Boomer & Gio
Hour 1 - Yanks Opening Day Preview, Knicks Beat Pelicans, Levonte David Retires
25 Mar 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
It's the Boomer and Geo podcast from WFAN. And we're coming to you live from the Built Forward Tough Studio. Boomer Esaias and Greg Giannotti. It's Boomer and Geo on the fan. Cybercast across the country on CBS Sports Network. And where we are, the free Odyssey app. Good Wednesday morning, the morning of opening night for Major League Baseball and the New York Yankees.
You, of course, can listen to the game right here on the fan. It will be on Netflix for the first time ever. And the Yankees, the phrase all offseason has been running it back. And this is as close to running it back as you could possibly run it back. There's three games. Guys who were not on the roster last year starting on this opening day roster. That is it.
And they're not all that much of impact players. I mean, hopefully they all become impact players. But you're talking about Ryan Weathers, the trade that they made.
Chapter 2: What are the key highlights of the Yankees' opening day matchup?
You're talking about Cade Winquest in the bullpen. You're talking about veteran outfielder off the bench, Randall Gritchuk. After that... The Yankees are the same Yankees. And that doesn't mean that they can't go win the division. That doesn't mean that they can't go win the World Series.
But they're going to have to get exceptional pitching from the guys that are coming back from injury in Garrett Cole and Carlos Rodon. That has to happen along with Max Fried and Cam Schlittler. But here we go. So much baseball ahead of us. Good morning, Boomer.
How are you?
Yeah, a lot of baseball ahead of us for sure. You know, and the good thing for the Yankees is that yesterday Garrett Cole looked pretty good. You know, I wanted to see what it looked like, and then I wanted to listen to him after the game.
And, you know, he's talking about coming back from this injury, and he's trying to, you know, temper everybody's enthusiasm because he hit about 96 on the gun yesterday. And, you know, he did give up a home run. But the point being is that I was thinking myself as a guy who made a living throwing the football.
and throwing every single day, how difficult it is for these guys to come back from Tommy John surgery and the things that they have to go through and the lonely days that basically has gotten Garrett Colt to where he is right now. And, yeah, you know, you're excited. You see him throwing 96, and you're saying, you know, why isn't he on the team? Why isn't he on the roster right now?
Well, I mean, you know, your body takes time to heal, and it's not just physically heal. He's got to mentally heal. He's got to feel really confident that he can go out there and give an 85-pitch performance with all of his arsenal of pitches. And he's got to be able to let it go mentally. And I don't necessarily know he's there yet. I don't feel like he's there yet.
I feel like he's getting close. And it's probably going to be mid-May. You know, again, that is going to be a shot in the arm when you get your ace back, and then all of a sudden they become the healthy pitching staff that I think Brian Cashman thought they would be when he added Max Freed, and away you go. So they should have one of the top pitching staffs, let's say, starting in June.
If they're all healthy, if they're all here and Gary Cole doesn't have any setbacks between now and when he does come back. And I would say that, again, you want to be really, really careful with this, especially at his age. That's the other aspect of it. And I give him a lot of credit. I give all these guys a lot of credit that come back from it because I –
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Chapter 3: How does Gerrit Cole's performance impact the Yankees' season?
That's what you're going to see for those four guys. And at the top of that rotation, it's got all the potential in the world. Right. And then hopefully those four guys make it through and everything's fine. And then all of a sudden you have, you know, the reinforcements coming behind them. And then that's when maybe the Yankee season takes off. But, yeah, it is.
Look, we talked to Nick Swisher yesterday. It is that the narrative is they're running it back. They don't have they didn't change much. You have the same shortstop. You're going to have essentially. That was the biggest surprise to me. Really? The offseason, that was the biggest one. Look at how much money they're spending.
No, I know, but I just... For them to go out and get a brand new shortstop, they would have had to make a major move. And it would have had to been something that would have been earth-shattering in terms of the contract and possibly putting them over the luxury tax. So I'm not surprised. I'm actually, you know, I've told you, I've...
So since I'm not a Yankee fan, I will say I've always liked Anthony Volpe, and I know that there are people out there that can't deal with it, but I thought he got better once they set the defense better. When they made the trade for Ryan McMahon, it settled third base, and it put Jazz Chisholm back to second. So that was fine.
I mean, all of a sudden, he played better defensively under those circumstances. There's nothing worse, I would think, as an athlete. I don't care what sport you're playing. If you're on the ice, you're on the court, you're on the field.
the guys next to you, you got to trust, you got to believe in, and you got to believe that they're going to make the plays that they they're required to make, as opposed to thinking that the guy next to you is got a problem or has an issue. And then you have to cover for that guy. And that's just a mental thing that just happens naturally within the body of a game and a body of a team.
So now, you know, they, they, they make the trade for Ryan McMahon. And all of a sudden they said, Anthony Volpe, look, man, we got a top end third baseman here. Don't worry about it. And he could just relax and he doesn't have to feel like he's got to make every single play. And when you have a second baseman who's more comfortable over there, everything seems to fall into place.
And he played better defensively the second half of the season. I'm not going to sit here and argue whether or not he's a great hitter or he's trying to hit too many home runs. I mean, we all see what we see when he's up at the plate. But there are moments where he's one of the reasons why they win games. Yeah, you can't say that the Yankees don't give these guys opportunities.
We have seen it so much through the years. They give them more rope than just about any organization in Major League Baseball. And you would think it would be the opposite because it's the New York Yankees. But when you're on your rookie contract, if you're one of these young guys that they projected into the future as being a starter, they're going to give you multiple years to figure it out.
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