Latest / Foul Territory / Fair T: Astros & Jays surge, Guardians & Mets fall, Judge’s story

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Fair T: Astros & Jays surge, Guardians & Mets fall, Judge’s story · Foul Territory

0:00
Speaker 1: Maybe they're not getting enough attention, but they should be.
0:02
Speaker 1: They're playing at an extremely high level school. Bul is
0:05
Speaker 1: a blast to watch every fifth or sixth day. Welcome
0:09
Speaker 1: everyone to the Monday edition of Fair Territory. I know
0:13
Speaker 1: I say this every week. You guys probably get tired
0:16
Speaker 1: of hearing me say it. But we've got a lot
0:18
Speaker 1: to talk about. There is a lot going on in
0:20
Speaker 1: the game right now, but it hit some things off
0:23
Speaker 1: the top, just real quick. Trek Schooble last night Sunday
0:25
Speaker 1: Night Baseball, thirteen strikeouts, just brilliant. James Wood the Nationals.
0:31
Speaker 1: Four intentional walks, the first player since Barry Bonds in
0:35
Speaker 1: two thousand and four to draw four intentional walks in
0:38
Speaker 1: a game. And the Miami Marlins, my goodness, they've won
0:41
Speaker 1: seventh straight. They've swept a road trip in San Francisco
0:45
Speaker 1: and Arizona. They finished June with a winning record. Good
0:49
Speaker 1: for the Marlins. But I've got some other things that
0:52
Speaker 1: I want to dive a little bit more deeply into.
0:56
Speaker 1: The last two weekends for Fox. I've seen the two
0:58
Speaker 1: NL East Powers, the Mets, the Phillies. The Phillies both weekends.
1:01
Speaker 1: The Mets a Saturday ago I gotta tell you, folks,
1:05
Speaker 1: not that impressed. And I'll go with each team and
1:08
Speaker 1: I'll tell you why I'm not that impressed with either
1:11
Speaker 1: as we go along here, Let's start with the Mets
1:14
Speaker 1: swept by the Pirates this weekend. The lowly Pirates outscored
1:20
Speaker 1: thirty to four. Hard to do nine straight runs, nine
1:24
Speaker 1: and more runs in each of those three games they
1:27
Speaker 1: allowed thirty to four. They're outscored, and they didn't face
1:31
Speaker 1: Paul's schemes in this series. Also, they had a team
1:34
Speaker 1: meeting Saturday and then the next day lost twelve to one.
1:37
Speaker 1: That's not what team meetings are supposed to produce. So
1:41
Speaker 1: we heard from the Mets owner Steve Cohen on X
1:43
Speaker 1: this morning, and he had some things to say. And
1:46
Speaker 1: let's look at what Steve Cohen said. Tough stretch, no
1:49
Speaker 1: sugarcoating it. I didn't see this coming. I'm as frustrated
1:52
Speaker 1: as everybody else. We will get through this period, and
1:55
Speaker 1: I'm sure that they will. Our injured pitching will come
1:57
Speaker 1: back over the next few weeks. It is unlikely teams
2:00
Speaker 1: hitting with runners in scoring position will continue at this
2:03
Speaker 1: week pace. Keep the faith. Well, that's a good message
2:07
Speaker 1: from Colin. That's the right tone he should be establishing
2:09
Speaker 1: as owner. The Mets, though, are three and thirteen in
2:13
Speaker 1: their last sixteen games. Guys like me, reporters like me,
2:17
Speaker 1: men and women were praising the Mets pitching just I
2:20
Speaker 1: don't know, a couple of weeks ago. Since then, they've
2:23
Speaker 1: lost Senga to the IL McGill, to the IL Canning
2:26
Speaker 1: to the IL Manaiah remains on the IL. Mantas came
2:30
Speaker 1: back could first start not so good yesterday, and he
2:34
Speaker 1: is lined up to pitch against the Yankees in the
2:36
Speaker 1: Subway Series in this coming weekend. So the Mets have
2:40
Speaker 1: some serious problems. And it's not just the injuries to
2:43
Speaker 1: the starting rotation. Their bullpen has sort of fallen apart too.
2:47
Speaker 1: In the month of June they ranked twenty eighth in
2:50
Speaker 1: bullpen Era And offensively they're too top heavy. They've had
2:54
Speaker 1: some situations with different positions this year that have not
2:58
Speaker 1: gone that well. Right now, they're going to below average
3:01
Speaker 1: production second base, third base, catcher, and center field. So
3:05
Speaker 1: there's not all that much that they can do right
3:09
Speaker 1: now before the deadline, but there is probably a lot
3:12
Speaker 1: that they can do at the deadline. Okay, that's the Mets. Now,
3:15
Speaker 1: the Phillies took two or three this weekend against Atlanta,
3:18
Speaker 1: and by the way, Atlanta with these two teams, the
3:20
Speaker 1: Mets and Phillies in the state that they're in, should
3:23
Speaker 1: be all the more embarrassed for the season that they're having.
3:26
Speaker 1: But the Phillies have again the NLA's lead. That's fine.
3:31
Speaker 1: They won two or three from Atlanta, very good, but
3:33
Speaker 1: there are some issues there too. Now Bryce Harper might
3:36
Speaker 1: come back tonight and that would solve some of their
3:38
Speaker 1: offensive issues. For sure. They've got an amazing rotation, second
3:43
Speaker 1: in the majors in era. Their bullpen is a bit
3:46
Speaker 1: of a mess, and Jason Stark wrote about this last
3:48
Speaker 1: week in The Athletic after interviewing Dave Dombrowski. Dembrowski has
3:53
Speaker 1: said we're gonna get Alvarado back in August for the
3:55
Speaker 1: regular season. He was their best reliever, but he's eligible
3:59
Speaker 1: for the postseason after testing positive for performance enhancing drug.
4:04
Speaker 1: He also plans, Dombrowski does, to eventually move a starter
4:08
Speaker 1: or two to the bullpen. They've already done that with
4:10
Speaker 1: Taiwan Walker. But that's not the only issue with the Phillies.
4:14
Speaker 1: The bullpen. The offense too. It just doesn't seem to
4:18
Speaker 1: be at the level that it should be considering the
4:21
Speaker 1: names in that lineup. The Phillies rank eleventh in the
4:24
Speaker 1: league and runs per game eleventh in the majors. That's okay,
4:29
Speaker 1: but it should be better, and they're a team that
4:33
Speaker 1: isn't getting what they would want to get from a
4:35
Speaker 1: number of different players. I would say that Boehm is won.
4:39
Speaker 1: He was hot for a while, not so much lately.
4:41
Speaker 1: Stott is another just up and down the lineup. Schwarber's
4:45
Speaker 1: been great obviously, Turners had a remarkable season so far,
4:49
Speaker 1: but they're not clicking the way they should now. Maybe
4:51
Speaker 1: the return of Harper helps that. Maybe they bring up
4:54
Speaker 1: Justin Crawford their top prospect at some point, to maybe
4:57
Speaker 1: address left field. But they've got some work to do
5:00
Speaker 1: at the deadline as well. So the NL East it's
5:04
Speaker 1: going to be a race. It's maybe not going to
5:07
Speaker 1: be as great a race or as dynamic erase as
5:10
Speaker 1: we would have thought with both these teams. I wouldn't
5:12
Speaker 1: say the Phillies are reeling right now, but both these
5:15
Speaker 1: teams have not quite played to the capability that we
5:18
Speaker 1: all expected. The Mets did early. They're struggling right now.
5:21
Speaker 1: The Phillies have had their moments, and certainly they face
5:24
Speaker 1: good pitching this week in Houston and Atlanta, but I
5:28
Speaker 1: do want to see more from their offense. All right now,
5:31
Speaker 1: as we move on, speaking of Houston, the Houston Astros.
5:34
Speaker 1: We don't talk about this team enough. The Houston Astros
5:38
Speaker 1: just won two or three from the Chicago Cubs in
5:40
Speaker 1: the Kyle Tucker Ryan Presley Homecoming Series. It's an amazing
5:44
Speaker 1: series in a lot of ways. Cam Smith, the Astros
5:47
Speaker 1: big acquisition in the Tucker trade, had a big series
5:50
Speaker 1: as well. But what's amazing about Houston is they're playing
5:54
Speaker 1: and have played since May fifth without your Don Alvarez.
5:58
Speaker 1: It's almost two months now without ours. They've got a
6:01
Speaker 1: number of starting pitchers on the IL right now, Blanco Arraghetti,
6:05
Speaker 1: Christian Javier Hayden, was Nesky, Luis Garcia is an entire rotation.
6:10
Speaker 1: And yet here they are the month of June nineteen
6:14
Speaker 1: and seven, best record in the majors. It's a testament
6:17
Speaker 1: to what they do, a testament to their culture, a
6:19
Speaker 1: testament to the manager Joe Aespotta, the general manager Dana Brown.
6:23
Speaker 1: They're going to be looking for a left handed hitter
6:25
Speaker 1: at the deadline. They'll get Alvarez back, hopefully soon, maybe
6:29
Speaker 1: even this week, but they'll still need more left handed punch,
6:32
Speaker 1: and I imagine maybe they'll look for some other things,
6:34
Speaker 1: different pieces here and there as well. They're bullpen the
6:38
Speaker 1: back of the one of the strongest of the league
6:40
Speaker 1: with a brew and hater. They have been just one
6:43
Speaker 1: of the best stories of the season. And again, I
6:46
Speaker 1: don't know that they're getting quite enough credit for what
6:48
Speaker 1: they've done, because heck, we just expected every year from them,
6:53
Speaker 1: but this was the year, and we actually say this
6:55
Speaker 1: every year, this was the year they should have taken
6:58
Speaker 1: a step back the team. I want to discuss a
7:01
Speaker 1: team with a huge series coming up this week, the
7:04
Speaker 1: Toronto Blue Jays. The Blue Jays have played really well,
7:07
Speaker 1: just took two or three from the Guardians in Cleveland,
7:10
Speaker 1: two or three from the Red Sox at Fenway, and
7:12
Speaker 1: the big series I was talking about is a four
7:16
Speaker 1: game set against the Yankees at home when they are
7:19
Speaker 1: trailing the Yankees by only three games in the Al East.
7:23
Speaker 1: We've talked a lot about Tampa Bay and how well
7:25
Speaker 1: they've played, lost two of three this weekend to the Orioles.
7:28
Speaker 1: But they've been really good. The Jays are right behind them,
7:32
Speaker 1: and the Jays have had a very interesting season because
7:36
Speaker 1: their offseason acquisitions Santan Darren Hoffman, they're big acquisitions, have
7:41
Speaker 1: not done all that much Andres Himenez another one. But
7:45
Speaker 1: they've gotten contributions from some unexpected places. Addison Barger certainly
7:50
Speaker 1: one of them, Ernie Clement, Nathan Lucas. These guys have
7:53
Speaker 1: done things that no one really expected. Now. I know
7:56
Speaker 1: a lot of Blue Jays fans out there saying, can
7:59
Speaker 1: you hate the Bluelue Jays. You haven't said a nice
8:01
Speaker 1: thing about the Blue Jays in a year plus, blah
8:03
Speaker 1: blah blah, blah blah. I don't hate the Blue Jays.
8:06
Speaker 1: I certainly don't hate Toronto, and I certainly don't hate Canada.
8:09
Speaker 1: I have had questions with the way the Blue Jays
8:12
Speaker 1: have been run by their front office, questions that a
8:15
Speaker 1: lot of Blue Jays fans have, But I guess don't
8:18
Speaker 1: they don't like it when maybe this little guy with
8:20
Speaker 1: the bow tie asked those questions. That's fine, but the
8:23
Speaker 1: Blue Jays give them credit. Springer resurgent ear at age
8:27
Speaker 1: thirty five. They've got their rotation pretty much in place
8:31
Speaker 1: now much better, with Schurzer back, Eric Lower making a
8:35
Speaker 1: great contribution, and of course the three guys at the top, Bassett, Barrios, Gossman,
8:40
Speaker 1: They're terrific. So I kind of like where the Blue
8:43
Speaker 1: Jays are now. I'd like them even better if Santan
8:45
Speaker 1: Dare got back and if Hoffman kind of stabilized a
8:48
Speaker 1: little bit and maybe him and Theez started hitting more.
8:51
Speaker 1: But this is a team that has been much more
8:55
Speaker 1: of a force than I expected. And remember, I don't
8:58
Speaker 1: know in the winter, we were talking about them as
9:00
Speaker 1: kind of a team that might be sellers at the deadline,
9:03
Speaker 1: right they had Flat unsigned, they had Bobochet who still
9:07
Speaker 1: was unsigned and is going to hit the free agent
9:09
Speaker 1: market most likely. But the Jays have kind of exceeded
9:14
Speaker 1: what a lot of people, including myself, thought they would be.
9:17
Speaker 1: And they've got this huge series against the Yankees coming
9:19
Speaker 1: up in the middle of Canada Day celebrations. It should
9:22
Speaker 1: be a fun week in Toronto. Now. Finally, before we
9:26
Speaker 1: move on, the Cleveland Guardians, and this is the other
9:29
Speaker 1: side of the coin in the American League. Cleveland Guardians
9:34
Speaker 1: have been a huge disappointment. Now. They exceeded expectations last year,
9:38
Speaker 1: did things beyond what anyone thought they could when they
9:42
Speaker 1: made it to the American League Championship Series and of
9:44
Speaker 1: course lost to the New York Yankees. The Guardians did
9:48
Speaker 1: that kind of, in the words of one executive, spinning
9:51
Speaker 1: a bullpen fairy tale. That's how they did it. They
9:54
Speaker 1: spun a bullpen fairytale, and obviously it helped them get
9:58
Speaker 1: to where they needed to go. They have offensive issues
10:01
Speaker 1: for a while now. Offensive issues have persisted this year.
10:05
Speaker 1: Just got swept at home by the Cardinals. They're forty
10:08
Speaker 1: and forty two. They're eleven and a half games back
10:11
Speaker 1: in the AL Central. The Tigers obviously are running away.
10:14
Speaker 1: They've had a remarkable first half of the season. But
10:18
Speaker 1: you just wonder what's going to happen with Cleveland. They've
10:21
Speaker 1: got Chicago, Detroit, Houston, and the White Sox going into
10:24
Speaker 1: the break. Their schedule is really tough. They just have not,
10:28
Speaker 1: for whatever reason, found offensively deadline sellers. Yeah, they could
10:32
Speaker 1: be sellers, but they don't have much to sell. Carlos
10:35
Speaker 1: Santana maybe, but it's just disappointing to see what has
10:38
Speaker 1: happened with the Guardians. Maybe they bring up Chase the
10:41
Speaker 1: latter their number one prospect and get some good things
10:44
Speaker 1: out of him, but it just seems that this is
10:47
Speaker 1: not the Guardians year. All Right, we've gone through as
10:50
Speaker 1: much as we can go through, at least in the
10:52
Speaker 1: first segment. Stay tuned. We've got a lot more to come.
10:58
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12:00
Speaker 5: Well well, well, well.
12:06
Speaker 1: Time out for the Inside Dish, the part of the
12:08
Speaker 1: show where I talk about maybe a story I've written,
12:10
Speaker 1: a trend in the game, something else entirely. But today
12:14
Speaker 1: I'm going to talk about the story that I published
12:16
Speaker 1: today about Aaron Judge. This story was three weeks in
12:20
Speaker 1: the making and it has kind of an interesting backstory
12:23
Speaker 1: to it. So I wrote about this in the wind
12:26
Speaker 1: up for the Athletic. I don't know about a week ago,
12:28
Speaker 1: but I'll go into more detail here. So three saturdays ago,
12:32
Speaker 1: I'm at Yankee Stadium and we've got the Yankees Red
12:35
Speaker 1: Sox broadcast on Fox, and of course Aaron Judges red
12:39
Speaker 1: hot at the time, and I'm asking people questions, what
12:41
Speaker 1: is standing out to you about him, what do you think?
12:44
Speaker 1: And someone told me, this person shall remain name was
12:47
Speaker 1: check out how much he is swinging. That's the difference.
12:51
Speaker 1: He's swinging a lot more than he ever has. And
12:55
Speaker 1: I found this curious because great hitters get pitched so
12:58
Speaker 1: carefully that sometimes, like Juan Soto, they ended up not
13:01
Speaker 1: swinging a lot right. Intentional walks happen. Walks that aren't
13:05
Speaker 1: intentional but semi intentional happen. They don't get a lot
13:08
Speaker 1: of good pitches to hit, and the great ones are
13:11
Speaker 1: exceedingly patient. So I started looking into this. I made
13:14
Speaker 1: some calls that week, knowing that we had the Yankees
13:17
Speaker 1: Red Sox again the next weekend from Fenway, and I
13:20
Speaker 1: could talk to Judge at Fenway hopefully, and in the
13:25
Speaker 1: coming days or the days that led up to that game,
13:28
Speaker 1: I spoke to the Yankees hitting coach James Rawson and
13:30
Speaker 1: some others just about what was to me an interesting
13:34
Speaker 1: sort of phenomenon that he was swinging at this high
13:37
Speaker 1: rate in virtually every possible situation. So then I talked
13:41
Speaker 1: to Judge on Saturday, and this was the day after
13:45
Speaker 1: he hit that monumental home run off Garrett Crochet at
13:48
Speaker 1: Fenway to tie the game after striking out three times.
13:52
Speaker 1: So I'm like, wow, all right, he had the three strikeouts,
13:55
Speaker 1: but that home run was kind of a legendary sort
13:57
Speaker 1: of home run, or at least at that moment, it
13:59
Speaker 1: seemed like it. I taught the Judge and then on
14:02
Speaker 1: Sunday prepared to write the story and did write the story.
14:06
Speaker 1: Problem was, Judge struck out not only three times Friday night,
14:10
Speaker 1: but three times Saturday and three times Sunday, and the
14:13
Speaker 1: Yankees were swept, swept by the Red Sox at Fenway,
14:17
Speaker 1: the Raphael Dever's Red Sox at Fenway. And we decided
14:22
Speaker 1: at the Athletic, well, the story is written. It's where
14:26
Speaker 1: we want it to be. But if we published it
14:29
Speaker 1: on Monday, after we just struck out nine times in
14:32
Speaker 1: this series, after the Yankees just got swept, it might
14:36
Speaker 1: not be a good idea. And I remember Chris Kershner,
14:38
Speaker 1: our Yankees right telling me, you run this on Monday.
14:41
Speaker 1: The comments are going to destroy you. And yes, people
14:45
Speaker 1: would say this is weird timing. The guy's not hitting,
14:47
Speaker 1: what are you writing this for? So I figured, okay,
14:50
Speaker 1: no problem, it's Aaron Judge. I'll wait a couple of days, Wait,
14:54
Speaker 1: a couple of days, we'll get hot again, I'll publish.
14:57
Speaker 1: Problem was he didn't get hot again. He didn't get
15:00
Speaker 1: hot again at all. For a couple of weeks from
15:04
Speaker 1: June fourteenth to twenty eighth, he hit something like one
15:07
Speaker 1: seventy six with a six forty five ops and only
15:10
Speaker 1: two homers. And I kept waiting and waiting, and it
15:13
Speaker 1: was kind of driving me nuts. And the reason it
15:16
Speaker 1: was driving me nuts is because most writers, when they
15:19
Speaker 1: write something, they want it published. They wanted to get
15:23
Speaker 1: out to the world. They don't want to think this
15:25
Speaker 1: is the biggest thing that they've wasted their time. And
15:29
Speaker 1: it happens. Sometimes you lose a story for whatever reason
15:32
Speaker 1: that you can't go with. You don't have it good enough,
15:35
Speaker 1: or maybe the timing isn't right. Who knows. There are
15:38
Speaker 1: one hundred reasons why you might not publish a story.
15:41
Speaker 1: But in this case, I knew I had something that
15:44
Speaker 1: I thought was interesting, something that really had not been
15:46
Speaker 1: written about as far as I know, and I wanted
15:50
Speaker 1: it to get out. So I'm waiting and I'm waiting
15:53
Speaker 1: and I'm waiting, and finally, yesterday Sunday, there it is
15:59
Speaker 1: to home run from Aaron Judge. One of them was
16:02
Speaker 1: early in the count, and that was one of the
16:04
Speaker 1: points of emphasis in the story, that he's swinging early
16:06
Speaker 1: in the count. And today we published the story. Finally,
16:10
Speaker 1: I didn't even have to tweak it that much. It
16:12
Speaker 1: was pretty much all set. So Judge in the story
16:17
Speaker 1: explains that he is being more aggressive this year. He
16:20
Speaker 1: was surprised that I told him about the swing rates.
16:22
Speaker 1: He didn't know, at least at that point, that he
16:26
Speaker 1: had been swinging at a higher rate. Now he's just
16:28
Speaker 1: going out and playing. He's not studying the numbers necessarily
16:31
Speaker 1: as deeply as maybe we are. But he did say, hey,
16:34
Speaker 1: I'm trying to be more aggressive. I'm trying to be
16:37
Speaker 1: more aggressive because I know then I might only get
16:41
Speaker 1: one or two pitches to hitting it at bat, and
16:43
Speaker 1: I want to be sure that when that pitch comes,
16:45
Speaker 1: the one that looks good to me, then I'm going
16:48
Speaker 1: to be swinging. And again, it is almost like the
16:52
Speaker 1: anti Juan Soto approach. Right Soto, it seems like every
16:55
Speaker 1: at bat is this masterpiece in which he runs the
16:59
Speaker 1: count to three and two and it's just working in
17:02
Speaker 1: his favor, and he's a Maestro just kind of dictating
17:04
Speaker 1: the whole at that. Now Judge is dictating at bats too,
17:07
Speaker 1: but only in a different way. And I also found
17:10
Speaker 1: it curious, and I asked Judge about this because he
17:13
Speaker 1: grew up not far from San Francisco in Linden, California.
17:17
Speaker 1: Barry Bonds when he was hot, like crazy hot, like
17:20
Speaker 1: Judge has been at various points, what happened, Intentional walks happened,
17:26
Speaker 1: And yet it was James Wood drawing the four intentional
17:29
Speaker 1: walks on Sunday and Aaron Judge has drawn I believe,
17:32
Speaker 1: only eighteen all year. It might be off on that number.
17:35
Speaker 1: So that was curious to me. And Judge basically said,
17:39
Speaker 1: in his humble way, I'm not Bonds. I'm not getting
17:41
Speaker 1: pitched like that. It's different. Bonds was getting one pitch
17:45
Speaker 1: maybe per game. I'm not in that area, So that
17:48
Speaker 1: was interesting. It was also interesting to hear the Red
17:50
Speaker 1: Sox pitching coach Andrew Bailey say we attack aggression with aggression.
17:56
Speaker 1: We're not dancing around even great hitters like Aaron Judge,
18:00
Speaker 1: because Aaron Judge, like all great hitters, fails more often
18:04
Speaker 1: than he succeeds. So the whole thing to me was
18:08
Speaker 1: just interesting and I'm sitting on it week after week
18:12
Speaker 1: after week. Okay, it was only three weeks, but it
18:15
Speaker 1: seemed like forever. And yesterday, after he hit the two
18:18
Speaker 1: home runs, I was kind of very excited that finally
18:22
Speaker 1: I could get this story out there. It's out there today.
18:25
Speaker 1: I've seen some people already in the comments talking more
18:28
Speaker 1: about Barry Bonds than talking about Aaron Judge because Bonds
18:31
Speaker 1: is mentioned in the story. And yes, I mentioned that
18:34
Speaker 1: he used performance enhancing drugs or was alleged to have
18:37
Speaker 1: used them, and people just can't still accept that he
18:41
Speaker 1: was a guy that has all these records, or is
18:44
Speaker 1: a guy that has all these records when too many
18:47
Speaker 1: he was tainted. I get it. That's a fair discussion.
18:51
Speaker 1: It's not what this article is about. So anyway, the
18:53
Speaker 1: Aaron Judge story is finally out there. I am thrilled
18:56
Speaker 1: it's finally out there. Is it my best story ever? Know?
18:59
Speaker 1: But when it was sitting there and sitting there and
19:02
Speaker 1: sitting there, I was just stewing and I could not
19:05
Speaker 1: get over it. Now I'm over it back right after this.
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Speaker 1: All right, Like last week, we are taking questions from
20:20
Speaker 1: chat BCC. That's a free chat app. Go to foul
20:24
Speaker 1: Territory dot Chat. It's totally free to get in and
20:27
Speaker 1: join the conversation. All right, let's start it off here
20:30
Speaker 1: with the questions. Oh, here's a good one from Jeremy Meyer.
20:33
Speaker 1: Would the Age trade Luis Severino because he's unhappy with
20:37
Speaker 1: the whole mound? Now everyone knows Severino's home road splits
20:40
Speaker 1: have been kind of crazy this year. Unfortunately for him,
20:43
Speaker 1: the road splits did not or the record took a
20:47
Speaker 1: hit yesterday against the Yankees. He did not pitch very well.
20:50
Speaker 1: And the question now is okay, he's so miserable in Oakland,
20:53
Speaker 1: then he's pretty much said that would the Age trade him?
20:57
Speaker 1: The problem here and MLB Trade Rumors dot Com that
21:00
Speaker 1: a really good analysis of this last week is that he's,
21:04
Speaker 1: even with the great road numbers, not pitching all that
21:07
Speaker 1: well this season. His performance has not been that good,
21:10
Speaker 1: poor strikeout rate, lowest ground ball rate of his career,
21:14
Speaker 1: and his overall numbers really aren't that good. And here's
21:18
Speaker 1: the big problem. He's owed more than fifty five million
21:21
Speaker 1: from right now through the end of his contract, which
21:24
Speaker 1: would be in twenty twenty seven. He has a player
21:27
Speaker 1: option for twenty seven, but at this point you would
21:30
Speaker 1: have to think he'd be exercising it. So I don't
21:33
Speaker 1: know if the A's can trade Severino, whether they want
21:36
Speaker 1: to trade sever Reno, that's another question, and it'll be
21:39
Speaker 1: answered in the next few weeks. All right, next question,
21:43
Speaker 1: This one comes from Delightful, who asks are we making
21:46
Speaker 1: a big enough deal out of the Tigers this year?
21:48
Speaker 1: To this point, they were kind of an afterthought this
21:50
Speaker 1: year despite their magical twenty twenty four campaign, and it
21:54
Speaker 1: feels like it's getting written off because of a weak
21:57
Speaker 1: American League. Delightful fair point, and the Tigers as an
22:01
Speaker 1: ALE Central team, maybe you don't get as much attention
22:04
Speaker 1: as the ALSE teams or even the Astros in the West,
22:07
Speaker 1: but my goodness, they have an eleven and a half
22:09
Speaker 1: game lead in the Central. They're tied with the Dodgers
22:12
Speaker 1: for the best record in Baseball fifty three and thirty two,
22:16
Speaker 1: the third in the majors, in ERA, fifth in runs
22:19
Speaker 1: per game. Maybe they're not getting enough attention, but they
22:22
Speaker 1: should be. They're playing at an extremely high level. Scooble
22:25
Speaker 1: is a blast to watch every fifth or sixth day,
22:28
Speaker 1: and their offense has been better than expected, so I
22:31
Speaker 1: would tend to agree they're not getting enough credit. This
22:34
Speaker 1: isn't the thirty five and five run in nineteen eighty four,
22:36
Speaker 1: but it's been pretty darn good, all right. Next question,
22:39
Speaker 1: This one comes from Robbie Hyde, who asked, oh, is
22:44
Speaker 1: it time for the Red Sox to move on from
22:47
Speaker 1: Walker Buhller. I was struck after that game yesterday in
22:51
Speaker 1: which Walker Buller struggled again, his ERA rising to six
22:55
Speaker 1: point four or five when he said, I think I'm
22:58
Speaker 1: fighting for my spot in the game. Honestly, that was
23:02
Speaker 1: as straightforward and as honest or remarked as you'll ever
23:06
Speaker 1: hear from a player. Here's a guy with four quality
23:09
Speaker 1: starts out of fourteen, a guy the Red Sox paid
23:12
Speaker 1: more than twenty one million for one year. And yes,
23:15
Speaker 1: he is struggling. He is struggling like crazy. Korra was
23:18
Speaker 1: asked yesterday Alex Korra if his spot in the rotation
23:21
Speaker 1: was in jeopardy, and Korra basically said, not right now.
23:25
Speaker 1: Our managers never talk about a pitcher losing his spot
23:29
Speaker 1: in the rotation right after a game. That never happens.
23:32
Speaker 1: But at some point, yes, the Red Sox might need
23:34
Speaker 1: to do something, So we're gonna see with Walker Brewery
23:37
Speaker 1: right now. The Red Sox, they've had a number of
23:40
Speaker 1: issues surfaced in recent weeks. One of them is they're
23:42
Speaker 1: starting rotation. They've had injuries too. Hunter Dobbins got hurt
23:46
Speaker 1: he was pitching well, Cutter Crawford still out, and Tanner
23:50
Speaker 1: Hawk on his rehab assignment has not been good. So
23:53
Speaker 1: a myriad of issues facing the Boston Red Sox right now.
23:58
Speaker 1: And finally a question from Mounts who asked, is Oneil
24:02
Speaker 1: Cruz really available? Well? I wrote last week that the
24:05
Speaker 1: only untouchables with the Pirates were Paul Stein's and Andrew McCutcheon,
24:09
Speaker 1: So immediately a lot of people drew the rifle conclusion. Woo,
24:13
Speaker 1: O'Neil Cruz is in play. He would be difficult to get,
24:17
Speaker 1: I would imagine. But his ops before his two home
24:20
Speaker 1: runs yesterday was seven fourteen. Now it's up to seven forty,
24:24
Speaker 1: but it's still down from his seven to seventy three
24:26
Speaker 1: ops last year. He's entering arbitration this winter, so he
24:30
Speaker 1: has three years of club control remaining. He's going to
24:32
Speaker 1: get more expensive. I get it. But at the same time,
24:36
Speaker 1: O'Neil Cruz is still part of the Pirates' future, I
24:38
Speaker 1: would think, and for that reason I don't expect him
24:41
Speaker 1: to be training before the deadline. All right, before I go,
24:45
Speaker 1: I want to send all my best wishes to Ron Washington.
24:48
Speaker 1: Of course, he is not going to be the Angels
24:50
Speaker 1: manager for the rest of the season, and he is
24:52
Speaker 1: one of my favorite people in the game. He is
24:54
Speaker 1: one of everyone's favorite people in the game. Wash get
24:57
Speaker 1: well soon. And also he's Dave Parker going into the
25:01
Speaker 1: Hall of Fame this year. One of the most entertaining,
25:04
Speaker 1: fun players and a great player. Dave. We will miss
25:07
Speaker 1: you so badly. All right, we'll moving back Thursday with
25:10
Speaker 1: our normal show. I want to thank everyone for watching,
25:13
Speaker 1: for listening. You know where to find us YouTube, Apple, Spotify.
25:16
Speaker 1: Have a great week everyone.
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