The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Rockets Take The #2 Seed! What's Going On With Astros Bats? Brian Bogusevic Joins The Show

Episode Date: April 9, 2025

Rockets take the #2 Seed! What's Going on With Astros Bats? Brian Bogusevic Joins The Show

Lunch timers. This is the Matt Thomas show. Ross, Via Real and Adam Wexer with you here. Yeah, I guess that makes you our pinch hitter for Matt Thomas for four hours. Although it's more of a replacement. I don't even know how this would work. He's out of the lineup today. I'm in the lineup.

You're out of the lineup. He is not starting. Yeah, you're right. He's completely out of the lineup. So you are here. We are at, let's go ahead and set the scene. Big City Wings Markey location. We have two.

Count them two. four pack of tickets to give away to an Astros game. We're not talking about upper deck. You're not going to get the air condition dripping on you or anything like that. We're talking about dug out seats. Two four packs will be given away here at the Big City Wings Markey location. We have a lot of stuff coming up on the show with you until 2 o'clock. Matt Thomas is out.

Adam Wexler is here. You can get in if you'd like it. 7-1-2-5-790. 7-13-21-2-5-7-90. we will have Shetjo bum ass up coming up later on the show. We'll also have Brian Bogussevich talking all things Astros at 11 o'clock. And really, I'm going to mention this to Boggi when we get them on Wex. This is a good time to have an expert like Brian Bogusovic on where if everybody were hitting,

maybe we wouldn't have much to talk to him about on the interview. But we can go through a number of different of Houston Astros who are struggling at the plate, including just about everybody except for Jose Altuve. Jose Altuvae has gotten off to a nice enough starts, and it's been enough with guys behind him hitting 2.14 and 189 and 156 and 154. And Yiner Diaz is hitting 061, and today they're trying to win their third series of four. They've won two of three. A win today gives them a third series victory in the four that they've had. Obviously, that means they were swept in one of them.

The only one they lost, they didn't win any games. But you win series, you usually have a pretty good season overall, and that's what they're trying to do today. They are in a pitchers park, for one thing, and I do think the Mariners suffer a little bit from that, because they just don't score any runs at home ever, even though they're pitching is so good. And that's what's been on tap for these two games. I don't think the Astros could have ever imagined getting the kind of pitching they've gotten through the 21 innings of this series. It's been incredible, or 20 innings of this series. What they got from Wisniewski, no nothing, except for two pitches, gave up two runs and seven innings.

Fromber truly gave up nothing. He left the game with no runs on the board. Unfortunately, Taylor Scott has been used in both games, and that's pretty much it. That's really the only downfall for the Astros in this entire series. It cost them one game. Luckily, yesterday didn't cost them the game. It cost them the lead, but it didn't cost them the game. Big, it bats in terms of making it happen. There weren't very many of them.

Victor Caratini's was one of them. He's single to score the only run in extra innings. The Astros have played four extra innings this season and have yet to give up a run. Well, that's great. I just wish they would get it done at nine. I was on a postgame, I believe we started at 12.30 a.m. last night. That was fun. We got a couple of calls.

Bogie was doing postgame last night as well. That's true. You guys can share some postgame after dark stories. I guess we could do that. We got a few calls last night on the 10th inning show. I do appreciate you folks. got in. But it was a late-night West coaster for the Astros. As

you mentioned, you got Fromber. You got Ace Frumber, thankfully. He did stabilize in that start against San Francisco Giants. He was giving up some runs earlier, and things got a little bit better. But so far, two times out of three, he's been pretty good. As you mentioned,

Wes Neski, going seven innings deep. That's good, because the Astros are going to try to figure out what they are piecing together when it comes to a starting rotation. They do get off day tomorrow so they can try to stay on schedule if they would like. But Spencer Arrogatti going down, and we talked about all season about, okay, they got a nice one through five.

What's going on after that? And unfortunately, we're on April 9th, and we already have to try and answer those questions. Yeah, I'm curious to see if Joe will have that decision today, because I kind of feel like using Ryan Gusto yesterday might help him make that decision. If this was part of a program, maybe this would have been a bullpen day. We might as well use them in the game. if they anticipate maybe putting him in to the rotation. I think that would be a little bit of a risky move

because he's, yeah, he was stretched out during spring, and now he's gone another three weeks by him being used the way they have. He's already thrown eight innings this year. I wonder if they would just rather keep him where he is, at least for the next two or three turns through the rotation and look more to Colton Gordon, have him make his major league debut and just take over that spot. They could shuffle the rotation a little bit with who's healthy

just because of how the schedule lays out But the timing of those two starts was Neski into Frumber was also huge because he came off back-to-back days where your starters did not pitch very much. You know, Blanco did not go deep into the game and the day before the same thing had happened. They had to have those two starts in back-to-back games to get them to today. Where if Hunter Brown does what he's been doing, they probably have everybody but hater available to them today. Maybe Ryan Gusto not available because of the position he's in. But it would be nice to go out there and maybe put some runs. on the board and play a little bit of a different game.

The one game they wanted with the nine runs, it's just such a different baseball game with your pitchers not being on thin ice every pitch that they throw, and they did flawlessly. They were down 7-1 for six innings as they made their comeback, and then 7-5, and then 7, 7, and then 9-7. It's just a different way to go out to the mound and pitch when every pitch isn't, well, this could be the pitch that kills us.

Yeah, they've won five games. The biggest win was by three runs. I was against twins five to two. They exploded for five runs. Like you said, we haven't had it really this year, except for the other way. Well, the Astros did come back in that game when they were down 7-1. But you haven't had it. We're like, okay, here comes whoever.

Well, when it was Raphael Montero, before he was traded yesterday, if you have not heard. It's like, all right, yeah, it's kind of a lazy six-seventh inning. You're just looking at throw strikes and get out of here because the Astros have exploded for 8, 9, 10 runs. It just hasn't happened yet. We're 11 games into the season. Yeah, it's not going to happen unless the players that have a pedigree, have a resume, have a history, start turning it around. And unfortunately, both of the new guys are far from it. Paredes hasn't produced a home run.

What's his on-base looking like? His on-base is just fine, as you know, because he continues to draw walks. He's hitting 214, which is a good 30 points below his career batting average number, although not too many people should be looking at that. some still do. 346 on base percentage. We talked about, you and I talked about this earlier before the season began. He's going to be 100 plus points better than his batting average with his on base. So if he just hits 240, then he's going to have a 350 on base percentage, which on this team would be tremendous.

Because Christian Walker and Yiner Diaz right now, man, Christian Walker is now finding ways to have four at bats and five outs. He's striking out in an alarmingly high rate for his career and swinging. at pitches that are not in the zone in doing so. His third strike swingings have been on pitches that are fading worse than Vigio pitches so far this year. And it's been incredible. That's just not what he's done throughout so much of his career. And I actually think Yiner had better A-Bs in yesterday's game.

But it doesn't matter at this point. There's got to be some production. You can't get two hits, 11 games into the season. Yeah, I think that's just the blessing and the curse with Yiner. And that's the way, I mean, unless we're, he completely starts changing his approach. He's a guy who swings at everything. So he's prone to, he'll have a week where he's getting two, three, four hits every single game.

And he's hitting everything. And then when he's not, it looks like what we're looking at right now, which we've seen those types of spells from him. But I thought, really, and maybe I just put in too much stock of what happened last year. Last year he started out the season really hot. And then I figured maybe it's because he was catching every day or whatever. Legs started to slow him and bog him down a little bit. he was hitting slumps. So this year I was hoping for at least the same thing to where he would start out hot, but it's the exact opposite of that. As you said, the dude's hit in 061, and it's not like he draws walks.

No, if he's not hitting himself on base or allowing the Mariners to put him on via error, and he ultimately ends up scoring, all this being said and all this unfortunate, non-positive offense talk, we're coming off the first meaningful at bat of Cam Smith's career. Not only did he drive in the run, not only did he run around the bases faster than any Astro has, or likely will the rest of this year, one of the fastest in the season in Major League Baseball, but he got around on a pitch.

I don't know if everybody's noticed this, but even when he's making contact and not staring at strikes go right down the middle, everything is going to the first baseman or to the right fielder. He ripped one down the third base. line, which is a rare spot for a triple, and he still made it to third. It obviously drove in the run, and it was a huge at bat for the person, as much as it clearly obviously meant something in the game. Yeah, he was out for a couple of games, and we talked to Joe Espada about it yesterday,

letting him clear his head, said he would be back in the lineup. He was got his first extra base hit, his first run batted in as the Astros got the 2-1 win over the Seattle Mariners. They go for the series victory. today at 310 here on Sports Talk 790. We've got to take our first break. We are broadcasting live from Big City Wings, marquee location.

We will be giving away a couple of four-packs of Astros tickets here with you until 2 o'clock. You want to get into the phones. You can. How are we feeling about Cam Smith? How are we feeling about the bullpen and the pitching and the hitting that is not there? 713-212-5-790 is the first. phone number 713-212-5-790. You can also send tweets to at SportsRV and at Adam J. Wexler as well.

If you'd like, we got Brian Bogussev coming up at 11 o'clock. Shut your bum-ass up slash. Ain't nobody got time for that coming up at 1130 as well with you until 2 o'clock here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross without Matt Thomas. 10.20 in the a.m. here on Sports Talk 790. Rosvia Real with you on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. There is no Matt Thomas. He is traveling with the Rockets. We are now at the Big City Wings Marquis location.

We will be given away four packs of Astros tickets talking about dugout seats. So come by. We're going to be here until two. We'll be giving those away later on on the show. You can also get on the phone lines if you want to interact that way. 713-212-5-790 is the phone number. 713, 212, 5, 790. We got Brian Bogus 7 coming up at 11 o'clock.

We'll be talking a lot of Astros. Of course, we got other stuff to get to with the Rockets, more Cougars fallout and all that good stuff. But last night, the Astros get the victory 2 to 1. 12 freaking innings in Seattle. And I think you kind of mentioned it, and I saw you tweeting it about it as well, Mr. Wexler. You were none too happy with Taylor Scott being the first out of the bullpen

for the Houston Astros? He didn't throw strikes in the appearance before, and that cost him. Both of those runners came around to score in a one-run game late in the game after Hayden Wisniewski pitched his backside off. And to bring him back the very next day is an understandable move by a manager. We're early in the season. Need this, get this guy going.

You know, show that I have confidence in him. I completely understand that. And there were still nine outs to go. It was only the seventh inning. I'm glad you said all that. I just don't think that's the move you make in the same. situation the Astros are in with their offense. It's just get his confidence going at a different point in a different game in a day or two.

Are you sure you're going to get all these great starts lined up back to back to back? Bring him in in a fourth inning. Bring him in in a sixth inning. Something like that. When to me, especially since this happened to be the day, you traded away Raphael Montero, who probably was your last guy in the bullpen in terms of non-long men. And that also meant with the Bennett-Susam move that had not yet mattered. because he wasn't there yet.

You were playing one pitcher short in the game yesterday to begin with. So I would have probably waited. Now, you're going to lose the game probably if he comes in in the 10th, 11th, or 12th inning. But I wouldn't have done that in yesterday's game. And it showed again. He puts too many runners on base. He throws too many hitable pitches, the strikes he does throw, and it happened again in last night's game.

Yeah, that's the funny thing to me, though, it's like, but just like six months ago, this was one of your. more reliable guys. And maybe he was lightning in a bottle and maybe he'll never be that good again. But I think, and the way that you laid it out, I think it's fair. I think a lot of people, I was getting

a lot of tweets, and nobody really called about it last night. We were mostly just talking about the game and stuff. We're acting like, this is managing malpractice and Joe Spada needs to be fired for putting Taylor Scott out there. I'm like, hold on, let's pump the brakes, folks. He was one of your more reliable guys last year. And we've already seen this track

record. You mentioned it just now. Joe Espada backs his guys. He shows confidence in his guys. He's a people-first type of manager to where he says, hey, Taylor, you were one of our guys last year. We need you in a big spot. We're going to go to you right here because the other options were, I think it was two righties he was facing up immediately,

and Brian King can get righties out. And Brian King was used in this game and got four outs. But it's like you got to spin the wheel, which journey meant unreliable without a big sample? size journeyman, am I going to rely on tonight? He doesn't have a whole lot of options, especially with Brian to Bray you down. Yeah, there's no question about that, although I do think

track record is interesting with these less experienced pitchers, and as much as Taylor Scott's not some 22-year-old kid, he's still a fairly inexperienced pitcher because he didn't pitch his way into a major league spot until last year. Last year, he's the first time he's been a major league pitcher from the beginning to the end of the season. It was more innings last year

than he had his whole career. And I guarantee you that had something to do with his late game or late season slowdown. He was trustworthy for four months. He was really untrustworthy for the final two months of the season. His last 16 appearances over August and September of last year, he allowed an OPS of over a thousand. He was extremely hitable.

The Taylor Scott we saw at the end of last year was the Taylor Scott that showed up to West Palm Beach, and it's the Taylor Scott that so far started this year, which is the Taylor Scott that was the pre-astros. Taylor Scott, and it's why he never held down a consistent spot there. Again, I said it in one way the first time, the second way, with your bullpen being down a guy, you're down a guy. How many arms do you think he has to choose from? There's only so many guys he can even throw.

Brian Abrams probably not going to be asked to pitch in yesterday's game. So now you're down two guys, because you're down a spot and you're down him. There's only so much he can do at the end of the day who pitched. All of them. Everybody essentially had to go out there and give you something and be asked to get. get their three outs or their six outs like Josh Hader. It just makes a little bit more difficult when one of those guys who you have to go to at some point. If it wasn't then, it would have been elsewhere, and you're right, the spot where he used him seemed like a reasonable spot to do so.

And then Brian King just keeps doing Brian King things. He allowed his first runner and just blew people away. His stuff doesn't appear on the gun like it's unhittable. His spots are being hit very, very well. And I imagine his delivery. We'll ask Bogie about this. I think you guys may have already about his release point and how deceptive that might be. But establishing a role in this bullpen has happened rapidly for Brian King.

He is absolutely their seventh inning guy. Their last three relievers, their Hater Presley Abraeu of 2025 is King Abraeu Hater. I don't think there's any question about it. No, I don't think so either. That's the way that it's emerged. We also are 11 games into the season. And so we'll see how things go from there. And you do have Caleb Orton and Forrest Whitley coming soon as well.

But I was talking about this last side of the post game. There was a caller. And he was like, yeah, well, you know, you got Caleb Orton and Forrest Whitley coming. And it's like, okay, yeah, we're talking about a journeyman and an unproven major Ligger as well. So I kind of feel bad for Joe Espada. The state of this bullpen, it is. Now, while there are some good arms, like you mentioned, Brian King emerging, it's also like who's going to be extremely reliable. have some hope when their relievers throw hard.

Caleb Orton, Forrest Whitley, will throw hard. Yes, they will. Orton made his first rehab appearance in yesterday's Space Cowboys game through 15 pitches, nine of them for strikes, not very effective, giving up a run on a couple base runners and hitting a guy and not finishing his inning, although he may have just had a plan of throwing a strict 15 pitches. Forrest Whitley expected to throw today for the Space Cowboys. But going to guys that throw that hard, I think,

gives everybody hope. It doesn't necessarily work out that way because if they don't throw strikes, it really doesn't matter. But that's what Caleb Orr did do last year. And I think there's some pretty significant hope that if healthy, that's exactly what Forrest Whitley will do also. Bennett Sousa will be available today, presumably,

for the Astros and they'll at least have a full roster. Another lefty. Four of them. I was going to say, do you think Bessie Baker's mad with all these lefties in the bullpen now? Okay, he probably doesn't care. He's pruning grapes on his win. It is a vineyard. Do you not get the sense that Dusty Baker's post-baseball life is pretty sweet?

He's doing all right. I feel like he lives a certain relaxed way to begin with, even through his managerial years. That's just who he is. That's just his personality. Unless you question him about which catcher he should play, then he gets really mad with you. That's my experience anyway. It's a 24-hour day. That's five minutes of his day.

The rest of his day, it's all good, throwing some wristbands, getting the dugout, hang out a little bit. Know the off-season's coming. He's got his World Series championship. He enhanced his resume while he was here with Houston, although it was legendary to begin with. And now, like you said, you know, enjoying some of wine country days. The vibe of that sounds pretty good. Yeah, I guess he's doing all right.

He might have fired off a text today and said, hey, man, what's up with this? Hey, man. You think he even texts that way? Hey, man. Come on, damn, dude. All right, we're going to take a break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross, with Adam Lexler, without Matt Thomas. You want to get in how are we feeling about the Stroes 713-21, 5.

You know what we haven't even mentioned? The greatest Astro of the Mall, Jake Myers. We'll do that when we come back. 713-2125790 is the phone number. We are at the Marquis location of Big City Wings. They just opened up this garage door. It is a gorgeous day to sit on the patio. Maybe you want to have some wings?

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from the Markey Center location of Big City Wings Adam Wexer Ross Vireel with you I think I don't know if I'm going to be able to wait till two to eat

Wex but I think I'm going to try my best and I have to ask you a very important question What is your sauce of choice when you were at Big City Wings Well I've been to this location now three times within the last three weeks

Oh wow I also With our latest visit, which was during the semifinal, National Assembly Final, on Saturday night, I was a bit of an over-orderer, so I brought some home. So I actually ate Big City Wings last night for dinner. The new Taheen dry rub. I had it for the first time on Saturday night. It is outrageously good, and I'm not a big dry rub.

Oh, I don't know. You didn't seem like you'd be a Tahin guy either. It's good. It's good stuff. I go straight for the firehouse. Firehouse lemon pepper. with some blue cheese. Let's go.

Love the flavor of a habanero pepper. Quite spicy. Anyways, that'll be coming up. I take care of the peppers when I order the White Wings app. So good. Ooh, the White Wings. Classic.

All right, we're here, Big City Wings, Markey location. You folks want to get in on the phone lines, you can. 713, 212-5-7-9. You want to come by and say, hey, you can. We'll be giving away

two four-packs of Astros' tickets, talking about some pretty good seats. So we'll be here until 2 o'clock. Come by and say hello. Again, phone lines. open at 713, 2125-790. 7-13-21-5-7-90. The good news is all this is we're talking about the bats struggling, and you mentioned,

the bats have been terrible. Astros have still won five games, and the other good news is, while you are two and a half games back early on in the season, there is not a single team in the American League West with a positive run differential. Again, the West will be winnable, I think, this year. Yeah, the Rangers, unfortunately, up a couple of 1-0-0 victories already earlier this season, actually in back-to-back games. They're a minus 12.

The Astros are only a minus 9, and there's still two and a half games behind them. The Angels keep finding ways to win, and I don't know how many people saw some of the highlights from the latest game at the latest minor league ballpark that's being used for Major League Baseball. I'm guessing the lighting sucks in the ballpark where Tampa is playing their home games, because guys are running to the wrong place to catch fly balls, to catch pop-ups in the outfield. Mike Trout. Now, granted, he doesn't have a lot of right field experience. He says, he played seven games this year, hadn't played any games in right field since 2012.

If you haven't seen him overrunning a ball by about 15 or 20 feet, it happened in last night's game. And ultimately, they caught a break on the other side. The Angels did to win another one-run game. They're even. A robust even on the run different. And they're four games over 500 like the Rangers are. I did think the Angels would be better. I don't think this is too much to get worried about.

What it means is when you play them 13 times this year, don't expect to go 11 and 2. The Angels aren't going to win this division, and they're probably not going to be in the race all year. But they're not pushovers by any means. I think they smartly put together a roster that can have them competing right up until the trade deadline, when they can unload some of these players and get talent. in return, I keep going back to something that the Royals did a couple of years ago. The year the Rangers won the

World Series, they signed a Roldus Chapman to a one-year deal, and they were not going to be good and not going to be competitive, likely. He pitched great out of the bullpen, they traded him to the Rangers, and the Rangers gave him Cole Riggins, who is an absolute stud in their starting rotation already a couple years in, with many

more to come. I wouldn't be surprised if the Angels tried to do something similar this year. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. That's one way to run a franchise, I Hey, why don't we sign the guys to a bunch of cheap deals, and we'll try to get some prospects out of the deal? Okay, I can see that going now. I just, yeah, you're right.

I don't think the Angels are going to be long for this. The other thing you mentioned about the American League, there aren't any other teams even three games over 500 in the whole league, except for the Rangers and Angels. The awesome, unbeatable mashers in New York, they're 6 and 5. The AL Central leaders, They're seven and four. It's Detroit. I mean, nothing's going on right now in the American League outside of the American League West.

Yeah, what the hell's going on with the Yankees? I guess they're just running into the buzzsaw that is the Tigers who have won five in a row. Well, now the Yankees have lost three in a row as they've met up with the Tigers. Tark Scouble was on the mound yesterday, and the Yankees scored zero times. Yeah, what was it like 27 degrees out there or something like that? It was snowing pretty heavily early in their game. They were playing afternoon games. And guys were out, Redone was out there in his typical short,

leaves while he's pitching in the snow badly. Well, that's normally how he pitches these days anyways. So, all right. So you're telling me not only is the American League West for the taking, the entire American League is for the taking for the estuary. I mean, I appreciate MLB.com not offering you a wildcard tab, 11 games into the season. They shouldn't be. But at 5 and 6, like you're a game out of the wild card.

Hey, yeah, I like this. We're going to wild card talk right now, 11 games into the season. year. I really do like that. I do like it. Scoreboard watching already. So the Astros' offense has been horrible. It's been one of the worst in baseball. Where, if you've got your crystal ball, like, where is it going to be? I was hoping preseason top 10-ish.

Last year, they were 8th in Team OPS. I think they're one of the better teams in scoring runs. I can't remember. Oh my God, they're absolutely bottom of the barrel right now. Even worse than the Twins. Worse than the White Sox. 30th out of 30 in team OPS right now, the Houston Astros. It's embarrassingly low. It's because they don't have any extra base power right now.

You got a lineup, but you get to put nine guys in the lineup every day. They've done that 11 times this year. Four Astros have homered. Only four Astros have homered so far this season. None from Paredes, none from Smith, none from anybody in the outfield other than left fielder, Jose Altovae, who has a home run as two home runs as a left fielder, One as a second basement.

Pena got's has two. And Alvarez and Walker have just one each. And this is where the issue is. Where does it get better? It has to get better at 3, 4, 5. The lineup is put together correctly if the guys are doing their job. Yorda and Alvarez is not doing his job. Even though he's walked five times in this series,

he's got to drive in runs. He's got to drive the baseball. He has to be the key to this offense. They won't win at all. They won't score if he has a down season. I don't really care what the other eight guys do. I don't think it's impactful enough. If he doesn't have a strong offensive season,

and I mean a typical 9-90 OPS season, then they're sunk no matter what everybody else does. But right now, while he's not doing much, everybody behind him is doing even less. Walker, Diaz, and Pena are all hitting worse than him. And he's hitting 189 with a 630 OPS, and they're not even close to him. Yeah, that's the thing, is it's going to get better.

They're not going to finish 30th in team OPS, but how much better is it going to be? And when you say 3, 4, 5, I mean, are you talking about Jeremy Pena? Because ideally it would be Yannard Diaz is your 5. I'm trying to give him a break. I'm trying to give him a break. I don't even want to say he has a 200 OPS,

because I almost feel like that's a mistake, but it isn't. His two hits are singles. He's had 33 at bats to accumulate two hits. And it's obviously not who he is. We don't have the rest of the season to balance it out. A 2 for 33 would stand out at any point. We're at that point now. You couldn't hide this in August, but he doesn't have the positive side yet to at least give him some balance.

I think the way, if you guys were listening earlier, the Ross described it, I wouldn't call him so streaky because he's just been a really good hitter, hitting between 280 and 300 as a major leager, but he hasn't got into a comfort zone at all to where, if he plays 10 games, he's going to have a hit in nine of them. He's played 10 games or nine games. He has a hit in two of them. That's unheard of for Geyer. Yeah, hopefully, I mean, he's going to.

have to. As far as guys that are carrying their weight from where they are in their batting position, it is Jose Al-Tuve, and it is the greatest of all time, Jake Myers. A couple of hits last night, the only multi-hit game. I do feel bad about what I'm going to share with you, but I'll do it nonetheless. Come on, man.

We have an A-team group text, and it was fired up pretty good last night during the game. And Jake Myers was at the plate in advance of, you know, one of his typical at bats, and I said, I know we're only 11 games in the season. There's a long season ahead of us, but that swing from Jake Myers might be

the worst swing of the year. The first pitch he got from Luis Castillo, I believe it was in the fifth inning, was a billion miles off the plate from the moment it left his hand. And he swung at it with the weakest Todd Frazier-esque caliber swing. Hey, he was fooled, okay? He was sometimes he gets fooled. He swung at it like it was a little league game and his coach yelled, swing at the last moment because he made no attempt to hit the ball. He didn't even lunch for it. He just moved his bat through the zone. If they were measuring the bat speed on that, it was probably in the 30s. You'd like to see it in the 70s or 80s. But, as you noted, however, go ahead. He had two hits. Yes. He had one of the only two hits in the game the night before.

Yes. And the game hit streak. First two plays of the game last night. Cam Smith makes a great catch. And then Jake Myers makes an even better catch as he does. he will be a finalist for the gold glove in the American League again this year. I have no question to no reason to doubt that at all. He may even win it this year. Yeah, he's great in the field. He's your ninth place hitter. He's getting on base.

Now, for the most part, okay, fine, when he's not swinging away. He's been drawing a little bit of walks, and we saw that in stretches from him last year. Just needed to be a little bit more consistent. So he is unquestionably of the usual nine. He's been their second. This is how bad their offense is. He's been their second best hitter. Don't say that at every single number you're looking at.

He's drawn three walks. He's got a 717 OPS. He's got seven hits and 25 at bats. He's hitting 280. Jake Myers is hitting 280. Those numbers aren't really good. 717 OPS isn't good. But when everybody else in the lineup,

and I keep forgetting to add Brendan Rogers to the new guy pool with Walker and Paredes, he came into last night's game with a nice hitting streak. He just has so many empty at bats. And their strikeout totals, game wide are way out of whack. This cannot continue. And I don't think the history of these players suggest that it will, but their swing and miss right now is through the roof. And it's not at bad pitches necessarily all the time. They're just missing. They're whiffing way too much. And he is a big culprit. 11Ks and 29 at bats. Well, good news is we'll have an expert to talk about all this with Brendan Rogers. I'm not dumb, Brendan Rogers. Brian Bogussevick is coming up at 11 o'clock here on Sports Talk 790. You can get in as well. Those of you on hold will get to you at As we go along, 713, 212.5, 790 is the phone number.

713, 2125, 790. Adam Wex at Ross v. Ria. I'm with you from the Big City Wings marquee location until 2 o'clock. Yes, it does continue all the way until 2 o'clock. We got everybody's favorite segment. Ain't nobody got time for that slash. Shut your bum ass up. That's coming up at 1130.

We will have Brian Bogussevick breaking down these asht. Metro's bats coming up at 11 o'clock. We have you at 713-212-1-2-5-7-90. And out here at the Marquis Big City Wings location, we'll be giving away some Astros tickets. You want to come by, have some good grub, maybe a drink. I'm not going to tell your boss.

Just always plan for a safe ride home. Don't drive drunk. Don't drive buzzed. And we'll hang out and give away some tickets. So come by Big City Wings, Markey location. So a lot of different things to get through. Haven't even mentioned the Rockets

clenching the number two seat wax. We do have to get back. They were awesome last night. They were amazing. I love, I mean, what a great game by the Rockets, or maybe they didn't play. The Oklahoma City Thunder finally sat up in their chairs. Luca Donchich got ejected, and the Lakers lost.

And the Houston Rockets are the two-seed in the West. We will get to that as we go along, but right now we do have a call from Don in Cyprus. Want to talk some Astros. What's up, Don? Hey, I was just talking about, the catchers. I'm wondering why they're so terrible this year

at throwing runners out. They made a... Their throws have been on the wrong side of the bag. They bounced to the second baseman. Last year, they were the best of the baseball. This year, they're the worst. Yeah, thanks a lot, Don.

I think, was it, like 14 out of 15? I think they're up to 16 out of 17. Okay, 16 out of 17. I give you two things to point out first. Their pitchers this year, even worse. than last year at Harding Runner guys. They were bad last year. I mean, Javier's not there.

He's one of the worst. It's like you could see it. And I can appreciate the, by the way, at Diken Park now and in the ballpark they're playing in right now, they have the overhead camera rolling down the third baseline that they use for stolen bases, guys rounding the bases on extra base hits, where it gives you a full view of everything that's going on. There's plenty of other cameras. We've seen it before. But this one really shows you, like Mitch Garland.

There shouldn't have even been a throw. He doesn't steal bases. He isn't fast, and he easily stole a base on the Astros pitcher. There's nothing for the catchers to do. Victor Caratini doesn't have a very strong arm compared to Yiner either, so I don't anticipate Victor throwing too many guys out to begin with. But that's been the biggest issue, I think, this year. Go back to the opening series of the season.

Look at that throw that Yiner put on third base. Put the throw right on the bag with fire behind it. Paredes, all he had to do was open his glove, let the ball fall in, fall in and the player slipped right into the tag. I don't think there's anything wrong now with Yiner's arm or his pop speed, but I do think it has a lot to do with pitching at this point in the season, the focus on, well, I need to get this over. I'm focused on the hitter.

The Astros, several years running now, have been notoriously bad at holding runners on. And I think that's the biggest contributor today, but I wouldn't rate either of their catchers in the top third of the league in throwing guys out, or I guess arm speed. So expect a lot more of this and teams should be doing this. If you have a team you can take advantage of, you should run at will on them. And 17 stolen base attempts in 11 games is a pretty good number, considering how well the Astros have pitched and how limited the base runners they've allowed.

It's not like they're giving up 15 runs. And so they're people running. They're just, we got a guy on. Let's just run to second. They're not going to throw us out. Yeah, it's been pretty bad. It's a combination of things like you, I mean, you laid it out there perfectly. It's just, it's maddening how it can.

continues to happen, though. That is definitely a way, and especially since the advent of the pickoff rules and stuff like that, it feels like steel numbers are up and cot stealing percentages are down, but it can't be this bad. You cannot have, you said 16 out of 17? I believe that's what they're sitting on right now after last night's game. What is that? A 4% caught stealing percentage or something like a 5%? Whatever it is, that cannot stand. That cannot stand. Yeah, the Astros certainly have to do a little bit better, And I believe there are ways to do it, but I know they've stressed it and focused on it, and it hasn't changed. It's actually gotten worse.

Heck, the only guy that's picked anybody off this year is now in Atlanta Brave. Raphael Montero. Yeah. Well, maybe that's why they traded for him. Yeah, stop making these throws on over there and getting guys out. Did talk about that a whole lot. I'd probably offer a little bit of a hat tip to Dana Brown on that move. Not sure what will come back in return.

It's a player to be named later. They did reportedly include a very large chunk of cash to cover the majority of what's to be paid to Montereos. But this is a player you were trying to move off of your roster for quite some time. You tried last year at the deadline and there were no takers. And now he had the opportunity to move him now. Can't believe there are no takers for Raphael Montero. Well, yeah, he's gone as Wex has mentioned. And I mean, there are so many issues.

The good news is we can keep coming back to the fact that they're five and six. it can get better. The hitting will get better. I imagine 16 out of every 17 base Steelers is not going to be successful. But also, I guess on the other end, is this pitching going to sustain with the injury now to Spencer Arigetti? And you're going to be searching for answers for what's going to be happening, especially a long-term plan for the fifth starter. Yeah, they're probably not going to sustain quite what you've seen from a few guys. But if Framber sustains it, I wouldn't be surprised.

If Hunter sustains it, I would not be surprised. It's more about 3, 4, 5. You've gotten one ace-level performance from those spots from two of those guys. Ergeti's first start was ace-level. Six innings, one hit. And obviously, was Neski's last start was ace-level with seven innings of two-run baseball, where he honestly pitched. It seemed like even better than that.

It was never in trouble, but did make the mistake to Bliss right after the mistake to... Ryan Bliss. He almost hit one out again yesterday. He hit one to the wall, the only extra base hit that the Mariners had. but he is a light-hitting second baseman with speed. I like the way was Neske's throwing the ball, so maybe there's a little bit of hope that he's better than a fifth starter. He, I think, was the fifth starter coming out of spring training, rightfully so.

But the biggest question, Mark, is beyond the injury to Arredegetti is Rinell. Rinell has not really pitched well in any of his outings. He did not pitch well in spring training, and obviously his arm was used way more last year than it ever was in his entire career. Yeah, the usage was high And if you look at things like Batting average balls and play, Field independent pitching,

he was due for, he's due for aggression this year, and he probably wasn't ever going to keep up what he did last year. It was just kind of limit the regression to improve, to get better, which these, you know, we go to these advanced statistics,

they don't talk about, they just project, and they go on based on what history was. So, Ronell Blanco can still improve and get better as a pitcher as he continues along in his major league career. So you're hoping for that. to offset some of the regression that is due.

No question about it. He'll get another opportunity. We'll find out what the Astros' plans are with the open spot. Two weeks into the season in the rotation with the, I would call it a freak injury to Spencer Argeti. There are pitchers on the field all the time during opponent BP, and they don't off. Not only did he get hit, he got hit on his pitching hand and broke a finger. How? Broke's thumb.

So ridiculous. Yeah. All right. We're going to take quick break here. We do have Brian Bogus Evik coming up to talk all. All things, Astros. After this break, we also have ain't nobody got time for that slash shut Joe bum ass up. Ross v. Real, Adam Wexer, with you live from the Big City Wings Marquis location until 2 o'clock.

Right back with Brian Booker 7. Hour number two of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Ross v. Real, Adam Wexer, with you at the Big City Wings marquee location. We'll be given away a couple of four packs to Astros tickets. We'll be here until 2 o'clock come by and say, hey. A lot of stuff to get to here on the show. We got ain't nobody got time for that slash shut your bum ass up coming up at 1130. But right now we are pleased to be joined by Brian Bogus Sevik.

Joins us every week. Does a great job. And well, I was mentioning this earlier on the show, Brian. It's good to have you now, especially like if everybody were hitting, we would maybe have a little bit less to talk about with you or maybe it would be more fun. We've got a lot to break down with these struggling bats with the Astros right now. And let's go ahead and start it off.

I'll spin the wheel. Let's go to Yiner D.S. Oh, that's a tough place to start. You know, there are a lot of guys as we go through this who you can say, you know, point to different things as to why they're close or why, you know, it's just a matter of time. I think Yiner's in the toughest spot. He looks like he just doesn't have any timing. He looks lost. his body's going in one direction, his bats going in the other direction.

And the swings have just been kind of, you know, flailing at balls. It looks to me like he needs a couple of games where he just left the ball travel, get into the hitting zone because he's out trying to hit. He's trying to hit the ball way out front of home plate while his body's going into the third-based dugout at the same time. He's probably, as much as so many of these guys on offense has struggled, I think Yiner's probably had it the worst. A bogey, Wex here with you as well. I'm curious if at any point during his previous seasons,

have you noticed him ever looking like this and maybe then what he did to get out of it? Not this bad. There's been times when he struggled, but a lot of that has just kind of been overaggressiveness. Right now it just looks like he's trying to hit the ball as soon as it comes out of the pitcher's hands. I think really what will do him well

is if he just, you know, completely eliminate the left side of the field for a couple of that bat or a couple of games and just says, you know, I'm going to try to shoot balls, you know, into the forehole and into right field and back that contact point up a little bit. But he's done that at times, you know, throughout the course of the last couple years when things have not been going well, just, you know, take that simple approach of like, I'm going to take a couple pitches, see it, and move that contact point back and use the other way. But he's a long way from even being able to do that. Is it kind of looking back at last night's game-winning hit,

that kind of at bat, just from the right side, looking at how Victor Keratini took that pitch and just popped it through the hole to drive in the run, that kind of at bat and just say, this is where it's pitched, just send it through the hole for Yiner, just on the right side? Oh, absolutely. I mean, there was such a good replay of that swing from Caratine,

and you could just see how long his head stayed down on that ball, how deep the pitch got into his swing. You know, he hit it basically off of his back leg through the six hole on the left side. You know, if Yanger could take a couple of those and just see where that contact point is, that's a good place to start because then you can start working it out front, then you can start worrying about elevating. Then you can start, you know, pulling balls for power. But right now he's just got to get, he's got to get the ball.

to a point to where he can make solid contact with it. Brian Bogusufik with us here on a Sports Talk 790. Let's go to Camp Smith. First extra base hit, first run batted in after a couple of days off. Did you see anything different from him yesterday and just evaluate what you have been seeing from him? Yes and no. I mean, that was certainly the best swing he's taken all season, you know, eliminate the spring training stuff. But since the regular season has started, that was definitely the best swing he took.

He's late. He's been late on fastballs, you know, since the regular season started. He looks a little bit passive, almost like he's trying to get on the fastball by trying to get into hitter's counts where he can look and hunt for the fastball, but all he's doing is getting himself behind in the count and making it worse. That pitch that he hit for the triple, it was a breaking ball. And, you know, it's probably off script of what the Mariners pitchers wanted to do because Luis Castillo to start that game was just, heater, heater, heater on Cam the whole time. You get a reliever in there. But the thing that he did earlier in that at bat is he took a really aggressive swing

on the first pitch of that at bat at the fastball. So now all of a sudden you can put into the pitcher's head, okay, maybe he's starting to get on it. Maybe I have to do something else. And he throws a pitch that kind of goes into his bat a little bit. But, you know, at the Major League level, you're not going to get into hitters counts and you're not going to walk just by taking pitches.

Pitchers don't just lose their control and put you in a 3-1 count because they can't throw a strike. You've got to scare them out of the zone. You've got to scare them away from attacking the middle of the zone. So I would almost like to see Cam go up there and get more aggressive. You know, usually you're trying to take young hitters and dial them back a little bit. You know, I'd almost like to see him maybe not the point of what George Springer was when he first came up, where he was, you know, ready to swing when he woke up in the morning. But just go out there and just, you know, get to hack and let your natural ability take over.

And then you can start scaring pitchers out of the zone. Then you can start working at bats, getting in hitters' counts, hunting pitches. But right now, they're just attacking a hitter who they think is just behind it a little bit. Not quite to go pick the stick on you, because you guys will take care of that later today and all throughout the season over on the TV side on Space City Home Network. But rather than going through the whole lineup, we'll eliminate Jose Altuvae at the top and eliminate the elite hitter that Jake Myers is at the bottom of the lineup. If you got anybody else in between, and this is not just today,

but maybe over the next couple of games, who would be your pick to click? Who do you see maybe starting to come around and no longer hitting below 200? Well, I think Jordan's really close, and, you know, that's not anything, you know, revelatory right there. I mean, he's one of the best hitters in the world. But his swings have looked much better. He's just missed a couple pitches, hit another couple pitches hard. He's also getting pitched really carefully right now because the guys around him aren't hitting. but I just think it's a matter of time before, you know, a pitcher makes a mistake and he jumps all over it,

or, you know, Christian Walker wakes up and he gets, or all of a sudden, Yoron gets a couple more pitches to hit. He's getting really close, and I really like the swings that Jeremy Pena has been taking. His bat looked really quick. He's on the fastball, but he's not cheating to get to the fastball. He's able to lay off with some tough breaking balls while still being quick enough to handle high velocity. So I like where. Jordan is getting to, and I really like what pain has been for most of the

feet. Brian Bogus-Evich, continuing with us here on a sports talk 790. Let's go to the pitching side. Last night, Joe Spada in the seventh inning going to Taylor Scott. Were you surprised to see him in that role or come out of the bullpen then? No, because I think we're still in the mode of the roles are kind of what we're defined in spring training and going through the offseason and that, you know, Taylor Scott was kind of penciled into that seventh inning role. It's kind of morphed into

a hybrid of him to Stephen O'Kurt based on what you want from a matchup lefty-righty standpoint and that pocket of the lineup lent itself to Taylor Scott. You know, he hasn't thrown the ball particularly well to start the season or even really in spring training. So that might, you know, that might change. you know, here in the near future. But no, I wasn't seen. The season that he had last year buys him a little bit of a longer leash to go out there and get right.

But, you know, somebody's going to have to step up and be that seventh inning guy. And he did it last year, and it's still his kind of job to lose, but, you know, it might not be for long. We already rubber-stamped Brian King as the seventh-in-goy. Is that okay?

He's been great. And not only it has been great from a result, standpoint, every inning that he throws looks easy. I mean, he goes out there and he just blows 92 by guys and he just drops sliders in that nobody can hit. And every time I look up and I'm filling out the scorebook, you know, he's finished an inning with no base runners and he's thrown only like 12 pitches. I mean, he's been unbelievable. Stephen Oakhart has had some success as a major league reliever, some very good success. A couple of seasons ago with Miami, it obviously went in the opposite direction in the last two years.

did he refind what he had been doing when you watch him pitch and he was on the mound last night to finish things off what is making him so successful again well first of all he he dealt with some injuries the last couple of seasons so he looks like he's healthy first of all because he has had some really good success in years past the biggest question coming into this season for him was what is he going to be able to give you against right He's always been really good against lefties. He's always had a really good slider that's tough on lefties, but what does he do against righties to get them out? And the inning that he threw last night, the biggest out that he had to get, Ryan Bliss at the end, you know, to close out the game. He had to go off of his, I'm just going to slider a lefty to death because he's facing a good right-handed hitter, a right-handed hitter who handles lefties very well.

And he located three fastballs, one at the top of the zone, two on the outside corner, you know, 92, 94 miles an hour. So that's the biggest thing that I've seen is that he's got weapons to handle righties as well as lefties. And he did it in as big a spot as there's been so far last night. Let's talk about some more positive things. Is Jose Al-Tuvae just going to hit until he's 50? I wouldn't bet against it. Everything that he's ever been challenged with, he's done. So, yeah, I mean, what's going to affect him?

When they said he couldn't hit in the big leagues he did, when they said they couldn't hit for power he did, when they said they're going to change his position, and is that going to affect his hitting? It didn't. I mean, he, with all the stuff that he's dealt with this offseason and coming into the season, trying to learn a new position, you know, he's out there.

You know, when the team's at home and we get to go out there early, he's on the field at, you know, 3.30, 4 o'clock taking extra fly balls. Like the amount of workload that he's taking on is greater than what he's probably had since he was in his second, third year in the big leagues. And, yeah, he just continues to be the hitter that we've seen for 12 years now. So I don't know why it's ever going to stop. Well, I'm not a ball player. I'm not flying on the charter with the team.

I'm not making those trips from city to city. You've obviously done that. I view today's game not only to get at 6 and 6, win a third series, get on back out of town. But that happy flight, I always think is a huge, huge, deal. You're playing Seattle also. All those things go into it, but it seems like today, I'm not going to go big

game, must win, anything quite like that, but it's kind of important to go out there and take care of it today and hop on that burden style. No, I think you're right. And yes, there's a little bit of a I don't know if it's momentum or just mood thing that will carry

over when you win on a getaway day. But really, if you think about it, you know, if they win today, they win two series, on the road in which they didn't really hit it all. They had a couple of blow-up starts from starters where the bullpen had to cover a ton of inning. So if you're all of a sudden coming back from a road trip and you can go four and two

without really playing all that well outside of some, a couple of really good pitching performances, you know, that in and of itself is a confidence booster to where you can look around that clubhouse and say, hey, man, if we ever start playing well, Like, there's no telling what we can do because we're out here winning series, and we're not even playing well yet. Brian Bogusevic, thanks for the time, as always. Appreciate you, and we'll continue to talk to you down the road. All right, guys. Appreciate it.

All right, there you go. Brian Bogusevic, great job, as always here on Sports Talk 790, as we broadcast live from the Big City Wing's marquee location. Until 2 o'clock, we'll be giving away some Astros. tickets so come on by if you'd like to again the marquee location of big city wings going to take a quick break you want to talk some astros rockets anything you want to get to you can the phone lines are open at 713212 5 790 we also have 8 nobody got time for that slash shut your bum ass up coming up at 1130 here on sports talk 790 back at you here matt thomas show with ross

lots of good stuff for you Brian bill gets up obviously offering the intel there on the Astros. Maybe give you a little bit of thought to some of the things he had to say, both about the pitching staff and the offense. Adam We're actually here with you, no Matt Thomas today. We're here at Big City Wings. We're at the marquee location. Great stop for lunch today.

Come on out and see us and enjoy some wings. Our sampling has already begun. We've got the awesome new dry rub, the tahine. We got some gold lemon pepper, all sitting here waiting for us to enjoy. Sorry, I was white. wiping my fingers. Yeah, Ross dug in already, as he should. Our engineer deserves a little bit of extra time to get his drug on.

Me and self-control don't get along too well, so I had to dive right in. Sorry. What's going on? What did I miss? You didn't miss anything. The Astros conversation, obviously, with Brian Bogusevic, I think this is, it's, obviously, it's so early. There are 151 games left in this season, but it is pretty alarming how many different Astros are in a very bad place, offensively. It's not just the production.

As we talked about with Yiner, it's more about what they are doing at the plate, how they look at the plate. And, you know, we're seeing the Christian Walker bewilderment walk is way too prevalent. Walking back to the dugout, shaking his head just, I can't believe I swung

at that, or I can't believe the umpire called that third strike on me. He's already had four or five walks back to the dugout after striking out that I didn't think we'd see much at all this year. And that to me, for who he's been, And none of the players they added this year had a longer road of success in his past than he did. Again, a later player from when he got to the big league, sure, but he spent the last four years as an everyday player and has produced all throughout.

Some of his numbers this year, peripherals are not anything like what I would have expected. I know it's only been 11 games of Astros baseball this year, but he's got a hard hit rate, which is a good predictor of what's to come, not necessarily results based, but process. base and I absolutely stole that line from Brian Bogussevic, a line he used last night. They're so good. The expectation that things are going to go his way are there. They're better than they've ever been. His hard hit rate is as good as it's ever been in his career. His bat to ball rate is, it's right where it needs to be.

You look at some of the advanced stat cast numbers that are with there. His bat speed, it's right where you would have expected it very high, among the best on the team, among the best in baseball with some of these numbers. But then his strikeout rate is way out of whack, never been anywhere near this high. Maybe he's had a two-week stretch of his career where it's been this high. A little hard to pinpoint that. But doing it the way he's doing it, there's too many at bats, and he's by no means the only culprit. They go up there.

They're taking an alarmingly high rate of pitches to hit. They're taking them. Their strikes, their fastballs, they're catching a huge portion of the plate. And a lot of Astros hitters were either looking for something else, or just getting into the at-bat, and they're just letting them go. Yeah, that's funny. The funny thing to me is that everybody is struggling, and it seems like they're struggling in different ways.

And with Walker, it has been the whiffs, it has been the strikeouts, and the lack of walks. He has not drawn a walk on the season yet. Yeah, his walk rate is about 10 for his career. It's at 0.0.0. Yeah, 10, yeah. 10% walk rate's pretty solid. 0% is not good. That is totally unexpected, and that begs a quite.

If he's whiffing so much, he's not walking, is he because of the contract and coming over here and the offense is struggling, is he may be pressing a little bit too much in the box? Yeah, I don't see how you could shy away from that term. It certainly looks like he's pressing in the box. And even last night, he walked away from it back, kind of shaking his head. The one ball he really connected with just hit it to the wrong part of the ballpark. And Julio Rodriguez was able to easily track it down. But, you know, 57% hard hit rate, his career's 45. He's never finished this season over 50.

at 57. There are some things that suggest... It could get worse. No, I'm saying it. His hard hit rate is going to go down, but his results are going to go up. Okay. Okay. There's no, there's no question about that. I mean, no, I don't question it either. It's going to happen, but it's just everybody in their own little way is going through their slump all at the same time, except for, as we mentioned, Jose Al-Tubei, and to a lesser extent, Jake Myers. Wouldn't you also agree we've already seen plays made at first base defensively? Oh, yeah.

That we would have never seen last year? Absolutely, 100%. Was it the first inning yesterday? That was a run-saving dive that he made, and no disrespect to our good friends. John Singleton, Jose Abrae, whoever else, that play would not have been made by those guys. Christian Walker has already been saving runs this season for the Astros.

John Singleton hit his first home run of the season yesterday? Four? The AAA Mets? What do they play? Syracuse? Okay. Are they the Syracuse Mets? I think they are.

I have no idea. I mean, I'll take your word for it. Let's go Syracuse Mets. I mean, I'm wishing John Singleton all the best in his future endeavors, but he's a replacement level guy. Yes, this is an attempt at an upgrade, to be sure. Yes. Yeah, the offensive numbers are very Abraeu-esque for Christian Walker,

but the defensive metrics are saving throws that have been off the bag, you know, cutting off singles, turning what would-be doubles into outs. And it's one of the reasons why they need to do that. Their defense needs to be at a much higher level than it was last year. Paredes might not make these spectacular plays that you saw from last year's third baseman, but you also realize you're not expecting to replace a gold glover with a gold glover, but make the routine plays look routine. And for the most part, he has done that.

I think he's played a pretty good third base. We'll see how the season continues. But you should have plus-level defense at every spot with Walker being elite. Pena is probably very close to being called elite, and both Rogers and Paredes just need to take care of their business. Rogers isn't quite the defender he was a couple of seasons ago in Colorado when he too picked up a glove made of gold. Yeah, he's just depending on what numbers you look at.

He's not the second baseman that he was a couple years ago, but it's an upgrade, especially over Jose Altuve. I think despite the O for Five Day yesterday, that he's trending in the right direction. We had him on the Matt Thomas show with Ross, and he talked about his approach and how things have been changing, and he think they found something. So a bit of a hiccup yesterday, but if you can just hit some,

and then you just need everybody else to, everyone to do their job. We go back to Bill Belichick and the Patriots. Do your job. Not everybody's doing their job, and they're still five and six. Yeah, finding a way to win. They're going to be in a lot of close games, even later in the season when they're hitting. Their pitching has been very good. Their bullpen's been very good.

Taylor Scott's one guy in the bullpen. The rest of the bullpen's been very, very good. Haters pitched two innings twice already. at this early point in the season, which is clearly something to monitor, but he also is able to do it because unlike last year at the beginning of the season, he's pounding the strike zone. He's throwing his pitches, whether they're off the plate and guys can't lay off of them. His first inning of work last night, the ninth inning was just one, two, three,

give me back to the dugout as fast as I think we've ever seen him perform. And it wasn't much different in the 10th inning, even dealing with the gift runner over at second and then third. Yeah, I was actually going to bring it up with Brian Bogusevic, but we just didn't have time. There's too many things to get to that, you know, in a way, you're like, oh, yeah, Josh Hader went on there and got six outs. That's what he's supposed to do. But it's like, dude, it's been nails early on multiple times now already, getting you six outs and staying in games and racking up three saves and getting you the win on Sunday as well. He's been huge. He's been absolutely, if he started off this season, the way he started off last season,

the Astros would have lost a couple of more games already. No doubt about it. And it is what he's here for. It is why you went out and paid him the kind of money that you did. But the expectations are going to be super high. He's a closer. He's an elite-level pitcher, and he still is at this age and stage. But you go see it happen, and you're like, yes, this is the only way to keep things where they are.

Because think about if this is what happened last year, except for the result. He pitched in that Toronto series after the, got swept by the Yankees, and it was the only game they lost to Toronto. They would have left Houston at 3 and 4 instead of 2 and 5 if Hader hadn't given up the ninth inning two-run homer in a 1-0-0 Astros game. Well, he's been out there now four times, three-for-three on saves, multiple two-inning appearances, all at his highest level. He's closing out these victories, or allowing the guys behind him yesterday, to close out victories.

He's supposed to be pitching in your wins only, and that's what he's done this year. It's been beautiful. It's been great to see. Yeah, it's almost like I said. He goes by without saying because that's the life that relievers live You do your job. You get your six out. You're getting saves. Yeah, that's what you're supposed to, but tip of the cap shall we say to Josh Hater Three saves a 1.29 ERA at the start of the season It was a little shaky in that first First game and we're like oh gosh is this going to be another one of those long seasons? But he's been absolute nails since then Gotta have it. Hasn't a lot of hit since then.

He's been incredible. And every pitch you're throwing in a game yesterday, once you get to your top of the ninth inning and you don't score, it's a walk-off opportunity for the Mariners, the last four innings that game, the ninth, tenth, 11th, and 12th. So thus is the life he leaves as a closer. All right, we're going to take a quick break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross with Adam Lexer. We are at the Big City Wings marquee location if you want to come by and say, hey, coming up next. You have something you want to get off your chest. You have something, somebody's been making you upset,

somebody that has really been ticking you off, or if somebody's been talking too much and saying the wrong things, I want to tell me, ain't nobody got time for that slash shut Joe bum ass up. That's coming up next. And I'm really excited to hear what Wex has to say on this one. 7-13-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. Ain't nobody got time for that slash shut Joe bum-ass up.

Coming up next here on Sports Talk 7-9. Ain't nobody getting time? Ain't nobody getting time for that? Hey nobody getting time for that. It is time for my favorite segment of the week. You want to get in. Phone lines are open at 713-213-2-5-790. 7-1-3-21-2-5-7-90.

Maybe you got cut off in traffic. Maybe somebody's been upsetting you at work, and you want to say, ain't nobody got time for that. Ain't anybody got time for that. Hey, or maybe something. Someone's been saying something. Maybe Dan Matthews has been spouting off on the morning show, and you're like, man, you know what, Dan Matthews, shut your bum ass up.

Shut your bum ass up, man. I just say that because Dan Matthews is currently scarfing wings down here. He's doing the right thing. Hat tip to Dan for making it on out here, enjoying his day with us. You are not eligible for the Astros tickets, Dan. You're not eligible for the Astros tickets, Dan. Sorry. Yeah, I know.

Yeah, that's true. You know what? Dan will actually, we're adding it to the package. Dan will sneak in with his credential and sit next to you with the tickets if you'd like to win them. All right. We got some Astros tickets that we'll be given away here. The Big City Wings marquee location here on Sports Talk 790 with you until 2 o'clock. So, Wex, you are esteemed guests.

Well, first thing, again, phone lines are open at 713-212-5-790. If you want to tell Gators fans are the Florida. Gators to shut their bum ass up. But Wex, you are our esteemed guest here on the show. Thank you for hanging out, number one. Number two, have you cleared all the wings out of your teeth? And number three, what do you got? Well, I'm not going to ask you if the answer to that question is yes or not, because if it isn't, I'll be rather embarrassed. But I can't speak, and that's what this is about. So last night, as the rockets were clinching the number two seed, it was a result of the Lakers losing with the magic number of one. Any Rockets win or any Lakers' loss would do it. It happened.

The Rockets have three more games that have zero bearing on their postseason seating. They will now meet the winner of the 7-8 playing game. Tuesday, April 15th. Whoever wins that game, that's the best of seven first-round opponent for the Houston Rockets. We don't know who 7 or 8 will be, but shut your bum ass up has to do with what happened in that game. Shit your bum ass up, man. I completely agree that J.T. Or should not have ejected. Luca Dotschitz, or giving him the technical, but the shut your bum ass up is for Luca and all the Laker crybabies.

Shut your bum ass up, man. You can't yell at everybody in the arena, every game you play for your entire NBA career, and then say, how could you do that? How did you not know I was talking to a fan? Oh, maybe because he already gave you your 13th technical foul of the season earlier in the same game. and you still couldn't stop talking. As much as I think it's embarrassing for the Mavs to have put this, Luca is awful because of this campaign out there after they traded him. By the way, Lakers at Mavs tonight for the first time.

We'll see if Luca plays the second night of the back-to-back. But one of the things that was discussed, heck, Wendy brought it up during the finals last year, and I don't think this is a reason to trade a player. But his complaining to the officials is, you are on all NBA first team, Luca. No question about it. He is an all NBA first team never shuts his bum ass up.

He yells at everybody in the arena. He whines and complains. He doesn't run up and down the cork because he's too busy complaining. And he was always near the top of the board in technicals. 13 and 14 for a player who's missed a bunch of time this year. He is one of the elite players in the league, but he never shuts up. And this is what happens. Shut your bum ass up, Lou.

I like that. I'm with it. How could you throw me out? Because you've been yelling the entire game, and I didn't know who you were yelling at. He always looks like a petulant child, and then he has the haircut of an eight-year-old. So it always feels like it just makes the situation worse. Like Luca Donchich looks like a doughy kid who unfortunately can drop 50 on you in any given moment. Yeah, there's now two players in the NBA who have more technical fouls than Luca, because I haven't seen... I know one of them.

That yesterday's has been recently. The only two players, they both reached their limit and was suspended for a game. Dylan obviously is one. And Dremont? Nope. Oh, I don't know. It's Anthony Edwards. Oh, okay.

Dremont's right there. He picked up number 13 against the Rockets, but again, he's also on the first team of never shuts up. Wow. And the officials in the Golden State Rockets game were embarrassing. I'm glad you brought that up. He begged them to throw him out, and they wouldn't do it. Because that's where I was going. I'm glad you brought up Dremont.

Okay, maybe I brought up Dremont. Dremont Green. First of all, you scream at the referees more than anyone in basketball. You should have been run from that. game. And oh, by the way, you absolutely tried to, it literally could have ended Alpern Shingoon's career with that flying elbow. Nobody goes towards the basket perpendicular. You go up towards the basket where your elbow will lock out. I know your game. I'm familiar with your game. Draymond Green, you're trying to end people's career. You're one of the dirtiest

players, if not the dirtiest player in the history of the NBA. And you have the gall to scream and clap at the officials. And oh, by the way, the officials don't even object you. So you know what? Ain't nobody got time for those crappy officials not throwing out Dremont Green. And Dremont Green, shut your bum ass up. Ain't nobody got time for that?

One more. Wait, wait, wait, let me go. Shit your bum ass up, man. Thank you, Jonathan. You know what, J.K., what do you got? Man, you know, there's something... No, I don't know. So... That's why you tell.

It was Monday. The game was right, right? And today's Wednesday. And I'm still seeing all this hate going on, Emmanuel Sharp and the Cudes, man. And what's all going on with them, right? And the plays, everybody's reliving it and stuff. You guys understand these guys got class this week after all that, man.

Like, all this is going on. And on top of that, they had probably homework they were doing on the week. I know the joke is like, oh, no one, they don't do the homework or da-da. Man, you guys could give these athletes some props, man. Ain't nobody got time for all this hate, all this. They went, what, five straight days traveling or, you know, in two weeks, a whole month, just going and balling. So we got to give them some props. Hey, nobody got time for that.

J.K. wants to give the student athletes some love. I love that. He does that all. I think every week. I really appreciate it. I'm on board with Jonathan Allen's agenda here on a sports talk. It was nice to see yesterday the Cougars arrival back on campus over the Guy V. Lewis development facility. Their bus pulled up, and there were a ton of fans.

awaiting their arrival. They helped to put some smiles on their faces. And Emmanuel Sharp specifically, you can see in some of the videos and pictures that while he was interacting with fans and signing a few things, he had a smile on his face and probably had not had one since, obviously, the evening before with what went down. And he and many others that were there that night, that suffered through all that, that had an amazing season. And I don't know what next year, portends, but they have – this was the most talented team. Kelvin Sampson has had. There's no way next year.

Until next year. More talented. And I do think we're going to find out there are a couple players that will transfer out, especially with yesterday's news that there is a point guard transferring in, in addition to the three elite recruits that will be on campus next year. One of them also a point guard. I think there'll be some players that could come back that won't. But man, they're definitely one of the, they're a number one seed talent again next year.

No question. Yeah, they're going to be the number one team, at least to start the season. next year. We'll see after that. All right, 713-212-5-790. If you want to tell somebody something you ain't got time for or to shut their bum-ass up, CB is on the phone lines. What's up, CB? Hey, guys. If you're a fan attending an Astros game, a Rockets game, or Texas game, in between innings, halves, quarters, when you get up from your seat, you go down the stairs on the right side and up the stairs on the right side. That way, there's not any one

person going the wrong way in traffic. It's common sense. Ain't nobody got time for that. ain't nobody got time for that I like that one because every game you go to it's an issue if you fire off a common sense ain't nobody got time for that I am so down

those are the best ones because they're so obvious and yet it is an issue and you know sometimes I will veer to the side I don't belong on out of necessity

because somebody is on the side they don't belong on yeah I don't know if there's like a bunch of Britons visiting the stadium or what's going on. It's out of control. I like that CB brought that up. It seems to be an issue basically every game you go to and no matter where you are. Now at Toyota Center, will you ever just kind of hold your ground to play chicken with the walkers heading down or up on the wrong side? There's going to be

a break in the handrail. There's going to be an opportunity for someone to move where they belong. But would you ever just play chicken with them? I guess maybe I have before, but I try not to make a habit. I'm non-confrontational in general. I hear you. I just like to I give everyone the free pass. That's how I roll. All right, we're going to take a quick break here. If you still want to get in, you want to tell somebody to shut their bum ass up, or ain't nobody got time for that?

713-212-5-790 is the phone number. 7-13-212-5-7-9. Continuing on on a Wednesday afternoon, almost, still in the a.m. here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Anybody got time for that? Shut your bum-ass. up ongoing here on Sports Talk 790. Always fun when I can drop that on Luca. We'll see what the remainder of the season is for him, but he absolutely will not be doing that because he never

does. Draymond will absolutely not be doing that because he never does. And to make people aware of what they could have found on the X platform when Draymond's elbow met Shengun's face April 7th in the evening at Sports RV. His exact words were there is nothing natural about this shooting motion. Watch his elbow go back up when he actually tries to make the basket. Completely intentional. Shocking that you were able to quote tweet a Laker fan account who had the video for you. I just put in Dre. Yeah, I put Dremon Green and whatever video popped up I used. And that's a good angle. I mean, look, it's very clear, as I said, if you're going up to the basket, your elbow was not out in a chicken wing. It's not natural.

Going into a player, you know, that's in your way that might file you, there's going to be contact on your shot. Going up strong is one thing. What he did has nothing to do with that. Terrible. Honestly, I'm not even kidding. You could be kicked out of the league for that. Or maybe he even should.

So then when they went to review an only flagrant foul won him, where you're even more incense? I couldn't believe it. I mean, I could believe it because that's what he does. He's crafty. He kicks up in the air and he's like, oh, it's a natural motion. He pushes guys. He's crafty with it. Like, you know, your two eight-year-old's fighting

in the back seat of the car. He started. He started. I'm not touching him. Oh, no, he did it. You throw, there's a way to be crafty about how a dirty player. It's a craft he's been honing for 15 years. The parents in the front seat know who to blame.

Yeah. Yeah, it's ridiculous. All right, let's go to the phone line. 713, 212.5-790. The phone number 7-1-2-5-790. Stephen in Los Angeles. Go ahead. Um, my ain't nobody got time for that is Taylor Scott, not only can you not throw strikes anymore,

but when you put guys on base, you let them steal on you every single time. Joe, I think you're a great manager, but ain't nobody got time for Taylor Scott in high leverage situations anymore. Thank you, Steve. We have talked about this a little bit with Taylor Scott. I think the plan was, I think going into the game with Brian and Brian, Brian Abray U down. Joe Spada's thought was Taylor Scott is my seventh inning guy. Brian King is my eighth inning guy. John Hader is my ninth inning plus guy.

That's probably how it went down yesterday. I feel like with Taylor pitching the last two days, today might be Logan Van Wye Major League debut day. We'll see if it goes that way. And that's the other part of it. He was a man down in the bullpen because there was a spot empty because the Montero trade. He was a man down, an additional man down in the bullpen because Abraeu was down. one of the other additional men in the bullpen has never thrown a major league pitch before in Logan Van Wye

so it's pretty easy to get to the conclusion of why he was in the game yesterday and when he was in the game yesterday it just as unfortunate that he's carried over how he performed late last year into how he started this year not very successfully I should actually correct myself the Joe Spott's real plan was Astro's score 8 in eight running eight runs and you don't have to worry about high leverage relievers unfortunately it's not happening in basically any game that they're playing. Ain't nobody got time for these Astros

bats to be as slow as they are. Ain't nobody got time for that? Gio, and Atascata. You are next up. Hey, guys. Great show as usual. So, for my, shut your bum ass up. Ain't nobody got time for it. As soon as you guys mentioned that you were going to be at Big City Wings at the Marquis Center, you know,

I say, you know what, I'm going to go ahead and check my PTO. I got some PTO. I'm going to take the day off and make it a day, you know, take the wife out there, some wings, you know, meet you guys. It'll be a cool thing. So this morning, I wake up to a phone call for my supervisor saying, oh, Gio, we need you to come in. We're short-handed today.

So to my supervisor, shut your bum-ass up. Ain't nobody got time for that, man. I'm trying to get me some Astro tickets and a Wexler and Ross Hedshot signature, man. Shut your bum-ass up, man. We got a stack of them for you, Gio, man. Appreciate it. Sorry you couldn't make it. Yeah, you know what?

I'm giving one to your supervisor, too. Ain't nobody got time for that. geo supervisor. Hey, nobody got to be out of here, have a good time at Big City Wings marquee location. It's very unfortunate. Very, very pro Sports Talk 790 and Big City Wings. We love you for that. Yes, we do appreciate you.

In Sports Talk 790, you can make your number one preset on the IHeart Radio app. We would appreciate it if you did that. All right, well, anybody else want to get in? You can. 713-2-790 is the phone number. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. You know, I got another one. I'm not really big into hockey, and maybe that's a fault of mine,

and many people would say that's a fault of mine, but I understand that Alex Ovechkin has recently become the all-time goal score in NHL history. And what did I see on my 4U tab, unfortunately, that ESPN and First Take and Stephen A and all of them were making it about, they were just comparing Alex Ovechkin's legacy to LeBron's legacy. Does every single thing have to tie into the L.A. Lakers and the LeBron on ESPN? Ain't nobody got time for that ESPN. Come on. Ain't nobody got time for that?

That's quite a connection. The all-time leading NBA points score, and now we have an all-time, NHL goal score. Can you imagine where the NHL would be, which is to say nowhere, without the legacy and the time on the ice of Alex Ovechkin? I mean, I can't even imagine how low a league they would be, how little fan support they would have. It'd probably be a 12-team league right now if Ovechkin had not made his way to the NHL and made his way to the top of the NHL scoring list, which he did.

Goal scoring list. Goal scoring, not points. Earlier this month, I mean, he's been incredible. Everybody knows Alex Ovechkin has carried the torch for the NHL for the last 15 years. everybody knows that great comparison between he and lebron i love it it makes perfect sense i'm feeling like there's some sarcasm here i mean holy cow these you've got these shows that have three four five talky talkers on it yes and those shows usually have five maybe eight people that help you with the show produce and other people i'm not necessarily saying maybe the makeup artists but

they might offer a suggestion here too all these people come together first thing out of their mouth, every post-show meeting. How do we talk about LeBron James tomorrow? How do we talk about the Lakers tomorrow? The Rockets are the number two seat. How do we make this about the Lakers? The Oklahoma City Thunder have a chance to win 70 games. How do we make this about the Lakers?

How do we make this about LeBron? Nikoliochich and Chey Gilgis Alexander are running neck and neck for MVP. Is this a LeBron-like season we're seeing from SGA? Is this a LeBron-like season? performance we're seeing from Nikola Yokich, every. And I get it for the magnitude that he's been and who he still is. And it's nothing about him, really. It's about the networks and the Yakker's inability to speak about anything else.

And to some extent, they're consumers. Are they really that tied to this? They will only watch the show if you talk about LeBron, even when we're talking about Alex Ovechkin? That's pretty much what they do. And in a sense, it is, look, They have ratings. They know that when they talk about LeBron,

that they're going to get more eyeballs, they're going to get more action, they're going to go more viral and all that type of stuff. So in a sense, it's, you know, what is that, that meme? We're then the guy in the hot dog suit. We're all looking for the guy who did this. In a sense, it is the sporting public in what they take in and being drawn to star power and all that type of stuff,

but mix it up a little bit. I mean, my goodness. It's just beating over the head, I think, going to a well one too many times, in a way how we talk about how it's always the Lakers and the Warriors on T&T and ESPN. It's like there's other teams to talk about too. And I think it is a little bit short-sided long-term to where you focus so much with LeBron. And when he does eventually retire, you're scrambling for something else to talk about.

I don't know if you know this, Ross, but if the playoffs started today, we would see the Lakers and Warriors in the first round. Let's talk about it. Oh, actually, we could. Well, let's talk about who your number two seed is. as well. Who is that if the playoff started today, Adam Lexler? The number one seed is the only team ahead

of your Houston Rockets. Sitting at number 2, 52 and 27, the first of their last three games. You'll hear right here on Sports Talk 790 later this evening. Their last meeting of the season with the Los Angeles Clippers, and maybe, just maybe,

their first game of the season against Kauai Leonard. Yeah. He hasn't played them all. Well, we'll see, depending on how the play-in goes. Okay, we're going to another break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross without Matt Thomas. Two hours are in the books. We are continuing to broadcast from the marquee location of Big City Wings. We very soon are going to give away our first four pack of Astros tickets. We'll have another one later on if you want to come hang out. And if also you want to come get on the phone lines, you can talk some sports with us at 713-212-5-790.

News at noon is coming up. Ross v. Riesel, Adam Wexler, with you on Sports Talk 7. 90 until 2 o'clock. Back half of the program begins right now. I'm making you work today. Yeah, well, as this, I mean, I could have just taken the day off, considering Astros baseball one. That would be lazy. That would be something Matt Thomas would do.

Yeah, or AC, although he will have pre and post game. Yes, at least you're working. And I and Matt all have some rockets work coming up later this evening. Adam and Matt will have rockets and clippers for you with a very late tip off. I'll be over on the TV side with Calvin Murphy and Gerald Green on some. Space City Home Network for Rockets Basketball. Again, now these games have no bearing on the standings. We'll get at all those things here, but I even recognize it is exactly 12 noon here on the

Matt Thomas Show with Ross. It's time for the news at noon. You know what? We will start there. We have been neglecting our friends and partners, the Houston Rockets. It's been a long season, Adam Wexler. The Rockets at 52 at 27. You have the Los Angeles Lakers losing last night to the Oklahoma City Thunder 136 to 120.

Why does that matter? It matters because your Houston Rockets have clinched the number two spot. I mean, I cannot believe we were out like arguing about Gary Clark Minutes. David Nawaba needs to play more. Is Christian Wood a top three player on a championship team? under no circumstances, even knowing we might go this direction today with where they've come from to where they are, did I expect the name Gary Clark to come up on today's program? Former Houston Rockets legend, according to Rockets' Twitter.

I mean, people were losing. Why is it Gary Clark getting minutes? I'll hang up and listen. People were losing their mind. He needs to play more. It was something to behold what was going on. He's a lead on defense. He's knocking down threes.

He's the perfect three in D wing. let Gary Clark cook. And it's like, okay, bro, we are obviously dealing with, well, quite frankly, teenagers who don't know ball. But anyways, I mean, all those things and these arguments that we had, Stephen Silas, bless him. I still love him as a coach. But we appreciate all the rockets of the past. It has led to this exceeding expectations. Win total, I believe, was 42 and a half or 43 and a half start of the season.

They're up to 52 wins, and they are the number two seed in the Western Conference. Yeah, all locked up, 52 and 27, the Lakers, the Clippers, the Nuggets, the Warriors, the Grizzlies, and the Timberwolves are three through eight. They're separated by two games, those six teams, four of whom have an identical 47 and 32 record. So any one of them, any one of those six teams could end up seven-eight. with the winner of that 7 and 8 playing game being the Rockets' first round of Bowman. Yeah, pretty crazy. We don't know where they are going to be in the playoffs. But as far as the rest of the regular season,

you got three games left tonight against the Clippers. Then they will take on the Los Angeles Lakers last game of, that we'll be taking on the different nuggets. We've seen the Thunder. And they're their new head coach? Oh, yeah. What's his name? I don't even remember.

Adelman. Adelman's kid. Oh, okay. Sure. One of the Adelments. So the Thunder have been playing their starters. They've been clinched for a long time as far as the number one spot. How do you think the Rockets and Imen Adoka handled the minutes for the squad the rest of the way?

I don't know if it was a coincidence or the thought was already there. The Rockets have had and currently have three players already listed on their injury report for this evening. Fred Van Bleaks doubtful, so I'm sure he's not playing tonight. And Alper and Shingoon and Jabari Smith Jr. are questionable. That's an ankle for Fred, the groin of Jabari, the back for Alpern. All of these things have come up at a time throughout the year. And Fred specifically, there's no question about that injury. Eme talked about that at their last home game.

This is something that he is dealing with, probably the remainder of the season. He's someone who may actually get all three games off, and then the full week of rest. They'll either get six days off or five days off before their first game the following weekend. I bet you Fred is out of the Rockets lineup for the remainder of the season, and they'll just go easy on others. Jalen's going to play in all three games, continue his consecutive games played streak,

but I doubt they are gunning hard to push these guys, even though they're playing their best basketball of the season. You could think to carry that momentum into the playoffs. He's going to pull a Randy Moss. He's going to come in for like five minutes just to get the start streak and keep it going and then not play the rest of the game. Why don't you say that about Josh Allen?

He just did that at the end of this regular season in their last game. Oh, yeah. That's right. Yeah, Josh Allen did it. Why don't you pull it Josh Allen? There you want to put whoever. What else is on the news for today? Oh, well, let's keep it moving on the news at noon.

The Houston Astros, if you did not catch it late into the evening, well after midnight, in 12 innings, they defeat the Seattle Mariners after dropping the first game of the series. A good way to win the series after dropping the first game wax is to have Framer Valdez and Hunter Brown going in the next two days. It certainly made you think, well, Well, man, a sweep could be in the works if they had taken care of a 3-2 lead heading into the late stage of the first game. But Fromber aced it up yesterday, no runs allowed while he was out there for his six. And an earlier first pitch today to getaway day out of Seattle for the Astros with Hunter Brown. Shockingly, Seattle's sending the same guy to the mound that started yesterday's game.

Luis Castillo, Luis F. F. Castillo is the 1890s, I believe. Yes, Luis F. Castillo is making the start today. and we'll see what the Astros have in store with Hunter, who results haven't been unbelievable, but he is throwing the ball unbelievably well, in my opinion, through his two games. I'm feeling a night, can we get a first, like, really relaxing victory for the Astros today?

Hunter Brown's going against that awful Seattle Mariners lineup. You're going up against Timo Luis Castillo. Like, come on, let's get some hits today. Can we do that? Can we, like, I don't know, I got a crazy idea. How about a couple of home runs from the squad today? Well, here's a picture of the Astros haven't seen before. That's old news.

Like, we don't do that anymore, do we? I guess not. He's only thrown six and two-thirds of major league pitching in his entire career. His first start was brief, three innings, three runs. Okay. So, yeah. You know what? I am personally guaranteeing, if not Adam Wexel will give you $100.

I'm personally guaranteeing the Astros win today. I will give you 100 MT bucks. I'm going to tell you, those don't play well. The values going down. Yeah, I tried to use them overseas as well. It didn't really work. The MT bucks are going down. They're crashing like the stock market right now, but I digress.

All right, anyways, let's keep it moving on the news at noon. Other things to get to here. Let's go to the top ESPN headline of the day. The pirates say their new Bucco Bricks display is on the way. Your thoughts, Adam Wunceler. Marco bricks, some form of currency there in Pittsburgh? I think so. You know, the Pittsburgh, in terms of what is in store for the visuals at their ballpark,

I don't know if it made news at noon worthy earlier this homestand when they were in hot water with Roberto Clemente's family. Oh, my gosh. And they took it down for that seltzer. Yes. We have his name and his number all over the ballpark, and our wall is 21 feet high. You know how much we were. It was an oversight, an honest mistake.

What are Bucco bricks all about? I have no idea. I was just reading headlines. Let's keep it moving with an actual super important headline. Actually, I believe they talked about this on first take for 90 straight minutes. Adam. LeBron James will be turned into a Kindol. Sadly, I have seen the figurine.

You have? Yes, because on the TVs here, wall-to-wall TVs here, Big City Wings over the marquee location for us today for the live broadcast during one of the programs that was on over our shoulder. LeBron was gazing longingly at himself in figurine form. Was it like Alex Rodriguez kissing himself in the mirror? Not quite like Timberwolves owner Alex Rodriguez. Well, I'm looking at the pictures of the Kindol now.

Looks good, I guess. He doesn't have a basketball. He looks like he's headed to the arena and knows it's on ESPN, so he's going to be seen coming from his car. They've even got the sponsor plugs with the Beats by Dre headphones in this thing. This is ridiculous. Well, is he wearing, he's not wearing LeBron's, is he? Or he's got to be, right?

No, those look like, those look like Jordan wants. That's what I thought I saw. So the goat makes it onto LeBron's figurine kicks? Yeah, he's playing the other, the, what did he call it? The ghost, the ghost of Michael Jordan that he's been chasing? Keep on chasing. Sure you'll get there. one day. Well, he surpassed him in points court.

Great. He surpassed him in assists. Awesome. He surpassed him in rebounds. Wow. And that's about it. Not scoring championships, not MVP, not NBA championships. It's okay not to be the greatest ever. It's okay to be the next greatest or the third or fourth or fifth. He's one of the all-time greatest. Well, it depends

on how you define all-time greatest. LeBron is one of the all-time greatest. We're not debating that. Oh, no, I'm not debating that. We're not debating that he is the greatest, are we? I'm saying the argument for him that he's the greatest. If I'm picking one player from NBA history to start a franchise with, I'm picking LeBron James. You really think so? Wow. How come? Longevity. And playmaking abilities. Like, he's proven his longevity. But if you started your franchise with any player and you get him for their whole career. Right. Well, so start your franchise with Michael Jordan.

And because of the information you have, encourage him not to gamble. And go ahead and not take two years off and not retire early for no reason and not need to come back. Yeah, exactly. Just go ahead and play your 15, 18 years. Clearly, emotionally unstable. Clearly a bad gambler. Clearly, can't guard one through five. I know we're news at Newton here. Can't guard one through five like LeBron James. But in light of the fact, we just finished the final four and we're about to start the masters.

Anywhere close to the playmaker, doesn't make his teammates better? Do you consider Phil Mickelson and Charles Barkley in the same gambling vibe as Jordan? I would say so. Like it's an issue? Like they're bad? Like, it's been a lot. a problem for them. But look at where they are and what they're doing. It's like not a problem at all. Well, I don't know. Phil Mickelson has been subpoenaed

and he's been... He was eating dinner with all the other master's winner this week. Well, he's been a state's witness as well as Phil Nicholson, so it's probably a little more serious for him than the others. He's fine. He's on the course. He's playing his golf. Swinging the sticks. Yeah, I guess he has been.

All right, well, elsewhere on the news at noon, here's some news for you, Adam Wexler. We're broadcasting live from the Big City Wings Markey location. Great to be out here as always. I mentioned been out to this location a couple times, three times in the last couple of weeks was here. You've got to get a booth named after you. They have a booth named after Matt Thomas for the Kingwood location.

We need the Adam Wexler booth here. This will definitely and has become my home base for Big City Wings. Same. I live like 10 minutes. Yeah, it could not be any closer to our place of work. You're a resident, so it's a nice spot. And the day today, you mentioned it earlier, we are right next to the patio. It is beautiful outside today, and it feels like we're broadcasting outside.

It is gorgeous, yes. They have the garage door, whatever you would call this, wide open. So come hang out at the Big City Wings Marquis location if you'd like to come by. Ross Vireal, Adam Wexler, with you. Half the show done, so we have given away half of our Astros four packet tickets. We have one more to give away. If you want to come by and try to win those, we'll be with you until 2 o'clock here on Sports Talk 790. The Matt Thomas show with Ross, and today with me, Adam Wexler, coming to you live from the marquee location at Big City Wings.

Had a chance again to sample some of one of their new flavors out here, the Taheen Dry Blend, had some Buffalo lemon pepper, had some Buffalo hot, and, well, the kitchen's open. You can come on out and enjoy some of your own as we continue with our number three here. Wexon Ross here with you, 713-212-5-790 if we want to get in on the decision. discussion, mentioned the slate ahead here on Sports Talk 790. Astros baseball comes your way at 2 o'clock with the Astros on deck. AC will have that for you. And then Hunter Brown and Luis Castillo, the other Castillo, going at it this afternoon, a 310 first pitch.

Astros will lead into Rockets coverage, Rockets and Clippers coming your way later this evening. And Rockets, again, have already locked up the number two spot. The Clippers, well, I don't know where they're going to be, but they have also been playing some of their best basketball of the season. Rockets stopped the Oklahoma City Thunder, 11-game winning streak a couple of nights ago. The Golden State Warriors were 21 and 5 since the arrival of Jimmy Butler, and the Rockets took care of them. The Clippers have won 17 of their last 20 heading into the ballgame tonight on the hardwood. We'll see what the Rockets have in store for them if, in fact, they are going full bore, the final three games, knowing that they've already locked up the number two seed.

They will not be any higher, they will not be any lower, and they won't have much to say. except in the games they play. Remember, each of their three remaining games are against a potential opponent in the opening round of the playoffs. Because any of these teams could still drift down into that seven or eight spot. None of them currently are in that spot.

Denver's playing with a new coach. The Lakers and many of the other teams probably want to be two or three. Two is now out the window. Or six or seven and avoid being on the same side of the bracket as the Oklahoma City. thunder, but if you play with fire and your playoff positioning, then usually karma comes back

to bite you. So I don't know that these teams will really necessarily go about it that way. Still a little bit alarming that a team with championship aspirations right now, two years removed from winning the NBA championship with roughly the same core group of players. Decided not too bad internally. It's not working out for us here. We're getting rid of both our GM and our head coach with three regular season games remaining, which Denver did yesterday, with Calvin Booth in the front office and Michael Malone,

the all-time winningest coach in franchise history, and the only coach to ever deliver Denver a championship. Not too bad. It's not working out. We can't win like this. You've got to go and you've got to go right now. I can't believe that there has been three moments recently in the NBA where I see a tweet from Shams Sharania.

I see a checkmark. and because Elon Musk ruined the checkmark system, I have to check, double check, triple check, and then I see it, and then I still can't believe that it's real, and I still can't believe that this happened with the Luca trade. Yeah, go ahead. The Luca trade, the Taylor Jenkins firing,

and now the Mike Malone firing? Yes, that would be correct. That's all three. I mean, how? I've been talking about them as one of the Western contenders, And really, I've been kind of putting them in the pecking order ahead of the Rockets just because of the talent they have. And as you mentioned, the core that they still have. But I guess things have gotten so poor and so bad and so toxic.

And reports are coming out that maybe it is just the general manager versus the head coach or whatever. And players are taking sides. So they got rid of both of them? So the basketball is going to get better over the next two weeks? That's what I'm saying. The interim coach who's been on staff is going to say, hey, we're not playing hard enough. on defense. And here's what I'd like to change. We need to be doing this. We need to run this switch.

You've got to have communication. We'd like to defend it this way. You've got to slip down here and you've got to show up here. Like, they've spent an entire tenure of Mike Malone not doing this stuff and now Adelman's going to get them to do it in the next three games plus postseason? I don't get it. It doesn't make any sense.

That's what we're doing. I just don't get it, which we do on Thursdays on the Matt Thomas show. I just don't get it. It makes absolutely no sense. But what you were talking about with the seating and where it's going to go, I mean, there's no ideal way for this to play out for the Rockets. The good thing is, what we talked about is, first of all, we wanted to, first of all, we wanted to make the playoffs. Or the play in, then it went up to the playoffs, then it went up to top four, then it went to two or three.

Now they are two. I mean, I honestly still can't believe that we're sitting here. So as far as teams to avoid, I don't even know, Warriors probably, Nuggets probably. How much of the Lakers scare you in the playoffs? Well, if they beat the Lakers and Nuggets, and I know they're not necessarily going to play their absolute hardest, best full lineup to do so. But if they did that, they would be the only team in the Western Conference, the only team in the NBA, to beat every other Western Conference playoff team twice this season. If they do that. And again, it's a little bit out of whack.

I would say they would have if they would have played everybody. That to me says, and now that they've also seen the Butler Warriors twice, and they're one-and-one against them, they're going to see the Luca, Lakers, presumably, on Friday night. Do you really have to avoid these teams? Because I feel, oh, you want to avoid the Warriors or Lakers so you get the wolves, or you get the Grizzlies? I'm not, I don't

think that should be in our minds as followers of the Rockets or the fans of the Rockets. I would say Grizzlies. Give me the Grizzlies. I'm not trying to avoid anybody. I'm not trying to avoid anybody. I'm not afraid of the matchup against anybody. No, you shouldn't be necessarily afraid, but there are teams that

Well, okay, I'm afraid of Steph Curry. I'll say it. He's the boogeyman. He is the Houston Rockets Playoff Boogie Man. I've had enough of Steph Curry ruining the Rockets' playoff hopes over the last years, 15, 10 years or so. It's the worst he's ever been. Yes. Clearly, he's old. Everybody gets old. I just had a conversation with one of our longtime listeners. Everybody gets older. It's just what happens.

I don't think what they did to him the other night is repeatable to that degree. Certainly not in a playoff game. not with how it will be officiated. But when he isn't on, I think the Rockets have the ability to beat the Warriors. And unless he's really on, you know, the guy you're so unhappily remembering about in the postseason, I still think their team did get better. This is a very good trade for them. And Cominga's back and their other players like Gary Payton II and Brandon Pajemski

clearly helped that team win and are way better than people give them credit for. But they're no different than anybody else to me in the West. The West is awesome. The team the Rockets plays is going to be really, really good. I don't know that any team makes the Western Conference playoffs this year and doesn't think they should be in the Western Conference finals. The Wolves were there last year. The Lakers have Donchich.

The Nuggets just won the championship. The Grizzlies were just on the cusp of doing this two years ago before last year, and they still have a pretty good big three. This is incredible. The deepest the playoffs, in my opinion, have ever been. If you are the eight-seat and you are in the playing tournament, you absolutely should believe you can play in the Western Conference finals. Yeah, they should.

Their fourth in net rating in basketball. The last 14 champions, NBA champions have been top five. Derek and Tender now. There's that little thing called the Oklahoma City Thunder going on up there. That's going to be tough, and they would be rightfully favored in a seven-game series. And yeah, I'm not saying, go ahead. The two-three seed and the three-seed. Avoid them.

just beat them this week. The Rockets beat the Thunder and the Lakers beat the Thunder. I'm still scared. Soundly. I'm still scared. I'm not saying you shouldn't be. They are as good as their recorders. Believe me, I get that. But unbeatable, they've played in the Western Conference finals zero times.

They have very little playoff experience last year was their first time. How has the playoffs of this team? No, no. I'm just saying they're clearly the odds on favorite, and they absolutely should be. And they're significantly better than everybody else. but it's not a foregone conclusion. It feels foregone to me. That they're going to make the finals.

I think so. I mean, I would pick them. Yeah, I'm picking them, and I think they're going to be heavy favorites, and I think they're going to end up there. But, hey, it's been a great season for the Rockets. They can beat anybody, as you said, as you've kind of outlined, they've been beating a lot of the top teams in the West. They've fared very well against the top teams of the East as well.

All right, phone lines open at 7-13-212-790. Yankees Keith is next up here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. What's up, Yankees Keith? Hey, good afternoon. I'm calling to congratulate the Rockets for that fantastic season. Unfortunately, they're going to play the Lakers again Friday, and I got to bet with our brother, but I can't. We're going to play our second and third string.

Is there any way possible the Lakers and the Rockets will meet in the playoffs, beat them fortitude? Yes, it is very possible. As of this moment right now, they are the three seed and that would be a second round matchup. They also, like I said, they could. They're 48 and 31. The seventh seed is one game behind them.

They could be in the playing game. They could be the first round opponent for the Rockets. What's the procedure if there's a five-way tie? Do we know that? We do. I don't know what the answers are to the tie-breaking procedure, but they do. It is in place head-to-head.

Division winner has the first tiebreaker after head-to-head. which probably comes into play with whichever team is in it, if they all end up tied like that. And I don't know that we'll end up quite like that. Well, yeah, if they all, I guess, huh, do you go to the division tiebreakers? Because, yeah, Lakers, clippers, warriors all in the same division. Of course, the Rockets have clinched the Southwest Division Championship.

Congratulations to them. All right. We'll figure that out. We're going to take quick break here. We're not going to figure out. We're not going to figure out. The league will figure it out. We're going to do full detailed breakdown of every single possible tiebreaker

scenario coming up here on Sports Talk 790. Maybe I'm making that up. We're not going to do that. All right, we're talking to some Rockets. We've been talking to some Astros. Anything you want to get to. We're with you until 2 o'clock at the Big City Wing's marquee location. Ross Villarreal, Adam Wexer with you at 713-2125-790. 7-19. 7-1-3-2-1-790. 1230 p.m. here on Sports Talk 790. Ross v. Real with you, Adam Wexer as well. It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. We've got the Texas hammer Jim Adler is in the house taking pictures with Adam Wexler. He said he's his hero for years.

Glad he finally gets to meet him. All right, man, this is getting wild over here at the marquee location. We also got some party people. We got some people signing up for the Astros, four pack of tickets. We'll be given away in the short order here on Sports Talk 790. We're having a good time. The wings are flowing. It looks like some people are taking some half days and getting day drunk as well.

I'm not going to call anybody else. by name but it looks like that's going down over here at me we'll just head over to their table after we're not marquee location yeah uh wow that you didn't know the texas hammer was going to be here did you uh he is here got some other things going on here a friend of the i heart radio media family the texas hammer the adlers if you will yes the adler family uh i think they're filming a commercial or something over here they're working on some some social i'm to take a peek over there here in a minute. Also a very strong representative

at the University of Texas Longhorns. Oh, I actually didn't know that. But actually, as you say, that it kind of jogs my memory. I think that is... Okay. A good friend. Hook them horns. We're in a good spot. You do all Longhorns talk the rest of the show. I guess we could have started with it. You can go... Well, I'll get you 25 seconds here. Thumbs up, thumb down on Sean

Miller. Thumbs up. Big thumbs up. This is an easy one. Thumbs up or thumbs down on stealing the baseball coach from Texas A&M. Things are going pretty well so far for the baseball program. And the Longhorns repeat as SEC champions, believe it or not. In what sport? Oh, they lost to Georgia a second time. They reached the SEC tournament championship,

or the SEC championship game in football for a second consecutive year. Volleyball, I'm feeling good. When you advance past Georgia in the playoffs, it makes it feel like you were better than that. Right. Well, when your quarterback needs Tommy John, those kind of things are going to happen. I will say they will not repeat his

SEC champions. I'm sorry, reach the championship game. Reach the game, maybe. Okay. Very strong. Teams very young. I think honestly,

Arch might be a little overhyped. Well, he's definitely playing with an unknown and possibly lesser group than they had last year. Yeah. All right. Well, there you go. That's your longhorn minute.

Brought to you by absolutely. Actually, brought to you by Jim Adler here on a sports talk. 790. Rosvi Real, Adam Wexler, with you. Phone lines are ringing, so you want to get in. You can't at 7-13-212-1-2-5-790. David in Vegas has been waiting patiently, so let's go ahead and get to him. David, how's it going? Uh-huh. Yeah, I agree. Happy note. This has been widely reported, but, I mean, it's just out there. reputable sources have confirmed

at CBS Sports MLB.com and so on, but it's not too widely reported. There was a, we lost a former Astro last night in a terrible tragedy. We talked about it yesterday and I think we brought it up earlier on the show. Octavia. Okay, your screener didn't know that, but

yeah, RIP, Octavio Dotel, other things down there. Boy, the provincial governor was killed in that nightclub collapse in San Diego, Dominican Republic and Nelson Cruz's sister also lost her life in that so pretty broad

tragedy but I have a special fondness for Octovia Dutel is an astro because in my life I have only ever gotten one major league foul ball one in my entire life and it was when the pitcher was Octovio Dutel for the Astros when I got that so

anyway RIP All right thanks a lot David yeah we mentioned it well it was kind of we weren't exactly sure yesterday. The news was that he was initially pulled from the rubble, so we thought that he was going to escape with his life, but unfortunately

the result in injuries, he passed after that. So Octavio Dotel, rest in peace. Former Astro, one of the greatest setup man in Astro's history? Yeah, he had his finest moments, I think, in a very long and successful career as

an Astro, and as part of that most dominant bullpen this franchise has ever had from a three-person trio, with Wagner, Lidge, and Dothel. He was a part of two pretty significant Astros trades, the one to acquire him, sent Mike Hampton to the Mets, the one to acquire Carlos Beltron, sent him elsewhere as part of that three-way deal

during the season in 2004, where Beltron made himself a lot of money with his post-season performance, and then ultimately returned after learning how to sign's deal from the Yankees. Yeah, which we appreciate. Thanks, Carlos Beltran. Really, really, really couldn't have done

without your pal. All right, 713-212-5-7-90 is the phone number here on Sports Talk 790. The Matt Thomas show without Matt Thomas with Ross, with Adam Wexler. Continues at 7-13-212-5-7-90

with Biscuit holding Longest. What's up, Biscuit? Hey, man, what's up, my brother? Hey, man, you got one of my favorite guys on the most knowledgeable guys. And old Wex there, man. And I just want to talk a little cougar basketball. ball, man.

Hey, Wex and Ross, man. You're saying all this stuff? They got the three top 20, right? High school players, right? You got the big guy transferred from San Houston. Now you got the guy

transferred from Creighton. You got Sharp, you got Mercy, you got Arsenal, Uzant. I don't know, Wex, I think somebody's going to be and you see they came out as number one early, early,

because of the projected line up in the players. Who, who you think going to be the eye man out? I'm thinking, Uzanne and Arsenal, I wouldn't be surprised. I know it don't happen with Calvertam, but somebody's going to have to get in the port if they want to play. Very likely, and you're right. And we talked about that just briefly earlier, the amount of talent that is currently set to return,

plus what's coming on campus with Harwell, Senac, and Fleming's, just those three. there are more, yeah, there's not playing time for the talent that they have, and guys aren't going there to not play. You know, the transfer to you of H. for Uzon was to play, and potentially there's a transfer out of a player or two, and he certainly might be one of them that transfers out also to play. Somebody wouldn't be able to play here. It can't all work. It's not where a player of this caliber, and there's six or seven of them, wants to be, and the NIAO money will be there for them to do so.

And I imagine we'll hear about it in the not too distant future. Because remember, very, very unhelpfully, the transfer portal opens before the season comes to a conclusion in college basketball. And the teams that were playing as deeply as the Cougars were and others are handling both at the same time, coaching games to try to win a national title and recruiting players and looking into the portal as they're doing that. That's the crazy thing that we're talking about this.

It's like the University of Houston Cougars and Kelvin's have too many players. They have too many options. They have the number two recruiting class. They're going to be number one coming into next year to where the program was when he first got here and how he's got them up there, making the Final Four, unfortunately falling short in the championship game.

But the heights that this program is reaching right now, where, I mean, you mentioned the NIL money. I don't know exactly what the spending is like. over there at U of H, but in theory, it wouldn't be as big as some other programs, especially the Blue Bloods with the history. But Cougars do have the history, but it's pretty crazy that we're where we are right now with this program. They've done a pretty good job. You know, Landon Gossling is helping a great deal with what they're doing with their NIL money

and how it's being funneled through the program or what they can do with these athletes. He was a huge part of their team not too long ago. And now on this side of it, he's done a great job. And this is the only way you can truly get to the... this spot in college basketball and then hope to remain in this spot in college basketball. There's a tremendous amount of money that people are willing to give to their sports at these universities. You've got to go out and get it from them.

Appreciate you, Tima. He is definitely one of them. He's put his money into the building, the hiring. I mean, you'd think by now with all the work that he's doing. I would hope so. Yeah, that's true. Well, he's not working today, but we do appreciate him. He's traveling with the rockets and doing God knows what in Los Angeles right now.

But that's okay. We're out here at Big City Wings having a good time. Mark, the crowd, the lunch crowd is filing in. It's a great place to get some grub. And like I said, enjoy the nice day. They have a couple of new flavor wings for you. We had a chance to sample them out here, although I've already had a chance to sample them in my recent visits and a full menus. Where you live here now?

You better believe I'm probably not going to get out of here today without a dessert or two. Okay. I wouldn't expect you to. You're going to your fried Oreos guy? Had fried Oreos the last time, had the funnel cake fries the time before that. It's probably going to be one of those two. Okay. All right.

Well, we are actually going to take a quick break here on the Matt Thomas show when we come back. We've been talking a lot of Astros. We've been talking a lot of Rockets. By the way, we do have a four-pack of Astros tickets to give away here at the Big City Wings Markey location. But we also have the Astros lineup. It's not really anything too. I'm not going to oversell it. It's not anything too crazy, but a couple of things

we will have to get to on that Astros lineup. We're with you until 2 o'clock. If you want to get into the fold, you can do so on the phone lines at 713-213-2-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90 is your phone number. It is the Matt Thomas with Matt Thomas, without

Matt Thomas, with Adam Wexer, broadcasting live from the Big City Wing's marquee location, until 2 o'clock. Here on Sports Talk 790, your home for your Houston Rockets and your Houston Astros. 1246 in the PM here on Sports Talk 790. Ross Villarreal with you.

Just a couple of minutes. I'm going to have you draw a winner here, Wex. No shake your head at me. Oh, what is it called when you let those intrusive thoughts come to light, something like that? Oh, yeah. I know what this is technically used for in the kitchen, and I know what you were doing with the items.

in there, but I won't say it. Okay. I was just mixing. There you go. Mixing is what I would call. Mixing the greens. Yes. I don't know exactly what you would call it, but that's okay.

All right, Adam Waxler, Ross, be a reale here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross without Matt Thomas. 713-212-5-790 is the phone number if you'd like to get in. 7-13-212-5-7-90 coming up at 1-30. We'll have our conversation, good conversation. I mean, Brian Bogusevic really loves you. having him as a partner here on Sports Talk 790. What he does is Space City Home Network.

He breaks it down, articulates things well, funny, engaging, good. Good stuff from him earlier today on the Astros in the state of their lineup right now. That's coming up at 1.30. Speaking of the Astros lineup, you see what I did there? Not, like I said, a whole lot of surprises, but a couple of things to note. First of all, Yanor Diaz out of the lineup. Victor Caratini is in the six. hole. He is the catcher for the Astros today, but how about bumped down? Is this a bumping up of

Jake Myers or a bumping down of Cam Smith or both? Cam Smith in right field batting in the ninth position for the Astros, Jake Myers in the eight spot in center field. Yeah, considering who's in the lineup today, I don't know that it means a whole lot, but I do think having Jake and Cam bat in front of Jose Altuve in this manner and this lineup is something that Joe Espos. I was thinking about. The best hitter on the team is batting leadoff, which is probably what you should be doing, and currently is the best hitter on the team.

But the way it looks like they're going to have to score runs is with the 8-9 leading into 1-2-3, rather than 1-2 leading into 3-4-5, because their 3-4-5 has been so bad. It's not going to be this way for long, and maybe it plays out and maybe it doesn't. It is right now something that they need to see what they can do about it. I do think it's also a little bit interesting, and I don't know if it's by chance or by choice.

First game of the season, Hunter Brown was throwing to Yiner Diaz. This is now the second straight game. He's thrown to Victor Caratini. I don't believe he has any issue with either one of them. He was super complimentary of Yiner and the work that he did in that opening game when Hunter Brown was on the show with us after his first start. And you were talking about how his Vila was up and his pitch to all those things. They really worked very well together. I think it's actually just a sign of instead of what they used to have,

oh, we can only throw to, I'm only throwing to Martine, or Martin's so great. He has to be our catcher. Both of these catchers, I think, are doing a tremendous job with the pitching staff and do all the work necessary to gain their trust in their planning sessions, et cetera. I'm not looking into this too deeply, but I just know it because it happened now twice in three games. He's thrown to the victor. Yeah, 310 first pitch here on Sports Talk 792. clock five of the Astros on deck show for you so victor carotini catching 400 brown everything else

pretty normal i mean i guess Jeremy where are we out on jeremy he's been batting fifth quite a bit yeah he has been bad because diaz hasn't played well it's been huh i want it now he's hit a couple of home runs like you're not saying you want victor caratine or brandon rogers batting fifth are you brendan rogers well he did go over five years he said he's been fine he's he's been fine The additional problem of not getting hits, which is the biggest problem, they're striking out too often. There's too many players in this lineup striking out too often. This is the deal.

I'm trying to look at this lineup and convince myself that this can be an offense that is going to catch fire and really be one. Look, I'm not looking for them to be top five in baseball, but good enough to where it can offset, I mean, win some games to where the pitching is going to be elite, and the offense is going to be good enough. But Jeremy Pena, we've seen some struggles, and we're hoping for. him to turn it around and he has had the couple of home runs that's looked good but it's then like victor carotini yeah britton rogers i'm gonna mires mcams smith i'm gonna make a mathematical

guess here without finding it elsewhere i'm sure somebody has this easily popped up on their accumulation of stats the rockies are number one in the worst strikeout rate 112 strikeouts and 10 games that's pretty good but the team that struck out the most only has 115 strikeouts the astros have 110 and they've played two or one fewer games than all the teams ahead of them. After the Rockies, my guess is strikeout rate. The Astros have the second worst offensive strikeout rate in baseball right now. Well, they have the absolute bottom of the barrel worst team OPS right now. But those things, your OPS is bad for all sorts of reasons.

But you're not even grounding out and moving the guy to third. You're not hitting sacrifice flies. You're not moving runners anywhere because you're walking back to the dugout because you couldn't make contact with the baseball. Yeah, I'm trying to pull it up for you. K percentage. Oh, this is actually last year. What year is this? 20-25.

Okay. Hey, good news. They're not worse. The worst in baseball. Yeah, that's what I said. Colorado was worse than Houston was second. I did the math in my head correctly. You look at this guy.

Wow. I wouldn't even ask, do you? With the SAT-D math was looking like. Do hit us with 2024 because that was, it was an issue more last year than it was in 20-23, but not to this degree. they were nowhere near this bad last year. No, they were second to last, second best. As far as they had the second lowest K percentage last year at 19%.

So that's a pretty big difference from second to 29th? I would say that's significant, yes. It's going to get better. Yeah, honestly. How long were we going to, it feels? Why are we doing this back-to-back years? It's early. It's going to get better.

It's early. It's better this time that we're talking more about the record than the performance. Last year, the record was so bad it obviously matched their performance. They have a chance to return to Houston with a 6-and-6 record. A third series win in four attempts. And I would give Victor Karatini this nod in his post-game on-field interview last night. All he said about his hit was you look at what happens when you put the ball in play, when you make contact. He slapped a single through the shortstop third base hole with the infield in.

And Chas McCormick on third base, you pushed across a run in extras, which is necessary to win. all it took to win. Thank God for Rob Bancford and the free runner. Yeah, the Astros, I did happen to tweet this out or post it last night on X. Vintage extra inning, Ghost Runner Astros. Joseo, they had a shot up the middle with a runner on second. It hit the bag and Ryan Bliss made an unbelievable play. Great play. And they had a single with a runner in scoring position, and he didn't even attempt to run home,

nor should he have. Cam Smith, third base. Line drive to Luke Rayley in right field. Were you surprised that the new third? base coast, Tony Parrish Chica did not send him. Yeah, he doesn't, not quite the windmill of the Gary Pettis. I was a little surprised, yes. You just scored your first run.

It's seventh inning. It's Cam Smith. Are you protecting him from a collision, potentially? I guess. I couldn't wrap my head around that one either. I thought he would have been sent. I agree. The throw might be great at all, and it was a pretty good throw,

although it got away, but the throw is also coming from right field. The catcher's got to probably be up the line. line. He obviously has to turn in that direction and swipe tag you. I thought it was an opportunity to try to get a second run in a game where if you score two runs, if you have a two run lead on the Mariners in their ballpark, you're usually in very good shape. I think it's one of those where, yeah, you get aggressive. You make them make the perfect play and it just didn't happen. But hey, all's well. It ends well, I guess. Yep. Allswell and that's well. We used up a couple of more relievers.

Hopefully Hunter Brown. How about eight innings to shut up ball from Hunter Brown? round, let's go. There was no thought from you that Wisniewski at 82 pitches should have had another inning? It was a brief thought, but I totally understand where Joe's spot is going. Hayden Wisniewski never thrown more than 89 innings in a season. If you throw them out there with 82 pitches, maybe with a short leash, then you're having a reliever come in there with, you know, if he gets a couple of guys on, he gets up to 100 pitches, you're in that danger zone, then you've got a guy coming on in an unclean inning.

I was okay with it. I thought it was right too. And Joe Spotted said basically what you said. He did his job. That was the work we needed from him. He did his job. Absolutely. Did his job.

Well, unfortunately, Taylor Scott did not do his job and now has not done his job in back-to-back games. All right, we are going to take another break here on Sports Talk 790. And the Matt Thomas show with Ross. My name is Ross Villarreal. You want to get in, you can. It's 713-212-5-790. 713-212-5-7-99. Three hours already in the books of the Matt Thomas show with Ross.

One hour to go. Hour number four is coming up as we continue broadcasting live from the big city wings. Markey location. It is Sports Talk 790. You're home for your Houston Astros. Hour number four of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. with Ross here on a sports talk 790 broadcasting live from the biggest city wings marquee location and the hour is now adam we're going to do the drawing right now

i'm mixing this up i am tossing the entrance who will win the four pack of tickets to the astros game go ahead and pull a name just one he's dry it off yeah just one making sure i had Why do you have to rip it in half? It's all in one piece. You want to read it? Jonathan Heyman! Jonathan Heyman! Is there a Jonathan Heyman in the house?

Okay, congratulations. Oh, my goodness. Aren't you glad you showed up? Jonathan Heyman, you are our winner. He's going to see the Stroes. How about four dugout tickets and parking? Here you go, buddy. On May 11th, the Astros taking on the Cincinnati Reds.

Congratulations. Congratulations. People really win on SportsClock 790. That's right, folks. That's right. All right. Congratulations. To all of you, I'm sorry, second prize will be a handshake from Adam Wexer. Joan, you win a handshake from Adam Wexer. She got one already, actually.

We spoke earlier. That's a long-time listener of the programs. All right. Let's keep it going here. Hour number four of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Brian Bogus Sevik coming up the great conversation with him talking about these Astros bats who continue to struggle. we've been talking about the Rockets locked in

as the number two seed in the NBA playoffs and anything you want to get to at 713 212-5-790 7-1-3-212-5-7-90 Hunter Brown on the hill for the Astros 310 first pitch coming up 2 o'clock Astros on

deck so we've talked about the Astros bats basically ad nauseum it's unfortunate that every single one of them continues to be slow and every stat that we look at continues to make me more and more depressed. Can you convince me? Is it going to happen that at some point this will turn around to the degree where the

Astros will be at least, can you give me top 10 offense by the end of the season? Yeah, I don't think I'll probably be able to do that. I think the issue for me is even when they get it turned around, you're going to need Diaz to hit how he did because Peña, Walker, and Perettus, the three other most important players to this offense that aren't the obvious. guys, they're not at high average hitters. They're not going to get, they're not going to be on

base via the hit. They're not going to be pushing runners around the bases via hit as often as you would like. They're going to hit home runs. Like Peretti and Walker are probably going to hit 50 homers this year. I imagine. They're only 49 away right now. Between the two of them. But they're probably going to hit

240 and 250, respectively. They're probably going to be in the, I mean, I would hope Walker can still be an 800 OPS guy, but he's probably trending more towards the hopefully the high sevens and Paredes is probably somewhere just below that. But it's a huge jump from where they are. But the problem is it's everybody else that's all at once. It's not an issue of Christian Walker comes out of the gate and hits 180,

unless Paredes hits 160 and Diaz hits 067 and Pena hits 150 and Alvarez is still under 190. It becomes an issue because it's a team-wide issue, all of them at the same time. The resumes say otherwise. not worried about Walker at this stage of his career. Nothing about that other than the strikeouts is of any concern. He's hit up, I'm sure he has the best hard hit percentage on the team. I imagine as the best percentage of balls that have been hit at 100 miles an hour plus. He's just not hitting him where he needs to yet.

And then the strikeouts are a team-wide, not expected issue. They can be a top 15 offense, which is all. they need to do. And it's also more about are the runs coming home? If they're good enough to hit with runners in scoring position which has been back and forth with this team a couple times during this golden era. If they're on the plus side of that this year,

then everything's fine even if your OPS and average aren't top ten. Yeah, that's another thing is that with, now you've replaced Kyle Tucker with Cam Smith, so there's some offsetting that, but it just feels like overall the team speed is just

I mean, Jordan Alvarez can get going. That's fine, but Isak Paratus is very slow. Alex Breggen was slow. Issoc Paratus is even slower. And just as moving guys around, having guys go first to third would actually Astros have been pretty good at early

on this season, but second to home, first to third, that type of stuff to where that materially helps you produce runs, this is just not going to be confused with one of the fastest teams of baseball, in my opinion. Christian Walker, slow. Issaq Peridus, slow. They're not fast.

There's no way around it. And all the base stealing talk we had over the first three hours, on top of that, they're a bad base stealing team. They get bad jumps. They get thrown out way too often. You're going to call Jake out like that. Jake had an awful jump in the game yesterday. What he gets?

Jose Al-Tuve the other day when Paredes was at the plate, and they kept having three-two pitches with nobody out. And he's running the second on a three-two pitch like it's the end of the inning. It gets thrown. He obviously also had the base running Gaff the other night. It happens. You can't do that on top of all these other issues you have. You've got to be a lot better at that.

I want to talk about Yordon Alvarez too, because, okay, we all say he's going to hit, and he is going to hit. It's also, in a way for as good as he is, and how great the OPS numbers have been, it may be hoping this year for that next level, to not quite Aaron Judge Juan Soto level, but getting closer to that type of threshold. And hitting 40 home runs for the first time in his career,

which he's never done. He's been one of the best hitters on the planet, but you're also hoping for some growth and some improvement there. And again, he's going to turn it around like the whole offense, but again, I asked to what extent to what level. Yeah, I wouldn't have expected that. I don't think there's more from him. If he has a 40-home or season, that's a bigger number.

But I don't know that his OPS or OPS Plus is really going to be all that different. Yeah. Like how much more is there for you? He's been over 174 times in his career in OPS Plus, which is insane. Well, Aaron Judge is like at 220 right now. Come on. It might pain everybody to hear this. I know.

I know. Jordan isn't Aaron Judge. I know. I know. He's not. The best hitter in the American League again, especially with Otani on the other side now, is Aaron Judge. What is it right now? for our good friend, Yordon Alvarez, the OPS Plus.

The OPS Plus is not very good. It's 87. 100 being average, folks. And he's a career 166 OPS Plus guy. That's pretty damn good. That's pretty damn elite. So, yeah, unconcerned about him. His bats have looked a little bit better. I'd probably say during this entire road trip,

it's a little bit tough to get into a groove when Seattle doesn't want you to see the baseball. They've walked him five times in two games. So I think those things actually trend well for him. And honestly, we've talked to. about this and I do believe it, it matters every time he comes up, and it does matter in the first inning when he comes up, he's getting to see a lot of pitches before he steps into the batters box. I do think that helps him, and I'm waiting for it to pay off.

Yeah, it doesn't help to be that much. I haven't paid off at all. But I do think he gets more comfortable when he sees that as games begin. His numbers in the first inning last year, and it's hard to really separate them from the days where he batted second and the days where he batted third, but his numbers in the first inning were his worst. Not from a run production standpoint, because that's unfair. Yeah, that's very unfair. There could only be one or two guys even on base, but his overall numbers of, you know, hard hit balls, his batting average, his slugging, which is just an individual number.

They were down in the first inning, his first at bat of all these games. Oftentimes he was batting, and he was in the batters box on the second or third pitch of the game. Yeah, I wonder how many, I mean, how many games did he play second in the lineup, up and then we're talking about just isolating those singular bats. I haven't been able to quite do that. We'll have you. We'll get you on the spreadsheet tonight, Wex. But yeah, I always still argue that I would rather have, like, for example, there was a big spot last night.

I think it was where I think Jake Myers got on, and then Jose Altuve did as well. And then for some reason, maybe it was because it was like 11.30 at night or something, I jett I mind-tricked myself into thinking that your arm was coming up. And I got all excited. I was like, yes, here comes. Here comes Yordon Alvers. I'm like, wait, no, it's East Huck Paredes is up now. Oh, this is the worst.

You probably could look at the other side. Huli Rodriguez in last night's game, he was batting leadoff. When you're at the bottom of the order and anybody, you make a mistake to anybody. I think he was second yesterday. Did they put Dylan Moore in lead off or no? Yeah, you're right. The day before. The day before he was lead off.

And he's popping back over as your number one, your leadoff guy. When you make a mistake with 7-8 or 9, and you could have gotten out of the inning with him, Leading off the next inning, well, now you're facing him because of the spot in the order. That's the payoff, one of the payoffs, on batting your best hitter first. He's their best hitter, even though the numbers aren't there yet. But he's the best hitter they have, and he's batted first quite a bit. I imagine he will continue to do that.

Otani pretty regularly, both with the Angels and now the Dodgers. He bats lead off. That's one of the reasons. He also has protection with Bets and Freeman, when healthy batting behind him. But there is a reason for it. There's a good reason for it. Yoron's never going to bat first. for the Astros, I don't think.

And I'm probably okay with that. Probably never. That'd be cool, though. We start the game. Yordon Alvarez is out there, blasts and bombs. That'd be pretty cool. I mean, we're old enough to remember

when this was not a question. Your best hitter bats third, your best runner-forthers or bats fourth. It's really not that. Aaron Judge has consistently batted one or two for several years with Aaron. And like you mentioned, Otani, and then, yeah, Julio was leading off yesterday.

I think, is it Polanco? They would rather have, but Polanco, of course, hurt. He's in today's lineup batting behind Rodriguez in the two-hole. And who am I thinking of? Oh, Victor Robles is the one that got hurt. He's going to miss months, maybe up to 12 weeks or more after he made a spectacular catch. And we've seen it now a few times the last few years because of where the netting now is.

Guys can make spectacular dive into the stands, catches, but all they're doing is diving into a very awkward net and then bouncing back. That's good. He got hurt. Well, yeah, I guess you could also have guys get their. teeth knocked out, jumping into the stands as well. Or you can go J.D. Martinez on the fan and just put your hand right in the middle of her chest. Oh, I don't recall that.

It's all over the inner web. It's many years old. The short porch are the short fence at Fenway? I don't want to Google J.D. Martinez's phone fumbling breasts, so I'm just going to go ahead and take your word for it. It'll show. I think you have to be good on that one. All right. We're going to take a break on that note. Here on Sports Talk 790, the Matt Thomas Show with Ross. Adam walks at Ross v. Real with you.

You want to get in, you can. 713-212-5-790 is the phone number. 7-13-212-5-7-90. Astros on deck coming up at 2 o'clock, but also the Matt Thomas Show with Ross with you until then as well, here on Sports Talk 790. Hour number four rolls along here on Sports Talk 790, the Matt-Tomisho with Ross from the Big City Wings,

marquee location. those you came out. Appreciate you all. Gave away our two four packs of Astros tickets, but there's still time to come hang out, have some great food, have some great times, maybe a liquid lunch. Maybe you took a half day? Yeah, we see a few people that we know

that may have taken a half day. They just got there multiple trays of food. Handed off to them, said hello to Gary and Suebs and many of the other great people that made their way out here and have said hello. Joan was out here earlier. Jonathan, our winner, just able to say hello again for a second time.

As he scooped up his Astros tickets? Yeah, it was John Heyman, but it also was not the writer for MLB.com. Or where is he now, New York Post? I can't even recall it. That is correct. Okay. I muted him ages ago when he started getting stuff wrong. When he was hearing things.

Yeah, when he was hearing things that were completely wrong and ridiculous and spouting out misinformation, I was like, okay, it's time to meet my good friend the mute button, which is your biggest friend on the Twitter slash X platform. So for explanation. purposes, a mute button accomplishes the same thing as the block button, but the person that's been muted or blocked is unaware. That is correct. That's the way I like it. I like when people send me a bunch of tweets and they're screaming into the void and they're all upset

with me like, I don't even know you exist, bro. So go ahead and keep on, keep that same energy. And now the block button doesn't even matter anyways because our good friend Elon Musk, for inexplicable reasons, made it that someone can block you and then they could still read your tweets. It seems like it defeats the purpose. It seems like that's not what Block means at all. But anyways, I digress.

All right, so we've been talking a lot of Astros. We've also been talking some Rockets here on Sports Talk 790. Just a quick eyebrow raise from me earlier. I was looking earlier. You were talking about the injury report with the Houston Rockets. That Fred Van Vleet is doubtful. Probably will not be playing. The spread was at Clippers minus 8 and a half,

but it has slightly tipped in the rocket's direction down to seven and a half with the rockets taking on the clippers 9.30 tonight, I believe here on Sports Talk 7. Yes, and these are really, really difficult for those that, even if you know the rockets, know the clippers, know how they've been playing, the rockets are in a new position. These games have no bearing on the standings. So how they're going to play it tonight, Friday night, and Sunday, I'll. afternoon is a bit difficult to guess if you're looking at their minus whatever, their plus whatever, going into these three games. Now, I know it means something to the other teams, but I actually feel the same way. Do we know that Denver's trying to get this seed versus that seed? Do we know that we don't try to do anything? What are these teams playing for?

And I still can't believe there's four days left in the regular season. There's three games left for everybody. And the team that's three could be eight. The team that's eight could be three. all six of the teams that haven't clinched a spot in the Western Conference playoffs, everybody but OKC and Houston. OKC is one. Houston is two.

None of those teams have clinched their spot yet. The Lakers could be in the playing tournament. Any of these teams could be in the playing tournament. The other thing that could happen tonight of note for the Houston Rockets is this could be it for the Phoenix Suns. They could be clenched to not be in the top ten. How have they lost seven games in a row? Did you happen to catch their work last night? I had it on. I wasn't watching if that makes sense.

They're not trying, and I'm being dead serious. Golden State had a 50-point lead, five seconds into the game. It was embarrassing. But Dallas is locked into the play-in tournament if they win tonight or Phoenix loses tonight. And that would be that for their pick, which belongs to Houston, definitively being a part of the NBA draft lottery. and there's still room for them to make that pick even better because they keep losing.

And if the Eastern Conference playoffs kind of go haywire from a playing tournament, this could rise three or four spots back from 14. I feel like Cooper Flag fits nicely on this Rocket's roster. I really do. And that would probably accelerate their ability to say, okay, we can break up some of the young core because there's only so many spots on the court. What do you make a Cooper Flag, by the way?

He's the consensus. this number one. I'm not getting superstar vibes from him. I'm getting good and be, and we also do have to remember, this should be his senior year of high school. He's 18 years old. So he's going to improve. I don't know if this is the easy way or the wrong way. Is he a slightly better Lori Markinen? Lori Marketing is probably taller, right? Now, he's become a really good three-point shooter. He, of course, got a max deal.

And an all-star, by the way, Lauren Marketer. He was good in Chicago, but not what they thought he'd be. Yeah. He's been through Cleveland and now Utah. He is not a superstar. He is a borderline all-star. He's probably a 23, 24-point-a-game guy with 8-9 rebounds and a good three-point shooter. I think Cooper Flag is just a little bit better than a eight.

And I'm not, it sounds obvious. I'm not saying it only because he shares the same skin tone. But I do think he's going to end up playing a similar style of basketball. I like that. I love it. Like, he's going to probably be a little bit better. finishing around the rim, and I actually think Markanin's pretty good. He just doesn't do enough of it anymore. I think he's a guy who's now settling for too many jumpers. I think flags a little bit more athletic than that.

And again, I think Markanin's very athletic. It's one of the reasons why he got to this point and was able to earn that contract. But I think he deserves to be the number one pick. I do think he's the best player in this class. And I think you're probably right in still placing him just shy of superstar status. Top 15 or top 24 players are all stars, basically. Is he going to be a top 25 NBA player? I don't think it's a given. I mean, look at, say, Palo Bancaro. I don't think that's a bad comparison either.

I think he could be similar to that. He's similar to Wagner. I don't think there's too much differentiation with how they're going to play. I don't think he's ever going to have the weight and strength maybe that Paolo has, but I think he's a better leper. I think he's going to be able to finish around the basket very, very well. But these guys aren't stars, and they are maxis. players, not stars,

but they are going to get a max deal. Franz already got his. They're going to get Max. Yeah, well, Max deals just get handed out to everybody, but yeah, that's just kind of my gut feeling right now is that I like Cooper Flagg. He was great. I mean, look, he scored 27 points against the best defense in college basketball, that being the

University of Houston Cougars, and almost, I don't want to say effortless, but you kind of look at the box, and you're like, oh, man, I guess he was going off for a little bit there. He did score 27. Yeah, just from the late-in-the-game situations, The call that was made when he went over the back, Jay Juan. The call that wasn't made when he fouled Tuggler on the rebound slam.

He absolutely smashed into his arm, no call, nobody cared, nobody even mentioned it. And then his own offensive foul on the final play. When he hooked the defender to try, hooked Roberts to try to get an open look, which he then missed. It's okay. Calls are going to get made and not made. I'm kind of glad nobody did bring it up. I just did to kind of point out the, it wasn't really a part of who won and lost that particular game. Missing a goaltending call may be a little bit different because that is it points on the board.

You know, the foul on Roberts late in the game, Roberts still had to make the free throws. They had to be in the double bonus. Those things are all part of it. This is just simply Florida took the ball off the room. That's illegal. That should be two points on the board. Well, you shouldn't. Okay, so they're going to replay the game.

No, it changes the scenario. Everything changes it. Just back to the Cooper Flagg scenario. With the seven-game losing streak for the Sons, they're now 35 and 44. They've already bumped up to the ninth worst record. Let's go. And that's a 17.3% chance of bumping from 9 to top 4. It's a 4% chance of moving inside to the number one spot.

And when I was talking about the playing tournament, if Orlando or Atlanta do not advance to the postseason or both of them, then they're going to move two teams potentially that could help with this scenario also. The way Phoenix is losing, it doesn't look like it's going to matter. I think the spot they have today is the spot they're going to hold at 35 and 44. They'll probably finish 35 and 47. They're going to end with a 10-game losing streak. And they're going to have the ninth best chance to land the number one pick in the draft, which is a Rockets selection.

The Rockets currently have a top 10 pick, and they're the fourth best record at the NBA. Life is good. You know, all this Oklahoma City draft asset nonsense talk. Oh, they got 80 billion first-round picks. Yeah, here are OKC's first-round picks in next year's draft right now. I'll go real quickly. Nowhere near the top of it. Nowhere near the top of it.

Zero top 20 picks. But they have a bunch of them. Yeah, they do have a bunch. But do they have the value of the Rockets pick? That is not the case. All right. We're going to take a quick break here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross. Earlier today, we got a great conversation of Brian Bogussevick talking about this Astros' struggling lineup.

We'll bring that to you as we go along. We'll bring that to you actually coming up next as we go along here on the Matt Thomas show with Ross with you until 2 o'clock. Adam Waxson-Ross v. Real back with you after this very short break. Go with Ross without Matt Thomas. He is out traveling with the Houston Rockets. Adam Waxler is here hanging out with me at the Big City Wings marquee location. Earlier today, we were joined as we normally are on Wednesdays at 11 o'clock. by Brian Bogusevic.

It's a long four-hour show, so we did want to bring you. We have different audiences. We want to bring you guys some of that conversation. Really good stuff every week with Brian's Bogusevic. You can always catch it on our podcast page

at Sports Talk 790.com. As I said, Wednesday's at 11. Normally we will replay it as well. So here is some of that stuff, talking about the Astros, struggling bats. And as I started off the conversation, saying we're going to spin the wheel,

which struggling Astro we're going to talk about? And, well, the wheel landed on Yiner Diaz. Oh, that's a tough place to start. You know, there are a lot of guys as we go through this who you can say, you know, point to different things as to why they're close or why, you know, it's just a matter of time. I think Yiner's in the toughest spot. He looks like he just doesn't have any timing. He looks lost. You know, his body's going in one direction.

His bat's going in the other direction. And the swings have just been kind of, you know, flailing at balls. It looks to me like he needs a couple of games where he just left. ball travel and get into the hitting zone because he's out trying to hit he's trying to hit the ball way out front of home plate while his body's going into the third base dugout at the same time he's probably as much as so many of these guys on offense has struggled i think yiner's probably had it the worst a bogey wex here with you as well curious if at any point during his previous seasons have you noticed him ever looking like this and maybe then what he did

to get out of it? Not this bad. There's been times when he struggled, but a lot of that has just kind of been over-aggressiveness. Right now, it just looks like he's trying to hit the ball as soon as it comes out of the pitcher's hands. I think really what will do him well is

if he just completely eliminate the left side of the field for a couple of that bat or a couple of games and just says, you know, I'm going to try to shoot balls into the forehole and into right field and back that contact point up a little bit. He's done that at times throughout the course of the last couple years when things have not been going well, just take that simple approach of like, I'm going to take a couple pitches, see it, and move that contact point back, and use the other way.

But he's a long way from even being able to do that. Is it kind of looking back at last night's game-winning hit that kind of at bat, just from the right side looking at how Victor Caratini took that pitch and just popped it through the hole to drive in the run that kind of it bat and just say this is where it's pitched just send it through the hole for Yiner just on the right side oh absolutely I mean there was such a good replay of that swing from Keratini and you could just see how long his head stayed down on that ball how deep the pitch got into his swing you know he hit it basically off of his back leg through the six hole on the left side. You know, if the I can take a couple of those and just see where that contact point is,

that's a good place to start, because then you can start working it out front, then you can start worrying about elevating, then you can start, you know, pulling balls for power. But right now he's just got to get, he's got to get the ball to a point to where he can make solid contact with it. Brian Bogusufik with us here on a Sports Talk 790. Let's go to Camp Smith. First extra base hit, first run batted in after a couple of days off. Did you see anything different from him yesterday and just to evaluate what you have been seeing from him? Yes and no.

I mean, that was certainly the best swing he's taken all season, you know, eliminate the spring training stuff. But since the regular season has started, that was definitely the best swing he took. He's late. He's been late on fastballs, you know, since the regular season started. He looks a little bit passive, almost like he's trying to get on the fastball by trying to get into hitter. counts where he can look and hunt for the fastball, but all he's doing is getting himself behind in the count and making it worse. That pitch that he hit for the triple, it was a breaking ball.

And, you know, it's probably off script of what the Mariners pitchers wanted to do because Luis Castillo to start that game was just heater, heater, heater on Cam the whole time. You get a reliever in there. But the thing that he did earlier in that at bat is he took a really aggressive swing on the first pitch of that at bat at the fastball. So now all of a sudden you can put into the pitcher's head, okay, maybe he's starting to get on it. Maybe I have to do something else. And he throws a pitch that kind of goes into his bat a little bit.

But, you know, at the major league level, you're not going to get into hitters counts and you're not going to walk just by taking pitches. Pitchers don't just lose their control and push you in a 3-1 count because they can't throw a strike. You've got to scare them out of the zone. You've got to scare them away from attacking the middle of the zone. So I would almost like to see Cam go up there and get more aggressive. Usually you're trying to take young hitters and dial them back a little bit. I'd almost like to see him maybe not the point of what George Springer was when he first came up,

where he was ready to swing when he woke up in the morning. But just go out there and just get to hack in and let your natural ability take over. And then you can start scaring pitchers out of the zone. Then you can start working at bats, getting in hitters' counts, hunting pitches. But right now, they're just attacking a hitter who they think is just behind it a little bit. Not quite to go pick the stick on you, because you guys will take care of that later today, and all throughout the season over on the TV side on Space City Home Network. But rather than going through the whole lineup,

we'll eliminate Jose Al-Tuvai at the top and eliminate the elite hitter that Jake Myers is at the bottom of the lineup. You got anybody else in between? And this is not just today, but maybe over the next couple of games, who would be your pick-to-click? Who do you see maybe starting to come around and no longer hitting below 200? Well, I think Jordan's really close, and, you know, that's not anything, you know, revelatory right there. I mean, he's one of the best hitters in the world. But his swings have looked much better.

He's just missed a couple pitches, hit another couple pitches hard. He's also getting pitched really carefully right now because the guys around him aren't hitting. But I just think it's a matter of time before, you know, a pitcher makes a mistake and he jumps all over it. Or, you know, Christian Walker wakes up and he gets – or all of a sudden, Yoratting – He gets a couple more pitches to hit. He's getting really close. And I really like the swings that Jeremy Pena has been taking. His bat looked really quick.

He's on the fastball, but he's not cheating to get to the fastball. He's able to lay off with some tough breaking balls while still being quick enough to handle high velocity. So I like where Yordon is getting to, and I really like where Pena has been for most of the feet. Brian Bougassevin, continuing with us here on a Sports Talk 790. Let's go to the pitching side. Last night, Joe Spada in the seventh inning going to Taylor Scott.

Were you surprised to see him in that role or come out of the bullpen then? No, because I think we're still in the mode of the roles are kind of what we're defined in spring training and going through the offseason. And that, you know, Taylor Scott was kind of penciled into that seventh inning role. It's kind of morphed into a hybrid of him with Stephen O'Kirk based on what you want from a matchup lefty-righty standpoint in that pocket of the lineup lent itself to Taylor Scott. You know, he hasn't thrown the ball particularly well to start the season or even early in spring training. So that might, you know, that might change, you know, here in the near future. But no, I wasn't seen. The season that he had last year buys him a little bit of a longer leash to go.

out there and get right, but, you know, somebody's going to have to step up and be that seventh inning guy. And he did it last year, and it's still his kind of job to lose, but, you know, it might not be for long. We already rubber-stamped Brian King as the seventh inning guy. Is that okay? He's been great. And not only has he been great from a result standpoint, every inning that he throws looks easy. I mean, he goes out there and he just blows 92 by guys, and he just drop sliders and that nobody can hit. And every time I look up and I'm filling out the scorebook, you know, he's finished an inning

with no base runners and he's thrown only like 12 pitches. I mean, he's been unbelievable. Stephen Ocert has had some success as a major league reliever, some very good success. A couple of seasons ago with Miami, it obviously went in the opposite direction in the last two years. Did he refine what he had been doing when you watch him pitch and he was on the mound last night to finish things off. What is making him so successful again?

Well, first of all, he dealt with some injuries the last couple of seasons. So he looks like he's healthy, first of all, because he has had some really good success in years past. The biggest question coming into this season for him was, what is he going to be able to give you against righties? He's always been really good against lefties. He's always had a really good slider that's tough on lefties, but what does he do against righties to get them out?

out. And the inning that he threw last night, the biggest out that he had to get, Ryan Bliss at the end, you know, to close out the game, he had to go off of his, I'm just going to slide a lefty to death because he's facing a good right-handed hitter, a right-handed hitter who handles lefties very

well. And he located three fastballs, one at the top of the zone, two on the outside corner, you know, 92, 94 miles an hour. So that's the biggest thing that I've seen is that he's got weapons to handle righties as well as lefties. and he did it in as big a spot as there's been so far last night.

Let's talk about some more positive things. Is Jose Altuvae just going to hit until he's 50? I wouldn't bet against it. Everything that he's ever been challenged with, he's done. So, yeah, I mean, what's going to affect him? When they said he couldn't hit in the big leagues he did, when they said he couldn't hit for power he did, when they said they're going to change his position,

and is that going to affect his hitting? It didn't? I mean, he, with all the stuff that he's dealt with this offseason and coming into the season, trying to learn a new position, you know, he's out there. You know, when the team's at home and we get to go out there early, he's on the field at, you know, 3.30, 4 o'clock taking extra fly balls. Like the amount of workload that he's taking on is greater than what he's probably had since he was in his, you know, second, third year in the big leagues. And, yeah, he just continues to be the hitter that we've seen for 12 years now. I don't know why it's ever going to stop. There go, Brian Bogussevik.

Full conversation available, Sports Talk 790.com. Ross, Villarayl, Adam Wuxer with you. We're going to take a break. And when we come back, the final segment of the Matt Thomas with Ross without Matt Thomas, broadcasting live from Big City Wings,

marquee location. Or the Matt Thomas show with Ross, as we call it. Here on Sports Talk 7.90, that's the show you're listening to with you for just a few more minutes. We'll have the Astros on deck program coming up at 2 o'clock. Astros and Mariners 310 first pitch here on Sports Talk 790. A couple of notes to get to Mr. Wexler.

First up, Spencer Arrogatti, good news, will not require surgery on his fractured thumb. This from Chandler Rome, Joe Spott is saying Arrogati will be in a cast for two or two and a half weeks, after which there will be follow-up imaging to make sure everything is healing, and there will be more clarity after that. Yeah, pretty surprised that there is not a surgical procedure necessary, but we just went through a little bit of this with Jabari Smith Jr. They ultimately decided surgery was not needed for him. Which metacarpal?

Which metarst, wait, metatarsal was at the feet? I think in both cases it was that opposable thing. Okay, good. So we'll see what it means for a pitcher with obviously the arm being involved. He can keep his arm loose-ish, but he can't do it by throwing a baseball. Yeah, okay. Well, he's going to be in a cast, so no video games for Spencer. I know he likes to play Fortnite, other shooter games as well. But good news that he is not going to require surgery. And, well, we were talking about this with Joe Spottie yesterday. He's been asked about it. What are the plans as far as the rotation, short term, and long term.

They do have the day off tomorrow. At some point, could there be Lance McCuller's Jr. factoring in? And he will get his third rehab start on Saturday for AAA Sugarland. He threw for the Corpus Christi Hooks on last Saturday. I think it was inning in two-thirds, 50 pitches, 28 of them for strikes, giving up four runs, two of them earned. Was it three batters he walked or something like that? So at the end of the day, you just want him to be healthy. Sounds like he's healthy. He's going to start again on Saturday, up to 50 pitches.

What are we expecting from Lance McCuller's Jr.? I mean, honestly, the way things line up, let's say, unless Colton Gordon is the person they choose to take that start that's available. And it might be Friday. It might be Saturday. With the off day, there's an option if they'd like to bump up Rinell to Friday, and maybe it's Saturday this open. I'm not sure how they're going to play it here. But unless, say, Gordon takes the spot and keeps the spot, all signs point to Lance McCuller, Jr., going through his necessary 30 days. and there's probably a minimum of two more starts after this one coming up Saturday, maybe a third.

And I don't know why he would not be put back into the rotation for that very reason, because they already, this is why you never make those plans. You ask Joe and you ask Dan, well, what's going to happen? Well, we don't know yet because we didn't know Spencerergetty was going to get hit by a batted ball at a batting practice session for the Seattle Aaron, but it did happen. What the hell? We always say it's baseball and you see something you've never seen before in baseball, but a dude cracking his thumb out there on his throwing hand out there in batting practice.

Yeah, McCuller said very clearly multiple times during an extended session with the media after his appearance with the hooks. He's unconcerned with the results, or his parents' first time this season with Sugarland. Yeah, but if he threw two innings of shutout ball, he'd be like, oh, yeah, it felt good. Well, so that particular day, he struck out the side in the first inning. I didn't think he was back. I didn't think, oh, get him up here now. I know he's going to get...

He is back. I don't think if he gets minor league hitters out, he's going to get major league hitters out. Conversely, I don't think if he's allowing runs to minor league hitters, it's a given that when he comes up here with much better hitters, the same is going to happen, if not worse. We've seen rehab appearances for pitchers before. Not quite like this one. He's a very unique case for how long he's been gone. But they're trying to... There's a little bit of spring training to it.

they're working on things. I need to get up and down. I need to make sure my velocity's there. Am I executing my pitches? Is the shape of the pitch is what I want? Versus, yeah, this guy got me here. This guy singled off the wall. This guy doubled to the gap.

I didn't strike, all right, threw too many balls, and he's headed down to first. I don't think it does. One doesn't equate to the other. And in Lance's case, I'm hopeful that plays out. I also don't expect Lance's first start with the Astros to be some sort of shutout performance over four or five innings.

Well, probably, we'll go like a three and a third walk a couple of guys, three walk, two walks, three strikeouts. If you're unfamiliar with Lance McCullors pitching as a major leaguer, he works counts. He has long at bats. He has high pitch counts, which prevent long appearances. Which is why I don't want him in the bullpen, which some people have floated out and talked about. First of all, he's making $18 million. You want him in the starting rotation if you're just organizationally from the bottom line of that. And second of all, he kind of works best working out of his, working out of the own jams that he gets him into.

You don't want it coming in an unclean innings and jams already in walking guys. Yeah, that's why the conversation that really was never had and nor needed me. It's not that easy. It doesn't happen that often where guys can do it. And certainly not in this case. Just because a really good pitcher got hurt and made himself into a closer, John Smoltz. Yes. It doesn't mean everybody else can or should.

That's like the extreme scenario. If I wanted to say another, Dennis Eckersley, so now I've got to go back 40 years to find another one with that kind of success rate as both? He was a really good starting pitcher, and then he was the greatest closer in baseball for 10 years. Right, right. Well, I guess we'll see what happens. I completely, I still remain optimistic,

and I want to see Lance McCuller's Jr. produced because the injury that he did get addressed is the one that goes all the way back to 2021. So hopefully we are all good and he can pitch. And this will be some kind of blip on a radar we're talking about in five years with Lance McCuller's Jr. That, oh, remember that time he was out for two years and now he's been a good starter? I don't know that it's going to happen. Is his arm going to fall off? But it's very clear that he needs for the Astros to be successful this year.

I think he's got to factor into their plans and be effective. We never talked about it. I don't think the whole show. Ryan Gusto. Yes? Do you think that they should consider him or keep? him where he is because it's been so valuable already. I think they would consider him.

I think they are considering him. I don't know what they would do. Probably keep him in his role because you've needed him so much. It is early season. Early season, you're not having guys go out there. You're pulling Hayden-Wesneski after 82 pitches. If that game is in August, you probably let Hayden Wesleynessy go out there for another inning. But you need innings.

You need somebody. And as you mentioned, Gusto has been used. At this moment, I would keep him in his current role. Yeah, it's a tough one because the longer he goes in this role, the less likely it is you move him back into a starter's role because he's still probably currently stretched out pretty good from his work in spring training, from a three-inning outing. If they needed to convert him to a starter, he could probably go out there immediately with the proper rest and get you into the fourth or fifth inning. And a starter two later, now he'd be perfectly capable of going five or six if he was pitching well.

And I think the more he is in the bullpen, the harder it becomes to flip him in season. All right, that is Adam Wexer. And with that, that will conclude four hours out here at Big City Wings, a marquee location. Thanks for hanging out, Wex. Oh, loved it. Got our grub on earlier with a sampling of wings. We'll be doing more of that now. All right.

We have Astros on deck coming up shortly, but before we do get to that, I do have to remind you again. I'm sorry to be pestering you. It's under a week to go. How you feeling about your taxes? Toptax Defenders.com can help you if you're somebody who the IRS says owes $10,000 or more. If you've received a letter from them, The IRS is aggressively going after independent contractors, companies that use independent contractors and small business owners. You might need toptax defenders.com.

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Let Top Tax Defenders help you at TopTax Defenders.com. That is Toptax Defenders.com. Okay, now we can really get out of the show, Wex. Again, thanks for hanging out. Thanks to all of you for joining us. Thanks to Brian Bogusevich for joining us as well. Thanks to Jonathan Allen back at the station dealing with us out here on location, doing a great job. I do it for Gene-M.

Coming up next, it is Adam Clanton and the Astros on. Deck Show 310 first pitch. The Astros taking on the Mariners. You're on Sports Talk 7 out of your home. For your youth at Astros.