Rates & Barrels - Fernando Tatis Jr.'s new deal, the next young stars primed for an extension, and the next Ben Zobrist

Episode Date: February 19, 2021

Eno, Britt and DVR discuss the Padres' 14-year extension with Fernando Tatis Jr., the next young star capable of getting a similar deal, teams with good (and bad) depth, and history's lack of appreciation for Ben Zobrist's 2009 season.  Rundown 4:51 Fernando Tatis Jr. Early Career Comps 9:13 A Potentially Team-Friendly Deal for the Padres 14:49 Why Tatis Staying in San Diego Isn't Bad for Baseball 18:46 Looking for the Next Long-Term Deal for a Young Star 33:17 Over/Under 3.5 Starting Pitchers with 200+ IP in 2021? 41:58 Teams In Good at Bad Poor Positions with Depth 56:39 Revisiting Ben Zobrist's Incredible 2009 Season Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow Britt on Twitter: @Britt_Ghiroli Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Please consider taking a few minutes to follow out our Listener Survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/athleticaudiosurvey Subscribe to The Athletic for just $3.99/month at theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Peloton. Forget the pressure to be crushing your workout on day one. Just start moving with the Peloton Bike, Bike Plus, Tread, Row, Guide, or App. There are thousands of classes and over 50 Peloton instructors ready to support you from the beginning. Remember, doing something is everything. Rent the Peloton Bike or Bike Plus today at onepeloton.ca slash bike slash rentals. All access memberships separate. Terms apply. Welcome to Rates and Barrels. It is Friday, February 19th. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris and Britt Giroli.

On this episode, we'll discuss the mega extension signed by Fernando Tatis Jr. We'll talk about some other players who might be primed for deals like that in the not so distant future. Got a lot of great mailbag questions that have been coming in. One focusing on all-time great utility players, which is really interesting. It's the Ben Zobris question that I ducked on last Friday's episode. So we're going to get to that among other topics today. How's it going for you on this Friday, Britt? It's going well, guys. Those of you watching on YouTube, I got Starbucks. Talking to my two friends, Derek and Eno. Almost a weekend.

There's ice everywhere and it's freezing here. But hey, I've got power. I've got water. It's better than most of the state of Texas. So can't complain. Yeah, that's kind of how I feel right at this point. I have no grounds for complaining about the cold at this point, given the alternatives elsewhere. What's good with you today?

You know, not much. It's going to be like 60 something here today and I'm going to run outside. And I mean, it is affecting my decision making process. I'm going to spring training. You know, I've been talking a little bit about this and like I'm really struggling with the decision because, yeah, seeing baseball games. Great. You know, going to Arizona, usually one of the highlights of the year for me, actually, because I'm lucky because I'm not like a beat writer has to be there for six weeks. You know, I get to go in for a week or so and and just knock out a bunch of interviews and see some people. And it's usually great.

It's usually attached to going to my AL Labor draft. It's usually definitely one of my favorite weeks of the year. I usually do sort of 10, 14 days. I don't know if I want to go because going to see a game is so complicated now. It's like the mask up and the distancing. There's no fans and i usually will walk the concourse and talk to people and and see fans um then and the interviews are supposed to be like sort of six feet apart if you get them there's no there's no

clubhouse access and some some teams will give you this like sort of uh six foot apart thing and i just um i don't know how casual that's going to be to sort of shout questions to a person six foot away. It'll be it'll be kind of zoom scrum ask. And so I don't know. And then there's like, I guess there's some personal risk. But you know, my parents are about to get there. All of my parents are about to get their second vaccine. So it seems like almost time to get out there and do this sort of thing. So I don't know. I'm just sort of I think this will be I think honestly, I think this will be what we all will deal with in the next couple of months where we're like, is it is it time?

Like, is it time? I mean, all the numbers are getting better, you know, in terms of COVID. And like, you know, like all these people are getting vaccinated. We're, you know, we're like going to get past 100 million soon. And like, at some point, we just have to kind of rip off the Band-Aid, I think, and like, get back out there. And I think that'll be really difficult. And no one, and it'll be almost like a personal thing. I don't think there's going to be an announcement that's like, okay, it's all good now.

Come out of your houses. Yeah, you can leave now. It's safe now. We're pretty sure it's safe for everybody. So you can all go back to what you were doing. It is going to be phases. It's going to be different people at different levels. And part of that's just compared to your family.

My mother-in-law has had her two shots. She works in healthcare. Nobody else in my family has even had their first one yet. So I'm going to be behind where you're at just naturally because of my situation and then the people closest to me too. So it is going to be really nice to have social functions slowly returning, be that you know softball leagues or pickleball or broomball or whatever it is that we all were doing before getting those things back even gradually is going to be great at some point hopefully this spring summer we also can't wait for like a hundred percent vaccinations like that ain't happening i mean have you have you looked around in america recently it's true yeah i mean i think i'd be lucky i think we'll be lucky if we get to sort

of 70 75 so you know there's going to be some guesswork around you know when we can get out there but there absolutely is let's get to this fernis Jr. deal, though. 14 years, $340 million. It broke on Wednesday night. It didn't even seem real when I saw it scroll by. I think Robert Murray was first to that news on Wednesday. And look, 14 years is a long time. My mind immediately just tacked a plus 14 on my age, and I tweeted, oh, I'll be 50 when that's over. Terrible way to think about things. Like me at 50, I'll be gray. I might have a 10-year-old. I mean, maybe I'll have two kids. Like what? I don't want to think that far into the future. But there's a short list of players

that you could reasonably want to sign for 14 years. And I do think Fernando Tatis Jr. is on that list. Look what he has done to start his career. 39 home runs, 27 steals, a 301-374-582 line through 143 games as a 20 and 21-year-old. That's as much as you can hope for. Doing that at the shortstop position now, over a 14-year deal, a shortstop on day one of that deal is probably not a shortstop at the end of that deal. That's a problem for year seven, year eight, year nine, whatever.

We'll get there when we get there. It's got a no trade clause too, which as we've seen with big contracts, doesn't mean he will actually be a Padre for the next 14 years, but there's a good chance of it happening. I like this because it's the Padres. It's a team in a small media market. It is a team that has traditionally not spent money like this. Our friend Jason Stark had this tweet on Wednesday night, the Padres are the first team to have two position players with $300 million contracts on the same roster, which is just staggering to think about that. To me, it's a good sign for baseball as a whole. I know we've got a bad CBA negotiation looming on the horizon at the end of the season,

but let's just drill into this from a few different perspectives. Eno, do you think this was the right call to make a commitment like this to Tatis if you're the Padres? I mean, there's so many ways to attack that question in terms of is it the right call? Because you could talk about dollars per war. And I think from that perspective, yeah, I think it's great. It's basically buying out his arbitration years and then handing him the Manny Machado deal

at the end of it. It's paying fewer dollars per win than they paid Machado or they paid a projected win than Bryce Harper got. So, you know, it looks like a decent deal. Of course, it should be fewer dollars per win overall because they're buying out arbitration years, blah, blah, blah, blah. But I think in terms of dollars per win and projected value, best laid plans of mice and men, he should end up with somewhere around 70 war, a Hall of Fame resume, top 10 shortstop, going into the Hall of Fame with the Padres hat on, and not costing that much per win. That's a lot to say off a guy who has not yet played a full season of all

um so you know when i when i tried to do the comps i looked at uh you know the other way of asking answering the question is what has happened to players who don't been like this before and you know in terms of starts to their career he's up there with pool holes trout acuna jr bellinger s Soto, Alex Rodriguez. And I think you're hoping this is the first Alex Rodriguez deal, basically. You're hoping this is Alex Rodriguez, and it seems like it is. But also lower on the list, Bob Horner, Giancarlo Stanton, and Carlos Correa, three guys who show you that even if they have insurance on the deal, even if his career doesn't end,

there are ways where he could lose value. A jammed thumb here, a bruised shoulder here, a this or that or this. And if he just averages, you know, 100 games per season or 120 games per season, Bob Horner, you know, averaged like 120 games a season for his career and it was over early. You know, I don't think insurance will cover all that and it won't necessarily be the same value that it seems like, and we'll have a different discussion and you know, injuries is totally hard to project. So I,

you know, do I think that he's an injury prone player? Cause he's hurt his thumb and his back. I don't know, but it could turn in that turn out that way. And that would be, I think the worst case scenario. Yeah.

I guess on the flip side of this, I think it's a great deal for the team. If I'm Tatis and I'm 22, it's a ton of money. But aren't you kind of always wondering what if a little bit? You mentioned the Mandy Machado deal, and people seem to have done that math. But the people I talk to think that that's conservative even because you look at arbitration, you look at the CBA, which people think is going to get blown up. That's true. And the way arbitration changes, paying players earlier in their career could become a thing. So even so, I saw estimates of about 50 million that he'd make an arbitration.

So let's say he makes 55 million, which is still conservative. That deal is now 285 million over 10 years it's it's less than manny machado less than harper yeah to put that in perspective also this is probably his only deal this deal runs through 36 yeah which is an interesting time to run it because harper's getting paid till he's 40 right something around there right uh manny was a little bit older when he signed this deal had already made some money in arbitration uh so it's interesting when you look at it and the best example uh to me that i was told was listen did you guys know that anthony rendon and mike trout make about the same average annual value they're about the same AAV a year.

Trout is just a shade higher. We're talking about a tiny little bit. They're both about 35. And Trout was an extension, right? And Rendon is a free agent. Yes. Anthony Rendon was considerably older. He's older than Trout. His deal is less years because he's four years older than Trout.

He's great, a great player. He's not as good as Mike Trout. So it just shows you the plus and minus, right? Trout got a lot of money, but that's still a club-friendly deal. Tatis is getting a lot of money, but this is still a club-friendly deal, barring some kind of crazy injury. You're looking at free agents right now making $40 million a year, and you're going to pay Tatis in his prime years less than $30 million.

That's a great deal. I think that's a great point. And then on top of that, just think of what we were talking about at the top of the show in terms of where society is now and where the economy is now. you just, if you're Tatis and you just say, I'm going to make the 55 million probably no matter what, because arbitration is going to give me that. I'm going to either make that or more over the next few years. And all the while the economy is getting better, then I might hit right in the middle of a boom. I might become a free agent, right? Or I just wait. There's no reason to sign it now. There could be like the next two, three years, the economy could go crazy and you could still sign that extension with more dollars on it. Right. And people agreed. Agreed. The Manny Machado deal was great two years ago. Is it

going to be so great in four more years, which is when Tatis starts the Manny Machado deal? Yeah. Even inflation says you should get more than the Manny Machado deal, even if you're just Manny Machado. Just to play devil's advocate, I agree with Britt's point. If you think about Tatis being a $25 million AAV player over the life of the deal, that's going to look bad later if he's the player that he's projecting to be, which I think he is that guy. I think it'd be pretty much injuries are the main way this doesn't work out. I think it'd be pretty much injuries are the main way this doesn't work out. I do think taking on some risk is part of the deal for the team side. There is some risk here that he does suffer that catastrophic injury.

They have ways to protect themselves. They can take out an insurance policy on the deal. I think there was a pretty big insurance policy on the Prince Fielder deal, for example, when he hurt his neck. That obviously wasn't all money that the Rangers and Tigers ended up paying to Prince Fielder. Some of that was covered by the policy. David Wright, the Mets got that money back at the end. So there's some protection built in, but I think part of this is that it just blows

the previous similar deals out of the water. So maybe that's part of where my mind keeps getting tricked. It feels like there's an appropriate amount of risk really on both sides. Tatis gave up potential future earnings, but the Padres did make a pretty massive commitment to him, at least compared to everything we had seen previously with players in pre-arb situations signing long-term deals. I mean, go back to Acuna and Albies. The Aussie-Albies deal was panned as much as any contract we've seen like minutes after we learned about it. This is a big step away from that, even if it is ultimately a better deal for San Diego than it is for Tatis. And I think maybe the other thing I like about this is what I said up top. It's San Diego.

This is exciting that this is a team spending a lot of money, a team in California where restrictions on fans might be a lot tighter than they are other places. They're going to lose the ability to have people in the stadium potentially for a good share of 2021. That's a real concern for the Padres and the Dodgers, and there they are spending. Having Tatis is a cornerstone on top of having Machado for a long time, on top of still having young, elite, potential big league players who haven't even debuted yet, I mean, C.J. Abrams, Mackenzie Gore, Robert Hassel,

who they drafted in the first round last year, this organization is setting itself up to actually be not only relevant for the life of this contract, but to be contenders for a significant portion of it too. So I just think all of this is actually really exciting. And I saw there was a tweet going around. I want to say it was Thursday and I'm blanking on the name of this person. It was one of the producers for the Mike Greenberg show on ESPN, Get Up. And the argument was that it's

somehow bad for baseball that Tatis is in a small market. I don't think that's the case at all. I think it's great for baseball. I think it's great to have more interest in other places. And when the Padres play the Dodgers, that's going to be a nationally televised game. When the Padres play the Giants, that's going to be a nationally televised game. When they go and play St. Louis or the Cubs, that's going to get on national TV now. when they go and play St. Louis or the Cubs.

That's going to get on national TV now. This isn't a bad thing for baseball that Tatis is in San Diego as opposed to lining up to eventually play in LA or Chicago or Boston or New York. I agree. Also, San Diego can be the new San Antonio Spurs. They're the only team in town. So it's a small media market, whatever.

People don't have to say, oh, do I want to go to the football game or the basketball game or the hockey? No. Do I want to go see the Padres? That's it. So they can be the San Antonio Spurs. That's it. The only ticket in town if they're a good team. Another thing I like about it is just locking up a star for a really long time. I mean, I think that there's a lot of teams using the R Rays model and maybe we're seeing the Red Sox use the Rays model. The A's have long used the Rays model or maybe they started it. But the idea that players are fungible and you're going to move them and only have them for a year or two, I don't think is great for fandom. So having the opposite

of that happen, we're going to lock somebody down for a really long time that associates your two brands, Tatis and the Padres are now a brand together. And if he gets national deals, and he's already signed sort of like an Adidas deal and stuff like that, that's only going to help the Padres. One thing that I don't quite understand is the timing and the money, I guess, maybe they're just making a bet on roaring back to life in terms of attendance and making a ton of money off of people coming to that park because, you know, it is the kind of park where, you know, you buy expensive food, the food is really great and the beer is really great. So it is the kind of park where you drop some coin on non-seat type items.

And I guess they could make a lot of money off it. But, you know, their TV deal is not up for renegotiation anytime soon. And I'm unclear sort of what the play is other than maybe that sort of Spurs angle. It's like we're just going to declare ourselves as the best game in town and keep even in the bad years have like two million people coming to our games at least so it might it's i guess it's an attendance play when nobody else is making an attendance play really yeah isn't it to the new chairman in charge isn't there a new chairman in charge they're risking something they're obviously risking something i'm just trying to figure out the reward i I guess the reward is attendance. Yeah.

Yeah. So I think like the guy previously in charge was not a big spender, right? Fowler, right? Maybe. But yeah, right. Jarrett Seidler. Yeah. I wonder too if like this Seidler guy who's got apparently billions of dollars in LA, like does he have plans to expand?

Does he have other investors that are now going to be interested in the Padres because of these kinds of moves sell I mean sometimes it seems like this this sort of thing happens before selling a team too you'll see um adding a lot of players making you know when you spend a lot on players it sort of ups the value of the the the sort of a perceived value of the team another way of doing it is getting a new stadium. You saw Luria get a stadium in Florida and then sell the team almost immediately. There could be something about either gathering new investors or selling the team. I think this is actually spending off the TV deal that they negotiated, I want to say,

six or seven years ago. We talked about it maybe a month or so ago. They got a pretty good long-term TV deal and are now spending up to that deal after not doing it. I think it's part of that cycle, financially speaking. Let's take a look for the next Tatis deal because the first place my mind went, Britt, I think a lot of people were thinking about Juan Soto once this deal was signed was, well, this seems like good news for Juan Soto. And I think undoubtedly, yes, it is good news for Juan Soto. But you wrote a piece looking at the possibility of Soto signing a similar deal, and it doesn't really look like that's going to happen anytime soon. Yeah, I did speak to Scott Boris, Soto's agent. Listen, I think it's important to remember

that Tatis is not represented by Boris. And when Boris goes into negotiations, he doesn't say this player from another agency got this. No, these team friendly deals don't mean that Juan Soto is going to sign a team friendly deal. We went over the AAV. Juan Soto is a year ahead of Tatis. He's arbitration eligible. He's already making eight and a half million dollars. I don't think there's any way you keep Juan Soto for a first number that starts with three. I think you have to look at those free agency years, look at Boris, who doesn't sign a lot of club-friendly deals, and say that the probability of the Nationals keeping him is slim unless they're going to go out and probably come up with a record deal. I don't think anyone would be surprised if

he matched or eclipsed a deal that Mike Trout got. So, you know, I think I and as you were saying, a lot of people were like, oh, this is probably around where you start the Soto conversation, but it's not. Soto has a lot less risk than Tatis. We've seen him play over a couple years now. We've seen how he holds up. And you can make the case that he may age better in the outfield if we add a DH as he gets older than a guy like Tatis at shortstop. So I think it's kind of apples to oranges, unfortunately. It's a great deal.

The Nationals would sign Soto yesterday, I'm sure, for that kind of money. But it's just great deal the nationals would sign soto yesterday i'm sure for that kind of money but it's just it's just not going to happen we've seen it too many times with boris uh look at what he got bryce harper and juan soto is a much better player than bryce harper oh whoa whoa whoa whoa is that is that a is that a controversial statement i don't think so i think i think the groundwork that juan soto is putting in the early years of his career, it has eclipsed what Harper was doing. And I feel like every time Harper comes up, he gets compared to someone who is somehow even better. It speaks to how good Bryce Harper is that he gets compared to Mike Trout and Juan Soto all the time. But he loses in those comparisons, even though he'd win nearly every other comparison

always worse than future hall of famers that's good yeah i mean he's not this future hall of famer is worse than these future hall of famers but still better than just about everybody else yeah you buy a personality too and i think harper was a bit much for some teams and guys like to tease you you the personality adds to it right guys like soto look the character the personality seems at least now to add to it it's hard at 22 to say you'll be that guy for 14 years but i don't know that kind of factors in i think it'd be easier for tatis to be uh the face of baseball for example than mike trout um just in terms of their their their personalities you know uh it's just easier. If I'm Nike or if I'm a company

that builds these things, I see Tatis as somebody I could work with. Mike Trout, you're like, so what do you like outside of baseball? Weather. Baseball. Oh, I like the Eaglesagles golf new jersey that's legitimately a problem for other players too paul goldschmidt i think always kind of fell into that camp too where it's like as great as paul goldschmidt was as a player there just wasn't a lot there for companies to get excited about for the marketing to get excited about yeah part of it's how those players are presented, but part of it is the core personalities of those players themselves. Tatis, certainly a lot like Ronald Acuna. When you watch him, there's an extra energy around him. And his teammates feed off that, right? And I think that does add to that marketability. But okay, so if Juan Soto is not going to take a deal like this, and that's based on Boris being his agent

as much as anything else, if this time last year we had said Tatis is going to sign a 14-year extension, $340 million, everyone would have looked at us like we were crazy. That's how much things can change in a year. And this was coming off of a shortened season,

no less. But as we sit here today, the early days of 2021 spring training, which players are the best candidates to be on the receiving end of a similar deal this time next year? One quick note about Paul Goldschmidt. Before, because he got dragged by Derek

for being boring, and he kind of is. But he spends the first 20 minutes of every clubhouse availability sitting by his locker in case a reporter needs him, which tells you everything you need to know. Like that's legit. That's like awesome that he does that.

But he is boring. I got it. I just wanted to point that out because I heard it. The interview sucks, but you can get one. But he's there. I mean, that's unbelievable.

I'm not trying to rip the guy. I just, if there's some players that they're not people that want to be on camera. Yeah. They're not craving that attention

and that's not necessarily what Tatis and Acuna do but some people are a lot more comfortable and a lot more outwardly expressive than others and Trout and Goldschmidt

happen to be two great players that they just don't bring that energy all the time. Right, right. It's the Derek Jeter school of the media.

Always be available, never say anything. Right, right. It's the Derek Jeter school of the media. Always be available, never say anything. Yeah, exactly. For sure. In terms of your original question, what about Alex Baum, the Phillies?

You know, he came up last year, was really good. If he has another good year, certainly going, is, you know, their next big guy for the future. Can they afford

to pay Harper, Real Muto, and him? I don't know, but the best way to pay him would be to pay him now right to give him that cheaper long long-term kind of deal um i don't know that just jumped out to me as you know dombrowski's not someone who's who's tight with the purse strings um i don't know i think that maybe we're talking about him in a year. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

I think of Boehm as like kind of higher floor, maybe not the same ceiling as Tatis, but if he showed some more, like if he showed some more power in a believable way, I think, yeah, that's a good name. I think maybe one of the blue Jays. Like we,

I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's Boehm. I don't know if it's boba shett we've been kind of uh lukewarm on him but like if vlady kind of tapped into the power in a way um like he has he has skills that other than his body

he has skills that should age well i mean in terms of he has really good plate discipline really good contact if he was showed the power that we think he can have um then i think you could at least think he'll be a first baseman for you for a really long time so um i think maybe vlady should be on this list um you know i don't think sometimes it's you know it's a it's a marriage of the team and the and the player right like dylan carlson right um youson could have a breakout that could do it, but I don't think that the Cardinals will necessarily plunk that money down. Cody Bellinger. Same thing with the Rays.

The Dodgers. A little bit up and down. Yeah, the Rays. Like Wanda Franco would be the type of talent that I would see with Tatis be like, oh, he'll hit the ground running, be amazing, and they want to lock him up for other months. The Rays aren't going to do that. I know.

I thought the same thing. I'm like, what about, oh, never mind. Never mind. Yeah. It's interesting. I don't think it would be 300 million, but Wander is probably one of the better answers to this question. And I think with the Rays, we saw them do it with Evan Longoria, right? I mean, it was in that era. Who fired his agent after that, yeah.

Yeah, right. I mean, but Longoria at that time, and again, things have changed a lot. This is the benefit of waiting is look at the deal that Evan Longoria signed at the beginning of his career with the Rays versus what Tatis just got this week. Big, big difference more than 10 years later. Franco, I think, is the kind of player that would maybe do it. And if it's one year into his career, he's probably going to get less money. It would also be a shorter deal. It wouldn't be 14 years. I don't see the Rays doing a deal quite that long. I could see more like seven for 150 or something. That's kind of where I could see that long. I could see more like 7 for 150 or something. That's kind of where I could see that going. Wander would then hit free agency in

his age 27 season, if I'm doing the math right on the fly. That's pretty appealing. That's maybe a balance that works. That's the Ray's model is buy out arbitration and then get a couple options on the free agent years, the first two free agent years or whatever.

That still falls short, though. It's half the length of the deal that we just saw. But Beau Bichette was actually the first player that came to my mind because, you guys, I think this has to be a player that plays up the middle. I don't think a team is going to make a commitment of 10 plus years

on a corner guy. Even as good as Vlad is, as much as I like Baum as a hitter, I think that sort of disqualifies them from it. What about Soto? He plays right field. Soto. But there's, and I think he is,

He's such a special bat. He is in his own stratosphere as a hitter. Yeah, he is. Like, he could end up like a top five bat of all time. Right. He's breaking it because of just how good he is as a hitter. I don't know. I think Wander is the most likely player to get something close. Even that's not close.

I actually think Bo Bichette is more likely to get a contract like Tatis' than Vlad Jr., though, because he plays up the middle. Bichette's a tough player to figure out, though, because it's only 75 games so far, so we're really limited in what we've seen from him. That makes him more similar to Tatis. Right. Yeah, exactly.

The slash line, 307, 347, 549. It's half of a big league season, 16 home runs, but that paces out to 30 if he gets a full season. It'd be 16 steals over a full season. He's got eight so far. I don't know how much he's going to run long term. The hit tool's really good, so we're not worried about a guy that's going to so far. I don't know how much he's going to run long term. The hit tool is really good. Right?

So we're not worried about a guy that's going to age poorly because he doesn't make enough contact. And he's 22. Yeah. You're right on the

Wander Franco though. The raise in 14 years. In 14 years, the raise will be the Vegas raise. So they can't actually like probably count on. But maybe this is why it works

because we were just saying like San Diego is stunning to be a team doing this. Maybe that's why it does work. Maybe it is Wander for 14 and 350 or something. Okay, if you were in the position, if you were the GM of the Rays, would you

try to make that commitment to Wander? We were just saying this seems like a team-friendly deal for San Diego. We haven't seen Wander yet. Let's assume Wander comes up and plays really well. Let's just make that assumption. You approach him now. If you really believe in Wander, you approach him now and you try to get him to sign the Robert deal.

Right. The Albies deal. The hypothetical here is that he comes up this year and he's really good. We're like, wow, we've seen only one year, but it was an amazing year. It was everything we hoped it would be because then he's got that shot at the 300 plus million. Yeah. Well, Eric Neander can want to do whatever he wants, but it's really about Stu Sternberg. It's really about the Ray's ownership at that level, right? You're not talking,

when you're doing those kinds of deals, you're not dealing with the GMs. They're in the room, but AJ Preller isn't making that move without the ownership saying you can do it. So I think you almost have to take the GM out of the equation and say, which ownership group is going to be okay with this kind of commitment, with this kind of spending? I mean, Mookie Betts would have been great for the Red Sox to lock up.

That's a team-friendly deal too that the Dodgers signed Mookie Betts to. You look at his value, that's an under-the-market deal for Mookie Betts to. You look at his value, that's an under the market deal for Mookie Betts. Okay, I got one more possible situation. Seattle. It's corporate ownership, but they could be convinced to buy one of those Jared Kalanich or Julio Rodriguez to buy into that long term. It's not enough the middlethe-middle player, but we may see it soon because I think Kellynch will

be up this year. Julio Rodriguez probably maybe near the end of this year or definitely by next year. Anyway, that's one I'd keep an eye on. One last question though, guys. Is this the last time we see this because does the CBA

change the way we pay younger players? If you're a player right now, do you want to see what that new CBA looks like instead? I mean, so jamming a deal in between now and the end of the season? I'm rooting against... If I have money and I'm putting money down, I'm putting money down against massive changes. Because of COVID and because of everyone taking a shortfall player wise i don't think there's a lot of people that have a lot of money in their coffers a lot of you know taste for for like a full lockdown there might be some vitriol but there always is they always talk about that so it's hard to kind of i think that if you just like talk to certain players you'll

get a lot more vitriol right you'll get a lot more like hell yeah we're gonna you know but then you have to think that there's like the faceless voting block of the rest of the players that are not really necessarily talking to you right now so i think that there will be something where they like double the minimum salary uh expand playoffs and get dh and i think that'll be it but if you're doubled i mean these guys that's what that's so you're doubling the minimum salary that'll change you're starting to change the yeah you're starting to change the because then you're making a million as soon as you hit the big leagues right so then uh so then even those first those first three years or whatever like you know you're going to make three to five million you know that would encourage more players to try and wait to free agency right if the pay is that if it's doubled i mean that's a

pretty significant increase compared to where it's at right now. Also, encourage teams to sign some veterans because if I got to call this reliever up and he's going to be a million dollars the first day I call him up and I don't know exactly how good he is, I think he's good, versus should I sign

Adam Ottavino off this next deal for three to five million, right? Maybe I should take the Adam Ottavino in the next deal for $3 to $5 million, right? Maybe I should take the Adam Ottavino in the hand versus, you know, whatever, however that goes. No, I agree. That's actually a great point. You're going to throw some reliever in the bush. You just couldn't come up with a name.

Coward. We have a great question here about pitcher workloads in 2021. This came from Justin. Justin wants to know, would you take the over or under of three and a half starting pitchers to eclipse 200 innings pitched this season? So could there be pitchers on contenders

that may have starts skipped come September for potential playoff starts? Could there be some factors in play that really limit the number of pitchers who actually get up over 200 this season? I mean, you guys have actually been in some calls and talked to some teams that are trying to map this stuff out. You know, we've speculated on what the heck teams are going to try and do to manage innings a bunch of times. What's the general sense here in terms of workloads at this point? It seems like everybody's stepping into this season not quite sure of how they're going to make it all the way through. Yeah, I think that's right. I don't think anybody has a clue. I think it's going to be wildly different. Like, are you going to tell Max Scherzer, hey, Max, we got to go a little easier on you because you didn't pitch a full season last year? No, you're not. Are you going to treat Steven Strasburg differently? Of course, that guy's coming off of carpal tunnel surgery. So

I think I'll probably take the under on that. I think it might be right around three or four guys who hit 200 innings. But really, when you're looking at these teams and you're looking at the playoffs and you're looking at kind of a lost year for a lot of people, I don't think teams have any idea what to do or how they're doing it or what to base these innings off of. I think it's going to be a lot more finesse, a lot more feel, a lot more high stress. Are these stressful innings? Are they not stressful innings? I think you could talk to 30 teams and have 30 different opinions about how they're going to try to keep their young guys, which is mostly the concern, right? The young cheap commodities, how they're going to keep those guys safe and injury free. I think everyone's just kind of like flying blind here a little bit.

I mean, the dirty little secret is that nobody really had any idea before. And then we had, and then we had a catastrophic event that changed a season like we've never seen before. And people have even less of an idea. I mean, I, we, we talked to a bunch of people about this in the context of what the last season would mean when we wrote that piece with Melissa Lockard. And there was a lot of different really cool quotes that I passed on along to another writer. We'll see if they make the light of day. If not, I'll use them at some point. But just to kind of paraphrase, one of them said, in the past, we had a spreadsheet we looked at it and if we liked what

it said we added 10 we didn't know why we added 10 we added 10 you know and uh uh and that actually jives with something alexandopoulos said publicly he said the you know teams add 10 to 20 we don't know why he said it in a press conference so um you know there was like a bit of like we don't really know what we're doing the science of it is you know the best teams will be you know having everyone throw with the moda sleeve on having everyone throw with the catapult on having all this information come in um and try to kind of uh do that acute to chronic ratio and try to stay on top of it and look for like Josh Kalk who works for the Twins now had a piece about the injury zone they'll look for things like a massively dropping zone rate or an arm slot that even drops an inch you

know or fastball velocity decreases on the order of 0.3 0.4 0.5 they'll they'll notice that and they will uh maybe push push a start or um have them miss a start skip them in the rotation one time i think you'll see a lot of that so the best teams have a little bit more science behind it uh but i would say just generally everyone's kind of like, I have no idea what's going on. Well, the last time we had a normal season, all the way back in 2019, we had 15 starters get to 200

innings or more. Well, I can tell you by projections the most any projections have for 200 this year is two. I would be surprised if projections had more than four or five, though, going into 2019. I think that's just the way projections are. What you do is you push. It's like you don't normally have a team projected for 100 wins because you just push.

Projections just push everybody towards the mean. So, yeah, you're right. They probably didn't project that before. So maybe that's an argument for four or five, but it definitely would be less than 2019 either way. Yeah, yeah. I would take the under 2019 for sure. Everybody would.

But I'll take the over on three and a half. And the guys that did it in 2019, Verlander, Hurt, obviously not going to do it this year. Bieber, yeah, he could probably do it because I think he's a low-stress inning sort of guy. Bauer, obviously, whatever. He's going to do his thing. Cole, I think because of the investment that the Yankees made in him, they're going to be a little careful with him. There could be phantom IL stints or even real,

just a minor injury that they want to be mindful of that causes him to come up a little short. It's possible, but I wouldn't expect it. Strasburg, obviously not coming off of neuritis. I mean, I like him as a bounce back guy in 2021. He's not throwing 200 innings this year. That's just not going to happen. Grinke, I guess he's healthy and old, so it's healthy-ish, I guess. He wasn't healthy at the end of the season.

How stressful is it to throw 87? Sorry, sorry, sorry. Jeez, Eno. Can't rule that one out. Lance Lynn, I guess, is possible. He's going 67 these days. Have you seen that little thing he throws now? Yeah, that weird little pitch.

Yeah. That's a fun pitch. Lance Lynn could do it. He could, but it's just like, I don't know. They're just unimpressive innings. I mean, we're just crushing people on this podcast today. It's so mean. Mike Miner threw

208 innings in 2019. I don't think he'll ever come close to 200 again. He's had arm injuries in his past. I don't see that happening. Bumgarner could do it. It's Bauer, Beaver, Cole, DeGrom, Hendricks, and Nola are near the top of the innings projections

burrios maybe could be up in there maybe i mean yeah i don't know i feel like i mean you guys are right nobody knows nobody has any clue what they're doing anyways i mean he knows the only one on this podcast that has kids but the whole baseball pitching thing seems to be like parenting like you pretend you have it all together. You take credit for what goes right. And when stuff goes wrong, you're like, that wasn't on me.

It wasn't my fault. Exactly. Some people just get into it. Not my fault. I keep all these guys healthy. Yeah, exactly. That's just what it seems like to me.

I heard that one person who had a reputation for keeping his pitchers healthy actually told his pitchers not to report minor injuries. That will skew the data just a little bit. Very famous person. Really? Yes. If I guess who it is, will you tell me? How many very famous pitching coaches are there? Not many. That's why I was...

Like three? It's one of those. Could it even be a Jeopardy category? You need five to be a Jeopardy category. Does his name rhyme with Mio Schmizoni? No, it doesn't. No, it rhymes with Maeve Munkin. No.

All right. So I think I probably helped to narrow it down now. All right. We just played Guess Who? I think we have it solved. Thanks a lot for the question, Justin. Justin's also curious if we're going to do the subscriber fantasy baseball contest like we did last year. We had a cut line contest.

Yes, that is supposed to come back. I think Nando is working on the details for that. Just like our home run derby league, we'll pass on the details once that comes together. We were kind of trying to avoid the poop show. That wasn't a poop show. We had fun, right? We had fun. It was a ton of fun.

Project Goat was great. It was just a total error on my part not thinking about what was going to happen to our email boxes. Guys, keep emailing Derek. Please don't. I'm under a lot of stress when I'm not hanging out with my friends.

I don't need more emails. If it's a good question, please send it. Don't email just for the sake of emailing right now if at all possible. But thank you for good question, please send it. Don't email just for the sake of emailing right now, if at all possible. But thank you for that question, Justin. I've got one here from Tom. With injuries being a major factor in the game right now, which teams are in the best and worst spot

if they have injuries? Who has enough bench to stay competitive? For example, the Nats look okay now, but they have no prospects. I can count the players they have in the top 100 on no hands. It's true. I was going to say, that's a big goose egg for

the Nats. Big goose egg right now. There's a beer tip in there from Finback Brewing. Coasted Toconut, a real good Imperial Stout. That does sound really good. Yeah, I think they're really nice. Porter Stouts, really good this time of year, especially.

All right, I totally agree on the Nats call. Like, they're the ultimate. If they have a couple of injuries, they're probably looking to next season, which is terrible because they've got great young players. You don't want to throw away seasons right now. But who else sort of fits into this similar bucket where the big league roster looks good, but there's not a lot of help

on the horizon. I mean, I think that kind of describes the Brewers, to be frank. I think the projections generally like them as a second place team that could maybe win the NL Central. They don't have a lot of big league caliber players knocking on the door to help in any facet, right? Their best position player prospect is Edbert Perez. He's probably a full year away from even seeing double A. So he's not going to help. I think Garrett Mitchell's probably not going to help this year.

Pitching-wise, it's more like back-end guys. I think they've brought up some of their hard-throwing relievers. So they could have things go pretty bad pretty quickly with injuries. But who else fits into this group what's the yankees it's like the the daily uh like rather rallying call every year just keep stanton and judge healthy like otherwise they're in trouble again right every year they they do

have some prospects that you know they're not like a total baron farm system but you don't have aaron judge and john carlos stanton hanging out in your minor leagues. I think that's a great point, actually. I think that the depth for teams right now is not actually coming from the minor leagues. I think the minor leagues is more maybe ceiling and long-term planning. I think what you're seeing with teams like the Yankees signing DJ LeMayhew in the past or the Blue Jays signing Marcus Simeon, even though they had a full infield, or even the Brewers signing Travis Shaw when, I mean, it's on a lower level than those other two. I'm sorry.

But signing Travis Shaw when you already had Luis Urias. The point is that there are teams that are, or the Padres signing Haseon Kim when they had Jake Cronenworth and Jorixon Profar, the idea now is to actually have 10 or 11 starting level players, I think, on the better teams. So what teams would I think have a problem with that? Actually, you know, I actually think that the Yankees depth, Major League depth is not where it used to be because with letting Gardner go and now starting Frazier um your backup DEH outfielder is Jay Bruce and Mike Tauchman and your backup infielder is Tyler Wade I think that's less depth than they've

had in the past right I agree I agree I think their position player depth is weaker, but I still like the young pitching depth. That's one of the areas where they're okay. They're fine. If they lose a couple pitchers, they could actually keep it together because there's some ceiling in some of those young arms. The Jays I think have become a team that have good

depth. Any depth chart you look at and you say, there's one too many good players on this, they have ample depth at a minimum, and they might even have above average depth chart you look at and you say, there's one too many good players on this, they have ample depth at a minimum, and they might even have above average depth. Because you go Springer, Semyon Bichette, Teoscar, Vlad Jr., Biggio, Gurriel, Rowdy, and Jansen. That's their projected starting nine on roster resource. That doesn't include Randall Gritchick, who's a good power guy that would play a lot most places, right? They've got a guy in Joe Panik, who's a good power guy that would play a lot most places, right? They've got a guy in Joe Panik, who's a capable play-all-over infielder. They've got depth at the catcher spot. Alejandro Kirk is one of the better catching prospects in the game,

so he could come up and take on a meaningful role. I mean, when the offseason started, he was projected to be in the mix for DH playing time. So I would say they're one of the new teams that jumped up in this group. We talked about the Yankees just a minute ago. Do the Dodgers fit as a good depth team still? I mean, on a glance, I think they always tend to be in that range. They traded for Sheldon Oji, I think,

because they used to have two utility players that could play everywhere. They used to have Taylor and Hernandez. And that's kind of amazing to have two right-handed guys who can play infield and outfield and can play shortstop. I mean, you don't really want Kike playing shortstop, but still, that was pretty amazing to have both of those. So I think that's why they traded for Sheldon Noisy is to kind of replace that depth. And it is a step back, but I think it's still there. They still kind of have pieces. They can play Bellinger at first

and Muncy at second. They're kind of a mix and match i think the team they're deep the team that i'm worried about is actually the other one in well it's not in los angeles i hate that they put that name on there anaheim that's the worst thing anaheim um because uh david fletcher i think is needed as a starter now right so if david fletcher is a starter and fowler is a starter then your outfield your centerfield depth is Juan Ligaris. Eh, I mean, that's not on the level of other teams. Your shortstop death, I guess, is Fletcher, but then you got to, basically,

your shortstop death is Flank and Barreto because he's got to play second if Fletcher's playing short. Third base is Matt Thies. Thies? I mean, I like thighs, but I guess they focused on pitching depth, but I think that their position player depth is poor. It's poor. It's bad.

Yeah. I mean, on the flip side, so I think the Phillies have no depth and they're not a great team to begin with. They just brought back the band. You hate them so much. They just brought back the band from last year. JT Real Muto is out to opening day. Tell me, how do you feel about them? Not good. I think it's more of an average

bench. I don't think they're necessarily bad, I think. Because the lineup wasn't the problem last year. The bullpen was a big problem and the back of the rotation was a problem. Whether or not they're any better this year hinges on growth there. If they lose an outfielder, Adam Haseley, Roman Quinn, those are capable backup outfielders. Haseley, if it's a long-term injury, I think would play more. Quinn, maybe in more of a pinch, is the guy that gets those opportunities.

To me, Haisley starts and Kingery is their Enrique. Yeah. Kingery is a nice player to have in that super utility role. I think Brad Miller is a better bench player than people realize. He was pretty good, again, in St. Louis. Had some pretty interesting stat cast numbers in 2019, also with the Phillies. Not a defender, just kind of a pure hitter. I also think on the flip side,

the Mets today adding Walker on that two-year deal are now a very deep rotation with Syndergaard. Yeah, I think they spent a lot of effort on depth in general. Yeah, their pitching was not good. They're starting pitching, even with DeGrom last year, their ERA as a staff was like mid-fives. So I think bringing that guy in, they kept Stroman, they've got

DeGrom, they've got Syndergaard maybe coming back, right? June or July. Almora, Villar. Carrasco, I keep forgetting they have Carrasco. They're a solid staff. And they added, I think it was 11 pitchers, not just Aaron Loop

and Trevor May, but they added 11 relievers, I i believe on big league deals so wow they took what was their worst right what was their worst um you know they're the worst issue they added 15 pitchers 15 or 16 today i guess now with walker um in big league camp so they've made some moves i think it was a really good off season except for all the stuff that made it a really bad offseason. But that is not really baseball decisions, I guess. Right. The roster is deep, though.

We talk about depth, and I think they finally have that depth, at least on the pitching side of things, I think they have that depth. You've got Smith. If Smith can go to DH, you might actually improve defensively. You've got a lot of people that can play different places. That's the one thing I would say about the Phillies is that at least some of the, even if their players,

they don't go really deep on the depth charts, a lot of their players can play multiple positions. Segura can play second and third at least and Kingery can play all over. So there's a little bit of depth baked in, but I think you're right. I think it's a little bit closer to the Angels than the Dodgers, for example.

Yeah, I think the Mets bench is pretty appealing because you have Elmora and Kevin Pillar, two guys that actually can play center field. So that's nice to have that. They can obviously go play corners if they need to. Elmora doesn't hit much, but Pillar's at least passable as a hitter. Villar, as a super utility guy, is pretty interesting

just because he's a better fantasy player than he is a real-life player, but he can play three or four spots. He has power. He has speed. He takes some walks. That's a really nice player to have to plug in. Luis Guillerme, I think, is your more prototypical glove-first sort of infielder, so they have that. If they need defense late innings, they got a guy that does that. They need a little offense because someone's hurt.

They've got that in VR. And Tomas Nito, I think, is one of those sneaky good defensive catchers, just a ridiculous arm behind the plate. So if anything happens to James McCann, they at least have a good defender behind the plate. I got a bad depth team. White Sox.

Ooh. Yeah, I think they, yeah. a top heavy sneaky good one you know bad backup center fielder backup outfielder is adam angle uh backup shortstop is danny mendick luis garcia is that luis lurie sorry lurie yeah i knew it wasn't you know dropping from grandal to collins would be, you know, a step back. I don't even know if Zach Collins is really a catcher. I think he's just more of a DH that can put the gear on. Lucroi signs.

That was a little bit better with Lucroi signing. Jermaine Mercedes is actually kind of an interesting guy that doesn't really have a glove, though. So it's like, you know know you'd be playing him out of position almost anywhere and then actually you know i don't even think their starting pitching depth is that great because uh right now they've got kopeck in spenciled in they you know they they had a zoom meeting where you know rick hann is talking about how they've got to handle kopeck with kid gloves so you're gonna play rodone orever, and I don't think you ever want to start Ronaldo Lopez again. Sorry, I'm being really mean.

I don't mean to be so mean, but I'm just saying, I don't think he wants it. Are you hungry? Oh, no. Yeah, I think it's sneaky, not deep. Man, that was like a Kevin Millar right there. They're good they're a good team but if they have a couple of injuries they're going to feel it because they do not have

a lot of big league caliber players to plug in uh interesting though i mean andrew vaughn they did a good job not blocking andrew vaughn as it stands right now jose abreu and andrew vaughn will share first base in dh If Vaughn hits the way that prospect analysts expect him to hit, this is one of the better lineups in the American League if everybody stays healthy. So high variance for sure. And I think in that division, that might be enough to get them there, right? Cleveland, not as good as they were with Lindor, so they come back to the pack a little bit. Minnesota, are they a good depth team? Off the top of my head, I think

they're probably league average, right? They're okay. I can't think of any bad spots. I want to give them an above average grade. I think they might be really good. Louisa Ryes is good. Two good catchers. Ryes is young, too. Two good catchers

with Garver and Ryan Jeffers. Arias is young, too. Two good catchers with Garver and Ryan Jeffers. Jake Cave is fine as a bench outfielder. I don't think he's good, but he's good enough to just be there. Better than Adam Engel. And they've got Royce Lewis. Royce Lewis isn't far away from coming up. And I think they've moved Lewis around defensively. I know in the Fall League when we last got to go there, which was amazing,

he was playing other spots. He played some third base and some center field. Larnach, too. If they decide to bring him up, Larnach can come up and play. They actually have some depth from prospects. They've pulled some pretty interesting relievers out of relative nowhere in recent years. They add Colomay. They still have Taylor Rodgers.

Tyler Duffy is one of the more underrated relievers in the game. They bring in Hansel Robles trying to get his velo back. Jorge Alcala was a guy that I liked as a deep sleeper for saves before Colomay got there. So I think their bullpen runs pretty deep. Okay, here's where it starts to break down. They're starting a rotation.

They're starting five right now. Barrios, Maeda, Pineda, Happ, and Shoemaker. Matt Shoemaker unfortunately has the F health grade. I mean, he just does. But you got Dobnak. Dobnak's a really good sixth starter, I think. Yeah. Dobnak's a good sixth.

If you got two F health grades in the rotation, you got to go seven or eight deep. That was their issue last year. That was part of their big issue in the postseason, right? It was their pitching. They were falling apart a little bit, yeah. Yeah. You can't rely on one guy.

Odorizzi hasn't signed yet, has he? No. No. They seem like an obvious place for Odorizzi, though. Yeah. I guess they're just waiting on some of these. There's a decent amount of guys still out there, right? Like big league guys that are just kind of waiting around for deals.

I talked to Jason Kipnis before he ended up signing, and he said that there was a pretty large group of guys who were just like had their bags packed weren't sure where to go ready to get on a plane at any second um which must be extra weird right now with everything going on but uh he'd upgrade i mean every team would take a guy like Jake Odorizzi. You're right. Odorizzi, Porcello, Leak, Hamels, Gio Gonzalez, Cahill, Bailey. It's not bad. There's definitely some guys out there.

I think for Rick Porcello, for as ugly as the ratios have been really two years running, at least he gives you innings. I think he's third in innings pitched over the last five seasons. You'd think that teams just desperate to figure out ways to get through the season are going to want a guy like Porcello. So I think the Twins are a team with good depth. I wouldn't call it great depth. And I think where they get dinged the most is probably the starting rotation, mostly because of two of

the five guys they're relying on in Pineda and Shoemaker having such elevated injury risk. So a really good question. Thanks for sending that in along with that beer tip, Tom. One more question here, and this is what kind of puts it all together. What makes a great bench is having someone that can play all over and play those spots well. So this is the email from Will. I was looking into Ben Zobris Hall of Fame case, something I desperately want to believe in. And I guess I hadn't realized just how good his 2009 season was. He slashed 297, 405, 543, which was good for a WRC plus of 152. He also contributed significantly defensively with about a quarter to a third of his value coming on that side of the ball. He did this with a position line.

He's got the places played 49H67835D, which if you've looked at baseball reference, means something to you. If you've never looked at that, I just read a bunch of numbers. He played all over. I'm a Fangraphs guy, man. I looked at that and was like,

what is that? Whoa. Yeah, he played everywhere. There was no single position at which he played two-thirds of his game. A true utility man, but also arguably the best position player in baseball that year. He led position players with an 8.7 FWAR and an 8.6 BWAR, respectively. And what I think was quite the snub, he finished eighth in the MVP voting,

behind even Kentry's Morales, who was worth less than half as many wins as him at 3.7. It's a great email, Will. Can you think of any better season by a utility man? And is there any current player or prospect that you think could rival it? I think Will's a Twins fan. I guess Williams-Estadillo could have a crazy breakout season, but I'm not holding my breath. I'd be happy if he just got more playing time. No, because if you're that good of a utility player, you have a position.

You start playing. Yeah. Yeah. There's an inherent problem in how Ben Zobris did that that keeps so many other players from being able to replicate it. If you're that good at playing all those spots defensively, usually you just end up sticking at one spot so you don't move around that much. Or if you're that good defensively at that many spots, you can't hit. And because you can't hit,

you can't play as much as Ben Zilbers did. So it's just like you run into a problem every time if you try and find another player like that. We may never see another player like that, another season like that Ben Zobris season moving around as much as he did. Was he in Tampa that year? 09?

Yeah, right? Okay, so I covered him in 08 and I do remember that breakout year. I wasn't there anymore, but like I remember very vividly that Rocco Baldelli, he credits like some conversation with Rocco Baldelli where Rocco told him like, yeah, every time I go up to

hit, I swing as hard as I can. And it was like a light bulb moment for Zobris. Like he was just like, couldn't believe that you could go out there and swing as hard as you can every time. And that's when like, you look at what he was earlier in his career. It's like this light hitting guy. He found a stroke. And I just I don't know why that stands out, but I just remember him talking about Rocco Baldelli saying like, yeah, I swing as hard as I can every time. And it was such a crazy concept to Ben Zobris that then he became, they called him Zorilla that year. He just became the Zorilla.

That was it. 27 homers. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think that is the problem because, you know, even Zobris himself kind of settled in. He was mostly a second baseman outfielder for the rest of his career. There's a problem of definition when you try to do the research. I did look at people who played eight positions or more in their best season. And Hernandez is 2018. He had a 118 WRC+.

And the only person that came in anywhere close was Cesar Tovar. And if you're a Twins fan, you know, writing that email, Cesar Tovar was a utility man for the Twins that had two four-win seasons while playing eight positions on the diamond. He was a little bit Zobristian in that regard, but he didn't have much power. Didn't have much power. And, you know, Kike himself is another example. He had that 118 WRC plus. He had a three-win season,

but I kind of summed up the guys that I think in the game that are like that now, and I had Chris Taylor, Jeff McNeil, Jonathan Villar, Joey Wendell, Tommy Edmond, Kevin Biggio is maybe going in that direction, Scott Kingery, Dylan Moore, Jake Cronenworth. These are all guys that could, the younger guys are guys that could establish themselves at a position this year. Edmund could take second base for his own this year, I think.

Biggio has had second base. He could take third base for himself this year. Kingery might be the center fielder. Dylan Moore, not sure exactly where, but he could be somewhere. And Jake Cronenworth was the second baseman. So all those guys have been utility-ish in the past, could be in the future,

could be as good as Ben Zobris with the bat. But also if they are as good as Ben Zobris with the bat, will take over a position. So that was my sort of past and present Zobris that are out there. But maybe there's something really unique about what Zobris did that maybe a lot of people are not going to do. I mean, Merrifield is doing the second base outfield thing in Kansas City right now.

So I guess if you want to keep it down to just two positions, there are some people that are doing second base and outfield. I think Jake Cronenworth, of all the players you mentioned, and those are some good examples of similar players, I think Jake Cronenworth might be the closest thing we could see expecting an eight-war season from anybody is just bananas. Part of this is you've got to be on a good team. I think you have to be a left-handed hitter because

to have the platoon advantage to play enough to catch fire and kind of force your way into the lineup a lot, you want to have that lefty-righty matchup. Cronenworth has that. You need a good eye at the plate. Cronenworth has that. And he has the tools. He has the

tools without a position. The hit tool is a little above average. The speed is above average. The defensive grade is above average. The arm is above average. If you can play five or six positions that well and you've got patience, you've got the foundation.

I think you're going to find more players who are in their mid-20s who are just breaking in who can follow this arc more than you can look at a list of prospects and guys that are 18 to 21 and identify someone like that because top prospects have either better tools as a hitter or better defensive attributes that enable them to lock down a spot up the middle. And you kind of need these funky tweener sort of guys like toolsy, but not too toolsy.

And I think Jake Cronenworth ticks enough boxes where I would say he could be the closest thing we see to Ben Zobrist, even though I don't think we'll ever see a season like that Ben Zobrist 09 season again. Agreed. That'd be fun to revisit, you know, like a look at this because it's never happened.

How many things can you say in baseball that like with certainty are probably never happening again that's probably one of them yeah i feel like we just turned on the jason stark bat signal yeah i was thinking about this but you what you're talking about the prospect thing made me realize when i the way that i put this list together was i looked at second base and looked at uh you know i looked at my fantasy line up my i went to yahoo and looked at second base and looked at all the guys that had multi position eligibilities that's the easiest way to do it but i didn't do it for shortstop and i didn't do it for shortstop for two reasons one's over second base but two if you can play shortstop and you have tweener skills a lot of times you're a shortstop you know i mean like if you can actually play short stop, you're a short stop. Um, you know, so it is, uh, there are certain

positions where this goes. And so when you're looking at prospects, if they, if they are listed at short stop, if people think that there can still be a short stop, then there'll be a short stop. But if people are talking about them not making shortstop, that's where I'd start to look for future ones. So I think Vidal Brujan came to mind as a guy who's already kind of moving off shortstop. Maybe O'Neal Cruz, but I think he'll just be a masher that plays third or something or first. So it's kind of hard to kind of spot that. It's very rare. We didn't used to have second base prospects. We had shortstop prospects who ended up at second base. Right. So it is something about finding a flawed prospect that's good enough to play a lot of places.

Yeah, it's a really weird thing to try and prognosticate. I don't think you're going to do it really with any degree of success. I agree. It's finding a needle in a haystack in some ways. Thank you for that email, Will. That was a fun email. And in all seriousness, send us emails. Ratesandbarrels at theathletic.com.

I'm never going to get to inbox zero anyway, so I'd rather get great questions for the show that make us laugh along the way. Yeah, I'm just going to give up on inbox zero. Eventually, I'll just torch the email account entirely, just light it on fire and start over. Like that office space moment with the printer? Yeah, it's exactly Michael Bolton versus the printer. That's exactly where my email inbox is headed at some point. If you enjoyed the show,

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to start is the price. That is going to wrap things up for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We are back with you on Monday. Thanks for listening. Thank you.