CLEVELAND, Ohio — It’s time for this week’s edition of the Terry’s Talkin’ podcast, with cleveland.com columnist Terry Pluto and host David Campbell. In today’s episode, they talk about the Browns’ hiring of new coach Todd Monken.
Also, they discuss the Cavs and their defense-fueled resurgence; and the new contract that the Guardians offered to José Ramírez.
Highlights:
The Browns have hired experienced offensive coach Todd Monken as their 19th full-time head coach.
Inside Monken’s difficult 2019 season in Cleveland
Monken is known for a blunt, no-nonsense coaching philosophy focused on accountability and winning.
The Browns prioritized fixing their “broken” and lowest-scoring offense by hiring Monken over defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz.
As a play-calling specialist rather than a “CEO” type, Monken’s success will heavily depend on hiring a strong, autonomous defensive coordinator.
Why it’s unlikely that defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz will return after being passed over for the head coaching position.
Why Monken’s immediate priorities should be to establish an offensive vision and build trust with defensive players who supported Schwartz.
The Cavs’ recent success is credited to a dramatic improvement in their defensive performance.
A debate has emerged over Darius Garland’s future role, with Terry suggesting he could lead the second unit upon his return from injury.
The Guardians signed star third baseman Jose Ramirez to a significant four-year, $107 million contract extension.
Ramirez’s deal, which includes deferred money and a hometown discount, is highlighted as a rare act of player loyalty in modern sports.
Remembering the late Gary Briggs, a witty and beloved former trainer for the Cavaliers.
A listener recalls the legendary 1968 World Series story of the Detroit Tigers moving Gold Glove outfielder Mickey Stanley to shortstop.
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: Welcome to a historic day with the Terry’s Talking Podcast. We’re taping this on Wednesday 28th at around 3:00′. Clock. And Terry, the Cleveland Browns have a new head coach. So I guess we should start with that and we’ll see where we go on the Cavs and the Guardians. We’ve got some stuff to work through there, but pretty hectic day. It broke this morning and it’s just been nonstop ever since. Todd Monken is the guy. He’s the 19th full time head coach in the history of the Cleveland Browns. He’s turning 60, I think on February 5th, coming right up. He’s been in, he’s been a coach for almost four decades, 10 or 11 years in the NFL. I wanted to ask you. Well, your initial reaction seems kind of similar to what we’re hearing from fans, which kind of not blown away happily by this. But what was your initial reaction? What have you been processing since then?
Terry Pluto: I’m probably happier. And a lot of fans you think they, they hired Bozo the Clown or something. Based on some of my email, I’m like really? I mean let’s be fair. I mean, I get it. I wanted Schwartz also, you know, given the fact that what the, what the, the big three or whatever the final three became with Monkin and then Nate Shieldhouse, I think question when did you first hear the name Nate Shieldhouse?
David Campbell: Well, I watched him at Illinois when he was quarterback there to watch some Illinois football. But then after that he kind of didn’t really register much with me after that because he started coaching and went to Iowa State and then, you know, into the NFL after that. But so I’m a little more familiar with him. I mean he’s one of the greatest dual threat quarterbacks, if not the greatest dual threat quarterback to ever play at Illinois. So anyway, that was my familiarity.
Terry Pluto: Right. But I’m just saying most of the fans who said well I would rather have had them, him, they probably never heard his name till last week. I mean, can we get real. And I’m just trying to set up the field first. And so his he did call place for a couple years for Matt Campbell at Iowa State. Then he went to the NFL with the Rams and they give these nice titles out like passing game coordinator or whatever. But with the Rams, Sean McVeigh is the head coach. He also calls the place. Then they had Mike LaFleur. LaFleur was the offensive coordinator and I guess number three then would have been Shieldhouse, whatever passing game coordinator. But. And he’d been in the NFL two years. I mean, they had hired this guy. I’m like, oh, please, this is a huge gamble. Now, he may end up being a good coach and something along those lines, but for real. And the fans, like, wanted him. I know one of the talk radio stations had a poll with Schwartz, Monkin and Shieldhouse Shoehouse 1, I guess, because he’s not either one of those guys. But that’s not a particularly great reason to pick somebody. So then you could tell what they were really serious about, David, was a certain profile of personality. They wanted a demanding coach who’s very experienced. And I think that they wanted a change of personality from Kevin. And so then you end up with Monk and Schwartz. I was been joking with somebody’s kind of like, you know, grumpy old men a little bit in that regard, but because, you know, neither one suffers fools very well. But they clearly were looking in that direction, and so that’s what it came down to. But this creates all kinds of dynamics and challenges.
David Campbell: So we’ve. We’ve been in the business a little while, Terry, and we’ve all heard the phrase winning the press conference. You know, when a new coach comes in and wins the press conference. I feel like today on January 28, it’s like all the reaction today, it’s kind of like winning. Winning the day before the press conference happens. And like, there’s. If the Browns start to pile up victories with the. With Todd Monken as coach, like, nobody’s going to remember today’s instant takes that people have. I did. I do find it interesting, the fans. I’m seeing a lot of fan sentiment. That’s because. Because it’s the Browns. They don’t trust the hire. You know what I’m saying? Like, if it was another. So I got a couple of emails here.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Just run through them and then. All right, this first one’s from Norman Strongsville. And he stole one of your Jimmy Cannon things. Terry, nobody asked me, but does it really matter who the next coaches of the Brook Park Haslams? I still have no confidence in them getting anything right ever. This one is from Terry Ramey, longtime listener for our podcast in Burlington, North Carolina. He says, dave and Terry, I’m in shock, and I know I shouldn’t be because it’s the Browns. I just heard they hired Todd Monkin as head coach. My, oh my, this has Haslam’s hands all over it. Wasn’t he the one who backstabbed others when he was with the Browns before? Why? Oh, why? Well, yeah, that we can talk about that too. Why o. Why with all the other people they interviewed, would they pick him? I’m so disgusted by this selection. No wonder we’re the laughing stock of the nf. I bet Kevin Stefanski is rolling in Atlanta. I’m not a big fan of Barry, but I definitely know Monkin wasn’t his pick. Thanks for letting me vent. Thanks, Terry. So let’s go back to. So Todd Monkin was here in Cleveland in 2019 as the offensive coordinator for Freddy Kitchens and it didn’t last long and it didn’t go great. So why don’t you talk about that, Terry, because I know you’ve done some.
Terry Pluto: It was an odd pairing. Todd had just finished three years at Southern Miss as the head coach. He took a team that hadn’t won a game and then I think he went one win his first year, three wins the second year, nine wins the third year. Todd wanted to get back to the NFL where he had been. I think he’s with Jacksonville early on and he got a chance to be offensive coordinator with Tampa Bay. And so he went to that and then, you know, eventually came to the, to the Browns when he was, he had good numbers as an offensive career in Tampa Bay. But I forgot who the head coach was. He was fired. They all were fired. So I remember when he came here, Freddie was just named a head coach and we were trying to figure out frankly why Todd took the job because I heard he was pretty good and why would you want to when Freddie was going to be probably calling the plays. And I think it was a mistake. But Freddie didn’t, wasn’t backstabbed by Todd. That’s like saying, you know, the guy got blown up because he buried a landmin line and then stepped on it. I mean, that was Freddie as a coach. I mean, he blew himself up and he, and he, you know, that all the dumb things he did. Monkin would go to these press conferences and be asked about some of the stuff that Freddie was doing and you could just see he didn’t rip him. But you know, he couldn’t just flat out lie for him. He sort of bit through his tongue. He probably set a record of press conference biting through your tongue and grimacing as you answered. But it obviously didn’t hurt his reputation because when that year was over, Georgia swooped in and hired him. David and I believe Todd was one of the first of where these big time college teams go in and grab these NFL coordinators, right? Take them there and throw NFL type money or more at them. And then he went there. In the three years I was looking at, his teams average like 500 yards offense. I mean, they were. They were just powerhouse.
David Campbell: He was making $2 million a year at Georgia.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. So as a coordinator, I mean, if he was, you know, backstabbing people or whatever, you don’t do that. And then, of course, he gets hired by Harbaugh and, you know, so Kirby Smart and Harbaugh, two of the best. And they don’t tolerate fools either. That’s why I throw that out. That was something. I mean, when Freddy Kitchen’s buddies would have said, but I don’t there. I. I just dismissed the year in Cleveland. I, you know, once in a while we get into a job. You get into a job. You know, why did I take this? This is a mess. And it’s just. Forget it. Because he was successful in Tampa before that. He was successful at Southern Miss before that, and then successful the two OC jobs afterwards.
David Campbell: Okay, sorry to cut you off there, Sherry. I was going to say, I wanted to flashback to December 29, 2022, and it was a couple of days before Georgia played Ohio State in the College Football Playoff semifinal game, which was an epic game at Ohio State. Lost on a missed last second field goal. But our former colleague Douglas Maurice was down covering that. And Todd Monkin had a press conference when he was working for Georgia. And I pulled some of the quotes from that column that Doug did with about Todd and he was asking.
Terry Pluto: This was an epic press conference. It was. Yeah, yeah. You know, but it was revealing to his no nonsense approach. If I remember some of the quotes, and just a reality based thing, and I’m sure this actually has some appeal to the Browns. Go for it.
David Campbell: Okay, I’m gonna. I’ve got the quotes pulled. I’m just gonna run through them. If you want to jump in and stop me. Okay, go ahead. Or we can just go through the whole thing. All right, so this is Todd Monken on December 29, 2022, at. Before the national semifinal. You go from Tampa, where we had gotten better on offense. We ended up being let go. We turned it over too much. And, you know, I thought Cleveland was a tremendous opportunity. I still believe in that. That’s the reason I went there. I just didn’t do a good enough job. I did a poor job with the role that I had there. I have a lot of regret the way I handled certain things. We had good players and we just didn’t win enough. Let’s not kid ourselves about what we do. I’m paid to score points and run the offense. And that relationship only goes so far, and I don’t want it any. Kirby Smart is my boss. My job is to work my a blank blank off for us to be as good as we can be on offense. The moment I don’t see it that way is the moment I’m wrong. This is a business. I’ve gone to organizations that say, this is a family. This isn’t a family. This isn’t a family. You’re going to fire me if we suck. So don’t say it’s a family, okay? This is the way it is. It’s what we choose to do. This is a business, and I get it that way. And my job is to do the best job I can for Kirby Smart. And our players, they pay me a lot of money. We all know that. I value getting paid. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t do this for nothing. But the reality is you have to be careful because your happiness is in winning. It’s about winning. It’s the fight song in the locker room. That’s what it’s about. I’d rather be winning in Alaska than losing in San Diego. So the reality is that’s what this is about. It’s about winning.
Terry Pluto: I forgot that. Why?
David Campbell: Yeah. And then he was asked like, what was his Cleveland? What was his Cleveland regret? And he said that I did a shi blank blank y job.
Terry Pluto: So I don’t think he was there. You got stabbing Freddie in the back with that and was interesting. I didn’t have the quote in front of me, but he gave an interview now, not about a month or so ago where he said, you know, I have to take some blame for Lamar. I didn’t do as good enough job with Lamar, especially this past season. It should have been. So he comes out and says that stuff. I mean, he is a total bottom line guy. And that’s why I remember when the Browns were playing the Ravens, it was last year, and Jameis was the quarterback then. And they asked Monkin before the game about Jamis. And as you could tell, he says what he thinks and he says, I was together with Jameis. He goes, he would come in the office about when I did and leave about when I did. He goes, he was all about football. I know something like, I know he’s got kind of a flaky personality. He goes. He goes, I love the guy. He worked hard. I wish him well. And like, that’s as gushing as you’re gonna get from this Guy. And so I. That actually kind of. Because I was sort of on the fence about Jameis, you know, because he was, he was a little odd with his personality. But I, when I heard that from Monk and I thought, oh, because there’s no reason for him to go on that link now. He is an accomplished offensive coordinator. I mean, that is a fact. And people who want to dismiss this or whatever are just being unfair because they’re unhappy because Rush didn’t get the job or they wanted to hire some. Some 30 year old kid or whatever it was. But to pretend that the Browns just, you know, the Browns is the Browns and they hired some guy and you know, this is not Freddy Kitchens. I mean, this is not a guy who had, you know, basically never been a coordinator before or whatever. You know, this is a guy that. His offenses in Baltimore were good. I was getting these emails from people saying, well, he was throwing the ball too much in Baltimore or whatever. I have it in the column published. I mean, he was in top three in rushing attempts, in the bottom three in passing attempts all the years there. Yeah, maybe there should have been games that should have given the ball more to Derrick Henry or something. But let’s not pretend this is Ken Dorsey. I mean, I’m serious. Let’s look at the. Because what I try to do in my job is because they don’t do what I prefer them to do, I still have to judge it fairly just because they didn’t pick my guy. And what about the guy they did pick and what does he bring here? The Browns looked at that offense which has had the fewest points in the NFL the last years and think, think it’s absolutely broken. And they’re right. And then they decided that when we had a look at Schwartz and we had a look at Monken, frankly, what’s more important for us to fix? And they went for the offense and they knew that that could cost them Schwartz. We’ll see how this plays out. He’s under contract for a year, but they really believe Monkin was their guy. And my newsletter just went out and I knew this was correct, but I did find it. The story is that the Giants were indeed waiting to see if Monkin got this job. If not, he was going to New York with Harbaugh. He wasn’t going to stay here because he and Harbaugh are close. So that’s how it played out. But that was probably the delay. David. My theory is that they were sitting there, well, you know, if we name Harbaugh, excuse me, if we name Jim, we don’t get Monkin because he’ll go with Harbaugh. And if we name Todd, Jen’s going to be all angry. Who knows how that’s going to go.
David Campbell: Yeah, and I think that’s an important point, Terry. Well, a couple things. If you were to name like the top 10 offensive coordinators of the last 15 or so years, like Todd Monken would be near the top of that list, like in terms of his accomplishments. So you’re right. It’s not just some guy. He’s one of the best. He’s one of the best in the business. At what? And I think Jimmy Watkins, our colleague, was making this point in a column he wrote a few weeks ago. But if you do hire Jim Schwartz and he brings in an offensive coordinator and the Brown, you need to score like 28 points a game in the NFL to be a consistent winner. Right. Which is what you were just talking about. But if Jim Schwartz is the head coach and he brings in like a hotshot offensive coordinator and the Browns start scoring 28, 35, 42 points a game, guess what happens in a year or two, right? That guy gets hired.
Terry Pluto: And now you’re. My argument is great. When, when was the last time, seriously.
David Campbell: What was a problem to have?
Terry Pluto: But yeah, it’s like I remember people were saying at Cleveland State before they start, well, you know, if they do get a good coach, Cleveland State in basketball, he’s just going to get job somewhere else. Well, I will tell you this. For the time they won Division 1, until Dennis Gates went to Missouri, not a single coach in Cleveland State in 30 some years went to a better job. And not a single coordinator here, you know, became a head coach because of his experience in Cleveland. If they found a Wunderkin, great. I’d never buy that. That argument, no problem.
David Campbell: But your point about the Browns wanting to fix the offense is paramount here. And if you’re changing offensive coordinators again, it would be a great problem to have if the Browns lost somebody because he was too good. Right. But. But I think it is easier and I don’t think this played a lot into the decision, but I think it might have had a little something to do with it. And again, this is just me talking. I have nothing, no reporting to base this on or anything like that. But it’s easier to replace a defensive coordinator than it is an offensive coordinator. If you can have Todd Monk in here for five, seven years and have continuity with the young quarterbacks you have here, like, that’s a good thing. And I think that probably helped them decide between the two guys. I don’t know. I’m just guessing.
Terry Pluto: Well, they big offensive priority. I think they believe they have a lot more talent on defense, which is true. That it would be an attractive job to somebody. I don’t know who. But the key thing, whether you have Schwartz or you have Monken with this job, neither one has really been a, you know, a. What I would call a CEO head coach. I know Jim was the head coach in Detroit, but I believe he also called the plays on defense there. And I don’t know what Todd did it Southern Miss, but my guess is he did the offense because that was always his calling card.
David Campbell: And Todd, by a CEO coach here, you mean somebody who, who has an offensive coordinator who calls plays in a defensive corner and he oversees everything like Harbaugh.
Terry Pluto: Harbaugh’s right. CEO coach. You know, he is that. And, and so you, you see that. And also just where the guy has enough experience or even if you say he’s calling plays, he can go over on the defensive side and really communicate with people. Whereas in either of these cases, you know, Schwartz has basically zero experience on offense and Todd is zero on defense. So both have to hire what I call a coordinator slash head coach of that unit. And can you believe I forgot who was. Did you see somebody wanted to interview Bubba Ventrone.
David Campbell: For a special teams job?
Terry Pluto: Yeah, yeah, Charger somebody. I forgot who it was. It’s like good.
David Campbell: Yeah. So he might be leaving too.
Terry Pluto: That’s fine.
David Campbell: Terry, I wanted to ask you, who do you think is happy about this hire today? I mean, Todd Monkin’s happy, but people in Berea. Who do you think should be happy? I have one person that I was going to throw up. And this ties back to what you were talking about about Todd Monkins history of running the ball and the Ravens being. And this was in your comm. They led. They were first in the league, second in the league and third in the league in rushing attempts.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: The last three years. But I think Quinshawn Judkins should be happy today. If you’re someone who likes carrying the football and you like a run centered offense, I think that he’ll be happy about the hire today. Is there anybody else you can think of that might kind of be excited that this happened?
Terry Pluto: Hopefully the offensive lineman. But now they got to find an offensive line coach. Maybe they keep this Bloom. I think his name Bloomgren. I forgot. Yes. Yeah, maybe they’ll keep him, but not a lot to recommend him. On what went through now was a tough job. You know, that’s. Now that’s the challenge for Monkett, assuming Jim. All right, let me ask you this, David. Suppose they have a meeting, Schwartz and Barry and Monkin, and they tell him, look, you’re under contract, so you’re either basically being our defense coordinator, or you’re not gonna be coordinator for anybody this year. And suppose Schwartz says, I guess I’ll go back, you know, I’d rather work. How does that play out?
David Campbell: Oh, man. All right, so here’s my Chicago roots playing out again. That reminds me of when the Bears hired Mike Ditka in the early 80s, and they brought him in as an assistant. He was an assistant for Tom Landry at Dallas. And he came back and he’s like, I want to hire my own coaches. George Hallis gave him the job. He’s like, I want to hire my own coaches. The Bears defensive players who were playing for Buddy Ryan at the time all got together and went to George Hallis and said, listen, we have something special going here. We believe in Buddy Ryan and we want to play for him, and we need to keep this guy and we can do some great things. And, you know, we know what happened after that. They. They won the 85 Super bowl and the whole bit. It was kind of a. An era of decade. An era of dominance there before Buddy Ryan left to become a head coach of his own. So it would be something like that where it’s kind of like two teams operating.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: Within the same locker room. It’s like we’re the defense and you’re the offense, and we’re not gonna. We’re not gonna. But we’re going to excel on our own, and the end product will be something that people are going to like. That’s how I could see it working. But I don’t think it’s going to go that way. I really don’t. I don’t think Jim Schwartz would be able to kind of swallow his pride and show up after being passed over. I think this is very.
Terry Pluto: Figures. I’ve been here three years. I know everything. If they don’t want me at this point, I did all my essay work and everything else, and I would rather just go somewhere else. You know, life’s too short. I’m 60. A couple years ago, I had major health problems with my thyroid. I had to step away from full time from the game for two years. And I could understand that, you know, as you get there, and if you force his hand, then it wouldn’t Be good because you know what happened if defense goes this way or that, as you said, maybe sometimes it works, but they’re both divided. But if there’s problems with that, then they turn on each other. And there you go. Yeah, that would be kind of Browns like by the way. Oh, man. So that’s why this is a real challenge now. Maybe Todd laid out exactly who he thinks he can hire and what they can do. They clearly need a big time special teams coach. Now. One thing they do always have going for them when it comes to hiring coaches is they could throw a ton of money at them. That’s what they did with Bill Callahan. What? Bill Callahan was let go. I think he was the interim coach in Dallas or somewhere. I forgot where it was. And within four days they were on the phone with him. Stefanski, I think called him the day or two after and they had that deal done. And I heard they threw a ton of money at him to come in his offensive line coach and they threw a ton of money at Schwartz to come out of the semi retirement to be the defensive defensive coordinator. So they do have that going for them, you know. So the question, and also the other thing that does help is when a new coach, head coach comes in, if you’re a assistant out there, you think, well, he’s probably got to be here a few years. And they did give Stefanski six years. And so you think, well, at least, you know, the bottom line, guy like Todd would probably tell them, look, I’m probably going to be here two or three years anyway. They just hired me. You know, they’re paying me. You know, they all, they all get five year contracts. They’re paying me for five years. You know, we’ll give you a five year deal. And you know, well, it’s not a bad deal. You know, he’s probably going to say, you go somewhere else, this guy’s getting ready to get fired. You know, you know how it is. You’ve been around with we’re all men here. You could just hear that discussion with that. So that might help. But I don’t know who the in the hiring pool is available.
David Campbell: Yeah. And you know, we hear a lot from fans about all the Browns are this and the Browns are dysfunctional and all that stuff. And I think on the flip side of that, I think there’s something to be said for coaches who want to come here if you can win a Super bowl in Cleveland. Like talk about a legacy. Like, you know, you win a Super bowl with the 49ers or with the Chiefs, like, they’ve been there and done it. If you do it in Cleveland and you’re part of that, that’s really, that’s like, you can call it a career after that, right?
Terry Pluto: You have, you have two winning seasons in a row that build the statue. I’m serious. Back to Bernie. Two winning seasons in a row. No, say he’s here four years and next year, whether they win this year five, say they win seven, it’s probably going to be right, you got no quarterback whatever. But then all of a sudden they knock out a 9 and 8 and 11 and 6, go to the playoffs. Don’t you know, we’ll be calling it Monkinville. I mean, it’s just, that’s the way the Browns fans are.
David Campbell: Yeah. But like, what I guess what I was saying is that, you know, when Jimmy Haslam and D. Haslam bought the Browns, their, their fellow, their fellow owners, you know, they were, they used to own part of the Steelers, right. And people were telling there’s only one Cleveland Browns and it’s a, it’s a legacy, storied franchise. If you can buy the Browns, you should do it. And I’m just trying to think as a coach, if you go, if you come here and have success, yeah, it’s pretty remarkable.
Terry Pluto: Like, I mean, I’m not talking about super bowl, just you start having winning seasons. That’s why what I mean to me, I’m still baffled by the Sean McDermott theme. Other than it’s the Kurtz are pretty good that we talk about. You know, the guy went, took Buffalo to the playoffs for the first time in 17 years, had one losing season. He went to the playoffs with Tyrod Taylor and, and he took a quarterback in Josh Allen who was not a finished product at all. You could look at his stats and things and, and help there. Now, they went through different offensive coordinators, but in the end they’re watchable, relevant, all the stuff that we don’t have. And Sean McDermott, I believe, will always be revered in Buffalo by the fans because odds are they probably won’t repeat that either, I may add. And he’ll always be special, Tomlin, always be special in Pittsburgh, despite all their there. And you’re right here, Marty Schottenheimer is still the most revered coach, except then you have to go back to Blanton, Collier and Paul Brown. That’s it. And so that’s why you’re correct in there, because the bar is so low. By the way, I did look up, I wondered had Todd ever Interviewed any for any other head coaching jobs A year ago at this time, 20, 25, he interviewed for your Bears, David, and also the Jacksonville Jaguars. Didn’t get them, but he interviewed.
David Campbell: All right. One thing I was curious about, Terry, what advice would you give Todd Monkin coming in here? He sets foot in Berea the first. You know, what do you think he needs to do when he hits the ground in Cleveland?
Terry Pluto: He needs to set out exactly what type of offense he wants to have. Because it’s been a mishmash of Kevin calling plays. Kevin gives up plays. Ken Dorsey, I mean, they didn’t end up that way. But when he went starting from opening day of 24 to, I think game seven of 25, because I did the stats on this. So in approximately. What’s that like? That’s like, yeah, 24 games, they have thrown more passes than anybody else in the NFL. I mean, the first thing I say that stops. We’re not doing that anymore. Then secondly, you know, he’s got a deal with Shador. And the other questions, what about quarterback? I tell you, you look at Sam Darnold, what he’s done, and you look at Baker and this. I’ve been in kind of the bridge quarterback camp for a while, and I’m even more entrenched there. I don’t know who’s going to be available this time around. You know, all of a sudden, Mac Jones goes to San Francisco, plays a couple good games. Did Sam Barnold get fixed in San Francisco? Because remember, Jones has a little success early on with New England. And so somebody like that bring him in with Todd. I see. As opposed to, I mean, who are you going to draft?
David Campbell: Yeah. And so I think what you’re saying, you know, we’ve heard stories about when Vrabel went to the Patriots, the first thing that he did was they practiced the Victory formation. And he’s like, we’re going to be doing this a lot. We got to know how to. We have to get it right. So it’s about setting the vision of what success looks like. And that’s what you think he needs to do on offense is like, this is what. This is what our winning offense is. Is going to look like. I get that.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: My. My advice is I think there’s a lot of defensive players with the Browns who are probably upset today.
Terry Pluto: Yes. Yes.
David Campbell: And I would advise him to spend a lot of time not talking X’s and O’s with those guys, but kind of explaining. Not explaining, but just getting with those guys and listening and listen yeah, that’s a great way to put it, Terry. And we’re not going to talk about X’s and O’s today. I just want to. I want to show you who I am, what I’m about and, you know, why you should follow my program and why you mattered what we’re doing here.
Terry Pluto: I mean, Kenny Atkinson, when he got the cast job, remember he was coaching in France in the Olympics and in between, he was like flying over the country. Grant’s a smaller group of guys to meet with these people and to really. And he told me, he said, I spent more time listening than talking because I wanted to see what they wanted there. And, you know, they’re successful pros. And so, I mean, the first thing you’re right, you probably. The first thing, I just take Myles Garrett to launch and then find out what works, what doesn’t. You know, get Denzel, get Delp it, get some of these other guys in there and talk to them so that they don’t feel he’s just the coach of the offense, but he’s the coach. I really like that, David. You get a better. You had a better idea than I did.
David Campbell: Well, no, I just. I mean, we heard how much those guys spoke out for Jim Schwartz for the end of the season, and I’m sure they’re disappointed. Right?
Terry Pluto: Sure.
David Campbell: So they don’t really.
Terry Pluto: Maybe some of them were in Baltimore when Monkin was there or, you know, I don’t know if any employee to Georgia or something. But I mean, if you go back to 2019, I guess Ward was still was here and Miles, not too many others. But again, Monkin was doing the offense back then, so. Yeah, you’re correct. He’s gonna have to show he’s the head coach and how this works. So.
David Campbell: I like yours, too. I think that’s good. Like, setting a vision for the offense is really important, especially with the youth in the quarterback room because they haven’t.
Terry Pluto: Done it for two years.
David Campbell: Absolutely. All right, I was going to. Before we wrap up, I was going to run through the coaching openings and who’s filled them real quick. Okay, so Giants, John Harbaugh, Falcons, Kevin Stefanski. The Dolphins, Jeff Halfley. The Titans hired Robert Sala. Joe Brady has gone to the Bills. The Ravens have hired Jesse Minter. Steelers got Mike McCarthy and then the Browns with Todd Monkin. So I think we’re left with the Raiders and the Cardinals. Right. Those are the only two left. I haven’t seen anything on those, so.
Terry Pluto: And if you. Yeah. And if you look at like this morning, before the Browns hired, if you were. When the 10 jobs came out, I had like four of them. In the bottom jobs, Tennessee was one. Arizona, Las Vegas and Cleveland, Tennessee hired a while ago. Who did they hire? I forgot. Salah.
David Campbell: Yeah, Salah. Yeah.
Terry Pluto: Okay. Not a bad choice because he’ll come in with some macho stuff and you know that. And you need that again, some fire in that. But you’re still looking. Arizona still looking around. And I would have thought the Raiders might have got something going. You do have the number one pick and you got a ton of cap money. But I don’t know what the problem there is. You know the other thing that happens now in modern media because everything is so immediate, it feels like it’s June already. Before the Browns hired a coach, where in the old days it was just, you know, people paid attention, but it wasn’t like every 10 minutes, oh, I gotta check X or I gotta go on ESPN or I gotta go to cleveland.com or I gotta go to wherever it is. Not just for the rumors here, but the rumors all over the league. And why aren’t they doing something? Why aren’t they doing something? They got to be doing something. It’s been forever.
David Campbell: I’ve consumed 700 stories this week and tweets and social media posts about the coaching search. Yeah, yeah, you’re right. It speeds up the time, doesn’t it? It makes it seem like it’s going.
Terry Pluto: A lot faster because everything is just so hyper speed. And I just thought I’d throw that in there. I mean, granted the. The Browns took later to hire a coach than some others, but there’s still a couple teams looking and still a couple teams just recently hired. I mean, it’s interesting. Joe Brady got the job with the Bills. I guess that was Josh Allen, like Joe Brady. That sounded like that to me. And you know, Brady, I think he’d interview somewhere else last year. I forgot where or something, but that’s.
David Campbell: Who knows. It’s a good point. I was just going to mention. So the Browns played the Bengals on January 1st 4th, right?
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: So it’s been three weeks and three days and they have coached, correct? Yeah.
Terry Pluto: Now, in some cases, I think Atlanta targeted Kevin. They probably they wanted him. The Giants curly targeted Harbaugh and they were able with Jackson Dart, I think, to throw that really impressive package at him. And the Steelers targeted Mike McCarthy, which surprised me, but that was Crowley, the guy they wanted. The Browns I don’t think targeted anyone. I think they had some guys because if Shorts Were the target, it would not have gone on this whole.
David Campbell: Well, and the Browns, we’ve seen some reporting on this, but they’re all about process and target somebody. The process, you shouldn’t even have a process the way they would think about it. It’s like we’re going to do this in a methodical way. We’re going to use data, we’re going to ask these guys some questions and here’s how it’s going to go.
Terry Pluto: I did a little reporting on that. Well, one, there’s a personality test. Now that’s the thing. I mean if you’re talking to Jim Harbaugh or something, you know, or John Harbaugh, either one of them, you’re waving that, you know, that kind of thing. But the quote unquote essay questions I was told were four to six football specific questions that they wanted guys more based, philosophical, you know, how do you feel about this or that? Maybe your plans for assistant coaches and then those were going to be the basis for the second interview. So it’s a way to have the guy prepared. That’s what I was told. Now maybe somebody out there went through this whole process and said, well, they just lied to you. Terry. It was, you know, it was all about an essay on what did you do in your summer vacation or how do you see your place in the universe. I mean, if that’s the case, that’s stupid. But it’s like Todd Monkin, look at our quarterbacks. How do you rate them? What do we need to do here? How do you see that? That’s a good essay question.
David Campbell: Todd Mong and a good jumping off point for an interview.
Terry Pluto: What about our offensive line? Now, you know, it’s older. Take a look at what we got coming and going. What do we need to do? So that would be actually, I’ve had job interviews that actually wouldn’t bother me. Four or five specific questions, not that you have to write forever, but to get me focused, that’s fine. And I have taken those personality tests over the years. I think after a while you sort of almost see what they want. You know, you kind of figure out how to answer those. But okay, if it makes some corporate dweeb happy, fine, whatever. I don’t think that was a big detriment. Now the other thing to keep in mind when coaches withdraw, remember how powerful agents are in this. There are several agents that are the key ones for these coaches. Sometimes when the agent says, well if my guy’s not going to get it, just let us withdraw. It looks Better than you didn’t get it. So that sometimes I think not in all cases, but I think in some of these cases, that’s what happened. And also, you. Fine, because I may need that agent to do me a favor later on because that agent also may be representing the, you know, the secondary coach that I want or the specialty coach or whatever, and I could maybe get higher on their priority interview list or, you know, there’s a lot of. There’s a lot going on behind the curtain with all these coach coaching hires. Well below the level of head coach.
David Campbell: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I took a personality test one time and I failed, Terry, so I don’t know what that says, but I had.
Terry Pluto: A hair test and I failed.
David Campbell: All right, should we take a break here real quick?
Terry Pluto: No, I want to just talk about Shador Sanders making the pro ball.
David Campbell: Tim Belichick, our colleague, put together a post. He did a roundup of social media today, and I think it was a reporter in New York who said Todd Monkin was drawn in by the allure of a Pro Bowl. I thought that was a great line, so.
Terry Pluto: Oh, could you. I have to admit, I would love to sit in the first meeting with Monkin and Chidor where they did film.
David Campbell: Oh, yeah.
Terry Pluto: And, you know, Shador goes on one of those wandering around backwards things.
David Campbell: Could be a.
Terry Pluto: That would be. That would be very interesting.
David Campbell: Hopefully, Hard Knocks will be back in here.
Terry Pluto: Right. To Shador’s credit, though, you know, from everything I’ve heard, I mean, he, you know, he was doing all those extra coaching sessions, and I’m not a Shador fan, believe me, I’m not on the social media whatever. But, you know, credit where credit is due. He was doing all the extra coaching things, all the work that they asked him to do. He did it, but I just don’t think he’s very good. But that’s up to Monkin now to figure out.
David Campbell: All right, well, that’ll be a topic for another day. We have a lot of time to dissect the quarterback room and the draft and all that, so. All right, we’ll take a break here. When we come back, I want to ask Terry about what he’s seeing with the resurgent Cavaliers. So we’ll talk about that and more when we return on Terry’s Talk. Welcome back to Terry’s Talking. Terry, you have a couple of appearances. One is tonight down at the Music Box. I think it’s sold out with you and Regina Brett, and then there’s one tomorrow. Talk about either or both of those.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, Tonight I was told it was sold out but my guess is if you show up, I doubt everybody who bought a ticket it’s going to show up as a benefit for the Haven of Rest, by the way, which is Akron City Mission, close to my heart. That’s Robert and I do ministry there a couple times a month and been doing that since 1998. So really a worthy cause. Then on Thursday night, 6:30, this one’s a freebie and it’s at the new Barnes and Noble in Strongville. I’ve not been there but I heard it’s really, really nice. I went to the New Strongs and Barnes and Noble in North Canton and that was a really nice store. So I’m just excited to see anybody’s opening bookstore bookstores. There was one in Cleveland. I did a appearance called Visible Books down on it’s like we’re on West 40 something or other. And that’s, that’s a cool place too. And it’s sort of a coffee shop, book bookstore thing and also the area where people give talks and those. So I’m all for reassert re bookstores reviving themselves.
David Campbell: Cool. Yeah. So if you wanted to check out tonight’s event at the Music Box down in the Flats, you can go to musicboxcle.com and there’s a list of events there and you can find out more about that. And then Terry’s appearance tomorrow, Barnes and Nobles, 16700 Royalton Road. And that is at 6:30 tomorrow, January 29th.
Terry Pluto: I should add to the music box one that’s a faith based one. Regina Brett, former point dealer columnist, and I are doing it together and Roberta’s gonna be singing and we did one there a couple months ago and the demand was real big. So we do it again.
David Campbell: Nice. And I see the sun’s out now so hopefully people can get down there and it won’t be too bad with weather and everything.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, driving around is fine. You just freeze. But don’t take a stagecoach.
David Campbell: That’s right. All right, Terry. The Cavaliers have not lost since we our last podcast. They’re up to 28 and 20. They’re the number five seed in the East. I think they’re only a game behind Toronto right now for the fourth spot. And I think the biggest difference we’ve seen is the defense and you know we can go through the numbers. I know they’ve been I think you had in your column and maybe it was in your newsletter today. I think in the last seven games they’ve held the other team to 109 points on average.
Terry Pluto: Wow. Sounds like a lot. Except the average team almost scores 118. And in six of their wins of the last seven, they’ve held them to 104. So that it’s not. Sometimes you could do that by playing a real slow pace or whatever. That’s not what they’re doing. They’re just playing better defense. They’ve been owning the boards. They’ve been outscoring teams in the paint. They’ve changed around from this obsession with just taking three pointers all the time to taking them some of the time, but really using their size. And not only that with Nance, excuse me, with Jared Allen and with Mobley, but like Donovan’s been going to the rim more often. And you’ve seen some with Tyson. Tyson’s a big part of this too, because, I mean, you know, the fact is right now, this is another one of those where you look at Garland, yes, Garland no. When Garland’s played this year, they’re 13 and 13. When he’s been out, they’re 15 and 7. And two years ago, when Garland missed a fair amount of time, I forgot what their winning percentage was. But with him, but without them, they went 17 and 8. And that’s when Streuss was in the back court with Donovan. And I like the bigger backcourt. Now, of course, you got. You got Garland’s hurt. Garland’s on a max contract. One of my things I’ve thrown out, I don’t think they’ll do it. But players like Garland, who’s kind of are smaller, David, and kind of thin, but can score some, they tend to thrive being that instant offense off the bench. They come in and then also they’re matched up generally facing kind of lesser opponents where their defensive problems isn’t quite as glaring. But I don’t know if they’ll actually go to that. But that’s always. I’m always interested in trying to bolster the bench. You know, I pushed for Jared Allen coming off the bench or whatever, but now, David, they’ve gone big. You’ve got Dwight, you got Dean Wade, and you’ve got Allen and you’ve got Mobley. Now Mobley’s out. Of course, just as they get rolling, it gives another injury, calf muscle, one to three weeks, they said. Unfortunately, it’s the same cast muscle he hurt in early December, so we’ll see how bad that is. But that reminded me that front line a little bit when JB was here and they had Lori market in with Allen and with Mobley, and that was a good defensive team.
David Campbell: So I was looking at the stats from the game the other night, the home game against Orlando, and you know, you look at the minutes and it’s like, all right, Mitchell 35, Mobley 35, Tyson 34, Allen 33, Wade 28. Which is, you know, more than you’d usually see from him, I would think his injury history thing. But like, Tomlin, 23, Porter 15, Proctor 14. Ball 13, Nan 6. Like, I’m trying to insert Darius Garland back into this, and I like the bench idea and I think it should work. And I think if you prioritize size and defense and let the scoring take care of itself, I think Darius Garland coming off the bench and giving that second unit some pop, some offensive pop, I think that’s a really good formula and I think it’s something the Cavs should look at. Right.
Terry Pluto: The problem, I love the bench group where you have Porter and you have Tomlin and you have Proctor. Bring some energy ball. Ball is good defensively in that, but there’s not a shooter in the bunch and they could really use that. And so it’ll be interesting what Kenny does as things go along. But look, Garo’s got to get back on the floor and stay there for more than two weeks now. It’s the other foot. I don’t mean to be sarcastic, but I mean, No, I know it’s.
David Campbell: It’s. It’s not quite the junior Solgauskas foot problem status yet, but it’s. It’s been a lot of games, that’s for sure.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. All right.
David Campbell: The Cavs are playing LeBron James and the Lakers tonight at home here in Cleveland at 7 o’ clock down at the Arena. And then the Cavs will be embarking on a long road trip. Their Friday at Phoenix, Sunday at Portland.
Terry Pluto: You said a bad word. A road trip.
David Campbell: They’re embarking on a trip. Sorry.
Terry Pluto: That’s right. The light. Hal Lebowitz would not be happy.
David Campbell: That’s right.
Terry Pluto: Terry. There’s no such thing as a road trip. The team is either on the road trip.
David Campbell: Habits are hard to break. They’re going to be playing five games in a row out West.
Terry Pluto: How about that?
David Campbell: Friday at Phoenix, Sunday at Portland, Wednesday at next week at the Clippers, February 7th at Sacramento, and then the following Monday, which is the 9th of February at Denver. So that will be some interesting basketball.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: All right.
Terry Pluto: If Mobley’s off for some of this, this is. This is now. This takes out what they’ve been doing. You know, Mobley’s been going to the rim a lot, scoring more inside. He still sometimes pulls up and just fight fires. It’s like. It’s like the ball hit off Jose’s bat. This is line drive that just goes, you know, at the rim from 25ft. But when they’ve gotten more and more to go to the. Go to the rim, score, draw some files, and then defensively. But now it’s going to be hard. I’ll be interested to see what he does tonight. I mean, I guess you go Allen, Wade. I don’t know. He’s going to start. We’ll find out.
David Campbell: All right, Terry, this is, and I think you wrote about this in your newsletter today, the probably most underplayed story of the year. The. And we, like, if you listen to Terry’s talking, talking, like, sometimes we come up with some stuff, right? Last week we were talking about do the guardians need to do something for Jose Ramirez because of all this money that is being thrown around. And like a few days later, they added four years and $107 million to his contract that he signed before 2022. And I know you were surprised because people are like shrugging their shoulders and like, yeah, great. But it’s a pretty big deal.
Terry Pluto: It’s a big deal because. Well, first of all, it’s a message to the other players that we recognize greatness and we want to reward it. And it’s a message to Jose and sending a message that I spent my career here. I wasn’t lying when I said I wanted to stay here back in 22 when he signed a contract extension and that I want all these records and I think I can win here. And so he. He did that. And then on top of that, they’re deferring 72, basically 10 million a year. His contract is 25 million a year for each of the next seven years. Out of that 10 million, each year is deferred for down the line. I mean, you know, Jose is. I’m making a ton of money. That’s his view, dude. So I want to. I’m not worried about making more money than Frankie Lindor or somebody like that. I mean, I want to be paid. I want to be the highest paid player on the team, but I want to win and I want to be in clay for where they can leave me alone and I can play ball. I mean, that’s really how he looks at it. We win, they leave me alone. I play ball. And there’s no guarantee that you up and go to New York. That it’s going to be better and it could be worse. Because when you look at how the Mets have played since Lindor went there five years ago, it’s not nearly as well as the Guardians have played in this. Fan.
David Campbell: I’ve been thinking about this and I wanted to ask, do you think we will ever see this happen again? Is this like a once in a lifetime situation? I mean, certainly in Cleveland, but I’m even thinking like in Major League Baseball where a guy comes up with one team and stays there forever and takes. I mean, you know, it is at a hometown discount because he likes where he is. I don’t think we might never see this ever again. Right?
Terry Pluto: No. And even to say Jose ends up he’s still playing at 40 and his contract’s up and he wants to play one more year and ends up playing for the Red Sox, I mean, that doesn’t count. You know, you would have played eight zillion years here. No, I don’t think so. Jose, like his agent, put out a tweet defending himself, the agent, for taking the contract because he would sell you. Oh, you sold them short or whatever. But his agent was representing Jose’s interest. This is what Jose wanted. And as he mentioned, Jose will walk away from baseball having made 272 million and laughing all the way to Cooperstown. He also mentioned that in the last four years of this contract, he will be paid, I believe, something like 106 million, which by far is the most money ever guaranteed a player 36 years or older. And so that’s why he was kind of defending himself. But. And also that’s hard for these agents because they keep score with contracts. And sometimes when you sign a quote, unquote bad contract, another agent uses that against you to steal your client. Of course, Jose ain’t going anywhere. And that’s. But I. This is almost unprecedented.
David Campbell: Yeah. And again, I. I don’t know that we’ll ever see this again. Like, where somebody stays with the same team, doesn’t jump somewhere else for more money to the Dodgers.
Terry Pluto: Crazy stuff with Jose, too. David, the last two years are the first times in his career he’s stolen over 40 bases. How does he do that? I mean, look at him. He’s not really fast. He doesn’t look fast. I’m not even sure he runs fast. He just steals bases because he’s Jose and he knows how to play.
David Campbell: That’ll be like his last career accomplishment with the Guardians or something. He’ll steal 40 when he’s 40.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, right. 40 for 40. Yeah. Or whatever. It’s just. And it’s. And you watch him during the games, where they have the camera that goes to the corner of the dugout there during the games. It’s like it’s his office during the game. You know, Angel Martinez is there. Some of those other guys, he’s got the iPad and they’re looking at some stuff. And, you know, it’s just. He’s just so locked in. I think in the last. I have a newsletter something like he’s missed like 15 games in the last four years total or some crazy thing like that. He played with a broken bone in his hand a few years ago, part of the year.
David Campbell: It just never tells anybody, never complains.
Terry Pluto: No, nothing. Just. Yeah. If anything, leave me alone, don’t bring it up. And that’s why you have to, you know, just appreciate this. And odds are the last couple years of contract, Jose is not going to be the Jose we know. But so what, you know, you’ve had him here and I still have that here. And I ran a picture of him when I wrote the combo about Jose of him running around with that flag last year when they won the Central Division. He was just like some kid who won the state title and something. I mean, just. He was so excited.
David Campbell: Yeah, it was a great moment.
Terry Pluto: Yeah.
David Campbell: All right, well, we’ll be barreling towards Spring Train before we know it here. It’s. It’ll be February when we podcast next week, so pretty soon Paul Hoynes will be in Arizona and you will too. So we’ll be. It’s coming up fast, so. Alright, couple of emails to wrap us up here, Terry. This first one is from Ted M. Anthony, and Ted says. Hi, Terry, I want to start by saying that I love your weekly podcast. You and Dave do a really great job. Thanks for that, Ted. That’s much appreciated. I wrote to you a while back. You sent a very nice reply and mentioned that you dined at a local seafood restaurant, Abbeville, Louisiana, with Joe Tate.
Terry Pluto: Yes.
David Campbell: Is that how you say it? Abbeville. Wish I could have bumped into you guys and prodded you for some great Cleveland sports Insider stories. I went to high school at Glen Oak High School in Canton, and Gary Briggs Briggsy was our trainer for all the sports teams. He was a real character, but also a positive influence for me and all of my teammates. I was saddened to hear that he passed away recently, but I also look back fondly at all the great memories and I’m thankful that I got a chance to show a Chance to know Gary before he hit the big time. I’m wondering if you have any funny or interesting stories about Gary that you might want to share on your podcast. Also, I know it’s a long shot, but if you ever get down to Louisiana again, shoot me a line. I would be honored to buy you lunch or dinner at a great Louisiana restaurant. Again, this from Ted. So, Gary Briggs, Terry.
Terry Pluto: We have the crawfish there at that place. Joe Tate and I. And I. Oh, yeah, I remember that. Gary Briggs is a longtime trainer with the Cavs. 70s and 80s. And during the. The years that I covered them at the old Coliseum, we sat down at the end of the scores table right next to the bench. So I was sitting right at the end of the scores table right next to Gary Briggs. And so I was, you know, once while I talked to him in between or whatever, and I. And he. I’m early on, so I’m. I’m listening to this, and he was like yelling, three seconds. At least twice a quarter. Three seconds. That’s three seconds. And I finally said his name was Briggs. He was like, what is that about? He goes, if I get one. And then, then he says, watch. And then he would get one. He’d like, punch, you know, punching. Ah, I got that one. So he said, trainers do that. They. They had a thing. Three seconds, or, you know, he’s out of bounds. He’s out of bounds. But the other line that I love, this, like, you know how a guy catches the past and he like, steps on the. Steps on the line, you know, out of bounds, line is turnover. And Briggs will lean over and go, you know, they just painted that line there yesterday. You can’t blame him. He has stuff like that that he would say. And he was like. He was a crusty guy, too, but the players really did love him. And I know he. I mean, God, those guys worked so many hours back then, and they didn’t have all the assistant trainers and everybody else that these guys have now. You know, the sports science guys, as they call them, with the, you know, the physical trainings.
David Campbell: Oh, yeah. I mean, the trainers are there in the morning giving guys treatment before, shoot around and.
Terry Pluto: And everything.
David Campbell: They’re late at night after the game, giving guys ice. And.
Terry Pluto: Remember that. Yeah, they just painted those lines on the floor yesterday. So you can’t really blame them.
David Campbell: So his thing was if he. If he yelled out three seconds five times a game or whatever, and he got one call, that was a great percentage. Right?
Terry Pluto: Well, you know, it’s the old what is it? Suggestion, you know, just get it out there. Yeah, I never heard an official go by and say would you just shut up already about the three seconds.
David Campbell: Right.
Terry Pluto: That’s what tell me. I guess other guys yell three seconds too. So it’s all right.
David Campbell: I do have one more baseball related email here. Since the weather is so awful and cold, I thought it’d be nice to think about some baseball. And this comes from Robert Helenava from Pontiac, Michigan. Robert, I hope I got. I hope I got your last name right. He says, hello David and Terry, I’ve been listening to a few years now and I enjoy your podcast. Podcast on sports and also non sporting topics too. Thanks for that. Appreciate it. Robert, on your last show, this probably a few weeks ago now, Terry, you both were discussing shuffling infielders to the outfield and doing the opposite move as being a rare feat. I have a lasting memory from my youth on that accord. Mickey Stanley, a bona fide major league center fielder, moved to shortstop in the 1968 World Series. He’d never played the position previously and he went error free in the seven game series. Beyond that feat, Mickey Lolich won three games in that series while 31 game winner Denny McLean was just average at best, winning and losing a game. Take care, Robert Helena P.S. my last visits to Cleveland, I went to the old baseball park, namely League park in the Huff neighborhood. Babe Ruth hit more home runs in Cleveland than any other city, I was told. Beautiful little museum and refurbished ballpark. So that’s before my time, Terry.
Terry Pluto: All right. But I will tell you, the 1968 Tigers are one of my favorite teams because as a kid I was born in 55 and remember this is like maybe 10 or 20 games on TV, period. But the Tigers were on WJR out of Detroit, the great voice of the Great Lakes with Ernie Harwell. So I used to listen to them at night and you know, kind of Detroit cool. I still have a soft spot for the Tigers, you know, sort of the same type of cities. Well, that team was amazing, but again, a manager named Mayo Smith. And that year they had a shortstop. This shows you how when you’re a kid you remember things. Can’t remember yesterday. Ray Euler was a regular season shortstop. I think he hit about 160. This is 68. Remember only Karl Yastrinski had 300 that year. It was the year of the pitcher. So I believe Stanley played shortstop at high school or something. But he was, he was an excellent center fielder, almost like Marquise Grissom or one of Those kind of guys that get really just go get the ball. But all sudden, remember this before the DH also. So he’s sitting there going, how can we get some more offense? Even though Stanley wasn’t a great hitter, at least might hit more than 160. So he talked to him and they started hitting ground balls at short and. And so they moved him there and I forgot who they put in the outfield. I think Jim Northrup ended up playing center. But it’s like, I mean, I could name, I’m going to name the. I’m going to name, I believe the starting lineup. I’m probably going to by doing free end was a catcher. Norm Cash played first. Dick McCall played second. Boy, we’re usually played short. And I forgot the third basement. I knew the minute I bragged about it, I went, al K line wasn’t right. And then they had. Jen Northrup was usually in left. And then they were playing Stanley and center. That was usually it.
David Campbell: 8 out of 9 is not bad.
Terry Pluto: Mickey Lowich and Earl Wilson and Denny McLean were the big three. And a lot of times that’s about all they needed. And it was a fantastic team. And they play the Cardinals. It was great World Series, but yeah, like now people would, I guess to the point is people would go crazy. You’re doing what for the World Series? Remember, there were no playoffs. You just kind of won the thing and went, you’re taking your center field or you can play them at short in the World Series. And it worked.
David Campbell: Man, that was, that was bold. Yeah, I thought it was pretty bold when the Guardians put Chase Dilauto in center field for his first major league game.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, at least they didn’t ask him to play short.
David Campbell: Yeah, no kidding. Taking a guy who’s never played the position before and just throwing him out there.
Terry Pluto: Throw him out there. I mean. And the thing that impressed me about the water, that in those two games there was a ball hit in the gap and he went and cut it off and he just turned and fired a dart to third base. I mean, it was the absolute. It was a pure outfield instinctual play. And I remember when I first saw him play, he was at Lake county and he was playing right field then. Or maybe center, I forgot which. It was a double header. But he made a very similar play. Cut a ball off in a gap turn and threw a rocket throw exactly to the right base. And it could have been cut off if needed. And I’m like, ooh, they have an outfielder. And so that’s. Hopefully we’ll be talking about that this year because they, they ain’t going to do much. David, on the, on the batting end of it. I’m going to write about that for this weekend. I had a long talk with Chris Antonetti last weekend. Of course Kristen talked at the Akron Rubber Rubber Ducks like Winter Festival.
David Campbell: Yeah, the Hut stove.
Terry Pluto: Mike Bona was there and he talked about that. You know you look at but guys we’ve given money to for one year, whether it’s Eddie Rosario or Carlos Santana, most of these kind of one year rentals, what do they really get out of them? And the answer is not much. So that’s why I think they were looking more at we’ve got some guys who want to play and we’ll go for it. Now I would love, still love to see them pull a trade or something to add a right handed back but does I hear zero about that. But I also know with the guardians usually you hear it like two seconds before it’s announced. That’s when it leaks out and it’s big.
David Campbell: It’s bigger than you ever thought it would be when it does happen.
Terry Pluto: Yeah. Well even like last year I there were no hints that Naylor was going to be traded. I mean that they might trade him, sure. But he was going to be traded for Slade Sacconi or that kind of complimented complicated three way deal where Jimenez went ended up with the Blue Jays and Cleveland got Ortiz. So they, they tend to just sort of or even you know, Jose’s yeah.
David Campbell: New contract came out of nowhere.
Terry Pluto: I think his agent sort of announced that. But so.
David Campbell: Well, we previewed it.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, we did.
David Campbell: You could say so.
Terry Pluto: All right. I have a story on that. The the tribe had a catcher in the old days named Roger Peckinpah. And there’s a writer for the pine dealer named Dennis Lustig. And Lustig I guess was because Danny Cogwin told me this story. And so the phone call comes in and Cogwin answers it and yells across from hey Dennis, Dennis, there’s a guy on the phone. He says I’m the late Roger Peckinpah. And I guess Dennis in his story had called Peckinpah the late Roger Peckinpah early. Well that’s now here’s the good part. So about two years later, Peckinpah does indeed become the late Roger Peckinpah. And then Coughlin says I yell over to Dennis a Roger Peckinpah died and caught and went lost. I had that two years ago.
David Campbell: He had the scoop.
Terry Pluto: So there you Are.
David Campbell: All right, well, we’ll end it on that. I did want to say Robert mentioned League Park. If you ever get a chance here in town, you get a chance to head over there. 76th in Lexington.
Terry Pluto: Yeah, it’s a neat thing. I watched a high school game there about two years ago and it was really cool to see it. The museum is good. The neighborhood’s better than like when I used to tutor over there. I tutored at John Raper Elementary. I think was 72nd and Huffer 77. The school’s even gone. When I was at Cleveland State for a year, I was helping a sixth grade class. Mrs. Hines, I remember, was the teacher and I was tutoring math for her. It was kind of a government program making some money, working with kids because my degree was secondary too. So I was over there a lot. It was a lot rougher then, frankly than now. So I wouldn’t have no problem down there going during the day in that.
David Campbell: Oh yeah, I went down there last Father’s Day. I brought my kids down. They have a thing on Father’s Day where you can play catch on the field. It’s artificial turf field. Now this league park, when they refurbished it, they made it the same dimensions as the old league park. And so I think to right field is like 280.
Terry Pluto: Something. Yeah.
David Campbell: But there’s a 75 foot high fence green and. Yeah. And then I think straightaway centered is center is like 4:40 or something ridiculous like. But it’s neat just to stand in the place where, you know, Babe Ruth played. And they have a really nice museum there. It’s a nice way to spend a couple of hours. So.
Terry Pluto: Absolutely.
David Campbell: Thanks for mentioning that, Robert. All right, Terry, you mentioned your newsletter a couple times. We would love to have our listeners sign up for that and subscribe. You can go to cleveland.com Pluto there’s a blue bar at the top. Click on that and subscribe. I think you get two weeks free of the newsletter. It comes out every Wednesday and we’d love to hear from you. Email us. I’ve got a bunch of stuff we didn’t get to today. Emails that our listeners have sent in because of the coaching hire today, which was kind of breaking news. But hit us with your thoughts, comments, questions, and you can send those emails to sportscleveland.com and just put Terry’s talking in the subject line. You got anything else, Terry?
Terry Pluto: That’ll do it. All right.
David Campbell: Good luck tonight at your event. I hope it’s a great time. It sounds like you’re gonna have a big crowd there. We’ll see you all next time on Terry’s Talkin’.