Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
All right, welcome back to Blair and Barker. Brought to you by Capital One. Capital One, what? Giving Canadians credit for 30 years. Sorry, caught me in mid-coffee swallow there. 707 will be the first pitch tonight from the Rogers Center as the Jays look to even up their series against the Marlins.
As a reminder, tomorrow afternoon is a 107 pitch, so we'll be doing Blue Jays talk following the game, and then we'll be doing an hour-long Blair and Barker from 5 to 6. All right, with that big ball. I don't like that.
I don't have a choice, do I?
The guy keeps saying it. I don't know why we play baseball in the daytime. We got electricity.
Play it at night. I like day baseball. I just didn't like playing it. I like watching it, though. Gives me something to do during the day. But playing it's really tough. Routines and how you get loose.
I always find enough to do during the day that I don't need to.
Facing all these nasty pitchers early in the daytime. It shouldn't be allowed. I mean, we really do.
Every baseball fan loves Day Baseball. The only people who complain about Day Baseball are... It's the players. You and the players. The players and some of the reporters have to get up on the road because it was a late night the night before, although generally it's actually really good because your deadline is, you know... You're just looking for something to complain about.
I think that's what it is. I never liked Day Baseball. Never. I just... No. Mm-hmm. I played some 10-30 games in minor leagues. Now, you're talking not fair to a player. That's him right there. Those kid games. Paul Tuckey. Triple-A team for the Red Sox. Not good.
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Chapter 2: What letter grade did Bob Nightengale give the Blue Jays and why?
And so Castillo said, and again, this is through an interpreter, he was saying that he asked the manager, he said, I was kind of asking maybe one more inning. Maybe one more inning. And then he said, you know, we know that was part of the plan and you've got to respect what the decision was. And this is what...
This is the thing, I look back at the Jose Barrios decision with John Schneider, and the one thing I haven't really been able to understand, and this is kind of the same thing, And maybe, Kevin, it gets something you could talk to. Because for all, like, I'm sure this makes sense. I'm sure there's something numerically or something that says that it makes sense for these guys to piggyback.
But I think sometimes we lose track, those of us who haven't played the game or even played sports, we lose track of the competitor. And what Luis Castillo was saying here is, yes, this was the plan, but I was dealing. And the same thing with Jose Barrios. I don't think John Schneider dropped it on Barrios all of a sudden. I'm sure this was talked about.
And it's just... It reminds me that you are dealing with athletes who are competitors. And at the end of the day, everybody's getting paid. I get all that. But when guys are going well, they... do like to stay in the game, don't they?
Okay, well, there's a lot of smart people running these teams. Most of the time, they're right. Optically, whether it looks optically right or not, most of the time, they're right. Numbers don't lie. Like, they're not just going out there going all willy-nilly. Boy, I can't believe I'm saying this, but it's just that's fair. That's the way it is. His stuff...
The last couple of years has gone down. It just hasn't been good enough. You don't want him to face the top of the lineup more than however many times they want him to face it. That has something to do with it. And they're three games under .500. They're in second place. They're facing the team that's in first place in their division. They're about winning now.
You're trying to get the most out of two dudes who, quite frankly, are going through it a little. And this is...
This is... I mean, this gets a little more interesting because it's the second time they've done this, only the other time it was reversed. Yeah. It was Miller starting and Castillo coming up. Matchup. Matchup. And... Miller, that time, did the same thing. Now, he didn't sort of stay in the dugout for the entire inning and yap, yap, yap, yap, yap at the manager.
But he did the same thing when he came out. He was chapped when he came out there as well.
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Chapter 3: What sets the Milwaukee Brewers apart from other teams?
It ain't the other way around. That's kind of where they're at, and they're losing. Yeah. You know, every once in a while when you're losing, dude, and your season's not going the way you want it to go, and your stuff is just not playing the way it should normally be playing, sorry about your luck, bro. Like... You're going to do what I tell you to do, whether you like it or not.
So it's just best for them two dudes to get over it, right? And if there were 10 games above 500, they're not doing this. You know it as well as I do. You're going to give these two guys longer leashes to figure out whatever they're going through to get out there and get on track.
Right now it's about winning, and the best way they feel like they're going to win is to piggyback however they want to do it to sort of match up their stuff against however many times they want that stuff, to however many times they want them to see that part of the lineup. I get back to that khaki thing. I poke fun of it, Adam. But, boy, they're right most of the time. And I just. Oh, yeah.
It is just the way it is. So, yeah, I mean, if I had any sort of advice, get over it. How about that? You like the fire? But don't just sort of start throwing things. And, you know, that kind of was said. That's not the first time this has happened. Something obviously has happened that we haven't seen. That, you know, those two don't like the manager.
They don't like whoever's making these decisions.
Yeah.
And this is kind of festered over to this point. Do this behind closed doors.
That's all. We talked about Jacob Mizorowski. And I loved his quote after the game last night. He was asked about the number 100 mile an hour pitches. That's what I do. I throw hard.
Who's that sound like? I strike people out. Trey Savage. Trey Savage. That's what I do.
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Chapter 4: What is the situation with Tarik Skubal and the Tigers?
I don't care who is in the infield. Obviously we don't want anybody running anybody, but take the ball. If you can get it, you can, if you can catch the ball on your feet without leaving your feet and, and you know, you got to call them off. You know, that's, that's our, that's our right. Having the right away as a, as an outfielder, no matter who it is.
So, and I'll, you know, I also talked to Andres about it and just said, Hey, I've let him know to be aggressive. He's, he's, he's going to be coming to get the ball. So if you hear him, just, you know, get out of the way. And Andres knows that. And I said, man, we trust you more than anybody going back. But as you know, it's much easier coming in and going back on the ball.
Okay, with Dalton in center field, it looks to me like optically he's lost a step. Now, you can tell me otherwise if you want, but if he hasn't lost a step, is there something else you see maybe jumps he's getting?
And if it's the jump thing, how do you fix that as an outfield coach coming to a veteran guy saying, hey, we need to work on getting better jumps to catch balls we should always be catching?
Yeah, I don't feel like he's lost a step, Kev. I feel like there's been some reads where he's broke back on and the balls have fallen in in front of him because of that. So for me, it's more of a read standpoint than anything. And the way you fix that is you get as close to game reps as possible.
Things like live fungo or drop ball fungo where we kind of toss the ball from the side, take a swing at it. Or, you know, game BP reps as much as you can and, you know, treat those like a game as far as your jumps and your routes go. So You know, he's trending in a good direction. We talk all the time. I have the utmost faith in Dalton Marshall out there. He's a gold-lover.
There's just been a few plays that he's gotten caught on. And I think by the end of the year, you'll see the numbers be where they normally are.
Mark, silly question. When he's offensively going through it, does that affect anything he's doing on the defensive side? I know it did with me and you. I mean, we can say it all as a human being. But, you know, we're hitters first. Any thought of, you know, every once in a while when you're going through it offensively, kind of your defense doesn't look the way everybody wants it to look?
Speaking for me, I always stung at the plate, so I could. I had to stop it. That's funny. And I would, you know, that is a good question. With him, it's not the case. He really takes pride in his defense. Him and his buddy, Kevin Kiermaier, that were out there together for a few years. Those guys don't mess around, man. They separate it when they get out of that box and go put their glove on.
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Chapter 5: Why is Luis Castillo upset with the Mariners' pitching strategy?
Jeff, you know, it's interesting. Now that we're in the coach's box all the time, there's a lot less chatting than there used to be for sure. You're just not as close together. But I got to give a shout out to Vic Carapazza. Vic's a chatter and loves baseball, loves the game, and loves talking about the game.
So he's a very personable guy who I enjoy getting to know over the years, getting to talk to. Chatty is first baseman. It's not quite what it used to be. You know, Sean Casey's a good buddy of Kevin's mind. He used to chat it up quite a bit. It's not quite to that level anymore. Freddie Freeman's also always very, very open, kind, likes to catch up and things like that.
So he's the first one that pops in my mind. But it's not quite like it used to be, I think, on the chat. It's just because, again, of us having to be in the box.
Yeah, how different has that turned out to be, having to stay in the box now because of the new rules? Has it been more of an adjustment than maybe you thought? And I guess maybe Carlos might be more of an adjustment for the third base coach in some ways, would it not?
Yeah, I think it was an adjustment for both of us, and we spent a lot of time in spree training talking about it. I can give you one example. We were playing the Tigers at home, and we got backpicked twice. and a game with Thomas Naito behind the plate. And I had to basically change the way I stood so I could see the first baseman breaking early on back hits from the catcher.
So there's definitely adjustments there that we've made, and a lot of it is kind of where you look at the positioning. You're kind of waiting later to turn your head to see contact at the plate as a result just because you don't have the same vision that you once had when you could be kind of further down the line.
Bud, do you like the way the Jays are running the bases as of, say, the last couple of weeks?
I do. I do. Actually, we were just talking about that as a staff today. Over the last 10 days or so, we're trending in a much better direction, Cab, both on stolen base percentage as well as taking the extra base. which are kind of two of the main areas we focus on. So, you know, I like our guys, and a lot of that comes with offense.
As you hit more and you're up in games more, you can take a few more risks. If you're down in games more, you've got to be a little more careful, right? So a lot of that comes with swinging the bats a little bit better, and I think those things are both trending in the right direction.
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