[MUSIC PLAYING] Bad morning, Joe, sports at 5.9 in the van, bad at his brain gunning. Blue Jays won it all at home this season. Changing the fortunes came on for dinner. Yeah, it was a long day for us. We were there at 5 in the morning, longer for you. Yeah. But I got to go home and nap before I returned. Ben Shulman was just like he was grinding. He was just walking the halls for hours and hours and hours. Yeah, sure. You know what I bet he did, because he's such a good team player when he got done talking to us yesterday. And then we have some TV obligations. He then grabbed the shamwows that we're hanging around. And he's like, we'll get to polishing. These rails a little more. It was-- it cannot be, again, the amount of shining we saw going on for the three hours we were on radio yesterday. Yeah, we need to get a report from somebody who might be down to the ballpark right now. I wonder if that's what caused-- I just wonder if that's what caused the eclipse. It's like it became so shiny that it then affected-- I don't think that's how it works. I did either the phrase physics are weird yesterday on the air, but I do understand that's not how that works. You sure did. All right. Stuck to a smart man. Smart-- smarter than-- Yeah, he's smart enough to not engage in the conversation we were just having. It's Ben Nicholson Smith of the @TheLetters podcast. How's it going, Ben? Good. How are you guys doing? Doing very well. That was a better foray. I mean, they didn't score a ton of runs. They didn't hit a home run, but Ben, I know like your mentions on Twitter probably is populated with vitriol as mine are. And it feels like that was a much needed victory for this Blue Jays team that's just trying to not have its fans turn against them early in the season. Like, is that overstating it? I think that's pretty fair. I mean, it's been a frustrating stretch for Blue Jays fans. And I think that that's completely understandable, just given how things have unfolded. And it was so long since they'd actually played at home, right? It was more than six months. And that's a long stretch for any team. But especially for the Blue Jays, because they obviously played their playoff games on the road. And then they played their first 10 games of the season on the road as well. So I think that any frustration that the fans have is justified. It's been a long time since this fanbase had a lot to really celebrate. But at the same time, even if it is justified in a lot of ways, it takes the fun out of it if you're kind of losing interest in the team after 10, 11 games. And no one wants to hear that it's a long season and that things can shift. So it's much better if the team can sort of play a little bit closer to its potential. And then everyone can just kind of feel that relief that I think yesterday contributed towards. Yeah, it was very, very cathartic. You know, one of the things we've been talking about is just the response that Schneider got at the kind of beginning of that game and how he's kind of been the avatar for everything that people haven't liked. And obviously, you could feel how you feel about his lineup decisions the way he puts it together. It's not all his fault. Do you feel a little bit like Schneider is wearing all the ills of this organization from the kind of fanbase perspective right now? Because again, you know, like, there's the little grumbling when he comes out to take burrios. And it's like, is that 100 pitches? Of course, he's going to take them out. But we all know where everybody's minds go there. Are you surprised at the reaction to Schneider? I honestly, I thought it might be a little harsher. You know, I think it didn't surprise me at all. He was booed a little bit as a mixed reaction as everyone was introduced. Pre-game amidst a lot of hype and excitement. And then when he comes, I have to take burrios. I mean, that's like, catnap for Bluejay's fans, right? Like, of course, they're going to boo him. And look, I mean, there's a lot of other stuff in that game. But as far as that one moment, like, yeah, that's where Bluejay's fans deserve to have a voice. And it doesn't have to be logical. I mean, in that moment, that was a totally reasonable time to take him out of the game. But yeah, of course, Bluejay's fans need to have their voice heard there. So I think that if Ross Atkins was introduced, he would have got booed even harder. But part of the world being a manager is you have to take that public-facing element of things. And that's part of the job, part of the reason that Major League managers, you know, it's a tough job. And it's a well-compensated job. But that's part of the reason why. Jose burrios obviously reversed the narrative last season. It was great all season long. And yeah, and the innings he was allowed to pitch in the postseason, who's his best self during that run. He has now completed at least six innings. And all three of his starts allowing three or fewer runs. And all of them went into the seventh inning yesterday, throwing over 100 pitches. I mean, what are we seeing from Jose burrios? What is his upside potential for you? Because he is a guy that's gotten Cy Young award votes before. Yeah, I mean, I think his upside is exactly that. And I don't think he needs to be any better than this for the Bluejay's. I mean, this is great. This is front line stuff. If he keeps doing this, he'll definitely be getting Cy Young votes. There's just done a lot of guys who do this consistently over the course of 32 starts, which, again, he's been-- he's been so consistent with. But what we're seeing right now is great stuff. I mean, we see the fastball in '95, '96. And we see the breaking ball that was just nasty last night, really, really all night. And we're seeing really good commands. So I mean, and also a guy who fills his position and stays composed on the mountain, does the holds runners, does the little things that you would want a pitcher to do, works with the pitch clock. I mean, he's-- yeah, this is what a front line major league starting pitcher looks like. This is exactly what you hope if you were drafting someone in the first round or first overall. This is what you'd hope that that player would become. So he's as good as it gets. And it's not to say that every start is going to be like this, because as we've seen before, sometimes that command doesn't stick around. And that's when he does get into trouble. And that's what 2022 looked like. But as far as what his upside is, it's exactly this. And I don't think it needs to be anything more. Yeah, no, this is the consistency that allows this to be the more, right? Like, you don't need more than this on any given one night. You just need to see a lot of nights like this. And I'm not saying that is he hasn't done this in the past, but it's just that's what allows you to be a front line starter. It's not that you go eight scoreless every single time. It's just that you do that every time. You mentioned him being able to field his position. Boy, a lot of people were doing that last night, as much as we talk about wanting this team to hit and needing this team to hit. And I don't think anybody's ever won a baseball game, zero to negative one. So you do have to hit to win games. But when this team is put together, it's pitching and it's defense. And you saw that last night. I mean, the Bezio play gets all the headlines. There was the great play. Kuremeyer made to cut off that ball in center field holding. I forget who it was, but just to the single there. It just, again, like we talk about a kind of dream home opener. And there were a little moments you can quibble with, for sure. But the defense part of it was on display in such a big way last night as well. Yeah, it really was. And that helped the Blue Jays limit Seattle to just those two runs. The Bezio play, for sure, was great play. Barrios as well was in good defense. But yeah, I think to me, the guy who stuck out the most yesterday was Kuremeyer. I mean, you think back to the fifth inning in Thai France, it's a gapper, like for 95% of players, that's a double. Like he just, he hit a gapper. But Kuremeyer is so fast and it's such a good read that he kept them at first base. And then next batter hits one into center field again. And then Kuremeyer makes a perfect throw. And you know, didn't get the assist. You just cut it full up. It did not get the tag down. It's like every major league they're based on has to make. I mean, there's just zero excuse there. You have to get that tag down. But as long as we're talking about what Kuremeyer did, that throw was perfect. Like it was, it was exactly where it had to be. So it's impressive. And we watched the last year, so I'm not surprised anymore. But Kuremeyer, I mean, he's just one of the best center field defenders that we've seen in the last 20 years, if not, if not even longer. No, he's the best of this generation. He really is. And Dalton Varshos, quite good when he gets an opportunity to play that position. He's a very good left fielder, but Steam needs offense. And I know we were told that, hey, we're not deviating from the plan, just 10 games into the season. Maybe we are 11 games into the season because against the righty, he is out of the lineup. And David Schneider was in, he was hitting fifth. Like what was that to any came up with a couple of big hits? I mean, none bigger than the bases loaded blue base hit up the middle to take it from one nothing to three nothing. I mean, what did that tell you with that lineup decision on the home opener? Yeah, it's an interesting one, right? Because when I spoke to you guys just a few days ago, we were talking about how David Schneider wasn't in the lineup that much. And then here we are talking about how he was hitting there against the right. And just as an aside, the chase did really well as a team against Luis Castillo to be able to put up those four runs against him. But Schneider was a part of that. So, you know, in this case, it definitely worked out. I think we're starting to see David Schneider earn a little bit more consistent playing time. I don't think that that means that we see that much less at Dalton Varsho because really, he's got a chance to run into 25 home runs this year. And he's got a chance to be one of the reasons that this offense does turn around. So I think the J's still really believe in Dalton Varsho and nothing about the first 10 11 games has shifted that. So I'd expect him to be in the lineup five days a week going forward if not more. - Hmm, kind of ruins my theory that Ben reminded me of this morning that he should be catching now if he's going to be taking another lineup for David Schneider. I mean, I know I brought this up to you before, but if this is going to be part of the equation and Danny Jansen's a free agent, like do you think there's any world where they revisit this? Or that's just done. He's an outfielder now, and I need to stop talking about this forever. - Well, I mean, you can always stop, or keep talking about it, friend. - Nah, you said the thing first. Freudian slip, I knew what you wanted to say, Ben. I know. - But yeah, I mean, I just, I don't think that you're not going to do that mid-season. If they were ever going to try to reintegrate him into the catching mix, the time to do that would have been spring when you have all kinds of time and you have all these resources and less pressure. I just don't think you try to do that mid-season. So to me, Dalton Varsho's now a fielder. That's kind of it. - Where is the leashat with Bowdoin Francis right now? I mean, he looks so good early on in that Yankee Stadium start and then it all came apart on the one swing of the bat off John Carlos Stanton's swing. I mean, before that, he got into some walk trouble to load the bases. But yeah, and it's not like there's an obvious candidate. Right now, Uriel Rodriguez isn't, I don't think, ready for major league action at the moment. Obviously, Alec Minoa becomes less and less a factor. The more we see those minor league numbers, where is Bowdoin Francis' leash? - Yeah, it's a great question. I mean, he's gone from facing Houston and the Yankees on the road. That is a tough way to start. Now, he didn't make the most of it. He did not execute or pitch to the height of his abilities. That's clear. At the same time, it'll be a lot easier this weekend when he faces the Rockies in Toronto. The Rockies, obviously, a pretty decent team at home, but a really, really bad team on the road offensively. So that is a favorable match up up there with the White Sox or something. So we'll see what he can do against the Rockies. And at that point, if the struggles continue, the Jays really would have to look at other options. I don't know exactly what those would be. Maybe Uriel Rodriguez could give you four. He's stretched there to about 50 pitches right now. So you're certainly not getting six innings out of him. But Rodriguez has pitched really well, and he's got major league staff. And he's pushing at AAA. So he's definitely closer than Reedeman, who kind of continues developing. And Manoa, he's just got a close strike. He's not close to being a major league pitcher right now, just based on you need to have him more consistently in the strike zone before you're confident, calling him up to face the best offense in the game. So step one for him is just one strike. And that's what's happening just yet. Yeah, I guess we can save this conversation for when it happens, but he's on the clock, right? The 30-day rehab clock where they have to make a decision at the conclusion of 30 days, whether to option him or call him up to the major. And he has options, right? But he wasn't so receptive to being optioned a season ago. And I guess part of that was that he thought he was injured or claimed that it was injury-related and that it maybe should have been an injured list situation and not an optioning. I mean, could this get ugly in 30 days? Again, we're not seeing the results in the minor leagues, but he thinks he's ready for the major leagues. Is there potential for some real conflict between Alec Manoa and the Blue Jays in less than a month? You know, it's not my read on the situation. There's always that possibility. You hope it doesn't happen. But my read on the situation is that the vibes seem to be good and it's certainly much improved between the Blue Jays and Manoa. It's more a question of what the production looks like. And yeah, this continues if he's not able to consistently be in the strike zone. You know, you did walk for and hit one batter in that first outing. The Blue Jays say that they're not concerned with that, but it would be hard not to be. You know, I think that most neutral observers would view that as a significant issue with him not throwing strikes. So, you know, at this point, yeah, the logical thing to do for the Blue Jays would be to let his clock run out and then option him if he's not throwing more strikes. - Yeah, boy, that'll be an interesting fork in the road when we get there 'cause I just have a feeling it's not gonna be super everybody being on the same page there. But maybe I'm wrong, maybe it sorts itself out. Like I said, or like Ben, both of you Ben said, we have 29 days or so to sort that out. Chris Bassett getting the ball tonight. It's been hardly a disaster to start his season, but you're still looking for that first Chris Bassett game from last year. Again, for and run in each, you can work around that. Not the way the offense was going in those games. How important is it for him to, you know, if this was a hitter who'd, you know, obviously you can't equate starts to a bat, but who'd had the start he'd had, you go, yeah, you just need to see him kind of have something drop or have one get out of the park for him. How important is it for Bassett to kind of have a, again, I don't want to overstate it, but a bit of a bounce back, a get rate start tonight. - Yeah, I think it's very important. It really hasn't gone his way, the first couple of starts of this season. And if you're trying to picture how the Blue Jays get towards the top of the American League Easter back into the playoffs, like they're going to need Chris Bassett. I mean, you look at some of the other questions in their rotation, you know, the hope is obviously that Kevin Gosman's below questions were really just related to the, to the cold temperatures in New York. And there's nothing more to it than that. And they're hoping that Bowdoin Francis can get things going and that Manoa eventually can and all these other guys, but you're hoping as all that unfolds that Chris Bassett and Kakuchi and burios can really be stabilizers for the rotation. So absolutely every Chris Bassett start as a big one. And especially because he hasn't yet had that good start. I mean, there's a little frustration there on his part, you know, talking to him after he's starting Houston. You know, of course he's capable of more. You know, he's capable of more and did not get to that level. I think this is frustrating for sure for him. All right, game two of 81 home game. So I guess only 80 remaining at Roger Center. Game one went pretty well. Ben, thanks for this, buddy. Anytime guys, thanks. Ben Nicholson Smith of the at the letters podcast. I guess we'll see you with the Dalton Varsho. I mean, he did factually hit 20 home runs a season ago. Boy, you didn't feel like it. And if his home numbers were anything like his road numbers a season ago, we'd be having a different conversation. He plays incredible defense. And not a premium defensive position left field, but he can... - Unless you're in Houston, you got to work around that box, I guess. - I suppose, but I know I sound like a broken record here, but I think we can all agree. David Schneider needs to continue to get playing time. - Yes. - And how that happens? It's like, if it's, I don't know. Kevin Beggio is fine. - Yep. - He's also left-handed. And I think he's performed better offensively than Dalton Varsho. So I'd prefer to have him in the lineup if we're just talking about offense. But yeah, okay. One of Dalton Varsho or Kevin Beggio, even against right, he's has to sit because David Schneider needs to play or it's Justin Turner playing third base and he's the DH. I'm sorry, until further notice. - Yeah, I don't, I do not disagree. I would love to sit here and tell you you're wrong about the babe, but you're not. You're right. You need to play. - All right. So Maple Leafs have two games against the Devils this week. One at home on Thursday and tonight on the road in New Jersey. And we talked to Jason Bucala about some of the depth options and some of the questions that the Leafs have to answer here is they get healthier and specifically Callie Yarnkruk. - Yeah. - 'Cause all of a sudden the Leafs have this like incredible, they're in an incredible spot in that they have lots of capable forwards and some capable forward is not going to be playing in game one of the postseason. One capable forward right now and Nick Robertson isn't playing and he's scored. He's done the one thing he was asked to do which is score goals and he's just like, I did that. And I'm like, sorry, buddy, on the outside looking in. - Have you seen Bobby McMahon? He scores goals and he's so big, so he did. - You're right. Robertson, I didn't even include in this because he just seems so far removed from the conversation. It feels like, it almost feels like it has to be Neelander or Marner getting hurt for him to make his way back into the lineup right now given what they like of the utility in that bottom six. And honestly, Bucala saying, just talking about the upgrades that have been added at those types of positions, the middle six, the bottom six, if you will, it's jarring how different it is from last year. So I pulled up last year's Leaf team, just numbers alone. Now, this includes goalies and defensemen as well. So all the players who played 47 Leafs got in a game last year. Now, some of these don't count. Like one of those, for example, is Jet Alexander. Okay, he doesn't really count. Okay, so let's put the number to 46. - Okay. - The amount of guys that have suited up for the Leafs this year, and part of this is, we'll see what happens in those last two games. Maybe this number expands by a fair amount. We only use 33 players this year. Some of the guys that the Leafs were leaning on, I'm gonna just read their names and tell you how many games they played. Now, some of this, Alex Kerfoot. - Yeah. - It wasn't a problem, but he wasn't a solution. We saw it with these guys, with Marner, with Nielander, with Matthews, with Tavares, Driedall, played all 82 games last year. Who picked whichever of the supporting cast you think he replaced, it's been an upgrade. If it's back, don't meet in spades. Zach Aston Reese. - Yeah, that's crazy. - He played 77 games for this team last year. (laughing) - That's a, that's a lot. Okay, this one's not as funny. So I'll just skip to the, I'll skip one and go to a lesser game play, but it's funny. Dennis Morgan played 23 games. Pierre Engvall, 58. Wayne Simmons, God love him. But the, the tread was gone on the tires. He played 18 games. - Wow. - Joey Anderson. Remember him? - Sure. - You shouldn't. He played 14, Dried and Hunt played nine games. Abbe Kubel, that very short lived experience. He played six games at the beginning of the season. And then these guys just like, hey, remember some guys. Alex Steves, Nick Abruzzese, Kyle Clifford, Simeon Durr, Arge Chinsev. And this guy did have a moment. So let's save him for last. Redeem Zahorna, the big center. Remember, he scored a goal against the pens. He was like six, seven. He's huge center. He played two games last year. But those are the types of players that you're getting Bobby McMahon minutes from right now. Cali Yarnkrock, David Camp. I know he was here last year, but he is firmly in that class of player on this year's team. When you just look at the numbers, those guys that have been replaced by, again, pick your middle class player on the Leafs this year, it's jarring how much better the supporting cast is, honestly. - Yeah. And it's hard. You can't say it's the best. - Nope. - Because Kadri played. - Yeah. - He was a, you had, now some Kadri's are third line center. Right now it's Pontus Holmberg. - And I didn't include the guys that pushed those out, right? Like that's Nola Chari coming in and pushing out. And Ryan O'Reilly. So after the deadline, it was very different. But man, look at the body of that team from last year compared to this one. - That's not, that's not very good. - Oh, it's not. Like, yeah, Alex Kerford, God love him, killin' penalties and score the O.T. winner. - What have ya? Really fast, too. Smart dude, too. - More quick than fast, gotta be honest. (laughs) Okay, very smart though. - Yeah, we're parsing. Yeah, he's quick with the brain, too. - Yeah, that's, that is jarring. I mean, does it make you think differently about this team's chances? Because that was the team that finished with a bunch of points and boy, they looked really good and like had a bigger swing at the deadline, right? And there's no Ryan O'Reilly walking through those doors from the Maple Leafs this season. Now that being said, Tyler Bertuzzi and limited track record in the postseason looked pretty good. Max Domi, same deal. They don't have a Khan Smite trophy though. But yeah, it's just, there's gonna be legit, like I'm talking in earnest and you can't say that I'm wrong about Matthew Nye's not being in the game one lineup for the Maple Leafs. - But even him, he only played three games for this team last year in the regular season. I know playoffs he got in there, but again, like he's another guy who played very sparringly last year in the mix this year for this team. It's jarring. And Domi, when you ask me if it makes me feel better, he's the one guy. He feels like the X Factor type. He has, you're right, he doesn't have a Khan Smite trophy. But he has the moxie of what you want the Leafs team to feel like. You know, we do this like, who's the real captain stuff? It's not Max Domi. But if we're doing the like leadership group or leadership core, he is already firmly a part of it. He's talking after all the games. He's going right into Bunting's face. He gives you that attitude that you've always wanted from this team and it's from a good player. It's not Ryan Reeves who again has changed how we feel about him even completely right now. It's not Ryan Reeves running around and making him feel strong. No, it's a guy in Max Domi who at his weight class, at his weight class, will go. Anybody who wants it and he'll yap at anybody who doesn't want it and he can perform. And this part can't be overstated as well. He knows what it means to do it here. He does, he saw it, not the ultimate it, but he saw what it meant to have success here and what that tastes and feels like. Well, plus all the depth forward options with this Least team have been here all season long and have built up some chemistry. This is not baseball, right? That's really important. Okay, they had a bitter runway at the end of the season, but yeah, Matthew Nyez gets dropped in. The final three games, he's asked to play a big role and had some big moments in the postseason as well. And Ryan O'Reilly, a guy also had some big moments, but there feels like there's real chemistry with this season. Like, they know what to expect from each other and like, just go back to the first month of Tyler Burtuzzi and Max Domi, those are good players. Like, yeah, it takes a while for people to get used to each other that this is not something that's being adjusted on the fly. And I don't know, not for nothing, they do seem to enjoy each other's company. They really do. I brought this up yesterday. All the Matthews I don't think has ever had more fun in his life right now. It really seems that way. And part of it is just, yeah, it's a good week. Like, he scored 65 revos beating the wheels off, two guys in a week, one of them in Montreal. How could you not? But it seems like he's having as much fun as he's ever had. Yeah, I mean, that was supposed, like Ryan Reeves was supposed to be the social convener for this team. And that's part of it, I'm sure, off the ice, like maybe they're getting together more, but it's just to be like on the ice. It seemed like everybody gets along. Yeah, they really do. The cohesion is what stands out to me for sure. All right, when we come back, Blue Jays Mariners game two, tonight down at Roger Center, we'll talk to Mike Petriello, MLB.com, currently working for Blue Jays Central on Sports Set. He joins us next is the fan morning show continues Ben Anis, Frank Gunning, Sportsnet 590, the fan. Breaking down the top stories in the NHL every day, The Jazz Mary Show. Subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Fan morning show Sportsnet 590, the fan, Ben Anis, Brent Gunning, that David Schneider with an insane start to his career at Fenway Park against the Red Sox, an insane first foray into Major League Baseball, first 35 games, first 141 played appearances, an OPS of a thousand and eight hidden 276, 404 on base, 603 slugging eight home runs. And you're like, well, what a, well done. Like you put yourself on the radar. Well done. You get to go to your first Major League spring training. He was not even in spring training. A season ago, and he got to go to spring training this year. And you get to play in his first Major League, Grapefruit League games. I'm sure an honor for him. Yeah. And I guess there was some debate about him making the team, but he didn't perform all that well in those spring training games. And he still made the team on the strength of those 35 games. But it doesn't get to start, especially against righties early in the season. And it hits the home run against Josh Hader. And you cried. Yeah. And, and now we're looking at eight games and 20 more played appearances where, like, everybody's waiting for him to fail, not, not the people in my listening audience. I don't think I'm like you. And certainly not me, but people it feels like within that organization are like waiting for the other shoot to drop. And all he's done is in the 20 played appearances, he's had this season, had a 932 OBS couple of home runs. And yeah, big hit yesterday, albeit a blue single up the middle with the bases loaded though, is the blue Jays take game one of three against the Seattle Mariners. No pictures in the box square. That's correct. Let's talk to Mike Petriello of MLB.com working for Blue Jays Central throughout this series. Thanks for doing this, Mike. How's it going? Good morning, guys. Happy to be here. So ballpark, like, let's let's get one, your sense of the new renovations and two, how bizarrely it played last season. Like, are we going to get a sense of whether this is truly like a pitcher's ballpark this season? Or do we have to wait for three years? Like, even two years of sample, not enough to know how this new configuration plays? Yeah, not only two years, but years where they keep changing things, right? Like, I kept talking to people yesterday saying, you know what's going to be great? It's opening day 2025. We are not going to have all sorts of new things. You're not going to have half a season played, you know, in minor league ballparks because of COVID, you might just have a normal regular off season and the same ballpark two years in a row. And I do think that's going to help us a lot, right? Because you could look at the data from last year and I did this yesterday on TV and what happened mostly was it seemed like the ball didn't fly as well, you know, especially for right-handed batters, the carry just wasn't there. The numbers support that and the players say that. So I believe it's true, but it's also one year, right? It could be total noise and we've got more changes this year. I'm hoping we'll get more data and know a little bit more by this time next year, but at a certain point, we just need the ballpark to be the same for many years in a row. Yeah, it's funny you say 2025 is like, well, that will be the year that everything's normal. And it's like, yeah, depending on what happens this year, the two guys that people think of when they think of the team might not be here. So yeah, it'll be normal for the ballpark maybe, but we'll see what the team looks like between now and then, you know, as the year kind of evolves. Again, like I, this is teasing out the answer you just gave, but I'm trying to dive in here. Like, is there a point in this year where we'll have enough data to kind of make some extrapolations or we really do just need to wait? Like I do feel like as you, I don't know, I understand there's 81 home games. That's not a big sample size. Half of that certainly is even smaller. But do you think there's some point this season where we'll be able to tease something out or we really do just have to wait? Oh, I'm sure we'll try to make those connections whether the data supports it or not. Yes, that's what we do in baseball. It wasn't any good park factor tries to account for the identity of the players who are there, right? Like you wouldn't say Yankee Stadium is a great home run park just cause Aaron Judge lives there and is hitting home runs. You know, you try to compare what he does at home versus on the road. That kind of thing takes time. But I bring that up to also kind of say the opposite. Did you know this morning, as of this morning, the Blue Jays, the batteries of the second weakest hard hit rate in baseball? I did know that. I'm looking at it right now. Yeah. And that by itself, it shouldn't affect park factors cause if they go do the same thing on the road, right? Then obviously that tells you something different than if it's a big split home or the road. But, you know, if you're not hitting the ball hard, it's also a little bit hard to tell you how well the ball is going to carry because you're sort of going to hit the ball hard to do that. Okay. So is it too early to have takeaways about that, you know, the hard hit rate and the average exit velocity also being second worst in all major league baseball? Oh, they got the Oakland A's by point two of a mile per hour. So that's good. Yeah, that seems bad for a team that struggled offensively. I know not like in an overall sense, it's weird that their overall numbers last year offensively weren't as bad as the way it felt and the run scored thing. But yeah, that's jarring to be that far down the leaderboard, even 11 games into the season. Yeah. I mean, you look at the guys in the lineup, right? Do I really put a whole bunch of stock into the fact that Kevin Kiermeier is hitting 107 and George Springer is hitting 167, you know, no. Do I really think Justin Turner is going to slug 550 all year? Probably not, right? So much of this is just so early. But the problem here is I think going into the season, the team not hitting the ball that hard was kind of a big concern, you know, given the moves they made in the off season. Obviously, they didn't get the big bats and Chapman is gone. And you know, Isaac, kind of Fleva is a very good defender, but he's no one's idea of a big power bat. So I think there was a concern coming into the year that maybe this team wasn't going to have enough slug, obviously pending what kind of year you get from Vlad and Boboshette, clearly. So I'm not going to put too much into 11 games other than I was already a little worried about this and it's already starting to rear its head a little bit. So I would say for most teams, I wouldn't really care about this at all for this team since it was already a concern. It maybe gnaws at me just a little bit more. That's not a data point so much as it is. Oh, I was worried about this and maybe we're already seeing it. - Yeah, it's, you know, confirmation bias is the thing, right? You believe something to be true and you see it. You're like, yeah, I think this is what's happening. Back to the park for a second. And to your point, like we don't know, let's say they did build a pitcher's ballpark. With the team that they have, is that a bad idea? I mean, you look at the staff they have, they're going to win games 'cause the staff is great. And, you know, maybe the bats do normalize or you get some of the pop that you expect from Vlad and Bo like we talk about there. But if this is a pitcher's ballpark, I actually think for this specific 2024 iteration of the Blue Jays, that's probably a good thing. - Well, I'm going to make a statement that might get me kicked out of the country before the game tonight, I think. Is the pitching rotation great? And I say that they were great last year. Absolutely. Rios is fantastic and kukuchi. But I had a couple of concerns about the rotation coming in 'cause Noah for sure was a huge question mark and he's a million miles away. Chris Bassett had a great year last year, you know, but he's also 35 and through 200 innings. Kevin Gossman is 33. We knew he had a shoulder issue and they're trying to bow in Francis. It hasn't worked out great so far. They have got good depth, I think, in the minor leagues. But I don't think it's reasonable to look at last year's starting rotation, which was outstanding. And say, we're getting exactly that again. You know, it's probably not going to be as good, not necessarily 'cause the pitchers aren't as good. It just because so many guys had really good years last year. And if you've looked around the sport right now with pitchers, it's really hard to rely on starting pitchers to do that many years in a row. So I look at the team and I think, well, the pitching might not be quite as good. So to your point, if it's a pitchers ballpark, that might help counteract that a little bit, but the offense might not quite be as good. And if it's a pitchers ballpark, that might hurt that too. I'm not sure it's a pitchers ballpark, right? They've also cut down, however, thousands of square feet of foul territory. That'll help the hitters a little bit, right? There's a couple of foul outs you won't get and you'll live to maybe get a better hit. And I'm just not convinced that what we saw last year is the way the ballpark is going to be forever. Like kind of going back to what we said before, it's so early, it was one year. We just need to see more before I'm comfortable saying, "Oh yeah, it's a pitchers ballpark now." - Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think your reason, it's a reasonable take to have questions about this rotation. Jose Barreas was so good yesterday. He has been so good through his three starts this season and considering the narrative, especially over the weekend of pitcher injuries, that he's never spent one second on the injured list in his entire career. Mike, this is already like a very valuable thing that he did, but like guys that are able to do that, do they become more valuable? The more it just feels like one pitch ends a guy's season and we're seeing it more and more in Major League Baseball. I don't know if I would say more valuable because I think those guys already have been valuable, right? If you can throw a lot of innings at a high level, I mean, I don't have the numbers handy, but I was reading this morning that's something along the lines of guys who threw like 180 innings with an ERA under three and a half. There was only like 10 of them last year or something like that and those guys are generally, if you look at the names, I'll consider it to be very good pitchers, you know, like Chris Bassett's on that list, Pablo Lopez I think is on that list. There's a lot of difficulty in finding those guys as it is and while I don't want to diminish what we've seen in the first week, because it's very clearly a problem that's going to have to be reckoned with in terms of injuries. I do feel like we see this early in the season most years as guys leave Arizona and Florida, they come in a colder weather, intensity gets ramped up. I'm not saying that this is a fluke. I'm not saying there won't be injuries the rest of the year. Certainly there will be, but I do think if you go back and you look the first week or the first month, we tend to see it more and I think the difference this year is maybe the quality of the names, right? Some of the bigger names and guys without arm injuries and guys you wouldn't have expected. And I think that's kind of what's driving the conversation right now. - Okay, do you not think it's an existential crisis? Because, you know, we got dueling statements between the PA and Major League Baseball. It does feel like, yeah, it feels like a big deal, but maybe it's just, it's normal stuff and it's just the names that are bigger this time around. - Well, it's definitely a big deal. I mean, it's been a big deal for 10 years or longer, right? I don't think the pace you're seeing this week will continue all season long. I do obviously think you'll see a lot more elbow injuries. I mean, that's clear. When everybody's out there trying to throw max effort all the time, I mean, we have seen this for many years. And as far as the clock goes, you know, it's hard to sit here and say the clock has absolutely zero effect, right? I don't think you could prove that. It's also hard to sit here and act like pitchers just started getting hurt last year. We've seen guys get hurt many times, even Spencer Strider, who I don't think we know is having Tommy John yet, but it sounds like that's the direction this is heading. He already had one in college when he wasn't even throwing that hard before there wasn't a clock there. So like I said, I wouldn't rule anything out. If we want to say the clock is part of it, that is very possible, but it's just so difficult to believe that it's suddenly the primary driver when we've been seeing arm injuries going up for years and years and years, pretty much in correlation with velocity going up and up and up. - Yeah, I think I'm pretty sure it's an old video. I'm sure you've seen it that's been kind of making the rounds of Tyler Glass now talking about the removal of spider tack and that being as much an issue and kind of forcing him to have to grip the ball harder. I think we all would agree that there's no world where baseball is getting rid of the pitch clock. It has been too good. You cannot put that genie back in the bottle. Could you see a world where there is some more of an understanding of going, and again, you're not going to say, "Hey, here's your spider tack, Eric Cole. Go do whatever you want with it." But do you think that that could be a kind of halfway point or an all of branch to the pitchers or the PA for lack, or also of just saying like, "Hey, okay, we understand. Maybe we overstepped a little too far, but we also know how much we want to see baseball or offense improve across baseball." And it feels like that's counterintuitive to that as well. I just wonder what your thought is on that. Like the pitch clock definitely being an issue, but the removal of the spider tack and the more stringent checks we see now, I imagine that would have a big, big part in it as well. - Maybe, I saw his comments. I thought they were thoughtful. I'm not aware of any great evidence that proves or disproves that. I think it's a hard thing to study. I do think guys were getting hurt before the spider tack was banned, right? Plenty of guys were using sticky stuff and getting hurt. So it's not like that is the obvious inflection point here. But I do know that since the sticky stuff was banned, you've heard a lot of players complaining about, the baseballs, they want it to be pre-tacked, and they just tried this a couple of times. And for whatever reason, they just haven't been able to find one that works. So I think that is something that everybody would like to get to. I'm just not sure a version of that baseball exists right now. So is there a happy medium where maybe the pitchers can use something else to get grip, but isn't spider tack that makes the spin go wild and everybody striking out and saying possibly? I just think if it was an easy answer to that, then they would have done it yesterday. I don't think that exists right now. - Back to the Blue Jays offense just for a second here, Mike. Because I believe you wrote a story when David Schneider-Mania was first happening as to whether this was sustainable or what are the things that he's doing and can we extrapolate that? And it did seem to me in reading that, that it was like, okay, maybe this guy's not gonna be an MVP candidate, but like, yeah, it seems like the things he's doing, which is taking walks, having good play to appearances. And then when he gets a pitch to hit, he hits it hard that that seems like a thing you would want to do as an offensive player. He's been good this season. Every opportunity he's gotten to play, which is now getting, it's increasing. And he's allowed to start against a really good right-handed pitcher in yesterday's starter, Luis Castillo. We'll see if he starts tonight. Dalton Varsho was the guy that was not in the starting lineup yesterday. We know Dalton Varsho's value as a defender. And yeah, if the offense is better than it was a season ago, if it's closer to what we saw in Arizona, that's a very valuable player. But we haven't seen that as a BlueJ yet. I mean, does Dalton Varsho's defense make him, like, is the gap in defense worth the gap in offense between he and David Schneider? Well, it sort of depends on what positions you think they're willing to play David Schneider at. Is he strictly a left fielder DH? Do they actually trust him to play second base, third base? Those are the kind of questions that open up a lot of possibilities. Because if he's just going to be a left fielder in DH, that's tough, because then if he's DHing, then Justin Turner isn't playing, right? If he's in left field, then Varsho isn't playing. And that's obviously a huge hit on defense, even though I know Varsho hasn't hit. If you think they're willing to play him at second base or third base, then I think that opens up a lot of possibilities. Because you've got, I know, a kind of a left. It was a very good defender. It can play either one of those spots. You've got Bijio at second base, obviously. What I'd like to see a little bit more is maybe not so much lefty, righty, platooning, but kind of offense and defense platooning. Start Schneider at one of those positions. And then you know you've got a guy off the bench who can come in and add some defense, because the way the offense is going, like, yes, I expect more, obviously, from Bijio and even Kiremeyer. But who is a potential breakout that, aside from guys who have done it before? And maybe it's probably Schneider, and I'm not sure it's anybody else, right? So you want to give him some run. You want to give him a shot to see how real this can be. And if that means you have to, you know, suck it up on defense a little bit, you know, maybe you don't do it when Chris Bassett's pitching. Maybe you do it on a pitcher basis. You worry less about the pitchers that he's facing and more about how he fits in with the rest of the roster. I do think there's ways to get him with playing time. I like that except Chris Bassett's starting tonight. And I wanted to play tonight. So yeah, but like in theory, that makes sense. Sorry about that. How dare you? Mike, appreciate it. Thanks, man. Hey, guys. Thanks a lot. Take care. You too, there's Mike Patrell, MLB.com, and Blue Jays Central. More and more people coming around to, yeah, like look at the bottom five guys in the lineup. Where is the big offensive breakthrough coming from those guys? Like Isaiah, kind of full F01. He's going to hit 30 bombs this year. I don't think so. I probably not. Probably not for the rest of his life. Yeah. So it's level baseball. Yeah. So if it's offense you need, and yesterday felt like an offensive explosion, it wasn't. They scored five runs. Uh, yeah, you know, the famous 500 right opening day. Yeah. I mean, that just for you, by the way, the, the, the Dodgers score like five runs in their sleep. Like they just, they're not playing right now, but they just scored five runs. Score bug. Five nothing Dodgers. It's the first pitches yet to be thrown. Yeah. It's like, uh, at the end of American gladiators, the eliminator where you get like the advantage to start the, yeah, or I guess what they do now at the FedEx cup where you start with the lead. Minus 10. Yeah. Yeah. That's what the Dodgers are doing. Blue Jays don't have that advantage. They just need to scrape and claw and get their way to five runs in a baseball game, which again felt like an explosion. Um, that's what David Schneider in the lineup going two for four with a car, a couple of RBIs. I don't, I don't think they can afford to, to sit anybody that provides above average offense. No, you need them in. I also love it when a smart person says the thing I said the day before because I had thrown out the idea of you do it based on the, like, I agree with you that it is becoming, the evidence is becoming so overwhelming. You start with a place that David Schneider is in the lineup and then you kind of reverse engineer it from there. But if you are of the belief that this team clearly seems to still be of the belief that you need to get them in there and he being Varshow, it's like maybe you do kind of look at it again. Like, like Mike just said, you look at it of your own picture, not the matchup of what you're getting on offense, but the matchup of what you need defensively. I'm with you though, that doesn't matter as much. You got to get some hits. Can't win a game zero to minus one. Haven't seen it yet. Don't think I ever will get the guy who hits in there. I'm with you. Don't look at me like I'm disagreeing with you because I'm not just, I'm not sitting here screaming, Ben is right. Yeah, you should. Okay, Ben is right. Yeah, thank you. With that one thing and most things wrong. It's fine. Yeah, like he's always going to be replaced defensively at the end of games that they're leading. That's that's fine. And I think David Schneider understands that that that yeah, he's not. Hell of a thing. If he's like, how dare you take me out? I'm the babe. That's the thing. He's like not doing that ever. Like even though, and I get it, like he knows who he is in his pedigree and yadda yadda yadda, but like also there must be a growing frustration. If I'm getting frustrated, don't you think like David Schneider after he hits a home run off Josh haters like, Oh, that's kind of weird. Like I've done is like, for sure. Of course. How could you not? That's kind of bizarre. Anyways, enough David Schneider for a second. Wow. Okay. Mike must have been in the club yesterday. Mike. Mike said the thing that could be the most frightening for this team. Oh, if the, yeah, the pitching is and as good and was the thing that we were on alert for this season, are we? Briel so good. Yeah, I don't question Kevin Gossman. No, I thought it was a fair point by me to bring up heading into the season. Yeah, I don't think he's going to fall off some cliff. Even if Kevin Gossman is your number two with burrios being an ace, you can, that's okay. You can do that. You say Kukuchi, I did view as a guy that was a potential regression candidate, but like he's figured something out, man, because the fastball always played. He just couldn't put it in the zone. Yeah. And the pitch clock, I mean, everybody else's elbow is exploding, but for him, he's like, Oh, it made me good. Yeah. He's like, I love it. Make the whole game out of the clock. Why didn't yeah, more, make it one second. He'd be the best pitcher in baseball. No, it does feel like it took the brain out of it for you. Say Kukuchi and he's now good. Chris Bassett, though, is the guy who doesn't throw upper 90s, right? He's doing it with guts and guile and career high 200 innings a season ago. And not like Jose burrios has never been hurting his entire professional life. Yeah, he's the guy that you do kind of, you're maybe looking at tonight's start, like a little side out. You're like, what, what are you? And if like Bowden Francis is nothing. And so you got 250 rotation that you got question marks about. Okay. That's a different deal. We'll say I had Chris Bassett hasn't been awful awful, but he hasn't been the guy that we saw last season and what you need out of Bassett hinges a lot on what you get out of the first three guys we talked about in that conversation. Like if burrios is what you saw yesterday, Kevin Gosman is close to what he's been. And Kakuchi is good Kakuchi, then you have a certain floor that you can have Bassett fall to. But if one of those guys isn't the full fledged version of themselves, then you can't afford Bassett to take some massive step back. So I think he is the hinge point, but it's also about what happens kind of in front of him. And if those guys can stay elite. Yeah. And on the one hand, it looks like a good match up against Mariner scene that hasn't hit yet. But they're going to hit eventually. Well, they're due. Yeah. All right, game two tonight from Rogers. We'll be back tomorrow. It's another edition of the Fan Morning Show. Ben Ann is right gunning sports at 5.9 in the Fed. Good morning. [MUSIC]
