Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2340: Kick Me Out of the Ball Game

Episode Date: June 27, 2025

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Dicky, er, Richard Lovelady’s short tenure with the Mets, round one of Paul Skenes vs. Jacob Misiorowski, the nature of modern pitcher’s duels, a Jacob-related fun fact, updates on Juan Soto and Jo Adell, revisiting childhood favorites through the lens of advanced stats, and public funding for the […]

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Effective moral sauvage. Effective moral sauvage. Effective moral sauvage. Effective moral sauvage. I'm Raleigh Fangraves and I am joined by Ben Lindberg of The Ringer. Ben, how are you? I'm morning New York Met Richard Lovelady or Dickie, hard to say. But after we spent all that time trying to determine whether we could call him that or not on our last episode, Met's designated him for assignment already after a single outing which didn't go that great. Yeah, he has been DFA'd and it was widely reported that Richard Lovelady was designated for a summit because that's print. So I guess

it's the official first name. about the amount of time that we spent on that. Did we talk about Dickie Love Lady longer than his outing with the Mets lasted? I think the possibility is there. Look, you gotta embrace your opportunities when they present themselves, Ben. You can't just be, you know. Hopefully he'll catch on somewhere else. And insist upon wearing the number 69.

Yeah, wherever he goes next, we will know that we can call him Dickie, at least in certain contexts. And yes, I guess that jersey idea though, that would have been a big seller, even if Love Lady himself was no longer on the Mets. You got to imagine that that thing would have continued to sell. So missed opportunity. You don't want to call it an in memoriam

because that suggests he's dead and he's still in a live person even if he's not currently in New York Met. And I guess there are rules about it. If you're an active player, they probably wouldn't be able to like do a Jersey, but they should try, or the next team, the next team. Well, the day after Richard Love Ladies, Dickie Love Ladies, Metz debut slash

Swan Song, we got round one of Misarowsky skeins. Were you tuned in? Were you watching this one? Yeah, this was appointment viewing. Anyone who was able to watch a day game probably was, any baseball sickos out there, were certainly watching the Brewers versus the Pirates, which would not always be the case. But when you have Jacob Misurawski

and Paul Skeen's facing off, then you gotta watch. I would say that it was a slight letdown, maybe, after the big buildup, just because it didn't last all that long. I mean, that's maybe the problem with pitchers' duels these days or prospective pitchers' duels is that often the pitchers you're anticipating performing are not actually there most of the game, which was the case.

Misrowski went five, Skeens went four, right? Because he wasn't at his best and his defense let him down. Yeah, it wasn't actual errors, but it was kind of errors. And it was, you know, weak hits and bleeps and bloops and things, but it didn't go great for him. And Misrowski was great yet again, but only stayed in for five. So that's the issue you're going to get, especially with young starters these days. They're just not going to stay in that long typically, though Skeens has

certainly gone deeper into games than this, but it was overwhelming stuff on display. Oh yeah. And I saw a stat, I think it was sport radar said that this was the highest combined fast ball velocity by two starting pitchers in the same game. Average velocity, I guess it was Mr. Oski's 99.5 and Skeen's 98.5. So it's rare that you're going to see Skeen's outstuffed in a game, but arguably that happened here. I think that a thing I kind of failed to appreciate

about the potential experience of watching Mizorowski is that, and I shouldn't have been, because this sort of manifested to his detriment, candidly, during his spring breakout game, but he's an emotional young guy, you know? Like him coming off the mound when he's gotten out of a jam, when he's led a couple of base runners on, but he's wiggled his way. He's, he gets pumped. He's a balletic kind of guy. He moves in a very fluid and graceful way. And so he does this little

hop off the mound and he was going, yeah. And it was cool. I was, this is exciting. You know, you're an excited young guy. I felt bad for Skeens. You know, it's like normally, I mean, maybe it's a pleasant change of pace in a weird way because normally it's the offense that kind of does him in or the lack thereof. And this time it was like, to your point, they weren't called errors, but they were closer to that than good fielding if we were going to put an adjective on it. So it felt bad for him. But also, you're not always going to win. He knows that. Yeah.

I guess sometimes the bullpen lets him down too. Any facet of that team could potentially let Paul Skeens down and the offense too because the lack of run support. It's kind of an across the board lack of support really. But Mr. Oski's been sometimes literally unhittable and sometimes close to it in his brief big league career, three starts now. So these young starters, they throw hard.

Chase Burns came up for the Reds, made his debut and at least early on also looked dominant. So yeah, I don't want to valorize velocity too much because I do think that that sends the signal that you should throw as hard as you possibly can at all times and teams send that signal and the financial incentives of the sport send that signal as it is,

but it is pretty overwhelming to see these guys go at it like that. So yeah, hopefully that is the first of many matchups between those two. It'd be nice if they're in the same division after all. And so they could be tangling plenty of times over the course of their careers. Let's hope, at least, let's hope that they hold up

and are able to face off again. But it is something I think about these days when I'm getting excited about a pitching matchup and then I think, you know, these guys aren't going the distance most likely. So once the sixth or seventh inning rolls around, it's just gonna be generic bullpen guys facing off most likely.

So you kind of, you hope for the fireworks before then. I saw someone and I am now forgetting who's my apologies, but I saw someone and I am now forgetting who's my apologies but I saw someone on blue sky comp Miz to DeGrom without the command and I immediately thought of you and was worried on your behalf I was like oh Ben's gonna be so upset. Ben's gonna be so nervous. Yeah well Jacob DeGrom was great on the same day actually. Sure was. He was excellent. Have you ever been less interested in a fun fact than that one? I mean, not to knock our good friends at Optistats, but have you ever felt less upon hearing a fun fact?

It's not even that you don't like it or think it's tortured or taxed, but I'm sorry again to our good friends at Optistats, but I've never felt less upon hearing. Part of this is that I will admit I ate an entire box at office heads, but I have never felt less upon hearing. Part of this is that I will admit I ate an entire box of mac and cheese at like 10 a.m. because we're recording a little earlier than we do. And I was like, oh, wow, I gotta eat lunch beforehand.

So maybe all of the feeling has been taken up by the carbs that are rapidly expanding in my stomach. But okay. It's not an uncommon name. It's not like it would be one thing if it was like, this is the first day that three pitchers names. I don't know. I, I, I hesitate to say a name is uncommon because there's always going to be a con. About Otto. Otto, right. Otto, Otto or Alejandro. That's actually a very common name in some contexts, but you know what I'm trying to say. Like it's not an uncommon name and it's not an uncommon name, particularly in the baseball

context. We got to do something about all these chases. I'm telling you. Yeah. Oh yeah. It's out of control. The Tigers just called up Dietrich Enz, 34 year old Dietrich Enz. So yeah. Dietrich? Yeah. The early 20th century, late 19th century German names making a major comeback where the Kaisers, it's time for a Kaiser comeback maybe. Not a literal Kaiser to be clear. No, but the fact that Jake or Jacob is pretty common, I guess, makes the fact more fun or makes it more impressive that there hadn't been three.

Does it? Well, if there had been no Jacobs previously, then it would be even less notable that there had never been three Jacobs pitching as well on a day. It amused me. It made me smile. But I was interested just because I'm always interested in DeGrom and now interested in Miz and don't sleep on Jacob Lopez, who was the third of the Jacobs

who pitched well for the A's as well. But yeah, it was one of those where you start with the idea of I wonder if this is the first time ever. And it was, and it was a notable day for pitching in general. I think it was Sarah Lang's noted that there had been seven team shutouts on the day, and it was tied for the second most shutouts on a single day in MLB history, and the first time since 2015. It has happened 11 times, I believe. But yeah, good pitching performance across the

board on that day. Yeah. And some of them were even good in losing efforts. You know, like George Greer looked good. Yeah, the other thing about the early career fun facts, because Sarah had one about Mrowsky too, that he's allowed three hits total in three career starts, as I just said, sometimes he's been unhittable. And that's the fewest of any pitcher in his first three appearances, at least in the last 125 seasons, minimum 14 innings pitched.

And the thing is that he probably didn't have that many more innings pitched than that. And that's the other thing is that I see that genre often of like fewest hits allowed, fewest runs allowed in first X starts of a career. And that also is kind of an error effect because he's thrown 16 innings in three starts, you know, he went five in that most recent start. If this were some earlier era, then probably he would have thrown more innings and thus he would have allowed more hits and runs, no matter how good he is. And so, it's kind of that barely clearing the minimum effect,

where the less you pitch, the more extreme your performance can be in that small sample. And so, if you're judging against all pitchers historically, then they probably would not have pitched that few innings in three starts if they had been pitching well, which is kind of a condition of that fun fact as well. Yeah, I would really be curious, and I imagine we're going to get an answer to this question probably in short order. I will be curious to see sort of how his velocity trends over longer outings, because it's not as if he wasn't throwing hard.

It's not like this is a totally new spike or anything like that. Like he's a hard thrower. But will he be able to sustain quite the same way if he's going seven, eight? What if he does? That'd be so exciting. But you'd be so nervous. So maybe I don't, maybe I want it to taper for your nerves, Ben. Man, it's a lot of mac and cheese I ate.

I'm really, I'm like, oh, I have some carb experience I'm going through right now. I wish you well with that. Thank you. We'll see how this pod goes, I guess. One Soto update, his WRC plus on the season. I had a one Soto update. I have his player page up right now.

We have one brain, Ben. Oh, okay. One brain. Yeah, Wonsoto update is that Wonsoto's good. Still good. Wonsoto's good. Yeah, 152 WRC Plus on the season, getting back into typical Wonsoto territory.

He's been the best hitter this month, June 236, WRC Plus. He's got 10 homers this month. So it doesn't take that long with a hitter of his caliber. You look up all of a sudden and you realize, oh yeah, he's more or less delivering the performance that he was signed to deliver. 509 Woba in the month of June. You know my favorite fact about Juan Soto in the month of June? The Mets are 11 and 12. Can't predict baseball, Susan.

Yeah. Things were going better for them when things were not going better for him. But yeah, he's got 19 home runs now, which is another Sarah Lang's fun fact tied for his most through 81 team games in a season with last year when he was also playing in New York for a different team and was fantastic. So yeah, he's walked more than he has struck out as is typical for Juan Soto. His backup is still at 254. His expected weighted on base is still way above his actual. So there's room to improve here. And yeah, we know about the defensive limitations and the base running limitations.

He's negative eight according to stack cast outs above average or negative eight fielding run value as well in right field for the Mets this season. So that's not great, but on the whole, you know, yes, they're stolen nine bases already. How about that? But yeah, he's going to hit his way to being immensely valuable. And now Mets fans, if any of them were impatient, wondering when they were going to see the Wonsodo that their team signed.

Well, here he is. And he is in fact spectacular. I don't think I've seen any Mets fans complain about Wonsodo at all the rest of the year. I think they've been so level-headed, you know? They're like, let him adjust. He had to move, maybe, presumably. Could have moved, you know? With a contract like that, you can buy whatever house you want.

Yeah. But I don't know. I've, I've never known Mets fans to be reactionary in any way. Um, always very mellow as a group. I know that the defense hasn't been good, but I don't feel like he's had any, you tell me, I don't know if you're watching a lot more Mets than I am, but it doesn't feel like he's had any notable, like, dramatic miscues or anything like that. He seems like he's playing on Soto's defense,

which is, you know, like, kind of meh, but it hasn't, like, declined in a way that makes you think, oh, gosh, something bad's happening here. He's just being himself. But, man, he's been quite, quite good over the last month, and that team has been just mired in a funk. And now they don't even have a love lady. Like, what will they do with themselves?

Yeah, yeah. It's been pretty impressive to see him round in to form. You knew it was gonna happen. You knew it was gonna happen. It's not the first time. Yeah, no one was seriously worried or hopefully they weren't that suddenly he was just not going to be

himself anymore. But sometimes it takes a little time to get going and you can be a slow starter. And yeah, it's not the first time even that a Mets superstar has started slow after signing a big contract with that team or, you know, debuting and they're not all there were cracked up to be immediately. That was the case for Carlos Beltran in his first season with the Mets. That was the case with Francisco Indore. And those guys, they eventually made good. There is, I think I referenced the concept of a transition tax, which is something that Bill James

did research about when he was with the Red Sox, so it's not public, but he had found that there was something to the idea of when players change teams or when there's a big free agent signing that sometimes there's sort of a slow start. And I don't know the exact parameters about it. I actually emailed with him earlier this month because I was trying to figure out what exactly he meant by the transition tax because sometimes it's been portrayed as a big free agent with a big contract and and sometimes a big market too and

He said I did do research about 2012 or 2013 which found that players who switch teams Are significantly more likely to have serious down years than comparable players who do not switch teams. I remember now that this research was triggered by the Red Sox signing of Karl Crawford. I found that 22% of players who switched teams in the offseason had serious declines in performance in the next season, as opposed to 17% of comparable players with the groups balanced by age, defensive position, and established value. 17% to 22% is a 29% increase. So I found that there was a 29% increase in serious

one season declines for players changing teams in the off season. And I ran this by Russell Carlton as well. And he kind of confirmed something similar, at least across the board that, and this is accounting for the fact that if you're a free agent, signee, you're probably on the older side,

and maybe you're getting that contract after a big walk year, platform year, and maybe you could be ripe for regression, but Russell found even after controlling for that, that team switchers maybe roughly half a win worse and I don't know what exactly Bill looked into when he was trying to find like serious declines, but there's something to that and you can see why there would be if you're changing teams

just in general there's just more that you have to deal with. Like you're making new friends on the team, you're meeting lots of people, you're learning the ballpark, you're learning your commute to the ballpark, you're finding somewhere to live. Now, Wonsodo didn't change cities, obviously, this season, but he still switched organizations and there were even higher expectations on him with the gigantic contract. So I don't know if you narrowed it down to players who were free agents and signed giant contracts in addition to just the team switching effect.

I don't know, maybe it would be more pronounced or maybe not. But sometimes it is the case that the player starts a little slowly and then maybe it's their second season with that team or maybe in Wonsoto's case it's, I don't know, their third month or something with the team. But then they're firing on all cylinders and you see the player that was hailed. I think that just fundamentally, if you arrive at a team, first of all, there's going to be the free agent, non free agent distinction, which is a meaningful one to draw. And then I think there's also something to the notion that like our expectations of his disruption, maybe they would be more profound if he had just been a national the entire

time. But you know, you become a Yankee. You're not there because you chose to be. You've been traded. You're moving back across the country. You know you're going to be a free agent in a year. And I don't mean to suggest that he was like one of the sad men on Reddit where they're like, does this room look good? And it's like their mattress on the floor with like a PS5 and nothing else. And you're just like, wow, you might be single forever, my friend. We don't know.

Like maybe it works out for them, but you worry, right? The PS5 part, that sounds okay to me, but the only a mattress. Yeah. You need somewhere to sit while you're playing the PS5 that is not on the floor. Ideally, though in college, I did have one of those gamer chairs in my dorm room where it was like on the floor, ideally. Though in college, I did have one of those gamer chairs in my dorm room where it was like on the floor. And it was like one of those rocking, not a kind of a rocking chair,

but like, you're sitting on the floor and you can kind of rock on it. It was good for a dorm room. I guess the point is that what is good for a dorm room is maybe not the best later in life. You want to upgrade your appointments perhaps. Yeah. You're just allowed to be comfortable even if you're single, I guess is my point. Men seem to struggle with that more than women, again, generalizing, but accurately in my

opinion. I'm not saying that that's what Juan Soto's Living Street was, but one can imagine that especially if you know, like I'm going to reach free agency come the fall and I don't know where I'm going to end up that you're not nesting in quite the same way. So you probably did move and it's a new organization. You have all these new coworkers, you know, it's like, does your key card work? Yeah. All kinds of stuff. Like it just seems, it would be surprising to me if

there wasn't some penalty to that disruption. And I don't imagine it being particularly lasting or profound, but it seems intuitive that there would be something going on. Cause you know, these are people, their lives have been disrupted. And I can't imagine what it would feel like to like bear the scrutiny that he did over the winter as he was making his decision in much the same way that like, I can't imagine

what it must have felt like when he got traded and he didn't sign an extension. And we had to not talk to Scott Boris while I was at Dodger Stadium, because he was busy and we were like, why did he cancel? And then we were like, oh, that's why. He was a little busy figuring that out. So it seems natural that there would be

some kind of fall off. And I do love that here's this like, sort of established phenomena, right? And you imagine it washing over different guys in different ways potentially, because, you know, maybe if you're at a different phase in life, you're more or less disrupted by that kind of a move. If you have to maybe one Soto actually had an easier time of it because like he, at least

as far as I know, is like, you know, he doesn't have children. So he's not like, Oh God, I have to think about what the schools are like. And where do the Yankees and Metzal live? Probably in New Jersey, right? And like in Westchester, are they like Westchester people? Probably. I don't know, it varies. Yeah, probably varies.

But anyway, all of that to say, like he didn't have to worry about that stuff, again, as far as I know. And so, you know, it might be less of a profound impact, but maybe it's a bigger impact because this is your big chance. This is your shot to really determine the course of your career. And again, there was so much scrutiny and everybody was waiting for Soda to sign and as Soda signs, so goes the rest of

the market and there's all this stuff. And we were all freaking out, not us, because we're not Mets fans, famously even killed, but also freaking out. And all of that amounted to like still a 1.16 WRC Plus in March and then a 1.22 in May. And then he was like, oh yeah, I'm Juan Soto. You should all relax. True 36. Yeah. Some of the costs that come with displacement are minimized. If you are a major leaguer, especially a star for the rest of us, for normals, if

we move, that can be quite disruptive. And in some ways, I would think that if you're a superstar, well, you can get out of some of that hassle, you can pay people to move you if he had to move. He was quite well off even when he was with the Yankees, so he may very well be living in the same place. But even if he had to move, okay, you have someone pack up for you and you're moving from some luxury place

to another luxury place and you can just pay people to take all of the sweat out of it if you want to, and you're moving, you're part of this fraternity of baseball players. So yeah, you do have to be in a new clubhouse and make new friends and everything, but also you know a lot of those people and they know you and your reputation precedes you. And so it's a little bit different from if you're just a regular person

and you're moving to a new city or even moving within the same city. It's just, it can really throw you off your game. And yeah, being very wealthy can maybe smooth out some of the bumps on that road, but not all of them. That's the point is that, yeah, it can still, and you know, some of these players, of course, are moving from a different country sometimes, and are familiarizing themselves with that, and assimilating culturally, and the language barrier, and all the rest of it. And so, yeah the younger you are and the bigger that move, the more it can actually

impact your play. So we should be mindful of that. Yeah. You know, you can pay people to sweat for you, but you're still going to sweat the move, right? Cause you can't have someone else feel your anxiety for you. And like we've gotten a very unfortunate reminder of this, this week with what happened with Ketel Marte during that White Sox series, but you just never, you don't know what's

going on with people, you know? And I'd like to hope this is perhaps granting this person entirely too much credit. I'd like to hope that the guy who heckled Ketel and made him cry didn't know the reality of the situation, right? Didn't understand what had happened to Ketel Marte's mother for those who missed this story. Like, there was a fan in Chicago who yelled something at Ketel Marte. We don't know the exact details of what he said, but it clearly pertained to his mother who tragically passed away in a car accident a few years ago. He and his mom were quite close and it was very upsetting to him. And, you know, he heard it and Dora Lavello heard it and he cried on the field

afterward because it's clearly still a very tender spot for him. This fan was rejected and now has been banned from all MLB stadiums, which good. I'd like to think that he was doing something that was rude and ill-considered, but perhaps not as pointed as this incident suggests, but you don't know, right? You don't know what's going on with folks, what they're dealing with at home, you know, what the state of their health is. We just don't know. And you can boo all you want.

I'm not saying they're professionals. They understand that that comes part and parcel with it, but I don't know. It's just, I'm not saying we all have to walk around imagining that every person we're encountering's mother has died and that they are feeling understandably raw about it even years later, but like a version of that might not serve people badly. Yeah. I want to return to Kotel and quote unquote fans in a second here. Did want to note though when it comes to game playing and the impact on performance,

Jeff Passon profiled Jacob Wilson, yet another Jacob of the A's, and Wilson, I don't know if he's a PlayStation owner because apparently he plays on PC, but Wilson said, kids are going to love this one, parents are going to hate me. This is like the one weird trick that parents are going to hate. I am a big believer in video games. It's fast decision-making strategy.

I think that gets me ready for the game because when you're in the box, you have to process a lot. So there's some days where I'll wake up and I'll play video games and then I'll go to the field and I'll have a good day. Some days I won't play and don't see the ball well. I think it really helps me train kind of the decision making that I have to make six, seven hours later at the baseball field. So Jacob Wilson batting 340 something.

It's all because of Fortnite. I'm sure it's not all because of Fortnite. There's a lot of other work that goes into it and he's also the kid of a Major Leaguer. I thought you were going to say there are a lot of other games he plays. Well that too probably. I don't know if some people exclusively play Fortnite, but yeah, he's, you know, he's got a lot of gifts. He's the son of a big leaguer. He works hard, but also Fortnite, which was heartening to see. Take that, Mom. There have been studies.

Take that, Mom! Jacob Wilson's mom. I'm not heckling his mom, to be clear. We just talked about not doing that, but my mom specifically, in case she's listening, she's not listening. Yeah, you're allowed to heckle your mom. You know her circumstances. We don't. But there have been studies that show that playing games, it can help with your reflexes,

your spatial thinking, etc. So yeah, nice to get a shout out from Jacob there. And one other bit of non-serious banter, Joe Adell update, because it's been a while since our last Joe Adell update, and it's the longest running thread in the history of forums, is Joe Adell good at baseball. And maybe he's getting to the point of being good at baseball consistently. We'll see. He is a 120 WRC plus. He has picked up his performance also. And there was still hope coming into the season for Joe Adele. And then he was hitting well for a little while and then he wasn't for a longer while

and it looked like, oh, here we go again. And you know, he's been pretty decent on the whole. He's got 17 homers and he's cut down on the worst of his whiffing. And on the whole has been a pretty productive hitter and the defense, I guess it's not the best in center, but you know if he could run a 120 WRC plus that would be a victory. He's now 26 years old and he is

flailed offensively for years to varying degrees and he's kind of been better this year and the Angels as a whole have been quite respectable which surprises me they're 40 and 40 as we speak. They're a game and a half out of a wild card spot. I don't really expect this to last. They've been outscored by 46 runs and you look at their roster and you think, how are they doing this? But even the fact that they're 500 in almost July, that is a victory of

sorts to go along with their 40 actual victories. They just swept the Red Sox who have not hit well since they traded Raphael Devers who could have foreseen that. I couldn't. I thought that that trade was really smart and good and that everyone involved with it should be very proud of themselves. I think that if you check the transcripts, that's what they'll say. I don't know. I'm just happy for Joe Adele. I don't want to make a thing of it, you know, because I'm not convinced by this at all. But I feel like Adele, you know, is maybe a good example of how the 2020 season, the bizarre nature of it, the way that it pressed certain guys into service,

it wasn't always great for guys. I don't know that Adele was served particularly well by having to play at the major league level that year. I feel badly for him because I don't know that his career went quite the way that it could have had that been handled differently, which isn't to say that he wasn't over-evaluated by guys. Again, forum closed after however many comments, but this is good. It's nice. It's nice for him. I don't think that he's a center fielder, but he is one for the angels.

I don't know that I view him as a 120 WRC Plus hitter, but he also, you know, he isn't doing anything that makes you think that he's like way over his skis. In fact, you know, if you look purely at the gap between his WOBA and his ex WOBA, one might argue that he should be getting even better results just based on the quality of his contact. So I am happy for Joe Adele and I hope it continues because this is not a franchise that's in like a great spot.

I mean, it's going better than we expected in terms of the results on the field this season, but they remain a club that I find to be largely directionless. I don't know that they have a particularly compelling strategy to develop good players. They seem to just go fast and sometimes they break things, you know? I don't know that that is like a winning strategy over the long term, but if they have a couple of guys who are merged from this sort of weird, in between post-Otani, pre-End of the Trout era group and are viable big leaguers, that'd be great. You know? None of the weirdness of the organization is Joe Adele's fault. So why not? Yeah. I think I had a bold preseason prediction last year that the angels would

weirdly be better without Otani. And that did not come to pass, but I was just, I was one year too early. That's all it was. I just jumped the gun a little bit. Okay. Also, have you ever had the experience of looking up a player you were fond of in your youth and realizing that advanced stats do them no favors and that maybe they weren't as good as you remember them being war wise at least?

Yeah, I rooted for Dan Wilson, Ben. I'm familiar with this phenomenon. Dan Wilson, okay. That's your guy. Yeah, well, I was thinking also of a Mariner, sort of, because Diego Segui died this week and he was a Seattle pilot and a Seattle Mariner, so Seattle baseball legend. And from Diego Segui, I then thought of David Sigi, who was his son and was a player when we were kids. And I was fond of David Sigi, who was also a Mariner for that matter. And I just kind of enjoyed his game.

And you know, he wasn't a bad player. And I guess I didn't think he was a superstar or anything. In fact, he was never even an all-star, let alone a superstar, and he doesn't have any black ink on his baseball reference page or anything. But David Sige never had even a three-war season according to FanGraphs, and I think FanGraphs is actually higher on him than baseball references, though he did have one barely three-war season according to baseball reference, which was his have one barely three-war season according to baseball

reference, which was his 98 season with the Mariners. But he was like, you know, not a big power hitter and he was first baseman left fielder, so I guess it's not that surprising. But he was a pretty good hitter overall. I guess it's partly that his offensive peak was like 95 to 2001, which was, you know, steroid era, it was high offense times. And so the era adjustment doesn't do him any favors. And then, you know, he batted 307 with a 375 on base over that period, but only a 480 slug at, you know, high offense position. Just not a great power hitter, but high average hitter didn't strike out a ton.

Just kind of enjoyed his game, but you know, he just, he wasn't that great. I guess he wasn't that great. He overall just, you know, defensive value, not really there. Base running value, not really there. Below average fielder, even relative to his positions over the course of his career. So I remember watching him more fondly than I guess war remembers him really, but that's kind of a common phenomenon that you just, you have to come to terms with. You know, we viewed certain players through rose-colored

glasses perhaps. Well, and you know, sometimes the gap is more obvious in hindsight. Sometimes you have guys who, from a surface stat perspective, played well or did fine, but then like, you know, they are reevaluated particularly on the defensive end and you're like, oh, this was actually not as good as I recall it being. But I don't know, I think all those guys, you get amnesty for liking the guys you like when you're like a little kid, you know?

You can't read for so much of that time. You know what I mean? Like advanced stats, you're figuring out how to count. You're figuring out division. You know, you're learning the difference between the word specific and pacific so that you don't call it the specific ocean. Although my mom found that really cute when I did it.

She's like, it's not the specific ocean. And I was like, I beg to differ. It's that one over there. That is a specific- Right, you're specifying Pacific Ocean. It was Pacific Ocean. I just heard it wrong. You hear something wrong one time, you just keep saying it sometimes.

Yeah. I guess Sigi's offensive output, even less impressive given that he was a juicer, and this is not suspected. He came clean about not being clean when it came to what he was putting into his body. He also, he had kind of that blocky body that I associate with the steroid era in retrospect

when I look back at certain players. It's not that players aren't big and strong now, if anything even more so than then, but there is just a different body type that was in that era that I just associate with, you know, like Jose Canseco and Glenn Allen Hill and David Sagee and Mark Maguire. Just this like blocky mass monster kind of body that you don't see quite as much these days. Even with players who lift, they just, they look more limber, I guess. They look like they might actually stretch. Well, to their detriment perhaps, but you know, just like an athletic build, a more natural kind of muscularity, I suppose one might say. But kudos to Sagi for being one of the

early guys to come out and cop to what he did and not sugarcoat it at all. This was like 2006, 2007 that he said he used HGH, he used steroids, he said, I have nothing to hide, I have no problem talking about what I have done. And he said, I'm not gonna snitch. Like he didn't talk for the Mitchell Report, he didn't want to name names, but he named his own name and was just like, yeah, I did this stuff like this, you know, just kind of laid out exactly what he took and when,

more or less. So I kind of applaud that. Maybe David Sige has less at stake than some more notable players who were worried about their Hall of Fame status or whatever, though I think that often obscuring that stuff, if anything, was counterproductive, that the guys who have been more open and apologetic have suffered less post-career in terms of the court of public opinion and media members and Hall of Fame voting, etc., than guys who have just been more upfront about it.

So salute to Sigi on that score at least. Yeah, I think that your ability to ask for forgiveness in those moments is enhanced by a proactive confession. Enhanced, so to speak. Haha. And then offering being contrite in a way that's genuine. I think that that tends to roll over people and wash over them a bit better. But you're right, like there is just a funny gap. It's not that there are no guys today who could in a way typify the archetype I'm about to describe, but like the guys who were Juicyn,

they looked like you could render them as cartoons fairly easily, right? Like if there were a baseball version of Space Jam that you would be like, oh yeah, here are the Monstars and there's like a direct analog there. Whereas today you have fewer guys who look like the liver King, your guy. Yes. Having some trouble. Having some trouble over there. Yeah.

Liver King. Lots of trouble. Yeah. Goodness. Also, I don't know how to segue from the liver king to some other subject, but- I don't either. But your tax dollars at work now, almost officially, I guess, the bill is awaiting a signature from the governor who supports the measure, so that should not be an obstacle. But yeah, the Diamondbacks are getting their half a bill of public funds for renovations

to Chase Field. Too many Chases, as you just said, yet another Chase. The ballparks are named Chase now these days. I guess too many Chases just when hitters are facing some of these Chases as well, especially Chase Burns. But we've talked about this before, that the Diamondbacks plan for public funding here, so as not to offend said public, they sort of sold this as no new taxes,

but ultimately we were saying, what's the difference really, if it's the same taxes extended, or it's coming from sales tax revenue from Chase Field, which is itself publicly owned. And so they're taking the sales tax revenue of businesses around the stadium and raising this over a 30-year period. And the Diamondbacks, out of the goodness of their heart, are kicking in a quarter bill themselves.

And, you know, we've talked about this and you've acknowledged, I think that this place does need renovations from someone. Like the roof not working, the air conditioners not working. The roof works now. They've opened the roof with people. And by that, I mean fans who was like, they could open and close the roof with like players and media members in there. But once fans wore in, it was like a they could open and close the roof with like players and media members in there. But once fans wore in, it was like a either or sort of situation, but that seems to no longer be the case. I don't know what, I don't know if an actual fix was enacted or if there was just a determination that's like, it'll probably be fine.

You know, like air travel now. But yeah, like it needs spiffing. I would like to propose that the first place they start is the ladies room in the press box in terms of their renovation dollars. If you guys could work on that, that'd be great. Because boy, does it consistently smell weird in there, like a middle school bathroom. Now they have these bright fluorescents in there. And I'm like, I don't know that being able to see better is helping in here. But yeah, it needs a spiff, you know, the air conditioning, some of this I want to acknowledge the like realities of the place that we have decided to build a big city, which is the

middle of the frickin desert. And it's hot here, although, you know, it's hot everywhere this week, and it's a big, big space. And ideally, you're going to have a lot of people in there. And so I don't know that it's ever going to be like, you know, chilly in chase. There's just a reality of having to cool that kind of a space. But yeah, the air conditioning could use some spiffing.

Like it just, it needs a, it needs a spiff. It needs better concessions, please. I'm just asking to be able to get one IPA on draft that isn't a hazy. Nowhere, you know, like you got to go up to the little... It used to be four peaks brewing, now it's a different thing. But why? Why only hazies? Too many hazies. Not all of them are good. I just want one normal IPA. One normal West Coast IPA please, and not from Hob Valley. They're a piece of ****. Anyway, half a billion dollars not needed to solve that particular problem, but you

know, while we're listing grievances about Chase Field. So yeah, it needs a spiff. And you know, I guess if the options are half a billion dollars for renovations or brand new ballpark, well, this is a bargain. It is hilarious that this is going to go to the governor's desk because we are like terrifyingly close to a government shutdown in the state of Arizona

because the House and Senate, which are controlled by the same party, all the Democrats have not been able to get a budget together that anybody agrees on. So, you know, little funny that we're like, give the biz boom and the money. But yeah, I don't know. They're staying put. It's a weird mix of things that I think about the Diamondbacks because I do think that they have done a pretty admirable job of spending on the team, particularly after the World Series.

And it hasn't manifested in another run like that, obviously, because Montgomery got hurt and Lenny wasn't good and, you know, Eduardo Rodriguez has been hurt and then kind of mid and Chase Burns famously got hurt after being good and now he needs CJ. So like they, did I say Chase Burns? I meant to say Corbin Burns. CBeran Yeah, different Burns. Chase is okay as far as we know. LSF Yeah, please remain okay, young man. CBeran Scared some Reds fans there. LSF So sorry Reds fans, my apologies, my apologies. But they signed Prudomo to an extension.

They signed Cattell to another extension. Obviously Corbin got an extension. Like they are putting money into this club. And that doesn't say that I'm like a huge fan of Ken Kendrick or that I don't have any notes on his tenure. And the fact that taxpayers are paying any part of this bugs me as one, but they are putting money into the team. And I think that's good.

You know, I think they recognize that there are young guys on their club who are build around dudes who are playing well, or at least they are when they're not injured. And again, it hasn't manifested in another postseason appearance or another World Series appearance, but they're doing the stuff we want teams to do, particularly when they end up having a revenue windfall after an unexpected deep playoff run. So, you know, I'll partial credit them. I still remain steadfast in my belief that like public money should not go to funding stadiums.

It's ridiculous. I have an objection to that. And I think that on a payroll basis, like I have a lot of respect for what they've done over there. So that's ridiculous. I have an objection to that. And I think that on a payroll basis, like I have a lot of respect for what they've done over there. So that's good. Yeah. Generally prefer that billionaire sports team owners pay for spiffing themselves, but you're right.

If they do get that handout, then at least hand it out to some players. Sorry. And if you're getting a handout, one IPA, one normal, just one. How many places do you need to be able to get a Bud Light and a commemorative cup? Better beer selections, please. Please, and I know I'm spoiled. I grew up at a ballpark

with some of the best concessions in baseball and easily some of the best beer selection. I understand, but it enhanced my enjoyment of a club that was terrible for much of my youth. So like, you know, have a lady out. Okay, so Cattell, like you, I want to think the best of my fellow man. And it was a man in this instance.

It was reportedly a 22 year old dude, White Sox fan, who was literally giving him grief here. And so, yes, I'd like to think that it was some generic taunt that for whatever reason just penetrated the armor that players really have to have at all times. The fact that Cattell broke down the way that he did, and how could you not feel for him? It did make me think that it was more pointed and targeted.

Yeah, just because I assume that players have heard every generic taunt, even if it's like, you know, yo mama sort of stuff. And that's maybe, what is it? I guess eight years after her death. And sometimes, you know, grief can resurface and it can hit you when you're not expecting it and you think you have kind of mourned and come to terms with it and then suddenly it's as fresh as it ever was, so you never know. But the fact that this penetrated his defenses to this extent made me fear the worst, essentially.

So we don't know that it was the worst, but there have been some other incidents recently. So Dennis Santana, Pirate's Pitcher, he was just suspended for games and subsequently appealed, but he was suspended, and understandably so, for taking a swing at a fan in the bullpen. And he didn't say exactly what it was. He said that the fan had crossed the line too many times. It was subsequently reported by a Pirates pre and post game radio show host that the fan had been throwing peanuts at Santana, insulting him in a way that had racial undertones and also that the fans did their homework and mentioned Santana's recently deceased father in the taunts. And Santana was just on

bereavement leave in April because his father passed. So it was sort of similar in some respects. And, you know, he was kind of backed up by teammates, by Ben Sherrington, etc. Not defending that he actually took a swing at the fan. He did not connect on that swing, but vouching for his character. And Santana himself said, you guys know me, I'm a calm demeanor type of person. I've never had any issues for any of the teams I played for. This guy crossed the line a few times. And I don't doubt that that's the case. And that fan was ejected and, you know,

the White Sox fan in the Marte incident, as you said, he was ejected and banned from every ballpark indefinitely and good. But this sort of thing, Jaren Duran was heckled in a way that was specific to Duran opening up about having contemplated suicide, which he talked about in that Netflix doc. And a fan recently taunted him about that.

And he was upset and fortunately he restrained himself, which infamously Durand has not always done when it comes to responding to fan heckles. But this sort of thing, I don't know whether it's gotten worse in person because there have been incidents of this sort going back quite a ways. It certainly seems that it's gotten worse online, specifically because of sports betting. And this was a thing that Liam Hendricks spoke about this season about how he's gotten death threats

against his life, his family, his wife, like just telling him the absolute worst things. He had cancer, obviously, referencing that. And there have been lots of articles Tyler Kepner wrote about this just this month for the Athletic about baseball players and the interactions that they've been subjected to because of sports bettors. And I don't know whether any of these in-person events was sports betting related, though it surely wouldn't surprise me if that were happening too, but just the DMs that these guys are getting.

And I'm sure that if it's just a DM, quote unquote, just a DM, like getting a death threat in any context is not good, you know? Like when it's more anonymous like that and more removed from real life, I guess in some ways Maybe it'd be even scarier in other ways Maybe not because you just if you're bombarded by these messages I guess you just figure that it was heat of the moment the anonymity that is granted to people because it's the internet and you know They're not actually serious about this and as far as we know, I guess a sports better has not made good on this in

baseball on these threats and so sure, it's probably just hot air, but you never know for sure and you can forward these things to MLB security as players do, but you know, it's just, it's hard to be subject to this all the time, but these in-person events specifically, we don't condone and sanction violence here typically, but like some of these incidents, I can't really fault players that much for when a fan consistently, repeatedly crosses the line like this for making it physical. Because it's just like the fact that players are restrained from making it physical is why certain spectators feel free to say these things.

Because they would not say these things. Like the online trolls who are sending these DMs, they would not say those things in person. And even the fans who are saying it in person, they're doing it from the safety of the stands. And they would not be saying those things to Dennis Santana, 6'2", 2", whatever. Like, you know, these are big, strong men and generally these fans would hold their tongues. And, you know, there may be some IPAs involved in these incidents or... Sure, yeah, it doesn't help.

Beer, just alcohol, obviously, probably makes this even more likely. But it's so weird because players, like they have to hold their tongues and hold their fists specifically, which generally is a good idea in any context. But yeah, it's bad for the product of Major League Baseball for players to go after a fan. And Ben Charrington said, I know and we know and Dennis knows that fans are precious

to us and we can't do that. There is a reason there's discipline. Sure. Although to even like lump this person who was saying these things to Santana in as a fan. Yeah. Yeah. Obviously, I mean, the original fanatic meaning fan was originally, I think, kind of derogatory. And in this case, it is, I guess, bringing back the original meaning. You don't want your players like punching or attempting to punch people who are paying spectators. Then again, they're not doing that without provocation, and they're not even doing that typically with the usual provocation, which is just booing or going after a guy because he's not playing baseball well.

That's seen as fair game. It's not something that I did as a fan. I just, you know, I feel like not gonna boo my own guys. It's just gonna make them feel worse if anything. And you know, why pile on? They probably feel bad about it as it is, but you know, there's a social contract there. You pay for your ticket and you're allowed to boo

and you get a big salary to be a public figure as a baseball player. And some of that just goes with the territory and you probably build up a thick skin in most cases. Okay, but some of these cases where it crosses the line, it's like, these are not the fans whose business you're trying to cultivate for one thing. So like if the takeaway from this is that if you say incredibly hurtful and personal things to a player,

that player might just punch you. You know, like maybe that's the disincentive that we need. I don't know. I'm not actually approving of players punching people. And yet I can't say that I really think less of Dennis Santana as a person if these reported details are accurate.

I mean, any other context, that is what a lot of people would do, and the threat of that sort of response would prevent that initial hectoring and insulting. So it's just this weird case where it's like you're behind the glass at a zoo or something and people are tapping at the glass and yelling at you. You're on display for these people. And that doesn't actually give you license to just say whatever you want. And so I feel for players like this. Yeah.

Like you, I don't think that violence is generally the answer in these moments, but the imbalance between our expectations is striking, right? Because I think these guys are largely expected to kind of take it. Obviously, we're seeing a limit to that, right? There were consequences for this guy who heckled Cattell. So it's not like anything goes. And I think trying to precisely define exactly where that line is, you know, that might be kind of a fool's errand. You sort of know it when you see it, I think. And it's going to be different with every guy, right?

Like I might sound a little crass in the way that I put this, but like someone with an alive healthy mother, you tell a yo mama joke to that person, it hits differently than if you tell that joke or, you know, rain down that particular taunt to tell Marte. So I think that having, you know, like a strict sort of content specific ban on this stuff is going to be challenging. But I also think that you're right to point out that this is not the behavior of a fan. I think this is part of the danger

that comes with rooting uncritically for the laundry, because I am sure, assuming that this person was of relatively sound and sober mind, assuming that we've not gotten reporting to this end and so I don't want to like turn this thing that happened to Ketelmarte into like my hobby horse. But you do have to wonder, I was like, did he like lose him a parlay bet or something? Like is that what motivated something with this amount of animus and vitriol? But you know, let's assume for a moment that that didn't happen. I imagine that this was a White Sox fan, not a Diamondbacks fan, you know.

The Diamondbacks were on the road. But, you know, this behavior happens in home ballparks toward the home nine, right? And I think that if one of these guys was forced to sort of justify his behavior, he'd probably say, well, he's letting the team down, he's not playing well or whatever. But you're allowing people to operate too much or removed from the actual people on the field. I don't want to take this and like, blow it up into a broader societal thing, but it's like there's just this nastiness that I wish we would have greater pause about, you know? It's like that's a person on the field. And I know that it's a public

person and it's a famous person and you know, potentially an incredibly wealthy person, but like that's a guy, you know, it's not a brand. You're not yelling at Arby's, you're yelling at a guy whose mom is dead. And again, maybe he didn't know that maybe, but even still like you're paying to be there, but you're also paying to be at that person's place of work, you know? And it's like, transport yourself into a different setting. Imagine that you're heckling the sandwich artist at Subway. Like everyone around you would be like, excuse the swear, what the fuck is wrong with you? Like, what are you doing? You know, and I don't wanna be,

I feel like I'm putting all these caveats on it, but you know, I don't wanna be like histrionic about the online of it all. But I do worry that like having that kind of mediated, anonymous interaction where you're at a remove and you aren't not only not having to worry about like the potential physical consequence of going after someone and then finally getting fed up and popping you in the mouth, but even just like the normal social consequence that you would incur in a

situation like that. And this guy did, he incurred a consequence. And it's good to see that happen, right? That there's actual like accountability in this moment. But I do think that people kind of take this online of it all. And when they ported into the real world, they're then surprised when the social interaction doesn't go well after that. And it's like, what was your expectation? You know, if you said to the person sitting next to you in the stands, what you had just said to tell Marta, that guy might hit you. You know, you just don't know. And like you, I don't want to encourage people to get into fights. I don't. Having said that, like, I do wonder if some of these guys had like an experience

of watching one of their own get f***ing clocked by a pro athlete, if they'd be like, oh yeah, I probably shouldn't do that. I know that he's not the tallest big leaguer in the majors or anything, but like, can you tell how much he is six foot and two ten? If that guy went into the stand and hit you, you're probably getting knocked out. Yeah, there's a f*** around and find out aspect to it where you want that quote unquote fan to find out. Yes.

And maybe Cattel-Martes tears were one way to find out. Who knows? Like maybe this fan felt remorse. I don't know if the type of fan who would be doing this taunting, you know, sometimes tears are what a troll wants to provoke, and that would be satisfying for them. But who knows, maybe there might be, ooh, I went too far. Oh, I actually feel bad about this, not because I just got banned from every ballpark,

but also because I just, I made a man cry. I feel bad about that. But that is probably less reliable than I just got decked. So now I feel bad about it. That's like stimulus response, you know, that's like classical conditioning. Hey, if I yell this insult at someone, I might get punched. So that's a bad idea.

And these incidents are not new necessarily. I mean, you know, going back to the beginning of baseball, there's like people yelling at umpires and attacking umpires and kill the ump and that whole rhetoric. Or, you know, there have been cases where athletes have been physically attacked on the field, on the court, whatever, by spectators. And there have been some incidents where there's that case, gosh, more than 20 years

ago now is 2004. It was where Frank Francisco, who was with the Rangers at the time, got arrested because he threw a chair that hit fans. Remember, it was like Doug Brokale and Frank Francisco and some fans. Again, the details weren't really reported, but they supposedly crossed the line in some way and then Francisco did too. And he tossed a chair that hit a guy in the head and then hit a woman also who had nothing to do with it. And he was arrested and maybe sued and there were like actual injuries.

So they're innocent bystanders. You know, if a player goes into the stands, if you get some malice at the palace sort of situation that can backfire also. Like that can, that can lead to people who had nothing to do with it, becoming collateral damage and that's bad. So you can definitely take the response too far as well, but I'm just, yeah, it's hard to assess whether people in the stands are actually getting worse or whether they were always bad and maybe we're just more aware of these things than we are.

Or fans, spectators know more about players just because all this information is at their fingertips when they're sitting in the stands, they could just look up something that would be maximally hurtful about that player to taunt them about, so it could be that too. And yes, the whole sports betting issue as well. And just the fact that you can contact a player via Instagram or something in a way that you could not personally reach out to someone previously. So it could well be getting worse in some respects, but it's an unusual situation where one party is restrained. And frankly, like a lot of the civility that we take for granted, just in society, some of it is backed up by the physical consequences of something.

Hey, you do something bad, that person might just clock you or maybe call the police or something. Like you could suffer some consequences. It's not just all that we abide by the golden rule all the time, nice as that would be, it's not a utopia. And so sometimes the consequences can stay you. And this is a weird situation where some of the consequences at least are off the table that you might normally face if you said something like this to

someone like that and you just wouldn't do it and players as public representatives of their employers and their sports and their union and all the rest they have to Abide by some decorum even if it is not reciprocal And that's just something you sign up for as a player. And so you know you're getting into that. And I guess that's the way it kind of has to be. And yet in certain incidents, I have a hard time holding it against a player

who just snaps when something like this happens, within reason, within moderation, but yeah. For the reasons that you're outlining, like, I don't think the realistic answer is like, well, use your best judgment about whether or not to clock a guy and how hard and how long you keep going. Right. Because just think of the example that you gave, I'm sure that the intent was not to like have an innocent bystander get whacked in the face with a chair.

Right. And so when you open the door to that sort of behavior, you are, you know, you are asking judgment of a person in a moment when their judgment is likely compromised by the heat of the moment and the emotion that they're feeling. And so it's not, I don't think a viable route for accountability. I think that the likelihood of that going fast in a bad direction is quite high. But I also think that like, maybe they should be allowed to like, go stand really close to them while the fan has to sit down. Like maybe it's not that you're allowed to clock them, but maybe

it's like, I'm going to remind you what like a pro athlete looks like, you know, and then you can make more informed decisions in the future. Like when you can tell that the guy is a pro baseball player by the way that his back looks through a t-shirt, that's not a guy you want to f*** with, man. Like you're going to have a bad time, you know? Also, again, this I really would not condone under any circumstances, not even in a hypothetical way, not even to wonder like, I don't know, also again, this, I really would not condone under any circumstances, not even in a hypothetical way, not even to wonder like, I don't know, if we let people clock each other.

You realize they have bats in the dugout, right? Like, I mean, like you are counting on restraint. And balls for that matter. They can throw them very fast. Poker face taught us sometimes that kills a guy. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Behave yourself, people. I'm sure this plea on this podcast will solve the problem, I'm sure. The sports betters have definitely been listening to us and I'm sure will continue.

To be clear, I don't know that was the motivation for this guy. I'm not saying that. It was the first thought that I had, but I don't know that was the motivation for this guy. I'm not saying that it was the first thought that I had, but I don't know it to be true. And so I would not want to use it to my own advantage to make a point that I am right about, but want to be honest about what I know. Jared Sissling Yeah, it's like the Simpsons episode where Whitey Ford gets pelted with pretzels and you know, Hank Azaria says, it's a black day for baseball. Here come the pretzels. Here come the pretzels.

Probably players might prefer to be pelted with pretzels as opposed to personal insults, preferably neither, I guess. But you know, don't throw things at them, either peanuts or otherwise. Okay. Lastly, maybe we could just briefly consider another moral question. Have you been following the Fernando Tatis Jr. versus Big League Advance story at all? I saw that Fernando Tatis Jr. is suing Big League Advance, which is a company that has appeared on this podcast, right? Didn't the Big League Advance come? Now with me.

During the Jeff Sullivan era, this was episode 1272. Yeah, we talked to Michael Schwimmer, who is the founder and CEO of Big League Advance and a former pitcher himself. And this has come up before, I think Cheryl Ring talked to him also for a fan grass post back in 2018 because Big League Advance has been sued before Francisco Mejia did file a lawsuit against Big League Advance. I think that was subsequently dropped. Nothing came of that. But yeah, the business model for this company, it's sort of like VC, but for athletes, essentially,

it's like they invest in players and then as a condition of that initial investment, they get a cut of that player's earnings down the road, at least in big league advances case, only if that player makes the big leagues. And then there's sort of a set percentage. So for Nidu Tatis Jr, he got a $2 million payment from big league advance way back when, when he, 17 years old and now is on the hook for 10% of his major league earnings because of that payment. And so now he is suing to try to get out of that. And there is something unsavory about this business model, certainly. And I kind of also am not entirely sure how I feel about this lawsuit or its odds of success. I guess part of it just depends on the specifics and how this deal was entered into. It's like clearly you're taking advantage of players who at least at that point were not well paid. And I would hope that this business model, to the extent that it worked before,

doesn't work so well anymore because... The circumstances are less dire. Yeah, and minor leaguers are unionized now and they get, you know, not great pay, but better pay and better living conditions and nutrition and all the rest of it. So hopefully the need is a little less dire. It was always kind of curious.

I thought that Fernando Tatis Jr. Was one of the players who signed up for this just because he's the son of a big leaguer and I don't want to presume anything about his relationship with his dad. And yeah, I don't know, you know, his dad, I guess later in his career, didn't make that much money and plenty of players have frittered away their earnings. And so I have no idea what their financial situation was. And Tatis, he did get a bonus when he signed, but, you know, I guess he was harder up than

you might have thought, given those facts that I just outlined. And so he signed up. Now, he was 17 years old. At that time, he was not Fernando Tatis Jr. I mean, he was not a big prospect. He was not yet a top 100 guy. Was this before he was traded by the White Sox in the James Shields trade?

Like clearly, you know, he was not seen as a sure thing superstar, obviously, or he probably would not have signed this deal. And I don't know how that two million may have helped him, for all we know, it actually made a difference and helped him get to the point where he could sign this sort of contract. Now, this rate of return, it is Rumpelstiltskin-esque, It is Rumpelstiltskin-esque. It's kind of like you're extracting this enormous sum. So it's like a, what, 1700% rate of return on Big League Advances investment, I guess,

not accounting for inflation. It's a lot. And so if this were a straight up loan, then it would be illegal. It would probably violate California law because you don't want like really predatory opportunistic lending happening here. And Big League Advance would say it's not a loan because he wouldn't have had to pay back anything if he had not made the majors. And the whole business model for big league advance, which I think they've been pretty frank about is like, most of these bets are going to be bad.

And most of these guys are not going to make the majors. And every now and then you might get one who pays for all the others because he signs a $340 million deal like Fernando Tedes Jr. did. And so I certainly understand like Fernando Tatis Jr. did. And so I certainly understand why Fernando Tatis Jr. doesn't want to be bound by this. That's a lot of money and he could have another contract coming down the pike at some point in the future. And maybe he wants to get out of this before he has even more money coming to him.

It's not as if, okay, if Big League Advance advances taking a $34 million chunk out of the 340 million for an interest, that's his junior should be okay. In theory, you know, like he will not be out on the streets because he has to pay big league advance getting that quantity of money. And so I guess in an instance where you get a payout this large, the player should be able to foot that bill because they're getting such a windfall as it is. But the whole thing, I don't know, like you sign a contract, generally that's binding. We typically don't toss out contracts unless the contract was entered into under adverse

circumstances some way. And I guess that's what Mejia was arguing, I suppose, unsuccessfully, that like, you know, there wasn't adequate representation or like there was a language barrier. He didn't understand what he was getting into. I'm not sure if Tatis is arguing that or just that this is like too much money to be expected to pay. And Craig Calcutera, a former lawyer or I guess non-practicing lawyer, he wrote about this in his newsletter, Cup of Coffee, and noted that Big League Advance, their contracts are controlled by Delaware law, which tends to be more company friendly. And so Craig was sort of pessimistic about his chances here, even

as he sort of supported Tatis's case. So I don't know, I laid out a lot there. What do you make of this? Well, I won't pretend that I can say, like, obviously this violates some stricture of the law that allows Tatis to get out of it. I mean, it does seem like his argument is basically just, this is too much money for me to have to pay given what I got. But I am sympathetic to the notion that like, first of all, I think the business model is gross. And I think one of the non-moral, more strategic arguments for Major League Baseball ensuring that their guys continue

to make a living wage even when they're only in the minors is that you can imagine circumstances where it just wouldn't be good for some of your stars to be beholden to a company like this. And I don't mean to suggest that big league advance is like trying to blackmail Tessie or anything like that,, having them on the hook for this much money to a third party seems like it at least introduces the potential for, you know, bad misadventure, right?

So there's that piece of it. I also think that like, it seems reasonable to me. And again, I don't know that this is an argument that holds legal muster in these things, but it seems reasonable to me that we would apply a higher degree of scrutiny to a contract that's entered into by someone who's under the age of 18. And I'm sure that, you know, Tatis was being advised by his agent, I don't know the degree to which he himself was actively involved in the negotiations

for this sort of thing. But particularly in the international market, there's just, regardless of the changes that have happened to the pay scale in the miners, the combination of potential desperation and the age of the individuals involved just seems like it's ripe for abuse on the part of a company like this. And I think that they are being honest when they say, you know, most of their bets aren't going to hit, you know, just because the, the washout rate for a lot of these guys is going to be high. And that's fine. But like, that doesn't mean that the individuals involved are necessarily getting like a completely

fair deal either. And it does seem like some amount of regulation of like exactly how much can be, it's not being borrowed per se, but you know, accepted from big league advance and how much they can extract. It seems like the sort of thing that regulation would be good to address because this just seems obviously exploitative. And the fact that their business model is dependent on a couple of these contracts hitting big and others not doesn't change the impact to any individual person who signs one of these deals and then is on the

hook for $34 million. So I don't care for it. It doesn't seem based on what I've read about it that Tutsis is likely to succeed here. But I do think that there's some value, I don't know if this is a motivation for him in bringing this suit, but I do think there's some value in him doing it if only to put other players at an earlier point in their career sort of on their guard about this stuff. He did say that.

Oh, he did? He said in a statement, yeah, I'm fighting this battle not just for myself, but for everyone still chasing their dream and hoping to provide a better life for their family. I want to help protect those young players who don't yet know how to protect themselves from these predatory lenders and illegal financial schemes. Kids' focus should be on their passion for baseball, not dodging shady business deals. That sounds better than, I don't wanna pay these people's 34 million, but also, you know, maybe that's sincere.

I don't see any reason to doubt the sincerity of that desire just because he also clearly doesn't wanna pay these guys. And you know, he'd probably be honest about that part too. But yeah, I think bringing attention to just how extractive this can be is valuable. And you know, they're people, they're people. to just how extractive this can be is valuable. And you know, they're people, they're people. And I think that every opportunity we have to reject the commodification of these athletes

as anything other than people and embrace the fact that they have families and interests and hopes and dreams and are vulnerable to exploitation at times. And, you know, I don't say that like we need to be paternalistic to them. But if you're a 17 year old being told that you can have $2 million, and all it's going to take is some percentage of your future earnings, that just seems like a situation that's ripe, like I said, ripe for exploitation. And I think that that would be true regardless of where the kid came from. You know, I don't want to say that this is for whatever reason, you know, this is something

that only kids coming out of the international market are vulnerable to. I do think that like given the circumstances of amateur players coming out of Latin America, like there should be additional scrutiny because it seems like they would be even more sort of, I keep saying ripe. I don't care for that, but it's true. They're not fruit. They're young men. But yeah, I don't like it. And if I were the union, I would take a pretty hard stand on this stuff because again, it just seems like you're setting your guys up for a really painful conversation later. And it probably seems like a good idea at the time, but I'm skeptical that it is, you know?

Yeah. Hopefully this is already the case or closer to the case than it was when Tatis was 17. But yeah, ideally, if you have made an investment in a player as a major league organization, then you would support that player and your investment by just giving them whatever they need to succeed and maximize their career. And just not giving them a reason

to want to sign away a few trillions because they have enough to have a living wage year round and be able to afford to train and to nourish themselves and focus on baseball, that would be ideal. And I think a lot of it, I guess, depends on the specifics of the arrangement in my mind. I mean, I think, yes, in an ideal world, you just have no need for a company with this business model.

But in terms of this specific agreement, Craig outlined that there are a couple different ways in which an agreement can be unconscionable in a legal sense. It could be procedurally unconscionable and substantively unconscionable. The former is like the circumstances of the contract were shady, you know, like one side is under duress in some way, like if you're holding a gun to someone's head and making them sign something, then that's procedurally, right. Or it could maybe be substantively unconscionable

if the terms of it are just so bad that it's unreasonable essentially. And in this case, now, if everyone went into it with their eyes open and test his head representation, and an adult did have to sign off on this agreement. And so if he knew what he was getting into and then it turned out to be a bad bet for him and he just doesn't want to live up to the contract, then I'd be a little less sympathetic. And I'd say, you know, you signed this thing, and this money may have helped you,

and now you're mega wealthy, and so this company can take its pound of flesh at this point. Now he alleges, or the lawsuit alleges, that there were predatory tactics, according to the Associated Press, to lure him into an investment deal that was actually an illegal loan that Big League Advance misrepresented

itself to Tatis, hid its unlicensed status and pushed him into loan terms banned by California's consumer protection laws. So if there's truth to that, like if they really did pull the wool over his eyes in some way, then that's a different story, you know? And then I would think that a different outcome could be justified. So really it kind of depends on the specifics of what happened here to make up my mind. I guess I'm not automatically siding with either party here. So I kind of need to know more, need to know the actual truth or

facts of the case. I know there have been cases where players have not paid big league advance and big league advance has sued. Like hopefully this isn't, I don't think it's the kind of operation where they're, you know, sending people after you to kneecap you or something, but like big league advance sued Franmiel Reyes, I think earlier this month, claiming that he had breached his contract that he owed them 400,000 or something plus interest and plus money that he had made in Japan. So I guess there may be players who just have not paid and are trying to get out of it that way potentially too. So yeah, I don't know. I think it'd be better if such agreements just were not ever seen as

beneficial to the player because their needs were taken care of. But also, I guess, you know, I do believe that if you know what you're getting into, then the fact that it didn't work out for you doesn't necessarily mean that you should be freed from that. So I guess we'll see. It'll work its way through the system and hopefully there will be a just outcome of some sort. Yeah. And I'm not a lawyer and that applies to everything I've said before. And I also am especially not a lawyer practicing in the state of California. And wouldn't it be nice if consumer protection were taken more seriously such that this is writing a foul of some state law, which I wouldn't be surprised by, you know, one of the states in the union that tends to take that stuff more seriously. So yeah, there could be circumstances particular to and specific to his

residence in California when he signed the deal that would alter this in some appreciable way. I don't know the answer to that. Yeah, he was not actually in California when he signed it. I think actually he may not have even been in the country, but he is still- Well, then they can't get him at all, right? What are they going to cross the sea? Yeah, now that he is in California, yeah, he signed it in the DR. But he's still covered by the California laws as a resident and worker there. Yeah. They have to go cross a specific ocean to find him. Exactly. All right. Speaking of players named Otto, Patreon supporter David reminded me that

Otto Velez, who I mentioned the other day, the most recent player named Otto, before Otto Kemp and Otto Lopez, was nicknamed Otto the Swato. We need to bring that back too. I wonder if the Otto resurgence could be a rocket power effect or a Simpsons effect? Is this because of cartoons? Also on last episode's outro, I mentioned Dane Myers robbing Marcel Ozuna of a home run, but not quite catching the ball. Listener Daniel suggested that that should be called a blown run robbery. Well, listener and Patreon supporter Alex Vigdermann wrote in with some data on blown

run robberies. Alex, of course, works for SportsInfo Solutions and he has some sports info for us. He writes, you might have seen this coming given that we've tracked home run robberies for decades, but we track blown run robberies too, with a much less catchy name of Rob's Home Run no out. We've only charted these since 2020 unfortunately, but we've identified 17 instances in that time. A couple of factoids, don't want to risk calling them fun facts erroneously.

There have been 317 true home run robberies in that span. So about 5% of home run robbery attempts end up with the ball bouncing back onto the field. And the leader in this stat since 2020 is Tyrone Taylor, who somehow managed to do this three times in the span of three months in 2024. I think those do qualify as fun facts. I had fun learning them. I also have fun learning that someone has decided

to support Effectively Wild on Patreon, which you can do by going to Patreon.com slash Effectively Wild and signing up to pledge some monthly or yearly amount to help keep the podcast going, help us stay almost ad free, and get yourself access to some perks, as have the following five listeners, Drew Elliott, Lisa Holt, William Fife,

Alex Glossman, and Henry Johnson, thanks to all of you. Patreon perks include access to the Effectively Wild Discord group for patrons only, monthly bonus episodes, playoff livestreams, prioritized email answers, personalized messages, discounts on merch and ad-free fan graphs, memberships, and so much more. Check out all the offerings at patreon.com slash effectively wild. If you are a Patreon supporter, you can message us through the Patreon site. If not, you can contact us via email,

send your questions, comments, intro and outro themes to podcast at fangraphs.com. You can rate, review and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and Spotify and other podcast platforms. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group slash effectively wild. You can find the Effectively Wild sub-edit at r slash effectively wild. And you can check the showively Wild sub-edit at r slash Effectively Wild.

And you can check the show notes and fan graphs or the episode description in your podcast app for links to the stories and stats we cited today. Thanks to Zachary Goldberg filling in for Shane McKeon today for his editing and production assistance. We will be back with one more episode before the end of this week, which means we will talk to you soon. All of these stats and players in your head

Isn't it wild to repeat them? To all of your indifferent family and friends They'll keep you company, they'll keep you sane On a long bike ride or a slow work day Making bedwax about a playoff race A blues bad'siled It's effectively wild Like Nolan Ryan was, sometimes