The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - The Matt Thomas Show 10-10-19

Episode Date: October 10, 2019

The Matt Thomas Show w/ @SportsMT, @SportsRV, and @ProNickLow 10/10/19Double Crush Bus (0:00)Reid Ryan Joins Matt As The Astros Prepare For ALDS Game 5 (29:06)Astros Revival (39:54)Dana Holgorsen Joins Matt As the Cougars Get Ready for Cincinnati (56:59)Dr. Roto's Fantasy Football Feature Week 6 (1:14:32)

It's larger than life. Yeah. You, sir! Lunch timers is the Matt Thomas show. Yeah. And what's happening in lunch timbers. Good afternoon and welcome to a Thursday edition of the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790. Oh, snap.

I don't know if I'm ready for this, Matt. You better be. I'm nervous. I ain't waiting around for you. The bus is leaving. I miss a bus many a time as a youngster. Yeah, and that's why the whole education thing went south for you, but that's not the who nor there.

That wasn't until college years. All right. It was a good student until then. It's time for you to load on the get on the bus. Yeah. It's game five, much to our complete surprise. The Astros and Rays are going to play for the division series. Speaking of game fives, what a pair of really bizarre, dramatic, and different.

ways game fives yesterday. So if you want on the bus, let's go. 713-212-5-790. 7-1-3-212-5-7-90. If you want the double-crush bus, here's how it works. You call in, you tell us what you're wearing, what you're drinking, and who the pick-to-click is in a game-five victory. for the Astros. Could be Garrett Cole striking out 13. It could be George Springer

with a three hit day, including a home run. It could be whoever plays in right field. You decide. It could be a Will Harris. It could be a Joe Smith. It cannot be a Will Smith, however.

Will Smith might be pretty good, according to Joe Girardi. Joe is busy interviewing for the Cubs job. That's why he was in focus on the assignment in hand. Yeah, you think he was looking up and down. He was like Googling the Cubs roster. I would be. 713, 212, 5-790.

If you want in, I want to know what you're wearing. Yeah. What you're drinking? Now, let's run through it. I'm wearing collared 790 shirt. Yes. Blue pants. Blue shoulder stripes.

Blue shoulder stripes. I'm drinking Corrie's light. Really? Yep. Cold, refreshing. and clean. And the pick-to-click for me, sports RV, George Springer.

Ooh, I like that one. I've got a little lead-off Springer Dinger for tonight. I ain't picky. I want a crooked number in the hit column. I want at least one in the run and one in the RBI column. Guess Garrett Cole's too easy. You want me to run through my...

I'm wearing. What's you wearing? What would you call this? Astro Orange Polo. Yes, 2017 World Series Champions. I like it. I got some blue jeans. on. I got my

white kicks. Yeah. I'm going to be drinking. Refreshing. Ice cold. Always easy to drink. Dosekis. Sure. And my player to watch tonight Jordan Alvedo. Really, you're the rookie

in a game five of division series. Michael Connor tweeted this last night. I totally agree with him. There has been time. He, I mean, he swung and missed really badly at a at a curveball in the last game, but for the most part, he seems like he's been under control. he had that double that laser double that he hit he's been getting a hold of a couple of them here and there and i like the way that his approach has been at the plate he's going to hit a home run tonight

you're calling your shot yes let me tell you something if that happens on the second floor of the bus yes we celebrate i'll buy you a shot we refilled the pural stations yes we greased down the the stripper poles the bus is ready to go all right so if you want in now's your opportunity 713 212 5 790. Now, our first entrance of the bus, she's having to come in from Canyon Lake to go to the bus. You don't understand this, Ross. This is how important a Game 5 is. Asia and Clear Lake. Hi, Asia. I don't know if I'll be able to run there because I'm not making on time. See, I was listening to y'all yesterday. I'm like, okay, I'm going to get on that bus.

First, I got my ring on, my World Series ring, my orange socks on, my shirt. But I'm bringing the most important thing of all. And this is for the players. We're bringing the visualization master who's going to hypnotize all those guys for them to see the ball and hit the ball, and it's only giving home runs and hits tonight. And then I'm going to bring an extra bottle of something called Red Line, not Red Bull, Red Line, that gives you a little extra energy. And we're going to kick out because I don't want no freaking upset like the Washington Nationals because I've been drinking since that last game that Cole that Osuna almost gave up. And I do not agree. I do not want Asuno coming in the 19th and that was, unless we've got like five runs. Otherwise, no way. He'll give me a freaking heart attack.

You can let them, maybe if we have two or three runs, then you can let them pitch one hitter, and if they get on, forget it, that's it. I'm out. Okay, we have to win, or I don't know. I'm shaking right now. I don't know if y'all get hit from me from a long time. I can hear you.

I can hear you. Yes, I can hear you. All right. I think you just fueled the bus yourself. Just kidding. Well, you know, you can come back another time. I can't come back another time because I'm too busy. Just kidding.

I'm not busy. Busy. Just kidding. I am. make time for you. Just kidding. I don't know how to make time. Just kidding. But I know how to make pies. Just kidding. I don't. Just kidding. I don't have a pan. Just kidding. I do. And I'll make one right now. I can't. I don't have a pan. Just kidding. I do. I got to buy Just kidding, I do, but I got to buy sugar. Just kidding. I have what I need, but I don't have a stove.

Just kidding, there's a stove under here. It's hot. Ouch, just kidding. There's no stove under here. It's one in my house. Let's go there right now. Just kidding. We can't all go together because it's hard to travel in a group. This bus ride so far is pretty intense. You ever get on a bus ride or an airplane next to somebody that's super talkative? Are you talk guy on the plane? Never.

I'm never taught guy. Never. It's always, you can tell. It's always an old lady. And before she starts talking to you, she tries to make eye contact with you like 15 times. And so you have to just put. your blinder, your horse blinder's on and don't make eye contact. You can

feel the energy of somebody wanting to talk to you the whole plane. So what happens today on the bus is that you don't talk to anybody, you just fist bump because right now it's confidence. You hug it out, you celebrate after the Astros win. Yeah, the last time I was on a plane, luckily that lady was in the

aisle and then she was talking to the girl that was in between us the entire time. This girl was like trying to read her Bible. It was like this young college girl just trying to hang out And this lady kept talking to her nonstop and I felt so bad. Our friend Grace is wearing her orange Springer jersey. Yes.

Drinking Crawford Bach. And Yuley will be killing it tonight. That's her pick to click. Carbought brewing is a solid choice. Nothing wrong with that. All right, here we go. A couple more people want to get on the bus. Let's go.

713-212-5-790. Ben, you are always walking on the bus. What are you wearing? I'm wearing my Astros hat in my dirty jersey from the last game. Game two. Okay. I'm going to be holding a double-crush bus. You've got a double fist.

Yes. Double fist and Cus Eusekis. And, you know what? I'm bringing Steve Irwin to bring that cranky wave-wing against the Tampa Bowl rays, which is amazing to anything else in the actual. Who are you bringing?

Steve Irwin. That's gross. Ever heard of him? No, I've never heard of him before my life. Thank you. You're bringing the corpse of Steve Irwin? Yeah, that's awful. Bad joke, Ben.

his jokes are getting worse I didn't think it was possible Matthew there's like 10 of you that we know who you are and what you bring to our show he's bringing somebody that's been dead for like 10 years of the show you're exhuming the corpse of steward that's just in poor taste Ben come on come on

that's like something Nick would say it is hi Nick I'm wearing a 2017 Houston Astros World Series champs t-shirt. Nice. Some

simple black slacks. I'm drinking. Let's go with Lafroy because I like my scotch to taste like dirt. And tonight I'm expecting two home runs from George Springer and three RBIs from

La Pina. Oh, so Yule and Springer are the leaders in the big clutch hitting, although you've got Jordan Alvedo doing his thing. Patrick, what are you wearing on the bus? Yes, sir, Mr. Pete's Basket, Thomas. I've got all my orange Astros, our spandit, wrestling outfit. I am drinking silver patron and the machete.

Martin Maldonado is going to bring it home for it. Huh. Little Martine, the personal catcher of one and the only, Garrett Cole. Thank you very much. You know what he needs? A female. Background checks.

I was thinking. Yeah, and a probation officer likely. Jill on 790. Jill, what are you wearing? I am wearing a white t-shirt with my bright orange at first Thursday. All right. And I'm wearing some blue and orange, sparkly beads and bracelets. And I am actually driving down I 10 from Beaumont to Houston because I'm getting on a plane to go to Kansas City.

What? Yeah. And so we've got a big group of traveling Texans that are going to be watching the games in a bar tonight. Watch our Astros win this. All right. Thank you. Have safe journals. I will.

And I agree with you. I think Springer's going to be our hero tonight. All right. I think that's a good call. That would be the call. Thank you very much. You'll be careful going to KC. Our friend Joan, orange crushed T-shirt, Springer, Dingers, two of them,

Scotch, and a bag of confetti coming on the bus. We can clean it up. We have a service. Okay. We do? Well, we're going to have to. We make Nick mop up. They're not losing tonight, right?

Right? Just give you a look. He did enough of that in the Navy, sir. They're not losing. They're not losing. Say it. They're not losing tonight. I mean, I don't think so. The bus has departed.

Thank you. Thanks for all. Okay. Stop. This is Craig Vigio. Vigio. Back to Matt Thomas on Sports Talk, 790. Oh!

You're home with the Stros. Malinato's going to catch. That'll change. That shouldn't surprise anyone with Garrett going. But I kind of see it a different way. I see it as their pitching has really been exceptionally well, or done exceptionally well. And our guys have had a few games here to see these guys over and over again.

So I don't think now is the time to really turn your back on one of the best offenses in the big league just because the pitching staff has had a run of success for a couple games. We'll go with the same guys. and that was further in evidence when I got a release from the Astros that coming up later today, Josh Reddick is going to speak to the media prior to today's game. They're not going to put somebody out there in front of a microphone for him not to play on the game. So Josh Redick, I know that a lot of people wanted to see Kyle Tucker. It wasn't like Kyle did anything to take the time away.

This particular case to me, Ross, it feels like Hinch is going with the been there, done that guy as compared to a guy that has had a very, very, very small sample size in postseason baseball. Yeah, I've got no problem with it. Like I mentioned, I know it was just one moment, but when he's swinging, like you said, he's swinging at pinnadas out there, it seems like maybe he's not ready. And I'm okay with Josh Redick being in there. I know it's maybe it's unfair, but A.J. Hinch doesn't have time to be fair. Yeah, this is a lot about a gut.

This is a lot about the analytics will only go here so far. That's the thing about analytics that drives me crazy is that, you know, if you are analytic guy in day one, you should be all the way through. But Rossi, baseball playoffs are not analytical. Clayton Kirshaw has been one of the best pitchers in Major League Baseball for a better part of what, 10, 15 years. He throws six pitches. I think the first three were strike, strike, strike. Two of the next three, home run, home run, tie the ball game. That's not analytics. That's October moments. I think pitching starters in relief is the anti-analytics.

That is, I know who this guy is. Because I don't know what the analytics would have said about Justin Verlander, pitching on three days' rest. But the human side of it says, Justin Verlander is one of the biggest badasses in Major League Baseball, and should one day be that big of a difference? Well, the answer is yes. The human element sometimes is going to be greater than what the analytics tell you.

I mean, it's just sometimes, just because of the result, I don't know, it just depends. We don't know, just because one thing turns out poorly one time doesn't mean it would have done that every time if that makes sense. Okay, let's go with that then. If Justin Verlander pitches 10 times in the rest of his major league career in the postseason on three days rest, what kind of, do you think the results be more positive or more negative? I'm probably more positive than what you got there, but I mean, I don't. I don't know. It's just tough to gauge. He just still looked like he didn't have it from the beginning. And he's 36 now. So if you were saying from now to the rest of his career, probably not going to get much better. That's nine more years. He's going to picture he's 45. You think so? I mean, he said it. I'm not going to argue with him. Hey, it is a Matt Thomas show. Nicklow back at our producing things brilliantly. Ross, myself. We're here. 713212.5.790. We will hear AJ. AJ is going to speak the media at 245. So we will carry that for you to close out the show this afternoon. just to let you hear the absolute latest on what his team is thinking about.

But we'll mix in some other sound bites as well. You heard Ozao Tuvia on the show yesterday. We'll play some of that if you missed that. And then we have to talk about last night with the Washington National. Let's go the first game first. We're at the airport in Tampa, and ready to get on our flight to come back to Houston. Were you drinking?

I had one. Okay. And I also had some crab biscuit that was delicious, but that's not here nor there. Really? Not a huge Bisk fan, but it was just fantastic. I love a good Bisk. I'm changing my tune on this. So let's say you're Atlanta brave fan.

Oh, man. And you have season tickets. Yes. Or you have a playoff package. And you just can't go to the late afternoon start in Atlanta. You're like, you know what? I'll wait to the first half inning and see if I, and if I haven't been able to sell the tickets, maybe I'll drop them. Maybe you're a person looking to buy.

tickets, okay? Mm-hmm. And you're like, the prices on the stub hubs and the third-party ticket places, they usually drop after the first pitch or the start of a particular game. Right. Could you imagine with the stub-hub people or any of those other folks were doing when the St. Louis Cardinals scored 10 runs in the top of the first inning? It was more, it was like a 1990, a 1929 stock market crash situation.

It was just bad. Could you imagine if, hey, Ross, if you have kids, which you don't know if you do or not. No, we're all clear on there. Mom, hey, Dad, Ross, can we please get out of school early to go watch the Braves and the Cardinals? Well, what time is your last period in? 2.45. Well, okay, by the time I pick you up,

take you the stadium, get you in. We'll probably get there in the bottom of the first, top of the second. Dad, I'll still want to do it. I still, I want to go see my Braves. Yeah. Oh! Yeah. There are people, which by the way, apparently they're stopping the Tomahawk thing. Because one of the St. Louis

relievers is Cherokee and said it was offensive, so they're dropping that. Oh, okay. Anyways. But, you know, there was people, absolutely. There's people getting their tickets scanned as the runs are just pouring in from the, from the carders. And it wouldn't stop. They're in line at getting their nachos and their chicken tenders and their beers and their

sodas. Expensive, by the way. All that's what you said. They're getting... Do you stay? I mean, do you stay there? How long do you stay there? Put yourself in that seat, Matt.

How long do you stay to that game? I thought about this yesterday. I probably stay seven. Seven. Six full. If the score is not within, say, three or four runs, top of the seventh, I'm leaving. Top of the seventh. It was 13 to 1.

I would have left. Okay. And I'd have been mad. There were Dodgers fans, by the way, leaving that game when Howie Kendrick hit that home run in the 10th or whatever it was. And by the way. The Grand Slam. A loss like that, I think, could have long-lasting effects on how postseason sales are. You know, Atlanta is a finicky city to begin with.

That's true. When the Astros and Braves would play for all those years, they would never sell out Turner Field. And I don't know what SunTrust Park was sold out or not yesterday. But I think Atlanta baseball fan has been through this so many times that they're probably not going to be able to have great crowds ever for a playoff game until they win that division series. To not only lose to send it to a game five, to have the home field,

but to end the season 20 minutes after the first pitch of the game 5 of the division series. That's crazy. It's wild. Most run scored in the playoff game ever or something like that? So that was crazy part. Yeah, that was crazy part number one. And then crazy part number two was this. Kelly's one strike pitch.

So we're going to fly ball, center field deep. Bellinger going back to the warning track, to the wall. It's a grand slam. How he can. has done it. They're going crazy in the Nationals dugout. Howie Kendrick with a grand slam. Here in the 10th inning of game five, the Nationals seven, the Dodgers three.

Not only was it him, but it was the same Howie Kendrick, who, and I thought TBS did a really great job. He had not one, not two, but three defensive blunders in the series, and he had one major base running gaff. four major, major mistakes in a very small sample size of a five-game playoff series, and yet he comes away the hero. That's the beauty of sports. It's a beauty of playoff games. It's a beauty of playoff baseball. Playoff anything.

And I couldn't take my eyes off the game. All they wanted to do was just get something of contact because they had loaded the base and they intentionally walk the guy in front of him. Get something of depth. Bring the run home. You have a one-run lead. Not only does he hit the home run, Ross. he hits it to the biggest part of the ballpark

straight away center field crazy stuff in the Dodgers the best 106 win team is out after a game 5 at home I'm just saying that's what I just said a fact

okay let's just do this if you're nervous call me now all right let me get my phone we had the revival in half an hour by the way if you are nervous about tonight. Call me.

713-212-5-7-90. No! All right, look, we are a full-service radio show. If you are nervous, I understand. Game 5 is always nervous. Game 7 is nervous. It is what it is. There's nobody's ever been calm. Let me tell you, the Astros are a bundle of nerves.

They're excited, they're positive, they're confident, but they're nervous. If you ain't nervous about a deciding a must-win game, Ross, we'd like to call it here on the show. This is a must-win game. This is a must. I tweeted that out, and there's been like a dozen people like, no bleep, Sherlock. Thanks, Einstein. People are coming after me.

You tell me that Twitter is rude? It's been pretty funny because they just don't get the joke. So, I mean, I just got to laugh at them. Somebody said, hey, would you stop to the double crush bus? It didn't work out. I'm like, I don't do it but three times a year. I think our success rate is very high. And last time I checked, they have a World Series banner.

They went to the American League Championship Series last year. Look, it doesn't. I'm just saying, here's the problem with Twitter. Standing back. Yeah, just stand back on this one. Some of you are, you have no fun in your life. And you keyboard warriors

want to go run your 140 at me. That's fine. You can do that. Don't follow me if you don't like the stick of the show. We don't do double crush bus four times a week. We don't do it four times a month. We do it three times a year when it's relevant. We're going to do a kick-ass revival in 23 minutes with Sports RV. If you think that bit is bad, don't listen to it.

But what we're going to do is we're going to try to, at least, to the best of our ability, entertain you. If you don't like it, just don't listen. But running to Twitter and telling me how you don't like it makes you look like an ass. And it makes you look like you're void of any sort of enjoyment in your life. And this radio show is about sports and fun and interesting. things and talking about the games. And if you're not into, like, for instance, last time I checked, Dave Letterman for 30 years did the top 10 list.

Harpool karaoke seems to do it just fine with James Corbyn. Everything that is the, what's the show on? Jimmy Fallon. He's a working bit for his entire show. NBC doesn't tell him to stop doing it. So let us have some fun. and if you want hard no, hard nuts and bolts,

war, risk, what else they got? Wobah. WRC. Plus. This ain't the show. But I got some seriously nervous people in Houston, Texas, and our job as Major Market Radio host, Ross, is to calm people down because the Astros are going to win this game today. I like it, Matt.

I'm done. Thank you. Don't mean to jump on the soapbox there. David in downtown at 1238. Hello, David. fellas how you doing? Hey, before I get to the game, quick question, Matt, have you heard anything about Grimes, the U of H?

I keep hearing this, the done deal. He's going to get the approval, but I don't know what's taking it in still so long. Have you heard anything? I have not. I can probably ask, we got Dana coming up at 1.30. I can ask, but I don't know if you'll have a hell of an answer for us, but I can certainly ask. Okay. Getting to the game, you know, Houston fans, I think, are a little bit different than fans across the country.

We kind of live in the, oh, no, what's going to happen next type of mentality because of all the crap we've had to deal with. Do you, as fans, do you enjoy games? Oh, you're talking about Grimes and a basketball player. You're not wrong sport. I was thinking Grimes. I don't think it's a football player named Grimes. Yeah, you're talking about Quentin Grimes, right? Hello?

Yeah, can you hear me? Yeah, you're talking about Quentin Grimes. A U.H. basketball player? Yeah, I'm talking about Quentin Grimes. Oh, okay. I was trying to, okay, wrong. I'm not going to ask Dean about that. He'd have no answer for that.

Go on, please. So as Houston fans, do you guys enjoy being the overwhelming favorite or do you enjoy being the underdog? Because I'll give you my take. The anxiety level in being the overwhelming favorite is much, much higher than being the underdog. I'd rather be a favorite. Yeah. I'd rather be a favorite. Yeah, for sure.

First of all, I don't know what it's like to not be a favorite. I mean, to have this kind of run. It's been unprecedented, basically, right? As I said, the last time, any team in this town that has been the overwhelming favorite is probably the Fiasama Jama team of 2019, 83, 84. There were underdogs in the 17 World Series, but I'd still rather be, look, the Longhorns are like 11-point underdogs in Saturday. I am dreading watching that game. I'd rather be watching today of the Astros' favorites.

Yeah, as far as I'm concerned, I love where the Astros are. because you know what? If you're the underdog, you're an underdog for a reason. Something's wrong with you, right? Ross, if you're the underdog at a home game, you know, in any game of a series,

is because either the pitcher is better than you, the defense is better than you, or the hitting is better than you. Yeah, that means your team's not as good. That's right. I have, like, a little confidence. I'm anxious, but I'm confident. I would love the Texans to be an eight-point favorite

of Kansas City. Yeah, it ain't happening. I would love the Cougars to be a 10-point favorite home against Cincinnati. Dave, definitely ain't happening. So, just telling you. I'd rather be the favorite. When in doubt, always be the favorite.

Yes. Because most of my life, I've been the underdog. I haven't had some success, but, you know, most of my life underdog. Matt, River Oaks on 7-90. Matt, what do you got? Hey, guys. One, like your show, I like your objectivity. Look, I'm a Cardo fan.

Three times when I last 35 years, the Cardinals should have been World Series champions. They weren't 2014 when 112 games are awesome. I'm nervous. I'm an Astros fan too now, owned by a fan of this guy. But I'm just worried about something stupid happening. Like, look at the game last night. The Cardinals, when they beat the Braves,

I mean, you know, a pitch that should have been a foul tip, that should have been caught, wasn't. Then a ground ball of the Freeman for a easy double play with Molina was, you know, booed. And then a wild pitch that should have been in out. And you look at those things, and I just hope that doesn't happen. after the best team in baseball last 30 or 40 years.

And, I mean, he hate to say they deserve it, but they do deserve to be World Series champions. And I hope they lose the Cardinals in the World Series. But I'm excited. I think Cole's the right guy. I kind of wish Verlander was not a pitch. I actually called in another time on your radio station, and I didn't think Verlander should pitch,

but that is what it is. Just hope something stupid doesn't have. and that's the only way the Astros lose tonight. And good luck. And yes, I'm still nervous. Okay, thank you for the phone call. You should be nervous. Your Cardinals beat the tar on the Braves.

I know he's nervous for the Astros, but Cardinals Astros, that sounds sexy for a World Series. Cardinals, I mean, anything's sexy. I don't care who the hell it is. Yeah, I don't care. Can you believe the Dodgers are out, though? Astros versus the Batavia muck dogs. Sounds like a good matchup to me.

The Dodgers at 106 wins are done with game five on their home field. Mm-hmm. Tonight's a coin flip for the Astros. It just is. They're about minus 270. In the real world, Rossi, and you always go to this Vegas bit. In the real world, it's a coin flip. It's not a coin flip.

They're at home with Garrett Cole. They're favored. Well, of course, because Vegas wants action on it. Were the Dodgers favored over the nationals yesterday? Okay, then give me even money. I'll take the Astros if it's a coin flip. I don't want to bet the game. Okay.

I want to bet against a team that I'd like to see go. What was the number on the Dodgers Nationals yesterday? I don't know. I bet it was comparable. I'm sure the Dodgers are favored. Yeah. So, again, betting is one thing. I'm talking about the true emotions and the of the game.

It's there's not, the Astros are not a decided favorite. I don't care what Vegas is. Okay. Because if the outfield continues to hit the way they are, they make them an underdog. That's just it. The Astros offensively had played like underdogs the last two games. All right. Well, then bet me a dinner then.

I don't want the, You take the nationals then Okay, I want plus 240 or whatever You're the one that wants to say it's a coin flip So that means he has to give you two and a half meals? Okay, yeah, two dinners to one I'll bet the Tampa Bay race Really?

Yeah So I need two and a half dinners. You'll get two dinners and a lunch Compared to mine one dinner. They're plus 245. That's two and a half dinners. You're getting two dinners and an appetizer. That's, hey, that's a deal.

Citizens of H-town! Welcome the president of your Houston Astros. Hail to the chief of Crush City. How about the Houston Astros? Astros, President Reed Ryan on 790. It's brought to you by Expedity, the future of awesome. All right, here we go. 607, the first pitch time.

We'll be here until three. Adam and Adam. We'll be over at home plate bar and grill at 3 o'clock, and then I'll join them at 4.30, taking you to 5.30 for the network join of game number 5. Reed Ryan. How's the office today? Well, Maddie, I am talking to the call for a box. I'm just kind of pacing around the stadium today, walking on aimlessly, waiting on the gate to open, nervous.

So, you know, it's right to go. It's that excitement, Christmas Day type of season. here at Minamade today. You know what? You're supposed to be nervous, and I was telling us to Ross. Nobody likes Game Vives. I mean, we love them because there's great drama to it, but there is somebody's going home tonight.

It's crazy. And as I told the audience yesterday, look, the Astrobatts have not been great in this series. We all know that. But this Tampa Bay pitching staff, I think, frankly, hasn't gotten enough credit because, A, they've been accustomed to doing this bullpen-type game, and when they do it, larger, they're pretty good at it.

I mean, look, they won, what, 90s? six games in the AL East with the Red Sox and the Yankees in there. And, you know, Baltimore's rebuilding. So picked up a couple there. But, you know, had they been in our division? You know, how many do they win in that division? So they're good. They're really good.

And, yeah, it's the concern I don't think has been Cole, even Verlander coming in on short rest, heroic effort, you know, grind in to keep us in the ballgame where we have a chance in our final at that. you know, we could have won that game. And, you know, it was great series down there. I wish we could have come out on top and not had to play this game. But look, we had an incredible season. We've got a shot to win one ball game at home with a 20-game winner,

300 strikeout guy on the hill who's been as dominant as anybody in baseball. And if we win this game, we get to go play to go to the World Series. So it's exciting. It's what we've been working towards, really, since Jim Crane bought the club. It's what the expectation of this fan base is, is that we play for championships here. And tonight, we have a chance to play for a championship. And who knows, Matt? You know, last year we went through Cleveland real easy.

Maybe this develops a little bit of grit for some of these guys that helps us, you know, win the whole thing. So I'm looking at it as a positive. I just am ready for 607. No question about that. Any tickets available at this point or has everything gone? No, you know, you've got to go to the secondary market at this point. You know, Stubhub or somewhere like that's normally the best way to get seats. You know, the deal today, gates open three hours early, so starting at 3 o'clock, we'll have the street fest going, you know, so get down here and get in the ballpark.

We want to pack this place and really create that home field advantage. We got Bagwell throwing out the first pitch The Yordon Alvarez, so maybe a little bit of You know, rookie of the year foreshadowing as Bagwell was our first ever rookie of the year And, you know, we think we got the good vibes going here at home So let's play ball and it's been a great year And hopefully we're playing the Yankees at home on Saturday. I love the fact you've been able to connect today's players of the yesterday's players.

What was it like with Billy Wagner and Roberto Osuna hanging out? You know, it was really fun. Billy back at the game. I sat with him and Vigio and Bagwell down in my seat. And when you get guys together, even if it's been 10 years since they've seen each other, they just pick right up where they left off with the stories and the memories. And it was pretty cool. A fan walked up to me and said, do you know how many people would pay a lot of money to sit down there by those three guys and listen to them, talk and watch this ball game? And, you know, it just, what people forget is we've had some incredible players here in the past. And, you know, part of my job is I want to try to

highlight those guys, connect our new players to some of the history of this club, and let's try to build something great so that, you know, we become one of the storied franchises of baseball. And tonight's one of those nights, Matt, that we can take that next step if we win tonight. Are you superstitious at all? Oh, of course. I've been in baseball my whole life, man. You know, it's like same tie, same, you know, drive the same way to work the whole deal. But the problem is when you start getting too many of them, then you can't remember them all.

So trying to keep it positive today. Was your dad any different in playoff games than he was during the regular season? Because I'm trying to, look, AJ's very level-headed. The clubhouse seems to be about the same as soon as it was when I was in Tampa. But I'm just curious when the doors are closed, do guys, and it's not wrong or right, it's just human because the intensity and the importance of these games are 50 million times more than they are a regular game in May. So I'm just curious what you've noticed in terms of mannerisms, demeanor in the last few days

as compared to, say, a mid-week series against the A's. Yeah, it's ratcheted up a notch, no doubt about it. You know, in Tampa, Jose Cruz Jr., Chaito, works for the Players Association, and he and I and Garrett Stubbs were just kind of sitting around the food room because we carry these extra guys, the guys that didn't make the roster, case somebody gets hurt or if we need them for the next playoff series. And, you know, Garrett was saying, hey, this has been incredible for me to be around and be a part of. But, like, I'm getting out of these guys' way and letting them do their work now.

And that's really kind of been the attitude of everybody is, you know, kind of respect the ritual, the process, the preparation, you know, the work in the video room, the work in the cage. And what's great about our players is, you know, we're five hours from game time, basically. And they can start, you know, their busy time is digging into the prep, digging into the reps, and in creating that focus. For the rest of us to work around the organization, we just have to hurry up and wait. And that's the hard part around here. Any ideas? Okay.

Do I even talk about – I was going to ask about the weekend series time. But you know what? Let's not do that. Let's just talk about tonight. Who's trying to jinx? I'm not as I'm saying. I got to talk to Eddie Martini. You've got to run somebody out of here.

I stopped myself in mid-sentence, so that's still a save on my part. I'm trying to think what else. What do you think about the whole Tampa experience, St. Petersburg, good crowds, but I felt like half the audience didn't even know who half the players were. Well, I'll tell you what, it was a great atmosphere over there. You know, what's funny about Tampa is they put up really big TV ratings over there. People love the race. there's just an element of some older people.

There's an element of some fixed income as folks have moved there to retire. And I spent a lot of time in our two days there just kind of talking, man on the street as we went out to eat. And what folks really say is that they lack a corporate base. There's really not, you know, the corporate base. And if you look around Minutemade Park, a lot of the companies in Houston, you know, They take care of us by buying signs, buying tickets, getting their employees out, supporting our youth initiatives. And so Tampa is actually, I think, a really good baseball town.

People love the sport. They follow it. It's just the price of poker and big league baseball is getting ratcheted up as, you know, the haves and the have-nots, the disparity kind of grows. And so the fact they're able to do what they do on their payroll is just incredible. They have a great organization. They produce some incredible talent over the years. and they're a scary team, man.

They're a really scary team. I will tell you, though, Matt, the highlight of the trip to Tampa, which there weren't many because we lost both games, was I had dinner with Todd Callis and his wife, Michelle, and Duane Stats and his wife, Carla. And, you know, Duane was our broadcaster here in the late 70s, early 80s. And it's so odd for those guys because they've worked 150 to 162 games. And then all of a sudden, the playoffs come, and they're just sitting on the sidelines with nothing to do. And it's really, it was an interesting dinner just to get their perspective on what it's like for them to go through this series and be taken out of their day-to-day responsibilities. I really mixed opinions about that because when I was a very, very, very young baseball fan, the team broadcasters would join the network broadcast.

But then there was all this talk of pro one side or pro the other. And then you get broadcasters that come in and do this series who haven't been around the team that don't know the team that mispronounce the names, that don't know who they are. So it's kind of a damn if you, damn if you don't. But at the end of the day, the folks at FS1, MLB Network and ESPN and TBS are broadcasting to the entire country. They're not doing it to a Tampa Bay or Houston fan base. You know, you're right. And that's probably been the number one thing I've got on Twitter over this series has been people's distinctions. for the broadcast

team and the fact that we've had different broadcast teams and different people on the broadcast kind of across everything from MLB to FS1. One of the great ideas I saw on, and I've watched it in the National Championship game before is where, you know, if you want

Alabama or Clemson broadcast team, they run it on one of the other channels. And so I think it's a great idea. I'd love to see it. I don't know in the early rounds that that'll ever happen, but what's really special is our fans are accustomed to our broadcast team. I think they do a great job. And the ratings have reflected both the play on the field and the connection with those guys.

And so they're missed, but we had dinner, and it was a good dinner. And, you know, hopefully tonight we take care of business. And we'll hopefully have another one somewhere. All right. Go find your office couch. Take a little nap. You may need it before 6 o'clock. Thanks for the time.

Yeah, we'll be good. We'll be good. Thank you, Houston, for all the support. Let's get out early. Let's get loud. and let's get a win tonight. Perfect. And we're going to help that next.

Thank you, Reed, Reid, Ryan, president of business operations for the Astros. Yeah. It's the Mike Thomas show. And it's time for an Astros revival. If you would like to speak to the clergy,

713-212-5-790. 7-13-212-5-7-90. I present to you, the Reverend's... R.V. Oh, it's a beautiful Thursday afternoon here in Houston, Texas, Matthew. Thomas and I appreciate you bringing me to the joint congregation here as we all get prepared for an ALDS game five at Minute Maid Park. And oh, my baseball lords, we have many things to pray for you today, the first of which is blessing the arm of one.

Garrett Cole. We understand that you have touched his arm, Lord, with the electricity that gives him 100 mile per hour fastballs, even if it's in the eighth inning. Now, he threw 118 pitches in his last start, Lord, so I understand that he may be wrapping with fatigue. However, I ask you give him strength tonight to mow down the Tampa Bay raise hitters. Can you please allow G. Manchoy to not walk like 17. times like he did in the last game, my lord.

Please give Garrett Cole the same strength that you gave him in the last game that he pitched against the Tampa Bay Rays where he was striking out the Tampa Bay ray hitters left and right. And also, my lord, we ask that you please wake up the bats of many Astros who have been struggling throughout this series. My lord, please, you have allowed Michael Brantley to lace some lined. drives out into the field, but unfortunately they have been befallen into the hands of the Tampa Bay Raid defenders and Lord, we please let you allow them to hit into the gaps and over the fences

the hard hit balls of Jordon Alvarez, of Michael Bradley, of George Springer, Lord, we pray the Astros bats have been bamboozled and befuddled by the pitching of the Tampa Bay Rays. Tyler Glass now. He is a fine young pitcher. We understand, my Lord. But we ask, please allow him to be stricken with some sort of disease of the brain, infect him with

the demons, and allow the Astros bats to get going for the first time. Since game one of this series where they scored six runs, they have since scored three. Three and one. This is not acceptable, my lord. Please, we ask of you. We beg of you.

to allow the Astros' bats to awaken from their deep slumber. Thank you, Reverend. Inspiring. Any other requests? If you shall choose to be a part of the revival, the phone lines are yours. Yes, if you would like to step up and testify, 713-212-5-797-13-21-25-7-97. 790, our baseball lords will keep us strong. We appreciate you for having Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman carry the day for the offense,

and we ask that they maintain their greatness in a game five at Minute Made Park in front of 43,000-plus Astro fans. Good Lord, we hope that they can keep the greatness going for game five against the evil Tampa Bay raise. Brother Nick, the pulpit is yours. Lord, give these Astros your knights of the heaven the strength to smite these devil rays. They stand in our path to glory. They stand in our path to the light. We need our bats to wake up so we may cast out these demon fish and send them back to the eternal darkness that is tampernought.

of Bay, Florida. Send them back to the Waffle Houses. The Tropicana ends. The congestion on 75, the freeway, and the 14 double-X shirts that become extra small after one washing for $9. Send them back to that. Oh, Lord.

Brother Joseph at 108 on 790. Hello, Brother Joseph. Yes, Reverend Rowe. We have left that house to the demons and the devil of Tropicana Field. And we are coming back home to the House of the Lord, Minutemate Park. And we all know that Minutemade is a superior orange juice to Tropicana. It is not from Concentrate. And the Astros will score many runs tonight, many, many, many runs.

And the cold train is going to roll all the way through H-town and all the way to the American League Championship Series. And we will not be the Dodgers. We will not lose game five on our home field. We will go on and we will defeat the Yankees and then we will go to the World Series and we will win it here in 2019. Amen.

Thank you, brother, Joseph. We take one more from the congregation. By the way, continue to pass the plates. Yes, please always remember. We are trying to build a new foyer in the church. We thank our sponsors. You'll be hearing one in a matter of moments. We must pay our organists.

We are four weeks back, home payments. Brother John, welcome to the congregation. I'll give you a testifying. Testify this. We don't get right. You're going to be another part of history like the Oilers in Buffalo when we were the best team in the league and got beat three games in a row. This is straight evil!

Bigra evil in this circus ten of our clergy. He is not wrong, man. The good sports lords have sought down to strike down the Houston Oilers. To strike down the 1998 Houston Astros in 2004 as well. We asked that they show us back the light that they showed us in 2017. Much better, brother. No random doubles going down the wall like they did it at Fenway Park last year. just let them fly straight and true over the Crawford boxes

as they leave the bats. No outfield catches in left field. What an amazing catch, said TBS announcer who doesn't know the team. Two more calls. Brother Jim and Crosby. Hello, Brother Jim. Yeah, so I want the Astros to win and I have the recipe for the revival to succeed.

And this is it. The actual players during batting practice in Warma must throw many balls to the fans. They must keep the baseball gods and throw the balls to the bench. And then the fans must give all the balls to the kids. So what you are saying, my brother, is you are looking for a souvenir treat in such important times. Clearly, this young man is going to batting practice and is looking for his, many freebies as possible. Greed is a sin.

By the way, the collection plate is coming around one more time. Yeah, let's go ahead and send that back through one once again, through the congregation. Brother Bruce, you're the final man to speak in this revival. What do you got? Oh, Lord, thank you. Brother Bruce here, and I agree with all the other does of the city.

Look here. Lord, he's just blessed Mr. Spring's back. One time, would you please? I know he's called us in the church, but he needs his bad a blessing so he can hit that ball tall and then cross and rock the middle of track either and look here i did put them on that plate so i don't know we supposed to get our prayers answer thank you brother thank you brother bruce and that is an astro's revival and hopefully

we never have to do it again because the next time either a tire or down we don't do it when they're like up three one we don't do a revival we do like a celebration yeah they're winning tonight Give me the strength to not argue with people on Twitter because I have not been having that strength this morning. You arguing again? You mute this conversation and we're gone. Yeah, we're gone. We're done. There is a big douchebag named SportsBlass Houston.

I don't know that that guy is a douchebag. I don't know anything about him. He is a douchebag. He is a douchebag. First of all, he hates me. So why do you listen to me? I don't get it. I'm just explaining, like, you were talking about the guy who said, hey, the bit sucks on Twitter.

Like, okay, if you think the bit sucks, don't listen. You don't like, if I go to a restaurant, Matt, and I think the service sucks, I don't go up to the waiter's face and go what, you know what, man, you suck. You're the worst waiter I've ever seen. You just don't go back. Yeah, you just don't go back. Like, if you think our bit sucks, you don't have to go out. Look, we can, I can handle it. I've had hundreds of people tell me I suck on Twitter.

Oh, my God, I've lived my life. But I just don't get it. I don't look like, oh, you know what, man, if I watch an episode of, like, I thought the sixth episode of season two of Stranger Things sucked. And I love that show. I don't go up to the duffer. brothers and find their Twitter and say, you know what, guys, that sixth episode was horrible. You guys suck. Guess what I did?

Yeah. When I don't find an episode of This Is Us to be very good, I don't tweet at me anymore. You don't go to the producers and say, man, that was horrible. Like, you just move on about it. Move on. Whatever. Dana Hogerson in 15 minutes. Dr. Roto at 2 o'clock and the AJ Hinch press conference at 2.45, so a lot to get to

between now and 3 o'clock. Carl and Dickinson's been very patient. We'll get to him. We'll get to the rest of you at 713212-570.790. Don't leave Matt Thomas in your car. Take him with you. Download the free IHeartRadio app for your phone at Sports790.com. Just remember you'll have to feed him.

Thomas 122. It is the Matt Thomas. O'Donnellerson is going to join us in a few minutes. Cougars against the Natty this Saturday. Hopefully it's a really busy time in Houston Sports on Saturday. Well, the Cougars against the bearcats at 2.30 at TDCU. And then a 7 o'clock for the Astros. And you know what?

Screw it. The Astros upon the Yankees in game one on Saturday. Oh, okay. Let me tell you something. If you believe me saying that is, then you must be broadcast. You can't say no hitter guy. I got a huge news for you all. What's that?

I have nothing to do with the success of any sporting event. That's true. Zero. I am just as much responsible for a four-hit day as I am for an 0-4. Hmm. Same. Okay. Nick seems to disagree.

Well, Nick's just like playing with sound effects back there. That's true. You don't care. For the most part, no. By the way, your revival was very good. You got into character. Was it? I'm talking about you.

I'm talking about Nick. You were average. Nick was like above the average. Oh, good job, Nick. Because sometimes Nick says things and you're like, what the hell they just say? But that actually made a lot of sense right there. Thanks. What did I say? Exactly.

I'm speaking in tongues. That's right. 713, 2, 1,2, 5, 790. Carl's and Dickinson on 790. Hi, Carl. Well, I called it right to last game, but I got a good prediction tonight. Okay? All right.

The Astros, we're going to knock them out of the ballpark tonight. Guaranteed. I just checked my little Yorkshire, and his little ears are crooked, and he's looking at me kind of. happy, so whatever Sparky tells me, they're going to win, they're going to win big. That's your dog's name is Sparky? Yeah, I'm named him after Sparky Anderson.

Okay, so let me get this straight. Your dog's ears flipped. His ears turn when they asked those to win. I don't understand it. Do you day drink? Do you day drink or no? Sir? Do you day drink?

No, no. but what I'm telling you is I told you Verlander was going to get knocked out of the park a couple days ago. Remember I told you all that? They were ready for them. Not really, but that's okay. We'll trust you. Tonight, they're going to, the a half-shows are going to believe

how great they're going to do. Now, if we win big, I'm going to call you back. I'm going to check Sparky's ears next week. All right, Carl. Ross, how are your ears right now? Normal? A little big from my head, but that's okay. We got a few minutes before we get to Dana here.

Let me run through. few scenarios. What do you got? You tell me how likely this could be. We did a little bit of this yesterday. We'll do it again today. I'm scared. Astros fall behind 2-0.

Pored on an inning, say, 5, 6, 7, 7,000, win the game 7 to 3, 7 to 4. Is that what you called? I forget. I think. I said 7 to 4. Okay. What do you think?

Plausible? Sure, right? Yeah, okay. Cole's not giving up two early runs. St. Louis, Tampa plays a role of St. Louis, and the Astros are down 10-0 after a year. That's zero percent chance.

Astros are up six to one. Harris and Presley and Osuna. Get it to six, five. Oh, no. Runner at second and A, Osuna finishes the game or B, somebody else finishes it. Zach Grinky comes in or what? No, no, he's untouchable. You can't use that Grinkey at all today.

No. You got to throw the kitchen sink, Matt. No, but he ain't the kitchen sink. He's like, he's like the, he's like the, the dishwashing lotion. You can throw him one inning today. He's the palm olive. You throw him one inning today. He can go Saturday.

Charlie Morton pitching today, yes or no. You might. I thought I didn't ask questions. Either yes or no, no, I might. We'll see Charlie Morton at some point. How about that? Blake Snell. No.

Diego Castillo, who was amazing. Oh, yeah, 100%. Oh, yeah. Let me taste something. He walked out that mound like he had just finished game seven of the World Series We'll probably see him at St. Petersburg. We'll probably see him early. Over under on time of game.

First pitch is 607. I'm going to put the over under and the end time at 9.57. Going to go three hours, 50 minutes. Three hours 50? I hope under. I hope under. Go look at the times. I'm going under.

You're not going to want to see the end results. I think about Major League Baseball. It's the best time of year for baseball fans. But if you're in the East Coast, are you standing up until 10, 15 at night to watch the ending of a raise? Astros Division Series game? Are today's youth and say Cincinnati are going to stay up and watch that whole thing?

I mean, if you're baseball fans, yeah. Let's see. The game times this series so far. 324, 346, 337, 349. I'm going under. Oh, I'm going way over. Okay. 350 is the overtime.

9.57. Game will not be done. Because everybody's going to unleash their bullpen. No room for air anywhere to go. Cole's throwing complete game shut out. God, I hope you're right. I absolutely hope you're right. I hope our might too.

And remember, if the Astros lose tonight, it's Disco Friday Day with Matt Thomas. Disco and day drinking. We're going to just fly out, we'll have like an open liquor cabinet here on the station because there's no way I'm doing a sober show tomorrow. There just isn't. Okay. 713212-750.

7-1-2-5-790. Let's say how to our good friend, Dana Holgerson. He is next. Dr. Roto coming up at 2 o'clock for some NFL of Fantasy Football. conversation, A.J. Hinch's press conference at 245. Your hoops. The Houston Rockets. Your hits. And the Astros.

And your honest opinions. All the tickles play. All in for Houston all day. This is Sports Talk 790. Our friends of the joint chiropractic bring you our weekly visit with Dana Holgerson, getting a week off after the Cougars got a week off, knocked off North Texas. and I'll tell you what, Dana. First of all, congratulations.

Be nice to hear your voice and see, these little walks you get on Thursdays. I'm going to be nearly as bad with the weather we're about to get the next couple days. Well, it's around 92 and just sunny and gorgeous right now. I heard it's going to cool down a little bit, but I haven't seen that yet. We've been out there for three days, and it's been pretty hot. I was hoping it would stay hot for this weekend's game. We finally got a home game at 2.30. But it's going to be a nice day.

All right. So I want you to grade yourself on the speech before the game, because I'm thinking about if you were to walk in the Astros Clubhouse, how would Dana Holgerson tell the boys about tonight's game five? So give me like 10 seconds of what you would tell the local nine if you were getting ready for the game. And you were in there in chart. And AJ said, hey, I brought Dana Holgerson in to kind of get you guys fired up. You're going to be sorely disappointed, my.

My new Rockney pregame speech is just really honestly don't exist. You know, I'm just, I'm a firm believer in messaging, which we do throughout the course of the week, and typically the messaging doesn't change. We kind of got a feel for what we got to do to be able to win the game. And you get those guys in there, you call them up, and you'll save Lord's care, and we get a win on three and then we go we go out there and we do it.

I tell you all those pre-game thing, if you're really getting somebody really fired up right before the game, that wears off right after kickoff. So it's almost like you've got to do your best work on like Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Thursdays. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah, we practice on. Yeah, we go Monday night, then we go Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday afternoon, you know, and then pretty much the haze in the barn at that point.

But, you know, I just try to be consistent with what the messaging is. And, you know, the messaging this week, we got a really good team coming in on Saturday. Cincinnati's a top 25 team. They're four and one with their only loss against Ohio State. But it's really kind of the same thing as it was against North Texas at this point with the Houston Cougars. We just, we've got to worry about us and we've got to worry about just improving week to week. All right. So let's get honest here.

Clayton, too, was really, really good. Not only was he accurate, move your team down the field. He had a terrific run late in the contest that kind of sealed things. Unfortunately, he pulled a little bit of the hamstring. I'm assuming since it hasn't been much headlines that he's 100% locked and loaded. Is that right? I wouldn't say 100, but he's awful close. You know, unfortunately, he's got a ton of reps, a lot of snaps and a lot of reps up until this point.

And, you know, it was good to watch him go in there and execute. We felt very, very, very confident that he would do that, just with the amount of reps that he's had. I thought he played really well. You know, last week didn't get a lot of reps and had absolutely gotten to the points where he's been getting reps, going to understand the game playing for sure. But it doesn't really need the reps based on the fact that he's got all the reps here for the last, you know, since we've been here in January. He's got a good bit of him.

So he's going to be ready to go. He's going to be locked and loaded and ready to go. Dana, honestly, you've had a lot of victories in your career as a head football coach. And I don't know where you put the North Texas game, but there was obviously a lot of stuff going on with Derek's situation and whether or not guys really were vested in the program. Was there a little bit of the, you know what, I'm proud of you boys, not only for burning North Texas, but kind of showing America that this team hasn't given up on the season. No.

You know, people are saying we're throwing the towel in and we're, I don't know, I guess people are using like a tanking deal. I don't even know what that is in college athletics, but it's really, you know, just I was just proud with the way the guys they just attacked the week and they put their head down and they blocked it all out. And they worried about themselves and we played hard. I thought it was a good team win. We dominated on special teams, which is good to see.

And then offensively and defensively, we improved. And that's just what we're at as a program right now is where we are as a football team. It's where we're at as a program is. Your job is just to continuously try to get better. Has the team, I'm assuming that the off time took care of some nicks and bruises with some guys. Is that fair to say? Oh, yeah. You know, and I heard you say, Matt, it was an off week. I can assure you it wasn't that. But we did have some downtime, you know, which was, which was really beneficial, you know, and from a mental standpoint, it was really beneficial as well. just, you know, when you play that many games in that short period of time, the mental fatigue is what was more concerning to me than the physical aspect of it.

So I came at a good time. You know, we gave them the weekend off. We, you know, went out and did some recruiting, which was all real positive and real good. But just getting back and getting ready to go, these guys were fired up. Our GPS numbers have been really good here this weekend. It's going to be a battle on Saturday. Cincinnati is a really good football team. Yeah, I should correct myself, Danny, because when I say off week, I go to Vegas for four or five days. These young men are in class for a couple days. Yeah, I'm usually on a beach

or something like that myself. But we were at high school football games. I did take Friday afternoon, went and watch the Astros, win game one. You know, looking forward to being able to watch that game tonight, game five. I hope they're going to get us a victory right here. But, you know, the haze in the barn at this point,

and I got my radio show tonight, and then I want to watch him to that game. Tell me about Desmond Ritter. What do you like about him? He's the quarterback for Cincinnati. Yeah, they got a big back field now. I mean, they play Big Ten football is what they do. I mean, Fickles is a Ohio State guy, Big Ten guy. I mean, they're going to be physical, you know, on the offense side.

I know they throw the ball a good bit, too. They're about 50% each, but they're going to try to establish the run with got big backs. They've got, you know, three or four different guys that they're going to try to get involved in the run game. And then they're going to play good defense to be found on special teams. So it really reminds me a big 10 football. You know, got to watch a little bit of football here this past weekend. And, you know, that's the type of stuff that they do. Staying with that strategy, I think their tight end leads their team in reception.

So is that become a bigger focus of practice this week is going after guys? When frankly, sometimes you don't even see tight ends in football? ball games. Yeah, well, we've got a pretty good one. I think that's starting to come into a zone right now. Christian Trahan, one of our leading receivers and snap guys as well. So it's good for our defense to be able to go against us. We're multiple. You know, we're obviously trying to run the football as well. And just being able to practice at that, against that with the tight ends and stuff is going to help our defense, you know, moving forward. We'll leave it that, Dana.

Thank you for the visit, as always. We'll see you on Saturday. Best of luck, and good luck. And it's nice having you guys home for a little while. This will be a nice little run here the next few weeks after this is a Yukon. Yeah. Yeah, it's awful nice to be able to play a home game. You know, the scheduling gods weren't very kind to us,

and the American didn't do us really any favors by putting our first home game that October. Hopefully we've had to change in the future. It isn't really fair to our fan base. But with that said, here we are. We're home. to play Saturday at 2.30. I apologize for all the construction and the noise in the background.

There's just all kinds of buildings going on here at the University of Houston, which we're not going to apologize for. No, I was going to say. What are you putting out? Football facilities, baseball's looking good. Helda for Tita Center's a freaking amazing facility. I mean, you've got it all right now. Well, we don't get it at all.

That football facilities must have got to be next. So we got plans for it, but that's not what you're currently here. This is academic buildings and parking garages, which is needed as well. We get to 11 wins and get to a championship. I'll help you write a check. Is that fair? There you go. There you go.

Thanks, Dana. We'll see you later. Okay. Dana Hogerson joining us from the University of Houston here on Sports Talk 790. Greg Bejo here. The heart of the order is up right now. Matt Thomas is swinging for the fences here on Sports Talk 790. Fantasy football chair coming up in 12 minutes with a good doctor on Sports Talk.

719. 713-212-5-790 is how you reach our show if you want to get in. Astros getting ready for tonight's matchup with the Tampa Bay Rays. Ross, you know I love poll questions on Sports790.com. Yes, I do. And the recent results are in, let me see if I can get you the results of the poll question. Of course, that would be better if I had it ready. Well, that's what a good host would do.

Can you segue for like five seconds? Oh, here it is. Yeah, why don't you go ahead and follow? No, I'm done. At Mortim T. 1,323 votes are in. Wow. 86% have the Astros winning.

14% have the raise. You said it's a coin flip game, though, Matt. Yeah, but I'm not talking to a coin flip audience. I know. It's called a selection bias. The people that are following you are all Astros fans. If you're a Tampa host, you might have a different... What if I would have gone to raise.com and said, hey, everybody, what you all up to?

Yeah, that's what you all up to? Yeah. It might have been different results. G. Man Choy, I'm tired of hearing about those chance. Yeah. I'm done seeing Tommy Fam. I'm tired of him walking on three, two counts. He's done nothing but walk.

His on base is like almost a thousand. It's not supposed to be, but it can be. That's okay. He's going to strike out a ton tonight. I can feel it. Did yesterday's results wig you out more or less? The answer to me is easily more. No bearing.

Oh, absolutely. Because everybody in Dodgerland was like, Oh, Washington, we got this. Atlanta, we hit all these home runs. We got all of our starting pitchers. They had Mike Fultenevich going, the former Astro. And he got crushed. Fulte was good this year.

Until yesterday. Sound familiar? They sent Brian, poor Brian McCann into retirement. Houston 7, Tampa 4. Really? Wait, that's what you said 4-1 earlier? Was that me? That was you.

4-1 Astros. I don't know how they're scoring 7 against these pitching. That's what I'm saying. It just makes no sense for me to say seven runs. Okay. You're going with it. Okay. Yeah. The total is seven. By the way, those of you that want Josh Redick not to play tonight, that's not going to happen. He's going to speak to the media in about 40 minutes from now, and AJ Hinch is not putting a player up on the stage that's not going to play. That'd be awfully embarrassing to him, so.

Hmm. Okay. I'm trying to think what else. I don't know what else you can do. These teams know each other. Is this just like you and I trying to discuss a game seven of a playoff series? Or maybe like the third match, a boxing rematch. It's like the third match. You already know each other very well. Like Ali Frazier 3, the Thrilla in Manila. But it's funny as you say that, I get less interest in rematches in boxing

where the later in the games in the series makes it more interesting. Mayweather, ever want to see Pachial Mayweather ever again? I have no interest in that whatsoever. The Thrill in Manila is one of the greatest fights of all time. Because that's one among eight million round threes of something. Let's see. Pacquiao and Marquez, 4 was a great fight. That's the fight you came over for and I started cursing of the TV because Paciow got knocked out cold. Yes. We weren't there very long either. It was a six round. Six round knockout. Thanks for making me remember that. Sorry about that. It's a horrible match. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, the only advantage I would say, can I get B, I'll just be glass three quarters full.

Mickey Ward and what's his name, Arturo Gotti three was a thrilling fight. Okay. We'll get to boxing to America tomorrow. Jose Altuvae mentioned this yesterday. He's seen all the pictures now. There's nothing that's going to surprise him because the rays have literally emptied the whatever. Kitchen sink, whatever.

There's nothing they haven't seen before. That's true, but he sure was swinging wildly at those sinkers from Luis Castillo, so hopefully that doesn't happen again. But he also went deep in game three. So I'm not, look, to be brutally honest, I'm not worried about Jose Al-Tuvre. I'm not worried about Yorda and Alvarez.

I'm not worried about Alex Spragman. How do you feel about Jordan Alvado? I love me some Jordan Alvado. He's my bestie. The fact is, if there's anything to worry about, it's I need my Michael Brantley back of everything except September. His September was not good. And the George Springer.

I mean, he got a couple of hits yesterday in game four a couple days ago, but he hasn't been able to be nearly the table setter. That's why lead off guys are so important to teams. They set the momentum so ridiculously early. And I don't care if they say, well, they only technically do it once per game. That may be true. But every time you feel like George Springer is at the plate, he's about to start something. You know what I mean?

He gets on base. It feels like so often that he's getting on something else behind him is going to be even better. He's a streaky hitter. He's always been. I think he'll be okay. I like you picking him as the breakout candidate. I'm with it. The outfields got to do something.

Look, the Astros have won games without Josh Roder kidding. I mean, that's just the reality of it. A lot of them. And again, I've never been. Second half of the season. Yeah. I've never been around a team that relies on a ninth place hitter to determine whether or not they're going to want to play a series.

Everybody's worried about him. He's hitting night. Like, it's okay. Let's go to Brandon on 790. Hi, Brandon. How are you? Good. I'm going to talk about Astros today.

Well, I would hope so. You were guys talking about our man number 23, Michael Brantley. How much does he have today or yesterday or Tuesday? Yeah, Michael, Brandon, he has not had a home run in the series. Thanks for the phone call. Yeah, Brantley's Powerstroke has just not been there. He got two hits in game one and has not hit, I got a hit or a walk since. Isn't it funny?

We have not mentioned Carlos Corre's name as a guy that's picked a click. No, I don't expect a whole lot out of him. Although somebody did pick him on Twitter. His OPS on the series is 250. Michael Brantley. That's on base plus. Slugging. That shows you how much of a slump he's been in. But, I mean, unfortunately, we're kind of used to this with Michael the month of September.

This hasn't been a great month for him. That's true. Got to turn it around at some point. Well, better be now, because tonight is. It's now or never. It's a must win for sure. Wow, should we play that? No.

Elvis song? That's a jam. I don't like Elvis. You don't like Elvis? Generally speaking. What? Yeah. Not my guy.

Okay. Elves is one of the all-time greats, Matt. Yeah. You don't like the Beatles. I've never said that. I never said that. Yeah, you do. I said I don't think their music holds up as much as some people.

Oh, yeah, it's funny. It's 2019 and it's still holding up beautifully. I just said it's not holding up. It's holding up. You put on, oh, I want to hold my hand. That's not going to move me. But that's not the Beatles. That's not?

That's early Beatles. Oh, I'm sorry, who is that? You put on, let's see what song would hold up. Hey Jude, let it be. Hey Jude, it's a good one. Revolution. Revolution sucks. Revolution's a great song.

That sucks. Let it be and Hey Jude, I'll give you those. Okay. Among 40 other hits. Before we get to Dr. Roto, let's say hi to Ray Ray on 7-9. Ray, Ray, how are you feeling about tonight? I'm feeling good, MP. I'm feeling good, MC.

You know, we got home to them. Declos, Gary Cole, you know, everything going our way. But I think we just need to be more aggressive with the play, more disciplined at the same time. And don't help these pitchers out. I know we're going to face the guy who pitched game one, right? Glass now or whatever. They start switching up pitchers like that. Again, we just need to make sure they put it over the plate.

Make sure they come to them. They got to come to them anyways. They got to put it over the plate. Let them find the strike zone. We just got to be disciplined at the plate, not help them swinging at crazy pitches because, you know, they get frustrated but not getting hit. And then everybody wants to hit a home run versus just putting the bat on the ball, getting some contact, face hit.

We still score runs with base hits, but you can't score any when everybody's trying to hit a home run. See, and thank you for the call, right, right. I appreciate it. I don't think I'm watching, I'm not watching them hit home runs. I think they're having a difficult time just making contact period. Yeah, there's... Teams that have large strikeout counts are the ones that are swinging for the fence.

They need strikeouts in the game. Very normal. Yeah, they're not swell. George Springer's kind of swinging out of his shoes, but that's what George Springer does. He does it in a middle of a spring training game. For the most part, that's, I don't see a whole lot of that from the Astros hitters. In my opinion, I think they're just not seeing the ball well, and they're swinging and missing and getting a lot of soft contact. All right, good, doctor.

Before we get to the football action, you are in race country. I don't know how big that is. There were 30,000 people the last two times when I was in St. Pete. But how is Southwest Florida feeling about tonight's game? You know, we don't really talk much about the race down here. I'm about two hours south. But you know what? They're plucky and their pitching is good.

So I was disappointed that the Dodgers lost yesterday. I always wanted the two best teams to play. I wanted to see the Astros play the Dodgers. It's going to be a great game today. Cole's got to do it. He's going to get a big old contract this year, so this is a way to earn it. So I'm rooting for them. Let's get to the games.

First of all, we'll start about this evening's matchup. Weather is apparently going to be a factor between the Giants and the Patriots in Foxborough. How does that affect our skill position players this evening? I think fantasy football players overrate the weather, right? The offense knows where they're going. The defense doesn't. So it's always an advantage to the offense. I worry more about wind and fog, right?

If it's windy, then it's harder for the guy, for the quarterback to throw the football. And if it's fog, it's harder for the receiver to see. But look, the Giants are just really bad tonight. But if you're desperate for a running back, maybe John Hilleman, because he's going to get the touches, but you're starting Michelle, you're starting James White, you're starting Gordon, you're starting Edelman, you're starting Brady, and this game is going to be an utter blowout.

So 17 points, regardless of fantasy, we shouldn't worry about the final score then, right? Yeah, it's going to be like 43 to 3, something ridiculous. All right. Philadelphia and Minnesota, two schizophrenic teams, two teams that you could easily say are NFC title contenders, and then two teams you could say that could throw up a dud in a particular week. So how does that affect who we play and who we sit when these offenses are so schizophrenic so far? Yeah, no, it's a good point.

I think that the Vikings have the advantage if they're willing to let Kirk Cousins throw the football like they did last week, because the Eagles are susceptible in their secondary. It's very weak. They are really good at stopping the run. If you own Dalvin Cook this week, you'll see him having way better luck with receiving yards than you will have him rushing. So, but I think this is a stealing week. I think this is a digs week. Start them.

I know you're thinking not to, but I do think it's a good opportunity. For the Eagles, look, went past to play well. Earth has to play well, and they have to figure out how to run the football against the Vikings. If they could run the football, they'll set up the pass. I think Jeffrey's got a tough matchup. Maybe Aguilore is a sneaky start. All right. With Washington and Miami, we would never.

watch this game unless we had two things. Fantasy football and betting. So with that being said, and your responsibility to our audience is giving us the good fantasy stuff, who is sitting and who is playing in this awful matchup? Yeah, just throw the record out when these two teams play. For the Redskins, I do like Adrian Peterson. Bill Callahan has already come in and said we want to run the football. That is good news. If the Redskins get out to a lead, Adrian Peterson could have 20 carries for 80 yards in a touchdown. I know it seems ridiculous, but it could happened. And I think we're going to start Terry McCorn. He's startable every week. He's been sensational, and Case Keenan makes him even better. For the Dolphins, what a mess. I guess you're

starting Kenyon Drake because he's been very good. Albert Wilson is back for them this week, so I think he might be interesting. And Preston Wilson's been very successful this year. That's it. Teddy Bridgewater as a saint. Have we noticed the numbers about where they would be with Breeze? Has there been a dramatic drop-off? Where are we with them as they go to Jacksonville, who's trying to stay close with the Texans and the cult in the AFC South? Well, the drop-off is with the peripheral players, right? So, you know, Michael Thomas is getting his, and Alvin Kamara is getting his. It's the Ted Gins of the world.

It's the Treykins of the world. It's the Traquins of the world. You know, Jared Cook was successful last week because the Buccaneers are horrific covering the tight end. Right? So that's the problem. That's what makes free so great. He involves everybody with the Saints. Now with Teddy Bridgewater, it's literally Thomas and Camar. Seattle plays at Cleveland.

The Browns have been a disappointment because so many people, Roto, thought they were going to win the NFC at the AFC North. So forgetting about winnings and losses, how have they performance-wise gone? I would assume that last week was a dud for anybody that played Cleveland players of that game at San Francisco. I think the word is shocking. I mean, they were shockingly bad.

That it was 3-3, and ask yourself this, that was even that close. They couldn't even get garbage time production. It was that bad. I mean, they were out coached. They were out-play. They were out everything. Baker Mace it looks horrible.

If you want to cut him right now, I get it. I get it. I just wouldn't do it. I think that he's going to have a better week this week. Seattle's a bit overrated defensively. I don't think that they're going to shut anybody down. So look, I will give the Baker and Beckham and Landry one more go this week. They're playing at home.

Seattle rarely travels well. Let's give him one more shot. What about the Seattle side of things? They're having to win games more offensively than maybe people in Northwest part of the country thought they were going to have to. Well, yeah, and look, Russell Wilson is magnificent, and Tyler Lockett has to get more involved. So if you own Lockett, you're a little disgruntled because, you know, he's only getting four or five targets a game. That's because the Seahawks are winning.

If they're losing, then they'll throw more. So I love Lockett this week, and Chris Carson is really good. He is much better than Rashad Penny. So, I mean, you always start Lockett, you always start Wilson. And Will Disley's been pretty good. So, I mean, I think with tight-end being such a very difficult position, I think Disley is a week. we start now. All right, I had to start Andy Dalton last week because I've got so many

injuries with my quarterback spot, and despite the fact he's 0 and 5, he gave me some good fantasy numbers. Baltimore conversely's dropped two straight. Has the Lamar Jackson train slowed down a little bit, and who we plan on this matchup? Yeah, just mark my word, Cincinnati's run defense is

really bad. I think that's the second worst football. This is a Mark Ingram week. This is a Lamar Jackson run week. This is a Mark Angram week. This might even be a Gus Edwards finding a touchdown week. I mean, that's how bad the Bengals are. I think Marlon Humphrey is going to cover Tyler Boyd, but you can't bench Tyler Boyd, he's too good.

But outside of that, I guess you play Joe Mixon. You play Boyd, but I don't really like Eifford. I don't like Aud & Tate. I don't like Andy Dalton this week. I think you should go out right now. If you're on Dalton right now, go out and pick up either Gardner, Minchew, or Kirk Cousins, they will be better than Dalton. Perhaps the most intriguing of the late

afternoon games, and we'll get to some other ones in the second segment, but the Niners at the Rams. San Francisco, I think people wanted to see if they were really legit, 3-0, they were beating Cleveland to get to 4-0. Meanwhile, I think there's a lot of hesitation with the Rams' defense the way they performed this season. Can some of those Niners skill position players score at L.A., like the Bucks did a couple of weeks ago?

Yeah, what makes the Niners frustrating is that Kyle Shanahan, he's a brilliant plate caller, but for fantasy purposes, you never know who he's going to use. So is it a Tevin-Colman week? Is it Matt Bryda? Is it Rahe Moster? Is it Dante Pettis? The only guy that you can trust is George Kittle. But he wants to run the football, establish the run, and then it opens up the pass.

And I think the Rams are in big trouble. I do. I think they're in big trouble. The 49ers pass rush has been great. Nick Bosa, he may not be getting facts, but he's getting close. And close means pressure. And the Rams' offensive line has not been very good this year. So you've got Gurley who's injured, right?

He's got a quad injury, so I don't know how much I love him. And San Francisco's run defense has been the best in the NFL. you might see Darrell Henderson, and Brandon Cook's injured too. So I think the Niners are a good position this week. All right, Dallas at the New York Jets. Jets still looking for their first win. Dallas looking to get their mojo back after they were steamrolling people during the course of the early part of the season.

Can some cowboy players get fat and happy against this over defense this year? Yeah, I think for sure. Look, Dallas looked great in the beginning part of the year because they played bad teams. That's just fact. I mean, they played the Giants in Miami, and they got fattened up. But that doesn't mean they're not a good team. They are a good team. The Jets are really a bad team.

I mean, even Chris Herndon, they're tied in, who was supposed to be back this week, injured his hamstring. That's how bad it's been for the Jets. I like Zeke this week. They will get him involved. I like Michael Gallup is a sensational player. If you could trade for him, trade for him now. Amari Cooper should have a week. And then for the Jets, I do like Bell.

I do like Robbie Anderson. And Jameson Crowder is very interesting. He's been terrible recently. I think he could probably get him in a trade for a box of donuts. Donald threw to him, what, like a million times in week one? He may get some action within this week. All right. More with Dr. Roto, including the late games, the prime time.

And, of course, the Texans and the Chiefs Sunday in Kansas City. More with Dr. Roto, after I tell you about my friends over at High Meadow Ranch Golf, it's where the city meets the country. It's my home course. It should be yours. It's an hour's drive from downtown Houston. It's a very relaxing, enjoyable track championship, holes very good for people with handicaps of seven or as high as 27. And when you play the 18

holes of golf, you're thinking to yourself, man, I'm hungry. Go to Ogies Grill right on the course after and enjoy some of the best cheeseburger onion rings you'll ever have in your entire life. In fact, what I would do is get your early tea time for Saturday or Sunday and then catch the college and pro football games on those particular days. But more importantly, if you get very limited free time like I do and you want to play a course that's going to be fun and for a chance to be in a relaxing environment. You've got to think about High Meadow Ranch Golf. See the course for yourself, book your tea time,

and think about the ranch house for things like bachelor parties, receptions, happy hours, company events, everything they can do for you from before you play to after play will be spectacular. Again, it's where the city meets the country. Check them out online, highmatterranchgolf.com. Highmetoranchgolf.com. The good doctor, Dr. Roto, with us here on Sports Talk 790. I don't have any Tennessee or Denver players.

I don't think Dr. Odo I'd even want them in this matchup. It feels like a game that I would just as soon watch something else because they have been underachieving disappointment and flat out boring football teams. Yeah, you're going to want Derek Henry, though, because Denver's run defense has been terrible. Remember what happened Leonard Forn Natch was a couple weeks ago. Yeah.

I mean, he only ran for like 2,000 yards. I don't know why the Chargers didn't do a better job last week. I think Melvin Gordon looks slow, but we'll talk about that later. like Derek Henry, the Titans do well on the road. They've actually been better on the road than they have been at home. So I would look for him. I think that they're going to shut down Corey Davis. I do, Denver. So A.J. Brown could be another sneaky A.J. Brown week. For Denver, I mean, look, I don't love anybody here. Emmanuel Sanders, Cortland Sutton stepping up this year. Outside of that, I'm not playing anybody. All right. Let's get to Atlanta and Arizona. We saw the

Falcons and Texans last week here in Houston, Roto. And I feel like I've talked to you about the Falcons a lot. For as much offensive firepower as they have, they just don't score enough, and their defense was atrocious. Can Collar Murray get fat and happy off of the very poorest Falcon secondary?

Yeah, he really can. I mean, Kyler Murray, if you think about it, has been a sensational quarterback this year, with one exception. He can't score the touchdown. They're getting field goals. If he converts these field goes to touchdown, he'd probably be a top five fantasy quarterback. He's He's that close.

That's the difference between him and Deshaun Watson. Deshaun Watson is making those throws to Will Fuller, right? And is Kyle Mer are going to be able to do that? I'm not sure. But I think this is a week for the Falcons. This is a week for the Cardinals. You just vote up on these guys. I will be discussing one guy in my locker the week for sure.

He's my favorite player this week. And Matt Ryan is going to get healthy. Austin Hooper is a great play this week as well because the Cardinals are putured against it covering the tight end. We know, Roto, that the chargers are lousy at home. Two losses in an overtime win. forgetting about the records. Are we seeing noticeable differences in the Chargers offensively in terms of our skill players when they're in Los Angeles as compared when they're on the road when they look like a lot better football team?

Yeah, the Chargers are really frustrating. I mean, Melvin Gordon, like I said, watch him. Watch the film. Did he look that fast to you? Didn't look that good to me. They were trying to feed Echler every which way. I think the team might be better off with Echler starting. I'm just throwing that out there. You've got Mike Williams, who's a plus matchup against anybody.

You're not finding him. They desperately need Hunter Henry, who, by the way, is either going to play this week or next week. So if you dropped Henry, go get him now because you're going to want to use them. But you're absolutely right. I think the charges are very frustrating, and they're not opening up the offense correctly. For Pittsburgh, you've got this new kid, Hodges as the quarterback, James Washington is out. And Jalen Samuels is out. So the steals are literally down to the following guys.

James Connor, Deonté Johnson, Juju, Van Gogh. those are the guys you start. And do you trust the quarterback, whoever it may be? Not really, but I don't think the Chargers defense has been sensational. Derwin James is a big loss. Melvin Ingram is out. So I think he will be better than most people think. Can Joey Bosa get to him?

That's a big question. All right. Let's get to the Monday night contest between Detroit and Green Bay. This feels like this could be an offensive explosion, especially because the fact that the Lions, I mean, Matthew Stafford still knows how to chuck the ball 50 times, especially when they fall behind 14-0 early like they do most times when they go to Green Bay. Right, but they don't want to do that.

See, what the Lions want to do is run the football. And the Lions had the right blueprint against the Chiefs. They just couldn't put them away like the Colstead. They want to run Carry-on-Johnson 25 times. Now, Dallas tried to do that last week, but they couldn't because Green Bay got out to a 14-0 lead. So the key is this. If Green Bay gets out to an early lead, Detroit has to change everything of what they're going to do, and then it could be a big game for the Packers.

If the Lions can keep it close, you watch Carry On Johnson is going to have 25 carries and they're going to play good defense and the game is going to be a lot closer than people think. All right. Now to Texans and Cheaps, Houston putting up their most prolific offensive numbers probably ever in the Bill O'Brien era.

Granted, it was against Atlanta. The Chiefs were stunned at home by Indianapolis. Pat Mahomes was a full participant in practice the last couple of days. but the ankle is still not 100% in his mind. So who is sitting and how nervous are you if you're loaded with Kansas City players that you're going to see a repeat performance against the Texans this Sunday? So you're not going to see the repeat performance, and here's why.

The blueprint to beat the Chiefs has been established. You've got to run the football, right? You've got to contain Mahomes and you've got to bleed the clock. The Colts do that really well, right? And the Lions do that really well. I don't think the Texans do that really well. That's the problem. Carlos Hyde is not Marlon Mack, right?

Carlos Hyde is not Carry on Johnson. And that's why this game is going to be a higher scoring game than we expect. I think there's a good chance Tyreek Hill comes back, right? And then that changes everything because right now Hartman and Robinson and Byron Pringle, they're just fillers, right? Hill is explosive. So who am I starting? I'm starting Kelsey for sure.

I'm starting Damien Williams. I'm starting McCoy. I'm always starting my chiefs because that's what you do. You start the Chiefs. For the Texans, you start QT, I think is interesting. I think Will Fuller will be good. He's not going to have the week like last week. I think this is a Hopkins week.

I do. And I think this may be a Hyde week because the Chiefs run defense is very soft. I know Bill O'Brien's going to want to try to run the ball and test them early on. Maybe Hyde gets 80 yards in a touchdown. Now, before I wrap things up, let's get to what we'd like to do every once week. And that's ask you to give us the, Number one, no doubt about it, player that's going to do some serious damage this week. It's Dr. Roto's lock of the week.

Yeah, last week, the lock, I wish I'd given you guys Will Fuller, what a game he had. But this week, it's Julio Jones. And, you know, he's like a 10-month-old pregnant woman. He's ready to burst out any moment now. The guy always has one week where he has 200 yards receiving for like 11 receptions for 200 yards and two touchdown. This is the week. The Cardinals are terrible. They run a ton of plays.

They didn't give him the ball last week. They gave it to Calvin Ridley. Julio does magic this week. Lock him in. All right. That's my, that is Dr. Roto's. Lock of the week. Dr. Roto got an email in.

Want to know about one flex bot between three guys. Williams of Kansas City, Scantling of Green Bay, and Pringle of Kansas City. One of those three have to play. Which one of those three would you go with? William's from Kansas City. I mean, or I would do Pringle if we, make sure it's a chief and then watch what happens and see who's playing. If Hill or Watkins is out, fringles in.

All right, we'll leave it at that. Dr. Roto, where can people find you the next couple of days? Sure, you can find me at full-time fantasy.com into the promo code Roto 50 for 50% off your first two months. You can find me at sI.com backslash fantasy. I've got my start sits up and I've got my visionary plays of the week. And of course, you can find me at Twitter at DRROTO. Good stuff. As always, my friend.

We'll talk again next week. All right, take care, M-T. You got it. Dr. Roto with us here on Sports Talk 790. Right now, a message for Big City Wings. If you're looking to find a spot to watch the games tonight, pro college, Astros, go to Big City Wings where it's buy one boneless, get one free at any of the eight Houston area locations. Great food, amazing appetizers, the desserts, the fried Oreos are just to die for. You're looking for something a little healthier.

They've got great sandwiches and salads, but of course today is their tried and true formula of buy one boneless, get one free. any of those eight big city wing locations. To find the one near you, bigcitywings.com, plenty of TV's, great drink specials, and happy hour starts in less than an hour. Big on wings, big on sports, and of course big on specials and big on happy hour. Big citywings.com, big citywings.com. The Matt Thomas Show. Back to it. On Sports Talk 790.

Escalated. Home of the Stroes. All right, the reality is this. And again, thanks to Dr. Roto for his weekly Thursday, really with this. Thanks, Danny Holgerson. AJ Hinch is going to speak in about 10 minutes from now. This will be a shorter segment for us, getting ready.

I asked this yesterday. Let's do it again. Garrett Colgo 6. 7-8-9 belongs to whom in Wattle. You ready to do that? Well, I would be depending on matchups. But Harris Presley-Ossuna would be the natural order of things, I would imagine. Joe Smith for a situational hitter maybe.

Okay. You know, the crafty sidearm guys always figure out a way to get in the rotation somehow. I love one of a little sidearm. You get a little sidearm action. It's fun. You never know what's going to happen. You know the great thing about sidearm guys is they never are aces. They rarely are closers.

Now, some have been, but rarely. Right. But they always seem to have an extraordinarily long shelf life. They stay around forever. It's like if you were to play baseball and you were to be a pitcher, I know the money is really good when it comes to being a starter or a closer. Garrett Cole agrees. Garrett Cole's going to see this firsthand, how amazing it is.

But the point is that you're also going to make and have a chance to play 15 years with a nice salary. If you can just get one person out like a crafty submarine guy or the situational lefty. Yes. But when they change the rule that you have to face at least three, we might see a little bit of dying off of the situational lefty. Yeah, that's one of those spots. You're like, hey, right-hander, you can get an out for us too, please. If not, too bad, because we're going to keep up there for at least three pitchers. I'll tell you what, the three-pitcher rule is going to slow down is going to quicken the postseason game.

Because imagine right now, if you're Kevin Cash or you are A.J. Hinch, you are thinking about this guy does this against this header, this guy does this against this. This could be one massive arm change because the shelf life, the rope for anybody, except for maybe. Maybe Garrett Cole is externally limited today. Glass now doesn't have any longer of a leash or at the same amount of leash that Gary Cole does. I think the only pitcher that's going to be able to work through an early mistake will be Gary Cole. Hopefully he doesn't have that.

It'll be fine. He's been dominant since May. There's no reason to think he wouldn't today unless you're worried that he threw 118 pitches most of his career. Full rest doesn't bother me. Okay. You're holding your breath. You're like...

Because let me tell you something. You were nervous before game four. Yes. And I tried to calm your nerves. And it certainly didn't help. I get, I mean, yeah, I told you, I'm not, that's just the way I am in life. I'm not super overconfident. Hey, this is going to be fine.

Astros are winning 100%. Ra, rah, let's go. I'm a cheerleader. I'm not that. That's not how I am. That's not my disposition. And if I did, I would be being fake with you guys. And I just can't do that.

I'm nervous. Yeah. To have the blind, there's no way the Astros can lose mentality would be foolish. But we've spent the better part of. we trying to explain that being the favorite is cool because you typically have the best team? Not typically. If you're the favorite, it's because you are better in every single aspect of things. Right.

Or more positive than the negatives, yes. The Astros are the favorites, rightfully so. They're the better team. I expect them to win, but I'm also nervous about it. And here's the thing about whether it's Tampa Bay or hopefully it's Houston. The Yankees are sitting there going, we're doing great. We're getting rest our bodies. We're getting healthier guys back.

All of our pitchers are back in order in terms of where, they're supposed to be in terms of rest. Yes. I think even with if the Astros are the winner of tonight's game, which hopefully is the case, I think the Yankees will be the favorite in game one, especially because Zach Grinky was so poor in game three against the race. Grinky would have be Severino? Yeah.

Game one at home. Yankees might be slight favorites. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it. And we will do that at about 11 o'clock tonight, fair? Okay. Do you want me to drunkenly call you in the, are you doing postgame tonight? doing the post game. I am going to the game and I'll be having a few.

Here's the plan. If the game is close or they lose, Michael Connor is coming to do the show with me to the studio. Because he wants to be a part of the last if it happens. And I don't want him to think that way, but I get it. Okay. If they win, then I'll be in the Kingwood Studios.

Oh, come on. No, he wants to get up in the morning and celebrate. Okay. I'm telling you, if they lose, tonight. Friday is all disco with Jake Kaplan mixed in and Brian T. Smith. We'll have Jake Kaplan make a couple selections.

We'll do beat the schmows. We're going to beat the schmows regardless. By the way, if you'd like to play beat the schmows tomorrow. Four NFL games against the spread, you have the chance between Ross and myself. If you beat or tie one of us, you get $25 worth of Papa John's pizza. If you tie or beat both of us, you get $50. If you tie or beat out of us, you get nothing and like it. So if you'd like to be tomorrow's contestant,

I don't know the time we're going to do it at this point because we don't know the emotions of the game. Either way, we should say third hour. Probably the last hour of the show, somewhere in between 2 and 3 o'clock. They win, we'll be celebrating. If they lose, we'll be in sorrows. Yeah, and we'll make terrible picks.

In our feels. So if you want to play beat the schmose in the 2 o'clock hour tomorrow, send Ross an email right now. Ross at Sports 790.com, R-O-S-S-S-790.com, and you can play Beat the Shmoz. Cougars coach Kelvin Sapson here. You're listening to the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790.

AJ H.S. is going to speak in a matter of moments. I want to remind you about U.S. coins, the place to go for your best buying and selling a gold and silver. They had the best collection in the Houston area. They would love for you to go visit their showroom in 8435. Katie Freeway. You will not be disappointed in the collection, the service. And the fact there's going to be no behind the wall behind the room deals. everything's out in front. They'll test everything to make sure everything you're looking to buy from them is completely 100% legit.

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can actually take things away from at a very affordable price. 8435, Katie Freeway, the home of U.S. coins, 713-464-68. That's 713-464-68. We are awaiting AJ Hinch to speak to the media. He's going to be cool as a cute. cucumber, right? There's no...

He's going to come out and say, I don't know what we're going to do tonight, guys. Guys, it's game five. I've got the best team. I've had 107 wins. I just don't know if we're going to win. That would be pretty funny if he did that just to troll everybody. AJ, our managers in baseball that would troll. Like, a Joe man would troll. Mm-hmm.

I don't think AJ would troll. No. By the way, Adam and Adam will be at home plate bar a grill across the street, and then I will join them at 430 for an asterizond deck until 5.30. I will be there in a non-work capacity. You'll be having some bruise. That might be. And a burger.

And some wings. Signing autographs. Well, not the last one. Unless you got 20 bucks. You're charging for your autographs? You are vain since you've been on this show. All right. We're going to believe it or not here.

Yeah. But we're not because we're going to go to AJ's press conference. Believe it or not, the Astros win. Believe it. Believe it or not, Springer, Brantley, and Redick combined for four hits or more. Springer and Brantley combined for how many? Four or more? I said Riding 2. Don't forget

about old Josh. That's a good number. Say not. Can they win with less than four in that group? The answer is yes, but would you like your chances if that was the case. I would like them a lot better if they were over four, of course. All right. AJ Hinch is working his way up.

What we will do is we will say goodbye for now. Go to AJ and then we'll let the boys over at home play take it from there. Here's AJ on 790. Let's get it started. AJ, how about it, game five? You guys have been in tight spots before and coming through in flying colors. What's a confidence level with Garrett on the mound

and your guys back home? Well, as you would expect, this answer is pretty high. We feel good about our team. We feel good about the day. We have Garrett Cole on the mound. We have a really good offense. We're going to play in front of an incredible crowd. So obviously, we're going to feel really good about it going

into the game, and then you've got to go out and win. So I've never managed a game in the playoffs without pressure. Our players have never played a game without pressure. This is part of what we do and how we do it. This time of year is great. We'll embrace it. And it's a good day to win a game. You lost game four.

And you lost game three. They won game three in game four. OK, there you go. But how much does it help knowing that it came right down to the end again in game four? Well, I mean, I think for this is a really good team. So I think when you get to this this time of year, there aren't a lot of bad teams that show up in October.

So I feel good about our team. We're going to play our 27 outs. It's going to take a lot of different guys and somebody to step up and do some great things. But I feel really good about the mood and the vibe and the way we are. Bats got really good at the end of game four. So I don't think we have to do anything other than be ourselves

in this building, and we'll get another win. Pithrow, far right? AJ, as experiences you guys are in the postseason, this is the fourth elimination game already for the race. The fact that they've done it four times now, and this is your first of this postseason, is there any inherent advantage for them?

Well, the odds are in their favor. They're going to lose one, right? I mean, that's all should shift to us being having the advantage. But I don't think so. I mean, I think the, they're not comfortable to play when you're ahead. You're still playing the opponent. You're still playing the game this time you

So they clearly have had to dealt with the emotions a little bit more this season, but I don't think they're going to kick their heels up and feel completely comfortable just because they've won a couple of elimination games. I think the pressure is a little bit more mutually shared than everybody wants to believe. They're there is uncomfortable going into a game five, given the ramifications and consequences as we are. How we've gotten there has been a little bit interesting, obviously with us having two game to nothing lead and then one in the two games at their house.

but I think everybody's stomachs churning a little bit today, and as it should be, in an exciting game like this. Go front row of the right. Justin mentioned to us that he tries to block out the incredible atmosphere inside this building, and he only kind of realizes what happened after he's left and maybe driving home. Are you at all aware of what this building's like

when your fans are going nuts, or are you, you know, a step ahead, five steps ahead? Yeah, well, I'm aware of going into the game. When you stand out on our field, and minute made at the National Anthem, and the crowd starts that buzz, and they start to do the introductions, and you feel it growing a little bit.

This is a real environment. Our fans do a great job of making sure everybody understands exactly where we are. We're going to see a lot of orange. We're going to see a lot of people on their feet quite a bit. The ovations that come when you announce these names is really second to none. So when the game starts, obviously, it's moving pretty fast.

And I don't pay a ton of attention to the, the environment, but our guys appreciate it. They feed off of it. I want our guys to embrace this. I think this is an incredible opportunity for us to play a really exciting game. And for a lot of those guys, it's not the first time we've had this feeling in this building.

And we're pretty good in this building. So I think that energy that's created, that buzz will not be a distraction. It'll be welcomed. Fourth road to the left, Scott. AJ, I know the answer probably is you worry about your own team. I'm just wondering with. What happened to the Dodgers last night?

Is there any correlation? Is that serve as a reminder to anybody in the clubhouse to you? As to, hey, what can happen to the favorites and to a team that's won 106 games or whatever? Well, if they don't know by now, then I probably haven't done my job before this. I mean, they know exactly what's at stake. They're like, oh, okay, the Dodgers lost, so we better really try today. You know, I think it's just this time of year. It's a good reminder more so, I think, moving forward as in every team,

does it. You got to try to win every game and everybody does because this is this is exactly why you play aggressively in the playoffs and you you put your players out there aggressively and maybe even have them try to do something that they haven't done before. You try to win every game and close these out when you can because some crazy things can happen. You know I'm sitting in the in after our workout yesterday and Troy Snicker one of our hitting coaches is watching his dad manage a 10 run first inning against them. Like, nobody thought that was. Even the Cardinals didn't whenever they were bunning in the first inning to try to play for one run. So I don't think there's a lot of reminders needed in there. Like, hey, by the way, just so you know, we're going home tonight if we don't win.

And that's very obvious. So I want our guys to embrace it. We understand what's at stake. But we came into this series knowing we had to win three against a really good team. They've continued to earn our respect along the way and winner take all tonight. Fourth world toward the center?

The race tweaked their lineup a little with Sogard, who's more of a contact hitter instead of Brandon Lau. As the season has gone on and Cole's strikeouts have piled up, have you seen examples of teams changing their approach a little against him? Yeah, I think it's been more platoon decisions, less contact decisions. I think, you know, when you, when you, I've seen teams load the lineup up with lefties to try to make them throw a few more breaking balls, maybe stay away from the power fastball. I've seen some teams, you know, hang with their righties a little. little bit and hunt the heater. So he's been very good at reading the different the different approaches that different teams have taken. I mean, it didn't surprise me that Darno was going to hit in the middle of the order. He's had nice success against him. Tommy Pham was going to hit where

he was going to hit, you know, putting So guard there. You kind of know the motivation right away because Lowe's had a little bit of a hard time making contact against Cole. So none of that stuff surprises surprise me. And, you know, they're trying to win the game, which is which is why they're they're making the tweaks to their own roster. So when I got the lineup across the way, I wanted to see if Diaz was in it, how healthy is he. I wanted to see if they were going to play Sogard or Wendell or, you know, potentially low.

So once they did that, you start to build your game plan and get on to whatever approach they're going to have. First row to the left. AJ, can you talk more about the at-bats from the eighth inning on? Last game, Robinson had a home run. Brantley flew out to the warning track. Yulee hit one in the shift, but it was hit hard. And also, do you believe in momentum from those at-bats carrying over to tonight's game?

Well, the bats were really good at the end because you want to put yourself in a position to continue the game. And Bregman's at-bat in the middle of all that was very big. Getting the base hit, and Jose's walk was really good. I mean, these are some of the best hitters in the league. They're going to have good at bats at the biggest moments, you know, and everybody was on their feet at the top whenever Alvarez was facing Snell. So those are game deciding at bats and the quality of those at bats I was really impressed with.

Momentum-wise, I mean, I don't know that a day off and you move venues, I think that this isn't that much of a momentum approach for us. We're going to face a completely different guy today. But I like the fact that we gave ourselves a chance to tie that game up or potentially continue on that game with two at bats. One was the Alvarez at bat against Snell and Yuley's missile up the middle that they played their defense. in the right position.

So I think it's just more about winning today's game and less about capitalizing on any sort of momentum from almost winning. There's probably a time for one or two more. We'll go to one right here in the third row on the right. Are Granky and Verlander available today? Yeah, we'll see. I mean, it's all hands on deck.

So to be honest, we haven't spent a lot of time with either of them. I've been doing a lot of different other things, but we'll talk about it before the game. but I would assume everybody's going to be willing to do. What I choose to do or who I choose to use is will be determined between now and game time and into the game. So I don't expect them to say no if I ask them.

Anything else? All right, thank you, AJ. Coming up in the room will be Kevin Cash, and for those who miss it, 315, Willie Adomas. Well, we will not carry Willie Adamas. I don't think that's the case. Way more entertaining. What about Kevin Cash?

No. Adam and Adam are better than Kevin Cash. Debatable. A team is up next. I'll join him in 90 minutes from Minute Made across the way over at home plate. I hear Adam in the background. Tasting. Hello?

Can you all hear me? We can hear you just fine. Get ready. A team next on 7-9.