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Speaker 1: Skip.

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Speaker 2: How are things.

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Speaker 1: I'm doing well? Guys here Detroit raining right now, hopefully

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clear is up for for game time.

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Speaker 2: Hey, my partner here, Ross is going to do the

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postgame calling show. Let's pray for a three hour rain delay.

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What do you say?

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Speaker 3: Oh, come on man.

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Speaker 1: No no, no, no, no, no, no, we you know we we

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need this game to start on time. It looks like

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you're going to be clear for for game time. But

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right now, yeah, it's pretty well outside.

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Speaker 2: All right, Well, thank you for the weather update. Update

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on your squad. Look, you can move the line up around.

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You could move guys in and out. You've tried, You've

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in combination of things. Do you want to chalk this

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up to dog days of summer? Is this a team

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wide funk? Where are you right now? As you've seen

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your team unfortunately not be competitive the last couple of days.

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Speaker 1: This is this is baseball, man, I is August. It's

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late grinding through things. You know, the guys are are grinding.

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They they're preparing himself very well. Now when it's time

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when the game starts, he's taking us. We're having difficulty

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executing our game plan, which is which is part of

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the game. This is what happens in a long season. Now,

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our job is to walk in every day with a

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winning attitude. You know, we we're going to do whatever

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it takes to put ourselves in the best position to

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win today and not talk about yesterday. You know, today's

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a new day and we got we got you know,

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we got Hunter on the mound. We're going to prepare

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ourselves to put a height against Google.

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Speaker 2: I want to ask this. I know that Jeremy was

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kind of feeling it this weekend. I know that you

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had to leave Christian Hobvier off the mound early the

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game on Sunday. Is there any sort of sickness going

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to the team right now or is just a couple

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of remote guys.

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Speaker 1: You know, just just a couple of remote guys. I

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think it. You know, we there's been like a like

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a bug around and some of these guys were you know,

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they're under the weather a little bit. But that's part

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when you are, you know, at home with your family

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and your kids, and you know, that's how I consider

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our club house is a family, and we are around each

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other all the time. So some of these stuff is

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going to spread around. But right now, you know, things

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are the guys are feeling better, and those guys that

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had the little we're not feeling well, they're starting to

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feel better.

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Speaker 2: You know, no one's going to ever question it. They do.

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They're ridiculous about the game plan, the approach going in.

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But when the game gets going, are there things I like,

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maybe taking a pitch, not taking a pitch, trying to

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go the other way, not go the other way? Are

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there little intricacies that maybe you're not seeing right now

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from this team that maybe you saw earlier in the year,

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Or am I just trying to get really micro on

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this trying to figure out why the team is struggling

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offensively these days?

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Speaker 1: You know what, at the end of the day, you

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have a game plan and sometimes it comes down to

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the fundamentals of the game. Sometimes it comes down to fighting,

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grinding in a bat, doing what it takes. You know,

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when you get too strikes, hits ball the other way,

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you know, it's a you know, making the starter, you know, work,

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let me take a few more pitches. You know, sometimes

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you've got to do things that are uncomfortable to become comfortable.

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So we're trying to do those things. We do it,

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We've been doing it lately the last couple of games

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we have not it has not work out our way,

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and sometimes it's about fighting. Sometimes it's about who wants

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it more than the other team. You know, that's the

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message that we always continue to preach our guys that

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sometimes when things get tough, you got to be tougher,

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you have to fight, and you know the fights in there.

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It just things haven't gone our way the last the

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last two or three games.

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Speaker 3: You mentioned maybe taking some more pitches as far as

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an approach, and we kind of talked about when Estak

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Paradus went down that that was a big piece of

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the lineup that was missing. But what exactly what does

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that mean? Like in practice, you just talk to guys

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because you want guys to stay within themselves but may

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be more patient. But also if the guys out there

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throwing strikes, you can't just sit there and take pitches correct.

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Speaker 1: But you know, another thing is you know they're not

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always going to throw strikes. That's the part of the

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game that yes, the guy's throwing strikes, but once they're

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head in the account, they're just not going to continue

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to throw the ball in the box. So us recognizing

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is where they go with their Mythus, what pitches do

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they want us to chase when they're ahead? And if

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we are overly aggressive. Now we see pitches that we

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normally don't swing at, Pitches are on the edges that

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we usually take. We're chasing because because we find ourselves

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on our heels. And so that's the balance when it

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comes to having an approach. You know, we know we

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have the tendencies of the pitchers, we have faces pitchers

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in the past. Now is us staying within ourselves, not

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trying to do too much, trust to plan and fight

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through our back and and that's that's what leads you

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to good offensive games like we saw in that series

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against the Yankees against the Red Sox in Miami where

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we grind it and we got the starters out of

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the game in four or five innings. And we need

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to kind of go back to that. And we saw

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some of that, yes, Eb Flairty where he was high

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pitchcounts to three or four innings and and and we

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were we were right there and then things just got

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out of just got out of our hands.

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Speaker 3: Astro's manager Joe Spotta was here on a Sports Talk

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seven ninety What did you see that you liked from

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Spencer Arraghetty yesterday, and what does he need to improve on?

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Speaker 1: You know what I think the last you know, every

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start he's gotten, he's gotten better. He stuff's gotten better, Yester.

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The first two innings it was a ton of strike,

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sweeper fastball, uh some through some really good changes against

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some lefties. So so you started seeing the signs of uh.

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The Spencer that we've seen in the past now is

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once you get into the middle, middle of the game

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and you start building up the pitch counts seven, you know,

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the sixty seventy pitches, keeping the quality of pitches going,

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you know, limiting the walks. You know they're falling behind hitters.

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That's when hitters kind of capitalize the same way we

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do against our opponents, when we start seeing the pitch

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coown go up, our bats get better. He's got to

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be able to you know, finish some of those get

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some of those hitters up. Joe.

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Speaker 2: I've tried to avoid getting into a deep injury conversation

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with you because it's been a broken record unfortunately, and

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I want to talk about one player we've not talked

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about a lot. It's going to be playing today for

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the Corpus Christy Hooks and that's Jordan Alvarez. Yep, can

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you definitively and maybe there's not a definitive answer to it.

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What do you want to see? What is the game

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plan from an organizational standpoint to say, Okay, all this

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time away, the rehab, going down to West Palm, it's

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all paid off. He's coming up here. He's gonna play

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for you. You're gonna put him in the heart of

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your lineup and hopefully he stay as healthy the rest

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of the season.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what. For me, to be honest, I

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really not looking out the outcome of the game, like

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performance wise, you know, I'm not looking for him to

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go there and get three or four hits today. I

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just want what's what comes after the game, how he

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feels postgame, and how he feels tomorrow morning. If he

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feels good and he's able to play tomorrow Wednesday, I'm

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feeling great. So for me, I'm not really looking at

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how many a bass equality of a bath You're done

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is a great hitter? All I want to hear that

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Joey felt good, I'm ready to go tomorrow, and then

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we could continue to move forward and building building him

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up to get him back at some point.

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Speaker 2: Do you want him in the outfield at all during

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this time down there or does that come when he

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comes to see you.

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Speaker 1: You know, we one day at a time. Right now,

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he's going to DH and we are focusing on just

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trying to get as many as at bats we can.

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You know, if we put him in the outfield, which

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we probably would during this rehab, the problem with that

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will be if we you know, he has him play

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on the field for a few months. So if he's

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six innings and he needs to come out of the

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game because of the length of the game, he could

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miss out on a few of bats, and I want

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him just to try to get as many as a

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beast as possible. And the best way to do this

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is you're dhing. You lead him off and just let

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them control the volume of swings and the volume of

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the game as he goes in that DH spot. If

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he feels good and we could get him in the outfield,

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let's go for it. But right now DH, let's try

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to get as many as the bats as possible. Want

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to make sure that he feels good postgame and tomorrow morning,

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a couple.

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Speaker 2: More minutes here with Joe spot It from Detroit Astros

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and Tigers here tonight on Sports Talk seven to ninety.

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You lost Josh Hater for the regular season. You've got

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Brian braw now as your closer.

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Speaker 1: To me.

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Speaker 2: The indirect effect of that is, I think Brian Brow's

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got closer stuff. He could probably close for ninety percent

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of the teams around baseball. You're now going to be

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asking some guys that were your fifth sixth inning, midleverage

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guys to be in some higher spots. And I think

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right now you're kind of thirsty to find that guy

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that wants to take that seventh inning from anybody in

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this Astros bullpen.

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Speaker 1: And we've had guys that have shown capabilities of doing that.

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But you're right, you know they they're going to be

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exposed to more of those big moments the next six weeks,

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and I know that they're capable of doing that. They

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have shown the toughness and the ability to do it,

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you know. But it's different now when we get to

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August September, right the stage becomes much larger, and now

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it's us helping them manage that volume, those big innings,

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those big moments, because we know that they have this

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stuff is the toughness to do it. It's just making

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sure that they know how to do it day in

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day out.

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Speaker 3: The chas McCormick making his bid, is he telling you

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he wants to close it games out?

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Speaker 1: You know? I I kicked my hat to chast because

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he understand them the situation that we've been the two

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days for sure, And as a professional man, he's he's

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a Joe, I understand, I get it. I go out

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there and do it. You know, he's not a pitcher,

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uh and we'll know that, but he's a team he's

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a team player. That's a class act what he's doing.

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And I have a lot of respect for him for

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doing what you know, what he's done the last the

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last few days.

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Speaker 2: And hopefully you never have to see him anymore this

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season on the mound, to be honest with you, Skip,

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that would be great. Thanks Joe for the time as always.

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All right, guys, you'll see Joe spotted with us from

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Detroit