December 30, 2025 • 33 mins
Host Tom Verducci welcomes the coming New Year by celebrating the 90th birthday of Sandy Koufax! Tom looks back and the accomplishments of Koufax and how his career started and how he ended as a Hall of Famer, 4x World Series Champion, and 3x Cy Young Award winner. Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh wins the SI Breakout Player Award. Tom documents his career from getting cut in high school to making the Major Leagues. What happens next for Raleigh and how does he respond after his 60 home run season?
Pitchers are throwing faster than ever, but using less fastballs overall. Tom brings out the data from this season to look at where the use of the fastball is heading. Throwing 100mph used to be an anomaly, now every team has a pitcher that hits the mark. The number of 100mph pitches has quadrupled in just the 6 years! Tom wraps up 2025 with some MLB news on the A's and the future of Alex Bregman.
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
The Book of Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio,
Hey Darreon Welcome Back. It is the Book of Joe
Podcast with me, Tom Berducci and without Joe Madden. This
time Joe's away for the holidays. Wishing him and all
(00:27):
of you a very happy new year, a great twenty
twenty six. What I wanted to do first of all
is wish a very happy birthday to a baseball legend
and even more importantly a good friend, mister Sandy Kofax. Yeah, unbelievably,
Sandy Kofax, forever young, is turning ninety years old. I
(00:51):
know that's hard to believe. He looks great, and every
time I go to Dodger Stadium in the postseason, I
look forward to seeing Sandy Kofax down there and his
seat field level by home plate. Sandy Kofas have always
been fascinated by him. Just the integrity, humility, and the
conviction of Sandy Kofax. Besides obviously one of the great
(01:14):
left handed pitchers of all time, Sandy Kofax was known
as the left arm of God. And at this time
of year, we talk a lot about the Hall of Fame,
and my hall of fame ballot is in the mail
on its way to Cooperstown. Those ballots will be announced.
The results of that will be announced in January. Sandy Kofax,
(01:35):
to me, is one of these inner circle Hall of
famers where you don't have to look at the numbers.
He defined baseball in that era, and when you look
at the stretch that he did have, it defines greatness
in probably a more of a brief period of time
because of his arm injury than anybody wanted to see.
(01:56):
I mean, check this out. From nineteen sixty one, nineteen
sixty three to nineteen sixty six, you're talking about a
four year period, Sandy Kofax averaged two hundred ninety eight
innings a season with a one point eighty six er.
Let me say that again, over a four year period,
(02:16):
he averaged just about three hundred innings per year with
a sub to er. I mean, that is crazy. I
know it was a depressed hitting environment back then in
the sixties, but my goodness. He also, by the way,
you talk about big game pitchers career era in the
postseason zero point nine to five. That is the lowest
(02:40):
of the more than two hundred pitchers who have started
at least five postseason games. The greatness of the man
was even greater in the biggest moments. That is a
testament to a true champion. But yeah, think about how
his career began too. And I love this story because
remember he was signed at a Brooklyn in nineteen fifty five,
(03:01):
a bonus baby had to be carried on the major league.
Was really just a hard thrower who had no idea
where the ball was going. And it was pretty much
that sort of pitcher with some peaks and valleys for
the first five or six years of his career. And
then it was a spring training game in nineteen sixty one.
The Dodgers back then trained at Dodgers Town in Vero Beach,
(03:22):
still my favorite spring training destination of all time. By
the way, they were playing an away game in Orlando,
so the split squad game, so the staff stayed behind.
So Sandy Kofax is going to pitch in Orlando and
the staff is not there that day, so there's no
pressure from the pitching coach, the manager, you know, trying
(03:43):
to perform and make yourself look good in front of
the brass. He gets on a plane. It was a
short flight to Orlando and Larry Sherry is his catcher
and says, let's try something different today. Let's just throttle back.
Because Kofax was a max effort kind of guy, and
Larry Sherry just advised him's throttle back on it and
(04:04):
see what happens. And Sandy Kofax used the term famously.
I took the grunt out of my fastball, basically not
trying to throw the ball as hard as he could.
He was supposed to go five innings, but the pitcher
behind him in the sequence mapped out for that game
missed the flight. So now Sandy has to go seven innings,
(04:25):
so there's even more of incentive for him to throttle
back on this fastball. Well, he throws seven no hit innings.
I mean, first of all, the idea of somebody throwing
seven innings in spring training, you can tell it was
a different era. But as Sandy Kofax said, I came
back a different pitcher than I left, and that began
(04:47):
his years of dominance of Major League baseball. I mean,
he had three years in a row where he won,
or three out of four years where he won the
Major League Baseball Triple Crown, not the League Triple Crown.
The Major League Triple Crown. It's just fascinating to me
that it can happen that quickly. Of course, this is
before technology, before somebody found another pitch through the use
(05:07):
of high speed cameras or changing their grip on getting
a different kind of spin access on their breaking ball.
This was all just old school. Hey, let's try something
different today. So happy birthday, Sandy Kofax, ninety years old.
And they also wanted to point out something that I'm
not sure if you caught this. Sports Illustrated announced their
(05:29):
end of the Year awards and the Major League Baseball
Breakout Player of the Year is cal Raley with the
Seattle Mariners. This is another story I love because, again,
you talk about someone who you think of as being
a superstar player, like a Sandy Kofax, but it's the
journey to get there that made their story so fascinating.
(05:51):
Most players you see, certainly hitting sixty home runs. I
mean it's plug and play, man. You see these guys
coming a mile away. The greatness is obvious at an
early age. Not so the case with cal Raley. And
when I talked to him for a story I did
on SI for winning this award is the breakout player
of the year. He was so proud of the fact
(06:13):
that it did not come easy for him because he
knows all the hard work that he put in. I mean,
this is a guy who in the minor leagues, he
bought himself a small machine to fire tennis balls at
him to learn how to block the ball better behind
the plate as a catcher. You know, all the years
and pitches he had from his dad. It was a
college coach in North Carolina in the batting cage, just
(06:35):
time after time, trying to really hone his stroke from
both sides of the plate, which, by the way, he's
a natural switch hitter. I know you've never heard of
such a thing, but I asked cal if he was
natural ready or left. He actually said neither, And it
is true. As soon as he could stand, his dad
put one of those big red plastic bats in his
(06:56):
hand and had him hit from both sides of the plate,
just literally flipping balls from just almost a foot away
from him and switching his hands around and changing the
grip to bat as a switch hitter. As soon as
he could stand. It's the only thing he's ever known.
And what his dad, Todd told me was that he
never wanted his kids to think they had a quote
(07:17):
unquote weaker side of the plate. And it's true. You
look at the breakout year that cal Raley had and
he just smashed the ball from the right hand side.
He's there's really no platoon split with cal Raley. Definitely
a platoon neutral in terms of power. And getting back
to his story, I didn't realize all the things he
(07:37):
had gone through to get to the major leagues. First
of all, as a middle school kid, he was cut
for the baseball team. I mean, how many guys had
sixty home runs were cut from the middle school team
growing up. By the way, he was also cut from
the basketball team that year. Yeah, I mean, you talk
about a blow to somebody. And this is a kid
who loved baseball. He's in a cage all his time,
all the time with his dad. Yeah, he was young
(07:59):
trying out for the team. But my goodness, what a
blow for a young kid who just dreams of being
a baseball player. So he gets to high school, he
starts playing. He's the catcher on the team, and check
this out, he's such a poor hitter that the coach
used the DH for him, not for the pitcher. You know,
in high school you can use a DH for any
(08:20):
position on the field. They DHD for cal Rawley in
high school. Crazy right, Then, as he sort of gets
bigger and matures, becomes a decent player, he wants to
play D one college baseball. Why not? And a bunch
of college coaches are telling him, you'll never be a
D one player. You're nothing but a D three player.
I mean, you talk about something that he has worn
(08:43):
as a chip on his shoulders since he goes to
Florida State. And you know, he had a thumb injury,
so he didn't play his summer before his junior year,
which is going into his draft year, and he had
kind of a season that was affected by the thumb
and finger injury as a sophomore. So some of the
scouts who are high or on cal Ray began to
(09:05):
cool on him. And that was the year the Seattle
Mariners started an analytic system where they ranked players in
the draft according to an algorithm essentially, and they had
cal Raley in that draft class rated at number three
hundred and seventy nine. Now they wound up taking him
(09:25):
in the third round, which is still kind of crazy
when you think about a guy hitting sixty home runs,
and by the way, they had Logan Gilbert in the
first round. You talk about a real good draft. That's
franchise changing. But cal Raley has worn all those things proudly.
And by the way, when he got to the major leagues,
they didn't think he could hit right handed, and they
had him platooning with a guy named Tom Murphy. Decent player,
(09:49):
but you look back on it now and you're like,
cal Rawley wasn't even an everyday player when he first
got to the major leagues. So here he is in
twenty twenty five, sixty home runs, the first catcher in
baseball history with sixty home runs, the only switch hitter
in base history with sixty home runs, the second youngest
player to hit sixty home runs. Only Roger Marris back
(10:11):
in nineteen sixty one was younger. And you think about
his ascension to sixty. You know, in the auto industry
they like to measure acceleration by how fast you go
from zero to sixty. Well, Cal's acceleration to sixty off
the charts great. Thirty four home runs in twenty twenty four,
and then he throws out sixty the next year, There's
(10:33):
only one player to get the sixty home runs who
got there faster year to year, and that was Sammy
Sosa back in nineteen ninety eight, who increased his home
runs from thirty six to sixty six. And make that
what you will. So I think of Sandy Colefax and
I think of cal Raley at this time of year
(10:53):
and how we liked to to find greatness. When I
look at these Hall of Fame ballots in my hand
all the time, and it sometimes it's the ones that
you don't see coming. Cal Raley is the first person
who was drafted, who is not drafted in the first round,
to hit sixty home runs. I think that's an honor
that he wears very proudly. Journey is certainly not over
(11:14):
for him. It'd be fascinating to see what he does
in his bounce back season because that was just a
dream season for cal Raley. I'm not saying he can't
do it again, but it is difficult for something like
that to happen as well as it did for him.
Staying healthy, catching more innings than any catcher in the
American League, and throwing up sixty home runs. That is
(11:36):
the story of Kofax and Raleigh not too dissimilar when
it comes to their path too greatness. Let's see if
Cal is starting a streak of greatness the way Kofax
did in the middle sixties. Hey, we're going to take
a quick break here on the Book of Joe in
this abbreviated edition. But I wanted to talk about something
that you've noticed, I'm sure watching any Major League Baseball games,
(12:00):
especially in the postseason. What is going on with velocity
in the major leagues? It keeps going up, we know that,
but can it keep going up? Have we reached the
point of human ceiling when it comes to how hard
pitchers can throw? I got some numbers for you that
might surprise you based on the twenty twenty five season
looking back on velocity, and we'll do that Ray after
(12:23):
this on the Book of Joe. Welcome back to the
Book of Joe. The Joe Less edition of the Book
of Joe. Joe is a way for the holidays and
(12:45):
happy New Year, Joe Madden and all of you. I
mentioned velocity, and if you watch the postseason, you saw
just the arms coming out of the bullpen for both
teams and even the starting rotations with Toronto and the
La Dodgers in the postseason. Man, you too need to
throw hard. And I realized we talk about this a
lot here the Book of Joe, that velocity is going
(13:06):
down in terms of how much it's used, but it's
going up in terms of raw numbers. Pitchers are throwing
harder than ever, and yet they're throwing fewer fastballs than ever.
So I decided to put some numbers on this, looking
at the twenty twenty five season, looking only at the
four seam fastball, no sinkers, two seamers. This is the
(13:27):
traditional backbone of baseball, the bedrock of pitching, the four
seam fastball, that old country hardball pitch that you know
when you were growing up and everybody taught you you
need to establish your fastball and work off of that.
And the four seam fastball is that pitch. In twenty
twenty five, four seam fastball average was ninety four point
(13:53):
five miles per hour. I mean that it's gone up
literally every year now for the past five years, and
it has not dropped for the past eighteen years. So
eighteen straight years the average forcing velocity at worst has
stayed the same and has gone up otherwise every year
(14:15):
for eighteen straight years. So how far has it come up? Well,
if you go back to two thousand and eight started
this eighteen year run since we've had these kind of measurements,
it was ninety one point nine back in two thousand
and eight, So we've gone from ninety one point nine
to ninety four point five for the average fastball. And
(14:35):
back in two thousand and eight, the batting average on
the four seen fastball was two seventy eight and the
slugging four point fifty one. Well, last year twenty twenty
five down to two forty nine and the slugging down
to four thirty three. So in throwing fewer of these
four seamers, but it increased velocity because we're down to
(14:57):
about thirty two percent, one out of every three pitches.
Now you're seeing the foreseen fastball at a higher velot
being harder to hit. Now, what I also wanted to
do is tell you how much harder it becomes to
hit a fastball the harder that it's thrown. So I
looked at the twenty twenty five numbers and they broke
(15:17):
them down according to pockets of velocities, starting with ninety
again fourteen fastballs. From ninety to ninety three miles per hour,
the batting average was two seventy three. Now the middle nineties,
ninety four to ninety six, you had a couple of
ticks on your fastball, it goes from two seventy three
down the two forty five. Now here's the incentive for
(15:40):
a pitcher. If you can get your fastball to ninety
seven and above, it goes down to two eighteen. I mean,
that's a huge difference. So again, the average fastball is
between ninety four and ninety five. So those middle ninety velocities,
the batting average is two forty five. If you're below that,
(16:00):
it goes up to two seventy three. If you're above that,
it's two eighty. It's a one. It's no wonder why
we say everybody is chasing velocity, and what we're seeing
also now is an increase at the much higher end
of the velocity scale. Looking at pitches at one hundred
miles per hour. Remember back in the day when guys
(16:21):
threw a hundred and you were like, oh my goodness.
I remember when a rold As Chapman got to the
big leagues and he was warming up for his first
major league game in Cincinnati, and people literally ran to
the bullpen to watch him warm up. I mean it
was like Barnum Circus had come to town. People had to
(16:42):
see this thing that they heard about, that this guy
threw harder than everybody else, and just to watch him
warm up. People were running there to see how fast
the rold Is Chapman can throw a fastball. Well, now
literally every team has a rolled as Chapman. You know,
the novelty of throwing one hundred has worn off, the
(17:02):
effectiveness though not. In twenty twenty five, there was a
record number of pitches thrown at one hundred miles an
hour or more, two thousand, nine hundred and seventy three.
It was the first time in Major League Baseball history
that there were more one hundred mile an hour pitches
(17:24):
than there were games played. Think about that, more hundred
mile an hour pitches then games played in the major
leagues in twenty twenty five. How far have we come? Well,
going back even just say six years twenty nineteen, there
(17:45):
were six hundred and twenty pitches clocked at one hundred
miles an hour. So we've gone from six hundred and
twenty in twenty nineteen to almost three thousand in twenty
twenty five. The number of one hundred mile an hour
pitches has more than quadrupled in just six years. And
(18:05):
if you want to go farther back, in ancient times,
two thousand and eight there were one hundred and ninety
five pitches thrown at one hundred miles an hour, So
we've got for one ninety five to almost three thousand
in eighteen years. What's interesting to me, though, is that
as these pitches become more common, and again they're not
(18:30):
extremely common, it's still just a small percentage of the
basketball is being thrown, but hitters are seeing more of them.
The batting average against pitches one hundred miles an hour
more actually is going up a little bit. Last year
twenty twenty five, the batting average on pitches one hundred
plus was one ninety. Now, among the eighteen years we've
(18:51):
tracked these numbers, that is the seventh highest batting average
on pitches one hundred miles an hour or more, so
essentially middle of the pack results kind of average. So
hitters are adjusted the more they see pitches at one
hundred miles an hour more, I mean I don't know
about you, but these are the things I find fascinating
(19:11):
that you know, we definitely are able to teach velocity now,
you know a generation to go. I'm talking only twenty
years ago. If you saw someone with a good arm,
you would say, hey, they were blessed with a good arm.
Now you see someone with a great arm, and you
can say they were blessed with a good arm, but
they learned how to throw harder. We definitely can teach velocity.
(19:33):
We know that it's been proven their systems. People are
paying a lot of money onto the amateur market to
get their kids to throw ninety so that a college
coach will actually look at them. You know, we can
talk for another day about some of the risks associated
with that, because you're talking about kids with growth plates
that are still open and the bodies just physically are
not equipped to handle the torque that throwing ninety miles
(19:55):
an hour puts on an entire body, but especially at
the shoulder at the elbow. So there definitely is a
risk associated with it. But yes, you can train to
throw harder. Now, can you take somebody off the street
who has no athletic ability at all and have him
thrown ninety No, it doesn't work like that, but you
can have them enter a training program and under the
(20:15):
right sort of supervision, add velocity, and that's what is
driving the amateur market. There's no question about that. So
once again velocity in the major leagues, unforeseen fastballs. It's
gone up for a fifth straight year. I don't know
how much farther it can go, you know. I remember
talking to Glenn Fleisik, who's one of the biomechanics in
(20:39):
Alabama at the institute there, and that's been studying biomechanics
for years and years, and he told me years ago
they took a cadaver and they stretched the shoulder muscles
and they put some torque on it and see how
far it could go. And basically he came up with
the idea that the human arm is really at the
(20:59):
end of the envelope when it comes to how much
stress it can take in throwing. His does these guys throw?
So will you see a guy throwing consistently one hundred
and ten one hundred and twenty miles an hour? Is
that where we're heading? I don't think so. But I
think where we're heading is a world where every staff
has two or three guys that can throw one hundred
miles an hour. Just the universe of elite throwers will
(21:22):
continue to grow and that will continue to bring the
velocity up. But once again, we're talking about an era
where they're throwing fewer of those fastballs because we've learned
so much more about spin and shaping pitches that the
coin of the realm now is not so much velocity
as driving the amateur market, but in the major leagues,
it's about how well and how often you can spin
(21:45):
a baseball. Welcome back to the Book of Joe, the
Joe Less edition of the Book of Joe. So, you know,
moving on to one of the topic, a little bit
(22:07):
of news. Traditionally, by the way, one of the quieter
periods of Major League Baseball off season between Christmas and
New Year's there was some news that the Oakland Athletics
signed Tyler Soderstrom to a contract extension of seven years
and eighty six million dollars. Now they're building something there
(22:28):
in Oakland. Of course, they're going to Las Vegas in
a couple of years, and this is what they had
in mind. With revenues coming in from a planned ballpark,
they can now extend some people as they have for
Brent Rooker and Lawrence Butler. Maybe Nick Kurtz Jacob Wilson
might be next. But they've got the makings of a
nice team here, especially offensively, and Tyler Soderstrom is a
(22:49):
big part of that. I thought it was a really
good extension for him. You're talking about a guy who
I know. You talk about that ballpark in Sacramento as
being a hitter friendly park. It definitely is, but his
splits were pretty neutral when it comes to home and road.
I love the way that in August and September after
(23:09):
hitting it, you know, kind of typical young players. Valley
middle of the season came back August in September his
slash line three twenty seven batty average, three point eighty
seven on base and a five thirty three slug that's
in forty eight games the last two months of the season.
So that definitely plays. So I love the fact that
(23:32):
the A's are locking up these guys. A good core
of young offensive hitters certainly need to add to the
again the pitching arsenal that they do have. But keep
your eye on in Oakland. Don't think they're sorry. That's
my bad. That's a dollar fine. By the way, keep
your eye on the Athletics, who are gonna make some
noise in that division. Not quite sure if they're ready
(23:52):
to win yet, but it's a team that can come quickly.
I would not rule them out as just being a
factor in the playoff race in twenty twenty six as
we look ahead. Last piece I wanted to bring up
on quote unquote news is Alex Bregman and his situation.
To me, he's he and Kyle Tucker a the two
and Cody Bellinger the best free agent still out there.
(24:14):
The market developing slowly for the top of the market
for the offensive players. Bregman's an interesting case because he's
got a good market. Remember he walked out of a
deal with Boston where he had two years and about
fifty nine million dollars left on his contract, so he's
going to do better than that. Of course, in terms
of length, it wouldn't surprise me if Alex Bregman wants
(24:36):
a six or seven year deal. Last year, the Tigers
offered him a six year deal at one hundred and
seventy one zero point five million dollars. He took the
shorter term with Boston, the higher AAV and the chance
to go back out there in the market as he's
doing right now. I still think Alex Bregman is going
to have a good market out there. Listen, he did
have a quad strain last season. He missed seven weeks
(24:57):
with that injury. He did slump at the end of
the season. He is entering his age thirty two season,
so I can see and he's not a big guy
where there's some trepidation on some teams in terms of
where this contract is going in terms of length. But
you know, I see a market when you've got four
teams involved, four really good teams, the playoff contenders, the
(25:19):
Blue Jays, the Cubs, the d Backs, and the Tigers.
To win the bidding, you're probably gonna have to go
to a level that maybe you're not initially comfortable with.
I think that's gonna take time, though. I think if
you're looking at Alex Bregman's signing, it's probably a little
bit later more so than it is sooner. But you know, Bregman,
Tucker Bellinger, those are the keys. As I look as
(25:40):
we turn to January and how this offseason is playing out. Now,
it's going to be a case like a Bryce Harper
where teams are already in spring training when the deal
gets done. Probably not, but I do think those guys
will get wrapped up before spring training, maybe even before
the month of January is out. And speaking of January,
(26:01):
I tease this at the top or it's the season
when we talk a lot about the Hall of Fame
and the voting results are coming out in the month
of January. Of course, Carlos Beltron is the one who
had the most support coming back. Carlos Beltron Andrew Jones
on the ballot this year looking to see if they
can get in. It's going to be really close for
both of them. I can tell you that in the
(26:22):
past I have voted for Carlos Beltront. Not in his
first year. Of course, he's associated with that twenty seventeen
sign stealing scandal in Houston, and not just associated with it,
by the way, a guy who has called the Godfather
because he was so involved with it, kind of spearyheading
it as one of the true veterans on that team
who did have a lot of sway in that clubhouse.
(26:44):
So certainly don't want to minimize his role in that scandal.
I'd still love to hear him take a little more
ownership of what he did. He initially pretty much denied
doing it, and you know it cost him his job
as manager the New York Mets. So I still think
he needs to be forthcoming about it. Listen, we all
(27:05):
move on, right. We know what happened. It's been very
well detailed and kind of like some of the steroid guys,
man just come out and take ownership of it. And
I do think at one point that he will or should,
But I do think he'll probably get over that seventy
five percent threshold and get it. It's not a deep ballot.
(27:25):
You're not going to see any first time ballot guys
get in this year. Probably looking at Beltron and Jones
getting in and Jones again not a slam dunk at all.
It's an interesting case with Andrew Jones had a great
run early in his twenties and then fell off a cliff,
(27:46):
basically didn't take care of himself. There's a domestic violence
incident that a lot of voters look at and say, well,
I don't know if I could really check that box
next to his name. And I understand he was a
fabulous defender in center field, and a big part of
his case is what he did in center field. But
(28:06):
a big part of his case also means you have
to believe in defensive metrics. You have to believe, according
to the metrics, that Andrew Jones was twice as good
in center field as Willie Mays. That's what the metrics
tell people. And I'm sorry, I'm not buying it. You know,
I saw Andrew Jones play. Was he great? Absolutely? You know,
(28:28):
so was Tory Hunter. So is Jim Edwins, So was
Devon White. You know those are elite fly checkers, fly chasers.
But are you telling me that he was twice the
center fielder as Willie Mays. Sorry, not buying it. So
anybody who was looking at war and making a case
for Andrew Jones, especially based on his defensive war sorry,
(28:51):
you know, if you want to use it as a
rule of thumb as an idea of how good somebody was, okay, yeah, fine,
same with gold gloves. Are you know the empirical data, No,
it shows you that he's twenty year after what his
peers thought of him. But as comparing one player to
another as empirical data, no, stop it don't use that.
(29:14):
So that's the Hall of Fame vote coming up in January.
I always look forward to that. It's always controversial, but
that's a good thing, you know, don't run away from it.
They're tough decisions to make, you know. I'm making them
for I don't know more than thirty years, and it's
never easy, but it is a privilege and I never
take it lightly. So a lot to look forward to
(29:34):
in twenty twenty six. But what I wanted to do
here is as Joe always does in these podcasts, with
some words of wisdom, and for me, you know, I
want to go back to something that cal Rawley told
me as we were having our conversation. And you know,
(29:54):
he was the one who really brought up a lot
of the kind of disrespects, if you will, that he
had growing up, the ability that he had to just
push it aside and push through and keep going and
make himself into a sixty home run hitter. It's a
very instructive story to me, not because he hit sixty
home runs, but because it didn't stop him. And what
(30:19):
he told me is and I want to end on this,
and in Joe Madden's style, here is closing with words
of wisdom. I asked him about the fact that, you know,
college coaches especially were telling him that, you know, you're
not going to be a d one catcher, which is
all he wanted to do. And here's what he told me.
(30:39):
I guess a lot of people, a few coaches of mine,
were telling me there were limits to what I could do.
And you don't forget those things. Those are the kind
of things that drive you. I mean, you don't tell
anybody what their limits are. You let a kid dream
and you give them as much as you can. You
(31:02):
want those kids to go out there worrd. Yeah. I
remember having those conversations and seeing them right on the
writing on the wall. Those are tough things to swallow,
but you learn to use those as fuel. I just
love that coming from a guy like cal Rawley in
the year that he had, he didn't forget those things.
(31:24):
It drove him. You know, I tell people all the
time that when it comes to young people in sports
and journalism and music, it doesn't matter what a kid
is pursuing. There are two things that we as adults
are obligated to provide them, and that those are opportunity
and encouragement, opportunity and encouragement. Give them the opportunity, make
(31:49):
yourself available to coach a little league team, to give instruction.
But then the encouragement is just as important because as
we all know, baseball is a game built on failures.
But you know it's so is life, and you know,
not everybody is great out of the box, and having
encouragement along with opportunity is super important. So you know,
(32:13):
I'm really happy that cal Raley brought this up in
the year that should be celebrated. He went back to
a time that probably wasn't so easy for him, and
it would have been easy for him to say, well,
you know, I guess I'm gonna have to maybe pick
another sport or pick another interest. But good for him
that he had the passion to get through this. And
as he said, you let a kid dream and you
(32:35):
give them as much as you can. Man those good
words to live by as we turned the corner on
twenty twenty six. So thank you, cal Raleigh. Thank you
to all the listeners here on the Book of Joe podcast.
Twenty twenty five has been an unbelievable year, capped off
by one of the greatest postseasons. Certainly one of the
greatest World series of all time, certainly that I have
(32:57):
seen in person. Look forward to twenty twenty six, a
lot coming up, World Baseball Classic, other great year of
baseball coming up, and another great year of the Book
of Joe. And we will see you next time on
the Book of Joe and hopefully with our good buddy
Joe Madden back in the saddle, see you next time.
(33:24):
The Book of Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio.
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The Book of Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio,
Hey Darreon Welcome Back. It is the Book of Joe
Podcast with me, Tom Berducci and without Joe Madden. This
time Joe's away for the holidays. Wishing him and all
(00:27):
of you a very happy new year, a great twenty
twenty six. What I wanted to do first of all
is wish a very happy birthday to a baseball legend
and even more importantly a good friend, mister Sandy Kofax. Yeah, unbelievably,
Sandy Kofax, forever young, is turning ninety years old. I
(00:51):
know that's hard to believe. He looks great, and every
time I go to Dodger Stadium in the postseason, I
look forward to seeing Sandy Kofax down there and his
seat field level by home plate. Sandy Kofas have always
been fascinated by him. Just the integrity, humility, and the
conviction of Sandy Kofax. Besides obviously one of the great
(01:14):
left handed pitchers of all time, Sandy Kofax was known
as the left arm of God. And at this time
of year, we talk a lot about the Hall of Fame,
and my hall of fame ballot is in the mail
on its way to Cooperstown. Those ballots will be announced.
The results of that will be announced in January. Sandy Kofax,
(01:35):
to me, is one of these inner circle Hall of
famers where you don't have to look at the numbers.
He defined baseball in that era, and when you look
at the stretch that he did have, it defines greatness
in probably a more of a brief period of time
because of his arm injury than anybody wanted to see.
(01:56):
I mean, check this out. From nineteen sixty one, nineteen
sixty three to nineteen sixty six, you're talking about a
four year period, Sandy Kofax averaged two hundred ninety eight
innings a season with a one point eighty six er.
Let me say that again, over a four year period,
(02:16):
he averaged just about three hundred innings per year with
a sub to er. I mean, that is crazy. I
know it was a depressed hitting environment back then in
the sixties, but my goodness. He also, by the way,
you talk about big game pitchers career era in the
postseason zero point nine to five. That is the lowest
(02:40):
of the more than two hundred pitchers who have started
at least five postseason games. The greatness of the man
was even greater in the biggest moments. That is a
testament to a true champion. But yeah, think about how
his career began too. And I love this story because
remember he was signed at a Brooklyn in nineteen fifty five,
(03:01):
a bonus baby had to be carried on the major league.
Was really just a hard thrower who had no idea
where the ball was going. And it was pretty much
that sort of pitcher with some peaks and valleys for
the first five or six years of his career. And
then it was a spring training game in nineteen sixty one.
The Dodgers back then trained at Dodgers Town in Vero Beach,
(03:22):
still my favorite spring training destination of all time. By
the way, they were playing an away game in Orlando,
so the split squad game, so the staff stayed behind.
So Sandy Kofax is going to pitch in Orlando and
the staff is not there that day, so there's no
pressure from the pitching coach, the manager, you know, trying
(03:43):
to perform and make yourself look good in front of
the brass. He gets on a plane. It was a
short flight to Orlando and Larry Sherry is his catcher
and says, let's try something different today. Let's just throttle back.
Because Kofax was a max effort kind of guy, and
Larry Sherry just advised him's throttle back on it and
(04:04):
see what happens. And Sandy Kofax used the term famously.
I took the grunt out of my fastball, basically not
trying to throw the ball as hard as he could.
He was supposed to go five innings, but the pitcher
behind him in the sequence mapped out for that game
missed the flight. So now Sandy has to go seven innings,
(04:25):
so there's even more of incentive for him to throttle
back on this fastball. Well, he throws seven no hit innings.
I mean, first of all, the idea of somebody throwing
seven innings in spring training, you can tell it was
a different era. But as Sandy Kofax said, I came
back a different pitcher than I left, and that began
(04:47):
his years of dominance of Major League baseball. I mean,
he had three years in a row where he won,
or three out of four years where he won the
Major League Baseball Triple Crown, not the League Triple Crown.
The Major League Triple Crown. It's just fascinating to me
that it can happen that quickly. Of course, this is
before technology, before somebody found another pitch through the use
(05:07):
of high speed cameras or changing their grip on getting
a different kind of spin access on their breaking ball.
This was all just old school. Hey, let's try something
different today. So happy birthday, Sandy Kofax, ninety years old.
And they also wanted to point out something that I'm
not sure if you caught this. Sports Illustrated announced their
(05:29):
end of the Year awards and the Major League Baseball
Breakout Player of the Year is cal Raley with the
Seattle Mariners. This is another story I love because, again,
you talk about someone who you think of as being
a superstar player, like a Sandy Kofax, but it's the
journey to get there that made their story so fascinating.
(05:51):
Most players you see, certainly hitting sixty home runs. I
mean it's plug and play, man. You see these guys
coming a mile away. The greatness is obvious at an
early age. Not so the case with cal Raley. And
when I talked to him for a story I did
on SI for winning this award is the breakout player
of the year. He was so proud of the fact
(06:13):
that it did not come easy for him because he
knows all the hard work that he put in. I mean,
this is a guy who in the minor leagues, he
bought himself a small machine to fire tennis balls at
him to learn how to block the ball better behind
the plate as a catcher. You know, all the years
and pitches he had from his dad. It was a
college coach in North Carolina in the batting cage, just
(06:35):
time after time, trying to really hone his stroke from
both sides of the plate, which, by the way, he's
a natural switch hitter. I know you've never heard of
such a thing, but I asked cal if he was
natural ready or left. He actually said neither, And it
is true. As soon as he could stand, his dad
put one of those big red plastic bats in his
(06:56):
hand and had him hit from both sides of the plate,
just literally flipping balls from just almost a foot away
from him and switching his hands around and changing the
grip to bat as a switch hitter. As soon as
he could stand. It's the only thing he's ever known.
And what his dad, Todd told me was that he
never wanted his kids to think they had a quote
(07:17):
unquote weaker side of the plate. And it's true. You
look at the breakout year that cal Raley had and
he just smashed the ball from the right hand side.
He's there's really no platoon split with cal Raley. Definitely
a platoon neutral in terms of power. And getting back
to his story, I didn't realize all the things he
(07:37):
had gone through to get to the major leagues. First
of all, as a middle school kid, he was cut
for the baseball team. I mean, how many guys had
sixty home runs were cut from the middle school team
growing up. By the way, he was also cut from
the basketball team that year. Yeah, I mean, you talk
about a blow to somebody. And this is a kid
who loved baseball. He's in a cage all his time,
all the time with his dad. Yeah, he was young
(07:59):
trying out for the team. But my goodness, what a
blow for a young kid who just dreams of being
a baseball player. So he gets to high school, he
starts playing. He's the catcher on the team, and check
this out, he's such a poor hitter that the coach
used the DH for him, not for the pitcher. You know,
in high school you can use a DH for any
(08:20):
position on the field. They DHD for cal Rawley in
high school. Crazy right, Then, as he sort of gets
bigger and matures, becomes a decent player, he wants to
play D one college baseball. Why not? And a bunch
of college coaches are telling him, you'll never be a
D one player. You're nothing but a D three player.
I mean, you talk about something that he has worn
(08:43):
as a chip on his shoulders since he goes to
Florida State. And you know, he had a thumb injury,
so he didn't play his summer before his junior year,
which is going into his draft year, and he had
kind of a season that was affected by the thumb
and finger injury as a sophomore. So some of the
scouts who are high or on cal Ray began to
(09:05):
cool on him. And that was the year the Seattle
Mariners started an analytic system where they ranked players in
the draft according to an algorithm essentially, and they had
cal Raley in that draft class rated at number three
hundred and seventy nine. Now they wound up taking him
(09:25):
in the third round, which is still kind of crazy
when you think about a guy hitting sixty home runs,
and by the way, they had Logan Gilbert in the
first round. You talk about a real good draft. That's
franchise changing. But cal Raley has worn all those things proudly.
And by the way, when he got to the major leagues,
they didn't think he could hit right handed, and they
had him platooning with a guy named Tom Murphy. Decent player,
(09:49):
but you look back on it now and you're like,
cal Rawley wasn't even an everyday player when he first
got to the major leagues. So here he is in
twenty twenty five, sixty home runs, the first catcher in
baseball history with sixty home runs, the only switch hitter
in base history with sixty home runs, the second youngest
player to hit sixty home runs. Only Roger Marris back
(10:11):
in nineteen sixty one was younger. And you think about
his ascension to sixty. You know, in the auto industry
they like to measure acceleration by how fast you go
from zero to sixty. Well, Cal's acceleration to sixty off
the charts great. Thirty four home runs in twenty twenty four,
and then he throws out sixty the next year, There's
(10:33):
only one player to get the sixty home runs who
got there faster year to year, and that was Sammy
Sosa back in nineteen ninety eight, who increased his home
runs from thirty six to sixty six. And make that
what you will. So I think of Sandy Colefax and
I think of cal Raley at this time of year
(10:53):
and how we liked to to find greatness. When I
look at these Hall of Fame ballots in my hand
all the time, and it sometimes it's the ones that
you don't see coming. Cal Raley is the first person
who was drafted, who is not drafted in the first round,
to hit sixty home runs. I think that's an honor
that he wears very proudly. Journey is certainly not over
(11:14):
for him. It'd be fascinating to see what he does
in his bounce back season because that was just a
dream season for cal Raley. I'm not saying he can't
do it again, but it is difficult for something like
that to happen as well as it did for him.
Staying healthy, catching more innings than any catcher in the
American League, and throwing up sixty home runs. That is
(11:36):
the story of Kofax and Raleigh not too dissimilar when
it comes to their path too greatness. Let's see if
Cal is starting a streak of greatness the way Kofax
did in the middle sixties. Hey, we're going to take
a quick break here on the Book of Joe in
this abbreviated edition. But I wanted to talk about something
that you've noticed, I'm sure watching any Major League Baseball games,
(12:00):
especially in the postseason. What is going on with velocity
in the major leagues? It keeps going up, we know that,
but can it keep going up? Have we reached the
point of human ceiling when it comes to how hard
pitchers can throw? I got some numbers for you that
might surprise you based on the twenty twenty five season
looking back on velocity, and we'll do that Ray after
(12:23):
this on the Book of Joe. Welcome back to the
Book of Joe. The Joe Less edition of the Book
of Joe. Joe is a way for the holidays and
(12:45):
happy New Year, Joe Madden and all of you. I
mentioned velocity, and if you watch the postseason, you saw
just the arms coming out of the bullpen for both
teams and even the starting rotations with Toronto and the
La Dodgers in the postseason. Man, you too need to
throw hard. And I realized we talk about this a
lot here the Book of Joe, that velocity is going
(13:06):
down in terms of how much it's used, but it's
going up in terms of raw numbers. Pitchers are throwing
harder than ever, and yet they're throwing fewer fastballs than ever.
So I decided to put some numbers on this, looking
at the twenty twenty five season, looking only at the
four seam fastball, no sinkers, two seamers. This is the
(13:27):
traditional backbone of baseball, the bedrock of pitching, the four
seam fastball, that old country hardball pitch that you know
when you were growing up and everybody taught you you
need to establish your fastball and work off of that.
And the four seam fastball is that pitch. In twenty
twenty five, four seam fastball average was ninety four point
(13:53):
five miles per hour. I mean that it's gone up
literally every year now for the past five years, and
it has not dropped for the past eighteen years. So
eighteen straight years the average forcing velocity at worst has
stayed the same and has gone up otherwise every year
(14:15):
for eighteen straight years. So how far has it come up? Well,
if you go back to two thousand and eight started
this eighteen year run since we've had these kind of measurements,
it was ninety one point nine back in two thousand
and eight, So we've gone from ninety one point nine
to ninety four point five for the average fastball. And
(14:35):
back in two thousand and eight, the batting average on
the four seen fastball was two seventy eight and the
slugging four point fifty one. Well, last year twenty twenty
five down to two forty nine and the slugging down
to four thirty three. So in throwing fewer of these
four seamers, but it increased velocity because we're down to
(14:57):
about thirty two percent, one out of every three pitches.
Now you're seeing the foreseen fastball at a higher velot
being harder to hit. Now, what I also wanted to
do is tell you how much harder it becomes to
hit a fastball the harder that it's thrown. So I
looked at the twenty twenty five numbers and they broke
(15:17):
them down according to pockets of velocities, starting with ninety
again fourteen fastballs. From ninety to ninety three miles per hour,
the batting average was two seventy three. Now the middle nineties,
ninety four to ninety six, you had a couple of
ticks on your fastball, it goes from two seventy three
down the two forty five. Now here's the incentive for
(15:40):
a pitcher. If you can get your fastball to ninety
seven and above, it goes down to two eighteen. I mean,
that's a huge difference. So again, the average fastball is
between ninety four and ninety five. So those middle ninety velocities,
the batting average is two forty five. If you're below that,
(16:00):
it goes up to two seventy three. If you're above that,
it's two eighty. It's a one. It's no wonder why
we say everybody is chasing velocity, and what we're seeing
also now is an increase at the much higher end
of the velocity scale. Looking at pitches at one hundred
miles per hour. Remember back in the day when guys
(16:21):
threw a hundred and you were like, oh my goodness.
I remember when a rold As Chapman got to the
big leagues and he was warming up for his first
major league game in Cincinnati, and people literally ran to
the bullpen to watch him warm up. I mean it
was like Barnum Circus had come to town. People had to
(16:42):
see this thing that they heard about, that this guy
threw harder than everybody else, and just to watch him
warm up. People were running there to see how fast
the rold Is Chapman can throw a fastball. Well, now
literally every team has a rolled as Chapman. You know,
the novelty of throwing one hundred has worn off, the
(17:02):
effectiveness though not. In twenty twenty five, there was a
record number of pitches thrown at one hundred miles an
hour or more, two thousand, nine hundred and seventy three.
It was the first time in Major League Baseball history
that there were more one hundred mile an hour pitches
(17:24):
than there were games played. Think about that, more hundred
mile an hour pitches then games played in the major
leagues in twenty twenty five. How far have we come? Well,
going back even just say six years twenty nineteen, there
(17:45):
were six hundred and twenty pitches clocked at one hundred
miles an hour. So we've gone from six hundred and
twenty in twenty nineteen to almost three thousand in twenty
twenty five. The number of one hundred mile an hour
pitches has more than quadrupled in just six years. And
(18:05):
if you want to go farther back, in ancient times,
two thousand and eight there were one hundred and ninety
five pitches thrown at one hundred miles an hour, So
we've got for one ninety five to almost three thousand
in eighteen years. What's interesting to me, though, is that
as these pitches become more common, and again they're not
(18:30):
extremely common, it's still just a small percentage of the
basketball is being thrown, but hitters are seeing more of them.
The batting average against pitches one hundred miles an hour
more actually is going up a little bit. Last year
twenty twenty five, the batting average on pitches one hundred
plus was one ninety. Now, among the eighteen years we've
(18:51):
tracked these numbers, that is the seventh highest batting average
on pitches one hundred miles an hour or more, so
essentially middle of the pack results kind of average. So
hitters are adjusted the more they see pitches at one
hundred miles an hour more, I mean I don't know
about you, but these are the things I find fascinating
(19:11):
that you know, we definitely are able to teach velocity now,
you know a generation to go. I'm talking only twenty
years ago. If you saw someone with a good arm,
you would say, hey, they were blessed with a good arm.
Now you see someone with a great arm, and you
can say they were blessed with a good arm, but
they learned how to throw harder. We definitely can teach velocity.
(19:33):
We know that it's been proven their systems. People are
paying a lot of money onto the amateur market to
get their kids to throw ninety so that a college
coach will actually look at them. You know, we can
talk for another day about some of the risks associated
with that, because you're talking about kids with growth plates
that are still open and the bodies just physically are
not equipped to handle the torque that throwing ninety miles
(19:55):
an hour puts on an entire body, but especially at
the shoulder at the elbow. So there definitely is a
risk associated with it. But yes, you can train to
throw harder. Now, can you take somebody off the street
who has no athletic ability at all and have him
thrown ninety No, it doesn't work like that, but you
can have them enter a training program and under the
(20:15):
right sort of supervision, add velocity, and that's what is
driving the amateur market. There's no question about that. So
once again velocity in the major leagues, unforeseen fastballs. It's
gone up for a fifth straight year. I don't know
how much farther it can go, you know. I remember
talking to Glenn Fleisik, who's one of the biomechanics in
(20:39):
Alabama at the institute there, and that's been studying biomechanics
for years and years, and he told me years ago
they took a cadaver and they stretched the shoulder muscles
and they put some torque on it and see how
far it could go. And basically he came up with
the idea that the human arm is really at the
(20:59):
end of the envelope when it comes to how much
stress it can take in throwing. His does these guys throw?
So will you see a guy throwing consistently one hundred
and ten one hundred and twenty miles an hour? Is
that where we're heading? I don't think so. But I
think where we're heading is a world where every staff
has two or three guys that can throw one hundred
miles an hour. Just the universe of elite throwers will
(21:22):
continue to grow and that will continue to bring the
velocity up. But once again, we're talking about an era
where they're throwing fewer of those fastballs because we've learned
so much more about spin and shaping pitches that the
coin of the realm now is not so much velocity
as driving the amateur market, but in the major leagues,
it's about how well and how often you can spin
(21:45):
a baseball. Welcome back to the Book of Joe, the
Joe Less edition of the Book of Joe. So, you know,
moving on to one of the topic, a little bit
(22:07):
of news. Traditionally, by the way, one of the quieter
periods of Major League Baseball off season between Christmas and
New Year's there was some news that the Oakland Athletics
signed Tyler Soderstrom to a contract extension of seven years
and eighty six million dollars. Now they're building something there
(22:28):
in Oakland. Of course, they're going to Las Vegas in
a couple of years, and this is what they had
in mind. With revenues coming in from a planned ballpark,
they can now extend some people as they have for
Brent Rooker and Lawrence Butler. Maybe Nick Kurtz Jacob Wilson
might be next. But they've got the makings of a
nice team here, especially offensively, and Tyler Soderstrom is a
(22:49):
big part of that. I thought it was a really
good extension for him. You're talking about a guy who
I know. You talk about that ballpark in Sacramento as
being a hitter friendly park. It definitely is, but his
splits were pretty neutral when it comes to home and road.
I love the way that in August and September after
(23:09):
hitting it, you know, kind of typical young players. Valley
middle of the season came back August in September his
slash line three twenty seven batty average, three point eighty
seven on base and a five thirty three slug that's
in forty eight games the last two months of the season.
So that definitely plays. So I love the fact that
(23:32):
the A's are locking up these guys. A good core
of young offensive hitters certainly need to add to the
again the pitching arsenal that they do have. But keep
your eye on in Oakland. Don't think they're sorry. That's
my bad. That's a dollar fine. By the way, keep
your eye on the Athletics, who are gonna make some
noise in that division. Not quite sure if they're ready
(23:52):
to win yet, but it's a team that can come quickly.
I would not rule them out as just being a
factor in the playoff race in twenty twenty six as
we look ahead. Last piece I wanted to bring up
on quote unquote news is Alex Bregman and his situation.
To me, he's he and Kyle Tucker a the two
and Cody Bellinger the best free agent still out there.
(24:14):
The market developing slowly for the top of the market
for the offensive players. Bregman's an interesting case because he's
got a good market. Remember he walked out of a
deal with Boston where he had two years and about
fifty nine million dollars left on his contract, so he's
going to do better than that. Of course, in terms
of length, it wouldn't surprise me if Alex Bregman wants
(24:36):
a six or seven year deal. Last year, the Tigers
offered him a six year deal at one hundred and
seventy one zero point five million dollars. He took the
shorter term with Boston, the higher AAV and the chance
to go back out there in the market as he's
doing right now. I still think Alex Bregman is going
to have a good market out there. Listen, he did
have a quad strain last season. He missed seven weeks
(24:57):
with that injury. He did slump at the end of
the season. He is entering his age thirty two season,
so I can see and he's not a big guy
where there's some trepidation on some teams in terms of
where this contract is going in terms of length. But
you know, I see a market when you've got four
teams involved, four really good teams, the playoff contenders, the
(25:19):
Blue Jays, the Cubs, the d Backs, and the Tigers.
To win the bidding, you're probably gonna have to go
to a level that maybe you're not initially comfortable with.
I think that's gonna take time, though. I think if
you're looking at Alex Bregman's signing, it's probably a little
bit later more so than it is sooner. But you know, Bregman,
Tucker Bellinger, those are the keys. As I look as
(25:40):
we turn to January and how this offseason is playing out. Now,
it's going to be a case like a Bryce Harper
where teams are already in spring training when the deal
gets done. Probably not, but I do think those guys
will get wrapped up before spring training, maybe even before
the month of January is out. And speaking of January,
(26:01):
I tease this at the top or it's the season
when we talk a lot about the Hall of Fame
and the voting results are coming out in the month
of January. Of course, Carlos Beltron is the one who
had the most support coming back. Carlos Beltron Andrew Jones
on the ballot this year looking to see if they
can get in. It's going to be really close for
both of them. I can tell you that in the
(26:22):
past I have voted for Carlos Beltront. Not in his
first year. Of course, he's associated with that twenty seventeen
sign stealing scandal in Houston, and not just associated with it,
by the way, a guy who has called the Godfather
because he was so involved with it, kind of spearyheading
it as one of the true veterans on that team
who did have a lot of sway in that clubhouse.
(26:44):
So certainly don't want to minimize his role in that scandal.
I'd still love to hear him take a little more
ownership of what he did. He initially pretty much denied
doing it, and you know it cost him his job
as manager the New York Mets. So I still think
he needs to be forthcoming about it. Listen, we all
(27:05):
move on, right. We know what happened. It's been very
well detailed and kind of like some of the steroid guys,
man just come out and take ownership of it. And
I do think at one point that he will or should,
But I do think he'll probably get over that seventy
five percent threshold and get it. It's not a deep ballot.
(27:25):
You're not going to see any first time ballot guys
get in this year. Probably looking at Beltron and Jones
getting in and Jones again not a slam dunk at all.
It's an interesting case with Andrew Jones had a great
run early in his twenties and then fell off a cliff,
(27:46):
basically didn't take care of himself. There's a domestic violence
incident that a lot of voters look at and say, well,
I don't know if I could really check that box
next to his name. And I understand he was a
fabulous defender in center field, and a big part of
his case is what he did in center field. But
(28:06):
a big part of his case also means you have
to believe in defensive metrics. You have to believe, according
to the metrics, that Andrew Jones was twice as good
in center field as Willie Mays. That's what the metrics
tell people. And I'm sorry, I'm not buying it. You know,
I saw Andrew Jones play. Was he great? Absolutely? You know,
(28:28):
so was Tory Hunter. So is Jim Edwins, So was
Devon White. You know those are elite fly checkers, fly chasers.
But are you telling me that he was twice the
center fielder as Willie Mays. Sorry, not buying it. So
anybody who was looking at war and making a case
for Andrew Jones, especially based on his defensive war sorry,
(28:51):
you know, if you want to use it as a
rule of thumb as an idea of how good somebody was, okay, yeah, fine,
same with gold gloves. Are you know the empirical data, No,
it shows you that he's twenty year after what his
peers thought of him. But as comparing one player to
another as empirical data, no, stop it don't use that.
(29:14):
So that's the Hall of Fame vote coming up in January.
I always look forward to that. It's always controversial, but
that's a good thing, you know, don't run away from it.
They're tough decisions to make, you know. I'm making them
for I don't know more than thirty years, and it's
never easy, but it is a privilege and I never
take it lightly. So a lot to look forward to
(29:34):
in twenty twenty six. But what I wanted to do
here is as Joe always does in these podcasts, with
some words of wisdom, and for me, you know, I
want to go back to something that cal Rawley told
me as we were having our conversation. And you know,
(29:54):
he was the one who really brought up a lot
of the kind of disrespects, if you will, that he
had growing up, the ability that he had to just
push it aside and push through and keep going and
make himself into a sixty home run hitter. It's a
very instructive story to me, not because he hit sixty
home runs, but because it didn't stop him. And what
(30:19):
he told me is and I want to end on this,
and in Joe Madden's style, here is closing with words
of wisdom. I asked him about the fact that, you know,
college coaches especially were telling him that, you know, you're
not going to be a d one catcher, which is
all he wanted to do. And here's what he told me.
(30:39):
I guess a lot of people, a few coaches of mine,
were telling me there were limits to what I could do.
And you don't forget those things. Those are the kind
of things that drive you. I mean, you don't tell
anybody what their limits are. You let a kid dream
and you give them as much as you can. You
(31:02):
want those kids to go out there worrd. Yeah. I
remember having those conversations and seeing them right on the
writing on the wall. Those are tough things to swallow,
but you learn to use those as fuel. I just
love that coming from a guy like cal Rawley in
the year that he had, he didn't forget those things.
(31:24):
It drove him. You know, I tell people all the
time that when it comes to young people in sports
and journalism and music, it doesn't matter what a kid
is pursuing. There are two things that we as adults
are obligated to provide them, and that those are opportunity
and encouragement, opportunity and encouragement. Give them the opportunity, make
(31:49):
yourself available to coach a little league team, to give instruction.
But then the encouragement is just as important because as
we all know, baseball is a game built on failures.
But you know it's so is life, and you know,
not everybody is great out of the box, and having
encouragement along with opportunity is super important. So you know,
(32:13):
I'm really happy that cal Raley brought this up in
the year that should be celebrated. He went back to
a time that probably wasn't so easy for him, and
it would have been easy for him to say, well,
you know, I guess I'm gonna have to maybe pick
another sport or pick another interest. But good for him
that he had the passion to get through this. And
as he said, you let a kid dream and you
(32:35):
give them as much as you can. Man those good
words to live by as we turned the corner on
twenty twenty six. So thank you, cal Raleigh. Thank you
to all the listeners here on the Book of Joe podcast.
Twenty twenty five has been an unbelievable year, capped off
by one of the greatest postseasons. Certainly one of the
greatest World series of all time, certainly that I have
(32:57):
seen in person. Look forward to twenty twenty six, a
lot coming up, World Baseball Classic, other great year of
baseball coming up, and another great year of the Book
of Joe. And we will see you next time on
the Book of Joe and hopefully with our good buddy
Joe Madden back in the saddle, see you next time.
(33:24):
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