- 16 hours ago
Seth and Sean discuss the Astros pitching and health problems getting even worse this weekend, and how happy they are that the Rockets ended up seeded against the Lakers as we near the NBA playoffs.
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00:00I had a great weekend. I'm not going to let the Astros dampen my weekend.
00:04Well, let's see if we can make it through this show without another Astros pitcher being sent back to Houston.
00:12Boy, yesterday was rough, and I don't blame Todd or Jeff Blum for this at all,
00:19but between talking about how many pitchers have been sent back to Houston
00:23and all of the incredible, incredible walk stats,
00:28not to mention how great the 7 through 9 batters have been against the Astros on this road trip.
00:35It was depressing as hell.
00:37I was going to start sending Blum some other interesting walk stats.
00:43You know, how long did these boots were made for walking last on the charts?
00:48Oh, a whole bunch of walk things, yeah.
00:50Art Garfunkel took up long-distance walking as a hobby after he was out of Simon and Garfunkel.
00:58All of these things about walking.
01:00That sounds like a fun Google search.
01:05Average number of steps people take.
01:07Anything except how many times the Mariners have walked.
01:12Oh, my God.
01:12Well, did you – I mean, the big one is that the Astros are on pace, like, by a mile
01:21to set the record for walks given up in a season.
01:26They're on pace for giving up, like, 1,000 walks this season.
01:29Well, don't worry.
01:29There's –
01:31993, I think, was the number I saw.
01:33Sean, they signed six pitchers in the offseason.
01:35Okay, so clearly they have depth.
01:37I don't know.
01:37Maybe you've only been casually watching, and maybe you don't – maybe you don't realize
01:43they've already – they've already used 20 freaking pitchers.
01:46They do – the depth.
01:47Dude.
01:48Do you sign – oh, you can't sign Dylan Cease or spend any kind of money on actual pitchers.
01:52So you just sign as many as you possibly can, and they all suck.
01:55The pitch – well, and then you go on the flagship on the pregame show on Sunday
01:59and tell people that you're not concerned because you have such depth with your pitching right now.
02:03That's what Dana Brown did.
02:04You know what – you know another thing, too?
02:07What the hell – what is with any of the discussion at all about Abreu
02:12and whether he's in high-leverage situations or, oh, he's not a closer.
02:17He's thrown two miles per hour slower than he usually does.
02:21I don't give a damn if he's out there in the eighth or the ninth or if he's an opener.
02:26He's not a good pitcher right now.
02:28No, no.
02:28That was the funny part.
02:29It was yesterday.
02:30And so welcome in, everybody, on a Monday.
02:34There's a lot to dig into with the Astros on the weekend, and none of it's good.
02:38Yeah, the very last inning yesterday I know is what you're referring to.
02:42And as he was warming up in the bullpen at Abreu in the eighth inning,
02:45and, of course, the final – you know, the score was 6-1 at the time.
02:48Not normally a time that you bring in your closer.
02:51Certainly not a time you bring in your closer when he pitched the day before
02:55and walked three guys and gave up a game-winning hit on Saturday night.
03:00But they're bringing him in just to try to get his head right.
03:03And for the first time all season, he doesn't give up a run.
03:07He had given up a run in every outing.
03:09His ERA going into that game yesterday was over 20.
03:13Anthony has a clean inning with air quotes because they didn't score any runs.
03:19But I'm like, he had runners on second and third when he got out of the inning.
03:23Like, he didn't do anything in that inning that would say, oh, yeah,
03:28got to get this guy closing games again for sure.
03:31Like, he put two guys on.
03:33Right.
03:33And gave up hard contact to get out of the inning.
03:35Like, it was so – yeah, the whole thing's bad right now.
03:39And this is how bad the pitching situation is.
03:42And if you haven't been keeping track,
03:45and if you've been not paying attention the last few days,
03:47A, I don't blame you one bit.
03:49This is just an unwatchable mess of a baseball team.
03:52Saturday they looked awesome right up until the fifth inning.
03:55Because I didn't watch.
03:56We were out on Saturday night.
03:57They had a five-run lead, Sean.
03:59Yeah, yeah.
03:59It was – oh, that set all kinds of records, too,
04:03for number – having so many fewer – having so many more hits
04:08and still losing the game.
04:09I've got the stats.
04:10I've got them right here.
04:11I can't keep track of any of it anymore.
04:13How many more hits did the Astros have than the Mariners on Saturday?
04:16They had 17 hits.
04:17The Mariners had seven.
04:18Yeah.
04:19It was the – it was a – the Mariners on that – in that game on Saturday night
04:24faced a five-plus run deficit but still won.
04:27They got out hit by 10 and still won.
04:30No Major League Baseball team.
04:32You ready, Seth?
04:33No Major League Baseball team had done both of those things in the same game
04:36since the Indians against the Yankees on July 27, 1932.
04:44Why is it that it feels like –
04:46Less than a century.
04:46Why is it that it is less than a century?
04:48That's true.
04:49Why is it that it feels like we in Houston get hit with more of these types of tweets
04:54than any other city?
04:55Nobody's ever done this since –
04:57Well, some of them have been positive.
04:58Texans made a cottage industry out of it a year ago.
05:01Offensively, some of it's been really positive.
05:03There have been a lot of really good – they're the best offense in the league right now.
05:07Right, right.
05:08Yeah, and the pitching stinks.
05:10And this is what I was going to say.
05:11The fact – if you haven't been keeping track, the Astros have sent three pitchers home during this –
05:19And that doesn't include Cody Bolton, who left with back tightness yesterday.
05:22I just know – they may not have time to send him home for an MRI.
05:25They might have run out of the budget.
05:27For MRIs, yeah.
05:28They sent Hunter Brown home on this trip.
05:30They sent Christian Javier home on this trip, both with shoulders.
05:33They sent Imae home after his one-third of an inning on Friday with, quote, arm fatigue.
05:39And he was complaining about the hard mound.
05:41But this is how bad the pitching stuff is right now, Seth, is that Jeremy Pena leaving the game on
05:49Saturday
05:49and not playing yesterday is almost obscured by the – like, that's a big deal.
05:54Like, he was your best player last year, and he's got a knee injury right now.
05:59And it's almost like we don't really have time for this, Jeremy.
06:02Sorry, because we've got the worst pitching in baseball right now.
06:05Yeah, the worst pitching in baseball, which tied into the best hitting in baseball.
06:11But then with Pena, her – Correa is seemingly taking – he's like a wealthy aristocrat from the 1800s
06:19in how he's recovering from this illness that he had.
06:22What is that? Okay, thank you.
06:22He's just – okay, the guy –
06:25He's going off to visit a sulfur spring or something.
06:27What the hell?
06:28Maybe he's powering through something.
06:30Maybe he got three hits on Saturday in the face of just –
06:34It was a heroic effort even more so than we know.
06:35A COVID equivalent? Yeah, I have no idea.
06:38I have no idea.
06:39All I know is it was one of those double takes I had where, like,
06:42Carlos Correa is still recovering from the illness that he had in Colorado on Wednesday.
06:47And I'm like, he had three hits last night.
06:50What are we doing?
06:51Like, what is going on with this baseball team?
06:54No, no, and you're right.
06:55And the perception –
06:57The game they had to have, kind of.
06:59Like, how are they – so it feels like they're incredibly soft.
07:02Because somebody's leaving for something.
07:04All the time.
07:05And you're right. With Emai.
07:06Oh, gosh.
07:07Okay, we've heard about the balls are more slippery.
07:10The mound is steeper.
07:11Oh, my God.
07:11The mound is hard.
07:11The mound in Seattle is hard.
07:13He's not used to pitching and weather like –
07:15It was 66 degrees.
07:17It was 64.
07:17It was 66.
07:18It was – yeah, this –
07:20Whatever it was.
07:21Yeah, it was in the 60s.
07:22I know that.
07:22Yeah.
07:23Does he understand the Fahrenheit Celsius thing?
07:25I don't know if he does.
07:25I don't know if he does.
07:26Maybe he actually thought it was hot.
07:28Yeah, right.
07:2866 Celsius.
07:30Oh, my God.
07:30Yeah.
07:31You can practically boil water.
07:34Oh, my God.
07:35So, it's bad right now, man.
07:38It's really, really bad.
07:39Other than the – you know, other than the hitting shows up, you know, 60, 65% of the time,
07:47there's nothing good going on.
07:48And if you want to make some money, just keep pounding overs on the other team.
07:54Keep taking that Astros opponent over, team over on runs, and at the very least,
08:02you can get wealthy during this time of horrific baseball.
08:06Just to follow up on, because remember, the whole great thing about right now,
08:12the thing we're supposed to be looking at is glass half full,
08:15is that they signed so many pitchers in the offseason, and there's so much depth.
08:19So, five of these six guys that they've added have pitched for the Astros.
08:24Pearson hasn't pitched yet.
08:26The other five have a combined 6.56 ERA.
08:29Yeah, yeah.
08:29No, Dana Brown – Dana Brown sounds delusional.
08:33And he's in a tough spot to have to answer questions on the flagship
08:36about just how bad the pitching is right now.
08:38Would you re-quotes like this one yesterday?
08:40And he's talking about who could be on the way as reinforcements for this whole thing.
08:44Lambert, who you mentioned, Colton Gordon, and Jason Alexander.
08:48Obviously, Eric Getty's going to pitch here at some point.
08:50I know he's on the schedule to pitch later this week.
08:53But he – like, Dana Brown, literally, this is a direct quote.
08:58This is not paraphrasing.
08:59We feel like right now we're going to be able to sustain these injuries
09:02because of the depth we have.
09:05That is a terrifying quote to hear from your general manager
09:07when your baseball team has an ERA of 6.5.
09:12Your relievers have pitched more innings than your starters.
09:16It just – it's just absurd.
09:20Seth, think of how many starts they've had in the last week
09:22where the starter hasn't made it out of the second inning.
09:26Yeah.
09:27They had like – I saw the stat.
09:30They had like four or five of those all year last year,
09:32which feels like a lot to have even in a full major league season
09:35where you have starters either for injury or performance get yanked
09:39in the first or second inning.
09:41They've had three on this road trip.
09:42They've had three in the last week.
09:44All right.
09:46The one positive – I was trying to take positive yesterday,
09:48and those guys were talking about the standings
09:50and how the AL West pretty much would – as of entering yesterday,
09:54everybody was pretty much 500 or less except for the A's who are –
09:59they're 8-7 right now.
10:00I don't know if they played yesterday or not.
10:02Right now, the A's, the Rangers, are tied at 8-7.
10:08The Angels are 8-8.
10:09The Mariners are 7-9, and then you have the Astros.
10:12Yeah, the division stinks right now.
10:14It's not – it's a –
10:14So that's the – I mean, the reason for hope would be
10:17that the division stinks, John.
10:18A couple years ago, you started off with a horrendous record
10:21and ended up winning the division.
10:24Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
10:25Yeah, they're both 8-7, so the two teams you talked about,
10:28Rangers and Athletics, as of this morning, as we wake up –
10:32Yeah, I didn't know if those were from yesterday or not.
10:33Sorry, the standings.
10:35Oh, no.
10:36The – because you said I didn't know if the A's –
10:39you didn't know if the A's played yesterday.
10:40That's why I was –
10:41Right, yeah, I was just reading the – yeah,
10:43I was reading the standings from today.
10:46Yep, yep.
10:47So that's where we are with the – that's where we are with the Astros.
10:51It's a horrible weekend.
10:53It's a terrible time to be a baseball fan in Houston.
10:55The one thing we did get that we hoped for –
10:58I think I was hoping for, at least, over the weekend,
11:00was that the Rockets will be playing the Los Angeles Lakers in the playoffs.
11:05I thought the computers were going to get me, Seth,
11:07because Denver – all Denver had to do was lose last night with a skeleton crew,
11:12and they would have fallen into fourth place.
11:14But Denver actually went out and tried last night,
11:16and they beat the San Antonio Spurs.
11:17So the Rockets get the Lakers in the first round.
11:19It was a motivational and inspirational tale for the ages.
11:22Yep.
11:22I was excited about it.
11:23Yeah, yeah.
11:24But this is exactly what we wanted.
11:26We weren't ashamed of it.
11:27You want a weakened Lakers squad and the Astros – or the Rockets –
11:34what's the – Rockets are favored in this pretty heavily.
11:37I would guess.
11:38I haven't looked at the odds yet.
11:39Yeah, I haven't looked at them either.
11:41I actually stayed up – I was going to go to bed early last night
11:44because the Rockets game didn't mean anything.
11:45They weren't playing any of their guys last night.
11:47And so I was going to go to bed, and then I opened up the score –
11:50because I assumed that the – I just assumed that the Nuggets were going to lose last night
11:54and fall into the four seed because they weren't playing anybody.
11:57Well, it turns out the Spurs weren't playing any of their guys either.
11:59So it was a battle of backups.
12:00Other than Jokic playing 18 minutes last night, it was a battle of backups.
12:05And so I wanted to play the Lakers.
12:07I didn't want to play the Nuggets.
12:08So I actually ended up staying up and following that game until like 11 o'clock.
12:11But I didn't – I know the Rockets play their first game Saturday night against the Lakers.
12:15So you're going to get a lot of – because it's the Lakers and it's LeBron
12:19and it's LeBron versus Durant, and this has probably looked as like some sort of final battle
12:23between these two because we don't know what LeBron's going to do next year.
12:26Right.
12:27You're going to get – you're going to get a lot of, I would imagine,
12:30pretty prime spots from a scheduling standpoint here.
12:34If Durant – if the Rockets win this series, Durant will be 3-1 in his career
12:38versus LeBron in the playoffs.
12:41In the postseason.
12:41Yeah, yeah.
12:42Yep.
12:43So that would be cool.
12:44Yeah, that would be great.
12:44I feel like this too, even though the Lakers are weakened
12:47and even though the Rockets are favored,
12:50and it's not the same as the challenge the Rockets had last year
12:53in the first round of the playoffs, I feel like there's – if they can win this series,
12:59it's definitive – I don't want to say success, but it's progress.
13:03That if you just, you know, factor in back to – let's talk about Fred VanVleet
13:08for the 978th time.
13:10But the progress they've made in the last few weeks is something that makes you feel a lot better
13:17about moving forward next year, no matter what happens in the second round of the playoffs.
13:20They just absolutely have to win this one.
13:22They have to.
13:23Tari Eason has to be the best version of himself.
13:25The young guy's got to not turn the ball over so much in the fourth quarter.
13:28If they just do that and they win this first series, I will be gung-ho, full steam ahead,
13:33no matter what happens in the second series.
13:34Here's the update on – I'm looking – I Google Luka Doncic update,
13:38and I'm looking at an article from heavy.com.
13:40Major update on Luka Doncic status for Lakers-Rockets playoff series.
13:45Slovenian guard – it already feels like AI.
13:49Slovenian guard Luka Doncic is not expected to be ready for game one
13:53of the Lakers and Rockets playoff series.
13:55It begins on Saturday.
13:56Yeah, all the Lakers writers and the articles I've seen just don't seem to be acting
14:02like that's going to happen.
14:03He'll be in attendance.
14:04All the talk is how is LeBron going to be able to carry the team without Reeves
14:09and Doncic, so I'm not anticipating those guys being back.
14:13No, no, no.
14:14He's expected to rejoin the team midweek, so he'll be on the sidelines for game one
14:19on Saturday.
14:20But the report published by a Slovenian outlet over the weekend said,
14:25quote, after a short break in Slovenia, Luka will return to Madrid for a new
14:29series of therapies.
14:30So he's – I guess he's going to give this a try.
14:32So he's just – so he's going from Madrid and back to Slovenia for a weekend
14:36of gallivanting, I'm guessing?
14:37He's going back to Los Angeles, and then he's going to go back to Madrid, I guess,
14:42for a new series of therapies.
14:43Wait, wait.
14:43He's going back to L.A. as well?
14:45Yeah, he's going to be on the sidelines for this series.
14:48Oh, and then back to –
14:50And then back, yeah, yeah, yeah.
14:51So he said – but also after a brief trip to Slovenia?
14:54I'm going to read exactly what's in front of me here, okay?
14:59Doncic, currently in Europe seeking treatments for his hamstring, visited his home
15:03country of Slovenia over the weekend.
15:04So he's like, oh, I'm over in Europe.
15:06I may as well go visit the folks and whatnot to spend time with his daughters.
15:09So his daughters are in Slovenia.
15:11He's reportedly slated to return to Madrid early this week to complete a second round
15:15of stem cell therapy.
15:17Then he's expected to rejoin his Lakers teammates midweek this week, meaning he'll be on the
15:22sidelines for game one.
15:24Okay, the short break in Slovenia is the one we were just talking about.
15:28So he's not going back over to Madrid.
15:30He's coming to L.A., and then he'll be here for good.
15:32Okay, gotcha.
15:33Yep, yep, yep.
15:33So that's the deal.
15:34That's the deal.
15:35That seems like a lot of globetrotting while you're trying to recover from this.
15:39So it was almost like he had to go to the stem cell to recover from the flight and the
15:42trip to the stem cell.
15:43Do you think that Luka is one of those people that we were talking about last week that goes
15:48on to the airplane in a wheelchair because he gets to get on early?
15:52Yeah, I bet he is.
15:53I bet he's boarding early.
15:54But he leaves walking off the plane.
15:57Yeah, he just jumps off.
15:59Yeah.
15:59He's doing his Russell Wilson airplane exercise while he's on the plane.
16:04He boards early because he's got a medical condition.
16:06And then he's doing lunges and air squats.
16:10In the aisle way.
16:10And they even have a wheelchair waiting for him when he gets off the plane.
16:13He's like, good.
16:14I'm good.
16:14He just...
16:16Yeah, so no Luka, no Austin Reeves.
16:19I'm excited for these NBA playoffs, man.
16:22After what's been a...
16:25This regular season in the NBA, the fact that it's been so much about tanking and everything.
16:29This regular season in the NBA has been more about the crappy teams than it's been about
16:34the good teams this year.
16:36Yeah, it really has.
16:36I'm glad it's over.
16:37Yeah.
16:38Well, and then the Lakers...
16:39I feel like the Lakers are almost...
16:41People talk about the Lakers like they won 40 games this year or something.
16:46So it would be a different deal and story, obviously, if Doncic and Eason were both healthy.
16:53Yeah.
16:53But they're not.
16:54They're gallivanting around, getting stem cell treatment and visiting their children.
16:58Like that matters.
17:00You got a series to win, son.
17:02Yep.
17:03The place that I go to to get my updates on...
17:08Or to get my odds does not have odds for the postseason up yet.
17:12Probably because they're waiting for the play-in this week to take place with the 7 through
17:1510 teams in both conferences.
17:17So there you go.
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