Autograph stories and listener mail

Hey everybody, it's good to be back on the Terry Talking podcast. I'm David Campbell, your host Terry Pluto is here. We took a couple of weeks off for summer. Terry, you were in Wyoming, which I know I love to go to and you and Roberta do a lot of hiking out there and I was off last week and I was painting . You were on the west side, weren't you? Yeah, it's a lot of you painted the west side . I did. I painted the well, I didn't paint the town, but I painted my living room. So that was good to have done . So we're back and we're excited. We're going to get into some stuff about everything happening in sports. And a lot of it has to do with the calves last night. I guess we can start with them. And I know you want to talk about some maybe help for the Guardians if there is any of the miners . So we'll get into that and we've got some more great autograph stories so we'll do all that. Anyway, I thought we'd start with the draft and the calves and there's a lot going on here, Terry. Last night the cavs in the draft. They had the number twenty nine pick and they waited and waited and wait till they came around. And then they took Alex Caraban of Ukon, you know, one of the most accomplished players inkon Y huistory, which is saying something . From what Chris Fiedor was reporting, the cavs didn't really like much of what was available at that spot. So they traded Cariban to the Kings and they dropped down to number thirty four, which will be tonight and they also get a future second round pick and Chris reported that that second rounder is very distant in the very distant future. I think was planet far far away, I think is more likely . Yeah. So anyway I have a thought before we go. This is interesting to me how I watched the NBA and how they operate for a while it seemed like could care less about second round picks. Didn't want them, you know, they would trade seventeen second round picks as part of a deal. Who cares ? But all of a sudden and maybe this is a product of the apron or whatever , teams are saying, you know , I think I'll get a second round pick or I might actually care about it because the second round pick, you can give it a non guaranteed contract where in the first round they're all guaranteed. So that's an that was , I think, a slight change . And I know I'm sure the cast figured well, we go down five picks, we could probably get somebody. They didn't want to guarantee that guy three million dollars this year because the calves are right now four point five million dollars over the dreaded second apron and it isn't just a matter of paying luxury tax and so on. It has to do with the limits. Yes, it has made some trades last year, but they weren't the type of trades they would have liked to have made. They were kind of limited on having to match salary straight up, all this kind of stuff. And so that's that's what was going on, but I 've not I heard that mention other places. Well, you know, seconds around picks now have gained a little value. It's like it's like you had a dollar and a half in your hand. It has always been a dollar and a half. That's what it is . But now it's like, I like having it as opposed to like, I don't care here you take it. Yeah, you know, it is it does seem like it's all about flexibility, right? Terry. Like it's you can throw it in as a sweetener and a trade and like you said if you draft the first rounder, they get a guaranteed contract with worth millions. If you draft if you draft somebody early in the second round like the cavs will be doing tonight. Apparently it's flexibility and it's like you can sign him to and I think Chris had a lot of this in his story, but you can sign him to a two way deal. You can sign a partially guaranteed deal. You can you can there's a lot of different ways you can go about it and you're not kind of stuck with it. And as you pointed out, every dollar they spend , they have to pay a tax on because they'll be in the luxury taxes they say. I also want to mention this, David. And maybe it's because I have sort of an old view of kind of a team assembling and that. This is we should talk about the Watson tariff and that was way before the current president came in. I coined that turn back in twenty two with all the draft picks that were traded. Well, this is the apron tariff . I mean, normally you would like to take a guy at twenty nine or down at the bottom of the first round because he's locked up for two years and if he ends up being a pretty good player. Like say for example, Jayland Tyson who was a twenty fifth pick a couple years ago, you got him under team control for several years not that much money . But now it's like every , you know, every million or whatever counts because of the apron thing. And this is a price you should pay because they could say, well, you know, I don't like this guy or that guy, but I mean now I look back I wasted about seven hours of my life looking at tapes of guys that would go from like number twenty to number forty. Mike Fratello was helping me something too with those former CAPS coach. We were having a good time playing player personnel . Now one of our guys that we do like Henry Visar, Visar, he's a six hundred eleven kid from North Carolina , big guy could make some threes , hustle player. He's still available and another guy of interest is Isaac Evans. And maybe they have their eyes on those two guys because Evans is a three point shooter and this other guy there and they thought well, you know, we're drafting my thirty four and so Odds are maybe one of those two would be available. So perhaps they handicapped it like that. But my feeling always is if I'm drafting the bottom of the first round and I think this guy could be a role player for me right away , I'd like to get him. I don't want to wait to see what happens in the second round because I'll tell you the dumbest thing that's ever said in drafting and you hear this. Well, if all three of these guys are about equal, then I'll just wait to see who's left over. There's never a draft where you have three people where they're all equal . At least they're not all equal to you . A certain skill may be more valuable to your team versus another team. So you know what that is? That's a throwaway line that people say. Fact, we could put that on a list of cliches like running downhill right boy there's some downhill there was some real downhill going on in an NBA draft. Guys are going downhill all the time there . All right , well this might be a good time to do like a state of the Union on the camp series. And we can start here with an email from Bill Maris from Medina, longtime listener. And Bill sent us a couple weeks ago and I wanted to save it because there's an interesting topic here with James Harden and then we can kind of see how the rest of the roster fits around Bill's questions. So greetings guys you, so than much fork the podcast. I anticipate and enjoy it every week. Thanks, Bill. Watching the cavs destruct in round two with the slowness of James Harden very apparent. I can't help but wonder what would happen if a younger, faster , more productive point guard , what it would look like next to Donovan Mitchell. It just seems like Mitchell has had to support and sometimes drag along his running mate Garland Harden as opposed to someone who compliments him and really adds to the offense. He's got to be getting tired of carrying the male constantly. How about moving hard and if that seems it seems that if this part of the ongoing problem isn't solved, the cavs may just continue to struggle to get to the finals. What are your thoughts? Well thanks . I said, Oh, because good luck with that moving harden, but generally, generally I agree with that. So all right, so Harden's contract is a forty two million dollars player option for next year , which he 'll pick up you think that might change, but only thirteen million of is guaranteed, right? So anyway, tell us about Harden's contract and then we can kind of look at the rest of the roster. All right, so Harden's contract was that. He had a no trade cl.ause He went into the clippers at midseason. Fourth time in six years he asked for a trade . That has to be a record for me. I mean, four times in six years . Anyway, what he wanted them to do was to guarantee the forty two million for this year and also give them a contract for this says twenty six twenty seven twenty eight fully guaranteed. They said no we're not. Well then, I ain't planned back and forth they went . Meanwhile , they were calling around about Harden and the cast were calling around trying to see if anybody would want Darius Scarlet because of his fully guaranteed contract, right around that forty two million or whatever it is Mark for the next few years and Garland with all his toes. So the cavs had a younger quicker guard, but he still wasn't any good in the playoffs either for them . So that's the problem . So in general, the diagnosis is correct, but they are stuck with James Hard and they made him some sort of verbal agreement or he would not be here . Because remember, he is not afraid to sit out . Now exactly what it is, I don't know lately at first I heard they're guaranteed they were going to guarantee the forty two million and partially guarantee a contract for twenty seven twenty eight . But lately I've been hearing something like seventy million for two years . By the way, he's thirty seven . And he was exposed by I'm sorry, who was it that sent the email because Bill's right on the right on the money. He was exposed the lack of athleticism and that not just by the knicks , but really through the whole rounds of playoffs. Everybody that they play. Toronto did it to them . And he was , you know, he looked he looked kind of clunky and old at times . Now what he did actually help them and I nobody ever accused James Harden being that particularly good of a defensive player, but it was better in Garwin and you didn't see them picking on hard ened as much defensively like others. So that was a plus . But so you look at the payroll, you got two guys making fifty million Mobile and Donovan Mitchell right now harden's in there at forty two. So they could probably if they do rework that contract, that would knock it down so you have next year Jared Allen goes into his new contract extension , which is twenty eight million, thirty million and thirty two million . Kind of high , but I would argue that the way the NBA is now, I think the average salary is about fourteen million dollars or something . You know, I'll take Jared Allen at that. Then I have two guys that are called I call them right now the salary captureers . That's sixteen million for Struce and fourteen point five for Schroeder . So one of those guys if they could move would kind of we're, just trying to get them under the apron so they have more flexibility . And the problem there if we're talking about you going, yeah, but what makes the team better? How do you make the team better? It's a good question because we're talking about cutting. See, a lot of these teams made these tough decisions a year ago. The Celtics whacked a bunch of guys. Remember they got rid of Persinus and a couple of others that they did not want to go into this apron thing. The caves are the only ones who did it. And you go back and you look at it, you realize they did it with for Deandre Hunter and there's a couple other but that was a big contract that they took on . So there you are . Free agents by the way, unrestricted free agents. A guy that I like, Keenon Ellis . And then you have and you have Wade and Larry Nash Junior I who don't know if he'll play anym ore and Bryant . So those are their four unrestricted free agents . I happen to see Chris Fedor sent a thing out to our subtext subscribers the other day you want. to If check that out go to, Glen. com slash cabs. And there's a blue bar at the top and Chris and Ethan Sansar Cab orters and Jimmy Watkins all text people every day. But there's a lot of interest around the league and Dean Wade , apparently . He's a great locker room guy. He's big, he can defend and a lot of teams would love to have somebody like him. So I think if you were to ask Chris, he would say that somebody might want to watch as, you know , somebody who might not be back next year. So yeah, very interesting. Yeah, I mean, wait wait wait Wait got a lot of value. I actually think Bryant on a cheap contract brings a lot of value too . And we'll see how that goes . By the way, Chris, congrats to Chris because he called me and he says, Are you hearing that the calves might just trade the pick? They don't want to make it. I'm hearing this because we have kind of different sources, both of us. It's a classic generational thing where I'm seventy one, I did the NBA way back when he's doing it now . So I cross checked and I was not able to find anything one way or the other than some people said that makes some sense, but he nailed it. You know, he had it out, had it first. And believe me, I was surprised because I did not hear one word about that in the calls I was making up until draft day when we were talking about different players with different NBA people absolutely. Yeah, I mean, he's all over everything is a great and I'm tough on basketball writers because I was one at the Beacon Journal. That's right. And I am. And you know, Brian Winherst was my protege. Of course, he's now way in passing, but we did two books together . We work together first at the Beacon and then at the PD and Chris and Chris belongs right up there , you know, Wendy's farther along in his life and his career than Chris is, but they've both got the right stuff going . Well said. Okay, so I need to ask you the big question here, Terry . Jimmy Watkins, our colleague who I just mentioned, had a column yesterday and he his take is the calves need to do something big and drastic this season and we saw the move yesterday with Yanis and the Yanis trade, Yanis and Bobby Portus going to the Miami Heat for Tyler Harrell. Let me make sure I got all these right. Himij . My guy love Jaques. Yeah, I love Jaquez. He's one of my guy. fifteen points off the bench , he's good assist, good rebound. I'm sorry, does he have these guys that I kind of like and he's one of them, you know, hero can score and spark. There's another big guy. I think his name is Ware. Cole Wear and Casperus Yak onas is also part of the deal. And the bucks also got the number thirteen pick last night . And there's going to be a first round pick swap in twenty thirty, a first round pick in twenty thirty one .. Yeah, right Well forget all the thirty stuff thirty one thirty one in thirty three and a second rounder in twenty thirty three. So when you don't need a second rounder in thirty three gives them flexibility. No, but here's what I anyway here,'s my question Terry do the cavs . I mean, we're talking about trading one of the one of the core four Jared Allen or something like do you do you think do like what Kobe Altman is saying right now in terms of we're going to let these guys develop together and take a run at this for the next couple of years or do they need do you agree with more with what Jimmy is saying that they need to make a bold drastic move to get this thing over the hump or end on that? They would argue and I would tend to agree that one of the moves was made already. They got rid of Garland . They broke up the Corps four . So they did that. Of course, the problem is now you've taken on hard ened. But I want to talk first about the Yanest trade. Well, I don't think Cleveland could have been a player in this. Okay . I was told by somebody high up that , you know, Jimmy Haslim, by the way, is emerged as the main owner over there with the bucks that he was interested , not just him but also their new coach Taylor Jenkins. By the way, hired a very good coach, former Memphis coach, Jenkins is a very good coach . They were very interested in doing a deal similar to what the Browns did for Miles Garrett. In other words, get some young guys now not just draft picks that you think can turn around and be pretty good and then also the picks. So their mind and I think this is correct. I mentioned Yaques who I like a lot Hero , those guys, I mean, if they were in this last draft, they'd gone in the first round. They're still relative ly young , you know, where borderline first round or second . And then they got the picks. See , I don't know who the calves had that would have fallen into that category other than maybe Tyson , you know, I'm looking at Younger there and possibly Merrill , but so that's what they wanted to do. That's why they did also didn't take the trade with Boston for Jon Brown . Brown was obviously an elite player, but there was two unprotected picks, but they weren't getting they felt they had they felt they really had to redo the roster get, younger, better, all that . And Yanis was the way to bring this in. So in their mind, they were looking for young guys who would like be first round picks in this draft only got a track record with them and then the picks also. So that's why they went to Miami and that's why I think Cleveland was not in that discussion whatsoever . So it's an interesting approach taken by them and we'll see how it works out. Utah sort of tried something similar to that when they traded with the calfs for Donovan Mitchell , if you remember, they got Colin Sexton in that deal, they got a bag who was the number one pick , and they picked up some other player kind of who didn't work out so well along with the picks . And it just didn't, you know, didn't really go for them. In fact, here's an interesting stat. Since the Donovan Mitchell trade was made, the calves had the third best regular season record in the NBA there since twenty two. Utah who also traded Ruby Go Rudy Go Bear. They got twelve thousand first round picks and everything else . And I mean, they did. It's like seven or eight between all those trades and they're still they had the third worst record in the NBA since twenty two . So that's why I think I always like how the trends are moving. I think that's why some of these team s are going, I'd rather take a guy who's in his second or third year who I like already in the NBA . It's almost like the transfer portal . The Jared Versus principle as it's known, right? You get a guy who's a proven commodity and instead taking a chance on a draft basis. Right. And also that with upside, the age, all that. Right. Okay. All right, so it sounds like what you're saying is you think that staying the course here and betting on internal development is enough to get the case I don't know. I mean, you could maybe trade Struce, he's got his expiring contract. Somebody might want that. The problem is I don't see who you trade. I mean people want to trade Jared Allen all the time. By the way, you're not anywhere near the Eastern Conference Finals without Jared Allen . He had two great games, game sevens . And the problem with trade now and is, you know, Mobile gets hurt. You got nobody. You have no size, you got nothing . And he even though it sounds like a lot of money in the NBA is kind of like, oh, that's above average, but that's not bad for that kind of player. You know, I don't know what else. You know, look at these numbers now. I don't write down millions. I just write down the two digits forty two, twenty eight , fifty because my mind get wrapped I guess twenty eight bucks, forty two dollars . My mind handles that better . It's like fantasy money. Yes. Keep it, just keep it simple. So all right . By the way, Jay Jaywen Brown's contract , fifty seven million , sixty one million , sixty four million . Yeah, and Trey Young just signed a huge deal this week and he can't guard anybody . Yeah . Well, that's the modern day NBA. Everybody wants to keep their guys it's very hard to find people who can do what these guys do. And so they're getting premium money and that's where we're at. So all right, anything else on the cab story you want to get into? No, I think that'll be curious to see what they try to do, but I guess what I'm saying is they're limited in what they can make some interesting maybe secondary moves that I don't see them making a big one but yeah I mean they'd have to give up I mean Evan Mobile is the is the guy that's the guy yeah that's the guy that would have to go if you're gonna do something I. mean for, all the sometimes frustrations about Moby, whatever, Moby's a really good player. He's a boyer line all star . He's not this, you know, for a while the cavs are talking about future Hall of Famer and all this. They need they should have dialed that down from the beginning . But he's a good player . And also he's about the right stuff. By that, I mean he's unselfish . He'll defend . You never hear a negative word about him . That stuff's important in the NBA. I mean, what when you looked at the Knicks and those comebacks and things they made , that was a together team and it was actually together team the year before with Tibeto where they got to the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time in like twenty some years . And you know, they got all those guys from Villanova , with Brunson and with oh my goodness Bridges and Josh Hart playing championship teams in Villanova. That was by design, by the way, not just Villanova, but we want these winning guys and then they put Carl Anthony Towns who's been a little bit iffy some point in Minnesota. He just blended right in with that culture thing . You know, the culture doesn't necessarily guarantee a title, but a good culture guarantees you, I think that you're in the playoffs and you're a you're a viable team. I mean, the cats are a viable team , but it's hard to go from viable and pretty good to great . Well, and I think the knicks are what Kobe Altman looked at a year. I mean, everybody forgets the Nicks didn't do it last year and it was like, oh, this team the Knicks are never going to do it. They don't have what it takes and they stayed the course, you know, for the most part and it worked out the next year. So I think the Knicks maybe have provided the lines too . So the Knicks lost an eastern conference finals last year. They went this year. The previous year , the Indiana lost in the conference finals and then in twenty twenty five, remember they went to the NBA finals . So it's not always, but of recent, there's kind of a rite of passage there . But like when you'll tell you this though, when you have hard and the clock's ticking on this guy, he's going to be thirty seven. And it's like the people that want to bring in LeBron, okay, let's throw forty one year old in there with a thirty seven I mean, really is that and that's so we'll see. I think what Bronze going back to the Lakers anyway, but yeah, I would say so and I don't think we should expect anything drastic. I mean, this the vibe we're getting from this front office is that they believe in the guys they have and they're going to try and do what the Knicks did. So all right, let's take a break here, Terry . And we come back, we've got an email with an idea about what the guardian should do with one of their infield spots. I wanted to run that past you. And then I know that you're looking for some minor league help offensive after the june thirteenth. I think Poinsey called it a lightning strike that man just decimated the team. So all right, we'll get into that and more when we return on Terry's talking . All right, we're back on Terry's talking. I did want to mention Terry's newsletter, which was a great read today. Well, it's coming out in half an hour at noon every Wednesday it comes out. I know you got a lot of great stuff in there about the SORSBE situation this week, Terry, which we're actually going to talk about in a minute. Go to cleveland. com slash pluto, go to the blue bar at the top, and you can subscribe to get Terry's newsletter. I think you get two weeks as a free trial, but miss the other big plug Thursday night. Oh yeah , Barnes and Noble in Aurora six hundred and thirty and Dave, you know, if you go and you don't like it , you can get a f ull refund . Don't even double your money back that you paid to get through the door at the Barnes and Noble Money back guarantee. Yeah, you Barnes and Noble and Aurora Thursday night six hundred thirty brand new Barnes and Noble Store, so I'm anxious to see it. I heard a friend of mine did an event there and she told me it was really, really nice. So it's kind of cool to see Terry like, it seems like book sters are having a moment here and I know Barnes and Noble shut down a lot of locations and now it seems like they're starting to come back and they're opening yeah . People seem like they're looking for a place to go to hang out and talk about books and and be with people with all this AI stuff that's going on in our world. That's really great to see. And so I'm glad to see Barnes and Noble is kind of starting to expand their loc ations and really give people a place to go. So all right, the Guardians are forty one and thirty nine. They're playing five to five baseball and they are now in second place one game behind the White Sox . I was mentioning Hoynesy called it the june thirteenth lightning strike and man we haven't podcasted since then but just to recap the Guardians lost Jose Ramirez Angel Martinez and Chase Delauder all within I think five innings to broken bones and they've been having trouble scoring runs I guess we can just kind of talk about maybe what they could do here Terry last night they got off to a nice start like Stephen Kuan doubled and they they knew Parker Messik was pitching and they they sacrificed early last night to push the guys over to second and third and they couldn't get him in and like they're trying to play small ball because they know that's maybe the way they need to win some games here is really lean on their starting bitching and and get a few runs up early, but like it just has not been working lately . What do you see from the Guardians? And do you see anywhere they can turn here to kind of get a little more juice in the offense with all these guys out? Well, let's talk big picture. First of all, there are eleven and fourteen in one run games . Okay Okay I went back from twenty one on twenty doesn't count, but the two years that they had a losing record in one run games that was twenty one and twenty twenty three. They did not win the division . You know, like they were four games under actually both of those years . But like last year they were they were they were six over five hundred the year before they were ten over a year now another one of those years eleven over and there were records like twenty eight and seventeen one run games. They win those one run games. That's how they got to play because they don't hit a ton of runs. They're going to play a lot of close games and they got to win. They're not doing it this year . And part of the reason sometimes they've had a couple bullpin belt blow ups, but really they just don't score . I mean, that you get right down to it . By the way, I cannot watch Stewart Fairchild anymore. I mean, fourteen strikeouts and nineteen at bats . It's just it's really rough you bring ing him up. But to a point I also wanted to make is this . So you go, well, let's go down to triple A , but you know what? Fairchild was doing a triple A . He was sitting two hundred and eighty nine with an eight ninety six OPS, which is terrific. Anything above seven hundred and fifty is really good . And he had five home runs . There's a big gap between AA and the Big Leagues . And so they brought him up and, you know, he just he looks hopeless . So that's they got to find some help somewhere, but all right. So I went to the miners , looked at it . And I mean the problem is the prospects actually are here That being, you know, Bizana's here . De lawater's here, but he's hurt. They just brought up Colil Watson who had hit twelve home runs down there . And sometimes look at your prospects and then guys like I like Ralphie Alvelles was , but he was hitting three hundred and seventeen at Akron this year and then he went up to up to he's gone up to Columbus Columbus and he sit I wish I could read my writing. He's in two hundred and fifty five. He's got one home run it's just not been good , you know, he's he's struggled Bon Aware by the way he's sitting two hundred and thirty seven down there. He's got four home runs, but you know, if you want to go down that road again , you know, this would have been a good time for CJ Kfis to show something , but he's not. He's sitting two hundred thir andty three with a six hundred forty seven OPS and ooh, ouch, one home run one hundred and sixty plate appearances . So you could talk about Cooper English who's a catcher . He's hitting two hundred and eighty nine, nine seventy eight OPS, twelve homers . The problem is you got the catchers here and he's played a grand total, they're played in the alfield played a grand total of six games in the alfield in his pro career. He played a little bit in college , but at Clemson , by the way, can't blame the catchers . Can't blame the catchers ? Patrick Bailey. This time. Yep. Patrick Bailey , Austin Hedges combined hit like two hundred fifty and five or a six hundred eighty six eighty OPS and the month of June where nobody's hitting except pretty much the catchers . Patrick Baile'ys hitting three hundred and six this month and Hedges is wacking out in a three hundred thirty three clip with eight twenty three RVI's. So these guys are going get off our butts . It's not our fault . Can we go back to the one run game thing a little bit ? I just was kind of putting this together in my head. I mean, you talk about the Deshaun Watson tariff or that after effects or that, you know, kind of the what happened in the wake of that trade. And man, the one run game thing , it is making me think about class A part just what a what a huge moment that was for this franchise. I mean , every time the guardians would be in a one run game, they would march out these relievers just one after another late in the game and you most nights teams had no chance against these some of these guys . It you know, it was Cade Smith going to Claus A and then they bring Gaddison before them and and yeah like they don't have that now and on Monday night I thought was a perfect example they put Kade Smith out in the eighth because it was a high leverage situation and they asked him to go two innings and he man he was I think he gave the winning hit on a ninety six mile an hour fastball or something. So I mean he had plenty of stuff, but it's it's when you get different guys giving hitters different looks every inning in the seventh, eighth and ninth like that is a huge thing and I don't feel like the guardians have guys they can go to right now in front of Smith to get that same effect. Is that am I am I right on that? No, you're absolutely you're absolutely right because first of all Gaddis has not been right this year. You know, he has some arm problems this spring training. He's had some good moments but he,'s not like he was when they were able to line up Gaddys , Smith and Cosay , that very formidable. You know, you could even think back to when he had like Cody Allen and Andrew Miller and Brian Shaw, you know, those kind of guys going . They don't quite have that this year . They have different guys, Sean Armstrong, I think's not been as good as they had hoped . And so that's a that's a problem there . And the other problem is sometimes too, really, if you look at some of the games when they finally descore it's off a home run . They're not manufacturing much . And that's because they're not getting on base . It's just by the way the other day Gabriel area struck out five times in the game. Am I correct? We have a letter we have a letter about this in email. Please read it. All right. This is from Mike Arnbrewster. Mike is from Rochester, New York and he says, Hey, Terry . And he sent this before yesterday's game. So I don't know if the stats are up to date, but he says while, it's understandable why the Guardians are struggling with three of their best hitters, it seems they could do better by splitting third base between Daniel Schneimen and David Fry . Gabriel Arius is in a four for twenty two slide and struck out five consecutive times in tonight's loss in Chicago. Arias had plenty of time to prove himself over the past several seasons, but has yet to break through as a legitimate big league player. He looks lost at the plate and frequently has for a few years now. It's hard to see Ernie Cle do so well in Toronto while we watch Aryus struggle here. Ernie would look great at third base right now with Jose out for several weeks. Perhaps mister Aryus needs a fresh start in another city. What say you? So a couple things there, I guess. What should they do with RES? And then how would you handle third base? And thank you for the email, Mike. Well, Schneimen, by the way, this month is seven for fifty batting one forty, but he's hit a couple homers . Now I'll take Schneimen over Arius . Even if Schneimb decides he now wants to be a right handed hitter as opposed to a left handed hitter. I would still take him over Aries. I'm sorry Arius , I just lost all hope on him about a year ago. You know, he's up to about a thousand at bats now in the big leagues and you could look at the numbers and they're not good . So yes, I mean and now Fry this month he's no help either in June he's two for twenty five , but I would rather go with Schneimen and Fry than Arius. I'm on board with that. You know, Fry could throw the ball now. He had that Tommy John surgery . But I mean, Fries Fries really struggled. I mean, he's this month two for twenty five. He's got eleven strikeouts and his twenty five at Bats . And there's stuff like Greece Hopkins, Hoskins this month , seven for fifty five , batting one twenty seven . See, these were guys Fry Hoskins Schneimen , that you need them to be, and of course, the big one , Stephen Kuan . There's nothing there . This month is hitting two hundred four, five hundred twenty four and OPS . I mean, they're happy. You listen to TV broadcast, they're happy when he draws a walk . I don't mean to be that. I'm just stunned by this. I've always been a remember Roberto's that's been her guy. She found them in that minor league game we were watching many years ago and that and to see the bottom drop out of him offensively, I never thought that would happen after he had established himself So, you know, you look at you look at these stats and you know, I'm trying to find out like in the miners . Yeah, big side for me . I don't have a good answer. There's a guy named Kobe Hub who's a catcher. He's hitting two hundred and eighty four. He's got ten homers . See, the opportunity is there for a couple of these older veterans they're like Juan Brit o. He's not hit at all since he went back. Big disappointment to me. I've always liked that he's hitting two hundred thirty three this year six hundred and ninety five . Cafus down there. He's also hitting two hundred thirty six forty seven one home run. I mean , the door is wide open for them to, you know, get some do something . But believe me, they'll call you up. They did they've already called up Watts and they called up, you know, Fairchild . They're looking , you know, if Ralphie could get hot, you know, but they're not they're not producing, you know, we'll see if they do anything with Cooper Angle, but it's pretty hard. I don't know. Do you want to bring a guy up to the big OZ played a grand total of six games in the minor league in the alpha to catch her and say, here's your chance and know you're going to do this . Yeah , by the way, the other guys are coming back soon. Yeah, right. You might be sent down again. So all right, so I've been saving this email Terry from Ron Mooning and Toledo and I probably had this on our list for a month and we haven't been able to get to it, but it's really fascinating how things have changed so much since Ron sent this in s,ays but, he Hey Ter,ry, if money were no object, I would be in favor of the guardians entering into longer term contracts with Messick, Williams, De Lauder, Basana, and Smith. I realize it's not reasonable to do all. Please rate these in order of who you would want the guardians to enter into long term deals with. I'm gonna write down the names. What are they? Messik. Messik. Who you've loved for a while? Love when he's in the monorsit, yeah. Gavin Williams. Yeah. Scott luck with that, the water . Bazana and Smith. And I have the Kate Smith basically has arbitration for another few years before he's an unrestricted free agent. So he's got I think three years of arbitration . Williams also has three . I'm trying to look at some of the other guys here that would be messed for Basana and Dolauder. Mexico got two years of pre arbitration. Yeah, they all de laughter's got two years of pre arbitration. So basically these guys are under team control for a long time. But I think what Ron's getting at is, you know, we saw them do this with like Kipnas at kind of an early stage where they tried to lock him in for a while, but which of those guys to answer Ron's question, do you think they should maybe prioritize ? Well, I'd be interested in talking to Smith . Of course, you remember remember Trevor Stefan. They were high on him , and they gave him a he was smart. He signed it as a two or three year. It wasn't a real big deal. And of course, he immediately had Tommy John surgery . I mean, this is just the way it goes. Which is why we, you know, this is my thing. If you're a pitcher, they throw a contract at you, that first contract for some multiple years, sign it I'd be interested to see what Messix agents would be thinking because I believe he's not had any arm problems in the miners or whatever . I would really love the way p heitches. I loved it when I saw him in a minor league game and I didn't know he's going to be this good this soon, but you could just look at a guy and say this guy's going to be a good pitcher . Now Gavin Williams forget it. It's Scott Borrsow , you know, Scott Borrows just turned down, I don't know what he turned down one hundred fifty million or more in the offseason for the Tigers for Terrick Scubble , you know, of course Scubble had the arm thing, you know, they did this new form of Tommy John with this long needle. I read about it and it's an interesting thing. We'll see if it holds for Scubble . But now problem with the water going long term with him is When's he going to be healthy for a full season ? When it hasn't happened yet . So too early for him, right? Yeah. So is Gavin Williams? I mean, is Messic number one on your list then until somebody Michigan and Kay Smith. Miss ion. I would see what I think one and two. Yeah , and I see what it would be. You know, I'd talk to them and see what they're thinking . The water would be going to get hurt. Bazon is just starting his career And Gavin Gavin's like a forget it. I mean, that's a yeah, you would I'd like to sign Gavin Williams, you know, Dave and Terry would like to grow hair, you know, all that kind of stuff, but you guys got to borrow us. It's not going to happen . And so just I mean, I remember that there's a playoff game last year with Detroit Scubble versus Gavin Williams and I was thinking and I mentioned it to body else with the Guardians. I said , you know, this is Scott Borros' dream game right here. He's got his two big aces in there and he's sitting there probably with this four guys of analytics and accountants figuring out how much money can we turn these two guys into and and that is always he's always does it, you know, he takes them out to free agency . I would be surprised if they did this with Smith What he's twenty seven, I think, and he's got three more years of arbitration left. And you know how it is with relievers here? You talk about pitchers generally as you know, you got to get them young and locked in if you like them. But like with Smith under team control for three more years would be interesting. He's going to get a big raise, but like yeah, I don't know. I'd have to look at a believer . Can you do something like yeah four years for twenty? I don't know , twenty five, something like that over that in the words, it's modest, but it's locked in. But it's basically yeah you just go to them and say look, we can give you this and what you don't say but, what's implied is this your Tommy John insurance policy . All right, well, if you feel on the Guardians, I thought that was a great email. Thanks for that. If you want to hit it sponsor comments, of course you can always reach us at sports at Cleveland. com and put Terry's talking in the subject line. I don't know any other guardian stuff, Terry I'm just kind of looking at my numbers here . Menzardo is having a nice month of June. two hundred sixty three, eight ninety four, four home run s. He's been probably the best player in the month of June . Although Hedgers and Bailey was said were the best players in the month of June. They just want that on the record. That's right . I watched the other day. I mean, I know fans are, you know, they hate the catchers because they don't hit . I forgot what game it was , but there were twice a guy on third base and I can't recall was pitching. The point is they threw two terrible pitches in the dirt off to the left and hedges just caught them . And it was the same game, I think in Milwaukee, or whatever the Milwaukee catcher kept having to walk back to the backstop to pick up the balls that were getting by him in the dirt . Those are saving two runs . They really are . And that's why the Guardians are big on that . I mean, really, if you have to rely on your catchers to hit a lot, I mean, granted, you don't want to hit in one hundred and forty , but if you have to rely on that, your offense is all messed up anyway . Yeah, I mean not to have our obligatory money ball reference, but like it's all about getting guys on base and scoring runs and preventing runs. Preventing runs. Yeah. And creating runs costs way more money than preventing runs and that's something that we've talked about the guardians really try to cultivate is fine catchers who can prevent runs. By the way, did you see in Kell Stuffin, the guy they got for Bieber ? Yeah, I got hurt. Tommy John. Yep , I believe. Has Bieber, I'm going to check what we're talking. I want to see if Shane Beaver's finally got to the big wigs or not. I know he was throwing some body was coming up soon. Maybe that he's throwing some games in the miners, but you know , by the way, that's another one. They thought he would be back now . Yeah, it's yeah, they just activated him. So we'll see how he does. But here we are in the middle of June and he hasn't pitched a big league game yet . These guys, that's why and maybe maybe you're even right on Kay Smith. If he doesn't I could throw something real modest at him and see what he takes Messik you would try, but maybe he's like Bybie or whatever, you know, you're like, yeah, give me Betch Yibby's glad he took the contract . Yeah , he's well I mean these guys are staring at two years some of them like Messic staring at two years of pre arbitration . So that's where the opportunity might lie. I think you're right . Yeah . All right, well the Guardians are going to try and climb back into a first place tie in the central today at two hundred ten. They're taking on the white socks and then a ten game homestand Terry, three against Seattle this weekend , three against Texas next Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and then the White Sox are in for four games on fourth of July . Man, who would have thought it would be like a battle for first place at Progressive Field next weekend when the White Sox were coming to Well, there's only two decent teams in the whole American League s in Tampa Bay. The rest is like they're all a couple games over or they're all mediocre or worse. Oh, I know, but I mean the White Sax have been losing one hundred and twenty games, a hundred games like it has been a dragon turnaround. It's I'm sitting there I'm looking up all their players during this game. David, I don't know who these guys are but they're But they're, you know, finally, the prospects, the losing, the trades are starting to pay off for them . And they don't have the who's the guy that the guy from Asia , what is his name? He's got twenty homers. He hits homers and strikes outs and walks. Yeah, he's not even playing, but they got a nice, you know, they have they have a nice team and they're also you know where they're at now, they're at the fun stage where you've been terrible for well, they have three consecutive hundred year game losing seasons . And all of a sudden you come out and you're playing well and people are excited . It's new. It's like coming out of the dark ages . And that's when it's really, really fun. The really hard part is when you've been pretty good for quite a while, say like the Guardians or even the Cavaliers, and you're trying to get better than that . That's the tough part . Yeah, and it's fun to see that because in the White Sox fans, they've always been like the number two team and the in the cubs everybody everybody goes to the cubs games. They want to sit in the bleachers and they like the little fans and like the real quote unquote real fans have white sox fans have always identified themselves as the real fans were you a White Sox fans? You're in Chicago I was both teams, but could you be both ? I liked both teams. One was in each league and they were both terrible. So it didn't matter okay, I'll give you that . So yeah, so it's good to see and it's going to be some fun baseball. I think the fourth of July weekend down at the ballpark. So yeah. All right, let's talk some football terry. This soresby thing has been just crazy and it looks like it finally came to an end at least for now this yesterday on Tuesday . Just for people haven't been paying attention this Brendan Soresby was a quarterback at Indiana. He was a red shirt and then he played and during that whole time he was betting on everything, including on Indiana Football . Yeah. And he basically got caught his thing was like I was redshirting, betting was the only way I could feel like I was part of the team . He decided to transfer for this season to Texas Tech and they paid him five million dollars in NIL fees to do it . And the NCAA said, You got to be crazy. You have been caught betting on college sports. You're done. He and his lawyer went to court and a very favorable judge down in Texas who I believe was a Texas tech grad am I remembering that right? anyway anyway, but he ruled in favor of S oresb likey and, is yeah, you're stopping him from playing football and pursuing his dream . And it was impressive to see the response, Terry. Basically the big twelve is like , don't play Texas Tech. Everybody who scheduled Texas tech don't play them cancel, your g ames with them. There was a huge, huge pushback on this . And finally , after absorbing all this for a couple of weeks, Texas Tech and Brendan Soresby decided we're not going to do this. We're just going to go to the NF L. They put in their request like three days before the NFL was going to decide whether to have a supplemental draft this summer . And the NFL basically put out a release on Tuesday saying we're not having a supplemental draft. We haven't had one for like seven years. We're not having one this time. It's too late . So there you go. That's the setup, Terry. There's a lot to digest here in terms of the gambling and and anyway, just what do you think about all this? There's a lot of I went through some confession time for those who get my newsletter. I was writing about Soresby before the ruling with the supplemental draft came in because I was like why theown Br should get involved in this . And this is a guy that placed nine thousand bets that's the number that was reported . And by the way, there's a bunch of affidavits and things where Soresby himself was the one that said, Well, when I was at Indiana I was red shirting and said I really wasn't on the roster and it kind of felt like was bidding on the team to win and he also did prop bets on players by the way . And he was saying that it kind of make me feel like part of the team. I'm like, huh , you know, it's like, why don't you just go make a fan duel commercial and be a part of the team , but that's not how you're part of the team. And by the way, I may add , when you are and your football is more your game than I am, stop me if I'm wrong, and I'm serious, David , wouldn't a redirsth quarterback be getting the game plans for that week? Oh, you better believe it and they're practicing. Yeah, he would know are they going to run the ball a lot this week? Are they going to throw the ball a lot? So if you're betting on how many passes are thrown or whatever by. And the way, he did , you have inside information . So that's doesn't matter that you're not dressing for the game that week. And Negas, well, I stopped after I started playing. I mean, great. He also was found to be giving having created accounts in other people's names as relatives and also having friends and relatives placed best for him. He placed nine thousand bets in like a four and a half year period . I mean , what is that? Five bets a day or something? How do you do that? I mean, you just he blamed it on the apps. Yeah, no kidding. Well, if you got a gambling app, it's going to say, why don't you gamble? It's just like I'm an alcoholic, but I blame it on the fact that when I went to the liquor store, I bought something and it sit home in my refrigerator . And I mean very serious it's the same and by the way the ramifications are the same , you know , the gambling has wrecked families and all this other stuff and I just believe it skews how you look at it's. my It own personal policy , but I do not think people in the sports media business should be betting on sports, at least the teams that they cover. That's my feeling because I use your coverage . By the way, I will have to confess now, I did make a sports bet in twenty twenty two, when Steven Kuan, Roberta's favorite , was I got off to a fast start. There was a veteran writer who to protect the innocent. He said, Ah, he'll be gone by June or whatever. You know, I said, guess what? My birthday's june twelfth. I say he's going be to here on my birthday and we must put a buck on it . So that I won a dollar on Steve Quan on june twelfth. Now maybe maybe now that you know that you may take me off of the guard ians coverage, but I mean, I hope you declare I hope you declare that on your taxes. By the way, you know why I also tell the story, we're not talking about that . You know, we're talking about hardcore stuff here. And this was as hardcore as you get. When you can't even remember all the stuff he was betting on . It was just incredible to me . Yeah, I saw in the fact that people say just give him another chance why right now? He needs to sit out a year and get into some heavy, he went to some place in Arizona for thirty five days . Like a rehab place Yeah, whatever. Yeah where they tell you don't I mean it's I started my newsletter with R Schleester and Schleester was the Star Quarter back at Ohio State . He ended up being a fourth pick overall, I think it was eighty two anyway, the Colts pick number four overall in the draft and he just , you know, you go back and look at that his career and this was before was so available . You know, he started going out things to Saoto Downs or whatever they call it down there in Columbus and he met some other gamblers and got into the sports stuff and then you turn around and he just kept doing it. He got his second year in the NFL. He was suspended for gambling. He came back and he just kept doing it. Then of course the drugs show up and everything else . I'm not saying Soresby will go that way , but I'm saying there is a precedent of wash yourself and all of a sudden yeah, you know what? You know what? By the way, last thing Schweister found after a while the support system was gone because when he did play for the cult he played poorly and then it just in and out of prison. I remember he was I just missed him one time at Summit County Jail. He was there for a while when I was doing ministry and he was in a different part of the jail because so I didn't I didn't have him in my class because I heard he was going out , but that was about by the way, when he would do jail ministry, they think called pods or areas of it, and you would be assigned a certain area that was yours . And he was elsewhere . It was just and I heard, you know, and you know what? I also heard about him. He's a great guy. He's great. You know, the deputies like them . It doesn't matter. I mean, if you're an addict, you got to deal with this stuff . Well, on that was the really interesting part of me to the end of the NFL's statement yesterday . Like usually these things are like super sanitized and they have lawyers look over every single word and I expected the NFL to just keep it very clinical and be like , hey, you applied three days before the supplemental draft decision was had to be made. We didn't have enough time to go over your case. We're not having a supplemental draft. Like they could have left it at that, but instead they, added a thing and they're like in addition , what do they say ? You have shown no accountability for your actions . You have you haven't shown any remorse and like they went that extra step just to like slap him back and say, listen, this is serious and you need to get this taken care of in a meaningful way before we're going to let you into the draft. And I thought that was an interesting extra step that the NFL took to just I would message that is exactly what I would have doing this. Yeah , it's exactly what I would have said. You know, no, we're not doing this. Secondly, you need to deal with the thirdly. Anybody else out there making nine thousand bets in the five year period and you think you're going to go in the draft. If we find out, no, you're not . Well, yeah, in a thirty one day program or whatever, that's that's who knows if that's enough, but yeah it's I mean it also comes down to a lot of so much of addictive behavior you have to deal with, you know, there's a period of being broken, heartache, brokenness , you know , and then really changing your life, changing the people you hang around and that stuff. The other thing that would come up and I get this sometimes is like, you know, when somebody would there right away mess up as an athlete course. O theyf're only a for a goodthlete who messes up. I get this. And I would say, No, this guy needs to sit out. This guy needs to do that. They go, Well, I thought you were a Christian. You would have about forgiveness in that. And this is a thing that we would deal with jail ministry all those years. And even now when I go to I'm not doing the jail ministry anymore, but it's Have and Arest, which is Akron City Mission , yes, God will forgive you, but there are consequences to your actions. And part of repentance, which means I'm sorry not just sorry, but I'm sorry enough to change is dealing with the consequences of your actions. I think that's what the NFL was saying. You know, there are consequences to these actions . And we're going to take the game away from you and maybe that will get your attention. Because think about it. So he makes all these bets when he's at Cincinnati, granted it's not on football or whatever. And he goes, he leaves there to get five million bucks to go to Texas Texas. So you know, what did what consequence did he ever have till now? I'll tell you what it reminded me of was when Mark McGuire got called into Congress to testify about the steroid thing. And what did he say over and over? Yeah, I don't want to talk about the past. I just want to talk about the future . And people I think I don't know if it was a house committee or Senate committee , they're like, wait a minute . We have to talk about the past because that's why you're here. And we hardly examine this to find out what's going on. So it's like it kind of reminded me that a little bit. It's like Soresby and his legal team are like, oh, well, you know, it's all in the past. Like let's just move on. And you're right. You have to address what's happened before you can move on. And the interesting thing, Robert and I were talking about that's an important step. Yeah. Britt and I were talking about this guy's reading some of the stuff and I said, Well, it says here he said that part of the reason he was gambling was to deal with his anxiety problem. Which you know is going to cause anxiety. It's making sill ions of bets of cause anxiety . And it just shows, you know, how off it is . And again , I would love to see this kid really make it because he could be a powerful witness, but he's got to go through the period of , you know, they would say kind of the wandering in the wilderness of, you know, this is you had it, you lost it, you know, here's how you can get it back . And I don't I mean, I had some people saying , Well, you've been worth a fourth or fifth round pick. No, it's not like that. It's not like you pick up a guy that you know , he blew his knee out or something at you know sort of a gamble that way. I mean, the truth is even with the Sean Watson for all his problems, nobody would be doubting that Sean Watson wants to play well, you know, nobody doubts that. But the problem is when a guy's had made all those bets and everything else and he throws a pass into double coverage gets picked off, you know, you then you start looking and go wonder what that's about. Is there something behind the curtain there? I'm still periodically emails about Classy. Remember in twenty twenty four, he allowed only two home runs in the entire regular season. He allowed three home runs in the playoffs. Now there's no indic ation for all the investigations that anything was going on in the playoffs , but you're tainted by that because of all the other pitches that he threw in the dirt or whatever for prop bets. So it's a it's a tough situation, David. And I'm glad first of all, I was glad Todd Munkin said what he did way back when 're a slurry soul. I'm not sure you want to go down that one. That was the first taste of Todd Munkin had been a little different than the previous coach . And you asked him a question, he had an answer because he's thinking, I don't know, I got enough to deal with here with Shadow and DeShaun trying to get them , you know, get Shador going in the right direction. Apparently he is by the way, in terms of a player and getting Watson to see if he can get anything back of what he once had back in twenty twenty . I want to ask you a question. Here's a quick email. This is from Joel Gro, Joel's a long time listener. He says, Hi, gentlemen, Art Schleister, know Ohioan if they're old enough to remember Schlister and his sad story could possibly think dra fting Soresby is a good idea for the Browns. Thank you . Thanks, Joel . But so you got actually got letters on both sides from this. Were you surprised by that or were you like No, of course this is an athlete and people want the Browns to win. You weren't surprised. All right, cheap plug time. You know, why can't this team find a quarterback? And this the desperation of the Browns wanted they'll try anything . Let's try this, let's try that . And the same way , I mean you go back and there was a reason nobody said we're going, to match theowns Br two hundred and thirty million dollars offer and all those draft picks and everything else to Houston. Yes, other teams were negotiating in that and made offers, but nothing close to Cleveland when you're desperate, you do dump stuff and damaging stuff . And the Browns fans are desperate for a quarterback. The Browns are desperate for a quarterback. I mean, let's see what Monkin can do with the two guys . You know, I would like to see , you know , more . I'm not a huge fan. I think there, but I want to see more of that than if you'd brought in, okay, then you would bring in let's say Soresby. So now you got to deal with all those questions, well, how's he look? Is he getting a boy? Is he is he making bets? I mean, all that kind of crazy stuff . Yeah, and I think if you're Rasp Browns fans, I think that if you ask them to choose between more drama and less drama for this franchise, they would probably choose less drama And you want , you know, if you're getting drama, like Lebron always brings drama with you, but it's good drama. I mean, it's interesting drama, you know, it's like there and you know LeBron periodically want to play coach or GM, but he's a great player . By the way, I want to say something interesting. I was watching the draft and some of the guys looking at the different guys, this is not just a pick on Peterson, but I did look up there. Peterson's from Canton and Peterson, the number two pick last night. Right, right and his his dad played for the Acrony . Anyway, he played two his dad played with a guy named Matt Futch, the center for Aquranu. Matt was then the and they were friends. Matt was then the coach of CVCA Caga Valley Christian. And the first two years Darren played for Matt Futch played extremely well in that. Then he went to Huntington prep in West Virginia and then he went to I think Napa one of the big California ones. Now this a common thing you see three high schools in four years for a lot of these elite prospects . And I remember I did a story earlier in the week where I was talking with the coaches of LeBron , both Keith Danbroot and with Drew Joyce the third, Drew Joyce, the second excuse me, about LeBron and there's a ten year anniversary thing, you know, and they were talking about that. And then I realized well LeBron played four years to St. Saint V with the guys from the neighborhood , his friends, and a couple others from the Akron area . There was never one word that he was going to transfer anywhere else . You know, I just it's a different time, but it's pretty different. But you know what? Terry , like I was coordinating high school coverage at the plane healer during that time and like they turned Saint V into a prep team. Yeah, they did. And it wasn't because they grab guys from, you know, we're going to get guy from New York and this guy from Detroit and assemble . Like it was a homegrown all star team with guys who played division one college basketball that were home grown by Keith Danbroad and all the people in the Akron basketball community there and those kids all put in the work and they I mean, they were they were traveling the country playing they were out in front of that. Like we might never see something like that ever again . No, you go back to team turning like this prep outfit that just is an all star team that goes everywhere to play everyone. Right. Romeo Travis was on that team and Drew Joyce the third. They both went to play at Acranu and played very well . And there was a kid I can't think of his name. Well, Sean Cotton was their big burley football player who would rebound everything and I think he played college football. I know that. I can't remember. Yeah, it went to Ohio State or somewhere. It didn't work out. Yeah, and then he went to Ashland. There was a smaller guard kind of like a Steve Kerr type or whatever on the team or a guy comes off the bench. He went to Walsh , which was division two slash NAIA helped play on a national championship team. He might have been like from Madonna or somewhere like that, the outer game was for Mave on Lake in my Lave on Lake. Yeah. But for the Cori Sometime Yeah. Corey something, but that was the point being that was that team but now I was told later on I had all kinds of friends on that coaching staff that O Kill and a couple others really came hard after LeBron. This was like after LeBron had left and they said, Oh no, we were really scared. OK, but it wasn't just them. They mentioned a couple others someplace in Las Vegas or something. There were still a few of those. And he said, LeBron just was not interested . He, you know, he was going to instead and instead they got Oak Hill to come to Cleveland State and play them on CSU's court. And it was a nationally televised game with Tick Vitals. So yeah. By the way, this is this is not a knock on Peterson or any of these other kids . When I hear, oh, this is the best sentence since LeBron , stop . Lebron is one for the ages . And as you mentioned, yeah, LeBron had some nice division in players on his team, but it wasn't like these were guys going. I remember when they played O'Kill then and I'm sitting there writing down the two years they played them where those kids were going. They were going to Kentucky and Purdue and Wisconsin and USC. You know, it wasn't like that group of kids and they beat them anyway Because Lebron is there's only one Lebron for our ation. So true. All right, before we move on from football terrier, I got a I got a business idea. I want to run past you . Let's see what you think of this. So you know it's always like no, it's not frightening. You know, these teams are always like tank for Wemby and Tank for Arch Manning. And there's this kid named Madden San Miguel he's like a viral video sensation from the time he was like four, his father has been training him to be Rob Grankowski. Oh man and his name is Baby Granck, and it's totally ridiculous , but he's got this huge following on social media and he's in eighth grade right now. And he actually, Andrew Gillis, our Ohio State Recruiting reporter reported a couple weeks ago that Baby Gronk was at the Ohio Stateotball F coamp a couple of weeks ago as an eighth grader, which a lot of eighth graders do go down for that. Yeah. So I've got, you know how when you walk into the Browns games and all those people are on the sidewalks selling t shirts that they've made with like different sayings on it, I think the new one for this season should be Tonk for baby Gronk. Tonk y Gronk. What do you think? Would you buy one of those for five ? No I would not. But you could go for it. But then again, I don't watch TikTok. So what do I'm a bad source on this , so that's a baby baby but yeah he's doing all these he's been lifting weight since a very young age. It's ridiculous really who was the guy that was like that a football player that his father tried to make him into it began with M. Tod Morinovich, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, sometimes the parents have become so over the top with that and they go to every camp and everything else. You steal the love of the game from the kid ? Well, I'm afraid that's what this is, but hey, you know what? People like what people like. Anyway, I just thought it was funny that Gran Grunk was at the OSU football camp. So Tonk for Gronk. If anybody wants a good t shirt idea, yeah, running for the football season. Yeah, called send that to Dave Campbell. I have nothing to do with this. As of twenty thirty one, so all right , I have to apologize to our listeners. We have so many great autograph stories and we're trying to get to all of 'em. We got a we got a couple here. We'll keep going through these because there's some really fun ones and we can wrap up with these. So you ready? Yes. All right. Hey Darry and David. Hey Darry and David. This is from Alan Gilbert in Yellow Springs, Ohio. He said, Here's my autograph story. I'm fortunate to have been able to attend every greater Cleveland Sports Award event since its inception in two thousand. In two thousand two, Jim Brown was receiving the lifetime achieve ment Award and there were Cleveland Sports Celebrities Galore there, including some of his contemporaries. I became friendly with Claude Holland, the legendary Cleveland High School track coach. He introduced me to his mother Bernice , who appeared in the nineteen forty eight Olympics . She signed my program . She introduced me to Harrison Dillard, her teammate who won a gold medal in the same Olympics. He signed my program , mister Diller then introduced me to his friends, three older gentlemen who were all sitting alone. Current athletes were getting all the attention. They introduced themselves as Dick Shaffrath, John Wooden, and Bobby Mitchell. Wow. You guys are royalty, three Hall of Famers, I said to them. They all graciously signed my program. What a thrill it was. I later learned that Shaffrat was not in fact in the profall hall of fame, but he should have been. Quick side story, I had a friend who went to high school at John Hay in the late nineteen sixties. He told me that John Waten was his substitute teacher in Fizz ed class one day. And he said, I don't know what you guys were doing in class this week, but today we're playing football . All right, and this next one, our last one is from Kevin Schroyer. And you remember on our last I think in our last podcast here, we had a story about a guy who couldn't get the Jim Brown autograph . He failed to get it. And so Kevin Treyer heard that and he writes in and says, Hey, David Terry, I love the podcast. I heard you read the failed Jim Brown autograph story on the latest podcast. And it reminded me of my long wait outside of the Indians players parking lot as a teenager. I couldn't believe my luck that my favorite player at the time Pronk, Travis Afner , came down the line along the fence. I was so nervous with excitement as he took my hat in his hand and asked me for my pen . I didn't have a pen . He handed back my hat and moved on to the next kid. I still can't believe to this day that no one next to be offered a pen off andered me a pen. That year for my birthday, my aunt bought me a pack of ballpoint pens . Thanks for that, Kevin. Hey, you know, we'll keep running through these. These are that autographed business , that's cutthroat out there. If you're not prepared , too bad, the next guy is. That's right. Someone else is going to get your autograph. You got to be ready with your double pins. You gotta have two pins. To pin ch at least yeah, backup pen for the real one. So all right, we good here. Anything else terrible now to hear you mentioned your upcoming appearance. We mentioned the newsletter. And again, we love hearing from you. If you want to hit us with an email, thoughts, comments questions. You can do that by sending it to sports at Cleveland. com and just put Terry's talking in the subject line. All right, we got some good baseball coming up. We'll have a lot to talk about next week and we will see you then on Terry's Cook