The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - SWING OFF RECAP, How Did We Like The Challenge System? Lip Service @ SEC Media Days, NBA Twitter Is Off The Rails

Episode Date: July 16, 2025

SWING OFF RECAP, How Did We Like The Challenge System ? Lip Service @ SEC Media Days, NBA Twitter Is Off The Rails

Lunch timers is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. In H-Town, good morning and welcome to a Wednesday edition of the Matt Thomas show with Ross. This is Sports Talk 790. We saw the Sultants of Swing. And Ross, Villarreal, make sure you do not call it the home run derby. It's the swing off. I thought that's what you did with your pineapple. No, that's the people that live.

in uh well we've you said it you've already said it 500 times on air we'll do it 500 a second time it might rhyme with bina ran ration good morning to you it is the matt thomas show with ross i'm matt he's ross we've got actually a fair amount of things to get to today uh it is the slowest week of the year and i think ross i don't mean to toot our own horn but i think we've been able to handle the last couple days pretty good We're doing great, Matt. Fantastic. Better than ever.

And I feel like there's a few things today from the All-Star game. Now, I didn't tell anybody not to watch the All-Star game. I would never endorse that. You do what you want to do. There was nothing else on television, and my wife and my daughter were out shopping. So, again, what am I going to do? I'm not going to go shop and watch the All-Star game. And I thought largely, I mean, if I was to give it a grade, the entire presentation,

I'd give it a B plus. Would that be fair? I thought it was good. Yeah, I liked it. Of course, your favorite Matt, ludicrous coming out of the beginning with the Welcome to Atlanta. They got Jermaine Dupre out of Mothballs,

which I appreciated. That was cool. Good to see. He's still knocking around. You know, it's funny because I was at a restaurant when that was being performed and it was on closed caption. So I had no idea if it sounded good,

sounded bad, and frankly, it didn't matter because I don't know either of their songs anyway. But that's a different issue for a different time. What I loved about it, we'll get to. What I didn't like about, it and more importantly your friend me gave you the gut feeling this thing was going to go extra and it did yesterday yes matt you know what that's a that's a long shot hit so good job

i'll say this to show you how little people really care about the all-star game and i'm going to be flat out to you i had no idea there was a swing off i forgot until it was happening i was like what are they going to do and then they mentioned and i was like oh yeah i remembered them talking about it. Well, it's funny because a lot of the national baseball writers who are there were tweeting out last night as it was about to happen. If this game goes extras, nobody, I mean,

the, like the pass-ins and the other nightingales and when they were all there, we're like, yeah, we have to tell you it's a swing-off. So let me tell you about the swing-off. Tell me about the swing-off, Matt. Let me just say about everything. Last night was an exhibition. There was nothing about last night's game that I want to see

implemented in a regular game, except the ABS challenge system, which, by the way, worked beautifully last night. Yes, it was great. There was a couple that were like millimeters close. The best part was the pitchers could turn around

and look at the Jumbotron out at Truis Park and right field and look at it. I mean, there's no guessing. There's no, hey, what are the umpires thinking? What's going on on the headset? They're not underneath the hood of a replay monitor. They just turn around and look.

Oh, okay, that's good. if that's how it's going to work, even the diehard, diehard of baseball players that do not want to see it would have to say, hey, it worked out last night.

Yeah, I thought it was perfect. And I think you had the gut feeling, and I agree, it's coming next year. Now, let me ask you this. The biggest thing about this is it's going to be a challenge for every team,

whenever it does come into play, is who's going to have the story? should use it, and at what point of the game do you do it? Now, remember, you get two, and as long as you keep getting them right, you get to keep those two. Yeah. But if you have a reputation, like, for instance, and I'm going to use a baseball crossover, basketball crossover, Alper and Shengun wants every foul called against him to be challenged. And he's wrong, about 85% of the time, I would say.

I would want Alper and Shengun nowhere near a batter's box or a pitching match. or behind the dish catching because he would think everything was a strike or a ball and I would lose my challenges within the first five minutes of the game. Well, he's not going to be here next year, but Fromber would be a bad one, I think. Even Joe Espada mentioned it like, oh, we're going to tell Framber to go cool it on that. He was mentioning that in spring training. Like, I've got to have a talk with Fromber about not using all the challenges. That's exactly right.

So the issue is going to be, and this is not, it almost gives the umpires a little bit of leeway if they goof up early in the game because there's going to be some managers that are going to like, I don't want to burn it if I need it in the 7th, 8th, and 9th thing of a ballgame. So I don't know how you get around that, except they don't want,

here's what baseball doesn't want. They don't want it every single pitch. Now, you do, and I could be convinced of that. Again, I'm going to take small steps on this, but they don't want every single pitch being reviewed with a slight delay. It's not a huge delight. As a slight is not even the word.

I mean, it would be, it's minimal. I mean, as soon as the pitch hits the catchers, they know if it's a ball or strike. Yeah, yeah. But do you have to go back and look and put it on the jump bowtron? Those are all logistical things. I just think that if you're going to, if this is going to be implemented,

which I believe it will be in 2026, just a gut feeling on that, that you're going to have some managers that are saying, don't even bother until it's a crucial part of the game. Base is loaded at strike three to end in any one of the modern scoring position. I mean, it would just take people, and teams getting used to it. You're not going to do it.

Nobody out forthending up five to two. You're not going to sit there and go, oh, I got screwed on that. You know what? Unfortunately, you're still going to have human error. You're still going to have human error because they literally will install the technology to get every single call right and not use it.

I don't know. You're going to fall in your sort of this. I appreciate you. I appreciate you. I've been on the warpath for many years. At least I'm winning the small battle, getting the challenge. That is exactly right.

All right. So we're going to talk about what we did. That was one of the, I'll tell you the one thing I didn't like him. We'll get to that in the next segment, but I don't want to get into the swing off, the Hank Aaron tribute, the players being miced up. And I mean, it felt like if you weren't miced up Ross last night, you weren't very good, right? I mean, you were like the mid-level All-Star.

Yeah. Is that bad? Do you feel like you're not part of the team if you didn't get mic'd up? Like, who was that guy from the Marlins, like, at the end of the game? He's like, I'm in the swing-off? Well, yeah, it's the thing that is that, If you didn't get miced up, that means they didn't think you had a good personality. Kyle Stowers.

Or you were going to be a huge part of the game. So, again, that to me was exhibition. That to me added flavor to the game. I know there were some people that were saying that maybe it was too much. It's the All-Star game. Sorry, Stowers. But yeah, go ahead. Yeah, I mean, you can bring it more Miami Marlon players.

I have no problem with that. To me, it was just a – Last night to me was a sit back. I'm a baseball fan. I'm just going to watch. I'm not going to break down the pitch selection or what the OPS plus is or what the exit velocity is. Just watch the best players playing the game in their own uniform, by the way. Thank you for that Major League baseball.

And I was also talking about this yesterday or just as far as the swing off part of it. Yeah. They let the, you let it breathe a little bit more with just going by swings or outs. When they do the time thing, it's just too much. It's too fast. I think the derby should go back to the out system or a certain amount of swings, and you can only take like three or four pitches or whatever out of 20 swings or something like that. Yeah.

So, again, I would never want that any part of a regular season game. No way, no how, no chance. I do like the runner at second base, the Manford Man Rule, whatever they're calling it. I like that. I don't want a swing off. I don't want a home run derby. And I don't know. You're a soccer fan.

How do you feel, I may have brought this up to you a couple times. What are your, what's your general thoughts about the shootout? Because you do play an extra, how many minutes you play right after you play the regularly? Yeah, depending on the, I mean,

some of the, like the summer cups go straight to PKs, but most of the time they play an extra 30 minutes. So you're talking about 90 minutes running around. Then a hot, two hours of sprinting around. They're like, all right, everybody's about to die. Let's do something. Let's just have a kick. Let's just do it with a penalty kicks.

Yeah, that to me makes, I mean, you can kind of justify that because you did give it a legitimate way to end the game, the way the game was played during. Yeah, it would be like if they did this at like the 12th inning because it's 90 minutes, then 30 minutes, right? So that would be three more innings, three more innings and then a swing off. It would be like that. Yeah, I don't think we're going to have. I mean, how many games have we had that have gone, say, past 12 or 13 since the Manford Man Rule has been put in a place? It's been very rare. Yeah, very rare.

Also, okay, on the show today, Brian Bogussevich, going to join us at 11 o'clock. Looking forward to talking with him. We have shut your bum ass up at 1130 today. We believe it or not today at 150. And we have a couple of things, Ross, I want to get to. The rhetoric coming out of the SEC Media Days is so rich. There's been one theme that I have heard from every coach and every player. that I've seen on ESPN.

I know Dan and Sean today had Greg Sankey on the commissioner of the conference. Oh, wow, they did? Yeah, it's good get. And they had a really old guy on earlier, but that's fine. Nothing a big deal on that. But Sankey came on, and he was very, very poll. I mean, commissioners are polished, right? I would say, yeah.

You have to be salesmen. You have to appease your people that you work for, which in his case are the 16 different presidents and the 16 different athletic directors in a conference, just like, commissioners and all the professional sports are polished. But there's just been a storyline I'm just going to get kind of getting tired of. Saying with college athletics, the NIL top ten is out in terms of money being spent.

There's a reason why the University of Texas is doing quite well, sports, RV. Landed two top recruits, the top defensive lineman and the top linebacker out of Georgia yesterday. Kirby Smart can't be particularly happy about that. That's a shame. but you'll be not surprised at who is among the all-time money spenders this offseason when it comes to NAL. Okay. We've talked about this school a little bit. We have Twitter acting stupid on NBA Twitter.

I'm revolving around LeBron James. I do want to get to that. And just some general thoughts if you happen to see the All-Star game and what look forward is to be, hopefully, it will be a very exciting second half of the season. If you'd like to join us today, you may do so. at 713-212-5-790. The lines remain available for you this morning. 7-13-212-5-7-90.

If you're following us on Twitter today, we'd appreciate that. At SportsMT and at SportsRV. And, Ross, where do people find you on Insta? Wow. What used to be inside? It was a polite Wednesday? I appreciate that, Matt. Well, I thought about, you know, when you're spending alone time in the hotel

and you're watching the All-Star game, You reflect on things. Okay. I appreciate that, Matt. Yes, you can follow me at Sports RV on Instagram. I'm trying to build it up after years of neglect. Let's just say, company initiatives. It would really help me out if you would follow me at Sports RV on Instagram.

Thank you, Matt. Anything for you, Ross? I think I'm going to try to be as nice to you as I can for four possible hours today. Oh, wow. I thought you were going to say for the foreseeable future, but I'll take four hours baby steps. That's good. Well, it's like, you know, they say in a lot of addictions one day at a time. You have to, you know.

That's true. That's true. Maybe tomorrow I will do, make it two straight days. One can only hope. All right. 713-212-5-790. It's how you reach our show if you want to get in today. 7-1-3-212-5-790.

It is the Matt Thomas show at Ross. We've got a busy show today, and we want you to be a part of it. It's 7-13-2-1-2-5-7-90. 10-21. Matt and Ross with you here on a Wednesday. We've got Brian Bogusivic coming up at 11 o'clock. 1130. We'll talk to you and ask you to tell some people to shut their bum axes up.

And ain't nobody got time for that. We'll have the news at noon. And of course, believe it or not, to wrap up the show today at 150. We've got a lot of time with you. So come on in. We thank you for listening. Thank you for being a part of the radio program. I did talk about Ross's IG.

You did give a review of Superman. You gave it at what, a seven and a half? Is that correct? Seven and a half? out of 10 yes that is on my Instagram story thanks to those you who followed me which is me I saw it

thank you you're welcome what I am nine away from from 1,000 nine away from 1,000 if you can follow at Sports RV on Instagram I'd appreciate it sorry go ahead and then if you got a second no worries if you can follow sports MT2 that'd be cool

what gave what did not allow it to reach to an 8 or higher huh I thought there were some, I mean, look, it's a Superman movie, it's a summer blockbuster. Definitely there's going to be some of the cheesy humor. I thought at points

it was a little bit thick. I also, and people were probably going to fight this on me, the guy Nicholas Holt, who was Lex Luthor, I thought he was good, but it just I found it difficult to buy into his performance 100%.

I think he was like an 8 out of 10. He wasn't a perfect cast, but I thought the guy that did Superman was great. Lois Lane was perfect as well. The parents were really good. Most of the rest of the casting, I really liked. But it was that. And then, like I said, a couple cheesy moments. I'm trying to remember just some other, I mean, you have to have a suspension of disbelief in a, in a action movie with a superhero anyways, but some of that stuff you're like, why is this happening? Or how would this happen? This doesn't make any sense. Just like plot holy stuff.

Okay. I honestly have not seen any Superman movies since the original trio in the 80s. Yes. I'm just not much of a Batman Superman kind of movie watcher. But that's, you know, to each his own. I mean, it's doing very, very well, right? Yeah, it's doing well. And you can tell from the beginning, they kind of set the tone.

Like the color palers, it's not like, you know, they went into this era of superhero movies like 10, 15 years ago where it's dark. It's dark Superman. And the world is the worst. This is a lot more light, airy, fun. The color palettes are lighter. I mean, he's wearing his red underwear. Like, that's kind of, you know, kitsy and campy in its own self.

So, yeah, it was a lighter tone. And I thought overall was very well done. Okay. Well, seven and a half out of ten. Seven and a half out of ten. Yeah, very good. All right. So what I didn't like about the All-Star game,

they needed to get to the game a little faster. All this, it's just, I was waiting for first pitch. Intros. Yeah. That's a very minor thing, is that's going to have. happen with ever any event i mean the all the all stars i hate the fact ross that the players once they're done playing shower and get out of the stadium as fast as possible apparently they were on planes like out of there if i would have been smart i should have looked at the private airfields

of atlanta's airfield to see can you go back and where they were going can you look at archives and go back on that or no uh you can but it would also require me figuring out if they were flying out of heartsfield which is the main airport in atlanta or they were going to some you know private executive airport kind of thing. But like, show how tiny was unavailable. I mean, because he was gone. Yeah, with the guys for the swing off, it's like, all right, who's left? Who's still here?

Are there any pirates available? Joe Tori? Get back in there. Joe, I mean, I respect these putting the uniform on, but. Uh-oh. No, that's all much of say. Remember, I'm going to be nice today. What are your thoughts on, one, Clayton Karsh?

Kershaw talking during in the middle of pitching. I thought that was great. Love it. But also what are your thoughts on him being in the game at all as a legacy all-star selection? Well to me

this is such an exhibition event that doesn't carry any weight which is what I've always was happy about. I'm okay with that too. It's weak sauce. Sorry. It's a participant.

participation ribbon. Yeah. Clayton Kershaw shouldn't be in there. But I mean, wasn't Cal Rip gonna a participation ribbon guy one time? Yeah, was it fan vote though? Or did they just let him in afterwards? I think they've done this before.

Yeah, they had. They did it within the last couple of years. I'm trying, was it, um, oh man, I can't remember. It was a pitcher, right? In the last couple of years? Oh no, was it pool holes, right?

Was it poo holes? Yeah, maybe that sounds good. I'm trying to, I can't. can't find it on Google, but I think it was beautiful. I just, my, my thought is this game means so nothing to anything except enjoying it for a few hours

that if you want to bring somebody in from years past that is retiring or close to retiring, I don't know, is Clint Kirchard retiring this year? I guess so? I don't think so. I mean, guys, we would have known if he was retiring. Yeah, I mean, Verland is trying to pitch

until he's 50. Curshaw is 37. I mean, is Justin Verl Leonard earn a spot on one of these? Yeah, absolutely does. Why is it the definition? Is he like, what about me? I haven't won a game yet, but damn, I might not come on, let me go.

Yeah, it doesn't matter to me. What I was more bothered by was the fact that you could have gone to your flight aware and seen nine different private planes leaving in the sixth inning of a game. Now, this is another warpath I've started on. I just think these All-Star selections are out of control

because at the end of careers, you're weighing whether or not a guy is a Hall of Famer, one of the things you point to is all-star appearances or Pro Bowls or whatever. Now, Kerchall is going to get in no matter what. It's not really affecting his resume. Right. But I mean, having four or five All-Stars doesn't sound as good as having seven or eight. And I think that does matter at the end of guys' careers.

I'm talking about not just the Legends pick thing, but also when guys are injury replacements and making the distinction between actual All-Star, selections rather than I was the 10th guy who got in because 10 other pitchers didn't want to go.

So how would you describe Issock Paredes? He was a laid adon but didn't even go. Yeah, then it's going to be on his resume, right? When they induct,

if he makes the Astros Hall of Fame or something, they're going to be like, oh, four-time All-Star, whatever. It's like, yeah, kind of, but not really. Yeah, the reality

is the kind of, but not really, is probably a part of a lot of things. All-Star appearance. I mean, think about this. They're baseball players who have hit a bunch of home runs, but they were on teams that were losing 115 games a year. Or you had a running back who had 14, 100-yard games,

but if they were down three touchdowns, they just hand the ball off just to, I mean, like, the, yeah, but really not, Michael Strayhan's single-season sack record. When Brett Farve laid down for him, literally laid down for him. No way, I mean, you and I remember that. Yes. But if you were to go on Jeopardy, Sports Jeopardy, yes.

This gap tooth, $100,000 pyramid mid-host is the all-time single-season sacklet who's Michael Strand? I'm going to say, well, you know, it's because Brett Farve laid down one. Yeah, the record is the record. That's why, especially when it's, like, they need a first, second, third. That's why I like All-NBA more than All-Star and then All-Pro. They need something like that. Baseball does do it now, I think.

I don't remember what they call it. but there definitely to me should be some kind of distinction. I don't know. Just me telling an old man yelling at Cloud. That's okay. You're a lot of yell. That's fine. Okay.

All right. 713212-570 if you want to join us. The only thing I didn't like about last night was, again, the players taken off early. I just, you can't hang around next to 90 minutes. It's the All-Star game. You're not in the DMV line. You know what I mean? it's a pretty special event.

I just thought it was just... They disagree. No question. But now that's a new thing. I mean, what kind of message are you sending to your fellow all-stars that stuck around for the game? Get your weight up, son. Well, it's, you know what it is? It's the divo-like process that is at professional athletics.

For that matter, college, too. I mean, it's just, we're nothing but full of divas now in sports. I did my two innings. I got my 1-A-B-N. manager told me I wasn't going in. I'm going to go take a shower and get on the plane and get out of here. Oh, I also have a conspiracy theory about this all-star thing. And we'll discuss that.

That's not showing up. Ooh. You and I have not discussed this. It makes this show great. I can't even guess what your conspiracy theory is. We'll let the audience hear it next. 1029 on Sports Talk 790. We've got some folks that want to get in on the conversation.

We thank you for that. We do believe that calls can be a good. part of the show and sometimes they can be a bad part of the show. We'll have an example of that coming up very shortly. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-2-1-2-5-7-90. Matt and Ross with you with Brian Bogus-Evich joining us coming up at about a half an hour from now.

All right, Ross, the conspiracy theory. I have no idea we're going with this. I want to sit back and let you say what you got to say, and then I'm going to either respectfully agree or respectfully disagree with your... You can disrespectfully disagree, too, if you want. There's probably a chance of that. well for sure. You have all these players who are opting out of this, this honor, the All-Star,

and a lot of them, especially the ones who were initially selected declining, do you think there is somebody or people, for example, like Hunter Brown pitching on Sunday, and then that kind of opens up a window for at least the possibility of Fromber Valdez or somebody else to make the All-Star team, not just to make it, but a lot of these players have incentives in their contracts where you get $50,000, $100,000, whatever. You get $15,000 for making the All-Star team, but then you get another $50 to $100 in the contract.

Could it be guys who don't necessarily want to go to the All-Star game also opting out in order to get some other guys some more money from teams? That would require an extra layer. of help meaning this maybe guys who have the same agents that's exactly right that's where they're like hey oh you're my guy man you know what i'm going to opt out hopefully they select you and then you can get you can get your 50k man i'm going to opt out part of it part of the reason they're opting out conspiracy theory it's not crazy which upsets me because it's easier to destroy your crazy theories it's just i'm going to i'm going to lean towards that is a very very small percentage here's

one I will give you. How about, and again, I'm going to use Hunter Brown as an example. How about Hunter Brown going to Joe Espada and saying, hey, I'm in the All-Star game, it's cool, but I don't really want to play. Can you please start me on Sunday? That's probably correct. But also, I mean, he was on schedule and he probably wanted to bounce back before the All-Star break after his bad start, even though he didn't.

Well, and here's a thing. is that he would have, okay, if he pitched on, which he did, unfortunately, it was not great. He has Monday off. My guess there's some sort of side session on Tuesday, right? So he could have thrown an inning in the game yesterday if you wanted to. In theory. In theory. Your theory, again, doesn't, it's not ridiculous, but it would then take an extra layer of, well, how does it help the player then?

Are you going to, is that agent going to say, I'll give you a cut? I'll give you a little bone. I don't know if you could even do that. It's like helping your guys out, Matt. Okay. Yeah, I can't dismiss it. I want to, but I can't. But I don't think it's prevalent.

I think it's maybe if you were to put a percentage in it, maybe one case per year each team, maybe. But then, you know, again, if you're Scott, if you're a Scott Boris client, are you really worried about $50,000? Well, maybe that's Scott Morris clients. They're all making $300. million dollar contracts yeah yeah i'm trying who also i'm sure there's other agents i mean we would know if we heard their names but i can't nothing comes to minding me i just know the talent

it's like c a there's right there's excel like Kyle Tucker's got a group's got a bunch of people he's got involved yeah yeah uh yeah all right i will man i can't refute that again i don't think it's prevalent but it's certainly it to say that it's never happened would be would be i think would be flat false. Try to help somebody else out. Get a bonus. Especially somebody pre-arbitration. Or maybe a teammate.

Yeah, or a teammate, yeah. I'm not saying it happened with Hunter Brown, but maybe part of him was like, hey, if I don't go, then Fromber might have the option, and I don't know what's in his contract. Yeah. Let's go to, okay, now, Eric and Bay City called the tentating show on Sunday, Ross. Remember how horrific that call was?

That was pretty bad. Will he bounce back? Hello, Eric. Well, well, well, fellas. I listened to Monday's episode. on the I Heart Podcast. I was driving my parents all the way up to Cleveland. We went to a Reds-Marlins game at the Great American Ballpark, beautiful play.

Nice. Nice. Yeah, it was quite entertaining to watch another group's fan base be flustered and angry as the Marlins beat the Reds at that game 12 to 2. And feel like I was not alone, although none of them were critical of their manager because they have a great manager, unlike us. But what I would like to say is, Ross, I don't blame. me for turning off the radio. I wouldn't want to hear

the truth either. I was right. No, you're an idiot. You're an idiot. Eric. How long have you been watching baseball? 35 years. How many defensive replacements have you seen? Late inning defensive replacements do you think? I don't know. Ballpark it. 500?

Jason, the guy that called Jason, after y'all talked about that, he brought off the one critical point. You guys sat there and talked about how 40% of our roster was AAA. That is correct. We have a huge huge number of AAA bats. You cannot do a defensive substitution

for one of the very few elite major league bats you have remaining in that lineup. He just went to bat. Then they were going to go to the ninth, then they were going to go to the 10th, and then they came into the 11th, and then they brought out of base. And then they won the game. They won the game, Eric. I don't have much time left to talk.

I'm going to have to leave out. I'm sorry. I'm going to walk out. I'm going to let Eric have his time to talk about whatever else he wanted to talk about. But you're way wrong on that. Go ahead on your other bad point, I'm sure. Okay. Well, I appreciated Caleb's conversation, and I also follow the dash and dynamo, and I always hope good things for them. And I don't want our fan base to look like the dashes either. Also, last thing that I will say, you can chuckle at the whole dash dynamo aspect of it or whatever. But, you know, I tell a lot of my friends in San Antonio, we have more basketball championships than they do, which is true. We have six and they have five, because I count before the comets one. Now, absolute final point, Matt, you said we need an arm. I agree with you, Matt.

What do you think about going to get Rich Hill or Dallas Keikle from the Royals? I'll hang up and listen. He's just trolling. We're not going to answer that. Is Rich Hill a member of the ARP yet, or is it on the precipice of hitting that number or what? I think he's the first player to be in the old timers league and at the major league level. Yeah, I believe Rich Hill did throw a pitch to, I believe, oh yeah, we're getting word. He did throw a few to Babe Ruth, very young in his major league career.

Oh, man. Eric, Eric is, I would say one-of-a-kind, but we've had a lot of listeners like Eric, so it's not like he's one-of-a-kind. I think he's a call with the most balls. Eric, you know what? I respect this. There's a thin line between bravery and stupid. I believe is a very popular saying. That's what they call this show sometimes.

Bravery and stupidity. Which is which? Oh, my goodness. All right. There you go. So we've got that going on. All right. 1042, we're going to take a slight break from baseball.

We'll get back to the conversation with Brian Bogussevick coming up at 11 o'clock here on Sports Talk 7. We are going to get into the hyperbole that I'm hearing from the SEC Media Days. 1043 SEC SEC SEC SEC By the way

Does that person Lose his job When Sark went out there And the Aggie Warham was being played That was pretty funny I feel like that was like Accidentally on purpose

But they got to get to the bottom of that That doesn't see That just this seems I guess it's probably one track off On whatever CD they made But Well if they made a say I was going to say

Isn't everything digital by now Shush All right I dated myself. It's fine. Put your VC. On the cassette tape. Jonathan,

do you know what a VCR is by any chance? I know all that. VHS. I grew up on that stuff. I was like the last little age part of it. All right. We'll get Ross's 8 track out and discusses of the music next here on the Matt Thomas show. Ross.

713212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90 with the world. So I've been listening to a little bit of Gordy and Dan Matthews in Atlanta at the SEC Media Days, and I've been watching some of the sports centers and the fine bomb shows and whatnot, just kind of getting the lay of the land of what's happening. And there is obviously the number one theme, and it's been this way probably at these media days for the last four or five years. It's the economics of the sport. And the boys this morning had Greg Sankey on for a few minutes, and he was very polite.

And I've seen Kirby Smart with some interviews. The thing about Sanky today that bothered me, and it's not necessarily bothered me, was just give me some new material. He's like, you know, we've got to get a handle on this NIL and transfer portal thing. And then all the media goes, yeah, it makes a lot of sense to me. We've got to get this handled. Ross, the SEC doesn't want any handle on this. The NCC wants it to be exactly the way it is.

We can outspend you. We have bucks. We're going to go get the best players. And the rest of you will see. say all the polite things, but we don't want, well, we have no interest in making sure that Arizona State is competitive with us. We want to be who we are.

And I wish they would just be fully honest about they don't want regulation. They need to say they want regulation. They don't want regulation. Come on, let's be honest. People are lying all over the place. That's why I tell you why all the time. Greg Sanky's lying.

Nice guy. Commissioner. Commissioner's law. That's what you can say. Yeah, you have to say it publicly. Like, we got to keep an eye on this, guys. We can't keep being four of the top five. teams in the ranking recruiting.

Yeah. Come on. This is horrible. Yeah. I mean, we really, we'd like to see you in Nevada. You really can step up a little bit. What? And then Kirby Smart was asked, he says, if there was one, somebody asked him, if there

was one thing you could change. And this doesn't make a little bit of sense. He says, if we're signing players and we're giving them NIA money, we have to hold them to a contract. Apparently these contracts are not worth the paper that are written on. Yeah. I'm sure there's a lot of legal reasons for that. Yeah.

So I just was curious. I was interested to see if there was any breakdown of players. Now, again, going to the too deep of South Carolina is not interesting to people. It's about this stuff. This is what our show is about. It's about the bigger picture of things. So on three is a website, right? On three sports.

Yes. Pete Nacos is a business writer for said website. He put out a tweet yesterday, the top 10 biggest spenders in college football this season. Stay with me on this, Ron. Okay. Auburn 10, SEC, Tennessee, SEC 9, Michigan, and USC are tied for seven. Big 10.

Miami at number five, along with Texas and NEM. So it's three SEC teams. Oregon, four, Ohio State three. The two biggest spending teams in the country in NIL, quote unquote, paying for athletes is our will be this year at number two, Texas Tech, and number one, Texas. Texas Tech, number two? Number two. They got to get their team rankings up.

They only have one five-star player. But I guess you got to pay those premiums to get them up to Lubbock. Exactly. Well, it's funny because I did see a tweet, and I sent it to my son, and he's not happy with me. on three sports says Texas Tech's roster is set to cost north of $28 million this season here's the part of the last part of the court and it's where Cameron was not happy with me

they have to pay 30% more to get the players they want because of location I mean the truth hurts sometimes dust bowl over there that was Jonathan that said Dust Bowl that was not me. You can tell by how fast he said it. My dad's a graduate from Texas Tech, so I can talk all the middle. And it's just not that pretty.

I, you know how I feel, but I love it. Yeah, you love loving. I do love loving. You love going to the Rexis Roadhouse out there and having a great time. And they got a, they got a reaff ranks there now. That's great. They got a meismake. It was a groundbreaking ceremony.

I think the mayor was there. Let me taste of it. When you have one less rappelries and you got an extra reaperie than you got an extra or rehab rangs, you're very happy. Don't order the shrimp. They're not catching it out of Lake Texhome or whatever the hell is up there? I don't think so. So I was thinking about Texas Tech for a second here.

Uh-huh. You have to make the playoff, right, when you're paying $28 million, correct? Well, the recruiting class is 33rd. Maybe they're spending a lot in the portal. I'll go look at the portal classes. But as far as new recruits, They're 28th on 24-7 and 33rd on on three. I mean, am I not right?

I mean, I know the one that one dude loves his school, and obviously he's got more money than God at this point. Mm-hmm. But... Oh, they're number two in the portal rankings. Ah, imagine that. Lubbock, Texas. Texas Tech University,

$28 million for a roster. Portal rankings, LSU, Texas Tech, Miami, Ole Miss, Oregon. Boy, Miami and Oregon. Well, Oregon's always going to have the money. Phil Knight's basically said, I'm going to just continue to give money until you get me a national championship. Me's been waiting for... That's a great example.

You think money in college doesn't... I mean, we don't have a huge example size of this because it only been around a few years, but Phil Knight said, I'm going to continue to give money because I won a national championship. I'm dying for this. It is, yeah, it's so hard. Paying $28 million. I mean, Texas heck and finish 8 and 4 again.

You know who's, these coaches, Ross, are going to have such a short leash now. If you thought the pressure was bad now, imagine if you gave your head coach $28 million for a bankroll and you can't win at least the Big 12. Ryan Day would have been fired if there wasn't a 12-team playoff. If it were a 14-team, they were the 6-seat. He would have been fired. That's why I think we're going to start to see a lot more college coaches, not necessarily leaving the coaching industry,

but maybe thinking more pro down the road. Well, there's only 32 jobs. And most of them go to guys who are already NFL assistants. It feels like it's either retreads or guys who are NFL assistants. I mean, you tell me, if you're Joey McGuire today, you are very happy that you've got somebody giving you that kind of cash. but you better win. That leash is very short, right?

Absolutely. That's all I'm saying. All right. Brian Bogusevic, we'll get his thoughts on the All-Star game and the second half of the Astros season. And Tulane football. I mean, we could. I think it'd be a sore subject to him,

but we could do that if you want to. Let me tell you about Berkeley Eye Center right now. This is a really good opportunity for those of you that have said, finally, I need to get LASIC because I'm tired of wearing glasses. I'm tired of wearing contacts. I want to have clear vision, and I want to have LASIC. Because so many people, my friends, my family have had it, and it's time from you to have it. Well, I want to give you an opportunity to earn a double coupon.

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We say hi to Brian Bogus Evik of Space City Home Network. Bogey, a happy All-Star break. Your thoughts about just the general evening, everything about last night? Tell me what you did and did not like, if there was anything. about both that kind of drew your interest about last night's events? I'm kind of

in the middle about everything. I enjoy the celebration of the game. Part of it, I enjoy kind of the celebration of also the individuals and letting guys kind of get outside of the team aspect a little bit and see some personalities. At the same time,

I'm, you know, after close to 100 games of real baseball and exhibition game. I'm kind of meh about. I do like the idea of trying out some different things and having the game be a little bit different than just your average regular season game and putting in some, you know, different tweaks or ideas that we'll maybe see in the future. But other than that, for me, it's not necessarily about the game. It's just about the weekend and the events and the people and, you know, that to me is the fun part. All right, a couple of real quick things.

Automatic Ball Strike Challenge system, what do you think? I like it. I liked it in spring training. I like where they're going with it. I think they've done a really nice job. You know, they've used it for so long and so many games in the minor leagues that I think they've got a really good feel for how to use it quickly and efficiently. I like the added drama of showing it up on the big board in real time

and kind of giving the crowd something to get into. I think it's a great idea. I was a big proponent of if we got it, let's just use it for every pitch, but I do like the way they're trying to use it, you know, just a more, you know, important situation type of way. Bogey, we had Breggman on with us a couple of years ago when he was still with a team in spring training, and we thought he would universally, like every player, would love it. The consensus was we couldn't find enough people that are active players that love every pitch

being determined ball strike via the computer. Why do you think so many players are against it? They're just naturally resistant to change, first of all. I mean, when you've spent the amount of time preparing and training to play a certain way, the idea that things are going to be changed and there's going to be some unknown is a little bit unnerving, but they also assimilate to everything really quickly and very smoothly. I think also there is, you know, the human element and the gamesmanship is something that you can appreciate while you're in the game. You know, from the outside looking in, it's very black and white.

It's like it's the ball. We wanted a ball. It's a strike. We want to strike. But the idea of, you know, watching a Zach Grinkey hit the outside corner over and over and then start going an inch or two off and walking the umpire off the plate as well as the hitters, you know, that appreciation of skill is something. that could be lost if we're just using a computer and it's black and white. So I think it's two things. I think it's just natural resistant to change.

And them not wanting to lose an element of true greatness, not being able to exploit human error, I guess. Yeah, that makes some sense. Let me also ask you this. I'll get Ross got a couple questions in after me. One of the things I brought up about the ABS is what are managers going to tell their players win and if to use it in the right situations. Do you potentially squawking something in the third inning knowing if you lose it, you might not get it,

you got one challenge left, if this comes into play. My question to you is if you were a manager, what would you tell your 26-man roster about how and when and what seems appropriate to use those ABSs? Because if you lose the two challenges, you're done, you may want them in the ninth inning of a very close game. Yeah, I think first and foremost you express the idea that it is for important situations, right?

It's something that's flipping inning, flip a game, flipping that bat, and preferably later high leverage type of situations. That being said, I mean, there are so many, you know, if Eastak Parade is 100% sure that a ball got called to strike, I'd be okay with him challenging. You know, it's kind of got to be a little bit of self-recognition also. I think some of the teams in the way they were using

in spring training. It was a good idea where from the pitching side, they put it on the catchers to be the ones making the challenges and not the pitchers, trying to take a little bit of the emotion and adrenaline out of it. And, you know, I think it's going to be kind of case-by-case basis. But, you know, even in, they had meetings with teams in spring training just going over this. And everybody is on the same page that the way that it's being implemented and most likely will be implemented is to not try to change an O-O pitch in the first inning. It's to try to get a big pitch right in the seventh or eighth inning in a one-run game. And if everybody kind of understands that, I think guys will be fine just letting it back to play out the way they do in your

kind of run-of-the-mill type of situations. You know, for the most part, everybody understands that. Maybe there's a couple of guys you've got to pull aside and have a conversation with a like, hey, you do not have the green light to call. I mean, you got to shut guys down on the base pass every once in a while. You can shut them down on challenging stuff, too. That'd be a fun conversation to have. Brian Bogussevick with us here, to Sports Talk 790. Transitioning a bit to the team in the second half coming up.

Let's start with Hunter Brown. Last couple of starts, not the way that he wanted them to go. What do you think as far as what's happening with him? Is there just some fatigue? Is it just a couple of bad starts? And that's it? And also kind of a gut feeling from, Do you think with him pitching on Sunday, do you think he'll get a couple of extra days off for the weekend?

Or where do you think Joe Spott is going to throw him? Yeah. So I think coming out of the gate, my guess is you see both Fromba and Hunter in the Seattle series because you need that. And I think it'll be Fromber first and then Hunter in either game two or game three. I think, you know, Fromber will be on an extra day rest going Friday. don't want him on too much rest. And Hunter looks like he can use an extra day or even two. So as long as you'd get him in that series, I would be fine with him throwing Sunday. I actually like the idea of them being split up and, you know, having the ability to stagger them if you need to push

somebody to eat up innings because there's a short start somewhere. But in terms of his last couple starts, you know, it all kind of started in the Colorado start for me. The stuff just wasn't moving the same. I kind of attributed it to altitude. You know, the sinker doesn't always sink the same way. Breaking balls don't have the same bite. But then we kind of saw some of that stuff carry over into Cleveland and then Texas. I think it might be a little bit of fatigue. And, you know, I'm not talking about fatigue. Oh, my gosh, he's dying out there, his arms hanging. I mean, the velocity is still there. The spin rates are still there. Everything looks good. It's just every once in a while. Every once in a while, there'll be a fastball that'll kind of get on the side of instead of

finish through it and have that hop at the top of the zone. There have been a couple hits on changeups where they've kind of cut back into the middle of the plate instead of him getting on top of it and kind of pronating and getting that drop and sink. And that's just, you know, a little bit of release point stuff. And if you start getting a little tired, your body starts getting a little tired, things go out of sync and it shows up at release point. And it's just little bits where, you know, he was out, there were times when he'd go

out there and throw 100 pitches. and perfectly execute all 100 pitches. You know, everything came out of his hand exactly how he wanted it. You know, you get a little bit of fatigue, and all of a sudden a couple mistakes show up in the middle of the zone and they get hit. To be expected, he's 115 innings already. He's gone deep into almost every start that he's pitched.

I think, you know, the all-star break and maybe an extra day on the backside will be good for him, and I think there's no reason that he's not going to be fine coming out of it. All right, and on the hitting side, it feels like, again, we ask every week about Christian Walker, how beneficial you think a couple of days to clear the head for him and kind of finding where he's at to where, I mean, we are this deep into the season and he just still has not fully busted out of the funk. And when it kind of looked like he was, unfortunately, although I'm saying, you know, in the grand scheme of things in life, he doesn't think it's unfortunate,

but he had to go on to the paternity list. Then he came back and didn't have a good series against Texas. Yeah, it was unfortunate, the timing of it. you know, because he was really heating up. But at the same time, you know, he goes into the break having four days to kind of sit on what he's done in the past, you know, a couple of weeks, which I'm sure a lot of that will just be baby time, not going to think about hitting all that much. But, you know, to have a little bit of positive momentum with how that last road trip went, you know, when you think about a guy who goes into a prolonged slump, you think there should be some, you know, equally high, high coming off of it. and that's how it's going to balance out.

You know, maybe we're not going to see that. Maybe we're not going to see, you know, a month where he hits over 400 and hits 12 home runs. But, you know, maybe we're just going to see the guy who's putting up the numbers that we thought he was going to put up just, you know, minus the first six weeks of the season or whatever, whatever. And maybe it doesn't all the way balanced out. But, you know, if you look at his body of work over, you know, prolonged period of that bats, it's not all of that far off. And I know we haven't had that huge swing back to correct it and level everything out for the whole. But it's been overall not that far off of what we expected. So I think the biggest thing for him is now getting pitches into locations that he wants.

You know, he was trying to hit everything that they were throwing at him, prove that I can hit all parts of the strike zone. What I thought he did best on that road trip when he's sitting the ball well was getting the fast ball down in the zone out over the plate. like, you know, two ways you can deal with that fastball at the top of the zone. Either figure out how to hit it or just stop swinging at it. And it looks like he's gotten to the point to where he's going to try to stop swinging at it unless he has to, you know, with two strikes. So get pitches and locations that you want, finish the up at bat on those pitches and deal with the results and take what you can get. And I think, you know, we're starting to see him move down that path.

Last question, Bill Geh. do you think that we'll know what the injury status is of so many of these players based of what Dana does in the next two weeks via trade? Would that be an indirect sign of, hey, Christian's close, hey, we may get Luis Garcia back, hey, we might have Spencer Arigetti, Yaron-Alvarez, an infra? I mean, is there an if-then statement to how active the Astros are with potentially improving the team based off of injuries, or do you think if you had a chance to pull Dana's side and say, hey, even if you get one, two, three of these guys back,

you've got to go get some reinforcements before the deadline? No, I don't think it'll have anything to do with injury status or injury severity, because I don't know that they have the ability or means or desire even to make a big move if one were warranted. You know, if you were counting on Yordon coming back and all of a sudden they know in the back of their mind, he's not coming back. There's no move to be made that they can make to go replace that. So I think that the moves that they can make and will make because they're going to, you know,

certainly do something are going to kind of be the same types of moves, the same caliber of moves, which will be additive but not big. even if you're going to get a good chunk of those guys back on the pitching side, you're still probably going to want to add an arm. And if you aren't going to get those guys back, I don't think they have the ability to go add a bunch of arms. And I don't think they have really the prospect capital to go out and add a top of the rotation type of guy.

So, you know, I think they're kind of just in the situation that they're in where you're going to kind of, you know, add on the fringes and solidify some things. and hopefully get all the guys back that you're expecting to get back. But if you're not, you're kind of just in the position that you're in. Bogey, great stuff as always. Hope you in charge some downtime and we'll talk again next week. Thank you for the visit as always.

All right. Cool. See you guys. You got it. Brian Bogussevick with us here on Sports Talk 790. But it's here on the Matt Thomas show at Ross. 713-212-5-790. So if you would like to come in and tell somebody to shut their bumasses up,

you're more than welcome to do that. Eric, and basically, he feels like he's a Hall of Fame class member. that. Would you say correctly, a sports Harvey? He's one of the Hall of Fame dumbest calls consistently of all time. Yeah. Or one of the greatest trolls of all time. One of the other. There's balls. No. It's not have most balls. Most balls is being

daring and saying things. He just says stupid crap to get on the radio. I have never seen a computational caller like Kim in my life. He haven't been around long enough. He's right. Yeah. He loves big wrong. Yeah, that's fine. All right. That's coming up for 10 minutes. So I'm listening to

Bogie, and with such a nice perspective to get his on the show, because he's, he's direct, but he understands that he gives you that player perspective. He's not been too far away from the baseball field. I really got the sense, and look, Dana, he doesn't speak on Dana's part, and he certainly doesn't speak for Jim Crane, but I think Dana's holding on, he's clutched onto these jewels known as his draft picks, and I think he's, he's having fatigue about moving players, right? Ross. And I do think they need an arm. I said that on to tell the truth on Monday. I don't know. I'm not counting on Javier. I'm not counting on Garcia.

Eragetti, it looks like he's starting to throw, which is a good sign. Whom else am I forgetting about? Anybody else? Luis Garcia, J.P. France? No, J.P. France, no. No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. What? Well, you hold on. You said Gusto Gordon and the boys are all great. No, I didn't say they were great. I said they're doing their job. Okay.

Great's a relative term. You talked about how the farm system rankings don't mean anything because all these guys are so great. So you don't need pitching. But you, so if your minor league system is 28, that means there's not a lot of people there. And frankly, to me, that also means two things. It means that maybe you want a player from another team, Ross, and maybe that organization's like, I don't like your system. Yeah, you got to pile up a bunch of one and two. dollar bill is to get to 10.

Well, in my case, nickels and dimes, but that's a different issue for a different time. I don't know. I don't get the feeling it's going to be a very intriguing deadline. I'm with you. My gut feeling

is there, I think there will be a move made here or there. Correct, but it will not be one of those that when we do our breaking news sirens it could be what? one or two maybe. If we have a three siren,

three breaking news, that means something pretty impactful was made by the team. I'm going to just tell you. And you can't build a team on hope or prayer. Uh-oh. I think the pitching's going to be fine if they don't make a move.

I really do. Hunter Brown Framber is already the best one to in baseball. You just need one and a half-ish of aergeti, Javier, and McCullors, and you'll figure it out from there. It's the playoffs. You don't need to go five deep.

You need four, though. And so they had to make the move for Kukuchi last year to get to the playoffs. They would not have made, what they were, they were like 9 and 0 in his first 9 starts or something like that. They don't make the playoffs,

what I don't think, or they needed to make that move to make the playoffs. You don't need to make moves to make the playoffs this year, the way you are. You're five games up. I know that is,

but I think getting your guys back, they're going to be good enough. The Mariners, quite frankly, I have more confidence that the Mariners and Rangers are just not very good than the Astros are that good. So you don't need to make moves to get into the playoffs.

Getting in and winning, and this is what we've talked about before. You might not have the best team in going into the playoffs, but baseball works quirky that way. If you go the 22 formula was, now the lineup was better at this point, but if the Astros get fully healthy, we'll see.

The 22 formula was great pitching and an insanely great run from the bullpen and enough hitting. They can get to a World Series like that. We'll see how healthy the Dodgers or whoever else comes out of the National League is. But look, the Tigers are good. I ain't scared of the Tigers. Yankees are good. I ain't scared of the Yankees. Not saying that the Astros are going to steamroll all them.

but I think they can't Can and would win series against those teams as comprised. I would be prioritizing a bat. I just would. And I understand the thinking of, okay, you can't bank on Javier and all those guys, but Dana Brown says he's pretty close.

Of course, we've seen setbacks, but even if that happens, Erigeti, I'm not worried about it because it's not like it's been an elbow issue. It was literally a bone freak bone injury that he should be fine from. But I think we've, we were saying that 45 days ago.

Yeah. Okay. Well, do you think there's some kind of elbow setback? No, I just don't know that unless the ball that was that hit him basically decapitated or sliced off his

finger. I mean, I don't think there was an imputation, but yeah, I'm just here's my, here's the reason why I'm going on the pitching front. Not that you couldn't use both. Okay, I'm under preposition. I would, I'm, I'm, here agreeing with you on that. You could use both

but... McCuller's is way too yo-yo. He is who he is, at least for this year. And Gordon and Ryan Gusto and who else am I forgetting about the rookie the soft-haw? Brandon Walter?

Brandon Walter. I mean, it is what it is. You can go with one of those guys for three innings in a playoff game and then go to a bullpen situation. And this is worst-case scenario. This is Javier coming back and he's or have,

Harvey are not coming back. And I, maybe I'm banking too much in Arroghetti. But I think because of the lack of resources in the farm system, that is the route that Dana Brown might have to. And that's where I agree with you.

I think there just isn't enough that's going to appease other teams. All right, let's tell some people to shut their bell masses up. 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. 13212-5-7-90. There's somebody that's made you mad. You want to tell them to shut their bum-asses up?

Let's go. If somebody at the office is just talking to you ad nauseum about things you don't care about because you're trying to get your deadlines meat, and they're talking about their meatloaf they cook for last night. Anybody got time for that? 7-1-3-21-2-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. Shut your bum-ass up is next.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is our favorite half-hour of the radio week. it is for me. Somebody irritates you. Somebody say something wrong. Somebody cut you off. Somebody rude to you at the office in your home. 713-212-5-7-19. It's okay to call your wife and tell her to put the radio on

and tell her then to shut her bum ass up. I mean, it'll get you very far in life, but it's worth a try. And then if something happens in your life involving your wife, which I'll be discussing today on my radio show here with you, Ross. Uh-oh. You can say nobody got time for that. So with me doing these radio shows from our hotel, she's like, I'm not going to sit and watch you do a four-hour radio shows, but you're boring.

I'm like, well, honey, this is what I do for a living. Oh, thank you very much. Appreciate you, Matt. I love you. She goes shopping, Ross, while I'm gone. And she went to the University of Rhode Island bookstore yesterday. Oh, no. And she lowered up on gear.

Of course. She did buy some stuff for me, and I was very appreciative. But she also bought for people that are like people she's not seen in 40s. years. I'm just kidding about that. No, she's, all the kids have gear. My father-in-law has gear. My mother is going to have gear. I mean, everybody's got gear. Your second cousins, the dogs. I mean, the dogs. So she comes in with the gear and then she says, I got to go get one more thing out of the back of the car. And I'm like, what do you have to get? She bought a suitcase yesterday. Just for the gear.

What? Ain't nobody got time for that. Ain't nobody got time for that. Now, I'm so, I'm dumb. I thought it was, it's not Rhode Island College. It's a University of Rhode Island? University of Rhode Island. Okay.

17,000 students, big school. Okay. What's Rhode Island College? That's something else? I mean, I like a smaller, okay. I have never heard of it. Oh, okay. There's actually several Division I schools that play in the state of Rhode Island.

There's Providence, University of Rhode Island, Brown. Well, there's Rhode Island College. It has an enrollment of 6,100. The things you learn on the Matt Thomas Show at Ross. It's public. Okay. Well, good for them. Yeah.

Cardi will be playing in the Atlantic Ten Conference. Okay. And, of course, can you name the two most famous basketball players ever to play at Rhode Island? Cotino Mobley. And I can't remember. You're going to say it, and I'm going to remember it. That is correct. Just say it.

Lamar Odom. Lamar Odom. Yeah. Oh. I shouldn't. What did you do? He had a nice NBA career. I didn't know it was that high-caliber guy

I come out of there. Until he hooked up with Karakadash. Well, and then he was on crack and doing fake Viagra and having heart attacks. We know this, Ross. So to my beautiful wife, who's not here right now, the most famous crackheads

in American history, Rhode Island, University of Rhode Island. University of Rhode Island, Go Rams. I say to anybody that has to go to a department store to pick up a suitcase just to put souvenirs

And do you know. Take it back? Ain't nobody got time. No, we're going to, we're bringing it home on the flight. Ain't nobody got time to that? Man, that's, you might be the number one husband and dad. Thank you. You see, any issues I may bring to this show, they're well, there's some foundation to it.

Man, that's so many things to say and none of them to say on air. Oh, don't because she'll find you. That's what I'm saying. She'll land to the airport tomorrow. I'm like, uh-huh. I'm already on her bleep list anyways for. saying a couple extra days. Very Smith Givings.

They're going to Newport tomorrow. Newport, Rhode Island tomorrow. Oh, are they going to the International Tennis Hall of Fame? No. Why not? I told our buddy I would see it in the next couple of years. I think they have a display of Pete Sampras's back here. Ain't nobody got time for that?

What's wrong with y'all this week? Y'all, I can win this. No, he means like what we have to. I'm going to go what yesterday. I went to see the Superman movie. I already gave my review, 7.5 out of 10. Right. Now, one of the group of four of us was behind, and I wanted to send that person a ticket because everything's digital these days.

Well, megal minimas and their infinite wisdom, when I try to send one ticket, it sends all four. Now, I didn't hit send, but there's no way, there's no option. I'm sitting there talking to the guy at the kiosk who's looking at our tickets. I'm like, I'm sorry, is there a way to split off these tickets? He's like, no, you can't do that. that. And I was like, why not? And then he's like, I don't know. And then, you know, it wasn't his fault.

You know, he just, he's a movie nerd and doesn't know how to talk to people and that's fine. But it's like there is no possible way to send a person one ticket who's going to be about 20 minutes behind us because I wanted to catch the previews. That person could make it. That's fine. It makes no sense. Ain't nobody got time for that. Meagle Minimus? No, I'll call you out.

Regal cinemas. Make a way you can split off tickets. It's ridiculous. Why told you what happened to me in Vegas with Barry Manilow, didn't I not? I think so. Let us, uh, goodness. I, uh, my wife bought the tickets and. Oh, that's right.

You couldn't transfer it. Raster said that she couldn't transfer them to me. So I had to go, I had to log off on mine and pretend I was her. And you talked about them on this segment. Yeah, Rickett Raster. No, no, they deserve to get bleeped on. Ticket Rastardt. Ticket master.

You suck. You absolutely 100% suck. And I don't know if there's some option I didn't click, but I couldn't split off one ticket. And so I had to screenshot the QR code and then explain to the guy like, hey, when he comes with this code, you know, you got to let this person in. But whatever. Everything was fine, but it was an extra headache. Nobody needed. All right. Completely understandable, Ross. I am 100% on your side on this. All right, Jonathan, what's the matter with you?

I'm on the TV right now. It's the Pat McCaffrey show. The what show? Pat McCaffrey. The Pat McCaffrey show, yes. I thought we were supposed to. Okay, anyway. Oh, you know what I do like that?

What does I call him Pat McCaffrey? Right. So he has jelly roll on here, and I'm tired of seeing this dude. He's the most pushed industry plan of this generation. industry play jelly roll is everywhere and i'm tired of seeing him ain't nobody got time for this he's not my sports oh you're anti jelly roll really i can't stand him i've never listened so i can't i'm sorry i could i just see him everywhere i couldn't tell you one of his songs i i know that my wife and my daughter like him um but yeah i mean the the

tattoos on his face are not the best look. Yeah, it must be a big Gucci main fan. Giving post-will-own vibes. But I'm not going to be judging McJudge on that. If you want to put various marons in your face... I'm going to judge you. Why are you putting tattoos on your face? Come on.

It's kind of weird. Ugh. By the time we're in the grave, Matt, will we have a precedent with face tats? Feels like it could happen. Ooh, a face tat? Are you going to vote for the jelly roll postie ticket? Let me ask you this.

Has there ever been a president with a tattoo period? A noticeable one? Feels like Billy C's got one. Come on, I'm sure you did. Billy C in Arkansas? It's a picture of him with him eating a Big Mac or something. You think a drunken one? Yeah.

That's funny. All right. 713212-5-790. If you've got something that's bothering you this week, we give you another 15 minutes or so to let it all out here on Sports Talk 790. I don't know if, Carl and Dickinson is going to tell somebody to shut their bum ass up, but he's next up here on the program. Carl, good morning to you.

You know what? I haven't called all year, and that's a blessing for y'all. But anyway, here's the deal. We went all those games. We come back, Cinderella turns back into a punk and after the ball. I think we need a psychologist for that team. there's something mental going on boys that's all i got to say hey karl thanks for the phone call give us a call back next july 16th appreciate you friend and put down the butt ice is that what he's drinking does he have a swisher sweet in his mouth too probably maybe a can of

skull you don't know that i don't not know it maybe he's calling us from the waffle house parking lot ready to get him some scattered covered and smothered it's one and two things he's He's been hitting the mud mice or the Miller, a biller by bif. The biller by bif. Matt, you like Waffle House? Wait, you don't? No, no, I do. I know, I love that.

I know, I'm just asking him. Oh, yeah, yeah. Matt. Jonathan, I don't like Waffle House. I love Waffle House. All right, you got some redeeming points. I take back what I said about the cherries. Oh, my God.

Get me into a Waffle House? Oh, Ross, we can crush. Oh, so good. And the egg prices are dropping, so that means it's not going to cost as much for that two-plate thing that's got like 6,000 calories on it. I'm not familiar with that. It's two eggs, toast, bacon or sausage, hash browns, and a waffle. All-Star? That's the All-Star?

That's what that's called. Good for you. Good pull by you. But see, I go to the Waffle House just to watch the camaraderie between the, between the, uh cooks and the waitresses when the waitresses is screaming out the order and the guy doesn't hear it the first time and then she screams it out again and she's he's like you don't then the guy says you don't talk so loud next time we didn't hear me last time and then you didn't watch our kids last night and you why why were you out to i mean it's like it's like a jerry springer show in a restaurant

and there's fights and sometimes chairs get thrown and there's fights too yeah i mean america america is the waffle house right when you think about it. Wow. You know what? That's one of the most profound things you've ever said. I think it is. We're like one huge waffle house. America is one huge waffle house. All right. 713-212-790. If you want to get in, the music will resume. So will this segment. 7-13-212-5-790. If you want to tell somebody to shut their bum asses up, let's go at 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. A couple more things I've got to get off my chest here. It's and shut your bum ass.

Ain't nobody got time for that Wednesday. To runken roanuts, Ross. I don't know if you know this or not, but New England is the home of ronken roernuts. And they just call themselves ronken now. Yeah, I think there's one every 37 feet as decreed by law. There is, I saw a ronken being built within a ronken. Really?

Runkinception. So after the show yesterday, we went driving around. Yes. My favorite donut is the ronken coconut, toasted coconut donut. Someone got a coffee, and I said, this is like it, we got off there at 3 Eastern, so about 3.30, 3.45. You like toasted coconut. All the best. Man, you.

That is my favorite donut. You have the most unpredictable food tastes of anyone I've ever met in my life. That's why I was part about the Waffle House. How could you be surprised? It's America's gift to greasy food. Well, you know, you, uh, I don't know. fancy mat, you know, Waffle House might be a little too low brow for a fancy mat, you would think. Ross knows what I talk about.

I get to the Dunkin' Donuts. Runkin'Ronuts. Runkin'Ronuts. Medium coffee, two creams, one spunda. Yes, sir, anything else? I really would like a toasted coconut donut. Oh, sure, we'll be happy to get it before you pull up the order. Get there.

We ran out of runken toasted coconuts. It made me sad. I'm sorry for you lost, Matt. You should be. I'm so emotional about it right now. Ain't nobody got time for a ronken ronuts to be open at 3.30 in the afternoon, not have at least one toast of coconut available to me. So there's a lot more in Houston.

Have they been building these up? There's more in Houston than I thought. Yeah, there's one in Kingwood. I mean, they're popping up all over the place. They used to be only a couple, right? And they don't want to call themselves ronken ron. They're just ronken because they want to give you the impression that you can go get other things besides donuts.

there. Oh, I guess. All their other donuts are mid. The toasted coconut is America's donut. What else do you dunk? I'm not dunk in a breakfast sandwich. You dunk a muffin. Nobody's dunking a muffin in their coffee. The hash brown sticks. All right, and then one more thing. To all of you

price horses that play, believe it or not, at 150. The last two days, the last two days, we have given away tickets to see Rick Springfield and Wang Chung, and who else is part of that 80s thing? Spendale Ballet? Whatever.

No one wants to go to that concert. That would be a fun concert to go to. I mean, the 80s is largely overrated when it comes to music. John Wayne? John Waite. Who's that? Who is that? John White's got a hit.

Who? What? Stay with me on this. In what country? Stop. Who is John. wait, literally. Okay, I'm going to find a song of his.

Okay. We're going to play it real quick. But point being is this, you prize stories never worry about if it's the, some no-name band I've never heard of before, you can't wait to play the game, but it's for some reason, oh, missing you. John, wait, missing you at all. I am missing you. He's a one-hit wonder?

I don't know if he's a one-hit, but that's the one big one. It hit number one, it looks like. Yeah. Oh, hell no. It's not the whole night. It's one song. Yeah, he's going to play his one song and shuffle off the stage. Then you're going to Wayne Chung.

They're going to spend more time setting up his drum kit than he's going to be actually be out there. Have you ever Wang Chunged in the Woodlands before? Well, you've got a chance today at 150. I haven't wang chunged in many years. Oh, this is this. No. This is fine.

It's fine. I mean, that's what John Wade is. It's all. All right. This was a number one hit. Ain't nobody got time for you price horse being picky about your prizes. All right. Be better America.

And this was number one in 1984. This is not a bangor, but it's not terrible. It doesn't hurt your ears. I'm saying. It should be like top 40, but this number one hit. Dude, the 80s were a dark time of music. I'm telling you. In some respects.

John Wade. This isn't a woman? No, it's a dude. Most famous. of songs. This may not take very long. This is not terrible. Okay.

Oh, right at the chorus he cut. He's also on a song called When I See You Smile, but when he was a bad English? What the hell is bad English? Okay, you're just reading off his Wikipedia page. You don't know any of this. When I see you smile. No, no. I lie awake at night.

I just had a call her just getting mad that you don't know that John Waite stuff, man. Yeah, Ross. He had one big hit. He just gave you multiple. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. He had one. Okay, Tears was a number 37 hit.

Every step of the way, it was 25. He only had one major hit. I ain't heard none of that. Back to the point. And missing you sucks, caller. And back to the point. You prize hours do not be discriminatory towards the 1980s one hit wonders. John on 7.

John, what's the matter with you? Hey, MT. First off, you're a fool if you don't Wang Chong. second off I love to win chung oh I appreciate that I was on a business trip last week

just one night up in San Francisco at the Rariot and I got charged an extra $11 and 28 cents to have my room clean

that I didn't really want but either way I get home it's on my expense report and I now have to set my company a check for $11.28 because that was not part of my trip. So to both the company and the Rariot, please shut your bum asses up.

Shut your bum ass up, man. I respect that, but let me ask you this. Are you a Marriott Bonvoy member? He's not going to answer. He hung up. All right. You get 11 extra miles for that. points just saying

but yeah you shouldn't be charged for housekeeping it's part of the daily thing charged for a housekeeping yeah that's what he was saying $11 I'm telling you San Francisco Ross it's got some weird rules dude it really does you can defecating where you want to

essentially that's I don't think that's legal they charge you 5% for health insurance for the waiters and waitresses I'm okay with that actually it gets a price though. Felipe. You can tip less, right?

In theory? You can theory. If you're tipping 20%, then you could bump it down to 50. But I'd rather tip him more, and he doesn't get tax on that. Thanks, President Trump. Hello, Felipe, you're on 790.

What's the matter of you? To a cap. Well, first off, man, I don't know why you're picking Dunkin' Donuts over Shippies. The Shippeys is the goat. But there's no Shippling in Kingston, Rhode Island, bro.

I mean, come on. I know they're popular, but not that popular. You're right. You're right. My bad. My mistake. I'm not saying. But I will agree with you on the prize horse.

To all you prize whores that are not loyal listeners, y'all take all the good prizes and then y'all leave the loyal listeners with the crappy ones. No thing. To all you prize whores, set your bum asses up. Ain't nobody got time for you to run in at the last 10, 15 minutes of the show and tune in and say, my favorite part is right now. My favorite part is your voice. Listen to the show, please.

Yeah. Let us loyal listeners win these prizes. is yes shit your bum ass up man Felipe you're absolutely 100% it's why I love you Felipe matter of fact Ross

should we start requiring people to tell us a part of the show every day we give a password how about it we give a password we give the password out three times a day okay tomorrow 10 o'clock 11 o'clock 12 o'clock hour

and then in the 1 o'clock we can even do it at 110 or something we'll do it four times tomorrow we'll do a password day only jim Jim on 790 Jim what's the matter with you No, not so much. I just wanted to help you out a little bit with John Wade. I'm not a monster fan, but he's more than just as so. Hold on. Let me finish. I've got to help you guys out. He was also the lead singer of the babies. You remember the babies? Midnight Rendezvous, back on my feet again. Isn't it time? Every time I think you kind of like melodic rock, but a couple of pretty decent tunes with Midnight Rendezvous and back on my feet again. So he did more than just a solo career. Like I said, not a big fan, but he's got, he

does have a catalog so don't short it what so what are you doing i caught the tail in it is he are you going to see him in concert now or what's the story no jim the last couple days on believe it or not the prize horrors who will win for they'll go see some rando band we're also giving away the psychedelic furs john wait you they can't run to the phones fast up to win tickets to see psychedelic first we have a chance to go see wang chung rick springfield and john way and nobody wants to play believe it or not I'm going to do a, that's a hard pass for me. Oh, no, you're not helping.

Ross, did you go see Dyer Straits? They have this and the, what, I want Miami TV, Money for Nothing, Chicks for Free Song. What else? Walk a life, that's a good one. That's a jam. Yeah. Are they even active? No, I don't think so. Mark Knopfler was a great guitarist.

But if they were active, we'd give away tickets. I wonder if our prize force would appreciate that or not. Who knows? It is the third hour of the Matt Tommy show at Ross on Sports Talk 790. 713-212-5-790. If you'd like to join our show, 7-1-3-212-5-7-90, we had a fun edition of Shut Your Bumass up. And anybody got time for that.

The All-Star game from last night will be part of today's News at noon. Yes, Matt. It was quite dramatic, there. Sorry, go ahead. You introduce me. I'm calling you the Kevin Burkehart of Houston Sports Media. Oh, wow, that's actually...

Wow, did you see those Gibronians? They all picked their teams they used to play for to go to the World Series? No, I didn't. Yes. Alex Rodriguez, Yankees, Derek Teter, Yankees, Big Poppy, Red Sox. Well, man, I was feeling good about my

prediction that it wouldn't even be close with the National League winning when it was 6-0-0-0-0-6. Unfortunately, a furious comeback by the National League All-Stars forcing, I'm sorry, the American League All-Stars forcing a swing off, which the National League did still win. So if you, by the way, does that pay out on the money line? If I'm Money-Lied National League, do I get that?

I believe you do, yeah. Okay. By the way, I was, we were, somebody brought up earlier today that if you are one of the players it gets miced up during the All-Star game, you get an extra $15,000. Hmm. I don't know if I've never heard that. I don't know. I would not say it wouldn't be true.

Okay. These players are some money horrors, aren't they not? Just an insurance payment on your Rari. Well, it helps you pay for that private playing when you leave in the fifth inning. Yeah. I got you. Well, Matt, the National League did win the swing off in a tiebreaker. A couple of interesting storylines would be the swing off tiebreaker.

I think most people liked it, even though it's not the best option. It is what it is. And then also, of course, the ABS challenge system used multiple times. Feels like most everybody found it pretty entertaining. And both of us have predicted it will be instituted in the major leagues next year. The thing I loved about it most, and again, look, I've only sought a handful of spring training events. But it was very seamless, right? It wasn't clunky?

No, I thought it was great. and having it on the big screen behind him in right field, I thought was a really nice part. So was it Kershaw that was talking about it? Oh, it was Paul Skeens, I think, is what it was. No. I don't remember. I didn't have audio on the whole time.

No, it was Scoobel. It was Detroit pitcher Targ Scoobel was like, oh, I think I got that one. He was, yeah, I got it. Oh, that's right. I love when the guys talk on them during the game. Now, I don't want them doing it in a September penit chase. In the game that calls counts.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm with you on that. Yeah. It's fun in an all-star setting to be sure. Matt, ratings are in for Monday night's home run derby on ESPN. And Cal Raleigh and the big dumper. Of course, he is the big dumper, carrying them up 5% from 2024,

an average audience of 5.729 million viewers up from the previous year when it was Teoska Hernandez and Bobby Witt Jr. facing off in the finals. I don't know. I guess the question would be, is something in 2025 with all the different television options and streaming? If you get 5.7 million, that feels like a win to be. Does it not to you? I think that's a huge win. Absolutely. I'd have to go look at the weekly rankings or something, but I imagine that'd be one of the most watched programs of the week. But I mean, think about this, in the 70s and 80s, network TV shows like Dallas and Laverne and Shirley and all the family would get 10, 11, 12 back. 13 million people.

You had five channels to choose from. Cable was just starting up. You didn't have a tremendous amount of options. You've got 7 million options now. Yes. If I'm Major League Baseball, I get 5 million to watch a homeowner derby that the formula really hasn't changed in 25 years. That's a win for me. I would agree with you, Matt, on that.

Best thing about last night's game, which I didn't talk to you about, the Hank Aaron tribute. Oh, my God. Yes. that was cool. Well, Milo Hamilton mixed in there? Milo and Vin were mixed in, and thankfully that Midal got his run because, and again, I'm purely biased

because I was saying I knew Milo for many, many years. His call to me is the definitive call of that moment, but there were a lot of, Vin Scully did it for Dodgers television that day. The game was nationally televised. Kurt Gotti, he was a Hall of Fame broadcaster. He was doing the version, but it feels like to me

model's call gets more of it, because I think it was the hometown call. And you're actually going to go with somebody that was associated with Hank Aaron. And obviously, Milo was. So great job by everybody involved in that. All right, Matt, moving along. We'll go to the college football realm. Texas football coach Steve Sarkeesian is downplaying NIL's influence in Texas's recruiting

amid reports of a $40 million roster for the Longhorns this year. Steve Carson-Sarkeesian saying it's more about relationship building. That's a lie. That is a 100% lie. Coach said, quote, we don't talk about NIL or revenue sharing or publicity rights until the very end. Lie. And that may hurt us on some kids. Stop. It's not hurting any kids.

But if the kid is coming to Texas for that reason, we don't want him anyway. That's a lie too. I can't offer every player the most money that he might get offered from another school. It just doesn't work like that. Yes, you can. that's not true you can't outspin every kid every school and every kid you can't outspend

on every single position stop getting close though no Texas you know what it's another reason why I hate Texas guess what when Texas when Texas wins a national championship this year it's not going to be because of

hard work and determination yes it would and desire it's going to be because you wrote a blank check and you said hey come play for us Texas Tech is writing a blank check so they're going to win the championship Ohio State's writing a blank check well they want to last year, Michigan State, Alabama, there's like 10, 15 schools writing blank checks. They can't all win the championship, Matt. Well, of course, U of H isn't going to be anywhere near it, but that's when Tech, when

U of H wins a championship. We do win based off of atmosphere, education, facilities, friendliness. Friendliness? Yes. You're going to win a championship on the power of friendship? Yeah, I mean, I'm going to say that if you're, again, I'm not going to say that, But I'm going to say that we're very friendly school. So nobody on that basketball team is getting paid, huh?

I didn't say that. All right. We're not cash with the people. $40 million. That's why these teams need general managers. How are these coaches going to pay attention to payroll? I don't know. They shouldn't be.

Aren't they supposed to be turning a blind eye. It's all about relationship building. That's what Coach Sark says. He's a liar. All these coaches are liars. That's why I don't want to listen to that overall. I think to an extent he's right. Because if Georgia and Alabama and whoever, they're probably offering about the similar amounts,

you don't just up, tick up the offer. And there are, some players have taken less to go elsewhere than go to different schools. I can tell you that all the top flight recruits go to the University of Houston are taking less to go to Houston because they want to get the great education to other schools want to offer. Well, they're out of options and they felt like they're like, all right, SFA or Houston, I guess I'll stay in Houston. Now, they've got a five-star quarterback coming next year, right? He's not making any money? We got one right now.

Okay Connor Wegman Let's go What was the What was the prediction For the place finish in the Big 12th I believe they were predicted to finish first or second

First or second And the bottom fourth That's not nice 713 Are we got anything else to go to here before I really get here to I thought you were going to be nice to you I can't do it for four hours

You know what I was talking about Sark And you started being mean So you know what I pushed back I'm going to apologize guys, even though you started it. I actually know what I do like, sir.

Matt started it. I do like Sark. I mean, do you feel as comfortable with your head coach as you've felt in 25 years, honestly, since Mac? A championship would be nice, but it's difficult. Gotten in the final four twice. Is it a championship or busting Austin this year?

I would say, or a bus in what way? Championship or bust would mean like it's time to fire Sark if they don't win it all. I don't think that's going to happen. No, I don't think so. And I wouldn't call for that. All right, real quick, do you use it? think that the music that was played, the Aggie Warham, when Sark went up there, was that intentional? Or do you think that was just a case of mistaken fight song? I feel like it was

accidentally on purpose. But who knows? I don't care. At least somebody got to chuckle out of it until that guy is. I mean, I laughed. I thought it was funny. All right, let's get to a time out here. We'll come back. We'll get some phone calls given. And we have some NBA Twitter idiocy out there. We'll get to that as well. And if you did watch the All-Star game, what was the very best thing about it for you and what was the absolute worst thing about it for you? 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-790.

Ross, what is today's edition of Believe or not? Coming up today at 154. Amazing 80s concert tickets. It's Jim Wade or whatever his name was. John Waite. Okay. Jim Waite was his second cousin. 7-13.

What should it be? Oh. Believe it or not? I don't know. It's a good question. Superman? Wait, we did that already. We did that already.

Dang it. I'll just re-hash those questions. You're not doing Wang Chung. I'm not making up... I'm not to make up six things about Wang Chung. I don't know if it's even possible to do eight Wang Chung songs. What happened yesterday? How about various All-Star players?

I don't get my toast of coconut donut. Like, what's his name? Towers or Towers Towers Towers Towers? I don't know what you're speaking of. The Miami Marlin. Oh, my God. It's this person on Miami Marlins. Oh, Towers.

Kyle Stowers. Stowers. Stowers. Stowers. There you go. Much better. 713-212-5-790. 1224, Matt and Ross with you here on this Wednesday. Brian McTagger. will join us tomorrow for his thoughts about the second half of the season.

He'll be heading up to Seattle to see the Austerers and Mariners. Kind of an important three-game series this weekend, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in the Pacific Northwest. All right. Back to this farce that is asking coaches and administrators and presidents how to fix the college system. So, Ross, I'm going to give you an open-ended question. There is really no wrong answer. so if I am to presume that the SEC coaches who have more money generally speaking not all of them but most of them have more money than anybody else does four to five schools maybe the big tenet four or five schools are making crazy money too that have money and they're and they really they really do want to fix it how do you fix it can you can you put a salary cap on schools you have to wipe out the NCAA or they're going to have to get rid of their exempt status that's number one and then yeah you make some sort of partnership but i don't because if you don't if you

don't put a salary cap in place and you let free spending going there's no way it can be fixed i have a question for you yeah why can't free spending just why why can't it just continue well i think the answer is it's going to continue no i mean why should it stop because and i'm I'm just giving you the other side of it, is that you want to create as fair of a playing field as possible. Not saying that all are created equal, because in theory, NFL teams are all created equal. In theory, baseball teams are, although you know they're not. Yankees and the A's aren't created equal. But in theory, they're supposed to be.

But they're not. The naive approach would be, I do want to have more schools, more competitive. playing at a higher level with a chance to win and win big. That if we don't cap this thing and money gets out of control, it's going to be six to eight schools every year for the rest of our college football life.

You may say, well, it's already that way. It was already been that way. Exactly. Who's the last non, like, big name off the wall team to win a college football national championship? The answer is nobody. I mean Well the answer is obviously

BYU and 1980 Okay BYU and the 8 is how that was 40 years ago Yeah Or I mean I don't know if you want to Didn't Washington win one in the early 90s Colorado astray Colorado

But those are Power 5 Power 4 programs Mm-hmm The true underdog Would be the 84 BYU There wasn't Big 6 and Big 5 And power 5 at that point But that would be the one

That would come to mind immediately to me And how about this? But you know what? they're also mad at each other too. Do you think that, do you think Oklahoma's happy that Texas Tech is the second biggest spenders? Get your weight up, son. I'm sorry, it is what it is. Texas Tech is spending money with Cody Campbell.

Texas Tech in the previous system in the last 50 years, I'm going to guess, I don't know this for a fact, I'm going to guess they've won zero national football championships ever. Yep, that'd be fair. And now somebody comes in and they put some money in and they can inject some life into the program. and yes, they have to pay 30% more to get kids up to Lubbock, but they have more of a shot than they did before. So I argue the opposite. The way that this is now, more programs have a shot than ever before.

Oregon with Phil Knight has a shot. When under previous regimes, or if he didn't exist and they weren't going to spend money, they would have no shot. So this actually, to me, opens it up more than it closes it because I'm sorry to, you know, whoever, Texas State or whatever. UNOV.

That's a bad example. Louisiana Tech, whatever. You never had a shot in the first place. But I feel like the biggest bitching is among those schools that already have the money, right? I don't know. How is Georgia and Kirby Smart right now that tech, now, now, granted, it could be for a variety of other reasons besides the cash. But I think cash is a huge part of it. Let's not be naive to this.

Is Kirby Smart losing his mind because, Two of the top high school players in Georgia who had seriously thought about staying home or going to Texas? I mean, maybe. I don't think it's amazing. They've got a pretty... What am I going to do? What am I... Oh, what is he going to do?

They've had the top recruiting class the last in five years. But he's got to be thinking his mind, if I have a cap, Texas can't pay every one of those schools. And neither can Georgia, though. You're cutting off your nose and spite your face. I don't think the... I don't think the Kirby's smart. I think he's, like, chalking it up to the game. I don't think he is losing sleep over a couple of recruits because they've been just fine over there.

You know what I would actually respect? I actually respect of a college coach during SEC Media Day. It was like, what do you all want to do to fix this? And it's saying nothing. We're very pleased, very happy. We have a great collective behind us. We've got alums that want to spend the money. And because they want to spend the money, we are all in for this.

By 24-7 rankings, Georgia has the number two class. Texas has the number seven. So let me ask you this. If we don't believe in a salary cap, I'm going to just throwing this out there, then why are there not salary caps? Why are there salary caps in any sport? That's collectively bargain between owners.

This is college. This is a free-for-all. And that's where what people are saying is, why can't 100 schools collectively bargain this? And my answer to that is because 100 schools have 100 different agendas. They have 100 different agendas. They have 100 different, I mean,

they all have different TV deals. They all have different resources. you have every every college I mean rice what's the enrollment of rice 5,000? Yeah, including graduates

What's the enrollment in Texas A&M? 100,000? No, it's 50, yeah, but yeah, I get your drift. So, I mean This to me is funny because we've spent a lot of the summer talking about this and a lot of the spring. 79,000 enrollment

at Texas A&M. Lordy. I thought Carly going to Rhode Island is going to be big at 17,000. thousand. Mm. Mm-mm. But,

so if we're you, L. Monroe, we're just going to enjoy our football, go eight and four, and be good. Yeah, take your check when you're in the non-conference. If you're SFA, when you come to Houston and get your ass kicked. Oh. See, this is what I wanted him to do.

Oh, I'm going to have so much. I'm just, you're a young fool. We like you. It's okay. Axe. You get. asked, Maddie. He said you get asked. Cougars are nothing to a lumberjack.

You hear me? Cougars are nothing to a lumber check. Oh my God. I love this. This is happening in July. He is so smart. Why is he smack talking? I don't know, but I love it. It's ridiculous. It's not professional. Cougars getting

hacked up, maybe. Let's go. 1232 on the Matt Thomas show at Ross and poor Jonathan, who's obviously clinically ill at this point. 713-212. 5790, 713, 212-579. NBA Twitter Ross

is broken. Can I explain to you why? It's been fractured for some time. But I mean, yesterday, as I was just kind of scorned the 4-U tab, and that's me being stupid again, but I'm obsessed with 4-you. I'm just going to tell you I am.

It's 100% broken. 7-13-212-5-790. 7-1-2-1-2-5-790. you want to visit with us through Twitter, you may do that as well. At SportsMT, at SportsRV, and at Sports Talk 790. 1236. Matt and Ross with you on Sports Talk 790. Hope you guys are having a nice Wednesday.

If you would like to join us on our radio show, we have lines available for you. If you'd like to do so, 713, 212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-790. All right. Ryan SFA is dog water S-H-S-U has whooped that ass for years

and we aren't doing great to assume SFA will do anything of relevance is insane Yeah that's what we call you Jonathan I'm talking to everybody that has the radio on right now I don't care If it happens y'all are going to be like wow

Like you a bitch wow It's okay it's okay It's okay It's okay Folks we don't know if Jonathan smokes any weed or large amounts of it, but there's got to be something going on in his brain that's not working. All right.

Let's see. I'm pulling up the schedule from last year. Don't do this to the poor kid. That was good. Seven and five. Okay. Losses to McNeice. Ooh. North Texas.

Ooh. South eastern Louisiana. Yeesh. East Texas A&M? I didn't know what that is. and incarnate word. That's okay. The East Texas A&M Lions.

That used to be Texas A&M Commerce. No, that's, no, you're lying. That's from a movie or something. No, no, no. That's not a real school. It's not a real school. All right, so let me tell you about NBA Twitter for a second. And this could be for any sport that you care about.

So forget it being about the NBA. There are endless rumors about LeBron James being traded. It is all over the place. I haven't seen it. It's on your 4. You, Deb. So now there are people on Twitter going to this, like this template and putting names in, but using the same message. Blank is being traded to the blank, okay?

The deal isn't public yet. No shams tweet, but behind the scenes, it's done. Then you insert the players and being named. And then it says the league is about to be flipped upside down. I saw this with Janus a few weeks ago. Oh, and the very last statement of the tweet says, more info soon, stay locked in. All right.

So the latest run of this generic templated, templated, templated? Templated, yeah. Templated? Templated. Templated. Templated. Templated tweet is LeBron James. I have seen this on about 25 different Twitter accounts.

Now all those people have a combined follows of about 78. Mute them. I need to. Just mute them. Mew buttons are different. So this is what some, I'm not even going to give it the name because it's not even worth it. LeBron James is being traded at Dallas Mavericks. The deal isn't public yet.

No shams tweet, but behind the scenes it's done. LeBron A.D. Kyrie, the league is about to be flipped upside down. More info soon. Stay locked in. When are we going to ever put? punish anybody for putting crap against the wall and so it's seen if it sticks.

The misinformation, it's it's unstoppable. Because if you call somebody and say there's a fire in your building and there's no fire, you get in trouble for that. Now this is sports information or rumors.

So this, I'm not trying to equate the same as a you know, screaming fire in a movie theater as compared to doing this. So you're saying whoever is making balls SAC Sports needs to be prosecuted. Yeah, okay, that's, okay, whatever, sure. But what are we doing here, Ross?

Why can, why can, why has, who is the president of Twitter content watching? Is there such a person? I'm just going to, is Elon, I thought Elon and, and Trump weren't getting along so he's got more time to focus on this. I don't know. They're back together. Who knows? I have both of their names muted off my timeline.

It's, I'm going to say this and it's, I don't want to, you know, again, get off my lawn. Old Man shakes fist at cloud, but it's true. I love it when you go old man on here. It's the kids. I did stupid stuff on the internet when I was young. I made, I've talked about this. Like I said, back in my day, it was message boards, not Twitter, but I. Did I, did I, when I was like 19 years old make a troll account and go troll Texas A&M and OU boards on ESPN?

Yes, I did. Oh, no. I did. You hear that, folks. That's why we're embarrassed to have this part of this radio show. I was stupid. It was a waste of my time, but I thought it was funny at the time. And people who make these accounts, they love when they can get somebody retweeting it or taking it.

That's, what's a nice way to say they get off on that? Excuse me? They gain great pleasure. Excuse me? I don't know. I'm looking for a different term. a phrase, but you get my drifts. That's how they get their jollies. How about that?

Excuse me? Okay, you can't excuse me that one. That's true. People get their jollies off of misinformation, getting likes, getting retweets, getting duping people, and it's a lot of people on the internet, and they love it,

and that's what a lot of misinformation campaigns, or not campaigns, but I'm just talking about, like people who do individuals who do these things. and so I just try to find them and I try to mute them and go on about my day as best I can and don't these Twitter accounts get paid now for the... Yes, yes, exactly.

That's honestly, that was a horrible decision to pay people based off impressions and I said it when it was going to happen because people don't even care. Now you have people who get, they get in groups with each other, Matt, and they get in like these huge DM groups. They're like, all right, you follow me, you follow me, you follow me,

I'm going to tweet this, then you got, I'm going to quote tweet with this, then all you guys retweet this, Then we'll get all the impressions. And then they get all these in these collectives where they're trying to make money off Twitter. Putting out the most ridiculous, reactionary stuff, getting as many impressions as possible. Doesn't matter if it's true or not. If you get 10 million impressions off a tweet, your payment doesn't care how accurate the information was.

The bottom line is you got those impressions and you're going to get however X amount of dollars. But where's that money coming from? Who's paying that out? I don't know. I think it's very low, especially on Twitter. the amount of impressions you get. But it's more than nothing. If you're in college and you're making a few extra hundred bucks off of click farming

or a couple thousand bucks. Why aren't today's kids getting money the old-fashioned way? Giving plasma. That's how you make the money in college. They're still doing it. Oh, trust me. You can do it. But you can do both, Matt.

Plasma on Tuesday and Prussian Farm on Wednesday? By the end of the day, you can make rent. The end of the week. Or get a pizza. I literally had a classmate that needed to pay rent. That's what he had to go do at the class. He had to go get to the plastic centers to pay his rent. It's funny.

They never ask for older people's plasma. I only want the kid's plasma. That's probably better. Like, is my plasma old and not attractive to people? I don't know. You passing the blood test? Screening. You passing the screening?

I don't think so. I don't know. I just, I saw this formula, this template had, you know, and it said Janus, jams won't report it it's going to happen. Luca does this. Man, you have to be so careful if you use Twitter as a new source.

Just be super careful what you read. In the old days, you could just see if they had a verified checkmark and you knew you were good. Yep. And now... I'm more likely to believe it's false when I see a check mark now. And now, you know what we've got going now? I noticed in the last couple days is now you've got

bots that are talking about your tweets and putting in their own little crypto messages at the very end. Yes. They're like, oh, wow, what a great tweet about the Rockets, Matt. Follow my guy, blah, blah, blah for the greatest tips on crypto. And I go to block them, and they've already blocked me. Yes. Again, it's really odd.

What the hell? Where did we go wrong? I don't know. Yeah, where did we go wrong? Why can't we have gone right? I don't know. And I know Blue Sky tried to do something. I know that threads is trying.

But they're not. Nobody's there. I go on a blue sky and it's like there's nobody. You know what? I'm going to try. I'm going to try. Or threads. Well, threads.

The only reason why I'm in acting, even looking at threads, is because it has a relationship with Instagram. Where you can follow me at Sports RV. I'm four away from a thousand. You're four away? Yeah. Well, I got some even better news. Go ahead.

I'm only 53 away from 2,800. Wow. That's great, Matt. Just saying. Follow at SportsMT on Instagram. Thank you. SportsMT, your blood pressure will be lowered. Your 401K will go up and people will like you.

Oh, I got a new follower on threads apparently half an hour ago. Thanks, whoever you are. All right. Follow Sports RV for him shooting videos with his large head with astrographics behind him. Now, see, if you click on the video, My head is like in the bottom third. It's not that big. But when I don't click, it's in the upper third.

Okay, what do you want me to do? I don't know. It just seems weird. It's like you were and you're taking a college level film video class and shooting film with yourself. It's a green screen with the chromacry key. And you click the video, it's on the bottom in. I make it tall. I don't want to make it wide because Instagram you're supposed to put it.

You're supposed to make tall videos and pictures. So you'd rather be taller than wider. What? 713-212-5-790 Ross, can I tell you how much I hate, Chandlerone? Yes. What are you doing? Oh, well, actually, I'm glad you asked.

I will tell you, I was reading an email that our friends at Cinergenics want you to note that the free tea test ends July 31st. Head to FixMilOTE.com, thanks to all our great sponsors, including Cinergenics. I did ask. You asked, I was reading the email. So, Chaler Rome sends me two texts in the last five minutes,

and you're thinking, could it be baseball related? Sure. Zero chance. Something happened to the blackjack table. He's in Vegas, I think. He is in Vegas. He sends me where he's going to eat dinner tonight. Ooh, to make you jealous.

Yes. Okay. So my reply was, send me leftovers. Then his reply back to me on with that was going to the, the best brunch buffet in Vegas in 25 minutes. Which is, oh, do you know it or he's saying? Oh, I think it's with a win. Okay.

Never been. It's expensive yet delicious. And then I sent a bunch of swear words that I cannot repeat in the air. By the way, can I take an issue with something I saw you say on Twitter about Vegas? Let me confirm this. Yeah, please do. Didn't somebody was asking you for Vegas? tips or something?

You said younger crowd downtown. Do you say that or did I misread it? I would disagree with that. I think it's a younger crowd on the strip. Do you really? Huh? I don't know. I don't associate. I mean, when I walk the strip,

when I walked Vegas downtown at 11 o'clock at night, when everybody's smoking lots of pot and eating pizza, I associate with the younger crowd. I think it's the younger crowd. The clubber, the clubbing younger clubbing crowd, I would say is more. on the strip than downtown. Well, I mean, we're still talking about millions of people, so maybe it was easier to.

I just would say, generally speaking, if you're staying on the strip, you're probably a little older because you can afford the strip prices. That's true. That was my kind of connotation on that. Okay. Like, if you and I went to the Bellagio, we would not see, we would see more, we'd see more 23-year-olds at Circa than we would see at the Bellagio. Hmm. I don't know.

If we took the people in front of the fountains and went from one block in front of the fountain to the left of it to the right of it and took their median age and then took it against a two block stretch of the Fremont Street experience, I think it would be, I think it would be not significantly younger, but I would say downtown younger. I would say Belize you would be younger. But I don't know. But definitely I would say as far as the clubbing and all that stuff with the younger kids are doing. that's 100% way more on this trip that is what you're saying there's not there's not a lot of clubs in downtown there's bars but they're in clubs right carl is already telling me about who she's bringing for her for 20 first i'm like girl that's still four years away i don't like i want to be a part of that trip well you took your sons no is that will you send the send the wife and

the daughter i think i will go and just go separately it's in a different hotel okay you'll stay downtown those stay on the strip That's exactly right. I think you've got to go to the strip at least like once, but it's such a soulless. It's just, it's worse or worse. Well, Vegas, generally speaking, a soulless. That's true.

And that's why I'm hoping the Rockets get to go play in December at the play in-season. The knockout tournament again, or what they're called the end-season. That's why if I'm going to spend all my money and lose it on blackjack, I'd rather go to a city with Seoul. I'd rather go to New Orleans. I'm telling you, Phoenix is sneaky good, Rossi. I'm just telling you.

I'm not, yeah, I'm not doubting you on that. Okay. I guess how far is it from the Grand Canyon? Ooh, I could combo that. I'm just saying, you can say with me you're welcome to, and I'm not flying you out there for that. You're not? No, I've got you for the Western Finals.

Ooh, three hours of the Grand Canyon? That's not bad at all. Not bad at ever. No, you could do that. The Grand Canyon is too hot in the summer, though. No, the NBA season's in November, December, January. I mean, it wins that schedule release. One month.

By the way, the NHL has your schedule announced today. We play about the same time of year they do. And their schedule's already out. How does that make you feel, Matt? Disjointed? Hmm. Okay. Well, this says, the Google says September, October best.

So hopefully it's early season against the suns. By the way, not that we have a huge Bradley Beale audience, but Bradley Beal signing a two-year deal today with the Los Angeles Clippers. Good for him. 11 million dollar contract. You said Bradley Biel. Bradley Bill? I thought he had a No, they released him.

It was a buyout, basically. That's crazy. Kawhi Leonard, Bradley Beale, and James Hardin. What could go wrong? Except chemistry. Well, if it was like 2012, they'd be pretty good. That is true. Or 2015.

Yeah, that's it. All right, 713-212-5-790. 713-212-5-790 we have another hour left to go ross what is today's edition of believe it or not coming up at about 50 minutes from now i don't know would you bradley beale really i mean i could give up with eight questions on bradley beale you could do that jim jim waith john wait oh that's close it wouldn't no really weren't close at all actually no i don't all the names of the world it was pretty close not like Like I said, Mahatma Gandhi. Now, we could just play Believe it or not and just say, believe it or not.

I wonder if we didn't even get people to just do that without even having the question. We did that once. We did it one time, yes. I think we were punched drunk live on air. I forgot about that. He just said, believe it, and it was either believe it or not. Yeah. And sometimes he would say not, and it was not.

It was an embarrassing low point of the Matt Thomas show in the last year. It was terrible. so funny because when people got it wrong, they're like, what? That was actually, that's Did we scan, did we actually scam people during that or what? I don't remember. No, it was, that was

great, actually. I'd be down to do that again. No, we're not doing that. One o'clock, final hour. 103 on Sports Talk 790. We had some great baseball conversation with Brian Bogussevich earlier in the show, and if you missed that, we'll have a great portion of that at the bottom of the hour.

We believe it or not at 150. Tomorrow, Ross, is tomorrow, is tonight the slowest day of the year in sports? I know the Aspies will be on. I will be watching zero that. I'm actually commuting back to Houston, so there's no chance, no way, no how.

I'm going to even watch one minute of that. I mean, I have some interest. I think Shane Gillis is pretty hilarious. That I don't doubt, but the whole event itself. I just, the Espies was cool for a while, but there'll be 0% chance to catch it. But a lot of it's because I'm traveling. But let me get to the other issue.

Tomorrow, we're going to put together a top ten list of the 10 from 10 down to one. Who has to be, and how are we going to phrase this? I want to make sure our phrases properly. We've got three seasons coming up. The Astros' second half. We have the Texan season. We have the rocket season, and we have the Houston Cougars season, football and basketball. This is a Houston-centric list.

And it's only athletes, not coaches or general managers or owners or front office people. We're going to put together the MVP list of the 10 most important people in Houston for the rest of the year. So tomorrow, Ross, when you put together your list, because you won't do it until probably $9.59 tomorrow morning. That's not true. I already got a top six. The number one person in your list has to be the most, the person has to have the most important season coming up for their respective team. Zach Short, number one. Let's go. And we'll publish our list tomorrow after we announce it.

We'll do it probably like 10.30 tomorrow. And then we'll publish it out there. So it's our list of 10 people, 10 athletes that have to have a really good year for their respective teams. But somebody's got to have the best year. Who is that going to be? We'll do our list tomorrow at 1030 here on the show. All-Star Game. I think, look, if the home run derby ratings were good up 5% from last year,

I'm assuming that you'd see similar improvement over the game itself. Wouldn't it make sense? Yeah, the game got close. People probably flipped it back on. Then there was a swing off. Then you added in the ABS, which I found interesting. I thought overall, I was more invested in it than I thought I would be. I was too, because, again, I just thought it would be in the background television.

But I'll tell you, what got me was the Hank Aaron stuff. That was cool, too. How to superimpose all that on the field? Again, remember, you're talking about video technology is unparalleled. that beautiful building in Las Vegas, which I always mispronounced the name of it. The sphere. S. Fear.

The sphere. Look at that. Thank you. So they basically use the same technology that the sphere uses, right? L.ED lights and whatnot. Yeah. And they put the audio in there.

It was two and a half minutes. I've watched it probably five times since it was originally broadcast. Oh, really? That's cool. It's really awesome. And I got to interview Hank Aaron, not one-on-one, but I was in a group setting. Oh, wow. And it was probably a year or two before he passed.

And I'll say this, Ross, I was, I'm not a kid in a candy star. I was like in awe of him. And I never saw him play. I mean, it was well before my time. But being friends of the model for as long as I was, obviously, all the great stories about Hank. And just to be around him for a few minutes, it just felt like I was around royalty. Yeah, you were. And I'll be honest with you, friends.

I don't do that a lot. I don't get fanboy on many things in life. Because, I mean, we're in clubhouses all the time. Look, I'm very blessed to be traveling with an NBA team full of superstar millionaires and very famous people. It kind of just, it's common for me. But there's a handful of times in my life that I have fanboyed. and when Hank Aaron was a guest one year at the Astros Foundation dinner, which I was invited to at the time Minute Made Park,

and I'm sitting here with my phone just grabbing a couple of sound bites of Hank Aaron talking about, Milo who was retiring that year, it was amazing because he was the things he had to overcome, the blatant racism in our country, the fact that he had death threats because he was about to, knock out the most valuable award for any individual hitter in baseball and how he to stay in separate hotels and it was just in you know and all the things he did just in the civil rights movement in doing this and doing it with just such little pomp and circumstance he's he may be one of the greatest people I've ever been around not about that I know but just being in awe of a sports athlete I kind of would have felt that way if I'd ever met

Muhammad Ali, I would have probably felt that way. If I would have been able to, I mean, I'm trying to think of my short list of all-time, all-moment athletes, and it's not very long list because Henry Dowley did so much on the field, but he did so much off as well. I just, it was great, and I thought everything about the ceremony yesterday was fantastic. And look, MLB has its image problems, and, you know, and Rob Manfred gets crushed for a lot of things. but if he had anything to do with it or his department had it. I mean, obviously they did. They put on a masterpiece yesterday.

That was as classy of a thing as they could possibly. Plus the whole thing about the cancer thing they do during the middle of the game, too. They've done that for years and years and years, and it's still chokeship every single time. It just does. Yeah, it was great. So as much as Major League Baseball gets crapped on for a lot of things, and boy, they still have their issues, Rossi, ballparks are still full, TV contracts are still big. being up for grabs.

Revenues are going up. The long-lived, long-forecasted demise of Major League Baseball continues to be just that a myth. I think they've made great strides with the pitch clock and the extra man and trying to shorten games. It's for a younger generation, and that's what they were worried about. It's for younger generation, they're chiming in a little bit more. They're not saying, I'm not saying every 25-year-old is set. down at a bar watching the Astros or watching

the game, but they're getting a few more because they were deathly afraid that they had lost a generation of fans, because the phone does play a role on it. Kids attention spans do get affected by

different forms of things to watch and see on TV and things in their phone and whatnot. Yeah, I think the MLB app is good. I think the coverage like you're talking about, their Twitter accounts, social media, they do a good job, of building and marketing guys. Like, for example,

like the biggest star in baseball is probably Showing. He doesn't speak a lick of English. That's good marketing. And the biggest star in your sport does not speak the native tongue of where he is. He's being marketed well and showcased well. And you got your hottest pitcher in baseball going out with one of the highest women in sports.

That helps out too. That's marketing. Oh, you're talking about Paul Skins. Yeah. It doesn't hurt. Doesn't hurt. I was like, who's going to hurt dating? I don't know. Oh, who is Tarik Scoobled dating? I don't know.

It doesn't matter. Never mind. Now, here's the thing that Major League Baseball can't get passed. And this is a criticism of previous commissioners and the future, whoever the commissioner will be when Rob Manfred decides to sit down. You've got ten dormant franchises still to this day, Ross, that are all very profitable. Yeah, that don't give a damn about winning.

That's why I'm saying they probably don't see it as a problem. No, they don't. Because what's good for ratings? Is it good for ratings of the pirates invest and care and spend money? Or is it good if the Yankees and Dodgers do? But if I'm a fan of that team, I know. I can't be a fan of that team. That's why the Astros were there earlier this year.

And it was Paul Skeens versus, was it Hunter Brown? Or it was like some kind of somebody had top heavy lineup. Yeah. Yeah, and there was 15,000 people there. See, if I'm a pirate fan, and I live in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, I'm not thinking about the good of the game if I'm a pirate fan. If I'm a pirate fan, I want Paul Skeen's to have great players around him that can actually score runs.

The running joke last night was it Paul Skeens had a 6-0 lead for himself, and he can't get a victory of that. He can't get a win. He never get six runs ever in Pittsburgh. Yeah. Oh, those McCullors and Skeins. Hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey now.

They, Asheros won the game. They did. You know what? Road McCullors is much better than Home McCullors. Certainly when the Pirates are going to line up as well. It's like Andrew McCutcheon is still here. Is that Willie Sarder coming from the past? Bill Madlock playing third base.

Go ahead. I don't know. I don't know. Jason Kendall. Is that Kent DeColvey closing out the games? I'll go with Jason Kendall. All right. 113.

I'll do Sports Talk 790. This is more John Wait? The heck is this? Donuts to start advertising our prize. This is Paul Young. Every time you go away. Oh, there we go. All right.

Tomorrow we're going to give out a password for Believe it or not. What is it or not topic? How about Hank Aaron? Wait, it's kind of good. Wait. Oh, this is not bad. You would go see this at Cynthia Woods. Come on.

No. Maybe in November when it's like 72 degrees. But imagine when Wayne Chung comes on, we're all dancing up and down. I'm going to the bathroom. You are not. I'm getting another drink. That's when you start leaning over for a kiss from your lady on the lawn. What does this lawn you speak of?

Yeah, see, you're fancy mat. You've never been on the lawn because you're not salt. to the earth, Matt. You're not down to earth with the people. Out in the lawn, having a good time, making moves on your lady, and getting secondhand marijuana smoke clouds.

So you'd rather me do that than sit in a section with chair back seats, cover, and a fan. There's no, what, there's a fan on you? There's big fans of time. Beats breezy out there on the lawn. You make your own breeze. Yeah, that's

because you're eating strange foods before the event. Yeah, watch out for that brownie. Lawn's good. You get to lay down. It's comfy. Hang out with the people. But aren't you so far while you can't see the acts? No, it's not bad. No. It's not that bad. All right. Here's what I'm going to do. Between now, I don't care. What month are we in here, July? Give me 12 calendar months. I'll sit along with you for something.

It's not a concern of mine, but you're just missing out. All right. So we got the interview with Brian Boga Civic coming up in a few minutes. Let's talk to Brandon. Apparently is inside Diken Park right now. I don't know what he's doing there. Well, it says he's at Minutemate Park, which is old. Well, that's, yeah.

You know what? I think we've got to update these. I think I've been meaning to talk about this, but I'll just say it on air. I think we didn't talk to the producer by just confirming, hey, are you calling from wherever? Yeah. You don't want to say Jersey Village, but you could. Because we always get people calling in like, yeah, I was in San Antonio one time six months ago, and now it still says that on the phones.

All right, let's try it. Hi, Brandon. You're on 790 calling us somewhere in Houston, Texas. Hello, Brandon. I'm mad. I'm actually in Beaumont, not inside. Oh, hell. See what I'm saying?

Sorry to buzz your bubble on that, too. I hope you guys are having a great week so far. I love the show, man. Listen, every day. You guys are a great afternoon. Entertainment. We love it, man. I just want to get thoughts on, you know, as we get to the second half,

Of course, I know it's a critical three-game series with Seattle out of the break, no doubt. You don't want to just let them back in with that five-game leave. But I know that kind of some movement happened today. I saw Adam Frazier get moved to the Royals looking at that to you on some of the rumors out there. And I kind of saw something. I know there's going to be a lot of reports this time of year. People are just, you know, guessing and kind of putting things out there. Starting pitching, obviously they've got to look at what about maybe a reunion with Uncle Charlie,

Charlie Morton coming back and maybe you have to give up too much because I know the farm system missed in. I know Seth Lugo would kind of cost a little bit more with the Royals. And then what bat do you think, Matt, as far as looking at those left-handed hitters that they so crave there, too, and kind of the status of Yordon may be coming back or being pro long or something like that. I feel like we've got to make some moves, Matt, and I want to get your take on that too as well, man. Appreciate the time.

Thanks so much. We'll see you guys. Rossi, I don't want Cedric Mullins. I'm sure he's wonderful. I'm sure he can patrol. Now the reason why is Patrick Mullins may be a mix is if Jake Myers has gone for a while, which, you know, that could be a possibility. God, I hate even saying that.

But let me go back to what the caller said about Charlie Morton. That would be an aster-esque type move in 2025. And I'm not saying he's the guy that we should be thinking about. Got a guy in his 40s? What kind of, he was having an okay season last I looked. That's what I'm saying? But I'm saying just an okay, gritty, been there, blah, blah, blah kind of thing. I mean, yeah, how much better is he going to be from

than Ryan Gusto and Colton Gordon? He's got an ERA of 518. He's got an ERA of 518. Ryan Gussow can give you better than that. I think he's around these high fours. Charlie Morton. If Charlie Warren comes here, I would be curious.

He's a whip a 1.5, he's 41 years old, and an ERA of 518, I'm good. I don't even want to have this conversation about grabbing people because I think every time we bring up a name it's going to be, well, that's too much money.

Or that's too much of a, you have to give up too much of a talent, or the contract's bad. Or you have minor league, you don't have enough minor league prospects. I mean, Ryan O'Hurne's a name that's been brought up a lot. People have been mentioning Josh Naylor, Eugenio Thwadeth, even though he's not a left-handed

hitter, he's right-handed, he's righty. I mean, O'Hern makes sense. You could put him in the outfield. I mean, you wouldn't play first base. You can put on the outfield. Yeah, but you've got to figure something out at second base. What's the latest on Brennan Rogers? It's falling off a cliff? Look, Brennan's a nice guy.

But are you really worried about whether or not Brendan Rogers come back and help this team? Just as a warm body. It would be a warm body. Be a cold bat, but a warm body. That's pretty funny. Thank you. I'm just going to say to the previous

caller, who's in Beaumont. Yes. and not MMP. Yeah. I wouldn't expect much. I have a question. We've always...

Unless this, unless Ross and I'm sorry to interrupt you, but unless Dana's really believing what the doctors are saying when these guys are going to come back, quote, unquote, sooner rather than later. That's got to be lip service to ask. You might not have any other choice, is what I'm saying. You're already holding the glue with these guys pitching.

I think what the problem has been... Well, I mean, you're not holding the glue. It's kind of the way. the blues getting loose. All right, what was your question? More Elmer's than Gorilla. What was I going to say? Oh, do you think you can always,

it feels like you can always, always, always use leverage arms, we've said, but is this bullpen good enough or do you think that would ever be a possibility? One more leverage arm. Would Brian King get you back something in a return? No, no, no, no, I'm saying acquiring a leverage arm because, I mean, it has been Brian King and O. and the Sousas of the world have been pretty good. But they're going to, you know, you're talking about how like Jake Myers and those other guys

regress, yeah, exactly. I think middle relievers naturally reggae have regressive. Exactly. So would you want to go with a guy to where you could be? Well, what you thought you had in theory with Presley, a Brayu hater. And also that being a possible Band-Aid solution to if you are not able to acquire a starter, well, if you get a high-leverage reliever, then we're just needing these other guys to get us to the sixth inning and then we're gravy in a playoff scenario.

Again, I'm sure others have done it. I would not put that into play for the Astros. I don't think you want to go with bullpen by committee. You can do it for one game, but to try to win one series would be difficult. To win two series would be just about impossible. Well, Matt, you want a new car, but you can only afford an electric bike.

Can I Uber instead? That's going to be more expensive day by day. Yeah, public transportation can work too. Exactly. Here you got to get your bus pass. Because the Astros aren't affording Bentley's at the deadline. But can I get a civic? You got a lot of civics on the lot.

You got a civics in the garage. It's got a lot of miles on them. Can I get a sportage? It's going to cost you. You're saying no. Deep into the savings. The savings account is low. The savings account is 29th in baseball.

All right. Brian Bogussevick, his thoughts. This, this car talk is depressing me. So you're telling we got a bunch of jalopies is what you're trying to say. Do you, they don't even know what jalopies are? Have you heard the word jalopy? I have never heard.

Is it like a lemon? That's pretty, that's not terrible. I would say lemon doesn't run. Jalopi gets you A to B, but, you know, you might have to put. You're taking your girl on in a jalopy. Let me just say that right now. I didn't have a dilapia in college, actually.

One headlight. You're going to be asking to borrow mom and dad's car because you can't take a jalopy on a date. I can just tell you that right now. I had a Cutlass Capri back in 1990. Ooh, good God. What a mess that was. My first car was a 1993.

Honda Accord. That bad boy ran to 300,000. Oh, my God. You're such a bragger about that. Let's say here from Brian Bogus 7 next. Our time is so 130 with a word for uptown appliance repair. A few minutes with Brian Bogussevich is always Must listen to radio.

We'd like to play some of that here in this segment. And in fact, we got the conversation started with Bogie earlier today about his thoughts about overall the events that were the Midsummer Classic. I'm kind of in the middle about everything. I enjoy the celebration of the game. Part of it, I enjoy kind of the celebration of also the individuals and letting guys kind of get outside of the team aspect a little bit and see some personalities. At the same time, after close to 100 games of real baseball and exhibition game, I'm kind of me about.

I do like the idea of trying out some different things and having the game be a little bit different than just your average regular season game and putting in some different tweaks or ideas that we'll maybe see in the future. But other than that, for me, it's not necessarily about the game. It's just about the weekend and the events and the people. And, you know, that to me is the fun part. All right. A couple of real quick things. Automatic ball strike challenge system, what do you think?

I like it. I liked it in spring training. I like it. I like where they're going with it. I think they've done a really nice job. You know, they've used it for so long and in so many games in the minor leagues. I think they've got a really good feel for how to use it. quickly and efficiently. I like the added drama of showing it up on the big board in real time

and kind of giving the crowd something to get into. I think it's a great idea. I was a big proponent of if we got it, let's just use it for every pitch, but I do like the way they're trying to use it, you know, just a more important situation type of way. Bogey, we had Bregman on with us a couple of years ago when he was still with the team in spring training and we thought he would universally like every player would love it the consensus was we couldn't find enough people that are active players that love every pitch being determined ball strike via the computer why do you think so many players are against it um they're just naturally resistant to change first of all i mean when you when you've spent the amount of time preparing and training

to play a certain way, the idea that things are going to be changed and there's going to be some unknown is a little bit unnerving. But they also assimilate to everything really quickly and very smoothly. I think also there is, you know, the human element and the gamesmanship is something that you can appreciate while you're in the game. You know, from the outside looking in, it's very black and white. It's like it's the ball. We want to the ball. It's a strike. We want to strike. But the idea of, you know, watching a Zach Grinky hit the outside corner over and over and then start going an inch or two off and walking the umpire off the plate as well as the hitters. You know, that appreciation of skill is something that could be lost if we're just using a computer

and it's black and white. So I think it's two things. I think it's just natural resistant to change. And then not wanting to lose an element of true greatness not being able to exploit human error, I guess. Yeah, that makes some sense. Let me also ask you this, and we'll get Ross get a couple questions in after me. One of the things I brought up about the ABS is what are managers

going to tell their players when and if do you use it in the right situations? Do you potentially squawking something in the third inning knowing if you lose it, you might not get it, you got one challenge left. If this comes into play, my question to you is if you were a manager, what

would you tell your 26-man, Rob, about how and when and what seems appropriate to use those ABSs, because if you lose the two challenges, you're done, you may want them in the ninth inning of a very close game. Yeah, I think first and foremost you express the idea that it is for important situations, right? It's something that's flipping inning, flip a game, flipping that bat, and preferably later high, leverage type of situations. That being said, I mean, there are so many got, you know, if you Eastock parade is a hundred percent sure that a ball got called a strike. I'd be okay with him challenging. You know, it's kind of got to be a little bit of self-recognition also. I think some of the teams

in the way they were using in spring training, it was a good idea where from the pitching side, they put it on the catchers to be the ones making the challenges and not the pitchers, trying to take a little bit of the emotion and adrenaline out of it. And, you know, I think it's going to be kind of case-by-case basis. But, you know, even if, they had meetings with teams in spring training just going over this. And everybody is on the same page that the way that it's being implemented and most likely will be implemented is to not try to change an O-O pitch in the first inning. It's to try to get a big pitch right in the seventh or eighth inning in a one-run game.

And if everybody kind of understands that, I think guys will be fine just letting it back to play out the way they do in your kind of run-of-the-mill type of situations. you know for the for the most part um everybody understands that maybe there's a couple of guys you got to pull aside and have a conversation with him like hey you do not have the green light to call i mean you got to shut guys down on the base pass every once in a while you can shut them down on challenging stuff too that'd be a fun conversation to have uh Brian Bogussevick with us here to sports talk 790 transitioning a bit to to the team and this in the second half coming up let's start with hunter brown last couple of starts not the way that he wanted them to go uh what do you

think as far as what's happening with him? Is there just some fatigue? Is it just a couple of bad starts and that's it? And also kind of a gut feeling from you, do you think with him pitching on Sunday, do you think he'll get a couple of extra days off for the weekend or where do you think Joe Spott is going to throw him? Yeah. So I think coming out of the gate, my guess is you see both Fromm Berand Hunter in the Seattle series because you need that. And I think it'll be Fromber first and then Hunter in either game two or game three. I think, you know, Framber will be on an extra day rest going Friday. You don't want him on too much rest. And Hunter looks like he can use an extra day or even two. So as long as you get him in that series, I would be fine with him

throwing Sunday. I actually like the idea of them being split up and, you know, having the ability to stagger them if you need to push somebody to eat up innings because there's a short start somewhere. But in terms of his last couple starts, you know, it all kind of started in the Colorado start for me. The stuff just wasn't moving the same. I kind of attributed it to altitude. You know, the sinker doesn't always sink the same way. Breaking balls don't have the same bite. But then we kind of saw some of that stuff carry over into Cleveland and then Texas.

I think it might be a little bit of fatigue. And, you know, I'm not talking about fatigue. Oh, my gosh, he's dying out there his arms hanging. I mean, the velocity is still there. The spin rates are still. there, everything looks good. It's just every once in a while. Every once in a while there'll be a fastball that'll kind of

get on the side of instead of finish through it and have that hop at the top of the zone. There have been a couple hits on change-ups where they've kind of cut back into the middle of the plate instead of him getting on top of it and kind of pronating and getting that drop and sink. And that's just, you know, a little

bit of release point stuff. If you start getting a little tired, your body starts getting a little tired, things go out of sync and it shows up at release point. And it's just little bits where, you know, he was, he was out, there were times when he'd go out there and throw 100 pitches and perfectly execute all hundred pitches. You know, everything came out of his hand exactly how he wanted it. You know, you get a little bit of fatigue and all of a sudden a couple mistakes show up in the middle of the zone and they get hit. To be expected, he's 115 innings already.

He's gone deep into almost every start that he's pitched. I think, you know, the all-star break and maybe an extra day on the backside will be good for him. And I think there's no reason that he's not going to be fine coming out of it. All right. And on the hitting side, it feels like, again, we ask every week about Christian Walker. How beneficial you think a couple of days to clear the head for him and kind of finding where he's at to where, I mean, we are this deep into the season. And he just still has not fully busted out of the funk. And when it kind of looked like he was, unfortunately, although I'm saying, you know, in the grand scheme of things in life, he doesn't think it's unfortunate.

But he had to go on to the paternity list. then he came back and didn't have a good series against Texas. Yeah, it was unfortunate the timing of it, you know, because he was really heating up. But at the same time, you know, he goes into the break having four days to kind of sit on what he's done in the past, you know, a couple of weeks, which I'm sure a lot of that will just be baby time, not going to think about hitting all that much. But, you know, to have a little bit of positive momentum with how that last road trip went, you know, when you think about a guy who goes into a prolonged slump, you think there should be some, you know,

equally high high coming off of it. And that's how it's going to balance out. You know, maybe we're not going to see that. Maybe we're not going to see, you know, a month where he hits over 400 and hits 12 home runs. But, you know, maybe we're just going to see the guy, a guy who's putting up the numbers that we thought he was going to put up, just, you know, minus the first six weeks of the season or whatever, whatever.

and maybe it doesn't all the way balanced out. But if you look at his body of work over, you know, prolonged period of that bat, it's not all of that far off. And I know we haven't had that huge swing back to correct it and level everything out for the whole. But it's been overall not that far off of what we expected. So I think the biggest thing for him is now getting pitches into locations

that he wants. All right. We need those pitches where he wants him. Hit them hard and do it for more than three games in a series in our week. That again was Brian Bogus-Effic with us every Thursday here on Sports Talk 790. Hey, we're going to play, believe it or not, next. And the category today is it all things, Hank Aaron Ross, is that we're going with? Oh, I love Kyle Schwerber.

Kyle Swarber. Okay. All-Star MVP. That's true. Hit the dramatic home run in the swing off. We'll have, believe it or not on him after I tell you about what's happening at Talyard Brewing. Five minutes left to go on the show. What should we do?

We should play America's fastest-growing sports radio game show. We simply call it a beat. Believe it or not, and here's how it works. You'll call 713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-790. Today's edition of Believe it on is brought to you by our friends at talliard brewing.com. Category today is all things about Kyle Schwerber, who was in BP of the All-Star game for his winning home run in the swing off.

Is that three times fast? I'll read your statement about Kyle Schwerper. Statements completely under-league. Accord. You'll say this. Believe it. Statements errone. Full of bunk and made up.

You'll say this. Not. Two. Kyle Schorber, believe it or not, it's win your prize. We're playing for it today. Jonathan. We're playing for a pair of tickets to see Rick Springfield, John Wade, Wang Chung, and Paul Young on I Want My 80s tour.

Friday, July 18. at the Woodlands Pavilion. Tickets are on sale now at Ticketmaster.com. And of course, we got the Sports Talk 790 t-shirt. Let me tell you guys better get in here, all you, all you prizehors. I want these tickets gone. Let's go. Roger, speaking of a prize whore. On 790, Roger, you're ready to play, believe it or not? Believe it.

Kyle Schwerver was drafted second overall by the Cubs in 2014. It did not sign until the Cubs up their offer minutes before the deadline. Believe it or not. Believe it. No, he signed right away. He's very happy. Chris on 790. Chris, you're ready to play, believe it or not?

Believe it. Kyle Schwabor is major while in Indiana was communications. Believe it or not. Believe it. No, he's a recreational sports management major. Tim on 790. Tim, what was your favorite part of today's 10-2 radio show? Tim.

Tim is speechless. He's dreaming of getting wanky. chunged. Brandon, what was your fair part of today's 10-2 radio show? The Superman bit. Coming out of college, draft scouts compared

Kyle Schwabber's swing mechanics to those of Jeff Bagwell. Believe it or not? Believe it. Believe it. That is correct. Statement number two for the win. In high school, Kyle Schwabber was also a

standout football player, earning all Ohio honors at linebacker his senior year. Believe it or not. Believe it. That is a good. Correct. You're going to to the concert. Whether you want to or not, you're winning. Congratulations. Ross, 713, 212-5-790. I want my 80s. You want your 80s. Al on 790, Al. You're ready to play, believe it or not?

Yes, sir. Kyle Schrober was slated to represent Team Israel in the 2003 World Baseball Classic before being sidelined with an oblique injury. Believe it or not. believe it no we made that up i'm sorry bros talking to adam clan what do you want how's your family oh they're great how's life

fantastic we're going to get barbecue tomorrow i'm excited about that two rip back i'm asking if we're going to de lais's barbecue over there on main street by the cvd by the cbd you shop bat uh all right let's see we got about 30 seconds

can we get one more person in somebody's uh yeah Click that guy. That guy right there? New phone, who this? Paul. Paul. Kyle Schwerber was the cover athlete for the mobile baseball game MLB Perfect Game 24. Believe it or not?

Not. That is correct. Statement number two for the win. Kyle Schwerber's younger brother, Taylor, is in the Philly's farm system as an outfielder. Believe it or not. Believe it. No, he's not. There's no such a word.

Not. And that'll do it. We're getting better, Ross. Those prizes start improving. Those people start coming back in. We'll hear from you prize horrors eventually. Speaking of, Jim Weath had some hits.

Stop. Mr. 80s is up next. His name is Adam Clayton, alongside Adam Wexler. It's the team. Talk to you tomorrow at 10 right here on Sports Talks 7-9.