Cardinals TV analyst Mark Sweeney joins the show to preview the Cubs' upcoming series

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Rahimi & Grote Show 14 min 4 speakers 5 chapters transcribed 1 month ago

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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?

Rahimi Harrison-Grody 0:00

Rahimi Harrison-Grody. We are family here. We are family. Middays 10-2 on 104.3 The Score. Swing, fly ball, hit in the air toward left. Blede and Myers converge. It's Blede with a last-minute stab. And in extra innings, the Cincinnati Reds take two out of three. They beat the Cardinals Sunday 5-3 final.

Vinny Rotino 0:29

That is courtesy of Cardinals TV. This is Rahimi Harrison-Grody on 104.3 The Score, and we go out to our hotline and also to Twitch, twitch.tv slash thescorechicago, and bring in a friend of the show, somebody who I am proud to say that I worked alongside, Mark Sweeney. He is at SwingDog9 on X, Cardinals TV pregame and postgame analyst, and the last time we talked to him, he was getting ready for his son's promotion. in school. So congratulations again to Gavin. Sweens, how are you today?

Mark Sweeney 1:02

Layla, thank you. And thank you for that memory. It was a huge promotion. But yeah, he's moving onward and upward to a freshman in high school. So I'm excited for that.

Vinny Rotino 1:11

That I cannot believe and is disturbing because I remember when he was a teeny, teeny kiddo. In the meantime, we were trying to figure out, Mark, we've just been doing some reading during the break. Do you know who's starting tonight for the Cardinals?

Mark Grote 1:26

Liberatore or what?

1:27

Yeah.

Mark Sweeney 1:28

I haven't heard yet, and they've had 20 games in 20 days, so they're trying to get creative. They've tried to keep Hunter Dobbins, who they used as an extra guy to push the pitching staff back a little bit, because they try to do that. They try to give them different times where I think every organization tries to get creative. They always say the six-man rotation thing. But they're in that midst of 20 games in 20 days, and I think they have to just try to get creative out of the All-Star break.

Mark Grote 2:00

Yeah, and speaking of the All-Star break, the Redbirds have lost three straight series after winning three of their previous four series heading into the All-Star break. What's been going on?

Who is Mark Sweeney and why is he joining the show to preview the Cubs series?

Mark Grote 2:16

Are they just fatigued at this point with, as you said, in the midst of the 20 games in 20 days?

Mark Sweeney 2:21

Yeah, it's hard to say they're fatigued when they're this young, their youngest roster in baseball. So I think you got to be careful how you say that. Mentally fatigued and challenged with 162 game season, for sure. I think that happens to a lot of people. I think it really comes down to the offense hasn't been getting a lot of slug. It's hard to string hits around. I don't care who you are in the game of baseball. It's very difficult to single teams to death they've done a better job with runners in scoring position but they're not getting enough slug they're not getting enough home runs and when they don't get that it's very difficult puts a lot of pressure on the pitching staff it's a culmination of things they had two walk-off losses in a row one in arizona and one to start the angel series in anaheim

Mark Sweeney 3:14

Those things hurt. If you win both of those games, I think you're feeling a little bit different. You're right around 500, but they haven't played and they haven't won those close games in the second half.

Vinny Rotino 3:25

Yeah, Mark, the numbers speak for themselves. I'm looking at after July 2nd and 3rd, the Cardinals now rank in the bottom third of Major League Baseball and run scored since that period. Last in batting average at 204. On base percentage is just 273. And slacking percentage is 309. Now listen, you saw it when the Cubs and Cardinals met up the last time in St. Louis. The Cubs have also had their fair share of offensive slocks. I mean, they had a bad month of May. So I feel like this is something that is taking teams down more often than we realize these days.

Mark Sweeney 4:00

Yeah, Leila, I mean, all those numbers are ugly and you go through those times and everyone understands when you slump and you slump collectively, it's very difficult to win consistently at this level. That's the reason why you see a lot of the National League teams are sitting right around 500. There's a lot of intrigue in the wildcard race. If you're not playing inspired baseball, you're not winning series. I think it's going to be very difficult to gain ground.