After Hours with Amy Lawrence PODCAST: Hour 2

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Shop in store or visit Ashley.com today. I just had this pang of, man, how selfish of me. Maybe some of you like having a Monday doubleheader. Just because my brain is tired doesn't mean you can't have two football games on a Monday night.

So I'll try to think more about you next time. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. We've got our Monday MVP poll that will be ending this hour, but soon you'll also hear the candidates for TD of the Week. So on Twitter, After Hours, CBS, you can vote there. That's where we'll put up the new poll as well.

Happens every Monday night once the NFL weekend is firmly in the books. Also find me on Twitter, ALawRadio, and then our Facebook page too. YouTube channel has a brand new video up. We'll talk about it more coming up later on this edition of the show. By the way, I have yet to tell you my crazy half marathon in a tropical rainstorm story because it is a whopper.

Well, a whopper would indicate it's not true. It is a doozy. How about that? It is quite the story. So we have a lot to get to in the next three hours. And Monday into a Tuesday, there are always the injury news, the injury tests, and the updates, and the fallout from the week that was in football too.

So that's on the docket. Plus, we're getting down to the last week of the Major League Baseball regular season and still so much to be decided, specifically when it comes to the wildcards. We've got vintage Verlander on Monday night, but the Rangers showed no sign of slowing down ever again. They weren't slow necessarily, the two games that we saw in the NFL on Monday night. But the offenses at times, they were disjointed, maybe a little discombobulated. It took the Buccaneers way too long to find their stride.

Baker Mayfield is under center, Robert Hainsey. And will take the snap, looks to his left, those to his left. It is a caught ball. Mike Evans touched down Tampa Bay.

Fire the cannons finally. Finally, Gene Deckerhoff says on Buccaneers radio. And those were the final points of the game with just over nine minutes to go, but not nearly enough. The only touchdown for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. A couple of turnovers in there. They did manage to show some life there, but couldn't get enough going with the run game. And honestly, were out muscled in the trenches on both sides of the ball.

But Todd Bowles can't put this at the feet simply of the offense. Obviously, we didn't move the ball well. As a team, we didn't play well. It wasn't just the offense. We're going to win as a team.

We're going to lose as a team. Offense didn't play well. Defense didn't play well. Special team gave up field position. They're really good defensively. They're front.

They're incredible. It's tough to run on them. Obviously, we spread them out later on and were able to get that going once we wore them down a little bit. So, yeah, we just got to be better early on. Disappointing as a whole just because we didn't win the game, but short week for us. We've got a divisional opponent coming up, and so got to look in the mirror, get things fixed, and move on. Can't have time to lick our wounds. Baker Mayfield and Todd Bowles and the Bucks now absorb their first loss of the season.

To that end, we need to talk about it, right? We welcome T.J. Reeves, who is part of the Deckerhoff crew. Gene Deckerhoff does play-by-play.

He's on the sidelines roaming back and forth and up and down and seeing what he can see. T.J., let's talk about the Eagles and what they were able to do in the trenches. What stands out about the game against Philadelphia?

How about two words as advertised on Philadelphia? Both sides of the ball, front seven on defense, controlling the line of scrimmage, and then that offensive line just went right at the Buccaneers for four quarters and took it to them for the most part. They ran when they wanted to run. They controlled the clock. They controlled the game. So, as much as it was a frustrating night for the Bucks, not really able to do a whole lot in this one, you've got to credit the Eagles. They look like the defending NFC champs tonight at field level. Big, physical on both sides of the ball, and if you're going to beat this team, whether you're San Francisco, Dallas down the road, maybe the Buccaneers get another crack, whomever, you have got to be ready to bring the lunch pail and bring it for 60 minutes because that's what the Eagles do. And to this point, they had not turned the ball over offensively. An interception tonight, and then there was another lost fumble. So, what did you see in terms of the way that the Eagles played them defensively? They were very physical, again, in stopping the run for the most part, especially early in the game. Buccaneers could not get in a rhythm. They got one first down on like each of the first three drives and still had to punt the ball. And in the sequence you're talking about, we haven't seen a turnover yet in Baker Mayfield through a pass where he just did not see the safety coming over in front of Chris Godwin.

But you immediately get that one back, Amy. You get an interception by Devin White, who was playing hurt. I'm not making excuses, but he's not even 75% of Devin White. He picks the ball off, and he's the only guy on that side of the field, and he ran about 20 yards.

And can I say it on after hours? He looked like me going out of bounds. I mean, he just didn't, and I'm 53 years old. So, he didn't have anything on that play. But then you give the ball right back two plays later on a Rashard White fumble. Rashard said to me after the game just a little while ago on Buccaneers radio, I got to take better care of the ball.

They're going to swat at me. I'm a second-year player, and they swatted at him from behind and knocked it out of there. It gave the Eagles momentum back. They got a field goal.

They then come out of a locker room and march on a 75-yard drive, and that really wasn't everything, but that set the tone for the second half because once they put that in for 20-3, it was big trouble for the Bucs. What have you noticed about this group, this new offense coming together and gelling, and how the pieces fit? They have been good, and again, it's a first-year offensive coordinator in Dave Canales who came from Seattle as the QB coach, so he's getting used to calling plays.

He's got a brand-new quarterback in Baker Mayfield who's getting used to the personnel around him. Four of the offensive line positions are different. You've moved Tristan Wirfs from right tackle to left tackle. You've got a brand-new left guard who was with the Chargers last year and Matt Feiler.

You've got a rookie right guard that you just drafted out of North Dakota State, Cody Malk, and then Luke Gedecke, who primarily played guard last year but is a natural right tackle, is the right tackle. 80% of your offensive line is different, so that is going to take some getting used to, but by and large, against Minnesota and Chicago, they were able to execute. They were able to protect Baker Mayfield. This is a different level team, obviously, tonight, and they disrupted the Buccaneer offensive line from the jump. They pressured Mayfield some, and the Bucs never got in rhythm, really, until the fourth quarter. It was a key sequence in the second quarter where they put a drive together, and Mike Evans did come up with the ball in the end zone. You settle for a field goal, and from there, it was a drought after that, doing anything offensively until the fourth quarter, and the Eagles are too good for you to go two or two and a half quarters without scoring points. TJ Reeves is fresh off the Buccaneers' sidelines on their radio network as they drop their first game of the year to the visiting Eagles, but still two and one, and interestingly, in the NFC South, everybody loses in week three. We'll get to that coming up.

It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence here on CBS Sports Radio. I've heard Todd Bowles describe Baker Mayfield as a warrior, which I thought was an interesting word for him. What type of leadership style do you see with him?

I like what I've seen so far. You hear all these different stories, and look, he understands this is his fourth opportunity and maybe his last opportunity for now to be an established starter if it doesn't work out. I mean, let's be realistic. You had a chance in Carolina, and it didn't work. The Rams did not make a legitimate offer to keep you, so now you're here in Tampa Bay on a one-year Prove It contract, so he knows he's got to be the best Baker Mayfield. He's got to be a leader as a veteran. Remember, the guys played in over 40 games in the NFL. He won a playoff game in Cleveland, and he's done a really good job of keeping his composure and being on the same page with Mike Evans and Chris Godwin. Tonight, the opponent had something to do with that, but by and large, Baker Mayfield has been good, and it's early. It's only three games, but they've got to keep him healthy, and he's got to keep the right attitude and the right focus right now. Because you've got a lot of talent, especially on the offensive side of this football team, between Evans, Godwin, Rashad White, the running back, and the tight end that can go down the field and can make plays.

You've got some weapons, and if Baker Mayfield trusts those and can set them up to make plays, you've got a chance to do some damage. I like the connection I've seen between him and Mike Evans. Mike, obviously a very talented receiver, but the last couple of years had a Tom Brady.

That's developed pretty quickly. Yes, and there were a couple of balls. He just said to me again on the postgame show, a couple of balls for Mike Evans where he didn't make the play, and he said, those are on me.

But yeah, he made a couple of spectacular catches in this game as well, got the touchdown later on in the game. Baker sees the same thing that Tom Brady saw when he wanted to come to the Buccaneers, which is Mike Evans is going to make a lot of quarterbacks look good. Chris Godwin underneath is going to make a lot of quarterbacks look good, and you're just getting acclimated as a new quarterback with a new offensive coordinator and a new offense for these guys to learn. You're just getting into the beginning stages of it three games in. Let's see what it looks like as you get into mid-October, early November. Does the offense start to click a little bit more?

Because you certainly have some weapons that can make that happen. I like Mayfield's toughness. He'll get into a defender's face that's trying to rough him up or sack him. He's not taking anything off anybody, so you see some early positive signs that the Bucs can build on there. Rashad White has had some really impressive moments and impressive runs to start the season. A third-round pick from 2022, and it was a different backfield with Tom Brady the last couple years. How much of a balance do the Bucs want between him as their premier back and then the passing attack? Well, you had Leonard Fournette here, that's your point, previously, and he was a great outlet for Brady on short passes as the check down, so White can be that as well, and you saw a couple of times tonight when he got in space and they got him the football, he can make people miss. He's very patient with how he runs. I think one of the criticisms that may start to build up is that maybe he needs to be a little more decisive in hitting a hole if it's there on an occasion, because in the NFL, it's a half-second, it's a half-step.

And if the half-step or the half-second isn't to cut and go somewhere else, it's a half-second where two guys close and they're on top of you, and you get a yard instead of maybe getting eight or ten yards or getting out the gate. So we'll see. He's developing. Only a second-year player. He was a tremendous pass catcher in college.

He'll probably, if he stays healthy, easily be a 50-catch guy or more over a 17-game season. He's that good out of the backfield. So that's one of the pieces on this offense, and they do want to be balanced. They want to have him run the ball. He's the primary back here. Fournette's not here anymore. He's the primary guy they want to go to. TJ Reeves with us after Buccaneers and Eagles on Monday Night Football. He's a sideline reporter.

It's after hours on CBS Sports Radio. Yeah, bit of a surprise after a couple weeks, TJ, because you had three teams that had started out 2-0 in the NFC South where there's been so much transition at Coach and QB. After having seen now three weeks with this division, what are your impressions? It's interesting that Atlanta got off to the 2-0 start. So did New Orleans, but neither one of them looked very good. I mean, the Saints, in fairness, had the lead, then Derek Carr got hurt, but they didn't look good in the third and fourth quarter of that game.

Atlanta got really handled in a lot of ways like what Philadelphia did to the Buccaneers, what Detroit did to Atlanta. So it is a division that is wide open. It is a division that eight wins may be enough to win it.

It was last year. Nine wins, you're a pretty good bet to win this division. And the Buccaneers now have the Saints staring at them for the first of two for this week. They then play Atlanta coming in a couple of weeks after that and then don't really have a division game until much later in the year. They don't see Carolina at all until very late in the year. But I honestly believe the South will be wide open with a chance for an eight or nine-win division winner. And the Buccaneers hope to be there come late December. They hope to be in the range seven, eight wins, something like that, with a chance to win the division. Isn't that what the Bucks did last year, win it at eight and nine?

Yes. I mean, just be in range. We kept joking. The old Dick Van Patten comedy, eight is enough, with the eight kids. We kept saying eight is enough and eight was enough last year. I don't know that eight is definitely enough this year on eight wins, but a ninth win, ten wins absolutely wins this division, the NFC South. Nine may be enough as well.

Who can get to nine? That's what part of the challenge will be. Why are the expectations so low for this team? Is it because of the change at quarterback or something else?

I think it's part of that new offense. salary cap greatly restricted you. You could not go out and be aggressive in free agency. So this is looked at as kind of like a rebuild in progress on the fly with star players like Evans, like Godwin, like Vita via the defensive tackle. Lavonte David and Devin White in the middle.

Antoine Winfield, a very underrated safety, making plays all over the field. You have got some players on this team. You just don't have as much depth maybe as you would want. Certainly not like Philadelphia, not like San Francisco. And if the Bucks are going to contend with those teams, they've got to play a complete game. They've got to play clean where you're not turning the ball over.

They were neither of those things, young lady, on Monday night. And that's why Philadelphia got the W. TJ Reeves is with us here from Tampa after hours on CBS Sports Radio. Still watch this Bucks defense, especially with Todd Bowles as the head coach. And I feel like that's an advantage the Bucks may have over some of the other teams in the NFC.

Or at least can go toe to toe with the defense the Saints have. Well, and he wants this to be a turnover creating a havoc type defense, wreak havoc. And they didn't get to Hurts as much.

And I know Hurts was also battling flu-like symptoms. He wasn't himself trying to run the ball, didn't see that very much. Threw it when he needed to throw it.

A.J. Brown was good. But this defense has gotten sacks the first two weeks, had six of them against the Bears last week. Bears are obviously awful. They had five turnovers coming into the night, five takeaways, got two more tonight. That's the kind of defense Todd Bowles preaches. And if the Bucks are going to go anywhere, that's the kind of defense they're going to have to beat. Front seven creating pass rush and sack opportunities and get some takeaways.

Take the ball away. And they got a couple of them in this game, but ultimately it was not enough. Philadelphia just too good running right at that Buccaneer defense and kind of wore them down some. I mean, they killed the last eight and a half minutes of the game tonight. The Bucks get in the end zone, get a two-point conversion.

It's 25 to 11. You're thinking they've got all three timeouts. There's about eight and a half minutes left. If you get a stop, the game is back on.

You've got a chance. The Eagles didn't let that happen. They slammed the door. They got five first downs. They killed the clock.

Credit to them. So right now we have just the two teams, the Niners and Eagles, who played in the championship last year. They're still undefeated and only one team in the Miami Dolphins from the AFC. And I have got to ask, what is your reaction to what happened yesterday with the Dolphins against the Broncos?

And not just a 50-point win, but a 70-point performance. Amazing. And you don't know this, but I'm about to let you in on it. My in-laws may be the biggest Dolphin fans ever. They've lived in the Tampa Bay area forever. They were going bonkers. All the Dolphins fans are going bonkers.

It was almost like an out-of-body experience. And every time they got the ball. When you contemplate, Dan Marino had all those great numbers in a Hall of Fame career.

He didn't come anywhere close to having a 70-point game. They were just ridiculous on the Broncos. And because we were playing Monday night, I got a chance to watch a good bit of that game. Typically on NFL Sundays, I don't get to sit and just watch games because we're working.

They worked them over. This is why I keep saying to Buccaneer fans, and I'll say this after the loss. Okay, you're 2-1. Would you rather be Denver coming off of that game with the way that they looked? Would you rather be the Washington commanders trying to figure it out after what Buffalo did to them?

Maybe be the Chicago Bears at this point, who look very much like a team that could go winless with the disarray they're in. That was shocking. And I think it's as shocking as anything is that Denver didn't look like they wanted to tackle anymore. From like the third quarter on.

I mean, honestly, that's how 49 to whatever becomes 56, becomes 63, becomes 70. It was ridiculous. Are you a believer in the Dolphins?

Yes. How can you not be? How can you not be with that explosiveness, with the scheme they have to run the ball? I don't know that they can win the whole thing, but good Lord, they are spreading people out. They are passing with amazing efficiency.

Tyreek Hill is lethal in the open field in space, still is. And there are a lot of people that are going to be eating their words about Tua Tagovailoa not being big enough, not being good enough. I mean, 16 for 16 to start the game. It's a long season. It's only three games. But how are you not a believer in what they've done offensively so far this year? Wow.

Yeah, it's been a lot of fun to watch it come together. What's one other factor, element, or storyline that strikes you after three weeks of the NFL season? I don't want to cop out on you. The fact that anybody can beat anybody. Who saw Houston going to Jacksonville and just put it on them for four quarters? Not me. That knocked me out of my Survivor pool.

I know. Who saw the Dallas Cowboys basically no-show for four quarters in Arizona? I mean, it's one thing to credit the Cardinals, but the Cowboys didn't play with emotion or passion.

How much of that is Trayvon Diggs' injury and he's gone for the year a couple days before the game? But I mean, this league, it has already been demonstrated. Anybody, any given week right now, early on in the year, yes, the better teams will rise to the top, but you better be ready to play. You better be ready to play week in and week out. So that's the surprising thing.

And I am here to testify on After Hours. The Eagles are legit. The Eagles have been legit the last two seasons. They are physical. They are tough. Good luck on stopping them on third and one and fourth and one when they're still allowing this push rugby play. And in third and short and fourth and short, good luck stopping that.

I watched it firsthand tonight. The Eagles are tough. And if you don't mind, I'm going to pick your brain actually about one more thing because I know you're also immersed in college football. You do play-by-play and address it on your podcast. How much of a hit did the Deion Sanders circus take in Oregon?

A big one, a big one. And now, and now you've got USC coming for this week. And the only question is, is Colorado going to keep up with them? USC is going to put points up at USC defense, not as good as Oregon.

How about in the greater Denver slash Boulder, Colorado market? You had Oregon up 42 to nothing and you have the Broncos give up a 70 burger on Sunday. It was a rough Saturday and Sunday for those two. And it will not get easier for Colorado, not just USC. They still got to play Oregon state. As you know, they still got to play Washington state. They still got to play UCLA.

They still got to play Utah. It could be rough down the stretch here. We keep saying it's a long season. It's a long season for Deion for coach prime. And it may get longer starting on Saturday. Wow.

Only three weeks into NFL a month into college football still have infinite possibilities. So you can find TJ Reeves on Twitter at Buck BUC sideline guy. And that's exactly where we hear him, see him, watch him. Thank you so much for a couple of minutes. Always good to connect with you. Always good to be with you on after hours whenever you need me. Come find me.

Thank you. Well, we can do that. We can track you down.

I promise we won't be like stalkers though. TJ is a lot of fun to talk about when it comes to football and always brings a sense of humor. The Buccaneers, they're going to need that when they go back and watch the tape.

Though I would suppose no one is in the same boat as the Broncos. Sean Payton actually was speaking about watching the tape between Denver and Miami from Sunday and that it was pretty rough. We have a lot to get to as reaction from week three in the NFL. We're going to get to certainly some more reaction from the Eagles locker room following their victory and their three and oh start even though they went one for five in the red zone, they're able to control the line of scrimmage and control the ball and control the game. Want to pivot to to some baseball because Mike Trout was speaking out an emotional Mike Trout. We don't get that very often from him, but another rough season that was cut in half by injuries.

So we'll hear from him on the back half of the hour. The playoff picture is slowly and I do mean slowly coming together, but a week left to go in this regular season. It's that is crazy. It is hard to believe that this time next week we'll be talking about the wild cards and we'll be talking about the playoffs and pitching rotations lined up and everything of the sort. So October is coming.

October is absolutely the busiest month of the year in this business. If you are on a national scale and you cover every sport, not just one over the other. See, I will pivot a little bit to baseball and specifically with Mike Trout coming at the back half on Twitter, a law radio. Take the poll if you haven't done it yet. Monday MVP and then also on our Facebook page, check out the YouTube channel too.

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Yeah, he does. Hurts to Brown and that will wrap it up. This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Philadelphia Eagles and the San Francisco 49ers are 3-0. The call there with Merrill Reese on Eagles Radio. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Thanks so much for hanging out with us.

You can find me on Twitter, ALawRadio, also on our Facebook page. That's named after the show, as is our YouTube channel. So, A.J. Brown, you may remember, was it two weeks ago? Where he was, yeah, it was weekend number one, right?

No, no, it was week two. Where he was jawing at what was Jalen Hurts and it was Nick Sirianni who stepped in the middle. And presumably it was because he wasn't getting the ball as much as he wanted. And so on this night, he hauls in nine catches for 131 yards. And the question had to be asked about whether or not A.J.

Brown is happy. We always are trying to get A.J. involved. I mean, we're trying to get all those guys going. And it's not like, I know sometimes it might appear that way, but we're taking what they give us. We have an idea of what they're going to do going into it.

But then we're going to take what they give us and search the situations. They were giving us some one-on-ones on the outside to A.J., so we took that. And so it was a check by Jalen and Brian. I thought Brian did a good job on the second play of the game getting to the check that sprung A.J. The ball wasn't going to A.J., and then it went to him because we checked out of it. And then he had the next one that gave us a certain coverage that was able to get it as well. So we're always going to want to get A.J.

involved. It just so happened that he had the first couple catches of the game, 44 yards, I think it was, on the first drive. And he kept rolling from there.

Whenever we got our opportunities to go one-on-one, we tried to make the most of it. Whenever there was in zone, we tried to just sit down in a good spot and make the catch for Jalen and move the change. Jalen Hurts has plenty of targets, and they had a ton of yards. They racked up 472 yards, though, let's see, 201 was rushing yards. So they were able to move the pile and move the line.

And it's a little bit like factory, right, where you just kind of keep it moving, keep it moving on down the line. But they weren't as effective in the red zone. So one-for-five in the red zone, and teams still working on coming together, though they can see the progress. I think that's the beauty of team sports.

You know, I think you heard me say time and time again, no man is an island, you draw your strength from others. And obviously everybody had each other's backs tonight, and we found a way to win. Defense played a hell of a game. They threw the 200 yards of offense, turning the ball over, you know, and that's team football.

And I think for us, we just have to take advantage of opportunities when they give us those turnovers and finish in the red zone. It's a team that, even though they have shown, you know, some kind of letdowns, I guess, and I kind of wondered at the beginning, like, why? Why would that be happening when you're talking about almost all the same personnel and really the key, the offensive line? Obviously the backs have changed a little bit.

But yeah, I don't know that I expected them to struggle at all, to scuffle at all. But at the same time, it is early in the season. And so some teams, you know, they don't play their guys in preseason, or even if they do, guys aren't quite back in football shape again, if you will. But as long as they can run the ball the way that they do and stop the run the way that they do, this team will be successful.

I mean, that's the key. And as much as we've had this conversation all of the offseason about the value of running backs, pay them, don't pay them, you know, sub them in, next man up type of thing, they're going to get injured. And there's a bunch that are injured right now. In fact, Kenneth Gainwell missed game number two for the Eagles.

He was back on Monday night. But as long as they can run the ball, the Eagles can run the ball, the Niners can run the ball, as long as they can run the ball and stop the run, they will be successful. And as the temperatures get colder, even when you're playing in the rain, right, that they were in Tampa, or gosh, some of the crazy conditions with Ophelia over the weekend for teams on the Atlantic coast. And then when you're talking about field conditions that deteriorate, or when you're talking about those games where whether it's wind or hostile environment, blah, blah, blah, you go on and on. Defense travels. The run game travels and the defense travels.

And those are two things, especially to be successful on the road, that are so critical. And another reason why, even as the passing attack is still trying to find that consistency, that the Eagles are 3-0 and that the Niners are 3-0. As well as the Miami Dolphins, who just put up 70.

It's crazy, right? Okay, on Twitter, ALawRadio, always good to hear from you. Facebook, YouTube, we're glad to connect with you.

Thanks so much for hanging out as we kind of let the dust settle from the NFL weekend. Got to pay some attention to baseball. It has been a while. Mike Trout catching my attention on Monday because he was speaking out and not in a way that was overtly positive, which is generally what we get from Mike Trout. He tries to maintain a positive attitude. He tries to see the glass half full, if you will. I know that irritates so many people, including my friend John Kincaid. He can't stand it when people go glass half full, glass half empty. He'll argue with you if you throw that out there.

Hi, John. Anyway, Mike Trout, really emotional over the toll of this season and how tough it's been and losing yet another half a year to an injury that was no fault of his own. Or that was a freak injury. The big question is Desmond Ritter. The problem that I think a lot of fans are having and looking at Desmond Ritter is they just haven't seen enough. They want to trust him. They want to believe.

But I will tell you this, Jason, in the training camp sessions that I had a chance to go check out, the one thing that bothered me was his aggressiveness to throw the football when he needed to. Listen and subscribe to In the Huddle, available on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. The venue set. Families coming in from all over.

It's their quinceañera. With all the excitement, it may be easy to overlook COVID-19. It's still a risk. And that's why it's muy importante to get this season's COVID-19 shot ahead of time. It helps protect against COVID-19, which can cause severe illness and hospitalization. So let's set the date, vaccinate and celebrate.

Check eligibility and schedule this season's COVID-19 shot on the CDC site vaccines.gov. Sponsored by Pfizer and BioNTech. You're listening to the After Hours Podcast. The 1-0 is hit high into the air. Deep right center field. Walsh going back to the track at the wall.

It's gone. Second row of seats above the high wall in right center. Touch of all, Adolis Garcia. The 2-2, a swing and there's a drive down the left field line. Fair foul, certainly home run distance. It's off the foul pole extension. Home run, Mitch Garver. The Rangers go back to back here in the sixth off of Jimmy Herget and lead for the first time tonight, 2-1. Now the 1-1. And that ball is cranked to deep right field. It's got a shot at leaving the yard and it's gone.

Into the parking alley where the buses go. Three consecutive long balls for Texas. It's 3-1. It was hot at the time and, yeah, get it while it's hot. So, yeah, three in a row is something really cool.

I've never been a part of something like that before. Big for the team. Cool for us to kind of like bust that one open right there and, yeah, we'll take the W. This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Nathaniel Lowe and the Texas Rangers have won six in a row now, padding their lead or protecting their lead, I should say, atop the AL West.

A call on Rangers Radio and then, Nathaniel, on Valley Sports South West. This has been a roller coaster since the All-Star break for these Texas Rangers. The fact that they put together another six-game winning streak is huge and it couldn't come at a better time. But remember when they were backpedaling and they were sliding and the Astros had taken over the lead in that division. Now the way it stands, you've got a two-and-a-half game lead for the Rangers over Houston.

Houston got vintage Verlander on Monday night, able to keep the Mariners at bay. And then it's another game and a half between the Mariners and the Astros. Right now, all three of those teams, obviously still alive, four playoff spots and it's going to go right down to the wire. So the majority of the teams are sitting on five, six games to go.

So we're into the final week now, which blows me away. It always does when we get to this point and I think, whoa, almost 162 regular season games in the books. And yeah, you've got division winners in some cases, but not in every case. And you may know which teams are headed to the playoffs, but you don't necessarily know the seeding or the matchups. In the National League, Diamondbacks, Giants and Padres are all still alive four wildcards, even though the Dodgers have won that West division again. And the Phillies have a pretty commanding lead in that first wildcard spot. But Diamondbacks and Cubs right now have the exact same record, so they're tied. Marlins are a game back, the Reds, the Giants, the Padres, all still technically alive, even though the Padres and the Giants are below 500.

It just happens to be how they're all grouped together. So we will watch and we will wait and we will wonder with intrigue. On Twitter, ALawRadio, on our Facebook page too, you can vote for the Monday MVP. You can also just be ready for the TD of the Week.

We'll reveal the candidates coming up next hour. Mike Trout speaking out, and an emotional Mike Trout, explaining what this season has been like for him. He played roughly half the year, and let's be fair, it's not an aberration for him.

I have made jokes in the past or been a little snarky about the fact that this is as regular or as familiar as death and taxes. It just happens every year where these injuries to Mike Trout come up either about the time that the Angels are attempting to stay afloat for the playoffs, or whenever they're holding on to their last vintage of hope, their last shreds of hope, and he gets injured and it all goes out the window. And once again, the Angels will miss the playoffs.

Have not made it since 2014. The Mike Trout injury scene routine, the Angels starting out hot and then falling off the edge of a cliff, that proverbial cliff also seems all too familiar. But usually you don't get a Mike who will admit how difficult it is. Now, do we know he can't stand being injured, he can't stand not playing? Yeah, but oftentimes because the Angels aren't involved in a playoff race, they'll go ahead and they'll shut him down.

And recently that's exactly what Phil Nevin did. The manager of the Angels announced over the weekend that he would not come back from this hand injury in time to play this season. And so here's Mike, who was with the team on Monday, kind of reacting to the cold hard truth that yet again, half of his season was lost to being hurt. Yeah, it's frustrating. It's better now, obviously, but I want to get back.

It's tough, so it's been hard on me. You can actually hear the emotion in his voice, but more so if you watch the video, you can see how shaken up he is. You can see how upset, you can see how much this bothers him that it's been the same storyline. It's been the same narrative around Mike Trout and the Angels for years now. I mean, he's got three AL MVP awards and that is three in eight seasons.

And he also finished as the runner up multiple times in the MVP voting. But he's gone through a torn calf muscle going back to, gosh, 2021. He had a back issue that kept him off the field for a month, at least last year, and all he wanted to do this year was stay healthy. He actually admits that he hired a lot of different athletic trainers and people who could work with him on staying healthy, work with him on his durability. And he says he felt great. But he ends up with a broken bone in his hand because of a swing, right?

Just something that you really can't plan for, you really can't plan against. And then he admits that he maybe tried to come back before he was ready, right? So that ultimately turned out to be the worst decision, turned out to be the one that kept him from returning at all. Came back probably sooner than I should have. I wanted to be out there with the guys, pushed it and it was just sore.

I was just uncomfortable. You know, when I came back, it was I was in pain. You know, I was just my swing wasn't right.

Just wasn't myself and just trying to I was taking it day by day, trying for the soreness and and just the discomfort to go away and never did. Now, given it, you know, a few extra weeks off, it's going away, starting my swing process. I've been swinging obviously not going to come back, but I wanted to just I just want to get my head straight for the offseason. Have a clear my mind, just have a healthy offseason.

After hours with Amy Lawrence here on CBS Sports Radio. Seven years, two hundred fifty million dollars left on his contract. Remember, he signed that crazy eye popping extension going back. Gosh, it was at four years now.

And it was one of those that the Angels were going to use is really the foundation. And they've tried they've tried to bring in different free agents, obviously Ohtani. And it seemed like this was a year in which they were finally going to end that playoff drought. But now there is speculation about whether or not the Angels will trade him. The problem is he's got an injury history now that goes back multiple years. His contract is massive. So there are only a couple of teams really that would want to bring him on board. And more and more now we're seeing that there are teams that want to get underneath the salary cap. So, yeah, the question to Trout is whether or not he wants to stay. It's like I go through this every year.

So it's like, you know, I think there's private conversations I have with with Artie and John. And, you know, it's like I said, I'm doing the same thing I did last last, what, 13 years. Just go on the off season, clear my mind, get ready for spring and, you know, wearing an Angels uniform in spring. But ultimately, the emotion was there. And we got a peek into what Mike Trout is dealing with and how upset this last couple of months have been for him.

The injuries sucks. I mean, like I said, you know, all the hard work and stuff and just freak stuff happen. So but try to stay positive. You can hear that emotion in his voice. I'm trying to stay positive. And yet there's some sniffles there. And you can tell that he teared up and was shaken. If you watch the video, I hate it for him. I really do. But the Angels are in a they're just in an unenviable position here with the Otani and the Trout contract.

And once again, missing the postseason. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence, CBS Sports Radio.