This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jagen Zalaz sound Fox Sports
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c R two SA at iHeartRadio Station. Hey, good afternoon, everybody.
Welcome to Eye on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve
Rivera. He's jagan Zaus got our guy Ryan in today for Thursday. Welcome
everybody. I hope you're enjoying your day so far. Well, yeah,
so you brought up the Dodger game from last night. Who you were until?
Yeah, I was. It was fine. It's not my fault you
Tony didn't to home again. You know. I look, I'm a purist,
right, I want umpires and I want umpires, you know. I
don't want them to go to some electronic strike zone. Right, Okay,
okay, I want that. I want the umpires. But damn it,
get it right. Happened twice last night, twice, not once, but
twice, Chelio. Tony got called out on st on a third on a
third strike that was out of the zone. Oh okay, you're not even
close. I mean not. He's he's a big tall guy. One was
like halfway up his shins, and the guy to call third strike on that.
The other one was outside and low and got to call third strike on
that. And Okay, I mean I probably wouldn't cared if I didn't have
five bucks on him to hit a homer last night. So that's what pissed
me off. Right, So he lost two at bats because the couldn't call
it, couldn't call a strike, couldn't call it the strike zone. And
it pissed me off. And so you know, and you see some of
these other umpires, like there was, I mean, there's an umpire out
there and I can't remember Angel or something, Angel Hernande, who's like he
gets like something like seventy one percent of strike calls correct. That's unacceptable,
that's unacceptable, right. I mean, you can be wrong sometimes, and
that's that's the charm of you know, having an umpire, But you got
to be right more than that. You got to be right like ninety five
percent of the time nineteen. Yeah, you can't be right. You're wrong
a third of the time. You can't. And that's how you're going to
lose your job. That's how they're going to go to the electronic strike zone.
And I don't want to do that. I mean, it's it's hard
enough sitting through the replays and you know, on a close play at first
or whatever. And some of those take along the one in There was one
in the Arizona game against Utah. It took like five minutes. Yeah,
And I'm like, if in five minutes you can't tell what the call is,
then you got to leave the call right, you can't change it.
And then they came out five minutes later, after all this time, and
they reversed the call. What was it? What was it? Like?
A no, no, it was it was a it was a play on
a double play, I think, And and they uh, and they called
it, you know, they called the double play, called him out.
And then they came back and said he was safe and and and I guess,
you know, and they I mean thinking when when when instrutram play first
came out, there was a time limit, But what's happened to that?
Because this took and I mean, I I'm driving home and I'm waiting for
this game to end, and you know, and I'm like, this needs
to end before I get out of my car, and and uh and it
took forever, and and it was and it was it was a game that
the Arizona was winning by a lot. What the hell, you know?
And they want to speed up the game. And but then they do that
like you have like maybe like a two minute yes, and and and if
you again, if you can't tell pretty much right away, if it's too
close to tell right away, then do you You just got to leave the
call as it is. But back to the balls and strikes thing. Some
of the I mean there you see some you know, there was one,
uh the other day it was the ball was a foot outside and they called
a strike on it, and like, what are we doing? It's crazy?
This is nothing new, no Steve. But but now that we have
more you know, more technology and stuff, they need to be Now that
we have draft kings, no paid more. Now that I'm now that I'm
gambling on it more. I got a number for you show. Yeah,
there's that on my phone. They're like like right under my wife's mister,
another call for you. But you know, and I really don't ever want
to want to see the umpire behind home plate just stand there to make calls
at you know, calls at home play instead of balls and strike. But
you know you can't. You can't miss that much and still get paid umps
and enough to make a living at it. Well, sure, but does
tell me how two thousand, five thousand. I think they make pretty good
money. I'll look that up. But uh, sorry, everyone started off
the show on this to exactly but we did. But you won't want to
fix the clock just because, just just to be sure, we gland.
According to this website, usually umpires salary can range from one hundred and twenty
thousand to over three hundred thousand dollars annually, just depends somebody how long,
Yeah, how long you've been been doing it and stuff like that. You
know, and you know, plus you get all the travel and all that
stuff. So sure, but it's it's experience. It's you know, if
you're in Major League Baseball versus somewhere else, you know that kind of stuff.
But where you're based, it says there's a lot of factors. But
you know, that's I mean, that's a According to Sporting News, it's
one hundred and fifty thousand to four hundred and fifty dollars season to watch a
baseball game. Because I remember it used to be that. You know,
they had to go get jobs in the off season, you know, but
yeah, you know, but but you know major league athletes had to do
that too. You know, they talk about you know, NFL players in
the early days would have to go work in you know, instead of working
out of all off season, they were working at kmart and stuff. You
know. So, but that that's it. You know, Hey, that's
a decent living. I'd be you know, somebody came and said, I'll
pay you a hundred fifty thousand dollars to go be an umpire, I'd say,
okay, but that's a long road. I mean it's a long road
for to get there. Yeah, no, you take it's nice long road
to get there. Yak. It is for the NBA refs and the you
know, everyone gets well, damn it be good enough to earn that crap.
Yeah, well you think they would be. Look, if you've ever,
I mean, you really pay attention to what they do. It's a
hard job. You know. Everybody, you know, everybody in the stadium
doesn't hate them, but might hate them at some point during the game,
right you're catching crap the only time they ever you know, nobody ever says
what a great call. They only they only rip on you if it's a
bad call, right, So it's a you know, it's a it's a
tough job. I don't know that i'd want, you know, people yelling
at me. I mean, I did Little league games and I you know,
and having parents yelling at them. They just wanted to turn around to
punch them in the face. The most vicious player people out there, the
parents. Yeah, you know, I you know, I had the I
had I got to I got to do the Little League Majors All Star Tournament
one year, okay, and an easy play I was a second base kid
gets thrown out a second by a lot and I mean buy a lot.
Not even close, right, It's like not even close. And he kind
of heard his ankle, you know, when he slid into second base.
So the coach comes comes out. He comes and looks at the kid's ankle,
and then he starts yelling at me, saying, and I blew the
call, and he goes, he goes, he goes, that was a
messed up call, And I'm like, are you talking? I thought he
might have been talking to his base umpire for having the kids steal, right,
because are you talking to me and he goes, yeah, I'm talking
to you, and I said, that wasn't even close. It wasn't even
close. And then he started get but I said, okay, it wasn't
close. He got one more word, and you're gone from your kid's All
Star game. So you decide what you want to do. And then he
went back to working on the kid's ankle. But I mean, the kid
was out by six feet and he comes out and argues the call. I'm
like, what are you doing? Well? That was Twitter, that was
Twitter before Twitter was Twitter. Yeah, you know, you know, it's
not my fault, it's your faulty. Then then there's the worst. That's
when when you're calling your own kids game okay, and then the fans on
the other side, are you sure compensating? Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah
no, it's si no win situation. That's why you just kind of be
Switzerland. Just kinda watch, just kinda watch, Go home, eat your
burger, go to sleep. Well, welcome everybody again. Thursday. You
set me off, I set you off. But we're gonna talk. We'll
talk a little about that with our first guest, Tom Condy. Tim Tom
Condy Kendyatty, Tom Candyatty. I've been wanting to talk to him for a
long time. I got him this week, thankfully through the Diamondbacks. About
all that. We'll talk about just a chance of something like that happening with
the umps. You know, did he ever have well? And then you
know he was a knuckleball pitch. So trying to call his pictures I can't
even imagine, but that was like, so that'll be a little fun and
his son obviously pictures for you, Clark Candyatty. He'll be throwing the second
game in the series, Arizona Series tomorrow, and you know it's funny.
I went to his win his Twitter pitch. I was, go get their
Twitter sign idea, so like, I don't know, like the last twenty
post by him on his twitter, on his Twitter for everybody's kids kids,
you know something airs on a baseball probably yeah, super proud dad. I'm
sure Solus his kid's good. Yeah, he's gonna, he's gonna, he's
gonna pitch in the pros. He's gonna be down here, Uh Saturday or
tomorrow. I guess he pitched tomorrow. You say, yeah, tomorrow,
I think And maybe Saturday. Uh, so we'll talk more about that and
talk about the good old days when he pitched in the major leagues. Yep,
when he was a Dodgers Dodger, Cleveland Dodger. I'm gonna go back
to the Cleveland Dodger. You got your stories, I got uh And then
we're gonna go to h Matt Morano, who goes works from Go Easy Cats,
and we'll talk what's going on with the recruiting. How does it look
for Arizona comparatively to other schools. Yeah, football and basketball, because that
kid tomorrow is gonna announce my issue. Yeah, you know, his his
choice Florida here or Washington the j Bermuda Triangle. Yeah, exactly. Did
you hear what what da Dabo Sweeney said? Dablos Swing literally said on a
radio show. I called it up and I have it. He said there
are no players in the transfer portal good enough to play for Clemson, basically
saying, if you've gone into the portal, you're not good enough to play
for us. And that's why his program is going to and exactly because that's
what he's kind of stayed away from, right right, he said some other
something else stupid he said, all our players are transfers. They're transfers from
high school. I'm like, dude, you you know, uh, the
Nick Saban, the greatest coach arguably in college football ever, but certainly in
you know, this generation, use the transfer portal. I mean, how
you can sit there and stand alone and argue and say, no, guys
in the transfer portal are good enough to play for us. Well, you've
seen what's happened to his There's there's the Dabbo Sweeney approach, and then there's
the Calipari approach. So you got to find that perfect meeting, right,
because because it's not what it hasn't worked for cala Perry. Well maybe not
with the transfers, but with the went and done people. I'll tell you
what, he's digging himself up. He's digging himself up a deep, deep
hole because it hasn't worked so far in the last two three years. Right,
that's his biggest criticism, Yeah, that we're not improving through the portal,
but we're trying to get through the h And you know, he goes
on and says that every everybody who posts that, then it starts another thread
of dude, man, you better get with the program or you're going into
the toilet. You better win. Yes, about winning with talent or no
talent? We saw and everything Arizona's historically had talent and then marginal talent.
Yeah, and marginal is not the right word. But you know what I'm
saying. Dick told me I had to coach him up, rich Rod had
to coach him up that you know, two star scoobs, the you oh
my Joeys was oh geez. But the okay, okay, you know how
to come up with Everybody has this, you know, gim me a phrase,
you know, just just play the game game. I don't care about
uniforms. Play it again, dead game. Yeah. So but man,
I don't know, Man, I don't know. It's like, okay,
so do you not believe in n I l either? You know? Right?
Right right? That's the stubbornness to try and stick to what was instead
of understanding what is is. It's crazy. I mean, you're you're just
you're just laying a laying a bad bed that you're gonna have to lay in
for for a while. Right. And he's probably surviving because he's dabble Sweeney.
But soon a certain amount of time you're gonna have to start winning.
You guys start winning some game with talent or no tell? Yeah, okay,
what else is going on? Before we head out to talk to Tom
KENDIOTTI? You know, I just you know again, getting ready for this
big Arizona series, uh starting tonight. Stootball starts tomorrow to stop off starts
tomorrow at three o'clock against Villanova tonight at six o'clock Oregon Stage year. It's
a three game set. Arizona just has to win one game. Uh.
Orgon State looks to be the favor to win the series. I saw something.
They're they're ranked higher than Arizona r and everything else. I saw some
d you want predictions maybe fifteen sixteen people and only three had Arizona beating them
for the series. They're they only again, only gotta win one, win
one, okay, and you're going because they could have win tonight. Yeah.
I was gonna go tomorrow, but my daughter said, what what are
you doing? We have we have ninety seconds. I'm gonna ask you a
weird question, but you know, I know you answer it. So your
kids are gone. When they were younger, who ran the house they did?
Now that they're older and gone mostly. Wow, I have to I
have two of them. I have two of them in my house. Runs
the house. They still run that. Okay, there's four of us.
There's four of us in the house. I'm fourth in line. Go to
your dad. Yeah you're your dad. Yeah your dead. Yeah. I
wrote that a story in my many years ago, when the kids were small.
I was Dagwood Bumpstead, I was I was Al Bundy. I was
this dude that just a dude on the that dude who plays the mortgage.
You're just along for the right. There's there's a three way tie for first
in my house and then me. Yeah. Yeah, it was long.
Just know that I'm good. I'm good with it, you know, I
just I just roll with it. You know what? Do we have it
for dinner? I know what you guys decide. Just make sure you don't
don't miscalling me. Yeah, make sure I'm there. Okay, Okay,
So let's let's take the break, all right, Ryan, Well, we'll
get to you and then we'll have the Tom on the phone, Tom Candiaty.
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details breaking down all the exes at OH. It's Steve Rivera and Jacin salvinz.
This is I on the Ball on Fox Sports fourteenth. Hey, welcome
back to Wind the Ball Here on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. I'm Steve Rivera,
He's Jacin zaliz Now and I phone. We have Tom Candiotti, former
Major leaguer and now Arizona Diamondbacks radio guy. Tom. How are you man?
I'm doing great. How you guys doing. We're doing great as well.
We've wanted to have you on the show for a few reasons. Your
time here at Cleveland, are your time with the Dodgers, just to make
it happy. And obviously your son's a fantastic picture here. You must be
a proud dad, Ah, super proud. You know, I've obviously been
really close with Clark through his journey and from the time he was in old
high school even before that, but through high school and through college and to
where he's at right now. And you know, I couldn't be more proud
of, like his development, you know, his attitude, you know,
just the way he holds himself, and obviously his talent. But yeah,
I'm super excited, like every time he takes the mound. Well, I
was telling you off air, the three games I've gone to to see Arizona
play, he's he's pitched all three of them, and you know, he's
I completely impressed the hell out of me, to the point of like I'm
thinking, Okay, if he's the day two starter, not the day one
starter, how good is the day one starter, right, because that's you
know, Clark has just been I just love the way he throws. He
just it's like he's not not ever, he's not ever phased up on the
mound, right, whatever's happening, You just give me the give me the
ball, throw the next pitch. You know, Clark is and there's a
big reason for that too. You know, Clark has been around a lot
of Major League baseball players. You know, when him and his brother were
younger, I would take him to work with me and and I'd get to
the ballpark about one point thirty. Of course, those guys could go where
they want, they go down to the locker room. You know, they
would hang out down there. They would go watch guys throw throw batting practice,
they would watch bullpens, they would do like whatever. They were like
part of the team. And so you know, he doesn't get overwhelmed when
he gets in situations and stuff like that. I think just from watching and
being around you know, major league players, you know when when they were
young, and just kind of learned that. That's a huge advantage for kids.
I think. You know, when you have you see what dad does,
you love what dad does, and you get to do what dad does.
Oh yeah, well, well Dad's boring that he's up there studying on
a computer. You know, he'd rather go down and and you know,
hang out down at the batting cage and hang around the players and you know.
And the funny thing is, even when Chip was managing the Diamondbacks,
you know, Clark was just a kid that would be down there just kind
of hanging out. I think he was fifteen years old at the time.
And uh, Chip probably didn't even know it at that time until we got
there to Tucson and when we were getting recruited and uh, he goes,
yep, I remember you all the time when you were down there in the
locker room. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool. Whether he believes that
or not, that's okay. So you you were you were one of the
you know, long time I would say, you know, a great knuckleball
pitcher. You were known for your knuckleball. Did Clark does he have one?
Has he ever tried it? Would he ever show it? Or was
he? Has he not been interested in it? Well? What Clark?
Through his development? You know, I've introduced him to every single pitch.
I don't care if it's a basketball, four seam er, two seamer,
slider, cutter, curveball, change up, knuckleball, forkball, splitter,
you name it. You know, I've taught him how to throw it,
and then he so he knows how to do it. And actually he does
throw a knuckleball. He'll never throw in the game, right, there's no
way, you know, but he knows how. I always thought it was
important to introduce, you know, my boys to like all these different pitches,
and they kind of go from there, which ones they like, which
ones they it feels better coming out of their hand. And then I would
try to tweak them a little bit by just watching their natural delivery and what
would work best from that arm slot and that release point, and then they
just kind of develop on their own that way. And and for Clark,
you know, it's kind of been you know, he experiments a lot,
but when he got to Tucson and the University of Arizona, you know,
they really tweaked him because they now could show him through metrics what a four
seamer does compared to his two seamer. What happens if you raise your arm
angle, you know, through three or four inches and deliver the ball up
there instead of like a lower arm angle. And so, you know,
Kevin Vance has been outstanding for him, and you know he's really used the
program at U of A to really develop. How long of a major leaguer
were you? I came up in nineteen eighty three and retired in the spring
of two thousand. Well, so a nice seventeen year career. How has
that changed the pitching aspect of it, because it's you just said twenty pitches
right there, an arm angle and velocity. How has that changed in your
time? Oh? Incredibly a lot. You know, there's I mean,
there's so many aspects of pitching that changes, hitting, that's changed, you
know, and obviously the little cat and mouse game that goes back and forth
between the two. But you know, it's a game of power now,
whether you're hitting or whether you're pitching. And you know, velocity is king,
and so you need guys to be able to get it up there in
the mid nineties or higher, you know, to really be able to,
you know, to succeed on the major league level. Now there's a couple,
you know, outliers. You know you could you know, you look
at Ranger Suarez and what he could do, you know, for the Phillies.
He might be the best pitcher in baseball down he throwsy one miles an
hour. But but for the most part, you know, velocity is king.
But you just can't throw one pitch. You know, you have to
have you know, if you have even if you're a reliever, you have
to have a couple of pitches, and if you're a starter, you certainly
need more than you know, more than a couple of pitches. He need
three or four pitches. So Clark has that ability. He's got a really
good split finger. He doesn't throw it that much. Yeah, it really
hasn't hasn't done that that much it at Tuson, but he's got that in
his bag. You know, hopefully he'll never have to use a knuckleball,
but we do play catch with it and it's kind of a fun thing between
him and I. So, Okay, where does the where does the velocity
come from? Right? I mean, how do the how have these guys
become such hard throwers? And there's so many of them? Yeah, how
do you develop velocity? I guess is what is what I'm asking? Is
it just natural you have the natural physical ability or is there something that these
pitchers do while they're working on everything that helps them develop to be able to
throw into the mid nineties. Well, strength obviously is a big part of
it. You have to be, you know, pretty strong, you know,
but you need to have arm speed. So arm speed, just like
that speed is going to increase the velocity of the ball. And there's different
ways to increase arm speed, and that's being shorter and quicker. Sometimes it's
the rotation of your hips, you know, it's the drive from your back
leg. Most of the time, when you look at really hard throwing pictures,
you know, their their lower body strength is incredible. But you also
need to have other things and timing aspect to go with that. So I
can't just answer that with like one, you know, one thing that does
it. It's there's a variety of things that have to come in place.
In fact, that was there Tuesday. I think I would do go see
you guys play, and the pictures are bigger now they're bigger, dude,
Right, there are a lot of power in the legs. Like he says
in the hips, you don't have any kent anymore. Yeah, you do,
you know what I'm saying. Or from the guys. You don't have
the finesse guys anymore. So that's all changed. I wanted you to come
up with any Dodger stuff with his connection to the Dodgers, because I have
a Cleveland Indian Tom. Yeah, I grew up a Dodger fan. You
know, we got them on the radio here. So I've been a Dodger
fan all my life, so obviously followed you when you the time you're with
them. So okay, when you went to the Dodgers, you know what
was it kind of was it different from maybe going to you know, any
other tim the Dodgers up there like a you know, you go to the
Yankees, you go to the Dodgers. Maybe I don't know who else you
put in that kind of stratosphere of major leagues or were you just happy to
be somewhere. Well, you know, I we go back. I signed
with the Dodgers after the nineteen ninety one season. I was a free agent,
and I was a you know, I was a trade deadline guy that
was traded from the Indians at that time to the Blue Jays and we got
to the playoffs, lost to the Twins, who went on to be the
Braves. So I became a free agent when that season was over, and
the Dodgers were one of the first teams to call, and so I went
down and talked to you know, their staff and Tommy Lasorda and the whole
I got the whole Dodger experience. But on top of that, I grew
up in the Bay Area and where all my buddies were Giant fans, but
I happen to be a Dodger fan. At that time in the sixties,
really all the only games that really got telecasts were when the Dodger or when
the Giants went down to LA and played the Dodgers, or the game of
the week, that's really all you had, and that was usually the Yankees
and somebody. And so I was able to, you know, fall in
love with Cofax and Drysdale and Maury Wills and Tommy Davis and you know that,
you know, that group of Dodgers. And sure enough, when I
go down there, the first guy they have down there is Tommy Davis.
And wow, he was my my favorite player growing up. And and so
I was able to talk to him, and of course became friends with Sandy
Kofax and Don Drysdale and all those guys would be there at Spring trading of
course, but uh, you know, it was a pretty easy, you
know call for me. You know, when the Dodgers called me, you
know, Icho, this is where I want to go. That's too cool?
Yeah, nice, Yeah, that's the cool. I mean, look,
you just mentioned all the names, right, yeah, that I grew
up and I just looked you up and you're three years older than me.
So we we grew up watching the same guys. And you know, as
you said, you know Tommy Davis, I mean, you know, I
think him and Willie Davis playing at the same time, and you know,
confusing those guys sometimes because they're both so good. But that's so that's so
cool that you got to play with the team that you want to know,
you wanted to play for, well grew up. Yeah. So Tom,
my story is when you were in Cleveland back in eighty eight. I want
to say, here's a skinny, twenty four year old kid, kind of
out of college, just out and I was coming spring training with the Indians.
You know, as you know kids here, young kids go do spring
training. Kind of a dream of mine doing this, and my run ins
with here a couple of players in the Cleveland Indians were not was not very
fun. And I saw you the names off the air and you'd understand.
And I said, you know, guys, who could I talk to you?
That's a good dude. Well, Tom's talks to everybody. He's a
nice guy. So I went to talk to Tom Candieta twice just to get
my story. You can get that hell out and not be yelled at by
the guys. So that's my story with you, and I love you for
it. You know, it's obviously very intimidating when you become like like an
announcer or a broadcaster or you know, a reporter or whatever. That is
to actually go into a major league locker room and and and start asking the
major leaguer questions. Yeah, and they don't know. You never know where
it's gonna go, and they don't know you. And guys nowadays are are
fantastic. They're all really really good. They're all you know, they're they're
all schooled very very well. But back in you're talking back in the eighties,
you know, you never know, some guy might bite your head off
back you know, with no repercussions, there's no social media, there's no
thing. You don't have to worry about anything, right, Right, But
it's a different crowd today, obviously, Yeah, no questions, Thank you
for it. We're gonna ask him about pitching pitching with the with CA.
Okay, so we were I was, I was complaining last night because okay,
I'll just I I needed I need to show he time to hit a
home run for me last night. Right, and he gets called out,
he gets a call third strike on two balls that we're outside the strike zone.
You know, he got the little square now and you know, my
point was, I really don't ever want to see electronics strike zones, right,
I want to see umpires calling balls and strikes. But I do want
to see umpires be better at it as a pitcher, you know, I
mean, what what what do you want from an umpire consistency? They talk
about those kinds of things. Would you want if you're all of a sudden
back in the Major League, would you want the electronics strike zone now?
Or do you do you still think that we need to keep the umpires back
there? You know, that's just a difficult one. You know, it's
it's weird now because everybody that watches the game on TV, they have little
strikes on the little box up there, you know, and so right away
guys want to judge the umpire how he's doing. I think I did last
night and so, but that's what you're looking at. You're not looking at
where the catcher's sitting up. You're not looking at anything other than that box
that they put up, it seems like. And I get caught into that
once in a while too. But as a pitcher, you know, look
at my job was to pick up you know, get the sign, pick
up the catcher's glove and hit the target, you know, And the more
times I hit the target, the better game I was going to have the
better you know, outing was get a ball place, least amount of pitches,
all that stuff. You know. Unfortunately, now guys don't hit the
target as much because they're all maximum effort deliveries in the way they throw the
ball. You know, they just want stuff on the ball. And so
it's really difficult for an umpire because he knows he's getting graded on balls in
that box. In my day, like if you get if you're around the
catcher's glove a lot, and even if you miss a little bit, you're
going to start getting those calls, right, And nowadays that's not that's really
not even it. They're they're so the umpires are so in tune into where
that box is that and they know they're going to get graded and uh and
you guys could probably go out. You can probably see it on Twitter right
that the umpire score scorecards, right and you can see actually how they are
and you know how they how they did and all that stuff, and it's
I know, I just you know, it just it's it's a little different
game, but it's it's a game that you have to adjust to as a
player. Nowadays, you know, in the minor leagues, they're you know,
they're getting to the point where they you know, hitters or pitchers can
question calls like well, once or twice a game or once a whatever it
is. And so I don't know if that's going to keep going towards h
you know, or migrating towards Major League Baseball or not. It seems like
everything they try in the minor leagues seems to be, you know, a
precursor to what's gonna happen in the big leagues. So that could be another
interesting possibility. One last question for me, who was the toughest dude you
faced in your career. There's a lot of them, you know, there
was a lot of them. The one guy I never really liked the face
was Larry Walker, and I think a lot of that had to do with
pitching in Colorado that wasn't like friendly to me in that high altitude, you
know, throwing breaking stuff. It just didn't break like it normally did so,
and he was a really good hitter anyway, and obviously a good player,
and so that was like, boy, this is chuck and duck,
you know, But there's others, you know, and you can flip it
on the other side, you know, which guys did you like throwing to.
You know, Vinny Castilla, I don't know what the number are that
between me and him, but I don't think he ever got a hit off,
you know. And then he's pitched I'm pitching to him in the same
environment, so who knows. You know, there's I was lucky enough to
pitch for a long time. My first major league start in the major leagues
back in nineteen eighty three, I was able to I threw a complete game
and got carl Yastrevsky out, you know, and I thought that was huge
because I was a kid pitching against that guy and my mom at my mom's
garage door. Yeah, you know, but I was I don't even know
how old I was, nine years old. Yeah, but you know,
and Reggie Jackson was in that group the whole thing. And and then even
at the end of my career, you know, then you're you're talking about
guys like like Tony Gwen and you know, these touch hitters that are Hall
of famers, so you know, it's you know, but Larry Walker,
I think it is probably the one guy that kind of stands out to me.
All right, last question for reals, Now, do you still have
a lot of your your gear from you know, our souvenirs, T shirts,
jerseys, whatever, and does one you have more of one team than
another. You know, Clark stole a lot of that stuff from me.
Got shirt you know with the Braves at the time, you know the chicks
Dick the long ball. Yeah, I think he stole that one from me.
He stole I think I think he went through all my equipment bags and
stole every T shirt that I had. So if you're looking for that stuff,
you better have Clark. You probably got right exactly. Yeah, yeah,
right, thank you, Tom. You know the guy who struck Yuzinski,
right or ship screen I struck out Tommy Martinez is a twelve years there
you go. Yeah, good for you, Thank you. Tom has a
lot of fun. Appreciate it. Well, I appreciate you guys having me
make good luck tonight, right because yeah, you guys this weekend. Thanks
a bunch. That was fun. That was a lot of fun. That
was a lot of fun. Very cool. Yeah, Tom, you know
again, you pitch that long in the major leagues, you're good. Oh
yeah, you know, you're really good. And to be good good enough
for that long? How cool? Is it to face those dudes, those
dudes. Yeah, and then you win the game and things like that because
you always remember it. Look the forty some years later, what you what's
your greatest one of the greatest moments. Well it struck out struck yeah,
yeah, no big deal, it's not that night exactly. Okay, all
right, that was very cool. Hey, stick around, give us a
call. We'd love to hear from you. Five two zero, four,
one, six, seventy four, forty. We're here for anything you always
want to talk about, So give us a buzz. If you're an Arizona
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Steve Raverera and Jay Gonzalez on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. Hey, welcome back
to I on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty on Steve your Jay.
You got Ryan with us that twelve minutes. Anybody you want to give
us a call? Five two zero four one six seven four four zero.
Did you guys go back in the day to spring training? Uh? Were
your experiences? You know, when you were a kid and from Santa Mania
High School. I dreamed about doing stuff like that, you know, and
before I was in Dallas and I covered the Rangers. It was a little
tough thir two. But here the spring training was not fun for Yeah,
well, I had the same experience you did. I mean, I was
having fun, but I you know, it was kind of like, okay,
you know which guys to kind of stay away from, and you did,
and you mentioned the same guy's name right right, Julio Franco was just
a pain in the butt. And I just didn't even try because I was
told don't go near him, just don't go near him, and I didn't,
and maybe that's what he wanted. But there was one other guy that
I did go near that the one guy who I talked to who just kind
of was a jerk was a guy named mel Hall. You know, I
tried, I tried to go interview him, and he was just he was
just the worst. Get away from you, just get the hell away from
you. You know. I asked a couple of questions, he gave me
a couple of one word answers, and I said, okay, this,
you know, cause because the you know, covering spring training probably the same
with you. The job was go in, you know, go go to
get a feature, right, go go to batting practice or whatever, try
to interview somebody before the game, then then write the story during the game,
and then kind of rec at the end of the story you talk about
the game pair exactly. So you always had to get a feat and so
it was there just a guy that you had to go, just go talk
to a guy. And that's what the fans here, you know, they
wanted. They just wanted to They wanted us as local writers to talk about
the guys that are, you know, the big league guys. And so
that's what you were doing. Sometimes you'd get a you know, it was
the Indians who were the team here, and you'd get the Indians. Other
times you'd go get you know, somebody from the opposing team. You know,
Uh, Sean Dunstan, I thought, you know, when the Cubs
came here, it was a guy that I go, Yeah, but you
know on the Indians where you know, I learned, okay, stay away
from Al Hall, stay away from Wilia Franco. A story that always stuck
with me was I did a story on Jay Bell, who was nineteen years
old. He was in you know, in the Major league spring training.
He was like the future, right, and he never I don't think he
ever even came up with with Cleveland. I mean, he got traded,
he entered the cub and uh he went to a bunch of places, but
ended up on the Diamondbacks or the World Series team. So you know,
you got to. You know, Phil Nekro got traded to the to the
UH to the Indians towards the end of spring training. So he shows up
one day and so natural I had to go interview Phil neicro and he was
the nicest guy in the world. Yeah, well, here's the guy who's
gonna be a Hall of Famer. You, Julio Franco, are not going
to be a Hall of Famer, and you're a jerk. You Mail Hall
are never going to be a Hall of Famer, and you're a jerk.
Here comes this Hall of Famer and he's the nicest guy ever. My story
two stories, Jim Abbott Fantastic and Rock Crew two weeks and that. I'll
remember those guys in the Candy Audius, the guys who spoke to you five
minutes. All you're looking for is five minutes for a five hundred word story,
and you're and you're done, and that's it. You just need a
couple of minutes of their time, and and you got it. You know.
I I saw Will Clark, I was I was going to the Giants
locker room. I was going to the Giants locker room. And two I
wanted to talk to Will Clark and he and he's and he's standing outside the
locker room talking to somebody, and probably an eight year old kid walks up
to him and puts up, you know, cardon ask him for not graph
and he screamed at the kid. He's like, didn't you see I'm talking
to somebody, And he yelled at the kid, and the kid just turned
around and walked away. It probably went over to his dad and started crying,
you know. And I wanted to say, what a what a turd?
So I went into the giants locker room and I don't know why I
would have interboy, I didn't injury. I said, well, I'm not
talking to him, you know, I'm not even gonna try. I'm like,
why why would you do that? That was kind of my first taste
of this job. Is fun, but but they're not all good dudes exactly,
and and they and they were not but so you just kind of,
you know, you talk like I would always ask the Cleveland writers who were
here, Hey, you know who's a good guy, who's not a good
guy? You know? Who should I talk to you? That's what I
did, Kenny Audi. I said, I just want to get through the
day you want to talk to you and he was sitting in the back and
you know, warming up, blah blah blah, and you got five minutes.
Yeah, it was fun. You know. Bob Feller was was uh
you know, was in was in the camp. A couple of days.
I went to talk to him. How old was he? He's pretty old
already. Nobody's talked to me. And the years I was that's Bob Feller.
Yeah, you know, guys like, yeah, I had fun with
it. I know if your whole tame time was miserable, and but but
you know I I I did enjoy doing it. Uh and and and you
know it's one of the things that I covered that then I had to cover
the tours that season. Was I hated that tis a lot of games and
some of those dudes were very bitter because they weren't at the majors. They
were better because they were on their way up and weren't there yet, or
they were better because they were on their way down, and and uh,
I you know know I that was that was a hard gig. And it
was kind of like the same game every night, right, the same game.
So you don't about the game, yeah, because and there would be
fourteen game homestands, right, so for two weeks solid, you're covering the
game and it's like no days off and all that kind of stuff. Baseball
writers are special breed because you're there three hours before the game, you're there
for the game, and then you're afterward. Under that, I were writing
the always some fun stories out of that. Though. There was a guy
got it like Eric Bullock. Okay, he was remember Bullock very much?
Okay, so better players like nineteen eighty five a shaighty six. It would
have been the eighty six season that I could that I covered him, and
he had been They had run his mug shot with the game story. This
was like five days in a row, and so they are our editors were
told, do not, under no circumstances are you to run his munk shot
in tonight's game story. And then he went like four for four with the
homer and like, what are you gonna do? You gotta have Eric Bullot's
mug with the game story because he was one of the better players, a
good player. He's a really good player. Yeah, those days are rememborable,
but not in many ways. Yeah, the guy who helped me a
lot too, back in eighty eighty nine who was fatal because you know,
yeah, Mike, Yeah, he was around. He was around. Another
story for regarding the Tucson guy, Sammy Khalifa, who had been with who
had been with the pirates, with the pirates, and he got he got
sent down to the It was Hawaii was there was their team, and he
got sent down while his team was in Tucson. So he had to report
to Tucson. He didn't report, did he He did, but it took
forever and they they have seventy two hours to report, and and Hawaii had
a four game series, so he was going to have to report while he
was while they were still here in Tucson. And I remember going up to
uh their manager said when Sammy didn't get here, he said, he said,
it's a longer road on the way down than it is on the way
up. And that that was, you know, and he's one of the
better stories that has ever come through here. Yeah, because he was like
a strong draft pick out right, and then he's kind of he's still around.
He made the majors. Yeah, yeah, and didn't last long,
but he he got he got up there, get up there. So they're
very very cool. Hey, you know what I think that it was.
All of that was was cool. I mean, how can it be uncool
to be covering sure, especially at our age at that time. No,
No, if it's a bad day, you didn't have many of them.
You just kind of have to pick and choose and you know, kind of
will work your way around some bad times. Yeah, and back then the
toros, I think the tours weren't not that good. When they were not
that good, there will be six seven hundred people at the games. Yeah,
but you know, I mean, okay, covering a spring training day
would mean showing up at the ballpark one o'clock in the afternoon, you know,
not no early ten o'clock in the morning, because the games were one.
Because you showed up about ten o'clock ten thirty, stand around the batting
cage, find somebody to get a story with, Go interview him in the
locker room right before the game starts. Then watch the game story, write
the story during the game, add a couple of paragraphs about the game,
and you were home by five o'clock. Yeah, that was not not a
bad day. It is a report. Those are the days when you didn't
take your work home with you, right, you know what I'm saying,
when you were covering the team daily, when you're worried about you know,
somebody jumping hip or whatever. No, you were, you were done,
and you went back the next day for the next stort. Yeah. Plus,
I don't know what it was. I've always thought this, and this
is gonna you're gonna think this is dumb. The Cleveland Indians clubhouse guy,
they would make, you know, a meal or the fee food for the
media right in the in the in the little media room or whatever it was.
And I don't know what it was. But this guy made the best
tuna ever. And I don't know how he did it. I've always tried
to figure out. Was it because he drained the oil and the water better
than I can. You know, I opened a can of tuna today and
I squeezed it really hard. Thing about this guy that there was something to
how he made his tuna, that it was to the you know, forty
years later, I think about this guy's tuna and I'd have a tuna sandwich
every day. Yep. And it was and it was awesome back in the
late eighties. Yeah, yeah, the good old days. As we like
to call him. Now, Okay, you know, in fact, fifteen
years ago, and I don't know if your your wife. I think guy
saw a post fifteen years ago yesterday, right, the citizen closed, closing
of the citizens. So she brought that up yesterday and I was gonna post
of something today thinking that it was today, but it was yesterday. Is
this how our lives all changed, including yours, because she had a job,
you know, she had a job, and then she didn't have a
job, and she didn't have a job, and it was you know,
and it reminds me of you know, that kind of started the I don't
know if it started, because I'm sure it went on before. But you
know, it's not the one newspaper town. The media business is not the
same. TV stations like Channel four has gone through its stuff, other stations
have gone through their stuff. It's just a totally different came. Well,
yeah, that was you know, that was as the landscape was changing,
and that was you know, they were a casualty of that of that changing
landscape. And you know in the paper, look at the start of no
it's half of what probably even that man, it's a shell of itself.
I mean that newsroom, Steve was just there were people in it. I've
got an old picture even before what the newsroom looks like today with it,
you know, I mean we're talking to probably like an early nineteen eighties photo
of the news of people. And it was buzzy, and it was busy.
There were people at every desk and and you know, some reporters,
a lot of reporters didn't have their own desk. Like I worked at the
police station. So if I had to go down to this to the office
to write a story, I just had to find an empty desk to go
sit at. Yeah, no, just a you know, a computer,
a desk that had a computer. I did eventually, yeah, not until
I was working covering sports. But you know, like as a sports writer,
none of us had our own desk. You just worked at whatever desk
was empty, and you try to get there at a certain time to get
a certain desk and stuff. I mean, that's how busy it was that
there wasn't even room for everybody to have a desk. And it was a
big office. Okay, oh good, good to go through memory lane.
People are saying, shut up, alright, okay, so we'll shut up
we'll shut up right now and go take a correction, right, will have
breaking news, yep, load it up, okay man, So breaking news
coming up. Uh. Then we've got another great guest coming up. Uh
uh Matt Moreno, we'll talk about a lot of recruiting stuff. There's just
the buzz from that just never ends, and it just doesn't so we'll have
more of that to go. So all right, let's take our break and
we'll be back with breaking news.