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Speaker 1: I want you to put the word up there. We

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Speaker 1: back up. We're back again, we back up, back up.

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Speaker 1: It's time for Dodger Baseball. But can we go back

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Speaker 1: to back to back? That's the cue. Ladies and gentlemen,

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Speaker 1: May I have your attention, please, Hello and welcome. It

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Speaker 1: is Friday, April third, twenty twenty six. N O domine

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Speaker 1: and that means one thing. It's podcast time, baseball, podcast

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Speaker 1: time with your host, creator, spiritual figurehead, CEO, IT department,

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Speaker 1: et cetera. That's me, Richard. Parks like parks and rec. No, no, no,

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Speaker 1: I wasn't on the show. Yeah yeah, I love the show.

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Speaker 1: Who love parks and rec? Anyway, it's time for Dodger

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Speaker 1: Blue Dream and thank you for tuning in. The Dodgies

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Speaker 1: are four and one as of the time of this writing,

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Speaker 1: as of this morning Friday, and that's a good record,

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Speaker 1: enough for first place on top of the West Burn

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Speaker 1: Division in the National League. But that four and one

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Speaker 1: record perhaps belies what this first homestand of games was

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Speaker 1: like against the d Backs and the Guardians. Pitching looking

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Speaker 1: really good, offense not playing to its full potential, let's say,

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Speaker 1: but still a win is a win and theoretically one

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Speaker 1: hundred and sixty one and one is still on the

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Speaker 1: table for twenty twenty six, and wouldn't that be something. Hey,

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Speaker 1: now a boy can dream, Kenny, That's what baseball is about,

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Speaker 1: and as we like to say, baseball is not just

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Speaker 1: about baseball. Think about it. While I set up the

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Speaker 1: format for today's episode, and by the way, as I

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Speaker 1: finished this episode up and hit published, the Dodgers are

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Speaker 1: about to start a series against the Washington Nationals out

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Speaker 1: in DC, so we'll see that four and one record

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Speaker 1: might change by the end of this recording. Stay tuned

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Speaker 1: to find out today on the show, three stories from

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Speaker 1: the first week of baseball at Dodger Stadium in twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty six, as the Dodgers vie for a third consecutive

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Speaker 1: World Series championship. Number one, we are going to talk

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Speaker 1: about the trumpet entrance song for one of our new

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Speaker 1: players that became one of the biggest stories on the

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Speaker 1: field and off this past week. Number two, we are

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Speaker 1: going to talk about why people were lining up in

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Speaker 1: the parking lot at Dodger Stadium starting at five am

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Speaker 1: before a nighttime game one day this week. And last.

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Speaker 1: Number three, we'll spend a little time talking about the

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Speaker 1: pitching in specific with focus on the Japanese men in

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Speaker 1: our rotation, because we saw all three of them start

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Speaker 1: within one week. Sho Heyotani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, we saw him twice,

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Speaker 1: and the young gun Roki Sasaki. Everybody's looking good. We'll

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Speaker 1: dig into why. Okay, that's what's on deck today on

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Speaker 1: DBD season Threep two. The dream continues again. It's a

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Speaker 1: recurring dream and that is a very good thing because,

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Speaker 1: as we like to say every year that we've released

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Speaker 1: this podcast, asked the Dodgies have brought home the goods,

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Speaker 1: the hardware, talking about World series trophies. Boy, all right,

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Speaker 1: enough chin wagon for me. Let's get onto the show.

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Speaker 1: But first a few words from our sponsors. Stay tuned,

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Speaker 1: welcome back to the show. Thanks again for being with us. Today.

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Speaker 1: We're doing three segs. We'll have a chit chat about

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Speaker 1: our pictures who hail from the Land of the Rising

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Speaker 1: Sun show, Hey, Yama, Roki, all of whom started this

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Speaker 1: first week of the season. We will be talking of

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Speaker 1: about a nutty giveaway promotion that has fans going cray cray.

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Speaker 1: I'm talking about the Yoshi giveaway. But first, let's talk trumpet.

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Speaker 1: It's the top of the ninth inning at Dodger Stadium

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Speaker 1: in Los Angeles. The Dodgers are up, but just by

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Speaker 1: a single run. Fifty five thousand fans on the edge

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Speaker 1: of their seat. Suddenly the loudest sound at Chavez Ravine

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Speaker 1: isn't a baseball bat. It's a trumpet, and that can

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Speaker 1: mean only one thing. Edwin Diaz, the Dodgers' new star closer,

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Speaker 1: is jogging in from the bullpen, behind the fence and

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Speaker 1: left field to the mound to take the ball and

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Speaker 1: close out the game. As fans, we don't just hear

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Speaker 1: this song. We wait for it, much like California Love

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Speaker 1: meant that ken Lee Janssen was coming in and the

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Speaker 1: game was over, and Welcome to the Jungle meant Eric

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Speaker 1: Gagne was coming in and the game was over. Edwin

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Speaker 1: Diaz is the next in a succession of historically dominant

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Speaker 1: closers on this Dodgers franchise. And when you hear that trumpet,

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Speaker 1: you know it's time for Diez to come in and

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Speaker 1: shut the door. The track is Narco by Blaster Jacks

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Speaker 1: and Timmy Trumpet, and it's been Diaz's run out, walk

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Speaker 1: out entrance song. Since his time on the Mets, Diaz

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Speaker 1: was already famous for this, and his entrance had already

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Speaker 1: become a phenomenon known throughout the baseball world during his

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Speaker 1: tenure in New York and Narco by Timmy trumpet is

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Speaker 1: inextricably linked to Diez's identity. So when we heard that

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Speaker 1: Diaz was signing to a sixty nine million dollar three

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Speaker 1: year contract with the Dodgers over this offseason, that's the

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Speaker 1: highest annual average value contract ever awarded to a relief

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Speaker 1: pitcher in Major League Baseball history. We knew that the

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Speaker 1: trumpet was coming with him, but nobody could have guessed how.

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Speaker 1: During Diez's first week in Los Angeles, the trumpet entrance

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Speaker 1: has already been taken to a whole new level. It's

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Speaker 1: become the talk of Dodgerland, and it's changed the life

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Speaker 1: of one native Southern California. Let's keep digging in deeper.

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Speaker 1: This is the latest in a tradition of live music

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Speaker 1: in baseball that goes back to the very beginning of

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Speaker 1: the sport. Just how characters in operas have light motifs,

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Speaker 1: little music cues that are associated with them that play

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Speaker 1: anytime they come on stage. So it has been in

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Speaker 1: baseball mostly you think of batters who get a little

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Speaker 1: snippet of a song each time they walk to the plate,

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Speaker 1: but with a reliever like Diez, you get the whole song.

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Speaker 1: So it's a bigger moment. And back in the day

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Speaker 1: it would be live music, but these days it's mostly recorded.

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Speaker 1: But to make it more special, how about a live trumpet.

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Speaker 1: It's about theater spectacle, drama, tension, anticipation, and brass, with

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Speaker 1: its unique ability to cut through the din of a crowd,

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Speaker 1: has always been an instrument of choice as the live

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Speaker 1: soundtrack for a ballgame. Obviously, the Dodgies, the top organization

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Speaker 1: in baseball, know this. So this entrance came to being

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Speaker 1: in New York Queens. But now it's come to La Hollywood,

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Speaker 1: tinsel Town, the entertainment capital of the world, so we

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Speaker 1: already kind of expected that this would be going next lev.

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Speaker 1: In fact, I made a prediction on this very podcast

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Speaker 1: that we might see Flea from the Red Hot Chili

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Speaker 1: Peppers out there with his trumpet. He's got a new

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Speaker 1: trumpet album out making a play in the jazz world.

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Speaker 1: I'm all about it. Flee Big fan loved the memoir too,

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Speaker 1: and maybe we'll see Flee out there with his trumpet

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Speaker 1: doing the dias entrance music in October. If it happens,

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Speaker 1: I'd love a cut of the action, or at least

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Speaker 1: a little credit. But that's not what we're talking about today,

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Speaker 1: and that's not what happened last weekend. It was the

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Speaker 1: second game of the season, Friday night, lights on, but

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Speaker 1: then off they go down for the music. Phones go up,

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Speaker 1: fans on their feet, The aura appears, and as the

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Speaker 1: bullpen gates swing open out in left field and Diaz

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Speaker 1: runs out to the mound at the base of the

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Speaker 1: stands in the left field pavilion, outwalks Tatiana Tate. Well,

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Speaker 1: we don't know her name yet, big hoofy afro, big glasses,

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Speaker 1: big hoop, earrings, and at Edwin Diaz jersey. She's become

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Speaker 1: a viral sensation after appearing at Dodger Stadium twice and

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Speaker 1: two nights to see Diaz close out two of the Dodgers'

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Speaker 1: first four victories. And I'm very impressed and happy for

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Speaker 1: this young lady, and so I thought that i'd tell

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Speaker 1: you a little bit about her. She's from Long Beach,

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Speaker 1: early in her life. Her parents did not allow her

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Speaker 1: to do sports, instead enrolling her and her brother in

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Speaker 1: a community program at a local church in Long Beach,

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Speaker 1: and that's where Tatiana Tate fell in love with the trumpet.

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Speaker 1: On a podcast interview in twenty twenty four, Tatiana credited

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Speaker 1: Terry Moore Rip who quote taught us not only how

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Speaker 1: to be a musician, but how to be an entertainer.

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Speaker 1: She said she was shy growing up, but she liked

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Speaker 1: the trumpet because it was loud and it could grab

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Speaker 1: the attention of a room. It became an outlet for

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Speaker 1: her personality. She went to Long Beach Polly for high

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Speaker 1: school and then she got her Bachelors of Music in

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Speaker 1: Jazz Studies in Commercial Music Composition from California State University, Fullerton.

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Speaker 1: She has shared the stage with the likes of Stevie Wonder,

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Speaker 1: Chaka Khan, and Lizzo and from the jazz world are

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Speaker 1: Turo Sundival very impressive and now she's added Dodger Stadium

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Speaker 1: to her resume. She said she dreams of being a

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Speaker 1: female Miles Davis. The last iconic Dodger's Closer entrance was

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Speaker 1: Kenley Jansen's California Love. Before that, there was Eric Gangne

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Speaker 1: and Welcome to the Jungle. But Diaz has already made

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Speaker 1: his mark even in that grand succession thanks to Tatiana Tate.

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Speaker 1: Perhaps Tatiana Tate, with her distinctive looks and expert horn skills,

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Speaker 1: will become as inextricably linked with late inning dramatics and

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Speaker 1: the taste of victory as Welcome to the Jungle, California

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Speaker 1: Love and Timmy Trumpets himself for the sake of Tatiana's career,

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Speaker 1: and Edwin Diaz is for that matter, and for the

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Speaker 1: Dodgies themselves as an organization. This reporter certainly hopes so

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Speaker 1: for Dodger Blue Dream. I'm Richard Parks at Dodger Stadium,

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Speaker 1: sending it back to you in the studio. Richard, what

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Speaker 1: a fun little piece. I loved that. I love the Dodgers,

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Speaker 1: I love Trumpets. We'll be right back after a short break. Hey, everybody,

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Speaker 1: welcome back to the show. As I said earlier, it's Friday,

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Speaker 1: April third, and the Dodgers are in Washington, DC playing

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Speaker 1: the Nationals. And that game is over and the Dodgers

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Speaker 1: won by a score of thirteen to six. Show that's

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Speaker 1: nice and good to see the Dodgers' offense coming alive,

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Speaker 1: because that's one of the things that, in spite of

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Speaker 1: a really good record, we haven't seen so much of

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Speaker 1: this first week. This will be reflected later in a

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Speaker 1: short piece we're doing about pitching, but first, let's talk

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Speaker 1: about why were people lining up at five am on

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Speaker 1: a random weekday last week at Dodger Stadium when there

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Speaker 1: was a game time of seven to ten pm. It

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Speaker 1: started as a mystery. Every year the Dodgers release a

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Speaker 1: schedule for their promotional giveaways. There's a long history of

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Speaker 1: this with the Dodger going back to this guy named

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Speaker 1: Danny Goodman, who's known as a marketing genius and was

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Speaker 1: the Dodgers director of Advertising Souvenirs for almost three decades.

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Speaker 1: Goodman is credited with being the guy who brought bobble

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Speaker 1: heads into baseball, little six inch tall dolls whose heads

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Speaker 1: bobble back and forth on a spring. They started generic

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Speaker 1: and simple, and they've become more custom over the years,

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Speaker 1: and people, a lot of them, Dodgers fans go cuckoo

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Speaker 1: for them. Sometimes you'll see people rolling up to Dodger

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Speaker 1: Stadium and they have tickets and they collect their bobblehead

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Speaker 1: free giveaway and they just turn around and leave. They

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Speaker 1: don't even watch the game. And you see these things

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Speaker 1: on pre sale on eBay for sixty dollars and more.

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Speaker 1: It's something that has become insanely popular, and there's a

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Speaker 1: scarcity element for a lot of these giveaways. They're forty

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Speaker 1: thousand items and stadium capacity is fifty five thousand, so

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Speaker 1: if you're one of the last fifteen thousand to enter

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Speaker 1: that night, you're not gonna get your giveaway. And as

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Speaker 1: I said, the Dodgers had just put a mystery giveaway

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Speaker 1: on the schedule for March thirty. First they didn't say

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Speaker 1: what it was going to be, but then boom, they

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Speaker 1: announce what it's going to be. And it's a Yoshi

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Speaker 1: bobblehead presented by the Super Mario Galaxy movie, which would

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Speaker 1: be released the following day. And it's a crossover with

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Speaker 1: one of the most popular Dodgers, Yoshiobu Yamamoto, except it's Yoshi,

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Speaker 1: the character from the Super Mario Brothers World wearing a

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Speaker 1: number eighteen Yamamoto jersey. So you've got the Dodgers, You've

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Speaker 1: got Nintendo. It's a big movie there's the scarcity element,

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Speaker 1: and then they started promoting it with little videos and stuff.

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Speaker 1: And then on top of all of that, it happened

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Speaker 1: to coincide with sho hey Otani's first regular season start

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Speaker 1: on the mound for the twenty twenty sixth season, and

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Speaker 1: show Hey pitching is one of the biggest stories of

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Speaker 1: this season because this is the first season we're going

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Speaker 1: to have him at full health as a pitcher. He's

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Speaker 1: been rehabbing from a major surgery on his pitching elbow

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Speaker 1: for the past two seasons, but this year he's at

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Speaker 1: full health and he plans to be in the Cy

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Speaker 1: Young conversation, and so everyone's super hyped because the chance

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Speaker 1: to see show Hey strike guys out and hit home

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Speaker 1: runs in the same game is just the definition of

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Speaker 1: the highest possible octane excitement for contemporary baseball. And so

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Speaker 1: this is just officially gotten way out of control in

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Speaker 1: terms of the giveaways. People are always lining up early,

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Speaker 1: and there's lines going all the way through the entire

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Speaker 1: expanse of the park lot, which if you know Dodger

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Speaker 1: Stadium or if you're familiar with Los Angeles' reputation as

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Speaker 1: a driving town, you know that's quite the distance, and

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Speaker 1: five am might be becoming the quote new normal for

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Speaker 1: some of the most coveted giveaways. Not my thing at all,

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Speaker 1: But bring a chair and a thermos of coffee, you

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Speaker 1: filthy animals. Okay, that's enough on that, But apropos that

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Speaker 1: we mention both Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Shohei Otani because they

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Speaker 1: are two of the three players featured in our next

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Speaker 1: and last segment, which is basically shouting out our pitching

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Speaker 1: for how they have carried us in the season thus far.

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Speaker 1: Of all of the reasons the Dodgers are feared this year,

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Speaker 1: our pitching rotation is at the top of the list.

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Speaker 1: It's just Ace after Ace and Stud after Stud. It's

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Speaker 1: an embarrassment of riches. The organization has actually probably gone

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Speaker 1: way overboard in signing way more starting pitchers than are

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Speaker 1: actually needed to fulfill a regular season rotation, and that's

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Speaker 1: strategic because Pictures get injured so often these days, and

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Speaker 1: the Dodgers' playoff berth is all but guaranteed, so you

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Speaker 1: can see how having a few spare guys in the

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Speaker 1: rotation could come in handy throughout the course of a

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Speaker 1: six month season, and certainly into the postseason, where pitching

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Speaker 1: wins ballgames and series. And one of the most exciting

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Speaker 1: things about our rotation is the triumvirate of Japanese excellence

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Speaker 1: with Roki Sasaki, the young phenom, Shohei Otani, the two

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Speaker 1: way god, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who's won three MVPs in

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Speaker 1: the Japan League as a pitcher. And we saw all

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Speaker 1: three of these guys start over the first week in

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Speaker 1: LA and all three are looking mighty fine. Let's break

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Speaker 1: it down, okay Yama, you might remember a little something

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Speaker 1: called the twenty twenty five World Series Most Valuable Player Award. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that was our boy, number eighteen, which, by the way,

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Speaker 1: signifies the ace on a Japanese pitching staff. That's why

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Speaker 1: he's wearing it. He works out with a javelin a

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Speaker 1: habit that MOOKI picked up in spring training, and now

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Speaker 1: all of a sudden, Mookie's hitting again. Kawinkie dink Japan's cano.

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Speaker 1: I just love our short, stocky king eligible bachelor. By

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Speaker 1: the way, and with that three hundred and twenty five

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Speaker 1: million dollar bag, that's the most lucrative contract ever awarded

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Speaker 1: a starting pitcher in Major League baseball history, which Yamamoto

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Speaker 1: got before he threw even a single pitch in the

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Speaker 1: major leagues. I'll be looking forward to seeing who Yoshi

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Speaker 1: decides to date during his time in LA. Quite the catch,

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Speaker 1: no pun intended, But what I wanted to say is

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Speaker 1: that after that twenty twenty five World Series performance, and

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Speaker 1: indeed throughout the entire postseason last year, where really Yamamoto

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Speaker 1: led a pitching staff that carried the offense on its

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Speaker 1: back to that second consecutive title, that theme has really

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Speaker 1: continued this year, picking up right where he left off.

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Speaker 1: Two starts, twelve innings total, two earned run in each

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Speaker 1: for an even three zero zero er. He got the

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Speaker 1: win in the actual season opener. I was there. He

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Speaker 1: looked sharp, and in his second outing he took a

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Speaker 1: tough luck loss even though he only allowed two runs.

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Speaker 1: The offense just didn't show up, which has kind of

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Speaker 1: been a theme for Yama Moto throughout his career and

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Speaker 1: certainly this season so far. Perhaps one of the reasons

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Speaker 1: why last year Yama was overlooked for the Cy Young Award.

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Speaker 1: He doesn't really get the attention nationally that he might

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Speaker 1: were he in a smaller market. Perhaps there's just so

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Speaker 1: many stars on the Dodgers that Yama doesn't get as

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Speaker 1: much screen time. And then there's also the language barrier,

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Speaker 1: though he charmingly does his best to speak English when

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Speaker 1: he can. But you know, Paul Skeen's won the cy

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Speaker 1: Young and obviously gets a lot of media attention because

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Speaker 1: his girlfriend has millions of followers on social media. But

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Speaker 1: Skeens is more of a big fish in a small pond,

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Speaker 1: and by the way, is off to a horrible start

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Speaker 1: in Pittsburgh, while our boy Yama or Yoshi, they're used

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Speaker 1: interchangeane in Dodgerland. I would say is a cy Young

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Speaker 1: Award favorite for the twenty twenty six season, but honestly,

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Speaker 1: we're not chasing awards here. One last observation on Yoshi.

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Speaker 1: With a contract like that and the talent that he has,

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Speaker 1: Yamamoto could have just set the controls to cruise. Instead,

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Speaker 1: he's shown us already in his short time he's a

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Speaker 1: hard worker, and so we say to Yamamoto san Otsukara,

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Speaker 1: some of this, thank you very much, and please keep

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Speaker 1: up the good work. As for show Hey his twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty six season debut against the Cleveland Guardians on March thirty,

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Speaker 1: first was insanely off the charts. In typical show Hey fashion,

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Speaker 1: he went six scoreless innings and allowed just one hit,

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Speaker 1: striking out six on eighty seven pitches and earning the

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Speaker 1: win that day. As we said, this is going to

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Speaker 1: be his first full season at full health as a

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Speaker 1: pitcher and as a hitter in Dodger Blue, and with

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Speaker 1: those six scoreless innings, Shohy has now not allowed a

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Speaker 1: run in the last twenty two plus regular season innings

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Speaker 1: dating back to last fall. He didn't really get much

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Speaker 1: work in as a pitcher this spring, and he already

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Speaker 1: looks like he's at peak form, so that doesn't really

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Speaker 1: make sense. But with show Hey, nothing does. He said

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Speaker 1: that he wants to vie for a cy Young this year,

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Speaker 1: and while I like Yoshi for this, there's nothing wrong

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Speaker 1: with a little healthy competition between teammates. Love you, Show Hey.

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Speaker 1: Rounding out our triumvirate of Japanese starters, rookie Sasaki twenty

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Speaker 1: four years old, all gas. He throws triple digits, but

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Speaker 1: so young and relatively unformed. You see the emotion in

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Speaker 1: the We've seen him cry in the dugout, and I

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Speaker 1: feel for him. It seems to be a psychological thing

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Speaker 1: as much as anything else. I'll remind you that Roki

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Speaker 1: lost his father and his grandparents in the tsunami in

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Speaker 1: Japan in twenty twelve. Kid's been through a lot, so

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Speaker 1: you know he's tough. And in his debut he went

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Speaker 1: four innings and allowed one run, struck out four. And

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Speaker 1: this is really really good to see because his spring

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Speaker 1: training was disastrous by any standard. I'm actually surprised that

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Speaker 1: he showed up in the starting rotation this early because

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Speaker 1: his ra in spring was over fifteen. So one ernie

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Speaker 1: in four innings from Kaibutsu, the monster of the Reyewa era,

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Speaker 1: we will take it. What I'm hoping is, in addition

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Speaker 1: to Shoheiya Nyama, who we will be speaking about on

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Speaker 1: this show indubitably throughout the year, we'll also be hearing

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Speaker 1: a lot about Rokie, stay strong, Rokie son Kaibutsu. That's

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Speaker 1: it for this edition of Dodger Blue Dream. Thanks so

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Speaker 1: much for listening. Dodger Blue Dream is written and produced

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Speaker 1: by me Richard Parks. My co host is chef Wesley Abula.

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Speaker 1: Original music in this episode by William Ryan Fritch, Jonathan Snipes,

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Speaker 1: and by me. Special thanks to Caitlin esh and Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: Parks Kibbi. My computer died this week and I had

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Speaker 1: to problem solve, so please forgive any laps in quality

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Speaker 1: of any kind. Please rate and review the show if

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Speaker 1: you can. Dodger Blue Dream is produced in partnership with

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Speaker 1: Iheart's Michael Tura podcast Network. For more podcasts from iHeart,

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Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get

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Speaker 1: wherever you get your favorite shows