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What changes could the Nats make after a Miami sweep? · District Territory

0:01
Speaker 1: We have an extra special episode of District Territory today.
0:05
Speaker 1: It's Giveaway Friday. We got to sign baseball card giveaway.
0:08
Speaker 1: The Nationals just got swept by the Marlins, but they're
0:10
Speaker 1: out in Arizona today. Today, I'm gonna be joined by
0:13
Speaker 1: Spencer Knowsbauma the Athletic and I'm your host is always
0:15
Speaker 1: Eric Shellhouse. But let's not waste any time and jump
0:18
Speaker 1: into it. Welcome back to the District Territory Podcast. Happy Friday,
0:29
Speaker 1: everybody listening. Happy Friday. Spencer, how are you doing.
0:33
Speaker 2: I'm great.
0:34
Speaker 3: I don't want to say I just got back, but
0:36
Speaker 3: I got back late last night after a quick trip
0:39
Speaker 3: to Wilmington because there's no such thing as a real
0:42
Speaker 3: off day on the baseball schedule, so it was really
0:45
Speaker 3: fun being out there and talking to some of the
0:47
Speaker 3: guys there. And yeah, this is a rare time where
0:51
Speaker 3: I'm not on the road with the team, so I'll
0:53
Speaker 3: be I'll be following from Afar in terms of what
0:55
Speaker 3: goes on in Arizona, but like you, you know, there's
0:59
Speaker 3: still a way to follow the team. And yeah, he's coming.
1:02
Speaker 4: Up late night.
1:04
Speaker 1: Nats, as they used to say, packing the damn remember
1:06
Speaker 1: hashtag Late Night Nats. I also want to give a
1:08
Speaker 1: quick shout out to our listener Joe. Joe actually sent
1:11
Speaker 1: me a DM the other day. Love the podcast. You
1:13
Speaker 1: guys are so positive and treat the players like real people.
1:16
Speaker 1: So really appreciated the kind words from Joe, who wrote
1:19
Speaker 1: in after I think Wednesday's episode last week maybe Mondays,
1:23
Speaker 1: but let's jump into Wednesday's recap against the Miami Marlins.
1:27
Speaker 4: The Nats dropped it four to one as.
1:29
Speaker 1: Sturiy Ruiz got the party started for the Fish in
1:32
Speaker 1: the top of the second inning a solo shot, but
1:34
Speaker 1: as Frannie says oftentimes on this show, it's not the
1:37
Speaker 1: solo ones that'll kill you. In the bottom of the
1:39
Speaker 1: third inning, the Nationals got that run back pretty quickly,
1:41
Speaker 1: bases loaded, nobody out and Dylan Cruz bringing a run
1:45
Speaker 1: home on a fielder's choice, Otto Lopez with a fielding
1:47
Speaker 1: aer shortstop Louis scrambling back, but the Marlins and Max
1:50
Speaker 1: Meyer able to work out a trouble there. Curtis meet
1:53
Speaker 1: double play shortly after, and Clayton Beieter nearly pulling off
1:56
Speaker 1: the Houdini Act in the eighth inning after loading the
1:59
Speaker 1: bases with no out Joe mack of a Marlins rookie catcher,
2:03
Speaker 1: what a season he is having. Delivering the big blow
2:05
Speaker 1: there gave him a three to one lead, and as
2:07
Speaker 1: I said, Marlins went on to win four to one. Spencer,
2:11
Speaker 1: you also tweeted this out the day and night difference
2:14
Speaker 1: between the Nats offense ops and night games at this
2:18
Speaker 1: time at three PM on Wednesday, seven eighty seven, first
2:22
Speaker 1: in Major League Baseball in just twenty third at six
2:24
Speaker 1: eighty six during the daytime. This could have been something
2:27
Speaker 1: we could ask about Blake after the game, but I'm
2:29
Speaker 1: just curious, this is your thoughts on that. I mean,
2:32
Speaker 1: seems like in the daytime players usually have a better
2:35
Speaker 1: time of seeing the ball and hitting the ball, but
2:37
Speaker 1: not the case with this team.
2:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's a mix of things. And part
2:41
Speaker 3: of why I didn't ask Blake this time around is
2:43
Speaker 3: because I asked him the last time they'd struggled in
2:45
Speaker 3: day games, and so the most recent update or analysis
2:50
Speaker 3: I have from him on that front is that that's
2:53
Speaker 3: just kind of the way that things go. And yeah,
2:55
Speaker 3: there are certain parks where it is harder to see
2:58
Speaker 3: during the day. They don't necessarily think that Nationals Park
3:02
Speaker 3: is one of those. Nor did they think the last
3:05
Speaker 3: place they played a day game, which was Progressive Field
3:08
Speaker 3: in Cleveland, was one of those parks. But absolutely can
3:11
Speaker 3: be real. You know, they're kind of claimed asking round
3:16
Speaker 3: is that there isn't too much to it. I will
3:18
Speaker 3: point out that throughout James career, his his splits between
3:25
Speaker 3: day and night games are pretty distinct. And also there's
3:29
Speaker 3: a significant enough sample where like, I think you can
3:32
Speaker 3: look at some individual players and say that it's real
3:35
Speaker 3: he's got like a nine oh one ops during night games,
3:37
Speaker 3: but down to day games. It's yeah, something to monitor
3:43
Speaker 3: there now and throughout the course of his career. But
3:47
Speaker 3: they more so feel like it's more of a by player.
3:52
Speaker 3: You know, maybe a guy isn't to say that James
3:54
Speaker 3: falls to that, but like maybe a guy just like
3:57
Speaker 3: isn't as food I feel for a game, and it's
4:08
Speaker 3: a very young team, Like if you look at who's
4:11
Speaker 3: I'll actually ask you this, if you were to guess
4:13
Speaker 3: which team has the best OPS during day game, not
4:17
Speaker 3: a young team, do you have a guess who that
4:19
Speaker 3: might be?
4:23
Speaker 1: I mean, I would say someone in the central I'm
4:26
Speaker 1: kind of I'm guessing Cleveland, he says, not a young team.
4:29
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say, like Cleveland or Minnesota.
4:32
Speaker 3: It's it's actually so like you've got to think of
4:34
Speaker 3: like the veteran rosters. So the Dodgers and the I believe,
4:37
Speaker 3: if I remember correctly, Dodgers are first by a mile
4:40
Speaker 3: and of course right because like they're veteran Leyden, these
4:44
Speaker 3: guys have done it for years. They know how to
4:46
Speaker 3: like figure out their teens. Yankees same way, like everyone
4:50
Speaker 3: in the roster feels like it's in their thirties, whether
4:53
Speaker 3: or not that's actually true. So yeah, I think a
4:56
Speaker 3: lot of it just comes down to experience, and where
4:57
Speaker 3: you can see the Nationals thrive is more in like night,
5:02
Speaker 3: where of that, for whatever reason is a real strike.
5:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think the big testament is just to
5:11
Speaker 1: Max Meyer, the guy that the Marlins had on the
5:13
Speaker 1: bump Wednesday night, he picked up his sixth win this season.
5:16
Speaker 4: As we start to open.
5:17
Speaker 1: Up All Star Game voting, I think that's a conversation
5:20
Speaker 1: Marlins fans are definitely looking forward to. But here's Blake
5:24
Speaker 1: Terra on Max Meyer following Wednesday Night's loss.
5:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, really good stuff.
5:29
Speaker 5: Throw a ton of off speed too, and you know
5:31
Speaker 5: when you're throwing ninety five ninety six.
5:33
Speaker 2: It plays out even more.
5:34
Speaker 5: Were able to throw a lot of secondary pitches, a
5:36
Speaker 5: lot of secondary pitches for strikes, and I think that
5:39
Speaker 5: we just didn't quite make our adjustment to beat him
5:41
Speaker 5: on that. I'm not sure if we were just sitting
5:43
Speaker 5: fastball too much or what it was, but he did
5:45
Speaker 5: a really good job of throwing a lot of those
5:46
Speaker 5: secondary pitches for strikes.
5:48
Speaker 1: We also saw the starting pitching debut Wednesday Night or
5:53
Speaker 1: MLB twenty twenty six regular season MLB starting pitching debut
5:58
Speaker 1: of Andrew Alvarez, and I really liked what I saw
6:01
Speaker 1: out of him. And here's Blake speaking about Andrew and
6:04
Speaker 1: how the Marlins shaped up with them on Wednesday.
6:06
Speaker 2: He threw the ball really well.
6:08
Speaker 5: I know, he got a little bit of trouble there
6:09
Speaker 5: early on, but then settled in did a really good,
6:12
Speaker 5: really good job for us. I got the ball to
6:14
Speaker 5: Brad Lord, who you know, he's been awesome for us
6:16
Speaker 5: all year and give us a chance to win that game.
6:19
Speaker 2: Yeah.
6:19
Speaker 5: I mean, I think we kind of knew coming into
6:21
Speaker 5: this that Albi's tough against lefties, and they were probably
6:23
Speaker 5: going to start with their lefties off the bench, and
6:25
Speaker 5: then as soon as we switched to the righty f
6:28
Speaker 5: had a feel and they were going to bring all
6:30
Speaker 5: their lefties into the game. Yeah, I think it does
6:33
Speaker 5: show some respect, but it's also just a strategic way
6:36
Speaker 5: of matching up.
6:37
Speaker 1: It now, Spencer, when we were watching the game, it
6:40
Speaker 1: was those batch of left handed hitters that really gave
6:43
Speaker 1: beat Her a difficult time in the eighth inning when
6:47
Speaker 1: the Marlins rallied back, and to me, I think it
6:50
Speaker 1: just truly spoke the volumes that the Marlins didn't want
6:54
Speaker 1: to have those guys in the lineup right from the rip,
6:56
Speaker 1: and that as soon as Albi was out of the game,
6:58
Speaker 1: they immediately plugged him in.
7:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's a thing where you've seen teams do
7:06
Speaker 3: that in the past. But why it feels so distinct
7:09
Speaker 3: this year is two reasons. A, the Nationals are doing
7:13
Speaker 3: it way more and so it feels more commonplace where
7:16
Speaker 3: every game it's like god like you're matching up against
7:19
Speaker 3: so and so and so and so and so and so.
7:21
Speaker 3: The other aspect of it, which you alluded to, well, A,
7:24
Speaker 3: this Nationals lineup is you know, unreal this season. Secondly,
7:31
Speaker 3: it's very left hand heavy, so you see these like
7:34
Speaker 3: weird quote unquote lineups that the Nationals put out where
7:37
Speaker 3: they try to avoid these pockets of just like lefty
7:41
Speaker 3: left lefty, or you see them, you know they they
7:47
Speaker 3: line up in those same pockets as well. And so
7:50
Speaker 3: we've just seen so much mixing and matching this season
7:53
Speaker 3: with the Nationals bullpen the opposing bullpen, and yeah, that's modern,
8:00
Speaker 3: but it also kind of does, as you related, to
8:02
Speaker 3: show respect for what Alvarez was able to do in
8:05
Speaker 3: that outing, and yeah, Beater couldn't get the job done,
8:10
Speaker 3: which to me feels like more of a blip than
8:12
Speaker 3: maybe a sign of things to come.
8:15
Speaker 2: But yeah, it was.
8:16
Speaker 3: It was a really interesting kind of pocket and moment
8:18
Speaker 3: in the game.
8:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, the Nationals pitching staff issued eight walks over the
8:23
Speaker 1: course of the game, which Blake did acknowledge in the
8:25
Speaker 1: postgame press conference. And it was an interesting game to
8:29
Speaker 1: see how Blake managed the bullpen. We're gonna hear his
8:31
Speaker 1: words and thoughts on that really quick.
8:34
Speaker 2: Yeah for sure.
8:35
Speaker 5: Yeah, and look, if we if we get the heat,
8:36
Speaker 5: if we get beat by hits home runs and we're
8:38
Speaker 5: not walking anybody, we'll revisit it. But at the end
8:40
Speaker 5: of the day, a lot of times we give up runs.
8:43
Speaker 5: There's there's walks of free bases involved.
8:46
Speaker 2: I'm not sure.
8:47
Speaker 5: Look, I think yesterday we felt pretty good with Mitchell
8:51
Speaker 5: Parker coming in against these lefties didn't go our way.
8:54
Speaker 5: Today we felt really good with the arms we had
8:57
Speaker 5: lined up, and which is why we went to Bradlaw
9:00
Speaker 5: in the fifth when we did, which is why we
9:02
Speaker 5: went to then Rebalta beat her Barland, guys that have
9:05
Speaker 5: been you know, really good for us in the back end,
9:07
Speaker 5: and yeah, and they just got to us.
9:09
Speaker 2: I'm not sure.
9:10
Speaker 5: I wouldn't say it was fatigue or anything like that.
9:13
Speaker 5: I mean, those guys were all arrested, and those are
9:16
Speaker 5: the guys we believe in.
9:18
Speaker 4: Now.
9:18
Speaker 1: The bullpen was really rested coming into the final day
9:21
Speaker 1: on Wednesday. But it really is a curious question to me,
9:26
Speaker 1: Spencer at least, is does this bullpen need another left
9:29
Speaker 1: handed reliever? If Andrew Albarez is to be slotted into
9:33
Speaker 1: the rotation and Mitchell Parker is being treated as a
9:36
Speaker 1: long relief pitcher, is Richard Lovelady enough to be the
9:39
Speaker 1: specialist down there?
9:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's funny.
9:42
Speaker 3: I actually wrote about this in the Athletic on Thursday morning,
9:47
Speaker 3: So I'm glad you brought it up. It's it's a
9:50
Speaker 3: case where it's a mix of things. First and foremost,
9:53
Speaker 3: the Nationals spent most of the first month and a half,
9:57
Speaker 3: as you'll remember, with like three or as many as
10:01
Speaker 3: four left handers in the bullpen, so that in games
10:04
Speaker 3: like this, they wouldn't be asked to go to love
10:08
Speaker 3: Lady in the eighth one night and then open with
10:10
Speaker 3: him the next night, like you could throw Pool in
10:11
Speaker 3: as the opener back back then, you could throw Cna
10:14
Speaker 3: Perez like they liked ken Waldechuk in some of like
10:17
Speaker 3: the longer spots. Unfortunately, right now they have two guys
10:21
Speaker 3: out there, Mitchell Parker one of them who you know,
10:26
Speaker 3: I still believe in, but he's it's undeniable. He struggled recently.
10:31
Speaker 3: So yeah, it's a it's a case a not having
10:34
Speaker 3: enough guys out there. I think they definitely need at
10:36
Speaker 3: least three, if not four. But that brings it to
10:39
Speaker 3: the other point, which is they have been the worst
10:42
Speaker 3: left handed bullpen in baseball if you look at the
10:45
Speaker 3: things under their control, which we know is walks, home runs,
10:49
Speaker 3: and strikeouts like that's generally regarded as the things that
10:52
Speaker 3: are under a pitcher's control as opposed to you know,
10:55
Speaker 3: batted balls and play their last in kind of the fit,
11:00
Speaker 3: which is kind of the round up of those categories.
11:04
Speaker 3: And so they just haven't been able to find the
11:06
Speaker 3: right arms. Part of what I wonder is whether they'll
11:09
Speaker 3: be scouring like the back of a forty man roster
11:13
Speaker 3: some waiver claims to see if they can they can
11:16
Speaker 3: help some of these guys out. I think they trust
11:19
Speaker 3: in their pitching development, and you know, a lot of
11:21
Speaker 3: those guys who get cut loose, especially from the bullpen,
11:23
Speaker 3: are usually like a tweak away. That's not to say
11:26
Speaker 3: it's easy or whatever to identify those guys, but right
11:29
Speaker 3: now it's been a real achilles y the now. So yeah,
11:33
Speaker 3: I think they need at least at least three guys
11:36
Speaker 3: in there, and you'd like to have one more effective
11:37
Speaker 3: arm definitely moving forward.
11:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think it's such an intriguing conversation too,
11:44
Speaker 1: given love ladies, splits this year have been super reversed
11:49
Speaker 1: for those of you that aren't familiar, and that's listeners.
11:51
Speaker 1: He has been getting Brighty's out at a remarkable clip,
11:55
Speaker 1: but the lefties not quite as well, which is historically
11:58
Speaker 1: that's not how it's gone for him, but just something
12:00
Speaker 1: abnormal about this season. And Spencer, Yeah, you did write
12:04
Speaker 1: a story in The Athletic the other day. Some good
12:07
Speaker 1: stuff in there. Definitely worth checking out for anyone that
12:10
Speaker 1: is not given to listen really quickly before we take
12:12
Speaker 1: a break. You had a very good exchange as well
12:15
Speaker 1: as Mark Zuckerman talking with manager Blake Dutera following Wednesday's
12:19
Speaker 1: game about some incredible defense we saw from the seam Douniaz,
12:22
Speaker 1: I didn't put b roll of those plays in the show,
12:24
Speaker 1: but let's hear what Blake had to say.
12:26
Speaker 5: Yeah, he did a really really good job for us
12:28
Speaker 5: defense with the plays he made. You know, even if
12:31
Speaker 5: the guy at third was safe when that Baldi through there,
12:33
Speaker 5: I thought that was the right play.
12:34
Speaker 2: Like I said, we're super athletic.
12:36
Speaker 5: We want to err on the side of making aggressive
12:38
Speaker 5: mistakes if we're gonna make mistakes, and I thought Nas
12:40
Speaker 5: was looking to make a play there, and he did
12:41
Speaker 5: a great job. And curtis a really good job of
12:43
Speaker 5: holding the tag on when he came off.
12:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, like I said, I thought our defense played well today.
12:46
Speaker 2: Is that a case where you would trust him to
12:48
Speaker 2: try that play? With maybe not other guys.
12:49
Speaker 5: No, I want all of our guys be able to
12:51
Speaker 5: make that play. I think we're athletic enough to where.
12:53
Speaker 5: Look if we get a hard hit ball at us
12:54
Speaker 5: and we think we have a shot to make a play,
12:56
Speaker 5: I want these guys to do it.
12:57
Speaker 2: We're gonna make a mistake. I don't want them to
12:59
Speaker 2: be scared to make plays.
13:00
Speaker 4: Now.
13:01
Speaker 1: I wish we had those plays that Nuna has made
13:03
Speaker 1: in front of us to show our viewers or listeners
13:06
Speaker 1: wherever you may be tuned in right now. But Nas
13:09
Speaker 1: made two astounding plays and Wednesday night's game, one going
13:12
Speaker 1: up the middle and then firing to third base, cutting
13:16
Speaker 1: off a runner.
13:16
Speaker 4: Who didn't have to go.
13:18
Speaker 1: He just picked his head up and said, hey, if
13:19
Speaker 1: I can get this guy, I will, and fired at
13:22
Speaker 1: dark and then one going to his left into the
13:25
Speaker 1: hole into the right fields, out into the right field,
13:29
Speaker 1: shallow no man's land, if you will, I guess that's
13:32
Speaker 1: what they call it, and then turning across his body
13:34
Speaker 1: and firing the second base to cut off a lead runner.
13:38
Speaker 4: And this is nothing new for Nasty Nas.
13:41
Speaker 1: But Blake saying that he wants to see all these
13:43
Speaker 1: guys go ahead and make plays like that. I think says, hey,
13:47
Speaker 1: Doaz is a leader on defense because his ability to
13:50
Speaker 1: pick his head up and make a heads up play
13:52
Speaker 1: like that really astounded me on Wednesday Night, Spencer.
13:56
Speaker 3: No One part of why I thought Blake's comments were
13:59
Speaker 3: so interesting as we can becus. In my mind, I
14:01
Speaker 3: think of Nas as the only person who should be
14:04
Speaker 3: making those throws, or maybe who not has the capacity to.
14:08
Speaker 3: But that's really the only guy we see taking some
14:11
Speaker 3: of those risks, and I felt like that's because Nas
14:14
Speaker 3: is so locked in both physically and mentally on the field.
14:18
Speaker 3: The fact of the matter is the Nationals like they
14:21
Speaker 3: don't want their identity this year years down the line
14:23
Speaker 3: to be, Hey, that team with like one good defensive
14:26
Speaker 3: infielder who takes those like risks and gets out the
14:29
Speaker 3: lead runner. They want the entire team to kind of
14:32
Speaker 3: establish the mentality now again, just does this mean I
14:36
Speaker 3: think that we'll see CJ Like doing the same stuff
14:40
Speaker 3: in the upcoming Arizona series. I don't think so. I
14:43
Speaker 3: think they're still trying to teach him some of the
14:46
Speaker 3: aggressive plays. Again, You've seen him a lot with his
14:49
Speaker 3: glove down more one handed, and that's still part of
14:53
Speaker 3: the learning process, but mentally they want him to be
14:56
Speaker 3: thinking about those plays where it's like, yeah, CJ, you
14:59
Speaker 3: are like, you have a good enough arm, you have
15:01
Speaker 3: a good enough club, you have good enough range to
15:03
Speaker 3: be able to make all those plays. And so their
15:06
Speaker 3: idea is, hey, if we're building this like fast athletic
15:09
Speaker 3: young team in the future in the right now, like
15:12
Speaker 3: why not have those guys throw out the arms so
15:16
Speaker 3: it will be funny kind of as I and you
15:18
Speaker 3: and Franny watch this team in the future and analyze
15:21
Speaker 3: this team in the future, do we have to maybe
15:23
Speaker 3: look at like a a CJ or you know, Brady
15:26
Speaker 3: once he's back up, or even occurred us with a
15:29
Speaker 3: more discerning eye where we say, hey, like should they
15:33
Speaker 3: have tried to get the lead runner out there we're
15:35
Speaker 3: in the past, it's like, hey, just make the simple
15:36
Speaker 3: play and move on. I think you put a lot
15:39
Speaker 3: of pressure on other teams as opposed to kind of
15:44
Speaker 3: being more passive when when you're able to make those
15:47
Speaker 3: sorts of plays. So, yeah, that comment was was very
15:50
Speaker 3: fascinating to me. And they have the guys who eventually
15:53
Speaker 3: should be able to do it. It's a question of
15:54
Speaker 3: how long that might take, at least in my eyes.
15:58
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I try my best to be a
16:01
Speaker 1: quiet viewer and listener when I'm up watching in the
16:04
Speaker 1: press box.
16:04
Speaker 4: Spencer, you know, I'm not terrific. Did that.
16:07
Speaker 1: Sometimes I let a little play by play slip out
16:09
Speaker 1: from the second row.
16:10
Speaker 4: But when Nas did that, I think.
16:11
Speaker 1: What slipped out on my mouth there? For a second,
16:14
Speaker 1: I'm thinking, what is he doing? And then just fired
16:17
Speaker 1: a strike and then did it again thirty seconds later.
16:20
Speaker 1: This was in the fifth inning of Wednesday Night's loss.
16:22
Speaker 1: But yeah, we've seen guys like CJ. Makethrows like that.
16:25
Speaker 1: Before hearing Blake's comments afterwards, he wants to see everyone
16:28
Speaker 1: makes plays like that.
16:29
Speaker 4: Just fire me up.
16:30
Speaker 1: But we're going to talk about Arizona after the break.
16:32
Speaker 1: Nats are out there taking on the d Backs. Preview
16:35
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17:39
Speaker 1: We are back Spencer the Nationals uh taken on the DBAX.
17:44
Speaker 1: Later on today, It's going to be Fosterfest at the
17:46
Speaker 1: ballpark for those of you at Chase Field and Merril
17:49
Speaker 1: Kelly gets the rock for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Foster's just
17:52
Speaker 1: been terrific this season. Last time out, five innings, five
17:55
Speaker 1: strikeouts against a dangerous Podjay's lineup. He's six and two
17:59
Speaker 1: with the three, seven, six, A, one fifteen whip just
18:02
Speaker 1: twenty one walks to sixty five strikeouts coming into tonight's game, Spencer,
18:08
Speaker 1: what can you give for d Backs fans a little
18:10
Speaker 1: preview of what they might get from Foster Griffin tonight?
18:14
Speaker 3: Yeah, if there are any Dbacks fans watching, this guy throws,
18:17
Speaker 3: as we've talked about many times. God, now I forget
18:21
Speaker 3: seven pitches.
18:21
Speaker 4: Like it said, I don't believe think officially unofficially.
18:26
Speaker 3: That's right again, Like we'll kind of, you know, mix
18:32
Speaker 3: and match you to death. Which is funny because it
18:34
Speaker 3: feels like Merril Kelly's almost the same way. He's got
18:37
Speaker 3: like six or seven pitches as well, and he's someone
18:40
Speaker 3: where Uh, it's funny to see the success that each
18:45
Speaker 3: of them have had. Like Foster has outperformed the peripherals
18:48
Speaker 3: a bit, but the numbers feel real at the moment,
18:50
Speaker 3: like an era in the threes is about what you'd
18:52
Speaker 3: expect from him. Merril Kelly's got an expected ARA like
18:54
Speaker 3: of seven and his actual area is five. So both
18:58
Speaker 3: these guys kind of outperforming peripherals but really struggled this year,
19:03
Speaker 3: and so yeah, it's almost funny to see it's fun
19:05
Speaker 3: when it's like at Paul Skeins versus Foster Griffin, because
19:08
Speaker 3: it's like, oh, these guys Dom Schlitler against Foster Griffin.
19:13
Speaker 3: But these are two guys that pitch the same way
19:16
Speaker 3: but have had very different results. So it'll be funny
19:19
Speaker 3: kind of going into this to see, Oh, this guy's
19:21
Speaker 3: throwing ninety two. Oh, this guy's also throwing ninety two.
19:23
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, and you know this is nothing new
19:26
Speaker 1: to you. You're right, it's similar styles, but you check
19:29
Speaker 1: the Dbacks. Not a lot of numbers, not a lot
19:32
Speaker 1: of career matchups in Major League Baseball versus Foster Griffin.
19:35
Speaker 1: Not a lot for the Nationals either. C J abrams
19:38
Speaker 1: nine career bats, just one hit offf of Merrill Kelly.
19:41
Speaker 1: But yeah, you know, you get these division division matchups
19:44
Speaker 1: and stuff. Guys haven't seen each other or division division
19:47
Speaker 1: cross division matchups and I guys don't see each others
19:50
Speaker 1: quite as often. Louis are three for six with the
19:53
Speaker 1: home run in his career, so you know, be cashing
19:57
Speaker 1: that Louis for the daily Dingers.
19:58
Speaker 4: That'd be my pick.
20:00
Speaker 1: But you know, Spencer, we look at the upcoming schedule
20:03
Speaker 1: after the Arizona. NAT's go to San Francisco for three
20:06
Speaker 1: and then an off day before they come home for
20:08
Speaker 1: some Inner League play against the Mariners and the Royals.
20:12
Speaker 1: Now I'm not trying to come down on these teams,
20:14
Speaker 1: but if you look at the schedule the Nationals had
20:16
Speaker 1: in April and May, maybe feels like this is.
20:18
Speaker 4: A bit easier breathing.
20:21
Speaker 1: I don't want to say you ever say hey, we're
20:23
Speaker 1: gonna walk in and take this series, but after facing
20:27
Speaker 1: the big gut Dodgers Division fos like the Phillies and
20:30
Speaker 1: the Braves, do you feel like there's almost a sense
20:32
Speaker 1: of like, hey, we're built for this, We're prepared for this.
20:35
Speaker 1: Within the clubhouse.
20:37
Speaker 3: I think there's a sense of that. I think the
20:39
Speaker 3: question is how real it is? Right Like you look
20:41
Speaker 3: back at last season. It's actually funny. It was this
20:46
Speaker 3: road trip at almost this exact time. It was last
20:50
Speaker 3: May and late May, where you had an Arizona trip
20:53
Speaker 3: and you had a Seattle trip. They ended with the
20:56
Speaker 3: Arizona trip. The penultimate game of that series scored like
21:00
Speaker 3: ten runs before they made an out, and it was like,
21:02
Speaker 3: oh my god, They're like a game might be there.
21:11
Speaker 3: They obviously highlighted Meeta about it's never I'm coaching and
21:18
Speaker 3: you you saw real swoon that they weren't able to
21:21
Speaker 3: come back from. And so I honestly and even in
21:25
Speaker 3: that swoon, oh it's the marlin. So this is a
21:32
Speaker 3: case where I don't think you can necessarily fall into
21:35
Speaker 3: that trap, even it feels easy to where it's hey,
21:38
Speaker 3: we're in June again. This is the same time they
21:40
Speaker 3: struggled last year. It just lost her and h and
21:45
Speaker 3: so treat this, you know, they'll always say they treats
21:50
Speaker 3: the same. They have a winning record again that are
21:53
Speaker 3: over five hundred record against. I think it's a small sample,
21:57
Speaker 3: but it's still relatively significant. And so you really have
22:00
Speaker 3: to take care of business again out in the desert
22:03
Speaker 3: against a team that allows a ton of runs but
22:06
Speaker 3: scores a ton of run and then in San Francisco,
22:09
Speaker 3: which is a complete opposite pitchers park team that has
22:13
Speaker 3: been better offensively, fully gotten going, but can pitch really well.
22:16
Speaker 3: Like you're seeing all these different styles and gameplays. I
22:20
Speaker 3: think you do need to come out of this road
22:22
Speaker 3: trip at least three and three to feel good about.
22:27
Speaker 2: This.
22:28
Speaker 3: You know, trade deadline coming up not too far from now,
22:31
Speaker 3: and I think a lot of what happens over the
22:33
Speaker 3: next thirty days or so is might dictate that your
22:35
Speaker 3: direction that the National's going. So it's early June, but
22:39
Speaker 3: this feels like a really important time for the.
22:41
Speaker 4: Franchise, definitely.
22:43
Speaker 1: And I'm really really excited for the Giants series. You know,
22:47
Speaker 1: I know we already played them once this year, but
22:49
Speaker 1: two young managers, I mean, that's just that's exciting. That's
22:52
Speaker 1: chess match on chess match for me, and I enjoy it.
22:55
Speaker 1: Give our online viewers a quick look at the National League.
22:57
Speaker 4: He's standings.
22:58
Speaker 1: The Nationals dipping below the five still good foray third
23:02
Speaker 1: place in the National League eese. They are eleven games
23:05
Speaker 1: back of the Braves, but hey, they are a lot
23:07
Speaker 1: closer than the wildcard. They are in the mix. They
23:09
Speaker 1: are in the picture. Here on June fifth, I think
23:13
Speaker 1: now is a good time to get into the details
23:15
Speaker 1: of our giveaway. So today Friday Friday Giveaways, we got
23:20
Speaker 1: a Tanner Roark sign Baseball Card National's Legend. This is
23:24
Speaker 1: a twenty fifteen bowman. There's a cool story behind this one.
23:27
Speaker 1: I got it signed at spring training in twenty sixteen
23:30
Speaker 1: with Liam and his Tanner was signing them. I had
23:33
Speaker 1: like a little booklet, so he went and did everything
23:36
Speaker 1: that I had in there. I think there was two
23:37
Speaker 1: or four cards, and he pointed to his two rookie
23:40
Speaker 1: cards and he explained to me I wasn't allowed to
23:43
Speaker 1: sell those two because they would be worth more. I
23:47
Speaker 1: promised him I was never going to sell any of them,
23:49
Speaker 1: but unfortunately, one of those cards I'm going to be
23:51
Speaker 1: parting with today. So if you would like to win
23:53
Speaker 1: this Tanner Roarks sign baseball card, there is going to
23:56
Speaker 1: be a link to a Google form in the description,
23:58
Speaker 1: go ahead and fill that out. There's also a questionnaire
24:01
Speaker 1: in there if you want to shoot me and Spencer questions.
24:03
Speaker 4: We'll take a stab of them on Monday's episode. Perhaps, Yeah.
24:07
Speaker 1: Until next week, Kevin is hitting the links getting some
24:12
Speaker 1: work on the golf swing out in Arizona right now.
24:14
Speaker 1: Hopefully we gotten back for Monday's episode, Spencer, anything you
24:17
Speaker 1: want to throw.
24:17
Speaker 3: In, that's all I got.
24:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess one more thing I should toss it too.
24:22
Speaker 1: You want to make sure to subscribe. You want to
24:24
Speaker 1: make sure to subscribe so you can win that giveaway.
24:26
Speaker 1: And we have them every Friday because when we hit
24:28
Speaker 1: a thousand. We're given to this Eli Willetts sign baseball card.
24:32
Speaker 1: I saw it last night. I went into the card shop.
24:35
Speaker 1: I didn't pick it up because I was like, Hey,
24:37
Speaker 1: you all can just leave it here and I'm going
24:39
Speaker 1: to put a little QR code right beneath it and
24:41
Speaker 1: you all can scan if you want to enter to
24:43
Speaker 1: win that.
24:44
Speaker 4: Make sure to subscribe.
24:45
Speaker 1: You don't want to miss next week's episode, and we'll
24:47
Speaker 1: see you then, see you later
25:00
Speaker 2: Now