Rates & Barrels - 2021 Pleasant Surprises, Part 1

Episode Date: September 20, 2021

Eno and DVR being a new series, take a team-by-team look at pleasant surprises from the 2021 season. This episode begins at the bottom of the AL West, and wraps up part way through the AL Central. The Mariners have found several regulars via trade in the past year-plus, The A's rotation as a whole has exceed expectations, and the Astros continue to hold a place among the league's best organizations for pitching development.  Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Subscribe to the Rates & Barrels YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/RatesBarrels Subscribe to The Athletic at 50% off for the first year: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels presented by Topps. Check out Topps Project 70 celebrating 70 years of Topps baseball cards. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris. On this Monday afternoon, on this episode, we are going to take a look around the AL for 2021 pleasant surprises. Looking for teams that had someone or a few someone step up in ways that we did not expect going back to the beginning of the season. We'll take a look forward and see what we expect from some of these pleasant surprises in the future. An episode really, I think, probably inspired by Cedric Mullins

as he's on the brink of a 30-30 season, which is pretty exciting. Eno is on mute right now, which is weird, or I can't hear him at least. I'm muted because of my dang dogs. Oh, what's going on with the dogs? It's fine It's gone Are they happy again?

Blame the dogs They pooped in the living room again No, what? Why? They pooped in the living room again As it gets colder I think they're just lazy And they don't want to poop outside in the cold. And so they come running in and they go poop in the living room, which is nice and warm.

I mean, they're small dogs and they don't have long hair, but it's not cold here. I hate to be the one to break this to your dogs. It's just not. Relatively cold. It's just not. Relatively cold. Your dogs are aspiring good boys, but they're very particular about their conditions, I guess, is the thing I've learned about them so far.

They're working on it, though. That's right. They're working on it. They're working on it. So we're going to fly around the league. I decided we're going to go from west to east because things never really seem to go that way on pods. We always go from east to west.

But guess what? Eno and I are out west. We're going to start out west, and we're going to start from the bottom of the standings in each division and work our way up. Why? Because I can't remember the last time we started a pod talking about the Rangers or anybody on the Rangers as the very first thing we talked about. If you guys thought that the Tyro Estrada episode a few weeks ago was weird, you haven't heard anything yet. So I started looking at the Rangers again today. Let's start debating Yanni Hernandez and Yoel Pozo. Yeah, I mean, I think their pleasant surprise was mostly in the first half.

Adeliz Garcia has to be the guy that you'd, if you had a trophy for this, if we had our 3D printer, no one's come through with that yet, but if we had our 3D printer and we were making a pleasant surprise trophy to give to someone on each team. A pleasant surprise trophy. You were better than we thought. Here's a trophy. I do think that he has really regressed though in the terms of his on-base

percentage, his walk rate, his chase rate, and everything. And it's possible that the other contender for the Pleasant Surprise trophy, which I'm trying to imagine what it looks like, but anyway, the Pleasant Surprise trophy, you didn't suck as bad as we thought you would, goes to Nate Lowe, I think. And Nate Lowe um just a combination

of age and plate discipline i kind of see him if i was going to pick one of them for sticking around next year it would be more low i think low will have maybe the most war on the team which may be a low bar to clear no pun actually intended I'm not a pun guy the way many people in the fantasy baseball Twitter community tend to be. But a couple things with Nate Lowe that caught my eye. The park index this season for the ballpark in Arlington, it's a 78 for left-handed hitters in terms of home runs. So definitely a big drawback for him being there is reduction in power output. I think he's probably more of a neutral park, like 20 home run sort of guy right now, but he hits the ball hard enough to think there could be a little more power that he could still tap into.

The weird thing in his profile specifically, there's a near even mix of home runs against fastballs, breaking balls, and off-speed pitches. So on the one hand, he's hitting all different pitch types out of the ballpark. That seems like a good thing, but his numbers against fastballs are a little underwhelming. And I always worry about someone who's supposed to hit for power, not doing enough damage on fastballs, and them being maybe vulnerable, especially those pitches up in the strike zone. and them being maybe vulnerable, especially those pitches up in the strike zone.

It's true. It's something we saw maybe in Rowdy Tellez's makeup, his statistical makeup on the way into Milwaukee, but he's managed to do well there. He does in Milwaukee have the benefit of a better park to help him out on that. It does speak to a different kind of approach. He's not necessarily a get-out-in-front approach guy, right? If you're a get-out-in-front guy,

you do more damage on fastballs, you do more power damage, you might whiff a little bit more. So, you know, can he afford to whiff more and whiff 28, 29% of the time in order to unlock that 25 homer power, then he may not actually get much better overall if he does that. You know what I mean?

Yeah, that would be a step forward but a step back sort of simultaneously. He's been 13% better than a league average hitter, 11% now for his career. But I think because he walks a lot, that might be a slightly better version of Nate Lowe in the long run. Does run a little bit too. 7 for 7 is a base dealer, so I think that little contribution is worth mentioning. Would love to see him hit the ball in the air more. This is the highest ground ball rate we've seen so far from him in the big leagues,

and this is his first full season as a regular. So, you know, some sweet and some sour in the profile. And I would agree with your main takeaway. It's more likely that Lowe is a contributor throughout next season on this team than Garcia by comparison because of the holes that have been exploited in Garcia's approach. Who is your pleasant surprise for next year? I mean, I guess another way of asking it is who do you, what regulars, what major league regulars do you think they uncovered this year other than Lowe and possibly Garcia? That's about it. I think as far as new players go, I mean, I think if you

want to look at the pitching side, just generally who are major league players for next year. I mean, Solak, I actually think the, you know, the, it's an open question. We've seen a couple different Solaks. I think Jonah Heim is probably a regular. Yeah, I like him as a defiable regular catcher, at least your starting catcher. But his overall line is 58 WRC+, so that's not a given. I like Yanni Hernandez's plate discipline and his contact rate, but the power is a total zero.

Isaac Heiner-Falefa, because of his defense, still there. I mean, he's not new to the picture. He's just going to be a holdover, I think, for next year. But because of his offense, he's somebody you're trying to move off of. Yeah, eventually you move on. Andy Ibanez is a little bit interesting, but also a little bit old. Low K rate, but i don't really know if he's a regular for them next year willie calhoun's had another lost year with

injuries not really sure if there's a whole lot more with him that we're gonna see him might be he might be my pleasant surprise guy he might be my uh my long shot pick also i mean i think yanni hernandez with that walk rate and that contact rate will probably have a role on the infield. He'll probably replace somebody like Charlie Culberson and just be a utility slash bench guy at the very least. I think he'll be useful to the team. And then Willie Calhoun has the biggest breakout potential of somebody who hasn't, other than their best prospect, Josh Young.

Maybe Leote Tavares. Those three, one of those three will be the breakout star next year. I think this is a team that's just at a strange place because a lot of their prospects are on the older side. You know, Young, Justin Foscue, Davis Wenzel. Those were, I think, the top position player prospects, according to fan graphs, entering the season. Cole Wynn, their best pitching prospect, has had a good year at AA. I just don't feel like they're necessarily sitting on a future core that's going to get them to the playoffs. It seems like they're still missing a few things.

Maybe they're a team that spends some more money, though, in the offseason. They bring up those guys over the course of the next year and going into like 2023, they start adding some pieces of the roster because the one thing the Rangers have done well, in my opinion, over the last few years is they've done well with veteran starting pitchers in free agency and in trades. That's been one thing that has worked out for them because they just, they don't seem like they really have an identity at the big league level.

You know, ever since the, the Elvis Andrews, Beltre, Rudin, Odor crew kind of broke up over time, seem like they really have an identity at the big league level you know ever since the the elvis andrews beltre rudin odore crew kind of broke up over time something has been missing in texas and i think that next crew is still a year away from really starting to make an impact i think the money might be actually the the most interesting part they are super they're about to get super cheap uh they already their 2020 payroll was estimated around 151 million um and that's down to 98 this year i guess the actual luxury tax payroll is 114 this year but um that's likely to really drop next year because Lyles is a free agent. Holt and Culberson are

free agents, and that saves them $10 million. But I'm just looking up and down here. Other than those two guys, the only person who will be on a contract is Jose Leclerc on a $5 million deal. Everybody else will be in arbitration or pre-arm they're about to get super super cheap the only people in arbitration are Fulte, Nawitz, Kiner, Falefa, Bush, Guzman, and Calhoun none of those guys are going to be really expensive in arbitration no and a couple of those guys are probably going to get non-tendered yeah that's possible too I mean I don't even know if Guzman's on the team I'll echo your Willie Calhoun for 2022 because I still think when you put the ball in play as often as he does and you have the ability to hit for at least 20 home run

power that will play I think similar to you know Nate Lowe the park's going to work against him a little bit but I don't see them having enough internal competition to push him out of the mix just going to come down to his own health as far as whether or not he sticks as a 500 plus plate appearance guy for them in 2022 yeah yeah i think that was a big part of why the power wasn't necessarily there for him this year i mean i think given what happened to him this year that the fact that he was the league average bat on the on you know for 244 plate appearances is not a terrible sign next year he'll be 27 and basically he'll have a chance at a peak season and should be a late late rounder even in the deepest of leagues going into next season as well let's move on from the rangers let's go to the

second worst team in the al west let's talk about about the Angels where, I mean, Shohei Otani, yes, that is a surprise that he reached that level, but maybe less of a surprise when you go back to when he first signed and the Japanese Babe Ruth label was what he sort of came to North America with. I think the actual pleasant surprise here is that the Angels have had a couple of pitchers put together decent seasons. Alex Cobb has done it in about a half season, but 80 plus innings of being almost a two and a half win pitcher, that's a five win guy if he's healthy over a full year. Is Alex Cobb actually kind of interesting now? You know, the stuff in command numbers always liked him. And, you know, to have a 26% strikeout rate, 8% walk rate,

he's comfortably above average everywhere. He's really suppressed the homers this year. I mean, this is kind of what stuff in location plus always said he could do. The one thing that I will say is the fastballs aren't good, but the way, you know, there is evidence that pitchers are, I have a piece about this coming out this week, about how pitchers are retaining usefulness, are aging better. Starting pitchers are aging better.

I think partially part of it is they're using their fastballs less and less, and they're retaining their ability to strike out people that way. And also older hitters are striking out more. So just in general, the game is set up so that the older pitcher can go. So I think Cobb would be a great signee, especially because at this point with his durability, I think next year he's going to be the kind of guy

who signs for 1-10 or 1-8. And those kind of pitchers have been turning out to be good bets for for a lot of baseball teams why in my head is alex cobb a 2022 blue jay yeah that's exactly it or back to being a ray yeah i guess that's usually how it goes right the second stint with the rays the giants are always a fun place to to wish cast these people into too because the giants seem to have two spots in the rotation that they keep warm for veterans like this at any given time yeah i think we're up to two pitchers that we've seen who are going to be free agents or the guys that might be traded this offseason now that we've

already put on the giants so we have filled the two spots keep doing it i'm predicting i'm setting the over under at 19 and a half total pitchers that we try and put in San Francisco over the course of the season. But any other pleasant surprises on this Anaheim team for this season? It's interesting to talk about a bad fastball and two good secondaries with decent command because that's kind of what Patrick Sandoval is doing right now. He's really improved the slider to the point where the slider and the changeup are legitimate weapons. And though the fastball isn't that great, you know, here we go. 26% strikeout rate, 10% walk rate.

He hasn't suppressed the homers as well as Cobb. But if you can do those things, and he seems to have proven he can, I think he's a back-end pitcher. Now, how do we add this up for them next year? Because they don't have Bundy coming back, which some people would be happy about that, but he's a major league starting pitcher. They don't actually have Cobb coming back.

And I don't know, Canning, did he get TJ? He had the PRP injection, right? No, right back. He missed a stress fracture in the lower back. So I guess coming back next year, you've got Canning, Otani, and maybe Paki Naughton and Patrick Sandoval, and you're hoping that Detmers is the guy who comes

and blows the doors off the hinges, I think the Angels themselves will be in the mix for a pitcher like Alex Cobb, actually. Maybe a reunion makes sense for both sides in this case. If you were trying to decide right now between Bundy and Cobb based on what you've seen from them this season and of course what Bundy did in the shortened season was pretty exciting. Who do you prefer

going forward? I'm going to take Cobb. I'm going to take Cobb. It was a bad enough situation this year for Bundy that I would just want to see more out of him. I think that the Angels, I think Cobb will cost a little bit more,

and I think the Angels would be more likely to want to pay a little bit more to get a little bit more. But the projections are for like a 4-7-7 ERA off of Bundy, and they're for like a 4-2 from from Cobb so Cobb's a better pitcher yeah pretty nice uh edge to Cobb I guess in this case which is really hard to believe when you think about where these guys were going in drafts just six or so months ago but the Patrick Sandoval situation looks like he's solid at least for the back. I am feeling the Angels as a nice potential bounce back team in 2022 because very little Mike Trout this year, very little Anthony Rendon, even if you're going to regress Shohei Otani back into, you know, planet Earth. a combined 10 plus wins above replacement.

And they've basically been trotting out replacement level guys in their, in their stead so far. So I do think there's, there are reasons to be optimistic if you're an angels fan, even though this season turned into a disaster, other than enjoying to watch Shohei Otani on a regular basis. Marsh and Adele, the two outfielders, Brandon Marsh and Joe Adele both hit the ball really hard.

They both have the same problem when it comes to making contact. But if one of them works out to their 90th percentile, then that's the kind of profile that can turn into a star. And everyone's looking for stars and if you can take a young star and add them to trout and um and uh rendon and walsh you know i feel like that could still be the recipe for contender for a legit contender you know if you around, they're using their time right now to develop Jack Mayfield and let Marsh take his lumps at the major league level. And so that could be really valuable time for them. Maybe Marsh hits the ground next year and only strikes out 28% of the time and has a

breakout season. And then it's Trout and Marsh and Adele in the outfield. Wait a second, this is starting to sound good. You know, Fletcher is one of your worst regulars instead of one of your best, you know? So there's some work to be done, and they'll have to see if Jack Mayfield can be their shortstop. But with the returning stars, a little bit of money, and these young outfielders, there could be something brewing

here. I'll throw the Joe Adele 2021 Major League strikeout rate into the pleasant surprises folder for this team. A 22.9% K rate from a guy that was striking out 41.7% of the time in 2020. It's even less than he was striking out at AAA this year. He was putting up great numbers at AAA Salt Lake. And it's even less than he was striking out at AAA this year. He was putting up great numbers at AAA Salt Lake. Joe Adele had a 29.2% K-rated AAA, which gave me some pause about what we might get from him upon his return to the big leagues. He's exceeded my expectations in that regard.

So I think that's one of the most encouraging things you could see really with any player's profile as you go up and down this roster. There's still star potential in Adele and Marsh. I will go to bat for that. And I think that, you know, their debuts did point out some of their flaws. And, you know, it's not like either of them

just landed and did everything they were going to do. But I think there's another level in there for both of them. So we're about 20 minutes into this pod and I'm having the immediate realization there's no chance that we're getting through the entire American League on this episode. So consider this a two-part episode. This is part one. We'll probably get through half of the AL Central. We're at least going to get through the West. Maybe we'll hang around long enough to knock out two teams in the

Central. We're trying, but there's a lot to be excited about when you dig in the corners and find reasons to get hyped up. Let's take a look at Seattle because I think there actually are some nice stories there. Of course, they've exceeded expectations from a win total perspective. We talk a lot about the young players they have, but even Ty France is, I would say, a pleasant surprise because more often than not, a player like Ty France, who dominates the upper levels of the minor leagues at an old-for-the-level sort of age, comes up, gets the chance, is a slightly below-average player, or is an average hitter and a bad defender, and sort of just disappears in a couple of years. I don't get

that sense that France is that kind of player, because he's taken a few steps forward. It's been not only just volume in the sense that he's played 139 games this year, but he's lowered his K rate down to 17.1%. He's been a three-war player so far, 16 home runs on the season. A hot finish could put him up closer to 20. But I think the biggest surprise for me, and this goes back to last season, is Ty France is hitting for average. That is not something I expected to see from him in the sense of like a two

90, 300 type hitter that he's been these last two seasons. Where do we go from here? I mean, again, old for when he broke through, but has a really nice track record and a pretty good resume now at the big league level after what he's accomplished in 2021.

For me, it's really interesting to put Ty France next to Abraham Toro. Both I would say probably pleasant surprise. Both teams that have broken out and established themselves as somewhat of Major League regulars

this year for the Mariners. And both have slightly underwhelming batted ball stats. Ty France has a better max EV, but in terms of his barrel rate, 7%, it's just what you would call above average. Toro has the lower max EV. His barrel rate at 9.5% tickles better than average than average uh but uh you know his overall power numbers aren't great one thing that i i think that i see between toro and france is not everybody has to be

a superlative barrel meister you know not everybody has to be out there basically for their power and their power alone what you see in toro is a lot of contact and good patience. And we see with Francis a decent amount of contact and good patience and enough power. So, you know, kind of between the two of them, it seems like they've almost unlocked this character that's not going to be super valued around the league. You know, I mean, France has now established themselves. They could probably get something in a deal, but France and Toro were readily available as prospects go.

Toro went for two relievers, and France went for Austin Nola. That was a massive deal. Yeah, he was just kind of, it felt like a secondary sort of throw-in. Throw-in, right? Yeah. So they got these guys that were super readily available, probably because their minor league stat cast was not something

that knocked your socks off. And yet here they are looking like major league regulars. Now, I think it's fair to wonder if they make enough to be the beginning of a core, right? They kind of seem like just like regulars rather than the kind of players that would drive a core. But you still have Kellnick coming. You still have Rodriguez coming. You've got other players that could you know even kyle lewis

you have between those three players you have uh the opportunity to create a star like one of those could be a star very easily maybe two and then you want to have your france and toro types to to to lengthen the lineup and to have a major league you know have a major league team out there i think you can trade for players like France and Toro, and it's the same way you can accrue value making smart waiver claims. We talk about that with the Giants and Farhan Zaidi all the time,

where being willing to turn, that's another way to do it, but getting players back in these trades, maybe finding teams that are going to have a 40-man roster crunch in the offseason, taking advantage of that and giving those players opportunities. That's another way to add that value. I think finding two and three win players in trades or on the wire is extremely valuable.

Because if you're getting these guys who are either early in the arbitration process or pre-arb, which is the case, I think, of both France and Toro for at least another year, that frees up money that you can go spend in free agency to fix more of your flaws. And as long as you're keeping that money available, you can be a player for whatever it is you might need that could help put you over the top. So I think the Mariners, I'm more in than out of them as far as what they're doing overall. I think they're well positioned for the next couple of seasons. I've talked about that a few times on the show over the course of the season. And Jared Kelnick, I know it's still pretty lost in his overall numbers. His

numbers since August 1st are I think a lot better overall. I think the adjustments we're seeing from him are very encouraging, especially when you account for age. He's turned 22 back in July, so it's 178, 288, 349 on the surface. He's been much better than that

over the final six and a half weeks of the season. What was our bet that I'm going to, and what am I going to have to do? Oh, yeah. I don't even remember off the top of my head what you threw out there. It was about like reach rate and maybe OBP or something. Yeah, he's had a 116 WRC plus since August 1st,

10 home runs and 176 plate appearances. So I'm very encouraged by the adjustments this time around. Eat some hat on this one maybe. Definitely has looked better recently. And I think that generally the Mariners look like, the one that open question for me is just how much money they have, how much money they're going to spend. Cause they've hovered around this sort of 80,

90 million now for a couple of years. And I can't tell if it's just there and rebuild or if they're just going to be a lower level team in terms of fans, in terms of payroll. So it's an interesting question to ask now because seager's uh you know 19 million is the most on the team and it's going off the books um you know unless they uh they do that option and i kind of doubt they will um but are they only going to spend the 19 million or are they going to maybe try and get two free agents and and augment this young group and and kind of get

out in front of it like with the Manny Machado signing. Try to get an in-its-prime free agent to be there at the right time when this team kind of crests. I think that would be a really good move for them. I don't know who it is. Yeah, don't sign a Hosmer. Don't do that one advice my advice to Jerry DePoto which is free on this podcast don't sign an Eric Hosmer that would be a bad choice for the organization but I think this is um this is going to be a nice couple of years for the Mariners they are they're

well positioned because it's it's not just K, right? Julio Rodriguez isn't far away. Noel V. Marte is one of the more interesting position player prospects in the minors right now. They've already brought up Gilbert. Emerson Hancock and George Kirby are not that far away. So they're going to keep adding impact players to this group. Their bullpen is going to be better

the next year. They're going to have Deo Castillo for the full year. Ken Giles is coming back. And Andres Munoz is throwing 100 miles an hour in the minor leagues right now. And they found a couple other relievers. And if those guys can stick around, I think they were going to have a really good bullpen next year. Yeah, how about Paul Seawald? I mean, relievers, I think, just because of the way war works, tend to not pop as much on leaderboards. There's a pleasant surprise for you, for sure.

There's a guy that whenever they added him, I didn't think twice about it. I probably didn't even notice that it happened until he was there. So he's had a great year. Yeah, yeah, he's been a real find for them. And, you know, there's some possible regression coming from him because he's had such a leap forward this year.

But you cover that over with the ability to add andrews vinos and ken giles so i think generally they're they're building i would say they're building in the right in the right ways in the right directions i do think that the question is how much money will they spend and will they add to this in free agency i'll throw i'll throw chris Chris Flex in there as an honorable mention. They have so many, though. I mean, it's like Luis Torrence deserves

a little bit of love. I mean, I don't think that, I mean, there's some that expected this, but the 190 ISO is maybe the biggest surprise because there was a question of if he was just,

you know, if he's going to be a power guy or an average guy. Well, I think they're all in the same trade, which is pretty interesting because you have France, Andres Munoz, Luis Terenz, and Taylor Trammell.

And even a Trammell, I think the comp I've heard on him in terms of his profile is Brett Gardner. If Taylor Trammell is a Brett Gardner type player, that's like a 10 plus year big leaguer. That's a really nice player to have too. It's another two to three win sort of guy that fits in around those higher ceiling players

that are drawing a lot more interest and a lot more hype in prospect circles. So two thumbs up. I like what they've done. A lot of success stories there in Seattle for this season. I find the next team we're going to talk about in the AL West to be a little more difficult, and that's the A's. And it's weird because they're not a bad team. So obviously they're doing some things right. And I guess it comes down to the

starting pitching because other than Frankie Montes, who showed us this before his suspension a couple of years back, looking at this group i didn't expect chris bassett to be this effective i didn't expect james caprillion to be this good certainly didn't expect cole irvin to get the results he's getting i think we're finally seeing some correction on him and even sean mania like we've talked about sean mania for years he's exceeded expectations too so i think the pleasant surprise in oakland is that all of their starting pitchers have been probably just a tick better than anybody would have expected them to be. Yeah. Shout out to Sam Schultz, who's doing some great work with the pitchers there. She's kind of the liaison between the analytics and the pitching coach and the pitchers.

And Sean Mania, you know, recently I was talking to him and he was like, yeah, Sam's doing a great job. I would say that they almost seem to be over their skis a little bit, some of them. Chris Bassett, I always look at his stuff and I just wonder how he does it almost. It's a really good fastball. It's a really good cutter. The really slow breaking balls are just enough as a foil for that fastball-cutter relationship that's really working for Chris Bassett. Montas is the guy that we as a prospect community or as a fantasy community have seen coming for a long time and

have anointed him here a couple different times. So it's just been kind of an up-and-down career. They're getting a lot out of Cole Irvin and James Caprellian, too. They're kind of different pitchers. Irvin doesn't have great stuff, but has five different pitches he can command. Caprellian seems to be looking for his best fastball mix between his four-seam and his two-seam. But, I mean, they have five pitchers here with an ERA under four.

Yeah, and I think if you'd said that back in March, I would have said, that's cool, AJ, Puck's pitching well. Yeah, and Jesus Lizardo's pitching well. It's just been guys that you didn't really expect, I think, making those leaps. And with Puck, you know, maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe it still happens in some kind of hybrid role, but I think my expectations have really started to fall. I think this is a team, though, where they're having some trouble developing position players. Obviously, Matt Chapman and Matt Olson, the two guys in the corners, they developed start to

finish in their organization. I think Tyler Stoderstrom looks like an impact player. He's their highest ranked prospect. But it's not a good system. And the way they operate, they need to start hitting with young players. They need a couple of success stories on that side if they're going to avoid falling to the bottom of this division on an annual basis. And I know people probably thought that about this team for a while, but I do think there's a bit of a gap right now when you start to look around at the talent that's being amassed by Seattle and Houston specifically. Like those two teams and then the Angels with the star power they've got. You could see the A's pretty quickly kind of falling down near Texas in this division if they don't have some big wins on player development

with position players in particular. Yeah, but it's kind of amazing. Just knowing how little they do invest in player development in terms of monetary investment, which you can guess how little it is just based on what you know about Oakland and how much they spend. And it is that little that they still manage to have these players come through and do well. I guess it's just a really high-velocity organization

because what I see is Chapman hitting in his second arbitration season and Olsen hitting in his second arbitration season. Those two are going to cost $11 million this year. They're going to cost twice that next year. I would assume that they would cost around $20 million next year. And what is Oakland going to do without what you're saying, without popping on some of these young guys? They're going to trade Olsen and Chapman.

They're going to get five players each. They're going to get a new 10 players. And two of those guys will be good again, like the two that they traded out, and they'll just rinse and repeat. I mean, that's what they've done forever. Yeah, I mean, it's usually a good way to go. I think it's harder to get away with trades like that now, though, than it's ever been.

So I think you're right. I haven't heard a lot of people talking about those two guys going somewhere, but that might be part of the solution in Oakland if they want to really bolster that system and build more upon that core. Let's close it out with a look at Houston, not the episode, but just the AL West. Luis Garcia has been the Astros' most valuable pitcher this season, and I know you've liked him since arrival. I was drafting him as a reserve wherever I could, hoping he'd get an opportunity early in the season. drafting him as a reserve wherever I could, hoping he'd get an opportunity early in the season.

And even with that optimism, I think he's exceeded even my highest expectations for him here in 2021. Yeah, I think that's partially because he came up as a change-up guy. And so we all wondered if he had the breaking balls to succeed in this league. He's now added three breaking balls to that change-up. And I love And I love pitchers like that because I think it says wonders about their adaptability, their possible aging curve, what it might look like on the back end. Remember, Zach Granke was watching Felix Hernandez when he was a young pitcher and said,

whoa, that power change, that's pretty cool. I want to throw one like that. And you see the way that's done for Greinke's career. So Garcia's saying, oh, a cutter? Yeah, let me start throwing that too. Now he's cutter, slider, curve, change. He's got a lot of pitches, a lot of command of most of those pitches. I don't know why he wouldn't keep it going.

I think he's established himself now. And if you look at Garcia, Urquidy, and Frambois Valdez, that's three young international pitchers that are all performing nearer at the top of their levels. Perhaps we should be talking more about how the Astros are a premier pitching development organization. Yeah. I mean, I think people for a few years

have at least kind of put them in that group. Wherever you want to draw lines, they're in that top group, I think, in almost every conversation I hear. But I think what's interesting about all those guys that you mentioned, none of them had the prospect cachet of Forrest Whitley, for example. And I think it was Tom Trudeau a few weeks ago who had a tweet just throwing out all the names of the 40-grade and 45-grade pitchers who have come to this sort of top 30 to 40

starting pitcher range. Garcia is certainly a part of that. Or Keeley, when healthy range. Garcia is certainly a part of that. Or Keeley, when healthy, I think can be a part of that. Valdez is in it. There are guys on other teams too. There's a lot of value right now in the fantasy game, but also just in baseball in general, if you can take those guys and turn them into the 50s and 55s,

as opposed to paying the premiums for McKenzie Gore or Forrest Whitley. And I realize injuries are a part of this too. I'm not just ripping guys for getting hurt. It's not like that at all. Even Matt Manning, right? You think about the way we treat the high pedigree pitchers and keeper in dynasty leagues generally. Not everyone plays this way, but they have this extra premium on them.

And yet we're at a time when pitching development and turning 40s and 45s into 50s and 55s and even some 60s, that seems to be a skill that some organizations really have honed in on. It's not just organizations too. You've talked about it before. It's a lot of guys putting in the work on their own, finding different ways to add to their arsenal and get better. A lot of what Corbin Burns has done, you can give the Brewers some credit, but he was throwing in the backyard and working with tech himself too, right? So there's definitely more resources out there for players than there have been in the past. So I think it's changing a lot about how I think about pitching in the long run. I've always been careful about having pitching prospects, but when I get pitching prospects now, it is more of an organization-first sort of approach

where I think about, okay, what does this team do? What do they do well? What kind of starter skills does this guy have? And I'm trying to find higher probabilities of success rather than going sort of high risk, high reward. Whereas with position players, I'm still more in the high risk, high reward bucket. I want the impact star, not the guy that comes up and hits 15 home runs, steals eight bases and hits 260. Yeah. Like you'd rather still have Joe Adele than Abraham Toro, maybe, you know, even now, uh, because one has that, that, that ceiling. I can see that. I think

that we can also get into some trouble because, uh, teams are changing a lot in every off season of what they do in their pitching development programs. I try to stay on top of it, and it shifts underneath you. The Blue Jays, for example, just made it a thing that they cared about, and they underwent a lot of changes in a really short amount of time, and their pitching program is a lot better. And so it's hard to know, you know know is Pearson the graduate of the old pitching program or the new pitching program or the Pearson problems due to the one or the other uh and what

is that what is Pearson does Pearson mean a lot or a little about you know who else is going to come out of that organization so you know and then Manoa right like you're still judging the organizations based on these outcomes so there's you So there could be some luck and some recency bias that's coloring you in those. One of the things that I try to take away from this, these aren't like sort of hard rules, but fairly close. I will trade away pitching for hitting any time. So I'll trade away pitching for hitting prospects any time. hitting anytime so i'll trade away pitching for hitting hitting prospects anytime however if i get a big deal and i'm looking to like looking to like find the final piece for a big deal with somebody

and um and they're gonna they're gonna add one more piece and i often like that to be a to be a pitcher because i find because of attitudes like mine and because of we all look at the the data and we all see this that pitching prospects are uh aren't valued I don't want to go so far and target pitching prospects and trade for pitching however I do want to have more lottery tickets in there especially when at the very end of a deal you might have gotten to somewhere where the deal is pretty much fair to just get an extra pitching prospect thrown in because people don't value them so much. It's great. It's like it's just like a little bonus.

I think I got Logan Webb and Cal Quantrill both the same way in similar sort of, you know, bulk deals where they got kind of thrown in. And I was like, well, I'll take them. You know, it's another shot the another bite of the apple um and because it's really hard to predict who you know who those guys are going to be cal quantra and logan webb are you know pretty different people yeah and you can absorb some pretty bad ratios trying to stream guys like that when they don't figure it out so So, um, you know, we've, we were there even for a brief stretch earlier this season with Logan Webb himself.

And now I'm like, it's high on Logan Webb. I think is anybody that I've, I've talked to, at least to this point. Uh, one last thing on the Astros. This isn't really a surprise,

but how many hitters do you think the Astros have? We'll set the minimum at a hundred plate appearances. How many hitters do the Astros have with a WRC plus above 100? I'm looking at it. Oh, you're looking at it. Okay. Yeah, I have the numbers open, but it is amazing. I mean, let me see if I can count it up real quick.

I mean, is it 9 or 10? It's 10. Yeah, that's wild. Yeah, it is wild. And yeah, straw doesn't even count. Straw and Toro don't count. They might be getting close to hundreds with their new teams. I mean, they have seven over 125, and those guys are all regulars.

Yeah, they had extras. They had extras that were right around average or could have been above average. We don't need those guys. Jake Myers is in here with a 119. Ledbees Diaz with a 108. Chaz McCormick with a 107. You're adding that

to the seven guys over a 125 WRC+. That is amazing when you see that level. They're a really good player at Melbourne, man. Just to think about how we were clowning on them for their center field situation at the beginning of the season. And then it turned

out that Straw was good. Chaz is fine. And Jake Myers might actually at the beginning of the season. And then it turned out that Straw was good, Chaz is fine, and Jake Myers might actually be the best of the three. Yep, I think they're getting the last laugh on that one. But you put it up against something like Cleveland where you're like, well, you guys can't develop an outfield. And I guess what is their outfield now? Straw, Reyes, and still trying to figure it out. Yeah, and it's really, it's got to be so frustrating if you're Cleveland and you go see Tyler Naquin go on to

put up the season he's had in Cincinnati. I didn't realize injuries were a big part of Naquin's story in Cleveland, but to know you had that guy, that you have a need there and that it's happening on the other side of the state, that has to just frustrate you so much if you're a decision maker in that organization right now. Let's go to the AL Central. We'll knock out probably three teams from this group. We start at the bottom with the Twins, and with a player that I don't think we've talked about on this pod all season. If we have, I've completely forgotten about it. Jorge Polanco, who I think I was pretty safely assuming had the 2019 power surge that was mostly the result of the year of the rabbit ball,

has proven that wrong. It's the second time that he's been a four-win player in his career. He's over 30 homers and 10 steals this season. That's pretty exclusive company. I'll pull up a list here momentarily to see how many guys have done that. But what's next for Jorge Polanco? How early is he going in 2022 drafts? And are you a believer in what you've seen from him here this season? I wonder, has he played enough shortstop? He has played enough shortstop. Dual eligibility enough shortstop dual eligibility up the middle beautiful i mean any sort of power explosion like this i think you you gotta you gotta rest it back i mean 10 percent bail rate that says yeah it's supported by what he's done so far but you still

want to add regression so you still want to regress him back to his five percent career bail rate but could he maybe put up another season like 2019 next year where he hit 22 homers and had four stolen bases and a.350 OBP? That's sort of what I might be expecting from him next year, 20 to 25 homers, five or so steals, a decent OBP. That's a really good another season. That should be good for another three to four wins again. That's a really good season.

That should be good for another three to four wins again. And great for a team that may just shift him back to shortstop. I don't know. Or we'll figure it out at shortstop. But great for a team that still has somewhat of a core hanging out. And I don't think it's anywhere near as bad as their results have been this year. No, they should bounce back quite a bit going into 2022. And I think it reminds me in some ways of the power growth that we saw from Eduardo Escobar a few years ago in Minnesota, where Escobar just looked kind of like a guy, a regular that could play all over the infield.

And then he had that first time in 2017. He popped 21 homers that year. I think a lot of people looked at that and said, that's not going to happen again. Came back, did it again in 2018, then popped 35 in the year of the rabbit ball in 2019. Kind of did it with sub 20% K rates, a decent but not amazing walk rate.

Very similar sort of story, I think. And Polanco's showing a little more ceiling, so perhaps a little more to be excited about. But I don't think he's out of place if you want to put him in the back of the top 100 overall with that combination of power and speed, given the fact that we have seen a level very close to this before. When he had that 22 home run season two years ago, it did not come with the 10 steals. And he has 10 for 16 as a base stealer. So if they are better next year, I do wonder if the steals kind of tick back into the 4 to 6 range.

Still not zero, but not necessarily the 10 to 12 that you might pencil him in for. Yeah, it might be the biggest surprise for me. He stole 10 bases, but I'll take it. I've got a few shares of him. I like him as a player. He does represent a little bit of the where are we as an organization? Are we building? Are we rebuilding? Are we reloading? Because, yeah, he's a nice player and he's going to be around for a couple more years. also probably be one of the players that could return you the most if you actually were rebuilding right because he's under contract for like 21 million over the next three years it's very

affordable contract for an up the middle player especially a team that needed to cut corners and salary somehow would love to give you prospects i think for jorge polanco and yet i don't know if I'm just, you know, have the rose-colored glasses on, but next year I see Kepler, Buxton, Larnak, and Kirilov in the outfield with, you know, extras to play first. So Kirilov can play some first and push the no to DH when Donaldson's in the field. I see an entire lineup that is fully ready to go and mash next year and only has one question. Shortstop.

And you can either answer that cheaply with Nick Gordon or you can maybe, this might be exciting, go buy one of the shortstops. Yeah, I mean, it goes kind of against the way the Twins usually shop in free agency. Josh Donaldson, to me, was kind of their bigger, splashier move. Like, that's kind of at the high end of what they would normally do. I know they were a team that extended Maurer years ago and paid up to keep the homegrown star in that case. I wonder, is there a second-tier guy in this class of shortstops that would make a lot of sense? And then I think the other guy that they have that, you know,

could be part of that solution too, is a healthy Royce Lewis. I mean, they lost Royce Lewis to a torn ACL and, and maybe with, you know, Simmons moving on, you,

you have shortstop cleared for the guy that for a while looked like he was going to move around a little bit, but now he might have that spot to call his own if you really like him there. Yeah. And the, there is, I hate to be a broke record there is a question of how much they have to spend i think they might have sort of 10 to 15 million dollars to spend they have simmons um and pinata coming off that's 20 million dollars um and uh you know they they've spent 133 million in 2020

and we're going to end this season around $120 million. So I could see them having about $20 million to spend, though. I don't know if that gets you, you know, into this top tier, like you're saying. I think that the very top will be maybe, I don't know, if Semyon, you want to put him back at shortstop story or korea i don't i mean even if you push all your chips in and depend on 20 million dollars a year i don't know if you're getting any of those guys maybe simeon simeon might fight fit the donaldson thing where

you're just like he's older we get we we fewer years on the deal, it's a smaller deal, so we get Simeon and we put him back at short, and we have Simeon. I mean, wouldn't that kind of change your opinion of this lineup pretty quickly? Or like Donaldson's deal will be up and then Simeon plays third. You know, like you move things around.

I think having one too many is a problem they can afford to have, and I think going into a season where they don't have Nelson Cruz locked in as the DH gives them the flexibility to move Miguel Sano off first base, as you mentioned earlier. So you can, you know, you can use all those outfielders you mentioned plus Kirilov at first. Or if you're not happy with Kepler, you can play Kepler less and play somebody else at first. And there's a lot of interesting ways that they can go about it in Minnesota. I didn't really see a lot to get excited about on the pitching side.

I would say Bailey Ober, as we've talked about a few times in this pod, looks like a guy that will be giving them some sort of quality innings in the back of that rotation next year. I mean, the one last question on the Twins, though, for me, is how they address their concerns in the pitching staff and at shortstop with the money they have. You know what I mean? Because if they do spend, even if they get one of the and shortstop with the money they have. You know what I mean? Because if they do spend,

even if they get one of the cheaper shortstop options, get Simeon or whatever it is, they'll still have a hole in the starting rotation. And I know they've traded for Joe Ryan. Were there some other names? I know they made it like a thing that they were looking for in trades was pitching that was close um maybe i'm just not thinking of it right now but anyway they got joe ryan uh they're gonna have uh bailey ober and then i don't think they've answered any other

questions in the starting pitching rotation right no and i think with Kenta Maeda, I mean, he had Tommy John, so that's a big loss for them because they were expecting to get 150 plus innings from him next season. So that's one more they have to get. I wonder if Simeon Woods Richardson is actually going to get a chance in the big leagues next year. I think that's a possibility. One of those guys who's very polished for his age, so maybe they're relying on him as at least an option from May or June on next year. They're going to have to get pitching. And I guess if you said you can really only have one area where you spend up,

are you spending up on a pitcher? Are you spending up on a shortstop? I think because of Royce Lewis, I'm more likely to go ahead and take my chances and spend up on pitching. They could be a good fit for Robbie Ray, potentially. Yeah, yeah. And I think I agree with you because there's another way of saying it.

They have multiple needs in the rotation, and they're going to have to spend there anyway. So if you can just paper over shortstop with Nick Gordon into Royce Lewis, then that's your worst position out there offensively, and it's actually a pretty good lineup offensively even with that situation. So you just say, all all right we'll get what we get out of short we have multiple needs in the rotation we not only have to get maybe robbie ray but also you know be in

the market of all these older guys that are going to be on short-term deals right so i think maybe most of their money is going to be spent in that place and i think they will be in the market for some of these names that we said, like Alex Cobb, where they just want a short deal with an older pitcher. Let's go to Kansas City, where the surprise to me is that Nicky Lopez has 20 steals this season. That wasn't part of the plan. I thought I had Nicky Lopez figured out kind of the poor team's version of like a Nick Madrigal, which is, you know, a filler sort of player for fantasy purposes.

A guy that can play both middle infield spots, maybe isn't an everyday guy, but he's 20 for 20. He's cut his K rate down to 13.5%. He's held some of the walk rate gains we saw. And this might be really important his defensive numbers are better than magicals which seems to be a meaningful thing i mean basically we're talking about a guy who has every tool but one and that one tool is the one that the teams value the most power right now if you think about all the things he does well and you think about finding power everywhere else in your lineup, you can easily justify having one guy like Nikki Lopez. And I think it all sort of comes down to,

if you believe in him holding an average in the two 82 90 range, then he's going to have an OBP. That's good enough to be a table setter. If that's the case, you're getting steals runs and batting average, even if you're not getting much in terms of, of homers or RBIs, the, well, I mean, I if you're not getting much in terms of homers or RBIs. I can't say the crazy thing.

I feel bad. It's not the right choice of words. Choose your words more carefully. The surprising thing for me with Nicky Lopez, 12 of those steals have come since August 1st. They've been coming in bunches later in the year. And I think it's tempting to always see a player who's running more later in the year and wonder if that might carry over that rate of taking off, if that might carry over over full season, because that would point towards more like a 30 plus steal future. If Lopez does that, and we know this is an organization that will run. So I think that's where some of that extra

optimism comes from. If you're looking for affordable steals in the future. Yeah, I do think it's funny for you. You mentioned, I think you were sort of mentioning it in a fantasy perspective of like, you know, you can have Nicky Lopez on your team if you, if most of your other guys hit for power. I think that is actually kind of important on the, on the, on the real baseball side of things too. Like the way I was talking about, you know, the twins, maybe just having one-0 in their lineup at shortstop and figuring it out. I wonder if you really want to have a lineup that has Lopez, Merrifield, and Mondesi in it. You're talking about potentially the group having a below average OVP. As a group not really standing out in power,

although Monacy has obviously some abilities there. It's three positions in the lineup that aren't doing things that other teams are doing. Now, if you want to lean into it and just be the go-go Royals, that's fine, but they haven't quite done that either. Maybe it just means that Whit Merrifield is going to be traded. That's something we talk about every offseason. It is every window.

We don't have transfer windows in Major League Baseball. We talk about trades in July. We talk about trades around the winter meetings every single time. We talk about Whit Merrifield. The last four cycles it's been Whitmerryfield, trade, question mark. And he's still there. He's still doing Whitmerryfield things. I think with the Royals, if they're going to do something different,

it's worked for them before. Their recipe to win the World Series was not the typical path to get there. And I do think they could build something with this core. I mean, I think Mondesi, I think you alluded to this, has some power. It's just, can he stay healthy? If he's a 2050 guy over a full season, he's a star, and we're head over heels just excited about what he's been able to do. Then he's not just the speed guy,

but he's a guy that adds a ton of speed on top of a profile that's maybe good defense at one of the middle infield spots, plus that power. If it's Lopez and Merrifield, two guys like that, I think that can work if you're an elite run prevention team. But where you stop becoming an elite run prevention team is when you start trying to find the undervalued power guys to jam in the corners that's when you start to lose a lot defensively so i think that's sort of the the give and take that the royals are stuck trying to rectify yeah it's interesting right now the top of the death chart in fan graphs for the royals are Top of the depth chart in fan graphs for the Royals are Mondesi at third,

Lopez at short, Merrifield at second. Taylor is one of the elite defensive center fielders in the league, and Benintendi and Isbell on the corners are also good defenders. Right now, this actually looks like a go-go defense first kind of lineup with Santana being kind of the outlier um and you know they're using Sal Perez in in some DH moments too so maybe what we're seeing is the phasing out of the Hunter Dozier Ryan O'Hara and crowd right and the gradual sort of uh finding of a like you were talking about with the Rangers you what's the narrative? What's the guiding light? What's the philosophy?

Maybe the philosophy here is defense and speed. I just, I'm going to look right now. My guess, what's your guess before I tell you where they rank in OVP in the league? I'll say 23rd. That's very specific. 24th. Are you a psychic? No.

That's pretty crazy. I spend too much time at FanCrafts. No, but I think that's meaningful because all those guys that I met, all those guys that I labeled contributed to this 306 LVP. Yeah, I mean, even Sal Perez, for as great of a player as he is, he's generally not going to be a positive in that particular area. But if he's going to mash 40 home runs, I guess you're not as worried about it than if he's going to be a 20 home run guy.

But if you say they need a first baseman and a DH to hit for power, okay, of all the things you go to an offseason needing and pitching like everybody, first baseman and DH, they come very cheap at this point. They're very affordable. They fit the overall model there and you can allocate the larger share of your resources to addressing the pitching problem. Now, I don't know. Can they go get a splashy free agent pitcher? Every team should sign Robbie Ray. That's the other. Every pitcher should go to the Giants, but every team should sign Robbie Ray because you need innings. You need a veteran who can come out there and pile up Ks. Even if you're going to regress him with the walk rate a bit, he's still probably a pretty big upgrade for you as a group, right? So I don't know who exactly it is, but I do think the things the Royals need are not that difficult to get for the most part

to sort of bolster that offense and push it a little closer to what could be a slightly below league average unit. And if they're a lead at run prevention and they find some more bullpen arms, they find a way to get some of the young pitching to develop, they could actually surprise some teams or surprise some of us in 2022. I would look at their pitching development program as an opportunity for improvement because what I see are a lot of high picks with great velocity and some okay movements on their pitches, but I see inefficient use of the pitches in terms of not necessarily using their best pitch the most.

I see some awkwardness with some of them. Should they be throwing a four-seam or should they be throwing a two-seam? Lynch came up as a two-seam guy. He's throwing the four he's throwing the four seam now but the four seam doesn't have good numbers in terms of the stuff it doesn't have a good ride so i think a new pitching coach and then maybe an addition of somebody like marcus stroman could be a really interesting duo where they might actually lean into sinkers because they seem to draft guys that use sinkers, lean into the sinker side of things and use a plus plus defense to convert those balls in the ground into outs and just kind of lean into an old school philosophy and be like, yeah, we're not chasing barrels. We're not chasing four seamers with ride and strikeouts. We're going to put the ball on the ground and we're going to pick it and we're going to run and we're going to

do this in an old school way. I could see that actually working, but right now I see them kind of stuck between the new school and the old school uh especially when i look at their pitching program so um i think that they need to look at that a little bit and i and i kind of doubt that they will i mean they just promoted uh their their their leadership uh up a rung there's not really much impetus uh that suggests that like they need to go and look at themselves internally and improve their processes. The other thing that I really need to throw out there too with the Royals, both Bobby Witt Jr. and Nick Prado are hitting at AAA. Bobby Witt Jr. is putting up great numbers in Omaha.

Nick Prado has been a great turnaround story in the minors this year too. 31 homers combined between AA and AAA, really showing that he's going to be a future regular and an impact regular at first base. So there's two more quality offensive players that bring up the floor of that group that are probably on the roster in the early part of next season.

Bobby Witt Jr. could be called up among the first players promoted in early April in in 2022 and prado might not be far behind i suppose that's why uh they have all the optimism and they and they promoted their uh promoted their people because they they feel like this is the core um but i'm just nervous because they had all these dang pictures they. They spent high picks on. They spent draft resources on. They spent time on. And they're not hitting their best outcomes yet. So this might really work out actually in this other way that I'm thinking of pitching these days,

which is that starting pitching takes longer to gel. And starting pitching takes longer to solidify. Just in terms of the skills and the mental aptitude that you need to be a starting pitcher. There's more pitches you have to master. They have to master the sequencing of them, the movement of all of them and the mentality of getting through five innings while throwing basically at your maximum velocity and throwing your best pitches the most often. I think that's a very complicated thing to navigate. And I think that's a very complicated thing to navigate. And so what we're seeing is that pitchers are becoming viable everyday starting pitchers kind of later in their career.

And maybe the Royals are galaxy braining this and they're just all those guys are struggling now. And two or three of those guys will gel next year. And Bobby Witt will come up and we'll be talking about what a great rotation the Royals have and how they can pick it at every spot in the field and Witt pushes Merrifield to right field and all of a sudden their worst defender

is Witt Merrifield in right field. I don't know. I guess it could still all come together. I just look at Lynch and Singer and think why aren't we getting more out of these pitchers? Fair question to ask for sure.

And the struggles of Jackson Coar, I think that's part of it too. Asa Lacy doesn't look as close to big league ready as we would have thought coming into the season. There's a lot for the Royals to solve on that side before they're going to be able to take that step back up and push the White Sox. There's still a pretty clear gap. But I think the most important thing that you said about the Royals, at least in my head, is they have an identity. They have a plan. They have some things they're trying to do. And I think in fantasy baseball and regular baseball, it doesn't matter. In a long-term scenario, you need to have a direction.

You need to have an identity, and they're at least among the teams that have one, even if their identity is very different than what most teams in the league are trying to accomplish. Yeah, I just looked at their middle half in sinker usage, and some of those pitchers, Daniel Lynch, he had a super sinker. Everyone loved his sinker.

It's kind of a strange combo. Yep. Strange indeed. So we got through seven teams out of 15. That leaves us eight more AL teams for Wednesday. And then, of course, the 15 NL teams to get through next week. Which actually, hey, that's not a bad plan. It's that time of year we can check in the playoff races, which we'll do every week on Fridays. We're only

two weeks away from going to the daily format with the postseason. It's going to be a lot of fun having that show every day. You were tired of us now. Then we'll give you once a day. You're really nice and tired of us. The good news is we're not going to do 66 minutes every day.

I would have fun. I would break, but I would have fun breaking. That's the way I would describe it. I kind of feel like I'm breaking anyway, so I don't want to go down that path any further. I'm trying to duct tape it back together, trying to get there. But I think the short shows during the postseason

are going to be a lot of fun. So if you enjoyed those postseason shows a year ago, we're doing them. We're just doing them in a way that is probably a little healthier for our sleep schedule. I think it's probably the way I would describe it, especially for Brit being on the East Coast. I also just don't think that, and feel free to tell us we're wrong in email form with lots of yelling. Hopefully caps, caps, put some caps in there.

Love all caps. No, just kidding. You guys aren't like that. Hopefully caps, caps, put some caps in there. Love all caps. No, just kidding. You guys aren't like that. The idea that I don't think that after a game,

even a really good game, maybe after a really good game, you want to be on Twitter and see everyone jumping around, that sort of deal. But I think for the most part, after the game, you turn it off and you go to bed. So the idea is to have something that goes up in the morning that can function as either a more in-depth recap,

something we noticed that maybe not everyone was talking about, or also just looking forward or kind of looking at things from a higher viewpoint rather than right after the game, we'd be talking about whatever this play or that play and be jumping around the room, basically. Yeah, I mean, I think if we get to the later part of the postseason, maybe we'll have some watch parties or we'll do some stuff depending on what's happening in a series that might be

in the evening, but doing the show in the morning and having a chance for people to jump into the live stream and ask questions along the way. It's all stuff that we're excited about. Had a lot of great ideas come in via email about possible merch items. And one I thought of when you said something about eating a hat earlier, which is kind of a common expression almost in this show, especially when it comes to wagers. I think we should find a company that will manufacture some fruit snacks for us in the shape of a baseball hat. So that way you can eat hats. We can just sell them.

Just regular fruit snacks. Nothing else added or anything like that. It would be nice if they were branded. That would be hilarious. Yeah, so some eat a hat gummies. Eat your hat. Eat your hat gummies. So that's on my list, among other things.

Keep the emails coming, by the way. If the Brewers make the World Series, I promise you for Derek that me and Derek will do something with beers live during a Brewers World Series game. I might put my microphone on mute and do the blurry face dot, even if that's happened. Just to blur yourself out. Just to blur yourself out. Just to blur myself out. I'll be there. I'll be present, but my focus will be in a different place.

No video. We'll just put a live mic on in the room while we watch. I mean, wow. Is there a better way to lose your job? Yeah. If that's how it all ends, I ends, that's how it has to be. Okay. We're workshopping this.

We're workshopping it. We'll figure it out. Usually after about minute 61 on the podcast, we just start throwing things out there. And yeah, canned koozies, of course, that was a good idea. But man, the gummies. Oh, I just want the gummy bears. What's the name of the company that makes the good gummy bears haribo haribo i wonder if they're interested in making hats especially if we explain why why would you like baseball cap gummies sir well i'd like to just say i'm eating a hat

well when you lose a bet yes so. So lots of fun things coming. Keep the emails coming. There are a ton of emails in the inbox, probably going back to about July that I have either read and started to respond to or thought about responding to. And then, you know, like a box or something had to be packed or I had to drive 400 miles that day. And then I got exhausted and then more emails came in. And it's no, no we it's terrible we're we're yeah we spent uh we spent some time before we even got on here talking about an email so we're the emails are jogging stuff loose even if you don't always uh hear about it uh

directly right away it definitely helps us shape the future of the show yeah and the quality of the feedback that people send is greatly appreciated. It's very thoughtful and it's only going to make the show better. So continue to pass along ideas, suggestions, your thoughts, things you like, things that you don't like.

Not all caps is preferred. We don't really get emails like that. So don't be the first one to send us an all caps email because it would break a streak. The other thing you can do if you're enjoying the show, of course, is always drop us a rating and review on Apple. Don't let the haters win. If you're watching us on YouTube,

hit the like button, subscribe to the channel. Hopefully down the road, among the many things we've discussed over the years in this pod, some more fun videos. We've had hundreds of ideas almost that we haven't executed yet, so they're still out there they're on whiteboards they're in notebooks there's still more time that's that's kind of a big part of it

and um hopefully i'm not moving across the country for a little while so that would be terrific to just you know calm down and execute some ideas but drop us a line rates and barrels at the athletic dot com on twitter he's at you know saris i am at derrick van riper that is going to wrap things up for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We are back with you on Wednesday. Thanks for listening.