The Red Sox walk-off the Baltimore Orioles in the series finale, and take 2 of 3 from the birds at Fenway. Joey Copponi and Scott Neville are joined by NESN broadcaster and host of the 310 to Left Podcast, Tom Caron. Joey, Scott and TC talk about the Deja-vu of the 2024 Red Sox, what fans have to look forward to, some of TC's favorite moments covering the team, and his co-chairman role with the Jimmy Fund.
All that, and much more!
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All that, and much more!
The ITM Podcast is brought to you by:
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00:00All right, we are joined by broadcaster,
00:02co-host of the 310 to Left podcast,
00:05and I would say the face of Nesson, Tom Karen, TC.
00:08How you doing?
00:10Joey, Scott, good, how you doing?
00:12I'm doing all right.
00:13Sox, maybe not so much.
00:16We're coming to the end of another deja vu season,
00:20if you will.
00:21I wanna know what it's like from where you sit.
00:24If you think it's harder,
00:26or it's sometimes maybe easier covering a team like this
00:29in a season like this.
00:32Harder or easier than what?
00:33Like winning teams?
00:35Yeah, the 2018, obviously it's kind of hard to compare.
00:38Like, yeah, I'm sure that was a lot more fun,
00:40but do you think it makes the job tougher
00:43in a year like this?
00:44Yeah, in some ways it does.
00:46I mean, listen, I've been doing this a long time,
00:49so it doesn't really change what I do,
00:54but it changes the interest level,
00:56it changes the energy around it, right?
00:59I mean, if the Red Sox are playing in a playoff race,
01:05if they were tied for the wild card right now,
01:08instead of, as we talked,
01:09being four out with three weeks left,
01:13you'd be a lot more invested in what the Twins are doing
01:16and what the Royals are doing,
01:17and there's more energy that kind of rides you.
01:21And just, we were talking about this yesterday,
01:22from a personal perspective, it's a really long season.
01:27We're sitting here at whatever we're at, right?
01:29140, whatever.
01:33We haven't done them all, but we've done most of them.
01:35And it's sort of the energy of a playoff race
01:37that picks you up and lifts you down the stretch.
01:41That hasn't happened yet.
01:42So yeah, it's a little harder to sort of roll in here
01:45every day when they're playing badly.
01:48That's the way it is.
01:50Yeah, the energy's contagious,
01:51not just from fans to players.
01:53I know they talk about that all the time,
01:55but just in the building,
01:56especially being seated where you are,
01:59out in right center, getting this ruckus crowd
02:03kind of does, I would imagine,
02:05transfer into what happens on camera.
02:08We talked a little bit, Scott and I on this show,
02:11about what the White Sox broadcasters
02:13must be going through this year
02:14and what that must be like to do 162 for them.
02:18But part of me thinks it's almost better in a way
02:22because you're coming into every day expecting to lose,
02:25and then every win is like your Super Bowl.
02:27Whereas the breakout of the Sox,
02:30this team should be really good, should be interesting.
02:33Yeah, that's an interesting point.
02:35I remember Dennis Eggersley saying to me years ago,
02:37we were sitting in the studio, he's like,
02:39and this is probably 2009, 2010.
02:43So you're talking about like every year,
02:45even the years they didn't make it,
02:46they're in it till the end, right?
02:47So they're a playoff caliber team every one of those years.
02:53And he says at one point,
02:53imagine doing this in Pittsburgh or Kansas City.
02:57Yeah, and then it was like four or five years later,
03:00it's 2012 and 2015.
03:04And I was like, well, yeah.
03:06Remember you said that that time?
03:07Well, this is what it feels like
03:09in Pittsburgh or Kansas City.
03:10And yeah, it's been, listen, man, it's been a long time.
03:14Like I've been sitting in this chair since 04,
03:17not this exact chair, they get new ones.
03:20But back then you took it for granted, you really did.
03:24Because like I said,
03:25even the years they didn't make the playoffs,
03:26they were in it till the end.
03:28And then, really over the last 11 years,
03:33right to 2013 was a gift from nowhere.
03:36But from 14 to now, 14, 15, two last place,
03:41five last place seasons out of the last nine.
03:45And by not being in last place this year,
03:48maybe that's a step in the right direction.
03:51I'm still not ready to say it.
03:52Listen, I spent most of this year
03:53buying into what these guys were doing, right?
03:55I mean, this was 10 games up,
03:5711 games up at the All-Star break.
04:00I've been a horrible second half, we know that.
04:02I liked their moves at the deadline,
04:03and they went and got relievers, veteran relievers.
04:06I was like, all right, that's exactly what they need.
04:08Well, neither one panned out,
04:10and both are on the injured list.
04:12So as much as I enjoyed a lot of this season, I really did.
04:16I mean, as a fan,
04:17I thought this was a good year for the team,
04:19but I'm not ready to say right now
04:21that it was a big step in the right direction,
04:24because I need to see what happens
04:25over these next 17 games.
04:26I think they matter.
04:27You end up with a losing record,
04:29you end up in last place, you're right back where you were.
04:31So I will say that, that these three weeks matter,
04:35even if you don't think they're gonna make a playoff spot,
04:37how you finish this season,
04:38after back-to-back last place finishes, this matters.
04:43Yeah, that's something I think me and Joey
04:44have talked a lot about,
04:45getting out of the 78 win area,
04:49just because if you win 84, 85,
04:51you can tell yourself
04:52that there was a step in the right direction.
04:54If they end up with 80 wins, it's like,
04:56okay, this was the same thing three years in a row.
04:58I think that's been a big threshold,
05:00for no real arbitrary threshold for us,
05:03just to feel like it's moving in a direction.
05:06I wanted to ask you about your podcasting.
05:10This is your first season at 310 to left,
05:12or starting that show.
05:14I actually worked at Nessun in 2022.
05:17I helped kind of behind the scenes with the TC pod,
05:21TC company.
05:22I think we've maybe exchanged emails at most,
05:24but yeah, it was one of those things
05:26where I was trying to get involved
05:28and try and make the written content
05:31and the video content combined more with podcast content.
05:34No, you were one of the few who did.
05:36You were the shining example
05:38of people who cared about the product.
05:40Yeah, I mean, I was just trying to find a way to,
05:42we were doing all these,
05:43we write like 70 articles a day or something like that.
05:45And it was like,
05:46we can combine some of these things more.
05:48I know I was surprised at 22 years old,
05:51how much leverage they gave me in terms of like,
05:55I went with Ahmed to see a CMO
05:58and he was just like,
05:58how do you, what would you do?
05:59And I was like,
06:00TC should probably read an ad for his own show
06:03on the pregame.
06:04And they were like, all right.
06:05And then you like started typing an email
06:07and I was like, all right, hey, we're cooking.
06:09So I know we got a little bit of success there.
06:11By the way, Scott, not to cut you off,
06:12but what you stepped into was just the culture at Nessun
06:16of, oh my God, we're so sick of hearing TC whine.
06:19If you want to take on any of this, please take it.
06:22That's what you stepped into.
06:23Well, hey, it was fun for me.
06:25It was fun to have a little direction at that age
06:27that I didn't expect to have.
06:28And like, I know like, you know,
06:29that was when Tyler was involved as well.
06:31And I remember that kind of,
06:33it was a little short lived
06:34because I think he emailed me and was like,
06:36oh, hey man, like I'm leaving.
06:38I hope it's in good hands.
06:39And I was kind of like, oh man,
06:42I am too.
06:43And then I don't know what happened after that,
06:44but yeah, it was-
06:45I got Alex Spear.
06:47Right, yeah, good point.
06:49Yeah, so I wanted to ask you
06:50what motivates you to do podcast coverage
06:53when you're already on TV so many hours a day?
06:55I feel like that's a lot to throw even more on camera work
06:58in there and interviews
07:00and when you're doing all that you're already doing.
07:02Thanks, yeah, it's a lot.
07:03It's, but the original, so let's go back.
07:06I mean, the beginning of it was 2020
07:11and it was the TC and Jerry podcast.
07:14And that's where it began.
07:16The original idea was Jerry, Remy and I
07:18sitting around at spring training,
07:20bored, came up with the idea of doing a podcast.
07:23And we thought it'd be funny to call it Tom and Jerry.
07:26Apparently there's legal rights and whatever.
07:28So Nesson didn't want to take that fight on.
07:31So we changed to TC and Jerry.
07:33And the idea was,
07:35that was the time when they were doing
07:36the three man booth, right?
07:38It was Eck and Rem with Dave O'Brien.
07:43And they were so good,
07:44but it wasn't like the old Jerry show,
07:47like Jerry with Don and Jerry with Dave
07:51when it was a two man booth,
07:52where you just kind of see
07:53that really funny side of Rem come out.
07:56It would happen once in a while,
07:58but with the three man booth,
07:59it's just a little different, right?
08:00Eck was really good,
08:01but it had gone kind of in a new direction.
08:03So the idea was, let's just do a podcast
08:06where we can mess around
08:07and Jerry's got great stories
08:09and it won't be that hard.
08:10It'll be me and you.
08:11It's like, all right.
08:12Well, then it was COVID.
08:13So we actually did it for that year.
08:16I remember one of my favorite Jerry Remy stories
08:20was during COVID, he did the podcast.
08:23Who was I?
08:23So what have you been up to?
08:24And he was telling me how he would,
08:26and he was high risk, right?
08:28He had multiple lung surgeries already, cancer survivor.
08:32He would get in his car.
08:34He wasn't supposed to go like anywhere because of COVID,
08:37but he would get in his car,
08:38the inside car in the garage inside
08:43and drive to Fenway like he was going to work,
08:46loop around Fenway and then drive back home
08:49just to get out of the house.
08:50Like never get out of his car, never.
08:52And like, it was just like,
08:53that was what he was doing to stay sane.
08:56And then, you know, and then he got sicker
08:59and ultimately we lost him
09:01and I didn't know what we should do.
09:05So the idea came to just keep the podcast going with guests.
09:12And it wound up being really fun.
09:13Like I really enjoyed it because it was, you know,
09:15we do what we do in the pregame show.
09:17It's really fast paced.
09:18We cover a lot of ground.
09:20If you compare our pregame show
09:21to a lot of other pregame shows,
09:22we got a ton of content in our hour.
09:24Like we're bouncing around with a lot of interviews.
09:26We got Jemai on the field.
09:27We got our guys in the booth,
09:30but this was a chance to sort of sit down
09:32with someone for 20, 30 minutes like we are now.
09:36And just have a really good conversation,
09:36get to know the player.
09:37And the player started doing it.
09:40So it was great.
09:41And then Nesson kind of really got
09:43into the podcast business this past off season.
09:45They launched six or seven video podcasts
09:49that air on the YouTube channel
09:52and on different platforms on Nesson.
09:55And I was like, they wanted two a week.
09:57And I was like, I can't do it.
09:58I can't do two a week
09:59and six or seven pregame postgame shows.
10:02It's not sustainable.
10:04But we got to talk about what if you had a co-host?
10:06So Alex and I had kicked around the idea for a while.
10:10Alex and I both started covering this team in 02.
10:14He was a writer for the Boston Metro,
10:16which doesn't even exist anymore.
10:18And I was the sideline reporter for Nesson.
10:20And we've just always had a great relationship
10:24and been good friends.
10:25So I thought it'd be fun.
10:26I love the way he approaches the sport.
10:28He's analytical, but he's upbeat.
10:31You know, there's a lot of guys
10:32that have been covering this team a long time
10:34who are really pretty negative all the time.
10:37And Spear and I aren't really like that.
10:38We both still have fun coming to the ballpark
10:40for some reason,
10:42and think it should be fun to cover baseball,
10:44even if they're not doing well.
10:45So there you go.
10:46There's your unexpectedly long formative answer
10:49on the podcast.
10:50But you will always be part of the DNA
10:53of the TC and whatever the hell
10:55it's going to be called today podcast.
10:57He doesn't need that.
10:58He doesn't need that ego boost.
10:59That's okay.
11:00No, I don't.
11:01He's entirely removed from the success of 310 to left.
11:04No, you're an early adopter as we like to call it.
11:07So thank you.
11:08Here we go.
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12:20But no, you and Spear are great.
12:21And Spear is awesome.
12:22I mean, he does seem like a guy who just,
12:24I mean, he emits a real passion for the game.
12:29Andy doesn't fit like the archetype of a stereotypical,
12:33you know, baseball writer
12:34who's been doing this for 20 plus years.
12:36He seems like an accountant who stumbled into baseball
12:41and he's just survived.
12:42He's Harvard, unlike the rest of us,
12:43he is Harvard educated.
12:44So it does sort of, you know, give him a different,
12:47but he's analytical without being a complete nerd.
12:50And I use the word, you know, lovingly.
12:52There's a lot of nerds in baseball,
12:54but a lot of them, you know, write very nerdy copy.
12:58He doesn't, he's funny.
13:00He connects with people.
13:01He tells you their story.
13:03He's that rare combination.
13:04I'm much more of a storytelling analytical guy.
13:07I like analytics.
13:09I like metrics.
13:09I use numbers.
13:10I use stats, but I am, you know,
13:1375 storytelling, 25% numbers.
13:17He's more probably a number guy than a lot of people,
13:19but he's not 80, 20 numbers story.
13:22You know, he's almost 50, 50.
13:23He tells a great story.
13:25He's got the numbers to back it up.
13:26It's a rare gift.
13:28Your guys' dynamic over there is great.
13:32And to pivot to the team just a little bit here,
13:35I gotta get-
13:35Speaking of numbers, they're not good.
13:38Yeah, they're tough, but I got some numbers for you.
13:40The old Tom Caron line of contention.
13:45Which has been workshopped for a few years.
13:47Is that where I got it from?
13:48Because we quoted on the show.
13:49It's yours?
13:50Oh, thank you.
13:51Yeah.
13:52Yeah, I came up with it a couple of years ago.
13:53I started using it a couple of years ago
13:54because we had this inevitable slide
13:56through September for the last few years.
13:58And it just, I needed to workshop it.
14:00We didn't come up with a good name until this year.
14:02Like we used to kind of go the other way
14:04and name it such a stupid name.
14:06And one year we called it
14:07the Playoff Viability Quotient, the PVQ,
14:11which just doesn't, it's just so, you know,
14:13but it's, didn't it?
14:14Yeah.
14:14But the line of contention kind of actually nailed it.
14:17And it's real simple to me.
14:19You can, without, you know,
14:23without being too far out of the realm of possibility,
14:26you can shave a game off the standings per week.
14:30So if you're within the number of weeks
14:33remaining of first place,
14:35you are, in my opinion, still a contender.
14:38And it really came back to,
14:39I mean, Scott, you're in this,
14:40and it really came back to every night,
14:42how many teams, we have a meeting,
14:43how many teams should we show in the standings, right?
14:45September 1st.
14:47Where do we cut the line?
14:48Cut the line at more weeks,
14:50more games back than weeks remaining.
14:52And so now it's become a thing.
14:54And this year of all things,
14:55it's because they just, it's such a weird race.
14:56Like they have no business being even four back right now.
14:59Right?
15:00They should be 12 back the way they play.
15:02But Minnesota has been awful.
15:04And Kansas City just can't string together a week.
15:09And, but the Red Sox can't, the door's open.
15:12They just can't go through the door.
15:14And, you know, they've been hovering
15:16in that three to five behind range for like a month now,
15:19which is crazy that they haven't fallen back the other way.
15:22So they're back, as we speak,
15:23they're back below the line of contention.
15:25Detroit is still in it and they're out of it.
15:28So, and by the way, the final, go ahead.
15:30Yeah, we're getting a lot of use out of it
15:31because they're always creeping back in.
15:34Alex Spear and press me on this.
15:36I had to, the weeks remaining change
15:40at midnight on Thursday each week, just so you know.
15:44That's when you go to the weekend series.
15:47And I feel that you,
15:49that's when you round down versus round up.
15:51You round up till midnight on Thursday.
15:53Okay, I've been going via Sunday,
15:55just cause you know, where the, where the season ends.
15:57Which makes sense, but then Monday,
15:58you still got, I mean, you got six days left in the week.
16:00It feels, you know, it feels very harsh.
16:03So I grade on the curve.
16:04And, and so, you know, you could go,
16:07the other way we were talking about was like three minus
16:10and then two plus on Thursday, but that's now it's good.
16:13So three and two, two,
16:15it's two weeks as of Thursday at midnight.
16:17So as we're recording this,
16:18we're recording this before the series finale
16:20of the Orioles series.
16:23They are just under that line.
16:24They're one game under the Karen contention line.
16:27Four games back, three weeks left.
16:30Yes.
16:32It means right now they're out of it.
16:33Fan graphs has them at a 6.8% chance of making the playoffs.
16:37Do you have that odds high or low?
16:38Which by the way, was almost like a 5% drop last night.
16:42Which is crazy.
16:43Like that, they were 11% going into last night's game.
16:46And that's, what's crazy.
16:47And part of that is because Detroit
16:50moved the game ahead of them.
16:52Detroit has the tiebreaker in that head to head.
16:54So that's really two games ahead of them.
16:56So now it's not, you know, because if you,
16:59that's the new age, right?
17:00If you finish it at dead heat
17:01and they have the tiebreaker, you're out.
17:04And so, because you lost those last two games
17:06in Detroit last week,
17:07you went three and four against Detroit.
17:10And if you tie them, you're out, they're in.
17:12So that, that factors in.
17:15Because now you don't control your own destiny, right?
17:17When you were ahead of Detroit,
17:19you had those three games against Minnesota looming
17:21in a couple of weeks.
17:22You can hang three games back, you can catch them.
17:24But now, not only would you need to do that,
17:26you'd need Detroit to lose a couple.
17:29So do you think that's 6.8?
17:32Does that feel accurate?
17:34Yeah.
17:35Yeah.
17:36I mean, is it arbitrary?
17:37Is it just a no?
17:39In your mind?
17:40What?
17:41Is it hard to know they're not in?
17:42It doesn't matter if it's 6% or 2%, like they are out?
17:45No, it's not a hard no, because again,
17:47Minnesota's a mess.
17:48I mean, they really are.
17:50And I don't think Detroit's any good.
17:52It's funny, when you look at all this,
17:53the thing that I keep going back to,
17:54the thing that keeps eating away at me,
17:56is these teams that have kind of caught you,
18:00Seattle and Detroit specific,
18:01they traded away guys at the deadline.
18:03Like they waved the white flag.
18:06The Red Sox traded 10 prospects to get better this year.
18:11And instead, they went in the tank
18:13and they've let the sellers catch up to them.
18:15That's not ideal.
18:17I mean, the same thing has happened
18:18kind of around baseball.
18:19Like the Orioles buying at the deadline,
18:21kind of losing the division.
18:22The Cubs selling at the deadline,
18:24look like they might have a shot.
18:26Like, it is strange how it's just nonsense.
18:30It's been a weird race.
18:31It's been a weird race for a number of reasons.
18:33Just like I said, all these teams, nobody's been good.
18:35I mean, like really, nobody's been good
18:38in the American League.
18:39I think all the contenders, at least yesterday
18:43when I looked, I haven't looked today,
18:44but all the contenders had losing records
18:45over the last 12 games or something like that.
18:48Like everybody ahead of you.
18:49There was some, Sunday after they lost
18:52that horrible game in Chicago,
18:55I think it was like Minnesota had gone 12 and 14
19:00in the last 46 and picked up a game on the Red Sox
19:04in that stretch.
19:04I mean, it's just, you're not gonna get any, you know?
19:06So the bullpen's been bad since the all-star break.
19:10That's really the, you know,
19:11that's where you fired your shots at the deadline.
19:13You thought Sims and Garcia were gonna help.
19:16They didn't.
19:17And the bullpen, you know, now they're on the injured list
19:19and the bullpen just doesn't have the arms left
19:22to get to the end.
19:23The starting rotation's been really good
19:25for the last two weeks.
19:26It's like a sub-three ERA.
19:28Nobody even knows, you know?
19:30Cutter Crawford who pitched last night,
19:32his last five starts, he's got an ERA right around 2-9
19:36and he's lost all five of those starts.
19:39You know, it's crazy.
19:40The bullpen, it's just, it's the late inning collapse.
19:43And then the defense has been a problem all year
19:45and the offense went cold, right?
19:47The offense was covering up for a lot of mistakes
19:50and offenses come and go and right now
19:52they've been in a funk for about two weeks
19:54and that's killed them.
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21:18Yeah, you mentioned the fan graphs dropping significantly
21:22after yesterday's loss.
21:24I want you to know that was an impact one for me as well
21:26because the way we do our analysis around here,
21:29I made a bet with Joey that there was no chance
21:32that we were gonna lose a Margaritaville giveaway night.
21:35And so now after the show we do tonight,
21:38he can tell me at any point in the show,
21:40as many times as he wants,
21:41I have to do a shot of tequila on the show.
21:44For however many times he wants for the rest of the show.
21:46So it was a big loss for the team and myself.
21:49I just, you know, I didn't think it was possible
21:51on Margaritaville night to take that loss at home.
21:54But yeah, I mean, that's gonna happen.
21:56Rolling in his grave.
21:58It's, you know, there was a great story the other day
22:00about how in 2004, when he was here and I was at that show,
22:03he predicted the World Series.
22:06He was like, this is the year we reverse the curse
22:08because he had played at Fenway for the first time
22:11and then they won the World Series.
22:12And if I would, I would have been with you.
22:14If there was anything,
22:15there was any mystical support for this team,
22:18it would have been last night, so.
22:20Well, if you want to support, you know,
22:21you've got your own post game show.
22:22I'm just saying, just gonna throw that out there.
22:24I don't know if you do that.
22:25I feel like you might have a little bit more handcuffs.
22:28Yeah, Papa Bond's not here.
22:29If he was here, we might do something with you,
22:32but it's Jim Rice tonight.
22:34I don't think that'll happen.
22:36So what I want to ask you about is, you know,
22:37we talked about, you know, the bullpen not being good enough
22:39and, you know, the rotation has been good
22:41the last two weeks, but on the whole, it's, you know,
22:42kind of been, the depth has been certainly tested.
22:45I wanted to ask you, you know,
22:46we've entered the last few off seasons with, you know,
22:48varying degrees of optimism entering the off season
22:52since Dombrowski left, really.
22:54Do you take this as the year that the Boston
22:56starts to act like, or the winter,
22:58they start to act like a big market team again,
23:00or are you expecting more of the same from Breslau
23:02that we've seen in the past?
23:04Can I go see none of the above?
23:06Like, I think, here's what I think,
23:08and I don't know any of this, but here's what I think.
23:10I think this is the year they make the moves
23:12they need to make to get pitching
23:14because that's what they're lacking.
23:16We all know it.
23:18I don't think they're going to go out
23:20and spend a ton of money,
23:22which I guess is what makes you start acting
23:24like a big market team.
23:26I think, you know,
23:27they've got surplus positional player prospects,
23:32and I think they're going to use those resources,
23:35I think, to go get a pitcher that would be under control.
23:38Because the problem with free agent pitchers,
23:40we know, is you sign them at 31, 32 years old,
23:43you give them too much money for too many years,
23:46and they break down.
23:48So why not trade?
23:51And I don't know who, but let's face it,
23:53right now, as you sit here looking at next year's team,
23:57you're going to have in some sequence,
23:58Rafaela and Duran and Abreu and probably Roman Anthony.
24:05You're going to sit one of them on the bench,
24:06you're going to platoon.
24:07I mean, what do you, you know,
24:08chances are you're going to have to sit one of them
24:12every night unless you trade Yoshida
24:14and make one of them a DH,
24:15but none of those guys really profile as a DH.
24:17Their strength is that they can play defense.
24:20So why not trade one of those guys?
24:21You know, why not make one of those guys
24:23the centerpiece of a deal that gets you
24:26a young, controllable pitcher?
24:28Not just because he's cheap, but because he's young.
24:31And Seattle, Jeff Passon was talking about this yesterday.
24:33Seattle is an obvious trade partner.
24:35They've got an incredible rotation
24:37and they've got pitching prospects
24:39and they've got not enough hitters.
24:43You know, I think Castillo has three years of control.
24:46And they've paid him, right?
24:47He's making, I don't know, 67, 72 million,
24:50something like that over the next three years.
24:52But that's pretty cheap for starting pitching, right?
24:55And he's a good one.
24:56So see if you can line up there.
24:58You know, you've got infield prospects
25:01between Von Grissom, whatever he's going to end up being.
25:04But prior to this year,
25:05he was supposed to be a can't miss bat.
25:08Christian Campbell's become one of the fastest rising players
25:11in all of minor league baseball.
25:13So there's two middle infielders.
25:15Marcelo Meyers has got to come in somewhere.
25:17He's got three more years of Trevor Stork.
25:19And you've got Casas and you've got Devers at third base.
25:23So again, there's a surplus there, right?
25:27You know, you've got Kyle Teal coming.
25:29You've got Connor Wong.
25:31Is Wong a utility guy?
25:32You know, there's some things you've got to figure out
25:34on the position side that I think when you do,
25:36and they already have, I don't know.
25:38But, you know, a couple of those guys
25:40are going to be expendable.
25:41And they're big prospects.
25:43Like these are either young major league players
25:47who have already shown you something
25:49on a break or whatever,
25:50or some of the top prospects in baseball right now.
25:53You can package those up.
25:54And I think really help your pitching staff.
25:57Cause then you'll have, you know,
25:58you're going to have G Alito and you can roll your eyes,
26:00but you're going to have G Alito.
26:01He's going to take the player option, obviously,
26:03and be here next year.
26:04And he's been durable up to now.
26:06Tanner Houck showed me something this year.
26:08I can pencil him for the top two.
26:09Brian Baio has been inconsistent, but he's coming along.
26:11Connor Crawford's a good back of the rotation guy.
26:14You go get a pitcher
26:16and maybe you sign, you know,
26:18the next Seth Lugo, who wasn't a ton of money,
26:20whoever that is, Michael Wacca, you know,
26:22who was here a couple of years ago
26:23was good when he was here.
26:24You know, you go round out the rotation that way.
26:27And I think this team is a contender.
26:29I think you're two starters away from being a contender,
26:30but I thought that last year and they didn't address it.
26:34Yeah, I think the one thing that's frustrating there,
26:36and it kind of feels like, you know,
26:38maybe you've reset expectations.
26:39Everyone has like the last five years of reset.
26:41It's like, you talk about having to trade away
26:44a Rafaela, a Duran, a Romanet, something like that.
26:47But it's like back in the day,
26:49Corbin Burns is going to be out there.
26:50You could just get someone like him or Rosie Sasaki,
26:52if he does get, figure out a way to get over here.
26:55And then you have all that depth and you have the ace
26:59or at least the frontline starter or something.
27:01But I do see what you're saying.
27:03Like, they definitely could get away
27:04with a trade like that.
27:05But, you know, where you do have a couple of like horses,
27:08potentially Blake Snell,
27:09I don't know how much of a fit that's going to be.
27:10But, you know, there is a way to buy talent this off season
27:15without having to trade any of those young players away.
27:18Well, again, the things I would say is,
27:21A, I don't know where all the young talent's going to go.
27:24Right, I mean, again, you can only have 13 guys on a roster.
27:27You can only have nine players starting.
27:29I, you know, I wouldn't be surprised
27:31if part of that log jam gets cleared up
27:33if they can trade Yoshida and make someone the DH, right?
27:38So that would give you an opportunity
27:41or maybe that gives an opportunity to bring back O'Neal,
27:43who I love at this ballpark, and maybe DH, he stays healthy.
27:48But I just think it's not just the Red Sox.
27:52And you could say they don't act like a big market team,
27:54but most of the big market clubs
27:56don't go spend a ton on pitching anymore.
27:58There's only a few.
27:59The Browski doesn't fill it up either.
28:01We know that the Dodgers do it in LA,
28:03but most of the other teams, you know,
28:06I mean, like to me, it's like the Cubs getting Imanaga.
28:11Like that was the kind of deal you want to find.
28:13You know, Yamamoto was just an insane amount of money
28:16and he ends up on the IL most of the year.
28:18You know, if you're going to sign a guy
28:19to a five-year free agent contract,
28:21you're going to spend, you know, whatever,
28:24five years and more, you know, 200 million or whatever,
28:30you got to assume that for a year and a half of that,
28:32he's going to be recovering from Tommy Johnson.
28:34And that can happen to anybody,
28:36but if you're going to lay out 30 million a year
28:39for a pitcher, that's 30 million
28:41you're going to be paying while they rehab.
28:42So that's just the reality of pitching now.
28:44And I just think it's smarter to try to get a younger guy
28:48who you can control than it is to go pay
28:50because free agents are older,
28:52more likely to break down on the pitching side.
28:55I have to be honest with what with both of you guys.
28:58I am so ready for speculation season to be behind us.
29:04Like the past three years of being like,
29:07well, maybe this off season, they could trade for this guy
29:09and they can, you know, this piece and that.
29:11I want it here.
29:12And I know that's like a spoiled nineties kid
29:14who got to grow up seeing 38 championships
29:17in the city in my lifetime.
29:18But I'm so past like, well, maybe they'll do this.
29:23Maybe they'll do that.
29:24I want it.
29:25I want it now.
29:25I know I feel like a brat banging on the table, but.
29:29Well, last year was not right.
29:30Breslow had just come in.
29:33And so there was a certain amount of getting him up
29:35to speed and where, you know, and again, you know,
29:37I thought, honestly,
29:39I thought he showed a willingness to be bold.
29:42You know what I mean?
29:43Signing G Alito wasn't nothing.
29:44I mean, he was one of the bigger free agent pitchers
29:47available out there.
29:48And, you know, I mean the Jordan Montgomery thing,
29:51I still think was a mistake.
29:52They should have grabbed him.
29:53I think he would add a good, a good run here.
29:55It was a mess for him the way it turned out.
29:57He fired Boris.
29:59I just am, you know, trading Chris sale for Vaughn Grissom.
30:03You can complain about it now,
30:05but everybody loved the move at the time.
30:08And that was a pretty bold move.
30:10And, you know, what he did at the trade deadline,
30:13right, the Verdugo deal,
30:15which is big looking better every day.
30:18And then again,
30:19he showed a willingness to be bold at the trade deadline.
30:21He traded away 10 prospects and got back some pitching,
30:25including Priester who struck out seven last night.
30:28It was a first round pick.
30:29So they've got more pitching.
30:30So I like what he's done so far.
30:32I'm like you, I'm excited to see him a full off season.
30:36You know, now that he knows this organization,
30:37he knows his prospects.
30:38He's had a year under the hood.
30:41Let's see what he can do.
30:42There is a reason to believe better days are not,
30:45not far off, but TC, I wanted to-
30:47I would bet you right now, a shot of tequila, just one.
30:50I'm an old man.
30:51I'm not going to do much.
30:52But at this time next year, we'll check in.
30:54They will be in the playoff race at this point next year.
30:57In fact, I think there'll be a playoff team next year.
30:59I really-
31:00The TC guarantee?
31:01The TC guarantee that there'll be
31:02above the line of contention.
31:04I absolutely, you know, time's running out this year.
31:07I would have thought a month ago,
31:09I still thought they were a playoff team this year.
31:10But I absolutely think the young players we've watched
31:13mature here over this past year,
31:16they're going to be impact players next year.
31:18I think they're a good team next year.
31:20As do I, as do I.
31:22TC, I wanted to open up the floor to you.
31:24You are co-chairman of the Jimmy Fund.
31:27And this Friday is the Radio Telephone Check
31:29presentation at Fenway.
31:32Last Friday.
31:32It was. Last Friday.
31:34It was last Friday, so sorry.
31:35Last Friday.
31:36That's fine.
31:37There's 4 million, we're happy to present it.
31:40First of all, how you first got involved with them
31:42and Dana Farber and what that means to you and your story.
31:45Thanks.
31:46Yeah, Brock Holt and I are the co-chairmen
31:48replacing Larry Lucchino, who, you know,
31:51used to joke when he was running the Red Sox
31:53that it would take two people
31:54to replace him for the Red Sox.
31:55Well, it took two people to replace him at the Jimmy Fund.
31:58And, you know, Brock and I have both
32:00been real passionate about it.
32:01I had a lymphoma diagnosis back in 2015.
32:05I was very lucky that they removed the mass
32:08and nothing, I never had to go through chemo,
32:10never had to go through any treatment after that.
32:12They removed the mass.
32:13That was it.
32:13They got all the cancer, which was amazing.
32:16It hadn't spread, but you know, you glimpse into that abyss.
32:19Like I walked into the Dana Farber Cancer Institute
32:22for my first round of body scans
32:25to see if the cancer had spread anywhere else
32:27now that we knew it was cancer.
32:29And that's pretty scary moment in anybody's life.
32:32And, you know, the reassurance and the confidence
32:35that you gain from a place like that,
32:37knowing you got the best in the world,
32:38I wasn't, I was scared, but I wasn't,
32:41you know, I've been doing a telethon at that point.
32:43I've been doing it since 2003, four, whenever we,
32:47it's been 21 years I've been involved.
32:50And I've heard so many stories.
32:52I was like, okay, yeah, now it's my turn.
32:54Not a huge surprise.
32:57So many people get it.
32:58And so when they came to me over the telethon last month
33:03and they said, listen, we're talking to Brock.
33:04We'd like to find the right person to do it with him.
33:06Would you be interested?
33:07Brock and I, I love Brock, we're great friends.
33:09He doesn't live locally.
33:10I do, so I can do some of the stuff he can't.
33:12So that's sort of how we ended up here now.
33:15And kind of the lead advocate is the role, right?
33:18A lot of kissing babies and shaking hands
33:20and trying to help them get the word out.
33:24First big event we'll be doing the,
33:26I'll be doing the Jimmy Fond marathon walk, October 6th.
33:30You can go online, learn more about that at JimmyFond.org.
33:34And it's just, you know, I, it meant so much to me
33:38through that sort of two year stretch of follow-up tests
33:42to see if I had cancer and how scary that is.
33:45And they were just so amazing
33:48that anytime I could do anything to help them back,
33:49I would.
33:50So this is a small way to repay some of that debt.
33:53Yeah, they do great work over there.
33:54I mean, we, as well as every other person on the planet,
33:58you know, have people in our lives who, you know,
34:00cancer has touched and they just do great work over there.
34:03So thank you for your involvement over there too.
34:07And also just a personal one here,
34:09a hefty dose of gratitude from some friends of mine in Maine
34:12for all that you did in Lewiston.
34:14I know you were very involved in fundraising there
34:16and involved in the vigil out there.
34:18So a couple of moments of genuity here at the end to,
34:23you know, a couple of thank yous for-
34:25Yeah, well, you know, we've seen too many of these.
34:29Yeah, we've seen too many of these mass shootings.
34:33And that's one thing, you know,
34:34I said I got cancer and he sort of said,
34:36oh, well, I guess it's my turn.
34:38You don't ever expect it to be your turn
34:39that your hometown is on the news.
34:42And so that was scary stuff.
34:43So thank you.
34:44Yeah, that was a heavy time.
34:47My one year anniversary is coming up in October
34:49and I'm gonna be involved in some stuff up there for that.
34:52Just a really, a heavy, heavy burden for a lot of people.
34:56And, you know, I just remember other people saying this.
34:58So I remember saying it when I spoke in Lewiston,
35:00like don't let that night,
35:04that horrific senseless act of violence define the city.
35:08Don't let, you know, anytime you hear Lewiston,
35:10don't let it be, oh my God, that town, I'm sorry.
35:13You know, it's a great town.
35:14Mainers are strong, they're resilient.
35:16So the city is back on its feet.
35:18If I can help that, I will.
35:20Yeah, no, that doesn't define Lewiston.
35:22Ollie Liston does.
35:23That'll always be-
35:24There you go.
35:25Well done, the phantom punch.
35:25Yes, exactly.
35:27Well, thank you, TC.
35:28We hope to have you back on.
35:30Thanks so much for coming on.
35:32Thanks guys, it was fun.
35:32We'll talk to you soon.
35:33Yeah, and you kept Kenley Jansen waiting.
35:35So there you go, that shows how important this is, right?
35:37I gotta go talk to Kenley now.
35:39He's waiting downstairs.
35:40So thanks guys, I enjoyed it.
35:41Thanks, appreciate it.