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Boomer & Gio

Best of the Yankees on WFAN: An Opening Day laugher

26 Mar 2026

Transcription

Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.

Chapter 1: What were the initial reactions to the Yankees' opening day victory?

0.031 - 9.734 Al Dukes

Baseball underway and under an amazing way with... I gotta move this. I mean, every night's a hockey night. Not anymore for the Ranger fan, for crying out loud.

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9.774 - 11.378 Unknown

Why was that? Why was that even there?

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11.398 - 16.69 Al Dukes

I don't have no idea. But anyway, it started off in a great way for the New York Yankees. A shocker.

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16.67 - 39.338 Al Dukes

Shutout victory 7-0 cruising along no problems freed great offense relentless without home runs bullpen comes in no blips on the radar at all so a really really good start for the Yankees outside of Aaron Judge but you don't really need to worry about him because you know he's going to be totally fine. So, yeah, I felt like this is it, man.

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Chapter 2: How did Aaron Judge perform in the season opener?

39.358 - 49.033 Al Dukes

We are right back in it. We got Yankee fans fired up about their team again. We got everybody complaining about the broadcast. Ed Boomer put his Yankee sweatshirt on again today.

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49.414 - 60.409 Unknown

Good morning, Boomer. How are you? Number one, it's not a Yankee sweatshirt. It's a J. Crews sweatshirt, so I don't want to hear about it, all right? And I don't lay out my clothes the night before. I just pick something out of the dark and throw it on.

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60.429 - 62.211 Al Dukes

This was just a total coincidence.

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62.311 - 82.614 Unknown

100% coincidence. And by the way, the first thing I thought about last night, honestly, was thank God Trent Grisham picked up his option. Really? That's the first thing I thought. I mean, because everybody's screaming and yelling about that for the last six months. Yeah, they're not happy about it. $22 million? Yeah, but he came through last night. It's one of 162 for sure.

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Chapter 3: What were the standout moments from the Yankees' offense?

82.934 - 107.378 Unknown

And... You know, I think you said it. I mean, Max Freed's the story, honestly, because he was just absolutely amazing and great. And that, I mean, if you were a player and you were the opening day starting pitcher, you couldn't ask for a better outing. And that's something that every team hopes for and wishes for. And unfortunately for Webb of the Giants, it's the other way around.

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107.498 - 114.806 Unknown

But, you know, look. All I can say is that it's a great start, and that's all it is. It's a start. So here we go.

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114.986 - 135.028 Al Dukes

Yep, that's right. And you said that you couldn't ask for anything more from Max Freed. You probably couldn't ask anything worse from Logan Webb. But from the Yankee fan perspective, who cares? And all the things that you want to see and the things that we hear about, not like everything is cured at one baseball game. We know that is not the case. This is the way you want to see them win.

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135.088 - 150.713 Al Dukes

You want to see the dominant starting pitching. You want to see them be able to score runs without the home run. And it's great when Aaron Judge has four strikeouts and he's 0-5 that the Yankees still find a way to score seven runs. And there's just no sweat at all in a victory.

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150.733 - 168.7 Unknown

But I was just thinking at the bottom of the lineup starting, you know, when you get the Jazz Chisholm in the lineup and then you look down and you look at all the guys that actually came through here, It was good. Everybody had a hit in the game with the exception of Aaron Judge. So, as you said, I'm not worried about that. But, you know, you think about it. Stanton had two hits.

168.76 - 174.589 Unknown

And then, of course, Austin Wells had two hits. Maybe his elbows are feeling pretty good.

174.749 - 175.37 Al Dukes

They have to be.

Chapter 4: How did the broadcast on Netflix differ from traditional baseball broadcasts?

175.39 - 184.863 Al Dukes

What do you think? They have to be with that exit velo. 114 miles an hour on one of those line drives. Don't do that. No, I'm just saying. That's what they were talking about.

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184.883 - 185.744 Boomer Esiason

They were talking about it.

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185.764 - 195.294 Al Dukes

They were really impressed with it. I was more like... being facetious with the broadcast last night because they were all over that. They were basically a big tongue bath with the 114-mile-an-hour line drive.

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195.314 - 197.997 Unknown

Well, that is baseball parlance these days.

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198.057 - 200.179 Al Dukes

Yes, it is. It certainly is.

200.239 - 215.393 Unknown

So, again, I don't want to overreact to anything. All I just want to say is that it was enjoyable to have real baseball back finally, other than the WBC, which was great. It's nice to have it back, and today's a huge day over at Citi Field.

215.373 - 215.854 Al Dukes

That's right.

216.174 - 224.348 Unknown

I love the opening day. I mean, in Pittsburgh, actually. Well, no, it's here. I drove past the signs yesterday.

224.489 - 239.895 Al Dukes

It is here, and I was going to say, I always love when we have the home openers and doing a morning show because inevitably at least one or two people that are driving to the parking lot early to tailgate will call in and they'll be all fired up, and it's about as happy as you get.

Chapter 5: What were the criticisms of the Netflix broadcast during the game?

268.542 - 290.286 Al Dukes

No one ever likes anything that is new. I guess the only question I would have is, you know – It's really a one-off. It is for Netflix, but – And they're pumping all their shows. They're doing all their things. And obviously, you know, with Wednesday on Netflix, that's where the thing, you know, first pitch thing comes in and the WWE presence because they've got WWE.

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290.306 - 303.16 Al Dukes

Like, this has been going on for years and years and years. I mean, Jim Nance has been reading promos for CBS shows and the Masters and the March Madness and NFL games since he started in the 70s.

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303.14 - 322.161 Unknown

You know, that was one thing that I wasn't prepared for when I took the Monday night job at ABC. All the reads? The amount of promos that Al Michaels had to do during the broadcast for upcoming shows in prime time for the network was just unbelievable. It is basically – and football in general –

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322.141 - 344.49 Unknown

Football more so than baseball, but football in general on the national broadcast networks has always been a promotional tool for whatever else is coming up. How many times did we promote, even on the NFL today, you know, 60 Minutes, what's coming up later on on 60 Minutes? It was just a constant pounding of promos for everything that was happening on the network.

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344.59 - 355.604 Unknown

So, I mean, Netflix took it and put it on steroids last night. Sure. They had people there that have been all over Netflix. They were promoting all their shows. It got a little much.

356.305 - 377.19 Al Dukes

Certainly, it was a little much. They had the Red Boats out in McCovey Cove. They had all that stuff. Netflix has gotten into sports in a big way. They're probably going to see what the returns were for this game if they want to spend more money on Major League Baseball in the future. The one thing that

377.17 - 393.685 Al Dukes

that I guess I would ask if I were someone who was a part of major league baseball or a part of net more major league baseball, who's trying to capture a younger fan or trying to get more attention towards the game. Like, you know, the, the bad bunny halftime show, I came in the next day. I was like, listen, it's not for me. I'm not a bad bunny fan.

Chapter 6: What does the guest think about the new ABS system in baseball?

394.125 - 414.809 Al Dukes

You know, I'm not a young Puerto Rican in America where this made, you know, a lot of sense to me. All right. That's fine. But I can respect the fact that this guy's had a great career, had a good performance and it meant a lot to a lot of people. Right. So I can understand who it was for and people who love his music. What I don't understand is what all of this last night, who was that for?

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415.39 - 439.429 Al Dukes

Like the WWE guy coming out, one of the tag team guys just says, yeet. He goes out there, he's like, let's go, yeet. He says this on the field. All right, who's that for? Like Bert Kreischer coming out and screaming to the crowd. Who's that for? I mean, it's fine. It's entertainment. But the two cars and then the dancers and the trolley car and all that music when the guys are coming out.

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439.449 - 452.028 Unknown

You know who it's for? Who's that for? It's for the people who don't have Netflix. That's who that's for. Not the people who have Netflix. Well, what do you mean? Meaning that... What they're doing is promoting the things that are on their streaming service.

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452.048 - 463.781 Unknown

So if you do not have Netflix and for some reason maybe you got it for this game or you got to see everything that they have to offer, essentially. So they're trying to sign up more people.

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463.982 - 467.846 Al Dukes

I know, but that doesn't get that job done.

468.647 - 480.749 Unknown

But again, they have a very... a short period of time to promote everything that they have on their streaming service. So I think that's why they did what they did and the way they did it.

Chapter 7: How did Jazz Chisholm's comments impact the discussion about stealing signs?

481.29 - 486.22 Unknown

And it was just over the top. I mean, it was just ridiculous. It was in your face everywhere.

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486.2 - 506.922 Al Dukes

Yeah, which I don't get as bothered by it. I'm more interested in the conversation about the people behind the scenes. What are you trying to do or trying to accomplish with this? So you gave me an answer with Netflix. All right, so Netflix is going to put everybody out there, going to try to promote their product. We've seen that.

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506.962 - 512.673 Al Dukes

I just talked about how that's been going on for years and years. That's nothing new. I'm talking about from a Major League Baseball standpoint.

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512.693 - 518.626 Unknown

I'll tell you what they're doing. They're trying to get as much money as they possibly can for their product, exactly what the NFL has done for years.

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518.646 - 521.151 Al Dukes

So that's it. So basically, there's the answer.

521.131 - 531.802 Unknown

So they're not really trying to grow the game or find a younger fan. They're trying to grow the worth of each MLB team by adding more money to the kitty that they all share.

532.023 - 536.355 Al Dukes

Right, which in turn could be turning off their core fan base.

536.96 - 559.896 Unknown

It could, yes. I don't think that they think that way. I think they're just thinking about being partners with as many different providers as they possibly can to make as much money as they can. It's a dangerous game to play if you're baseball. I've always told you this. The NFL does it better than anybody. So for years, you've had Fox and CBS doing Sunday afternoon and Thanksgiving.

559.876 - 575.359 Unknown

And then when we get to Sunday afternoon, the NFL packages what Fox and CBS does, and they sell it to YouTube. Prior to YouTube, it was DirecTV. So think about that for a second. The NFL has money coming in from Fox and from CBS.

Chapter 8: What are the expectations for the Mets' home opener following the Yankees' win?

575.659 - 593.748 Unknown

They're producing the games. They make Fox and CBS wrap those games up, and then they're going to bundle that, and they're going to sell it to YouTube TV, and then we... as fans are going to buy it from YouTube TV so we can watch whatever game we want to watch in the Sunday ticket package.

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593.808 - 616.526 Unknown

Think about the brilliance of that from the NFL side in terms of making money for the 32 teams that are participating in the league. And I think that's what Major League Baseball is trying to do. They're trying to expand their footprint in these streaming services, in these networks, in these different apps. That's what their job is. That's what the commissioner's job is.

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617.067 - 634.582 Al Dukes

I know, but I also think you have to have people that are interested in the game to do any of this. That's really my point. And it's like you have this, are you going to go to the short term, I'm going to grab this money and let Netflix completely take over our sport on our biggest day in the spring?

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634.602 - 641.25 Al Dukes

Or are we going to actually try to do something to get more fans involved so the sport doesn't die on the vine?

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643.255 - 662.783 Evan Roberts

It's a day of excitement. Welcome to Evan and Tiki. I think when it comes to the Yankee game, no one actually wants to talk about how Max Fried was awesome into the seventh inning and escaped his one crisis moment in the first. No one wants to talk about how the bottom of the order was electric when they were jumping on first pitches from Logan Webb.

663.083 - 677.589 Evan Roberts

No one even wants to crap on Aaron Judge, who struck out four times last night. It seems like the biggest response to last night's Yankee victory Was Netflix. Am I reading the room wrong on that one?

677.629 - 696.412 Unknown

No, you are dead on it. Dead on it. The broadcast was disjointed. It was full. What did you call it? A mob cast in our text? That was not me. I cannot take credit for that. Somebody called it that. It was just, God, there's so much going on that they're missing what's actually going on. And that was my biggest issue with him.

696.953 - 715.579 Unknown

What was it, the fifth inning or sixth inning when Cody Bellinger came back with a hit and they're just getting out of commercial and they're like, oh, you know, Cody Bellinger with a drive to right field. And it's like, dude, show me the game. You see the guy on the mound getting ready to pitch. Come back. Yes. Who cares?

715.639 - 736.496 Unknown

You got to show an Intuit commercial or whatever the heck they were showing at that time. And that was just... Part of it, the entire broadcast. It was just little misses. They have this scheme that they work up from a ball coming into the ballpark and a guy in the stand catches it and he's like, oh, this is cool. And then they show the close-up on the ball, but it's blurred.

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