Rates & Barrels - Which MLB Players Will Make Team USA in 2028?

Episode Date: August 13, 2024

With the 2024 Olympics completed, Eno, Britt and DVR wonder -- if MLB players are participating in the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, who among current stars will be on the roster? Plus, they discuss the unexpected sweat for the NL West and possibility of four teams from the division finding their way into the playoffs.  Rundown 1:08 The "Locks" for Team USA in 2028 (Assuming MLB Players Are Included) 3:39 ZiPS Projections for *2028* (Thanks, Dan Szymborski!) 7:05 Pitching Changes A Lot Over Four Years 15:00 Overprojected Unproven Players? 20:12 How Do We Think Aaron Judge Will Age? 23:20 Looking Back at 2020 Suggest We Might Underrate Current Late-20s Players 29:55 The Race for the NL West Looks Like a Party 41:53 Four Teams From This Division Could Reach the Playoffs 52:48 Will We See Another August Waiver Roster Dump? Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper Follow Britt on Twitter: @Britt_Ghiroli e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Join us Thursday at 1p ET/10a PT for our weekly live episode with Trevor May! Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper, Eno Sarris & Britt Ghiroli Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Benefits vary by card, other conditions apply. ["The New York Times"] ["The New York Times"] Welcome to Rates and Barrels. it's Tuesday, August 13th. Derek Van Riper, Inosaris, Rich Roley here with you. On this episode, we dig into a few pressing questions, including who would be on a Team USA roster for the 2028 Olympics if we can build it with major league players. Maybe it's a pipe dream, but there are some stars that want to happen. So we figured we'd go through the process of actually putting together a lineup of who could be on that team four years from now.

We're going to check in on the NL West, which is going to be a battle over the final month and a half of the season. And we're taking the possibility that a few teams followed the Angels lead from last August and cut payroll using the waiver wire during the second to last month of the season. Kind of a new thing we saw last year in mass. Maybe one or two teams could try to follow that this year. Let's get right after it though.

Team USA in 2028. When I bring that up, Britt, who are the first few names that pop into your head as current stars that will still be good and are very likely to be on that team if we do, in fact, see major leaguers in the Olympics four years from now? Yeah. Well, I think we're lucky in the game set a place where so many of these young stars are up here already. It might have been very difficult to predict even 10 years ago. But I think of Bobby Witt Jr.

I think of Jackson Holliday. I think of Gunnar Henderson, Adley Richmond. Right, I think of all these guys who have yet to hit their prime and they could be in their prime years when we look down the road four years from now. I think, and we did this yesterday, spoiler alert, this all came out of our pre-podcast

show yesterday. As you guys know, predicting pitchers is very difficult. Outside of Paul Skeens, who if he stays healthy, I think we all know, could be one of the best pitchers in baseball. You know, you can make that case probably already. But so difficult to predict what these young arms are going to do. Guys in the minor leagues, guys who haven't really figured it out yet. We see this every year.

We'll all of a sudden add a new pitch or add 15 pounds. And Mason Miller with the A's is a great example and kind of almost come out of nowhere. And all of a sudden they're in the All-Star game. So I have a really difficult time with the pitching side of things. I think there's so many young position players in the game that you can fill out a pretty good roster for talking about team USA guys. And then you can make the case for some of these veterans that I think need to be in the Olympics, whether or not they're in their prime, even if it's a reserves, you know, bench spots. I think some of these guys who are stars today should be in the next Olympics if they want to. And I think there's a pretty big push for players that want to play,

big league players that want to find a way to play in LA in 2028. Yeah, I think there's some precedent for this in other sports. Diana Tarassi, I believe, just got her sixth gold or something. So I don't think she played at all. I was even surprised to see her in uniform for women's basketball, but she was on the team. And so, you know, you kind of your own personal Snoop Dogg in a way. You could have Bryce Harper, Aaron Judge. Also, the way the baseball works is so great with DH and first base. You can, you can likely have somebody that's a little bit older that kind of, um, represents that energy.

And I think we, you know, if we're building this lineup, even if Bryce Harper, he does project, we got these projections that are kind of fun from, um, Dan Zaborski. Thank you very much, Dan. These are Zips projections for 2028 sorted by war. Uh, and then, uh, with a focus on American players. And, um, what you see here is Bryce Harper is projected to be a below average player in 2028, um, with an above average OPS, but no defensive

value, same thing for judge. And so, um, you know, in those cases, I think Harper talking about wanting to do the Olympics, being some energy behind it. Yeah. You put him on the team, even if, you know, theoretically you could have Michael Harris playing first base or something stupid, you know what I mean? Like, you know, it doesn't, it doesn't make sense to keep some of these people out, even if whatever the productions are, but to your point on, on pitching.

And this is just to read this off for people who are listening. The projections for twenty twenty eight say Gunnar Henderson, number one, Bobby Wood Jr., number two. I think that's not a surprise. And that's going to be the foundation of the team if they if that allows to happen. But there are some surprises below. Riley Green is third.

Kobe Mayo is fifth. Jackson Merrill would be the center fielder for this team. Corbin Carroll tied with Jackson Merrill with four wins projected in 2028. Mason Nguyen might be the backup shortstop on this team if we just go by projections. But there's Rutchman. Carson Williams is the prospect on this list along with Kobe Mayo. So those, I just, it's harder for me to believe because there is a bust rate associated with prospects and you know, this is the projection system just liking something about them as prospects. But you know, Jordan Westberg, Pete Crowe Armstrong at the bottom, those are fun couple

of names that have defensive value are pretty solid players. And you have to kind of imagine yourself four years from now, there's going to be some growth in some of these players. Five Orioles position players on top end players generated by zips. Yeah. Really cool that Dan sent that over because it just gives you an idea. Like we like to assume that the stars of today will be the stars of tomorrow and the stars of four years from now, but everyone ages a little bit differently.

And even if you go from elite to very good or very good to good or good to just average, that's going to make a difference over time, right? I find that the most difficult players to predict aren't necessarily the young guys. I'm with Britt, like Whit, Henderson, they seem like locks. I think you'll have guys like Harper and Judge kind of anchoring it from a veteran perspective, too. They'll be in their mid-30s by then. I think it's looking at someone like Austin Reilly, who's reeled off a stretch of three straight, five-war seasons prior to this year. This is a down year for Austin Reilly.

He's 27 right now. When he's 31, what kind of player is he going to be? Is he still going to be a three or a four win player? Could he actually make this team? So you look for those middle guys, they can be tough. I think Kyle Tucker is still going to be a really good player four years from now because there's not a lot of swing and miss in his profile. So I think that's the type of stuff that I'm always looking at is like, what kind of hitter

are you and how does that usually age? Does that give you enough of a chance to still be good enough down the road? The pitching thing brought up, you know, we'll spend more time on the hitters today because that's that's the bulk of the focus. The relievers are almost impossible. Who's going to be a good reliever four years from now? Like the best relievers in the game right now, four years ago, largely were irrelevant,

not entirely, but there are some major pop-up guys every single year. And as all pitchers do, they break down, but they also have their stuff deteriorate pretty quickly because they rely heavily on one or two pitches in most cases. So what works today doesn't necessarily work three and four years down the road. I was thinking about this. There's no like Mariano Rivera, right? Where we're going to see like a 10 year stretch of excellence, right?

Like- I guess Jansen is our guy now, but we're not going to, we're not putting him on the team four years from now. Wouldn't be on team USA. It's weird. There's not like one automatic guy, right? But I can't even tell you who's going to be a good reliever next year.

Like managers would tell you that bullpens are so cyclical that if you have a good reliever one year, you're almost better like dumping them because chances are he's not going to have that year again. That's kind of seems like the race do. Kind of like a big baseball carousel. But yeah, many people feel that way that like you got somebody to sell high because you don't think he's going to sustain it. So if we have trouble projecting the bullpens for next season, four years out,

it's just wild. Right. I think you can maybe look at starters like we mentioned skeins, but how many Paul skeins are there that were like, this guy's good. He's young. He's going to be a star for a while as long as he stays healthy. Not that many. I think it's it's I know 2020 is was a weird year, but it is four years, you know, from from now so backwards. So I just thought it would be instructive for me to just read out the top 10 relievers in 2020. Devin Williams, Reisel Iglesias, Brad Hand, James Korinczak, Mike Myers, Evan Marshall, Edwin Diaz, Jose Cisnero, and Trevor Rosenthal. So how many, so Devin Williams is still playing, Liam Hendricks might get back on, Reisel Iglesias, so the top three were still around, but then you hit, you know, basically you're almost 0 for 7 after that. In terms of one for seven after that. And how many of those guys are making like a quote unquote all star team?

Right. Yeah, that too. I mean, Liam Hendrix might come back and pitch again, but is he going to be Liam Hendrix the same way? That's irrelevant for the American team, probably, but still just giving you the idea. And I'm not on the starting pitching side just as bad, but you could have your sort of Bryce Harper of pitching where somebody, you know, one of the, the name I put forth for us is Zach Galin is like somebody who will be in his early thirties, but I think might age okay because he has lots of different pitches.

He has good command. And you know, if Zach Galin is still pitching and he's interested in this, then you could have him as sort of the professor emeritus. Even if you if you use you have mostly younger people on the team other than him. But this is the top 10 pitching in 2020. Shane Bieber, you Darvish, Jake DeGrom, Trevor Bauer, Danelson, Lamet, Luis Castillo, Hermon Marquez, Zach Granke, Dylan Bundy, Kenta Maeda. Can drop a little Brandon Woodruff and Lucas Gilito on there at 11 and 12.

I mean, injuries in pitching are just, that's a big part of the chaos there You just don't know who's gonna age gracefully in terms in terms of ligaments and muscles and all those things. So That's I mean, you know the bottom of that list was all full of injury Woodruff with the you know The thoracic outlet Dylan Bundy just lost all his below pretty much, you know Granky was nearing the end of his career. You probably wouldn't have picked Granky to be good four years from then, but, um, you know, this is not a

great list. It's and then that's part of the problem, too, is like gone are the days of like the Scherzer Verlanders where you get this 10 year run who I think we can both you know, all admit are not making the next Olympics. They'll be well past their prime, but they had this like really long stretch of consistency that just is not how the game operates.

Or if it is, if it is not gone, then it's not super obvious to us right now who is the next Justin Verlander or Max Scherzer. You know what I mean? I think it's more of that. Yeah, I don't think the pitchers are gone, but I think you don't know who they are until they kind of weather a storm

in their early to mid thirties and then come out of it on the other side still pitching well. Because there was the point where you thought Justin Verlander was done. Remember when Verlander had the core muscle surgery, had kind of back to back rough years in Detroit? It looked like it might've been the beginning of the end for him. And then of course he's had amazing run in the time since then, mostly in Houston. But if you look at Corbin Burns right now,

he's 29, okay, four years from now, he's 33. It's not impossible that Corbin Burns is still good enough to be on this team four years from now. He could still be dominant. I mean, it's gonna mean a lot about his VELO. If he does he keep his VELO and does he not get hurt, if he did both of those things, then he might still be as dominant.

That's a fair point. He had 167 in 2021, 202 in 2022, 193. No, these are innings. 193 innings in 23, he's at 149 and two thirds. I mean, he's a horse in today's standards. Right. Like, so he's at least kind of like ticking those boxes where top end performance workload over a pretty long stretch. But if you had to wager on it, you'd say, hmm, don't know if I'm betting on guys in their. I'll believe it when I see it sort of deal. So you skew younger when you're looking at pictures like skeins and Spencer Strider coming off elbow surgery. You know, if he's still healthy, we could probably assume he has a role Hunter Green.

But there's some risk with skein, Strider and Green that we, you know, there's that, there's that either you take injury risk when you're trying to project four years out and you take like older guys, or you take some, take on some risks that you don't even actually know exactly how good he is. We all think we know exactly how good Paul Skeen's is, but we're not sure. Yeah, we have no idea. We all think we know a lot more than we think we actually do. Unless you listen to this podcast, why?

Yeah. I mean, if you look at how much, Spencer Strider has been dominant, but like, for how long? You know? Yeah. Like, just think about Hunter Green. We have Hunter Green as a possible on this list because he looks really good right now, but the last two years he wasn't that good.

Would he have been somebody we want on the team? If you're talking about the top five starters, American starters in America, in MLB right now, you might not have put him on there before. So there's like, you know, talent risk and then there's injury risk. And when you're trying to evaluate pitchers four years out, it's just the combination of the two is really tough.

I'm surprised that anybody gets a six year deal as a pitcher. And this is why it's so hard to draft pitchers too. I think even making this list gives you a new appreciation for teams drafting pitchers, doesn't it? Cause it's like, well, I don't know. And I have to, it's almost like I have to do it, but I don't know that any of these are gonna work out.

We have some prospects that we might put on this list, but like, I don't know that any of these are going to work out. Like we have some prospects that we might put on this list, but you know, geez, I think Jackson Job is awesome, but I, you know, do what do I know? It's just sort of baking into the expectation similar to the 2028 Zips hitters where you say, okay, there's gonna be some names on here. We haven't seen in the big leagues yet, because that's just how it works. Like if we went back just a year or two ago, we wouldn't have necessarily expected Gunnar Henderson to be a lock on this team two years ago. But now he looks like he's clearly going to be one of the best players in the game even four years from now, because he's already ascended to that level. I took the initial run at the first 13.

Are there any names I put on there? Younger names where you were like, oh, that that's interesting, but I'm not sure. I had James Wood, Wyatt Langford, Royce Lewis, Jackson Holliday. You mentioned him. I think he's pretty safe as much as you can say that about a projecting a guy that's barely been in the big leagues. But who of that group gives you the most pause because we've seen so little of most of them at the big league level? We have such like recency bias though, because a month ago we have said Jackson Holliday

was a lock. It would have been in the category of he's done amazing things in the minors, the projections are going to spit out some really good numbers and it'll have time to reach that level. I think that those pieces are still in place, even with that, that bad 10 game run, because he's been great in the minor league. The elite of the elite age to level production at every stop. So I think we still wouldn't excited, but I think we have a little more confidence in the heat

of a recent return to the big leagues where he's having that success now. I think that's fair. I don't, I thought your list was good. I think honestly, it's such a guess. I think we all kind of came to the same sort of agreements on most of these position players. I think for people listening, wondering like what we did roster wise, I think we assumed 26 because I think if MLB does agree to let baseball players, pro players, guys that are on 40 man rosters, which hasn't been the case lately, I think they're going to push for

that 26 because it will in theory keep these guys a little bit healthier, having the extra pitcher, having the extra position player. The last time in the last Olympics, it was only 24 on every roster, right? So that changes what we're doing. If you're going to lose the pitcher, lose the position player. I do think again, for people listening, wondering like, why are we wasting our time? There's a huge push by Casey Wasserman at CAA to get players that are currently on a big league team to play. Bryce Harper's been very vocal about it. Many stars have been very vocal about wanting to play,

and it actually could slot in, people think, in the all-star break. They'd have an extended all-star break. LA obviously already has the facilities. That was the issue in Paris with Dodger Stadium. So there is a real real chance that this happens and we know baseball's in at least the next two Olympics. And if you need to have a bunch of games on a couple of days, like you could do Anaheim too. So. Yes.

And they have talked about having qual, WBC, uh, the next WBC, which will there'll be one in the interim. I think 2026 is that the next WBC? Um, they will talk about having qualifiers there so that, you know, which will be one in the interim. I think 2026 is not the next WBC. They talked about having qualifiers there so that it was a very condensed schedule so that players who play in it would only be gone for a week. It's not a three week sojourn like some of these Olympics.

Yeah, we talked a little bit about this and I think you'd have to have it so that there was only eight teams that make it or something. you know, and maybe you could do something with, uh, you know, a loser's bracket so that, you know, eight teams, you know, you could lose once and, and still win the whole thing. And you would think they would want to do it though, because if you're the IOC, um, show, hey, oh, Tony, you don't want to show him, you tiny to play in the

next Olympics, right? Like they call these huge stars. We're talking about US here, but obviously there's huge stars everywhere. The Dominican. I think for baseball, the value judgment is a little bit more complicated because they wouldn't want Shohei Otani, for example, to be injured playing in that. But like we said, injuries can happen anytime. And also there is, I think, a lot of value for baseball

to be in the Olympics in terms of like, you want to grow the game? The world watches the Olympics. Not having your best stars in there is meaningful. Why do you think all these soccer players are allowed to play in it? Because soccer knows that this is a good thing to have to have their best players in it.

Yeah, hockey lets it happen. Don't they build in a break? Yeah. Yeah, I don't think this is impossible, and it seems like there are enough forces behind it where it's less of a pipe dream than it's been in the past. Right. You have the right kinds of players on board that want to be a part of it, too. Hello, people. or want to be a story of the day. Then every Friday Adam Leventhal and our club reporters will preview the potential tactics drama and Jeopardy riding on the biggest game from that coming weekend. Check us out

wherever you get your podcasts from for free. We hope you can join us for what is set to be another blockbuster Susan. Aaron Judge is a fascinating case because he is doing things right now that are unusual for even a great power hitter, right? He might make another run to the 60 home run Range it's 62 two years ago. He's got a shot to do the same thing this year He's gonna be 36 years old four years from now There's a big question about judge in general like how's he going to age and there've always been questions about as a bigger player Is he more susceptible to injuries but

sometimes I think we get so caught up in those questions with Judge that we're not fully enjoying what he is doing on the field. He's just been ridiculous. This is the third consecutive season in which Aaron Judge has had a barrel rate above 25 percent. That is absolutely absurd. So my question for both of you is, how do you think Aaron Judge is going to age? And does he just kind of fit into that Bryce Harper bucket of, yeah, even if he's not this version of Judge, he's such a star and such an important part of

USA baseball air quotes, as we kind of try to project this, that he's there, even if he's not one of the five or seven best position players on the team anymore. I don't know one thing of just about the quality of his play. Since free agency began in 1974, we've had 10 seasons where a player had a WRC plus of 200 or better. That means that they're twice as good as the average player. I mean, they're a hundred points better or better. And so in that group, there are two people who have done it twice. We all know one of them, Barry Bonds.

Barry Bonds, yeah. Four times. But Aaron Judge is in the middle of doing it his second time. And that and he basically him and Barry Bonds are the top six. Then you have Jeff Bagwell, Frank Thomas, Mark McGuire and Juan Soto rounding out the top 10. So you know, Judge, you know, deserves all of the flowers in terms of how you'll age. I think that what we'll see is most likely something along the lines of Mike trout where it's harder for him to stay on the field but when he's on the field he's hitting well and he's sort of you know at some point maybe at that point he'll be a DH defensively but I think he'll still be able to like you know be your DH and and slug you thirty five homers or whatever still you know eating at that age that's that's kind of how i see it. Yeah i agree i think he's on team us a if you want to be. In twenty twenty eight and he's the dh you may be the captain of the team harper made captain of the team and maybe the heart and souls of that squad.

He may be the captain of the team. Harper may be the captain of the team. There may be the heart and souls of that squad. But I think both of those guys, like we said, are more, I don't want to say figureheads, but are also there for an element of nostalgia and stars. And I still think he's going to be, I think both of these guys, especially Judge, are still going to be like, hey, you make a mistake.

He will make you pay for it. But we all know that defense and base running declines first for players. Those are the first skills that they lose. So I do think in four years, you know, you're looking at Aaron Judge as, you know, purely a hitter when you are when you are talking about him versus he still may play the field for the Yankees on occasion. He still played a lot. I mean, I'm not really sure how their roster shakes out in 2028. I haven't given it a lot of thought. But I think for the best of the best, he's a bat and Harper is a bat slash first base. And those guys are still scary hitters.

They're lethal hitters. They're like Albert Pujols. Right. You couldn't make a mistake to Albert Pujols at the end. He actually hit really well. But he was it was not the Albert Pujols of yesteryear I that's kind of how I see those two guys and I think you know four years ago The the batting leaderboard tells us a pretty different story It tells us that if we're under rating anybody for this roster, it might be a veteran Because four years ago Fernando Tatis jr. Jose Ramirez, Freddie Freeman. Freddie Freeman was a third best hitter four years ago for nano tatties jr jose remears freddy freeman freddy freeman was the third best hitter. Four years ago jose bray you of course there's there's our loss but muki bets trade turner manny machado marcello zuna,

Anthony radone another loss mike trout tenth so that eight out of the ten very best batters in twenty twenty are still really good batters now. And very best batters in 2020 are still really good batters now. And so we may find that if we are undervaluing anybody in this in this search for who's going to be great in 2028, it's somebody who ages gracefully. And it could be somebody like George or Harper, or there could be somebody else that we're not necessarily thinking of this year if we're looking looking, I guess it would be maybe for players that are like 27 to 30 right now that are just gonna age better than we think. Guys on that list include, let's see here,

Jaren Durin, Brent Rooker. No, that'd be fun, but no. No, well, Brent Rooker. No, no. Well, here's my question. Freddie Freeman probably going to play for Canada. Yeah. But is Mookie Betts too old? What would he be? 34, 35. Would Mookie Betts be on Team USA? Exactly. Like that.

He's another guy. Yeah. He'll be 35. Same kind of situation as Harper and Judge in a lot of ways where it's like chances are. Yeah, actually, just based on kind of situation as Harper and Judge in a lot of ways where it's like chances are Yeah, actually just based on what he's done up to this point and how he's getting there How will course eager age like we think he'll just be injured a lot but you know, what if you know, he's just a He's just a good first baseman or something at that point. So there's there's there's some names on on this sort of veteran list that

That will be surprising and it'll still be really good in four years. Yeah. Fun exercise though, nonetheless, and more to come on that front here as the week unfolds. Brent Rooker, no. I mean, I'd love it just from the, I'd be happy for him and it'd be amazing. It would be surprising.

But the biggest thing, so I think the happy for him. It'd be amazing. It would be surprising. But the biggest thing, so I think for me, the tactical part of this exercise, if you're using projection brain, fantasy baseball brain, you're looking at swing and miss and how poorly swing and miss will age over four years and even doing all the damage that he's doing right now. Brent Rooker is sitting with a 29.9% K rate and he's already 29 years old. That's part of why Mookie might be a better bet. It's like he'll at least be making contact and since he runs well now,

even if he runs a little bit worse, like he still won't be like a plotter, you know? Right, that's why the Mookie and Kyle Tucker are I think are a little bit easier to project as still being good productive hitters. Like Mookie versus Jackson Holliday at second base is a really interesting one I think. Because with Jackson Holliday we're baking in so much he hasn't done yet. Yeah. You know?

Yeah we are. And we're just assuming that in four years he's gonna be great and not like a historic bust, which I'm not saying he is. Or just an okay player. Right, he could be an average player. And Mookie could just be declining super gracefully and still be better than Jackson Holliday, even though there's a huge age difference.

It's possible. I think the name I put on the list that I'm unsure about just because of poor health is Royce Lewis. Oh, I had that circled. I was thinking Mason Wynn would make a better thing there because there is gonna be somebody who makes his team for defensive reasons You know and I know you have Bobby witt and Gunnar Henderson that could both be short stops before years from now They might not both be short stops

Yes, that's a fair question. I had a backup catcher at Patrick Bailey on here right that that makes sense He may not be a star But you need a good American backup catcher, you know, and who are you going to pick that fits the bill right now? So I think that's my Mason Wynn is my Patrick Bailey for this team. It's like, gonna be a shortstop, gonna probably be a good defensive shortstop, you know, may want to have that arm on your bench to why did he put Royce Lewis on there 32 homers in 440 plate

appearances as a big league player. That is a difference maker with the bat. If he can string together a few years of better health in multiple torn ACLs, it's just horrible luck, but there's a component of that. That's just unbelievably bad luck. We'll see if he has hamstrings and quads, which you know, there's other soft tissue stuff. We'll see if he still has hamstrings and quads. Yeah, we'll those other soft tissue stuff. If that's the problem. We'll see if he still has hamstrings and quads. Yeah, we'll see if he still has them four years from now.

Four years from now we'll all have bionic hamstrings. Maybe we'll have better treatments, better replacement quads and hamstrings available for these nagging injuries. But yeah, more to come on Team USA in 2028. Hopefully some kind of confirmation at some point. I don't know, in the next year, that this will actually happen

because we'll get fired up about it when it does. I missed the Olympics already, by the way. I just, I loved it as something different to watch, especially with the time change, being in the Midwest, games being in Paris, you could wake up, turn on, watch live stuff. I didn't even care what it was on. It was amazing.

Every event I watched was fun. It was kind of fun to see bizarre sports. I mean, break dancing. We watched some ping pong. Just turn it on. Enjoy it. Handball. I watched a field hockey final.

One thing I really did dislike, though, was it was really hard to find something you actually wanted. If you wanted something specifically, it was very hard to find. I found I don't know if it was a Hulu interaction thing, but like. Yeah, I had Peacock and they had all these like gold medal highlight channels and stuff that you could like really easily. I felt like sort through it. Yeah, dude. Really?

And NBC's had the Olympics forever. Peacock was built for the Olympics. You could watch every event in its entirety. I was watching surfing one night and I actually got kind of bored because they have to wait a long time for a wave. It wasn't edited. It was like a five and a half hour presentation of surfing. So it was actually very relaxing. It was almost like a screen saver. Very, very calming. Yeah, get Peacock next time. You know, it had like, you could skip to just the US gold

medals on one channel. You could watch the gold medal highlights. They had prime time in Paris every night. Snoop had a show. It is also very sort of America centric. Maybe that was part of my problem. I was trying to watch a basketball game that was America was not involved in. And so I just couldn't find it, you know, and I yeah, maybe maybe it was just me. Maybe it was user error. But I think it was user error in this instance.

Let's move on. Let's talk about the NL West for a bit. I think last week we were talking about the possible best teams in baseball right now. I threw the Dodgers out there as my pick. I think it's a fun question because we named three teams, brought up two more and maybe still didn't even hit the best team in baseball. River Ryan got hurt in the time since then. I know I'm not going to throw back my statement to the Dodgers, the best team in baseball right now, because I think the key still is Yoshinobi Yamamoto. They just got Mookie Betts back last night, homered right away. So Dodgers are doing Dodger things.

And Clayton Kershaw, even working with the diminished velocity, still looks like pretty darn good Clayton Kershaw to me. Like, it's so easy to underrate him. Here's my question for both of you. Where does Clayton Kershaw rank in ERA going back to the start of 2022? I set the minimum innings to 250 innings, so that way he has enough innings to qualify. Where would you say Kershaw ranks in ERA? That dude, third.

Top 10? First. He's first by almost a quarter run. Like not just first by a little. Where do you think he ranks in whip? He's such a legend, dude. Well, now at first. Yeah, now at first.

Now you got us, yeah. He's tied for fourth in whip. I know you can't rely on Clayton Kershaw for 30 starts, year over year, right? But when you have him, he's still just about as good as anybody. It might not be overpowering. It's not fire breathing, Paul Skeen's electric stuff.

It may not be your opening, your first, your playoff starter, your playoff ace. That's the thing. Yeah, he hasn't been good in the playoffs and I think that has tarnished how his perception a little bit. I mean, that's kind of ridiculous though, because it dismisses the

value he still brings to the table. Like there's a lot of value. I'm not saying it's not ridiculous, but I think that's where part of the perception comes. That might be part of the, yeah. It's gotta be, but it's so weird to me. Also just like, you know, we're, we, we see a lot of velocity everywhere else and he's got none of it. No, but it's still working.

It's still working. It's he's down like a half tick ish from where he was a year ago, but kind of a similar pitch mix. It's not like he's throwing 50% four seam fast balls at 90 miles an hour. Like he's adjusting. He's doing all the things that a great aging pitcher should do to continue making it work without the stuff

that he used to have. So anyway, I think Kershaw's return, even though it's been a little bumpy at times, that's still a big lift for them. What do you make of this race right now? I think one takeaway from last week was, I thought they'd have to sweat to win the division. And that looks even more true a week later

because the Diamondbacks are playing well, the Padres are playing well, they just got Joe Musgrove back, and the Giants, they're in the rear view mirror. They're pretty far back. They're probably not coming back to win the division, but they're hanging around and they're pitching as we saw again with Blake Snell on Monday night.

They're starting pitching is a problem. Yeah, no, it's really interesting that if you take the last 30 days and just look at team trends in this division, it looks like there's a very clear best team in this division that's not the Dodgers. And if you sort by WRC plus over the last 30 days, the San Diego Padres are sixth with a 126 WRC plus. The Dodgers are 10th with a 108 and the Giants are 17th with a one, one oh two. Uh,

what about Arizona? And oh yeah, you're right. Arizona. Second, 143. Ah, oh my God. They're cooking right now. The Diamondbacks are just on fire. On the pitching side. Oh no. Damn you Arizona. On the pitching side, oh no, damn you, Arizona. On the pitching side, Arizona, second San Diego, third. So there's, we're making the case here for Arizona and San Diego, both being better than Dodgers, Dodgers 15th in, in pitching war over the last 30 days. So, and that's the full staff.

So, but it's hard to know exactly what to make of this in sort of thirty day trends because a we've also seen we've seen good teams like the the Yankees. Look terrible for for stretches so there there are there are just terrible stretches in every in every good season there's still terrible. The Dodgers could be just going through one of those. And then secondly, these rosters are dynamic and they're changing all the time. And what sort of Dodgers team are we looking at in the last 30 days? And is that the next 30 days? So that can be the same roster.

And so I think that's a big question. Like for example, you're getting Clayton Kershaw back. But the Padres got Joe Musgrove back last night. You know, well, the Dodgers are going to get Yamamoto back. Yeah, I know. But like the Dodgers, not the only team that's hurt. That's true. Darvish also could be pitching for San Diego at some point in time. Dennis Lynn reported yesterday with Ken Rosenthal that he's been throwing bullpens. So I know the Dodgers have a lot of injuries, a crazy amount of injuries.

But I think it's also crazy to not assume that Arizona and San Diego could also either keep this up or get slightly healthier too. Right. In fact, it's not a crazy thing. I'm surprised that Fernando Tatis and Joe Musgrove are leading the pot. Like no, I'm personally surprised that Arizona's is second in the last 30 days in pitching war because you know They some of the components don't look like great. They don't have the greatest strikeout rate. They don't have the greatest walk rate

They have been suppressing homers really well, but best in baseball. So maybe they have something there or maybe that's just luck I don't think the Arizona pitching staff is that great, but they are healthy now and they have six starters right now So they can even go to a six man rotation to maybe keep their guys healthy or they can play around with matchups or, you know, make Ryan Nelson like a super sub, you know, kind of a utility pitcher. You know, I don't know what is what they're going to do, but they are the healthiest of the squads and somehow second best in baseball. It's they are weird for me. I just when I look at them, I'm like, it's an okay team, you know? I see them a lot of them. Yeah, you forgot about them.

It's easy to forget. I didn't even look at them on the board. I was like about to do a whole Padres thing. We talked about Ryan Nelson a bit on Monday's show. Brendan Fott's been pitching pretty well. Zach Galin is just, Galin, he's their ace. Even if he's not a top 10 guy league wide, he's probably easily still a top 20 pitcher.

So they just get underrated. I underrated their offense like a month ago. We were looking at lineups and talking about different matchups we were trying to stay away from with our pitchers. And I thought Arizona was a matchup you could kind of mess with, with your kind of mid rotation starters and live to tell the tale. Nope, they are consistently actually very good. I think what I did is I was projecting the struggles of Corbin Carroll across the entire rotation starters and live to tell the tale. Nope. They are consistently actually very good.

I think what I did is I was projecting the struggles of Corbin Carroll across the entire lineup, but they've been really good. The injury, the Christian Walker has six homers in the last month and a five 77 slugging, you know, maybe he's putting it back together. And then they bring in Josh Bell on waivers to step in for Christian Walker.

It's working. He's got a 181 WRC plus as an Arizona Diamondback. And then you've got Jock Peterson and Ketel Marte who are white hot. They're both hitting over 340 with 400 plus slugging and 800, I mean, 800 slugging, 400 plus OVPs together. I mean, that's a great duo to have in the middle of your lineup. And you know, Jock Peterson, what do they sign him for? Like one and four.

He gets underrated a lot because it's a big side platoon. It was 12 and a half. It's still, it's not, not that much for what he brings to the table with the bat and then could tell Marte he's on pace for a possible 40 home run season. Who the heck had that written down anywhere? Doesn't, isn't he kind of like back end MVP status at this point? I mean, he should get at least a few votes. Yeah. I mean, it's crazy because if you had said which division might be a blowout in spring training,

we might have said the West because the Dodgers did so much and the Padres traded away Juan Soto and no one really bought that Arizona could repeat what they did. So if I told you the Dodgers are double digit leaders in the NL West back in February, you two have been like, probably yeah. It wouldn't have been a crazy thing if we had picked the Dodgers as having this double digit lead because they've had double digit leads in the NL West before. They went and created a super team. It's wild to me and credit to Arizona and San Diego for putting the pedal to the metal at pretty much the right time here.

You mentioned Arizona being very healthy, So there may be a little regression there, but San Diego in particular, it are winning games in all kinds of ways. Jackson Merrill looks like a guy who could be rookie of the year. He's, he hits big home runs for them. He makes big plays for them. He does not look like a guy who's in his first season in the big leagues. And I think that's been huge and doing, you saw last night in Musgrove's debut. He didn't even go five innings, but it doesn't matter because their bullpen is so good that they can introduce Musgrove back into the game. He can throw like 60 pitches and they win that game two to one because they can

trot out there like five headed relief monster out of the bullpen. So they're a scary team. I think if they make it in, because like I said, they could only they could get help, they could get hurt also, but they could get healthier here, they could have garbage, they could have musk rope more, more stretched out, Fernando to these could carry a team for a week or two, like, they're a very scary team. And I think the more you watch them, the more you're like, one, how was this team so bad last year? And two, if they get in, they're going to be a hard team to beat because of how we've seen, how much the bullpen

and how much that can matter when it comes to the postseason. Right. How much having those four or five guys to shorten those games up can have you steal games that you had no business winning, especially if you're starting rotation is thin and they're starting rotation is still pretty thin. Yeah. The other thing that is kind of, uh, kind of cool about, and this is on the offensive side, there's a Dennis Lin piece about how they, you know, in San Diego, they really wanted to improve their contact.

Jackson Merrill is in the middle of this, uh, as a really good contact player. But, you know, I think the added dimension later in the season for Merrill has been the power and marrying that strikeout rate with power is really the way forward, because what you see at the top of the strikeout rate leaderboard over the last 30 days is the Royals with the best strikeout rate in the Padres tied with them, basically. And then Arizona third. All three of them have

above average power because there are people on this strikeout rate list like Washington is fourth and you've got Cleveland seventh always and and you've got the Angels 12th these are teams that are striking out less than average, but don't have that power aspect along with it. And if you pair power with a low strikeout rate, then you are one of the best teams in baseball offensively. The Dodgers, by the way, a 25.7% strikeout rate over the last 30 days, and that is 25th in baseball, basically tied with the Giants.

So, you know, and there are teams on that side of the leaderboard that are still okay Offenses the Dodgers still have a dope 108 our WRC plus Atlanta strikes out More than anybody other than the Colorado and they have a 107 WRC plus But it puts a lot of pressure on your power on that side, too And you have to they also you have to walk a lot You have to do all the other things if you're going to strike out that much. This is a weird scenario that could unfold now. But it would have helped if Giants had found a way to win last night and that Snell sale matchup. But the Giants could be the

last wild card. We could be in a scenario where all four of these NL West teams, Dodgers, Podgers, Dbacks and Giants all make the playoffs. It's lining up where it's at least possible. And the Braves have that position right now, but it's going to be close. At least it looks like it's going to be close. The Braves are struggling. Three and seven in their last 10. They're up two and a half on the Giants for the last wild card spot right now.

Cardinals are in the mix there. The Mets are one back. There's other teams there because the NL's been like that all year. What's really interesting, if you look by run differential at the other teams jockeying for that spot, the Reds, even though they're four and a half games back

of the last wild card, are a plus 45 in run differential. They have the best run differential of any of the teams below that line right now that don't have a playoff spot. So I guess if I'm looking for a team that is not part of this NL West picture that could find its way back in,

the Reds might be the one that look close to dead on paper that still have some life left. Yeah, the end of season projections on fan graphs have the Braves with 86 wins, the Giants with 82, but you know, there's a hot stretch in there that could change things. Padres with 90, Dodgers with 95 still. So that's the kind of sober numbers based approach. But you know, a lot of this I think still looks at season long trends and says, oh, well the Dodgers have a 100 run differential

and have done this over the full season. And they aren't looking at something like I'm looking at like a last 30 day split. And that makes sense for a projection system to look at the full season and look at the full quality of the team. But I think it also makes sense as humans to like look at the last 30 days and say well this roster Over the last 30 days has performed this way. It's not like 30 days is a tiny sample It's like a full month of kind of mediocrity from the Dodgers So, you know after being a superlative team that looked like they were gonna win 115 or something this year now now They've come back to earth. So, you know anything can really happen over this last 45 days or so, but that's what the projections say.

Dodgers easily over the Padres, and 90 wins for the Padres, 89 for the Diamondbacks, and those are the two wild cards along with the Braves. To me, the current margin's a little smaller than the projected one, and that's just, you know, separating the current gap a little bit over the time. I don't know if I can buy that. I think it's going to be a sweat.

I think it's going to go down to the final week, at least for the division in the West, which is more exciting than a lot of years when the Dodgers have been able to get enough separation to kind of coast into the postseason. I always wonder, too, though, across all sports, are you better prepared for the postseason if you've been playing games that matter for several weeks or even a possible like couple of months consecutively? Like, do you just have the the right focus, the right mindset going in? It's not just a baseball thing, necessarily.

I found very little correlation in the numbers angle. Very little correlation between September records and October records. But wild card teams do well in the playoffs. Wild card teams historically have fared well in the playoffs. So maybe it's not so much September record as it is just getting in or mentality of just getting. There's a schedule component to that. Wild cards have different schedules.

They play they kind of play all the way through without resting. Yeah, that's that's where I wonder if it's the rest component, maybe getting in, having to play the games that matter and being a wild card is this little sweet spot where, yeah, the time off is good and you already, you know, advance through that first round. But you have everything just synced up the way it needs to be going in when you earned that spot through the final. Baseball is such a daily game.

There's something about it that it's like, so, you know, the other sports have days off, more days off, they have different schedules, they're more likely, you know, you almost never ask in baseball, do we have a game today? You know what I mean? Like, you show up and you're like,

oh, oh, there's no game today? Sweet. Turn, turn the car around, go back home. Yeah, there's a very much like, it's like an everyday thing and you kind of have to get into these grooves. And that's why I think teams also fall out of grooves and fall into grooves.

And it's something that you can't, numbers are not gonna be, are gonna say no, teams don't have hot hands because you can't pinpoint the beginning and end of a hot streak. Like you can't predict it. But you can be in one. You can be in one. You talk to any of these guys who are on a hot streak

and the ball looks like a beach ball. I mean, just look at the Texas Rangers last year. Like they were they the best team in baseball for the full season? No, but like they were, you know, during the playoffs. Yeah. The time it mattered the most. This is the part that you still can't,

yeah, you still can't quantify the momentum factor, I think. And we see that in other sports. You see that in March Madness, right? You see that, you know, a little bit in, you know, other venues. But yes, for me, baseball is such a it's because they play every day. I think basketball most often crowns the best team as the champion. Because they have full series, the whole seven game series.

Yeah, definitely not the Super Bowl, because no, I don't think so. I think how did what team showed up there? You know, and there's also a big matchup question. I think in in in football because whoever you play in the playoffs, it's not like, you know, you could just be playing a weak slate to get to the Super Bowl and then,

you know, Thor has some strong opinions today. I know, do you guys hear him? His dog walker is coming. Oh, he's excited. He's not, he's not even, I know. What's funny is like, that the dog walker will still have to drag him

out of the house. Like he's almost 10. Like he acts like a tough guy behind the door. Once they come in, he's like, oh, are we walking? I don't wanna walk so much. He knows what he wants. Yeah. Yeah.

And yeah, rare cameo from Thor who usually doesn't have the energy. Usually don't hear a peep out of him. The key question here is, if we had to make the call today, are you sticking with the projections and saying it's the Dodgers, you know? And I'm staying with the Dodgers. I'm not moving off them.

I just think they're going to have to sweat it out closer than the projections say. Do you think the Dodgers win the division? and how many other teams out of this group actually do make the postseason? Yeah, I want to stick with the Dodgers. I just think that when you, you know, when you do look at this, this last 30 day splits too closely, you start, you just forget how good this team really is. And getting Mookie and Freddie back, I think is, is huge.

There was a little, you know, in that time period period muki was hurt and there was some freddy missing so. You know when you look at that line you say oh the bottom foreign great well now replace some of that bottom four with muki bats and freddy freeman how does the line of looking at now and what recently with both you know with with both these guys and i feel like you start to be like, how do I pitch this lineup? Like, how do I get through this lineup? It is a really good lineup. And so in the meantime, while they've been crappy, you know, Gavin Lux has been getting a little better and like some of their they've been sorting through some of their pieces and they acquired some pieces of deadline. So if this lineup, the worst players in the lineup are Gavin Lux and Tommy Edmond. I'm starting to think like this could be the best lineup in baseball again. Britt, what do you think? I mean, Dodgers to win the division, but other two teams still getting in behind them?

I think so. Like I want to disagree just for contrarian sake. Also, because like, let's face it, we're not even into September. We've seen some crazy stuff happen in September. We've seen collapses, we've seen teams storm in. And I don't buy the projections that this is going to be a coast at all, like Grave's new DVR. I think it'd be pretty cool if a team that wasn't the Dodgers won the NL West. I have a hard time seeing the Dodgers now that they're getting healthier. Like kind of continue to spiral and give away that lead. But I very much think that the Padres could win this division.

It wouldn't surprise me. So I'm just going to go with the Padres just to be a little bit different. I think they're confident. I think they're playing with the momentum we talked about. And they have the potential to get even healthier and better. Tati's is a big piece. I mean, if they can, Tati's is a huge get him back.

It could change things that line up. I'm going to go with them because it's it would be so boring if we just saw the Dodgers march to an NL West title. I like Arizona. It's funny. We're like counting out Arizona, which the World Series last year. And apparently, I was the second best pitching staff and the third best hitting over the last three, 30 days. Okay. And this, this again speaks to my, like,

let's just make it AL and NL and the top teams get in. Cause it's like, just wild if we get three teams, maybe even four teams in from that, that NL West. That's not probably how people perceived it going into the season, I don't think. I think people thought that there'd be one there'd be one wild card coming out of there at most. I think for trading away, Jorge Saler, the Giants deserve to come up short. The spirit of it's like your lineup's not that good. Keep the guy that has game changing power that can just go red hot.

It's so it's such a Farhan move, but we found Jarrar Incarnacion, who's hitting the ball really hard and kind of looks like Horle Heseler and he costs, you know, $15 million a year less, so. No, I don't like it. I'm not rooting against the giants, but I'm more just looking at saying, hey, you know, that's like the wrong thing to do. If you're trying to make up ground and your problem is largely scoring runs, don't try to have your cake and eat it too. It's not that big of a deal to keep. Saler.

I think that there's going to be some leaner times coming from Elliott Ramos and Tyler Fitzgerald at the top of that lineup just because they're swinging this. So, you know, I know that they're they look great right now, but they're putting the one two in the lineup. And, you know, that means they they want every plate appearance they can to go to those two guys. And I'm not sure it's going to work out that well.

The series lineup kind of nice at the end of the season. So the second to last series of the year for the Padres on the road at Dodger Stadium, that could be the series where one of those teams potentially clinches it, or it could be Padres D-backs in the last series of the season in Arizona for the division or just to make the playoffs. So I like the way the schedule shakes out. I'm glad the schedule worked out that way. The Giants do not play the Dodgers again, but they do play Arizona,

I think, six times. Yeah, they've got them in the first week of September. Giants are a little bit more, you know, almost in the spoiler role, possibly. Right, or Giants Cardinals could be looking for the last wild card spot final weekend of the year. It's a home series for the Giants, too. So, I don't know, a lot of different ways

this one can play out. It's more fun and a deeper division than we expected going in. One more question for you before we go. We saw the Angels buy and then purge, trying to get below the luxury tax threshold last year, using August waiver dumps to do that. And it was weird, the Guardians kind of

reaped the benefits of that, even though they didn't make the playoffs. Ken Rosenthal wrote about the possibility of the Rangers maybe shedding a few players to save some money before. Oh my God. Is there any first Scherzer be a waiver dump? I don't think Scherzer was in that, but it's guys like David Robertson, Andrew Heaney, maybe Nathan Evaldy.

It won't might not be quite as extreme as the Angels But do you think whether it's the Rangers or other teams? This is something that more clubs might employ because now you have this extra month you played since the deadline If you were kind of a bubble team 15 20 percent chance of making the playoffs at the deadline You stayed in you didn't sell you can at least save Four or five six million whatever it is in payroll for the final month of the season. Because if this is the norm, the way the players are awarded is frustrating. The fact that Cleveland just got three roster upgrades,

even though they have to manage the roster and DFA and push guys off the 40 man, it's just kind of weird. It's like being in a fantasy league where someone who's out of it just drops a bunch of players three weeks before the end of the season and worst one person gets the pile of our team with money The worst wild card team with money gets to pick them up basically very odd. I Think that there is a calculation the team has to make that goes beyond just how much money we can save I'm not sure exactly what it is, but I I do think that you can

poison yourself a little bit as a free agency destination if you just cut guys like this. You know what I mean? Like, you're not, for the player, you're not trading them to somewhere where they know they're going somewhere. You're cutting them from your team. And then the player has to find out where he's going. You know what I mean? Like they're in limbo I bet you that it didn't make the angels of a nicer place to go for play for players, you know, I mean, I Bet you players roll would roll their eyes at it like if the Rangers cut everybody and

Then they weren't into free agency next year and somebody got an offer from the Rangers and an equal offer from somewhere else, they might take the other offer is what I'm saying. I think there could be some tarnishing of your legacy as a team if you just put six players out there. Like let's say it is Max Scherzer. You put Max Scherzer and Nate Iovaldi on waivers. Right? Is there nothing? Nothing resonates with this with you guys? What do you think?

I don't know. I just flat out don't like it. But I'm with you on the, especially if you're signing a one year deal. You know, oh, okay. They're just gonna put me on waivers. Because it's usually guys who are expiring, right? We don't see this with players that have years of control left. Oh yeah, totally.

It's pending free agents, guys that you wouldn't give a qualifying offer to that. But one year deals are lifeblood, lifebloods of some teams. Like most teams would love to finish like two or three roster spots with one year deals. Like the giants love it, you know, like, you know, certain teams love it. The only reason I would wonder if it doesn't make a big difference is because if we're talking about guys on one year deals, they're probably

looking for their next home anyway. And you're talking about a month where they live in a hotel and possibly go play for a better team. So maybe the pros outweigh the cons, the hassle, the inconvenience, like you knew the situation going in on a short-term deal. So maybe it's not that big of a deal. I would make it a priority to talk to the players.

Sure. As an organization, I'd be like, listen, we could save some money here. You could go somewhere better. Do you want to? I would ask them. What do you think, Britt? More of this to come?

Or was that just a blip last year with the Angels being that aggressive about shedding payroll? I think MWB is going to change the rules, so I don't think it's worth a whole lot of debate. They don't really, they don't like that. They didn't like that look? No, it's going to change. Ken Rosenthal wrote about for his piece today, it's just like the optics

of the defending champions doing this. That's kind of a strange vibe as well. I hope it's not a trend, but I did realize when Ken wrote that, I'm like, oh, yeah, we're kind of in that window where there might be a team or two that thinks about doing that to save a few bucks. We're going to go if you'd like to save some money on a subscription to the athletic, you can do that at theathletic.com slash rates and barrels. You can find Eno on Twitter at EnoSaris,

find Britt at Britt underscore Giroli, find me at Derek VanRiper, find the pod at rates and barrels. That's gonna do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We're back with you on Thursday. Thanks for watching!