Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 1355: Opening Day Banter and the Baseball Brit

Episode Date: March 29, 2019

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about their Opening Day experiences, the pleasure of immersing themselves in baseball again, baseball players being better than ever, and MLB’s arbitration championship belt, then (22:25) talk to Joey Mellows, AKA “The Baseball Brit,” about how he became a baseball convert, his worldwide baseball travels and his quest to […]

And we try to keep our spirits high, but they flag and they wane when the truck pulls up out front in the light spring rain, and they say, like withering flowers, let the good times roll on through these first few desperate hours. Hello and welcome to episode 1355 of Effectively Wild, a baseball podcast from Fangraphs presented by our Patreon supporters. I'm Ben Lindberg of The Ringer, joined by Meg Rowley of Fangraphs. Hello, Meg. Hello. We have a guest today. We'll be talking to Joey Mellows, who is a delightful 34-year-old from Portsmouth, England.

He is known as the Baseball Brit. Essentially, he discovered baseball a few years ago and has devoted his life now to following baseball everywhere all over the world. And he's going to 162 games this summer, or at least he is attempting to. And he's trying to spread a love and awareness of the game to his compatriots. So we'll talk to him and he is a delight. And he is actually in Seattle where he saw the Mariners on opening day. And I guess we should just do some opening day banter because there was actual baseball and we got to watch it.

Yeah, we did. We got to watch actual baseball. We got to watch baseball players hit a lot of home runs yesterday. 50 is a lot. That seems like a lot of home runs for opening day. That is a lot. Was that a record? I know the Dodgers' eight home runs was a record for a team on opening day, but that was extreme. You wouldn't expect to see that many home runs on opening day because A, you've got aces going for the most part. And B, you've got cold weather usually, although it was pretty nice generally yesterday. So that was unusual. I don't know if it means anything because I looked at home run rates in spring training and they were actually very slightly down from last year's spring training. So it doesn't seem like the ball just went crazy again or anything.

But who knows? Maybe it's a new ball for the regular season. There's no telling when the ball will change without any warning. But yeah, that was weird and fun. Lots of dingers. And some of the dingers, sense, right? You expect some of these guys to hit home runs. Javier Baez does that. That's a thing he does a lot. Chris Bryant does that. Chassin does not, so that was weird. I think that might have been the weirdest one. I cannot say that I expected Tim Beckham to hit not one, but two home runs off of Chris Sale. That wasn't a thing that I had on my list of likely outcomes for opening day. So that was bizarre. What was your opening day consumption strategy?

So at Fanagraphs, we do a very long opening day chat. And we did that again, although I was not as active a participant as I had been the prior year, because it turns out that when you are also running Fangraphs, you have a lot less time to sit there in the chat and get to converse with our readers, which is a bummer, because that's always good fun. But I basically had games on all day. I have an Apple TV, so I can only do two at once. And so after the early slate, things got a little bit tricky. But I had two on the TV. I had one on my laptop.

And then I was just kind of bouncing around as people in the chat were getting excited about stuff. So I checked in briefly on the weird, almost for a while, perfect game. Yeah, Jordan Zimmerman. Yeah, of all people. That would have been much weirder than 50 home runs on opening day. I watched a fair amount of that Rays-Astros game. I watched a good deal of the Phillies rally against the Braves bullpen.

That was something that you might see a lot this season. Yeah. If only they had options to improve that situation. It's very sad for them. And then I had the Mariners-Red Sox game on while I was editing a Tigers list. So I don't know about you, but I think one of the things that I like the best about real baseball that matters being back is that background noise that occupies my house from April until October is just back. So I just have that comforting set of sounds while I'm doing

other stuff. So that was nice. What do you do for opening day? Well, I was writing for like the first half of the day. And so I couldn't pay that close attention because I'm one of those people who just can't do anything else while they're writing, which I wish I weren't. There are like only a few kinds of music I can listen to while I'm writing and anything with voices or like moving in images is just going to completely derail me. So I watched like the beginning of the de Grom-Schurzer deal, and then I just kind of went back to writing, finished that up, and then just bounced around to whatever was on.

I enjoyed even the White Sox-Royals game, which got interesting at the end because there was a late rally by the White Sox in the ninth inning. And it was one of those innings that we won't see anymore after this season because there were like, I don't know, three or four pitching changes after just like a batter a piece. So that kind of bogged it down. And that made me not sad that that type of inning will not happen anymore. But the rally itself was fun. And Loy Jimenez was involved. He didn't do anything great, but he was there, which was cool.

And it ended with a really fun plate appearance by Corey Dickerson, who saw like 11 or 12 pitches and fouled off a ton of them and then ended up grounding out. But it was a good battle. And Jason Benetti was doing the play-by-play so that was a lot of fun and uh yeah and then I watched Red Sox Mariners because it was kind of the only show in town at night but uh it was great just kind of following it I mean I do like just letting it wash over me I also get kind of anxious because suddenly there's so much happening that as someone who's supposed to cover this stuff, I feel like immediately like I've lost track of everything because over the winter, like even if it's a busy news day, it's pretty easy to keep track of what you have to keep track of.

You just go to MLB trade rumors or whatever and, you know, maybe there are a few signings or trades or something, but it's pretty easy. And then as soon as baseball games start, I feel like I'm constantly missing something. Maybe there are a few signings or trades or something, but it's pretty easy. And then as soon as baseball games start, I feel like I'm constantly missing something. So that's kind of the downside, but also the upside. Yeah, it can be tricky too. I struggle, you will be shocked to learn, by getting overly fixated on very tiny things that happen in games. And then my anxiety comes with, it's like, oh, this is quite interesting to me.

Is this interesting to me in a way that is going to result in me spending a bunch of hours of my life looking at this tiny minute moment in a baseball game? So I get preemptive research anxiety. How many at-bats like this am i going to convince myself that i need to need to watch in order to write 2 000 words on this weird face that somebody made but yeah i really liked that that de grom scherzer matchup was going to be good sort of no

matter what because you know you have these great starters but it also struck me as being sort of of if the game is going to be home runs and strikeouts, like that is the version of that game I want all the time. Yeah. Because it was very fun to watch, even though, you know, it was very low scoring. Not a lot happened. You know, DeGrom got Juan Soto on a 3-2 changeup that just made me feel feelings about baseball again. So, you know, there's the anticipation of work, but you also just get these really great little moments where you're excited that you actually have something to write about again

that isn't the sad state of labor relations. So that part of it is freeing, even as it is you're mentally assigning yourself, you know, 2,000-word articles. Yeah, right. And the thing that I was working on for the first half of the day that was preventing me from watching baseball was about how good baseball players are now. And that's an article you can all go read right now because it has been published. But I tried to look sort of statistically at ways to show just how much better baseball players are

than they used to be, which is not surprising, probably not controversial if you're someone who listens to this podcast, but it can kind of be easy to overlook because baseball players are always playing against other baseball players from their era. And so you don't have like an objective mile marker that you can judge them against like, you know, track and field has times and you can watch the records being broken. And in baseball, it's a little harder. So you just assume that the players are getting better, but you can't necessarily tell that from the stats. And so when Adam Adovino or someone comes out and says that he'd strike out Babe Ruth a whole bunch,

people get mad and he has to like apologize and walk it back a bit because baseball loves its history and doesn't want anyone to tear down its icons from earlier eras and so i looked at that a few different ways and you can kind of like just compare over time because if you look at players who are sort of in their prime period and so you wouldn't expect them to age, really. You can just go like year to year and say, OK, how did the like 27 year olds or the 26 to 28 year olds do this year? And then how'd they do the next year? And if you assume that they didn't actually physically decline, then if they declined for other reasons, then maybe it's because the rest of the league got better. So that's one way you can look at it. Or you can look at the spread in talent. Or you can look at pitcher hitting, which that's the only thing I like about pitcher hitting is it's this one thing that you can kind of use to judge how much baseball players are improving because pitchers are not selected for their hitting skill. And so they just keep getting worse and worse and worse. And that's because all the players who are selected for their hitting skills are getting better and better and better. So I looked at that in a bunch of ways.

And as far as I can tell, baseball players are not only better than they've ever been, but they are actually improving right now at a rate that is among the highest in history. So that's kind of cool. It's like 150 years into professional baseball and players are still getting way better all the time. And there are lots of reasons for that, but that's why I think the MLB let the kids play campaign is just been so well-received and just seems so perfectly timed because the kids are playing, we're seeing this historic youth movement and they're playing really well. And so of course, like the new ad where you have a bunch of players kind of bragging about how many home runs they're going to hit. And it's okay to brag now because this is modern baseball and we don't have to be the most self-effacing sport. I think that makes sense because the kids are really ridiculously good. And we saw that with Jimenez and Patis and, you know, Alonzo making their debuts on opening day. It just never ends so much talent. I was trying to explain to my mom over the weekends, my grandparents were in town, you know, they don't quite understand like what my job is. So we were talking about the Mike

Trout extension and, you know, that number is such a big number and they were trying to understand sort of where he fits in the baseball landscape. And, you know, I'm running through all of, all of our well-known Mike Trout fun facts. Uh, and just, you know, the, those numbers didn't really mean anything to them. They're older baseball fans. They don't really experience baseball through analytics the same way that we do. And I was able to say, I was like, he might be the best baseball player who's ever played. And he is surrounded by the best baseball players who have ever played. And we get to watch it. Like there were generations of baseball fans who didn't get to watch these guys and they got to watch baseball and they had a good time. And, you know, we don't have to like, you know, make fun of them because they've passed, but, uh,

you know, we just have this extraordinary opportunity to watch these guys play. And I think that you're right. That campaign resonates because there's so much potential for us to just get to enjoy this wonderful thing if we can kind of get out of our own way and if Major League Baseball can get out of its own way. And so even though there aren't all positive indicators, it is nice to see that there is some understanding somewhere of what it is that they really have and what potential it has because it's amazing and we get to watch it. It's so cool. Yeah. Speaking of negative indicators and Major League Baseball getting out of its own way, should we talk about the championship belt? Do you want to tell people about the championship belt? Yeah, so there was reporting today from The Athletic that there is a championship belt.

I'm imagining this is like a WWE belt, right? That is given to the team that manages to, in the course of salary arbitration, the team that manages to, in the course of salary arbitration, suppress player salaries the most or come in at the lowest number overall. And so there are a lot of things that are wrong with this. I am not a lawyer, although Fanagraph's Cheryl Ring is going to take a good long look at this. It seems very collusion-y to sit around and be excited about how you have collectively suppressed player salaries. So that seems bad, although I will not use the capital C collusion word with any kind of authority. But it's just like the tackiest. It's just such a tacky, gross thing to do. I wonder if the person who takes that home,

like how do you explain that to your spouse when you get home? Here's the prize I won at work for making sure that a young person pursuing their dreams makes as little money as possible. Right. Maybe you just leave that at the office. I don't know. Yeah, I guess. It seems like. Yeah. I mean, my understanding of this is that it's not technically collusion in a legal sense because teams are kind of allowed to collude on arbitration. They are. It's a weird thing.

Right. So if this were happening in free agency, that would be a big no-no. This is not technically a no-no. It is optically a no-no and maybe morally a no-no. I mean, it's, you know, like we understand that this is capitalism and baseball is a business and businesses generally try to make money and baseball is no exception. But celebrating, essentially suppressing players' salaries is very icky, especially given everything else that is going on. So I mean, the purpose of a baseball team's salary arbitration department or whoever's

working on that is obviously to win the case and to make sure that you pay the player less than the player wants to be paid. But kind of crowing about it and awarding a championship belt from the league itself is, I mean, it's certainly not good for perception right now, given everything else that is going on. Yeah. I just think that when we look ahead to this next round of CBA negotiations, I think that in the last couple of weeks, there have been moments where people may have been slightly more optimistic that we would arrive at something reasonable, right? Major League Baseball was potentially interested in paying minor leaguers more, although there are caveats to that. And they have formed this committee as part of their rule changes

to explore rule changes together, but also to sort of get ahead of some potential CBA issues. And I think it is a good reminder that this is an inherently adversarial relationship, even as it is one that means coming together at the end of the day to play baseball and to put a team together. And so I guess it's useful in that respect because it is easy to kind of get caught up in that optimism because I don't think any of us are especially keen on the idea of a work stoppage

for a variety of reasons, but the reality might necessitate one if this is the sort of internal posture that teams in the league are taking when they're thinking about the arbitration process, which is itself sort of a fraught way to explode a relationship between a player and a team. I don't know that we've seen players be particularly reticent to resign in free agency with a team, but we hear every year stories of players who come out of the arbitration process having had to sit in the room and hear their employer talk about how they're bad at their jobs, which seems unpleasant. And so to add an additional layer of sort of

grievance to that process seems very short-sighted in service of a gag. So I hope that they are sort of reflect on how this looks and how people who maybe aren't familiar with the legal ins and outs of this process are going to view this behavior and what else it might indicate. You know, so I think that it's not a good look. And to come the day after opening day when we were, you know, recapturing that sort of spirit of the game is just, it wasn't a pleasant thing to wake up to. And I think that we don't have to belabor this, but there are bits in here about sort of the interaction between MLB's Labor Relations Department and how the teams file around the arbitration process that I think probably will bear some scrutiny in the next couple of days, because it does sound like, you know, they are positioned as a central resource for teams, but it sounds like there is a more forceful desire on the league's labor relations department to sort of drive teams toward numbers that are lower than maybe they might be willing to pay for some premier players.

So I think that's going to be something we have to look at pretty carefully because it seems bad. Yeah. And evidently there've been more teams that are going to file and trial where they just, they send their numbers in and then it just goes to an arbitrator as opposed to before when it was more of a conversation and a negotiation. But kudos to Mark Craig at The Athletic for bringing this up. And I guess rumors about the championship belt had been floating around, but he actually got Major League Baseball to comment on it by reporting on it well. So that is good. And I'm going to guess that maybe the championship belt will be retired in future years,

if not the mentality behind the championship belt, at least the physical manifestation of it. Probably not great at this particular point in time. And yeah, I mean, as we were just talking about, baseball players are better than ever. Younger baseball players are incredibly talented and great right now. players are incredibly talented and great right now. And that just leads to some of these other issues with the salary scale and the economic structure, because of course, a lot of the production is being put up by players who are in that period where they're not getting paid that much, at least relative to older players and more experienced players. So that kind of exacerbates the imbalance there and makes it more imperative for the Players Association to figure out some way to get those younger players paid. So, yeah, we talked about whether we wanted to talk about this because it's opening day and we're about to talk to Joey, who's like relentlessly positive and sees the joy in everything.

And so it felt like a bit of a bummer to talk about the championship belt, but you got to take the good with the bad in baseball. And it would be nice if it were all good, but it's not all good. No, we do. We do have to do our jobs. And, you know, it would be irresponsible not to talk about this stuff. But yeah, it's just so tacky. And you want a sense that there is an appreciation for the seriousness of the situation they find themselves in and how contentious and thorny some of this stuff is and so i think that um you know i hope that they reflect long and hard about not only the optics of this but the sort of spirit behind it and you

know find their way to something that more closely mirrors Joey's appreciation for the game than this, because this is a bummer. Yeah. And you and I haven't even read the new Deadspin story about the Ricketts and the Cubs, which will probably be even more demoralizing, but that'll be a topic for another day. And before that, we will actually enjoy baseball. It's kind of a bummer that there's no day baseball on the day after the pink day. Yeah. This is a scheduling thing in case they get rained out on opening day, right? Right. I think so. Yes. So maybe it's necessary, but it's kind of when you see a whole lot of baseball after no baseball, and then it goes

away for even like half a day, it's like, like no give give it back you just gave me baseball and now you're taking it away again i want to watch mike trout again yeah all right well the mariners are undefeated so that's exciting and uh baseball's back and that's exciting so we will continue to watch it and enjoy it over the weekend and i think our plan is at least for the two of us and Sam to maybe reflect on some opening baseball and our next episode. So that'll be fun. But we will take a quick break now and we'll be joined by Joey Mellows, the baseball grit a dream, Joey's in a lovely place. Joey's got smart in his face. Joey's in a dream, Joey's in a dream, Joey's in a lovely place. Joey's got smart in his face.

All right, so we are joined now by Joey Mellows, a.k.a. Baseball Brit. He is temporarily in the same city as Meg, Seattle, where he saw the Mariners play on opening day. Joey, hello. Thanks for joining us. Hello, Ben. Hello, Meg. Thanks for having me on. Yeah, happy to. So we'll get into your whole backstory and history and what you're doing this season, but give us your opening day experience. What was your impression of Seattle and of the undefeated Seattle Mariners? Opening day was, it's incredible. It's actually the third time I've seen the Mariners already this season and they're 3-0. So the weather was terrific. You know, the Macklemore, a bloke called Macklemore did like some singing before the game. i didn't know any of his songs but he was a very enthusiastic young man so i kind of enjoyed that

and uh yeah it was really fun watching d gordon and malik smith like they're two players that you know i could watch all day where were you in the park did you do anything before or after the game what was your your whole opening day approach i was set up high behind home plate and to be honest i was right on the aisle so people kept coming up down. I couldn't really see the hitter. So I just kept moving around, which to be honest, was probably the best thing to do because I got to see lots of different views of the ballpark and sit with different people. So I had a lovely time and I'm excited to get back there tonight. You get a Kikuchi start tonight. So you'll be able to see him twice, I guess, in such a short period of time. I'm jealous.

I've only gotten to see him pitch live once. I'm really, yeah. I mean, Yusei Kikuchi, he's a guy that I was really excited to see get signed by a major league baseball team. And he had a really strong start, didn't quite get to five innings in Japan. So we'll see how they manage their innings tonight, I guess. But he's someone that really excites me as a player. Well, since you just saw the Mariners in Japan and now you've seen them in Seattle, can you give us a comparison of the atmosphere, the ballpark atmosphere, the crowds, how the game kind of differs? Because of course, as we will get into, you started getting into baseball in South Korea and you've seen baseball games all over the world. So what's the experience like at say Safeco compared to Japan or South Korea?

Japan, there's obviously stereotyping a bit, but in Japan there's, there's a lot of kind of brass instruments. It's very organized. Like, so they cheer when their team are at bat. And then the home fans are quiet when the away team come up,

but often in Japan, they'll have away supporters. So it's just a lot of trombones and like bugles and stuff it's uh like a cacophony of noise in japan whereas in korea it's kind of more there's more singing like chanting from uh from the fans normally each player has their own kind of song that the fans will know and they'll sing often to music whilst he's and then in in the usa like uh what's kind of fun here is you've got more stuff in between innings when you know the big screen's on and there's kind of crazy stuff going on in the in the crowd like there was kiss cam yesterday that was super awkward smile cam g gordon was talking about you know whether it's trashy or flashy you know flip-flopping or some dance move

that the kids are doing so it was really fun here as well it's just it's just all a bit different each place yeah not enough trombones here, though. That's for sure. Get your trombones out. Yeah. Yeah, we're going to have to work on our brass section. Get practicing, please, listeners. So we should get into your history and how you ended up here.

So for people who have not read or heard about your story, give us the origin of the baseball Brit. So I'm just a regular English bloke. I lived there till I was 29. I was a teacher straight from university at a boarding school. Very sensible, humdrum life, I guess, and never given baseball a second thought, to be quite frank. But I moved to South Korea for a teaching job with a London-based school and went on holiday to Japan just across and I had my parents with me and they're quite old they've been with me for about two weeks I'm sure they'll be listening to this so I've got to be careful but you know it was like the third night in Japan I wasn't

really sure what to do with them to be honest so we saw that there was it was opening week and I just thought that's an easy way to kind of keep them occupied and happy for a few hours so we went along in Osaka to see the Oryx Buffaloes play the Chiba Lotte Marines. And I just absolutely fell in love with it straight away. So went back to Korea and started watching my local team in Seoul, the LG Twins, and I've been hooked ever since. And what sort of drove the change of focus or broadening of focus from baseball in Asia to include Major League Baseball? Well, in Asia, obviously, I was trying to understand a completely new game in a different culture and different language. So even the Korean players have Hangul on their, you know,

for their names on the back of the jerseys. So I was trying to understand statistics on the board in Korean. And with the time difference, I soon realized that Major League Baseball games were shown in Korea in the morning. Korea is about 13 hours ahead. So like a New York game at 7 would be on at 8 in the morning in South Korea. So I started watching Major League Baseball really just to try and understand more about what I was watching because it was in English at last and I could actually understand what the commentators were saying. So Major League Baseball for me was kind of a learning way to understand what I was seeing in the various Korean ballparks I was traveling to. And so take us through your decision to quit your job, to decide to devote yourself to baseball full time and to just go on the road.

I mean, had you been thinking of making some sort of change and when you discovered baseball, you realized that that was what it would be or that you'd at least take a gap year and just devote it to baseball? Yeah. So just to be completely straight with everyone, I didn't quit the job. I, you know, just the contract came to an end. I didn't, you know, let those kids down or anything. Then you was leaving and it was all sorted. So the contract ran down and I've been teaching for 10 years. So it's all I've really done. And I just thought with the London series coming over um this summer Yankees Red Sox play two games June the 29th and June the 30th this was really the the best time to try and have a full run at it and try and recruit more people back in Europe to you know watch baseball and you know share sharing the enjoyment that I certainly get from the game

so I've saved up for 10 years and I don't have a car or a mortgage. So yeah, I've chosen to do this and I'm really excited by it. And to be honest, you know, Ben and Meg, I wake up every morning with the biggest grin on my face. So already for me, it's been worth it just because I feel so energized and so excited each day. Can you talk about the logistics of all of this? Because I'm curious to know how far like how how far in advance have you planned your summer your trip I have this vision of you standing sort of a beautiful mind style with every

schedule of major league baseball spread out before you as you decide how you're going to navigate all the different parks and home and away series do you do you know where you're going to be on you know August 15th or are you playing it a little more fast and loose? So the way I kind of planned for it, I created, I'm a super nerd. So I created this map of every professional baseball team in the United States from major league, minor league, independent league. And I plotted them all on this map exactly where the ballparks are. And that's been what I used to get the schedule together. parks are and that's been what I use to get the schedule together I try and make sure that I'm not traveling too far each day so I'm not tired and I can really enjoy being at the ballpark and

speaking to people before the game players broadcasters fans so I'll post it on my twitter when this comes out so if people want to have a look at it and maybe it will help help help other people plan a road trip or whatever then that would be cool but that's what I use but in terms of planning for this trip it's it's not something that I've planned for for a long time I've always saved the money I thought it would be maybe for like a mortgage or for a wedding but you know you can't plan for those things sometimes and when I wanted to have a bit of a change of career I just thought well maybe it's time to treat myself a bit and stop being so sensible and boring and saving this money up and never really enjoying it and you know let know, let's see if we can get more people into baseball, which is

something I'm truly passionate about. And so you know that you'll be in Seattle, say, until Tuesday, and then I assume you know where you'll be going from there. But do you have it planned out step by step? I'm going from this city to that city and this ballpark to that ballpark, or are you kind of winging it? Well well it's all planned up until i think the beginning of august so um i'm trying to make sure that i get to all 30 major league ballparks just to kind of show show each team to to potential new fans back in europe who who might not have a team to support i mean that's one of the most interesting things about being a fan from outside of the usa we really don't have any ties to one particular team

so we're in a quite privileged position where we can kind of sit back and think about being a fan from outside of the USA. We really don't have any ties to one particular team. So we're in a quite privileged position where we can kind of sit back and think, who am I going to support? Whose jersey am I going to buy? Which team am I going to save up money and travel to? So I really want to make sure that it's not just Yankees and Red Sox that people are hearing about back in the UK,

albeit we're very grateful that they're coming over this summer. But I want to introduce the Minnesota Twins and the Houston Astros and the Tampa Bay Rays and show off Tropicana believe it or not so that's you know I'm in Florida in in May I've never been to Florida in my life it's one of those places that I just remember seeing like Will Smith like welcome to Miami or whatever that song was back in the 90s I was like that place looks amazing so I'm just so excited that I'm going to be there, man. That's delightful.

I am curious sort of how you have found the response to be from your, you know, your fellow countrymen and women. As you've talked about baseball, have people back home been receptive to this, you know, wonderfully, delightfully insane endeavor that you're embarking on? Or do they look at you a little funny when you tell them? How do they understand what you're doing? And how have they kind of responded to baseball in turn? I'd say 99% of the responses I've had to this have been overwhelmingly positive, which I'm surprised by, to be honest. I mean, it's Twitter, so you're never too far away from someone calling you a twit but it's uh it's been very positive and I should say that there is

already an existing UK baseball community it's it's not it's not just me there's there's lots of people there that are really passionate about the sport already like tomorrow in London there's a MLB meetup to UK where people are being encouraged to bring friends from work that don't maybe don't know about baseball to come to a bar and they're going to show six or seven mlb games on saturday so that's you know that's something that's already taking place we've got a website batflips and nerds which anyone that starts getting interested in baseball can write for and they'll edit it and publish their work which is really cool they've got a podcast as well i know mike petriello's been

on it um who bends on mlb network with i think sometimes so oh and there's another podcast called absolute bunts it sounds a bit rude but it's fine absolute bunts uh they they have podcasts like which are for beginners so if even if you don't really know the rules it's just two guys that are kind of learning baseball stage by stage and it's really fun and And, you know, there's all these people back home that are doing really positive things to grow interest. And I'm just fortunate enough that or silly enough that I'm out here able to watch games myself. Yeah, well, is that community in the UK? I mean, was it seeded or started by expats who were trying to watch the

game and get other people interested? Or was it purely just organic, just people who had never been into baseball but came across it in some way and wanted to know more? I mean, I'm kind of late to the game because I only got into, I saw my first game in 2015 in Japan, and I've lived abroad since then. So I'm a bit detached from the UK. But from what I understand, it used to be on television on Channel 5, which is a kind of, it's a terrestrial TV program that most people can access freely in the late 90s and I think they they had a run of games up until about 2008 and lots of people that you know used to work nights

and were students and stayed up late got into baseball that way the time difference really guys is the thing that makes baseball not very accessible to us back home. It's on at midnight most of the time. And if it's an L.A. game, for example, it will be on at three in the morning. So it's just the fact that people don't really see it on their screens or they don't really see it in the newspapers. And that's something that I'm hoping to change with some other people. There's a new show on BT Sport in the U.K. called Caps Off. And I'm doing some stuff for that. And that's being filmed out in ESPN studios in Bristol, Connecticut.

I fly there on Tuesday. And we're just hoping that more people stumble across baseball and think, maybe we've got some games this summer. Maybe we should go. I'm curious sort of where the conversation around sabermetrics and analytics is in that community, because as it's formed maybe a bit more recently and doesn't carry some of the same hangups that the baseball watching audience in the US has had as they've adapted to a changing game. Do people view baseball through an analytics lens in the UK? I mean, obviously, there are going to be a range of reactions to the game.

I don't mean to say that everyone's going to view it quite the same way. But kind of where does that conversation stand among UK fans? Yeah, so we've got a really diverse spread of level of interest in the game and level of knowledge. We have some people, for example, I've got a friend called Russell, Russell Eason, and he writes a lot for Batflips and Nerds about sabermetrics and, you know, what's the best way of evaluating pitches and hitters and things. And there's certainly, you know, if people want to read that information and find that information, then it's available online. At the minute,

you know, I'm just traveling around trying to, you know, find the most accessible kind of statistics for new fans to kind of understand how good a hitter is. So it's a frequent question I'll try and ask players, you know, what do you think is the best way of evaluating your own skill set? And, you know, I get a variety of responses. And to what extent do you try to use analogies to other sports that are more popular in the UK? Because I remember when we did an interview about Finnish baseball, Pesopalo, over the winter, we were making all these comparisons to baseball, to American baseball. over the winter, we were making all these comparisons to baseball, to American baseball. And our guest was saying that at times it's maybe more helpful not to do that because it's even more confusing if you try to say, well, it's like this, but it's different in this way and that way,

instead of just explaining how it is without any comparisons to anything. So do you say, oh, it's kind of like cricket and that you have this and that or do you just sort of explain it from the ground up in the uk i'd say we try to avoid those kind of analogies it's very easy to slip into saying like the yankees and manchester united and the red socks of liverpool not only because you know john henry owns both liverpool and the red socks but yeah it's something i try not to do very often with people in the uk it's more a question i get asked over here by american people is you know how does this compare to cricket and you know i was talking to rob bradford the beats uh red sox beat writer yesterday about any pace of play and he asked me for some

comments about the game yesterday was apparently very slow and i hadn't even thought about whether it was slow or not i was just sat there having a lovely time and he he wanted to know how long the cricket game was so i said it's five days for a test match so this really you know three hours 20 minutes or two hours 50 minutes I don't care it's it's just more opportunity to you know to enjoy everything that I'm watching I'm so envious of you being able to just enjoy a baseball game without all of this horrible backstory on pace of play what a lovely what a lovely thing I really don't get it guys to be honest yeah I mean I'm an outsider and people are trying to shorten it or whatever and have pitch clocks and things I know in the minor leagues last season they they were putting

runners on second base or something if it went to extra innings and I mean in Korea where I you know I kind of watched a lot of baseball a game can end in a draw so after 12 innings if it's tied the game just ends and I know that's shocking to you Americans that there isn't a winner you know someone isn't a loser and someone can't you know you know enjoy the glory of winning a game but yeah I don't care how long the baseball game is here it's it's just more time to kind of understand and look around and enjoy reflect and think and talk to the people that you're watching the game with we're going to send you you to New York to plead our case to the commissioner.

I'll do what I can, guys. Well, this is the second season that you've been on the road because last year you were kind of making the circuit of independent league ballparks, which of course the independent leagues are close to my heart too. And you went to some major league games. I think I found one article with you where you said that you actually preferred IndieBall because it was just a little less corporate or, you know, less antiseptic and just sort of has character and flavor and all of that. And of

course I see the appeal as well. So tell us about that experience of just kind of going further from the spotlight. Yeah. So I'm a really simple guy and i just i get a lot of enjoyment from watching baseball and you know the major league level there's there's the big contracts and you know it's lots of money and it's very corporate and like i spent last summer just watching lots of independent baseball where people are playing for the love of the game or you know they're because they're still holding on to a dream that they haven't quite realized yet and the people that are working you know for the various clubs are there they're not getting paid a lot of money but they're doing what they do because they believe in the sport

and you know that's something that I share and I wanted to speak to them and you know kind of learn more about their own experiences within baseball and I had a I had one of the best summers of my life last year and I met Theo Fightmaster who I know you know Ben used to work with with the Sonoma Stompers and that was the most expensive hotel of the whole trip then, by the way, was in Sonoma, mate. I don't know how you afforded to live there, mate. That's ridiculous. Well, I live in Manhattan right now. So relative to that, everything else is cheaper. But yeah, Sonoma, not cheap. And I know a lot of your listeners, you know, really enjoyed the book and, you know,

your time with Ben with the Stompers. And, you you know that for me was like a real fanboy moment meeting theo and having a cuban lunch with him and you know what a lovely kind man i'm so excited that he's now the commissioner of that pacific association league and i'm really sure it will go from strength to strength under his leadership and guidance yeah are there players who you're um especially excited to get to see live and in person as you you know sort of work your way through this schedule this summer? Yeah, there are, Meg. I'm a huge fan of Eric Thames, or Thames, as you guys call him. But, you know, for me, the River Thames, it's in my head, that's always how I used to say his name when he was playing for the NC Dinos in Korea. He was a

megastar over there. uh he really respected the culture and he he learned a lot about the language and you know he was on tv programs there singing uh you know dressed like in a disguise they had no idea it was Eric Thames and he's even been back and done that since he left Korea um he's he seems like such a lovely person and he's obviously an absolute machine with the weights and stuff and he loves loves his beers. So I'm really hoping I catch up with Eric in Milwaukee or maybe on the road and try and explain why I'm such a fan of his. But Zach Greinke's another one. You know, he seems like a very thoughtful, quirky,

kind of intelligent guy who likes the scouting aspect and spends his free time learning more about baseball as well. And, you know, I'm sure he wouldn't want to meet me because of his personality. He's quite a quiet bloke from what I understand. But, you know, I'm certainly very excited to watch him pitch on the road. And I know he had an awful start on opening day, but he's in my fantasy team. So I believe in you, Zach, if you're listening, mate. And, well, you talked about how you get the luxury of kind of adopting a team.

You don't have a built-in affiliation geographically, so you can choose whichever team most speaks to you. So have you chosen one? Have you become a fan of any one team? I mean, this is a cop-out, but my team are the LG Twins. I lived in Seoul for four years, and they were 15 minutes down the road. And I used to go and watch them. My mustache, I have a ridiculous mustache for those of you that haven't seen my ugly face but that's because uh you know

my favorite Korean player is called Park Young Tak and he's you know he's one of the hit leaders in Korea and he's a he's an incredibly looking bloke he wears glasses like you know spectacles on the field and um that's why I've got the moustache for him but in major league baseball just to try and connect more perhaps um yeah I do have a team I keep it a bit quiet guys to be honest because I am trying to introduce people back home to you know to all the teams and I don't want to people to start giving me you know pelters on twitter for being a I'll say it I'll say it I'm a Royals fan I'm a Royals fan all right how did that happen I guess they were good when you first got into baseball well no like i started off watching the rangers because i used to coach soccer in dallas when i

was i was at university in london and i used to coach i did a thesis on tipping culture you guys tip here and it was looking at whether it's a social norm or an economic necessity why do people tip in the usa and you know whilst i was doing that research i was coaching soccer in the USA. And, you know, whilst I was doing that research, I was coaching soccer in the Dallas, Fort Worth area and went to Pizza Hut Park as it was cool to watch FC Dallas. But in Korea, Shin Su-Chu, all of his games are on TV. So we see all of Ryu's games for the Dodgers. Every single Dodgers game is on TV, every single Rangers game. The Pirates are on as well, the third baseman, Jung Ho Kang. So I watched a lot of Rangers games with Shinsu Chu. So I started off with them, but then I dated a girl from Kansas City.

And that was much later after the World Series win. And I fell in love with Kansas City as a place. And I used to fly back and forth from Seoul. I got booted off a Delta flight because they'd overbooked it. So they gave me like $3,000 worth of flights, you know, for the inconvenience of the fact I had to get removed from the flight

because they'd overbooked it. So that's how I afforded that. You know, I'm just on a teacher's salary, but I got lucky with that. So I flew back and forth and just love Kansas City. And I love the Royals this season with all the pace they've got, they're gonna be a fun watch and had a great start yesterday. And how are you getting from place to place? Because you mentioned you don't have a car, right? So are you taking buses everywhere? Trains flying? flying yeah so at the minute um i flew in from south korea to seattle the reason i'm here is i mean officially it's because i'd love to see seattle and the red sox are coming to london and they start here the world series champs but

you know with these delta points i was able to get a flight here for 35 pounds from seoul 50 or whatever so it was so cheap that i flew in here and i fly east on tuesday and then i've got a mate who is going to hopefully give me a car. I haven't asked him yet, so it's a bit awkward. But I'm meant to be there on Friday in Philadelphia. So I'm hoping he's going to lend me his car. And from then on, I'll just be driving around. And I'm really excited about the road trip aspect, you know, just hitting the open road.

And I'll be downloading a lot of Effectively Wild podcasts for sure to listen on the way and catch up with all the pre-season stuff you were doing and there was one I really enjoyed last summer when I was driving around about some bloke crazier than me that went to 30 major league yes that's right 30 days Michael Mountain so yeah I mean this is nothing compared to that well played mate right and you're speaking to us now from the hostel where you're staying in Seattle do you know where you'll be staying day to day? I mean, are you mostly going to be staying at places like that? Or have you kind of made friends and internet friends who you'll be crashing with from time to time? tomorrow here and they're sold out so I had a random message this morning from a bloke called Patrick who lives in Seattle and he just he just offered whether you know he said would you like to stay with me and I'm going around his house at nine o'clock tomorrow morning he's got a golden retriever he said and he's got to go to work at 10 and I'm just going to be sat in his house in

Seattle with his golden retriever for the next three nights so I mean it's the kindness of strangers really that's keeping this trip going. And Twitter is, you know, it's a strange beast, but people have been really positive and I'm just ever so grateful for all the offers that people have kind of sent this way. And it's very much appreciated. Yeah, it does occasionally counterbalance some of its nastier aspects. Yeah, Twitter can be a bit mean, can't it, sometimes? Just a little bit. So at the conclusion of this, I mean, you don't have to have an answer with this,

especially if your parents potentially listen to this podcast. But I'm curious, sort of, what do you see your place in baseball being going forward? Are you hoping that you'll do this and then go back to teaching? Or do you have ambitions within baseball itself? curious what what comes next after your wild summer no to be honest I don't know I have no idea it's not something I'm thinking about that far ahead at the moment I'm just waking up each day and just enjoying life and enjoying the fact you know the baseball season started again and I get to have this incredible journey and you know show people back home hopefully that baseball is a sport that's that's worthy of their time and interest get to have this incredible journey and you know show people back home hopefully that

baseball is a sport that's that's worthy of their time and interest so I have no idea where this is going to lead if it leads nowhere then I'll go back to teaching it's something I've enjoyed doing for 10 years and working with young people is also exciting and enriching in its own way so I don't know and I'll worry about it towards the end of the season when I'm destitute. And you will be going back to London for the games there. Can you explain what those games might mean to the UK baseball community and to people who may not even know about baseball, but will because of those games? Obviously, MLB is kind of the last of the big American sports to play games in the UK. So I don't know whether that means that the territory

has already been staked out by basketball or by football or what, but do you expect this to make a major difference? Ben, I'm so excited. Like we all were online when we heard this news, I remember fist pumping the air. I was so happy. And, you know, this is, this is a really big step with major league baseball coming over, particularly, particularly with the teams they're bringing. I mean, I mean, they could have brought the Marlins against the Royals and I'd have been delighted, don't get me wrong, but the fact they're bringing two of the biggest guns in all of Major League Baseball, it's a real statement of intent from them. I know they're back officially in 2020 with another series, which is yet to be announced. But from my understanding, this is a long-term thing,

and I think they're looking at a decade-long kind of push to try and have a larger market in Europe and try and grow interest in baseball. And the people that I'm friends with on Twitter, we're all behind it 100%, and we're going to try and take our mates and stuff and get them interested and hopefully get them watching more baseball. And how much is baseball played there?

Because just from following your Twitter feed, I've seen some tweets about youth baseball tryouts and that sort of thing. And of course, there is a national team, even if it is mostly made up of people who are not natives, but maybe have some ancestors from the UK. But how much is baseball played? Can you find it? If you're a kid in the UK and you want to play baseball, can you do that? You can definitely find it. It's played on Sundays. I'm in touch regularly with our national coach, Liam Carroll. Part of what I'm doing out here at the minute is to try and find a way to get some funding for Team GB. We're currently ranked 38th in the world. We have a big European competition in September and the aim is to climb up the rankings.

And they got some funding this year for the first time, which is really exciting, about £32,000 for equipment, a sports grant. So at the minute, in talks with people about how we can try and support the GB national team more and, you know, get more kids playing baseball recreationally and also competitively. And you've kind of gotten this close-up look at baseball. You're almost, you know, a member of the media at this point. Later today, you're going to be going down to the clubhouse, right, with a beat writer who's kind of taking you under his wing and you've been credentialed for these games and you've gone on MLB Network and ESPN. I mean, did teaching sort of prepare you for this kind of experience because you're used to talking in front of crowds and meeting a lot of people? I mean, is this sort of all a whirlwind at this point? I have no idea why this is happening. No, yeah. It's every day that stuff like that happens. Like in Tokyo, when I just got an email saying,

we've got you a media credential. You can come onto the field for Ichiro's last game. I had to pinch myself and think, what? Are you being serious? Me? Seriously? But yeah, I mean, teaching has helped me because as a teacher, you know, there were times, guys, when I'll be honest,

I hadn't maybe planned the lesson as thoroughly as I should have done. And, you know, I'm kind of acting in front of the kids, just trying to be as enthusiastic as I can and try and make them realize that I haven't planned it as well as I could have done. So yeah, from that point of view, I'm acting every day. Today I'm going down to the clubhouse and I've heard in the States that you're allowed to speak to the players

when they're still getting dressed and things. So I'm terrified today that I'm going to, the first experience I have of seeing Mookie Betts is gonna you know he's gonna be in a towel or something and he's just coming out of the shower so I don't want to have that image of Mookie in my head like I'd rather remember his fantastic play in the outfield or whatever so I'm a bit nervous like it seems such it seems such an invasion of privacy to me but that's why Rob like that's the one thing that I said to him said Rob can you take me down Rob Bradford can you take us down to the clubhouse today because I really feel uncomfortable about the whole situation but he's going to take me down and hopefully I'll say hello to a few of

the players and get them introduced to people back home so I'm really excited and I'll be heading down to the T-Mobile park almost said Safeco in about three hours so yeah just very fortunate and I have no idea why it's happening but I'm just enjoying the ride at the minute. You mentioned that the pace of play issues don't really bother you. I'm curious, as someone who has a very informed perspective, but one that's a bit outside of sort of the typical perspective here in the US, what do you make of baseball's seeming fretting over the state of the game and where the game is going? Are there issues that have been raised that you think have some validity and that

you'd like to see addressed? Or do you think that we're just tinkering with something that is best left alone? I think there are genuine issues. Yeah. I mean, with my Twitter account, I'm always trying to be very positive because that's the angle I'm going for to try and grow interest in the game. But I've got friends that play in the minor leagues and I was shocked when I learned about you know how much money they get paid or how little money they get paid perhaps I should say I've been to you know I've been to their houses and things on the road and seen that they're living you know five people in an apartment with blow-up mattresses it's quite shocking to see the conditions they live in I don't want to drop any names because I don't want to embarrass the players

or the teams that they're now affiliated with. But I think that that's something that needs to be addressed. And there was an excellent article by Emily Walden recently, which did explore in more detail the kind of living conditions that these minor league players have.

For me, as a humanities teacher, that's something that I think is the most shocking aspect. And all this pace of play or whatever, to me, I'm not as well informed as other people. So it doesn't bother me. But certainly I think people should get paid a living wage and for working during spring training. What's your strategy for familiarizing yourself with baseball history or how much do you make an effort to do that? to do that because there is just so much history that when you grow up watching the game, you know,

you hear names on broadcasts and it all just sort of seeps into your brain. But when you didn't grow up watching it, you, I would imagine, have to make a more concerted effort to find out, oh, this guy, this Hall of Famer who was just mentioned, what's his story? How much time do you spend kind of just bringing yourself up to speed or do you prefer to just appreciate the game in the present this is going to sound a bit cliche ben but to get into the history i watched ken burns's documentary and that took up about 20 hours of my life but i've actually downloaded it on my computer so every now and then like when i was in career i used to sometimes and i don't mean this to be rude to kenneth but i used to like play it whilst i was in bed and i'd fall asleep just listening to because it's so soothing his voice and uh you know it's quite a kind of nostalgic romanticized

way of looking at these past baseball players and that got me into things like the tto6 baseball cards and learning about the onus wagner card and things and um yeah, I mean, there was a fantastic book I read called The Glory of Their Times or something. And, you know, I'm an avid reader. I'm a nerd, unsurprisingly. So yeah, I try and learn as much as I can about the history of the game. But I'm also very much focused on the present at the moment. So yeah, I think baseball's got a fascinating history, and I hope to get to Cooperstown at some point in the next year or two. Can you talk about the new show, Caps Off, which you mentioned briefly before? But what's the audience? How do you find that show?

And what are the hopes for how that might help spread the game to the UK? Yeah, so this is a new show that's filmed by ESPN. It's only 12 minutes long, so it's quite short. I hope it becomes longer, but it's shown on BT Sport in the United Kingdom. And I know on Thursday it was their debut show. It got shown at, I think, 3.45 on Thursday afternoon. And it's also shared via social media from BT Sport and from ESPN. And it's essentially a way of introducing baseball to new fans.

So they kind of look back at some of the history. They focused on Ichiro, for example, at the start of their first show. They talked about Bryce Harper. And then they did make that analogy of comparing him to Lionel Messi. And, you know, I think that, you know, some people enjoyed that and some people didn't. But it's a difficult bouncing act for them because they've got to cater to the existing fans who are very knowledgeable. There are some incredibly knowledgeable British baseball fans and then also they've got to try and hook the attention of people that might just be flicking through the TV

channels so I think it was a really good start and I'm excited to see where it goes in the future and you know my part on the program is very small I just basically do a little video from each ballpark I go to of me just having a lovely time. So it's very easy work for me. And, you know, I'm excited to see what the future holds with hopefully more coverage of baseball. Have you ever had a bad ballpark experience? It sounds like you are pretty much blissful wherever you go watching baseball. But has there been any negativity? I mean, just as I am as a bloke, I try not to dwell on, you know, any negative stuff.

But there was one time at Yankee Stadium, I was wearing a Texas Rangers jersey. I had Shinsu Chiu on the back, obviously, you know, living in Korea. I love Shinsu. And we'd just beaten them in a Thursday afternoon game. And I was outside of a bar called Sam's waiting for an Uber. And it said it was one minute away. And there were these Yankees fans yelling at me from the bar windows, Oi, you know, Rangers, get in here. And they were kind of, you know, quite aggressive and away. And there were these Yankees fans yelling at me from the bar windows, Oi,

you know, Rangers get in here. And they were kind of, you know, quite aggressive and drunk and they wanted to fight me. And I wasn't sure whether to run or keep looking at my phone because this Uber was one minute away. Do I stay and get punched? But,

you know, not have to forfeit like $10, whatever it is for, for missing an Uber or do I run off? And I was on my own. So, you know, I've got no shame.

I don't mind running away from a fight. No worries. But yeah but yeah i mean that's the only negative thing i've had and it really wasn't that bad and it was just a few lads you know you'd enjoyed a few beers at the game and i was wearing a rangers jersey no sweat you know no no trouble whatsoever what's the best ballpark experience you have or is there one that you're especially looking forward to on this on this road trip that you haven't gotten to see yet well just to give some love back to the Yankees. I was at another game at the Yankees and I was sat on a chair and my credit card fell out of my pocket in New York, of all places, right at the start of my trip. And that's how I was financing the whole summer. So I thought, oh, golly, what's going to happen now? I'm going to have to go back to England.

I've lost my credit card. It will take like a week for it to get replaced I can't get it posted anywhere so I just went down to the Yankees like office and someone had already handed it in and it was in an envelope with my name on and they just said here you are Joey like someone handed in your credit card and I was just like wow you hear all these stories about New York and stuff and yeah I just thought that was wonderful that someone had seen it and they thought to return it and you know thank you to the Yankees for sorting my you know sorting out my summer and saving it from uh from peril two years ago or whatever so that was a really good experience but you know the independent stuff in you know any independent ballpark i've got the biggest smile on my face that you can imagine and this this trip meg i'm looking forward

to genuinely genuinely looking forward to tropicana um i've heard i've heard the worst things about it but but whenever I hear something negative about something, I always think, well, there must be some beauty in it somewhere, and I'm going to find it, and I'm going to hold on to it and cherish it and share it with people. Tampa Bay Rays, I'm coming for you. Yeah, I'm trying to think of what the beauty would be there, but I don't know. Maybe Jeff Sullivan will be there then who knows oh yeah jeff sullivan and it's named after an orange like tropicana that's an orange juice right yeah i think it's incredible you've got petco park which is named after a pet shop and then you've got tropicana that's named off like an orange juice carton oh you've got

some cracking names like with your ballpark so i enjoy these like even though they're big sponsors i think it's pretty cool pretty funny yeah mike's. Mike Zanino will be there, right? He's beautiful in his own way. Yeah. Yes. Flawed but beautiful. That sums up his major league career. That sounds right. So do you reflect much on, I mean, this turn that your life has taken? I'm just trying to imagine what the few of five years ago would think, seeing you now just devoted full time to traveling around the world, watching a sport that at that time, I assume you were just peripherally aware of and had no inkling that it was about to become your full time occupation. So do you think about that much or are you just kind of riding this wave? I mean, I haven't really thought about it until you've asked, but I imagine me five years ago would be bitterly disappointed with what I'm doing now. Just like anyone else, I hope to get married and have a house and kids and stuff. For me, that hasn't happened.

For those people that have got that, you're the luckiest people in the world really but I'm just excited to be waking up watching baseball and I try not to you know think too deeply about whether I am where I want to be or not and you know what the future is going to be it's just today I'm watching the Red Sox and I'm going to watch Yusei Kikuchi pitch and you know life couldn't be better could it yeah well it has been a pleasure to follow baseball along with you and I mean I think it's something that if you've been watching baseball your whole life it can really renew your appreciation of it to watch someone else discover it and get into it for the first time the way that you have. So I think following you, I mean, I hope that it has helped spread a love of the game to UK fans, but I think you are also doing the same for American fans who have kind of gotten cynical and jaded about baseball and we take it for granted.

And your joy about baseball, I think, helps us recapture that. So I appreciate that. And please, I hope that you have a wonderful journey and no negativity anywhere. And tell us where people can find you and follow you and hear you and just experience this trip that you're taking. Sure, Ben. And can I just say thanks to you and Meg for having me on. Like when I got the message yesterday, I couldn't believe it. I really couldn't.

So it's been a real privilege to be on and talk about our UK baseball community. I'm online mostly on Twitter at BaseballBrit. And I'm trying to – I don't get Instagram. I'll be honest, but someone told me I need to be on there. So I'm the baseball Brit on Instagram. And please bear with me on Instagram guys. I really don't know what I'm doing. And are you still on the bat flips and nerds podcast at times? Yeah. So the bat flips boys, uh, have a regular podcast that comes out once or twice a week at the moment. And that's

batflipsandnerds.com is their website. And they're on Twitter, batflips underscore nerds. And, you know, do engage with them because, you know, they're, they're far more knowledgeable than I am. And, you know, you can have a really in-depth conversation, particularly with Russell Eason, by the way, he's, he's like our, what's his name? Bill James. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, please enjoy the summer and maybe we will check in with you again down the road. Lovely. Thank you, guys. Okay.

That will do it for today and for this week. Thanks to you all for listening. You can support the podcast on Patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectively wild, as have the following five listeners, Michael Gates, Adam L. Cross, Sean McGuire, Tim Conrad, and Neil Weinberg. Thanks to all of you. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash groups slash Effectively Wild. It is always busy when actual baseball is going on. Honestly, it's a kind of an efficient way to keep track of everything that is happening because every game is being watched by someone in the Facebook group who will post if anything interesting happens. So I find it a

useful way to keep track of the action. You can rate and review and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and other podcast platforms. Keep your questions and comments for me and Meg and Sam coming via email at podcast.pancrafts.com or via the Patreon messaging system if you're a supporter. Thanks to Dylan Higgins for his editing assistance. You can pre-order my book, The MVP Machine, which comes out June 4th. I can't wait for you all to read it. And I usually end these things by saying I hope you have a wonderful weekend,

but I don't even have to hope. Baseball's back. Of course you're going to have a wonderful weekend. We will talk to you on the other side of it. I find that day by day You're making all my dreams come true So come what may I want you to know

That I am yours alone And I'm in love, in love to stay As we go through the years Day by day I said Day by day I said day by day