The city Creative, Creative, creative. Welcome to another Space City Saturday on
Sports Talk seven ninety Michael Cunners live and local h Town breakdown on the world
that matters to you, the Houston sports world. All these great Houston fans
here. We love you all, so finished up on that to do list,
loot up the cooler because you can't drink in talk sports all day if
you don't start now. This is Space City Saturday. Here are seven nineties
Astro's insider Michael Cunner, and it is a big day here on Sports Talk
seven ninety. Fast paced because we are short. This show ja just an
hour today until eleven, but I will be with you until eleven thirty because
we will have the Astros on deck show following. As it is finally here
people, Jay V Day is back in the city of Houston, technically in
the Bronx, but he is going to take the mound at Yankee Stadium today
with Houston plastered across his chests. I'm gonna go ahead and assume that they're
wearing the gray uniforms today, but maybe there were who Whatever uniform they're wearing
today, it's either gonna say Houston or astros across that man's chest, and
he is back in your lives, back in our lives. If you want
to join us between now and eleven, you can do so at seven one
three two one two five seven ninety seven one three two one two five seven
ninety that's our phone number again to get in here. You can tweet me
at MC seven ninety as well. Like I said, I'll be with you
until eleven thirty in the On Deck Show. Today, we'll go up to
the Bronx out of the first break of the show and visit with Brian McTaggart
oft MLB dot Com. I asked him to push back from his normal spot
with us on the On Deck Show yesterday to today because well, today's Verlander
Day and we would I would like to talk some JV with him, and
of course on a day that it makes the most sense, because again he
is back, and what a week it has been. Look, we have
a lot to get into. I do want to dedicate a segment during this
first hour to college football because the mess that it is in terms of the
craziness continues and a lot has changed even more in the last twenty four hours,
and it doesn't look like the change might be stopping anytime soon because there's
still a lot of teams in limbo. So we'll get into that before we
get out of here in this first hour and go strictly back to Astro stuff
at eleven. But jert adjustin Verlander back for the Astros today against the Yankees.
That are a very good win for the Astros last night against Louis Severino,
who has got awful and you know, he pitched like he's got awful
last night, and you know, you love to see it. For the
Astros. Their offense went out there and took advantage of a very bad picture.
And that's exactly what they got was a great performance out of that offense,
and that offense was doing everything that it needed to do. And Jordan
hits a home run. They get Kyle Tucker another big hit for him as
well. Just what a fun night. You always love the Yankees players or
the Yankees fans there at Mint and met not Mintamid Park, Yankee Stadium,
going out there and stink or having to deal with the fact that the Astros
are taking it to them, and that's exactly what they did last night.
They took it to them. Nice and you know rough, which you always
love. And today they looked to do it again with Justin Verlander on the
mount. And I know that it's been a weird week. We've gone back
and forth on a lot of things for the Astros in terms of how they
got to this point of bringing Verlander back to the ball club. But here's
the short term right now view. They needed him. That's it. They
needed him him back. They needed a starting pitcher in the worst way.
If you've been listening to this show on Saturdays for the last couple of months,
I've said it basically every single weekend. They needed starting pitching and the
best starting pitcher available on the market was Justin Verlander. And they went out
there and they got him. And you cannot be mad at all if that's
what the baseball team decided to do, was to go and get his services.
And that's exactly what they did. In you know, the fact that
they brought him back by giving up their two best prospects, who by the
way, Ryan Clifford, one of them that they gave up. The other
night, in his first at bat in the Mets system, hit a home
run. That's the one that's going to hurt. He is going to be.
Now. I'm not saying that Drew Gilbert's not going to be a good
big league or Drew Gilbert's probably going to be a very good big leaguer.
I expected him to be an astro at some point next season, and I
think that, you know, realistically they I know that Dana Brown kind of
changed his tune on everything just a couple of days ago in terms of well,
he's a corner outfielder and everything. I know they wanted him to be
the center fielder probably at some point next year. But look, they also
do have a center fielder right now, and Chaz McCormick and what he has
gone out there and done, which is be awesome. The focus again is
on Verlander. We saw last night Hunter Brown third consecutive, really strong start
for him. If he continues to find that consistency that he needs to have,
this team is going to be in a very good spot. They get
jose Er Keaty back tomorrow, which, by the way, if you miss
the news on that or Keaty Back France JP France will be available out of
the bullpen tomorrow. He's not necessarily moving to the bullpen, is what they
say right now, I don't know how they're going to make this work going
forward in terms of the rotation. Here's the facts, though, Excuse me,
the Astros have more starters than they need given the schedule and the days
off that they have. I've brought this up many times. The month of
September they have every single third Thursday off, and you can't really do a
six man rotation unless you want it to it. It's pointless almost to do
that, because then you're gonna be giving six seven days off for starters the
rest of this month of August. They're off on Monday, which by the
way, will be the day that they go to the White House. Justin
Verlander, when we check him with Brian McTaggart, he tweeted out, he
told I guess mctagger or everybody yesterday that he might wear a gold suit to
the White House on Monday. So Jav's gonna go and style. But they'll
be off again next Thursday. So they have a stretch here of nine games
in a row, and then they play from the eighteenth until the thirty first,
and then again in that month of September, every single Thursday they are
off. So it's hard to manipulate your rotation. But the facts are the
facts right now, and Mauricio Dubon, not y. I'm saying, Mariesea
d Monks. I'm looking at a tweet about him right now. He's actually
in the line of today Jav's personal catchers back today, by the way,
But JP France, he is. He has been one of your most consistent
starters. I don't think you can knock him out of the rotation. It's
unfair to him in the performance that he's given you. So what will they
do? The biggest question coming off of this week, and it's gonna take
I think some more starts of being bad. Do you consider going ahead and
bumping Javier back to the bullpen where he's had some success and you know,
maybe it's easier for him to pitch from the standpoint of he's been dealing with
what we know is dead arm and he doesn't have it all. So I
do wonder if that's a possibility for this ball club. I do not know
if that is or not. We will see, but they're gonna have to
figure it out. At the end of the day, they get two aces
back into this staff. You'd love for it to be a third by having
Javier b Javier, that would be awesome, But you have Verlander, you
have Fromber. Of course, Fromber a little bit extra motivated the other night
with what he went out and did against the Guardians, tossing a no hitter,
which was just awesome. Again, what if freaking week it was for
the Astros overall what they were able to accomplish, but getting him back and
getting Verlander back, Now, look, Verlander, we watched how the season
ended for him last year, and the regular season was unbelievable. You have
a sub two era, you're the unanimous Alsy Young Winner, and there's every
reason why he should have been voted that way as well, there's nobody else
that was as good as him last year. Postseason Wheels fell off outside of
the start against the Yankees. Now that's the good news is that today he
comes back to the Astros and is playing a team that he's are facing,
a team that he's already faced twice this season, has been excellent against them
two more times this year, was excellent against them in the ALCS last year.
Then you just go look at the lineup at the Yankees roll out every
single day and you see all the swinging miss in it, and you say,
justin Verline is probably gonna have a good day today. I'd be surprised
if he does not do well in this one. And I say that,
and I'll probably jinks him. No, I don't want to do that.
He's going to have a good day today. We all probably know that,
and I think the Yankees deep down in know that as well, because he's
kind of their daddy. They, by the way, are going to have
Aaron Judge back in their lineup today. He was out yesterday, did pinch
hit for them late in the ballgame. Gean Carlos Stanton also in the lineup
because he is homered in both games of the series so far. So those
are the guys that you watch out for. But Verlander it's not. And
look, really since he's come back from the side or from the Tommy John,
it's not been pre Tommy John Verlander. The swinging miss that he gets
has been different. Now. Last year it was fine, it was really
good. Still, he did get a lot of strikeouts. He had more
strikeouts than innings pitch. This year it's not been the same. Now.
His season started off, he had the injury in the spring, started off
a little late. It was in the month of May, had to get
himself back and going, and in the last month he started to pitch more
like himself. But here's the difference that I think we will see today and
you'll see throughout his ten year back. It takes him a little bit more
work to get through hitters, counts run a little bit longer. Not that
he's throwing more balls. He still throws a very high percentage of strikes,
but it takes more work to get those guys out and it makes the counts
go deeper, and then on top of that as well, the pitch count
runs up a lot faster. He's just not consistently going six and seven.
He's going five and a third, five and two thirds, six six and
a third, six and two thirds, and not reaching that seventh inning as
much as he has in the past. Now, look from the astro stamp
on him to get back to being that guy, because we all know how
much the workload has been put on the bullpen overall this season and the exhaustion
that they've put on a few of those guys, and you want to help
that out. And that's a big reason why you get this guy back now,
this guy, like I mentioned, misses the month of May, and
you know, is he a little bit more fresh than other times. I
was texting with Steve Sparks the other day and he's gone back and watched a
lot of his stuff now. He said to me in the text that we
were going back and forth, he said, he looks fresh. He said,
I think he looks really fresh compared to where he was last year,
and he expects a lot out of it. As I mentioned, that month
of July was good for Verlander. In that month he did go at least
six innings in four starts. Out of the six he made, the other
two were five and five and a third. There were a couple of games
that were walk heavy, or I should say three of them six and one
three and another four in another. That's the other concerning thing is that there
have been a lot of walks. He has more walks this season in ninety
four and a third innings, I believe is the number yet ninety four and
a third innings, he has thirty one walks, where in one hundred and
seventy five innings last year he had twenty nine. And he's never been a
guy when he's with the Astros at least that walks a lot. And now
look, early in his career, he was always a high walk guy.
He was walking sixty plus basically every single season up until twenty fifteen, then
again in twenty seventeen, but most of those came when he was with the
Tigers. Really, since he's got into the Astros. Now, look,
I'm just gonna be completely honest with you, and I think everybody knows that
once he got to the Astros, he stopped walking. Guys. He was
probably putting stuff on his fingers. And we've seen the case that was made
the other day in court or that was settled out of court with the Angels
and their guy. But that's okay, everybody. Look, it's not the
okay, take them, but I'm not worried about it. Everybody in the
sports doing it. Trust me, every single pitcher in baseball is still using
something on their fingers. They can tell you they're not. They absolutely are
so not too concerned about that, but would like to see, of course,
the walk number come down for Verlander moving forward. But they got him
back. That's what matters, and it is completely surreal to see him out
there to see him the other day at the podium wearing the ASTROS hat,
going through it all. You know, it's weird for him. He basically
said just as much in that press conference. I'll give you some of that
here come up throughout the show. Seven one three two one two five seven
nineties the number to join us this morning. We're with you until eleven thirty
we officially go into Astros on Deck mode. Coming up at eleven. We'll
visit with Brian mctaggard during that show. We're also going to get into,
as I mentioned, some of the college football craziness because it affects well school
here in the city of Houston, that being the Cougars, of course,
And unfortunately, or I should say fortunately for some of you that are leaving
the conference, you don't have to deal with it. I thought you just
get to go to a more difficult conference. But seven one three two on
two five, seven ninety agains the number to join us here on Space City
Saturday, get on in here Talk Verlander Day right here on seven ninety.
Space City Saturday continues. Find Sports Talk seven ninety. It is Space City
Saturday right here on Sports Talk seven ninety Michael Connor with you guys until eleven
o'clock this morning, when we transition into Astro's on Deck mode. We're basically
doing Look, it's an extended basically hour and a half Astro's on Deck Show
today if you would like to join us in this first hour seven one three
two one two five seven ninety seven one three two one two five seven ninety
on the return of Justin Verlander, who, by the way, spoke with
the media a couple of days ago up there in New York, and of
course the number one question that came out of it when it came to trade
was coming back to Houston his of course preferred destination. Yeah. I mean
I think this when after I had some conversations with Billy and Steve about next
season and their plans, I think, you know, entertaining the idea of
a trade and and waving my no trade clause, I think Houston was,
you know the number one choice for me. The just knowing these guys so
well, and you know, having a chance to win, you know,
the familiarity, and you know, I had such a great time here,
so yeah, you know that was yeah, number one choice. It's good
to hear of course, and I think we all knew that that was going
to be the thing. You know, you're not putting this player up.
And I know that there's been a lot reported about teams that were interested in
him outside of the Astros. There was a report this week the Red Sox
were interested. Of course, we knew that the Dodgers were interested early on.
The Rangers were a team, it was reported, but they went and
moved to the Max Scherzer thing real quick. And I don't even think messed
with the Justin Verlanders thing, because I don't He wasn't interested in them in
the off season when they tried to sign him, And I doubt that that
he was really interested in going back there. Now he if he was going,
if he was leaving somewhere, He's coming back to Houston because he chose
living in New York. He and his wife did, Kate Hupton, you
know, And I say chose living in New York. The New York Mets
gave him the biggest offer that he received. Is reported that the Dodgers gave
him two for eighty. We don't know exactly what the Astro Rose gave as
well, but it was you know, it's probably a significant offer, just
not anywhere near what they had offered. If the Astros had offered more than
the Mets, he would have probably stayed in Houston and he never would have
had to do any of this, which would have been nice and giving up
a couple of prospects that you really were counting on for the future. But
he and his wife also had the idea of living in New York and that's
a transition, and that's a thing, and I get where that would be
difficult. I think if you had presented to him. Now, look,
winning, like he mentioned, winning a championship at this stage of his career
is when you're making these kinds of decisions is what matters more than anything else.
And he wouldn't wasn't just gonna jump like you know. I know there
are some reports out there that the Reds were interested. He we all know
he was not going to pick up and go live in Cincinnati, Ohio and
play for a franchise that's historically cheap. Now it does have a ton of
young talent, right like he was, that was never gonna be a thing.
I question if you would even be interested in Baltimore. Baltimore didn't have
a history of spending a lot in the off season. You know, they
do have a ton of They're they're going to be a monster like they've built
it with the Astros people there to where it's going to be an Astros like
thing for a very long time there. In terms of their success, they're
gonna be awesome. But I doubt that he would have gone to Baltimore.
I really do think that if he was leaving the Mets, I think he
was only going to take two places. He was gonna take Houston and I
say, LA, But I don't know necessarily that he wants to be a
Dodger. But you know, if the Dodgers had presented an offer, I
would be I wouldn't be surprised if he accepted it if it was the best
offer, and that's what the Mets brought to him. That's the credit to
the Mets here for knowing the player and taking care of the player too,
is that they went to JV and said, Okay, here's the deal.
We got a deal done with Houston, will you go? And he came
right back. It works well with the staff, as you heard, We
know how much the pitching staff has worked well with him. Throughout the years
as well, and the players know him and you it's it's familiarity. I
had, you know, living wise, if he's I would assume he's bringing
the family down for the rest of the season. I don't know what their
situation is, but wherever he lived when he was here before, if it's
available or you know, they can, they will have. They have the
ability to find anything that they want with the amount of money that those two
have very quickly. But it's still it's it's just this extremely odd bizarro world
that he is back there. Of course, one of the most important things
in this was the relationship with Jim Crane. Here is jv on just that
I mean a lot, you know. I think it's when you're gathering the
information and that's all you can do as a player. Right in this situation
with the note trade, cause is I try not to get too far ahead
of myself. I try to gather as much information as possible and and then
make an educated decision. You know, everything goes into that bucket when you're
gathering information. My relationship with Jim, my relationship with my teammates, the
coaching staff, familiarity with Houston and the fan base and spring training location.
You know, all of it is what really went into my thought process leading
up to this again, gathering information on there's not a lot of information to
gather, you know, what you're coming back to here, but the stuff
there matters, and we know that, and we all knew that if he
was coming back here, more than anything, was gonna be a Jim Crane
led thing because those two are close, and that's where at the end of
the day. And we've talked about that this week seriously as much as we
get and I got to like part of me has a hard time stomaching the
situation. Now. Look, hindsight is easy to do. I get that
the Astros, if everything went right this season, would not have had to
go back down this road and go get justin Verland, or they might not
have been interested in him. If Garcia doesn't have his arm fall off,
if Lance but Colors ever pitches this season, if Urkeiti doesn't miss months of
the season, they might have been just fine in the rotation, and we'd
be sitting here today saying, well, they got like three relievers and you'd
be happy. But it went this way. I was never mad like everybody
else that you moved on from him from the standpoint of you didn't like the
contract. The Mets are paying a ton of it, which is great.
It makes the astro's life a lot easier. And that's Jim. That's been
Jim Crane's philosophy forever. Correct. The first time he acquired Verlander, he
did not pay all the salary. Now he did approve, of course,
with Luno directing it at the time, an extension for Verlander two years,
sixty six million, which of course he did not pitch under. O you
shouldn't say didn't pitch under. He made one start, opening Day in the
middle of the summer twenty twenty at Minute Made Park against the Seattle Mariners.
Pitch well, I was there still the strangest environment I have ever been in
my life, a completely empty ballpark playing baseball. It was weird, but
he was good. But he one game in that contract, missed the twenty
twenty one season, missed the World Series run that year, losing to the
Braves. But then comes back and of course gets the cy young last year,
gets another World Series and it felt like a storybook ending to his time
like that is the truth of the matter. But now the storybook ending gets
to continue, and I'll go ahead. And we were talking this week during
the A team I was in with Adam Wexler all this week. If you
missed any of that, you can always catch the podcasts on the website sports
Talk seven ninety dot com. It feels like it with his return, now,
this is it. He's not pitching for anybody else. He of course
is under contract through next season, and if he throws one hundred forty innings
next year, his contract vests for the next season at thirty five million,
which the Mets are paying like seventeen million of that that would put him through
the age of forty three. He has always said forty five astros are still
competitive at that point, he's still good. It's hard to imagine the astro
saying, hey, you know what, JV, just go ahead and walk
away. They'll keep they'll keep running it back with him. And part of
me, at that point, you're so far in, you're so invested,
and you've had this guy for so long, and you know there's part of
the history of it. I would love, I think, like a lot
of you, to see the day come where Justin Verlander is going into the
Hall of Fame and he's wearing that astro's cap on his plaque. That'd be
awesome. They've never put a picture in with an astro's cap in the Hall
of Fame. Now, look the circumstances and everything. Whatever it might have
been, it was a mistake by the Hall of Fame to put Nolan Ryan
in as a Ranger. It was a mistake, I think by everybody on
that part. But I get that his relationship there and everything else was a
little bit different. They kind of ended on a sour note here in Houston
with ownership back in the day. But he should have been in as an
astro. The majority of his work of his career came as an astro.
Hell, he could have been an angel and angel or an astro is what
his hat should be in the Hall of Fame, not a Ranger. And
if there's anybody out there that's a Rangers fan or from Dallas, it's listen
to it and thinks I'm crazy, You're wrong, flat out, But it
would be awesome to have that guy go in one day and have that Astros,
that Houston logo on that hat in the Hall. That opens up this
possibility again. He is which, by the way, I'm gonna go ahead
and give you if you're paying attention in the next hour. He does have
two hundred and fifty career wins. Now we all know that he would love
to get to three hundred. We've not seen a three hundred game winner.
I need to pull up the list. It's been a long time since we've
had somebody get to three hundred wins, and it's gonna become even more rare
as we continue to move on with the way that they handle starting pitching in
today's world. The last guy to reach the three hundred win number was Randy
Johnson in two thousand and nine. It was actually on this day back in
two thousand and seven, by the way, that the previous pitcher before him,
Tom Glavin, on this day in two thousand and seven, got win
number three hundred of his three hundred five in his career. But the Astros
have a chance to have a guy that could be here and maybe maybe can
get to that number. And for what I was going to tell you is,
if you're listening in the next hour of the show, in the pregame
show, the trivia question, here's your answer. Sixty one sixty one wins
lifetime for Verlander with the Astros. Of course, that does not count the
postseason, where he has the majority of his career postseason wins. With the
Astros, he has sixteen of them lifetime. Finally got that World Series win
last year, but has two, four, five, six, seven,
eight nine of his sixteen postseason wins as an Astro, and of course has
won two of his three cy Young Awards here in Houston outlook, he did
win an MVP and a Rookie of the Year and a pitching Triple Crown in
Detroit. It's gonna be difficult, but it's going to take a few more
years of adding some stuff on, I think for the Hall of Fame,
who ultimately does have the right to the decision on this. Every single time
that a guy goes in seven three, two on two five, seven nineties
the number to join us here on Space City Saturday. We'll take a quick
time out when we return. I do want to get into the craziness of
college football, which started I shouldn't say started. It's been going on,
but it got even wilder yesterday. We'll get into that next here on seven
ninety Welcome back to Space City Saturday on Scorts Talk seven ninety. We're into
the final half hour of this show. Coming up at eleven, we transition
into Astros on deck here on Sports Talk. It's seven ninety. My Connor
back here with you. If you'd like to get in seven three, two
on two five seven ninety on Twitter at mcven ninety is the way to join
me there of course as well. But the Astros and the Yankees coming up
twelve oh five, first pitch. I'll be back with you after the game
as well for the tenth inning show here on seven ninety, which last night
we you know, got through some phone calls. It wasn't the most crazy
because the Astros went out on one. I do always appreciate when we're a
little bit less on the wild side because that means the Astros did well,
and they did exactly that last night. Justin Verlander back on the mount today,
but mentioned it ahead of the break and if you were for some reason
under a rock yesterday or just not paying attention. First of all, I
have always since it started back in the day, loved the college football realignment
talk. And I think it's kind of like hit NBA free agency talk,
like there's a lot of the time. Now, I love the Rockets like
everybody else, and I'm excited to get them back. But during the regular
season of an NBA season, at times, and I guess you could get
that way with baseball too, it becomes like exhausting, or it's so long,
there's so many games that you just kind of tune it out to an
extent and you're more worried about the player move With the player movement in the
NBA, I think is always a little bit more fun and spicier to talk
about than the actual on the court stuff. At times. I've loved from
the moment we started getting football college football realignment talk like twelve years ago,
it has just been this crazy, crazy thing that has not gone away.
I can remember when it started. It was all the talk of getting teams
to leave the Pac twelve to join the Big twelve. Never happened. Eventually,
of course, the teams leave the Big twelve for the SEC and the
Pac twelve and the Big Ten. Nebraska goes to the Big Ten, Colorado
goes Pac twelve, A M leaves for a M, Missouri lee for the
SEC, and it felt like the Big twelve is dying. They held on
through the years. Of course, they tied all their hopes to the Longhorns,
who have been a colossal disappointment basically every single season. Yes, I'm
talking to you, Longhorn fans. You know that you're a complete underwhelming,
under achieving football program considering how much money you make in the expectation and honestly,
the level of the conference throughout all these years, how the Longhorns haven't
been consistently dominating that conference is kind of embarrassing. And I think that any
Longhorn with a level head there would probably tell you the same thing. That
you're Texas, you should get every player that you want. You have an
unbelievable campus, you have unbelievable facilities. You're in an awesome city for college
students. Like if I was a college football recruit and Texas was chasing me,
I'd go there all day over any any other school in this state.
And that's no disrespect of what they've done in College Station, TCU, Baylor,
Texas Tech, wherever it might be. You of h I would go
to Texas all day long. It's just better and they haven't been able to
do it. And a lot of that's been the coaching throughout the years.
Of course, after mac Brown, you know, Charlie Strong was a complete
disaster. Tom Herman turned into a disaster eventually, But it's not like Sarkiesan's
been any better. Now he's getting better recruits probably than they've had out of
any of those guys at any time. Of course, and more importantly,
the quarterback position quin yours this year, arch Manning waiting in the wings to
take over, which we assume is after this season, Texas should start feeling
like they're back. But oh wait, they're leaving for the SEC, which
is going to be extremely difficult for them to go and win immediately. And
if you think that they're going to the SEC and immediately winning, I'd be
surprised. Now look A and M did it. Now again, they did
it because any more than anything, they hit on a quarterback in Johnny Manzil
and that allowed them to go in there and win. So they can do
that. If arch Manning is a you know, everything that arch Manning has
talked about being, they can win. We'll see how the conference aligns or
aligns things up schedule wise, and or you know, we do know the
schedule. I guess what for next year, but how they consistently do all
that, and it's there's a lot of moving parts. But last night,
or yesterday after, and really the day before, we're seeing the death of
the Pac twelve. Now, I've always been a Pac twelve fan from the
standpoint of I think, like everybody else, you love late night Saturday West
Coast football at twelve thirty in the morning, and it's you know, Oregon
versus Washington State, and it's sixty two to fifty eight with fourteen minutes left
in the fourth quarter at twelve thirty in the morning, and you're like,
let's go. This is what I'm talking about. You rather had too many
beers. You've just been sitting around at your house and whatever it is you're
watching college football to like one one thirty in the morning. It's awesome.
That's dying, to an instance, never going to completely die. They'll still
play late games at night, but the conference is dying. Arizona after Arizona
follows Colorado to the Big Twelve, and then last night it becomes official that
the Big Twelve votes in approves the additions of Utah and Arizona State to the
conference as well, which is a very big deal for the conference to get
the rest of the probably most significant schools available in the Pac twelve into their
conference. I know that Arizona and Arizona State don't have this unbelievable rich history
of being incredibly successful at football. Utah has been awesome for a very long
time with Kyle Whittingham. I think that that is a sneaky, great addition
for the Big Twelve. The number one thing that is stands out through all
of it is that the Big Twelve has done an unbelievable job of saving their
conference. They knocked their commissioner hire out of the park in in Brett Yormack.
He's been awesome and he's gotten them an awesome TV deal, and the
Big Twelve has put itself in a spot where they are now, without a
doubt, the third best conference in college college football, in college sports period.
It sounds like, I mean, the ACC should survive. The Florida
State thing is interesting. You think that if they're leaving, they're trying to
get to the Big Ten at this point because the Big Ten might try to
expand to twenty. They add Oregon and Washington, which is another good get
for them the Big Ten, though is so funky. And that's the part
that you do hate of all this is that you know you've killed rivalries in
some spots, like no offense to the schools that are going UCLA USC Oregon
Washington, Like nobody's gonna get jazzed up for Oregon versus Illinois, or Oregon
versus Indiana, or UCLA versus per Due, Like those do nothing the Big
Ten for a conference that has some really good historic programs in Ohio State,
Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State. There's a lot of crap in that
conference, and they are a little bit I've always felt it's an overhyped conference.
Now with the addition of the West Coast teams, it's a big day.
It's just gonna be weird. You wish it was more, you know,
geographically driven. And I will give the sec that they have stayed and
Greg Sanky has always said that they want to stay geographically aligned, so that
I interested in going out and jumping and getting teams way west or way far
east, northeast, north, whatever it is. They've stayed in that southern
region of the United States, in the south southeastern region of the United States.
Texas is as far as over as they're going. They're the powerholder in
all this. They're the best damn conference. We all know that, and
that's not changing anytime soon. So the madness is not going to stop anytime
soon, you think. But the Big twelve is secured its life with what
they've done the other conferences. The PAC twelve is on its deathbed. The
ACC is in a weird spot. I think I would prefer, probably like
the ACC to not watch that conference implode. And people love to get hot
and by oh, it's all about money. Of course, it's all about
money. That's all this sport, all sports are. It's about money.
As long as you can turn on College Game Day on Saturday morning and then
transition into a crappy Big ten battle between Indiana and UCLA. Yeah, at
eleven am, you're gonna be fat and happy. Turn on the SEC at
two thirty. Follow that up with a good Big twelve matchup, maybe in
the evening or in the late afternoon into the night, and maybe another SEC
matchup for the night game. Before the late night game. We're all gonna
be happy here in a few weeks and in the next year when all the
changes do come. Seven one three, two, one, two five,
seven nineties are number one final segment of this show. Those you unhold stick
there, We're gonna take a quick time out. We'll come back wrap up
the thoughts of this show before we transition into the Astros on Deck Show coming
up at eleven Here on Sports Talk seven ninety This is Space Cities Saturday on
Sports Talk seven ninety one. It's our final few moments of Space City Saturday.
We will transition into the Astros on Deck Show here at the top of
the hour, getting you ready for the return of Justin Verlander today to the
mound for the Astros twelve O five, the first pitch. I'll be with
you for the on Deck Show from eleven to eleven thirty, then of course
after the ball game for the tenth inning show as well. I want to
get you guys in on the phones before we get out of here for again
this part of the show. Brian McTaggart will join us in about thirty minutes
here on seven ninety to give us the updates from up there in New York.
Rogers on the line wants to talk to us here this morning. Hey
Roger, Good morning, guys. Hey, I don't want to be a
downer. I was a good win yesterday. I just I'm not I'm not
understanding dust this philosophy. So later in the season, we're coming down the
home stretch on on a division, on a division chase, and he's still
teakering with the lineups. You know, I don't understand the Cassenger. I'm
he got Aldres at DH is fine, you kidding, you know, there's
some way you got to fit that. The das back in the lineup.
Man, it just means so much right now. Every game matters, you
know, every game counts. So I'm not just understanding Gusts philosophy. So
late in the season, we're just kind of annoying as a matter of fact
to me. And that's all I had. Fellows, have a good day,
Thank Roger. Look and yeah, the lineup today, I'll just go
ahead and give it. I'll give it again before we get out of the
on deck show today, I'll two Day at second Painia short Tucker and right
Bregman at third, Jordan DH McCormick and laughed dubon the return of Verlander's personal
center fielder is back. He's bat in seventh and playing center. Greg Hessenger
is starting today at first base and batting eighth. Then Martine Moulton Island is
catching and batting ninth. I am with you from the standpoint of Yaner Diaz.
I don't know how you don't get this bat consistently in there every single
day. It makes no sense. We were all told ahead of the season
that you know, this is a guy that's got some versatility, playing the
outfield a little bit and play him at first base, he can play him
other places. And then he sat for the first two months. It was
dumb. Snow the way around it, it was dumb. He gets playing
time, of course when the ordon goes down, basically starts dh ing all
the time. And he's hit fourteen home runs this year. It's a three
run bomb last night. And look Yannar Diaz is not the next coming like
he has flaws. He cannot continue to be the guy that he is as
now. Look it's his rookie year. You get him room to grow.
He's only walked up, believe, six times this year. That's atrocious.
He swings at everything. He has to find a way to work on his
plate discipline. If he doesn't at some point in his career, it's going
to catch up to him. He'll be a guy that doesn't get on basic
a good clip. Teams won't value him, and as his skills diminished as
he gets older, he will be become a negative at the plate. Look
at Hobby Bayaz of the Detroit Tigers. There are so many similarities in terms
of the way that they approached the plate between Yanar Diaz and Hobby Bayas guy
who had a ton of success early in his career, put up a bunch
of numbers, hit really well. He's now into his thirties and he has
been god awful and his plate decisions have gotten worse and worse than There's the
mental side of that that makes things worse as well, so Daz has to
figure that out. But flat out, he's been one of your best hitters,
even with his lack of on base skills this season, he hits a
three run jack last night. He finds a way to get hits basically every
time he's out there. And he's not in the lineup today, I understand
that matchups and stuff are important. I got a couple of tweets about it
to day, like, oh, well, he's not good against left handed
pitch. He's had like fifty nine at bats in his big league career against
left handed pitching. You don't know that. I don't know that he hit
over two eighty against big league left handed pitching in the minor leagues. No
offense to Great Kessenger. Great Kessenger is not a big league player, has
not proven to be a big league player. I don't understand necessarily why he's
on the roster, to be honest with you, I don't I know that
he has versatility to play across the endfield. He doesn't play, he sits.
Why is he here? And then you have a day like today where
honestly, your infield probably won't work a lot today. Verlanders a flyball pitcher,
So I understand you wanna have your you know, perfect outfield defense that
you can get out there for him today. But he's a flyball pitcher that
typically gets flyballs or strike as. There's not a lot of balls on the
ground for Justin Verler. Yan Ardas can handle playing first base. There's no
excuse for yan Erdas to not be in the lineup today. And I,
like the rest of you, I'm not on this train of crush and Dusty
Baker in the lineups every single day. It's a long season. You're gonna
use different lineups. Guys are gonna get days off. It is what it
is. But the guy had a three run bomb last night in the first
any in a ballpark that profiles to what he can do. Yander can hit
it out of any ballpark. The guy hits the piss out of the baseball
when he hits it. But he has an incredible ability to hit the ball
to right field. You saw it last night. He didn't crush that home
run. You flick a ball out to right field of Yankee Stadium. You
got a three o lead. Why is he not in the lineup? It
does not make sense at all. We'll ask Brian mctaggard about it at MLB
dot com coming up during the Astros on Deck Show. No, we're gonna
go to the top of the hour here and then we'll get back into the
Astros on Deck Show here in a moment. But on this Yiner Diz thing
with the Astros, he just has to be in the lineup every day.
He's been one of your best hitters this season for a team that has had
incredible inconsistency. In terms of their offense, and not enough thump at times.
This guy, so far this season and when he has played, and
he has played a total of sixty eight games, two or thirty one at
bats, has hit fourteen home runs of his sixty three hits. I mean
hell, twenty eight of his sixty three hits have gone for extra bases,
twenty eight of them. If you just go for comparison, say Josea brey
You plays every day, Josea brey You has four hundred ten at bats,
one hundred and seven games played. He's not in the lineup today. He
has twenty six extra base hits extra base hits this season. Yiner Diaz has
played half the time basically and has twenty eight. You have no business not
playing this guy every single day at all. And I'm not interested in the
excuses. I'm not interested in hearing anything else. I don't you know what,
if you're concerned about him against left handed pitching, the only way to
find out is to give him actual at bats against it. You can't make
a determination off of fifty something at bats at the big league level period in
the story. So I will say again they are wasting their time today playing
great Kessinger at first base, Yaner Diaz can completely handle it. Now.
Look, they've put themselves in a roster bind I get that because he is
the backup catcher, and you know you don't want to lose the backup catcher.
You don't want to get both guys hurt. But that's your decision.
You've done this. You can't keep one of your best bats out of the
lineup every sing the day, and that's what they're doing with Theanar Das.
Let's go to Actually, Scott just hung ups and never mind, we were
gonna get it quick phone calling. So again that's my thoughts on it.
I don't know if they're going to necessarily continue to go through that. I
think on a day like today, I'd be less concerned about putting Das in
the lineup and playing first base because you could just transition him over to the
catcher spot if you need two, and then put a bray you in a
first base if you had to do that to where if you do, if
you dhim, of course you lose your dh At that point you're playing old
school National League baseball, which is a problem. But I just I'm not
interested in looking at an Astro's lineup that does not have him in it.
Don't tell us before the season that there's this versatility and everything, and then
you're afraid to use him at first base for whatever reason. It's just dumb.
Now, look, playing the Yankees today, I'm not as concerned about
it as you typically would be because the Yankees are throwing a nextra Cortez.
He's not been very good this season. The Astros last year in the postseason
got to him. I think that the Astros match up very well with him
today. Oh my watch is going off. I will say the other part
of the line of today that bugs me Jeremy Paine in the two hole.
Jermy Paine has shown no signs of improving. He showed no signs of anything
going well. He's hitting everything on the ground or he's striking out. But
they got him slatted back up in the two hole today. I understand you
want to get a guy going, you want to get protection or everything,
but you're giving your most advanced to one of your worst hitters on the team,
and Jeremy Painia consistently. Why why Chas McCormick has been red hot put
him in the two hole? He crushes left handed pitching. Put him in
the two hole today. It makes no sense. There's not an excuse.
There's not a single answer in the world that makes sense as to why Chas
McCormick can't hit two today and Jeremy Painia has to hit two. I don't
even care if you're gonna be stacking Painia, Dubon, Kessinger, and Maldon
on a back to back to back to back. I don't care. What
I care about is al Twoba, McCormick, Tucker Bright and Alvarez all hitting
together and getting those guys the most advats that you can get. But you
need to put pain in the two hole today. Now. Watch, he's
gonna go out and I know he had a couple hits last night. They're
infield hits. He's gonna go out today and hit like a he did hit
a home run off of courts last year in the postseason. I'm forgetting that
that's on me off top of my head. I'm probably gonna go out and
hit two jacks today and make me look like an idiot. That's fine if
I prefer that to happen. So that's where I keep getting back to some
of the lineup decisions. I get why you guys get so frustrated. There
are days where it irritates me too, and today when I look at it
for the return of Justin verte Lander two today too. This is not your
optimal offensive lineup. It's just not. And you have a day off on
Monday. You should have no concern about getting guys days off a bray you.
I'm fine with getting a day off today. He's gone back into a
complete tailspin in the last week, has dropped his batting average back down I
believe below two forty. He's been awful. Get him out of there,
get his mind off of it. But they should not be running out a
lineup when they have days off available coming up. That's not their best offensive
lineup because when you get to the postseason, you're gonna need your best offensive
lineup to win baseball games. And they'll probably make the mistake and I'm doing
that in the first couple of games and their offense won't be great. Then
they'll have to pivot really quick and go do it. We see it happen
to not just the Astros, to every single team every year. They do
this. They overthink things, They play matchups too much, and this is
one of those spots. We will take a quick time out here on Sports
Talk as seven ninety this is the end of a Space City Saturday, so
when we return, we'll get back into the Astro's discussion. We'll officially get
you ready for JV Day as we will kick off the Astros on Deck show
coming up momentarily here on Sports Talk seven ninety