morning. This is my fourth trip to the morning drive. Really? Yes. Okay.

Yep. Couple in the old I heart, Clear Channel world. and then did proper gentleman for a while with Langez and then now with you. And you're on with Dana Tyson too for a while, weren't you? You know what? I was doing sports on KTRH back in early 2000. That's true. I remember that. That was 515 and I didn't, I was late a few times of those.

That was the worst phone call you'd ever get was the Matt, your sports updates coming up at 90 seconds. And I ended the Kingwood Studios back then, so I was stuck. That's true. So you were giving them from the 610 loop. I was rushing quite along and getting a phone call. Matt, we need to talk. All right. Let's get to it. This is the Matt and Ross in the morning show. We're with you 6 o'clock until 10.

We're today on the radio program. We will discuss a complete and utter disastrous Astros homestead. Yes. So I'm just coming back from vacation. You're going to have to update me. What the hell's going on with the Houston Astros? Well, I'd like to say you'd be surprised at what you saw or heard, but you're not. I'm not super surprised.

surprised, but I'm disappointed. I mean, the A's have mailed it in. The A's, they're like shutting people down. Nick Kurtz is hurt. Brent Rooker, like, they're giving Jacob Wilson is like, he's like a part-time player for them. Like, they're actively trying to lose. We could play, believe it or not today at 950. Is this a current Oakland A or not?

And I can tell you from experience, having watched all the games, I didn't work any of them, but I listened to it and watched, I probably would lose very easily. I'd be priceless, believe it or not, at 9.50. Okay. They weren't even the Sacramento Riverbats, or whatever the hell they called themselves. I don't know. They were like the Stockton Frito Pyes. It was, I don't know what the hell was going on there.

And then you get up six nothing yesterday. You're like, okay, fine. Two out of three, we'll take it. You're up six nothing. We're all good. Yep. And then that fifth inning happened. Christian Javier happened. Anya de los Santos happened. Look, you're not going to win. every series. You'd like to. But this was the

fat and happy nine game stretch. Yeah, even before that, the 12 games against teams below 500. You were going to bury the Mariners to make sure they were not considered an AOS opponent anymore contender. Whoops. You were going to beat up on an angel team who you swept

in Anaheim just what, two weeks prior to that. They gifted you a couple of those, yep, but whatever. Then you got the A's who have decent players that are going to be great when they get to Las Vegas. Yes. But that's not for two more seasons.

Mm-hmm. You were at worst supposed to get six and three. I was asking for seven and two, Rossi, but I was accepting of six and three. Eight and one, nine and oh was a pipe dream. You went three and six. You failed. It was a big test, not even a big test.

It was actually like a pop quiz where you had all the answers in front and you still failed. an open book exam and you didn't open the book. You were cocky. You were erring. You know what you did? You know what it was? I'll tell you what it was. Oh, this is my first analogy of the morning show. Oh, here we go. Jonathan, stay with me on this. I'm scared. This is going to hit. I'm scared.

You went to go take your driving test without going to driver's ed. You're like, I drive on the, my mom wants me driving the parking lot at the mall and at the grocery store and it and at the school. I can go past that test. Yeah, that's good. I'll accept it. I'll give them a C. Oh, come on. Uh-oh.

Oh, that's horrible. Come on. Dang it. Dang it. That's pretty funny. I'm glad that drop is concerned just into the mornings. Yeah, we're bringing more drops of the morning show. More insults.

Oh, for six with runners in scoring position yesterday. Well, you know, I was not to name drop, but thanks to Channel 2 and Sports Sunday, they had me on the show yesterday. Yeah, you look thrilled on that screenshot. he posted. Because he said, hey, we'll promote your new morning show. I'm like, of course you will. Thank you very much. Thank you.

He's like, well, on a 1 to 10, what did you think? How bad the series? The home stand, I said it's 12. And it basically, and look, you can't describe every game in one sentence, but you can go macro view. And the macro view is, the pitching is, the bullpens exhausted

in coming down to Earth, which we knew it was going to happen. But you cannot, Ross, You cannot go two plus weeks without somebody going six innings. You are going to give it to your bullpen and they're going to be fatigued and tired. And it's August dog days and it's Pennett Chase. They're just not that good. Yeah, they're just a mediocre baseball team.

And we've been talking about this basically all season long. Like if this can get going, if this can happen, if this pitcher can step up. And basically every if that we've been hoping for that could round this team into a good team has not happened. Some guy named Jack Perkins carved you up for five innings after the opener yesterday. I mean, come on. Yeah, come on. He got a 680-60-80 RA, and you couldn't get anything going. And, oh, by the way, did you get a hit from the outfield besides Dalton Varshal's home run?

I mean, Tremel, nothing. Well, Tremel, he's been terrible. He broke an 0 for 20 yesterday. That's good. Cam Smith, Zilch. He's been bad. Lamont Wade actually did a service by, pitching a couple of inning while you were gone. That's right against the Angels, right?

I was checking the box scores as I was out in Washington State. I've never sway Jr. I've never seen a left-handed Ephis pitcher until now. Yeah. It's got to really throw you off. Terrible. All right. It's just not a good baseball team. And yet? They're tied for first place. Oh, here. Don't give me the N-Yet. No. I don't want ain't yet right now. You're getting too bad. No. And yet they suck. Okay. They've been playing bad baseball. Good thing the American League West, I mean, it is just an abomination of baseball. And Texas, who is really the team I don't respect.

I mean, I somewhat respect Seattle. I don't respect Texas. The Astros have a minus 44 run differential. That is the best in the West. They are the best team in the West with a minus 44 run differential. That's embarrassing. What a horrible division. Oh, my, fold this bad boy up.

Every other division has at least two teams with a positive run differential. You've got zero and the Astros that are not even close to zero or even. And you're best in the West at 65 and 66. By the way, I am golden on my gut feeling that they're not going to win. The division winners aren't going to win any five games. Okay, that is that is locked and loaded. Now the question is, will this division winner have 82 wins, which would put them a game, two games above 500?

Yes. Yes, and it will be the Astros. How about that? although the schedule's toughening up. Yeah, you got six in New York and you're like, well, the Yankees, I mean, the Yankees are going to crush them because their offense is awesome

and the Astros' offense is putrid. Well, it would be very astros of them to go out there and win at least two out of three against. Now, the mess are terrible, but you know what? It's New York and you never know what's going to go to a different confide. And then you've got games of Tampa and Philadelphia and Atlanta. And, oh, by the way, you've got the last week of the season. You got two against Seattle, who is probably feeling great

because they're still in this pennant race somehow, some way. And then you've got four against the Bakersfield A's. White Sox. Oh, yeah, I forgot four with the White Sox, too. Schedule strength remaining, most difficult in baseball. Remember we were reading like 27, 28th? Love that. They're 11th now.

Yeah. Good news is Rangers are 9th. They've got some tough games, too. But the meat of the suck. That makes sense? The meat of the sucky schedule. the meat of the suck yeah like the real juicy

we're you still doing Friday clips yeah of course okay just making sure the meat of the sucky schedule was just in front of you you had you had a girl you had a girl who was oh no she was crushing the meat of the suck

no stay on different different one you had a girl who was loving you and it's like please let's go out and have a date let's go on a weekend trip to Lake Charles or Las Vegas and you just sat there and said, we'll just be friends. You just, it was just there for the taken. Jonathan.

Yes? Save the line. Go to break. Good job, Matt. All right. Oh, there you go. Give you a good job. We are late for break, but you know what?

We didn't start until 20 minutes past. Screw the first hour. It's all good, baby. Normally at 6.30, starting tomorrow, we'll do sounds at 6.30. Something we found interesting for the night before, but we're going to skip that today because, well, you know, it is what it is. We're busy. But we will, you will hear those sounds we're going to play, later in the show. Steve Sparks is going to join us at 8 o'clock. We have to tell the truth at 8.30.

If you don't know what these things are, we'll tell you about that as a show moves along. Missing yes at 930 today, and believe it or not, at 950. Matt and Ross, we are in the morning. And we're going to be here. 6 o'clock until 10, Lord willing. Equipment willing. So our clock is all goofy because of our earlier starts. Yes. We will get back on the clock.

Eventually. We'll get back on the clock. Sparks is going to join us at 8.30 this morning, for those that don't know, and again, we've been on 10 to 2 or middays for 90% of my time here in Houston at IHeart and at Sports Talks. We do it once a week on Mondays. And we're going to have a little bit of what we call a signature segment every Monday at 830, where we will, I will give you four opinions of mine. And Jonathan and Ross will have to determine either one of the four opinions is a lie or one of the four opinions is a truth.

So we do that and we have a little bit of a contest. And we'll be doing in the middays for a while. And Jonathan's about 11 weeks behind Ross. So we're going to have to really do some catching up here between now. He's working on it. That's not fair. I'm like five. Yeah, but it's easier to embellish on things.

I think it's six. Yeah, I think it really is six. But that's not here nor there. We did it by the way. Jonathan did it and he got me. That's good. Yeah. What was your, you still were bullish on somebody?

Go ahead and tell the audience. Touched EMI? Yep. That's what it was. No way. Yep. For real? Yeah.

I was completely. guessing and I was actually kind of half joking Jonathan what's going on it with that one yeah I saw that slider you know yeah he still got it still got it still got something or he still got 18 million dollars coming his way he's still off and in yeah all right we get to some football

here obviously a lot of weird things going on we got something weird happening in Cleveland we have something weird happening at LSU yes we have an S Cantor going to to a WNBA game what is he doing over there he just go away I He's attention-horring, I imagine.

But the girl, I don't know who know her name is. She's got to stay away from that. She sees him just don't focus on that. It was just a, oh, WAB can't get out of its own way. And again, Ines Candor never should have been allowed in the building because he was going there to be a blankster. But that's something, I don't want to get to man on that. The main thing I could get to is my beloved Astros. My beloved.

I don't beloved them. I don't believe them. I can't quit them. You know how you can't quit them? You can't quit Texas Longhorn football? Hey, hey now. Playoffs. Twice in the last three years. Yeah, you can't quit them. I can't quit. These are things in my life that cannot quit. Caffeine beverages, extra coffee, which I'll be doing a lot more of.

The McRib. The McRib, which is America sandwich. No, it's not America's sandwich. I can't quit the Rockets. I can't quit the Astros. I can't quit my Cooters. I'm not asking to quit them, but I'm just telling you, don't have to love these guys. Can I tolerate that? I don't have to love Lamont Wade Jr. Because what I was thinking about this before I went on Channel 2 last night was like, did the Astros outfield have as bad of a weekend as I thought they did? And the answer was absolutely they did.

Yeah, Varsho had the home run. Crawfordbach special, wasn't it? No, it was pretty good John. Okay. Pretty good, pretty good polk. Altubi went deep yesterday. That was good, too. Let me, let me.

By the way, did you all see Saturday? I know some of you, maybe not all of you did. And Ross brings up the defense. defensive metrics and they're very fair. I'm not saying they're not fair. I didn't make them up. But I don't know if they've updated them since then, but there were two balls on Saturday that Jose could not get to.

That was like, oh my God. Someone five foot 10 would have gotten to. He can't move. No. And I love him so much, but he can't move anymore. I know. He had one crazy-ass throw in. Then there were two plays that he could have made,

or I would say, of an average second base. could have made that were not made. Second worst, defensive run saved in baseball, minus seven. Bryson Stott, tie with jazz chisholm, worst, and it's minus 13. Jose Al Tuva. Okay. I don't know. That's a lot of gobbly goop you just mentioned.

It just sounds. It's not. It's not. But it's bad. But I'm saying it sounds bad. I totally believe it sounds bad. Like, uh, four doesn't sound great, but you got to put things in perspective. No, yeah.

Negative 13. Yeah. Negative 13 is bad. Okay, zero is average. What I love in Minneapolis when it was minus seven? It wasn't good. No. Well, guess what?

Everybody's the second worst is minus seven. He's a minus 13. Is there anything in life that's a minus seven that is good? Golf. Ding. That's it. That's about it. That is it.

IQ? No. Bowling score? No. Important to your company? No. He's a minus seven this quarter. Golf?

Probably not good. That's great. See, that's what I'm saying. You had to put it into perspective. Okay, there we go. Minus 7 golf? Yeah, minus 13. He's minus 13.

You know what? If he was at Augusta, we'd be doing pretty good. Unfortunately, this is defensive run saved. They're two grass fields. Yeah, I'll give you that. All right, I guess that's true. Folks, what are we going to do? Because here was a thing yesterday.

He's not getting to 3,000, by the way. You couldn't blame Joe Espada for yesterday. Unfortunately, a family emergency. I almost wanted to tune into the post-game show just to hear somebody blame his spot on. Oh, there was pitching coach blame. there was Omar Lopez. Somebody called a 10th inning yesterday and was complaining that Omar Lopez was wearing

sunglasses so he couldn't address the media directly when he wears the same glasses. The Rexbecks. The Rexbecks. Every single time. Every game. Every game. He's going to wear the Kurt Rambus specials. That's just how he rolls. If you watch a game. Yes. He doesn't go with shades on Monday. He doesn't go bifocles

on Tuesday. He wears those same rexpects every single time. The guy who's at the pickleball court going ham and he's like 48 years old with two knee braces. That's the ones he wears. He wore those when he was on the racquetball court. He wears him in the baseball dugout. Yes.

God Almighty. It's just bad. I mean, just... And you weren't even around for me to just text somebody to get mad at because it was just terrible. You're going to text me. I just wouldn't respond. I know, I know. Offense can't hit. Starting pitching isn't going deep.

Bullpen has been taxed and overuse and human. Other than that, things are going to be. And realistically, did anybody, I mean, everyone's like, well, honey, why did he not put, why do you put Benetius in? Because if you're a live arm, you got to be used. You just do. Yeah. If you're worried, and again, A.J. Blueball, nice young man, doing fine. He's pitching more in his life than this year than he's ever pitched for in his life.

He's, I believe, pitched more than any reliever in baseball by like 30 innings. Something like that. Not 30, but close. I'm sorry, you can't use Stephen Okraint and A.G. Blueball every night. And again, a brain who's been. doing good, but it's not like he's had a pristine season. This bullpen is overused and coming down to Earth. 6.46. It is Matt and Ross in the morning.

What? We are Matt and Ross in the morning. We are going to energize your morning sports talk. May it always be good, but we're going to energize it one way or the other. It's going to be great. Are you sure? Yes. All right. Good. Positive. Astros fall. Jesus. 7.6. It sucks. Oh, well, they were up 6-0, Matt.

Okay. What happened? I went to sleep. Texans back on the practice field today. Getting ready for a trip to Charlotte for the Friday night game with the Panthers, which I would assume not a single person you would recognize will play in, well, maybe some, like second and third teamers and some special teamers, that kind of thing. We'll be playing in that, but we will get a little bit of football. We got a lot of actually non-Huston Texan stuff. Although while you were gone, Jayden Higgins, ACL, Dunnman.

for the year. No, what happened? No, Camp Star, ready for the breakout season. Year 2, he's all good to go. Was. Past tense. Can't do it. All right, Tankdale, your next man up. Let's go, baby. How's he doing? He's practicing fully. Over nine and a half catches, baby. I can't wait. I gave him, him being Jonathan, a chance to surrender like they do in blackjack. Uh-huh. Because Tank's not going to start the season with the team. He's just not. Okay, well, you only need nine and a half catches. That's like literally he can do that in one game. We have bet on a breakfast meal And I said, let's go surrender

Just buy the hash brown What do you dial that back to just a hash brown? Yeah. Oh, you all dialed you started with a hash brown Then you dialed it up. Yes, we're right now at a breakfast meal And now I'm asking him if you would like to surrender To give me the hash brown and call today.

You guys are like the yeah, you guys are like the S&P 500 You're just going up and down. I guess it's more Bitcoin. Oh, that's horrible. No, hey. He doesn't want to do it. He thinks it's going to happen. Oh, did he want to up it though?

No. Okay. No, he realizes. It's fine. I think breakfast is good. Especially considering the new circumstances in the morning. Oh, yeah. There's a problem we start to get it like a 10 o'clock.

Which actually, they still serve breakfast until 10.30. Yeah, that's fine. Don't tell Michael Douglas second. That's going to be a massive, massive problem. Oh, don't tell the McDonald's over here on Postoaked that. I was in the line screaming at the thing for five minutes. I had to leave. Yeah, you know what?

We're not off to the greatest start. McDonald's wouldn't even take my order. And then we had the technical difficulties. We're doing okay. But now we're doing great. We're in mid-season mode now. We are going to be a program. This will be a stunter for some of you.

We will actually like to talk to you at 713-212-5-7-90. Now, I don't know if our phones work, but we assume they do. So we're going to try to open it up. Oh, you know, we don't have time because we've got to get the top of the R. David and Vegas has been patiently waiting. Thank you, David. And David's going to be our very... It's like 4 a.m. over there.

Yeah, it's 4.54. He was calling it 4 o'clock this morning when we had complete chaos here. So David and Vegas is going to be our very first out-of-town caller. We need a Houston caller too. Yes. So if you'd like to be the very first Houston person to call, man or woman, 713-212-5-790, 7-1-3-212-5-7-90, we're going to play some audio coming up in the next hour on this. Did you see what's going on with Deshaun Watson in Cleveland?

It's not going so well. It would be the complete definition of tone. deaf. Seems like he's playing the God card a lot too, which is generally, you know, what predators do. Yeah. Yeah, beef, look, if you want to use religion, I'm all for it, I'm a man of faith, and I think it's fantastic.

But don't be a fraud. Hmm. And Deshawn's a fraud. Oh, defraud Watson. I like that. Wish I would have thought of that myself, but I didn't. I'll give you credit. All right. Ladies and gentlemen, we're going to reboot the start of the second, actually a boot of the second hour. Yeah, we're going to boot.

it was a soft launch in the first hour with a now we're going to hard launch you're going to hate this it's a song from the 70s oh no but it absolutely hits okay how we're feeling today about the asteris by way someone who was texting asking if that was taylor swift that we got for the opening song no we did not book taylor swift that would be awesome if we did I don't think we can afford her, Matthew. We've got AIs that are just... We've got to pay your salary, so I don't think we're going to afford Taylor Swift. Yeah, I didn't realize if I'm getting a bump and salary on this. No one of the here at the office has said, you're going to morning driving. We're not going to give you more money for it. And it is what it is.

6.57, we are Matt and Ross in the morning. This is Matt and Ross in the morning. 701 and H town. Good morning. It's our number two, the first full one of Matt and Ross in the morning. Morning on Sports Talk 790. Sunshine go away today. The Astros blow a late lead as they fall to the A's 7 to 6 in a game they once led 6 to nothing. How much does it cost?

I'll buy it. The time is all we've lost. I'll try it. After his life. Sunshine. Sunshine go away. My yard is complete crap. What happened?

It's 123 degrees every damn day. Oh, I'm sorry. What's the weather been like? You know, as it rains as you've been gone. Really? Zilch. Oh, it was like 72 degrees and sunny in Washington. Shut your bum ass up.

It was nice. I don't rain here. Highly recommend. All right, that's fine. We get vacation talking 940. I think I need one. Good morning, everybody. We are Matt and Ross.

Hi. And we are in the morning on Sports Talk 790. I'm ready to go now. This is a fresh hour. Chemical issues at least out of the way for the next few minutes. I got Jonathan here who came with us. Yes. Happy to have him.

Happy to have Jonathan here. He's like, screw this. I'm going back to middays. I don't need this. These headaches. These morning headaches. Well, at least our IT department's on Eastern Time. That's good.

What was it like talking to our IT department? No, forget it. We're not going on. We're moving on. We're moving on. We're moving on. We're moving on. the Astros embarrassing

homestand. I thought I felt bad. Robert Ford did not sound too pleased. Play that last good of the game. Poor Robert. Now remember Robert loves the Astros like I love the Astros. Yeah, you call the games. And he calls the games like I call the Rockets. So we as play-by-play broadcasts,

and I'm sure Mark Brennerner does the same thing. By way, shout out to Mark sent me just a fantastic message yesterday. I didn't get anything from him. Yeah, okay. So like I was saying, Robert wears his emotions his sleeve like I do

and here was Robert of the final call again last night. 3-2. Swing and a mess. He's got a fastball by him and that is the ball game. What a brutal loss to end a horrific homestand for the Astros. For the second straight day the Astros blow a late lead as they fall to the A's 7 to 6 in a game they once led

6 to nothing. I know Robert. I know. We know, Robert. We feel your pain, Robert. You can hear it in his voice. Poor guy. Let me tell you a tough home stand. Look, last, remember before the Rockets got good, I was doing 60 lost seasons. That's one thing. But I also, last year, remember last year how many blown leads of rockets had?

We lost a 25-point lead in New Orleans. Four-quarter leads seemed to be, were an issue a couple times because of the offense. 17-point lead in New York. There was a big one against San Antonio. Yeah, it happens. And we try to keep a positive outlook on things and call it. and obviously have an infinity for the team that we're calling, but sometimes it just, you just kick in them.

You're not supposed to be all smiles when you just blew a 6-0-0-0-8. To the baseball. To the A's. They're actively quitting on the season. They are trying to literally, you don't tank hardly in baseball, they're tanking. Yeah, their motto, I don't if y'all know this is not, is A's baseball, look forward to seeing us in 28. See you in Vegas.

Yeah, they're like, we don't care. A's baseball, we don't care right now. They literally play in Sacramento with Vegas patches on their sleeve. They've got, they're checked out. They don't care. They have the word Sacramento on their jerseys. They misspelled it intentionally. They don't care.

They don't. They play in a minor league ballpark with Vegas on their jerseys in Sacramento. They don't care. They're checked out. And they just kicked your ass two out of three games. And they traded one bright arm in their Mason Miller who throws 124 miles an hour to San Diego. It's fine. It's fine.

And yet our local line lost to them twice. And come from behind fashion. 65 and 66. For first place. Terrible. It's embarrassing. American League West, all of you need to be embarrassed, including the Astros. You just had 12 straight games against teams under 500. And you went, what, 5 and 7?

3 and 6 on the homestand. This was the... I'm not going to... Say it, fat and happy. Fat and happy. Well, they got lean and sad. This was all. All you can eat, the plates were there.

All you have to do is walk up and get the food. That's it. That was better. We're trying. Yeah. Our power number two is sort of a little better with Mr. analogy over here. My philosophy is my analogies are going to get better in the mornings.

Okay. Although you would think they would be better in the middle of the days of a chance to think a lot of these things. This is really going to be off the cuff. So it could actually get worse where it gets better. I don't say that. Ding. 11th most difficult schedule in terms of strength of schedule remaining in baseball

for the Houston Astros. But the good news is the Rangers have the ninth most difficult schedule remaining. How about Seattle? We got to keep... Seattle ain't done. They lost the Cubs yesterday, but... Yeah, they're three back. I can go look them up.

I think they have like the 29th or 30th, honestly. It's something not good for us here in Houston. I know the Astros have, what, Kansas City still right? At home stand with them. Astros, you're talking about? Oh, and a bad team. You got four more with the A's, which you should be automatic wins, but how'd that go over this week?

Nope. Three with the Mets, three with the Royals, and a couple more with Seattle. And you got Tampa, playoffs. Phillies, likely playoffs. Seattle has the easiest schedule remaining in baseball. In terms of strength of schedulers. Screwed. They got three with the Phillies and the Red Sox after that.

Seven with the A's, seven with the Angels, three with the Rockies, and then a couple of series with the Rangers. So why wouldn't Seattle be the favor of the Miracle League West? Because they're just not good. They don't hit. Nobody's good. Nobody's the favorite because nobody's good. Everybody's the unfavorant. Everybody's just bad.

Like, you want it? No, I'm good. You want it? No. No. Do you know, I've been asking on this show, for somebody in the American League West to win 10 to 12? Because if you win 10 to 12, you've got it.

You might as well, you win the title. That's where we thought where they were. They won 12 out of 14. They went on that big run after getting swept by the Orioles to start the second half of the season. They are one game over 500 in the last two months. When you were supposed to just. Kick the crud of the opponents. All praise, but at least Yordon can get a triple crown.

We'll feel good. But he's even got a hold off junior Caminerre? Yes, he's cooled off. Cooled, but not cold, but he's cooled. Right. Pena has cooled. They intentionally walked him like three times yesterday, right? Yeah.

Including putting the tying run in second base. It's crazy. You know what? Other teams are like, we'll let Lamont way beat us. Yeah, we'll let Taylor Tremel beat us. Oh, yeah. We'll like Cam Smith beat us. Yeah, Esock has gotten hot, but they're still intentionally walking to get him up there.

Yeah, they're not, no. We love you. And ESAC's been good, but they don't, they're not afraid of it. All right. On the phones we go, the very first call of Matt and Ross in the morning belongs to a man who's calling us. It's been on the line since the 4 o'clock hour in Las Vegas. David in Las Vegas on 790. Good morning, David. Good morning, gentlemen, and Ross vacation. Congratulations. Yeah, sure. I think because your 4 o'clock in the morning, it was a little rough. But, you know, I'm an aging handicapped.

You never know. You know, that's so bad this morning. It was up. All right, we can't do this. Yeah, David, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Huh.

Huh. Maybe it was David's connection. I think that was David's connection. It better be. And maybe the towers haven't woken up this early in Vegas. we had we couldn't hear you David it might be our phones okay we're gonna try again I don't I'm gonna walk out of here

put it this way I just if it's our phones it'll be dead air in the morning on sports talk somebody because I'm leaving it's fine second time better be the charm Brian on 790

Madden Ross in the morning Brian good morning Matt and Ross in the morning starting at 622 you gotta love it I was like, well, they're already getting the dead Matthews issues that he experienced on a regular basis. So hopefully this is the glitch to get the show going and nothing, nothing moving forward. So, but good to hear you guys on this early in the morning.

Thank you, Brian. Ross, welcome back. Happy to know you did not get mauled by a bear. Yes, I did not get mauled by a bear or a mountain lion. Sorry, Matt. I know you're disappointed. I'm a little disappointed because what I'd like for you to do is at least. If you get video of you being mauled, get your other good a hand and videotape.

You get some good a hand. So my good hand, so I'm getting mauled in one hand. I'm going to get on my phone with the other and then videotape it. Yes. Oh, that's horrible. Yeah, that's great idea. I would say the most dangerous animal I ran into was a marmot. And I didn't get bit by the marmot. You would be on the Today Show.

You'd be. Oh, you want me to get on the Today show with a mangled arm. I used to watch it show when I used to get up in the morning around this time. Okay. Well, we can turn it on now. Listen to this guy. Watch this guy barely survive. Shark attack. You can be the same thing. Watch radio host in Houston.

So you want pub for the show via me getting mauled. No, it would just be your Instagram, not mine. Okay. At Sports RV. Brian, what you got sports-wise? No, guys, unfortunately, I think we've regressed to what we were in April. And it's sad to say, I mean, you can't get a starter to the sixth inning. Not even your quote-unquote ace in Hunter Brown. He can't get you into the six.

I mean, part of that may have been a spot of issue with whatever happened on Saturday, pointing at the bullpen by mistake. But, and this is what happens. Now the last two weeks, you've been relying on your bullpen to cover five, six innings every single time, and these late-inning collapses are going to happen. But Eniel Delos Santos has now turned in back to the reliever

that the Braves DFA'd. Whatever good vibes you got out of him and whatever clutch situations he helped out in, he's back to being the player that was DFAed for a reason. and we saw that yesterday. I mean, he was not good. He has not been good for the last month, roughly.

And, I mean, I don't know who else is available, but I would just DFAM and bring up a limber Santa or somebody else because you've got to have at least halfway reliable arms, and he is not that anymore. I'm sorry. Yep. Thank you, Brian, for the phone call. I appreciate it.

And Christian Javier melted like butter yesterday, Ross. Just cruising along, and then one blemish, and boom. Yeah, he had seven strikeouts in the first, what, three in the third or something like that? His pitch count wasn't high. It was like, man, just get us through us. Get us through six, something. Yeah. And he gave a three-run shot and then he gave him some more traffic and then Ennio Della Santos did the rest.

John and see we'll get to you. Bottom of the hour, former Texans quarterback losing his damn mind. Say Drozenfels? I'll let you keep guessing. Dan Orlovsky. It's Matt. Tony Bank. and Ross in the morning.

719 on Sports Talk 790. Deshawn Watson has lost his damn mind. You'll hear that coming up in about 10 minutes. And by the way, his coach, I got new respect for Mr. Cochlin. I think it's Todd Monken. Monken. Cockland, Monk. Whatever. That's fine.

I'm like close enough. I mean, actually the Texans and Browns play show this year, so we'll be talking a little Browns football. Okay. But this is probably be... I'm excited. We'll probably do it today and then we'll probably won't do it again until the Texans for the Browns. Texans back on the practice field getting ready for Friday's pre-season finale

against the Carolina Panthers they will go to Charlotte tomorrow practice Wednesday have off Thursday and then Friday they will play them in the final preaches in game and then we got a long time in between do you think the NFL space is this properly by the way they've been doing this for a few years now

long time off in between yeah which I like actually gives you a nice big cushion as league commish to schedule your fantasy football draft because nobody wants to schedule why do people do it in the preseason it's ridiculous did you see the video of the guy who drafted Ashton Genty number one overall and by the way

when did Ashton Jentee ever become the number one overall picking a fantasy draft? I don't know man I'm not I'm not on my big board you talk to that guy don't look at me there are people who believe in Ashton Jenty I mean 25 yards off of 1,000 last year we'll be getting 1,000 this year hey say Adam Schetter

says ankle injury should just be a couple of weeks well they're going to call them the gimp now that's fine They're not sawing his ankle off, okay? Just so he can never get to a thousand yards in his career. He had four, six, 40 time, and now he's going to go to 5-440 time. You know what the hilarious thing is. So for people who don't know or who are new to the show, perhaps. Matthew said that we've been disagreeing about Ashton Genty

and how good he's going to be in the NFL. And so literally the second he hurts his ankle, Jonathan and I get a text from Matt. Uh-oh. Ashen Gentie, not getting to a thousand, thousand yards. that is. So we'll see what happens. How much time home is. Well, they first thought it was much more serious. And then, you know, again, what you have to do is you have to actually wait for

things to come into play and have agents call and say, hey, it's not that big video. Now, again, that could be the agent also calling a Schepter saying, hey, don't worry about this, trying to soft pedal and soft play this potential injury. So we really don't know. Yeah. Apparently, he had to be helped off the practice field. It's believed

to be a sprained ankle. It is not considered a long-term injury, and the organization is breathing a sigh of relief tonight, that according to Adam Schuster. And he threw in a rap sheet mentioned in there. Are these guys going to get along now? They're okay? They're not going to have to. They're in the same umbrella. The Disney umbrella. My guess is Rappaport has his agency goes to and Shepter has a lot of overlap, I'm sure, too. Well, Drew Rosenhouse probably talks to both of them. Yeah, you can also cross-sick each other to make sure neither one of you sounds bad. That's true. That's a good idea. There you go. So Ashton Gentis going to be okay. Deshawn Watson?

we'll hear from Deshawn coming up in the next segment of the show. Let's continue on the phone and say hi to John in downtown. John, you're on with Ross and Matt in the morning. Hello. What's up, guys? Hi. Have you ever ever had a waffle sandwich? Yes.

You know, I love it when the Blue Jays come into town because that's the only time they serve them. You know, you can also make one at home. No, I'd rather, I'm too lazy to do that. No, wait a minute. Hold on. Hold on. Where did they serve them? I'm sure. They do the regional. But you can also go to Waffle House and say, get me two waffles, jamming egg and some bacon in between it, and there's your Waffle sandwich right there. Well, you know, I would rather buy the instant pasteurized egg, cardinal of that, and pour it into the skillet and scramble my egg and then get the waffle in here. That's very fair. Isn't Chick-fil-A doing a waffle sandwich?

They are. I'm sorry, Rick Raleigh. Yeah, anyway. Uh, anyway. Guys, I know you're not going to like this, but you're not going to like what I'm going to say, but there was no excuse and all this that ever. It's brutal, man. I mean, all these games that, you know, the nine games that were played, you know, it was just awful, dude. Why do you think we would not like what you're saying?

Have you never listened to the first? I mean, I don't like it, he said it, but it is true. Well, the last time I called, you know, and I made a prediction, and I don't know if who was it, but they said, well, thanks, John, for the call, and, you know, it was gone. You know, I didn't get the chance to say anything. So we're giving you, we're giving you the window to say what you're saying, but we're not disagreeing with you. It's a terrible week, absolutely terrible.

Yeah, I, you know, and yesterday I was listening to Gordy, and he didn't sound very positive yesterday. You know, he was, you know, he was, he says, well, I would have to go into New York and by the Yankees and get swept. And I didn't really like what he, that was not, you know, that's not really helping. a team any, but... Well, John, they just went three and six against really bad

teams. Yeah, I know. And it's not going to get any easier. No, exactly. Not at all. Thank you, John, for that. We're done. Yeah, thank you, John. You put those two together. I mean, it could be some Ls on the way for the Astros. Thankfully, they got a day off. Well, I mean, if there's been any road venue against elite teams they've had

success with over the years, it's been at Yankee Stadium. But, of course, you have a better lineup in previous years going up there as compared to what's on the flight to New York today or yesterday. Do we know that I see Peco listed on ESPN, but they're often wrong. Are we going on? Are they going with, uh, I think I saw, has that been announced for sure? Chandler and or Matt Kawakarwa put the starters out for the weekend. Okay. It won't take you long to figure it out.

Okay. Yeah, it looks like it is Pecco Lambert Wesniewski. How are we feeling? Well, I mean, Peco versus Garrett Cole, all for Pete's sake. I'm going against my old team, the Astros. Let's go Lambert. Oh no, I was an rescue that day. Why are you staring at me like that?

You okay? It was just your first Garrett call out of the gates at 725. It's not out of the gates. We've been on for a while, an hour and three minutes. That's right. Oh, that's horrible. Do you think, you know, we got to get Robert Ford to give us some more drops. So I was, yeah, we're going to probably bury that one.

Yeah, we don't need the lethargic calls where he sounds like the team shot his dog. Like when he had, when the aster's hit a whole. home run again. Let's get a see you later. Well, we'll hope for that. Well, there was one yesterday. What are you talking about? They did it. We can go, I think we have the ones from like, Yordon Alvarez, see you later, see you later. When he's jumping up

and down to the booth. See you later. That video with Robert jumping up and down is classic. Yeah. So tell me the Ethan Pecco's story. They called him up because I've been on vacation. Yeah, less than four innings. He was okay. He was okay. I mean, it wasn't great, but again, you're talking about an astros rotation that does not have any length to it.

You've been hoping for anything. somebody to wake up. And it's not even... Who's their best starter still? Lambert? Lambert looks gassed. He just does. And he has for a few weeks now.

I mean, the numbers may not completely show it to you, but if you've watched the Astros in the last four or five starts of Peter Lambert, you're noticing it's not the same Peter Lambert. And Hunter Brown, same things.

Low-hit count, relatively low-run count, high-pitch count, can't get you deep into games. A lot of walks. A lot of... You know what it is? Not a lot of blowaway. He's going, and I'm not trying to say every single batters on this, but Ross, he's going. It feels like 9, 10, 11 pitches with a lot of guys in his burning his pitch count up.

Okay, so starting rotation is not good. Lineups not hitting. Bullpen is getting gas. Yes. And defense has been questionable. Correct. Other than that, things are going great for the Houston Asher. Still in first place. I don't know how. I don't know how either. Under 500. All right. Deshawn Watson, would you describe it as a 20-6? tumultuous run in Cleveland? I would say disastrous.

Yeah, I was going to go with that one. Tumultuous sounded like a big, heavy word. I mean, it's been good for his bank account. All the guaranteed, by the way. He and David Mulliggetter have been happy with the money that has been guaranteed. Those Cleveland Brown checks keep cashing. Well, ACH keeps going through the bank account, so they're happy there. And the Cleveland Browns, when you goof on a quarterback, it's the best example of how, not only if you goof on the town,

but you goof on the contract. And they did both. And that's why the Cleveland Browns are the Cleveland Browns, for a reason. So Deshawn had a less than spectacular second preseason game and heard it from the fans, and Deshawn wasn't pleased about that.

728 here on Sports Talk 790. It is 734. It's Matt and Ross in the morning. We thank you for listening to our first show today. Sports Talk 790. All right. When I watched the preseason, And obviously I'm going to watch a lot of the Texans, although the first half in the game of the other night was plenty.

Actually, the first quarter was the first team out there scored a touchdown. Woody Marks looked good, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I will put NFL network on just to kind of get a sense of what's going on around the NFL. And they were doing a recap of the games over the weekend. And unfortunately, the Cleveland Brown's quarterback situation has not been resolved. Apparently, it's going to be resolved today because the head coach, of the Cleveland Browns, Tom Monkin, is going to make that announcement.

And the announcement is probably going to mean that Deshawn's going to get the job. DeShon Watson. Not because he's been amazing in training camp, it's because he's got $230 million in guarantee money that the Browns have committed to him or will be committing to. So Watson in the second preseason game, I guess it was their first home game, whatever. It was terrible.

And he's been terrible. He's only made, he think he's made less than 20 starts. He's been often hurt. He was suspended by the NFL. for all the massage therapist situation, fine $5 million. And when he plays, I think it's 19 starts Rossi, he's not been good. There's been nothing that has been satisfactory about anything that Deshaun Watson has done is at Cleveland Brown.

He's been bad. He's been getting protested by fans and then he's been ripping up his Achilles. Not great. Yeah. Cash and checks. Nothing. So we're going to play some audio for you of a part of a press conference. And as the press conference begins, look,

optics sometimes are nothing, sometimes they're everything. Before the press conference begins or as he's going up there, he's answering questions, he's putting his diamond earing into his ear. That's bad optics in my mind. You can afford the diamond earring. I get it. Congratulations. Just put it on before you get up in front of the microphone. Maybe it slipped out.

No, you're not, there's no maybes. So he was asked about the very, very obvious booing of him throwing a pick in this weekend's playoff exhibition game. And he goes on to say it's a couple minutes long, but it's worthy of playing. This is, woe is me, Deshaun Watson talking about the criticism he has received not only in Saturday's preseason game, but his entire time in Cleveland. I mean, I didn't have no reaction. I think the biggest thing is

I think you guys know too and I think the whole world know it has nothing to do about the performance it's a little bit personal than that so I think that's a disrespectful thing so yeah I mean I'm going to keep whatever I feel

with me and my family internally on how I feel about that and yeah just move on but don't you think to Sean that winning and playing better would eliminate some of that bullying? Last time I played on this field, I told my Achilles.

And that same fan base, they cheered when I got hurt. So does that have to do it? What does that have to do with anything about performance? When a person get hurt, especially for your own city, and they cheer. Does that make you regret coming here? No, I don't regret anything in my life. You know, I think the Lord put me through situations for it. reason. So I don't, I don't regret anything at all. But, you know, I had a different thoughts on how it was

going to be, but, you know, it is what it is. You know, sometimes, you know, the table's turn. And I'm patient enough because I'm a child of God to, you know, wait for that time to change. So I'm not tripping on it. I'm not tripping on it. Translation. Have you seen my bank account? Recrats. Are you kidding me? We're doing okay. All right. I was not there, nor were you. But I could probably Ross find the game video

where he suffered his latest injury, where he claims that people were cheering for his injury. Okay. I don't find that to be impossible to believe, but I find it improbable. Really? When someone gets a serious injury, they're cheering him off the field?

I don't believe that. In Cleveland? Browns fan? I could see that. I mean, I don't know. I haven't seen. Has anybody looked this up? I mean, somebody didn't need to verify that.

Yeah, it didn't have anything. I didn't seem to have any problem. I mean, it didn't shock me at all. You can, him and Hall. Oh, no, here we go again, because I got news for you. We got one of those here. Lance McCullors. Oh, he's hurt again.

Yes. So people were not cheering for Lance McCuller's injuries, but they were going, no, but this is a different situation. I mean, this is a guy who had got slapped with 25 lawsuits. So it wouldn't shock me if people were cheering when he got hurt. Oh, okay. I never quite thought of it that way. I mean, maybe there's some of that residue of that. Okay, so he believes he's being disrespected. I got news for you, Ross. He absolutely was being disrespected. Yeah. No one has respect for Deshaun Watson. He's, uh, the lawsuits. Yes. The suspension. Yes. The fine. Overpaid. The injuries. The ineptitude. Yes. And the arrogance. Six things that kind of gain disrespect. I don't think anybody's crying for Deshawn Watson. or should they be. Just not all that surprising from what we've seen from him.

So he's going to go with the victim card. And even if he played two cards, the victim card and the God card. And even if he believes all that, which I believe in his myopic mind, he does. Don't say it. Okay. You don't, none of that should have been said. Zilch. Okay.

Honestly, sometimes is not the, best policy. I always say you folks, it's better to lie. Yes. And in that particular case, he's getting cruising. If he would have lied and said, you know what, I understand why people were mad at me, I'm just going to go out there and do the best I can. You know what? It had been generic and boring, but you know what? It wouldn't have been played on Houston Sports Radio. So, Todd Munkin, first year coach, Cleveland Browns, by the way, congratulations, Todd. You're going to enjoy your two-year experience. Like most of the other coaches have been to everybody else. Yeah. Here was his thoughts on the fans.

booing to Sean Watson. Hey, how's it feel to get booed? I mean, it's a pretty easy question. It sucks. I don't want to get booed. It comes with the territory. You don't want to get booed? Let's play good football. Let's play good at quarterback. Let's play good on offense. Let's play good as a team.

And then you don't have to worry about all that because it can turn just like that. Win, play good football, and everybody will be fine. That's just part of it. I mean, so I told him, you good? we're good. Part of what we do. There it is. Good for him.

Good for coach. Play good football. They won't boo you. It's very easy. Very forgiving. Especially NFL fans. Fans in general are forgiving. Yes.

In general, yes. Especially in the NFL. I hate to keep making an Astros comp on it, but y'all hated Lance McCullors. Y'all hated Jose Abrae. You hated Raphael Montero. If they're throwing BBs and hitting home runs every other day, you love them. That's what we as fans do. We love you.

one day we hate you the next. People booed Carlos Beltran for like 12 years. Yeah, until you came back and gave back. Yeah, we're all good. Yeah. Carlos Beltran. Get the mothballs off that old jersey. We're going to be ready to go.

You're never going to win the woes me versus the fans. And fans are not always right. Trust me. No. Fans are doing the wave when the asters are batting. That's very, very wrong. Okay. Fans are blaming pitching coaches and managers who aren't even in the stadium that day.

Fans are not always right, but they're the ones that, look, you don't have the evidence on your side. There is nothing except for maybe you feel sorry for him being as injured as he's been over the last handful of years. But all that money is guaranteed. And I'm telling you, it's just life. If an NFL team that you love and adore has ownership that says we're bringing this franchise quarter, back in. We're going to trade multiple draft picks for him. We're going to give him a long contract of $230 million of which for the first time ever in NFL history. All of it's guaranteed. You're going to hear it if you ain't on the field. It's beautiful. It's just life.

Cleveland Browns. As you put the diamond ring in your ear when you're answering questions. He was just fixing it. I went and looked at the video. I got no issue with that at all. That's a non-issue. It's a complete issue. It's a zero point zero on the scale. He should be suspended for four weeks for that. He should be suspended for other things that he did, which he was. Putting on an earring, whatever. It's fine. Put the earring down, focus on it later. He was just a little loose.

Got to tighten up your earring. Got a nice watch on, too. A bunch of diamonds in that thing. He's doing okay. He's like, no regrets. Look at these earrings. Look at this watch. He's got a diamond bracelet on too.

So he's basically, he's throwing shade at you on the dais. No. Look on the stuff I got. Yeah, he's doing okay. I'm surprising. I'm not. as he can come pick him up in the middle of the press conference. I hope he's doing better.

Yeah, look, he's got the big diamond earring. He's got the watch, man. He's looking nice. Well, that's going to really endear himself the Cleveland fan. Yeah, he's got, oh, the chain, too? You're making my point. I love it. Oh, no.

743. Steve Spark's going to join us in 17 minutes here on Sports Talk. Every night. Steve is with us every Monday. We'll have Dana Brown Wednesday at 930. For the love of God, Ross, we needed an Astros, some wins there. We needed him on these nine games homestand against bad teams.

They won three games. More on that coming up with Sparky in about 17 minutes. By the way, Sparky is the dad of the year. What happened? One of his beautiful daughters got married this past week. Okay. I believe in Italy. Hmm.

Okay. So as I texted him yesterday, he'll be doing Rock Astros radio for the rest of his life until he's 93. It's going to have to pay the wedding off. I hope he does. We are Matt. and wrongs in the morning. First day with us. If you've been with us in 6 o'clock,

you were probably larger disappointed between 6 and 22. 6.22. Maybe they loved it. Maybe they felt like, man, this is better. This is a cup of Joe shows. Great. How's listening to Morning Sports Radio?

Give me in this morning. Good God. National radio. Holy crap. I thought local radio was bad. Not great, Lord. I went to bed.

Like, a non-nights the Astros are playing. I'm going to go to bed. 18 and 830. I'm just going to do it. Okay. You take a melatonin or what you do? No, I just listen to wrestling podcast. Okay, and put you right out. Right. Or the Adam and Adam podcast.

Ooh, 18 podcast? I'm going to miss those guys. Yeah, because I don't think we can, we can, we'll take shots to them and they won't hear it. I know. There's no way Adam Clanton's up right now. There's zero chance. Zero percent chance.

Wexter is up, but he's, he's ready to go to Texas practice. Although Clinton may be taking his kid to kindergarten or whatever. Or is he in first grade? I can't remember. He's growing up too fast. Yeah, I think it's maybe first. I think it's second. Oh my God. He's growing up fast. He is grown up.

I remember going with him and Teresa and my wife and I went to see Hall and Oates back when they liked each other. Yeah? And Teresa was pregnant. It was Hall and Oates. Hall and Oates. Okay. Now it's just Hall. Yeah.

And Oates is like, what am I supposed to do? They're going to hang out and collect royalties? He's doing okay. I would think so. All right. Steve Sparks is coming up at the top of the hour. We have 830. We got to tell the truth.

By the way, I've got my to tell the truth. Locked and loaded. You do? How many lies? I will tell you that I will tell you that I'm. I am lying three times. Wow. One truth.

Okay. One truth, three lies coming up 830. We've got missing you at 930. For those who don't know what missing you is, missing you is we look at five former Houston athletes and see how they're doing elsewhere. Okay. And we've been doing it obviously during the baseball season

because of the season, but we will kick in football in a few weeks. Okay. Dallas Keiko didn't make the cut, did he? I haven't done it yet, so I don't know. No. Oh, we're going to have a brand new member of the Missing Your Club. Okay. It was a suggestion from a listener just the other day.

So we'll have that for you coming up. And then the debut of Believe it or Not in the morning at 950. What is today's topic? What? I know. We're brick, you didn't tell me that. Everything's coming over. We're still doing, believe it or not?

And tomorrow, Ross's NFL. Ross's NFL ReWind makes his debut. I know. What time is that one? That's at 930. Okay, I'm going to rate that. I'm giving you like three, you get three and a half hours heads up. It's fine.

You got to believe it or not in the same day. All right. All right. Fine. I've sold my name on the show. I've got to pull my weight. That's right. And by the way, for those of you looking for Dr. Roto, he's coming with this as well. And his debut edition of the show is this Thursday at 9 o'clock. I'm going to get you earplugs for those segments because he's got you playing better the last couple years.

I know. And he'll normally join us on Friday during the season, but this week he'll join us at Thursday at 9 o'clock. All right. How's your draft board looking? Our draft's September 3rd. Well, apparently, Ashton Jentee's off the list. No, he's back. He's back. Maybe fall. He should be ready week one. I'm just making that up. I want you to draft him. There's a chance. If I let ESPN auto draft me, you never know. Yeah, you never know.

713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. An old friend of the show, and I mean old, is joining us right now on the show. Talk some Astros baseball. For those of you that are middayers, you know that Terry in Ohio always brings it here on 7-90. Terry, you're on with Matt and Ross, and we are in the morning. Hi, Terry. Hey, how are you guys doing? Congratulations.

Thank you. I appreciate it. It's nice you to say that. Appreciate it, Terry. Hey, welcome back, Ross. It's good to be back, Terry. Vacation was nice, but it's good to be back as well. Yeah, I called last week. Madden told you to ask her to go four and five. Yes. What's going on with these guys? I don't know. Terry, we thought you were being, you were going to be wrong. We thought you were like off your meds, but you were clearly on them. Three and six. was absolutely terrible, just terrible.

Hey, what about taking to Sean Watson for a backup quarterback? For whom? Oh, you're going to trade him back to Houston? Oh, I don't, yeah, I don't know. Davis Mills is entrenched. Thank you, Terry, for the phone call. Terry's in Cleveland, so he's locked on Browns. Let me ask you this, would you, speaking of extending quarterbacks,

would you extend Davis Mills? For what? Solid insurance policy? I'm good. I mean, you can find a Davis Mills. No, I'm fine. Are you sure? Absolutely.

Hold on, hold on. You missed Brett Rippin on the son. Oh, he was terrible yesterday. Are you sure about that? Honestly, I turned the game off once C.J. Stroud went in. I'm going to be honest with you. Aren't these backups getting like $5 million a year or something like that? Yeah.

You find a guy. Okay. Look, you want to pull up all the backup quarterbacks? Kyle Allen, Quinn Ewers, Tommy DeVito. It's fine. Carson Wentz. Yeah, you can find a backup. I'm sorry.

I like Davis Mills. You're saying you would not enter a thought of extending Davis Mills. I mean, what, for a reasonable rate? Okay. But it's not like I'm going to pay him a bunch of money. Joe Flacco is still in Cincinnati? Is that true? Of course he is.

No, good for him. He's got to be approaching 40, does he not? He's over 40. God, almighty, it's crazy. Yeah, 41 years old. He's been bouncing back between the Bengals and the Browns, I think, for the last two years. Yeah, so I was confused. I didn't know which one he was at. No, he was still in the league. Good for him.

Trubisky's backing up Cam Ward. Yeah, you can find one of these guys. It's fine. Okay, but he knows a system. I'm just, and look, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not a, I'm not. I'm being a mills realist. You're calling him money Mills. You got a money Mills tat on your forearm. I don't think so. Although my oldest son has a mills surgery. Actually, these backups are worse than I thought. Jake Browning is still kicking it? Good for him. Kinney Pickett. Oof. To a tongue of a low over and Michael Pinnock's. Oh, two lefty bad quarterbacks.

At least the receivers get some consistency. When one comes in, there's both left-handed. Okay. Maybe that's a gut feeling I have tomorrow. The next quarterback that gets a new contract. I like Davis Mills. Sure, if you want to extend them, but I'm not going to give him any kind of crazy money or anything like that.

I think $5 million a year to carry a clipboard is crazy money, but good for him. This is Matt and Ross in the morning. And you've been. listening to him in this time slot every Monday during the baseball season for a long time and we are very happy as part of our transition to have one of the great baseball

minds, broadcasters and awesome storytellers to Astros Radio, the one and only Steve Sparks joining us from New York City. And also, by the way, Sparky, you are the father of the year because you took your family

to, is it Italy, am I correct on that? I did. Yeah, last week I missed six games with the Astros and went to the Amalfi Coast in Italy. Okay, so let's back up a second here. You have two daughters and daughter says, we're going to go get married. And you're like, I like the new future son-in-law. He's a good kid. Where do you all want to get married?

Do you want to get married and say Tom Ball or Katie at the Woodlands or something? And she says Italy. And your response to that was what? Italy, Texas? Exactly. I mean, my... That was my response. My God, Steve.

I mean, I don't want to pocket watch you, but are you broke or never? What's going on with that? I mean, are you using Purdue to pay for this wedding? Ooh, Lord. Am I getting paid for this spot finally? No, you're not a damn thing. No. Oh, hell no.

This is in my contract. No. No, it's in your contract. Sorry. Sorry. Oh. It's going to hurt. I mean, it was an expensive wedding.

It's going to hurt for a little while, but it was worth it. Good. That's my baby. That's my last. wedding. And you're all done because the sun gets married. You're not on the hook for that. And again, that's what I'm hoping. Yeah, your lovely wife sent some great pictures

and it was great to. Congratulations to the entire Sparks family. All right. So you get back and you get back in the States and you find out the Astros, do not do enough damage against the Mariners. Okay, whatever. They don't do enough damage against the angels and you're like, oh, God. And then

you come back to watch the last two against the A's. I mean, you could not have come back in an absolute worst time, unfortunately, for the local nine. that's true you know but and I thought about it about three weeks ago too I thought to see a show at the bottom doubt against Baltimore if they played poorly

and that series it felt like they probably should have won that series and thought all right maybe this is a low point and they'll start looking up from there and they did they put together a nice little run but here we are again man this is probably as low

you're hoping as he gets in thank goodness that they're in a division Matt and they're in a league where they're still right in the middle of it. They're tied for first in their division. Second place, you know, the second place is still in play. You know, when you look at maybe having the second best overall record as far as division winners go to have a buy, so that's still in play. And they've just got at some point they've got to go nine and three.

You know, they've got to do something like that to separate themselves. and I think they can do it. I think they can play better baseball, and I expect them to. Ross, with you here as well, Sparky. Got a question for you about, hey, how's it going? I'm doing great. Good to hear you guys.

Yes, sir. All right, so the rotation, obviously has been a struggle all season long. You felt like Hunter Brown was going to come and stabilize things, and it's been a bit of an issue for him. I know, obviously, this is a league-wide thing in terms of guys not going deep in games these days, but what are you seeing from some of the pitching? Just guys not able to go deeper into games

and be efficient? I think it's just lack of command compared to what it used to be. I mean, guys are throwing harder. They're getting way more slinging miss. There's more effort involved in the pitches that they throw. I think the Astros are a good case in point. Just

quality start, you know, and you can say what you want about a quality start, which is six or more inning, three earn runs or less. Just a quality start the Astros Bullpen at the 2-2-E-R-A. You know, just give me six-innings, so I don't have to cover so many outs per game. One of those guys is usually going to falter at some point if you're having to use four or five relievers every game.

So I'm with you. I want these starters to go further into these games being more efficient, maybe more concentration on strike one, whatever they have to do. Maybe it's better targets from your catcher. You know, it's changed a lot as far as catchers goes. as far as dropping their glove so they can steal that low pitch. But with the ABS talents, I'm not so sure that's even that big of a deal anymore. So I don't know.

Just throw more strikes, get ahead of the count. We know there's a huge difference when you get ahead of the count. On one and two, rather than two and one, it's a massive difference in on-base percentage. I think it's about 180 points. So that would be my message. So two of the first three pitches for strikes, let's go. Steve Sparks with us here on a sports talk 790, specifically Hunter Brown. And he's a guy who even when he was at his best last year doesn't necessarily go deep into games,

but has had a little bit of a trouble with the walks. And I listen to you a lot of times you're talking about his mechanics and things that he's trying to do in terms of like slowing down. Can you just give us some insight into how he can limit those walks and be the guy that we thought that he was going to be when he came back? You know, we saw about three starts in a row where he started to command his fastball better. He's taken a step back maybe in his last one or two where he's walked a few more than he's wanted. Maybe not even the results you just left and you can just see that he's spraying the ball a little bit compared to what he was. And what he was doing when he was doing it really well, he was slowing his hands down. And that was allowing his arm to catch up with his body.

So then you get to a point like, okay, You know, I've thought about these mechanics. I work on it in between starts and things are starting to look a lot better. At some point, and this is the secret to sports, and no matter what sport it is, when you're competing at a very high level, you cannot think about mechanics. You just can't. You just got to see it and hit it or see the glove and hit it, see the target and hit it. But if you're thinking about where your elbow is or what your hands are doing, where I'm striding, anything like that,

that detracts from what you're really trying to do. That's compete at a very high level. And that is the antithesis of what you're trying to do as an athlete, whatever sport it is. That's the secret. I mean, if you're going to school right now and you're listening, when you're competing, there's a time and a place for mechanics. It's not when, it's not game time.

Now, there might be a simple thing you can say every once while. I was like, you look down, you know, drop your chin a little bit when you're making your turn, something like that that can get you back on track. But, you know, big, big mechanical thoughts are just taboo. Steve Sparks with us from New York. Aster has started a series of the Yankees tomorrow here on Sports Talk 790. Sparky, the clubhouse and you've been around them as a player and as a broadcaster for a long period of time. It's a marathon ebbs and flows.

You can't get too high. You can't get too low. It felt like a couple of comments coming out of the clubhouse yesterday from, namely Christian Walker, was a little more sense of urgency. So let me ask you this. If you are underperforming, you can say, all right, guys, let's get it together. If you are who we think you are, and like the reality is it's a 500 team, it's been that way for 75% of the season. How do you motivate when you look around and you're not going to call, I'm not talking about you particular, the general player in that room, knowing that you've got some guys that are very talented and you've got some guys that are just overmatched.

How do you motivate this time of year? with the playoffs still in hand, when you've got a roster that's probably got quite a few holes, at least from an offensive standpoint, getting a decent playing time. Well, let me start with this. I think the American League is full of rosters that have a lot of holes. You know, and I don't want to point fingers at specific guys or anything like that.

I feel a roster, you know, I feel at the lineup part every day, you know, nobody, no other team is really jumping at me thinking, and like, I can't pitch to certain portions of this lineup and feel pretty good about it. I mean, just nobody has, like when the Astros were batting Gurriel seventh, nobody has that right now. So that's the situation with that. I think you get confidence from practicing really well and preparing really well, and that should give you confidence going into a game like, okay, I'm ready.

And the other thing is, is you've got to be honest with yourself and say, Did I have a good approach and did I execute it? And here's what I mean by that. Is my approach to not try to pull this guy, try to go the other way because I'm going to take what he gives me or am I going to get greedy at a certain point and pull off and try to hit a home run into the Landry's Cropper boxes when the account changes.

When I come out of my approach, I need to be honest with myself and say, hey, you know, stick to your plan, you know. And I think that's what we see sometimes. Guys trying to do too much in certain times. We saw it in the first inning for a long time. You know it's been since June 12th at the Astros that scored three runs in the first inning until yesterday. That was a game where they scored nine in Kansas City, but it's been over two months since they scored three runs of the first. And it wasn't for lack of base runners.

It was for lack of approach and execution and getting a big hit in a big moment just by going the other way maybe sometimes. And it was nice to see that the Astros were able to just. do that. They scored six runs yesterday. They should have won, but that's baseball. But I like the approach. You know, you take what they give you. If you're thinking the right way and you just react, I think that's the proper approach. And I think that's what Christian in his post-game comments is talking about. It's like we need to stick to what we do best, and that's to have a patient, selfless approach. We'll wrap it up with another pitching question because we respect your acumen on that as much as anybody

in this marketplace. Peter Lambert looks like he is struggling a little bit. I'm not going to say that we're going to expect to see nine runs again in a short period of time like he had earlier this week. But it's been a month where it just hasn't been the same Peter Lambert. You know, we have been so accustomed to baseball fans

and broadcasters about watching pitch count when you get to 90, 95, 97. Uh-oh, time to get the bullpen. At this point of the year, if your arm is healthy, I'm talking about every single guy in that starting rotation. Can pitch count be damned? Or we still sitting there are worried about it because there's been so much wear and tear? And maybe Peter Lambert's a good example. That because he's pitched a lot of

innings. But where do you see Lambert, first of all, and then where do you see the pitch count overall here with a month left to go in the season? Matt, I think it stems from what people, you know, and the numbers that you see the third time through the lineup is where it stems from. You know, and the numbers suggest that like third time through that the opposition has a much better, has much better numbers, much more success against his typical pitcher. But if you're a guy like Peter Lambert in my eyes that can execute and pitch guys differently

that third time through, then I think there's a little more leeway that can be granted. And I think with him in particular, he is kind of a unicorn in the fact that is a right-handed pitcher. And this is, I mean, people think just because you're in the major league that these guys can command their fastball at will, they can't. I mean, this has been going on forever. Guys who can command their fastball, righties, inside the lefties are few and far between. And because of that, lefties can lean out over the plate and go the other way or keep their front shoulder closed and really inflict a lot of damage against guys. But if you're on, if you're making them honest inside and someone strikes inside, then you make them protect both sides of the plate. And Peter Lambert does that as well as anybody I've seen on the,

the Astros in a few years when he's going well. The last couple of days, he's gotten away from it for whatever reason, but I guarantee he gets back to it. But he commands fastball inside the lefties as well as anybody I've seen with the Astros at a while. So, you know, the velocity is still fine. You know, we can probably look at any pitch comparatively to the last season or two when he was in Japan and just make sure that you're not jumping that too far.

but I feel really good every time he starts and when you write this name in the lineup card for me I feel like the assures are going to win all right my friend enjoy your off day in NYC I know you've not spent much money the last handful of days

you've got plenty of money to go to see a Broadway show maybe go play at a high-end golf course maybe go to a deli I don't know what you're doing today but you've got your flush with cash so enjoy that and we'll talk with you again next week thanks man

I can see Ross take care buddy all right our man Steve Sparks Great stuff as always. What do you do? And I'll ask them off here, but what do you do when the daughter says we're going to Italy? Man, you're pocket watching hard right now.

Because I'm going to... You better save up. That's what you're going to do. You know what I'll probably do it with Carl? I'll say, here's a set amount. No, we'll get yourself. Yeah, we'll get you a shift that, I don't know. But if I said to her...

Go back to McDonald's. But if I said to her, here's 20,000. That doesn't include the money that's going to cost me to fly me and my wife over there. I don't know, Matt. And the kids? Yeah, well, do you tell her, you're going to tell her no? Are you going to tell her to get alone? You think Steve Sparks sold his last daughter?

No? I don't know. He's probably, he's got some baseball money, right? Yeah, he's not during 10 year ago. Oh, okay. Did he get his service time? So that's what I'll do. I'll say, hey.

Now we're service time watching Steve Sparks. So I'll say, let's go break. Yeah, I'll say, watch this. This is Matt's fault. Hey, Carly, I would love to be able to send you on a Hawaiian, do the Hawaiian wedding. But since I only worked radio, I don't have enough money to do it. I'm sorry. All right, well.

And then she starts tearing up, but dad is what you haven't saved up for this? Not really, no. Okay, well, you might want to get on that. Okay, that's what it is. Start saving now. Yeah, I like how you think. Let's go. To tell the truth is coming up at the bottom of the hour.

Our morning first voyage in to tell the truth. I will have three lies and one truth. You've got to figure out what we're doing on that. 713-212-790. It is Matt and Ross in the morning here on Sports Talk, 790. It's my and lost in the moor. I'm obsessed. Boo!

I love them. I love them. What's up with this AI clap trap? We're doing it. We're on Sports Talk 790. So here's the bit. We want you guys. It sounds like Rebecca Black, that girl from it's Friday.

Perfect. No, that's not good, Matt. She's not good. Well, we're going to have some more, we have a lot of people on our audience. And Javier and Laredo, remember our friend of Javier, he's going to do some liner's course. Breaking news. Sounders? Another one.

Another one. Now I'm on the fence. Another one. I don't even know what it is. Just released by the Houston Astros. Effective today. The Houston Astros and general manager Dana Brown have mutually agreed to part ways. Hit it again.

Hit it again. Five? Hit it again. Six? No. Five is back. That's true. Brown's contract was set to expire at the end of the 2026 season.

His responsibilities will be transitioned to the Astros' Assistant General Manager's Charles Cook, Gavin Dickey, and Connor Huff, and a senior advisor, Jeff Bagwell. Hit it again. I know it again. Max is five. You can't go eight for Dana Brown. Who are we talking to our Wednesdays, Hefe? We're getting Jeff on?

Wait a minute. Wait a minute. We is... Just trace? Yeah, go ahead. We lost Boga Sevik and McTagherty and we're not getting Dana? Boo! This Madden and Ross in the morning sucks.

I want Madden and Ross in the midnight, Beth. Hey, we got Sparky on. He was good. Who reported it, by the way? That was actually just released by the Astros. We got the release just sent to our email as well. If you want to read further on that. There's more of a press release.

So, yeah. Let's go ahead and read it. I'll read the first one. Hold on. Hold on some more reading music. Yeah, this can't be, this can't be breezing. Why not? It's a firing. We knew this was coming, though. Zero surprise.

This is very zero, this is a zero point zero surprise. Zero point zero surprise. Not good news. I'm sorry, big news. I don't know. What do you want? What do you want, Matt? What do you want? I don't know. Just find something. I just, I just, I just put it in it. This is, this seems for it. This is light and airy.

This is not lightenary. Yeah, he's breezing a vacation. It's fine. This is what Dana Brown is going to be putting when he gets on the boat, on the yacht. All right, here we go. Relaxing. Let the man relax. Kick up in the, like a wine country guy.

Take him on a trip to Seattle. Yeah, we'll go to. You know the spots. Go to Paso Robles. All right, I'm going first paragraph. You go second. Oh, sure. Why not?

Over the past four seasons, Dana has helped our organization win two division titles and has led our baseball front office through key scouting, draft, and development efforts. This is Jim Crane speaking, by the way. On behalf of the Astros, I want to thank him for his commitment, energy, and contributions to our organization. We wish him and his family the best.

Okay, so this other one is Dana Brown. Oh, okay. Let's go ahead, yeah. I want to thank Jim Crane for the opportunity to serve in my first role as an MLB general manager. The Astros organization and the fans have welcomed me and my family, and I'm grateful they've called Houston home for the past four seasons. I wish the organization well,

and I look forward to the future. as I continue my 36 plus years in professional baseball. On the way out, he dropped the 36 years in professional baseball. Do you think he was... He mentioned it every week on the interview. Maybe he was upset about the shift change. Oh, us, me? He was like, I'm not talking to those Ye-Hus.

Yeah. Okay. Well, by the way, one more thing. You know why this Matt and Ross in the morning is going to work? Because we got the breaking news and A-Team didn't, so suck it, 18. There's the worst. I'm not thinking about them at all. I'm thinking about Dana Brown.

Do we do Dana Brown missing you? Oh, how? Was he scouting somewhere? Not yet. But he'll be in. We're going to check on his draft picks? It's interesting because the first couple of drafts haven't been fruitful, but the last couple, all the Astros' top prospects are recent Dana Brown picks.

But they're not ready yet. You're right. They're 18, 19 years old. And a lot of times, 18, 19 year olds are great prospects and they don't develop. Not saying that's going to happen any of these guys. I'm not saying, I'm just saying. you know what I'm saying? All right, let's do this.

Let's make sure we hit the breaking news sound again, just so you all know exactly what just went down. Morning shows don't get breaking news at 827. Yep, Astros press release. Dana Brown mutually agreed to part ways. I mean, it makes sense. There's nothing else from, I was, it is funny because literally, so I have this notepad, man,

which you've got me, thank you for the calendar. You're like, I'm like, thinking of questions for Dana on Wednesday. I'm like, what the hell do we even ask him? Raynell Delgado? What, Lamont Wade Jr. is up to? I mean, there's nothing to be done. Draft is done. Deadline is done. Team's not playing well. Well, and you're not going to embarrass. And your one acquisition at the deadline has been a dud.

And it's just a reality. Is this what it is? It's been a dud. Varsho has been terrible. At the plate. He made a couple of good catches recently. So he's good in the field. Here's me rolling my eyes. Can you all hear it? Hey, Jake Myers fan club likes a good. good center fielder with a light bat. He's used to, Jake Myers' fan. Exactly. We're just transitioned right to the Varsho fan club.

Getting 169 is an astro with a 532 OPS. OPS plus, leave. We have more by the one? What? No, this is. Oh, okay. You're in. Dilton Varsho's OPS plus a 50 is breaking news.

Breaking news. Donne Varsho hasn't worked out. So. 11 hits and 71 played appearances. The keto good radio show is adapting to the news of the day. So we're not going to do it to tell the truth right now. Okay. Believe it or not, Dana Brown? Yes.

No. You got an hour and a half to figure it out. All right, fine. All right. Houston, Texas. We are a show that takes phone calls. This may be foreign to a lot of you all, but we're going to do this. We're going to welcome you on the radio. If you'd like to join us, Dana Brown out as Astros general manager.

You're not even typing it up yet? think I should. What was your favorite? Dana Brown moment. What was your favorite Dana Brown moment? I'll have it for you next. Okay. What an odd first day of Matt and Ross in the morning.

Including breaking news. We don't, again, morning shows don't get breaking news very often. Today's day, baby. Today is the day. So the Astros have blessed us with breaking news. It's not a win. Yeah, it's not good news. It's not.

Yeah, it'll be interesting. And obviously, oh, we should say, Dana Brown. Yes. Mutual party of the ways, that's not true. Dana Brown has been let go. Basically, yeah, it's like, we'll go ahead and let him go.

He's not doing much the rest of the season anyways. I mean, a very, very tough task for Dana Brown is you're going to have to contend at the major league level. You're going to have to build up the roster. We want to buy deadlines in order to stay in contention as well. So you're going to have to trade away some of your prospects. Oh, by the way, we're letting all the big free agents walk because we can't afford them.

So you're going to have to find other guys on value deals. And you have to continue to keep us as contenders for as long as possible and stay under the tax where you have to move a Maricio Dubon. You have to move a Hazer Sanchez to try to stay under the tax. Tough task. Could have done better, though, building up the prospects. Could have done better with the farm system and the draft picks as well. And I think the pitching moves from all this offseason has just been a disaster. Burroughs,

Tongue, Emi, who else? I feel like I'm forgetting somebody. Ryan Weiss. Yeah, Ryan Weiss. They were all disasters. This is the gods honest truth here,

and this is not hyperbole. It's very difficult to have restraints on you, meaning financial restraints or contract philosophies. But most of these teams in baseball Ross operate under those. Tampa Bay has done

it forever and ever and wins. I'm looking at the major league. I'm looking at teams that are in contention right now. Milwaukee is not a high spending team. They do it. Miami is this year is above 500 and going to the playoffs. There are more teams that act like and operate like the Astros than act like the Mets, the Yankees, and the Dodgers.

That is indisputable. You have to be, you are, every team has different restraints. The Astros are more forthcoming with contracts. and say Cincinnati or Pittsburgh, okay? They are more willing to go on the free agent wire or make a trade or go into the Far East for Tatsu Aemai. I got news for you. Case in point, the, I'm just talking a rando team. The Arizona Diamondbacks are not going to commit $18 million to a player that's playing in Japan.

It's not going to happen. So every team has its quirks. You take a job. there was no surprise at how Jim Crane wants to operate his organization. And by the way, you want to make this a Jim Bain bashing session. The best baseball in the history of this city has been under Jim Crane's leadership. So that is not disputable either. Right.

It's difficult. It ain't easy. But Ross, it can be done. And unfortunately, Dana couldn't do it here. It can be done or at least more consistent. I mean, you're talking about the Brewers and the Rays. I mean, the Rays don't win world championships. I don't know when the last time the Brewers won a world championship either.

And that's been the task. And obviously it's tough because only one team wins every single year. But he didn't do enough. It was a difficult task. Believe another example. Doesn't spend a lot of money. They're always in contention. Yeah.

And it's been four seasons of me. Now the farm system looks like it's building up a little bit. We'll see what happens with this year's draft class. But last years and the years before were pretty good. But it wasn't enough. And I think the biggest death knell to me was all, every one of your pitching acquisitions. Every one of them. Was a disaster this offseason.

It just hasn't worked out at all. What we don't know, and they're not going to tell us, because I'd like for them to be forthcoming, but they're not going to be. Is whose decision was it on Tatsu Emi? How much of the Diken business relationship had to do with that? We don't know. How much of that was Jim Crane going, hey, we need to go tap into the Far East. Is there somebody over there?

And Dana goes, hey, there's this guy named Tatsui Emai. That would be great. Jim Crane says, hey, is that the best guy you want to tell us about? And oh, by the way, I'll call my friends Dyken see if they want to partner up with this. So we don't know where the level was of who had the interest on that.

Because, you know, Jim likes to get involved in the baseball operation side of things. He personally negotiated the Justin Verlinter contract. He personally got the, He sent Jeff down to Florida to find out exactly what Jose O'Bray you had in the tank, and obviously the answer was not much. So he's not a, I'm not my GM do my thing. I'm going to get involved.

Yeah. And that's another thing that's been tough, as he's always, he's had Jeff Bagwell, Reggie Jackson, Jim Crane in his ear as well, and we don't know how much autonomy he's had over the years. And I do want to say, kind of to backtrack, we said none of the pitching worked out. Peter Lambert has worked out. But other than that, it's been, it's been. It's been pretty bad. I get you.

Not good enough. These are difficult jobs. There are only 30 of them, Ross, and each of them are going to have their issues to them. I guarantee you not everybody has free reign like the Dodgers general manager does. And all 30 teams, especially in this day and eight, they're smart. There's fewer inefficiencies in the market. Every team has a good bunch of guys who are making draft picks and finding free agents

and looking at analytics and looking at holes and swings and pitch to pitch mix and all that type of stuff. It's hard. The downfall to me for Dana was lack of real movement at the trade deadline. He was on one hand behind his back. The lack of all the different pitchers that came in except for Lambert. And I also think that the fact that the minor league system remains bottom three in baseball. Ross, every time we go look at a new survey, baseball America, baseball prospectus, MLB.com, no one gives the Astros, their flowers on their monoling system.

somebody's got to be 28, 29, 30. And it feels like the Astros have been that way, really, since the latter days of Jeff Lunar running the organization. I'm looking at their top 10 or top 30 prospects list. And all the top guys are recent Dana Brown acquisitions, but they're not all thought of

as the best prospects in baseball. They're all Dana Brown guys, but they're not all top prospects. Yeah. All right. To answer your question, we'll go to some phone calls after that. The best movie made was You Say Kikuchi coming here.

You say Kikuchi helped stabilize the Asteroon. offense to get the Astros into the playoffs or close to the playoffs. No, it was playoffs. He didn't pitch. He didn't pitch, but yeah, they made the playoffs. He was ready for game three. Game three never happened. Thanks, Tigers. By the way, you know who I want for the general manager, don't you? Jeff Bagwell.

No. Love Jeff. David Stearns? Nope. Okay. Timperper. Nope. We're not going to retread. Okay. I don't know who do you want. I'll tell you in a moment. Look at this guy.

Bringing the professional radio teases to the morning. That's what I'm talking about. And I am not afraid to say it over and over and over again. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Who I want as the Astros general manager may not happen. Probably very unlikely. But I'm throwing it out there.

And we'll talk to Ronnie and Bright. 843. 50. Matt and Ross in the morning. All right. Ross knows to answer this question because I've been telling you off air for many months now. I put this at a 1% chance.

Okay. But you know what? I'm going to write it down as a gut feeling. Well, that'll be tomorrow. Yeah, I'll do it for tomorrow. And I'm sure the Astros are going to do their due diligence with people in the office. Assistance, scouting directors, blah, blah, blah.

I mean, former GMs, whatever the case may be. you have to cast a wide blanket on this. And frankly, you're, and unlike the last time, Ross, you're going to have plenty of time because there's going to be a lockout. A lot of time. A lot of time. How does that work? Can you can't, can you even conduct interviews?

Yeah, that's baseball operations can do it. Yeah, absolutely. You just can't do it with the players. Okay. There's no contract negotiations. There's no signing up. There's no players can't be in a facility. You're interviewing guys from other organizations and that's okay, too?

That's what I guess, what I'm wondering. Yeah, I think that's baseball. Okay. Yeah. All right, cool. All right. I mean this with all sincerity. The man I would like to see the Astros run

and run the baseball operation side of this, whether it's GM, president of business, whatever you want to call it, is a man who's currently managing the big leagues right now. His name is A.J. Hinch. A.J. Hinch has front office experience with two different baseball teams. He's always, I think, intimated in the past

that that was something he was thinking about when his managerial days are done. Now, he's currently under contract with the Detroit Tigers and I believe he's got a couple of years left if I'm not mistaken. 52 years old. Did he sign any extension

this last year or the year before maybe? Yeah. So the chances of this happening are very, very slim, especially, oh, by the way, that, you know, he had to be fired. But we've seen people get rehired. Yeah.

I'm just going to tell you, and you don't have to trust me for everything. Okay. My own personal belief is that AJ Pinch is a very bright baseball mind that would come in here, fully embrace the job, would organize it because he's been with four different teams organizationally. He would take the best of it. He's smart. I think he's a good

negotiator. I think he's fair. I think he's got a good eye for talent. I think he's a great manager. I think he would be a very, very successful general manager who, oh, by the way, still has a residents here in Houston, lives here in the off-season, and I think you could pencil him in for a very long time and feel like that he could appropriately fix the minor league system. I know, I'm not guaranteeing this. I'm saying, in my mind, and again, I don't spend any time, oh, there's this guy in the Marlins organization. I don't do that.

I can't do that. My brain can't handle that. But all I can tell you is, I knew when even AJ was managing that in the best of the best of the back of his mind, he's thinking, I want to eventually get in the front office. And I think A.J. Hinch, if ever given the opportunity to interview here in Detroit said, no, I don't know how Detroit feels about it. They're under 500 this year. They're underperforming. They just got swept this weekend by Kansas City, I think is where they're played. They're not in the playoff contention. Yeah, they're out.

That's that it to make a huge difference, but could. You never know. My belief is that A.J. Hinch would be a fantastic general manager. I will guarantee you, Ross, that AJ Hinch will be a general manager in baseball at some point. Okay? And you want to hear. I'd like it to be here. I want now, I don't, this is not the direction that the organization is going to go. I don't think because Jim Crane had the data analysis nerd and Jeff Luno and I don't want to say rent a muck in the organization, but things were not going the way that Jim Crane wanted.

And then he had James Click here from Tampa. But I want the next big data analysis nerd. That's what I want. Okay, that's fair. I don't care. I just want some nerd with spreadsheets. Let's go. Now this is Jeff Bagwell running on a hope of a prayer and a feeling and a wish and a gut feeling.

Dana Brown liked analytics, but Dana Brown wasn't an analytics guy. He was a scouting guy. It was folksy and all that type of stuff and I got 36 years in baseball and I've been scouting and I can, the eye test is going to be the Trump everything. No, I don't want that guy. I want some nerds. Get a bunch of nerds. in here with a bunch of spreadsheets. That's what Jeff Luno did and that's what whipped this

organization in your shape. And I'm going to not to oversell my candidate, but Jeff and AJ had a really good relationship because they were in tune with that stuff. I like Jeff Bagwell. I'm sorry, Jeff Wano. Okay, Leone. Okay, got you. Okay, well, any of these

Jeffs. All right, I want the biggest data analysis nerd, whether it be from the brewers or from wherever. I don't even know. Tampa, I know we went to that well once with James Click, and that didn't work out. And Jim Crane doesn't like data nerds anymore. He's stuffing them in lockers and he wants baseball guys.

How has that been working out for you for the last few years? It's been mediocrity. Yeah. I get it. I get it. I would think the next general manager of this team, whoever it may be, would be more. It's going to be more. You think so?

I don't know. I feel like Jim Crane doesn't want to go there anymore. Because he did it with Luno and click. Stearns and Elias were of the off the Lunotry stack geeks. They have both been failures in their jobs. Yeah, I mean, Elias has been mixed. A lot of his draft picks worked out. But, yeah, the results hadn't been there.

They had that 100-win season a couple years ago. They also don't spend in Baltimore. David Stearns, they do spend in New York. Yep. I mean, I don't know if that's a name that Jim Crane would want back here. If he got let go, would you consider David Stearns? because that's a name that has been linked to the Astros and Jim Crane before. Yeah, that's right.

Hell, they could be getting somebody from baseball America for all we know. That's fine. Those guys are happening all the time. I like them all. Baseball prospectus, let's get all these nerds in here. Get a bunch of nerds in here with some spreadsheets and I'm ready to rock because it worked the first time. Bright on 790 at 856. You're on with Matt and Ross in the morning. Bright, good morning.

Good morning. How are you all this morning? Good. Good. Hey, two points. Question. Is Doug Flutie like the worst actor in a commercial you've ever seen? My second point is that, you know, we've spent a lot of mornings bashing Dana Brown. And then about 20 minutes ago, y'all actually just sat and defended him and said he had a hardest job and that Ukraine controls everything.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't put words on our mouth. We did not say controls everything. I said he is involved, but he's not controlling. everything. That's not fair. Okay. And I'm going to hang out and let y'all cut. What is your opinion on the day-to-day operations? I get

where Dana Brown controls sort of the bigger picture, but as far as the day-to-day operations, optioning, making some pitching decisions, how involved do you think Dana Brown was and that? And I'll hang up. Hey, I enjoy y'all's a show. Thank you very much. Thank you, Brian. Appreciate it. We'll answer those questions coming back. Oh, let me write it down.

Yeah, write these down. If those of you don't know, we would have people ask this question and say, well, and then we'll come back. We're going to do it for real. Then we forget about it. It's a new year. It's a new show. It's a new us.

We're going to be better. It's mid-August in 2026. Yeah. So what was exactly the question he had? I don't even know what it was. What Dana Brown does? I would like to break it down this way. How much autonomy did he have in certain sections?

And we'll guess, but I think we've got educated guesses. We'll do that. We can do draft, trades, free agencies, stuff like that. Yeah. 713-212-5-790. We are going to have me missing you coming up at 930. Wonderful. It's kind of an homage to the front office.

Dana Brown, we're missing him. He's fine. Are we, though? Oh, look who chimed in for the first time in an hour. Oh, look at you. My truther is piping in with that? Yeah. What you just heard is a man who's bullish on Tatsu Emi.

I obviously didn't. Hey, hasn't Burroughs been tearing it up in AAA or something like that? He's rehabbing, yeah. He's ready to go. This is Matt and Ross in the morning. We have breaking news in the first ever Matt and Ross in the morning. It's not Matt Thomas with Ross. It's not Matt with other dude.

It's not me. It's you and me. Thank you. Let's go. Appreciate it, Matthew. All right, Matt and Ross, we are in the morning, 6 o'clock until 10 each day here on Sports Talks. We have breaking news for the day. Astros about, what, 45 minutes ago releasing.

the news that Dana Brown and the Astros are mutually parted. When you see, when you hear mutually parted, Jim went to Dana and said, you're gone and Dana said, okay, I agree to that. See you later. We will just watch Dana go. That's where you play Robert Ford. That's horrible. All right.

You know what, I'm blocking this guy. Hearing Mr. Texas this early in the day is an experience, all right, this guy's getting blocked. No, who is that person? I'm going to follow. Yeah, that's all good. I'm not going to tell you. All right, that's fine.

Okay, so the Astros, are going to do it by committee. A lot of the names you don't know. The one you do know? There's nothing to do. What are you going to do? What are you going to do? Does you dumb twiddle? Maybe the Nelson Velasquez one half a week.

Yeah, I guess it would call up. That was a fate of complete. Just pull some names. Oh, Nelson Velasquez. He was DFA and no one picked him up and said it's like, I'm going to afraid. Rale Delgado. Lamont Wade. There's a lot of names we're going to remember.

We're going to have to remind us in five years. We're going to do a 2026 Houston Astros quiz. How about two? Yeah. Okay, two years. We'll do a remember this, 2026 Houston Astro or not. We're going to remember Zach Cole because he was such a nice person. Oh, my God.

Yeah, we will remember Zach Cole? Yeah. Or how about that, wasn't there a center fielder that had a cup of coffee with the Astros too that brought the family? You know, like Julia always goes and talks to the players and he's been going already. Dustin Harris? Sounds about it right. Yeah. Remember, who was that catcher?

came up for like two days. I think I was on vacation for that one too. Oh, here we go. Colin Price? Colin Price. That's who it was. Oh, Lucas Spence? Oh, Lucas Spence. Yeah, they're all about their families. Yeah, we're going to do 2026 Asher or not at some point. Who the hell's Daniel Johnson?

Couldn't tell you. What? This guy, Daniel Johnson. How many of bets? Daniel Johnson, 17 played appearances in eight games? Daniel Johnson? Outfielder, 30 years old? This is made up.

Is he really? Look. Oh, my God. He did. He did play for the Astro. I forgot about this guy. I'm embarrassed. I'm sorry.

He should be. Write that down. Matt's embarrassed and sorry that he didn't know who Daniel Johnson was. Now that I see his picture, it's vaguely familiar, but is this right? I'm going to Google right now, Daniel Johnson Astros. I forgot, Cesar Salazar played nine games this year. Nobody hit him in the chest. Nobody hit him in the chest.

That's good. That's good. That's good, yeah. Tough scenes. All right, so somebody said, what is Dana Brown for? Now, again, this is educated guess. Okay, yes. Dana Brown's job.

Dana Brown, I believe, had complete control of the draft. I totally agree, yes. Okay? Brought in for that. I think Dana Brown was told go get us some pitching debt because last year, because of all the different injuries. So, Dana sent his scouts out under his direction and said, let's go find some people.

I believe Dana Brown was a serious part of the Mike Burroughs trade. I don't think Jim Crane runs multi-billion-dollar jobs. He's not trading for Mike Burroughs. I think, right, those types of trades. I think any, but I think Jim Crane signed off on it. He signs off on any of them. Yeah, right. Jim Crane's like, okay.

Yes. You want to make this trade? Tell me why we're making it. Okay, sounds good. We're going to add this guy. We like his repertoire. We're going to add a sinker or whatever. Yes.

I believe Jim said here is a basket of money, go use it for Ryan Weiss, go see if Kiwi Tang, tongue, excuse me, is an option. I mean, just go find some people. Build up our pitching because we were in such trouble last year. Then maybe Jim and Dana had a conversation. Again, this is purely hypothetical. call. Hey, let's do a deep dive on whether or not we can invest in the Far East. Because that's, why do the Giants and Mariners and the Dodgers get to do it? Why can't we do it?

We're smart. We spend money. We don't spend it crazily, but we spend it. Let's go get somebody over there. Dana was given the job, I think, responsibility. Go find the best armed out there that would be, it would contemplate coming to play for the Houston Astros. Because let's face it, a lot of these Far East players don't like playing. outside of West Coast teams for some weird reason. They found somebody. Thought two you, Mai was different.

He said he didn't want to be with the Dodgers. So then we're going to add that to the fact that, oh, by the way, Deakin Park is now the namesake of the new baseball stadium and there's now a huge business relationship. And by the way, I've got no problems with that. If Deakin wants to help

create a baseball business partnership with the Astros, zero issues with that. So are they investing in advertising overseas or back and forth or hey, Deakin's CEO's favorite player of all time was Tatsui Emai? Whatever. You get handshake backroom deals all the time. You pitch while, nobody cares.

Yeah. Nobody cares. And when he was signed and they had a big press conference, it was a, the H's up, and everything's great. He was at the NRG Stadium. I'm sorry, he was at Houston Stadium. He was all over the place. Now. Tossing up his H's.

Yeah. So now it's feeling good. So let's fast forward. off to a sluggish start. Yeah. Dana says, are we sellers or buyers? And my assumption is, Jim goes, we're buyers. Yes.

But we ain't going to mortgage. What's your system like? Dana's like, eh, you're not great. I mean, we're 28th. And Jim's like, wait a minute, why are we still 28th when I brought you here to build this thing up? I mean, this is all. I'm just playing here on this.

Yeah. Okay. And then he says, let's go get some players. and Dana's like, I don't want to give up anybody. He goes, all right, that's fine. You can not give up who you don't want to give up, but we need players. And did Jim veto a Brian Abray? You trade?

There was a report about that. It was unreliable. I don't know. Yeah, but there were reports from Channel Rome, reputable source that Jim didn't want Major League guys traded off. So Dana Brown was hamstrung with trades. He was hamstrung with free agents. He had a certain amount of bucks.

budget. He did have to give away Maricio Du Bonn. Marisa DuBond would have been a big help to this team this year. If he's hitting like he would have been in Atlanta. He's been great. We'll have more on that later on. And Husa Sanchez, I don't know how much that would have helped, but you did have to stand or the tax. You had to have everything go through him when it came through free agency and trades. Full autonomy in the draft is good. And results there were mixed at best. And then all the offseason pitching, except for Peter Lambert, which is a disaster.

And how many, and I don't know the answer to this. So I'm just throwing this out there. How many teams owners go to the general manager and say keeps under the tax? And how much was it Dana Brown do this? How much was it Jeff Bagwell's being consulted previously before? Reggie Jackson wasn't around this year. But the last couple of years, Reggie Jackson was consulting. And so you've got the other assistant general managers.

So it did feel like Dana Brown had a lot of cooks in the kitchen for him. I'm just going to say this, Ross. And you can argue with me or disagree or agree. I don't think this is not a situation that is not. formed to a lot of other baseball teams. I don't know. Does everybody have some legendary Jeff Bagwell involved in their decision making?

By the way, I mean, any decision we know that he's been involved, is not been good. Forget about Jeff Bagwell. Forgetting about General manager is not, the door is closed, let the man do the cooking. I think he's, there's lots of lieutenants bumping around. I would say out of 30 teams, there has been more meddling and involvement with Jim Crane and Jeff Bagwell

than other than on average. Maybe more than a average. But that doesn't mean Dana Brown couldn't have done the job. That doesn't mean Dana Brown did a perfect job in my mind or anything like that. I don't think he did enough. Struck out too much in the draft, especially the first couple of years, struck out too much with these pitching acquisitions. Relievers, I mean, just adding too many just the guys. Same thing with the outfield, unable to handle the outfield to get any semblance of anything going out there. So overall, Dana Brown, meh, not any big loss.

Find somebody who can do the job this offseason and go from there. We go to calls next. All of you online. We're going to get to as many of you as possible. We've got also as well missing you at 930, believe it or not today at 950. It is Matt, it is Ross. And we are in the morning, our debut edition of the show here. And we thank you for being a part of our radio show. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90.

Breaking news of the day, Dana Brown is out as general manager of the Houston Astros. We've got a lot of folks that want to get their two cents in. So let's get, we'll have a missing you coming up at 930. Believe it or not today at 950. I don't know, Matt. We got a lot of folks. phone activity. Fine. I'll do it. Look at it. I'm getting a desk there right now, Jonathan. I'll work on that. You take some calls. We'll leave it out today. What's the topic? Not Nana Brown.

Why not? Astro GM or not? Questions about former 70s? I'm about questions about former GMs. Okay. James Click questions. Jeff Leno? Yes. Tim Papura. Tim Papura. Tow Smith. Ed Wade or not? Ronnie on 7. Hi, Ronnie. finally. I've been on hold for three days. That's a lie. Well, not quite.

The only thing I wonder about Dana Brown, and I can't blame him for everything that happened. It started with Commissioner Dewa Diddy-Ditty. When he took draft choices and international money away from us, the general managers were all subject of trying to do things with their hands tied behind their back. But he did make some weird decisions. I don't disagree with Mike Burroughs. They got him for control. Just because a guy doesn't do well, his first year as a player,

he got control over, maybe he'll do better than next. You don't know. But the thing that really got me with Brown, why the hell did you get rid of Mauricio Dubon for a punching Judy hitter? I just, and Alan has done some decent things. You know, he'd done better than I thought he would. But why did you get rid of Maricio DuBahn? And why did they fire, or did Crane fire Brown today?

What happened? What happened this morning over their morning cups of coffee that caused them to just explode and do this right now? Does he really think they're going to win just because they got rid of Dana Brown? No, he's not trying to galvanize the team. First of all, the Dubon thing was a money. Yeah, saving money. That was getting under a salary cap issues. And so, again, Maricio was really a nice player. 6.1 million for him, 1.4 million for Nick Allen. So Maricio DuBong was a nice player, but he wasn't going to, all the sudden, he's not going to be a plus 10 victory guy.

He's versatile. He was utility. Everybody, Ronnie loves utility players, and he was nice. But you play Maricio Dubon six days a week. You're going to get about a 240 average. Now, this year, he is exemplary for the Atlanta Braves, but he's also got a great lineup around him. there are going to be a playoff team, and he's had a really good year. Nick Allen, we knew what Nick Allen was. He's lived up to expectations, which is not much. So that's in there. As terms of firing up the team, no, this is more about happenstance.

This is not about the guys in New York and right now are not waking up in their hotel room going, oh, oh, we better get our act together. Our general manager just got fired. This was just more formatics. And I think part of it also, Ronnie, is honestly, the Astros fan base is pissed off today if you're going three and six on a homestine against, nine jimokes. And so it looks like

the owner of the team is like I just can't sit back and watch his team compete for division championship, even in a crappy division, and just allow things to go. And I know good and well that I'm not bringing back to dinner brown next year. Well, I guess that's true. So, in a sense, he was trying to

motivate the players. By firing him now. I don't know. Who's going to be motivated? As Altuve is going to hit the box and he's going to be all motivated by Dana Brown. This is for you, Dana? Well.

Okay. Thank you, Ron. You were worth the way, Ronnie. We appreciate it. 713, 212, 5, 790. Here's our buddy, Mark. Mark on the 10th inning show last week. Oh, was he?

Yeah. We got sideways. We're best friends again, right, Bob? What are you guys yelling at each other about? Everything's cool. Hey, but I got to say this. What motivates Al-Tubi is going to New York to hear those fans boo. You watch him have a great series.

And furthermore, we play good against top-knops teams we suck against teams that suck. That may be a phrase we may use. We suck against the suck. I get it. That's fair. Yeah. Okay.

To start out with, how is Dana Brown, I mean, not Dana Brown, a spot. Is everything cool or do we know yet? We don't know, Mark, and I'm not going to ask because that's a very personal situation. All I can tell you is that would only. Omar Lopez has asked about it that he was very honest and said it was one of the worst days that Joe's had to go through in a long time. So whatever it is, hopefully it's better today than it was yesterday. Exactly. As a human being, I pray for him.

As a manager, I think he's going to best he can with what he's got. He's got a double-18 other than the top three players. And I want to say this, what's happened to Dana Brown should I have? two years ago. All I can say is Dana Brown, get out of town, don't let the cement hit you where the good Lord split you.

All right. Wow, that's tough. He was given Dana Brown one year. It's not in the Dana Brown fan club, is he? Mark Brunit. I mean, it was time. He was out of a contract. I mean, let's impress.

You don't think. Now, again, Jim Crane does not text me, hey, man, here's what we're doing. But you never heard Ross and myself. I don't know what the rest of our host did, but you never heard us say things are looking bright for Dana. We weren't whispered anything.

We deduced. We deduced properly. Right. I think y'all deduced properly. Guys under a contract, look at the team, look at the results, look at the players, look at the roster, look at the farm system. Just the transactions of this year alone. Think about that. They got to, I feel like, yeah, Dana Brown was like that guy in your fantasy league just hitting the waiver wire four times a week.

then none of the players end up doing anything. That's what it was. Hey, here's Lamont Wade Jr. Hey, here's Dustin Johnson. Hey, here's Nelson Velasquez. The reality is if one or two of those pop, then he's got a puncher's chance to stick it around the end of the year. And a puncher's chance to keep his job.

I think, yeah, if Mike Burroughs, Tattoo Emi, Ryan Weiss, if like two out of three of those were pitching well, first of all, the team would be better. You'd be five, six games above 500. You wouldn't be where you'd be in first place. If a couple of the outfielters, you get a little bit more juice from those guys as well, the team would be more successful and he would be his job would be a lot more safe

Brian is with his at 924 on Matt and Ross in the morning a good morning Brian hey Matt hey Ross I just want to congratulate you guys on the morning drive I know how hard that grind is so I wish you guys the best of luck on that one oh I know this guy you sound very very familiar morning grind I wish I wish Jonathan would understand who I am when I call I don't call very often but I listen to you guys you know when I am in my truck headed to the office and now I'll be listening to you guys in the morning. That wake-up call sucks, but I know you guys will do well. We're going to be great, and by the way, you set the high parameters for this spot.

So my friend, I give you nothing but flowers on that. By the way, you're making a lot more money today than you were a year ago, right? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. All right, good. Yes, I am. I appreciate the kind words, though, Matt. And then also, how about a ratings gift for you guys on day number one? talking about. What are you talking about?

People are just naturally going to tune into our show a day a general manager gets fired. What are you talking about? You're nuts. I'm, hear me out real quick. Hear me out, hashtag, you know what I mean. But another thing is, they're going to, they were going to tune in anyway, to listen to you guys on the new morning drive show.

But then also the Astros part ways with their general manager, you know that goofy station that just went to FM saw you guys making the move and was like, oh, damn, now we've got to compete against Matt and Ross. And now they just fired. their GM. Now we've got to listen to that too. You guys are cooked over there on that FM station. I know you're not going to comment on that, but anyways, on this, on the Dana Brown thing, and I'm going to make two points, and then I'll let you guys get to it. But until Jeff Bagwell is

gone, no general manager is going to succeed here. And then also, I would love AJ Hinch to come back and be a general manager. I'm also wanting an analytical nerd like Ross is so I can go with either of those, but don't be surprised if Jeff Bagwell does the buddy-buddy system and brings over Brad Osmiss as the next general manager. You know what? As soon as you, listen to me very carefully, as soon as you said buddy-buddy, I knew the words Brad Osmiss were right behind it. How did I know that, Brian?

How did I know that? I will no longer be an Astros fan if that happens because good will help us because that's true. But still, it's going to suck. because Brad Osmus could potentially be a name to watch. I don't like it. I don't think anybody would like it. Jeff Bagel has way too much say. Doesn't matter who the general manager is.

You could bring Luno back, bring an AJ handship. If Bagwell's around, that general manager is going to be handcuffed. Again, congrats guys. I'll be listening when I'm in my truck. Thanks, buddy. Yeah, I think Brian wants to be a general manager too. And I think he's a bench coach. I just saw him last week.

I don't remember which game I was watching. I know a lot of the ladies of Houston will welcome him back. and by the way, if he is a general manager any general manager gets announced here, we're going to be open home. It's because two reasons. One, it's time to get benefit for the doubt. It's got a chance.

Number two, they'll be on with 930 during the season. That would be great. You're welcome with old moms who are. Oh, Brad Auspheus, we love you. AJ Hinch would be good. It's a good interview. I'm telling you, and I'm not doing it for, because AJ's a great interview,

because he is a great interview. I'm telling you, AJ Hinch was meant to be a general manager. Why? Because it's been a manager for But he's got front office experience Yeah, he does I don't know he's meant to be a general manager

In my mind he is Okay, in your mind In my mind You're going to Carolina Okay In my mind if AJ Hinch got hired I think people would love it Okay, I'm sure they would

As compared to Seymour Rex I don't know what to care about that Do Jim Crane even want to have him back? No It feels like that's a name He would try to stay away from that era I mean it was a black guy And not only the Astros

It's a black guy in Jim Crane I know That's why he's been so involved with the organization since that. I know. But a man can dream. I'll take the field. I'll take the field.

We're taking two field bets. Okay. Missing you. Real quick edition and the phone calls between now and 10 o'clock. You know what? Did you do work on believing or not today? I did.

I got one question. This is a terrible precedent. I know. Just one day. First of all, we started late. It's a breaking news day. Yeah, it's a breaking news day. It's a breaking news day.

It's true. It is a breaking news day. I will do it tomorrow. We're going to do Astros General Manager History. Okay. This is a terrible precedent, but it's a smart thing to do. People want to talk about the, it's breaking news day. You're off the hook today.

But tomorrow, you better damn have it. 9.30 on 7.90. Day, oh, actually, every day. Every Monday on the Matt and Ross in the morning, we're going to do this at 830, or 930. It's going to be missing you, which is various. athletes. Yes. And my earphone just busted.

All right. That's the first time of the show. Looking forward to it. Shut up. I don't know how you do that. It's fine. Dan has the same problem too. He does? Yeah, he used somebody. I was like, I don't know what to do about it. Back to it. We're going to look at five athletes

that used to play in Houston. And we're doing baseball. It's going to move to basketball and eventually we'll move to football. So we'll do it. And we're going to find out if we're missing them. So without any further ado, I didn't say a word. But you're laughing at it. I haven't said anything.

It's rude. I'm rude. It's running a professional radio show here. Okay. L is for the left ear. R is for the right ear. Enough from you. All right, here we go.

Alex Bregman, Chicago Cubs. Oh, is he still hot hit? Now, part of this is that three home run game, I think, yeah, because they do the last seven games he's played. Uh-huh. Not seven days, the last seven games. Yes. Last seven games, nine home runs, nine hits, 28 at bats.

Three home runs. eight ribbies. Damn. That's a really good week. Or last seven games for him. For the season, 19 home runs for Bregman. 69 RBIs. Okay.

Three stolen bases. His OPS is now at 766. Ross, I ask you, are you missing him? He's rounded into form. I will say yes. Even though Isak Parade has been hitting hot, big picture the answer still no.

Because it took him for. forever to get hot and on top of it. He's making a lot less money, a lot more money. I don't care about the money. It's not my money. Yeah, but you pay him a million, a million, trillion billion dollars. Since we're now the defector general managers for the Astros, we've got to keep out. No, Jeff Bagwell's got it. Just go

and name Jeff Bagwell here. Could you have maybe not told the Astros may not say anything about it? Did they have to put him in the press release? They put him last. They put him last. Yeah, save the best for last. You name all the assistant GMs and then you put Jeff Bagwell in there? I'm sure that's really, that's

really inspiring confidence in the fan base. It's not great. Literally the first five mentions with the most likes of Bagwell. Run with the names. Do you have the names in front of you then? Yes. Okay, go ahead. Assistant General Manager's, Charles Cook, Gavin Dickey, and Connor Huff. Lovely people.

Never met him. And to Senior Advisor, Jeff Bagwell. Astro's owner and chairman, Jim Crane, will oversee baseball operations through the transition period. And he's got more time because there may not be a season for a while. It may not be much for a general manager to do.

Jeff Bagwell hates everything about analytics. I'm sorry, it's 2026. But maybe he's, let me ask you this. If the second greatest or greatest astro, depending on who you are, if the owner says we'll give you money, I'm not mad at Jeff. Okay, I was going to say, don't get mad at him. I'm not mad at Jeff. I'm just, he shouldn't be in the job he's at.

He shouldn't be having any kind of say in terms of moves that they're making. Yeah. All right, next up, Kyle Tucker. Last seven games. Better than last week. Okay. Five for 28. He went 0 for a homestand while you were gone.

He's cold again? Oh, yeah. No home runs, three ribbyes, two walks, four strikeouts. Didn't have a sullen base. And for the year, guaranteed money, 11 home runs, 57 RBIs, OPS of 689. He's making $60 million. He's got a wins above replacement of 0.0. He's been replacement level for $60 million.

All right. Framber Valdez. Last start. Last Monday. Five and two-thirds. How many people did he hit? How many catchers did he hit? Four runs.

Five hits, four walks. But they got the win because they beat the pirates pretty badly. Valdez on the ear is 8 and 8 with a 4.65ERA. I ask you, Ross, are you missing from Valdez? Well, considering five and two-thirds is basically almost a complete game here in Houston, I'm going to say yes. Yeah, I mean, we haven't had a guy go six or more in two weeks. God, that's embarrassing. Next, Maricio Dubon.

Oh, yeah. Sorry, go ahead. Nine for 23. Uh-huh. No home runs in RBI. Yes. 10 dingers this year, 62 ribbies, and an OPS of 709. That's started the drop a little bit.

Nine for 23 is, I mean, he's not much power. It is what it is. But, of course, we're missing. We've missed him every single week we've done this show. Yeah, I'm missing him. Especially because Nick Allen doesn't play hardly. For a reason. Light hitting.

Defense will be okay. Nice guy. Light hitting. Nice, sweet guy. Yeah. Yeah, he looks like he won a contest before the game. Who wants to play on the team? now.

Oh, you're like open tryouts? Yeah, he looks like he won the open tryout pregame. And then they stuck him in as a bench guy. We welcome for the very first time on missing you. Okay. Relief pitcher for the Chicago White Sox. Jose Orkiddy. What?

Yeah, I know. Are you what? This is out of left field. Six innings. Oh, wow, stop. No runs. Oh, God. Eight strikeouts.

What? In six scoreless France. James, two hits. Yes. Yeah, we could use that. On the year, Orkini 2-1 with a 506 ERA, he does have one save.

Oh, really? I'm sorry. This is going to be against it. I'm not missing Jose O'Kee. What do you mean? Sweet fellow. Did you just say six innings a shutout ball?

As a reliever, but the Ernie's still five. Come on now. Imagine what it was before the six innings of shutout baseball. Where are you seeing that? I see ERA in 296. Oh, I'm sorry. No, ERA of 5.

That's a field independent pitching 296. ERA of 279 is a white sock. I'm missing them. Bring them back. You believe the white socks lost over 100 games, and they're probably going to win the America League. They're probably even the number two seed in the American league. Yeah, what happened to the Astros are almost the two seed talk while it was gone.

Well, I lied about that during to tell the truth, so I feel validated in that. And that is, this week's missing you. God. This just makes me sad. at the standings. 65 and 66. First place. Division, banner.

Yeah, you know what? No. If they win the division with a losing record, you are not allowed to hang a banner for that. Not only, not only will

you get to hang a banner, I'll help you hang it. No. Or the banner's got to be like, I don't know, it's got to have a stripe or an asterisk on it or something.

You can't do that. That's embarrassing. Okay. I'll take it. Because again, American League, heavy power between the Rays and the Yankees, everybody else. Meh. Just get there. They're not with stop.

They're not winning the AOL. They're not. I want to see them beating on the field. I want to read, I don't need Rossville. What bet did we make? We were we discussed one, but you wanted me to give you like a, I don't know, French fries with garlic aoli or something. And I had to put up a steak or something. Correct.

I like those odds a lot. Tony and Angleton, we'll get to you. Joseph will get to you as well. Now, we are against my better judgment. We are skipping, believing or not today. What do you mean? It's busy. Breaking news, man. It's breaking news day.

Breaking news. The successful radio shows don't stick to bits when you've got breaking news. Thank you. We don't call them bits. We call them enhancement segments. Okay. We do? I guess first time I ever brought them up that way.

Yeah, you need to be enhanced. Big time. All right. 713-212-5-790. 7-13. one, two, five, seven. And get in here and talk to us because the Astros have made a move with a general manager out. And senior baseball advisor, Jeff Bagwell's involved.

El Faye Bagwell. He's got it going, folks. I brought this to you many of time. Is there anybody that's ever been more beloved as a player? Player has been more hated as a front office person. I can give you a short list. Probably we could find one. Oh, Michael Jordan.

John Elway is hated in Denver. They hate him in Denver? They did. They do? Why? Is he getting booed? I don't think he was booed, but he wasn't being applauded. No, no, no, no. Okay.

Who else has sucked as a... That's probably... There's probably plenty, but I mean, Bagwell... Bagwell is legitimately either the first or second best player ever to don't an Astro's uniform, and y'all hate him. I don't hate him. I like him. It's not his fault.

He doesn't know baseball. Jim Crane's putting him in the position. Okay, I'm sorry. Don't know, doesn't know baseball is very, very obviously too strong of a term. Correct. But I was like somebody a little more. I do apologize. I'm sorry, Jeff Bagwell.

And the Bagwell family. But I would say he's not a good front office guy. Who was your, who you're going to say is the other person? Did you have a cop on that? I thought you're going to say you had a cop on somebody. Oh, Isaiah Thomas? Oh, excellent. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. He ruined multiple franchises. Yeah. 943. To you with the phone. Next, it's Matt and Ross. See in the morning on Sports Talk 790.

Two real quick things. Number one, Jonathan sent me a listener of ours, sent us a note, said that we'll have to hear back in the baseball card ever again. I don't know, depends on who they hire. Jeff Bagwell uses that phrase. Does he really? Yeah. I didn't remember.

We got a team back at the baseball card. And number two, say a thought and prayer for those people that are traveling with Chandler Rome. He's on a flight right now to New York when all this was. going down. He just tweet a while ago, never fall asleep on a plane. Poor kid. Nothing to do about it. But he's, you know, he's up

and he's in the air right now writing a story losing his mind. No, did you see what he tweeted? He tweeted his story. He said, anyway, here's a story that's been written for months. Oh! He's so sly. He's very prepared.

He had it locked and looking. He did. The writing had been on the wall for a while. As Timitaggart and Kawakakawa. By the way, Marga McTaggart will be on with the new Dan Matthews show coming up at 10 o'clock. The Dan Matthews show with Josh Jordan, is that we're going to call it? Is Josh getting part of the name or not? I don't know.

If I'm Josh, I'd do it. You want me to help you? You got to weasel your way in from the producer position. I know these things. Tony and Angleton at 950. Good morning. You're on Madden Ross. In the morning.

Hello, Tony. Good morning, gentlemen. Welcome to the morning show. Did you even imagine that your first day on the, for the show, that the general manager would be relieved of his duties. So I called last night, I called last night, and Gordy was a man in the phones. And if it would have been a month ago, he would have hung up on me. But he let me have my say last night.

Gordy, if you're listening, shout out to you. Do you remember when Jim Crane relieved Jeff Lundowell of his duties and they had the big press conference at the ballpark? Right at the very end of that press conference, he said, he looked right in the camera and he said, y'all, please come to the ballpark. Please come to the ballpark. Forgive us of this. We're going to be the same team. Please come to the ballpark. His biggest fear has come true.

The Astros are going to be off the front page. It's going to be all about the Texans. It's going to be about football. And you guys agree with me, disagree with me. It doesn't matter at this point. You talked about Frammer Beldez, the kind of. runaway season he's having this year. You go back and look at his numbers in the playoffs the last couple of seasons.

Look at what Bregman's, he's setting the world on fire. Can you imagine if the general manager would have had a little courage and had the leeway? Probably had fought the same thing, but he couldn't do it because the owner wouldn't let him. But if you had traded those two players at the right time, the optimum time, you'd be the St. Louis Cardinals. You'd continue to win, continue to be successful. but he didn't do it and that cost him his job. I don't know what else to say. The handwriting's been the wall.

Channel Rome's got it right. I can't wait to go read his article. But that's how I'll feel about it, man. Okay, thanks for the phone call. I've got all the folks I want to get in. Robert's been okay. He's not dynamic in Detroit. He's been mid.

But you would take mid at this point. But you're not going to pay crazy money for mid here. You've done that already with Tatsu you might. Christian Walker's got that down, Pat. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, there's too much men on this team. It's weird to say. Well, they're 65 and 66.

That's mid. Yeah. Not a good baseball thing. Yep. Let's go to Jim in Mo City at 9.53. Hi, Jim. Hey, Matt. Quick question for you.

I need some help on the logic that they're moving you to the morning show. Is it because the market share is so large that they're willing to put you up against John and Lance? or if I was looking at this, I would sacrifice the A team in the morning because no one listens to them and put you guys where you can dominate another section. So help me out. All right. Thank you, I guess. First of all, I'll let you handle that one, Matt.

You know what, I'll do it. The reality is this. Sometimes you have to freshen things up. As I said, it's on Friday when you were on with me. And we need to freshen up. And my partner, Ross, has deserved this opportunity. And he said, Matt, let's do this. And I was like, you know what, Ross, you've been with me for a long period of time.

This is important to you. I'll come aboard. So we're going to do it. Love Johnny Lance. Respect John and Lance, but we're not scared of anybody. Yeah, we're not scared of anybody. We're going to, here's what I got news for you. We're going to bring energy every morning.

Even after Rocket Games, you're going to think I'm wacky now. Imagine me after a rocket game. We're going to have great calls. We're going to have really interesting people on the show. We're not going to braw me with crap you don't talk about. Not the other people don't do that, but we're just going to take what we did successfully tend to. And frankly, there'll be a bigger audience for it. Yeah.

That's it. Morning. More listeners. Yeah. Feeling good. Joe on 790 at 9.54. Hello, Joe. Hey, how you doing?

Good. I was calling to ask, do you think Joe and spot us next? And my second question, I got two questions. Second one is if the Astros make the playoffs, do you think they'll be more likely to hold on the players if they shouldn't versus if they miss the playoffs and then try to clean house? And I'll hang up and listen. Thank you.

Thank you. I don't think Joe's celebrating this today. Now, I don't think his fate's been determined per se. I don't think this weekend went a long ways in terms of the defense of keeping. I mean, again, part of me, not 100% of this, but part of me does believe that the events of this week didn't help out both guys. You needed to show something from above to say,

yes, Astrofans, we know you're pissed. We're not going to just sit here and watch his team suck against the Angels and the Ace. I just feel like he's kind of gone no matter what because even if they go on some kind of crazy magical run, he's a free agent. Joe could go anywhere. Now, of course, labor stoppage.

pending, but it doesn't, it just doesn't seem super likely the scenario in my mind where he's back no matter what. No. I mean, if I was a betting man and I want to be a betting man on this, I don't think Joe's back. Because if I'm Joe and we go on some magical run, you make the World Series and then I'm hitting the open market and there's a bunch of jobs open, I'd be like, no, thanks, Jim, you missed your chance. You missed the boat. I, let me tell you. Personally, I would be bitter about it. I will say this. I think it's very important. I think Joe wants to be the manager for the Houston Astros. I don't think he wants to get into being a free agent.

He's not enjoying this. We've got to get out of here. Warrior Lucas and Joseph. We're giving you the gift to Dan Matthews. Stay right there. Who will have Brian McTaggart on in about 20 minutes from now. First show, how did we do? First half hours sucked.

The first 22 minutes were a little bit of a problem, but we got a complete train wreck. We were great after that. I thought Fox Radio held it down well. Yeah, it's fine. Up next. Dan and the I'll figure out something clever.

The Dan Matthews show. But I want to advise on the A team. I don't say that. Oh, Dan Matthews is in the afternoon. Talk to you tomorrow at 6 on 7-9.