In which James and Seth FINALLY have a disagreement…

Welcome everyone to WFHRs PlayMegas for this April 15th, 2024.

You have your host James J. I am joined by our best pitch hitter we have in our bullpen.

And our bullpen, I'm gonna make you sense.

Well this, you're mixing your new things there, man.

That didn't make any sense.

In the dugout we've got, we're calling up Seth Habhagger.

Seth, good to have you with us.

Oh, it's always fun.

I got too fancy with it.

You did.

You're trying too much.

I tried too hard.

We want to say a big shout out to our friends over quality plus printing always trying hard for you.

Yeah.

Always working their tails off for you.

Big shout out to quality plus printing, getting your words out here in Wisconsin Rapids.

Go there for all your printing needs and be sure to join us on Wednesdays in the eight, about 845-ish on our morning show.

We have our wicked awesome word of Wednesday with our friends over there.

Mm-hmm.

And speaking of friends, Seth, we have got a lot of friends joining us today.

Tyler Miller, general manager, assistant general manager.

I almost promoted him.

Assistant general manager of your Wisconsin Rapids Raptors is going to be joining us in a little bit.

And then about 330, we're going to the fourth period for you.

Head coach GM of your Wisconsin Rapids River Kings coach Paul Peck, we're going to join us.

Nice.

A lot to get to.

Wrap up the season there.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm looking forward to talking about that.

Looking forward to talking with you about our schedule here coming up on WIRI and WFHR.

The sports we're going to be covering.

We've got coyotes in Utah.

We use.

I want to talk about that.

That's just insane to me.

And there's a bunch of stuff.

We're going to talk brewers.

I want to talk baseball with everybody.

Anybody wants to talk about the NFL draft.

Please.

Please bring it up.

I made myself.

I promised myself.

I wouldn't do it.

It's got to be you guys.

Otherwise, we're probably not going to talk about it until like.

The torture happened right now.

It's happening.

It's happening.

I had places I wanted to start.

But like what often happens in life and in sports, you have to audible.

You do.

Seth brought something up in our pregame that is boggling my mind.

It is wrinkled my brain.

First off, everyone more importantly.

715-424-2600.

Call up and join the conversation, everybody.

424-2600.

This is a call and show.

We'd love to hear from you.

Absolutely.

Seth and I were talking about our conversation last week about the rash of injuries

for baseball players, particularly pitchers.

And you were mentioning something that I thought was really interesting,

especially the tail end part.

Right.

Well, I was listening to a podcast about one of the guys was like, you know,

he was curious about other sports.

You know, where's the, where are the injuries happening?

Where's the concern about these sorts of things?

So he listed a couple of other sports.

You know, that say, oh, there was a rash of injuries.

I mean, we can go back first to the percussion thing with football,

which some are still dealing with too.

But the one that blew his mind and just totally.

So there's been a rash and women's soccer of ACL tears.

I mean, at least there's been a couple of women, you know, really well known

that have like three ACL surgeries.

I mean, this crazy stuff, okay?

And one of the, so they've been, you know, working on this to try and say,

hey, how can we help, you know, how can we make this better?

Well, one of the things that the ladies listed was, maybe it's because there's no soccer shoes,

specifically for soccer for women.

What the, oh, man, I almost, oh, I almost messed up right there.

But I think I had a rut.

There are no, there are shoes designed for women's soccer.

Sockers, specifically, they're like, they have, they have shoes,

but they're basically like men's shoes smaller.

They're not specifically made for women's feet, which blows my mind.

I cannot rat my brain around that.

I'll give you not to that.

I mean, for what, let's just look at this on a business level, okay?

Like, there's a literally half of the population you could be selling shoes to.

That's how much money?

Yeah.

How much money you're just leaving out there, but just the principle of it alone,

and the idea of it, the creativity is not there.

How ridiculous that is.

That's insane to me.

It's the most, worldwide, the most popular sport.

Worldwide.

Yeah, yeah.

By far and away.

And which is just as many women play and love it as men.

Yes.

And what?

What?

What?

I don't get, you know, it may have nothing to do with the ACL thing,

but still, I mean, why don't...

I saw, I make the round sometimes looking for sounds for our show

and different topics.

And it actually got one for you a little bit later

that is one of the best calls I've heard in a long time.

All right.

But I hear people losing their minds over like one soda,

not taking a walk, even though he's got some of the best discipline

in baseball history.

But, you know, people losing their minds over stupid things,

just silly things.

Yeah.

Nobody.

I've never heard one talking head from the mouse network

to any other talk about this.

Seth is the first...

I mean, I know.

I can tell you how much of my bandwidth is taken up by sports.

You'd be, you'd be, you really, you'd really like James,

you need some help.

Yeah.

I've never heard that before.

That's insane to me.

No.

I heard it on a baseball podcast of all things.

It's, yeah, it's, I just buttoned.

I'm genuinely furious right now.

And it has no, and I have no place in this.

I'm not a soccer player.

I'm not a woman.

Yeah.

I don't sell shoes.

I don't have any.

But it drives me insane.

That's nuts to me.

I don't know.

Got to tell you, man.

Wow.

I, it's, it's just as crazy to me these under reported stories

and sports because they love to focus so much on other things.

Whereas they, you know, I was joking with Seth about this.

The 24-hour news cycle, when it popped in, when it first started,

they got the blueprint from sports.

Sports was the only thing doing anything like that.

Right.

The blueprint from sports.

And I think that that is a big part of the reason why you, you see so much of even,

even your, your respectable news shows and everything.

Debate television.

Yeah.

Like that's all you get nowadays is debate.

Yeah, right.

You take this side.

I take this side.

Everything's turned into that.

And now sports has been influenced by news because all they do is sad stories and bad stories.

And they don't lead with good stories anymore and everything.

Human interest stories.

Yeah.

Like turn out to be like really sad.

Yeah.

And while doing that, they also seem to have things missed the mark and not covered.

Did anybody happen to catch that the Arizona coyotes are moving to Utah?

Did anybody see that?

No.

Yeah.

I heard nothing.

Nothing.

First off, we should remind everybody there is a tee hockey professional hockey team in Arizona.

Yeah, Arizona.

Arizona coyotes.

Which just on its face is weird.

Yeah.

Utah is just as bad.

I mean seriously.

I didn't know you could get a more stranger team to have a professional hockey team than Arizona.

I'm kidding.

Not Florida, not any other team surprised me more than that.

But Utah?

Utah.

Utah.

Now that doesn't, that isn't a shot at Utah.

No.

And no more power to them.

I think it's cool when small market cities get a team.

But I mean like, you know, is there that much demand in Salt Lake for hockey?

Yeah.

Well, and maybe there is.

I don't know.

But it's not pruh.

Yeah.

Okay.

Arizona coyotes are on the verge of relocating the Saint Lake Salt Lake City.

The NHL Board of Governors has approved the transaction.

But all signs pointed to Utah, jazz owner Ryan Smith acquiring the Bellagruzi franchise,

which began its running in 1996.

Wow.

So the year I graduated high school, they got a team from Winnipeg.

And now they're going to put them in Salt Lake City.

Why did they ever move them?

Why?

I know why they did.

I'm an adult.

I understand this and all that.

But why?

Winnipeg.

Oh, there's a team in Winnipeg again.

Yeah.

And none in Hartford, by the way, which deserves.

Hartford Whalers should come back.

If for any other reason, then let logo.

I mean, any other reason.

I mean, plenty of other reasons.

The Nordics.

Yeah.

And the Whalers.

No, the Nordics.

Those are both of those.

Perfect city needs a team.

But I'm sorry, by the way.

You know what?

I'm going to make a bowl.

Let me make a bowl prediction right now.

Okay.

With all this.

So the Oakland athletics going to Sacramento for four years, going to Salt Lake City.

They're going to end up back in Oakland.

Yeah.

Yeah, probably.

They're going to end up back in Oakland.

Because it's not.

It's going to fail in Vegas.

It is going to fail.

Bad.

And they're just going to end up moving back to Oakland.

In true sports radio talk, doing takes and everything.

I see your take.

And I'll do you one better that the Raiders are going to move from Vegas back to Oakland.

Awesome.

You heard it here first, everybody.

Here first.

You're going to hear Tyler Middler, assistant general manager of your Wisconsin Rapids rafters.

When we come back on playmakers here at WFHR.

Welcome back, everyone to WFHR's playmakers here at AM 1320, 975 FM.

We are WFHR locally grown radio.

I wanted to let Tyler.

I was trying to build bird some time to let Tyler put the headphones on.

And it just sounded all mumbled and joked up.

But I was just reading my telepropter.

Yeah.

I was saying to be fair.

I was just reading the telepropter.

It doesn't work that well, man.

No, it doesn't.

We have with us not only Seth Habagger, but assistant general manager of your Wisconsin Rapids rafters.

Tyler Miller with us right now.

Tyler, how are you doing?

Doing well.

I heard I was the general manager on the way in.

Yeah.

Got a little scared.

Got a little scared.

Well, we were expected that press release.

I really appreciate you joining us, man, especially considering how much we have to talk

about other rafters have been, especially if you're under newsletter.

You've been getting a lot of releases lately.

I want to kind of rewind back a little bit and touch on the rafters and the food and

farm exploration center announcement.

That's really special.

I think it's a great place to start.

Oh, my gosh.

That place is amazing.

If you guys haven't been up there yet.

I'm going to get up there.

It is so cool to see what they're doing there again as somebody who's from Indiana and

agriculture is big there, but it's a lot of corn and that's fun.

So it's like you can see the cornfields and that's it, but you go up to that food and farm

center and they really focus on everything from farm to table.

I mean, it's they start at the soil.

They start to teach you again.

It's soil not dirt and just the different types of different stuff and how things grow

in different environments.

So yeah, we brought Rosco up there for a little photo shoot and announced the partnership.

It's going to be a really fun one.

We're hoping to expand it years to come.

It's a brand new center up there just a couple years old.

So again, great, great people up there.

We're excited about this partnership.

I'm really excited about the ag day we're doing.

That was something they were they were really passionate about.

And then I kind of helped design the farmer jerseys, which I thought turned out really

cool.

And so yeah, no, super excited to kind of showcase agriculture, which again, I've been

here for two years and I can tell that that's that's what this this area is and Wisconsin

as a whole.

So many of our ball players are midwesterners or come from agricultural states, not even

just in the Midwest, but I know a lot of Californians to consider, you know, them in ag states

and everything.

So that is certainly nice to see.

Those connections are great to see.

And you know, as something that I we I had met Lippard our ag age and I last week talking

about the center and anytime we can create like not only empathy with us and our farmers

and create more of those connections, but an idea of like sparking something in a young

mind.

You know, it's not surprising to hear a kid love and baseball, but we need more kids that

want to be farmers.

We need more kids that want to put their hands on the dirt.

And then this, you know, these kind of things can only help with that.

No, I fully agree.

I think that's why I think partly why the center's there.

It's it is.

It's to start that young.

It's they've got a grocery store that they start out with and it's just a bunch of food

there and teaching about where it comes from and all that.

So no, I fully agree.

I think when you build it, you know, again, the field of dreams, when you build it, they

will come.

I'm going to say anything fails.

They can just build, you know, advice and ghosts.

Correct.

Correct.

As part of the partnership, our rafters will host Ag Day at Winter Field on June 16.

During that special event, rafters are going to done farmer theme jerseys.

You were just touching on Tyler, looking forward to that.

I love these special jerseys.

We've got a sucker for that stuff.

I think a lot of us 90 kids are like, you know, we we we when you couldn't just get a

jersey anywhere.

We had to really fight for them but everything like just really, there's something about

them.

That part that part is cool that you mentioned something though during that that I really

want to take some time on some time.

And that is not only the what you do, I think a lot of us would assume with your rule,

your job and the tasks that you have.

But one of the things that a lot of us would imagine is an assistant general manager working

on a jersey or those kind of things.

We got to get into that sometime.

Well, I could sit here all day and talk about the bubbleheads and jerseys and giveaways.

So again, I truly is that's one of my favorite parts of the job is is again, working with

the sponsors, figuring out what they want and how we can execute it and doing that very

cool.

Single game tickets are on sale.

Let's hit on let's make sure that we remind everybody about that.

Yeah, just this morning.

It's been a busy day over there.

I was a assumption, assumption has their first home game today over at Winterfield.

So a shout out to the to the royals.

We host them at Winterfield every year and so I was out there painting the lines and getting

stuff ready before I came over here.

And this morning I sent out the press release at 9 a.m. that single game tickets went on

sales.

So you can now purchase tickets for all 36 of our home games online in person over the

phone, whatever's convenient for you.

Keep in mind, of course, every home game, every pitch, every win of Raptor baseball right

here at WFHR, where it belongs.

We have been the home of the Raptors since they came to this town and we always will be

as far as I'm concerned.

One of the things that I say that with pride of is that the Raptors take so much pride

in what they do in our community and everything.

One of the ways that we are able to show our respect and how much we appreciate these

teams is these tickets.

You know, I know a lot of people have seasoned tickets and that's fantastic.

But purchasing these daily tickets as I look at them, so just an old reference.

But I think it's one of those things that we get to show that on a daily basis almost

with amount of games we have.

Hey, we're here.

We love you guys.

It doesn't matter if you're old and 20.

We're shown up at the ballpark, which we have done before.

We have shown that this town has shown how much they appreciate that.

What are some other things that you're excited about as we're finally starting to get

some announcements out?

I know about it.

It was like two months ago you joined us and yeah, I have to tell the audience, Tyler,

we had to put them away.

We had to put them in another room because all we wanted to do was tell you guys all this

stuff.

It was.

It was so hard to keep it.

Yeah, it's so hard to keep it in your tent.

There's some secrets where I do a lot out and I'm like, hey, you've got to promise

if it comes out, I know who to come back to.

Yeah.

Because I've only told two people.

But no, I think again, something cool that's just happening is some of these nights

coming together and really trying to own.

We just announced all of the jerseys now so they're all out there and again, the Farmer

one is really cool because it plays a part into that partnership and again, one that's

super popular this year's or that was super popular in the past as a Mossy Oak kind

of camo theme for hunters.

So again, it's something where my job is to sit here and find what our fans would like.

And again, as somebody who now has been here for three years now and I do, I feel like

I have a good grasp on our fans.

I have a grasp on what they want, what they're looking for.

So again, I'm all about trying to cater to our fans and do what they want.

And again, I'm not going to share one thing.

I'll get in trouble.

But there is something that we have cooked up here for here for July.

So be on the lookout where we're going to announce something here soon once I can finalize

some of the details on there.

But besides, besides the night, it's the guys.

And I'm sure you want to dive into the two players that we've had debut in the MLB.

And I think that's where when we saw the first guy debut just a couple of weeks ago, it

was like, okay, this is it.

This is the season we're kicking off.

MLB players are getting called up.

Our guys are moving through single AA and now our team following our team in college.

So now it's I'm all about kind of the player hype and following around the players that

we have come and come in the summer.

I picked up Eric Getty just to add my fantasy team just because he was a former

after man that I was I was trying to decide between two guys.

I'm like, well, he was a rafter.

Boom.

I'm such a hoover.

I'm so bad.

I had it.

But it's it's one of the things we take that we're home we're all homeers really when

it comes down to it.

We all root for these guys and these teams.

And it's not surprising considering how close we get to the and how much, you know, we

have a number of callers to call our regular basis that still speak to oh, I had a

rafter player, you know, three, four, ten years ago or something like that.

And then getting a chance to follow these players often, you know, we've we've heard

plenty of stories, not just here with the rafters, but other minor league teams and everything

of, hey, I'm making it to the majors.

You want to go to a game, you know, the host family being invited to that premier game

or something like that.

That's the build the relationships you build here.

And I say that to remind everybody we're always looking for host families that really could

go a long way with helping not only our players, but give it get you as a fan enjoying

it and getting an insight that you might not know I normally get and I always have to

plug the intern host families as well as a former intern who again, I truly, I think I've

said this before, but the only reason I'm here is because a host family took me in coming

from Indiana.

I mean, I wasn't going to find a place to live unless I was going to live in the studio,

you know, doing that would have.

But again, I wouldn't have came up here if it wasn't for the host families as an intern.

And so I always I love the player host families.

I love that.

And that's again, how this how this team is here.

And truly it is the foundation of the internship it is built upon host families.

And again, we're all chasing the dreams of again, making it to the major leagues one

day as well.

If you are interested in being a host family, encourage it to reach out to the rafters

northwoods league.com is one of those ways to do that.

We'll give you more as before Tyler wraps up going back to the players, the debut of

them.

We'll be player that played for us to play that would or feel these things.

Certainly, you know, first and foremost, a city and it's in the way that city is, the

people all that is the number one selling point I would imagine.

Is there a better selling point for a team than hey, look who just made it to the MLB all

the time.

I mean, I'm telling you, I Bryson starts my starting second basement on my diamond dynasty

family.

Everybody's my MLB, the show diamond dynasty team on video games and my goal is to have

a whole whole starting lineup where we can get the bullpen and have everybody.

It's just I'm actually the rafters.

But no, it is.

It's it is.

It's a selling point.

Bryson's not right now again, it's it's he is he's he's doing really well for himself

in the at the Phillies and has made a name for himself and so it's like that, that's what

we can provide it really is that I love that that we can provide that for these for these

players.

And again, who knows?

Like Spencer Ergeti, I mean, everybody was like, Oh, yeah, he could do it.

He could do it.

And then but the one that did the Nick Avala before they were like, like looking at it,

you didn't know he was going to make it one day.

So you just never know where these guys where they get placed, how they're how they're

hitting coaches and single A double A, how they're pitching coaches.

So again, I give all the credit to our pitching staff, John Halama when he was here, I mean,

if you look at these guys that have debuted in the MLB, they were under John when he was

here.

So I think it's a huge testament to his coaching style and again, a former Major Lager

that we were able to have on staff, which helps Tyler, before we let you go, was there

anything we wanted to cover?

We didn't get a chance to.

No, I don't think so.

Again, I think we're really getting getting ramped up here.

Again, I think we're I know we're under 50 days to opening day, but single game tickets,

again, that's next week will be kind of rolling out some of the promotions, a little

deeper dive, all the giveaway items are already announced.

So if you're interested in a certain giveaway, we definitely have those.

But again, just really ramping up for the season and getting excited for some rafters

baseball guys.

Can not wait for me.

Cannot wait.

Yeah.

May is right around the corner.

It can't get here soon enough.

We're looking for rap, we're looking forward to rafter baseball already.

If you want to check out that schedule, get single game tickets, maybe be a host family,

find out more northwoodsleague.com, northwoodsleague.com.

Be sure to follow your rafters and social media.

It's a great way to keep up to date.

Everything going on with your Wisconsin Rapids rafters.

And I should note, Tyler has been nice enough.

He's going to join us every couple of weeks, give us some updates on the rafters and keep

in, especially during the regular season.

We'll try to have some players on, meet your rafters, all of that fun stuff, looking forward

to it.

Yep.

I promise.

I'm coming on air right now that this year, we'll get everybody in, we're going to

get players, coaches.

I would like for you guys to talk to our kid and coach, pitch and coach, kind of pick

their brands a little bit.

And our radio broadcaster is super excited.

I actually was just emailing with him last week and he's really excited.

So again, we're getting so close, it's getting excited and things are starting to fall in

place over there.

Looking forward to him.

Thanks so much for the time, Tyler.

Thanks, guys.

We'll take a quick time out.

We'll come back with our fourth period, head coach and GM of your Wisconsin Rapids River

Kings coach Paul Peckman.

I'm going to join us coming up on Playmakers here at WFHR.

Welcome back everyone to Playmakers here at WFHR.

It's time for the fourth period.

Joining us on the WFHR phone lines right now is head coach and GM of your Wisconsin

Rapids River Kings coach Paul Peckman coach.

It's good to talk to you.

Jim here, how you doing buddy?

Doing good.

It's great to hear from you.

It's been a little while.

We want to catch up with you a little bit and give it to a wrapping up of the season and

hearing about what you're up to right now.

Well, right now, back to the grind and starting to build another team and still getting some

of our age outs committed into college.

So talking a lot of college coaches these days and potential new players for this coming

season.

So it's a lot of the same, you know, recruiting never ends and so we're going after it.

I will be heading down to Jacksonville for this weekend.

My oldest son is getting married.

So maybe I'll catch a little time on a beach from Donna.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, can, uh, Mausletoff.

Congratulations to him.

That's, that's awesome.

I'm a foolish romantic coach.

So I love hearing that stuff.

That's awesome.

Um, when it comes to, when it comes to the scouting and the recruiting, now it days with

all the tech with all the ability to be able to, you know, a kid is playing over in Iceland

and they can send you video of it and those things.

It seems like it's a lot better.

But one thing that I, I was curious about and I've heard some coaches in baseball talk

about and, and I can only imagine it's even bigger for hockey is it's almost, there's

almost too many players like it's a good problem to have, but there's so much more data

nowadays.

There's so many players.

Did you find it difficult to kind of filter through all that or you're like, hey, it's

a good problem to have.

It is a good problem to have, you know, when you're recruiting, I mean, our league is,

is gotten so big that, uh, you know, you have to, you got to look as many plays as you

can, right?

Because it's not, it's not like you're drafting somebody and it's, you know, hey, come play

here, but, you know, they have to, it's a pay to play league, right?

So these guys are paying to come here to develop, to learn and hopefully get some college

exposure.

There's a lot of different moving parts and dynamics that come into recruiting.

Uh, you know, I mean, I was on a, uh, on a video call this morning at 7 a.m. Eastern

time with a kid in Sweden, right?

So there's, there's a lot of that and, and there's a lot of game film watching, uh, you

know, I do that a lot, all day, all night and, um, so it, it gives you different avenues

on how to see and then you're looking at, uh, talking to coaches about kids and most

of the cars, like, and there's a lot of different things that go into it.

So you got to go through, you know, a lot to get the guys that you want and hopefully

put together a team that can help us make a run and reload and go back to the nationals.

Yeah.

And that's, uh, that's where I want to go, coach, uh, if fantastic season, I want to

congratulate you and everybody that has a fingerprint on that organization.

Everybody deserves to take credit on one of the most successful seasons we have ever

had as River King's fans.

This city has just still talking about it.

We've still enjoyed, uh, referencing, I just was talking to somebody yesterday or a Saturday

about the River Kings.

They brought it up and everything and how exciting the season was, went to a bunch of home games,

him and his son enjoyed so much of it.

He wants to bring his daughter next year.

That was the only thing you did.

He didn't get a chance to bring his daughter, uh, what's bring her next year.

So we, we really had a great time this year.

We enjoyed it.

Want to thank you for that.

But what for you is the biggest takeaway from this season or what are some of the biggest

takeaways from this past season?

That's a tough one.

I ask you the tough questions.

The biggest takeaway is that we, we got the, um, we put together a team that was not

high powered as, as our previous season, right?

We didn't have a Tobias Falcad.

We didn't have a wheelchair caracol or a car or a couple of, uh, we had more depth and

the biggest takeaway, I think for me is that, uh, we had a lot of guys that just bought

in, um, and we, and we watched the same line and it was, it was incredible to go to the

nationals.

I mean, if you really think about it, James, that we, we had to win the last eight games

in a row to win a division by one point.

Yeah.

It's incredible.

Yeah.

I, I, I, I don't, I always, uh, try to be careful of, uh, being revisionist history

in those things, but I've never seen a season like this.

Uh, I, I, I don't want nothing against any of the former season or players or coaches

or anything like that.

But I've never seen a hockey season like this and I've been watching hockey literally

my whole life.

And I've never seen that before in a, in a division, uh, like ours and those things.

It's never, I've never seen anything like it.

It was amazing.

It, it, it, it was, it's incredible and then we sweep two rounds, right?

So now we're up to 12 wins and then we go win the first game in nationals.

We win 13 in a row, right?

And, and the thing is, is that every game was close, so the guys sticking to the structure

and the game plan that we went through all season long, um, it is exactly the way that

we needed to play when it came time to, to really challenge to go to nationals.

Uh, and what I take away from this is that I am so proud of these guys and the effort

and the commitment that they made on a daily basis to pull that off.

It's, it's incredible.

I mean, it, it really is.

And to me, I just get chills thinking about it because that's what makes me proud.

And, and when guys commit to college and coaches, I just have a coach email me two

minutes ago and just said, I'm certainly impressed with how hard you guys play.

And to me, I mean, that's what I want our program, uh, to be known for, you know, blue,

you know, hard, you know, hard hat blue collar workers, we're going to work and we're

going to, we're going to make this community proud.

I, I, I, I, I'm going to give coach a lot of credit here because the, the, I, it was

a great season and everything, but I'm still a little bit bitter about the way the final

game ended because of the, the, the, the, the disparity of the shot song, I couldn't

believe it.

Yeah.

The way that it ended.

There was some bad luck involved in that too, but, but I, I mean, the season was fabulous.

I'm with you guys totally, but just a little thing at the end still kind of bugs me a little

bit.

Yeah.

You're not the only one.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's, it's, it's such an interesting thing with sports when it comes to that of how

you walk a line of, you know, feeling that, but also, well, tomorrow, we got, we got

a, this is a 24, uh, seven, three hundred, six to five day again, you know, sport, all

sports are nowadays.

Yeah.

So you have to focus on tomorrow.

Yeah.

How you walk that line seems so difficult to me as a sports fan or as a sport as an athlete

as a coach, any of those things, as a fan, I, I, I, I, I find it very, um, almost, almost

like a gift.

Yeah.

Like the games just keep coming.

Yeah.

I mean, you got to wait a season, but you're still at least into the season.

It's going to happen again.

Yeah.

It's, it's easy, I think, almost as a fan as a player, as a person that is their, their

literal job, that's got to be a lot more difficult.

And I, I admire that so much about athletes, just in general, uh, when it comes to that

coach, as I'm mentioning, it is your 24, seven job and, and so much going on, you mentioned

the recruiting.

What other things are, are you doing right now to prepare for the next season?

Well, we will be heading to Montreal in two weeks, um, May 3rd for a long weekend up

there.

We've actually the river kings put together a prospect team that will happen in the

Quebec junior hockey showcase.

So we'll be up there.

Uh, we got a bunch of guys that we're looking at and obviously everybody else in the showcase.

We're going to be recruiting heavily up up there and then, uh, May 12th will be in Chicago

and actually, I'm, I'm coming right up on a 13th and we're closing on our house, is

I bought a house and ramparts, um, so we, uh, we're going to be closing on that.

So I'll be up there for a couple of days, uh, we, and then, uh, okay, no, I didn't mean

to cut you off.

Sorry, coach.

I got excited.

Uh, when you're in town, you'll have to stop by.

We'll have to have you in studio.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

Looking forward to it.

You know, we have a couple, a couple of other, uh, you know, main camps and now you,

you know, you're going into the tier two levels and all the main camps and we got some guys

that I've set up with main camps with and, uh, we'll see how they do and if not, they're

going to come back and, you know, we're going to reload and, uh, go after this again.

Looking real forward to that coach, uh, and, and talking again too, because, uh, coaches,

uh, and I, we've talked about this and he's going to join us throughout the off season

here.

Keep that energy for our River Kings going, uh, and appreciate that.

Appreciate you being able to take the time out of your rigs, incredibly busy day.

Um, have fun in Florida, safe travels out there, uh, mauslet off to you and the family.

And thanks again for joining us coach.

Thank you.

Thanks guys.

Appreciate it.

Take care.

Uh, GM and head coach of your Wisconsin Rapids River Kings coach Paul Peckman joining

us in part of the fourth period here.

Uh, find out more River Kings hockey dot com River Kings hockey dot com, help your

Kings build hockey up and down the river, uh, follow them on social media, promote the

team, uh, off season or not, I don't care if it's 100 degrees outside.

Let's talk hockey.

You know, you can feel cool like it's in the middle of the winter, right?

It's really done.

You should work.

You should work at marketing.

Uh, we are going to take a, uh, a quick time out, uh, and come back and we'll open up

the phone lines 424, 2600, call up and join the conversation.

Seth and I just waiting to talk with you right here on playmakers brought you by

quality plus printing at W F H R.

Welcome back to W F H R's playmakers here at, uh, it's 340 on the clock for, uh, on

this 15th of April.

Hope you guys are having a good one out there.

The phone just popped up as soon as I hit the mic.

Yeah, wow.

They're ready.

That's great.

That was awesome.

Seth and James here to take your calls.

Let's do so.

Good afternoon.

You're on the air.

Uh, good afternoon, guys.

Hey, I promised you James that next two weeks, I will talk to you about NFL

draft.

I promise.

Best listeners, best listeners, maybe best listener, maybe he could be, he could be,

we give awards.

Yeah.

Appreciate that part of that, is that part of that, that, that, that W, what is the WBA?

No.

Yeah.

Best listener.

Oh, that would be sure.

They should have a category for that.

Yeah, they definitely should.

Uh, what's on your mind today?

Well, you know, I, I don't want to, I don't want to get too far out in front of my

skis right now.

But, you know, the start of the brewer season has been so fun.

Mm-hmm.

So I had to do some digging, and I'm, I'm going to try to impress you guys and go for

maybe a, if most of the city, I did my research a little bit here.

I know that last year's baseball season, the first 15 games, okay?

Mm-hmm.

And the brewers are on track to do what they did last year.

That's what I came up with.

At this point last year, at this point last year, they were at 10 and five.

Exactly the same.

They were 10 and four.

Yeah.

Wow.

But the, but the difference is, the difference is, is that they got shut out three times

last year in the first 15 games.

Ooh.

This year, this year is zero.

Mm-hmm.

Huh.

I like that.

You know, the run differential last year was 27.

This year, it's 31.

And they're like, third or two, second in the whole national, the whole major league baseball

with the run differential.

Mm-hmm.

The biggest, this is where I think where there's going to be a big difference between Pat Murphy

and Craig Council.

Mm-hmm.

Last year at this time, they had scored 76 runs.

They could guess how much they scored so far this year.

Oh, I thought I'd heard this.

Yeah, I don't know.

I'm not sure.

91.

Wow.

Wow.

Craig, who?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, here's something that I picked up on in the spring training with Pat Murphy,

in a huge difference between Craig Council and Pat Murphy.

And keeping in mind these two are friends.

They're still friends.

They're still talking almost every day.

And interested in picking each other's brains and all this.

Council, I like Craig Council.

I know that people are scoff at that nowadays, but nothing has changed for me with him.

I don't care what team he goes to.

I'm a fan of that guy.

I like how he coaches.

I think he's one of the best, if not in the top five coaches in Major League Baseball.

But Pat Murphy, he's a little more tightly wound.

Pat Murphy has been waiting his whole life for this opportunity.

And now that he's got it, instead of kind of like being really tight wound

and oh god, I got to be perfect.

He's playing with House Money, man.

He's loose.

He is loose as it gets.

He is playing with House Money.

He knows it and the players are picking up on this.

It's not, I don't take anything away from Connor Dawson.

They're hitting coach.

I think that goes, that should be, that's a name that should be talked about when we're talking about these guys.

Ricky Weeks is another name that should be mentioned.

Yeah.

But Pat Murphy, man, congrats to him.

And enjoy your ride here.

I don't care if it lasts 20 years.

I hope he coaches this way the whole time.

Because I think that that is a, it's not the integral part.

I'm not saying that this is the reason that they're doing this or whatever.

But that is a big part that it plays, it plays a big part in mentality.

Look at the, the New York Mets last year.

Nobody wanted to play together.

Nobody wanted to be on that team together.

All the talent in the world didn't matter.

You can have talent.

You need that.

That's the only way you get into the majors.

Right.

But man, if you are enjoying, go into the ballpark every day.

That is going to, that's, that's something you can't ask for more.

Right.

I don't disagree with you on that one either.

The one thing that I noticed is that he's a college coach.

Yeah.

They're all young players.

That's true.

That's a good point.

All the young players.

That's a really good point.

The Brewers are, you know, funny.

And he knows how to coach these guys.

I mean, I know how he knows.

I mean, Craig, you know, they break to me, you know, to me,

he used too much of the analytics.

Yeah.

Way too much.

The Brewers are in first and then, and now central,

up over the pirates right now.

And if that wasn't more, that doesn't interest you.

And sound kind of interesting or cool, I think.

You know, seeing the Pirates and Brewers up there and all that.

How about the fact that the Cardinals are 79?

Like, either one of those stories.

A lot of people would be pretty excited about it.

They're still better than my white socks, of course.

But that doesn't, that's a low bar.

That's a low bar.

Yeah.

The cups are playing pretty good too.

So right now, actually, it's probably, boy,

the NL Central is like my favorite division right now.

Easily.

Because they've got all these young teens, all the young players

that Cincinnati, I mean, come on.

I, the Cubs and even the Cubs, but the Cardinals are who cares.

But the rest of them, they're fun to watch.

I was a big, big, big, big, big Griffey fan.

I haven't cared about Cincinnati Reds baseball since Griffith was there.

Yeah.

Well, you know, you know, if you think about it,

because we talk about the run differential,

the central division, that's three of the top five teams in a league.

Yeah.

And, you know, in that category.

You know, and it is going to be awesome to watch this over.

Like some, I know most, one of the more popular things to say about baseball

is it's so long or it's too long.

With, with a season like this, it's not long enough.

Like this is going to be, it should be exciting going forward.

And especially when we're talking about storylines in what to look forward to this year.

The four letter network, all these other ones are going to focus on injuries,

all that.

And we'll talk about those things.

But I want our show to take the positive, to focus on a lot of those exciting things going on

that aren't being covered.

Like every great young player is named Jackson.

And I think that you just get Jackson on the back of your jersey, you'll be fine.

Like it does.

It doesn't matter.

Any team will have a Jackson at some point, right?

Yeah, like that.

I think that while you can't guess who's going to, not only who's going to be starting for your team tomorrow,

but who is, who is going to be good, that's hard to engage.

The offensive side of baseball right now has been so exciting with stealing being back

and a defense at an all time high as far as like cool plays to see.

It's been really exciting.

I'm not just saying that is a big Mookie Betts fan.

Because I've got a stat for everybody.

I got some stats for everybody today.

He's out of his mind right now.

I mean, first off, my first stat of the day, Mookie Betts is 31.

Like, like, just this, this is that.

Just say it's 31.

It played second base in short stuff, but all this doesn't matter.

Put him anywhere.

This from Buster only, Mookie Betts is leading the majors in hits and walks.

Now it's early, early, obviously.

Yes, completely.

Mookie has done that since 1900.

Nobody.

Nobody.

Not even close.

He's also up there in walks.

So he could statistically lead the league in hits and walks.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's nuts.

And I even get into his defense.

That might be record OBP, by the way, on base percentage.

If he were to lead in both, that would be just insane.

Yeah.

Interesting.

You bring that up.

Because another stat here, I think this is from Sarah Lang.

Highest OPS in teams first eight games of the season.

Minimum 25 at Betts.

Barry Barnes was up there in 202.

Adrian Gonzalez in 2015.

Ray Langford in 2001.

That's a nice.

Ray Langford.

Whoa.

Mookie Betts is in the middle of all these packs.

Like all these.

Yeah.

It starts.

It's a really insane start.

Yeah.

Well, you know, I think, you know, to me, I think now, if you think about it,

because, I mean, if you look at the drawers and there was 40 last week,

and I'm all stuck, if you saw it or you saw a game of all this,

the analytics, all this stuff.

Mm hmm.

You know, they're saying that really stand to ring.

You know, they're not even close to where they're, you know,

the analytics should be on their launch angles and all this stuff.

Yeah.

Let me tell you something.

All that stuff is out the door with me.

Yeah.

You're certain to you guys.

I think you're starting to see guys saying, OK, I'm done with these analytics.

I'm going to play my style of baseball.

You know, I wonder.

I wonder.

Go ahead.

Sorry about that.

And that's why I think that.

You're seeing, you know, the runs.

I mean, granted.

There's a lot of, you know, a lot of the big news.

It's not heard or not.

You know, that.

You know, stretched out enough yet and all that.

But.

The runs per game, I think, is up this year.

And major league baseball.

Mm hmm.

And I think it's to the point that everybody's tired of the analytics.

And how, how they have to proceed the game at.

And.

Just let the kids go out there and play.

Yeah.

Go back to fundamental baseball.

You pitch the ball.

You hit the ball.

You run the bases.

You catch the ball.

Just go back to fundamentals.

And you're going to see a much better.

Baseball games.

Then I think you'll, you know, they keep one by me.

Yeah, there's certain things you have my look at for analytics,

especially when it comes to matchups.

But let these kids just go out and play it.

That's what Murphy's doing.

Just go out and play it.

I, I think what we're seeing is a correcting of the market.

Um, the, the love of analytics was a money ball on a lot of that

really propelled that up there in the sport.

And baseball has always been in love with their numbers.

Baseball is all about numbers and stats.

It has been as long as any of us have been alive.