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Concerns For Certain Phillies Talent (PST Episode 531) · The Philadelphia Sports Table | Philly Sports News & Views

• 0:00
  Hey, everybody, it's Jeff. Wanted to let you know that we've recorded
• 0:02
  this podcast episode on two different dates this week. We recorded on Tuesday,
• 0:07
  September twelfth, twenty twenty three, and Wednesday, September thirteen, twenty twenty
• 0:12
  three. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but we
• 0:15
  hope you enjoy the show. All Right, everybody, you're listening to the
• 0:43
  Philadelphia Sports Table podcast show, the longest running weekly Philly sports podcast show in
• 0:47
  the world. Thanks so much for joining us ten years strong. We've got
• 0:51
  some great content coming your way this week. The NFL season is in full
• 0:55
  swing, the baseball season in this Philadelphia Phillies team boy had some trouble against
• 1:00
  the Braves here recently in this series. As we're winding down the regular season,
• 1:06
  we're certainly gonna be getting into some Phillies talk. We're gonna be getting
• 1:07
  into some NFL talk this week, Aaron Rodgers going down and what NFL Week
• 1:14
  one actually ended up, Meaning we've got some college football talk on the way.
• 1:18
  Joe da Leone from the Belief podcast Network. He's gonna jump on and
• 1:22
  talk to us about this early college football season, what we're seeing, and
• 1:25
  then on the table. We got our friend of the show, Justin Clue
• 1:27
  from Baseball Prospectives Hitting Season Podcast. It's gonna be coming on to talk about
• 1:32
  this Phillies team. So stick around with us. Hope you enjoy the show.
• 1:37
  I'm Jeff Warren and I'm here with my good buddy Eric Leonard. Man.
• 1:40
  Eric, how are you doing? Man? Do him an answer seriously
• 1:42
  here? Well, you've got all It's up to you. I mean,
• 1:46
  we had a good forty five minute therapy session before a well a half hour
• 1:52
  before we hit the record button. I like those therapy sessions. We haven't
• 1:55
  had one in a little while, but you and I both definitely needed it.
• 2:00
  Well, you know sometimes like an illness will sometimes bring out the best
• 2:05
  or worst in a family. Yes, And I'll just say I was diagnosed
• 2:09
  with a blood clot on Monday, my third in nine years. I have
• 2:15
  a blood disorder, so it's I'm prone to. It's not because I'm VACS
• 2:17
  people. I don't have the VACS poison in my system going on exactly.
• 2:24
  I know, I know, and I almost want to announce it on a
• 2:28
  pst Twitter just to see the assholes that'll chime in. And I'm poisoned in
• 2:31
  vacts. But yeah, that that happened. I'm dealing with it now.
• 2:36
  This is again I've done this before, a lot of fun stuff that goes
• 2:38
  along with you have to stick needles in your stomach for a week, just
• 2:42
  somebject stuff within or it's the best, right And and then the best part,
• 2:47
  though, is was you're kind of working through it. I continued to
• 2:50
  work. I didn't take any days off. You're really tired though, your
• 2:53
  legs sore, and I agreed to do the show. But I worked today.
• 2:58
  I ate some food, fell asleep for a nap because I'm gonna do
• 3:00
  the show tonight. I was just really tired. And it's just it's it's
• 3:04
  awesome when you have some passive, passive aggressive parents. Yeah that don't aren't
• 3:07
  getting what they want from you, even in your worst times. And uh,
• 3:12
  I hope they're listening to this. They would have have soly no idea
• 3:14
  what I'm talking about anyway, but this ship goes right over their heads.
• 3:19
  Right. And a mother texts me earlier today, how are you doing?
• 3:23
  I didn't have a chance to text back. Long day busy. I'm forty
• 3:25
  seven kids, mortgage all that shit, right, So sorry, I need
• 3:30
  to get back to you right away. She's calling as I'm waking up.
• 3:32
  I call her right back, and I get the I'm worried sick. The
• 3:37
  least you could do was text me and just the classic. I just I
• 3:42
  should have responded with this, but I didn't want to. You know why
• 3:44
  she's She's seventy three years old. I guess I could have said. The
• 3:46
  least I could do is not communicate with you at all, right right,
• 3:51
  I could just cut you off. We never talk again. That's the least
• 3:53
  I could do, if I want to get down to it. So we
• 3:59
  both have ass of aggressive mothers that have no concept of at times of anyone
• 4:03
  outside of her own periphery. My mom is not like that entirely. We've
• 4:09
  actually come a long way, the two of us, but this was kind
• 4:11
  of this kind of harkened back to some old stuff. My father who hasn't
• 4:15
  reached out once. You know about how I'm doing, And I asked her,
• 4:18
  how's how's the old man? Don't I know? He's good? You
• 4:20
  know him? And that's great. That's so good to hear. I'm so
• 4:24
  happy he's doing well. God damn it, that's awesome to hear anyway,
• 4:29
  Yeah, that's what I'm dealing with tonight in this week. But I'm here
• 4:32
  to do the show because this is actually enjoyable, and I tell you I
• 4:34
  didn't. Jeff is my buddy out of all my friends where we can text
• 4:40
  one another. Hey, I had a panic attack today. Yep, thumbs
• 4:43
  up. Absolutely, Yeah, we can talk about it at some point,
• 4:46
  like, yeah, so we this the show, and you know it's kind
• 4:48
  of the pre and post show oftentimes turns into talks about that. So I
• 4:54
  thought I'd just bring that to the table. Absolutely yeah, because absolutely for
• 4:57
  other people out there list I'd have to deal with this shit. So look,
• 5:00
  I have a mom whose birthday she turns. She turned seventy five on
• 5:02
  Sunday. It's gotten to the point where my wife needs to actually communicate with
• 5:06
  her because it's just not good. When I'm communicating with my mother, who's
• 5:11
  extremely needy, it's like I'm not I'm not even like a son to her.
• 5:15
  I'm I'm a servant. That that's how I'm seeing. And it's like,
• 5:18
  are you gonna take me to breakfast? And then we need to go
• 5:21
  get ice cream? And it is it's just I know it sounds ridiculous probably
• 5:27
  to the listener right now, but it's the the expectation of what I need
• 5:30
  to do as a son in her mind that is just completely and utterly ridiculous.
• 5:38
  And it's just years and years and years of this stuff. And my
• 5:42
  gosh, the first few minutes here really is it's another therapy session. And
• 5:45
  we brought the listeners in with us well, and they also don't know the
• 5:49
  thirty forty year history. Oh I know all this, so we obviously cain't
• 5:53
  go into that, but you can hear in our voices as we say it
• 5:56
  like this is this is not unprovoked, We're not making this up, like
• 6:00
  this is this is real And it's I think we talked about I use the
• 6:04
  term empathy. That's like the new buzzword in the next last five or ten
• 6:09
  years, and that aldereration just doesn't no concept of it. So no concept
• 6:14
  of it, I'll be honest, like doing this podcast too, it is
• 6:17
  actually therapeutic, and it is in a sense, you know, at least
• 6:23
  how I look at it, it's a it's an art form in a way.
• 6:26
  I mean, I'm here in my studio area in my house. Eric,
• 6:29
  you have a little you have your little podcast center area down in your
• 6:32
  basement in your house as well, and it is an opportunity for us to
• 6:36
  just kind of get away from life for a little bit. And it reminds
• 6:41
  me of what the folks over a Broad Street Hockey who who are good friends
• 6:46
  of this podcast if you've been around long enough, and they did their very
• 6:49
  last Broadstreet Hockey BSh radio show together. They were talking about how, I
• 6:55
  mean, they're still kind of going to be going on. They got they
• 6:57
  have some projects that they're they're doing and stuff. If you're familiar with that
• 7:00
  crew anyway, but they were talking about just what that show has meant to
• 7:04
  them over the years. This freaking podcast ours that I'm talking about now,
• 7:09
  the PST podcast, the therapeutic aspect of us being able to talk about sports,
• 7:15
  you know, whether it's the interviews that we've done over the years and
• 7:17
  just talking about the Eagles and the Phillies and the Sixers and the Flyers,
• 7:21
  when Lennon and I are talking now talking about the Union every now and again,
• 7:26
  are just college football and the drafts, the many drafts too. It
• 7:30
  is absolutely therapeutic and maybe for you who is listening to this, you may
• 7:36
  not necessarily understand that we're just a bunch of dopes that are in your ears
• 7:41
  right now. But for us being able to connect with you in this way
• 7:46
  and in this manner and just it is it is absolutely enjoyable that we're able
• 7:49
  to take a step outside of real life for a second and just talk about
• 7:55
  stuff that we like and do it with people that we like. And I
• 7:59
  it's something where I'm taking a step back from it. I'm like, I
• 8:01
  just don't want to take it for granted. I still love doing the show.
• 8:05
  I honestly, I don't look at the I don't look at the stats
• 8:09
  because I was told years and years ago if you start doing that, you're
• 8:11
  gonna lose the passion for the for what you're doing and what you're talking about.
• 8:16
  Dude, I'm serious. I just I still love doing the show and
• 8:18
  it's absolutely therapeutic in a lot of ways for you and I or when Len
• 8:22
  gets on as well, for us to just talk sports and just it's just
• 8:26
  the sidebar of life that I am still loving after all these years. Man,
• 8:31
  it sounds like we owe the audience like one session per week for the
• 8:35
  last ten years. Yeah, that's expensive, man, And I just and
• 8:41
  I just had this thought. My dad listens to the show sometimes. Oh
• 8:45
  boy, I hope you listen. Oh boy, how about Passive Aggressive?
• 8:50
  I'm talking about them on the podcast. There you go. Well, like
• 8:58
  I said, we've got some NFL talk coming to you this week, as
• 9:01
  well as some baseball talk with the Phillies. We've got some college football talk
• 9:05
  as well. Two guests this week on the show, and again Justin Klue
• 9:09
  from Baseball Perspectives and the Hitting Season podcast and the Dirty Inning podcast as well.
• 9:13
  I almost forgot that as well. He's gonna be coming on to join
• 9:16
  us too. So Eric, let's let's talk about a week one of the
• 9:20
  NFL season. I mean, we saw a lot of interesting games and and
• 9:24
  to piggyback off the Table Talk podcast and discussion that's in the in the podcast
• 9:30
  feed folks, if you haven't listened to it yet, that that conversation that
• 9:33
  I had with Mark Schofield from sp Nation, and we're talking about could this
• 9:39
  NFL season actually become the defensive season? Is? Could the NFL be taking
• 9:45
  that shift right now? As many offenses we're really struggling out of the gate,
• 9:50
  and some of these offenses seemed to be figured out by the by defenses.
• 9:54
  And I mean I'm talking about I'm talking about defenses like the Tampa Bay
• 10:03
  Buccaneers. I mean, they played pretty darn well. Whether it was the
• 10:07
  Dallas Cowboys. We know the Cowboys have a stout defense, but my god,
• 10:11
  I mean a forty to nothing game. I mean, they couldn't even
• 10:15
  kick a field goal. The New York Giants couldn't kick a field goal.
• 10:18
  You saw the defensive just absolute, I'll say, amazingness. From the San
• 10:24
  Francisco forty nine ers in Pittsburgh, we saw defenses absolutely dominating. The Jets
• 10:31
  defense kept them in that game after Aaron Rodgers went down. We're certainly gonna
• 10:35
  talk about Aaron Rodgers in a little bit, but I don't know. I
• 10:37
  think it's interesting how Mark scofield this past week on the show on the Table
• 10:41
  Talk Show, Eric was saying, this could be the year of the defense
• 10:46
  in the NFL. We're so used to seeing offense, offense, offense,
• 10:50
  tons of yards being put up, but we might be seeing that shift this
• 10:54
  year. And I know it's only Week one. I know it's only Week
• 10:56
  one, folks, but I think it's interesting to think that we could be
• 10:58
  seeing that that shift right now, I'll push back a little bit just because
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  like I'm dating back like twenty seventeen, the Eagles, you know, the
• 11:11
  I'll focus on the Super bowls the kind of create the narrative that went into
• 11:13
  the next season, like the Pat's Eagles Super Bowl. Everyone came out of
• 11:18
  that going we're in a new generation of football where offense is just going to
• 11:22
  be ninety points combined every game, and that's how it's going to be going
• 11:26
  forward. Then fast forward, I think it was like two years to the
• 11:30
  Rams pat Super Bowl where it was a defensive slaughterhouse, right, and then
• 11:35
  the narrative going into the next season was, Okay, it's going to be
• 11:37
  we're back to defensive football. I think what happened is the rule changes occurred
• 11:43
  with the preseason and teams are just not even playing their starters on offense.
• 11:48
  Defensively, it's a whole lot easier to defensively to congeal, right, to
• 11:54
  come together as a unit. I think, especially when you're playing against an
• 11:56
  offense it hasn't really played together in real game for months. Like you saw
• 12:01
  the Bengals game, Joe Burrow wasn't exactly healthy Browns have a good defense,
• 12:05
  but man, that was that was hideous. He had an eighty two yards
• 12:09
  passing I mean, that's that's that's pitiful. And then conversely, the Browns
• 12:15
  weren't exactly really killing an offense either. And Deshaun, you know, I'm
• 12:18
  not sure how much you played in the preseason, but I'm assuming it was
• 12:22
  it was very little. Right, we could be seeing a turn, a
• 12:26
  change of the guard to the defensive side. But maybe this is just a
• 12:30
  cause and effect from rule changes that are just kind of when did the preseason
• 12:35
  rule changes begin, like a year or two ago? About two years ago.
• 12:39
  Yeah, and maybe that's what we're seeing now, Like the first three
• 12:41
  games are almost preseason games where the defense has the advantage and you're not going
• 12:46
  to see the offensive numbers. Maybe by the end of the year. This
• 12:48
  the league is still designed for offense. They've changed the rules so much that
• 12:52
  it's you can't touch the quarterback wide receivers are can over the middle without getting
• 12:56
  killed. It's really set up for the offenses to put up tons of points.
• 13:01
  I mean that that Bucks Vikings game is a great example. Yeah,
• 13:05
  I don't know how much the Vikings played offensively, together. In the preseason,
• 13:07
  they looked rusty as hell. The Bucks do not have an awesome defense,
• 13:11
  there's no way. But they looked really good week one. What are
• 13:13
  they gonna look like in Week four against another team that actually has their offensive,
• 13:18
  their offense going, you know, full full speed. So maybe it's
• 13:20
  a rule change, maybe is maybe it is a change for this season.
• 13:26
  I kind of leaned towards the rule changes by week four everything that kind of
• 13:28
  turn around. You look at somebody like Kirk Cousins who had like three hundred
• 13:33
  and forty four yards on the day Justin Jefferson absolutely murdered and they still end
• 13:39
  up losing the game. Sure, there were some turnovers, but again that's
• 13:41
  you know, that's part of that Tampa Bay defense that came to play and
• 13:46
  and and that's why I kind of took a step back and said, boy,
• 13:50
  you know, you can have these powerhouse wide receivers and very talented wide
• 13:54
  receivers like Justin Jefferson putting up the numbers that he did, and they still
• 14:01
  end up faltering. So that's why I kind of like took a step back
• 14:03
  ericon was like, you know, this could be the year of the defense
• 14:07
  here if even if even if a team like Tampa Bay is able to get
• 14:09
  in there. But then again, like you said, and we saw it
• 14:11
  with the Eagles game, the rust that is there because a lot of these
• 14:15
  offensive starters aren't playing. I mean, even Jason Kelsey was saying, we
• 14:20
  didn't do a good job like you know, we we were. We pulled
• 14:22
  one out and we got the win, but man, we gotta get a
• 14:26
  lot better and we got to congeal a lot better in terms of that offensive
• 14:28
  line. And Jalen Hurts did not look like Jalen Hurts. He did not
• 14:31
  look like one of the top five quarterbacks paid, top five paid quarterbacks in
• 14:37
  the NFL for sure, just very hesitant. A lot of rust on the
• 14:41
  offense too, so that's probably playing into it as well. Yeah, And
• 14:45
  I think you have to be super objective and look at each game individually on
• 14:46
  each side of the ball. Like the Pats Eagles game is a good example.
• 14:50
  I think the Pats defense is pretty damn good. Yeah, I think
• 14:54
  the Eagles offense was rusty, and I think in a couple of weeks they
• 14:56
  probably do better. Yeah, the Pat's defense, but I don't think they'd
• 14:58
  put a like forty eight points against the Pet's tea. I think they're pretty
• 15:01
  good. Actually, I think it'll all even out. The teams that really
• 15:05
  should be worried are the ones that fully invested in the preseason and beef the
• 15:09
  rosters up and like went full bore and play their starters and got housed in
• 15:16
  Week one. Like, yeah, the Steelers should be freaking worried, Like,
• 15:18
  I know, they played a really good Niners team, but they had
• 15:22
  that team in their in their place. They played pretty much the whole preseason.
• 15:26
  They were rare to go, like I think I think, I'm sure
• 15:28
  Tomlin had that date circle. We are going to put it to these guys.
• 15:31
  We're gonna show the NFL who we are. And they got crushed.
• 15:35
  Yeah, that's a kind of team. I'd be like, oh, like,
• 15:37
  that's not a lot of takeaways out of the Week one. Like I
• 15:39
  would not go walk away saying, like, you know, the Cardinals played
• 15:43
  really well, they held their own. I don't think they're any good,
• 15:46
  Like I would not be like, I don't think the Giants are forty points
• 15:48
  worse than than the Cowboys exactly. Yeah, But if you're a team like
• 15:54
  the not or the Steelers, I'd be scared, like that's that's a bad
• 15:58
  loss in one where it's not just that it's like the Chargers, I would
• 16:02
  be like, oh, oh no, we're in trouble, right the Dolphs
• 16:04
  came into our house. They didn't destroy us, but like, defensively,
• 16:10
  we had no answer and we had all year to correct what we had last
• 16:14
  year. We played hard in the preseason and we came out and gave up,
• 16:15
  Like, however many points in Tyreek destroyed us, Like those are the
• 16:18
  kinds of teams. I'd be like, oh man, those like there's only
• 16:22
  a couple of teams I would have hard takeaways from, including the team and
• 16:26
  our next topic, by the way, absolutely well, let's get into it,
• 16:29
  but first I'd love to hear from you, Philadelphia Sports Table at gmail
• 16:32
  dot com. What are you thinking of this NFL season early on? Is
• 16:34
  it the year of the defense or is it just offenses that need to get
• 16:38
  that rust off of them. We'd love to hear from you and read your
• 16:41
  email here on the show. As Eric segued into our next story here that
• 16:45
  we want to get into, and it is one of the biggest storylines heading
• 16:49
  into the nf NFL season that is just no longer. And it is the
• 16:53
  career of Aaron Rodgers and where that career was going to go. Was he
• 16:59
  going to be able to get the Jets to the playoffs? And now his
• 17:02
  season is done. He tore his chilies after. That's an inside joke,
• 17:07
  folks, just to let you know. So, yeah, he tores Achilles
• 17:12
  here. So I mean, it's a downer for this NFL season and football
• 17:18
  fans who just love a good sports story. It was a great sports story.
• 17:22
  Hard Knocks really has been fantastic. Hard Knocks has been fantastic. I
• 17:26
  loved it, and I feel like it's like all for nothing in a way,
• 17:30
  because it's like it gets us hyped up, it gets us psyched,
• 17:33
  it gets us all ready for the season. And this year they had a
• 17:37
  great storyline in one of the best players to ever play the game, one
• 17:41
  of the top quarterbacks to ever play, going to a team that has floundered
• 17:45
  and floundered, and then four plays into the regular season, Achilles goes and
• 17:52
  it's done. It's like over and it's back to Zach Wilson, and it's
• 17:56
  like, it's like, my gosh, was that for nothing? It's like
• 18:00
  and Hard Knocks was for nothing. Basically, I don't know. What are
• 18:03
  you thinking, man, Well, I mean I'll push back. Just in
• 18:07
  the Hard Knocks got what they wanted out of it, like whether he did
• 18:10
  well or not during the season, they got the ratings they wanted. People
• 18:12
  were talking about it. Yeah, this is the first time I heard people
• 18:15
  talking about Hard Knocks in a while, to be honest with you, and
• 18:18
  actual people actually engage with it. And like I was seeing memes on on
• 18:22
  X and everything X or Twitter whatever you want to call it, but I
• 18:26
  do not call it X. I have to because it's on my phone and
• 18:29
  I still can't. It still looks like a porn app to me. If
• 18:33
  anyone I know looks at like, it's not porn, it's Twitter. But
• 18:37
  no, I think they got what they wanted because I actually I actually paid
• 18:41
  attention to which tells me something. Now what I will say now, if
• 18:47
  he has been healthy and played well tonight, it wouldn't have just been a
• 18:51
  week one story. It would have been a year long story. Unfortunately,
• 18:55
  because of the injury, it's a week one story, maybe week two,
• 18:57
  and then it's it's kind of kind of it's gonna kind of go away.
• 19:02
  Yeah, because what else is there to talk about? Yeah, now the
• 19:04
  big stories. Who will they sign to to supplant Wilson because there's no freaking
• 19:10
  way they can go forward with him. I see the list of possibilities and
• 19:14
  it's it's ugly, you know, Well that's the thing. It's like,
• 19:18
  is Carson Wentz really gonna come in and like because it's a possibility, But
• 19:22
  I I'd rather I am Zach Wilson. I mean, the names are are
• 19:26
  hideous, They're they're boring, like Joe Flacco. My god, Like what
• 19:30
  here is this is? We're still doing it with Carson Wentz. I think
• 19:34
  I saw Colt McCoy, which I would actually take Coult McCoy at this point
• 19:37
  over all those other names. Yeah, I saw Colin Kaepernick, Tom Brady
• 19:41
  of course, like just a lot of like a lot of names are never
• 19:45
  going to happen, but they just throw them out there because it's the press
• 19:47
  and there's no stories to go. But if we have a Jets fan in
• 19:52
  our life, good friend of ours, Dave, one of our best friends,
• 19:56
  and I noticed he got quiet on the text thread after the injury.
• 20:00
  Oh he didn't just get quiet, it was dead silence. Yeah, it's
• 20:02
  not him quite yet. He just kind of logged off. I get it,
• 20:06
  and I was trying to talk up his defense, saying, man,
• 20:07
  you guys are good, like trying to get him engaged again. I could
• 20:10
  tell he was just done. Yep. That really was a double kick in
• 20:14
  the nuts. That was like a jackass clip where you know, the fans
• 20:18
  were all hyped. Rogers goes down, goes to the tent. Hilarious.
• 20:23
  By the way, I'm watching the game with my son. He's never seen
• 20:26
  the ten in his life. First time I ever saw the ten, and
• 20:29
  he looks at me and goes, is he dead because he's just I was
• 20:33
  like, no, they do that so you can't see what's going on,
• 20:36
  and yeah, that made me laugh. Pretty goes like, no, he's
• 20:38
  not dead, but I could see why you think that. But then for
• 20:45
  them, though, to come back and win, and for the young guys
• 20:48
  to show up like they did, Man, Garrett Wilson is incredible. I
• 20:52
  got the guy at three interceptions whitehead, it doesn't name yeah, white and
• 20:57
  to get your hopes back up like that and to win that game. But
• 21:00
  then you see Zach Wilson running off field, going yeah, there's the double
• 21:04
  kick in the Nuts. That's the one where Johnny Knoxville kicking the balls.
• 21:07
  You fell over, he reached down to grab your hand and he kicking the
• 21:11
  balls again, like the double nuts shot. Because because everyone's reminding like that
• 21:15
  was an awesome win. But oh shit, Zach Wilson, one of the
• 21:18
  worst traff picks in history in the Jets franchise. What you're saying a lot
• 21:21
  is our quarterback still, So I feel so much for the Jets, and
• 21:23
  just to go on the other side of the ball, the Bills, you
• 21:27
  should be concerned. I would say I have a newfound love for the Buffalo
• 21:33
  Bills. My daughter spent a lot of time this past summer up in Buffalo
• 21:37
  because she was doing dance stuff at Buffalo University, and I gotta say I
• 21:42
  kind of fell in love with that area in the summertime. I'll know,
• 21:47
  I'll put that kid right summertime. I'm sure it's horrendous to live there in
• 21:51
  the wintertime. But it's almost this provincial like the Buffalo Bills, like a
• 21:56
  high school team. I know that's almost like a cliche, like the Packers,
• 21:59
  But man, you walk down any neighborhood street, there are bills,
• 22:03
  flags and Bills banners hanging out windows like and this was in like May first
• 22:10
  time I was up there. I was just up there again a few weeks
• 22:11
  ago in August, and it really is like a local high school team up
• 22:15
  there. They love that freaking team, and I feel so bad for them
• 22:19
  because I like the stuff that Josh Allen was doing. Is that correctable?
• 22:25
  Like what the hell was he doing? And I'm not sure if that defense
• 22:27
  is any good. It just makes me feel for that team, both teams.
• 22:32
  I for the fan bases, I walk away going, oh no,
• 22:36
  if I'm the Jets fan, we have Zach Wilson. The Bills by the
• 22:37
  way, Oh no, what do we have here? Maybe it was just
• 22:41
  one bad game, but that was a shaky as hell game for the Bills.
• 22:45
  If I was a fan of theirs, I think they're gonna bounce back,
• 22:48
  and like you were saying earlier, with these offenses, I think a
• 22:52
  lot of these offenses are going to bounce back, and just they're gonna get
• 22:56
  that rust off of themselves. Jeff, those four interceptions though that's true?
• 23:00
  Yes, yes, my god, Like I'm not and I don't watch him
• 23:03
  all the time, but from what I understand, he's very risky, yes,
• 23:07
  but it comes to a certain point in your career you can't do that.
• 23:10
  But you gave this team the game. You just they lost your starting
• 23:12
  quarterback. Like there's there's one thing being the gun slinger. There's that a
• 23:18
  thing being an idiot and handy the game. Do you have a team?
• 23:19
  I think yeah, out of control? Yeah, And I think that.
• 23:22
  I think what we may have seen with Josh Allen and that first game of
• 23:26
  the season is that he had the moxie. You know, He's like,
• 23:29
  I'm Josh Allen, I have I have been kicking ass for a lot of
• 23:32
  years. Here, I'm Josh Allen. I'm gonna do what I want here.
• 23:36
  And that moxie turned to what you were just talking about. It turned
• 23:38
  to oh my god, how is he making these type of decisions? I
• 23:42
  think at times these professional athletes were paid so much too, and the pressure,
• 23:48
  I understand, is there, but still, you know, they sign
• 23:49
  up for it, but still they they they they outthink themselves and they just
• 23:56
  try to do too much. We saw that all We saw that a lot,
• 23:59
  not just from Josh Allen. We saw it with some other folks too.
• 24:02
  Throughout the week one and I think that's another part of this early NFL
• 24:07
  storyline too well. And one of my takeaways too after that game, because
• 24:10
  I didn't watch all because it was exciting, that was that was that's a
• 24:12
  that's a fun game of money. Yeah. Big takeaway though, was like
• 24:17
  the Jets are super talented, Like I think way, I think, way
• 24:22
  more talented than the Bills at each position you go across the crow, across
• 24:26
  the board, I think. I just think on both sides of the ball,
• 24:29
  they're better than the Bills. If they had a decent quarterback, I
• 24:33
  think they're They beat the Bills in division for sure. Now I'm not so
• 24:36
  sure because Zach Wilson. But that was also another takeaway, like the Bills
• 24:40
  seem to have floundered some drafts, some drafts here, and eventually that catches
• 24:44
  up to you, like beyond Stefan digs, like where was he going to
• 24:48
  go with the ball? Right, That's why he was throwing so many exceptions
• 24:49
  because like, I don't know what to do. I only have like one
• 24:52
  or two weapons tops. But again, that was the first I'm not the
• 24:56
  biggest NFL fan, but takeaway like that was a fun first week. There
• 25:00
  was really a lot of good games. Yeah. Absolutely, let us know
• 25:03
  what you thought a week one again, Philadelphia Sports Table at gmail dot com.
• 25:06
  We'll read your email here on the show and respond to it. And
• 25:08
  if you're new to the show, subscribe. We would love to be in
• 25:11
  your ears on a weekly basis. Listen to the Opposition Territory pods, the
• 25:15
  Eagles preview shows, listen to their Eagles postgame shows as well. We also
• 25:21
  have our table talk show where I interview somebody in the world of Philly sports
• 25:26
  or the sports world in general. Those are some fun discussions and if anything
• 25:29
  happens to your podcast feed, you can always head on over to Philadelphia Sportstable
• 25:33
  dot com. We've got all of our shows on our website over there,
• 25:36
  as well as our PST special shows. We've done some movie reviews, done
• 25:40
  some music talking as well, some fun stuff there. And make sure you're
• 25:45
  following us on the social media sites out there. We are on Instagram search
• 25:48
  out Philadelphia Sports Table there, and we're on Twitter. I'm not calling it
• 25:52
  x. We're on Twitter at Philadelphia PST, follow Eric at Brick Polot and
• 25:56
  you can follow me at Jeffrey Underscore Warren and we are going to take a
• 25:59
  quick break right now, and when we get back, we're gonna do some
• 26:03
  baseball talking, some Phillies talking, and some college football talking. So stick
• 26:08
  with us. We'll be back in just a bit. All right, folks,
• 26:11
  We are back here. And interestingly enough, I said last week on
• 26:15
  the show with you Eric, I was gonna wait to do uh you know,
• 26:19
  at least one of our listener feedback emails to Len got on because it
• 26:26
  was something that Len and I were kind of talking about. But I kind
• 26:27
  of wanted to get into it with regard to stolen bases because one of our
• 26:32
  long time listeners of the show, April from down in South Carolina, we're
• 26:36
  kind of going back and forth over email about JT. Real Muto. I
• 26:40
  know we've talked about real Muta on the show and just how he hasn't necessarily
• 26:42
  been having that real Muto season that we have been used to, and even
• 26:48
  from a stolen based perspective, he's not getting guys out, you know.
• 26:52
  And April was big basically came back saying, you know, you know,
• 26:56
  I mean our numbers, stolen based numbers up this season just due to the
• 27:02
  larger bag. So I thought it was interesting and I saw this article that
• 27:06
  was on MLB dot com specifically about, you know, most stolen bases in
• 27:11
  a season. What's happening this season with regard to stolen bases. So it's
• 27:15
  not necessarily JT. Real Muto based, but what I think is interesting is
• 27:21
  that actually the three thousandth base that was stolen this season, it was actually
• 27:26
  Bryson Stott. He stole it in the fourth inning at Citizens Bank Park this
• 27:32
  past Friday, and or no, two fridays ago, I'm sorry, it
• 27:34
  was two Fridays ago, and interestingly enough April, just to let you know,
• 27:40
  nineteen eighty seven that was the most stolen bases in a season in the
• 27:44
  live ball era, three thousand, five hundred and eighty five. Then nineteen
• 27:48
  ninety nine with three thousand, four hundred and twenty one stolen bases coming in
• 27:52
  at third, nineteen eighty three was three thousand, three hundred and twenty five.
• 27:57
  So a lot of stolen bases here for sure. So it's interesting to
• 28:04
  see how And I just I love the way the game is being played now
• 28:10
  this year too, with the pitch clock faster games. But I do think
• 28:14
  it's great that we are seeing more bases that are actually being stolen Eric,
• 28:17
  because it's enhancing the offense. That's inevitably what Major League Baseball wanted to do
• 28:22
  anyway. So on a micro level, twenty three teams this season, I've
• 28:26
  already surpassed their two twenty two stolen base totals and we still got what We
• 28:32
  still got a couple more weeks to go here. So apparently the big winners
• 28:36
  here are the Reds, who are already up one hundred and five stolen bases
• 28:41
  from their two thousand and twenty two total of fifty eight. And it's pretty
• 28:45
  pretty impressive. So the stolen base issue, yes, And in April,
• 28:49
  as it relates to JT real Muto, you know you you definitely have a
• 28:52
  point in your email that because the bases are larger and it's probably one of
• 28:59
  the reasons why he just hasn't been getting as many base runners out this season.
• 29:03
  However, I think we're seeing it across baseball as well, and I
• 29:07
  don't know, it is a down year for JT. And I know it
• 29:10
  seems like I've been really crapping on him over the past month or so,
• 29:14
  but it's it's concerning for me because the guy's basically been the general for so
• 29:18
  many years out there and might this start to be the downslide of his career.
• 29:22
  Maybe maybe we're starting to see it. He's still a fantastic catcher.
• 29:26
  I still love him. I do, but it's just not the JT real
• 29:29
  Muto season. But I just on the other side of it, Eric the
• 29:33
  stolen bases. I actually really like what we've been seeing this year. Major
• 29:37
  League Baseball did some good things this year for the first time and what like
• 29:41
  forever. So I'm liking it. Man, Yeah, me too. And
• 29:45
  I as far as JT goes, we've kind of crossed that threshold into we're
• 29:52
  a veteran team and we're probably gonna we're probably gonna peak in August in September,
• 29:57
  and JT's that kind of play two where he's probably gonna kind of slowly
• 30:03
  get into ship, not getting into shape, but like get into full playing
• 30:06
  mode, like hitting it, just the whole thing. And I think the
• 30:08
  whole team. They have some younger guys, but it's more of an older
• 30:11
  team. And I think that's what you're going to see, is that again
• 30:15
  they're going to peak in August September and make that run and as long as
• 30:18
  they can stand on the wild card because man, the Braves are so freaking
• 30:22
  good. They really are. Man, no shot. Yeah, they just
• 30:26
  took three out of four from us, and they're as far as the stolen
• 30:30
  bases go. Like, I kind of love that, Like the Major League
• 30:33
  Baseball did finally do some good things. The rule changes that definitely helped.
• 30:37
  In terms of the pitch. The pitch clock is huge because it disallows it
• 30:44
  kind of thwarts the pitchers from doing that. I'm going to throw six straight
• 30:47
  pitches over to first and bore the entire crowd, and this is going to
• 30:52
  be the most boring I think I've sen of the show twenty times. I
• 30:55
  hate when pitchers used to do that, especially when you're fanning. You're in
• 30:57
  the crowd, You're just like, oh my god, yeah, dude,
• 31:00
  come on, just throw the pitch exactly like. But you can see,
• 31:07
  like I talked about the preseason, you know, rule changes and cause and
• 31:10
  effect. Like you see the offensive off some of offenses are just not quite
• 31:14
  there because they they're rusting them and played together. I think the rule changes
• 31:17
  with Baseball, we see them kind of immediate. I don't agree with some
• 31:19
  of them. I don't like the runner on second base in extra innings.
• 31:25
  That's stupid. That's like, that's like like I coached coach pitch baseball two
• 31:30
  years ago, and like your kid pitches five, then you have to go
• 31:33
  in as a coach and throw until the kid injurs, Like, what are
• 31:37
  we doing here? This isn't teaching these kids anything. That's almost on the
• 31:40
  same level and that we're talking about eight year old kids. But to see
• 31:44
  the stolen bases, just go through the roof coming from and they are really
• 31:48
  through the roof. They This article is awesome by on MLB. Yeah Andrew,
• 31:53
  I forget who wrote this, but there was Andrew Simon, Yeah,
• 31:57
  Andrew Simon and Schante sit. Sorry, I have no idea say her name.
• 32:00
  I have no idea how to say her name. Yeah, I apologize,
• 32:04
  but it's just an awesome I'm sure Justin Clue could probably probably knows her
• 32:07
  name and probably speak to this even better. These stats, but like they're
• 32:10
  they're projected to have almost thirty five hundred steals this year major League baseball as
• 32:15
  a whole, and that's probably I think that's one of the highest totals since
• 32:17
  like the mid eighties. And that's when I came up as a fan.
• 32:20
  Yeah, where I mean, holy helld stolen bases Back then, we're just
• 32:24
  like one Samuel would have seventy stolen bases, and he was like eighth in
• 32:29
  the National League, right, Like we're like nineteen eighty seven, Vince Coleman
• 32:32
  had one hundred nine stolen bases the year before on one hundred and seven.
• 32:36
  That was when Ricky Ricky Henderson was stealing over one hundred right, eighteen ninety
• 32:42
  every year for like ten years. Yeah, it was a different sport,
• 32:45
  I get that, but it was also way exciting, way more exciting than
• 32:49
  pitchers throwing the first base over and over and over and and and just to
• 32:53
  go. You know, I think you know, some of the players are
• 32:59
  probably juicy back then, possibly right, there might have been a little drug
• 33:01
  maybe maybe, But then what that led to eventually, like I think it
• 33:07
  went from a I went from a speed I'm just gonna talk drugs in baseball.
• 33:10
  It went from a speed league where everyone was taking greenies and like they've
• 33:14
  all talked about it, right, and then they went into the the let's
• 33:16
  get beefed up period of steroids and stolen bases kind of went to the wayside,
• 33:21
  like the most basically like forty or fifty right now. I'm sure there's
• 33:27
  they drug tests way better, but the athletes now are so much better.
• 33:30
  Like you like, look at Ronald Lacuna and look at Vince Coleman and Ronan
• 33:36
  Kuna has A. I think he's he just hit the thirty sixty club this
• 33:38
  year, Yeah, which is I would say probably the best player in baseball
• 33:43
  at this point. He is awesome. The thirty sixty is kind of unheard
• 33:46
  of, but just the speed too, Ellie de la Cruise, it really
• 33:52
  is kind of kind of the stand out there. But I like in section
• 33:55
  five of the article they talk about the top thirty eleven teams. There's four
• 34:01
  teams and the like of all like twenty eight feet per second. Yes,
• 34:06
  And the reds Pirates, Guardians and Phillies are all in the top ten in
• 34:08
  terms of like twenty eight feet per second scots like number four in the league.
• 34:14
  That's fast as ship yea. And those are some athletes, dude,
• 34:17
  And they do test. Just in general, they've the athletes have gotten better,
• 34:22
  and the rule changes have certainly helped kind of turn that around, and
• 34:24
  it makes it makes that like the Ronald Kunas seem even that much better.
• 34:30
  Guys that have power and and speed, whereas like jose Can Saki used to
• 34:36
  be that guy. But God knows what was in his blood and his system,
• 34:39
  right, I can only imagine a Kuna like you know, never tested
• 34:45
  for anything. He's just a big dude, fast as hell, awesome athlete,
• 34:49
  sixty thirty club man that is. That's freaking awesome. Like I don't
• 34:52
  know, I love stolen bases and I'd love to see that's coming back.
• 34:55
  I do too, I really do. And Major League Baseball made some damn
• 34:59
  good decisions this year in terms of what they did for their game. It's
• 35:02
  about time, about time they did it. Let us know what you're thinking
• 35:06
  about stolen bases, what you're thinking about even JT. Real Muto, I'd
• 35:10
  love to hear from me as well about him. Philadelphia Sports Table atmail dot
• 35:15
  com. Shoot us off an email. So, Eric, I got a
• 35:19
  couple of conversations that I'm gonna be having with some guests here, So I'm
• 35:22
  gonna let you go, buddy, any final thoughts before we head out again.
• 35:27
  I appreciate the listeners for listening to our therapy session earlier in the show.
• 35:34
  Now I'm gonna rest my leg. Okay, you'd be proud of me.
• 35:37
  I see you're having a college football discussion with somebody. Yes, if
• 35:42
  I missed the name, I apologize. But I watched college football Saturday.
• 35:45
  Oh. I didn't feel well because of my leg. And I actually sat
• 35:49
  there and watched Alabama Texas all right, and I watched Cal and some other
• 35:53
  stupid team. And yeah, I mean it was it was, I was.
• 35:58
  I actually watched some It wasn't bad. Not the NFL levels. It's
• 36:01
  almost like the college and NBA. Yeah, it's college football. Almost feels
• 36:07
  like a different sport a little bit to me. I just just that's just
• 36:10
  one week of watching. But and I'm also going to uh when the show
• 36:15
  gets published tomorrow, I'll wait for a possible text from my mom. We're
• 36:22
  talking about your dad on the show. I know. I it's the first
• 36:25
  time I ever kind of really talked about them. Yeah. Oh gosh,
• 36:30
  oh well, hello, hello mister and missus Leonard. I just wanted to
• 36:34
  say, Hi, it's Jeff here. All right, buddy, I will
• 36:39
  let you. Jeff made me do it. Mom. Oh yeah, I'm
• 36:45
  the director of funning games around here from a movie. No, it's actually
• 36:51
  our friend of the show Bill Matts. He always says that on the BSA
• 36:53
  radio book. Bill's fantastic. I'm gonna use that a work for me.
• 37:01
  That's a really good idea. I should actually use that on my campaign this
• 37:07
  year. When I'm going door to door, they're like, who are you,
• 37:09
  hey, I'm the director of Funning Games. Put it on the poster
• 37:14
  exactly the yard signs. Put it on my yard side. It's it's not
• 37:17
  gonna say Jeff Warren, Northampton County Council. It's gonna say Jeff Warren,
• 37:22
  director of Funning Games. That's what it's gonna be. Oh, your opponents
• 37:25
  will have a field day with that. They'll look in your past and oh
• 37:30
  gosh, he's gonna be of course you did. Of course he is funning
• 37:35
  games. This whole party's funning games. Yeah, all right, buddy,
• 37:40
  I'm gonna let you go. Folks, we got some college football talk coming
• 37:44
  your way, as well as some Philadelphia Phillies talk. We are gonna let
• 37:47
  eric go. Let's get into our college football discussion right now. It is
• 37:52
  certainly the college football season. Love, what is happening early on in the
• 37:57
  season here in twenty twenty three and to join us from the Believe Podcast Network.
• 38:01
  We've had a number of Believe Podcast guests on they're doing great stuff over
• 38:06
  it Believe. We've got the one and only Joe da Leone. Joe Man,
• 38:09
  how you doing, Buddy good good? It's it's awesome that we're now
• 38:13
  in the throws of this season, so we actually have games to talk about
• 38:15
  it. It's like I spent the whole off season speculating and now we're in
• 38:21
  it. Now we're in the thick of it, and I'm excited for more.
• 38:22
  Absolutely, if you're not following Joe on Twitter, you have to at
• 38:27
  Joe da Leone again with the Believe Podcast Network at Believe Network on Twitter,
• 38:31
  and Joe, I know you've got some podcasts, you've got some online content
• 38:36
  that you've been pushing out and just doing a great job with it. So
• 38:38
  why don't you get that out to our listeners? Uh? Yeah. You
• 38:42
  can find me on YouTube where a lot of my content is the first Team
• 38:45
  Hack City where I post those shows just Hack City on YouTube. Or you
• 38:50
  can check out The Raffino and Joe Show, which is another college football show,
• 38:53
  yes that I do with my co host Blake Raffino and that's just Raffino
• 38:57
  and Joe Show on YouTube. Awesome AWESO some. All right, well,
• 39:00
  let's get into some storylines that we've been following here at the PSD podcast show,
• 39:05
  and just the college world in general has really been following, you know,
• 39:07
  early on in this season. I mean, yes, we're only two
• 39:10
  weeks into this college football season, Joe, and it's already been fun,
• 39:15
  it's been entertaining, it's been interesting thus far for just about every conference quite
• 39:20
  frankly, so I'm wondering to start us off here, what's been the most
• 39:23
  surprising aspect of the college football season thus far here for you and why?
• 39:30
  I think the biggest for me, Jeff, is the lack of top talent
• 39:37
  in the SEC. And I know that it's kind of been a storyline and
• 39:38
  if you bring it up with with SEC folks, they get upset if you
• 39:43
  try to put out the SEC's down this year. But the reality of it
• 39:46
  is that outside of Georgia, which there is a little bit of shakiness on
• 39:51
  offense for Georgia, I'm sure they're going to be fine, though We're not
• 39:53
  gonna really be too worried about them. Down the line, I don't know
• 39:57
  who that second best team is, and they are on a historic streak if
• 40:01
  you will, where they are losing to all their non conference opponents. I
• 40:06
  think the only instance, the only game that they have a win is Tennessee's
• 40:09
  victory over Virginia. So we're at a point now where you know, Tennessee
• 40:15
  hasn't separated. Alabama just lost to Texas in their offense looks problematic. LSU
• 40:22
  looked rough against Florida. Say, I think that if anyone does recover,
• 40:25
  If anyone does recover, though, it probably will be LSU. But there
• 40:30
  is just such a toss up on who that next team is, which I
• 40:34
  didn't expect. I thought that it was going to be, you know,
• 40:36
  a lot of top teams fighting for that second spot. Instead it's you know,
• 40:39
  who's the next best amongst a questionable group. Absolutely, I think it's
• 40:45
  a great answer. The SEC has been very interesting, but again because of
• 40:49
  kind of that that that lack of you know, top end talent and productivity
• 40:52
  that you were just talking about it, it's gonna be really interesting to see
• 40:54
  where the SEC goes, not only Week three, but for the rest of
• 40:59
  this college football season. Here, but moving along, Joe, I wanted
• 41:02
  to get into a certain college football program, one that I've been following for
• 41:07
  years because my good buddy, and I know he's going to be listening to
• 41:09
  this. Hey Josh, how are you, buddy? Anyway? University of
• 41:13
  Colorado. I've always rooted for this football program because of my buddy Josh,
• 41:16
  and we certainly have to get into what's going on there because as sports fans,
• 41:22
  the majority of us, we love these kind of stories, you know,
• 41:24
  we love these kind of stories during March madness. We love that Cinderella
• 41:28
  story, the story of a floundering team and organization just rising up in the
• 41:35
  ranks and it being such an incredible story with talent to watch on a weekly
• 41:39
  basis. But I think it also goes Joe to a deeper aspect of the
• 41:44
  game of football, in my opinion, in terms of turning disrespect into respect
• 41:50
  almost overnight with what we've been seeing here with the University of Colorado's football program.
• 41:53
  So what are your thoughts on what Colorado has done, what it's meant
• 41:58
  to the game of college football thus far early on here in twenty twenty three.
• 42:02
  Yeah, I think there's two parts of this. There's the side of
• 42:07
  what has happened on the field where and especially the actions that have come through
• 42:13
  in the transfer portal. I think we're seeing a reshaping improof that not only
• 42:16
  Colorado, but you know, teams like Florida State and Texas can go out
• 42:22
  and attack the transfer portal and attract all of the best athletes that have developed
• 42:27
  at other smaller programs across the country and bring them in. And I think
• 42:31
  that on top of that, Coach Prime has created a completely new clock for
• 42:37
  a lot of new head coaches. I think that there's gonna be a lot
• 42:42
  there's gonna be a lot of a lot of coaches that are going to struggle
• 42:45
  in year one. In year two, like Matt Rules a really good example
• 42:47
  of somebody who might struggle early that you know, the fan bases might not
• 42:52
  be as patient because they're gonna say, well, what just happened at Colorado?
• 42:55
  This team, you know, finished with a bowl game, They finished
• 42:58
  with eight or so win They looked really competitive. It has really really changed
• 43:02
  the clock, and I'm rooting for it. I have been on Coach Prime
• 43:07
  since he took over at Jackson State and him attracting Travis Hunter to go play
• 43:12
  for a top HBCU and FCS program at Jackson State, and to see the
• 43:16
  progression there and then the transition to Colorado. I was all in. I
• 43:21
  had said that I thought that he was going to get that team to a
• 43:23
  respectable level this first season. But I don't know if I actually I do
• 43:28
  know. I can't say that I thought it was going to be this immediate
• 43:31
  and the other. The other aspect of this, though, that's really interesting,
• 43:37
  and you talked about that respect and disrespect. It's kind of funny where
• 43:40
  I don't think there's that many Colorado haters out there, but if you weren't
• 43:44
  in on them immediately, you were considered to be a hater, which I
• 43:46
  find really really funny if you thought that Dion Sanders could turn around the program.
• 43:52
  But we're skeptical, skeptical of skeptical, man, I can't talk to
• 43:57
  this morning again. That's all right. We're unsure of how things were going
• 44:01
  to turn out early on in this twenty three season. If you question that
• 44:08
  at all, you were considered to be a hater. So it's kind of
• 44:12
  a mode mentality in a way. And I think that we just need to
• 44:14
  wait to see how the last at the end of the season plays out,
• 44:15
  but I'm rooting for him. It's a really, really fun storyline. I
• 44:19
  do wonder what this storyline, Joe, kind of just as a sidebar,
• 44:22
  what it means for the evolution perhaps of the college football head coach, and
• 44:28
  what head coaching means for college football in the future. You know, you
• 44:31
  mentioned, you know, Matt Rule, somebody who was seen as you know,
• 44:35
  a I don't necessarily say revolutionary type of college football coach figure, but
• 44:39
  somebody who then went onto the NFL didn't see too too much success there.
• 44:44
  But we know has that college football mentality aspect and inevitably leadership qualities to really
• 44:52
  take teams to that next level. And I wonder what Dion Sandra. I
• 44:55
  wonder what prime coach prime I should say, how he is going to set
• 45:00
  that foundation and now already is setting that foundation for future college football head coach
• 45:07
  leadership, and how it's going to transform in a sense just the coaching aspect
• 45:12
  of the game and even the recruiting aspect of the game as well. I
• 45:14
  think it's fascinating to think about. Yeah, and I think that I should
• 45:17
  have brought this up earlier too. Is that a lot of people are,
• 45:22
  I think, are going to try and a lot of programs and athletic directors
• 45:27
  are going to try and replicate this, But the reality of it is it's
• 45:30
  an exception and not the rule. I think that what he's able to do,
• 45:35
  no one else is going to be able to replicate, except for maybe
• 45:37
  teams trying to go out there and hire other big name former player coaches,
• 45:43
  because that's what the attraction is. That's what Travis Hunter, what led him
• 45:46
  to go to Colorado is that he it was a massive Dion Sanders fan,
• 45:51
  and I've read a number of articles where it talks about how Travis Hunter would
• 45:55
  you spend times, spend time mimicking his celebration, watching his highlights, and
• 46:01
  it was just inevitable that if he got offered by him, that he was
• 46:05
  going to end up choosing to play for him at jack State. I think
• 46:07
  that it's going to be so hard to replicate that. That's why there's rapid
• 46:10
  success. It is easy to convince a eighteen year old, especially a receiver
• 46:15
  or a defensive back or just a very athletic kid. I was the one
• 46:21
  who did at the highest level. If you're coach prime saying that and I'm
• 46:23
  going to help get you there. And I think that a lot of young
• 46:28
  recruits are going to be excited about the the energy, the swag that comes
• 46:31
  with the program. That it's just a completely different tone than if you go
• 46:35
  and play for Kirby Smart or Nick Saban. So I just don't know if
• 46:39
  anyone's ever going to really be able to replicate this. Again, I think
• 46:43
  the bigger the bigger takeaway here is that as soon as this season ends,
• 46:46
  and maybe it's not until after Shuder, Sanders and Travis Hunter leave, instead
• 46:52
  of teams trying to create their own version of this, someone's just going to
• 46:54
  offer him a ridiculous amount of money. And that's that's what the real takeaway
• 46:59
  is is ever Ruin is gonna want Dean Sanders turn around their program. Absolutely,
• 47:02
  It's gonna be an interesting storyline to follow for sure. Again, folks,
• 47:06
  we're talking to Joe da Leone from the Believe Podcast Network. Check him
• 47:10
  out and everything he's doing. You can follow them on Twitter at Joe da
• 47:14
  Leone. He's a great, great follow and kind of moving along here.
• 47:16
  You know, you're talking about the SEC a little earlier and the Big ten.
• 47:21
  Okay, of course we know, the two main powerhouse conferences in college
• 47:24
  football as we know, so, like, as we're watching all the teams
• 47:29
  within these two conferences this season, and I'm assuming it's probably gonna be the
• 47:34
  Big Ten, do you think the Big Ten actually has that edge in terms
• 47:37
  of SEC versus Big Ten at this particular point in the season. Yeah,
• 47:42
  after two weeks right now, it appears to be the case, but I
• 47:45
  wouldn't say that too confidently. I'm not really in on Ohio State. I
• 47:50
  think that Ohio State has a lot of questions to answer in the way that
• 47:53
  they play against Donor Dame next week is going to be really really impactful for
• 47:58
  that final stretch of this season where they have to play Penn State, they
• 48:01
  have to play Michigan. How can their offense look against a team that's got
• 48:05
  really good defensive backs and a stout defensive line and just a well coached unit.
• 48:09
  I think that Penn State has shown some intrigue, But the same deal
• 48:13
  here where you beat the doors off a Delaware and you beat West Virginia,
• 48:19
  who's one of the worst Power five teams in college football. Illinois is a
• 48:23
  nice little test, but Illinois is not played up to how I thought that
• 48:28
  they could be. It's still a team that is going to fight you defensively
• 48:31
  in a defensive line that's going to get after Drew Aler. But my big
• 48:37
  thing is I think that the second best, maybe if not the best conference
• 48:39
  this year's the Pac twelve. We have all of these teams that are offensively
• 48:44
  explosive. USC is going to be hard to stop for any team unless you've
• 48:47
  got an elite defenense. I think that Washington has been very well rounded.
• 48:53
  Oregon, if they can hit their stride, is very well rounded. And
• 48:55
  then we just talked about Colorado. Washington State just beat was Hanson, who
• 49:00
  was supposed to be a good Big ten team. Oregon State looks really good.
• 49:02
  And then Ucla with Dante Moore is exciting with the true freshman five star
• 49:07
  quarterback. Absolutely, And to close this out here, Joe, you recently
• 49:10
  released your top ten college football teams after Week two. Of course I loved
• 49:15
  seeing, uh, you know, Penn State there. I'm a Penn State
• 49:20
  alum. I was at the game this past week against Delaware. My wife
• 49:23
  is a University of Delaware alum, so she actually wore a Penn State T
• 49:29
  shirt. Though that's the thing she wore a Penn State T shirt. Delaware
• 49:31
  scores one touchdown. She actually stood up and cheered, and people were so
• 49:37
  confused over that. Yeah, so you gotta let her have that. The
• 49:39
  people in our section were so confused by it. Penn State a T shirt
• 49:44
  on her and she's cheering for a Delaware touchdown. You should have let her
• 49:49
  wear a Delaware shirt. I mean, because they absolutely honest they didn't.
• 49:52
  Yeah, but they really didn't. And I will Yeah, I was gonna
• 49:58
  say that the Delaware fans are kind of not existence. So that's funny.
• 50:00
  I played against Delaware when I was at college a couple of times and we
• 50:04
  beat them. In the stands were just empty. There was nobody at the
• 50:07
  games. That's really funny. Well, I loved your top ten. I
• 50:12
  thought it was a great top ten list of college football programs and where they
• 50:15
  are here after a week two. But as I was looking through your list,
• 50:19
  Joe, I'm wondering, like, which in your top which team in
• 50:22
  your top ten do you think it's the most vulnerable of losing that top ten
• 50:25
  status. It was a team that I just talked about a second ago,
• 50:29
  and that's Ohio State. I'm Alabama I don't really bring up in the conversation
• 50:34
  because I think it's inevitable that they end up getting bumped out. I think
• 50:37
  that they're gonna lose to somebody that they're not supposed to eventually down the line
• 50:40
  because Jalen Milroe is too predictable to prepare for. But I think the more
• 50:45
  controversial pick is Ohio State because of what is coming up for them against Notre
• 50:51
  Dame. I think that even if they beat Notre Dame, it is going
• 50:53
  to be a huge task for them for Kyle McCord, for Marvin Harrison Junior
• 50:59
  from BUCA to play a actually less further receivers, but for Kyle McCord to
• 51:05
  play good enough of a game against Michigan and Penn State's defense, for him
• 51:09
  to play well enough against all three of those teams, I think is a
• 51:14
  really optimistic outlook and speculation that offensive issue and for Kyle McCord's inconsistencies thus far
• 51:21
  is a bit concerning. So I think that the one I am the most
• 51:23
  out on that I've ranked that high is definitely Ohio State. Again, Folks,
• 51:28
  Joe da Leone from the Believe podcast Network. He's on Twitter at Joe
• 51:32
  da Leone, Joe Man, thank you buddy so much for coming on.
• 51:35
  It was great talking college football with you. Come back and join us down
• 51:37
  the road, my friend. Of course, I'm sure when draft time rolls
• 51:40
  around, I'll be I'll be back on the show and appreciate you having on.
• 51:45
  You got it, my friend. Great conversation with Joe about some college
• 51:49
  football storylines that we are following here. It's it's been an awesome season so
• 51:52
  far. I don't know about you folks out there, but I think that
• 51:55
  college football this year is extremely interesting, not just with guard to the Big
• 52:00
  Ten and SEC, as Joe is talking about, even though they are the
• 52:02
  two powerhouse conferences, there's other great college football being played. Been loving watching
• 52:07
  it on Saturdays for sure. Let us know what you're thinking about this college
• 52:12
  football season. We'd love to hear from you, Philadelphia Sports Table at gmail
• 52:15
  dot com. We'll read your email here on the show and respond to it.
• 52:19
  So with that being said, we are soon going to get to what
• 52:21
  we are throwing down on the table, but we got to take a break
• 52:23
  to pay some bills. We'll be back in just a bit, all right.
• 52:27
  We are back, and we got to get into some Philadelphia Phillies talk.
• 52:30
  Because this team is, you know, coming to the end of this
• 52:34
  regular season. We're already in that mindset of getting set for what this postseason
• 52:38
  could be. I think for this Phillies team, what are they going to
• 52:42
  need to do in the mound, what are they gonna need to do in
• 52:44
  the batter's box. We got a great discussion coming your way. It's what
• 52:46
  we're throwing down on the table and now on the table to get into this
• 52:53
  Philadelphia Phillies team. It is great to have on the podcast. I love,
• 52:58
  absolutely love talk to him. Always fun, always entertaining from the Hitting
• 53:04
  Season podcast and you could listen to them over at w h Y Y Billy
• 53:08
  Penn and also he does some writing for Baseball Prospectus as well. Find him
• 53:14
  on Twitter at justin underscore Clue. I think I got that right. We
• 53:17
  didn't even talk about the Twitter handle, but I've said it so many times
• 53:20
  so in the course of this podcast, I'm pretty sure it's just an underscore
• 53:22
  clue. We've got the one and only justin clue. How you doing,
• 53:24
  Buddy? You got it? Yes, Yes, nailed it. Yay,
• 53:30
  you've been on the show. Yeah, I was gonna say, you've been
• 53:31
  on the show so many times, and then I'm like, all right,
• 53:35
  I actually don't need to look at his Twitter bio to do the freaking intro
• 53:37
  here. I just made the underscore part of my legal name. Yes,
• 53:42
  beat up the process. Oh I like that. I like that very twenty
• 53:45
  first century cyberpunk. Yes, extreme. Right. Well, I gotta tell
• 53:51
  you what's cool. Has been actually watching this Phillies team this year. I
• 53:53
  really think it has been a faun season. Like so, of course,
• 53:57
  ups and downs, it's to be expected, it's the game of baseball.
• 54:00
  But man, it has been really enjoyable to watch this team in certain aspects
• 54:05
  of this team grow over the course of this twenty twenty three season. Justin
• 54:09
  and I first wanted to get into a certain gentleman that in my brain I've
• 54:14
  just been going back and forth on it seems week by week, and that's
• 54:17
  Kyle Schwarber. You know, we've talked about him at length on this podcast
• 54:22
  show over the past couple of months. You know, I know that you've
• 54:24
  all talked about him as well. You know, he's one of the he's
• 54:28
  one of baseball's best power hitters, yet his rock bottom batting average and defensive
• 54:34
  shortcomings really make our brains hurt at times. Again, my brain goes back
• 54:37
  and forth with him all the time. Early frustration with him this season has
• 54:42
  now led I think a lot of us knowing that he's going to be a
• 54:45
  key offensive cog as this team is looking towards the postseason. Here, So
• 54:49
  in terms of Kyle Schwarber here, what does he need to do in terms
• 54:52
  of his plate appearances? What do those plate appearances, inevitable plate appearances mean
• 54:58
  to this team from here on out? In opinion? Hit a home run?
• 55:01
  There we go. Okay, simple, Sorry, I mean you should
• 55:06
  just go to the next question, because you're absolutely correct. That's kind of
• 55:08
  what I'm looking for. And fortunately that's what he's been doing the past couple
• 55:14
  weeks. So yeah, that's every everybody's got a different definition in this lineup.
• 55:19
  I mean, you have certain expectations for different players. And by the
• 55:22
  time people were ready to or by the time it was trendy to have the
• 55:27
  Kyle Schwarber his batting averages cartoonishly low conversation, it was so far into the
• 55:32
  season, let alone his career to not know that's exactly you know, that's
• 55:36
  what you're signing up for I think the more important thing to focus on is
• 55:38
  the fact that he's never hit forty home runs in a season twice in a
• 55:43
  row before, right, That's something he didn't do until he came to Philadelphia.
• 55:45
  So yeah, that was part of you know, that was part of
• 55:47
  the deal though, Like, sure, you can hit one sixty as long
• 55:51
  as you're hitting the home runs too, and for a long time he wasn't
• 55:53
  doing that. So I think you saw a lot of people reacting to that
• 55:58
  once they've noticed how low his ess were. Exactly. That's what kind of
• 56:00
  where I was, and I've talked about it recently. You know where his
• 56:04
  career batting average I believe is somewhere around like two twenty six, two twenty
• 56:07
  seven, two twenty eight, somewhere around there. And when he was in
• 56:10
  like the one eighties, I'm thinking, you know, I would just hope
• 56:15
  for career type of average. And I know that's asking a lot of Kyle
• 56:20
  Schwarber because we know, like you said, we know the type of player
• 56:22
  that he is. But I'm finally coming around. I'm one of those late
• 56:24
  bloomers here justin I'm finally coming around to the fact that Okay, yes,
• 56:30
  this is who he is. But you know what, again, a key
• 56:32
  cog in this Phillies offense, and they're gonna need him for the postseason.
• 56:37
  It's just they're gonna need him to keep doing what he's doing. Yeah,
• 56:40
  they will, which is why it's it's good that he's started doing it late
• 56:44
  in the season. First, I did just want to address real quick.
• 56:47
  I don't think a guy with a batting average over two hundred has a rock
• 56:51
  bottom batting average. So that's that needs to be said, okay for starters,
• 56:57
  and I think a lot of the commentary around Swarber has also revolved around
• 57:00
  where he's been hitting in the lineup. And then once Thompson, Rob Thompson
• 57:05
  kind of just said straight up, yeah, he's not going anywhere unless I
• 57:07
  have like a strong reason to move him out of that spot. Yeah.
• 57:10
  I think you just saw a wave of acceptance kind of go over Phillies fans.
• 57:15
  And then again he started hitting. Other guys who can hit started hitting,
• 57:19
  And I don't think it's as much of an issue anymore because of the
• 57:22
  success the Phillies have had at the plate. But that being said, that
• 57:25
  is you just need Cale Schwarber to keep doing what he's doing, because starting
• 57:30
  August first, we finally started seeing the Phillies that these Phillies were supposed to
• 57:34
  be. I don't know if we're learning how sustainable of a team that that
• 57:38
  is, or if we're learning that these are just kind of These are guys
• 57:43
  who who you know, are going to take a couple months to really get
• 57:46
  in their groove. And if so, I would again suggest people learn how
• 57:50
  to watch the team and just understand that that is apparently the kind of team
• 57:52
  they are. I'm not saying it's easy. I'm just saying, when you
• 57:57
  know two of them are hitting under two hundred in May, you gotta just
• 58:00
  roll with that and understand they still have decent playoff chances. But that being
• 58:05
  said, I'm not saying any of this hasn't been frustrating. I'm not saying
• 58:07
  Calwarbur hasn't been frustrating. I'm not saying Klschwarber leading off hasn't been frustrating.
• 58:10
  But right now he's working. It's working, and if anything, you need
• 58:15
  to see some more from some other people. Absolutely absolutely, And I think
• 58:17
  it's interesting, you're kind of maybe it's a good segue into the next gentleman
• 58:22
  on this team that wanted to talk about because your podcast host John Staliness over
• 58:27
  at The Hitting Season podcast recently wrote an article in The Good Fight about Nick
• 58:30
  Castianos and his plate discipline. Really good article, folks, I would highly
• 58:36
  recommend you read it. John wrote that Castianos is not taking the ball up
• 58:39
  the middle of the plate with any authority as of late. He's absolutely correct.
• 58:44
  And even though it's definitely a bounce back season for Nick Castianos, I
• 58:49
  mean, I mean earlier on this season, my gosh, it was so
• 58:52
  wonderful to watch him at the plate. You'd think, will this plate appearance
• 58:57
  be something really special for us? And at least that's how when I'm on
• 59:00
  my couch watching and that's what I'm thinking earlier on this season. But he's
• 59:05
  slid a bit here in the second half of this twenty twenty three season.
• 59:09
  What does the team need from Nick Castianos at the plate as we're looking towards
• 59:15
  the postseason here justin well, not to answer succinctly, but you know they
• 59:21
  need him to go back to that first half stretching. And I think the
• 59:23
  product of that was before even spring training started, we saw that they were
• 59:30
  having him do two things to sort of address his terrible season at the plate
• 59:35
  in twenty twenty two, and that was move up in the box and move
• 59:37
  closer to the plate. These are very small adjustments, and I feel like
• 59:40
  that's the kind of that's really the only kind of thing you're going to be
• 59:44
  able to easily sell to a veteran hitter like Castianos. Kevin Long is not
• 59:47
  going to come in there and be like, well, you gotta deconstruct everything,
• 59:51
  like you gotta hit BP with this bucket on your head for training or
• 59:54
  something. They're not gonna go for that. It's more just like, here,
• 59:58
  here's a little tweak I noticed watching, you know, some film of
• 1:00:00
  your swing. And that's what they suggested for him. They wanted him to
• 1:00:04
  be able to expand the strike zone because that's where he was feeling like he
• 1:00:08
  was missing pitches. He didn't feel like they were blowing fastballs by him.
• 1:00:12
  He felt like they were getting him outside the strike zone, because he swings
• 1:00:15
  are pretty outside the strike phone. But by moving him in the batter's box,
• 1:00:19
  he was swinging and missing less. Now I'm not saying this because I'm
• 1:00:22
  breaking down his swing and I'm prepared to offer a diagnosis. It's more just
• 1:00:27
  like Nick Castianos. Any hitter really, but Nick Castianos, it feels,
• 1:00:30
  specifically, is sort of built like a Jenga tower with how how many adjustments
• 1:00:36
  and how many moving parts and how many X factors come into play when you're
• 1:00:38
  taking a swing, And Castianos just kind of feels like he is a and
• 1:00:44
  I don't mean this in an insulting way, but more of like a delicate
• 1:00:47
  Jenga tower that perhaps has a couple of areas where there's just one block and
• 1:00:52
  that goes out of alignment. Then he's he's just waving at that low outside
• 1:00:55
  slider all day long. I think that's a fair assessment. Yeah, so
• 1:01:00
  I think, no, I mean, just to wrap that up. I
• 1:01:02
  think what he's got to do is just tighten up that tower again, you
• 1:01:06
  know, make those small adjustments that he was able to make last time,
• 1:01:08
  and understand that they may not even be the same adjustments, but that he's
• 1:01:12
  still got to be able to think openly enough to make them. And I'm
• 1:01:15
  not saying anything, you know, this is me. I'm talking directly to
• 1:01:17
  Nick cast you out of like he knows what he's got to do. The
• 1:01:21
  problem is that, you know, we sit there for a couple of weeks
• 1:01:22
  before it seems like somebody thinks, oh, an adjustment should be made.
• 1:01:25
  I think we're just at the time of year where if something's not working,
• 1:01:29
  dude, you gotta do to make it work, because you got to start
• 1:01:31
  racking up some wins. Absolutely, absolutely so, all right, we got
• 1:01:35
  another player to talk about here, moving on here with this interview and discussion,
• 1:01:40
  and this player has been discussed so much on both of our podcasts throughout
• 1:01:45
  this season, and it's just it's hard not to keep talking about him.
• 1:01:49
  And that is one Aaron Nola, Oh my gosh. Look, as baseball
• 1:01:53
  fans, we like to look at trends of a player to help us determine
• 1:01:58
  what we think and how we think a guy is going to perform out in
• 1:02:00
  the field or out on the mound. You know, we've seen new and
• 1:02:04
  we've seen some old trends from Aaron Noel throughout this season, but the meltdown
• 1:02:09
  trends seem to be more prevalent this season. I don't know, maybe it's
• 1:02:13
  situationally where us fans are looking at it and thinking that it's worse possibly than
• 1:02:19
  any other year. But I look at these meltdown trends as being like,
• 1:02:22
  my gosh, this could happen in It could happen in the second second round
• 1:02:28
  of the postseason, and that's that. So with this postseason stretch right around
• 1:02:34
  the corner, you know, that could potentially define his legacy. I'm wondering
• 1:02:38
  justin what are your thoughts on Nola, his recent performances, and just how
• 1:02:43
  the expectation game looks for him at this particular point in his Philly's career.
• 1:02:50
  I was thinking today, who would you rather have on your team a guy
• 1:02:53
  who pitches like a number one, but who at any moment can start pitching
• 1:02:58
  like a number four, or a guy who pitches like a number three all
• 1:03:02
  the time. And that's the kind of question, that's the kind of question
• 1:03:07
  you're asking, well, because I'm not even like focusing on any number three
• 1:03:12
  out there in particular, or just like, where are you willing to give
• 1:03:15
  up ceiling space for stability? Yeah? And I think a lot of Phillies
• 1:03:21
  fans probably are, But that's probably but only because of a recency bias.
• 1:03:24
  I think that there's a lot of attachments to Aaron Nola because he's kind of
• 1:03:29
  like he's kind of like the Reese Hoskins of the pitching staff, and that
• 1:03:31
  he's he came up through the system. You know, you all know the
• 1:03:35
  story got here, and I think people formed attachments to him, but there's
• 1:03:38
  no there's just no arguing that he's their most infuriating player. When you think
• 1:03:44
  about the expectations you have even now, when Aaron Nola makes a start,
• 1:03:47
  you're like, you know, you know, oh, it could unravel it
• 1:03:51
  any second, but you still kind of think, like, yeah, this
• 1:03:53
  is this, this should be he needs to step up. And then he
• 1:03:57
  does what he does a lot, and you're like, why did I think
• 1:04:00
  he could do that? And then he comes out and throws seven and two
• 1:04:01
  thirds of no hit ball and you're like, right, because he can do
• 1:04:04
  that too. So at this point, again, our diagnoses from as far
• 1:04:11
  away as we watch them can in this case only be broad in that I
• 1:04:16
  think he's just got some mental adjustments to make that he has struggled to make
• 1:04:21
  throughout the season. I've beaten this drum all year. Like you said,
• 1:04:26
  my official fan diagnosis is that he is a pitcher who can pitch really well
• 1:04:30
  until the second he gets into the least bit of trouble and then he just
• 1:04:34
  unravels. He's a raveler and that's his biggest weakness. So I don't know
• 1:04:40
  how to tell you to stop doing that other than slapping you with a rolled
• 1:04:43
  up newspaper, and that doesn't even work any of the time. So I
• 1:04:47
  think it's just more about mental adjustments. He can't still be struggling struggling with
• 1:04:51
  the pitch Clock's been a full season, and he knew that was coming,
• 1:04:55
  so like he should have been ready for that before the season started. So
• 1:04:59
  I think I think there's just some stuff going on upstairs. It could be
• 1:05:02
  related to a lot of things. It doesn't even really matter what it is.
• 1:05:05
  The point is that, you know, he knows what kind of picture
• 1:05:08
  the Phillies need him to be, because right now they have a serious shortage
• 1:05:12
  of that kind of picture. I was thinking to myself too, I wonder
• 1:05:15
  if the business aspect of baseball is really getting to him. I just read
• 1:05:19
  an article recently today about in its Football base Derek Carr was talking about how
• 1:05:25
  this off season and just the business aspect of the game of football weighed so
• 1:05:29
  heavily on his mind, and specially last season as well. Everybody is made
• 1:05:33
  differently, our brains work differently than each other, and you know what,
• 1:05:39
  maybe that's part of the equation as well. Maybe Aaron Nola's already, for
• 1:05:43
  whatever reason, just thinking about the offseason, thinking about free agency, maybe
• 1:05:47
  wants to stay in Philly. Maybe he doesn't. Who knows what's going on
• 1:05:50
  in his brain with that, I could not imagine those type of feels throughout
• 1:05:56
  the cares of a season where where your leg see, again, your legacy
• 1:06:00
  is being defined here at this moment with this particular team. That is all
• 1:06:04
  you have known. And I think there's something to be said up for that.
• 1:06:09
  Yeah, I do wonder what he've used his legacy as I fear other
• 1:06:13
  than anything other than some some kind of completely epic turnaround in the postseason,
• 1:06:18
  his legacy is going to be what we are. We've already sealed it.
• 1:06:23
  He's already sealed it. And if you want to go down that road,
• 1:06:26
  I would say, you know, could I see a situation where his their
• 1:06:30
  inability to work out a deal before the season started maybe impacted him. And
• 1:06:35
  I don't mean just on its own. I mean because at the beginning of
• 1:06:38
  the year, all you saw was the phrase, Aaronola is betting on himself.
• 1:06:42
  Yes, do you feel like he won that bet so far? No?
• 1:06:49
  I certainly don't think he's going to make as much money as he hoped
• 1:06:53
  too as a free agent, but he still he still will make money.
• 1:06:57
  But I you know, if he had had twenty twenty too this year,
• 1:07:00
  he would make more money in free agency. Absolutely, I think that.
• 1:07:02
  I think that's fair. And I think the reality too is we've known what
• 1:07:05
  he has been through, you know, August and September. Quote August and
• 1:07:09
  September Aaron Nola last year was kind of an anomaly. He had a pretty
• 1:07:13
  strong September and we're thinking, oh my gosh, here it is right now
• 1:07:16
  he is getting out of whatever that September funk it has been throughout his career,
• 1:07:21
  and now we're in September. We saw some good stuff in August,
• 1:07:25
  we saw some crap in August two, and we're like, okay, yes,
• 1:07:28
  this is the Aaronola. We know we're talking about legacy. So I
• 1:07:31
  think you're right, it's kind of solidified at that point. Yeah, hopefully
• 1:07:35
  you know, he can come through. Hopefully the playoffs are a playground for
• 1:07:41
  him to be able to say like, look, you know, part of
• 1:07:43
  the reason I struggled near the end of the year was because part of our
• 1:07:47
  workload Stamino wise to prepare me for the playoffs was that, you know,
• 1:07:51
  so I would be prepared for this so that I would be able to pitch
• 1:07:54
  well in October by you know, maybe sacrificing a couple of games in September.
• 1:07:59
  Does it even work like this? I don't know, but like,
• 1:08:01
  if that was the case, that's something that could change his legacy. But
• 1:08:05
  yeah, as it stands now, everybody knows how everybody knows what the Aaronola
• 1:08:10
  definition is because we had to come up with it earlier this year because we
• 1:08:13
  were all going insane watching him pitch. Absolutely again, folks, justin clue
• 1:08:18
  from the Hitting Season podcast w h y Y listen at I listen on Apple
• 1:08:24
  Podcasts, by the way, but you can go on over to Billy Penn
• 1:08:26
  dot com as well and check out what they have over there Baseball Prospectus as
• 1:08:30
  well at just an underscore clue on the Twitter dot com. I don't know
• 1:08:35
  how much longer I'm gonna be on that freaking site, but I think that
• 1:08:39
  every day, every day I've been saying it on this podcast for like four
• 1:08:43
  months now. At this point, I'm like, you know what, I
• 1:08:45
  need to crap or get off the pot here and make a decision. Yeah,
• 1:08:49
  But to conclude our discussion here justin you know, I'm worried about some
• 1:08:57
  guys on this team, and I wanted to get your your take on guys
• 1:09:00
  that we are really worried about down the stretch here, you know. And
• 1:09:02
  for me, it's Jose Alvarado. I mean, after what we saw from
• 1:09:05
  him in the playoffs last year, I think a lot of us thought that
• 1:09:11
  he was just going to be real, steady eddie during the course of this
• 1:09:15
  season. Unfortunately, if yes, some injuries have prevented him from doing a
• 1:09:17
  lot of what we had hoped. But I'm getting terrified he's out on the
• 1:09:23
  mound as of late in high leverage situational moments. I just don't have that
• 1:09:28
  trust in him. I don't think a lot of fans do either. So
• 1:09:30
  for me, that's who I am really worried about in terms of Phillies player
• 1:09:35
  as we're looking down this postseason. Who's that one Phillies player that you are
• 1:09:40
  really worried about to be a detriment to this team possibly if they want to
• 1:09:44
  make a deep playoff run. Well, here's my secret, cap I've never
• 1:09:47
  not been nervous when Jose Alvarado has been in a game, even when he's
• 1:09:51
  been good, I'm always I'm always nervous because the Phillies went out of their
• 1:09:56
  way to collect a bunch of hard throwers who don't alway he's have command.
• 1:10:00
  Sometimes they just they just don't have it. And while that's going to be
• 1:10:04
  the most dangerous for the hitter or potentially the umpire, it's also going to
• 1:10:09
  be dangerous for anybody watching them pitch in late innings. And that's what the
• 1:10:12
  Phillies have in late innings. They got Craig Kimbrill, they got Jose Alvarado,
• 1:10:15
  and they got Sir Anthony Dominguez, who I feel like at this point
• 1:10:18
  is kind of my answer to your question, Okay, because he is a
• 1:10:21
  he is a guy who again you've seen the best of him, and we
• 1:10:26
  also know what he's been through healthwise, but you've seen him at his best
• 1:10:30
  and you know what he has been capable of, and now being a relief
• 1:10:33
  pitcher, you know you're not seeing him at a steady pace for larger chunks
• 1:10:36
  of games you're seeing him sporadically and you're maybe not getting a clear sense of
• 1:10:45
  what he's still capable of the point like he's still got velocity, which tells
• 1:10:48
  me he's not in pain or struggling with some kind of injury, but he's
• 1:10:54
  his control is really taken a hit, and all these guys, you know,
• 1:10:58
  they're kind of just reaching that point where they're hard throwing is turning into
• 1:11:00
  an accurate throwing. Yeah, And that's not unfixable, and that's it.
• 1:11:05
  That is just kind of the type of pitchers the Phillies have reserved for high
• 1:11:09
  leverage situations, which feels again crazy, but still, you know, it's
• 1:11:15
  not the first time a team's gone that route, and it's worked out for
• 1:11:18
  large parts of the season. There are parts of this season where the strongest
• 1:11:21
  aspect of the Phillies as a team was their bullpen. They leaned on their
• 1:11:26
  bullpen for a couple of weeks, maybe like even a couple of months at
• 1:11:30
  some points. Yeah, they were this was a pitching first team and their
• 1:11:33
  bullpen was a big part of that. You're starting to see tired arms come
• 1:11:36
  out there. You're starting to see guys who've missed time due to injury out
• 1:11:40
  there who weren't able to, like you know, use that time to rest
• 1:11:43
  because they were dealing with other issues. So you're starting to see guys like
• 1:11:46
  Taiwan Walker get a rest day between starts. You're starting to see them say,
• 1:11:49
  we're moving from a six to a five because Lorenzen and Sanchez are just
• 1:11:54
  gonna be stacked on top of each other because Lorenzen's miles past his career highest
• 1:11:59
  pitch limit, so you know, and that's supposed to be your guy who's
• 1:12:01
  supplementing the pitching staff. Now he's an unfamiliar territory too. So what I
• 1:12:06
  say Dominguez, it's partially because I I'm rooting for him as you know,
• 1:12:13
  as I always have been. But like once again, I'm hoping he can
• 1:12:16
  be one of these effective back of the bullpen guys. But they're the ones
• 1:12:19
  making you nervous right now, whether it's him or Alvarado or Kimbrell or any
• 1:12:23
  of these like next tier guys. Like next time I see Andrew Ballotti in
• 1:12:27
  a game, I'm gonna bite through my desk. So it's it's just a
• 1:12:30
  it's the problem period for us in the bullpen right now, but there's still
• 1:12:35
  like seventeen games left in September. I think, yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 1:12:41
  you said this team was fun to watch while we were recording this too,
• 1:12:44
  and as you were saying that they were going down by five rounts.
• 1:12:45
  So yeah, and look, I'm still gonna say seriously, I was gonna
• 1:12:50
  end our discussion by saying, you know, even though we have these concerns,
• 1:12:54
  we are really worried about certain aspects of this bullpens. For me,
• 1:12:58
  it's still been a fun, fun season. It really has. It has
• 1:13:00
  been a fun season. It's been fun. They are a you know,
• 1:13:05
  this might just be recency biased, but I would say they are They are
• 1:13:09
  a harder team to watch than last year. But that's probably not true.
• 1:13:12
  It's probably just because I'm watching this team now. Last year, you know,
• 1:13:15
  we know how that story goes. Absolutely, so they will always be
• 1:13:18
  a stressful team to watch because they're rarely ever going to be the most dominant
• 1:13:24
  team in the league, like the Braves, right They're going They're going to
• 1:13:26
  be like, you know, a loose collection of psychopaths who for some reason
• 1:13:31
  like their brain their their pistons firing, and their brain align so they all
• 1:13:36
  get along with each other, and they can hit home runs. So they
• 1:13:39
  are a fun team to watch when they're winning. They're not a fun team
• 1:13:42
  to watch when they are struggling. Great way to end our discussion, folks,
• 1:13:45
  Again, Justin Clue at just an Underscore Clue on Twitter. Also from
• 1:13:48
  Baseball Prospectus and Hitting Season podcasts with the John Stalness Liz Rocher over at w
• 1:13:56
  h y y Billy Penn dot com. It has been great talking to you,
• 1:14:00
  buddy. Come back to join us down the road. I would love
• 1:14:01
  to talk to you again, my friend. We'll do take care. So
• 1:14:05
  much fun talking to Justin all the time. I love I just love his
• 1:14:12
  cadence and delivery. I know maybe you don't understand it as much if you
• 1:14:16
  haven't been doing podcasting for over ten years lately we have, and as long
• 1:14:23
  as Justin ads anyway, he has always so fun to talk to and a
• 1:14:26
  plethora of knowledge about this Philadelphia Phillies team, baseball in general. So that
• 1:14:30
  was a great show. That's gonna do it for us this week. If
• 1:14:33
  you are new to listening to the podcast, we'd appreciate it if you would
• 1:14:36
  subscribe on whatever podcast platform you are on Apple podcasts, give us a follow
• 1:14:41
  there and rate and review the show. That does help us out. And
• 1:14:44
  also, if anything happens to your podcast feed, like for instance, my
• 1:14:47
  friend justin there and the folks over at the Hitting Season podcast, they had
• 1:14:53
  major issues on Apple Podcasts recently where the podcast just we're not coming into my
• 1:14:59
  particular app. So for us, if that ever happens to you, head
• 1:15:01
  on over to Philadelphia Sportstable dot com. We've got all of our podcast shows
• 1:15:05
  over there. We're on Instagram. Search us out there, and it's gonna
• 1:15:10
  do it for us. Folks. Take care, we'll catch you next time.