August 1, 2024 • 51 mins
In this episode of 'The Book of Joe' Podcast, Joe Maddon and Tom Verducci explain why we didn't see any blockbuster deals before the trade deadline. Which team made the most impactful moves that will make a difference? Tom was puzzled by the Orioles and seeing the Rays/Marlins combine to move 18 players. Plus, a tease for a very special guest coming up on Episode 100 of The Book of Joe!
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
The Book of Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio.
Hey thereon, Welcome back to the latest episode of the
Book of Joe Podcast with Me, Tom Berducci and Joe Madden.
And Joe, we are on the other side of the
(00:24):
trade deadline after months and I really mean months, because
people love talking about the trade deadline way too far
in advance. I remember when people were talking about the
Mets and the Astros dumping players. Well, it turned out
that we didn't get any blockbusters, Joe. I mean, with
all the names out there and all the possibilities, I
don't think there was any name that made you go
(00:47):
wow at the trade deadline. So real quick, I'll ask
you first to give me your first overview of what transpired,
if not the last day, the last couple of days
at least, because there were a lot of moves, but
again no blockbusters.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Yeah, filling needs right, I mean, the blockbusters a fun
thing for the fans to get involved with and talk about,
and it's great fodder for talk radio, whatever, newspapers, TV shows.
But I think a lot of teams did what they
needed to do, filling spots, making themselves stronger. And I
think after all that's what it's all about. I mean,
(01:23):
it's always nice to get the big, splashy dude, but
that doesn't always ensure everything, ensure everything, ensure everything. It's
just I like filling my little the holes, the gaps,
whatever I think I need. I need some spackle to
put in there right now to make this thing work.
So I think a lot of teams did that. I
a lot of even like yesterday with the Mets. Blackburn.
I love Blackburn. I've always liked him, the guy from
(01:45):
the athletics. I think he's a really good pitcher. They're
going to be surprised because I'm sure most of them
have never are hardly ever seen him pitch. But this
guy can be very functionally good down the stretch for
this particular team and others. I mean, you know the
bet I guess Tanner Scott was one of the bigger names.
And then again, it's it's who we getting in return.
You don't even know. We have no idea what these
(02:06):
guys look like a lot of times, and you have
to wait a couple years to find out, you know,
really who won anything regarding a trade. So I think
it's been a gap filler, even like Chisholm, like all
of a sudden, he comes back there and starts hitting
home runs and inject some life into that team, which
is noticeable whether they're in Philadelphia. I don't know if
it's going to be sustainable. Maybe I probably should be,
(02:28):
but nevertheless, mission accomplished regarding like let's give these guys
a shot in the arm and kind of like kickstart
them or a jumper cable them and get them going
in the right direction again. So that was my impression. Nobody,
like you said, nothing over the top, Schooble and those
dudes Guerrero, everybody stayed place and in place, and Snell,
(02:48):
Matt Snell really coming on strongly. But I think a
lot of functionally good moves.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Yeah. For me, it gets back to what's taken over
the game, and that is relief pitching. I mean, there
was a scramble for these teams, and they jumped out
early to grab relief pitch. And on the final day,
thirty four players were traded, and twenty of them were
relief pitchers. And a lot of these dudes are in
their thirties. They're pitching for their third, fourth, fifth, or
(03:15):
sixth team. Maybe they came up with a different pitch
or a mechanical change. Everybody is looking to go deeper
and deeper and deeper in the bullpen, especially with swing
and miss guys. And you know, fortunately or unfortunately, that's
where the game has been going that the emphasis on
starting pitching just is not there anymore. Jack Flaherty was
(03:37):
the best starting pitcher. He changed teams and he's before
this year he selled for a one year deal with
the Detroit Tigers, and he's you know, there's no John
Lester out there getting traded. There's no Max Scherzer, there's
no you darbish, there's no Coal Hammils, there's no Justin Verlander.
The premium now is load up on as many bullpen
(03:57):
guys as you can. And that's why when I look
at the deadline, I think, to me, the biggest winner
is the San Diego Padres. They won the bullpen race.
First of all, they're playing great baseball these days, especially
they coming off a huge East Coast trip where they
won three series in a row. They have a lot
of momentum. Aj Pereller, you got in love with this guy,
(04:20):
does Joe? I mean he goes out and he makes deals.
He's not bragging about his farm system. He's not, you know,
buying himself time as an executive by saying, we get
we're loaded with guys in a ball just stick around, folks.
He's trying to win a World series and he did
it once again, getting Jason Adam and Tanner Scott to
the best relief arms in the business. With Robert Suarez
(04:41):
on the back end, this has got They've got a
loaded bullpen. Now maybe they get Joe Musgrove back their
starting rotation. It's just phenomenal in terms of being able
to spin a baseball. You know, they cut the Dodgers
deficit to five and a half games with a great
come from behind win the first game of that series,
down five nothing, they pull it out. So I think
(05:02):
san Diego now to me, Joe, and especially with the
way the Dodgers and the Phillies have hit a lull
here in the middle of the season, san Diego Padre
has really jumped out in the pack what's been a
kind of mediocre pack in the National League, and they're
as dangerous as anybody right now, especially in a postseason
matchup situation with that bullpen.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Can't disagree trying to win you know, trying to win.
Right now, I see nothing with that philosophy. I wish
more teams could incorporate that. But in regards to your
bullpen wars or your bullpen guys, watch the box scores.
I mean I don't get to see all the games,
but I definitely could read. I read the Post every morning,
and the New York Post that is. And when I do,
I'm just checking out box scores, and you try to
(05:41):
recreate what's going on in gosh. I mean every game,
there's tons of bullpen usage every game. Every team, it
seems starters less than five innings all the time. And
with that, yeah, you're gonna need all these guys this
time of the year. I always wanted. I've always felt
the teams I've had in the past. Yes, you always
look to bost of your pitching somehow because if that
(06:03):
breaks stein you're really in trouble. So you're really trying
to make sure you have the depth necessary, whether it's
starter or reliever. However, box scores, man, just check them out.
There's tons of them. An age I always liked twenty
eight twenty nine year old players that have been with
maybe one or two other organizations. They've kind of figured
it out. They really have a slower heartbeat, and they're
(06:24):
truly there's nothing that's going to be overly impressive to them.
There's the nervousness is gone. They're able to breathe in
the moment. I really like that age group. I do.
You know, you got the prodigies that become really good
before that, but a lot of them really have to
weigh twenty seven to twenty eight, maybe even twenty nine
to be to get to the point where their brain
and body function in unison. And I like that. I
(06:45):
think that's a great component of that kind of a player.
And the other thing is when these organizations get these
pictures a little bit older, they're more willing to use them.
They're not trying to protect them as much, and they
know they're there on a short term basis, and they
also know that they can replace them eventually. So there's
a lot going on there with that age group in
that particular pace, And from the pitcher's perspective, they're finally
(07:08):
arrived mentally, I think, and from the front office position
more willing to subtract some of the rules in regards
to the usage. I'm watching the Yankees right on Tonkin,
My god. I mean that guy seems to be out
there often almost every night. So guys that have been
banging around like that, again, you're willing to put more
mileage on the arm than those that have not. And
(07:28):
I think this all plays into it. But final point, yes,
I do like the guys that are reaching for the
brass ring. They're not just sitting in the weeds. You
constantly and everybody gets praised for dumping players, dumping players
and moving forward. Listen, there's times you've got to do that.
I understand that, but I like the groups to try
to win.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned Dombrowski too, because he traded
for Carlos Estevez. I thought that was a great pickup.
He had a lot of uncertainty and actually still has
some in his bullpen with a lot of guys you
just can't throw strikes. And you know, Joe, there's nothing
worse as a manager to see games go away based
on free path from your relief pitchers. And he got
a true closer ninth ending guy Carlos and Stevez and
(08:10):
a lot of the prospect mavens are out there saying
he overpaid for this closer. The Phillies are a win
now team. They had an obvious hole in that team.
You're not going to be hanging out to prospects when
you're the Philadelphia Phillies and you're Dave Nebraski and you've
got a World Series championship on the horizon. So the
idea that teams quote unquote overpaid is based on what
(08:34):
prospect rankings. I mean, come on, I'd rather have a
general manager if I'm a fan of a team who's
got a window to win a World Series. I don't
like the idea of windows in terms of years because
they can come and go very quickly. But right now,
the Philadelphia Phillies, we know this year twenty twenty four,
of a chance to win the World Series. You don't
hoard your prospects. And I don't agree with the idea
(08:57):
of overpaying when you're filling an immediate need for a
World Series caliber type team.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Well, how about back in the day when the commissioner
could declare a trade nolin voy because it wasn't in
the best interest in baseball? Right?
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Oh, that was usually against Charlie Finley. He's trying to
sell off his.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Player exactly right, that's that's what happens. I mean, the
narrative is so changed where I mean, I don't remember, well,
I'm just thinking quickly, but when we were coming up
in the seventies and the eighties, there was none of
that I remember, like the big selloffs. I'm sure that
happened on occasion, but that had to be really bad.
By the time the White Sox dumped, there were only
(09:33):
a couple games down and they dumped, and that was
a big uproar. I can't remember exactly what year that occurred.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Yeah, the White Flag trade Wilson Alvarez. They were about
two and a half games out of a wildcard I
think it was ninety seven, and there was a big
up war.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
But you know they people cover the prospect industry a
lot more, Joe, And the way to cover that industry
is to say everybody's going to be great, because that's
going to get you attention.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Really listen, just work the minor leagues, be a minor
league player development guy, and you'll I could just sit
here and create a list right now guys that I
thought were going to be really good that couldn't even
get the double ay or outside of double a. It's
just it's very difficult to fulfill all the potential that
everybody speaks about. And right now there's even a thinner
(10:17):
grouping or layer of available prospects based on the number
of guys in your systems. And I know you're going
to make the argument that normally the higher draft picks
are the ones that do eventually end up in the
major leagues. But that's probably true, and that's always been true,
but there's always this undercurrent of players that is able
to surface and become functionally good or very good or great,
(10:39):
majorly Mike Piazza as an example. I mean, so there's
all of this is that the narrative is changing. You're right,
I don't wow when I just constantly hear about the
narrative regarding the prospects and how what they're going to
be like and how good they are and whose opinion
is that that's going to be so funny man, because
(11:00):
that's exactly where I'm going with the quote of the
day after this, it gets annoying sometimes. I like the
groups that play to win, and you know when you
sneak and you know things have gone wrongly. I not
even like with the White Sox that they're doing it
almost is like they've accepted How long ago have they
accepted this absolute misery? And what does that mean for
their fans and fans base. They think they're going to
(11:20):
make it up to them in a couple of years.
That's not necessarily true. So anyway, it's the narrative has changed.
It used to be we're going to try to win,
and there used to be situations where it was not
in the best interests of baseball.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Yeah, there's a researcher at MLB Network, Matt Baker, did
some research on prospects traded at the deadline, went back
over the last decade, and he found that I think
the number is three percent of the prospects traded at
the deadline turned out to be impact players or major
contributors on the big league level. So if your team,
if you're celebrating because your team got some prospects, just
(11:56):
be very careful. I'd rather be celebrating if my team
got out there for got true major league talent to
try to win a World Series. By the way, when
I talked about relief pitching, Joe, and you've seen this
in the arc of your career. If you go back
ten years, and that's not a long time, right, Just
go back ten years, the average major league starting pitcher
would throw six innings average ninety six pitches, and they
(12:19):
counted for seventy percent of the wins. Okay, so that's
sixth innings, ninety six pitches, seventy percent of the wins.
This year, starting pitchers are averaging five point three innings,
you're averaging only eighty six pitches, and they're getting only
fifty nine percent of the wins available. You talk about
(12:39):
the declient of starting pitching, and this is what again,
I'm circling back here to the trade deadline. All these
general managers, president of baseball operations, whatever you want to
call them, keep looking for people with closer stuff to
come into the game in the fifth and sixth inning,
and they're finding them. You know, the batting average in
(13:00):
the Major League baseball from the seventh innings through the
ninth inning is thirty four. It's just hard to get
a hit about what's coming out of these bulls, coming
out of the bullpen. And that's why I think, to me,
the Padres are a clear winner of the deadline.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
How's that work? And everybody's five hundred. I mean, I
you know, all these things everybody's trying to, like have
talked about this, playing the same game with the Rays,
then you can look this up, I'm sure pretty quickly.
I know, when we come into spring training, my goal
was to get a thousand innings out of the starting pitchers.
And I didn't mean like twenty of them. I'm you know,
it was like six, seven, ten. I mean we might
(13:36):
have had nine or ten. I think we did it
one year with less than ten starting pitchers. We got
a thousand innings out of these guys. So we let
them pitch. That's what they're there for. They're called starting
pitchers for a reason. And when you do that, your
bullpens stay healthier longer. You don't have to constantly search
for new guys, and there was more pitchability. It wasn't
just about coming out there and rearing back and trying
to throw as hard as you can for you know,
(13:58):
whatever amount of time that was.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
And even now with the new rules and just thinking
about this quickly, the three batter minimum that also impacts this.
I used to like to get guys in and out,
in and out, in and out if I could to
possibly save them and use them more often because if
he just threw maybe one hitter, one out and get
them out of there and just start matching up. I
always like to do that because I thought that had
a positive impact too. But thousand innings with the Rays,
(14:24):
I think we did a thousand at least one time,
maybe twice, and came close another. But that group was
so good, and that's what made the Rays great. It
was the fact that we pitched so well. We starting
pitched so well. We had the bullpen was always in
a state of flux, like you're talking about. We brought
a lot of veteran guys in, guys with some mileage,
but you never worried about hurting their arms. They knew
(14:44):
how to take care of themselves. You knew what they
can do. If they told you I can pitch today,
I believe them when they pitched today. If they told
me they cannot, they did not. Rafael, I've talked about
this t before. Rafael Soriano came into me after a
game where I did not use them, and because you know,
we had talked to front office, was concerned whatever, and
he said, Socio, listen to me. If I can go,
(15:06):
I will tell you I can go. I say, sometimes
I feel better on the third third consecutive day than
I do on this second consecutive day. He says, it
just it just varies, it's different. So he taught me
a lesson there at a betteran relief pitcher. Really listen
to this guy. He's going to give it to you
straight the line. I want the ball. Don't tell me
(15:27):
that I used to hate that I want the ball.
I mean that that's just such a much. He'smo kind
of an attitude. No, are you good? How do you feel?
Talk to me because they need to know this before
the game. And if you tell me before the game,
then I can think in a way that would better
suit us tonight and then tomorrow the next day. Because
the thing you have to consider with bullpen guys too,
for me was always it's not just about today. It's
(15:47):
about the rest of the week and who we're playing,
and who's your starter. You got a six starter starting
to Martyr tomorrow, and if you use a lot of
bullpen today, my goodness, you could be in big trouble
tomorrow with this guy. That that's really you don't expect
a lot of innings coming out of him as compared
to Okay, you got your stud the next day, go ahead,
maybe overuser abuse your bullpen the night before, because you know,
(16:08):
more than likely this guy's going to more deeply into
the game, the interconnectingness of the game itself, and of
course the bullpen, to me, more than any part of it,
is really something to be paid attention to. So I
could go on and on about this. I like a
thousand innings out of my starting pitchers, and I don't
think I don't think that's impossible, except the fact that
we don't promote it anymore. We promote guys that spin
(16:30):
the ball, throw hard at the top of the strike
zone more, and we want more of those guys, like
you said, to debilitate the latter part of the game.
But what's happening. Everybody's a five hundred club. Everybody's following
the same playbook.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
I'm not a big fan of the cliche of winners
and losers before the dust is settled at the trade deadline,
but I do. It's really too nuanced, and it's obviously
too quick. But I understand why people do that. But
I'm curious as to what the Baltimore Orioles are doing, Joe,
you and I both really love Baltimore's talent and the
(17:03):
job and height is doing. When we get back, I
need help figuring out what the heck the Baltimore Orioles
did at the trade deadline. Welcome back to the Book
(17:26):
of Joe podcast, our Trade deadline wrap up edition, and
I mentioned that, Joe, I'm really curious as to what
the Baltimore Orioles did. We've talked about this. They have
reminded me with their core of young players, not just talent,
but the chemistry on this team really takes me back
to your Cubs team, going back to twenty fifteen and
the way your team was finished off with John Lester
(17:48):
as a free agent, world As Chapman as a trade
piece at the deadline. I get the sense that's where
Baltimore was. To me, they needed an impact front of
the rotation, or at least someone behind Corbyn Burns type
starter and another power arm of the bullpen to supplement
Craig Kimbrel was very underwhelmed by what they did at
the deadline, Joe. They got Zach Eflin, who strikeout rate
(18:10):
is way down this year. They got Trevor Rodgers, a
starting pitcher who literally has the worst whip among any
pitcher with one hundred innings this year, and his velocity
is down more than two miles an hour from three
years ago. He is not missing bats at all. They
got Alloy Jmenez, a guy with no defensive quotient. He's
(18:31):
basically a DH who's hitting more ground balls than any
hitter in the big leagues. Austin Slater and Christian Pasha
are both the same player. Both can't hit offensively. They're
true center fielders, but you're not getting much offensively.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
You know.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
They were sitting on a tremendous pile of a new buzzword,
his prospect capital, and this is what they came away with.
I'm sorry. I mean, maybe this plays out and Eflin
just turns it up. I like Zach Eflin, don't get
me wrong, But to me, the Oriols needed someone to
slot between Corbyn Burns and Grayson Rodriguez. They have again
a window right now to win the World Series. I
(19:07):
understand what they're doing. They wanted players with contractual control
beyond this year. They didn't want to get into the
rental market. I understand they needed starting pitchers for the
twenty twenty five season. But I think you need to
be more aggressive and go out and get a Tanner
Scott who they had before. Go out and get a
Jack Flaherty. Maybe that experience from last year didn't suit
(19:29):
them well and they didn't want to go back there.
But to me, Joe, this team doesn't have to make
every move with an eye on twenty five. Twenty four
is right here. The opportunities right in front of you.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Well, there's so much going on right there. First of all,
they see something. That's how I look at acquisitions like this.
There's always that we could fix somebody mentality.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
I'm glad you brought that up, Joe, because I want
to ask you about that. You know so much about
player development, and I agree. Rogers has not been the
pitcher he was three years ago. F one's lost the
ability to swing a miss. They took two guys. They
didn't mention this from the Philadelphia Phillies, who Rob Thompson
had lost complete confidence in because they can't throw strikes.
Gregory Soto and Sir Anthony Dominguez. I mentioned Jimenez can't
(20:13):
get the ball in the air. You're putting a tremendous
amount of confidence in your major league staff with new
players in a short period of time to get these
guys straightened out. You tell me how that works out.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
That's an analytical move right there. And I'm not trying
to bash on anybody right here. Please listen. That's the analysts.
There's looking at something within the data, the information to video,
all that kind of stuff, and they're looking at that
and they believe they're going to be able to fix it.
So they'll gather, they'll decide all this, and then then
they will hand it over to the coaching staff and
they'll hand it over with advice in regards to how
(20:48):
to do this, and strong advice. Now, back in the day,
that would obviously that was not part of the quotient.
So it was about whether you know, you thought your
coaches could look at this, figure it out, make this
guy better. But under the circumstances you're describing, more than
likely those guys would not.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Have been acquired.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
That would not have been part of how we did
things at that particular juncture. So first of all, they
see something something that and analytics is brought to their attention.
I remember the time in the winter time Andrew called
me and he said what do you think about Fernando
Rodney And I said, well, you've got a good arm
is an apple. But by he says, our guys love them,
(21:25):
and you know what, that's your head a point six
y four e RA and set like a record. Up
to that point. They see something that's the only thing
I could I could gather right there. You've talked about
for nexte years to come. The control was starting pitching.
They believe they can fix them. Now that's another thing.
When you're in charge of development and player development and
coaching and whatever. You always believe you could fix somebody.
(21:47):
You always do. But then I learned it's not true.
It's not true that you could always fix somebody. There's
certain things within them that's more difficult than others to fix,
and the most difficult thing to fix with somebody's head.
So again, I don't know what these guys are like.
I don't know what they're thinking. I don't know how
they breathe. I don't know any of that stuff. Because
to me, that's still like the most important thing to understand.
How does this guy think? How does he breathe? And
(22:09):
then after that you can try to figure out if
we can actually fix them physically. So these are the
kind of conversations that are not at So that's independent
of how analysts work, which would be primarily almost like
in a vacuum, looking at movement and all this stuff
numbers and projections and all this stuff, whereas I'd be
more concerned in talking to the guy researching with former
coaches and players and what's he like, what does he
(22:31):
think of? Where's his head at right now? That to
me would be the more interesting part regarding his short
term and then eventually a long term benefit beyond that bullpen.
I mean, listen, I've had Craig Kimball, good guy, really
good guy. But to me, that's even more important if
they're trying to win right now, you cannot rely on
that with any kind of consistency. It's just I watch him,
He's going to have his spurts of being really good.
(22:53):
Of the spurts, it's just a little bit more if
he kind of a thing. So I really thought that
they needed to nail down that bullpen. S Or Anthony,
I watch him, great arm, Gosh, narn he's got a
great arm. But you talk about inconsistency regarding and again
when I watch him I think it's mental because he's
not focused in the sense that he's going to dominate you.
Because he's got the kind of stiff that's like he
should almost be able to say, here comes my fastball,
(23:15):
try to hit it and just blow it by somebody.
He's that got that kind of talent, but you don't
see that. So these are the kind of thoughts I
have as developmental guy, as a coach when you're bringing
the guys in, This is what I would be looking at.
So there's got to be a balance. I don't think
there's enough scouts on the road anymore. I don't know this,
but in order to balance this kind of projection. But
I promise you at the end of the day, whatever
(23:37):
the analysts say is going to out weigh with the
scout in the stands is.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Going to say, Okay, now, let me put you in
the shoes of your buddy Brandon Hyde. You're the manager
of the Baltimore Orioles. You've had a lot of these
players come up together, right the timing of these young
players as a group, they know each other from the
minor leagues. You've got a first place team and now
with two months left in the season, You're introducing seven
new players to a twenty six man roster.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
Not easy, not easy, absolutely right?
Speaker 1 (24:05):
How do you handle that?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
The thing about that the biggest guard there for me,
The thing to watch for is whose place are they
taking and what's the perception among the group. Of course,
I mean you're in charge of the guy or the GM,
the manager, et cetera. You're the ones have to make
these decisions. But I'm here to tell you, when it
comes to a really talily nick group, if they see
somebody walk in the door that they don't perceive to
(24:27):
be as good as the guy that's walking out the door,
this new guy better perform well, and perform well quickly,
because there's going to be it's going to injure the
confidence of the group.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Well, Joe, I mean, you're probably looking at Cedric Mullins
losing at bat. You're probably looking at Ryan Mountcastle losing
at bat. You're probably looking at Ryan o'harn losing at bats.
These have been core players on that team.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
That's it. That's that's my point. I mean, And I
used the example of Chico Lean when he came into
door in Anaheim ninety five season. Because disar gets Hurt.
We already had Spike Owing on the team, We had
Rex Huller, who are very capable of playing second base,
but we chose to bring Chico Lean in and move
Damien Easley to short. Wow, that taught me such a lesson.
(25:06):
That was a veteran clubhouse too, which I think has
an impact too, as opposed to a bunch of young guys.
May not see it that way, but when you're working
with a bunch of veterans, which the game was more
veteran at that time, you have to be very careful
about that because it can cause them to go on
a different trajectory because they really were upset by that.
So these are the kind of things to me that
(25:26):
are very necessary to really try to keep an eye
on and understand because it's real, it's true, and it
can't have an impact.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Well, now let's talk about the Yankees, because I think
the Yankees and closed the gap on the Baltimore Orioles,
and certainly if you watch them play ever since Saturday
night in Boston when Trent Grishen rescued them from a
loss with a big two out hit in the ninth inning,
they've found their groove and part of that was adding
Chisholm Junior. And they also got Mark Leier Junior, who's
(25:54):
been a strikeout machine by the way, from the Cubs.
Those are two really good pieces the Yankees needed, and
I like the Chisholm addition, especially Joe. He played his
first game at Fenway Park on Sunday night and said
something really interesting. He said, that's the biggest crowd I've
ever played in front of. That's Fenway Park, the smallest
park in baseball. And then from there he goes to Philadelphia,
(26:17):
sold out crowd forty five thousand people, half Yankee fans,
have Philly fans. The places, you know, goes crazy. This
is a guy I believe is energized by the opportunity
not just to be in a race, but to have
the attention on him. I think he's an extrovert guy
who wants to show people how great he is. And
you know, he's come out with a bag four home
(26:39):
runs in his first three games. He's playing third base,
a position he never played before. He gives the Yankees
a speed element and some swag that they probably needed. Listen,
never rolling right now. I love the moves that they've
made and obviously it still always comes back to Soto
and Judge. Judge has just been I mean, as great
as he's been, you know, is seventeen games in a
(27:00):
row on base, getting on base literally two or three
times a Night's just been incredible. But I'm telling you,
the Yankees right now have flipped their entire season. As
much as they wallowed a mediocrity, a lack of lineup
depth for two months. It's a different team right now.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
And what's wrong with What's wrong with that? What's wrong
with Addy? A little charisma? Listen, I have not watched
him that much jazz play, but I've been watching the
last couple of days. First of all, I love his
attitude regarding you. I could play third base, Yeah, give
it to me. I got it where gliber did not
want to go there and he said no, I got it.
And to me, it should have just been the other
way around, just based on physical ability, athleticism, whatever, up
(27:38):
the middle versus the corners. So that's my old scouting
standard right there. So he comes in very charismatic. So
was Mickey Rivers. So was kind of Reggie Jackson. So
was Thurman Munson. So was Lou Panellis, So was all
the former Yankees back in the day. More recently, the
(27:59):
great teams, Paul O'Neill, the Ice couldn't get off of Pauloni.
I mean, they've been part of the land. I think
the team today the last couple of years has been
way more died in the wool and really lacked that
kind of a looseness, and not in the sense that
you're going to take the team down the wrong path,
just the fact that you go out there and have
a noticeably a great time playing the game. Like when
(28:19):
Rizzo walked in there a couple of years ago, they
automatically started talking about riz and the impact he had
in the clubhouse. The only thing I don't like I
don't like the bastardization of the uniform. I don't like
all the different colors being incorporated in the uniform. It's
in the uniform, and listen, I'm addressed. I'm not in
a dress codes. But that's the only part I would
like to see to become a little bit more strict
with if you have a uniform, have a uniform. Otherwise
(28:41):
just wear whatever you want.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
And that's pretty much what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Green belts with green belts and even judged with the
aqua sleeves and stuff like that. I mean, I don't
know a uniform is uniform. I like uniforms, I do,
and that'd be the only thing other than that. I
love I love the way he is. I love his energy.
He did something the other night that wasn't called attention
to when he stole third base in a seven to
two game and nobody said anything was a ninth inning.
(29:06):
Those are the kind of things that could have got
you hurt back in the day a little bit. So
maybe just a little bit more education on how to
play the game. He just needs more information with that.
But when it comes to charisma, I mean, intensity is there.
He plays it hard all the time. All the things
you're looking for is there. I just think he needs
a little bit more information to really tighten his game up.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Now let's talk about the LA Dodgers, another favorite coming
into the season. What they did at the deadline. First
of all, I think I counted at last count. I
think they have six shortstops, you know, Mookie Betts, Tommy Edmund,
I'm at Rosario, Ki k Hernandez, Chris Taylor, on and
on it go. So I don't know what the final
arrangement is going to be Defensively, it's great having a
(29:47):
guy like Mookie. You can play him at second, playing
it short playm in center field. Kevin Kiermayer, who I
don't know if he's going to get much run in centerfield.
He hasn't hit much at all this year, but he
is a great defender. But the big move was Jack Flaherty.
That tells me that they're not totally convinced that Moto
is coming back or at least has enough time to
be playoff ready. What Clayton Kershaw might be, what he
(30:10):
is right now, A lot of questions, Bobby Miller, Walker Buehler.
There's just too many questions for the Dodgers. And they
went out and got the best starting pitcher who was traded.
That was Jack Flaherity Trek school Ball was never getting traded.
Garrett Crochet was never getting traded, especially to the Dodgers,
because he just imposed too many rules on an interested
team in terms of, hey, I'm not pitching in October
(30:32):
unless I get an extension, and so you've got and
then Blake Snell. The Giants really weren't trading unless they
got blown away, and that was another contractual issue that
made it difficult to agree on value. He's either a
rental for two months or if he opts in, he's
got thirty million dollars coming next year, and teams weren't
sure how to value a picture with that kind of
(30:55):
value fluctuation. So it came down to flarity. He's a
guy who's thrown his curveball and slider more than ever before.
He's really gotten heavy on spin. It's worked out for.
His strikeout rate is up, his walk rate is down.
He's a guy I believe will start a playoff game
for the Dodgers. So good for the Dodgers. I mean
they're scuffling right now, and they've tried all year to
(31:15):
fill the rotation holes. They needed a little certainty, Joe,
and I think they got the best option available in
Jack Flaherty. So if you want to go back to
your winners and losers, I'd have to say they want
just on Floherty alone. They didn't pay a high price either.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
I love Edmund. I'm a big Edmund fan from Saint Louis.
I know he's been injured.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Yeah, he hasn't been on the field yet this year. Joe,
I know a rist surgery. It hasn't actually played a
defensive position, but I'm with you, and if he's healthy,
love the flexibility and even the offensive game.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
Well, the risk injury always bothers me. Normally, when the
guy's coming back from that and he's deemed to be well,
you still have might have to wait a little bit.
Risks are really touch I mean, after all, that's a
huge part of the game, your wrists, so that would
be a little bit concerning. I'm sure they did their
due Dell homework. But here comes Flaherty. Flaerty when he
was in Saint Louis, Man, I'll tell you what, one
(32:08):
of the best athletes as a starting pitcher in all
of baseball those first couple of years in Saint Louis.
I was so impressed by him. He could hit, he
could also run the bases, he could pitch. He had
great stuff, just so athletic, moves so well, kind of
like Musgrove, a better version of Musgrove. I thought that,
you know, with the Pirates and the Padres, I was
always a big Flaberty. Than then all of a sudden
(32:29):
it was like, WHOA, what's wrong with this guy? Command
was not there, never could get out into the fifth inning.
Showed flashes of brilliance, but it was very inconsistent. And
I tell you, I like the idea of him throwing
more breaking balls. There's some guys that have issues was
commanding their fastball, and you always want you always liked
the idea of like fastball command setting up everything else,
but some guys you might have to have breaking ball
(32:51):
command to set up your fastball. I've had pitches like
that in the past, where I even had a pitcher
in the minor leagues that has such a great curveball
and did not know where his fastball was going. I
had said, if you threw two consecutive fastball balls, you
have to mandatory throw a breaking ball, because I thought
he commanded the breaking ball better. So I don't even
know if this is an issue of just looking at
(33:13):
him from the perspective that it was kind of in
vogue right now to throw more breaking balls, or if
they felt they commanded his breaking ball better. I've always
talking about wrists. I've always thought if by doing that,
you find your wrist, you find your release point, and
then eventually you find a better method of throwing your fastball.
Without even thinking about it sometimes when you're just putting
(33:33):
so much pressure on your fastball to control and command it,
and it becomes actually a mental kind of a gig,
and then all of a sudden it becomes shotgun. You
have no idea where it's going. So I kind of
like that without having seen it, it makes sense to me.
But this is one of the better athletes that has
coming down the pike over the last I don't know
five whenever he signed, I was with the CUBBIESYT, so
(33:54):
it had to be like eighteen, nineteen seventeen. He was
in there at some point. This guy has great stuff
and he's a great athlete.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Well said, let's jump around real quickly to some other teams.
Pittsburgh Pirates are a player, Joe, the Pittsburgh Pirates added
at the deadline. And how about this. On the last
day of the trade deadline, nine hitters were traded. It's
not a lot, right, I mean, it's just not a
lot out there. Nine hitters were traded. Eight of them
have below average adjusted ops's The best hitter that was
(34:25):
traded on the last day of the trade deadline was
Isaiah Kiner Fileffe and he went to the Pittsburgh Pirates,
and by the way, he signed for next year as well.
That was a really good pickup. They also got Brian
dey la Cruz from the Marlins. Nice pickup. Pirates are
a dangerous team, Joe. They're in the wildcard race and
I'm telling you, you've been there on bad teams, You've
(34:46):
been there with good teams. For a team that traditionally
has done nothing but sell off at the deadline, that
has to energize that group, no.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Doubt, no doubt. I mean, if you're not used to
having somebody walk in the door only having people leave,
it's going to make a big difference. You know, the
cutcheon being at the head of that whole thing. And
again you look at players that are less stand that
they're tradable, and they pick him up out again. I
believe that they believe they can fix this guy. Whatever
they feel like the deficiency is. They feel like they
(35:15):
have the anecdote they could fix this guy. And that's
that's just how this thing works now. Connor Philippa, I
like him. I liked him with the Rangers a lot.
When he was at the Rangers. He was a really
good player. He was kind of like David Fletcher is
another version of Dave. I'm still being a big David
Fletcher phantom surprised he's really drifted away. This guy could
(35:36):
fill a lot of these voice for a lot of
these different teams if he's playing like I saw him play.
But Conner Philippa is that kind of a player, I think.
So yes. When a guy with that experience walks in
the door to the Pirates, maybe you know it's not
the big Marque guy, but conversationally at a locker rafter
a game, a lot of locker before the game, on
(35:56):
the field, during batting practice, whether it's on defense or
by the cage, guys like this can do a lot
of good for you. These guys like this can get
somebody's right before the game begins, and you cannot underestimate
how important that is. So yes, I agree. I'm a
Pirate fan does my second team growing up because I
like their uniform so much and I love Roberto Clemente.
But otherwise I think they've done a lot of good
(36:16):
things that I'm rooting for them.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
And here's a question for you. With the last person
leaving the state of Florida, turn the lights off, please.
Eighteen Major League players were traded by the Rays and
the Marlins. And I understand limited resources. I get it.
You know, they shouldn't be trying to win the World Series.
I understand that, but you also, to me, you cannot
(36:38):
celebrate the tremendous amount of turn that goes on. I
don't want to hear about how smart these front offices
are because they pirated somebody's, you know, number eight prospect
in their system. Eighteen major league players left the Marlins
and the Rays. It's just not good when it continually happened. Yeah,
every team's going to go through periods where you need
(37:00):
to retrench. I get it, but my goodness, that's a
lot of major league talent moving out of the state
of Florida.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
Great, you're right on, right on. And you you know
when I was there, when we got there in six
everybody said, oh, the Ray's got to get out of
this division with the Yankees and the Red Sox, they
got to get to another division. And I said, no,
for me, it was we needed to stay there because
you got at that time, you had to play the
Red Sox and the Yankees. Was it eighteen times? Nineteen
(37:31):
times annually? And you had to pay half of that
in their ballpark, and I thought the best way to
get good quick was to play in those kind of
environments where it was really tough. It was very difficult.
You had to be at your best, you had to
play baseball. And my thought was, I didn't care. This
is what I mean. You look it up. I don't
care what the payroll is. It's about who plays a
(37:51):
better game at baseball on a specific night. That's how
I looked at it, and that's what I used to
try to sell my guys. You can look at all
the names, all this stuff. There's some great lineups, look
at the Yankee lineups, look at the Red Sox lineups
at that time, and here comes the Rays. So my
selling point was, and I believe this, and I still do,
who plays the better game tonight? Who plays the better
game of baseball tonight? Baseball, not the rote a wireball, whatever, baseball.
(38:16):
Who plays the better game tonight? And that's how the
race got good because we faced it down, we embraced
the target. We walked right into that fire, and eventually
we beat the Red Sox in Boston, which was not easy.
It was harder for us to beat the Red Sox
in Boston than it was for us to beat the
Yankees in New York. But you had to get those
(38:36):
two things. There's nothing more gratifying than walking out of
a dugout at that particular point between two thousand and seven,
eight nine ten, walking out the dugout in Fenway or
a Yankee stadium shaking hands after a win on the
Mount Gosh, that was one of my the happiest moments.
That's the happiest moment of your baseball life at that time.
So it's still there, man. I just again, I don't
(38:58):
know that people. It's a narrative. How do you convince
your guys that you can do this stuff, or how
do you convince that you can't do this The narrative
always is convincing that you can't do it for me,
Yet you're spending more money. But who's going to play
better brand of baseball tonight?
Speaker 1 (39:11):
And finally, Joe, I want to give you two under
the radar moves to me that could have the biggest
impact the additions for me. Number one is Michael Kopak
going from the White Sox to the Dodgers. This guy,
if you look at his fastball properties, it's off the charts.
I mean, he's got a Garrett Cole fastball. He needs
work on his slider, he needs work on command. And
(39:32):
again you talk about teams fixing people, the Dodgers have
a tremendous history with their resources, especially when it comes
to spin. I think he's going to be a dominant
postseason pitcher for them, a multiple inning guy, come in
the six to seventh inning and shut a game down,
give the offense time to come back. The other one
for me is Alex Cobb. I know you like Alex Cobb.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
A lot, love him.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Hasn't pitched at all this year, but he's coming off
a hip injury. He's on his rehab, he's got one
more start. He'll be in the Cleveland rotation. Cleveland did
need a veteran arm in that rotation, and they got
a really, really good one, a battle tested one. Listen
that the Giants are going for. But they're using a
Hayden bird song and the rookie in the rotation rather
(40:13):
than trusting Cobb coming back, which is fine, that's Italian
evaluation thing. But good on Cleveland to be imaginative enough
to go out there and take a picture. Who hasn't
throwing a pitch in the major leagues this year, and
think we get to the postseason, we've got ourselves a
tough cookie as a veteran starter.
Speaker 2 (40:29):
Ac Alex one of my favorite that I've ever had,
among the best makeup guys I've ever had. Big game situation,
you know to expect and his stuff. Listen. I try
to convince THEO to sign him with the Cubs the
year that we signed Chatwood, that came in for a
couple of years, and we couldn't get that done because
(40:53):
Alex was coming off some tough moments there. But this
guy's change up, whatever that is, that vulcan pitch that
he's got is unbelievably good. And the thing that about
Alex also the totally I thought was underrated for so
many years. There's this curveball. His curveball is outstanding, and
then he knows how to pitch with this fastball and
he got a little funck in his delivery. He's great
(41:13):
at holding runners, he's got a very quick move in
the first base, and the makeup, like I said, is
overwhelmingly great. He when he's not pitching, talking about that group,
he's going to walk around before the game in the
clubhouse after the game. In the clubhouse, he's going to
do all the things necessary that you want from a
really established and a good starting pitcher, major league pitcher. Listen,
(41:36):
I could go on and on about this guy. I'm
that big of a fan. Be wonderful to see him
come back healthy and well because if he does, and
you know, the shortened part of the season like kind
of right now, he's got only a couple of months
to cover heads up. If he's If he's well, he's
because he likes it. He likes this stuff. He likes
pitching in big games, and he's really good in him
(41:56):
and he can get out good hit or is both
sides of the plate. A big fan of the move Kopek,
I don't really know. I know he's got a great arm,
but I've never really seen a lot of him. But again,
you're right, I think the Dodgers see something they think
they can fix.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
We're going to take a quick break right here. When
we get back, I want to ask Joe about something
that happened with Dave Roberts of the LA Dodgers in
terms of a manager and the rule book that I've
never seen before. Maybe he has I'll run that scenario
by him right after this. Okay, Joe, I need to
(42:38):
get your memory working here and your vast resources history
of the game, because I've seen a lot of baseball myself,
but I haven't quite seen this where Dave Roberts. It
was a game against the Padres, extra innings, bases are loaded,
and first of all, Mike Schiltz, who I think is
a really good manager, pinch hits for Jake Croinworth, his
number three hitter in the lineup against the lefty Alex Basia,
(43:02):
and I don't think the Dodgers works. I think that
to happen, he send up Donovan Solano, the right hander,
to pinch hit. So when the pinch hitter is announced,
Mark Pryor the pitching coach, goes out to the mound
to talk to Visilla. That's typical because when a pinch
hitter is announced, it's not charged. As one of those
five official mound visits you have. You get a chance
to review the scouting report on a pinch hitter, which
(43:23):
is fine. So then Dave Roberts came out after that
and wanted to know if he could change pitchers, and
obviously you can't because he now has to face a batter.
Once there's a mound visit, the pitcher has to face
a batter. And while this is going on, the pitch
timer is running, so a ball is charged to Visia,
(43:44):
so he starts with the bases loaded, tie game, extra
innings with one zero count. Next pitch, Donovan Solano wins
the game with a bass hit. There a little confusion there,
but it began to me with Mike Schildt and the
Padres making the aggressive decision to pinch hit for the lefty,
the number three hitter of the lineup, a good hitter.
Jake Cronenworth, who was typically as Jake is, was cool
(44:06):
with it after the game and he's like, oh, I'm
trying to do is win. Yeah, I was ready to hit,
but I'm okay with it because we're winning the game.
Beautiful interesting scenario there, beautiful.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yeah. First of all, I'd want to believe because I
think I would have done it if I ever had
that in my back of my mind, because maybe Coroner
Whorth's been struggling, or you know, you're coming in against
the Dodgers. They have all these lefties that are going
to match up with and I have a Solano is
a really that's a perfect guy, contact guy in that situation.
Having that conversation with Coroner Worth in advance would be
vital to me that I would go out to and say,
(44:36):
listen if this were to occur, because it's don him
and Solono, a guy that could a veteran that could
really move to baseball. I think it's easier for obviously
for coner Worth to understand that, plus just the fact
that you'd want to do it at all. So Number one,
I think that's part of it. I'd be curious. Number two,
Shilty's a minor league manager. He's a grunt. He's seen
these situations before, he's done these things before, and he's
(44:57):
not concerned about having to answer tough questions afterwards if
it doesn't work, because that's why it falls under the
category of the right thing to do. So you do
the right thing, and if it doesn't work, that doesn't
mean it was a wrong decision. It just means it
didn't work out. So I'm looking at that and yeah,
I mean, yes, you have to face that one more hitter.
And that's the beauty of that whole situation, the way
it came down. So listen, I worked against Shilty, and
(45:21):
when I looked across the field and the things that
he did, promise you, this is exactly what I thought
to myself. This guy was a minor league manager. He
worked in the minor league. Bruce Boch, he was a
minor league manager. He worked in the minor leagues. Jimmy
Leland minor league manager, worked a lot of time in
the minor leagues. It was obvious to me. And these
are the guys that caused me my most concern, and
the other dugout because believe me, they're thinking this stuff
(45:44):
all the way through. They've had these conversations with you know,
their coaches in the past. They've sat after tough losses
and talked about things with the beer for years. They've
done this. So it's hard to slip something by these
guys because they've they've been there, done that. So doesn't
surprise me about Shilty. And understand, this is where all
the little nuance comes in. Have the conversation before and
(46:06):
give somebody heads up. You're thinking this if it were
to pop, and then that way a guy like Conaworth
could accept it more easily. But of course, when Solano
gets a hit, everybody's happy.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
Yeah, good stuff. I mean, I think again, I'll go
back to where we started, Joe, with the importance of bullpens,
and it actually plays up in the postseason and on
the other side of the deadline. I am now looking
at the Cleveland Guardians and the San Diego Padres as
two nightmare matchups for a higher seeded team. If you're
(46:37):
looking for this year's version of say last year's Diamondbacks
or last year's Rangers, I would start with those two teams.
Both teams, by the way, also have high end talent,
real true star players, and I like the way the
managers run both of those teams. I love the fact
that they don't lose games late, and both teams have
(47:00):
to me some nice momentum going. So I know that
chalk is you know, top five payrolls, you know Dodgers, Yankees, Phillies, Braves,
et cetera. But if you're looking for a nightmare matchup
in the postseason environment, because it is a different kind
of game, keep your eye on Cleveland and San Diego.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
Can't disagree. I love that stuff. And again, who's who's
playing better baseball? Play better baseball. It's not it's not
about your pocketbooks and how much money you've spent. Who's
playing better baseball? What is the philosophy? Look at the
way the Indians play. I mean, my gosh, that's that's
beautiful the way they play. They play hard all the time.
I'm loving you that voters having a great first season.
I love all of that. I love all of that.
(47:39):
Now that he's got Cobbra there, that's yeah. Probably he
probably caught Cobber with the with the race at some point.
I think they might have overlapped a little bit. That's
kind of interesting. I mean, I think Cobbra might be
as old as Steven. I. You know, that's kind of
a nice situation. But I I you know, it's noticeable
when a team develops their own personality and method of
(47:59):
play and it stands out. And I really really do
appreciate anything that's apparent with the Indians. It's I don't
I don't watch the padres enough to know that, but
I know Shilty and I know what the demands are
going to be there, and I know the conversations are
going to take place. So it's all interesting stuff. There's
going to be an outlier maybe too, Like you're talking
about somebody will separate at that particular time at the
(48:23):
end of the year during the playoffs. But for right now,
who's going to play the better game of baseball tonight?
Speaker 1 (48:27):
By the way, Joe, this is our ninety ninth episode
of the Book of Joe, number ninety nine. It goes quickly,
doesn't it.
Speaker 2 (48:35):
It's our Aaron Judge episode right here, there you go.
Speaker 1 (48:39):
And by the way, we are working on efforting a
surprise mystery guest for episode number one hundred. So for
those of you who just joined us, those of us,
those of you who have been around, you don't want
to miss episode number one hundred, not that you want
to miss any any episode that we have, but especially
(49:01):
for one hundred. How's that for a tease.
Speaker 2 (49:02):
That's nicely done. Looking forward to this surprise guest. Also,
it's going to be very interesting to say the least
is a man of many talents and interests, especially in
the game of baseball, and I'm just curious to get
his take on what's going on in the game today.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
Well said, And as far as ninety nine, who is
going to take us out in the court of the day?
Here Joe? For episode ninety nine of the Book of
Joe Winnie Churchill.
Speaker 2 (49:31):
And this was serendipitous because going into this morning, based
on the trade deadline, I just researched evaluation. You know,
how do you go about evaluating quotes on evaluation? And gosh,
it was a bunch that popped up and kind of
surprised me. But typically Winston Churchill, you know, one of
the greatest leaders. You know, you could bang on him
(49:52):
as much as you want, but to have the cajones
to do what he did during World War two man
and stick to his guns literally, it is truly incredible.
So anyway, true genius resides in the capacity for evaluation
of uncertain, hazardous and conflicting information. So that's what he
(50:14):
did back then, and that's what all these gms and
soothsayers do today. A lot of conflicting information, sometimes hazardous,
but you got the true genius. He really involves being
able to sip through all that and come up with
that decision that can set your team on a different path.
Speaker 1 (50:36):
Did Winston Churchill rely on analytics?
Speaker 2 (50:39):
Yeah? I think it's called the bottle of scotch.
Speaker 1 (50:44):
They worked for him.
Speaker 2 (50:45):
There's so many analytical equations in any bottle, it just
got to be into it. Take the time, but we've
all been there. We've all been there.
Speaker 1 (50:52):
Good stuff, Joe, looking forward to the next one. Number
one hundred will be next. Folks, you got to tune in.
Thanks Joe, Thanks going Tommy, thank you. The Book of
Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
(51:13):
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
The Book of Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio.
Hey thereon, Welcome back to the latest episode of the
Book of Joe Podcast with Me, Tom Berducci and Joe Madden.
And Joe, we are on the other side of the
(00:24):
trade deadline after months and I really mean months, because
people love talking about the trade deadline way too far
in advance. I remember when people were talking about the
Mets and the Astros dumping players. Well, it turned out
that we didn't get any blockbusters, Joe. I mean, with
all the names out there and all the possibilities, I
don't think there was any name that made you go
(00:47):
wow at the trade deadline. So real quick, I'll ask
you first to give me your first overview of what transpired,
if not the last day, the last couple of days
at least, because there were a lot of moves, but
again no blockbusters.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Yeah, filling needs right, I mean, the blockbusters a fun
thing for the fans to get involved with and talk about,
and it's great fodder for talk radio, whatever, newspapers, TV shows.
But I think a lot of teams did what they
needed to do, filling spots, making themselves stronger. And I
think after all that's what it's all about. I mean,
(01:23):
it's always nice to get the big, splashy dude, but
that doesn't always ensure everything, ensure everything, ensure everything. It's
just I like filling my little the holes, the gaps,
whatever I think I need. I need some spackle to
put in there right now to make this thing work.
So I think a lot of teams did that. I
a lot of even like yesterday with the Mets. Blackburn.
I love Blackburn. I've always liked him, the guy from
(01:45):
the athletics. I think he's a really good pitcher. They're
going to be surprised because I'm sure most of them
have never are hardly ever seen him pitch. But this
guy can be very functionally good down the stretch for
this particular team and others. I mean, you know the
bet I guess Tanner Scott was one of the bigger names.
And then again, it's it's who we getting in return.
You don't even know. We have no idea what these
(02:06):
guys look like a lot of times, and you have
to wait a couple years to find out, you know,
really who won anything regarding a trade. So I think
it's been a gap filler, even like Chisholm, like all
of a sudden, he comes back there and starts hitting
home runs and inject some life into that team, which
is noticeable whether they're in Philadelphia. I don't know if
it's going to be sustainable. Maybe I probably should be,
(02:28):
but nevertheless, mission accomplished regarding like let's give these guys
a shot in the arm and kind of like kickstart
them or a jumper cable them and get them going
in the right direction again. So that was my impression. Nobody,
like you said, nothing over the top, Schooble and those
dudes Guerrero, everybody stayed place and in place, and Snell,
(02:48):
Matt Snell really coming on strongly. But I think a
lot of functionally good moves.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Yeah. For me, it gets back to what's taken over
the game, and that is relief pitching. I mean, there
was a scramble for these teams, and they jumped out
early to grab relief pitch. And on the final day,
thirty four players were traded, and twenty of them were
relief pitchers. And a lot of these dudes are in
their thirties. They're pitching for their third, fourth, fifth, or
(03:15):
sixth team. Maybe they came up with a different pitch
or a mechanical change. Everybody is looking to go deeper
and deeper and deeper in the bullpen, especially with swing
and miss guys. And you know, fortunately or unfortunately, that's
where the game has been going that the emphasis on
starting pitching just is not there anymore. Jack Flaherty was
(03:37):
the best starting pitcher. He changed teams and he's before
this year he selled for a one year deal with
the Detroit Tigers, and he's you know, there's no John
Lester out there getting traded. There's no Max Scherzer, there's
no you darbish, there's no Coal Hammils, there's no Justin Verlander.
The premium now is load up on as many bullpen
(03:57):
guys as you can. And that's why when I look
at the deadline, I think, to me, the biggest winner
is the San Diego Padres. They won the bullpen race.
First of all, they're playing great baseball these days, especially
they coming off a huge East Coast trip where they
won three series in a row. They have a lot
of momentum. Aj Pereller, you got in love with this guy,
(04:20):
does Joe? I mean he goes out and he makes deals.
He's not bragging about his farm system. He's not, you know,
buying himself time as an executive by saying, we get
we're loaded with guys in a ball just stick around, folks.
He's trying to win a World series and he did
it once again, getting Jason Adam and Tanner Scott to
the best relief arms in the business. With Robert Suarez
(04:41):
on the back end, this has got They've got a
loaded bullpen. Now maybe they get Joe Musgrove back their
starting rotation. It's just phenomenal in terms of being able
to spin a baseball. You know, they cut the Dodgers
deficit to five and a half games with a great
come from behind win the first game of that series,
down five nothing, they pull it out. So I think
(05:02):
san Diego now to me, Joe, and especially with the
way the Dodgers and the Phillies have hit a lull
here in the middle of the season, san Diego Padre
has really jumped out in the pack what's been a
kind of mediocre pack in the National League, and they're
as dangerous as anybody right now, especially in a postseason
matchup situation with that bullpen.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Can't disagree trying to win you know, trying to win.
Right now, I see nothing with that philosophy. I wish
more teams could incorporate that. But in regards to your
bullpen wars or your bullpen guys, watch the box scores.
I mean I don't get to see all the games,
but I definitely could read. I read the Post every morning,
and the New York Post that is. And when I do,
I'm just checking out box scores, and you try to
(05:41):
recreate what's going on in gosh. I mean every game,
there's tons of bullpen usage every game. Every team, it
seems starters less than five innings all the time. And
with that, yeah, you're gonna need all these guys this
time of the year. I always wanted. I've always felt
the teams I've had in the past. Yes, you always
look to bost of your pitching somehow because if that
(06:03):
breaks stein you're really in trouble. So you're really trying
to make sure you have the depth necessary, whether it's
starter or reliever. However, box scores, man, just check them out.
There's tons of them. An age I always liked twenty
eight twenty nine year old players that have been with
maybe one or two other organizations. They've kind of figured
it out. They really have a slower heartbeat, and they're
(06:24):
truly there's nothing that's going to be overly impressive to them.
There's the nervousness is gone. They're able to breathe in
the moment. I really like that age group. I do.
You know, you got the prodigies that become really good
before that, but a lot of them really have to
weigh twenty seven to twenty eight, maybe even twenty nine
to be to get to the point where their brain
and body function in unison. And I like that. I
(06:45):
think that's a great component of that kind of a player.
And the other thing is when these organizations get these
pictures a little bit older, they're more willing to use them.
They're not trying to protect them as much, and they
know they're there on a short term basis, and they
also know that they can replace them eventually. So there's
a lot going on there with that age group in
that particular pace, And from the pitcher's perspective, they're finally
(07:08):
arrived mentally, I think, and from the front office position
more willing to subtract some of the rules in regards
to the usage. I'm watching the Yankees right on Tonkin,
My god. I mean that guy seems to be out
there often almost every night. So guys that have been
banging around like that, again, you're willing to put more
mileage on the arm than those that have not. And
(07:28):
I think this all plays into it. But final point, yes,
I do like the guys that are reaching for the
brass ring. They're not just sitting in the weeds. You
constantly and everybody gets praised for dumping players, dumping players
and moving forward. Listen, there's times you've got to do that.
I understand that, but I like the groups to try
to win.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned Dombrowski too, because he traded
for Carlos Estevez. I thought that was a great pickup.
He had a lot of uncertainty and actually still has
some in his bullpen with a lot of guys you
just can't throw strikes. And you know, Joe, there's nothing
worse as a manager to see games go away based
on free path from your relief pitchers. And he got
a true closer ninth ending guy Carlos and Stevez and
(08:10):
a lot of the prospect mavens are out there saying
he overpaid for this closer. The Phillies are a win
now team. They had an obvious hole in that team.
You're not going to be hanging out to prospects when
you're the Philadelphia Phillies and you're Dave Nebraski and you've
got a World Series championship on the horizon. So the
idea that teams quote unquote overpaid is based on what
(08:34):
prospect rankings. I mean, come on, I'd rather have a
general manager if I'm a fan of a team who's
got a window to win a World Series. I don't
like the idea of windows in terms of years because
they can come and go very quickly. But right now,
the Philadelphia Phillies, we know this year twenty twenty four,
of a chance to win the World Series. You don't
hoard your prospects. And I don't agree with the idea
(08:57):
of overpaying when you're filling an immediate need for a
World Series caliber type team.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Well, how about back in the day when the commissioner
could declare a trade nolin voy because it wasn't in
the best interest in baseball? Right?
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Oh, that was usually against Charlie Finley. He's trying to
sell off his.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Player exactly right, that's that's what happens. I mean, the
narrative is so changed where I mean, I don't remember, well,
I'm just thinking quickly, but when we were coming up
in the seventies and the eighties, there was none of
that I remember, like the big selloffs. I'm sure that
happened on occasion, but that had to be really bad.
By the time the White Sox dumped, there were only
(09:33):
a couple games down and they dumped, and that was
a big uproar. I can't remember exactly what year that occurred.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Yeah, the White Flag trade Wilson Alvarez. They were about
two and a half games out of a wildcard I
think it was ninety seven, and there was a big
up war.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
But you know they people cover the prospect industry a
lot more, Joe, And the way to cover that industry
is to say everybody's going to be great, because that's
going to get you attention.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Really listen, just work the minor leagues, be a minor
league player development guy, and you'll I could just sit
here and create a list right now guys that I
thought were going to be really good that couldn't even
get the double ay or outside of double a. It's
just it's very difficult to fulfill all the potential that
everybody speaks about. And right now there's even a thinner
(10:17):
grouping or layer of available prospects based on the number
of guys in your systems. And I know you're going
to make the argument that normally the higher draft picks
are the ones that do eventually end up in the
major leagues. But that's probably true, and that's always been true,
but there's always this undercurrent of players that is able
to surface and become functionally good or very good or great,
(10:39):
majorly Mike Piazza as an example. I mean, so there's
all of this is that the narrative is changing. You're right,
I don't wow when I just constantly hear about the
narrative regarding the prospects and how what they're going to
be like and how good they are and whose opinion
is that that's going to be so funny man, because
(11:00):
that's exactly where I'm going with the quote of the
day after this, it gets annoying sometimes. I like the
groups that play to win, and you know when you
sneak and you know things have gone wrongly. I not
even like with the White Sox that they're doing it
almost is like they've accepted How long ago have they
accepted this absolute misery? And what does that mean for
their fans and fans base. They think they're going to
(11:20):
make it up to them in a couple of years.
That's not necessarily true. So anyway, it's the narrative has changed.
It used to be we're going to try to win,
and there used to be situations where it was not
in the best interests of baseball.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Yeah, there's a researcher at MLB Network, Matt Baker, did
some research on prospects traded at the deadline, went back
over the last decade, and he found that I think
the number is three percent of the prospects traded at
the deadline turned out to be impact players or major
contributors on the big league level. So if your team,
if you're celebrating because your team got some prospects, just
(11:56):
be very careful. I'd rather be celebrating if my team
got out there for got true major league talent to
try to win a World Series. By the way, when
I talked about relief pitching, Joe, and you've seen this
in the arc of your career. If you go back
ten years, and that's not a long time, right, Just
go back ten years, the average major league starting pitcher
would throw six innings average ninety six pitches, and they
(12:19):
counted for seventy percent of the wins. Okay, so that's
sixth innings, ninety six pitches, seventy percent of the wins.
This year, starting pitchers are averaging five point three innings,
you're averaging only eighty six pitches, and they're getting only
fifty nine percent of the wins available. You talk about
(12:39):
the declient of starting pitching, and this is what again,
I'm circling back here to the trade deadline. All these
general managers, president of baseball operations, whatever you want to
call them, keep looking for people with closer stuff to
come into the game in the fifth and sixth inning,
and they're finding them. You know, the batting average in
(13:00):
the Major League baseball from the seventh innings through the
ninth inning is thirty four. It's just hard to get
a hit about what's coming out of these bulls, coming
out of the bullpen. And that's why I think, to me,
the Padres are a clear winner of the deadline.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
How's that work? And everybody's five hundred. I mean, I
you know, all these things everybody's trying to, like have
talked about this, playing the same game with the Rays,
then you can look this up, I'm sure pretty quickly.
I know, when we come into spring training, my goal
was to get a thousand innings out of the starting pitchers.
And I didn't mean like twenty of them. I'm you know,
it was like six, seven, ten. I mean we might
(13:36):
have had nine or ten. I think we did it
one year with less than ten starting pitchers. We got
a thousand innings out of these guys. So we let
them pitch. That's what they're there for. They're called starting
pitchers for a reason. And when you do that, your
bullpens stay healthier longer. You don't have to constantly search
for new guys, and there was more pitchability. It wasn't
just about coming out there and rearing back and trying
to throw as hard as you can for you know,
(13:58):
whatever amount of time that was.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
And even now with the new rules and just thinking
about this quickly, the three batter minimum that also impacts this.
I used to like to get guys in and out,
in and out, in and out if I could to
possibly save them and use them more often because if
he just threw maybe one hitter, one out and get
them out of there and just start matching up. I
always like to do that because I thought that had
a positive impact too. But thousand innings with the Rays,
(14:24):
I think we did a thousand at least one time,
maybe twice, and came close another. But that group was
so good, and that's what made the Rays great. It
was the fact that we pitched so well. We starting
pitched so well. We had the bullpen was always in
a state of flux, like you're talking about. We brought
a lot of veteran guys in, guys with some mileage,
but you never worried about hurting their arms. They knew
(14:44):
how to take care of themselves. You knew what they
can do. If they told you I can pitch today,
I believe them when they pitched today. If they told
me they cannot, they did not. Rafael, I've talked about
this t before. Rafael Soriano came into me after a
game where I did not use them, and because you know,
we had talked to front office, was concerned whatever, and
he said, Socio, listen to me. If I can go,
(15:06):
I will tell you I can go. I say, sometimes
I feel better on the third third consecutive day than
I do on this second consecutive day. He says, it
just it just varies, it's different. So he taught me
a lesson there at a betteran relief pitcher. Really listen
to this guy. He's going to give it to you
straight the line. I want the ball. Don't tell me
(15:27):
that I used to hate that I want the ball.
I mean that that's just such a much. He'smo kind
of an attitude. No, are you good? How do you feel?
Talk to me because they need to know this before
the game. And if you tell me before the game,
then I can think in a way that would better
suit us tonight and then tomorrow the next day. Because
the thing you have to consider with bullpen guys too,
for me was always it's not just about today. It's
(15:47):
about the rest of the week and who we're playing,
and who's your starter. You got a six starter starting
to Martyr tomorrow, and if you use a lot of
bullpen today, my goodness, you could be in big trouble
tomorrow with this guy. That that's really you don't expect
a lot of innings coming out of him as compared
to Okay, you got your stud the next day, go ahead,
maybe overuser abuse your bullpen the night before, because you know,
(16:08):
more than likely this guy's going to more deeply into
the game, the interconnectingness of the game itself, and of
course the bullpen, to me, more than any part of it,
is really something to be paid attention to. So I
could go on and on about this. I like a
thousand innings out of my starting pitchers, and I don't
think I don't think that's impossible, except the fact that
we don't promote it anymore. We promote guys that spin
(16:30):
the ball, throw hard at the top of the strike
zone more, and we want more of those guys, like
you said, to debilitate the latter part of the game.
But what's happening. Everybody's a five hundred club. Everybody's following
the same playbook.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
I'm not a big fan of the cliche of winners
and losers before the dust is settled at the trade deadline,
but I do. It's really too nuanced, and it's obviously
too quick. But I understand why people do that. But
I'm curious as to what the Baltimore Orioles are doing, Joe,
you and I both really love Baltimore's talent and the
(17:03):
job and height is doing. When we get back, I
need help figuring out what the heck the Baltimore Orioles
did at the trade deadline. Welcome back to the Book
(17:26):
of Joe podcast, our Trade deadline wrap up edition, and
I mentioned that, Joe, I'm really curious as to what
the Baltimore Orioles did. We've talked about this. They have
reminded me with their core of young players, not just talent,
but the chemistry on this team really takes me back
to your Cubs team, going back to twenty fifteen and
the way your team was finished off with John Lester
(17:48):
as a free agent, world As Chapman as a trade
piece at the deadline. I get the sense that's where
Baltimore was. To me, they needed an impact front of
the rotation, or at least someone behind Corbyn Burns type
starter and another power arm of the bullpen to supplement
Craig Kimbrel was very underwhelmed by what they did at
the deadline, Joe. They got Zach Eflin, who strikeout rate
(18:10):
is way down this year. They got Trevor Rodgers, a
starting pitcher who literally has the worst whip among any
pitcher with one hundred innings this year, and his velocity
is down more than two miles an hour from three
years ago. He is not missing bats at all. They
got Alloy Jmenez, a guy with no defensive quotient. He's
(18:31):
basically a DH who's hitting more ground balls than any
hitter in the big leagues. Austin Slater and Christian Pasha
are both the same player. Both can't hit offensively. They're
true center fielders, but you're not getting much offensively.
Speaker 2 (18:45):
You know.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
They were sitting on a tremendous pile of a new buzzword,
his prospect capital, and this is what they came away with.
I'm sorry. I mean, maybe this plays out and Eflin
just turns it up. I like Zach Eflin, don't get
me wrong, But to me, the Oriols needed someone to
slot between Corbyn Burns and Grayson Rodriguez. They have again
a window right now to win the World Series. I
(19:07):
understand what they're doing. They wanted players with contractual control
beyond this year. They didn't want to get into the
rental market. I understand they needed starting pitchers for the
twenty twenty five season. But I think you need to
be more aggressive and go out and get a Tanner
Scott who they had before. Go out and get a
Jack Flaherty. Maybe that experience from last year didn't suit
(19:29):
them well and they didn't want to go back there.
But to me, Joe, this team doesn't have to make
every move with an eye on twenty five. Twenty four
is right here. The opportunities right in front of you.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Well, there's so much going on right there. First of all,
they see something. That's how I look at acquisitions like this.
There's always that we could fix somebody mentality.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
I'm glad you brought that up, Joe, because I want
to ask you about that. You know so much about
player development, and I agree. Rogers has not been the
pitcher he was three years ago. F one's lost the
ability to swing a miss. They took two guys. They
didn't mention this from the Philadelphia Phillies, who Rob Thompson
had lost complete confidence in because they can't throw strikes.
Gregory Soto and Sir Anthony Dominguez. I mentioned Jimenez can't
(20:13):
get the ball in the air. You're putting a tremendous
amount of confidence in your major league staff with new
players in a short period of time to get these
guys straightened out. You tell me how that works out.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
That's an analytical move right there. And I'm not trying
to bash on anybody right here. Please listen. That's the analysts.
There's looking at something within the data, the information to video,
all that kind of stuff, and they're looking at that
and they believe they're going to be able to fix it.
So they'll gather, they'll decide all this, and then then
they will hand it over to the coaching staff and
they'll hand it over with advice in regards to how
(20:48):
to do this, and strong advice. Now, back in the day,
that would obviously that was not part of the quotient.
So it was about whether you know, you thought your
coaches could look at this, figure it out, make this
guy better. But under the circumstances you're describing, more than
likely those guys would not.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Have been acquired.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
That would not have been part of how we did
things at that particular juncture. So first of all, they
see something something that and analytics is brought to their attention.
I remember the time in the winter time Andrew called
me and he said what do you think about Fernando
Rodney And I said, well, you've got a good arm
is an apple. But by he says, our guys love them,
(21:25):
and you know what, that's your head a point six
y four e RA and set like a record. Up
to that point. They see something that's the only thing
I could I could gather right there. You've talked about
for nexte years to come. The control was starting pitching.
They believe they can fix them. Now that's another thing.
When you're in charge of development and player development and
coaching and whatever. You always believe you could fix somebody.
(21:47):
You always do. But then I learned it's not true.
It's not true that you could always fix somebody. There's
certain things within them that's more difficult than others to fix,
and the most difficult thing to fix with somebody's head.
So again, I don't know what these guys are like.
I don't know what they're thinking. I don't know how
they breathe. I don't know any of that stuff. Because
to me, that's still like the most important thing to understand.
How does this guy think? How does he breathe? And
(22:09):
then after that you can try to figure out if
we can actually fix them physically. So these are the
kind of conversations that are not at So that's independent
of how analysts work, which would be primarily almost like
in a vacuum, looking at movement and all this stuff
numbers and projections and all this stuff, whereas I'd be
more concerned in talking to the guy researching with former
coaches and players and what's he like, what does he
(22:31):
think of? Where's his head at right now? That to
me would be the more interesting part regarding his short
term and then eventually a long term benefit beyond that bullpen.
I mean, listen, I've had Craig Kimball, good guy, really
good guy. But to me, that's even more important if
they're trying to win right now, you cannot rely on
that with any kind of consistency. It's just I watch him,
He's going to have his spurts of being really good.
(22:53):
Of the spurts, it's just a little bit more if
he kind of a thing. So I really thought that
they needed to nail down that bullpen. S Or Anthony,
I watch him, great arm, Gosh, narn he's got a
great arm. But you talk about inconsistency regarding and again
when I watch him I think it's mental because he's
not focused in the sense that he's going to dominate you.
Because he's got the kind of stiff that's like he
should almost be able to say, here comes my fastball,
(23:15):
try to hit it and just blow it by somebody.
He's that got that kind of talent, but you don't
see that. So these are the kind of thoughts I
have as developmental guy, as a coach when you're bringing
the guys in, This is what I would be looking at.
So there's got to be a balance. I don't think
there's enough scouts on the road anymore. I don't know this,
but in order to balance this kind of projection. But
I promise you at the end of the day, whatever
(23:37):
the analysts say is going to out weigh with the
scout in the stands is.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Going to say, Okay, now, let me put you in
the shoes of your buddy Brandon Hyde. You're the manager
of the Baltimore Orioles. You've had a lot of these
players come up together, right the timing of these young
players as a group, they know each other from the
minor leagues. You've got a first place team and now
with two months left in the season, You're introducing seven
new players to a twenty six man roster.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
Not easy, not easy, absolutely right?
Speaker 1 (24:05):
How do you handle that?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
The thing about that the biggest guard there for me,
The thing to watch for is whose place are they
taking and what's the perception among the group. Of course,
I mean you're in charge of the guy or the GM,
the manager, et cetera. You're the ones have to make
these decisions. But I'm here to tell you, when it
comes to a really talily nick group, if they see
somebody walk in the door that they don't perceive to
(24:27):
be as good as the guy that's walking out the door,
this new guy better perform well, and perform well quickly,
because there's going to be it's going to injure the
confidence of the group.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Well, Joe, I mean, you're probably looking at Cedric Mullins
losing at bat. You're probably looking at Ryan Mountcastle losing
at bat. You're probably looking at Ryan o'harn losing at bats.
These have been core players on that team.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
That's it. That's that's my point. I mean, And I
used the example of Chico Lean when he came into
door in Anaheim ninety five season. Because disar gets Hurt.
We already had Spike Owing on the team, We had
Rex Huller, who are very capable of playing second base,
but we chose to bring Chico Lean in and move
Damien Easley to short. Wow, that taught me such a lesson.
(25:06):
That was a veteran clubhouse too, which I think has
an impact too, as opposed to a bunch of young guys.
May not see it that way, but when you're working
with a bunch of veterans, which the game was more
veteran at that time, you have to be very careful
about that because it can cause them to go on
a different trajectory because they really were upset by that.
So these are the kind of things to me that
(25:26):
are very necessary to really try to keep an eye
on and understand because it's real, it's true, and it
can't have an impact.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Well, now let's talk about the Yankees, because I think
the Yankees and closed the gap on the Baltimore Orioles,
and certainly if you watch them play ever since Saturday
night in Boston when Trent Grishen rescued them from a
loss with a big two out hit in the ninth inning,
they've found their groove and part of that was adding
Chisholm Junior. And they also got Mark Leier Junior, who's
(25:54):
been a strikeout machine by the way, from the Cubs.
Those are two really good pieces the Yankees needed, and
I like the Chisholm addition, especially Joe. He played his
first game at Fenway Park on Sunday night and said
something really interesting. He said, that's the biggest crowd I've
ever played in front of. That's Fenway Park, the smallest
park in baseball. And then from there he goes to Philadelphia,
(26:17):
sold out crowd forty five thousand people, half Yankee fans,
have Philly fans. The places, you know, goes crazy. This
is a guy I believe is energized by the opportunity
not just to be in a race, but to have
the attention on him. I think he's an extrovert guy
who wants to show people how great he is. And
you know, he's come out with a bag four home
(26:39):
runs in his first three games. He's playing third base,
a position he never played before. He gives the Yankees
a speed element and some swag that they probably needed. Listen,
never rolling right now. I love the moves that they've
made and obviously it still always comes back to Soto
and Judge. Judge has just been I mean, as great
as he's been, you know, is seventeen games in a
(27:00):
row on base, getting on base literally two or three
times a Night's just been incredible. But I'm telling you,
the Yankees right now have flipped their entire season. As
much as they wallowed a mediocrity, a lack of lineup
depth for two months. It's a different team right now.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
And what's wrong with What's wrong with that? What's wrong
with Addy? A little charisma? Listen, I have not watched
him that much jazz play, but I've been watching the
last couple of days. First of all, I love his
attitude regarding you. I could play third base, Yeah, give
it to me. I got it where gliber did not
want to go there and he said no, I got it.
And to me, it should have just been the other
way around, just based on physical ability, athleticism, whatever, up
(27:38):
the middle versus the corners. So that's my old scouting
standard right there. So he comes in very charismatic. So
was Mickey Rivers. So was kind of Reggie Jackson. So
was Thurman Munson. So was Lou Panellis, So was all
the former Yankees back in the day. More recently, the
(27:59):
great teams, Paul O'Neill, the Ice couldn't get off of Pauloni.
I mean, they've been part of the land. I think
the team today the last couple of years has been
way more died in the wool and really lacked that
kind of a looseness, and not in the sense that
you're going to take the team down the wrong path,
just the fact that you go out there and have
a noticeably a great time playing the game. Like when
(28:19):
Rizzo walked in there a couple of years ago, they
automatically started talking about riz and the impact he had
in the clubhouse. The only thing I don't like I
don't like the bastardization of the uniform. I don't like
all the different colors being incorporated in the uniform. It's
in the uniform, and listen, I'm addressed. I'm not in
a dress codes. But that's the only part I would
like to see to become a little bit more strict
with if you have a uniform, have a uniform. Otherwise
(28:41):
just wear whatever you want.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
And that's pretty much what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Green belts with green belts and even judged with the
aqua sleeves and stuff like that. I mean, I don't
know a uniform is uniform. I like uniforms, I do,
and that'd be the only thing other than that. I
love I love the way he is. I love his energy.
He did something the other night that wasn't called attention
to when he stole third base in a seven to
two game and nobody said anything was a ninth inning.
(29:06):
Those are the kind of things that could have got
you hurt back in the day a little bit. So
maybe just a little bit more education on how to
play the game. He just needs more information with that.
But when it comes to charisma, I mean, intensity is there.
He plays it hard all the time. All the things
you're looking for is there. I just think he needs
a little bit more information to really tighten his game up.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Now let's talk about the LA Dodgers, another favorite coming
into the season. What they did at the deadline. First
of all, I think I counted at last count. I
think they have six shortstops, you know, Mookie Betts, Tommy Edmund,
I'm at Rosario, Ki k Hernandez, Chris Taylor, on and
on it go. So I don't know what the final
arrangement is going to be Defensively, it's great having a
(29:47):
guy like Mookie. You can play him at second, playing
it short playm in center field. Kevin Kiermayer, who I
don't know if he's going to get much run in centerfield.
He hasn't hit much at all this year, but he
is a great defender. But the big move was Jack Flaherty.
That tells me that they're not totally convinced that Moto
is coming back or at least has enough time to
be playoff ready. What Clayton Kershaw might be, what he
(30:10):
is right now, A lot of questions, Bobby Miller, Walker Buehler.
There's just too many questions for the Dodgers. And they
went out and got the best starting pitcher who was traded.
That was Jack Flaherity Trek school Ball was never getting traded.
Garrett Crochet was never getting traded, especially to the Dodgers,
because he just imposed too many rules on an interested
team in terms of, hey, I'm not pitching in October
(30:32):
unless I get an extension, and so you've got and
then Blake Snell. The Giants really weren't trading unless they
got blown away, and that was another contractual issue that
made it difficult to agree on value. He's either a
rental for two months or if he opts in, he's
got thirty million dollars coming next year, and teams weren't
sure how to value a picture with that kind of
(30:55):
value fluctuation. So it came down to flarity. He's a
guy who's thrown his curveball and slider more than ever before.
He's really gotten heavy on spin. It's worked out for.
His strikeout rate is up, his walk rate is down.
He's a guy I believe will start a playoff game
for the Dodgers. So good for the Dodgers. I mean
they're scuffling right now, and they've tried all year to
(31:15):
fill the rotation holes. They needed a little certainty, Joe,
and I think they got the best option available in
Jack Flaherty. So if you want to go back to
your winners and losers, I'd have to say they want
just on Floherty alone. They didn't pay a high price either.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
I love Edmund. I'm a big Edmund fan from Saint Louis.
I know he's been injured.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Yeah, he hasn't been on the field yet this year. Joe,
I know a rist surgery. It hasn't actually played a
defensive position, but I'm with you, and if he's healthy,
love the flexibility and even the offensive game.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
Well, the risk injury always bothers me. Normally, when the
guy's coming back from that and he's deemed to be well,
you still have might have to wait a little bit.
Risks are really touch I mean, after all, that's a
huge part of the game, your wrists, so that would
be a little bit concerning. I'm sure they did their
due Dell homework. But here comes Flaherty. Flaerty when he
was in Saint Louis, Man, I'll tell you what, one
(32:08):
of the best athletes as a starting pitcher in all
of baseball those first couple of years in Saint Louis.
I was so impressed by him. He could hit, he
could also run the bases, he could pitch. He had
great stuff, just so athletic, moves so well, kind of
like Musgrove, a better version of Musgrove. I thought that,
you know, with the Pirates and the Padres, I was
always a big Flaberty. Than then all of a sudden
(32:29):
it was like, WHOA, what's wrong with this guy? Command
was not there, never could get out into the fifth inning.
Showed flashes of brilliance, but it was very inconsistent. And
I tell you, I like the idea of him throwing
more breaking balls. There's some guys that have issues was
commanding their fastball, and you always want you always liked
the idea of like fastball command setting up everything else,
but some guys you might have to have breaking ball
(32:51):
command to set up your fastball. I've had pitches like
that in the past, where I even had a pitcher
in the minor leagues that has such a great curveball
and did not know where his fastball was going. I
had said, if you threw two consecutive fastball balls, you
have to mandatory throw a breaking ball, because I thought
he commanded the breaking ball better. So I don't even
know if this is an issue of just looking at
(33:13):
him from the perspective that it was kind of in
vogue right now to throw more breaking balls, or if
they felt they commanded his breaking ball better. I've always
talking about wrists. I've always thought if by doing that,
you find your wrist, you find your release point, and
then eventually you find a better method of throwing your fastball.
Without even thinking about it sometimes when you're just putting
(33:33):
so much pressure on your fastball to control and command it,
and it becomes actually a mental kind of a gig,
and then all of a sudden it becomes shotgun. You
have no idea where it's going. So I kind of
like that without having seen it, it makes sense to me.
But this is one of the better athletes that has
coming down the pike over the last I don't know
five whenever he signed, I was with the CUBBIESYT, so
(33:54):
it had to be like eighteen, nineteen seventeen. He was
in there at some point. This guy has great stuff
and he's a great athlete.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Well said, let's jump around real quickly to some other teams.
Pittsburgh Pirates are a player, Joe, the Pittsburgh Pirates added
at the deadline. And how about this. On the last
day of the trade deadline, nine hitters were traded. It's
not a lot, right, I mean, it's just not a
lot out there. Nine hitters were traded. Eight of them
have below average adjusted ops's The best hitter that was
(34:25):
traded on the last day of the trade deadline was
Isaiah Kiner Fileffe and he went to the Pittsburgh Pirates,
and by the way, he signed for next year as well.
That was a really good pickup. They also got Brian
dey la Cruz from the Marlins. Nice pickup. Pirates are
a dangerous team, Joe. They're in the wildcard race and
I'm telling you, you've been there on bad teams, You've
(34:46):
been there with good teams. For a team that traditionally
has done nothing but sell off at the deadline, that
has to energize that group, no.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Doubt, no doubt. I mean, if you're not used to
having somebody walk in the door only having people leave,
it's going to make a big difference. You know, the
cutcheon being at the head of that whole thing. And
again you look at players that are less stand that
they're tradable, and they pick him up out again. I
believe that they believe they can fix this guy. Whatever
they feel like the deficiency is. They feel like they
(35:15):
have the anecdote they could fix this guy. And that's
that's just how this thing works now. Connor Philippa, I
like him. I liked him with the Rangers a lot.
When he was at the Rangers. He was a really
good player. He was kind of like David Fletcher is
another version of Dave. I'm still being a big David
Fletcher phantom surprised he's really drifted away. This guy could
(35:36):
fill a lot of these voice for a lot of
these different teams if he's playing like I saw him play.
But Conner Philippa is that kind of a player, I think.
So yes. When a guy with that experience walks in
the door to the Pirates, maybe you know it's not
the big Marque guy, but conversationally at a locker rafter
a game, a lot of locker before the game, on
(35:56):
the field, during batting practice, whether it's on defense or
by the cage, guys like this can do a lot
of good for you. These guys like this can get
somebody's right before the game begins, and you cannot underestimate
how important that is. So yes, I agree. I'm a
Pirate fan does my second team growing up because I
like their uniform so much and I love Roberto Clemente.
But otherwise I think they've done a lot of good
(36:16):
things that I'm rooting for them.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
And here's a question for you. With the last person
leaving the state of Florida, turn the lights off, please.
Eighteen Major League players were traded by the Rays and
the Marlins. And I understand limited resources. I get it.
You know, they shouldn't be trying to win the World Series.
I understand that, but you also, to me, you cannot
(36:38):
celebrate the tremendous amount of turn that goes on. I
don't want to hear about how smart these front offices
are because they pirated somebody's, you know, number eight prospect
in their system. Eighteen major league players left the Marlins
and the Rays. It's just not good when it continually happened. Yeah,
every team's going to go through periods where you need
(37:00):
to retrench. I get it, but my goodness, that's a
lot of major league talent moving out of the state
of Florida.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
Great, you're right on, right on. And you you know
when I was there, when we got there in six
everybody said, oh, the Ray's got to get out of
this division with the Yankees and the Red Sox, they
got to get to another division. And I said, no,
for me, it was we needed to stay there because
you got at that time, you had to play the
Red Sox and the Yankees. Was it eighteen times? Nineteen
(37:31):
times annually? And you had to pay half of that
in their ballpark, and I thought the best way to
get good quick was to play in those kind of
environments where it was really tough. It was very difficult.
You had to be at your best, you had to
play baseball. And my thought was, I didn't care. This
is what I mean. You look it up. I don't
care what the payroll is. It's about who plays a
(37:51):
better game at baseball on a specific night. That's how
I looked at it, and that's what I used to
try to sell my guys. You can look at all
the names, all this stuff. There's some great lineups, look
at the Yankee lineups, look at the Red Sox lineups
at that time, and here comes the Rays. So my
selling point was, and I believe this, and I still do,
who plays the better game tonight? Who plays the better
game of baseball tonight? Baseball, not the rote a wireball, whatever, baseball.
(38:16):
Who plays the better game tonight? And that's how the
race got good because we faced it down, we embraced
the target. We walked right into that fire, and eventually
we beat the Red Sox in Boston, which was not easy.
It was harder for us to beat the Red Sox
in Boston than it was for us to beat the
Yankees in New York. But you had to get those
(38:36):
two things. There's nothing more gratifying than walking out of
a dugout at that particular point between two thousand and seven,
eight nine ten, walking out the dugout in Fenway or
a Yankee stadium shaking hands after a win on the
Mount Gosh, that was one of my the happiest moments.
That's the happiest moment of your baseball life at that time.
So it's still there, man. I just again, I don't
(38:58):
know that people. It's a narrative. How do you convince
your guys that you can do this stuff, or how
do you convince that you can't do this The narrative
always is convincing that you can't do it for me,
Yet you're spending more money. But who's going to play
better brand of baseball tonight?
Speaker 1 (39:11):
And finally, Joe, I want to give you two under
the radar moves to me that could have the biggest
impact the additions for me. Number one is Michael Kopak
going from the White Sox to the Dodgers. This guy,
if you look at his fastball properties, it's off the charts.
I mean, he's got a Garrett Cole fastball. He needs
work on his slider, he needs work on command. And
(39:32):
again you talk about teams fixing people, the Dodgers have
a tremendous history with their resources, especially when it comes
to spin. I think he's going to be a dominant
postseason pitcher for them, a multiple inning guy, come in
the six to seventh inning and shut a game down,
give the offense time to come back. The other one
for me is Alex Cobb. I know you like Alex Cobb.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
A lot, love him.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Hasn't pitched at all this year, but he's coming off
a hip injury. He's on his rehab, he's got one
more start. He'll be in the Cleveland rotation. Cleveland did
need a veteran arm in that rotation, and they got
a really, really good one, a battle tested one. Listen
that the Giants are going for. But they're using a
Hayden bird song and the rookie in the rotation rather
(40:13):
than trusting Cobb coming back, which is fine, that's Italian
evaluation thing. But good on Cleveland to be imaginative enough
to go out there and take a picture. Who hasn't
throwing a pitch in the major leagues this year, and
think we get to the postseason, we've got ourselves a
tough cookie as a veteran starter.
Speaker 2 (40:29):
Ac Alex one of my favorite that I've ever had,
among the best makeup guys I've ever had. Big game situation,
you know to expect and his stuff. Listen. I try
to convince THEO to sign him with the Cubs the
year that we signed Chatwood, that came in for a
couple of years, and we couldn't get that done because
(40:53):
Alex was coming off some tough moments there. But this
guy's change up, whatever that is, that vulcan pitch that
he's got is unbelievably good. And the thing that about
Alex also the totally I thought was underrated for so
many years. There's this curveball. His curveball is outstanding, and
then he knows how to pitch with this fastball and
he got a little funck in his delivery. He's great
(41:13):
at holding runners, he's got a very quick move in
the first base, and the makeup, like I said, is
overwhelmingly great. He when he's not pitching, talking about that group,
he's going to walk around before the game in the
clubhouse after the game. In the clubhouse, he's going to
do all the things necessary that you want from a
really established and a good starting pitcher, major league pitcher. Listen,
(41:36):
I could go on and on about this guy. I'm
that big of a fan. Be wonderful to see him
come back healthy and well because if he does, and
you know, the shortened part of the season like kind
of right now, he's got only a couple of months
to cover heads up. If he's If he's well, he's
because he likes it. He likes this stuff. He likes
pitching in big games, and he's really good in him
(41:56):
and he can get out good hit or is both
sides of the plate. A big fan of the move Kopek,
I don't really know. I know he's got a great arm,
but I've never really seen a lot of him. But again,
you're right, I think the Dodgers see something they think
they can fix.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
We're going to take a quick break right here. When
we get back, I want to ask Joe about something
that happened with Dave Roberts of the LA Dodgers in
terms of a manager and the rule book that I've
never seen before. Maybe he has I'll run that scenario
by him right after this. Okay, Joe, I need to
(42:38):
get your memory working here and your vast resources history
of the game, because I've seen a lot of baseball myself,
but I haven't quite seen this where Dave Roberts. It
was a game against the Padres, extra innings, bases are loaded,
and first of all, Mike Schiltz, who I think is
a really good manager, pinch hits for Jake Croinworth, his
number three hitter in the lineup against the lefty Alex Basia,
(43:02):
and I don't think the Dodgers works. I think that
to happen, he send up Donovan Solano, the right hander,
to pinch hit. So when the pinch hitter is announced,
Mark Pryor the pitching coach, goes out to the mound
to talk to Visilla. That's typical because when a pinch
hitter is announced, it's not charged. As one of those
five official mound visits you have. You get a chance
to review the scouting report on a pinch hitter, which
(43:23):
is fine. So then Dave Roberts came out after that
and wanted to know if he could change pitchers, and
obviously you can't because he now has to face a batter.
Once there's a mound visit, the pitcher has to face
a batter. And while this is going on, the pitch
timer is running, so a ball is charged to Visia,
(43:44):
so he starts with the bases loaded, tie game, extra
innings with one zero count. Next pitch, Donovan Solano wins
the game with a bass hit. There a little confusion there,
but it began to me with Mike Schildt and the
Padres making the aggressive decision to pinch hit for the lefty,
the number three hitter of the lineup, a good hitter.
Jake Cronenworth, who was typically as Jake is, was cool
(44:06):
with it after the game and he's like, oh, I'm
trying to do is win. Yeah, I was ready to hit,
but I'm okay with it because we're winning the game.
Beautiful interesting scenario there, beautiful.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yeah. First of all, I'd want to believe because I
think I would have done it if I ever had
that in my back of my mind, because maybe Coroner
Whorth's been struggling, or you know, you're coming in against
the Dodgers. They have all these lefties that are going
to match up with and I have a Solano is
a really that's a perfect guy, contact guy in that situation.
Having that conversation with Coroner Worth in advance would be
vital to me that I would go out to and say,
(44:36):
listen if this were to occur, because it's don him
and Solono, a guy that could a veteran that could
really move to baseball. I think it's easier for obviously
for coner Worth to understand that, plus just the fact
that you'd want to do it at all. So Number one,
I think that's part of it. I'd be curious. Number two,
Shilty's a minor league manager. He's a grunt. He's seen
these situations before, he's done these things before, and he's
(44:57):
not concerned about having to answer tough questions afterwards if
it doesn't work, because that's why it falls under the
category of the right thing to do. So you do
the right thing, and if it doesn't work, that doesn't
mean it was a wrong decision. It just means it
didn't work out. So I'm looking at that and yeah,
I mean, yes, you have to face that one more hitter.
And that's the beauty of that whole situation, the way
it came down. So listen, I worked against Shilty, and
(45:21):
when I looked across the field and the things that
he did, promise you, this is exactly what I thought
to myself. This guy was a minor league manager. He
worked in the minor league. Bruce Boch, he was a
minor league manager. He worked in the minor leagues. Jimmy
Leland minor league manager, worked a lot of time in
the minor leagues. It was obvious to me. And these
are the guys that caused me my most concern, and
the other dugout because believe me, they're thinking this stuff
(45:44):
all the way through. They've had these conversations with you know,
their coaches in the past. They've sat after tough losses
and talked about things with the beer for years. They've
done this. So it's hard to slip something by these
guys because they've they've been there, done that. So doesn't
surprise me about Shilty. And understand, this is where all
the little nuance comes in. Have the conversation before and
(46:06):
give somebody heads up. You're thinking this if it were
to pop, and then that way a guy like Conaworth
could accept it more easily. But of course, when Solano
gets a hit, everybody's happy.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
Yeah, good stuff. I mean, I think again, I'll go
back to where we started, Joe, with the importance of bullpens,
and it actually plays up in the postseason and on
the other side of the deadline. I am now looking
at the Cleveland Guardians and the San Diego Padres as
two nightmare matchups for a higher seeded team. If you're
(46:37):
looking for this year's version of say last year's Diamondbacks
or last year's Rangers, I would start with those two teams.
Both teams, by the way, also have high end talent,
real true star players, and I like the way the
managers run both of those teams. I love the fact
that they don't lose games late, and both teams have
(47:00):
to me some nice momentum going. So I know that
chalk is you know, top five payrolls, you know Dodgers, Yankees, Phillies, Braves,
et cetera. But if you're looking for a nightmare matchup
in the postseason environment, because it is a different kind
of game, keep your eye on Cleveland and San Diego.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
Can't disagree. I love that stuff. And again, who's who's
playing better baseball? Play better baseball. It's not it's not
about your pocketbooks and how much money you've spent. Who's
playing better baseball? What is the philosophy? Look at the
way the Indians play. I mean, my gosh, that's that's
beautiful the way they play. They play hard all the time.
I'm loving you that voters having a great first season.
I love all of that. I love all of that.
(47:39):
Now that he's got Cobbra there, that's yeah. Probably he
probably caught Cobber with the with the race at some point.
I think they might have overlapped a little bit. That's
kind of interesting. I mean, I think Cobbra might be
as old as Steven. I. You know, that's kind of
a nice situation. But I I you know, it's noticeable
when a team develops their own personality and method of
(47:59):
play and it stands out. And I really really do
appreciate anything that's apparent with the Indians. It's I don't
I don't watch the padres enough to know that, but
I know Shilty and I know what the demands are
going to be there, and I know the conversations are
going to take place. So it's all interesting stuff. There's
going to be an outlier maybe too, Like you're talking
about somebody will separate at that particular time at the
(48:23):
end of the year during the playoffs. But for right now,
who's going to play the better game of baseball tonight?
Speaker 1 (48:27):
By the way, Joe, this is our ninety ninth episode
of the Book of Joe, number ninety nine. It goes quickly,
doesn't it.
Speaker 2 (48:35):
It's our Aaron Judge episode right here, there you go.
Speaker 1 (48:39):
And by the way, we are working on efforting a
surprise mystery guest for episode number one hundred. So for
those of you who just joined us, those of us,
those of you who have been around, you don't want
to miss episode number one hundred, not that you want
to miss any any episode that we have, but especially
(49:01):
for one hundred. How's that for a tease.
Speaker 2 (49:02):
That's nicely done. Looking forward to this surprise guest. Also,
it's going to be very interesting to say the least
is a man of many talents and interests, especially in
the game of baseball, and I'm just curious to get
his take on what's going on in the game today.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
Well said, And as far as ninety nine, who is
going to take us out in the court of the day?
Here Joe? For episode ninety nine of the Book of
Joe Winnie Churchill.
Speaker 2 (49:31):
And this was serendipitous because going into this morning, based
on the trade deadline, I just researched evaluation. You know,
how do you go about evaluating quotes on evaluation? And gosh,
it was a bunch that popped up and kind of
surprised me. But typically Winston Churchill, you know, one of
the greatest leaders. You know, you could bang on him
(49:52):
as much as you want, but to have the cajones
to do what he did during World War two man
and stick to his guns literally, it is truly incredible.
So anyway, true genius resides in the capacity for evaluation
of uncertain, hazardous and conflicting information. So that's what he
(50:14):
did back then, and that's what all these gms and
soothsayers do today. A lot of conflicting information, sometimes hazardous,
but you got the true genius. He really involves being
able to sip through all that and come up with
that decision that can set your team on a different path.
Speaker 1 (50:36):
Did Winston Churchill rely on analytics?
Speaker 2 (50:39):
Yeah? I think it's called the bottle of scotch.
Speaker 1 (50:44):
They worked for him.
Speaker 2 (50:45):
There's so many analytical equations in any bottle, it just
got to be into it. Take the time, but we've
all been there. We've all been there.
Speaker 1 (50:52):
Good stuff, Joe, looking forward to the next one. Number
one hundred will be next. Folks, you got to tune in.
Thanks Joe, Thanks going Tommy, thank you. The Book of
Joe podcast is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
(51:13):
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Fox Sports Radio News
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Jonas Knox
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