This is the Dunlebatar show with the Stuka spot cast. Any other thoughts here? Amari Stonemeyer is a Hall of Famer. I wouldn't have immediately gone there.
I wouldn't have immediately assumed Hall of Famer. I would have immediately got there. High school dominated the lead for a couple of years. Yeah, especially when you consider how gracious this Hall of Fame is compared to the other sports.
But yeah, incredible career in Phoenix was talked about, rightfully so for much of a season, his first season in New York as an MVP candidate and dealt with a lot of adversity in his career. His life. Yeah. And like to be able to battle back from the injuries that he had previous to New York and reach those levels again, really impressive.
So Amari, first of all, you talk about his peak. A strong six to eight years. Right up there with Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan, Dirk Novitsky as one of the best power forwards in the game. He, beneath all of them, I would say no, I don't even mean that as an indictment because he was top five in MVP voting.
But those were all better players than he was, right? And I also don't mean to diminish him when I say everything that he did with Steve Nash. But when they revolutionized how basketball was being played, it was at least in part because he had a number two in Nash that those other guys you just mentioned did not. Well, I think the thing that a lot of people would point to is that technically Amari was the number two.
Steve Nash was the one who got a lot of the credit. Two MVPs. Yeah, but it was a symbiotic relationship because. But all those guys are number one's you just mentioned, all the others.
And again, I don't mean to indict him. I'm just saying, when you guys have such a different opinion than me on me being like, well, Amari Stalemai had a really, really great career and he wouldn't have gone in automatically by my metric unless you're making the basketball a fame, a lot less hard to get into what you do. And the other holes of fame. You guys are doing this thing where it's like, you can never give anyone credit for having a Hall of Fame career.
You have to undercut it immediately by saying, oh, but that's what, no, no, no, let's not do that. I don't think this is one of those cases. Yeah, like this guy's all. Go metal winner, yep.
And he, like, when you talk about going to New York, that was a crater that no one wanted to go to. Nobody wanted to go there. And he went there, reinvented them for a season. And it's not because he fell off a cliff.
Basketball wise, his knee gave out under. And he punched the fire extinguisher, leaving the court in a playoff game that that's not why his career. Sounds like you hate Amari Stalemai. Yeah, what you do is that?
That anti-Semitism continues to rear its ugly head with Dan Levittard. The thing about Amari, Dan, was that he was probably the best finisher in basketball in his front. There was nobody who was better at finishing. Everyone thinks of the dunks.
But I'm telling you, this guy was so incredible at making finishes at the rim without actually dunking the ball. Because his hands were so good. He had great hands. He'd catch anything he'd throw him.
And he'd finish. I remember being on the practice court. And a drill was kind of like, got to get a certain number of shots up in a two-minute span. And Amari dunked so hard.
It felt like a sonic boom. It knocked me back off my feet. He never made contact with me. But the dunk was so forceful, the wind blew me off my feet.
And I fell down and everyone laughed. So go to time. That really happened. That really happened.
Why that turn his dunk in there? Why is he back? I haven't listened to much of anything you were saying because I was startled by my hatred of Amari. I'm startled by it, too.
It surprised me. It came out of me. But it's not because he's Jewish. No, I'm pretty sure you were also pissed off Subaru got in last year.
Subaru's Jewish? Are you not that way? That's not in any way true. You just made up a total tape about it.
And there was a moment of growth for Dan. Did you just come out and admit and embrace? Well, you can't say that. It feels like I can't.
It sounds like I can't, but I can't. It's funny because it's a word. Right. It's a real word.
JEW. Well, Charles Barkley came on one time and spelled it. I thought that Charles Barkley would have gotten more aggregation and fanfare. I don't know if you guys saw what he did on CBS.
There was a profile. I forget the young man's name that plays for you, kind of. It's one of the titles with them. Yeah, Caravan.
It was a profile on Caravan. And he took the opportunity to make a stance on immigration. And his eyes weld. He was tearing up about the treatment of illegal immigrants in this country.
It was a weird on-ramp to that discussion. But it was obviously something that was bothering him. And he got emotional. I would have thought, given it's right before a big game, he's on network TV.
It's Charles Barkley. That more would have been done with that. It just kind of came and went. I was like, was that the only one that saw that?
I was Caravan also from Southboro, Mass. So I don't know. Don't take the even gentle situation. Like I said, it was a weird on-ramp.
Makes threes from half court. And we'll make him the thing I wanted to mention about Charles, though, because it can be said without anyone refuting it, that there has never been anyone in the history of sports broadcasting like him. No one is allowed to endure for as long as he has, as an American voice. Never mind someone who got that way polarizing.
That just never happened. And it'll never happen again, either. But he got a lot of criticism when him and Dick Vital did one of these broadcasts, because the sanctity of the broadcast is such that even those two legendary personalities, it became old guys telling stories, and it got a lot of criticism, because Charles is 60 now. Charles is an old broadcaster, and Charles getting emotional is one of the human things that makes him endure when four decades is not normal to be this kind of voice.
And he's human in a way that people understand. And when he talks about stuff and cries on television, it still means something somehow. I don't know if he's, is he old? I mean, he's always kind of had old guy opinions.
For a broadcaster, I was stunned to find out Bill Raffery, didn't call his first final four until he was 72 years old. Bill Raffs, because he was always on the B team. He was always on the B team. And then like when they got to like the A games, it was, it was not him.
It was a Jimin. Kind of like a Mandela effect, because like his voice is just always associated with these weak moments and his emotion always meets it, that you would think that he was the voice of these big games. I'll give you another one. Bill Walton never called him B finals, because Bill Walton was on the B team.
It was him, Tom Hammond, and his niece, Napper Jones. And the A team was always like, Costas and the Collins, or Marv Albert and Doug Collins. Marv Albert, Doug Collins, Isaiah Thomas, like they were, they were the A team and the B team. And even though we always take a Bill Walton's incredible, like he never called the big game.
Can I just segue from what it is that we are talking about here into the story involving Puke Nakua, because I've been remiss in not mentioning this before now, because there's a set of circumstances here that is unusual, right? Earlier this week, we spent some time discussing, like is Puke okay? Is football damaged him? What's going on with the internet videos where he's passing out in public?
And we invoke Junior Say-Out in part of a larger conversation when a guy is spinning out and crashing publicly and might be self-medicating because his sport hurts, and some of these guys are gonna medicate because they need to just stop physically hurting, because some of what they do is insane. We now have news, and this is unusual. I mean, you tell me how private this normally happens. I'm surprised today that I was surprised that I don't more often see in sports before anyone has actually failed a drug test and been caught by the league.
People doing the celebrity rehab thing of both image and public facing everything, raising their hand and saying through their lawyer, yeah, I'm going to rehab. I needed to help with some things. I don't see that very often in sports. Why don't I see that very often in sports?
It seems like a pretty simple thing for people to need help before there are public crash outs on, yeah, I need to go take care of something. I need help. Well, typically the public crash outs are the indicator that, oh my God. Because up until that point, the addict always believes I have everything under control.
I'm fine. So I get loose a little time sometimes. Some of you have some fun, but I always know. I always know my limits.
That's how they talk. And then something happens that demonstrates to them, you have absolutely no control of your limits, and that's usually the light bulb that goes off. And this was revealed by his lawyer who said that he entered treatment before news of this assault allegation came out, which means when we were wondering like, is he okay, this is concerning behavior? He was in treatment, so credit to him and his team for getting them the help that he very clearly needed.
One of the things though, that's interesting about this to me, right, is public drinking crash outs in the modern age from superstar athletes, not really seeing them in the major sports very much. We also don't, to be fair and to not be reckless, despite how this sounds. We don't know if it's just alcohol. We don't know what he's checking.
Oh, no, wait, wait, wait, wait. But his attorney Levi did give us some information because what he said is just rehab to deal with an assortment of life issues. They've been unclear about what the crash out is, but there's no disputing that there's a crash out that is now required Levi to thunder in, and that's his attorney down. That is his attorney down.
That is his attorney down. That is his actual attorney. That is his actual attorney. That's me in 20 years.
No, that is, no, it truly is. That is the guy. That he's riding in on behalf of mental health and 20 years. Wow.
That's right. That's what I said. Yeah, you know how much of a mustache guy there's not? It can be.
He doesn't want to be. Yeah, I don't want to be. I mean, let's take a look at that. That's your future.
That's a good look though. For the audio audience, Levi does not look 20 years older than Chris Cody. If Chris Cody, he also doesn't look like a Levi. Dude, I didn't want to say it, but the name by itself, boy even saw his picture.
The name was kind of confusing. Last name does it for you. Yeah, but that's the two combinations. Mcather.
Mcather is the last day for the audio audience. OK, this is a cowboy lawyer who looks like this guy's son. I mean, he looks like champ kind inflated. It's champ kind has a lot to do.
You guys have me being older than this guy. Get out of here. I look great. Chris Cody, this is what I'm going to tell you.
Just happened in that room. I'm sorry to do this to you. It is what happened. I don't think I will be misrepresenting either Mike or Tony here.
If we gave you a light blue jacket right now, that outfit and that hat and you made that same gesture, we could put those pictures side by side. No, people would say those people are roughly the same age. I disagree. That's what I can disagree with what happened behind you, because I saw it and you did not.
They came out as crazy. It came out as 20 years, huh? And the reason it came out that way is because both of them registered as I'm not sure Levi's older than Chris. And the Catherine Brothers.
Give me his age. Chris still owes a couple of good of death punishments. So I know how to do this one. I'll do that.
Roy, clone scholars, you can do that. Hey, Roy, buddy, you know that energy shift when the game gets good and everybody altogether in unison knows to stand up on their feet. Oh, absolutely. Like, yeah, you've been at many big time sporting events.
You know that moment quite well. That's what it's like when you take your first sip of queer. Oh, delicious. It's the signal that says, we're not checking the time anymore, pal.
It's when small talk turns into stories. Queervo, man. It's at high five, a random stranger effect. That's right.
The game is popping. You're hugging people you never met before. That's the kind of energy that Queervo brings. It's so smooth, so delicious.
That's the Queervo effect. Keep it, Queervo. Hello, friends. Hello, listeners.
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In terms of key fans, you're the most irrational of us. What's the pivot? Oh, what are rational? Stu Gats.
Oh, my rational! You hear your voice there? If I were making a cartoon thing that was meant to symbolize a rational, that's the voice I would give. Primus.
This is not a libocard show. With a Stu Gats. Boy, can I get a verdict here on what has happened here? Because it happened behind you as well and you might not have gotten a good look at it either.
But I really do feel like Mike and Tony both said, Levi is not appreciably older than Chris Cody. And the cowboy hat helps you, Chris. If I take your hat off and show your hair to people. Oh, that is a damn thing.
The smaller cowboy hat does make you look younger. I think that looks like his little brother. Roy, what is the age difference between those two human beings if I gave you no other information other than those photos? Definitely 15 to 20.
He's on par. He's right. Roy gets it. Who's younger?
All right, I'm doing a little research on his page under the rising from humble roots part of his website. Levi was born in Texas. Yeah, yeah. Levi was born in Texas and went to Baylor and got a bachelor's of arts degree in 1990.
So I mean, he's college age graduating in 1990. 22 in 1990. I was born in a set. So that would put him somewhere under his 50s.
Oh, imagine that 20 years old? So this could be your father? It was really more of an opinion on how you've aged. Yeah.
I look great, dude. Yeah. Are we not looking at the same thing? Yes, we are.
The smaller hat doesn't make you look like a little crazy. It really did take 15 years off you. The fact that they brought in a toy hat of some sort. It's like, Levi, make sure you take your little brother with you.
Oh, I hate it when I had to take him like, you're slow little brother. Fine. Come on. Whoa.
I leave. I got my hat on just like you. I love this side by side. I never felt better about myself.
I'm so in closing. Credit to Pukinikoua for Ken Truman. That's my big event brave and we hope for the best. Guys, you remember how I had this long standing take that if I had a time machine, the one place I'd want to go is the cabin that reportedly John Travolta and Nicholas Cage rented for a weekend in the woods while they were preparing to start shooting face off to get everybody's manurisms down, right?
To learn each other inside and out. The new place I want to travel to is the quarterback room in Las Vegas. Wow. When Kirk Cousins meets Fernando Mendoza.
I can't imagine how long that handshake is going to be. It's an honor to meet you. What are you doing here? What are you doing here?
I saw you playing Atlanta. Hey, big fan. Big fan. How are you bro?
Big fan. How are you bro? I love yours. How's your dad?
My family? How do you like your state? Me? I don't season it at all.
There will be a Mr. Cousins in there. That's the one place where you guys head around. Mr.
Cousins, nice to meet you. I'm Fernando Mendoza. Please call me Kirk Cousins. I'm going to make you better.
I'm going to make you better. You guys mentioned earlier that that quarterback room is going to lead the league in corny. How often are we doing that to the quarterbacks in that league? Often.
I think most of the quarterbacks tend to be more like button down, button up and like not. But there's a balance, right? If you have a corny guy, you probably don't have another corny guy as a back home. Something like something I'm super cool.
Good hand. I think it's like both. My home's play is exciting. Kind of a corny dude.
Is he? No, man. You got to get out the top. He's going to lose.
No, people don't look at him that way. Wait a minute. What are we doing here? Because I want to be accurate about this.
What's corny? Well, because this is why. If we're going to start here. Look, the Fernando Mendoza story is unbelievably charming.
Just a staggering story from start to finish. But now you're going to get him in a corny off with Kirk Cousins who, I mean, even when he's, you like that, even his a defiance. We laugh at because it's just, no, you're corny and you're defiant. You're a crowning achievement moment.
It's not easy to throw for 400 yards in that league. We still think you're corny. We bury Russell Wilson in corny. Like you guys are going to put this as the corny as quarterback room in the league.
I got his sharpens iron. This is the perfect mentor for Fernando Mendoza. If we could hand pick a mentor for Fernando Mendoza, many people were saying he reminds us of Kirk Cousins. His approach to the game.
This is perfect. Yeah. This is amazing. Quarterbacks are supposed to be cool.
It doesn't have to be Joe Burrow, but it's not like it doesn't have to, it's like, I'm going to agree. I think Fernando's cool. It's a literal match made in heaven. Yes.
Is Bonix cool? Yeah. Yeah. I think you guys are complaining good with cool.
That's right. Yeah. Maybe I'm just doing good looking with Bonix. I don't think Bonix is cool.
Yeah. I don't cool. That cool? Cool is like a bonus when it comes to quarterback.
First off, just because you got corny quarterback doesn't mean you got a bad one. Right. Exactly. Cool.
Yeah. Cool. Can we throw Tom Brady into this equation in the handshake when they all meet each other? Because he, look, you want it to be in the blue quarterback room?
He is somebody. He's a robot. He's a seven-time champion. And maybe you guys would regard Kirk Cousins differently if he was all the same things and a seven-time champion?
Hold on. Let me introduce another contender. Brock Purdy and McCorkle Jones. Brock Purdy is not cool.
That's a great example. And McCorkle Jones is his backup. Brock's got some juice to him. Come on.
If I enjoy a period. Brock has some juice. He's got that Levi's contract. It's playing games with you.
His teammates say Brock's got some juice. He would fit right in with Kirk. You're just doing the white thing. No.
You're doing the clinics? It doesn't fit. I'll tell you who's cool. Jackson Dart.
That's cool. Jackson falls on the line. This is the bus factor. Cool.
You might be too cool. I don't think it's a bus factor. I think you're just going to run headfirst into something. If you wear a chain.
It's a bad thing. It's a bad thing. What kind of chain? He wears a nice style chain.
That's cool man. That's a cool quarterback. Another stat here on Victor Wemanyama. This is from Mark Stein's researcher.
He had 41 points and 18 rebounds in just 29 minutes last night. That's the third time he's had 40 in 10 in 30 minutes or less this season. Most such games in a season in NBA history passing Giannis in 2022, 2023. What are you shaking your head?
To be fair. I mean, could we name collectively me and you the starting lineup for the Warriors last night? It was a bad team. It was a Santa Cruz win.
I don't even know if Gee Santos was playing. I don't know who that is. He's been actually very good for them. He's really good man.
He got paid this year too. No, it's true, Tony. This is, but again, he's done it multiple times now. That's the thing.
It's not that he did it last night. It's that this is the most time that's happened ever in a single season. And that's what makes it so special is that he's doing this routinely. Do you feel like him coming out and saying, like, I really care about the MVP?
It's kind of like, man, I don't like that. So I think we're at a point where, to continue the conversation of cool, too many people are trying to be cool. And so I welcome every time Victor Wambagnama gets aggressive and campaigns for any of these things. Because what I'm noticing, what happens, it's forcing other guys to react to have to be like, well, so before Victor said his thing, I believe it was down here when he first said, he said defense is part of it.
That was here, right? That was here, right? Since then, we've got Luca campaigning, whether it's his coach or him or whatever. You got Shaco just Alexander.
You've got, obviously, King Cunningham's. Has your coach said anything? Or he just continues to have triple doubles and lead the League of Businesses? Before we get to pitch clock here, I just want a kind of music.
I asked Roy before the show to find me music that would give off the pageant tree if you would round up a round table of champions together and have like a ceremony where they're introducing champions of the future. Our looks like champions of the past need to be together here to celebrate what the games are. The championship parade of sorts. All right.
So bring all our champions in here from previous looks like tournament to all the voices, just one after another. Folks looks like a train conductor. Jay Cutler looks like the guy trying to break into a house on an alarm company commercial. Jackie McMullen looks like your mom's friend Carol.
Tony Saracusa looks like the guy up back to take a bite of a hot dog only to have it stolen by Spider-Man swinging overhead. Andy Reid looks like the small town sheriff that falls asleep while watching the prisoners wakes up briefly to yell out, who's there? To know one in particular and immediately falls back to sleep while the prisoners continue to carefully reach for the jail cell keys dangling from his belt. Old school skeleton keys.
Doug Peterson looks like he specifically asked for full custody of the basement air hockey table in his divorce. That's go piss Mike. Yeah. Oh, it was serious.
Yeah. I was like your brother's friend Devin. Who everyone just comes deep. This one is so good.
So good. Those are all of the champions all time and they are telling us that we've got four teams remaining in our tournament. So these are the matchups Saturday. You've got Illinois.
That's represented by Tony reality. Tony reality looks like the overzealous owner of an Italian restaurant who always greets you at the door with a my favorite couple when you walk in perfect going up against Yukon represented by. It looks like a newly opened chapstick and then the championship is being played Saturday night. It's Arizona.
That means Jonathan Zaslow looks like an off-duty mine going up against Michigan. The most perfect one in the tournament, I thought Michael Smith looks like the high school teacher that motivates his students by sitting in the chair backwards video team. I don't know why you'd put up Tom Thibodeau instead of Michael Smith. He's done this perfectly for weeks.
He also kind of looks like video team. You really watched that because Thibodeau does not look like that at all. And Michael Smith, put it on the pole and nailed it a hundred times. I want to hear you read it again.
I want to put it on the pole at Lebittard show does Tom Thibodeau look like the opposite of Michael Smith. I have a confession to make up until this point. I did not realize that Tom Thibodeau was black. The video team has ruined our tournament.
We stumbled right at the end like the guy who were in the marathon. We were doing that so well for weeks at a time. Pitch clock not done well next whoa at Tim's you can now add protein dairy beverage to any drink. What about coffee?
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Chicken noodle soup. Okay. You can add protein to most drinks at Tim's at participating restaurants in Canada. This episode is brought to you by Samsung Canada.
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It sounds to me like everybody could use a hug because a hug is always the right size. Stogats. All I have put in my body today is three cups of coffee and an entire cup of coffee. Don't let him fool you.
He said in the break that he's jittery. This is the Don Libertard show with a Stogats. All right, Lewis. You're setting in for Chris today.
What I'm going to need from you. Okay. It's first. Have fun.
But when I normally introduce the show, I have Chris Dewey, Harry Carrey, hi everybody. So, all right. You're getting there? No, it's okay.
You're ready to do that when the time comes. That I am. And also Ben Sheets. Welcome to the Pitch Clock.
Here's the pitch, a two-part baseball segment, combining a nostalgic baseball trivia game and an interview with an expert. This is the Pitch Clock. There's been about a week of baseball, and we are here on the Pitch Clock for our second episode of the regular season. Hard one.
That's Lewis. Okay, Lewis. Not bad. Not bad.
That's Ethan. And we now have two different Harry Carrey impressions in replacement of Chris. Not forever. Just for this week.
Chris, I love you. But we couldn't wait for you to do this. Hey, so we're going to have David Sampson here. We've talked to him a couple of days ago about the first week-ish of Major League Baseball, some of his favorite things.
Some of his least favorite things. We'll get to that momentarily. He did a great job of getting everyone up to speed on what this week has been like. But, of course, Lewis, we're about to go head to head in some nostalgic baseball trivia.
I'm excited about this. I'm excited to have you here. You did such a great job on the livestream with us. Thanks.
And I really look forward to get into this with you. Lewis and I have talked more than we ever have, because he's been sending me nostalgic baseball content on Instagram. It's like a build. They do the build your team.
You have $15. So if you guys would like to open your folders inside, there is a build your team. And I took pretty much the same format. But I added on that team.
There were pictures. I added outfielders instead. So you're going to have $15. In front of you, there is a list of $5 players, $4 players, $3 players, $1 players.
I'm going to require you, if you add all those one from each column up, you get $15. I'm going to require you to pick one player from each column. You have to spend $15. You cannot have money left over.
You have to spend $15. Obviously, you have to take one player from each position as well. Now, how we're going to do this is, are you guys aware of the stat ISO? Yeah, I am.
But Lewis isn't. ISO is your slugging percentage minus your on-base percentage. So what you're looking for here is a guy who hit a lot of home runs, but maybe wasn't the best on-base artist. Cool.
Okay. So a lot of silky. Okay. So you want the power guys with maybe less on-base is what you're looking for.
Okay. So we're going to add up. I have in front of me each guy's ISO. So in the $5 column.
At first base, you have Alper Pouvels. At second base, you have Chase Utley. At third base, you have Alex Rodriguez. Short stop, Derek Jeter.
And in the outfield, Barry Bonds. In the $4 column. Jim Tomi. Robinson Canoe.
Chipper Jones. Jimmy Rollins. Larry Walker. $3.
Carlos Delgado. Jeff Kent. David Wright. Hanley Ramirez.
Tori Hunter. $2. Paul Canerko. Brian Roberts.
Or Thomas Ramirez. Jose Reyes. Vernon Wells. $1.00 column.
Sean Casey. Orlando Hudson. Mike Lowell. Agriya.
Maglio. Oh, yes. That's a very smart pick. Barry Bonds has a $3.09.
ISO. This is so tough. You know what? Wow, you have made this really difficult in terms of strategy.
Obviously. I know what I'm going to do here. Do the only comparable player to Barry Bonds. Don't tell me what to do.
Don't tell me what to do. Alper Pouvels is here. Yes. But.
But. But. But. But.
You know what? I know. Yeah. Correct.
All right. I'm going to go. Line up. You know, if you're asking for a value, about $0.05 plus, you know, $0.05.
It would be really, really high. And the disparity that I can get at another position is potentially higher correct. So. Just purely for the fun of it, I'm going to go.
First base. Jim to me. Nice. Nice.
Jim to me had a career. Two 78 so he had two 78 you said it was 3 and 9 for Lewis to 78 for me. You just say that all nine are not there. with David Sampson.
David Sampson is here with me. David, I'm excited to dive into this with you. And let's start right here. What was your favorite thing that you saw in majorly baseball over opening weekend?
Well, to start with everything, just having baseball back, when regular season starts, man, you know, it's like the first half mile of a marathon. And that's where we are now in football terms, Jeremy. We're like, not even at halftime of week one right in the NFL. It's so early, but you just are getting into it and you don't know what the next six months will bring.
I've loved watching games. I wish there were more of them on throughout the day. I'm not loving sort of the schedule, but that's a CBA issue we can talk about. But it's just so good to have it back.
One thing that was brought into major league baseball this year for the very first time is this ABS system. And everyone is having an overwhelmingly positive reaction to it thus far. The challenges, the drama that seems to ensue. You had, you know, Suarez challenging back to back pitches against CB Buckner.
You had a moment where Derek Shelton's getting tossed out because he thinks the Orioles pitcher doesn't tap the hat quick enough at being in the ballpark in Miami, seeing folks react in in real time. So this incredibly quick and efficient system. I mean, between the pitch clock and now this a couple of great innovations for baseball the last couple of years, what's your takeaway from what you've seen in the reaction to ABS? I think you're going to find this will be the most important change that's happened in your lifetime because in my lifetime it is.
And I've been having conversations with people pitch clock and DH and ghost runner. This one is major. And here's why the amount of strategy that is required given the parameters of the rule is significant. And it makes me wistful because I loved being in the national league when pitchers had to hit because you really had to manage the game and you were doing switch switches and pinch hitters and when you hit for your picture and where do you move people in the lineup and I just love that game.
I understand the DH. But the strategy of when to do it is fascinating to me. Yeah. And what you're going to see as the season progresses, I think you're going to see teams understand better how to use the challenges versus a random second.
And even if you get it right, the risk is that if you get it wrong, you lose the challenge, it becomes a major deal because look at what's the Yankees got Aaron judge an extra at bat because of a challenge against the Mariners. They didn't end up scoring. But you know what, you can. And that's something that we just hadn't seen before in baseball.
So it's awesome. And what a great point that you made on it feeling a little bit like the old national league strategy. The fact that there's actually something here where you have to as an entire team, look at the app at who's up, who's in scoring position. Is it worth something in this moment where really right now the only other decisions managers are making are do you want to pinch hitter or you know, do you want a different reliever in those things match up in different ways?
So it's a great point that you make there with the strategy and something like baseball fans love the chess not checkers of the game of baseball of thinking about that strategy for the long term. All right, I'm going to go with a second pick in my draft. I am I am going to so I was going to go Albert pool. So I can't do that.
So why not? Oh wait, you did it. I went so no, then I'm going to go Albert Pujols. Okay, so Albert Pujols, Jeremy were smart.
Jeremy Albert Pujols, career 248. Ah, immediately vindicated. Yeah, you mean that's so much value. So Lewis is going to have to go because he's got $10 at 18.
Okay, I'm going to go here for $3. Second baseman Jeff Kent. Dude, you look, look, look, you just look, you just circled him. But it's okay, because I'm a backup pick.
Jeff Kent has a career 210 ISO. It's really bad. After two rounds, he's crushing right neck and neck boys. Now he's crushing me right now.
I'm going to take Dave Robert, that second base for $2. That would be Brian Roberts. Brian, sorry, Brian Roberts. I regret to inform you has a career 133 ISO.
I'm going to go. I'm going to go. I'm going to go. I'm going to go for outfield Larry Walker.
Nice. Love that pick. You know, I'm a big, big, Larry Walker guy. That's 252 ISO.
All right. All right. All right. I'm ready to go.
Okay, so let me bag this now. Hose Rayas for $2, please. Hose Rayas, a career 144. Jesus, these skinny guys up in the middle.
Sock, huh? Yeah, I mean, you need a lot of slug. Yeah, I keep forgetting that. Okay, so you're just going off building a team and I get it.
I'm building a nasty team. Yeah. Let's move on here to some of the surprises in a positive way here. Who is a team that start may have surprised you the most?
It could be negative if you want to go that route, but who's a team that stands out to you that in these first several games has kind of surprised you with the way that they've played? Well, listen, it's early. But anytime you can win a game at Dodger Stadium, I'm going to have to say that that team wore in some attention and you look at what the Guardians do and how they have to operate and they have a chance to have a new owner at the end of this year or at the latest in 2029, someone named David Blitzer, who is an owner of the Sixers and the Devils as well. And the Guardians just find a way.
They trade players. They retool. And for whatever reason, they just find a way and they're leading the central division. Obviously after five games, it's hardly we're talking about.
But that said, if you've never heard of their players, that makes you normal and that's okay, because the beauty of baseball is that any given day, but you look at them, beat the Dodgers, the way I watched earlier in the week, and you just realize that, okay, the Dodgers can't win 175 games this year. There's a way to beat them, just like the way the Mariners beat the Yankees. There's going to be a moment when good pitching is always going to beat good hitting. And at the end, that's what we'll see for the next six months.
But Jeremy, my number one story has to be the Philadelphia Phillies. And when you choose to run it back and you watch your team get old, it happens really fast. And it looks like the Phillies, when they let Castellanos go, but they brought back JT, they resigned Schwer. Bryce Harper is the worst hitter I've ever seen forget elite.
He's not an average major leader right now, except right now is not a weak Jeremy. This was the entire world baseball classic. Forget the game time to run home run in the eighth inning. Other than that swing, the guy has been just there's off now.
Is it possible that they all aged at the same time? And they're all going to be bad? Well, that would make for a long bad year for the Phillies, which Jeremy, I predicted because I don't have them making the playoffs in my preseason predictions. But man, do they look bad?
I do remember talking to you about that. And it is the the wary nature of trying to run it back and get to a World Series with a team that is aging sort of all around you at once. We'll see if Bryce Harper can recover with some more of that raw milk. Let's talk about the stars of the week here, David, because, you know, you mentioned the Guardians chase the lottery guy who had a ridiculous start.
Obviously, Joey Weemer with the Washington Nationals. I think the first player likes to say Barry or maybe set a record to reach base safely 10 straight times for Marla Joey. We were the DFA in earlier in the year. But David, who stands out?
We were talking stars of the week, you know, whatever direction you want to go with it. Who's the star of the week for you? The Nationals are in first place. I mean, they're tied with the Marlins and the Mets, but the first place after several games.