Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 23 | Sept 20th | Wild Card Races Are WILD

Episode Date: September 20, 2019

The Cubs and Brewers are tied for the 2nd wild card. The Rays and Indians are tied for the second wild card. The Brewers have won 12 of their last 14. Things are gonna get wild.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices 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, where the wild card races are about as wild as they can get. What's up, everybody? Thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of Talking Baseball. My name is John Boy. I'm coming to you from New Jersey, and I've got my best friend, Jake. He's back in Denver. We were in the same room last time. We were not in the same room.

We're talking to each other through a computer screen. the magic of technology. Baseball, Jake, is winding down. We are so close to the finish line, and there's still a lot of fun questions to be answered. We've been doing this twice a week trying to figure out how we think this thing's going to finish, and we kind of got the mayhem we want it this week coming into today.

I'm excited. How are you? I'm doing well, James. Yeah, man. it's out there. And it's, I mean, we've seen this forming for a little bit now. I think the biggest thing is still that one really good team is not going to make the playoffs. And it's, I mean, it's crazy the ripple effect that can have, you know, going down the line.

I mean, obviously not having a chance this year. But if it's the Cubs in the National League, I mean, that would mean the end of Joe Madden. and it's kind of been adding up that way anyways. But it's, I mean, I'm just looking at the standings right now, and yeah, I'm giddy. I mean, Tampa and Cleveland are tied. Right now the Cubbies are out, Mila Oake, they are fighting the good fight. So, yeah, man, it's good.

And I think a little behind the scenes is I think you and I are stoked as natural Yankee fans to not be in the wild card discussion for the first time. years because who that sucks i got excited this morning because i got the windows open and fall broke once already and then it was a fake out and then summer came back i'm hoping this is the real deal i mean we're september 20th now we're close to october the yankees clinched you and i are yankees fans we got excited about that it just feels like okay time to move on we're very close now some teams aren't there yet, so I'm excited that we are and we get to sit back and relax a little bit. And other teams get to as well.

The Braves have clinched a postseason spot. The Astros have clinched a postseason spot. The Nationals have clinched the Wild Card Spot, correct? Let me double check. The Dodgers. I don't think they technically have. No. No, they're only one game up on Milwaukee.

Wait, so who else is clinched then in the national? So the Dodgers have clinched the West. Atlanta has clinched the east, I believe. They got the X next. They've clinched a playoff berth. I think they're, I mean, they've basically clinched the division. And then Houston and the Yankees. Houston and the Yankees.

Crazy. And the twins haven't clinched yet? Twins have not technically clinched. They are four games up on Cleveland. and I'm surprised they haven't technically clinched the wild card spot, but I guess the wild card so tight that no. Cool. Interesting.

All right. Well, let's take care of some business before we really dive into all this. This episode of Talking Baseball is brought to you by five wonderful people. Amy Smith, most recent Patreon sponsor, supporter, Amy Smith. Nick Lakati, Lakoti. Lecote. Goddy Phil

Philly Jeff Hinkle Sure I got him as a first baseman Yeah Hinkle I think he's when he's coming into the draft You're a team you have to decide

Do you want to put him on the bump Or you're going to keep him at first I got him as a Vogelback type Oh I'm seeing I'm more Ike Davis Oh okay Okay Little Nacho 12

I don't know a position You got a position that feels like an unknown family member because you're a nacho I mean little nacho it's a lot of my identifying terms it is Jake

are you still going to get drunk for the wild card games oh yeah so I because Jim I saw a few people celebrating the Yankees clenching the east yesterday and I was like do I have a drink we had to record talking yanks but do i even snag a beer and i was like no because it was travel day and it was like five days on the east coast eating out and all that stuff uh and then i was

reassured myself i was like yes i still owe myself the wild card um so probably not both games because that's poppy gordo's body can't do that anymore but but definitely one of them the first wild card game is october second i believe so there's there should be one Tuesday one month not Monday one Tuesday one Wednesday question mark I believe it's the second and the third or it's the oh it's the first and the second okay so they do make one of the teams play the next day that's right what which one's the first wildcard game that we're going to get which one do you want to get first oh interesting well the NL plays first um I don't don't know if that's a factor in this question.

Well, I was asking the question. That's the answer. Yes. The NL. I'm more excited for the AL one. I think it depends on the NL, right? Well, Jim, actually, this is a, I think you just kind of threw this out there as a shrug. But this is a very serious conversation because it's, A, where's the game being played?

Well, for the NL, it's most likely Washington. Right. So we've got that for the NL, but the AL is very much up in the air. And I know if it's Tampa, your choice isn't the AL anymore, I don't think. I got Tampa. Indians are coming for him. Right. I know you have that. But currently they are tied 90 and 63 up. Do you want to play in game? Do you want a, like a play in game for the wild card? Is that or is that too much mayhem for you? Like if the Indians and. and the Rays have to play a one-game play-in to see who can play the wildcourt?

And this happened before. Are you rooting for that, or would you rather just have a clean break, like a good finish, clean ending? I think I'm rather just clean ending. For some reason, I don't know why. As a baseball fan, I would root for that. That would get me excited. Yeah, the one-game playoff.

I, and most people would assume it's the Red Sogs. I'm pretty grown up in Connecticut, very cordial with a lot of fan bases. Jim, I wouldn't wish the one-game playoff wild card game on my enemy. I mean, that is hell. That is hell. It's not fun. You can, your season can go down the sink, basically with one bad pitch for 18 innings. I feel bad for the Nats.

So, yeah, so I guess it's nationals. I mean, they're going to be hosting it. Actually, Jim, we say that casually, they're one game up. The nationals are not a lock to host that game. Yeah, they're going to be hosting it. We thought that for a long time, and now they are back to Earth. They are two up in the lost column. I know you're big on that.

It's all matters. And you can assume that. Man, Milwaukee is fighting with everything they've got. The Cubs are fun. Cubs and Cardinals have seven. Well, let's get into some reports so we can get into this more. Okay. Let people know.

We got to let them know who's in the standings and all that stuff. That's true. And the National League report is brought to you by our friends over at Roosevelt Shirts. Jake's got three in his possession now. I've got three in my possession. Intern Luke has some. They're fun. They fit nice.

If you're sweat a lot, Jake and I wore them. We walked across New York City. I was sweating my butt off in my Roosevelt shirt, but it was nice. Like it wasn't like how cotton catches the sweat and then you're doomed for the rest of the day. It's much better than that. They're fun. We were wearing them. We looked sharp.

We look snazy. You can get them at R-S-V-L-T-S dot com slash johnboy. If you go there, they've curated a whole batch of baseball shirts. We have the major league ones, which I think may see the light of day. we may match them at spring training? There's always a chance, John. Always a chance. So go to roosevelts.com,

R-S-V-L-T-S dot com slash Johnboy. Use discount code Johnboy to get 20% off. That's a cool discount code. It helps a lot. So go do that and tell our friends at Roosevelt's. Thank you. And let's go to the buggy. All right.

Now for your series that don't matter, the Giants took two of three from the Red Sox. One of the games won 15 innings. and saw 24 different pitchers stand atop the mound. The Red Sox were done in by a wild pitch and a sack fly in the 15th. The Diamondbacks beat the Marlins in the bookend games of a three-game set. Okay, cool. Moving on to the series that holds some implications.

The Phillies took two of three from the Braves. Good for the Phil's, but it probably means very little, as they are four games back in the wild card with two teams ahead of them. The Brewers hosted the San Diego Padres and won three out of four games. The Brewers are now 12 and 2 in their last 14 games. They just keep winning since Yelich went down, and it's a team effort. Kane with two home runs. Rookie Trent Grisham got involved.

The starters and the bullpen and the bullpen days, it's really like they are throwing the entire team at their opponents right now to keep the magic alive without Yelich. The Cardinals squared off with the Nationals in St. Louis. The cards won two of three. And in the rubber match, Adam Wainwright out-duled Max Surr. Max Scherzer. Kind of interesting.

The Cubs lost a series to the Reds, classic Cubs. I'm kind of getting sick of them. They got shut down by Sunny Gray. At a steedis popped Hu Darvish for his 16th Homer in 47 games. And in the rubber match, rookie James Norwood blew it for the Cubs in the 10th inning. The Mets lost the first game to the Rockies, but won the next two to take the series. Stroman had a really nice start.

Pete Alonzo hit home runs number 48 and 49 on the year, but the Mets are three and a half games back, two back in the loss column with two teams ahead of them. Nationals have a one game lead in the wildcard races, Brewers, then Cubs, then Mets. Then Phillies, it's getting sloppy. In the NL Central, the Cardinals are three games up on the Brewers, I believe, and four games up on the Cubs. The Cubs and the Cardinals have seven games against each other left. There's like 10 games left in the season.

So we will see. It will get interesting. The Central is still interesting. The Wild Card is very interesting. I do think the Mets and Phillies are out of it. Yeah, it's tough to picture a world where Milwaukee, the Cubs, or the Nationals, drop so much that the Mets and the Mets getting hot enough to find themselves in it. It just doesn't seem realistic.

Hey, prove us wrong, Amazons, but that seems what is dead. may never die. Jim, you're out on your cubbies? Last up you were giving me the hole. They got seven against St. Louis. They're right where they want to be. Now you got them DED dead? No, they're not dead. They're not dead at all.

They can still do a lot of damage versus the Cardinals. But I don't have them doing anything in the postseason because they can't fucking, they have no consistency. Yeah. It'll lose a series to the Reds. Like, come on. At home. And 31 and 40.

on the year now on the road. And Jim, we do have, sometimes we can jump into the future on this show. They did lose the first game last night to St. Louis. Kimbril gave it up. So, yeah, I don't know. I mean, again, like you said, they've got the games there if they can find the right button to press. I'm starting to really enjoy St. Louis.

I mean, Jack Flaherty has continued to be at it. You're going to hear about Adam Wainwright later. So I'm coming to enjoy the Cardinals. I'd like to see them do some playoff baseball. The Cubbies, man, you're right. I think, I don't know, though. One game playoff with Joe Madden pretending to coach for his job, that gets fun. You think he's coaching for his job?

There's been weird rumors around that all year that Joe Madden's kind of run his course, which, I mean, is a very managerial thing. It's not a shot at Joe Matt. and a lot of managers, your voice can run, get old in the clubhouse after a few years. And I don't know, the energy's kind of been down in Chicago. This was supposed to be not a Cubs dynasty, but I mean a team that's supposed to compete every year and be a threat for the World Series. And since they've won, they kind of haven't been. Yeah.

Well, yeah, they had the series, the year before they won, they took the Mets to the, the NLCS and then they win. And then what, I don't know what happened the next year's, but Dodgers got him, I'm guessing. I don't know, man. Madden's also expensive and that is not the way managing is going. It's going like, hey, why don't we just get a young guy to do this cheap?

And Madden's expensive. I have no idea if he's coaching for his job, if they're going to bring it back, whatnot. I do know that Schwerber's been going off for the Cubs. Yeah, yeah. We had a, and it's totally, Schwerber's having a very 2019 season.

I think he's going to sneak up on 40. Yeah, he's got 37 homers, 239 batting average, 329 on base, but an 849 OPS. So he's, yeah, I think it's a little bit good player, a little bit juice ball, because Jim, if you actually look, a lot of his numbers from last year

look pretty similar, except the gopher balls are up 11 right. now, which I don't know. A little juice in the ball for a big guy like that. It's up. Yeah, the OBP is way down from last year. And them homers. OBP, I said it right.

Yeah. I don't know. He's got like a double, a triple, and two home runs his last couple games. Like that. But I don't know what's going on with the Cuppies. I'm getting sick of them. I'd rather them just be good. I'm sure Cubs fans are getting like what the hell is going on.

I was going to say, Cubs fans are 1,000% with you, man. They, they, too, would like to be just really good. So. Let's see, who do they got coming up? They had in these Cardinals series, the next game is Waka versus Mills, Dakota Hudson versus Kintana, who you have on Slump Watch, and then Miles Michaelis versus Hugh Darvish. Guy. Yeah, and Jim, just doing quick, Quick Cubs history, because you and I blanked for a second there.

Jim, they lost in the wild card game last year to the Rockies. I think that was the one game. Or no, the Rockies advanced, that's right. And then the year before that they lost in the championship series to the Dodgers 4-1. So they got beat 4-1 by the Dodgers in 2017, and then they've lost in the wildcard game last year. So I think, again, not exactly the competing for titles every year that I think Cubs fans were expecting. Rizzo came back, hit a home run. That was exciting for them, I think.

Yeah, that was cool. One of the worst ankle rolls you'll see on a baseball field, it was, I mean, looked like a basketball one, but on turf, you don't see that a lot. And then he hits the homer. That was pretty cool. Yeah. And Costalanos is still doing his thing. Bryant's still doing his thing.

I mean, Zobrist is doing well in the last couple games last week or so. I don't know what's going on with them. Whatever. Bullpen, I guess. I think it's just, it's tough, Jim, because we, A, we've kind of been low-key rooting for the Nats because, I mean, if their pitching can turn on for the playoffs, like, holy crap, they can be there at the end if they want to be. The brewers went from kind of fluky, get out of my face to now it's like, bring the noise.

Whoever's doing it for the brewers. I'm interested. Jordan, Liles, brawny? Sure. I know, man. I was looking at like, who's been doing stuff for them? Corey Spangenberg. Oh, yeah.

Had some key hits. Corey, is how you say it? Spangenberg? I don't know how else you'd say it. Yeah. I think that's the only way you can say that. Trent Grisham, his stats are not good in the last couple days. No.

But he had some, like, of his four hits in the last week, I think they did. They helped. They were like clutch. He had two RBIs in the series on one hit. He had a little league home run the other day, too. That's fun. Jim, I think the dirty little secret, and I did see this stat on ESPN, so I'm going to half butcher it and half not give them credit.

but Jim, I think since Yelich has gotten hurt, they have the worst or the third worst batting average in baseball, but their opponent's batting average is the worst, or technically the best for them. So the dirty little secret is the Brewers are pitching, and that's how you win baseball games. Yeah, I think Hauser had another good start. Not really, dude.

Howzers, they don't like, they're still, you know, last year the brewers were like, we don't have starting pitchers. We just have throwers. They still kind of operate like that or they're starting to again. Like, Hauser went in his last four starts, he hasn't finished the fifth inning. You barely even got to the fifth inning. Then Zach Davies is the other guy that's doing stuff for them. Jordan Lyle's been pretty good for them since the trade. Liles has been good. You're going to hear about him later.

But look at Zach Davies, man. Five innings pitched, four innings pitch, four point two, five, four point one, five. Like, it's not even like an ask, it seems like. Yeah, it looks like, and Brandon Woodruff is back, I believe. I know he was out for a while. I mean, Joe Gonzalez is having a quirky, solid years. It's, it's, they've been in playoff mode for a little bit. It's day by day.

How are we getting the next couple batters out? And it's working. They're winning, winning ball games. That winning ball games. Drew Pomerant's coming out of the bullpen for him. It's an all hands on deck. Keston here had a home run. Lawrence O'Kine at two, like I said,

which is kind of fun, actually. I don't think it's, I don't think it makes for anything substantial come wild card playoffs if they do get in. Like, I don't think they're primed to make a run. But they're having fun. And hey, you mentioned Drew Pomerant's casually, Jim, 22 innings.

He's been coming out of the bullpen for them, 38 strikeouts. Drew Pomeran is a guy who's been getting knocked around for the past couple years. He might have made himself some good money as a reliever in free agency this year. Well, so he came over there, right? And they put him in as reliever. And the first two times he, like, got the hold or got an out, but it really wasn't great. in his last 16 games as a reliever for them he has only allowed a run in one of them or only allowed an earned run in one of them

yeah so 15 out of his last 16 appearances without run so that's drew pomerance who they traded for from the giants and jordan lyles who they traded for is also doing well so they got that that's good for them yeah i mean would would not be doing what they're they're doing without Jordan Liles and Drew Pomeran who they got at the deadline. How about that? The Mets, they lose the first game to the Iraqis, but they win the next two. But, I mean, we kind of said, like, I don't see them. I don't see them overcoming.

I think the Brewers are kind of in a good spot with the Cubs and Cardinals beating each other up. Or the Cardinals just slaughtering the Cups. Those are the options. Either they're like, they split the seven games or the Cardinals destroy. the Cubs and win like six of them. And if that happens, that helps the brewers. If they beat each other up, that helps the brewers. I don't think there's a bad outcome for the brewers with the way the schedule is lined up.

I mean, the brewers have to win. Exactly. That would be the, if this brewer's house of cards starts to come apart. So if you're a Mets fan, you need the Brewers' House of Cards to fall apart and you want St. Louis to just dominate the Cubsies, which, hey, the Cubsies could kind of to be hanging up by a threat. I mean, they can turn it around today, but again, we do know they lost game one to St. Louis. So the Cubbies have currently lost three straight. They're out of the playoff picture. They could turn it around instantly, but they could also let the wheels fall off this thing. And then get hot, Mets.

Alonzo's 49th. Did I see that? Yeah, 49th for Alonzo. The Brewers play Pittsburgh, then Cincinnati, then Colorado, all right? versus Pittsburgh this year, they're 12 and 4. And versus Cincinnati, they're 8 and 8. So maybe those games will be harder. Pittsburgh sucks. Yeah. They're so bad.

It sucks because I kind of liked Pittsburgh, like maybe five, six years ago. I was kind of excited about them. I think they might be the team in history that got screwed by the new wild card format the most. Because it just felt like they were in that one game playoff. every year and they'd lose. Yeah. Damn. Quato on the mound. Remember that one?

McCutcheon. Yeah. Bummer. Want to go to the A.O.? Do you have anything? We have a question in the chat from Kyle Davis. Okay. Do you think the Phillies at Brave Series

shows they might not do well in the playoffs? No. I mean, I think we just said the Braves are one of four teams in baseball that have clinched a playoff spot, which means they're handling the rest of their season differently. the fight in fills were probably, you know,

they're half game behind the Mets who we just gave a little bit of attention to. No, I mean, the Braves, this feels like the first time in two months I've said they've lost the series. That's probably not factually accurate, but their goals have now changed. It's getting Akuna to 4040 and just getting everyone healthy and lined up for the playoffs. Yeah. Well, like, Kiko didn't do good. Tehran didn't do great.

The bullpen did good. Yeah, I don't think so. I mean, there was that, what was it, a week, week and a half ago where it was like, yo, can the Braves catch the Dodgers? It feels like that's gone now. And there's no, there's no middler tier. Like, there's no one on Atlanta's butt anymore. And the Dodgers are out of reach.

So Atlanta's just in cruise control, get healthy, get lined up. Yeah. Young Thick Austin Riley with three games in a row with a hit and pinch hit, double, pinch hit, hit, and then a home run. So Young Thick Austin Riley coming back, Jake. Love that. All right. Let's move on to the American League. Get the boogie going.

You tell us what happened. Sounds good. I can try, Jim. Jimmy, in the American League, the New York Yankees take two hours. of three from the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. They clinch the AL for the first time since 2012. They have the returns of Louis Severino, their ace, and Giancarlo Stanton, former NL MVP.

Also a good chance they lose Domingo Hermann for the rest of the season. Bad stuff there. We'll see what we hear about that. A real mixed bag in NYC. Jim, we know because we were there. The race split two with the Dodgers. If you want to see a box score filled with pitchers, check that out. Jim, you buried it in the National League.

How about YAS? New young Yaz in Boston. That was fun. Anyways, the Baby Jays take out the broomsticks against the Orioles. Jim loves that. Big weekend for Kevin Beggio, always doing it Biggio, in the land of 10,000 lakes in the central. The Minnesota Twins win their three games set against the Chicago.

white Sox, including two, a wild extra inning game where they each scored in the 11. Then the White Sox scored two in the 12th, but the twins fight back. Ronald Terreas walk off hit by pitch. Three runs in the bottom of the 12th. Holy smokes. The Cleveland Indians, they sweep the Tigers. So yeah, you did your job. Three runs in three games for the Tigers, a classic case of good pitching for

a bad team. That's what'll happen. And the Kansas City Royals, they take game one from Oakland and put up a hell of a fight. Not what the A's were expecting. A's win a pair of one-run games to take this series. That must have been brutal watch for Oakland fans. Oakland fans reach out. And speaking of Oakland surviving, you know the Angels aren't a bad way right now with no trout or Otani in the West.

Houston. They clinched the division. They win a pair of tidy games against the Texas Rangers. Garrett Cole World can't get enough. He gets his 300th strikeout on the year. Pittsburgh has to be saying, where the hell was that guy? That's insane. Congrats to Cole. Congrats to H-Town. And lastly, and leasedly, the Mariners sweep those aforementioned pirates. The Mariners sweep the pirates as their ship completely sinks. Kyle Lewis hit another home run. Marco Gonzalez, Jim, you're going to like his season even more. And oh my God, Pittsburgh, get out of my face. And that is the AL report.

Not bad. And like we said in the AO Wildcard, Indians are tied with the rays now. So, yeah, we've got the Indians tied with the raise. Oakland is two games up. So maybe we start getting excited for the. those Vuvuzuela. And then, yeah, Yankees in Houston officially clinched. And Minnesota has all but clinched unless there's an epic collapse coming.

Yo, how about the Mariners sweeping the pirates? That's some nautical shit. Dude, pirates. I've got to get in, you know I love chopping up the stats. I got to get on their record because I did it a few weeks back. And it was like, wow, they were really bad since the All-Star break, they might be doing like semi-historic stuff because it's, it's, it's bottomed out further than I thought.

What about just the fact that the Mariners swept the pirates? Exactly. That's what I guess when I said bottom up. You're not getting it. Yes. Yeah. I got the nautical thing. I just said that.

I don't care about the actual result of the game. Two bad teams. Shed long. Yeah, no, nautical stuff. Should they play more? Seems like it. Battle of the Sea. right basically a mariner is just a pirate with morals a pirate is a mariner with bad morals

yeah that's uh we if we start mixing up MLB rivalry week that uh that's that's a no brainer yeah damn what's up what's the royals deal dude Jim you got to check out these box scores because you're and I would love to hear from an Oakland fan uh the royals dude they take game one and if you're Oakland you've got to be pissed off because a the royals are coming to town and you're thinking sweep how how sweep it is Jim royals win game one six five the athletics win game two two to one and then the a's win the final game won nothing so we've got three one run games with the royals taking the first this was pro i mean the athletics came into this thinking like hey let's let's get our sweep and move on and then you find yourself

in a dog fight for all three games? Feisty. Yeah. Well, it's not good that Liam Hendricks blew another game. Liam, sit on that outside fastball. Is that two in a row now? There had to be some one in between, right? His last couple games include two blown saves.

Yeah, I mean, they won the next two games they won by one run. And I saw he got the save in one of them. sure about the following one. I mean, there's... I'm misremembering. I'm misremembering. He didn't blow another one. It was the Yankees, which was a while ago.

Yeah. Yeah, and I mean, they're firmly in bed with Hendricks at this point. There's no coming back. He's been amazing. Yeah, he's been amazing. And then he came back the next day and got big part of their order. Soler, Dozier, Gordon. So good for him.

And who did it? It was Matt Olson with a home run in the bottom of the seventh to tie it. And then Kana hit by pitch, Seth Brown double to take the lead. That was game two. Damn. Brett Anderson with a good start. Matt Olson, you've seen me falling in love with him. He's going to approach 40 homers this year.

And he missed like the first month of the season. He won the gold glove last year. Matt Olson is crazy good. and his home runs, I know we always love the clutch factor. A lot of his recent home runs in Houston was to take the lead against Kansas City. Like this guy hits him when the – holy crap, Jim. Yeah. Matt Olson, seven homers in his last 12 games.

He's got two tickets to paradise. No, he doesn't have that. I mean, he's got six homers in his last nine. He's a, Matt Olson's a special player. I love him. Okay. Good stuff. Emotional.

Do you see the rubber match was the Sunday game, was one nothing into extra innings? It was Homer Bailey versus Danny Duffy. Talk about your fucking battle of 2013 pitchers with promise. Yeah, man. I saw, there's a couple guys in the stat books that looked like dug into, dug into something this week.

And I like that a lot. But yeah, dude. A's fans must have been freaking scratching themselves all week. Danny Duffy, 2014. 25 starts 253 ERA. Gee, might hear more about him later, too, Jim. Homer Bailey, 2013. 32 starts, 349.

ERA. Crazy. They're shutting each other out in 2019. And then what was it? Olson with the, they intentionally walked Olson in the bottom of the 11th

and then kind of doubled to score them. Well, there was a, the base was open. So it was like a force situation. Damn. Fucking royals. Aren't just,

just roll over and die like the tigers. Make it easy. Cleveland had it easy. Ned Yost effect, baby. All right. So now I got to see who the Royals play. If they're going to be these assholes. We've bought into the Royals a thousand percent after these three games.

Well, okay, they're going to go to Minnesota and get their asses kicked. Okay, then they go to the Braves for two and then they play Minnesota for three. Never mind. Beat Minnesota. Tough end of the year. This is what we were talking about with the twins, though. The twins are in a stretch right now where nothing, they're not going to see a competitive game until the postseason.

So maybe the Royals can give it to them. Otherwise, it's not looking good. Yankees news, if anyone is interested, the Yankees have been doing this thing where someone gets hurt, someone leaves, someone comes back from the roster, someone leaves all season. It's kind of a joke at this point, just waiting for like, okay, well,

Severino came back, who's leaving, and then it was Patanus. He's out for, for, the year. Achilles injury and he's a free agent, so that's sad. Then Stan comes back and it's like, all right, well, who's leaving? And Domingo Hermann has been placed on an administrative leave for accusations of domestic violence, which we're not going to touch.

But bad news. So that's just the Yankees get one back. They lose one. We recorded a full episode of talking yanks last night. if you're really, really getting into that, but we don't really dive into the Hermann stuff because nobody knows the actual news on it yet. But it was an insane 72 hours as a Yankee fan. Severino making his return.

Then it comes out. Patances is out for the season. Then Stanton comes back. It was Cici's last start at the stadium. Then the Hermon stuff. Then they clinch. It was insane. You think the Rays are worried at all

That they are now tied with the Indians I think Jim this is This is where the one game playoff comes in I think all of these teams have been in such a dog fight for so long now Like if they get the one game playoff they're happy Just these those three teams just don't want to be Fully excluded at this point That's what I'm saying do you think the Rays fans

I think they were cocky two weeks ago they were like up three in the wild card race or up two and a half or something like that. Now they're tied for the second. And I think they have the hardest schedule of the three. It looks like they're playing Boston coming up. That gets tricky too, Jim, because they've got a two-gamer against the Yanks, but the Yanks are in full cruise control.

So, I mean, who knows what they're even going to see from the Yankees that series? Yeah, I mean, if you're any of these three teams, you're concerned. You want to be Oakland with the two-game lead right now. What about how to Blake Snell do? But yeah, Snell did good. I think he was two innings, no hits, 4K, something like that. Real baby step for him, huh? Yeah, well, Jim, I think it's weapon mode, man.

I think they want Snell being able to pitch three to four innings. They know they're not going to build them up. They want Glasnow to do the same thing. I think they are just in, it's Charlie Morton and then everyone else be a weapon. Yeah, I wonder. That's so interesting how it's going to happen. Man, I'm excited for the Indians raise, Oakland finish. Let's play a game, Jake.

Okay. Love games. This is probably too much of an endeavor, but I'm going to do it and then we're going to get out of here quickly. Okay. You're going to simulate the rest of the season. Ooh. You have two seconds.

Okay. You ready? Oakland versus Texas, how many do they win three games set at Oakland? Three. They sweep them? Yeah. All right. Texas has nothing.

Then they go to L.A. and they play in Anaheim for two. Split. Okay, so you got them. And then Seattle, at Seattle for four. Seattle just swept the pirates. I'm going to go split because I'm going to say like the last game doesn't matter. Okay, you have them winning five more games,

which would put them at, I don't know. That would put them as the winner. basically. It has to. So Tampa. They have three games at Boston. Or three games versus four games, four games versus Boston at home. Three at home. They win three, yeah.

Three, that's what I would have it. Then two versus the Yankees. Split. Split. That's what I have as well. And then three at Toronto. Ooh. Two out of three.

So you got them winning everything. So you have them winning everything. So you have them winning six. You have them winning six games and you had Oakland winning five. So actually you might have them tied or something now. No, I think that would still have Oakland up because they've got a two game lead. I think I had them winning six too. I know this gets scary because we're not a math podcast.

Oh, you did have them winning six. You had them both winning six. You had them both winning six. So that leaves the A's as the winner. Okay, Jake. Let's simulate Cleveland now. Cleveland. I think we were too nice to both teams.

I think they might, I think Tampa might split with the Red Sox. But the Red Sox are, they're down in the dumps. Okay, Cleveland's fun. They have three Phillies coming to Cleveland for three. Oh, damn. You go two out of three.

I mean, Cleveland's a better team and they're at home. All right. Then they go to Chicago for three. I got them sweeping. swept the tigers. I got them sweep in Chicago. The White Sox, okay. All right, yeah, we can pencil that in. White Sox and pesky. Then they host the National, or they go to the Nationals for three. Nationals are going to be in full, get ready for Wild Card Boat. Remember the Yankees did this last year?

They did like half games, half starts. They were. They have a one-game lead in the wild card right now. The Nationals are like, the Nationals have to keep pushing. So how do you have Cleveland and the Nationals in that last series? It's going to depend, really. Because, I mean, the Nationals lining up their guys, we did this before, is still going to be some good guys, too. And even like Annabal Sanchez.

I don't know. I mean, I would go. I'll mark them down for two, just assuming that last game means nothing for the Nats. But I don't know. They could very easily not. Oh, wow. You know what? then you gave Cleveland seven wins.

So you have Cleveland as the second wild card and the athletics as the first wild card. The numbers, I don't know, the numbers don't seem to add up over here at all. You had Cleveland winning two against Philly. Right. Sweeping the White Sox. Yeah.

And winning two, you penciled them in for two. That's seven. Yeah, I don't know about the sweep against the White Sox. That was you. I like the pesky white socks. I think that's a two out of three. Okay, so classic Jake has every team doing the same thing. What do you have, kid?

We're listening. You got a mic? I have the raise. I have the raise winning five and the Indians winning six. I have the Indians winning six. I have the Indians beating the race for that second wild card. Nice. I think Washington's going to have that locked up by the time they get to that last series,

just like the Yankees said last year. They can't one game lead right now for Washington. Cleveland versus. Think about how negatively we talked about the Cubbies and like a Washington loss and a Cubby's win. And they'd almost be on even ground. It's crazy. It's crazy. All right.

Well, let's move on. Deep into that, that. Deep. Deep. What do we do here? Standout performances. Standout performance. I get to go first.

Your guy, Jim. This is a fun one. Do you know where this is? D. Nelson Lomet. From the San Diego Padres. De Nelson Lament. Not a shame to admit I didn't know this guy. Didn't know his name.

In 2017, He made it to the Biggs. He got signed by the Rays or someone in the AL, I believe. But his papers didn't work out. So then they got signed by the Padres for like 100K. And he makes it to the Biggs in 2017, got nasty stuff. It starts 21 games for the Padres. But he had to get Tommy John.

So he missed all of 2018. So he's been recovering, battling back. He just threw six innings against the Brewers. who are all hands on deck, who are 12 and 2 in their last 14 games, and he allowed one earned run while striking out 14 batters. Earlier this month, he took a no-hitter into the 7th against the Mariners. So crazy performance against the team that's doing everything they can to win, striking out 14, allowing one earned run.

His season, Jake, thus far, he hasn't dug a giant hole for the Padres, but he doesn't get enough innings because he walks too many batters. So his ERA isn't looking that good because he can't get himself through like five, six innings every time. So he's got to cut down on the walks. His stuff is nasty. 97 mile per hour fastball. The slider is kind of like Severino slider, like a really like sharp darting slider. Tight.

So, yeah. So Dean Nelson Lemette is my standout performance for the 14K. One run is more impressive against the Brewers. who are scrapping and Klon. Yeah, and LeMette, he is a big strikeout guy. And, Jim, you mentioned the innings thing with the walks a little bit. He also, I mean, I think coming off of that surgery with the Padre season being the Padre season and NL baseball, I mean, he's only thrown 100 pitches once.

More than half of his starts have been in the 80s or less. So I think he has potential for more. They're also probably not pushing it too hard. But yeah, he's a guy that he's got all the talent in the world. He, I mean, he's why people get excited about the Padres future. Guys like him, Lucchese, they just came out with the top prospect list last week. And I think the Padres have another starting pitcher who's like the number three prospect. I mean, the Padres are, they kind of followed the Houston.

formula a little bit when when Houston bottomed out and got terrible and I mean everyone knows what Houston's doing now so it'll be interesting to see if if San Diego hits on enough of these guys to I mean be a threat next year I know that's what they want to be be a threat next year maybe they don't be so angry then they need the Dodgers to have a crippling playoff loss so that the Dodgers can kind of have the wheel start coming off If the Dodgers lose. Yeah? Yeah, that'd be funny.

That'd be terrible for Dodgers fans, but it'd be. Right. Mayhem. Be mayhem. Who's your standout performance? Jim, my standout performance, you heard my voice just lose excitement a little bit because he's a guy that pretty much could get it every time he pitches, but he did something really special, so it gets him on there.

Garrett Cole, Jimmy, he's a starting person. pitcher for the Houston Astros. He's crazy good. He had a casual eight-inning pitch to and run 10-k start. That's fine. That's like just that's a that's not even a great start for him at this point. That's that's silly. Jimmy a couple numbers since June 19 games started a hundred 288.2 innings pitch a 190 k's in those innings with a 182 ERA. What he's doing is crazy. It's tied for the fourth longest streak in MLB history with double-digit strike. Strikeouts in a start. Only guys ahead of them are Chris Sale and Pedro. A couple socks. How about that? And Jimmy, I mentioned it casually when we were going through 300 strikeouts this season. He's the 18th pitcher ever in the history of this game to do that.

18th pitcher ever to have 300 strikeouts in an inning. The combination of his arm talent, the Houston Lab, a little pine tar and in this new age of strikeouts. nobody cares, helps him out a little bit. But it's as one of the more impressive feats you'll hear about in baseball. And Jim, what gets me really excited about this, well, is not seeing him in the postseason. But this dude is going to be the story of the offseason. Wherever this guy signs in free agency, we've got some fake little birdies in our ear. He's a California guy that there's some California rumors. be cool to hear all the Trout, Otani, Garrett Cole stuff.

Or do they not have money? Because they still have to pay Albert a lot of coin. But Garrett Cole is the story of this off-seating because, Jim, you already know it. I mean, the Yankees fan base are going to be saying, oh, we got to sign Garrett Cole. It's not even, as the Yankees fan, I have it at 0.1%. Right. But if any of any of the MLB teams with money, whether it's Cubs, Dodgers, Houston, Yankees, I mean, right now, their whole offseason plan right now amongst fans is, we're going to sign Garrett Cole.

Yeah. So I don't know. I just think it's going to be very interesting to see if he can kind of add to the lure of his season with his postseason effort. It's him and Verlander for the Cy Young. Garrett Cole, 18th guy ever to do it, Jim. Ever. Ever. I know where we stay on the series that happened from the week, but.

Sure. Jack Flaherty yesterday. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. It might be dated for the next, for Monday show, but Jack Flaherty is insane right now. Yeah, I had a- Cardinals pitcher's going off, went on. off again. I had a buddy who I, another Jimmy, Jimmy Widman, didn't think he'd begin a shout

out. We, we talk like quarterly. Hey, how are you? What's going on? And he goes, hey, man, first baseball game I'm watching this year. Jack Flaherty guy looks incredible. And I sent him a couple stats and he goes, holy shit. That's exactly what he looks like right now. So, yeah, where Jack Flaherty pod? He's good. Speaking of not good Slump watch Slump watch All right we got to update

Slump Watch last week we had Atastitis Aquino He's actually just kind of been on slump watch Because he hasn't worked his way off officially But we also just want to keep up with Arstetus So Jake he went two for 14 With a home run and 7Ks

Like I said at the top of show It's his 19th home run and 47 games games or something like that. 16th. 16th. But, I mean, his numbers aren't good. He just had two hits,

one was a home run. So I'm keeping them on just because I still want to, I want to see, I want to ride out his season. Yeah, I mean, it's still just a keynote watch, basically at this point.

He's technically on pace for like a 54 home run season if he had played a full season. Jim, I got to say I'm rooting for him to have one more hot week because otherwise the peripheral numbers are dropping pretty quickly.

So yeah, yeah, they are. Like the home run total is impressive, but all the other stuff is kind of fading. They're like plummeting, to be honest. Yeah, I mean the last basically two weeks he's hitting a buck 40. So come on Aristides, line it up. Dansby Swanson has been on Slumpwatch for a while. He plays two games of the three.

He went one for seven with the walk. He is now slashing 156 batting average, 99 on base percentage, 203 slugging and a 502 OPS in his 19 games since returning from injury. It's a little bit of injury return watch, but he's been nothing. This has been brutal. He was thrown on there due to injury. Get off my Braves. Get off my Vandy guy with Dansby Swanson.

And then we had Walkgate last week with him. This is a travesty. Well, he's not performing well with the bat. He's a, don't make me get weird with the numbers. You can't. He's got bad numbers. Past five games, he's got a 400 on base percentage. What more do you want from this kid?

Some hits. Okay. Well, he's getting on base. That's step one. Love you, Dansby. Pete Alonzo's been on Slump Watch, and he basically goes shame to flame. He went six for 11 with four,

BIs and four runs. So eight runs was his doing. Two home runs, 6.15 on base percentage in the series. I mean, that's as off as off gets. Good for Pete Alonso. Haven't given claps in a while. Pistol Pete deserves it.

And he should be getting 50 in the season, which is awesome. It's insane. That's insane. Yadier Malina was on slump watch. He goes three for 11 with a double, 275 batting average Yadi can come off

he's old I see this is where I disagree with you you have a low bar for Yadi he's a big part of their team I mean he's not I'm keeping him if you're keeping Dansby on there I'm keeping Yadi but like Yadi am I wrong is Yaddy and Ruline a good hitter

Yaddy like anymore like has he like isn't 275 with a 275 on base percentage, like right around who he is these days? I mean, he's hitting 264 this year. I mean, Dansby Swanson doesn't get on base at a 400 clip, but you hate him because he's beautiful, so I don't know.

Oh, he's your four-day sample? Bigger than Yates. Jake's butterdive stats are getting crazy. Bigger than Yadis. Hey. What do you mean bigger than Yotties? His five-game sample is bigger than Yotties, yeah. What?

You're talking about the sample size, babe. Yeah, but Yaddy, I mean, he was on Slumpwatch last week, so you got to double it up. Fine, take him off. You just have a low bar for Yadi. I do, I do. I see him as a leader and a catcher. Yeah. We can leave him on. I mean, in his last 10 games, Yadi's numbers are atrocious. We'll leave him on. Leave him.

I think he's going to get off because of, we're sick of talking about him. Max Muncie. two games versus Tampa Bay. He went one for eight. In the last game, the one hit was a two RBI double. Only a two game series. And one for eight's not good. Half don't care about this one.

So whatever you want to do. Yeah, this gets tricky because no, they shouldn't get him off Slump Watch. But I mean, do the Dodgers care? No. No. All right. Cool.

Vladdy Jr. I mean, I almost want to just completely save this for the next segment or whatever that segment is down the line. But Vladdy Jr. also kind of went shamed flame on us. And he was playing against the Orioles. So he'll dip into that bucket later. But he had two hits in each game went six for 14 with a double and a walk. End your season strong, Vladdy. I know Jake was saying his numbers were on that ridge where, you know, he's on the fence post and he can fall one way or the other. So fucking suck for the next three games versus the Yankees, then go on a tear versus the Tampa again or whoever you're playing. That's what I'd like.

Fair. But he is definitely off slump watch for now. Hopefully the Yankees can put him right back on. That'd be cool. Kevin Kiermeyer, I added, Jake, and I kind of have a question mark here. Is he just bad? So up until the All-Star break, he was having a pretty decent. season for Kirymeyer who's a defensive center fielder but he had like a seven something ops for the

whole first half of the season he's currently working on an 0 for 16 streak which is why he's on slump watch and then i was looking i was like since the all-star break kevin keirmeyer he plays every day he has a 189 batting average at 237 on base percentage and a 566 ops that's bad like that's a lot of time for a lot of bad. Jim, I know he's a defensive guy. He stays. Yeah, I mean, he's one of my favorite defensive players in the league. He's won the platinum glove before.

But Jim, I think he stays because obviously he's not known. Well, he's stay. I'm adding him. Yeah, he's, he, well, what you mentioned bad watch, which is, which is another world. Oh, okay. But Jim, I think more importantly is the fact that, um, I mean, the race use him in their lineup. He usually bats like six or seventh, but we've seen games this year where he's batted third for them.

I think he was in a hot streak when they did that. But, I mean, they use Keirmeyer as a cog in that lineup. It's not like they just bat him last like Jackie Bradley Jr or something like that. So I think for that reason, he stays. It's bad. Those numbers are really bad for since the All-Star break. Oh, yeah. All right.

Rookie Will Smith for the Dodgers, Jake. After his first 25 games in the league, He had a 329 batting average and a 404 on base percentage. So we're talking about small sample sizes. And we're talking about first time through the league, which, you know, this kind of adds up to the cliche. But in his next 23 games, he has a 147 batting average and a 207 on base percentage. Like cut his numbers in half. The first 25, cut him in half for the next 25.

And he's currently won for his last 23. And I think they're trying to get him out of this because they started him, like, the last 5. five games. He started and played the entire game. Yeah, I mean, he became kind of a, he became a part of this team. So it's definitely interesting to see how he winds down because he could change his playoff time. And then my last one is Mani Machado, who's two for his last 28 and having just an awful September, 563 OPS, 263 slugging in September. for Manny. His season's going to be one of his worst offensive seasons in a while, I believe.

I think he only has a 700 OPS, which is pedestrian, and Manny Machado is supposed to be one of the best players in the sport. So new league, new faces, new routine, new pitchers, new everything. So I kind of give him a little bit of a slide. But blows. Yeah. And he, um, I think. this Padre season fell apart really quick. And we've had Machado on Slump Watch. He was having much more of a Machado year kind of through the trade deadline. And then the wheels have fallen apart these last couple months. I, uh, because I don't want to talk assonine about it because Machado slander can go downhill really easily. I'd love to hear from a Padres fan. Like, does it look like he's kind

of giving up or is he just struggling? Because Jim, August 1st to now, so the past more than month and a half, He's hitting 193. That's 44 games played. So I'd love to hear because obviously can't watch all the games, especially slide in Padre games. That's not like, man, he's not used to losing seasons. Jim, those Orioles teams were actually pretty good for a while. I mean, I know it's easy to kind of shrug at,

but, well, he ended up on the Dodgers. Oh, yeah, you're right. You're right. You're right. Um, dude, the Orioles are so bad. 47 wins in 2018, 49 wins in 2019. Holy shit. Moving on up.

Holy shit. The Orioles are going to see as many wins in the past two years as the Yankees, Houston, have seen this year. Dodgers. Oh, my God. That is terrible. Oh, bad. All right. Oh.

Dirk nasty's on Fuego. That means I'm all fire, baby. Like Waco. Jake, who you got? Who's on fire, huh? Huh, kid? Who's got the stick going? Who's got the ball for groping?

Who's swinging it, kid? Jim, I'm going to start off East Coast Bias because that's basically what this whole show is. I don't think anyone says that about us. No, it's just. I like mocking them. Jim. A.L. East outfielders. A couple of dudes you're very familiar with.

Jim, start off with Trey Mancini for those Orioles. He's still fighting the good fight. They were up in Toronto. Trey Mancini, he's 15 for his last 32. Four home runs. 16 RBIs. I think it's in like this past six games. 16 RBIs.

That's a 469 batting average, a 1,000. dot 441 OPS for Trey Stay strong Trey Mancini. Dude, do you want to know something about Trey Mancini? Yes. This is his third season in the MLB And he's only 27 years old

But because he's been on two 40 win teams He feels like the weathered, grizzly veteran of the Orioles The only true pro Is this third season, he's young. You would think he was like fucking 33 and doing it like, you know, the main stay. It's, man, it's one of the more bizarre things. It actually puts my brain in a pretzel because you're right. I mean, if Trey Mancini was on the Dodgers, he'd be like a platoon player and a guy, you'd be like, yeah, he's pretty solid.

I've seen him play. But he's like the face of the O's. Young kid still getting his reps in. Like, no, it's third year. the biggest mainstay on the Orioles. Yeah, Mancini might be able to come something. Yeah, that's, Trey. You are our fearless leader for Baltimore.

Jim, I mentioned being the strength of that Orioles team. Speaking of strength, how about Yankees' legend, Brett Gardner, Jim, he's a guy that you and I obviously swoon over. If you've watched him on a day-to-day basis, he is a joy. He's 10 for his last 23. three homers, eight RBIs. That's a 435 batting average of 500 on base, 1.457. 36 years old, Jim, playing center field.

He is who, what Tray Mancini feels like to the Orioles. Yeah, a little different. It's yes and no. The mainstay, the old man, the leader of the young kids. That's how Trey Mancini's described for the Orioles. He's played two full seasons in his life. Yeah, Brett has a full decade on him. But yeah, old man Gardy is putting up a pretty incredible season.

I was doing some of my choppy stats last night. You can make an argument he's been like the third best center fielder in the AL this year. Trout and Springer, those guys are pretty good. But more importantly for a guy that was going to be asked to be the fourth or fifth outfielder on this Yankee team, Gardy has put a huge year together. and Jim, speaking a huge years, a guy that's been a thorn in our side, Randall Gritchick, all our Cardinal listeners are glad to get an update on their old friend. He's been a Yankee killer.

His stats are pretty wild. He just got his 30th homer, but Jim, he's got five homers in his last six games. Mike, I don't know if you want to say anything about it. It's insane. Watching him play against the Yankees this year, he feels like one of the best players in the league. Fuck, Crando Gritchick. Amen to that.

Jimmy L. Segway, I started with the ALEs, outfielders. I got a couple young infielder that you might not know about. Tommy Edmund. Oh, my God, this freaking guy. He's on St. Louis, but I like saying his name with the Boston accent. He's been playing third base and second base for the Cardinals, Jim. his rookie year. He's hitting 289 with an 805 OPS on the hole,

which is just really solid from an infielder. But he's gotten hot recently. He is hitting 10 for 24 with three home runs in the last six games. And back to our big Pirates Mariners battle. Shed Long, Jim, another Yankee legend, 12 for his last 28, two home runs. And he's a little guy, 5-8, second base. He could be a guy that he should be getting a lot of run.

And if you're a Mariners fan, you're excited about the Shed Long experience. Shed Long, Jake's bitter rival. Doesn't one of the better names you'll come across. And proud of the Internet of just doing the Long Shed joke. It's basic, but you got to hit that. So good job, Shed Long. And Jimmy, wrapping up throwers. I was going to do kind of blast from the past throwers

because you mentioned my guy Danny Duffy earlier. His last two starts, 13 innings pitch, one run. Duff Man, digging deep for the Royals late in this season. Good for you, man. I like Duffy. Duffy was going through a really tough stretch last season, really, really tough stretch last season. And he stood up in his locker and said,

I'm terrible right now. I'm more upset than anyone else. and do you I mean am I going to fake an injury and go hide on the DL for a little bit no I'm going to go out there every day and pitch and see and I respect him for that so I'm glad that he figured it out because he was in a tough way last year in like you know early maybe June or May forget what it was yeah I mean last year he finished the season with a 4-8-E-R-A this year he's currently at 4-3 and yeah you I'd like to hear some Roy Royals fans if they think they figured something out the past few starts would be nice to see him have a nice little bounce back because like you you dug into those 2014 stats. He was a stud. So good for D. D. Duff and our new favorite Royals the rest of the way, I guess. Jimmy, I mentioned him. Adam Wainwright for St. Louis. We've been falling in love with Jack Flaherty. It feels like Adam Wainwright's been there for the past two decades. And whenever they need him, he comes out and he twirls. Last two starts, 13 innings pitch, no earn runs. It's just hard because his legacy or whatever is tied to striking out Beltron. Right. And that's what I think of him, which is so long ago.

But it was like the start of his career. But that's when I think of him. 2005, right? 2005, he came up. He only had two appearances in the regular season. I'm not sure if he did anything. No, I think 2006 maybe. Oh, yeah, it's 2006.

But, yeah, Jim, I mean, this guy was a stud in the mid-to-end of the 2000s. He finished third in the Cy Young, second in the Cy Young, 0-9-0-10, respectively, and he had some good years before that. Here we are in 2019. He's still twirling the pill. He's got a 383-ERA. He had a couple rough years, the years before, a couple injuries catching up, led the league and hits giving up in 2016.

Jim, he's having a really good year. Adam Wainwright, and hey, man, in the playoffs, you want to go out to battle with guys who have been there before? Adam Wainwright, man. Him and Flaherty, damn. So a little love to my cards and my last guy, Jim, for the Sox. Hey, I can give them some love. Eduardo Rodriguez, who his stats on the year are going to look very impressive.

His last two starts, Jim, 12.2 innings, pitch, one earn run, 22 strikeouts. And Eduardo, he's, you know, the AL war leaders for pitching have, are going to look pretty funky at the end of this year. So if you're into war, sorry about it. But 353 ERA, 191 innings, 199 strikeouts. Big year for Eduardo Rodriguez. Big year.

Good for him. E. Rod. Yeah. News just broke on Domingo Harmon for the end. Yankees, he will not pitch for the remainder of the season or postseason. Heads up. Damn. Next.

Way back. Goodbye home run. We kind of mentioned this. The Orioles got Vladdy Jr. hot. He was on slump watch. He had a 167 batting average of 2.17 on base percentage. His last 11 games going into the Orioles series, he gets two hits in every game has like a 400 on base percentage. percentage. It's crazy. And then you have Cabin Bigio on here who hit for the cycle, which is cool,

but also not that cool. He had a 221 batting average before and a 235 after. Is that what you have on here? Yeah. So, Jim, coming into this series, as you know and the people listening have known, I love the on the fence stats. Kevin Beggio coming into this series. And it actually goes a little further than back. If you remember, Jim, we were talking about the Baby Jays. His batting average was sneaking near the Mendoza line. He snuck it up a little bit. But coming into the series, 221 batting average, a 755 OPS,

which a bad batting average, a pedestrian OPS, after this series, 235, which is more respectable in modern day baseball, and a 794 OPS. So again, a couple good weeks, Kevin. and your rookie season looks a hell of a lot different. Yeah, he was slumping a little bit, I was slumping a bad bit, and the Red Sox actually got him hot,

and then the Yankees and then Orioles got him going. Going. Good job, baby Jays. Good for him. You know what? I'm going to play this just because I like the sound effect. Who got mad? We had no objections, Jake.

Wow. According to the website that I use, which I've trusted all season, they're telling me we had no ejections this week. The last ejection was Matt Joyce on the 15th. That might be the first time. Yeah. Dolphinately. Why?

Everyone's getting ready for the playoff push? You're either giving up or you're too valuable to get ejected. It's crazy, man. We did have Shorebur got mad at Amir Garrett. which was fun. Did you see that? Yeah. Schwerber's been having a really good series.

Amir Garrett's been having a really bad time. They bring Amir Garrett in just to face Schwerber. He strikes him out on some nice sliders, walks off the boundary. He just goes, fuck yeah. And Schwerver's like, get back.

Hey, watch you get a fucking dugout. Something like that. And then he just puts his hands up and runs to the dugouts. I was like, okay, I'm good. We're good. I'm here. I'm here. Oh, you want me to get to the dugout?

Yeah, I'll run to the dugout. Sorry, man. Sorry, struck you out. And it's really funny because Schwerber turns around and then he's just kind of like, okay.

Okay. Fuck. Yeah. I look bad here. Damn. Oh, wait. The actual, the results of the matter

always, the results of the at-bat always matter more than this shit. So, yeah. Yeah. So that's really all there was for the who got mad.

Not much there. Yeah, man. Uh, call up watch. You got anything? Yeah. There's a phone. I was wondering if it was going to ring.

Hey, Anderson Franco, you're the only one that got the call, kid. And yeah, if you're listened to us talking MLB because you're more so getting into it, the minor league seasons are over. So basically, if you haven't gotten the call by this point, you're not likely to get the call, barring something a little out of the norm, like the Yankees actually just called up someone to replace Domingo Hermann. He hasn't made his debut yet, but maybe we'll talk about him next episode. But Anderson Franco, he's a Venezuelan pitcher, Jim, for the San Francisco Giants.

I know you love going into a guy's debut. He comes in, it's a blowout game. I think it's 11-3. So Anderson Franco comes in in the ninth inning so he can finish out the deal. Foul pop out, nice. He gets a strikeout, so he's got that on the board. Two outs. He's clean.

Gives up a homer to Jackie Bradley Jr. I was looking at the Red Sox, and I was like, tell me it was Divers or Bogarts or, you know, Betts got him. That's the second fucking home run. Jackie Bradley Jr.'s had against the guy making his debut this year that I know of. That's smart. What a bully.

That's smart. Pick on someone your own size. Oh, I guess that's what he's doing. And Jimmy, this is, I just scrolled down to Anderson Franco's transaction page. you know, signed as a kid in 2009. Jim, he got drafted by Tampa in the Rule 5 draft in 2013, but he never made the roster. But Jim, that was 2013.

If he stayed, he would have made his MLB debut in 2014. Here we are in 2019. He finally gets a call in September at the end of the years for the Giants that are out of the race. Hey, good for you, Anderson. Rico Garcia was the other pitcher that Jackie Bradley hit a home runoff who was making his debut. Got him. Damn.

All right. Jackie Bradley Jr.'s home run log this season, Jake, impressive or not impressive? Elvis, I'm just going to read them all as fast a second. And then at the end, you have to say a total, just impressive or not impressive, okay? Okay. You're a big J.B.J.B.J. Fan. Elvis Luciano, Sam Gaviglio, Ryan Presley, Shane Bieber, Ryan, Yardro, Adrian. Samson, Dan Staley, Lucas Gialito, Nestor Cortez, Tom Estrellum, Jimmy Yacobonis, Domingo Hermann, Tyler Clippard, Nick Whitcran, Aaron Nola, Drew Smiley, Rico Garcia, Masahiro Tanaka, Logan Webb, Anderson Franco.

Yeah, I'm giving that like a six and a half out of ten, something like that. There's some good names on there, right? Yeah, dude, Presley, you skipped over him. He was crazy for a little while, but, and then you had a run of, a run of solid starting pitcher, so good for J.B.J. Good for J.B.J. Awards. I've got an award, Jake, to give out.

I like that. It's called the Man Over Beast Award. Man over Beast. Man tames beast. Beast submits to man. The Indians. The Indians. they went 18 and 1

versus the Tigers this year Yeah Tamed the Tigers Man wins One with nature Native Americans out there Doing all their spiritual stuff Taming tigers

Ain't gonna beat us That's like the best No team has gone 18 and 1 Since we've had the 19 game schedule So Pretty impressive Does it? Does that,

Jim, you've, well, interested to get your thoughts. I mean, does this lesson the Indians for you a little bit? Because I know you've held the AL Central over the Twins had for most of the years. I mean, this is 18 and 1 against one team. Yeah, why would it? Yeah, yeah, but the Twit, it gets hold over the Indians head as well. This is my point. Okay.

I just haven't heard you really say it about the, the Indians, only the twins. The Indians get no love. I'm combating the love that the public gives the twins. What's that? Okay, yeah. No, I want, this is exactly what I was looking for. I was looking for your angle on it.

Yeah. No one's, no one's acting like the Indians are God's gift. But people were acting, people were acting like the twins were like reinventing baseball in the first half. They're like, oh my God, the twins. Like, well, they play nobody.

Damn. I put so many eggs into the twins aren't real basket that I'm going to get shit on. Or I'm going to shit on people. That's life, kids. I've gone harder than I should have, I think. Yeah, the balance has now been thrown off a little more. But I respect the hell out of it. 13 wins against the White Sox.

11 against the Tigers 10 against the Royals It's like come on We'll say that is 6 and 1 against Texas I've done this every show The twins The twins have a bad record against good teams You're

So does Cleveland Yeah That's what Cleveland gets no love What's your award? So anyway, man man over beast man over beast nice award jim thanks um 18 and 1 that is that is just silly um well let's find let's find the one game and who the hero was give me your award i love that yeah you dig that up i'll uh i'll go here because yeah that's who should have gotten the award whoever whichever tiger

claimed it um jim my award and this is i think this is my favorite award so far i'm giving out the Liquid Courage Award. And Jim, it's someone on the beer makers. I've referenced in him a few times. Jordan Liles. Jim, Jordan Lyle's, Jordan Horton Liles. Love that.

Former first round pick of Houston. He comes up in the major leagues at 20 years old during some of the Houston bad times, basically. He's got an ERA in the Fives. He goes over to the Colorado Rockies. He struggles there. do a lot of pitchers. And he's kind of bounced around between Colorado, San Diego, Milwaukee,

and he started the year on Pittsburgh. Jim, they traded for him at the trade deadline, and he has been so good for them. He's 6-1, a 2-3-5 ERA, 10 games started. Again, they don't ask a lot for him, because it's that Brewer's mindset of take us as far as you can, babe. And Jim, I think the best part about this is, so he was having a bad year. His ERA is 5-11 lifetime.

Jimmy, he's played on five major league teams. Colorado Rockies, the team he's played the most with, 105 games. He's got a 5-2-E-R-A. Houston, three years, 72 games, a 5-3-E-RA. The Padres, he played 29 games, a 55-3 ERA. Pittsburgh. He started the year with them. 17 games, a 5-36 ERA. So for these four major league teams,

his ERA is 5 plus, except his two years with Milwaukee, 21 games. He has a 257 ERA. He just needs that brew crew love, man. So shout out to Jordan Liles and whatever the brewers are doing with them. Whatever they're doing with them is working. It's working.

We'll beer beer sandwich before the game. Ooh. So the one win that the Tigers had over the Indians this season was on April 10th, the second game the two played against each other this season. Trevor Bauer versus Matthew Boyd. Nice. Bauer gave up 10 hits, four-earned runs. The Big Blow was a home run.

by John Hicks to go from 2 to 1 to 3 to 1, and then Josh Harrison singled in Gordon Beckham to make it 4 to 1. That's why they got rid of Bauer. Yeah. Boyd when he was good. Bweed. Yeah, boy. Yeah, bleed.

So good job the Tigers for winning that one game. Congrats. and losing the rest. How many times you think they got shut out of those 18 games? Tigers lost 18 games to the Indians. How many of those 18 do you think they got shut out? Shutouts are hard to do. Shutouts are hard to do.

Cleveland does have really good pitching. I'm going four. I'm going to count it. One, two, three, four, five, six. And then there's one, two two games with only one run.

Not good. Get that elevator going. Yeah. Elevator time. If you're stuck in an elevator with the fan of this team, here's some things you can say to his face. Padres?

I do some Padres. Okay. That's what Elevator Talks here for. Okay. San Diego Padres, the first thing I want to find out is who can they ruin anyone's season. Okay. You go schedule on them. And you already did your DeNilsson-Lamette thing, so you guys are already friends.

DeNelson-Lamette, you can know. Yeah, you know about him. he just had a really good outing. They cannot. They have, shit. They have six games left against the Diamondbacks and three against the Dodgers. So they're, there have no motivation to play at all.

Yeah, pretty brutal for them once Tateas Jr. went down. Man, on the offensive end, this is tough. They got rid of Fran Mill. Oh, no. what it is, Jim? One of the prospects they traded for, they got Taylor Trammell in that, that trade, right? He, um, I think he hit a homer to win like the AAA playoff series. So that's Deep Tracks Padres. Whoa. Yeah. Okay. That's deep track. Do they like Andy Green? I guess this is like a question for Padres fans more than anything else. I know nothing about it. I know nothing about,

him. He got extended through 2021, so he's got two more years. But yeah, I know nothing about if people like Andy Green or not. Yeah, let us know. Man, so many young guys on this roster that aren't doing awful, awful, but not doing good. Man, I don't know. And that Hosmer, Hosmer.

And Andre. They need hitting at this point. I mean, Paddock has put together a pretty good rookie season. Your guy, Jim, 140 innings pitched, 3-3-E-R-A. We've done Denilsson Lamet. We've talked about how far Cal Quantrell's rookie year fell off. So many young arms, Lucchese has just been solid. I loved, I stumbled into the Joey Lucchese is their Dallas-Kykel comparison a couple weeks ago. I really like that. Otherwise, I don't know. Get some bats in town. You think they're good on arms with who they got? They got Paddock, Richards, Lomet, Lechese.

I don't know. You think that's all? I mean, Lauer is just having a meh, kind of. I think this is his second year. Quantrell, we talked about how the wheels fell off, but I mean, he's still a young arm. Kirby Yates is pretty impressive. They got to flip him at some point, right?

and kind of assemble their own bullpen. For me, I mean, it seems like they have pitchers that can give you an outing on a given day. And, again, that top prospect list that just came out, they've got more help on the way with him and Mori Hone. McKenzie Gore, first round pick. Yeah. First round pick, it looks like he might be parts of the plans for next year.

That'd be cool. But, I mean, yeah, man, they need to tease to be healthy. Are they going to go be spenders at all this offseason? I'd like to see them. And wow, Padres offseason talk. This is what I'm here for, babe. Are they thinking, let's go get Garrett Cole? I mean, it would be wild if they are.

I think their name is out there. So I do think they do have some money to spend. That'd be really weird. But I guess then you could flip one of your young pitchers for hitting. Because remember, they were kind of in the running for Cinderguard, or at least those rumor mills. It'd be interesting. I'd be interested to see what they hear.

I'd like to see them do kind of the Minnesota Twins route. Like bring in a couple of these veteran hitters that aren't getting big free agent money anymore and like fill some holes in your lineup to make your team competitive. Or go out get Garrett Cole and then trade, you know, one of your young pitchers for a couple field players and roll the damn ball out there. Ooh.

Ooh. You doing dips? I did two and my feet were on the ground. They weren't. They were nothing, technically. They got to get rid of Hunter Renfro. Wow. Yeah.

I would love Padres fans reach out and tell me what the deal with Hunter Renfro is. I think he's bad and not good. Like, does he, but is it like, does he need to get out of San Diego? Like, I feel like if Hunter Renfax, like, I feel like if Hunter Renfro ended up on Texas next year. He'd like hit 35 homers, a 250 batting average. You know what I'm saying? In his last 60 plate appearances, how many hits do you think he has?

Seven. Five. Okay. Not great. Damn. The Padres gave up. The Padres gave up. In his last 78 played appearance, he has seven hits.

Man, Hunter Renfro is on Slump Watch, but it might just be bad watch. I don't know. Anyway, I need more of a scouting report on Hunter Renfro because there are some good numbers tied to him. All right. Well, that ends this episode of Talking Baseball. We thank you guys very much for tuning in, hanging out with us. Have a fantastic weekend. Enjoy the wild card races.

If your team is involved, I feel bad for you.