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Live from the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. Rich Eisen. Hello, Rich Eisen. Rich Eisen. Oh, that's Susie Eisen.
The Rich Eisen Show. And now, sitting in for Rich. Here's Dan Schwartzman. Hour two on this Friday. In for Rich baseball's all-star game, the Home Run Derby is almost upon us.
I used to be a huge fan. I do like the All-Star game, don't get me wrong. I think baseball players actually try. I'm just not crazy about pitchers pitching one inning and calling it a day. And I like the All Star games when they or the Home Run Derbies when they have People you actually want to see in a home run dirt.
But baseball, we are. Past the halfway point, but call it the halfway point because it's the. All-star Um You know, the All-Star Week is coming up shortly in Atlanta. Kind of cool stuff on social media. I watched that Brian Wu TikTok where he calls his parents.
The Mariners pitcher calls his parents and he's kind of like, Oh, what are you guys doing? You're going to come to New York. We'll go out after a game. We'll get breakfast, whatever it is. And he's like, And then you're coming to Atlanta.
And they go crazy because they realize he had made the all-star team. And, you know, baseball during spring training, they show the guy getting called into the manager's office where he's told he's made the team. And they kind of make it a funny thing. That's some of the stuff I do love to see. But baseball halfway point is here.
A lot to get into. Jared Diamond covers baseball for the Wall Street Journal on X at Jared Diamond joining us. And Jared, I get to watch Aaron Judge a lot being in the New York area. And. What he's doing this year, leading baseball in average, he's second in home runs.
I believe what he's tied for, the lead in RBIs. Uh number one in hits. Is on base and slugging percentages are like Ruthian numbers here. When you see what he's doing right now, and we presume he's obviously clean, baseball is a bit different right now than the steroid era. Uh do people really appreciate what they're watching in terms of greatness with him?
Probably not. Last season, we were all talking about how Aaron Judge uh with having or had truly one of the greatest seasons in baseball history. And by just about every measure, he's been even better this year. I mean, this is a guy that is now sort of heading toward his third in the last four years.
So we have Ruthian tight season. If he makes it to sixty home runs, And there's no guarantee he does, but he's got 34 right now. There's definitely a chance if he stays healthy, a good chance. He would have multiple seasons with 60 homers, topping 60 homers. And the reality is no clean player in baseball history has ever done that.
There has not been a clean player that topped sixty homers twice in his career. Babe Ruth sorry, Aaron Judd is a sixty two. He has a fifty eight, and he's well on his way to topping sixty again. Uh The only unfortunate thing about Aaron Judge's career is that he didn't start getting up to the Yankees until he was twenty-four. He lost those few years and he was 21, 22.
Probably the only thing stopping him from pursuing 800 homers, I mean, who knows? And a couple of injury years as well, Jared. We played like 112 games, yet blasted like 37 home runs. I mean, some ridiculous numbers. And, you know, it's funny because you are talking about an all-time great.
And when he first came up, and we know he strikes out a lot, but he's a slugger, his career average is over 290, which is kind of shocking if you think about the type of player he is. I mean, hitting 365 is going to help. But on the other hand, you have Shohei Otani, who's back on the mound, throwing an inning here or there. And yet, when he's at the plate, he has struggled to bid the last three weeks to a month, but he's also a guy on pace for 50-plus home runs yet again. You know, baseball I I don't think does a great job of marketing itself.
And here you have two guys who you could consider to be all time great players, Judge and Otani. Has baseball, in your opinion, done a better job the last couple of years of kind of using those two guys to enhance the popularity of the sport, especially to a younger audience? And it feels like Otani is just about everywhere. I think they're doing the best they can. Look, baseball's always gonna have limitations.
In this space compared to the other sport. And any baseball fan kind of knows what they are, which is. It doesn't matter how great you are in baseball, the impact that you could actually make on a game. Is limited. I mean, Shoei Otani, when he's pitching and hitting simultaneously, is making more of an impact on a game than any player in the history of baseball.
But nonetheless, Yeah, you only bat four times a game, maybe five. Uh we've all gone to games. Excited to go see. The superstar player. And he goes over four, he doesn't get a single ball in the field, and he literally had absolutely no impact in the game.
That is not a problem in the other sports. If you go to to an NBA game to go watch you know, Kevin Durant as a weird example, but first guy that popped into my head. You could basically be certain that that player is going to have the ball in his hands constantly, is going to do something. to impact the game. Same with football with a quarterback.
That guy's got his ball in his hand. Every two seconds, and it's going to make an impact on the game. And it really allows you to sort of market the individual stars. In a way that I think is harder in baseball when they don't have the same impact. It also doesn't help.
And I don't, this does, this is not sort of a. criticism of either of the players we're discussing.
So Ewatani does not speak English in public. That is completely his prerogative. He speaks some English. in private. That's you know But it's hard to sort of put him out there when he can't really speak.
And Aaron Judge. He is not Mr. Rah Rah, vocal leader, look at me, look at me guy. And that's fine. He is entitled to sort of behave the way he wants to be.
By all accounts, he's a great teammate, he's a good guy. But he doesn't like like being front and center, and I don't think Major League Baseball can really do much about that.
So I think they're doing the best they can, and baseball has made great strides in recent years. The the game is growing among young people. The rule changes have made a big impact.
So I hope it's trending the right direction as a baseball fan myself. And by the way, don't worry, we spent about 10 minutes for no reason on Kevin Durant and our one of this show.
So you just kind of actually fit right into what we've been doing for the last hour. I was listening. You just didn't know. That's why. Of course, you were listening, Jared.
Why wouldn't you be? Who's not listening? Jared Diamond covers baseball for the Wall Street Journal, joining us here on The Rich Eisen Show. Dan Schwartzmann in for Rich. Remember, at Jared Diamond on X.
Juan Soto has rubbed some people in New York wrong, mainly Yankee fans, of course, but he recently came out with an interesting statement. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about, Jared, where he was asked about being snubbed for the All-Star game. He made it about like a financial thing, right? And people then said, aha, you see, he only went to the Mets for the money. Were you rubbed a little wrong by the fact that he, instead of saying, I'm disappointed that I'm not an all-star because that's what you strive to be in baseball, and he.
More talked about it being a financial thing, bother you at all? I don't think it was the most elegant way of making the point. He was trying to make. I don't think anyone would say that it was necessarily the best. way to go about it.
But I do think there's a lot of sort of uh Uh High emotion? About Juan Soto? around baseball and among fans. since signing that contract. Yeah, it was a gigantic contract.
It was a bigger contract. Than anyone could have imagined. Do I believe that the discourse around his contract played a role in say why? The players didn't vote for him? Yeah, I do.
I do believe that played a role, right? I do think there's some.
Sort of who is this guy? Who does he think he is? The reality is one siroosh. should be an all-star. I mean, I know he's had he he's been sort of an up and down First half, but he has been fantastic of late.
His June was absolutely phenomenal. At the end of the day, we're sitting here on July 11th. He is not having a good season by his standards, but he still has a 900 OPS. Like, That's sort of what the Met would the Mets like 950? Would they like 989?
I think he's got last year, sure, but. This is the year this is half of year one after signing this big contract.
So look. I think if you are sort of a reasonable Mets fan, you are Still pretty confident that Juan Soto is going to be fine. He will be. He's not the first player to sign a huge contract and then sort of struggle at the beginning. Right?
That happened. Mets fans should know about that about as well as anyone, right? I mean, everyone who's a Mets fan remembers Carl Sbeltron in 2009 when he signed that giant contract with the Mets and he really struggled. He had Probably the worst season of his sort of younger career And guess what? He came back in two thousand six and was one of the best players in baseball.
And like everyone now sort of thinks of Carlos Beltron's time with the Mets fondly.
So yes. I think everyone needs to calm down a little bit. I do think he should be an all star. And maybe Juan should sort of stress test his comments before speaking next time. Jared, bigger surprise for you through this first half of this season, what the Blue Jays have done, taking a two-game lead in the American League East, or what we're seeing from the Cubs in the Central, where they're scoring a boatload of runs.
They have some really good young talent. They have outfielders that between the Japanese kid and Pete Crow Armstrong, you're talking 150-plus RBIs. Who's the bigger surprise to you, Chicago or Toronto? It's funny. Going into the year, I genuinely thought both of those teams were going to be playoff teams.
Wow. But I still would say Toronto. Only because of how bad they were to start the year, right? I was actually high on Toronto coming into the season. I was telling people before this I thought they were going to be good.
Then they got off to this pretty rough start, and I was like, well, I guess I'm a moron. Why do I believe in these guys? They always seem to underachieve. That's sort of been the. The run of the Blue Jays in recent years, but they really turned it on.
And I guess the reason what they're doing is so impressive is they're doing it. In the AL East, right? Like the Cubs. The Cubs winning the NL Central should not be a surprise to anyone. They're the only team that spends any money in a pretty weak division.
Like all credits in Milwaukee, what they do every year is like absolutely extraordinary with the budget they have and the fact they're only two games behind the Cubs right now is like a real testament to them. But like you sit here right now. And at the season end of the day, there'll be four American League East teams in the playoffs. Like that division is Brutal, right? With the run, Boston is gone.
Only one seven in a row.
Now Boston is now in postseason position.
So the fact that Toronto is sitting here in first place on July eleventh, right, like I didn't expect that, right? I thought they were going to sort of be competing for one of those sort of second, third wildcard spots. The fact they're sitting here in first place ahead of the Yankees, Uh that surprised me. Certainly more than the Cubs who I think just have an easier road to a division title in the NFL Central. On the other side, in terms of biggest disappointment, is there a bigger disappointment in your mind than the Braves being twelve games under right now?
I think there's two candidates. or biggest disappointment. I and I really don't know where I would rank them. But it's it's Atlanta, like you mentioned, and in Baltimore. Right, like Baltimore being 42 and 50 is a shock.
I know I just praised that division, but. The Orioles, man, oh man, I mean, they've been so good the last couple of years. They build that whole thing up. Uh And then to just like fall on their face this year is a real, real debacle. And then there's Atlanta.
Like you said, who could have seen this coming? I mean, what a shock. First of all, you just never expect the braves to be bad, right? The braves are just like good all the time, it seems like. They're just always.
good. If you sort of if you're around my age, growing up sort of in the nineties into the two thousands, like you just You just used to seeing the Braves? In the playoffs every single year, just about. They've been in the playoffs how many straight years now? I think seven consecutive seasons.
So it is pretty shocking to see them eight games. Under 500 as well. It's funny that they're both eight games under 500. I guess that's just sort of the mark of disappointment. But when you're hosting the all-star game, there's all this excitement around your team.
Is you're getting Ronald Latunia back, who by the way has been Really good since coming back. Yeah, it's shocking. I think the most shocking thing about the braids are like they're not hitting. Right? Like you just saw that you see you see that lineup.
And they got Riley, they got Olsen, they got Abby, they got Atunya, they got. And there is not. Like it's just, it just isn't working. And there's, and right now, it's like very hard to see either of those teams kind of bouncing back. There's too much competition.
We just talked about the NL East. The NL East is a real gauntlet too, right? With Philadelphia and New York. It's like hard to see the Braves kind of getting back into it. Look, they did it in 2021.
They won the World Series. They were Nowhere'sville at the All-Star Break in 21. They won the whole thing.
So I wouldn't rule them out entirely, but it is hard to imagine. It's a real sort of missed opportunity for that franchise for sure. All right, last question. Jared Diamond covering baseball for the Wall Street Journal. We have the Hormon Derby at Truce Park in Atlanta, July 14th.
Acunya, you like to see anyway, obviously, exciting player. Cal Raleigh's in it. The guy's leading baseball and home runs right now. The names after that: James Wood, Byron Buxton, O'Neal Cruz, Jr. Caminero, Brent Rooker, Jazz Chisholm.
Somehow, Jared, you have a very good sense of humor. Try to make that sexy for me to where I'm going to be like, man, past Raleigh and Acunia. I got to watch these guys. Yeah, like I understand. It works wonderful.
And Forgers are past the the era of the best of the best doing this event, right? Like Aaron Judge, Sharo, Tommy. They're not going to do it. You're just not going to get them to do it. But I think there's some exciting names.
I mean, the name to really look out for in this event is O'Neal Cruz. Like, to me, O'Neal Cruz is the favorite to win this thing. Like, there is nobody in baseball that hits the ball harder than O'Neil Cruz. O'Neill Cruz on Pittsburgh is like the biggest enigma in baseball. He literally has hits the ball harder than anyone in baseball, has the highest average exit velocity.
And yet he isn't good. Like consistently, which is really bizarre. But if you know he doesn't hit it. Right. He doesn't.
Right. Like, you it's like that scene in Moneyball, the movie. It was like, if he could hit good, he would hit good. All right, but Odil Springs taking batting practice. Like I don't know if you saw Paul Skeens had a quote the other day where he said that O'Neill Crew is taking the best batting practice I've ever seen in my life.
And I really don't think he meant that as like a veiled insult, although it kind of sounds like one without any context. But the guy has it so hard.
So I think that's exciting. Jazz Chisholm's like really fun player. Right? These aren't superstars, but there's They're fun players. You get Cal Rawlin, you get Acuna.
The Derby's always just kind of like a fun event because You know, I don't know. Maybe they juiced the balls or something, but it does mean the ball really is flying every year at that thing.
So I still believe, despite all the problems that baseball's all-star game has, it is still the best all-star game in Spanish. Agreed. I think by far, honestly. Like, Look, is it what it used to be? No.
It's never going to be what it used to be. It still is, I think, a fun event. I'm glad they're going back to wearing their actual team uniforms and not wearing those abominations they've put them in the last few years. It's still great to see all these guys on the field together. I think baseball is doing good stuff with how they present it.
the the mic up players and all the sort of T V sort of gimmicks. They're doing I still think it's fun. I'm looking forward to being there and like You know, it's better than the Pro Bowl, it's better than whatever that NBA all-star game is. You don't say, really? Better than the Pro Bowl?
Come on. Yeah. So I'll take what we could get. You know what I'm saying? Right.
Well, you made it a little sexy. I take it on a day right now, the way you. Told us who to watch. O'Neil Cruz, the name to watch in this home run derby. And you know what?
I had Pete Alonzo fatigue. I'm kind of glad he's not in it, just to say, just because. Again, he's been in it for so many years in a row and winning it. It's just like, come on, let somebody else win it. Yeah.
At least we don't need it. New blood, you know. He's a pretty unique player.
So a lot. Pete Alonzo, that's how a lot of fans now in the country met Pete Alonzo, was through. That event.
So, like, guys can sort of rise and kind of take on personality that you didn't know that they had before in this thing.
So who will it be this year? There's a there's usually like a good moment in the home run derby every year. It's usually someone you don't expect. Yeah, no, I agree. And you know what?
Maybe they should throw some humor into this and have James Woods go to bat for James Wood. Why not? You get the reference. Right, I mean, come on, you got to do something, right? Yeah, I got a little snicker from you there.
Come on, I got to get some questions. There's Ryan. Look, there's MLB, if they'll get people watching, they'll do anything at this point.
So, whatever it takes, Jared Diamond covers baseball from the Wall Street Journal. Check him out on X at Jared Diamond. Jared, appreciate the time. Have fun in Atlanta and have a great weekend. You as well.
Thanks. Anytime, good talking to you. You as well. You get the reference, right, Art Martinez? The actor James Woods.
Oh, yeah, oh, yeah. The Nationals player James Wood. Right? Come on How funny would it be if they send up James Woods to bat in the All-Star game? In the Derby.
Just kidding. I just had to throw it out there because people are like, who the hell is James Wood?
Well, he's actually a fairly good power hitter, young, young player, by the way, for the Washington Nationals. I'll give you my thoughts on the home run derby. Major League Baseball's first half of the season. That is next. We are humming along here on a Friday, July, what is it, the 11th?
Time flies by the way. Summer's going by. 7-Eleven. Very quickly. 7-Eleven, baby.
That's right. Dan Schwartzmann on this Friday, sitting in the big boy chair for Rich, it is the Rich Eisen Show.
So you know we love talking movies around here. You know we love talking comedy around here. We also love talking about classics around here.
So, you know what I'm all about. That said, All of that said. You know how I must have felt when I was sitting in the movie theater like I was the other day watching the previews, and up came a preview. For the naked gun. with Liam Neeson as Frank Greben, Junior.
That Preview had me at hello. I loved police squad back in the day. I loved the naked gun back in the day. And here comes the naked gun once again with yes, Liam Neeson as Frank Drebin Jr. Come on now, son of the celebrated police squad, Lieutenant Frank Drebbin from the original movie, Paul Walter Hauser's in this movie, also Pamela Anderson.
Guess who also makes an appearance? WWE superstar. Cody Rhodes, and the producer of the movie is Seth McFarlane, the creator of The Family Guy. Come on now. This is going to be so much fun.
I'm excited to see The Naked Gun in theaters on August 1st.
So. What do you do on August 1st? Of course, you're going to a theater near you and you're seeing the naked gun. I might even be there. This episode brought to you by Progressive Insurance.
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Dan Schwartzmann. The Rich Eisen Show. And man, baseball, home run derby July 14th. Ronaldo Decunia, he is the local guy playing, of course, at Truist Park in Atlanta. Baseball's home run leader Cal Raleigh of the Seattle Mariners.
Definitely want to see him. The guy is a catcher who's blasted 36 home runs this year. He is on pace for 63 home runs. And, you know, he asked you at home runs. It's not as if the guy is not a home run hitter, Cal Raleigh.
The three years prior hit 27, 30, and 34 home runs. The one difference is his average this year is much better. He was a 211, 232, 220 guy, lots of strikeouts, not a lot of walks, low on base percentage type of guy, just an all-or-nothing power hitter. But this year, he's batting a bit more. What's funny about this, I want to bring in my colleague here, Art Martinez.
What's kind of funny about this is. Cal Raleigh could blast 60 home runs as a catcher. And he still should not get a single MVP vote. Over Aaron Judge, who's batting 100 points higher than him. Not amazing.
Why is yeah, why is that? 'Cause he plays in Seattle? No, because I mean, Judge is obviously a better player, right? Like, Cal Raleigh is going to match potentially this year, home run for home run. He's got 36, Judge has 34.
Judge has 78 or so RBIs. Raleigh has 76.
So they're neck and neck in those two categories, right? You don't think he's going to sustain it for the rest of the year? No, even if he does, you know, he's batting 262. Judge is a guy right now who is putting up Ruthian type numbers. I mean, Raleigh's hitting 262, which again is not terrible in today's baseball.
Aaron Judge is batting three fifty six. He's batting 96 points higher.
Now, Cal Raleigh is a guy that doesn't walk. A ton compared to Judge. I mean, Raleigh's walked, you know, a good amount of times. He's going to probably walk about 100 times this year. And Raleigh overall, because you know, it's all about saber metrics now in baseball.
Oh, of course, of course.
So, Raleigh, his OPS is 1-0-0-8. Pretty good.
Okay, no one's gonna scoff at one zero zero eight. Do you know what Aaron Judge is doing this year, what his OPS is? 1192. He's got, in essence, a 1200 OPS. Crazy.
It's crazy. I mean, people don't realize Aaron Judge The last season he has had where he was under A 1000 OPS was 2021. It was 916, by the way. Not much, you know, you can't scoff at that. But I mean Aaron Judge is doing things that people shouldn't do.
His career OPS is over a thousand. And this year he's at 1,200. I mean, his on-bass percentage, he gets on bass over 46% of the time. He's slugging 73%. I mean, that's incredible.
So, as fun as Cal Raleigh has been, and he's obviously been quite the slugger this year. It's not going to mean squat. Because unless Aaron Judge falls off the face of this earth or gets injured. Which could happen, by the way. But unless that happens, Aaron Judge is going to win himself.
Another MVP. His third. and rightfully so. And cement himself as a Hall of Fame player. And they just talked about it.
They just swept the Mariners the last three nights. And they were being no-hit into the seventh inning yesterday, down 5-0, and they came back to win that game. And it was Judge that did the walk-off, right? Yeah, Judge had to walk off, give Volpe a lot of credit, had an incredible slide where the ball beat him to the plate, but I saw it. Yeah, but he took that wacky slide where he put his right arm and Raleigh couldn't tag him.
So, you know, interesting. But You know, Aaron Judged, the guy that, barring injury, is going to have over 50 home runs this year for the fourth time in his career. We're talking about the non-steroid era, we think, right? We think it's the non-steroid era. Maybe we're wrong, but that's the thought out there.
And You have a guy who's literally putting up Abe Ruth-esque numbers. It just, it's not something you see a lot of. That's what my whole point is. We've watched a guy become literally a legend. When you think about what he's accomplishing on a baseball field, and I think the same thing, by the way, with Otani.
And you get to watch a lot more Otani than I've been struggling lately. Struggling, striking out a lot. Oh my gosh. Yeah, listen, he's going through one of those stretches and he has that. Remember last year he struggled, uh about a month before the last month of the season.
But Otani, who's now down to 279, his OPS has slipped under a thousand, he's still on pace for over fifty home runs, over a hundred RBIs, by the way, is a leadoff hitter. He's going to walk over a hundred times. Yes, he is struggling. He's striking out a lot. But you know, once he gets hot again, the home runs are going to come, and Otani's going to be a guy that this year.
Is going to go over the 40-home run mark for the fourth time in his career and probably over the 50-home run mark for the second time in his career.
Well, let me ask you a question. his pitching, does that have anything to do with his struggling? That's a good question. I would say right now, yes. And the reason I say yes is because batting still, he's still first in the lineup.
Well, I think it's more a case where he's not fully back pitching, right? Where he's pitching seven innings or six innings last year. He pitched two innings last outing. Right. Two innings, right?
He's pitching an inning or two innings, kind of like the starter for the game, and then they take him out early. And I do think there is a case where Otani potentially, potentially. I don't know his mindset, of course, but I think Otani to a point Thinking too much about that side of the ball, getting himself back to where he is a consistent starter throwing seven, eight innings, whatever it might be. And maybe he's kind of taken the eye off the ball no pun intended, by the way. for the hitting.
For that reason, I think we should move him down in the lineup. Yeah, it's not. He's gonna wake up, but but Art, he's gonna wake up. He's going to, you know, the light bulb's going to go back on shortly. And when it does, watch out baseball.
Remember last year, the last month of the season, what he did was just ridiculous. He had that one game with like seven, eight RBIs, whatever it was, it was insane.
So, yeah, he's struggling right now, and it's been a tough three weeks or a month, whatever it's been. But when that light bulb goes on and he's comfortable again at the plate. he's going to be fine. I just think it's a tough position right now if you're Dave Roberts. And Otani dictates a lot and probably too much.
I think Otani kind of dictates what he wants to do more so than he is told what to do by Dave Roberts or anybody in the organization. And I think that was the case with the Angels. You know, Otani is a guy who knows his body. He's a guy that knows his arm. If he doesn't feel comfortable on a day he's going to pitch, he won't pitch.
He'll just say, I'm not pitching. You know, I get it. And you kind of have to handle him to a point with kids' gloves. And I don't mean because he's got an ego or because he's a jerk. I mean you have to handle him with kids' gloves because.
No one in baseball probably puts as much strain on their body than Shohei Otani when he's playing both ways. And when that happens, you have to listen to him. And if he tells you he's not feeling it or something's wrong or in warm-ups, it just it wasn't clicking and he decides he can't pitch or whatever it is, you don't say no, you're going out there. You say, Okay, show a.
Next time, you know?
So I think he's a creature of habit to where he's gotten accustomed to batting leadoff. And for the most part, he's been a very good leadoff hitter. He's going to walk over 100 times this year. He's got a high on base percentage, which is what you want from a leadoff hitter, right? Today in baseball, guys who are batting leadoff have 330, 340 on base percentages.
This isn't the Ricky Henderson era where you're, you know, consistently over 400. Otani's got a 383, and this is after the struggles. Last year, 390, the year before that, 412.
So Otani is getting on base a heck of a lot more at this stage in his career.
So I. Just be patient.
Now, the stolen bases are an issue, right? Last year, 59 stolen bases, first player ever, 50-50. But I think he's also not stealing bases because of the fact he's trying to protect himself. He's trying to protect his arm. And that is an issue.
If Shoe Otani just strictly was a hitter right now and they decided not to let him pitch, would his numbers be even better than they are? By the way, his numbers are pretty phenomenal right now, anyway. But the answer, I think, clearly is yes. Because last year when he didn't concentrate at all on pitching, He had a legendary type here. He set a Dodger record for home runs in a season.
And he's a pitcher/slash hitter. Think about it, right?
So, when you talk about the greatness of Shohei Otani, You have to understand that this is a guy who, if he was strictly a pitcher, is probably a top 10 pitcher in baseball. Right, when Shoei Otani is healthy. And his stuff, and he, you know, that's all he's concentrating on. He has the velocity. He's got the pitches.
I mean, Shoei Otani has everything. He's not a one-trick pony as a pitcher. He's not just a guy who throws a flamethrower throwing 100 miles an hour, and that's it. You know, he could get guys out. You know, he's a guy that has struck out over 200 batters in the season.
As crazy as that is, because Nowadays, you think of Shoei Otani, you say to yourself, oh, this is a guy that, of course, is going to hit 50 home runs. No. His last year, his second to last year at the Angels, he had 219 strikeouts in 166 innings. And if it wasn't for Aaron Judge breaking Roger Marris's Home run record for the American League for a single season home run total. Shoe Otani.
And by the way, you could still make the argument Otani should have won MVP regardless of Judge doing that because Otani won 15 games, struck almost 220 batters out, and hit 46 home runs, I believe it was, and didn't win the MVP.
Something, whatever it was. I mean, it was an utterly phenomenal year for him. And because, you know, Judge breaks a record, he gets the MVP. But we could be talking about Otani going for his fourth straight MVP this year. But you know, he didn't win.
He was second behind judge. And by the way, even with Otani's struggles art. And again, he's gonna get hot. He's in that MVP conversation again. In the National League.
Yeah, absolutely. In the National League, absolutely. Like, look around the National League right now, okay? Look around the National League. Who is your MVP?
Think about it. You don't have a clear cut like Aaron Judge. In the American League, it is clear-cut. Aaron Judge is your MVP. In the National League, who is a clear-cut MVP?
There is not a clear-cut MVP. There's not. Yeah, Schwarber comes to mind. But Schwarber, yeah, but Schwarber's a guy who's going to hit you what? He's in 250 right now.
That's going to go down to 240, 230. Who else? Suarez, another guy is going to hit you at 220, right? He's hitting 249 right now. Hard to say that Eugenio Suarez is going to be an MVP over Shohei Otani.
It's stunning if you think about the fact that Shohei Otani is. Even with the struggles, but probably your favorite. Suzuki and Crow Armstrong have been very good for the Cubs this year. They both have 25 very similar stats, by the way. They both have 25 home runs.
Suzuki's got 77 ribbies. Armstrong has 70 ribbies. They're both hidden in that 270 rage. You're not going to give them the MVP over. Shohei o Tani Want Soto?
Pete Alonzo's had a nice year. I mean, but honestly, it's crazy, right? You think about it. Yeah, yeah, you're right. You're right.
There's not there's nobody that that that sticks out that you say, Yep, that's the guy. And in the end, as I've been saying, he's going to put up big numbers. He's going to get his 50-home runs. Hundred Ribbies is a and think about this, he's a leadoff hitter. That's going to hit 50 home runs and drive in 100 runs and score 150 runs as a leadoff hitter.
I know he's a DH, and that hurts him a bit. It didn't hurt him last year for MVP. But I understand where people say, How do you give a DHE MVP? But in a league where you don't have anybody. Outstanding statistically outside of Shohei Otani, he's going to potentially win.
yet another MVP. You know, you talk about a guy who potentially is going to win his fourth MVP this year. That's Hall of Fame stuff. Right? And he's winning MVPs last year and potentially this year, Shrithi for his hitting.
Forget the pitching.
So, just incredible what we are witnessing these days. In baseball, When you look at Judge in the American League and his pure domination, and Shohei Otani in the National League. And the domination he has shown, of course, it's been a struggle the last month, but all said and done, he's going to hit 350 homers, 100 ribbies. 20 stolen bases, another ridiculous year for Shohei Otani, to say the least. A lot going on in the world of sports.
Getting the zone, AutoZone. Welcome to AutoZone. What are you working on today? Hey, that's the spirit. Right now, we're celebrating free with a free STP oil filter when you buy five quarts of oil and free Duralast brake pads when you buy two rotors.
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Back on the Rich Eisen Show, Dan Schwartzmann in for Rich on this Friday, July 11th. I love Fridays. Love it. It's like, you don't feel like you can do whatever you want today, right? Unless you have to work on the weekend.
Do whatever you want. What do you want to do, honey? We can do whatever we want. Go wherever we want. Wear shorts to work.
You wear shorts to work.
Well, I don't. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned. I don't wear shorts to work. We work in radio. Yeah, that's true, but I don't know.
I just don't wear shorts to work. I guess I could. Would it make a difference, right? Nobody's seeing you. No one's seeing me.
But there are people here in the building though. That's the problem. And so it's like, do you want to look semi-professional? People in the building, the big bosses here. And where are you coming out of?
I'm in New York. You're in a big yeah, big building here.
So there's a lot of people. Oh, okay. But my big dilemma today is not do I want to wear shorts to work. You know, Fridays here in the building I work at, they have ice cream.
Well it's okay. Yeah. And I don't mean like Crappy ice cream. I mean, they have like. The good stuff like Chipwitch.
Uh they have the um like uh Nestle, those cones, you know, the chocolate and stuff. Yeah. Yeah, they have the good stuff. You want like the sorbet, they have that. The fruit bars Every Friday at one o'clock, they have ice cream bar.
Sometimes on Mondays at one, they have ice cream too. But every Friday at one during the summer, they have ice cream. And like the Hagendas bars with the chocolate with the chocolate shell on it, or the vanilla with the chocolate shell on it, those. Like, they have like the good stuff. the real deal.
Man. Yeah, yeah. Like all you can eat. Like, you want to grab two ice cream bars, you grab two. Three, you grab three.
And unfortunately, I have not been able to get ice cream today. Because it's just far enough away that if I ran to get it and I got back before we came out of a commercial break. I'll be out of breath, so I'll be like, ah. We're back on the show.
Okay. And then I can't eat ice cream for like 12 minutes, right? I can't eat during the seven minutes. Right. It's going to melt.
So, it's either going to sit here melting in front of my eyes, and I'm going to be like, I really want to eat it, but I can't because I can't talk on the air with a full mouth. That'd be kind of rude.
So I I can't eat my ice cream. And by the time we're off the air, It's all gone.
Well Yes, most likely. There's one caveat. I know the guy who runs the food services, a good friend of mine. You slept on the 20th? No, we're just very we've become very good friends, and I'm thinking of just maybe being like, hey.
Any chance you can put a couple of the ice creams in. the freezer and when I'm done I'll go get him. But here's the other dilemma, okay? I got to work very, very early this morning, like very early. And there's like the early bird parking special at the garage.
And if you come in, you have up to 12 hours, you get one rate. If you go over 12 hours, It like doubles, right?
So if I linger around here at work after the show. Oh, it's more than 12 hours.
Well, it will be like I would have to eat ice cream in like 10 minutes, like stuff myself with ice cream. And but you know, the problem is if you eat like cold stuff very quickly, it doesn't agree with your stomach, you know? You got to break cold stuff. You've got to breathe. Right, your brain freeze, your stomach gets bothered.
It's just not pleasant.
So. The dilemma is, I don't want to pay double for parking because I sat here and I ate a couple of ice creams. I know it's a terrible dilemma to have. You've got quite a dilemma there. I know, right?
It's like, what to do here? What would you do in this situation? Real-world problems here. Do I get a couple of ice creams put in the freezer to eat later and then shove them in my mouth so I don't pay double for the parking because I don't want to go for 12 hours at the garage? Or do I just enjoy the ice cream and pay double?
But that's stupid because for that double price, I can just go buy ice cream too. I mean, real worries here in life, right? Oh man. Real problem. I know.
I know, Art. Major problems in uh old Schwartzy's life here.
So, I already know what I'm going to do. I'm just not going to eat ice cream today. How about that? I'm not gonna do it. There's plenty on the Grades.
Yeah, but It's here, it's Friday. Literally, they bring out coolers of ice cream, and it's upstairs as we speak. Like ice cream stairs. If the floor, I can see the escalator. If the floor right now just collapsed right next to me, like I would have an ice cream, a tub of ice, like a.
Like a cooler of ice cream right here in the room. Yeah, big problems, my friend. Big problems. Yeah, I can imagine. I know, right?
I mean The dilemmas we deal with in life, right? These are the problems we have in life. I wish it was all so easy. All right, quick update here. It looks like we're going to have number one versus number two in the Wimbledon.
Men's final. Yeah, yeah. He doesn't look too good. He's old. This is like watching Fedder the last couple years of his career.
Where it used to be automatic, right? Like like Fedder's gonna win. And now, then it became like, okay. Djokovic is younger, he's just at this point better. And I think right now, Djokovic is the old man, right?
What is he, like 36 years old, 37 years old?
So when you have no, you know, Carlos Alcaraz is 22. He's a punk. Yeah. Oh, we're going to get into that. Yannick Sinner is.
You know, he's a young guy, right? Sinner shouldn't be either.
Well, he's only 23, by the way, and he should not. He got that. Was it performance enhancing, right? Uh he got busted for a performance enhancer and they only suspended him for a couple of tournaments and it uh conveniently they suspended him only during the time that there was not a Grand Slam. And what's up, I don't believe he missed.
Well, that caused a big, big controversy. Where other players were not happy with the fact that He seemingly got off easy, but When he should have been suspended for a much longer time. And should have been beaten by Grigor Dmitrov in this tournament. That's right. He was up two ga two sets to none.
when he uh retired because of injury.
So, yeah, but this whole sinner thing where he. I I believe, and a lot of people believe, he skirted A harsher penalty When he was, when he should have probably been suspended longer, is what people believe. Based on the fact that he failed the test, I believe it was. Right? I mean, I think that's what it was.
I mean, it makes perfect sense.
So here's the story, okay? The story was. He tested positive from the World Anti-Doping Agency. In 2024, for Clestable, it was announced in February of this year. Then WADA, the World Anti-Doping Agency, which doesn't have a backbone, they accepted the cause and explanation of the positive test.
And a lot of people didn't believe him. And they, though, said the player bears responsibility. He was suspended for three months. And he was ineligible from February 9th to May 5th. which means I believe he was eligible for every one of the He was, I think, eligible for one of the Grand Slams.
Right. And a lot of people in tennis were not happy with the fact that he seemingly got off free. And Djokovic said back at the Qatar Open this year: quote: the majority of the players feel like there is favoritism happening. And I agree. If Yannick Sina was ranked 100th in the world or 50th in the world, He may get a lengthy suspension of a year plus, and he's missing probably all the majors.
So Yannick Suner did not get a lot of popularity. In, you know, because of the fact that he seemingly skirted a tougher. Sentence for failing a doping test. All right, one to talk a little NFL, a running back, avoid serious injury. Hour three of the Rich Eisen Show next.
Dan Schwartzmann in for Rich on this Friday. Jim Rome takes on sports. Why? Because you're not playing me. With rapid fire takes.
And a lot to get to, and I'm not sure you're going to like all of it. Honestly, I don't even care if you like all of it or not. I have a job to do. Scorching debates. On any given week, you have lots to beef about.
Take advantage of it. Get up in here. He's the Spitfire of Sports Smack. Which is not my fault. We will get to all of that.
The Jim Rome Show podcast. Get up in here. And we'll beef later on. What's your beef? Follow and listen on your favorite platform.
You've been warned. Yeah.
