Skubal Day, Illini Football

Welcome to the jungle. A very good Tuesday to you. I'm Jim Rome and the program is presented by FanDuel. Always presented by FanDuel. Great to have them. Great to have you. Great to be here. All right. Good show for you today. In fact, good show for you every single day. But today especially. Why don't we get right to it? You know where to find me.

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and you can email me at Rome, R-O-M-E, at Habitat.com. All right, so the interview is set up like this, coming up at 1240 or in about 40 minutes from right now. The head football coach at Illinois, Brett Bielema.

Good jungle guy. Brett Bielema coming up in hour one. Coming up in hour number two, always look forward to this. Mike Sando from The Athletic dropped his tear column.

The quarterbacks in their tears. Who's rising up? Who's falling down? That's always a great read.

This year is no different. Mike Sando coming up at 140. So all of those things and then your takes and my thoughts. All right, so get up in here.

If you want to know also on the other side of the glass, Alex Hardy, still running the board. Alex! I'll be taking a few days off.

Tommy. Ding. In his customary spot. In the back row.

Cindy! XCR. I don't know. I can't see in.

There's still no camera. Somebody's in there, or I would not be on TV right now. I know somebody's in there. There's something in that lettuce.

There's something in that XCR. All right, so first things first. Today actually is a big day. Today is the big day.

The day that everybody knew was coming and the day that everybody dreaded is here. The guy that's helping the villains of baseball ruin the national pastime makes his debut for the bad guys tonight in Wrigley Stadium. That's right.

Tarek Skubal's Dodger debut tonight. Yeah, I know. Here we go again, Rome. No, no, no, no, no.

Not the same old. A lot of the same old, but not the same old. Listen, the funny thing about this, the Dodgers actually need this dude tonight. The Dodgers actually need a quality start tonight.

The Dodgers actually need their newest ace to step up and be a stopper and get the Dodgers going in the right direction once again. because even Dodger Jim can admit the Dodgers have been ass lately. And that's why they made that deal for this dude in the first place.

Because they need this dude. Not because they could. Not to flex on the rest of the league. Not to help the owners build a lockout case.

Not to troll small market fan bases. It's because the Dodgers need this guy. They barely won the last two World Series, and they thought they needed more to have their best chance at a three-peat. It doesn't mean they're ruining baseball.

It certainly doesn't mean that they deserve all the blame and vitriol and hate that they're getting. Sure, they just improved. They did. I'm not saying they didn't, but it doesn't guarantee they're going to three-peat.

Anything can happen in the postseason. Once again, both the Padres and the Blue Jays had them on the ropes. Either one of them could have finished. And if they did, we're not having this conversation about how the Dodgers are, quote,

ruining baseball. So, no, it doesn't mean they have to apologize because they didn't do anything wrong. But you don't have to take my word for it. Take it from the newest Dodger, Tarek Skubal.

You know, every team could make that acquisition. And I don't really sympathize with people that blame the Dodgers for anything they've done. You know, they've developed a really good organization. They draft well.

They acquire talent really well. They retain talent. It's a winning organization. Now the complaints seem to be because they've won the last two World Series.

You know, I don't think it was like that three years ago. So I don't really sympathize with people that are complaining because the Dodgers do all the right things. It's like my man's been a Dodger forever.

Welcome home, my brother. Breach, bro. Looking good in that Dodger blue, too. Man, you really are a true Dodger, and you haven't even taken the ball yet.

You're going to fit in perfectly, my dude. By the way, I agree with every word that he just said. I couldn't have said it better myself, Although it's essentially exactly what I said yesterday.

And you can miss me with, so the dude's already drunk on the Dodger blue Kool-Aid. Great story, Rome. It's not the Dodger blue Kool-Aid talking when everything he says is true. What part of that did he get wrong?

First of all, any team could have made that deal for him. True. Yes, they also draft well. True.

And they acquire talent really well. True. And they retain talent. True.

They do all the right things. True. That's probably why so many players want to be a part of this team. And it's a really, really dumb reason to try to turn them into villains.

Root against them if you want. That's fine. I could care less. But acting like they're wrecking the game and they're all really bad guys is just lame.

acting like they have any agenda other than winning is detached from reality. Once again, anybody could have beaten that trade package. Anybody could have gone and snatched this dude. As for why the Dodgers were the ones that did,

again, it's not just because they could. They went and got this guy because they think they need this guy. And anybody who regularly watches this team this season gets that. Again, they are playing like ass right now.