This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera on Fox Sports fourteen fifty powered by Nova Insurance Services. In sure your most prized possessionets well.
Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to I on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera. In with me today is by Friday Guy, Chicken Sauce. I'm here, Chicken sauce. Nice haircut, thank you.
I get whenevery five weeks. Oh really? Oh that's right, because you get a bullet and then you get it. Yeah, and it grows fast. Yeah, not a bullet.
If they didn't, if they didn't cost so much, I'd do it even shorter, short than four weeks. But it used to be six. But it's I don't know what it is. Maybe as I'm getting older, it's growing faster.
I don't know.
And my boy, Ray, you call me Ray, just don't call me late for dinner. Yeah, what's up? Ray? That's up?
Ject I do good Friday Friday take it is a quick week, I thought, Yeah.
Maybe Well I told you, man, I forgot I was supposed to be here. I'll found out because I saw it on Twitter.
Your your hair isn't growing fast because you're older. You're just older and forgetting crap.
I'm sitting on my desk and I said, I'm going through Twitter and I'm like, there's the there's the show graphic. I'm like, holy crap, I'm supposed to be at the show in half an hour.
You're like yourself, I need to be somewhere.
I need to be Yeah, the car. But I will say sometimes you asked me to help with guests on Friday, and you didn't decay. You went and got some guests, and I had no idea what the hell was going on? And then I sudden I realized I had to get get ready to get over here.
Yeah, so we're here, you're here, we're here, We're here. A different show today, kind of a sports show. Obviously, did you watch baseball? Did you watch baseball?
The other night we talked about Discovery Baseball College World Series. Yes, what a crazy Bunker's college Baseball is great.
That's what makes it was fair and he's gotten so much better because they've also brought on the the the time limit rules, you know, the pictures time limit rules, so those games aren't four hours anymore and stuff like that, unless they're you know, long you know, like an extrating game or whatever. But college baseball is crazy great and and it's fun to watch, you know. I like the pace of it. Now you don't feel like you've got
to commit a whole day to a game. And then these games in the College Woral Series has been incredible, Yeah, all of them.
We had RAG on yesterday and with Dave Silver and he talked about teams aren't actually winning games, that they're losing.
They're losing games, and then it happened it that's what. Yeah, we talked about that, Arizona did that. A few of them.
They have three errors in the in that eighth inning or something like that, at least two, yeah, two or three, but or maybe two, a couple of airs and then a bonehead play or something, and.
Just how they got there in the first place.
Right, same thing, same thing, you know, and again, you know, just the littlest things, you know, the bad breaks, the little loopy bass hits and those kinds of things, and you know, it's but it's it's it's I I still like the college baseball game. I mean, I'm a bigger fan obviously of because I'm a big fan of the Dodgers, but I've always loved College base.
So I think Michael, did you tell me yesterday he hit a poll? Yeah, maybe go back to the poll. So the poll was, did you know this, who are you pulling for? Tucson Coastal Carolina or j I know? You know, so who you pulling for? You're bitter, but I'm not.
I'm not. Here's it and here's the deal.
I I okay, do I am. I still kind of unhappy with how Ja Johnson left because I know he was interviewing for this job during the course. Yes, one of the things, and again goes it goes to when you think you know but you don't know. One of the things is I always thought that he didn't even come home with the team. Okay, okay, he did. He did, he did. And you know this. I know this because my son was on the plane and he's and and and he went, you know, he was part of the staff that went on the trip.
He said, they came home.
Jay got off the plane first, and he shook the hand of everybody who got off the plane and said thank you.
All right, but then he left. So, yeah, it was right, It.
Wasn't as it wasn't as gross as it has been made out to be. And and you know, and I don't blame him for going to l C any more than I blame Jedfish for going to for going to to Washington, you know, but it's still a little distasteful knowing that while he was trying to get his team to focus on the World Series, he was out.
Of interviewing for the job.
That part of it, you know, if you Jay Johnson, you got to say, guys, let let me finish. And if they say, well, we're gonna go get somebody else, and you say, well.
Then go get somebody. Yeah.
But you know, because if that's the kind of program you are, that's going to make me take my full attention away from the college war say.
I don't want to work for it.
You know what, And I bet you, I'll bet you my windowar two year five that they wanted him and they would wait.
And they would wait. That's it. And that's the point.
But the other stuff that we made assumptions about, you know, he cared about the program. He came home and but and then but then he meets It's kind of like.
It's like the borderline story, right, Yeah, everybody was pissed until they until they realized the real story, Yeah, the real story behind it.
So I'm I think it's an incredible storyline that he's playing the team that beat him in the College World series, you know, back when he was it air.
I think it's an unbelievable storyline.
If he wins it, great, I'll kind of root against him just because they're LSU, not because of Jay Johnson.
I never root for LSU for anything. All Right, What's what's the story there?
If they play Alabama?
When that happens, I just kind of wish the field would just suck itself into the ground and take everybody with them. That part of the have you ever seen have you ever seen the end of Poultergeist? The original poultry Guys, when the house gets sucked into the ground.
Tell what the choices? What are the choices?
So the choices for that poll that Michael lev had put up a couple days ago was Coastal Carolina and that one's I guess a lot of people are rooting for him sixty two percent, and then LSU was eight percent, and then an asteroid hitting was twenty nine.
That's me.
I'm just I'm just not you know, I just don't like anything that else.
You just stand. I'll watch it. I'll watch it.
I'll watch the game because it's it's fascinating stuff. But I you know, whoever wins is fine with me. I don't have a problem with either one.
Yeah, okay, but you know what, we'll Closer Carolina is really good. Yeah they are. I mean who would have thought that when Arizona played them.
I mean people are making the assumption that because they're not a power for power five school, that they're really good.
I think baseball is one of those equalizers. Yeah, you know, you can say who what? And they turned out to be just good baseball.
I think what we'll find out, what we'll know at the end is that because it's best two out of three, the better team is going to win, sure, right. And you can't even even if Closer Carolina beats them two out of three, you can't say, well, LSU was better. You can't. Whoever wins this game, whoever wins this series is the better team and deserves to be the national champion.
I think the same could be said for softball. We thought we had Ryan Rodkey on yesterday and he's he does this right, all right? Game, and I told him, I said, I thought Texas Tech was one pitch away from winning the whole thing. And it was the it was the pitch outside that they didn't pitch outside, and they hit the ball and they won the game and they couldn't sustained blah blah blah. But you know, sometimes the better team, at least in your eyes, doesn't win.
In one game. Yeah, right, but that's why you play a series.
And I've always liked this this format two you know, the best two out at the end, get get through your bracket, and then go in the best two out of three.
Yeah, okay, So that's this weekend. There was one that's pretty much done with right everything. Everything's done academically and athletically.
Everything's done.
Signings and recruits right now what I can see.
Yeah, okay.
And uh and your guy is off to Switzerland here pretty soon, Tommy Lloyd.
Yeah, to see what he does up there. Recrreans do. Okay.
Uh, So this today, we're gonna have the first hour, We're gonna have a sugar, but we're gonna.
Have two San Suarrow guy. Uh, you pushed the name, Tell me real.
Quick, Mike, Mike whaling and he's now filled the first basement with the team.
There are three time champs.
Yeah, we had him, we had him on a couple of couple weeks.
I don't know we had Mike on, but we've had Mike, We've had somebody from I think we had the manager of the team on.
We want to have him on next week. So yeah, they're pretty good. I have a chance to play at one hundred and five.
Degree with Steve, even even though I'm not going golfing this weekend. Would you go?
You didn't last weekend? It wasn't bad. You know that it was one it was one o five, but it didn't seem.
But I'll tell you what. It was a three of the morning.
No, No, we played it. We played at ten o'clock and and it was a tuc Sound country club, so there was nice chests of water every other hole. We got to the end. We looked at the back of our golf cart. There must have been twenty five water bogging empty water bottles between my son and I but not But you know, it was fine. But I went and played nine holes, just walk nine holes at El Dorado on Tuesday.
I think on Tuesday, I nearly died.
I got home and I had the shakes, and it was nine holes at five o'clock in the afternoon.
But you know, there was.
More shade and stuff like that, and I got home and I had the shakes.
Yeah, that's like the ending of the hot time. Yeah, but then it starts to Yeah, so but we're not we're not. We're not playing this week.
So we're gonna have Mike Whaling here did about ten five minutes whatever it is, and then we're gonna have Q Baker yep at four seventeen. He's the offensive linemen for an offensive linemen for the Sugar Skulls.
Yeah, they're doing pretty well.
How about the Sugar Skulls. Two of their four wins are against the Rattlers. Yeah, it's crazy.
I'm surprised they haven't disbanded from them.
They or that Kevin hasn't taken their best players and said you come over.
Here and play for me in season trade. We'll joke about that.
Yeah, that's fine, big but yeah, but you know, whether they're four and six, I think they're still in the playoff. They got a bunch of games laught, but you know, they got to turn it on a little bit.
Yeah, okay, uh should be should be good, just you know, off the off the radar type of show today with you here.
Yeah, first of all, you're wearing Giants colors, so that's great colors.
I'm upset. What is the orange orange?
Yes?
Secondly to out of three Dodgers beating two out of three, you thought you guys were all that when you won the first one in the couldn't do it again?
You know, we got raffe Now how that goes later?
Later?
Well, what's that?
Well that was last night. That was I loved it. You know, there's always video and stuff like that. So somebody posted a video and because this was between the managers, it started between the managers. There were a bunch of guys got hit and so uh, Bernando Tatis got hit. I get it. It's like they've played the Dodgers seven times and they've hit him five times. Okay, I can understand why they feel like, yeah, now, this particular one wasn't on purpose. The picture the Dodgers pitcher was a
guy who just came up from the miners. His first game in the majors. He was wild the whole time he was in there. Okay, he's he's a minor leader. They're not going to have him throw it. Fernando Tatis. He just threw an inside pitch and got Tatis in the hand. But the powders were pissed because he's been hit a bunch I think he got They played four games, he got hit in three of them this week, so they got pissed. So the manager comes out and he's yelling,
and he's yelling at Dave Roberts. Dave Roberts comes out and pushes him, and it's on.
You know, it's on.
But in in in all the heat of it, somebody's got there there. I guess maybe their phone on Dave Roberts and he's saying, I'll kick your ass.
I'll kick your ass. Who's the manager?
Uh, still some old guy who even before I saw any that I'm texting with my son. I'm saying, Dave Roberts will kill this guy. If they fight, Dave Roberts is gonna kill him.
It was kind of like the Zimmer thing with yeah, yeah.
But but but they mix it up last and then so then after that, Now on this one, they didn't throw the pitcher.
Out or anything like that.
The umpire made a judgment that it was you know, he's a young guy out there, and he threw an inside pitch and he him on the hand. Well, Otani gets hit and it was like right at him, right, So they threw that picture out. So then the man well, both managers have gotten kicked out right after the fight, so now the uh, you know, a new manager is appointed. So then they issued a warning to both teams. So
then they hit Otani in the back. So then the new manager got kicked out as well as the picture and it was on again and they were all it was crazy. I love it, you know. I let's tell him my son. The padres are like that that annoying. Well, they're stupid, they're not any good. They're idiots, and you just want to beat the crap.
Up that's coming from a dog. Am I right, right, come on, Uh you're a giants.
Wait till he wait till you leave Monday. Those giants.
Tell me I'm lying. That's what they're like. They think they're good and they're not.
They they got some good players, they can't.
Beat the Dodgers.
They're just kind of yipping around and you just want to smash the Giants. The Giants are just Giants are a legitimate rival of the Dodgers.
I think that because I remember they did the rivalry weekend or whatever, and I didn't really like that because it didn't I don't think it was a good representation of the actual rivalry and stuff like that.
Who do they play?
The Giants played the A's, But I remember like even the Yankees and the Dodgers played, the Dodgers played the Angels.
Those aren't rivals opposite exactly, the rival the Dodgers rivalry with the Giants. And and then if you want to say doing American League rivalry, its obviously the Yankees, Yankees and the Red Sox man so so not even the Red Sox so much with the Dodgers, but yeah, the Red Sox. But if you if you're going to pick an American League team that the Dodgers rivals with it, it's the Yankees.
The Angels. You're saying, the Yankees and the Boston.
Yeah Yankees, but you know the Dodger and and even now, uh ray, the Dodgers Giants rival isn't as big as you When I was a kid man, you just it was blood.
Yeah, well, I mean I think what really like makes it stand out is like they they moved together. Yeah, they were both in New York and they moved together. It's like that's that's I mean deep seated, right, And they both came out and put their flags out here. Yeah, and then they wouldn't add it from then on.
Yeah. There's a lot of moments in time, you know, in that rivalry that make it a rivalry.
The Dodgers and the Padres are not rivals.
The Padre again, the Padres are that little kid that you just want to kick in the ass and tell me that they get the hell away from you.
With that said, we're gonna get a get the hell out of here and get ahold of whiling from the from the sorrows.
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This is I on the Ball with Steve Raba on Fox Sports fourteen fifty.
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Hey, welcome back to my I on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera in with you today's Jaginsauce got ready behind the scene. Here now on the phone, we have Mike Willing from the Tucson Souorrows.
Mike, how are you.
I'm doing great, Thanks so much for having me.
Guys, Josh, of course you're doing great, and so is the team team and four what the heck's going on with you guys.
Yeah, we're off to a great start this year. It's really exciting stuff. Right out of spring training. Came out of the gates really hot, and you could tell right away that this was going to be a great group we had. We had a really talented group show up and a collective group of guys show up in Pecos, Texas for our spring training and we've just we've just hit the ground run and we're playing great ball right now and excited for uh, keep keep keep going forward with it.
Let me ask you, because I know kind of the Santa Fe League I throw in front from, but does the team Tucson team go to Pecos?
Does everybody go to Pecos?
Uh?
Yeah, we were out there to start the season in Santa Fe and then we made our way to Pekos eventually, so the whole team was out there and that was our way series and then we we made our way back to back to Tucson for our.
For our home series.
Oh so, so what I meant though, was because you said at the beginning, I was thinking that, like everybody went to peck Us for training and then but you already had your team, You started your team.
More or less.
Yeah, we we had a spring training right before the season started. And the way that works is that our manager, Sean, he recruits guys from all over the country, guys from all different backgrounds to show up and kind of showcase themselves over the course of about a week, give or take. And then from there we're able to, yeah, to break that roster down and get ourselves a team and then
start our season up right away. And yet, like I said, our first our opening series was out in Santa Fe and we did a bit of traveling before making our way back to Tucson. And now we're a good like three weeks into the season. I think you said like fourteen or fifteen and maybe.
Sixteen four oh yeah, yeah, yeah, so we're it goes.
By quickly, and yeah, we're about three weeks in now and playing some great balls. So it's been exciting.
Mike.
Who are the guys that are on the team? You know, you know, where are they coming from? You know what kind of you guys are all in it for the same thing. So how does that, you know, help build a team?
Right?
What's that like? And what's what's the approach? I guess is what I would ask.
Yeah, it's it's a makeup of guys of all different backgrounds, which is really cool. Like you said, generally the common denominators that we all have that common goal of wanting to continue our careers in some capacity of professional baseball and getting a chance to play out here is a
lot of fun. But amongst us, there's there's guys that have been playing for for a few years now in the professional scene, and then there's guys that are fresh out of college, you know, like Like I said, our manager Sean McNeil, he recruits guys from all different types of backgrounds. We have a good dose of returning guys too that were on the club last year or even have been here for a few years. And just a
lot of talent. Yeah, a lot of guys that come in fresh out of it, fresh out of college, so this is their intro to Pro Bowl and they had, you know, coming off great, great careers at all different levels, so Division one, two, Division III level and then the NAI level as well. So it's it's a really cool makeup when you get them in a clubhouse with the
guys that are from tons of different backgrounds. Everybody has their own unique stories, and then when you bring them all under you know, one one team and we all have sort of one common goal. It's it's cool because you get a really different and like diverse blend of baseball players.
So what's your what's your background? Is this your first year or second year? And how has it been tusuns only one hundred and twenty degrees.
Yeah, yeah, which is actually it's that's pretty Uh, that's kind of a shock to me because I'm a Northeast guy originally, so being down here in the Southwest, I definitely have to get acclimated to the weather.
But no, this is my this is my second year here.
Last year twenty twenty four was my first full season as a two Sons Suguara and it was my first year in Independent Pro Bowl. So I was excited to come back out here and play again. But yeah, like I said, initially, I'm.
From upstate New York, so a few hours north of.
The of the city where I went to, Sunny Albany. Sunie is the state University of New York Albany, and I played played my college ball out there. Then after after playing college, I just kind of wanted to sort of immerse myself in the, uh like the professional scene and see see if I could push my career a bit further. And I was fortunate enough to come across with with Sean McNeil, and yeah, here we are.
You know, we uh we've got to to son Shires calls here And it's sort of a similar thing, right, Guys trying to you know, continue their careers, get an opportunity, uh, those kinds of things. How much do you think about that in terms of things that you've got to do to get, you know, to get that opportunity to get somebody to see you, get somebody to look at you, or is it are you able to just go out and play and kind of hope for the best.
How do you approach that?
Yeah, I would say it's kind of a combination of both.
When you want to play, when you're you know, maybe you played in college and things of that nature, and when you want to continue your career beyond that, you definitely have to do some digging on your own and and get yourself in front of the right eyes, you know, whether that's going to whether that's going to workouts and tryouts and things like that, or just getting in touch with, you know, coaches and and trying to reach out maybe through all different types of networking that you can do
and things like that, or you just have coaches reach out to you. There's a lot of different ways that can work. I guess the right answer is that there is no singular path. There's like I said earlier, there's tons of there's tons of guys that come from all
different sorts of backgrounds. But yeah, you definitely have to you definitely have to do a lot of work on your own on your own part where you're reaching out to people and you're trying to really immersify yourself in the whole process because it's so competitive nowadays in the professional scene, even at like the independent level and like the lower independent level where we're we're not affiliated with Major League baseball.
Of course we're not like minor league players, right, but it's still.
Such competitive baseball because there's so many guys out there that are looking to continue their careers, right and you know, really want to keep playing baseball and see how much they can get out of their careers. So you got to you got to really work hard to make sure that you can get in front of the right eyes.
And then hopefully make that happen.
You know, Steve and I both covered minor league baseball here in Tucson, and they were Triple A guys, so you know, guys who are on the cusp of are on the way up or on the way down from the major leagues. But I know about ust, but you know, I'm not going to lie that there there were a lot of guys that you know, we talked to and we met or winning and losing didn't really matter to them all. They wanted to do was to play well and get somebody's attention. But it seems like, you know,
you guys as a team. It just sounded what you sound like that it does matter to you guys, even though guys are trying to get the opportunity.
But you still want to win.
Games, right of course, Yeah, I mean inherently as a competitor and anything you want to win, you know, that's part of your your foundation, or at least it should be in my opinion, you should always want to win, no matter where.
You are, no matter what.
Level you're at, and like, of course, like yeah, there's there's like the underlying sense of I want to keep playing and maybe if I'm lucky enough, I could get promoted to uh, you know, a higher league and somebody can get because there's always there's always that next level.
Right.
But at the end of the day, no matter.
Where you are, that's if you're in high school, college, professional, even all the way up to the very top, you should want to you should want to win baseball games. And and I think that that'll there's there's no reason that the two can't be correlated.
Right where you care about.
Your your how well you play individually and also how well your team does. Those two things should there should be a lot of parallels there because if you if you do want to do well, the best way you can do well is think of, you know, how how can I help this team win? Because if you're going to perform well, that's look, that's all the more likely that that's going to help the outcome and and of the of the game.
So, yeah, we all want to win.
It's it's also helps that we've we've melded really well early on this year and and we have a great group of competitors that all are sort of on the same page in that sense where we're playing good ball and we want to we want to stick to that going forward.
So so, Mike, I mean, you've you've been talking about you guys kind of all having like this really good connection and like, uh gelling together very well. What are you guys doing like just off the field, like in the locker room, when you're hanging out like on days off.
Well, even even tell them your situation. That's a great question because it's more about because I think three dudes, three dudes lived together with my friend. That's kind of how it got connected to me. Yeah, you're I mean, there's more than just baseball here, right right, Mike.
Yeah, absolutely, it's the playing in this league in and of itself is a great experience for all those reasons. And part of what's so cool is we get to see parts of the country that you wouldn't otherwise really see. I guess at least in my experience. I said, I'm from New York originally, so I can't really imagine myself out in certain parts of you know, New Mexico or West Texas. So we we get to go to all
sorts of cool places places like that. We spend a lot of time together on the road and in road trips, so by nature, yeah, you're gonna you're gonna find guys that you get along with. And we all get along together so well with throughout we're just seeing each other so much because it's a you know, it's a two two and a half month season depending on how far are you going to the playoffs, so it's a lot of games and.
A short amount of time.
So we're around each other every single day, a lot.
Of turnaround with some of the travel, and so we we all.
We all get along so well. And you know, whether it's just after the games and we go grab a bite to eat, sit down or before games. You know, we we have time where we can you know, kind of do some recreational stuff. Obviously, like you guys said too, it's it's super hot out so there's not a there's not a whole lot you're doing as far.
As going out, going out during the.
Yeah, exactly, hanging out by of the pool. Yeah, no, do things like, well, we work out together, try to try to you know, push one another in that regard.
But yeah, it's just all the all the.
Good camaraderie definitely showcases itself just in the because of how much we're spending time with one another. So yeah, it's it's been great.
I'm curious what you studied in New York. You sound like a very bright guy. I say this because you use words like correlated in parallel and I'm googling that. I'm googling those words, so what the hell?
Yeah, yeah, no, I don't I don't mean to, I don't mean whatever.
But you.
We're just sports dudes.
That's probably just because I was one of the I was one of those those college student athletes that I ended up having.
Like a six year college career.
So I was in college forever just because I played through the COVID years and everything like that. And I had a red shirt ear on top of that. So I was in college for a long time. And yeah, I got my degree in communication and then I got a UH. I did like a graduate program in UH in communications as well for my last year of college eligibility.
So cool. You might have to have you as a co host one of these days when you're not doing it.
Maybe yeah, oh yeah.
So let me ask you.
I know you played the outfield, I know you played first base. Does that that must help you in terms of being noticed because you can play a couple of positions.
Yeah.
Yeah, having the versatility is great.
Being able to do that, And I think a lot of guys try to do that thing. Whatever your your tool is, you want to showcase it. Whether it's if you're a really good base runner or your good power, if you're on the mound and you got you can throw a good velocity, or you got really good stuff, really good pitch, like a mix of pitches. You want to showcase whatever that is. So and and part of that is just adding things to your.
Your tool set.
Right, like you want to if it means trying to pick up a new position, just doing anything to sort of showcase that you're trying to really indulge yourself as a baseball player and continuously grow, continuously get better. I think that that's a big part of of maybe earning an opportunity at.
The higher level eventually, is.
That you showcase the fact that you can still improve and as opposed to just sort of plateauing and remain remaining stagnant as a player. So anytime you're able to do things like that, I think, I think it's helpful. So I just want to be well rounded, want to contribute, like I said, to winning the best best.
Way you can. So yeah, it's it's good. It's good.
I played college or in college, I played primarily just the outfield, and then when I got back out when I got out here, we had last year, and then this year too, we have there's we've come across, especially at the professional level, some some really really really good athletes,
uh in in the outfield. So I not not to say that I'm not a good athlete myself, but I whenever it's like, you know, if you can find ways to stay out on the field and maybe pick up a corner infield spot where you don't have to run, you know, all over the field, and just make sure you can stay in the lineup.
You know.
That's that's a good way to.
Do if you're reading a dictionary in the dugout. So sir, go ahead, go.
Ahead, Okay, So tell us a little bit bit about your upcoming schedule. If people on a common and see you play, uh, how you know how when?
Where?
Yeah, we played. We play at Keno Veteran Memorials Stadium, which is a great venue. Like I can't say enough good things about it. It's such a it's such a fortunate opportunity to be able to play there. In my you know, probably slightly biased opinion, it's the best place to play in this league by far. It's it's a great venue. Our are the staff there does a great job.
So we we play there.
Our schedule is pretty consistent and so usually it's Thursday through Sunday or any mixture of those three days will have three game series at home. So usually Thursday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday, any combination of like those three days.
Will be will be at home and then we hit the road for some.
Series uh in places like like Roswell Roswell, New Mexico, Santa Fe, New Mexico, Pecos, Texas, Alpine, Texas. But yeah, when we're home, we play over at Keno Veterans Morales Stadium seven pm. We've actually had some really good turnouts so far. It's been a lot of fun we do. You can follow us on all our social media, which is like two San Saguaro's handles, and the social media team is doing a great job this year of putting
out a lot of our promotions. Will each each night, each game night has like themes to it, so we'll do like an eighties night or like you know, things like things of that nature. Stuff like promotion for like some of the kids and that they can come out and have fun, they get to they get to run the bases. We'll do we'll do fun seventh inning stretch activities. So we we like to keep it, keep it lively,
keep the games interesting. We've had some great crowds this year, so yeah, you can follow along with that on all of our social medias.
We have.
Facebook, Instagram are the two main places where.
We're actual Tickets are all general admission tickets are ten bucks, right cool, you.
Know, yeah, yeah, yeah. We got concessions, we got some, we got some. We got a team store there, I believe, with some some good apparel, and so yeah, it's.
A lot of fun. Great. We've been pretty pretty good at home.
So far this year too.
I think only one.
Loss at home if I'm not nice.
And so yeah, we had an awesome walk off win last night in a really exciting game. Shout out to Marquise Woods had a big, big rb I too rb.
I double to win it for us in the bottom of the ninth.
Which was our first walk off this year. Offense has been swinging, swinging.
A great this year.
Got a ton of talent out of the out of the bullpen, and all of our starters are off to great starts too, so it's well, we're firing on all cylinders.
Well, Mike, we appreciate your time. Tell Quinn to get you some nice fish when he comes back, and we likes likes to grill.
He cooked me up a.
Delicious steak the other night. It was on Father's Day. It was it might have been that thirty two ounce steak.
And it was.
It was delicious. It is the best best meal I've had since coming since coming back out to Tucsons. So they really fortunate to be.
Out here with these guys, right right, Well, we'll see you soon. Appreciate your time. Thanks, sounds good, Thanks so much.
Guys.
Those tags, yeah, Mike, Mike whaling from the Sorrows. It's very cool. Yeah, yeah, well spoken obviously.
Yeah, and you know, I mean those guys they love the game, right yeah. Yeah, it's like like again like the Sugars, cause the guys who love the game still looking for an opportunity. I feel like they've got a little something that that can attract some attention.
Even if you even if they don't, and you know, real estate, because you were part of that, they get to do something that you and I probably dreamed.
Yeah. I'd love to have been maybe the Savage. I guarantee you if you would have given the opportunity, yeah, I would have. Yeah, I would have to. Yeah. Okay, let's go pay two sons. Steve Vera here and I've got a tip for you.
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Steve Rivera, He's got his eye on the ball on Tucson sports station Fox Sports fourteen fifty.
Hey, welcome back to winding the ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera, your Jagan's aus who got ready behind the scenes stuff.
That was a lot of fun. That was fun. He was fun. Smart guy. Smart guy, yeah, way smarter than either one of us. Yes, yes, So what do you get rewarded for hitting a guy hitting hitting? He gets sent to the miners.
Man.
He started a big huha last night. And again, like I said, not because he was trying to hit for Nando Tattios. He was all over the places. As a joke, if you had been trying to hit for Nando Tatis, he never would to hit him because he wasn't throwing it anywhere he wanted to. Last night, Uh, he was wild, and he looked he looked spooped, right wide eyed.
It was his first time in the majors. He looked.
Intimidated by the by the whole deal. And then he didn't pitch well and so they his name is something little. Uh, but they already sent him to the miners today, so that's what he calls man. You know, hey, look he's got his cup of coffee. He was, you know, he was what's his name, Uh, the bull Durham guy, Crash Davis. He had his moment up in the majors. If look, if he's good enough, he'll be back, be back. Jack Little is the guy's name. He'll even They brought up
a guy named Will Klein. So Dodger's pitching. Man, it's just a mess, but they're still the best they've had. They've used the most different starting pitchers of anybody in the league.
And I want still the first place. How many games over?
Uh not a ton not as much as you would expect, but you know, but they're still a first place the division.
He pitched later tomorrow. Who Tony for?
He threw on Tuesday?
I think they said Sunday.
Yeah, and he only threw an inning, So you know, they could bring him back. You know, they're obviously going to be very careful with them. I'm not sure when he'll when he'll throw again. Let me see, Well he's not throwing today, and he's not throwing Saturday, so maybe they'll use him on somebody.
Yeah, that's what you said. So you're gonna have breaking news for the Last Nights game and Sunday's game.
I'll leave it atone, Okay, anything else, Jane, No, you know, I mean that's that's the way it goes.
You probably know how many weeks before football starts.
It's under seventy five days, because I know somebody posted seventy five days to football just a few days ago.
Okay, we're getting close to seventy days, so that's quick. That's what ten weeks? Yeah, that's ten ten weeks.
Yeah, it was like thirty until they play Hawaii or not thirty. I mean they play on the thirtieth.
Yeah, I think it's probably ten weeks until there.
In the first game, I was kind of starting to gear up for our pool, Steve, you know, starting to get things, you know, get things put together, checking out the schedule, you know what games look like. Because the first weekend of college football actually starts the second to the last weekend of August. There's like four games on like the twenty fourth, and then the full first week of games. I think that's Saturday is August thirtieth. Yeah,
Labor Day weekend late August thirtieth, is that Saturday. But there's some games on the twenty eighth and the twenty ninth.
Yeah, and so is there was on a Friday or Saturday. Saturday.
Their can't their game with Kansas State here the third week of the season is a Friday night game, which makes me very unhappy because you lose the tailgate day. You know, you don't really tailgate on Friday. I mean some people will, the super super diehards will. We're kind of semi diehards anymore.
Yeah, but we won't. I'm sure we won't tailgate on that Friday. We'll just kind of show up at the game and do whatever we do. What are you hoping you know, we haven't talked it three in a while to see because you go, you go and you sit in the stands, and what are you hoping to see? For improvements? Well? One, I obviously hope the team is better, right.
Okay, Yeah, but the fan experience, they've got to do something first of all.
First, and I don't know when they'll ever have the money to do, they got to fix that sound system, without question, without question.
That really takes away from the experience of the game, I would have sound system.
I would have never known that had I not gone with our guy Bill. You invited me and I went, I'm thinking, God, that's muffled. You can't hear it.
And and you know when we've experienced it on both endscause when when when they put up that sound system, we were on the south end of the stadium and it was blaring.
Isn't that what it's from? From the south end?
The speaker system is attached to the scoreboard right on the south end. So we're there and we couldn't hear because we could make it because it was too loud, right, And then we also didn't feel like we had a good view of the big, new, big giant, you know, scoreboards. So we moved to the north end. We are now the third section in from the north end from on the on the west side. Okay, we still can't make out what they're what they're saying. I was with him
and I just want you can't it's it's terrible. And I'm told that when that sound system got designed, it wasn't designed by somebody who knows how to design that. There's just somebody who said I know how to do this, and they said, go do it and it was terrible and it's still.
Yeah. You know, well Greg Byrne was still here when they put up.
That scoreboard ten years so, so that's the first thing, because it takes it takes away from the experience if you can't I mean, you can make out the play by play guy, you know, Jeff Deane, you can hear what he says, but anything else like the videos and the the the on field.
Promo, you cannot make out total. So that's that's the thing. Number one. I never would have known that had an okay number two. Number two is food. Although they made some improvement.
I'm okay with the food, partly because I don't eat a lot there now. I mean I do wish i'd go back to the old nachos where you get nachos in a bowl, and but I don't like the little cup that you get on the side.
But that it's not enough for me.
The food is not enough for me to complain about because we stuff our faces at our tailgate and by the time we get to to the game. You know, if I get a hot dog, it's a surprise. I might get some nachos. But that's it. So I'm not and you know it's expensive, but I don't spend a lot of money on it. Okay, to me, A lot of it is we need something something more clever with the with the promo and the games and stuff like that. They're annoying. A lot of them are annoying.
Are you saying that because you're older or because they're just annoying?
You're just dumb? Do you go to football games?
Yeah, I'm usually the box with Brian though.
Oh that's right, I am just dumb. Yeah, there need to be more clever. They need to be a little more clever or you know, I don't know.
I mean, my brother hates the fact that the band doesn't get to play enough, and I'm like, I don't of mind with that too because I don't like the band.
Right.
Well, we had the band director, right, and you weren't here that day, but you asked me the questions and I did one of them, and you said he.
Didn't answer the question. He didn't he didn't aswer the question. Well, what he said was you know that that they can't do an entrance because the tunnel is too small. Well, that's a bunch of crap. And I'll stand by that because if you watch, if you watch the tunnel that the Ohouse State Band comes out of, it's two people wide, and they have a great entrance.
They have the best entrance in all of college football.
And they've got a tunnel that you and I could barely walk by it, walk through it side by side. It's your pregame food that so, so don't tell me that you can't generate some sort of a great band entrance.
That that would be a up in my up in my uh things that they need.
And you've been you've been to a number and we covered the you know, we covered the team many many years ago, but you've been to other places where.
You say, God, that's pretty good. Can't we do that? Can't we do that? Right? Right? Give me a give me a place, Well, well, I state you were a state. No, I've never been know how to Wisconsin?
All right?
That jump around that they think things they do between the third and fourth quarter, all right, And now to know that's something that has to organically happen. You can't say, you know, Jed Fish tried to force some stuff and it just did not just his music, Yeah, it just didn't. Somebody's got to come up with something, right, and I don't know what. It's not the wave or the rock whatever they do, you know, it's it's something.
And I don't know what it is. And they've tried a bunch of things.
And I give him a lot of credit for you know, the guy who does the drum at the beginning of the game and from where we said, he's in the far corner of the stadium, so we can't hear that, you know, we don't hear it.
So I don't know what you do. You wish.
Arizona had something like that, but those things have to happen. As I said, you can't create those things.
Right.
Something.
You wish Arizona had something like that and not not a lot of schools have that.
You know.
You you see the you see the.
Entrance that Virginia Tech does, you know with enter Sandman. I watched it on video and I get tingles.
Yeah, dude, right, yeah, I mean I remember there was a video probably a couple like a couple a couple of months ago.
It was Metallica playing in that stadium.
It was rocky.
I'm surprised to still because they went you know, they went crazy because Metallica came in and played their entrance in a concert in the stadium, you know, and it would be like if you sent different end it's coming played airs on the stadium.
You know.
There's things like that, Stephen, and it's it's hard for me as a fan. It's one of those things where I'll know it if I see it, right, I can't think of it if I but I'll know it if I see it.
And I'm gonna throw this at you.
The fact that Arizona's not a football school and it's not known for being I think that has something to do.
Sure, you know, but I like the DJ. I don't like the DJ. Yeah, I don't like any yelled at by a DJ at a football game.
Is it because of your age?
Yeah?
Probably yea.
And that's why I asked you. But you're there kind of different capacity. Well he's not, yeah, And he's not there to entertain us. He's and he's there to entertain you, right you, and and and and and then and people in the you know, in the zone of zoans.
That's how I get the U A basketball because it's the same type of thing. It's the music's not for the people that intended.
We're not the we're not the demographic. It's the people that are playing it.
So I don't know what it is, but but I will say, start with that damn sound sah with I'll fix the sound system and it'll fix a lot of things. It'll make you won't be cringing when somebody starts yelling into the into the microphone.
Well here's the thing, because because Desiri has these uh questionnaires, right or whatever.
Yeah, we'll see, yeah, we'll I respond to those all the time. And this is what you putt Yeah, you know, it would be sweet. They put in misters, like like how they have that like shopping malls and stuff. They just like put in misters. That would be That would be awesome.
Like like those lines that they have the camera on maybe one of those that kind of revolves and goes back.
I'm in the shade. I don't care you guys, that's too bad for you.
And the sun hit oh yeah, like I see it from the box and the sun on zone and like, man, they are cooking right now.
You know, hey, look, we all we all did our time there. Okay, we all did our time.
We sit where we sit because of like in the day in the day game, we're the first ones in the shade because the press box shadow comes over us.
That makes sense. Yeah, like you said, you've paid your dues, so I don't care about anybody else.
You gotta go.
We Gotta go was a quick segment. We'll come back and get some breaking news.