Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 2488: Ohtani Rules

Episode Date: June 6, 2026

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, please visit our Patreon. Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Shohei Ohtani’s career-year pace, how often his number of times on base has exceeded his times on base allowed in his two-way games, and his awards outlook, discuss Aaron Judge’s injury and the wide-open AL MVP race, and then (1:06:39) Stat Blast about the most former catchers in one game, Brayan Bello’s woes as a starter, clustering a team’s plate appearances in one inning, perfectly parallel pitch counts for piggybackers, long-lasting low-WAR players, where in the batting order teams tend to go back-to-back-to-belly, players with the longest streaks of having a teammate in the World Series, the most times striking out looking, the best duos drafted consecutively, and more. Audio intro: Tom Rhoads, “Effectively Wild Theme” Audio outro: El Warren, “Effectively Wild Theme” Link to FG combined WAR leaderboard Link to batting pace leaders Link to pitching pace leaders Link to Ohtani game story Link to “true win” wiki Link to “I’m the Greatest” Link to Judge injury article Link to Judge injury testing article Link to article on Judge injury impact Link to Judge quote Link to Raiders scene Link to story about Raiders scene Link to Beer Barrel Man wiki Link to Ben on Ohtani and Judge 1 Link to Ben on Ohtani and Judge 2 Link to Amtrak event Link to Crizer on scoreless innings streaks Link to The Miz on Pokémon Link to Sánchez meal plan Link to Red Sox vs. Guardians game Link to Sox catchers tweet Link to The Onion blades article Link to Ben on Padres shortstops Link to Russell on emergency catchers Link to catchers Blast text Link to catchers Blast data Link to article on first-inning scoring Link to info on first-inning scoring and HFA Link to Bello Stathead query 1 Link to Bello Stathead query 2 Link to story on Bello being optioned Link to MLBTR on Bello Link to Yankees’ 13-run inning Link to % of PA in one inning text Link to % of PA in one inning data Link to Miller-Castillo game Link to parallel pitch counts text Link to SABR on Allan Roth Link to longest-lasting players Link to consecutive-homers text Link to consecutive-homers data Link to The Human Centipede 3 wiki Link to Jágr streak tweet Link to Jágr streak post Link to Jágr wiki Link to The Rural Juror clip Link to teammate WS streaks data Link to looking-strikeouts text Link to Beltrán K Link to previous “Toothpick” Jones episode Link to draft duos data Link to harmonic mean wiki Link to Brett-Schmidt draft round Link to listener emails database Link to Emil Gumbel wiki Link to @ScoringChanges tweet 1 Link to @ScoringChanges tweet 2 Link to @ScoringChanges tweet 3 Link to loose bodies clip  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

Does baseball look the same to you as it does to me? When we look at baseball, how much do we see? Well, the curveballs bend and the home runs fly. More to the game that meets the eye to get the stats compiled and the stories filed. Fans on the internet might get riled, but we can break it down, uneffectively wild. Hello and welcome to episode 2488 of Effectively Wild, a Fangraphs baseball podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters.

I'm McGrawley of Fangraphs and I am joined by Ben Lindberg of the Ringer. Ben, how are you? Just dandy. How are you? I'm alive. Good. That's better than the bare minimum. And I think we are both doing decently in the grand scheme of things. But neither of us can compare to Shohei Otani, whom I must report is doing. doing well. He is having himself a fine season. And I know that we're well down from our historic highs of talking about Shohei Otani, our banter rate about Otani has been higher in past seasons.

But he is having a career year. I will have everyone know. This is probably peak Otani, which I know seems almost preposterous to say this far into one of the best peaks in baseball history. Do I even need to say one of? But he is having his most valuable season or is on pace too. And even if we are not on pace to set a new high for talking about Otani, maybe we can pick up our pace because he is on an 11.5 war pace entering the weekend at Fancrafts. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think that he took personally your suggestion that he would win? the sigh, but not MVP. Do you think that he's... Yeah, he has picked up his hitting since then.

He has. He has indeed. He is quite a bit closer to his career norms at this point. Feels ridiculous to say for a guy with a 161 WRC Plus. It's a pretty special thing. I think we have seen flashes of this version of him before, but not quite like this, not sustained in this way, not synced up quite so well, you know, between the the hitting and the pitching and the pitching and not in a context that matters unfortunately right that is

part of what makes it special so it's it's really something to behold i have beheld it a lot lately and his career high in the previous season i believe according to fan grafts war was last year was nine point four yeah and now he is on pace to surpass that by two full wins 11.5 war pace at baseball reference, he is higher than that. In fact, he is leading the majors in Fangraphs War at 4.5. Baseball reference has him at 5.2. And his career high, I believe, at baseball reference is 9.9 in 23. You know, I'm more of a Fangraphs War guy than a baseball reference war, and that's not me being a company man. I'm paid by Patreon, by our listeners, not by fan graphs directly. Obviously, I have fond feelings about fan graphs.

We are affiliated with fan graphs. You are employed by fan graphs. But I think just objectively, if I had to choose, and I don't much of the time, I can look at both. I do prefer fancraft's war. But this is giving me some second thoughts about that, the fact that Otani has a higher baseball reference war both this year and for his career high. I'm suddenly doing distracted boyfriend at baseball reference war. So just bump up the numbers a little bit

But you don't even have to put your thumb on the scale Because Otani is doing that himself And we have a lot in store for our Patreon supporters today We're going to talk about Aaron Judge We're going to talk about Bobby Witt Jr. and Jordon Alvarez Awards races I have a bunch of stat blasts to share later on this episode But I have one Otani related one to lead off with here

because one reason why we're talking about Shaihutani now specifically is that he just had a fantastic two-way outing this past week. And it was one of those where we all just take stock of, oh yeah, we should be talking about him every single time he does anything, which was basically podcast policy for some time. And we've pulled back on that a bit. But in his most recent outing, he reached base five times because he had three singles. and two walks. And as a starter, he pitched six scoreless to further lower his ERA to, what is it, point seven four. Yes, it is point seven four. But like his FIP is two for one.

So it's even good Ben, you know, kind of washed. Yeah, I know. Look at that sub 200 Babbup is basically, it's just a mirage and a low home run per fly ball rate and everything. Yeah. I do have kind of maybe an irrational belief in Shohei Otani's club. from having watched him so much because he does have a tendency and a lot of pitchers do, but his is pretty pronounced or it has been in the past to really reach back to throw harder to get out of jams.

He's a bare-down guy. He is, he really is because, yeah, he paces himself somewhat. Obviously, his stuff is still ridiculous even when he's pacing himself. But you can totally tell when he knows that he's at the end of his outing and he's trying to get out of a jam or he's just he has runners in scoring position or whatever it is he will often just suddenly dialed

up and then you remember oh right when he wants to he can just throw 100 1 or whatever this yeah but yes perhaps good fortune has been on his side but I was wondering about outings where he

just so manhandles the opposition that he is more productive offensively than the entire team he faces as a pitcher. Because in this outing, it was six scoreless and six Ks. And he allowed only two hits in one walk. So he allowed three base runners or three times on base and had five himself. And so I wondered because he had more times on base as a hitter than he allowed as a starter,

which starting pitchers have had the highest career rates of doing that historically? and how he compares. I guess he also personally scored more runs than he allowed because he crossed the plate once and his opposition did not. But I thought it might be fun to look at this in terms of times on base. It's kind of like the true win, a stat that was discussed in the second Sam era, which was when a pitcher threw a complete game and hit more home runs than runs allowed. So it was sort of as if he had won it single-handedly because he just pitched.

the whole game and then just personally hit a home run and that would have made the difference anyway. He didn't really need his teammates to show up at all in a sense. And this is less stringent than that. And it was always rare, but it's unheard of now. Only Otani could do that really in the universal DH era. But this is not a true win. We need some new branding for this. But I asked Michael Mountain about this. And he looked into it. And I think we have some interesting takeaways here. So he has excluded from his analysis starts that were made with the DH rule in place where the starting pitcher never batted. If the DH entered the game as a fielder and the starting pitcher subsequently batted, he did count that. Or if the Otani rule was in place

and Otani batted as the DH even after he left the game as a starter, he counted that too. So that's the ground rules here. So six of Otani's 10 starts so far this season meet those criteria, which gives him a career rate of seven out of 91 starts or 7.6% outreaching his opposing batters. And apart from Austin Voth, who made nine starts in National League parks before the Universal D.H was instituted and accomplished this feat in his final opportunity on June 6, 2021, one hit by pitch as a batter and zero base runners allowed in his two innings of work as an opener. I think we can probably not quite count that. Yeah.

That was his only start of the season. Otani has the highest rate of any pitcher since 1898 with more than three such opportunities. We need a name for this. So if you have something off the dome, then feel free to suggest. Otherwise, I'm throwing it out there for others to suggest a moniker for this sort of two-way appearance and excellence. But Michael continues that Joe Strong of the Baltimore Blacksci. Fox also did this once in 14 games on record, which would put him ahead of Otani's pace coming into the season. But now that Otani has racked up one more, that's not the case.

Also, Negro League statistics are spotier. Strong started many more than 14 games. Those are just the only ones Michael could find with a known hits plus walks plus hit by pitch total for both his batting and pitching lines. Okay. So no one with as many eligible games started as Otani is remotely close to his career rate. I feel like I said remotely. That's not how you say that word. But in fact, Michael says,

no one besides Otani has done this more than twice, period. Oh, wow. Yeah. The two timers, and that's, I guess, a negative connotation. But in this case, the two timers are Max Scherzer, who did it twice in 222 eligible starts. Madison Bumgarner, a pretty accomplished hitter in his day by the standards of his day.

He did it twice in 293 eligible starts. Doug Drebeck did it twice in 316 eligible starts, and the big train, Walter Johnson, did it twice in 666 possible starts. And again, Otani has done it seven times. So this is sort of a signature stat for him. I did enjoy that Michael mentioned that in the famous game when Cesar Tovar played all nine defensive positions on September 22nd, 1968,

he was technically the starting pitcher that day. So he got that position out of the way early. He allowed one walk in his one inning of work, but of course stayed in the game and ended up one for three with a walk of his own at the plate, making him the only player in recorded history with a 100% rate of reaching base more often than the combined batters he faced in his starts. Fun fact. So I was actually sort of surprised that no one else had ever done this more than twice.

because you go back far enough to Walter Johnson or beyond. Pitchers used to be more passable hitters. Yeah. But they also generally pitch deeper into games, so it was harder to do. And Otani, he's just ducking out of there after six innings. He has it easy. And I mean, I do think it bears repeating, Ben. The man has a 161 WRC plus.

That he does. Even in an era where pitchers were better hitters than we saw at the tail end of the pitchers hitting era, they weren't generally 161 WRC plus guys, right? They weren't even, they were not, they were not 142 WRC plus guys, which was Otani's full season WRC plus in 2022. They weren't doing that generally. I'm sure there are, you know, exceptions. but I'm not surprised that it's as infrequent a phenomenon as as you're describing. That strikes me as just about right, honestly. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I tried to make it harder on him here because I'm anticipating people saying, oh, Otani rule, we're always bending the rules in favor of Otani special treatment. And in this case, it skews things a little bit because he does get to stay in games after he is removed as a pitcher, he gets to continue to hit, and he's not expected to finish what he started on the mound. So you could say, well, this is sort of skewed. It's easier for him to do this because he doesn't have to go as deep into games

as some pitchers in earlier eras did. And he gets to keep racking up times on base after he is no longer pitching. And by the way, as has been documented, he generally has hit a little bit worse. on days when he pitches. And so we're looking only at days when he pitches here. And yet still he has done this so many times. Okay.

So we thought, all right, let's make it tougher on him. Let's hold him to the same standard as everyone else. And Michael said, I could try to figure out how many times Otani has done this if you count only his batting appearances before he was removed from the game as a pitcher. Okay. So just imagine that he's like any other N.S. starter. Exactly. Yeah, back in the day when now starters would hit.

Yeah, or any starters. Back in the day. So he doesn't get to keep compiling after he's pulled from the game as a pitcher. That makes it more apples to apples. Now, in the game this past week, he still would have done this because he reached in his first four plate appearances and he still would have qualified because he reached base for the fourth time in the top of the same. sixth as a batter and then he pitched six full innings as a pitcher. So would have counted anyway. But Michael looked at this also. If he didn't have the Otani rule helping him out, only, quote unquote, only three of the aforementioned seven times that he has done this

would have counted. And Wednesday would have been his first time doing it as a Dodger. But that is still more than any. anyone else in recorded history has done this regardless of how many eligible starts they made. So, yeah, this is, it's, it's pretty, pretty impressive because the four times he, he did this at Dodger Stadium last year were all Otani rule aided June 16th, June 22nd, July 5th, September 16th. Of course, he didn't pitch a full season last year and he was ramping up even when he came back. But the three that still count are this week, Wednesday, and then twice on the road with the Angels. He did it as well.

And it's, I guess, a little helpful, as Michael noted, to be on the road because you get to bat before you pitch in that case. But he did this April 20th, 2022 and April 17th, 2023. So three total times. And again, no one else has ever done. So even if we try to adjust, you can't adjust his singular excellence out of anything. Do you worry that we're not talking about Shoho Tone enough? I do, think.

No, do you worry that we, not you and I specifically, but like as a sport, that we don't have anywhere left to go with this guy? Well. Do you, you know what I mean? I was thinking today about, and I want to be clear, I think baseball is better when Aaron Judge is healthy and playing and playing well. But I was thinking today about Judge's injury. And, you know, as Jay Jaffe and I were going back and forth a little bit last night as we got clarity into the severity of it and, you know, there's the relief that it's not thoracic outlet syndrome. You know, we're kind of going back and forth on it because he wrote about Judge today. And I kind of snarkily equipped.

and again, I'm trying, I don't know, trying to make light at the injury, but I was like, oh, well, we're going to get a new ALMVP, I guess. Yes, that was one of my first reactions too. Oh, finally. And what a spoiled brat I sound like saying that because, you know, to be able to have both of these guys and I'm going to say something that might offend Yankees fans. And I just want you all, I don't, I'm not trying to bring you low again in your in your moment of vulnerability. But like there, we can acknowledge a gap, right, between Otani and Judge in terms of what the peak form can look like and sort of how singular it is, how singular. Can you modify singularity? Probably not. It's like unique, right? Anyway. Yeah. I can have different degrees of, well, maybe not. No, maybe you can't. But, well, yeah, you could be, you could be singular in more ways than someone else's singular. Correct. That's true.

several points of being singular. Yeah, but you can have points of uniqueness. It's true. But I think we can acknowledge that like the firing on all cylinders version of Otani looks different in a real way than Judge. And yet we should appreciate, we should appreciate Judge. You know, we need to like let ourselves acknowledge to your point what it means to be able to watch these guys.

And yet, and yet, we have this moment. We're like, oh, we get a new thing. And so I just wonder what the next narrative breakthrough is for Otani. And I think we're seeing it this season. But like after that, you know, after we get the version of him that looks like it is going to come with both an MVP and a Cy Young, potentially. Although it really will be interesting to see how that trends. but then what? You know, it's like we talked a couple episodes ago about like Wembe and his giant hands,

a perfect of anything else. And I think that this is something that's going to be interesting to watch NBA fans grapple with. Like how long are people going to be amped for Wembe, which feels like a ridiculous thing to ask because he's so singular and so unusual in the, even in the history of a sport that has. has a lot of precedent for like good big men, right? He's just unlike anything we've seen, at least in a long time. And yet, you can kind of already feel in a little bit where it's like, well, he did,

he did have that obvious elbow in that one game. And, you know, he's so French. How will people feel about that? So I just, you know, and I'm not saying that people are going to like turn against their tonny. The people who are inclined to sort of embrace a heel turn are still trying to flog the notion that like Otani was the one who was gambling and Ipe like took the fall for him. So, you know, maybe we've already quarantined part of the baseball fan population and put it over in conspiracy land.

But it's just a, it's just an interesting thing to think about. And I also can't believe I'm even entertaining it because really what we should be focused on is what he's doing right now, which is so incredible. Yeah. Well, Wemby's so young that he has room to grow. I mean, physically, maybe not, although I wouldn't put it past him. But, yeah, he's just evolving. And this was a new version of Wembe this year. And he's so good at defense.

But, well, how high is his offensive ceiling? Again, not physically. But he's 22 years old. And Shohay Otani is about a month away from reaching the advanced age of 32. And I've been writing something. thing about solo Beatles music. And so when I see 32, I think of Ringo Starr singing in the John Lennon written, I'm the greatest.

Now I'm only 32. And all I want to do is boogaloo. Hey, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. It's shocking that you have time for so many obsessions because you also just consume so much media. You couldn't do it if you needed to sleep more. I realize that your entire professional life is predicated on you. Keeping all these plate spinning and balls in the air. Being a low sleep guy.

Short-changing myself sleep-wise. But anyway, so I don't know whether all Otani wants to do is Bougaloo now that he is about to be 32. Probably not. But I will say a word in defense of Aaron Judge because won't someone stick up for Aaron Judge. I think that he has been good in a meaningfully different way from Otani. But if we're just talking about peak value, I think he has a strong case to have been better in that department than Shohay Otani. Just, you know, he has had higher war totals. Yes.

He's been at 11 war, right? He is when they are both kind of in the past several seasons, when they're both healthy and operational and everything, generally, Judge has outstripped Otani war-wise. I want to be clear. I am not, I'm not like a judge war truth or anything like that. I don't think that, you know, the numbers are what they are. And he is, he is phenomenal. And it's, it's incredible because he, you know, was a guy who, after a couple of good seasons, people were still like, well, is this guy going to really, like, be a Hall of Famer, though?

And it's like, yes, the answer to that seems like it's a resounding and unequivocal, yes. But I think that both of these guys will, their career, will stand the test of time when we are looking back on this era of baseball. But I think that the way that we collectively talk about Otani is just, it is going to be operating in a different register than it is for judge. And I don't mean that as a slight on judge. It's really just a statement about like how unusual and increasingly. and incredible Otani's

both the attempt and the execution of the attempt doing the two-way thing and like especially if he keeps accruing hardware and adds a sigh young I just think that

when we are at a point where there are generations of baseball fans who were not around to see Otani live and obviously their ability to access his play will be like

appreciably better and different than our ability to like watch Babe Ruth, right? But Aaron Judge is good, even though he is, you know, so much better than everyone else around him. He is good in a way that will feel familiar to baseball fans of the future. They're like, well, I've seen a version of that guy before, right? I've seen a version of the giant guy. I've seen a version of the incredible hitting guy who like looks like he should be too

long but is able to hit the way that judge is able to hit. They will have sort of precedent for that in their mental catalog of baseball. And maybe there will be more Otani lights in the future. But I just don't think that unless you were around to see it, that you're going to be able to quite, you know, there will be legend associated with that because it will be so distinct from what folks are used to seeing on a day-to-day basis as baseball fans. I just think it's going to be a different level of thing. Plus, like, all of his deferrals will have hit him by then.

So he might just own California. You know, who knows? He might just, who knows what will have changed? Maybe he'll be president. We might get a lot more relaxed about some stuff. He will have moved so he doesn't have to pay state income tax at that point. But on when he's actually making money. But we don't know that he's that kind of guy yet.

So let's not tag him with it. It's true. Maybe he will just decide, I want to give back to the public. I want to help infrastructure projects and therefore please tax me by all means. I do wonder, yeah, it would be so great if he would really cement his place on like lefty baseball Twitter if he came out tomorrow and was like, no, I think that like we should be texting a millionaires at a much higher rate. Honestly, like infrastructure costs money and we believe in a community good. I am always curious with guys who come to the states from abroad. I wonder where he and his family will settle when his playing career is done. Like, will he want to stay here or will he and his wife and family, however many kids they have by that point, want to go back to Japan? Anyway, that's neither here nor there.

It's just the thing I think about, you know? Well, Judge v. Otani, it's kind of the sword fight in Raiders of the Lost Ark. It's like you have this fancy guy who's spinning the swords around and then Indy just shoots him and the fight is over. That's such a, yeah. It's kind of what we have seen here where Otani is just like, what if I am a two-way player and what if I do both things? And then also what if I'm the first 50-50 guy and you've never seen anything like me? And Aaron Judge is just like, what if I hit a ton of dingers? Like, what if I was just the best hitter?

So Aaron Judge is Indiana Jones in this. Judge is Indy. Yes. And Judge is Harrison Ford who had dysentery and just suggested to Spielberg, what if I just shoot the sucker so that I don't have to have an extended sword versus whip fight here. That's kind of what this is where Otani is doing all the fancy stuff and all the high degree of difficulty. And then Judge is just kind of pulling the trigger the old-fashioned way. And it's not particularly, it's not as impressive perhaps. It's very impressive to be clear. but it's maybe not quite as impressive, but it gets the job done. That's kind of what it is. Now, Judge has been so good at the more traditional model of being good at baseball that we've still marveled at him. And he still has the ridiculous Bondian WRC Plus marks

and he still had the 62 homers and all the rest. So he has been so spectacular at doing this in a more conventional way that it is still a spectacle. It is still sensational. But probably maybe in his heart of hearts, who knows? Maybe Aaron Judge is just looking at the war leader boards and saying, hey, scoreboards, leaderboards, I have the higher total. Everyone's making such a fuss about Otani.

He can do all this fancy stuff that we haven't seen in a century or ever, et cetera. And here I am still being better at baseball than he is, in a sense. But what Otani does is just so impressive. and unprecedented, or at least without recent precedent, that we all marvel at it because it's more than war. It certainly is war, but it's the degree of difficulty that he sets himself. So it is interesting to think what else could he do, because we've probably been having this conversation

just about every season of Otani's career, at least every fully healthy season of his career. Oh, okay, he raised the bar. He has now met or exceeded our wildest, for how good he could be. Now what? Now we'll just all be blaze about him. And maybe we have been to an extent, because we've talked about him less, even though he's

having maybe his most valuable season, we've talked about him less on a rate basis than we did in a lot less valuable seasons than he had in the past, because it was new and novel, and we'd never seen him do it or anyone do it. And now we've seen him do it several times, and we understand that he can. and so in order to get us to talk about him at anything like the old rate, he now has to be even better than he was before and impress us even more. And so he has done that at times with, oh, suddenly I'm a 50-50 guy, and hey, now I'll just be better at pitching than I've ever been,

and I'll do all of these things, or I'll just be a better hitter than I've been before. So really, it would be hard to go anywhere from if he were able to win the Siam. Young Award and the MVP and have a 10 plus war season or something. Then he'd have to, I think, he'd have to just get into another baseball line of work. He would have to just start playing the field, I think. He'd have to show that he could be a good outfield defender, let's say. He'd have to maybe morph into a gold glove outfielder plus closer or something. Like there'd have to be some new permutation of his.

skills, I think he'd have to be deployed in a different way, probably. Do you think that if he started to demonstrate like a pronounced uptick in his durability as a starter, that it would change anything? Because part of the reality of him having to manage the dual workloads is that, like, he's probably always going to have some sort of upper bound on how many endings he goes in a start. Even if as the rest of his career unfolds, we start to seem more. more days like we have seen of him this season where they just don't have him hit on the days

that he's pitching and he's not doing he's still a two-way player but he is not two-way in the same game otani we do need some new verbiage i know yeah or this week when he had that great two-way game and then they gave him the next day off which was pre-planned but they told him ahead of time so that he could just leave it all on the field yeah and i guess that that may have worked but Yeah, it's true. And he's been pitching on a once a week schedule pretty strictly, too. So, yeah. But then again, these days, it's not like you have anyone really racking up.

Right. Well, at least we haven't, but this season, well, maybe in some cases Christopher Sanchez. He's doing his best. Cam Schlittler, sort of. So that's the question, I guess, is should he win, sigh? Because he probably should not, right? I mean. If the season ended today, as we always say, which would be weird and why would it?

And that would be quite disappointing. But if it did, he shouldn't be the Siyang winner. He shouldn't be the Siyang. No, I don't think so. And I'm sorry to be so, like, forceful about it because that sounds disrespectful, but he shouldn't be the Siong. No. Now, if he manages to be a qualified pitcher or close, he's just tracking barely behind that pace.

now and somehow we're able to maintain this sort of sparkling ERA, well, there would be, I think, a push. There'd be a sentiment. Hey, this is the thing he hasn't done. How cool would it be if he did do it and checked off this box? And it was his goal coming into the season. But we do not have to give him the award because he wanted it. So as cool as it would be for him to earn it legitimately.

And I'm sure that even he would not. not want to just kind of get a courtesy sigh or something. He wants to win it, fair and square. And as of today, he's not been the most valuable pitcher in the National League because, well, partly it's because, yeah, he has been a little lucky. Despite being great, he's also benefited from some good fortune. But also, he doesn't have the innings. And, you know, he's doing a decent job in the innings department. but he has been outstripped significantly.

Christopher Sanchez has pitched 86 and a third innings. Shohei has pitched 61. So if it were just the Miz, who's about 10 innings ahead of Otani, well, I don't know, but even the Miz has been more valuable as a pitcher than Shohei Otani has. Otani's been excellent,

but he is, I think, effectively tied with Paul Skeen's, but they are both well behind Christopher Sanchez, and Jacob Miserowski. So if they were to sustain what they have done, then I don't think there's a great argument for giving Otani the MVP other than look how low his ERA is though and wow, wouldn't it be cool if he won one?

Neither of which really passes Buster if I'm being intellectually consistent here. So yes, I think that he would have to continue to avoid regression. if the other guys keep pitching at this pace. And they've done it in such impressive fashion with Christopher Sanchez having a pretty historic scoreless streak. Right.

With the Mizz, throwing harder than anyone has ever thrown as a starter. They have some sort of sexy attention getting aspects to their season two. Right. This was the point that I made when we had our even more premature side discussion, which is that like it is not as if we are lacking in competition. compelling narrative for the guys at the top of that leaderboard. And now we have even been more compelling narrative because I think when we had that conversation, Sanchez had maybe just begun his scoreless streak. He was not that far into it, if I recall correctly. And the

Miz is the Miz. So, I'm so casual about that. The Miz is the Ms. You know, this like baby-faced Charzart obsessive who really throws 103. I just love how much he loves Pokemon. Yeah, it is fun. And then you have picture of the month, Spencer Arrogatti, who's coming for all of them, hot on their heels. But fortunately for them, no, he's in the American League. I was going to say, they don't have to worry about Spencer Ergetty. That'll do it for the free preview of today's Effectively Wild. Thank 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

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