Inside Access with Jason LaCanfora and Ken Weinman
Cordell Woodland: I'm not very comfortable with the backend of the bullpen
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You know, you get to see a little bit of a different look with the offensive line with how to learn the bomb not being there, been Cleveland getting the bulk of the snaps at center. And by my count, really only have one poor snap. And Lamar was able to kind of pick that up and get into the play even still. But overall, it does start to feel like they're giving more of these same guys a look along the offensive line. I'm sure you guys know by never shot Bateman ended up leaving practice a little bit earlier today on a pretty on a highlight play for sure, catching a touchdown over two guys Lamar perfect ball placement for him. So kind of the guys for the most part that I feel like that have been hot have kind of stayed hot here recently. Always still stayed hot. Marlon is still having a really good camp to this point as well. And today was I thought Mark Andrews made quite a few catches today as well. Cordell, last year, one of the more jarring things for me in the preseason and I don't get to work up about preseason football was watching David Ojabo struggle miserably to set the edge and stop the run and they're running pitch plays for their tight ends and they're running all over them. We've heard a lot about breakout candidates this year and always getting a lot of hype and Travis Jones is getting and I'm hearing a whole lot about a job but we had Jonas on a little while ago and he wasn't exactly raving about him either. Has he done anything to catch your eye good, better and different? You know, it's crazy. I was talking to a couple of media members about that today and I can't name you one defining play to this point in camp that I can remember from David Ojabo. That doesn't mean that he hasn't made any, you know, it's a lot of things going on at the same time. So who knows? Maybe I missed him. But to this point, I can't sit here and say that there's been a practice to where I'm like, oh, yeah, you know, I'm leaving practice with a play in my mind from David Ojabo. I paid attention to him a little bit after that conversation today and, you know, he's going up against a couple of second team guys and it is still, I'm just not seeing much movement there. So, you know, the part of it is he's probably trying to get back into the swing of things. He hasn't had a lot of consistent on the field time. That's a part of this. But at some point, you know, you want to see something from him. He's going into year three now and you're going to blink and it'll be four years gone by and this isn't a guy with a, you know, a fifth year option or anything like that is getting to the point now. So it's like, you got to show me something. And last year, you mentioned a preseason. It was very disappointing for him even when he was healthy. I would imagine he's going to play at some point to some degree in this preseason as long as he's healthy. So I do think, you know, he it'd be great to start to see some flashes from David Ojabo because pass rush is a big question for them still with as good of a temp as Oway and Travis Jones and Matt Abike and those guys are having. And the idea would be that Oway would be a part of that pass rush group. And I mean, I would imagine you want to see something against some of these lowered here guys in the preseason. Cordell, a year ago at this time, we were wondering where the pass rush was going to come from and the edge rush and ended up leading the league in sacks. But you touched a lot on a job. But what do you think of the edge group as a whole? I mean, I do like what Van Noy gives him. I don't know if he'll necessarily have the year that he had last year. And I don't, you know, I'm still trying to battle with do they need him to have that year? And right now I can't talk myself out of saying that they don't. I mean, because clowny is not there. I don't I don't I feel like it's dangerous to depend on an interior pass rush to have the type of year that Matt Abike had again last year, strictly in the sack numbers. So I mean, it's still a concern for me, you know, definitely it'd be tough on me to not say that. I still think schematically they'll be able to to get to the quarterback because they have some great DBs that are that excel at blitzing Kyle Hamilton is still a phenomenal blitzer. Arthur Mullette as well, Marlon Humphrey from that nickel spot does it well also. And then that's not even a counting for when maybe they start to send guys like Nate Wiggins back there in the speed that he has. So we'll see. But I do think that they'll be able to get to the quarterback with their scheme now. Patrick Clean was a big part of that last year being able to put pressure on the quarterback blitzing up in middle. We'll see him Trenton Simpson can kind of give them a little bit of that same juice. But definitely right now pass rush is still a force by even acknowledging like you said, we thought that for the last couple of years and as a team that really hasn't been a problem for them. We all belong outside. We're drawn to nature, whether it's the recorded sounds of the ocean we doze off to or the succulents that adorn our homes. Nature makes all of our lives well better. Despite all this, we often go about our busy lives removed from it. But the outdoors is closer than we realize. With all trails, you can discover trails nearby and explore confidently with offline maps and on trail navigation. Download the free app today and make the most of your summer with all trails. This season Instacart has your back to school. As in, they've got your back to school lunch favorites like snack packs and fresh fruit. And they've got your back to school supplies like backpacks, binders and pencils. 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You don't sink in and get stuck like with memory foam. And thanks to over 1400 air chambers in the gel flex grid, you will sleep cooler on a purple mattress. Purple has a wide variety of mattresses from the original purple mattress to the restore hybrid collection that combines gel flex grid with coils and the rejuvenate lux collection, the height of luxury with over 112,000 to five star reviews to prove it. Visit purple.com to find the perfect purple for you and enter code podcast 10 to get 10% off. Talking to Cordell Woodland it's inside access here on the fan. Let's switch to the Orioles. They got kicked in the teeth Thursday and Friday by the Guardians. How impressed were you that they came out of that series winning Saturday and Sunday and getting a split. Yeah, that was good to see. I mean, it was good to see guys like Gunnar and Adley getting back into the swing of things. Looks like that pop is starting to come back for Gunnar hitting his first home run since the all-star break Jackson holiday going yard a couple of times. I mean, that right there, I think is the big part of it for me at least because a couple of weeks ago, his name was floating out there a lot based off of what we saw from him and his first stint up here in the major. It's good to see that at least right now the work that he put in when he went back to AAA is working out for him because they're going to need a lot from him. Mayo obviously has been a slow start for him. You hope it changes. Look, that Guardians team, I think the world of that Guardians team, they're no slouch. It's not easy to beat that team in general. We saw that the last time the Orioles played them in the series, but to go to Cleveland and beat them where they seem to have a lot of success in general to split on the last two games I thought was huge for them, especially with Corbin Burns not having his best out. This is sort of one of our topics du jour here, Cordell, eighth inning, ninth inning. How comfortable are you with the assortment of arms they have? It's not very because I don't think we're going to get much consistency right now. I think we can see different guys in different roles until Brandon Huy gets to the point to where he's back to trust and Craig Kimball fully or he trusts one of these other guys, whether it's the Mingas, whether it's Soto can know any of these guys on the back end, but I think it's going to be a little minute of mixing and matching, going with the matchups, going with the hot hands or the hot arm in this case, but I think just with the question marks surrounding Kimball, it's tough to fully feel great about the back end of the bullpen. It's upside there with Soto, but we'll see who knows right now. I'd like the Mingas. I like that trade and I kind of like what he gives them, but I don't, there's nobody in that group right now that I'm banging on the table to be the closer for this team right now. It's just not. I'm okay with them going out there and going with the matchups and going with who he feels like is kind of hot at that time, but I think it's probably going to be a while before we see some true stability in the back of the bullpen, if at all, to the point where we were to the point to where it used to be where, all right, we knew Cano was the eighth inning guy and in at least for the case of this season, we knew Kimball was the ninth inning guy. I don't know if we're close to getting back to the point to where there are those, you know, strict roles for guys right now. Of course, it's been the C Jackson holiday to get off to this hot of a second stint with the big league club. I think it's great. I mean, I was one of the people and I turned out to be kind of the minority over time that didn't really want them to move Jackson holiday as much as I think the world of Terry school. I wasn't ready to kind of just, you know, get rid of get rid of him right now. I didn't think that the two weeks in or whatever it was that we saw from him early in the season up here in Baltimore. I wasn't convinced that that's who he was, you know, and it's the first blip that he's really had since he's been drafted. I mean, the kid has kind of spoiled us with the way that he's been able to rise through the minus to this point. So that was the first adversity that he's facing. Look how he's responded at least right now. Of course, his baseball things could even go out there and go over for tonight and make me look like an idiot. But as of right now, you know, it's good to see that at least he was able to learn from his issues and come back and it's easy to fail again. But so far he hasn't. So it's good to see that he's putting the best version of himself on display because, you know, you look at the trade deadline and what could have been and what happened and what didn't happen. I'm sure people kind of feel play when you're shaking up sports again. Trying to figure out what to eat for dinner yet again with North sides and bullion as you're not so secret ingredient, you can skip the drive through and do dinner at home. Nor taste combos provide a menu of delicious, affordable and well balanced meals that you can prepare in 30 minutes or less. Visit nor.com to get quick and easy recipe ideas for your home cooked weeknight dinners. It's not fast food, but it's so good. Get your laugh on with me, Chris Jericho at the Talk is Jericho podcast. We've got Guns N' Roses Hall of Famer, Duff the Kagan and his joke of the week every Friday plus regular visits from the hilarious Brad Williams and special appearances by everyone from Gabrielle Fluffley Iglesias, Mark Marin, Dennis Miller, Cheech Marin, Kevin Neeland, if they're funny, they're on Talk is Jericho. So listen to and follow Talk is Jericho now on the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast. [MUSIC PLAYING]