Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 434 | CBA Talk, Stroman to the Cubs, Chris Taylor Re-Signs LA, & JBJ Back to Boston

Episode Date: December 6, 2021

Check out the Jomboy Media Binho Tournament livestream at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCifMPWjBEu7rYx3CVdkjiWAUR  Participate in our anonymous audience survey and receive 20% OFF to the Jomboy Media Store: https://forms.gle/zQoCok3GtV4gesM8A  Get 20% OFF + free shipping at https://manscaped.com/talkin  Timestamps: 4:00 - Labor Pod 32:30 - Marcus Stroman to the Cubs 44:15 - Christ Taylor Back to LAD 47:30 - Red Sox Rotation 53:00 - Jackie Bradley/Hunter Renfroe Trade 58:45 - Jordan Lyles to the Orioles Presented by DraftKings 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.

Hello and welcome to talking baseball. It is lockout season, no games, but we got some tidying up to do. We missed a couple things. Let's talk about them. Hello and welcome to talking baseball brought you by Draft Kings. My name is Jimmy. Sitting next to me is Jake in the middle. We have Trevor Fluke.

And in the corner, we have producer B, B, D. Baseball locked out. Nata. Players are faceless. Nothing's going on. Baseball's dead. Jake, the coldest in the streets it's ever been? Yes or no?

I think so. Baseball threw a late Hail Mary last night with some old-timer Hall of Famer, so I do love that. But yeah, no, baseball chilly in the streets right now, and I don't love it, but I do love being the number one CBA podcast in the world, brother, kind of like me holding my bino belt that I'm putting on the line tomorrow night at 7 p.m. Live on the tube.

We're having a bino tournament tomorrow, and I'm holding the belt until then. But, yeah, baseball, a little chilly in the streets. Do you know how important this bigno tournament is tomorrow, Trev? The bino tournaments are going to be an eight-person bracket. The winner gets the belt for two months. There's going to be a tournament every two months. Jake, we just got the belt.

And Jake's technically the last winner. He only faced one opponent instead of a pool of eight players. But, I mean, he could lose it tomorrow night, and whoever wins it gets it for, you know, 60 days until the next tournament of eight. There will be a regular season in between to determine who makes it into the bracket, who's dancing. But yeah, Jake's like got to really use this belt nicely because it's on the line tomorrow. Everyone can tune in.

It's the John Boy and Jake TV YouTube channel. We'll be live streaming at 7 p.m. Jake's belt is on the line. Trevor, how are you? How is your weekend? James, Jake, big, big, don. Guys, people in chat. What's up?

I want to be, this is a transparent pod. Ooh. Okay? We're transparent here. Yeah. So I was on the bea, bino website. Yeah. I was talking to you guys and said, hey, I'm looking to buy a few bignos for Christmas.

James you looked at me or you didn't look at me you texted me and said let's wait till Tuesday let's bake that out go a little bit with old bigno so I will be ordering two bigno boards

one for me and then one for a Christmas present I watched something that I'm kind of upset that I didn't know you could do on bino's website this dude was flying the sticks

he was lifting the ball He was kicking it over the defenders. I didn't know you could do that. Game over, boys. Next time I come into town, there's no defenders, essentially, if you kick it over them. The professional bino guys are kind of out of control.

Also, did you know that? Cole Tucker's friends with the guys who invented bino, and it's like not, it's kind of like, they went to high school together, and like, Cole Tucker's like, you know, part of the bino rise, basically. Yeah. We didn't know that when we got the board.

It just kind of happened. Love that. Yeah, he said he's a minority owner in it. Good for him, man. Pretty nuts. So make sure you tune in Tuesday night, 7 p.m. For now, let's talk about the lack of baseball. I think we, for this episode, there's a bunch of moves that happened.

Nick Martinez, Jordan Liles, Rich Hill, Hunter Renfro, Paxton, Chris Taylor, Marcus Stroman. We're going to do that as a second part of the show because I think we can, got to just kind of talk about the situation at hand. Baseball's locked out. The owners voted to lock out the teams. So we're a labor pot again. I don't know how deep we want to get into this, how not deep we want to get into it.

I kind of have an opening question that might lead us into more stuff. And that is, as of right now, do you think we will miss games in the 2022 season? Treb, I'll ask you first I do not think we will It's my professional opinion here That We've lost some games You know, last couple years here

They don't want that to happen anymore I think there's enough time here We've been negotiating this thing for quite some time Throughout the 2021 season You know, I know the media portrays it where both sides are just completely so far apart, but I believe there'll be some headway made, probably towards February, something like that.

It's going to be tough for guys to get the spring training and get all that in, but I think it'll happen. I don't think we'll miss any games. Jake? I'm scared, guys. I'll be honest with you. I'm a little scared because everyone's been saying the, you know, Yeah, both these sides are going to figure it out come February.

The part that scares me, unfortunately, is I think both these sides keep saying that expecting the other side to come down in February, which I don't know. I'm just not confident enough in that. And I think, and this is where I got scared the other day, and I will say, I do think we miss a couple games. I don't think it's a lot. But there's no hard deadline right now. And so we just saw it with all these free agent signings. and we're going to talk about the ones we missed at the buzzer. Strowman's a big one.

You know, we saw we had two motivated sides to get deals done. Players wanting to get signed and teams wanting to get players in-house before this lockout. And we saw a lot happen up until that deadline. We don't have a deadline and we just have two sides that think the other one's going to cave in, but they also don't like each other. So like the only thing that becomes a threat in an actual deadline is open. day. And that's kind of the lockout. But we saw between COVID and everything else, like, pitchers need a spring training. So I'm just worried that with no actual deadline, we're going to get up to mid-March or

hell up near April and say, okay, well, you know, we had to actually scare some games and cancel some games, but we need four weeks to get the pitchers ready. So I think that's going to be, What's interesting. And maybe they'll start flashing a real deadline, and that'll be what changes things. Like maybe one side's going to throw out a February 14th deadline, and that'll give us some action. But as of right now, until we get that, I'm kind of, I think we're going to miss a couple and run into like a buck 50 game season. I, right now, I think probably wouldn't surprise people. I get myself ready for the worst.

So when it comes, it doesn't upset me. and I'm like, I was prepared for this. But I've been thinking about it, and I think we're missing games for sure, because neither side sees both sides aren't trying, in my opinion, I would guess from the way we've seen these sides deal with each other before, are they're seeing this February 1 deadline,

quote unquote deadline, as we got a cave by then, but they're saying, I can't wait to prove to them that we won't cave by them. I think they're both preparing to, like, be excited, about being stubborn and being like, we will not let that effect. And then what are you going to do then? Then you need like two weeks of proving to each other that you're not going to cave

before you even start doing anything in good faith. I mean, the way that there are, the things that we've been hinted at, Rob Manfred's like, Rob Manfred's addressed to the public, just blatantly lying, is a bad start. Like Rob Manfred putting in writing, we were forced to lock out the season when it's just a very liberal use of the word force because no you weren't, you voted to.

Like Jameson Tione tweeted they didn't have to do a lockout. They could have negotiated and like put a halt to things while they were negotiating and then I still could use my trainer that I've been working with. But because MLB decided to lock the players out, now I can't use the facilities in the place

where I've been rehabbing this whole time. They didn't have to do that. So, MLB's, Manfred's opening address was just so bad. And it, and it's for people who are in the know. It's like, oh, no. You're just lying. It's like when someone scams your grandma and your grandma starts falling for it. And you're like, no, this guy's not.

These guy's full of shit. Like, how could you, how could anyone fall for this? That was like the tone of Manfred's letter. I'm choosing to be positive here and optimistic because I've been a part of these talks for so long and they are so negative. And we're getting back to stuff we talked about when we were a labor pod back was that, 2020. Yeah. The two sides don't like each other. And I'm going to say this again because I think it's very important.

the thing that's drilled into the players all the time is that Jerry Rinesdorf once said the owner's biggest mistake in 94 was not being willing to sit out for two years so that has been drilled into the players heads and that is why you know this like the licensing checks that we're supposed to get from all the MLB logoed stuff gets put away for years prior to CBA's being up there's a big war chest of money and there's and like I said, think about that. You're willing to wait two years. I think we missed some games then.

I am looking at a chart here. There's been some work stoppages before. Only three times we lost games. They've all been because of a strike. 72, 81, and 94. Every time there's been just, I don't know if lockouts always precedes strikes. I'm not sure.

But anytime there's just been a lockout, but we have not lost any game. So I'm hoping these two sides can come together. Me too. But, I mean, you guys are right to be pessimistic. I'm choosing to be optimistic because I don't want to think about that. It's just people need baseball. We need baseball.

So I'm hoping that... All the numbers were good last year. Like, it's thriving and exciting. I think the streaming was up. I think the age demographic went down. You got young stud. You got Otani, who's the biggest international sensation the game probably has ever had. I mean, he's got to go a couple more seasons, but I think it's fair to say that he has.

He's en route to be. He's on route to be. Each row, but I mean, if Otono, Otone does another year of what he just did. Yeah. I mean, one MVP. The money is, the money is good in baseball. I think the main thing is what they're trying to figure out, and this is pretty difficult. It really is.

It's the distribution of that money. And where should it go? And who should get what? Now, if you look, the team franchise values have risen tremendously over the last 10 years, over the last 20 years. Player salaries really haven't changed at all. So that's not good. And if you really look at the numbers and where those franchises are going and the way players

are paid right now, yes, I know they just showed us half a billion dollars the Rangers just spent. and all this stuff happened. That's not, this isn't who this lockout is about. It's not about the top end 1% players. Like those guys are going to get paid regardless and teams are happy to pay those guys.

They're also happy to pay major league minimum to guys. It's about the guys in the middle. The guys that, you know, spend six years in the minor leagues and then are up and down for five years in the big leagues, never really getting anything. You know, major league minimum it's good i get it if you're making 500 000

a no more person would really really like that but remember this is only for a certain amount of time and if you're getting sent up and down up and down you're actually not making the major league minimum it's it's about those guys you need to be get basically what the players want i think in the end like the best case scenario is up the major league minimum get guys to free agency faster because teams are paying for these paying you know pennies on the compared to worth, like value for these guys when they're young. And then when players finally can get to the point where they can make some coin and actually make what they're worth, they're done.

They're out of the league. Teams get rid of them. And that is the root problem of what's going on. That's what the PA is trying to fix right now. And that's, I think what's going to be interesting. Like, let's put a lot of our cards out there. We're obviously pro player. We have a lot of relationships with players now.

Not a ton with owners, but we're also fans of baseball. Like we became fans of baseball because we watched a lot of great players, a la Trevor Ploof, play the game, and now we're into this world. They want to play a ball. And you're right. They obviously have issues, and this is a contract, but baseball players want to play baseball. Like, that's the end of the day.

They want to make a little more money while doing it. That makes sense. They want to hit free agency or, earlier sure. It's finding out what makes sense from both sides. And I think everyone thinks that the owners are going to come to the table more aggressively because some of the COVID stuff. We talked about it how, you know, a lot of these people have their projections for the next couple of years. They didn't expect the COVID year. How hard did a lot of them really get hit, especially when you start talking about some of these teams where ownership bought a bunch of restaurants around

the stadium and stuff like that. So I think we'll start, we're pretty good at, at hearing the whispers. Like, if things start really getting aggressive, maybe end of January, early February, I think that means the owners are motivated to get this done, and both sides will figure it out. February is really the pivot month for me, because we know how much of this stuff goes back and forth in the media.

And I think you also have to tie it to the sports world, right? I believe the Super Bowl falls right around Valentine's Day this year, if not on Valentine's Day. It's a late Super Bowl, no? Another week in the football season this year. Ah. And so, you know, those, and maybe it's those final two weeks when the Super Bowl's over, if we don't have a lot of updates, what do we see going across in the media? Is it kind of, I don't want to say slander campaigns, but are we working towards something, are we not?

Because, you know, if March 1 becomes a line in the sand, I think everyone can kind of make that work. Like, pitchers will complain because they always do, Trevor, right? These pitchers. but I don't know. I think that time of year we're really going to know if we should be scared or not. Yeah. What do you feel about Manfred's quotes? His one quote was the worst thing that happens is when we lose players in free agency.

Which, I don't know if I... You said that's the most negative reaction they get is when people leave for free agency. Which, hold on, I agree with. And I've talked about on this, it's a weird way he's going about it, but I've talked about it a lot. Like, I like when guys stay with one city, their whole career, when they're good. I liked when Maur did that. I liked how Jeter did that. I think Freddie Freeman should do that right now.

Like I hope Tatis gets locked up. I do think that's better. But the way he's spinning it is that to do that, you have to, like, hurt the players' earnings and keep him under cost-controlled years. for longer when there's different ways to do it. I agree the end result should be try to get guys to one say. I think it's better product for the fan and the city. But we've talked about this lot.

How do you incentivize teams to bring back stars for what they're worth? Now, this was the thought behind the qualifying offer that when you offer the qualifying offer, that's a way to incentivize a team to keep a star because if he doesn't accept it, then you lose a draft pick and you're paying him the average, blah, blah, blah. But it really backfired on the players the way the qualifying offer set up. The owners manipulated it. And that's the big thing. The owners are really smart and the GMs and the front offices are really, really smart.

They're not putting the PA down, but I don't think the PA has the brain power. and the amount of people. We're talking about 30 teams with rooms of smart Ivy League college grads. And a ton of money. And a ton of money to manipulate whatever rules the PA sets. So when the PA sets these rules, they just don't have those kind of resources to be like, hey, run a mock season, run a mock five years with this and see how it can be manipulated. And I think that's why the CBA is, they're going to be a little scared with whatever they set

because it all be manipulated the same way again. that's the thing is doesn't matter what language is in the CBA the owners and the people who are running the teams they pull the strings they they're the ones that make the moves with the players they're the ones that sign the players they're the ones that bring them up and down they're the ones to decide when they're ready like player does players or the PA that has no they can't do that at all so it doesn't matter what language or what rules are put in like you said James the owners can look at it and say okay this is how we're going to, I mean, for back, a lack of a better term, manipulate this. Let's find

the loopholes. Let's find where we can take advantage of it. Look, it's business. Like, that's what that's what they can do. Like, they're allowed to do that. If it's within, you know, the laws of the CBA and the rules of the CBA. So really, it's, it's tough for players because, like you said, like there were some things put in in 2016 that were supposed to be, you know, for, for the players and to help parody and all this stuff. And instead, the owners turned them all and basically created a soft cap with the competitive balance tax they've turned the qualifying offer into basically you know uh yeah like there it's it's gone awry and it but it's not because the brain power is so much better it's because when you are the ones making the decisions you can take a look at

the cb a and to decide how all right this is how we're going to approach this the players and the association really once the cba is done and signed there's not much you can do Yeah, just to expand on the qualifying offer. So it was supposed to make teams offer stars that were leaving contracts to keep them on the team. Problem is it's only a one-year deal. And what players want the most is long-term deals. And the problem was now if a guy leaves, he's got a draft pick attached to him. So we saw in 2019 spring training when they had to make that free agent camp.

It was any player that had a draft pick attached to him, like Keikle, when Keiko went to, oh my God, when Keiko went to the White Sox, or was it the Braves? When Keiko went to the Braves, whatever year that was, he didn't get signed until after the MLB draft because no team thought he was worth losing a draft pick to sign him. So the qualifying offer that the Astros extended him killed his free agency. And Kimbril absolutely obliterated it where he then didn't get a contract and didn't play for two months because they would rather just get him for cheap and not lose it. So, I mean, that's how the qualifying offer, which was it put in place to do what we're asking,

have stars stay in their city. It just completely, like, ruined the middle tier player. Well, and I think that, like, those guys, those are still upper tier. Like, Trev, you mentioned the middle tier. We still need to figure that out. and I know sometimes we reminisce about Yankees teams that had guys like Tim Raines and guys like that on the bench.

And, you know, we have a couple ex-ball players in John Boy Media now that, you know, 2018 would have rather given, you know, Trevor Plouf, a little bit of keesh than find out some rookies. But right now, the cost equation, they'd rather try out the kids. And this is the one where, obviously, I'd say this, we're pro player, we're closer to that. I'm a ball player, blitzball. The average MLB salary went down from 2019 to 2021. Like, just think about that.

Like, I know, like, zoom out a little bit and just think about any company, any organization. If you're making money, like, that's something you should take pride in. I know, we're a smaller company, but, you know, one of the happiest days me and Jimmy had last year, two years ago, was when, you know, the company started going again and we could give everyone, like, bonuses and raises and stuff. Like, that was exciting for us. To see that from 2019 to 2021, the average salary dropped 4.8 percent, like, everything else is going up. So, like, we, you got to figure that out.

You got to figure that out. Because everyone, and, you know, I see it sometimes the chat starts going. We get caught up in the Scherzers and some of those guys. Those aren't the norm. far from it, nor the problem. Yes. But they get the most press and like you and you predict you predicted it, James, when you said this is just a whole,

this is a shiny thing to show people. As such a joke. I predicted that as such a joke. And then he literally said exactly what I said. And I, I tweeted it as such a joke because obviously you can't do that because the world isn't that dumb, Ed Vanfred put it in there.

But it's true. I mean, we still have people caught up on, well, Scherzer's making all this money. No one is fighting for the richest of the richest of the richest of the richest of M&B players. They are getting their worth. We're fighting for the dudes who get run out of baseball when they still have a lot to offer the game because the situation is,

It's much cheaper to pay a rookie 500 grand and shrug and say, hope he's ready than to pay the guy who you know can help contribute to your team what he's worth at that point. So we're just in this cycle of six years of cost control, three team control, three arbitration, and then you better be upper echelon by the time you come out of that six-year window. otherwise you're going to flounder. And that's gone. And that's not because there's a lot of people that come out of that six-year window

that aren't the upper echelon. They're not the Scherzer's. They're not the Chris Taylor's even. Most of them. Most of them. But they're still better than the kids in their first window. So, and if that's the equation, like I don't blame the owners for manipulating it. I really don't.

That's where I think I might differ, like, because they're businessmen. So I understand that. And that's for some players, it's like, well, this kid might be pretty good. And he's 16th of the cost. So what they're trying to do is just change it. So it's not that easy of a decision for the owners and the GMs. And it's a little harder and say, well, you know, let's get the guy who can help us right now and not shrug. And it's not one 16th of the cost.

That's my opinion. Because I understand that in the parameter set, they're businessmen. And like, do you want to roll the dice on Andouhar to repeat his rookie of the year nominated season? Or do you want to spend $300 million on Machado? Like, wrong decision at the time. But I understand that's the thought process that the last CBA given them. So that's what the CBA and the players are trying to change now. So I got to go soon.

You guys know that I gave the out. But I totally agree with everything you just said. it's about those middle-tier players, guys that have risen through the grind and have made it. And it's like they return to like get paid what they're actually worth or even close to it. And then they're gone. And I want to make a point.

You said three years of league minimum, three years of arbitration, and then you get free agency. The average big league career is like three years. It's like before you even get to arbitration, And that's not to even think about you get drafted at a high school. I believe there's five years before they even have to put you on a roster. I think it's four years before they have to put you on the 40 men.

Then there's three years of options there that they can send you up and down with no penalty. And then you have the three and three. It is you are under team control and making. I mean, we know what the minor leagues makes. It's nothing. You are losing money essentially to play in the minor leagues most of the time. They control you for a good 12 years. Yeah.

That's freaking nuts. So Clint Frazier. You reach the apex of your profession, of a highly lucrative profession. You reach it. You do well. And then they kick you to the curb. It's brutal. Clint Frazier has played in parts of five MLB seasons.

He's had a lot of injuries and that hurt him as well. But he also rode the bus up and down so often. and sometimes it was performance-based, but I'm just trying to make a point here. He played in parts of five seasons, and he has accrued three years of service time. So the fact that they can manipulate that, I mean, they did it with Brandon Drury, the Yankees, they've done it with, they did it with Tommy Canley, where they just send you down because you have an option, and then you're not accruing service time, and then that pushes your free agency back. I remember they pushed Brandon Drory.

They kept him in AAA for like 30-something days. It's like the maximum rehab assignment. Yeah, because that made him under contract for one more full season, which come arbitration, basically those five extra days you kept him in the minor leagues, you cost him come arbitration a couple million dollars because that's just the control they have. So that's the major issue here. It's nothing to do with the high line players and numbers. And that's, you know, we say Clint Frazier, we throw him out there.

That guy's, you know, he was a top five draft pick. Like, he's also almost not the norm. Like that guy, you know, we don't even picture him that way. But yeah, and just the other thing, and I guess this would be my counter to Uncle Rob about guys changing teams, go check out your relief pitcher situation around baseball because this is what teams are doing. If you have a reliever who's maybe in his third or fourth year with a team,

a guy you're getting pretty familiar with. He might be getting ready to make $1.5 million. Good amount of money, right? Well, they can have three rookies make $500K and hope they're as good as that guy. So that's the kind of cost analysis equation that these front offices are doing that honestly kind of makes sense as a business. But that would be increased player movement, wouldn't it? Don't we want to keep these guys on teams so fans don't get sad?

I really have to go. There's Derek in the chat. Derek in the chat said, I sound out of touch because 500K for only a few years is 10 times a salary of many Americans. I understand. 500K. Well, you've got to take into account the window.

Tell them, Trev. Taking the account, you're not making that for the rest of your life. You also just went to the minor leagues where you were losing money. You were living below the poverty wage there. you have to give all that up and guess what people aren't going to like me saying this but playing in major league baseball is an expensive lifestyle you have to have an apartment for six months you have to find a rental apartment in spring training for too much teams don't pay for any of that you have to ship your cars you have to pay for your family to come to the games if they want to if you want to see

your family at all you got to pay for flights for them then you got to tip the club out staff you have to pay your dues you have to pay your agent fees you have to pay taxes like you you think you're going to come away with 500 grand if you're lucky on 500 grand half of that's gone already because you're in the top tax bracket it's gone okay and then you have to pay for all the stuff and yeah and you still have bills and all this like you're lucky to save i don't even know it's not it's not like these guys are making out like bandits on 500 grand they're just not it's expensive freaking lifestyle more that's just part of it you it's very hard to make it a not expensive lifestyle how about that yeah there are i mean it is a lot of money for

a job. I think the the shelf life is is more what I land that there. Like you said the average. They're just not going to keep all that money either. It's not like you just get this in the bank. You train and they make you lose money training for this profession you know, whatever. They pay you shit and that's what they need to fix the minor league system. But it's more just a shelf life. Like a lot of guys are earning money. Yeah. The shelf life is the main thing, but I can itemize

all your expenses to be a professional. baseball player, things they expect you to do, hiring trainers in the off season, finding facilities, and they want you to eat right, but they don't really feed you right. So it's like, there are so many things, man. Trev, can you keep mentioning you have to go? You said you had a hard out of one. Do you want to tell the people where you're heading? I'm going to.

No, I don't really want to because that's going to make me sound bad. But I am going to Las Vegas for a charity event. Yes. Yes. Doing some golf thing out there. some former big leaguers, Tori and Griffey, which would be really cool.

I don't even know if they know I'm coming. I'm kind of like crashing this thing, so that'll be fun. Joe Tori? Your media. I know. Joe Tori? No, Tori with two eyes.

Yeah, Tori Hunter. Our teammate. I like Tori Hunter. I was more excited. I thought it was going to be Joe Tori. Last thing I want to say before I go. Shout out, Jim Cott, Tony Oliva,

all the other guys, Buck O'Neill, there's a bunch of guys that got inducted into the Hall of Fame. Very proud of all those guys. I love Tony Oliva. I gave a story on baseball today about him. One of the best dudes in baseball ever. Out of all those guys,

which one do you think Shaves his pubs the best? You know I love Cuban ball players. Let's go, Tonyo. Let's go. Ho, ho, ho, fellas. Noddy or nice. Tis the season to perform. You don't know what to get as a gift or a stocking stuffer.

Well, today's sponsor, Manscaped has the tools to guarantee you. It has the tools to guarantee you win this year's stocking stuffer or white elephant competition. When's the last time you were in a stocking stuffing competition? Shoulder one your white elephant, BBD. Manscaped is the leader in men's below the waist grooming, and they have served more than 4 million men worldwide. If my math is correct, that's over 8 million balls. Get 20% off plus free shipping at Manscape.com.

Get 20% off and free shipping at Manscape.com slash talking. Be the balliest gift giver this year with Manscaped. Tom Ace has a really good point in the chat. We met Tom. Nice guy. Good dude. I dedicated a game to him. He said, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.

Cot lets it grow. And like that's obvious. Just so obvious. ATO. I mean, it's bad. We'll get him some Manscaped. Before we move on... He lived in a van, I think, so.

Or like a camper, I think him and his wife RVed. Not ideal situations for manscaping. Before we move on to the next topic, we want to do, because there's some stuff we've got to catch up on. Sure. Just while we're showing the labor discussion, an example of a guy just to show how long a team can just control you and you're not in control of your career. Again, not to be Yankee-centric, but they're the team I'm most aware of.

I mean, Higgy, our guy, he was drafted out of. of high school in the seventh round. It wasn't added to the 40 man until he had to be. And he was an up and down third guy. Now he's going to be 32 years old this year and he just entered arbitration for the first time. So in theory, three more years will be 35 the first year. He has like his own choice. If he, if that happens.

Man, they like protected him from rule five. I mean, Higgie's not like a slugger or whatever. But it's just wild that in all his time he's never once been able to, like maybe a new team. It's not an option. It's not an option. He's kind of the case study for this is how long they could keep you. How long?

Out of high school, he was drafted. I don't believe he went to college. So 18. So from 18, then whatever the number of years there. He's going to be 32 in April of this year. So not that he maybe he's never wanted out, but that's wild. Like we're talking 14 years. Think about how many jobs you've had until year 35.

Similarly, Lucas Linky just said Arbor. I want to play. If I want to play baseball, it's with this team, and I have no say. That's kind of wild. All right, you want to talk about some of these signings? I think so, right? Yeah. Do you?

Some of them, like not a lot of them, to be as honest as I can. We open up Podger sign. There's two big ones. Podger signed Nick Martinez, four-year-twenty. 20-m-deal deal? Like, no. Nice little story. But, yeah, I think... Two big boys came off the board. Marcus Stroman.

Three-year, 71-mil with an opt-out after the second. I read somewhere that, like, a joke, it was like, they just asked for what Verlander got, but in half. But is it not even in half? No, it's the same. No, the first two years is $250. He got with Verlans. So that joke was wrong. With a bonus year. Yeah, he's the option for the third year.

Yeah, I saw so many. any different reactions to this signing? Because I think he's a hot rod on Twitter. People were saying it was an overpay. And then people were saying, oh, he didn't get nearly what he wanted. It's a pretty good contract. Pretty good signing. Yeah, I mean, you just, so, A, I'd be fascinated to know how the coming up on the timeline

and the buzzer affected his free agency. Because you're right. I'm guessing both sides of that argument would be, you know, there's a pretty good conversation that Marcus Stroman could have got five years, four or five years. But he does get really good money. He's getting 25 per these next two years. That's, you know, that is big boy money. So, I mean, congrats to Stroman in that way.

And I think the team was also surprising the Cuppies. Yes, it makes you think about what they're doing in, like, kind of like my favorite gift that no one knows, Sean Wallace, where he's kind of thinking and then his eyes trinkling, he goes, huh. Hmm. That famous Sean Wallace. Wallace, Sean.

Because are the Cubs, the Cubs aren't going to not get anyone else. Why would you give $50 million for the next two years if you're not trying to compete? So I did one of my classic Jakey deep dives into this Cubs roster. I mean, top to bottom. Classic deep dive, hours of your life. Really investigating, what's going on here?

Yes. I think next year is their find out year. They had a couple guys. They had Frank Schwindle kind of went nut job for a little bit. What's Frank Schwindle about? They had Patrick Wisdom go nut job last year. Nico Horner, again, big prospect for them formerly of the compound. Like, what's he really about?

So our guy Nick Madrigal should be with them next year. So I think next year for the Cubs is kind of... What do you say next year? 2020? This coming season. I think we say this year. This year for the Cough, I mean, 2022, it's 2021. I think there's a conversation to be had there easily.

The next baseball season. This baseball season? We're in a weird area here, but I would, I thought you were, I thought you were talking about 2023, so that's why I was going to. The 22 Cubs. Raphael Ortega, go look at his stats. No, refuse. You'd like them, though.

Okay. I think it's kind of the Cubs want to find out where they actually land, and then they'll have Stroman for that year, and then they can make aggressive Cubs moves. But at the same time, they could use a short stuff. There's rumors that I believe and don't believe all the same that they were linked to Correa, that they reached out to him. They could use a guy like that.

And they also made that sneaky Wade Miley move at the beginning of all of this. So they added Stroman and Miley, which Stroman Hendrix Miley, I don't think that should scream to anyone about like a top three, but Alec Mills. Alec Mills is currently their five-starter. They have Adbert, Alzalae is the four.

Yeah, I mean, everyone knows that that's just stupid. But I don't know. Again, Cubs fans, you guys let me know a little better. I know our Jill. Jill's an all-star Cubs fan. Jill H. So, yeah, good for Strzman. I think they got to go get other people now.

I mean, do they get Bryant back? Do they get Correa back? How big do they go? But they can't stand. Pat, if you give a guy 50 mil for the next two years, you're kind of declaring we're opening a window here. Well, you're just, like, kind of like sneaking the window open and then, like, people are noticing it because what are you doing?

What do you do with the window? You're just, you're not slamming it open like this. Like, just kind of, like, slowly opening it. other wild card in Cubsland is Wilson Contreras. There's trade rumors around him. We've seen the catcher market and they signed Jan Goams. So there's a conversation there. Are they waiting for the DH and Wilson Contreras can be a kind of catcher DH type or do they plan on moving contraris and either getting another arm? And, you know, would we be shocked if they did another like Jock Peterson type thing where they should sign a guy to one year and hope he clicks for a little bit?

I think that's where the Cubbies are going to land. I had that moment of, I don't want to say fear, but if the Cubs get in the shortstop game, like the prices go back up. But I don't think they are. I think they are. You think they are? How long do they have Magical for the next five years?

He's playing second base. I know. How long do they have them for? A while. So. Well, they also have Horner, who is like a big time prospect, and they currently have him penciled in the short. So I think this year might be a Horner or Madrigal one of you guys is going to stick.

I don't think they can do that. Okay. Like if you're giving Struman 25 mil for this upcoming season, you should try to win around him. Otherwise, why did you do that? Coming into the off season, there were like rumors around the fringes about Cubs potentially being involved in the short stops too. And everyone thinks they have a chance to bring back Rizzo who's, you know, not as, his best form, but he's still very much a high-quality MLB player. So they can do stuff.

He gave, like, a big heartful stuff. Goodbye. You're just move on. Yeah. What if the Yankee thing just becomes a blip? I think the Yankee thing will be a blip. Like the parents got divorced and then he's, but they actually got back together.

Like, remember that? Remember that month? It was, like, seven months? It was last year. Dad was sleeping at Uncle Gary's? What was that? about. He said he had back complaints about the mattress, but that didn't seem right. My back's been killing. He could have just slept downstairs. He likes the bed downstairs.

Sure, Rizzo can go back, but I think they did a haul goodbye. People cried. Showed up at the door drunk. People cried. People did cry. But people cry. Oh, all the time. Cubs, do a little more. Because I mean, these moves, still don't have the Cubs messing with the brewers or the Cardinals, really? Yeah, not really. But, I mean, Vogelbacks off the Brewers now, so. Ooh.

So where's he going to go? That's the rest of the episode. Where will Dan Vogelback go? Follow him on Instagram. Pretty good follow. Yeah? Yeah. I'm trying to figure out where he's going to go.

Right now. Okay, the three of us get to give our Vogel back predictions. It needs to be a place that already has a big guy. He can't be the only big guy. Wow, Yankees. You have Voguey to the Yanks. Insane. Yeah.

I'll go. Spring training invite. I'm going to go Seattle. BBD? Back to Seattle? Vogue's going back. Organizations like him. Back, back, back to where I have.

Deep in thought. Until Jimmy said Yankees, I was thinking about same thing, like a minor league invite situation. Oh, yanks, too. No, because now I don't believe in it. Okay. I never believe. To be mean. So no pick. No pick. I'm out. Okay. Good prediction.

Prediction pot. I don't think Bbedee's going to get it right. It's a tough, man. I don't think he's going to get that. Every chance in the world. The other one is Chris Taylor. Four years, $60 million. We have a note here that says GSJ is mad about it. Who said that? In our notes, it says GSJ is mad about it. Oh, we don't speak about the hushman.

Good for the Dodgers? Good for the Dodgers. Good for Chris Taylor. Belly had a silly belly video that was going around the internet the other day where we called them money bags or something like that. It was good. Yeah, I think we all kind of did the turkey math on this that with Seeger gone,

with Scherzer gone. The Dodgers having money and still wanting to pay players. It seemed like this linked up. And I think it ties into the Stroman conversation a little bit. Chris Taylor did have the qualifying offer attached that I do think scared teams away a little bit. And there was also rumors that he really wanted to return to L.A. Why would you not? So when you put.

That team seems so close and so fun, and he just plays wherever he wants, and they're always in the postseason. When you put all of that in the bucket, it was like, yeah, Chris Taylor was going back. And I think there was an initial reaction from every contending team, because every contending team would have a spot for Chris Taylor, because Chris Taylor plays every position. That it was like, 15 mil a year, Chris Taylor, he could have been a fit here. Yeah, but I think he wanted to go back to L.A.

Did you think he was going to get more? I kind of did. I thought the number was going to drop. I tweeted like right before he signed because they said he was signing, but they didn't have the numbers yet. I thought there was a chance we got like a four for 80 or maybe even a little more just because I thought as the free agent started to go. And like I said, supply and demand, a lot of teams wanted Chris Taylor. But I think the qualifying offer took a couple teams out of the running. That it kind of landed.

I think a lot of people were kind of expecting the 4-for-60. Good for him, man. I know we like telling the good stories of baseball players, but, like, he was a DFA kind of spit-around guy, right? They were done with them. Turner, Moncey. Swing class crew. Dodgers are the original reclamation team.

Should we do a Dodgers swing-class shirt that's just, like, swing? It's people swing dancing, and there's baseball stuff on it. And what's the guy, Van Skoyek? Van Skoyek. Whatever his name? is he's the instructor Van Skoelik Van Squeez me

Okay What do you know about Scott Kamenicki Scott Kamenicki? He was a ball player Yes It was Third base

He's a pitcher So What am I think? I was thinking of Ken Kamenetti I used to always switch the letters there Oh Okay Sorry

No, it's okay I mean I explain myself In other news James Paxton Didn't we did we talk about this Red Sox signed James Paxton One year 10 million

We did on talking yanks Oh yeah Red Sox Red Sox got a grab bag of pitchers They got James Paxton Rich Hill And wasn't there another one And Waka

They already have a solid one through four So One of those guys They'll get innings out of those three Somehow And I think This was buried about the Paxton deal because he is coming off T.J.

And I don't think he's expected back to midseason. So we've done a lot of our T.J. talking here. There's a club option for the next season. That makes a lot of sense. That's a good Tommy John deal. I think you'd think that might be a bigger factor in it than next year. But interested to see. Because, yeah, they are expecting Waka and Hill to pitch innings for them, Major League

innings next year. Paxton, I think they have it as like if we do see a midway through next year. Cool. But if not, we have that club option if we want it. Does Paxton have incentives? Because isn't his Seattle deal, wasn't it, like, every 10 games and he only pitched one? I don't know what his incentives are, but he can get up to 3 million incentives. and there's some funky, it's some funky option stuff because it,

I can't tell if it's like one of those weird two-year things and then he gets a player thing, but there's two option years after this year for 13 each, and then it becomes a player option for 4 mil next year if the Red Sox declined the 13-mill. So let's say you get to the 10-mill guarantee. Interesting. So this was a Red Sox specific show, I'd be all over that. Well, I had there. That's the type of contract you like.

I know. They're so bizarre. I don't think he made any money last year. So how much is he going to get this year? His salary this year is $6 million. He has a $10 million guarantee because it's... With the buyout? Because it's a, yeah, buyout slash option.

Just a little... Player option. Inside into the price of starting pitcher. James Paxson might get 10 mil this year for kind of nothing. Oh, be good and get Tomajun. You get Tomajun guaranteed 10 mil. Yeah. Do you know who won the 2012 award of excellent?

in sports law? I don't. It was Dick Moss. Sure was. Dick Moss. I feel like we've talked about Dick Moss. Probably. I mean, you're not going to come across that name and not talk about it.

And then he looks like the clown. No, he looks like the dead guy in a doctor. What's the game where you try to play doctor? Is it called doctor? Operation. Operation. He looks like that guy. that's all the signings

unless there's some I missed No I mean there's other small ones And some trades Do we have another Yeah draft kings Oh The main advertiser Presenting the show

What do you think the odds are For you to win The title tomorrow In Rio You only had to beat me last time Now you got to beat three other people Can we get them To get Bino bits

For the next tournament Yeah I just I think we can Do we have to sign like a competition act? Something. Like in good faith, we will play Bino to our best abilities and we won't, like, rig it. Players competing. We'll talk to them.

Okay. Well, for now, before you can bet on our Bino tournament, which is Tuesday at 7 o'clock, you're just going to have to bet $1 on an NFL game for a team to score, and then you win $100 free dollars in bets. How about that? A single point gets scored. You get $100 in your account that you can use to bet. And if you take 50 of those dollars and you bet it and then you win a million dollars,

you cash out. Now you've won a million dollars and you only put down to $1. Wow. Great bet. $50 down to win a million? Would love to know what the odds were there. Download the Draft King Sportsbook app now. Use promo code Johnboy bet $1 in any team to score and win $100 in free bets.

If they score, you score with promo code Johnboy this week at Drafking Sportsbook. an official sports betting partner of the NFL. Must be 21-year-old or New Jersey, Indiana, or PA. Only new customers only minimum $5 deposit, $1 wage. It required one per customer restrictions. Apply cedrafficings.com slash sportsbook for details. The gambling palm call 1-800 gambler.

The grandee man to manage the Mats? Yeah, I think. You don't say? I don't think it's going to happen. I think it's, if he does good for him, for me, that's always one of those like, dude, you made a lot of money playing baseball. You've got a pretty sweet TV gig. And I think he does a lot of stuff with the players alliance.

He's the president of the players' alliance. So I don't know. Like I'd be happy with the Mets. Like he's one of the most beloved guys around baseball. They're also interviewing Quattaro today, the raised bench croach. Ray's bench coach. They'll probably give it to him, man. Kind of tell us your secrets award.

Tell us your egress award. There's a couple trades we could touch on. All right. There is the Renfro JBJ one at the deadline, which... I love that. Want to know why I love it? Because I've made up fan fiction about it. Ooh, okay.

Let me name the players in the trade because I did partially break it. And then you tell us the fan fiction, and we'll see what overlaps. Hunter Renfro is going to the brew crew. Jackie Bradley Jr., and two specs, prospects, are going to the Boston Red Sox. And Jim, why is that again? I have fan fiction about this trade. Cora, Science's Extension, right? The kind of, last year, they didn't know about Cora.

They just hire him to appease the fan base and a scapegoat, and then Heim was going to get his new guy afterwards. Some thought maybe that was it. Cora comes in, big swinging dick, wins everyone over, gets him to the playoffs, has a lot of fun, advances him. They give Cora the extension. Cora says, I need one thing. Go get me my centerfielder.

Oh, okay. And scene? That's end of it, yeah. End scene. Because Heim didn't want to bring him back at all. So, J.B. Jay had, like, the worst offensive year of his career last year.

But Corr said, I will sign this extension, but I need one thing. You go get me my center fielder. So it's good. Great. It's good to be buddies. And that is fan fiction.

That is fan fiction. I saw a good tweet. I think it was by our guy. Sung-meen Kim who said this is the Red Sox selling high on Renfro Renfro had a really nice year

last year he was kind of a key cog for the Red Sox And if you remember Renfro the COVID year For the raise we were kind of almost laughing at him His at bats became pretty tough towards the end

But again weird COVID year All that stuff he's always Had a really good arm defensively blah blah It's them selling high on Renfro. They're buying low on JBJ, kind of what you said. Like JBJ's hitting last year was bad, bad, bad. Never been what JVJ's been about, but it was below what he's normally about.

So if they can get, if those things return back to medium, they can still use JBJ. I mean, people have seen, we've all seen him patrol center field at Fenway and in the Red Sox uny. If they can get value out of JBJ, they kind of swapped outfielders, and then they picked up two prospects along the way. So I kind of like that angle on it. Like, you know, they're kind of, you're flipping the, flipping the coin on the outfield a little bit, and you'll see what return there. Plus, you got two prospects. If one of them hits, you've, like, fully won the trade. I like it from the brewer's side a lot. And the brewers, I mean, it's, their side's kind easy like, right?

Lost the right fielder, got a right fielder. Boom. Do what you did. Hunter Info is more a Ray's Brewer's type player. It's true. Red Sox fans aren't going to like that, but it is true. I don't have it as a knock on the Red Sox.

I know. They could still not like that. I just have them more as like an analytics platoon. We're going to ring out the best of you. Guy. Great arm. Great arm. Great arm.

And it was really good. 816 OPS from Hunter Redfro. 31 homers. That's his second 30-plus homer season in the bag. Tell me everything you know about Bob Wickman. Four. Dude, you're going to love Bob Wickman. A, he was a gross closer for a little bit in the 90s.

And B, I think he has half a finger. You know his agent was? No. Dick Moss. Should have knew that. Yeah. Should have known that. You really should have known that.

Bob Wickman only had half a finger. I bet I could butternice some stats. I could, Jim, I could do it. Do it. The last four full seasons? So you take out 2020. 2017, 18, 19, 2021. Hunter Renfro has 25 plus home runs in each of those seasons.

I bet I could, I could chop that down and make him with a pretty elite crew. Do it. Maybe I will. Butter knife away, man. Go then. I'm gone.

And I think if you, by rate the eight homers you had in 2020, I think that because that's what, 24 over 162? Is that how the math works? I'm not a math guy. I'm not a math guy. I'm not going to multiply by three, right? Three, six, and one 20. I think that's high.

I think we got to get rid of it. You're doing eight times three is 24. Nobody can do that math, Dave. I call you Dave. Jolly calls you Dave And now it's throwing everything out Throwing numbers at me He's homer at a 25 homer pace every year at least

I can feel my brain melt When you do that Is there anything else on the list that we need to talk about Uh There will be a day There will be a day I think it should become a running joke of the show When we talk about some of the extensions we missed

We keep hinting at the Adam Fraser trade. But we talked about it. But we talked about it. Like Mariners fans, come on. Talked about it when they got Ray. We like it. Jordan Liles to the Orioles. How much?

One year seven mill. I would love to know those contract negotiations. Because this was like the last one at the buzzer. Did you want to know what it is? Okay. And this isn't fan fiction, right? This is more fan fiction. Okay, it's more fan fiction.

And this is like the Roberto Perez, the pirates. Okay. This is a memo from Manfred. And this is fan fiction. A memo from Manfred to all teams. And you say, hey, good or bad. Big or small. Rich or poor.

Go sign someone in the middle. Anyone. We need leverage here. Orioles going to need you to go spend seven million. on someone. Pirates, please go spend 7 mil on someone. Debex.

You guys were awful last year. I'm going to need you to go spend some money, make some moves. We're going to negotiations and we need every team on the column of, did you do something and pay a guy? That's my fan fiction of why the Orioles signed Liles

and why the pirates signed Roberto Perez when they don't have to. Can I tell you more things about the Jordan Lyle? contract. So it's a 500k signing bonus, salary of 5.5K. So that's up to six million. So that's a $6 million. And then it's a $1 million buyout after this year.

That's how you get the 7-mill contract. It's an $11 million team option for next season if he's good. Why would they pick that up? I have something mean that I'm not going to say. But if I'm going to say it The only reason that team option is good is if they want to trade Jordan Liles And then the team grabbing him Retains that team option

And the only reason the Orioles would put that in there And I think the benefits luxury tax Stuff I think Here's my thing Yeah Yeah And it's kind of mean so I'm not going to say it All right, it sounds like you're going to say it

But you're a free agent And you're like, you know Uh huh hey, like if maybe the Dodgers or the Rays, like if they see something that they like, I'm doing, maybe we'll tap into that, you know, kind of go to the next level. The Orioles call you up and they're like, some of our numbers really like you.

You're like, oh, no. Well, dirty little secret. That's not good. That isn't talked about. The dude who basically gets a lot of credit for building the Astros team is with the Orioles now. So maybe it is. Jordan Liles.

Former Astros, great. Double check that. Double check that. I double check that. It felt right. Just Google. He was part of the Texas Rangers' old man staff. But yeah, he came up with Houston.

Jordan Liles. Let's go. Former Astros. Great. I'm going to Google it. I'm going to Google all those words with quotes around them. See if it's ever been typed on the Internet before. No.

So you're a liar. One more Jordan Liles fact before we get out of here. Jim, Jordan Liles has pitched on one, two, three, four, five, six baseball teams. Mm-hmm. On five of those six, he has an ERA in the fives. 16. Two years with the Milwaukee Brewers, a 264. Bring Jordan home, Milwaukee.

Might be a trade. Maybe. Early rumors. This year's trade deadline, Jordan Liles to the bruce. John Boy Media's Brewer's Beat reporter, Jake Sterrelli, early Jordan Liles trade rumors.

Don't drop your belt. Bino tomorrow night, 7 p.m. One more thing. And we have one more ad. If you've been with us this long and you're still listening to the episode, you are a real one. And our sales department

or just our company is looking for a quick favor from everyone. I'm going to read this. We are incredibly grateful for each of you in the John Boy Media. We want you guys to fill out a survey for us to let us know how we can better do everything we're doing. And if you fill out this survey, you will get a 20% discount code to the John Boy Media store.

It'll take you less than five minutes to complete. Please consider doing it to help us out. All you have to do is click the link in the survey in the description of this episode on YouTube and answer the questions and you get 20% off our store. Thank you for letting us learn. more about our audience so we can make this community better than it already is being your belt on the line tomorrow night john boy and jake tv youtube channel live streaming chose mcfly will be doing play by play i will be participating jake will be participating bbd will be participating zack will be participating

jo's will be participating jally will be participating shackle will be participating and then maybe chris mcfly is the eighth spot and that's it that's all we got what an episode love talking ball Thank you.