Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 1690: No Regression to the Means

Episode Date: May 6, 2021

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Orioles ace John Means pitching a no-hitter and the dropped-third-strike rule that prevented him from having a perfect game, Tony La Russa’s latest managerial miscues, an umpire admitting he guessed at a call, the Yankees turning their season around after a slow start and the perils of small-sample […]

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Hello and welcome to episode 1690 of Effectively Wild, a baseball podcast with Fangraphs, presented by our Patreon supporters. I am Ben Lindberg of The Ringer, joined by Meg Rowley of Fangraphs. Hello, Meg. Hello. We are recording on Wednesday evening Eastern time, a little later than we had planned, because we were watching a baseball game that was taking place in Seattle. And let me read you the headline right now on mariners.com. Tell me whether you think this captures the main story of the game. Here's the headline.

Kikuchi sharp in finale. That tells you all you need to know, right? I mean, he was sharp. He was. That is not an inaccurate headline, but as you were hinting, perhaps incomplete one. Yeah. No, there was someone who was slightly sharper, in fact. So the Mariners buried the lead there, and you can understand why the poor Mariners.

They've been on the wrong end of many a no-hitter in my memory. But this is the latest. So John Means and the Orioles shut down the Mariners on Wednesday. Means was fantastic. Some might even say perfect. He was very close to perfect. We could talk about that. Technically, this was a no-hitter, and John Means was brilliant.

This is the third no-hitter of the season. Probably not the last, as we have said, because the league is batting 234 as we speak, but means nine innings, no walks, no hits, no errors, which is odd in a no-hitter. That is not a perfect game. Twelve strikeouts. This was a career-high number of Ks for him. And this was, I'm reading a tweet here from our Orioles season preview guest, Joe Trezza, who is citing the Elias Sports Bureau.

John Means today threw the first non-perfect no-hitter in which the opposing team did not record a walk hit by pitch or error. So it's the first in which the only base runner reached on a dropped third strike. Only a dropped third strike standing between John Means and perfection. I know that there are people who like this rule. I know that we've talked about those people. I know that we read from Sam's piece, which I still think is the best and sort of most concise articulation of why I think that this rule is garbage. But I just want to reiterate, I think this rule is garbage. Me too. reiterate i think this rule is garbage me too and look i think that it is important for the purposes of us all agreeing on a consistent reality yes that we adhere to definitions as they are presented

and so i accept that this was not a perfect game because my understanding is that we think of a perfect game as one in which no base runners reach base at all. There are no base runners on the base, and we are used to perfect games becoming no hitters as a result of walks or hit by pitch or an error, right? That's what we kind of understand no hitters to be in reference to perfect games. But I'm here to say that this is another example of why this rule is garbage. And one thing I'm a little nervous about, as you noted, we waited to record because we were watching this game and we wanted to see sort of what the results ended up being.

And this would have been a sparkling performance from Means regardless. At some point, we're going to have to do an ode to John Means' changeup because it is quite a delightful pitch. But I was watching, and there's this strange dynamic that goes on in the course of a no-hitter or a perfect game where the pitcher doesn't really talk to very many people. They don't want to get him out of his rhythm. I'm sure that it got resolved very quickly if it was an issue, but do we know for sure that John Means knew that he was throwing a no-hitter and not a perfect game when the game concluded?

I don't know if we know that. He seemed, I mean, he would be very happy regardless. And I don't know John Means, so I cannot reliably differentiate between perfecto happy and no-hitter happy. Those are both elevated states of happy but i'm a little worried like 10 of me is worried that he until he got like in the scrum or maybe until he got out of the scrum and was preparing to talk to a reporter after the game that he did not know that he did not throw perfect perfect game. I'm a little worried about it, like 10%. Yeah, I wouldn't blame him. If he had checked the MLB app during the game, he would have been misled

because both the MLB app and MLB.com, right up until the very end or just about the very end, said perfect game. When a no-hitter or a perfect game is in progress on the website or the app, it shows a little message telling people that, and it said perfect game is in progress on the website or the app, it shows a little message telling people that, and it said perfect game long after that runner reached via the drop third strike. So clearly the programmers of whatever logic controls that on the app and the website did not take into account that there could be a no hitter where the only base runner who reached would be on a drop third strike. So when I initially tuned in, I thought I was tuning in to watch a perfect game. And then I was

informed by the broadcasters that in fact, it was a no-hitter. So like you, I agree. We agree on the rules beforehand and we understand that a perfect game means no base runners, but that does not mean we have to be happy about the fact that this rule is on the books. And we've objected to it before, and I get it. It's not quite perfect. Although in this case, the runner who reached was caught stealing.

So that runner was erased and means did in fact face the minimum, making it even more flawless and weird that it wasn't a perfect game i'm getting agitated all over again yeah i know really but it was a great performance regardless and regardless means is it's great like we extolled his virtues recently when he stopped the oakland a's winning streak and yes he's just easy to root, sort of a data-driven player development success story, late bloomer, mid-round draftee. Wasn't a lot expected of him. And he has kind of remade

himself and changed his pitch mix and picked up new pitches and added velocity and turned himself into a legitimately very good starter. And it's been fun to watch and on this day he threw 113 pitches 79 strikes he threw first pitch strikes to 26 of the 27 batters he faced which is pretty impressive and this game went fast it was two hours and 25 minutes even though the Orioles scored six runs so he was working at a nice brisk pace and he just looked great yeah if you if you look at our leaderboards and i just did the full season split so this does not take into account today but you know if you if you look at our pitch value tab on the leaderboards and you are looking at the sort of value of a particular change up for a pitcher right and so here I'm looking at weighted changeup runs per 100 pitches and means this changeup is the sixth best changeup in baseball and the second best changeup thrown by a left handed hitter.

And so he's just it's just fun. You know, it's just like a cool mix of things. if we want to lean into embracing a narrative to help us make sense of the world around us, there's something charming and sort of cool about a guy like him succeeding and throwing a no-hitter, but even just being himself, because for such a long time, the knock on Baltimore was that they could not develop pitchers to save their lives, and their approach to it was backward and not data-driven,

and guys would leave, and they would be Jake Arrieta and then we would say ah Baltimore and we'd kind of you know cry in Old Bay and feel badly about it and then there's means and so it's I think that if I were an Orioles fan I would I would be forgiven for looking at him as sort of a not only a great pitcher in his own right and a fun guy to watch on a team that is still trying to find its way through its rebuild but sort of emblematic of the the change in direction and focus within the organization and so it's it's a cool thing like a no-hitter is cool like on its own it's cool for a guy like means to be one to throw it is really cool for him to throw it given who he is and the org that he's from i think it's just a really powerful combination of things and

we like narrative because we're we're writers and podcasters and narrative makes um what we do more interesting and at least more cohesive so a very cool thing one i'm glad we uh delayed for so that we could talk about because john means yeah and if this leads to more discussion of the drop third strike rule and maybe more people up in arms about that i would not be upset about that either i understand why people i understand the justification that is given here right that the rationale comes from this idea that the defense has to make a proper fielding play to record it out i understand that but as sam said like there's just so many exceptions to that and we we allow for those and some of them i think are far further

afield not in a literal sense but in sort of a metaphorical sense from the active pitching and sort of the most reliable way to record outs and we accept that those are going we accept those exceptions but we don't we don't look at this and say the pitcher did he did his job he did his business i don't i don't care for it. But I think that John Means is probably really happy. Although, again, probably maybe slightly let down because I'm not totally convinced he didn't know he had the perfect game. Would you tell him if you were the pitching coach?

I don't know the name of the Orioles pitching coach, but if you were Bob, the Orioles pitching coach, I could look it up, but why delay the pod for a second. If you were Bob, the Orioles pitching coach, would you tell John Means, like, hey, man, I just want you to know that, like, due to a weird rule that, like, is kind of divisive in certain corners of the internet, you're not technically throwing a perfect game right now. You are throwing a no-hitter. I mean, it's possible that this was on a screen somewhere within T-Mobile. There could have been other clues sort of given, but I don't know. They sure celebrated like they maybe thought that was a perfect game. Yeah. I don't know. Do you want to alleviate the pressure on him or do you want to give him that competitive edge where he wants to finish it off? I guess I probably would not want to distract him at all. Like you're not even supposed to talk to the pitcher during the no-hitter attempt, right?

Which is sort of silly. That's the tradition. I don't know if that was actually observed in this case, but you know, why give him something to think about that is not finishing off this start and why make him upset about it potentially you know what if he's angry about the drop third strike rule and suddenly that distracts him from the attempt to to finish this off so no i probably would not break that to him until after the start yeah i mean that's probably the safest thing but you're you're putting a lot on his ability to maintain his composure it probably said on the scoreboard at T-Mobile, and I just wasn't able to tell from the broadcast angle that like,

oh, this is a no-hitter. Congratulations. I did appreciate. I was watching the Mariners broadcast of this game, not the Orioles broadcast, just because you get used to things. It's like comfortable socks. I really liked how nice they were about john means on the broadcast yeah it made me really it was just nice it just was a nice thing

i don't know it's just nice when people are kind so anyway it was it was like ah he did a cool thing and we all get to be excited about i'm watching him react and i think he thought this was a perfect game yeah it's hard to tell the difference between the no-hitter reaction and the perfect game reaction right i don't know him those are both elevated states of joy who knows what they look like it's very exciting regardless like he gets to you know he gets to feel happy and uh be you know he'll remember this day forever and i i doubt his experience of it will be diminished in any kind of a lasting way if he temporarily thought he threw a perfecto but did not. Although I stand by my take that the Mariners will not make the postseason again until someone other than Felix has like the most recent perfect game.

So maybe Seattle should have advocated for a change in the scoring decision. I don't know. I'm just saying. Well, he's on a short list of starts this good. Baseball Reference just tweeted a list of eight starts or eight pitchers who have had games with 27 outs, 12 or more strikeouts, no hits, no walks. Nap Rucker, Sandy Koufax, Randy Johnson, Matt Cain, Felix Hernandez, Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, and now John Means. And this is the first Orioles solo no-hitter since all the way back to 1969 when Jim Palmer did it. The Orioles have never had a perfect game, and I guess they still haven't technically. And he only allowed one hard-hit ball, as StatCast defines it, 95 miles per hour or more. And that ball was a pop-up, so just did not allow a lot of hard contact, although there were some balls with high expected batting averages. So he could have lost it.

That's usually the case in no-hitters slash perfect games. So anyway, congrats to John Means and the Orioles. And let's hope that the draft third strike rule is changed someday so that this can be averted in the future. It will never be changed it will remain with us forever and uh and i i imagine i will make peace with it eventually but today is not that day pitching coach is chris holt chris holt oh chris holt that's so and so sorry chris i just didn't remember i know some them, but some of them I forget. And Bob seemed like a neutral alternative to not knowing.

So here we are. Sorry, Chris. Definitely a lot of pitching coaches named Bob. Yeah, Bob, Robert, Roberto. Like there are a lot of, you know, we got a lot of options here. It's a popular name. So before John Means finished off his no-hitter, there was a different

trending topic on Twitter. Tony La Russa was trending before John Means dislodged him. We talked a little bit about this on our most recent episode about Jeff Passan's report that there's been some grumbling going on in the White Sox clubhouse about Tony La Russa's managerial decisions. And that grumbling perhaps is going to get a little louder after Wednesday's game so Tony La Russa did not cover himself in glory in the 10th inning of a game that the White Sox lost to the Reds one to nothing so what happened here the headline the most notable screw up here is that he had Liam Hendricks serve as the White Sox zombie runner, which is not great because Hendricks is a closer. He is not a runner and this did not have to happen. It turns out

that Tony Russo did not know a rule that was relevant here. So the zombie runner rule I am quoting here, the runner placed on second base at the start of each half inning will be the player in the batting order immediately preceding that half innings leadoff hitter or pinch runner. And so La Russa thought that that would be Hendricks because he had been double switched in to pitch. And so that was his spot in the batting order. batting order. However, the rule continues, if the player in the batting order immediately preceding that half innings leadoff hitter is the pitcher, the runner placed on second base may be the player preceding the pitcher in the batting order. This rule will not be in place for the postseason. So he could have had Jose Abreu serve as the zombie runner, but he did not know that that was the rule. And friend the show james fegan read the rule

to him after the game and tony rusa said i'm guessing you know the rules better now i know so that was one issue and then also in that inning so you have the zombie runner on to start the inning and then yasmani grandal walks and as a listener just pointed out to us via email brendan wrote in to draw our attention to yasmani grandal's line which is really something he currently is batting 121 with a 363 on base percentage and a 259 slugging and that all comes out to a 100 WRC+. So your typical league average hitter with a 121 batting average and a 363 on base, thanks to a 27.2% walk rate.

Anyway, he got on base with a walk, and then Larry Garcia grounds into a force out. You have first and third with one out. Billy Hamilton comes up. And La Russa has Garcia steal second. And he said that it was a managerial call for Garcia to steal second there. And La Russa said that he would make that call again. But Garcia was thrown out. And then Billy Hamilton struck out.

And the White Sox didn't score. And then they lost in the bottom of the inning. And that just seems like a strange call too, because you have Billy Hamilton up who is probably not going to ground into a double play. And you already have the runner on third who can score if he just hits a sacrifice or something, which it seems like Billy Hamilton would be capable of doing. So that was perhaps an odd decision, but it was not a misreading of the rule or just an ignorance of the rule, which was also an issue in this inning. So that just contributes to the perception that Tony Russo is just a little bit out of his depth here. You know, it's odd not just that he didn't know the rule, but that no one knew the rule or that no one felt comfortable telling him the rule or whatever communication breakdown happened there.

Like, you know, the manager has a lot on his mind, but that's what your bench coach is for. That's what your other coaches are for. That's what even players are for. You know, someone should speak up and know that rule and say something and i thought it was funny that the opposing manager david bell i'm reading a tweet here from another friend of the show trent rosecrans david bell said he knew the rule quote the league made it really clear that it was going to be a new rule in spring training so he's just totally throwing tony under the bus here. Oh, no. So that does not reflect particularly well on Tony. Yeah, and as you say, it doesn't reflect well on anyone.

It's not good that... I mean, he doesn't strike me as a tyrant, so the second explanation here is sort of not persuasive to me, but either none of them knew the rule or no one else on that staff felt sufficiently empowered to be like, hey, Tony, we don't have to. We can just be Jose Abreu. He's not fast, but that's better than having Liam Hemsworth out there. But Tony La Russa, while he seems old school,

I don't know that he has a reputation for being so stifling in his approach that he wouldn't be like, oh, me i'm gonna be mad at you because you told me i didn't have to run with a pitcher you jerk so it's not the best that no one was like oh wait hold on liam come back a second like just hang out because you're you're not going to be busy for a minute here that seems bad i wonder about about him claiming that garcia's steal was a managerial call that's probably true i did write at one point for fan graphs about like there being a strategic value of being kind to others and one of the ways that bosses can manifest that is like standing in front of their people

when their people are about to endure criticism and sort of taking responsibility for behavior that isn't theirs as a means of deflecting ridicule or shame from others. Now, I wrote that about Mickey Calloway before we knew what we know now. So let's imagine that it's a manager we all like and a coach who we don't think is a creep. So just again, it's Bob. So Bob is out there, and he is saying,

like, no, I told him to steal. I had that on, and he just was following orders, and, you know, stuff happens, and that's too bad. And, again, I think that's probably unlikely. I think that based on what we know of Tony LaRusso, he probably just called for everything, you know, to do that. But the possibility exists that he's just trying to like protect his guy i don't think that's what happened but if you were like if you're a white

socks fan and you're looking for a reason to be optimistic you could latch on to that i don't think that you'd have a lot of good reason for it but it is an explanation that um at least makes somebody nice even if it doesn't necessarily absolve them of the greater sin of not knowing that, say, their closer doesn't have to run in extra innings. So, you know, we'll imagine a hypothetical Bob that it's really a shame because I like that piece, and now I feel weird reading it. Well, in Larissa's defense, the last time he managed,

they just played the games. You know, they didn't have a zombie runner, so I'm not saying that things are better now and if this were just some sort of principled stand against the very existence of the zombie runner rule i would be more inclined to forgive him but you know he is managing under weird manfred ball rules so i guess he has to know how they work. He does. But if we're coming up with counter explanations to explain this behavior, I like very much the idea that he is staging a quiet protest of a situation that he finds to be insulting to the game of baseball and one that undermines the sort of integrity of the game that he

has known for so long. That's much better. Although, you know, the counter argument to that, if you're a disgruntled White Sox fan right now, is that if you play normal extra innings, then he just has longer to manage. So that might not make you feel better. Kind of, you know, kind of a double-edged sword, that one, potentially. Yeah.

Even if he was trying to make a point here he probably shouldn't have done it at the expense of his team and his closer so no but it's a weird game that we are watching these days i'm seeing some people pop up with defenses of the drop third strike rule on twitter i don't know this is going to be a discourse, I think, one of those discourses that we so often talk about. Famously love those. Joshian tweeted, seeing a lot of hate for the drop third strike rule.

The idea is plays have to be completed to get an out. It's a good rule with good exceptions to protect force-based runners. But there are exceptions, Joe. Yeah, there are exceptions.e yeah there are exceptions there are and there are a lot of exceptions there are great many there are great many exceptions i think that the you know i think that the future of baseball just depends on more people reading sam so that was probably true to begin with we'll link to sam's famous uh aside once again third strike rule yeah all right so

what else do we have to discuss producer dylan alerted me to a quote that is relevant to something that keeps coming up on this podcast which is the idea that umpires sometimes make calls without actually seeing the play and we have talked about whether they should just say it was too close to call or they didn't see it and they should defer to the replay umps and that is not currently an option but there was a play on a salvador perez single in a royals game where umpire angel hernandez everyone's favorite ump signaled an out on salvador perez's signal and here is what angel Oh, boy. As you saw, I got basically blinded by the outfield scoreboard. The pixels on the lights were as clear as white can be. I was trying to make out what happened out there. The harder I looked, the less I could see.

So I was trying to read the players to see what they did with the ball. And I had to come out with the call. I basically guessed on the wrong call. So as soon as I turned around, home plate umpire Edwin Moscoso started walking toward me. We got the crew together and we fixed the problem. And Alex said, so you signaled for an out call as if the outfielder had caught the ball. And Angel Hernandez said, correct. and justice was done. But this was a clear instance of an umpire admitting that he made a call without actually being able to see what happened. And I'm sorry that it's Angel Hernandez in this case, because as soon as you mentioned Angel Hernandez, everyone says, oh, well, of course, it's the notorious Angel Hernandez. But I'm sure that many an umpire has made this sort of play and this sort of ruling because he is not the

only person who would have lost track of something because of something getting in the way. And so he actually admitted it here, which is interesting, but I'm sure that many other umpires, whether they'd admit it or not, have similar situations. And all we're saying is that maybe they could just say, I didn't see that one yeah you can't say you guessed better to say you didn't see like even if you did guess even if that's the truth i think you have to be conscious of how that undermines the faith that people have in you doing your job in a way that we perceive as like deliberate and fair and not guessing not that angel hernandez really has much faith to undermine yeah but like

you gotta you gotta you gotta fib in that case it's better in that case in my opinion to be dishonest in the service of preserving our faith in the system and that these rules that we have collectively made up but agreed to adhere to have some sort of rationale that binds them together and makes them sensical. So you got to fib in that case and be like, I had a bug in my eye. I had a bug in my eye. And so I was like, oh, I got to get this bug out of my eye.

And then I missed it. And so I was like, oh, I got to call everybody over because I had a bug in my eye and I didn't see it. You got to lie in that case. It's better to lie. Yeah. All right. Well, it's just got to lie in that case. It's better to lie. Yeah. All right. Well, it's just relevant to this topic that keeps coming up.

There is a real life example. By the way, which game is more perfect? Is the John Means no hitter or the Armando Galarraga non-perfect game? Which one is closer to perfection for you? Oh, that's a really good question are they equally close to perfection no no i don't think they are i think galarraga is closer to perfection maybe hmm let me think about why i think that why what what is your answer to this question galararraga is like, according to the rules, he only allowed a base runner because of an umpire screw up.

Right. Yeah. In this case, like you could say that means a lot of base runner because of a catcher screw up or some combination of the pitch being wild and the catcher not catching it. So at least like a perfect game of no hitteritter, those are kind of team accomplishments in a way. We talk about them as individual accomplishments. We attribute them to the pitcher, but they are team accomplishments. But the umpire is not on a team. Right, exactly.

Yeah, so I think that Galarraga for me is probably closer because, one, it was an error not of any of the players. It was an error of judgment on the part of the umpire. And like wouldn't happen in today's game in theory, right? Like they'd be able to fix that now. Yeah, right. Although in the future, if they change the trap third strike someday, then you could say that maybe retroactively they could make this a perfect game or at least that it would be one. Sure. And so I guess in that respect, like within the existing architecture of the game, they are roughly equivalent.

But within the the rule structure, like there's nothing about what the fielding team did in Galarraga's perfect game that should have resulted in him losing a perfect game and so I think that that is where the important difference lies for me because you're right I think that no hitters and perfect games are are fundamentally team accomplishments and we talk about them as being the sort of province of pitchers but every single no hitter and perfect game has you know a play where you're like ah that that's the one that but like made the difference and it's funny that we even talk about it that way because technically like they all made a difference right people boot easy balls all the time so you know all of those plays end up mattering over the course of

a perfecto but i think that there's something fundamentally different about the mistake coming at the hands of one of your teammates versus someone who is supposed to be adjudicating the contest. So I think that Galarraga is closer and a good example of an umpire saying, I made a mistake. Right. Like they wrote a book together, didn't they? Yes, they did. Yeah, they patched it up. And in some ways, maybe it worked out for both of them they got a book out of it and everyone remembers armando galraga because

he missed out yeah i mean according to like the line score and the box score like he did allow a hit he didn't even get the no hitter so it seems like it's further away from perfection but i mean he wasn't as good in that game i think as means was in this game like he had three strikeouts in that game but i think yes because the only thing that prevented him from having the perfect game was someone who was not on his team yeah yeah yeah i think that if we could go back and add an asterisk we, we would do that because he threw a perfect game. It just doesn't show up anywhere. Although it does show up in that book.

So there you go. But yeah. All right. Remember when we talked about the Yankees and their slow start? This was April 20th. The Yankees were 5-10. They had hit quite poorly to that point. And we said, don't panic. We said, don't worry,

Yankees fans. The Yankees will be okay. And since then, as we speak prior to the Yankees game on Wednesday, Yankees have the best record in baseball since we recorded that episode. They are 10-4 since that time. And they have the third best WRC Plus in baseball since that time as well, 119. So we were right, I suppose. Not that it was anything brilliant to say, hey, don't overreact to 15 games. But yeah, turns out the Yankees probably pretty good. They have played as they were expected to since then. Not that we are flawless soothsayers because we were raving about how well the Dodgers were playing up to that point too. And then suddenly the Dodgers turned into the Tigers for a couple of weeks. So it works both ways. I guess the takeaway is

less about us being so perceptive and prescient than it is about a couple of weeks of team performance not mattering all that much in the grand scheme of things, or at least not being Being so perceptive and prescient. Than it is about a couple weeks. Of team performance. Not mattering all that much. In the grand scheme of things. Or at least not being all that reflective. Of true talent. I think that that is one takeaway. That one could have from this experience.

And I would say that is probably the most accurate. One that reflects reality. But the other takeaway that we could have. Is that we still just don't understand. The full extent of our powers. And so once we know them better, we're in like the, you know, the first couple issues of like an X-Men run. I don't know if I'm talking about that the right way, but I think that I am. Like, I think I'm right about the X-Men part.

I don't know if I'm describing how comic books work quite right, but it's fine. No one will tell me that it was wrong. So don't worry about it we're not going to get emails so i think that we just don't understand our powers and once we really have them under control once we've gone through the training montage then um then we're going to be in good shape so yes yeah well just wanted to mention they have regressed to the mean they have regressed to what they were supposed to be so hopefully yankees fans panicking a little less these days calling for cashman's head and boone's head a little less these days not that it's going to be an easy run to the top of the al east but just saying things have

normalized somewhat yeah well and now they get to direct their ire toward the astros so i think that the you know there are a lot of healing moments to be had in the last couple of weeks for the Yankees fans. Yeah, Jun Li wrote an article about sort of the crowd reaction to the Astros' first visit to New York since the sign-stealing scandal. And he mentioned one of the heckles that someone yelled was targeted at Astros third baseman Alex Bregman. And the heckle was, you don't deserve your accolades. That's so, that's great. I mean, like we've talked about our own proclivity or lack thereof for booing, but I think that we have said

that if one is going to engage in some sort of heckling or booing, that you should like you should like come up with stuff that is personal but not problematic and i think that that is really nice you don't deserve your accolades that's delightful yeah i mean there were inflatable trash cans and people saying stuff about bangs of course too but sure i enjoy the very formal full sentence heckle. Yes. Be a better helper. Have you watched, I don't remember when this came out,

but when the Angels played the Astros in Houston in that game where Trout got clipped on the elbow and then missed a couple of days, he was mic'd up for that game. And his mic'd up time, for for some reason i was watching something on youtube the other day and you know how on youtube like some channels you get like the 30 second ad and then when you're a certain number of seconds in you can skip the ad or you have to wait until it runs in completion but it's like a normal tv length ad this was like the entirety of mike trout miked up as an ad in in a like cooking youtube i was watching so it was like the entirety of Mike Trout miked up as an ad in a cooking YouTube I was watching.

So it was like a, this is the best possible ad experience that I could be having because I- It's an ad that's better than the video you were trying to watch probably. Well, I don't know if that's true. I think that Claire's chocolate chip cookies are going to be pretty darn good. But I will say that if i had to be diverted for anything i'm glad it was mike trout but so he was miked up and you know he's miked up so we should be conscious of the fact that he is conscious of the fact that we can hear him and he's probably not going to choose to like be a dick when he's miked up because he wants people to like him and

also he seems like a nice enough person and someone who's like not, you know, going to give you the business necessarily for everyone to hear. So the people watching it go like, oh, Mike Trout. He doesn't strike me as that kind. But I was struck in by how sort of collegial he was with all of the Astros guys while he was there. Like not just, you know, there are very, actually very few guys on their active roster who were part of that sign stealing team, the banging scheme team, which does make the booing kind of weird in a way. Because I'm sure that some of their players are like, but I wasn't, that wasn't. Anyway, but, you know, he's like yucking it up with Correa and talking about like the newest thing on Call of Duty. And after he got hit and, you know, he didn't come out until and you know he didn't come out uh until after he he didn't come out immediately like he ran the bases and there was a moment where he was standing

on second and Correa told him that he hoped he didn't come out because he liked watching him hit and anyway it was like a nice exchange and the reason it's relevant to this is I I was wondering if you know if he had been mic'd up last year, and maybe he was at some point, and I just don't remember it, but would he have had sort of the same reaction? Would he have given them more of a cold shoulder? You know, because of the way that the divisions were aligned last year with the pandemic, like, Trout played against the Astros,

but, like, a lot of teams didn't, right? The reason this one was so notable was that this was the first time that Houston had been back in the Bronx. I was like, oh, is Mike Trout helping us understand something about how we process frustration or betrayal and how we move on from other people doing slights to us that we feel and experience? Arguably, the Angels angels slights were were minor

compared to the the yankees based on how postseason stuff has played out and i know that there are yankee fans that feel that like altuve rob judge of mbp stuff and so like i i don't mean to say that they're exactly equivalent but the astros do see the angels you know as division rivals and they have to play each other and the Astros keep the Angels out of the postseason entirely when they're good or at least they contribute to the problem. It was interesting. I think that part of what we're seeing here in a way that is predictable

is like a pent-up expression of frustration and betrayal and anger. is like a pent up expression of frustration and betrayal and anger. And it's, I wonder what it will look like and sort of how long it will take that wave to crest before people are, you know, a little less boisterous. And I don't, I don't mean that like Yankees fans shouldn't be boisterous about it. You know, I'm not sort of digging at them, but it was just kind of curious, like, oh, you, part of curious like oh you part of it is that you have to exist in this universe in a way that's much more close and active and intimate than a fan would because you see these guys and some of these guys might end up being on your team at some point because of how free agency works and trades and what have you but

it was just interesting i was like oh mike trout's a nice guy or at least he fakes it well and he's also probably had some time to like think about this and see these guys in a way that makes it a really different experience for him than it is for a fan or even a member of the Yankees roster seeing the Astros in a regular game situation at home. It's just a different thing. So anyway, it's interesting. Yeah. And by Trout standards was pretty outspoken and critical, both about the science-doing scandal. You know, it's just a different it's a different thing. So or maybe it's just when you're on the same field as people, it's hard to maintain that sort of stance.

But yeah, he was not yelling at Alex Bragman that he doesn't deserve his accolades. It would be weird to do that in game. We would all go like, that's kind of intense, man. Oh boy, perfect game is trending now. Oh, it's brewing of intense, man. Oh, boy. Perfect game is trending now. Oh, it's brewing. I just clicked on the trending topic. The tweets are flying. Oh, my goodness.

How happy is Tony La Russa right now? He's like, oh, no one's going to remember my goof. Yeah. So I wanted to mention, you know, as someone with a known stance on the DH, I'm in favor. There are two events that I- Known stance. I've attended meetings.

I sort of dread when one of two things happens. One of those things is a pitcher has a good hitting performance because then everyone who hates the DH comes out of the woodwork and says, here's why we can't have the DH because you won't have this fine hitting performance by this pitcher. So that's one, and that's people who are against me who are on the other side of the issue. Then there's the case where a pitcher gets hurt while hitting or running after hitting, and everyone who is in favor of the DH says, see, this is why we have to have the DH, and we have to get rid of pitcher hitting.

Why are we endangering pitchers? And both of these are part of the argument. There are things that you could bring up. I could say that, yeah, I think that would be a benefit, probably, of having universal DH, is that we would not have pitchers getting hit or hurting themselves running the bases or in the batter's box. But that is not the primary reason. And it's, you know, not frequent that a pitcher gets hurt hitting. And so to pin it to that, to use that

as a reason to say, see, see, this is why we're right. This is why this position is correct, always just seems unnecessary to me. And the same with, you know, pitcher has a good game at the plate. And so therefore we have to preserve pitcher hitting. We're using isolated examples here, one-offs to say, this is why the rule should stay or go. And really I'm looking at the big picture here. I'm looking at the fact that pitchers are hitting, as we speak now, let's get the updated numbers, 110 with a 138 on base and a 146 slugging. That's your standard negative 21 WRC plus with a 46.4K percentage. And that is after the offensive heroics on Tuesday by Dylan Cease and Oscar Enoa. And I don't want to diminish their feats. So Dylan Cease, he had three hits in a game and that was more hits than he allowed in his six innings pitched. And that was impressive. It was particularly impressive because he hadn't hit in a game since high school. particularly impressive because he hadn't hit in a game since high school. And so to go up there as an American League pitcher and record three hits, a double and two singles, he was the first AL

pitcher to have a three-hit game since Jared Washburn in 2001. And he may very well be the last to have a three-hit game. And it's pretty impressive and it's cool that he did that, not having hit in a game since high school, but also he hadn't hit in a game since high school. This is why I'm against this, or this is a big part of why I'm against this, is that we're not asking pitchers to do this. We're not asking them to do it in the American League. Usually, we're not asking them to do it on the way to the major leagues. So suddenly they get there and they're thrown into the fire. You know, if every other league still had pitchers hitting, that would be one thing. But now you have guys who go from like little league or high school to the big leagues and suddenly they're taking at bats again. And yeah, that makes it more amazing that don't cease had three hits,

but I'm guessing he's not a great hitter. He's not going to do that again. And most pitchers are not doing that. And really it's sort of strange to ask him to do that with no training or experience. And with Inouye, like he's hit home runs and back to back starts. He's had Otani-esque pitch velocity and exit velocity combinations. I mean, he is hitting balls 107, 110 miles per hour while throwing 100 miles per hour himself. And, you know, in his start on Tuesday, he hit a grand slam and he allowed only one run unearned in seven innings

and really impressive. And I don't know whether this is a fluke or whether he would just be a good hitter by pitcher standards. And, you know, if he's a legitimately good hitter, then he could always DH or pinch hit or whatever like Otani does. I'm guessing not. I'm guessing that his offensive upside is more good hitting pitcher, which is still bad hitter. bad hitter. And anyway, I'm just saying like, yeah, if your main argument for keeping pitcher hitting is that, yes, they're terrible most of the time, but then when one of them does something good, it's more surprising and unexpected and fun because you're not expecting it, then I get why

you might say, see, and this is why you have Waskar Inouye making the case for me here. see and this is why you have Waskar you know I'm making the case for me here but I don't accept that argument and I also don't accept the guy gets hit by a pitcher pulls a hammy or something and so therefore that's the case my case is that pitchers

are not selected for this they're not trained for this and they're across the board truly terrible at it even after those performances by Cease and you know know, a negative 21 WRC+. So that's it. I'm saying, like, we can use the larger body of work here to make the argument more so than cherry picking a good offensive performance or an injury here or there.

Right. I think that, you know, I'm not unsympathetic to the idea that baseball affording us sort of surprising delights is like part of what's incredible about the game. I am known to enjoy those. I'm a known sort of cultivator and curator of those moments. it might be slightly more predictable, but certainly far more regular if we put bats in the hands of people who actually know how to use them and allow pitchers to just like do the pitching thing because they're really good at the pitching thing. Why are we down on them being so good on the pitching thing? Them being so good at the pitching thing is like a problem, right? It's

a thing we look at in the sport and we're like, they're too good at this so why not just let them do that part and then let the hitters be hitters you know i i as we've talked about there are people who have a real vested interest in pitchers hitting and i think that some of them have i don't agree with their rationale but i know that is the thing that matters to them but as you said in the grand scheme they're just so they're so bad at it they're so bad at it and the odds that you're going to see something spectacular the reason it strikes you as spectacular is because you probably can't remember the prior instance of the guy even getting a base hit you can't even remember you're like oh this is spectacular. Why? Because he's normally really bad at this.

Oh, yeah, like let's have him keep doing it then. What? What? Yeah. The most persuasive argument to me, which I think is not the one that most people make, but the thing that I will miss when pitchers stop hitting is just having the basis for comparison of players

who are not selected for their offensive skills and don't put much work into their offensive skills and in some cases haven't hit since high school that enables us to see how much better the actual hitters are getting because it's it's kind of tough to tell like how much better are hitters today than hitters 20 years ago or whatever like there's some complex statistical techniques you can try to see, like looking at age cohorts and people coming in and out of the league. But it's hard. It's hard because pitchers and hitters, they're always competing against each other. And so hitters are getting better over time, but their stats relative to each other are not necessarily

changing. But because we have pitcher hitting, it gives us this sort of stable baseline, right? It's like a standard candle in astronomy. It's like something that we know the magnitude of. We know that pitchers as hitters are not getting meaningfully better. They're not being recruited for their offensive skills. And so we can compare just how much worse and worse and worse they are getting over time relative to the league average hitter. That kind of tells us in a roundabout way how much better the league average hitter is getting. So I will sort of miss having that as sort of a yardstick, a way to tell how much better baseball players are getting as pitcher hitters do not get better.

But that's just kind of my idiosyncratic reason for kind of liking having pitchers hit but all i'm saying is i i just i kind of dread it even when people are making the argument that i agree with which is that there should be a universal dh when it's based on one incident right whether it is a guy getting hurt or a pitcher excelling in a certain game i'm just saying i i almost dread those things happening because i know that in my mentions someone will be saying see see this is why we have to have pitchers hit because of this game or see see you're right we need to do away with pitcher hitting because of this and no it's just because they're terrible at it it's a totally different job and we shouldn't ask them to do both of these things so that's just my little rant yeah

i think that you are correct and to focus on one instance one way or the other you just lose the power of the totality of the stats which just speak to like suck. So embrace the sheer weight of the statistical record and make change that you want to see because I am tired of watching these guys hit. Although maybe Jacob deGrom is like, please let me keep hitting. So speaking of rules I don't care for, I wanted to read this email from listener Noah E. in Cambridge, Mass., who writes, Ben, you're going to hate this, and I'm extremely sorry.

But I had a very misguided, he says, thought on how to reduce the extent of three true outcome plate appearances and bring back the small ball we all, question mark, love so much, put a runner on second at the beginning of every inning in the around half season we've now seen in total with zombie runners it sure seems like there are a lot more sacrifices to bring the undead home hitters swinging for singles rather than dingers and general base path excitement this is all to be expected because it's a lot easier to get base path excitement when there are people from both teams out there every great story has conflict etc but do you think this is just because it's extra innings and we'd see this anyway? Or might it be possible to bring the enjoyable chaos into more of the random number generator we call baseball, e.g. the earlier innings? is going to go for it. Why not go all in? In fact, if they really meant it, they would put a zombie runner on second every time the bases were empty. Hit a homer. Great. You're

on second now. Sackfly scores the zombie from third. You know where to go. Line out into a double play to start an inning. Second base is where to go to live out your shame of getting more outs as the first batter of the game than ever possible before. Would love to hear your thoughts on just how unwatchable this new product would be. So, Sam

and I talked on an episode last year about this, about the idea of, well, why not just do this every inning? Because Sam was in favor of the zombie runner rule. And one of the critiques that came up was like, well, if it's so great, then why don't we just play every inning this way? And I think Sam pointed out some fallacies there and was not in favor of having it in every inning, even though he liked it in the extra inning. And obviously, I am not in favor of it in any inning. But I just wanted to mention this to nip this in the bud as a potential argument in favor of the zombie runner rule, the idea that it leads to less three true outcome baseball. that it leads to less three true outcome baseball because if that were the case,

then people could say, well, at least the silver lining of the zombie runner rule is that it is putting more balls in play and leading to fewer strikeouts and so on. And that is not the case. As it turns out, despite Noah's anecdotal observations here, I was just looking at the Fangraph's splits leaderboard

and I looked at the MLB rates for extra innings only. Thus far this season, and granted it's only 449 plate appearances in extra innings entering Wednesday, but the percentage of plate appearances that have ended in a walk, strikeout, or home run in extra innings this season is 42.8. or home run in extra innings this season is 42.8 42.8 percent compared to 36.4 percent for all innings including extra innings so it turns out that thus far this year the TTO rate is actually significantly higher in extras and a lot of it is an elevated walk rate which comes from more intentional walks. Those situations create incentives to put people on base. But it's not just the extra walks.

The strikeout rate is also higher in extra innings. Could be small sample, could just be better pitchers. That might have something to do with it. You know, you have Liam Hendricks out there to try to preserve the tie. So it might be that, that you're saving your closer for extras or whatever but for whatever reason it hasn't actually been the case that balls have been put in play more often in extras it's actually been the opposite so i'm just trying to turn what could be an argument in favor of the zombie runner rule into an argument against and i will also mention that yes base path madness can be fun but bunting for hits is one thing.

Sack bunts are everything. Sack bunts are boring. Bunting for hits are fun. We should always draw that distinction and not conflate the kinds of bunts. I was asked in my chat today if any strikeout should automatically erase every base runner. erase every base runner so for example if you had two on and no out and were like worried about a double play but a strikeout actually would function like a triple play and just reset the inning and the questioner said that's an instant incentive to put the ball in play and it's like well there's an incentive there but the ability to execute on that incentive isn't a given. So I think you just designed like a 30-minute baseball game.

Yeah, probably, right? Yeah. I think that the stance that we should take, because remember, I've been converted to your position. And by converted, I mean I've been inspired to care about it, whereas before I didn't feel very strongly about it one way or the other. I mean, I wanted you to be happy, but I didn't feel very passionate about the zombie runner rule. But now, I think it's bad. So I think that the way that we should collectively decide to talk about this is to say that this is a pandemic aberration. It was presented and introduced and justified and passed in the interest of keeping games shorter,

both so that we weren't taxing pitching arms that haven't had their usual ramp up and also to not have guys in close contact as much because we're worried about a pandemic after all. And so we should not talk about this as if it is an eventuality, right? This is something that we adopted in like an emergency capacity,

like requiring factories to produce ventilators, right? It is a wartime effort. But soon, hopefully, the pandemic will be over and the justification for this will be gone. And then we can return to normal baseball because we all know that it is actually a rather small percentage of games that goes to extras and goes really deep into extras and so we should like don't we should not grant the premise of the question that this is a thing we have to deal with it's like no this will go away and so don't bring it into the to regulation play because it soon will be gone from extra innings play i reject the idea that this is a permanent change we say no yes yes let's not accept that once applied it must be permanent and i did just check by the way last season as well and it was also the case that extra innings last season had a higher three true outcomes percentage 38.5 compared to i think 36.1 for all innings so it was the case in a larger sample last year as well.

Right. And see, in none of those cases did a pitcher have to. It's very embarrassing. Yeah. Like I make mistakes at work. We all make mistakes at work. We are none of us perfect. We are fallible by nature.

But I haven't made that mistake. Yeah. So that's something. Yeah. I guess you haven't been. Yeah. So that's something. Yeah. I guess you haven't been called upon to make that decision either. But if you were, I'm confident that you would know the rules because you read the rule book

without being a major league manager. I do do that. It makes me really fun at parties. One more email here from Miranda, also on the subject of Manfred Ball. She says, So I was discussing the seven-inning no-hitter concept with a friend. A question came out of it, why do some people appear to have higher standards of realness for a no-hitter than for a baseball

game itself? If we're not counting a seven-inning no-hitter as a real no-hitter, then by extension, why are we counting a planned seven-inning game as a real game? Both teams lose the same number of offensive chances and so on, so within those constraints it's level, but is it equal? For game outcome it is. Seven innings hold the same weight as nine innings since it's the same W or L, not a percentage of a win, but those seven innings are not equal to nine innings for a pitcher's performance, and yes, I realize a no-hitter is much harder through nine innings. It's just that people seem outraged lately about the seven-inning no-hitter issue, but less mad about seven-inning games themselves and their integrity, and if they're real. Thoughts? one of the arguments in favor of it being perhaps a qualified no-hitter, one that came with a seven inning designation next to it. But this was one of the things that we considered when we were talking about it. It's like we grant these to be games that count, right? We would say that a guy

had thrown a shutout. He would have a shutout in his stat line if he had done that. We count all the other stats from it. So it seems strange that we draw a line at this achievement what did they they say it was a distinguished accomplishment or yeah something yeah yeah so i think it's a great question i mean the justification for this is also sort of pandemic related um because there was a concern about not being able to make up games if there were a lot of cancellations and they want to get guys out of there yada yada but yeah i i think that i think that you're right i think that you should you should take to the streets yeah preach your truth because your truth is right if yeah i mean i i still think that it is important again to have that like little parenthetical that says seven innings because we're just really bad at remembering stuff yeah we're really bad at

remembering things and i wouldn't want some intrepid researcher like 15 years from now who was perhaps a very young person when this was all going on and didn't remember like the ins and outs of of bum garner's no hitter to think that oh this was exactly the same as the other things and then they would write an article on fangrass.com and someone in the comments would be like, well, you got to add a caveat to this thing. And they'd be like, hey, Meg, why didn't you tell me that? And I'd be like, because I don't remember anything, man. Like it was a hard year.

So I think that it's important to have something there that distinguishes it from other no-hitters because it is a different kind of accomplishment, but I think it is still an accomplishment within the confines of regulation play. And so we should acknowledge it as such. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I think about that. I do see the argument for drawing a distinction between a seven inning game and a seven inning no hitter because one is an individual accomplishment and one is a team accomplishment. And when you're talking about the game, if you all agree that it's going to be seven

innings going in and you both have the same chance to win that game or lose that game, like it maybe hurts the better team because you're more likely to get an upset if you play fewer innings. But I think it's maybe a little different than just an individual accomplishment like a no-hitter, which is significantly easier and really has a different meaning in seven innings than it does in nine. It's far harder to have a no-hitter through nine innings. And if that is what we historically have understood a no-hitter to be, then it really colors your perception of that accomplishment. Whereas a game, we just accept, well, a game is one team plays the other and one team scores more runs than the other team. And that is still the case in a seven inning game. And I guess you could say that a no hitter is just a start where a pitcher pitches a complete game and doesn't give up any hits. And that's still true in a seven inning game, but it does really change the nature of the accomplishment in a way that maybe a seven inning game, little as I like it, doesn't change the nature of a win quite to the same degree. So I guess that would be one argument for drawing some distinction there. But I will

say that I am an opponent of the seven inning games. And we got another email from a Patreon supporter, Jody, who wrote in to say the following is in response to MLB playing seven inning split double headers and charging full price for both games. And Jody continues earlier today, I went to my local donut shop and ordered a dozen donuts. After paying for them, I opened the box and saw that there were only nine donuts in the box, along with a note. The note was on Camping World Stationery and appeared to be from Rob Manfred. It said,

Thank you for purchasing donuts from us. I realize that you're receiving over 22% fewer donuts than you paid for, but them's the breaks. You see, even though our donut shop employees won't be at the store any longer, if they gave you the full 12 donuts that you paid for, I'm going to tell the public that you're getting less than the full amount because of checks, notes, health and safety protocols. Listen, I realize that argument is completely

ridiculous. It's just that the owners and I are confident that most fans won't complain enough about buying a ticket for a nine inning game. And then thanks to a different game getting rained out, ultimately getting 22.22% less baseball than you paid for. Believe me, this time next spring, you'll think getting 22.22% less baseball isn't that big of a deal when you'll be getting 100% less baseball while we try yet again to break the players' union. Signed, Rob Manfred

presented by Doosan. Seriously, I feel like if we fans don't complain very loudly about this, MLB will continue getting away with giving us less baseball for the same price. It's an outrage. And I guess it depends whether you go by time of game or innings in the game or action in the game. You might get different answers, but it's true. People are paying full price for seven inning games that they expected to be nine. Okay. Well, sure, that's a bummer. I won't deny that that's a bummer.

I have a hard time getting worked up about that particular bummer. Yeah, me too. I'm like examining my soul to say, why, Meg, you get agitated about all kinds of stuff, so why is this not clearing the bar? I don't know that I have a satisfactory answer to that. I think you should go to a different donut shop. I think that the metaphor is

perhaps a touch strained i think that i wish donuts didn't give me heartburn quite as often as they regularly do what's that about with donuts and heartburn i don't have a good explanation for that but i like get a i get a little heartburn sufferer i'm lucky in that respect i i normally am not either but i get a little gird with the donuts and I like them so much, but then I'm like, ugh. I think that the takeaway from this though is that yes, you should express your displeasure when we talked about the reason we should care about the Super League. Was it Super League?

Was because it demonstrated the power of fans to sort of shape the future of the game in a way that is positive or at least expresses a fan preference in a way that we tend to not be able to muster here in the States. I will say that we have been introduced with a countervailing force, which is the potential profitability of gambling. with a countervailing force, which is the potential profitability of gambling. Maybe you will get as many donuts as you want, but you will have to make prop bets on their size.

I'm going to resist knowing more about this until I absolutely have. I know it makes people mad, but I'm going to keep doing it because I can only live so long, and there are only so many hours in the day, and I have all these books I haven't read, and I keep buying them even though they're unread, and so I got to read these books, and then I will learn about gambling. There's so many people who are so frustrated right now,

and I'm really sorry, and I sound like I'm delighting in your frustration, and I swear that only 10% of me is anyway there are many reasons to be aggrieved about the seven inning games like imagine if you're the twins if you're the Minnesota twins and you're 0 and 10 in Manfred ball games either seven inning games or extra inning zombie runner rule games and 11 and 7 in nine inning games yeah imagine how you're feeling about that right it's not that they were at a disadvantage in the manfred ball games relative to the other teams really but if you figure that they're generally the better team in the typical

matchup as they were projected to be entering the season then shortening those games makes it easier for them to be upset and no they should probably not be going 0-10 in those games, even so. But still, if you had that sort of disparity, you look at where you are in the standings in your overall record, and you say, well, if baseball were just nine inning games, as it was for so long, then maybe we would be doing a little bit better than we are. Or like, I think mostly, though, that there's just just there is an inherent unpredictability to going to a game in person

and we accept it in a lot of cases and i appreciate how this feels different right because it is an imposed it is a difference of experience that is imposed not by god or nature but by rob manfred and it's like you'll defer to rain but you don't want to defer to rob so i i get that right because i'm sure that it feels very different to you as a paying customer of like the yankees if you let's say you buy a ticket to a game and you purchase that ticket with the understanding that garrett cole is gonna pitch and you're like ah garrett cole i love garrett cole and then the game gets rained out and then the next time you go a less good starter starts i need a different team because some of the you know a lot of the yankee starters have actually been pretty good you're a fan of the baltimore

orioles and you bought a ticket and you're like i'm gonna see john means pitch and you're like yeah john means and then the game gets rained out and you get comped to go to a different game but then in that game their fifth starter is going i don't even know who their best and so you're like well this is a dramatically different experience. I'm seeing a much less good guy go. Or maybe it's not even a less good guy. Maybe you just want to see your guy. You have that guy who you're super excited about. And now you don't get to see him because by the time they can make up the game, someone else is up in the rotation. And it's just that's just the way the cookie crumbles.

But you sit there and you're like, that's not John Means' fault. And it's not even the Baltimore Orioles' fault. It's the Reigns' fault. And who can be mad at the Reign? It just exists. It's not an entity. It doesn't have, you know, conviction or purpose or even malice. It just exists as Reign. And that does feel very different to you than thinking you're going to get nine innings of Garrett Cole and maybe you get, maybe you still get to see Garrett Cole, but you only get seven innings of him. And you're like, well, I feel a little bit cheated.

And so I understand how that's different, but I think that mostly it's going to be okay. And we should express that we don't like this. And again, we should not take it as a given that it is going to persist into future seasons when we are hopefully much further removed from the pandemic. But I think it's okay.

I think it's okay. I think it's okay. Like just imagine that what you're really missing is the two innings you would have spent in line for a less good beer than you deserve because you're going to a Yankees game and there is no good beer to be had. Right. It's like that.

All right. Shall we close by meeting a major leaguer? Sure. Sure. Meet a major leaguer? Sure. Sure. Meet a major leaguer. I am very eager to meet this nascent major leaguer. It's the thrilling debut of somebody new.

Let's meet this mysterious major leaguer. All right. So our new segment, we introduce a major leaguer who has recently made his major league debut, but may not have made it to your news feed. So do you want to begin today? Sure. So this player was suggested to us by a number of different listeners. So thank you all for raising him to our attention. This is Jose Rojas, who is a player for the Los Angeles

Angels. He is a third baseman and an outfielder. He is a hometown guy, which is part of the reason that his story has been so meaningful to people there he went to he went to literally anaheim high school in anaheim california so he's not even just a hometown guy meaning that he's like from la or from orange county he's from anaheim and he was drafted by the angels in the 36th round of the 2016 draft and he kind of bounced around as a as a college player he went to fullerton college and then transferred to v University in Costa Mesa. So he's been a California guy for his entire career, basically his amateur career as well as his pro career. And he, you know, didn't play last year as no one did because of the pandemic.

And he got his shot this year. He has had, you know, not the best time in the major so far he's had 47 played appearances he has a 47 wrc plus he has just seven hits among them but he has seven hits and he's a hometown guy and his story is really inspiring there's a great uh los angeles times piece that we will link to that i it has too many like movie highlight moments to really do justice to all of them. So we'll be sure to link to it here. This is from Jack Harris. But he is the son of immigrants.

He has had a number of instances in his life where he couldn't play the showcase circuit, really, because it was expensive. And his younger brother had lymphoma. And he has just been tested and tried throughout his his young life and his young career and and now is getting a big league opportunity and it's really exciting so i guess when he he made his debut it was against liam hendricks it did not go well he struck out but his family was there and they were all crying and he had former coaches watching on tv and you know he has been chasing this moment

for a really long time. Like I said, he was drafted in 2016. He's 28 years old. This is sort of, you know, he's the kind of guy where if you call him sort of an org player, you might not be totally out of line. But, you know, he made the team and is getting his opportunity mostly because of injury. And I don't imagine that he'll necessarily stay up with LA for all that long, but here he is. So yeah. Yeah. He has played several positions. He's played first base, second base, third base, left field, right field. Yeah. He's been all over the place trying to help out that porous angels defense that we talked about last time. still porous but you know it's always nice when a guy a local guy gets an opportunity i think that every fan base probably has their

local guys and the the spectrum of quality that those players exhibit over time is widely variable like wildly variable but they always mean something so yeah yeah the 1086th player drafted in the 2016 draft yeah long long time to wait to hear your name called i don't think that we we don't talk enough and we talk about it a great deal but i still think that we could probably talk more about just what an achievement it is to make it to the major leagues at all and that's sort of the premise of this entire series right but even within the context of this series it's like for a guy taking in the third round it's a big deal it's like any prospect who sees major league time is an accomplishment not just for him but for you know for the scout who saw him and persuaded the orc to take him and for all of his

coaches along the way and so i don't know we know, we've had rule five guys, we've had former first rounders whose careers haven't quite panned out, but to go in the 36th round, like this round of the draft is probably never going to exist again. And so for him to succeed the way he has is really exciting. And so we tip our caps to Jose. All right. So now we know Jose Rojas and my major leaguer to meet today is Alec Bettinger. And Alec Bettinger is kind of the opposite story of Kent Emanuel, my meet a major leaguer last time. So Emanuel had that great historic relief appearance where he pitched eight and two thirds innings in his major league debut out of the bullpen, and he's had a couple scoreless appearances since then, so that's nice, but things did not go as well for Alec Bettinger in his major league debut. In fact, they went about

as poorly as they could, but he still became a major leaguer on Sunday. So we've talked about how the Dodgers have been in a rough patch lately, but Sunday was the exception. Sunday, they beat up on Alec Bettinger and the Brewers 16 to 4. And so Bettinger had never pitched professionally above AA, and he was called up to make this spot start. Perhaps we'll see. I think he's still on the roster. Don't know if he'll make another, but he is with the Brewers prospect. He was Eric Langenhagen's 14th ranked Brewers prospect last June. Here's what Eric wrote about him then. A senior sign reliever coming out of Virginia, Bettinger experienced a velo bump in his second pro season and also developed better movement separation between his curveball and slider, which has enabled both of them to play

better. He still only sits 89 to 92, but he gets way, way down the mound and generates about 7 feet of extension, causing his heater to jump on hitters and create flatter approach angle. His fastball is also spin-efficient and has plus vertical movement. He's gone from elder org filler to back-of-the-rotation prospect in half a season. He is not a blue chipper or anything. He was a 10th-round pick by the Brewers in the a season. He is not a blue chipper or anything. He was a 10th round pick by the Brewers in the 2017 draft. He is 25 years old, turns 26 in July, 6'2", 210, right-handed

pitcher. And so he's facing the Dodgers in this difficult assignment where it's just like, hey, we need some innings. Just, you know, go get some outs and last as long as you can and he's facing maybe the the best lineup in baseball certainly the best team in baseball even if it hasn't been playing that well lately and he gave up 11 runs and you know that's not the way that he would have wanted to debut he made it through four innings 11 11 runs on 11 hits, two walks, no strikeouts, just not the line that you want. And this was an item in the Baseball Prospectus box score banter the other day. And it was talking about how you don't see that many starts like this anymore, where the pitcher really just has to wear it. Patrick Dubuque wrote about this.

The pitcher really just has to wear it. Patrick Dubuque wrote about this. And really, there are only a few instances over the past decade where someone went four plus innings and gave up 11 or more earned runs in a start. Bettinger did it for the first time since Jeff Locke in June of 2016. Before that, it was John Lester in 2012. And you just don't see this anymore because guys just don't get left out there to give up run after run and hit after hit like that pitch counts being what they are but in this case it happened and he hung on and he is the second pitcher in MLB history to give up 11 earned runs

in his debut following Arnie Munoz of the 2004 White Sox. And that was the only game that Arnie Munoz ever started in the major leagues, which I hope will not be the case for Alec Bettinger. Munoz did go on to make some more relief appearances, but that start went so poorly that he just never got another one. And I was not watching this game, but according to Patrick's description, like it could have gone so much better. This was really a game of inches situation.

So Patrick writes, infamy seized Bettinger by a literal inch. After loading the bases with two outs, Matt Beatty rolled a dribbler under the pitcher's glove on the right side. First baseman Keston Hura barehanded the ball and underhanded it to first in time. But Bettinger, having diverted his path to field the ball, put his foot down just off the bag.

The next batter, A.J. Pollock, delivered a 1-1 pitch over the center field wall. So he gave up a grand slam there. And then in the next inning, Patrick writes, Beatty continued to thwart baseball's sense of justice by hitting another grand slam an inch over Abisail Garcia's outstretched glove in right. It was a nightmare. And like all nightmares, once the next day begins, it'll all be forgotten except by Bettinger himself. So it could have turned out much differently if Bettinger had been an inch in the other direction, or if that ball had been an inch lower or shorter shorter then maybe he would not have given up those two grand slams and he would have had a better day but he did make the major leagues he is a major leaguer and congrats to him and i hope he gets more opportunities and he said i've been punched in the mouth plenty of times in this game this game

is going to humble you many many times anybody who's played it for as long as we have here knows that. I'm just going to keep pushing forward. That's all I can do at this point. So rough. And that home run, the Grand Slam had an expected batting average of 30.030. Yeah. So it's tough. It's tough. And Adam McAlvey had some unfun facts about this. Bettinger set the Brewers' record for runs and earned runs allowed in a Major League debut. The Dodgers' 11 hits off Bettinger were one shy of the Brewers' record for a pitcher making his Major League debut. Bettinger became the first pitcher in the modern era since 1900 to allow multiple grand slams in his Major League debut. He's the 14th pitcher to allow multiple cliche game is major league quality and hopefully his actual game will be at some point in the future I just I hope this is not a one and done situation where he gets

sent down when other guys get healthy and he just has to live with this line, hopefully either he'll get another shot now or he'll be back at some point in the future. Just not a dignified debut, but hey, he made it. He is on the board. So that's something. That's more than we can say. It sure is more than we can say. But yeah, I hope he gets another go around, if only to bring it down slightly. Just a little bit. Yeah, it wouldn't if only to bring it down slightly. Yeah. Like a little bit.

Yeah. It wouldn't be hard to bring it down from 4.75, which is where it is right now. Well, and then you can say, even if it's a mediocre kind of go, you can say, well, that was a bad, I was nervous. That was my first time out, but this was okay. Then you can point to one and be like, yeah, I had a decent guy. Mm-hmm. So inspired by Bettinger, I just wanted to read this quick piece in the milwaukee record which is uh just about

an even worse debut in milwaukee major league history so i will read here this piece from tyler moss who says as unsavory as sund's performance was, it actually wasn't the worst debut in the history of Milwaukee professional baseball. If you ask us, that unflattering distinction goes to Alfred Alamazoo Jennings, an unqualified catcher whose entire career consisted of just one game he never should have been asked to play. The year was 1878. The Milwaukee Grays were in Cincinnati near the tail end of the franchise's one and only National League season to play a series against the Reds. With the team's three catchers hurt, Grays manager Jack Chapman took an unconventional approach to finding a backstop for the August 15th game.

O.P. Kaler, Chapman asked Jennings, a 27-year-old amateur player who was managing a baseball club in Delaware, Ohio at the time, to join the team simply because he, quote, looked so large and handsome, so very like a catcher. Oh, my God. He has a good face. Yeah. He had the good body, I guess. Wow. I don't think there's catchers as being notably large and handsome compared to other players, but yeah, he had the good face. He had the good body, I guess. I don't think of catchers as being notably large and handsome compared to other players, but yeah, he had the good face, he had the good everything.

The deal was even sealed with Chapman buying Jennings dinner. The following afternoon, Jennings was behind the plate as the starting catcher for a professional baseball team based in a city he neither lived in nor had any connection to, simply because he kind of looked like he could be a passable player. He was not a passable player. Over the course of that game,

hard-throwing Graves pitcher Mike Golden and Jennings combined for a total of 10 passed balls on the official scorecard, though Jennings later claimed it was actually 17. The makeshift battery repeatedly got their sides crossed up, resulting in one of Golden's pitchers breaking two of Jennings' fingers. I signed for an out curve and got an inshoot, which broke a couple of fingers, Jennings later said in an interview. Go ahead, I said. I'll stay here all day, even if I have to stop them with my elbows. You can't drive me away.

The woes of the abysmal big league debut weren't just limited to Jennings' defense. In his three-play appearances, he went 0-2, though he did reach base once on a walk. The Grays lost 13-2 and root to a 15-45 record in the team's one and only big league season, and Jennings was never asked to play another game. He ended his one-game career with a war of negative.2. While his major league service time was almost as brief as it can possibly get, his terrible showing made Jennings something of a legend. In an article about that fateful August 15th contest, Kaler gave the catcher who Milwaukee literally pulled off the street the nickname Alamazoo and criticized his putrid performance. When Al pulled on his sole leather gloves and poised near the grandstand at three o'clock, the crowd scarcely breathed. Zip came the ball from Golden's hand. Bang, it went against the backstop because Al had stooped too late to pick it up. It took several minutes for him to gauge the speed of Golden's pitching, but he got it down fine at

last and stopped the ball every once in a while. But the low comedy parts came in when the new catcher went up close behind the bat. A batter had but to get on first base and a run was scored. They went to second and third without danger and tallied on a passed ball so it turns out that alamazoo had an okay life at least uh in the immediate aftermath of that he became an umpire he later became a cincinnati police officer before finding success as the parched corn king of america with a profitable business and lots of friends both in and outside of baseball. Unfortunately, he died in 1894 at only 43 years due to complications from surgery.

But now we know what would happen if someone was pulled on to catch a major league game just because he kind of looked like a catcher. Did you say the parched corn king? Yes, the parched corn king of america i guess i don't know dried corn i guess dried corn yeah i i guess it just goes to show that like your your expectations of your life must be different if you're like notably handsome yeah like no i'm gonna live a different life than a lot of people because i'm like i'm i'm noticeably handsome i'm handsome

enough that even though my face is going to be obscured by a catcher's mask, it is thought to be like, you know, sufficient for employment. Yeah. Well, that and his size. They may not even have masks in 1878, so maybe his face was on display. More visible. physical appearance still plays a role in where players get drafted and whether they get opportunities but probably not quite so clear a role as it was in the case of alamazoo jennings in 1878 a little less rigorous when it came to talent evaluation so yeah and they don't even have parched corn to fall back on now so yeah it's really so sketchy alecer, maybe you did a little bit better than that.

All right. On that note, we can end here. Well, I just watched Jose Rojas record his first two hits at home. Congrats to him. Of course, I was not watching the Angels primarily for Jose Rojas. I was watching for Shohei Otani, who was pitching and not hitting this time because of the Angels' short bench. And Otani was a lot of fun to watch. He went five-plus innings, one hit, six walks, seven strikeouts against the Rays. Of course, the Angels lost the game after Otani was pulled. They were winning 1-0 when he left. No blister issues for

him, so that's good news. The same shaky command which came and went but didn't hurt him because he was basically unhittable, and he kept conjuring strikeouts to get out of jams. If he could just get the command down, get some more first pitch strikes, get ahead of guys, and then deploy those unhittable breaking balls, that would be a sight to see, and I hope we will see that sight sometime soon. But despite that shakiness, I saw this tweet after the game by Brent McGuire. As a hitter, Shohei Otani has a better WRC+, 161, than Jose Ramirez, and more home runs, 9, than Mike Trout.

As a pitcher, he has a lower ERA, 2.41, than Max Scherzer, and a higher K-rate, 35.7%, than Trevor Bauer. As a runner, he has more stolen bases, 6, than Byron Buxton. And hey, even if it's just looking for the most impressive names and cherry-picking stats, pretty fun. I should also mention that the Yankees won again, scored a solid six runs against the Astros. Giancarlo Stanton continued his latest incredible run. And I will end with one more email from Patreon supporter Adam, who writes, If you're not entirely fed up with getting descriptions

of how other sports handle replay, I think rugby is an interesting comparison that's essentially the exact opposite of baseball. In every televised game, the ref is mic'd up and the sound is played live with the broadcast. The way the players and ref are expected to talk is similar to how a child in trouble at school talks with the principal. Replay is used a lot, called the television match official or TMO, and the angles used to make the call are played on the Jumbotron while the ref and TMO talk it out for all to hear. On tough calls, there is no call on the field. They just go to replay. The gesture to defer to someone else on

the call is not as cool as covering your eyes in volleyball. They make a big square with their hands to represent the TV. Curious which, if any of these, you think would be an improvement for baseball? I think probably both, but certainly the former. We talked about this with Cricket too. I would love to see some transparency and to actually see and hear the conversation that is going on between the ump on the field and the replay ump, and to watch what they're watching. I think that would be a big improvement.

And I like the TV gesture, too. So thanks to those of you who follow other sports that we may not pay as close attention to for filling us in. You can support Effectively Wild on Patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectively wild. The following five listeners have already signed up and pledged some small monthly amount to help keep the podcast going and get themselves access to some perks. Joel Watts,

Will Hickman, Carol O, Robert Milholland, and Bennett Aiken. Thanks to all of you. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group slash Effectively Wild. You can rate, review, and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and Spotify and other podcast platforms. Keep your questions and comments for me and Meg coming via email at podcast.fangraphs.com or via the Patreon messaging system if you are already a supporter. Don't feel obligated to email us about the drop third strike rule. Just saying. Not clamoring for more messages on that. Thanks to Dylan Higgins for his editing assistance.

And we will be back with one more episode before the end of the week. Talk to you then. Successful conversation Can take you very far There is no real perfection There'll be no perfect man Just pieces of connection Giving all we can