Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 491: Improving All-Star Week

Episode Date: July 14, 2014

Ben and Sam talk to Zachary Levine about ways that Major League Baseball could make All-Star week better.

I know it's not a game, but it feels like losing when someone you love throws you away. I fix it. I fix it. I fix it. Good morning and welcome to episode 491 of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast. I don't really know how we're supposed to introduce this anymore. I guess we could say the daily podcast presented by the Baseball Reference Play Index. I'm Sam Miller with Baseball Perspectives with Ben Lindberg from Brantlin.com, a subsidiary of ESPN. What do you want to do? We'll streamline it. Technically, I have not started my job yet.

I don't start until next Monday. So right now, I'm just unemployed. I'm between jobs, and you're just doing me a favor here, letting me come on your podcast. Well, if anybody's looking for a good employee, he's unemployed, but I will vouch for Ben Lindberg as an employee and a person. Thank you. So hopefully that'll help you get some work

in these next four days. Thanks, I hope so. I've got a few lines on things. Something's coming together, I think. By the way, thanks to everyone who said nice things to us on Twitter or via email or Facebook group or iTunes review or whatever it is on Friday or over the weekend.

There were some very nice touching tributes to the podcast. So thank you. Yeah, we have a guest today. But before I introduce him, before I note him or say who he is or let him talk, Ben, do you feel like briefly noting the all-star iTunes review? Because it really is one of the highlights. I'd say it's one of the high points of the show. It was pretty good. Yeah, let me see. I sent it to you. It's a five-star review.

Its subject line is, Only Shooting Stars Break the Mold. And it reads, I hit the ground running with this podcast at about episode 20, and Effectively Wild has slowly grown into my favorite sports podcast and my first listen every day when a new one pops up. It is, in short, my personal all-star of a podcast. There's so much to do, so much to see with this podcast. Ben and Sam are the sharpest tool in the shed. They have a deep knowledge of baseball and a genuine chemistry together.

It's a refreshing contrast from podcasts where the media men beg to differ. So when somebody once told me that the podcast is no longer going to be a daily thing, I was happy for Ben that he got a new job, but sad that it's no longer going to be a daily release. That said, I guess I understand the move. As one genius once said, you'll never know if you don't go, you'll never shine if you don't glow. genius once said, you'll never know if you don't go, you'll never shine if you don't glow. Yeah. All right. So that's very well done. Yes. Good job. All right. Well, good job. All right. So we're here with Zachary Levine. Zachary, how are you doing? I'm good. Thanks for having me. I'm very happy this is continuing to be a thing. Yeah. I'm very glad that you coming on every once in a while is also continuing to be a thing. Yeah, I enjoy it.

One of, probably our, I would guess our number two most frequent guest, is that? Yeah, if it's not Russell, it's got to be Zachary, right? Oh, I was thinking Jason. Oh. Jason's been a fill-in for me numerous times but yeah Russell, anyway so Zachary, you're here to talk to us about the All-Star Week

and where Bud Seeley gets it all wrong, right? Gets some of it wrong and I think there are we talk about the ways that we've tried to that we've tried to fix baseball, tried to fix the draft, and how many of them actually make things worse. That's sort of going to be the disclaimer to this whole how to fix the schedule in the Futures game

and how it all relates in this four-day break. So where do we start with things that are wrong? All right. So there was an article today by Craig Calcaterra at NBC Sports. He's one of my favorite reads. And the headline was Major League Baseball needs to shift the All-Star Week schedule, talking about how the Futures game was played yesterday, Sunday, at the same time as the World Cup final, which despite our nation's not being in it, still captured a lot of the attention. And also at the same time as active baseball games were going on, the same time that a lot of the people who might be your audience for the Futures game were either

at baseball games or watching their home team on television. So in the age of the DVR and with the Futures game sort of not being important for a result. It's probably not a bad thing to be able to watch on delay. It carries over to delay a lot better than an actual baseball game would, where it's sort of about who wins and what happens. The Futures game is mostly about being able to get your eyes on people. But the article was about how baseball can sort of make this into an event. And Craig laid out two possibilities that I wanted to discuss

and maybe ask you guys about. I'll read from it. Quote, can anyone explain to me why Major League Baseball doesn't do something about this, such as moving the Futures game to Monday night and getting rid of the home run derby, or if the home run derby is too much to lose from a financial perspective, shifting everything forward a day with the Futures game on Monday, the home run derby on Tuesday, and the All-Star game on Wednesday.

If we were to do that, more pitchers could take part in it due to the extra day of rest. Plus, we wouldn't have the utterly and totally dead baseball night on Wednesday. So those are Craig's two suggestions. And to me, the second one makes much more sense. I don't like the home run derby, but I think the ratings will say that and the interest from fans and the tweets as it's going on will say that there definitely is an audience for it. But I was curious about what you guys thought about those two suggestions. I mean, I think the Home Run Derby is somewhat stale

and they're doing what they can to freshen it up. But I would keep it. But I've always thought that they should just put the Futures game as like a lead-in to the Home Run Derby. And I think maybe Jeff Passan might have suggested that years ago, just have it. Because right now it's at 5 p.m. Eastern on a Sunday, which is just such a strange time. It's not prime time. There are games going on. It's just not an hour when people are tuning in for some special baseball event. So even if you just made it Monday at the same time and just had it happen as the opener to the Home Run Derby, I feel like it would get more attention. And it should get more attention.

Even if you just moved it to Sunday night and replaced the Sunday night game of the week for that week with the Futures game and made that a primetime show on the MLB network, I don't know, maybe ESPN would want to broadcast it. I doubt it. But I doubt it's big enough to replace Sunday Night Baseball ratings wise. But, you know, if baseball stopped so that everybody could sort of start, you know, All-Star Week on Sunday, you know, evening and then it kind of leads into the rest of the week's activities, I can't even see that working. Yeah, but the way it is right now

is the weirdest. I mean, not only that, but nothing starts at 5 p.m. working. Yeah, but the way it is right now is the weirdest. I mean, not only that, but nothing starts at 5 p.m. Eastern. There aren't even regular games that start at 5. What starts at 2 in the afternoon on the West Coast or 5 Eastern ever? Is there one single sporting event that has ever started at 5 Eastern? No, there's a lot of 4s, and then the Super Bowl is 6, and there are no, I don't know of any 5s. And you would think that this would be something that Major League Baseball would really want to promote.

I mean, right now there are people in our Facebook group who forgot to DVR or had to be at work on Sunday when the game was going on and, and they want to see the game now. And there's just no, no real clear way to see it. Someone looked at the MLB network schedule for the next few days. It's not being replayed. You'd think it might be replayed tonight, for instance, it's not even. So it's really, it's strange. Cause I mean, you said that, you know, you,

you don't think it would get Sunday night baseball type ratings and maybe it wouldn't. But you'd think, I don't know, maybe my viewpoint is skewed by the just rabid interest in prospects at, you know, among baseball prospectus readers, among our listeners, among people who read internet sites and read scouting stuff, but that's a self-selecting group. Of course, those people have come to Baseball Prospectus to read those things, and there aren't that many places you can get that kind of info, which is why it's so popular for BP and for the other places that do it. Maybe among the general baseball-watching public, it doesn't have the same appeal. But MLB has put such an effort into making the draft an event. And I don't know how successful that's been,

but that's, I mean, it's one of the marquee events of the season. MLB markets that heavily. And you'd think that the Futures game is a bigger draw, a more interesting event, if only because those guys are close to the majors. They're going to be there soon, whereas the main problem with the draft is that it's not like basketball. It's not like football. These guys are not going to be in the major leagues next year. It's going to be a while, whereas Futures game, these guys are ready.

They could be up this year. So it's strange. You'd think they'd want to promote it just because these are the next baseball stars who are up and coming. And, and also because you'd, you'd think there would be interest in it, at least among, among our group of people who write about the game or watch the game and read our writing. It's it's regarded as, as maybe the highlight of this week, I would think. Do you think there's anything, just out of curiosity,

do you think there's anything that they could do to the Futures game itself to make it more interesting or a better product on its own? Not just timing-wise, but as far as the game itself, the selection process, anything like that? I guess if you look at what the NBA has done with its All-Star Week, and we can talk about this in a few minutes as we talk about what else could change with All-Star Week, is that the NBA has the rookie-soph rookie sophomore game, which is just what it sounds like.

And if I were suggesting a way, this wouldn't be necessarily a good idea, but it would be an idea that would probably get more average Major League Baseball fans, like fans who are just fans of their home team and maybe know one or two prospects but aren't really prospect people, is you open it up to MLB rookies who aren't all-stars. You consider the Futures game not only prospects, but here are guys who are already up and playing in your home stadium right now who are the next generation of stars. You could have Mookie Betts playing.

You could have some of the guys who either just broke in, and I said Betts, I think he might have been selected to the future scheme and then couldn't play. But you include the guys who have some name recognition to the more casual fan. Yeah, that makes sense. And I guess the idea in exclusions who has a plate appearance in the majors but was ineligible is that the idea is that these are people who you can't otherwise see in a big league park. And so once they are people who you can't otherwise see on in a big

league park um and so once they're in the majors you can see them in a big league park if you really want to go but you're right it does seem like a strange strategy to uh to exclude the most marketable or the most uh you know uh the the biggest draws uh specifically because they're bigger draws you know just because they're bigger draws, you know, just because they've made it to the majors. I was wondering whether it might be, and this is maybe less a replacement for the Futures game. Actually, the one thing I would do is I would rather see the Futures game be, like, streamlined, like 15 player rosters on each side

so that you can see these guys play full games um because i think that you know it's if you really want to watch a player you don't just want to see him bat once or or you know play the field for two innings so uh i would rather see it just be basically you know very few substitutions and you know you have a couple of relievers in the bullpen but treat it almost like a real game. The other thing, not necessarily to replace it, but maybe as another event that might work in All-Star Week, would be a draft pick scheme. And I would actually probably rather watch draft picks, and maybe the average fan would i'm not sure i mean once you get past the first uh you know the top prospect uh in your team's farm system most fans don't really know that much beyond and so most of these guys aren't huge draws but the draft picks have like a sort of uh sexy luster to them right now and it's tricky because not all of them have signed

um and a lot of them are sort of at the end of years where they've been you know worked hard um and you know they're sort of shutting it down and you know their development is probably at a more important stage where the club really wants to get them in and get a look at them and probably doesn't want them going away for three days but i would watch the heck out of a out of a first round game. I wouldn't be, yeah, I mean, I'd watch that. I'd definitely watch that. I'm more intrigued by the Futures game than by that just because of the proximity to the majors

and the amount I know about the players, although I guess you could say that that's a reason why you would want to watch the draft pick game because you don't know as much about that about those guys we we did a we're doing a how to fix all-star week group post at grantland which is something that grantland has done the last couple years and my hey hey yeah am i not allowed to to promote that you're allowed to but we were we were just for the record we were also thinking of doing a how to fix the all-star game well so i just don't want you thinking that that because you said that i want this to be a safe place

where we can share i start worrying about intellectual theft so yeah how to how to it's not the most original idea in the world pretty original pretty original it's been done 10 times every year that I can remember. So my contribution was that we should put some prospects in the derby. I want to see the minor league home run leaders in the home run derby. Brian Dozier is a fine player and Todd Frazier is a fine player, but the thought of watching them take batting practice essentially does not make me want to drop whatever I'm doing and watch that. I would definitely drop whatever I was doing and watch Joey Gallo and Chris Bryant

try to hit home runs, which happened today, just plain batting practice. It was like a frenzy on Twitter, just people reacting to those guys hitting balls out of the stadium. And then, of course, Gallo was the Futures Game MVP because he hit a gigantic home run. So I would love to see those guys in the home run derby. As it is, if I watch, it'll be on in the background and I won't be paying very close attention. If those guys replace the least exciting players in that event, I would be riveted. So that's my recommendation for that. Did they broadcast? Not original, by the way, Ben. We

had this exact conversation last year. Didn't we last year? You and me. Last year we wanted we wanted like Ben Revere in it and Hichiro and Jose Altuve or something weird and effectively wildy. In addition to the minor

top minor league. Oh, okay. Well, I'm sticking to it. Did they broadcast batting practice? Is that how people saw it or were people tweeting? It was people who were there.

I'd like to see. I'd like to get a bootleg of that show. Yeah. Just the basement tapes or something of Joey Gallo hitting baseballs in a basement. That'd be fun, actually. That would be awesome. I guess the Home Run Derby discussion brings me to sort of the next question from this piece, which is, you know, we have these empty days. If we're not moving anything, if we're just moving the Futures games to Sunday night or something like that, we still have these empty days on Wednesday and Thursday. I think the AAA All-Star game might still be on Wednesday, but that's like the opposite of the Futures game in a lot of ways.

But what do we do with these blank nights in the calendar when there are no other sports going on and baseball has just this opportunity to just sort of keep the public interest momentum going. You're not competing against anything on that Wednesday and Thursday nights. I think that's why ESPN puts its big award show that Wednesday night. The ESPYs are, I think, that night just as a blank night on the sports calendar. But we have the Home Run Derby. Are there any other skills competitions that you think would be at all watchable and might catch on like the Home Run Derby did? We definitely discussed this maybe last year,

and as I recall, you were anti pretty much everything, right? I'm strongly opposed to skills competitions for baseball. Why? Can you rehash? everything right i'm strongly opposed to skills competitions for baseball can you why can you rehash uh yeah as i recall it's that uh the skills are either themselves boring like running is boring to watch uh unless it's in a baseball context and pretty much all the skills are boring except when they're in baseball game action so like watching a guy run while the ball is live is exciting but watching a guy run from one you know from a starting line to a finish line is uh is not hence the not having track meets on abc uh every weekend uh despite them being run all around the world um and same

with like throwing people talk about throwing, but throwing itself is not that interesting throwing when you have to, um, you know, pick the ball up, maneuver your body, throw with, you know, uncertain momentum, uh, at a, uh, target that might itself be moving while a runner is closing in. I mean, whenever you see these, these, any, any great throw that we um that we watch over and over on youtube or mlb uh highlight clips and gifs for years and years there's always the element of the runner the runner is it's always a close enough play that the runner is himself a character in this and it puts throw in perspective and so if you just had them throwing it like a garbage can and trying to throw it into a garbage can from right field, it just wouldn't be that interesting.

If there was no race, if there was no kind of uncertainty about where the ball is coming and who's running where and all that, I just don't think it would be interesting. So I think generally any time someone recommends a skills competition, I tune out. I'm not interested. I'm kind of with you. I think the Home Run Derby, we all complain about it being boring,

and it is kind of boring, but maybe that's because we've been watching it for, you know, it's been going in the current format or something close to the current format for 30 years now with the All-Star break. But if it were once every 10 years, I'd be into it. If it were new, if we'd never seen it before, I'd be excited to see it.

So what if we just had a rotating skills competition where it would always be new? So maybe the event itself would not stand up to repeated viewings. If it were held every year like the Home Run Derby is, we would all stop watching. But if it were once, if it were the first time we had ever seen it, I'd watch it, right? I'd watch any novel baseball idea.

I'd watch guys race around the bases. Even if running itself is not inherently an interesting activity, I would watch just to see who ran around the bases fastest, right? I'd be interested in who had the fastest time. Or if you did, say, like a long toss thing, like who can throw the farthest, I'd kind of be into that i'd want to see how far into the stands an outfielder could throw the ball from home plate that kind of thing or some kind of uh pitching command accuracy target test right we always we always talk about how accurate pitchers are and how often they can actually hit the target and how we don't think it's as often as people think it actually is. So what if we got the best control command pitchers

in baseball on the mound and had them throw to a tiny target a certain number of times? Maybe that would teach us something about baseball. I mean, it might teach you and me something. It might teach a very tiny number of people paying attention for just that specific reason, something about baseball. But can you imagine somebody jumping out of his couch because Tyler Skaggs hit the corner? Can you imagine anybody really freaking out because the pitcher hit the target? Isn't that basically what bowling is? People watch bowling. It's the same thing.

Except these are people we've heard of. Honest to God, Ben, I would actually, I think that baseball players bowling and like a baseball player doing sports that they're not good at, competition would be significantly better. I would much rather see like Johnny Helweg and Jose Altuve bowl off. Yeah, we got a listener email not too long ago asking us which players we would want to see bowl or would pick for our bowling team.

And make no mistake, I don't want to see that either. I would much rather see it, but that would be awful. The one that I would want to see, and this would never ever ever ever ever happen is i want to see if you gave every guy one pitch how fast you could throw it like that's the uh i know i'm talking about every other sport but baseball here but in the nhl skills competition that's the one where everyone remembers the winner is the hardest slap shot competition. And, you know, I would love to see who could get it up over 103 if you gave

him one pitch and said, you don't really have to hit just the strike zone as long as, you know, it doesn't bounce and is readable by the gun and stuff like that. doesn't bounce and is readable by the gun and stuff like that. Or make them hit the strike zone and, you know, just have it be a little more realistic that way. But that's, I mean, someone would get badly hurt. Yeah, but you're closer.

Like, I think that having them do something that they don't ever do is much more interesting. Like, the most, so, okay, what's the most, other than the home run derby, what's like the sort of the greatest stunt skills competition in baseball history? I have, I mean, I have the answer. I don't know if you guys, if anything jumps out at you, but. Just like measuring Bob Feller's pitches with a motorcycle. Was it the guy who held all the baseballs in one hand? No.

That's a good one too. No, it's the guy who caught the baseball that was dropped from like the wall. Oh, right. Oh. And like it broke his hand and I think he might have died. But that's the classic one, right? And so, if you had a bunch of catchers trying to drop things dropped out of a plane, that'd be good.

That's like a total freak show. That would just turn it into a circus. I would watch it, though. Seeing a guy really line up a throw from left field, not as interesting. Ben, you made a decent case for it. For a split second, I thought I might be open-minded, but I'm not. So I was going to ask about the All-Star game itself.

Is there anything that we could do, that Major League Baseball could do to make that more compelling? Because my general thought about that is that the All-Star game is roughly as good as it could be, roughly as compelling as it could be. The basic idea is you get the best players together, you put them on the same field at the same time, and then they play baseball. And that's not maybe quite as must-see an event as it once was when a lot of these stars were unfamiliar. an event as it once was when a lot of these stars were unfamiliar.

You didn't get to see them unless maybe they came into town once a year, and some of them never came into town, so you couldn't ever see them unless maybe there was a game of the week or something. You could occasionally get a glimpse of them, but otherwise you'd just be reading about them or you'd be looking at their stats, but you couldn't actually see them. And so the All-Star Game, when they're all together, that was a big draw. Whereas now, we've got embeddable highlights. We've got highlight shows on every night. We've got MLB TV. You can watch anyone at any time. And so seeing them all at once is nice. I watch it usually,

but it's not that exciting because all these guys individually are very familiar to us. So I don't know whether the All-Star game has the same ceiling it once did. I don't know whether you can recapture what was lost there, whether it's a change to the way the guys are selected. to the way the guys are selected or I don't know, or whether you put in the artificial stakes of the home field advantage or take it out or you mandate that guys have to play a certain number of innings or whatever tweak you make to the formula,

it's still basically the same thing. It's these best players in baseball playing together and maybe that's not quite appointment viewing anymore. Right, and I think, I wonder if baseball has a problem, but it seems this way in all sports, is that even if you put the, I guess it's 68 now, best players in baseball on the same field, you can't watch the game and say,

oh my God, these guys are good. If you're someone who's watched baseball, the best players playing with and against each other doesn't look all that much different than anybody playing against anybody to me. And I guess in the Futures game, you did see some of that reaction. Like, you got to check out, turn on your TVs now, you got to check out this matchup. some of that reaction, like you got to check out, turn on your TVs.

Now you got to check out this matchup, but I don't know how much of that was novelty and, and how much of it was, yeah, you really do have to check out this guy who throws 98 against this guy who can hit it 400 feet. And if in the, in the baseball all-star game, we're just so familiar with these guys that, that we don't, we don't even think of matchups that way. Yeah, Futures Game is inherently interesting. If you're at all interested in these guys, it's like the All-Star Game.

It's a meaningless exhibition of the best players in a certain league or collection of leagues. And, you know, it's a different format. It's U.S. versus world. Maybe that makes it more compelling. I don't know. But it's just inherently interesting because we haven't gotten to see these guys. They don't have the same exposure. Even with MILB TV, you're getting standard definition looks at these guys from weird

camera angles that you can't skip to their at-bats. So even if you're a prospect person and you follow prospects pretty closely, you don't quite get the same opportunity to see them on that sort of stage. So it's inherently interesting, I think, just because these guys are new, whereas the All-Star game, these guys are not new. We know who they are already. So I don't know what you can do about that and i don't know whether it's a problem or not it just you know it it is it's

it's as compelling as it is it's not it's not the biggest event on the baseball calendar anymore i've been i've been racking my brain trying to think of a way to make it interesting and i think you're right i i can't do it i think that there was a year a couple years ago where it was sort of it was notable like everybody noted that like every pitcher on the al team through like 96 or or harder like as an average fastball and there's a way that you can sort of get swept up in velocity that's the best thing it has going for it is that it's velocity against power hitters but yeah it's it's and it's sustained it's you know it's like an action movie, kind of. It's as close as baseball can ever be to an action movie, where every beat is something

interesting. But yeah, there's not much you can do. So here's my proposal. It's three parts. One, offensive players don't play defense. Defensive players don't play offense. So you have a defensive all-star team and an offensive all-star team on each team uh and then hopefully you would have a lot fewer substitutions because you're already getting so many players represented so many teams represented and nobody's too tired okay so offensive and defensive squads for each team uh pitchers mound is 55 feet away and the ball is juiced to smithereens like Like every ball, it's like, say, a 35% juice factor on each ball. Your pitcher is going to get himself killed. Net. There's a net.

There's a net and no bundle. Oh, okay. All right. Well, I like it better. I mean, the whole key is that you have to change something. If you want to make it compelling, you can't just say the outcome of the game is going to determine home field advantage in the World Series. Because that's, first of all, that's, you know, three and a half months down the line. It's not, it doesn't really have much suspense when you're saying maybe three and a half months from now, your team will, in a seven-game series,

get to play four games at home instead of three. It doesn't really put you on the edge of your seat, especially because for most fans who are watching the game, that's probably not going to be an issue, right? Russell Carlton made the case in his latest article for Fox that for the A's, because they are a near lock for a playoff spot, you could say that home field advantage for them, so the outcome of the All-Star game for them,

is as important or affects their odds of winning the World Series as much as the Jeff Samardzija trade did, which is interesting. But for most teams, they're... Probably not true, though. Oh, he did his core math. I mean, because, did he? Huh. Yeah, I mean, you can read what he wrote. I mean, there's only a one in four chance that the A's make it to the World Series,

and then what are the chances that they play seven games? I think he said if both teams are equal, then it raises your odds to 52% of winning instead of 50%. Yeah, but they're only like a 25% chance of making the World Series, even if they're a lot to make the playoffs. Right. Anyway, so for most teams, of course, it's not. I mean, most teams are not going to make the playoffs. And for a lot of teams, I mean, most teams are not going to make the playoffs. And for a lot of teams, it's clear that they're not going to make the playoffs.

So for them, the incentive of winning home field advantage is non-existent. So you can't just add these artificial stakes to make the game more interesting. You know, I don't, because it's not that big a deal, I don't even think it's that huge a travesty to do it that way instead of just having an alternate alternate every year. But I also don't think it's much of a much of a draw. So you can't do that. You have to what we want to see is something different. That's what we want to see. That's what would make us watch, I think, is not to see the same baseball that we see on every other day of the year.

We want to see either different players playing. We want to see Gallo and Bryant in the Home Run Derby, or we want to see the same guys doing different things. And that's where the skills competition suggestions come from, and that's where your suggestion comes from. But that's kind your suggestion comes from but that's that's kind of the key you can't have the same same baseball and yet have it be way more compelling than every other baseball game it has to be different in some fashion what do you think of

i think it was uh john marosi had the wrote about the u.s versus the world idea for the All-Star game? It's pretty offensive to the world. You know, the idea that we lump everybody into... I mean, as it is... Mostly it's just offensive to Puerto Rico, I think. I don't know. The idea that, like, you know, I don't know, that everybody from another... I don't exactly know how idea that, like, you know, I don't know, that everybody from another... I don't exactly know how to articulate why it's offensive, but I don't think that...

It's saying, like, we're as good as all of you guys put together. Well, that's not even what... That's not even it. I mean, because maybe they are. If they are, so what? If they are, they aren't. It's more lumping everybody together as the other that feels weird. Yeah, and it feels like we should be moving toward the Starfleet one planet thing

where we don't have to divide everything into nationalistic lines to make it interesting. But we just finished the world cup which is exactly that and everyone loves it so i don't know and and i guess what i was gonna gonna wrap up with is does it does this show sort of how spoiled we are as fans of baseball and and you know consumers of baseball and in some ways producers a little bit, I guess, but that we see two empty nights on the schedule and start flipping out and trying to fix it and trying to propose what to put where and how to avoid this problem that every other sport deals with every week. If you're talking about football and then basketball and hockey and the playoffs.

You get these days without games and we're pretty spoiled here, aren't we? No. No. I mean, no. No other sport purports to be to you what baseball is to you. I mean, it's a daily game. It's a daily schedule. It's like if I don't see a co-worker for a day, that's not a big deal.

But if I don't see my toddler daughter for a day, I'm allowed to miss her, right? It's a different relationship. Yeah, sure. Yeah. I mean, as a fan, I'm okay with it. I'm okay with having a couple nights off in the seven-month stretch of baseball. I see your point about how you'd think that maybe Major League Baseball would want to capitalize on this dead spot on the schedule when there's no real competition. And that's something to be said for filling up those days with some sort of event. But the players need a little bit of time off, right? So it's okay. It's okay.

I think it does maybe say that we're spoiled, that we're not all that interested in the All-Star game, or that it's not as interesting as it used to be, because we have access to all the stars in all the games. Whenever we want, we can watch any game we want. We can see the stars every day. You can actually watch a lot of the Futures Games players every day. Yeah, you can. If you spend, what is it, $19 for the MILB TV cast?

Yeah, it's not a lot. I do. So it's, yeah, I mean, we're definitely spoiled in that way, I think. When you're in the, when you move to the blackout territory of six different teams like I'm in right now, we'll talk again.

Yeah, well, that's, yeah, that's another issue. But no one likes that. So we're meeting back here Wednesday night for the AAA All-Star game, is what we've decided, right? Are the rosters up? Who are the most depressing players on the AAA All-Star game? I'm not sure. AAA All-Star team rosters.

I got it. All right, so let's see. Bobby Karecki. Anybody remember Bobby Karecki? Yeah. He's there. Aaron Laffey, I believe, and one of my minor league free agents. Hopefully he'll open some eyebrows. some i you don't open eyebrows what

are you open no i eyes raise eyes just raise some eyebrows uh shonatan solano uh wilson betameet oh wow ruben gotai huh uh mike hessman yeah mike hessman has to be there yeah he does he's i'm looking at me he's probably the manager dan johnson dan johnson was called up right so he's maybe he's on the blue jays now uh chris dickerson uh ezekiel carrera uh are there some prospects logan kensing remember logan kensing are there prospects on this team or isioshiwada. Oh, wow. Do you see any? Mike Jacobs. Yeah, Mike Jacobs.

Gregorio Petit. Brennan Bosch. I don't know why that's the first one I laughed at. I don't know why I laughed at him. Sorry. Yeah, there's some prospects. John Peterson. Yeah, Arismendi Alcantara from the Cubs.

But he's up. Andrew Susak. Not many, though. Yeah, I probably won't watch that. Okay, is that it? That's all I've got. Okay. By the way, hat tip to Ryan Webb for finishing his 84th career game on Saturday,

pushing him one ahead of Matt Albers. Did he take the mound or something with him? What did Cooperstown ask for? I always want to know what Cooperstown asks for when a record like this is set. Yeah. Well, I don't know. He'll probably set it again soon. Probably just Ryan Webb. Ryan Webb will have to stand behind glass forever. record like this is set yeah well i don't know he'll probably set it again soon he'll just ryan

webb will have to stand behind glass forever yeah tossing the ball up and dead just tossing it and catching it tossing it and catching it at least some wax works or something all right so that is it for today please support our sponsor baseball reference go to baseballreference.com use the coupon code b BP to get the discounted price of $30 on a one-year subscription. We need some emails for Wednesday's listener email show, so please send those to

podcastatbaseballperspectives.com and we'll be back tomorrow. I was thinking the other day, I was I'm very happy this is still going, but when you guys hung up because Sam was in that airfield and couldn't hear you anymore, it would have been just the perfect ending for the podcast. Oh, that's true.

It would have been such a movie ending.