Speaker 1: One of our favorite parts of the week, especially during
baseball season, has to spend ten to eleven collity minutes
with our friend Brian Bogus Evic Space City Home Network,
and he's with us here every Wednesday at eleven o'clock
on seven ninety Brian, Good morning to you. Jeremy Paynia
goes deep yesterday. I guess the number one thing about
him this morning is how he wakes up on how
that finger feels?
Speaker 2: Right? Yeah, that's you know. Always the question with guys
coming back from injury is once the adrenaline wears off,
how did it feel? Now? How do you feel with
a little bit of just general movement in there, maybe
a ball that gets in on your hands a little bit.
But in terms of what we saw on the field,
I didn't see anything that made me think, Okay, maybe
he's not ready. I guess, you know. The other conversation
that you have to have is how do you feel
from a timing standpoint, you know, where you're seeing the ball? Well,
did you feel like you're tracking? Well, obviously you hit
a ball into the train tracks, I would assume it
was seeing it pretty good, But you know, does he
need a couple more at bats they have, you know,
workout today that he can get some swings in. But yeah,
all all signs point to him looking like he's ready
to go, which that is a massive bullet dodged for
the Astros.
Speaker 1: I think Brian, we can generally speaking, figure out what
it would feel like to have an injured finger or
a hand and putting the bat back in and swinging
as hard as you can. But since you played the
game and we're at the highest level, tell me any
elements like that in your career and what kind of adjustments,
whether it's you or a fellow teammate, you had to
make knowing that maybe your finger or hand was not
one hundred percent.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, anytime you have hand finger wrisk and
you're talking about a swing, you know, first of all,
you want to make sure that your your swing in
general is not compromised. Right. You don't want to create
bad habits that you're going to have to work through
and try to figure out for a month because you
were trying to get into a game. You know a
day or two early that that's first and foremost. But
you know, the funny thing is is oftentimes if you're
taking a good on time pure swing and hitting the
ball flush. It typically won't bother you where you feel
it is a miss hit right, get something off the
end and it stings your hands a little bit, or
you're fooled on a pitch and you kind of get
caught way out front and you flail at it a
little bit. That's when you feel it in a hand
or a finger or something. So it didn't look like
he had any of those swings yesterday, so it probably
don't feel it. But I would think that's kind of
the situation that you want to avoid, is kind of
taking an awkward swing and you know, adjusting on the
fly and doing something that maybe you're not comfortable.
Speaker 3: Doing and sticking with that, but going a little bit
to the outfield. I'm just curious your thoughts about the
push and pull of handling yord On Alvarez of him
wanting to be in left field, and we interviewed Joe
Spondi and said, yeah, Jordon sends me like highlights of
him being out in the outfield, and he wants to
do that, and he's a human being and he wants
to be help the team even the best way possible.
But the organization wants to protect him. How do you think.
I mean, just let's just go from like an organizational
standpoint of trying to handle that push and pull when
it comes to a guy who needs to be your
team MVP if you're going to go where you want
to this season.
Speaker 2: Yeah, A lot of it from from just you know,
kind of keeping him at ease with it. A lot
of it has to do with trust and communication, right,
you have to have the trust built in that he thinks,
even if you're doing something that he doesn't necessarily agree with,
that you're doing it because you think it's best for him.
He has to trust that, and then also openly communicate
why you're doing it, what you think it can benefit from,
from you know, the entire season standpoint, how it affects
other people, how it will affect him, and make sure
that he even if he doesn't agree with it, he
understands your thinking on that. But and then you know,
from a from the organization standpoint, I mean, it's a
risk and reward play, right. You know, you're you're trying
to avoid the risk of losing him to an injury
that he suffers out there so that you can, you know,
seemingly maximize your offense by him being in the lineup
every day. Well, if that calculus starts to change over
the course of the season, maybe you have a little
bit more risk tolerance of putting him out there if
it means maximizing your offense by getting all of those
infielders into the game at the same time on a
regular basis. So it's you know, I think they've made
it well known what their preferences going into the season.
I don't necessarily think that that has to be the case,
hard stop, no matter what. As we get a little bit.
Speaker 3: Further in, Brian Bogosovik was us here on Sports Talk
seven ninety and then just like strictly from jord on,
it's kind of crazy to say, like, ask does he
have something to prove? Because it's been with the injuries
when he's locked in. He's one of the most dangerous
hitters on the entire planet, and it just has unfortunately
been injury after injury for him. Do you feel like,
I don't know his mindset of having something to prove
or anything like that.
Speaker 2: I don't. I don't think. I don't think I would
think of it as something to prove. I just think
it's just a desire to be able to show you know,
we we all know what he can do because we've
seen it. And but I don't I don't know that
on a national standpoint, or just a game as a
whole or or a fan necessarily of another team would
really appreciate what he is as a hitter. And I
don't often hear people outside of Houston discussing him in
that that elite group of the Aaron Judges and show, hey,
Otani's of who who are the best hitters in the world.
And I absolutely, I absolutely think he's in that category.
But you know, he's going to have to get one
hundred and fifty plus games of at bats to be
able to accumulate the kind of numbers to kind of
announce himself on the safe so prove it to us. No,
I think everybody is of the mind that he's one
of the best hitters in the world, but yeah, maybe
on a on a national level to just kind of
be spoken of in that you know, top tier of hitters.
Speaker 1: Well, obviously we just got word within the last couple
of minutes as bry S Matthews has made the roster.
Speaker 3: Jeremy pinion as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there you go.
Speaker 2: They must have been listened to us. So yeah, well, I.
Speaker 1: Mean yeah, I mean, let me take you. You're getting a
lot of carriage on this radio show, plus your Sehn
people trust a Brian focus of an opinion.
Speaker 2: So good for you.
Speaker 1: All right, So, uh does Bryce I mean steady diet
of games. I don't know how much he's going to play.
Versatility everything I think was one of the storylines for
him coming out of spring training and him moving around
as much as he did.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I think it's he showed a lot
in spring. He showed that, you know, maybe maybe he's
turning a corner and there's being a little bit more
contact and a little more hit ability ability versus just
you know, all or nothing power. He can just you know,
when you're talking about a guy who's not going to
play on an everyday basis, regardless of what the timeshare
split is, it's not going to be every day at
least at first. You've got to be able to impact
the team and the game in different ways. And he
can do so much with the glove and with his
legs and you know, with the power. So I think
from from that standpoint, he earned that spot, But just
from an overall roster construction standpoint, I think it just
that was the move that made the most sense to
complement the other pieces that are on the roster.
Speaker 1: Also a minor move, Christian Vasquez makes the team as
the backup catcher. That to me says that Walter Yannick
means to do everything. You can't give it the big
leaks as soon as possible. Is that how you kind
of feel about this situation.
Speaker 2: I think it's certainly speeds his timeline up, or maybe
the organization's timeline for him. Yeah, it's you know, that's
a that's a difficult situation. I know the team and
the organization really likes cess our salas are. It's just,
you know, one of the things that you have to have,
you know, if you're talking about fall black plans, you
have to have more of a known quantity, and even
have that known quantity is a couple a couple of
years removed from being at his act, you know best,
as a player. They're very comfortable with Christian Vaskis if
they get in a situation where he might have to
play a little bit more than once every four or
five games, that they know what they're going to get
out of that, so that that's that is a difficult situation,
but obviously one that they felt like just is one
that has to be made.
Speaker 1: Do you think that yan Air is kind of feeling
this pressure a little bit because of the fact that
the numbers defensively were so poor last year. And look,
you can live with a guy that may be below
average catcher in terms of framing and throwing guys out
if the big slug is there. What's going through his
mind as we think about twenty twenty six and is
this need to be necessar the breakout year, but the
year that needs to be the consistent power here that
we think the DS can be.
Speaker 2: I think absolutely. I think from from two stands points
from from his own personal standpoint, this is a huge
year for him. I mean, he's at the point in
his career where he's had enough time where he should
be turning that corner and becoming the hitter that everybody
knows he can be, which which is, you know, a
lot of contact and a high average to go with
a lot of power. It's certainly it's always going to
be a bat first type of catcher, but he's got
the ability he's got a strong arm. He can throw
guys out even if he's not the best defensive catcher.
But you know the team needs him to be that
as well, because you know, you're getting to a point
to where this younger crop of players is now ascending
to being the guys on the team. Right. This is
your bounce team. This is Jeremy Payne this team, this
is Hunter Brown's team, and Yiner is supposed to be
in that group for the team moving forward.
Speaker 3: And before we get you out, Brian, just how do
you see this season playing out? I know it's kind
of a question because there's there's so many question marks
when it comes to the pitching and the hitting, but
I just your thoughts on how the season might shape
up and where they'll end up in the aos standings.
Speaker 2: You know, it's it's really a cliche thing to say
health is going to be a big deal, but I
think because there is a lot of variance on this
team between what you think could maybe be the best
case scenario and a worst case scenario. If they a
healthy version of this team, the lineup is deep, they're
you know, a little bit more dynamic offensively. There are
some guys who can run a little bit. And I
think what I was most encouraged by the spring is
the pitching, not just the high end pitching of Hunter
Brown at the top being a cy young candidate and
Emi looking like he is the top of the rotation,
but also the depth I think they can. They have
more than enough pitching to navigate through one hundred and
sixty two. So I think that for a team that
was on the outside looking in at the end of
the year, with a good, strong, long start, I think
that they're really going to push a Mariners team who's
looking to make the next step as well.