Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 175 | Mookie's Extension and Postseason Expansion

Episode Date: July 24, 2020

The season is here, but baseball demanded that we talk about non-gameplay one more time! Mookie got a 12-year extension to stay in LA (2:30), the Blue Jays are currently without a home (16:55), and MLB and the MLBPA agreed to expand the postseason to 16-teams! (21:55) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to Talking Baseball. There's a lot of stuff happening, and I'm not even talking about the season starting. I'm talking about other things. How about that? Let's do it. What's going on, everybody? Welcome back to Talking Baseball. My name is Jimmy.

I got Jake sitting right next to me. Trev just put on some dope shades. He's in California, and we're coming to you live from the Roosevelt Studios. That's RSV-L-T-S studios. Trev, Jake, here's the deal. We are recording this before the Yankees' Nationals game starts on opening day. So if you're listening on Friday morning, this isn't going to be about the games at all, because baseball dropped a ton of news in our lap that doesn't even pertain to gameplay.

So it's like one more off-season pod before we get rolling into game recaps and all of that. We got the Mokey news. We got the Blue Jays news. We got the expanded playoffs news. A lot of stuff going on. Trev, I'm going to throw it to you first. How are you doing in California? Are you ready for the season?

Are you excited with that they gave us a couple more bits of offseason news? I mean, I'm ready for the season. We've talked about that. I wasn't expecting any news. I hadn't even, I mean, there's been whispers that they've been negotiating some expanded playoffs, but for them to kind of drop it at the doorstep on the eve of the actual real open. day is quite something and we'll talk about it. It's, I want to get into negotiations.

We're a labor dispute pod one more time because I am very interested in the negotiations. Jake, how are you doing? Good to be back and yeah, I'll catch up the people. Dodgers won in a route, 8-2 final, Yankees 1, 6-3, Cole looked good. So there is the baseball. If you were looking for that, it was a good opening day. and yeah man it's it's nuts it's 20 20 it's baseball in the it is 20 20 I mean it's it's so 20 20 dude I mean the fact that three hours before the season we agreed to a new playoff structure

kind of insane and I mean I'll I'll let you guys pick where we go first but mookie getting a full bag or as Trevor said before he got about six bags I think that surprised to all of us and means a lot of different things going forward. So I'm excited to do it. The mooky news, we'll start there. What is the contract 12 years for 400? 300? It ends up being with this year like 13 years, 380 something.

Okay. Now we had a whole conversation about what we thought would happen. And if the free agent market's going to be down, I remember we all kind of said, the Dodgers are dumb if they don't negotiate with him right now. But then we also said, but he told the Red Sox, hey, I want to be the bell of the ball. I want to go around and get coveted and be invited places and and masqueraded as, you know, and been told how great I am and all that stuff.

And the Dodgers are like, maybe the Dodgers did it because it is a huge contract. Maybe COVID scared him into taking something, but the COVID stuff kind of out the window because this is a huge deal. It's a huge deal. Treff. We talked about this being advantageous with guys. like this, we talked about how we've heard that the free agent market is going to be pretty much non-existent this offseason. We also said, though, that these high-end guys are still going to get paid. Now, were we expecting Mookiee to get the 12 years after the pandemic?

Absolutely not. I think I said he might get a four-year 160 or something like that. I think that was my opportunistic Dodgers contract that I thought they should throw out there. What this is telling me is two things. The Dodgers obviously want Mookie for good. And I think Mookie was a little scared to test this year. If there was a second wave or there was a canceled season and we didn't know what was going on in 2021, that could definitely alter things. But I think he's hedging his bed a little bit and saying, you know what,

that's not even take it to there. I like L.A. I like what I've seen so far, and they're offering me this money. Here we go. If he hits the open market, does he get something better than this? I mean, there's a chance. But, Trev, when you say hedge your bets, he's hedging his bet with the biggest contract of all time. So that's a pretty good hedge. And, you know, I think something that may be interesting or maybe really dumb if we talk about this.

But the contract rolls until he's age 39. and a guy that relies on speed and defense is a factor. It'll be interesting to see how the end of it winds down, as it is with all of these big contracts. I heard, you know, the MLB guys, Jim, you threw out a name earlier today, Ichero. Yeah. That, hey, you know, Mookie, usually the concern is about guys getting heavy

or putting on weight. Like, Mookie doesn't have that. So as long as he stays healthy, maybe he can make a chunk of this contract by good. Anytime you go 13 years by the end of it, it might get ugly. But man, I think, you know, Mookie and his agent, probably a few months ago looked at each other and we're like, hey, now, what's going on?

And I'm sure when he came to the Dodgers, they said, we want to have you. There's a reason we traded for you. And honestly, like, you know, normally a deal comes out and we're like, Mike Trout should have hit free agency. He should have got a lot more. Or, you know, we're complaining about, you know, someone gets overpaid, how'd they get that contract?

I didn't hear any of that on the internet. Like, this seems good. It seems appropriate. I think shocked was the first mindset. And then from there, people, I didn't hear a lot of backlash. I think I was the loudest backlash. And it's not backlash. It's just confusion.

Like, what's 39, what's 30, what's 36 through 39 year old mooky doing? Yeah. You know, and I don't care. I'm not like scalding the Dodgers or I don't really care. I understand how long contract. you are overpaying for the first five years, and then you're going to figure it out at the end. That's how they all work.

That's how I work with C.C. Sabathia. That's not worth with Garikov. It's how it's going to work with Trout, even probably. That's how it's going to work with Harper. That's how it's going to work. I get it. The DH is going to come, and that's going to help soften the blow a little bit. I'm, like, kind of thinking now, like, what's Mokey going to look like at 39?

Like, is it going to be, like, a bowling ball, just hitting homers up at the plate? Like, that will be awesome. You know, like, is he going to continue to be lean? Probably not. So I'd love to see, like, a, I don't even know what Mookiee's at right now. A lean 185. A thick, later in life, mooky bets was a little more popola. Like that.

Like a Kirby Pucket body. I got Mouserrain. Jim's got Mouserrain right now. There is a mouse in our office. And I'm going to blame Mous Brain. You just took my water cup, which I had been using as my water cup, and put your gum in it. Oh, I thought that was mine.

No. Well, I took the garbage out here. I didn't want gum in my mouth because my mom always yells me when I do shows with gum. I didn't want to just put on the table. Damn. I could have took the bang. Double whammy. We got a mouse in the office treb.

And every time something brushes against my leg hair, I freak out. Like Luke did it earlier and I, like, freaked out. So if you hear me, freak out, that's why. So that's the update. Mookie contract is funny, hilarious, and so sad if you're a Red Sox fans. A lot of Red So bad. Thought they were going to try and resign him. I posed this on Twitter, and it wasn't trying to be hot take.

He was a genuine question that I had. I got answers from Red Sox fans, so I think it is a bad question when you actually know the full story. But I said, if they don't trade him and COVID happens, and he's still a Red Sox for this season, does he take that offer that they gave him? Does it scare him into accepting the offer that they had originally handed him.

Now, a lot of Red Sox fans, maybe they just don't want to understand that reality or live in there, said no, it was clear he wanted out and wanted to do something different. They didn't even think the Red Sox would still offer him that and all of that. I don't know.

It's an interesting situation to me. I think you could take a little column A, little column B there to a degree, but also, and this is what a lot of our Red Sox fans said, that the socks didn't really come to the table. And I think the last rumor we heard about the socks was like low 200 millions. Like we're, you know, we're talking about being 100 plus million off.

So that's probably the biggest factor. It always comes to money. But I think recent events tied in a little bit, but not too much, Trev. I don't want to be like a Homer L.A. guy, but I'm going to be a Homer L.A. guy. Yes. If you're mooky bets, and you got to say, I got to plant my flag somewhere for 10 plus years. Boston's not it. It's not

The rudest thing anyone said about any team I'm just being honest Like if you have your choice of where you get to go Boston or L.A Like you're going to choose L.A Like I would say I'm not 90% of people how about that Okay I don't want to do this conversation you're very biased

Do it do it guys do it I got reasons People will choose where they're from What happened? The mouse is here Mouse is here Mouse is there he is There he is

Catch it BBD No BBD is petrified I would grab that thing with my hand right now Just go grab it What's it gonna do to you? I'm not helpful in the situation I don't know what to tell you Be squirmy and gross

Put a glove on Tell me about the Northeast Give me your home seat Trev I would choose Where is who Kooky from? I don't know Nashville

Nashville yeah Yeah I don't know That's not the thing that I'm arguing You said 90% of people would rather live in L.A. than Boston. Yeah. I disagree. I think if you ask anyone on the East Coast,

you're going to probably get like 60% of East Coast or say they'd rather live on the East Coast. Yeah, but have they been in L.A. for the past, you know, five months like Mookiee has, or whatever, you know, however long he's been here. Have they given it a chance? I visited L.A. and I lived in California for nine years and I would never want to live there. Nor Cal. Are you going to have $360 million? in live in LA because it's a different LA. You're changing the question.

It's a different LA. I understand what you're saying. I'm sorry. But I disagree with the whole LA is better than everywhere sentiment. I don't say it's better than everywhere. It's better than Boston. I like both places. Yeah, I know Jake really likes Boston.

There's somewhere I want to go with this that I'm not going to go with. L.A. brings out a difference. You're saying Boston's racist? L.A. brings out a side of me. Not saying any of that. And let's focus not on that. The Red Sox came out and said their fan base was racist. I'm not saying anything.

I'm just saying that maybe that was a factor. My guys in the office right now are playing scared, Trev. We're playing scared. Jim's feet are up on the table. DVD looks horrified. I'll say, there's Meriden what both you guys are saying. I think there's something to being a star professional baseball player and wanting to be in L.A.

That's kind of what I meant. I didn't mean like. Yeah. In his shoes, I was talking about. Can you come in here and set up a GoPro on BBD's face? I think that's what's gotten lost in transition here. Jimmy's calling in the assistants to get a GoPro on BBD because he is playing scared right now.

He's playing very scared of a baby mouse. And it's not his thing, so it's fine. What else on Mookie? I mean, we're losing it. Has Mookie the Moogie contract? Well, how much does this affect other Dodgers? Like what's their salary cap and all that? Do they even care?

I think they've got a good juggle. I mean, price is going to come off in a couple years, right? When they probably have to pay belly, something like that. They're L.A. They're homegrown. So, like, they get these guys at discounts for a long time. Yeah. I mean, they signed Pollock, which, you know, is respectable money.

He's a role player for them right now. He comes off soon. I mean, L.A. is set up for years, and, you know, this sounds sports. sports takey jakey but sports takey jakey they gotta start running into some rings otherwise things are gonna get real loud in l a traff 100% 100% the sentiment out here right now is it's ring or bust like and it's i mean i have a one-one and since what i always forget is it 88 gipson yes i think so yeah so people are ready especially going to two world series and just getting their hearts ripped out what if what What if Mooky has a terrible month of this first month of this season?

Are you guys ready? Are Dodgers fans? I'm not too close with Dodgers fans. A lot of them that enjoy us are pretty optimistic, rational ones. But there's got to be some that are going to be screaming about about Mooky if he has a bad first month here. Twelve years is a big commitment. The media is different here. The people are different here.

Oh, yeah. They're more eager to be happy with their team besides one guy we know. And where I disagree with you, Jim, is the fact. that now this contract's in place, it went from one bad month for Mookie could be half his career as a Dodger. And the whole trade. To now he's on the Dodgers. You're right.

That's a great way to look at it. So one month is one month. And I mean, you lost Jeter Downs and those guys for the ability to do this. Yeah. Oh, yeah. They're all in. All the chips from the middle of the table, like, let's go. Minus the always losing in the playoffs for the last five years.

It's been really nice to be a Dodgers fan. sands that. Trevor, and this is the other side of it, which, you know, people were throwing salt at John Boy and I got ahead of it on the salt. But, and tell me if this is too Yankee-centric, but I'm pretty stoked that he's not going back to Boston because I know you were poking us a little bit on the podcast, but that was a very real possibility. I mean, when Mookie Betts truly hits free agency, there's what, five teams that have a realistic shot of signing him. And if he went back to Boston after an abbreviated season and picked up, you know, some decent prospects. So let's say one pans out and is the real thing.

I mean, you know, it's kind of what's been in Yankee world the past few years. A Raldus Chapman and Glaber Torres. Like, I was very relieved as a Yankee fan when he got signed to the Dodgers. Four words, Jake. Yeah. Give Heim some time. Yeah. Amen. I'm going to pose this question to you guys.

This is, I've been thinking about it. I don't know which way I would live. If you're a Red Sox fan, would you rather have Mooki for this season and then offer the qualifying offer and get a draft pick for him? Or would you want to see him go to L.A., sign the extension, and get Jeter Downs and Alex Verdugo? You'd rather Mookie. As a real fan, yeah, you want him on your team. I mean, he was homegrown, he was like the most loved player. You'd rather move.

It's tough both ways. Yeah. I mean, Verdue. What's the bigger? Hall, though, the qualifying offer in 60 games of Moogie or Verdugo and Jeter Downs? That's kind of my question, I guess. I mean, like, Verdugo is pretty good. Yeah. People have kind of overlooked that. And, you know, if Jeter Downs pans out, like, they're, you know, they got some assets. So it's just, anytime you have an MVP caliber player in your organization as a fan, I mean, you're

wrapped around them. The face of the team. You're wrapped around them. So that's, it's tough to quantify. Let's move on. I have one last thing about the Dodgers payroll. Justin Turner comes off after this year. I don't know if there's options. I don't think there is. He signed through this year. That's an interesting development.

Yeah, he's like 36, right? Yeah. He'll go play somewhere else. Found it later in life. Me too. Yeah, a little bit. Yeah. I want to go to the Blue Jays first

because the conversation I really want to have is the playoffs, so I want to just do the Blue Jays real fast. they're homeless. They're getting kicked out of anywhere. I don't know if we had this conversation with you, Trev, but BPD on John Boy and Jake Radio said, like, when they were going to Pittsburgh, it was like, doesn't that not make sense?

Because now you have central region teams mixing with East region teams, and the whole thing was for them to not get mixed up. So it was a great call by BPD. And then Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania, the state and the city, we're like, yeah, no. We're good. We're good on that. Don't bring all the mess to us.

So they kicked them out. I think the Orioles offered them a job, but Maryland's like, I don't know. It seems like whoever says yes to this now is kind of a bozo. So now they might be roving the entire season and just playing away games nonstop as the home team. I mean, I just feel like that doesn't make any sense. What's your solution? I don't know, man. I mean, there are open parks.

So I read a little bit into this. And one thing they were saying is a lot of these parks aren't equipped with like Major League Ready Lights. Now, can they bring lights in there like they do for the Williamsport games and all that? Sure. They do have one exception, or we have one exception, and it's the Omaha Stadium where they hold the College World Series. I think they could end up there. It's a home park for them. It's nice enough.

A lot of travel. It's just not east. It's just not east enough. I mean, okay, but then you think about what a team like Seattle has to do. They travel a lot. Texas has to travel a lot. Texas has to travel a lot. You know, these teams travel.

So if I'm a player, do you want to travel all year? Or do you want to go somewhere and maybe have an extra hour plane ride everywhere else you go? Like, you're going to want to have a home park. Did you hear how awesome the Yankees schedule is if the Blue Jays are just playing at their opposing teams field as the home team? The Yankees would play 23 out of 29 games at home to end the year. I mean, okay.

So I'm rooting for that. I know you guys like that. That's nice. Omaha is the solution. That's what I think. Really? I'm surprised. I haven't heard anything about that, but it makes sense to me. Get you a heart down out.

Yeah, I don't know. The one that I feel has lost legs because, and you're saying, you know, lights is easy to fix. You get a couple cranes, put a couple light bulbs up there, bang. I don't, if I'm the Blue Jays, I want to keep things as much in my own control as possible. And I'm doing Buffalo. No, you've never been there, that's why. Right. I'm going next year for two weddings. Buffalo, no, no, let me just clear this up because people came at me on Twitter about this.

Buffalo, the city's awesome. Like, I love Buffalo. I've had a great time. It's rebuilding. The facility is there. You can handle it. You can do stuff on that anyways. In the Camden Yards plan, they're basically going to make them another clubhouse because they don't want them sharing the same clubhouse as the Orioles for like

cleaning and health purposes. So, I mean, I think there's an easy way to do it. You can hook up a fake new clubhouse in Buffalo outside the facility or something, you know, put up a tent. Some space heaters. And I mean, it's a Blue Jays facility. And I think you do that and maybe you leave Florida as an option open if Buffalo gets cold towards the end of the year and you have another facility down there. It's your spring training. I don't know. If I'm the Blue Jays, like I just want this as much in my control as possible. And it feels like, I don't know, it feels totally out of their control. Like a reporter started the whole Pittsburgh rumor thing.

And now Camden Yards is trying to figure it out. So I don't know, man. I feel bad for them because how much of our offseason was talking about the Braves is like this fun team, the baby Braves, like let's see what they can really do. And now it's like, if I'm Ryu, fuck this. I'll tell you one cool thing for these guys would be if they played somewhere, say they went to Nebraska, I don't know what the state taxes are in Nebraska, but they're surely lower than the Canadian taxes.

Okay. Because those are a lot. So, you know, there's a little silver lining there for these guys. Perks. But I don't know. Buffalo to me, man, is just not the answer. They need somewhere that they can call home, man. Yeah, Omaha, baby.

Even if you get an Airbnb for two months or whatever it is, like you need a place that is your room to put your head down. Yes. You know. Hotel living ain't it? I don't care what kind of hotels you're in. You go crazy like that. I did 17 days once traveling in different hotels, and it was, I mean, by the end,

you're like, you're a zombie. You're not your normal person. Yes. Sucks. All right, can we move on to the playoffs? Yes. Playoffs. Oh, good sound effect, BBD.

Yes. Okay. Well, it's insane. Okay, everything we've talked about and everything we've said is worthless. The top two teams, the top two teams from every division are automatically in the playoffs. Astros and A's probably in. Twins and Indians, twins and White Sox probably in. Yankees' rays, probably in.

Nothing matters. Nothing matters. This whole regular season is a farce. card. It sucks. Now, it's stupid and I hate it and it's dumb and it's ugly. But I will accept it after I'm done giving the rant on as soon as I'm done explaining why I hate it. I will accept it. I will embrace it and I will dive into the silliness of it. But everything that we thought mattered doesn't matter. The top two teams are automatically in. Yeah. It's so stupid. Go off, bro. I love the queen.

I understand. I know. Okay, the labor negotiation side, I understand why everyone did this, because MLB wants more playoff games because they want to make up all the lost revenue from COVID. MLB players,

half of them are now going to start the season thinking, fuck, this isn't going to be worth it if we don't even make the playoffs. This gives them a better chance of making the playoffs. This also gives them a ton of money because they weren't getting any money on playoff shares really before this, so now they get this. So I understand.

why they all said yes to this. As a fan, I think this sucks. As a Red Sox fan, as a Blue Jays fan, as a White Sox fan, as Angels and Rangers fan, you guys should be ecstatic. It's nice if you do include the Red Sox in there. You're welcome, Red Sox fans. After Treb said your whole city sucked. Now, here's where it gets so funky.

I need your guys' help. I can't even figure out what is being said in this tweet by Jeff Passon. Okay. Let's go. The one and through three seeds. Awesome. We'll go to the division winners based on record.

We got that. So the west, the central, and the east, that's the one, two, three seed. Bang. Overall record between those, one, two, three. Yeah. Huge. Seeds four through six will go to the runners up based on record. So in the division.

Yep. That's stupid. Okay. Seed seven and eight are the wild card seeds just overall record. What are you confused about so far? Well, I just think that's dumb. Okay. There's a possibility the third best division winner.

So say the Red Sox get in as the wild card, right? And they have a really good record. They could play a worse team than the two best division. winners. So if you're the wild card, you can potentially play a team that's worse than who the Yankees would have to play as being the first place seat. You lost me a little there. See, it's fucking confusing. It's incredibly confusing. Because they're ranking the four through six, they're ranking the second place finishers. So does anyone get a buy? Let's start there. I don't, well, we haven't got there, man. Okay. We're not even. Well, that would help.

I think. We're not even there yet. Okay. I think if we were there, that might help, though. What's the setup right now? We have three division winners, two wild cards. And three second place division. No, I'm saying before this.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we had 10 teams making the playoff essentially. We're adding six more teams, which is. is ridiculous. It's too many. Look, I mean, it's stupid. And I like that you hate it so much. I really enjoy that.

I like kind of when you go off on your little tangents. When it's all said and done, just like how these negotiations were stupid and everyone was pissed off, when the playoffs come around, we're going to be like, okay. Like, let's see this fucking circus. Like, they're going to have guys teams pick who they want to play.

and some fucking selection show. But we're all going to be eating it up because that's what we do. We like baseball. Just like we don't care about anything that happened for the past three months. Here it is an opening day, and we're giddy because we love it.

Same thing's going to happen to playoffs. We're going to be absolutely dialed. What's your fear? Because I know you're coming at this from a Yankees perspective. So you're saying... Fear? He's not.

The regular season doesn't matter. At all. It didn't matter to the Yankees anyway. No, it did. I was scared of the race. Now the Yankees and the race, both are probably going to be in the playoffs. And if the Yankees aren't the first seed and they're the second seed, it doesn't matter.

Nothing matter. Like literally they took all meaning for all the good teams out of this 60 game season. Sprint, anxiety, nervousness, don't care. Well, I agree. We'll see what the seating ends up looking like and how the draft goes and all that stuff. They're not doing any of that. They're not? Trevor just said.

I thought they changed all the draft stuff. Okay. Oh, they're not doing a selection show? I mean, we're doing this in real time, people. Details still leaking in. I think it's just straight seeds. That's the problem. Just straight seeds.

So the one plays the eight? I don't think so. Okay. See, I think that's... I'm assuming... I think you're confusing me, Jim. I'm assuming the one... So, okay, the one plays the eight, the two plays the seven.

I'm assuming what that statement you were saying is that the seven seed would be a technically the wild card this year, and they could be better than the five or the six, in theory. Yeah, the third seed Red Sox could be better. It's like in NFL that there's, if a wild card team has a better record than a division winner, but the division winner is still going to be the three or four. It just makes no sense to me to give the second place from each division an automatic spot. That completely erases the division race. If you want extra teams, that's fine.

but the three division winners should be there, and then it should just be the next five or seven teams or whatever, three, five teams. I mean, across the board, just by record. The bigger point is it's 16's too many. You know,

we talk this through a little bit on JJR this morning, and, you know, I've been asking for this for a little while. I think expanded playoffs for this year made sense. 60 games. I want to make sure that the best teams are in there. and we kind of have stepped far away from the fact that if a good team has a bad two weeks

start, sprint, whatever, they could actually be in trouble. I know we've written off the Yankees and the Dodgers in some of these teams, but it would be more of a joke after 60 games if they did normal playoffs and the Yankees or Dodgers didn't get in. 16's way too much and that's frustrating. Like Trevor's saying, and Jim, you said it too. Like by the time this comes around, we will eat it up. there is a little bit to the college football argument of, you know, make every, you know, they say every game matters,

and that's why they like having a small playoff. This is expanded. It'll be interested to see how the standings sort out to see if, you know, if there's a clear dropout between five and six, if that makes somebody really fight for a higher seed. I don't know. I'm interested to see, I think they went too far with it, but it was all to get, you know, a player incentive. We've got 23, 24 competing teams this year, and now the players have a little extra incentive to get, I think what last came out was 50 million in playoff bonus money.

Can I go off for a second? King. Just a little, just a little. Let a rip. I'm going to bring it back to the dark days of last month in the labor negotiations. Yeah. All we ever heard from the owners, number one, that they weren't going to make any money. Baseball is not profitable.

And most importantly, we couldn't. play a lot of games because we had to make sure that the postseason wrapped up quickly before we got into November. Okay. So now we've seen Mookie Bet sign a massive extension. We saw a playoff division series get bought out by TBS for a billion dollars. We've seen the Mets are up for sale for over $2 billion. And now we see the owners saying, you know what?

We were kind of just kidding about that November thing. Like, let's expand the playoffs. Let's get them in. all that meant absolutely nothing we tried to tell you guys when we were talking about it and now you're really really seeing it it was negotiating in bad faith from the get-go and it makes me sick everything of recently has been brought to us by camping world

um i i saw uh you know again we watched the yankee so i'm sorry i have to use them for this example but they had a fake little you know, an Audi advertisement behind home plate in the stands where fans would normally be. So, you know, everyone's kind of still getting their money. And we didn't talk about this with Mookiei. The early rumor is that come free agency, the big boys will still get paid, but the middle class might be in trouble, which that's been a discussion in baseball for a little bit now.

I don't know. It's just this funny world, and I don't want to get John Boy even hotter because we did this earlier. but, you know, think about the only people in the world who tell you baseball is a dying sport. It's people that don't follow the game and people on top of the game. So really, I mean, it's really bizarre. And I know we all get triggered by that sometimes. I know I was listening to a Scott Van Pelt podcast a little while back. And, you know, he gave a real serious.

I forget who he was talking to, but he's like, is baseball like actually going to die? And, like, you know, Scott Van Pelt's on top of the sports world right now. And he has to ask other people for their takes to kind of start to formulate all of his. And if he's asking those questions, it's because the top of the game says it. So I don't know. I'm excited to see it. I think, yes, the regular season matters less. We're more guaranteed to get the best teams in there.

And hopefully things are close enough that the seating matters. Hopefully we get some of that towards the end of the year I'm doing it out right now Because I'm so confused by this I'm doing out at 60 games last year With this new format What the what the 1 through 7 seeds would have been And 8

1 through 8 seeds Math pod Why I'm only up to 7 So that's why I have the dates Like are they pushing it back Is it adding any more dates To the schedule Like, are we going to go into November, or did they find some way to magically fit those in on the same schedule?

I mean, does an eight-team bracket sort itself out? Yeah, right? Wild card, divisional championship? I did hear the first three games. So the first opening round, which every team will play a three-game series, is all at the higher seeds home. So there's no travel day. I don't know if we talked about that yet. That's interesting.

That would be a nice little plot twist. A little benefit. And hey, I think, well, I won't get into some dark alley back stuff behind the game. But baseball better hope that, you know, if this happens, they better hope that the Yankees, the Dodgers, you know, the best teams make it past that wild card round because then people will get very loud. Well, I heard it's all three game sets. Can we talk about that?

That's what I'm saying. Every series or the first round? Yeah, there's no one game out. Yeah, the first round, yeah. That's what we just said. Yeah, there's no one game and out, right? Right. No wild card one game.

Oh, that's still short, but I think it's better than if they were still doing one game wild card. Oh, yeah, that's, that wouldn't be possible. All right, so after 30 games, the Astros would have been the one seed. Well, Astros and Twins both had 40 wins. So I don't know what the tiebreaker is because they don't play each other to do that. Harding. Yeah. So they'd be the one, two, Astros one, twins two, Yankees three.

Now the raise, now you have to do the second place teams. Second place teams. So the rays would be the four, the Rangers, the five, and the Indians, the six, right? So that means, and then the Red Sox and the White Sox. So the six plays the three, right? Sure. So that means the Yankees would play. Astros would play the White Sox, and that adds up.

40 teams, 40 wins versus 30. The 31 win Red Sox would play the 40-win twins. Watch out, twins. Yankees would play the Indians and the Rangers would play the Rays. So it kind of works out fine there, I think. You guys are losing me. Yeah. Well, the problem is the third place Red Sox could have a much better record than the second place White Sox.

And then the Yankees would have to play, you know, someone's going to have to play a better team. It just doesn't work out standing. There shouldn't, I mean, I think you'll probably end up seeing this. But at the same time, I mean, the games are going to be so close this year that it's not going to be as big of a gap. Like, I think literally just numbers-wise. It's more that... I mean... It doesn't matter.

We get wild-car teams have better records than division winners, so I mean... Yeah. We don't play a balanced schedule anyway. There's a lot of things that factor in every single year, so I wouldn't... You're tripping out about it for some reason. It ruined the fun of the season. I just spent like a month talking myself into the fun of the season. I don't think the season should be ruined for you.

It ruined the fun of what the season was. It's completely different now. First place... Different fun. Doesn't matter. If the Yanke... are well in first or second. They're just going to rest guys the last two weeks to get their lineup in order and health

in order. And there's not going to be any, there's going to be no divisional races between the premier teams. It'll be the people slopping around in the mud. You don't think so at all? You don't think a fight for first and second matters? Not when it doesn't mean you're going to play the worst team. If the Yankees or the race, I mean, the difference could be the one seat or the four seed. Like, that's important.

But the four seed may play a, worse a better, the four seed may play a worse seed than the one seed. That's the whole point of this. No. The fifth, the fifth, the, the fifth best team will be better than the eighth team. Like just math. Yeah, I think you're, I mean, that's literally passing street. There's a possibility that the third best division winner plays a worse team than the two best division winners.

There's a possibility. I think we're harping on it way too long. Yeah. I don't think it matters that much. I think the, what makes me mad is that we spent several episodes. previewing, you know, the playoffs. I think... And now that's all shit.

Yeah, the thing that kind of sucks is like, you know, just kind of racking through it in our head. I was talking about the Diamondback stealing a spot because the Central and the East were going to be so gnarly. Now I think if you're those East Coast teams, I think you're pretty excited because you're kind of better equipped ball club. So, yeah, I mean, there's going to be a little bit of funny business. At the end, it's going to be playoff baseball.

The better teams will be at home. and win your series. You know, you brought up, like, I'm excited to see who finishes second in the N.O.S. And I was like, why, who gives a shit? Now look, baby. Now look. Yeah, that race gets fun.

Yes. Looks like you were right. Jake Stradamus, Toilet and Nostradamus, right there. Second place in the NL West, baby. I'll deep die for the next 40 minutes on it. Nice. I'll get over it and I'll be fine with it. It does really loosen the butt cheeks of the 60 game season.

A little bit. I don't like it. Second place. If the Yankees got second place, they were going to a one game playing wild card game. Now have to go to second, now if they get second place, they're in a series.

Three games against the Indians. Yeah. Now that three-man rotation, the top three starters means a lot more. I'll say that. Mouse come back? BPDs clipping cords and getting mouse scared. All right, game starts in 45 minutes.

Let's get out of here. We have a big piece of news we didn't talk about. What is it? Juan Soto. Yeah. It's a bummer. It's a bummer, man. It's bad timing, too.

Two weeks, that's what they're saying, usually, right? But they all are saying that he tested. He just has to test. Yeah, he was isolated earlier, so he still has, I think the rule is past two tests. Past two tests, yeah. Yeah, well, I mean, he's been negative a couple of, different times and I think they might be thinking this is like a random bad test. I think you also have to be three days symptom free.

But he's a symptomatic. I think he has been. Of course he is. It's a minimum of like four days of being out. Best case scenario. It just, again, we're recording this. It's 6.15 p.m. So the game's going on in 45 minutes. I'm just bummed because it's going to be so much of the broadcast and so much of the conversation. And it sucks because I mean he's also Juan Soto, too, one of the best players in the world. It's good for a Yankee fans. Well, yeah. Hobie's back and healthy and all that and no one else catches it and doesn't go through

the Nationals. Hey, we talked about this a lot, though. Some teams are going to run into COVID and schedule luck, whether it's starting pictures or whatever. The Nationals minus Juan Soto and Rendon from last year are a very different team. He's getting out of the way early. Jimmy was pretty shocked when he looked at the Nats lineup. Starlin Castro three-hole?

Yeah. Hey, man. Go put up a fight. Have a day, Starlin. Can I change my Homer guy? Too late. Too late. And if you're wondering what Trevor Plufe is referencing,

go check out the Talking Baseball Pre-game Show. Oh. On literally everywhere. Kershaw's not pitching tonight. It's just in. Placed on injured list with back stiffness. Wow. Jesus baseball.

Bueller time. Is Bueller stepping up or are they just going to go a willpen game? They better not. They called up Dustin May, but I don't know what they're doing. I guess they have an off day tomorrow or no, they don't have an off day tomorrow. They don't have an off day tomorrow now, yeah. They'll probably just move Walker up, move everybody up one spot. That's pretty late notice for Walker.

Heyman tweet, Trump will throw out first ball. Yeah, saw that. And Fauci's going to follow him? Or is Fauci just out? I heard that he was going to do it at Yankee Stadium, August 15th. That's the tweet I saw. The world's on fire. World's on fire.

How about yours? No, he's doing out at Yankee Stadium, not at national. August 15. Okay. Well, what's Heyman's tweet then? Yankees confirmed. Trump will throw out a first ball this season. Just a first ball this season.

In the parking lot. Throw a for, yeah, no, it's August 15. There's two facts. I'm not thrilled with the new playoff system, and John Heyman is sucks at Twitter. So bad at Twitter. And Bob Nightingale. No, I don't even care.

Okay. Bob Nightingale makes complete, coherent tweets. You know what he's trying to say. Okay. The message is just wrong. He just makes it up. Heyman just grabs words off his fridge magnets and puts it on the internet. Okay.

Narnly. Narnly. Narnly. Nautly with a G. Gnarly. See you guys. Thanks for tuning in. Hope you have a fantastic weekend.

Baseball's back. Hat, a back. Fire. Angels, make the playoffs. How about that? Jeez. Shades are sick. I got the Mariners.

Jake sucks.