Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2294: Season Preview Series: Dodgers and Rockies

Episode Date: March 12, 2025

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about a surprising amount of Mo Vaughn content, a rash of spring injuries (including Gerrit Cole‘s Tommy John surgery and other Yankees ailments), the latest A’s and Rays woes, and more. Then they preview the 2025 Los Angeles Dodgers (26:11) with The Athletic’s Fabian Ardaya, and the 2025 Colorado […]

They'll still be speaking statistically, rambling romantically, pontificating pedantically, bantering bodily, drafting discerningly, giggling giddily, equaling effectively wildly. Hello and welcome to episode 2294 of Effectively Wild, a FanGraphs baseball podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters. I'm Megio, Fangraphs, and I am joined by Ben Lindberg of The Ringer. Ben, how are you? Just reeling from the revelation, or really I should say confirmation, that Moe Vaughn took HGH about a quarter century ago. Just has blown my mind, has rocked me back on my heels. Say it ain't so Moe. I was just not expecting to consume so

much Mo Von content this week. Just devastating, devastating to learn this, that Mo Von dabbled in HGH 25 years ago. I completely missed that as a story. I hate to break this to you. Yeah, I know just the real time reaction, learning that, uh, your idol has a feet of clay move on. He did indeed take HGH as the Mitchell report reported back in 2007, but we hadn't heard it from the man himself until now. I see. Yeah. I was going to say like, were we, um, we kind of had a sense though, yeah? I guess I may have entirely forgotten about the fact that Mo'Van was in the Mitchell Report to

begin with, but I was not waiting here with bated breath for confirmation or refutation one way or another about what Mo'Van may have taken 25 years ago, but now we know and hopefully we can put it behind us. Just as a country, we can heal much like Mo von tried to when he took HGH roughly 25 years ago. I gotta tell you, Ben, I haven't thought about Mo von and an age, you know? Yeah. It's been a good minute. Can I tell you where my brain went just now? My

brain was like, okay, so like Moe Vaughan, but that wasn't the name. That's a different Moe than like the Moe from the Godfather. That was Moe Green. Moe Green's crimes far more serious than Moe Vaughan. So, you know, in that respect, Mo Von coming out ahead hasn't killed anyone so far as we know. Oh yeah, not even sure this was a crime. I don't think it was even banned in baseball until 2005. Obviously there was no testing, so. It makes it sound like you meant that murder

wasn't banned in baseball. And I can assure you that it was. Maybe not explicitly. I don't know that there was an MLB rule specifically about murder that's just kind of covered by the laws of the country one would hope. But yeah. I regret the murder jokes. I don't feel great about it, but I don't know. In a weird head space, thinking about being a little bit rude on social media later and unrelated ways. See how it goes. Well, I can't blame you just dropping this Mo'Von bomb on you just as we're recording.

I actually, I was happy to have the opportunity to think about Mo'Von because I quite enjoyed Mo'Von's. Sure. He was an incredible hitter and just a really fun hitter to watch at the plate. And thinking about Mo'Von and looking at his stats and marveling at his 1996 season led me to other fine 1996 seasons.

And I was remembering some guys because those late 90s slash lines just seemed so aesthetic in this 700 OPS era. Then I was thinking about Ellis Burks for a while, which is, it's always a good day when you think about Ellis Burks. And we should talk much more than we do, I think, about Ellis Burks for a while, which is, it's always a good day when you think about Ellis Burks and we should talk much more than we do, I think about Ellis Burks. This should just become an Ellis Burks podcast and his 1996 for the Colorado Rockies, whom we're about to talk about, just fantastic.

What a hitter Ellis Burks was, what a great old hitter Ellis Burks was. So that's where that took me. But it was funny because this came from a Ken Rosenthal report that he reported or confirmed that Mo von did indeed take HGH as he was trying to work his way back from all sorts of knee issues. And it was an exclusive. It was the headline at the athletic was Mo von fearsome slugger named in Mitchell report admits to using HGH, colon exclusive.

As if everyone else was chasing the story and Ken got the scoop and everyone was like, ah, darn it. He got the move on confirmation. We were all trying to get move on on the record about whether he took HGH and Ken, he did it again. He beat us all to the story. And I think it was because Ken Rosenthal wrote multiple Mo'Von stories this week. It's just Mo'Von week at the athletic. As you said last week,

it's sort of a slow week for news or at least some sorts of news. Yeah, I guess I wish it were a slower week for news, but he wrote a story just about how Mo'Von has found his way back to baseball and a story just about how Mo von has found his way back to baseball and he's rediscovered his love for the game through his 12 year old son. And he has a, the Mo von sports academy and all of this. And I think it was clearly like something that came up as Ken was talking to Mo von about this sort of profile and just feel good puff piece. And then they split it out into a second story

with its own promotion, just to get the clicks for Mo'Von's HGH revelation. And it was just a little bit funny, you know? I don't know that anyone was really waiting for this news or was particularly affected by it, but now we know. And unfortunately, we also know that a lot of other players are injured as Mo'Von was back in the day. And I always say spring training, it's just a war of attrition.

You just hope to get through it. You just hope to dance through the raindrops somehow without getting wet. You just want to get to opening day without your roster being reduced by injuries. And it never happens really, but you always hope that it can. to get to opening day without your roster being reduced by injuries. And it never happens really, but you always hope that it can. And until fairly recently, this spring had not been that bad. We hadn't been talking about too many injuries. It wasn't like last year where it became a big story.

And then all of a sudden all the injuries hit it once. They certainly hit the Yankees all at once. And Garrett Cole having Tommy John surgery, perhaps as we speak, he's out for the year. Heal is out for seemingly at least half the year. Yeah, for a while. Yeah. Stanton has multiple elbow issues, issues with multiple elbows, that is. And like we knew that he had elbow issues. We knew he had elbow issues when he got to camp,

but now they seem much worse. I don't know if they have worsened or simply our understanding of them has become finer, but the way that people are talking about his elbows seems very alarming. It's quite a concerning, like this doesn't seem like mere tennis elbow anymore. Now that tennis elbow is mere for those who suffer from it, I think that people find that fairly debilitating. But like, doesn't it seem as if the rhetoric around his elbows has escalated?

Has it been escalating? Yes, because I guess they haven't really responded perhaps to the PRP treatments that he's been having. Isn't it interesting just what is legal and what is not? PRP, that he's been having. Isn't that interesting? Just what is legal and what is not PRP? That's fine. I mean, that's your own blood and you take it from yourself and you spin it up, but still like it's a, a healing factor, at least in theory, it's something that you're doing that's natural in the sense that it's coming from you, but not natural in the sense that there's a procedure and the blood is extracted from your body and it's spun up and then it's reinjected and that's legal. But HGH

is not legal and how does LASIK figure into this and how to other drugs that are just routine now, you can take ozempic if you want to lose some weight, that's perfectly fine. Ozempic, mozempic, you could take that and you wouldn't be banned. And Ken Rosenthal wouldn't write about it 25 years later, but HGH, no, you can't do that. And look, there are actual differences between these things. I'm not saying they're all the same. Part of it is just the health risks as opposed to the enhancement potential,

but they're all the same in spirit. They're all the same in these are things that you're doing to potentially enhance your performance, and we always have to just figure out where we draw the line, and it's sort of squishy sometimes, it's not that clear or bright a line at times. Yeah, it's an interesting thing because we are, I think that we tend to think of some treatments as appropriately sort of acceptably therapeutic and others as obviously performance enhancing above and beyond sort of like an aid to recovery. But we know that that is a squishier line than we may be allowed for both within medicine itself where HGH can be used in sort of a therapeutic

context. And then also, you know- It's also a natural hormone that you produce just at a certain level. Exactly. And then, you know, you have admitted quote unquote PED users who have talked about the thing that they found the most sort of beneficial from their PED use being the sort of speeding up of the recovery process in between games, in between injuries. And so it's a, you know, it's a fuzzier line, which I don't say to suggest that like, well, anything should go or we

shouldn't have, you know, some interventions that are classified as generally performance enhancing versus generally therapeutic. Although the league grants therapeutic exemptions for some drugs that are considered performance enhancing absent a therapeutic exemption. So I say all of that mostly just to say like these things are maybe a little more complicated than we allow them to be sometimes. And I think we can admit that nuance without condoning obvious cheating behavior. So it's just, it can be a trickier thing, you know? People have different naturally occurring levels of things. So one person's natural testosterone level might be someone else's enhanced testosterone level.

It's just, it's kind of complicated, but I'm not, not going full RFK here or anything. And I'm not endorsing the enhanced games, the proposal for- I would argue that one should not go any distance of RFK. There is no, there is no acceptable therapeutic dosage in that regard. I would concur. Yeah. And I talked recently on Hang Up and Listen about the enhanced games, this MAGA backed proposal for just like the Olympics of juicing where just you can take stuff and it's okay. Yeah, this is a thing or at least it could potentially be a thing. But I'm introducing you to all sorts of news and revelations in this intro.

And that's after I said we should keep it short because we have two long previews here. We do have two long previews. And we've got to get to them. We are doing two teams here in the NLS, so much like last time when we did Phillies and Marlins. So we're doing a best of times, worst of times, intro division preview. So we'll be talking to Fabian Ardaya

of The Athletic about the Dodgers, and then moving on to Patrick Lyons of Rockies Insider about the Rockies. And then moving on to Patrick Lyons of Rockies Insider about the Rockies. But yeah, the injuries, we won't get fully into the Yankees now because we have a Yankees preview coming up later this week. So that will give us ample opportunity

to talk about the implications for them. I didn't even mention DJ Lemahue. Some of these are more surprising than others and some of them are more impactful than others. Cole obviously is a bummer just for them. It's a huge blow. It hurts people who like watching good pitching and also I guess hurts his Hall of Fame chances. It just, it stinks. There's no way to replace a pitcher like this at this stage of the offseason or the spring or really at any stage. So it's a big blow and we will talk about how the Yankees

will attempt to respond to that later this week. By the way, the Dodgers are projected to be by far the best team in baseball. So we're doing Dodgers today because Fabian has a plane to catch as do the Dodgers. So they're going to Japan and we wanted to get our preview in before Fabian departed. And then we will circle back to Yankees and White Sox as do the Dodgers. So they're going to Japan and we wanted to get our preview in before Fabian departed and then we will circle back

to Yankees and White Sox later this week. And that'll be that. We'll be done with the preview series before even Cubs Dodgers opening day, let alone opening day for everyone else. We have followed quite the pace. Yeah, but it wasn't just the Yankees injury stack. It was also Francisco Alvarez. It was George Kirby. It was Grayson Rodriguez. It was Andrew Kittredge. And some of these are very bad and some of them are just mildly concerning.

And some of them are no structural issues, just a little inflammation. Let's just take some time off. Although that's scary. It's, it's kind of like with Cole, where he misses the first half of the season, if not more, last year, and then came back and wasn't his peak self, but looked close enough to regular Cole that he obviously helped the Yankees and they won a pennant, and we've come into this year thinking, okay, maybe that'll be behind him, but once that sort of thing happens to a pitcher, I never allow myself to exhale. I just, I can't anymore.

I mean, with any pitcher really, even if they haven't had an injury issue, but we know that the best predictor of future injury is past injury. And if you're someone who has missed time with elbow stuff or forearm stuff or shoulder stuff or whatever it is. It's not always a harbinger of doom, but I just can never really relax after that. Cause I just have to assume, well, there was something wrong in there. There was something going on and maybe the rest and the PRP completely healed it, but maybe not.

And maybe you're kind of ignoring some nagging, niggling little issue, and you think, oh, an off season of rest will help, and then you get back to camp and you're ramping up and you realize, uh-oh, or maybe you sprung anew. I don't know, but this is the season for that sort of thing to happen, and it stinks every time, but it's pretty predictable every time.

So something like Grayson Rodriguez, that's scary. That would be a big blow to the Orioles rotation. It's just, it's pretty predictable every time. So something like Grayson Rodriguez, that's scary. That would be a big blow to the Orioles rotation. It's just, it's bad. So you just hope to get through the spring with as little of this news as possible. And we were doing okay until recently, and then it all fell apart along with players' bodies. I can't believe that you would subject me to that

after you just brought up George Kirby's name. Feels incredibly rude. I am already so sad. But I will simply say like, it's a real bummer and yes, it runs the gamut and you end up in a weird spot as a commentator when it's particularly when it's injuries to teams where either in the case of the Mariners, the starting rotation was correctly the the case of the Mariners, the starting rotation was correctly the perceived strength of the team and you want them to have done other

stuff and it's like, well, now you have an injured guy and like, what do you, this is why it's maybe bad to lean so heavily or in the case of the Orioles where, you know, everyone and their mother has been encouraging them to take on more pitching and now they're down some pitching and it's like, wow, we were because you don't want to be like in an I told you so spot with a guy getting hurt. But there is like an element of I told you so to some of these and some of that's unfair because it's like they're pitchers. They're going to get hurt at some point. They're all going to get hurt at some point, you know? All of them, probably. But it does put you in kind of a bind sometimes, particularly when it's March

11th and, you know, opening day is shockingly close. It's so near, so much to edit between now and then, but still so near. You know, it's far away in terms of the word count, very close in terms of the number of days, just uncomfortably so. Yeah, yeah. Well, we will talk more Yanks later this week. And man, I thought they had done a good job of dealing with the departure of Juan Soto as best that you can when you lose a player like that.

And they made a bunch of- I think they have. They did, yeah, but then, but then all of this happened and suddenly, you know, like you can lose one guy from the trifecta of Soto, Judge, and Cole, but when you lose two, it's tough to come back from that on top of these other injuries. So look, they've made moves, they've been aggressive,

they've upgraded. I think you could have made a case that they were stronger coming into the year than they would have been if they had just signed Soto and done nothing else. And obviously signing Max Reed looks quite crucial now. And I guess you could say, yeah, it'd be nice to have Nester Cortez around, but it's also nice to have Devin Williams around anyway, we'll get into Yankees talk just briefly, I just wanted to say a word about the A's and the Rays, which is, boy, both of these situations sort of stink, and the Rays situation, which we've talked about their ballpark

issues throughout the off season and the weird way that they were going about their relationship with various local councils and seemingly not pursuing the deal that they made and were they trying to back out of it and are they trying to move or sell or what is going on here? Why are they being so obstinate when it comes to the terms of these deals? And it was reported at the Athletic now that MLB is pressuring them. Manfred is pressuring them. Other owners are pressuring Stu Sternberg potentially to sell, or at least to get some certainty here, which sort of supports my feeling that there was something odd going on here that they seem to have balked or gotten cold feet, or maybe they

had ulterior motives or whatever it is. And I wish that MLB and other owners had had this sort of energy for John Fisher and the A's when their ballpark debacle was happening. But I don't really know where this is going to go. And it seems like as we discussed on our raise preview segment, there's just a lot of uncertainty about where this team's going to play long-term, short-term, who's going to be owning this team. But yeah, it's as weird and as strange as it seemed that there was this impasse

and that the team was just being so standoffish seemingly. It didn't only strike us as strange. It also seems to have raised the hackles of Rob Manfred. And if you're an owner and you've done that, then you know that you have erred. Yeah, it doesn't seem like a good situation, Ben. It's always hard to know exactly what it's gonna result in, but it's amazing that this is the thing

that ran afoul of him though, and that the A's situation didn't. It seems like there were opportunities to get pissy, right? Like it seems like there were some chances maybe they should have been taken. Yeah, I wonder if it's that the A's avoided making a ballpark deal, whereas the Rays did make one and now seem to be backing out of it perhaps, though they deny that they have

any funding issues. And you gotta think that Manfred is frustrated in the sense that before he retires, which he has already announced that he plans to do after his current term, not that he'll necessarily stick to that, but for his legacy, I'm sure he'd like to get the expansion process started before he goes, and he suggested that that won't happen until the A's and R's situations are resolved, and they have stubbornly resisted resolution. Russell Carlton had an interesting piece at BP the other day, where he showed that the gap between backup players and starters seems to have gotten smaller lately, and that consequently maybe replacement level needs to be revisited, but it could be because of

a talent glut, given how long it's been since the last round of expansion. Anyway, even though he has passed up opportunities to be publicly pissy about the A's, we are not bound by that. And another opportunity to get pissy at the A's, which we never run short of, they're gonna be all patched up this year, so they have a Ricky the A's, which we never run short of. They're going to be all patched up this year. So they have a Ricky Henderson Memorial patch, which okay, of course they should, but they will also have multiple patches for the multiple cities that they're sort of affiliated with at this point. So they had a Sacramento patch on their shoulder,

but now they also have a deal for a Vegas patch so they have struck a three-year deal with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority and They are now the official travel destination partner of the ace and so they're gonna have a Las Vegas logo on One of their sleeves while also having the Sacramento patch And it's not like a huge lucrative deal. It's like a couple million, few million per year. It's, it's not a ton of money. And it just, I guess with an eye toward, well, we're going to be a Vegas team, that's the plan eventually.

So maybe you want to advertise your upcoming Vegas affiliation, but it's just such a strange relationship that they have with the city of Sacramento right now. It's just like, I guess it's an open relationship kind of in that both parties know what they're getting into here. Like Sacramento knows that the A's are planning to see other people, see other cities and move on. Like the A's are not looking for something long-term with Sacramento,

but how do you feel as a Sacramento fan? and move on, like the A's are not looking for something long-term with Sacramento, but how do you feel as a Sacramento fan? It's like, you probably want a big league team and maybe you're happy to have one in the short term and it's fun to go to a game, but this team is like actively in the process of leaving. It's just like being in a relationship where one party is totally in and the other has a wandering eye and is looking around and maybe is not committed to this thing.

And I just, I don't know how you could get invested in a team that is wearing Las Vegas patches and Sacramento patches and also refuses to use your team name as its designation and just prefers to just be the athletics with no city name, which I will not be abiding by both out of principle and because it makes me uncomfortable to write a's with multiple apostrophes. But it also sounds strange to say athletics every time when you want a possessive. So I have to say Sacramento's sometimes. It just feels like it

would be hard to buy in under those circumstances because it's a marriage of convenience and they're just not that into you on top of the red flag that they just had a horrible breakup and all their exes hate them. I think that that's right, but I also, if we have any listeners who live in Sacramento, I would be curious about your perspective on this. I don't know that anyone was really expecting a long-term investment either in the A's from the fan perspective or by the A's into the fans, if only because like that ballpark is a minor league affiliate for another team, you know? Like I imagine that, or it houses a minor league affiliate for another team under different circumstances. And so there, there was a baseball context for that field before the A's ever came to

town. Right. And I don't know that, you know, if you're from Sacramento, that you're predisposed to be, you know, a Giants fan just because it's the, because Rivercats were a Giants affiliate, right? That was a, that was a Giants affiliate. So I don't know that you're necessarily like a Giants fan just because the Rivercats were in town, but I think that people are pretty clear-eyed about the transitional nature of this arrangement. Now, there might be people who live in Sacramento who with some amount of good cause might have thought, well, they're never going to end up in Vegas. Because I'm gonna tell you,

I know there were new renderings of that ballpark that came out recently, and they're supposed to break ground in June or whatever, but until a shovel is in the ground, I'm assuming that that stuff's gonna fall through. Just because, you know, the track record ain't great for getting a new ballpark deal done if you're the formerly Oakland Athletics so maybe there are a couple of Sacramento fans

who thought oh maybe I'll turn around a little bit longer but I'm I'm skeptical that many people thought this was gonna be sort of a long-term arrangement. They're going into it knowing that this is a fling we'll have some fun. And I wouldn't and to be clear like if you live in Sacramento and you're stoked to have the ballpark filled with a big league team, that's fine. I don't think any less of you for it. I'm not saying you should boycott or something in solidarity with these fans. You can go to a game.

I mean, you certainly could. Yeah, if you want to, you can. I'm not going to dissuade you from, from depriving John Fisher of money, but Right. Not obligated one way or the other as far as I'm concerned on that one. But, I do find it tacky. Look, I know that there are sponsorship patches on uniforms on other teams and that those teams will sometimes have franchise icons pass away and they wear a patch in remembrance of that franchise icon and

they still have the sponsorship patch on and I get how business works Ben, I'm aware of the business here, but I do wish that in in seasons where you were wearing a tribute patch that that would be the only patch you'd wear, you know? I know that's not a realistic wish, I understand the capital markets, but I wish it were because I feel like, you know, he deserves that. He deserves that. All right. Well, you deserve a Dodgers preview and a Rockies preview. And so we are going to give you that now. We will be back in just a second with Fabian to talk about the Dodgers, followed by Patrick on the Rockies. Well, we are joined now by our pal, Thad Yenardaya, who covers the Los Angeles Dodgers.

He is busy doing laundry, packing his bags, doing this podcast, and getting ready to leave for Tokyo. He'll be taken off in much less than a day by the time people are hearing this. Hope he's ready. I envy him. This is an exciting expedition. Welcome Fabian, welcome back.

Thank you. I'm looking forward to my 24 hours back in Los Angeles before being in Tokyo. Well, we'll talk about that trip in a moment, but I guess we should get the off season out of the way, not much to cover here as usual with the Dodgers. Just pretty, pretty sleepy winter for them. You left the angels beat for this really just don't understand the career choices personally, but I'm glad that this makes you happy to have a lot of transactions

and exciting players who are still good to talk about. Maybe we can start with Roki. Why not? I obviously want to hear about how he has looked this spring and how the Dodgers plan to ease him into their rotation, but maybe we can return to the courtship and the controversies and the conspiracies. How did the Dodgers sign Roki Sasaki? Was it foreordained all along? I think it depends obviously on who you ask, if you're a team that signed Roki Sasaki or a team that didn't. Well, we're asking you. Well, obviously, I think the appeal of the Dodgers to Roki Sasaki was very obvious. I think it kind of always made sense as a landing spot, which is why, I think a big reason why the Dodgers were attached for as long as they were. This is international free agency.

I think if you're a young international free agent and you want to have a seamless transition from Japanese baseball to the United States, you would look to a place that just did that the year before with Yoshinobu Yamamoto that has the biggest Japanese star in the game in Shōhei Otani that has an infrastructure in place and understanding even if maybe there are some questions with how the Dodgers have kept some of their pitchers healthy they have gotten certainly got the most out of their stuff and gotten them as effective on a per inning basis as they can get. And that if that's what you want to do if you're Rookie Sasaki, like it made all the sense in the world.

And I think obviously the Dodgers were looking at this as a very unique opportunity because for as much as they have spent money, anytime you can add a guy as talented as Rookie Sasaki for a six and a half million dollar signing bonus, they were going to leap at the opportunity, especially with how veteran much of their group is. Being able to add someone who's just 23 years old and sort of perpetuate that window into eternity, it sort of helps. And he doesn't come without flaws. I was there on the night that he made his spring debut. It was great. He's also so violent in his delivery. So as they look to both keep him healthy

and help him continue to improve in advance as a big leaguer, what are some of the developmental tweaks that they're contemplating with Roki? Yeah, a lot of the focus obviously was on the velocity. I mean, that was the homework assignment that he gave to every single team and trying to figure out how to get back up to the upper 90s, which is where he had been in sometimes triple digits in Japan.

And obviously that first start, you kind of saw that it was back. He was touching 99 miles an hour, sit averaging 98. Then the questions become, okay, how good is he going to be day one? And how close is he to the finished product that they envision him being? It doesn't seem like he's very close to what he could ultimately wind up being just because of how talented he is. Their way of spinning it was because of how talented he is, his ceiling, and what this is a guy who could be as talented as any pitcher in the sport. He's a guy who'd probably be effective from day one, but there are clearly some tweaks that they have to make.

Making sure that velocity is sustainable, giving him a third pitch. Obviously that splitter is, it's something else. I think at that first start, I was thinking that so many of those splitters were sliders just because of how they were moving, and some of them were cutting, and some of them were sort of fading,

and you just didn't really know what direction it was gonna go. So you would think that it would be a slider, and then you sort of look at the data, and obviously the spin rate kind of shows that it's a splitter. Developing a third pitch that sort of fits, whether it be something that's in the velocity band below the splitter or between the splitter and the fastball, something that moves glove side for him, is something I'm sure is gonna be a focus for them later on in the season.

You sort of saw that last year. Even with the oceanobu Yamamoto, they really emphasize the slider over the latter half of the season and sort of incorporated a cutter and a two seamer just to sort of give different looks for guys. Rokuzisaki is going to be no different. I think there's probably even more moldable clay there with him just because of how little experience he has. I think it's a little over

400 innings in Japan as opposed to like 1200 innings for Yamamoto when he came over. HOFFMAN And you and some of your athletic colleagues did a deep dive, a reported piece on the presentations that teams made to him and the homework assignment that he gave teams, which was evidently just asking why his velocity dropped. And that seems like quite a reasonable thing to ask and something that you would want to hear from your potential employers. Although, of course, many people perceived that as him just trying to gain intel from rivals

knowing that he was going to choose LA all along. Do you know what anyone's answer to that question was or what the Dodgers' answer to it was? I haven't been able to get specifics. Obviously a lot of that sort of the Dodgers like to keep the proprietary stuff proprietary when it comes to the mechanics, but it seemed like the people I talked to, it seemed like it was still kind of in the early stages for them for what they wanted him to do. And obviously the velocity did tick up in that sprint training start and we'll see

as we're recording today, he's going to make his second Cactus League start and his last start before Tokyo, but it seemed like obviously stuff was already trending in the right direction, but I'm sure there's some stuff that where I mean he wasn't 100 healthy last season as part of it as well He had the shoulder issue. He had the oblique issue that uh, joe wolf his agent kind of admitted that he was pitching through last year And understanding that and understanding his body's in the right place now is at least a better starting point for whatever changes they kind of want to implement, whether it be mechanical or sort of emphasizing certain things in terms of maximizing that velocity. It's funny to start with Roki.

It's obvious why we did, but it almost makes you forget the huge free agent signing they had in the rotation that was Blake Snell, who we admit on Effectively Wild is a good pitcher, although he is not our favorite pitcher to watch. What about Blake Snell attracted the Dodgers and do you think they'll make him more efficient, please? That latter part was a question that's definitely been already broached to Dave Roberts in terms like does he have to be more pitch efficient to get through starts? I think the appeal was kind of obvious. The Dodgers were going to be sort of operating at the top of the pitching market again this

off season, just not just because of how many starters got hurt last year, but certainly was a factor there. And I think of the group, you sort of mentioned the Snell, Corbin Burns, Max Fried. The one that kind of always made the most sense to me in terms of just understanding what the Dodgers value, it was Blake Snell. And there's obviously been an attraction

for years to Blake Snell. I mean, they've tried to acquire him in the past. Andrew Freeman was the guy who drafted him in Tampa Bay. Blake Snell likes Los Angeles. He wanted to be there, and he wanted to sign quickly. All those factors kind of fit the Dodgers kind of perfectly in terms of also what they value in generating swing and miss, and understanding that they don't need him to be a workhorse per se, even though he probably will be their closest version to a workhorse. So that kind of attracted them to him and understanding

the upside that there is. Like this is a guy with multiple side youngs. There's a very, very short list of pitchers in the game who can sort of claim that. He's a guy who, Clayton Kershaw has already said, like he always was the lefty he liked to watch and vice versa. There's a mutual admiration there. So it made a lot of sense. I do if kershaw maybe can tell him a couple things about the pitch efficiency front But I think part of what makes blake snell as effective as he is is just because of how he pitches and understanding that That's going to maybe soak up a lot of pitches in his pitch count But living on the edges is what's going to avoid Obviously the big damage and the swing and miss he can get in the zone is already so effective and so dynamic and it's going to be, I think, a perfect fit for what the Dodgers like.

Well, we've asked about two other players before we got to Shohei Otani. I'd say that's incredible restraint on our part. And the Dodgers are acquiring a pitcher named Shohei Otani effectively, or at least they are in theory. So we have two surgeries to talk about that he is returning from here. There's the one that was preventing him from pitching last year, the elbow surgery, and then there's the shoulder surgery. So what's the state of both of those body parts? And I guess if you want to answer pitching first and then hitting second, or if you want to cover both in

the same answer, like some sort of two-way preview guest, you can do that too. But when are we going to see him on the mound? And well, let's start there and we'll see where we go. The hope was sort of, or at least what Dave Roberts had kind of pitched as like a loose idea was around May, which made a lot of sense. It's essentially what the Dodgers did with Walker Buehler last year in a similar spot, coming off a second Tommy John surgery, had his surgery around the same time frame

though, Tani did in terms of like relation to that season. And so you sort of, you're like, all right, that's an easy way to manage his workload, sort of manage the innings on the front end as opposed to the back end. Obviously the production wasn't great for Walker Buehler last season, but in terms of workload, it seemed like it made a lot of sense. So that was always the plan going into the spring. Things were going well enough that Dave Roberts even suggested he could possibly face

hitters before they left for Tokyo. But obviously, he hasn't thrown a bullpen since February 25th. Dodger said that that's intentional. They sort of understood that the fact that he's coming off the shoulder surgery as well, their rationalization is that sort of understanding that the workload was going to ramp up on the hitting side. They didn't want to ramp him up on two fronts at the same time and potentially overwhelm him in March when they can sort of have two tracks going simultaneously, not necessarily simultaneously over the course of the season and making it more

gradual build up. And part of that's because they have the pitching depth to sort of absorb it, but also understanding that if Otani is good coming off a second Tommy John surgery on the mound, then ideally he's someone you'd like to pitch for them in October. So you'd rather have him sort of peeking in October as opposed to maybe hitting that wall off a second surgery in October. And he's hardly the only pitcher they have coming back from injury. I want to ask about Tyler Glasnow and how he's doing and Dustin May who had maybe one of the more horrifying descriptors of an injury I've ever heard of, both random and body horror-esque.

So how are those two guys doing and how are they ramping up this spring? Yeah, let's start with Glass now, just because it's probably more straightforward. I mean, he sort of felt something in his elbow over the course of the second half of last year and was kind of pitching through it obviously got shut down in August They tried ramping him up in September and really kind of like the crux That the Dodgers say it was the crux of like their run in September in October last year was The day that Tyler glass now got shut down for the season was a day in Atlanta He was sported supposed to start a simulated game

The hitters are out there the catchers are ready and he just didn't come out. He didn't pitch. He felt something in his elbow, it just didn't feel right. So they shut him down, MRI'd him. There wasn't enough structural damage to really be concerned. They sort of graded it as an elbow sprain, and his elbow felt close to normal at the end of the October run. That is a good sign going into, obviously, this spring. We'll see going forward, but the hope he's saying

is that some of the tweaks he's made to his delivery, trying to emphasize more on getting natural extension instead of feeling like he has to force his extension down the mound, maybe allow his body to be in a better place and put less stress on the elbow going forward. And so far, it seems like it's going pretty well. He's always been a guy who's sort of thinking about his mechanics out there. One of the things that Dave Roberts kind of stresses is like, all right, once like the game starts, he has to really feel athletic and stop thinking

about his mechanics. And that's something that Klaus has kind of said, like, is always kind of a battle for him is sort of just going out and competing as opposed to like thinking about everything having to play out perfectly for his elbow to sort of feel good. That's only that obviously he looked good right now in spring He looked really good this time last year in spring So we'll see sort of how things go in the second half of the season But so far everything's going well there and with Dustin May. Yeah, you kind of touched upon like he even before Last summer sort of happened. he was already in a position where it was a pretty grisly injury history. I mean, he was coming off of his second major elbow surgery in three years. I mean, his elbow never really felt right coming off Tommy

John surgery. The first time he basically said he never had a pain-free day of throwing, but he just felt like that was a normal part of the rehab process and just kept pitching through it. And obviously it got to a point where it was unbearable. In May 2023, I left to start out for the first inning. It was a torn flexor tendon, a Tommy John revision, and he was feeling really good this time last year. And then also going into around July of last year when he was really throwing really well, he was getting

ready to start facing hitters soon. Like, he was on the final stages of that rehab. He goes out to dinner in Arizona with his wife, is eating a salad, something got caught in his throat. He went to go wash it down with some water and he felt like his entire body was on fire instantly. So, he was rushed into surgery that night. Basically, said he would not have survived that night. Basically said he would not

have survived that night if he had not gone in for surgery because he had ruptured and torn his esophagus. So obviously that halted any of his plans for pitching in 2024, which was probably the last of his concerns. But yeah, he needed surgery, obviously emergency surgery there. They kind of cut through his abdomen to repair the esophagus. But he has had a fairly normal spring otherwise. He is in a position where it looks like he's won the fifth starter job at this point, just because Tony Gonsolin, who's the other guy who's coming off an injury, coming off Tommy John surgery, sounds like he tweaked his back in the weight room recently.

So that sort of settled the fifth starter spot. And that means that May will have a chance to really kind of hit the ground running. And he's kind of admitted that he didn't really care about what the role wound up being this year because he just hasn't pitched enough to really assert a claim to really feeling that he needs the role. He understands his stuff is still as good as anyone's. The fastball has been around 95, touched 97, but the slider is still such a unique pitch with how much spin and movement he can impart on it. And the sinker is still

moving really well. And he's not, he's a guy who obviously has always had high velocity, but it's the movement profile that's going to help him survive in the major leagues. And I mean, that it looks so far pretty good this spring. I eat a lot of lettuce and I'm doing my best to just put out of my mind the possibility that this is something that can happen when one eats lettuce. It's just such an extreme. It's so extreme that it would happen. You know, you hear it for the first time and you think that you're on the front end of

a joke and then you realize how serious it was. I'd never eat salad again. I'd just be done with that, I think. Yeah. And that probably wouldn't help your health either, but maybe in a less acute immediate way. But yeah, I'm a big iceberg guy. I'm hoping it wasn't iceberg. Hoping it was one of the more leafy lettuces and that would help my mindset. Sometimes I'll just pick up a head of iceberg like Andy Samberg and Will Forte and that SNL skit and just chomp it, just have a whole iceberg in my hand. That's something that I will do at times. And I just, I don't want to be thinking about Dustin May when I'm doing that, but I do want to ask you about Dodger's injuries, not ones involving esophagus, esophage, but elbows mostly.

And I have crunched the numbers on this in the past and the Dodgers have had a lot of Tommy John surgeries. I know, breaking news here, but I have looked into this in depth in a previous pod. And part of that is that they have signed guys with injury histories and they have the payroll room, the buffer to do that. And part of it is just that they have guys who are good and guys with good stuff and guys who throw hard. And we know that those things are correlated with injuries. And that's why we are where we are in Major League Baseball today.

But Andrew Friedman did acknowledge that, yeah, they have had a whole lot of these injuries and he said something to the effect of they were going to do some sort of internal audit. They were going to check to see if there was anything they could do better or that they weren't doing well. So do you know what that consisted of? Did they learn anything from that self-evaluation? Yeah.

So those first conversations actually started during the first round by that they got, they already had a bunch of their org pitching development group in the building just because, I mean, it's October. You kind of want to have all hands on deck. But they spent some of that time kind of brainstorming ideas and trying to figure it out and what was going on. They kept having conversations throughout the winter. And basically when we asked Andrew Friedman again about it this spring, they said like yeah There are some small tweaks that we could probably make Seems like maybe some slight differences in the return play sort of format sort of how you build guys up but at the end of the day like there are a lot of

wide raging factors in the sport that kind of contributes to this and like you mentioned The Dodgers kind of have a high risk tolerance for this like Clinton Kershaw kind of said this to me last September, like this is kind of an organizational philosophy of theirs, understanding that you can sort of get these high upside guys, especially whether it be in free agency or in the draft, because they're willing to ignore some injury risk, or willing to draft guys who are already injured and sort of understanding they can build them up and really maximize what they look like. So some of that's a factor in there as well. Some of it's that they throw really hard.

I think a couple of years ago, that Tulsa AA rotation was the hardest throwing rotation at any level in baseball. And I think almost all those guys have suffered some sort of major injury since. So they've been really good at sort of developing velocity. They're really good at sort of targeting premium stuff But I think last year was kind of the worst end of injuries that you sort of feel as a result of that kind of philosophy

And of course they have practically an entire rotation on the injured list right now Some of those guys are likely to come back this year Some of them aren't as you look at the injured depth behind the guys who are going to be in the rotation on opening day, what are their timelines for return? Maybe let's start with Kershaw and then who among their sort of high minors group do you imagine might get pressed into service if you know injuries are to strike again? Yeah, Clayton Kershaw is throwing bullpens already and he's back in camp. He sort of, the running joke I kind of had all up in there was like, I fully just expect

him to just be in the clubhouse the first day of training, even though he wasn't signed. And there, lo and behold, there he was. He was signed and signed, did his deal, went back to Texas for a few weeks and then came back this week, partially because he wants to go with his family to Tokyo and sort of experience that but he's throwing bullpens everything seems to be going well with the foot and the toe and his shoulder still feels really good he said he feels like he could be ready at the end of may or at least be ramping up at the end of may he said that he kind of anticipates starting this season on 60 day il but like around when that's up like he feels like he could be ready also I will see how Shoei Otani is ramping up and sort of what they want to see out of that.

Emmett Sheehan's a guy who's coming off Tommy John surgery and he thinks he could be pitching at least in rehab games by May or June so you're seeing like a lot of those guys who should be available around midseason and that's around sort of when you're kind of anticipating maybe some of that depth to really have to be sort of cut into it just because of circumstances and stuff like that. And obviously we'll see how much time Tony Gonsolin has to miss with tweaking his back. He was the guy who was pretty close to built up and it was between him and

Dustin May for that fit starter job until he tweaked his back. So he's someone who's sort of in that death bucket, but then behind him, you've seen a lot of the guys who sort of you didn't expect to see last year in the big leagues, who now have some big league experience under the belt, whether it be a land and knack who pitched in the World Series, Ben Kasparius is expected to start the season in the bullpen. But I mean, he's a guy who wound up starting a potential World Series clinching game and which was a surprise to everyone. I think Dave Roberts kind of said, I didn't even know who he was until July or August,

that he wasn't even a big league spring training last year. So he popped up and he's in the depth chart. Jester Robleski's actually had a really, really good spring and looked really good throwing a lot more strikes. And he's the guy who's always been kind of intriguing, even though the numbers weren't very good in the big leagues last year. And then obviously Nick Frosso is another guy who's always been kind of intriguing even though the numbers weren't very good in the big leagues last year And then obviously Nick frost is another guy who's coming off of shoulder surgery

It's still to be determined if they want to see him as a reliever going forward just because the injury history and the delivery is Very violent and the stuff is still very good, but sort of figuring that out But it's still not sure like what that's gonna look like for him this year But he's an option and obviously there's also Bobby Miller, who I think was less than two years ago was starting a playoff game for them. Had a case to start game one for them. And obviously had a kind of miserable 2024

and then looked really good in camp and then took a line drive off his forehead. They kind of set him back a little bit. So he's someone who should start the season in the minor leagues, build back up. But once he's built back up, should be at least a depth option. CB 05.00 Other guys who I guess won't be options, Michael Groves and Brewstar Gradaroll, and gosh, we could keep going, I guess, Gavin Stone. I'm just scanning the list of shoulder and arm surgeries from the past several months. And we can maybe talk about Michael Kopek for a second,

who is not on that surgery list as of yet. He is out with forearm inflammation. So how serious is that? And did that play a part in either the Tanner Scott signing or maybe the Kirby Yates signing some of the moves that they made in the pen this off season? Yeah, he's throwing bull pens, hasn't faced hitters yet this spring.

I think he kind of didn't realize through last October that they made in the pen this offseason? Yeah, he's throwing bullpens, hasn't faced hitters yet this spring. I think he kind of didn't realize through last October that, I mean, he knew he was pitching through some discomfort, but he didn't realize just how much that had taken out of him until after the World Series and really sort of felt sort of compounding effects of like continuing to try to throw 100 while dealing with some inflammation in his forearm and really feeling fatigued. So he's someone that they aren't really going to rush to get back, just sort of understanding

what he could mean for them in October and sort of over the stretch run. But yes, him and Evan Phillips, they kind of knew going into this offseason that they weren't going to be ready to start the season. Phillips is a little bit of a faster track. Like they're thinking early April, he could be back. But they kind of knew that was the case. And that was the reason why they were more aggressive than they really have ever been under

Andrew Freeman's tenure in acquiring free agent relievers. Like they usually don't ever spend in that market, especially not to that extent, especially if you're a guy like Tanner Scott. And yeah, Andrew Freeman admitted like, this is why we were as aggressive as we were a big factor in that understanding that. Okay. If they're starting pitchers, didn't really get ridden hard in October,

but their bullpen definitely did. Blake Triney was coming off a pretty major shoulder surgery, thought at different points that he might not pitch again, had an amazing season last year and was kind of used hard, especially in that game five, was used to have a pitch into a third inning there. So you're understanding that like, all right guys, maybe feel some of the effects of pitching deep into October. Here are two guys who didn't really pitch deep into October who were incredibly dominant

last season in Kirby Gates and Tanner Scott. And they made a lot of sense for them to add there. And also, like, obviously, once Kopek and Phillips are healthy, then you're looking at a really, really deep bullpen. I wanted to ask about sort of the flexibility of that bullpen because I think that Alex Vesia is the only member of that group who still has an option remaining. I guess that if they get Eduardo Henriquez back from his foot injury, he gives them some optionality there. But did they take that into consideration when they were piecing this together? Because they're in a spot where, you know, absent injury, they might end up with a guy kind of getting lost to waivers just because they can't send them down.

Yeah, I think they kind of already ran into that before the spring started with Ryan Brazier. Obviously, in retrospect, you probably try to keep Ryan Brazier, understanding that there's going to be some injuries that sort of clear up some of the issues, at least to start the season. But that's why they say Ryan Brazier was the odd man out there. And they kind of traded him. They got some financial savings, relatively speaking, out of it just because of a four and a half million dollar contract to really give me like a ten million dollar contract for what the Dodgers have to pay in taxes

and everything like that. But yeah, that's certainly something that's a factor once Enriquez comes back. Ben Casperius is a guy who has all of his minor league options remaining and he'll start the season in the bullpen. He ever blessed Key and also a guy who they added to the 40-man roster this year in Jack Dreier who actually is really fascinating. I think they sort of took a chance on Alex Vesce a few years ago because he has such a unique induced vertical break on his fastball. I think it led in majors last season and he induced a vertical break on his fastball and Jack Dreyer's is higher than that in terms of like the data we've seen so far in spring training and that's why he's been as effective as he's been in the minors

last season was starting to throw a lot more strikes they basically told him because he was a guy who was an undrafted free agent out of Iowa partially because he had undergone Tommy John surgery was kind of a soft tossing junk baller, lefty starter there that basically converted him to relief. His fastball is up to 92, 93 now. He's basically, for the most part, fastball slider, really relying on that fastball open zone. And he's really effective doing it. He's had a really good spring. I think he's going to make the opening day roster just because of how, or at least has a really good chance of making the opening day roster just because of how good he's looked. And he's got another guy who is on the 40-man now, has all his options remaining, and they're

trying to cycle through to make sure that they have at least some flexibility there. And they'll gain some flexibility in their bullpen, at least whenever Shohei Otani joins the rotation, just because they'll be able to essentially have an extra pitcher on the roster. Yeah, I was going to ask just how they'll be able to essentially have an extra pitcher on the roster. Yeah, I was going to ask just how they're going to manage everyone's workloads because A, you don't want to work anyone too hard. I know the Dodgers, they understand the difference between process and results and the results last year were great.

They won the World Series, but you probably don't want to go into October with a devastated staff like the one that they had last year. So they want to make sure that guys are healthy when October rolls around, but they don't really have to worry so much probably about the division or making the playoffs. So that gives them a little leeway. But just in terms of piecing together the innings there,

I know they're coming out of camp with a five-man rotation with the off days early in the season. But then when Otani returns, if they go with the six man, none of their starters is really someone who's known for regularly going super deep into games. And then they have a lot of one inning types in the pen. So is it just maybe having like a Gonsolin or Robleski sort of a long man converted starter in the pen who can soak up some innings if the starter doesn't go deep into games. Like it's just a math problem at a certain point and it helps to have two-way Otani and for him not to take up a pitching roster spot.

But still. Yeah, I think that's sort of the logic there, at least for having Ben Gasparrius in that bullpen to at least start the season. They kind of view him as a guy who was good and winning bursts could go two or three innings. He's built up for that at this stage So he's someone who could sort of function as kind of a swing man long guy type of thing I think that probably would have been the role for Dustin May had to own a Goncalin not tweaked his back just because Dustin May doesn't have minor league options left he's a guy who at least is built up and has the ability to go deeper and they kind of had to keep him around. So those are guys that both make a lot of sense in that role. And yeah, they kind of ran into this issue last year as well.

And that's basically what Ryan Garbero was on the roster for the first half for. He soaked up innings wherever he could. And Dave Roberts kind kind of said commended of his being one of the MVPs of that bullpen Regardless of what the results were just because understanding what that did to keep everyone else fresh sort of understanding How veteran or group that was especially last year you had? Blake Trine and Daniel Hudson two guys who really had barely pitched the last two years just because of injuries And now they were in prominent roles in the bullpen so keeping both those guys fresh enough to get through the season largely unscathed I think they can sort of credit Ryan Yarbrough for

that so he they'll sort of have Kasparius and Robleski if he's on the opening day roster or like Tony Gonsolin or Dustin May probably back there as sort of a length option. And Yamamoto, who's in line to start the first game against the Cubs in Japan, we didn't get to see as much as we would have liked to of him last year, 90 innings in the regular season. He was quite effective. It felt like we didn't get to see the fully effective and dominant Yamamoto, and it seemed like he wasn't quite himself after he returned late in the season. So are there any lingering concerns about the shoulder that kept him out

last year and how he looked late in the season and into October? Is he fully ready to go now? And did he and any other members of the staff have to do anything unusual to ramp up early for this Japan series? I think they sort of understood that there'd be an earlier ramp up for Japan, but I think in terms of anything else, I don't think they did anything differently. I kind of asked Yamamoto that himself, like, did you learn anything from how, like how you have to prepare for a major league season? And he said that you didn't really change much in terms of his preparation.

I think he kind of showed me a lot in terms of how he looked in the World Series and also in game five against the Padres. His ability to be resilient and sort of when the lights got a little bit brighter, he did pitch his best. Like he really found a way to sort of show me something there and he was really, really good in that start against the Yankees. I think only gave up the one hit over seven innings and was really effective and dynamic. He's a guy who... There's a lot of different ways he can be effective, which is part of what makes him so good. He really learned to lean on the slider when he really has to and his back is against the

wall and that's a really effective pitch. He's looked really good this spring in terms of how the Dodgers people have sort of talked about him. They talked about him as almost a completely different guy in terms of confidence, how he feels. He's kind of admitted that the communication is just so much easier this year than it was last year, which is understandable. There's so much that was kind of new. He didn't really have his interpreter hired until just before they left for Korea. There's so much that was new to him last season. And having a year under his belt, understanding where to go, comfort level, understanding the coaching staff, sort of understanding

him. Because last spring was also left to sort of letting him do what made him effective in Japan when it came to some of his unique workouts and how he trained. And he still does a lot of that stuff, but now at least the Dodgers people have a lot more familiarity with why he does what, in what order, what purpose it serves, and they can better find ways to integrate things. And last spring also, they were working with him on trying to avoid tipping his pitches.

That was a big part of last spring was sort of tweaking something in his mechanics because he didn't really, at least from what I was told, like the pitch tipping wasn't necessarily something he had to worry about as much in Japan, whether it be opposing players not really exploiting it or it like the tweak just wasn't as noticeable. So they sort of corrected that and we're finding ways to sort of adapt that. And I think he understands now it's sort of all around what it sort of takes. And that's why he's looked so good this spring. Maybe we can finally talk about the hitters because boy, do the Dodgers employ some good

ones. And I want to talk about bets mostly within the context of him playing shortstop and how they're thinking about one, what they've seen from his performance so far this spring. Obviously, he played games there last year. And then how they're kind of thinking about the potential backups for him in the event that he becomes injured or they need him in the outfield or they just aren't getting quite what they want from a defensive perspective. Because I never want to doubt Mookie Betts, but obviously, you know, he's been famous as an outfielder for quite a while so how are they thinking about piecing that infield together now and then what are their contingencies in the event that Betts shortstop doesn't work out? Yeah and my

piggyback question on that is just like who's the driving force behind this like does he want to play shortstop and they're accommodating him or is it the other way around? I do think he really wants to play shortstop. And I do think that he kind of told me, like he felt embarrassed last year at shortstop, how he looked, how he felt. And he said he hadn't felt like that.

He said he could only point to like two times in his baseball life that he really felt like that. One was when he was 20 years old, he's kind of told this story before, but like he was really kind of struggling. I think he was in rookie ball or somewhere, really low levels in the minors and he signed up for the ACTs because he was going to quit baseball and obviously didn't wind up doing that. But he was really struggling at the play and really felt like down on himself. And the other time was his first professional game when he was fittingly at shortstop, played six innings, committed three errors. first professional game when he was fittingly at shortstop played six innings committed three errors

Like he felt like he was embarrassed and couldn't really handle himself there So I think there is a part of it like he felt embarrassed there and he felt like he knew he had the talent to do it But he just it that he just never was gonna be in a position to succeed there Just because of the timing and everything like that and he didn't blame it on anyone in particular, but it just was never going to work that way last year. So, I think he was definitely a driver in terms of playing shortstop. I think part of it also, the Dodgers kind of looked at it from a roster perspective and you can sort of rationalize, all right, they want to keep Teosca Hernandez there.

They want to be able to bolster the lineup. They kind of targeted Michael Conforto is a guy who obviously I mean He can only play a corner at this point, but like offensively is a guy who? Fits their line up and what they kind of wanted so you're able to sign both those guys instead of just one of those guys Because Mookie Betts is in the infield and they sort of are mapping out the rest of it They felt like Mookie Betts at shortstop was sort of a surplus proposition. They sort of looked at his bat as something that even if he's just playing average at shortstop, which would be an improvement over last season, his bat was good enough that would make him stand out. I

think even last year I saw like when he went down with a broken wrist and then basically stopped playing shortstop after that, he was third among shortstops in Fangraphs War behind Gunnar Henderson and Bobby Wood Jr., which sort of speaks to the bat and what it means to have that kind of bat in a premium position. So that's sort of the drivers there. I think he's actually looked a lot better at shortstop this year. He really has. He looks a lot more natural. He spent basically a week or two after the end of the World Series. He's already starting to throw He's already starting to map out what it would look like. So he got together with Chris Woodward who's back as the first base coach

He got together with PD Montero who's one of the video coordinators for the team and Ryan Goins who was one of his Favorite people in baseball. He said like one of his closest friends in baseball He was actually an infield coach for the Angels and they basically all coordinated on a game plan to basically get him from What that's called a ball level at shortstop to a major league shortstop over the course of an offseason So they kind of map that out Included a trip around New Year's to Austin, Texas to work out with Troy to Lewicki Which is why you start to see a little bit of like how he Especially like at the way that Mookie that's kind of charges the ball, kind of looks like Troy Tulowitzki now in terms of like the throwing angles

and everything like that. And they found something that they feel works for them. So I think they feel really confident at least to start the spring. Obviously it's a lot easier said than done and it does help to have a full offseason on it as opposed to I think it was 15 days before opening day last year They kind of moved them there. So that definitely helps they feel good about that plan But yeah, there are gonna have to be contingencies there and they have options there But it's not necessarily one clear-cut one way. I think they obviously believe in Miguel Rojas Defensively at shortstop they have for a while, but they know that at his age

They don't feel like he could probably hold up playing every single day. I know Miguel Rojas has kind of said like hits his goal to kind of prove to him like he still physically can handle being an everyday player but you saw even last year he sort of handled that first stretch and then wound up having a hernia injury that he kind of played through throughout October. Tommy Edmonds, a guy who's played a good shortstop in the past and was there shortstop last year when the season ended but he, a guy who's played a good shortstop in the past and was there a shortstop last year when the season ended, but he's a guy who's going to have to bounce around everywhere anyways. Kike Hernandez, you could probably handle it in a pinch. And they actually have a shortstop that's kind of waiting for them in the wings for the first time in a little while. Probably since

Gavin Lux first time they've had a shortstop that you could really feel confident waiting in, waiting in the wings. And Alex Freeland, who had a really big year in 2024 is going to start the season in AAA but he's at least intriguing enough that if you kind of have to break glass there I feel like they feel they can sort of give him a runway and feel reasonably confident with what he brings. I generally just believe in Mookie Betts being good at which is, I know, hot take. To be clear, this is not an anti-Mookie take. It's just, it's a calculated risk, off season improvements aside. It's never been done before. Who has ever had an anti-Mookie take?

Tell me the name of that person. Bring them before me. Who would say such a thing? But yeah, it's kind of an interesting sequence because it felt like he was kind of forced into doing it by circumstances and then now it's like, he's John Locke on Lost. He's like, don't tell me what I can't do. And he wants to be the shortstop now,

but it's also like, they're the Dodgers, they'll be fine. I mean, it's kind of strange, I guess, to have as much talent as they have and as high a payroll, and then have these questions about shortstop and have Mookie bets moving around all the time. But I'm less concerned about it than I am with a team that might have to actually win every game. I mean, we talked so much about like Devers and Bregman and the Red Sox and everything. The Dodgers just, they have more room to maneuver. If Mookie doesn't work out at shortstop, they'll figure something out. They can afford to lose a game here or there, not that they're thinking of things that way. But tell us about, I guess, Mookie's prospective

double play partner, Haesung Kim. What was it that attracted the Dodgers to him? I was semi-surprised by the Gavin Lux trade given how he hit late last year. So what made them move on from him and on to Kim? Yeah, I think it's something that I'm still kind of trying to wrap my head around a little bit. Obviously, like you look at Kim on the field and like he is a premium athlete. They kind of made a point of saying like their first week of spring that he had the lowest body fat percentage on the team like he's Like he's a shorter guy base. He's kind of jacked and he's a guy who's like really fast and a really Smooth slick defender. You can already see that already

The bat is something that they are gonna still have been working on I think what they sort of saw in him originally was here's a guy who has Not hit for a lot of power obviously in Korea But good bats of all skills gives them a lot of power, obviously in Korea, but good basketball skills, gives them a different dynamic than they had in the lineup. Obviously at his best, Gavin Lux can sort of be a basketball guy who gets on base at the bottom half of the order, but obviously isn't maybe the same athlete that he was before tearing his ACL,

at least in the first year afterwards, it's clear that he was still feeling it on his body. And they sort of looked at Kim as a guy who is probably gonna come cheaper than Lux, has another year of control at least, and plus the club option for two years after the three years are done. So they looked at that. And also the guy who they have some maybe some roster flexibility with going forward rather than Lux, who was kind of pinned down to second base at this point in his career. Kim is a guy that they've at least thrown out at second that shortstop has played third base before they tried him in center field for a game or two in spring training just because they

felt like he could do it. Yeah that's sort of like the impetus for the move. I think obviously the way the spring has kind of played out has kind of raised some of the further questions that already existed with Kim's bat. Like they've employed some swing changes with him that They feel are Translated pretty well in terms of what he's willing to do versus like what they're trying to tell him to do They feel like he's been very amenable to them They're trying to get him to improve his bat paths really maximize the bats a ball And really use that to sort of give that different dynamic they're looking for.

But obviously, the transition has been rough at the plate, at least to start this spring. It's been an adjustment to Major League pitching. I think they sort of told him the first couple weeks of camp to be ready for high 90s velocity just because that's the big thing that people will point to coming from Korea. And then he steps in there against Tyler Glass now for live BPs and Glass now throws him three straight breaking balls. They swung through. There's an adjustment period there.

I would anticipate honestly at this point him starting the season in the minor leagues, which was something that Kim himself kind of acknowledged was part of the calculus with signing with the Dodgers. He understood that signing a deal that sort of didn't require his consent to be sent down to the minor leagues was a risk. But he said if it's already been challenging enough to go to Major League Baseball, he would rather would do it at a place where he felt like he could develop. And at least if he does have to spend more time in the minor leagues, he would benefit

from it. So I think he will start the season in the minor leagues, which leaves some question marks at second base or center field, depending on how they want to use Tommy Edmond. But at least that's a place where he can maybe get every day at bats and they can feel like leave some question marks at second base or center field depending on how they want to use Tommy Edmond, but at least that's a place where he can maybe get every day at bats and they can feel like the swing changes they're working on with him or kind of he actually can swing through them as opposed to maybe playing once or twice a week. I don't want to say that Freddy Freeman's season was bad. I think a lot of hitters in Major League Baseball would very happily accept four wins and a 137 hitters in Major League Baseball would very happily accept four wins and a 137 WRC+, but I do think it's fair to characterize it as trying both on and off the field. He did not have as

as superlative a season as he usually does. Obviously, he and his family had to deal with his son's illness and then he goofed up his ankle. So as we turn the page on 2024, what is his status now, just from a health perspective? And then apart from, you know, the illness with his son, which I don't want to say is a just sort of thing, like it's to trivialize it, but what does he attribute some of his struggle from last year to? Yeah, I mean, he was he was definitely frustrated. The first half of last season with like his swing he felt like he he just wasn't sticking through the zone long enough and it's a tweet that he's always kind of

Felt that off and on and spurts at times and he hasn't really like he never really found a consistent way to get out Of it in the first half of the season production was still solid if not Freeman level just because he's Freddie Freeman But he felt like he was just starting to turn the corner when his son Max got sick right around the All-Star break. Obviously, he's partially paralyzed for a small period of time. He's recovered well since. Everything is going well with Max, thankfully. They celebrated his birthday party during spring training. Everything is going really, really well, but yeah, that obviously was something that he was away from the team for about ten days came back he admitted

like obviously he understandably so it was very distracted for much of August and September to a point where Dave Roberts basically called him one Sunday like hey you're like you need to not play for this series that you are I'm sending you this series you need to focus like come to the ballpark do whatever you need but focus on family like focus on that not worrying about your hitting you came back was feeling a little bit better during that stretch he also broke his finger I was playing through a non-displaced fracture on his finger in September and then as you mentioned it's badly sprained the ankle on the day the Dodgers clinched the

division and also as they're prepping for the playoffs he tears some rib cartilage like he was he was playing through a lot you sort of see like you you saw sort of the wounds of what he was dealing with whether it be how he was taping up his ankle it looked like a football player out there he'd be playing with a giant wrap around his waist all October you're still seeing some of the effects of it now in terms of how he's sort of handling it. He thought he would be able to avoid surgery on the ankle. Then it just kept swelling around Thanksgiving. And they figured out that he

had actually torn ligaments in the ankle, which had healed. But there was also bone spurs that kind of broken off. And there was one that was about a couple inches away from his Achilles tendon that would have been very concerning going forward. So they had surgery to kind of remove that and sort of address that. And he's now obviously playing and he's insisting on playing. But I mean, he's said he has 90 minutes of treatment before he even hits the field and an hour of treatment after he leaves the field. So like, he's very clearly going to still be sort of playing through this this season,

at least the first half of the season. And that's something that doesn't seem like it's affected the field. So like he's very clearly going to still be sort of playing through this, this season, at least the first half of the season. And that's something that doesn't seem like it's affected the swing, but like, obviously that's something to keep in mind in the first half of the season. Well, it's been a while since we asked about Pitcher Otani. So now I can ask about hitter Otani slash runner Otani slash Fortnite avatar Otani. He showed off a new sliding technique, right?

So is he going to be sliding differently to avoid another shoulder dislocation? And just generally, do you think he'll be running? Or will he just look at last season as, okay, been there, done that, had my 59 steal season, my 50-50 year, and now I'll be pitching again and I've had more surgeries and I'll take it easier. Was that just kind of a one-year wonder, that specific type of wonder last year? Yeah, I think you can safely bet that that was sort of like a one-year thing because I think he definitely more than doubled whatever his previous career high was on his own bases.

I just expect him to be a lot more cautious running the bases this year. I think they kind of understand, but obviously if it's still being aggressive on the base pass going first or third trying to score stuff like that, like I think there's some parts of that that you can't really take out of a guy, but in terms of like stealing bases, I would fully expect him to steal a lot fewer bases this season because he's coming off the shoulder. The fact that he's trying to pitch again, I'm sure it took a lot out of him just running it as much as he did. And I think going forward, the shoulder looks fine right now at the plate. I think yesterday as we're recording this, like he hit a double off the wall.

That was 118.5 off the bat. Like the exit velocity and stuff like that is still being generated really well. It's just a matter of like trying to keep him on the field as much as possible, recognizing that he'll have to pick and choose his spots. I'm sure maybe come October things are different, stakes are different. If you need a base, he'll probably seek it out and understands now how all the work he kind of did putting into sort of getting better as a base dealer is going to pay off. But yeah, I think the days of him stealing 59 bases

might be behind him. Hostage Just as opening day was about to dawn last year, Will Smith signed a 10-year contract. He had an okay year, won 11 WRC+, which is downright great for a catcher. But I want to ask about the present of that position and also its future because I don't know if you know us but they have a Really good prospect down in the minors in the form of Dalton rushing obviously Austin Barnes is still Floating around in the backup role rushing is not on the 40 man hunter fiduciate is on the 40 man. So How does Will Smith bounce back at the plate and then how do you see this position being configured going forward?

Yeah, I think we've seen a running thing with Will Smith the last couple years where he's had really good starts this season and you see some things to sort of tail off for him in the second half offensively. And there's been at least medical reasons for both. I think in 2023 they said it was because he broke a rib early in the season, was trying to play through it, and even when the rib was feeling better, he developed some bad habits with the swing. They never quite got corrected. Last season, he badly rolled his ankle sliding in June at Yankee Stadium and had a really bad bone bruise that he just kept playing through.

He said he didn't feel it when he swung or when he was squatting behind the plate, but only when he ran. And he said he didn't affect his swing swing but obviously you look at the numbers before and after and it's pretty stark difference. He said that the ankle is still kind of bothering him. He was slow played in spring for that reason, sort of understanding that he was probably going to have to play through some discomfort to start the season. The bat looks better at least to start the spring.

So I wonder if there are some actual things with the swing that he discovered this offseason that he was able to tweak He said he he tried focusing more on the mechanics of the swing than more than anything else But yeah, I think that does raise some concerns about like alright if here's a guy who Last couple years has been banged up behind the plate It's not exactly like designated hitters open for him to sort of have days off there. So how do you sort of keep him healthy? How do you keep the bat productive? And what does that mean possibly for the long term of the position? Because he's the guy who obviously they can mention that he's a franchise catcher. This guy who they paid a lot of money to for the

next decade. Understanding that he probably won't catch for all of 10 years of that deal, but like for a good chunk of it. That's something that still has to play out this season and yeah, there are reinforcements on the roster. I mean, Austin Mars is the last year of his deal, so he's sort of in that stretch where he's kind of just a veteran backup. Hunter Fadouche is a guy who probably would work his way into other teams catching at least as a backup role just because of his ability. He's a good enough hitter for a catcher, can hit fastballsballs pretty well And they think highly enough of him as a thrower and receiver

but yeah, then there's all in rushing coming like they they are already in that process of basically putting him in through finishing school at this point when it comes to what it takes behind the plate because Dave Roberts has said so beginning of spring. He said throughout the spring the bat is ready to go It's just there's not really a place for him to play right now, especially when they sign up for Fordo. They had tried rushing in left field a little bit last year in September, just as a way to if they had to squeeze him onto the roster, that was the way they would do it. There isn't really that path, whether at first base in left field or behind the plate or

at DH for adult rushing. So they're just trying to figure out the best way forward for him. They're trying to get him ready behind the plate or at DH for Dalton rushing. So they're just trying to figure out the best way forward for him. They're trying to get him ready behind the plate. They basically started incorporating something this spring where at the beginning of spring, they're doing mock game planning meetings and basically telling Dalton rushing and some of the other catchers in Camel. All right. This is let's prepare as if we're game planning for these four hitters in the National League

West. Like how would you, how would you create a game plan around them? How would you go about game planning for each of our pitchers and you have to lead the meeting? That's something that they sort of did that was different this year. A lot of it was geared towards getting Dalton rushing specifically ready and they did something similar with Will Smith in 2018. They basically just had him around the big league team all of September even though he was on the 40 40 man roster, just basically shadowing because they basically just wanted to show him, all right, this is what it looks like to be a game planning catcher with the Dodgers with all of our information, all of how we want to get guys ready.

So that's what they had rushing do this spring. And they're kind of just trying to finish off what it looks like because I wouldn't be surprised if he debuts this year. And what's that look like Cause I wouldn't be surprised if he did abuse this year. And what's that look like? I don't know. It depends on obviously Will Smith's health, how he's hitting and sort of how the rest of the pieces work. Cause he looks very blocked right now on paper.

I was also curious about the defensive transformation or trade-off he seemed to make last year, which was he led the league in caught stealing percentage for catchers, but then also his framing seemed to take a significant hit where he went from average-ish consistently to well below that. I don't know whether those things were connected or he was prioritizing one or the other, but I was wondering why that happened. And then also while we're on the subject of catchers, could you just explain Austin Barnes to me?

And just the fact that he seems to be the barnacle that can't be dislodged from this roster. That's a mean way to describe Austin Barnes. But he's kind of the Martin Maldonado of the Dodgers where it just, it doesn't quite make sense. Just his longevity and he's just surrounded by all these superstars and then Austin Barnes just still there after a decade and it's not like he's horrible and obviously they must think that he's bringing some value that is not showing up in war because if you look at his

war over the past several seasons, let's say 2019 to 2024, you add up all the playing time, 356 games, 1100 plus played appearances, 3.3 war. So you could do the math and divide that and it's not great. So what's going on with Will Smith's framing slash throwing and then why do the Dodgers love Austin Barnes? Yeah, I haven't, I mean, he has never said anything directly to that effect, but I think, I do think there was a little bit of a trade-off there. I think he sort of looked at it in 23 Dodgers really, especially as the rule changes were

implemented, like the Dodgers seemed like they were, it took them a little while to really adjust to the new rules, just partially because like their roster was already set, they weren't set to really take advantage of the base stealing rules, just because as a veteran roster, the way, there aren't a lot of guys in that line if you sort of point to they are, they're going to steal a lot of bases. There was part of that. I think they felt like they had issues controlling the running game, especially when the rules changes started.

I could think of a couple of series, especially against the Dimebacks where they really kind of ran all over them, especially in April of that year. And some of that Dave Roberts has attributed after the fact to Noah Sendergaard's presence. Like he just notoriously has been very bad at controlling the running game and didn't really put much thought into sort of trying to control it because he was trying to focus on being an effective pitcher again. So that was part of it. And I think they sort of understood like how much of a game-changer that is. And they felt like that was, I'm sure that was part of why they're really emphasizing that part of Will Smith's game. With Barnes, I mean, he's the longest tenure position player on the roster. His presence on the roster predates Dave Roberts' tenure. He has overseen

the entire thing. But yeah, he's the guy who David Roberts kind of described as like a culture center. He is a guy who in a lot of ways, they love his game planning, they love what he sort of represents, they love that he's sort of seen all these different eras. And he's a guy who is still a productive enough player. I know 2023 was rough for him offensively, and there were stretches where they kind of had to use him out there as a closer everyday catcher because Will Smith was dealing with Concussion so that's where maybe Exacerbated some things but they still feel really comfortable with them behind the plate Clinton Kershaw

Will often have Austin Baharn behind the plate for his start. They won't say it's sort of primary catcher, but like he often will be behind the plate when Clinton Kershaw starting and there's some value that they still feel like he brings he's in the last year of his deal and He's sort of still just riding it out. Like you mentioned like he is the guy who the numbers don't really quantify Although he I think he's like five for five and ABS challenges this spring So maybe there is some hope for Austin Barnes yet in the new era whenever that comes. But yeah, I think he's been around for so long and he means so much to the organization that they signed him to that contract extension.

And I was a little surprised that he's seen the end of it, but he is. And that's sort of a testament to him. Jared Ranere It's just the new AJ Ellis. Jared Ranere Yeah, in a lot of ways, yeah. Host You mentioned Dave Roberts' tenure, and now Dave Roberts' tenure will be extended Is there anything that we should read into that other than the Dodgers like Dave Roberts? I know Dave Roberts is gonna stick around longer

I mean, I think they were in a position where they kind of had to do it obviously coming in after especially after last year He was gonna be entering the last year was deal this year last year was I know it's coming cliche It's a sort of say this about Dave Roberts the last year was deal this year last year was I know it's becoming cliche to sort of say this but Dave Roberts the last spring last October is a sliding doors moment like that that's what it was like they were down to one of the NLDS odds are if they lose that series I would not have been surprised one bit if Dave Roberts was not the manager of the Dodgers this season but they win that series they battle off 24 consecutive scoreless innings they win

the World Series, and all of a sudden you're looking at Dave Roberts in a completely different pedestal, just because the resume is what it is. It is an unassailable resume. They have won two World Series over nine years there. They've never missed the postseason. Highest winning percentage ever for a manager with at least a thousand games managed. What he has done has put himself on a pedestal that is very limited, even in the long history of the Dodgers. You're looking at Tommy Lasorda, but Dave Roberts has more regular season success than

Lasorda. Walter Alston, but also, Alston did it in an era where you didn't have a postseason format to go through. What Dave Roberts has done, if anyone was going to get a record contract, it was him and sort of understanding what, even the day that credit council signed that contract, he was talking to him just about what the reaction was throughout the industry. And he basically said like, good on him for establishing the value for a manager because free agency in a lot of ways, the only way you can do that. And he did that. And it's, I don't think it's any coincidence whatsoever

that Dave Roberts' new deal, the average ending value of it is 0.1 million more than what credit council got per year because of the market that was set. And that sort of made it a no brainer on both parties to just keep this going. Yeah, both of the teams we're previewing today extended their managers for different lengths of time,

but only one of those decisions was kind of confusing because the track records are just diametrically opposite. So I guess Teoscar kind of falls into this category too of they brought him back. Well, sure, why wouldn't they? He had a great year and he loved being there. And so they wanted him to stay and he wanted to stay. So I don't really have a question, but he's back So my only question before the final one is about the team's age

because if Kim is in the minors the Dodgers once Tommy Edmond turns 30 in May will not have a Younger than 30 hitter on the roster and a lot of those guys are well beyond that point. The bench, super old, lots of mid thirties there. Some of the stars too. Now there's more youth in the rotation. It helps when you sign Yamamoto and then Sasaki falls into your lap. But this team is getting old. Now it's getting old with really good players who are still excellent and they

still project to be by far the best team in baseball, but is there any concern on the Dodgers part about whether the wheels start to come off or whether they have to start working in some younger guys at some point? I think working at some younger guys is an inevitability at this point, but like obviously, like we've kind of talked about over the course of this preview,

like Dalton Rushing is coming, Alex Freeland appears inevitability at this point, but obviously we've talked about over the course of this preview, Dalton Rushing is coming, Alex Freeland appears to be on the come as well, and I think they have a couple of really exciting outfielders, Jose DePaola and Zaire Hope. Their farm system is still very well regarded, and whether that's being used to acquire big league talent that's younger, or those guys actually come up and produce. I think that's something the Dodgers are very conscious of. That's why you've sort of seen trades kind of like the Gavin Lux trade or the Michael

Bush trade before, but they are really trying to, if they need to, off the edges of the roster, trade to try to get younger pieces in the farm system because they know that the taxes aren't nothing in terms of not just the money that you get to spend, but also having your draft pick pushed back, losing out on draft picks because you signed free agents with qualifying offers attached to them, in the case of Otani a couple years ago. Like you're gonna lose out on some abilities

to add young talent, but there are still ways that they feel like they can try to keep things young and productive in their farm system They still feel really good In terms of their ability to generate guys at least guys that are drawing interest to other teams Well, that can be flipped to keep acquiring big league talent to keep this going The thing that andrew freeman has kind of said ad nauseam for a few years is he says like every big market team that spends A lot is going to fall off a cliff at some point

They're trying to become that team that doesn't do that and That that means finding ways to be creative means finding ways To really just keep churning out of their farm system because they know that this is a veteran group That has largely been together for a long time or at least has been through a lot together And has accomplished on their big league careers But also understanding that there has to be a next wave that comes, there has to be more that comes and they have to maximize whatever window they can to add young talent, even if the draft picks are going to get pushed back, even if the international bonus money is going to get cut into, there are still ways to try to maximize it and it's sort of a more difficult

proposition for them, but they found ways at least to find the Alex Freelands in the third round. Delta Rushing was a second round pick who was the Dodgers' first round pick, essentially their first round pick that draft because they had to lose their first round pick or have it pushed back into the second round because of how much they spent. So they've still found ways to hit later in the draft, but they have to see how long they keep that going. Well, need I even ask our traditional closing question, what constitutes success for the Dodgers? I guess I'll ask it just for completeness sake, and you can answer that however you want. But I

I'll also toss in a little bonus aspect to that, which is basically how have the Dodgers reacted, aspect to that, which is basically how have the Dodgers reacted, if at all, to their perception, their reputation as the villains, the bullies of baseball now? Are they embracing it? Are they saying, yeah, we're the new evil empire? Are they completely tuning it out? Are they scoffing at it? Are they looking around the clubhouse and seeing all the superstars and saying, wait, are we the baddies? So is any of that happening whatsoever? Well, I mean, last year they, they didn't even win a hundred games. So there's that. But I think obviously it's hard to ignore it. Hard to ignore all the questions about it.

Hard to ignore the conversation around the sport about it. Hard to ignore when your friends are texting you saying, really, you signed that guy. Like they, there's a lot of stories of guys starting saying that, like you guys signed him too. saying really you signed that guy like they there's a lot of stories guys start saying that like you guys signed him too but I think they sort of acknowledge that they're in a special situation here to do something that hasn't been done in 25 years which repeats champions and I think that a thing that I kind of asked Dave Roberts about recently was the concept of like

all right how do you sort of keep that carrot for guys I sort of keep that pushing and they can use absolutely use the idea of them being villains of the sport in some ways as A carrot to push forward they aren't shying away from the word dynasty when it's something that they want to Aspirationally get to they want to be able to call this a dynasty So that's something that they are using to motivate them I think the idea of them being this team that's sort of seen as the idea of them being this team that's sort of seen as hated by the other teams. Like Dave Roberts said, like he'll bring up all the different things that Dodgers are doing in Japan to make other teams jealous. I think there is some definitely something that is leaning into that, understanding

that. And the way Andrew Freeman will put it is sort of it's a zero sum proposition. Like if every other team, 29 fan bases are upset, that means the Dodgers fan base is really happy, which is the thing that is obviously his more primary driver. All right. So be a dynasty is basically the goal that constitutes success. Slightly different from the goal in the second half of this pod, but we will get to that in just a moment. Always a pleasure to read you at the Athletic, to talk to you here. Bon voyage, I guess. Enjoy your trip. And I just read this morning that the cherry blossoms in Tokyo are projected to open on March 23rd, but I guess you can't stick around because you probably got to get back for covering Cactus League action.

Unfortunately, it looks like rainy weather while I'm there, but I'm still looking forward to it. Well, I hope you get to see some of the sites and just the baseball games themselves should be pretty interesting sites. I do wanna just relay a complaint if you wanna pass this along. This war of pranks that Otani and Roberts have going on, it's not working for me.

It's just, it's not really landing. You'd think it would, like I'm always here for Otani, just having fun off the field content, but this thing they have going where they're just like doing things with each other's cars and it's like super staged and everyone's filming it. And then they go and they're just like, oh, got me again. It's just, it's not really resonating.

I've got to say, I'm sorry. It dates back to last year too. Like there was a bit that were, I think it was Shohei Otani was going to pass Dave Roberts for the most home runs for a Japanese born player in a Dodgers uniform. And that, that was going to be the thing. He was going to get a car and because Joe Kelly got the car and then there was a toy car on Dave Roberts' desk instead. So yeah, it has certainly dated back to last year and I don't know if it's gonna keep going, we'll see. But yeah, I can relate to that a little bit.

Yeah, every time to retire the bit, the bit had a good run. And so have you on this very substantial preview segment. Thank you again, Fabian. Of course, always. Well, Kim did indeed get demoted along with Bobby Miller right after we stopped recording Meg said something about how we hadn't really talked about Michael Conforto and Fabian said that Dave Roberts had declared that Michael Conforto was his pick to click and I asked whether a pick to click was synonymous with a breakout candidate and Fabian said that Roberts had included the caveat that he didn't expect Conforto to be quite Te Oskar level, so not getting people's hopes too high.

As Fabian said, there's a cap to the click. It's more of a short-term, single-season thing. Plus Conforto's been too productive in the past to qualify as a breakout candidate for me, but you know that. You also know that we have a Rockies preview to get to, so let's take one more quick break, and we'll be back with Patrick Lyons. before I could breathe. They say I waste my time tracking all these stat lines, but it's here I found my kind.

We're all effectively wild. All right, it's time for some rock talk. That's what I'm calling it here. I don't know if anyone else calls it that but we'll make it happen We are joined by Patrick Lyons who does rock talk at Rockies insider. Hello, Patrick. Hey Ben. How are you? Thanks for having me today. Does anyone call it rock talk just me No, but it could be some new branding going forward perhaps. Yep, that's yours for free if you want it. I don't know if you do.

So we can talk about what the Rockies did this off season, although that might not take us that long because they're one of a bunch of teams that didn't have the most active winter. That seems to have been a theme of this season preview series. And we always wrap up these segments by asking what would constitute a successful season, but maybe we should start by asking whether it was a successful off-season.

What were the Rockies' goals going into the winter? Did they achieve them? Was there anything they tried to do that they weren't able to pull off? Well, with the Rockies, they keep their cards close to the vest. So they might publicly have goals and privately have different goals. But GM Bill Schmidt did say that cutting payroll was somewhat of a priority. And they were able to clear close to $15 million on the books by-

Success, we did it. Mission accomplished. Yeah, they non-tendered Brennan Rogers and Cal Quantrill and had some contracts coming off the books, like nine and a half million dollars to Daniel Bard, 13 to Charlie Blackman. So they saved a lot of money and then they just basically reinvested it

in bringing back Jacob Stallings and then signing Kyle Farmer and Tyro Estrada. You know, I think what would have made this off season successful, and I would probably give it a D in a sense, because on one hand, you've definitely freed up a lot more playing time for young players, at least seemingly.

There were a lot of non-roster invites that are getting the opportunity this spring to possibly take spots and playing time away from the young prospects that they've been touting for the last several years. But I think what would have made for a better grade is if they were able to swing a deal, something creative, a trade where they could have essentially utilized the depth that they've had in their outfield prospects because there's something like eight of their top 15 prospects are in the outfield. And some of them are closer to the majors than others.

But you guys cover baseball, so you know. There's only three outfield spots. So you can't play all of those guys. So I think they needed to be a little bit creative with utilizing some of that prospect depth to make them better, either in a creative old school baseball trade of prospect for prospect or something that would have been a young player that could have made an immediate impact in the majors because they just have too many outfielders down in the minor leagues.

I guess a related question to that is what is your sense of where the team sort of understands itself to be in the competitive cycle? Because I think, you know, we've seen an improvement in Colorado in the last couple of years in their willingness to play the young guys, right? To sort of see what they have in some of these either prospects of their own or post prospects who they bring in. But I feel like I still am having a hard time with them getting my arms around like what do they understand their timeline to be here? Because

to your point, they do have some exciting guys down on the farm. They also, you know, haven't really done much at the big league level in 161 games last year. So how far from being, you know, a surprise wild card contender do the Rockies think themselves to be? That's, that's the big question I think in, in many ways, because they have improved in a lot of different ways. But I think in the division and around the national league and in major league baseball in general, other teams have improved that much more.

So it's, it can be negated at times. They've been saying essentially since 2021 when John Gray and Trevor Story left, they're only a season removed from the Nolan Aronado trade. They've been really playing up those prospects saying, you know, we might be a couple of years away. Ahead of the 2023 season, Jim Bill Schmidt said at the winter meetings that, you know, we're close behind. We might be a year or so off from what the Arizona Diamondbacks are doing. And then of course the Diamondbacks go on to make the world series that year. And you

know, they're, they're still struggling to get back to the postseason or be even relevant. They now have six consecutive losing seasons this year by all accounts will probably be under 500. And for the first time in franchise history, they will have lost seven consecutive seasons. This has already been the worst six year stretch in team history. But if you ask the front office and people at the top of that organization, they do think that they're two years away and that maybe 2025 is the year where they can bridge the gap just a little bit.

A 10-win turnaround, again, is an improvement, but it only gets you to 71 wins. If they could do something like that, then maybe they make a little noise in free agency, get creative with trades this off season, and then maybe just maybe another 15-win turnaround is possible. That did happen between 2015 and 16 at the end of Walt Weiss's tenure as manager, where they did make great strides. They brought in Bud Black in 2017 and they were able to make the postseason.

So I think they're looking at that template as the one going forward, at least right now, 2027 could be when they get themselves back into contention, but so many things have to go right this season. Well, they did commit less money to players this offseason than any team other than the Marlins or the Cardinals. But let's talk about a guy they did commit a bunch of money to and maybe regret doing so, Chris Bryant, who started off this spring with an encouraging swing and everyone got pretty excited.

Bryant is back because he hit a home run that was an absolute bomb and it was 462 feet and it was off his bat at 112 miles per hour and people were raving about the bat speed. He hasn't totally torn it up this spring other than that home run. But that was just one swing and one connection that I had kind of counted out seeing from Chris Bryan again, given everything that we have read and heard about his medical condition and how chronic the descriptions have made it seem. So how is his health and what is the level of optimism and where and how much will he play if all goes according to plan? By all accounts, KB and the Rockies are saying that he's in a good place and he is, I think. I think he's certainly better than he's been in the past.

They really focused on a big off-season regimen of physical therapy. They even sent a lot of the team trainers out to Las Vegas, to Brian's home to really make sure that he was taking off all of those boxes, somewhat under their, their careful eye to make sure that he was following through with that. And, you know, he's, he's looked better and he's, he's been in a better spot now. But Black has said that Brian continues to rebound fairly well and recover after his spring games, but we've still yet to see him in back-to-back games up through the start of this week. He did play twice in three days. He played at first base for the first time

defensively all spring on Monday. So, you know, he's certainly trending upward. And that's been one of the biggest questions for both Brian and Bud Black is what necessitates a good season for Chris Bryant and how can he build momentum? And it's really just about being on the field, even if, you know, the numbers are certainly not going to be good because he's obviously not a mid twenties player like he was in the early part of his career with the Cubs. He's now 33 years old, but if he can play 120 or so games, that's something for him to build upon going forward because he still has three more years under contract after this season. And up to this point, his first three years have only produced 159 games played for the Rockies. So

that's been obviously somewhat of a sunk cost in a lot of ways and it's been very frustrating. But if he can be on the field and kind of show some of these young players how to grind it out, that's providing value. The Rockies are very much about getting that value off the field and clubhouse presence and whatnot and whatnot, because they're certainly not going to get their investment back on the field offensively with their DH now. 2023 made it look like the Rockies had kind of pulled one over on the Guardians with their Nolan Jones trade because he had a 137 WRC plus, he showed much improved outfield defense.

It kind of looked like it might be a bit of a mirage. He had a 401 babbip that season. And then last year, his season was pretty much undermined by injury. I'm curious where you think Jones is going to land because he didn't seem like a 137 WRC plus guy, but obviously the back stuff clouds our understanding of last year. So what are your expectations for him in 2025? I honestly don't know what the Rockies are going to get from Nolan Jones. And because of a lot of the prospects in AAA like Yankee, L Fernandez and Zach Vien will be interesting to see how long they stick with Nolan.

A buddy has even said recently that basically almost bringing into question that like Zach Veen has a lot to prove and Jordan Beck has a lot to prove at the big league level. And so does Nolan Jones. So he kind of threw his name in there because of everything that went down in 2024 with a low backs strain that he was dealing with for the entirety of the season. So 2023, you know, certainly had those flashes with the 20 home runs, the 20 stolen bases, and then defensively, you know, he's in the basically the 100th percentile in terms of arm strength, had 19 outfield assists. So, was really performing on all sides of the ball

for a guy that was only up in the majors with the Rockies for the final four months of the season. That's the guy that they hope that he can become again. And it remains to be seen if he's going to do that. Nolan is very hard on himself and can be very critical of his performances. And that's something that he is working through that I think he would benefit from, you know, as Clint Hurdle likes to say, showering well, like just letting it go, flushing the day's performance down the drain and moving forward with a fresh start. And if he can do that more, and if his body can hold up, then I think you're going to have a much better chance at him performing a lot closer to what he was like in 2023 than in 2024. Let's talk about Ezekiel Tovar, who made some major strides last year. He's one of

the best defensive short stops in baseball and last year he approached average offensively, which made him quite a valuable player. Is there more in that bat and how does he access it? I think there is a lot more left for him. He led the team actually in home runs last year with 26, which isn't bad for a guy in his age 22 season. I think the swing and misses are the biggest part of his game that he needs to improve upon. He struck out 200 times last year, the first time in Rocky's history when it struck out 200 times, but he had nearly 700 plate appearances. So he's getting those opportunities and when he makes contact, it's plate appearances. So he's getting those opportunities and you know, when he makes contact, it's pretty solid. So, you know, just being a little bit more selective at the plate,

I think is a part of his game that he can improve upon. It's kind of strange for a guy that plays shortstop to, you know, maybe not have as many steals as he does. He nearly was caught stealing as many times last year as he was successful, 6-5 on that. So he's a little bit more of a power bat in that way. And you saw that with his 45 doubles, which led the National League. So I think he's continuing to improve. His body seems like it's fully filled out.

So I don't think he can maybe make any more improvements in that defensively. He's an interesting player because he won the gold glove last year, the youngest National League shortstop to ever win that award. And yet if you go back for any Rockies fans, or even if you go on social media to try to find an otherworldly clip defensively of Tovar, there's not a lot. Like he's pretty just steady. He's almost Derek Jeter without the jump throw. And of course, Derek Jeter has his detractors too with a lot of the defensive metrics. Without the jump throw and also good at playing short stuff. Both of those things. I say it because Tyra Ostrada, who basically rubbed up,

who barely rubbed up against Derek Jeter when he was a prospect in New York, kind of threw some of those comparisons around. So it's that's sort of a loosely based comp, I think, in some ways. So he's a player, I think that's still continuing to develop and has just always been young at every single level. And he's still going to play for much of 2025 as a 23 year old. So I think there's still another notch that he can step up this year in 2025 and maybe uncork, you know, 30, maybe even 35 home runs in the middle of that lineup while also cutting down

on his strikeouts. Let's stay on the infield. I want to talk about a new guy and an existing guy. First, do you think this is sort of the level for Ryan McMahon? Obviously, this is someone who the Rockies signed to a six-year extension, although a very affordable six-year extension at $70 million. And then you mentioned the signing of Estrada. We might not normally linger on a $4 million major league deal, but that constitutes big activity for Colorado. So what do they expect from McMahon? And then what did they see in Estrada

to make them want to bring him into the organization? Right, McMahon has pretty much been a finished product for the last three, four years. There wasn't any player basically in 2020 that hit 20 home runs. But over the last five 162 game seasons, he's one of like 17 players who've hit 20 home runs each and every season. He's between 20 and 24 home runs. He's going to strike out a ton. He's going to have 70

RBI give or take. He's going to draw a decent amount of walks and he's going to provide gold glove caliber defense over at third base. And now that he's 30 years old, they're really, this really is the player that you're going to see going forward. Like they're really, I don't think is, is another notch for him going forward. And then that's okay. Cause that's still, you know, basically a three war player. As far as Tyra Estrada is concerned, you know, they got away from Brendan Rogers and went with a slightly more veteran type player in Estrada that they hope can be a lot more like the guy that was performing for the Giants

in 2022 and 2023 before having some injuries last year with San Francisco. And one of the comments that was made in the preseason by owner Dick Monfort, who was, you know, he said that he was trying not to put his foot in his mouth again and still ended up saying that between Estrada, Tovar, Michael Toldia, who they've been talking about his defense and he's really solid at first and, and Ryan McMahon at third base, that this could be one of the best infield defenses in the history of baseball. So you know, I don't think Estrada is that strong of a guy, but you know, maybe in a good year, he might be able to be on the fringes of gold glove caliber at second base. But you know, they're, they're hoping that he can, you know, steal some more

bases, stay healthy and get back to the guy that they saw a lot with the giants a couple of years ago. I loved that by the way, he was so close to reforming. He was like, I'm not making any just wild predictions this year. I'm not going to say the Rockies are going to win 94 games or play 500 ball. But then he uncorked the infield quite honestly. And if you like defense and I like defense will be the best defense maybe in the history of the game. Just

what made that comment pretty funny too is when he said he wasn't going to make any predictions, he paused for a second and then looked over at a table of reporters as if to say, so you're not going to get me this year. And still made those comments. And to be fair, they weren't as bad as, we might be around 500, which he made at the start of 2023 and eventually lost 100 games for the first time in franchise history. So it was an improvement.

Yeah. Just an update here, probably too late to ward off emails from Rockies fans, but Rock Talk is taken, or at least has been taken at various points in the past. According to Google AI, assuming it's not hallucinating this, there is or has been a Rock Talk Rockies baseball segment on KOA and it looks like maybe about a decade ago, the team itself did a video series where it interviewed players on FaceTime or something,

then they called it Rock Talk. And maybe also Thomas Harding at MLB.com about a decade ago did an interview series that was labeled Rock Talk, potentially. Rocks Talk. Yeah, it's just all the great ideas are gone, I guess. I might be back in public domain at this point though. That's true.

It just reminds me too much of Rock Chalk for Kansas. It feels like a Jayhawks thing. So that's why I would avoid it, like you're gonna confuse people. Rock talk? Rock chalk? Rock stuff? Well, great minds, I guess. Independently, we all conceived rock talk.

Why would we have you, by the way? I've been wrestling with this lately on the show. Colorado or Colorado? Oh my God. I mean, I have an authoritative source here, a Coloradan or Coloradans. So what do you say and what do those around you say? I don't even know now. Now that you said that you should have just asked me what the name of the state I live in is. Colorado? Yes. So we say you know put the rad in Colorado but it's Colorado. But you said Colorado. See, I think it's split because I've seen some polling on this and it seems like the natives are divided

on this question. So I think I'm okay persisting in saying Colorado, which is the way that I've always said it. I've adjusted to Oregon, I get it. It's definitely not as egregious as your Oregon nonsense. Look, I've put that behind me, but, and then I tried to wrap my mind around Nevada instead of Nevada, and I think I've gotten the hang of that, but then Colorado was just a pronunciation too far. So I'm happy to hear that maybe I don't need to go that far. Maybe I'm okay

as it is. Yeah, I think it's more raw than it is rad. Okay, I'm happy to hear that. We're gonna get emails, but. If Portland ends up getting a team, you know there's gonna be a home run calls of that's an Oregoner. So it probably doesn't matter in 10 years anyway,

how we pronounce anything. We're not gonna do that. Cause no one from there says that. It's not the same. Only the visiting broadcasters will say that. The New Yorkers, I guess. People from New York can do that, but then they got to make their peace with Houston Street, okay? I accept Houston Street. That's fair. I mean, frankly, I wouldn't expect anyone

to know that it's Houston. Why would they? Anyway. To go back to Montfort's prediction here, even if that was hyperbolic, he's not way off. This is a good defensive team and good defensive infield. This is a strength of this Rockies roster. And one thing that has not been a strength for them is getting strikeouts from their staff. And so if you are going to allow a lot of balls in play, then it's good if you can glove them. So is that the new strategy?

We're always wondering, how do you win in Coors Field? And the Rockies never seem to have had a consistent or effective answer. I guess one way to do it would be having a great defensive team because Coors Field is very large, just a lot of square footage. That's essentially been the strategy for the entirety of the franchise

is having a strong defense because at altitude, all-speed pitches just don't have the same movement. There's more balls put in play and you've got the second largest outfield in the game behind Kauffman Stadium and largest in the national league. So you don't get killed with home runs quite as much as pre-humidor. Now you get killed by singles, right? It's death by a thousand paper cuts. So the strong defense has always been really important for the Rockies and you go back and look at their most successful teams,

they had strong defense. In 2017 and 2018, you had DJ LeMahieu, Trevor Story, and Nolan Aronato from second to third. So that's always been something that they've played up because they know their pitchers are, are going to have to pitch to contact in that way, try to aim for more ground ball pitchers than, than fly ball pitchers and, and defense. Yeah.

Has always been a source of, of pride for the Rockies, you know, for, for quite a long time, because they just haven't had those guys that can continually get strikeouts at altitude. John Gray was able to do it for a little while, you know, with his 16 strikeout performance and his rookie season and who Baldo Jimenez certainly was great at Herman Marquez, at least before his Tommy John surgery certainly, you know, had a penchant for the strikeout, but otherwise it's not really something that they've aimed to try to seek in both the draft and in both player acquisition at the big league level.

I want to ask about some of the young guys who might get time at the big league level this year. You mentioned a couple, but as you look to their guys in the high minors, which of their prospects strike you as likely to see big league time this season, either because of underperformance and injury or because the club wants to give to see big league time this season, either because of underperformance and injury or because the club wants to give them some big league run and kind of see where they are from a developmental perspective? I really think Chase Doelander is, and there's a name for pronunciation, it is Doe, not Doll,

but Chase Doelander, I think is going to get a lot of opportunities. He still has a chance to break camp in the starting rotation, despite some struggles, 12, 15 ERA. It's spring training. It's only three outings. So take that for what it's worth. But they really just like his makeup and his maturity. And there are some injury concerns at the rotation right now in general. So they might give him that opportunity because he doesn't have anything else to prove at the AA level. He was fantastic there injury concerns with the rotation right now in general. So they might give him that opportunity because he doesn't have anything else to prove at the AA level. He was fantastic there last year, as well as in high A and started the futures game for the national league. So he did everything right

in his first professional season last year. And it'll basically come down to whether or not they want to start his season or even spend any time at AAA in the Pacific Coast League with the Albuquerque Isotopes. Do they want him to get that experience against more mature and more veteran bats at the big league level or in the minor leagues with the Isotopes? So I think Doe Linder is one of those guys that they want to get as much big league experience as possible. Also because Hermen Marquez and Austin Gama are going to be free agents after this year. And you've got Kyle Freeland who has a mutual option for 2027.

Antonio Cinzatella is a free agent after next year. So this starting rotation that you've had together for a while isn't going to be around much longer. So you, you've got to transition. You've got to give some opportunities to these young guys. And Doehlender has just been checking all of the boxes so far in terms of, you know, just doing the right things. He had a four walk performance in his third outing, which was really uncharacteristic,

but otherwise, you know, he's given up a couple of home runs in the spring and just bounces back and doesn't seem to be fazed by it at all. So they like everything about his makeup. And I think he's the one guy that regardless of who's performing at the major league level, they're going to find some room for him if he's healthy, if he continues to be healthy, going forward to, to give him some big league playing time. So we talked about how good the defense is, but you gotta miss some bets at some point. And I understand the park effects of playing on the moon, and this is one area where I guess the humidor doesn't help. But when you are not just last, but last with a bullet, you're three

full percentage points essentially behind the angels who were 29th. It's just really hard to win that way. And I guess the good news is they only had the fifth highest walk rate in baseball. So it's just not a great combination. They did have the eighth highest ground ball rate. So that's something kind of keeping the ball on the ground, but it's just really tough with those types of peripherals to put together an effective staff and they've got to do better. So is there any sense that they're aware of that, that this is bad, that they do actually want

to get guys with strikeout stuff? Do they have any somewhere on the staff or who are coming along or is it a pitch mix issue? I just wonder whether they are accepting that this is as big an issue as it appears to be from afar. Like with a lot of areas where they have difficulty, they acknowledge that there's difficulty. They do talk about trying to make certain changes, but as we've seen in the last half decade, they've really struggled to get those answers and do enough of those things.

I think they at times can just write something off as being just not their way of play. Stolen bases is one of those things where they continue to be at the bottom of the league each and every year and they talk about stealing more bases and then ultimately they don't. As far as missing bats is concerned, they definitely have issues with that and their own bats get missed a lot too with the strikeouts. They're abnormally high for baseball. Seth Halverson has been one of those guys and Victor Vodnik, they've got two young relievers that you're going to see a lot this season that can blow 100 miles an hour and definitely do a solid job of missing bats. And really that's, that's one of the first times that they've ever had, you know, guys that can throw that fast. Like Julian Fernandez was one guy

who, you know, got passed around a lot in the, in the rule five draft a few years back. He's one of the few guys that were actually able to touch 100 and do a decent job of finding the strike zone. Halverson and Vodnik, they find the strike zone a lot more, they're a bit more consistent and they are able to miss bats. I don't think they've really made that a priority to target guys who can throw 100 miles an hour going forward. I think some of that could have to do with issues in developing

those players. Riley Pint was a guy that touched 100 and just couldn't find the strike zone whatsoever. He finally was able to make his debut in 2023. You saw him in the majors a little bit in 2024, but everywhere he went, he just couldn't find the zone and walked far more than he was able to strike out. So, harnessing those guys can sometimes just be a crapshoot and there's a high likelihood of those guys needing a Tommy John surgery. So, could that possibly be their MO that they're just avoiding those guys altogether? Very well could be because they certainly haven't targeted those guys as being players that they really want to be a part of the organization. Given some of the pitching issues, it is kind of incredible the continuity that they have

in that rotation where the majority of the 2025 rotation is essentially the majority of the 2017 rotation. It's kind of the same guys. It's Marquez, it's Freeland, it's Sensatella. So is it that those guys like being Rockies and they like having them around? It seems like that's been kind of a theme of the Rockies off the field too,

when it comes to just loyalty to people inside their organization or promoting from within or being slow to move on from people despite a lack of success. So what has led to that trio and maybe others sticking around for as long as they have? I think you hit the nail on the head with a lot of that. It's a combination of these players do like being a part of a loyal organization that does a really good job of taking care of their people.

And they, you know, they hire good, good folks in general, right. Behind the scenes that, that treat others well and other organizations do that too. And they hire good people that are also good performers at their job as well. Like that, that can also happen, but pitching at Coors Field is just a difficult task and a lot of guys don't want to do it. You know, the last time that they signed a free agent starting pitcher to a deal was Kyle Kendrick in 2015, one year, $5 million. So guys don't really want to come to Colorado and they will if you pay a certain premium,

but then at, even at that point, they have a certain track record of, of guys like first starting out with Darrell Kyle, who only stuck around for two years before they traded him. Mike Hampton, two years before they traded him. Danny Nagel, whose tenure in Denver ended with an arrest. So they are very much of the mindset where if something doesn't work once, they're not going to try it again. And when you have guys that are able to perform, even if it is to a four or five ERA or close to a five ERA, but can post 25 starts a year and be fine with pitching at altitude, you want to keep those guys around.

And I think that's one of the reasons why they did extend Antonio Sinzatella ahead of the 2022 season and extend Kyle Freeland, who's a homegrown guy in Denver that, you know, checks off a lot of really good boxes and he's a competitor and he's certainly had a lot of really strong spells over a period of time. If you go back and look at the 16 starts he made after his stint on the 60 day IELT last year, he was really solid. Not the guy that was fourth in the NL Cy Young award voting in 2018, but still a valuable commodity for everything that you could look at on the back of the baseball card of a John Gray and say, this guy's okay. He's not great. He's still got a nice four year deal, 50 plus million dollars from the Texas Rangers.

So these guys have value out there and they have even more value to the Colorado Rockies. So they want to keep those guys around and keep their names on the marquee so that when people do show up to the ballpark, they know who the players are on the field. They might not be happy with how they're performing, but they do know and they do have a familiarity and a sense of, man, I've been watching this guy for a really long time. For Freeland and Antonio Senzatella, this will be their ninth season in Purple Pinstripes.

For Jermen Marquez, this will actually be his 10th season. So it's kind of a combination of these guys are treated well, they're comfortable in this organization, they're appreciated. And the fact that, you know, the organization views them as, frankly, some of the best options that are out there to them because there aren't a lot of really solid pitching options that they can rely on going forward, either in free agency or either in a trade where they have to give up a ton of prospect capital and maybe not get back what they thought they

were getting. At least I think that's how they view it. If it's broke, don't fix it. That's how the slogan goes, right? I think that's it. There was a time when I was excited about Kyle Freeland. He was actually on this podcast and I think I wrote about him too. It was 2018, which was kind of a career year for him. And we were all excited because it was like, Kyle Freeland, he knows how to pitch at cores and he can defy gravity somehow and that didn't really turn out to be the case. But yeah, he's had a nice career.

I don't know how to recover from that quip except to say that there are also returners in the bullpen transition. You talked about Vodnik, There have been some other additions this off season. Talk to us about how this group lines up. Are they going to have a set closer? And if so, how are they thinking about piecing the endings together while they bridge to that guy? The Rockies and Bud Black are very traditional. So I think they want to go that route of this is the guy in the ninth inning for at least as long as that player is performing, unless they've got to make a move.

The organization does want to give an opportunity to Seth Halverson, who did debut last year. He's still a rookie, moved really quickly after being drafted in the seventh round in 2023. So he's been a fast mover and he was pretty solid once he came up last year, had a ton of success and really experienced the highs and lows of being a big league closer last year in Los Angeles, where he got out of a bases loaded jam in the ninth to get his first career save. And then the very next day gave up back to back home runs to Otani and Mookie Betts to walk it off. So, you know, he's, he's got a certain mental toughness to him, maybe a little bit more so than a Victor Vodnik, but Vodnik could have an opportunity. He had nine saves for them last year and probably would have had a

lot more had his IL stint not interrupted that flow he's been having. The team also has Tyler Kinley there who's a veteran that's, that's closed before. Again, I think they, they've been saying that they want to give that opportunity to one of the young guys, Halverson being number one, but Kinley can do a good job stepping up there. He does have some of that big league experience. Scott Alexander is a nice veteran lefty to have in your bullpen. Diego Castillo very well, you know, might make

this team at a camp as a non-roster invite. And then after that, I think one of the strengths of the bullpen is that they're going to have the ability to get away from the cold hand. And I phrased it that way because when you're pitching in Albuquerque, you're not going to be a hot hand ever. So they're not going to be able to tap into the hot hand, but they are going to be able to get rid of that cold hand. Either a guy that's pitched far too much and is fatigued, either needs to go on the IL or can get optioned down. They've got a lot of young players that still have their options from Jake Bird, Luis Peralta. They've got a lot. Jaden Hill, who they really like, Angel Chiviji, who had a couple saves last year. And I think that's going to allow them to stay fresh and give Bud Black a lot more opportunities

to put the best guy out there, put a healthy guy out there. Because last year they set a record, modern day record, I think of any day record, where they lost five games where they were leading by five runs or more in the ninth inning or later. So they had these like catastrophic losses all throughout. I think they were all in the first half too. So those are five more games that they're probably going to win this year because of the depth of that bullpen might not be veteran depth, but it is enough depth where you can go away

from that cold hand when you need to over the course of the 162 game slog. There's been so much written about the course field hangover effect, how just going from altitude to lower altitude, it makes it tough for the Rockies. When they go on the road, when they come back, they're constantly having to adjust to different pitch movement and they have had extraordinarily large home road splits. And it's not just the hitting environment at Coors, it's more than that. And I know they've tried various things.

And I remember Charlie Blackman really trying to be an innovator here when he was a Rockies player. Now he is a Rocky Special Assistant to the GM. And he was all about taking brating practice before the start of a series and trying to find a way to adjust to the new movement and high speed pitches and all of that. Have they done anything differently?

Are they still following the Blackman regimen? Do they feel like they have made any progress in combating that problem? No, I don't think they have. Again, it goes back to sort of pinpointing the problem and saying, that's just the problem and it's always going to be the problem. And there's no solutions to that. And to your point, Charlie Blackman, a player was the one who had to institute this, right?

To say, Hey, we got to try something different. We got to do something different that I think can help. They did invest in a pitching lab a couple of years ago in spring training, but by all accounts, the Rockies are still five to 10 years behind just about every team in terms of analytics, which is something they actually said at the end of 2019 during their media availability.

They were very clear that it wasn't a press conference. It was immediate availability. And, you know, but black basically said like, yeah, we're, we're behind in a lot of ways, but we're trying to make steps forward. So they have taken those steps, but it's been more on the pitching side than the offensive side. They brought in Hensley Mullins who they thought, you know, might be able to bring a change about, you know, so many of the strikeouts that they had under Dave Magadon, but that

really hasn't worked out so far. So I think they've, they've just kind of accepted things for what they are, which I think is unfortunate because a lot of people look at Coors Field as an opportunity to take advantage of your environment. I don't know that it's still there, but at one point in the visiting clubhouse, when you would go all the way down into the batting cage, which is all the way at the end of the visiting clubhouse, making it very inconvenient, which was probably a smart strategic move, but inside there on the wall, it says, welcome to But inside there on the wall, it says, you know, welcome to 52, 85,280 feet above sea level, you know, as, as somewhat of a, of a mind trick, if you will.

Right. And I think they should, they need to play up on that. A lot of people have said that get back to the Blake street bomber days where, you know, they were successful in, in 95 of just going out, hitting home runs and just something like that, which obviously can be a little bit hokey I think to some baseball people when there's probably some analytical evidence and data that you could possibly point to to take advantage of that environment. But trying something different is something that they are very reticent to do in a lot of different ways.

And eventually at some point they will try to do things differently and they won't just look at a lot of small sample size results and say, Hey, we've got something or we might get something and let's keep trying at that, but you know, until then they're, they're very much try once and if it doesn't work, that's just kind of how it's always going to be. Yeah. Shut off the humidor. Let's have some fun at least while we're losing some games.

Let's see some big flies. Have they staffed up at all to your knowledge in the front office? Not that there's a perfect correlation between the size of your R&D department and its effectiveness, but at times they have really stood out in the sense that they have just not employed a lot of people. So have they made any efforts there to expand the group? Not too much. It's a little bit bigger than it was, you know, a couple of years ago when they were essentially down to one, you know, they did hire Brian Jones to take over that department and, you know, he's done a good job, but he's, he's only one

person and his team is still on the smaller side, so they are taking steps to go forward. It's, it's kind of like how we started. There are improvements, but those improvements still fall behind the industry standard for what so many other teams are doing around the game. And I'm not really sure why they aren't investing a little bit more in that, but that's just kind of where they're at right now. I wanted to ask about one of the guys who I imagine they're hoping is going to reap

some of the benefits of good player dev. He's been a kind of controversial prospect, or at least controversial from our perspective, and that's Charlie Condon, who did not make our preseason top 100. Eric Longanagan's fairly skeptical of his swing. He fared better by some other publications lists. So I'm curious what your sense of Condon has been. He's obviously a good bit from the majors, but has seen some time in spring camp. So what is the latest on Charlie Condon?

Well, some of the numbers from 2024, you could say, and the Rockies are, and Condon certainly isn't making any excuses, but he was having somewhat of a thumb injury. So his poor performance has been attributed to that a little bit. He's a guy that wanted to go out and play. Hayes Bocan was in the middle of going to the postseason and winning the Northwest League. So he just wanted to play. He's a grinder. He wanted to go out there and didn't really care about his his performance in that way. So the Rockies conned in and I think a lot of fans are

are giving him a pass on that. And I think you should, but I've also heard certain concerns from folks about the swing and how there's, you know, there could be some issue with that. The Rockies have a track record of not really being too concerned about players swings. Benny Montgomery, certainly being one of those, a guy who has somewhat of a hitch in his swing that they selected early in 2021 out of high school from Pennsylvania. And he's kind of struggled. Injuries have certainly curtailed his path to the majors, but he's still a very toolsy guy.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with Condon because he played third base at the university of Georgia, but didn't get as much playing time at third base last year. Some of that I think has to do with Northwest league MVP, Calcaros being the third baseman there, but he very well could end up being another in a long line of outfielders down in the minors that are the Rockies top prospects. So this will be a big year for Condon.

It was somewhat interesting that he didn't get a big league invite, I think by some folks that don't know the Rockies well. Rockies don't typically give those kinds of invitations to young prospects. In many ways, with a lot of their guys, they dangle carrots to say, hey, work your way up to get this rather than, hey, we want you immediately to see what it's like on the big league side and to be rubbing elbows with a lot of the big leaguers. Condon has still had those connections with a lot of big league guys,

but just not in big league camp. So it really wasn't too much of a surprise and certainly not a knock on a guy that was fresh out of college. That's just not really how the Rockies operate. It's always so interesting to do the Rocky season preview segment. It's like a kind of cultural exchange. You know, you're like learning about customs from some unfamiliar land and our guest always has to explain, see, this is how the Rockies do things.

And it's just different from all the other teams. It just really always surprises us somehow. And speaking of those surprises, Bud Black is back, he got extended. Maybe that shouldn't actually be a surprise because again, we're talking about the Rockies and they tend to stick with people. But I'll read you something Joe Sheehan wrote back in January. Bud Black is entering his ninth season as Rockies and they tend to stick with people. But I'll read you something Joe Sheehan wrote

back in January. Bud Black is entering his ninth season as Rockies manager, living off the successes of the 2017 and 2018 teams. The Rockies have finished last three straight years, under 500, six straight. They're a half game ahead of the Nationals. It's the worst team in baseball in the 2020s. They probably fall into last this year

and it's not like the 2026 team is expected to make a big leap. Black deserves some credit for the development of Tovar, Doyle, and the others and he's tied to a terrible front office. Still, there are very few modern precedents for a manager keeping his job with this level of failure. So aside from the Rockies not wanting to let anyone go seemingly, which is a quality that I would appreciate in other industries sometimes, other areas of government. But why did they decide that they want to continue to be in the Bud Black business? That article by Joshian was interesting because I looked it up this off season too, like how

many managers had lost a hundred games in back to back seasons and have come back and you know, a lot of them were player managers or they were expansion teams. Connie Mack, of course that happened to him, but he was also the owner of the team. But he's not going to fire himself. But you know, in recent memory, Derek Shelton and Mark Hotsay who are still managing their teams for better or worse also had had those back-to-back 100 loss campaigns. But ultimately to your question, the Rockies, they just like to kick the can down the road, I think a little bit and have some of their decisions made for them. It's like the depth that they have, the roster crunch with all of the prospects. you know, I think a lot of teams would look at that depth that they have and say, okay, let's, let's put our money on these

three or four guys and let's utilize that prospect capital and utilize those assets to get better in other ways. But they don't do that and just allow it to play out, you know, itself and it'll, it'll work itself out rather than they work it out. And I think that in some ways was the approach with Bud Black. out itself and it'll, it'll work itself out rather than they work it out. And I think that in some ways was the approach with bud black. I've loved having him. He's been the only manager that I've covered since I started doing this in,

in 2018 and great baseball guy. But I think that the direction of the team is still just so uncertain. You know, obviously on one hand you can say, well, the direction hasn't been good, but I think they might in some ways be worried about what the direction of the team would be like with somebody else. That if they were to bring in maybe a young brash manager, someone that they give an opportunity to,

whether it's somebody in-house or somebody from outside the organization, there might be certain questions that are asked about why are we doing things this way and we should have this happen. And I think striking a balance too, between what the front office wants and what the manager wants, which, you know, I really only know about what the Rockies do, but from what I've seen on the outside, looking in, you know, a lot of the decisions that are made by teams and in terms of rosters is made by the front office.

These are the guys that you have and here's who you're going to play. And there's maybe a little bit of wiggle room for the manager. With the Rockies, I think they really do value what their manager, and in this case it's Bud Black, has to say in terms of that roster construction and, hey, let's keep this guy around.

Maybe we don't wanna trade him because then who do we have at this position or who do we have batting cleanup? So I think that there could be too many cooks in the kitchen. And I wouldn't put that on Bud Black because he's the manager. A lot of front offices don't listen to their managers in that same way. And so if the front office is going to do that, I think that's more of a knock on the front office.

So I think they'd be worried about what could happen if a new manager might make too many waves and could kind of disrupt what they have going on. And that might be one of the reasons why, you know, Bud Black is still around. There's also the element too of he was there for so many of the young players that were coming up in 2017 and 2018, had a ton of success with them going to the postseason in back-to-back years for the first time in franchise history that maybe there's still some more

of that, you know, prospect whisperer in there for Bud Black with this next crop. I think it's kind of a combination of all those things. All right, well, that takes us up to our final question, I suppose, which is what would constitute success for this season? And as usual, this requires reading some sort of tea leaves to figure out what the Rockies think a successful season would be, but how would you gauge whether this is a step forward for the organization?

Man, that's, that's a very loaded question. I think because I think there's just a huge range in, in possible outcomes. Maybe not that huge, but I think, and I've been saying this a lot on, on my podcast that, you know, you could lose a hundred games again, but give a ton of playing time to all of these young players to figure out what you've got, which frankly they should have been doing the last four years and they really hadn't until the second half of last year. That would be much better than maybe winning 70 games and having somewhat of a 10 win turnaround, but you're doing it with maybe the, the Sean Bouchard's or

the Nick Martini's Diego Castillo, a lot of veteran guys that aren't necessarily going to be around in a couple of years. So I think a success would, first off, just avoiding a hundred losses, which is, I know, kind of sad and maybe laughable to say that's one of those things, which I think they will do. I think 67 wins is probably that, that median of what's to expect. They've been fairly fortunate so far on the injury front. And if they do have more injuries, like they sustained in 2023 with Marquez and Sinzatella both needing Tommy John, and really that played out over 2024.

And they were left out there with not enough depth. They've got better depth now, but it's just not experienced depth. It's young depth. It's young players that if somebody does go down, can they immediately jump in and be effective? And if they have some of those growing pains, then you are looking at a lot closer to a hundred losses again, but they don't feel that way. And I think success is having Doyle, Breton Doyle or Ezekiel Tovar jumping up

another notch because they need a superstar that that's one of the biggest things that they need besides just a lot of really good contributing players. They need a star. They need somebody to elevate the team and put the team on their back as much as one player can in baseball and be a leader too. With Charlie Blackman having retired, there isn't an obvious leader to step up. Ryan McMahon has that most experience. So finding a leader, finding a superstar and figuring out which young players are really

going to contribute in a big way over the next couple seasons. That would be success for them. And also having the best defensive infield ever. Important criterion. Yes. We got to remember to check back on that at the end of the season. By the way, can't let you go without asking about the spring sensation of Jeffrey Yan. Tell us a little bit about the Jeffrey Jan experience and is this going to be just

a spring story or could it be a full season story? People are not going to be happy when I say I think it's a spring story. You know, even when it happened in the off season, it went viral in a lot of different ways and people got excited and I think some people got excited because they thought it might be somewhat of a change in ethos for the Rockies because they don't typically have flashy players. That's something that they can kind of, I don't want to say tamp down in some of their young guys, but you know, Zach Vien went from having purple hair to

blonde hair. He went from having a bat flip that went back to the pitcher to kind of calming, uh, his, his play just a little bit. So he's an exciting guy, certainly to have, they're going to love him in Albuquerque in AAA. He's already been reassigned to minor league camp. The Rockies don't have a ton of lefty depth right now. And Lucas Gilbreth is one of those guys that it remains to be seen how he can bounce back from the surgery he had this off season. So maybe they find

a spot for him in the majors, but a lot of that I think is going to have to do with his performance. So it's not impossible. I hope I'm wrong, but I would probably have to say this might just be a spring story. Sorry. I also hope you're wrong, but it's been fun while it's lasted. Well, thank you for previewing the Rockies, really serving as a Rockies whisperer, Rockies interpreter, just trying to tell us how you pronounce the name of your state and how you understand the state's baseball team. And you can read the coverage that Patrick provides at Rockies insider at Just Baseball. You can also hear him on the Rockies Insider podcast. He's on YouTube, he's on TikTok, he's everywhere.

We'll link to all of his outlets. Thank you very much, Patrick. I thank you so much for having me. This has been a pleasure. We've enjoyed the Rock talk. TM. Well, producer Shane informed me that in 2007, the Rockies actually did trademark Rocktober.

The Rockies filed applications with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on October 4th asking for exclusive nationwide rights to use of Rocktober, not only on t-shirts and bobblehead dolls, but stuffed animals, Christmas stockings, baby booties, and more. There was seemingly some concern that this could interfere with classic rock radio stations use of the term, and it would appear that this trademark was granted, because Shane found that it has been renewed as recently as 2023, if only the team could trademark playing in October. Fortunately Rock Talk is evidently still fair game. You can support Effectively Wild on Patreon. Just two more previews to go, Yankees and White Sox will have that later this week,

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Thanks to Shane McKeon for his editing and production assistance. We'll be back with another episode soon. Talk to you then. I wanna know about baseball I wanna know about every single team I wanna know about setbacks and fan graphs and about oh oh oh, Tony I'm a very modern man I'm a very modern man I'm a very modern man

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