The Braves' Turning Point (Hour 2)

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Get guaranteed low prices and excellent customer service from the professional parts people at O'Reilly Auto Parts. Time to update you on some of the biggest stories in the world of sports with some audio. Let's get to a news brief. Time for your daily news brief.

We get you caught up on the rumors, reports and reconnaissance from the day in sports. So the Giants are screwed this weekend. The Giants are really screwed for the rest of the season, but this weekend in particular, not that it's a big plus if you have Daniel Jones, but I think you'd much rather have Daniel Jones than Tarod Taylor. Daniel Jones out this Sunday as they go to Orchard Park to go up against the Buffalo Bills who are a 15 point favorite. Andrew Thomas, offense alignment and the Giants preeminent offense alignment also out. So I can't give you any hope here if you're a Giant fan heading into this one.

Now I will probably have this clip used against me on Monday because I'm going to say this. The Bills are a lock this weekend and the Bills are the survivor pick for this weekend. And I was debating who I'm going to use as my survivor pick in the week. I'm like, I could go the Eagles up against the Jets. I looked at the Rams and I said, maybe they're the play up against the Cardinals. But with that being said, I just read a report that Sean McVay's wife is expected to give birth like any day now. And if she goes into labor, he said he will miss the game according to pro football talk against the Cardinals.

And then I'm like, oh, keep it simple stupid. Let's not get crazy here. The Giants are playing the Bills. Yes, you have the day ball and Shane connection with Buffalo and how much they're familiar with this Bills regime.

But just from a talent perspective, it's not even close. The Giants are all the way down here. Oh wait, can we find the Giants down there? Oh, let's get the Giants some water.

And then you have the Buffalo Bills all the way up here and you have the Bills fans jumping off of like mountains to land on tables and they still are looking down laughing at the New York football Giants. But anyway, we need a little levity here for Carlos Ortiz, who's helping out with the show today because he's a miserable giant fan, right? Carlos, you want to laugh a little bit.

You're a friendly guy. I only laugh to keep from crying because of how bad this season is. Well, I'm going to make you laugh here. Here's your offensive line coach Bobby Johnson on the pressure he's feeling. How much when the line struggles do you feel the pressure on yourself? I always put pressure on myself. You know, not if you're asking me, do I feel pressure from other people? I put more pressure on myself to not even really pay attention to the other stuff. Has anybody said anything to me directly? My job is to get the guys to play to a certain level.

They have not played that level. So that's, I feel pressure, not by any outside measures. You know, I went home the other day and my wife moved me.

That's enough pressure. Nah, I have to ask you something, Carlos. Do you think when Bobby Johnson walks into his home, his wife's sitting there saying, Boo! Coach, you suck!

Your line's horrible! If she's a New Yorker, yes, but no, there's no shot that he's walking into booze. She's giving him the support hog and like, hey, you'll get them next time, Tiger.

I don't know though. I could see, now I don't know how large his family is, like if he has kids or anything like that. But if you're sitting down at the dinner table, you know, everyone likes to poke fun and have some jokes at the expense of our loved ones in the family. Like, do you think if he has a kid, his like, I don't know, his eight-year-old saying, hey, Dad, can we actually block for the quarterback for like three, four seconds? I'd be doing that as you would then say, oh, pass me the steak. Dad, pass the steak. And how about you guys actually finally do something up front in the trenches? Oh, kids are savages. Kids have no filters whatsoever. So you pass that steak and you're just like, oh, look how easily that got through.

It's smooth, just like your line. Is that the coach saying, maybe the wife saying no nookie time and you have to sleep on the couch if your offensive lines doesn't start playing better? It's serious. You'll know she's mad if she doesn't say anything. That's when you know he's in the doghouse. Well, also you got to probably enjoy living in that New York, New Jersey area. If you're Bobby Johnson, if you continue to perform this way with your unit, you're going to be having to pick up and move your family and move them somewhere else.

So maybe that is like kind of a motivational tactic by the wife. No nookie time until your team starts blocking and getting some Daniel Jones, some protection or throughout Taylor this weekend. Here is Stefan Diggs. So there was an issue on the sideline last weekend in London. Stefan Diggs wasn't happy. I guess he was more upset at himself from the way that people said it than he was yelling at his teammates. But here is Stefan Diggs, thankful for Josh Allen defending him the other day. Obviously, I'm thankful to have a quarterback that I had my back in every instance, especially considering people don't know what's going on and on the sideline.

You're not on the sideline. I mean, people don't hear. People just see.

And it's easy to react however you want to draw whatever conclusion you want from what you saw. Carlos, you probably had a friend that you know, they're in like a relationship and you know, it's probably just not a healthy relationship. But then when they go out for dinner with another couple, you would think they're the greatest couple in the world and that everything's going on fine, right?

I'm sure friends look at me the same way. Yeah. Well, I've met your wife before. Yeah. No, I seem to have a very good relationship. She keeps you in line.

Oh yeah. And I get out of line a lot. So there's a lot of work behind the scenes for her and I feel bad. Every time I see Carlos wife, I go up to her and I say, you deserve a medal for having to put up with Carlos Ortiz.

She has more medals than I do. I go, I apologize for what you have to put up with. But anyway, that's what this Stefan Diggs situation feels like. You know, something was wrong this off season with Josh Allen, Stefan Diggs, or Stefan Diggs and Sean McDermott. And now they're putting up the front that everything is okay. And everything may be fine, but it's not as good as it once was. And everyone's starting to realize something's up and it may not be as bad as we think it is. But when there's so much uncertainty and ambiguity there, it raises questions and it raises people to be curious and maybe make it worse than what it is. And then every little thing that you do turns out to be a bigger situation. Like for example, if you're a husband and you leave without your wedding ring on, cause you're just going to the grocery store and someone's like, Oh, you don't have your wedding ring on. Is everything fine at home? Yeah, I'm just a schmuck and I forgot to put my wedding ring on my finger. May not be a big deal or it actually could be a big deal.

Let's go to Justin Herbert. They go up against the Cowboys on a Monday night football and he was asked if he'll be limited because of this finger injury. I think there's so much going on during the game that you're probably not going to be worrying about it too much. I think you're just going to be worrying about not getting tackled or not taking those hits. So whether it is scramble, it's about being safe, getting down.

And that's in the back of your mind. So I'm going to ask this on Friday and then we'll circle back to it on Monday. Right now, the Dallas Cowboys are on the road. There are two point favorite up against the Chargers. Where do we lean on the spread?

I'll start with you, Carlos. I'm taking the Cowboys. So you're laying the two points with the Cowboys.

Yeah, I'm laying the points. Stu, Cowboys and Chargers, Cowboys a two point favorite. I can't bet on the Chargers.

I have to go Cowboys. See guys, Vegas is looking at you two like sheeps. That's what they're doing.

And I'm going to be the lion here. This is what's happening. Vegas is putting this spread Dallas at two. Oh, Dallas just got emasculated up against San Francisco 49ers. The Chargers, they stink. They have so much talent, but they can't get it together.

Brandon Staley is just a stupid coach in this league, which he is. And I think Vegas is trying to say it's a low spread. We're begging you to take the Cowboys on Friday. I will plus the two points right now, mentally with the Chargers. And we'll circle back in on that on Monday when we preview the game, but I don't only think the Chargers are alive in this game right now.

I think the Chargers win the game outright. How about them Cowboys? You drama Dallas choking Cowboys. Wouldn't it be the most cowboy thing in the world to be three and three, but after you beat three terrible teams in the Patriots, the Giants and the jets, everyone's like, Oh, go Dallas. Dallas is going to be wonderful. Oh, Dallas is a force to be reckoned with.

Gelb. You're an idiot. Oh, Channing Crowder. You're a moron for all the things you said about Dak Prescott on the Zach Gelb show. And look at the Cowboys right now, the cockroaches of Cowboys fans. They're on the verge of getting exterminated once again, and we didn't even have to wait till January to do so this year because you know it and I know it.

The Cowboys are just not a Super Bowl contender. They all teased us though early in the season. They're like dancing. They're like, Oh, we're really good. We're going to be fun.

We're going to be wonderful. Who's the dominant defense? Oh, this offense is good. Oh, Dak's coming together. That's going to be a great quarterback and look where we are now. Cowboys three and two Chargers two and two. I tend to think those Chargers are going to put the Cowboys down to three and three. Hate to see it.

Here is a funny exchange. Nick Castellanos was interviewed after a big time game once again, as the Phillies advance and they're dancing on their own. Oh, they do have a partner here in the NLCS. It will be the Arizona Diamondbacks, but let's not ruin a good song. This was an interview with Nick Castellanos on the field with TBS. Nick, nobody in major league history has hit two home runs on back-to-back postseason games, but you just did.

And you guys are handed to the NLCS. Where's the question. There's no question.

Thank you for telling me. I thought you'd be happy with that. I am, but we got eight more wins. Nick Castellanos. It's funny because on the field, he's like Mr.

Personality, right? He was the player that was standing at second base earlier in this series. And everyone thought he was giving the middle finger to his own dugout, but it was his ring finger saying, Hey, let's go win a ring this year. And then you see that Nick Castellanos. And we all remember Nick Castellanos with the Brenneman when he was apologizing for the homophobic slur. And then it's like, Oh, Castellanos swinging a drive deep to left. And he's like, I apologize for the awful things that I said. And now anytime there's a bad moment in the world, Nick Castellanos is always linked and people always put out that spoof of the Castellanos home run when someone's apologizing and trying to give him me a Colpa.

And then you hear Nick Castellanos in interviews and he just wants no part of them. And I appreciate that because that's the biggest slam dunk thing in the world. You're on top of the world right now after the NLDs that you just had. And the guy's basically telling you how great you are. And you could just, you don't need a question there. You just go, yeah, it's wonderful. Great team, blah, blah, blah.

And he goes, is there a question there? I respect how committed to being a douche at times. Nick Castellanos is.

I really do. And I say that in a polite way out of admiration for Nick Castellanos. Let's go to coach prime Dion Sanders. Travis Hunter is expected to be back for the game tonight. They're going to monitor him in pregame warmups, but this is a Friday night kick at 10 PM Eastern and coach prime isn't happy with it. Even though it's 7 PM Pacific, he doesn't like late kickoffs. Makes these eight o'clock games.

That's the dumbest thing ever. I know, I know. It's those fellows over the television site every minute in life. Who wants to stay up to eight o'clock for a dirty? You wait till we do it about the West coast. I mean, East coast.

They even care about ratings or anybody watching it. I don't. You, you, what are we supposed to do with, I'm sorry, I'm Vinny. What are we supposed to do with the kids all day until eight o'clock?

Yeah. Wait till we're on the road. What are we supposed to do all day until eight o'clock? So what you supposed to do in the hotel?

What you supposed to do all day? If when we have a game like that on the road, we get home at five o'clock in the morning, right? Yeah. Thank God we're not going to be in this conference.

Oh, that's wonderful. So what I love about that is you have the coach of Colorado who's in mountain time and this game is being played in mountain time tonight. So that's an eight o'clock kick.

Like that's not that late on a Friday. And then they're going up against Stanford who is Pacific time, which is seven. So if you're a Colorado or Stanford fan, that's a pretty damn good kickoff, but here is coach prime who just gets it. And he goes, we know our fans are going to tune in. We got to cater more to the fans on the East coast. And that to me is so funny because when you're an East coast guy doing national radio, and we talk a lot of West coast sports, we get so many lame critics in our business that don't actually listen and just want to be critical. And they go, Oh, CBS sports radio was an East coast network. Oh, they never pay attention to the West coast.

And I'm like, Oh really? Where does a bill writer do his show from all the West coast? Where does Jim Rome, the legendary Jim Rome, the franchise of this network, where does he do his show from the West coast? So it's not as if we only have East coast people here at the network. So it's funny to me that the guy that's coaching in mountain time is like, Oh, we need to be more concerned about the East coast folks. I love that coach prime.

If you want to be a program director for a national radio network, we will definitely welcome you here. Alrighty, let's go to Spencer Schreider on the Braves playoff loss. They're now out of the post season after having the most wins in the regular season. You look at the playoff format and everything. I mean, you don't need to be a great team all year. You need to get to the playoffs and then it's a different game.

And we did a lot of good things in regular season, but ultimately we got to find a way to make the next step in the post season. I'm sure there's a lot of Braves fans out there that aren't happy about that. I mean, they have every right to be.

And, uh, you know, they have every right to be that way. And, um, you know, we got nobody blamed but ourselves. And you know, for me personally, I didn't. I wasn't good enough. No excuses.

I like that answer from Spencer Schreider. We'll talk more about the Braves coming up in about six minutes with Tom Glavin Hall of Fame pitcher who will join us right here on CBS Sports radio. And finally, if you weren't watching this game last week, we're going to be talking about the Cougars. We're going to be talking about the Cougars in Pennsylvania and Houston. Let's listen up to the Cougars. Hail Mary on the Cougars radio network, the Houston Cougars back to pass Donovan Smith Smith steps up in the pocket, unloads it, throws it all the way downfield into the end zone tip, and it is caught. Caught by the Cougars.

Caught for a second. The ball was tipped up in the air, and the Cougars win the game on the final play. Unreal. Unreal. There is nothing like a game that you think is over. And then the next thing you know, you win. That rush is just crazy. And when you have the play by play, the answer go, unbelievable. You just felt all the emotions go down from the pit of the floor, then all the way up to the top of his brain saying, I can't believe we just won this game.

Alrighty, that's a news brief. It is the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports radio. A lot to react to with the Atlanta Braves going down in the NLDS once again to the Philadelphia Phillies. We'll talk some postseason baseball with the Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Glavin next.

The free AutoZone fix finder service can help you find a fix for free. Get in the zone. AutoZone restrictions apply. Let's go out to the guest line right now. We'll chat some playoff baseball, and we'll do so with a MLB legend in the Hall of Fame played for the Atlanta Braves World Series MVP. And that is the great Tom Glavin here with us back on the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports radio. Tom, always appreciate the time.

Thanks for it. How are you? I'm doing well, Zach. How are you doing?

Well, I'm doing fantastic. So we knew that the Braves had this great regular season. The expectation was to get back to the World Series and win it. They've met their kryptonite once again in the Philadelphia Phillies, and they go down in four games. How did you react to that one last night?

Well, listen, I'm surprised as anybody, right? I mean, you look at the season the Braves had, and like I said to people all the time, I know post seasons obviously is tough and not necessarily always the best team that wins in a short series, right? If the team gets hot, then other teams in trouble.

But having said all that, I always ended it with, I'm not going to bet against the Braves. They just had too good a team, too deep a team, and I think they were the odds on favorite. Unfortunately, to your point, the Phillies had a little bit better series. Their superstars rose to the occasion and really made the difference in that series. So it was a tough ending to a great season for the Braves. It's something that they're unfortunately, and I've experienced it enough in my lifetime, too.

They're going to have to live with that, deal with that over the course of the winter and find a way to put it behind them and be ready to go next year. You live in it both ways, winning a World Series, and we know the Braves have won a World Series, and then people expecting more. Just what advice would you give to this Braves team moving forward so they go get another championship? That's just the thing. You got to keep giving yourself chances. Listen, it was frustrating for the teams that I was a part of in the early 90s when we lost in 91, we lost in 92, we lost in 93, but you keep giving yourself chances. To me, that's the thing. As a player, you want to have a chance every year, and you hope it goes well or hope it goes right for you at least one time, which again, in my case, it did. But yeah, you got to keep giving yourself the opportunity. The only way you're going to do that is to approach each and every year as its own thing. You show up for spring training a year after you've lost a bitter playoff series, whether it be in the first round like this or in a World Series.

To me, it doesn't matter. You lost. When you show up, you got to find a way to put that behind you. There's nothing you can do about what happened last year. You can learn from it, but you can't do anything to change it. So all you can do is take what you learn, try to apply it to the next season, and then go out there and bust your butt and try to give yourself another opportunity come October of that season and roll the dice again.

See what happens. Tom Glavin here with us. The Orlando RCS situation is fascinating to me because he said attaboy. The Phillies used that as motivation, and then I thought that the Braves really let that get to them and become a bigger deal than what it actually was.

Last night, he's going at it with Phillies fans. Were you disappointed in the way that Orlando handled that entire thing? I wasn't really sure exactly what happened.

I had just heard that he said something. My initial reaction is, why? Why do you allow that to happen? Why do you say something that the other team or the other player, whoever it's directed toward, can potentially use for motivation?

You don't need that, right? No, I think the circumstances were a little bit different than I thought. My understanding was something that was said in the clubhouse. I think in the clubhouse, you always want that to be your sanctuary a little bit. But hey, at the same time, if the clubhouse is open, reporters are in there.

Who knows? That's why you got to be careful about what you say, and particularly in the postseason. I know that's something that so many of those teams I was a part of, that Bobby was the manager. We worked really hard at trying to stay away from those opportunities. I'm not saying that we were 100% successful, but our mantra was always keep your mouth shut, keep your head down, go into town, win your series, and get out.

Don't give that team on the other side any more reason to want to beat you than they already have. Who knows how much motivation that plays? I don't know how much motivation Bryce Harper needs to have a big series against the Atlanta Braves, particularly in the postseason. But I think it's probably fair to say it didn't hurt matters for him, Eddie.

It was just so bizarre to me last night, though. You're in an elimination game, and he's turning around and getting into it with the fans, and Okunio almost did grab him in that video. He's like, what are you doing pretty much? It was weird that the focus, I don't want to say wasn't on the game, but he was even responding to the Phillies fans.

Well, to your point, if he's even engaging with them for a second, then his focus is taken away from what he should be doing. I think that's the risky run when you have those kinds of situations. I've obviously done so many interviews now here in the postseason and talking about different things. One of the things that inevitably comes up when people start talking about the postseason and try to break things down is, would you rather have talent or experience? Look, I'd love to have a combination of both, but I think I'm going to err on the side of experience just because of stuff like that. Things like that, when you've been experienced in the postseason, you know how to deal with that stuff. I know for me personally, my first postseason, it wasn't so much the games that was hard to deal with.

It was everything else. You're flying your family in and out of cities. You're getting hotel rooms.

You're getting tickets. There's way more media than you're used to being around. You're having to deal with that and all the while you're trying to prepare and play games. I would say that the biggest thing in terms of having that playoff experience is learning how to deal with all the noise and the distraction that goes around the game. When you learn how to deal with all that stuff, it makes it a lot easier to have your focus on the baseball game and just ignore all that other noise. Tom Glavin here with us. You see the Orioles go down. The Braves go down. The Dodgers go down. I know that the Astros are still alive and every year they're in the ALCS. It feels like a lot of people are now saying maybe this format change isn't a good one and you win all these regular season games. You have a lot of these teams go home. Personally, I would say just do what the Astros do.

Do you have a problem with the format and you think they need to tinker with it? I don't know. What do you tinker? Hey, you guys won your division and you lost because you had off days. We're going to fix that. How do you fix that? What do you do?

I don't understand. Again, I go back to some of my days of playing and we didn't have this off time. My first few years of playing in the postseason, it was the LCS and that was it. You had a couple days off at the end of the season and you were right back in the soup again. There's something to be said for that.

There's no doubt about that. I think every manager who is in a situation where they're trying to maneuver through off days will tell you that's the biggest challenge is keeping guys ready. Keeping guys kind of geared up and having that intensity that you had to win your division in the first place.

I still say that the format favors the teams that win their division. You have home field advantage. You have off time. You have time to get your guys healthy.

You have time to get your rotation set. But having said that too, I don't think that not having those off days is clearly the downside to those teams that have had to experience that either. To me, I think the format is fine. If there was one thing I would look at doing is I would look at reseeding the teams after round one. I'm not saying it doesn't matter. You've got to beat everybody, but to some extent it matters a little bit. So the Phillies win and Arizona wins. Well, if the Braves have the best record of baseball, they should be playing the lower of those two seeds. To me, that's something I think baseball needs to look into. But as far as the off days go, listen, I would much rather be a team that wins my division, has off days and can get everybody healthy and get everything set and take my chances with that versus having to win an extra series. Talking to Tom Glavin, do you feel as if we're on a collision course with these final four teams of Phillies and Astros once again for the second year in a row in the World Series?

I mean, who knows? Look, I don't know how you can discount anybody at this stage of the game, right? I mean, the Phillies, I think, obviously, are a team that maybe has a little bit, or at least on the side of the most star power. Houston certainly has their share of star power. The Rangers and Arizona are two really good teams that most people don't know anything about.

And as much as it's a surprise to most people that don't follow either of those teams that they're where they are, it's probably not a surprise to their fan base. You look at the Rangers, the Rangers had an unbelievable offensive year. The only thing that overshadowed it was the Braves offensive year. So they're a really good offensive ball club and their pitching kind of comes together. I know they got some guys banged up, but their pitching has been good enough to give them a chance. And I think Arizona is a team that was pretty streaky during the course of the year.

But when they were on the good side, I don't think there was anybody that really was excited about playing them. And they're a team right now that clearly is on the good side. But again, they're a really good club, a really good offensive club and pitching club that most people, myself included, can't tell you a whole lot about them. Yeah, and I look at the Phillies, you just have such great chemistry right now. And they are chasing to get back to that World Series and correct the wrong from last year. But then you look at that Arizona team, you're right, they had a strong start, and then they were kind of forgotten about. And they have a good mix of youngsters and veterans and no one's expecting anything out of them. I think that makes them ease up a little bit. And I think this could be a fascinating NLCS because all the pressure is now on Philadelphia to get this thing done.

No, I agree. And again, it's really hard to factor in what the expectations of winning does to teams does to players, right? You know, the Braves again, clearly the team that had the bullseye on the back, right? Everybody expected the Braves to win.

And there's a there's a ton of pressure that goes along with those expectations. And conversely, you know, when you're a team that nobody really says much about, or doesn't give you much of a chance, yeah, you kind of go out there with that carefree attitude, like, you know, truly, like, what do we have to lose? Nobody expected us to be there, right? So, you know, the Braves, again, you know, I think there is some benefit in that, of being that team that kind of nobody's really paying attention to now. I'm not saying for a second that Philadelphia is not paying attention to Arizona.

Of course they are, you get to this stage of the game, anybody can beat anybody. But to your point, I think Philadelphia is the clear favorite in that series. And you just don't know how teams gonna guys, mostly individually, how guys are going to react to being a favorite.

Last thing, Alaska has nothing to do with the playoffs. But for a Tony with his future, if you had to take a guess right now, where do you feel like he'll be playing next year? You know, I think it's a really hard call right now. I think those waters have been muddied really badly now with his injury, right?

I don't know. I mean, it's the kind of thing, is he going to be able to come back and hit and not pitch? Or is he going to have to take the whole year off? I mean, I don't know enough about it. But I mean, look, I think obviously, obviously the bigger market teams are always going to be in the mix. But I think that it's going to be an interesting thing. You know, I mean, surely from the pitching side, we've seen a lot of guys in the last couple years that have been traded or signed coming off of Tommy John. So I don't think teams are overly concerned about the Tommy John aspect of it. But I think for me, the more intriguing side is, you know, is even going to be able to play next year?

And if he's not, how does that factor into a team signing him knowing they're getting nothing for a year? Now, I know he's not a pitcher, but you saw Harper had the Tommy John and look, he goes to first base, they eventually and they used him in that DH role. The thing I wonder, because you know, if he could hit next year, and then when he wants to return to pitching a year from now, do they maybe say to him, let's use you in a closer role, or put you in a relief role instead of being a starter? I wonder if they make that change with him?

I mean, that's possible. Listen, I think it's gonna be hard listening. And I know people don't like hearing this, because, you know, he is such a player to watch on both sides of the ball, there's gonna come a time where he's gonna have to make a choice, I think, you know, it's just, it's just too demanding to do what he's doing now. Is it the kind of thing where it alleviates some of that stress on him to be a closer?

I don't know, maybe, but, you know, it may be the volume, right. But if you're out there DH and every night, and it's weighing on the back of your mind that at some point in time, you're gonna have to come in that game as a closer, you know, mentally, that's a lot for 162 games a year. So who knows, but, you know, I just, I just can't see him being able to continue doing what he's doing for the foreseeable future. I think he can do it for a little while.

But I think there's going to come a time where just physically, it's going to get tougher and tougher to do both of those things. By the way, you think the Dodgers send the Braves like a gift basket? Because no one's talking about the Dodgers losing after what happened with Atlanta.

Well, I mean, they I'm sure they are in LA, obviously. But now I mean, look at I think both of those teams, you know, there's some some questions they have to answer, right? I mean, look, they're both super, super good teams. Yeah. But you know, kind of fell to the same fate. They took the same time off, and they weren't the same team coming back that they were after that time off. And, you know, again, that's, it's always a concern.

And clearly, you know, there's still some more questions that out there as to, you know, if you're the team that wins your division in this format, how do you how do you keep your guys sharp? He is the great Hall of Fame pitcher and Tom Glavin. Tom, always appreciate your insight. Thanks so much for doing this. Enjoy the weekend. Alright, Zach, have a great weekend.

Appreciate it. There you go. Tom Glavin joining us right here on the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. Let's react to this Orlando RCS situation on the other side. Also, one running back in the NFL that could be on the move or one pundit is saying that that team should trade and we'll tell you who that is on the other side.

But first up, standing by with the latest CBS Sports Radio update. Here he is, the act man, Rich Ackerman. Is this a little bad bunny on a Friday? Am I right on name this tune?

I can't name you the song, but I can at least name you the artist here, Carlos. Yeah, you're halfway there. This makes me feel like I want to go clubbing tonight. Maybe spend a little night out on the town here.

It is Friday in the Big Apple. I actually have one of my best friend's 30th birthday party tonight. So doing that, he rented out a bar slash concert venue. He loved to rap and he made an album when he was in college.

No kidding. And now it's the 10 year anniversary of that album. So for his 30th birthday, he's doing a 30th birthday celebration, 10 year anniversary of the rap album where he's going to produce or he's going to perform like six or seven songs.

And we're all going to buy tickets for this thing tonight. Oh, that's cool. But you get imagine you get to throw a listening party for your birthday party. Yeah, that's performing live. They got like a band and everything. He's going to rap over the band, like a bunch of friends and stuff like that.

So it's going to be cool. Now, are you obligated to like cheer and applaud him even if it's a bad song? Well, here's the thing. So if I was small, yeah, I wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb. So no one would realize if I'm like, oh, you suck. You're horrible off the stage. What are we doing here? But since I am a gargantuan human being, I have no choice but to look like I am a Swiftie pretty much.

Yeah. You're just like bop in your head because you're the tallest guy there. Like, why is Zach tying his shoes so many times?

Because he's booing every time he ducks down. Maybe I need to find like a couch in the venue and just sit down and and kind of look like I'm a VIP so I could avoid any true human emotions while that's going on. So that's what I'm doing on this Friday evening. We go right from the show to some dinner to a little pregame and then right to the venue tonight. So you should come, Carlos, if you want. Stu, you're more than welcome as well, I don't think. Imagine Stu saying to his girlfriend, hey, you want to go see one of Zach's friends who's rapping tonight?

Stu's girlfriend would basically say, all right, lose my number, lose this relationship, right? Yeah, especially since we have doubles tonight, that's a no. You're doing double date tonight? Is that what you meant? Well, we have doubles game. Oh, devils, devils, devils. I thought you said doubles.

You made the wrong choice. Stu there for a second on CBS Sports Radio. Stu's really partying on a Friday. You in, Carlos? You coming? Yeah, dude, I'll change out of this jersey. I'll come right back. I feel like Carlos is actually serious. I am.

If you're serious, I'm serious. Yeah, feel free. Just got to buy a ticket. It's like 15 bucks. Oh, that, you know, that's, well, that's nothing with our Odyssey money.

You know what? I will pay for your ticket if you really want to come. That's very generous. I'll take you up on an offer.

Don't need to. I have my own $15, but I'll be there. I know.

Yeah, but come on. You save your $15. I'll pay for the $15 for the suffering that you're going to have to go for tonight at this show.

No, I bought my head too. I'm like, yeah, this song's awesome. Well, that's, I think you'd be great for this because it's the stranger coming to the party that no one knows.

And it's going to be Carlos Ortiz, who's never had a bad day in his life, or if you have, you've never shown it here, at least at CBS Sports Radio. And Carlos is a very energetic, exuberant human being where I do feel as if you are like the best hype guy to bring along to maybe make this party a little bit more happening if it needs a little extra seasoning of fun here. Yeah, dude, I'm all about like life at a party and libations being had, you know, like, because, listen, life is short. You better live it up now because we only got like grains at a sign left in our glass. Yeah, and the Braves aren't having any fun right now.

So we'll do the cheesy radio transition there. The Braves aren't partying right now. The Braves aren't dancing on their own. And I really think what happened here with the Atlanta Braves is they weren't ready for the moment. And they knew that the Phillies had their number.

And the little thing that disrupted the the apple cart got into their their brain here. And this whole Orlando Garcia situation is like one of the more overblown things that I've ever seen in my time of covering sports. So Harper gets doubled off here in the in game two.

And he gets tagged out with the double play. And I guess in the locker room, Orlando Garcia was basically saying attaboy Harper, which is something that's not a big deal. But if you're Philadelphia, if you're a Philadelphia fan, you use that as motivation.

And you use only like one small thing, even if it's minuscule and innocuous, to kind of, I don't want to say motivate you pump you up, but make you push the loss away very quickly. Because sometimes when teams lose, they dwell on the loss and they can't compartmentalize it. And the next thing you know, it carries over into game three. And Harper in game three has the two home run stairs down at Orlando RCO when he's rounding second base, going to third to eventually go home.

And that was a moment where I know Harper's sitting there doing the throat slash at home plate. But it felt like the series ended in game three. And if the Braves were mentally tough, they would have bounced back in a tough environment where now the Phillies are 10 and two in the postseason at home in the last two years.

And they would have found a way to get the job done last night. But I wonder where the focus was of the Braves. And you know, they're talking about how it was off the record comment and all that. Like you're in the locker room with hundreds and hundreds of media members there.

You know, if he said like, hey, it's off the record, then someone violated something. But if someone just heard him say that, I don't want to hear how this clubhouse is this sanctuary and all that stuff. And it's almost as if that comment derailed the Braves in the post-season because they got so worked up in defending the comments. You needed some leader on the Braves to say bleep that who cares?

I had a boy Harper, you messed up. And now I know we lost game three, but we're going to come back. We're going to kick your ass, go to beach in game four. Then we're going to go back to Atlanta and we're going to find a way to win this series. That's what the Braves needed to do.

Or they didn't just need to feed into this becoming more of a distraction. And if I, you know, last night, seeing that with the Braves, I was kind of furious. Now I was not rooting for the Braves. I'm not a Phillies fan. I'm a Mets fan, but the Braves have become obnoxious. But I kind of was thinking if that was my Mets and that was Orlando RC on the Mets and an elimination game, you're turning around to a Phillies fan and do it like, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah. And you're trying to start something with the Phillies fan because they're yelling at you and getting in your head.

That's just a sign of weakness. You are a player. In that setting, the fans are coming to see your team or the other team play. And this may sound condescending, but the player is above the fan in that situation where the fan is supposed to try to get in the game. It's supposed to try to get into your head, but as a player, you can't allow that to happen. And Orlando RC allowed the great Philadelphia fans who have one of the true home field advantages in sports, which is not a common thing anymore to get into the head of a player. And still like that was so alarming to me. I don't know your take on this too, but it's crazy to me how in an elimination game, a story in the aftermath of game two still was marinating in the, in the brain of Orlando RCA through game three, and then in game four. And he took time when he's sitting on the, on the dugout next to Ronald Acuna to respond to a fan when all of his focus should have been on the field with what's going on and trying to come back and in a game that was winnable, win it and send it back to Atlanta. It's almost inconceivable to me how long this, this story did go on throughout this series where, you know, the Philly fans going to get on you and Orlando just and Travis Darnell and all these guys just kept addressing it. They never nipped it in the bud.

Yeah. You almost want to get over it. It's just, it's, it's crazy that I would go on for so long and, and such a big moment too. They've played this whole season and we're the best team the entire season by far and very good. None of this, the entire season, then you get to, you know, game 163, 164, and then it's a complete mess. It's, it's an absolute mess. And now Braves fans are going to be thinking about this one the entire season.

And you just got to walk away, just being absolutely annoyed with this baseball team. I saw that Bart Scott, by the way, to quickly transition was on ESPN earlier this morning and he was advocating the, the giants to trade Saquon Barkley and for the Ravens to trade and give up a second round pick for him. You know, at first I go, you know, in a running back market that is not robust and teams not looking to trade for running backs and commit to them longterm.

There's been some exceptions, right? I know they weren't traded, but Nick Chubb got the extension. Christian McCaffrey got an extension, then got traded. And recently Jonathan Taylor just got an extension. But with Saquon being hurt right now, it's rare then to see a team have to give up a second round pick for a position that is more by committee than a bell cow back.

And also this guy's in the final year of his contract. But the more and more I think about it, the giants are going nowhere. Even if you extend Saquon like three years, you're never going to probably be ready to win when Saquon's still in his prime and Saquon's always dealing with injuries. If the giants get a second round pick for Saquon Barkley with how miserable this season is, the Giants are trying to accumulate as many draft picks as possible because the Giants are going for as close as a complete reset that you're going to have to go through this off season where you're going to keep your coach, you're going to keep your general manager, but you're going to be looking for a new quarterback.

You have some foundational pieces in Dexter Lawrence and then also Andrew Thomas. But outside of that, there's not a lot with this Giants team. And it wouldn't make sense in the year of 2023 and then 2024 to go get a deal done this off season with Saquon Barkley. Now, I don't know if the Ravens would give up a second round pick or if any team is going to give up a second round pick right now for Saquon. But if Joe Shane gets that phone call, how could you say no?