Rates & Barrels - Britt talks to The Commish, the Astros' case for Best Team in MLB, and dismantling bottom feeders

Episode Date: June 25, 2021

Eno, Britt & DVR discuss Britt's recent interview with Commissioner Rob Manfred, a birthday no-no to Eno courtesy of the Cubs, the Astros' case to be considered the best team in baseball, Jacob deGrom's bid for the NL Cy Young and NL MVP awards, and the most likely candidates to be dealt by the O's, Pirates and Rangers.  Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow Britt on Twitter: @Britt_Ghiroli 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 for just $3.99/mo to start: 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, Eno Saris, Britt Giroli here with you on this Friday, on this episode. We will discuss the interview that Britt had with Commissioner Rob Manfred earlier this week. I laugh as I say it just because I don't know if I should call him Commissioner Manfred or just Rob or how I should refer to him or that guy that no one likes. Whatever we do, it all feels wrong. Like we'll get into that interview and some responses that he had to some questions that Britt put out there that I thought were pretty interesting. The Cubs threw a no-no, combined no-no to celebrate Eno's birthday

on Thursday. So probably the coolest thing that happened on Eno's birthday, actually, even though the Dodgers walked a million times in that game. We're going to talk about the Astros because no one likes to talk about them and they're actually really good and they might be the best team in baseball. We got that going on for us. We're going to try and break up several bad teams. We're going to break up the Orioles, the Pirates, and the Rangers because there aren't that many spare

parts. Feed on their carcasses. There's not much there to pull off of them. You got to put three bad teams together to find a few interesting trade pieces. I had to Frankenstein that part of the rundown. But let's get right to it. Britt, you had an interview with the commissioner himself just a couple days ago. It was two days into the new enforcement of the sticky substance rules.

And you talked to him while we were all thinking about Max Scherzer versus Joe Girardi and Sergio Romo getting the belt off like he had three minutes to get through security before catching a flight. But things weren't as bad as those two incidents at the time that you spoke to him. And after reading the interview, I think it actually, in a weird way, sort of calmed me down. It was like, okay, the way this is happening, for the most part, it's not that invasive. It actually seems like a reasonable way to implement these procedures compared to some of the ridiculous alternatives that we could dream up that would be much worse. Yeah, I think I was comforted, certainly, because I think it's easy to sit here and be like, everything's a mess. Sergio Romo's taking his pants off.

Max Scherzer's going nuts. We'll get into the numbers a little bit later, but it's working. Guy spin rates are down. For the most part, I think the novelty is going to wear off of checking these guys. I do think moving the checks to the dugout away from the TV cameras would probably make this less of a spectacle. to the dugout away from the TV cameras would probably make this less of like a spectacle. It's almost like become a little bit of an entertainment value because it's new and people want to know what's going on. But, you know, it's is it perfect?

No. Do I agree that Joe Girardi should be able to challenge something in the middle of an inning? Absolutely not. I think that needs to go away. And I asked Manfred about it. He said, no, right now they're going to continue to allow managers that power. But, you know, it's something they could revisit if they continue to see guys abuse it for gamesmanship. You know, I go back and forth with it. Yes, Manfred is not charismatic.

He doesn't have a whole lot of charm. So everything he says is very dry. But you're right at the heart of it. Like this is they're correcting a problem. And imagine if they were super tough on this, right? We'd be on this podcast crushing the sport for not being tough on cheating. So they are tough on cheating and now people are complaining. You know, I saw something in, from Jen McCaffrey with Garrett Richardson talking about how tough it is to adjust. And he said, oh, I, you know, I've only had like a week. How have you only had a week? This has been going on for two years. And a month ago, they made it clear that punishment was coming. Enforcement was coming. So if you chose to wait until Monday to make this adjustment and

to go cold turkey, that's kind of on you. No, I mean, you've, you've known this is coming. The threat of it is coming. And now you wait until the last second. So now you're having issues. I guess I just don't really have a whole lot of sympathy for those guys, right? Like was Max Scherzer using before? Probably because his spin rate was down like a lot of guys, but did Max Scherzer still find a way to strike out eight Phillies and get through that game? Yes. So the good pitchers are still going to be good. And I guess I just don't really have a whole lot of empathy for the guys that are making excuses that, oh, we only had a week and I feel so out of whack. Like, it's kind of on you, bro. Yeah. You know, Rob Arthur had a great piece out today that showed the spin rate started dropping May 15th. So, you know, there were people that were starting to wean and somebody said you should call them the weenies.

But anyway, there were people who are trying to wean starting May 15th. There were people that saw ahead and saw this problem coming and were dealing with it. But I will say that I have a little bit of sympathy because baseball has this rule has been on the books for years and baseball has been talking about this for a couple of years. So I think that there's like a little bit of skepticism maybe from some players being like, you know, whatever, another memo, you know,

like who cares? But this last memo, I think, you know, was the one where like, oh crap, they're actually going to do, you know, when Ken came out with the details of like what they're going to do, I think people were like, oh crap, they're actually going to do, you know, when Ken came out with the details of like what they're going to do, I think people were like, oh crap. One thing that I wonder, so the numbers here, the numbers, uh, about if you take the like most liberal definition of timeframe, cause it's kind of hard because some people were weaning. So it's kind of hard to catch the right timeframe for definition. It's kind of hard to like nail this correctly but i took the a liberal definition of two standard deviation

change uh 54 players are down two standard deviations it's like 230 rpm or more um and that represents 15 of the population now when we were going into it, we got about 30% and 40% guesses about these guys that would drop that much. I think that 30% might still be right because A, we're only one turn through the rotation so far, not even fully. And B, there's going to be some who continue to cheat because if you look at the way they're doing it

that's very rote you know what i'm saying they they came up with this idea they're like we're gonna check this this and this what about some other place you know like why not put it uh like on your jock or like you know i mean like why not put it like in your armpit or something it just looked like you're itching armpit i don't don't know. There's got to be other places. People had it on their neck. I think the hair, the hairline, you know, behind the hair would, you know, you take your hat off and the hair covers it. So there are still places you can cheat. And so I don't think we're going to get the full 30% off of it.

And then we might settle in at like 20, 25% leaving still 10% of cheaters out there. I think the other question that came up in the interview, Britt, that you put out there that I thought was pretty compelling was just that you wondered if Manfred should be more public facing with all of this, right? I mean, we've looked at this and he has not had a actual press conference in well over a year the last time i saw him speak was opening day last summer the delayed opening day nazi hankies game that went into a rain delay and manfred was on that game i think it was an espn like nationally televised game and lightning was across the back of the sky thunder Thunder was crackling because, you know, why wouldn't it be, right? Perfect, perfect scenario. Do you think Manfred needs to be out in front

from a public standpoint? Like, obviously he's working behind the scenes and has a cool team working on this, but he pointed to Theo Epstein being available because he's closer to the research. Like, is that appropriate? Or do you think Manfred owes the fans and the league as a whole a more public presence here?

Yeah. So I'm glad you brought that up. And also thank you for saying my questions were good because I feel like being put on the spot very quickly and being told, hey, you're going to get Manfred and having almost no time to prep. I was like, oh, man, I'm going to get crushed. You were working on a different story. You had another column written that you scrapped, huh? Yes. And the point of the column was we haven't heard from Rob Manfred. And I said to MLB.

Oh, you can get him on the phone now then. They're like, wait. And so you know that my column was probably one, a torture and two, like true. Because I went through that morning and I asked people that we work with at The Athletic, like, hey, how often does Gary Bettman talk? Well, turns out like seven times. Like he had video conferences since like this pandemic started. How often does Roger Goodell talk? Well, turns out he had an in-person and a Zoom thing in February, whereas Rob Manfred and MLB blamed the pandemic and said, well, he can't have a spring training thing. Well, I'm sorry.

The Super Bowl was in Miami in February and Roger Goodell still did something. So I kind of was like tired of not hearing from the commissioner of the sport. And so I did, as you know, said I had a different story going. And then all of a sudden it was like, wait a second, we can get you Rob Manfred. And I was like, whoa, whoa, just me alone. Kind of scared. So I quickly, it was within the hour you know um and he's he's very defensive yeah he's very defensive he's not charming it's not i've talked to bud selig one-on-one and it's

almost like grandpa bud this was very like you know he was not going to- Lawyerly and- Yes. And so I kept saying, and I said at the end, because this was my sole point is, okay, it's great that Theo is taking an active role. It's great that Michael Hill is speaking in these memos. Neither one of those guys is the commissioner of the sport. I want to hear from Rob Manfred. the sport. I want to hear from Rob Manfred. I want to know what he thinks of Max Scherzer in Philadelphia and Sergio Romo dropping his pants, right? Like, I think if you're the commissioner, whether you're good at it or not, a big part of your job is talking to the media and talking to

the fans indirectly through the media, right? It's presenting the sport. And I think your job when you make difficult decisions is to explain those difficult decisions so that we don't sit around here with our conspiracy theories. That's how conspiracy theories start. Lack of information, lack of transparency. So to me, I think Manfred almost had to speak. You know, I know people are like, great, Geddy never talks. I think I just lucked out and kind of was maybe the last person me i think manfred almost had to speak um you know i i know people are like great get he never

talks i think i just lucked out and kind of was maybe the last person that drove the nail in the coffin of like where is this guy shouldn't he be proactive um you know i think if you're out in front of stuff as you guys know like if you're out in front of i don't know like a fight with your spouse if you're proactive instead of react it always just better. It's a better way to do it. And I hope, I know Manfred's probably going to speak at the All-Star break. But to me, when you move the All-Star game, you change the draft, you fundamentally change the way the minor leagues are going on. which, correct me if I'm wrong, but it's pretty unprecedented for a sport to all of a sudden change, not even change a rule, but drastically change the way they enforce a rule in the middle of the season. I would like to hear from the commissioner. You know, I don't think Theo's going to cut it in that kind of a scenario. Personally, I think whether you agree with Manfred or not, it was nice to finally be like,

oh, this is what Rob Manfred thinks. He thinks it's going great. Well, I don't. But at least you had a sense of here's what the guy in charge is thinking. So then you can hate him, love him, whatever. Yeah, have some perspective. I mean, I think it helped us be like, okay, there's some people who look at this and say, it's fine. Yeah, I think that it probably did some good by talking to you, finally. But he didn't come from a marketing background. He's like a lawyer. And so I have to think about his lack of being out in front on this one

through that lens. And so to me, it's all about the CBA. It's all about the coming fight with the players and the collective bargaining agreement that he does not want to be out on this player enforcement issue at a time when they're at the negotiating table. You know what I mean?

I think he wants this to seem like, oh, it's just like an enforcement thing. So talk to my enforcement guys. Talk to Mike Hill and Theo Epstein. You know, this isn't like a state of the game thing. It's not a Rob Manfred thing, you know? Like he probably, he might've called you because Max Scherzer said, these are Rob Manfred rules.

Yeah, I asked that question. I said, like, how do you feel when you hear that? And he said in the interview, oh, they had a chance. You know, then he took some shots at the union, which is always like kind of what happens with these two. The union had a chance to give their input. However, if you're the union, hitters are thrilled. You guys saw what Chris Bryant said earlier this week. We know that other hitters have been vocal about this needing to change.

So if you're the union, you really can't do much of anything. And also, the union could have went to Theo Epstein or Rob Manfred and said, we want this, this, and this. And the league would have been like, cool, we wrote it down and we threw it in the trash because this rule's already on the books. So we don't need you at all. You have no input here. Thank you.

But it is like, there's a strike zone on the books. And it's a little bit like in the middle of the season, them being like, okay, we're going to start calling the strike zone at the knees that we don't normally call or whatever. You know, they don't do that. No. I was just thinking about an example from another sport. I was looking for one a few days ago and I realized that in the NBA playoffs, Giannis from the Bucks takes forever to shoot his free throws. The rule on the books is 10 seconds to shoot your free throw.

He takes 12 plus. It's been written about on The Athletic. I think Sam Amick had a column about it today. And the hard thing about it is if you don't enforce that rule all season or you start selectively enforcing it on one player in the playoffs, you're moving the goalposts even though you have that rule on the books, right? And it's much less, I think, impactful than changing pitchers as much as this enforcement changes pitchers there's more of an injury component that we're worried about too right like but but if they start to enforce that on janice it'd be like the how that's how max and romo feel yeah i mean you would you'd if you were again we're not a basketball podcast but you'd

hack janice a lot more knowing if that rule is going to be enforced because you're putting him on the line a lot more he's probably not making those free throws shooting them faster so you know you can't change how you apply rules to a game on the fly this is part of why it's messy but my last thought here is like this was going to be a problem no matter what they did like no matter how they solved it people were going to complain all in all i don't think it's that unfair maybe standing there on the field while fans watch with your arms out like that, maybe something about that's a little bit awkward or embarrassing. It seems like most players aren't that bothered by it. And it seemed like Scherzer was more bothered by Girardi having him checked multiple times. This was more Scherzer versus Girardi and then being mad that Manfred enabled that scenario to even play out rather than it being this whole process is garbage. But the difficulty of that is that that is what's on in the rule book. Right. So taking that away from managers, it's actually a change of the rule book, whereas nothing they've

done so far has been a change of the rule book. You know? Yeah. Yeah, that's fair. Although. But I think that managers should just shut up and not – because if they're being checked twice, any requested check from a manager is a dick move. Yeah. I'm all. Yeah. I also feel like you said, if we have all these weenies, which by the way, I'm totally stealing. We have all these weenies and then all of a sudden they jump up like four or 500 RPMs in, in the next inning.

Well then in between innings, say something to the umpire, right? Like we have the data. You don't have to do it in the middle of an inning. To me, that screamed gamesmanship. I think there should be,

you want to keep the managers involved. Fine. But it should be, it should be in between innings. If they, they, they have to have that data, right?

It's on Savant. That's what I was saying about, about Joe Girardi. He'd be like, Joe, look at Savant. He's what I was saying about Joe Girardi. Be like, Joe, look at Savant. He's not cheating. He's down like 350, dude. Yeah, if you're going to do that, you should be pretty certain that you're right.

And you have good clues, good indicators that would make you very confident that you're making that challenge, making that claim at the right time. If you want to check out that full interview, get a subscription to The Athletic. $3.99 a month gets you in the door at theathletic.com slash rates and barrels. As we mentioned up top, the Cubs had a combined no-hitter for Eno's birthday. One of our listeners pointed out this is actually the first no-hitter

since we did our no-hitter draft about a month or so ago. We didn't have Cubs combined no-no as one of the things we drafted. But Davies was, I think, fits the bill that I was kind of trying to go for. He is on your rubric as just a guy that usually throws a lot of innings. And because of walks, he was unable to get deeper into this start. But the Cubs bullpen, their A bullpen has been good all year, and that was on full display against the Dodgers last night with Chafin, Ryan Tepera, and Craig Kimbrell finishing it out.

And Kimbrell legitimately did not realize that he finished a combined no-hitter. You could see it on his face as everyone runs out onto the field. Someone tells him, like, no, we had a no-hitter. And he's like, oh. He was so focused on the game that he didn't even realize it was a no-hitter. Those combined no-no's are awkward. I saw one

on TV as a fan in Atlanta in the 90s and everyone's like, yay. There's something about the no-no being the one guy that everyone celebrates with. But if Kimbrel's out there on the mound, then Davies did a lot of the heavy lifting. Who do you run to hug?

Davies. Kimbrel! Thanks for cleaning. Yeah. who do you run to hug Davies? Kimbrough. Thanks for cleaning. Yeah. Hug the guy who definitely knows that it was a combined no, no. Cause he was out there for two thirds of it. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, here's the interesting thing to me was it was the first time we saw like a really good team get no hit. Right. Like if you're the Dodgers, are you panicking? I started to wonder about the Dodgers, I don't know, I think after the sweep, courtesy of the Padres earlier this week. Keith and I talked about it on the Athletic Baseball Show just as a series that we were really excited about at the beginning of the season, the first time it happened.

And somehow this week it kind of just flew under the radar, relatively speaking, probably because of the sticky substances and everything. But the Dodgers are just starting to get completely healthy again. Muncy just came back. Bellinger just came back. I still look at that lineup top to bottom as one that can do a lot of damage. Seager's only about a week away from the rehab assignment. So once he's back, we're looking at a team

that will continue to be among the league's best offenses. I wouldn't read too much into what's happening to them this week. I think there are some bigger picture things that maybe haven't gone the way we expected. They need more production out of their corner outfield in particular. Left field is where they've struggled. Pollock hasn't been very good. Chris Taylor's been just kind of okay. I don't know. I just look at some of these guys, and I'm surprised that we're not getting typical Dodgers performances from them. But then you look where they're at in the standings, and they're right there in the thick of things in the NL West, right? They're even with the Padres, even though the Padres have played two more games, and they're only four and a half back of the Giants.

And I think we all could say the Giants are surprising us. They're better than we thought. But the Giants probably aren't holding a four and a half game lead all the way through deep into September over the other two teams. Call up Elliot Ramos. Push more chips in if you're the Giants.

I mean, why not? If you think he's ready. Yeah. Sam Wong also was the biggest mover in my new Stuff Plus for the rankings. He actually went from being really poorly rated by Stuff Plus to being really well rated. So Sam Long, come on down. Giants have almost 20 more homers than the Dodgers but listening to you talk I'm like oh yeah Seager belly you know like I can see how that happened and that if I going forward I would bet on the Dodgers to hit more homers than the Giants yeah you know you you did like a lot of research on who's down and I don't want to out guys but the Dodgers were a team that was already outed by

Sports Illustrated how much does maybe this sticky stuff play into this slide? If at all. Listen, I don't want to, I'm not going to name names, but I will say that Dodgers go, I have a list of like the biggest droppers and there are Dodgers at eight, nine and 11.

And I think there's even more but 8 9 11 like at the very top of the list oh 27 yeah there are dodgers all over this list so i don't know are they the most prevalent team at the within the top 10 i would say yes yes. Yes. What's interesting to me though, so you mentioned the home run difference, even with that and even with those injuries, both the Giants and the Dodgers offenses have been 10% better than league average this season. And we know the Dodgers have the up arrow with all those guys getting healthy. That's a clear advantage to them. If they are a team or a pitching staff that is more impacted than most, or maybe the most impacted by the crackdown on sticky substances, it brings us back to the question that we were starting to raise when this first became an issue. If everyone's moving down

some, even the team that moves down the most is taking a hit relative to everybody else. But how much of a hit is it? Do they go from having a top five pitching staff to top 10 or top 15? Are they losing a huge edge or are they losing a little bit of an edge in that area? And then how much can they make adjustments between now and the end of the season, right? What changes can they make as a pitching staff to offset some of the things being so different about their arsenals? Well, I think probably the bet on power sinkers in the bullpen will turn out to be a good one. So, you know, you're kind of is Broussard Gratterall hurt?

Why have I not seen him pitch? I saw him get optioned to AAA two or three weeks ago, I think. But anyway, like a Trinan type, you know, that's, that's not, that's not sticky stuff. That's, that's like just bonkers balls. But you know, then you see Blake trying to go out there against the Padres and throw just ridiculous looking pitches at 98,

99 with ridiculous sink and everything looks amazing. And they just like get a couple of nubblers. Like it's not really like strikeout stuff so you know why the rest of the league has gone towards the strikeout stuff when you see like three little nibblers and all of a sudden the padres win the game um but uh i think generally they're i it is like three or four players so it's not the whole staff. And I think that their offense will start to kick in now. Getting healthy, getting people back.

The offense can offset some of the pitching drop, maybe. I'm still in on the Dodgers as a legitimately good team, even with some of those issues hitting their pitching staff right now. And that NL West battle, I mean, we thought it was going to be a two-team battle. Increasingly, even if the Giants aren't going to win the division, I don't think they're going to crash and go away. I don't think they're going to have an Orioles or D-backs type run where everything regresses extremely hard and they go back to being like a 500 or below 500 team. By the way, those two teams with 20 plus game losing streaks on the road, I saw this on MLB Network this morning,

it's the first time that's happened since the late 1800s. Wait, we have a second team? Yeah, the Orioles. Oh. Yeah. Well, the parody is insane, guys, because I was talking to a scout yesterday with Detroit. And did you guys realize that last month was their first winning month in three years?

Yeah. Wow. Yeah. I mean, I'm actually more surprised that last month was a winning month. I know. I said the same thing. I'm like, oh, the Tiger is terrible. He's like, actually, I'm like, oh, we've been paying way too much attention to the sticky, to the goop, and not enough attention to the Detroit Tigers.

But they are flirting with 500 right now, so they could have back-to-back winning months, which would probably, I don't know, maybe be even longer. I'm not sure. Call up Riley Green. Easy, easy, easy. We did talk about that also on the Athletic Baseball show for today, though, too, because their young pitching is starting to come together. They brought up Manning. He still looks like he's a little… They need some hitting, though.

Geez. They're getting there, though. Torkelson looks a lot better now than he did when the minor league season started. Riley Green, who you mentioned, is having a great season. Dylan Dingler looks like a good value pick. There's actually a lot going right for the Tigers right now. And in that division, if we were looking at the six divisions in the game right now, is the AL Central the easiest division to make up ground in right now? Not necessarily for this year, but just in terms of your rebuilding effort. Can you accelerate year over year faster in the AL Central than you can in any other division in the game right now? Yes. Look at the Indians.

Right. Cleveland's falling apart. Minnesota is an old, kind of flawed team that needs to make a few adjustments on the fly. The Royals are getting better, but they're not a juggernaut. It's basically the White Sox. They're your long-term biggest threat. The White Sox are running like Lurie Garcia

and the White Sox are gettable. I agree. The only other team than the Dodgers that has two in the top 15 is the White Sox. I like that you keep dropping little nuggets in here.

You didn't want to do it, but you keep doing it. It's information. I'm just trying to walk the line because I'm really trying not to scapegoat. This isn't about... I'm not trying to play gotcha. But it's information. It's interesting. I think you could do it with teams, and then you're not calling guys out.

But I would be interested. I'd read an article that were like, these three teams have been impacted the most by this. Yeah. But then you kind of have to show some sort of charter table. Yeah. All the comments, if you don't highlight the players, are going to be like, so who on these teams is it? I mean, it's public info, though.

He's tall. Yeah, it would be the worst game of Guess Who ever, I think, if it came down to that. Let's not do that to ourselves. I wonder, though, in August, if Eno can write like a who's now that now that we've gotten rid of the sticky stuff, who's tops in the spin rate in the post Frisky. Ah, I like that idea. And it's going to be it's going to be interesting because a lot of the people that were at the very top are the biggest dropper. I mean, that's how math works. But it'll mean that the new top is lower than the old top, probably.

Yeah, that's a really good point. Put that on the idea board. I know you've got that within arm's reach at all times. Does anybody want to see the idea board? Are you going to show everybody? Looks really good. Wait, I hope I didn't. I hope anything wasn't.

I'm going to take that off the screen just so people don't steal all of your ideas and I'll pay a couple bills real quick. We have to face facts here. We're talking about the Dodgers maybe being a little down relative to our previous expectations. I don't think anyone really wants to talk about the Astros,

but they're really good. Their offense is head and shoulders the best offense. They're your Astros. They're definitely not my Astros. Maybe they're our Astros. I was talking them up back in March when we were doing the BetMGM promos because I thought the World Series odds were pretty good for a team that has multi-year deep trips into the postseason, certainly has the core necessary to make a run.

Their offense right now is just in a tier of its own. A 127 WRC plus entering play on Friday. The Giants and Dodgers are tied for second best at 110. We just talked about them a few minutes ago. are tied for second best at 110. We just talked about them a few minutes ago. In a year when strikeouts are just all over the place, they still have a K rate under 20% at 18.6%. Only team by far, I think the next lowest team is 22 flat, and that's the Royals. And yet they still have pretty good power. I mean, they don't have league leading power, but they're doing a ton of damage. I mean, they don't have league-leading power, but... They're doing a ton of damage. I mean, the home runs, yeah, they're 101 home runs, so

10 fewer homers than the Giants, but slugging percentage? The Astros are slugging 459 as a team. These numbers are ridiculous, and I think we really have to ask ourselves, are the Astros the best team in baseball? Clearly, they have the best offense in baseball right now,

but they've got some pitchers who are exceeding expectations. They don't have gaping holes on this roster. I think their biggest need is to fortify the bullpen, which is easy to do, relatively speaking, at pretty much any trade deadline. If you're looking at everything today and thinking about the paths that teams have to take to win their division and possibly make it to the World Series. The Astros look like they're in a really good spot right now, as much as I hate to say it. I had a very important thing to tell everyone listening that Dusty Baker is calling this year's team the Big Orange Basket. Right? Is that right? Not the Big Red Machine? He said he played against teams.

He obviously played against the reds teams that were the big red machine and now he wants he said maybe we're the big orange basket i don't know how to feel about that basket what what is a basket like they're togetherness like we're all together in a basket i think he just wanted a word that wasn't machine and the big orange hammock i mean they're they aren't why do i think that's so funny the basket is pretty funny too it's like a such a dot dot dot like what did what did you say it's such a dusty baker thing to say um it you're right nobody wants them to be good but they're good they're averaging over seven runs a game over the last three weeks, three and a half weeks, really. And this is a time when offense has been historically bad.

So it's just crazy to watch. And you're right, Derek. You look at this. There's not these gaping holes. It's not like, oh, we've got to outslug our pitching staff. Their pitching staff has been pretty good, relatively speaking. And, I mean, yes, we talked about how bad the Tigers are, but they absolutely loaded the base. What was it, six of nine innings in last night's game?

That's crazy. I don't care who you're playing. I don't care if it's an American Legion team. That's impressive. It just is. And I think Dusty Baker was the right guy over there to deal with all the cheating stuff, to get them through that. And I understand that people are never going to like them. But I saw something the other day that said their offense is better, putting up better numbers now than they did during the trash can saga.

So are they using something else or are they just this good? I will say this. No Astros are down two standard deviations in spin. No weenies. No weenies. Yeah, and one of my sources predicted that. So if they're cheating, it's not probably in the two ways

that have been most talked about in the last few years. So I thought this pitching staff, I really like it. And what's interesting about it, too, is that it's not necessarily that. At that one point, I've said stuff like, oh, the Astros are all about stuff. And so they bring up guys like Josh James, and it doesn't work out all the time. I look at this pitching staff now, and I want to kind of retract that statement. I think, I think these, they're, they have gotten the most out of very different pitchers. Lance McCullers Jr. and Frambois Valdez could possibly not be more different. You know, I mean, I guess they both have good curve balls, but other than that, one guy's

like a power pitcher with no command. And then they have Framper with a sinker and great command. And then that Urquidy, who's like a change-up first guy in a league that doesn't really love change-ups right now, and he's dealing. And then Granke is just going to throw something that's 47 at you and something that's 88 that doesn't move and something that's 88 that does move. I mean, he's just the kitchen sink right now. I love watching him pitch, man. I think it's just crazy that he does so well with an 88-mile-an-hour fastball. So, you know, I think that they could get – I don't even know what they should get because Javier at this point is in the bullpen. He's going to help improve their bullpen and everybody else is going to be shopping for bullpen help.

So I expect them to do something small and get like a side armor or something like, you know, like get some funky looking reliever, um, that nobody's thinking about, you know, and that, and call it a day. Wait a minute. Hold on. You know, I have to go back to this real quick guys going off script. Uh, you know, the, your source said that the Astros wouldn't be one of the teams that were cheating in this, because I had so many pictures that were like the team that hired the chemist has to be the Houston Astros. So I think that's it.

I think that's just a bum rap at this point. I think that's a bum rap. Why is this? Are you surprised? I'm surprised. Derek, are you surprised they're not on this list at all? I am.

I'm surprised. Yes. Why? Tell us, you know, fill me in. Well, I don't know.

I just don't think that they cheated in this way. I mean, Strom, Brent Strom did say on the record that there used to be like a pine tar rag out, you know, in the bullpen and people used it. So I'm not saying that like there's nobody, especially on the like between one standard deviation,

two standard deviations, there's people there, the weenies. There's probably some weenies on this. I'm sort of eyeballing it, but they don't have any of the like very top users. And it just, maybe it's just by accident because the type of pictures they got, you know,

like, like or Katie change up guys, not going to do it. You know? You know, I don't know. I don't know. You know,

I just, I think it's, I think it's by accident. I don't, I that they but they there are other teams that pursued spin so relentlessly like a team we just talked about that where they kind of shared it more amongst themselves from what I'm hearing behind the scenes. From what I'm hearing behind the scenes. It's interesting. Yeah. Because everything the Astros do. Will be under a cloud of suspicion.

For the next decade probably. It's just the way it goes. But the number of bounce backs they've had. In their offense. Having a healthy Jordan Alvarez. Doing this without George Springer too. Replacing George Springer with Miles Straw. And still having an offense that's this much better. Than everybody else's.

Very impressive. I do like the the variation in their starters like i think they've got a good mix of starters to group that doesn't necessarily on paper if you put them up next to a lot of other playoff rotations you'd probably go advantage to the other side in a lot of matchups but those guys are good enough to hold their own they're good enough to go five plus and because they do different things i think that could also be a bit of a challenge as you get to october as well i think the the bullpen is a little clunkier than maybe you're making it out to be ryan presley is outstanding if christian javier is an extra

starter and he stays in the bullpen that's awesome i think they just need two more like really good relievers that they've got resources they They can find a way to, to make it happen. So I think the reality guys, we're talking about the Astros and they're probably the best team in the game right now. Victory lap time. I said the Astros had the fifth best rotation going into the season. Yeah.

And nobody else really had that. You also said the Cubs. You also liked the Cubs. Oh, just shut up. She just put you right back down within seconds. You had three seconds. I just blew that balloon up. The lawn chair

was just three feet off the ground and Britt sniped the balloon before you even had a chance to go any higher. Incredible. That was record time, dude. That's why you guys invite me here on Fridays. Oh, man. Hey,

I've got a little bit of news I'm just gonna insert here, randomly, that I haven't cleared with anyone. And Britt is gonna find out on air, and I think she's agreed to go. A meetup at Tivoli Brewing on the Sunday before the All-Star game, and the idea is wiffle ball game.

Ah, I like that. Yes? Yes. Yes. Britt is in. Nick Groke is in. We'll see who else is in. You know, some guys are going to be really busy.

Like, you know, Keith Law, like the draft is that day. I don't think Keith will be coming. He's probably not going to skip the draft to play. We've got three writers that are coming. And if you're in the area, you know, come on out. We'll nail that. Like, I'm getting texts right now about, like, what time is good and, you know, stuff like that. I think nail that. Like I'm getting texts right now about like what time is good and, you know, stuff like that.

I think you got to tweet it when it gets closer. This sounds amazing. Yeah. We'll do it after the Futures game, maybe in the afternoon after the Futures game. Yeah. I'm wondering, should we invite like former players that may be in the area where they make us look too bad? Should we invite them if they're only on my team?

I think that would be hilarious. I'd love to look bad. I think that would be in the area where they make us look too bad? Should we invite them if they're only on my team? I think that would be hilarious. I'd love to look bad. I think that would be great. Oh my God, if I got struck out by like a former pitcher, that would be so amazing. Is it too late to make team rates and team barrels shirts and really pump the podcast? Oh my God.

All right. Well, we'll see. We'll see how this ends up going down, but at the very, even at the, just the very basic level of just a wiffle ball game with readers and writers, I think that was just really fun.

So let's do it. And beer, right? We're drinking. Yes. Oh yeah. Tivoli brewing. And beer.

Tivoli brewing. I'm going to have to find a way to just fly in for Sunday and then fly out on Monday. Work expense. This is a work expense. We'll do a live podcast. If it, if it gets you on an expense flight out there. Oh, yeah. That's on the table, man.

That's on the table. Live stream the Whipple. It's coming up quick. That all-star break is only like two and a half weeks away, right? We're closing in on it real, real fast. All right. We talked about the AL Awards races last week, looking at the MVP and the Cy Young situations there.

The NL side is pretty interesting because Jacob deGrom, if healthy, appears to be running away with the Cy Young Award in the NL. And the latest odds from BetMGM have him at minus 450 to win the Cy Young. It seems pretty early to have a guy that far out in front. The other lower odds options, you got Brandon Woodruff now at plus 800. I think he opened somewhere above plus 2,000. We talked about him a bit back in the spring.

Corbin Burns at plus 1,500. Kevin Gossman at plus 1,500. Zach Wheeler and Hugh Darvish at plus 1,800. Is it really in the bag for DeGrom? Performance-wise, it certainly appears to be. It's just a question of health. I wonder, are we really going to get what looks like a normal season from DeGrom here forward? Or do you think it's going to be constant setbacks?

The last couple of weeks have certainly raised a lot of concerns. I mean, you know, if you were projecting innings for DeGrom for the rest of the season, would he be among the league leaders for you? Or would you have to ding him based on what we've seen lately? I mean, I kind of, in like my rankings

and stuff, focus on per inning value because I think that projecting innings is really tough because everyone was sure that Brandon Woodruff wouldn't have that many innings this year. I was like, no, I don't know. He's just really, really good, so I'm just going to make him fourth in baseball.

So I think that's the same thing. I'll have DeGrom first, but if you're asking me if I honestly think he'll be among the league leaders in innings i don't think so i mean it's he's been hurt and the and the pain is like traveling around his body which is uh just concerning to me it's definitely scary and i wonder like what volume of innings he has to reach to win the cy young award because he's got a 0.50 era entering play on Friday. It's just absolutely absurd. 14.6 Ks per nine. Walk rate's low.

Home run rate's low. I mean, of course it is. I'm not letting anyone score runs. If he only throws like 50 more innings but keeps those ratios at historically amazing levels, does he still win, though, even though he doesn't have the wins and Ks? He's on the qualified leaderboard when you're sorting. Can you win it that win, though, even though he doesn't have the wins and Ks? He won't show up on the qualified leaderboard when you're sorting. Can you win it that way, though? Because, I mean, every once in a while, the leaders get in the mix.

Kershaw one year had amazing numbers, 150 innings, and didn't win. Yeah. Well, but what was that year that Verlander lost? Did he lose to Snell? And he made a big deal about it because he didn't have as many innings? Verlander had so many more innings. What year was that? Yeah.

Oh, he lost to Rick Porcello? Porcello. That's what it was. That's right. He made a big deal out of that. Yeah. He made a huge deal. Not a great look for Verlander,

but also looking back, Rick Porcello has a side job. I know. And then Kate Upton got upset and it was a huge to-do. Which, I mean, obviously, if you're married to Kate Upton, why not use that network, right?

Whatever. I guess. Although it doesn't look amazing to me. It's sore losing. I don't often take my baseball knowledge from a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, but I did appreciate the fact that she was getting some interest going in the game.

She was quoting stats and stuff, wasn't she? Yeah. Listen, I think DeGrom's going to get it as long as he comes within the stratosphere of innings. Because he's the best pitcher on the planet right now. So I think as long as he avoids...

The thing that could mess it up is if he has an IL stint, right? If he keeps pitching and they're not super long stints, you can still... Every fifth day, you can still every fifth day you can still in my opinion get enough innings to get there but i think if he misses two three weeks and then they baby him coming back like then just know and i saw something today peter gammon's

right on the athletic about how the mets are like hey jacob de grom can be an all-star but he is not pitching in denver and i support that like he should be shutting it down he should be resting he should not be pitching for all of us in those awful awful ugly all-star uniforms which by the way again off script today dvr sorry but i have got i must say like i'm not into fashion at all, but those were terrible. And if they're going to be terrible and bland, why not have, like, each player's charity on it or something? Why not, like, make them at least worth something? Because, honestly, what was really cool to me, and I remember it was a big deal a few years ago, is every team having their uniform represented on the field. I remember when Manny Machado was almost traded a few years ago, the Orioles specifically waited until after the trade deadline.

It was like breaking during the game, or not the trade deadline, the All-Star game. After the All-Star game. Yeah, literally breaking during the game. Manny Machado was like – So they could have an Oriole out there. So they wanted him to wear that Orioles jersey. That was a big deal. Worth actual money.

Yeah. Now we've totally whitewashed the whole thing like take all the color out they they're literally white boring jerseys and is it is it's is it like a soccer nod or something no it's terrible it's an attempt i don't know it's a cash grab i. I mean, it's another thing they can sell. The hats look atrocious too. I don't know how with the resources you have, you can get any designers you want to work on these projects. How do you come up with this stuff?

There was a really cool project from 2013 that I retweeted yesterday. There was a designer who took the soccer jersey concept and put baseball logos and sponsors into it just to see like, what would this look like? And it was just a really interesting way to do something different, right? You could find creative people that will really kind of push the limits and they'll come up with something that actually... Yeah, like an actual soccer thing would have been better than this, like, you know, with stripes and, you know, like, you know, like a soccer kit, you know? If you're going to do something different, go be different and do it right.

I don't know what happened here. I can't explain it. I don't want to explain it. I kind of want to see what the Atlanta ones would have looked like. Do they have those mocked up? Is that somewhere? Can someone get their hands on that? Isn't there a COL or something on them? On the jerseys?

They probably just took the Atlantalanta design and just morphed it into the is it just the atlanta ones they hastily redid or or or did they have to scrap the atlanta ones completely and this is why it's so bad because they did this in like the last three weeks i i mean i don't know these do look like bad soccer jerseys is what they look like. How do you guys feel about the ones where they were white and black? I hate to go out on a limb and say, nope. I kind of like them.

I thought they were all right. The Players Weekend ones, right, is what you're talking about. This is the first time they've actually had all-star uniforms. So those are the Players Weekend. Oh, that was a Players Weekend thing when they were all white and black? Yeah, that's the Players Weekend, which they're not having this year, somebody told me. I don't know if that's news or not, but let's drop that here on the pod. They're not having a players weekend this year.

I know they feel like because they allow guys to kind of be more liberal with their cleats that they don't need to have a weekend. But I kind of liked it because of the nicknames and the personality. We gave you this little thing, so. We let you wear the shoes that you wanted. Yeah. I was like, come on. Now, wear these jerseys. Yeah.

And here's the other thing, guys. Like, okay, if you're going to make these bland things, then give them some personality. Let them put their nicknames on the back. Have some fun with it if you're going to do these bland jerseys. You know, make them a little more fun. This is clearly, like you said, a money grab.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if you can even blame them changing locations. If you didn't have time to do it, don't rush the assignment. Just stick to what was going on, right? Like, this has I did the assignment in between. We're not going to have all-star game jerseys this year. We're just going to have them wear their own. Yes.

Here's the thing, though. Fixed it for you. It's a business, right? So there was no All-Star game last year because of the pandemic. So they're trying to make more money. Nike signed that new deal to make the uniforms prior to last season, right? I'm guessing that Nike

designed these. These are Nike. Yeah, of course. My guess is that part of their deal with MLB was that they got to make special All-Star Game uniforms to sell. And MLB said, yes, we will sell these for hundreds of dollars and sell ugly hats to go with them. And you will find these at TJ Maxx, Ross, Marshalls, all those places I like to shop because I don't like to spend money on clothes. These will be there.

And I'm still going to laugh at them. When they're $19.99 and there's a rack full of them, I will still. They debuted at like $140 was 400 yeah the authentic ones are 400 what on earth are those made out of how do you who is that for like that is just so amazingly out of touch here's what they should have done if you're going to mess around with the uniforms for the all-star game which is actually i'm okay with that i I'm not so far on the traditional side where I say every team has to wear their original uniform on the field. I'm okay with messing with things a little bit. Introduce your new alternate uniform at the

all-star game. So, you know, when you have every player out there, they're wearing their team's uniform, but they're wearing something you haven't seen them wear before, right? You're putting them out there in what will actually be their team's new uniform, their new third or fourth alternate, whatever. Do that, at least, instead of making these just ridiculous pieces of garbage because no one wants this. Not a single person on my timeline said, no, those actually aren't that bad.

Every single person universally hated them. We don't agree on anything in this world. Not a single thing. But our unified hate for these stupid all-star game uniforms, that might be the one thing that we all actually agree on. Rob Manfred unifying

us. I mean, this isn't even him. I'm not even going to pin this on him. There's so many other people that were involved in this. We don't even get to know their names, but ridiculous. I'm sure there was somebody at MLB that got these designs from Nike and was like, oh, God.

But it was somebody who was so low in the system that they're like, I can't stop this. Because we've all been in those situations where we're like, this is a bad idea, but I know I can't stop this thing from happening. So people gonna hate this but it's gonna happen yeah the uh the other nl mvp or other nl awards the nl mvp award de grom's actually the favorite for that a narrow favorite at plus 125 tatis is plus 200 acuna is plus 375 and there's a massive gap before you get

to anybody else so really nl yeah so we're down to this three-player race on the nl side i'd be much more inclined to steer away from de grom here because if the if the workload doesn't max out in the second half i think he's going to have a hard time sweeping psy and nl mvp even though this season he's putting together has been outstanding yeah i agree he's done he has been outstanding. Yeah, I agree. I don't think he gets MVP at this point in time. He'd have to come back and start pitching seven, eight innings. I don't know if the Mets are going to let him do that.

I agree with you. I think this is a two-person race, right? This is a cuña tatis. I don't see anybody from the NL coming up and making – You don't see Brian Reynolds? Hey, he's having a good year. He's right there. You don't see Brian Reynolds? Hey, he's pipping a good year. He's right there. I don't see Kyle Schwarber, though.

I think he should be mentioned on this podcast because the guy has been completely out of control. I do want to mention again, this is like the last – How about Turner, though? War says Turner is pretty close. He's been good, too. Schwarber has been just insane with the home runs. I do want to say that the Nationals are 500 and people are talking about them now being buyers. So you were one of the early –

So go shove it with the Max Scherzer talk, Eno. Okay, you won't get traded. Fine. People got really upset about that. It was just so early. Britt got upset about it, not me. Nobody else is bugging me. I just felt like this team had a historic comeback in 2019,

and as soon as they stumble in April, people want to pick off the pieces. The buzzards were already swarming, and now they're back at 500. They got Steven Strasburg somewhere. Hopefully, he will come back. And the division is a mess. The division is a mess. It's not the NL West. So, I don't know. Again, just wanted

to point out that... I'm surprised Joe Ross is a capable starting pitcher. It looks like. Pretty mean? I mean, sorry. Yeah, that was so mean. I didn't mean it so mean. I just mean he looks like a capable starting pitcher.

That's great. Still mean. That's great so let's see that still mean that's great yay sorry i didn't mean to like just poop on jill roth um i'm not sure that the same is true for eric betty i'm being mean again oh um you have a point though he's you do again starting is the need okay okay? Can we get them? Oh, segue. Can we get them a starting pitcher from the Orioles? What are the other teams? The Orioles, Pirates? Yeah, we had three. We were going to dismantle the Rangers, the Orioles, and the Pirates.

The Pirates have pitching. It's like Chad Kuhl or something. I think that would be better than – Chad Kuhl plus Eric Fetty, you know, making each pitch two, three innings, and that's it. Yeah, I think the Pirates have Tyler Anderson too, one of your guys. Yeah. And he's a one-year contract guy, so he's a rental.

And he can go deeper into games. I think he's going to be one of the more highly coveted pitchers on the market this summer. Yeah, probably. I think he's going to be one of the more highly coveted pitchers on the market this summer. Yeah, probably. I agree. Because he doesn't require as much prospect cost to get him. Right.

Yeah. In a team like the Nats, like who, who are they giving up? What young talent are they actually giving up to get a pitcher? They don't have anyone. They don't have much. Yeah.

They probably have enough to go get a Tyler Anderson. Right. They don't have enough to go probably have enough to go get a Tyler Anderson. They don't have enough to go out and get someone who's a lot more established. Fair. Yeah. Here's the problem I had, though, is I tried to dismantle these three teams. The Orioles have a bunch of guys with several years of control left, like John Means, and he's hurt right now. So I don't know if this is going to be the time they trade John Means.

It could be a winter trade. It could be maybe next year's trade deadline. Talk about how crappy it would be to trade Trey Mancini in the middle of this season. Yeah, Mancini's still got one more year before he's a free agent. It would be hard to do that. In the middle of a comeback year. He's going to win comeback player of the year. Easily.

It's probably locked up already for good reason. The two position player rentals they have, Freddie Galvis and Michael Franco, one of them fits. I bet you Galvis goes somewhere. Galvis belongs somewhere. He'll be the utility guy for some team. Or maybe they have a shortstop injury

and need to paper over it for a little bit. If you're a team, the White Sox need second base help, right? If you miss on Adam Frazier, if you're looking for Adam white socks need second base help right if you miss on adam frazier if you're looking for adam frazier for help at second base and you miss out freddie galvis might be a fallback option for a team like that so he's going to go somewhere michael franco doesn't play for a contender he's not a bench player even for a contender so you're not getting anything there are you going to move anthony santander with arbitration control through 2024.

I mean, if you get a good offer, great, but, but he's like not having a great season. He's been hurt. I don't know. Yeah.

Yeah. So I don't think you get anything there. Paul Fry maybe is one of their more tradable options. Everybody wants relievers. I think, yeah. Trade a reliever or something. Yeah.

And he's lefty. I think you trade Paul Fry. I think he becomes a guy who you flip to get a couple younger guys because why do the Orioles need him right now? Yeah. Can I trade Paul Fry to the Astros since I love the Astros so much? And they don't really have a good lefty reliever, right? I'm circling through the names that I've got.

Blake Taylor and Brooks Raley are the two lefties right now. Blake Taylor's okay, but I think it might be better to have a better lefty. Tanner Scott is pretty good, but I guess also it's like his first year, so he's still on the minimum. Is he a rookie? Yeah. He was up and down a bunch, but this is like his first real he's here. He's still probably

on the minimum then so i just maybe that doesn't make sense to trade a guy on the minimum yeah so i mean i found this exercise to be particularly difficult with the orioles because i came away with galvis as one guy that goes for sure and possibly the only one unless they're willing to deal players that have some years remaining which is is not out of the question. I do have a way that Tanner Scott gets traded. There are some teams that are right at the luxury tax. So there might be even a team. That's a rich, you call a rich team that just doesn't want to go over the luxury tax.

Like the Astros actually are super close. They are, they're super close to the, to the thing. And they don't want to go over because they already have all these problems from the cheating stuff. They've lost all these picks. They don't want to lose any more picks. So the Astros might be looking for some, I don't know how much Paul Frye is making, but they may pick somebody like Tanner Scott instead because they're like, we need someone on the minimum. Now, Fry should still be on the minimum because I think he's got his three arbitration years coming up after this year.

So cheap for now and not that expensive next year either. Paul Fry it is. That's a good point, though. All right. So we've dismantled the Orioles pretty well. It didn't take long. Didn't get much out of it. Didn't get much extra toothpaste out of that tube.

They're at the bottom of this rebuild. It's all going up. It's all great in like three, four years. All right, so the Pirates, Adam Frazier is going somewhere. He's got one year left before free agency too, so he's not just a rental. We talked about Tyler Anderson a bit before. You can put Tyler Anderson on basically any team that just needs pitching depth, starting pitching depth,

because he's a starter even for a contending team, probably like a number four sort of guy in a seven-game series. He starts one game, maybe gives you some length as a reliever in another. That's probably your expectation for him, right? The other guy is Richard Rodriguez, but let's look at Frazier first. Everyone wants to put Adam Frazier on the White Sox. Is there anywhere else where you see Frazier being a particularly good fit? I think part of the appeal with the White Sox is that they also need a little help in the corner outfield too. If you get Nick Madrigal back at some point, you're looking at a guy that plays second base, Frazier moves back out to the outfield. If you're thinking about next year really in that case, because I think Madrigal,

his injury is bad enough where I don't know if he's even a lock to come back this year. Yeah, I think the Nationals need infield help a little bit too. They could use, I guess, a guy like that. But again, like we said, they're in a weird spot where what are they going to give up? Is it enough? And also, I don't know if they believe they're in yet or not, right? They're kind of a weird buy-sell team. They might just end up standing pat, and nobody really knows what to do with that. But they could use a guy like that. Yeah, I could see. Frazier, this is not based on thinking necessarily about the personnel, but about the flaws.

The Cubs are sixth in the big leagues in strikeout rate. And that's basically Frazier's best skill, is putting the ball in play. So I would say something like going to Chicago, A-0 or N-0. It's pretty interesting that the Cubs are the other possible fit there. And Madrigal is out for the season.

When that initially was reported, there was a chance he'd come back late in the year, but they did update that about 10 days ago to say he's not coming back. They had a full surgery to put the stuff back together. Yeah, it was a little worse than they had feared. So no Madrigal coming back in 2021. So both Chicago

teams are Frazier. Nothing makes me wince. Even the fractured testicle makes me wince less than thinking about tendons ripping off the bone? I'll take the tendon. Both are bad. Let's not want either of these things to happen. Let's not even think about this because we're not going to be happy with either of those outcomes. You look at some other teams that could use second base help.

It's really not that many that are contenders. That's why I think the two Chicago teams make a lot of sense for Frazier. Richard Rodriguez could fit anywhere. I think the question people have from a fantasy perspective is how many of those teams would let him close? And I'm sure you could count the number of teams that would let him close outside of Pittsburgh, probably on one hand,

if you're talking about legitimate playoff caliber teams. But what about the Giants where the closer role has bounced around a little bit? It's been mostly Jake McGee. I guess if San Francisco said, we think this guy's an upgrade, there's a chance he still gets saves if he lands in San Francisco. And San Francisco could use some bullpen help, I think. My issue with San Francisco, though, is do they decide that they're going to go for it because that division that they're in...

Real rough. Yeah. But they banked so many wins. They banked 45 wins already. They have. I mean, if they're in the NL East, I don't think we're even having this discussion about whether they're in or not. But, I mean, if the Giants make the playoffs, it basically means that the Padres or the

Dodgers don't. I think the West can still get three teams in, though. If you look at the way the other divisions are playing, because the East is beating up on itself so much that there's a big gap right now. If the Mets have 38 wins, they're atop the division with a three-and-a-half game lead. They're six games behind the Dodgers or six wins behind the Dodgers right now. That's a pretty big difference. I guess the Mets have six wins behind the Dodgers right now. Yeah. That's a pretty big difference. I guess the Mets have a bunch of games still to make up.

So how those makeup games go will change a lot about where they're at too. Yeah. And then the problem with the third team in a division is you're always playing around your division. So the Giants are at a disadvantage just based on the fact that they have to play the Padres and the Dodgers so much. on the fact that they have to play the Padres and the Dodgers so much. I could see the Giants doing something a little bit different than other teams because I feel like Richard Rodriguez will actually be a hot commodity because he's cheap now, $1.7 million this year. There's two more seasons of arbitration.

He's got the vaunted closer experience, quote-unquote. And every team is going to be looking for relief help i feel like any every contender and i feel like the giants could like they always want to outsmart everybody in the room they could do something like um when the dodgers got uh dylan floro and a couple other guys that were starters right and they and they just said these guys are meh starters, and let's put them in the bullpen. And they were better. Chad Kuhl, I think, could be a great reliever

and maybe give them some length if they feel like they want to do it in the middle of the game. So I think Chad Kuhl is like a... Maybe buy him as a reliever is an interesting idea. Yeah, it's interesting. The Giants, the Astros, and the Jays Maybe buy him as a reliever is an interesting idea. Both kind of operate the same way. Try to be a little more clever. Try to be on the second wave of guys or the less heralded players so they don't get caught in a bidding war because that's a huge deal. You don't want to overpay, especially if you're the Giants.

You've exceeded expectations. You don't want to mortgage parts of your future just to make one earlier push than expected. Their core is still coming up. They still have more help on the way. Two of us have been on mute now during this show, so we're real hot today. Awesome.

Mid-season form. Last team to dismantle, the Rangers, where I think Kyle Gibson has become a more intriguing trade ship than we would have thought three months ago. He's still got a year left on his deal. It's cheaper than this year. So just over $7.5 million for 2022. So you've got Gibson, Ian Kennedy, who's a rental, and Joey Gallo, who's got one year before free agency. And maybe we could throw Mike Fulton-Evich into that bucket of guys that are starting right now that could be relievers and possibly make an impact and not cost you nearly as much as the Richard Rodriguez types. Richard Rodriguez types.

I like Jolie Rodriguez, but he just doesn't have the numbers right now that I think he'll be really desired heavily. I think they might actually end up keeping Kyle Gibson. I think they're desperate. It's just my read, and

it's not obvious that it's true, but that they'd want to get better soon. You know what I mean? Yeah. Just the idea of like, you know, changing GMs and having the new stadium and,

and been in like a rebuild for a really long time. So I think they might keep Cal Gibson. Yeah. Just, they're just so not good right now. Oh, they're terrible. I mean,

well, Gallo is an easy one, right? Because the Padres have interest again. They had interest last trade deadline. they're just so not good right now oh they're terrible i mean well gallo is an easy one right because the padres have interest again they had interest last trade deadline they have some injuries they could use a guy like that um i we know that and the padres take big swings yeah exactly i was gonna say we know they're not hesitant to pull the trigger um so i'd be surprised if he i mean to me that's got to be the front runner for Joey Gallo for his services at this point in time

and if you're the Padres you're not just going to sit around and stand pat at the deadline you've got to make whatever moves you think you can make to distance yourself from the Giants and distance yourself from the Dodgers maybe Gibson stays you're not giving up Abrams

or Gore but maybe like Camposano or something? I don't even know if they'd give him up. I think he's clearly their catcher of the future. I think they asked for Abrams last time and Patino, and the Padres were like, no. Not even close. Yeah. What about something like Haseong Kim? That might be an interesting idea.

even close. Yeah. What about like something like Ha-Seong Kim? That might be an interesting idea. It's not cheap cheap so that

could be part of the problem. Yeah. I think it's 25. I think the Rangers are atrocious. Like I really do.

I think they're just I can't find things about that team that I like right now. You're right. That's a tall order.

That is that's like rebuilding the Rockies and the AL without the detriments of having to deal with Coors Field. Dude, their prospects aren't even that good. That's what I'm saying. They've been at this for a few years. They had a nice run four or five years ago, that initial core, kind of the end of the Adrian Beltre era, and it just doesn't look like their rebuild

has the direction it needs yet. Like they should be a little further along than they are. If you look at that team and say they seem like they're maybe ahead of the curve or were ahead of the curve 10 years ago, in a lot of ways, it doesn't seem like they have that edge anymore. Yeah, I agree with you.

Like, again, I covered the Orioles forever, so I'm never going to think they're not that interesting but i think they're way more interesting than the rangers are there's a lot more things to watch there's a lot more players to watch yeah they might have the best pitching prospect in the minors you know they've got and they've got they've got the ability to make some position players with that park i feel like yes it's a nice it's a nice way to land as a position player. Between Rutschman and Grayson Rodriguez and D.L. Hall, there's three guys right there that I like better than any prospects in the Rangers system. I guess Josh Young is probably the hitter I'm most excited about there, but I don't see that turnaround happening quickly.

I think we've successfully dismantled those three teams. I'm a little higher on Kyle Gibson getting moved than Eno just because I think he actually gives them some good young players back in the return. I think the teams actually buy into what he's doing. Because also because the extra year of control, if you're buying him, you can say we want him for our rotation this year. And then we also have him next year. So I think it makes all the sense in the world before we go a reminder check out the subscription to the athletic for 3.99 a month if you don't have one already theathletic.com slash rates and barrels again read brit's interview

with commissioner rob manfred check out eno's latest rankings and you know be invited to eno's chats which happen right after this show each and every friday on twitter he's at you know sarah she's at brit underscore droly. I am at Derek van Riper rates and barrels at the athletic.com is the email address. If you'd like to drop us a line that way, that's going to wrap things up for this episode of rates and barrels. We are back with you on Monday.

Thanks for listening..