Episode 52: Justin Topa Is The Mariners' Best Reliever, Bryan Woo Is Better Than You Think, And Lyle Is Banned From T-Mobile Park

00:00:00 Speaker 1: Welcome to episode number fifty two of the Marine Layer Podcast. We'll talk about Brian Wu's evolution in the big leagues this year, including his edition of a cutter and how much he's been throwing it. We'll talk about Justin Topa's recent run of dominance in the bullpen. We'll go down on the farm and take a look around the minor leagues and pick out a standout Mariner's minor leaguer, a look around baseball with our MLB wrap around another Russell Wilson Umpire of the Week, and we'll close out the show with Speak Your Mind. 00:00:26 Speaker 2: And before we start the show, a reminder to you guys that if you're listening on our audio platforms, head over to YouTube check us out on our video side too. If you head over there, hit subscribe, like comment, turn those notification bells on that way. You know when we go live, you know when we post an episode. So make sure to go over and do that and hit subscribe to our YouTube channel. We just passed one thousand followers, by the way, or subscribers, I should say that. 00:00:49 Speaker 1: Let's go that's pretty cool, pretty cool. 00:00:52 Speaker 2: And then if you go over to our audio platforms, Apple Spotify, Google, Amazon, Go follow us, download our episodes and give us that five star review. The five star review and the downloads help us out big time. So it only takes a couple extra seconds, so make sure to go do that and then follow us on social media Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube shorts at Marine Layer Pod. 00:01:14 Speaker 1: Let's get it rolling and we welcome you to this episode of the Marine Layer Podcast, part of the Just Baseball Podcast network. Recording a day early on Wednesday, August thirtieth, and Lyle, I came to a conclusion this week. Would you like to know what it is? 00:01:42 Speaker 2: I'm anxiously waiting. 00:01:44 Speaker 1: Okay, I after lots of consideration, about twenty four hours worth of consideration, I would say near twenty four hours worth of consideration, have come to the realization that you should be banned from attending Tuesday Mariner games. 00:01:59 Speaker 2: You have to say for yourself, coincidence or not, that I was there and the Mariners lose to the Oakland A's it's all it's all on me. I mean it's all on me. It's it's my fault. 00:02:12 Speaker 1: It's tough for a bit, because not only do the Mariners need to beat the A's every single time they play on this season. Not only is one of our friends one of the most obnoxious A's fans you will ever or he claims he's an ACE fan, you get the point of all time, but also it just so happens that you show up and George Kirby gets scratched with an illness, and all of a sudden, Julio's foot is hurting, and then Ty France says the ball go off his wrist, and then JP Crawford slides laid into second base and is hobbling. And the only correlation I can really draw here is Lyle Goldstein in the ballpark. Hmm. 00:02:55 Speaker 2: I've been there on a Monday once before, and Paul Sewald got traded about five seconds before I walked through the door. We got that Jeff pass and notification on our phones. So is it weekday games as a whole I'm just banned from or has that been retracted because Rojas and Canzon have been so good? 00:03:11 Speaker 1: How about Monday through Thursday? Because I still miss Paul. 00:03:15 Speaker 2: That's fair. Usually we are there on weekends. In all seriousness, that's when TJ and I are usually at the ballpark doing content. Is those Friday, Saturday Sunday games when they're at home. We coordinated to be there on Tuesday this week because we worked out of time to talk to Luis Castillo, to get them on our social media channels and ask him some of those fun questions. And that was just the day it worked out, and certainly to get a chance to talk to Louise, I was like, yeah, I will carve time out of a weekday to go down to the ballpark and do it. So we already posted one of our clips with them on our channel, which is pretty cool. What I didn't think was going to happen is a couple hours after we would see arguably the Mariner's best pitcher, you can make an argument for George Kirby and the Mariner's best hitter both get scratched from the game less than an hour BEFO for that, I did not expect. 00:04:02 Speaker 1: Yeah, or did you expect it because you were the reason for it. 00:04:08 Speaker 2: Yeah, this is all getting pinned on me. 00:04:10 Speaker 1: It is like literally the only thing that changes, right. All those tea people who are planning on being at the ballpark, they probably bought those tickets a while ago. I know, the funco pops are really popular. Someone who actually works at my station made it a point to go up to Seattle here from the Corvallis Alburn area to get a phone go pop specifically. And the Mariners had over forty four thousand people there on a Tuesday night, by the way, which is bonkers in and of itself. But all those people have already planned to be there, all the beat writers, all the media, they know they're going to be there. But us, you know, we're coordinating. We're trying to get Louise this time and trying to get Louise that time. And because the first time you went to get Luis was the trade deadline, right, yeah, it was that. So I think you trying to get Louis during the week is really the core issue here. Now. If you want to see all of Lyle's hard work, go check out our social media pages wherever you get your social media sans Facebook at Marine Layer Pod. So, the fact that three guys get scratched from a lineup, or three guys eventually are out of a game by the third inning and the Mariners, one of the most popular Mariners in the clubhouse gets traded, I think you know that's that's some pretty hard work to get to get that if you think. 00:05:26 Speaker 2: About it, weekends only is what I'm hearing out of your mouth. That's it. 00:05:32 Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. I think so because you know, results speak for themselves, as they always say, especially in Major League Baseball. Your record is your record is what what? What it is? Right, That's what it is. 00:05:45 Speaker 2: Do I make a counterpoint here and say that that is the only game the Mariners of lots of the A's all season. 00:05:51 Speaker 1: That's even more to your more to the point, there's no counter to that. You just you hurt yourself even more. It's like, so, not only are the two games I showed up to try and interview Luis, the most popular figure in the clubhouse got traded, Julio and George got scratched pre game, Ty gets scratched out of the lineup. In the middle of the game, JP Crawford looks like you potentially hurt himself, and the Mariners lost to the ACE for the first time all season, a team they should never lose to. I'm no lawyer, but the cards are not stacked in your favor here. I don't think the jury's ruling in your favor. There sir, maybe. 00:06:26 Speaker 2: I'll have to rest my case. No more Tuesday games, period. 00:06:29 Speaker 1: No, are we reaching a settlement here. Been watching a lot of suits, so I'm ready for my rad to I got my I'm brushed up on lawyer skills. So you want to reach a settlement here, just no more Tuesdays, No more Mondays or Tuesdays. 00:06:42 Speaker 2: My settlement, however, is the Mariners play the Angels Monday and Tuesday. And as we've started to promote a little bit here for a couple of weeks, now we've got some promotions to do on that Monday and Tuesday in a couple of weeks when the Angels are in town. So I may have to put that whole thing on pause for an exception. 00:06:59 Speaker 1: Mm. Yeah, we're gonna have to I don't know, we're gonna have to talk about this. Yeah, I mean, yes, you're gonna be there. But now, like this is the litmus test of how much your cursed aura is gonna affect this team. 00:07:14 Speaker 2: That's true, and the Angels are about as bad as you can get at this point. We'll get into that later. So if I go in a couple of weeks during those weekday games and they have a bad series. Maybe we'll have to circle back to this. 00:07:26 Speaker 1: Then, maybe like I'm actually never letting you go to the ballpark again the first four days of the week. 00:07:33 Speaker 2: Ooh man, I've got some pressure here. There's pressure on me for the Mariners to win in a couple of weeks. 00:07:38 Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll have to see. Let's get to our Mariner's storylines first up on our Mariners storylines. This idea came to light earlier this week on Monday, where we see Brian Wu, despite a pitch count, manage six brilliant innings against the Oakland A's, and I thought we would check in on this, Well, how have you seen Brian Wu's evolution as a big league pitcher throughout these months that he's been up with the Mariners. 00:08:05 Speaker 2: First thing that jumps out is his fastball. What all five of these Mariners starters have that's so unique about this rotation. All five of them have true fastball value and Brian Wu is certainly in that category. The run value that Wu has on both his four seamer and his sinker aka two seamer, the two pitch types are pretty similar each your three. So when a fastball is coming out of Brian Wu's hand, the run value is six, and positive run value for a pitcher means he is pitching well and guys are not hitting him. So when Brian Wood throws fastballs, it gives hitters nightmares. The biggest thing I've taken away is that Brian Wu fastball despite getting lit up in that first start against the Rangers where we saw him leave a lot over the middle in his career, in his debut, we see now that this is a very, very upper echelon big league heater. 00:08:54 Speaker 1: There's a really good segment that's probably still up on the MLB network Twitter pages, is probably on their Facebook page, probably on their YouTube as well, about the uniqueness of the slots of the Mariners, because Lyle mentioned, like, all five Mariners starters have fastball value. But the reason they all have fastball value, as MLB Network put it, and I thought this was brilliant, is that none of them are average in any way. The worst thing you can do is be average at something, so from like a release point, an extension point, a spin point, you don't want to be average in any of those senses because that's what most of the big league hitters see. But Brian Wu is like the epitome of that. Right, he's like the opposite. I think you're going to reference something about this, but I'll just start it if you notice, like what makes Brian Wu so unique as a pitcher is how low he releases the ball. We see a lot about how high you can release the ball and how intimidating it is to have a ball come like straight down at you. What about a ball like writing up, because that's what Brian Wu does so well. He almost like launches the ball up. It's not actually up because he's on a ma but that low release angle that he has really works to his benefit and we've kind of seen that, and it helps when you can mix two fastballs that move in completely different directions. 00:10:12 Speaker 2: Him and Logan Gilbert are polar opposites in that way. Logan is very over the top. He gets right on top of you with his fastball. He's got the really long extension. Brian Wu releases it from a pretty low point, but the actual stuff on it makes it near impossible to hit. So what they call induced vertical break, which is a fancy name for essentially fastball rise, Brian Wu has next level fastball rise on his pitches. The break he gets on that fastball, aka the elevation and the rise is about fifteen inches and between the low release angle and the high rising fastball, man does it give hitters nightmares? And people not just not just like fans who like watching Brian WU but actual front office people, media people, analysts. They rave about Brian louse heater because it's really unique and it gives hitters fits. 00:11:05 Speaker 1: Here's something I'll propose. I'm looking at a savant page and the thought pops into my head that, like, not many rookies savant pages look like this. I can't really color it if you're watching on YouTube or listening on wherever podcast platform you're listening on. But his savant page is better than George Kirby's was when he was a rookie. His savant page is better than Logan Gilberts was when he was a rookie. And I was thinking, Okay, who's the best rookie pitcher this year? Who's gonna be the best full season rookie pitcher? I think it's probably Tanner Biby, right, he would say so in Cleveland Low unless she had any objections. 00:11:42 Speaker 2: That's probably right. Cannon Bibeus I think it's actually said byby but Biby, Yeah, he is some shot to win Rookie of the Year. It's not a slam dung, but he is very much in the mix. 00:11:53 Speaker 1: So I was like, okay, so look at his Brian was blows his out of the water. Now, remember all of these are expects, right, is based on the quality of contact, not on the results. But regardless, I mean, Brian Wuz looks like someone who's like in his third season, but he's sixty innings into his big league career, and in terms of total innings this year, I guess he's at one hundred and nine, and which is another thing we'll talk about here in a little bit of his workload and how they're going to manage him going forward. But it's just it's just marvelous to see that even coming off the injured list and being a little rusty and being on a pitch count, he still manages to actually mow down the A's lineup, which again isn't actually that much of an achievement, but we will will highlight it as well. I want to talk to you about his cutter, because that's a pitch he started highlighting more and more and more as this season has gone along, and we saw the most usage out of it on Monday versus the A's. He got his high as chase rate on it over fifty percent fifty five percent to be exact, on Monday against the A's and he's almost replaced his slider with that pitch, and I thought that was kind of inter that he has turned his more sweeping slider into a cutter, which essentially acts as like a gyro bullet slider. And he's been very effective and getting guys to chase as well. 00:13:14 Speaker 2: Continue to add more pitches. It's pretty I mean, it is pretty remarkable. Sometimes you'll see guys do this right. Just like how Logan Gilbert ditch his change up he preferred the splitter. Brian Wu ups to go to the cutter. And he's got a big arsenal for a rookie too. He didn't come in here. He's different than Bryce Miller in this way too. We talked about how Logan Gilbert and Wu were different. Well, the two rookies are different too, and Miller and Wu. Miller is very fastball dependent and don't get us wrong, Wu will highlight his fastball, but Bryce Miller is really a two pitch guy. At this point, Brian Wu's arsenal is very large, and he has added pitches like this cutter, which have proven to be very effective. I think people still believe there's some room for that cutter to grow. But when it's on, it's really really good. 00:13:57 Speaker 1: And I think about it this way. He just throws cutter pretty off. It's not like a hard Corbyn Burns cutter. But if you think about the direction those three pitches goes. His two seam fastball slash sinker runs to his arm side. His fastball for the most part like tiny bit of armside run, but for the most part, you know it's a fastball. It goes up, it doesn't really move horizontally. But then his cutter moves towards his glove side. And if you think about someone throwing their pitches hard, harder, right, you'd say, okay. So Brian Wu has a fastball that he now essentially throws to the glove side, is a fastball that rises and goes up. And he also has a fastball that goes to his arm side and goes in. And those were his three primary pitches on Monday, and knows about as effective as we've ever seen. That might not be his repertoire every single start, but he's shown that, like he's pretty comfortable with those pitches, and it allows for a little bit more consistency. When you're dealing with less break on all of your pitches, you can throw more strikes. And as we mentioned, you will say, well, Brian would needs to work on his command. Well, what better way to work on your command than if you know you have a better idea of where your pitches are going, like you did on Monday. 00:15:05 Speaker 2: So, just as a refresher for people who don't remember the final line on Monday, Brian Wu against the A's went six innings, three hits, no runs, one walk, five strikeouts. Now there's people out there that will think to themselves when they see fastballs watching on TV, oh, you got to sit on the fastball, wait for the fastball, take advantage of the heater. Well, when you're Brian Wu and you have a fastball that moves straight, a fastball that breaks to his right, and a fastball that breaks to his left, that's not an easy task for hitters to try and figure out because if you see a straight fastball and then all of a sudden it just moves right at the end of the pitch. There's no preparing for that. This is why it gives guys fits. He has essentially three different fastballs, like you outline, and you don't know which way it's going. 00:15:51 Speaker 1: And let me clarify again, I used it in like a general sense. His cutter's really not like a not like a true fastball, but it is a harder pitch. I mean he throws in the upper eighties, so it's like close enough. It does drop quite a bit, as like thirty inches of drop on it, which is very similar to his slider. The only difference again between those two pitches is that his cutter only breaks four inches to his glove side opposed to I think it was thirteen inches for his slider. So that's interesting. But I thought it was an interesting case study on Monday because using primarily those three pitches, he ends up throwing fifteen of twenty first pitch strikes and one three ball count in the question of yeah, you know where your stuff is going, and and the data point we got on Monday kind of shows that. Now if you look on the other side, if you look at his slider, he's throwing his slider less. If you line up, you can go on Baseball Savant and look at pitch percentages of your cutter game by game this season, and you look at pitch percentage of your slider game by game this season. Not a perfect straight line, but his cutter overall has trended down. His cutter, sorry cutter, cutter is trended up in usage his his his slider. Yeah, lost of words there. His slider has been moving down. It's down in pitch percentage per start. And then his chase rate overallspers cutter as well as he's thrown it more has continued to go up. So I think that's a pretty positive development for Brian Wu if he's really feeling comfortable with his repertoire. Again, I think back to Logan Gilbert's rookie season. He hated throwing his off speed pitches because he didn't know, he had no command of them, he didn't know where they were going, and they really weren't effective strikeout pitches. He'd becomes so fastball reliant. Well, now Brian Wu has a pitch that's not necessarily his fastball that he's comfortable throwing and it's effective it's just so much more advanced than what we saw from Logan Gilbert as a rookie. I mean even you could say to some sense George Kirby, George Kirby's stuff, as we mentioned this year, is infinitely better this year than it was last year. He did have his times last year where he just couldn't miss bats. As offen, it's not the problem this year for George, and Brian is showing that now as a twenty three year old. Pretty impressive. 00:18:00 Speaker 2: Do you hear the story they were talking about with Trent Blank and Brian Wu on the broadcast on Monday? 00:18:06 Speaker 3: Uh? 00:18:06 Speaker 2: No, So this was a great story. So Trent Blank, who is the Mariners to give him the exact correct terminology, he is the director of pitching for the Mariners, And they were talking about that twenty twenty one draft class where they drafted Brian Wu in the sixth round. A lot of people thought that was way too high to be taken Wu because he did not throw a lot of innings, his numbers on paper were not good at cal Poly, and he'd had injury problems. People thought that was a bit of a stretch to go take him in the sixth round. Well, if you ask Trent Blank, he said, if I had the first pick one one, I'm taking Brian Wu in that draft. He said, I am taking Brian Wu at number one overall in twenty twenty one because they absolutely fell in love with all the stuff and the numbers that were just blowing up their radars when they saw him in college. Now, they didn't take him in the first round. They settled and took him in the sixth. But here he is looking like he's looking right now, and we'll see where he progresses forward. Because there's a lot of people that believe Wu's upside could be in the top end of this rotation, maybe ahead of guys like Bryce Miller. 00:19:11 Speaker 1: I do raise my eyebrow to that just a little bit. But their bet has paid off. They did believe in him as a big leaguer and he has performed, so they were right. They're right on that. Maybe not one one that might be a stretch. 00:19:24 Speaker 2: Well, Trent Blank doesn't get to make the pick. To be fair, He's that's just what he said. He loved Wu that much that that's when he wanted him. He said, if it was up to me, that's what I'm doing. 00:19:33 Speaker 1: What are they gonna do with his workload? So he's at one hundred and nine ins. We're nearing up on a stretch as of recording this. There's gonna be an off day tomorrow, and then when this episode publishes, they're gonna start a thirteen game stretch with no off days in the start of September, where I believe they are only they're only two off day after after tomorrow, there are only two off days the rest of the season. How are they gonna how are they gonna balance this? 00:19:58 Speaker 2: So Scott Servis talked about this on Tuesday in his media session. They did say that they're going to monitor it. They did say they're going to keep a close eye on it. If you saw Brian Wu get pulled after six innings the other night when his pitch count was really low, this would explain why. First off, the Mariners were torturing the aids in that game. It was a blowout and they decided this is a perfect opportunity to get Wu off his feet and keep his pitch count down. Now, what they do on this road trip, it's probably a possibility they skip one of his starts. He was also just on the il just as a way to make sure he is not overworking himself. They do have Luke Weaver, who made the spots start on Tuesday. If they need somebody to fill in again for Wu, they have someone. I don't know exactly what's going to happen, but we know that Brian Wu is on an innings limit. He hasn't been shut down, which is great for the Mariner's sake because he's been so useful for him. But if he's not going to get shut down, they're probably finding unique ways to just plug and play him a little bit to make sure he's not getting overworked, and part of that might be missing a start on this upcoming road trip. 00:20:57 Speaker 1: I do think it's interesting that they say innings limit because he's whatever limit they had probably set preseason, he's already passed it. I guarantee that, like he's he's more doubled than his innings than he had last year, more than doubled, and that just like that just doesn't happen. But we saw the same thing with Kirby down the stretch last year. I mean, they monitor him a little bit in August, but like once they needed him in September, I mean, he was still full go for the most part, so I'm I'm curious. I would say the final couple weeks of the season, he's probing out the training meeals off like they're because they're gonna need him, Like they gotta win these games still, right, they're looking out for Brian MoU but they also got to they also gotta win these games, so responsibly, they're gonna put them out there and they're just gonna let them pitch. I have a hard time seeing them actually shutting them down or anything. I mean, it might be one start where he goes three innings. I would say he piggybacks, he goes three, Luke Weaver goes two or three, and then the bullpen takes the rest. Right, I think that's probably would be especially now that the rosters are expanding, you can afford to do that a little bit more. 00:21:58 Speaker 2: Yeah, And look, Kirby didn't have the injury problems that Brian Wu had. But you look at the last ten games, all against the Astros and Rangers, and you don't need us to tell you that the Astros and Rangers are neck and neck with the Mariners in this als race, and every game's going to matter. That the last ten games may decide the season, so they're going to need their full rotation going and at the top of their game, and that includes Brian Wu. I do want to give one little last shout out here to this really good article from Pitcherless. Shout out to Jack Bully that wrote it. If we haven't sold you enough on just how much people believe in Brian Wu's stuff. The headline of this article is Brian Wu's repertoire is the blueprint for modern pitching. Yeah, the blueprint. And basically what this article gets into without reading every detail, is that while he does need to work on command, he is so far and removed from the old school pitcher type that hit your spots, throw strikes, pinpoint command type guy. He is a guy that has rediculous stuff. In fact, they headline in this article or they outline that they don't believe he actually has pure stuff to improve on, like they think his stuff is all there. It is just about refining some of his pitches and crisp and making sure that command is crisp moving forward. But they outline with all of his pitches just how good and effective it can be, and they basically believe his future has just sky high limitations. 00:23:29 Speaker 1: That's crazy. Like just remember Brian Goo hasn't even pitched two hundred innings since college. Mm hm, remember that he hasn't. 00:23:37 Speaker 2: That that's how much people love stuff and they outline it with all these pitches. Again, you can check out this Jack Foley article on pitcher List just detailing what makes Brian Lou so unique because there are not many like him, especially with the stuff he possesses and how many pitches he can throw. It's the Mariner's got a good one. They got a really good one in Brian Lou. 00:23:58 Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna have to read that article. Glad you pointed that out. 00:24:02 Speaker 2: Before we get to our second storyline, here a quick word from our friends at the Columbia Athletic Club. Columbia Athletic Club in Juanita Bay in Kirkland is a full service, family owned athletic club that's been inspiring healthier lives since nineteen eighty one. Amenities include all new strength and cardio equipment, free weights, basketball and squash courts, saltwater pools and hot tubs, and so much more. Included with your membership our group exercise classes with the likes of Yoga, Zoomba, bar, group, power, and cycling. The best promotions of the year start now through the fall season. Get started with a free five day trial at Columbiaathletic dot com. That's Columbiaathletic dot com. 00:24:45 Speaker 3: This fall, stream your favorites and discover more with Disney Plus, Hulu and ESPN Plus together. Watch the highly anticipated new season of Loki and see the ghost materialize in Haunted Mansion on Disney Plus. Much more frights with the Boogeyman, an American horror story delegate, on Hulu and on ESPN Plus. Get into the action with college football and NFL. All of these and more streaming now. Get the Disney Bundle with plans starting at nine to ninety nine a month, plans with ESPN Plus starting at fourteen ninety nine a month. Terms apply. See Disney Bundle dot com for details. 00:25:26 Speaker 2: Second storyline, TJ. I'm just gonna go ahead and say it. The Mariner's best reliever is justin Topa. 00:25:33 Speaker 1: And I didn't you know. I didn't realize this run he was on, to be honest, until we decided yesterday to talk about this, I wouldn't have noticed the fact that he has not given up. He's given up one earned run in his last twenty three and a third innings, dated back to that National Series in which we declared the season was over, Like, that's how long in that span since that series he's given up one earned run. So yeah, by results, yes, yes he is. 00:26:04 Speaker 2: Now that is until today today being the day we're recording on Wednesday, where he did give up one run to the A's. But that being said, dude has been on an absolute terror So entering Wednesday, he's had an sixty eighth er since June fifteenth. Since July first, it's been forty. And this run he gave up on Wednesday against the A's snapped a streak of what was eighteen consecutive scoreless appearances. Justin TOPA has been absolutely lethal. 00:26:35 Speaker 1: And this also comes at the right time where Matt Brash and Androis Munnos have been struggling to sort of figure themselves out in August. For as hot as the Mariners have been in August hasn't come without some struggles from your two best stuff relievers in Brash and Munos. And Munyos had a nice clean inning today to finish up the game with the A's but it hasn't been all easy sailing for him as being he's been trying to navigate his sophomore season with the Mariners and Brash as well in his own sophomore season, it's not been one hundred percent consistent. Well, justin TOPA, just this random thirty two year old rookie who the Mariners traded from the Brewers for Joseph Hernandez in the off season. Uh, doesn't seem to be having that issue. I mean, he is very confident in his stuff and it's worked remarkably. Here's the best stat of all of that, of what you just mentioned in that stretch that I mentioned, he's not giving up a single barrel, not one and a barrel. By the way, for those who forgot what that is, it's the right combination of exsit velocity and launch angle. A barrel is essentially what you want for a home run. Essentially, you hit it between X and X, and you hit it over ninety five miles an hour. 00:27:49 Speaker 2: Is TOPA. Technically a rookie. I thought he'd surpassed that. I mean, I know he does like throw money innings, but. 00:27:54 Speaker 1: I think he is technically a rookie. Isn't he let me look, I'll sniff this out. 00:28:00 Speaker 2: Okay, while you look my bet on that is no, by the way, but let's see while you look that up. I would also like to mention, just piggybacking off of what you said with him not giving up barrels. Evidently he doesn't really give up home runs. Like his home run per nine rate is about zero point nine. He doesn't give up the long ball. Nobody hits them hard either, as evident from the barrels because he is ranked in the ninety eighth percentile in barrel percentage. He is ranked in the ninety sixth percentile in XCRA. He's in the ninety fifth percentile in expected slugging. Nobody hits topa hard. He gets so many soft ground balls and weak contact. This is what makes him good, and this is what the Mariner's thought could make him good when they traded for him. Is he gets so much soft contact from his pitch repertoire. I mean, he's a big sinker slider guy, and as a result, people don't really hit him. 00:28:54 Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't really find an answer on this. Yeah, I did find all of that. I Yeah, I guess you're right because He's like he has two full years of service technically by the counter. Right, So that's right. I'm maybe I was just misreading something. Yeah, man, dude, that sinker is unreal. It is so so so effective. Got like I mentioned with the barrel thing, right, the best thing about a sinker is you can't do the most damage with it. And we think about, like, we think about like the ideal Mariner's bullpen arms say last year, right, they last year in terms of what was that number I have here? It was, oh, it was ground bowl rate. Right, we think about the Mariner's bullpen as a whole. Right, this year they've been one of the best bullpens in baseball at generating ground balls. They were third in baseball and generating ground balls. Last year they were twenty eighth. Right without justin guys like Justin Tobole, without guys like Gabe Spire or Taylor sauce to who generate a lot of ground balls. It's what Justin Toba does. Is over all been an evolution of this Mariner's bullpen from what they were last year to what they are this year and this year despite less household names and training. Paul Seawell, the way. The effectiveness has continued because they've found ways to evolve and be effective by instead of getting a bunch of strikeouts, is getting a bunch of ground balls. 00:30:22 Speaker 2: Topa's ground ball rate is fifty eight percent. Yeah, that's high. That is very, very high. But I will say about Topa, while he gets a bunch of ground balls and soft contact, let's not twist the narrative here. He's not getting ground balls as being this guy who throws, oh, ninety one ninety two. He's a little bit of a he has a little bit of a low nineties fastball. No, he throws ninety eight miles an hour, justin Topa throws ninety seven to ninety eight miles an hour. He is not just hitting his spots and generating weak contact. He is hitting his spots. His command's been pretty good, but he throws with heat. It's not like he's throwing in the low nine. He just gets guys to swing and hit into the hit balls into the ground because they cannot time up his hard fast or his hard sinker. 00:31:08 Speaker 1: I think is it safe to say that he's the twenty twenty one Paul Seawoald or the twenty twenty two Eric Swanson of this bullpen. 00:31:16 Speaker 2: Yeah, he is the breakout guy. And it's not to it's not to throw a side Spire or Sawceto or some of the other guys that have really started to help out, even somebody like Isaiah Campbell. But this is just highlighting that the guy you didn't expect to be much of anything at the time of the trade has turned into arguably the highest leverage arm in the bullpen. If that's what you mean, I am fully in agreement. 00:31:39 Speaker 1: Yeah, and I got there's enough. Like, speaking of good articles, look at Landing wrote a good article on Justin Topa that if you would like to learn more about his pitch mix some things that like I don't even have written down here that is included, including his cutter. Very very very interesting stuff. Too many numbers for me to say in this segment, but some very interesting stuff regards list murders wouldn't be where they are right now without just Topa, they wouldn't. 00:32:05 Speaker 2: It's interesting. He's kind of taken over Muno's's old role when Paul Seawald got traded. The roles were Seawald would usually close Munyo's would face the best guys in the order, Brash was the bridge guy. Now Brash's role hasn't really changed, but now not all the time, but more often. You will see Munyo's strictly pitch the ninth and you'll see Topa go out there against the heart of the lineup when they need him most, whether it's the seventh or eighth inning, and he's been effective doing it. 00:32:34 Speaker 1: And another interesting thing I think about, we're throwing comps out there and Roles did I was thinking back to when they signed him, and I think we mentioned on here. It's like, yeah, he's just like Paul Seawald. I mean, this is the Paul Seawald mold. They couldn't be any different. 00:32:53 Speaker 2: To be honest, totally different. Because Paul Seawald throws high fastballs with good spin rate. They get a lot of swing and this, and then he throws a sleeping slider. What does Topa do? He throws deadly sinkers and gets a lot of soft groundball contacts. See well, for the most part, was always a strikeout guy Sam's twenty twenty two. 00:33:16 Speaker 1: Yeah, just an interesting thing. Yeah, this, like justin Topa has been such such a revelation and he's gonna continue to have to be a big part. He's gonna have to get some big outs down this stretch. And you know, if Brash and Muno's falter at any point, like they need him, they need like he's number three now, I would say, well number three. Actually, well we've we labeled him number one in this and on this podcast, we labeled him number one. I would guess in Scott's Scott doesn't have rankings, or he says he doesn't have rankings. But if Scott's got his his his tier list, like one person to tier topas now is number three his Uh, that's his guy, so they're gonna need him. 00:33:59 Speaker 2: I would be shocked if even Scott thinks higher of TOPA than three at this point, just because again he's facing the best guys in the order. It's not Brash. It's not Brash that's in there in the eighth inning facing two, three, and four. Brash usually is the bridge guy with runners on base. We've seen Topa in the last couple of weeks pitching those very high leverage spots hasn't phased in one bit. 00:34:21 Speaker 1: Nope. And that's just again just remarkable and another ode to the Mariner's unbelievable pitching development. And I'm excited to see what scrap heap guy they they put in their next year. I'd be interesting. Yeah, good stuff. On what go ahead? 00:34:39 Speaker 2: I would like to ask Jerry Depoto what I have to do to get a spot in the bullpen. I'm going to tell him I throw about seventy four miles an hour, not much off speed. I did hit my spots when I pitched in seventh, eighth, ninth grade. What do I have to do to get in this bullpen? Yeah? 00:34:53 Speaker 1: What's your best pitch? 00:34:56 Speaker 2: Probably a mid seventies fastball. 00:34:58 Speaker 1: Ooh, that's gonna be tough to work with. Does it spin? 00:35:03 Speaker 2: We won't know until we get some track man data on my fastball. 00:35:08 Speaker 1: I think you need to learn how to throw a slider. 00:35:13 Speaker 2: I'll work on that. 00:35:14 Speaker 1: I don't know if seventy's gonna cut it. Oh you got to change your arm angle. Remember average is bad. 00:35:20 Speaker 2: Yeah, I can go the pen Murphy arm angle instead. 00:35:22 Speaker 1: Oh no, throw a submarine. No, there you go, because that's what they tell every when he can't throw hard enough, just through underhand. 00:35:31 Speaker 2: I'll just send Jerry an email. What do I have to do to get in this bullpen. How hard do I need to throw? What does my spin rate need to be? What is my vertical attack? Angle? Have to be? Everything? 00:35:41 Speaker 1: Because you get some stuff to work on. But thankfully for you drive lines right down the road. 00:35:46 Speaker 2: Yeah, it's right there. You can just drive right up. Pay for some sessions. 00:35:50 Speaker 1: There you go. Sounds like a plan. Well, good stuff. We'll keep track of this through the off season. You have a lot of time to go do it. 00:35:57 Speaker 2: Hey, I won't say no. 00:36:00 Speaker 1: Let's go down on the farm. Okay, Well, who you got this week? 00:36:07 Speaker 2: It has to be Tye Pete. It has to be. You're talking about a guy who hit a grand slam in back to back innings. This week, he hit a grand slam, and he grand slams in each of his two at bats. He hits a grand slam, first grand slam of his minor league career, and then turns around and hits another one the very next inning, and the second one was off the south pod. Tye Pete is hitting just under four hundred. Since joining Thedesto, he is opsing over eleven hundred, and he has looked awesome. 00:36:40 Speaker 1: It's pretty good. The Mariners first round picks have have looked good. We haven't seen any formal yet, but Colt Emerson just hit his first home run yesterday and inside the park home run, and ty Pete with something he might not ever do again in his pro career. Might not he he won't. I'm almost to shirtly saying he's not gonna hit grand slams and back to back innings ever again in his pro career. But wow, he's been good. He has been super good so far in Modesto. They don't look for a couple of teenagers. They do not look overwhelmed at all. 00:37:14 Speaker 2: And they've only played a few games, so we'll see how they continue to progress. But you can't be anything but exciting but excited watching those two early on here because they've seriously looked awesome. And oh, by the way, this feels like a decent chance to throw out here so we can get out of this ahead of time. For any of you listening, tune into Wednesday's show because we're gonna have Typete on. We're really excited about it. Little spoiler, we've already recorded with him. It is going to be Wednesday's show, and he is seriously awesome. We will leave it at that, I think you're gonna really enjoy the interview. We love talking to him, and I think he's got a chance to be a fan favor here. 00:37:51 Speaker 1: Pretty quick, Wow, incentive to wait until next week. There you go. People will be waiting, people will be waiting. We publish at three am. If you want to set your alarm, I'm choosing this three pm Pacific, three am Pacific. That is, I'm choosing Spencer Packard. Lyle, I don't know enough people talking about Spencer Packard. He's in Double A and he is not on the Maritor's Top thirty prospects. Let me let me just let that know. Not on the Maritor's top thirty prospects us a ninth round pick out of Campbell in twenty twenty one, and all this dude has done since July first down in Double A is hit three point fifty eight four twenty three, five forty seven with a nine to seventy ozh ps. He's gone yards seven times, driven in thirty five runs, eleven doubles, and walked eighteen times. That's a pretty good flash line for Arkansas in a noted pitchers park, and it doesn't seem to really matter for him. He's just taking a sledgehammer to it. 00:38:49 Speaker 2: So I highlighted Spencer Packard early in the year because he got off to a really good start too, and he basically hasn't waivered throughout the course of the season. It's been awesome. No, people don't about him enough because because he is not labeled as a blue chip prospect, maybe people don't pay as much attention to him as they will some other guys. He can flat out hit. I'd assume he's gonna be in Triple A to start next year. I don't know what else he has to do with his bat in Double A. And if he continues to hit in Triple A, you just never know. We're not gonna sit here and promise he's gonna be an impact major league bat. But when you're hitting like that in a pitcher's park and you were a really good college bat, you just have to sit and at least wonder what could he possibly be. So let's see how he progresses, because I'm excited to keep watching him. 00:39:36 Speaker 1: What the way I thought about this is he's essentially doing right now what you hope Tyler Locklear is doing. By what next June right and Spencer Packard's got one hundred games on him in double A plus, so that's like the kind of the standard he's at right now. So don't be surprised. Keep your on Spencer Packard. He's he's been mashing. He's been mashing. He got to keep an eye. 00:39:58 Speaker 2: On and again, people, we'll talk about Lockleyer more because he is the higher end prospect, but Spencer Packer keeps doing his thing. Again. You just never know. You never know which guys from the minor leagues could really hit and totally pan out. You just don't know. So let's keep it like you said, keep an eye on Spencer Packers. He keeps going forward and he's probably gonna be into COMA next year. Okay, with that, let's get to our MLB wrap around, So a little behind the curtain into our show prep. There's one storyline we had to take out this week. We're going to talk about Mookie Betts and the Ronald Acunya MVP race in the National League. We're gonna save that probably for another week because a story popped up on Tuesday that cannot go unnoticed. TJ. The Los Angeles Angels are at it again. 00:40:53 Speaker 1: We need a new name for the segment. I was thinking about that. What should we rename it. 00:41:00 Speaker 2: Artie's Tails artis Angels? I don't know, Like, I. 00:41:04 Speaker 1: Don't even know where to start with this. Could you imagine think about this, A hypothetical team has this just unbelievable star, once in a generation player that's gonna be a free agent, not so confident they're gonna keep them, And they say, you know what, I think we'll keep them. We're we think we're only three and a half games out of a playoff spot. We're gonna go all in to win for him, and maybe he'll stay because that's our best shot. Show them that we care about winning and we'll stay. Little do they know, three weeks later they go from three and a half games out to twelve and a half games out, and then all those said players they acquired at said trade deadline they put on waivers to get claim for free starting tomorrow. Now, would this said star player be incentivized to play another game this season for said organization? I don't know, would he? 00:41:58 Speaker 2: So let's just headline the names the Angels on Tuesday put on waivers Lucas Gioledo, Matt Moore, Rinaldo Lopez, Hunter, Renfro and Randall Gritchik. That is a fifth of your team, all who are established veterans. Giolito, who you traded a decent amount to get only to keep him for one month and then let him go because essentially you've thrown the talel in on this season. This team is such a meme. They are a literal TV show. They're a soap opera. The Angels are a soap opera. 00:42:33 Speaker 1: Well, don't forget dominic leone Lyle. They put him on waivers. Two four more m. 00:42:38 Speaker 2: Oh they did, they did put Leon on waivers. Yeah. So TJ highlighted this in our social media post for Tuesday. You can go check it out on TikTok, Instagram, really wherever you want. He said this the following and let me put it out there. I am fully in agreement with him. If I'm sho hee Otani, I'm not showing up the rest of the season. 00:42:58 Speaker 1: And apparently I got called a quitter for that, so that was fun. I got a kick out of that. 00:43:04 Speaker 2: I'm sorry, but all you have asked out of your team as a result of being the best player on planet Earth and possibly the greatest player of all time is please just get some winning players around me. And now I'm trying to play to win through a torn UCL only for you to go and cut nearly our entire team and a bunch of established that's no, I'm done. 00:43:26 Speaker 1: Let me qualify. They're not cutting them. They're just on waivers, so that I think they stay on the Angels as long as nobody has claimed them. But as soon as someone claims them, they get them for free or free they got to pay the rest of their salary. But they're not they're not getting deffate. I got kind of confused about this too, but I don't. I don't believe they actually get outright released until someone takes them. 00:43:49 Speaker 2: No, you're right, I misspoke. They they do not get straight up cut, but they are opting to let these guys go. That's how I should That's how I should qualify. 00:43:58 Speaker 1: Or nothing. You don't get anything back, just leave. And remember the Angels had I believe, one top one hundred prospect at the deadline, and they actually technically they have two because Logan Ohapi is still a top one hundred prospect even though he's on the big league roster. But they had the catcher that they sent to the White Sox and the Gilido Ronaldo Lopez trade, and now they're essentially they're going like, somebody's gonna claim Lucas Giulido. He's had a terrible season, but somebody needs a starter. And Ronaldo Lopez actually was pretty good as an Angel, so someone's gonna get him to and you can never have enough bullpen help. But be like, if he was sitting there for the MS, I take him, but I don't think he's getting down to the Mariners at twenty six in the waiver wire. So I did mention last week when we were talking about the Angels again in our Weekly Now Angel segment about how bad the deadline acquisitions had been. This has to go down as one of the worst deadlines of all time for a team that quote quote unquote tried to go for it. Let me read you through some stats. These are about a week old, but they're still relevant. CJ cron fifty four ops plus. I think that's is that a Eduardo Escobar sixty four ops plus Randall Critchick forty two ops plus Mike mustak Is one oh four ops plus dominic leone a three e Ra Lucas Giolito a six six seven eer and then Lopez had like a one to eight small sample. So wow, good job, good job, Perry. Let Perry Cook. 00:45:33 Speaker 2: Let me say this again. If I'm show hey with my torn UCL, I'm telling the Angels I'm done. I have no incentive to play anymore. I'm hitting free agency. I'm gonna start recovering my elbow and start rehabbing. Now, whether that means Tommy John or not again, that hasn't been decided, but just in one way or another, start resting, not waste my time hitting for your team anymore, and then I'm gonna be a free agent league because what incentive does he have to keep playing for this team. 00:45:59 Speaker 1: Here's a number are very very interesting thing about these waiver moves and some of the players they decided to put on waivers. So the Angel's current payroll sits that I believe two hundred and forty one million dollars. So the players they have placed on waivers are worth about seven point five million dollars of contract if every single one of them gets picked up. Now, the luxury tax threshold is two hundred and thirty three million dollars. Now, if the Angels pay luxury tax this season and show Hey leaves. I believe, Okay, I believe this is all correct. I did read this. Their comp pick would be at the end of the fourth round. If they go under the luxury tax by the end of this year, the pick is at the end of the second round. So I thought that was a little curious that already's shedding some payroll, has already bloated payroll to try and get try and get a second round pick for when show Hey leaves, despite the fact he already gutted the farm system. So gotta chuckle out of that. 00:47:08 Speaker 2: I'm saying it again. I said it last week. I'm saying it again. The two worst franchises in Major League Baseball are both in the AO West, and neither of them are the Seattle Mariners. 00:47:19 Speaker 1: Here's another thing you're gonna laugh at. So when the Angels traded for Gilido and Lopez, they were a game and a half ahead of the Mariners. What is it thirteen and a half now with the win today and the Angels lost because Bryce Harper hit his three hundredth home run, I think, right, they lose today. 00:47:35 Speaker 2: Well, I know Bryce Harper hit his three hundred home run today. 00:47:38 Speaker 1: Yeah, it's mini storyline thrown in there. I'm checking the standings here real quick. I think it's thirteen and a half now, so you can say it's like the Angels traded. When they traded what was it, it's twelve and a half. 00:47:51 Speaker 2: Twelve, that's a. 00:47:52 Speaker 1: Shame, okay, Regardless, since the Angels traded for Rinaldo Lopez and Lucas Giulido, the Mariners in that same span have gained thirteen and a half games on them. It's pretty impressive. 00:48:07 Speaker 2: It's unreal. The Angels are going to be so bad for the next five to ten years. It's crazy. And I'm gonna say it again too. Repeat of last week, Stay Javou all over again. Time for Mike Trout to request the trade. If you care at all about trying to build your legacy up, go somewhere else, dude, because this team outside of you once show Hey Leaves is going to be close to the biggest disaster in baseball behind the Oakland. 00:48:33 Speaker 1: As impressive stuff from our friends down in Anaheim. Let's get to our second note here on the MLB wrap around. What is up with this Ronald Acunya thing. How do if you missed it yesterday. On Tuesday, there were two? Was this Tuesday? Monday? 00:48:54 Speaker 2: Actually Monday? 00:48:55 Speaker 1: It was Monday. Okay, cool, good thing, I got that right. Okay. On Monday, Braves are playing at Coors Field. Ronald's just kind of standing in the outfield and a dude runs on the field and gets all the way to Acunya and like tries to take a picture with him, puts his arms around him, just so uncomfortable for security people come over to try and rip wrestle this dude away from Acunya, and they're miserably failing, all while this other dude runs onto the field behind him to try and like to try and get Acunya again, and they let him get all the way to him and like knock Secunya over. It's so weird, so weird, Like how do you let that happen? 00:49:33 Speaker 2: I don't know what's going on with the security at Coors Field. I know it's not I know you only have so many security people and you can't contain every fan from trying to run on the field, not that most fans ever do that, but I just don't know how you don't get to those guys faster. I'm honestly shocked Acuna didn't try to kind of walk away from him once time was called and play had to be stopped. But man, it's they're lucky Una didn't get hurt because I'll tell you what, if these fans had actually hurt Acunya and he had to miss time? Could you imagine how big this story would get? 00:50:08 Speaker 1: Is that like a lawsuit? Like can you see someone for that? 00:50:11 Speaker 2: That's a good question. 00:50:12 Speaker 1: Could you see the Rockies for that? 00:50:15 Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean I didn't go to law school. But even though the law school was right across from Kronkie to Asu, No, I did not go to that school. I All I know is this would have built up like flames as a story if those fans had actually hurt Acunya and the Brave Superstar had to miss time. 00:50:36 Speaker 1: I'm shocked that like a like I'm marveled at a Cunya that like didn't like it, like swing or shove anyone or do anything, because I would have too, Like think about this, Like we both played high school baseball. Could you imagine someone like jumping the fence and running up to you in the outfield and trying to give you a hug in the middle of the game, like no, you'd like shove them away, like people would be pissed off. 00:50:58 Speaker 2: Maybe Acunya was, then most people would be in that regard because then even though it would be totally unfair for people to pinpoint it like this, somehow somebody would spin the story to Acunya shoves fan, which would be ridiculous because they shouldn't be getting near him. They're not allowed to be on the field. 00:51:18 Speaker 1: Next up on first Take or sorry, Undisputed, There. 00:51:22 Speaker 2: We go, There we go? Is Ronald Alcunya's legacy affected by him trying to prevent a fan from tackling him in the middle of the game. 00:51:30 Speaker 1: Next Ronaldicunya is no longer the nl MVP. Next on Undisputed, But yeah, credit to a credit to Acunya, because I wouldn't have like that's like, it's kind of weird, like total strangers running up to you in the middle of the game and and doing that, like kind of weird and even worse than like the Colorado Rocky security for again, four people were had had the first guy or like holding a body part of his and the dude was still as wrapped around Acunya, how like, what are you doing? 00:52:05 Speaker 2: And they took a Kunya to the ground at one point, like he was on the ground. Now, thankfully it was a very light takedown because they kind of wrap tackled and bear hugged him to the ground where he ended up being okay, which thank goodness. But I wonder if this rises security issues throughout baseball and they have to up the security a little bit to make sure something like this doesn't happen. 00:52:27 Speaker 1: Yeah, you can't have guys like Ronald Leucunya subjective fan, Like, you can't ever have a fan have the ability to run up to a player, because one of these days a fan might run up to Anthony Rendon and well we know what would happen. 00:52:42 Speaker 2: They get punched in the face. 00:52:44 Speaker 1: Yeah he's not missing this time. 00:52:49 Speaker 2: Yeah exactly. Well he missed that ace fan. He tried to swing at that ace fan and he just missed. 00:52:54 Speaker 1: Well, this time, they'll be on a level, a level playing field, and Rendon is gonna have time to put his glove down, throw a punch and then realize he just broke his rest and he's gonna have to go back on the sixty day il. 00:53:08 Speaker 2: Would they ever think about putting nets up behind the outfield walls the way they've put nets up in foul territory to try to prevent this sort of thing. 00:53:17 Speaker 1: No, I don't think so. 00:53:20 Speaker 2: I mean, the esthetic of the baseball game wouldn't look as cool if they did that, because you wouldn't see home runs flying a million feet. But it just depends on how serious they are if they start to try to opsecurity. 00:53:32 Speaker 1: Yeah. See again, thankfully Ronald did not get hurt, so I don't think this is a bridge they would cross right now. Mm hmm. 00:53:41 Speaker 2: Well, hopefully it's never a bridge they have to cross, because hopefully most fans are smart enough to not do that. That's the big thing. Yeah, yes, third storyline. While Ronald Acuna didn't get injured, our third story for this MLB wrap around, Felix Fatista did. The Orioles just took a massive hit this past week as the best closer in all of baseball now has a UCL injury. Everybody's waiting for further information on it, but Batista isn't pitching right now, and the likelihood that he comes back this season with a UCL injury already diagnosed seems bleak. 00:54:17 Speaker 1: Yeah. I don't know how to how to think about this, Like they said, they just want to let it calm down. They stole a month left to the postseason. Like he's not a guy who would need a rehab, a sigmon or anything like that. He could just come back and pitch. But like this affects the Orioles. This is how they win games. They're not a team that blows teams out on a regularity like the Dodgers do or the Braves do. Like they win close games because they have dynamite arms at the back end of their bullpen, and they've been remarkably clutched this year. Well, now you take your biggest bullpen weapon away, and that leaves you a little vulnerable, like some of these close games. Now you might not be able to hang on two at the end because you don't have Felix Bautista fire in one hundred and two miles an hour at the middle of a team's order. 00:55:08 Speaker 2: The Orioles is a team this year offensively ranked thirteenth in team WRC plus at one oh four. So they are an above average offense. They're not a great offense. They're not an elite offense. It's not what's winning them games. What's won them games this year, to piggyback off of you, is they have essentially made baseball game seven innings long, because if they're winning after seven innings, it is automatic. They go to uniar Cano in the eighth, they go to Felix Fatista in the ninth, they shut it down. The Orioles win game over. You don't have the best closer in all of baseball on your roster anymore, pitching the ninth inning or pitching two innings like he did against the Mariners to shut him down, things change all of a sudden, massively for the Orioles. I think their ceiling as a postseason team takes a massive hit if Fatista is not pitching. 00:55:55 Speaker 1: And those are the exact types of weapons that win you postseason games, like the Orioles still very well might win the American League East and we'll get a bye and we'll have the best record in the American League heading into the playoffs. That's still a very real possibility. But if there's a team that can go out there and just slug their starting pitching who I was talking about this earlier with a colleague of mine at the radio station it's like they don't really have like those dogs in the rotation, like the M's, like the Mariners, they have like great baseball terminology, they have dogs in their starting rotation. Well, the Orioles advantage is having dogs in their bullpen. But if they can't even get to their bullpen that way, and even if they have that situation, in these high pressure scenarios, you don't have your biggest dog in the bullpen, that not really kind of hurts you. So it'll be curious to see. It's like the twenty twenty one Mariners losing Paul Seawall, like if they did, they didn't, but if they did, like that would have crushed them, right, because that's how that team won games, and this is how this Orioles team wins games. 00:56:58 Speaker 2: And I don't know about you, but if I were an Orioles fan, I would not feel confident relying on Kyle Braddis to try to win you game one of a playoff series, because that's probably who's starting the first game, even though his season makes no sense because he's had a really good era, but everything about his savant page screams he should not be any good and is just due for a ton of regression. That feels like the type of guy where you get him in a postseason start and he's getting blown up halfway to hell. 00:57:24 Speaker 1: At least like Grayson Rodriguez has been better though, like when he went down to Triple A's comeback. He's throwing gas and he's been a little bit more effective. But I don't think he's at the point where he's starting a playoff game, or at least not starting the first one. He might still start a playoff game. 00:57:39 Speaker 2: Yeah, ge Rods actually started to really pick it up his last handful of starts. He started to look sharp, So that is a good point. But I feel like if you're just going to go off of season as a whole and experience, they're probably going to go with somebody like Bradish in Game one, and again, I would not trust that guy in my rotation to win me a playoff series. Personally, I just just don't love it. 00:58:00 Speaker 1: So we think about it this way too. We talked about this when Paul Cwold got traded. You need to essentially no replace the Orioles. Need to replace four innings a week, give or take, and at the end of the world, when you're playing six games a week. Four innings is not a whole lot. They're four pretty important innings. Four innings where you're leading in the middle of the opponent's lineup is coming up. That can be a big difference. And we are going to see over this next month whether the Orioles actually do have the guys in their bullpen besides yier Cano. I mean, Danny cole May has been pretty good this year out of the bullpen, but outside of that, I mean, they called up dl Hall. His stuff's pretty good, but he's been inconsistent. So that's a question that they're going to need to answer here down the stretch. 00:58:43 Speaker 2: Yeah, Fujinami has big stuff, but sometimes he has no clue where it's going, and camp thro strikes janier Cano is good. I would say there is definitely a drop off between Cano and Batista. However, I think Batista is at least a step ahead of Cano and past Cano in the ninth inning, and even with Cologne just a big drop off. Then you're asking these relievers to fill up a lot more innings and guys who you trust a lot less than Felix. 00:59:07 Speaker 1: Yeah, it'll be interesting to see. And this American League East race is going to be almost as interesting as the American League West race and those that the Rays and Orioles are neck and neck right now, and now we look at it, another team is particularly healthy either. 00:59:23 Speaker 2: I think the AL as a whole is just going to be super intriguing. I mean, the NL it feels like we're on a crash course for a Dodgers, Braves, NLCS. One of them's going to the World Series. If I have to put money down and be the Braves. The American League, it is wide open. It could be literally anybody right now. 00:59:38 Speaker 1: It could maybe except any of the central teams. The Twins have been pretty good. 00:59:42 Speaker 2: But oh yeah, not them. So between the Astros, Rangers, Mariners, Rays, Orioles, and if the Blue Jays find some way to sneak their way in, like if those six teams, it could be any of them. It could be. 00:59:56 Speaker 1: I do love playoff time. I can't wait one month, one month away? Can you make it? Okay, let's get to our Russell Wilson umpire the week. All right, Low, would you like to introduce our candidate. 01:00:07 Speaker 2: We got a good one today. Congratulations Carlos Torres, you are this week's winner of the Russell Wilson Up of the Week. He managed to miss four calls in the first three innings of the game in the Twins Rangers series. That seemed to aggravate Joey Gallo, so as a result arguing balls and strikes, Torres tosses them right out of the game. That infuriated Rocobell Delhi, Twins manager. He has issues with it. Carlos Torres tosses them right out of the game. So those two get ejected for telling Torres you're not doing your job or calling balls and strikes correctly. They lose their spot in the game that day. And then what does Torres do after that? Oh, he just turns back around, misses another eight calls for the day, seven of them going against the Twins. Impeccable stuff from Carlos Torres. 01:00:59 Speaker 1: We have a case of not being able to see over the middle and bailing out of the pocket too quickly from mister Torres's that's pretty impressive. It's hard to get both those in the same day, but he managed. 01:01:13 Speaker 2: It's one thing to eject a guy or two guys, being a player and a manager. In this case, it's another thing when you eject him and you're actually wrong. The players and managers are telling you you're wrong, and you're still on enough of a power trip where you're like, yep, you're done, and then you go back to doing the same shitty job you were already doing. 01:01:32 Speaker 1: We love umpires every week we tell you why. 01:01:36 Speaker 2: Yes we do. All right, let's get to speak your mind here, speak your mind spot That would be unwise. 01:01:48 Speaker 1: What is necessary is never unwise. 01:01:52 Speaker 2: What do you got ToJ All right. 01:01:54 Speaker 1: Well, we did say we're going to do this this week, so I'm just gonna say I really really liked Ahsoka. I thought it was pretty good. 01:02:04 Speaker 2: Okay, we're in the trust tree here. I had a very busy weekend. You're out of the ballpark all weekend. We're back Tuesday. We had a show to record Monday and an interview with Ty. So I still have not watched the Ahsoka yet. 01:02:17 Speaker 1: It OH very good thing. I didn't get a good thing. I didn't spoil it. 01:02:21 Speaker 2: No, no, I was gonna say, and this is totally on me, because I said on our last episode I was going to watch it before the next time we record a speak your Mind where we talk about it. So I've done this to myself. If you want to talk about it, it is totally fine. 01:02:32 Speaker 1: Now, I'm not going to spoil it. I'm not going Okay, has I already kind of got episode three spoiled for me? I watched it last night. I got it spoilt before I watched it, which was disappointing, and I wouldn't want to do the same thing to you, so uh, but you know, I liked it. I liked it. I'll probably leave it at that and we can we can kick this down the road to next week. The only other thing I have is uh, hot seat, my microphone. I'm getting a new one, thank goodness. I don't have to sound like I'm talking out of a tin can sometimes, and I'll sound professional. I like it. I'm excited. This is what being an adult is like. You buy things that will uh that aren't toys, but kind of feels like it. 01:03:07 Speaker 2: To be honest, I don't think your mike's been terrible by any strategy. I think it's perfectly done, a serviceable job. But I also know the new Mike you bought is very, very high end. So I think you're gonna sound pretty good, not that you don't sound good already, but I think just the quality of your sound will be another step above once you get it. 01:03:28 Speaker 1: I think so too. Oh and last thing, really looking forward to getting back in the full swing of like full sports season because like now is like when my schedule really just starts getting slammed. For example, this week, I'm calling soccer tomorrow. By the way, like still like a very interesting sport for me to call because it's ninety minutes of just me a on an Organ State live stream, which is gonna be very fascinating. The game will already be over by the time you're listening to this, but still, this is my my pregame prep high school football on Friday, and then we got a full full game day on Sunday when when Oregon State opens up. I do like this time of year because it keeps me very busy and I realize I have no free time. So that's fun Life in Sports. 01:04:15 Speaker 2: Piled on top of this podcast. 01:04:17 Speaker 1: Yes, of course, well that was given. 01:04:19 Speaker 2: Yeah, it is weird Oregon States playing on a Sunday. I know, the first weekend or two of the year. There's some games on Sundays, but it's funny. Oregon State kind of got the short end of the stick there. 01:04:27 Speaker 1: I don't think anyone's complaining though, because they're playing on CBS, so way easier to watch, unlike another PAC twelve program that played last weekend against the same San Jose State Spartans, and nobody could watch it because it was on PAC twelve network. 01:04:42 Speaker 2: What a great channel, honestly, but no, it is one more year, God it is. It is terrible. What an awful channel. Okay, I have two quick things on my speaker mind this week. One is sort of Mariners related. I know you were talking about at the start of the show. I'm not allowed to be at the ballpark any more, rare exception. I did leave the game early yesterday and actually about the second inning, where usually I always stay the full game and love to sit and watch and we'll be working on stuff and editing things and tweeting out during the game. But I went to a Mariner's watch party yesterday evening Tuesday evening because our friend Jason Churchill set it up because TJ and I are in this slack group with a bunch of Mariners fans and people talking there on a regular basis, and Jason said he was putting together this event. He said Oh, over at Tavernhall in Bellevue. We're going to hang out watch the Mariners game. We'll get to talk, you know, chop it up, all that good stuff. It was really fun. It wasn't like this huge group or anything. It was probably ten to twelve people, but it was fun to kind of talk to some other Mariners fans and talk to some fans that, like us, are very very invested in the team and really know their stuff. And we got to beat some new cool people. So I enjoyed being there a bunch that's cool. 01:05:52 Speaker 1: Yeah, hopefully I'm in town for the next one. That'd be fun. 01:05:55 Speaker 2: Yeah, it was really fun. I enjoyed it. And a couple of people there said they listen to the podcast, which is really cool. The other thing I've got is I have been seeing a lot of back to school commercials recently because we're almost at that time. Not that it affects us, but man, between seeing all the back to school commercials and knowing that Labor days almost here and school's about to start again for people, it's just given me real PTSD of how much I used to despise this time of year, not when we were in college, and believe or not. When we were at school, I actually, for the most part, would look forward to going back because I'd get to see all our friends, you included, although I guess we saw each other every summer anyway, because we were always in the same spot, whether it was Seattle or Cape Cod. But like high school in general, Oh, I'm getting major PTSD. Man, I hated school so much? What a what a terrible place? 01:06:46 Speaker 1: What class do you miss the most? 01:06:50 Speaker 2: Beatles class? 01:06:52 Speaker 1: No? Actually serious, No, like, which class did you actually quote unquote miss the most? I don't even what was kryptonite? 01:07:01 Speaker 2: Man? Everything? 01:07:04 Speaker 1: I mean. 01:07:06 Speaker 2: I guess, I mean, I guess if I had to pick, it'd be science. I mean I I wanted to just, I don't know, walk right out every time I stepped in that class. 01:07:19 Speaker 1: To translate, No wonder why Llow went DASU. 01:07:23 Speaker 2: Jo greatest thing ever, greatest choice I ever could have made going to ASU. I mean school, I mean, school really does suck. I think the way school is structured, by the way is just so ridiculously outdated. And I'm not saying everybody learns the same, but for me, I have learned so much more in my lifetime watching YouTube videos and learning off a five to ten minute instruction thing if you're curious about something, rather than sitting in a classroom at a desk for seven hours a day, I mean just listening to somebody talk at you. I mean, what a what a disaster of an idea, similar to how people are still hanging on to batting average, the idea of school is like one hundred years old. 01:08:02 Speaker 1: And I can't like thinking back to school, like I know people have nine to five's, but like waking up that early to go to class that started for me at seven fifty in the morning every five days a week was very interesting. I have no idea who I did that, And at ASU it is nothing of the sorts. I only had one semester total with a Friday class. Rarely ever did I have classes four days a week even so that if you need a reason to go to ASU, that would be one. But and then I think about it and laugh now because I definitely don't have a normal job now, I can't say ever, I've had to wake up at not multiple days in a row, at six point thirty to be anywhere by before eight o'clock, So I think that's kind of fascinating. But if you have a nine to five, you probably understand. 01:08:45 Speaker 2: If you have a nine to five, you get paid. You don't get paid to go to croll. 01:08:48 Speaker 1: Yeah, that is correct. There is some incentive there. 01:08:50 Speaker 2: Yeah. If you wonder why we love taking all these online classes at ASU, it's to make up for how miserable we used to be sitting in all these in person classes in high school. 01:09:00 Speaker 1: So this much easier to sit in bed, hungover and do class on your computer than it is to show up to class hungover and pay attention. 01:09:11 Speaker 2: And Stew's got a lot of really good online classes. 01:09:13 Speaker 1: Great they do, they do. Yep, we thrive. 01:09:16 Speaker 2: We're sitting here thriving, man. So yeah, that's why speak your Mind. I am sorry to the people that have to go back to school. I don't I do not envy you one little bit. But that's just a wrap on everything we got for Speak your Mind. Okay, I think that just about wraps up this edition of the Marine Layer podcast. You guys know the drill. You want to listen to the full form podcast, you can do so on Apple, Spotify, Google, and Amazon. If you do that, make sure to follow us guys, hit the download button. Leave us that five star review the downloads on the reviews really help us get the podcast out there even more so, help us out and take the extra few seconds to do that. Head over to our YouTube channel, our video side of the podcast, and hit subscribe on YouTube like comment, turn the notification bells on that way, you know. When we post clips, shows, segments, YouTube shorts, all that stuff, you'll get a notification about it. And then follow us on social media Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube shorts at Marine Layer Pod. That's TJ. I'm Lyle. As always, we thank you guys for tuning in. We'll talk to you soon.