Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2422: The 2026 Minor League Free Agent Draft

Episode Date: January 3, 2026

Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley, and Ben Clemens banter about the Astros signing Tatsuya Imai to a smaller-than-expected deal. Then (18:20) they continue a cherished podcast tradition by conducting the 13th annual Effectively Wild Minor League Free Agent Draft, in which they select 10 minor league free agents each and compete to see whose roster will accumulate the most combined MLB playing time in 2025 (followed by a postscript at 1:31:23). Audio intro: Cory Brent, “Effectively Wild Theme” Audio outro: Guy Russo, “Effectively Wild Theme” Link to guest appearances sheet Link to FG post on Imai Link to MLBTR on Imai Link to Feinsand tweet Link to The Athletic on Imai Link to minor league free agents Link to MLBTR on MiLB FA Link to last year’s draft Link to MiLB FA draft wiki Link to EWStats page Link to dynasty FA draft sheet Link to Brebbia on EW Link to MLBTR on Baddoo Link to 2025 MLB average SP Link to MiLB IP leaders Link to Can’t Hardly Wait scene Link to this year’s draftees Link to first Stathead query Link to second Stathead query Link to Boob McNutt Link to Mutt and Jeff Link to Gink and Boob Link to Bucco Bricks tweet Link to Lile’s Reddit response Link to MLB.com on Lile Link to car service jingles Link to Conjunction Junction Link to “certain point of view” scene Link to “Old Ben” clip Link to Slate on prediction markets Link to Bloomberg on prediction markets Link to Sporcle quiz  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

Effectively Wild A fancass baseball podcast Listen our emails that last When an antic baseball trip Every weekday Bring down your favorite pastime Sit down, relax in unwind As we learn how a tiny word

Hello and welcome to episode 24, 22 of Effectively Wild A FanGraphs Baseball podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters, I'm Megrelia of Fangraphs, and I am joined by Ben Lindberg of the ringer. Ben, how are you? Doing very well, thank you. And I am also joined by Ben Clemens of Fangraphs. Ben, how are you? I'm doing great. Happy New Year to you both.

Yeah, happy New Year. Since we started recording, we already said this off air, just to ruin the illusion that we don't talk at all before we press records. But happy New Year to everyone listening as well. And actually, the first email of the year. that we received to podcast at fancrafts.com was from Patreon supporter Dean Simmer who said, Happy New Year friends,

please to report that my nine-year-old just woke up and his first question was, in referring to the 2025 baseball season, should we say last year now? Yes. Yes. Yes. You're raising that young man right, Dean.

I'm surprised that that would be the first thought on a nine-year-old's mind on New Year's Day, but I appreciate it. It sounds like he has been podcast-pilled. So thanks, Dean. You're raising another young Patreon supporter in the future. It's interesting because it's not an issue in October. In October, everyone says this year, because, you know, the World Series hasn't concluded, I guess.

Although the regular season is done. Yeah, but the season isn't over. So you can say this season. Yeah, but people are good in October and then November 1st hits and everybody gets amnesia and all of a sudden my most consistent edit is the we have confusion between which year you mean when you say last year. But now everything's gravy and to pull the curtain back even further, you know, over the course of the holiday break, I was in process on editing the Seattle Mariners list, ran today, January 2nd, and I'm in conversation with Brendan Golowski. This is not a knock on Brendan, but Brendan was one of the many staff writers we have who's making this mistake. And then he said, aha, this is running on the second, though, so I can say last year, everyone will know

what I mean. I was like, that's right, Brenner. That's right. Well, no one else cares about this, but we care very much. As you posted on Blue Sky, our brief annual nightmare is over. It's over. And just in time because we will probably be referring to last season quite often on this episode. And if anyone's wondering, why is other Ben here? Well, other Ben's here a lot. He is our second most frequent podcast guest. You are just one appearance behind Long and Hagen. Really? Oh. Moving up quickly. Jockeying for first. Yes. But Ben is here because we are ringing in the new year with the 13th annual effectively wild minor league free agent draft. It's time.

Yeah, it's exciting. It's always this time of year. Sometimes it's late in a year. Sometimes it's early in a year. But we always got to get it done. I always look forward to it. Hopefully our listeners do too. We have done our preparation.

And we'll talk about that in just a second. After we get to one note-worthy signing of the new year. Yeah, the Houston Astros have signed Tatsuya Imai. We knew he was going to go somewhere because that was when the posting window was up. But this is in the vein of Munitaka Morikami, in that the top Japanese pitcher available, like the top Japanese position player, did not sign for nearly the kind of contract that was predicted. And Ben, when you did the top 50, free agent ranking at Fancrafts, you had him at 100 million. And others were more bullish than that. MLB trade rumors had him at 150 million.

And I guess, yeah, and Meg, we must have thought that sounded about right because neither of us... We didn't take that a contract? No, neither of us drafted. Neither of us took the under. Yeah, ESPN had him at 135. The athletic had him up in the 130s. Yeah, that was kind of the consensus. Yeah, you were low.

Yeah. To their credit, the Fangraph's crowd came kind of close to nail it because the crowd-sourced consensus was a mean of 73 million and a median of 64. And actually, 73 is, I think, the maximum that this contract could be. But it's a guaranteed three-year, $54 million deal with opt-outs after each of the first two seasons. Yeah. And then there are escalators. And if he triggered every threshold and somehow didn't opt out, which would be weird, then I think it would take it to something like 73. But, yeah, this was way under what he was projected to get, given that people seem to

to think. He's a credible mid-rotation-ish guy, and he's 27 years old. And he's the best pitcher coming over from Asia this winter. And yet, he settles for a lot less than expected. So what's happening here? Ben, have you reflected at all on your own predictions for Murakami, whom you had at 154 million? And you missed slightly, but who didn't really? So what's happening here? Yeah, I mean, I feel like I'm learning to override my model less Because I feel like this one is another one of them But like, in my, I would say that if you just used a spreadsheet to guess how much he would get It wouldn't be that far off from here

But then I like read all the scouting reports and listened to what people were saying And same with Murakami's right to Longin Hagen, that's where you went wrong Well, certainly not that, but like listening to the whole world like you know people were really high on these guys and A lot of the comparisons for Murakam or for Ami were like, this guy's like a number two starter in the majors. And I don't think that the translations would say that. No. When I initially model everything and just do that off of a, like, kind of a rule-based

thing, I had him lower. And, yeah, I think that essentially, it feels like this is not a crazy payday, but I feel like people were talking as though the last few deals for NPB stars coming over had gone so well that it was just going up and up. Yeah. I'm guessing that I'm, you know, that I'm going to miss on. Okamoto, too. Right.

I was going to say, we'll find out in a day or two. By the time we record again, Cosimo Okamoto will have signed somewhere. I had him and I at the same deal. And then I was like, man, I'm like way lower than the market on I. I'm not thinking about this right. I need to read more stuff about him. Yeah.

I mean, like I had Amai, I think both of them down for 418, which is what I have Okamoto down for. Maybe I'll be right on that. But given how everyone has been coming up short, I'm guessing that he'll go for even less. I don't know, because I think that, you know, he's older than Murakami, but I think the hit tool is viewed to be more stable, right? Like, there is a lot lower bust potential for Okamoto, it seems, is the consensus.

Yeah, although lower than am I? Well, right, yeah. I don't quite know how to make sense of that piece unless you're, well, I guess, really worried about the stature, right? He is a smaller guy relative to your typical big league starter. I think he's listed at like 5-11. And he is, I guess, pretty secondary dependent in terms of his best pitches, right? It's his breaking balls. So maybe you worry about the ball. This is, you know, this is an original thought. But yeah, I was surprised. I was surprised that he was able to secure the objouts, but also that there was such necessity for that to happen.

It is worth mentioning that both he and Murakami signed deals as if they were saying, man, major league teams are not paying for NPB performance, so let's hit free agency again soon. Yes, right. Yeah. And it was reported, I think Mark Feintan reported that Imai did get longer term deals for lower A.A.V. And he chose the shorter term higher AAB with opt-outs.

I think the same was reported about Moracami that he could. have had a higher guaranteed number if he had wanted to. But I like what you're saying, Ben, about maybe we just got anchored to the idea that the top NPP players of each off-season will just get gigantic deals, assuming they're not so young like Otani and Sasaki that they don't even have to. But it's, you know, just because Yamamoto got a massive contract and IMA is now the number one pitcher coming over from Japan this off-season doesn't mean that IMA-equals Yamamoto, right? So, or even Sasaki in terms of stuff and upside and youth and everything. Of course, you didn't have to break the bank to get Sasaki, but his first season over here was

kind of a cautionary tale too. So yeah, maybe it's that. Maybe we've all just kind of gotten too used to the idea that the top NPB free agent of each off season gets X, and that's not necessarily true. It depends on the class. I did wonder, just, you know, for anyone who needs a brief refresher. We did have Eric on at the beginning of the offseason to preview the class of Asian-free agents, and he told us about I. But his little blurb, or at least the co-authored piece that he and James Fagan did at the start of the offseason for fancrafts, scouting the Japanese and Korean players. The blurb was the 27-year-old. I. has steadily improved as a strike thrower and innings eater each of the last three years, and his fastball was still sitting

in the mid-90s at the end of 2025, even though he had worked 160-plus innings for the second consecutive season. I think he is the hardest throwing starter in Japan. It's just he isn't as hard a thrower as Darvish and Yamamoto and Otani were, but Imai's delivery arguably doesn't take full advantage of his special athleticism and flexibility, and he might find another gear in MLB. He has the stuff of a good mid-rotation starter and is in his prime. And Eric did a full breakdown of the deal, but the evaluation wasn't too different from that brief preview. And if that's true if that's who he is. If he's a mid-rotation starter who's fairly durable, and yes, maybe the command is kind of shaky or it will regress, but then again, maybe they could unlock even more

and he could get better, so they're still upside and youth, because that's a thing with him in Moracami. They're so young that I just really would have obviously taken the over on the deals that they got. So it perplexes me a little, and I can't help but think that these guys are maybe going to be bargains a bit. So I guess good job Astros. They managed to get a potential mid-rotation starter and still stay under the competitive balance tax threshold by $4 million or so, which seems important to them. Yeah. I mean, one nice thing is that, for Amai, is that he's not going to be that much of a bargain. If he has, he'll just leave. Yes, right. And save deal with Murakami, like, man, the White Sox might get an awesome deal for three years, but he's going to be gone pretty

quickly if he's great. Well, assuming that this takes the Astros out of the Framber Valdez market, if they were ever in it, then it's a credible contending rotation. There's Hunter Brown at the top, and then I and Christian Javier, and then Mike Burroughs, the guy they got from the pirates in the recent three-team trade. And then there's Ryan Weiss, another returnee from Asia whom they just signed. And there's just a bunch of guys kind of in the mix. Lance McCullors, or the idea of Lance McCullors, the theoretical possibility of Lance McCullors, Spencer Ergetty, Jason Alexander, etc. You know, you could find a fifth starter in that group somewhere. So it's good enough. You could imagine them making a run with that rotation,

assuming that people more or less stay healthy and MI is decent. So I like the signing for them. The only other possibility I considered, like could this have something to do with teams wanting to pay the NPB team less? Is that possible? Because the deal with the posting system now is that the team that posts the player gets like 20% of the first 25 million, and then 17.5% of the next 25 million, and 15% of anything over 50 million. And so the Saboo Lions aren't going to get all that much for posting, Am I here? And then same deal with Oricon. I don't know the incentive. Like, it's not as if the player really has an incentive to take less so that their old team gets screwed.

So I don't see really why they would settle. Yeah, they're definitely not going to do that, but you could imagine it affecting teams' desire to, like, move down the time versus A.A.V. They might be more interested in staying at the high-ish-A-A-A-V fewer years. I mean, the thing is that these deals aren't high average annual values. They're just not anything. They're just like pretty good deals. So I don't know that it's that particularly. I feel like it kind of operates in the same way that the qualifying offer does where it

doesn't matter for the no doubt, like star dudes. Like you're just going to sign Yamamoto, right? You don't care what the, I mean, I guess you care somewhat what the posting fee is, but that is understood sort of sunk cost in being able to retain his services. But you get a Yamamoto. so you're kind of indifferent to that. Whereas if there's a perception that a guy is a more marginal talent, then maybe it does factor to some degree,

but also those guys are just going to get less money anyway. So I don't know. Yeah. And this is the first player signed out of NPB ever by the Astros. I believe they had not signed a Japanese free agent I read at the Athletics since Kaz Matsui way back in 2008, and that had been after he had been in the big leagues for separate. Yeah, and they did, however, trade for Yusai Kukuchi, remember in 2024, which I cannot call last year anymore, and they seemingly did a good job with him, and he had a really good stint with them that he then parlayed into a nice deal with the angels.

And that seems to have resonated a bit because Kikuchi is also represented by Scott Boris, who represented I. And I think Boris praised the Astros for helping Kukuchi improve during his brief time in Houston. So that could have helped them as well. But yeah, I just, I'm somewhat flummoxed, somewhat perplexed, and wish I had taken the under on that. Because that would have gotten me back in the running after you took the under on Murakami. Yeah, it's all going to come down to Tucker for you, though. I really think it's all going to be about Kyle Tucker. Ben, what do you have on Kyle Tucker and off what initial?

I had the under on 400, I think, which... I like your side of it. I guess, but I'm not feeling great about it. It might be under 400, but it's... Let me put it this way. Tucker and Imi and Murakami are the three guys where I put my thumb on the scale most to move up my projections for them. So having been wrong with my first two, that increases my conviction that my third one was also wrong. Okay. All right. Any other thoughts on I or the Astros or remaining free agents before we get down to business?

I have a question for you guys. Sure. If you knew that Amai was going to hit his steamer projections. Which are? I don't even think. Just like a 4-3 ERA and 150 innings. Yeah. Would you be happy or sad about this deal? I'd be happy, I think. I'd be happy. I think I'd particularly be happy if I'm Houston because 150 innings of like reasonable. Baseball, that sounds good. They've been thin on the ground in Houston, you know, 150 innings from one guy. So it's like, I mean, it's a bad ERA, right? It's not a great ERA. That's the thing.

Yeah, we do have to adjust a little bit. We're not in deadball era like NPB is. But the league average, MLB average starting pitcher last year had a 4.21ERA. So that would actually not be that great. But it's essentially like, it's average-ish. The league average-ish production. It's not terrible. Yeah, not at all, right?

I mean, you get $18 million a year for a league average starter. And I guess maybe some escalators could kick in potentially, and then it might be a bit more. Yeah. I haven't really – like, I know that the deal will maxes out higher, but trying to figure out the exacts of that is beyond what I feel like doing on January 2nd. I guess he gets $18 million, but then, yeah, if he, let's see, escalates his 2027 sales. by $2 million apiece if he reaches 80, 90, and 100 innings next year. And then it also escalates his 20-28 salary, but he probably wouldn't even trick at those escalators

because he would just opt out. Even if he's an average starter, I would think he'd probably opt out. So you're really looking at a one-year $20 million deal for a league average starter. Yeah, I'd be pretty happy with that. You know what this would look a lot like? You say Kikuchi's deal with the Los Angeles. Yes.

Yeah, 363, and he threw 180 kind of meh innings. Yeah. So, I mean, hey, I assume the Angels are very happy with that deal so far. Yeah. Yeah, sure. That's 2.5 fan grafts war for his season. That's a solid rate of return. A good night's sleep, if you will.

Yes, I'm sure he will. Okay. So, the minor league for agent draft. Yeah. 13th time we've done this. So unless you are a recent listener, and in which case, welcome aboard, then you probably know the drill. But the drill is that we draft minor league free agents 10 apiece, and we try to target players we think will get major league playing time in 26. They don't have to be good. They don't have to be productive. It helps if they are,

because that will earn them more playing time. But we go purely by plate appearances and total batters faced. And it's just the sum of the plate appearances plus total batters face of the ten guys we drafted. And it's just for bragging rights, but sometimes there's a lot of bragging. So that's pretty important. I can speak from personal experience. We can all speak from personal experience, Ben. The receiving end of said bragging. Yeah. That's the thing. It's like, where do I go from here, really? I just, I feel. Wait a minute. This is not an invitation for us. Another acceptance speech.

I mean, it seems like an appropriate time to take one last. No. Lapp, bow, curtsy, just, you know. I mean, we did our recap of last year's results, but I just, I feel like I've seen the mountaintop and I don't really know where to go from here. So I feel some sort of malaise because I feel like I probably can't top my performance from last year. And it's just, it's all downhill from here.

and if we didn't just need to continue to do the podcast and if I didn't enjoy this draft so much, I should just call it a career, frankly. Thunking you on the head if he were with you in person right now. Enough, enough, then. Just walk away, you know, on a high note, but I won't. I'll continue because, you know, I could always, I guess, repeat perfection. So that's something to aim for consecutive years of going 10 for 10.

But, you know, that's the standards. that I set that we all aim for. And what we do is we take a list of minor league free agents that is put out by MLB and published by Baseball America. And there are 574 minor league free agents who declared shortly after the conclusion of the World Series this year. And as a brief refresher,

it's always difficult to explain what a minor league free agent is because a minor league contract is not synonymous with a minor league free agent. you can sign a minor league deal and not have been a minor league free agent, which is kind of confusing. But as Baseball America said, these players minor league contract terms expired, typically after the six renewal seasons of their uniform player contract were exercised. The uniform player contract, that's just when you get into pro ball into affiliated ball, you sign the generic uniform player contract, and it gives you several years of team controller. It gives your team several years of control over you.

and then when that expires, then you get to be a free agent if you're still stuck in the minors. And as Baseball America said, many minor league free agents this offseason signed initial UPCs for the 2019 season and had their contracts renewed for six seasons after that covering the 2020 through 2025 seasons. So it's just a release valve. It's a mechanism for anyone who's just been stuck in a certain team system, maybe blocked by someone at the major league level. This is they're out. This is how they get to become a free agent and hopefully find greener pastures. And then there are also some weird ones like guys who have been in the big leagues, but they get outrighted to the minors and they end the season in the minors and then they become minor league free agents.

So it's an odd amalgamation of names every year, which is part of the charm, I think. In fact, I saw the MLB trade rumors post about this back from November when Baseball America published its list and I looked at the comments on the MLB trade. rumors post and here are a few quotes such a bizarre group of players guys i had no idea we're still around or trying to be that looks like the majority of the 2019 MLB top 100 prospects list wow that's a lot of once wases never wases and reclamation projects and finally this is a legendary list for ball knowers hopefully we're ball knowers and we know a lot of these names though far from all of them that's for sure so we have put together our draft boards and we will do our best to throw some darts and hit big leaguers in 2026 any thoughts on preparation on the draft class

anything else i thought this was kind of a light bunch a poor group relative to the average yeah uh which isn't to say that there aren't some guys who will be worthwhile and might um play big league roles, perhaps meaningful big league roles, but it did feel light where I was like, oh, is it is it fewer guys than usual? And I was like, no, it's just you are good guys than usual. Yeah. So. Yeah, it is the same kind of quantity, but I also had that sense of not the same quality because I went back and I looked on on my miracle draft of 2025, the draft board that I had last

year. Unbearable. Unbearable. I had 48 days. I smoked you in the contract over under draft last year. It was not close. It was frankly embarrassing for you. And I have said so little about it. And here, other Ben, this is embarrassing, Ben. We bring other Ben into our podcast home and you, you are doing this in front of a guest. Embarrassing. Yep. Yes, I am. And I make no apologies. Not many apologies at least. But yeah, I had the same feeling because I had 48 names on my draft board last year. And this year, I have 32 that I even bothered writing down, which is like the minimum. I mean, I have to have at least 30 in case we all have identical preflis. And I need to draft the 10 guys you didn't. But just not a lot. I don't know if that's because I just didn't bother writing down guys. I'm realistically not going to draft. This has to be a bad class. I don't have a consistent method. I do something new every year.

But I was looking through this, and I was like, this seems bad. Like, I don't think many of these players are that good. Whereas I feel like in many previous years, I've been, like, spoiled for choice. Right. To the point that it's almost a problem.

And making bad decisions because there's, like, too many players that I like. Right. And this time is, like, too few. Yeah, I bolded, like, barely over 10. Like, guys I really want as opposed to, yeah, I can live with that guy, I guess. Right.

Yeah, actual top targets. It's not many more than just a full roster, and I will not get all of them, unfortunately. I don't know why that would be. It's just, I guess, fluctuation from year to year. But, yeah, it did stand out. I wonder maybe at the end of the year we could get someone to stat blast that and find out whether there actually was, like, less talent available in this draft class or not. But, yeah, we'll see. will do our best, despite the difficult circumstances.

And shout out to Patreon supporter Evan, who every year diligently updates what he calls the Minor League Free Agent Draft Dynasty Tracker, which is a record of all of the picks that we've all made over the years, including past participants, Sam and Jeff, and he tracks them over time and tracks them as if we were drafting in a Dynasty League, basically just like if we were drafting for talent and production.

And so he tracks the war, produced career by everyone. So like the best pick ever by Fangraph's War in the Minor League for Agent draft is Dylan Moore, whom Sam selected in 2019 and has accumulated 8.4 war. So that's Tops. And by baseball reference war, it's John Birdie, who I took in 2019, and he's at 8.6 war. So, yeah, like the names that we've hung in the rafters in the minor league free agent draft in terms of war, Dylan Moore, John Birdie, Scott Barlow, Craig Stammon, who's now a major league manager. That's how long we've been doing this. You know, that kind of name.

So, but we don't care if they're good. I mean, again, it helps, but that's not the main goal here. He also has our hit rates overtime and like how well we've done in war per year and total war accumulia and everything. And what this tells me is that, Ben, you have sort of a different strategy, which is, I think you employed this last year, where you kind of go like all or nothing a little bit. You tend to be a little riskier. I like picking guys who could have a good year. Yes, right.

You go for ceiling, sort of. And so your overall hit rate, I think, as a result, is the worst. But when you do hit. So you have hit on 50% exactly of your picks. 50% have made the majors in the year following the draft, whereas Meg is at 65. Meg has the highest hit rate, 65%. But I guess plays it somewhat safer,

whereas I and Sam and Jeff tend to cluster around 60%. So Ben has, at least in the past, I think, had more of like drafting for sealing in terms of playing time as opposed to just sort of taking the guy you think is pretty much a lock for some playing time

but probably won't actually get much playing time. You're just, you're rolling the dice. So I'll be curious to see whether you've remained true to form this year. I guess we'll see, yeah. And I have forgotten who has the first, oh, I guess it's Ben Climate

because you're all-or-nothing strategy didn't work out that well last year. So as a result, you have the number. one pick, so take it away. Here's the good news. There's only one player I wanted to draft this year. Oh, well, you get him.

I got him. I'm going to take Joel Piams. Yeah, that's a really... Presumably, that was the top of everybody's board in that there's not much of a board aside from him. I think it's pronounced Yoel Piaops, I think. Yuel Piaops. All right. I prepped on the pronunciation, hoping that I would

have to say it when I selected him, but sadly, yeah. Well, he's a good Major League player. who is signed to a $2.25 million deal. Yeah. I mean, he was a good last year. He was not good last year. He has been good. But, you know, like, he's a good reliever.

He's just a totally normal good reliever. He got kind of jammed in the Brewers. Our team is too good crunch. He had a 4-3 FIP when the Brewers DFA'd him, but a 7.23 ERA, and they just said, eh, let's not try to keep going with this. Our bullpen's really good. We're trying to move the Miz there.

In fact, that is basically what happened. He was designated for assignment on September 20th. So that's why he's a minor league free agent because of the weird machinations of the end of the season. So I'm just going to take him. He already signed, like I said, a $2.25 million contract with the Braves. That's not a contract you signed to go play in the minors. Yeah. Yeah.

No, it's a good pick. I think he was probably the clear number one. Again, you know, reliever. So there's a ceiling there in terms of total bad. matters faced, I guess. Like the, the best picks tend to be starters who can get even more playing time. Like, who did you take last year? Adrian Houser, Meg?

Yep. Yeah. So that was your number one pick. And he got 518 total better's face. If you hit on a starter, that goes, like, really far. Or you hit on a, like, an everyday player, but that's super unlikely. Yeah. But, yeah, that's about a safe a bet to be a big leaguer all year.

and maybe actually be decent. So good pick. All right, Meg, you're up. I'm also going to take a guy who has a one-year deal, although I think this is probably a split-contract. I'm going to take Ty Adcock. He's a right-handed reliever. He signed a deal with the Padres.

He was the Mets very briefly in 25 and 24 at the major league level. He pitched well in like three innings said in the majors last year, but I know that there is something of an embarrassment of riches in San Diego from a reliever perspective, but I do think this group is like a little more unsettled than it necessarily gets credit

for. Maybe they will make Mason Miller a starter. Maybe one of these guys will get hurt, you know? So I think that there's good possibility that he will be like one of the first arms that comes up if he doesn't break camp at the big league club. So take an adcoq.

That's a good one. And I'm thinking about whether I want to just go head to head with you. You know, I do. I'm going to get a guy who will be competing for pitching time with Ty Adcock, and that is Dyson Acosta, who was also signed by the Padres and also got an MLB deal. He was in the national system. He has not yet made his major league debut, but he is just 27 years old. Just 27.

Yeah. He has an option remaining, which that can be kind of a double-edged sword. Sure. Because sometimes when a guy doesn't have an option remaining, that's extra incentive to keep him on the major league roster. And that's good because someone else might get sent down instead. But also, sometimes it's incentive to just cut them because they're maybe not quite good enough to keep around to break camp with the big club. And there's just no room on the roster for them. And then they go.

that could work out either way. Maybe Acosta just, you know, makes the team out of spring training. Or maybe he doesn't, but comes up sometime later in the season. And he's got good stuff. He pitched well. He had kind of like a helium season for the nationals. He, I guess he had been in the upper levels of the minors previously, but he pitched in A ball. He pitched in double A.

He pitched in AAA and kind of split time between AA and AAA mostly. And overall was quite effective and struck out 72 in 52 innings, not too shabby. So hopefully he'll be doing that in the big leagues with San Diego this year. And you got all the way down to W for Washington and looking through these minor league free agents. That's until the victor go to spoils. You just stopped scrolling at a certain point. I mean, I ran out of time. Really?

Okay. Well, yeah, the baseball America list this year actually had, I don't remember this, but they had a breakdown by team and everything. Because it really varies whether teams had a lot of minor league for agents or not. And, you know, some of them have roster crunch and some of them don't. So, like, the Nationals had the most minor league for agents. They had 34 minor league for agents. I was wondering whether that's, they brought in the new front office and they're like, who are these guys? Yeah, maybe.

Get them out of here. Yeah. Whereas the Orioles had eight. So there's a real range there in terms of how many each team has. And then by level, they broke it down by level to 356 of the 574 were at AAA, I guess, most recently. And then it goes all the way down to like five guys who were in the Dominican Summer League. So it just, again, runs the gamut of minor league levels. And then they broke it down by position too.

So 268 of them, by far the most, were, oh, that's right-handed relievers, okay. Or no, that's just right-handed pitchers. I thought they had broken it down and starter reliever. Sometimes it's tough to make that distinction with players of this caliber. So it's just 268 right-y pitchers, 68 lefty pitchers, and then 66 outfielders, 59 catchers, 41 shortstops, 36, third baseman, 18, second baseman, and 18 first baseman. So there's a little bit of everything. Okay. So we're all on the board here.

We all have our first rounders, and now it's back to Ben. I'm actually going to take another reliever. I don't really know if that's a great choice, but this is a guy that I think is actually, like, probably a major leaguer. Zach Pop. Yeah, Zach Pop. Yeah. I just think that guy's pretty good. He signed a big league deal.

Did he? I just read signed deal, perhaps big league. So that's good. I can confirm. It's a big league deal. And he's out of options. So, you know, I mean, he might get cut, but he has, like, real Major League Baseball stuff. So that seems good.

And, yeah, if he starts in the majors, cool. Then maybe he'll do well. He was with the Mets. Most recently. He's now with the Phillies. And that Philly pen could be pretty good. So I don't know how much room there will be. But I kind of, I root for him because I believe he was the first player we ever featured on our

made-a-major segment. Is that right? Oh, nice. Good name. I've always remembered, yeah, Zach Pop. It pops in my mind. So, yeah, he was with the Marwins back then, and then he was with the Blue Jays, and most recently with the Mets, and also the Mariners.

He was very briefly with the Mariners as well this past season. So he's bounced around a bit, but yeah, he did get a big league deal. I was sort of surprised that he got a big league deal, I guess, but he did. So, yeah, there's always a run on the major league contract guys. at the beginning of these drafts for those who are just joining us for the first of these because that's just a little extra security that someone either commanded enough

desire from teams that they could go where they wanted and thought they would get playing time or sometimes it's like you're on the 40 man you actually have an inside track. We are picking the best minor league free agents but the difference between the average guy who signs a minor league deal and the average guy who signs a major league deal

is huge. Yeah. Because like the major league guys make the major league guys make the majors on average. All right. Nick. Okay. I'm going to take a guy who doesn't have a big league deal, but I think we'll get a big

league opportunity, and that's Eddie Yeen. Eddie Yeen. Eddie Yeen was with the Pirates last year. He signed a minor league deal with the Nationals. And guess what the Nationals are going to do? They're going to cycle through a bunch of guys and see if any of them are good. And he carried a three ERA at AAA last year. So does he strike many guys out?

I'm here to tell you he does not, but I think that the combination of upper-level performance with the team that, again, is going to be keen to see if they can, like, kind of make something out of post-prospect guys might give him a chance to break camp with the club. So Eddie Yeen. Plus it's fun to say. It is. Yeah, there are some good names in this draft. He's a former top prospect, right? I don't know where he... Or former prospect of some note.

He was definitely a ranked guy. Where did Eddie? Let's remind our show. He was like a 35 plus in his final year. Yeah, he peaked as a 40 plus. So he was a prospect, but he was not for. I recognize the name pretty well. I don't know why.

I guess he was on four different prospect list. So that goes. Baseball reference claims that it's actually Eddie Jean. Oh, really? Does that change whether you still want to select him or perhaps It opens up a whole new world of jokes. I guess so, yeah. Huh, that's a good one.

I'll see if I can confirm the pronunciation as we're doing this. Are his relief appearances, jean shorts then? Good one. That's all the got. Other sources claim it is yin. I hope it's yin's fun. Okay, I will select another guy who I believe does not have a deal currently, but seems like he should. chas mccormick yeah what's up with chas mccormick not having a deal he was on my list too

yeah chas mccorick has has been a big league regular at times uh place on her field too distant yeah he's coming off a not very good year or two years for that matter so you know i see why he is a minor league free agent and doesn't have a deal as of yet now there's always the risk of course when you select someone who has not yet been signed, that they might sign in Korea or Japan or something. And we do not get credit for that. It's only MLB playing time. And we've all been burned by those cases in the past. But yeah, there were several guys as I was doing my draft prep where I thought, oh, this is a good one. I like this guy. And then I was just about ready to write him on my board. And then he signed

with NPD or something. But good to know, I guess, that they were seeing the same thing I was. Anyway, as long as I avoid drafting someone who has already signed with a Japanese or Korean team, which I have done in the past. And then you're, you know, down a pick before the season even starts. So hoping to avoid that. But as far as I know, Chas McCormick, still a free agent. And just, you know, seems like he'll get a shot somewhere, right? You know, he's on my list. Yeah, he still plays center regularly.

I mean, you know, as much as he plays anything, he played more center than last. left or right, but you can play it all and is only like a couple years removed from being legitimately good and actually like hitting well, I guess is still kind of a platoon guy, but you know, good. Like in 2022, he was, he was a really good player. He's like a three plus war player. So. Yeah. He's the best peak player on this list, I think. Well, there's some guys who were pretty good a while ago. But yeah, he's only 30. So someone will give him a shot. Hopefully, not a team in Japan or Korea, but we'll find out. Okay.

That's actually the end of my targets list. I had four players on it. We've picked them all. Oh, no. Wow. Your strategy for this year is not prepping at all. It sounds like, which is valid. No, I read them all, but I just didn't think any of them were that good.

Oh, I see. I have some, like, begrudging targets. Yeah. I'm going to go with Valenti Belozzo because I've seen him pitch. He's a Marlins kind of swing man. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, is he good? He's not. I said that I watched him pitch, and I watched the Mets absolutely unload on him,

just absolutely destroy him for like two or three innings before the Marlins went to some bad relievers. He made six starts and pitched 80 innings in the majors last year, and then he elected free agency, and he's not signed by anybody. But I'm hoping that he will get a deal because he was good enough to pitch in the majors. I love this. It's a very It's a very interesting approach I wonder how it'll go

I don't think this one is going to be good But it might be and he's only 25 Sure, I mean 25, yeah Okay, so it's my turn now I'm going to take Blake Hunt Oh no! That was the other guy on my arguable list Oh, well, sorry

Come on! I'm taking Blake Hunt for those who do not know Blake Hunt is a catcher. He signed a minor league deal with the Padres. He spent all of last season at AAA for Seattle where, you know, if you're a catcher and you play for the Mariners, you're probably not going to see big league time. But he had like a 108 WRC plus and AAA.

Mostly I think that their catching situation, at least from a backup perspective, is pretty in flux because, you know, they have, they traded for Freddie for means. So they have him, and he'll be the starter. But, you know, it's just never worked out for Campy. You know, Louise Campestown has just never been a great option. And he's the backup on the roster right now.

And then when you look at sort of AAA, it's Hunt and then Rodolfo Duran. So I think there's a real chance that, you know, particularly if they, like, move on from Campi, that Hunt is in the mix there. He's had big league time. I think he's like a, right, he's had big league time, right? I'm actually not sure Not had big league time But a lot of AAA time

Sorry, that's right He hasn't debuted So I'm taking Blake Hunt Yeah Okay He's like a real prospect right Not for a while

He was he peaked at a 40 plus In 20s But like if he weren't on the Mariners He would have had big league time I'd Well I think that there's a team specific Like

Yeah I think he would play Right Being the other dude Like just makes it even tougher Yeah They have familiarity with him He was a pottery to begin with

And then a ray and then maybe an Oriole, yeah, an Oriole briefly, in 24. But yeah, anyway, Blake Hunt. Traded for Mike Bowman. Yeah, he was in the Big Mike Bowman trade. And also the Snell deal originally. Indeed. Okay.

All right, that Blake will hunt. I like it. All right, you have both selected players who were not on my board, which does not mean anything bad about the picks. It might mean something bad about my board. But I like that there's enough variety in our strategies here that we're coming to, even if we can all agree on Yoal Piaumps or, you know, Chas McCormick or someone, you know, we're all kind of employing our own separate strategies here.

So that's good. Okay. For my third pick, we always flirt. I always considered should I suggest snaking, doing a snake draft, and then we never do. It's just, it's effectively wild tradition that we just take turns. Maybe it's, yeah, it's probably more entertaining this way. We just, you know, no one has back-to-back picks. Okay, I will take Kevin Newman.

I'm taking Kevin Newman. You know, it's not exciting. Yeah, it's standard. Like, you always go for it. Do I take the guy who, like, might actually be pretty good and is, like, by the standards of the minor league for agent draft sort of a prospect? kind of like Blake Hunt, but has not been in the big leagues before? Or do you take the guy who has already peaked, you know, to the extent that he's going to, but is pretty solid, dependable playing time guy?

And that's Kevin Newman, at least, you know, past results don't predict future performance necessarily. But he has been a big league staple. He's played in 50-plus big league games, you know, pandemic season aside every year since 2019. been in the big leagues every year since 2018, and probably doesn't bode well that he kind of washed out with the Angels this past season. He just, he can't hit. I mean, you know, he's Kevin Newman. But other than that one year, I guess, like his first full season with the Pirates where he had kind of, I guess, a fluky bab appear and hit hit hit three hundred and was a little bit better than a league average hitter back in 2019. Now, he's 32. You know, he's a former first rounder,

But he's hung around, and now he's with the Royals. So he was with the Tigers most recently. He was with the Angels mostly last year, and he sort of stunk at the plate, but played every infield spot and then did okay in AAA with Detroit at the end of the season. And he just has gotten playing time every year. And one of these years, that will not be true. And it very well may be the year coming off of the year when he sort of stunk with the end. angels, but I'm banking on at least one more season of Kevin Newman somehow finding his way to playing time. And he's had like, you know, he qualified for the batting title once, twice, in fact.

And he's a couple of years removed from getting 300 plus plate appearances. So that's what I'm hoping, you know, that the royals just do their royals thing and are like, sure, yeah, whatever. It doesn't, you can't hit, but we need a utility guy. So it seems like a decent landing spot for him. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like he has got to be the first round pick who most mistakenly gives off like scrappy 25th round pick energy. Because you said that and I was like, what? Yeah, I know. It's surprising. Yeah, 19th overall draft pick of the Pirates back in 2015. How about that? I'm hoping that I will now be picking guys who you've at least heard of because we're pretty much off the board.

I'm going to take Sean Boyle. I wrote something about Sean Boyle once because. Amazing. Yeah, because, yeah, I mean. Why? I mean, sorry, but why? It was because his dad developed the pitch grader app. Oh, that's right.

Yeah. Okay. I retract my snark then. Yeah. I mean, I wasn't really writing so much about Sean Boyle's about, yeah, like player development in college and, yeah, like tools that teams were using in college to develop players, et cetera. But he, yeah, he was sort of like a regular starter in AAA this person. year, right? Yeah.

Basically, he was a regular starter in AAA, and as I look through the roster for the Padres for their starting rotation, it's got a lot of guys where I'm like, uh, no. Like, I don't know, you can't be counting on Randy Vasquez. You can't be counting on J.P. Sears. U. Darvish is injured, and like, I know it's internal brace, so like maybe he'll be back for the second half of this year, but like, I'm not looking at their rotation and going, these guys are deep. They have a lot of players who are famously heard a lot.

You missed Matt Waldron. This will be the year. He'll just be a staple in that Padres rotation. He's definitely one of the guys battling Boyle for playing time. And to be clear, like, Boyle is not as, is not that good. You know, he has some command. And we graded four different pitchers, four different pitches of his the last time that we made him a prospect. But we gave them all kind of bad grades.

Yeah. He's like a command and not going that hard kind of guy. The slider's okay. you know, it might work. The Padres, they always need innings. They always are doing weird stuff. Maybe he'll make 15 starts and be like, okay, and then get traded because that's how they work. Eddie Yeen, pronounced yin, I have confirmed.

Yeah, okay, good. All right. Sean Boyle, okay. Yeah, good pick. He probably, he must have, like, been among the minor league leaders in innings pitch, probably. Yeah, he threw a lot of winning last year. But still, yeah, okay. All right, Meg.

Oh, where do I want to go next? Okay, I'm going to, I don't feel good about this from a strategy perspective already, but I'm going to do it because one of my other options is to take a pick purely despite Ben, and I'm not going to do that. I am going to take, oh, am I going to say this last name correctly? Mark Colosseri? He's a catcher. He signed with the Phillies.

He signed a minor league deal with the Phillies. And guess what the Phillies need. They need catching. And sure. Are they likely to fill that catching need with J.T. Rilmuto? Yeah, I would think probably. I would think probably, but somebody's got to back him up. What are you going to do?

Be in the Garrett Stubbs booby milk business? No, you're not. You're going to have respect for yourself, Philadelphia. You're going to have respect for yourself as adults. Of all the players who should be nicknamed boob, Garrett Stubbs is up there probably. Yeah, no, terrible. So, yeah, I just, this is purely a potential. roster fit sort of circumstance.

He did get limited big league run. Am I remembering this right? Yeah, he was up with Baltimore a couple of years ago for like one game. He's had a cup of coffee and 10 with Cincinnati. But, you know, he had a decent batting line for the Red Sox last year in AAA. So I don't know. Let's see if he gets any, see if he gets some time, you know. You got an invitation to spring training.

I might have to learn how to say his name. Always nice to be invited to things. That's good. Okay. All right. Yeah. Sean Boyle, by the way, 33rd in the minors innings pitch. So I exaggerate it a little bit.

Wow. Still. All right, then. I think I'll also take a Philly. How about that? You took a Padre before. I took a Padre. I'm going to take a Philly after you took a Philly.

And I'm going to take Lover Pagero. Yeah. Who was signed by the Philly. and was most recently with the Pirates. He's been with the Pirates for a bit. He's been in the big leagues each of the past four seasons, debuted in 2022. Kid hit, but he can play a bunch of positions, and he's young. He is 25, which is pretty good as minor league free agents go.

It's not quite like major league free agents. I guess there are plenty of young-ish minor league free agents who were drafted out of high school or something, and they're still fairly young, or internationally, which would be the case for Piggero. But he's signed by the Phillies, and that gives me pause because that seems, you know, like they are actually a pretty good team, and the Pirates weren't. And so that helped Pagero get some playing time with the Pirates. He maxed out at 213 plate appearances in any season with the Pirates and got only 88 in this past year, and I will reiterate he cannot hit.

So that is an impediment to Major League playing. time. But he can play shortstop, and he is young, and he's a former top prospect. He came to the pirates in the Starling Marte trade, so I will hope that somehow he finds his way to playing time with the Phillies, or that they let him go, and he ends up in some more auspicious situation. Okay, back to other Ben. Brian Navarretto? Okay. Tell us about him, because I know nothing. Yeah, well, I already spelled his name wrong. The double letters are tough.

He was a Brewer's catcher. Yeah, yeah. He had all these former Marlins. Well, current Marlins, too. And then he went to the Marlins late in 2025 and racked up some minor league playing time. And then some Major League playing time, 15 plate appearances of being a backup catcher. He hit preposterously well in those 15 plate appearances, which doesn't matter. But I looked at the Marlins' depth chart.

And we just, like, don't have a backup catcher listed for them, even though we list them as platooning. Like, I guess Roberto Hernandez, but he's not a catcher. And so the Marlins, also, like, Liam Hicks is not that good as you're starting catcher. I think that they are in a situation where they're going to be using a lot of catchers just to have a guy behind the plate. And Brian Navarretto is a 31-year-old who has caught for them without them hating him. So, yeah. I think that's a pretty good way to get playing time. I don't know if it'll work, but if I get 100 PA here, then I'm going to feel good.

Okay. Well, you're so uninspired by the talent available here. That's not the best challenge available here. I'm going to take Bradley Hanner, Bradley Hanner, who's a pitcher who signed a minorly contract with the Yankees. And he's a right-handed pitcher who signed a minor. league deal with New York. And I am intrigued here. He was with Cleveland. He had an ERE like in the force last year. But also here's a question for you. And here's a question for the Yankees to sort of in spring training. Is he better than Cade Winquest? Because Cade Winquest was a

rule five pick from St. Louis by the Yankees. He also throws right handed. So you think of them as like the two guys who were sort of potentially competing at the bottom of that roster. And so I wonder, you know, I wonder if he's better. I think we're going to find out. So that's the thing we're going to do, you know. That's the thing about that's the thing. If you weren't hyped enough for 2026 already, we will finally get the answer to that question that has been just plaking us all. We're wondering about that question. And I wonder, I wonder if they will be able to answer it. Now, here's the thing that I will say, which is Bradley Hanner's not on the 40 man right now. So is that working against him? I mean, like, yeah, it is, if we're, if we're

going to be honest about the circumstances, we'd say that that's working against him. But also, is, is Cade Winquest good? Did you know who Cade Winquest was before you read the Rule 5 scouting reports? I didn't know until I edited them. I didn't, I didn't have any notion of Cade Winquest. Still don't, really. Don't know that I have any notion of Bradley Hanner either, but here we are. Okay. Well, I'm tempted to do something similar to what I did with my Kevin Newman pick. Yeah, I'll do it. What the heck? I will select effectively wild meme, Aaron Judge, bestie, Tyler Wade. Not to be confused with Taylor Ward, but Tyler Wade, 31-year-old utility player, has been with the Padres for a couple seasons and has now signed a minor league deal with the Rangers. This is a again, a guy who cannot hit, who has played in 506 major league games, almost 1,000 career-played appearances, has a 62 OPS plus, and has been about 60 the last couple years, too. And yet, somehow, while maintaining his 60-ish OPS plus, he has racked up well over 100 played

appearances in each of the past two seasons. Basically, he does that every year, and he's done it with a bunch of different teams, Yankees, Angels, A's, Padres. Now he's with the Rangers who, you know, I could see them maybe having a place for him. They got rid of Adoli Scarsia. They traded Marcus Semyon.

And they got Brendan M.O., of course. But, you know, he gives you depth in a lot of different places. And his name sounds like Taylor Ward. And he can play outfield and infield. And somehow he always seems to find his way to playing time. So this is kind of a classic low ceiling, just betting on extending the streak of being a big leaguer improbably.

Cool. Back to Ben. I'm going to take a huge Chad. Chad Stevens, who's a six-foot-three middle infielder. I mean, that's... You're going to do Chad with Trump. No, that's... I'm actually not sure if I'd consider him a huge Chad because I feel like he's normal catcher-sized.

But this guy's big for a middle infielder. Yeah. And Baseball America even listed him at a shortstop, which I don't agree. with. So he was signed by the Rockies to a minor league contract. That's always good. So I like that. Yeah.

He even briefly played in the majors last year for the Angels. I was not aware of that. That's cool to know. I'm learning this right now live with you guys. But he also batted a lot in the minors, 528 times at AAA and had an above average batting line. So, you know, is he the best player on the Rockies? Like, actually, maybe.

So I like that. No, he's a middle infielder who plays for Colorado. So I'm hoping he'll get a lot of playing time. Yeah, it's solid rationale. Okay. Back to back. Oh, God, it's me again? How many of these do we do?

No, I know the answer to that. I'm going to take... I love this draft. It's so dumb. What a dumb exercise we do. We're sitting here. episode sometime of just a super cut of Meg, minorly, creaturedraft sounds. But I'm not panicked.

Have you noted the lack of panic that's present here? It's just like a wealth of options. You're just sitting here going like, you know what? We're making noises. We're picking guys. We're remembering some dudes. We're getting to know others, you know. We didn't know them.

And now maybe we do. So, you know, okay, I'm going to take Colin Snyder. Okay. Colin Snyder was a mariner He's been a royal He's pitched Like meaningful

In terms of volume Big League innings He signed a minor league deal With the Cubs He's a good slider He commands it You know He's Colin Snyder

You're telling me You think everyone In that Cubs bullpen Is coming out healthy at the end I'd submit that they would not submit that they won't because that does not how bullpens go and theirs in particular. So, Colin Sider. Okay.

Colin Snyder. I'm going really pitcher-heavy. I don't know. I don't know about it, but that's what we're doing. Sometimes when we're explaining who these picks are, it's like, it can't hardly wait where they're looking for Preston. And they're like talking to like a couple of stoners to ask where Preston is and just describing. Preston, and it's like, he's, he's kind of tall. You know, his hair's kind of, I don't know, brown.

It's not really brown. Oh, he's tall. Well, he's kind of tall, sort of tall. Yeah. He's always, like, wearing t-shirts sometimes. I mean, Colin Snyder's 6'4, so he's actually tall. Like, I mean, he's Preston. He's Preston, you know?

I like that guy. Yeah. So he's Colin Snyder. Look, Colin Snyder had a sub-2 ERA for the Mariners like two years ago, you know? His FIP was in the mid-3s last year for the Mariners. They almost made the World Series, you know? So what do you want for me other than to draft Colin Snyder, 6'4? Yeah.

All right. Okay. My next pick, I'm going to take a cue from Ben Clemens two years ago, and I'm going to select Joe Ross. Joe Ross was Ben Clemens' first round pick. in 2024, and that paid off. That was a great pick, got a lot of playing time. And this past season, he still got some playing time.

He wasn't very good, but he was on a good team. He was on the Phillies. I mean, Phillies' rotation, best rotation in baseball maybe, or second best or something. And somehow he was on that team. I guess he wasn't actually starting in the rotation, except for one time. He was mostly relieving, and he also wasn't very good. But he did pitch 51 innings for, a really good team.

And the year before that, when Ben had him, he pitched 74 innings for the Brewers. Yeah, before getting hurt, he could have pitched even more. Like, he might be good. I agree. Maybe. So he has not signed, I believe. And so, again, there is that risk that he could go abroad and I could miss out. But he does seem like someone who should sign somewhere and get some playing time if he's healthy.

He's – once the Phillies got rid of him, he signed with the cuff. in September. And so he was most recently with the Cubs just at the tail end had a couple outings for them, I think. And, yeah, still twisting in the wind right now. But hopefully he will find somewhere to play. And hopefully that place is the United States of America for a major league team. Okay. Okay.

Back to Ben. All right. You might see a bit of a theme in my picks emerging. I'm going to take John Brebia. No. How dare you take it? This was my spite pick. I thought about it.

I was like, who did you think he was going to annoy other Ben or me? Okay, so Ben Lindbergh's, if we're ranking the loves of Ben's life, we will put his wife first

because that's both true and, you know, polite. Otani second. Yeah. And then it's a real toss-up, Ben, between John Brebia and Joey Menesis. Oh, I mean, I like those guys a lot, too.

Joey Menesis is also available. He is a minor than free. I know. He is. He's just, He's a man of diverse tastes, I think, is what we're learning about Ben Lumber. I love him. He's been on the podcast. He's delightful.

I would have taken him, so I'm mad, but it's okay. Yeah, he's on the Rockies. Yeah. Yeah, that's, I mean, I actually think at his peak, he was a good difference making Major League reliever. I don't think he is probably that anymore, but, like, he's delightful. Easy to root for. Yeah. Of the, you know, in the you can be bad or be a jerk, choose one rule, he's never going to be both.

Like, people always like him. So I'm hoping he'll get some innings out of that and being on the Rockies. I would think so, yeah. And he was with the Tigers at the start of last season, did not pitch well. Then he was with Atlanta, did pitch well in AAA, right? But then he only got into three games for them in the big leagues. But yeah, you know, he's 35. He's been in the big leagues every season since 2017, except for he.

missed the pandemic year because he was heard, I think. But yeah, it's another, he's like the, at this stage, I guess, kind of the Kevin Newman slash Tyler Wade of relievers in that it's proven track record of being a big leaguer. And also, yeah, he has the Rockies thing going for him. Yeah, I would say meaningfully better than those guys in that most years he's actually been a pretty good big leader. Yeah, maybe less than. Oh, boy, I just looked at his last two years of numbers.

They were not great. Yeah. They were not good at all. But that's why he signed a minorly deal with the Rockies. But that's a sub-replacement-level pen in 2025. So if he's a sub-replacement-level pitcher, he might fit right in. He might be right at home. So good pick.

Good guy. All right. Back to Meg. Oh, God. Okay. It seems to catch you unprepared every time. I know. But it's just because I have a lot of guys on this list.

And I'm trying to like anticipate which of them might actually be picked by one of you because we all know how I reacted when you took Kriesmott and then my entire board got blown up that one year and I spiraled. And Clemens' strategy is totally inscrutable to me. And so I'm just flailing. Yeah. He's a chaos agent in this draft for sure. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's good because what this draft is normally is so stable.

And so we need more game. No, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to pick my own cannot hit guy. I'm going to take Kristen Paché, because who signed a minor league deal with the Mets. And the Mets are a good baseball team. And Pasha cannot hit really at all. It's sort of been his problem for much of his career.

But he can still play center fields. And I would submit that the Mets are currently laid on guys who can really do that. And as we all know, from losing old Meg on this podcast, I am Center Field Defense Built, Center Field Defense Built. That was harder to say that I anticipated for how important it is to me. I could imagine him sort of rising amongst and percolating up among the other NRIs and being in a position to either. be a bench guy for them or, you know, maybe audition for somebody else, but you're taking posh. Yeah.

I considered it. I didn't have him on my board because I kind of figured, well, Tyrone Taylor is already like a slightly less poor man's Christian Pache, probably. But then Tyrone Taylor could get hurt or, you know, he's not actually good. So. Right. And assuming they don't sign someone or require someone, which they still could. They still could. Yeah.

But it's true. It's not a... Will they? It's an area of need. It's not a position of depth for them. So there is an opportunity. Can Pache sees it? I don't know.

I don't know either. But we're going to find out. I mean, that is on the list of things that we will also find out. I mean, remember when they have like a load bearing Jose Siri? That was a weird choice, you know? Yeah. That's strange. All right.

Yeah, Shane, you can just cut all of that. Just cut all the badoo banter. Much badoo about it. nothing. Keep it in. The joke's so good. Just to make... The joke is...

Come on. That was on the top of the dome. That was very good. That's the best trip of the recording so far. Thank you. Okay. We have to preserve the pun somehow. So what just happened is that I selected Akiel Bedou.

Yes. Because I thought he was a minor league for agent. And then there was a whole bunch of boring discussion of whether he was, in fact, minor league for agent. And we all suspect that he was. I think he was. And I thought he was, but he's not on the baseball America list for whatever reason. And that's, that's what we go by. So, yes. And maybe it's an oversight on B.A's part. And maybe he should be eligible. But even if he was a minor league for agent, you two weren't considering him because he wasn't on the list. So it's, it's unfair, I think, of me to select someone who's not on the list. Like, you know, we don't, we don't

say it's always just who's on the list is we just go by the list that's the talent pool so yes yes i will be upset if he was a minor league free agent and if he gets major league playing time in 2026 but yeah we're just registering that i selected him and meg made a great pun and now i will actually select someone else who is hmm you know what all right i think i think i'm going to select Cal Quantrell. Yeah. What the heck? Cal Quantrell.

Who's on my list? Yeah. He's, again, he's been a big leaguer for a while now. He's been a big leaguer every year, 2019 to 2025. He pitched 117 and two-thirds innings in the majors this very year, mostly for the Marlins and a little bit for the Braves. And he's only 30. He was, I think, most recently with the Rangers, because he was bouncing around last year,

and the Rangers picked him up, and he finished. with two strong starts for AAA Round Rock. And that was that. And he has not been signed, I believe. So again, I'm risking. This is, you know, I've picked up a few unsigned guys here. So I'm flirting with disaster. Yes, I am gambling here that he doesn't go overseas somewhere.

Seems like a candidate, too. But could also be someone who just signs and plays in the majors. I mean, he's got to be one of the top. 10 most likely names on this list to pitch 100 in the majors this year. So that seems good. Yeah. So that's why I'm selecting him. Cal Quantrillis.

Okay. All right. I'm going to continue a theme. I'm going to take Brett Sullivan, a catcher who signed a minor league deal with the Rockies. Yeah. Relevant qualifications here are that he's a catcher and he's signed a deal with the Rockies. I don't know. Like, he's fine.

They have Hunter Goodman and then like nothing. Yeah. So it honestly, like I was looking at their players and they all sound like, create a player names like not the i've just never heard of any of these other catchers and i'm a professional baseball writer i don't actually think brett sullivan is likely one of the best few catchers in baseball but you know he's fine and that in and of itself is a lot on the rockies who are otherwise choosing between brian to bedincourt and brackston fulford as their partner for uh for hunter goodman so that that's kind of a tough mix Brexon Fulford.

Brexon Fulford really sounds like make up a name on the spot and don't think of it. It's a great name. Bresden, Fulford's not a name. Oh, no. But it actually is, I guess. Okay. All right. Back to Meg.

Okay. I'm going to take three picks left, right? Okay. I'm going to take Herardo Carrillo. Oh, yeah. Who had like a 369 ERA at AA last year, which like, okay, fine. mostly he signed a minor league deal with the diamondbacks and I don't know how much time you spent watching their bullpen last year but it was bad and it isn't much reinforced relative to last year so it's a roster fit selection for me and I feel fine yep that's a good one I consider Korea as well okay I all right so I've gotten with a lot of low sealing proven veterans of the minor league free agent draft pool and and i feel the needs to

just try to spot a prospect here and buy low on someone because all these other guys i'm just kind of hoping they haven't passed their expiration date this is someone i'm i'm hoping is just entering their prime and that's gavin collier okay okay it wasn't who you were nervous about i guess Yeah, so Gavin Collier is, he was most recently with the Rangers, and he remains with the Rangers. He re-signed with them, signed another minor league deal with them. He is 24, so he's a real young man. He was a 12th rounder in 2019, and this past year, he rose a couple levels. He made it to AAA, and he pitched well, at least in AA, and overall, he struck out 80.

in 61 and a third. He did, however, walk 46. So that wasn't so great. That's a lot. Yeah, struck out 12.6 per 9, but walked about half as many. However, he's got good stuff. He was pitching in high leverage rolls as a reliever in those bullpens. He picked up some saves.

And he led the miners in Baseball America's Stuff Plus model. So Baseball America has its own proprietary Stuff Plus model, which I was not even aware of. We've got so many stuff-based models. Everyone has a stuff-based model. It's a lot to keep track of. So I don't know who's is better or how they're even different. But he led all minor league pitchers in Stuff Plus, according to Baseball America. So that seems good.

And, you know, he's rising. He made it to AAA. and I'm hoping that he will rise one more level this year with the Rangers. It seems like there are opportunities in that organization. So Gavin, Collier, or Collier, but probably Collier, yeah, I'm betting on the upside here. Wow. I did not realize they had a stuff model. Neither did I. There are too many of these.

Yeah, I know. I'm going to go with what I've been doing a lot of this. And I'm going to take Evan McKendry, who is a pitcher who signed with the Marlins. you and the Marlins you're very in you're in I feel like they seem like a team

that might play a lot of these guys so I will tell you this Evan McKendry has a comp to Kyle Hendricks ooh that's good from 2019 when he was a low level prospect that's less good

he also like doesn't really break 90 that frequently but he he threw 87 innings with a boy A five and a half ERA That's not ideal for the white socks But Brewers, he was on the Brewers somehow

Yeah, I am going to take him And hope that the Marlins use him For a lot of bulk innings Because he like doesn't walk anybody And seems like he can throw a lot of innings That's like a nice Fifth Starter archetype So let's hope that one of him

Or my boy Valenti gets that job I'm going to take Matt Mervis Oh, yeah, I strongly considered that I'm going to take Matt Mervis Matt Mervis was, I mean, can Matt Mervis hit? I was going to say, we're sticking with the players who can't hit. I think if we were to ask those questions, like in earshot of Matt Mervis' mom, she might be like, hey, that's my boy. Why are you talking about him like that?

And, you know, sorry, Matt Mervis' mom. But he got a little bit of run with the Marlins last year, the Marlins, but has signed a minor league deal with the Nationals. I think he was most recently in the Diamondback system if we're going through it and again sort of similar to some of my other justifications in this draft they're going to cycle through some of these dudes and see what they can find

who do they have? Who do we have is that where we have Garcia? Yeah so we have Luis Garcia Jr. at first base per roster resource and I think Garcia is fine but I also think that like there's some just some squishyness on that on that roster yeah he's not a first baseman either so they

right easily move on and make him until the guy again Nathaniel low's gone and Josh Bell's gone and yeah that was why I was tempted by Mervis they just they don't really have a first basement so don't really have an actual first baseman so yeah and I I've I feel like I'm maybe a little over exposed from a reliever perspective so hopefully I hit on Mervis and he gives me some actual bulk good pick oh Okay. Well, I'm risking it again and going with yet another unsigned pitcher. Wow. Hopefully unsigned. I think so.

Austin Gomber, who was the return other than salary savings in the Nolan Arnado trade, went to the Rockies, got released by the Rockies last year, which does not bode well. However, he was then picked up by the Cubs. Yeah. And he pitched well for them in a few outings in the minors in AAA, finished the season strong. He pitched 19 innings for the Cubs in AAA with a 0.47 ERA struck out a batter per inning and walked only two. So I like how he finished that. He is 32 and baseball reference says his nickname is Big G.

Big G. So I've just, I've accumulated just a bunch of money. bunch of guys who've gotten a lot of major league playing time, just Joe Ross and Austin Gomber and Cal Quantrell. And I'm just hoping that someone, a major league organization, signs them. And Chas McCormick is in the same boat. I could end up with like a significant percentage of my team not even being eligible to accumulate playing time this year.

It would be very funny. And I'm not wishing for this because I'm magnanimous. But it would be very funny if after going 10 for 10 with your guys, if none of them saw big league time. That would be, wouldn't you find it funny? That would be funny. I don't think it's likely, but it would be hilarious. I don't think it's likely either. I mean, I think at least some of these guys are in the fact that McCormick's unsigned is sort of a head scratcher to me.

Yeah, because as much as I have gloated and may continue to gloat about that performance, I don't expect ever to replicate it and don't think I'm actually especially great at this. I don't know that anyone is especially great at this. Which is what made it all the more special for me because it was just a bunch of, you know, just long shots coming in for me. Okay, yeah, please people sign, stay in the warm, welcoming United States. Oh, yeah. So, you know, just please don't go elsewhere.

Yeah, okay. All right. Ben, your last pick? Yeah. Yes. Okay. I have to decide between two, ones that both made me go, huh?

Your draft is great. All right. I'm going to do this one. I'm going to take Tyler Birch. Okay. Here is the reason that I am aware of his name, because the Mets tied him to a two-year contract. Oh, okay. Is he hurt or something? He missed all of 2025 rehabbing from Tommy John. Okay. He is expected to debut at a reasonable time in 2026. I'm very unclear why they

why they signed him to a two-year deal. He's never made the majors. Maybe there was just so much demand. Right. Like almost certainly not the second year. My guess is that they preferred to give him the second year because they think he might be good. And then they have another year of him at a cheap price. But that I'm kind of confused because it seems like they could.

I don't know. In any case, I'm taking Tyler Birch because he's the only person on here to sign a multi-year deal. Yeah, that's good, I guess. Okay. Of course, you don't get credit. for what he does in the second year. But still, no one's ever drafted a guy at the multi-year deal before.

Yeah, that's fun. All right. Still doing new things 13 years in. All right. Meg, you're up. Last pick. I'm going to take Janzer Laura. Ooh, okay.

Who was last with the Rangers. And Janzer has had a really fascinating trajectory. Last year was his first year back in affiliated ball. In a while he had been a prospect with Royals and then sort of fallen off the map and was pitching in the Nicaraguan Winter League. He actually hit the aisle right before our Rangers list went live last year. And he doesn't have a particularly good slider, but he's built quite well, and he's been

pitching in Lidom, and his fastball is wild. He's getting like, he's got like crazy extension, it's got all this vertical movement, and he looks great he looks great uh he doesn't have a contract yet but uh i don't know i just feel and he's thrown so hard so i just i'm taking a i'm taking a flyer with my last pick on yon sir laura because he's got a cool it's cool you know it's cool okay hmm all right well there are a bunch of ways i could go with this but i guess i will take oliver done okay sure oliver done was with the Brewers most recently. He is 28.

He's an infielder, and he signed a minor league deal with the White Sox. And the White Sox, they're getting better. But I think it's still not the worst thing in the world to sign a minor league deal with the White Sox. So, yeah, Oliver Dunn, I don't know, he's been in the big leagues for the past two years with a good team. And now he's going to a less good team. Didn't get a ton of playing time with the Brewers. but he got some with the best team in baseball by regular season record last year. So what an accomplishment.

And, you know, didn't actually hit very well in Nashville for them in AAA, so that's not great. But he does play a bunch of positions. He played every infield position. He played plenty of short, so he can handle your utility role if you need him to. And we talked about Lenin Sosa last time. I don't know if Lenin Sosa. whether he'll block Oliver Dunn or someone else will. But yeah, I'm going to bank on a brewer going to less good team

and hopefully finding a place to play. All right, we have done it once again. I also have a control group, which was once again sent to us by Patreon supporter Thomas Burton. He has done this in the past and he just randomly selects guys from the draft board here so that we can test ourselves against pure random dart throwing. And his team, his computer-selected team, is Jonah Bride, who actually, I... Oh, I almost picked him. Me too.

So the computer's already making me sweat here, because I kind of wanted Jonah Bride. And Chornebriad, he was with the twins, now he's with the Rangers, and he was at Marlon before, and he's now reunited with Skip Schumacher. He's only 30, he's an infielder, and they've had some discipline. pointing corner infielder. So yeah, good pick by the computer. Also, Jake Christensen, Anheel Felipe, Carl Kaufman, Christian Hernandez, Josh Bro, D-R-E-A-U-X, Garrett DeVila, Dylan Fyle, Jack Lopez, and Tyrone Yule. So those are the names to beat for us this year. Anyone want to shout out anyone else they were considering? I guess we

We exhausted players you actually wanted after like four picks, Ben. So I don't know if there's like the one that got away for you here in this draft. If this kept going and I had to pick more people, I would have picked perhaps Nick Morgevichus. Okay, yes. Who had good minor league numbers in 2025. John Rooney, who signed with the raise and is a reliever like that. Or Ben Gamble, who I've heard of before. Ben Gamble's still around.

How about that? Wow. He has that classic Braves outfielder role where sometimes the Braves are just like, I don't know, man, play 500 plate appearances. Yeah, we like this guy for reasons we can't explain. I mentioned Chadwick Trump. He got a big time last year.

Yeah, he's back with the Braves. They've had him before. If he hadn't signed with the Braves, I would have taken him. They have too many catchers. Well, he's the only guy, I think, in the organization other than Baldwin or Murphy with MLB experience, I think. Yes, for sure. Maybe bodes well, because.

Because, yeah, you know, like Murphy was heard, and you never know. But, yeah. Okay. And Randy Dobnack. And Sean Jelly, because he's tall. Oh, yeah. Joe LaSorca, who signed with a minor league deal with Pittsburgh, Drew Rome, I guess. And, but, like, he, you know, he signed a minor league deal with Milwaukee.

So that seems unlikely. Although sometimes they're just like, come on down. Remember the year that we all draft. had like all brewers and then like, I don't know I got a playing time. Oh, speaking of, I almost picked Anoli Paredes. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, what could have been. I guess Nick Anderson's still floating around. Yeah, I had Nick Anderson

on my board. He's with the A's now and got a minor league deal that would pay him a million if he makes the majors. Hamer Candelario? It's Jamer, weirdly, which I always want to say, I know. I always want to say Heimer or something, but... I mean, that's rude of me, but I always have that wrong, yeah. Yeah, I considered Candelario, except he's also unsigned, and I just, I had only so much risk tolerance for unsigned guys, but yeah, like the Red signed him to that big deal, which was ill-advised, and he was with the

Yankees most recently in the minors, but yeah, considered him. Who else in the names you might know category? Spencer Turnbull, I thought about. He is also unsigned. Michael Grove is a manager agent, yeah, and he missed all of 2025 because he had labrum surgery in. March, like shoulder labrum, bad labrum for a pitcher. And I assume we'll be back at some point this season, but I just didn't want to risk that. And Jose Miranda, remember Jose Miranda from the twins? He's, he's only 27. He signed a minor league deal with the Padres. Can't hit or run or really fields. And those are kind of like all the things. But he has done those in the past, at least one of them, maybe. But I don't know how he fits in on that roster. They signed song. And yeah, I'm

not sure. But Jose Azakar, I considered formerly of the Mets. He's with the Braves. He's just another one of those. Braves outfielder, maybe. He's kind of like a sixth outfielder. Joe Mantoply has been a big leaker, also unsigned, but pitch pretty well in AAA for Toronto at the end of last year. Antoine Kelly, I thought about, who was a second round pick by the Brewers in 2019 and was like kind of a prospect. He was in the 2022 Futures game. had thoracic outlet surgery and came back from that and he was with the Rockies most recently but the Dodgers signed him so I was kind of going to go for a maybe the Dodgers can fix a Rocky but I didn't Carlos Rodriguez the 25 year old outfielder who is with the Padres now I believe

thought about him Luke and Baker who was most recently with the Cardinals first baseman 28 he's with the Diamondbacks now. When you signed some 6-4 guy, I wanted to top you and take an even bigger guy, so I almost took Ernesto Martinez, Jr., who is, he was with the Brewers, also, utility guy, 26. Sean Jelly was on the board.

That guy's like 7 feet tall. Very tall. Very tall. Yeah. Ernesto Martinez is 6-6. He is, yeah, he's a Cuban player, position player. And Vinic Capra, who was with the White Sox.

29-year-old infielder signed with the Red Sox. Also a former brewer, perhaps? That sounds right. I think that's right. Vinicapro, yeah. And then Buddy Kennedy was on my board. He was a 27-year-old infielder who's, I think, it hasn't been reported, but I think he might be with the Giants now. But he was most recently with the Blue Jays, and he was one of the – he was in that fun situation where he played for both the Blue Jays and Dodgers pretty forgettably for both of them last year.

so he was guaranteed a World Series ring. So I could have had a World Series champion, Buddy Kennedy, but again, I didn't. So, oh, and John Curtis, I considered, who's another reliever. I think we signed with the Diamondbacks. But, yeah. I almost took this guy Matt Turner.

Okay. Here's what's interesting about him. The Yankees signed him to a minor league deal on December 5th, which is five days before the minor league rule five draft, where the Mets took him from the Yankee. This guy is so unremarkable that the picture of him on Google is Matt Turner, the U.S. men's national team goalie. So in the end, I just didn't think he was good enough to pick, but I loved. You know, he chose who to sign for, and he picked the Yankees.

And literally the Mets drafted him five days later. I thought that was funny. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, those Mets and Yankees, they're just fighting over relievers these days. It seems like, all right. well we have filled out our rosters and chris handel and co the eW stats tracking team i'm sure we'll get them up on ewstats.com sometimes soonish and they'll be on the effectively wild wiki

and we'll link to this in case anyone wants to review our drafts or figure out how to spell some of the guys we mentioned i'll link to it on the show page and at ewstats dot com before the season starts even they have been having the projected playing time, according to the Fangraph's depth charts and Jason Martinez and Becker. They've had that playing time also before their actual results so that we can see heading into the season

who projects to win this thing. Though I think that ended up not being telling last year. I think Meg had the best projected team. That's right. But there's a lot of variability when you're talking about guys like this who are going to be on the bubble, obviously. But we did it.

Once again, thanks, Ben, 13 of these things in the books. And no better way to start the year. So happy New Year to everyone. Thanks for following us to another page on the calendar. Okay, bunch of follow-ups and other odds and ends for you. Meant to mention that it is refreshing to have some top Japanese free agents sign with non-Dodgers teams, non-West Coast teams even, the White Sox, the Astros, little variety. Now, maybe that's because the Dodgers sort of sat out these negotiations, not because they got out bid, but nonetheless, at least the talent is getting spread around a bit.

And, of course, I, in November, endeared himself to Dodgers haters when he said, of course I'd enjoy playing alongside Otani Yamamoto and Sasaki, but winning against a team like that and becoming a world champion would be the most valuable thing in my life. If anything, I'd rather take them down. Now he'll have a chance to. Two stat blasts or stat blast-like substances, both of which can be answered. with a simple stathead query. So we'll stick them here rather than give them their own segment. Patreon supporter Evan, the same Evan, who keeps those copious stats on past minor league free agent drafts.

He wrote a little late for the stories missed in 2025 podcasts, but perhaps this is something that can be covered on a future stat blast. I don't think this was mentioned on the show, but in a June 23rd game against the Mariners in Minnesota, Bailey Ober had an interesting final line, pitching seven innings, allowing seven hits, seven earn runs, and striking out seven batters. I don't know if this is unique, but if it has happened, I would guess it's been a long time. You especially wouldn't expect to see a pitcher who gave up that many runs last that long in the game in 2025. How many other times has an innings pitched equals earned runs, equals hits, equals strikeout stat line happened?

I'm sure 1-1-1-1 has happened hundreds, if not thousands of times for levers, and 2-2-2-2 has probably happened a lot too, but what about beyond that? Has anyone done this with an 8-8-88- or even 9-9-9-9-9-9-9-stat line? And the answer is no, 7-7-7-7. is the record. God, you know what this is reminding me of? In New York, there are two competing car services, Carmel and Dial 7. And Carmel has a phone number that's all sixes with a jingle that gets stuck into your head. It goes like this. Six, six, six, six, six. And don't even get me started on the four sixes ranch from the fictional works and also real life real estate holdings of Taylor Sheridan. And then, of course, there's Dial 7, and you'll never guess what their number is.

Pick up the line dialed 7-7-7-7-7 times. Yes, exactly. So a pitcher has picked up the line and dialed 7-7-7-4 times in ALNL history. Billy Ober did it last year. Prior to that, the last guy to do it was Wade Miley for the Diamondbacks on May 31st, 2013. And then Billy Pierce for the White Sox on May 3, 1956, and the first guy to do it, Fred Anderson, for the Buffalo Blues of the Federal League, June 16th, 1915. I like a little club like that, something that's been done only four times in MLB history, but those four instances are spread out over 110 years.

That's fun, because you might think that games like that, lines like that, might be clustered in a certain period in baseball history. No, not really. There have been 12, dial six games, six, six, six, six, six, mark of the beast, plus one. That was most recently accomplished by Griffin Canning of the Angels on July 30th, 2024. I'll link to this deadhead query if you're interested. This was not meant to be a six-seven thing, by the way.

I'd be happy to leave that meme in 2025. Great, now I've got those car service jingles stuck in my head. It's like when we were talking about the dong bong of the Orioles, the Homer Hose, the hydration station. And Meg said that hydration station had a nice little lilt to it. And then that made me think of Conjunction Junction, Junction, the song from Schoolhouse Rock, hydration station, conjunction, junction, same sort of meter. I was not the only person to make that connection. I saw someone else say it in the Discord group.

Brains are strange. The other question came from listener Joshua in our Patreon Discord group who wrote, so the Oklahoma City Thunder in the NBA have five losses, but three are to the spurs. That's 60%. Can anyone tell me the highest percentage of losses ever in an MLB season to one team? So the answer came from Patreon supporter Sir Parciful via stathead, who wrote filtering out 2020, it appears to be the 1928 Athletics, who went 98 and 55 but had 16 losses to the Yankees. That's a full 29.1% of their losses.

And it would make sense that it would be a long time ago when there weren't as many teams and you were playing the same teams over and over. In the divisional era, though, again excluding 2020, the answer is Cleveland in 2013. That team won 92 games but went 4 and 15 against Detroit. So that's 21.4% of their losses. Good one. I will link to both stathead queries. Last update, probably on Boob Fowler and his nicknames. I cited two articles that explained why he was called Boob.

Short answer. He was called that early in his career because of his lack of experience. He was green. He didn't know what he was doing. Just seemed or looked dunderheaded at that early stage of his career and the nickname stuck. Listener Ben Zimmer notes that there was also a comic strip started by Rube Goldberg in 1915 called Boob McNutt. Yes, I know. Which was about a buffoonish character. A later player, Eric Boob McNair, may have gotten his nickname from Boob McNutt. I suppose that could have contributed to Boob Fowler's nickname. But he may have just been called a boob for the same reason that the comic character was called a boob. However, why was Boob Fowler also nicknamed Gink? We didn't get to the bottom of that one. Well, Ben reports that starting in 1911, Walt McDougall had a comic strip called, wait for it, gink and boob. So if a guy was nicknamed boob, you might as well call him gink too. And in the comic strip, one of the characters was tall, one was short.

Gink was the tall one. It was kind of like another strip, Mutt and Jeff, with a short and tall character. So maybe Boob Fowler was called boob just because of his perception. foolishness, but he got called gink because of his height. He was only 5-11, but that was fairly tall back in those days. We talked about prediction markets, Kalshi, polymarket, et cetera. One thing I meant to mention is that these prediction markets are really thriving in this regulatory environment, by which I mean deregulatory environment. The Trump administration has been quite kind to them. As Bloomberg wrote, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission,

the agency that oversees derivatives markets had long frowned upon such offerings, but with Trump returning to the White House, the exchanges decided to see whether they could get a pass. It was a smart hunch. Donald Trump Jr. is an advisor to Polly Market, by the way. And Meng mentioned the concern about election integrity. Forget about sports integrity. These prediction markets also have major media partners now. Kalshi has partnered with CNN and CNBC.

Polymarket has partnered with Yahoo Finance, etc. So it is not even close to being solely a sports issue. Follow-ups to the stories we missed until we didn't because we talked about them last week. that Lenin Sosa was the longest tenured player on the White Sox? And, well, take it away, Obi-Wan. So what I told you was true from a certain point of view. Sosa is, I believe, the longest tenured player in the White Sox organization. However, Luis Robert Jr. is the longest tenured member of the White Sox in the White Sox in the big leagues in 2020, Sosa not until 2022. And Robert actually debuted in the minors a few days before Sosa back in 2017. However, Sosa was signed.

in 2016, whereas Robert wasn't signed until 2017. So Robert has been a big leaguer longer, but from a certain point of view, Sosa has seniority, and you know, you're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view. I was talking about how unimpressive it seems that the Royals finally had a pair of teammates who each hit 30 homers and had 100 RBI, and as Patreon supporter, WikiKeeper Raymond, confirms it really wasn't that impressive. It's only impressive that it took them so long.

They are the last team to have its first pair of 30 and 100 teammates. There is actually a Sporkel quiz about it. The twins were the 29th team to reach that milestone. They got there in 2019, peak homer year. Every team has done it in the 2000s, except for the Reds, who last accomplished it in 1977 and the Pirates in 1990. However, at 56 seasons for the Royals to do it, they aren't the team that took the longest to get there.

The Cardinals took 117 years. 1882 to 1998. Try to remember any notable cardinals who hit a lot of homers in 1998. Nothing really coming to mind. But of course, as Raymond notes, that first decade was in the American Association and early baseball was a totally different game

from today's. Lots of deadball era in there. We talked about the Bucco Brick scandal. There were customized bricks that were dismantled and discarded in a construction project, and the Pirates apologized for that. People's loved ones commemorated on the bricks.

The bricks just tossed out like garbage. Anyway, saw this, tweet on January 1st from Colin Dunlap, a radio talker for KDKA in Pittsburgh, who says, I have no idea who is right and who is wrong or what the email form said, but I just received perhaps the most hilarious texts I have ever received in my life. And the message is, so you remember the infamous Pittsburgh Pirates Bricks? My partner had one made for his grandfather 20-plus years ago, and it was destroyed. The Pirates sent him an email asking him to remember what it said so they could look up in their files to replicate the brick for him. His response was,

unsure, but it had William Bradford's name on it. This is the brick he got in the mail on Tuesday. And yes, wouldn't you know it? The new replacement brick says, unsure, but it had William Bradford's name on it. So they took that extremely literally. And yes, this does appear to be real. There's an unboxing pick and everything.

I will link to this. I guess it's the thought that counts, even if it was pretty thoughtless. We talked about Daylon Lyle's season for the nationals. And Patreon supporter Richie writes in to say, your discussion just focused on him being relatively unknown before appearing in the big leagues and having great success as a hitter. But Dale and Lyle was involved in a much more fun story. He won NL Rookie of the Month for September, and a big part was the number of triples he hit.

Despite only playing in 91 games, Lyle tied the Nets franchise record for triples in a season with 11, including seven in September alone. On September 19th, Lyle did an AMA on the baseball subreddit and was asked whether, if he had a chance for an inside-the-park home run, he would take it or go for setting the triples record. And its answer was, I rarely hit homers, so if I have the option, I'm going all the way. And as Richie writes, the next day, that's exactly what Dale and Lyle would do against the Mets with an inside-the-park home run in the 11th inning. He did have the opportunity to stop, get that triples record, but no, he kept running and he scored. A man of his word. Patreon supporter satellite 15 in the Discord group said I missed the call for stories,

but my Cardinals won would be pitching health. Only one reliever went on the IL during the season, John King, no starters. Aside from a couple sixth man or doubleheader starts and a bullpen game to close the season, it was the same five starters all year, disrupted only by the Eric Fetty trade. Michael McGreevy filled that spot without getting injured, though. This was not good because we suck, and the plan was for young arms, which we had been lacking for years, to finally push the healthy five-ish ERAs out. It was moot, however, as we pulled the exact inverse feet down in the minors where every single one of them got hurt. That and having a half-dozen catchers about sums up the season. And that's true, that's pretty impressive. Zach Thompson started the season

on the IL, I think, with a torn left lat. He got hurt in spring training, and then, yeah, there was John King with an oblique strain, and that's about it. But then, yes, in the minors, Tinkentz, and many others got hurt. And yet, look where it got them. The Cardinals pitching staff was 20th in Fangraph's War. So they kind of were a test case for something we talk about sometimes, where I wonder, well, would it behoves some team to try just acquiring durable starters, just collect a bunch of soft tossers. Not that the Cardinals were all soft tossers, but they mostly weren't hard throwing strikeout guys.

In fact, they had the second lowest strikeout rate in the majors ahead of only the Rockies. So sometimes as a thought experiment will say, well, what if you did just get a bunch of soft tossers or don't go for strikeouts, pitch to contact, don't throw too hard, pace yourself. And yeah, you won't be as good, but you'll be healthy. And you won't have to dip down your depth chart for replacement pitchers. And so it'll benefit you because you won't have the top end arms, But at least the arms you do have will be healthy. And maybe that's a market inefficiency.

Well, probably not. Because even if the Cardinals' health and stability was repeatable, you wouldn't really want to repeat it. Because, again, they weren't good. And they are, under Heim Bloom, trying to get guys with nastier stuff. So clearly, they don't want to keep doing what they're doing. But I guess that'll be my go-to example

for what a staff like that might actually look like. Not great. No wonder, everyone wants hard throwers who miss bats. And finally, when we talked about the Mariners signing Rob Reff Snyder, and I remarked that he was old to be signing his most lucrative contract. Not a record or anything, but I wondered who else might fit that bill. Listener Chris wrote in to say, When you were talking about the ref Snyder signing and wondering about the record contract age-wise,

I was yelling Jamie Wright into the void. He signed for $1.8 million in 2014 at the age of 39. It was his first big league deal since 2005. Jamie Wright. We had a Ben and another Ben on this episode. Why don't I quote Old Ben one more time? Now that's the name I've not heard in a long time, a long time. 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 and get yourself access to some perks. As have the following five listeners, J.S., Nick Blagin, Michael, Brett Knight, and Philip Tapley, thanks to all of you. Patreon perks include access to the Effectively Wild Discord group for patrons only, the bonus episodes. Playoff live streams, prioritized email answers, personalized messages, shoutouts at the end of episodes, discounts on merch and add free Fangraphs 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 Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Music, Spotify, and other podcast platforms. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group such effectively wild. You can find the Effectively Wild subreddit at our slash Effectively Wild. You can check the show notes in the podcast posted fan graphs for links to the stories and stats we cited today. They're also in the episode description in your podcast app of choice. Thanks to Shane McKeon for his editing and production assistance. That will do it for today and for this week.

We hope you have a wonderful weekend. We will talk to you next week. And once again, we wish you a happy new year. of bad takes for the good takes on baseball and life with a balance of analytics and humor philosophical music effectively wild effectively wild Effectively wise