Rates & Barrels - Never Doubt Shohei Ohtani

Episode Date: September 20, 2024

Eno and DVR discuss Shohei Ohtani's 50-50 campaign -- and the incredible performance he turned in Thursday to reach that milestone. Plus, they examine Bo Bichette's future outlook as his 2024 season has to come a close, before looking at the second-half K-BB% leaderboard. Rundown 2:03 Shohei Ohtani Creates the 50-50 Club 4:54 Where Does Thursday's Six-Hit, Two Homer Game Rank All Time? 10:00 Oh Yeah, He'll Pitch Again Next Year 16:10 Freezing Ohtani Takes (Including Our Own) 22:15 Bo Bichette's Disappointing 2024 Season is Over. What's Next? 34:02 Second Half K-BB% Leaderboard Surprises 47:38 Is Brandon Pfaadt the New Mitch Keller or Nick Pivetta? 55:45 Who Are You Targeting for the Final Week? Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris Producer: Brian Smith Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Find their products through banks, credit unions and associations, or visit securiancanada.ca. Securian Canada. Insurance designed for life. What the rates and barrels, it is Friday September 20th. Derek and Ryper Inosaris here with you on this episode. Shohei Otani has created the 50-50 club. We'll talk about that historical achievement which came as part of an all-time great performance at the plate on Thursday as well. I love that he didn't just do it. He just did it with that. Yeah, it wasn't like a one for five where he got the 50th steal or something. No, of course he did it in greatest showman fashion. So we'll take a look at some of the historical games

that are comparable to what Ohtani achieved on Thursday. Bo Bichette's season is over. We'll talk about what his future might look like. I liked Bo a lot going into the season. That was a bad call. We'll see how much of a discount we're gonna get in 2025. We'll keep an eye out for some Juan Soto news after he collided with an outfield wall.

We've got a second half strikeout minus walk percentage leaderboard that we're going to look at for some potential surprises, both good and bad. And we'll have a weekend waiver preview for those who are still pushing through the final week of fantasy baseball season as the regular season comes to a close next week Sunday. So still a little bit out there if you're trying to just make those last couple of adjustments and finish the money or possibly bring home a title as always if you'd like to join our discord you can do that with the link in the show description lots of good stuff happening in there but you know let's start with Shohei Otani he creates the 50-50 club 50 homers 50

steals we've never seen that before we'd never even seen 50 homers, 50 steals, we've never seen that before. We'd never even seen 50 homers and 25 steals in a season before. That was where my brain went right away when I started thinking about the stolen base environment and people that would be naysayers just to be jerks and I thought, okay, like yeah, it's a little easier to steal a base now than it has been at a lot of other points in big league history.

Doesn't matter, this is still an absurd achievement. Being a one ofof-one in major league baseball history is always going to garner a lot of attention so I decided to make a stat-head search for 50 homer and 10 steel seasons which did actually spit out 16 seasons in baseball history at the very top from a power perspective you might recall the Barry Bonds 73 homerun season in 2001 he stole 13 bases that year so that's at the high end for power you probably have forgotten the Brady Anderson 50 homer 21 steel season in 1996 and now nobody's forgotten that that was an amazing year

the Brady Anderson one might be more remembered than the Greg Vaughn in 1998 when Greg Vaughn hit 50 homers and stole 11 bases But most of the names on the list most the seasons you see are all-time greats You have Babe Ruth popping up on this list you have a mantle twice mantle a couple of a rod Seasons couple of Aaron judge seasons you got a couple of Ken Griffey junior seasons and the closest things we've seen to the 5050 were really like 50 and 24 Willie Mays hit 51 homers and 24 steals in 1955 a rod I think is before 20 player of all time. Yeah, and yeah, that's the level that we're looking at as far as 5050 and what that actually means right now like you're saying you can also take away 30 bases, you know, take away 20 bases stolen

bases and when the stolen base run environment went up it didn't double. Like the new rules didn't double stolen bases so you can't take half of his stolen bases away. If you take 10 or 15 away still the most stolen bases ever by 50 homers. Otani stole 20 bases last year with the same rules and yes he's played 15 more games so far this year that doesn't cover the difference of 31 it's almost just like it's intention it's like I can do more I think it's it's believing wanted to do more yeah it's like I can I can actually run I can steal more bases you know what it was easier for everybody on my team

to steal bases, so I'm gonna get more. And he's been caught fewer times. He's been caught four times this year. He's 51 for 55. Every time I think we found the ceiling for Shohei Otani, he proves us wrong. The lesson here, never doubt him. Nothing's impossible.

What are the numbers? He went six for six with two doubles and three homers, 10 RBI, two stolen bases. I mean it's the best offensive game of all time is what I will give him. Yeah you have to give him that title. There are some ridiculous games in baseball history that I think are better all-around performances. There were a few people in the discord pointing out 10 RBI's from the leadoff spot is also kind of absurd Oh, here's a good one, too Yeah, a couple of steals in this game as well, right?

Because if you look back another stat head search you can find three homers in six hit games and that Spits out a pretty amazing list a few but nobody had any steals nobody had a stolen base in their six hit three homer game I mean it's hard to steal bases when you're hitting a lot of home that's something I tweeted from Gabrielle star GF star one even setting the six hits aside no player has ever homered three times and stolen multiple bases in a single game before yeah that's never happened. The Sean Green four homers, six hit game pops up on this list.

Edgardo Alfonso had a three homers, six hit game back in 1999. Ty Cobb did it. Walker Cooper did it in 1949. Special shout out to that Jimmy Fox game that you pointed out, yeah. Jimmy Fox did it in a game in 1932, and every game except for this one where a player had three or more homers in a six-hit game was a blowout win for their team. Like, none of those games were close,

except for Jimmy Fox's game. You know when Rendon is on a list, the game was 23-5, yeah. Yeah, it was a laugher. I mean, yesterday the Dodgers won 24. And did Otani get one of his homers off Brujjan? Yeah, he did. Jimmy Fox did that in an 18-17 game that went 18 innings.

That game only lasted four hours and five minutes, by the way. Ultimate rabbit hole. That's what you're going to get when you get into the three homer games, like you get the worst reliever at some point and you get that extra one. But it doesn't matter because there was also the two doubles and the two stolen bases. I did want to point out that this was the greatest offensive game because shout out to David Larrilla and you know some people in our internal slack that

in MLB we were you know basically trying to put together the best games we've ever seen and I'd never heard of some of these games. I love Rick Wise threw a no-hitter and hit two homers? Yeah. That's pretty good. We could still get a game like this from Otani by the way. So like, don't count him out. I think Fabian Ardaya, the Dodgers writer at the Atlantic needs to make sure that Shohei Otani knows about Rick Wise because we need to give him another milestone to try and reach.

Yeah, the other one that was from David Larrillo was Tony Cloninger, or Tony Cloninger. 1966, he hits two grand slams and pitches a complete game. It, you know, he gave up three runs, so it's not, you know, the no hitter, but two grand slams from the pitcher. He had nine RBI before that in the season, so he doubled his RBI. I think he had like one homer before it, because he was 25 when he did this.

But yeah, two grand slams and a complete game. Yeah. What do you think? Which one do you take? Two grand slams? Because that one's, Rick Wise, I think you take that one. There's a no-hitter plus two homers. Two Grand Slams a complete game versus Shohei. The Rick Wise one comes in first for me.

Maybe Shohei comes second. I think you could make the argument for Shohei second. I mean, I think complete games in that era, especially were not as rare. The no hitter is rare enough on its own, and to even hit one homer in a no hitter is absurd. So that's why the Rick Wise one is just off the charts. Like that's number one. What did he have for breakfast that day? He had the flu.

He felt terrible. Oh, he had the flu. And he was facing the Reds on the old crappy turf. I was reading an old story about it. He was facing the Reds on the old crappy turf. I was reading an old story about it. He was facing the Reds on the crappy turf at, I think that was Riverfront Stadium at that era. So it was just disgustingly hot. Like, oh, so he felt like garbage and did that.

Oh, it felt like garbage. Make sense? Totally makes sense. Maybe he was like trying to get quick outs because he just wanted to get off the mound. So he just like threw a bunch of grounders and they just went at his hitters that day. And he's like, OK, let's get out of here. He was a fly ball pitcher.

Got a lot of ground balls, like six balls left the infield all day. And that was against the pretty good Reds lineup, too. So he's just trying to get out of there. He felt bad. He just wanted to go and lay down and drink some Gatorade and take a nap and had the best game ever played. So yeah, this is an all time elite offensive performance from Otani, not only on Thursday, but also this season. And we've talked a little bit about 2025 and what the first round of fantasy baseball drafts

are going to look like. But people might remember Shohei Otani is going to pitch again next year on top of what he does as a hitter. I wonder how much that'll matter for weekly like NFB site, BC type things. It doesn't matter. He'll still be like a top three pick just as a batter now, so.

Right, the only thing you have to wonder about is depending on whether there are any changes to how stats are processed for Otani. Ever since he came to Major League Baseball, the way different sites have handled him has varied slightly. Most of them would not allow you to accrue get stats from one side while using him in one role. Use them as a utility.

You weren't getting the pitching stats. If you pitched that day, use them as a pitcher. You weren't getting hitting stats. Now, what I'm wondering is, since Otani came to Major League Baseball, we've added the universal DH. So pitchers don't hit anymore on a regular basis. So programming wise, if you set up your fantasy game to actually count hitting stats for pitchers,

then if you use Otani as a pitcher, you'd get the hitting stats too, because other pitchers aren't hitting unless it's a weird thing happens. And you wouldn't get penalized by all the bad ones, yeah. Right, so I want to actually take some time and reach out to different commissioner services and see if anyone's going to handle it that way, where you'd

get all the stats simultaneously, if that's the case in your league. Or if you get them as one player and you can start them both ways or however they handle it. In terms of the way the user interface is, I would doubt it just because if you think about your lineups, so you have the hitters in one place and the pitchers in another, and it's like I wouldn't even know how they would represent it, you know, because there

would just there would be like this one player where they had two lines in the box in your like internal box scores and... The display issue would probably be worse than the counting issue in some ways because yeah, like where would they just fill your standings, they can, that's fine. That just goes in your standings Yeah, yeah, but how do they show it to you on your page? I think is awesome. Is show Hey, Otani is as a player he's about that much of a programming headache for for developers to try and like tweak and work everything around but

He's like the one man Danny Jansen, you know Gets traded from the Blue Jays to the Red Sox and has to finish the game on the other side of the pitch. I do know from, you know, decade plus of sitting 10 feet away from programmers at Rota Wire that all of the fun stuff that happens in baseball, all the weird stuff, basically everything Jason Stark writes about is a headache for someone.

They hate. It's not as easy for them as it is for us everything Jason Stark writes about is a headache for someone. They hate. It's not as easy for them as it is for us to sit back and enjoy it and just laugh at it. Definitely suspended games or something that anybody who does stats roots against. Otani just as a hitter. You think top three is where he belongs in 2025. I mean, you're looking at Bobby Witt Jr., Otani, and who's the other, who's the third you're putting in there? Well, actually I was looking a little bit more

of his time, you know. So, you know, this year, just by WRC+, it's Judge Soto Otani with Rooker and Witt. Rooker, tied with Otani,RC plus. But Bobby Witt right there, Vlad Guerrero Jr. Jordan Alvarez I think should be in that discussion. Gunnar Henderson, Bryce Harper, Mookie Betts. That rolls out the top 11. But Otani is a clear step ahead a lot of those guys. So it's really top three. But I'm also trying to incorporate the fact that Otani was good, not great, you know, before this and he has a career.

And so I was like trying to, you know, compare him to in the 2000s by WRC plus, it's Barry Bonds, Aaron Judge, Mike Trout, Jordan Alvarez, Juan Soto, Manny Ramirez, Shoya Otani. So, you know, if you are willing to include bass running, you know, then he's his best comp, I guess, is Mike Trout. And Mike Trout has in the 2000s has a better Diboba and a better WRC plus. So I would, I think as a batter, I have him second to Trout, second ish to Judge, you know, so of his time, a top five hitter. And then, of course, you add in the pitching. I don't know that I'm willing to give him top hitter of his time yet.

No, but I also I can't dismiss it as a possibility anymore. That's right. He turned 30 in July. And the thing that surprised me the most, I think about Shohei Otani in the last three seasons Is that he's kept the strikeout rate in the low 20% range Instead of sitting in that 25 plus percent range that he was at for the first four years of his career And the other thing he's done that we really don't see in a lot of player pages other than Aaron Judge He's got multiple seasons now with barrel rates above 20%.

That is extremely rare power to put with. He took like a max CV in his first three seasons. That was like it was good. One one, you know, 12 to 115, which is really good. And he turned it into one of the best in the league where he's been one 19, basically one 19 plus since that's, you know, Stanton Stanton ask you know Stanton's doing 120s right so he not only changed his barrel so it's not like he always had the raw power and found a way to tap into it he changed his raw power level and his game power level

which is very rare like I I don't know guys that change their maxi be that much you know we've seen it with the young guys So like CJ Abrams where he's like, oh he hit a ball once well once you never done that before But you know, he's like 22 so you're talking about a show he Otani who goes away for you know elbow surgery and then comes back and Hits the ball four miles an hour harder than he ever has before Yeah, that's exactly how elbow surgery works for most people. I mean, he's he's just an athletic freak.

And I think that, you know, if I had some, you know, there's the cold freezing takes are going on around Ototani and you know, I have some of my own. I thought that maybe he would be like a center fielder who was also the closer. That's what I saw because at least to give me some credit I could see that this guy runs like a gazelle and is super tall, has all these long levers, is going to get into the power. But I was worried when he first came in about the refinement of those tools. He was kind of like one of these really toolsy young guys that had the raw power but struck out too much as a batter, right? Even as a pitcher, he had the raw power but he didn't really have good command. So the thing that's been

so special, I think, about the late 20s and early 30s for him is that the sort of refinement of those skills that's happening. He's adding the sinker, he's adding a little bit of command, he's adding the game power, you know, so, you know, that's, that's I think, it's somebody who had some of the best tools of all time, now coming into his own in terms of the skills. I don't know if it's because he's a two-way player, a unicorn, you know, something that we may never see again

in our lifetimes, but do you have to start to think about training and how it could change the aging curve? We think we have a handle on the aging curve at various points and it seemed like peak age was getting younger, maybe it actually is, for the general population of ball players. That might still be true. The average age in baseball is getting younger.

I don't know if that what that means about peak, but but the thing like this, the day long the ending is getting worse for players there. Like I've already said this a bunch of times, but there's no thirty six year olds, you know. But what if there is this second peak that players can reach? Right. You get up athletically, maybe your peak is in your early, mid-20s, 24, 25, but your overall skills peak comes closer to age 30 now because there's better tech, better science, better things to help you stay healthy and to keep getting better. Maybe there's something there. It's worth asking with Aaron Judge, right, who's right now having the best season of

his career at 32. And so you do wonder if we need to reevaluate sort of years between 29 and 32, but Judge is old. Judge is old. The thing that I don't think has necessarily changed is I don't think injury risk has changed as you move deeper into your career. And I think that's what we'll see from Shohei.

That's what he's already shown us, right? So he may give us a little bit of the Sandy Koufax package from both sides where he just doesn't, you know, get the big round numbers. Like maybe Shohei Otani never hits 500 homers or even 400 homers, you know? He's got 222 and he's 30 years old. So, you know, it may it may be one of those things where he burns so bright,

but we still have discussions on whether or not he's the best player of all time, because he only ends up with 300 homers and 100 wins or whatever. There's so many ways for him to be great for a very long time though given the foundational skills He has shown us up to this point. Yeah What if he adds a hundred saves at the end of his career and he's like John Smoltz plus Or he's a gold glove defender in the field because something changes and he can't pit like there's so many different random Things that could happen here. I I can't even begin to try and predict how Shohayotani is going to age. There's just no there's no comp. There's no

There's no template or if we're completely flying. I kind of think he's already in the Hall of Fame, you know We were debating whether or not he's like one of the best players of all time and like I think he's obviously headed towards something I thought I just wonder if he's it's like something catastrophic happened tomorrow. Would he be in the Hall of Fame already? You know, not by war, you know, because he's only a 38 war. But with the lore and all the stuff he did, like maybe what he does as a hitter also gets dragged down by war because he does it as a D.H. So I think that's the other part of the Otani story that people will get that right.

They will fix that, I think, over time, as far as acknowledging his greatness. And I hope we don't have this out. I hope we just get to see it. I hope we get to see it for a long time because I, like I said earlier, I don't think we're ever going to see anything like Shohei Otani again. I think people are going to try, but this is like, it's like one to be Michael Jordan. You will have great players that follow. And they grew up idolizing him. And I think they could still fall short, they could be 80% or 90%

as good. And that's still really exciting and really fun to watch. But it might not be on this elite all time level. It's a funny thing that describes like where he is already and then There's a funny thing that describes where he is already and then where he fits in. So he's tied for career WRC Plus with Joe DiMaggio. That's pretty good. His seasonal WRC Plus, which is the best season of his career, or actually second best to last year, but his seasonal OPS is 172. Barry Bonds' career W WRC Plus, is a point better. That includes all the ups and downs of a career.

The problem is that Barry Bonds' career did not have the normal downs at the end. No, it did not have the normal downs. So, and we know why. So, it's a little unfair. But, you know, to have Joe DiMaggio plus, you know Possibly, you know a hundred wins Maybe a hundred saves. I think you should just do that

Closer now Yeah, maybe I like age 37 like yeah the wear and tear of being a starting pitcher and still being one of the best hitters In baseball at this age isn't working, but I'm going to come in and close out a bunch of games. Okay, sounds good. Let's have you do that, Shohei. You mentioned downs. I'm thinking about downs for a player that shouldn't be down. That's Bo Bichette.

His season is over. He's got a finger injury now that put him back on the IL. He only played 81 games this year. It hasn't been healthy. I mean, that's a huge part of the story, but I liked Bo Bichette in the third round back in the spring. I thought there was a lot of value here. I thought there was a chance he'd get back to 15 steals, he'd pop to 20 homers again. I had high expectations for the Jays lineup as a whole.

Those were largely unmet, although if you believed in Vlad Jr., if you thought this could be an MVP caliber season from Vlad Jr., I think you were right. It's just been sort of wasted by other things that have happened in Toronto. But as Bo goes, we know he's had an unusual approach for a very good player throughout his career, right? A lot of chase outside the zone because he can get to those pitches, not a lot of strikeouts despite chase, but also a pretty heavy opposite field approach. And the more we've looked at what happens when you go to the opposite field, especially if your barrels are to the opposite field,

we know you're not getting as much out of your barrels there than if you were pulling them. We've seen Beau Bichette most years settle in with a barrel rate just below 10%, lot of hard hit balls, great batting averages, solid OBPs, just a good all-around offensive profile. The downsides in his profile at times have given me Tim Anderson vibes, but I don't think we're talking about

a Tim Anderson crash just yet, because Bo is only 26 years old. And he hits the ball harder than Tim Anderson ever did. Yeah, so it was more the approach So how will this age right? Like this is this is an approach we've been leery of for a long time, but Generally, it's worked as an early round skill set was my process bad. He's also 26 26 you know usually the chasing really starts to bite you at 30, you know So he's still four years away from when you traditionally think the chasing would bite on the butt and I think to some extent he just didn't have you know we talked about.

Who are you guys just getting hurt in the middle of a hot streak like when you have three hundred thirty six plate appearances and your max eb is like two to three miles per hour off of your career max eb and your barrel rates half of what it normally is. I kind of just I kind of just get a read that you just didn't get going. You know, like you just never could get going every time you might have gotten going, something went something went wrong health wise. So I would buy him next year, I think particularly because it would be at reduced prices. The one thing that I will not buy is that the speed is ever coming back. So he's gone from when he debuted, he was 83rd percentile in terms of speed.

It's been a pretty strict downward turn. He bottomed out last year at 43rd percentile overall in sprint speed, and then he got it back up to 50th. But 50th for a shortstop he is the 47th fastest shortstop according to fangruffs I mean according to baseball smart so I don't think the speeds coming back and I think it'll push him off the position pretty soon like I think his next deal might not be to play shortstop and he's got one more year with the Blue Jays so I think he'll be moved off a shortstop soon. But I do think

he's got three more years of what I would say he can do is hit 280 and hit 20 homers and steal five bases. I think he's got three more years of that. It's weird because you don't have to run a lot to still have a lot of value in five by five Roto leagues. But if you are a middle infielder who's not elite in batting average and a well above average in power, it's a tougher profile to roster because you just need bags from everywhere.

I saw the same guy, but you know what he's like? It's like Carlos Correa. Oh, it's like Correa. Yeah, it's more like Correa than Seager. I think that's the because Seager's swing decisions and power numbers are better. But he's sort of like Freddie Freeman at Middle Enfield or something. Okay, so I look back at the meatball draft,

the Rob D. Pietro pull hitter podcast draft from about a month or so ago now. Jeez, it's been a while, but. Yeah, where did Bo go? Bo went just outside the top 100 overall. Pick 107 is where he landed. That feels about right as far as the discount goes. And who of the Mildline Fielders is up again?

Ezekiel Tovar went later in that round. So there's a would you rather. I know we've had questions about Tovar's approach too. Tovar versus Bo for 2025. Who do you like? Tovar. I mean, the park. I don't even like Tovar.

Tovar. I don't even like Tovar. I mean the park. I don't even like Tovar. I don't even like Tovar. His O swing percentage went up again. 48.48%. Dude. That's ridiculous. And much like Bo. I might take Bo over him and OVP. I don't know the over under on Tovar's OVP next year is 290. I don't know the over under on Tovar's OVP next year is 290. Yeah, no, that's that's fair, but Tovar's making it work with a pretty awful approach The only thing that gives you a glimmer of long-term hope that Tovar could become more patient as a hitter. He's still 23 He's still young enough to start making some changes or at least even doesn't walk more Maybe he'll strike out less or just strike out less. Yeah, he had probably better contact rates at points in the minors. So that could be the toggle.

I think the other middle infielder in that range at second base, Matt McLean, went three, four picks before Bowe. So what do you think about Matt McLean versus Bowe? McLean is not going to prove to us that he's healthy. And so we're going to be left wondering not only about his shoulders health in terms of what power he'll give us next year, but also how much power did he deserve in the past, you know? Yeah, Matt McLean, I think it was,

McLean versus Galoff, I think, was one of our toss-ups for this past draft season, right? And we loved the park for McLean, but I think versus Galoff, I think, was one of our toss ups for this past draft season, right? And we loved the park from McLean, but I think with Galoff, there were some things that were maybe a little better in the underlying numbers, and we didn't get a chance to really get an answer because McLean hasn't been able to play

multiple injuries this year. I think I'll take Bichette with the risk that McLean comes back and he just doesn't have the same power. And McLean's at least gonna run. That's a real risk, right? Yeah, McLean should run for sure. And the park's gonna help keep the power afloat,

at least being in Cincinnati. That's true. It's not gonna have zero power. We could have like a Johnson India power. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay. So you're Bo over McLean.

So you're gonna take McLean over Bo? I just need some better health reports first. And we're talking about two guys that have been hurt, but I think McLean coming off of a major shoulder surgery is a lot worse than Bo's combination of injuries this year. So I think so. I think they're right to be clustered together. If I were drafting in this moment,

I'd take Bo for the bounce back. But if we get more information, if McLean's at least healthy enough to not be rehabbing anymore and to be trying to get better this off season, instead of trying to get healthy. How about above Tovar? Is there somebody that we could be like, oh, we like these guys, Tovar and Bichette, better

than these guys? So going a little bit earlier than these two? Not a lot of middle infielders in that cluster. It's actually catchers, pitchers, corners. This is like last chance saloon middle infielders. It's kind of like the middle infielders that people like Jordan Westberg also went in the eighth round so what do you think about Westberg against bow and Tovar I could almost see taking Tovar and and bow over Westberg I like Westberg but he has this weird thing

where his contact rate is worse than his strikeout rate and he kind of does it also on the barrel max EV thing whereas max EV is okay but his barrels pretty good and he didn't steal that many bases Westberg has a little bit of collapse risk to him I think you know I think he'll be good but it could be 250 with like 17 homers and three steals next year yeah another another one of these guys that doesn't run that much. That's where the McLean profile fits the position better than the rest of the group.

But I still see a world in which Bo Bichette is very good in batting average, great at piling up runs and RBIs. And still gets you 20 homers. I think he gets 20 homers in. Ends up being in good value where he's going. Oh man, am I gonna turn Bo into this year's Gleyber? Is that that way? The whole point of this season was to stop stepping on the same rakes and now Marty's like making

Resolutions to step on the same rake labor is at least done like a late season rally, dude he's up to 250 with 14 homers and four steals and I kind of want to look at his auction calculator what do you think his earned value is in 15 teen leagues with an MI six bucks wait I gotta get an MI 50F 1 CI 1U2 oh you're doing the longhand you're not doing the new player later unreal haha yeah okay so you just miss filling in all those boxes don't you I Longhand, you're not doing the new player rater? Unreal. Yeah, okay, sorry. You just miss filling in all those boxes, don't you?

I can't. There's a part of you that likes to go through and change all of those boxes every single time. You sicko. Nine dollar second basement glaver Torres behind Cronenworth McMahon and stopped and whispered. Not turning into the party hangout that I'd hoped. The pity party hangout?

No, it's just the rest of development. George Senior's up in the attic, the hot tub, it's not going well for him up there. I thought I thought Gleyber was just the most obvious value in that seventh round pocket where he was going. I just thought everything was great. Got two superstars in the lineup with him. Everyday job walk year runs a little. He still had a productive season. Right. It's not a disaster, but it just you still lost value relative to where you drafted him.

You probably were looking for 15 plus and you got nine. So it's a slight loss. Yeah, so you drafted him around Andres Jimenez who got, let me see, what, ADP? Oh yeah, you drafted him ahead of Andres Jimenez who got $13. You drafted him ahead of Luis Garcia who got $16. You drafted him ahead of Luis Garcia who got $16 you dropped him ahead of a rise who got 17 Tourang got 18 bucks

steer got 20 You dropped him ahead of Cattell Marte. He was the best second baseman in baseball and it's $30 Cattell Marte did even More like that's that's what I thought was in the, I thought a monster, like a reasonably monstrous season from Gleiber, almost as good as what he did when he hit 57 home runs against the Orioles in a season a few years ago.

I thought most of 2019, let's say 30 homers was possible in the walk year. That's where I was wrong. I thought good average, good power, double digit steals, great counting stats. That's what I thought we were getting. And we didn't get that from Gleib. I mean, he just had the best K-rate of his career

last year. Yeah, man. You know, second best stolen base rate. He's going to the walk year. Another thing I was wrong about, I'm just gonna keep making confessions on the show for the remainder of the year, but let's shift the focus over to a leaderboard that I was wrong about. I'm just going to keep making confessions on the show for the remainder of the year. But let's shift the focus over to a leaderboard that I was kicking around. That comes out real small if you're watching us on YouTube. But all it is, it's

the second half strikeout minus walk percentage leaderboard. I put a few different things on there, including the stuff numbers and just looking at ratios, looking at different things and trying to find surprises, good and bad. I'm gonna not strain Eno's eyes and just take that off the screen right now. I found a few things that stood out to me looking at second half numbers. Chris Sale has a 25.9% K minus BB percentage

in the second half. I set the minimum innings to 50, so there's like 93 pitchers I think that qualified. Sale's doing that with an 86 stuff plus. So there's something going on with Sale. Like he looks fine. He looks like typical Chris Sale by most reasonable measures right now. That was just kind of jarring to me as someone who was dominating in a metric we care about.

The first half stuff plus was good. It actually was really good for Chris Sale Sale so I don't know what's going on there necessarily. One thing I can say is that we probably will see a boost for all lefties of maybe six to eight points of Stuff Plus. But still a 92 or a 94 on on that result is just a it's working it's working for Chris sale. That's

That's all I've got but even the other thing I can say is he's fairly unique I mean I I sat Behind the plate with my son for a game of Blake Snell versus Chris sale it's like snails number one Chris sales number three and It was really stark how? Weird their arm slots were both of of them. I think that that feeds into something where it's like, yes, Stuff Plus captures that to an extent because it loves release point, but the weirder you are, the fewer comps you have.

I think that's fair. That explains a lot of it. Blake Snell, by the way, you mentioned he's first in K minus B.B. percentage. The main reason I made this leaderboard is because I'm trying to get ahead of all the undervalued pitchers for 2025 stories that will be out there. Sleepers, all that kind of stuff. Right. Like this is usually like phase one of figuring that out. But Blake Snell, I think he's going to go a lot earlier in 2025 than he did in 2024 because I don't think he's gonna sit on the free agent market nearly as long, right? He's gonna opt out and either get more years to stay with the Giants or he's gonna go somewhere

else. Do you think we're at the point now where after another run, another great season from Snell, even though there's been injuries and the workload concerns are still there, do you think the market will finally push him up more like a top 10 starter again? I mean, there may have been a point early in his time with Tampa Bay where he popped up there once. I don't have historical ADP handy right now. But what's the difference between Snell and Glass now

in terms of injury risk, but then like the possibility of a massive payoff with a ton of strikeouts and ratios if he stays healthy for most of the season. Cy Young, right? Get two! Yeah, but the weird part for me is that I don't know that on the open market he's changed his pitch much.

Right, but but another year of showing hey this, this works. I'm really good. I make your team better. But it's still like, you know, I'm going to give you 110 innings in one year, and 150, and 180 in other years. You know, it's like that's the reason why nobody wanted to give him the full six. I think if I was a front office, I would try to lower that AV a little bit and just be like, I'm going to give you the Gossman Plus deal. I'm gonna give you, you know, five and 140 or something.

Okay, so you're gonna stretch it out a little bit further. Man, I think there is a question of how well will Blake Snell's stuff age for keeper and dynasty purposes. Is there a similar approach for you, talking about how Chase ages with walks. Like, do you worry the same way? If Blake Snell walks a lot of guys right now, it doesn't matter because he strikes so many guys out.

But if he walks as many guys three years from now, as he does today, and the stuff's not quite as good, those walks come back to bite him a lot more. I mean, a huge part of Blake Snell's skill set is hit suppression. And like that's also hard to hone in on. Like how much of it is Blake Snell? How much of it is Park? How much of it is defense? Clearly there is a role he has that his stuff has in how difficult he is to hit. Year over year over year you see low hit totals against his

innings total. That's just part of Blake's who he is and he's done it in three different organizations Generally in all pitcher friendly parks, but at least different places where it's like, okay This this is a skill that Blake Snell does own for his career 838 hits allowed almost 1100 career regular season innings if I'm reading Bill Bill Petty's aging curve aging curve for pitchers correctly, pitchers walk rate generally just goes down over their career. If I'm reading incorrectly and that's saying that pitchers walk rates get worse, it says minus point five. So you think okay it's minus point of five off of a bad stat. And home runs per nine go up and walks per nine go down. So I think I'm reading this correctly

and just pitchers walk fewer batters over the course of their career. There could be some survivorship bias, which is that if your strikeouts go down and you have terrible walk rates, you're just not in the sample anymore. Right. But this aging curve suggests that I think it also makes sense to like, you know, one of the ways you stay in the sample anymore. Right. But this aging curve suggests that I think it also makes sense. Like, you know, one of the ways you stay in the league is figure out how to command the ball and you know more about yourself.

And so I think that's I think that actually speaks well to Snell because strikeout rate is the one that goes down really badly. But at least he's starting in in like an excellent top of the league place. you know, so you're saying in terms of components, he starts with a 34% strikeout rate. Yes, he's going to lose

some off of that, but aging curve suggests that, you know, his 10 11% walk rate might actually, you might actually expect better going forward. Not a lot better, but you know maybe nine and a half, you know, he's done that a bunch. So I think aging curves are kind to him. The only way that they're not kind to him is that if he's missed so much time early in his career, he's only going to miss more time going forward. Yeah, and I do think with Snell it's not the same type of injury every time either. So there's multiple, multiple trouble spots. But all of that being said, I just I think he's going to cost a little bit more if he stays in San Francisco or lands another picture friendly environment. I'm probably in. I think it's

not impossible to find decent innings on the waiver wire. And I think the payoff, like the risk reward is probably worth it at this point. We've seen enough good Snell to trust it. Spencer Schwellenbach, man, he's popping in the second half. There's your guy. Like for every site that runs a 2025 undervalued players story.

He's gonna be on everybody's list. Everybody. There's gonna be a lot of Schwellenbach helium. It's a 24.8% strikeout to walk. 305 ERA, 106 whip in the second half. He's tied with the third best location plus too. So he's commanding it well. Lots of pitches, like any, he's on a good team.

You could look at his workload and say he'll throw more because he's been building up since he was a two-way player, late convert to pitching in college. All of the stuff, I know it's all there. So it's coming. But like how much is too much? Like at what point are we pricing Spencer Schwellenbach so highly that he almost can't exceed expectations anymore?

I won't know that until I really get my fingers into it. But like I think if you're taking him in the top 25 pitchers, then there's no there's no you're you're taking him in the top 25 pitchers then there's no there's no you're you're buying him at his upside you've ruined you've taken away the profit potential like you've already paid full freight yeah I think so I don't necessarily see him as an as an ace you know that's like you know gonna move into the top 15 or whatever so you just don't have that much receiving beyond that I think he'll be like a top 20, top 25 guy. But we'll see. You know, the one thing that happens is, you know, injury is such a big part of this where you, you know, from doing rankings

over the season, what you notice is that guys who you think are top 25 guys eventually get into the top 10 by the end of the season or top 15 by the end of the season just because everyone got hurt. You know? So like, he could find his way into the top 10 that way. But sort of true talent, everyone's healthy, I don't know that he's a top 10 pitcher for me in the big leagues. I find it interesting, the guys with ERAs over four on this list, there's not many of them. I mean, we're looking at the leaders in K-BV, it's super predictive. So most of the ERAs are twos and threes, and it's Bowden Francis and Bryce Miller and Shotai Managa and Zach Wheeler and Tarek Schubel.

You know, it's like, that's the list. But the guys over four are Logan Gilbert, Sonny Gray, Nick Pavetta, Brandon Fatt. These are in the top 20. Brandon Fatt, and I'm gonna leave those two off, I guess. So those are the guys in the top 20 in K-minus-BB with an ERA over four over that same timeframe. And I think I'm generally in on all of them going forward.

One thing that I see with Sunny Gray, and of course, what do they all have is, well, not all of them going forward. One thing that I see with Sunny Gray, and of course, what do they all have is, well, not all of them. Logan Gilbert, you spotted this one. A 52% left on base percentage, which is just ridiculous. That'll do it. That's just luck plus maybe the relievers

didn't help him out, you know what I mean? Gilbert was the sixth starting pitcher taken in the aforementioned meatball draft, early third round. I don't think anyone's going to get tricked by that. I think he still belongs in that conversation. He seems like a horse, healthy stuff, K's, you know. It seems, yeah, I'm not worried about that. Sonny Gray I'm a little bit more worried about

because he's older and the reason why his ERA is higher is home run rate and he's really fallen in love with that sweeper and of course that sweeper is going to keep his stuff plus number up but we've seen him now in periods of time late in the season and in the playoffs fall in love with the sweeper, throw it a ton, and I just think he becomes predictable in a way that some guys sit on that pitch or spit on that pitch, whatever it is, get him into bad counts, whatever it is. There's something about his arsenal that makes,

like it's also just not like a plus plus fastball anymore, right? So, you know, if you're a guy who's just bending tons of breaking balls, it's a little bit more like Joe Musgrove territory. You're like, oh, the stuff plus loves and the K-Miles BB loves him.

He's still not. I still can't put him in my top 20, even though my projections say I should. You know, that's how I feel sort of Musgrove Ian about about Sunday Gray. And then Nick Pavetta is just I think I wonder if Brandon Fatt

is the new Nick Pavetta. But Nick Pavetta, I think it has something to do with the park. I mean, a 2.4 home runs allowed, I think it has something to do with the fact that he throws a sweeper from a extreme four seam arm slot. I don't, I don't know, dude. Nick Pavetta has, for the most part in in his career been less than the sum of his parts Yeah, the Nick Pavetta has shown us who he is for a long time and I do think home parks have a role in that

But I think the thought part of this is interesting because thought just had a great start last night against the Brewers got the brewers Twice in a row because the schedule Brewers knocked him around in Arizona the first time. He came back, had 12 Ks, and was excellent. It's the same team. Same team. I realized, you know, day after clinching the division, maybe there was a little bit of a hangover effect there.

They didn't play a week. They gave William Thomas a day off. Otherwise, Contreras was in the lineup, Churio was in the lineup. It was not a watered down lineup. It was a great performance. And I'm looking at the game log, I just wanted to see what was different.

This is where I think having the stuff plus in the game logs is kind of helpful. Fats Forsiemer had a 112 against the Brewers in the start in Milwaukee on Thursday night. For the season it's a 95, so he was way above his season norm. It oscillates a lot. I'm a little surprised about this.

He has 110s, 105s, and he has 92s and 83s. He has a 78 stuff plus game. 75. Well, that's, no, that's home against Colorado. So he goes all the way from 75 to 112. That's the most I've seen any pitcher oscillate. And I think that's something we spotted actually at the very beginning.

We've talked about Brian Fott so much. He's the new Mitch Keller from conversational purposes. So he's Nick Pavetta and Mitch Keller just smushed together into one. Oh my God, we'll just rename this the Fott Keller. Fott Chance. Pavetta Paz. Yeah, Fatt Chance.

I mean, the first thing, one of the first things we said was, we're seeing large oscillations in his stuff plus due to atmospheric conditions in the minor leagues. Remember that conversation? That was like one of the very first things we ever talked about. And look at some of his fastball stuff numbers at home

compared to on the road. I think that fourseamer dips in various locations. I think it's a little worse at home than it is on the road. Yeah, oh I need a split on this. Yeah, that's just from the eye test. That's a lot of the high numbers are on the road. So that could, I mean that's a problem potentially if you have to make half your starts in a dry environment that doesn't work. It's dry and it's not gonna grip as much and in maybe in more neutral slash wetter environments it grabs I mean 107 in Miami 104 in San Diego you know Baltimore 111. I can confirm that it's it's very humid still here in the upper Midwest where summer

has been extended for a few weeks Yeah, so the story with him is a little different than Pavetta with Pavetta You like look at each of the parts and you're like, yeah good good picture, right? And then you look at the results and you're like, that's annoying With Pavetta, I think it was with fought you can kind of you see inconsistent foreseen and so the you know at his core Fatt's probably best as a sinker slider guy with a decent curve, right? And then you're like, oh this guy has a problem with lefties and that I think has been

True his whole career this year. He has a 277 WOLBA against the righties and a 341 against lefties for his career. That split is also 40 points, 349-309. So he's a guy who's just trying to keep it together against lefties. And I think that has something to do with the results changing from game to game to which teams have great slugging lefties and I think that has something to do with the results changing from game to game to which teams have great slugging lefties or whatever. I may have accidentally built a Brandon Fott in our build a pitcher draft yesterday actually. Looking at some of his characteristics. What did you get again?

I had plus plus extension which is a good extension not elite. I had I think off speed Velo and breaking Velo. He doesn't have elite fastball velocity. The feel for spin like I've got a few. But 85 on the slider is pretty good. 87 on the change up. You're right. Yeah. It's a little little bit of a Brandon Fatt profile. The thing I do like, they've already started to taper off his usage

of the force humor compared to last season. So I get the sense that the organization is working through it. There's a path forward. I think what's going to make FOTT a frequent part of the conversation here and everywhere is that when you look at a half season and you see a 597 second half ERA against a 338 Sierra, most reasonable people look at that and say, I want that picture. And then when you look at the models and you see, better than 105 stuff plus location plus pitching plus,

there aren't a lot of guys that have that. It kind of doesn't really matter like what lenses you like to look at. They're all going to tell you that Brandon Fott should be better. Most of them are gonna tell you that Tosh Bradley should be better too, other than the home run rate being just absolutely off the charts. And Bradley gets discussed

in this podcast enough too, so we don't have to rehash Bradley right now. You know, once you start getting past the top 25 in K-BB, you start getting closer to average. So average, I think is around 14%. Cody Bradford, Nathan E. Avaldi, Colin Ray, Luis Severino are all around 18 to 19 percent in K-Bb. So a little bit above average in K-Bb. I like all these guys a little bit, but I'm not putting them on sleeper lists. With Cody Bradford, the issue is just Velo. You know, I don't know how much I can trust Cody Bradford. You know, Cooper Criswell and Cody Bradford both look okay by stuff plus. You know, I've just a little bit distrust pitchers

that average 90 or less on the fastball. So that's not, and then I like Ivaldi, but I think between a lot of times the injuries, the age and the we don't know what park he's going to yet. I think, you know, Heman Severino are just guys that I'll take if they fall to Colin Ray territory. You know what I mean? Like, I'll just take if they're if they're free pitchers, but I don't want to do a real investment in them. So I think that Ivaldi and Severino will end up, you know, in somewhere between 50 and 60 in my rankings next year, despite having good KMSBV, OK Stuff Plus, you know, all that stuff.

They just, you have to consider aging curves. Those matter for Stuff Plus, for everything, for projections. And then, you know know to some extent their results Just haven't having that great. Yeah, you do have to be careful Be careful there the Other thing that caught my eye on this board before we move on Framber Valdez has a k-rate above 30% in the second half He's quietly putting together his best all around season for ratios.

It's more of the same in a lot of ways, just like a slightly better version. I don't have Fromber anywhere. I just, how and why do I keep missing? I know he's good, I know what he does works. I think I keep underestimating him or putting him in the same bucket as Logan Webb. And I think there might be a little bit more strikeout floor and even strikeout

ceiling from Fromber that I keep missing. Well, one thing that neither of them has or had going into this season was a plus hard breaking ball, like basically a slider. And both of them over the course of this season, Webb and Fromber, have really put forth better efforts with their harder breaking ball. So Webb has found a pretty good sweeper at 84 and in his last game he threw the most cutters of his career, 20% cutters against Baltimore. It wasn't the most amazing overall game

in terms of results, five innings, eight strikeouts, three earned runs, but it's a decent lineup, away from home, and Fromber's slider usage over the last few games and over this course of the season, I think explains a little bit of the difference in his strikeout rate. So I do, he doesn't use it all the time or even every game, but it is important for him

to use that slider sometimes. I don't know, what else? The other thing is that, again, as a lefty, he's undervalued by Stuff Plus right now. Yeah, that's definitely a part of it, but I, man, it just keeps coming up, delivering a lot of innings with good ratios and a few more Ks than I expected.

So we'll see if that second half actually turns anything more, but even if it doesn't. I'm happy I traded Heston Kirstad for him, I'll be honest about that. Oh, geez, that's a, yeah, that's a great trade. Let's take a look at the waiver wire here for the weekend. Who are you trying to target as you look for any answers possible in the

final weeks? I mean it's chaos out there. There's like Grant Holmes is stepping into the rotation for Ronaldo Lopez and you're like, maybe Grant Holmes can help me. Richard Fitz is getting some turns for the Red Sox, he's got another one coming up here on Friday night against the Twins. He hasn't allowed an earned run in his first two big league starts so, you know, pitched pretty well at AAA this year too.

Maybe an interesting guy in keeper and dynasty leagues where available to stash on the end of your roster right now to possibly get a shot at a Boston starter for 2025. Yeah, you know, Reese Olsen gets the raise. He didn't pitch that well on his first start back, but the raise offense, you know, Myles Michaelis at the Giants, Davis Martin.

I think it's a bad week to buy two starters because necessarily the last start is last game of season. So like Marcus Stroman is supposed to be a two starter, Baltimore at home, Pittsburgh at home. I don't think there's any like Marcus Stroman is supposed to be a two-starter Baltimore at home Pittsburgh at home I don't think there's any way Marcus Stroman pitches in that last game if it's meaningless time, you know Yeah, or if he does they just give him one turn to the order Let him get his work in and then they just say okay Let's let's pack it up and get you rested up for the start of the playoffs

I could definitely see that with more established starters. Yeah, so you could try to do like, okay, I'm gonna do a bad team young starter where they want him to start that last game and get innings, because they're trying to get innings out of them. Well, I just said bad team, worst starter. You don't want that guy?

Jonathan Cannon, you know, like angels at Detroit. Maybe he makes that last start, you know, and it's a decent matchups. I'm not going to say don't get Jonathan Cannon, but that's that's where you're shopping in deeper leagues. If you're looking for a two starter on a young team.

I mean, even Jacob Junas, you know, they need him to start just because they've run out of arms in Cincinnati. He gets at Cleveland, at Chicago. That's a, you know, and he's not always like in a go five or six. So I don't know. It's a tough week for streaming pitchers for sure. Yeah. I mean, Landon Rupp, who you mentioned earlier in the week, doesn't have a start on

the Roto-Wire grid yet, but he could end up starting one of the weekend games against the Cards next weekend. You have to look for guys that haven't hit their innings limit, whose teams just need to get through the rest of the season and try and stream from that group. There is a possible two-step for Hayden Birdsong. Maybe he makes both of those starts, but at Arizona for the first one in a game that matters for the Dbacks, and then the last day of the season would be the second one home against the Cardinals. It's like if you could would be the second one home against the Cardinals. It's like, if you could just have the last one,

you'd choose that. It's like, there's risk all over when you're trying to find innings here in the final week. It's like the worst thing to need because you need the perfect intersection of guy with no restrictions, who either individually, he cares a lot or team needs him

to just keep shoving through. And then an opponent that Doesn't have anything to play for or isn't very good Like if those lines intersect thumbs up because I've got a good pitcher for you who has a to start next week next week And who a pitcher I like and somebody I would pick up in keeper leagues and hope that he has a role next year's land And neck. Oh, yeah If you want land a neck, he gets the Padres at home and then he's at Colorado to finish the season. So Good luck with that choice

So it's very very tough on that side Are any bats that you've noticed in the last week or so that might actually be out there and able to help? I mean one of the things I do normally for bats because I'm I'm in a lot of leagues where I'm just looking for bats That are playing and so I'm looking for you know, the guys were playing the most and Jill or Shella could patch over some stuff for you You know the young guys that are playing a lot. I can't recommend them for you. Maybe Jarrett Triolo What's the pirate schedule this week?

Yeah, that's the other thing you're looking at too, like looking for extreme schedule imbalances and trying to find a group of all-righties or something. First Milwaukee at New York, you know, maybe New York is resting guys. Maybe by that weekend, plus they get the park boost going into Yankee Stadium for that weekend series. I think as far as like possible

Prospects that have been recently called up that might be available in some more shallow formats the we saw in Hela Cunha is Getting a look right now for the Mets looks I've seen you know the Mets Mets fans are very active on Twitter and They're a large fan base and a lot of them saying like oh, you know this could be real this power dude like Acuna's ISOs, you know, this could be real, this power. Dude, like Okunya's ISOs, you know, a double A and above start with a zero. So I don't know that I believe in this power. I know he hit two homers. Congratulations to him.

It's hard to hit in the major leagues. I don't think he's a hitter. I think he's a utility player. I can't figure out why it wasn't better at triple A this year if he's more than just's more than just an average bottom third of the order starter That's the part I can't quite get but there was a lot of speed 40 for 54 as a base dealer So if he's bottom third of the order on a good lineup Can actually use that speed not hurt you in batting average then probably be better than Luis Guillermes what I'm saying

Oh, I think he's better than Luis Guiomé, but. But I'm not sure he's a starter. Do you think he's a starter in the league? I think he might be. I think there's a good enough chance he's a starter. But think about where expectations might have been for like Bryce Terang this time a year ago, and then look at what Bryce Terang did.

A lot of it's opportunity and then having that categorical juice. So it could be non-zero power with good speed and an average that won't hurt you. That would work. I don't think they're moving Lindor off short yet though. No, it'd be at second base. And they're not, I mean, they haven't been playing him

in center. If they're playing him at second base, they're seeding a fair amount of offense. So it may happen though, I guess. I mean, he's up against Iglesias, who's not on the team next year. We're talking about free agents always with the Mets, right? And maybe Brett Beatty gets it together

and Jeff McNeil comes back next year. Yeah, that's no guarantee though. That contract is brutal. And they can move McNeil around a little bit, too I mean Acuna is playing short right now because Lindor has been hurt So we'll see if Lindor is back for the weekend that could create a little bit of a squeeze But even Acuna versus Iglesias, I know Iglesias has been a very pleasant surprise for the Mets Like it could turn to a little bit of a timeshare next week. That's the that's the little bit of a short-term problem

I guess with Luis Angel Lacuna. I was thinking also Nick York is getting a chance right now for the Pirates when you mentioned Jared Triolo before. So Nick York might be out there in a few days. They are playing Jared Triolo, Nick Gonzalez and Nick York in the infield. And the weirdest thing is they're just sort of like rotating them. So each of them gets a shot at shortstop. I guess they're trying to figure out who can play shortstop rotating them. Each of them gets a shot at shortstop. I guess they're trying to figure out who can play shortstop for them. Yeah, give them all reps, why not? And the answer may be none of them.

But you wanna know that sooner rather than later. That's true. One thing I like about Nick Gonzalez is Nick York more than Nick Gonzalez is making the contact. Nick Gonzalez I think maybe has a slightly higher ceiling because he's shown a little bit more oomph and he's been making more contact since he made a swing change this year. So I do think Nick Gonzalez ranks a little bit ahead. And then Triolo is probably last for me in terms of upside with the young guys

because he strikes out the most and has the the worst bat of all stats, but the one nice thing about Triolo versus the other two is he steals bases. So We I think we have a chance that all three of them play regular roles for the Pirates next year I mean, you're gonna come back with a Cribrine Hayes But shortstop and second are open plus utility and field plus first base is, I think, open. Rowdy is under contract until the end of the year. So there's a possibility it's Triolo Gonzalez and York

for first and second and short next year. Yeah, opportunity to find some PT though for the final week though, if you look at that Pirates infield, I think Tyler Soderstrom's another guy over in Oakland is playing a little bit more here in the final days of the season as well. If you're looking for some help on the corner,

the possibility of a home runner too. Soderstrom's got pops, the question of how long it's gonna take for him to tap into it. We are gonna go, good luck with those final weekend pickups. It is, it's a mess out there, as you could tell. Main event moved into third. I got a chance. Good luck, hey. Good luck, try to finish it off.

Try to at least get that entry feedback. That's not nothing in the main event. You can give us a follow on Twitter, enos.enosaris. I'm at Derek and I'm right with the pod is at rates and barrels. You can also get a subscription to the athletic at theathletic.com slash rates and barrels. $2 a month gets you in the door.

Have a great weekend. We're back with you on Monday. Thanks for listening. College football is back like never before. I'm David Ubbin and I host Until Saturday, the athletics leveled up college football podcast. Three times a week you'll hear me and my co-host, fellow athletics senior writer Chris Finneany and two-time national champion Damian Harris embrace the sport's new madness with you. We're also just going to have a ton of fun enjoying all the things that make college football great. Check out the brand new one until Saturday, every Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday this

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