 So you know Kershaw is back and that's great news and we've been hearing all about his velocity and we know it's diminished we understand that but what do you really expect now from him going forward Mark? Well you look at Clayton Kershaw it may be the back half of his career and not the Cy Young Award guy because he's gone through a lot of injuries and if Clayton Kershaw tonight is going to be good he's going to you're gonna have to look for his secondary stuff and it has a lot to do with that slider the slider is what he gave the home run up to Yasio Pueg it's not that finish he didn't have spring training this year so you're wondering if that's gonna be there we've seen a good curveball but you're wondering if Kershaw is that same guy anymore because of all of those injuries because of not having spring training. I worry about Clayton because of all of the bullets that he's thrown but this is a guy that's always relied on four pitch mix and if he didn't have one that night he still could dominate a lineup. Well Mrs. spring training is big for a starting pitch of his caliber but one thing about him he has the ability to pitch and pitch at a high level and you said he mixes four pitches now when he's at his best he had two pitches basically to get you out and now he's pitching with four pitches I don't worry about Clayton Kershaw because he's gonna find a way to get it done. If you think about the injury history that you that you have with Clayton Kershaw a lot of its back and then he so many times he's been through there the shoulder the bicep two back DLs and now the shoulder too much injury and plus they they ended up serving up that contract to him last year. For Clayton Kershaw I think the comp is a Zach Grenke. If you look at Zach Grenke that velocities dip down the differentials are very similar to the secondary stuff with the fastball so it makes it a little bit easier for the offensive guys to make those adjustments against how much easier Frank if you're taking if you this fastball is at 89 it's sitting at 8 9 90 tonight if his fastball is there how much easier is it for you to deal with the other well I mean I think you're able to sit back on the breaking ball more because you're not worried about the fastball blowing by you but what's gonna be cute with him is gonna be that cut that cutter he's gonna have to do that hard-slider cutter down and in to keep guys on his end I'll make his fastball better. All right we'll keep watching Kershaw tonight making his debut but it's Reds with a 2-1 lead in LA. This is a bad start. This is a bad start. They're 6-11 right now they just don't look good so is this simply World Series hangover for you? I think it's fatigue. I mean they're pitching staff they just been up and down. Chris Sell looks a little a little hurt I wouldn't I'm not saying he's hurt but he's not himself and it starts with your ace and he's been bad every outing so far this year. I just think this team is this not a hangover I think it's fatigue playing late in October. Everything went perfect for this team last year they hit on I mean every day the hit line drives went in big ball games they played incredible defense and they pinch well from starter staff to the bullpen when everything goes perfect like this the next year you can expect that because baseball is a different season every year. Yeah and I think it is a hangover because if you think of it though the way they started the season last year they started 17 and 2 and just just rolled the rest of the year everything went perfectly as Frank talked about I think this is the first adversity Alex Cora is doing and it's ever had so it's a test for him he's already built that trust factor in the locker room so I don't worry about this team moving forward but I do worry about Chris sale and I also worry about Mookie Betts and he was even commenting today about the way he is started 222 batting average three home runs seven RBI's this is the MVP and he did everything right last year can he jump on and have a hot stretch yes of course we all expect it because of what he puts into his craft but when you are struggling you look to your stars to get yourself out of it and I think Mookie Betts is gonna write the ship and then you're gonna not talk about the hangover that's going on now you're gonna say this is the talented team that is going to be where they're supposed to be right we so we've seen yellow and what he's doing to start the year when you in looking again it still is a small sample size but when you win an MVP as you have done how hard is it to now now that the bar is up here to say well that's the new bar especially playing in a place like Boston that's the bar you said it high league MVP you did everything won a batting title and then you come out and started like 220 people look at you like whoa whoa you're not getting done I mean baseball is year-to-year Mookie Betts is an incredible player he's gonna figure it out he's gonna figure it out fast and you think about it too I mean I spent a lot of time watching stars like Frank Thomas and they set the bar but they had expectation the next year even if they went through struggles they had expectations that they were gonna have their numbers at the end of the year it was gonna be where it's at I think Mookie Betts is at that point in his career and he's that star that has that expectation that's why he's disappointed yeah and mix mix in this the Red Sox starting staff the RA is 7.1 wow that is not gonna get it done so that's got to get better