 Annie Ball Sanchez shuts down the Cardinals and the Nats take game one, two to preview as well. Let's go. What's going on everybody? Thank you for tuning in and hanging out with us today on Talking Baseball. We're talking baseball, Annie Ball Sanchez and the Nats, we're talking baseball. Jake's 30 years old and he's full of Nats. How you doing, Jake? Morning. James, good morning. I'm doing well. I still have a little of the devil sauce flown through my system. Had a lot of grape sodas last night, including a haunted, it's like a haunted drink tour thing. I don't know, they were talking about, you actually would have liked it. There was some history stuff. They were talking about what old buildings used to be and the ghost stuff. I mean, there was a couple reaches. There was a couple like, yeah, let me see that freaking ghost, but I'm doing all right. I will say this and it should be a precursor to all the listeners. I'm so locked in on the Yanks. When you said two games to preview, I was like, what the hell's the other game? So I just, that's kind of where I mentally add a little bit so I don't want any of our NL slash Nat slash cards fans to be too offended, but Poppy's pretty locked in on what's going on this afternoon. Yeah, it's hard. It's hard to calm down the nerves and try to talk about it a little more rationally, which we will in the second half of the show. Oh, glasses, got his glasses on. And now I'm a giant NL guy. Glasses are on, I'm locked in on the NL, I don't care about the ale, the DH is whack. You do look like an NL guy with those glasses on. Huge NL guy when the glasses are on. Yeah, wow. Just nerdy and into like strategies. Hey, I'm just joking. Whoa. I do like the NL. The NL has provided a lot better baseball this postseason than the ale. Don't nerd shame on this podcast. I went to a ghost tour in New York with my girlfriend who loves ghost tours and it was more of just a history tour, but like history you would never share. They're like in this building, seven new people died of a fire. Right. It was terrible. Now there's all these safety rules because of it. People were jumping to their deaths and I'm like, holy shit, I don't want it. Like I'm interested, but like not interested. Right. And then every story ended with and now they say it's haunted. I'm like what? This is a ghost tour. You're just telling me history and then at the end you just say and now people say it's haunted. Yeah. You can't just throw that on the end to any bad thing that's happened. Yeah, there is one of those I'm trying to think that it used to be a brothel. The woman left the East Coast. She had like postpartum depression but they didn't know what that was at the time. So she just like fled. She became a whore. And then like one of her husband's friends came back from the East Coast and she like struggled every day. She like wondered how her family was. So one of her husband's friends came through the brothel and was like, oh yeah, they're happy. He remarried, they're raising the kids, everything's well. And they're like, oh, and then the whore went upstairs and shot herself. And it's like, what? Shouldn't she be happy for the kids? I don't know. A lot of moving parts, but had some grape sodas. Caught a decent amount of the games and I'll be honest with you. As a lifelong Cardinals fan, I'm glad I didn't watch all of the game. Yeah, well, you're a big Anibal Sanchez fan as well. I love Anibal, dude. I know, so this was a good one for you. He had almost had a no-hitter. He's, does this officially make the Nats the team of Destiny? Wow, wow. When Anibal Sanchez is throwing 7.21 hitters. I didn't watch first take this morning nor any morning in the last decade, but I think that's probably on their bottom line. Does this confirm Nats or team of Destiny? Yeah. And then they argue about it. What a stupid show. All right. And man, when did the Daniel Hudson news come out? Because I didn't find out that he wasn't gonna be there until like an hour before the game. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I watched with no sound. That was a big whoa moment, because we were kind of, we talked about it yesterday and I was surprised because I didn't think you were gonna fully be on this page, but you said it yesterday was kind of a must win for the Nats. And then you hear about the Daniel Hudson news and you're like, okay, so they've got one guy they believe in coming out of their bullpen. They have Anibal Sanchez starting game one of the NLCS. And now look where we are. I don't know. I think it's bad times to be a Cardinals fan for sure. Yeah. The Hudson stuff's interesting. Some like X Marlins exec slammed them. And what? Really? Not literally. Unreal that Daniel Hudson is on paternity list and missing game one of the NLCS. Only excuse would be a problem with the birth or health of baby or mother. If all is well, he needs to get to St. Louis. Inexcusable, will it matter? Yo, I can understand like, fuck that guy. Fuck that guy. You're only allowed to miss this if there's a serious problem with the birth of your child. Go fuck yourself, David P. Samson. I understand that, you know, you can naturally think like, man, that's a tough decision. Yeah. I think a lot of players would play and a lot of wives and mothers would be supportive of that. Like, no, no, no, no, no. Your team needs you. Yeah. But Martinez, Dave Martinez said, it's always family first, I understand. The timing didn't work out like we thought. Baby wasn't ready to come out. So we get him back when we get him back. And hey, if you work for a company that values that, you probably work better. So hopefully Daniel Hudson comes back, starts tossing gems for his newborn. Congrats on the kid. Yeah, he has to, right? We did this earlier in the season. When was the dad bull? I'm forgetting what happened. Was that early in the Yankee season? The dad bull? It was, fuck, who was it? We had two guys that just had kids. Hap versus David Price. They just both got, they both came off paternity leave and faced each other as the battle of the dads. The dad bull. Price got rocked, so his kids cursed and we're sorry, but, I mean, you, that's more real than the ghost tour I did yesterday. And yeah, no, I mean, Daniel Hudson and the Nats handled it well. I think it's gonna be one of these things. I mean, think about, I mean, 20 years ago, I think Daniel Hudson would be, you mentioned first take, Daniel Hudson would be getting scolded by guys. This is a once in a lifetime thing, blah, blah, blah. 20 years later, we're sitting here like, yeah, dude, go see the birth of your kid because it's just fucking sports. And I think even 20 years from now, it's not even gonna be a discussion. It's like, yes, you had to do that. And everyone ends up looking great about it. I mean, it would have sucked if the Nats had to go to their bullpen. They didn't have enough guys and they blow the game. Okay, so because Anibal led them to victory, they didn't need to use the bullpen really. He covered his job, right? Like he covered for him, basically. Yeah. Does the baby's middle name need to be Anibal? I mean, I think every baby that was born yesterday's middle name should be Anibal. That's a good call. I mean, what are we doing as a society? Dude, society probably used to be like that. Like back when fucking King Henry III got crowned, if you had a baby on that day, I guarantee like 80% of the people were like, well, his name is Henry. My dad's name is Chris because he was born on Christopher Columbus Day. Nine months of preparation, saying his name's gonna be Daniel. And then, no, born on this day. Oh, let's name him Chris now. Late, late change for my dad. That's living life, man. That's how I got my middle name. I was born on my uncle's birthday. People love that stuff. So yeah, welcome to the world, Anibal Hudson. Yeah, wow. Okay, you got a burn? I do. All right, let's burn this game so we can get into talking about it a little more in-depth. If we have an ad, it'll go right now. Anyone that doesn't know before we do this, the ads choose you. It's very weird how we have them done. And sorry if you hate them. But like, I didn't get one last episode. My dad got two. And they're very much tailored to what he likes. So creepy world we live in. We're happy to be getting some. What are the ads for your dad? Like wine and cheese. Sure. Kulit Packer. My dad works in the mailing industry. Yeah, that's fucking wild, right? It's a weird world. Yeah, yeah. All right, on your mark, get set, burn. Game one of the NLCS in the loop. As the Cardinals and Miles Teller-Michaelist try not to get whiplash versus Anibal the Animal Sanchez and the Washington Nationals. Top two, Howie Mandel Kendrick has a deal with the Devil versus Michaelist. Yann Ryan Gohm says he's not a mechafore, but he's not bad. Both those guys doubled their pleasure to get the gnats on the board, won nothing. The story? I don't care if they're juiced or not, give me the Anibal. He has people calling the Cardinals the Baja Men because they're one hit wonders. There's Lucifer's friend again, Howie with the RBI single, do little, does a little for the save, gnats, swipe, game one, two, nothing, attitude. I mean, unprovoked shot at the Baja Men. Well, here's the situation I found myself in. If you have one hit as a team in a burn, I'm gonna have to call you guys a one hit wonder. And so I looked up a list of one hit wonders and Baja Men is the only band that's like multiples that makes the most sense. So right now, the St. Louis Cardinals are the Baja Men. Okay, I get it now. And my hands are tied on that. I would have went Lou Baga. Oh, Lou Baga has a ton of hits. I know we did this on our radio show once, and then we played some of his recent songs, they weren't bad. Just get his name out your mouth. Okay, so the Baja Men. Yeah, man, you know what? I was watching this game, was carving pumpkins. I had the game on the laptop. I'm figuring out how to watch every single baseball game, but still be active in my life. So we're carving pumpkins, carved a hell of a pumpkin, accidentally carved it upside down. Didn't matter. What was your game plan with the pumpkin? Really bad at carving pumpkins. So we've carved them before. So I usually just go very basic jack-o'-lantern. Which you can't fuck up. If you make a very basic jack-o'-lantern, people are gonna be like, they're not gonna hate it. They're gonna be like, yeah, yeah, there it is. I did like a big mouth with stitches. It's on my Instagram story. It's pretty good. It came out pretty good, but I did upside. So anyway, my point is I'm watching the game, I'm watching the game, but I'm just doing activities and hanging out with my girlfriend and her friend as we do it, you know? Then I moved to the couch and I'm making gifts and videos the entire time. So I'm still feeling like I'm covering the game. I did not know he had a no-hitter until like the sixth inning. I didn't have the sound on and that's just not something you count, you know? And like when they cut to commercials, I just didn't notice the hits. So when that came into my head, I was like, oh my God. Yeah. I wish I could unhide myself because I may need to make some videos and shit. This would get real special real quick. Yeah. But that's wild. He walks Wong. Yeah, then he hits someone else. In the fourth. And yeah, I know, Jim, one of your, yeah, so Ares Arena pinch hit for Michael is in the sixth, hits him, that's just smart. Welcome to the game. You're not going to fuck this up. Goodbye. Yeah. If you think you're getting this, and then Yachty gets it later. But yeah, man, I mean, it's unbelievable. And then Martinez, it's the eighth inning. It's the eighth inning. Martinez comes in and pitch hits for Helsley. And then that's the first hit. They take him out, do little gets foul, or which is a huge at bat. Because that's the classic case of... Unravelling. Yeah, you go from no hitter, perfect game, and then you could go from to losing the game instantly. Well, that's why it's good. It's a playoff game. If this was a regular season game, and it's two-nothing, you might let Anibal fuck around and try to finish the game. Just to instill some confidence and pride, and hey, this is his game right now. And usually when that pitcher, when that gets popped, when no hitter gets ruined, then it just floods out. And you're like, because so much pressure gets relieved and now just a different mindset on the mound. And usually you see that implode. But because it's the playoffs, because it's a two-nothing game and so important, it's like no questions asked. Like everyone in the stadium knew he was gonna be done as soon as he gave up a hit. There was no way they were gonna leave him in. So it's actually beneficial. If Dave Roberts was managing the Nats, we're talking about how Anibal Sanchez lost this game. Sorry Dodgers fans. Sorry Dodgers fans. But you get it. You totally get it. You know. Yeah. Dude, Anibal was crazy. And then like the game was pretty good. I think the biggest thing for me was Soto Shuffle versus, versus Michaelis. Michaelis was good as well, dude. His curveball is crazy. He's fun. He's totally, because I mean, he went overseas for a little bit and came back, but it's a pretty cool time to be a pitcher with arm talent because you can go into a lab or wherever you wanna go, pick up some revolutions if you really care and you wanna work at it. And then you could go to a team and say, hey, by the way, my curveball spins as much as Kershaw's now. So if you're interested in that, let me know. Yeah, just call me up. Hey, how about our dude, Howie Kendrick, starting the scoring off with a double versus Michaelis. He's now eight for nine this season versus Michaelis. It's unreal. And I think it's almost unexplainable how there's some guys that just, because you think of baseball and you think like, oh, it's a sport of skill. There's some luck involved. But it's so funny that these guys are so talented that if there's a pitcher with a pitch mix and an arm slot that fits your hitting style, you own them. And I mean vice versa for some pitchers, but I think that's almost more common. But eight for nine. Well, it's eight for 12 now. There's two at bats later in the game that he grounded out, so I fucked that up. But at one time it was eight for nine. And he did score the winning run, the first run, because he let off with a double. Oh, so this Michaelis has a very distinct way the ball comes out of his hand. It looks like he's throwing it with a pins and needles hand almost. Like it doesn't look like, it just looks kind of loose, but so maybe Kendrick, there's something he clearly picks the ball up pretty well. Sees the ball well. And yeah, Jim, I think one of the other stories of this game is, and it's tough to know this in the second inning in this, where NL baseball comes into the play, is if you can have the batter lead off an inning in the NL, that's huge, because you're basically go to the top of the order with one out. And now you can get through a team's toughest hitters with like a leg up. Say that again, you said if you can have a batter lead off the inning. So the pitcher lead off the inning. So in the second Kendrick doubles Zimmerman grounds out, Taylor strikes out. So you have two outs and you're at the eight spot in the order, which is Jan Gomes with Anibal Sanchez on deck. So the kind of age old NL debate is, okay, do you pitch around Gomes and get Sanchez? But in these playoffs, we've seen it's been pretty impactful if you can get that eight hitter out and lead off with the pitcher. Now the pitcher's basically a free out and you go to the top of the order with the team's best hitters and a free out on the board. Instead, they give Gomes something he can handle. He doubles, scores Kendrick. And like you said, technically that's the game winning run. You don't know that in the second, but that's a brutal feeling when the pitcher is on deck. So yeah, I mean, if you're a Cardinals fan, you're definitely looking at that in hindsight with a knee. Yeah. Well, the next run and the only other run scored in this game was the, in the seventh inning. What was it? The knee and tripled pitching change, Howie Kendrick singled. So Howie Kendrick drove in the second run and scored the first run. Howie Kendrick was a big part of the offense. Good for him coming off that. The another point in this game I wanted to touch on was that catch by Zimmerman at first in the eighth. Did you see that, Jake? Almost wish he got the no hitter just so we can have like, and remember that catch conversations. Cause it was, Zimmerman shouldn't be doing that. It was amazing. Zim, he's a, hey, I know, I know you, we did a little mockumentary of it, but team of destiny, Ryan Zimmerman's playoffs. Holy shit, man. Crazy. What do you got on the, do you have anything else on that? Well, I was not on Zimmerman, but I know something that you're a big fan of. And you know, sometimes I like to give you some love, man. Okay. What are we talking about? Is that a problem? We'll see. It's the talk of the podcast. Jim, I think there was, and I'll double check right now, but I think the Cardinals went down, and obviously when there's a one hitter, these numbers look like that, but I think the Cardinals had seven innings where they went down one, two, three. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And I know that's something you're a big fan of, and it's just, you know, we've been on this big, like a walk is a rally in the playoffs, because if you have a guy on base, and that can turn into a two-run home real quick, I mean, there is just nothing. And it's, for Anibal Sanchez, I mean, obviously a special night for him, but as the Cardinals, I mean, that's, it's unacceptable. You're waking up in St. Louis, it's a bad morning. Yeah, I mean, I like counting one, two, three innings because it's, that's, it all sounds so obvious, but that's the goal of the pitcher and the defense, obviously. But just like the errand boon for the Yankees, and I'm sure a lot of other teams use this term, just traffic, you just want traffic. Like if you're the Cardinals fans, would you rather seven, one, two, three innings, or would you rather leave eight guys in scoring position? A lot of people would say, I'd rather the one, two, three innings because leaving people in scoring position sucks. It's not true, because if you have eight guys in scoring position, you're gonna score at least one or two, and you're gonna make them use more pitchers and you're gonna make them use their pitch count. You want guys on base, even if it doesn't, even if the result isn't a run, the actions of getting guys on base helps. A one, two, three inning does literally nothing for your cause. For the Nationals to have seven of them, that's kind of how the game went. And then we had the Soto Shuffle. Did you see this or were you getting spooked at the Haunted House? Soto did. I think I was getting spooked, but I love a good Soto Shuffle. Well, he does it all the time. He does it a lot. And he did it extra aggressive with during a bases loaded two out at bat. Extra aggressive. And Cardinals fans were in my mention saying, like he does this all, or Nationals fans, saying he does this all the time. There's nothing different. And I was like, I've seen the Soto Shuffle. I'm a big fan of it. This was a little extra. He was staring at Michael's, looking his lips, literally looking his chops, just staring at him. And he would wait, so I'm gonna do a little breakdown, I think. He would wait till Michael's would lift, like look up until he stopped staring. Like he wanted Michael to know he was staring at him. And then he did. Oh, absolutely. That's the whole point. I love the Soto Shuffle. I think it's like, if there was another species that did like Planet Earth on humans, I think the Soto Shuffle would be its own episode. Because it's like, watch as the hitter tries to intimidate the pitcher, as he throws a ball up in the zone and Soto licks his licks and he stares at him. Yes. It's very much his own version of a mini Haka. Yes. Go watch, go to my Twitter and watch this one at bat. Do you have your phone? Because it is extra than his usual Soto Shuffle. And there was one pitch, Jake, that he did the whole like Soto Shuffle, started grabbing his nuts, and then the ump calls it a strike, so he has to stop halfway through because he can't do it on a strike. It's only on balls. And then he grounds out and Michaelist grabs his junk right back in his face, looks at him at down the first baseline, grabs his junk. That was fun. I think it's fair play by everyone there. If you try to do that to intimidate the pitcher or get in his head or let your presence be felt, the pitcher's allowed to do it back to you. I think it's all in good fun. Yeah, I'm team everything. I'm team, I think Soto's turned it up a little notch the playoffs. I think this is kind of still in that realm. And yeah, if you're Michaelist, I mean send it. Let's have an alpha off. You see him looking his lips and staring at him? Oh yeah. That's Soto, he's found himself, I mean. Even the pointed toe and the bat, like wag in the middle of the strike, so I'm like, come on, pitch to me, pitch to me. It's, I think it's very much that Soto, Soto's had the two most important hits in this nationals playoff run. He's obviously had two special seasons now. I think confidence is an interesting thing. I was listening to a Barry Zito interview the other day and that was, that had a lot of wild left turns about confidence and what you're thinking on the baseball field, but in sports, it kind of doesn't matter until it happens on the big stage. And now Soto, I mean, he's like unlocked the final, he beat the final boss basically. He's had the two essentially game winning hits in two rounds of the playoffs and he's a monster. He has no fear and he's gonna lick at you, he's gonna shuffle, he's gonna show you his meat a little bit, Soto season. Yeah, the very next that bat, he did not do it as much. He was facing Andrew Miller, who wasn't bases loaded two outs, so it's all in fun as a third party. If you are a nationals fan or a cardinals fan, get a little emotionally fired up, sure, that's allowed, but third party, it's fun all around. He turns it up for the situation, which I like. Yes, it was very, very funny. I wanna do a side-by-side of him and Judge, because I don't know if Na and Yankees fans don't know this. Judge doesn't move his feet at all. He steps into the box and he stays there until he's either hit a ball, walked or shook out. He just literally stands still. And I think that's cocky in its own right, because it's like, I'm ready, come on, bring it. Whenever a pitcher takes on Judge, just stand there waiting. It'd be cool to do a side-by-side. This is the most you could do, this is the least. All right, let's get into the second half of the show. All right, got two games to preview, Jake. I know you only thought there's one, because there's really only one that matters in our hearts. And I'm sorry about that, but we are Yankees fans and this means a lot. And if you have a team in the post-season, you understand how much it consumes you. Well, the first game is not the Yankees, Jake. The first game is the two teams we just talked about. The Nationals versus the Cardinals. And the Cardinals have a tough, tough thing losing game one, tough. Because now you've got three dudes. I think the Nationals are the favorite. If you lose this game, you're going on the road to face Strasburg, who's been the best pitcher for the Nationals, and then Corbin. I don't know how, but you've got to beat Scherzer today. They have Wayne right on the mound. He's been really good this post-season. You got any thoughts on this matchup? Yeah, I don't know. I am feeling good. I thought I came off yesterday saying that it just feels like the Nats are all around better. And you wonder if St. Louis is going to rally. I have good news for St. Louis. That, Jim, there's some pretty good parallels from this series to the last series. I mean, if they can beat Scherzer today, I think they take back all the momentum. Where Scherzer, he's Max Scherzer, he's a trump card. His playoff numbers aren't full Max Scherzer, and a lot of guys aren't. So that's not shots fired at him. But you can get a couple of Scherzer, whether it's first inning or if you just run into one. And I think right now, there is so much momentum for the Nationals. They're sitting there saying, we stole game one. Hudson was out. I'm not sure if he's going to be back tonight. I think so, but I don't know. And yeah, I mean, if you can get to Scherzer, it's yeah, we did it. We took him down. We're not scared. And I think St. Louis was pretty prepared to leave this home set one-in-one, but you can't go down two-oh. No, and I'm rooting for the Cardinals tonight because a one-one series with Strasburg versus Flaherty in game three is everything we could ask for as a third-party fan from this series. And man, it kind of sucks talking about it, to be honest, and welcome to podcast life. Because yeah, I mean, I could see the Cardinals going down two-oh, and then I'd be saying the same stuff. Like if Flaherty shoves and tosses Strasburg to the side, like it becomes a road off. Did I say the road game was going to win the first three games of this series yesterday? How drunk were my? Yeah, you said. You said the roads. Okay, so yeah, I'm going to support that because I believe in my past sins. And yeah, sure, but it's going to be fun. We are falling for old man, Wainwright, giving everything he has. It's going to be fun to see Wainwright back against the wall. They need something special today. And there's kind of no reason to not believe Wainwright's going to be good. Yeah, I'm trying to look up Wainwright stats. I have Scherzer versus the Cardinals. Are you interested in that? I mean, a little bit. What if I told you Tommy Edmund lights Scherzer up? Tommy Edmund. Yeah, I had a couple of Cardinal fans DM me after yesterday's talking baseball. And they're like, hey, you didn't even mention Tommy Edmund and Wong. Those guys have been doing big stuff in our lineup. And I was like, yeah. Well, show me in the CS. Tommy Edmund. Oh, the 10 run first, none of those at bats count for the Cardinals. Right. That's just a collapse. They don't know my rule against that. Right. If you score 10 runs in the first inning, if you score five runs in the first inning, everything's impressive. If you score 10, that solely falls on the Braves collapsed. Yeah. And it's like when you score 20 runs in a game, it's not impressive. First 10 are impressive, second 10, not impressive at all. Anyway, Tommy Edmund is two for three off Scherzer Jake. Two for three with a home run. So that means nothing because Scherzer probably took them very lightly and he jumped them like so guard jumped Cole. But yeah, good for Tommy Edmund. He gets to go in there with little confidence under his belt. Marcel Ozuna has good numbers versus Scherzer in 39 played appearances. He's got a 917 OPS with two home runs. And maybe we just need to make this a generic thing because you could say it about literally any playoff game that, because I mean jumping on them in the first inning is the best way to score in the playoffs is the first inning meter, a 10 out of 10 for this game. Like you just got one hit. You lost game one at home. Max Scherzer's on the mound. Is the first inning scoring meter basically as high as it can be for a team? For the Cardinals it is. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yes, for the Cardinals it is. I agree with that. Because I mean if A, if they don't get a hit in the first inning, the stand starts looking around like, okay, we're doing this again. And I think even if you get traffic on the bases and you don't score, that's almost as deflating. Yeah, you know who's got really bad numbers versus Wainwright? Bad numbers versus Wainwright calculating Howie Kendrick. I'm not positive on his. It is a guy on the Nationals. We've been rude if it was a guy in the Cardinals. Yeah, it was guy on the Nationals who in this postseason has a 452 on base percentage and a 1.060. Rendon? Rendon, been the star. He is one for 16 against Adam Wainwright with no walks. So a 0-6-3 on base percentage versus Wainow. Doesn't like them curve balls. So watch out for that matchup. That'll be fun because Rendon's hot as a pistol. Can't hit him. And then you got Adam Eaton who has a 545 OBB versus Wainow. He's 6-4-11. And Ryan Zimmerman crushes Wainwright as well. Now you asked about Howie Kendrick. So I'll let you know. Two for nine with a walk. So nothing, nothing there. Howie Kendrick have a postseason. And Paul Goldschmidt sucks versus Scherzer. Two for 25. So there you go. That's my battle right now. One of those guys has to get the pitcher they've never really gotten before. Rendon has to get Wainow or Goldie has to get Scherzer. Who's gonna do it? Place your bets. And it sounds kind of dumb. It sounds like we're almost like we're mocking it a little bit but that's a huge thing. Like you come into the playoffs. Each of those pitchers is like, oh, I own this guy. If they get one off of you in the playoffs you're like, are you kidding me? I've dominated this dude. And now here we are game two of the NLCS and Rendon slaps one down the line or Goldie connects with one. That's a momentum. Momentum. So all right, I'm rooting for the Cardinals. I want a one in one series going into game three but just give me a special fun storyline. Whoever's down in the eight. Let's move on to the American League series and we have Scott Titmuss in the chat says is there an L game today? Didn't realize. Yeah. That's a great question, Scott. We, there's bias here go cry about it. I am amped up nervous as a Yankees fan. For this game one, Zach Granky going for the Houston Astros versus Masahiro Tenaka for the Yankees. I don't know. I can go into pitching matchups. Do you have any general thoughts about the series? We did a whole preview on talking Yankees. Astros are really fucking good. Yankees have not been this healthy all season but they are healthy. The Yankees lineup is much better than the Rays lineup. So I expect them to be able to get to pitchers a little better but those pitchers are still really, really good. I'm not cocky going into this. I was incredibly cocky going into the twin series. Almost like tried to simmer myself down in front of a mirror like don't jinx this. Why are you so cocky? I'm confident that this will be a good series that it'll be competitive. Yeah, and you and I went back and forth on this a little bit. I mean, in the realm of sports, when you see two teams like this, you normally sit there and say like, all right, we're going seven. It might be ugly how we get there. Get your popcorn ready. I don't know. I mean, obviously we'll see how the series goes. I'm sure there's gonna be 20 different takes and turns that come out of it. I think these are, and I don't think this is rude. I think these are the two best teams left in the playoffs. They've been two of the best teams all season. And they're absolute juggernauts. I mean, you look at the Yankees lineup. We did this yesterday and I think we did a little bit of it on talking baseball but I mean, go through that raised lineup and look at some of the guys. I mean, Travis Darno was hitting cleanup. For the Yankees, you'll probably see Giancarlo Stan, former NLMVP, not Travis Darno that got cut from a team this year. The Yankees lineup has incredible depth. The Houston lineup has incredible depth. Everyone knows about the Houston starters. The lesser known, but I mean, the Yankees bullpen is really special with some quality starting pitchers. I mean, this matchup, I think a lot of people are saying it's the de facto World Series champion. There's a lot of moving parts there, but this is, I think, and maybe this is AL bias or whatever, but these are the two best teams in baseball meeting up. It seemed like this whole year was building towards it and now we're here. Yeah, it's gonna be fun. I hope that it delivers. I hope the Yankees beat them 10-nothing every game in four, but I'm pretty aware that's not gonna happen. No, and it's like we were saying, and I think there's some parallels. St. Louis goes down and now they've got, they got Scherzer and Strasburg lined up with a Flaherty asterisk for game three, but the Yankees, and this scares us as Yankee fans, but the Yankees are almost expected to win this game because Verlander and Kohler on deck. So that's a pretty interesting dynamic. You don't see that in a lot of ALCS game ones that the home team, it feels like the Yankees really need to get it to a degree. Again, I'm sure this series is gonna have, this series is gonna have more turns than a roller coaster. That's just the nerves coming out, but it's exciting. You just, you want it to be good baseball. You don't wanna walk away from one of these games and be like, oh, that guy booted a ball or one relieve or blew it for you. You just don't want that. Yeah, yeah. Let's see, what are some common thoughts about this series? Everyone has the asterisk, had the better starting pitching, Yankees had the better bullpen. When you combine those, it levels out more than you want it to in your head if you're anti-Yankees. Like, they're like, they're bullpen for the sixth and seventh inning is similar to Verlander for the sixth and seventh inning. So just need the starting pitchers for the Yankees, they need the starting pitchers to go two times through. This game, Jake, Zach Grankey is on the mound. He's coming off a brutal start. He would not be their game one starter if they didn't go five games, but he is their game one starter. This is a big game, like you said, there are parallels with the Annabelle Sanchez stuff. Not as much, but stats-wise, the Yankees have played Grankey twice this year. I think they beat him once and didn't beat him another time, right? It's a deadline day. Yeah, and the first time, and actually this was one of the actual real answers Grankey gave in his press conference. You've seen this team twice already and he was like, they were so injured when I saw them. Yeah, that was the best answer he gave. Yeah. It's like that doesn't matter at all. It's a totally different team. Yeah, the lineups that he saw, let me read them too, because it'd be funny real quick. Brett Gardner let off. Voight was second. Gary, third. Gleiber, Tachman, Maven, Estrada, Wade, CeCe. So one, two, three, four, five, six of the nine won't be hitting in today. So there's only three hitters there, saw them that game. And then the second time it was Hicks, Judge, and Carnasio, DD, Gleiber, Geo. It's pretty good. Cameron Maven, Mike Tachman, Romine. So I think we have five. He saw five of nine that time. Yeah. I don't know. I think when you zoom out and you're talking big themes, I think what could become a theme of this series is almost, there's not half time in baseball, but in theory, there's the first half and the second half of the game. The Astros have the advantage in the first half of the game. The Yankees have the advantage in the second half of the game. I don't know if that sounds dumb to people, but it's true. So I wonder, it's kind of funny that the Yankees team, pitching-wise, that gets compared to this is the Royals team that won it all, because they had those four relievers that would come out. And it was awesome. When that Royals team was right, it was five inning games. And the Yankees kind of have that mentality. It's gonna be interesting to see how they try to jump these Astros starters if they try to make something happen. Or if they can get early leads, I mean, they believe in their bullpen where the Astros are gonna be believing in, A, their starters a third time through the order and their bullpen. It'll be interesting to see, I mean, can the Astros bullpen step up? Will Harris had a really special year, won five ERA in like 60 appearances. Can he be that guy in the playoffs? Ozuna, we saw him have to get pulled because they tried to push him more than an inning. How does he look like? And I mean, can they give it to those guys in the right opportunity? Yep, Tanaka, Tanaka tonight. What Tanaka does is throws a lot of different pitches and he's really good at throwing strikes, not in the middle of the zone. When he's on, when he's on, he's really good at nibbling without really being a nibbler. Like he'll, he can nibble correctly. And is Tanaka's worst playoff start ever is five innings pitch to earn runs. And that was his first ever playoff start in 2015. In 35 career playoff innings pitched, he has a one, five, four ERA, six starts. I mean, he's been special in the playoffs. And there's, if you're a Yankee fan, you have to believe in him. If you're a Houston fan, I mean, you're talking yourself into your team, obviously, because you got a ton of dudes and that lineup is a lot to navigate. I'll say this Jim, and I wouldn't say this on talking Yankees, but if they got to Tanaka somehow, we'd be shook because we've never seen that in the playoffs. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I don't even like talking about it, so. Yeah, so we won't. I don't like anything you just said. I feel like you're knocking on wood the whole entire time. I know. Hosea- He tried to be neutral. Oh. Well, who would Tanaka has to watch out for tonight is Braggman. He's got the best numbers versus him and George Springer. And then Reddick is three for 19. That's not good. Granky, DJ LeMay, you've seen Granky a ton. 61 plate appearances, 283 batting average. It's all singles, really. But it's a 283 batting average. And if DJ can do that, if he can just slap a single to open up the game, how much of a breath of fresh air that would be? Just like, OK, one base runner right away. So I'm rooting for that. All right. And by the way, there's a lot of social warriors that came out yesterday defending Granky's anxiety. And to a degree, you're right. But it was also Twitter just got the ball rolling on a topic, so everyone felt they had to get their tweet off like, yo, let's not make fun of this guy for that. And yeah, you're right. I mean, anxiety is a real thing. What a lot of people were talking about, though, is I mean, Granky's last three playoffs starts, he's been bad. 12.1 innings pitch, 15 hits, seven walks, 13 earned runs, 967 eRA. And his last three playoffs starts, Granky's been bad. So it'll be interesting to see with him being kind of the weak link of the Astros big three, can the Yankees jump them? And can the storyline? Is that Granky does get jumped today? I mean, the storyline is going to be that playoff Zach Granky isn't there. Yeah. Best case scenario for the Yankees. So best case scenario for the Astros. What Astros fans are rooting for is, obviously, they take game one. They've got Verlander and Cole, games two and three. They're up 3-0 after three. And that's their best case. Yankees fans. It would be jumping the bullpen, too. Yankees fans. If they jump the bullpen, that would be threat level midnight in Yankee land. For Yankees fans, it's different, Jake. We can't even have 3-0 in our sights right now. Trying to be, you know, they have that advantage. Where their best case is a 3-0 lead after three games. Yankees best case is a 2-1 lead after three games. We're being honest. And it's beat Granky tonight. Somehow get to Verlander or Cole at Yankees stadium. And if the Yankees are up 2-1 after three games, then you have their game four pitcher and game four. And then Granky game five. That's Yankee fans' fantasy. It's not as good as what Astros fans can dream up. They kind of have the advantage there a little bit. Yeah. And I mean, Yankee fans are saying to themselves if they're being real or not. But if you can get Granky, A, you're going to see him again. And B, you're going to get a start by either Jose or Keady or Wade Miley. So the Yankee fans are penciling that in as a win. So if you get two Granky starts and are Keady, you need to beat Cole and Verlander once, which those words could end up haunting me in a week and a half. But the Yankees have a path. Houston has a path. I feel like maybe we're talking ourselves down. It's going seven slash Yanks and five. A question from the chat before they wrap this up. From Rich George. Why do you think they are going with Tanaka game one? He's their best pitcher. Throw your best pitcher. He's throw your best pitcher often as possible. You want tank and two starts before anyone else. So that's why. He's their most reliable postseason often. I think best pitcher could get skewed, especially if Paxton's right, I think he's their best pitcher. Or Severino, actually. I think that's probably the question by Rich George. When those other guys are right, they're more talented. But Tanaka's playoff body of work is unquestioned. Yes, you're exactly correct. I just would have never. Who's your best pitcher for this series? Tanaka's the best pitcher in the series. Well, I mean, we could look back in Severino. Severino's a guy that could throw six innings with 12Ks. Tanaka doesn't have that. Yeah. But we can't trust Severino, and that's into the package right now. Right, as of now. As of now, Tanaka has the most reliable best body of work. Tanaka's good isn't as good as the other two. But Tanaka's good comes out more reliable, so he's the best pitcher right now. It has been out, yes. I factor that into who's the best pitcher. If you're just going straight skill, it's not Tanaka, but the Yankees clearly know Tanaka's their most reliable option. Yes. All right, that ends this one. Thank you guys very much. It's going to be, tomorrow might be a later episode, Jake. We have to do talking Yankees tonight. Then I have to do an airport run at 3 a.m., and then we'll do this whenever I wake up from that tomorrow. The moment you wake up, I guess, before you put on makeup? Yeah, say a little prayer for me. Forever and ever. See you guys. Enjoy the games tonight. If you're not a Yankees or an Astros fan, tune in. It should be fun.