As the Yankees’ visit and the All Star break and trading deadline loom, Luke Jones and Nestor discuss the sometimes chilly bats of the Orioles and how to avoid a sweep against the Cubs.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
draft, hit, orioles, yankees, left, year, feel, camden yards, pitching, teams, runs, baseball, ball, game, star, elias, wall, doubles, ballpark, winning
SPEAKERS
Nestor J. Aparicio, Luke Jones
Nestor J. Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home we are wn st Towson, Baltimore. Baltimore positive we are positively the Yankees you’re gonna get here. I don’t know if the orals are gonna win before the Yankees get here but the egg is gonna get here and on Friday, Luke and I will be down at families I’m rubbing my tummy right now need some shrimp salad and some muscle crabcakes eating those French fries they have down there we’re gonna be doing it for the Maryland lottery the Gold Rush sevens doubles we’ll have these giveaway talk to John Martin this week about scratching things off and giving away money we had a kind of a deep talk about gambling and gambling addiction a little bit. We’re talking about that as football seasons coming so throw money out there as words to the wise do these things responsibly even in baseball season. Our friends at Liberty pure solutions are bringing me water but I’m drinking royal farms coffee from a non sponsored coffee mug right now because I broke my coal roofing mug last week shattered all over the floor least didn’t cut my feet or my cats fee. Also our friends at Jiffy Lube multi care keeping the car running LUCAM to spy and time into TV parlance I’m stretching because I don’t really want to talk about the last couple of weeks against the cops I know you’d want to talk about me once they had it all even rain delay to screw it all up. A lot of hits know when the runs burns. No bueno. All Star break. Fellas need some time off except that the Yankees are coming in so you know rev up the Jets dude. Like this is like set a five alarm fire but it’s certainly a little a fender bender here on the way to the Yankees coming to town because you’d like for them to be playing better baseball right now.
Luke Jones 01:39
Yeah, um, you know, although the Yankees certainly have been playing awful baseball, what the worst team in baseball over the last three and a half weeks, which is just crazy to think about.
Nestor J. Aparicio 01:51
The worst team innovates. It said that again, at
Luke Jones 01:53
least going into what they want on Wednesday night. But going into that they had been the worst team in baseball over I forget what the exact date was, but was like three and a half over the last three and a half weeks. And that’s what I said to you during the five game losing streak with the Orioles was Don’t let a five game losing streak turn into five and 15 over a three, three and a half week period. So but look, I’m not gonna sit here and say that the Orioles are playing their best baseball. And yeah, they did bounce back from the five game losing streak. But it’s been choppy at best for the last three, three and a half weeks since that Yankee series, really, but I think you kind of said it. I think the all star breaks come in at the right time. I think these guys are a little bit tired. It’s not an excuse. I think we talked so much about June and the lack of off days. And they held up remarkably well for that considering it was a fairly difficult schedule. But What’s so weird about this and I will bring this up, more specifically pertaining to the Cubs. What’s going on with the Orioles against the NL Central. They lost two out of three to Milwaukee early in the year. No shame in that. I mean, the brewers are a good baseball team. But they were swept by St. Louis. I mean the the Cardinals are mediocre at best. They were they lost two out of three to Pittsburgh early in the season. I mean, the pirates aren’t terrible, but they’re like four or five games under 500, something like that. They did sweep the reds. But now they’ve at least lost two out of three to the Cubs. And they’re trying to avoid a sweep there. So, you know, I didn’t think Burns was bad. On Wednesday night wasn’t the best version of Corbin burns. But he certainly gave them a chance to win some hard contact in that second inning, they barreled up some balls. But he settled in pretty well after that. And that last run that the Cubs added on. So single that goes bounces off the second base bag that turns into a double and then they get a run on a hit after that. So there you said it. There was kind of everything. Some bad luck even in there. But I think for me mostly what the big takeaway was, unlike Tuesday night where they did very little with the bats, or after the first couple of winnings. They had ample opportunities in this game. I mean they were 104 11 with runners in scoring position they left 10 On days. They had traffic on the basis just about every inning and they just they couldn’t get anything going and then Brandon Hyde even said it and James McCann I backed it up in the postgame clubhouse that swings probably got a little long at times. I think you get in a position where even if you’re just down a couple runs anyone but especially a team that is known for its power, sometimes your swing is gonna get a little long where you’re trying to tie it up with one swing where a single or moving a runner along is is the better alternative on a night where runs are at a premium but also give a Managua credit. He’s pitched well all year and certainly pitch well against the Orioles. So you know we’ve talked about we talked about it during the West Coast strip, even as they were winning games, they weren’t scoring a ton of runs. So it’s been one of those rare time periods where you look over the last two weeks where the bats haven’t been on fire. And then when you couple that with, not on Wednesday night, but some of the other more difficult pitching performances they’ve had, yeah, it’s gonna be choppy, and you’re going to be a little more up and down. But you said it, not a five alarm fire. Not a three alarm fire even or anything like that. But, uh, certainly,
Nestor J. Aparicio 05:27
you want to wait to sweep fire? How about that I
Luke Jones 05:30
was just gonna say you want to try to salvage this last game and feel a little bit better going into this last series against the Yankees. And obviously the Yankees have been playing very poorly for a while now, but we know what they’re capable of. And we know how important these three games are going to be over the weekend. I mean, Nesta, if the Orioles take two out of three from the Yankees, they’ve clinched the head to head, you know, the season series. So they, they have the tiebreaker. So however many games they’re up or back in the Al east, it looks a little bit better than that even knowing what what a tie would mean for them so disappointing. But certainly not something that I’m sounding the alarm over, but like to see them. Snap out of this a little bit, try to get the last game of the series and feel a little bit better about themselves. With the Yankees coming to town and wanting to finish this, I would say first half we’re well past the first half technically speaking, but you know what I mean, in terms of feeling better about themselves going into the break? All
Nestor J. Aparicio 06:25
right. Um, I would try to take on topics baseball, I don’t know what our topic is going to be. I probably you tell me if you want to save this for Bally’s because it’s a good topic. But I think families we have to have some sort of all star game topic. So let’s have a meeting. You’re on the air. I don’t talk much about the wall. But Jim Palmer has called it the Great Wall. It’s had a couple of different nicknames. Clearly alias his wish Angelo spending some money on some of the fundings of the funding to get the pitching. You know, I guess Corbin burns would have been here either way. But a couple of his flies would have gone a little further as all the pitching, you know, in the ballpark over the last couple of years. Do you want to do wall at length? Or are you like sort of with that where you were with Tom Brady deflating footballs?
Luke Jones 07:19
Oh, I mean, we can do it right now. I mean, it’s not a new topic. I think it’s something that’s magnified when you hit a couple to the wall where you say that that had the chance to go out, although not just
Nestor J. Aparicio 07:30
us. But when Austin Hays is shaking his head, Randy first base, and you know, he’s thinking to say, you see the smile on his face saying that would have been out? That would have been out two years ago, you know, like out? Yeah,
Luke Jones 07:42
yeah. At the same time, you look at some of them. And, you know, it’s it’s also saved them a ton over the last few years. I mean, I I don’t, I don’t have any problem with it. I actually
Nestor J. Aparicio 07:55
think it’s a one size. I think it’s right size. Now,
Luke Jones 07:59
I would say this I and I probably brought this up to you a couple years ago, but I’ve talked about this with other people. I do think once they’ve done once they’re fully into the renovations, and there’s, there’s a full blown plan as far as what changes are gonna be made to the ballpark. I will hear maybe finding a little more of a middle ground. Yes, certainly. I don’t want to see them ever, ever go back to where it was where it’s 364 to the power alley, and it’s listed as that their their theories, and I’m sure you heard whispers back in the 90s. Even that it was it was shorter than 364 to the power ally and left center. I think
Nestor J. Aparicio 08:40
my husband had it had it had it had a tape. I think he went out there with yellow tape and measured it. I think Mark Williamson was looking over his shoulder when he was doing it, because it was back in 92 and 93 when I was out there, and it was like, you know, every part of the ballpark was being measured. But yes, I would agree. And Chris soils thought it was like 290 Yeah,
Luke Jones 09:01
yeah, exactly. I mean, it feels like something Mike Messina being a Stanford grad well would have investigated at some point but I’ve watched way too much baseball I’ll be a lot of it being really bad baseball, but way too much baseball over the years where this time of year, especially this week, where we’re talking about temperatures in the 90s and being so hot, what look like routine fly balls to left field that just get caught up in the air and just fly out. That doesn’t happen anymore. So I have no problem with the wall. We could talk about them potentially course correcting a little bit and maybe it’s not quite as lucrative to left field but I think the Orioles at the very least it’s it’s provided a break even proposition and I think the Orioles have actually been ahead in that when you look at their pitching at home compared to the opposition now. Ryan mountcastle Austin Hayes if you talk to them, you know anyone that swigging from the right side? No, they don’t like it but At the same time, it’s about winning baseball games. And, you know, I mean that couple examples on on Wednesday night. But we’ve also seen, we’ve seen guys that are able to clear it, no problems. So I don’t think it’s at this point that it’s not a topic that spend 20 minutes on, but on the
Nestor J. Aparicio 10:19
psychology of it, and luring pitching and growing bats and philosophically drafting and honing, left handed hitter, just all sorts of things, that if you have control of an organization as Elias had, you could look up and say other winning 100 games every year. Because we can say that at the end of this year, if they went 100 games, right, and you can say, what if I’m writing a book, if I’m writing Elias ball, and I might, there’s enough money in it, a hell of a writer if you haven’t heard? But like, if I’m writing that book and peeling that onion back, dude, that’s a thick chapter. And it’s an important chapter. If you pin them winning a World Series and pin them changing their thing. And I can I can I was with Mike Messina drinking beer, having him talk about it with his brother talk about if I were a free agent, if I could pick it pitch in any ballpark. I wanted to if I would never pitch in Colorado for any amount of money and I could get Danny Nagel on and we’ll talk about that. So Mike Hampton, he guys getting their feelings hurt going out there. Right. And there we go razor and their career reputations hurt or helped in some cases of Todd Helton and other plate players, right. But this ballpark had that bandbox thing. It has the thing that even Austin he shakes his head. And when it happens, we joke about it Palmer jokes about it, because it has a history. And it has a currency. And it has this trajectory now with fans and a new owner and Cal Ripken and all of these things. That what it’s going to be when it grows up is pitchers might want it it only takes one or two dude, one or two pitchers that stick around the pitch. Well here a Scott Erickson was way more valuable here. Back in the day because he pitched ground balls. He had a sinker guys beat the ball into the ground. They had a good defense. Philosophically, it’s why the Kansas City Royals won in 1980 and 85. And why the St. Louis Cardinals won in the 80s. With wheels and jets and astroturf. They played to it. So I sure you don’t want to take this on families with me because I got things I could say about this, Lou.
Luke Jones 12:40
I don’t know. I mean, I just feel it’s an old topic at this point. And look, Austin Hays can shake his head and you know me I’m not. I’m not anti Austin Hayes about him as a player even compared to a lot of people this year. I mean, he’s actually played pretty well since he’s come back from the aisle. But we also have something called Statcast at this point in time, and the Austin Hays fly out, according to Statcast would only be a home run in two of 30 major league ballparks so. Okay, now the old Camden Yards wouldn’t have been three of 30. I agree. Yes, but this wasn’t there. There are plenty of examples. There have been plenty of examples where you’ll you’ll hit a fly ball to the wall at a certain part of the wall and left field. And it’s literally the only Park in baseball where it’s not a homerun. So
Nestor J. Aparicio 13:28
if I were in Fenway that’s a double off the wall on Yeah, lots of routine fly balls to left
Luke Jones 13:33
and I’m really glad you brought up Scott Erickson just as an example because that there’s that was perfect. He was perfect for Camden Yards yet. Those were the days of the old carpet. astroturf. Scott Erickson wasn’t so good. That’s why it’s why he wanted to get out of Minnesota because that sinker ball did not play well playing on carpet where it was just so fast and we’d get through the infield over and
Nestor J. Aparicio 13:57
over singles become doubles. Yeah, yeah. I mean, he doubles become triples.
Luke Jones 14:00
I mean, we can do this all day. I mean, go you can go through better than I could because you know, you’ve watched baseball longer than I have the number of right handed hitters that went to Fenway and became to pull happy that okay, that they did some homeruns over the monster but it was to their detriment as far as their overall offensive profile. So, you know, we could do this all day. I’m gonna start with Rick Burleson
Nestor J. Aparicio 14:23
one Monique was what do you want me to go? I can go do that forever. I think you know, it was
Luke Jones 14:29
I’m thinking of the Kansas City catcher that actually killed the Orioles. Mike McFarlane. Didn’t he played a year there in ball? I think it was only a year in Boston. I think so. Unless
Nestor J. Aparicio 14:41
there’s a dude who played wiffle ball and loved Little League and played baseball and liked batting cages. Anytime I would walk on the field at Fenway Park and I did it 100 times is immediate member, including the 99 All Star game. The first thing you want to do is get in the cage and try to hit the wall. You know, I mean, and if I were left handed, I probably would be tapping at it for fun, you know? So yeah, I mean it’s such a weird different park right. And I think Camden Yards is more normalized now but I think the left the a wall and the hook of that and seeing balls go foul fair, whatever and just high enough and it’s going to play to Gunnar Henderson’s career to stay here that you don’t want to go to a place where left field or right field is a problem you know
Luke Jones 15:30
well and on the flip side of this now, the Home Run Ball is a different equation for left field but we also see way more triples now in left field which the old Camden Yards you never saw that so keep in mind when you do have a bigger left field you do have a bigger outfield there’s also the element of you better have a left field or you can cover ground and that’s where I think it’s been interesting to bring it back to the Orioles right now. We’ve seen Heston curse dad play some left field out there and to this point now very small sample size but we’ve seen him handle himself okay out there and I think that’s a big key for someone like him moving forward even though Heston Karstadt probably profiles as a right fielder and you would cover a little less ground in right field at Camden Yards but you know, depending on you know, it’s the same thing with you know, we using Fenway Park as the example yeah and left field you don’t need to cover much ground right field you need to cover a lot of ground at Fenway. So I like it. It’s made for him to
Nestor J. Aparicio 16:32
have an arm and right field like do we Evans and you’ll be compared to him? Forever? Yeah,
Luke Jones 16:36
yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, you always need to be able to throw from right field, but I mean, it’s, it’s added some new elements to the game that weren’t there. Pre What 2022 when they introduced the big wall, there definitely absolutely is a mental element to it. And I think that’s where someone like Jordan Westberg really thrives in the sense that okay, Jordan Westbrook’s game isn’t that he’s going to be a 40 homerun guy, but
Nestor J. Aparicio 17:02
his game is he’s going to hit 50. Doubles did. I was just gonna say I mean, he needed like, an unbelievable gap hitter.
Luke Jones 17:10
I mean, he cleared the wall. You know, he can clear the wall. No problem, but he’s going to be a guy that is probably going to hit 25 to 30 home runs and Molitor and
Nestor J. Aparicio 17:21
him lately. Don’t like that DiMaggio Molitor. Right, hit bang? You know what I mean? Like the way he comes through the zone? Um, yeah, yeah, he’s becoming one of my favorites quickly.
Luke Jones 17:36
I mean, I know, we talked, we touched on it the other day with him getting the all star nod. But I mean, the thing about him that I just like is, don’t get me wrong. He’s physically gifted, but he’s not physically gifted at the way that Gunnar Henderson who’s just a monster and does everything. Well, you know, I feel like Westberg is able to maximize his athletic gifts that he does have. But you look at him from a Statcast standpoint, like he doesn’t have extraordinary bat speed. But what he does what he has he uses really, really well and he you know, he’s hit with for power he’s hit for a decent enough average about the only thing he doesn’t do is he doesn’t walk a whole lot, which I wouldn’t put it past him that that won’t be something that he’ll continue to add as he gets older because I just think he’s another one of those guys. Well, he
Nestor J. Aparicio 18:22
hits strikes talking about that. It’s not Yogi Berra, you know, what I mean? Him strikes and he’s hitting strikes in all quadrants of the zone really mean, you know, he is a guy that if if they were playing, and he grew up in the game of, we’re gonna play everybody on one side of the field, dare you to hit the ball the other way? I mean, I’ve not seen him, but maybe whatever. But I mean, it feels to me like those are the kinds of tools that he’s had since he was nine years old learning how to do things like that old school stuff. Yeah,
Luke Jones 18:54
no question about it. And I mean, he was the one guy he doubles off the wall on Wednesday night, that was the 129 out of 30 ballparks, that’s a homerun obviously, but like and that’s what you need. You need to have the proper mentality and I think I’ve talked about this with you before I mean, the Orioles from the time that Mike Elias and sigma del and this current baseball operation staff, these current coaches you think about what the old school mentality was as far as hitting you know, pure hitting it was always what hit a line drive up the middle right? And I’m not saying that there isn’t a place for that. But we also know that even though the shift can isn’t as pronounced as it used to be, you can still position your second baseman shortstop almost right to the bag and that ball up the middle gets caught way more than it used to. Their mentality is hit the ball off the left centerfield fence. If you’re, if you’re right handed hitter if you’re left handed hitter, the mentality is you want to hit the ball off the right centerfield fence, you know, hit to the gaps. I mean, that’s really what their mentality is and look In this current, it’s funny, we’re talking about this because in this current stretch, they have struggled to score some runs, and they have struggled. But the body of work speaks for itself. They came into Wednesday night’s game leading the league in runs scored per game, we know that they’ve slugged we know they’ve hit for power homeruns doubles triples, because they have guys who can run. So I will still take that mentality over the long haul. And I know people will say, Well, are you gonna be able to do that in October? Go look at how many home runs the Texas Rangers hit last October. I mean, it’s we keep trying to size up this team for October and we all have priors. We all have ideas of what we think wins in October baseball and look. Yeah, they’re they need another starting pitcher. And yeah, they need to add some bullpen. I’ve talked about that since spring training that I want to see them add bullpen arms. But ultimately, if this team is going to make a deep run, they’re going to need their star hitters to hit like star hitters and perform and you know that it’s gonna be a matter of how are they swinging the bats come October, that’s why get to the All Star break for the guys that aren’t going to Arlington for the all star game. Get off your feet and get away from the game for a few days to get a mental break physical break all of that. But you’ve said it since day one, as we were talking about the pitching, even going into opening day you said it, they’re going to hit the baseball and I get it runners in scoring position recently, it hasn’t been as good. And yeah, they’ve been taking some big swings. And they’ve been trying to do too much at times. But James, we can set it and I happen to agree with him in this instance. This is part of this is the ebb and flow of a season and you’re gonna go through some stretches where you’re not going to swing it very well. We’ve, we’ve seen them go through some stretches where they’re not going to pitch very well, especially when they’ve lost two or three starting pitchers over the last six, seven weeks. It’s just reality. It’s not an excuse, they certainly need to address it and but in the meantime, still in first place, still in a position, excellent position, right around, you know, on a pace that’s right around 100 wins second straight year to your point. So not a five alarm fire, not a four alarm, fire or even a three alarm. But you don’t want to get swept and you want to feel a little bit better about themselves, with the Yankees coming to town. And if for no other reason, forget about the standings for a second forget about the tiebreaker and the head to head. You don’t want to give the Yankees any reason to feel good about themselves going into the break because like I said, they’ve been awful for close to a month. Now. You don’t want to give them a chance to reel off when two out of three are sweet or anything like that, where not only have they closed the gap in the division but they’re feeling way better about themselves because of late the Yankees. It’s been Aaron judge, Juan Soto is who he is and the rest of that lineup isn’t scoring runs, and their pitching has gone to a bad place. Even the rotation that looks so much better on paper than the Orioles rotation has been really bad the last few weeks. So you want to you want to leave the Yankees continuing to feel that way going into the all star break.
Nestor J. Aparicio 23:07
You know having Rick telander on this week and having Randy Merkin on with me this week and I would encourage everybody to go out to Baltimore positive even after the Cubs leave town during the all star break and listen to some wisdom. Randy Merkin has worked in sports radio for 30 years. He ran ESPN 1000 for a period of time in Chicago but he was one of our executive producers at Sporting News Radio. Chicago lifer sat in meetings with Mark gents cow Terry Brennan, we talked about all the backstage drama at one on one sports and and it was meeting after meeting after meeting about shows about budgets, all the boring stuff that went to five seven puts out on their Twitter feed with their little quadrants of notebook paper. And Kenny Albert taught me all this 35 years ago, I had him on two weeks ago. And then telander work at the paper as a columnist and Jack Gibbons, whom I’ve mentioned here as a saint, literally a Saint Jacques Gibbons, who is responsible for all of this and making me what I am and bosses do. I don’t have a whole lot of budget meetings with you. But I want to have a budget meeting cuz you’re going away for the week. And we have this all star game and we have the gunner Henderson Gun Show and all of that. Before we go, here’s what I want to do for our families. It’s our budget meeting for our faintly segment. I want to know what you think, as Colin this Luke, about the trading deadline, targets. And and the most important thing because you’ve, you’ve alluded to this more than anybody, you’ve talked a lot about this, who’s gonna get tapped on the shoulder and be exited off of the pile diver group, as book show authors showing up on all the competitors, podcasts and places in Baltimore, which I find to be fun. I want to hear what you think is going to happen over the next Three weeks in projecting this because it started already. Curse that or Couser mountcastle or mayo. Not holiday can’t be him mas can’t be Mayo GAPI him. Well Norby he’s expendable up. But does anybody want him? Um, where are we on Povich? How do we really feel about our pitching? Where are we with depth? How do we feel about the catcher who’s hitting the cover off the ball? There’ll be no spot for him here. How do other people feel about these prospects? I think that’s our segment on Friday. What do you think Luke? Can you give me a Can you give me 18 inch column on that for the Sunday? For the for the for the Bulldog? Yeah, yeah.
Luke Jones 25:45
I mean, I think there’s still a lot of conjecture, I think one interesting element. We haven’t mentioned at all with that. And, you know, I want to I don’t want to belabor this point. But you also have the draft. That’s this, you know, this weekend, and this week, that that coincides with the all star game, and we’re less than three weeks away from the trade deadline. I also think not that not that Mike Elias is solely focused on the draft. Let’s be clear, I mean, all these general managers have lieutenants and people in the organization that, you know, you can multitask, we all understand that. But it is, you know, and I’ve even seen, like the John Heymans and the ken Rosenthal’s of the world have alluded to this as well. It is something that teams do care about the draft, and teams do put it a lot of work with the draft and general managers care about the draft as well, that the timing of it is really strange when you think about that, where you have the trade deadline, and the draft being so close together. I think that’s where some executives probably would like to maybe see the draft move back to June or maybe be moved to a different time. I don’t know. But he’s
Nestor J. Aparicio 26:55
gonna break everything and change the whole calendar at some point. Yeah, yeah.
Luke Jones 26:59
But but but it is pretty, pretty interesting, though, when you think about it, and especially an organization like the Orioles who, as I’ve told you, Mike Elias, and I saw someone brought up one of his quotes from last year, right around this time, where he said, Look, yeah, we were excited about this year’s team, and we want to augment this year’s team. And we feel like we have a great chance to win a World Series, but I’m not doing my job if I’m not maintaining long term health for the organization as well. So but I, what better way the Orioles done that than to draft the way that they’ve drafted. I mean, they’re gonna send three guys, three guys to the All Star game in Arlington that they drafted. And yes, Adley rutschman. Everyone, you know, except maybe a few other teams might have taken Bobby wit. But Adley rutschman was very close to being a strong consensus one one at that point in time five years ago, but Gunnar Henderson and Jordan Westbrook were not top five or top 10, or even top 20 picks. And they’re both going to the All Star game. So if you’re Mike Elias, you’re still spending time on the draft, even though you’re not picking first or second or fifth, that’s still something so well, you know, like any
Nestor J. Aparicio 28:09
old music business, when I was a music critic, you talk to these nerds, and sometimes you see it, but we develop our talent we develop, develop our artists, you know what I mean? It guys like Prince would be like, I’m producing my own stuff, or I’m not signing with your record label. And then there’s other people that they draft that are one ones and look like they’re ready to come. And they don’t make it in other places. And here, they make it college players all star game this week, Adley rutschman, all that. But to your point, developing talent, is something we could never talk about. That really was the core of the Oriole way, it’s the core of everything to build the organization, right on up to like 82 or 83 when Earl Weaver and like Galra like, like right around there it stopped. And for 40 years, they didn’t develop anything. And you know, I hear Sidra Well, you know, I discovered Barry Bonds, I’m like, I’m thinking Wow. But there was a point where developing that talent, whatever that raw talent is, or whatever came into clear and the rub and the creams later on for him. But just in a general sense to your point. Not everybody takes sandwich picks and makes them all Famers. Right.
Luke Jones 29:18
Yeah. So and look, that’s not an excuse for my clients or anybody, like their trades have still been made. And we’ll see some trades made, whether it’s the Orioles or other teams in even as the next few days as we’re talking about this final series of before the all star break. But once the draft is out of the way, then it’s full systems go all these teams, what are they doing? Are you buying, are you selling? Are you buying and selling? Are you one of those teams that is going to continue to try to take this down and you’re going to try to evaluate the next couple of weeks. I mean, we’ve brought up the Texas Rangers as potential sellers and then they’ve reeled off a winning streak and now there’s talk about them staying in the race, but if they lose eight of their next 10 They’re probably sellers again, given where they They are and with some of the contracts that they have. So it really, you know, it sounds like a cop out. And, you know, I’m not just going to make a bold prediction just for the sake of doing it. But so many of these teams still don’t know who they are right now. And, look, I don’t think you should necessarily judge the next couple of weeks of baseball, any more than what’s happened over the first three, three and a half months now. But you do have so many of these teams with the three wildcards and now having ample examples, both recently, the Arizona Diamondbacks, who were mediocre all last year, until the very end this season, they get in as a wildcard. And then before you know what they’re playing in the World Series. So you have teams that are looking at that. And then but you also have teams that say, You know what, we’ve got a chance to be the third wildcard mathematically, but we don’t really think we’re built to make a deep October run. And that’s kind of where the Orioles were a couple years ago, right. When they traded Manzini and Jorge Lopez, I mean, it was a nice story that they were better. But I think two years later, it was the right decision. And we’ve seen them already have players that make an impact that they’ve acquired then. So there’s just so much of that going on right now. And the draft is just another variable. That doesn’t complicate things, because they’re, you know, they’re they’re separate entities. I mean, they’re separate objectives. But it’s still sweat equity, that general managers are exhausting right now to try to have a good draft and Mike Elias, even though the Orioles are picking way late, compared to where they were a couple of years ago, they still want to nail their picks they still early Westberg or Right, right. Sure, I mean, I mean, they’ve drafted guys, you know, the last second third round, I mean, I mean, guys have made it to the majors and everything. So not everyone’s gonna be a Hall of Famer or not everyone’s gonna be an all star. But you want to continue to draft and especially now, as we’re talking about potentially dealing prospects, you want to replenish that system, you want to have a pipeline, you don’t want to be in a position where that system gets cleaned out in the next year or two, and then suddenly, then you’re looking at a Windows closing at some point down the line. So the whole idea is to have that turn, you know, to have that turn, hopefully not a turn as extreme as Tampa Bay, as I said, and that’s where ownership and payroll will come in, in terms of hopefully keeping some of your young talent. But at the same time, we also know ravens being a perfect example. The draft, if you do it well can be the lifeblood of any organization in any sport. But certainly the Orioles have made their hay with the draft and they want to try to do that. But after that, yeah, make some trades, add some pitching. And they certainly need to fortify both the rotation and the bullpen. Luke
Nestor J. Aparicio 32:55
Jones can be found at Baltimore Luca out on the internet just not next week. During the all star game. He’ll be found he’ll be the guy get fat on pizza on the beach, on playing the role of Uncle Luke and St. Luke and Deacon Jones and all the other roles that he plays next week. He’ll be watching the Yankees in the Orioles this week and we’ll be watching the Orioles in the Yankees together on Friday. Dan of fade Lee’s as I bring my great trade debate to you letter raskins coming down on Friday. I’m trying to get some of the beat writers that cover the Yankees P caldera specifically I’m trying to get him to come over and sing some show tunes with me. Over fade these I’m trying to bribe him with the crabcake I mean guys from Jersey it’s easy to bribe the guy to crabcake bribe a Maryland lottery tickets as well. Gold Rush seven snugglers I’m giving these away to everybody. Even the Yankees fans that are data families on Friday your friends at Liberty pure solutions keeping our water crystal clear as well as Jiffy Lube multi care. It’s a beautiful summer I got my El Guapo shirt on. I feel like I give so much love to stay fair. We do the show there a lot. We did a show in Beaumont several times and I eat at Beaumont all the time and I love it. But El Guapo is the Mexican sort of Latin it’s not just Mexicans Latin, it’s got all sorts of stuff tequila, a lot of tequila. Really good food delicious brunch and I never like wear the shirt maybe because it’s green. I don’t know it’s but either way. Gotta get back over to El Guapo had some of the best shows I’ve ever done it oh guapo Jane Miller and I sat there discuss the city for a couple hours Rob Roblin who? To me he’s a legend. I got this sitting I had like a legitimate eremurus silver in the margarita, a margarita on the air with salted rim. With Rob robbing the hell. I felt like I was at the Preakness. So good stuff going on around here. Great guests in Chicago this week trying to get some New York people on. I think we’re gonna have some greatest hits on Monday and Tuesday. So you tune in near Brooks Robinson saying howdy. Are you here Cal Ripken being all serious about the Hall of Fame. Or here Tony Gwynn. He’s not alive. He’s But he comes back to life sometimes around here, and certainly his thoughts and his spirit and his voice and his chuckle and his belly laugh. So I’ll try to bring all that to life next week while Luke’s on vacation. get fat on max pizza down to Wildwood, while the rest of us are back here. Working hard sweat it out. Wait for the rock and roll on Nestor. He’s Luke we are wn st am 1570 Towson Baltimore and we never stopped talking. beat the Yankees for crying out loud in Baltimore. positive.com Stay with us.
