Cincy 360 w/ Tony Pike & Austin Elmore -- 4/14/25

Tony and Austin recap the weekend, chat Reds, check in with Mo Egger and Rick Ucchino, take your calls and TalkBacks, and more on ESPN 1530!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Skyline Chile, Cincy three to sixty about Cincinnati
from Cincinnati, sponsored in part by Skyline Chile. Stop by
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Feeling good, It's Skyline Time. This is ESPN fifteen thirty
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Speaker 2 (00:23):
Good afternoon, Happy Monday, Welcome in.

Speaker 3 (00:25):
It is the latest edition and the newest week here
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Sports Station. Thanks for listening on ESPN fifteen thirty or
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Speaker 2 (00:39):
Leave us a talkback.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
The slate is clean, which means now through Friday, your
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on this coming Friday, thanks to our friends. Of course,
that's Skyline Chili. Anytime you're feeling good and hungry, it
is Skyline time. Let me set the seen for you
here today a busy Monday. We are one week away

(01:05):
now from the NFL Draft, which means Austin that today
we can officially say next week is the NFL Draft. Yes,
that's a good thing. There are questions that we have
to answer that the Bengals have to answer between now
and next Thursday. But we have officially reached a point
in the offseason where we can say, right here on

(01:27):
the show, next week is the NFL Draft. That's a
pretty cool spot to be in now. We also thank
the Cincinnati Reds for making it a little easier to
get to this spot because the Reds Austin did what
we asked them to do. They swept the Pittsburgh Pirates.
And as they enter played today, the Reds are five hundred.

(01:48):
Get to five hundred, and let's see what happens. They
sweep Pittsburgh over the weekend, they are five hundred and
they are two games back of the Chicago Cubs. We
will spend a majority right here on our number one
today on the Cincinnati Reds. Outside of this first segment,
which will bounce around everything that happened over the course

(02:11):
of the weekend, we'll talk Reds for our one our three.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
Right before we.

Speaker 3 (02:18):
Welcome in Moeger, We've got to talk to a guy
that's getting ready to head out. He's heading to Las Vegas.
You may know him as rick Uchino, we officially know
him as Ricky Ringsides. Here on the show, rick Uccino
is all over the beat for the wrestling world, and
he leaves tomorrow to spend a week in Las Vegas

(02:40):
covering WrestleMania. That means he'll be there for SmackDown on Friday,
He'll be there for Night one of WrestleMania, Night two
of WrestleMania on Sunday, He'll be there for Monday Night Raw.
Ricky Ringside will get you ready for the week that
is WrestleMania. Will do that in our three today, outside
of our three and our number one being predominantly Cincinnati

(03:04):
Reds related, how can we not start the show by
congratulating Rory Michailroy on winning the Masters. He earns the
career Grand Slam, and I think earned is the right
word in this because he had to earn every bit
of it yesterday. The unique part of what Rory did

(03:25):
yesterday is I tweeted out along his front nine that
he's kind of just taking the suspense out of the Masters.
He was playing so well that you just think, man,
he is going to run away with this thing. He's
going to dominate. And then a little doubt crept in
and on whole thirteen on a par five, he did

(03:48):
the smart thing. He laid up off the tee, he
hit a smart second shot, and then he dumped his
third shot into the water and a four to five
stroke lead at one time became a toide match because
of what Justin Rose, who also needs to be commended.
He went to Justin Rose, Bertie Bertie, Bertie, Bogey Bertie, Bertie, Bogie,

(04:09):
Bogie Bertie.

Speaker 2 (04:10):
On the back nine.

Speaker 3 (04:11):
He was fantastic and put enough pressure on Rory that
after the seven on thirteen, Rory then bogied fourteen found
himself actually down one. He then birdied fifteen, birdied seventeen
after an unbelievable shot, and then all he needed to
do was par eighteen and he wins the Masters, and
he bogeis eighteen and a theme on the back nine yesterday,

(04:35):
he missed a lot of easy putts. He was phenomenal
with the approach shots, but missed a lot of easy
putts and the door fell wide open, and you thought,
now it goes to a playoff. Justin Rose is hot,
r feeling the weight of the world. They both striped
their te shots right down the middle. Justin Rose goes

(04:55):
first and I think he put one within like eight feet,
so Rory has to watch all of that. He had
just dumped it in the bunker on his approach shot
on eighteen in the round that he bogeied, and instead
he throws an absolute dard inside of Justin Rose. Shot
Rose miss his birdy attempt, Rory makes his. Rory is

(05:16):
the Masters winner. Rory earns the career Grand Slam. I thought,
Austin and a lot has been made about this. I
think the broadcast itself went seven minutes without anyone saying
a word, seven minutes of just taking in all the scenes,
all the emotion from Rory Mcrrory.

Speaker 2 (05:37):
It was. It was something to behold.

Speaker 3 (05:40):
It was awesome to watch, and to win it almost
in a microcosm of what's happened to Rory around his career,
because he's been close, he's had leads, they've squandered away.
To have a big lead evaporate and then come back
and win it. I thought was so fitting and I
don't think you you struggle to find many people who

(06:02):
are not happy to see what Rory McElroy did yesterday.

Speaker 4 (06:05):
Yeah, I mean for me, Ton It's always been a
like it's been Tiger number one and Rory number two
for me as long as Rory's been around, just kind
of knowing that their friends and his backstory and how
cool it was. I've always been a huge fan of his,
and then especially the way he handled everything with Live
Golf and kind of being the representative of the PGA

(06:26):
Tour and kind of speaking for a lot of golf
fans around the country, and to see so many heartbreaking
losses for him over the last ten eleven years or
whatever it's been, and to see it just like hanging
in the balance. They always say that the Masters doesn't
start until the second nine on Sunday, and that could

(06:46):
not have been more true, because you know, we're all
thinking it, here we go again. He has to be
thinking it too, the Tenson what is going on? And
then to see the leader I remember specifically that one
shot where he's walking and he turns around to look
at the leaderboard and realize that he's neck and neck

(07:07):
with I think at that point it was a three
way tie with Oberg and Justin Rose, and you're thinking,
oh my gosh, now I got to fend off two
other guys. I gotta fend off myself, and I got
to fend off Augusta National begin it begin, you know,
from the very beginning. It's like, Man, I felt like
I wanted to throw up that entire time because I

(07:28):
was so nervous watching Rory, just because I felt like
he deserved it and he had been so close so
many times, and how much it would mean to him
and and whatnot. But you know, you mentioned the way
CBS handled it. I would have to push back on that,
not after the tournament was over. But Jim Nance, who

(07:50):
I am a big fan of and who I love
and have never said a bad thing about, this is
gonna be the first time. Oh, Jim Nance on eighteen
in regulation and eighteen in the playoff was insufferable.

Speaker 2 (08:06):
Oh.

Speaker 4 (08:07):
He could not stop talking and filling all the space
and repeatedly talking about Rory's story. And I understand you
have to do that, that's part of it. But I
almost felt like if he were to fail again, if
Rory were to fail again, the build up that Nance
had put on him in eighteen and nineteen to the

(08:29):
millions of people watching would have made it even harder.
It would have made it even more devastating, and.

Speaker 2 (08:37):
That's not Jim's job.

Speaker 4 (08:38):
Jim's job is to tell the story, and he's obviously
always so good at that. But it felt like to me,
and maybe I'm just biased because I was pulling so
hard for Rory, but it felt like to me to death,
Jim nance was overboard on eighteen in regulation and eighteen
in the playoff, And you could kind of take a
deep breath after that second shot on eighteen into the

(08:58):
green and you're like, Okay, you know, surely, surely he's
not gonna miss this one. But then you're right afterwards.
I think they said like forty six words in a
span of fifteen minutes or something like that. And the
natural sound that Mike's picking up Rory talking to his friends,
and the emotion that was.

Speaker 3 (09:17):
So cool, awesome, awesome to see. You know, I credit
Justin Rose because he made like a twenty five foot
bomb on eighteen they did to tie it and give
himself a chance. Justin Rose was fantastic. And how about Rory, Like,
I look at the back nine. He starts the day
with a two stroke lead and he double bogie's number one. Yeah,

(09:38):
and you're like, oh boy, and this is gonna go bad.

Speaker 4 (09:42):
He kind of said after the round that that actually
kind of let him settle down a little bit. Yeah,
which is kind of interesting because you know the tension building. Oh,
I've got this lead, I've got this lead, and all
of a sudden it's gone.

Speaker 5 (09:51):
Ye.

Speaker 4 (09:52):
So you're like, Okay, well, I can settle down a
little bit. And then I think one of the bigger disappointments.
I'm how do you feel about Bryson, because I I'm
indifferent towards him. I don't I'm not a big fan,
but I don't like root against him. I used to
dislike him. I think he's come around in a big way.
He's not as serious. I read a story. Did you
see the night before?

Speaker 2 (10:10):
Yeah? That was the night before the final round.

Speaker 3 (10:12):
He's kind of walking around the neighborhood, comes across a
group of guys who had runned out of place, and
they're on the putting green and he spent an hour
with him, just kind of hanging out. He felt like
he was living in the moment, walking out, you know,
with the fans and enjoying that. I feel like he's
made a turn, but you know, I was disappointed with
the way he plays yeah, I can find it. I
wanted it to be him down the street. Yeah, and

(10:34):
he got this like live tension where they didn't speak
to it. Like Bryson said afterwards, he didn't say a
word to me all day. Yeah, Like there's that tension.

Speaker 4 (10:41):
There, which I don't think. I don't know that that's
as normal. Yeah, it ed happens on Sunday, but I
remember I was sitting there watching with my roommate and
he's like, he's not a huge golf fan. He's like,
I want Rory to win, but I want there to
be drama. Yeah, And I'm over here saying, no, I
want Rory to win by fifteen strokes. I thought he
was going to And all of a sudden, thirteen comes

(11:02):
around and there's drama. Yeah, and it got interested. That
was great television yesterday, man.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (11:07):
Justin Rose finishes second. Patrick Reid, who hold out on
his fairway shot going into eighteen, finishes in third, Scheffler fourth,
and then Bryson and Sung j M tied for fifth.
Outside of just the Masters FC Cincinnati, Austin, they won
their third straight. It was a Girardo Valenzuela gilt gone

(11:28):
now Girardo Valezuela scored the lone goal of the night
in the twenty eighth minute. FC Cincinnati wins one nill.
They are now Austin tied for second in the Eastern
Conference standings, just two points behind the Columbus Crew. Three
straight wins for FC Cincinnati sad news in the college
football world if you had followed along at all over

(11:49):
the weekend. Kyrone Lacey, the LSU wide receiver, and Jayden
Daniels posted a kind of a tribute to Kyron Lacey.
Kyraen Lacy had been involved in a car crash that
killed I don't know if it killed one or two,
but on he he was at fault in a vehicle

(12:14):
death that took the life of another completely obviously changes
another's life and that family, but had kind of turned
it around. He was going to participated at LSU's pro day.
He was the number six wide receiver prospect according to
mel kiper Junior. He died in what was an apparent

(12:35):
suicide yesterday. Obviously there's no winner in this. The family
and friends of those involved in who he killed. He
killed a seventy eight year old man on December sev
seventeenth and fleed the scene. He turned himself into authorities
on January twelfth, so obviously he had some court proceedings
coming up while also doing some NFL Draft coverage. And

(12:59):
we learned yesterday that that he had taken his own life.

Speaker 4 (13:01):
There was some sort of a domestic dispute yesterday in
which he fired his weapon I think into the ground
and then the police were called, and then he took
off and the police were chasing him and he crashed
and when they got there they realized that he had
he had killed himself. Uh, while that drive was going.
There's really sad. There's a lot of all of it.

Speaker 3 (13:23):
There's no winner in this, obviously the family of the
man he killed and now his family as well.

Speaker 2 (13:28):
His dad took to social media.

Speaker 3 (13:30):
UH late on Sunday and said, quote, our lives have
changed forever and this will never be okay. But did
did mention, uh, the the awareness on mental health and
to check in on on your friends and family and
anyone around you from a mental health standpoint, And obviously
it's all involved a very sad, sad situation from the

(13:51):
college football world. U S had a spring showcase on
on Saturday, and Tennessee will be looking for a new
starting quarterback. What'd you make of the news, Because we
talked about the hold end with Tennessee's quarterback on Friday,
Tennessee essentially said we're good, see you later.

Speaker 2 (14:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (14:07):
I think that was handled the right way. Yeah, I
think Tennessee did it right.

Speaker 4 (14:10):
I'm kind of stuck in the middle of this because
I agree with Mo in the sense of, like, if
you have leverage, you should use it, and Nico Iamaliava
is not an NFL caliber quarterback, so he should try
to get as much money as he can.

Speaker 2 (14:23):
Now.

Speaker 4 (14:24):
However, if you made a commitment to Tennessee and you
agreed upon an amount of money, and then all of
a sudden, you or people and your family are out
there shopping and looking for a better deal, and I
guess the story is that Dan Lanning found out about
this and reached out to Josh Hipel, the Tennessee head coach,
and then all of a sudden there was a dispute
and Nico didn't come to practice. And I think Josh

(14:47):
Iipel did the right thing by saying, listen, man, we'll
save the money. We'll see you later. And you know,
if you make a commitment and you backtrack on that.
I think that's lame, and especially for a guy who's
not that good of a quarterback to begin with in
a place like Tennessee and the SEC. You know, do
it now in the spring, get a chance to bring
up a new quarterback and figure it out.

Speaker 3 (15:07):
NBA playoffs are set. This gets started tomorrow. Play in
basketball Atlanta and Orlando, Memphis. How about Golden State loser
to the Clippers yesterday, so Golden State is in the
play in tournament. They take on Memphis. The Miami Heat
are in Chicago on Wednesday, and the Dallas Mavericks at
Sacramento on Wednesday as well. The other teams in the playoffs.

(15:28):
The Western Conference one seed is the Thunder. They await
a play in winter. The Rockets are the two seed.
They await the play and winner. So first round matchups
you get Nuggets, Clippers, and you get Lakers Timberwolves, which
should be a lot of fun. On the eastern side,
Caves are the one seed, Celtics are the two. They
await play in seeding. Pacers Bucks is the four to five. Knicks.

(15:49):
Pistons is the three six. The Knicks gonna be an series.
I think, yeah, if the Knicks win it, they would
play the Celtics, who if they have failed to defeat
all season long. But it is playoff basketball in the
National Basketball Association. Outside of the Reds, how about the
Chicago Cubs Austin. We mentioned this during the show or
pre show. Now, they lose Justin Steele for the year,

(16:11):
They lose the starting pitcher for the whole season. They
went into Dodger Stadium on Saturday and won sixteen to nothing.
I don't care who you are, you go in and
beat that Dodgers team sixteen nothing and then follow it
up on Sunday Night Baseball with a four to two win.
Cubs are playing really good baseball right now. Cubs have
themselves a plus forty three run differential, which is the

(16:35):
best in all of baseball right now. Mention the Reds
pull into a tie for second with the Milwaukee Brewers.
They are two games back of the Cubs. Padres lead
the NL West, Mets lead the NL East, Angels lead
the AL West, that Detroit Tigers lead the Central, and
the Toronto Blue Jays early on lead the AL East.

(16:56):
So that goes to show it's still very early in
this season. There's a lot that's gonna shake itself out.
We'll dive into kind of where baseball is. We'll dive
into the Reds themselves, not only with the sweep, but
kind of recap where the season is up to this point,
and we'll look ahead to the series against the Seattle
Mariners that gets started tonight.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
Do we have Austin is it?

Speaker 3 (17:20):
I'm sorry? They start tomorrow night? Do we have Luis Castillo?
I believe it's on the mound tomorrow night.

Speaker 2 (17:24):
Yeah, Tomorrow, Tomorrow night's gonna be cool night.

Speaker 4 (17:27):
It is Jackie Robinson Day across Major League Baseball, and
it'll be Luis Castillo up against Nick Lodolo, two of
the best pitchers in baseball at the moment. The Mariners
very much on a run similar to the Reds one
four in a row. They are eight and eight. They
just swept the Texas Rangers, their division rival, and as
we know, the Reds of one four in a row
or the Reds of one three in a row are

(17:48):
back to eight and eight and just swept their division rival,
drank Pirates.

Speaker 2 (17:51):
So this should be a good series.

Speaker 4 (17:53):
I mean, there are two teams that offensively are not great,
but pitching wise are good see is a top ten team.
I think they're ninth in Major League Baseball and pitching
right now, the Reds are third, and then they're slightly
better offensively than Cincinnati.

Speaker 3 (18:09):
It should be a good series. We'll dive into all
things Reds. I want to talk a little out of
the latest of the portal for UC and Xavier at
some point today, real quick, before we take our first break,
phone lines will be open five one, three, seven, four, nine,
fifteen thirty. How about Aaron Judge. You see this news
that just came down about thirty minutes ago.

Speaker 2 (18:24):
I did so.

Speaker 3 (18:25):
If you remember, the World Baseball Classic kind of has
taken off. It's been a lot of fun to watch.
The atmospheres, the environments have been crazy. Twenty twenty three,
USA lost to Japan in the championship. That is Shohey
against tramp for the final out. Yes, that team did
not have Aaron Judge. Aaron Judge has said and announced

(18:47):
today he will play for Team USA in twenty twenty six.

Speaker 2 (18:49):
How about that awesome news.

Speaker 3 (18:52):
If you can get the best of the best from
your game to represent Team USA in a World Baseball.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
Classic, that's pretty cool.

Speaker 4 (18:58):
The manager that team is Mark de rosa former Big
leaguer and now analyst on Major League Baseball Network, who
has repeatedly been singing the praises, as has the rest
of baseball about Hunter Green. I would wonder if Hunter
would pitch in the World Baseball Class. We're gonna talk

(19:18):
some Hunter curious about that. Also, shout out Austin. You
spent time there. I spent time there. You see baseball?

Speaker 2 (19:25):
Yeah, that was cool.

Speaker 3 (19:26):
Took on Arizona State, a very good baseball team. They
won two out of three, including a walk off suicide
squeeze in the tenth inning yesterday. Reds take two or
three from Arizona State. They're often our bearcats take two
or three. We got to figure out what the name
of this is. You see Xavier play tomorrow? Okay, we
gotta figure out what the name of that is. Crosstown dugout.
That might be the early leader in the clubhouse. Okay,

(19:48):
real quick poll question. Do they play that game at
you see? Okay, early poll question results?

Speaker 2 (19:53):
What do we got?

Speaker 6 (19:54):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (19:54):
Our poll question today Tom brought to you by Revivefitnessystems
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Speaker 2 (20:07):
Go check them out. Revivefitnessystems dot com.

Speaker 4 (20:09):
Thinking about the draft because today tone I began draft preps,
I really began down. I have forty five pages here,
I think, and if you know, Austin, I broke the
printer this morning. I have forty five pages here from
Dane Brugler's The Beast. Yeah, and this is your favorite position,
offensive guards. That's what I have printed out that I've
been looking over. I know Paul Dana wrote a piece

(20:31):
about it. I've begun draft prep. Well, that's the beautiful
thing about tomorrow. Reds have an off day to day,
which means, you know, we got to no recap of
the Reds tomorrow. That means we get to dive into
the draft tomorrow even more.

Speaker 2 (20:43):
That's true.

Speaker 4 (20:44):
So, which is the easier unit to quick unit fix
for the Bengals defense unit via the NFL Draft? Is
it the defensive line or the secondary? Two hours remain
ninety five votes so far, sixty seven percent say defensive
line is the easier unit to quick fix for the

(21:06):
Bengals defense. You can vote at Audio more at ESPN
fifteen thirty and at Tony Underscore Pike fifteen. And a
reminder tone that all of these stories we've been talking
about today the review of the weekend's top sports stories.
Those are brought to you by Cloudsroofing Systems of Cincinnati,
the trusted local roofing and gutter company visit KRS since

(21:27):
e with a y dot com.

Speaker 3 (21:28):
Some of those early voters must have not remembered recently
some struggles in drafting defensive linemen. We'll dive into those though.
This is since E three p.

Speaker 2 (21:37):
Sixty.

Speaker 3 (21:37):
Let's dive into the reds when we get back. We'll
take some phone calls along the way. Five one, three, seven,
four nine, fifteen thirty. Thanks to our friends at Skyline Chile.
Thank you for listening on ESPN fifteen thirty, Cincinnati Sports station.

Speaker 7 (21:48):
Now you're thirty from iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (21:53):
Fly Ball deep left field. He got a whole lot
of it.

Speaker 8 (21:57):
You can kiss that baby gut back Grand.

Speaker 9 (22:00):
Slam for Ellie Dayla Cruz on the Elli.

Speaker 10 (22:03):
Bobblehead night four to nothing around. Well, we were wondering
if he was gonna come back down the chute, and
he did, and Ellie did.

Speaker 8 (22:24):
Career Grand Slam for Ellie and that was one of
those high majestic flats.

Speaker 10 (22:29):
It just kept going, kept going, and then eventually Tommy
fam ran out.

Speaker 3 (22:33):
Of room, Tommy Tham running out of room. How about
the cowboy on the call came down the middle again.
I thought it was a flyout off the back.

Speaker 4 (22:42):
I did too. I was at the ballpark. I was
in that left field corner and off the bat, I'm like, gosh,
you just missed it.

Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yep. And then it just kept going. It kept going.

Speaker 4 (22:53):
You think bobblehead magics like, wow, Yeah, I mean I
saw it was a one hundred and seven mile per
hour exit velocity. Yeah, on a forty degree launch angle
on a ball that was above the strike zone.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (23:07):
Like from a physics standpoint, does it make sense that
doesn't compute? Yeah, incredible bat speed and putting a bet
on the ball for really Daily Cruz shout out to
the torpedo batman.

Speaker 3 (23:17):
Let's talk about how they did it. They got back
to five hundred, They're tied for second in the Central.
They started Friday night. How about this back to back
nights Friday and Saturday, the Reds put five runs on
the board and only four hits going into Sunday. Ten runs,
eight hits in the series. Now, the Reds also during

(23:40):
the series walked twelve times. That helped they struck out
just twenty one times.

Speaker 4 (23:46):
We'll talk about they got you hit a bunch too,
which is typical against Pittsburgh.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
Yeah, it reminded me that things could be bad, but
they're never as worse as what Pittsburgh is. Pittsburgh did
some things that would infuriate a lot of Reds fans,
or that maybe Red fans have been mad about in
the past. But let's start with Friday. Spencer Steer in
the first grounded into a double play. So the run

(24:12):
came in because they gave up the run because they
got the double play. But guy, we're gonna spend some
time talking about Jamer Jamer to run home run in
the bottom of the first as well.

Speaker 2 (24:22):
I can't even say it with a straight face. It's hard.

Speaker 4 (24:25):
I can't even enjoy saying his fun name to say
it's hard.

Speaker 3 (24:28):
Ellie Da La Cruz scored in the third inning on
a throwing air from the catcher. Ellie had a stolen
base in the game. Freedo had a stolen base.

Speaker 6 (24:38):
TJ.

Speaker 3 (24:39):
Friedel also got picked off a first base, which we're
not really going to dive into.

Speaker 2 (24:44):
But it wasn't so much the bats.

Speaker 3 (24:47):
On Friday Night, it was Friedel, Jamer Espinall and Travino
the only hits for the Cincinnati Reds in the game.
Brady's Singer solid, five innings, three runs.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
You take that.

Speaker 3 (24:57):
Every outing Brady Singer was solid. Rogers Ashcraft Pagan brilliant, Yeah, brilliant.
Over the final four.

Speaker 4 (25:06):
A guy who had a really good weekend was Graham Ashcraft,
a couple of two inning appearances over his last few
just seems to really really enjoy that role out of
the bullpen, and he's got a little bit of length
that he can give you. I mean, through this point
he's got three holes on the season, or four holds
on the season, whatever it is. He hasn't given up
a run yet.

Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yep, it was almost an exact box score on Saturday Night,
five runs, four hits. Pittsburgh committed another heir, but it
was the Ellie de la Cruz grand Slam in the
third inning that gave the Reds a four nothing lead.
Jose Travigno with a fielders choice in the seventh made

(25:47):
it five to two, but again only four hits on
the night. Friedel Ellie Marte. How about no alday Marte
with a couple of starts.

Speaker 4 (25:55):
Yeah, you know, I said to my friends at the game,
you know, I'm gonna have to say some nice things
about Noel Marte on Monday because he played a really,
really good game on Saturday.

Speaker 2 (26:04):
He was good in the field.

Speaker 4 (26:06):
I thought he worked counts pretty well, was able to
get a base hit, had a steel yesterday, a stole
a base yesterday. Yeah, I thought that was an impressive
weekend from Noel Vie Marte.

Speaker 3 (26:14):
Speaking of impressive, how about the outing from Andrew Abbott
first out into the year. Five innings, one run, five strikeouts. Again,
small sample size, but Andrew Abbott in his first start
was awesome.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
Yeah, and Jabou was good.

Speaker 4 (26:29):
It felt like for Abbot that like after he got
to like sixty five seventy pitches, Yeah, he started to
lose a little bit of that control. Ye, So that'll
be something to monitor as we move forward. Again, he's
still just still kind of ramping up to an extent,
but the way he was able to change speeds and
we've said it a lot about Abbot. He's not a
flame thrower, but he knows how to pitch. And you know,

(26:52):
I think when you have guys like Abbot and Green
in a rotation and when they're pitching back to back,
that can be really hard on a team.

Speaker 2 (27:03):
Especially the same series.

Speaker 4 (27:04):
Yeah, number one, when it's left handed, right hander, that's
one thing, and then when it's seventy five to eighty
to ninety five to one hundred, that's an entirely different
thing you're seeing on a night to night basis.

Speaker 3 (27:16):
What about if you get a series where you get Abbott, Green, Lodolo,
Oh my god, good luck.

Speaker 4 (27:20):
Yeah, that's why teams want to face Nick Martinez so bad.

Speaker 8 (27:23):
Yeah, it's more of a normal.

Speaker 3 (27:25):
But that win propelled them into the series win and
then gave them the opportunity for what they took advantage
of yesterday, and that is a series sweep, and they
did so Austin behind the arm again of Hunter Green.
The Reds struck first in the third with an espinall
single Freedom on a fielder's choice, and Elie de la

(27:46):
Cruz had himself an RBI single as well. They only
needed one of the runs because Hunter Green was on
the mound seven innings, two hits, just one walk. He
struck out eight pirates. Ian Jabou and Tony Santion come
completed the nine innings shutout. If you go back to
July or July first of last year, Austin hunter Green

(28:07):
has pitched eighty innings and two thirds, thirty five hits,
twenty walks, eighty three strikeouts, four home runs, nine earned runs.
Since July first of last year, he has a one
point zero one ERA. His ERA on this season point
nine to eight. That's zero point nine to eight. I
don't think there are enough accolades. I don't think there

(28:28):
are enough things we can say about how good hunter
Green has been. When the fastball is hitting one hundred
at the knees on the outside corner, good luck to anybody.
But his rhythm, his confidence looks so different than maybe
what we've seen early parts of last year and he
was struggling. He looks so much like a confident pitcher
that knows his stuff is good enough to do this

(28:48):
every single outing that he takes the ball.

Speaker 4 (28:50):
And I think it's because he knows he's not just
a fastball pitcher anymore. I mean, you can make the
argument that there's no better pitch in baseball right now
than Hunter Green's slider.

Speaker 2 (29:00):
Listen to this.

Speaker 4 (29:01):
He's thrown it one hundred and twelve times this season.
Batters are oz for twenty nine against it. Only major
league pitcher in twenty twenty five to throw a pitch
one hundred plus times with no hits allowed. He has
struck out thirteen batters on the slider and has a
fifty four point one percent fifth percentage on that slider.

(29:24):
So when you're in the same arm angle and you're
throwing ninety nine and then you can drop it down
to eighty five, ninety ninety one with movement, that is
so hard for any pit any batter in Major League baseball.
And then you mix in a little bit of a
splitter and you know, changing location. I think Jose Travino
has been a big part of that as well. For
over one Hunter Green. And even though it was Austin

(29:45):
wins yesterday, I mean still yeah. I mean, I think
you can make the argument right now that there's no
more dominant player in Major League baseball. It's not Aaron Judge,
it's not Shoheo Tani at least right now, it's nobody else, but.

Speaker 2 (30:01):
Yeah, he is.

Speaker 3 (30:01):
He's been absolutely lights out. If you put together the
series sweep, listen to this from a pitching standpoint. Austin
twenty seven innings on the mound, they gave up five
runs on ten hits, struck out twenty six, and walked eight.

Speaker 2 (30:13):
That's pretty solid.

Speaker 3 (30:15):
Hit and wise, fourteen runs on fourteen hits, struck out
twenty one times, but did walk twelve.

Speaker 2 (30:19):
I wish they could play the Pirates every night, Yeah,
I really do.

Speaker 4 (30:22):
I mean, that's a good way to dip the toe
into the water if you're uh Andrew Abbott and get started.
And I mean you got to feel like if you're Pittsburgh,
you're absolutely helpless when you know you you lose the
first too. And here comes Hunter Green on Sunday, and
I'm looking forward to to playing them ten more times
this year.

Speaker 3 (30:39):
He's the he's the type of pitcher legitimately, every time
he touches the ball, you feel like you're gonna.

Speaker 2 (30:43):
Win mm hm.

Speaker 3 (30:45):
And that's another reason to build around a pitcher like
that if you're an organization. Yeah, to build a contending team.
We'll recap where the season stands right now. We'll look
ahead to what's next this week for the Cincinnati Reds.
We'll take some phone calls and we get back five one, three, seven,
four nine, fifteen thirty, eight sixty thanks to Skyline Chile
on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station. Hey, welcome back,

(31:12):
since he three to sixty ESPN fifteen thirty, Cincinnati's Sports station.
We will recap where the Reds are from a season standpoint.
Still here. Coming up shortly, we'll look ahead to what's
next this week for the Cincinnati Reds. Starting tomorrow, they're
going to be home for three more against Seattle, and
then over the weekend they will head to Baltimore, Miami,

(31:35):
and Colorado before returning home on the twenty eighth of
April against the Saint Louis Cardinals. We should at some
point this week Austin find out maybe with Austin Hayes,
will he make his return against Baltimore? What that looks like.
We'll talk about more injuries later on in the show
as we get there, but it is it's Nicolodolo Versusluis
Castillo tomorrow night at Great American Ballpark. From a standing's

(31:58):
standpoint in the NL Central Pirates now five and eleven
in last Saint Louis at seven and eight, and then
it's the Cincinnati Reds tied with the Milwaukee Brewers at
eight and eight. They are two back of the Chicago Cubs. Again,
the Cubs plus forty three from a run differential standpoint.

(32:19):
They just beat the Dodgers sixteen to nothing on Saturday
and four to two last night. They win it both ways.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
They have.

Speaker 3 (32:28):
Listen to some of these games. Austin, they opened up
with a ten to six win over Arizona. They scored
eighteen in a win against Oakland or else wherever the
Athletics are Sacramento. They scored ten in a win against
the Athletics. They scored ten in a win against the Rangers,
and they scored sixteen in a win against the Dodgers.
They already have five times this year, six times this

(32:50):
year where they've scored ten or more runs plus forty
three run differential. Pete Crow Armstrong homer twice last night
to UH to finish the series win against the Dodgers
in La an impressive stretch there for the Chicago Cubs.

Speaker 6 (33:07):
UH.

Speaker 3 (33:07):
They now get ready to embark on a trip to
San Diego. Does not get easier right now for the
Chicago Cubs. We got a couple of minutes here and
then we'll get a break in. Mike is calling in.

Speaker 5 (33:18):
What's up, Mike, Hey, hope you had a good weekend.

Speaker 2 (33:23):
Thank you, Mike Austin.

Speaker 9 (33:25):
I was a ballun fun.

Speaker 2 (33:27):
Yeah, it was a blast man. Thank you for asking.

Speaker 5 (33:30):
Yeah, I wish I could have been there. I'd get
anything to do with bagain. So I don't about Baltimore
and they're in a tank. What that team is horrible
this year?

Speaker 3 (33:40):
Yeah, I'm surprised because I expected big things out of Baltimore.
They're six and nine, they're in the last in the
Al East. But I still think there's a lot of
teams that have yet to kind of find their level.
I think Baltimore is one of them, but I'm not
positive right now with the early struggles.

Speaker 5 (33:56):
Or you might be catching them at the wrong time.
Red Lake, so that's a good thing. Yeah. And Tommy Edmunds,
he's the MVP for the Dodgers right now. They stole
him from the Cardinals. That little rasc well, he can
play every position well and he can hit home right,
Their little little son of.

Speaker 9 (34:11):
A gun at sometimes all.

Speaker 5 (34:12):
Yes, I didn't know he was that good at Saint Louis,
but boy, he's sure showing out. And Roder said him,
that's for sure about the tournament yesterday, the golf tournament.
I'll tell you when they would play those clips of
then Scully when he used to do the the golf
tournaments in the seventies and eighties, Man, what an eloquent

(34:33):
voice he had. I think I think he was way
better than Jimmy Nansked, but I mean not the jim
nantz isn't good. But Ben was one of the kid
calling them golf games. It was unusual to have an
exciting regular season final game yesterday between those Clippers and Warriors.
That was a hell of the game.

Speaker 3 (34:52):
I know that that was the hard part because it
goes into overtime, and I was flipping back and forth
between the game and the Masters, and then it goes
into overtime, and I'm like, this is There's too much
going on in the Masters to waste on a regular season.
But I was happy because it finally felt like the NBA,
when the playoffs come around, gets back to so much
more meaningful baseball or basketball.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
Yeah, yeah, you're absolutely right. So and then with the Reds.
I'll tell you the Cubs now at this point, they
are certainly the team to beat because they're sixth and
hitting and team team batting in the whole MLB, and
they're pitching and I think is sixteen thread around there

(35:34):
somewhere there. What's killing me about the Reds is they're
at the Mendoza line hitting as a team, and the
and the Pirates are hitting one eighty four. I mean,
it's and you know, it's just really shocking. The Cardinals
are second in in UH in offense and team team batting,
team batting stats.

Speaker 2 (35:55):
Yeah, never would have seen that.

Speaker 5 (35:58):
Now the Central is shaping up to be very interesting.
Do you think it's really going to be the Reds
and the Cubbies.

Speaker 3 (36:05):
I still don't shut the door on the Milwaukee Brewers.
And the only reason that I think the Cubs have
a little bit of hesitation in losing Justin Steele outside
of Shota in Monaga. Right now it's Matthew Boyd, Jameson
tallon Ben Brown and kind of piecing it together. So
I know the Reds have an edge and starting pitching,
but that that Cubs offense mentioned Pete Crow Armstrong coming along,

(36:28):
they got Kyle Tucker. That's a very good offense for
the Chicago Cubs. They have the highest run differential in baseball.
But I do think the Reds starting pitching gives them
a fighter's chance based on what they've shown through sixteen games.

Speaker 5 (36:42):
Yeah, against anybody, against anybody, I don't even care what
team it is. That's so that's our glimmer of hope.
And it's actually more than a glimmer of hope. I
mean that should God forbid any injuries because that there
is a small margin, as Mow would.

Speaker 3 (36:57):
Yeah, and I do think when you when you look
at Reds, you can say, okay, if Austin Hayes comes
back to form, Matthew McClain comes back, and Tyler Stevenson,
that's obviously three better options than they're throwing into the
lineup on a daily basis right now. So they have
impactful pieces that aren't playing right now, and those are
three bats they can certainly use.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
In the lineup.

Speaker 5 (37:18):
Yeah, there's no question.

Speaker 8 (37:20):
That's all I got.

Speaker 5 (37:21):
Guys, just wanted to check Inlet thanks a lot.

Speaker 2 (37:23):
Have a God with Mike. Thank you.

Speaker 3 (37:26):
Yeah, I think the from a Cubs standpoint, I don't know.
Before the injury Austin it was. I know imanaga Is
is the guy, but Justin Steel was going to be
relied on to be a big piece of that puzzle,
and he was their number two starter, I believe.

Speaker 4 (37:42):
Yeah, I think that's you know, when you look at
the rest of the division, that's where the Reds have
the advantage. Obviously, is pitching. Pittsburgh they're okay and Schemes
is going to give you a chance no matter what.
The Cubs are a little bit banged up and inconsistent.
The Cardinals have maybe the worst pitching staff of the bunch,
be completely honest. I mean they're awful, especially their bullpen.

(38:03):
I mean the only light that they have is Sonny Gray,
no pun intended. And Milwaukee is well documented seven starters
I think on the injured list right now. So you know,
for that reason, I do think it can be the
Reds and the Cubs capital the top. But the Reds
just have to be more consistent offensively, and it does,
you know, give you a little bit of hope when

(38:24):
you think about the rest of the division, in the
division games that they have to play, because Pittsburgh's not
super strong offensively, Milwaukee not super strong offensively, but you know,
Saint Louis and Chicago are I mean, period, point blank.
Those two teams can hit. So if your strength is
their strength, it's gonna make for some interesting matchups. And

(38:46):
I feel like you always give the advantage to pitching.

Speaker 3 (38:48):
Yeah, and I do, I do think I know the
offenses is sputtering. There are three pieces that aren't with
the lineup right now that are going to help a
lot of lineups, and ideally sooner rather than later, the
Redge can get to that. Let's kind of let's let's
take a broad look at where things are apt when
we get back through this point of the season, what's next,

(39:10):
and kind of paint that picture for the Cincinnati Reds
going forward. This is sincey three sixty ESPN fifteen thirty,
Cincinnati Sports Station, a service of Skyline.

Speaker 11 (39:17):
Chilikwise, what's going on in baseball?

Speaker 7 (39:20):
Getting ESPN fifteen thirty from iHeartRadio.

Speaker 3 (39:35):
Welcome back, since he three sixty ESPN fifteen thirty, Cincinnati
Sports Station. Thanks to Skyline Chili, thanks for listening along.
We have we've kind of outlined the sweep of the
Pittsburgh Pirates for the Cincinnati Reds and I'm happy that
in early April we're talking about get back to five hundred,
and let's see what happens, because if this is late May,

(39:56):
early June, July, then this is a moot point. But
the Reds have battled back from early disaster. Let's just
call it what it is. This team did something that
hadn't been done in baseball since what nineteen sixty when
they lost three straight games, won nothing. It hasn't been
an ideal start by any means. They lose the first

(40:19):
two series of the year, they lost four in a
row going from the Rangers to the Brewers series. They
lost three out of four on the road against division
rival Milwaukee, and yet they found a way to go
take two of three against the Giants, and you leave
that third out there because you feel like that game
was obviously right there for the taking. And then we're
talking about a whole different run for the Cincinnati Reds.

(40:41):
But after taking two out of three from the Giants,
they come home and they sweep the Pittsburgh Pirates. So
take a deep breath, reset, look where things are right
now for the Cincinnati Reds. Again, this is a team
that I had a game that could have been one
on opening Day that could have been a series win. Certainly,
look at the back to back losses against the Rangers.

(41:02):
If they could have scored two runs, they win either
one of those games the one nothing lost to the Brewers.
This team has been there a lot. They give up
a five to nothing lead and a six to one
lead against the Giants, two five run leads they give up.
And yet all of that negative, all of the struggles hitting,
all of the issues that this team has had from
an injury standpoint of not just players being out, but

(41:25):
impactful players who you're looking at at the top or
middle part of that batting order, and you say, okay,
eight and eight isn't the worst thing in the world.
The Cubs have not run away with it. Eleven and seven.
They have not run away with anything. We've seen other
teams in baseball that have had slow starts, and look,
can can the red staff continue this all year? They're

(41:46):
going to dip at some point? Right they have the
third best team ERA in all of baseball. If you
look at the starter ra it's at the top, but
team ERA of two point eight seven, just behind the
Padres and the Mets. The pitching staff is great, and
while I don't think they could keep that level, they're
not going to drop off far from that. We've seen
enough from these starters to know that I know in

(42:09):
Singer Lodolo Green, they've got something genuinely special that they
can go into any series and compete. From a pitching standpoint.
The offense has been bad. We will we can talk
about Jamer Candelara, we can talk about some of the
other hitters in this lineup. The offense has been awful.

(42:29):
Look at some of the numbers up and down this roster.
Ellie is only hitting two thirty eight, Jamber one thirty two,
Gavin Lux two sixteen, Cees one sixty three, Spencer Steer
one oh nine, Jake Fraley won seventy one, Blake Done
one sixty seven.

Speaker 2 (42:46):
Like, they are not a good.

Speaker 3 (42:48):
Hitting team, but they weathered a bad start to the
season and they didn't let it unravel. They've got themselves
back to eight and eight with a winnable series coming up.

Speaker 4 (42:59):
And the other thing too, there is, you know, beyond
just batting average. You look at their on base percentage,
it's under three hundred. That has to get better, period
point blank. And you mentioned earlier the amount of walks
that they had in that series against Pittsburgh, that's not
something they did over the first couple series of the season.
So if they're able to turn that into a strength,
being a little bit more patient at the plate, finding

(43:19):
their way on base through walks and stuff like that,
that's gonna bode well for them. But if you remember
before the season, we outlined this stretch of games for
this team and primarily getting into the month of May
before they play Saint Louis and before they go to Atlanta,
you know, and that last call, Mike talked about how
bad Baltimore has been. Well, Baltimore is on the schedule
at the end of this week. Seattle is a team

(43:42):
that I think is very similarly built to the Reds.
Baltimore is a team that I think is very similarly
built to the Reds. And I think the Reds have
the advantage when it comes to pitching if they're able
to get healthy. And you go on this little stretch
here with Seattle in Baltimore and Miami and Colorado all
of a sudden, well.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
And it's also Lewis and Washington after that.

Speaker 4 (44:02):
Correct, So as we said before the season, where are
you at through the first thirty two games, through the
first thirty one games, we're at sixteen games in right
now and they're at five hundred. Now's the opportunity for
them to move up and down a little bit. And
you mentioned the Cubs. The Cubs have I think the
hardest start to a season by any team in baseball.
I think this is the hardest month that they have

(44:24):
all season. So you've got to be able to keep
pace with them, or at least get above them or
close to them, or whatever it might be, because they
have to play those bad teams too eventually, and the
Cubs are going to run through those teams.

Speaker 3 (44:38):
Well, you mentioned listen to this after they did take
two or three from LA three against San Diego, three
against Arizona, two more against the Dodgers, and then the Phillies.
That's a tough, tough four series stretch. Yeah, and then
they get Pittsburgh and then Milwaukee, but it's still San
Francisco and the Mets after that.

Speaker 2 (44:56):
Like this is a time.

Speaker 3 (44:58):
There's a lot of times during the season and that
you say, Okay, this is a time to push, And
there are other times, very honestly in the season where
you say just survive, and the Reds are in a
push right now. This is a time you've got a
makeup ground. This is the time you got to separate.
This is the time you got to start feeling good
about who you are as a team and take advantage
of this schedule coming up. That's what the Reds have

(45:19):
to do. We outline what it is for the Chicago Cubs.
I'm not closing the book on Milwaukee. I don't think
when all is said and done, Saint Louis and Pittsburgh
are contenders in this division. But if you are wondering
from a Milwaukee Brewer standpoint, who did take three or
four from the Reds. They they have Detroit, the Athletics,

(45:41):
the Giants, the Cardinals, and the White Sox coming up.
So not as winnable or not as bad of a
schedule obviously as what the Chicago Cubs have. So this
is a time to move, this is a time to
push for the Cincinnati Reds. We'll take a little bit
deeper look into what's next. Austin mentioned this Seattle team
coming in with some similarity to the Cincinnati Reds.

Speaker 2 (46:01):
We'll kick off hour two.

Speaker 3 (46:02):
We'll talk a little bit more about that we'll transition
an hour three to the Cincinnati Bengals, and oh yes,
we'll kick WrestleMania Week off with Rick Uchino in our
three as well, along with your talkbacks in the second
hour and your phone calls five one, three, seven, four nine.

Speaker 2 (46:15):
Fifteen thirty.

Speaker 3 (46:16):
Hour two is next thanks to Skyline Chili right here
on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports.

Speaker 9 (46:20):
Station WCKY, Cincinnati.

Speaker 11 (46:22):
Make us the number one pre set on your car
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Speaker 1 (46:39):
Cinci Shirts All Cincy, all Day. This is ESPN fifteen
thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 3 (46:49):
Welcome back, Welcome to Hour two of Cincy three to sixty.
Thank you for listening on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station,
and thank you to our friends at Cinci Shirts. Uh
real quick before we doviin a little bit more on
the Cincinnati Reds here Austin a sad note from a
Red standpoint over the weekend. Tommy Helms, the nineteen sixty

(47:10):
six National League Rookie of the Year with the Cincinnati Reds,
passed away over the weekend at the age of eighty three.
The Hall of Fame and Museum said that Helm's wife,
Cathy told the organization her husband died Sunday in Cincinnati.
Rookie of the Year in sixty six. Had two short

(47:30):
stints as the team manager as well with the Cincinnati
Reds I believe nineteen eighty three he was a manager
under Russ Nixon, and then he manned his twenty seven
games in nineteen eighty eight while Pete Rose was serving
a thirty day suspension for I believe for making contact
with an ump. So shout out to Tommy Helms's unbelievable career.

Speaker 2 (47:55):
He's in the.

Speaker 3 (47:58):
He's listed as one of the all Reds greats, and
the stats certainly back it up. He was inducted into
the Reds Hall of Fame in nineteen seventy nine. From
a Reds Mariner standpoint, Austin the tie in obviously with
Louis Castill is there. You get to see a little
bit of Louis Castillo, and I know you alluded to
it an Hour one as well. There are some similarities
between these two teams right now, and I believe I

(48:21):
would have to go back early into the season and look,
but this was viewed as a Seattle team that should
and can compete in the West, right I mean, they
view themselves as competitors in the AL West and a
little bit of a slower start they were four and
eight before going on to win their previous four. But
a lot of similarities between these two clubs.

Speaker 4 (48:40):
Yeah, I mean when you look at them in the
lens of the American League West, I think that's a
division that's kind of wide open right now. Houston is
down a little bit this year. The A's are down
inevitably and will be down for quite some time and
have been down for a long time. Texas has a
lot of potential, but can they put it all together?
Relying on a lot of young Players' Angels Angels who

(49:01):
I remember watching during spring training because they're one of
the teams that are always on and I remember thinking, man,
you know, they got some good players on this team.
They've got a decent manager in Ron Washington, They've got
a good mix of veterans and young players. Maybe the
Angels are going to be better than we think. Well,
they're right now in first place in the American League
West at nine and six, and the Mariners are eight

(49:23):
and eight in fresh off the sweep of the Texas Rangers.
And that's some of the similarities with the Reds right now.
The Mariners run differential is minus four, the Reds is
plus eleven. Both teams are eight and eight. Both teams
just swept division rivals. In terms of pitching, the Reds
are third in Major League Baseball in team ERA with
an ERA of two point eight seven. The Mariners are

(49:45):
ninth with an ERA of three point five four. And
when it comes to on base plus slugging OPS, the
Reds are twenty eighth in Major League Baseball.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
That's not good.

Speaker 4 (49:58):
The Mariners are twenty first, So I would expect some
pitchers duels to say the least, over the next few
days between the Reds and the Mariners.

Speaker 3 (50:06):
When you look at the landscape, by the way, after
Luis Castillo, it's Bryce Miller who has a four or
five oh ERA right now for the Seattle Mariners, and
Brian wu who is two and zero with a two
eight four ERA.

Speaker 2 (50:19):
Those nasty watch both really really good.

Speaker 3 (50:23):
So if you look now at what's coming up, and
we mentioned the Reds getting back to five hundred, and
that's kind of where this conversation starts. You mentioned those
series against Seattle, Baltimore, Miami, Colorado, and Saint Louis. On paper,
as the teams are right now, the Reds are good
enough to win every one of those series. How much

(50:44):
ground do they have to make up or how much
separation do they need to gain? In your opinion, Austin
over these next five series? Is it if you if
you win four of the five series, do you think
that's enough based on the start you had and the
competition you're going to be playing, Because, let's face it,
if we're here.

Speaker 2 (51:00):
No, it's too early to say that.

Speaker 3 (51:01):
But let's say let's say we're here on Friday. If
we're talking about a series loss to Seattle at home,
that's disappointing.

Speaker 2 (51:07):
Yeah, of course, every time you lose a series.

Speaker 3 (51:10):
If we're talking about a series loss at Miami disappointing,
a series loss at Colorado is disappointing. If you lose
the series at home against St. Louis, those are all disappointed.
I think if you go to Baltimore and you lose
two S three and you can see, Okay, this is
why Baltimore was projected to do some big things. I
think you could make a case for that. I think though,
with the other four series, you're gonna be kicking yourself

(51:30):
if you don't walk away with series wins. And I
know that's a high goal and lofty expectations to set,
but with the pitching we've seen through the first sixteen
for the Cincinnati Reds, the expectation and the bar should
raise when you go down a stretch of games that
the Reds are about to go down, because again, if

(51:51):
this is Baltimore in a month, it might be a
lot different than Baltimore right now. Baltimore's going through some struggles.
And in that Baltimore series, you're gonna get Hunter Green
and Nickelodolo. So in the toughest series of the five,
in my opinion, you have two of your best pitchers throwing.

Speaker 6 (52:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (52:06):
I mean, the way I look at it is, you know,
just because they've won three games against Pittsburgh, my mind
doesn't really change about the Reds, Like I still don't
look at them as a team that's good enough to
make a run at the playoffs. To me, this stretch, yes,
you obviously want to win those games, and I think
the expectation against teams like Miami and Colorado is that

(52:27):
you will win those games or win those series. We've
talked about it previously that this team has to be
better at home, like they have to be better at home.
They've been terrible at home the last couple of years,
So that to me is something to keep an eye
out on with Seattle. But I think that's a you know,
this can be a really tough series. I think Seattle's
gonna be the toughest series of the next four really

(52:48):
or what? Yeah, I do, just because of the way
that they pitch, and they have some power in their lineup,
and they're just all together, a well put together team,
I think. So I think their style of play fits
the ballpark in since I think that's just difficult. But
to me, it's more about these moves are about to
be made. Matt McClain is expected to be back tomorrow,

(53:12):
Austin Hayes will be back eventually, and I would assume
at some point during this series. Alexis Diaz was in
the clubhouse yesterday. What does this team look like? Tyler Stevenson,
by the way, is taking serious steps forward, and I
expect him to be back, maybe not during this stretch
but in early May. But either way, so this next

(53:32):
two weeks three weeks is about Okay, what do they
look like when they're at full strength?

Speaker 2 (53:37):
Sure?

Speaker 4 (53:37):
And is that gonna show me anything to change my mind?
Because right now, yes, they're better than those teams and
they should beat those teams, and you would think they
can do that on pitching alone, right, So that's one thing.
But to me, it's like, Okay, when they actually have
guys in the lineup, what do they look like? And

(53:59):
is there a point in which Terry Francona might be
willing to tinker? Is he gonna move Ellie daily Cruz up?

Speaker 2 (54:06):
Is you know? Is he gonna be willing to say?

Speaker 12 (54:09):
You know what?

Speaker 2 (54:10):
Jamer? Thanks? But no things? Right?

Speaker 4 (54:13):
Are they going to send Christian and Carnassi and Strand
down to Triple A? Which I feel like it's leaning
in that direction.

Speaker 2 (54:20):
He struggled a little bit lately. What's the plan with
noelvi Marte?

Speaker 4 (54:25):
How exactly does you know the Jake Frayley situation? Go
Spencer Steer when he's healthy? You're happy at eight and eight?
Based off the way they've started, in the intermace they've had.
But to me, it's like, okay, against teams that they're
supposed to beat and with a healthy lineup, Is there

(54:46):
anything here that's going to make me feel like this
team's better than I thought?

Speaker 2 (54:49):
Yeah, that's kind of what I'm living.

Speaker 3 (54:51):
It's the hard part about one hundred and sixty two
game because you go through these small stretches and a
lot of times we overreact to what's happening.

Speaker 2 (54:58):
But but I think that sixteen games as a overreaction.

Speaker 4 (55:00):
Yeah, but I think that's good though, to kind of
segment the season into a couple of weeks.

Speaker 2 (55:04):
Yes, all right, they're a different team.

Speaker 4 (55:06):
They're gonna be a different team when McLain and Stevenson
and Hayes are back, right, Like, that's that's what we've
been told, That's what everybody's been saying.

Speaker 3 (55:13):
Yeah, let me see what they look like with Hayes
and McClain in the lineup. I mean to me the
next segment, it's a race to May first. Yeah, it's
a race with winnable games to May first. And what
can you do to separate or are you looking back
on May first and saying, man, what a what a
golden opportunity they let slide over the last five.

Speaker 4 (55:30):
Series and if you really want to, you know, get
into it, because you you mentioned that series against Saint
Louis and Washington at the start of May, and then
they play in Atlanta for four And that's not a
team that's setting the world on fire either, Like, that's
a team who has been a disappointment. They're four and
eleven to start the season. Their run differential is minus sixteen.
They can't score either. So all of a sudden you

(55:52):
start looking. You say, all right, well they play Atlanta
and then they play a White Sox and they play
at Pittsburgh again, and then you got two of three series,
two out of the next three series at the end
of May against Chicago.

Speaker 6 (56:03):
Yeah, you.

Speaker 4 (56:05):
Better be firing on all cylinders by the time you
get to the end of May. So that's that's how
I'm trying to segment the season. All right, what are
the next two weeks look like? We get to May?
All right, what are the first two weeks of May
look like? And by that point you expect Stevenson back.
I don't know if that's healthy. I don't know if
that's a smart way to look at the season. But
that's kind of how I'm viewing it right now, because
there's different iterations of a team over the course of

(56:27):
one sixty two, and I think we saw a little
bit of what they could be over the last three,
but not every.

Speaker 3 (56:33):
Team is Pittsburgh. Let me ask one other question that
we brought up there. You mentioned Alexis Diz Right now,
Tony Santion has an era under one. Graham Ashcraft era
is at zero, Emelio Pagan one point two to three,
Brent Souter three to six to oh.

Speaker 2 (56:52):
Taylor Rogers two oh eight.

Speaker 3 (56:53):
Now, Sam Mall got roughed up a little bit, Scott
Barlowe has had a couple back to back tough outings,
and Jabou needs to be better. But when you look
at Alexis Diaz, how do you slot him in coming back?

Speaker 2 (57:06):
Now? Does he come back in right away as the
closer is he? I don't know that.

Speaker 3 (57:10):
I don't because I think what Francona's done to this
point is just kind of closer by committee, and one
day it might be Santition closing. The next day, Santion
might be used in the sixth. If you are Francona,
how are you managing Alexis DZ coming back?

Speaker 4 (57:24):
I think Amelio Pagan's a closer, and I think Tony Santien,
as Francona referred to him as the fireman. You know,
you need a guy come in first, guy out of
the bullpens. Starter gets into trouble and you might be
holding on to a two or three run lead. I'll
bring in Tony Santian to get us out of it
and then we'll find our way to the ninth. But
Amelio Pagan's going to be the guy of the ninth

(57:45):
and I don't see Alexis Diaz. And I give Francona credit.
He's repeatedly said even though Diaz is healthy, there's stuff
to work on and he's not good enough. He's just
openly said that, which I appreciate and I think most
people would agree who saw him pitch and spring draining
and for a good chunk of last year as well.

(58:05):
So to me, it's like, okay, last couple outings for
Scott Barlow not been great, right, just a little bit shaky.
You don't feel wonderful about it. Can he be Scott Barlow?
Can he be the guy who kind of comes in
to get you to Ashcraft, to get you to Santian,
to get you to Pegan. That's what I'm looking at.

(58:27):
I feel like he's got to earn his way back up.
And if he comes back and looks anything like what
he did a couple of years ago when he was
an All star, think of how dangerous the bullpen can be.
But I think he's got to earn his way back
to that because Pegan's been wonderful, Ashcraft has been filthy,
Santian has been really really solid. You feel good about

(58:48):
that right now, and you don't want to mess that up. Yeah,
I think they're in a really really good place right now.
From a pitching standpoint. We can talk more about the
Reds too as we go. Barlow has kind of been
like Francona's workhorse. He was that way in Cleveland two
or he pitched in a lot of games. He didn't
necessarily pitch for a lot of innings. So is there

(59:09):
kind of a back and forth between Santine and Diaz
as a fireman type of role and then hey, let
me go out into the next inning. Like Santine the
other night got four outs on eleven pitches, like that's ideal,
that's exactly what you want out of that role. And
then just overall, I know Lance posts a tweet about this.
The Reds are number one in Major League Baseball and
pitch efficiency, which is number of pitches per inning. I

(59:33):
think they're just under sixteen, maybe a hair under seventeen,
might even be below fifteen. That's sort of efficiency. Attacking
strike zones. That's what you have to have, and that's
what Diaz has struggled with. So to me, it's a
mindset for the entire pitching staff. As much as it's
just hey, Alexis, can you can you execute your pitches
and your stuff, it's like, hey, this is what we do,

(59:56):
and we attacked the strike zone. And I used to
make one of the Reds all year last year because
guy's come out of the boo bit and immediately walk
a dude. I've been counting. I think that's happened three
times this year. Bullpen's been awesome. It has been a
difference in handing the ball over now. The run support
is a conversation that we can have on another day,
But as for a Monday, pretty much as positive as

(01:00:18):
we can be going forward. The Cincinnati reds back to
fot out to Scott. Shout out to Scott, you changed
things last week.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):
Hopefully we hear from Scott on a talkback or a
phone call at some point five one three, fifteen thirty.

Speaker 8 (01:00:28):
Can we give out a quick shout out love giving
shout out.

Speaker 4 (01:00:30):
We had the pleasure this morning tone oh yes of
meeting our friend Dick in Dayton in studio. Dick was
in the studio, he was getting a tour of the
place from from Gary Jeff, his longtime pal. We got
to meet Dave and Dayton as well. And a happy
birthday to Dick who in his first birthday got the
tour of the iHeartMedia studio.

Speaker 2 (01:00:52):
Really cool. Shout out to Dick.

Speaker 3 (01:00:54):
Shout out to Dick from Dayton, thanks for always listening
and calling in your talkbacks. Are next a new week,
a clean slate. A CINTI Shirts gift card on the
line on Friday thanks to cintiy Shirts here and nour
number two of Cinty three to sixty on the Home
of the Bengals ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 11 (01:01:10):
Now your chance to win one thousand dollars enter this
nationwide keyward on our website.

Speaker 9 (01:01:15):
Win, that's win. Enter it now.

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
Tony Pike with my friends at tri State.

Speaker 1 (01:01:20):
Three sixty is back on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 12 (01:01:26):
All right though, let me hear you good loud oh
wld oh too ah fru. Well, listen to some towbacks. Well,
listen to the clouds. Get me a bud of Supprod Jones.

(01:01:52):
We hope those other two diver come back over.

Speaker 2 (01:01:56):
It's rout four totally.

Speaker 9 (01:02:02):
And come close to the show we got hag right.

Speaker 12 (01:02:09):
Hello, stars over talk back show.

Speaker 2 (01:02:16):
Rads well, rads Well, here we go, Red's wind.

Speaker 3 (01:02:20):
They won all weekend, a series sweep leads us into
our Monday edition of Talkbacks.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
Brought to you by Cynthy shirts.

Speaker 6 (01:02:27):
Man.

Speaker 8 (01:02:27):
It has us an awesome sports weekend.

Speaker 13 (01:02:29):
I got to see Rory get his green jacket and
complete the Grand Slam.

Speaker 10 (01:02:33):
Ellie hit his Grand Slam on BABA Heat Night.

Speaker 5 (01:02:35):
The NBA season wrapped itself up some really good games there.

Speaker 14 (01:02:38):
I got to see Dave Lapham and Zach Taylor at
some little league games.

Speaker 2 (01:02:41):
I was that which is still the random and very cool.

Speaker 8 (01:02:43):
The Derek car news had me intrigued that might force
the Saints to take a quarterback at number nine, which
is gonna leave some you know, another stud on the
board at seventeen for the Bengals to either pick or
maybe trade back.

Speaker 2 (01:02:54):
I mean they might trade back, guys. I don't know,
what do you guys think?

Speaker 4 (01:02:57):
Oh no, I think they're gonna trade back. That's my
gut feeling right now.

Speaker 2 (01:03:02):
Yeah, I think so.

Speaker 9 (01:03:04):
It's Craig.

Speaker 15 (01:03:05):
Great weekend for the Reds. The best part all three
wins were a great American. In the past twenty two
years a great American. The Reds have only finished five
hundred or above nine times. The point is, if they
can defend home field, maybe get twelve to fifteen over,
this could be a very good year.

Speaker 2 (01:03:28):
Okay, he's right. I like that. Greg.

Speaker 16 (01:03:31):
Hello, this is former President Ronald Reagan and wal there's
the hunter and then there's the hunted. Thankfully we have
the Hunter on our team. Oh and is Jake Freeley
trying to set the record for allowing the most balls
get past him and roll to the wall. And by
the way, my favorite part of the Frank Caliendo segment

(01:03:52):
on Friday was his gym Rome impersonation.

Speaker 2 (01:03:56):
Rack them.

Speaker 4 (01:03:59):
Yeah, uh, corner outfielder has not been great, although Gavin
Lux made a good play over the weekend.

Speaker 2 (01:04:06):
How sweep it is? Everybody half out the Red Legs.
They did pills.

Speaker 17 (01:04:11):
Hey guess what Pete Rose, Sarah, Michelle Geller myself.

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
All have in comments a.

Speaker 10 (01:04:18):
Happy birthday to us and Antony and also wanted to
give me a gift car from Sincy.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
Church for my birthday.

Speaker 9 (01:04:23):
I would be a post of that this week. Take
care of a body and go Red Legs.

Speaker 2 (01:04:27):
Right, Kevin, Happy birthday man, Tony Austin. Balling ain't easy,
all right.

Speaker 18 (01:04:33):
First off, one to wish Dick from dating a happy birthday, Dick.
We love when you call in. You're a great guy.
Hope you have a great day. Hunter Green is the
man the Reds can do this. Scott was right.

Speaker 4 (01:04:47):
Okay, okay, yeah, Balling ain't easy, loves Dick.

Speaker 18 (01:04:53):
No, Alvie, mart and Will Benson may be struggling right now,
but once we get an interleague play we visit the
Tampa Bay Rays in the Athletics get to play in
those minor league parks.

Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
We need to get those guys up.

Speaker 18 (01:05:04):
Signs Marte, Will Benson get and on.

Speaker 4 (01:05:08):
You know you mentioned earlier you called them the Oakland
A's or the Sacramento A's or whatever. I looked and
I kind of forgot about this. They don't have a
city designation. Like if you go look at the stats,
it literally just says athletics.

Speaker 2 (01:05:23):
It's just wild. What a place to be.

Speaker 19 (01:05:26):
Hey, guys, Jeff and you Richmond, Happy Monday to you.
It's a great weekend for sports. Congratulations to Rory for
winning the Masters.

Speaker 20 (01:05:36):
Now a Grand Slam champion. It's awesome. The Reds were
a Grand Slam this weekend.

Speaker 19 (01:05:44):
Nice to see that we might be playing meaningful baseball
past the middle of May. So way to go, guys,
have a great day, take care, Thank you, positivity.

Speaker 13 (01:06:00):
Master's finish of all time, right up there with Nicholas
in eighty six, Tiger and one and five. It's great
to see some drama on the back nine, and all
the more Rory winning the Grand Slam for his career.
Unbelievable Red get the sweet Hunter Green looks like a
real cy young contender. Back to five hundred baseball here
in mid April, let's go on a weekend, got love sports,

(01:06:20):
Let's go absolutely.

Speaker 4 (01:06:22):
I just saw some people in Major League Baseball Network
saying you know we need to be talking about Hunter
Green the same way we talk about Paul Skeens.

Speaker 2 (01:06:29):
Why not I agree with that.

Speaker 14 (01:06:31):
Tony, Austin Alex and Silverton. Tony, do you think Rory
winning the Masters this year gives people hope like Bolling
eight easy that you know, you could be a choke
artist and then finally win. It just was making me
think over the weekend. You know, does ballin eight easy
take that this or Master's up and give him a

(01:06:51):
little bit motivation saying I can't do this and also
have your birthday to dig in Dayton.

Speaker 3 (01:06:58):
You know, I was thinking about this a little bit
because you know, Rory was able to do it. But
a lot of the stars and golf have fallen off
a little bit. Justin Thomas has fallen off a little bit.
John Rahm and Dustin Johnson are not what they were,
and Tiger Woods is not playing right now. And not
to take anything away from Rory, but that the bad
news for Balling ain't easy. I'm not going anywhere for

(01:07:20):
Memorial Day. I'm still going to be there. I am.
I am to golf what Tiger is to I am
to the Memorial Day. Now, what Tiger is to Balling
ain't easy as rule now and I don't even know
if baling and easy would be rory No at this point.

Speaker 2 (01:07:36):
You well, let's just clarify that you're definitely not Tiger.

Speaker 3 (01:07:39):
The stars are not retiring, so that Balling ain't Easy
can can take his place on the throne. It's it's
not going to be easy for him if he even
decides to show up this show.

Speaker 4 (01:07:51):
I'm comfortable that Balin will find a way. And you
are nothing like Tiger.

Speaker 8 (01:07:57):
The West Coast out, Nelly, he is the baddest man
we've seen it.

Speaker 21 (01:08:04):
To go doing play, then you'll meet your face from
a man named on a green.

Speaker 10 (01:08:10):
He's a bad bad on a green.

Speaker 17 (01:08:13):
He's the baddest man in a whole down league, batter
than all King call.

Speaker 20 (01:08:20):
Mean of them a junk yard dog.

Speaker 2 (01:08:24):
I agree.

Speaker 4 (01:08:25):
How about that speaking about West, that's going to go
into the hopper, Great John Ryan speaking about West, reports
surfacing of a pretty big earthquake happening about fifteen minutes
ago out in California, So we'll be paying attention to that.

Speaker 22 (01:08:40):
Yeah, I already hers Tony's good friend Brothers and Hope
Fellers are doing good today and I'm telling you, uh
I saw already going today is saying that Keilly Schmidt
was the Bengals worst draft pick of all time.

Speaker 9 (01:08:54):
Well, I'll kind of differ with that.

Speaker 22 (01:08:56):
I think that David Verser nineteen eighty one first round
pick was one of the worst pick the Bangles could make,
ahead of Chris Collins worth that that year.

Speaker 3 (01:09:07):
It was I believe Sports Illustrated that named Achille Smith
over the weekend as the worst draft pick in franchise history.

Speaker 6 (01:09:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:09:14):
They got back to back wide receivers that year, right
with David Verser and uh and Chris Collins It's hard
to say anyone to me, It's hard to say anyone
other than Big Daddy Wilkinson. But I mean he did
play for a little bit longer, I guess. And you
could add Marshall Falk though. Okay, but I is it

(01:09:35):
that big of a deal if, like the other option
was Tim Couch.

Speaker 2 (01:09:44):
He wasn't that good either for the Browns.

Speaker 12 (01:09:46):
No.

Speaker 2 (01:09:47):
Yeah, so it's.

Speaker 4 (01:09:47):
Like, okay, well, yeah, you Achille Smith stunk, but so
did the other guy they would have taken, So that
I think kind of reduces the worst draft pick.

Speaker 8 (01:09:57):
I mean John Carter, Yeah, that I mean that was
an injury. John ross Is in the conversation.

Speaker 23 (01:10:05):
Absolutely, tp Audie d w Fellas that Masters yesterday incredible.

Speaker 8 (01:10:15):
It's one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen
in sports.

Speaker 2 (01:10:19):
Happy.

Speaker 13 (01:10:20):
I have a question for you guys today if you
won the Masters, what would be on your menu this
last week?

Speaker 2 (01:10:27):
Champion?

Speaker 4 (01:10:29):
Yeah, we did this last week. I posted mine on Twitter.
You can check it out at Audiomore. I went with
a ground bf or Zo. I'm a big Warzo guy.
I love Warzo, but you know, I've had some like
I've had some thoughts. I think I would change a
few things. I do kind of want the idea of
some Montgomery and Ribs. That sounds really good.

Speaker 2 (01:10:50):
Marcus Hunt was a bad pick too.

Speaker 4 (01:10:52):
I thought he was an undrafted free agent. He was drafted,
but does it I mean, does it count if he
was like a second round pick?

Speaker 6 (01:11:00):
Was he?

Speaker 2 (01:11:01):
I think?

Speaker 5 (01:11:01):
So?

Speaker 4 (01:11:02):
I was gonna say the first I'll retweet my menu,
by the way, you can go check it out at
Audio one.

Speaker 3 (01:11:06):
By the way, I'm going Hanky Panky's for my app
I'm going a skyline bar for the first course. Give
me a nice fle at, maybe a salmon choice and
then my mom's chocolate cake for dessert.

Speaker 4 (01:11:18):
On my dessert, I had homemade pumpkin pie, but I
think I would change it to Greater's black raspberry chip.

Speaker 2 (01:11:24):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (01:11:25):
I also, you know they talk about at the Master's
the peach ice cream.

Speaker 2 (01:11:30):
Have you ever had that?

Speaker 6 (01:11:31):
No?

Speaker 2 (01:11:31):
Do you like peaches? Yeah? I like peaches.

Speaker 4 (01:11:35):
There's a spot that I go to down by where
my mom lives in Georgia. It's like this little old market.
Everything in there like fresh, homegrown, and they give you homemade,
fresh peach ice cream and they serve it in like
a little styrofoam cup. It's like everything you could imagine
a mom and pop shop to be the best ice

(01:11:56):
cream I've ever had in my life.

Speaker 3 (01:11:57):
What's your favorite fruit? Because we're nearing the we're nearing
the start of watermelon season. Yeah, we get in a
peak watermelon. If you if you get a chilled watermelon,
that's pretty good in peak that it doesn't get any
better than not.

Speaker 2 (01:12:10):
I guess I would say oranges are my face. Okay.

Speaker 3 (01:12:12):
By the way, Marcus Hunt was a second round pick
in twenty thirteen.

Speaker 4 (01:12:15):
Okay, yeah, that's pretty bad. I thought he was like
a sixth round Marcus freaking Hunt.

Speaker 24 (01:12:21):
Hi, Tony and Austin. Yeah, the Masters. I love the Masters,
And you know I did a little bit of betting there.

Speaker 6 (01:12:27):
Oh.

Speaker 9 (01:12:28):
I am a.

Speaker 20 (01:12:29):
Payne Stewart fan.

Speaker 24 (01:12:30):
Nice rest in peace and then also Tiger and Dan
Rory and I hadn't bet on Rory because you know
it on it's evidence. But I'll tell you what I
cried when he won yesterday.

Speaker 9 (01:12:44):
Ride along with the man.

Speaker 24 (01:12:45):
You could feel that emotion the whole time.

Speaker 2 (01:12:49):
Have a good day, guys, we may I don't think
a little bit.

Speaker 3 (01:12:52):
I don't think I've ever seen portrayed more what it
means when the weight of the world is lifted off
of you. And you could literally see that with Rory.

Speaker 2 (01:13:00):
Yeah, I thought it was really cool too.

Speaker 4 (01:13:02):
His caddy gave him that moment yep, like just kind
of stayed out of the way and then like hugged
him and his caddy, I guess turned down like a
ton of interview requests, which I think is cool.

Speaker 2 (01:13:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 25 (01:13:18):
I tell you the Cubs are a good team. They're
hitting the ball like crazy for sure. Red starting pitching
is so good. I think the future fright for the Reds.
Just got to get some runs across. Really enjoyed the
Masters yesterday. So happy McElroy one. You talk about an
emotional victory, He had some serious emotions going on.

Speaker 2 (01:13:42):
Yeah, yep, very cool.

Speaker 17 (01:13:45):
Does anyone think the Reds would be eight and eight
if David Bell was still the manager?

Speaker 2 (01:13:49):
Oh? Think it'd be pretty similar.

Speaker 26 (01:13:51):
To Blue Lima. Wo how sweet it is and when
he makes believers of us all. My old man and
I went down to see Chase Burns and the Dragons
on Friday. It was cold as all hell, but he
was still pumping ninety seven ninety eight. It wouldn't shock
me in the slightest if he ends up on the
big league team by the end of the year. His

(01:14:14):
slider is disgusting. Those guys looked like me trying to
hit a slider in the show.

Speaker 3 (01:14:20):
He won't be in Dan. I'm hearing that very much longer. Yeah,
good on you for going and checking him out.

Speaker 2 (01:14:25):
That's cool.

Speaker 16 (01:14:26):
Double dipper, gipper start bench cut. Names for the UC
Xavior baseball series here the crossdown flyout, the crossdown ground out,
or the crossdown PopOut.

Speaker 2 (01:14:41):
I'll start.

Speaker 4 (01:14:43):
Flyout, Yeah, I'll bench ground out, I'll cut pop out.
I think so, but I think that leads me to
the name. Well, the Crosstown strikeout. Yeah, I like that
better than the crossdown dunk here.

Speaker 27 (01:14:59):
You know, it's mid April and the resurre at five hundred.
I think that's pretty good. Yeah, we're beating teams that
we should be beating. A shout out to Tommy Helms
who passed away this weekend Gold Glover. He was an
All scar and he also was like with the best
double play combination with David Concepcion and Jibbo. You know what,

(01:15:21):
except for that first game, he's pitching pretty well.

Speaker 2 (01:15:26):
Yeah, getting a little love today.

Speaker 4 (01:15:28):
Jabou deserves some credit for sure. By the way, just
announced by the Reds, the Reds today have placed on
the fifteen day injured list, retroactive to April eleventh, left
hander Sam Mole with left shoulder impingement that, of course,
could lead to the man we were just talking about,

(01:15:50):
Alexis Diaz rejoining the team.

Speaker 23 (01:15:53):
Hey guys, I'm just sitting here thinking, not a good
thing to do.

Speaker 28 (01:15:58):
Yeah, anyway, given our starting pitching and our pitching in general,
and how we're not giving any runs up, and how
our offense isn't really scoring a lot of runs, I
was just curious, what's the fewest runs scored by a
division champion? And let's just be optimistic and say a

(01:16:21):
World Series champion.

Speaker 2 (01:16:23):
I don't I don't have to look at that.

Speaker 4 (01:16:26):
We'll have to look into that, yeah, ADDI I forgot
to ask you know, next time you could look it
up and provide that intel with us or to us. Yeah,
and i'd be you could be a valuable talk about
That'd be a fantastic That's an idea, ADDI.

Speaker 27 (01:16:43):
I forgot to ask you, yes, on my first talk back,
you went to the game. Did you get an Ellie bobblehead?
And was he a switch hitting one?

Speaker 15 (01:16:55):
Uh?

Speaker 27 (01:16:55):
They were trying to explain that. I didn't quite get it,
but I hope you got one. I want one. Have
a great day, guys.

Speaker 4 (01:17:04):
Yeah, so I we thankfully the Reds send us some
of the giveaways beforehand, so I was able to get
a left handed one. And then me and my friends
went down. We went down early. I didn't think it
would be crazy around three o'clock. We got to the
ballpark at three o'clock and it was already almost lined
out to like the Holy Grail. Yeah, Like it was insane.

(01:17:27):
The line, so I was like, well, we should get
in line now, because you know, I want them to
all get Bibbleheads's part of the reason why we're here.
So we got in line, and wouldn't you know it,
all four of us got left handed bibbleheads. So we
started wheeling and dealing around the ballpark until we found
a couple to switch. So I was able, lucky enough
to get a left handed and a right handed one.

Speaker 3 (01:17:50):
I did look up the twenty twenty three Marlins. Austin
had a minus fifty seven run differential and we're a
second wild card team, so that the from a run
differential standpoint.

Speaker 4 (01:18:03):
The oath the three Marlins.

Speaker 3 (01:18:07):
They made the playoffs having the lowest run differential of
any team to make the playoffs.

Speaker 2 (01:18:10):
What about runs scored though, That's what he was asked.

Speaker 3 (01:18:13):
Yeah, I just figured with the run differential, that's as
close as I'm getting.

Speaker 2 (01:18:16):
Right now, Tony Austin.

Speaker 29 (01:18:19):
So as we get close to the draft here, I'm
putting together big board and it's interesting to me how
I feel like the Bengals whenever they go for someone
that has maybe character concerns or maybe an injury, that
always bites them in the butt. Whereas you have other
teams that, like, you know, have those concerns.

Speaker 9 (01:18:37):
But then the rock Stars.

Speaker 8 (01:18:38):
Why do I always feel like that's the Bengals.

Speaker 29 (01:18:40):
Is that just a small sample size or what?

Speaker 2 (01:18:43):
What do you guys think?

Speaker 12 (01:18:44):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:18:44):
Probably, I mean they brought in Vante's perfect, although I'll
be it a free agent, but they've they've drafted some
some of that in the past. I think they've made
the effort to try to steer away from that in
recent years.

Speaker 2 (01:18:56):
Yeah, I would say.

Speaker 4 (01:18:57):
I mean Joe Mixon worked out pretty well. It got
Harry towards the end, especially like with the character concerns.

Speaker 2 (01:19:03):
Thing injury wise. I don't know. I'm trying to think
of somebody that's like it was. I don't know, I'm
blanking on that. Give me some time, it don't hit me.

Speaker 30 (01:19:15):
Hey, guys, I've been listening a lot about the stadium
lease and what's going on up in Cleveland and everything,
and it appears to me that the two deals, the
Browns and the Bengals are daylight to dark different. The
Browns are going to pay the money back, it's more
of a loan, and in typical Bengal fashion, they're coming
along with their hands out, and my question is this

(01:19:37):
has the NFL outgrown the mom and pop ownerships like
the Brown family.

Speaker 4 (01:19:42):
First of all, let me just say this, it is
a joint proposal with Hamilton County, so the Hamilton County
is involved in this as well. This wasn't just and
the NFL has a stadium fund for ownership groups like
this to get funds. Tennessee is dealing with this. They
dipped into that fund to get new money to get
money for a new stadium. Buffalo. A good chunk of

(01:20:04):
the money that's spent on their new stadium came from
this fund that the NFL has. So no, I would say, no,
it's just that I think we're at a point across
the league where you see a lot of stadium leases
in building and stuff. Cities and counties and taxpayers don't
want to foot the bill for billionaires anymore. Correct, That's

(01:20:26):
what it comes down to, and it becomes a struggle
to get some of this through. It's part of the
reason why the NFL established this fund to provide some
relief for the ownership groups. And it's also not abnormal
for teams to get money from the state. How that
all works out and repaying it and so on.

Speaker 2 (01:20:48):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:20:49):
And it's a lot easier for a team like Cleveland
with an indoor facility to get some of that money
back and offset the price because of the sheer amount
of events that they're gonna be getting. They're also asking
for a lot less than Cleveland is. So they are
night and day. But I don't know that it's a
problem with the Brown family. I think it's the politics

(01:21:12):
of Hamilton County in and of itself, and just in
general taxpayer fatigue on helping out billionaires.

Speaker 12 (01:21:18):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:21:18):
I also think anytime you start trying to compare different
there are so many, like you said, intricate things that
go into it that you can't get caught comparing one
stadium thing to another.

Speaker 2 (01:21:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 31 (01:21:29):
Yeah, as always, what's good repping in Natty out here?
Sonny hot Zana, what up? Tony?

Speaker 16 (01:21:33):
What up?

Speaker 2 (01:21:33):
Body?

Speaker 31 (01:21:34):
Pitching power for my Rids? We got the best pitching
rotation in baseball? Who want this smoke? Because my boys
are throwing straight fire. Seven in is strong. Bring on
that Red Bird team. They stink.

Speaker 9 (01:21:46):
We sunk the Pirate ship.

Speaker 31 (01:21:47):
I ain't worried about the bum crew, and I'm definitely
not worried about that Cup team. We can put them
to sleep. It's just need my hitting to get together.
Bat and Ellie third is a joking. The lineup figure
something out. We need to back, need to change that.
We want the smoke here in Cincinnati, the street.

Speaker 20 (01:22:03):
Ice man, here on this beautiful ice, Monday on ice.

Speaker 22 (01:22:06):
The Reds are on a three.

Speaker 10 (01:22:07):
Game winning streak.

Speaker 2 (01:22:08):
We are ten days away from the draft.

Speaker 5 (01:22:10):
I cannot freaking wait.

Speaker 6 (01:22:14):
And it's my birthday.

Speaker 5 (01:22:15):
Oh wow, how the hell did that happen?

Speaker 2 (01:22:22):
Man?

Speaker 12 (01:22:22):
I have no idea.

Speaker 8 (01:22:24):
Birthday for life, all day, every day.

Speaker 2 (01:22:27):
Let's go rid, Let's go back huts. Wow, Happy birthday, Ice,
Happy birthday to Iceman. I have a feeling the positivity.

Speaker 4 (01:22:35):
I have a feeling he's going to celebrate with some
beverages while we're at it. I should say happy birthday
to my dad who his birthday was yesterday and uh
I was looking forward to seeing him and he's in Arizona,
so didn't didn't get to see him on his birthday.

Speaker 2 (01:22:50):
But happy birthday to my old man. I miss you.

Speaker 5 (01:22:55):
Georgia Valley.

Speaker 16 (01:22:57):
The best picture I've ever watched in a Red uniform.

Speaker 8 (01:22:59):
WHOA I don't know, if that's a stretch, but it
could be possible.

Speaker 2 (01:23:03):
Man.

Speaker 16 (01:23:03):
And what did you just say, Baron A Easy loves what?

Speaker 2 (01:23:07):
Yep?

Speaker 9 (01:23:07):
What did you say us?

Speaker 4 (01:23:08):
He said it he loves bonding, Easy loves Dick.

Speaker 21 (01:23:16):
That at that bart time Bike and my buck eyed
brother Addie. I thought this day wouldn't come. The Buckeyes
are here totally stocked on McDonald's. Get a hold of
this guy number four, Jeremiah Smith. They call him wow,
truly unbelievable. Will They're creating a fort dollar bill with
him on it. Also, this guy Cattail Jones, what a

(01:23:40):
brain on him. I'm actually naming him Secretary of Education.

Speaker 4 (01:23:48):
Into the hopper you go, Oh my gosh. The Buckeyes
are in d C today at the White House. That
is hilarious. Did you see the rings?

Speaker 2 (01:23:59):
I did? Oh my god, I did. That's ridiculous.

Speaker 32 (01:24:03):
It's god. Your players Batting first is stand point, Batting
second is batting third is wow, and batting fourth is slate.

Speaker 4 (01:24:22):
Batting fifth is Cincinnati because Tony always says Cincinnati reads
Cincinnati Reds.

Speaker 23 (01:24:29):
Hey, guys, I've heard you mentioned a couple of times
about Delie daily cruise leading off, and I was just
wondering if you know if anybody in the media has
asked him that question about it, and if so, what
his reply was.

Speaker 2 (01:24:46):
I think would be great.

Speaker 23 (01:24:47):
I meant, get your best player as many as back
you can get him.

Speaker 4 (01:24:52):
I believe Charlie wrote a story about this for the
Dayton Daily News. I haven't read it yet, so I
don't know what the answer was, but I believe that
Charlie did ask him about it.

Speaker 19 (01:25:04):
I'd be remiss if I didn't discuss our birthday guys today,
Dak and Dayton, Kevin, my guy in northern Kentucky.

Speaker 20 (01:25:12):
I hope you guys have great days, and.

Speaker 19 (01:25:15):
Tony's not about to discuss the new center that you
see got out of the transfer portal.

Speaker 20 (01:25:22):
Be curious to hear your thoughts.

Speaker 3 (01:25:23):
Oh yeah, you're gonna hear my thoughts on Big Slime.
Big Slime has coming to Clifton.

Speaker 2 (01:25:29):
What. Yeah, that's his nickname, Big Slime.

Speaker 4 (01:25:32):
I know some people that go by slime, and they're
not good people, Big Slime.

Speaker 19 (01:25:36):
If you're gonna include second round pick bus, what about
fat Freddy Children?

Speaker 17 (01:25:42):
Freddy Children's first off thoughts and prayers go out to
Tommy Helm's family.

Speaker 2 (01:25:51):
I didn't know a whole lot about him.

Speaker 17 (01:25:53):
But my question is, did debt news break of his passing,
like in the middle of the game.

Speaker 4 (01:25:59):
Yes, yeah I did, and uh it read to put
something up on the video board. I guess they're gonna
honor him this week before the home stands over.

Speaker 29 (01:26:09):
He yeah, we'll just put the record.

Speaker 25 (01:26:10):
Guys.

Speaker 2 (01:26:10):
I would look it up, but I'm gonna work.

Speaker 6 (01:26:13):
I'm not even supposed to use my phone.

Speaker 23 (01:26:15):
I'm taking a chance to even participate in it's all that.

Speaker 4 (01:26:19):
Uh talkbacks. Where do you work? What do you do?
We'll put your boss on. Yeah, talk to cowards. Yeah,
you better not be operating machine machinery. Please no, don't
do that. Please know.

Speaker 2 (01:26:35):
All right, that was our last very good, very good.

Speaker 4 (01:26:38):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:26:38):
We got an injury report to uh to give you
when we get back, and then we'll open up our
number three, which I'm looking forward to because we're going
to catch up an hour three with Ricky Chino. I
know Austin's looking forward to it as well. We'll get
you ready for wrestling.

Speaker 2 (01:26:49):
Way bathroom gratituate food.

Speaker 3 (01:26:51):
We got Moager is uh, Moger's going to join us
an hour and uh, we've got some uh, don't don't
have to be Bengal specific, but the draft this next week,
so we can dive into that a little bit as well.
We still got an hour and some change to go.
Phone lines are open five to one, three, seven four nine,
fifteen thirty at Sincy three sixty on ESPN fifteen thirty.

Speaker 11 (01:27:12):
Thanks to Cincy shirts WCKY Cincinnati make us the number
one pre set on your car radio and on the free,
new and improved iHeartRadio app. Free never sounded so good,
ESPN fifteen thirty.

Speaker 3 (01:27:23):
Much like a Hunter Green fastball, the spring storms move
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They are the Tri States trusted team to get the
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(01:27:44):
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Speaker 1 (01:27:52):
Cincy three sixty continues on ESPN fifteen thirty, Cincinnati's sports station.

Speaker 3 (01:28:05):
Welcome back since he three to sixteen, ESPN fifteen thirty
Cincinnati Sports Station thanks to Cincy Shirts. Just a couple
of minutes here, Austin. So let's run down while we
got a chance. Today's Postman Law Injury report delivered by
Postman Law Injured Postman delivers for the Reds. Yesterday, Cees
was out of the lineup. Terry Francona noted that the

(01:28:27):
first basement is quote banged up due to back and
hamstring issues. Something to obviously keep an eye on.

Speaker 2 (01:28:33):
Austin.

Speaker 3 (01:28:33):
Hayes has been rehabbing in Triple A Louisville. We'll set
the set check the timetable on which he can return
if it is truly the Baltimore series.

Speaker 4 (01:28:42):
He's two for his first nine in Louisville. He does
have a home run in a couple of games for
the best mentioned. Alexis Diaz is back with the team.
Matt McClain, according to Terry Francona, is confident that he'll
return on the ten from the ten day injury list
when eligible. That would be tomorrow and h Tyler Stevenson
after do we know the follow up steps?

Speaker 6 (01:29:03):
Now?

Speaker 3 (01:29:03):
After he received a good MRI and what now happens?
He's been doing a lot more work advanced work. He was,
you know, doing like grounders in for at shortstop with
the catcher's mitt, just to activate his legs and get
the twisting and stuff like that. He's been doing a
lot of stuff behind home plate, blocking balls, throwing stuff

(01:29:24):
like that, so seems to be uh on track. I've
always thought it will be early May for him, because
I would expect him to go down to Louisville for
you know, a rehab assignment. But uh, yeah, where's where's
Wade Miley at waiting on him?

Speaker 6 (01:29:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:29:40):
I don't think he'll be ready until June. I think
I was always the plan.

Speaker 3 (01:29:43):
Okay, Well, if he needs to get ready anytime sooner,
let me know.

Speaker 6 (01:29:46):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:29:46):
Major Major League Baseball news, it's the Justin Steele news.
The pitcher for the Chicago Cubs undergoing a season ending
surgery to address the flexor tendon and UCL in his
left elbow. Also, Sea Suzuki came out of the Cubs
game against the Dodgers a couple of days ago right
wrist pain. He hurt that on a steel attempt on

(01:30:07):
April seven. So something to watch for the Chicago Cubs
as well. That is it for today's Postman Law injury
report delivered by Postman Law Injured Call eight four to
four Postman Our three is next. I've got some some
portal happenings from over the weekend with the Bearcats and
the Muskies. We've got some NFL to get to with

(01:30:27):
the draft officially next week, and Rick Uchino is gonna
check in before he boards a flight to Viva Las
Vegas as he covers WrestleMania this week and weekend. Rick
Uchina will join us Moegger for quick Hits and our
three as well. Stick with us since he three to
sixty thanks to since he shirts on ESPN fifteen to
thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 1 (01:30:47):
Hey week, East Coast Subs since he three to sixty
of bount Cincinnati from Cincinnati, spuntered in part by Pennstation.

Speaker 9 (01:30:54):
East Coast Subs.

Speaker 1 (01:30:55):
Handcrafted hot grilled subs, fresh cut fries and lemonade. It's
all about good taste. Penn Station East Coast Subs order
online today. This is ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 3 (01:31:10):
Welcome back sincey three to sixty thanks to Penn Station.
Thanks for listening on ESPN fifteen thirty at Cincinnati's Sports station.
Top of hour three just to recap where we were
an hour.

Speaker 10 (01:31:22):
One.

Speaker 3 (01:31:22):
Major shout out to Roy McElroy winning the Masters in
a suspenseful form. Yesterday. FC Cincinnati also won their third
straight match. They are now just two points behind the
Columbus Crew in the Eastern Conference standing. NBA playoffs are
set to get underway, playing games starting tomorrow night. Cubs
have lost Justin Steele for all of twenty twenty five.

(01:31:43):
Aaron Judge is going to join Team USA and the
World Baseball Classic. And we celebrated a red sweep over
the Pittsburgh Pirates. That pretty much gets you up to
speed on everything that's happened. How about the happenings from
the weekend. You see the Bearcats they lost one today.
C J Anthony the walk On becomes the eighth Bearcats

(01:32:04):
enter the transfer portal. He joins Dylan Mitchell, Connor Hickman, Raveon,
Griffith Arrington, Page, Tyler Betsy, JJ Rembert, Josh Reed, and
Dan Skillings. The Bearcats have picked up kerk crisa Sincere Harris,
and yesterday they picked up Big Slime, Yes, Big Slime.
Jalen Haynes, All, a ten player from George Mason, has

(01:32:27):
joined the Cincinnati Bearcats. Still plenty of roster spots available
right now as it pertains to the Cincinnati Bearcats. I
believe right now you got Dada Jizsel, Tyler McKinley. It's
not a full roster of players coming back next year.
We'll dive more into the roster construction itself. But that's

(01:32:48):
the latest from the transfer spot. Lesina Troiore, the big
man that was set for big things last year for
Xavier before a season ending injury before things got going,
has committed to Sean Miller at Texas. But that has
not stopped the Xavier Musketeers from being extremely busy.

Speaker 5 (01:33:09):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:33:10):
Gabriel Pizzato from Evansville is now a Xavier Musketeer. Malik
Moore from Montana is now a Xavier Musketeer. Florida Atlantic's
Trey Carroll is a Xavier Musketeer as well. That Since
we last spoke on Friday, John Hugley, the former big

(01:33:33):
man for Xavier, committed to Dekane over the weekend. So
that is the latest from a transfer portal standpoint as
it pertains to the UC Bearcats and the Xavier Musketeers.
Of course, going into year one with Richard Patino Junior
as their head coach. We have time for a call
in a little NFL. What's up, mister Ace.

Speaker 6 (01:33:56):
Charlie, what's up Austin? So man? Man, I gotta say
I was about to say the worst the draft bust
in Cincinnati history to my memory, and then somebody said it.
I have to say that the second round pick who
could not even make the team, couldn't even make a

(01:34:16):
roster spot. Freddy's Childress.

Speaker 33 (01:34:19):
Yeah, Freddy Child, he had too many fat buggers, man,
that's true.

Speaker 6 (01:34:31):
But well as swell a swellers. I mean, I guess
I could say, with draft coming up, with all this
transfer portal stuff going down, I have to ask the
question to one Anthony Pike, Yes, what do you think
you would have done if you would have had the
opportunity to enter the transfer portal during your UC career?

(01:34:55):
Ohio team up in Columbus, or or maybe even one
of those UH cees who conference name I'll flip around
because I do not like the SEC, but one of
those cees conference schools down south Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:35:14):
I'd have definitely had to take a look at that,
probably the school up there in Columbus. I don't even know,
did they have a quarterback in two thousand and nine?

Speaker 2 (01:35:22):
We weren't interested in you. Probably were, I.

Speaker 3 (01:35:24):
Mean they canceled the game against UC and O nine
probably because they didn't have a competent quarterback.

Speaker 4 (01:35:30):
They took you off the list after eight four picks
against It wasn't it.

Speaker 3 (01:35:33):
There was a transfort Colonel, it wasn't there yet, So
you know, I I would have h I would have
loved to see, uh, all of the offers that came
in is what I would have loved to see.

Speaker 2 (01:35:43):
Mysteries. But I've always been loyal to Cincinnati.

Speaker 4 (01:35:47):
Tony's loyal to Tony's loyal to whoever's putting money in
his pocket. So he would have he was a business man,
he would have totally bounced. I'm a business first opportunity.

Speaker 6 (01:35:57):
Unfortunately, I think Austin probably would to try to recruited
you himself, because.

Speaker 2 (01:36:06):
Billbo Baggins would have been at my door.

Speaker 6 (01:36:09):
If you would have got extra, like an extra year
like they're tossing out there now, basically six years. I mean,
probably some folks are getting around with seven years eligibility
if they play their cards right, you got the extra year,
Oh man, shoot Tony who knows, man, you might have
had you with Tony Tony pizza, mister Race, thank you,

(01:36:34):
Pipe Streeter. Kids come out and by your pizza.

Speaker 3 (01:36:39):
Man, Mister that guy is built up by a man.
That guy is a treatment. I appreciate, mister A. Mister
Ace was authored one of my favorite moments in my career.
When we were out on on location. Mister Ace doesn't like.

Speaker 2 (01:36:55):
Me very well. Yeah, I remember this. We were out
where where were we at?

Speaker 4 (01:36:59):
We were with the Folkino, Yeah, we were with the
folks at Mercedes Benz and uh. We're doing quick hits
the very end of our show and mister Ace shows
up and we're talking to Mo and Moe's in the studio.
We're on location and mister A shows up and he's
fired up, and the show ends and he comes up
to me and he's like, man, Austin Elmore is a

(01:37:19):
clown and all this other stuff. He thought I was
Mo and was just bad mouthing me right to my face.
And I said, mister Ace, I'm Austin. And the look
on his face, I'll tell you he didn't.

Speaker 2 (01:37:35):
I give him credit. I give him credit.

Speaker 6 (01:37:37):
I know, I know, I know.

Speaker 2 (01:37:39):
I pissed people off. That's our ass part of the game.
But man, it was.

Speaker 4 (01:37:44):
It was hilarious to see that moment and I gained
a lot of respects for mister Ace that day.

Speaker 2 (01:37:50):
Shout out to you as thanks for calling in.

Speaker 6 (01:37:52):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:37:52):
Tomorrow Tomorrow is the local pro day for the Cincinnati Bengals.
This happens every year. A good contingent of both Miami
athletes and the University of Cincinnati athletes. Among those attending
for UC Xavier Henderson, Luke Candra guy, we've talked about
a lot. We'll get to him on that Mister Beast

(01:38:14):
guard outlook sometime tomorrow. Corey Kiner, Uh, mister Beast, the Beast,
the Beast. It's a totally different thing. Do you watch
mister Beast video? No, I just hear about him and
see him all the time. I was money he gives away.
I literally had to mute him the other day. I

(01:38:35):
was so tired of still his backstory, but it feels
like he's got a bunch of money.

Speaker 4 (01:38:38):
I was so tired of seeing mister Beast he was that.
You know how Moe puts out that list of words.
I did that with mister Beasts a couple of days ago.
You are saying, mister.

Speaker 3 (01:38:52):
Dane the Beast was what I was thinking of. Other
Bearcats in attendance, Eric Phillips, defensive end d'Artagnan Tinsley, Philip Wilder,
John Williams, among others, a good good contingent of Miami
RedHawks as well. Local Pro Day?

Speaker 2 (01:39:12):
Do we what? I would like to know? Did you
go to this when you were playing the Local Pro Day?

Speaker 3 (01:39:18):
I believe so, I don't remember. I would like to know,
like from Bengal's history, have they ever like seen anyone
at Local Pro Day that that changed their thought on
him so much that they ended up making a move
for that player.

Speaker 4 (01:39:32):
It's a good question. I feel like Kevin Huber would
be on that list. Yeah, he would be there, But
they haven't drafted a ton of local guys. That feels
like a good question for like a Jay Morrison. I
bet Jay would know the answer to that. I don't know.
I'm trying to think of some local guys off the
top of my head. Huber's the first one that comes
to mind. They've drafted a lot of dudes from Ohio State. Yeah,

(01:39:56):
but I think they probably had their eyes on Hubbard
before they're any pro correct, So I don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:40:02):
Draft week is next week, so we'll have this week
to dive into more draft rankings. We can look more
into mock draft, and I think it would be I
think it'd be good at least at some point we
look around not only the rest of the AFC North,
but teams that we view as contenders and what their
biggest team needs look to be going into the draft.

(01:40:24):
Because we've done so much on the Cincinnati Bengals up
to this point, so obviously we can we can have
that to watch as well. Other NFL news, Patrick Peterson,
the eight time Pro Bowler, is officially calling it a career.
The Dallas Cowboys off season program has started and Micah
Parsons is there. It's a little bit of a surprise

(01:40:45):
shout out uh to Micah Parsons. Kyler Gordon new.

Speaker 4 (01:40:48):
Head coach, Yeah and Brian Schottenhibery new head coach, but
not quite a yeah coach.

Speaker 3 (01:40:53):
Kyler Gordon of the Bears cornerback three year, forty million
dollar extension makes him the highest paid slot corner in
the NFL. Speaking of the Cowboys workouts, Dak Prescott not practicing,
but did say he could play if he had to.
And of course the reports we were talking about are
the talkbackers were talking about. Derek Carr has a shoulder
injury right now going on with the New Orleans Saints. Now,

(01:41:16):
if you would have asked folks last week, what is
one of the most interesting teams going into the draft,
they would have already said the New Orleans Saints. And
here comes this report that a shoulder injury could put
Derek Carr's twenty twenty five season in jeopardy. This, according
to multiple reports that came down on Friday, that would
certainly shake things up from an NFL Draft standpoint.

Speaker 4 (01:41:38):
They still don't know exactly what happened with Derek Carr.
This happened came out, like I think, right after we
got off the air on Friday. But yeah, I mean,
it's a team that's got a bunch of financial issues,
a new head coach, and a bunch of crappy players
on the roster and now here they are probably going
to be looking for a quarterback, which you know, even

(01:41:58):
with Derek Carr, even with Spencer Rattler, they were probably
gonna be looking at a quarterback to begin with. But
now maybe they're more apt to take a chance on
somebody a little bit earlier on. Maybe they'll trade up.

Speaker 2 (01:42:11):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:42:11):
They have a lot of needs and not a lot
of money, so I don't know that they'll trade everything.
I think it would be more likely that they just
go with Spencer Rattler and see what what's.

Speaker 2 (01:42:23):
His name their new coach.

Speaker 4 (01:42:27):
That's a great question. He just won the Super Bowl
with the Eagles. Keenan or Keel or something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:42:33):
That's good.

Speaker 4 (01:42:33):
We're up to see Kellen Moore is his name? Head
coach of the Saints. I said, Keenan and Keel. That
was a naked night show.

Speaker 2 (01:42:40):
Back in the day. Oh, I get all the I
get all the heat done. I know, you know, come on.
I do think it's.

Speaker 3 (01:42:46):
Fascinating what's gonna happen next week because I think Travis
Hunter and Shador Sanders are both interesting prospects.

Speaker 2 (01:42:52):
I don't think Chador is any good.

Speaker 3 (01:42:53):
Because there seems to be so much on them. I
actually saw someone that say one of their hot takes
was that Jackson Dart would be taking.

Speaker 2 (01:42:59):
Ahead of Shador Saints. Yeah. I agree with that.

Speaker 3 (01:43:01):
Yep, very interesting. We've got so much NFL to get
to between now and next Thursday, all the best draft
coverage will be right here on ESPN fifteen thirty. It
is Cincinnati Sports Station. When we come back, how about
some WWE coverage. Wrestle Mania Week is upon us and
Rick yu Chino is getting ready to board a bird
out to Las Vegas. He's gonna play some golf and

(01:43:22):
then he's gonna cover a bunch of WWE. But before
any of that, he'll join us next to preview WrestleMania
on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 1 (01:43:31):
Now your chance to win it back on ESPN fifteen
thirty Cincinnati.

Speaker 3 (01:43:43):
Welcome back since e three to sixty thanks to Penn Station.
Move it along here our number three on ESPN fifteen thirty,
Cincinnati Sports Station. Uh, the NFL Draft is next week.
There's a lot of build up to the NFL Draft.
The Reds are back to five hundred. We've discussed and
covered all of that today. We've talked about everything that's
happened over the course of the weekend. But for now,

(01:44:05):
it's also WrestleMania Week, and in the Pike household that
carries a little bit more. My son has decided to
throw his own WrestleMania party this week. We're up to
about twenty five to thirty action figures. They're all going
to be set up over the course of Saturday and
Sunday at the house. He is inviting, not me, He
is inviting friends and family over. He's coming up with

(01:44:26):
the men. You were excited about WrestleMania week, and I
know my guy, Rick Uchino is excited about WrestleMania Week.
We had to get him today because he's leaving to
head to Vegas on a jet plane. Baby Rick, before
we even get started. What's the easiest way for anyone
to follow along with all of your coverage of wrestling
and WrestleMania.

Speaker 4 (01:44:44):
Yeah, that would be on AX. That's the place where
I'm going to be putting out of most of the stuff,
and that's at Rick Uchino. So that's r I C
K U C C H I N O. All of
my written work can be found on the Takedown on
si UH so that's you can get there by the
mains Sports Illustrated page and go into the wrestling section.

Speaker 3 (01:45:02):
So it is I want to talk WrestleMania itself, but
it's not WrestleMania yet. There's a Monday Night rawl, there's
a SmackDown still to take place. We'll talk about the
cart itself, but is there anything that still needs, in
your opinion, to get hashed out or that will come
about maybe tonight or even on SmackDown leading up to WrestleMania.

Speaker 8 (01:45:23):
They got to find an opponent for Randy Orton.

Speaker 4 (01:45:25):
Yeah, that's that's the biggest question mark on my mind
right now, is you know, he had one of the
more marquee matches, well built in storyline for months with
himself and Kevin Owens, and then unfortunately, Kevin Owens announces
that you know, he needs next surgery and doctors are
not going to clear him to compete against Randy Orton
this weekend in Las Vegas. So now it's like, Okay,

(01:45:48):
you got your two weeks out, two weeks out from
your biggest show, one of your you know, longest running storylines,
one of your more marquee non title matches, and it's
off the off the table now.

Speaker 2 (01:45:57):
So what do you do in that situation?

Speaker 8 (01:45:59):
Do you go with?

Speaker 4 (01:46:01):
You know, a guy like Nick Aldis, who has been
the SmackDown general manager since he signed with a company,
but as a former NWA World Champion, former TNA World Champion.
There is at least a storyline built in because ever
since Randy Orton arrived on SmackDown, he's been given that
guy Rkos, so maybe he can pull him out of
retirement for a match. Seems like they might be leaning
towards solo Socoa. Not a lot of intrigue there for me,

(01:46:25):
because I feel like that's just gonna be. Yeah, Randy
wins going over no problem like Nick Alldos is interesting
to me. And the SmackDown crowd last Friday reacted when
Randy made mention and why don't we pull you out
of retirement and get the boots on? And all of
a sudden, you got the crowd who was going, yeah,
let's do that. I was like, that got a really
good reaction. But you also have a lot of guys who,

(01:46:45):
you know, if you want to do a surprise factor, right,
you got guys like Alister Black and Miro aka Russef
who are reportedly signed with the company but have not
returned on television yet. Maybe Nick Aldos, you know, pulls
a deal and finds somebody wrestling his something like that.
It looks like they're leaning towards solo Socoa. I hope
that's not the direction. I'd like to see something a

(01:47:05):
little bit more intriguing, but I expect that to be
wrapped up late late this week.

Speaker 3 (01:47:10):
What does the week look like? Because this is much
more now than just a Saturday and Sunday, Because as mentioned,
you're you're getting ready to head out to to WrestleMania
to Las Vegas. It's not just the event Saturday, the
event Sunday. I know they're doing a kill Tony thing
on Sunday after WrestleMania. What does it look like leading
up all week? What's happening in Vegas around WrestleMania. Oh,

(01:47:32):
my gosh, Like where to start?

Speaker 4 (01:47:34):
I mean, first off, you have WWE World that's going
on at the I believe Las Vegas Convention Center whatever
the name for their convention center is. So that's like
this massive WWE themed you know, museum, and that's where
their merchandise store is, and they have a bunch of
different events, like they're going to be doing one, Fanatics
is going to be doing one for Make a Wish,
where you have these kids are going to get to

(01:47:55):
go out on Thursday morning and do like a full
on WWE entrance with me to be superstars who are
are going to be there in attendance to that part
of it's a secret, so but I don't know if
I was supposed to say that, but you know when
they invited a bunch of the media out to check
that out. But WWE World goes on all weekend long,
and they're going to have their biggest merchandise store that

(01:48:17):
they have ever had that's going to be there. So
there's a lot of different themed events and conventions. You
got Wallemnia, which is going to be taking place Thursday night,
which I will be at for the first time this year.
I got the invite to go down to that. That's
going to be broadcast on Netflix Thursday night. You have
the Hall of Fame induction on Friday after SmackDown. There
are also after parties Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday at some

(01:48:42):
of these casinos that are going to be on the strip,
and I've been invited to a couple of those. I'm
gonna try to hit a few of those as well.
But SmackDown on Friday, WrestleMania Allegiance Stadium Saturday and Sunday,
Raw back at t Bobile on Monday, and then you
have NXT that's going to be in Vegas on Tuesday.

(01:49:02):
It is an incredible wall to wall Like I'm literally
I'm gonna have to get like my schedule like tattooed
on my arms, right, I don't miss anything or forget
anything and find time to write in between at the
same time. Uh, Saturday's card it looks like I believe
the main event is the seth Rollins Roman Reigne, CM Punk, Yes,
Gunther and Jay Usso, Tiffany Stratton and Charlotte Flair, war

(01:49:24):
Raiders in the New Day, La Knight and Jacob Fatu.
You got Ray Mysterio and El Grande Americano. Definitely not
Chad Gate, Definitely not Chad Gable. Jake Cargill versus Naomi
Jay Cargo A little tied here, which's with Brandon Phillips yep,
the Triple Threat match Without even going into predictions, How
do you feel like the build up has been for

(01:49:44):
this SETH Rollins Roman Reign Cmpunk. Yeah, I do like
this build There's obviously a lot of history that they
can play into this, and it would have been, you know,
fairly easy for them to lean into all of the
as Shield stuff and I think if Evince was still
in charge, this would have been hit over the head, like, hey,

(01:50:05):
by the way, did you know like two of these
guys were in the Shield and CM Punk was the
one who brought him in and all that kind of stuff.
But there was more to this history between these three
guys that they could really dive into, and a lot
of that does center around Paul Hayman. So typically I
don't like it when an outside entity becomes the story,
but in this case, it just made so much sense

(01:50:26):
with Paul Hayman literally being Cmpunk's best best friend but
also being the advocate in tribal and wise man to
Roman Reigns Rollins, And now they had to find a
way to pull him into the met because until this
past Monday last week, I'm like.

Speaker 8 (01:50:41):
Seth kind of feels like the third wheel.

Speaker 2 (01:50:42):
Here a little bit interesting.

Speaker 4 (01:50:44):
Now they've pulled him into this too, So it's gonna
all of a sudden, Paul Hayman becomes you know, like, okay,
where where does his allegiances truly lie in this matchup?
So the matchup in and of itself I think is
going to be spectacular. It's a it's a dream matchup.
It's the closest we're gonna be able to get to
a shield triple threat at WrestleMania, because I don't think
our John got our guy, John Moxley is going to

(01:51:06):
be coming back anytime soon. So he seems to be
an able d lifer, which good for him. He's doing
great there on his own, so the matching of itself
is going to be great. I think the build has
been pretty good as well.

Speaker 3 (01:51:17):
Is it the right call for that to be the
main event over Gunther and jay Usso because that's obviously
the next matchup? Question it it's been a bloodbath literally
lead up to this. Uh, it's not been that they've
they've played on the lack of confidence some men ring
fumbles that they highlighted for jay Usso. Should jay Uso
and gun there have been the main event? And same question?

(01:51:38):
What did you feel of the build up of this?

Speaker 4 (01:51:40):
So I don't it's so hard right because I think
because I saw a lot of people complaining about this,
like neither jay Uso or Charlotte Flair being in the
main event after winning their respective Royal Rumbles, and I'm like, okay,
but have their matches or their builds or you know,
have they done enough to warrant you know, going over

(01:52:04):
Roman Raine Seth Rollins and see I'm Punk in the
same match at the same time. And this is Punk's
first WrestleMania in twelve years. All right, This is Roman Reigns,
who has main invented ten WrestleManias. This is Seth Rollins,
who has been If it wasn't for Roman Reigns, would
be considered the top guy over the last decade in WWE.
This is a huge marquee matchup, one that we never

(01:52:27):
thought we would see for Forget doesn't even need a
It's so big it doesn't need a title tone.

Speaker 2 (01:52:32):
Right, So.

Speaker 4 (01:52:35):
Has the bill between jay Usso and Gunther or Tiffany
and Charlotte, at least until last week, have those warranted
being put over that match?

Speaker 2 (01:52:44):
I don't think so.

Speaker 4 (01:52:45):
I think what people get bogged down and start complaining
is over the fact of the billing of the Royal Rumble. Well,
you don't have an issue with the fact that jay
Usa is into the main event. You have an issue
with the marketing of the Royal Rumble, which that I
agree they need to change. Stop saying you're going to
the main event of WrestleMania because it's not a guarantee.
We saw this in twenty eighteen, either Oscar or shins
Kan Knackamoor a main event in WrestleMania in twenty eighteen

(01:53:06):
after winning the Royal Rumbles, So there's precedent for this.
It doesn't happen every year. But if you just say, hey,
earn a World Championship match at WrestleMania, I don't think
people will be complaining. I do think they have made
the right call. Although Charlotte and Tiffany has gotten very
spicy in the last time.

Speaker 3 (01:53:18):
We were watching last week my wife and I and
my wife looks mean. She said that felt like it
just turned real, felt like that got personal the build
up between Charlotte and Tiffany Stratton. Does are there times
where it crosses a line? Or oh absolutely, They're just
so good at playing into it, because I felt an
uncomfortable level in the ring watching it.

Speaker 4 (01:53:40):
That promo two weeks ago went way off the rails,
that was not scripted, that was not scripted, that pretty
much went off from jump and one of the things
that I said on the podcast, we do a Takedown
discussion show on the Takedown on SI YouTube channel every Friday.
I made a pretty good analogy. I thought that promo
was basically Apollo thirteen and where it was a successful failure.

(01:54:03):
Yeah right, Like it did not go according to plan,
But what did it do? It got people talking about
that feud, and it got people interested in that matchup,
and that was the promo exchange, even though there were
lines crossed on both sides. Okay, and Charlotte kind of
like almost testing Tiffany a little bit and saying, all right, well,

(01:54:25):
what are you gonna do? You know, you're twenty five,
you're the wwm's champion, but I'm the queen. Are you
gonna fight back? And then Tiffany did, and then Tiffany
went a little bit across the line, and then Charlotte
was like, oh no, you didn't. And you know, if
you haven't seen it, by the way, go look it up.
It's insane. But yeah, so they got people talking and
they got people interested in it. So while they did

(01:54:46):
cross the line and maybe got a little bit of
backstage heat about it, people are more invested in that.
So again, Apollo thirteen successful failure. Those three are obviously
the headliners. Quickly before we moved tonight, too war Raiders
in The New New Day. Yeah, Late Night Jacob fought
to any of the others. Do any of those have
the potential to steal the show? From a match standpoint
in Europeian, Oh, from a match standpoint, anytime Jacob thoughtwo

(01:55:09):
is in the ring, it's gonna be impressive. I don't
feel good for our guy Laa, Yeah, it's tough. Excuse
me heading into that one. Don't feel good for him.
But I'll tell you what. The one that I'm really
really excited for is Jake Cargill and Naomi. This is
the first non title singles women's match in WrestleMania in
eighteen years, and it's the first one without a very

(01:55:32):
tired stipulation, like I believe the last one was a
Playboy pillow fight. Yeah, and the one before that was
like a mud wrestling match or something like that. Or no,
it was a cat fight, right, it was a cat fight.

Speaker 2 (01:55:41):
It was.

Speaker 4 (01:55:41):
It was back in the days where women couldn't even
punch each other. And so the fact that we now
have Naomi, who is a heel who for the first
time in her career and her career dates over a decade,
is actually getting us a legitimate story to like really
sink her teeth into. And it's gotten to the point
where it's been so good that they put this matchup
that on WrestleMania. Huge for the women's division, and I'm

(01:56:01):
looking forward to that one as well. Night two WrestleMania.
Before we get to the main event, there's matches that
haven't because you only have so much time, so you
don't get the huge build up to every match. But yeah,
you can feel an intensity between Damian Priest and Drew McIntyre,
the Fatal four way with bron Breaker and Mysterio and
Penton Finn Balor Aj Styles and Logan Paul I think
has a underrated nature to it just because of how

(01:56:25):
talented both of those guys are. You get the Women's
Tag Team Championship match, you get a triple threat match
for the Women's World Championship. Outside of the main event.
What are you most looking forward to? A Night two?
A Night two man, I hate to say it, but
like that Logan Paul aj Styles match is going to
be really really good. It's gonna be very very good.

(01:56:47):
He delivers every time. Yeah, I hate to give Logan
pol credit for anything, but he is good. You know,
the bill to that match has been whatever. Logan Paul
shows up every couple of weeks, they cut a promo,
they punch you each other like it's been very paint
by numbers, but the match itself is going to deliver.
You cannot convince me that anything that Drew McIntyre does

(01:57:09):
right now is not just absolute gold. The guy finds
a way to make anything work. And the fact that
there has been like this year long story that's been
building between him and Damian Priest that like nobody even
realized until like they pointed it out, like oh damn, yeah,
you're right, like this this actually does make sense because
there were people who were looking at it's like why
is Drew McIntyre fighting Damian Priest, Like that's that's a

(01:57:31):
downgrade for him, And I'm like, no, there's actually, if you.

Speaker 8 (01:57:33):
Think about it, there's actually a story there.

Speaker 4 (01:57:35):
And that's that's part of the thing that I want
Iresle they need to focus on because they have tell
I think they have sixteen championships. They could defend this
wee again, they're not all being defended, you know, it
would be it would just be so easy to just
be like, all right here.

Speaker 8 (01:57:48):
Title match, title match, title match, tita match.

Speaker 4 (01:57:50):
No, give me some story, give me something else that
that you know has some meaning to it besides the championships.
And they're doing that with Drew and Damien, and I
think that match is going to deliver in a Sin
City street fight.

Speaker 3 (01:58:00):
Let me ask you, this the main event, and we
could we could probably talk for another half hour about
all the matches, and my street profits aren't even on
the main on the on the Carrett Wrestlemant. But John Cena,
Cody Rhodes. I go back to the last time you
and I spoke going into the Royal Rumble, we thought
it's it's seen A's time. He doesn't win the rumble,
it's jay USO's time. You go to the elimination chamber

(01:58:20):
and everything that takes place, and the Rock hands out
his stipulation to Cody Rhoads, and not only does he
deny it, but it's John Cena, for the first time
in his career turns into a heel, and my goodness,
I feel like he's delivered every time he's taken a microphone.
In my opinion, John Cena has been brilliant as a heel.
I don't know how the Rock storyline comes together yet

(01:58:42):
at WrestleMania with it. But from a in ring standpoint,
there were times when Cody and John last met that
I'm like, oh, this is getting testy as well, this
is getting here as well. What do you feel about
the main event of Night two of WrestleMania.

Speaker 4 (01:58:58):
So the bill of this matchup for me is kind
of been like I feel like I'm watching a Quentin
Tarantino movie because I feel like they gave me, like,
you know, the ending at the beginning, and you know,
they's like trying to fill in all the pieces and
you're trying to figure out the plot storyline. It's like,
hopefully all of this comes together and it makes sense

(01:59:18):
at the end, right, because that's the big thing. John
Cena turning heel, selling his soul to the Rock like
there hasn't been that piece that has connected all of
that together. John coming out and saying, you know, for
twenty years, you know, I've been harboring these feelings against
the fans.

Speaker 2 (01:59:36):
Great.

Speaker 4 (01:59:37):
I understand that John Cena looking at Cody Rhodes as
the company chosen replacement for him, and him resenting that
because he doesn't think Cody is good enough to fill
his boots. Great, I love that. Where does the Rock
come in? Because John Cena's whole thing is I'm going
to win the WWE Championship, I'm going to retire with it,

(01:59:57):
and hence i am going to destroy this company by
taking away your top prize. And I'm sitting here and
I'm going, Okay, I'm with you up until this point. Right,
the Rock is a TKO board member. Why would he
be on board with you sabotaging his company. That's the
there's the times, there's a missing piece to this. That

(02:00:19):
said that said, I've enjoyed the hell out of this build.
I think John has been great, Like even John going
so far as to be a heel to the point
where we don't get the cool new John Cena heel
that we've been asking for for twenty years.

Speaker 8 (02:00:34):
We don't get the new theme.

Speaker 4 (02:00:35):
We don't get him wrestling in in tights or a
singlet or anything like that. It's just him and it's
just him coming out to his same music with this
like just stoic look on his face and he's on
a mission. And the question for me is does John
still have it in the ring to deliver a great
match because it's been a while since we have seen

(02:00:57):
him have a great match, So I'm hoping that this
I'm hoping that he and Cody can find a way
to get him to that point because he I mean,
he had a very pedestrian match against Austin Theory at
WrestleMania was at last year out in La so that
was two years ago. Had a very pedestrian match with
Austin Theory. Two years ago, he had a match with

(02:01:19):
Solo Socoa where he got absolutely obliterated, like he barely
had any offense in there. It's been a long time
since we've had a good John Cena performance in the ring.
So that's what I'm curious to see. How I think
John's winning. Yeah, because that's how you elongate the storyline
into the Summer from the Right, and it's the whole
tie end of the Punk of Summer thing, Summer a

(02:01:40):
Punk thing where Punk stole the WWE title from John
Cena over ten years ago and said he was stealing.
There's so many great tie ins and things you can
do Sena and Randy Orton in Saint Louis at WrestleMania Backlash.
You can do Punk and Sena again over the summer,
building up to win. Cody ultimately wins the title back
from him. The story rights itself, But can John perform
in the ring? That's my biggest question.

Speaker 3 (02:02:00):
Lastly, WrestleMania is always known for some surprises. Yeah, with
the card and the build ups the way they are,
you kind of lose sight of could there be a
major return, could there be a big surprise?

Speaker 2 (02:02:11):
Do you have a prediction in that sense?

Speaker 8 (02:02:13):
A man, it's so hard.

Speaker 4 (02:02:16):
If if there was an open challenge obviously on the show,
I would say yeah, hands down. I would love for
there to be some kind of a United States Open
challenge with Chelsea Green. The fact that we don't have
either of the women's mid card championships newly commissioned being
defended on the show kind of ticks me off, But
there's only so much room on the cards.

Speaker 8 (02:02:35):
I understand that.

Speaker 4 (02:02:38):
My biggest thing would be do they bring Becky back
at WrestleMania. We've been waiting for her to come back
since she reportedly signed a new contract ahead of the
January sixth premiere of Raw on Netflix, And here we
are to WrestleMania a week and she's still not here.

Speaker 8 (02:02:53):
Does she show up. I don't know.

Speaker 4 (02:02:55):
I think if there's going to be a surprise for me,
my money would be on either Miro or Alistair Black
returning to face Randy Organ that right here on Monday,
April fourteenth, which, by the way, happy birthday to my sister,
you know, April fourteenth. That's what I'm saying. That's my
prediction right now, that would be the most likely.

Speaker 2 (02:03:14):
Rick, I appreciate you, man. I know it's a busy week.

Speaker 3 (02:03:17):
One more time because your coverage, You're gonna be out there,
boots on the ground. Easiest way to follow along with
your coverage this week?

Speaker 4 (02:03:24):
Yeah on X at Rick Ucino, R I C K
U C C H I N O, all of our
We got a great team over at SI for the
for the wrestling website, it's the Takedown on SI again.

Speaker 8 (02:03:34):
You can get there from the SI main page.

Speaker 4 (02:03:35):
And yeah, follow along whether I'm out at these events
or out on the golf course.

Speaker 8 (02:03:40):
So I'll let you know how I'm doing.

Speaker 2 (02:03:41):
Enjoy it.

Speaker 3 (02:03:42):
That is rick Yuccino a preview as we start WrestleMania
week since he three to sixty. Mowiger is next. ESPN
fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.

Speaker 1 (02:03:50):
Sweet and it's on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.
It's time for Sincy three sixty Quick hits on ESPN.

Speaker 2 (02:04:00):
Come on, Mo's here, it's quick hits. It's since three seven.

Speaker 3 (02:04:04):
We're finishing quick Hits and we're going to the Mowagar Show,
which is why you're here.

Speaker 8 (02:04:08):
We're just starting quick hits now, we're finishing your show.

Speaker 2 (02:04:11):
Something about that.

Speaker 8 (02:04:12):
Quick Hits will not involve Locks of the Night now. Yeah,
it's just too bad because the NBA playoffs are starting
this week. Man, how do you feel about the NIXT seeding.
I think the Knicks Piston series is going to be awesome.
I think the Knicks will win it in seven games
and then bow out very quickly against Boston. But here's
the thing about this. I know no one cares. This
is kind of what the Knicks were for most of

(02:04:33):
the nineties, and people revere those teams. Teams that for
the most part, and there were exceptions ninety three, ninety four,
but for the most part, they went into the playoffs
and he thought they're not going to win the East,
and they would get, you know, win around and then lose,
and we revere those teams. They are back to where
they were.

Speaker 2 (02:04:51):
When everybody loved them. It's where you want to be.

Speaker 8 (02:04:53):
But I think this series against Detroit will be awesome.
We had a guy play all eighty two games, Michale Bridges.
It's pretty cool. He played six seconds and game the
Brady two absolutely one of the weakest things I've ever seen.

Speaker 3 (02:05:04):
In the West. You got the Thunder and the Rockets. Yeah,
how many people realize Rocket's been bad the last couple
of years. Now they're the two seed. Either of those
two advanced to the finals in your opinion, man, I
don't know, dude. I mean the Lakers with Luca, Yeah,
it's having to be in the play in.

Speaker 22 (02:05:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (02:05:20):
Kind of gagged away that game against the Tempers yesterday,
very sad. I was still in the league. So did
a lot of people. And it's Jimmy Butler. Okay, the
West is wide open. But o casees, okayse is a
different animal.

Speaker 4 (02:05:32):
Doesn't it feel like the Bulls are kind of the
team to beat, being the hottest team.

Speaker 8 (02:05:35):
Play great down the stretch, man.

Speaker 4 (02:05:37):
I know, seventeen and thirteen, after they traded away those
dead weights that were taking the ball away from the young.

Speaker 8 (02:05:42):
Guys in the history of the play in. How many
times have the Bulls and Heat played each other?

Speaker 2 (02:05:45):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (02:05:45):
I think they're going to name it the Chicago Bulls
Invitational at some point.

Speaker 2 (02:05:50):
What do you got coming up on the show?

Speaker 8 (02:05:51):
Uh, CBS Sports NFL Draft analyst Mike Renner will be
with us at four thirty three. We'll talk about Hunter Green, my.

Speaker 3 (02:05:58):
Guy, man, Can I actually say the drafts next week?

Speaker 8 (02:06:01):
The draft is next week? It's fine, it's eleven days away. Yeah,
you're gonna hear a lot of draft profiles. And it
was asked to voys. The draft is less than two
weeks away. The Reds are good again. They've won five
out of six, a sweep of the Pirates. The Reds
starting staff is awesome. How do we feel about the
Reds through sixteen games?

Speaker 2 (02:06:21):
It's hard.

Speaker 3 (02:06:22):
I was thinking that today because I feel good. You
have three one to zero losses lumped in there. Yeah,
opening Day, which could have win either way, and then
you give up two different five run leads in the
loss against San Francisco, and yet eight and eight, and
it feels like very soon you're gonna be healthier.

Speaker 8 (02:06:37):
So here's the stretch we were just talking about it
off air. Yeah, they play by a bunch of bad teams. Now,
I think Seattle's decent. Baltimore is better than their record,
Miami's not as good as their record. The Rockies are
awful and have a bad record, but they've got a
shot now.

Speaker 3 (02:06:51):
Going into the next five series. Yeah, I think if
they lost. I think the Baltimore won on the road,
you could say, Okay, if they lose any of the
other I think that's a major disappointment.

Speaker 8 (02:07:01):
So I'm going to compare this year's team to the
ninety seven win twenty twelve team because there is a
fair comparison. Oh, I will make it. I hope you're ready.
We'll talk about Roy McRoy and the Master's yesterday. So
that's one of the best sporting events I've ever watched. Yeah,
I have a litmus test for awesome sporting events, and
the litmus test was passed. If you can pass a

(02:07:22):
litmus test yesterday and today.

Speaker 3 (02:07:24):
Can it ever be duplicated by another sporting event or
sport at the majors? To implement the no cell phone policy,
because there's just something cool about seeing photos from yesterday
and everyone watching actively and not five thousand phones that
are out.

Speaker 8 (02:07:40):
It's awesome. It's what there's a lot of things that
make the Masters unique. That's my favorite quirk. Both and
I've talked about this had a chance to go in
twenty nineteen, but just watching on TV, it's the best quirk.
Here's the thing though, Like let's say let's say the
Reds a head a night. You know what, no cell
phone night, man, you come to the game, you're not
allowed to bring yourself. Nobody would go. Nobody would go,

(02:08:03):
we're so damn addicted to our phones that nobody get
with the Masters would just sort of accept that. It's like, oh,
it's a quirk of the thing, right right, And let's
face it. I mean I was lucky enough to stumble
into badges that is for the elite of the elite
of the elite who get to go to the Masters,
Like I understand that. And lottery winners, which we have
a guy here who in the lottery a couple of
years ago. But like, let's just say a major League
baseball team said we're going to experiment and for a night,

(02:08:24):
we're gonna have the same sort of thing that you
go through when you go through the Master's no cell phone,
No one would go. That might be my poll question.
If the Reds had a no cell phone night, would
you go?

Speaker 3 (02:08:33):
I think I would go. I would make it a
point to go just for the no cell phone.

Speaker 8 (02:08:36):
That would be so excited to go.

Speaker 2 (02:08:37):
But here's the thing.

Speaker 8 (02:08:38):
You could also go to a Reds game and just
decide I'm not bringing my cell.

Speaker 3 (02:08:41):
Phone, right, but too many people you have to you know,
there's we have to record and film.

Speaker 4 (02:08:46):
And I went to a Netflix recording once for a
comedian and they take your phone.

Speaker 2 (02:08:50):
Really the comedy show.

Speaker 4 (02:08:52):
Yeah, they put it in like this pouch basically with
a magnet to prevent people from recording and stuff.

Speaker 2 (02:08:59):
It was interesting.

Speaker 3 (02:09:00):
People ever go back and watch the videos they take
at events, like the folks that like film every song
at a concert.

Speaker 8 (02:09:05):
I have put it on YouTube.

Speaker 2 (02:09:07):
I guess you'll go home. And Rewatch, I went to
a pool.

Speaker 8 (02:09:09):
Party two years ago and I left my cell phone
at home accidentally, And for the first forty five minutes
I'm like dude, And then after that it was the
most liberating thing of all time. Yeah, And like my
wife is like, man, you're you're looking people in the eye,
You're engaging phone.

Speaker 2 (02:09:23):
It's great. Well, would you.

Speaker 3 (02:09:24):
Say, like if I just came up to you, like
after a quick hits and I was like, hey, mo,
watch this video of the concert. I was out the
other night and I'm like, on the lawn.

Speaker 16 (02:09:30):
I'm good.

Speaker 2 (02:09:31):
Yeah. I don't know what people it ever happens to
those I don't know.

Speaker 8 (02:09:35):
I I think it's one of the most unique quirks
in all the sports. The fact that I love it,
and like, anytime you talk to somebody who has gone,
they're like, I didn't miss my phone, right because you're
taking in this like just beautiful piece of real estate
and you're at this historically important sporting event that you
don't miss it, you don't miss your cell phone.

Speaker 4 (02:09:54):
It's also the only event that I've ever heard people
say like unanimously lives up to all the hype. Yes,
nobody is ever like, oh it was cool, but it
wasn't as good as everyone says it is. Everyone's like, oh,
it was way better than I even thought it was
going to be.

Speaker 8 (02:10:10):
Yeah, it's It's one of the few things I've done that,
like I said, the exact same thing, like that exceeded
my expectations. My expectations were pretty high. Roy McElroy yesterday
reminded me of a former Red Oh we'll get to
who that is coming up the stah.

Speaker 3 (02:10:24):
It felt it felt like the turn, like, man, it's
it's not going to have any suspense. What am I
going to do with the rest of the day, And
then thirteen comes yeah, and it's like play it safe,
play it safe, mishit, oh boy.

Speaker 8 (02:10:36):
And I feel like the CBS broadcast did an awesome
job kind of telling the story of what his past
at Augusta has been, what he was dealing with, Like,
I think they did an awesome job of folding in
viewers who made me never watched off Now.

Speaker 2 (02:10:53):
At the end.

Speaker 4 (02:10:55):
I thought that Jim nance on eighteen in regulation and
eighteen in the playoff overdid it a little bit.

Speaker 8 (02:11:01):
I thought eighteen in regulation he rose to the moment
because he was like, dude, imagine it happened, like you know,
and he's teeing off. On eighteen he said something to
the effect of like, this is a hard enough shot
as is. Yeah, but I think you have a lot
of people who in that moment are watching that don't
normally watch golf, and so you have to kind of
lay it on thick and I think that broadcast on

(02:11:24):
Sunday in the final two hours of the tournament. That's
not for a golf aholic. Sure, that's for somebody who's
just you know, that's that's the one time of year
they watch. And I thought Jim Nansen CBS served that
audience really well.

Speaker 3 (02:11:37):
And then for the seven plus minutes after it's made
to not say a word, Yeah, that was great, and
you just get to kind of soak in and it
feels like you're a part of the moment and then insane.

Speaker 8 (02:11:46):
You get a chance to talk to Amanda Malonis.

Speaker 2 (02:11:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (02:11:50):
Oh, and you also get a green jacket one of
those two things I would think would be really cool.

Speaker 2 (02:11:54):
Yeah, pretty cool. What else do we have? I don't
know to stop my from making a joke? Now, go ahead,
make it. We got I'm good. Pull a trigger, nope,
shoot your shot, nope, what do you got palm?

Speaker 8 (02:12:06):
Make the joke?

Speaker 2 (02:12:07):
Nope.

Speaker 8 (02:12:08):
Man, you're letting down to audio. Audience is going to
make the joke. Paul question, do you want Austin to
make the joke?

Speaker 2 (02:12:15):
Jokes? Make the joke? Nope? Did you get a chance
to meet Dick from Dayton today? Were you around yet?

Speaker 8 (02:12:21):
I have met Dick from Dayton.

Speaker 3 (02:12:22):
Okay, hey, it's his birthday. He came down for you,
got surprised and came into studio for his birthday today.
Why uh, day from Dayton surprised him and Gary Jeff
was given him a tour. We got to meet Dick
from Dayton today.

Speaker 8 (02:12:32):
I don't know that this is a precedent. We won
three peas from the same pot. I don't know. I
don't know. I mean, look, I really appreciate anybody who
listens to any one of these radio stations. I don't
know that we want to open up that can.

Speaker 2 (02:12:44):
Of Wormsa's box.

Speaker 8 (02:12:45):
I don't know that that's really the right idea.

Speaker 4 (02:12:47):
Yeah, Alry scary enough when people are waiting for people
at the elevator.

Speaker 8 (02:12:51):
We had a guy who came to the radio station
once because he was upset at me and Lance. Lance
wasn't here, he was working at night and we had
a receipt at the time. Just something you said, yeah,
and she's like, I'm not going to say the guy's
name because he has since passed. So and so is
here to see you, Like, yeah, I'm not coming out, yes,
zero percent? Chance?

Speaker 2 (02:13:10):
Uh huh, you're at the side door.

Speaker 8 (02:13:12):
I'm just like, I'm not I'm not coming out. And
then we had a guy once emailed me, this is
like ten years ago, emailed me and said he'd be
waiting outside my car when the show ended.

Speaker 2 (02:13:23):
So I ubered home. Did you really know? I did?

Speaker 8 (02:13:25):
But the guy and he wasn't like I went to
my car like way like here, did.

Speaker 2 (02:13:29):
You take anyone down there with you?

Speaker 27 (02:13:30):
No?

Speaker 4 (02:13:31):
I know someone that works here now that has a
vast system for parking out of fear of that.

Speaker 8 (02:13:37):
Well, I get it, Yeah, I get it. We also
had someone who worked here once and her deranged ex
husband like came to the radio station.

Speaker 2 (02:13:46):
That's kind of fun.

Speaker 8 (02:13:46):
That wasn't fun at all. It's like, hey man, we're
not We're not doing this today. I got a show
we had just yeah, Like I came up on the
elevator with him. We get there and I'm like, hey,
they'll help you out here at the front desk and
he's like, oh, I want to see whatever her name was.

Speaker 3 (02:14:00):
Then tweet out the joke you were going to say, No,
maybe it's easier for you that way.

Speaker 8 (02:14:03):
We're done, because you know who has the sense of humor.

Speaker 2 (02:14:06):
People on Twitter what uh, what do you?

Speaker 3 (02:14:08):
You gotta think of a name too for UC and
Xavier the baseball tomorrk because they took two or three
from Arizona State, Crosstown Strico. You see baseball's fun. Man,
We're done. Mulwagger's next. ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station.
Have a great Monday.

Speaker 9 (02:14:20):
Until you see Ky Cincinnati.

Speaker 11 (02:14:22):
Make us the number one pre set on your car
radio and on the free knew it improved, iHeartRadio app
Free never sounded so good.

Speaker 9 (02:14:29):
ESPN fifteen thirty, Hey,