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Discounts not available in all states and situations. Los Angeles. We saw Justin Jefferson last at the Super Bowl in Las Vegas, Nevada. Where is that bag? I don't know, man.
I'm looking for the bag just like you are. Four years, $140 million. Today's guest ESPN MLB insider Jeff Passan, NFL Network reporter Stacey Dales, actor Ed O'Neill. And now it's Rich Eisen.
Yes, yes, yes, yes. Welcome to this edition of the Rich Eisen Show. Ed O'Neill's in the show. He's going to be in our green room in just a couple hours to be our third hour guest. Donald Sterling in the new show FX is clipped on Hulu and it's going to be great. He hasn't been here in a couple of years. I think prior to the Modern Family going off the air. His first appearance on this show was eight years ago. It's always a delight to have Ed O'Neill and he will be in studio hanging with us in our number three legend in the studio.
And a legend zooming in. Stacey Dales will be joining us from Chicagoland in hour number two. Talk a little bit of Bears. Mandatory minicamp is happening across the National Football League for some.
They've got an OTA in Chicago. But she's going to be joining us in her capacity of being a former star in the WNBA to make heads or tails of what everybody's losing their minds over with what's going on with the WNBA. She'll be joining us in hour number two. Jeff Passan. We haven't spoken a little bit of baseball. A little June 1st. First week of June check-in with Jeff Passan.
He'll be joining us first up in this program. Good to see you over there, Christopher. How are you? I'm great. What's up, man?
Mike Del Tufo is back from wherever the hell he was. Good to see you. You're working today? Yeah, good to see you.
I'm here a couple days. Then I'm off to St. Louis and I'll be back. What are you doing in St. Louis?
A playoff for UFL and then I go back to St. Louis for the championship. Very good. He doesn't know yet. How are you, TJ Jefferson? What's going on, sir? I'm good.
I'm still reeling from your backhanded Cowboys compliment yesterday. But when Mike says he's going to St. Louis, are you actually going to be in St. Louis? I am going to St. Louis.
You're not just in the truck? I am taking my first flight since December. So when you geotag on Instagram, you're actually going to be there. By the way, I will take a selfie at the Arch for everybody. We have lots of questions about your latest Instagram posts, but that'll be later on. That's not top of show material. Okay, sorry. But good to see everybody.
844-204-RICH is the number to dial. We say hello to everybody watching us on the Roku channel, which is free on all Roku devices known to man. Select Samsung Smart TV. There's Amazon Fire TV. There's the Roku app.
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It is your right. We appreciate you downloading any and all portions of our three hours of our program every single day. YouTube dot com slash Rich Eisen show become one of the many subscribers to our channel there. We would greatly appreciate that. Let's let's just give you a little bit of a tutorial if you need it.
I don't think you do, but I'll give it to you anyway. This part of the year in the NFL to tease. It's a tease because everybody's in action in June.
The question is how much action and who is in action? Because NFL teams convene and they have organized team activities. It can take the form of actual practices and scrimmages.
The question is, is how much work do you get done as Dan Campbell said today about the hard work that might be done in Lions organized team activities? His quote was, we're in pajamas. Now, a coach, when he says that doesn't mean like you're going to see you're searching up on X or tick tock or Instagram for a video of Aiden Hutchinson in like onesie footy pajamas. OK, like that's not what they make them that big.
By the way, it would be great. No, that's how coaches refer to not being in pads and in shells and things of that nature. You're in pajamas.
So the question is how much work you can really get done in pajamas. But it's also, you know, an organized team activity, maybe like the Buffalo Bills. Sean McDermott talking about dodgeball. It's about getting together and being together and becoming one as a team. And then there's obviously something in between where you do actual drills and actual seven on sevens or 11 on 11s. And you get some reps in that actually can help. And you start building towards becoming a team with organized activities. That's how that works.
That's how it works. And of course, the question always rises. Who's there?
Who's not? Why aren't they there? Three of my favorite coaching cliches.
I say it all the time. In case you're new here, they are the following. One, it is what it is. Right. Two, I don't have a crystal ball. How can I tell the future?
I don't have a crystal ball. And then, of course, three is control only what you can control. That's it. I can control only what I can control. Everything's out of my control if I don't have it in my control.
And that gets substituted for this very time of year. I'm not. I'm only talking about the guys that are here.
I love that one. It's only talking about the guys that are here, guys and ladies, because I'm not going to get into the whole concept of contractual business. I'm just the head coach. I'm just a caveman. And that's how we bring things to the Dallas Cowboys today.
Hey, sir, how many times have I told everybody from this chair you're going to have to pay C.D. Lamb? It's going to happen. You're not identifying one of the best players at his position in the National Football League at the age of his open window, wide open window of immense success is an 88 clubber putting things on a stat sheet over and over again, maybe in this window of opportunity that places him in a Hall of Fame conversation. And you're not going to look at him and say, this guy needs to show me something.
I don't know what the conversation is between the two of them. All I know is that it gets more expensive by the day for the Cowboys to not have him in camp. And in. The fold with his C.D.
Lamb on a dotted line. And when he isn't. In such a fold, he's not coming to camp and he didn't show up today.
Now, listen. We make big dings of it here on June 4th because it's not September 4th. It's not like they're getting ready to play the Cleveland Browns on opening weekend. True.
This coming Sunday. And the fact that he's not here now, does that mean the Cowboys are not going to win the Super Bowl this year? Of course not. Of course not. It's just something to talk about. But it's also something that if you are a head coach and you are trying to build a team and you're doing through these team building and everybody's in the building and this guy isn't.
How do you handle it? What does it mean? And Mike McCarthy, to his credit today, did not use one of the coaching cliches in his response to where is C.D. Lamb hitting C.D. 's status.
And have you had any conversations with him or expect him to see him? C.D. 's not here today. So. I'll tell you what, you guys do such a hell of a job with attendance, so I'll make sure you have some work to do at practice. So that's your one for the day. We'll see how good you are.
Great answer. Mike McCarthy. Oh, man.
Am I going to like this guy now or what? Mike McCarthy. He essentially gave you the I can only talk about who's here. But he didn't say that. He gave us a nice sound bite.
He's using a little bit of humor to try and take the bite out of the situation because you could see he's not terribly happy. Because he can't control whatever the heck the Joneses are talking to C.D. Lamb about or not. And he knows. In this all in season, he needs C.D.
Lamb in. And he needs all of them there. You know, he needs all of them there. You know who's there today is Micah Parsons.
And you know, he's on the list to get paid, too. He's looking for Micah showed up. It's tough to say I'm not coming. If you're sitting courtside rooting for the Dallas Mavericks, you're in town.
You're there. We've seen you on video. We've seen you there. We know you're in town.
We know you're in town eating popcorn. Yeah. Going at it with Anthony Edwards.
Free shoes. So now comes the question is how much contact are you having? What's going on? Because we're trying to figure out again, like, is he totally off the map? Is he totally off the radar screen? Is he totally shutting you out? Like what's going on? And Mike McCarthy, to his credit, did not give us a cliched answer on this front either. He's all grown stuff. Mike McCarthy hit it CD and all those types of situations.
He's in a business situation. You know, everybody's engaged and I have no, you know, no qualms or don't lack no confidence as far as, you know, our guy, our best being ready. Like, my focus is because, you know, right now, the younger players are passing the written part of it. They're able to get through the walkthrough and, you know, but let's be honest, we're not going to really, really know until we get the training camp and see him really go full speed, put pads on and things like that. So, I mean, it's always been about crossing thresholds of your teaching program and so forth. So, yeah, for all the veteran players, you know, they've been engaged and we'll be in a great spot.
It's really about the young guys. Mike, how has CD been engaged away from here? Has it been similar meetings that you guys have had with Mike and things like that? He's been engaged. I can just tell you that. He's been engaged. That's my word for the day.
I said it six times. So, engaged, engaged. And with Mike, do you expect him to jump in and do everything as if you've been running?
He's engaged also, so. It's a different question. What the hell, you're not going to practice today or what?
You got a long stay or what? No, you expect him to do that. Well, check him out.
Yeah, check him out. He's groansed up and he's groansed up and he's groansed up. He should jump on this desk right now.
Mike McCarthy, he's engaged. I mean, he's getting it all out since he's not going to be the coach next year. Get it out, get it out now. Go from should I like this guy to now you're getting him fired.
You know what? Give me what were they really thinking? I'm going to go here. We weren't planning on doing this, but I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this for Mike McCarthy.
What were they really thinking? Mike, I wish I had maybe we should get one of those cowboy cups to place in front of me like he always has in front of him. You have a styrofoam cowboy?
Somebody sent you one, I think. I've got so much stuff over here. So I placed it in front of you. There it is. See him right there? You see that right there? Is that a styrofoam?
I think that's styrofoam. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Listen, this is what I think he would like to say.
Listen. We're supposed to be all in. We're supposed to be all in, right? I'm all in.
I don't have a contract after this year. All right. I'm here. I'm all in. I know every single possible second that I need to be here.
Everybody needs to be here because all in the boss, the boss says that he's all in for a split second. Kind of thought that meant I might get Derrick Henry. I might get a few free agents.
He might actually extend DAC to start, you know, take that pressure off the situation and go ahead and create some cap space, give some to CD, give some mica, get everybody nice and happy going into the summer. So I don't have to sit here and answer your questions about this sort of thing. They're engaged. I'm not going to tell you how engaged they are. Why the hell would I do that? Because guess what?
Some of them aren't as engaged as I want them to be. And it's not my fault that CD Lamb's not here. The guy who says that we're all in, I guess he's just sitting back and waiting to push all his chips to the center of the table because I know he's got to give it to CD Lamb and I know he's got to give it to mica and I'd like him to give it to his quarterback so he could start creating this space for us to actually get everybody in here. So what are you asking me for?
Show up to practice. And I'm trying to make a light of it because guess what? The smile is my frigging umbrella right now. How's that?
It's great. Do you think he wants to say that to everybody right now? Because he's not the one who can figure out how to pay CD Lamb and how to figure out how to pay Micah Parsons, figure out how to pay Dak Prescott.
He does know all three of those guys are the guys who's going to get him another contract there and he does know that those three guys are going to eventually get paid and if they don't perform very well, he's the one who's not getting the contract and all three of them are going to get paid to stick around because these are the guys who make up the Dallas frigging Cowboys. So how's he going to answer the question about engaged? Get the hell out of here.
I'm thinking about getting a divorce. I know it's never happened before and obviously it wouldn't happen, but what if a coach held out? Like, he's got no contract next year.
Why can't he hold out? Hey, you know what? I'm not coming to OTA's. I'm not coming to OTA's. I want a new contract. Yeah, that's kind of defeating the purpose.
You know what I mean? Why can't we have coaching holdouts? That will instantly find yourself on the unemployment line if you... Well, because coaches are lifers. They are lifers. They are dedicated to the craft, lifers, and they know. Do you know how many times Mike McCarthy's probably told a family member, we've got to pack a box? Oh, yeah. Mooch once told me, I think he moved his family almost 20 times. They're always renting. Right, and so they understand that, but he also understands it's a results-oriented business and last year's result, what's the word for it?
I have it written down here, sucked. So he knows the way that the owner is responding to this is to say, we're all in. The question is, is the star receiver's not here. And it's not his fault the star receiver's not there. I don't think the star receiver misses, say, week one against Cleveland.
I don't think this is going to rise to that standard. But if reps matter in June, they're not getting them. So that's what's going on. That's what's up in the Metroplex today. Let's take a break. Jeff Passim will join us. We'll check in with him. Was Adrian Hernandez, what part of Adrian Hernandez? Was Angel Hernandez fired? What do you think? I think he was paid to go away. Do you think so?
Which sounds like, you know, a nicely lined cardboard box. I don't know. And then, of course, is Judge getting 60 home runs? He's got the answer. I think it's written down somewhere. Let's take a break.
844-204 Rich, number to dial. One of our favorites, Jeff Passim from ESPN. Stacy Dales and then Ed O'Neill in studio. And the best case scenario is for AFC East teams still to come. Man, the hoops finals are right around the corner. How cool would it be to go to one of those games? You might even be thinking that right now.
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That's OReillyAuto.com slash Eisen. I'll pass it here on the Rich Eisen Show. Correct. I was just talking in the Roku Channel Only segment about how I felt bad about telling Angel Hernandez don't let the door kick. When people are terrible, you should be able to tell them you're terrible. And you shouldn't feel bad about that.
Well, if I pay a ticket to do that. Thank you, Jeff. I appreciate you saying that, you know, I have a conscience and that I should I should follow it. So thank you. I greatly appreciate it. You're welcome.
And here's the thing I like. I want to jump in, too, because, look, I have written about Angel Hernandez. I have tweeted about Angel Hernandez. I have helped, frankly, contribute to the Angel Hernandez climate that led to him going away.
And it makes me wonder, like, what's my responsibility and what's my part in this? Because I think sometimes we take for granted what social media actually does and how it brings out the absolute worst in a lot of us. And and I think that the easiest way to do this and the easiest standard by which any of us, frankly, should live is, would I say it to the man's face? Any of the stuff we say on social media about Angel Hernandez, if you were confronted with Angel Hernandez, would you say it to his face? Would you call him the names that you call him online?
Would you tell him how terrible he is? You know, a lot of that stuff, frankly, led to him going away. He got tired of it.
He got tired of the social media firestorm that exists. And that, frankly, I will acknowledge this, is understandable because there were parts of his job where he was genuinely bad. And it was magnified by the ubiquity of baseball on social media now and how, you know, every time he would do something wrong, it would get put out there.
And then it would just almost compound upon itself. The last time and it would bring up the Angel Hernandez highlight reel. And you just have this echo chamber of Angel Hernandez awfulness that in the end, I think, wound up being a big part of his undoing. Well, I mean, it was clear, though, Jeff, too, that so many of the players had lost respect for him. Where I mean, the the Schwarber and Bryce Harper moments were where they're like, I know I'm going to get kicked out. So Schwarber is two handed slamming the bat.
Right. Or Harper, you know, being told, you know, the famed, you know, check swing. And then the fact that he was ruled by Hernandez to have checked his swing on ball three and then the same check swing was called strike three on the very next pitch.
And but my issues with Hernandez was he was always he did. Did he rarely ask for help? I mean, I think the answer is yes. Like I would never really see him sort of like, let's huddle it up and oh, yeah, I'll take I'll take this reaction and also some help from my colleagues to try and get out of a situation. Perhaps I'm not, you know, right. I never felt that from him.
Yeah. Even even even if that's the case, though, Rich, like even if it is somebody who goes and says, help me out on this, does that does that change the fact that he got it wrong in the first place? You know, it's usually not going to they're usually not going to overturn the call. And frankly, if another umpire sees something and says that you were wrong, he's going to say an angel doesn't know wouldn't have needed to initiate that. I think it was just that we we expect a certain level of competence from our officials. And when that level of competence is not reached and when that compact between the league and its fans that we are going to give you competent enough umpiring refereeing, whatever it is, when that compact is breached as frequently as it seemed to be with Angel Hernandez, that's where the league, frankly, needed to step in and do something.
And in this case, it would say, hey, we're going to offer you a handsome retirement package. So you stop being one of the main characters in our daily program. So that's that's that's what he was like.
He had become he had become like the villain who comes back every so often when you least expect it. It's like, oh, boy, angels trending again. We got an angel date today.
What do you do this time? As opposed to, oh, boy, we've got a big home run from Shohei Ohtadi. Oh, boy. You know, the Cleveland Guardians are playing an amazing baseball this year. No, it always went back to Angel. And it's like we had fallen as baseball viewing fans into this almost habit of waiting for an angel day to happen because it was inevitable. So did baseball have a guiding hand if if Angel Hernandez was saying, you know what, I'm done with the the online vitriol and the umpire auditors and stuff like that?
I've had enough. Did did baseball kind of give a nice little shove with a parachute? I don't know.
I don't know. It was almost, I think, like a meeting in the middle. I think it was like a mutual understanding between them. Like, you know, you've got your intermediaries who know Angel Hernandez and who know Major League Baseball.
And I think everybody recognized that, OK, this, you know, it ain't working. Like he was he was out for most of last year with an injury and he wanted to come back this year and he wanted to see if he could still do it. And, you know, for the most part, like that's that's the sad part of this, actually, for the most part, 90, 90 plus percent of the time, Angel Hernandez is really good at his job. Like he does a good job of getting balls and strikes.
Right. And there's a good job on the base paths. But good as an umpire is not good enough. You have to be great. You have to be spectacular.
You have to be the best in the world at what you do, especially when you have a reputation like you did, especially when you sued your employer like he has. I mean, there was just so much baggage there with Angel Hernandez that I think everyone involved recognized that in the end, this ultimately is going to be a better thing for him and for the league, too. Jeff Passan here on The Rich Eisen Show. And speaking of being able to admit when you're wrong while we're on that subject matter, I will raise my hand and say I was way wrong about the pitch clock. And I know you and I had many conversations as it was being invented and then implemented. I thought that this would just be taking the the loveliness of baseball's meandering pace and the ability to just chit chat in a ballpark and remove that for the sake of of being more current in a scrolling tick tock world.
I my son and I went to an Angels Yankees game last week, had a perfect view of the pitch clock. It was awesome. It was great. It never it never got in the way. It definitely kept things moving. It did not remove a damn thing from the enjoyment of the game. It enhanced it. My a friend of mine who lives in New York when the Yankees and Giants game was ending around a quarter after midnight, Eastern Time on Friday night was like, you should I'd have to stay up to one in the morning to see the ends of these games. He called the pitch clock in his mind the greatest sports invention since the three point line.
And it's very difficult to push back on that. Jeff, it's awesome. I love it. Can't love it anymore.
No. And it's you know, it filters its way down to which is like my favorite part of the house. So a lot of six because I watch a lot of 16 new baseball man. I watch my kid play a lot this summer.
And I feel like the pitchers are moving quicker at the youth level now because they understand that they're only going to have a finite amount of time once they get up into college eventually and into the minor leagues and the big leagues to throw the pitch. It's it's so much better as a fan. It's it's better for a casual fan. It is better for a crazy diehard fan.
It's better for everyone involved. And the best part of it, Rich, is the seamlessness with which it was integrated. Like it was the truest, elegant solution that I've seen in sports in a long time because it has cut down significantly, almost a half hour on average game time. And it's done so without taking any of the beautiful parts of the game that we worried away from it.
And the players have adapted fantastically. Now, I wish there were the same kind of elegant solution to try and get offense back to where it has been in the past. And that's what was supposed to happen with the ban on the shift and with the pitch clock and with these other rules. And for one year, you saw batting average climb up a little bit, but batting average is down then. Offense is down. Run scored per game is down.
And there is no obvious solution to fixing that right now without potentially inviting unintended consequences that you may not want nor realize are going to happen. But like messing with the mound distance to home plate and things of that year, because I mean, the number of guys like I mean, Mason Miller is a perfect example. Holy cow.
Just watching him throw. It's absurd. It is absurd. You know, and then you see the the the young pitchers that the Pirates are keeping on churning out right now.
Right. And just how it's just explode. The ball explodes out of pitchers hands. Relievers can all throw one hundred off speed pitches or like ninety two miles an hour. You know, and and it is awesome to watch the average the average velocity of the fastball in Major League Baseball right now is ninety four point four miles per hour. Like I was I was watching Major League a couple of days ago when the first pitch that Rick long through was clocked at ninety six and and it was like we got to get back in to throw subtract. You know, like it was oh my God, this guy throws so hard.
He throws ninety six. The average average pitch in the big leagues right now is ninety four point four miles per hour. And the breaking stuff that they're throwing is nastier than ever.
And it's you know, it's to the point like some people get kind of annoyed that, you know, the Jeff Nelson slider, like Frisbee slider that we've seen in the past is called the sweeper now. And in that Paul Skeans and Joanne Duran are throwing a splinker, which is like a combination between a sinker and a splitter. Pitching has gotten so good that we're needing to differentiate among all of these different pitches to try and explain how they're different because they actually are. It's like pitching has gotten so educated to this point and the ability to teach guys these unbelievable pitches to throw has has made it such that the advantage is there. And hitters are just trying to catch up and they're not winning that battle right now. And, you know, the only saving grace is is home runs because of home runs weren't where they are right now. Run scoring. Not going to say it would be down at nineteen sixty eight levels rich, but it would be pretty darn close.
Jeff passing a few minutes left with him right here on the Rich Eisen show. Is it right to call the Yankees a surprise team? I mean, because this is they're playing some of the best baseball I've seen them play in a very long time. Yeah. Right now. Yes. Since 2009. Yeah. Yeah.
Pretty much. I mean, Garrett Cole having his arm hopefully not blown out, but missing half of the season and they're twenty two over. And I didn't expect it. I didn't see it coming.
You know, I like admittedly, I did not either. I worried without Cole that the Yankees might have a problem making the playoffs. I was dead wrong about them.
Dead wrong. And look, I probably should have known that when you have two of the five best hitters on the planet and then some you know, on some days Aaron Judge and Juan Soto are the two best hitters on the planet, that your lineup is probably going to be OK. I worry that the Yankees were a little bit too old.
But you know what? Anthony Volpe has stepped up and Giancarlo Stanton has stayed healthy. And Alex Verdugo's been great. But the thing that really takes me by surprise is they're starting pitching. They're starting pitching has been their hallmark this year, despite Judge having this absurd May and Soto being as good as he's been over the first two months. They're starting pitching has been everything up to this point in whether it's Luis Hill, who's probably the favorite for American League Rookie of the Year right now, or Marcus Stroman, who has more than out pitched his free agent contract. Nestor Cortez has been phenomenal. Clark Schmidt had been great. You know, Carlos Redon so much better than last season in the bullpen.
Clay Holmes has been damn near unhittable and everybody else down underneath him. They may need another reliever or two at the deadline. But Rich, this isn't a team with a whole lot of weaknesses. And the fact that they're going to be adding the reigning Cy Young winner in the American League back to their rotation makes them even scarier. And I'll tell you, right now they're the favorite in the American League.
And in Baltimore has got a little bit of work to do in Seattle needs to go find some offense. And Cleveland's going to need to add before the deadline because this Yankees team looks scary. Yeah, I mean, and I said that with respect to, say, someone like Kansas City, like the Royals are performing very well.
But I'm calling the Yankees a surprise team. But while watching the pitch clock in Anaheim that day, I was with my son watching the Yankees and the Angels. I also was keeping track of Scott Boris standing there in his dugout perch in his suite while Juan Soto stepped to the plate. And I just thought to myself, what goes through this man's head as Soto steps into the batter's box right now? Like, what is that whole drama going to look like? I would say they should just the Steinbrenner should just adopt him. It might be cheaper to make him part of the family legally, you know, because. Yeah, I'm wondering what how is that going to play out with the trade deadline approaching? Obviously, Yankees aren't going to trade him, but everything over the next few months. How does this work, Jeff?
Does the number start with a five because it's got to. Don't you think I was going to say, because if not, then, you know, I think you're going to have a really difficult time being in the mix. And to me, this feels like a New York, New York affair. I know that the Yankees and Mets don't like going up against one another for free agents, but the Mets need a player around whom they can build and the Yankees have a player who has proven capable of not just walking into Yankee Stadium and being good, but walking in and being great, being foundational, being the match for Aaron Judge and somebody who can play alongside him for the next decade. And the thing about Juan Soto, Rich, is he's 26. He is a young free agent. So everything that teams are looking for, he has.
Now, we also know through free agent history that they're going to nitpick. And so the nitpick on Juan Soto is going to be that, you know, he's not a great defensive outfielder. And if he's not a great defensive outfielder now, what's he going to age like?
I don't care. The bat is so good. The bat is so special that the defense really doesn't matter because the skills that he has between his eye and how hard he swings and the kind of the quality of contact that he makes. He is an outlier. He's an outlier away from everyone, including Aaron Judge, by the way. And so when you have that unique of a set of skills, you need to be paid like a unique player, too.
And my last couple of minutes with you here in our June checkup, if you will, Jeff Passan. Who do we keep an eye on this month that might become sellers for a bunch of teams? I mean, you look at the National League and it kind of feels like set already, to be honest with you. I mean, I know the Braves don't have a close right.
Right. The Braves don't have a Cunha. There's seven behind the Phillies who have the same record as the Yankees. The Dodgers, if you can dare call a team 15 over disappointing, has a seven game lead over the Padres.
The Brewers are the only team above 500 in the NL Central. I'm wondering who we can kind of figure out who the buyers are going to be. Who do you identify as being in that cusp of selling, depending on how June goes?
Jeff? Well, if you go on to ESPN dot com right now, then you will see my early trade deadline where I go over all 30 teams. You're selling. It's like ESPN Plus. So it is a bit of a sale.
But trust me, it's worth it for the information you're going to find on ESPN. All right. So, you know, I mean, you can you give a little hint? So let's treat it like it's actually got them. I've actually got them rich listed as hinge because the trade deadline and how enjoyable it is, is going to hinge upon these teams actually moving guys. And the Toronto Blue Jays may be at the top of that list. We've got potentially Vladimir Guerrero Junior, potentially Bo Bichette moving. Now, Ross Atkins, their general manager, said it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for us to trade them. But let's remember two years ago, Mike Rizzo said on June 1st, we are not trading Juan Soto.
And then by the time August 1st rolled around, Juan Soto had been traded. So there's a lot of posturing going on. And I think the Blue Jays want to give themselves the opportunity to make this work. But they also understand that there are not a lot of great players from the obvious sellers who are going to be available. And that if if you're a team like them and you can rebuild the farm system because what you've got right now, frankly, hasn't worked to this point, hasn't gotten you out of the wild card round, you got to consider doing it. The Arizona Diamondbacks are going to be in there as well. The Detroit Tigers. I mean, there are some teams that are in the middle there that have guys who, if they decide to move, could change the trajectory of the deadline.
Let me throw one more out there for you, Rich. The Houston Astros, seven games under five hundred. Alex Bregman is a pending free agent. And then beyond that, after 2025, Kyle Tucker and Fromber Valdez are free agents. And I'll tell you, Kyle Tucker is really, really good playing himself into three hundred million dollar territory because of his production and because of his age.
And if he's out there, every contender from the Phillies to the Mariners and on down are going to want a piece of Kyle Tucker. Jeff Passan, I appreciate that. Everybody get to go to ESPN Plus for more than that.
You kind of kind of treated that like the article, like if you don't you only see the first couple of paragraphs and then you got to you got to pay to see the rest. So I appreciate that little tease and I appreciate always chatting with you, brother. You're the best. Truly. Thanks.
As are you, pal. Thanks. Appreciate you having me. You got a must follow out there on the social media landscape.
Jeff Passan, at Jeff Passan right here on the Rich Eisen Show. Lots to digest off of that. Tasty. Agreed. Yankees and Red Sox haven't played each other yet. I think that changes next weekend. I hate the schedule. I'm not a fan of it. I don't like it. I don't like playing all the teams.
I don't like your division rivals are only playing 13 times. I don't like it. I just don't like it. Yeah. You know what I mean? But, you know, again, you and I are, you know, more traditionalists when it comes to everything major league baseball. Yeah, but it's not like an orange wedge. I don't need to see my team play everybody.
Exactly. You know what I mean? I actually liked it when it was AL only. I didn't even I didn't even like interleague play. Now you're.
I thought it was cool that the teams first played each other in the World Series. I just would. You know what? I'd come up with city disconnect jerseys. That's what I'd come up with. Keep it to your rivals, please.
All right. We'll take a break here on the Rich Eisen Show. 844-204 Rich. Number to dial. Mike McDaniel has spoken about to his presence at minicamp.
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Call clickgrainger.com or just stop by. Tom in Canton, Ohio, has been hanging on since we came on the air. What's up, Tom? Hey Rich and fellas, how are you doing? Good, how's Canton doing?
How's Stark County, Ohio? We're ready for you to pump your chest. Tom, Tom, that puff, would you say puff my chest? Is it the phrase you use right there, Tom?
Pump or puff, whatever you want to do. No, no, whatever. That was the last two years.
That's an understatement for what's coming. No, I'm going to be volunteering at that event this year. You'll be volunteering? Yeah.
Okay. Are you in security, Tom? Are you part of security in the Civic Center arena?
I guess so. First I get to help out with the bar. Oh, wow.
Hey, I might hit that first. Then I get to escort the families into the event. How nice. Terrific. Great. Well, first of all, in advance, thank you because you and the Legion, the vast Legion of volunteers are what make that event so special and so welcoming for everybody who comes from out of town.
And secondly, what do you have in mind today? So I actually went to Big Flick this past weekend. You did? Hey. And I would never have gone if it wasn't listening to your show. Hey, really? That's awesome. Terrific.
So I guess I've got to ask Chris a question. Is Sarah a better softball player than you are? Because she made one hell of a catch.
That's what everyone is saying. So first off, there were a lot of people this year, a lot of celebs went, and not a lot of action in the field in terms of catching pop-ups and fly balls. But she said she was looking for a joke on her phone while the game was being played. And then so she made the catch. Who is hitting it? I forget who hit it. Tom, do you remember?
I don't remember either. Was it a Martin Starr frozen rope? Good one. Was it?
Good one. Did Sam Levine get into one? Very possible.
Which I don't know if he's ever done that since in Glorious Bastards. I don't know, but she did say she had, everyone was coming up to her saying how great of a catch it was. But she did it while holding her phone, which I don't recommend. So hold on a second. Tom, he didn't answer your question. Answer the question? I'm not going to throw my lady under the bus.
Or she is a better softball player than you. Come on. Okay. Tom, moving on.
I feel like I'm Brian Gumbel now. Moving on. I'll tell you one thing. The show itself on Saturday night was just... I stayed at the same hotel with some of the stars and everything that were there. So I got to see quite a few different people. Did you see Will Forte in The Fountain?
Singing Just Once? I saw you post that on Twitter. And I caught that, but I did miss that. Jake Tapper. Shout out Jake Tapper. Jake Tapper was the photographer.
The videographer. But Jeff Ross started off and you didn't know you were going to get an ab workout because you were laughing so hard. Right.
So that was awesome. And then I'm not sure if any of the videos were shown where Travis and Kelsey took out two tables. Yeah, he went into the crowd, right? Mahomes is throwing him autographed footballs. Yeah, for $15,000 you could buy a football signed by Mahomes and Kelsey. Right. So Mahomes was throwing the balls to Kelsey and then he was delivering the footballs.
And it was kind of just like inertia, like Travis and Kelsey just started running and he just couldn't stop and just went right into the tables. So great. Well, hopefully he's okay. I'm sure he got up, right?
I saw the video, he was okay. But that was great. So here's one other thing I just want to say.
Sure. So my family, when we moved from Ireland, we moved to Youngstown, Ohio. So I have, on my mother's side, the name is Lynch. And so my mother was related to, it was my mother's brother.
But my cousins, like their mother, is related to Ed O'Neill. Hey, well he's Mr. Youngstown, isn't he? I mean, that's his area. That's where he's from. Yeah. So he went to Youngstown.
My parents graduated from the same university that he did. Fantastic. Well, and he loves talking about Ohio in his Youngstown days and his previous appearances here, so we'll obviously get that again. Great chatting with you, Tom. I look forward to seeing you. I'll see you in August.
All right, sounds good. It's Tom in Canton, Ohio. Beautiful Stark County, Ohio. Love it. $25 million over the life of Big Slick.
Yeah, it's four over the weekend. Used to start again, Big Slick, it's called, because that's the phrase. Oh, there she is. Look at Sarah Tiana. Oh, wow. Look at that. Are you saying this form is not as... It's good. This is great form. Look at that throw.
I'm saying it's gotten better in the last eight years. Very. Well, I mean, what would you say? What do you say? Is that very Dansby Swanson-like right there?
What do you think? She loves Dansby. I know she does. I'm trying to make her happy by coming up with the proper noun. Garcia. Alby's-esque. Very Alby's-esque.
Looks great. Why did she choose 20? Your assigned numbers. Oh, is that what it was? Yeah, you're just giving jerseys. What was the name she put on the back? Because you can usually... Oh, I think it's just her own name. Really? Because back in the day, I used to put different names on the back. Oh, really?
Oh, I don't know. I put Balboni on the back of one Kansas City jersey and LaCock on the back of the other. Can you say that? Yes, Pete LaCock.
Do people have real players? I understand. He was also the son of Peter Marshall. Look at that.
Great photo. Peter Marshall, the host of Hollywood Squares, his real name was LaCock and he changed it to Marshall. I did know that.
Yeah, just trying to make people smarter and a little laugh. I don't know if Pat and Travis played because a couple of years ago... They were at the White House on that Friday. A couple of years ago, Mahomes hit one that I don't think has landed yet.
Right. In the softball game. But Kelsey got to live out his dream because Biden actually called him up to the podium.
Oh, right, and he put on a helmet. He said my fellow Americans into the microphone at the podium, which is apparently what he was trying to do the year before when Mahomes got him away. That's great.
He got to live out his dream because he's Travis friggin' Kelsey and we're all rent payers in his world, including the President of the United States. That's good. Fantastic. Great stuff from The Big Slick.
Our number one in the book, Stacey Dale's coming up. Here we have it. Okay. That's a nice, that's a good picture of...
It is a really good picture. Yeah, I'm going to need that. Okay.
To pass along. There we go. Is that Kristen Schaal in the back? She's now one of the... Heidi Gardner. Heidi Gardner? Okay, great. Heidi Gardner, yeah, from SNL. I couldn't see.
I should put on my glasses. Yeah, cool. Heidi's now one of the, she's now one of the principals, correct? She's one of the hosts. Because she's from Kansas City now. Yeah, she's from KC. She's one of the hosts now.
Okay. We had almost 60 celebs roll into town this weekend. That's great. Yeah, I saw Jeff Ross was there.
Jeff Ross was speed roasting everybody to kind of kick the night off. Fantastic. Yeah.
Camille Demjani, he performed Fortune, Feimster. Dude, those, I mean, I remember they started it in a theater. Now they're in an arena. Yeah, they fill that whole arena. Unbelievable. It's packed to the gills. It's so great. Yeah, it's so great. Good for them.
Yep. Children's Mercy Hospital, that's... Kansas City. And every single celebrity goes to the hospital. Because if they don't, they got to face Riggle.
And he will not stand for that. Doesn't matter how banged up you are. Oh, I remember. In the morning. Paul Rudd's mom is giving out B12 shots in the hotel. Those 1 a.m. moments where you're hanging out, you're having a good time, and Riggle's like, I think you guys should all go to sleep.
Because 7 a.m. we're on a bus going to the hospital. We're going to see the kids. I love it. Big Slick. Great stuff. Great stuff. And I guess it's BigSlickKC.org, if I'm not mistaken, is their website to go and donate. Our number two, count up Stacey Dales on what's going on in the WNBA and Bears Camp. And your calls. Binge seasons one and two of In the Red Clay now, wherever you listen.
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