CLEVELAND, Ohio — Welcome to this week’s edition of the Terry’s Talkin’ podcast, with cleveland.com columnist Terry Pluto and host David Campbell. It’s the 200th episode, and this week, they talk about Shedeur Sanders, his Browns future, and what the team’s 3-9 mark means for 2026.
Also, they share their thoughts on the Cavs and what they should do with Donovan Mitchell’s minutes going forward.
They also weigh the debate presented by cleveland.com Guardians reporters Paul Hoynes and Joe Noga about whether the team is doing enough to reach its stated goal of winning a World Series. You can read what Hoynsie had to say here, and what Noga had to say here.
Highlights:
The Browns’ 3-9 record mirrors last season’s, showing a lack of progress and ranking them among the worst teams since the 2024 season opener.The Browns’ special teams unit was labeled a “total embarrassment,” having surrendered five punt or kickoff return touchdowns in the last two seasons, the most in the NFL.Terry Pluto blames the coaching staff for the special teams’ consistent failures in coverage schemes and player development.A major issue with the special teams is the absence of a player who “captains” the units, as performance hasn’t improved even with safety Grant Delpit volunteering.Despite being hired to elevate the special teams, coach Bubba Ventrone’s unit has regressed to being “awful,” failing to replicate the top-10 success he had in Indianapolis.Following a listener’s email, the hosts agreed that with the season lost, the Browns should continue playing rookie QB Shedeur Sanders to fully evaluate his potential.While Sanders has shown progress operating from under center, a major concern is his tendency to hold onto the ball and take sacks, a habit that often carries over from college to the NFL.Terry expresses declining confidence in head coach Kevin Stefanski, whose job security is in question due to the team’s stagnant 3-9 record and low-ranked offense.Defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz: Head coaching candidate?.The two possible futures for the Browns: a leadership change due to a lack of progress, or ownership giving the current regime a two-year window to rebuild.The Cavs’ 13-9 start is described as “clunky” and unsettled due to injuries that have forced them to use 12 different starting lineups.There is an ongoing debate about Evan Mobley’s inconsistent role, questioning whether he is better suited as an elite all-around defender and rebounder rather than a primary scorer.Donovan Mitchell’s heavy workload is a concern, with his minutes climbing over 34 per game, risking burnout before the playoffs.Second-year player Jaylon Tyson is emerging as a leader, earning enough respect from veterans to publicly state the team needed to play harder after a recent loss.The central debate among Guardians fans is whether to accept playoff contention on a small budget or demand the team spend on free-agent hitters to pursue a World Series.Analysis shows the Guardians have the financial flexibility and desperate need to create a “batting factory” to complement their successful “pitching factory.”Listener Ed Cohen emails and asks: Why not use MLB’s new automated ball-strike system on every pitch? Tennis uses technology to great advantage, he says.
Here’s the podcast for this week:
If you have a question or a topic you’d like to see included on the podcast, email it to sports@cleveland.com, and put “Terry’s Talkin’” in the subject line.
You can find previous podcasts below.
Also, a transcript of the podcast is below. As it is computer-generated, it may contain many spelling and grammar errors.
David Campbell: Hey, everybody. Welcome to the 200th edition of the Terry’s Talking Podcast. I can’t believe it, Terry. I think we’re just Talking about the 100th episode a little while ago. Anyway, I’m David Campbell. Your host, Terry Pluto is here. Can you believe we’ve done 200 of these things?
Terry Pluto: I remember when we did them with two tin cans and a string, or is it a wire or whatever they used to do in the old days.
David Campbell: It was not that long ago.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, right.
David Campbell: So, well, we’re taping this on Tuesday afternoon, December 2nd, and I guess we’ll start with the Browns. Terry, there’s a lot going on here. And the Browns, of course, coming off their loss Sundays, the 49ers, 26 to 8. Tim Belichick, our colleague, put a post up, I think, yesterday that the Browns have the number five pick in the draft right now and also the number 20, 26 pick from the Jacksonville trade last year. They’re 3 and 9.
Terry Pluto: I don’t know.
David Campbell: Where do you want to start with the Browns? You want to talk about Shador Sanders? Do you want to go a different direction? How you feeling here?
Terry Pluto: Well, they’re three and nine, just like they were three and nine a year ago. If you go since opening day of 2024, how many teams, Dave Campbell, have a worse record than the Browns?
David Campbell: 3.
Terry Pluto: 2.
David Campbell: 2.
Terry Pluto: The Giants? No, no, the jets, the Titans and the Jet and the Giants.
David Campbell: Okay.
Terry Pluto: The jets have won, like, four games.
David Campbell: This year, including one over the Browns.
Terry Pluto: Yes.
David Campbell: Which maybe swung it for them.
Terry Pluto: They won a couple last year. So they’re, you know, a couple of them are like the Browns with six wins over the last two years. And I. I was just sitting there at that game with you, and I didn’t actually even bring this up, but I was thinking, I looked at that especially early in the second half. I went, why is anybody still in the seats? Because it was really bad. TV did not do justice to how bad the weather was. It was really bad and windy. So, you know, with that wonderful, gloomy setting you watch the Browns there have a total embarrassment on special teams again. I mean, who knew after opening day that the most reliable thing about the special teams would be the kicker?
David Campbell: I don’t think anybody would have predicted that. Okay, so, Terry, you wrote a comment about the special teams yesterday, and you. You had some kind of. Some of the stats in there, right? It was. The Browns have coughed up five touchdowns on punt or kickoff returns. That’s the most in the NFL over the last two seasons. 24 and 25, a 99 yard kickoff return this season. The third punt return they’ve allowed this season was Sunday of 60 yards or more.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Basically gave the 49ers a touchdown. Kevin Stefanski, keep saying that. You know, I’m responsible for all this and I’m. We’re going to get it fixed. Yeah. You know, you are better. It’s not getting.
Terry Pluto: Here’s right. And here’s why he is responsible. You know, I love kickers. Kickers live in their own special world, David. There’s that they don’t have like teams don’t have kicking coaches. They almost have to fix themselves or they have a guy they talk to. It’s just, it’s like knuckleball pitchers in baseball. There’s just not too many around. You have to find somebody else. So sometimes I kind of give them a pass on kickers other than if you find one, make sure you sign them up. But coverage teams, coverage. Now this is more even to your area, but I thought Lance, our Rance Rysel and our coach Lance, who breaks down the tapes, had all kinds of stuff about coverage. To me, coverage is coaching. Your thoughts?
David Campbell: No, I agree. I mean, so there’s kind of two areas here, right. And the Browns have a lot of rookies and they have a lot of rookies playing special teams. And when you put a guy out to field a punt like Gage Larva Dan did the other day and he muffs it like the coach can’t go out there and catch the ball for him. So I get that. Or when a guy is standing at the intersection of the 5 yard line and the sideline like you’ve, if you’ve told him 50 times, like anything outside the numbers, let it go. And he goes over there and tiptoes the sideline and falls out of bounds, like you can’t go out there and make that decision for him. Like the player has to do that. I get it. But these returns have been.
Terry Pluto: That’s why, that’s why I went there first. Right.
David Campbell: These returns have been a function of guys leaving their lanes and not doing their job. Guys getting blocked at the point of attack and getting pushed out of their lane. And you’re right, that, that’s, that’s coaching. It’s. It’s finding the right guys. I. Here’s the thing, Terry. Who’s the Browns taking the kicker out of it. Right. Who’s the best special teams player on the Browns right now?
Terry Pluto: I mean, basically it’s those, those guys that play by themselves. By that I mean, the punter, this long snapper and the kicker have all done a pretty good job, but they’re over by themselves. Right, but they’re not.
David Campbell: What I’m getting at is like there’s.
Terry Pluto: No, there’s no Josh Gribs, there’s no Josh Cribs.
David Campbell: There’s no, there’s no gunner who. You’re watching the game and you’re like, oh, the Browns have this guy on special teams and he is their best special teams player and he makes 60% of the tackles on coverage of kicks. They don’t have anybody like that.
Terry Pluto: And why haven’t they developed?
David Campbell: I have no idea. But like Grant Delpit has asked to be on special teams to help solve it. And when you have your starting safety volunteering to help and it’s still not getting any better though, like, that shows some, some issues. There’s no doubt about it.
Terry Pluto: Like, I mean, I, I’m not big on firing guys and all this stuff, but you know, my column was the, the stats on, on Bubba are in. And they are in an area, as you mentioned, coverage. That’s why I dwelled on that as opposed to all right, larva than drops the punt. It was really windy. It was hard. Now I know the 49ers weren’t dropping their punts. And my guess too is, you know, probably happen on Kali, on that is that ball’s in the air, it’s drifting, it’s drifting. He probably had no idea where he was when he caught it. Now that you should do a better job with that. But when the kick is up high, you know, you’re looking at it. Nonetheless, we did cover and the coverage wasn’t just there the other day. It’s been, it’s been chronic, chronic problems since 24. And that’s to me why you don’t look at someone else on your staff. You know, they brought in his name, Kyle Hoke. He was most. He actually was a defensive coordinator at John Carroll in 2017. Then he’s been at several big time schools as a safety coach. They brought him as assistant special teams coach. I don’t know if he’s had experience with special teams or not. You know, can he do something? I mentioned that I was and I consider it a blessing. I spent an hour with Brad Seeley when he was here for two years with Eric Mangini. Seely is considered like the hall of Fame, the. The ultimate special teams coach. And he was explaining to me how you do have to teach and develop your certain guys for coverage. You have to get a couple guys to take ownership of it and just that it can be done. You know, your head coach has to buy in when they put roster constructions to help with a couple of guys. And, and he mentioned too, you know, the kicking game is, is different because you would try to help them, but in general they’re, you know, they have such a specialized skill that a lot of guys don’t. You know, it’s not the average coach, but getting guys to run in their lanes and do this stuff. Come on.
David Campbell: Yeah. And, you know, Bubba Ventrone made a career out of us being a special team guy, but there’s no Bubba Ventrone on Bubba Ventrone special teams right now. And I think it’s really showing there’ who’s like the captain of the special teams that gets the guys together and kind of make sure they’re, you know, holding them accountable. I don’t know. I don’t know what that role is, but like the Browns don’t have it and it’s really hurting them. And I’m, you know, it’s like there’s going to be mistakes during the course of a season, but I’m trying to think of like, plus plays that the Brown special teams have had and there haven’t been any. Can you think of where the Browns made a special teams play and you’re like, oh, wow, that was, that was. That really helped the offense out or whatever or helped.
Terry Pluto: I mean, they went from being really mediocre with Mike prefer to just awful. That’s. And they were supposed to go from mediocre with prefer to good to very good with Bubba and Bubba’s. I couldn’t find it the other day, but I know when Bubba was hired, I did dig into the special teams ratings with the Colts and they were pretty good. They weren’t great, but they were top 10. There was no alarm bell. Wasn’t like, I remember when they brought in famous Amos Jones here in 2018 with Freddy Kitchens and he had come from the Arizona Cardinals and his stats were horrible there for like three or four years. I realized it’s not all the coach, but I do think some of this is coaching. I mean, there’s reasons Brad Seeley, you know, been good everywhere he goes. A couple of these other guys. Generally the, the Chiefs have very good special teams. You know, Belichick’s, regardless of their, you know, that’s one thing he, he stressed. And the problem on special teams is when you make a mistake, it’s often a calamity.
David Campbell: A 60 plus yard play.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Yeah, right. Or a 35 yard play. In the case of stepping out of bounds with it with a kickoff or.
Terry Pluto: Just in general, you know, even if the guy. So they catches the ball on the 12 yard line now and the sticking tackle around the 25 or 30, he’s out to the 42. That’s a big difference. And as you said, Kevin always says, well, we’ll get it fixed or it’s on me or I just, I just couldn’t stand it anymore. How’s that? That’s what I wrote your headline said. Yes, that was. I just can’t stand it.
David Campbell: Just can’t stand it.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, right. All right.
David Campbell: Okay. Okay. You want to get your Sanders here. Let’s see. So Brown, what did you say? Quarterback went 16 of 25 for 149 yards. He had the one touchdown pass, no interceptions, and his rating, his passer rating was 93.6. I wanted to kind of roll an email in here, Terry. That kind of the whole narrative of Chador is like the, the expectations in college versus the reality of what we’re seeing. So I thought this kind of tied it together a little bit. I just. So I thought we’d start us off with this. But this is from Tim Isabella, a longtime listener. He says, hey David and Terry, I know that Shadour Sanders was a fifth round pick in which he dropped in the draft because scouts did not believe his skill set was NFL ready. I didn’t believe he was that great. However, I was impressed with his confidence and he really made some very athletic plays against the Raiders. I’m sure Coach Stefanski and Tommy Reese kept his game plan simple, but I believe he exceeded Browns fans expectations. Terry said in the last podcast that 18 of 20 top quarterbacks in the 2020, in 2025 so far were drafted in the first round. That was the data you had from your newsletter a week or two ago, Terry. Tim continues. However, could these draft expert experts have missed on the intangibles quote unquote that Shadour has in terms of leadership confidence learning from his former head coach and NFL father? In your opinion, is it allow him time to develop as an NFL quarterback? Could Shador be the exception of successful top quarterbacks outside the first round? The flip side to this is that so many quarterbacks were taken in the top of the draft or first round that all have the measurables and they often are NFL busts. Why consider a quarterback in the first round next year if Shadur becomes at least our Bernie Kozar for the next eight to 10 years. That’s a goal, right?
Terry Pluto: Well, that’s.
David Campbell: Yeah, I mean, but anyway, going back to the, to the expectations and falling in the draft is, you know, people miss on quarterbacks all the time and is it possible like Tim’s suggestion that maybe they missed the, the NFL missed in the opposite direction or maybe they didn’t see what happened, evaluate himself.
Terry Pluto: They missed some of the time, you know, and because the two exceptions. And I’ll throw Brock Purdy in there because he would, he didn’t at that point. He hadn’t played enough to be in the top 20. So you had Brock Purdy, you had. Jalen Hurts was the second round pick. To me, the biggest exception was Dak. Dak Peterson Prescott, yeah. From the Cowboys. He was a fourth round pick in the same draft by the way, I believe is Miles Garrett. So that’s, you know, there are. There. But yeah, there’s misses in the first rounds but you go after for second round down. There’s a ton of misses. You know, generally what you’re doing, you’re drafting Colt McCoy, you’re drafting Jacoby Brissette, you’re drafting. That’s what I mean. That’s probably where they are with Dylan, you know, okay, well you know, this guy’s probably going to play in the league for a long time. He could start now and then, but it’s. Look, they could give all the rest of the games to Shador. I’ve seen enough of Dylan Gabriel. I’m not dismissing Dylan Gabriel as a pro quarterback. I’m just simply saying I’m with Isabella there that, hey, why not let’s look at him and see and they continue to build an offense to help him. I almost put that game Sunday in the same box as that when he came in against the, against Baltimore. There was so much going on there that wasn’t like the usual game. That was not just cold weather. That wind was wild. If you look, the 49ers didn’t throw that many passes either. In fact, it shows you what a, what a quarterback rating means. Because he had a better rating than Brock Purdy.
David Campbell: Yeah, the whole expectations versus like, you know, Andrew Barry and Kevin Stefanski say this after every draft. It’s like once you’re drafted, it doesn’t matter where you’re drafted. Right? That’s what they say. So it does. But like the NFL is like those, those. Remember those old Hank cranked washing machines where you would put it through the two rollers and crank and all the water would get squeezed out. But like that’s the NFL like that. I was, you know, I was thinking about Tim Tebow the other day for some reason and like it took one team, like when McDaniels was the coach of the Broncos.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Of all the teams and 25th overall in the draft.
Terry Pluto: Right.
David Campbell: Because one team fell in love with him. But Tim Tebow’s career was over in three years because he went through the NFL ringer and like he couldn’t, he couldn’t pass the ball at the standard of an NFL starting quarterback. So he was a first round pick. But he, you know, to Tim’s point, he was out of the league. That was a mis evaluation and actually.
Terry Pluto: Part of it there. I know I’m interrupting, but I’m going to do it anyway. They, they bet on his intangibles, his leadership.
David Campbell: Good point.
Terry Pluto: The running. They bet on the intangibles. But there has to be tangibles to go with talent.
David Campbell: Yeah, it has to be there.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, has to be there. And it just didn’t work out. It’s odd that Josh McDaniels of all the people would have fallen into that view because to me, I was thinking in that draft, oh, you take them around the third round, maybe you make him a half running back half. You know, the kind of that you just, you take him as, quote unquote, a football player and see what you can make out of them as opposed to, oh, first round pick and then play him right away.
David Campbell: All right, go ahead.
Terry Pluto: Here’s what I like. Here’s what I’ve liked about Shador.
David Campbell: Yeah, let’s get watched. That’s what I was going to bring up. So go ahead.
Terry Pluto: I’ve like, I’ve liked how he’s taking snaps under center. He hardly ever, if never did it in college. It seems to me he’s been able to get him out of the huddle and lined up most of the time. That’s pretty good too. By the way. This is why they didn’t put him in right away because it took time to. To learn these things. They are not as simple as you would think. For the heck of it. When I was on with WTA on their pregame show with the immortal Bloom Daddy, you could, you could have been Balloon David, you know. But anyway, he has a. I gotta ask him next time. I’m on with a Kevin Spencer, who’s a. Lives in town and he’s a longtime special teams coach and I think he did some other stuff in the NFL too, coaching. And I said, is this hard when you’ve been doing like shadow. He said, absolutely. He said, we, I. We goes. We worked with quarterbacks for weeks and weeks and weeks on that stuff because you have to, you know, they’re not used to. They’re used to going to the line, kind of staring, and the clock isn’t coming down on him. So he said Chador’s done pretty well in that area. Secondly, he has stayed away from big negative plays, which was a big knock on him there. Now, he hasn’t had a lot of big positive plays. He had two throws against Las Vegas and a nice throw to Fannin. But let’s just see. Let him play. And you look at Cam Ward stats, he’s terrible. I mean, he’s the number one pick in the draft. I had in my long. Think we actually have a rational discussion on Schneider, Sanders. A couple of people just wrote me back and said no. That was their answer for the whole email. But, you know, Patrick Mahomes started one game as a rookie. Jalen Hurst started three. Jordan Love started like three in three years or something like that. The rush to play these guys often puts them in the wrong situation. And generally it’s a bad team that drafts these guys and rushes to put them in. So you’re putting a guy who probably isn’t ready and you put them in a bad situation.
David Campbell: All right, well, I saw a lot of what you saw, Terry. I think the operation of the offense, which is. Kevin Stefanski talks about that a lot in terms of getting guys in and out of the huddle, getting everybody lined up. I think that that’s been really good by Shador Sanders, the deep balls, you know, which you’ve been talking about. We’re seeing the thing that’s. Again, it is very early, as you just pointed out, like in Shador’s career here. But we’re seeing some of the stuff that we saw at Colorado, the sacks that he’s taking and the holding of the ball. And, you know, I was watching some of the Sunday night game, and this really hit me when I heard it, because I had never heard this before. But Chris Collinsworth said during the Broncos game that he was talking with Sean Payton, the Broncos coach. And Sean Payton told him that the one thing you can’t fix from a college quarterback going to the NFL is a college quarterback who takes a lot of sacks. He said Sean Payton says you can fix the way a quarterback reads defenses or his footwork or their throwing motion or they’re moving in the pocket. But Sean Payton believes that if you took sacks in college, you’re Going to take sacks in the NFL and that’s a bad thing. So what that means for Shador Sanders, I don’t know. But when I heard that, I was like, wow, of all the things that you wouldn’t want to hear if you’re a Shador Sanders fan, like, that would be one. So is that going to improve as time goes along? I think that’s something that people are going to be watching, right?
Terry Pluto: It actually has improved since Colorado. He’s taken something. There was that one horrendous one he took. It was it run midfield, the backing.
David Campbell: Up sacks where he keeps retreating? Yeah, but I just talking about regular ones where. I mean, there was a play Sunday where he had one guy open early, one guy open late and didn’t hit either one of them and took a sack. Right? Like, that’s what I’m talking about. The lack of. And again, that was one play and it’s very early. But the lack of recognition to find the open guy and get the ball out on time, resulting in a sack, those are the ones that I think he’s really going to have to work on.
Terry Pluto: I just really, I’m intrigued enough and I know you are too, because we were sitting together. Just play a kid. Let’s see. Yeah, I mean, you’re three and nine again. You were three and 14 last year. Last year you, you played a bunch of quarterbacks that you had no interest in playing this year. Well, I guess DeShawn, he did, but he got hurt again. But Jameis, you know, they, he, you know, famous, famous Jameis, he had, he was fun to watch, but it wasn’t really what you’re thinking about in the starting quarterback. Then they were down to DTR and Bailey. Zappi, if I remember right, was last year. So. And then you turn around this year and you started with Joe and you bailed on him after four games. And then you go to Dylan Gabriel and now we’re on Shador and you just. I tell you what bothers me though. To me, it’s like you’re playing these guys on defense and you’re getting to see them play some of the guys on offense. But you’ve won three games again. You know, you start getting into that rut where you just stink all the time. It’s hard to get out of it.
David Campbell: And build a winning culture out of it.
Terry Pluto: They did not want to go 3 and 14 again. Jimmy said that. I know Andrew Berry did not want to go 3 and 14 again. I think in their minds they were thinking something like at least one seven. Because if you win seven, you’re still losing 10. So it’s not exactly a high bar. But this, you know. Now, maybe they finished wrong. The schedule softens a bit. But you know how it goes, too. At the end of the year, when you’re on a bad team, all of a sudden some of your veterans who all beat up, they just set out. Now, this is where Miles Garrett, even before this year, has excelled the previous five years. Four years, excuse me. He had missed a grand total, five games. You know, I would throw that up to defend them. Oh, yeah. But I go, no, this is a big deal. I mean, he’s a star. He could have said, you know, I, you know, tweak the hamstring. Yeah, right. They’re. They’re hurting. They are. And now this year, of course, he’s obsessively after the record. Great. You know, I don’t care. Go sack everybody you could find. Just think if this guy. We’re like on New England with Rabel now, where they’re 10 and 2 and his. His defense, where they’re up and just all the stuff they would do there. I want to ask you something. How good of a coach you think Jim Schwartz is?
David Campbell: I think he’s really good. Right?
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: You look at the track record, I mean, he’s always put together a great defense. And I don’t know what happened in Detroit when he was there in terms of the. What he was like as a head coach, but, yeah, I think he’s really good.
Terry Pluto: Do you think he could be a head coach?
David Campbell: I. Why not? I mean. Right. I mean, he’s already done it once and a lot of times. You see this in every sport. A guy gets another chance and has learned a lot from his previous head coaching experience. And he’s a different guy when he comes around the next time. So. Yeah, why not?
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Yeah.
Terry Pluto: By the way, just called up Cam Ward. Stats okay. All right. He’s completing 59% of his passes, seven TDs, six interceptions, rating of 75. He’s not making big plays now. I don’t know Tennessee well enough, their roster, but. And of course, the coach got fired.
David Campbell: Coaching change. Yeah. A lot of upheaval.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. All that. Right. But that’s. That kind of. There was a story in the Wall Street Journal about different number one picks. Like, Baker had a coaching change his rookie year. There’s like five of. In the last 15 years, the number one picks quarterbacks. It’s like coaches got fired their first year, and that’s so anyway, that’s the point being, if they had taken him, you know, do you have something? You don’t have something. Who knows?
David Campbell: Okay.
Terry Pluto: But I brought up Schwartz because I’m interested. I’m thinking.
David Campbell: We have it. We actually have a Schwartz email here. You want me to read it?
Terry Pluto: Yeah, go to it, because I want to ask you something.
David Campbell: Yeah. This one is from Brian Kirkendall, long time listener. And Brian says, I appreciate, week in and week out, the play of the Browns defense. I’m starting to wonder how they can keep Jim Schwartz. They have something going there, and if they decide on head coach, starting over on defense feels like a major risk. If the Browns change head coaches and lose Schwartz, that feels like a massive loss. If they go.
Terry Pluto: I agree.
David Campbell: If they go after a new head coach, though, it also complicates things. Telling the candidates they have to keep Schwartz and his staff in place. How does something like that work? Thanks, Brian. It can work, but it’s really awkward, right? I mean, I think back to the.
Terry Pluto: 85 Bears to have been somebody that worked with Jim somewhere along the line.
David Campbell: And so the 85 Bears hired Mike Ditka, like in 1982, and when he came in, they told him, listen, these players think Buddy Ryan is a great coach on defense, and they think they’re on the verge of something special and they want to keep him. Are you cool keeping him? And Mike Ditka said, yeah, I don’t think that happens very often, though. I think coach. Head coaches bring in their own guys. I don’t know that that would happen in this case. Right?
Terry Pluto: Yeah. And you would have to be kind of a guy like Stefanski, where you’re running the offense and you’re glad to have the head coach of the defense, a guy like Schwartz, and you don’t feel threatened by him. That would be the. The big, the way. But that’s correct. It’s difficult. That’s why I’m bringing this up. You know, if they could move on for Stefanski, I’m interviewing. I’m interviewing Schwartz. Seriously, I really am. I want to look at that because this. The one unit that has been working in the last three years is defense, and it’s a guy that has been a head coach. And my guess is he’s probably learned a fair amount since his days with the Lions. And, you know, he went through the health scare a little bit and everything. And I often think when you come on the other side of that, you are a better leader. I really believe.
David Campbell: Why? Just because of it. Kind of crystallizes what’s important or what.
Terry Pluto: Do you mean by that? Gives you more patient with people. Interesting to listen to them, I think. Or you just, you know, not if you get slammed by it and you don’t have the ability to do it. Now, the other question is, as a head coach, you have all this garbage you got to deal with, but when you’ve come through health problems like Schwartz did, and he may just think, just leave me alone and let me do my defense. I’ll come out my once a week and I’ll do my. My baseball metaphors and tell my stories, and we’ll go out and sack the guy 14 times. You know, you may. Sometimes you’re. You’re better off staying in your box. For example, once upon a time, hard to believe Dave Campbell. But I was an assistant sports editor in Savannah, Georgia, and I was a terrible assistant sports editor in Savannah, Georgia, because I looked at other people’s stories, things, and got. This is awful. And I just want. I rewrote them in the beginning or whatever. Or I became frustrated that they couldn’t see this. I’m not saying I’m like the greatest writer ever, but the Lord has given me the ability. This is where I learned I have it to kind of see what the story is about and sort of write it clearly. And I was not cut out for that. I mean, God gave me the ability to write. So I. Ever since then, I’ve always made sure that I structured the jobs I had. Are writing, you know, play to your strength. I don’t want to work, and I didn’t want to worry about who didn’t show up on the desk to help me. And, you know, and who’s got, you know, the sports neighbors say, oh, no, this guy’s getting divorced and he’s a, you know, he’s a mess right now. I don’t want to hear any of that stuff. And that’s the difference between. You’re the defensive coordinator. Yeah. You kind of have to kind of deal with your guys. But the big questions, I mean, you don’t. Jim Schwartz was not, I’m sure, asked to weigh in on Deshaun Watson. You know, how we’re going to handle him or whatever. That’s. But if you’re the head coach, you have all that garbage, and the Schwartz wants it. I don’t know.
David Campbell: Yeah, that’s a great question. And I mean, there’s going to be some openings this year. I’d be surprised if people weren’t talking to him. I Would you look at the Bad offense that has been played here the last couple seasons and how the defense is. Stayed motivated, engaged. And he, he’s. Those guys want to play for him. I mean, we see it every single week.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, they do. And I mean, and he has his things, you know, like he likes them to maybe just say over celebrate or whatever. But I know why he does it because he wants that unit to be engaged. And if we have to even kind of do it our own way because the other parts are so dismal, well, we’ll do it this way. So we’re, you know, we’re getting all excited when we sack a guy and we’re down by 18 points or whatever, you know, but we’re gonna do it anyway.
David Campbell: All right. So, Terry, one of the things I wanted to ask you. So with a three and. Right. Three and nine record you mentioned, the same as last year. What does this mean for 2026 in terms of where they are right now? And it seems like everything’s angling toward all right, next year is the year when we’re gonna get back in this. How does this year feel in terms of what it means for next year?
Terry Pluto: Right now to me, it’s. I mean we could, you could go to different. You know, Harold Fannin, I think has got a chance to be really special. Sweatinger already is special. Quinchin Junkins, I say right now is an above average NFL back with a chance to get with a higher high ceiling. You know, those. So you have that kind of stuff. Mason Graham, you know, is probably an average defensive tackle now again with. With a pretty high scene ceiling. But what does it add up to? It adds up to the same three wins you had a year ago. It adds up to an offense that’s ranked 29th after being ranked 32nd a year ago out of 32 teams. It adds up to the same old, same old. And that can’t be where you’re at. The NFL is set up to help bad teams become mediocre and help mediocre teams become good. Yet there are some teams that are just awful. And I’m sick of like watching this here. To me, I kind of fell off the Stefanski Van Wagon a few games ago just because I just felt that I think he’s gotten beaten down doing this job. Well, all. None of us will ever fully understand what they all went through with all the Watson stuff, you know, trying to make that work. And I see, see, I think Schwartz was able to kind of isolate himself from that and just do his job on defense. So My thoughts.
David Campbell: Okay, so let me run two scenarios past you, Terry, in terms of next year. Number one is that Jimmy and D. Haslam don’t like what they’re seeing. The mistakes, the questionable coaching decisions. You know that fourth down call the other day, like.
Terry Pluto: Well, the Harold Fanon.
David Campbell: Yeah, the Harold Fannin thing, like it was just. It was such an important play in the game. And when you see that, it’s like, you know, a few weeks ago the Browns pulled off this incredible run. All the guys onto the field at the end of the half and kick a field goal with the clock running right. And you’re like, that is some great coaching right there. And then you see the exact opposite of it. On that fourth down call, you bring in Harold Fannin in 18 degree wind chills to take a snap from under center. He hasn’t taken a snap the whole game. They fumble it. There’s linemen running back and forth. The line was already in disarray because of changes and the play clocks running down and Harold Fanning calls a quick snap and they fumble.
Terry Pluto: It was just.
David Campbell: That was the exact opposite of the. Of the rushing the guys on and kicking the field goal. It was just. It was weird to see.
Terry Pluto: I remember I asked you to go who’s that? Who’s behind center? I couldn’t figure out. It was last thing it’s like was Harold Fannin. Maybe the last thing Harold Fanon expected was Harold Fannin. They say they practice it with him, but I mean if you’re going to do it, you know. The other thing is if you’re going to do that, I’d rather put junkins in this, in the wildcat and let him try to get a run that way.
David Campbell: Which they, they are doing down near the goal line, right? Yeah, right. Or the Terry Pluto option which is put fan. Put fan in a tight end. Judkins in the backfield. Play action to Judkins five yards all the time. Yeah. Anyway, it’s easy to second guess fourth downplays, but anyway, go back. Let’s go.
Terry Pluto: But if a Roberta were there, you know what she would have said before all as that happened? She would always say why are they running where everybody’s standing? She always says that much of the game. Yeah. What look, they’re gonna our show go. They’re gonna run where everybody’s standing. And because she’s not a fan of the Twish push or any. She just thinks this, this is like why are you doing this is, you know, this is trying to take your head and just Go right through a wall. But it’s a legitimate question.
David Campbell: What do you mean?
Terry Pluto: I’ll tell you. One of the best plays, remember at the goal line, Tommy Reese’s. This is at Las Vegas and they should doors there. I don’t know, they run the two yard line or something like that. And Shadors at quarterback, he roll. He. He fakes to Judkins. He kind of was off to the right a little bit, fakes it to him and then rolls out a little more. And I think it was fan. It just kind of floated out to the end zone. Of course he’s wide open.
David Campbell: Well, we might see that. Let me go back to my two scenarios. All right, so the scenario one is like Jimmy and D has them are watching this and they’re like, listen, this isn’t working. We. We’re not making progress. We don’t like the coaching. We’re going to make a change. I don’t know if Kevin Stefanski and Andrew Barry are both gone or one of them’s here. So like that’s one scenario that could play out. The other one is the Haslams were behind the desean Watson trade. They realized it was a big swing and a miss as Jimmy called it, and they’ve told Andrew Barry and Kevin Stefanski, listen, you have two years to fix this. We know the roster is depleted. We’re going to give you two years. Everything is angling toward 2026. Let’s draft some good rookies, get them some experience and have our quarterback set going into 2026 and we’ll see where we’re at at the end of 2026. So those, those are kind of the two scenarios that I see in my head right now. I don’t know which one is going to be closer to reality when all is said and done or how everybody’s feeling about that. But yes, that’s kind of. That’s kind of. It could. Those are two very different places too. In terms.
Terry Pluto: That’S. That’s really. You put it together nicely in two things and that’s what it’s going to be. It’s either A or B. It can’t be none of the above because it’s either like we’ll give them another shot or it’s no, this is too bad. At the very least, we got it. We got to make some significant changes. They’ve done the change, the coaching staff stuff a couple of times already. That’s why, I mean, I think Kevin is the one there now. They do. The last time the Browns fired A coach, not the gm. Do you know when that was, David?
David Campbell: I do not.
Terry Pluto: It was 2000. Chris Palmer was fired and they brought in Butch Davis, although the GM was Dwight Clark, but really it was common policy. And then when Chris told me, because I was a pretty good relationship with Palmer said he went in and Dwight Clark was like, do you think I’m going to be gone too? And Chris said, well, I don’t know, Dwight. And he was gone about the middle of the next year because it was. They knew that Butch was going to come in and have a lot of power. So that, that. But that’s the last time. But if you look at that, I remember Banner fired Jaczynski after a year. But not long after that Banner and Michael Lombardi were both fired. And then they went to. Ray Farmer was promoted and they hired. They had hired Patton. That was the other thing too. Banner was part of the team to hire Spat and then they fire him and they move up Ray Farmer. You know, you could go all the way down. When Romeo Cornell was fired, Phil Savage was under the impression and told he could pick another coach. He had lists going. I know this for a fact, that interviewed him for Browns Blues and then he gets a call when he’s at the Charlotte airport and gets fired on the phone at the Charlotte airport the day before the Steelers game. He shows up at the Steelers game. Anyway, he wants to talk in person to Randy Lerner. Never quite get quite to get to the last meeting. So they both go. So in other words, the general thing was firing them both. Remember how they fired Hugh? And then a little while later, Sashi Brown didn’t make it through that season either. So there’s. There seems like that’s their pattern now. Will it change and they keep Barry and Gar Stefanski? I don’t know. We’ll see.
David Campbell: All right, well, the next chapter that we will see from the Browns is Sunday at 1 o’. Clock. They are playing the Titans down.
Terry Pluto: Suppose what do they have left? They have. They have. They’re three and six. Right. They got nine games. So they got eight left.
David Campbell: Yep.
Terry Pluto: Correct.
David Campbell: Titans. And then they’re on the road against the Bears and they’re good. Two more home games against the Bills and Steelers and then they close on the road at Cincinnati.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. So suppose they win three more then that. I think that could change it because then it’ll look like Kevin made some adjustments or something, you know, But I think for him to keep the job, they got to win some games.
David Campbell: Yeah, I think you’re Right.
Terry Pluto: You got to show something. Yeah.
David Campbell: And you know, Urban Meyer talked about this all the time when he was coaching Ohio State. He would go in every day and go up to Mickey, the Mickey Morata, the strength and conditioning coach, and would say, how are we doing? And that’s the question the Browns are asking every day. How are we doing? Are we making progress? Yeah. So they got to be doing okay by the end of the season. The ownership has to feel that way. So. All right. All right. You ready to take a break here?
Terry Pluto: Yes.
David Campbell: Okay. When we come back, we’re going to get into the Cavaliers. And it has been. We’ve been talking about this for a few weeks. It has been a slog. We’ll get into that. I also want to ask you, Terry, about the guardians. We have Paul Hoynes and Joe Noga. Our colleagues have been working on a thing the last couple days about the guardians say they want to win a World Series. And there’s kind of two schools of thought about whether they’re doing enough. I want to get your thoughts on that. So we’ll get into that and more when we return. Terry’s Talking. Hey, we’re Back on our 200th episode of Terry’s Talking. And Terry, I know your new book, why can’t this Team Just Find a Quarterback? And other thoughts on Life in Brownstown has really been a huge. It’s really been a huge success. And you’ve got a couple more book signings coming up, including one, well, tonight on December 2nd for anybody who catches this podcast. But it’ll probably be too late. But the next one after that is Thursday night, which is December 4th, and that’s in Cleveland right at 7:00′. Clock.
Terry Pluto: Visual voice books, and it’s a converted movie theater on Lorraine and around West 50th. I have not seen it, but David Graham, a publisher, has been there and sent me pictures. And it looks like a really neat setting. So I’ll be taking questions and all that kind of stuff there, and I’m anxious to see how that is, especially I’m always interested in these independent bookstores. They’re giving it a crack and see if they could make it work. So that’ll be fun on Thursday night. And then.
David Campbell: Then there’s one more on December 10, which is going to be in Westlake, and I believe that’s at the Barnes and Noble in Westlake at Crocker Park.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, that’s a big one. There’ll be a lot of people there. 6:30, visible voice, when it’s at 7. And it’s been nice. The crowds have been big for all the signings and I’ve been really, really pleased just to get out and meet the readers. And a lot of people have been listening to the podcast, which is nice too.
David Campbell: Cool.
Terry Pluto: They like the host. They’re not sure about me.
David Campbell: All right, that’s December 4th, Thursday, 7 o’, clock, visible voice books in Cleveland. And then December 10th, which is next Wednesday, 6:30pm at Barnes and Noble, at Crocker.
Terry Pluto: So.
David Campbell: All right, Terry. The Cavs, man, as easy as the start of their season was last year, this is. This year has been as difficult. They’re 13 and nine. I think they’re down to sixth in the Eastern Conference as of today, man, the pistons are 17 and 4. That has been some turnaround there and they’ve got some good young talent. But last night the Cavs went to Indiana on the second half of a back to back, beat the Pacers 135, 119. What are you seeing from the Cavs, Terry? A lot of drama is not the right word. It’s just. It just feels very unsettled, doesn’t it?
Terry Pluto: Yeah, clunky. I mean, Kenny Atkinson said that as the season was getting ready to start. And it’s a word that applies because this is, you know, dramas when guys don’t show up for practice and they want to be traded and all that. They don’t really have that. You always have a little bit of, you know, we should play harder this. You know, they’ve had 12 different lineup changes. I think what Kenny’s gonna really have to do is somehow get. They need to get Moby just back to playing like he was last year. Now he’s been better the last few games since that Toronto one. But trying to turn him into this offensive machine. I think we talked about that last week. I just don’t see it. I mean, he can get 18 to 20 by just playing his game and rebounding and defending. He’s a really good all around player, all star caliber. Not everybody is suited to score 25 to 30 points a game. And just because Giannis does it doesn’t mean this guy should do it.
David Campbell: Yeah. So let’s look at his last six games here, Terry, for Evan Moby. So last night against Indiana, 13 points. Then the night before against Boston, 27, which is kind of what we had talked about last week. Like should be up in that 25, 27 range. Atlanta, the game before, he had 20. Toronto, the game before they had. He had 14. Clippers the game before that, he had 18. And then the Pacers game on November 21st at home, he had 22.
Terry Pluto: And I’m interested in the rebounding, too. See, that’s what I think. I want to make sure this guy’s getting 8 to 12 rebounds a game.
David Campbell: Yeah, do. I’m gonna run through the rebound. All right, five last night, 14 against the Celtics.
Terry Pluto: See, before you go farther, the Celtics middle is wide open all the time. He has had good numbers against the Celtics in the playoffs. And that. Because that’s. That’s available to him and. And Jared also, but especially to him, the way the Celtics defend, because the Celtics were. Thing is, we’re going to make more three pointers than you, and we’re going to stop you from making three pointers. And you want to make two pointers in the lane, go ahead. That’s how they play.
David Campbell: All right, so it was five against Indiana, 14 against Boston, 14 against the Hawks, five against Toronto, 10 against the Clippers, and 12 against the Pacers on November 21st.
Terry Pluto: So you have two clunkers in there. The. The Toronto game where he just didn’t show up for whatever reason. And last night he would. He had. See, sometimes that. That quick pace of Indiana kind of gets him out of sorts, too. That’s why in that game, the star, you. Jaylon Tyson, I believe, had 11 rebounds, and I think Donovan had nine. Oh, geez. Donovan is something else. You could just tell he’s been mad, I mean, really mad about how they’re playing. And he goes in, he starts getting rebounds. And I know Kenny is just like. He’s drilling these guys. Team rebounding, team rebounding, team rebounding. Everybody go to the boards. Now. I was watching this with Garland, some of the games. Garland has never been very good defensively. I think he’s awful right now. And it could be the toe thing, but they really are trying to, you know, as they call it, hunt him. You know where they say Garland is guarding one guard, is defending one guard, and then the star is at the other guard position. And what they do is that man says. The man guarding the star sets a pick on Garland, and then Garland switches off. The next thing you know, you got a bad matchup. And it could be. Look, I’m. I’m very patient with Garland on now. I mean, this. This turf toe thing, it’s a serious injury. We’ll see how he does, but it’s a problem. I have not liked the little backcourt almost from the time they had it. They miss Struse. I think Strus is this shows his value because the backcourt that they had with Strus and Donovan when Garland was out a couple years ago went 17 and 8 and on top of it. And Mobley missed a number of those games too. And on top of that, the stats with those two on the floor were like just shining lights of hope of what. What the backcourt could be. Because one thing that, you know, Garland is pretty good on the pick and rolls with the lobs. He’s not particularly good at throwing the ball into the post. In other ways, Streuss is. And that’s a nice thing. I’m not saying. I’m not dismissing Garland because when he’s healthy, his offense is. It brings a lot of firepower, but they’re vulnerable in that small backcourt.
David Campbell: So you mentioned Donovan, Mitchell, Terry. I was looking at his minutes and we’re always kind of. This is something we’ve always looked at. But. So in 23, 24, 35 minutes, 18 seconds, average per game last season in 71 games, they cut him back to 31 and a half.
Terry Pluto: Yes.
David Campbell: Right. From 35, 18 to 31, 26. And now I think.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Yes. And this season he’s back up to. Between that, he’s up to 34, 18.
Terry Pluto: Rising and rising.
David Campbell: So this is not the formula the Cavs want. This has to. This is kind of a temporary thing to keep the boat afloat here until the reinforcements come. And when you’re anticipating, when Streuss comes back, Garland’s able to play more that those minutes will come down. It has to, right?
Terry Pluto: Yes. Yes. I don’t want to wear them out because the thing about I’m going to start doing this, count how many times he ends up on the floor. This guy drives in and you end up on the floor. You don’t think it’s that much just even in a pickup game, go out there and just fall on the floor. It’s not a trampoline, it’s wood.
David Campbell: Do it five times, then get on a plane and fly to Indianapolis.
Terry Pluto: And then do it five more times. Yeah. Or even more than that. And he’s flying into this, you know, the basket thing, because he’s, you know, when. When he feels they need a bucket, he just puts his head down. I’m going in there, you know, stop me is. It’s kind of like Nick Chubb or Jim Brown, you know, I’m going to see if you could stop me. And he, you know, he takes up. He takes a beating. I was talking to somebody in their organization now who’s not like on top, but just kind of works in the clubhouse there and everything. Just today and he was. And this is where you kind of like where he’s what they quote the lesser people, unquote. And he was just telling me what a gentleman Donovan is. And you know, he knows everybody’s name. I mean, in other words, he’s about all the right stuff. The way he comes across, that’s the way he is. And he said that, you know, Donovan is like determined to get this thing turned around and you almost have to put the brakes on him sometimes.
David Campbell: Well, that’s what I was going to ask you. Should Kenny Atkinson. So people don’t like when the team loses even, you know, the players and coaches don’t put the fans too. And they’re 13 and nine. Like, should Kenny Atkinson just cut back on Donovan Mitchell’s minutes like right now and just like, listen, we’re going to be closer to 500 than. We’re going to be around 67% of wins, but it’ll, it’ll pay off. Do you think they should just do that and absorb some of the loss especially he wants to be out there all the time.
Terry Pluto: Right. He’s like Jose. He’s just like Jose. Like, because they always wanted to play for the guard. This is the same thing. You know, the leadership stuff, the backs to coaches stuff, all that. It’s all there. The best player playing the hardest. I mean, Donovan is always up there in deflections on the team. For example, that’s. That’s one of the things he does. Yes. You just have to sit them down and say, you know what? We have guards who are starting to show something in Proctor and Porter and can play those guys a little more and just see if they can. There. You can move. You actually can move Tyson into the backcourt. When Tyson. Tyson played point forward at Cal, I had talked to him about this after he had signed and he said because they had some point guard problems, so they put him on the ball and he’s not that that’s his natural position, but he could do it. And Kenny’s pretty inventive. I’m sure he’s looking at all these things and trying to figure out, you know, what. What to do to keep Donovan someone healthy. Course the discouraging thing was I did all this great stuff with. With Donovan, fewest minutes. All that and he still got hurt in the playoffs. Well, I mean, that’s what drives.
David Campbell: Nothing you can do.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: All right. Anything else on the calves Cherry?
Terry Pluto: Just that I really Think that. Well, first of all, you see Tyson emerging into a viable NBA starter who also is about the right stuff, playing hard in that.
David Campbell: Well, it was interesting on Sunday night after that loss, he was front and center saying like, we’re not playing hard enough. We don’t want it bad enough. I thought that was really kind of a bold moment.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: For a second year. For a second year player like that. Yeah. So that was really good to see if you’re a Cavs.
Terry Pluto: I was talking again to one of my Cavs people not to on top, but somebody else and he said that that kid works so hard and play so hard. He has the respect of the veterans so he could do it. And they know he wasn’t just doing that to, you know, do it. He was frustrated. And so that’s, that’s a key part there, you know, is an interesting player. And I’m having trouble really getting my hands around because I always really liked Hunter before. You see him all the time. And now it’s like, I think he’s pretty good, but I thought there would be more there there from him. And it just seems like, would he be better coming off the bench or. I don’t really know. David, your thoughts on Hunter. It’s.
David Campbell: It’s the same thing with a lot of these guys. Like it’s up and down.
Terry Pluto: Right.
David Campbell: And you never know what you’re going to get on a given night. I just, I want to see what the Cavs look like in February. I really do. When everybody’s back and everybody knows the role and the rotation is set. It’s just, it’s just this is not the right time right now.
Terry Pluto: This is probably. The guys found the Pacers had the same discussion last year at this time.
David Campbell: Sure.
Terry Pluto: Like, because remember, they didn’t get going to the first of the year. I forgot what the record was, was under 500. And you know, then they, and they took. And he was trying to put in this kind of full court pressing style. We’re physical because of our endurance, not physical because they knock people around. The Cavs out rebounded Indiana again. Just like they out rebounded them in the, in the playoffs they did. But you know, they were killed on a couple of those missed free throws. But they were also basically almost run off the floor by the never ending defense of the Pacers. And remember the Pacers last year were the team that got the ball over half court, the fastest in all the NBA and also threw the most passes in the front court in the NBA because they just kept moving the ball moving, the feet moving, all that stuff. And I know Kenny has been frustrated because he’s not been able to get these guys playing the kind of offense they did last year. But I think some of it is to do with just all the changing of the lineups and injuries. And sometimes to your point, you got to ride it out.
David Campbell: It’s hard to create a team’s identity when you’ve got an inactive list for games that’s six or seven guys long. So totally, totally hard to do. So. All right, well, the Cavs are. They have a mini kind of three game home stand coming up. Wednesday they’re home against the Blazers. Friday they have the spurs at 7:30. That’ll be a fun one. And Saturday against the warriors at 7:30 down at Rocket Arena. So. All right, moving on to the Guardians. Terry, I kind of teased this before our break, but Paul Hoynes, Joe Noga, our two Guardians writers, Hoynes put a story up. There’s kind of, this is what the story is about. I’m just going to summarize it as quickly as I can. So it seems like there’s two schools of thought among Guardians fans. One group of fans is like, listen, this is a smaller market team. They don’t have a lot of payroll money. They’re doing great. They’re making the playoffs on a regular basis. Two Central Division championships in a row. We’ve had some incredible playoff baseball here. Guardians fans should be happy, right? That’s one school of thought. And then there’s another school of thought. And actually there was a Guardians fan who took out an AD after the season and challenged Paul Dolan to spend some money this offseason and basically said, listen, spend some money and bring in some offense through free agency or sell the team. That was what the AD said. But this other school of thought is like, listen, the Guardians are doing, they make the playoffs in their small market team, but like, they use that as an excuse to not spend money on free agents and bring in proven bats. And they want to see the team extend themselves a little bit more. Put a little, put some more money into the payroll and bring in some seasoned guys who can help get them to the World Series. I mean, the Guardians say every year, Chris Anthonetti, our goal is to win a World Series. And Stephen Voets, like, our goal is to win the World Series. And the second school of fans, they’re saying, well, if you want to get to the World Series, you got to invest in bringing some guys who can get you there, who can Hit some home runs. So how do you feel about that? Hoynsey kind of weighed in today and said yes, he agreed and he threw out some names that he thinks the Guardian should go after this season in free agency. Joe Noga wrote a piece today saying, listen, the Guardians are doing fine. They just need some patience to let Delauder and some of these other prospects come along. How do you feel about all this, Terry? It’s a lot to take in.
Terry Pluto: Well, I looked at their payroll for this upcoming year and you got Jose at 21 million. Then you have Kwon at 8.8 million and the third highest paid player in the team at the moment. Take a guess. David.
David Campbell: I don’t even know. Who is it?
Terry Pluto: Classe. How about that? Six million and he may be not even there. Then you go to Bybee at 4.4 million, hedges and hedges at 4 million and then Stefan at 3.5 and Nolan Jones, man of many lives, is at 2 million and everybody else will probably be under 2 million. So therefore you do have room to spend because this is, this payroll is pretty low and they have room to go out and try and make a bold move or two. But you can’t do one of these five or seven year contracts. You know that these crazy contracts are there not of course, hanging over everything. Is there going to be no baseball in 26 or there’s going to be a strike and that kind of stuff. But nonetheless you could still make a wise move or you can, you know, try to make some trades. You know, last year they spent $12 million on Carlos Santana. It didn’t work. And they’ve, they’ve kind of, when they, when they’ve tried to do these sort of one year rentals with these bats, they haven’t worked other than perhaps Mike Napoli. I think going back to that, I was trying to think if there’s anyone else, but for the, they, they generally are just sort of older guys who are done. And then when he got here, they, they put the exclamation point on, yeah, we’re done. And they need to do better than that. And I, I hope they make some sort of moves, but I’m not going to just reject the, the problem that both that bothers me is like, oh, they make the playoffs. It’s almost like you say, oh yeah, well today is Tuesday when they’re doing the podcast, like it’s a given and it’s not a given at all. Now I want to see Dilaudor play. I’m somewhat interested in Valera, but they do need just another bat or two in there, you know, even a guy to hit 15, 18 homers who’s been around. They seems like that’s one area where they have failed, where they try to kind of find that. They find these pitchers to come in for a year or two and help, but they’ve not been able to, you know, they don’t find the Ben Lively of hitters, for example, you know, who’s coming for a couple. Get a couple of years out of that guy. They don’t find that guy. And so that’s. I just thought of him because I remember when they brought him in there and I was talking to Antonetti and he was like talking him up and I said, chris, he’s had it. He had like a 3.5 in the KBO, the Korean League, and he had like a 4.9era with the Res. He said, you know, we really like them. We think, you know, we could. We can get them basically put them in the pitching factory and get them fixed. And. And David. Well, they need to get a batting factory going. I’m sure they need a batting factory and I know they’ve looked at this stuff, but they need to have it where they can get some of these guys that have come in that maybe been good and suddenly they’re off. Seems like when they get. These guys have been off and they stay off when they come here, that’s. That’s really where I’d like to see them. So some money. But the idea that just, you know, go out and you throw seven years and 180 million at somebody, that’s not, that’s not how you play it. And I generally hate those contracts anyway. Now, by the way, if I were doing the negotiations on this with the players and owners, even if I couldn’t get a total salary cap, I would push very hard for an NBA style maximum contract thing where it’s either four or five years for the money’s big, but it’s four or five years. And I’ve talked to a couple GMs at smaller to middle markets and they said that’s intriguing to us because say you give the guy five years at $200 million, okay? Ton of money. But he said if I’m two or three years in and he’s still a pretty good player, but my team’s in trouble, I can still trade him because.
David Campbell: There’S two years left, two or three.
Terry Pluto: Years left and then, yeah, the Yankees will come in there and take them or something. But when there’s like eight years Left.
David Campbell: You’Re stuck.
Terry Pluto: You know, you’re. You’re. You’re stuck. So that’s. Those are two thoughts?
David Campbell: Yeah. All right, real quick. Do you want to hear Hoynsey’s three names that he threw out for guys the guardians go after? All right. Center fielder Harrison bader, who is 31, 277 last season with the Twins and the Phillies. Seventeen homers, 54 ribies.
Terry Pluto: So I always kind of liked him.
David Campbell: Yeah. Jorge Polanco, 32, infielder, guy could hit.
Terry Pluto: He has trouble staying healthy.
David Campbell: Yeah. 264 with 26 homers and 78 RBI with Seattle last season. And then this was an interesting one, Paul Goldschmidt, who’s. Who’s 38.
Terry Pluto: Isn’t he 38? Yeah.
David Campbell: How did he fade with the Yankees? He had 336 last season. He was 50 of 149 with seven homers and 16 RBI.
Terry Pluto: That’s against lefties.
David Campbell: Oh, you’re right. It was against lefties.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. Yeah.
David Campbell: But he would, you know, he would help against lefties, which is something that.
Terry Pluto: They had to play him at first base, you know, or there.
David Campbell: Yeah. So anyway, you’re right, Terry. Those numbers, 336 and seven homers was against left handers.
Terry Pluto: Is Goldsmith the guy you bring in, and all of a sudden you find out at 38, he’s done, too? I don’t know. Yeah, Bader’s kind of interesting because you go back, I mean, here they are again. You got Quan in the outfield and you got Quan in the outfield. That’s it. And you could talk about the water, you could talk about Valero, you could talk about any of these other guys. You got Kwon in the outfield. That’s assuming you don’t trade them. Now, certainly there’s no reason economically to trade Quant. You know, 8.8 million on this low payroll that I just laid out there. Pay that. That’s easy. Now, you can wait till the All Star break and see the clock is ticking. Yeah, yeah, the clock’s ticking. The thing that’s a little disturbing about Quant is the second half totals the last few years have not been very good. We’ll talk about that next week. I’ll get all the data. I was looking at that. Does he wear down or what? I don’t know. But meanwhile, he may be the best left fielder I’ve ever seen. I mean, his defense is phenomenal. It. It saves runs. You know, sometimes I get a little bit, you know, skeptical. That run safe thing stat. Not with him.
David Campbell: You don’t even need the data is the data. But you can see it when the play is happening. You can just see it out there.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. And I’m like, are you running on this guy? You know, you watch that some guy hits a ball down the left field line and he’s not particularly fast and he’s thinking double. Quan’s thinking no. Yeah.
David Campbell: Or the guy heads back to first base immediately.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, try it, buddy. Just try it. Yeah, it’s almost like the first basis coaches should be tackling some of these guys. And that’s so those are, those are some thoughts. But when I laid out the highest paid players and I’m looking because you know Costa is probably going to be suspended, I would think you’ve got room to make some moves and maybe this is a time to try it, you know, instead of like Roman, you know, I know Orellano went and had a good year. Where’d he end up after the Cleveland had him and that. But you know, a guy that really is like bader’s been around and been pretty successful.
David Campbell: All right, well I would encourage you to go check that out. Cleveland.com guardians read Hoynsey story from Monday about are the Guardians doing enough? And then read their opinion pieces. Cleveland.com guardians so all right, we got one thing to wrap up here, Terry. This is from Ed Cohen, longtime listener and once again our listeners always come through with interesting ideas and takes on things. And this one is about the automated balls and strike system. He says. Hey guys, I meant to bring this up weeks ago when you and Terry were discussing MLB’s plan to institute a system whereby batters can appeal a few balls and strike calls each game and getting ruling from get a ruling from a computerized sensing system. You both seem to give the idea a thumbs up. My question, and I find it hard to believe I’m the only one raising it, is this. If we’re in agreement that a high tech system can tell whether the umpire got the call wrong, why would you not just let the system call every pitch and be done with those hard working and well intentioned but definitely valuable human home plate umpires. Most major tennis tournaments have done away with their line judges in favor of the automated Hawkeye system, which everyone seems to agree is infallible. All the best, Ed Cohen. Thanks for that Ed. What do you think Terry?
Terry Pluto: I’d like to see a whole game seriously in spring training or something called that way and see what they come up with. I have not seen it. I do like the Fact that whether are they going to have that thing next year where you get what a couple of question like yeah, you get.
David Campbell: The challenge strike call. Yep. I think you touch your cap and ask the umpire to review it and they review it. So each time I have to go back and find the rules. But it was two or three. Like Ed said, something like that.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s interesting. I’m just kind of looking at Harrison Bader stats. I think he’s pretty good defensively. I, you know, that’d be interesting to see what they could do there. Also, I would hope the Guardians would try to become aggressive again in the trade market. Like when they did, for example, they went out and they, they traded, you know, Jimenez and they traded Neyor and you know, with. They were going, their, their goal is starting pitching and you know, Naylor did bring them back. Slade Chacon, there was another guy. See, that’s how they are. The pitching factory. We’re going to put this guy in the factory and he’s going to end up being a pretty good starter. They were right. I mean I’m looking at those numbers like 4.9 or 5.6 going. I don’t see it. They did and they liked them in the draft 100 years ago and he was a first round pick. And then also then of course Ortiz did have some promise and that, you know, that all went sideways. Need a batting factory.
David Campbell: I see a T shirt in their future. Yes, right, Batting factory. But going back to Ed’s questions here. So I’m trying to envision a game without it. Without umpires.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: I mean we talk about the players union being strong all the time. The umpires union is also.
Terry Pluto: Yes.
David Campbell: And they are not going to like having that taken away from them. The balls and strikes. So there’s going to be a lot of negotiations and wrangling there. And like who calls safe and out on the bases and like plate and. And if there’s a, you know, an obscure ruling where there’s an interference, like you’re, you’re. Who’s going to make those calls. So I think it. Ed, your idea. The tennis thing is really interesting to think about because like it’s a ball on a line or off a line, they go to the video, it takes five seconds and they have the right call, like immediately. I just think baseball. There’s so many things that go on. Fan reaching over and grabbing a ball out of the. So there’s going to be. The umpires are not going to want to give any of this up and it’s going to be, it’s going to be hard negotiations if they.
Terry Pluto: Probably the way to go is just give, I don’t know, each team gets three challenges a game or something like that. You know, give more than like one or two challenges because they do it pretty.
David Campbell: Or maybe there’s not a home plate umpire, but then who calls the play at home like an out. Safe call at home, like, yeah.
Terry Pluto: And you can really.
David Campbell: Tennis is very cut and dry because it’s just in or out and you move on. So it’s interesting to think about. Great question.
Terry Pluto: I just think you would, you would increase the amount of challenges on pitches because I remember in spring training they had it and within 10 seconds they had an answer ball or strike. Remember they. So that, that was perfect for me.
David Campbell: Well, between the players and the owners negotiations and the umpires and the automatic balls and strikes, we’re going to have some long, drawn out meetings in boardrooms across America here the next couple of years. So we’ll see how it all plays out. So. All right, I think we’re done here, Terry. Right?
Terry Pluto: That is it.
David Campbell: All right. A couple of reminders. Don’t forget to check out Terry’s newsletter. If you go to cleveland.com Pluto there’s a blue bar at the top. Click on that, you get two weeks free. I think of Terry’s weekly newsletter. Comes out every Wednesday at noon. Always great stuff in there. You want to check it out, some behind the scenes things, contract information. And if you want to write us, I still have a bunch of emails I’m going through here about the Class A Ortiz situation. We’re going to roll those into the podcast as we can each week. Email us@sports cleveland.com and just put Terry’s talking in the subject line. Thanks for listening. We really appreciate everybody. We’ve made it to 200 episodes and here’s to the next hundred, Terry. Let’s see if we can make it that far, right? Two years from now. We’ll catch you next week on Terry’s Talkin’.