Brewers win big on opening day: Miz shines, Chourio to injured list, strikeout records and more (03.27.2026)

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This edition of the MicroBrew Podcast, my name is Jay R. Radcliffe, the Milwaukee Journal

Sentinel, my colleague Kurt Hogg was there at American Family Field as the Milwaukee

Brewers took down the Chicago White Sox in tremendous fashion.

14-2 is the final score that honestly belies the story of the day, which is the 20 strikeouts

that the Milwaukee Brewers racked up.

That is a franchise record.

I believe that's a majorly baseball record for opening day strikeouts.

There can't be many games if that's not a record.

And Jacob Isherowski was at the front of that very, very exciting day at American Family

Field.

And Kurt, I wish I had been there to see it.

I wasn't.

I'm here in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

What are your thoughts on Fort Wayne, Indiana?

Do you have any preconceived notions about what you're going to be like?

Oh, boy.

You are opening cans of worms here.

I didn't know that.

I didn't know you had that many feelings.

If there be so many games in the world.

Jay, you should be grateful for Fort Wayne, Indiana, because without it, you and I, like

I guess I might, we might have been like online pals, but without Fort Wayne, Indiana,

I would not be in your life.

I don't know how that works exactly, although I'm afraid that you're probably going to

tell me, I would say that we would have never been online friends.

I don't think.

I mean, no, but we're like a generation of heart.

Like I just don't think that's okay, but we ran in the same, the same like mid 2010s

Twitter circles is what I'm saying.

You're right.

I'd like have you would have like, oh, yeah, I'd know that guy in reality.

You don't have any idea where I am anyway, Fort Wayne, I applied it there for a job with

their newspaper, shortly after graduating college.

They interviewed me a couple times and then they didn't want me, so.

They're lost.

Well, I'm sure that turned out just dandy for them, so that's interesting.

But it turned out, it turned out great for your boys, so.

I turned down my first job offer, which was in Huntington, Indiana, not far away.

And man, I gave it a lot of thought.

I really had to think about it instead.

I ended up taking an unpaid internship in Milwaukee.

It was with the Milwaukee Brewers and things worked out great for your boys.

So that also worked out, but it's possible that we would have known each other on the Indiana

Prep Sports Circuit.

Is that possible?

We could have known each other from there.

I don't, I don't remember exactly what it would have been.

I don't know if perhaps that perhaps was probably involved in some capacity in Fort Wayne.

It was largely like Indiana and Purdue, which maybe I would be at the Purdue sweet 16 game

right now.

That's right.

You know what?

I don't think covering Purdue is the calling on my life.

I don't think so either.

That came by the way on over my shoulder here at this hotel room in Fort Wayne, Indiana,

watching Purdue and Texas.

Good game.

Good game excitement.

Nebraska Iowa, the heartland, very well represented.

And same could be said for the Milwaukee Brewers, lighting up the scoreboard to start the

year.

I'm just going to get to from this game.

There's homeruns from Jake Bowers and South Freelik.

There's the strikeouts that we talked about.

I think we can do a little three up three down action just to kind of play out this opening

day experience.

But I do unfortunately the news of the day I thought is kind of kind of came out hours

before the game.

I was still.

Yeah, let's talk about this.

Let's talk about this.

Yeah, to be honest, Kurt, because my day has been so busy, I haven't actually like really

dug into this.

But the Jackson, the Jackson Churriot going on the injured list is transaction alerts from

the hours before opening day.

That's not a good sign.

And the news coming down that he had in fact broke in his hand back in early early March.

He missed a couple games of the World Baseball Classic, if people will remember it.

It was discussed.

You guys talked about this with Pat Murphy about the hand injury.

He came back.

He came back.

He played.

He's homeruns since then.

Played throughout the month of March.

Played in the exhibition game two days before the season open.

And oh, suddenly, oh, yeah, that's a fracture.

We're going to need to take some time off.

It's on its left hand.

It's, I guess, relatively minor as hand fractures go because two to four weeks is the projection.

And that's not what I typically associate with a fractured hand.

But Kurt, how did this happen?

How did a month go by before anybody noticed this?

What in the world?

Well, it's not that they didn't notice it.

It's that they didn't notice that it was a hairline fracture from what we gathered today.

When Jackson first got hit in the hand with a pitch, and we asked about it the next, I

think the next day it kind of came out that he was going to miss, you know, miss a

game.

And everyone was saying, oh, there's no big deal.

It's fine.

Whatever, whatever.

And it's not a huge, you know, not a huge injury, but they, they looked at the X-ray

and the X-ray didn't show anything.

The thing the man, the manager said, Pat Murphy said, and I think he was like half joking.

Well, 75% joking, but it's one of those things where like, he's not really joking.

Are you saying send him home?

And if someone had been like, oh, okay, and they thought it was serious, he would not

have corrected them.

He would have been like, yes, please bring this man back to our team.

And they probably could have run an MRI on him.

I do have, look, I'm not an expert on medics, on medicals, on injuries, on the difference,

I know the difference between MRIs and X-rays, but I was unaware that you could see certain

things in a hand, bones on an MRI that you can't see on an X-ray.

I just previously I assumed the X-ray was good enough.

No.

That might be a boo-boo on me.

I don't know.

It's not a boo-boo.

Okay.

The brewers know that they're different.

That's not the boo-boo on them.

But I think JR, there's a bit of a boo-boo here.

Not getting the MRI until, not getting the full imaging until two or three days ago.

I think it's quite the boo-boo, indeed, because the timing could not be worse.

He could have been, I mean, it's different when the players, you know, at the WBC with

Venezuela, but it's not that hard to get a guy an MRI when they're playing in big league

stadiums and pricing in big league stadiums and in big cities.

It's not even like this is, you know, Venezuela and league winter ball and you don't know exactly

what you're dealing with.

The thing is run by the league.

So yeah, I think maybe some things could have been done a little differently and you

could have just rested in for the last three weeks and probably still would have opened

the season on the IL.

Yeah, it's one of those things that, I mean, it doesn't, I don't think there's a reason

to be bothered that he was playing for the WBC.

He could have been hit by a pitch in his spring game with the brewers.

Correct.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's not the WBC.

But what you're touching on is something interesting.

It's like, well, are they treating these players the same way?

And I don't mean like, obviously, they have access to stuff, but are they treating it

the way a team would treat a player who's complaining of any minor illness?

Well, let's ailment.

Let's, let's, you know, image it to death.

Let's go crazy about it.

Were they doing that?

I mean, I guess that's worth asking.

I'm sure that's true.

We do it again.

They won the WBC.

Yeah, they won the WBC.

Yeah, and here, and he played as they won the WC for sure for him.

But the tradeoff, I think, is absolutely worth it.

The brewers were probably not so much.

And like, look, from what I've gathered from my time covering baseball, this isn't like

protocol was followed.

Usually a guy gets hit in the hand.

It hurts a little bit.

It's brewers.

It's like, okay, let's get an x-ray on that.

That's, that's where you go first to see, okay, is anything broken?

Well, okay, came back negative just a, just a brews.

Let's wait for the swelling to go down, pain will go away.

And the brews did x-ray when he came back, I believe, as well.

It's just something was missed, you know, unless, unless there's a world, again, I'm not

a doctor, J.R.

But this doesn't seem like the most likely scenario.

Maybe it is where he had heard it, but not fractured it.

And then on the check swing and the exhibition games, he broke it or fractured it.

I don't know.

Maybe that's a possible scenario, but now we're getting a little, not a little.

I'm getting very deep into the semantics here.

Sure.

I think we can be done with the caveat.

I'm not a doctor in 2026.

There's so many people out here saying things that are patently false.

Like, what do we care?

Let's, let's just dive in.

We don't, we don't have to caveat anything anymore, Kurt.

Yeah, no, this is not going to be a podcast where we get into vaccine, vaccine theories.

Although, although that, that went pretty well for a couple shows in like 2021, so maybe

we should.

That's true.

We definitely have discussed vaccine stuff on podcasts before related to Wisconsin sports.

That has come up.

We're not going to do that to you, but this is a huge bummer.

And I mean, if he's gone for two weeks, okay, that's fine.

If he's gone for four weeks, it stinks.

But like theoretically, it's okay, they, they, they have like Perkins with a ton of big

experience, just ready to bring up, which is what happened.

But you know, this is, this is potentially the year Jackson, sure, it becomes a superstar.

Like this is his like, his third season after two very productive seasons, he's 22.

Man, it sure stinks to not have him right out of the gate here, especially because nobody

saw this coming.

It's just, it's just, it's just a bad omen, Kurt.

It's a bad ugly omen.

And it is one of those things that you just don't want to see if you're, if you have

any expectations at all going into, why does it have to be an omen?

The brewers pitched Ellen Rodriguez in the home opener last year.

You mean the elder Rodriguez?

Did you say Owen Rodriguez?

Did you just make a player out of Ellen Rodriguez and Owen Miller?

Did you just merge them?

I don't remember what I said.

I thought I, I, I, I thinking about it, I think I might have said Elwin Rodriguez.

I know his name.

It's Elwin Rodriguez.

No, you're right.

This, this may have no bearing whatsoever on their ultimate plate.

It's just bad vibes right out of the gate, bad vibes.

Now, the vibes were not bad all day, even, even after the first batter of the game,

chased me in my droff.

It's a home run for the Chicago White Sox.

Whoa, was that a, that was a slap to the face right out of the gate.

And then Jacob is a Rosky goes and strikes out 11 over five really good innings.

You know, here's the thing, Kurt.

I, I don't know if I think that's Jacob is a Rosky at his best.

Obviously, he's, you know, working the change up quite a bit.

He's still throwing hard, but like he wasn't efficient.

He walked through, you know, walked three guys, which is not the end of the world in five

innings.

I think you probably take that most of the time, but this didn't strike me as like a

virtue.

Oh, so Miss a Rosky performance.

And yet, at the end of the day, you know, the, the White Sox have just a couple hits

against him.

He's set them up for the, the, the B bullpen to keep racking up strikeouts and, and come

away with 20 for the game.

It certainly looks fantastic.

I feel like there's more, right, for Jacob Miss a Rosky.

I might be, am I, and maybe I'm greedy.

Am I being greedy.

No, there's better process for sure for Jacob Miss a Rosky.

This is actually kind of what might take away from it was, you know, I did a, I did a

live show with Chory over on Bruratoratory right after the game and Shouts to Chory come

on the phone.

And Shouts to Chory.

Oh, yeah.

He was bringing him on the phone.

And that was sort of my takeaway was like, it didn't feel dominant and then he had

got 25 whips.

Incredible. I don't know what that means for the White Sucks offense, but I have thoughts.

But it was certainly good to see the fastball play up like that because

the fastball has like, you know, it's been more electric. You think about that

Dodgers game at home where he struck up 12. Probably the twins game fastball was just electric

in terms of Velo and just like it looked like it was popping. But this was probably the best

as fastball has like actually played. 67% with rate is insane with the pitch of that

that usage. And he wasn't, you know, his average 98. He didn't have everything in the tank today.

Showed it a couple times when he needed it, but he wasn't exactly sitting 100. So

I think that's an encouraging thing. I think so.

But also it was the White Sucks and, you know, maybe that, not maybe, that certainly played into it as

well, but like, what do you want him to do? Not strike out 11 guys like he did what he's supposed to.

Yeah, no one's going to get excited because it's the White Sucks, but you're absolutely right.

They're big leaders. They're big leaders. And the White Sucks are not the dreadful team that

they were two years ago. They're not good, but this is a theoretically a better team in 2026,

two than what they were last year. So he, he pretty much, pretty much, you know, got, like you said,

just got whiffs all the time. It was really, really electric, a great way to start. As far as,

as far as offense, you got it from just about everybody. You got, you got some, some key hits.

We got a Joey Ortiz basis loaded. It's single. Oh, prediction, prediction, prediction season on

that one for you. Prediction season pod gets an early W. Remember, I am predicting he will hit

better than 500, 500 or better with the basis loaded. You know, you need the, no, you need

those opportunities to shrink. Can you believe that first step? That's right. That's right.

I may have gotten the W, but the point here is to not have very many of those this year. And

unfortunately, one on a big day, it does, that's an omen to that port ends to, but hey, he came

through with a duck snorty single. And then, then, you know, Wayne Contreras of the bases

looked double the races were on David Hamilton. Yes. I thought David Hamilton, I thought him just

being in the starting lineup was interesting. You know, we've obviously talked about him as an

option at third base and shortstop, which is also a place he got to play in this game. And

the fact that they went to him right out of the gate, you know, as a, you know, against a,

against a right handed starter. I mean, that tells me that they like him more than ring,

ring, he felt as a guy against the right handers, which means he's going to play an awful lot.

If that's, if that ultimately is what they decide to do. And then he was fantastic. You know,

he reaches base five times counting that catchers interference. He steals the man can fly. Oh my gosh.

I saw him in that exhibition game. He can fly. And played some good defense too. I'm not going to

let one game get me too excited about it, but just seeing him in the lineup tells me how much they

like him. We know they like him. And now I really see it. I see what they believe in him.

Tell me what you think of David Hamilton at this point early on here in 2026.

JR, he's a brewer so hard at her. Such a brewer. Yeah.

When I saw this man fight off a bunch of pitches in his first step at 10, then get a catcher's

interference. It was that bad of all time. They're saying, yeah, I had seen enough at that point.

That was, that was enough for me. It was, I mean, yeah, you said it really well, actually.

Congrats to you on that front. You can see what the brewers saw. And obviously we've talked about

it. There are people in that front office who are insanely high on David Hamilton.

It kind of reminds me of, I mean, it reminds me a little bit of Caleb Durbin in some ways, where

I'm like, I don't like, okay, where are you seeing this? Like, I understand he's fast. He has

good context skills and has great range on defense. But like this. And so to see it, we saw it in

flash and spring training where he actually, you know, did hit the ball hard from time to time.

And then today where he's basically just doing all the brewers things,

like you can get to 97 wins, right? And be like, how do they do this? How do they do this again?

Like, this isn't sustainable. And then, and then day to day, you're like, oh, yeah, David

Hamilton just plays third base for the first time. It his first start and makes bare-handed charging

plays and steals bases and draws catchers interference and gets infield hits on balls that hit off

the base and right to the second baseman. He's just too fast for you. Like, that's what they do.

David Hamilton is what the brewers do. And did they do it again with him? Maybe it's not, I mean,

this is not like a 500 plate appearance got. But if he can be, you know, if he can hit around

a 90 WRC plus and 300 plate appearances, it's a pretty good player.

The havoc he's going to create with those wheels, Kurt. First of all, 510. Are we counting?

No, we can't. Well, I'm not going, I'm not buying it is what I'm saying.

Yeah, I see. I see. He fits. He fits. No, I'm shorter. Oh, you think he's shorter, spiritually,

shorter. I love that. I listened to him in my short-king story because he also fits their style.

So I was like, yeah, yeah, I got to give it to him. They saw him. They did not see six-foot. They

saw what they wanted to see. And that's a tiny human being. I am concerned, Kurt. I'm concerned

because he was what's happening in my household right now. I was going to say your hotel. Oh, no.

This is not my household. Although people could probably hear the air conditioner. There's a car

alarm going off. My daughter is big time into Hamilton again. We go through cycles with all these

things. She is 11 and she is all back on Hamilton, which I love. I love. I am a little sick of the

like five or six songs that she prefers to cycle through, but still I am worried for me, Kurt.

There are a lot of Hamilton memes out there that I may be forced to deploy at points this season.

I don't know if I can resist the temptation here. It's going to be strong. It's going to be hard.

I'm going to be honest with you. My dog was barking because my wife just got home.

You also have noises in the background. I just put my headphones on. So I'm happy

or and or sad for you, but I ain't reading all that. Yeah, I totally understand. I'm right now

trying to workshop a let's steal their cannons. Hamilton meme into stolen bass. It's got some work,

but we'll figure something out there. We can do like a three up three down maybe. They did

one more thing that I want to talk about before we kind of do the three up three down and look

back at this opener, which had so so much happened. They added a reliever, Jake Woodford.

Yes. Yes. That's what I expected to talk about on the opening day 14 to 2 game.

This time Sunday when we hug up and we're like, let's do a podcast on Thursday after opening day.

The name Jake Woodford was definitely someone that you were thinking about. They add him very early

out of the week. A relief pitcher from the raise. I've already forgotten. I've already forgotten

where they got him. Yes, he was on the raise. So sorry, Jake Woodford. I'm so sorry. He gets

into the game. He gives up a home run. Murkami. Murkami had a good day for the white socks.

Homer's in his first major league game. He also drew a couple locks, but he gave up a home run,

but still added to the strike out total with free to close things down and make it an even 20.

Tell me your thoughts on him because numbers wise, you look at his baseball reference page,

nothing there is jumping out. No one is going to look at that and say, oh, there's a guy. There's

a guy that they got on the scrapy diamond, but the brewerers always find diamonds in the pitching

in the pitching rough. So what do you think about him? I honestly, I have the thoughts of what I

watch today and the changeups interesting. Sure. The changeups interesting. I think the brewer's

like true serum would tell you they just felt like they needed more depth. And that was the

genesis of this move. It's like, okay, we have Eastern McGee. This guy who has options. Is this guy

as good as Eastern McGee? I don't know, maybe, but Eastern McGee has options. And as we have discussed,

not a ton of optionable relievers on that 40 man roster. That's right. And even some of the guys

that you know, you might think about as later on, depth, like Jacob, why you expect no options left.

So it gives you depth. That definitely helps you at this point of the year who knows how long he

sticks around. I guess his performance will determine that. He gives you length. And I thought the

changeup was interesting. That's what I got on Jake Woodford. I think you're absolutely right. I think

they just they they just thought, why not? They can they can add an arm. I be kind of surprised if

he ends up here by a season's end since he doesn't have options and they love to wheel through

those relievers. I'd be surprised, honestly, if he makes it through July, but if he, you know,

who knows? They can take care of the guy and make him make him special. It's what they do. So,

you know, we'll see interesting and bummer for Eastern McGee because he was going to make this theme.

And now he's back in Nashville. He will be here this year, though. I'm sure. All right.

Anything else? Any big picture stuff? You know, I know Mark Adonazio talked

before the game. You got some thoughts from him. I thought we're kind of interesting. You want to

go through that before we get to three if we go? Sure. I asked a lot of questions today so we can

we can talk about it. I love it. The Brewers lost 20 mil on their revenue, but basically it was

a 20 million loss in terms of the TV deal. So that's a whole. That's that's

I got you there, I guess. Yeah, sick man.

He's actually been the opening day roster for the Guardians.

So I guess that's not optimal, but now you see why the Brewers went back to Valley Sports last year as

well. Because they were, you know, not a ton of money, but they're still getting money. Now,

ultimately, does this have long term effects? Probably. That's why the league wants to do it. They

understand that RSNs are no longer the way. So that that was one takeaway. The other thing I

thought that was interesting. There was, there was, he said a bunch of stuff. I thought one of the

other takeaways for me was asking about Matt Arnold's contract. And when we asked Arnold at the

season and press conference, you know, right, we've been promoted to president of baseball operations

about is this also an extension? He declined to comment on that. And then Otsunasio basically did

the same thing today. So I don't know. I don't know what, I don't know what I'm reading into that,

but that was they, they didn't, they didn't confirm anything. I'll say that.

Yeah, I kind of felt really between the lines. Honestly, they had extended him, but if they

did that, they would, they would be, wouldn't they celebrate that? Wouldn't they be like, yeah,

we extended it? We want him here. I can't say for sure, but I can tell you what I would do. If I

extended my, you know, two-time reigning executive of the year, I at least put out a press release

about it. For sure. So I don't know, yeah, that doesn't answer the question for us, but that is where

we are. Man, I hope, I hope, you know, feels like I'm playing with fire a little bit, you know,

as you see David Sterns and the Mets and pretty parole to of course got an opening day start for

the New York Mets. It's like, I hope they don't lose another GM to somebody else who's been one of

the architects of this, this turnaround, this incredible period into his history. All right, let's

go through some of the more granular details from this game. A one game three up, three down. Let's do

what Kurt here it is. Three up, three down.

Kurt, do you want to go first?

From this game, I do, I do, I do, it's fresh on my mind. I'm just trying to think what we haven't

spoken about yet. Will and Contreras is here. I absolutely 100% have that as my number one thing to

discuss in this segment. That will you Contreras is here. He's got it going on, man.

Where did that come from? It did not. Well, that's a great question, but all I can tell you is I

know it did not look like that when we left Arizona. So someone in Milwaukee had knows the answer

for this. He's got look up. Are we calling that a ponytail? Right? Kind of, yeah.

It's interesting. I heard the radio guys. It caught them off guard because I was driving to

Indiana. So I'm listening to this game on the radio. And they're like, we thought maybe there

was something on its uniform. We didn't know what that was. So this is an incredible fashion moment

in Brewer's history. Will and Contreras. I think a lot of people are going to want to know what's

going on with that hair. I think that's a big, big storyline coming out of this game. Fantastic. Amazing.

So I'm not sure. I got to read the story. Laurie Nichol was waiting to speak to him

after the game. I'm not sure. I don't know. I don't think he came out.

Yeah. So that was the word. It was like, oh, it'll be a while. He's in the trainer's room.

And buddy, those are the worst words you can hear. Yeah. You know, how many times in my

four months of covering Josh Hader? We heard he's in the trainer's room.

Yeah. That's their way of saying, not interested. That's their way of saying that.

Yeah. And also if he is in the trainer's room, that's actually like even worse news.

No, there's in the trainer's room, they're getting treatment.

Sure. It's just even worse news because they are going to be in there longer than if they

were just trying to wake up. That's right. We have to find out. And the world is going to want to

know this off day on Friday comes at a terrible time for people wanting to know more about what

you could cherish this here. I got me get an answer soon. The fashion worked here. I mean,

he had a basis clearing double. That was pretty sweet. So that was a big moment early in the game.

But yeah, that was that was one of the big takeaways. I got my number one here is Jake Bowers.

The king Lee Jake Bowers. Yes, that's right. This sing the praises of me.

You knew you knew what was happening here with Jake Bowers that he was he's someone we should

be paying attention to. Seven homers in spring. I witnessed the seventh one at American Family Field

two days before opening day. It was a gargantuan blast. I he also doubled down the line and hit two

absolute screamers every time that man is in the box. A baseball is in danger. His home run was a

moon shot. It was gorgeous. And he did strike out his first couple of hats today. So it's not like

it was a phenomenal day for him, but especially with choreo out. And you see Garrett Mitchell

and center and Jake Bowers in the left. And you feel like that's probably something you're going

to see a lot of. I think choreo's injury opens the door. Pretty obviously for Jake Bowers to get

an awful lot more time out in left field. I don't know how that's going to work all the time. But

man, he is mashing the ball. And Kurt, I don't know how high the ceiling goes with him.

I still feel like he's, you know, he's still, yeah, I don't want to say just Jake Bowers, but like,

I don't know if we've seen a like starter caliber Andrew Vaughn run in him necessarily, but

I'm driven big. Oh, no, it's definitely in there. We also saw a little more swing and miss today.

That wasn't there in spring at all. Like he had a 90 something percent zone contact rate,

which is insane, especially when you think about where Jake Bowers was a couple of years ago.

So yeah, like I've talked about him plenty. I don't need to go too deep on, but it was,

it's kind of funny to, well, actually, haven't last year, I guess we're the spring training hero

homers on opening day. So I guess I shouldn't, I shouldn't get too excited about it,

carrying over because well, what happened to Vinny Capra? It did not happen to not carry over in 2025.

You know, he's not on a big league roster to start the year. Vinny Capra, but he will be soon

probably, probably. I've no idea where he is. All right, let me get mine here. I'm going

Aaron Ashby pitched in an eight one game. What a pat Murphy just loves the his job. He just

loves doing this. He loves poking fun with people who are worried about these things. I can't

believe it. It was an eight one game in Aaron Ashby pitched because of course he did because that's

just what's going to happen with Aaron Ashby. There was a moment in the press box where

well, he comes in the game right and it's eight to one and I look over to Jack Stern and Jack

Stern's like, well, Jack's like one of the kings. Oh, Ashby's up again. He's like, well, he did

get fully hot, hot last inning. And I was like, yeah, that doesn't mean you got a user made to what.

But that's, it's just funny at this point. This is just how they operate with him. All right,

that's all I have. They're just going to use Aaron Ashby. They're going to do it every day if they

can. It's just the way it goes. He's going to have to be like dead tired for them to say no.

He did add to the strike out total. So good for him.

He's really elite. His stuff is incredible today. So we'll see if that

if that continues is incredible. My number two, well, I still have Joey Ortiz with the

bases loaded written down. I wanted to point that out. But instead of talking more about my

predictions, how about we go to the bingo card because before this is where I was going to go

with my last one. I am so sorry. I've stolen this from you. A couple days ago, MLB,

Major League Baseball released like a hype video. It was the, you know, every, every famous person

in Major League Baseball and Jacob Isarowski made the appearance. And the band BTS, the Super mega

star band. JR, JR, what, what, what genre of music is BTS? That is K-pop. And why is that important?

Why? Why is it important? You let me know. On our bingo card, I said one of the things for the

bingo card, Jacob Isarowski appears in the K-pop video. And that was a video with K-pop

music in it. I don't know how we call it anything less than K-pop video. It was officially sponsored

by a big K-pop band and the league. I've seen enough. Yeah, we've seen enough. We've done it.

We have been calling it one is down. We have our first. I know we lost, we lost like three or

four with Monasterio and Sequeler. Can you, some of those guys can you trade in?

Strange volume of our bingo cards. Took a hit because of those guys.

But I'd looked at it and we could, there's still two bingo options to the left and down

with this spot. So we are, we are sitting pretty, I think, 20% of the way there.

And we're only one hundred, one hundred sixty second of the season done. It's going to happen

for us this year. William Contreras, please start a podcast.

Dude, that guy, he absolutely could start a podcast. But yeah, this was, this was electric

for us to have anything even approaching a bingo card, a bingo card hit. So we are absolutely

counting it. Again, this podcast has had a great, great week. That's all I know. So did you

have a third one? Do you want me to, to keep going? I stole one from you?

I, Bryce Turing's steel was weird. We don't need to get into that. But I think he,

you know, what happened there? I think the throw just threw him off. Like it was such, it was in

the line. Like teams need to do that more. Just have your, just have your catcher throw the ball,

not at the base. But just so far down the line toward first base. And the fielder knows it's coming.

So he just tails for it. And then he catches it. And the other guy's like, well, I can't,

just run. I can't keep running. I don't want to run into the guy.

Corey Canable, friend of show, said on your pod that he thought maybe it was a mishidden run.

He thought Contreras and Turing had communicated and then Contreras didn't swing. I don't know.

Could be. I have no idea. Just weird. It is weird. I will close it down with this, my number,

my third and final. And it won't be about South Freely kidding a home run against the lefty.

But that was pretty cool too, because we didn't do that at all last year. And South Freely

power hitter question mark. My third thing, Kurt, do you know the name of the mayor of Appleton,

Wisconsin? Matt Erickson. Oh, you're so close. And Matt Erickson is, of course, fundamentally,

the mayor of Appleton, Wisconsin. The mayor of Appleton, Wisconsin is Jake Woodford.

Oh, wow. Amazing.

All right. The more you know, the more you know. So yes, the Moa Kibiris have a namesake.

Things we didn't talk about. I mean, there's still more I suppose, but Jordan Stolls and Jordan

love a double dose of Jordan throwing first pitches. Kurt, I think the world of both of those

athletes. I think they're incredible. I love how skilled they are in the various sports. I will

cheer for them heartily. I don't think either one of those guys can throw a baseball, but you know

what? I'm not judging. That's fine. It's just that's just not for you. That's fine. But I love

that they were there. I love that we had that kind of star power, throwing first pitches,

and that kind of Wisconsin sports love to kick off the 2026 season. And now, Kurt, you have an

off day or random off day, because of the weather, surely. I mean, baseball scheduled it this way in

a dome. I don't know what they did. Well, that's what the opening day scheduled this

spring is just weird. I mean, I kind of get it like you don't want to do a four game series here.

You want the brewers to open on Thursday. You could just open on Friday. They have some teams

not opening on Thursday. Just have everyone open on Thursday. Yeah. And then I have some four

game series is probably the way to actually go about it. But the brewers, the brewers and white

socks can't play a four game series. They just like, the schedule does not allow for that. So that

makes sense in this instance, but it is still weird to have the the rain day in the building.

I feel like in the past in dope parks, they haven't had them start on that Thursday. They've had

like, if this is the same days of the week, they just started on Friday and run right through

Friday, Saturday, Sunday. I don't know if I'm quite right about that. How do you feel about

baseball starting the season with this with a one off game, a night game on that Wednesday,

and then pulling into a full schedule on Thursday? Do you like that? No. No. But I am a baseball

writer and I'm not allowed to like it. Oh, that's a good point. Of course. I kind of do like it.

I do like it. The Netflix stuff, you know, it had its detractors, but I kind of like that concept.

I don't know why it leaves me feeling a little bit empty. Maybe it's just because Giants Yankees wasn't

like a, you know, exciting matchup. Giants Yankees is two Sunday night baseball for me without it being

like Dodgers Red Sox. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Or Yankees Red Sox. Like, it's just random enough that it

I should be interested, but it's too random for me to be fully interested. Yeah. I think that's

right. I think that's right. Before let you go a couple more games here, you're going to see Chad

Patrick on Saturday and game two be the first night game of the season. And then a Sunday afternoon

game where we get a first look at Brandon Sprote, who looked fantastic in that Tuesday exhibition

game that I was mentioning before, both he and Kyle Harrison pitched very well in that game.

What do you, well, anything that you're looking forward to here in the next two days?

I think that's Sprote game. Yeah. The Sprote game will be fun to watch. I curious to see

what his in-game mixes and kind of how he works with contrarian's back there. Yeah.

Because they didn't get much time, you know, working together.

Oh, that's a good point. Yeah. I didn't think about that. Oh, teams are kind of disadvantaged

when their catcher is off to the WBC, although I suppose everybody's losing a bunch of guys.

It doesn't really matter what positions they play, but I was going to do it for our opening day.

I guess you could call this an emergency podcast, although it's been on the schedule. I don't know

how emergent it is, but rumors come away with a massive 14-to-2 win. They strike out just about

everybody. 20 strikeouts. And Jacob Israowski Kurt is now going to win the Saiyans since Paul

Schien's had a terrible first inning that they could settle. He's that's my that's my snap

reaction. Jacob Israowski, Saiyans, let's go. Will he be sending a fruit basket to O'Neal Cruise?

Quite possibly. Oh, O'Neal Cruise is so exciting. That man is not an outfielder. He is not

capable of doing that. Should really move on, but whatever. The pirates have to play him somewhere.

So we'll see. We'll see a lot of O'Neal Cruise this year. All right. Enjoy your off-day

cruise fans. You'll be back of course on Saturday and we'll be a little weird schedule.

I'm sure after a 14-to-2 win, you just want to keep the momentum going. You'll have to suffer

through it. Enjoy some final or sweet 16 action. And we'll be back with you at the end of the week,

or I should say early next early Monday morning. Thank you for listening, everybody. Kurt,

thank you for joining me. Enjoy the rest of your time in Milwaukee, and you'll all be in four

minutes. Before you begin your road trip, ask yourself, do you really need five full suitcases?

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