Rates & Barrels - The post-deadline paths for the Mariners and White Sox

Episode Date: August 5, 2021

Eno welcomes Michael Ajeto from Lookout Landing and Janice Scurio from NBC Sports Edge and South Side Sox to this episode of Rates & Barrels. The trio gets into a wide-ranging discussion that focuses mostly on the post-deadline paths for the Mariners and White Sox, but gets into many other corners of the baseball world. Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow Michael on Twitter: @mikeyajeto Follow Janice on Twitter: @scuriiosa e-mail: [e-mail] Subscribe to the Rates & Barrels YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/RatesBarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels, presented by Topps. Check out Topps Project 7, celebrating 70 years of Topps baseball cards. And this is your host, Eno Saris. We do not have Derek Van Ryper today, but we have an awesome collection of talent here with Michael Ajeto from Lookout Landing and Janice Scuro from NBC Sports Edge and also Southside Sox. So we are going to talk today a little bit about the Mariners and the White Sox, but I'm sure we'll get into some regular baseball stuff. And I think that to start, we just had the deadline. We could kind of juxtapose the two deadlines that these two teams had.

They're kind of different teams. uh deadlines that these two teams had they're kind of uh kind of different teams and but i'm gonna have to go to you uh michael because um i just think there was there was so much uh talk and uh there was so much like rancor about the mariners um a deadline but my question for you is like don't you think that the mariners got better for this year after that deadline, even though like maybe, you know, sending Cameron Graveman out as the first move kind of made it seem like they were selling? I mean, they seem better, right? Like, Diego Castillo is pretty awesome, even at 96 instead of 97. I don't know. Yeah, I never really doubted it once once we saw graveman go

um i was really hyped to get toro because actually you're the one that put me on to him as a peripheral prospect or prospect of the week i think in 2019 or 2020 so i've been on him for a while now and i mean i was surprised that that was the return but I knew that Depodo wasn't going to just send out Graveman and just be done with it um yeah he's Depodo right yeah right like and like a lot of the reports were coming out and saying you know like uh the Mariners are talking to this team about this player and so I I thought that we would do something a little splashier. But, like, you know, in the end, to go from Graveman to Castillo, which I think at best, I think that's an improvement.

At worst, I think, you know, it's a pretty, you know, lateral move. But then to also address some starting pitching and also, you know, get a bat, I think that's pretty huge. So just along with kind of the within team things that are happening, like Jared Kelnick, you know, with his swing change, I think that they're a much better team coming out than when they entered.

It's just, it's definitely a bummer that we didn't come out with like Chris Bryant or something. Yeah. But I mean, I guess there's some realism with just about how the, the projections had you guys is how likely of making the postseason. And also just the difference,

there's a difference between being like a division leader and being in it for the wild card i guess um you know one thing that that uh strikes me is interesting and i don't know if you guys have like total uh spin rate uh like you're just like totally tired of talking about spin rates but graven was a guy uh whose spin rates declined um and then you have castillo whose velocity has declined this year uh compared to the last one. So I think it's just interesting to have those guys kind of one going one way and the other going the other way.

How angry should they be in Tampa? I mean, they're like in it for the division, and they just traded away their closer. But I guess in Tampa, everyone just expects it. Should Jerry have gone to the players and explained this before he did it? Or was there anything they could have like gone to the players and explain this before he did it or was there anything they could have done because the players were pissed yeah it's oh man that was a pretty uh bombshell of an article at the times um i mean i don't really know how you go about it because if you go to grave men and you say hey man like um i just want

to be up front like i think you, a lot of teams are asking about you and we just want to be open. Like, there's a chance that you get traded. First of all, like, I think you want to balance his mental health and how he's pitching because, I mean, that's a big thing to, you know, be weighing on you. But also, like, I think you need to i don't know it's essentially you need to strike a balance between telling the player um and also i guess

like not uh seeing what happens there so um i think that they they should have been right because if you tell them too early like then all the rumors get out and stuff right and and you don't want the player to find out from the media, but things happen really fast. And I heard... Apparently, I've been asking around, I think it's more normal now to hear from media or Twitter than to hear from your team.

That's the norm. And it sucks. I think I heard your take last week, and I think you're pretty on know, pretty on the head. It's like, it just materializes so quickly. And like, it's a,

it's a really big thing to be looming over your head. And then if you don't get traded, it's like, well, how much, you know, do I mean to this team? So I don't know.

I, I understand the optics were really bad. And you know, there was a lot of backlash, not only from the players, but across social media, people were like, what are the Mariners doing? But I mean, like they got a lot younger.

It's I just think it was a good move with really, really bad optics. Yeah. How was it in Chicago for the White Sox, you think, at the deadline, Janice? Was it was it just were there people saying we should have gotten more? Was it, you know, they already had a pretty good bullpen, but adding Kimbrel, I mean, that's not, you can't say that's bad. Is there any sort of talk about whether Kimbrel's there next year too?

And like what, you know, if there was anything else that fell apart or there were other options that they were trying to pursue? Yeah, so to take a quick temperature of the fan base before the trade deadline, no one was expecting the White Sox to really do much. So I might've told some people in a Twitter thread that, you know, if the White Sox did not make any moves, I wouldn't be surprised. I wouldn't be surprised, but I would still be pretty disappointed. Probably the move that I am perhaps the most underwhelmed with was actually the acquisition of Cesar Hernandez. The second base has definitely kind of been a black hole for the White Sox for quite some time,

both in the lineup as well, defensively too. So I felt as if it was probably the best they could do. Any trade that also comes just from within the division, I'm also just deeply suspicious with too. But so far, it looks as if Tony LaRusse is at least using him in the most optimal way, just mainly because he's been Cleveland's leadoff man all this time. And batting second, before coming to the White Sox, he had a 562 OPS and 87 plate appearances. So, yeah. Or wait, that's not right.

But anyway. Well, he's had that recent power surge. So I could see him fitting a little better second in the lineup or third even. But that's very true. And even just in the short tenure with the White Sox so far, he's been doing pretty well. So I feel as if at least on the defensive side, that's definitely an upgrade. On the defensive side, that's definitely an upgrade. But with Kimbrel, though, I feel as if that was the trade that just knocked me just on my behind.

I was not expecting that to happen. Really surprising, I thought. Yeah, it was very surprising, too. And the return also, too, I felt was fair. So Nick Madrigal and Cody Hoyer. Where do you sit on Magical? Isn't he like in Chicago, either you think he's a total bum or you think he's totally great? I feel as if he's neither. I feel as if he is. That's probably right. He has come through in some clutch situations. Probably the big inside joke for quite a while was that when will this guy ever hit a home run?

And he ends up hitting two. So that was something that impressed. Right. Right. So you kind of go with this recurring theme of all these, like just lowered expectations here. But people think he can't defend or base run, right?

Like people think he's really bad at those things. And that's because he is. Doesn't quite show in the numbers as badly, but. Yeah. Yeah. The eye test certainly shows that, yeah, he's gotten into a couple of blands before his injury. Yeah. Defensively too. I certainly wasn't impressed by that. too. I certainly wasn't impressed by that. So yeah, I felt as if that was a very fair trade. Cody Hoyer has kind of had a bit of a rough start to the 2021 season. 2020, he had some solid numbers too, but otherwise, yeah, very satisfied with the Kimbrell trade. Yeah. Yeah. I wonder if they'll keep him around to have that much money down on your two relievers.

It's like $30, $34, $35 million in your bullpen. That would be kind of different. Not a lot of teams are doing that. But if you give up Madrigal, I kind of feel like you're kind of into it. You want Kimbrel for more than just this year. for more than just this year. But one thing that I'm looking at with the White Sox is, you know, I put them, you know,

in the power rankings fifth or something. And I don't know, I saw somewhere else. Oh, you had power rankings and you put them, where'd you put them? All right. First of all, that's Drew Silva making the rankings. Okay. Blame it on Drew.

All right. So my job is I basically am his straight man or straight woman. I'm the one here just kind of, you know, grilling him for his decisions and life choices, which he absolutely deserves. So I've definitely embraced that role. So yeah, just on the surface level they have lost seven out of their last 12 and that looks pretty bad uh so the thing is though i do agree that withdrew that they should coast to the division title at least and where would you put them oh i would put them you know what that's a great question um i would i would probably just agree with you and maybe just rank them fifth, just mainly because. That seems so weird.

Like what are their weaknesses? And we'll get into that, definitely. So, I mean, they've got a 99.8% chance of making the playoffs. But also at the time, they also hadn't won two consecutive games in two weeks. So last night's win versus Kansas City was their first since then. So, yeah, there's been some games lost via the sputtering offense. And I know, you know, you mentioned weaknesses, but yeah, there's definitely a lot less parity in the AL Central.

The White Sox have just been the strongest team in that division for a while now. And it's not even close. So like I mentioned before, intra-division trades I'm deeply suspicious of. But I know power rankings are super decisive, though. But hey, you know what? Maybe the real power rankings were the friends we knew along the way. Where are the meriters on your power ranking, Michael? Oh, man. I don't know. It's weird. The way

that they win games is the opposite of how they won games last year or didn't win games. It's their bullpen. I think it's somewhere around where they were before, but they can't keep winning one-run games like they've been winning or winning in the actual or something.

It's it's wild. So, I mean, I don't even know where they're at, but but like middle of the road, they're pretty, you know, a pretty middle of the road team. Where do you see like what I think it's pretty I guess it's fairly obvious, but like, you know, maybe maybe you have a take on this. Like, what is their way forward? Like, I guess, is it just, you know, J-Rod and like the young guys coming up and perform it's offense, right? That's, that's what they need most of all. Yeah, I think so. It's weird because it's like,

they're not out of the woods yet. Like if their best, you know, if the best performance that they're getting right now is is out of their bullpen that's that's not great like things look pretty good right now but they haven't really developed that many players yet like we're still kind of like we're far along into the process but we're not seeing you know the fruits of of our labor yet it's really know the fruits of of our labor yet it's really like Gilbert and then hitting on like uh Austin Nola and um I'm blanking on someone else that we traded but you know like a couple older players like it's not really guys like Kyle Lewis or Evan White like Kyle Lewis looks like a good player but I think he looks more like a two or three one player than like the superstar that

or star that they might have uh envisioned when they traded for him so um i really really trust the pitching development i don't trust the hitting development so much um so i think it's it's really gonna come down to you know how they're hitting on their guys um in the next year or so and how they supplement and free agency. So, um, I'm a really big fan of a lot of our, um, and I say our, cause I'm a, you know, a Mariners fan. I know that people hate that. But, um, I'm a really big fan of guys like George Kirby. I'm not so high on guys like Emerson Hancock. Um, but yeah, I think it's going to come down to the specs and, you know, um, But yeah, I think it's going to come down to the specs and, you know, end of the year here, Julio, Kelnick, whatever.

But I'm still like pretty nervous. Like a lot of things still have to go right. And we still have to spend money, which I don't I think is going to happen. But I also don't really trust like I wouldn't bet my life on it. So, all right. Well, you know, that's kind of a vague answer, but it's, there's something really interesting there that I want to, I think there's actually something here between the two teams that I find really interesting about player development. Uh, and I, I think that when we all kind of talk about player development and try to think about player development, our biases come to the fore

and we kind of, uh, either like, you know, we'd like Kyle Bodie,, we like driveline, we like this, we like that, and we kind of sort of faith cast a little bit. I don't know. I have a lot of respect for the pitching program. And what have they done? They kind of produced Logan Gilbert, and we're waiting on the others. So we're kind of – we are having some faith there. And as much as you kind of – I kind of agree that I don't know

about their hitting. I mean, Jared didn't come up and hit that well. And he was a high pick and was supposed to be, you know, like a best prospect baseball or whatever, or top three, you know, and Evan White was such a, that that's, I don't know. There was like, they signed this big deal and he just really kind of fell apart. You know, the flip side is this in chicago uh most of what i

the people i talk to are like oh yeah player development in chicago is a real problem uh the the sort of minor league coaching they're not in on tech and data they don't know what they're doing uh they're they're you know pitchers have to go outside the organization i'm sure you've heard that before janice like with like giolito had to go outside the organization to get fixed and stuff um but at the same time just look at the freaking white socks you know like like they're loaded like like i mean they just got all these players that are so good so like like where is that like the players were just good and it didn't matter that their player development was bad or is there like idea of player development just sort of faith-based in a way

or uh or is there like equal parts scouting and and uh and player development and like it's kind of hard to separate the two so i don't know jump in. I don't that's not really a question. I think the White Sox have realized, yeah, computers suck. Technology in general is the takeaway. Yeah. The biggest takeaway here. But yeah, I guess maybe the White Sox potentially may be proof that not everything has to be super analytics driven. Although I do know that they do have a couple of analytics coordinators now that report to Tony La Russa, too. And I think a lot of turnover in the coaching staff has certainly helped, too. So the major league pitching coaches is tech friendly, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. So I ethan katz is certainly

i love how they were like well you fixed you leto come on yeah yeah certainly and the proof is in the pudding there uh where the pitching staff has been absolutely phenomenal yeah they've been really good yeah any thoughts on the mariners and player development further yeah i i have really kind of mixed feelings because I don't know if you've seen, but I wrote about Chris Flexon and I was really excited about this curveball coming in and he hasn't even really used it as a get-me-over pitch. He hasn't used it a ton and he hasn't used it effectively.

I know that I've talked to some guys in front offices elsewhere and they said that you know coming in um his his stuff graded out really well which is kind of weird for me like he does have pretty decent fastball properties but it's really straight like i think he gets one inch of arm side run um and like it's not like he has a really firm curveball, like has a lot of drop, but he throws it like 76. So there's guys like him and Kikuchi who like, to me, it seems so easy. It's like, just stop throwing that cutter so much, throw your slider more, throw it more out of the zone. And I don't know if some of the players are stubborn or if it's a team thing, because we know that they like JT Chagua,

he came in and I saw, I think Shannon Dreher was like, when did you, you know that your slider was such a good weapon? And he's like, I didn't, the Mariners sold me. And then your boy,

like, I don't know how to say his name. Actually. Paul Seawald. Seawald seawald that is i say it okay my man yeah yeah um i mean i like they changed his arm slot right they yeah they had that they had to have known you know something was there um i don't think you you know you take a a 31 or 32 year old uh guy looks like Paul Seawald and just, you know,

hope that he, he can stick it. Yeah. And I don't know if, I don't know if that was a him thing or a Mariners thing where they had him, you know, drop the arm slot, but it does seem that he's really optimizing,

you know, throwing the fastball up in arm side where, you know, he can get most of his whiffs uh throwing the the slider off the plate um because he's throwing the slider more now but yeah his i mean his vertical approach angle i don't know where it was uh before this year i'm sure i wrote it in the article and have just since forgotten but it's the fifth best in mlb it's right he's legit it's it's it's it's better than josh hater it's better than edwin diaz and and freddie peralta like it's legit. It's better than Josh Hader. It's better than Edwin Diaz and Freddy Peralta. It's legit.

It's an important skill, I think, to find relievers. I think you see a lot of other teams that struggle with bullpens. I think that that's a player development and major league coaching flaw there because that relievers are kind of what you need to be able to churn out to be good every year you know and you need to uh turn failed starters into that and you need to find relievers on the waiver wire and kind of i think that's a huge huge skill and i think it is a skill that both these teams have uh bummer uh i love bummer stuff uh i liked hoyer stuff but uh you know maybe they just didn't have enough time i think that that might have been it with hoyer is just uh there was a couple more adjustments that need to be made in the future or whatever uh but uh they seem to they seem to be decent i mean i thought the column a deal was

really dumb honestly um and then he was he was really good for them so um you know there's something uh going on there that, that's good for the White Sox. But, you know, when I do look at the White Sox, like it's, it's funny, it's a little bit easier. You look at the Mariners, you're like, what's going on at first base? And like, is Dylan Moore a first line starter and stuff like that? But when I look at the White Sox, there's, there's really much like one position that I'm like, okay, once everyone's healthy, what's going on in right field. I knew you were going to talk about right field. So historically right field has been just the huge Sisyphean task for the

white socks front office. So the no more Mazzara experiment failed. The Adam, we kind of all saw that one coming. So the Nomar Mazzara experiment failed. Oh, boy. The Adam Eaton experiment also failed. We kind of all saw that one coming. Myself included. Myself included. Yeah. As soon as I saw the deal made in December, I was like, what the heck are they doing?

But yeah, when Luis Robert returns, the outfield is going to get mighty crowded. returns, the outfield is going to get mighty crowded. So to shore up the right field spot, I feel as if Adam Engel certainly deserves it. I mean, yeah, he gets on base and he's having another interesting reverse split season, which is super fascinating. So I mean, in recent history, he hasn't been great against righties, but he's hitting righties really well. He's also taking his pitches. He's got a good walk rate, 927 OPS against righties. So yeah, that never was the case. But yeah, Woba, weighted runs, created plus, walks, all better against righties.

That's weird. I mean, that was the duck on him that he might be a short side platoon guy. There's also that he would never really tap into the power. And I think that that seems to be wrong. I think he's hitting for power too, right? Yeah, he absolutely is. So I feel as if if the White Sox do decide to go with the platoon option, Gavin Sheets finally elected that again. Tell me about him. Is he just one of these like misses a ton big boys that hits the ball out of the yard? Is that am I getting it right?

So there's a longstanding joke that the White Sox have so many of these first base DH power. And that's sort of true. So Gavin Sheets is certainly one of them. In the short time he's been up, he's hit six homers and has an 807 OPS in 26 games. That's ridiculous. That's awesome. Was he hitting like 150 or something and has an 807 OPS in 26 games. That's ridiculous. That's awesome. Was he hitting like 150 or something? I don't know what his batting average is, but I'm sure it's pretty low. Sorry, did I bring up batting average? Never mind.

If I was a betting person, I'd probably say it's pretty low. Andrew Vaughn's another one of them. He's been a decent defender in left field. He actually did start a game in right, which the results were not great. But anyway, yeah, it's all experimentation and throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks. The Mariners do the same thing with infielders. They love putting them in the outfield and not even like ones that might work out. Like, you know, Cattell Marte, like with diamond backstead with him or like Brad Miller in centerfield, like they're putting like shed long and left field and trying to make it work. And it's, I'm so sick of seeing it.

When I, when I see like an infielder try in the outfield, there's one disastrous one that I think of. It's, it's a little bit old school now at this point, but Daniel Murphy, it's a little bit old school now at this point, but Daniel Murphy, the Mets tried him in left field a few times because he played third, he played second. It seemed like maybe he could move around enough. And it was just one of these like things

where he's just like turning circles. Every time the ball goes up, he's like, oh, nope, wrong shoulder. You know, it's just like, some people just can't see the ball that way. Yeah. Yeah. But, uh,

but I just look pretty good. I mean, I hate to, I hate to bring it up. There's all these, this Tony, the Rooster stuff is just so interesting to me too. It's a little bit like the Mariners thing.

And I hate to, I don't want to sound establishment or come in and, and have a bland ass like take, but like, you know, like the Jermaine Mercedes versus Andrew Vaughn stuff. Like, yes, I think that there were some, some sort of coded language there where Tony La Russa was saying some stuff that I don't,

I don't like the words he used because he talked about Vaughn being a grinder and Jermaine being really immature. And it was just so weird at the time because Jermaine is tearing the cover off the ball and Vaughn has like two homers. But in some ways, I think what he was talking about has borne out a little bit. Like, was LaRusso a little bit right? Because Vaughn has ground his way to being a really decent major leaguer and it's real it's like when you watch him you're like oh

yeah he is kind of a grinder he doesn't swing at anything he's like always kind of thinking and he's gonna he's gonna find a way to hit 18 or 22 homers or something and like and be better than people thought and be a like a league average major leaguer and you're mean they found a hole and you know they exploited the heck out of it and he didn't really adjust back and then the worst part is when you get a taste of the major leagues you go back down and then you're just like oh i talked to chris bassett about the like yesterday actually where it's like it's just the worst feeling in the world because you got the major league paycheck and you were going to major league cities and now you're headed to modesto or raleigh or and i'm not talking sorry raleigh people or

i love i i went to a great bar in modesto and i went to camp in raleigh whatever but what i'm saying is as a as like a guy who was in the major leagues, it's definitely not the major leagues. And so you kind of feel just really, so I feel, I kind of, I just, I don't, I don't, again, I don't have a question and I'm sorry, but like, it's like, it's one of those things where like, I see, I think that the, when we're in the media, like on Twitter, we like, we have these like really one-sided views of things.

But then when you, when things play out, you're like, oh man, all these things are true. Tony DeRusso used some coded language, but your mean, like, you know, didn't react well to, to some adversity, but he also, that's like the worst situation to be in, to be sent back down and be looked over after you had some success. And Vaughn is a grinder, but yeah, he's white. But it's like, I just think it's super complicated. I think maybe the only thing to take away is like, maybe Tony watched, like kind of think

about your words, know what these coded words are. I don't know. I don't know if you, what sort of perspective you have on that, Janice. i think both can be true i i think tony i like you said uh was right about vaughn uh being a grinder and yeah um it definitely shows he's been doing especially well uh lately uh the dude can just mash simply put your mean on the other hand yeah it was exposed that he was having problems with hitting velocity and hitting breaking pitches and pitchers exploited that. So yeah, he was sent down, which rightfully so. But of course, like as members of the media, as fans, the optics weren't great. So on surface level, yeah,

he's using all this coded language. He's just describing your mean as just being this uh immature uh player that yeah that has so much to work on and i'm like yeah he's right but certainly he could have phrased things a little bit more uh a little more carefully than he did well and to like not not only like not support him but be be like, yeah, if they throw at him, like it's, that was just awful. Yeah.

Like, how do you do that with any player? Like it shouldn't, you know, that was puzzling. Just the hanging him out to dry. And then a lot of the public comments too. I believe like he made some public comments about Lance Lynn as well. Since then, it's been quiet.

I'm hoping that maybe the White Sox PR folks maybe pulled him aside and said, hey, Tony, look. I don't know, man. This ties into... Tony LaRusso has a long career of winning and being good at his job for the most part, but also of picking favorites, blasting players in the media. And so it's kind of amazing to me. I think there's a stat out there that he's managed in 2.5% of all the baseball games that have ever been played. That's so wild. Who was it that called him out in the 90s?

It was a player of color that said that he plays favorites. I think then he... It's been going that way for a while. Ron DeFleur and him had a really big falling out in the 80s. There's been some run-ins.

There was the whole kneeling thing he didn't like and he used some problematic ways to describe that. I don't know. I think Chicago is kind of fascinating in that way. I think there's another universe where this went totally differently.

Where maybe the injuries were in a different order or Rodon doesn't break out. You know, maybe cease, maybe cease kind of maybe cease regresses or I don't know. And then like it could have all kind of just, you know, started tumbling in a different direction. he could on earth to uh jimmy cordero doesn't get uh yeah his forearm strain and he ends up just like burnering all the saves into the liam hendricks and tony the wrist is fired too much in the season i mean i went on record saying that i thought that cease was kind of cooked like i i thought he needed to do like the corbin burns thing where like he needed to to throw a sinker because um i mean he's he's completely stopped cutting his fastball at this

point right i know it was a big problem in 2019 less of a problem 2020 i i haven't looked at his command i mean what i've heard is that he's staying back a little bit i don't know it's yeah it seems like a cat's miracle to me. Yeah, Command has definitely improved for Cease. He's definitely been the recipient of some luck. I do know that last year, a big talking point was that his FIP was twice the size of his ERA. And so, yeah, one big problem with Cease is that he also gets to 3-2 counts a lot. And sometimes the count... It's not that fun to watch.

Yeah. And sometimes it works to his favor, and other times it does not. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's long games with... I mean, it is nasty.

Like, the curveball and the slider are nasty. And the fastball, when it's 98 at the top of the zone, looks pretty nasty. And so if you'd, like, just make like a, I'm going to say a moving image here because nobody likes the way I say that word. What do you say? Do you say Jeff?

Yeah. I used to. I said it in my, my picture. Nick got mad at me. Yeah. So I changed it. I've been saying gift ever since. Oh God.

So anyway, if you made a moving image of cease you'd think he was one of the best pitchers on the planet um you know because when he looks good he looks amazing uh but uh you know one there is one thing in that in that um rotation that is interesting to me which is that you know i've got these stuff numbers michael kopech is like through the roof uh in stuff and of course when you when you pitch more innings stuff numbers regress because your velocity goes down and so you have to be stretched out there's a relationship between you know how many innings you pitch and and your stuff but kopeck's stuff numbers are so good that if he pitched three or four innings he'd still be

some of the best stuff in the majors like what, what do you do with Kopech? You just want him for that one inning or like, what if like Lynn only goes three or four in a playoff game or, or like, what if you wanted Kopech for two or three innings? Could you do that right now? I, I, what do you, what do you, what would you do with Kopech? I would definitely stretch him out. So, yes, I would certainly get on that,

especially if he's going to be a member of the rotation next year. So looking at his innings, yeah, he's at 41. So that's not a lot right now. Most of his appearances have been an inning or less. So he's being used right now in short, high leverage spots. So I feel as if, yeah, he could probably be a playoff weapon and move into the rotation for 2022, but he needs innings right now. He needs spot starts.

He definitely needs to go more than one inning. So, yeah, if he is going to be used as a starter, yeah, the time to stretch him out would be ASAP. Yeah. It's getting, it's getting late early on that one. Does he have an injury history? He does. Yes. I don't know. I mean, the last time.

Like Tommy John. And then it was a long recovery, I think from Tommy John too, where like there was some setbacks or no, he just peaced out of 2020. Yes. He might've been able to come back and then that was either personal stuff or he just didn't want to take part. He might've missed a fair amount of it anyway. I mean, he, he doesn't lose Velo after I'm looking at it right now.

Like after two innings, I don't, I don't know about like three or four. Cause he hasn't done that that much, but I wonder if you almost, I think it's a little bit risky but i wonder if you throw him in like that 2016 2017 like chris davinsky uh role before he kind of fell off like where he's going multiple innings um why i asked about the injury history is because it's it's kind of murky like i i think you don't want to do that too long like if you give a guy 80 innings to two years in a row like the outcomes are pretty bad so right like chris davinsky is right too like yeah davinsky himself uh or oh who's the guy that

uh the the yankees pitcher everyone talks about that uh chad green no the guy that that got ruined by a tony uh by um oh anyway um so the the the thing though about a copic that's interesting is that like i mean keiko is fine right but in a postseason game i feel like if keiko puts a runner on he's out for me you know like i feel like or two you know especially if he doesn't get the ground ball to erase the guy you know know, like piggyback. Yeah. I just wouldn't trust Michael. Uh, and then G Alito's kind of got like the sort of hair up his nose thing

where some games he's just not good, you know? And, uh, and like, you can maybe Cal and Lynn and Rodone, they look like that this year, but like you could see a game three situation where you,

you start someone, you're like two innings and you're like crap i wish i had someone that could blow them away for two or three innings and instead you could you could maybe piecemeal it copec one inning you know all these guys but it might be really nice and the the problem i think also is that who do you tell to sit right now i mean maybe maybe you're just sort of hoping that Giolito or Keiko or somebody just needs a blow and, like, you know, you can get Kopech, like, a two or three inning spot start somewhere. But it's just, it's like one of those things where there's such, it's such a good team that it's not obvious where you put Kopech, where you stretch them out, how you do it. Unless you make it a thing that you think about in any opportunity you can.

Somebody's out early for some reason or another. Kopeck here, we're going to give it to you for two or three innings now. But they just don't seem to be doing that. So I don't know. I find that kind of interesting. Yeah, and also, too, it's just always good to have more good pitchers on staff.

I know that some of the early, I guess, bitebacks to acquiring Craig Kimbrell was that, why do we need another closer? I was like, maybe having two good closers is a good thing. Oh, yeah. I mean, if you could get a guy to go six to go Kopech,

Hendricks, Kimbrell, or I mean, good luck. Good night. Yeah. And they're going to be a division winner. It looks like. So, I mean, everything looks, everything looks pretty good in there. All right. You know, one of the things that, that doesn't make any sense to me is you say Kikuchi. And I, I watch him and I'm like, he's good.

I think he's a good pitcher. Then I look at my numbers and it says he has the worst command in baseball among starting pitchers. And sometimes you watch him and he gives up seven runs. You're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it. But I've also talked to coaches of his and they're like, well, he just totally changed his arsenal. I think that maybe this is a one one season blip with the command numbers,

but the command numbers are also not good this year. So, and also his arsenal keeps changing, right? Like you you've been writing about, or I think we've been tweeting about this with the cutter usage. What do you think Kikuchi is? Fascinating. I mean, I think he's the greatest example of someone who's who's not pitching to his strengths um like i i said earlier i i think it's it can be as simple as taking uh

the cutter and and throwing it less because he throws it more than his forcing fastball and i think some of that is because of his commands. And I remember when he came over. He's kind of reaching back to throw that four seam as hard as he can, right? And so it's kind of scattershot. Right. But even when he was throwing, you know, 91, 92, whatever, like a couple years ago, his command wasn't great. I remember when he came over. I mean, you know, first of all, his command was supposed to be like 45 grade ish.

But I remember seeing, I don't, I was starting to dabble with like baseball savant queries back then. And I noticed that his like cold strike percentage, you know, on pitches in the zone, taking pitches in the zone was really low. And so I kind of just chalked it up to either, you know, he'll regress towards the mean or maybe it's his his catchers because he didn't have good catchers back then but he's had guys like austin nolan tom murphy catching him and his numbers haven't gotten better um and not only

that but he throws 83 cutters and three ball count so i think a it's like you're super predictable yeah but let b like i think it's because he can't command his fastball very well yeah um so i i ran the numbers again and he um in 2020 for called strike percentage on on takes in the zone uh he ranks 120th out of 124 at 85.2 percent uh and his fastball ranks 74th out of 102 so i i think it has to do with missing his spots you know uh it's hard to to frame pitches that are missing by uh you know a couple feet so i don't know i i don't know what his command plus is out right now i think it's probably like 78 or something like that i i'm pretty bad i find that hard to believe. I don't think he's like a Jose Alvarado-esque command guy.

He's not the Nelson Lemaitre. He's not like a power guy that just has no idea. I don't know. It could be wrong. Yeah. But I think if he can get the command plus to like the low 90s where lamette and um darvish whatever are i think he has the stuff to to kind of blow by people i think it just has to do with um really optimizing his location and and the pitches that he's throwing so he has some work

to do but like the talent's just so obviously there and it's it's super frustrating to watch him pitch because every start you'll find me tweeting, like throw your slider, stop throwing the, the cutter stop throwing the slider in the zone. It's so simple to me, but maybe it's an arm slot thing and he just can't command some of his pitches in certain areas. I think it'd be interesting. I think he could be a candidate for like a real break breakout in, in his third year. I mean,

in his third year with this new stuff i feel like this you know he's had these this for two years he's had this higher velocity and this new pitch mix i feel like a third year just really getting comfortable with where he can miss where he can put things um i i could see him kind of breaking out a little bit and we talked about dylan sees a little bit but it's a little bit like dylan sees i think he's just finding he's he's he's finding out where he can miss like where he can kind of safely live where he can miss um and also a little bit like glass now where i see him just sort of concentrating on the middle of the zone and like letting his movement kind of go from there um and not trying to like hit spots just Just be like, I'm going to, I'm just kind of going high or low in the zone.

But I saw this weird split that Cease has like a six year away from, away from home, away from home. And then it's like a two, three or something at home. And then last night he throws another gem at home. Do people talk about this? Like, do, does anybody care? Like, do we need anybody care? Like, do we need to like pretend we're home when he's on the road? Like,

does he need to take like a stuffy? Look, I got a stuffy back there. Does he need my stuffy? Yeah. Something like, yeah. Security blanket or something.

Just like some ambient noise. That's like Chicago traffic or something. I don't know. Maybe he's partying. He's a or something. I don't know. Maybe he's partying. He's a young guy. I don't know. So I did take a look at the game logs and it's actually three starts that seemed to have inflate those numbers up. So he did give up a season high,

a six earned runs in Minnesota, Cleveland and Houston. I don't know if not necessarily party towns. Really good. Yeah. It's not really part of Houston. I don't know if – not necessarily party towns. Houston is really good. Yeah, it's not really party town. I don't know. It's probably one of those just random splits that just doesn't mean much because, I mean, Houston is a really good team.

Minnesota can mash, you know. I was looking at – Cleveland went a little surprising. I was looking at a couple of his, you know, just like his pitch characteristics home and on the road, and like they're pretty similar. His usage is pretty similar. I noticed two things. One, he's also really bad when or not really bad, but not as good when he's pitching with non grand all, you know, catchers. That was my other point that so said he's Avala uh whom I would love to talk about uh he's been catching for a consecutive

four games now uh so last Saturday he hit mashing yeah he's he's mashing too uh so uh he might as well just be the new backup catcher uh but yeah uh he's been known uh for his good game calling uh not necessarily his bad. So we're definitely seeing like a complete 180 where we have this fantastic defensive catcher and someone who can't hit. But of course, we were definitely willing to give him the concession and being like, OK, so I mean, if he works well with our pitching staff. All right, whatever. That's a hole in the lineup. But we can address that later on. And now he's mashing. So now we're getting the best of both worlds. So, I mean, if this lineup was dangerous

to begin with, it's just gotten even more frightening. But framing-wise, I guess Grandal is kind of almost goat level. He's one of the best framers. And I don't know, do you know much about Zavala? Is it Zavala?

Zavala. What a name. I love itala? Savala. Savala. What a name. I love it. Obviously there to trip me up. But do we know if he's a good framer or maybe that's, or maybe, maybe that's some of it because,

you know, sees doesn't have the great command. So maybe Grundahl would steal him some strikes that, that Savala is not necessarily stealing him. I don't know. Just even given last night, it seems as if, yeah, he, I haven't taken a look at any of the numbers, but it seems as if his framing game was on point. But from what I've seen, pitching staff loves working with him. So that's testament right there.

Well, what's your key for the White Sox then? I mean, it it is weird I'm surprised that they lost uh so many games recently and uh you know I I try to watch uh every team but uh you know it's 30 so so what what do you get from watching them more often than I do that uh that uh they need to sort of right ship to you know going into the playoffs, just even watching some of the games in which they've lost. It's definitely kind of a feast or famine situation with the offense. And the team just somehow finds themselves in these, like, really weird, mysterious, like, lineup-wide slumps. So I don't know if maybe, like, I don't know,

we need to burn some sage or something. But, like, last week, Mike Miner just carved through the lineup. So 20 swings and misses. It was a ridiculous performance. And I mean, the White Sox typically hit lefties pretty well. That was definitely the case last year, but that kind of dropped off in 2021. But yeah, part of the reason why Tim Anderson

has historically hit lefties well, he goes through a handful of tough stretches sometimes. I think Eloy Jimenez also being part of the reason why Tim Anderson has historically hit lefties well, he goes through a handful of tough stretches sometimes. I think Eloy Jimenez also being out of the lineup has contributed to that too. But otherwise, this is a lineup full of amazing hitters. I believe it's only Leory Garcia and Billy Hamilton have weighted runs created plus numbers below 100. Well, they shouldn't play. Exactly. runs created plus numbers below 100 uh so well they should they shouldn't play exactly exactly uh so yeah anytime i see lori in the lineup i'm just like why uh when this team is good they're

just blazing hot and when the team is healthy they won't play either uh but uh it is i was i was expecting maybe to see more strikeouts they are about dead even uh for the league for strikeouts and i think i think you're right that some like Eloy coming back should I think help that. He's right around league average. He's probably going to replace somebody that's striking out more often than he is. I just don't see this as a

team that I don't know. Who strikes out the most here? The Rays. The Rays strike out a ton. And I think you will see them struggle to score runs in any given series where they're striking out a ton. So I just don't see that as being as much of a problem for the White Sox. Give me something on the Mariners down the stretch.

I guess they just need to keep the magic going, or how do you feel about what they need to do at the end of the season? Yeah, I refuse to lose. I think it's really about a lot of the kids, which feels weird saying I'm like, I turn 27 next month. I'm not that old. But, you know, Kelnick, like I said earlier, he looked really bad. Like there's no doubt about it.

He looked awful. What was the swing change? What did he change? So he was in this little like crouchy kind of position going into this year in spring training where he had this little rock that he did. And someone kind of posited that after seeing a lot of, you know, like low vertical approach angle guys, flat vertical approach angle guys, uh he did something to adjust to get uh pitches up in the zone and um i saw that kelnick said that he you know his like eye level was just kind of off on on like breaking pitches uh but he switched back to his uh 2019 and i think 2020 um stance where

it was it's a lot more upright there's a lot more motion in his hands and i think 2020 stance where it was, it's a lot more upright. There's a lot more motion in his hands. And I think it helps his, his swing rhythm a lot and his timing. I mean, not only that, but like he said, like his, his eye level when he's making contact. So I think he's not only seeing the ball better, but I think he's timing the ball better too. And since his, his swing change, he he's he's been uh he's been walking

more he's been striking out less obviously we're we're playing with uh like a week yeah but um i i think it's something to to look into yancey uh eaton was razzing me because he was saying like we're going on a weak sample but uh he made it you know in game and and it's something that he's had success with so um i think if he fire, it could be kind of what they're missing. You know, they needed one more bat. Yeah. So it's him, it's Toro, it's Ty France, and it's seeing if Tyler Anderson can give him something.

So, yeah, I think it's really just put up or shut up now. And lastly, I didn't have this on the rundown and I apologize for that. I don't want to surprise you guys with anything, but I, I I'm interested. I'm going to just leave this open there as a kind of an open-ended question and you can take with it. I just know that Michael has left a picture lift recently and made some comments. So I just wondered if y'all had advice for the industry on inclusion efforts and just things that the industry can do better, things that you've encountered, things you'd like to see. And, you know, I don't need you to kind of explain the whole picture list thing if you don't want to, but I just wanted to leave that as a as a sort of open-ended question if y'all had any thoughts i know uh i kind of surprised

you with that one but um yeah i mean i guess i got some thoughts yeah but uh i sure just does too uh just to give you guys a little bit of time to collect it uh you know some of the stuff that we've been doing behind the scenes with uh you Axe Fast has been trying to do kind of a mentor thing. So I've got my mentor, Victor Actinola, through him. I'm working with him. And I don't know. I don't know. I don't really have the answers.

I know that it's just a really white male- space and sport. And so, you know, it's just something that's on my mind. Yeah, I think that's honestly a lot of the issue is that it itself is just, you know, a really homogeneous, you know homogeneous sample of people. I think there's a lot of things that we could be doing better. And I guess at this point, it's y'all. Because I don't know. I probably won't play in any industry leagues next year. I think I'll continue a couple things, like Werf.

I think you're in one of the RF leagues too. But I mean, when I wrote that, that Medium post, probably in like February, March, I essentially was calling for a little bit of accountability where a lot of these things that I've been doing are in response to certain things. So I think at the time, it was when Smada gotten to, you know, kind of a tiff within the industry. And, and, you know, I don't think he went about it in the best way, but I think he had a lot of valid points. And so in the article, I just said, you know, like, if, if we're not going to be better, I'm like, I'll leave it to y'all to figure out. And one of the things, like, I got a lot of feedback and I I was excited, because I was like, yo, we're gonna, like, we're gonna make some changes, it's gonna be cool. One of the things I think would be cool is that at all the sites having, you know, fan graphs,

the athletic, CBS, whatever, having, you know, demographics to see, you know, like these are demographics and these are embarrassing. So having that public, I think would be helpful in terms of accountability. I think some sort of mentorship program. I know that Jen Mac Ramos and Shakia Taylor, they're doing something with IBWAA where they're doing their own mentorship thing. I know Alex, like you said, is kind of leading the charge with the promising. I think it's really hard with the mentor thing because it's hard to, and I say this as someone who has probably half a dozen, to keep in contact because for the writers, writers, really hard to be motivated. And for the mentors, it's hard to keep in contact with them. I think there needs to be more accountability there

in terms of, you know, how we're maintaining those relationships. I think there need to be more actual structures in place. And so I did leave P i did leave picture list and that has more to do with me just not really feeling comfortable in fantasy spaces anymore and and it doesn't have anything to do with nick pollock or alex fast because as far as i'm concerned uh they're two my favorite people i've ever met um but you know it just has to do more to do with just even being in the Discord, you know, I don't always want to talk about fantasy sports, and the

angle that people take is really gross sometimes. Again, I won't name names. I think in the Trevor Bauer situation was true. Yeah, like... Discourse was kind of gross. Right. And I think that's so common, and I think that a lot of the discourse is just Discourse is kind of gross. I don't know if you saw, but I think that the reaction to me making that tournament a month ago or whatever, and the backlash I got for that where people were trying to cancel me and calling me a reverse racist,

which is not a thing, people. When you compare that to... I mean, I know I've seen you call people out on Twitter, which I think is a good thing. I think that people need to be held accountable. And I think that people kind of hide behind their platforms and hide behind their friends. And it's just kind of a white boys club. And there's something there that is fundamentally a problem, though, which is that there's some money in the industry, but there's also not there's some money in the industry

but there's also not a lot of money in the industry so there's a there's you know I I'm here because of my family structure like I like this is the truth like I went full-time because I could live rent rent free you know right that is just a that is just a truth that's not there for a lot of people and i don't i don't know how to solve that because it's not like i can just pay a bunch of writers to write for other sites or you know what i mean or like and i can't convince the athletic to pay more people. And then there's this whole thing like you have to have a following to get the good job. And to get a following means sometimes, you know, I did put in my time like coming home from work and like having that extra job. Like I definitely did a lot of that.

But there was that moment where I was like, okay, I'm going to go out there and I have about, you know, two or $3,000 coming in next year, you know, because I'm going to write for Bloomberg and I'm going to write for fan graphs and I'm gonna write for this. And I've got, maybe, maybe I get $2,000 this year. There's just not a lot of non-white, you know, people with a lot of, with, you know, that, that have like families that are going to float them for this year where they're like, oh, you're going to only make 2000 a year. That's fine. You know? Yeah. We're, we're here for you.

Yeah. So a lot of it is systemic, but, um, I mean, I'm continuing to do work behind the scenes with picture lists and, and kind of their DEI, uh, diversity, equality, and I'm glad to see your, your sticker lookout landing. Yeah. Um, I mean, I can't, I can't stop writing about baseball. Um, and, and maybe I find my way back into the space but for right now it's just it feels so gross so yucky um so it was it was it was those things it was seeing um i mean the way that the the fantasy baseball industry

or community in in quotes i'll say uh attacked like jrett Seidler at, um, at baseball prospectus after he called out that person for talking, you know, the gross discourse about Bauer and, and, and talking about, um, you know, the, the fantasy ramification ramifications of Trevor Bauer. Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I've, I really think the issue, um, is that a lot of these spaces need to be decolonized. And I don't use that word like loosely. I think they're, they're rooted in, this is a really like, like big word, but they're rooted in, in whiteness and white supremacy, like at the end of the day, because if you're coming from a white framework, it's just inherently true. And those are some of those systemic things that you're talking about.

So it's a super, super difficult issue. And I think it takes a lot more people than me and a couple others to figure out. Not to say that I'm the only person doing the work. But man, it's so tiring because it seems like every couple of weeks, there's something that's kind of beaten me down. And that's kind of why I took a step back because it's, it's really tiring to do the work, especially when I'm doing it for free. I'm a poor grad student. That's what I'm saying. That's a big part of it. We are not letting Janice speak though. I want to make sure that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Janice, go yeah oh yeah no worries no mikey you are like really just like like you're spitting as the kids would

say uh but yeah just to talk briefly about my own fantasy experiences i i played in an industry league for the first time this year uh and while everyone I participated with was super supportive and just made me feel welcome, generally I just felt so incredibly overloaded and so you know you were talking about just how yeah not everyone can just afford to freelance write for an extended period of time and yeah say have that support surrounding them so I actually just started working full-time again I tried I tried to do the freelance thing for about three to four months so I had to take a good hard look at myself and just say all right this is not sustainable a handful of things aren't working so yeah I certainly just kind of had to put myself back into corporate America,

just in order to survive. But at the same time, though, and I think about this a lot, too. There have been many, many times where I'm interacting with folks on Twitter, or just in the comments of my article. And I've thought about quitting, actually, I thought about just, you know, just stepping away and disappearing, because I've had some people just say some really off the wall nasty things to me. And I'm just thinking, like, I could absolutely just end this all by deactivating my account and disappearing off the face of the earth. But of course, too, the reason why I'm still here is because the reason why I was reluctant to even start writing about baseball and fantasy in the first place was that no one looked like me. I didn't think, you know, what I had to say had a time and place.

I thought that what I had to say wasn't necessarily important, nor did it add to the discourse. So, yeah, I'm still around just mainly because it probably pisses some people off. Oh, absolutely. Like spite is the greatest motivator. I mean, yeah, the, just the more, the more people tell me to kill myself or whatever, just the more I'm going to write. That's just how it works. But anyway, yeah, kind of what Mikey was saying, a lot of these spaces are, yeah, very populated heavily by white males. And yeah, there definitely needs to be more accountability brought into the situation. And also too, just checking in and just like being mindful of the language that we're using i think even too uh nbc is uh making some good strides towards that um i think like my first

week uh my uh my boss dj short was like do not use fantasy owners as a term that that's just weird and i'm like i i agree that is totally weird it's hard sometimes to talk about it like i i try to be like own shares but like yeah yeah definitely don't say like i own that player yeah that that's weird and yeah and so just imagine saying it to the person you know what i think this could be a thing that we could do yeah imagine saying the thing you were about to say to the person's face. Imagine saying it to their person's face. Imagine, like if you're writing about a player, imagine them reading it.

I try to do that. That's been kind of a reality for me. That changed the way I wrote because I was like, my God, what if Tommy Pham saw that I wrote about owning him? My God, he would rip me a new one and he'd be right. You know? And what if, what if I was actually,

if I told Janice to her face, these things that I'm about to write down. Oh God. Yeah. I feel as if the whole veil of the internet has just created just this entire like monster of, of yeah. You're just like these, this big massive turds.

Just unable to be as awful as they want to be, just mainly because, hey, their name isn't tied to anything. But on the other hand, like mine is. Like, this is my real ass name here. And so, I mean, it's not like necessarily I can fire back just mainly because that just makes me look bad. Then they grab some little part of it and turn it into something or they, oh, I got you. That's what I've told people is someone tweeted, like, I didn't think that what blank writer did was necessarily wrong. Like, I still have him in a couple leagues i don't mind talking about it so he was like people tell me like i'm willing to have a dialogue about it so i i slid into his dms and and what i said was like imagine that you

explained uh to your mom your sister or your you know your partner that you were um discussing the fantasy ramifications of someone who did these things like yeah like was and like did awful awful things and and most women are gonna say that's why would you why and because you normalize it and you and you yeah plus like most of us don't have any extra information about this. Yeah. So what am I going to tell you, dude? Right. Just think about it.

Yeah. And so I think that's kind of where I think some people need to be called out more. There needs to be more accountability on some level because, people, I had people saying nasty things. My DMS a month ago, I had people calling me mentally disabled. I had people saying awful things and there were two people going to bat from maybe three people going to bat for me. One was a pictureless writer.

One was someone I'd never met. Another person was another person I'd never met. So it was really honestly hurtful. And I know not everyone saw it. Cause Mike, you know, I was on a podcast and he's like, I don't even know what you're talking about. But it, it, it made me honestly sad to see that like none of my colleagues and like people that like I see at like first pitch Arizona and I'm like, yo, what's up? Like no one was in on like

had my back and was like calling these people out. So, um, I felt very, you know, on that night I felt very alone for many hours and like literally dozens of people were calling for my head. Um, so yeah, it's, it's such a bummer. Yeah. I mean, it is what it is. And, and the thing that I did making the tournament, I knew that I was getting myself into, it was, uh, not the greatest decision, but it was disappointing nonetheless. Well, accountability is interesting. I mean, that's sort of what we're talking about here is like, if you said the thing to the person's face, you would have accountability from that person getting a reaction to you. Maybe slapping you upside the head. Yeah. And it's like accountability. It's not cancel culture. like it's it's saying this person who seems to be a

good person and like has a a wife and kids that he is very nice to i'm sure uh he did something that was wrong and like that doesn't mean that he's a bad person that we need to cancel him it's that uh we need to tell him let's talk about what the wrong thing is let's let's talk about what the wrong thing was yeah like it you can separate it from the person let's talk about what the wrong thing was. Yeah. Like it, you can separate it from the person. Let's talk about why it's wrong to talk about Trevor Bauer situation like that. Cause we're normalizing it. And let's talk about that instead of getting into this big,

well, I like him. Oh, I like that dude. And you shouldn't say that. No, I'm not saying that I hate that dude. I'm saying,

I just don't like that tweet. I don't like what it does. You know what I mean? And so that's where I think like, you know, some restorative justice, transformative justice could be just so helpful. But it's just obviously not something that people care about, honestly, in these spaces. And so I think over time, I've just realized that the type of people that are in these leagues with me, they don't actually care enough. They just care about. And I'm making a big blanket statement, but they care mostly about making themselves feel good about being a good person and that they're not doing bad things. So they rationalize it to

themselves. And I think that's one of the root issues that you can't really change without making really significant changes so i unfortunately i'm not super optimistic about the fantasy baseball landscape but i am a little more about um baseball writing so i it's just it's embarrassing to me that i i can count the amount of trans writers that i know on one hand and i can't think of one indigenous writer like it's it's a huge problem and and it's even though we talk about it a lot, it's not talked about enough. Well, uh, it's been a pleasure, uh, talking to you to do both. I hope that, uh, we can hang out in person sometime. Um, you are up in Seattle or Portland. Yeah. And you're in Chicago, Janice. are up in Seattle or Portland? Yeah. And you're in Chicago, Janice? I'm in Evanston. So just a suburb directly north of Chicago. Sweet. Travel seems to be a thing. I traveled to Denver and

got into a scooter accident. So I guess this is a thing that we're on your Colette thing. Yeah. Yeah. I had a little Colette in my head right before the scooter accident saying, you know, this is too far to go on a scooter. And Jason Colette would tell you to get off of the scooter and call right now. Uh, but unfortunately I didn't listen to him, but it's hard. Yeah. But hopefully we'll see each other, uh, in, uh, a cool, inclusive place, someplace, uh, soon. And, uh, thanks for, thanks for coming on. Thanks for having us. Yeah. Thanks for including the end conversation as well. I appreciate that.

Thanks a lot guys. That's a wrap for us here at Rates and Barrels. I'm sorry. I'm not the regular host. I forget what Davey R says. I think he says subscribe to The Athletic for, I think there's a 50% off deal right now where you can get all of our writing. And then I say, thanks for listening.