Fantasy Baseball Today - Fantasy Baseball All-Decade Team! (03/31 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: March 31, 2020

Get ready to debate! It wasn't easy putting together an All-Decade team, but all four of us came up with our own teams which of course leads to plenty of arguing and plenty of fun along the way ... We start with the infield (7:30) with Catcher being the easiest call. Then we take some time to explain our methodology for selecting this squad, but the debates really begin at 1B (16:00), 2B (20:26), 3B (24:55) and Shortstop (31:40). Did Paul Goldschmidt make the cut? Was Nolan Arenado a slam dunk? How much did steals matter? ... Getting to the OF (39:05) and DH (47:15). Mike Trout was an easy call, but Ryan Braun sparked controversy. In fact we had a lot of disagreements at these positions ... At SP (52:50), Adam gets shamed into putting Chris Sale on the team. Does Madison Bumgarner deserve a spot? And RP (58:10) was fairly easy ... Your emails at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the fantasy baseball today podcast from CBS sports. One, one pitch, basketball pulled and fast. Alvarez and toward the corner. Got a fantasy question? Email fantasy baseball at cbsi.com. Get ready to win your league. Where fantasy. Now here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris.

Hey, everybody. Welcome in to fantasy baseball today. No alternative universe today. Back to life. Back to reality. It is Tuesday, March 31st. I am Frank Sample, joined by Adam Azer, Chris Towers, and the returning Scott White. Scott, how was your weekend, man?

How was everything? It was good. It was good. It took a little bit of a longer weekend. You got any more fun? Kind of recharge my batteries. No, I did not go anywhere. Good.

No, my wife and kids threw a little party for me because it was right around my birthday here. Oh, happy birthday. Thank you. Today your birthday, Scott? Today is the actual day, yes. Oh, my God. Happy birthday, dude. Breaking news.

Thank you. My wife threw an office-themed birthday party. It's like the one Dwight through, she hung the banner on the wall. It is your birthday period with the like barely expanded balloons hanging from the ceiling. And I think my five-year-old was just so confused. Like, mommy does not know how to decorate. That's very clever. I love that. I love that episode. Good stuff. Yeah, lots of great episodes of The Office. One of my favorites as well.

Happy to hear that you're doing well. Happy birthday to Scott here. And you have to be doing better than Adam Azer because we have to start to show off with Adam Azers flub yesterday when talking about diehard. So we got this email not too long ago, actually. And this one came from Brian in Glen Ellen, Illinois. And he said, hey Adam, sorry this isn't baseball. but too funny to brush past on yesterday's show at the end you guys got into it seemingly every other day is diehard a Christmas movie or not conversation a slip-up that I thought was hilarious was when Adam referencing the police officer called him Carl Weathers the actor is named Reginald Vell Johnson who is also famous for playing the father also a cop on family matters

what's funny about this is that his name on the show is Carl Winslow I just love that your your instinct was to address him as the character name and not the actor name. So, Adam, you're a little all over the place there. Carl Weathers, the actor who played Apollo Creed in Rocky and famously Chubs and Happy Gilmore, Reginald Vell Johnson, Sergeant Al Powell in Die Hard, Carl Winfell and Family Matters. I meant to call him Carl Winslow. And I meant to reference his character in Family Matters, which was also a cop. So I said Carl Weathers.

I meant to say Carl Winslow. And I was quite embarrassed. And actually our boss, E.K., called me out on it this morning. And I said, oh, crap. Then we got the email. And I was like, before this becomes a scandal. And before we lose the bracket challenge, you know, the fantasy baseball podcast bracket challenge,

I better clarify that I meant to say Carl Winslow. So thank you for letting me do that, Frank. Has Reginald Vell Johnson ever not played a cop? I'm sure he has. Yeah, I think he probably has more than two roles. So typecast. In Ghostbusters, he was a jail guard, so that's pretty close to a cop as well. It doesn't speak well of American pop culture's view of police in the mid to late 80s and early 90s, that he was one of our most high profile policemen.

Yeah, he's not exactly the most in-shaped guy. Right, right. Not exactly someone you'd want chasing down a bad guy. He's very competent. Don't get you. No, you're right, though. He's not right. I agree.

And actually, he was incredibly incompetent at the beginning of Die Hard until somebody threw a body on his car. And he was apparently in Brooklyn 9-9. So, geez, he made a living out of this. All right, I'm sorry, Frank. Thank you for letting me get that off my chest. I know. Before the show, Frank, we couldn't stop talking about our all-decade team.

So I'm pretty fired up. Yeah, we've got the all-decade team. I feel like this is something we're going to do probably every Tuesday until whenever baseball is announced. We'll kind of do some kind of random draft, some kind of we'll all come up with the team of something. So today we'll be doing the all decade team from the 2010s. Last week, I know you guys did the fictional players draft. We'll have to kind of huddle up and figure out what we want to do for next week. But yes, today we'll be doing the all decade team for the 2010s.

It's also team named Tuesday. So we'll get into that a little bit later on, some of your emails, Fantasy Baseball at CBS. I wanted to do a deep dive of Jose Arkiti. I'm actually going to save that for tomorrow because yesterday Adam mentioned that you guys have never really kind of talked extensively about Jose Arcidi. So I think it would be a good time to kind of jump in on that. But I'll save that for tomorrow when we have a little bit more time to do so. Just did want to mention some news and notes quickly here at the top of the show. Sir Anthony Dominguez needs Tommy John surgery. I don't know that that affects things all that much. Did we ever get confirmation that Hector Narris was

the closer of the Philadelphia Phillies? Or was this kind of just like, by a deduction, there's nobody else there? I think it's assumed. Yeah, I don't remember seeing anything official. Gabe Kapler was famously unofficial about that. Joe Girardi, I think, would be less so. Yeah, and I think that makes sense,

because as long as Joe Girardi was with the Yankees, he pretty much for the most part had a set closer. The other news item, not really fantasy related. It's just what is going on with the Boston Red Sox? Like, they signed Colin McHugh as soon as Chris ALE was diagnosed with, like, his elbow pain. And Colin McHugh is still not throwing the ball. And last but not least, shout out to A.J. Reed, who has decided to retire earlier this month. So, uh, the long career of A.J. Reed is now over, unfortunately.

I do remember A.D., man. Like, we all thought, or at least I did. He was kind of regarded as one of those top prospects. The Astros had a ton of those guys. Him John Singleton did not work out as well. but AJ Reed, besides sending them up, Scott. AJ Reed was looking ridiculously productive. I remember for a while it was AJ Reed and J.D. Davis,

and I kept mixing them up because they both had initials his first names and their minor league numbers were good. AJ reads were better. And so it's interesting how those careers have played out. AJ Reed kind of zoomed up faster and then fizzled, and J.D. Davis has taken a slower path, but now it looks like he may be on the verge of becoming a, a big impact player in fantasy.

Yeah, again, that is J.D. Davis now with New York Mets, AJ Reed decides to hang them up. All right, I want to jump into the 2010s all decade team. I want to give us enough time to kind of hash this out, because based on the conversation we had before the show even started, I have a feeling that we are going to get into a lot of debate here over every position, where players are eligible. Process.

We're debating process a lot. Yeah. This is always fun. That is always good podcast content when you can't decide the rules of the exercise you're doing. Let's start things off at the catcher. I mean, I think this one's pretty self-explanatory in terms of figuring out who's eligible here at the position. But Adam, why don't you get started with who your catcher is for the 2010's decade here on our old decade team? This was one of the easy ones.

It's got to be Buster Posey, right? Yeah, I don't think there's going to be any disagreement on that one. Yep, yep. Distant first in OPS, OPS Plus, batting average. Now, can I, can I, all right, so let's talk a little bit about the process here, because we did this for fantasy football in January, and it was an incredibly fun exercise. But there was a specific tool that I was able to use in fantasy football

that I was not able to use in fantasy baseball. I don't know if it exists. So if any of the listeners know of this tool, please let me know. But in fantasy football, I can use a website that goes back in time and tells you who finished where at each position every year. Fantasy baseball, the best option you have there is to use your, you know, like a CBS league. But we only use the current player pool. So retired players disappear from the pool. So you wouldn't be able to compare, you know, catcher's not a great example.

But gosh, who are some of the... Like David Ortiz. David Ortiz. Yes, exactly. David Ortiz, right, you would have a tough time comparing. Adrian Beltray, that was one of the toughest ones. That was one. Comparing him to Aeronado was very, very difficult. So that made this a bigger challenge.

We also decided to go, what, catcher for one position, one of each position, three outfielers, five starters, two relievers. Yeah. Yeah, like, ahead to head points lineup. So maybe we should talk about, like, our process here, because I started just by looking at OPS. as a baseline, who finished the top each position at OPS, starting in 2010 going through 2019. Then I would start looking at fantasy production because steals would factor in and things like that.

But Posey was easy. I barely bothered looking at catcher. But for the other positions, it was tougher. But I don't know. You guys can kind of talk about how you did this. So there are obviously a need for tiebreakers here, because players who, especially at first base, I mean, I feel like you could make a whole team of first baseman

while shortstop was on the opposite and for me it's difficult to find the standout shortstop, which shows how much things have changed. And you forget how long a decade is because now we think of shortstop as one of the deepest positions. First base may be a little bit shallower than most. But looking back at the past 10 years,

I found the opposite to be true. And the biggest tiebreaker for me, I took a lot of things into account. It took overall production during this time. I looked closely at OPS, OPS plus especially, since it kind of, you know, there have been swings in what expected production looks like over the past decade, factored in stolen bases, of course. But there was, it's kind of like with Hall of Fame voting for me.

There was this, this need to balance both the extent of the production over that period of time and how high the peaks were over that period of time. So what ended up being the tiebreaker for me, if I was. was having a hard time deciding between a player who just put up big totals over that period versus the peaks. I sided with the peaks. I sided with the player who most often provided first round caliber production. And that's who I slotted ahead.

Same. Yeah, so I started things off just looking at hits and then I would look at OPS and I would also look at war. I didn't know if we were technically doing this from like a real life baseball perspective, of a fantasy baseball perspective, but I think if you're looking at war as well, I think Yadir Malina is somewhat in the conversation. I mean, he's second in war over the...

I did not look at war. I did not consider... Do you host real-life baseball today or fantasy baseball today? Come on, Frank. The ones who I considered alongside Posey were Joe Mauer and Brian McCann. Brian McCann actually led all catchers and home runs during this time. I will point out that both Buster Posey and Yadier-Malina had eight top 10 finishes in head-to-head points league leagues over the past decade.

So Yadamolina still pretty consistent while, you know, not one of the best. But he was just, he was consistent, but he was never, he might have finished as the number one catcher at some point. I'm actually not sure. But he was clearly never the best catcher in fantasy. So I think that, well, we'll see. My shortstop choice will be controversial. And I'm not. That was the toughest one.

Shortstop, it was really interesting, actually. But we'll get there. But no, Posey is the obvious choice at catcher. He's the only one whose career basically covered the entire decade, which also helped Maurer retired a year early or a year before the decade ended. And he moved off catcher. This is an amazing stat for Posey from the entire decade. You know what his batting average was?

His batting average was 302, which was, I think, put him among the top 15 hitters. Seven. Seventh among all players in batting average. As a catcher. Yeah, but another thing is that this is not just a cumulative who did the best for 10 years. Like, for example, for fantasy football, all, I had Arian Foster as one of my running backs, even though it was only like four years at the beginning of the decade where he was, you know, anything. But he was, he was ahead of his time. He was, he wasn't Lidani and Tomlinson from the mid mid-aughts.

Are we calling it that? Like 2004 or five, whatever it was. But Aryan Foster didn't do it for seven years or anything like that, but he was amazing, you know, number one caliber player for three years or some of that. So, you know, those types of things factor in as well. I don't know that I think, I don't think there was anybody on my teams that were just a few years, but it's not necessarily did you do it for a full decade like Posey, but it's Posey, the catcher. Yeah, Posey combines the longevity and the peak. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's subjective too, right? So, you know, you might ask Chris and Chris might say that, you know,

he chose someone that was really great for a four or five year span, whereas I think for the most part for me, I was kind of looking at longevity. like who was consistently great throughout the process. But I do agree. Buster Posey is the catcher that I have written down here as well. And again, we're using the head-to-head points roster construction. So one catcher, first base, second base, third base, shortstop, three outfielders, a DH slash utility, five starting pitchers and two closers.

Let's move on to first base. And I'll throw this one to you, Chris, to get us started here, because I mentioned that I used hits as a barometer for measuring catchers and I know Chris has dropped his head and I know that's something you probably will not be doing across the board here specifically for your first basement. Well so I my

strategy was I basically just went to baseball reference and I just kind of pulled a list of the top 200 and wins above replacement for the decade which you know covers pretty much anyone we'd want to talk about you know guys who ended

earlier there Chris Bryant who only had five years in the decade is there. So, you know, I think that's a pretty good way to start. And, you know, then I started sorting, you know, buy home runs and buy RBI and just kind of looking at who was among the leaders there. And for me, why did you decide to go war as opposed to OPS Plus? I feel like you're usually an OPS Plus guy for these discussions. It was, it was just because I wanted to, like, that's in my list. But I wanted to, you know, get, you know, get. a list to start from. Okay.

And so I figured just a cumulative evaluation was the best way to go about that. I got it. Because OPS is more of an average. Yeah. So a guy who had two seasons with a really high OPS plus could make the list, but he wouldn't really be in discussion. He might not have the bats, yeah. Yeah.

So, you know, then I start looking at, you know, home runs. And when you look at home runs for first base, for guys who were primary first baseman, Edwin and Carnacios is at the top Miguel Cabrera's number 8 Chris Davis Paul Goldschmidt So you know That's a pretty good place to start

Then you start by RBI very similar list The one place that really sets Paul Goldschmidt apart And he's my pick for first base Is well batting average first of all But also Not who I thought you were going to pick That's not who I thought you were going to pick

I thought this was Votto slam dunk No this is biggie No Votto was was Votto wasn't ever really in the conversation for me. I thought it was Votto for Chris. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's what I thought as well.

I thought Votto for Chris. I am, I'm looking at this more from a Roto perspective. Um, and so he just, he was always very good, but he was rarely like the number one first basement where Paul Goldschmidt, you know, was a contender for the number one overall pick.

Yeah. For a few years. Yeah. And he, you know, was productive pretty much the entire decade, stole 127 bases, and the 2010s hit 292, as you know, top 20 overall and home runs, runs, and RBI. So I actually think that was a pretty easy one. That was one of the first ones I filled in on that line up.

No, no. I thought it was hard. I went with Miggie. It was a very close call between Miggy and Votto because their stats like OPS and batting average and OPS plus were very close during that stretch. McGee had more home runs. Goldschmidt was very much in the discussion too. I thought

there were a lot of players to consider there. Freddie Freeman, Anthony Rizzo, Edwin, and Carnaccio, but those three were the ones who stood out the most. Votto, uh, Miggi and Goltzschmidt. I,

I ended up putting Goldschmidt aside because even though he's the only base dealer of the group, he got off to a late start compared to the others. He didn't get a full decades worth. I ended up going with Cabrero for Votto because I feel like that five years or six year stretch really at the start of the decade.

I mean, he had a triple crown in there. He had four batting titles. Like, he was just, like, the player who for several years in a row was the clear number one pick in fantasy. And then Trout came along and there was some debate between those two. But Cabrera was just was Mr. Fantasy there for a good part of the decade. Right. That's why I went with him. The way I saw it was like the first half of the decade, it was McGee.

And then the second half was Goldschmidt. Goldschmidt had a four-year stretch where he finished number one or number two at first base. And in those four years, Miguel Cabrera only had one great season. That was 2016. He also was great in 2015, but he played 119 games. And then he's obviously tailed off. I went with Cabrera. I did not think it was easy.

I thought it was between Cabrera and Goldschmidt. Votto, I didn't even consider. because of what Chris said. Like, yes, he had a great decade, but he was never considered as high end as Cabrera or... Votto might be the best hitter of the decade. Just in terms of the value that he added as a hitter alone. Although, as the entire populace of San Diego has been yelling at me on Twitter,

walks apparently aren't a part of hitting. Well, I would think of it more like offensive player as opposed to hitter, because hitter, I think of like the hit tool specifically, the ability to impact the ball with your bat. MIGI, baby, MIGI. But okay, so it's two Miggies, one Goldsmith and Frank. Yeah, I have Miguel Cabrera as well. I mean, throughout this time, first in hits at the position,

third and in home runs. He was second in war as well. You mentioned the Triple Crown throughout that year, 2012, 330 batting average, 44 home runs, 139 RBI. I thought Joey Votto was a very close second. I mean, he had eight top 10 finishes

throughout this decade in head-to-head points leagues. So very consistent. Paul Goldschmidt up there for me as well, 127 stolen bases, as Chris mentioned. And those three guys were top three in weighted runs created plus

by a decent margin as well. So I thought it was between Votto, Miggie, and Paul Goldschmidt. And I wound up going with Miguel Cabrera. Moving on to second. base. I think this one really comes down to, for me, it was, it was a two-player race. I'll throw it over to you, Scott. I mean, who did you wind up choosing between, I assume we have the same two players in mind? Yes, the players are Robinson Canoe and Jose Altuve. And this was a razor thin margin as well.

One of the factors I considered while doing this entire exercise, at least for hitters. And I think it's pretty apparent now that the main stat I considered was OPS Plus. since, again, that normalizes offensive production as kind of the league-wide expectations we're changing, is how many seasons over a certain OPS plus threshold a player had. And Canoe actually beat Al-TuVe in that regard. Just if we're talking pure what he did with the bat, purely what he did with the bat,

I would go Cano. But the stolen base gap is so big. And it's close enough with the bat That I was willing to go Al Tuve instead And what's interesting about that is For the first three years of his career Well the first two full years of his career

Which is 2012-2013 So we're already part of the way into the decade now Al-Tuvei wasn't Really much with the bat At all I mean the batting average was on the high In the high 200s it wasn't bad But he wasn't providing much power

but he had a 33 steel season there and a 35 steel season there. And then he won the batting title the very next year, 2014, 341 batting average with 56 steals. And then the power came along the next year, 15 home runs. And then obviously he became the perennial MVP candidate. We know him to be now. So yeah, it was kind of a slow start for Altovae, but there was enough going on in the early years that I think, I think then the late years set him apart from Canoe. Scott, for the children listening at home, you are promoting a cheater in Jose Al-Tube.

Hey, Cano, Cano also, though. Cano is too, right? Yeah, right. Yeah, I guess you're right, actually. I also went with Al-Tuvei. If you just go look at CBS the last 10 years, they each have three number one finishes, but again, you are going back in time

and not counting retired players, so I don't know how legit that is, particularly for Cano. I mean, just think about how often we were drafting them in the first round. Cano is a perennial, first rounder for a long time there. And then Al Tuve has been more recently. But it is, it is fun to compare how many times they've actually been number one at their position.

I think it's either, I think either Altuvei has more or it's tied, but it's close. Yeah, it was, it was a tough. You know, you know what, actually, so like first base was for us between two to three players, second base was between two players, shortstop's tough. I thought, I originally thought third base was tough, then I settled on one, but the utility spot was really hard. Like, do you just completely leave Robinson Canoe off your all-decade team? Do you put Paul Goldschmidt or Robinson Canoe? If you have Miguel Cabrera and Jose Al-Tubei at first and second base, who the hell's your utility going to be?

And then what about like, we'll get to third base and short stuff. So I thought that was really tough. But I also went with Al-Tuvei. Chris, Frank, sorry, go ahead. Chris, would you have? It's Al-Tube across the board, right? Oh, no, I have Robinson-Kano, actually. Oh, interesting.

Homer. Yeah. So Robinson-Kano, definite Homer here. first in hits throughout this span, 1,195 hits, first in home runs. So you're talking about out of position stats that you're getting there if you play in Roto, 237 home runs for Robinson Canoe.

He had more top 10 finishes in head-to-head points leagues throughout this span than Jose Al-Tuvres. So he had eight top 10 finishes. I think it's very close. And, you know, if you're just weighing it from like a Roto perspective and the value of stolen bases, I mean, I don't think there's a wrong answer. But for me, I actually, I went with Robinson Canoe.

I came close to. What finally convinced me as I was vacillating back and forth as I just looked at the black ink on their baseball reference pages, there's zero black ink on Robinson Canoe's black ink, of course, referring to how often he led his league in the category. And there's a bunch for Altuvae, batting average three times, hits four times, stolen bases twice. And okay, Altuve is the bigger standout there.

Interesting. Yeah, and second overall in the decade in batting average fourth and stolen bases. That's really hard to overcome. Third base to me was pretty tough. I mean, I think that there are a few names that are just at the top of the list. And then, you know, I'll just kind of throw the name out there. I don't know if anyone actually considered him. But Evan Longoria, I mean, the first part of the decade, really, I mean, he was kind of the juggernaut at the position here. But I kind of narrowed it down to four players for me personally. I had it Adrian Beltray, Josh Donaldson,

Nolan Aronado and Evan Longoria. And I settled on Nolan Aronado just because what he's done specifically the past five seasons. He's been a top five third baseman in fantasy each of the past five seasons. He has two number one finishes. Throughout this decade, 1160 hits,

227 home runs. That's tied for second at the position. I got a little bit of a later start into the decade than some of these other names, like Evan Longoria has more longevity. But Nolan Aronado, to me, what he's consistently done for like the past five, six years specifically. He's the third basement for me in the decade.

It was two of those guys for me. I didn't consider Longoria or Donaldson. I mean, I did it first, but it really was Beltray or Aeronado. This, to me, was the most frustrating one because I couldn't go back and see where Beltray had finished to compare it to where Aeronado had finished. So I ended up settling on Aeronado as well, but I will say that for three straight years, Adrian Beltray was top three at the position in OPS

with a minimum of... No, four straight years. No, no, no. Five straight years. So, yeah, this... 2010 to 2014. Belchrey was top three among third baseman in OPS with a minimum of 200 plate appearances,

which isn't much, but he always had more than that. So, again, it was like first half of the decade was Beltray. Yeah, Longoria was really good, too. Second half was Aeronado. Beltray didn't tail off as much as Longoria did. I went with Aeronado. he's finished number one twice, I believe, maybe once, but top two at least two or three times. But yeah, it was tough because I really wanted to measure where Beltray finished, and I couldn't do that.

This was a razor thin margin for me too, because you're comparing nine years for Beltray versus seven for Aeronado. And of those seven for Aeronado, of course, we're really just talking about five where he's been the guy we know him as now. and Beltray actually had the higher OPS plus between the two during the decade. He had the higher batting average by 15 or by 12 points. Equal number of home runs. And really what it came down to for me is I was comparing the RBI and run totals. I mean, Beltray won in both. Like I said, he got more playing time.

But when you look at the annual in those categories, the annual production and Aeronados led the majors in RBI twice. and since he since he became the guy we know him as today consistently over 100 runs scored too only once did Beltray even top 90 runs during the decade

so it was just and then you think about how consistently Aronado's been a first round pick and it's like yeah yeah I'd rather hype the guy who has the bigger peak which in this case is Aronado

fascinating was between Aronado and Adrian Beltray as well Yeah, and you guys all pick Nolan Aronado? Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm going to differ again. And part of the way I look at it is Nolan Aronado unquestionably had the higher peak. I think Adrian Belchray was the better baseball player, but in terms of fantasy value, there's no question. Nolan Aronado's peak was better.

But Nolan Aronado was only a must-start fantasy option for seven, six of the 10 years of the decade. his first season he had a 706 OPS. He was not really fantasy relevant. There was maybe only one year this decade. Well, too, I guess, 2019 he wasn't a must-start player. But there was basically one year that he played when he wasn't a must-start option, and it was his last year. And even then, he was still pretty good.

15 homers, 65 RBI, 273, batting average in 119 games. Like, he would have gotten to about 25 homers and 85. RBI if he played the full season. So I just, the consistency for me, especially because the peak was extremely high for Adrian Beltray, puts him over the top. Yeah, you had a four year stretch for Beltray from 2010 to 2013 with 28 or more home runs. He also had the 32 homer season in 2016. And he was far and away had the highest batting average of third basement throughout this decade with a 307. So I do think it was very close. But I, I wound up with going Nolan Aronado, and it sounds like everyone else did outside of Chris.

Chris wound up going with Adrian Beltray. And honestly, I can't blame you for it, Chris. Adrian Beltra is also like one of my, I don't know, six favorite baseball players of all time. He's such a delightful weirdo. And so anytime I can give him shine, I love that. It's amazing the late career he had, because this decade was all in his 30s. I mean, a lot of players are just done at the age we're talking about Beltra having this incredible stretch. it's it's it's you know he's going to the hall of fame of course he's in no doubt about it first

ballot if he hadn't wasted five years of his prime age 26 through 30 in a very difficult place to hit in seattle like even worse than it is today it's it's just it's it's kind of mind-boggling to think about what his numbers would be because of course the best season of his career came immediately before he signed that contract and joined the mariners 48 home runs 334 batting average with the Dodgers. So, I mean, we could be talking about him as an all-time great if he hadn't signed with Seattle at that particular point in time. Yeah, and definitely a fun-loving guy.

You're right about that, Chris. I mean, the whole dropping down to a knee hitting home runs, don't touch my head, yelling at Elvis Andrews. Like, that provided a lot of really fun moments. Great. No, that Friday, yeah, Chris, that provided a lot of fantasy production. That's totally, totally what we should be voting on right now. Oh, no.

The four years where you couldn't even use Nolan Aeronauta really provided a lot of values, Adam. All right, let's move on to shortstop where, again, this is one of the tougher positions because do you weigh someone like Troy Tulawitsky, who throughout the decade had some really big peak years? We were kind of always waiting for him to stay healthy and be a little bit more consistent. Or do you kind of value Francisco Lindor's production that he's put together over the past couple of seasons, specifically where he's become a consistent first round pick, or do you go completely off the board, which is what I wound up doing? Adam Azer.

What'd you do with shortstop? I don't think anyone's going to agree with this. I went with Elvis Andrews. Yes! Really? Oh, no. That's exactly who I have. All right.

Let's go, Frank. Let's go Frank. Yeah. Look, he was better than Manny Machado in 2013. He was better than Machado in 2014. He was better than Machado in 2017. Machado was better in 15, 16, and 18. Neither was very good in 2019.

But go to the beginning of the decade, Elvis Andrews stole 30 plus bases in 2010 and 2011. He was one of the best fantasy shortstop in 2012. So he was good before Machado came on the scene. And in six years of Machado, not counting 2019, where Machado was better than Andrews, but he wasn't really that much of a factor. I mean, it was whatever.

They split. They alternated three years, Andrews was better. Three years, Machado was better. So unless I'm forgetting someone. And originally I think I did sort of forget Toulowiczki. And again, that's another one. I can't really measure up where he finished. I took this from a rhodo perspective and I went with Elvis Andrews.

I have the same one. Oh, really? Three out of four picked Elvis Andrews, a guy who was never considered a fantasy stud. Disagree. That's sad. I don't know if that's true. Oh, I've been doing this for the whole decade, guys. So why.

I could promise you. Except for that 20, coming off 2017, that year he hit 20 homers randomly. Nobody was thinking of Elvis Andrews as an early round type. I mean, that is sort of true. He's lost 42 bases in 2013. He's still 37 in 2011. He scored 90 plus runs both years. It's a good point, Scott.

This wasn't as scarce back then. Scott makes a good point. So who'd you go with? I went Troy Toulitsky, who for the first half of the decade, was consistently a first round pick. He had pretty much all the best numbers

of any shortstop during that decade. 293 with an 868 OPS for the decade is OPS plus 123 overall which I think led short stops and then his peak years he had four years over 130

he had one year of 170 which is just outrageous. It is outrageous. I got a pick a bone. The guy who refuses to draft John Carlos Stanton in 2020. The guy who has John Carlos Stanton

as a bust is going with Troy Toulouitzky who played more than 130 games twice. That's a great point. And I love Troy Touloultzky back then, but you know what? Position scarcity was a real thing. So are you? Yeah, because Troy Liewiczki was good. And Troy Toulouitzky was,

it was really Troy Toulouewitsky and Hanley Ramirez, who I'm surprised hasn't been brought up. Yeah, probably because he wasn't at shortstop for the whole decade. But it was really those two and everybody else at Shortstop back in those days. But Toulot,

but you're talking about ADP, I think. Toulos always got hurt. No. He always got hurt. He did, but I mean, he was still awesome when he didn't get hurt. But he didn't play it off.

He was an impact player without a doubt in fantasy. And part of the frustration was he got her. But yeah, he was huge. The reason shortstop was so scarce is because Troy Toulouinski never played. I mean, 47 games in 2012.

That's a good joke, But it's obviously not the truth. I don't know how much you can count 2012 and 2014. He played 47 games in 2012 and 91 games in 2014. So now you're talking about three years. But games of like best player in baseball production. Yeah, but I'd rather have a full season of Elvis Andrews. I wouldn't. Not at all.

Yeah. The games played by Tulo from 2010 on 122, 143, 47, 127, 126, 91, 128, 131, 66, didn't play in 2018. No one cares about 2019 when he played five games with the Yankees. But yeah, I mean, there are a lot of holes there. It came down to those two for me. It came down to Toulow and Elvis Andrews. But, you know, Elvis Andrews, for me,

it's kind of like that Hall of Famer that gets in just based on accumulative stats. It's like 269 stolen bases by far the most at shortstop throughout this time. 810 runs scored by far the most. unscored throughout this time as well. So for me, I mean, that's why. Let's put this in perspective. If you're like me and not willing to consider Andrews because he's just not a high end

enough player, the other short stops I was considering were Manny Machado, who Adam brought up, Francisco Lendor, who you brought up Frank and Trevor's story. Like, so we're talking about really recent players or in Machado's case. I guess he's not so recent, but it was a slow start and has been kind of rough here in the last couple years. So you're not talking about players whose production has spanned the decade really for any of these, I guess, except for Elvis Andrews, which is why you guys are giving him the nod. Yeah. Yeah.

I want to point out a dark horse who I actually, it sounds really weird, but I think this kind of illustrates the place we're at with Shortstop in the 2010s, which it's the deepest position now. Another guy I considered who I maybe you guys didn't even think about was Ian Desmond. Oh, that's a good one. 177 home runs, 180 stolen bases. He only hit 263, but he's the only shortstop in the top 30 in baseball in that stretch. I believe that was RBI. He was top 40 in home runs, top 20 in stolen bases. It was a really bad decade for the shortstop position.

Can I end this? I almost consider Ian Desmond. Let me end this right now. I think this is going to convince Scott. I know it won't, but I think it should. I just looked on our Roto League in CBS. Remember, retired players are eliminated. So first, I'll make two statements.

Statement number one, 2010 through 2014, the first half of the decade, Elvis Andrews is a top two shortstop every single year. Retired players are gone. Retired players are gone. So I'm thinking at worst, he was probably a top four or five shortstop every single year. And higher than that, in several of those years,

number one or number two, for the first five years. You're leaving out a lot of really good players by taking out the retired players, Tuwitzky, Hanley Ramirez, Jimmy Rollins. But shortstop sucked. Like being the fifth best shortstop every single year. At least fifth.

Somebody had to be. At worst fifth, though. At worst, he was number one in like 2017 or 18. He may have technically been number one. been number one because nobody else like everybody else got hurt or just like nobody deserved to be number one. It's not like he was actually good. But that's what, yeah, he was

good. No, he was always good. That shortstop was that bad. It's more of a testament to the way shortstop was than how good than the way Elvis Andrews. That's fine, but he was the best one, at least according to three of us. Okay. All right guys, we got to move on to outfield. Agreed and

disagree. Scott will go with too low. The rest of us go with Elvis Andrews. Very surprised by that actually. That we all had Elvis and just outside of Scott. Outfield, we should basically designate this for just two outfielders because the non-mytrout division. You start three outfielders in a head-to-head points league. Mike Trout's going to be one of them. His triple slash over this decade, 305, 419, 581, 73.4 war, which is first among all hitters, the next closest is Buster Posey at 53. So it's just, it's not close, but I think we have a little bit of discussion on who we fill out with those other two

spots. Chris, why don't you get us started? So we want to go all three? Yeah, sure. Mike Trout, controversial. Best player in fantasy this decade, right? Not even close. I know he leads in OPS by a long shot. Yeah, I mean, he didn't. He missed the first two years, right, of the decade, but obviously since then, he's been the best player. He's got like a 172 way to runs Created Plus, which is like far and away the best over the past decade. This is actually not a stacked position. Like there are fewer outfielders than you think that have just dominated for the whole decade.

It's kind of more like shortstop where you have to take like a six year window where a guy was a standout. So I mean, Trout, even though he missed those first or yeah, two years of the decade, he's still like he still kills it on the totals. So I'm going to go away from recency bias and go with two guys who. haven't really been fantasy stars in the last couple of years, but who have actually still been very productive and were great early on in the decade, you know,

number one overall kind of players, Ryan Braun and Andrew McCutcheon. I had McCutcheon originally, but I bumped. Wait a second. Wait a second. My number two outfield is Chris's favorite player who he doesn't have at all? How is that possible?

How is it possible you don't have John Carlos Stanton on your, All decade team, Chris. Games. Why was it possible? Because Ryan Brown and Andrew McCutcheon were better. Oh my gosh. How many years was Giancarlo Stanton a number one overall

pick contender? Any? I think this is why Chris went with war and Scott went with OPS and maybe is this like a Toulowiczki thing where it's a games played situation? I mean, for one thing, John Carlos Stanton, he actually got the whole decade, right? His career began in 2010.

Obviously last year, I guess he, he only got nine years because he hardly played last year. But, um, well, so did Ryan Braun and Andrew McCutcheon. I think isn't, isn't John Carlos Stanton? He's top three in home.

Let me compare, let me compare these numbers with Braun again. So OPS plus 144 for Stanton versus 135 for Braun. Stan wins there, obviously. Um, let me look here. I'm only seeing,

I'll have to look at, I'll have to count up individual seasons. Yeah, but see, this is why I like to go through each season, because I'm only seeing, two seasons as a top five outfielder for John Carlos Stanton. Okay, sorry, I was looking at Stanton's

whole career, all right? I mean, I was looking at Braun's whole career. So it's actually the OPS plus gap is bigger here, 144 for Stanton, 132 for Braun. Stanton 308 home runs versus Braun's 241. I think Stanton actually has, like, is a top three home run hitter for the decade among us across all positions. But who's your third outfielder, Scott?

Did Chris give his yet? Oh, it was, it's McCutcheon like Chris had. Yeah. So the thing is, Ryan Braun is 14th among all players in home runs in the decade. So that's really good. It's not top three, but it's really good. He hit 294 in the decade. He stole 166 bases.

I believe he had a 30-30 season this decade. Ryan Braun has been pretty consistently. at least a starting outfielder, including the last couple years. He hasn't been great the last three years, but he's been worth starting. And he was a contender for the number one pick for half a decade.

Well, he actually had two 30-30 seasons, Chris. He had a 40-30 season back in 2012. Yeah. So the first three seasons of Braun were like peak Braun this decade. But then 2013 was that year. He had that weird injury

and hardly played it all. hit nine home runs and that's about the time the steroid stuff started. And so he had this little lull really for the last two-thirds of the decade. Now, two of those years ended up still being really good. But there was a lot of a lot of in and out of the lineup, a lot of up and down year-to-year in terms of production. True. OPS Plus, if you're just looking at 130 or more for the decade, Stanton had eight of the 10 years

where he was 130 plus. Braun had six. But like, so Braun was a top probably three outfielder in 2010, 11, and 12. I mean, he was a truly elite player. 2014 and 15, as Scott mentioned, he wasn't that good. But 2000. No, no, no, no, no, I messed it up. I messed it up.

Hold on. 2010 to 2012, he was like elite. 2013 and 14, he wasn't that good. 2015 and 16, though, he bounced back. And he was a top 10 outfielder of those two years. So, you know, I know he was in. and out of the lineup, you can say all that. But if you just look at where he finished in fantasy,

it seems to me going through the decade, he had a better decade than Stanton. But he didn't even make my... The last five years of Braun, right? The last three years of Fron, basically, he's been a guy pretty fringy just in terms of rostering. Okay, 2016, he finished ahead of Stanton.

2017, he most certainly did not. Yeah, I said that last three years, 2017, 2018, 29. So then you take the last three years, you compare that to the first three years of the decade, where he was one of the best players in baseball, and that's why this is tough. I went with bets, by the way.

Sure, I considered Braun. But, like, honestly, when I was ranking outfielders for this, I ended up going with Trout Stanton and McCutcheon. I had J.D. Martinez ahead of Braun. I had Jose Batista ahead of Braun. I had Bryce Harper ahead of Braun. I also looked at Moogie Betts and Chris Bryant. They were pretty close.

I actually don't see any argument for Bryce Harper over Ryan Braun. Okay. So I'll tell you who I had. I had Trout. And then originally I had McCutcheon, but I bumped him for Mookie Betts, who's been number one twice. Now, it's only been four years of great production for Betts. But being number one twice, just kind of, that's a philosophy thing. And then Charlie Blackman, last five years, he's been number seven, number six, number four, number one, number six and number 12.

It's actually the last six seasons. So that is top seven, five years in a row and number 12 last year, Charlie Blackman, to me, gets in over McCutcheon. So I went Trout, Blackman, and Betts. Yeah, so I had Trout, McCutcheon. McCutcheon just had that, you know, he had a stretch where for three, four years, he was pretty consistently a first round pick or close to a first round pick. And it's been really fun because, you know, actually I started playing fantasy baseball back in 2009 when it was his, it was his debut.

So I've kind of mirrored my fantasy career with Andrew McCutcheon's actual baseball playing career. So he's actually one of my favorite players. I have him on this list. And I actually have Jose Batista. I know he's kind of like bounced around positions, like came up originally third base, played a little bit of first base. But I mean, he had a stretch there. I mean, where he was one of the most consistent sources of power. And if you want to talk about him versus Stanton, which I think people will make the argument for, and I get it, Stanton 3808 home runs throughout this decade. And Jose Batista, 285, I just think in terms of the peak years, Stanton has only he had the 59 home run season, but he's only had one season over 40 home runs. And that is

the 59 home run season, whereas Jose Batiste, I believe, had three 40 plus home run seasons. So that's why I wound up taking him over John Carlos Stan. But we've got to move on to pitchers as well. We need five starting pitchers and two relief pitchers, two closers. Well, we actually have the DH, too, utility. Oh, yeah, yeah. Just do it quick. Yeah, real quick. Who do you guys have as your D.H. Util. Start us off here, Scott. Nelson Cruz, I was thinking in terms of D.H. only just because there were two guys who were just deserved consideration for this team, Cruz and Ortiz, obviously. And that was a very close call. But I ended up going with Cruz just because the playing time was more consistent. Ortiz

was pretty old for most of the decade and had frequent number of days off. even if even if i wasn't going utility only i think nelson cruz would have been my pick he's uh first in home run second in rbi i hit 281 in the decade he was just an unbelievably good hitter uh now the early years weren't quite as good but he was consistently uh 20 to 30 homers a decent amount of rbi i and you know then at the end he was just you know one of the 10 or 15 best hitters in fantasy pretty much every year. Yeah, but again, his fantasy value wasn't anything close to my guy's Paul Goldschmidt, because he was a DH.

So obviously he went several rounds later. I didn't know who I would choose between Cruz and Ortiz. I guess I probably would have gone Cruz too, but I just went with kind of a fantasy lineup, and I went with Paul Goldschmidt. He was the toughest call that I had to make going with Cabrero over Goldschmidt, so I went with him. although I guess Ryan Braun certainly had a good case and so did McCutcheon. I still can't believe I'm the only one who had Stanton.

He was such an easy call. He was eighth and OPS for the decade versus Braun's 19th. Like that's another. I do want to point out on Nelson Cruz. He was Altheod eligible in seven of the ten seasons this decade. But I never felt like he went as high as Gold'sman. No, but that's because he was old. Isn't there something to be said for Nelson Cruz potentially being

the most profitable player in fantasy for this decade. I think that's something we should factor in as well because six straight seasons now with 37 or more home runs with four of those 40 plus home runs. I just brought up the fact that Stanton only has one season with over 40 home runs in his career. And we consistently regard him as one of the best power hitters in baseball, whereas Nelson Cruz has 37 plus home runs in six straight and 40 plus in four of the past six.

I feel like my own arguments against Stanton are being used against me now. I think that Stanton is your worst call. I think it really... After Trout, he was the second name I slotted in. Just because you look at the totals and he's so high in all the totals for the decade. I don't want to do this to do on your birthday. It would have been a better pick for an outfielder than John Carlos. I don't want to do this deal on your birthday, Scott.

It's helped out by one big season, by the MVP year. I mean, it's a 59 home runs. Okay, but why is that like OPS for the decade? Because that's not... John Carlos Stanton 9.05, Nelson Cruz, 888. Like, why? Why? Why?

I just... I would you go Nelson Cruz over Stanton? Because he was a better fantasy player. Because OPS isn't a fantasy category. So, Scott,

think about this. Okay, but it's... Think about this. If you had, if you started a dynasty team in 2010, and you, and one person picked John Carlos Stanton and one person picked Nelson Cruz,

who would have had a better decade? Who would have gotten a better fantasy return? Cruz. Yeah. Cruz has been more consistent, too. Why? Like, Cruz's last six years have been great. Granted.

But the first four were kind of... Right, but Stans had four... That was part of the struggle between Cruz and Ortiz, too, is Ortiz had seven legitimately great seasons this decade, and Cruz just had six, but Cruz had... How many legitimately great fantasy seasons did you and Carlos Stanton have this decade? It's probably not more than six.

I love... I told you an OPS because he had eight of the ten years. He had an OPLI-P-E-S-plus above one-thirty. But it didn't play enough. It's the two-le-wit-wit-the-arument. He kept getting hurt. That's why he didn't finish high enough. And to Frank's point,

injuries in the past impact production. I just don't wait past injuries as heavily for future production. Her game production, like Stanton was getting drafted in the first round every year except for the year leading up to his MVP season and then obviously his two years in New York. He was always a first round. And then he was probably one of the most disappointing

players because he always got to remember these things. You need to get the memory. No, that's fine. But Nelson Cruz has probably been the most profitable player in fantasy this decade. John Carlos Stan has probably been one of the ones. What are we even talking about? Right. But John Carlos Stanton has probably been one of the least profitable players in fantasy

this decade. That's one of my favorite parts of this whole discussion is that Scott has Nelson Cruz as his DH. And we're still arguing about Nelson Cruz versus John Carlos Stan. Never forget the fact that Nelson Cruz had 7.000. stolen bases back in 2010. Who would have thunk it? All right.

So, yeah, 17 stolen bases at it right now with the Texas Rangers back in 2010. That might be more than Stanton has in the entire decade. But enough, Nelson Cruz, John Carlos Stanton, we've got to get into pitchers.

And honestly, we don't really have a lot of time to get into the pitchers here. But five starting pitchers, two closers slash relief pitchers over the past decade. Adam, why don't you kind of reveal your fantasy the rotation and bolt here.

Chris said something before the show about how all of the five starting pitchers are like top 15 guys this year. I did not come away with the same list. I imagine we all have Verlander, Kershaw, and Scherzerzer. Yep, of course. Okay. I went with Bumgarner and Felix Hernandez. What? Wow.

I feel like I'm missing someone. I thought the top four was very easy. And then maybe we could argue about the fifth. I had Kershaw, Verlander, Scher, and Sale. Yeah. I guess I'd have to look into sale. But, I mean, why is sale better than Felix Hernandez? Felix Hernandez was kind of the shirzer of the first half of the decade, wasn't he?

Well, sales had basically the whole decade. Maybe eight of the ten years, if you were leaving out last year because it wasn't so great, but I mean, he still obviously had a ton of strikeouts last year. Felix Hernandez, yeah, he was basically done being a high-end pitcher in 2015. Well, but okay, 2010, 2011, not really enough of Chris Sale combined 94 innings. 2012, yeah, all right. I mean, I think before he went to the Red Sox, he was never that great. He didn't finish as high as you would think because maybe he didn't win enough games.

His ERA was a little bit higher, something like that. His fantasy production. Felix Hernandez was, of course, not famous. winning a Cy Young Award with a low win total, 13 and 12. No, I'm just saying that sales talent didn't quite match the fantasy production

until he got to the Red Sox. Or his fantasy production didn't match the talent, I guess, I would say. All right, so 340 ERA for Hernandez versus 303 for sale. Whip 117 for Hernandez versus 104 for sale. I'm not doing the whole decade, because I don't care about 2018 and 19

he was one of the worst pitchers in baseball. That's obviously going to drag it down. I'm giving you the numbers for the decade here. Yeah, but that's not the right way to go about this. It's a big difference. If it was close, maybe you could say, okay, Hernandez won a Cy Young Award, won a couple ERA titles. Okay, fine. So if I take the first eight years of the decade, Felix has a 306 ERA and a 1.14 whip.

What is sale? That's about what sale is for the whole decade. Yeah, so, you know, look, you want to use the last two years as a tiebreaker? is at the end of his career, I don't really care about that. I care about how dominant he won't. But I have no problem. You're not weighing the bad years. There's a huge strikeout discrepancy. It's worth pointing out too.

We're also, like, Chris Sale's been a lot better than Madison Bumgarner. All right, fine. I'll put Sale on. I'll take Bumgarner out. This was the, I ran out of time. I think you reward Chris Sale for just how good he is on a per inning per start basis. 11.1 Ks per 9.

That's actually tied for second all time. Sales is the highest, highest, the highest strikeout to walk ratio of all time, one of the best whips of all time. Chris Sale is an incredible, he was,

I think the, what is it, the fifth lowest, fourth lowest ERA of the decade, and the second lowest whip of the decade. You got sale, I'm not taking Felix off. I don't care what you say.

He's my fifth starter. All right, I did not even consider Felix. So that's, that shows the difference there. I went with Zelle. at Granky, though, Stephen Strasbourg was close. I also gave some thought to DeGrom, Kluber, Lester, Hamels, and David Price.

David Price was actually probably leading for a while, and I opted for Granky over him. I have the same five of Scott. The only, I considered Hamels, I considered Price. I considered DeGrom. You know, if you talk about, you know, upside. He's had two of the best pitching seasons of the decade. But ultimately, Granky and Sale have both had the upside. They've also been really good for basically the entire decade,

whereas Hamels has never really been like a truly stone cold elite guy. He's never been in that conversation that Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander and Garrett Cole are in right now. Whereas, you know, Grinke definitely was. Sale definitely was. Sale would have been in that discussion, you know, at this. this time last year if he hadn't, you know, had that weird spring training thing. So ultimately for me, it's just that five kind of stands out from the pack. Chris, did someone say Stone Cold?

Now, I do think that Scots is basically spot on here. I think that those are like the top five in war over the past decade. And they were, they've been so consistent. Zach Ranky to me, again, much like Nelson Cruz, where he's just one of the most profitable pitchers for fantasy baseball and continues to be to this day. I mean, last year he was the top five starting pitcher in both Roto and in head to head points. And he's being drafted as what, the 20th starting pitcher off the board right now. So I think Granky's in that mix. I did give some serious consideration to David Price and Madison Bumgarner as

well. But I wound up with the same top five as bold Scott and Chris. The closers, we mentioned this at the top. It was really three names, I think, for most people that were kind of in that mix. It was Aroldus Chapman, Craig Kimbril, and Kenley Janssen. I went with Janssen and Arolda's Chapman. Did anyone else consider... Homer? Homer. I did not consider anyone else. I thought Kimberl was the easy number one, though.

I went with Janssen barely over Chapman is my number two. Janssen was actually kind of an easy call for me over Chapman. I thought Janssen was number one. Big safe difference, actually, like 30. Yeah, about 30 difference in saves. Chapman always had a sort of high-ish. E.R. or whip for an elite closer, whereas Jansen has the lowest whip of any closer with at least

150 saves this decade. So I actually went with him pretty easily. Yeah, I went anything different there? No, I left Chapman off. I also think you guys are, like what Chris said about Madison Bumgarner, just sort of dismissing him is ridiculous. I think he should be back on the list. Look, if you want to make your list worse, add Madison Bumgarner instead of Chris Sail. Holy cow, 2000, he probably had like six straight years as a top 10 pitcher.

Yeah, this goes back to the Elvis Andrews discussion. I mean, it's just consistency and longevity versus, you know, Chris Selle on a per start per inning basis being, I think, that much better than Bumgarner. But if you just want to talk about consistency and longevity, I think Bumgarner is in that. conversation at him. Yeah. But I mean, 8.7 Ks per 9 versus 11

for Chris Sails. That does not matter. It's where they finished in fantasy. Chris Sail had 12 saves in the decade Madison Bummer had zero.

Get out of here. Where they finished in fantasy, guys. That's, you know what? I'm sorry that it took me an hour to realize it,

but everyone went about this assignment wrong except for me. Sorry. Sorry, listeners. Well, you pointed out we didn't have the right

data to do it. I know. That was tough. That was tough. But to comparing sale and Bumgarner, you do have them. They're both in the system. Okay. All right, so let's wrap things up here with a team name Tuesday.

My debut to team name Tuesday, my inaugural team name Tuesday here. This one comes from Stephen Lipp, and it actually might be Chris Towers because he says, Hey, Frank, Adam, Scott, and Chris, in parentheses, the obvious star of the pod. Oh. All right, Chris. You got your burner account, Stephen Lipp emailing us in here. He says, Can I borrow a feeling?

I'm sure Adam gets this reference as that this is one of the cultural touchstones he doesn't have a terrible opinion in. Can I barred? Of course I get. Does Scott get the reference? That's from the Simpsons. Can I borrow a feeling?

Will you lend me a jar of love? Something like that. Yeah. You're right on. Kurt Van Houghton. I do want to give a shout out to Stephen. He reached out to me personally. My dog passed away two weeks ago.

He reached out to me personally. Sent a really lovely note. I just want to say thanks to Stephen. That was really nice of him. Yeah, that's awesome. We appreciated Stephen, and sorry about your dog, Chris. I know that it was something that you're going through there. So sorry for that.

But on a more uplifting note, we'll move on to some other team names. And these came from Max Swedberg. He has Zach Gallen Fanakis. Boo. It's like 10 years old or like a year old. Robert Lewis-Lewis Stevenson, reference to the author and Sox player, but bonus, Stevenson Expressway runs near Sox Park. That's not bad. Okay. That's not bad, man. Can I have a air number? That's good. Yeah, that's not bad.

Not all who wander are Franco. Yeah, I mean, I get it. Yeah. That's the Lord of the Ring reference. Like, I like it. I actually just finished my Lord of the Rings rewatch this weekend. So I'm here with you. You know, I like it. So not only did I not get the The Simpsons reference, I had to Google that before the show and figure it out. I've never watched a single Lord of the Rings movie.

So I've really got to step things up. Man, it's, they're figuring out here. They have aged incredibly well for like big budget blockbusters made in the early 2000s. Like you look at the Star Wars prequels and it's like, Oh, this looks like it was made with crayons. The Lord of the Rings movies have aged unbelievably well. I highly recommend it. Take my hand with your glove of love.

This next one comes. Yeah, they are. These next two come from Joe in Jersey City, dear Thomas, White, Castle, and Robinson. Those are all Franks. So thank you for the welcome here, Joe. Frank Thomas, Frank White, the Punisher of Frank. Frank White.

Frank White is Biggie Smalls. Frank Castle is the Punisher, and of course, Frank Robinson. He has Maximo Acosta Nostra. Anybody? Nope. I don't get that one. So when I Google it, Lacosa Nostra Urban Dictionary is this thing of ours, or our thing, depending on who's translating, is Italian. It's a euphemeral for the Italian mafia.

Frank, this is terrible. Stop giving this. This does not deserve the explanation. This is a terrible team name. No. Team name rule number one. You have to, people have to get it. If you need to go to the urban dictionary,

who's going to do that? Analyst Adam is... Love it. Kind of rude. Freed up, freed up to be myself, finally. After 10 years of shackles. Someone used their hard-earned money to send him Chef Boy R.D.

And he doesn't even say thank you. I don't know what's going on with Analyst Adam. It was an April Fool's joke that Chef Boy R.D. that bad. Did it come? Did you try it already? Yesterday on the show. You tried it on the pot. Oh, and it's that one? It is worth going back and listening to Scott because he hated it. He's such a baby about it. I was. I'm sure.

It was legit. I mean, it's not good. I eat it kind of ironically at times. This last one from Joe in Jersey City, Marwin and the Martian. Marwin and Adelis. Okay. and the Martian Jason DeVingez. From Pete, hey, Sanka, Yule, Jr. and DeRis. Tallulah.

What's that? That's the first name they come up with before they laugh it off. And then they settle on Cool Runnings. Oh, right? Wow. Really? You guys didn't know Sanka, Yule, Jr. and DeRise? I didn't.

The last time I watched it movie, I was probably 10 years old. and I remember enjoying it. Oh, it's great. It's a great movie. Now that you say it, it sounds right. But I wasn't registering in the moment. It's interesting. Our last team name for the day,

Clean Up When You're Done. I like that. It's pretty good. Pretty good. Nothing from Scott, nothing from Chris. All right. Who is it? Whose name is it using?

You're in Alvarez. Clean up on. You're Dawn. Oh, Your Don. Okay. All right. All right. See, I think if it is George,

Jordan still. I got to recalibrate. Adam broke me. Now I need to fix it. Fix my brain. All right. My inaugural team name Tuesday, I'm going to go with Devers ending story. That's a nod to

Stranger Things Neverending Story. One of my favorite shows from the past decade. What? What? What? What about the movie? Neverending story. Well, yeah, the never ending story of the movie, but also the song. Well, you see, that's where my millennial brain

goes to Oh, you are straightly. A song they sing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Song they sing, which is from the never-ending story instead of actually going

to the movie, never-endering. Okay. Chris is judging me hard right now. Because Chris has been a representative millennial for so long. This is, he's, he's, man, I'm showing my age.

He's going to have to engage the old man inside of them. Oh, boy. Get angry, Chris. Get off my long. No, I just, don't have any words. You're old now. You're the old. We're all old. Frank's making us. I am bald. You guys are the oldies. For Stone Cold, Chris Towers, Adam Azer, Scott Towers, and myself,

Frank Stample. You just called them Scott Towers on his birthday, Frank. God Towers. Happy birthday, Scott Towers, Scott White. I am Frank Sample. Thank you everybody for listening. We will see you again tomorrow.