Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 1909: The Podcasts Will Continue Until Morale Improves

Episode Date: September 29, 2022

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the inadequacies of dental insurance and Ben’s rewarding trip to Citi Field, a Marlins marketing strategy, Richard Bleier’s balk debacle, pitchers getting the memo about throwing strikes to Aaron Judge and Judge’s difference-making performance even when he doesn’t homer, preliminary Stat Blasts (41:33) about the most consecutive secondary […]

I turn the amp up high and my incisors start to scream The treble's like a root canal, the bass is oral surgery I turn the music louder as a test of my endurance I don't believe in novocaine, I have dental insurance My teeth hurt And I don't care. The ache inside reminds my mind my body's really there. That's why my teeth hurt. But don't complain, or pleasure lets you down. You learn to lean into the pain. Hello and welcome to episode 1909 of Effectively Wild, a Fangraphs baseball podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters. I'm Meg Rowley of Fangraphs and I am joined as always by Ben Lindberg of The Ringer.

Ben, how are you? Doing okay. How are you? Dental insurance is a scam, Ben. Explain yourself. well okay so the like broader question to ask in all of this is like why are the bones and squishy parts of the inside of my mouth covered by different insurance than all the other bones and squishy parts in the rest of my body so that's the first question why must we do these two separate things when we just do one comprehensive thing that is like hey you know how you have a human face with squishy parts and also bones?

Seems like we should make sure that those all do what they need to. And then it doesn't cover anything. It covers none of the things. And it's not like, you know, I'm not, it's not an issue of me being like, oh, I'm going to pick the low card. This was the only plan I could pick. This was the only one. This is not a fan graphs problem.

I'm not leveling accusations at my employer. This is an issue that I have with Delta Dental of Arizona, the only potential avenue I have through the exchange in the state of Arizona. It's a scam. What was not covered? So many things, Ben. We don't have to go into it. I still have all of my teeth,

and I am given to understand that if i want that to remain true that i have to pay out of pocket for several expensive procedures anyway i fared fine in the pandemic i was fortunate but you know i didn't i didn't see a dentist for a while ben because you know what you don't want to do when there's a global pandemic? Have your big mouth open. Right. While someone very close to it pokes a rat in there. Tough to be a dentist during the pandemic, I'm sure.

Yeah, I sometimes go a while between dentistry appointments. It's never like a highlight. It's never really something you look forward to. No, it's definitely not. Sometimes it's something you just have to do in a very pressing way. But I've been pretty lucky from a dental perspective. I mean, I got braces and a retainer and the whole thing. But other than that, nothing too bad.

No painful procedures that I can recall, and I guess I probably would recall them. I just don't get cavities. It's just not a thing that happens to me for whatever reason. I'm lucky cavity wise. See, like, here's the thing. I never needed orthodontia of any kind as a young person. And I didn't have a cavity until I had my first cavity when I was 32 years old, you know? So they did their job for a long time.

I thought we had an understanding, me and my teeth, you know. I thought we had an agreement. I took care of them. They take care of me. And somewhere along the way, you know, you start having problems. And then it all happens at once. And now you need expensive procedures you're gonna have to pay for them yourself so anyway thanks to our patreon supporters

support us at patreon so that i can have procedures that are not covered by mixed dental insurance can be covered one way or another and i will say i like my dentist and like they were very apologetic when they let me know how little of what i'm about to need is covered well invariably bodies betray us at some point yeah man that's the lesson that we've learned and that we all learned yeah unless you're albert bull's trying to hit 700 home runs i guess but um although his body betrayed him quite often along the path. But then it rallied, you know? Yeah, then it rallied.

Maybe that's why he's back to being Pujols again, is that he's just finally healthy. I'm sure he does. But maybe he's just finally healthy for the first time in more than a decade. Because he had the plantar fasciitis stuff like even when he was young like earlier in his career and he would play through it and he would rake because he was peak pool holes but eventually it caught up with him and he did not rake i i still remain mystified by just what happened to his plate discipline just in the middle of his career right in the last season

in st louis in the middle of it he just stopped walking and he started chasing. And I don't know if it was just like his eyesight degraded all of a sudden or whether it was a health thing. Like maybe it was lower body issues that he was just not able to cover those portions of the zone anymore. I don't know. Maybe he felt like he couldn't drive pitches that he was able to drive before. And so he had to chase more often. Who knows? But that never really corrected itself. And he had persistent lower body issues throughout his time in Anaheim. And this year, it seems like maybe it's just that he's been a part-time player. Maybe it helps to take some days off. Sometimes it seems smart maybe that was uh what

he was waiting for all along can't take days off of your teeth though ben no you know the teeth they have to work every day they get no days off they they are the cal ripken jr of your bones of all your bones those ones are the most cal ripken jr-esque they approach that with greater fidelity than any other part of your body which is why i guess they're covered separately maybe i'm scheduled to get my teeth cleaned on friday i hope it goes better i wish you well than it did for you but while you were getting your teeth cleaned or not or whatever else is going on there yeah see the upshot for you actually is that because i need like a super cleaning that they were not able to do today we were able to pod

because i was like yeah i was like you know maybe uh maybe we won't be able to pod because maybe i will have had my face pride open for an hour and then i will be like i don't know but instead i came in here full of rage but all of my teeth and no jaw pain just a wounded checkbook so here we are anyway i stepped on your segue jack told kate we have to go back yeah i have to go back i always have to go back but while you were doing that or not doing that, my second attempt at a transition. There we go. Sorry about that. But I had a very nice affirming afternoon.

Oh, good. Because I went to the ballpark and I did a couple interviews for an upcoming piece. And it was just a really nice experience. Yeah. And I have not gotten jaded about the fact that I can just go to a ballpark and talk to baseball players because I've never had to do it day in and day out. Had to, I should say in quotes, because a lot of people think that that sounds extremely cool. And it is extremely cool. That's the point. But it seems extremely cool when you don't do it every day. Right. When you do it every day, anything you do every day, some of the charm wears off. It becomes an obligation, even if there's some part of you that is still like, I should be pinching myself. This is a dream. Kid me, would have been super excited to be here. However, I have 10 deadlines and I'm constantly on the road and I'm living out

of a suitcase and I never see my family, et cetera, et cetera. Right. So I've never had to do that. I've never been a beat writer. I've never had to cover a team constantly or travel with a team. So it's been kind of nice for me that I can just kind of parachute in and duck in and duck out. And if there's a game that I want to go to or if there's a player I want to talk to, I could just do that. And I'm not chained to that the way that people who do that every day are. And so I can appreciate it, I think, with fresh eyes every time I do it. And I haven't done it a lot lately because I have other responsibilities at The Ringer and I'm editing and I'm writing about other things

and I have a kid and other things come between that. But the Marlins are in town. That's what got me to go to the ballpark today. The Marlins are in town. Everyone's just flocking to Citi Field to see the Marlins. But the Marlins being in town meant that Sandy Alcantara was in town, who's having an exquisite season. And I've been fascinated by some aspects of his season

and I hope that I'm not saying this in a braggy way I hope I'm saying it in a celebratory grateful kind of way but it still is incredibly cool that I could just walk into a ballpark like I can get on the subway walk a few blocks to the subway, take the subway to Citi Field, walk into the ballpark. They just let me walk right in there. It just feels like I'm getting away with something every time. Walk into the clubhouse, which again, if I were there more often, probably I would feel more comfortable and at home there, or maybe not. I'm not sure that I would ever feel completely comfortable in that environment. Like I've been going to clubhouses long enough that I don't feel like a total fish out of water. I hope that I look like I belong I'm allowed to be here, at least during these certain times. But it's weird. It's these people's inner sanctum and their private place. And I feel kind of like I'm intruding, even though I'm not really. And all of this is part of the agreement between

the players in the league and the baseball writers, et cetera, et cetera. It's just kind of an odd context to find yourself in. But the fact that they will let me in and I can just walk up to Sandy Alcantara, maybe best pitcher in the National League, arguably depending on which pitcher war you prefer, best pitcher in baseball this year, certainly one of the most successful, most innings, low ERA, extremely effective, great season, just walk up to him and ask him some questions and he will answer the questions. He doesn't have to, but he kindly did. And most players do. And that's just sort of a nice special thing. And then I can leave and get back on the subway and go home. And now I've got an interview with Sandy Alcantara and other players

on the Marlins and pictures of his pitch grips. I did the Eno Saris special with the pitch grips and everything. So you can look for that sometime soon at the Ringer. But the charm of that and sort of the, this is actually happening. This is something I can do that has not worn off and I hope it doesn't wear off. I hope that I'm not doing the job in such a way that it ever will completely wear off. It's a cool, special thing. I mean, I guess we've earned the ability or privilege to do that, but still kind of cool, kind of special. And it was not a mob in the Marlins visiting clubhouse. You got to have a nice personal conversation. Yes, it was not a gaggle.

You know, you'd think that some people might show up to talk to Sandy Alcantara, but not so much. There was, I think, no visiting media in the clubhouse whatsoever. And seemingly only a few people who cover the Marlins were in the Marlins clubhouse. I mean, it was just a ghost town other than the Marlins. So I saw Eli Sussman, who covers the Marlins for Fish Stripes, and he said hello. And he mentioned that he had just been listening to the podcast, which was nice. But other than that, there were maybe a couple other people there. So that made it even nicer because it wasn't one of those weird things where you have to wait for your moment and someone else is going to snag the player that you want to talk to or maybe they'll be busy. Yeah. with some prominent player when there's no other media members that you are currently competing with. So it was just a nice few hours of my day. Just kind of reminded me how nice it is to do that sometimes and how nice it is to be able to do that. So you would say that talking to him was

not like getting teeth pulled? Not at all. It was completely pleasant and my insurance covered it as far as I know. Just no copay to talk to Sandy Alcantara. Well, I didn't have a copay today because they're like, we'll do the scans to make sure that your teeth need work. Those will cover, but once you need them actually fixed, you're on your own.

It's funny because there must be something in the air because I saw just before we started recording that one Michael Bauman, he filed a piece on Sandy Alcantara I don't think he talked to him though so I don't know make sure you link to that Ben I made sure I said to Dan I was like if you're going to write about

Joey Manessis you must engage in the Lindbergh extended universe because this is a pet I appreciated the link oh yeah I was like you make sure and he was like yeah yeah, yeah, I got it. So anyway. Nice to know that Joey Manessis projects to be at least an average major league player next year.

Pretty cool, huh? That's kind of cool. Yeah. See, now I've thought about your lovely day and afternoon with Sandy Alcantara. And I've thought about the bright future of one Joey Manessis. And I almost feel better about the expensive pain that is in my future. So it's all in balance. I'm glad we recorded today. Yeah. Speaking of the Marlins, I saw Fish Stripes tweeted the other day,

new marketing strategy from the Marlins directly calling all Mets fans, in quotes, to buy tickets to next week's Brave series in Miami. It's the final home series for the Marlins. The NL East title could still be at stake. And so the Marlins, the team, the Marlins, are directly recruiting Mets fans to come to Lone Shark Park, as I'm calling it, to root for or root against, I guess, Atlanta. Wow. Right?

Which this kind of touches on what we were talking about recently with selling and opposing teams gear in a home park. Right? In this case, they are actively saying, come to this game. Now, maybe they would regardless. I mean, I think a lot of Mets fans probably would have shown up without encouragement. There are a lot of New Yorkers in Miami, obviously. So I'm sure that they would be out in force regardless. And I guess you could say, well, they'll be rooting against Atlanta, which means that they'll be rooting for the Marlins.

So they'll be de facto Marlins fans for this series which maybe makes this more acceptable like they won't be actual dyed-in-the-wool Marlins fans they will still be Mets fans but they will be rooting for the Marlins in those games so does that make it okay for the Marlins to say hey fans of another team come see our team that otherwise probably not a lot of people would be paying to see even though sandy alcantara might pitch again he will definitely pitch again he might pitch twice again i mean i think it is importantly different than selling gear for not only the opposition that night but a like a division rival so because you're like you said you're going to be pulling for the home team you know

i don't want to say with deeper feeling because i don't want to impugn the the fervor of marlins fans but certainly with greater urgency than marlins fans themselves might have just given the the relative stakes of that game for mets fans versus marlins fans so I think I'm going to say that this is okay. It's maybe not like the best thing, but I think it is an okay thing because you are, you're directionally aligned, like in a pretty importantly different way than you are when you're hawking Dodger gear to Dodger fans at, you know, at Oracle.

It's different. It's a different thing. I think it's importantly different. Yeah, I guess there's an enemy of my enemy who's my friend going on here, maybe. It's not ideal. No. And I will also say and admit, I am not super well-versed in where the fault lines

within NL East fandom lie right so there may be you know something that I am not really accounting for here that is important to how one would understand this decision and I imagine that we will be told about it if there is but I think it's not great but is okay I wonder how successful they will be. Also, should we be encouraging large groups of people to gather in Florida right now? Shouldn't we all be just going home? There's that too. Jeez. Right. I guess I could have availed myself of the opportunity to talk to Richard Blyer while I was in the Marlins Clubhouse. Poor Richard Blyer. I did that too. He's probably already vented

and said his piece about what happened on Tuesday. Three times! That was really something. Yeah. There was some balking happening there. You could call it a debacle. You hang out with me too much. I'm conflicted about how to pronounce

balk, whether I need to just say balk or whether I need to pronounce balk. Balk. I feel the need to signal that I know that there's an L there, but there's just like a hint of an L. Yeah, like a whisper, a whisper of an L. Anyway, Blier, you can't just be up there and just doing a balk like that. And he was doing that three times. I don't know that he was actually doing anything. He, of course, did not think he was.

But umpire John Tumpain, if that is how you pronounce it, T-U-M-P-A-N-E. I think that's right. Well, he thought that Richard Byer was just up there doing a balk like that three times in the same plate appearance with Pete Alonzo up there doing a balk like that three times in the same plate appearance with pito lonzo up there and i guess i can squint and see what he was seeing it's one of those rorschach test kind of things when it comes to box because if you know that a balk was called then you see a balk yeah or at least you're trying you're trying to see what the Empire saw. And there are so many different ways that you can conceivably balk that you could convince yourself that, OK, maybe technically, if we're going't come to a complete stop and he was drifting a little. That's what Tumpain said, at least. And he told Blyer that and Blyer did not agree, but

he certainly didn't agree on the second and the third. And neither did Don Mattingly, who is going to be leaving the Marlins after this season. And so he has nothing to lose. And so he went out there and said his piece and got his money's worth. And he got ejected, as did Blyer eventually. I think Tom Payne called it a discussion with Mattingly, which is a charitable way to describe the interaction that was happening there. But he said, from where I was, I didn't have Blyer come to a complete stop before delivering to the plate. So I called the balk. It obviously happened again. I tried to

give an explanation to clear it up. We came to the same decision that he didn't come to a stop to force another balk, which led to the discussion with Mattingly. So it was just a balk merry-go-round all while Pete Alonso was up. I think this was maybe the first time that someone had balk merry-go-round all while pito lanzo was up i think this was maybe the first time that someone had balked three times or been called for a balk three times in the same plate appearance not in the same inning i think it was the first time it had happened in the same inning three times since 1988 the so-called year of the balk when they decided that they were going to get aggro about enforcing the balk but it's just one of those things like blier's been in the big leagues for like seven years and has

pitched 300 something games and he had never balked before now was he failing to come to a complete stop more so than in every previous appearance in this game or was he just doing his thing and this particular umpire decided that that thing was a bach i leaned toward the latter but as is so often the case with boxes in the eye of the beholder yeah it's just odd when it's been an entire season basically right like you know the whole idea is that you don't want the the balance of information to be so out of whack between the pitcher and the hitter that the hitter can't make decisions once they've become a base runner. You know what he looks like now.

He's been doing this for the better part of a season. It just seemed strange. It's the kind of rule where I have some sympathy for the fix that baseball is in because it's already so complicated that to clarify it to the point of comprehensibility for like most people. You know, there's sometimes you see a balk and you're like, that's a balk. But most of the time you don't. That's not your reaction most of the time. Most of the time you're trying to decide like how silent to make the L, for instance.

And so to take care of all of the edge cases and describe it such that people be like, oh, I know all the look at the replies to any of the popular tweets about Blyers Bach, you have some people who just are the voices of authority and they espouse complete certainty about Bach. And they just it sounds like they never had a doubt about Bach. box and they just it sounds like they never had a doubt about box and then people who seem just as certain will contradict their interpretation of the box and then a lot of people will be like what is a box i don't know which is basically the the camp i'm in after all these years i basically have given up long ago on ever totally understanding what a bach is. I think we should all just accept that we cannot ever agree on that. It's like the Tower of Babel or something. It's like the Tower of Bach. We can never actually come to an accord on this matter. And so I will never, with any sort of certainty, unless it's the kind of bach where you just drop the ball, that's the one where it's

like, oh, okay, that was a bach. We all know what that one looks like. Most of the other ones though, it's really open to interpretation and you have to slow it down. And even then it's like, are we slowing it down too much? And isn't this what this guy always does? Which is kind of the pickoff attempt one too, like back when Andy Pettit was pitching, some umpires would call him on his illegal pickoff move and others would not. And it just got ingrained because, hey, that's Andy Pettit's move and everyone knows he's got a good move and that's what Andy Pettit's move looks like. And then occasionally an umpire would be like, no, you can't be doing that. I'm going to call you on that. Occasionally an umpire would be like, no, you can't be doing that.

I'm going to call you on that. But if you're a successful player and you have a habit of doing that and you get away with it for a while, well, it's been permitted. So now I'm allowed to do it, it seems like. But Box, no one understands, least of all, Richard Plyer in this situation and maybe even more than Richard Plyer, me. I certainly did not see it when I was watching it in real time. And it was only when I heard that box had been called that I then had to scrutinize the footage and drill down and talk myself into a balk having happened. Yeah.

And it's one of those things where, you know, we have gotten, say, this year, the Innovation of Umpires Explaining replay review. But again, this is a case where if we were like okay you got to get on the mic and like describe the buck i don't know that it clarifies anything because it it's hard to translate that set of like technical specifications to an intuitive like that's a that's a buck like when you're watching a baseball game and a pitcher throws a pitch,

not perfectly, not all the time, but I think that most fans who watch baseball every day can look at a pitch and be like, that was a strike, right? We don't have that intuitive sense except for when we're confronted with really egregious bucks. So I don't know what the solution is there, but it remains a problem, you know?

Yeah. Although it doesn't happen so often that it's a huge problem. So there's an element of whimsy to it too, where it's like, how does this happen? How have we not agreed on what this is? And why do we have this conversation every time something notable about box happens? what this is and why do we have this conversation every time something notable about box happens. But it's rare enough, unless they're making some kind of concerted effort to really enforce it and it gets out of hand, that it's usually not so costly or momentous or consequential that, you know, you wouldn't want a lot of games to be decided on box that no one agrees on whether it was a block or not. decided on box that no one agrees on whether it was a block or not but if it happens every now and then you know marlins mets game in september with yeah flyer on the mound right then it's fun for everyone except richard flyer yeah he he did not seem pleased he did not seem pleased no and i

would imagine that it would actually be pretty upsetting not just because you're balking in that moment, but like, what if you got like balk-induced yips or something? Yeah. It's like you're repeating this motion over and over again, and you've done it thousands of times in hundreds of games, and then suddenly they're telling you that it's illegal. Like, how is that not going to be in the back of your mind in the future? It's like, what, do I need to do something different here? And then once you start thinking about your mechanics and your motion and your delivery, then who knows what that's going to screw up. You just take for granted that this is how I throw a baseball.

And they've always said that this was legal before. And now it's not. Right. They're just pulling the rug out from under my feet. So that would kind of get in my head maybe if I were a pitcher who was having that happen. before right and now it's not right they're just pulling the rug out from under my feet so that would kind of get in my head maybe if i were a pitcher who was having that happen that often in a short span of time well and this is part of the issue with having having judgment be and discretion on the part of the umpire be part of the rule and i don't know that it's avoidable

unless we're sending everything to new york? And having all of those calls be made in a centralized place where like a group of people can huddle around and be like, no easy thing there. But it does leave open that you could be most of the way through a season and not have had a problem and then have one guy be like,

no, it's a buck. And then you're like, no, it's not. But I guess it is today, you know? I would give anything for an ump to get on the mic and just read john boyce's bach rules just read the copy pasta over the pa that would be great that would make all of the bach confusion worth it so we are recording during the yankees game so aaron judge is a

couple of played appearances in he has not homered yet maybe you know more than we do at this moment, listener. But we've been in some suspense. He has not homered in several days. What a bum. A week at this point. I know. But that brings me to a follow-up on one of our conversations last week about Aaron Judge. When we were perplexed that pitchers were throwing strikes to Aaron Judge. Well, guess what? They're not

anymore. The pitchers who have faced him since were evidently just as perplexed because they have not thrown him any strikes since we talked about this. So when we talked about this, I think we had the data through September 19th. So whatever episode that was, I was quoting the stats from September 1st to September 19th. And I noticed that the league average zone rate over that span was 50.5%. Just over half of pitches were in the rulebook strike zone. And Aaron Judge's zone rate over that span was also exactly 50.5%. Even though he was having a month for the ages in a season for the ages, pitchers were still throwing him strikes as if he was just some schmo, as if he was just any other hitter.

Well, since then. I like the idea that they were like, oh, that Aaron Judge? Oh, no. Right. It seemed like that was kind of what happened. It did. So it was night and day. They were all listening to the podcast.

Clearly. And they realized, great point, Meg and Ben. Why are we doing this? We should stop immediately. And they did. And so September 20th to September 27th, Aaron Judge's zone rate 25.9%. So roughly half the rate of seeing strikes as during that earlier period in September that we discussed. So it's just completely fallen off the table.

And that's not counting his intentional walks over that spin as well so he has the lowest zone rate of any qualified hitter over that period as well he should yep as one would expect him to so i guess all is right with the world as i said last time like i i wasn't advocating for them to throw him fewer strikes because it was fun that they were challenging him and that he was beating them time and time again because we got to see Aaron Judge homers. And now they have smartened up and they're not throwing him strikes and we're not seeing Aaron Judge homers. So that's not as fun. So I'm not saying I'm happy about this, but there is a way in which i feel like the world is back on its bearings and things make sense again because pitchers are not throwing strikes to erin judge well and it's not

that he hasn't seen any strikes like especially in this in these recent two games now his third against toronto like he's gotten to two strike counts right like he's had some pitches to to hit no some of them have been really gnarly breaking pitches that were harder to do anything with as evidenced by the fact that he hasn't hit a home run in seven days, but he has been getting some strikes, but just like a more rational number of them. I'm not going to remember who it was now. And so I apologize for not giving credit on this, but I did see someone speculate on Twitter that like, on Twitter that it's one thing when you're going to be the guy who gave up the 40th home run to judge.

Yeah, this is what I was thinking too. Yeah, you're going to be the guy who gave up the 52nd home run to judge. It's very different to be the guy who gives up the 60th home run. It's very different to be the guy who lets him tie Maris. It's different to be the guy

who serves him up the pitch where he moves ahead of Maris. Just in terms of our likelihood, like can you tell me who threw the 36th home run ball to Aaron Judge this year? I can't. Like I don't know. I don't know.

It was some guy, you know, and he hit a home run. Good for him. But like we don't remember that, but we will probably know the name of the person who allows him to tie Maris. Although I say that, and I don't remember who threw the 60th, so maybe everyone should just relax, you know? Because I don't remember. That was a whole week ago. My favorite thing about this is that he has from September 21st to the 27th.

So obviously not including tonight's games, but he has a 192 WRC plus. Yes. I was going to mention that too because, right, he has a 39% walk rate. Yep. That's not including the walk he drew in his first plate appearance on Wednesday. So 263, 548 on base. Yes. 421 slug.

He has a 438 Woba. Yeah, with like a 103 mile per hour average exit velocity. So he still hits some balls hard when he has hit them. And yeah, 192 WRC plus, that's like barely below his extremely high season long WRC plus so getting on base 55 percent of the time that'll make you a pretty valuable player just not quite as fun a player and not quite as likely to break Roger Maris's record yeah it's it is a profoundly like actually haha funny to me I know that I know that like yankee fans are not super stoked on it so i don't want to discount your i don't know whatever you're feeling right now i don't want

to discount your feelings but like this is it's funny it has to be we it's deeply funny ben right because he's drawing he's drawing walks and there are just booos. He strokes a double and everyone is furious. He's doing, I mean, he's still doing great. I know that we are going to be fixated on the record chase component of this. And now it feels like we are firmly in the backlash against there being any reaction to him doing this at all, where it's like, that firmly in the backlash against there being any reaction to him doing this at all right where it's like it's not the real record and we we agree on this podcast but one can understand why people are excited about this and as we have discussed might take issue

with the legitimacy of some other records like okay we don't have to relitigate that but we do feel it does feel like we're kind of in the backlash phase to all of this yeah but also if we could set all that aside for a second like i wish we could take a pause and we as people who like view baseball through an analytical lens could use this as a master class in all of the different ways that one can contribute in a really meaningful way to your baseball team, right? Because what a fabulous example, right? We have seen Aaron Judge home run hitter. We have seen Aaron Judge high average guy. We are in the midst of a golden Aaron Judge walk era that is also deeply funny. And so this is so great because it's like, look, we just rattled off a bunch of stats about him.

He has a 192 WRC plus despite the fact that he's walking like 40% of the time in the last couple of days. It's just, it's, I find it very cool and exciting that we have this great example of like all the different ways that you can be a really valuable contributor to your baseball team. And instead we're booing doubles.

It is. And I don't know how aaron judge feels like i know that he is he has talked about like he just wants the team to win he just wanted to win the east he just wants to get to the playoffs and they did right and and i i am of the mind that like he should be able to feel however he wants to feel about it if he came out tomorrow and it was like i really want to i want to hit 61 i want to hit 62 cool if he genuinely feels like i just want to win baseball games that's also fine like i try to take the approach that like when grown-ups tell you how they feel we should absent other information take them at their word right so if

he's just amped to be winning then cool good for a Judge I think that like Roger Maris's family deeply wants him to surpass their father's record because so they can go home they look so tired I do not know if they have clean laundry I hope where they are staying has a washer dryer but they are just they have the look of people who really want to sleep in their own bed and I don't say it to knock them I think it's deeply understandable but you know he just wants to win baseball games but look this is so cool like they're just there are a lot of ways to do that and to do it in a way that can be hugely valuable and sometimes even though it's the less like cool and sexy thing you just take a bunch of walks and then your team wins the al east you know no other work needed just take a bunch of

walks and your team will win the division that's how this goes but yeah i do wonder if he's like starting what percentage of aaron judge doesn't think he's gonna do it now what percentage of you doesn't think he's gonna do it now because i've asked this question to a couple of people it's like what if he doesn't what if he just stays at 60 like what if he's just stuck at 60 stuck at 60 what a really 60 yeah what a ridiculous thing to say yeah yeah i mean i think part of it i i don't begrudge the blue jays in particular for pitching around him because they're trying to win games they're trying to get into the post season yeah you know not so much the pirates not so much the red, and they finished the season with four games in Texas, right? So if the Rangers were walking him constantly in that final series, that would seem less

sporting, I guess, than when Toronto does it. Again, the fact that it probably made sense for pitchers to be more careful with Aaron Judge previously, but that possibly it's just the potential looming stigma of being the one to give up the historic homer and having your name associated with it. If that is in fact what has made some pitchers finally decide to be careful with Aaron Judge, I don't know what that says about the human psyche or about teammates or about just like self-interested behavior versus team first behavior. Like it probably made sense for a while to be careful with Air Judge, not to walk him every time necessarily. Again, he has a 192 WRC plus over this quote unquote sl, this homer-less streak, this drought of his. So one way or another, damned if you do, damned if you don't,

because either you throw him strikes and he will hit homers, or you don't throw him strikes and he will walk and maybe he will hit doubles anyway. So there's no way to beat him exactly. There's just a way to keep yourself out of the history books and also disappoint a lot of fans. I hope he does it. He's come this far. It's been a fun season and chase to follow. It is amusing in a way that we have

this little pause here, but ultimately I do hope that he can cross the magical 60 and 61 barriers and be there at the top of the vaunted, the storied American League home run leaderboard. I still think he probably will, but it's not a given, obviously. And we probably never should have taken his homer hitting for granted.

Players don't usually hit nearly as many home runs as he was hitting so that was the weird thing right it's the less weird thing for him to go a week without hitting one probably yeah yeah i think that that's right i think that we i don't know pitchers are human they are full of weird sometimes contradictory often complex feelings and i don't don't know, like if you want to, if you want to not be the guy that, you know, gets shown whipping his head around over and over and over again, because here's the thing. Let's say the judge does it. He'll probably do it, right? Like we hope he does. Sure. Let's say that he surpasses Maris. That home run is going to play how many hundreds, how many thousands of times over the next 50 years of baseball, right? It's going to be all the time.

It's going to be anytime anything interesting happens with Judge. It's going to be anytime anything interesting happens with the Yankees. It's going to be one of those. I mean, it'll be a baseball zen moment. It'll be on highlight reels forever next year when they do the catch it live on mlb tv you can see me on mlb tv it's gonna be judge hitting home run after home run after home run and in the foreground there will be some poor schmo whipping his head around to be like if i sky point will you catch it and it's like nobody

they're not gonna catch it so i i get it and and to your point like for the blue jays they need to secure their playoff spot you know they have stuff at stake here i know that there was talk when they went to extras against the yankees the other night like i'll pitch to him i'm like absolutely do not pitch to him like you are not obligated to gift this to him. And he still has to hit a home run. Just because you throw him a strike doesn't guarantee he's going to hit a home run. He's seen a lot of strikes this year, and he's only hit home runs on 60 of them. I don't think all of his home runs have actually been on strikes,

but you get what I'm trying to say. So he still has to do a thing. But you're not obligated to be the head whip around guy. I get people wanting to say, no, thank you. I don't need to be in the history books for that particular reason. Well, he just made it out, but he didn't put the ball in play. So I do have several stat blasts that maybe I can sort of scatter them throughout this episode because a couple are related to things that we have talked about here. As you noted, Judge has not seen a lot of fastballs lately,

not quite as extreme as his zone rate, but he has seen fewer fastballs, not the fewest, but few. And that made me kind of curious about who has seen the most consecutive secondary pitches in a game. Now, secondaries for some pitchers these days are primaries, what we would have called secondaries, right? Yeah. Who was it who just went over it?

Kyle Kishimoto in his first Fangraphs post, right? Wrote about we have maybe the first pitcher, is it, who has thrown a non-fastball as a primary pitch over the course of a season? Am I butchering this fun fact? I think you're—no, I think that that's right. Jacob Junis, if I recall. Jacob Junis. Jacob with a K, which, you know, I didn't double-check four times because I was like, what?

Yes, Kyle wrote about it on September 22nd. Jacob Junis and the disappearing fastball. A caper. That's not part of the headline, but it's implied. Yeah, and thatis and the disappearing fastball. A caper. That's not part of the headline, but it's implied. Yeah, and that's been a league-wide trend, of course, but he is at the cutting edge. He's thrown 51.5% sliders this season. So it's not just that the slider is his most common pitch.

It's the majority of his pitches is a secondary. So that's sort is a secondary. Yes. So that's sort of a milestone. And that actually dovetails perfectly with this first very quick stat plus. I asked Lucas Apostolaris at Baseball Prospectus what is the most consecutive secondary pitches that a hitter has seen in one game. But by multiple pitchers, it can be multiple pitchers. And the most on record, so going back to 2008 when we have this PitchFX or StatCast or TrackMan data, it is actually a Jacob Dunas game this year. Really?

So yeah, May 25th, 2022, the Mets were playing the Giants and Pete Alonzo saw 23 consecutive quote unquote secondaries. I don't think Junis was the only pitcher he faced that day, but he was the first pitcher he faced that day. And Alonzo saw 23 straight non fastballs. So that's a lot. And that's a lot. And that's a record. And prior to that, the record was last September 8th, Kyle Seeger saw 22 from the Astros, including Jose Urquidy. And before that, or I guess actually this year also, it's Lance McCullers. You would kind of expect Lance McCullers to be on this list because he is somewhat famous for just pumping secondaries and breaking balls over and over and over again and has set some records of his own that way. So he's in a bunch of the spots on the list. Number four is September 24th, 2010, Bobby Abreu against the White Sox, Angels White Sox.

And Freddy Garcia started off that game against him. He saw 19 consecutive secondaries, and that was a less secondary-friendly era. So, yeah, you have those guys I mentioned. Seth Brown in a Lance McCullers game this month actually saw 20 consecutive. Shohei Otani in a Lance McCullers game saw 19. Last September, Shed Long in a Lance McCullers game. Last July, yeah, you're seeing a pattern here. But if you ever wondered how many consecutive secondary pitches has a hitter

seen in a single game it's pio lanzo 23 but perhaps that record will be broken again sometime soon perhaps our judge will break that record perhaps you know as folks are peeking at home at this stuff like it is useful to keep in mind that you know different pitch classification systems sometimes classify different pitches different ways but yeah it does appear that junis is starting you know is a continuation of a trend that we will probably see accelerate in in the years to come just given the broader league-wide trend so there you go yes the secondary in the coal mine yeah so here is a related question about judge i got this question from listener Steven, who said,

I'm trying to find players who led the league in home runs and batting average, but did not win the Triple Crown. And he said, my hypothesis is that if you lead the league in both average and homers, you have a near 100% chance to lead the league in RBI as well. I don't know the best way to check something like that, etc., etc. So I threw this to frequent StatBlast consultant Ryan Nelson. Lucas Pasolaris, as I may have mentioned of Baseball Perspectives, helped me with that last query. Ryan helped me with this one.

And this is a point that we have touched on in recent episodes where I have noted that it seems odd that RBI would be the third leg of the traditional triple crown. Not odd in the sense that people really put a lot of stock in RBI for a very long time, but just because it does sort of seem like a gimme. Like if you're hitting for a ton of power and you're going to lead the league in homers and you're hitting for a super high average and so you're getting lots of hits of all kinds well the hitters in front of you really would have to be not holding up their end of the bargain to not have you get rbi or you'd have to go out of your way to be extremely unclutch not to have rbi so it's not just the fact that we have kind of discounted the value of rbi when it comes to player evaluation but it's, it just seems almost redundant.

It seems like there's too much overlap there. We want three really different categories, or at least I would. So Ryan looked into this. And by the way, you can see that with Judge too, because he entered Wednesday's game with just a slim one point of batting average lead over Luis Reyes of the Twins.

But he has a huge lead, of course, in homers. It was 23 in the AL entering the game. And then also a sizable lead in RBI. I believe he was nine up, which is maybe not a lock, but semi-safe at this point. But the batting average, that's the one that's kind of coming down to the wire here. Not surprising, though, that he would have the RBI lead if he's right there neck and neck with the leader in batting average and is also lapping the league in home runs. So Ryan reports, since 1900, there have been five Triple Crowns in the National League in that same time period. A player has led the league in home runs and RBI 54 times, RBI and batting average 18 times, and batting average and homers six times.

Okay. That's the National League. Okay. OK, that's the National League. In the same time period, there have been 10 triple crowns in the American League and a player has led the league in home runs and RBI 57 times, RBI and batting average 17 times and batting average and home runs 14 times. So in both cases, the least common pairing of these stats is batting average and homers and the most common is home runs and RBI. He further reports, league in RBI and batting average have won the Triple Crown, and 75% of players who led the league in batting average and homers have won the Triple Crown. So he concludes, if you lead in home runs and batting average, it's not a lock to win the Triple Crown. It's not 100%, but it is 75%.

It is very likely. It is definitely the hardest combo to get. And he comped it to the triple in the cycle, right? Like being a triple away from the cycle is not all that special. And being batting average away from the triple crown, still pretty good because you let the league get home runs in RBI. Right. good in home runs and RBI, but it would be much more common to have that pairing than to, say, lead the league in home runs and batting average and not in RBI. So there is a lot of overlap. There is a lot of redundancy here. So I think, granted, we have the sabermetric triple crown, quote unquote, and there's some overlap there, as we've discussed, and there's some overlap there as we've discussed and it's too late to rebrand the traditional triple crown there's just too much history and tradition associated with that but like what if we could though what if we could swap out rbi in the traditional triple crown so we could keep home runs and we could keep batting average because those are telling you two very different

things what's a third thing like a traditional stat not a new agey stat that would fit in with the aesthetic of the traditional triple crown not a stat that's like into crystals or something yeah right it would go well it would not clash with home runs and batting average but it would also not be as redundant as rbi crystals go with everything you know i don't clash i'm trying to think like yeah you could have something like stolen bases or something but then i mean that would be if you'd never have anyone do that that's too high a bar we should view it as like aspirational right we should view it as like let's build the composite player we want to see in the world you know it could happen seems unlikely but it could could yeah so i like

that just because it is a different flavor. You're still contributing something meaningful on offense, but it is not duplicative in quite the same way. But it's hard. It's hard to come up with one that doesn't have spillover into other stuff. Right. Yeah. Chuck Klein, I believe, in 1932, is the last player to lead his league in home runs and stolen bases in the same season

i think only three have ever done it jimmy sheckard and ty cobb did it in the first decade of the 20th century other players have have made runs at it so that's ultra exclusive as it is and that's without adding batting average to the mix so that would be probably too unattainable, although it would be quite impressive if someone made a run at it. But I'm just trying to think, like, I guess there aren't all that many traditional stats, like, you know, back of the baseball cards, five by five fantasy rotisserie style stats. I mean, there are five. So there just aren't that many to choose from here that would really fit the description i guess and give me a more personally satisfying traditional triple crown but i welcome suggestions from anyone yeah i just i it's it's too late right the die is cast

here right we're too set in our ways when it comes to the triple crown but i wish we could go back to the beginning and just pick a pick a different one i don't know maybe like again even like total bases or something yeah if you're leading in home runs and batting average you're gonna have a ton of total bases and judges leading the majors and total bases big surprise so maybe there's no perfect solution here but please suggest it if you have one yeah i mean there's got to be you're right that we're never going to change it though we've been we've been here too long you know yes yeah but i continue to find fault with the selection of the stats maybe it's the best they could do with the stats

they had on hand at the time i guess we could interpret it generously and say they didn't have that many stats we have way more stats now we have so many more to choose from so you can forgive it i guess some of them like crystals some of them don't you know there's just a whole bunch of stats yeah i gotta say i am enjoying the end to the season the denouement are you i am i hate every day of it it is torture ben i know baseball when will they stop playing this sport i don't mean it like i don't mean it like that i mean it like every day my confidence that the mariners will do the thing, collapses a little bit further. Well, they can't win, but the Orioles lost at least. So if that keeps happening, they will still back into the playoffs. But there's not a ton at stake playoff-wise.

Again, don't want to tempt Mariners fan fate here. I'm just saying if we go. You can say that without tempting, I think. If we go by the playoff odds at your website, Meg, I'm just looking at the numbers. Oh, sure. Now it's my website. Your website. I just make appearances here.

But there are, I believe, 10 teams that have 100% playoff odds. Maybe they haven't all clinched technically but maybe they have i don't know but they're all locks according to the playoff odds and then you have the mariners at 99.8 percent still a virtual lock as we will call it even though it's the mariners and so we probably shouldn't say that about them but you have have them. They round up to 100. And then you have the Padres as we speak. And again, this is all before Wednesday results. But 97.9% for the Padres.

So they're at 98%. So that takes us to 11 teams that are either locks or virtual locks, according to the playoff odds and the projections and then you have the phillies at 84.8 percent and the brewers at 17.3 percent so according to the playoff odds like the last nl wild card spot is really the only one up for grabs now of course the maritors could still blow this thing oh i feel i feel sick there are other teams that have not been eliminated and of course there are other stakes and playoff implications here home field advantage and matchups and top seeds in the league and so forth and and those things do matter to some extent. And of course, entering Wednesday, we have Atlanta and the Mets are in a deadlock

atop the NL East and there's intrigue there. They're going to play each other. And if they can't actually get those games in, then that would be super fun. A lot less fun than if one of them was going to be in and one of them was going to be out, as it is. it's just one of them will have to play an extra round. So there are stakes here. There's motivation, but it's not quite in or out.

It's just slightly more advantageous or slightly less advantageous playoff positioning. So the stakes aren't as high as they once would have been in a similar race. I'm just saying, like, we talked about this recently because of the fan graphs post about this and the lack of intensity and suspense at the end of the season. And that is still true. There just are not a lot of playoff spots up for grabs. And if you're not super into seeding in home field, then maybe that's not getting you going. But there is a lot to enjoy, I feel like. I'm just enjoying the baseball. Yes.

And seeing good players put the finishing touches on their seasons, players like Sandy Alcantara and Joey Manessis. Yeah, just to name the only two good ones. Yeah, we will not see them for many, many months. Yes. Joey Manessis picked on Sandy Alcantara and hit a homer off him. Why do they have to pick on each other, these players that I appreciate so? But it's nice to see them and appreciate them and savor them while we can because they're

going to go away for a while and we're not going to see them play for quite some time. And then you do have players who are putting together incredible seasons, whether it's Judge or Otani, et cetera, et cetera. Like there's a lot that I think that is left to enjoy. And maybe that's just because I kind of consume baseball now almost more through a player-centric individual season type or even like league-wide way than through the lens of any particular team. So maybe my view is skewed a bit but i'm not feeling like okay let's get this over with already like let's let's start the tournament

let's uh enjoy the rest of the regular season while we have it because we will miss it when it's gone yeah i think that that is a good reminder to your point there are guys who we will get to see in the playoffs but other guys where it's like you know farewell till spring and so we should take a moment to appreciate those players in particular because you know we'll we'll miss them when they're gone and it is you know on the one hand i feel very nervous at times i'll be like i feel nervous why do i feel nervous and then i'll be like i don't remember why i feel nervous but it is nice to have a path to some stakes in a season where we have at times felt like the stakes were lacking.

So yeah, I really feel like they should just play that Mets-Braves series in a neutral site. What are we doing, Ben? Yeah. Yeah. So I do have a fusillade of StatPlus. I've already begun it there, but I guess I can continue with a few more here. Or OBS Plus And then they'll tease out some interesting tidbit Discuss it at length

And analyze it for us In amazing ways Here's to DASTAblast I will say that, as always, the Stat Blast segment is sponsored by StatHead, which is powered in turn by Baseball Reference. And we always endorse the tools there, not just the baseball ones, but multi-sport. Just go to StatHead.com and explore your options and use our coupon code WILD20 to get a $20 discount off a one-year subscription. And I will also plug there is a postseason StatHead webinar coming up on October 3rd. That is Monday at 7 p.m. Eastern.

And some StatHead experts will be walking you through how to do it. There will be a webinar on how to make the most of your StatHead subscription for the 2022 MLB postseason. And some expert power users will be moderating that panel. So if you've been hesitant at all because you're afraid to dip your toe into the waters of Stathead. Dude, they are cool and healing waters. But there is a slight learning curve and adjustment. But really, it's a fun one. You get to poke around and figure out all the options available to you and the powers that you have suddenly been granted.

But there is a webinar. So you can check that out on Monday if you're on the fence. And maybe that will push you over to one side of the fence, hopefully gently. So a couple other stat blasts. Now, one is a follow-up to a previous stat blast. So as you will recall, we recently used StatHead to determine that those Atlanta Braves, they have one of the biggest day-night splits ever. They have been bad in day games. And we got an email from listener Matthew who said, I wanted to provide some insight on the day-night splits as a Yankees fan. And I noted that the Yankees last year had a slightly more extreme day-night split than the Braves do this year. So Matt says, as a Yankees fan, I noticed many people complained last year

that the Yankees put suboptimal teams out for day games. No evidence of this, but would love to hear if there's any substance behind the claim and if it applies to the Braves. And I guess it would make sense probably. I haven't looked at just what's the day-night split for every team in history, but you do tend to rest some starters in day games, right? You might not start your catcher in the day game after the night game. So you might think that on the whole you would have slightly less than your A lineup in day games in general.

So I didn't look into the Yankees case specifically. And in fact, I didn't look into the Yankees case specifically. And in fact, I didn't look into Atlanta's case specifically, but someone else did. Our listeners sometimes take these things upon themselves. So we got an email from JR in Philly who wrote, in response to your discussion of Atlanta's significantly worse record in day games, I had a theory that a manager may be more likely to give better hitters the day off for day games. I thought this might be significant, particularly if a team has a decent hitting catcher like Travis Darnot or William Contreras or a star player returning from an injury like Ronald Acuna or Ozzy Albies.

So, he says, I downloaded Atlanta's splits from the season and looked at each player's plate appearances as a percentage of the team's total. There's a spreadsheet which I will link to. Atlanta does have a 115 WRC plus in night games and a 99 WRC plus in day games, but it doesn't appear to be because of lineup decisions. Yeah, only Travis Darnot has a significantly lower percentage of the team's plate appearances in day games. And while Darnot does have a 124 WRC plus this season, those plate appearances have largely gone to William Contreras, who has a 138 WRC plus. He says, instead, I found that nearly every hitter in Atlanta's lineup has hit better

this season at night, sometimes significantly so. Contreras, Albies, Darnot, Michael Harris, Orlando Arcia, and Eddie Rosario all have WRC Pluses this season that are at least 35 points higher in night games than day games. Going a step further. I always like it when someone goes a step further. I often take a step too far. JR might be doing that too. Our listeners are great. JR might be doing that too. Our listeners are great. I used each player's full season WRC Plus to calculate what Atlanta's expected team WRC Plus would have been in day games and night games if each hitter hit for their full season WRC Plus in both day and night games.

I found that in that scenario, their expected team WRC Plus would be 109 in day games and 110 in night games. So my theory that the team's better hitters got more days off during day games didn't hold up. What's more interesting is I took a look at the team's pitching splits and found the exact opposite. Atlanta has a 3.37 team ERA in night games and a 3.65 team ERA in day games, and the difference appears to be entirely attributable to who was on the mound. I calculated the team's expected ERAs in day games and night games in a scenario where every Atlanta pitcher pitched their full season ERA in both day games and night games, and found that their expected team ERAs matched their real ERAs exactly. In other words,

while some Atlanta pitchers have pitched better at night or during the day, those differences evened out exactly. Instead, the difference seems to be that the team's Atlanta pitchers have pitched better at night or during the day, those differences evened out exactly. Instead, the difference seems to be that the team's better pitchers faced fewer batters in day games. Max Fried and Spencer Strider, who have ERAs in the two, started only 11 day games this season combined. Meanwhile, Charlie Morton, who has a 4.29 ERA, has started 14 day games on his own. And Kyle Muller made both of his starts during the day and racked up a 10.57 ERA. So there you have it. Atlanta hitters have randomly

and almost universally hit worse during day games and their better pitchers have pitched more during night games. Presumably by chance I would imagine. So that's the explanation and or non-explanation for Atlanta's extreme day-night split. Thank you, JR, for saving me all that effort that I probably would not have put in.

But thank you. Well, come on, Ben. You probably would have. Yeah, I'm not above doing that for other questions. I just don't know that I would have for this particular question. I see. I see. Fair enough.

But I appreciate that JR did. Okay. A few more here. So here's a question from Joey, who says, My wife is a lifelong Yankees fan and got me into baseball in my early 30s, so I'm one of the few fans you all have talked about on the show. I noticed

a Yankees score a couple weeks ago that was the start of the Fibonacci series. Speaking of nerdy questions. Yeah. Specifically, the game was the Yankees-Angels game on August 30th. The Yankees score went 1 in the first, 1 in the second, 2 in the third, 3 in the fourth, and then they did not score the rest of the game. I was wondering how common this series is in baseball and whether anyone has gotten longer into the sequence than this. I can't imagine many teams have gotten to 5 and few, if any, have gotten to eight. If we were pedantic about the sequence and who isn't

about baseball, the sequence would more appropriately be 0-1-1-2-3-5-8-13-21 for a nine inning game. So Ryan looked this up and found that by the pedantic definition of starting with zero, there have been 341 games that have kept up the pattern through the fourth, 11 that kept it through the fifth, and none that made it to the sixth. Wow. So the fifth is as far as it goes. There's a little list of those games, which I will make available. By the other definition, he says 23 teams made it through the fourth, none made it to the fifth. Three seems to be the max in the sequence. In fact, he says, I confirmed that there has never been a 1-1-2-3-5 sequence in any game period. The closest I have found was the White Sox went 1-1-2-3-4 in the third to seventh innings on october 3rd 1991 and i bet everyone watching at

home thought they're doing the almost fibonacci here history was happening i bet there was at least one person who was like this is stirring up a feeling from yeah high school that i can't quite place right exactly all right here is a question from Jackson, who says, my name is Jackson. Hi, Jackson. And I'm a bit of a Mike Brasso super fan. Okay. I don't know how many Mike Brasso super fans are out there. At least one.

Yeah, at least one. Yeah, he hit that big homer in the 2020 ALDS. I guess he's generally hit well. Yeah. Anyway, there's a leader of the Mike Brasso fan club here. I was watching today's, this was September 8th's Brewers doubleheader when Brasso got used in a bit of an interesting way. He hit leadoff against the lefty opener of the Giants in both games before being replaced by Jace Peterson in both games in his second at bat. I don't think I have seen a starter in both doubleheader games only have one plate appearance, much less as the leadoff hitter.

I was wondering if this has ever happened before in a doubleheader or even in back-to-back games. Thanks so much for your consideration. Ryan reports, this is not unprecedented, but it is very rare. Players have only had one or fewer plate appearances in a game in approximately 0.3% of starts, and presumably many of those are injury-related. of a doubleheader with the heyday being the late 1960s. So it happened a few times then. For example, September 5th, 1916, Dick Egan, Boston Braves, was pinch hit for by Joe Connolly twice. Egan was a righty.

Connolly was a lefty. It happened a couple times in 39 and then 48 and 53 and 58 and 59 and then 65, 67, 67, 67, 68, and then 73 and 73. And he says, that's it. It hasn't happened in almost 50 years. So this was apparently the first time that it had happened since, I guess, the first season of the DH era. Yes, the first season of the DH era. So May 20th, 1973, Eddie Leon, Chicago White Sox, righty second baseman, pinch hit for twice.

First by lefty Tony Muser, then by ready Mike Andrews. And September 29th, 1973, Bobby Grich, Baltimore Orioles. Last two games of the season for the already playoff bound Orioles. Both games he walked in his first plate appearance and then was defensive replaced or defensively replaced, I guess we might say. Oh, boy. That's a whole other kind of worm. Replaced defensed. Oh, no. By Frank Baker.

So that was it. So yeah, apparently's one Mike Brasso superfan who is presumably not related in any way to Mike Brasso, or I hope that that would have been disclosed in this email. It would be funny if he was related and had only just been like, and now I'm a, you know, finally that he's a big leaguer. I'm a superfan. Right. But this was an eagle-eyed listener who's just, you know, probably checking the Brasso

box scores every day just to see what happened to him. And this day, something semi-historic happened. So thanks for flagging that. It must be very strange to be a baseball player and be like, I'm probably not a lot of people's favorite, right? Like, you're probably realistic that just because there are a lot of baseball players and a lot of them are good, not because it's anything wrong with you, right? So I bet it feels good to be like, I got a couple who aren't related to me. You know, that's probably nice.

It probably feels real good. Probably almost everyone has one. Yeah. Maybe not like the last guy in the bullpen who is up for a day. Yeah, or like if you're a famous jerk, who is up for a day. Yeah. Or like if you're a famous jerk, if you're famously a jerk, you're probably not anybody's favorite. But otherwise. Hopefully. Hopefully.

Yeah. But probably like there is kind of a cult hero, folk hero kind of thing that happens with players who are not quote unquote good at baseball good by major league baseball standards that is and sometimes you you fall for those guys that can often be the the deepest kind of connection and maybe you form that bond in childhood before you even totally understand who is good and who is not you know you just know who you like and then maybe years later you look and see that they were sub replacement level or something it's like oh no but you still have that fondness that you that you forged at that time so yeah i think everyone's got someone or

at least everyone used to have someone these days there are just so many baseball players yeah it's just it's kind of hard to keep track of all of them at all times yeah like i you know he had a respectable big league career to be sure but like if you had asked young meg like who's who is one of your favorite baseball players like well my first answer probably would have been griffey and then it would have been edgar and those guys you know i don't know if you know this but but they're pretty good. Pretty good. Famously so. Then I was like Dan Wilson. Yeah, there you go. Dan, the man, handsome Dan.

That was what other people called him. Then I was a young child, so I was like, yeah, sure, he's handsome. You look at his career now, and like I said, he had a fine big league career, but he never had a season where he, apart from his very first one, where he played like 12 games, as I am now re-familiarizing myself with his fan graphs page, that was, you know, those 12 games, he had a 143 WRC plus. But other than that, he never had a,

he never even broke 100 on a season level, right? But I thought he was just the best. I was like, he's incredible. And he was a good defensive catcher, so of course I liked him. Right. Makes sense. There's someone out there for everyone.

Yeah. Well, this is a related question because it also has to do with substitutions. And this was something that the stat blast signal went up on the baseball subreddit. So this week, I believe it was Tuesday, in the Orioles game, so Ramon Urias was three for three and a double away from the cycle, and he hurt himself running around third.

His replacement, Jorge Mateo, doubled in his first at-bat of the game. And remember, Urias, he was just a double away from the cycle. So he completed his friend's cycle. Exactly. And so this was posted about on the baseball subreddit by listener or poster Mr. Macchiano and another poster, Matt02000. He flagged me and tagged me. And then I tagged in Ryan Nelson to do his worst and his best

and this is i guess we could call it the combined cycle yeah which is among the most meaningless accomplishments probably like it's nice though the combined no hititter I already write off, but that at least, like, there's maybe more significance to the combined no-hitter than there is to the combined cycle, just because I care about no-hitters more than cycles in general. Cycles just don't move the needle for me, and a combined cycle even less so. But I was kind of curious about this. Some posters were suggesting alternate names for this, like a zombie cycle, right? Like a beyond the grave cycle. But I don't think you can give the original, the part cycler, you know, the initiator of the cycle. You can't give them full credit for this. It's not like they came back and they completed the cycle. Someone else picked up the baton and completed the cycle. They finished the race.

I was just going to say we should call it a relay cycle. Relay cycle. That's not bad. Yeah. And would your opinion of combined no-hitters be different if we called them relay no-hitters? No. No. But a relay cycle, that sounds cool.

It's kind of confusing. I don't know that anyone would intuitively be like, what does that mean? Yeah, I know what that is. But I like the idea that I love how I'm attributing to them a closeness that I have no basis for. I don't think they dislike each other, but I'm like, his friend did it for him. I don't know them. But it's a it's a cycle relay it's not it doesn't mean anything but it's like kind of cool yeah kind of sort of

it's close to cool it's close to being cool you know term that that should exist and should be known it's not the most meaningless thing that I've ever heard discussed or tracked. That's the bar I'm setting here. I think that's fine. So Ryan, research the combined cycle, if that's what we're going to call it. We're calling it the relay cycle. I just established this. Sorry. So it's actually quite rare.

I don't know whether that makes it more interesting or not. Does that make it cooler? I don't know. It makes sense that it would be rare because typically why would you substitute someone who is in the midst of cycling, right? If they've gotten some components of the cycle, they've gotten hits, why would you remove them in many cases? So it's only happened 21 times or I guess now perhaps 22 times. 21 times or i guess now perhaps 22 times so it's quite rare and it has happened a few times with three players involved the three-player relay cycle slash combined cycle so 21 times but only a few way i think only a couple maybe were three-player ones. Most of them were two.

And there's no way to know exactly without going case by case, which you're all welcome to do. I will put the spreadsheet linked to it on the show page. But probably mostly injury replacements as this one was. I would think so. But different types of replacements. I would think so. But different types of replacements. So eight defensive replacements, five pinch runners, nine pinch hitters, and two double switches. And any of those could have been injury related, but they weren't necessarily. Some were also blowouts.

So maybe you were just resting someone. someone like most of the players on here are not necessarily name brands, but like looks like maybe the last game of the 2003 season, Barry Bonds was replaced. He started the relay cycle and then Pedro Feliz came in a double switch and Bonds was in left and Feliz came in a double switch and was playing third base in the same lineup spot. And he finished off the cycle that Bonds was in left and Feliz came in in the double switch and was playing third base in the same lineup spot. And he finished off the cycle that Bonds had started. I assume without looking that that was probably just resting Bonds on the last day of the season because some of these, you know, lopsided scores, etc. So all kinds of reasons why the relay cycle could happen, but it hasn't happened all that often. Interesting.

Yeah. I believe this was the first relay cycle since May 17th, 2016. The Tampa Bay Rays did it. So Brad Miller started at shortstop, and he got the single and the double and the triple, actually. And then Taylor Motter came in as a pinch hitter at the shortstop in that same lineup spot, and he hit the homer to finish it off. Taylor Motter. His father was a Motter. His mother was a Motter.

That's a Seinfeld joke. Anyway, it hadn't happened since 2016, and now it has happened again. So now we know this is a thing. We're making it a thing. The combined slash relay cycle. Even more meaningless than the cycle or the combined

no-hitter, but we're plumbing new depths of obscure accomplishments. Maybe the way to think about it is that we were able to come up with a name we liked and so it's cool for that reason right yeah okay i mean i don't i want to be clear like i don't find this to be actually meaningful i just find it to be kind of a a nice thing. Again, it still wouldn't be actually meaningful, but within the range of non-meaningful things. I think that if you come in and you contribute a non-single to the relay cycle, it is a more meaningful, not meaningful thing than if like the cherry on top of the relay because that's

relays work is a single because like you know anybody can hit a single you know and like anybody can hit a double aaron judge has been doing that for the last week he's just been hitting doubles like anybody can do that but no they can't that's harder so it was like you know hit a hit hit one of the harder things, and then it's cool. If what you do is you come in and you hit a little single, it's like, well, we're glad you're here and you did it, but I don't know if that means anything. Yeah.

If this mattered at all, which it obviously does not, then yes, you would have to apportion the credit to the cyclers. What if the second leg of the relay cycle is the guy who hits the triple because like famously that's the hardest exactly yeah so what if the other guy gets three hits but the one guy gets the the one hit that's the hardest to get it's the hardest to get right then is it meaningful no but like it's more meaningful. It's closer to meaningful, I think, maybe. Sure, yeah. Okay.

All right. A couple more. This will be probably a quick one. This is from Mike, Patreon supporter, who said he saw a tweet, and it's a tweet from the account Cards Magazine, which was sent on September 11th. And it said, before today, there were only six dates between April 1st and September 30th that Albert Pujols had not homered. One of those was September 11th. Now there are only five. He had a homer that day.

So Mike, our Patreon supporter, said, is that a record that Albert Pujols had homered on all but five dates between April 1st and September 30th? Has any player homered on all the dates in that range? And one would imagine there's a short list of suspects and candidates here. How many days is that? It's a lot of days and not a lot of people have homered more often than Albert Pujols famously. Famously not. So Ryan reports Barry Bonds homered on every day of that span except August 5th and September 30th. So 181 out of 183 and a record.

Go figure. The guy who hit the most homers also hit the most dates during this span. Yeah. So Pujols is at 178 over 183, which is second of all time. Mark McGuire and David Ortiz are at 177. Ken Griffey Jr., Willie Mays, Rafael Palmeiro, A-Rod, Gary Sheffield, and Jim Tomei are all at 176. Sammy Sosa is alone at 175. No one has 174.

Adrian Beltre, Carlos Delgado, Manny Ramirez, and Mike Schmidt are at 173. Henry Aaron and Miguel Cabrera are at 172. None of Miguel Cabrera's four homers this year were on new dates or four as of a week ago at least. Jeff Bagwell, Vlad Sr., and Harmon Killebrew are at 171. And Frank Thomas is at 170. All those guys hit a lot of homers. Yeah. Unsurprisingly.

Ryan also says Lou Gehrig homered on June 8th 18 times. That is a record. Rogers Hornsby, June 24th. Chuck Klein, May 30th. And Babe Ruth twice, June 23rd and July 9th, are tied for second with 16. That's the most homers on a given date. Then it is a three-way tie with 15 between

Babe Ruth, June 12th, Babe Ruth, July 2nd, and Babe Ruth, August 17th. 14 is a many-way tie between five Jimmy Foxes, a Lou Gehrig, three Melots, five Babe Ruths, and an Al Simmons. Okay. That's kind of a trivia, quirky

one. Yeah. I like that I keep going, huh? Like it means something. It just means they hit a lot of home runs. It mostly means that. Well, yes. I appreciate the support. I appreciate the yes ending, the emphatic punctuations there. You're helping me sell it here. It's going over well. All right. sell it here. It's going over well. All right. And last one. This one comes from Chris and the email subject line

is the game just got away from him. So this was sent on Monday, September 19th. Chris writes, during yesterday's Astros A's radio broadcast, I noticed a few references to the game getting away from A's starting pitcher Ken Waldachuk.

He ended up giving up five earned runs in the third inning, but he had nearly gone through the Astros lineup with one walk and three strikeouts before a Maldonado single started the one-out rally. Waldachuk didn't make it out of the third inning. This question isn't about Waldachuk's performance, but about any pitcher who was seemingly cruising along before hitting a brick wall. What is the worst start of a pitcher who was doing this? For parameters, I think a good starting spot would be either one time through the order of no hits, no runs, limited base runners, and striking out five or more batters before everything went wrong. A similar start by Jacob deGrom on September 18th could fall into the scenario. His line was five innings pitch, four hits, three earned runs, no walks, 13 strikeouts, but three of his hits were given up in the sixth inning with two hits and a homer before he was relieved. That was the

Joey Manessis game, I believe. Again, there's that man again. He keeps coming up. He keeps homering off name brand pitchers. So I think that studies have generally shown that there's not a ton to the idea of cruising, that if you account for the caliber of pitchers who tend to do well through the first X number of innings or batters or times through the order or whatever, it tends to be pitchers who just do well in general. And so if they are allowed to continue to cruise, then they would also do better than the typical pitcher there. But if you adjust for all those things, I don't think there's too much to the idea that how you are doing on a given day really pretends anything about how you're going to do the rest of that outing. And Russell Carlton actually just wrote about that recently because he showed just why it makes sense to to pull starters as often as teams do now particularly in the postseason because unless you have the most elite of the

elite aces basically just like your average reliever is expected to do as well as a starter even a starter who is cruising that day the fresh arm who has not been seen by those hitters multiple times already, probably a better bet, all else being equal. And that's just like your run of the mill reliever, let alone your late inning leverage guy. Yeah. All right. So Ryan says, I thought I would look at this in two different ways. One, how many runs allowed in a start after facing the minimum through three? So nine up, nine down. By this method, the record is held by Gene Packard of the 1918 Cardinals, who on August 3rd started the game with three and two thirds innings of perfect ball. He was cruising. He allowed a walk with two outs

in the fourth and then allowed a single, but a runner was thrown out to end the inning. Okay, through six innings, Packard had a two-hit shutout going definitely cruising how long do you have to be cruising to cruise to be said to to have cruised can you that's that's got to be like it's got to be more than than two innings more than an inning you can't cruise in one inning alone right three four five probably at least four or five. At least, right? Yeah. Okay. So through six innings, Packard had a two-hit shutout going, definitely cruising at that point.

He would then allow four runs in the seventh, then four more in the eighth, and four more in the ninth for good measure. Luckily, his team scored 16, and so Packard got the win. But his 12 runs allowed were the most ever by a starting pitcher who was perfect through three. There is a tie for second by this method with 11. Johnny Markham of the Philadelphia A's on June 15th, 1935, he was perfect through three. And then he allowed 11 runs in the next three and zero runs in the last two in the eight-inning complete game. They left pitchers in for a long time in those days. Yeah, they sure did. And then Jerry Casali, Boston Red Sox, June 7th, 1960, perfect through three, allowed four in the fourth, two in the fifth, and five in the sixth before being pulled.

All right. Second method, consecutive base runners allowed to end an appearance where the starter had thrown a shutout to that point, minimum X shutout innings. So by this method, the record is 10 straight base runners to end an outing after three plus scoreless, which has happened once. So Ed Heuser, H-E-U-S-S-E-R, Heuser, you can pick your pronunciation. I'm sure there's a correct one. But July 15th, 1940, through three innings, three hits, two walks, zero runs. In the fourth, ground out, single walk, E6, fielder's choice, fielder's choice, single, single, homer, walk, single, pulled, went from up to nothing0 to down 8-2. Wow. For a 4-plus scoreless inning start, the record for consecutive base runners to end an outing is 9, which has also happened once. Tex Carlton for the Cubs September 14, 1937.

Through 4, Tex had allowed 2 hits, 1 walk, and 0 runs. allowed two hits, one walk, and zero runs. But in the fifth, the wheels fell off. Triple, strikeout, sack fly, double, walk, single, single, single, single, single, walk, single. Oh my gosh. I think that was the right number of singles. Then they pulled him.

It went from a scoreless game to down eight to nothing. Wow. For five scoreless innings to start or five plus, the record for consecutive base runners to end an outing is eight, which has happened four times. Wilbur Cooper of the Pirates, September 20th, 1916. Earl Whithill, and don't have a date on that one. Art Houderman, Tigers, June 8th, 1950. And then Bob Smith of the Braves, April 29th, 1930.

Now, Art Houderman, he was perfect through four and a third, and then things went south in the sixth. And Ryan says this is probably the best single example as far as he can tell so hatterman through five one hit zero walks zero runs he's perfect through four and a third in the sixth ground out ground out hit by pitch single single double intentional walk single walk double then he gets pulled so he got through five and two thirds shutout innings of one hit ball ended with five and two-thirds innings and seven runs allowed. Wow. Yeah. Wow.

Yeah. So the game just got away from him, I think you could say. Yeah, no kidding. And then lastly, Bob Smith of the Braves on April 29, 1930 threw seven innings, 10 hits, but three walks and no runs. hits but three walks and no runs and then in the eighth single sack bunt walk single e4 single single single walk double and then he finally gets pulled it was a scoreless game and then suddenly he found himself down seven nothing yeah it can really go up in flames pretty quickly and he says the best somewhat recent example is probably Chris Nervison's September 9th, 2011.

It's not Nervison, is it? It's Narvison. I mean, like, I think you're about to make it his name. I think his name is about to be Nervison based on how these have gone. I enjoyed saying Nervison, but it was Narvison. But yes, some nerves may have been in play. Who knows?

But September 9th, 2011, he was starting against the Phillies. He actually had a no-hitter going through four, and he entered the sixth having allowed one hit and one walk. Then in the sixth, he started with two strikeouts and then double, double, walk, triple, single, double, single. He started the inning up 1-0, got two outs, then allowed seven consecutive base runners and left down 6-1. And his team lost 7-2. So, yeah, you can't take anything for granted.

No. I mean, sometimes you're cruising and sometimes you're the Mariners and you lose 13-12. Yep. A good day can become a bad day pretty quickly. Sometimes a bad day can become a good day, but not for a pitcher after he's pulled. I guess it could be a good day for other reasons, just not on

the mound. Yep. Alright. Well, we will end with the Pass Blast. So this is episode 1909. This comes from Jacob Pomrenke, who is the executive director of editorial content for Sabre and a Black Sox expert.

Find him on Twitter at Buck Weaver and he also tweets from at Sabre and while we're at it you can also find Ryan Nelson who does lots of staff blasts for us on Twitter at rsnelson23. So the headline for this 1909 pass blast Baseball Scouts,

the new wave. In the first decade of the 20th century, baseball owners were tired of spending too much money on prospects who never panned out. So they began to hire a new class of full-time employees who were asked to do a better job of evaluating young talent than

the old guard. As Tim Murnane of the Boston Globe, or actually pronounced Murnane, I believe, wrote in June 1909, Scouting for young ballplayers has grown to be quite a fad. Now, every well-regulated major league club has a man under contract to go from one end of the country to the other and size up some young player that is reputed to be a wonder. Murnane continues,

clubs get their most valuable information from the old ballplayers scattered about the country who are well-paid for tips, but no deals are made for the man until the professional scout has sized him up. So they had bird dogs, basically, and they would call in not a scout, but the scout, probably the sole scout at that point. This makes it a scout, but the scout, probably the sole scout at that point. This makes it a serious business for the scout, for the country is full of what is known as gold bricks. In fact, it was the large number of overrated ballplayers palmed off onto the big leagues that caused the magnates to employ scouts,

who in every case should be peculiarly fitted for this kind of work. who in every case should be peculiarly fitted for this kind of work. And Jacob concludes, The New Scouts were part of a growing trend for what they called scientific baseball in 1909. This phrase not only described new ways to build rosters off the field, but also the fast and exciting style of play teams needed to succeed in the low-scoring dead ball era with lots of hits and runs double and triple steals and even defensive shifts so it's interesting because then as now people were looking for competitive advantages like how can we be better at getting good players on our team now it's all sorts of inscrutable

elaborate deep dives that you have to hire your 25th analyst in the R&D department maybe to mine this information. Then it was, let's hire a scout. Yeah. Let's have one guy who will cover the entire country. Yeah, I was just going to say, imagine the travel. Yeah. You hear about scouts' coverage areas now.

It's like, oh, first of all, they probably weren't driving at that point. No, probably not. If they were, it was not in style on a highway system with good gas mileage. So they're covering the country. I mean, you know, they could take trains, obviously. And then who knows what they would have to take from the train to the field. But your coverage area is the United States. Nowadays, it's like scouts have a hard time covering a coverage area.

Back then, I guess maybe there were not quite as many states. But still, it was a big country. And it seems like maybe too much territory for one scout. But one scout was an improvement over zero scouts, undoubtedly. So, you know, you'd think like this would have been a day one thing. We should have someone who knows what they're doing and goes around. But, you know, I guess things evolved as we have covered in the past blast. And you only had so much baseball talent out there and there

were only so many markets and so many players to see but it does make you think of just like how many players were missed during that time who just like they didn't know that they were good enough to be big leaguers or they just were not found did not come to the attention of a team like nowadays there probably aren't that many players who want to play baseball. There could still be some good athletes, good potential players who just never pick up a ball and never play.

But if you're a good player, you're going to get seen. But back then, not necessarily. So there may have been many promising, talented players who just slipped through the net because there was one scout or no scouts. And if that guy missed his train, you were just out of luck. Exactly. Yeah. Anyway, different era. Yeah.

Judge is up as we speak. Oh, boy. It's a full count. Oh, boy. Go figure. He's seen an awful lot of uh full counts lately i'll just vamp and keep talking in case he hits the homer while we're talking and we can get the live reaction on the podcast i should get my mlb tv dial up here oh what's gonna happen can i I do it fast enough. I don't know. It's loading. Foul ball.

Buying more time for you to tune in. Yeah, he just wants me to be able to see it. All right, here we go. I have a 3-2 count is what I have. Yes, as do I. Nine pitches. It says that there have been nine pitches thrown. Pick-off attempt at first.

Stalling tactics. Delaying. Another foul. Yeah. Well, weing tactics, delaying another foul. Yeah, well, we can't. I saw a foul. Yeah. Pickoff attempt, getting booed, I believe, by the home crowd, by the Blue Jays fans who were like,

just pitch there and judge, even though it's a 3-3 game in the seventh. Yeah. There's some stakes here, and there's a man on first and no outs, but just uh they want to see tim mesa go about his business now and throw some pitches to their judge yeah what a fun little snapshot we can give people boston is up 3-0 in the bottom of the sixth tampa and cleveland are tied they were in a rain delay earlier i don't know if that's resolved like a little out of town

scoreboard segment uneffectively wild yeah the scarf ladies back there oh did he do it oh they're like can we go home now hey we talked long enough to see 61 whoa all right history oh my god history history history and we know the name of the man who gave up the Digger. Oh, here we do. Sorry, Tameza. Sorry, Tameza. Oh, my gosh. Where was that pitch located?

I guess, you know, fairly middle middle. It looks like a 95-ish sinker. Sort of centered, I suppose. But he threw enough pitches. I guess most of the pitches in that plate appearance were probably out of the strike zone or right on the edge of the strike zone. No, he threw him a strike and a big blow.

How about that? How about that? All right. Oh, the Maris's look like they're having feelings. Can the Maris's go home now? Yeah, do they get to go home now? Do they have to stick around for 62? I don't think you, I don't know. I mean, like,

I don't know. We don't have protocol for this kind of stuff. They are allowed to leave, I believe. Well, yeah, they're not, like, hostages. No, they can go at any time. But if you stick around for 61, I guess you're kind of obligated, right? I mean... So, they go to Baltimore

next, is that right? I think they play at home against Baltimore Which is fun It would be nice if he could hit 62 in New York It would be nice That would be a very nice thing Wow I just keep getting emails from my dentist

Ben Save the date This is great If I had done one less stat blast yeah we would have one more if we hadn't talked about my teeth yeah exactly see now it was all justified people who are wondering why are we talking about meg's teeth again oh i was gonna do that even if he hadn't hit a home run i i messaged you i was like i'm ready to pod but i'm gonna complain about dental insurance but it all worked out in a cosmic sense like i got to the end of my ladies there you know perfect i got to my last stat blast as judge was at the plate only because we spent some time talking about your teeth and dental insurance stupid it all

works out bad particular bones and weird wets. Love when we get a live look in on Effectively Wild that will not be live for anyone else. Yeah, but like. It was live for us. It was live for us. And the people listening who are from the future, that's not how it works, but are listening to this in the future, they will know the outcome of this. Yes. If he gets another plate appearance

and hits 62 then all of this perfection will be spoiled yeah but you know what are the odds of that it's the seventh they're ahead now that's probably not gonna happen all right well that was fun glad i could share that moment with you and our audience yeah well good for erin judge god it has to be such a relief he's like like, finally. Yeah, congrats to Judge. And well done to Meza for throwing the strike there. Oh, and you know what? No one, there's going to be no ball-related controversy because it went into the Blue Jays' bullpen. Oh, unless the Blue Jays hold out.

That would be a bigger controversy. That would be a much bigger controversy. I think that would break all sorts of unwritten rules if a player, can you imagine? They won won't do it they'll spare us that discourse yeah who's canadian they're polite yeah that's a gross generalization but wasn't there just a an article actually about that i want to say there was an article oh my god that guy almost caught it and then he did it oh no don't show him again oh they're zooming in on him now he's gonna hear about that for the rest of his life oh no don't show him again takes the heat off of

tim maza really we're all focusing on the guy who dropped the ball not the guy who gave up the tinger oh no that poor guy there Well, there were two of them. They kind of, oh, and now we're seeing the Maris's. This is really terrific radio. They do look relieved. They look relieved. Like, oh, we get to go home now. Yeah.

All right. All right. Thanks for listening to our play call from the past. We have established that I shouldn't be in the broadcast booth All right. All right. Thanks for listening to our play call from the past. We have established that I shouldn't be in the broadcast booth because I'll just end up talking about my teeth again. But, yeah, that was our episode, I guess. All right. That will do it for today. By the way, that article I was trying to conjure in my mind at the end of that episode about relievers and preparing to catch a historic home run ball hit by Judge, that was written by a friend of the show, Lindsay Adler, for The Athletic.

I will link to it on the show page as usual. Of course, everyone she talked to joked about keeping it and ransoming it off, but they wouldn't. They would give it to Judge as they acknowledge. However, there was one player who noted that he typically does not make any effort to retrieve a home run ball hit by the opposing team into the bullpen and that some players are superstitious about that. So there is sort of a semi-unwritten rule about retrieving opponents' home run balls hit into your bullpen.

Good piece. Check it out. And also, please check out Effectively Wild on Patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectively wild. The following five listeners have already signed up and pledged some monthly or yearly amount to help keep the podcast going, help us stay ad-free apart from our StatHead sponsorship, and get yourself access to some perks. Anthony DiStefano, JustAsking27, Nathan Wamser, Matt Thompson, and Quinn Stack. Thanks to all of you.

Patreon perks include access to the Effectively Wild Discord group for patrons only. We will unhook the red rope and usher you in. We also do monthly bonus episodes. We do playoff live streams. We give discounts on merch. You can get ad-free Fangraphs memberships. The perks go on and on. Not to mention the unstated perk of the satisfaction that comes from supporting the podcast and

perhaps Meg's dental work. You can contact me and Meg via email at podcastbandcrafts.com or by messaging us through the Patreon site if you are a supporter. You can also join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group slash effectivelywild. You can rate, review, and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and Spotify and other podcast platforms. You can follow Effectively Wild on Twitter at EWPod. And you can find the Effectively Wild subreddit at r slash Effectively Wild.

Thanks to Dylan Higgins for his editing and production assistance. We will be back with one more episode before the end of the week. Talk to you soon. U.S. Highway from north to south It's history breathing Get out from under the gun And drive down Highway 61 Animal's son saw the gold rush Saw the Civil War done

And settled down So On Highway 61