Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 341 | Sticky Stuff, Rays Pitching, and Kluber's Resurgence (with Eno Sarris)

Episode Date: May 26, 2021

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Hello and welcome to talking baseball. We got a very exciting show talking about pitchers with the pitching guru, Eno Seris. Hello and welcome to talking baseball presented by Draft Kings. Thank you very much for joining us and hanging out for a little bit on the midweek episode. We like diving into topics. We like diving into topics on the midweek episode. My name is Jimmy. His name is Jake.

In California, we got Trevor Plouffe. and in the corner producer BBD. And this episode we have is brought to you by dugout mugs because Father's Day is coming up, Trev, your dad, admit it, you're a dad. He's searching for his mug. Your dad. He's got a little knob shot glass dugout mugs. Jake's got the talking baseball one.

He's got the talking yanks one. Go get your dad for Father's Day, a dugout mug of the team that he likes the most, or you can customize it and put his face on the whole thing. Just send them a picture of your dad's face and they'll put it on a mug. You get the knob shot, the wind up, the season openers. The next 500 will get 30% off. If you use the code John Boy, you get 35% off. Dugout Mugs.

We got a bunch of fun stuff coming up with them. They're going to be part of our All-Star game extravaganza. We haven't fully announced yet, but we're excited about. So, dugout Mugs. Go to dug out Mugs. Use code Jomboy when you do. Jake, how you do? doing. James, Trevor, Big Baby David, everyone listening right now. I'm doing well. Doing well.

Getting through the week. Eno, I don't know what the best way to say it is. He's on our level, except he knows stuff. Like, he really knows stuff. Smart guy. Well, yeah, he's also, he'll get in the slime with us, which I like. So talk some great pitching stuff with him and I'm excited, man, like Memorial Day, summer baseball, sweating on the way to work? Like, we're here. How are you doing, Trev? I'm doing great. You guys know I love Eno. What he does for me as a baseball fan and a player, you know, like I can comprehend on some level some of the stuff that, you know, he's talking about in his articles, you know, a lot of the new age statistics and the analytics.

He's able to dumb it down for me. I think that's what he does really well. Like he's so smart with it. But like Jake said, he can get down and talk on our level a little bit. So I think that's a real, it's really beneficial for fans to kind of go in and listen to what he's talking about. Because he's on the cutting edge, but he'll have a beer with you and talk to you about it. That's how I feel about, you know. Jay, can you let everyone know how this came about?

Because there's a little backstory of why he joined us for this episode. So, Eno tweeted out March 23rd about Cory Kluber and he doesn't look that good. Never had a fastball, but he's sitting 90. But it isn't anything close to vintage. I had replied to that tweet on that day. I said, Eno, I'm trying to have a nice day, question mark. Because I guess I wasn't sure. Corey Klouber throws a no-no.

Eno, that tweet starts blowing up, obviously, because that's how the internet works. And Eno replied to one of the tweets and said, Jake, we should flog me with chains on YouTube. Let's go. I said, well, it is Thursday. And that's what we do on Thursdays. And then he replied, I'll get the essential oils in the gimp mask. You set the time.

So that obviously took me a back because no one's ever tweeted that on me. And, you know, we, for these midweek episodes, we wanted to explore stuff. We love Eno. It kind of seemed like time for some Eno. So we started there. We talked some Clubot, and he wanted to eat some bugs about it, but also talk us through it.

And we landed on some interesting stuff. And then we... Hell of an intro from him. Hell of one. I won't spoil it. An electric intro. But yeah, jumped around to some other pitchers he's liking and talking about. And we balls.

We cover the spectrum with Eno, always. always so we'll throw it to the interview it is brought to you by rise which is a new app we've been working with that i've been using on my phone to track my sleep because it's vital trev would you have did you download this uh i've been using it would you have liked this as a ball player so what this app does is it tunes into your fitbit or your iPhone um steps and sleep and all that tracks your sleep patterns and it like helps you out with your sleep debt and sleep debt so and like what you should be averaging let you know when you're going to be drowsy when you're going to be awake because everyone's got different hours you know i'm a morning person or i'm a night person

night owl early bird those are usually the terms for it um you can become a morning person according to them and don't worry you don't have to stop using your phone before bed and you can do it without buying a new mattress supplements or weighted brinklet blanket rise uses a scientific fact-based approach to help you get to sleep your body needs. It's built around the two principles that sleep researchers agree most affect how well we how we feel and perform. Sleep debt. I'm not going to know that word.

Sleep debt and Jesus. Sleep debt and Jesus. Circadian rhythm. Ooh. Yeah. Love Star Wars. He nailed it. Man. All right. So, Treb, when you were a ball player, late nights. What's your average time going to sleep when you're an active player?

2 a.m.? 3 a.m.? It all kind of depends on what kind of day or night you had. But yeah, you're late and then you rise late. Well, the reason I would like this when I was a player is because back in the day, people thought you were soft if you fell asleep or took need of the nap. There was, it was like, there was negative connotations involved with the word nap. And now you have science backing it up and like there's nap rooms in Major League Baseball

club houses and that is a complete 180 from when I played. So I'm all about Ross. Yeah. I mean, I told these guys I did after Monday through Friday on my own before I had the app, I would just, there'd be a day where I would just like fall asleep at 7 p.m. and wake up at 10 a.m. the next day. I'd be like, damn, I guess I needed that. Now the app, I did it for one week. And it's after five days, it was like, you've got five hours of sleep debt because you're not like,

it was like one hour less than I need every day. And then on Sunday I slept in until 930 or 10. And it was like, okay, you're good now. You cleared it. And I was like, fuck, that's really cool to know the actual calculations behind that. So go to get RISE, go to RISE science.com slash baseball. Download the RISE app today to try it for free. Find out if you're a morning person, night owl, when you get drowsy and you're sleep debt.

That's RIScience.com slash baseball to try the RISE app free for seven days. Let's go to the Eno conversation with Eno. We are joined by Internet Calfe model. Eno, Saris. Eno, how are you? I'm a shithead. For those just listening, Eno has shit on a cell. That's true.

And on my face, I did. I said, I said in spring, Corey Klooper did not look good. I said he did not look good. I said his command wasn't good. I said his fastball wasn't good. And then he threw a no-hitter. All these things are true. But you didn't know that it was the year of the no-hitter.

Yeah, right. Wade-Miley threw a no-hitter. Yes. Spencer Turnbull, as good as Spencer Turnbull. Rodon threw a no-hitter. He was dropped. You know. But let's also not forget that Cory Kluber is sporting a 286 right now.

So it's not just the no-hitter. No, I think I got it wrong. One of the things that I think is actually really tough to scout is command. I think it's one of the toughest things to see because pitchers move, pitchers lose, miss their targets by like 10 inches on average. So you might watch a game and be like, you know, this guy can't. you know he's not hit his spots but cluper is actually like i have a stack called command plus he's like 15% better than league average when it comes to command so i think that

yeah it's like that's like that's what i got wrong also like he sort of famously i guess i didn't know this until i my phone blew up after i texted i tweeted that out already i was like oh man this is this is destined to go poorly people are like don't you know he's like he's a slow starter and he doesn't you know he's not good in spring i'm like so i was with you you know i saw your tweet and i because i was i'm as i would still slightly as cynical as it gets when it comes to cluber mostly just because it was it's a 10 million dollar contract when the yankees are fighting against the luxury tax and have they only had 20 to spend they used half of it on cluber in a one year shot so for me it's he if he pitches good in the postseason or this was a waste of 10 million

So I'm coming into it as cynical as possible. In spring training, I didn't like that. But then there was, when I found that out and they said historically, he's a slow starter. That was the first I was like, okay, I will allow that into my brain. Because I didn't know that as well. But some guys are just historically bad early. And I guess. Coming off of injury, I mean, that was a big thing for y'all too.

Like having Tyon and Kluber coming off of injury where you're, you're depending on two guys in your rotation that, like, didn't pitch. Yeah. I mean, Herman hadn't pitched, and Monty was still not had a full season. So was a lot. But Klob has been pretty good. The no-hitter was pretty nice. Pitch mix is still, it's so interesting because he doesn't like calling it a certain pitch.

And then he's been using the change yet more often. Maybe you didn't know that scouting report. No, that's, I'm working on a piece with Lindsay Adler about the change. changeups. But, you know, it is, yeah, the second most he's ever used changeups. And it's, it's funny because I have this thing called Stuff Plus, which kind of uses movement and velocity to say, like, how good a pitcher's stuff is. And he doesn't rate that well overall, and his changeup doesn't rate well at all. But the cutter still, the cutter, the Cluber ball, whatever, the harder breaking ball still does really well. And so I think what he is is a

guy who has great command, four okay pitches, or three okay pitches and a great pitch. And I think that's enough today. So as Yankee fans, we should be drinking the Kool-Aid, like just go in the deep end with it or what? Well, I mean, the great starts were against, like, the Tigers and the Orioles and Rangers. The Rangers. So, like, I do think today is a big test. I mean, that's an awesome offense right now that's on all cylinders. So I'd expect more than, like, three runs, you know, 5Ks, three walks.

in like five innings today, you know, maybe six. So I think that's like Kluber against a great offense. So am I right or am I wrong? And it's like, that's not vintage Kluber, right? I mean, I know he threw a no hitter, but that's not vintage Kluber. Yeah, I don't think it's just a Velo thing with him. Like if he has command and he stays, you know, 15% above the average with your command plus step, to me, that's what I'm.

mentioned to Jimmy and Jake before the season. I said, I don't think he has to have Velo to be successful. If he can tunnel his pitches, the way that he has pitched his entire career will continue to work if he can locate. Do you find that that is, do you think that'll be true for him going forward?

If he can just stay at that level of command, he'll be able to pitch, shoot. I mean, as long as he wants to, right? Yeah, I just, there's like a threshold at some point. He's not a good fastball guy, right? Like, he never was, actually.

No. The way he broke out was to stop throwing the foreseem and move to the sinker. And I think that covered up that his foreseeing is not that good. But now he's kind of like a five-pitched guy where he can mix it up. And I think that does give you longevity. But at some point, there's a shelf where the fastball is just so bad, like you can't, you can't even really throw it anymore. You can't hide it.

You know what I mean? So like I think if he dropped below 90 or something. I'd be like, I don't think he can keep doing this. So I do think that like staying, and there's a research that suggests that, you know, if you stay between 89 and 94, like a little bit of tick up and down in there, it doesn't make it much of a difference. But if you drop below 89 or if you can get above 94, those are, that's a big difference. So, I mean, long story short, I think he's like, he's like doing the old pitcher's trick

where he's just like, I've got a lot of pitches, I'm going to mix them all up. I've got pretty good command of them. I guess he can do that for a while. I'm looking at Jake Peavy stats because that's who comes to mind when I think of like Cluber and Peev towards the end of the career. And I was like, man, did PV pitch till he was really old, but he only pitched until he was 35? And I think that's where Cluber is at right now.

Cluper's at 34 or something like that. So it's going to be interesting, man, because I think he does enough to, where it's tough for a hitter when you're facing him, you know, the way he's able to X the corners and kind of, fool you almost and you have to at some point when he's on have to pick a pitch and go with it. I think that leads to success. Here's my question to you like as a hitter. Like, you know, I was looking at this when we were talking about moving the round back and a pitching

coordinator told me that he would just have his pitchers throw 80% breaking balls, right, if the mound was moved back. And so there became a discussion about whether or not like if I told you a slatter of coming. Like if you just sat cutter, if you just sat cluber ball, would it be easier to hit it? Like, if you knew that- You're only getting sliders? Yeah, like if he threw 80% cluber balls, like, would you eventually just sit on that and be able to hit it? Yeah, because you'd know where you need it to start for it to be in your zone. I think that's kind of when, if he's, that's why you have to throw something else because then if you can't just, if you have to worry about another pitch,

you can't just say, I want this pitch to start right here and that's where I can hit it because if you're going to throw me 80% sliders, I'm going to dial into the exact point where I know that it's going to break into my hitting zone. And I know when to take it and all that. So I don't think that's,

that doesn't make much sense. Well, they're throwing more and more sliders every year. And so I think there are some people that think that like the slider is just harder to hit. It is harder to hit, but it's because you still have a heater to worry about, you know. Those guys are throwing hard.

too. They're throwing their sliders, but they're also throwing their fastballs harder. Yeah. And there will need to be a change in philosophy as we go forward. And I think that there probably already is starting to be some of that. But if you told me 80% sliders are coming, even if you had a good one, I think I'd be more successful than I wouldn't, than I would be with, you know, whatever the percentage is now, obviously. I've got, it's not like Romo is the best pitcher in the league, you know. I have good news for you. Is that?

Romo. My haircut, buddy. It's true. I have great news for you. Corey Kloobber's ERA against teams that are below average offense, according to team OPS, is 154 in four starts. His ERA against above average offenses in five starts is 490. Trade them.

so all the all the yankee fans being ruthless coming at you you know we got to wait another month you know this is so difficult about baseball and this is this is what i think is so it feels really unhinged when like a large group of people is trashing you maybe i was wrong it's fine with me baseball is really hard to procrastinate about and like be right about all the time like y'all have been wrong right Can I get you all to admit it? No, no. More wrong than yes. That's why we got to celebrate the few correctness.

Right. You know, you're so right. And it's, you know, we do heavy Yankee stuff. So coming in this season, we do player profile and projections and you try to map out. And like, try to map out the season for the 30, is he 35 or 36? The 35-year-old Corey Klooper, who's got a couple of. size in the bag, but he's also basically missed two to three seasons. And, you know, we were laughing because you either put this as a win or a loss,

we essentially put it as a loss, that Cressy, who's the Yankees trainer, is Cluber's guy. So when Ryan Cashman goes to get the medicals on Cory Clover, what's Cressy going to say? No, I've kind of done a shit job on that guy. No, he's going to say I've been lights out. So to predict what Cory Kluber is going to do this year, and let's be honest, the book ain't written, I think Yankee fans are excited that we're sitting here mid to end of May with a 286 ERA and a 1-1 war and that kind of stuff. But to predict what kind of year he had to put something fully in stone, like Kluber's going 30 starts, 285 ERA, or to say Kluber was going to get rocked, nobody knew.

That's the beauty of it. Yeah. Yeah. When someone is wrong, I'm like, ah, you know, it happens. I don't ever sort of feel the same like, got to go tell that guy. I'm sure that guy knows he was wrong. Meet him at the ass. Yeah, exactly.

Hey, but if you're going to get on the pedestal and say, I was right about something, you have to get on the pedestal and take when you're wrong about something. That's how I feel. Yeah, and I tweeted three as no hitter. I said, I said, I was wrong, man. I was wrong. Well, you said you were writing an article with Lindsay Adler, who covers the Yankees for the Athletic on the changeups.

We did a whole episode on talking Yanks all about it. So if you just wanted to use some of the research that we didn't do, Katie Sharp did. Transcript. We call it Matt Blake's changes. Because since he's come in, the Yankees have gone from 30th in changeup usage to third or something like that. Yeah, there's, there's some. something going around in the league too there's more changeups and i think what it is is like just generally we're going away from fastballs but i think there's maybe a point of no return

like that's why i asked trev about this is like i think there's a little bit of a point of no return on sliders where they're throwing sliders more than ever and you can like certain against certain pitches you can sit slider you know and once you can do that you can actually hit the slider and so therefore even if your change ups not great uh you uh you if you're sitting slider, you're going to miss the change of. That makes sense. I can buy into that. I just did a video on Garrett Cooper for the Marlins,

and he was facing Drew Smith for the Mets, and he was sitting slider. You could just tell by his body language, you know, he was definitely sitting slider. He finally got one and hit a walk off home run. I thought that was interesting. I was like, he's definitely just waiting for that one pitch there. And then he got it.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, the sliders are at the most that they've ever thrown them. And in fact, the sort of production on sliders is near the worst it's ever been. I think that goes hand in hand. So, like, you know, you kind of, the more you throw it, the more often someone's going to hit it. And that's actually the hardest thing in, like, when I'm looking at a pitcher, you know, it's the hardest thing. People say like, oh, man, he gets this many whiffs on this pitch. He doesn't throw it enough.

He should throw it more. You know, when he throws it more, he's going to get fewer whips. You know, people are going to split. other that's the thing is you can't you know there's very i mean i'm thinking back to you know me as a hitter a long time ago but there were only a few guys where i would sit slider i mean al alberkirke is one that really comes to my mind former pitcher were the tigers another guy ortega i believe was on the tigers but like you they all just work off each other and i think that's why it's so damn hard to hit when a guy you know they say when a guy has you know command of three pitches during a start

you're screwed. Especially if they're commanded to each side of the plate, right? Because that's almost like six pitches. You have to, you have to be able to eliminate pitches. That's why I love facing two pitch pitchers. So the more times these guys, you know, eliminate pitches, the better I think it is for hitters.

A two pitch pitcher, you know, if you only has one that's working that night, well, shit, man, you can just sit on that thing all night long. I don't, you know, I don't know if command of these sliders has gotten better with the more usage of them. I'm assuming command of sliders is probably better than it ever has been because they throw it more so they have a better feel for it. Could be wrong about that.

But yeah, I just think that there is a point of no return because they play off of other pitches. I mean, that's just an old adage. Your fastball plays up if you can throw your slider for a strike or your slider's going to be better if you're commanding your fastball. They go hand in hand. I mean, look at like Hunjian. you, right? He's like, throws 89, but he, he, like, you can't really eliminate any pitch

in any count. He kind of just, he has like four pitches and it could be anything at any time. So, yeah, it's 89, but it could also be the 86-mile-hour cutter or the, you know, so it's like a wide, wide range of things and a wide range of movements, and he's can put it inside or outside. So you're kind of like, you can't even eliminate a portion of a plate, you know. Yes, he's tough. He's real fun to watch when he's on. Because it's any pitch and any count, and everyone's off balance all the time. It's art.

We've seen six no-hitters so far. I'm counting bum-garner's. Seven, then. Seven? Okay, so. Out of the seven. Out of the seven, no-hitters, if we went back to spring training,

and I said, hey, one of these seven guys is going to throw a no-hitter. Musgrove, Rodon, Bum-Garner, means, Miley, Turnbull Cluber. Miley. Who would you have said, Miley? No, no.

Oh, what I said would have thrown? Yeah, who would you, who would you guess would be, I think, Means? I would not have guessed,

Miley. Means is good, yeah. Yeah, Means is probably the best guess. Or Turnbull. I think Turnbull because I love that, that park makes things a little bit easier.

So like, you know, you get like the Royals in Detroit, I would have been like, oh, yeah, Turnbull could turn that. A little day game action, like that.

add a lot. I know I you know we we always want to talk some ball stuff with you but for for talking baseball you like to talk a lot about balls yeah I mean I before Trevor ploof said sit on it all night and I you know I thought about combining the two stances but um who who are some other guys who are you drinking the Kool-Aid around the league on you know for talking baseball we we always say like everybody knows fans of their team know their team better than us we can look at stats and we can look at advanced stats, but we don't fully know the full picture. Who, you know, almost two months in now, who are some of the pitchers that the national audience should know more about or be thinking about?

Well, I'm assuming they know about like Corbyn Burns by now. He like broke that record. But in Milwaukee, also, Freddie Peralta is pretty intense. He releases the ball really close. He's almost got like a Glass Now thing where they, he's got super extension. And then he's got a super righty fastball. And then he's created a really good breaking ball that plays off of that now. So Freddie Peralta finally figured out.

He used to have problems in the first inning, but he kind of figured that out. I'm a big fan of Julio Ureus out in L.A., the lefty there. But I guess people probably remember from the World Series, who's another young guy coming up? Shane McClanahan, man. You guys see him. Oh, yeah. Oh, that is nasty. See, I've got, I've got him with like three plus plus pitches.

Jesus. So, you know, I don't know if they'll ever take the kid gloves off all the way and let him and let him go to like 100, any hundred pitches. They keep taking him out at 80, but I think he can still do it in the, you know, eventually they'll do it. At least they let him start. Do they let him start? Yeah.

Yeah. He's doing, he's been like about four in a time. four or five innings are the most. I got a question about a comment you made when the Adomis trade went down and the Rays picked up Fire Eisen and Rasmussen. You said that

they're really excellent in their vertical break. They rate well in that in that regard and that's what the raise really looked to that. Why are the rays, why do the rays know this and other teams don't? I don't understand that.

Like what are they doing so much better? Like, why is it always the rays that know how to get pitchers? I, from chat around the league, I've heard that the Brewers and Rays and Astros and Dodgers and Yankees. Those are the five teams that kind of know pitching the best, know the kind of stuff, you know, what makes good stuff, can bring it out of their young pitchers. but there's been a little bit of fascination in New York, I think, with fastball, with the high fastball, and the breaking ball, the hard breaking ball. That's like, that describes a lot of the young guys that are coming up through the Dodger system. And I think there's been some sort of acknowledgement with the Yankees that maybe command matters a little bit more than they thought.

So there's been a little bit of a change going on with the Yankees when it comes to that sort of stuff. but I think that the rays and the Astros and Dodgers and Yankees, those are the class of the league in terms of just acknowledging what makes a pitch good and going and getting those guys. The thing that I think makes the race stand out is they make more trades than anyone. They just like acquire more people than anyone. They're just like constantly and that makes us think that they're winning, I think most of those trades, not all of them, but you know,

they do well in the trades that they do and they just make a ton of trades. so we're kind of always talking about the race. But there are other teams that, you know, that know stuff pretty well. And the Brewers developed these two guys, right? I mean, they came out of almost nowhere. I mean, when's the last time you, this is the first time you ever heard of Drew Rasmussen and JP Fire Eisen, right?

Not Fire Eisen. Yankees great. Former Yankees left. Oh, he's a Yankee? Yeah, he went in, he, well, actually he was an Indian prospect. And then they, in the Andrew Miller, Clint Frazier, Justice Sheffield trade. He was part of that.

Oh. How do you end up in Milwaukee? The Yankees. Oh, it was the big... Rule 5 or was it a... It was the big Fire Eisen for Benny Escanio and International Slot Money Trade. Oh, yeah.

I remember that one. I think that was only, or was that? Who broke that? But... It might have been you did. It had to be Rule 5 eligible, so they've dumped them for... Needed the 40-man spot for something.

Yeah. You know, that vertical break pitch you're talking about, I took that thing. Way up top and triple it. You took Fire Rising Deep? Oh, yeah. We're a huge Fire Rising pot. Don't come at us with that.

Big Fire Rising pod. Sorry, sorry. So we know. Like, they were trying to make him a starting pitcher forever, right? And just the injuries didn't make it work. So I think that they weren't sure that he would be like a great reliever. But, you know, he has three pitches. They all look pretty good.

And the race wanted him. That's the scariest part. Yes, to do it. Treve, you want to... One of the things that has changed, I think, in my research into what makes pitch is good, is I used to think that velocity was the number one thing. And that was everything. But the last couple of people I've worked with on researching this, they've both come back and told me that velocity was like the fourth most important aspect of a pitch. And that, you know, things like vertical movement.

and velocity separation and the velocity on your breaking ball, like how hard your breaking ball was, those things were actually more important than fastball velocity. And I think what's happened is we've gotten so much velocity in the game. It's almost like the slider thing, right? We've got so much velocity in the game that that means there's some guys who aren't any good who would just throw hard, you know, that are in the game. And also, velocity is just what it takes to get to the big leagues.

once you get there, is there really that much difference? If you want to separate yourself, you throw, I throw 94, you throw 93, I throw 94 with a crazy rise ball. You throw 93 and it's just like an average fastball, which one is going to be much better? And is it going to be that one tick that matters or is it my movement? So I think that's what the rays, and if you look, the rays don't lead the league in velocity. He's not the like the hardest throwing guys in the world. They're looking for that vertical movement.

I like the vertical movement stance and this is just my dumb hitter brain thinking but when you're swinging a bat there's a lot of room for air horizontally because the bat is laid horizontally and when you're going up and down I mean that's the smaller part of everything so it makes sense then

when I think about stepping back into the box having to command pitch up in the zone and pitches down in the zone definitely is harder than going right to left in my opinion like if a guy is spotting at the top of the zone, you have to make a physical adjustment to get able to be able to get

to that pitch. And then when you do that and you can spot something down down in the zone, you know, you're kind of shit out of luck right there. Yeah, I think the Yankees were a big part of sort of turning things on their head a little bit with that rubric that you're talking about. So I think that they started doing this before anybody else, which is throwing the slider low for strikes in the zone and then throwing the fastball less often, but at the top of zone for whiffs and just kind of playing with what your approach might be at the plate which be like oh i'm going to spit on anything down you know i'm going to spit on anything that spins down because i'll be like that's that's that's supposed to make me swing over the top of it right so

you spit on it oh called strike one crap okay now i got to now i got to protect the slider down oh this is fastball's way out of the zone i've been looking at that slider down this this fastball's in my eyes and if you look at the yankees were the first team to like really reduce reduce fastball usage. They were the first team to have the hardest fastballs in the league. And the first team, I think, to use the high force team the way they did. That's why it was shocking when they traded for Hap and Lynn. Because we were like, these guys only throw fastballs.

And the philosophy at the time was to not throw the fastball lot. They were like the team that threw the least fastballs. And then they traded for Hap and Lynn. And I was like, those guys throw like 80% fastballs. I think it's probably the sign of a smart team, right? You can't fall too in love with yourself, right? Yeah. Like, we figure something out, but happen Lynn are there,

and the teams don't want that much for him. So let's go get him. I want Lynn back. He's going to be a free. He says he wants to fall in. Yeah, I mean, every day, every day. Treve, you want to ask some ball stuff? I know this is close to your heart.

All ball jokes aside, but we're starting to see some movement. I just don't know. what to ask because you know you've been on here before talking about the balls and we've talked about the balls and you know it's it is a very very big deal and it's like a tangible change and people this is what i don't like you know i'm going to tell you what i don't like and maybe you can just kind of go off that i don't because i really don't have a question because i feel like we've you've kind of covered it here but when we have these analysts you know guys on mb network um you know guys all over social all they ever talk about is oh well the reason that the offense is down

is because teams are teaching and i hate this term they call a launch angle approach which is so freaking stupid because a launch angle that's just a metric nobody's teaching a launch angle approach okay like everybody's still teaching hit the ball hard yes so now over one thing you want hit the ball hard yes that's what you're trying to do but now they've had now they put this out there in baseball world. Everyone's just trying to hit fly balls and that's the reason everyone's striking out, which is just not the case. So I have all these hitters, you know, texting me, telling me, we have to make a bigger deal about the spin rate and the spin efficiency that these guys are getting from these foreign substances. And I don't know what else to do. Like, I don't know how to

combat it. Like you have came at it and you had JT. Oruamuto put his name on it. And I said, that was a huge step when a catcher comes out against the pitchers, because that just doesn't happen. They're more on the pitcher side than the hitter side. That's right. I was like the double agents. They really are. They're more on the pitcher side though because they got to deal with these prima donnas all the time. So for JT to come out, I thought that was really, really good. And then just recently, Chris Rose rotation had Stephen Brawl and Trevor Williams on and he was talking them about the balls and about your article in particular. And they came out and said about how ridiculous it is. And now guys are using like cement, like wet cement on their

hands and it's it's really getting out of hand i don't know if you have an idea of how to make this story go bigger uh because i'm i'm fresh out of i you know i was talking to and i won't out him but i was talking to one of the lines of our industry about um you know coverage back in the day and i was saying you know it's frustrating it doesn't seem like readers seem to care about this and i thought maybe it was because it was like too technical it's like a part it's like it's been going on forever quote unquote and and and you know it's had something to do with how it's not really like really easy to understand right away it's like oh what they get more RPM and that's good why okay um you know and I was talking to him and I said was like that in the steroid area and they

said people didn't care about steroids when they wrote about it that was part of why the writers missed it or whatever was that like like the guy who wrote about McGuire having Androsceny or whatever in his locker, like the guy who saw that, he got totally vilified. Like he almost got like run out of the business. Because, oh, you shouldn't have been looking in his locker and that's just fine. It's just a supplement. It's fine. That documentary, we had the director on who who made it about Sosa and McGuire in the home run chase.

They showed that. They showed that he had in his locker and they openly talked about it. And no one cared at all at the time. No one cared. They only started caring when Congress started caring. But yeah, if you go back to the interviews and watch a documentary, everyone knew they were doing steroids, but nobody cared at all. And I do think that's what's going to happen here, Trev.

But because the first thing a fan does is say, well, do the players care? And for the last 10 years, the only people on record have been the hitters who said, you know, I think Harper was on record like five years ago saying, hey, it helps them control the ball. And that's been in every baseball players. That's been the narrative. And we're only like two months into trying to change that,

Trev. So like it'll come the more it gets kind of talked about. But it's a big deal to have pitchers talking about it. Yeah. Well, Chris Rose just had Trevor Williams and Brawl call it cheating on their, on the Chris Rose rotation. That's amazing. Yeah.

That's totally new. That is totally new and different. You have to combat the narrative that's just for command. So that's why I had a piece where it's like, it's plus 500 RPM. If they use the spider tack, the stuff that holds cement to your hands, that's plus 500 RPM. And you're like, well, what's 500 RPM? Well, how about this? It improves breaking ball stuff by 30%.

I had that stuff metric. It reduced, yeah. And if you look around the league, sliders all have like the craziest stuff metrics. And I think, you know, half of them are because of, you know, whatever's on their fingers. And if you just watch a game, you can see it. Yeah. Is it as easy as this, you know, because we're able to track now spin since 2015. Can our listeners, can they just go to baseball savant, go look up their favorite pitcher,

and they go back to 2015, see his spin, go down in 2016 and see a spin. And if there's a 300 RPM jump, is it as easy as, is it as easy as, you know, that to say he's cheating? I'll tell you. He's putting something on the ball. If you did find that, yes. Guess how many you'll find? One.

Bauer? Yes. That's on his page. You can say that. Like, I've seen. Yeah. He's the only one? Because he was the only one not doing it. He might find a couple.

But here's the thing that's happening. It's indoctrinating. It's happening in the minor leagues. So by the time you get there, you set, you have to do it in minor leagues. Because baseball came out and said, We're going to use Sivan. We're going to look at this. But what if my baseline was set in a high end?

Exactly. Can you, is there baseball savant numbers for the minor league system? Because there are trackman devices in a lot of these. Baseball has it. Baseball has it. And then, yes. Only M.O.B. has it?

Yes. There's a hack, though, to find some, you know, it's complicated. If you want to hit me up on Twitter, I'll point it out to him. There is a hack to find trackman for four minor league stadiums in Florida. That's such BS, dude. That is absolute fucking. B.S. They're trying to come down on this.

Well, they have all the information. They're not trying to come down on it. What are you talking about? They literally, they definitely don't want to come down on this year with the CBA coming. Yeah. They told every clubhouse they're not going to get in trouble. They said, hey, we're collecting all the baseballs, but don't worry. We're just collecting data.

You're not going to get in trouble. That's the message I'm getting from them. But, you know, it also could be like to your larger point about how, you know, steroids went down and stuff. This could be the Mitchell report time. This could be the like elite. You know, we're figuring something out. We're going to leak some stuff.

We're going to get the public behind this. And then, you know, in year two or three, we're going to start to come down. But I don't know. Like I just like trusting baseball right now. Like they tried to change the baseball. They told us they changed the baseball. And they did it in all the worst ways this year. The baseball now comes off the bat faster.

So it's more dangerous. for hitters. It doesn't go as far in the air, so home runs are been turned into outs. It has more drag, so it moves more in the air. And it's lighter, so pitchers are throwing it harder. So we're about to have the first season with plus an over 94 mile an hour average on the fastball.

How are any of those four things good? All those four things do is reduce homers and increase strikeouts. Oh, good job, man, Fred. That's incredible. And you know what, dude, like that's all these dumb things they're saying. Let's move the mound back a foot.

Let's do this, do that. All they got to do is stop people from putting shit on the ball. It's right in front of you. It's so much easier. And train hitting baseballs that are thrown a certain way. And then all of a sudden, they're not doing that anymore. And it's not just the substances. And obviously, that's the biggest part.

But now with, and I've referenced this a bunch, it's the slow-mo, edge of trouble. cameras where they can now just pitch design with this stuff. And they say, okay, well, I want my breaking ball to have X spin, X break, whatever, whatever, whatever. And they can just throw a bullpen session and come up with a pitch overnight. I do have pitching coordinator to say, well, if the hitters just got their axe together and tried a little harder. And listen, I know, no, no, I know. But I'm saying this, what about this?

There are technology, there is technology available to hitters that they're not using. The VR? as a group. There's VR, but yes, I've had people DM me and be like, VR is not to the right place yet. It doesn't trick your brain. It's not the right place. But there's catapult, there's hit the K-vast, you know, there's things you can do. Like how many major league hitters, the minor leaguers have all worn the K-Vis now, but like how much, what's the percentage of a major league hitters that have worn a K-Vest before? I don't know what a K-Vest is. Yeah, so there you go. And it's a very simple thing that can help you. It just tracks your body, movements and tells you, you know, your hips are firing too late.

Oh, I've seen. Oh, sure, sure, sure, sure. Yeah. See, when I went to Dodger, um, instructional league for three days and they were putting guys in that. Yeah. So all the minor leaguers are kind of going through it. And so it creates a baseline for like when your swing is right.

They have the numbers and you can get back in there if you feel like something's off and they can say, well, this is what's happening. I do have a funny story from that. So I wore the K vest, right? and I had near pro hand speed. Hey. I had a minus, minus pelvis. And then you put the vest on and then what happened.

So, but this is funny too because I think it gets to maybe the fact that technology is always going to help pitchers more than hitters, which is the fact that. They control the variables. That's why, you know. Right. Yeah, yeah. So I've had the vest on, right? And he said, okay, use some cues. Like, think of some different things while you're swinging.

And I was like, okay, I'm going to get into my glutes and see what happens. And I'm going to just load as hard as I can and see what happens. And the one that worked for me that gave me the best swing was I'm going to rip my pelvis through, right? I'm just going to rip through at that level. Yeah, I'm just going to rip that pelvis through. and I had I had a there was the best all greens on the K-Vest it looked beautiful it was great I missed the ball on the T hand-eye still matters hand-eye coordination still matters we need to get that KVS

yeah that's good how much do they cost you can optimize I don't I don't think they're too bad but you can optimize your swing and then you still have to like see there's some stuff now they're doing gaze training where they'll put like different cameras like things on your eyes and try to get you to look a certain way but I do think technology

favors a pitcher on some level. Yeah, I think the VR thing, if that gets up to speed and you're able to have two legitimate feeling at bats against the guy before you even step into the box, that is something that hitters are going to flock to. But I've

used one of them before. I think actually even two different devices. It's just not there yet. It's crazy to me. Like, let's go. Let's get on this. Because that's a big deal. But that's like the only thing that I can think of.

It's actually going to help you with a pitcher. You might be able to optimize your swing and your mechanics, but it doesn't matter if you can't, like you just said, if you can't put the barrel to the ball, what does it matter? It's the damn ball on a tee. You know, we have to kind of start moving. I have one last personal question. Is yours baseball related?

Baseball related, yes. Mine's half baseball. You know, what would you say is a one, the equivalent of a one dot OPS spin rate? Would you say 3,000 or 2,700 or 2,600? For a fastball, right? Any, any. 2400 used to be top 20%, but 2,400 now is top 40%. Okay.

That's what, that's what the spin substances is done. Everyone now gets to 2400. So 2400 is just everyone. does it. So yeah, I would say 2,800. I think Bauer's RPM on his four scene, which leads the league now, is 2800. So, yeah, so I was going to say

of any pitcher that's thrown 500 pitches this season, could you guess the top any top five in percentage of pitches is percentage of pitches thrown that have 2,800 or higher?

I mean, I gave you one, Bauer. Leads, he's at 73%, which is... I would say Cole, Cole is up there. Ooh, Cole, no, Cole is number 14. He's at only 15% of his pitches get that high. Corbyn Burns. Number two, 67% of his pitches are that spin rate. But the...

We're watching you, Corbyn. And the amount, the number of pitches is Bauer leads by a lot. Bauer has 777. pitches, 2,800 or more. Second place is Corbyn Burns with 406. Wow. So the mad scientist who builds labs in his backyard to practice this stuff and has now engaged in some other substances has mastered the craft. I mean, that makes a lot of sense.

Walker Bueller. Bueller's up there. He's number five. But he's at 34%. Bauer's number one with 76. Yeah, yeah Of his fastballs? All pitches.

All pitches, okay, that's what you're saying. 73% of all Bauer's pitches have 2,800. Five is Bueller with 34. Like Bauer and Burns are up here. I did. There are some people behind the scenes who are like mad about Burns. But I got some pushback from Milwaukee saying that as like a like a, 18 year old or something that's a real young in their minor league system he was throwing like 2,800

mile per hour, 2,800 RPM cutters. So like their stance is he's always done this. Oh yeah, sure. You went to the local hardware store. He was 18, I don't know. I mean, look, it just, you can't, we have a lot of data for, for pitchers. You can't just overnight just all of sudden jump like that. It just doesn't make any sound. And if you do just fastballs, Trabb? Just fastballs, Bowers are you crazy. I know. But look, I did run spin rate differences for someone who's writing a story on the athletic.

And in terms of like year over year difference, there's four guys who have a 200 increase this year. I don't know who Kyle Keller is, Will Crow, Jordan Lyles, and then Shohei Otani. But spin rate goes up with velocity. So I think on some level You have to take velocity out of all this Because Otani was down in Velo last year Because he was hurt And it's not like a who's who

And there's only four heart Otani Don't do that Oh he's healthy now He would break my heart He really would break my heart I see him as like a godsend man Saving our sport from itself It's so amazing

The opposite field power dude It's ridiculous All right. One last crazy stat while I'm on this page. The Dodgers as a team have thrown 703 pitches or fastballs, 703 fastballs with the 2,800 RPM. The Minnesota Twins have thrown six. Twinkies.

Why, Jimmy? Why did you have to go there? That's kicking someone when they're down, man. They're about to get hot. Eno, my. Jimmy, yeah, you. They're going to get hot, I know it. Or not, and they'll just die.

You know, it's late night. You've put the kids, you're, you know, it's just you. You lock the door, you light a candle. Maybe you had one, two IPAs. And you get to watch two pitches on repeat for the rest of the night. One is probably Caesar Valdez's dead fish. the other pitch you're going to watch with it. What's the RPM on that?

What is the other pitch? You know what? I really love watching our change-ups because it just seems weird to me to have a pitch go that direction. This direction makes sense to me. That direction does not. So I know he's not doing amazingly,

but Luis Castillo, his change-up or Zach Graham. Yankees power change still. You know, like I just love seeing a pitch go really fast and dive and go in that direction. It's just a boggles my mind a little bit. Jimmy and I share a fetish for front hip two seamers. Yeah. Oh.

I just watched, I just watched Maddox. Clover. Cluber's got one. We ring it all back to Clover. I just watched Maddie. Bauer does it really well. I watched a montage of Maddox doing it. Oh, yeah, Madagena.

It was illegal. Art. It didn't make sense. It's so good because you see there, they're just the body give up. The hitters just like, oh, and then. Get the jelly leg, man. You know, buckles was really, really good at that pitch, too. I don't think he gets enough credit for how good of a pitcher he was when he was, like, on.

If robot umms come, and they are coming because they're already at high A, if robot ops come, the robot ums will call that pitch a strike morrow. often. That is one of the least correctly called pitches is the front door too soon. Did you know the other day I was, this is a story kind of off the chart here, but I was at my little league coaching our team and this older team comes in. This guy's putting his gear on. I said, hey, man, catcher's gear. I said, hey, you do that like a leg on the ground stuff? You're trying to like get those low pitches called for strikes? It's like, yeah. I'm like, well, you better stop now because Robo umpires are coming. It's not going to.

matter, by that. And I don't think, I think he thought I was being really mean, but I was giving him real advice, bro. Just go learn how to hit. By the time you get to the show, son, you don't need to do that anymore. That won't matter. They'll only care about your pop time and your OPEO. P. Hitting has become so

hard that out, corner outfielders aren't corner outfielders anymore. They're just third baseman or first base, they're whatever. They're just hitters. Please hit. All right. Last question. Who's got the most swinging misses on a on a pitch with

RPM under 1,000. Is it the Valdez fish? I thought it was. That's why I was looking it up. It's Ryan Stannick. Oh, the splitter? His splitter? Yeah.

And then it's Chapman's splitter. There's only like two splitters in the game right now. There's like none. Not a lot of splitters. Yeah, I should have guessed splitter. Yeah. Stannick is back, baby. There we go.

All right. You even know he's gone. Thank you very much for joining us, Eno. Donning the shithead. Appreciate that very much. I took my medicine. Still, jury's still out, man. Anyone can know hit the Rangers.

Long season. It's a long season. I love you guys. Thanks, you know. Thanks, Eno. All right. There he was. Talking baseball, talking spin rates,

talking Kluber, talking, staying hydrated. Because it's another thing that's important. This is suddenly a health podcast. Yeah. We teach you about sleeping properly. Now we're going to teach you about staying hydrated. And you can drink this out of your dugout mug. Let's combine them all.

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drink hydrant dot com slash baseball you know can I give a personal experience with it what's that Jim can I give a personal experience with yes I've been on the train of you know drinking some sort of

hydration pack or something before I go to bed if I have a few pops at night adult beverages my wife Olivia went out the other night and she took one of those hydrogen sleeps before she went to bed. You know you don't sleep well when you drink. If you don't have something like that, she woke up the next morning and told me he goes, what is that stuff?

Wow. I don't know if they want me to say that or not, but that's my personal experience with it. I'm jealous. How about you know wearing a shithead hat? Yeah. How about it? Ready to go. Yeah, who just has that hat in their house? That's all. We didn't ask him about that. know.

Yeah, you know. I feel bad. Yankee fans coming at them. That's what they do. Like I told it, you put yourself out there like that. You got to wear it sometimes. That's okay. I think he's taking it all and good fun and he knows that he's probably right.

And we mentioned some things in that interview about the teams that Kluber's been facing. So the jury's still out. By the time this airs, we will know how he did against the Toronto Blue Jays on Tuesday night. He's got to face that fuck Richick. It's a good lineup, short porch. Let's do that because we're going to predict. We got two predictions, yeah. Against Jack.

Let's do both of them. Lucas versus Jack, their lines, and also the- So a reminder for our diehards to juggle our schedule a little better. We're trying to get these recorded Tuesday afternoon and premiering Wednesday morning for you guys. So, Kluber's stat line, what did Eno throughout what? Five innings pitch, three earn runs. He said three walks.

Why do I remember that? I'll go 5.2, 2 earn runs. Survives. I'm going to go straight with Eno. I really like that. He gets through five, not without a little trouble, three earned runs. I'm going to give him... Five and three.

Through five. I'm going to give him seven Ks, though. Okay. Five and three. Um Kluber Cluber Have the

I mean the The Jays are on a like what Seven game losing streak They've been hitting a little bit They've been hitting though Quality starts Six and three That's my guess

Okay And then the other thing Lucas and Jeff The other thing yeah The high school teammates Harvard Westlake How about this Who has a better start?

Let's just do that. Jack's 8-0. Jack's facing the tougher lineup. Yes. Gialito's coming off a great game against the twins. How about this? I'll go... Give me 0-0 in the 7th and I'm hard.

I'll go... Excuse me? It said give me 0-0 in the 7th and I'm hard. Like that? Like that a lot. Hornie pod. It's been like I'm tough I sit

I'm worried I'll start fighting my dogs I'll go I think they both go seven innings pitched two earned runs Flaherty gives up his runs early he's too hyped up

Gioledo gives him his up start of the third time through the order God that's nice right here Where's this being played? Europe. I mean, do they have to hit?

Yeah. Is in Chicago or is in St. Louis? No, it's in Chicago. It's in Chicago. I'm, I think Lucas pitches well, but I think Jack dominates today. I've said it. I said it on the IG show Chris Rose. I've never seen him more confident.

And that's a big thing for him because he's got all the talent in the world when he's locked in, confident like that. I'm going with him. I think Lucas is going to throw well also, but I think Jack. does something stupid tonight, like seven shoddy with like 12 kids. Okay. Lines are done. I mean, it's already happened, so we'll see. Yeah.

And we sound dumb. Yeah. All right. Thanks for listening, guys. Appreciate you. As always, we will be back on Friday for series recap. Let you know what happened. Tweetedino.

Tweetedino. Tell them these the best. Call him a shithead. Nicely. Nicely. Why Jack's so confident, Trout. I do.