Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2413: Allons-y, Alonso

Episode Date: December 13, 2025

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Garrett Stubbs and the latest example of eyebrow-raising off-the-field Phillies behavior (content warning: adult breast milk consumption), then (14:58) discuss the Pete Alonso signing from the Orioles’ and Mets’ perspectives, Stat Blast (47:09) about teams losing long-tenured/productive players and rapid roster turnover among title winners, and recap (1:05:25) a smattering of transactions to put a bow on the week of Winter Meetings. Audio intro: Tom Rhoads, “Effectively Wild Theme” Audio outro: Philip Bergman, “Effectively Wild Theme” Link to cursed Stubbs TikTok Link to info on breast milk drinking Link to bodybuilders and breast milk Link to Stubbs on EW Link to Phillies himbo article 1 Link to Phillies himbo article 2 Link to FG post on Alonso Link to Alonso’s career splits Link to O’s vs. LHP Link to Sheehan on the O’s Link to O’s offense sim Link to team SP projections Link to Post cover 1 Link to Post cover 2 Link to “Headless Body in Topless Bar” Link to Stat Blast spreadsheet Link to FG post on Suarez Link to FG post on Yastrzemski Link to FG post on Finnegan Link to FG post on Thomas Link to over/under draft results Link to MLBTR on Garcia Link to MLBTR on Rogers Link to Hughes/Fitzy story  Sponsor Us on Patreon  Give a Gift Subscription  Email Us: [e-mail]  Effectively Wild Subreddit  Effectively Wild Wiki  Apple Podcasts Feed   Spotify Feed  YouTube Playlist  Facebook Group  Bluesky Account  Twitter Account  Get Our Merch! var SERVER_DATA = Object.assign(SERVER_DATA || {}); Source

Well, the curveballs bend and the home runs fly. More to the game that meets the eye to get the stats compiled and the stories filed. Fans on the internet might get riled, but we can break it down on Effectively Wild. Hello and welcome to episode 2413 of Effectively Wild, a baseball podcast from FanGraphs presented by our Patreon supporters. I am Ben Lindbergh of the Ringer, joined by Meg Raleigh of Fangraphs. Hello, Meg, I'm mad at you. Oh, no, why? What did I do? Well, I was blissfully unaware that Philly's backup catcher and former effectively wild guest, Garrett Stubbs, had posted a TikTok. I forgot he was on the pod. He was on the pod. He posted a TikTok of himself, taking a shot of his wife's breast milk. And I did not know that.

And I might have forever remained unaware of that. If you hadn't signal boosted it on blue sky and brought it to my attention, I guess now I am committing the same crime against our listeners, because now I'm making all of them aware of this against their will. Are the Phillies okay? No. The answer to it is that, no, they're not okay. They're not.

What is happening in this clubhouse? What is happening here? What is going on? Has there been just a more entertaining team in terms of personalities over the past few years? Probably not. But I feel like it's kind of curdling, much like milk is known to do, in that they've gone from happy-go-lucky, lovable hymboes, to alternative medicine, different preparations of milk than the traditional. kind alter i i don't know what's happening with this team kyle swerber wants to be back on the fillies and i hope that he can bring some sense and some sanity here but i mean he's part of

the madhouse i guess right i guess he likes it yeah he's not he's not leaving anytime soon i just i don't i don't know i want to allow for the possibility the things have just always been like this and and and we didn't know about it because yeah this is classic we know too much about each other we know entirely too much about each other and yeah and look I I want if you don't want to know about this dear listener well first of all too late but if you don't want to know more about this you don't have to watch yeah skip ahead well I invite you not to watch I would but I am going to describe some things because we need to engage with this and then we've got to pull back to the the okay i'm putting timestamps in the up content warning because it's okay so first

of all the place to start and i will admit i did not listen to this with the sound on because i was like i need to have some sort of self-respect um very little clearly yeah one of the the description of this tic-tok is booby milk is always the answer and here's it here's the thing i would have that that's the caption provided by stubbs or his partner okay yes yeah i believe it's i believe it's his wife and then the hashtags are hashtag breastfeeding hashtag newborn hashtag baby hashtag milk hashtag fyp what does that mean that's for you page i assume oh okay okay okay so they're wanting it to go viral I'm feeling real good about my decision-making about not being on TikTok.

So, okay, let's start with a couple of things. The first of which is, I will say, they're making faces throughout this video that suggests to me that they at least know that this is a little bit weird. So, you know, that's something compared to, say, Bryce, who is very earnestly imploring you to take a third of your blood outside your body. These are grown people. They have made the bizarre choice to shoot. breast milk because he has like a little shock glass that's like yellow tinged which it took

me a minute to realize that it was the glass that was that color and the breast milk because I was like I was going to be like girl what is going on you know it's not like pure as the driven snow when it comes out but like it shouldn't be that color I think it was the shock glass so but sit with the idea of not realizing that for a minute and what it would do to your psyche that was my morning, okay? That was what I was going through this morning. But let's return to the caption. Booby milk. Have some self-respect. You're already making this weird-ass decision. You've already decided that you need to shoot your wife's breast milk. And by that I mean, like, put it in a shot class now. Yeah. Call it breast milk. You call it breast milk later. You call it breastfeeding

later in the, in the caption. Now, maybe breast as a standalone word would be like running a foul of some TikTok weirdness so I guess I'll allow for that possibility but booby milk you're making a dumb choice and then you're sounding like a child and those things in concert are not agreeing with me I mean none of this is agreeing with me so there's there's that part of it what is the idea here is it a dare is he just does he think that this has no when children breastfeed one of the benefits of that is like that it's very um beneficial to their immune system because they get, you know, a bunch of immune protection from mom that, you know, their little new bodies are not equipped with yet because they're not all, they're not fully online.

You know, you had a baby. We are wildly vulnerable at birth, shockingly so, amazing that we survived long enough to inflict this horror upon each other, right? And so, you know, like, I would imagine that the rationale here is about like some sort of immune benefit, immunity benefit, which is a funny thing to be emphasizing, given like where you might think the rest of his beliefs sit based on this entry into the constellation, Ben, yeah. What weird-ass ways to get on the injured list are these fillies going to avail themselves

of in the 2026 season? Because look, it seems clear to me that there's some real nonsense floating around in that room. You know, there are some guys believe in some real wacky, wacky, whatever is happening. It seems to be metastasizing, and I don't know where it will go next. I'm not sure whether this is better or worse than the unpasteurized milk that Bryce Harper has been drinking. And I know maybe it's different if it comes from your cow or doesn't. But this is, look, I know that. Really regrettable, really regrettable sentence. So proximate to the breastfeeding part. Really just a regrettable sentence. Apologies for all of this, really. Really for all of it. I know that there are people who do this and believes that it has health benefits. Like there is kind of a bro-science contingent among bodybuilders that they'll do this. Are these guys who are on gear?

Maybe and also maybe on breast milk. But from what I understand, there is less nutritional benefit for an adult than there is in regular old milk. Yes. It's great for babies. But once you are no longer a baby, no real benefits to this and possibly some drawbacks. So I'm not going to say it's as bad as exposing a large quantity of your blood to ozone, but it doesn't seem to be beneficial for a grown-up person like Garrett Stubbs.

I don't know if it's some sort of bonding thing, like we're a family, we're all in this together. I did not do this, to be clear, and had zero desire to do this and don't entirely understand. understand the behavior. Garrett Stubbs was a guest on episode 140. This was way back in 2017, long before he got hitched and had a kid and pounded breast milk. So it did not come up on that conversation if you care to listen to it. That was during the Jeff Sullivan era. And Jeff, of course, had a real crusade against trampolines, which he believed, not without reason, are deleterious to your health. And Garrett Stubbs is a living example of that. He's a trampoline survivor because he sustained a fairly serious childhood trampoline injury and still

has a crooked finger because of it and made it to the majors, no less. But we talked about that. That was why we had him on. And then we talked about other stuff. But we did not get into this. I just, I was going to say nip it in the bud, but even that seems questionable in this context. I just feel like the Phillies, someone has to just figure out what is happening here and potentially put a stop to it before it starts to affect the club.

Right. And I, again, I think that we just have to allow for the uncomfortable possibility that this has been, there's been woo in Bigley Clubhouses for a while. Sure. We know about fighting necklaces, right? and the magnets and all sorts of pseudoscience. Yeah. Yep.

So there is like a, you know, this is a thread that is not new, right? An instinct that is not new. We heard all kinds of silly things from big leaguers during the pandemic. We heard all kinds of silly things from big leakers when, you know, Canada had a vaccine requirement. They've heard all kinds of silly things. And at the risk of sounding a wee bit sexist, because. men are plenty susceptible to. I do wonder about, like, whether the wives are kind of an under-explored vector for some of this stuff, right?

Could be. I don't know. So, so there's that, but I have concern. And I do wonder, like, if you're the union, how do you feel about this, you know? Because, like, fighting necklaces, that's a doofy thing. The claims are dubious. They have not been proven. But they also are harmless right like it's not gonna do anything to you as opposed to like raw milk which might you could get listeria

among other things right and so like at a certain point isn't it in the interest of like the union or these teams to be like so hey guys you're making really bad choices for yourselves and I understand that you know there's

a bit it's it's uncomfortable to contemplate the union or the team as like the mode of intervention here because, well, then where does it end, right? Do they get to chastise you for, I don't know, eating things, normal things, things that human adults consume, not against the advice of the FDA, like, do they have a right to say anything about that, right? So I appreciate that this is a potentially slippery slope that they might not be interested in going down.

But I wonder if they want to think about. some, some little PSAs to be like, so hey, it's just heating it up most of the time. Also, that's not for you. The breast milk, that's not for you. That's for the baby. That's not for you. You're not the baby. You're not the baby.

It is really pretty explicitly for babies. It is for the baby. I see what you're saying here that, yes, some sort of informational session in spring training perhaps might be an order. Yeah, you don't want to get invasive and controlling. Right. It's a tricky thing. Yeah, you never know how people will react and it's, oh, it's my body. And I did my own research, et cetera, et cetera. And you know, you end up alienating people and they become even more committed to their beliefs. Right. It's got to be some way. Right. It's a tricky thing. And like, look, I'm not above them being tricked, you know. And that sounds condescending. That sounds like I'm patron. They're grown men. But guess what? They're grown men. They're not babies.

Right. So they need to get clear about how they understand themselves to be. Because you're a grown man. You want me to talk to you like you're a grown man? I agree I should talk to you like you're a grown man because you're a grown man, except that you are choosing to act like a baby. Because this is for babies. It's not for grownups.

It is for babies. I am so upset knowing about this. And again, I want to make clear that I, understand that it appears to be the color of the shock glass that is making it look yellow. I get that, but it's disquieting, you know? I feel off-kilter. Who could trick them? Who would be like the, who could successfully trick them?

That's not the right thing to do, but what do you do? What do you, what do you, Ben, Ben? I don't know. I don't know. What do we do with this? Something must be done. I'm more upset. I, you know, I was joking before, but now I think it's upsetting.

You shouldn't. It's for babies. Yeah. I miss the uncomplicated love that we had for the Phillies, just that affection we felt for those guys who had their top three buttons on buttons. Yeah, we're like, oh, look at these great hymboes. Yeah. And now we just know too much about the Phillies, unfortunately.

We know too much about each other. Yeah. Okay. Well, that was probably TMI. but I guess it's sort of a If we had to know You had to know But that's not true

Yeah Do you think It's partly Garrett Stubbs's fault It's partly our fault For promoting this message Do you think that he We're not promoting the message To be clear

We're not promoting it We are friendly opposed to this Breast Milk only for babies That's the I feel comfortable saying That's our editorial policy On Effectively Wild And on Paygrass

Only for babies Also Ben Also do you think that he thinks is going to make him grow big and strong? Do you think that this is part of the motivation? I realize I sound like a condescending asshole the way I'm talking about Garrett Stubbs. And I feel sorry about that, but I don't really because like what is

anyway, I'm upset. I'm upset. And it's a Friday show. And I'm upset. Yeah. Sorry everyone. Okay. On slightly safer ground and less gross ground, I will just mention to everyone quick PSA

that if you did sign up for Effectively Wild Secret Santa, if you did not, Sorry, it's too late. I told you many times. Better luck next year. But if you did sign up, then assignments have gone out. So if you have not received yours, check the spam filter. It sometimes ends up in there.

But I have received mine. So whatever email account you used to register for Secret Santa, you should now have your match. And someone has been matched with you. The subject line says your 2025 Effectively Wild Secret Santa match. So please do dig it up if you haven't seen it. If you do have any questions, you can contact us. Though Zach Wincos, our listener is the one who organizes it. And I probably will just ping him or forward the message to him.

But he could check it out if you have checked your spam and you still don't see it. And again, I will reemphasize if you have signed up, if you have committed to send someone a gift. Please, please, please follow through. Yes. You got to do it. Do not skunk someone. That would not be nice. someone yeah okay thinking about the breast milk still man i'm still thinking about it i'm so upset to put

that out of your mind for the rest of this episode no i'm going to be haunted for the rest of my life i know as are we all but let's talk about transactions okay we have some signings to discuss i have some adjacent stateless to relay but the big news of course is that petalanzo is an orio Pete Alonzo has signed with the Baltimore Orioles for a hefty sum. So the free agency didn't work out so well for him last time around, but good for him. He signed a shorter-term deal. He had himself a solid season. He opted out of that second year.

And then he managed to make good and get himself a long-term deal. I don't know whether it was just different market, different circumstances, different bidders, or whether it was the fact that even though he's a year older now, he's coming off a stronger season, or whether it's the fact that he does not have a qualifying offer this year. And so there's no draft pick compensation attached. I'm sure it's a little bit of all of the above. But the Orioles have signed him to a five-year, $155 million guarantee. Bad news, again, for you in the major contracts over under draft.

I want everyone to know that when I sound a little lukewarm about how much money is it isn't just because of the contract over underdraft. He gets a $12.5 million signing bonus, $18.5 million in 2026, and then $31 million annually thereafter. No deferrals, no opt-outs, limited, no trade clause. So we will certainly talk about the impact on the Mets and the departures that they have sustained, but to talk about the impact on the Orioles because Piedelonzo will impact plenty of baseballs as a member of this team. And probably the overlooked fact, as we and many others have stressed that the Orioles need

pitching, still true. But they also need hitting. They needed a lot of things. A lot of things went wrong for them last year. They had injuries. They had hitters stagnate and failed to develop or even take steps back. And they ended up with a weakness on the offensive side, too, particularly against lefties, but really against both.

had an 87 WRC plus against lefties, which was 20th in baseball last year. And so they have added Taylor Ward, lefty killer, to their lineup. And Pete Alonzo, who I would not describe as a lefty killer, he actually has a career reverse split, which is interesting, because it's not a short career at this point. But he has hit Ritees better than lefties in his career, despite being a right-handed hitter, 135 WRC plus against righties, 125 against lefties. I tend not to really believe that there is such a thing as a hitter with true

talent reverse splits, but it's probably safe to say at this point if you did the regression that he has a smaller than average split, let's say. And even if this is his actual splits, so 125 WRC plus against lefties, no slatch. So that and Ward, that's really good. going to help their lineup. And it is a pretty darn deep lineup now, top to almost bottom, not all the way down to the bottom, maybe, but most of it. It's looking pretty solid depending on who progresses. You have Jackson Holiday, Jordan Westberg, Gunner Henderson, Pete Alonzo, Adley-Rutchman, Taylor Ward, Samuel Busaylio, Colton Couser, and Dylan Beavers.

you know, a little bit of weakness, a little bit of question mark there at the bottom of the lineup. But that top six or so, that's solid. I mean, I guess I'm kind of banking yet again on an Adley-Rushman bounceback, which may or may not be. There's a good bit of that, like, kind of throughout, right? Yeah, and Jackson Holiday, can he take another step? Yeah. Can Gunner Henderson be not just a really good player, but an MVP caliber, player again. Yeah. Right. But getting Pete, that sort of safeguards you, because, you know,

he's about as safe a bet to crank dongs as anyone in baseball, right? Like, he's... The way he said that was so uncomfortable. Crank... Crank... Don't know what? Fair enough. Was not. Yeah. He hits the ball hard. He hits lots of homers. So we talked about Kyle Schwerber last time and how he hits more homers than anyone except Aaron Judge

and maybe Shohei Otani. Right after that is Pete and the Orioles, of course, were bidding on Schwabber 2 and they match the Phillies offer reportedly and he decided to go back to the milkmen and instead the Orioles have pivoted

to Pete. And the nice thing, the encouraging thing about Alonzo, he's never been a extremely patient hitter or a guy who has a high, walk rate. It's not a bad walk rate, but it's not commensurate with his power exactly. But he did lower his strikeout rate, and he hit the ball real hard, and he had a 141 WRC plus.

So even though he's obviously limited defensively and on the bases and everything else, in the short term, he's going to make you better. He's going to bolster your batting. So good on the Orioles for at least not resting on their laurels this offseason. I don't think that they're done. They can't be done. But offensively, I guess they're just about done. And, you know, I didn't even mention they've got like Tyler O'Neill on the bench still. And Ryan, Mountcastle, I don't know that he is long for this roster because I'm not really sure how he fits there.

There is some sort of, I don't know how all of this fits together. Yeah, because O'Neill, I could see him being in a platoon maybe. But then Mount Castle, he just doesn't seem. to have much of a role now and then Kobe Mayo. Mayo? Yeah. Happy birthday, Kobe Mayo.

I know. So those guys, maybe they're just sort of selling low on them at this point, but maybe you do just deal them for whatever pitching you can get because they do just seem sort of redundant here. So I guess the Orioles are kind of paying for the sins of, you know, failures of player development at the major league level, at least of late. And then maybe holding on to process. prospects too long or just not finding a way to work everyone in better.

And so they're ending up in a situation where they've got some guys who are sort of not past their expiration date. Gosh, that makes me think of milk, too. But, you know, we have milk on the mind here. I'm so mad. And you're going to say, oh, it's your own fault. No, no, it's not bad. No, it's not scary.

It's a skill to draft and develop well, but then also to know when it's time to sell high on a prospect or at least... Got a Kenny Rogers it. Yeah, right, exactly. Or, you know, I know exactly what you mean, and I'm sure everyone else does too. But know when someone's value is at their peak or when they will fit your roster or not

and then don't hold on to them too long. So I don't know. They have more moves to make, obviously, but what do you think of the Alonzo signing in isolation? I think so many things, Ben. I think that it is undisputably true. that this will make the Orioles offense better in the short term. I think it's undisputably true that this is a tough profile from an aging perspective.

There is not a lot of positive precedent for the, like, the back half of the 30s for right, right first baseman like this. And the speed with which Pete might just be a DH, not even a birth basement, might come up on us rather, Quick. And the scary thing about this kind of guy is that like the decline can happen very abruptly. Which Orioles fans know something about.

I don't want to invoke the specter of Chris Davis here. Like I hate to say it. I hate I hate to say it. But I do feel like someone's got to say it. Now, Chris Davis famously lefty. It's a little different.

But in terms of like the aging for Spaceman, the profile. file fits. So there's that part of it that I think is going to make the later part of this not look great. I think there's an argument that you could make that like if their internal evaluation, now who knows when they came to this conclusion, but if their internal evaluation of Alonzo was this strong, well, I didn't you just give him this deal last year and capture one more year of his peak. So, you know, there's like a timing component of this that I find a little bit funny, but I think it's a lot of money. I think it's, I think it's a lot of money. I think that if you

want to compare him to say Schwerber, who again, like, there's a handedness difference there, so it makes it a little bit harder. But I think that Kyle Schwerber is a better pure hitter than Pete Alonzo. But Pete Alonzo is younger, so he's got that working for him. And like, that's a meaningful difference. But it's only a year. So is it really? Although he just turned 31. Wow, what a birthday. What a birthday for Pete? Terrible birthday for Kobe Mayo. The announcement of this deal came down on Kobe Mayo's birthday where it was like, oh, buddy,

you thought you were having a good day, didn't you? And now? Not too much. But I think it's a lot of money. I think that it's a little bit of an overpay. I think it's maybe not surprising that they would do this if the sort of like big masher guy is

something they were prioritizing because now that Alonzo and Schwerber are off the board, unless you feel really good about Murakami, the rest of the market doesn't really have this kind of bat in it. So at least the free agent market. So I get it from responding to the particulars of this market piece. I think the back end of the steel is going to look pretty bad. But I also think that it does improve their lineup and lengthen it in a meaningful way for the next couple of years. And, you know, we spent all this time talking about the Orioles rebuild and all their

bright young guys. They're not so young anymore. And they're a lot closer to free agency than they used to be. And so if what Baltimore is trying to do is maximize this core, well, first of all, they still need some pitching. Yes. My God. But to your point, like, I think because of how significant the pitching need was, that it was easy to lose sight of the fact that the line up had holes in it that need to be rectified. He is a weird fit for them because of the guys you named. I think he was also a weird fit for the Mets for reasons that we talked about. And I think that it's a little cleaner in this case.

They still have needs. They still don't have, in my opinion, like a major league caliber center fielder on their roster, which seems like a problem. But I might be lower on Couser than other people. I think that the way that I would look at this from Baltimore's perspective is in the short-term, I like Alonzo's fit for them. I also have to kind of give them an incomplete, which is fine because it's December 12th as we're recording this, but like how they piece the rest of that lineup together and how they clarify what their sort of lineup plan is, I think

will go a long way to making me feel better or worse about what their fortunes might be in 2026. I do think they're, you know, in some cases reasonably, in other cases, maybe too optimistically banking on a lot of either positive regression or positive progression from guys in their lineup. You're right that it's like it seems deep on paper, but there are guys in this group that have a lot of questions. I'm not worried about Gunner. I think Gunner's great and will be great again. Just like a lot of regrettable phrasing in this episode. But like, you know, I feel a lot less confident in Adley now, which really bums me out because I love Adley. Me too. I fully believed in the bounce back last year and then yeah. Yeah, and then it all fell apart. So, and they have a lot more guys on sort of what we project to be their, you know, go-to lineup who are more good than great and some of them closer to complementary than like real star, in my opinion. So I think they still have work to do and how they piece that work together is, you know, going to be.

I think really go a long way to determining what they look like come opening day. I guess the one positive that we can draw in addition to the fact, and I feel like I'm being a little, I'm being a little uncharitable to Alonzo. He's coming off a 141 WRC plus season, right? Like he hit almost 40 home runs. So I think that he is a good hitter and, you know, clearly provides some of the things that they need.

And if what you're trying to do is look at this period and say, hey, let's get the very most that we possibly can out of this group, well, you don't necessarily care about the last two years of his deal, right? That's not what you're worried about. What you're worried about is getting a playoff win out of this group, you know, before Adley is probably out the door, right? And it's so, you know, he has one more year of arbitration

after this one like it it came up on them so fast right so and and gunner only is too so if what you're trying to do is like get the most out of this group like the you know the clock's the ticking um so i like that piece of it and by getting this done so early assuming that this is their big bat and then i imagine they will try to sign a real center fielder but who knows now they can just focus on the pitching piece because uh you know i'm being i'm being a little bit sassy toward toward their front office they know they need pitching. Of course, yeah. Everyone knows they need pitching.

But Ben, they really need pitching. They like really need pitching. So, so they got to get to going on that. But I like it fine. I'm happy for Alonzo. Like, he, he was this unfortunate thing that can happen sometimes where he came up pretty late, you know. And those guys, he didn't, you know,

he wasn't a full-time big league player until his age 24 season. And when that's true, especially when you're a right, right first baseman, like, sometimes you just never get your big payday. Sometimes you just never do, which doesn't mean that you can't have a lucrative career and, like, do well. But, you know, it's so funny because we were all like, oh, my God, he should have taken that extension when it was offered to him. And guess what? He came out doing just fine. He'd like made the extension and then some.

So how about that? Worked out. Yeah. And he's never going to miss a game, really. he has not missed a game in either of the past two seasons. Right. He has. He plays all the time.

Never missed more than 10 games in any season. So he is just an absolute rock in that lineup. And yeah, you have to project some growth and development. I believe in Basayo, but will it all happen this year? You know, who knows? Who knows? Jackson Holiday, I think if he hadn't struggled so much in his first exposure to the majors, we might look at his last season.

and say, hey, you know, 96 WRC plus in a full season at age 21. That's not bad, but more has been expected of him, of course, and can he deliver that? And it doesn't seem like he's really settled in defensively at second. In fact, Josheon floated the possibility of him following in the footsteps of his fellow Jackson, Jackson Merrill, and just having them try him in center fields on the grounds that it would help with the logjam, and he's not great at second seemingly anyway. So I don't know. I don't know how realistic that is,

but it might help a little bit just fit the pieces in more elegantly. But yeah, I think they certainly have been active and they've spent some money. And that was a big knock on them the previous winter, that they were just too complacent. They have not been. They signed Halsley. They made the ward trade. They signed Alonzo. And yes, they absolutely have to go get one of the top start.

at least remaining on the market, and I assume that they know that, and it would be silly for them to spend all this money on Alonzo, not that he doesn't help them, but I think... No, but it would be ridiculous. It would be ridiculous for them to spend all this money on him and then not go get started reinforcement. Dollar for dollar, you just, you absolutely need the pitcher that's, you know, and it's like, okay, even if you think that Rogers and Braddish are as good as they have been when they have pitched, can you count on them to be, state?

all season long. I mean, you can't count on any pitcher doing that. They need more than one starter, arguably. Like, again, I'm not saying anything they don't know. Yeah, if they could go get Frumber or, you know, in my or a couple of the top guys who are still left on the market, then you might look at this roster and say, okay, they're well positioned, even in a competitive division that has only improved this offseason. So, yeah, it's progress. We'll see what else they do And we will return to that topic

Now, the Mets I guess I understand it From their perspective It seemed like they were always reluctant To sign Alonzo to a long-term deal And I get it You know, it's tough from a fan perspective Because

Alonzo was beloved by a Mets fan He's a career met He had so many huge hits He's a fan favorite So it stinks to see a guy like that go, especially when your owner has all the money in the world, and you're thinking, well, you don't really need to penny pinch if you're Steve Cohen. So I get that. I, you know, from a baseball perspective, I think it's reasonable enough to let him go and we'll see what else they do.

Yeah. But having lost Nimmo and Diaz and Alonzo in quick succession, that's a lot to adjust to as a fan. I think the back page of the post was you got to bereave, you know, I don't know if it's, I don't know if it's that bad exactly. Also, like, that doesn't really work, so. Well, there's like a sad Mr. and Mrs. Met who look like they've been on a bender or something. And then there's also sad grimace in the corner for some reason. Too many bits. Yeah, yeah. But polar bear, no longer one of their bits.

So I think it's, you have your emotional component. as a fan. And you're saying, I like those guys. And these were people I enjoyed watching for years and important parts of the clubhouse and many good memories associated with them. And now suddenly they're gone. And the situation is sort of uncertain. And it's also an incomplete for the Mets. Because, you know, okay, they signed Devin Williams to essentially give them Diaz insurance even before Diaz left. And then, you know, they were nominally interested in keeping Diaz too. And I think there was even some report that they expected to be able to match the final offer and they weren't given that opportunity, something along those lines. Who knows?

Which might just be a sign that Edwin Diaz was ready to be done. Maybe. Yeah. But it's a lot of turnover. It's a lot of change that's going to be jarring. I think it's fine that they didn't bring him back. I think it's fine that they didn't bring Diaz back. They went inside Devin Williams. Like, they have an Edwin Diaz at home. And that's not quite true, but it might be close enough. I think that they had a really weird roster puzzle to put together over the long term

if they had brought Pete back five years of Alonzo with you know a looming need to DH1 Soto which again I don't think it's like this year or even the year after need

but would have I think will be a need sometime the next five potentially like I could see that happening was going to put them in a weird spot and they cleared out some of that stuff by moving Nimmo because he was also a guy who looked like he was ticketed for and looks like he's ticketed for DH2D at some point. But I think that like long term, it would have been, I think, a bit of a tricky fit. And Cohen does have a whole bunch of money. But right now, this roster

without Pete Alonso's deal, without bringing back Diaz, is already like a $280 million payroll. And I think that they have other quite pressing needs. that they need to sort out. So it's an incomplete because I do think that they need to address those needs and do so successfully before we can say, oh, this ended up being like really smart or what have you. But I don't think this is an instance of them metzing it. You know what I mean? But also, you know, I think that one thing I've noticed over the last week because there were

there were like a lot of Mets fans who were kind of crashing out about them leaving and then there were like a lot of analysts who were getting kind of huffy about them crashing out and those crashing out fans were like rude to the analysts so like I understand that piece of it I just think that it would be useful sometimes it might bring the the temperature down generally if like fans and writers remember that like they're engaged in different projects right and fans get to be sad that like the guy they liked best is gone um and analysts get to tell you if it's you know a good baseball that they avoided signing a right right first basement to a hundred and 555 million dollar deal and it doesn't have to be nasty so i just invite everyone to it it is the

holidays after all you really want to you really want to be using your one human life to get mad about pita lonso leaving i mean i mean be mad about it you don't have to be mad about at other people, I guess is my broader point. So all of that is to say, like, I think it's fine. I think that if they had brought him back, it probably also would have been fine. Everything I would have said about the Orioles would have been true of the Mets, where it's like the back half of a five-year deal with Piedelonzo's probably going to look kind of narnily. I do think the roster crunch piece of it would have been hard for them to manage. And, you know, if they want to spend that money on another established starter, I mean, it's so, the parallels between these rosters are kind of

funny because you know who else needs starting pitching the Mets probably need some starting pitching and i say that as someone who has all the confidence in the world in nolan mclean but like you know right now nolan mclean is we have as their number one starter on roster resource and i will remind everyone that he threw 48 innings in the pictures last year so like having another established like front line guy i think would be really useful to them Orioles 20th best projected rotation right now on the Fangraph's depth charts met 17th. So, yeah, not a huge difference there. Yeah, you know, I think also when you have Juan Soto and Francisco Indoor to top 10 position players in baseball, that eases the sting somewhat because, okay, neither of them is as long tenured as Nibbo was and Alonzo was, but they weren't really the franchise guys.

They were prominent players and successful players, but when you have those other two kind of cornerstones of the franchise signed forever, then that helps. Those are the guys you're really building around. And also, it's not like the Mets have been super successful lately. So, you know, if you're, so like you're breaking up the core of a team that went all the way or something, you know. So it is the funny thing about about Mets fans being so. bereft. So you can't say it's like the wrong whatever. You

haven't like had a great time lately, right? I mean there's been, to be clear, there's been plenty that's been good and positive about the Mets. I mean, this last year accepted, right, in the time that Alonzo has been on the roster. But I think that if you

were to ask most Mets fans, they would say that this era of Mets baseball has largely been defined by underachieving. Relative to expectation. So the fact that like these guys leaving is, is such a sting is interesting to me. I'm not saying it's like the wrong emotional reaction, but it is an interesting one given kind of where everything sits. Yeah, I saw a lot of Mitzvins. I kept seeing the phrase dollar store Stearns circulating, the idea that David Stearns coming from Milwaukee small market hasn't adjusted to

the big market where he has a bigger bank role. That transition. that, say, Andrew Friedman made going from Tampa Bay to the Dodgers and not having to scrimp and save and being able to be a bidder for the top talents on the market. But I think it's premature or just erroneous to say that about Sturz at this point. They didn't sign Wad Soto last offseason. Right. What are we talking about?

I know that that's, you know, signing Soto is an ownership-level decision, of course, but it's not like Stearns was saying over my dead body or something. All of the contracts that are going to satisfy that notion that, you know, him evolving into his own Friedman or whatever are going to involve, are going to be ownership-level decisions. Not to mention, like, you know, they took on, I know that there was a wash in a lot of ways sending out Nimmo's deal, but like they took on Marcus Semyon. Like, it's not like they haven't spent money, you know. And I think, look, I think that it's fine. I've said this a lot about the Dodgers. I give them a lot of leeway in terms of their year-to-year payroll decision-making

because I have confidence in that franchise based on many years of observing them that when there is a guy who they want and are confident will improve their club, they are not going to let money be the thing that determines whether or not they are, or at least in the conversation with that guy in his camp, right? And so there are going to be years where maybe you just don't like the guys out there. And that's not cheapness. That's an actual like evaluation distinction that you're making. And we've talked a lot about how this class is pretty underwhelming relative to the most recent ones that we've had.

Guess what? There isn't a soda to give a deal to. But the last soda there was to give a deal to, they gave a deal to. So what are we talking about, you know? So I think that, like, the notion that this is some indictment of his, like, perspective and philosophy of roster building is probably just overblown in either direction. And, you know, he might turn into the Friedman, but part of what has facilitated Andrew Friedman being Andrew Friedman in this era is Dodgers ownership. And we don't yet know beyond the Soto deal that that's exactly the tact that Steve Cohen is going to take. We have a good indicator.

I mean, we have a couple of indicators, and we've won really strong one in Soto. But, you know, give it a minute. Jesus. Like. Yeah. The other New York post headline was bare naked. Metz don't even make offer as Alonzo Bolts for five years, 155 million for moreals. Bair naked?

Yeah. What? Yeah. That doesn't make it. No. No. No. Look, we gave Scott the business.

And so we got to give our fellow, our colleagues in the business, the business, our bear, I know that Pete Alonzo's polar river, but bear naked? Yeah. That doesn't make any sense. Am I? No. It doesn't read better than it sounds? Is it one of those things where if you're reading it, you're like, oh, yeah, bear, no. No, I submit, no.

No, it's not the best work. It's not headless body and topless bar. It's not in that kind of caliber. So, anyway, that was a vintage post-head line. You know, on the one hand, I'm upset because bare naked, it's, aren't you butt-naked? Isn't that the expression? But-naked, not bare-naked? You're bare-ass and butt-naked.

Well, I think you could say, you could say bare-naked, but I don't really know how exactly it applies to not making an offer. I guess, yeah, like, you're not, you don't have Alonzo. covering you anymore. But what is that? That doesn't make any sense either. I just, we're all getting dumber and it's really the worst. Bear naked. No, that doesn't make any sense. That makes Ben, that makes no sense. Bear naked. It's, I mean, it's an idiom. It's just that it doesn't really. Is it an idiom? It is. Yeah. Bear naked is. It's a phrase. Yeah, it just means you're, you're completely naked, but I mean, I guess they've been stripped of Alonzo. They've been stripped of the polar bear, but it's, it's not the best. I don't think that that works at all. It did

stop me from thinking about breast milk for a little while. Maybe it actually accomplished all of its goals. Okay, step last. Cue the song. Shane, hit it. They'll take a data set sorted by something like three or a minus or OBS plus. And then they'll tease out some interest he did, but discuss it at length, and analyze it for us in amazing ways. Here's to taste a blast. What I wondered, as the Mets were mourning and as Mets fans were mourning, these departures of this trio, So just how historically significant is this? Because I've given grief to Mets fans before for bemoaning their situation.

And to be clear, they have a lot of reasons to moan and bemoan. But there are times in the past when I've thought that they were laying it on a little thick just compared to some other kind of cursed franchises who have really been through it. They were like recently-ish within the last decade in the World Series. barely yeah just about but yes true but uh i wanted to put this into perspective losing three guys like this who have all been in the organization for at least seven years six seasons in diaz's case because he missed one with an injury but at least seven years continuous service with the mats and fairly productive players and so i went to michael mountain patreon supporter staplast correspondent with this one and he used his retrosheet data and fan graphes

data to kind of come up with a cludge here. He didn't have a transactions database, but I think this worked well enough. He defined continuous tenure with a club as a period of one or more seasons in which a player rendered services to a particular club in every year of the period. Or if he missed a season, like Diaz did in 2023, he did not play for any other club at the major league level during that period. So this would miss, say, guys with impending free agents who were dealt at the day. deadline and then returned to their club the following offseason, which I guess is sort of the Andrew Kittridge situation with the Orioles. I failed to mention his reacquisition earlier, but basically this works.

So the record for most players with at least seven years of continuous tenure departing a club in a single season slash offseason is eight. Eight players who left the St. Louis Browns during or after the 1947 season, Vern Stevens, Bob Moncrief, Denny Gailhouse, Wally Judnich, Jack Kramer, Glenn McQuillan, and Johnny Barardino. Oh, and also, Hooks Ayat. Got to love. Ooh. That looks a great name. Yeah, which I may or may not be pronouncing correctly, but let's hope for the best.

So these guys all left the Browns. However, three of those players, Judnich or Judnick and McQuillen and Baradino, each missed three. Three whole seasons due to military service, and our man Hooks pitched only 10 innings for the Browns. He didn't play at all in MLB between 42 and 46. So if we want a non-war time answer to the question, non-World War II at least, it's the Tigers losing seven long tenured players during or after the 1952 season. Dizzy Trout, George Kell, Hoot, Evers. Hoot! Johnny Leipin were all traded in a blockbuster move.

With the Red Sox in June, a trade for a five-player return, including Johnny Pesky. Then in December, the remaining three players, pitchers Virgil Trucks, and Hal White, and centerfielder Johnny Groth and Hal White were sent to the Browns in exchange for left-fielder Bob Neiman and two sub-replacement-level players. However, in the free agency era, the record is six, long-time players lost. Accomplished by two teams, the 1976 A's, Sal Bando, Bert Campanaris, Gene Tennis. Joe Rudy, Raleigh Fingers, and Larry Haney. That was sort of a fire sale. That was the year when Charlie Finley, the owner of the A's, tried to just salary dump a bunch of guys,

and then that was vetoed, but then he managed to move them afterward anyway. And the 1992 Blue Jays, Dave Steeb, Jimmy Key, Rance Mullinix, Tom Henke, Kelly Gruber, and Manuel Lee. In the 21st century, the record is five long-term players lost. Three teams suffered those departures, the 2013 Yankees, lost Mariana Rivera, Robinson Canoe, Andy Pettit, Phil Hughes, and Jabba Chamberlain, 2018 Orioles, lost Adam Jones, Mani Machadoe, Chris Tillman, Zach Britton, and Darren O'Day, and the 2018 Guardians, Michael Brantley, Lonie Chistheson, Cody Allen, Zach McAllister, and Josh Tomlin. However, if you count player tenure by how much fan grafts wore they accumulated over their active tenure only,

So if they leave and rejoin a team multiple times, the war total gets reset. So these three guys were 57.8 FanGraph's War of Met's production departing, Nimmo and Alonzo and Diaz. So if we go by Fangraph's War, then the most devastating collective single-season departures in franchise history are all-time the 1914 world champion Philadelphia A's, who infamously had a fire sale right after the series. trading or releasing 214 FanGraphs War off their active roster headlined by Eddie Plank, Eddie Collins, Charles Bender, home run Baker, and Jack Coombs. There were multiple fire sales during Connie Mack's tenure, and of course they had the $100,000 infield,

which was a lot back then. So they broke up that team. In the integration era, it's the 1974 Tigers, which was the beginning of the team's 70s slide into the American League basement. They lost 179 fan graphs were notable more for retirements than trades as both Al Kaline and Norm Cash

hung up their cleats. But Jim Northrop had also been dealt to the expos in August. In the free agency era, it's those same 76As. They lost 170 fan graphs were. And in the 21st century, the 2002 Cleveland Club

and the 2007 Giants both lost 137 fan grafts wore for Cleveland. It was Jim Tomey, Charles Nagy, Bartol Colon, Dave Berba, Chuck Finley, Paul Shuey, and Travis Freyman, among others. The Giants lost Barry Bonds, Pedro Files, Noah Lowry, Matt Morris. So it's impressive to me that the 92A's lost all of those long-tenured guys and then repeated as champions in 93. So usually I would think of it as being a fire sale and then you suck after that, but no, they went right. back and won another championship. However, several of those guys were pretty washed by that point.

And I guess Jimmy Key and Tom Hanky were the only two who had any significant success after they departed Toronto. So I asked Michael just to put it into perspective. So obviously these Mets departures nowhere near the record setting totals in either quantity or quality. And so I asked roughly how often does a mini exodus like this. Mets one happened. And Michael said two or three times a year.

A team loses that many long tenured guys. Or four or five times a year, a team loses that much tenured fan grafts war. For instance, last year, the Astros lost 90 fan graphs war. So that's what I guess I'm getting at. I'm not minimizing that Mets fans can mourn this and can be sad about losing these guys. But I'm not sure how big a national story it really deserves. to be, you know, like, it's not some sort of mess or Mets debacle, I don't think, to have three guys like this move on, especially, you know, given where Nimmo seems to be at this

point in his career and the long-term outlook for Alonzo and all the rest. So it's sort of like you were saying, you know, it's not really a Lull Mets. Everything kind of gets lumped into L'LMets just because we're conditioned to see it that way. But this kind of loss happens fairly routinely actually. I think that one of the things that, at least my impression of the Loll Mets era, was a profound frustration on the part of the fans and public observers, for that matter, that the process was very often poor when it came to the decisions that the club was making, the justification for keeping guys, for sending them out, how you thought about, you know, injury prevention and player development and on-field strategy it was just it wasn't sound you know

and i don't you know you can you can want peter lanzos production over the next couple of years you can feel nervous that you don't have like a shutdown guy at the at the back of your bullpen although you know williams may well end up being that i think that you can have that feeling and that feeling is defensible because it's about like the kind of baseball you like to see and the guys you've enjoyed watching and the guys you hope you could keep enjoying watching, right? But I think the comforting thing for Mets fans is that like from a process perspective, I think the decision to let those guys walk is defensible. Now, like we've said, they need to do other things to bolster the roster and they are in a weird spot in terms of like

the guys they have on hand and how expensive they are and how expensive this team is relative to like how it projects, particularly in the rotation, and some of that might be, some of that under projection, to be clear, might be remedied by, like, Nolan McLean just being good over the course of an entire season. Like, part of this is just, like, he's a rookie and they're going to be conservative. But I don't think that this era of Metstom has been defined by bad process, quite the contrary. So that's the piece of sort of reassurance that I would perhaps offer to to Mets fans at this juncture. Like, this is a club that I think is headed in the right direction.

And I think that one thing you can draw from the Soto signing is that when it makes sense, when there's a guy who they want to be their guy for a long time, like they've demonstrated that they will spend up to do that. And yeah, that's an ownership decision. But yeah, that's an ownership decision, right? And ownership decisions have been the bane of this franchise for a lot of its recent tenure. So, you know, we're going to have our fun on occasion, you know. Can you imagine the reaction if we found out that a met was drinking breast milk?

Boy, the time we'd have. I'd like to see what the New York Post would do with that. But, yeah. I would not. I think it would end newspapers and get my end newspapers. And I'd be like, that's a loss, but also. If we ended the posts, that wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. It wouldn't be.

Because can you really call it a newspaper? Anyway. There's some pretty good baseball coverage sometimes. That's true. That is true. But yeah, I think that, like, we're in a new condition, and that's a good thing. Yeah. And I meant to mention this.

The projected war difference next season between Pete Alonzo and Mark Vientos is less than half a win. Now, I know that Mets fans may not completely trust that. I'm not saying I'd rather have Mark Viantos than Pellonzo in 2026. And, you know, the error bars are going to be bigger there around Vientos. and he's coming off of a down year, obviously. But he didn't actually have a better year than Pete Alonzo in 2024. Like, he kind of looked like a younger, maybe better Pete Alonzo equivalent or replacement back then. And he could be that again.

It wouldn't shock me if the next five years of Mark Vientos are more productive to say nothing of cost-effective, just in terms of pure on-field production, given that he just turned. 26 this week, I guess it was a happy birthday for him too. It's just happy birthdays and unhappy birthdays for all sorts of people involved in this trade or this, this departure. But, you know, for him to maybe reestablish himself and slug again, I wouldn't be shocked to see that and to see him sort of settle in and rake. And if they could get him and Alvarez just like being healthy and settled in, then that would go a long way. And then that would go a long way. if they could get some of their prospects who were coming along established and the young guys in the rotation, it could turn around pretty quickly.

It could look better. Yeah, just avoid raw milk and you're golden. That helps too. One other note that Michael Mountain relayed because it amused him and might amuse all of us. If you count just single-season Fancraft's War lost, the most devastating single off-season for any MLB franchise after 1901 is then 2000. New York Yankees. They had 29.2 fan graphs war from players in 2003 who didn't play for the team the following year, including nine players who put up at least one fan grafts war.

Raul Mondesie, Robin Ventura, Andy Pettit, Roger Clemens, David Wells, Chris Hammond, Nick Johnson, favorite of mine, Jeff Weaver, not favored of mine, Alfonso Soriano. But then they've signed Paul Quantrell, Tom Gordon, John Lieber, and Gary Sheffield, so they the 101 win Yankees, after losing more single-season war than any other team in history, one 101 games in 2005. Yeah, how about that? Fun fact. That was in the era when the Yankees were just outspending the rest of the league by a lot.

So that helped, I guess. And then the last note that he had here, the 1979 A's went 54 and 108. So that was the post-fire sale late 70s A's, then got rid of 11 players who had combined for negative 9.4 fan graphs war that season, then acquired 12 players who were essentially replacement level the following year and won 83 games in 1980, finishing second in the AL West. So that's the most negative fan graphs war shed by any team season. and that's classic addition by subtraction, I guess, or addition by subtraction of subtraction. Guys who were subtracting, you subtracted them, and then you got better by a commensurate amount or maybe even more.

So that's one way, I guess, to win as well. And I have one sort of adjacent staff last year that Michael did also, which was in response to someone in the Discord group asking about it. And this is about the fastest and slowest time. to completely turn over a World Series winning roster because listener Andrew M. in the Discord group was thinking about the Rangers and how they have shed a lot of their core 2023 players, the guys who are on that championship roster, including the aforementioned Marcus Semyon. And so Andrew wanted to know what's the quickest a team has ever entirely turned over a World Series team and what's the slowest? And so Michael ran those numbers as well and formulated the question as what's the fewest number of seasons between a team's World Series title and the first subsequent season in which none of the players who appeared in that postseason had a regular season start for that team. So if Team X wins the World Series, then the next year, player Y gets traded away, but several other players remain on the team.

and then the following year, Player Y is reacquired and stays with the team for 15 more seasons. It wouldn't count as turning over the entire team until Player Y retires. So basically, everyone's got to be gone. So there are 2468 player post seasons through 2024 for World Series winning teams. The fastest franchise to turn over an entire World Series winning team is the 1918 Red Sox, somewhat notoriously. You have heard, perhaps, of the curse of the Bambino. Of the 15 players who appeared in the World Series for them that year,

none were still on the team in the 1922 season. So you can blame Harry Frizzee, I suppose, if that's how you say it. They had a lot of guys get shipped out. Franchise relocations and name changes, which causes changes in the Retro-Sheet franchise code, that makes this a bit difficult. to track, Michael said, but he believes that the longest turnover period for a championship team

is the 1942 Cardinals. They had at least one guy from that team who didn't go to war, tiding them over the one year that Stan Musial missed, and Musial stayed with that team until 1963. So it took them 22 years to completely turn over their championship roster. Now, free agency era, there's more turnover, of course, so guys have more recourse. They can actually leave. Sure. So longest turnover period, 1983 Orioles and 1996 Yankees, both took

19 years to completely turnover. Helps, I guess, when you have a franchise shortstop, you got a Cow Ripkin or a Derek Jeter or whoever. Shortest turnover period, 1973-A's, 74-A's, we talked again about their fire sale

a second ago, and the 2003 Marlins, they each took five years to turn over. And yeah, it was Cal Ripkin stayed on the Orioles until 2001. Jeter stayed on the Yankees until 2014. So that's the records, I guess, Charlie Finley A's and the Marlins, who of course had a notorious fire sale of their own after their first championship. So that fits, I think.

But, yeah, lots of rangers have departed. But I don't know if anyone will actually manage to surpass these records. So, yeah. Yeah, sad to see a championship team get deconstructed. Yeah, it's never fun. Yeah. Okay, so there were other transactions, not quite as headline-grabbing as Alonzo's, but Robert Suarez went to the Braves on a big three-year deal, seemingly to set up Ryssel Iglesias.

So settling for a set-up role, he got about as much money as Devin Williams did. Maybe more when you account for the deferrals in Williams' deal. So that's interesting. It is interesting because one of those guys is older than the other, you know. Yeah, that is true. That's interesting because, and I like Robert Suarez, but he's almost 35. Yeah. So that's, you know, that's older than Daven Williams.

He's 31. It is. Yeah. And also he was brought in not to close even. Right. Maybe that doesn't even make that much of a difference these days. You know, I don't know if teams are paying for saves and closer mentality so much as they're just paying for good, effective late innings. But, yeah.

So, you know, he had to decide that it perhaps wasn't a top priority for him to get saves, be the designated save getter. Well, and it gives them good sort of optionality in that bullpen in a way. I mean, not literal optionality, but, you know, they have reinforcement in a way that I think. is going to be to their benefit. And, like, as far as it was really terrific, you know, and has been lately, and here I am saying how old he is, but, like, maintaining good fastball velocity. So I think that, you know, I don't know that I would have given him three years, but I feel like I've been saying that a lot this offseason.

It's something I don't want guys to get paid. I want that to be clear. I like it when guys get paid. It's just some of these are a little longer than I thought, as evidenced by how well my free agent draft is going. Yeah, you had another one go not your way, right? Or was it just the Diaz, the Diaz signing? And Chorber and Alonzo.

Right. Devin Williams. Devin Williams worked out in your favor. Yeah, that one. Yeah, you are right now at negative 46 million on the offseason. I'm pretty far underwater. Plus 33, but I've only had a couple decisions so far. Yikes.

Yikes. Yeah, it's not going to be a great offseason for that draft, I don't think, for us. But we kind of forecasted that. We might not have forecasted the other stuff well, but we forecasted that we weren't going to do well. So that's something. It's something. Yeah. The Braves also made another move. They signed Yistremski. Yeah. Talk about for a lot of, talk about exceeding expectations. Yeah, that was kind of a lot for Mike Yistramski, who himself is a 35-year-old gentleman. And I guess is kind of brought on as a fourth outfielder, platoon guy.

Right? I think you're paying him that. You're expecting to start him most of the time. I mean, well. That's starter money, but. It's starter money, but, you know. Put it this way. I think he'll start every day against right-handed pitching.

I don't know that they'll throw him out there against lefties very much. Right. Yeah. Yeah. It could work as a platoon arrangement, I think. But, yeah, so they gave him, let's see, he gets $9 million in 26 and $10 million in 27. and then a $4 million buyout on a 2028 club option. Right for $7 million.

So they, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I was sort of surprised to see that total with that team. But, I mean, I guess that's good. The market is fairly robust. Like, there have been a bunch of overs thus far. There have been a bunch of overs. I am flammixed, I'll admit.

I'm a little flummoxed by what to make of this market. because there were, I thought that like it might be kind of, kind of underwhelming and that some of that would be, you know, the quality of the free agent available and some of it would be, you know, maybe teams being a little conservative. But it hasn't borne itself out that way really so far. I don't know, man. I don't know. Yeah. I guess Stemsky, at least on roster resources, listed as the starting left fielder. I guess so good, because I was thinking pro far, pro far could dh, potentially there could be.

Prophar should deans there. Yeah, you got Harrison Center and Acuna in right. Yeah, I would think that, I mean, obviously the Braves are a big bounce back candidate as a team just because like the Orioles, they were the team that fell far short of expectations and so many injuries. but yeah if you know you have a full season of per far presumably and they still have to figure out some stuff like you know you want dubon to be a utility guy a backup probably and not your starting shortstop ideally so not that that was a strength for them before but if you could shore that up and then you get sale back maybe you have a more effective strider you. You get Lopez back, you got Schwellynbach back, you get Waldrip. Like, that was on paper a strong rotation and it is yet again on paper a strong rotation if those guys are healthy, which is kind of a big if. But yeah, it should be good. Should be a good team, I guess.

I guess. Should be maybe a winnable division again with the Mets, maybe treading water, taking a step back. unclear, and then the Phillies, less said about the Phillies on this episode, better. Already said enough. Yeah, probably. So, okay. Yeah. Thinking about it again now.

Yeah. The Tigers re-signed Kyle Finnegan to keep closing, relieving for them. So that's nice. Everybody wanted to get back together on that one. Yeah, sure. It seemed like it was likely to happen from the jump. And then we got some news shortly before we started recording that the royals are reportedly finalizing a five-year extension for Michael Garcia. Yeah.

That will contain a club option for a sixth season and will guarantee him 57.5 mil, although there's the option and some escalators, et cetera. and maybe this will finally cement in my mind that Michael Garcia is not Michael Franco, which is a very important distinction that I have. Quite important, yeah. Yeah, not always reliably made. It's definitely something that I need to keep reminding myself, even though Michael Franco has not been in the big leagues for a few years now. Quite well, yeah.

He's in NPB these days and not hitting particularly well. there either. Really, I must move on to the current Michael and the superior Michael, who is really underrated, I think, if anything, and is a really good player. I mean, he was almost a six-win player. Yeah, he was almost a six-win player by our version of war this year. Yeah, yeah. He had almost like sort of, yeah, it was kind of like an all-around, you know, he's 25 years old, good hitter, just good everything, really. stole 23 bases. Very strong defender.

Good defense. Yeah. Yeah. What does it remind me of? It reminds me of, it's like a Geraldo Perdomo sort of season, I guess. I mean, Perdomo is even better, but, and plays short and stuff. But, like, you know, just in the sense of kind of surprising me how good he was and taking a major step and then being a bit under the radar and kind of like an all-around contributor,

which maybe led to a little less attention, but shouldn't have. Yeah, I mean, it's funny that you say that because, you know, when, or earlier this off-season, like, Bauman was trying to find, like, who is the next Garcia or Pardomo? Like, who's the next guy who has been sort of an underwhelming bat for the first couple of years of his tenure in the majors and then seem to take a meaningful step forward? And we have to see him sustain it, right? but he's a he's a very good defender i mean like he he might be playing shortstop on another team that didn't have bobby wood junior so you know he's he's very good at third and yeah this year

like a plus defender at third with a 121 w rc plus like that'll play and maybe he settles down to something a little closer to to league average but it does feel like he's made a meaning full adjustment and the defense gives him quite a floor it's not very much money you know even for the royals you have to put that caveat on it but i like it i think he's a good player and you know i they have they have a lot of work to do as a roster you know that i can't believe you didn't lead with them bringing in lane thomas um but that outfield is still that outfield um so you know, there's work to be done on this roster, but I like the idea of them identifying the guys who they think are going to be meaningful contributors for the next little while and locking those

dudes in so they don't have to plan around them, right? Like, you just know you're going to have Michael Garcia on the roster. You just know you're going to have Bobby Wood Jr. You know, find those guys, give them deals that make sense. And then, you know, you have to go do to improve the rest of it. And so I like it. I think it's good. Yeah, not many, if any, left sides of the infield that I would rather have than the Royals combination of Witt and Garcia now signed long term. Yeah, that's pretty special. Yeah. Okay.

Well, that's a wrap on winter meetings week. Obviously, we didn't discuss every move in depth, but we talked about the big ones. And, yeah, you're back home. And I guess, all in all, it was, I don't know, it was not a dud, but not a smashing success of a winter meetings. You know, we had some big moves made, but it never felt like, oh, the stove is scalding. It's just, how it's all blowing up. I guess, yeah, there was briefly maybe when, I guess, like, yeah, you know, there was a time when, oh, it's all happening, but then it kind of calmed down again. And other than the Alonso move, it didn't really build on that.

But it's so weak for agent class to begin with. So I guess adjusted for that. it was not a bad winter meetings? I think that the thing that really felt like it was missing to me actually was more trade activity. I felt like we were very light on trade activity. You know, we talked about the Harry Ford for Jose Ferrer swap and what have you. So it's not like there was nothing.

I know, how can I forget the busy, busy bees that are the Los Angeles angels you need to get Vaughn Grissom like how could how could I forget Ben how how dare I really how how how dare but you know we haven't had like a big marquee sending but also you know when you think about the the last two winter meetings before this one one Soto was just doing a lot of the work for us in terms of like big events happening we didn't have dinner disrupted you know we didn't we were able to complete our dinner but there was no Brancino you know yeah yeah it's it's good But I'm glad that you got to sit and enjoy your dinner. But it's a good sign for excitement when you do have to interrupt the meals because something huge happens.

So that correlates closely to, was this a great sensational winter meetings? And yeah, it wasn't sensational. It was not sensational. It was fine. It was fine. But it was without fire. I mean, like, we didn't even have fireworks at the BBD. WAA meeting

You know Firework free kind of experience Although I don't know We could have gotten Worked up about the quality Of the coffee I guess But even that

We were too tired to really do that There was one evening Where I looked across the lobby As an aside Been too many places That are too loud You know Like

Was there a DJ? No there's no DJ Thank God There couldn't have been a DJ they decided to put the MLB network set in the lobby and like right off of the front door of the hotel like right off of the doors, the main doors of the hotel. So that was weird, but it was very loud.

It was so loud. My Apple Watch kept giving me like, you're in a loud environment warnings. I was like, I am. I am also unhappy to be here. Like, I mean, I was happy to chat with people, but it was so loud. And at one point I look across this very loud lobby

and I see John Becker with his laptop out in his hand and i was like oh no i had to go back to work and and i didn't i i don't remember what signing it was but it wasn't anything so so huge that i had to stop everything and say let's let's get to work out of the loud good i'm glad meg has ranted about lobby djs on the patreon bonus pods if anyone was wondering what the contact was there they don't belong there you don't It's a hotel. It's a club? Yeah.

Why are they there? Why is there? Too many DJs. You asked me important questions, yes. You know, everywhere. Sorry, DJs, but, like, I think it doesn't need to be, is it a crowded space? I felt like crowded in the lobby. It's loud.

We got a couple people pointing out. We mentioned that one of Scott Boris's lines was that Ranger Suarez, if you sign him, you'll be armed in Rangerous or whatever it was. And he also broke out the Scooby-Doo. comp yet again for Terrick Scoobel and Detroit. A couple people pointed out that he could have tied those together because armed and rangerous does sort of sound like

a scooby line because he got the rutrow raggy and the rangerous and there's something Scooby adjase there that he could have if he had to do the voice. Well yeah that wouldn't we wouldn't want him to do that probably well you know what I would want him to do

I would want to hear that I think I'm not sure if it would be well advised for him to do it, but I'd be interested. And we also got an email from Patreon supporter Articuno who pointed out, remember how when we were talking about the Sunny Gray saga and whether he actually wanted to play in New York and whether he was forthcoming about not wanting to be there and the back and forth among him and his agent and Brian Cashman, et cetera, and you questioned whether Sunny Gray would have called Cashman Cash prior to Gray's time with the Yankees? There is sort of a similar question in NHL circles.

So our listener says further to your conversation about Sunny Gray referring to Brian Cashman as Cash, there's a related NHL controversy right now. Star defenseman Quinn Hughes plays for the struggling Vancouver Canucks, while his two brothers both play for the New Jersey Devils. There's been rampant trade speculation, and Quinn was recently asked about it. And in his answer, he referred to Devils GM Tom Fitzgerald as Fitsy. This has caused Canucks fans to freak out. As under tampering rules, there is not supposed to be any contact between devil's management and Hughes. So the implication being that maybe they've been in touch because he's calling him Fitsy in a familiar way. Oh, no.

Yeah, yeah. But I maintain that some of these guys who've just been around the league forever, that you could call him Fitsy or Cash, even if you don't have a personal relationship with them just because people in baseball do or people in hockey in this case. I think that you're right. The part of it that struck me as odd is that I do think, you know, a player doing that about a GM when they are still like under team control. It just surprised me that there would be like a cap, especially if what you're trying to do is advocate for being on that team. I was just a little surprised that it would be so loose. I'm not saying it's wrong for it to be loose.

I'm simply surprised that it would be so loose. Okay. Well, that'll do it for us for today and for this week. Consume milk in a hygienic way, please, people. Oh, my God. All right. You know, we started this episode by talking about Garrett Stubbs, perhaps regrettably. I described him as the Phillies backup catcher, and I guess he is, but they haven't actually

re-signed JT Real Muto yet. They have Raphael Marchan, but Garrett got us. stay in game shape. Phillies need you in fighting trim. I don't think there's much chance that they will enter next season with Garrett Stubbs as they're starting catcher. I'm just saying, don't go out of your way to make that scenario any less likely. After we recorded the Exodus from the Mets continued, kind of. Tyler Rogers was not exactly a long-tenured met. He joined the Mets midway through this past season, but he's moving on to Toronto. The Blue Jays signed him for three years, 37 million, bolstering an already strong staff, continuing their aggressive off-season.

season and the influx of talent to the AL East. Also, we probably should have noted earlier that because of the competitive balance tax would have cost the Mets a lot more to retain Pete Alonzo than it cost the Orioles to acquire him. Not saying Steve Cohen can't afford it, not saying Mets fans should care. But it's true that he would have cost them something like double just because they have been penalty repeaters and so they have sky high tax rates. An additional factor that may have made them not really want to break the bank even more because it would have cost them a larger fortune to keep Alonzo around. But yeah, there really is a loss to losing your team's longest tenured player in Nimmo.

And maybe your team's most popular players, Alonzo Diaz, Diaz's entrance song, that whole ritual, even if Devin Williams pitches as well, he's not going to have the trumpets, or at least he'll have to come up with and earn his own entrance theme. So it does stink, even if you say, yeah, it's a business and ultimately wins or what matter. I think that is true. And if the Mets play better, which they very well might, and if the guys they let go don't age well or their replacements play perfectly fine, then I think Mets fans will come around. But of course, it's going to be painful. Even if you're in a romantic relationship that's not good for you. If you've been in it for a while, suffering that connection can kind of sting.

You have to figure out who you are outside of that relationship. It's almost an identity crisis. And sports teams can have identity crises too. Doesn't mean they're worse off than before. It means they're just more amorphous. But they'll develop a new identity. and maybe it'll be better than the old one, which probably wouldn't be that tough coming off of 2025. And the latest collapse, that probably doesn't make it any easier for these departures

to occur so soon. It is possible that Alonzo will lose something, too. I don't mean to suggest that his entire offensive rebound last season was a result of batting behind Juan Soto, but it couldn't have hurt Soto on base machine often got on in front of Alonzo. And Alonzo did see more pitches in the strike zone in 2025 than he had in 2024. Something to keep in mind. Thanks again to Michael Mountain for the stat blasting on this episode. We have done some other stat blasts in that vein, the ship of Theseus idea. If you're replacing all of the component parts of a thing, how quickly does it become a new thing entirely? I know we've done that on a game level, everyone in the starting lineup being replaced. I think we've done that on a season level, opening day starters, no longer

being on the team. We did one inspired by the 2021 Braves, I believe, about teams that had high postseason usage from players who recently joined the team. And I think we did one on games whose participants left the league quickest. So what was the time span from everyone playing in a certain game, no longer being in the big leagues? Sort of similar to what we did today. But I think this was a new variation on the theme. You can support Effectively Wild on Patreon 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 ad-free

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