Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2467: Stay Pricey, San Diego

Episode Date: April 18, 2026

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, please visit our Patreon. Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about another accidental challenge and listener-suggested alternatives to the head/helmet tap, the implications of the Padres’ reported sale for a record price, Mike Trout’s resurgence and Jordan Walker’s surge, a Stat Blast about one-man lineups, stoic responses to getting drilled by line drives, loud stadium noise, listener emails about extensions and the next CBA, tuning in to no-hitter attempts in progress, and “anti-framing,” and more. Audio intro: Jimmy Kramer, “Effectively Wild Theme” Audio outro: Gabriel-Ernest, “Effectively Wild Theme” Link to latest challenge Link to other review signals Link to soccer review signal Link to cricket review signal Link to skeuomorph wiki Link to HPB/CI challenge sequence Link to WSJ Padres sale story Link to ESPN Padres sale story Link to S&P info 1 Link to S&P info 2 Link to S&P info 3 Link to Chelsea protest story Link to Chelsea money loss story Link to Trout series fun facts Link to Trout six-game streaks Link to Trout four-game streaks Link to Trout’s Savant page Link to Trout hypotheticals Link to Trout’s five homers Link to Walker analysis Link to FG WAR leaders Link to Mets-Dodgers game Link to Jay on the Mets Link to Stat Blast spreadsheet Link to 1969 Williams game Link to 1991 Boston game Link to 1950 Vollmer game Link to 1978 Expos game Link to Freeland vs. Myers hit Link to Ben on sick players Link to sick Sale start Link to Greene game Link to Greene game article Link to 2025 stadium noise article Link to 2026 stadium noise article Link to Collins HoF induction article Link to Messick article Link to “anti-framing” article Link to “anti-framing” clip Link to listener emails database  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

Number one, Fangrass baseball podcast. This statcast is that blasts. T OPS Plus, when the stats need contrast, zips and steamer for the forecast. Hello and welcome to episode 2467 of Effectively Wild Baseball Podcasts from FanGraphs presented by and to our Patreon supporters. I am Ben Lindbergh of the Ringer, joined by Meg Rally of Fangraphs. Hello, Meg. Hello. Well, we had another accidental challenge.

Oh, boy. Yeah, we talked about this on Wednesday when there had been three in the preceding several days. And on Wednesday, after we recorded, there was another one. So now there have been at least four accidental challenges in the past week. This one was the Orioles Kobe Mayo, and he took a pitch that he thought was ball for. It was called a strike. He sort of started to walk to first, and then he kind of half reached toward his helmet. But he never actually tapped it. He never touched the helmet. It never made contact. You almost have to do a replay review to see if the helmet was touched. And it was not. And Homeplayed Empire John Tumpain interpreted that as a request for a challenge. And the challenge was issued, I guess, inadvertently. And the call was confirmed.

And Mayo was somewhat upset that he had wasted a challenge without meaning to. So happened again. And I did ask MLB about this. Just, hey, are you aware of these accidental challenges? Are you thinking of doing anything differently? Yeah. I didn't get an on-the-record response that I can quote. But my sense is that they're monitoring the situation that they don't want to make any premature changes.

It's still maybe just a handful of instances and all in all, it's gone fairly well. And maybe this will just be growing pains. Maybe it'll just be a passing problem. And everyone will get on the same page. Obviously, they have tested the challenge system in spring training and in the minors for many years. So it's not brand new to all the people involved. Many of the umpires, I suppose it is, except for spring training. But I think they're just taking a wait and see approach for now, which is really.

defensible. Maybe everyone will get the hang of it and this is just an adjustment period. Also, it's worth noting, I think, that these accidental cases, I think some of them were just habitual gestures that the player made unconsciously

because they were just adjusting their hat or their helmet. Others, though, and maybe this Mayo one, for instance, were sort of initial reflexive, ooh, I might want to challenge. Yeah, like half challenges, basically. Yeah, like a check challenge. basically.

Yes. You know, like they're trying to make the challenge gesture. Oh, no. And then they decide not to. So much as

not all check swings are ruled swings. Right. Not all check challenges should be ruled challenges. But it's understandable. I suppose that an umpire could misinterpret that

when the player is maybe sort of reflexively, instinctively, oh, eh, never mind. Yeah. Yeah.

You know, we're talking like milliseconds here. I mean, you have such a short time to, react and make the decision that maybe your hand could kind of reflexively start to go up. And then in the process, your brain asserts itself and says, no, not worth it. And then you kind of play it off as if you never meant to challenge. Yeah. So maybe there was half intent,

at least in some of these cases. I think MLB is emphasizing with the umpires that the players should give the verbal challenge as well so that it's not purely related to the gesture. But I still don't think the verbal challenge is mandatory, nor should it be probably, because I'm just anticipating that there would be times when it's so loud. You couldn't tell if it had happened. Yeah, and if a pitcher wants to challenge and the pitchers away from the umpire. And so if you had to hear it, then maybe that could cause issues the way that it does with pitchcom sometimes when even if the thing is charged and it's not gamesmanship, you just can't hear it because it's so loud in the ballpark. So that would sort of solve things if you had to require the verbal aspect, but then it might also introduce other issues sometimes.

And another thing that I had not really remembered or thought of, there was sort of a similar issue in the early days of the pitch clock where hitters would get into the box and they would hold up their hand toward the umpire as they were kind of digging into the batters box. Right. And it looked like they were taking time. Yes. Yeah, and this was sort of a habitual gesture that a lot of players made. Derek Jeter used to do this. Like, every time he stepped into the box, you know, hold up the hand. And under the pitch clock regulations, that was supposed to be your signal for a timeout.

And so there were some cases where the hitter made this movement and it was interpreted as a request for a timeout. And over time, I think hitters just internalized that and realized that they couldn't keep doing that motion. and that hasn't really been an issue since. So maybe that's the precedent here. And that hitters, if they are just kind of going to the helmet, just to make an adjustment, then maybe they will stop doing this once this has happened to them or once they have seen it.

But if I were working for the league, I might send these clips around to the umpires and say, hey, be sure that there's actual intent here and that they did tap the helmet. And if I were working for a team, I would probably send these clips around and say to everyone, hey, try to train yourself not to tap the head or the helmet unless you really mean it. We've gotten a number of delightful suggestions for a new challenge initiation, right? A new signal that you are initiating a challenge.

But I think that this is a fairly solvable problem with just better acclamation to the system. And I bet you're right. I bet that front offices are saying to coaching staff, hey, you need to, you know, you really need to emphasize with guys that this might end up costing us, that we might need a challenge later in a game and be unable to use it because they were tinkering with their helmet in a way that was confusing to the umpire. And, you know,

I think that you're right that requiring the umpire to hear the player initiate the challenge does leave room for some consternation, but I do think that having the verbalization be a point of emphasis is probably prudent. And maybe it's just like, really sell it, you know? Be a showman up there with your... Imagine you're tipping a top hat. You know how you wear top hat?

22-year-old baseball players? So I think that that's... This is probably an issue that sorts itself out with a little time and experience. Yeah, but as you noted, we did get many suggestions as we requested last time. We talked about some possibilities that you could have kind of the college sports equivalent where you're sort of twirling your finger around, but that would be possibly bad because in baseball that's the signal for a home run.

So we said, well, maybe it could be, you know, flip your hand on its side as if you're doing some cranking a film camera or something or rewinding a tape or whatever. So we suggested that, but then we saw, well, maybe that kind of. could be misinterpreted. You're doing a cuckoo sign or something, and maybe that's critical. I'm not trying to challenge. I'm just enthusiastic about what's on the Criterion Channel this one. Yeah. Or, and we talked about the C, you make a C with your hand, which is a volleyball thing, which I think is workable. But we got a lot of other ideas. Some silly, but many serious. We requested both. And I probably won't read individual emails, unfortunately, because we got so many,

but thank you to everyone. Yeah. Yeah. But I, A couple of the more common suggestions. One was just to make it more clear, more demonstrative, and to have to tap multiple times, which a lot of players do already. But I think if you mandated that you had to tap multiple times, a multi-tap model for this, then that might be better or clearer just because the standard sort of, I'm just adjusting my helmet. That would be meaningfully different. You could still get some fossil arms and jump in the gun. and, oh, I saw one tap and I thought you were calling for the challenge, and then I didn't wait to see if you were calling for two. But that might clarify things a little bit, possibly, and would be very similar to the current system.

We also got a lot of suggestions for the soccer model, which is, if you want a video review in soccer, then you draw a rectangle, basically, like the soccer referee signal for a video review. you draw a rectangle in the air, kind of draw a box. And this could, it's sort of a skewomorph for a video screen, but it could also work for a strike zone shape in baseball. And maybe it could be, yeah, more of a taller, thinner, rectangular box than in soccer typically. But that, I think, is typically done with two hands. And that's the issue. We got a lot of suggestions for things that would require two hands.

And I think that's sort of a sticking point. It could be done, but obviously if you're a pitcher, if you're a catcher, you've got a glove on one hand, and then if you're a bat or you're holding the bat, so you'd either have to do the gesture while holding gloves not a big deal, but a bat would kind of be awkward, or you'd have to drop the bat or hold it under your armpit or something. I don't know, balance it on its end. But then there's so little time that I think. Right, that's the thing. Yeah, if you had to like put your bat down between your feet or something and keep it upright and then, you know, you're using half the time that you have to challenge. But that was a common one. And you could approximate it with a one-handed gesture.

You could kind of do a one-handed sketch of the box, I guess. It would just take twice as long maybe. But yeah, I mean, there's precedent for that in another sport. And I think it would be not as easily miscommunicated. So, you know, that could work. Yeah, it could. I mean, at that point, though, just lay your bat down. Like, have your, have laying your bat down be the gesture, right? True. Yeah, I guess you could just drop the bat. Drop it. Yeah, we had some people suggest point at the plate, which I guess you might do for some other reason, but not really routinely. So, yeah, you could just point. Maybe that would work. I think multiple taps on the top of your head is the most straightforward way to address this, right?

So you have to do two or three, pick a number. And there should be an agreed upon number. Like, we should all agree. We're going to go tap, tap, tap. That's the signal. Because like the very top of your head, you know? Like if you're on the very top, you're probably in safe territory there that you're not just adjusting it. a little bit, you know? I think that's probably fine. Yeah. And some people suggested putting both

hands on the head, which, I don't know, maybe that has some of the same issues that we were just talking. But if you had to, yeah, if you had to do like the painting, the scream or something, you had to, you know, have both hands like up on the side of your head. But on the top of your head, I guess, like you're playing Simon Says or something. I don't know. It's just, Yeah. Because in soccer, obviously, you're not supposed to use your hands unless you're a goaltender. So, yeah. So in baseball, that's not the case.

And you're more encumbered. But putting both of your hands on your head, yeah, again, it could work. But it's just, yeah, it's a little more involved and time intensive. And then we had some people saying you could point at your own eyes with your two fingers, except that's kind of like the I'm watching you gesture. Right. But maybe not the like when you then move your fingers from your eyes at the person that you're watching, but just like at your eyes. But then again, maybe that could be misinterpreted as insulting as if you're questioning the ump's eyesight or.

Right. And part of what works well about tapping your head is that it's not, I mean, I guess you could turn around and point to your eyes at the ump. But that feels like very aggressive. And if you're doing it in front of like just looking out to the field, I'm thinking about it from the batter's perspective and the catchers, for that matter. There's there's risk that the umpire misses it. The tapping of the head is, it's hard to miss that, right? You don't have a directional dependency by doing that.

You're just like, oh, tap, tap. And then it's like, oh, there it is. Got to dial up the old challenge. So I just think, I think head tapping. Yeah. Is fine. And, you know, I bet the guys who have accidentally invoked a challenge to the extent that they have actually done that accidentally and not to your point, like, kind of being half-sies on it, I bet they won't do that again. Yeah, they'll probably learn from it and be more demonstrative or less, I guess.

But, yeah. Imagine you're taking a top hat off. Play to the back of the room. Yeah. Someone else suggested that instead of making the sea with one hand. And they could make the sea with both arms in sort of a YMCA kind of motion, which would be, that would be entertaining too. Yeah.

Is it more like a little, you're a little teapot? Well, yeah, sort of like that. Like a little teapot. Yeah. But I think anything where you have to, if you're the batter, lay down your bat, that's a non-starter. Unless laying down your bat just becomes the signal for. it. But again, I think this is a problem that probably sorts itself out in short order. Some people suggested make a fist and tap on your chest, pound on your chest, or just

distribute buzzers to all the players, not in like an Astros conspiracy sort of way, but just like everyone has a buzzer that they can trigger to initiate the challenge. You have to have a two pronged pitchcom like system where there's a closed feed between the pitcher, the catcher, the batter, and the umpire. And if you initiate a challenge, that way, it'll go in an earpiece and you go, oh, boy, it's time for a challenge. Nothing could go wrong there. It seems perfect.

We probably don't have to involve even more electronics and technology here and require everyone to be carrying buzzers about. So, yeah, we are, I think, are on the same page. We will continue to monitor this. very important issue. Okay. Yeah. All right. In slightly bigger news, it seems like we have a franchise sale, reportedly. Yeah. The Padres who have been on the block, they are going to be sold and for a hefty sum. So everything's coming up San Diego right now. The Padres have won eight straight as we speak and 11 of 12.

And it looks like this sale will also be a win for their ownership because it's tracking to be a new record and buy a lot. So the previous record for an MLB franchise sale $2.4 billion when Steve Cohen bought the Mets in 2020. And the Padres reportedly will be sold for $3.9 billion. That is a lot more than $2.4 billion. That's a lot more. Yeah. To Jose Feliciano. Not that Jose Feliciano.

It's going to be so confusing. Oh my gosh. We're going to have to pay such close attention to the linker. Yes. It goes by Jose E. Feliciano. Oh, okay, perfect. Not the Feliz Navidad, Jose Feliziano, but the co-owner of Chelsea, the soccer club. So Feliciano and his wife, they are reportedly the high bidders here, and it has to be approved by the owners and their various other hurdles, but it appears to be more or less a done

deal. So Feliciano, he's from Puerto Rico, I believe, he will join Artie Moreno as the only non-white majority owner of an MLB franchise. He is a private equity guy, surprisingly, who isn't. He is 53, which I guess is on the younger side as franchise owners go. But he's the co-founder and managing partner of Clear Lake Capital. And Clear Lake Capital partnered with Todd Bowley, who is a part owner of the Dodgers, they led the purchase of Chelsea in 22 for 5.2 billion. Todd Bowley was the one guy who was mentioned in the Epstein emails, but not in one of the worst ways. But anyway, this is a lot of money, obviously. And this brings the tenure of the Seidler family to a close. They put the Padres up for sale in November. Obviously, after Peter

died, there was a lot of infighting and some lawsuits. And Peter Seidler's. widow and his siblings, and they settled that, and they move forward with this sale. So it's been a pretty turbulent tumultuous time for the potrace, both on the field and off. But I guess there are a few things that we could take away from the Padres with all that they've been through. And in one of the smaller media markets, at least, in the game, in the sport, granted, they have the town to themselves when it comes to the big four leagues. There's an MLS team, there's an NWSL team, there's a G-League team, but there's no NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL competition. So that's

part of what makes the purchase appealing, I would imagine. But nonetheless, and even though attendance has been very good in the wake of the investments in the roster, I guess what you can learn from this is that despite all the doom and gloom and people forecasting disaster and how can they sustain this sort of payroll and this market, well, I think it worked out pretty okay for the sidler family. I think they're making out all right here. I think in descending order, here are the people who are the most excited about this sale. Number one, without a doubt, is the sidler family. Number two is the MLBPA. Yeah.

Because if the San Diego Padres, with, you know, the natural benefits that are sort of draws of attention that you're noting, a beautiful ballpark, an exciting and dynamic team. Yeah. But also with certain deficits, the size of their media market, other competition in Southern California, the fact that they do not have a lucrative RSN deal to call their own, right? are being produced by Major League Baseball, at least from a broadcast perspective, that that team is selling for this much and to a private equity guy. Now, we don't know what kind of owner he's going to be. We only know that people will be very confused about who he is relative to ball players with that same name. And I should say, not a soccer expert, obviously, but Chelsea has also had a pretty turbulent tumultuous time and is in the midst of a rough season and there's

a fan protest taking place of ownership this very weekend, I believe. So what is the nature of their protest? Just like a lack of confidence in their football slash soccer acumen and their transparency. And they have spent, they have invested in the team, but perhaps not wisely. And there's been a lot of like leadership turnover and just business practices, you know, ported in from private equity that haven't always gone super. well for the team's fortunes on field and off. So yeah. So not without potential pitfalls ahead, right? But just from a franchise sale perspective, it's one more our sport is thriving data point.

Yeah. It's also a, hey, you know, just because you're in a small market from a media market perspective doesn't mean you can't be an incredibly attractive business endeavor for people. One sale does not a done CBA make. But if I'm the PA, I'm accumulating clips about this. And I'm sure that the way that Rob Manfred talks about this sale will be stress tested and and worked through much more precisely than your typical sale announcement, right? And most of this rhetoric is going to come from the club. But yeah, I think it's good. You know, it suggests a healthy game.

And I have made this point before as it pertains to both the Dodgers and the Mets, and they are certainly not the only clubs in the league that have a financing feel and sort of source of wealth to their ownership group. and there are plenty of ownership groups that have a strong private equity focus in Major League Baseball that are not spending the way those clubs are. So it's not necessarily a sufficient condition on its own. But when you have clubs owned by people who've made their fortunes, not by manufacturing cars, you know, or like selling books or, you know, whatever. But they're doing financial services and they're willing to spend this. kind of money and they're willing to hopefully invest in their teams. It indicates that

the ownership class is not viewing this as like a bad business venture, which is an argument that sometimes gets deployed in the midst of CBA negotiations in a way that I continue to find hilarious because it's like, well, are you all saying you're bad a business? Like, what's the argument that's being made here? But it'll be interesting. We all lost something with Siedler's passing. I think that he took investment in his club very seriously. He really wanted to bring a World Series to San Diego. He spent in a way that reflected that. I think having owners like that in the mix is really important because it does sort of require of the other owners a little bit more when it comes to free agency. So, you know, I don't know that this new ownership group

will be an obvious parallel in replacement, but it'll be interesting to see. I didn't know that they were getting protested. It's not enough for me to want to pay attention to soccer. I'm sorry. I know you all like it, and I'm so happy for you. It's just not my sport, man. Well, it is part of the trend toward ownership groups, just having huge portfolios of franchises across multiple sports.

And I ask people in Boston how that's gone for them, right? In countries and continents. Right. It isn't necessarily great. I don't want to say that a big sale price is enough on its own to make this a good sale. We don't know yet. We don't know what kind of sale it is. And it sounds like based on some of their other ventures, we should go in skeptically. But that's the posture you should always take toward billionaires. So they're. Sure. And Chelsea has announced enormous financial losses, of course, because that's not confined just to MLB. And of course, there's creative accounting. But yes, you always do wonder, is there any robbing Peter to pay Paul that goes on? You know, that's something Red Sox fans have wondered. Well, are we trading mooky bets so that we can fund Liverpool or something? You know, it's just, it's hard to say because it's all part of the same sort of massive holdings for this person or this group.

But, yeah, I was trying to figure out, not a business person, as people are well aware, but I was trying to figure out just how lucrative this sale is. is considering what the franchise was purchased for. So Seidler bought the Padres in August of 2012 for $800 million. And this is a $3.9 billion sale. That's a 388% return or something. Now, obviously, inflation has happened. So that $800 million in August 2012, that's like $1.15 billion now or something like that. But still, that's like a 239% return over that time.

And this is, what, 13.6 years. So the annualized return, not accounting for inflation, it's like 12.3%. Accounting for inflation, 9.4%, which is still pretty darn solid. I think in the long run, if you compare to S&P, I think that's typically been maybe like 10% return. annually, or seven to eight maybe if you account for inflation. So this would be better than that. I think over this specific 13 or so year period, if you had put that money in the S&P 500, it would have paid off a little more than this, but it's close. And that's not accounting for other sources of revenue. Right. I know that the Padres in recent years have at least

reported annual losses. And in their case, I guess I'm inclined to believe it, maybe just because of how much they have invested in that team. But for many years before, that huge surge in spending, they had, and, you know, all of this is kind of, I said, reported, but it's mostly estimated by third-party sources because they're not open in their books. But for at least a portion of this period, they were believed to have had an operating income that they were in the black when it came to just making money over a given year, aside from the appreciation. and then there's just the hard to quantify but extremely significant value of, hey, you get to own a team. You don't get a little hat from the S&P at the end of the year being like, here's what your index fund won. No. You know, you can get a little hat for on the Padres.

Some of them are really good hats. Some of them are not. But that shouldn't dissuade you from trying to buy the Padres. Most of them are pretty good hats. I have one with a little, I have a Padres hat with a little swing and friar. That's got to be one of the best logos in baseball, I think. That's pretty, because he's got a little, he's got a little friar face and he's hitting a baseball. That's nice.

And Feliciano's not a local, but if you own a team, obviously, you're a local institution. You're a big wig, you know, you're big man on campus kind of in that town, especially if it's a city that doesn't have big four men's. sports franchises. So there's a lot of value that comes with that. You get to entertain people. You get to show off to your fellow unimaginably wealthy peers. You know, you get to brag about owning sports franchises. So I think this is attractive to billionaires, not just because it's a signifier of wealth and it's a solid investment, but because it's cool. You get to have front row seats to this stuff. Plus, it was reported, I think, that there's hundreds of millions of dollars in debt that the new ownership will be assuming here.

And so, I mean, even with that, saddling the new ownership, it's still this big a number, right? So even if you accrue all that debt, that is not an obstacle to having a record sale price by a lot. Right. Yeah. For it to be, okay, Steve Cohen, kind of an outlier even among MLB owners in terms of his wealth. Yes. And New York, even though the Mets and Yankees share it, that's the biggest media market. Yeah.

So for the Padres to sell for this number, yeah, I think that does say something about the financial health and profitability of the game, at least. And, yeah, that could have some bearing on CBA talks. Or maybe, maybe the Padres new ownership group thinks that the players are going to get absolutely, like, wrecked in the new CBA. negotiations and they are factoring into their model the possibility of payrolls that are dramatically smaller in the future. I suppose we have to allow for that end of the spectrum of things too, but I'm skeptical. I haven't been to all of the ballparks. And so I cannot say, for sure, which is the best, because I don't have a sense of it that's complete. But, man, that's a great ballpark in San Diego. That's a really special ballpark. And it's right

downtown. That's so nice. You get to walk and go have good food in San Diego. Great town. I love San Diego. All right. Well, we have to talk trout a little bit. I have a mini. Have to. Get to. Get to. Get to. Yes. And I have a little mini blast to share and some thoughts on deafening stadium sound. Oh my God. And maybe a couple emails. That'll do it for the free preview of today's effectively wild. you for listening. If you'd like to listen on and hear whatever wisdom and wit await, we would love to have you. You can visit patreon.com slash Effectively Wild to access the rest of this episode and plenty of other exclusive content, weekly subscriber-only episodes, monthly bonus shows, our Discord group, our live streams. Either way, we will be back with another episode soon, which will appear in full on this feed. Until then, we wish you well and thank you for your

support of Effectively Wild, whatever form it takes.