Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2183: .500 Days of Summer

Episode Date: June 28, 2024

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Nolan Schanuel’s aversion to day games, the Astros reaching .500 and coming for the Mariners, Houston’s weekend opponent (the Mets) making it back to .500 and nearing a playoff spot, the success (and good fortune) of Reynaldo López, the bad fortune of Adam Duvall, and how “expected” stats […]

Hello and welcome to episode 2183 of Effectively Wild, a baseball podcast from Fangraphs presented by our Patreon supporters. I am Ben Lindberg of The Ringer, joined by Meg Rowley of Fangraphs. Hello, Meg. Hello. Can I read you a relatable tweet? Sure. Relatable to me, at least. And really, it's the quote that is relatable. The tweet is about a quote. It's a quote from Ron Washington, Angels manager, about Angels player Nolan Shanawell. Here it is. Early in the year, Shanawell wasn't playing in day games because he had trouble

waking up in the daytime. And so I sat him down a couple times in day games, and now he wakes up at the daytime. It's me. It's you. Yeah, that would be me as a baseball player. We have day games? Oh. Yeah. Oh, no. This is my vampiric lifestyle and lack of circadian rhythm. Would stand me in good stead as a baseball player. It's a profession that generally is pretty receptive to people who stay up late and don't get up early, right? And if you're not like that coming in, you kind of have to become like that in order to live the baseball player lifestyle. But then it would be even more difficult to have to play

day games on occasion. And for me, we record this podcast almost always in the afternoon, mercifully. But if we had to get up early and record this podcast, always in the afternoon, mercifully. Yeah. But if we had to get up early and record this podcast, which sometimes you do in your time zone, might be more challenging for me. Because I'm not a morning person unless I am still awake in the morning because I've been up all night. Do you think that you would hit for more power than the one that has the big leg level? I think you might, you know. People are always surprised by how fit you are, Ben, you know? And I say, it's been years now. Why are people still shocked by this?

Well, they don't see me very much. They just hear my voice. And I guess I don't sound that way for whatever reason or so I've heard. But yeah, normally, I would say, well, obviously not every professional athlete is unimaginably better at everything than we normals are. And that is almost certainly true in this case. But Nolan Shonwell has so little power by baseball, big league baseball standards that I would almost entertain the notion. I might not actually ever hit the ball, but if I were to make contact, I don't know, maybe. I think that your contact skills are undoubtedly worse. And I

mean, no offense, but your power probably is too. But I wanted to get a little joke in, you know, I wanted to get in a little joke at old Nolan's expense. I don't relate to your problem. And I say that as someone who needs a great deal more sleep than you do to be like up and about and coherent but i am a i am a morning person and after 10 p.m it's like very dicey how cogent i'm gonna be i strongly prefer to be horizontal um after 10 p.m and sometimes ben i'll i'll be a level with you i'm level by like nine you know on a friday because the the week wears on you you know it accumulates by a volume like snow and then sometimes it's it's uh 8 p.m on a friday and you insist on on watching the thing you want

to watch and then you're asleep by nine and you hear about it over the weekend. You're like, well, I guess I misjudged that one. I didn't have the distance right. Sort of like Nolan Shonwell trying to hit everyone sometimes. Well, if you wanted to record the podcast in a horizontal alignment, supine, I guess prone would be challenging, but supine you could do. No problem for me. We're not on video here. You want to hold up that mic while you're lying in bed, then feel free. Be my guest. I don't because, you know, it's like noon where I am. This is a perfectly good time to be awake, although I ate a piece of cake and a piece of bread before we started recording. So,

might end up with some- Carbo-loading for Effectively Wild. Yeah. But I might end up with some carb but I might end up with some snoozies when it's all said and done but yeah like I am an early-ish to rise person and as I think I've remarked on the pod before even on

the weekend when I don't set an alarm I very rarely am sleeping past 8 you know and it's not just the cats although they have their say I'm'm just like, you know, this is what 38 is. It's being awake at seven, even though you're sleepy. Yeah, well, I have a young daughter and she also has her say. So that doesn't impair my ability to sleep in, unlike you say, Kikuchi, who manages somehow. I try so hard not to judge what kind of husband and father he must be, because I don't know, Ben. And even if I did, it's candidly none of my business.

Yeah, look, I don't want to know anything negative about you say Kikuchi. Don't milkshake duck Kikuchi for me. I'm enjoying him too much as a person and as a personality. Yeah, he seems a fine sort. But I do sometimes wonder, like, is this not about that I can't be? Well, we're not the same in that respect. I'm the same as Nolan Shanoel in that respect. And really, he's 22 years old. He was drafted out of college last year. So, you know, he was probably living that college lifestyle. I don't know what your day-night cycle was like in

college, but a lot of college kids, right? They're staying up late, they're skipping morning classes if they can't avoid them entirely, and sleepwalking through their mornings. And that was probably what Nolan Shonwell could get away with. I don't know what his baseball schedule was like exactly in college, but I mean, how many of us, who among us, right? One year out of college, not a morning person, just getting established in your professional life. And I don't know whether Washington literally meant that like he slept through day games or he wasn't showing up or whether he just wasn't performing well in day games.

And so he decided maybe we'll just bench him and maybe we'll send a message here that, hey, Nolan, you got to be ready for these day games sometimes. Right. Yeah. I just heard that and said, I see myself in a major leaker. Yeah, I do. I do want to offer, though, just because it feels important to say, like, when you're in college, you can like eat a bale of cotton. You can eat a piece of tupperware and like bounce back so i don't think that anyone's college sleep habits should be really looked upon favorably

or at least not um looked upon as if it's something that's sustainable right replicable into your 30s um and of course i have no idea what it's like to be a high level collegiate athlete. You know, I was worried about Hobbes and Foucault, you know, who says go to sleep Hobbes. I mean, not really. He was like pretty into work, but that wasn't his main thing and we somehow structure our lives around that. So the life of a writer slash editor slash podcaster can be conducive to unusual, non-traditional sleep cycles. And so can the life of a professional baseball player. So Nolan and I, we're mostly making it work, but sometimes we do have to play on other people's schedules and then we have to just do our best. Yeah. I do have, you know, I do have moments where it is like, oh, yikes, it's going to be a late one for me, but not regularly, Ben. It's not, it's not for me, you know, being, being awake during normal times. That's, that's the life for me, you know, to be awake during a normal time. You're so sleepo-normative here. I guess I am. I guess I am. And you know, what a privileged thing to say because I just have the cats. So I don't have a kid that needs to be tended to in the night, you know, with fevers and diapers and what have you. So some of this is very particular and peculiar to me, but I don't know, with fevers and diapers and what have you. So some of this is very particular and peculiar to me,

but I don't know, my circadian rhythm and my workday align in a way that is convenient for me. Let's put it that way, because that comes without any kind of judgment. Must be nice. Yeah, well, the day-night splits for Nolan Shanoel in night games, he's got a 683 OPS, which, look, it's not great in the grand scheme of things,

but is better than his day OPS, which is 631. So he has an 88 TOPS plus in day games in a mere 100 plate appearances, because maybe Ron Washington has learned not to play him in some of them. But yeah, if you could look at my TOPS plus in the daytime, I don't know how we would quantify that exactly, but it might be worse than 88 relative to my average production. So I have to ask you a very important question. Okay. Are you afraid of the Houston Astros? They're coming. They're coming. They're coming for your Mariners. They're not dead. They are the serial killer in the slasher movie, as we have postulated postulated previously yeah they're 500 for the first time they have won as many games as they have lost on the season coming off a strong start from a major leaguer we met spencer arraghetti yeah i won't do the exaggerated italian pronunciation of that

though you can i guess yeah that's my job you don't you don't you don't get to do the voice but i do i think real italians are probably hey, you guys could chill over there, you know? They're in second place in the AL West. They are a mere four and a half games behind your Seattle Mariners and three games out in the wild cards. Anyone who wrote off the Houston Astros, premature. They're doing it again. So how scared are you? Right now, the division odds, according to fan graphs,

still have the Mariners with almost double the odds that the Astros do. 62.9 Mariners' probability of winning the AL West, 32.2 Astros, though the Astros are now up above a coin flip. They're at 52.3% to make the playoffs. And we know that once they make the playoffs, an ALCS trip is inevitable. So how are you feeling about those Houston Astros? I mean, I'm always afraid, Ben. I'm, you know, I'm dizzy.

I'm throwing up. I'm like Hunter Green. I'm going to bring that up later. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Let's talk about that later because, to bring that up later. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Let's talk about that later because, boy, that was a it was a turn. You know, there were things that came out of him that normally don't at work. Of course, I'm nervous.

Hubris is something I don't want to say I'm completely immune to as it pertains to the Seattle Mariners. But it's close. Why would you be? Really? What about your history of Mariners fandom would cause you to be overconfident? Right. I'm well inoculated. I've gotten all my boosters, you know, as it were. I am very nervous. A horror movie killer is a great way to describe them. First of all, it's a little bit mean, and I'm apparently embracing this part of my personality. I don first of all it's a little bit mean and um i'm uh apparently

embracing this part of my personality i don't know if it's my favorite part but it's in there um the the bigger question for me is like what version of a horror movie villain are we getting like are they going to be um kind of a bumbling you know they come back from the dead over and over again, but they're supernatural. So like, that's scary because magic is, um, is a problem, but also like, they're not, are they going to be calculating? Are they going to be, you know, uh, Hannibal Lecter-esque, aware of their own intelligence as like a tool of their mayhem? Or are they gonna like, just have like skin that should have fallen off by now but somehow hasn't again because of the magic and they're just coming at you with a blunt instrument

that you could bob and weave and by bobbing and weaving in this scenario is like acquiring a bat that hits on the regular so i don't know what kind they're going to be. The serial killer, sometimes they will seem to break the rules of reality in a way that the Astros have also broken rules in the past. The ones in the movies almost always do that. And they're generally not sympathetic. You're usually not rooting for the killer, although there are some times when the incompetence of the protagonist is such that you do just wish death upon them. You just kind of root for the killer. It's like you deserve this, right? So you ran in the wrong direction.

You ran towards the creepy house with the chainsaws or whatever. You had sex one time. Yes, that was your mistake. You did not live a chaste lifestyle. And so you deserve to be slaughtered. But that's also probably the neutrals are not really rooting for the astros these days so there are some similarities there but of course as we have covered very few of the current astros actually implicated in the science dealing scandal

it may just be that you're sick of the astros because they're perennially appearing in the lcs and so even if they had done it completely on the level up on the up and up all the way, you'd still be sick of them and say, hey, let's get a cast change here. You can be wary of them without being either hung up on or like confused about the roster composition relative to the banging scheme group you know i want to be realistic on both sides like you know seven game win streak that that helps you out a good bit the mariners did finally win after i turned 38 so congrats yeah yeah we got that going for us i was like and the astros they've been beating up on some bad teams recently which helps but you know what um the mariners played the miami marlins

famously a bad team and they only took one of three so like you know but i do think that the astros are still pretty hurt um and i think that that will be an issue for them now one can look at the mariners and say not as healthy as they once were poor brian woo has a hamstring issue now which is like a new ailment he's still managing to like bob and weave out of the way of a season ending thing but to extend the horror movie metaphor if if we were worried about anyone kind of biting the dust first maybe it's him because it does seem like he keeps narrowly scraping by but it might get him when he's to be clear not rooting for that and poor guy sounded so demoralized when he was talking to the media after the hamstring thing so i think he's quite frustrated and i hope

that he has better health in the second half mariners not a good offense and like you know their vaunted bullpen is banged up and um you know makes you nervous in a way that i had grown kind of unaccustomed to so all of those things make me very nervous but yeah the astros are hurt in their pitching staff and also you look at the fan graph standings and you're like oh here let me look at the team hitting leaderboards allow me to sort this by WRC plus. And you're like, oh, Houston's at seven and Seattle's at 18. So it is a better lineup than Seattle's. That remains true. But it's not as formidable as it has been at times in the past. No, it's not. And it's pretty top heavy. And Bregman looked kind of cooked earlier this season.

He has turned it on again. And of course, Tuck Everblasting was on the IL for a while. Everblasting. If you have him and Altuve and Bregman and Jordan all hitting, then that's obviously about as solid a four as you'll find. But there is a drop off in the second half of that lineup. Certainly,

even though you don't have Martin Maldonado as the automatic out here anymore. He's been the automatic out for another team this year. So, yeah, it's definitely not the Houston powerhouse that we have seen in the past. And even though Hunter Brown has sunk his way to success, he's been throwing his sinker and it has elevated his game. And so he's been sinking to success as the Astros have been rising. And you have Eric Eddy, who's been,

and you have Framber, who's just not the old Framber really. And Ronell Blanco, who's been the pleasant surprise for them. But yeah, lots of injuries. And they entered the season with a lot of rotation injuries, but things haven't necessarily improved there.

So you can still hope that some of these guys will come back and help you and that Verlander will be better. And maybe there actually is a Lance McCullers out there in the world who will pitch again someday. And just, you know, you're missing Garcia and Urquidy and Javier. And it's just, it's been tough for them to piece together that staff. So it's not really a formidable team, but I guess no one in this division really is. So it might be good enough. And they have had an easier schedule than the Mariners thus far, according to ESPN's calculations. According to the projections on the Fangraph's playoff odds page,

they have roughly comparable schedules the rest of the way. So that's not a big factor from here on out. I don't know how it will go, Ben. I really don't. It sure would be nice if I could feel greater confidence in the availability of what Seattle needs in the trade market. I feel skeptical of that. So I will remain nervous. It was so nice when they had a 10-game lead.

That felt much better than four and a half. More than twice as big as the current one. I am comforted by the fact that Seattle has managed to play very well against AL West opponents. that Seattle has managed to play very well against AL West opponents. So, you know, they are setting themselves up to have, I think, favorable tiebreaker scenarios should it come to that. But it would be nice to just avoid that problem altogether

and win the division. And, you know, then we can deal with Houston as we see fit later, you know, which, I don't know. I'm not I don't watch a lot of horror movies. They make me scared. So I don't know which like villain like who who am I in this scenario? I mean, like I don't play for the team, so I'm no one.

I'm probably like one of the like, you know, prison guards who gets killed in Silence of the Lambs and has to look on in horror at what has been done to me. But maybe the Mariners will be Clarice Starling in this scenario, but not in Hannibal, because that's a, you know, that's a travesty of a project. But, you know, maybe they'll sort it out. You know, they're intrigued, but they figure out how to get around it. Signs of the Lambs is a problematic text, isn't it? We don't have to go into that, but there are parts of that that, ooh, don't feel good now. Which one was Jason? Jason is Friday the 13th.

Who's the villain in Halloween? Michael Myers. Michael Myers, right. Yes. Yeah. Did we ever figure out what his deal was? Doing a lot of movie TV commentary these days. I don't know if that's what people want from us.

Hey, you started it. I think that people's favorite is when I talk about movies I haven't seen, you know? Probably. Because I have a really good handle on the plot, for instance. Yeah. Save it for the Patreon bonus pause. Yeah, there you go. for instance.

Yeah, save it for the Patreon bonus pod. Yeah, there you go. But if you look at the base run standings, the margin is even smaller here between Mariners and the Astros. Yes, I'm sorry. But the Astros, three games under their base runs record. Mariners, one game over. So there's like a game of difference in underlying performance here. Deserved, expected performance.

So, yeah, get nervous, I guess, Mariners fans, or continue to be if that's just your default state. I'm not saying that this instinct is a good one because, like, I think that the general vibe from the Mariners faithful, at least the ones that I either follow or have seen retweeted into my timeline online, is like, it's, it's quite fatalistic. And it was as fatalistic when they were leading the division by 10 games as they are as it is today with them at four and a half. And so we could, we could try to chill, you know, because it's not a bad baseball team. And there were parts that the parts in the beginning of the season where I was like, I think this might be a bad baseball team. And there were parts in the beginning of the season where I was like,

this might be a bad baseball team. And now I think it's like it is a team that has some elements that are very good and other parts that are mediocre and in need of upgrades. I think we've learned things that should put us in a different headspace. But it is hard to, you know, when you think you're the final girl, I think it's hard to shake that feeling. You're like looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life as the final girl. See, I brought it home. If they could combine their rosters somehow, you could have that great.

There would be homicides. Well, yeah, their weaknesses and strengths are kind of complementary, I suppose, in some areas of the roster. In some areas. in some areas of the roster. In some areas. It's interesting to watch, you know, as I've had occasion to watch them, like, play the Rangers,

them being the Mariners, and then play the Astros. And it's like, you know, they played the Rangers and they swept the Rangers earlier this year at home. And, like, it was a really exciting series and it felt like they were playing some of their better baseball. And you watch the guys on the field

and not just guys who had played like not just mitch garver who was like hey friends but you know there seems to be like a healthy level of competition and also a lot of respect for um different guys on those clubs they seem to like have a friendly but intense rivalry and then you watch seattle play houston and you like, did anybody's car get keyed? Because I think you should check because those clubs really do not seem to care for each other. And it's not going away, even though some of the members who have perhaps instigated conflict in the past are no longer with the Astros. Or with the Mariners, for that matter. Jesse Winker was like, I will kill all of the Astros. Kill is strong. But he was ready to take them all on. He's like, I'm gonna

start and finish some stuff. Now he's ready to take on septuagenarian Nationals fans. He's going into the stands to yell at Nationals fans who've been heckling. Yes, he was seemingly maybe challenging a 66-year-old Nationals fan to a fight. No way. It was hard to hear exactly what was said, but yeah, it was not a great look for him. Yeah, that's not the best. So maybe the only team that has been as hot as the Astros in June is your New York Mets. My New York Mets. Well, yeah, not yours, but your Mariners, other people's Mets, if they're not disowning them.

But the Mets also returned to 500 on Wednesday, same day, not for the first time in their case this season, but the first time in a month and a half or so. And wouldn't you know it, the Astros and the Mets are playing each other this weekend. So sometimes the segues just suggest themselves. But the Astros, as we record on Thursday, they're 15 and seven in June, the Mets are 15 and six. And like every other team in the NL, they are in this thing now very much in the wildcard race. They had been discussed as possible sellers. And now it's, it's hard to see that happening. As we talked about not long ago, it's just hard to see almost anyone selling because so many teams are at least theoretically in

contention. And so I wonder whether we will see more buyer to buyer trades, like swap meet sort of, like here's something you need and here's something I need, but it's not someone looking toward the future. It's just trying to shore up one area of the roster and trading from the strength. So we might see more of that, but it's now hard to imagine. People were saying, oh, is Pete Alonzo going to be on the move and this guy or that guy? The Mets are now the closest team to a playoff spot that does not currently possess one in the National League. So they're a game and a half back of the Padres and the Cardinals, who are almost tied for the third wildcard in the NL. They're good again, all of a sudden.

And I know everyone's been joking about Grimace, but it is not purely the power of Grimace throwing out a first pitch for them. Like, they've been playing pretty well. I guess it's hard to isolate their performance from the Grimace throwing out a first pitch for them. Like, they've been playing pretty well. I guess it's hard to isolate their performance from the Grimace factor. Is it? But probably independent of that, they've been pretty good. We have to leave open the possibility that he is, in fact, magic, even though he is a person in a suit. I don't know the gender of the grimace.

Yeah, you can't prove a negative. Grimace could be a confounding factor here. Yes, sometimes they refer to the person inside the mascot suit as a friend, like a friend of grimace. That sounds unfortunate. Yeah, anyway. Can I briefly say something about the grimace of it all? Unfortunate. Can I briefly say something about the grimace of it all? Because look, I'm not trying to yuck anyone's yum except that shouldn't grimace canonically be like a Dodgers fan or an Angels fan? Because he's a McDonald's begin in the greater Los Angeles area, like maybe in San Bernardino or something? San Bernardino in the greater Los Angeles area?

He's a SoCal creature. I was about to say SoCal cat, but that implies that he has a recognizable species, which I think is probably not supported by the grimace of it all. I know that the seven line is purple and grimace is purple. I used to live off the seven, okay? You don't get to seven explain to me. You don't get to seven explain me. I used to live in Queens, okay? I understand Queens. I get to grimace explain to you. But why? But why? Why is he a Met fan? Why is he? What is happening, Ben? Why? Why? Because they claimed him as their own, I guess.

That's not a reason. You know, people get to claim stuff all the time. That doesn't mean that the creature being claimed has to go along with it. Well, Grimace was a willing participant. He was not there against his will.

I don't think someone else wants to try to reclaim Grimace if they could do that. I guess my point is this. If Braves fans were to come to their senses and realize that Blooper, Blooper? Is that his name? Is a terrifying flesh monster. And they were like, the fanatic, that's our guy. The fanatic would, well, he'd say words that we don't say without them being bleeped on this podcast. He wouldn't be like, oh, well, I've been claimed, so I guess I work for the Braves now. That's not how that works. Why is Grimace a Mets fan? I find this, what is Grimace's canon, you know?

Yeah, I don't know, really. I haven't done a deep dive into Grimace, but the information is out there, certainly, if you want to find it. Why does no one know? Well, here's what I do know. It is not purely Grimace who has been powering the Mets to their success. I think part of it is that they have gotten good contributions from the relatively young Mets, Mark Vientos and Francisco Alvarez, right? So those guys... Hit the shot out of the ball. Yeah, they've been back and they've been good. And that has helped a lot.

So Alvarez has been back since June 11th after being up early in April with the Mets. And if we just sort the old Fangraphs position player war leaderboard since June 11th, he's almost a top 10 player in baseball. leaderboard since June 11th. He's almost a top 10 player in baseball. He's number 11th overall with a run-of-the-mill 248 WRC plus in 14 games. That's worth a win. So he's been good and Vientos has been good too. He's not giving you the defensive value really, but he's got a 143 WRC plus in that same span and a 164 WRC plus on the season. He's been playing for them regularly since mid-May. He's basically been Pete Alonso come again, the second coming of the polar bear, more or less. Vientos is right there.

They can sort of slot him in if they were to trade Alonso a free left via free agency. They've got a young Vientos doing what a young Alonso did, more or less. So that has helped a lot. And they haven't even had Kodaisenga this season, right? So if you think and hope that you're going to get him back at some point, yeah, it's pretty hard to see the Mets as sellers at this point. There's still a question about are they legitimate playoff contenders, but it certainly didn't look like they were some number of weeks ago, right? And that has changed since June. I would be so nervous to trade for Pete Alonso.

I would feel great trepidation about that. I'd feel some trepidation about signing him long-term probably for the kind of contract that I imagine he will be seeking. Yeah. Is he a Boris guy? Yes. That's going to be a content. I wonder what lessons Scott will have learned about the market when he takes Pete Alonzo into his free agency. It's like you said, like they're getting good contributions from some of their younger guys. It helps that Lindor is on like a really terrific tear and has just been playing out of his gourd. So I love this thing that happens every year where like some percentage of the Mets fan base rediscovers that like Francisco Lindor is good actually. And it's

like, yeah, you have a future Hall of Fame shortstop and we've had him all along. Yeah. Yeah. You've had him all along. You could loved this lindor the entire time you know because like he's he's been there i know that there have been moments where like it hasn't been the best but also he's been very good for the mets um pretty much almost the entire time he's been there and of course they benefit from the fact that the wild card especially in the nl looks pretty wide open um i do wonder, what are all of these close to the race teams going to do in a couple of weeks? Because the posture that New York took coming into the season was one of, okay, this isn't our year. We're going to trade guys. We're going to bring payroll down. They did try to sign some of the marquee guys. We know that they made a real

push for Otani. We know they made a real push for Yamamoto. Obviously, neither of those worked out, but they did endeavor to sign those guys. But clearly with an eye toward, okay, this isn't our year, but we want to be good again pretty soon. And I think that that was a position that was pretty well supported by the holes they had on their roster uh as it was currently constituted and like playing in a really hard division right like they were looking up at two very good teams in the phillies and the braves but it's a new york team and steve cohen clearly wants like a postseason team on his hands it's like what are you gonna to do, Steve? And how many people are going to call you uncle between now and the trade deadline?

I guess of all the, you mentioned Boris, of the Boris 4 or I guess Boris 5, if we include JD Martinez, the late signing Boris clients, JDM has been the best of them probably or the closest to what his team was hoping for, right? Because Matt Chapman's been fine. He's been okay. And Cody Bellinger has been, you know, he's been all right. Yeah. And then, of course, Blake Snell has been another disaster in any number of ways. And Jordan Montgomery, you know,

not what you were hoping for, really, from him either. So the best return on investment, I guess, smaller investment, but the best return has been JDM, who is just, you know, despite his somewhat advanced baseball age, he's younger than we are, but he's 36 years old. He's younger than we are, but he's 36 years old and he has a 148 WRC+, which I guess it's just, you know, you're proverbial. He can roll out of bed and hit X guy. Like that's JD Martinez. He just, he pretty much always hits and he's hitting again. One could make the argument that, you know, what the low key best signing that they made in the offseason was, at least in terms of bang for the buck was harrison bader like he's he has a 113 wrc plus he's playing a good center field they needed that he gives them a lot of like kind of versatility and optionality in the outfield in terms of how they align their guys and some of their other outfielders haven't been performing

as well so um i i think that that has ended up being a really astute signing on their part. I know that Mets fans wanted more, and I get that. Fine. I'm not disputing that, but I think that he has really helped them out. So that's good.

Man, Jeff McNeil really falling off. Wow. I hadn't really grappled with Jeff McNeil's line in a while. And a 69 WRC plus is not nice. Later, you know, he would help them as they're a little shorthanded, injury deprived. But I guess as the Mets fan vibes have brightened the Yankees fan, the vibes there, the storm clouds are gathering. As we've noted, it doesn't take long for the attitude to turn. So maybe there's just only a certain amount of baseball happiness that can happen in New York at any one time. A very small amount. A very small amount, yes. time. A very small amount. A very small amount, yes. A very, very small amount.

You're fighting over resources like a pizza rat. Yeah, just concluded Subway Series was a meeting of one ascendant team and one that, look, they'll probably be fine, but it hasn't been that great lately. They are only one game up on the Orioles now, though, after at times being a little bit more comfortably uh in in first place but um can i tell you something very funny i don't know if

you noticed that um i got like nine notifications from the mlb app about judging that home run and so like he did that and i was like oh the yankees are probably winning and then i at the end and i was doing other stuff and then at the end of the night i was like oh i should check in on today's scores for the games that I didn't get a chance to watch any of. And I was like, oh, my God. What happened here? I was like, oh, I think there were other notifications that perhaps could have been sent from this game instead of me just learning that he had his 30th home run like 17 times. I was like, did he keep? I was like, oh, my gosh, he keeps hitting them.

I'm like, no, they're still telling me about the same, the same one. They're still telling me about the same one. I have disabled MLB at bat notifications. I'm anti-notification in general. I try to minimize them to the degree that I can. And I know you have to be notified of the things so that you can spring into action and start assigning pieces to people. But yes, I have muted those particular notifications. I'll find out, you know, something relevant happens. A podcast listener will email us. That's my notification. Yeah. Or you'll just get a G chat from me going, oh, no. And you'll be like, okay, this could be about five different people, but all five of them I'm really upset about. I just noticed that the Astros actually have higher playoff odds than the Mets do.

According to FanCrafts, the Mets are at like 42%. Mets, Astros, about 52%. But those numbers both creeping up or climbing quite quickly of late. I like it when other teams in the AL West have uh good playoff odds apart from the mariners because like i think most people who actually understand fan graphs which is the vast majority of our readership we have smart folks who come and read the site every day but there i remain convinced there is some percentage of our readership that thinks that i am like setting the play or at least putting my thumb on the scale in some way. And I was like, why would I say anything nice about the Astros?

There are plenty of players who play for the Astros who I like. And, you know, like, it's fine. But also, I spent the first 10 minutes of the podcast comparing them to various murderers. And I felt comfortable with it, Ben. You know, it felt natural to me. So that's what I think about that. But would I do that? Would I

juice their playoff odds? Me? Meg? No. Wouldn't do it. They must be true then. They must be saying something about something, you know? Yeah. Well, elsewhere in the NL East, it's been a while since we've done a check-in

on this season's converted starters? Converted relievers? I've forgotten. It's been so long that we've done a check-in on this season's converted starters, converted relievers. I've forgotten. It's been so long that I forgot what we settled on. Yeah, I think converted starters because they've been converted into starters. Yeah, converted starters. I think that's what you said. Former relievers who are now starting.

And Reynaldo Lopez, you know, he's kept it up. He's still doing it. Like, we were marveling at him early in the season. Can this continue? And it has. It certainly has. He has a 1.7 ERA through 14 starts, 79 and a third innings. He is the sole remaining pitcher, at least minimum 50 innings with a sub two ERA.

Yeah. Now, has he had a little luck along the way? Sure. Yes, I think we could say that, certainly. He has a Cy Young Snell-esque left on base percentage or strand rate. Sure, yeah. He's stranded like 86% of runners he's put on. And he's got a 279 BABIP and a low home run per fly ball rate.

You know the drill. So it's a 1.70 ERA. It's a 2.79 FIP, but that's also fantastic. Now, if we look at his X FIP normalized for the home run per fly ball rate, 3.68. Okay. It's not quite as spectacular, or I guess the worst of the estimators, his expected ERA is 3.97. his expected ERA is 3.97. Now, I would think coming into this season, Atlanta would have signed up for a 3.97 actual ERA out of Reynaldo Lopez with this kind of durability and taking his regular turns in the rotation. I think I certainly would have said, oh, yeah, that's worth doing this, this conversion. Like, this is pretty good. And he does have the biggest difference between his expected ERA,

which is a stat cast-based metric, and his actual ERA. So the difference of 2.27 runs between those two is the largest in that direction. The only other pitcher with a gap of over two in that direction is Tyler Anderson of the Angels. So, yeah, he's probably pitching over his head and he probably will come back to earth a bit. But, boy, what a success he's been to get half a season like this out of Reynaldo Lopez, who, when it was announced

that they were going to stretch him out as a starter, a lot of people were like, including me or us, I think, was like, this won't stick, probably. This, you know, they can pay this lip service, they could see how it goes, but it won't actually happen or they won't need him or it won't work. And, wow, it's worked quite well. And they have needed him, you know. They've needed him, yeah. have needed him you know they've needed him yeah at the time i i agree that we thought right i recall us thinking that it wouldn't necessarily work but i think we were pretty high on that signing because even with um the possibility that he would end up having to shift back into relief

like it's not an like an onerous contract by any means you know and he's been a very good reliever so i think our thinking at the time was well it won't work but if it doesn't who cares like that they'll just shift him to the bullpen and he will do great good stuff for them there but what a boon it has been for them because you know they are they're down you, they're obviously down Strider. Waldrop is hurt right now. Smith-Shavar is hurt. You know, they've had a real need. And so, you know, I look back on like that deal. The Chris Sale deal looks inspired for them at this point.

Like that trade has been so useful to them because he's been really good. Freed looks like he's returned to form. to them because he's been really good. Freed looks like he's returned to form. They've been able to weather some injuries that I think would have been pretty damaging to them had they not brought in Sale and Lopez. So I think now if they're very good lineup can just start hitting with any regularity. It's like, why are all these guys less good than they've been before? What's up with that? You know, they used to

be so good at hitting the baseball, and now it seems like it's a little harder for many of those dudes. Plus, obviously, they're down to Cunha. Wow, Ozuna really is a 166 WRC plus, doesn't he? He sure does. Now, if we could just get David Fletcher, knuckleballer extraordinaire, up there.

His most recent start. You are like, I am ready. I don't care what the gambling looks like. Put that cat in the majors. And I think that's a very bad idea until we know more. My stars. If he didn't bet on baseball, I say bring him up and, you know, do your due diligence. But if he gets cleared, his most recent start for AA, Mississippi Braves, six innings. This was on June 22nd, six innings, one earned run.

I mean, he's still, he's making it work down there. So, I just, I want to see this. I think it's a bad idea. I think it's a really bad idea, though. I think it's a great idea. It might be terrible in execution, but I just want to see it. I feel like you

have more faith in people than I do. That's one thing we've learned in the course of doing this pod. You're like, they're good most of the time, and I'm like, well, there are some exceptions to that, Ben. While we're talking about Atlantans, is that how you say it? Atlantans. A teammate of Reynaldo Lopez, Adam Duvall, he has not been going so great.

And he's also been sort of pressed into service. He was another fairly late signee who was not expected to have as prominent a role as the one he's been thrust into in the wake of Ronald Acuna's injury, etc. So his surface stats are terrible. He has kind of the opposite thing that Reynaldo Lopez has going on, where under the hood, it looks okay, but on the surface, it looks pretty disastrous. And so I was reading an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution about the season that Duvall is having. And he was talking about how he thinks he's hit the ball well, and he's flummoxed that things aren't going well. He said, looking up at the scoreboard, you see whatever I'm batting, but I think I have to be

a more mature player than to believe in that, right? There's balls that I've hit that should be homers that are out based on the wind or whatever. I think just being a mature player, I know that. I got to take those positives. Those stats are a little misleading. I'm not reading too much into them. Now, if I was hitting what I'm hitting and I wasn't hitting the ball hard, then I would be worried. I've hit plenty of balls that I'm happy with. Then he continued to talk about some particular batted balls that he hit with what would seem to be a home run resultant exit speed and angle.

And he's not getting the results. And here's how he put it. If you look at the numbers, they're very similar. It's just completely different results comparing last season than this season. I could easily have 13, 14 homers right now, and I'd enjoy looking up the scoreboard. I hit a ball in Baltimore, 106 mile per hour at 35 degree launch angle. Can of poop. Can of poop. That's not me repeating can of poop. He repeated can of poop. Can of poop. And then he said, like, why is that a can of poop

now? I don't know. Then I hit a ball to right field, 101 miles per hour, 26 degree launch angle. It was an out. It's like, why are those balls out? Why are those balls out? I don't know. I can't explain that. Can of poop. I'm can't explain that can of poop i'm not really familiar with can of poop as baseball terminology can of corn we know certainly and corn sometimes is very apparent in poop oh god ben i was like is he gonna do it and then and then you're like and sometimes and i was like he's gonna do it he's going there it's just obvious i mean how could i not but i mean much like the corn can of poop is a colorful way to put it i guess much as corn in the all right oh right my god he has a 52 WRC plus is the point. He's batting 166, 242, 291. And yet his expected weighted on

base is higher than last year's when he had a 116 WRC plus. So he is right. He is hitting the ball with the same kind of contact quality he was last year. His ex-WOBA has gone from 304 to 310. All right, woo-hoo. But his WOBA has gone from 347 to 242. And that's a drastic decrease. And so seemingly he is having really lousy luck. 200 BABIP on his part. So the WOBA minus ex-WOBA, if we look at Baseball Savant, if we set minimum 500 pitches let's say the difference between woba and x woba for reynaldo lopez he has the 13th biggest a 53 point gap there and in his case that is a good thing he's lucking out if we look at hitters and set the same minimum 500 pitches

woba minus x woba gap for adam duvall, 68 points. And as a hitter, that is not what you want. Well, it depends on which way you sort it. I'm sorting ascending, obviously. And so for him, not good because there's a 68 point difference there. And that is the biggest gap in that direction. So he has been the unluckiest hitter by that metric. He quote unquote should have about four more home runs. Only Bobby Witt Jr., who should have five more, is further below his expected total. And so I wonder, if you were a baseball player, we've established that if I were one, I would have trouble waking up for day games like Nolan Shanawell, and probably also would have

trouble hitting for power like Adam Duvall and like Dolan Shanawell. But would you feel better knowing that you were getting jobbed like this and having the confirmation and certainty that you were getting jobbed? Because I think that's maybe the biggest difference in how fans approach the game in the stat cast era is that we're all so conscious of expected stats. Yeah, not all, but many. We're conscious of the difference between process and results, right? Which is an idea that, you know, even Moneyball brought to the masses. But now that we all have X WOBA and X ERA and X everything else, I think we're more conversant with that idea, which you could go back to the dawn of baseball and you could find guys saying, I'm hitting the ball on the screws and it's going right out, guys.

And yet now we know that for a fact. Do you think that would be heartening? Because like Duvall, you could look at the numbers and say, yeah, but I know that I'm hitting the ball hard and eventually it'll even out. Or would it possibly piss you off even more? Because it's like, it would convert your uncertainty or like your lack of confidence into frustration maybe for me. Like I'd be annoyed, you know, I would have a different kind of emotional reaction where I'd feel less lack of self-confidence because it would reaffirm my belief that, okay, I'm doing everything right. And yet it would annoy me even more

knowing I'm doing everything right and still my stats suck and probably people are booing me and now you have a 166 batting average. That might be extra frustrating for me to know that with greater certainty. I think that there are like two ways to answer this question. I think emotionally it would feel really frustrating because if you're bought into all of that as a real thing, you just have to be sitting there going, how is this, how is it still this way? How is it still this way? Like we're officially halfway through the season after tonight's games on June 27th. How, how, you know, so there would be that part of it. I do think the piece of it that would give you some comfort is that if this is the issue,

right, if this is the way that it is manifesting for you, your job security seems better than the opposite. And so I think that would bring you a lot of comfort to be able to sort of point to that when you're having conversations with the front office and with the coaching staff and thinking about where your place sits on the roster and being able to say, I'm doing all the things you you brought me here to do now for duval like he isn't this odd spot because he keeps being a brave but he isn't being given the kind of contracts that the guys who keep being braves are often given right yeah like he is the exception to this, like here, we're going to

sign this court to a bunch of long-term deals and kind of know exactly who we have in the organization for the next decade. And, you know, I don't think that that's like an unjustifiable omission on the part of Atlanta's front office. But so you probably, if you're Adam Duvall, you're like, well, I'm not like totally secure because like they seem okay to like get rid of me when they need to. But I think that you would feel like your spot wasn't probably in jeopardy in the same way, which isn't to say that, you know, they wouldn't look to upgrade or whatever if the right deal came along. But, you know, I think it would give you some comfort that you're not going to come to the ballpark the next day and see your locker cleaned out. So that's something. That is true.

Yeah, right. In the past, it might have been you were crying out in the wilderness and insisting to everyone, no, look, I've just really been unlucky. Right. And maybe your employer would not see things the same way, whereas now they're going to be looking at your StatCast stats or whatever. And so they will know, OK, it's going to be okay. We should keep running him out there and it will eventually normalize and it'll look more like the Adam Duvall that we thought we were getting. So there is greater job security and yes, like your pay long-term and your employment prospects will more be tied to the underlying metrics than just the surface

stats that some people will still be fooled by, but maybe not the most important people from your perspective. We say all that and we have the understanding of his stats that we do, and we have access to the stats we've described, right? And it could well be that in his conversations with the front officer, with the coaching staff, like they're looking at that, and then surely they're looking at a bunch of other stuff too and might be able to give him more specific feedback about like what piece of it is him genuinely being unlucky and what piece of it is perhaps indicative of you know a particular style of hitting or whatever that isn't conducive to him actually seeing the kinds of results he wants on the field but

if it were me i would take some comfort in this and be like, all right, it's probably, it's going to figure itself out at some point, right? Like at some point, surely, surely, you know. So we promised that we were going to talk about Hunter Green vomiting. So I don't want to let people down. I forgot all about that until you said it again. Well, yeah, we did. So Hunter Green was starting against the Pirates.

And he just projectile vomited. I mean, it was a stream, you know? Yes. And it's odd because you don't see people throw up that clearly. If I throw up, which fortunately hasn't happened for a while. I haven't had an excess of roasted Brussels sprouts recently. I've learned my lesson. Must be nice, Ben.

Yeah. So when you throw up, fortunately you don't see it, not you personally, but when one throws up, you don't really see it come out of you. Hopefully not. You don't really see it come out of you, you know. Hopefully not. No, certainly not from afar. You know, you're leaning over the toilet, hopefully, if you're in the right place. And maybe your eyes are closed. You don't want to look.

Hopefully, yeah. And it just comes out, right? And then it's over. With Hunter Green, when a pitcher just vomits in public like that out on the mound where there's nowhere to hide, you just see the whole thing and it just comes from a pretty tall person and it goes all the way to the ground. There's a lot of extension. Pretty tall person. Yeah. This is a phenomenon that I've been fascinated by for quite a while. And I saw in response to this, Sam tweeted an old article of

mine that I wrote about pitchers pitching even on upset stomachs. And this was more than a decade ago, but I remain fascinated by this phenomenon because it does happen fairly often. It's not, when you see Hunter Green Ralph right out there on the mound, you're not shocked. Like, oh my gosh, what is he doing out there? You're like, yeah, we've seen this before. It's not routine, but it's also not like this is medical malpractice. Maybe it should be. I don't know.

Because in my personal life, the reason it's so inconceivable to me is that I have a pretty good pain threshold, high pain threshold, pretty good tolerance for pain, I think, but low tolerance for nausea. And so, if I am feeling like I might throw up, that's it for me. Like, I'm just, I'm down for the day, you know? I'm trying to move as little as possible. And so, it amazes me, of all the many things that amaze me about major leaguers and professional athletes in general, the fact that they would go out there and that they are sometimes able to perform at a high level while feeling like this. Because I don't know what it feels like to be able to throw a baseball as hard as Hunter Green, but I do know what it feels like, unfortunately, to throw up like Hunter Green. And I know that if I were feeling like that, I would not be on the mound. I would scratch myself from that start because it's not going

to help anyone for me to be out there. And a few pitches after the throw up, he gave up a home run to Brian Reynolds, who was the batter. And I don't think Brian Reynolds saw that he threw up. I disagree. I think he 100% saw it. Oh, yeah. He definitely became aware that it had happened because he stepped out and he was looking out. I don't know if he saw it actually come out of his mouth or whether he just gathered from the context clues

that this had happened. But he was definitely looking out there. And it's like, what do you do as a batter in this situation? Like, do I ask if he's okay? Do I just hit a home run a few pitches later? You know what? I maybe retract my prior statement. Maybe he didn't see because it's, I think the most impressive thing about this is the fact that hunter green was able to get turned around in time not to throw up at reynolds um because there is a ball very little time between when he delivers this pitch and when he whips around and just lets let's loose i will say that um this strikes me as um the the sick of a man who and they talked about this a little bit on the broadcast that

like the the the heat and his hydration was interacting uh in a way that was not the best for him because it's quite hot and humid lately in the Midwest. And so he might have just had this be a reaction to the heat. I find that plausible because, well, let's put it this way, Ben. Our listeners might remember that literally the day before opening day, I was overcome by what I believe to be a norovirus. And it was incredibly unpleasant. You had to find a sub. I worked as long as I could laying new track in front of me and then simply laid down on the floor in my office the day before opening day and was like, hopefully I feel a little bit better in the morning because I surely cannot do any more work today. And my experience had a little more substance to it than Green's did, which seems like

Green's sick seems pretty liquid. Yes. He said he drank too much water to prepare for the heat. He was over hydrated and it was all water when he threw it up. I don't know if it was all water because it wasn't a color I associate with water. But, you know,

you got other stuff in your tum tum. And then it comes up. Put it this way, when I had my experience, it felt a lot like the exorcist because split pea soup had been made in the house. Oh, no.

When it happened, I was like, I will observe the social contract and not say anything about this specific. And now months later, I'm like, it was the worst experience of my life. And I want you to visualize it as you're driving your children home from school. Wow. Well, you can't really get mad at me for talking about the corn now that you've mentioned the specific substances. I hope that people don't see it when they get sick. And I'm like, well, you do have to open your eyes after it's done and then you get to see the, you know. You're just not supposed to see your insides. Your insides, that's supposed to be a mystery to you, you know? Yeah. Let's keep those mostly sealed up at least. And his overall line for the day was four innings, seven hits, six runs, all earned, two walks, five strikeouts. He's been good this year. That was not a good day for him.

It was a 95 mile per hour fastball he threw right before the throw up, which I guess is slow for Hunter Green. Certainly not as fast as he can throw. And then, yeah, six pitches later, as fast as he can throw. And then, yeah, six pitches later, he gave up the home run, which I would almost feel unsporting to take advantage of someone who's like bent over throwing up right in front of me. Probably wouldn't stop me from doing it. It's an ultra competitive profession, but I might feel a twinge of guilt as I circled the bases. But it floors me really that this happens. And when I did my little survey back in 2012 of all the starts I could find of people who had a stomach virus or flu like symptoms or whatever it was, some of them pitched poorly, some of them pitch completely fine. Some of them were good. And it just it shocks me that anyone is capable of remaining upright, let alone doing something as athletic as pitching in a baseball game. So you'd think that some of these times, I wonder if there is kind of a macho thing going on. I don't want to take myself out. And also, there's a rotation. It's

fairly rigid in modern baseball. And so you are a late scratch. It does screw everyone else up. And then you got to do a bullpen day or someone's got to go early. And so maybe you'd kind of take one for the team there. But if we could do a survey, comprehensive survey of just every time that a pitcher has thrown up or has had symptoms like this and has gone out there and pitched, I wonder what we would find the actual impact is. Like, what would, you know, your TOPS plus on days when you vomit is like, how perceptible would that difference be? I wonder because, you know, if there's a pinch hit penalty and a DH penalty, there's got to be a vomit penalty. I just wonder how significant it is. Yeah, I do think that, you know, you are looking at really taking one through the team there. You know, it's just like we got to, I was about to say gut through this.

I didn't even mean to do a little bit there, but that's where I landed. It would be interesting, like when it's over hydration, like what do you do with that, right? Because when you have sick, when you have a, you know, you got the sick, the thing you want to do is start hydrating just as soon as you can keep fluids down so that you replenish your hydration because you get all dehydrated from being sick. So what do you do, you know, if overhydrating is the issue? Are you just like, I'm in balance now? I don't know the answer to that. I wish we could do a stat blast about that, but I don't have all the data at my command. I'd have to be a crowdsourced project to look up all the times pitchers have been sick and how have they performed relative to their overall lines. Got to adjust for the park and the opponent and everything. We want to be rigorous about these things. But I would be very interested in the conclusion there. Yeah, I mean, it would be fascinating. And I imagine the exact nature of your ailment probably has a lot to do with it.

If you're dealing with a stomach bug, like a viral thing, I mean, first of all, you should just be at home anyway because you don't want to get anyone else sick um but if it's if it's a heat related thing if it's over hydration or whatever i do wonder if there's sort of a a differential performance diagnosis as it were um for that kind of uh feeling woozy and and losing your lunch i mean you know that my my take on this is it's amazing that none of that they don't throw up more. I think that sometimes these guys, they get hit. They get hit by like a 98-mile-an-hour fastball. And I'm like, it's amazing you didn't immediately. I would just throw up. I think I would just instantly be like, oh, got to be sick now.

Because it's like, especially on their elbows. Getting hit by a fastball in the butt, I think you probably don't throw up. But if I got hit on, especially when guys don't wear uh an elbow guard and they get hit right on the funny bone which i know isn't your it's not a bone right your funny bone it's it's the nerve is it the nerve ben yeah yeah it's a nerve right i would immediately because when i was like if i whack my funny bone on like the counter in the kitchen it i get a wave of like so that's a great sound doesn't the ulnar nerve in fact ulnar nerve isn't really your ulnar nerve oh goodness scary scary nerve scary everything in baseball context yeah ulnar stay away from that, you know?

All right. I have a couple Otani-related observations for you. Okay. One, did you see Otani's life being saved by the Dodgers? Yes. Bat boy, I guess. I think it was the bat boy. It was.

I hesitate to call him a bat boy because he's really a Bat Man. And I guess Batman would be a cool thing to call him. Maybe that's what he calls himself. Maybe that's what it says on his business card, Batman. But his name is Javier Herrera. And something I was not really that aware of is that the Dodgers do not have Bat Boys per se. They have grown-ass bat men. Okay.

And they are around for quite a while. I hope that's on their business card. What's your job? Grown-ass bat man. Not a mere bat boy. No, but a bat man. Yeah. So, Javier Herrera, I found a story in the LA Times from a few years ago about the Dodgers batmen.

And they're really like clubhouse attendants, you know, all purpose. They do a bunch of things. They don't just bring the bats out there. But they are adults. So Javier Herrera, who I believe is the longest tenured of them, he's been with the Dodgers for like 20 years. Wow. Okay, now I do feel weird calling him a bat boy. Right.

Because he's like, he like has a pension, you know? Yeah. He's like, I got a 401k, Meg. What do you have? Nothing. He'd been with them 17 years as of this 2021 September story. So yeah, he's been there like 20 years now. And he had one moment in 2015.

I will read Javier Herrera's 17 years at that point of anonymous employment with the Dodgers was interrupted by one selfless act in 2015. The ball girl normally stationed in a chair down the left field line charged with fielding foul balls didn't show up. So Herrera, then a bat boy, filled in. The game was uneventful until the fifth inning when a pop fly sailed toward Herrera. He stood, lifted his glove and leaned back so far he tumbled over the railing, over a tabletop and landed headfirst on the concrete floor. The ball bounded into the stands. I lay there thinking, oh my gosh, what did I just do? I just embarrassed myself on national TV. That would not be the thing I would worry about if that were what had happened to me. Again, another instance where I would probably throw up. Yeah. I guess sometimes you feel better immediately after you throw up. You might feel weak, but also it's like a relief. Oh, yeah.

You feel immediately better. Yeah. Just get it out of your system. You know, now I can throw my 98 mile per hour fastballs again. That's not exactly how I feel. I can put together another. I can sit up. Right.

I can put together another five tables of the staff predictions post because that has to run before games start an opening date and it just has to run and so you're like how many of these can I do I'm gonna get as many done as I can and then I'm gonna finish them in the morning there will be no copy associated with this post it'll just be the predictions

and then someone's gonna complain in the comments that it's a joyless experience and I'm like do you want to see what my toilet looks like right now? But I didn't do that. I laid down and took a nap. So if Javier Herrera felt like he needed to make up for that moment, well, he certainly has. Because he made an incredible play here. So the reason why the Dodgers have bat men, apparently, why they have these grown-up clubhouse attendants, this article says, bat boys make little more than the minimum wage but are the envy of anyone who dreams of holding a job that puts them in uniform on the field in the dugout.

Labor laws can vary, but the Dodgers won't hire a bat boy younger than 18 because of clubhouse duties and potential travel. So I guess there's just less of a complication here. And so they have multiple Batmen or whatever we're calling them, and they help the clubhouse people and do laundry and keep the cleats clean and straighten up everything and also are doing Batboy stuff in the dugout. straighten up everything and also are doing bat boy stuff in the dugout. And so this was the moment for Javier Herrera to shine because he made a play on a foul ball off the bat of Quique Hernandez that protected Otani, who is right behind him at the bat rack. And this was whistling in there. This was hit hard.

And Herrera just barehands it. I mean, just casually, one hand snags this ball that looks like, I mean, I guess not one hand, two hands, you know, proper fundamentals. He made sure he had it. And Otani was like, he saw it late and was diving out of the way with his hand over his helmet. And who knows what would happen. But Herrera was there, barely flinched, made this catch with two hands. And, you know, kind of like exhaled, handed it to someone, nodded his head nonchalantly, casually, like he does this every day. And that was that.

So if you assume that this could have hurt Otani and maybe he would have gotten out of the way, it's tough to tell from the perspective here. But I mean, what war do we attribute to Javier Herrera here for saving Otani's skin? Like this is a clutch, you know, Otani might be the MVP, but MVP of this game in which Otani probably homered because he homers every game now, got to hand it to Javier Herrera. It's remarkable. Like, I don't know. You're right. You're right that maybe, you know, without his involvement, Otani just gets out of the way.

But he sure didn't look like he was paying attention, right? He's, like, doing stuff in preparation for going in the on-deck circle. Yeah. So, I think that this might have like hit him flush in the something. Like, it looks like it's going to hit him in the face the way that- Yeah. If it had hit him anywhere, it probably would have been there. It would have hit him flush in the face, I think, you know? Yeah. He was wearing a helmet, so maybe it would have hit the helmet, but still.

It's not what you want. It would have been very scary. And it could have been a quite serious injury, potentially. And I think that my read on the situation is bolstered by the facial expressions of everyone around them in the dugout. Yes. Because they look like they've just brushed up against a ghost, you know? Will Ireton, Otani's interpreter. Oh, my gosh. Had the most gif-able face.

His mouth is just a circle. Just an O. Like, wow. Wow. He's just in awe of this incredible play. I think that he, like, really did something here. You know? And I hope he gets a nice, like, bonus as a result of that.

Because, boy. Otani has, you know, given out Porsches for uniform numbers and everything. Like, yeah, I, it seems like that would be appropriate here too. Something significant.

Something. Yeah. So great play. We salute you, Javier Herrera. And in that game, I think that was the game where Otani set the Dodgers franchise record for RBI streak of consecutive games with an RBI, which was 10, which didn't actually sound that

impressive to me when I heard that was a franchise record for the Dodgers who've been around forever. I was like, is that it? That's all it. But the all-time record for RBI streak is 17 games set by Ray Grimes in 1922 of the Cubs. And even that, if you had asked me, what's the record for most consecutive games with an RBI, I'm pretty sure I would have been way high on my estimates because it just doesn't sound that impressive to me. I guess it is because like RBI always are, it's just kind of dependent on your teammates

and on the luck of the draw, right? So you could have 10 great games in a row and not have an opportunity in some of them to have an RBI. You have to come up with people on base and potentially in scoring position unless you're going to hit a home run, right? So in that sense, it makes sense that maybe your record RBI streaks wouldn't be that long. I was semi-surprised, though, that that was all it was. But congrats to him and congrats to Herrera for making it happen. Yeah, I mean, like, thank goodness that he was there because... Now, my other Otani-related observation for you,

I don't know if you saw this photo of Otani, which I will send to you right now and also link on the show page as per usual. But it is a picture of Shohei Otani with his dog, Dekapin, also known as Decoy. Oh, he's got a little backpack. He has a little backpack. He has a little backpack. So the caption on the tweet, an absolute legend and Shohei Otani, referring to Dekapin here. He has a little backpack too. Yes, if the roles were reversed. But the dog has a backpack. And this might be the first time that I ever agreed with you on your stance of like, there's something about that dog that's just a little off.

Really? Looks like a pretty normal cute dog to me. No, it's a weird dog. Yeah, you've always gotten the ick from this dog somehow. Wait, wait. Ick is too strong. I mean, I'm just saying there's something. Just some uncanny valley. Yeah, there's something too perfect about this dog somehow. Wait, wait. Ick is too strong. I mean, I'm just saying there's something. Just some uncanny valley. Yeah, there's something too perfect about this dog

is all I'm saying. Yeah. This is too cute. The backpack on the dog. And I was looking into how one acquires a backpack for a dog because I've been a dog owner for most of my life and I have never had a dog backpack or even

conceived of such a thing. And I don't know what I would use a dog backpack for. What would you put in there, right? Like what? I mean- Okay. So first of all, where would I acquire a dog backpack? Do I need to like teach you about Etsy? Do I have to introduce you to the website known as Etsy? Because you just go buy a little dog backpack. Yeah, but that's actually not what this is. This is not like a custom job thing. This is not like artisanal of some person put up a dog backpack.

This is a manufactured thing. How much would you guess? I won't say anything more. What would you guess the price tag for Dekopin's dog backpack here? Which is, you know, a small, fairly small dog. It's a very small backpack, just a little like square that looks leather. How much would you say this would run you? It's probably like fancy, you know, because Otani famously has so much money that when like a couple million of it go missing, he doesn't notice. So more than a couple, but I think he's still doing okay. If anyone was worried about Otani's finances post-ePay, I think now that I've looked up the information on this dog backpack, I think he's all right. Okay, I'm going to guess

$1,200 American dollars. Oh, wow. Okay. That's even higher than it actually is. I primed you to say a high number, obviously. Well, I figured it was like Hermes or something like that. Like a special Hermes dog backpack. $494. Okay. Free shipping. Oh, well, sure. But don't they, I'm sure they throw in the shipping for free if it's 400 bucks. Yeah.

Recommended for pets under 17.6 pounds, this particular model with a certain neck circumference and chest circumference. Sure. It says there's space inside for pet treats and toys. Okay. It's ergonomically designed for your pet's comfort while walking and running. It's detachable, which you can use with a leash, or it says it can also be used as a shoulder bag for the owner, I guess. It's made out of steer hide leather.

It's 0.68 pounds. It's a very small thing. It's a little backpack. Five and a half by like four by three inches roughly. And pet treats and toys, I guess if I put pet treats in my pet's dog backpack. You're like torturing your dog. Yeah. She would like gnaw her own face off to get to it. Right. So I would, that would be a torture device on my dog's back, I think. Yeah. Probably same for toys because – Sure.

So she would like to gnaw this thing off of her to get at it, I feel like. But Dekopene is probably much better behaved and well-trained. Well, right, because it's a weird dog. So, yes, it's an animatronic dog, I think you've suggested in the past. What's wrong with that dog? That's a robot dog. So it doesn't look like you could fit much in the way of toys in here. And again, I guess I could see, you know, like my dog leash has a thing on the end with the plastic poop bags.

Right, to put the bags in for when you're on a walk-in. Not a can of poop, but a little plastic baggie of poop. Right. So that I guess you could store in the dog's backpack. Maybe. Okay. So I have a couple of thoughts here. The first of which is I like that they picked a little tiny dog bag that maybe is small enough that it does not brush up against the clear bag policy that I imagine Dodger Stadium has. So good job there, rule followers.

So good job there, rule followers. I love that we have done a flip on the dog as a result of this tiny backpack. Because while I maintain that that is still something wrong with that dog, look, it's got a little backpack, Ben. It's got a little tiny dog backpack. You know, it's got like, oh, it's got a little backpack. And yeah, if it were me, the thing that I would put in there would not be treats or toys, but yeah, like poop bags for when you're out on a walk. I also applaud Otani being responsible here and being like, look, it's not very far seemingly from my car to the player's entrance to Dodger Stadium, but gonna keep a little buddy on a leash. Do we know the sex of the dog?

Is it a boy dog or a girl dog? It's a boy dog, yeah. So that he doesn't get away from me, little rascal, because you don't want any harm to befall your weird robot dog, you know? Those things are probably expensive. And the backpack, Japanese listeners may recognize it. So there is a type of bag in Japan. It's called a r. Reading about it, it's almost like, you know, getting fitted for your wand at Hogwarts or something. Well, you don't get the wand at

Hogwarts, you know what I mean? It's like that, you know? It's like you go to Ollivander's wand shop and you go to your backpack shop, which is not – for me, my backpack was just a piece of junk. Is it a magic backpack? I mean, maybe decopines is, but for me, my backpack was just some piece of junk that I wore until it wore out and then I got another one and it was not really a sentimental, fancy item. But this is a big thing and it's like a, you know, status symbol and it's a big thing for your kids to select one. And, you know, it's a family tradition and you go and get it together and then you use it for years and it's durable and it's leather, right? And so it's a special item and a special thing when you get your Rondocero bag that you use. And it's also so expensive because I think it's, you know, meant to sort of symbolize the importance of schooling and studies and academics. So, it might seem like, gosh, this is

a thing to splurge on, a backpack, why? But it's sort of symbolic of like, you know, you should take this seriously. I don't know what it symbolizes for your dog, but it's just, it is the equivalent. So it's kind of a Japanese cultural thing that might seem extravagant to some, but if you were over there, you'd probably understand. Now it might still be extravagant to have it for a dog. I don't know, but it's that brand and sort of a status simple here. So, you know, if Deku Pin plays with other dogs, they will probably admire his Rondoseru bag and harness. I know that like, it sounds extravagant. I do like the idea of buying something with the idea of it lasting a very long time and not needing to be replaced. Like, I think that's a good thing. It does tend to be more expensive and i don't

know if the price is like in line simply with the quality or if there's like a markup for it being like a magical backpack um yeah charge extra for magic i think that when you have the kind of money that that otani does like rich people spend money on some really weird stuff and some of that weird stuff is like not the best and this is like a tiny backpack is for his little dog and so i i think you know if you're gonna do a splurgy kind of item definitely involve the little dog like if nothing else even though i did manage to bring up several times how weird that dog is my heart has softened toward it um because now it has a little backpack you know and it's got it's got a little backpack i wonder if there is anything in his little backpack yeah you know

like like it could clearly hold something but is it actually being utilized in that way? I don't know. It took so long for us to learn the dog's name that learning the contents of the dog's bag, that might take a while. So we'll work our way up to that. All right. I will end here by just asking you a couple, how can you not be pedantic about baseball questions that we've received recently. So here is one that comes to us from listener and Patreon supporter James, who says, afraid I have to write in with a pedantic question. Don't be afraid. We welcome them. Using the catch-up feature on MLB TV, which is great, by the way, for Yankees Mets on June 26th, the first highlight says, Sean Mania leaves bases loaded in the first. Okay, Sean Mania leaves bases loaded in the first. However, he did this by inducing a double play.

Okay. You can understand my concern. Wondering if you two could provide a little guidance. It actually took me a moment to understand his concern, but- Say it again, because I don't know if I understand the concern either. Sean Mania leaves bases loaded in the first. However, he stranded the runners. He left the bases loaded by inducing a double play.

And what I have deduced, not induced, is that James's concern here is that technically he didn't leave the bases loaded if there was a double play, right? Because the bases were no longer loaded in the process of the double play. One guy gets thrown out, bases no longer loaded, right? So they're loaded at the start of the play. But before the final out of the inning is recorded, there is a base empty because someone just got forced for the second out of the inning. So can you say that he left the bases loaded? I think that maybe like in a technical sense, because what you're really saying is that no further runs scored or no runs scored, despite there being a runner at every base who could presumably do so. But if it were me, I would probably say he left him loaded and the final out would have been recorded by strikeout.

That would have been my or or or maybe like a pop up in foul territory, but not a situation where the runners would have been endeavoring to advance in any way. But if he did it via double play. Yeah. Like you have to and you got to save it it feels like a premature because they're that would suggest that they needed to they only had the one out and the base is loaded right is that right yeah so i think i would i would avoid this terminology i think yeah i would say and i think the announcer said something like uh he escapes unscathed or yeah you know he gets out of the bases loaded jam. You could

certainly say that, right? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good way to do it, out of the bases loaded jam, because it doesn't commit you to any particular means of securing your routes. Yeah. He did get out of a bases loaded situation. Yeah. But I think you can't say he left them loaded in that context. I think it's just not quite accurate. Yeah, I think that that's right. Yeah. Well observed, James. And Corey writes in to say, I think I've got a decent pedantic question for you.

During tonight's Twins radio broadcast, Danny Gladden cut to commercial by saying, after four, it's all Minnesota. They lead six to one. I feel like this is objectively false. The Diamondbacks had literally just scored a run in that fourth inning. I had noticed he also did this earlier this week against Oakland when he said that game was all Minnesota in a game the A's had scored two runs, even immediately coming back to tie the game at one after the Twins had jumped out to a quick lead in the first. I'm not saying a pitcher needs to be throwing a no-hitter or perfect game

to say it's been all one team, but it needs to be at least a shutout, doesn't it? At what point would you feel comfortable saying a game has been all one team? I would normally deploy it in a situation where the team that it has been all of has scored at least four runs. Because I think if it's just like a one-run game, it's like don't get ahead of yourself like one swing at the bat can tie this thing up right oh yeah so i think

you have to have at least four four let's call it four four runs and the other team has not scored any now i will say i think that if you like let's imagine that um arizona had scored one run in the first inning, and then Minnesota had gone on to score like 10 unanswered runs. At that point, you would be able to say like, since the first inning, it's been all Minnesota, you know? Yes. If it's unanswered runs, which is another thing we've debated and defined, if you specify over the period during which it has been all one team,

yeah, then I think it's okay. But so you're saying that in a 6-1 game where the team with one had just scored that one? I would not say that. That seems silly. That seems counterfactual to me. Because they just scored. Right.

Like they just scored. I think it's a thumbs down for me too yeah no reciting with the pendants more than paid pad padded padded pedants how could you not be pedantic about pronouncing i have a hard time with it i have a hard time with that one yeah well pendant is also a word but a pendant is one. Pendant is a word. Yeah. Balloon, bicycle, unicycle. All words. All words. Wide variety of words we have in this language. So many words.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, 6-1. Even though probably the win expectancy, you're up 6-1 after 4 or whatever, like, it's heavily tilted toward you. Right. But it's not all you. No.

So. It's not tilted toward you. Right. But it's not all you. No. So. It's not all. Yeah. If it's a total blowout, you know, and if. Yeah, like if you're up by like,

if you've scored 15 runs. 14 to two. Yeah. 14 to one. It's like, this one's been all. Yeah. I still don't know that I would do it though.

Yeah. I would feel the need to like qualify. I would feel the need to qualify. It's almost all Minnesota. It's mostly Minnesota. Very close to entirely being Minnesota. Much of this game has been Minnesota. We'd be really good at this job, I think.

I mean, I spent some of this episode describing being sick in detail that I feel confident we will get emails about. So would they put me in the booth remains to be seen. They'd have to at some point they'd have to cut to me and show my human face. And I have protested that. And thankfully, you agree in the podcast context. So that might take me out of the running just on its own. It's like, what, I have to do my hair? Are you out of your mind? on its own. It's like, what, I didn't have to do my hair?

Are you out of your mind? Put a bra on in this economy? No, sir. I don't do that either before we record. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I'd support you if you did. My last question here comes from Aaron, who is in Madison, Wisconsin, and he writes in with our third and final pedantic question.

I've been hesitant to email this in because it's as trivial as it gets. I would argue it's maybe not as trivial as our previous question. We'll see. But yeah, don't fear triviality. That's our wheelhouse here. But it's something I notice every time it happens, which is usually multiple times a game. But it's something I notice every time it happens, which is usually multiple times a game. When a hitter reaches a full count, the umpire provides the service of informing the field of the count with their fingers.

Sounds like a nice thing to do. Every single time this has happened, at least from when I notice, and I notice it every time I see it, the umpire—I guess you only notice that you see it when you notice, though, Erin. You might see it without noticing sometimes, and you never know that you see it when you notice, though, Erin. You might see it without noticing sometimes, and you'd never know that you noticed. But the umpire indicates three balls with his left hand and two strikes with his right hand. This appears as three and two from his perspective, but actually two and three to everyone he is doing this for. Is that not odd? Okay, I can concede that everyone knows this gesture means a full count. That's

fine. But what if an umpire did this for a non-full count in the same way, like a one and two or two and one count? Would that not be detrimental to everyone involved? Is this just the umpire being selfish, not caring what this looks like to the audience he is supposed to be serving? Isn't he just an a**hole? Or are they actually reminding themselves of what the count is? Or am I just being overly pedantic? Well, that last one goes without saying, I think, but we can still entertain the first two.

So it's backwards, I guess, from the perspective of the message recipients here. And if there are umpires in our audience who say, I do it the other way, please let us know. But if we're trusting Aaron here, then I guess there's something to that. I have not noticed an umpire ever doing the, like, here's what the count is when it's anything less than a full count. And I understand what you mean mean but also i would suggest that like you're never going to have a scenario where the way that uh an umpire uh announces this is strike three actually is to put up the fingers right like if you have been punched out he's gonna like he's gonna do that he's gonna do that he's gonna go you know he's gonna do the thing and it's demonstrative in a different way and so i think the perspective you

have on three two doesn't actually matter because you know from context clues that what the ump is signaling to the to the infield is hey we're in a full count in case you lost track of the count we're in a full count but you wouldn't do that with a guy who had just struck it would be hilarious if it was like he's in the you know he's in the box he's digging in and getting ready to go and the ump's like no actually he's like that you know that's not gonna so now for other counts there is a greater opportunity for confusion like Like, are you signaling balls and strikes or not? Or maybe this is just like understood universally that that's, that one hand is always the ball hand and one hand is always the strike hand.

You know, maybe they like teach that. Maybe you go, you go into camp and they're like, Hey, remember, you know, it kind of like right, righty tighty lefty loosey. I learned the other day that some people find righty-tighty, lefty-loosey confusing. I don't know what's wrong with that. I mean, I don't want to make anybody feel bad, but it also kind of feels like a skill issue. So, it's okay for me to be a little bit mean sometimes, you know, just like a little bit

like, hey, you know. Well, is it a handedness issue? Does that have anything to do? Is this like a right bit. Like, hey, you know. Well, is it a handedness issue? Does that have anything to do? Is this like a righty-centric world? I mean, I guess you still turn it that way. I think that my understanding of where people's confusion comes in is that they're not thinking about it rotating from the top. They're thinking about it rotating from the bottom or something. I don't know, man.

Like, do you hang the toilet paper with the paper coming over the top or the bottom? Over the top. Over the top. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Oh, boy. That could have been a podcast ender right there.

And here's the thing. Everyone else. It's come close to ending my marriage because I'm married to a under the bottom. Wow. And it's a little war we have when we replace roles. But it's more likely to spin off the role if you do it that way. Preaching to the choir. Jesse.

Oh, my goodness. Wow. Well, it's good. You know, your wife is so lovely. It's good that she has some flaws. You got to, you know, bounce each other around. Yeah. Anyway, I don't think it's that umpires lack the ability to put themselves in someone else's place.

Yeah, I don't think this is an indication of like... Perspective taking, is that what it's called? When a kid, like they can actually think of things from how it might appear to someone else instead of themselves. I think umpires probably have that capacity. Although some ump shows, you wouldn't know it necessarily. Yeah, fair enough. I think we've talked about or answered a question.

I think, you know, people have asked like, why don't you say the strikes first? Why is it balls and then strikes? Why is that the convention? Isn't the number of strikes maybe more important, more pressing? And I think we've covered in other countries, other leagues, Japan, maybe they do say strikes first. So I guess perhaps if you have international competition and you have American up at the WBC or something, I don't know. Could there be confusion if they flash the three and two, two and three and people don't understand? But probably they would because, again, you might verbally confirm what the count is if someone asks, but you might not put up the fingers in that situation. So, if you're only putting up the fingers in a full count, then there's really no potential

for confusion there. But I certainly see Erin's point. I think it's a situation where the context takes care of it, provided our understanding of when they do it is accurate. And if not, is accurate. And if not, like, it's around a lot, you know, it's like it is other places in the ballpark. And, you know, you could just say like, and sometimes the sometimes the catcher will do it, you know, but they they're normally signaling something. They're doing arms and, you know, hands on arms and going and everyone knows to move around. Final note, we mentioned Jordan Montgomery earlier. He had a disastrous start after we spoke. Bumped his ERA up over six, though only a mid-fours FIP,

if that makes you feel any better, Diamondbacks fans. Anyway, after he was removed, he took out his frustrations on his PitchCom device, which he threw against the dugout wall repeatedly. So we talked about parts of a uniform that a pitcher could destroy in lieu of harming themselves. I guess Pitchcom counts. Make it pay for receiving or transmitting those pitch selections that backfired.

All right, that'll do it for today. By the way, follow up to our conversation last time about that incredible catch by an Orioles fan on a foul ball. There is a short interview with him on Twitter, which I will link to on the show page. The upshot is his name is Tim Beyer. He's an Orioles season ticket holder. He's been to hundreds of games. He has not caught a foul ball before or any ball at an Orioles game. He was an outfielder in high school and he's been playing for the past 25 years on his church softball team. He said his hand still hurt and the baby in the stroller was his, but wasn't really a baby, was his three-year-old daughter who was reportedly not impressed and has apparently been to a hundred games, which makes me feel bad because my going on three-year-old daughter has not been to a game

yet. Am I a bad dad? Wasn't sure she'd enjoy it yet. Maybe if we just parked her inner stroller in the upper deck. You can support Effectively Wild on Patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectively wild. The following five listeners have already signed up and pledged some monthly or yearly amount to help keep the podcast going, help us stay ad-free and get themselves access to some perks, Ian Hembree, Caitlin Ainsworth Caruso, Brighton J. Swan, Colin Reddick, and Andrew E. Wilson. Lots of middle names and initials this time. Thanks to all of you. Patreon perks include access to the Effectively Wild Discord group for patrons only, monthly bonus episodes, playoff live streams, prioritized email answers, and so much more. Check out all the offerings at patreon.com slash effectivelywild. If you are a Patreon supporter, you can message

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on upcoming Effectively Wild listener meetups at MLP ballparks. Thanks to Shane McKeon for his editing and production assistance. We'll be back with one more episode before the end of the week, which means we will talk to you soon. You say I waste my time Tracking all these deadlines But here I've found my kind

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