The following takes place between eight pm and nine pm.
All right, let's keep rolling, no reason to slow down at this point. Eight nine Welcome in on RNAL Carrier Sports Talk presented by Kelsey Chevrolet. I'm Lance Pcalister. How about some Reds baseball? You know and you love Our next guest as a longtime Reds analyst on TV and in the radio booth for over the past thirty three seasons, he's going to be the featured speaker at the annual Franklin County Baseball Dinner coming up Thursday night in Brookville, Indiana.
A night of food, fun and fundraising and talking baseball. It is a pleasure to welcome in. Chris Welsh, how are you.
Lance LANs great to talk any time I can talk to you. And there's snow on the ground, I mean that's that's a good thing, right yeah.
And there's even like some hot stove news to melt the snow. Tonight, our guy see Trend has reported that the Reds have reached an agreement on a two year, twenty million dollar deal with Emilio Pegan the second year of player option. Your instant reaction A great.
Move, really good move. I was kind of distressed to think that he was going to be gone, To be honest with you, you know, he's an interesting guy. He had a tough twenty twenty four. He was injured, his velocity dropped down, he just didn't feel well. I think he had a lap problem that he really never did heal from. And then last year, you know, his velocity bumped up as high as it was in his entire career. So here he was thirty four years old, throwing as
hard as he ever did before. His splitter was really good last year. I think hit or sit like a buck twenty off of it or something like that. And you know, for all the worry that the people had about signing him to a small ballpark like Great American know Flyball, it didn't work out like that. He was a solid guy and he's really solid in the clubhouse, super leader. I'm delighted that he's back now.
The other news, Ken Rosen, everybody from Ken Rosenthal to John Hayman writing that the Reds are quote serious about Kyle Schwarber, that Kyle is at least willing to listen. What would you what would you say to us dropping Kyle Schwarber in the middle of that Red's line up, Chris Welsh, it would change.
A little bit. I mean, you know, he was kind of the missing link. In fact, there are a lot of teams that could use him right in the middle of the order obviously, and the Reds hopefully, you know, are on the trail and you know they've got a lot of things going for them and trying to re sign him. But you know, it's one of those things where you need a guy who puts a little bit of fear in the opposing pictures, and the Reds didn't
had that guy. I mean, they had good players, they had versattle players, guys who could play all over the place. Some of that could put the ball in play. Someone's struck out a little bit. But if you put Schwarburn there, when you're a pitcher, you know where he is in the batting order, I mean, is he on the deck circle? Is he in double deck? You know, do I have to face the next sitting Managers feel the same way when they're plotting out the lead part of the game.
Where is Schwarzer And because he can change a game on a swing, So it would be great, certainly, I'm you know, optimistic, but I'm tempering that a little bit because you know, the free agent market is a crazy thing. It's very unpredictable, no doubt.
No doubt they and they have some work to do. I want to go back to the bullpen. They still have some work to do to rebuild that bullpen, Chris. Why are the performances of relievers so seemingly volatile one year to the next. Why are they so hard to figure out and know what to count on and who to count on year to year?
Well, I mean it's not only with the Reds, but it's everybody. And I think that because everybody. I think nowadays, lance is being evaluated according to numbers. You know, how hard do you throw, how hard is your slider? How many times do you get thwings and missus? What is your soft contact? You know. The last thing that I think teams look at nowadays are earned run averages and wins and losses and even number of saves and holds and things like that. Those statistics are out the door now.
Everything that they're looking at is being grabbed by a high speed camera or some kind of an analytical machine that is breaking down the pitch. You know, the stin the axis of the pitch, the release point. Here's something for you. Here's one thing that made Emilio Pegan so good and deceptive. He throws ninety six miles an hour.
But he's six feet two inches tall. When he releases the ball to home plate, he's almost six feet nine inches tall, So he gives you, you know, six inches of extension, and that's six inches sneaks up on the hitter. Those are the kind of things that teams are looking
for nowadays. And I think the reason the teams are up and the players are up and down, pitchers especially, is because you know, they're chasing the unhittable pitch and they're trying to throw it so hard and snap it off so hard that they lose the consistency around the strike zone. And if you're wilder outside the drug zone, you're going to be wild inside the strike zone, and those guys get hit. So it's as simple as that.
That's why it's very hard to predict pictures, especially relief pictures.
I wonder Tony Santion was really good last year, but he was really worked last year eighty appearances. How much concern do you have about the carryover effect into the next season. After a workload like that.
There's a lot of worry about that. I mean, well, once a guy gets to about seventy games a year and how he's worked and so on, you see fewer and fewer relievers wanting to take the ball down the road when they've been they've been used like that. I mean, their agents are now telling them that, hey, you know, you shut it down until you know the month of August because you know you're coming up on free agency and you can't afford to go seventy five games this year.
They're going to use you. They know you're going to be a free agent. This is not Tony santi This is in general. So this is the one thing that's going on kind of behind the scenes in baseball that's very disturbing, where you're getting pitchers that are healthy who are not pitching because they're afraid they're going to miss the big pay day when they become a creation or and they get an arbitration. So you know, Santio is a team player. He's a guy that went out there
time and time again. He went out there, you know, on fumes many times, and I think that he's going to be well rested he's a big dude, man. I mean, he's a big, burly bull out and I love him and I don't think other hitters like to sit in the sit in the batters box against him either.
Chris, Are you bullish on a bounce back from Matt McLain this coming season?
Yeah, I am. I think that. You know, he had a really serious shoulder injury. I think the expectations for Matt McClain were way out of whack at the beginning of the year last year. I really do now really for me, Matt McClain, he has to be for simple. He just got to fix a couple of things at the play. Number one, he's got to stop chasing the high pitch. If he stopped doing that, you're going to bring the ball down in order for him. He's got a small strike zone. He's a little dude right highwives.
He's a big, strong, early kid, but he's not real tall, so it's a nice compact strike zone. He's got to make the strike zone his friend rather than his foe. And he started chasing things all over outside the zone. And you know, you pitch him in with fastballs, you pitch him away with sliders. The age whole way of doing it, and that was the way they got him out last year. Once he figures that out, you know, he's a speedy kid. He's got a great arm. He
wants to play. He's got this burning desire inside him, and that's probably the thing that I like the most.
You are the featured speaker at the annual Franklin County Baseball Dinner coming up next Thursday night. Are you excited to be in Brookville, Indiana for a big night of talking baseball?
I am, indeed and not doing that, but I'm going to see my old battery mate who ended up being a Reds manager, and Dave Miley. Yes it was Miles that called me and he got me over there. He's involved with that program over there, and it's going to be a lot of fun. It's not big fancy dinnering. I think they're doing pizza and salads and things like this. But I'm going to give a good talk about, uh, you know, about the Reds. Maybe have some broadcasting and
some history and maybe some jokes mixed in. And I'll tell you, and I'll tell everybody that shows up. If you don't like my speech, I'll almost get your money back so you can't beat that.
Love it if you want to ticket information, Chris has information on his X feed at think Pitch. I've also reposted it as well on X at lance Percallister. Hey, it is so great catching up with you. Love talking baseball with you. Thanks for making time tonight.
All right, Lance, anytime talk baseball with you, it's always a fun thing to do.
Thanks Chris. Take care,