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  • 1 day ago
Seth and Sean dive into Astros Manager Joe Espada getting chippy with Chandler Rome when asked about Ryan Weiss, and the several things that really drove them mad hearing it.
Transcript
00:00The bad night for the Astros last night, they fall to 14 and 22 on the season and they lose
00:06to the Dodgers eight to three close game early. It was nice. They gave up a run in the first
00:11inning. Okert did. And then the Astros battled back for a couple of runs against Yamamoto. I was
00:15like, okay, we maybe we're in for a dogfight here, you know, and then Ryan Weiss happened
00:20and he pitched four and a third innings, gave up six earned runs and a lot of hard contact
00:24and it was not good. And Ryan Weiss has just been, he he's, there's no way to sugarcoat
00:31it. He's been a disaster over his last six outings. He's got an ERA of over nine, even
00:37with the removing the bad luck, his ERA would still be over eight. And, and last night you
00:43were just in a horrible, horrible spot with him because he had to eat up innings for you.
00:49This is a second straight bullpen game because you have so few solutions right now with
00:54this pitching staff, a second consecutive bullpen game where, you know, you had a bunch
00:59of your guys pitch two days ago, pitch on Sunday. So they, it was, that was the most
01:05depressing part to me, Seth, that as Ryan Weiss was in there, just giving up hard hit
01:10after hard hit, like even some of the ones like he needed Bryce Matthews to, to make a
01:16spectacular catch out in center field. Yeah. Uh, at one point on, on one play out there,
01:21like he, there was a lot of hard contact. It was just not a good day. And the whole
01:25time, Todd Callis is giving you this warning label, like, Hey, he ain't coming out. Like
01:32they, they have to leave him in. They got to leave him in to eat up innings. They eventually
01:37had to use Kiwi Tang, you know, and, and, uh, in a situation where there is no reason to
01:43use Kiwi Tang, except for the fact that they don't have any options. There's just the, the,
01:48the six guys, the six guys that they signed to pitch for you in the off season, five of them
01:54have pitched for the Astros and they have a combined ERA above 6.0. Yeah. And it's just,
02:01it's been a trick. You can blame injuries all you want. The guys who are supposed to help you
02:05help protect you against injuries are the worst pitchers in baseball. Yep. It's just astoundingly
02:11bad. It's really bad. And so, so Ryan Weiss chief among them, at least for last night,
02:15he's the one that gave up most of the runs last night, seven, seven, seven runs, total six
02:21earned. So seven of the eight runs came in on his watch. The other guys came in and did
02:24a nice job after that. Um, but after the game, uh, uh, Chandler Rome of the athletic asked Joe
02:32Espada, a very valid question. I mean, in my notes last night, I'm like, can we just move
02:37on from this Ryan Weiss thing? And Chandler sort of asked that question. He asked about a possible
02:42change of scenery, his exact words. You'll be able to hear the question faintly, but Espada
02:47just took great umbrage with Chandler's question.
02:53Where is he going to go? Scenery where? Oh, come on. No, don't, I know, but don't, don't,
03:02don't try to play GM. We got it. We got to help him through it. Maybe it's here, maybe it's
03:07minor leagues, but you know, let's not just start pointing one bad outing because we could
03:12go down the list of guys that we working through this and we have confidence and faith that he
03:17could do this, but let's not get down that path of change of scenery or anything like
03:23that. That's not your call.
03:25It's not his call. Chandler's not saying it's his call. It's a valid question.
03:29And then you, in answering this inappropriate question, mentioned the possibility of him
03:35going down to the minor leagues. Chandler basically asked, is it possible that you could send him
03:42down to the minor leagues? Espada, disgruntled by that answer, says, maybe it's the majors,
03:47maybe it's the minors. Where on earth was the question out of line? And you're very, as you're
03:56tearing down the question is like, that's trying to play GM. You brought up a possibility of doing
04:02the thing he asked about and tell the people what Chandler had in his article at 1 a.m. last
04:07night. Chandler reported very early this morning that the team will demote him to the minor leagues
04:13before Tuesday's game. So we'll see. Now the Astros might see that. And given that Espada just got
04:19all huffy about it last night, maybe they end up saying, well, screw you. We're not demoting him,
04:23which is a great way to run a baseball team. So that's really keeping your eye on the prize.
04:30Yeah. Yeah. Spite. That's a good way to, that's a good way to run things. We're going to demote him
04:33on Wednesday. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, well, if they do demote him today, that is a horrible look for
04:38Joe Espada to get, to get chippy about that question, to take offense to that question and
04:46then have management above Joe Espada actually do what Chandler is asking about. Joe Espada was
04:52acting like it's silly to think to send this guy to the minor leagues right now. I actually wrote
04:57down six things about that cut that pissed me off. Um, Ben, can we play it again? And I'll just
05:02tell
05:02you to pause after each one here. Where is he going to go? Scenery where? Oh, come on. Oh, come
05:16on.
05:16Yeah. So for those of you who can hear it, Chandler says he has minor league options. Right. Right. Yeah.
05:22So, so he, so clearly that's what he scoffed at. Yeah. Like the notion that they would send him down
05:27to the minors. Oh, come on. Oh, come on. All right. That's, that's number one. No, don't, I know,
05:32but don't, don't, don't try to play GM. Pause. He's not trying to play GM. He's a reporter who's asking
05:37you a question about a guy who by reports is about to actually get sent to the minor leagues.
05:42The most vanilla of questions possible. It was really, it was like, he basically said,
05:48the space is yours. Uh, just, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. Um, continue.
05:54We, we got it. We got to help him through it. Maybe it's here. Maybe it's the minor leagues.
05:58Pause. Yeah. Now you're playing GM. Yes. Yes. All right. Continue.
06:08Is it possible you could go down to the minor leagues?
06:12Chandler. No, no. And I can, we're not doing that. I could be here. Could be the minor
06:17leagues. Yeah. Who knows? You just know Chandler was seething after the, after he said the word
06:21minor leagues. All right. Continue. You know, let's not just start pointing one bad outing.
06:29He's had six bad outings in a row, Joe. Not, not an exaggeration. He's had six bad outings
06:35in a row through which his ERA for those six outings is over nine. Yeah. Hey, you're cherry picking
06:42Sean. His season, our ERA is 7.5. That's fair. Okay. You know what? I got to dial it back
06:48a little bit. And now I'm trying to play GM. He's only been really bad. Not really, really
06:53bad. Thank you for checking me on that. Um, uh, okay. Uh, continue because we could go down
07:00the list of guys that we working through this. Okay. Pause. Yeah, we could let's do it. Yeah.
07:05And Ryan Weiss might be the worst out of all of them just because there's other bad guys on the
07:09team. Doesn't mean that Ryan Weiss doesn't deserve to go to the minor leagues. He's been the worst
07:15of all the really bad guys other than maybe Brian Abreu, but you're not sending Abreu to the minor
07:20leagues. Yeah. You know, that's not what we do with Abreu's. With Abreu's, we send them down
07:25to Florida to go work their things out. That's what we do with Abreu's. Rookie league. Yeah.
07:29That's, uh, um, boy, Weiss, uh, I love, I love this world we live in. You know, as I was
07:36early
07:36this morning, I was just, I was going through some of my old editions of my South Korean newspaper
07:41and, uh, I came across this article from January 3rd, 2026. Cause I didn't know, honestly,
07:48I'd search Ryan Weiss demotion to see if there's any news. Uh, this is a headline
07:52because remember he was in Korea. Uh, Weiss risks demotion as Emai, uh, claims rotation spot for
07:59Houston. Oh, big news. This is big news that we need to get somebody from Korea. Oh, that's true.
08:06Get somebody from Korean baseball on the phone to tell us about Ryan Weiss and what he needs to do
08:11to work. Can you call Korea for us? Can you book that on it? Yeah. Yeah. Call Korea. Maybe that's
08:16what, maybe that's why Espada got all testy when, uh, when Chandler said, I don't know,
08:20could you send him somewhere? Maybe Espada thought that Chandler was saying, why don't
08:24you send him back to Korea? Send him back? Did you keep the receipt? Drop him at Whole Foods
08:30at the Amazon. Hey Ben, do we have the rest of the cut? There was one more thing that made
08:34me angry. Uh, this is the sixth thing in that 30 seconds that made me angry. And we have
08:38confidence and faith that he could do this, but let's not get down that path of change
08:43of scenery or anything like that. That's not your call. No, it's not. Chandler is not
08:48thinking. Chandler's not claiming. That is one of the softest quotes I've ever heard from
08:54a manager ever. It's one of the weirdest responses. Yeah. Like in accusing Chandler of somehow trying
08:59to play GM. Yeah, that's not your call. Yeah. He, what the hell? I don't, I don't understand.
09:05I don't understand where, like what he thinks the role of the media is or his job as a manager
09:11is in that whole dynamic right there. It's wild, man. It's wild.
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