Full Transcript for Mac & Bone Show - Gregg Caserta Interview

00:00:00 Speaker 1: Our friend Greg Caserta now joining us on the line MLB network beginning. He does it all there on the network. Greg, what's up, man, how are you? 00:00:10 Speaker 2: I'm good brother. That is so on me. I accidentally had my phone on do not Disturb, so I was just looking at it for the last five minutes. I'm like, yeah, they should be calling, and then I realized, oh my god, I have two missed calls. I didn't recognize the area code, and here we are. So my apologies for being a little late. 00:00:28 Speaker 1: It happens to me all the time when I do spots in random cities, Like I missed the first part of every interview now because they go to spam a lot now as well, so I can't you have to literally wick out your phone and try to get it right when an answer. So, no, no problem at all. We are just talking about the NL East. And what's more surprising to you right now the fact that the Braves have allowed teams into the race, or the fact that the Marlins are one of those teams that's chasing down the Braves. 00:00:57 Speaker 2: Right now, man, you just beat me to the I was going to say, I know, we talk a lot about the Atlanta Braves. But I was going to just counter and say it's the Miami Marlins. They've been one of my favorite stories and one of my favorite teams to watch because of how they've built their team. It's really been a fun lineup to watch for the sake of our show on Biginning. You look at them, and they are a very deep lineup. They probably need a little more power in there, which is something that they can address at the deadline if they have the need to and if they feel that they can put a package together to go and get a bat. But you look at their rotation with Yuri Perez taking a perfect game into the seventh inning over the weekend, You've got Sandy al Contra with ten wins, looking like the guy that won the Cy Young a few years ago. He's at least back in that discussion as one of the better pitchers in the National League. And a guy that's been even better than him is Max Meyer. So you look at that right there, lineup, three deep starters, and now the one thing they probably do have to address is their bullpen. I think that would probably be the biggest issue for them. I am not concerned about the Braves in any way. I think that the expectation that we had about them coming into the season was with their rotation and how they would fill those holes, and eventually it caught up to them. If you get a few guys back, I think the lineup will ultimately be okay. And as we know, they have the best bullpen in baseball right now from an era perspective. So yeah, it's obviously weird to be talking about the Braves being this close to both the Phillies and Marlins. But I'm also not panicking. 00:02:32 Speaker 1: About Atlanta trade deadline end of the month. What do you think the Braves may look to add there? You've got laid the sunny gray in some reports, But what do you what do you think of position wise, the Braves need the most. 00:02:47 Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's that's really what it is. Bon It's the rotation. Because this lineup is still really, really good. It's as deep as any in the National League. I think that they've done a really good job with their bullpen just because you have Ryce ol Iglesias and Robert Suarez to cover the last two winnings. You've got God and guys like that that have come in and been terrific. So I look at them and say, and what I always say around the deadline is bullpen help is very easy to address. So if you've got to throw an extra arm in there, that's not a problem. But they need starters. The fact that they've got Ronaldo Lopez back in the rotation, which is something that it feels like we do all the time. He's in, he's out. They went back and running Carlos Carrasco again, which is amazing to me that this guy still finds a way to get a job because we know that his best baseball's behind him. So you know, Diddy or Flentis is a guy that has been part of this mix. He's really young. So in the end, they need starting and Sonny Gray would be an ideal guy for them. He's a guy that should be an All Star this year. He's a snub. But also now his outlook has completely flipped because the Red Sox are right back in the equation in the America like wild cards. So that's the thing I think I've said it to you and I've said it to others, is it would have been very easy to pinpoint Sonny Gray two or three weeks ago and say, yeah, that would be a guy that the Braves need. But now, because of one to two good weeks of really good baseball, the Red Sox go from being buyers or from being sellers to potentially being buyers now. And that's the difference with the expanded wildcard. 00:04:24 Speaker 1: We're talking to one of the real up and coming shining stars in Major League Baseball broadcasting, Greg Cacerta with us here on the Mack and Boat Joe MLB, Big Inning MLB Network. Greg, the AL is kind of wild right now because you know the records that are good. Of course, the Rays are doing what they do. The Yankees record is still pretty good in comparison to the other teams, but they have been struggling now like they often do in June and July. When you look at the landscape of the AL second half of the year, outside of Yankees and Rays, we'll talk that on a second. Any other teams you look at and say, hey, their position to have a big second half? Is it Boston a team in the West. Who else can be good in the AL? 00:05:11 Speaker 2: Right now? The first one that comes to mind is Seattle. I still am not going to completely write them off. I know that it's been a disappointing year compared to the expectations that were put in place. But if you look at their rotation, they have five guys, six guys that they can throw at you at any given night. And I know that Brian wu has not had a great year. There were people that felt he might actually be a cy young candidate this year. So the fact that they have that starting pitching depth and all of those