Tim Kurkjian joins Friar Territory

00:00:09
Speaker 1: All right, everybody, welcome to Friar Territory, part of the foul Territory network. I'm Darren Smith. That is Marty Caswell, and up until like a couple days ago, I was the most recent addition to the foul Territory family. But now here we have a little bit of royalty. Of course. He is our longtime friend for many years on the radio, my former colleague at ESPN, and now my colleague here at foul Territory. He's the winner of the Spinx Award. He's baseball royalty. Am I laying it on thick enough? Tim Kirkchin, it is good to see you, get the chat with you as always.

00:00:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was plenty thick.

00:00:41
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, Darren, Marty, great to see you, Thanks for having me on.

00:00:45
Speaker 4: Great to see you as will cho you Tim, And you said that the name of your show is is this a great game or what? And it's with your son Jeff. Now, the thing that kind of got me Tim when I saw the release was you are claiming no hot takes on this show, So what do you have against hot takes?

00:01:04
Speaker 3: Well, the whole world is a hot take right now, That's what I have against it.

00:01:09
Speaker 2: So I'm trying.

00:01:10
Speaker 3: We are trying to do a slightly different show than everyone else.

00:01:15
Speaker 2: That doesn't mean we don't deal with difficult situations. We do.

00:01:19
Speaker 3: But I'm not gonna sit there and yell at my son and have him yell back at me on a podcast. Everyone else does that, So we're gonna just try something else. We laugh and we learn on our podcast instead of scream at each other. And anyway, it works for us because Jeffrey is not a big baseball guy. You know, he was like the star of all the school plays in high school. And I know like three things in the world baseball, basketball, and sitcoms from the sixties, and Jeffrey knows everything else. So we're a good team. When there's something I need to know about music or pop culture, I go to him and then I tell a baseball story or two that maybe he hasn't heard yet.

00:02:03
Speaker 2: That's how our show operates.

00:02:06
Speaker 3: Well.

00:02:06
Speaker 1: I do love that, Tim, and I think people can relate to it as well. You know, even just recently last summer, my father passed away, and like literally the only thing we had in common was sports. So you know, as I'm listening to you talk about this opportunity with your son. You know, it does make me realize how special that connection was that I had, and I'm sure people that are watching and listening feel the same way. Part of it, i'm sure is for you, for the benefit of you and your son, but it's also i think something that will resonate really well with people that are going to tune in and appreciate that connection.

00:02:37
Speaker 3: Yeah, we get a lot of response to the whole father son thing, and we've had fathers and sons on our show, Karl Ravich and his son, we had Cal Ripken Junior and his son Ryan, so we really play that up as much as we can.

00:02:53
Speaker 2: We have Eduardo Perez on every year. Of course, he's the son of.

00:02:57
Speaker 3: Tony Perez, so it's a natural connection. So we just connect fathers, sons, mother's daughters, all that and baseball. It seems to work for us. And again we're not screaming and yelling. Hopefully we're having a little fun along the way.

00:03:12
Speaker 4: Well, Tim, it is it is great seeing you here and look forward to that podcast with you and your son. It's called let's say it is called is this a great game or what? And boy, it's so far a lot of storylines heading in the baseball season. Now I'm bummed out because normally when I go to Peoria, I always see you at Padre spring training, usually you know, wearing your basketball shorts, usually pestering AJ Prowler. Have you made your rounds around camps this the spring.

00:03:39
Speaker 3: Well, I'm kind of ashamed to say, Marty, I've already been to Arizona. Okay, I'm already back home. Traffic budgets are what they are. I used to I used to be the first guy to spring training. This year, I think I was the last. I used to spend six weeks at spring training, then we got cut to flour. This year was closer to eight days. So to make some very difficult decisions, I did not even go to Peoria to see the Padres. I am shamed, but I didn't have a choice. I had other assignments I had to do. So it's bad, but I did the best I could.

00:04:16
Speaker 2: Now I get it.

00:04:17
Speaker 4: Listen, when I was there early, there wasn't there wasn't much national media. There was mostly local. Imagine if you're the if you're the national you're going You're you're b lining. If the Dodgers can't because of all the storylines and of all the superstars that are there. But but Tim, when you look at the Padres, what's the one thing that jumps out at you?

00:04:34
Speaker 2: If you had been there?

00:04:36
Speaker 4: Are you gruel and agent peller on Craig Stanman, a relief pitcher, our first time manager?

00:04:41
Speaker 2: What are you thinking?

00:04:41
Speaker 4: Is it about Nick Castillano's in his fit with the Padres? What what's your hook with the Padres? I should you be Imperial Peeria?

00:04:48
Speaker 3: Well, I no longer ask questions about the managers that get hired today. Okay, the manager and the general manager of the Washington National combined are not as old as I am. So I have stopped asking, like, how can you hire a thirty three year old manager? How could you hire a relief pitcher who has never managed in the big leagues before? The rules have changed, Everything has changed. That job has changed as much as any job in the game since I first started covering forty five years ago. Craig Stammon is a great guy. He is smart, he knows what he's doing. So I'm going to give him every chance in the world to be really good at this, and I expect him to be really good at this, But you know, the thought of you know Jim Leland, and you know Bruce Bochie and Shoe Walder and Joe Madden not being in the game really at all right now, that worries me and it makes me wonder.

00:05:48
Speaker 2: But this is where we're going.

00:05:49
Speaker 3: We're always looking for somebody new who's got a different idea that no one's ever thought of. My guess is, however, any really good idea. Dusty Baker thought of it a lot the way, or Buck show Alder did or someone else. But I'm gonna give Craigs Dammin every chance of the world to be good at this. And it's just a different era in baseball.

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00:07:13
Speaker 1: Well, Tim, can you expand on that a little bit? When you talk about it being a different era in baseball? How would you what is the job description of the manager in twenty twenty six? So I know it might change team to team, right, different gms have different philosophies, But how would you overall describe what the job description is today, Let's say by comparison to fifteen, twenty thirty years ago.

00:07:32
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, the job today is to follow the rules set by the organization.

00:07:38
Speaker 2: Again, I'm a really old.

00:07:39
Speaker 3: Man now, but when I first started covering, you have the general manager and the manager, and they spoke every single day about what the team looks like.

00:07:48
Speaker 2: What the lineup should look like.

00:07:49
Speaker 3: And now we have an army of people in the front office, all of whom have a say in what should be going on. And in a lot of ways that's a good thing. But now, to me, ultimately the manager has to do, essentially do, at least until the game starts, what he is told to do by the front office. I talked to a manager no longer managing, and I said, I'm sorry, you're not managing anymore, and he goes, well, I'm not. I don't want to manage anymore because it's not the same job it's you it used to be. I talked to another manager and he said, well, the job I used to do as the manager no longer exists.

00:08:28
Speaker 2: And that's how we have to look at things. And this may not be a bad thing.

00:08:32
Speaker 3: I just know that when the Padres had Bruce Bochie, he was great.

00:08:36
Speaker 2: He went to the Giants, he won three times.

00:08:38
Speaker 3: He was brought to the Rangers and he won because they left the game in his hands. I think we need to do more of that, but we don't do as much of it as I think we should.

00:08:49
Speaker 4: And now to your point, Tim, Now all those the managers that you just mentioned. They're still in baseball, but a different role. So when I was in Pyeroid, there's Buddy Black. Buddy Black is now a special assistant to AJ Peller, Bruce Bochi is now a special assistant with the Giants to Buster Posey, and I believe Bob Melvin is now a special assistant with the A's. I'm not sure if they're the Sacramento of the Oakland and whatever they're calling themselves these days, but it is changing. And I'm thinking about what Jackson Merrill said earlier about how guys took on so quickly to Craigstamn and moving on from Mike Schultz, was the game has really changed a lot, and these players want someone relatable, like it matters to him, it matters to guy like Nick Castellano's number one, that he has a guy that actually played and that was most recently in the game that he can be relatable when you when you're talking baseball. So we'll see trend.

00:09:35
Speaker 2: It's really important.

00:09:37
Speaker 3: You know, when I grew up, the coach told you to do something, if your parents sold you, if a teacher told you, or a neighbor's parents told you, you did what you were told Today's players, and I'm not being critical.

00:09:48
Speaker 2: I've grown up in.

00:09:49
Speaker 3: A way where you have to explain to them why you have to do this. So when I hitting coach says we need you to go take extra VP or less batting practice, they need a reason why. And when the guy providing those answers has played in the big leagues, that's a really helpful thing. I just know when Paul Moldor was the manager of the Twins, they went back to Milwaukee and his number four is retired in Milwaukee in Miller Park, and one of his players, young players, looked at him and goes, is that you up there? And Paul molder have to explain, yes, that's my number up there. I used to play here, and I played here so well that they retired my number. So with today's players, you can't just tell them something. You have to prove to why they should listen to you. That's a big difference in the last forty five years.

00:10:43
Speaker 1: All right, Well, Tim, we were just talking a little bit about, you know, how you have to explain to players why it is that managers are making these decisions. And we've been talking a lot about the Podres lineup, Last year, it was Fernando Tatis Junior who led off for the potteris all season long, and by almost every metric, he was really good at that. This year, it appears the potters are going in a different direction. Let me just ask in the abstract, the leadoff position is such an interesting one.

00:11:06
Speaker 2: Show.

00:11:06
Speaker 1: Hey, Otani leads off for the Dodgers, and he's an MVP Award winner. He's great at it, he's, you know, a future Hall of Famer. But some would ask, why is a guy like that leading off? He hit thirty nine solo home runs? What do you make of modern lineup construction and some of the stuff that we're seeing from some of these managers just in general before we get into the potrace.

00:11:28
Speaker 3: Well, again, I'm almost seventy years old. So when I grew up, your best hitter hit third or he hit fourth, I'm all for getting my best hitter up in the first inning of a game. And yes, I'm the son of a mathematician MIT undergrad doctor in mathematics. I understand if you hit lead off, you get more chances to hit during the course of a season. Everyone understands that. But in a perfect world, I would still have my best hit hitting third, because he might come up in the first inning and hit a three run homer and then you win the game after one inning potentially. So am I okay with Kyle Schworber hitting lead off? Of course, they go to the playoffs every year. Show Hey is the most remarkable player we've ever seen. It would be stupid to argue with that. But if you're asking me, I have no problem with taking show Hey and say you're gonna hit third this year, or tatist Junior, you're gonna hit second or third this year. You know, you get him up with more men on base in the first inning. I think that's a good thing.

00:12:33
Speaker 1: M Yeah, I mean, and it seems like like, you know, the player himself is making this decision, you know, like like he let off all last year, and you know there's a bunch of these new stats with you know, w RC plus him and whatever. But but you know, the people like the idea that he brought that energy in the first inning. But he's another guy that wants to bat seemingly in the middle of the lineup, And like, to your point, I mean, this is just math, right, Like this is why we're seeing show Hey Tny, Francisco Lindor, et cetera. These guys all about first or second on the sport.

00:13:01
Speaker 3: Right, it's the math, and I understand, and we go by the math all the time in baseball. You have to wonder do we go by the map a little bit too much? And yes, everything starts with the Phillies. When Kyle Schwarber hits a lead off home or to start a game, that's a great boost to have at the top of the order. Just when I first started covering, you know, Bert campan Eiris would hit lead off because he was the diggy, little pixie, little middle infielder.

00:13:27
Speaker 2: Who could run. Well.

00:13:28
Speaker 3: Those days are over, and I get it, and I'm not so old that I refuse to adjust to what's going on. But if Tatis Junior says I'm more comfortable hitting third, then let him hit third, and let's see what he can do. If it doesn't work. You know, he can hit lead off and make that work.

00:13:47
Speaker 2: I know. I'm not even to use his name.

00:13:49
Speaker 3: As that point, he could only hit second in the order, and the manager hit him lead off and he said, I can't do that, and then they moved him to third.

00:13:56
Speaker 2: I can't do that then they've moved him down in the order.

00:14:00
Speaker 3: I really can't do that, he said, I hit second, otherwise I can hit now. I'm not sure about that either. But let's listen to the player once in a while and if he's more comfortable hitting in a certain place, let's give him a shot, especially when he's as decorated and as talented as Fernando.

00:14:17
Speaker 4: To tease jud Speaking of Tatis, and it's been a pretty hot topic. I mean, with padres found in this market over the past year, how do you evaluate the season that Fernando had last season? You know, set a personal high in in runs scored, right, but the slug was down, the home runs were down, and I think he was pretty down on himself, saying that I know and Craig Damn's are the same thing that we know this this player can be, can show that he's an MVP type player. How do you judge what Tatis showed last season?

00:14:48
Speaker 3: Well, I thought for his standards, and his standards are really high, this was a I would say a subpar season for him.

00:14:56
Speaker 2: Marty.

00:14:57
Speaker 3: You remember I came out to San Diego in the middle of the summer covered a series against the Rangers, did a game for the Booth on on a Saturday night or whatever it was, and.

00:15:06
Speaker 2: I talked to a bunch of guys and one of the guys said, Tatis is just lost right now. He's lost.

00:15:11
Speaker 3: Now, How can Fernando Tatis ever get lost when he's that talented and has says this kind of track record. Well, of course he figured it out. He had a bunch of homers. He had a very productive year. But he's even better than that. So when I say it's subpar, it's better than nine ninety five percent of the players.

00:15:30
Speaker 2: Let's be clear about that.

00:15:31
Speaker 3: But when we're talking about a talent like him, you know, you're thinking even more than what he did.

00:15:36
Speaker 2: And at no point, like for a six week stretch, should he have all sorts of hitting issues. He's too good for that.

00:15:45
Speaker 1: Tim The clock is ticking. You know, I would give anything to go to be thirty three years old again. But Maddy Machadah and Zander Bogarts are going into their age thirty three season in twenty twenty six. You know, Tatis younger, Jackson Merrill younger, some of the pitching getting a little bit older, just in terms of where the potterys are they've emptied out their farm system to really, you know, to add to the big league roster. How do you just gauge the Potteris sense of urgency here with their window of opportunity and where they might be heading into another season like this.

00:16:15
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, when you're in the Nashally West, a cent of urgency exists all the time because the Dodgers are there and they are dynasty right now. Last six years they've won three championships and had a winning percentage of six point thirty. Last team to do that was the fifty three through fifty eight New York Yankees. That's what we're dealing with here with the Dodgers. And this is the best Dodger team that I've ever seen. I saw them in spring training and they are loaded beyond words. So yes, if the Potterys are going to make them run at the division title, be competitive for a wild card, the sense of urgency is, we got to win now, and we got to do this before anybody else gets a year older. Now.

00:16:57
Speaker 2: I think Bogarts will have a good year.

00:16:59
Speaker 3: Manny Mitchel is a future Hall of Famer who doesn't seem to be slowing down significantly to me, but sure, any every year that goes by is another year that maybe you haven't won. So yeah, sense of virgin see no doubt about it. But that goes for like twenty nine out of thirty teams right.

00:17:16
Speaker 4: Now, Okay, Tim, I'm definitely gonna hold you to this based on what your answer is. So here we go. The Padres are a legit playoff team in twenty twenty six if what happens.

00:17:29
Speaker 2: Well, I think they have to.

00:17:31
Speaker 3: Yes, I think they're a legit playoff team no matter what in twenty twenty six. But what is going to have to happen is the young pitching or the pitching that they've.

00:17:39
Speaker 2: Acquired really has to be good again.

00:17:42
Speaker 3: Michael King has to come back and be great because when he's right, he's not good, he's great. Nobody can hit him when he's right. Joe Musgrove is coming back, that would really be helpful. Nick Pavetta has to be as good as he was last year. And you know, Mason Moore, just Mason Miller sorry, has to be a dominant closure that we know he could be, but he doesn't have the same supporting cast around him. With some of the moves that they made so it all comes down to pitching. Normally, I think they'll score enough runs to be a competitive team, but I think it's their starting pitching, like ninety percent of the teams out there, that will hold the secret to this team.

00:18:20
Speaker 1: And Tim I would just follow up as well, because I'm watching the World Baseball Classic and clearly there's so much young talent in the game today. It makes you feel good about the future once we get beyond the collective bargaining agreement chat. But Jackson Merrill, you know, was in and out last year. He was on the IL a couple different times, went healthy. Jackson Merrill does belong in the same categories Wit Junior as some of the other big you know, younger names that we're seeing featured in the World Baseball Class again in the sport correct.

00:18:47
Speaker 2: He's really really good.

00:18:48
Speaker 3: Look, he's not Bobby wit Junior, because Bobby wit Junior plays shortstop and has a longer track record and steals more bases. He's a better player than Jackson Merrill. But Jackson Merrill is on the very short list of really good players and good young players in the big leagues. And we saw it when he came up a couple of years ago.

00:19:08
Speaker 6: They took him a shortstop and put him in the outfield, and to play that well when it's that big of a change was just remarkable to me and get to know him a little bit, not surprised at all that he was that good.

00:19:20
Speaker 3: But I say this all the time, Darren Marty, this is the hardest game in the world to play, and guys who are really good at it aren't really good at it every single day. And guys have subpar seasons, they have down seasons, and out of nowhere they come back and they're great again. I fully expect Jackson Merrill to be the best Jackson Merrill we've seen this year, which is really saying something because two years ago he was sensationally good.

00:19:46
Speaker 4: He's a game ginger and to your point especially, I know last year was tough for him, dealt with the hamstring injury, the concussion, a bunch of different injuries. But I'm he's filling pretty good. He's talking about growing into his power. So I just think that right now we're just beginning to see, beginning to see how great Jackson Merril can be.

00:20:04
Speaker 2: No doubt about that.

00:20:07
Speaker 3: Tim.

00:20:07
Speaker 1: It is always our pleasure we appreciate you. Let's remind everybody where they can find you, not only all the years that we've come to expect to find you on ESPN, but also now I hear part of the foul Territory Network as well.

00:20:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's our podcast is called is this a great game?

00:20:23
Speaker 3: Or what?

00:20:24
Speaker 2: It's?

00:20:24
Speaker 3: My son Jeff and I to repeat, I don't ever yell at him, and he yells at me once in a while when I foul up the technology or I can't fix my printer right, or my screen doesn't work, or I have to adjust something and I have to take out my phone and do like a FaceTime with him so we can look at my computer and fix it, because poor old pop pop here.

00:20:47
Speaker 2: Has so much trouble with technology.

00:20:49
Speaker 3: But it's a lot of fun that we get great guests. We've had maybe ten Hall of Famers on our show the last couple of years. This is year number three, and starting next week, well two weeks when we start the first week of the baseball season, we'll have three shows a week, including one interview.

00:21:07
Speaker 2: So it's great fun. At least it is for Jeff and it is for me. What are you gonna book?

00:21:11
Speaker 3: As?

00:21:12
Speaker 1: Like Marty they have no hot takes on the world baseball class.

00:21:16
Speaker 2: That's nice to have ATA on the World base last night's game.

00:21:19
Speaker 3: We might have had to have had a hot take a last night, but that's okay. We'll handle that some other time. And yes, we'll get a j Preller on good and we will just probably discuss how he just schooled me so many times. He is an absolute nightmare to guard on the basketball court.

00:21:40
Speaker 4: At He doesn't need he does not need that for his ego. I'm gonna make sure that I said in this club. By the way, I have to ask you this question speaking to WBC. Okay, if you were gonna party, you, Tim Kirchin, go out and party with one team, which WBC team is it?

00:21:58
Speaker 3: I would party with any last an American team. It doesn't matter where they're from, because I did this WBC a couple of years ago at Chase Field. I would leave the ballpark and it was like Marty Garras was taking place in the streets. It was a gigantic party from whatever country was playing, and the Latino countries. It was incredible. It was like going to a parade. It was like going to the county fair and there was a baseball game being played.

00:22:27
Speaker 2: It was absolutely fabulous.

00:22:29
Speaker 3: And that's why this tournament really works, not just because the players are great, what a collection of players, but it's the fan base and how just emotional and how much they love being there. That's what makes WBC a stunning success.

00:22:45
Speaker 1: It is it is a ton of fun. Tim Krkschen, we appreciate you. You are a stunning success as well. Thank you very much for the time.

00:22:52
Speaker 2: Well, thank you Aaron, thank you Marty.

00:22:54
Speaker 4: By Tim all Right