Tuesday, June 24, Hour 1

This is I on the Bomb with Steve Rovera on Fox Sports fourteen fifty powered by Nova Insurance Services Ensure your most prized possessions.

Hey, good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to Tuesday's show of ut of the Ball here on Fox Sports Fortune fifty. I'm Steve Rivera.

I got Dave Silver with me in the studio.

I am here and I'm running the show, so expect the unexpected.

Our microphones are on.

That's good, we're yes, we're working. Hey, I've gotten better at this.

It's good.

That's good because we have no choice but for me to get better at this. Young guys are out today tomorrow. Uh, so we got this show going on. Luck to talk about Dave. You've been out for a little bit.

Yeah, you know, it's been kind of an interesting few days with the NBA Finals wrapping up, So that was I'm sure you guys talked exensively about that yesterday, but certainly that was kind of the highlight of this part of the summer, and so that's kind of the dead part of summer was kind of upon us.

Yeah, which is tough for me because I have a hard time finding people. I had one of your not a colleague of yours, but the same kind of business you're in with Jennifer, I think yesterday. And it's just how difficult it is to find stories this time of year. But you get the off stories. You don't have to do the sports stories, right, not that you have to do it before, but you find the off off the cuugh stories.

We used to have a lot of fun with those kinds of stories too, because those are stories maybe you would not have time to do in the heart of the football and basketball seasons in a town like this, So you kind of put those stories to the side. You think about it and say, hey, you know, why don't I contact this person. Let's do something a little bit different. So that's kind of what the summers were always about.

Off the top of your head. Do you remember any of those stories?

Oh?

Man, they weren't too memorable.

You were, well, it's been a while, but you you must have been a whiz at this.

I mean, let me go back and look. I mean, you know a lot of little league things.

Yeah, I think you say that. My one of my favorite was like back then, it was like the twenty fifth year of them going to the Williams Sport and the kids of seventy whatever it was, eighty whatever it was, and they still had their vhas VHS tapes, and and we ran those and I did the stories on most of the kids that are still around, and maybe a coach or two had already passed.

You know.

It was also good. Again, it doesn't really exist now. In the same form was this Tucson Summer Pro League. And that would kick in like in July usually or whatever. Right now, I guess it's going when when they, yeah, the guys would come Wildcats would be playing, or the recruit would be coming in, or some you know, veteran player would come back this summer.

Those were great stories to have, you know, stuck right in the middle, especially when they went at each other. Yeah, you know Richard's in the U and the Marcus Williams and the Jason Terry, Jason Terry and uh and Chris Rogers and those guys who just you know didn't want to back down.

Yeah, I mean they would come back. They would stick around for the summer. Things were different. I guess in those years they didn't have places to go or they didn't need to be back, but they would do summer school or just to kind of stay around Tucson and then they would play.

So those are a good summertimes story.

I used to joke about this because Marcus was coming back for his sophomore year and he'd score like forty five a game and blah blah blah. And I used to get email saying, how come he can do that? I hope he does that in the regular season, ma'am. He's playing against nobody.

Yeah, he's playing against some forty year old guy played you know, high school basketball twenty years.

Ago, right right, You'll be lucky to get fifteen from him. Yeah, And and and that's what he did every now, and he scored, scored, But yeah, there was kind of false expectations.

It was fun though it was.

It was a fun when it When it first started, I think they were playing at the JCC.

They would get you know, actually some people to come out and watch.

And then eventually I think it evolved and moved around to some different increations a great Gregory school, but back in the day it was it was kind of cool when all of a sudden, you know, hey, it's you'd get the phone call like at you know, four o'clock, Hey, I heard that you know, Richard Jefferson is going to show up and play play tonight.

We would just you know, send the cameras out.

Don't forget about TM USA two baseball that summer, the summers when they have the headquarters here.

Yeah, they had a lot of Olympic program whatever it was a USA Baseball program.

Jerry Kendall was coaching.

And you get a lot of the sons of the at the time, uh, the big the big wigs, you know, back in the back of the day. The Suns would come through your fourteen fifteen year old kids. Yeah, so that was fun.

I think we talked about this once before, but I'm pretty sure Fernando of Alanzuela brought to like Team Mexico here to.

Play exhibition games.

So maybe it was around high Corbette and Jerry Kendall and you know Fernando was, oh yeah, I think you did ten fifteen years from his last games. Yeah, you know, he was here. People knew him. People want to come out and you know, get his autograph.

And stuff and think he was accommodating too, wasn't he. It was right, well, the good old days. Now it's like it's too hot out of here.

Well, that's the other problem is, you know, you have to kind of base those stories either one being really super early in the morning or later later at night or indoors. So you know, we weren't going to run out there, and I mean there was some there was some stories worth covering.

Yeah.

Well the staple was the t on toros in the sidewin, right for all those years. You get your cameras out there for an inning or two and then get the call, yeah they're still playing. There's ten twenty five and they're still played. Yeah, extra eighties or we would we would do.

I don't know, you guys probably did sort of the same thing.

You know.

We would do interviews before the game and use that as our coverage and then oh, by the way, here's you know, twenty five seconds worth of highlights.

Yeah, especially in the afternoon paper.

What's what we did, you know, find a feature, do the interviews right during the stort, right during the game, and then just sticking the the score. Yeah, oh by the way, because you know what, most didn't care about the outcome. They're there to have fun, no, yeah, and get an update on maybe a player too, especially when they're coming down or movie no, I was gonna say that happened.

You know, at least a few times every season there be Ricky Henderson I remember showed up one time or the Kurt Schilling and Randy Johnson both came down here for rehab assignments.

With the hope that they would talk, and they usually were pretty good.

I think they understood, you know, they weren't being going to be outed by you know, ten people. It would be like two TV stations and one newspaper guy. Yeah, I mean it'd be it wasn't a big deal.

Did you ever have a confrontation with any of them? Confrontation? I don't think so.

No.

Yeah, it was when I first started, always on a twenty three year old, and it was tough the first year or so, trying the guy's trying to bully you and trying to you know, yeah, yeah, trying to you know, just bully you.

I used to not be super aggressive. I mean I kind of just flung to the side. I think most of us did because we didn't really know. I mean, they would be quote unquote, you know, focused on whatever they needed to do, and they finish hitting and they start walking away, and you're like, this is a good time to grab you.

Yeah, you're not quite sure that the right time, or I'll get you later. It's always a good good I gotta go get a sandwich. I'm still waiting for Ryan Samberg to finish the sandwich in the clubhouse. I'll be back, I'll be back. Okay, the game starts never came out.

We kind of stipp be the most was not in baseball, but this was basketball when the Lucas coach Lucas when he coached the Spurs, I want to see us, but John Lucas, when you cook, yeah, you know, they usually have time before the games to talk to them because you know they're and he kind of ducks me for a few I was following them around the court eventually and we ran out of time.

And it was like this guy, what the hell?

Yeah, it was a simple, simple, just a quick you know, get a couple of quick qutes for your story. Yeah, I think it's about Sean at the time, and it was, oh, it was like, come on, I'm not asking, you know, for the recipe for for whatever.

Yeah, well, I mean we you and I both kind of complained about access and how it's different now than it was. But at least, now, don't they have to do like some kind of pregame news conference at least the NBA coaches.

Like oh yeah, yeah, they do.

They and they do.

They open the locker rooms like ninety minutes before the game game okay, oh yeah, yeah, those are staples. Again, they have to agree to say yes to you. But they do bring the coaches in to get you know, early work in.

Yeah.

I mean sometimes Steve Kurr's best moments are in those pregame news conferences. Yeah, they ask him things and maybe yeah stuff. It's not pertin into the game itself, which is something else is going.

Yeah, well to your points to fill the notebook before the deadline comes later, because that'll be replaced or become the sidebar later in the night.

But now deadlines are so screwy, you know.

Like are they even deadlines anyway? Well, well, for the Star and I'm not giving away secrets. I mean, I think you're probably on deadline right now four o'clock for tomorrow's paper. But it's the internet that's twenty four to seven. Yeah, right, Once you come up with something, you put it on and you're good.

Yeah.

I was at the tail end of all that when I finished in two thousand and nine, I think when Luke was going.

Through his his his illness, the end of his time.

Yeah, I mean for us it was And that was always kind of bothered me too, is that we would put stories on the Internet before they even hit the air.

Yeah.

Yeah, which is a lot right right. You're breaking your own stuff if you broke yourself.

Yeah, here it is.

Yeah, though, that was very odd, but you know, I'm not sure if that actually worked. You know, people are going to jump on the Internet and say what does Dave have or what Steve edge?

It is? What it is?

I mean back then it was so new things like Twitter and Facebook and things like that that I was just kind of getting used to myself. And then next thing, you know, the TV stations all over the place are like putting their stories on you know, long before the Yeah.

Yeah, no, you know what I'm I don't even do much Twitter. I just don't like it. It's a bunch of crap, you know, people fighting with each other about stupid stuff. Uh so I just do it on Facebook. That's not and that's not it's a world. It's a different audience. It's older audience. You know they don't get into it, but Twitter is like crazy, you know, anybody from everywhere. It's just kind of talking. You just never know who these people are. That's the whole thing. I

How came you always on?

How come you always so negative with Tommy, Tommy Lloyd, I'm thinking what? So I had to go and see if this guy was a fake fake profile profile.

Yeah, I have a sense of who it might be. It might have been. I said, what are you talking about? I said, yeah, you always I.

Said, please breve it, go find it where because it's not true. He left me alone, and then he kind of sent me a note later on, and I'm thinking, go away a bunch of fake stuff.

You know, it's a problem on that old Internet.

You never quite sure if these people are real, where they're coming from.

There's you know, there's stories about that as well. I can look that up.

So Tommy stopped sending me those notes. No, he could care less, but yeah, it was just kind of strange. So today Tommy had no Dave, Dave Silver, We're gonna have the coach the manager of the Tucson Squirrels.

Last week we talked to one of the players. It was good. They're very good this year.

I think they were sixteen and four when we talked to the baseball player.

I think they won a game or two, so they might be better than that. Now.

His name is Sean McNeil. I'll see how long he's been with them. They won three titles of the Pequos League. So he's gonna call us about three eighteen in about seven minutes, and then at four seventeen about we're gonna have the good friend Doug Holler with the Athletic, who covers the Phoenix area for the Athletic and he's covering the Suns when I've talked to him about the big trade one. How's the city kind of dealing with that? I think they their time is coming gone with Durant.

Yeah, I know he was.

It was the honeymoon. It's a honeymoon everywhere.

Yeah.

So one of my buddies sent me his his profile, not his, but Durant's profile. All the uniforms he's worn in the last whatever. He's like j Lo of the NBA. Yeah, he's got every uniform now a new one. He's bounced around, that's for sure. What is He's thirty seven now, so I don't know how many teams is good. Like you said, he's got to be what five, five or sixteen?

Oh more than I think I have to count at least.

But yeah, it's been an interesting run for him, and you know, he seems to get to a place and he's happy with it for about a year or so, and then by year two the comments started coming out to get moved, and you know now they're now the Suns are talking about blowing everything up, getting rid of Bradley Beal as well. They want to build everything around Devin Booker, which they tried already once before. Yeah, you know, I mean the whole DeAndre Ayton thing never really panded out.

I don't know.

It's a strange franchise with a relatively new ownership group. We can talk to Doug more about that, and how sure he has observed that, you know, from day to day you never didn't quite know what the owner is going to want to do.

In addition to that, there's already kind of you know, everybody believes these mock drafts. I don't take much into account, but they have Carter Bran going to Phoenix at number ten. I think some some excuse me, some other mock drafts had him going twenty ninth to Phoenix. I guess my what because it's Phoenix, right. Yeah, you know that they would love him, but I think he's gonna go way higher than that.

So we'll see.

Maybe they want him that much, maybe he has an insight to what the possibility is.

It sounds like like, you know, we've been talking about this. It seems like, you know, really since the season ended, that he was really pretty much in the top fifteen. Yeah, you know, no matter what mock draft you looked at, he said, take those with a grain of salt, and no one will talk about them after sure, you know this thing's over.

But sounds like, you know, he's gonna have a pretty good chance. Yeah, yeah, no, good for him, Good for him.

He's gonna get a pay raise a little bit what they're rigging now, which I'm sure he made a pretty good penny over here. And then we'll see what happened with Caleb Love here in the next couple of days, because you know, I think that he's capable, but there's issues for whatever there are, because he's not in anybody's radar or a very few people's radar.

Well, you know, we all watched him play for the last couple of years, and we know what some of the issues are, and so whether or not he can take his talent to the NBA or maybe they can either fix some of the the shooting woes and maybe the inconsistency or maybe the lack of defense or whatever whatever things. Maybe we're holding him back in the scout size. You know, who knows he can get into a good system or maybe have to go play elsewhere in a different country, yeah, for a year, or hey see.

How that goes. Don't you wish you had his future?

Yeah, because he's going to make some money somewhere doing what he does playing basketball. He's playing basketball. Well, it's funny. Oh, let's take a break, going to get ahold of Sean McNeil and come back after the Breakka.

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This is I on the Ball with Steve Rovera on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. Subscribe now to the podcast on the iHeartRadio while just search Ie.

On the Ball.

Hey, welcome back to I on the Ball hill Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Roverta. You're Dave Silvery on the phone. We have Sean nil, the manager of the Tucson Suars.

Sean, how you doing.

I'm doing well. How you guys?

We're doing fine? Thank you.

You're in Pecos, Texas. How's the weather out there?

Yeah? A perfectly hot?

Same here? Is it a different hut?

A little bit more less less shade, more more oil field?

So okay, you can't really hide from the heat there, right?

How long you've been managing this team?

This would be my I want to say my fifth or sixth year in twenty twenty.

You you have a you must have a secret sauce to get these guys because you want a few titles yourself, right, Yes, yes.

I won too, one in twenty twenty one and twenty twenty one, and then unfortunately I didn't get to win in twenty two or twenty.

Three, but we were in the championships.

Yeah, two years as well.

How I always talking to Mike the first basement of years a couple of days ago. And obviously you guys have had a lot of success for having some of that. Now what was your success or has been your success to get to the finals at least a couple of times and win two titles? Because I think you do most of the talent evaluation or does somebody else as well?

No, it's just me so honestly, I just look at a lot of college staff.

That spend most of my time in the off season going through colleges just trying to make contacts and out the players, just to invite them to spring train and just to see if they're good enough to make the Suarros.

Okay, maybe a little bit about this year's club.

What can fans look forward to seeing as they come out to the games for the rest of the summer.

If you could just give us a record too.

We're currently eighteen and four.

And just to just coming out to see the suare is a lot of fun.

A lot of good baseball.

But also I think to highlight this team this year more so than the other teams I've had in the past. We have a lot more tu Song guys playing for us this year. A couple came back from last year. One's Jame and Servantes and the others Travis Cole. But then we have a couple others like Antonio Fernandez is one.

And then we have two kids.

Not I don't think they grew up in Tucson, but they live there now. One is Aris Rodriguez and the other is Francisco.

Coso. I think that's how you.

Say his last name, something like that.

So you don't purposely go out and find these guys, but they're good enough to make this team.

Being locals, yes, yes, yeah, no, I pull from all over the country.

We have East Coast guys, we have West Coast guys, Midwest guys, South guys, Dominican Republic I've even had guys from Australia and Japan before.

Wow, do they come looking for you too?

I mean do they look for opportunities where they can play and continue their careers.

Yeah.

People will reach out to me. They'll they'll reach out to the Instagram account. Usually they'll message that account and then they'll pass that information along to me. I believe Derek Cabrero is actually one of them that reached out to me. But then you know college coaches contacts that I have, they'll reach out to me through email and everything to tell me about a guy, or they if they have my phone number, they'll give me a call as well.

Are you guys kind of on your own with that?

I mean, as like you said, you're the one that's kind of doing the evaluating.

Do you have much help?

I wish I yes and no so so not really.

But then like the players that played for me in the past, if they see a guy, they might reach out and tell me, like, hey, I got a guy for you, or you should take a look at him.

We actually had a kid in spring training.

He didn't make the team, but one of my former players before I got to Tucson reached out and told me about this kid, and then I'll have, like, you know.

Guys that are currently playing.

There's actually two college coaches on our team or three, excuse me, three college coaches. One is at us W University of Southwest. They told me about their catcher, Brian Lodesma, and then you'll have we had another guy. He was he was a college coach for the University of Houston Victoria, and he told me about some of the players along with one of our players, Carson, that came from that school the year before.

So like, guys will.

Recommend guys to me because they kind of have an idea of what the talent level is.

So for the for the league.

So it's a it's a you might explain the league. It's an independent league to Pecklosh League. It's fairly new, maybe fifteen ten to fifteen years. Like I really don't know. I know I have a team in my hometown of Santa Fe. So these kids have dreams, right, I'm assuming you have dreams to move on and move up.

Could you talk about that?

Yeah, so obviously I would like to get into affiliated ball.

You know. For me, I'm not from.

Arizona, I'm from South Jersey live in Philadelphia, so it would be a dream for me to be to get into the Phillies organization. But for these kids, it's an opportunity to get their foot in the door in to get into higher levels. We've had players go on to higher levels. For Tucson specifically, we had one kid signed with the Padres organization back in twenty two and then we had one kid signed with the Cubs organization in January.

So there you're basically for this league. You're betting on yourself. But it is possible to give you a big name in.

Baseball that actually started in the Pecos League and made it to the MLB. Would be Armin Mercedes and you guys remember him from.

The White Short In fact, I was with one of the guys, the hosts, three of the guys. They said that you've already lost maybe made sure or not. Three players moving up somewhere.

Yeah, So off the top of my head, one is Julian Garcia. He's in Billings right now, billions of Mustangs in the Pioneer League. The other one just recently signed with the Tri City Valley Cats in the Frontier League. I'm drawing a blank on the other one. But yeah, guys during the season get picked up all the time from us.

That's why I said it's more a foot in the door kind of league.

So obviously we want them here because they're good players and they help us win, but ultimately we're happy to see them go when they get into higher leagues.

Do the scouts come out to the games? Major league scouts?

I want to say they would come out. If anything, they would watch more like online, just because it's easier for them to watch online. Especially our our staff, especially the play by play guys. They they set up our cameras really well, so now you can see you can have a better experience watching as well as going to the field. And if you know, like some of these scouts might not live in Arizona, so sour our camera angles are great.

I watch it myself afterwards just so I can see so some things or get more insight on guys. But usually they watch the watch online.

So what what's your background?

And I say that because you must have been a baseball guy, baseball player, and now you've been managing for a few years. And in fact, I was talking to Dave about his kids and I know my kids are just out of college or whatever, And it's a lot of it's who you know. And I'm sure you probably know people, and I'm sure you've already reached out to get a job somewhere above this, so you know you have to catch a break somewhere, right, Yeah.

Yeah, Like it's like you said, it's definitely who you know or that help you get into these higher leagues. It's a lot of word of mouth kind of deal.

You know.

I have a few contacts that I would say they are my mentor. One guy played up in UH made it up.

All the way up the Triple A Baseball.

The other UH played over in Japan professionally made a couple of million dollars, played for the same team that show hey Tani played for, but before Donny got there. And like I use him as a contact a lot, just because he is involved with If you guys ever heard of.

Baseball United over in what where am I thinking of Dubai?

Mm hmm.

So, like I've been trying to reach out of him because just he has a lot of contacts overseas in the US. And hopefully you know with all this winning that I'm doing, well, mainly they're doing and I'm just you know, standing there. Uh, maybe it'll work out for me in the future.

And the sport. You know, you just mentioned Dubai.

I mean we just had the World Baseball Classic there at the it's a Keno Stadium, So I mean there's baseball everywhere, right, I mean, I guess you got to be maybe a citizen of those countries, but to play on the on the the country's teams. But there's pro baseball, I know, like in Germany and obviously Japan and then in the Far East.

Yeah.

No, there's a baseball over the all over the world, like you said, Japan, and you have Korea, you have Germany, you have Australia. You have obviously mex Ago with the new team coming in in the in the winter time, which I think is great.

But like I think it's good for baseball. It's good.

I think it's great that you guys had the Baseball Classic as well. I was watching some of the games since I wasn't in Tucson online and on TV as well, just to follow just because I think, Yeah, it was a it's great to watch. It's great to see different countries really like you know, embracing.

Our like our sport. I call it our sport.

You know it's it's it's a great game to play, it's a great game to watch. So I'm glad that you guys had the World Baseball Classic in Tucson.

One of the things that struck me.

And I don't know how long this has gone on, but you're playing at Keno right, your games are at Keno. But not too long ago, you guys were playing at like a Reed Park or something Jerry Field. Sure, you know you guys have come a long way.

Yeah, So we actually started at Keno in sixteen and seventeen when I wasn't around, and then eighteen, I want to say, was Reed Park, and then nineteen was Cherry Field, twenty twenty was COVID, So we had to play at a location in Houston, Texas where.

All the teams played, like I said, in one location.

But for twenty one we were at Anti High School, and then we moved back to Keno in twenty two till now, and.

I feel like we're gonna be there for a long time.

Well, and I think, like I said that the Apples to Apples is probably the best ballpark you play in all over.

The place of and that I would say, this is the crown viewele of the PECOS League.

Does that help you because you guys have won a lot, Does that has that helped you pride wise or performance wise at all?

I would say it helps me more in the recruiting process, like when I go to find players, like one of the players, I would say that was like once I showed him the field, he was one.

His name was Andrew Baker.

To give you a little background on him, he played at the University of Florida, won a national championship with them as well, So like when he saw the field, he like, on I'm coming. I think the that atmosphere as well gives them more of a field, like a

It was, but this field is is immaculate.

Well, having grown up in Santa Fe and played at four Marti Park most of my young adult life, young before I became an adult, that's a Cracker Box compared to this.

Yeah, yes it is. It's definitely you'll definitely see.

Some high scoring games. But I will say this, it's it is my favorite place to visit during this like during the season when we have away games. I think the I think the mountains are beautiful. Being from the East Coast, we don't really see mountains, but just the atmosphere.

They're They're very supportive in Santa Fe.

Yeah, but I mean, like obviously, like the field is nice, but it doesn't compare to you.

You know, don't forget the food, baby, the food is fantastic.

That's true.

That's true.

And I'm assuming you guys are on your busting all over the place, right, is that how this this the summer plays out on buses.

Yeah, so it depends, right, Like, we have a budget for twelve twelve passenger vans this year.

We were only to afford one.

Just because unfortunately, our our host family coordinator had to walk away at briefly and that kind of put us behind and finding the housing for our players.

So we have one van.

The rest well, you know, we might have to carpool, but we had to use the rest of that money for airbnbs. For guys until we're able to find host families for players.

So when you're the remaining players.

Yeah, no, it's a it's a tough, tough league trying to survive. What do you do when you're not coaching the Suarros?

Do you go back home? And what do you do?

So when I actually, when I go back home, I I actually umpire baseball.

Games to make some money, but uh, just so I can.

Stay around the game, maybe get some lessons here and there.

I was previously with.

A mortgage servicing company, working remote remotely, but I you know, I walked away from that to focus more on on baseball and.

The recruiting process.

Well it's funny because we Dave was a longtime TV guy locally here, I was a longtime sports writer here.

Now I do this.

Uh, but you get to do what I don't know, thousands, hundreds of thousands of kids get to do or want to do. Right, You guys are playing baseball for a living, maybe making little scratch with it and trying to live your dream.

Yeah.

No, I feel like I'm I'm just lucky.

One day they just called me, He's like, hey, do you want to manage? And I was like, all right, and to be honest with you.

Before I said that all right, I was kind of unsure. But my girlfriend's the one that convinced me. She's actually the reason too, why I went to Tucson back in twenty twenty, because she's actually originally from Tucson, Arizona.

Wait wait, wait comes one hundred thousand dollars question? Is she still with you?

Yes?

So she knows how much money you're making?

Yes, she she When the previous team I was with was called the High Desert yard Birds, and the commissioner called me because that team was going to fold for the twenty twenty season.

He called me, He's like, you can go to Rosala, you can go to Tucson.

And I had to speakerphone, and she just looked at me and I already knew I'm going to tou Song.

Yeah. Well so you are married?

Yeah, yeah, pretty much. But I was the best decision that I that she helped me make.

Yes, welcome to your future. Well, Sean, we appreciate your time. When do you guys come back?

We'll be back Thursday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday against the Alpine their second they're the second place team in.

Our Division while we're the first place. So definitely a big series will be a lot of good baseball. So come on out if you if you can.

What's the July stuff or no?

Unfortunately, I know Keino has the College fourth of July game, but we'll be back on the fifth and six against Santa Fe.

Actually, okay, cool, cool, maybe we'll go see Thanks a bunch, Sean. Good luck to you this weekend. Well now in Packholston when you come.

Back, all right, appreciate it.

You guys have a good res too. Good luck tonight. Take care. Wow that was shut Sean mc from from the Tucson.

It's uh, it's yeah, you learned more and more. We didn't even ask him some tough questions because I did. Probably don't make a whole lot of money. But they're out there doing what they want to do.

No, I think that's that's the key is they're just trying to extend their their time in baseball, and you know, maybe somewhere along the line, someone's going to pick some of these players up. Remember we had a Tucson Toros came back and there were later incarnation.

They had an independent league team and a few of those guys made it.

I think a handful on that team eventually got out of Tucson onto a you know, professional minor.

League team, and a couple of made the majors. So it can happen.

So it's it's pretty good baseball too, if you if you're you know, Jones in for baseball at a certain level, it's it's, uh, it's not the big League, is not Triple A.

But it's pretty good now in Tucson. As he was saying, they're eighteen and four. They're really good at home, and they're really good on the road. Actually there's seven and one at home and eleven and three on the road, so they're playing some He must have an eye for talent because, like I say, he'd want a lot over the last few years.

And you know, and winning is difficult, especially in baseball.

You know, I'm looking at the teams and I'm gonna think that Tucson might be the biggest city market in the in the in the entire league. So I mean we're talking Alpine. I mean, I've been to Alpine, Texas. But tell me give me a it's like on the road to Big Bend. Okay, God, that's that's nowhere down there yet. Now I've never been. I've been to Big Bend. That's why I say, wow.

Yeah, it's kind of down in that direction. So I have the borders right there. It's yeah, Roswell. I've never there's New Mexico. Have never been to Roswell's not Roswell. But it's Marfa. Ever heard of Marfa? Yeah, Marfa Lights. So yeah, we went down there a couple of times for family. But yeah, that's it's pretty small, about seventy there. You know, they all all they have is this and they talk about this stuff all the time.

Yeah, I mean it's Santa Fan in the summer is beautiful, fantastic.

I go back.

A lot of people go back, right, Yeah, might go back all the time. Opera whatever, different opera, just as the show's shops and all that stuff. H yeah. Yeah. The richest people in Santa Fe are wearing brag tag clothes because they are artists. They are artists or sculptures. You know that just you would never know that that's the Georgia O'Keeffe guy or the woman.

You know what I'm saying.

It's just all these people they're there, that they're there. Yeah, Okay, let's take a break. We kind of over, We'll come back and Doc Moore. If you're an Arizona men's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for nearly forty years. Now

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Streaming live on the iHeartRadio app. This is I on the Ball with Steve Roverra on Fox Sports fourteen fifty.

Hey, welcome back to our in the ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. I'm Steve Riverta, your Dave Silver is good to get ahold of Sean You on a winning out there. Yeah, we have to go out there and help some popcorn and the beer, go.

Out and watch some summertime baseball in Tucson. Summertime.

I haven't done that forever because WBC was for February than it was anything else.

Right, Yeah, that was nice. Weather was nice then.

Yeah, it was a little cold because it was winding members. Yeah, oh yeah, you did some of the games.

It'll be it'll be interesting to see how that, I mean, the franchise has been around there there. I guess this league must be financially pretty solid.

I'm gonna say, yeah, I don't know.

I mean, I don't know it is from the top, yeah, you know, because I think they fund everybody.

There's a lot of teams in that league in some pretty small towns.

So I mean, it is what it is.

And so they're gonna go ahead and watch some some guys that are, you know, maybe still have that dream of getting into at least a professional organization or a major league organization.

I should say, yeah, yeah, people have different dreams. I'd get to the college, play there and see what happens after that. Maybe you'll get seen, Maybe you have a little niche that you can find. Yeah, you know, and you see college guys. You saw the college groups over the weekend or the last two weeks, and how good these players are.

And a lot of those guys if they don't get drafted or or you know, turn pro or you know, leave school, they have other places to go while they're still in college. They can go to the Cape Cod leagues, they can go to other places around the country and play in the summer.

So you know, well, you notice that the schools that he was mentioning were like, you know, D two D the smaller, you know, connected West. But but then you then he throws out the Florida school. Yeah so that was like really okay, yeah, you just you just wonder.

I mean, and if he has connections, and I think the main thing for someone like you know this this team is for him to have connections, him to know, Okay, it's time I need to get ten players. You know, where do I look and he can start making some phone calls and try to sell people to come here and to play.

It's like like where we'll go see tomorrow, you know with the draft, and you just got to be on top of things.

Know what's going to fit with your with your team.

Uh.

I think fillow that. I think that Tommy does this pretty well.

I know Lout did this well, and some some of the coaches, and I'm sure there's thousands of other coaches that do this well.

Where they fit the team scheme, with.

The personalities and the but some of them just go after talent and it doesn't work, you know what I'm saying. We were just talking about the The Rutgers team didn't have a good season, I think a losing record impact, but they had two of the best players in the in in the college game who might be playing pro.

And so you know that coach can turn around and say, listen, you know we might you know.

We need Look what I can do.

I can develop to you know, top five traftics even though we go you know below five hundred is a record.

Well it's kind of strange.

Well, let me tell you this. You talked about that, and I kind of laughed. Because I know you're not being serious. But Sean had these guys, right, he had these guys, but they were already He had the agents, they had the Aaron Gordon's and the and whom and Whomever's trier blah blah blah. They they were already going pro. They just needed a place to land for nine months exactly. They didn't develop NBA skills here, they were already developed.

I know, it's it's interesting too, that's you know, Carter Bryant kind of.

The same different, same difference. He didn't even play that much.

DeAndre eight and played a lot while he was here, as did Treer people like that. But yeah, I mean Carter Bryant, I you know, you look at you go, Yeah, he's got a great, great looking shot he's got he's very athletic, he's good defensively, seems like a good guy.

Well you know what else are they looking at?

There's not much right size right right because and I've said this before, uh when and I this is my pet peep. So you end the game in November, you kick some team by twenty even if it's a good game, and the guys sit down and look at their stats and how those stats kind of like really percterize or

And they've got great scouts and they'll, you know, they'll work these players out. I'm sure you know they all kind of the teams know when they're drafting. That's one of the things about the Suns is up until this this train the other day, they were not going to be drafting in the top ten, so they probably weren't looking at those types of players. And all of a sudden, they're getting the tenth pick, right, and who they going

Pickle right right, So now we're going to have Doug Holler, who covers the Suns for the athletic Maybe he has some insight.

I don't know him.

When I covered a day to day for the Citizen many years ago, i'd go up and see, uh, you know Arizona's people when they'd when they'd have workouts for the for the Suns, and and that was, you know, maybe courtesy workouts. They've bring a bunch of people in and out, so we'll see maybe even the diversions.

Yeah, you know, it's funny. Maybe I'm just not seeing it as much as we used to see it. But I don't know if they even do that much anymore. They'll bring in a group, like they'll bring in like five guys. I think they still do that, do they?

In fact, I was just reading the story about the kids at Rutgers and the Bailey kid refused all workouts. He didn't go anywhere. He had some plan and then he said, no, I'm not going to go. And people are saying that's kind of immatures as well. I'm just living. I'm just doing what I do whatever.

Well, you hear about that sometimes with the football players too, where they don't do workouts or they're they're just going to do the interviews and they're not going to you know, throw.

For the coaches or do whatever.

So it seems to be you know, their agents talking or their families talking and saying, you know, you might have something to lose if you go out there and show them something they don't want to see.

Was there a player just said, don't question me. I just came up with it. Was there a player you thought was a sure bet here that didn't make it even in our day, even in our day, And what's sport basketball? Basketball, because that's very apparent football would be difficult.

I don't know.

I think most of them that we thought were gonna go and have decent careers, I mean that was always kind of loots mantra was, I don't want these guys just to go up there and play for a year or two.

I want to have a career. And they and they did that. Many of them did well. The one guy that could.

Have been much better than what he was, and that was no fault of his own, was Michael Dickerson. Well, because he was fantastic, then he got hurt, growing the growing injury, and he kind of just faded away.

Miles.

I think more people had high hopes for Miles, but he was not an NBA guy.

No, he was a college guy. You're right about Dickers. About Michael. Actually, I saw him, I don't know, maybe in the last ten years or something here in Tucson.

He was around different, looks a little different, it's different, and he.

Was really friendly and he remembered me, which was that guy was like shocked that, you know, a good kid who I was.

But it was really nice to just kind of catch up with him.

He loved he stayed with the Olsen's. He stayed with him whenever he's in town. He was like kind of like their adopted son, because you know, he was just Michael Dickerson.

Yeah.

I think he had either relatives in Phoenix or Tucson. Still, I'm not sure exactly how it worked out, but he all of a sudden he showed up at this one gem and he was he was just yeah, yeah, I think.

He does that every still, because he's kind of like a maverick, just kind of in and out of places.

Yeah, and he was Yeah, that's a good that's a good example of one. Because most of the guys who you thought would make it made it.

Yeah, the Rooks and the Buchlers and the you know during my time the Chris Mills and he had the most unbelievable career and he's still living living that life.

I mean he's you know, TJ's kind of following in his footsteps very much.

So maybe even more. It's a part of the of the team, is the Kurr was.

Well, imagine his future coaching to coaching too, because you know that's going to happen, or broadcasting or broadcasting. Yeah, yeah, I would assume that he'd be a pretty good coach like his dad, you know whatever back in the day. Yeah, and that whole family is just a basketball thing. It's kind of like the Sean Miller family. You know, basketball was their life.

That's right.

Their dad was the coach and him, Sean and his brother were the players.

On the coach and they were all from Pittsburgh to r P. I probably know each other.

Yeah, that's high school year. I think that's why Sean brought him here. Probably thought a lot looked a lot like him, you know, this dogged guy, just the leader type, makes total sense.

I vaguely remember him when he played at pitt Do you remember? I do?

I do?

Because of his eyes and his intensity and thought throwing in Jerome.

Yeah, I know you remember that one played but you know, and I.

Think this is eighty nine ninety yeah maybe no, I think it was like eighty eight, eighty nine.

Yeah, well he played there, but that that play was like later on ninety ninety one maybe, yeah, but he was out there and he was just this guard right this, uh, this, this.

Is just the point guard.

McCoy had a couple of NBA players on the front line, if I remember, Jerome and Charles Smith one of those kind of guys.

Yeah, I can't remember exactly.

And they played here. They played there as well back in the day. So okay, we have about a minute, Dave, we'll come back. No breaking news. Maybe we'll take a call or two early on. And then talked to Doug Holler about the Suns and uh maybe Asu.

I think he's covering some issues.

Yeah.

I mean, it's been a busy, busy offseason up there, and the son's you know, making a big trade the other day, totally switching up the team again for like the second or third time in the last like three or four.

It's been a tough haul pretty much all of our time in Arizona for me and they you know, ninety three was pretty good, and then the COVID year when they went did really well, and then a couple of years ago when they went to the finals and then lost kind of like in an industry.

Yeah, it was just we seem to have had such a really good team, you know, a young team with eighton and with Cal Bridges and Cam Johnson and people like that, and then they just blow it up, bringing Durant and then they get rid of them, right. So it's just been an interesting Dave stretch. What have you done for me lately?

Man?

So what have you done for late lately? Okay, let's take a break and come back.