August 11, 2025 • 23 mins
Rob Friedman aka Pitching Ninja dishes out the nastiest pitches he's seen this season and what rookie pitchers have surprised him. He also covers Roki Sasaki making tweaks during his rehab and Jesus Luzardo tipping pitches earlier this season. What does Pitching Ninja think of Max Fried’s downturn? How much will things change for the Padres with the return of Michael King? Plus, Pitching Ninja delves into how Ohtani is dealing on the mound.
Get 20% off your first Slab Pack or card purchase by going to ArenaClub.com/FOUL and use code FOUL
(17:01) Afterwards, Trevor May explores the ups and downs of training pitchers at a young age, including whether 16-year-olds throwing 100mph is OK and how to coach teens to slow pitch velocity.
Hosts: Trevor May, Scott Braun
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
All right, we've got Robman aka Pitching Ninja back on FT.
It's good to see Rob. It's already August man. I
looked down. I'm like, man, we haven't seen Rob Freeman
in a minute. How you been. I've been good.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
I miss you too.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
We like these combos, and I don't know if we've
had Trevor on for these combos, but obviously we can.
We were nerding out a little bit more than usual today.
You know, some of the frat boys are off the
show today, so Trevor and I can just nerd out.
But let's start off this way, nastiest pitch that you've seen,
and I'll put it in two directions, One like the
actual pitch, like in one particular game one pitch, but
then also just in general, like, which pitch are you
(00:38):
enjoying watch watching from a starter or reliever on the
mount this year.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
That's a great question.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
I think I can come up with two that just
hit me off the top of my head as far
as nastiest pitch. One is a Joe Ryan sweeper that
was originally measured at like thirty inches and I think
they scaled it back to twenty eight inches of break
or something like that that was insane. It's just all
the right elements happened and the thing just broke like crazy.
The other one I was thinking of is Jacob Mazerowski
(01:07):
against Willie castro with that was a ninety six mile
an hour slider that sent him to the nether world.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
That was pretty sick.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
And as far yeah, I mean as far as guys
like I think he might have just the most eye
opening filthy stuff, like you have to watch every pitch
that he throws because you might see something you've never
seen before.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
But there are a lot of filthy guys out there.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
We asked that question. Now, I'm like, over here, I
kind of want Scott to interview both of us, just
get the same questions from both, because I was going
to say, he's going to say the Joe Ryan sweeper
if I remember correctly too, I saw it on your account.
He also like ran off of the camera screen, and
I was like, he kind of went with the ball,
which also I think added a little bit another question
(01:53):
along the lines of nasty pitches. I want to stick
to rookies because I feel like you have a pretty
good idea all of the rookies that come up we
include Miserowski too. Is there any pitches that you did
not anticipate to see that surprised you when you're like, WHOA,
(02:13):
I didn't know we had that. Is there anyone who's
come up this year that has actually blown your mind
with the pitch?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Well, there are two guys. I don't know if they
surprised me. Miserowski's one of them. Like, I didn't expect
his command to be as good as it had been,
Like he looks like a taller Jacob de Gram at times,
and that's ridiculous. The other I mean Chase Burns. I
knew his slider was really good, but his slider is
mid may arguably end up being one of the top
sliders in baseball. Like he is certified electricity when he's
(02:43):
on the mound, and I wish more people would watch that.
They pay attention to the runs, which he's had some
bad luck, but if you look at his pitches and
his strikeouts and swing and miss stuff, you can't miss
that guy.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
I've got a rookie for you that a lot of
the world maybe has forgotten about because he's been missing
for most of the season, But it sounds like he
might come back soon, and he's experimenting with a two seamer.
Did you see the recent comments from Roki Sasaki? And
do you think that he's going to work on adjusting
so that he can pitch in the big leagues. Not
that he couldn't, right, he got hurt. That's really why
(03:19):
he's been missing time here. But I thought it was
fascinating for him to take us inside. You know what's
going through his head as he's going to rehab here.
He thinks that he needs to remodel his game a
little bit, which every pitcher does to an extent. What
did you think?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
I think he's probably right.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
So his fastball doesn't have like it's fast, but it
doesn't have amazing characteristics. And hitters are waiting for that
fastball because they can't hit his fork ball, slash split
or whatever he calls it. That pitch is virtually unhittable.
But if you eliminate it and you sit on a fastball, yeah,
so you can have some pretty good luck. But adding
another fastball variation, you've seen it work with other guys.
(03:55):
I mean Hunter Brown just took off once he added
that two seamer. I think it might help him just
keep hitters off that kind of flatish fastball, and you
know he's got he's young, he's got amazing talent. And
I left him out because yes, his forkball, which it
really is, is one of the filthiest pitches in baseball.
(04:17):
But adding that other weapon I think is going to
be really important for him and could help him succeed
in the majors. I think he was caught a little
flat footed by the dropping velo because of the injury.
But also hitters, if they eliminate a pitch I know
one hundred mile an hour fastball's coming, it's easier to hit.
Speaker 4 (04:37):
You. Brought up a great point about the two fastball,
kind of to use a gaming term meta, and I
feel like this is something a lot of guys are doing,
Like Paul Skeen's talked about adding a sinker and a cutter,
just because even though he was as good as he can,
because he knows what he's going to need as things change.
And Roki this is a great example. I thought I
(04:59):
said this early in in the year too. I'm like,
he's going to need something that goes either that way
or that way at some point in order to get
lefties and right He's out and get away from produced bits.
So what is your opinion on do you think this
is a the having two fastballs? That is, do you
think this is a trend that is going to stay
(05:19):
become more necessary and stay necessary for a long period
of time, or is this going to be a you know,
one of the trending pitches kind of like everyone through
a sweeper and now we've some of the guys you
can throw a sweeper have kind of stopped and now
we've it's kind of evened out. What do you what
is your opinion on the idea of throwing more than
one fastball?
Speaker 2 (05:36):
I mean, I think that's a great question to me.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
The more pitches you have that you can command, the
better off you are for even things like tipping pitches,
like if you have if Paul Skeins has eight pitches,
even if he's tipping a little bit, because everybody has something,
it's really hard to figure it out if you have
eight different variations of different pitches. So I think that
the trend towards more pitches is going to keep going
(05:59):
because it's going to be all so easier to pick
up tips. Where we have biomechanics basically on the field
with Hawkeye stuff. You can run it through AI and
figure out what guys are doing differently on different pitches,
even if it's a tiny bit different. But if you
have to remember eight different things and remember slight variations,
I think it's tougher. So I do think there's a
trend towards that. Whether it's all gonna be sinkers, I
(06:21):
don't know, but we're calling them sinkers.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
They're not not.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
I mean some of these aren't even designed to be sinkers.
There are two seamers that designed to kind of stay
up in the zone as opposed to your traditional sinkers.
So there's so many different variations. I think the trend
is more two more pitches that guys can command.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
AJ I'm on my phone right now in Arena Club,
and I'm looking at the Emerald slab packs, and I
see in the grail a Bobby Witt Junior twenty twenty
Bowman Chrome Prospect Auto Gold Refractor card. Give me that.
Give me your phone. I'm gonna I'm gonna get you
to buy it to me.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
I don't have it.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
You get a slab pack, No, I don't have that,
And give me your slab pack Card's worth.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
You buy me slab pack, Scott, so I can get
the Bobby with Junior Gold Refractor twenty twenty Bowman Chrome Auto.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Because that sounds.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Awesome and it's worth a lot.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
It's worth a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
He's a stud, he's not going down.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Get a grill.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
Get a grill. I want a grail, Scott, give me
the holy grill.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
You do it.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
To do that, you must get yourself a slab pack
in Arena Club or if you want to get it
for a friend, you can do that too. And right
now you can get twenty percent off your first slab
pack or your first card purchase if you're going on
there and just like, hey, I want a specific card,
I find it there on to grab it for my showroom.
Arena Club dot com slash foul and use the code foul.
(07:38):
I'm just curious. Just a quick side question for you.
Did you see the you say Kukuchi story about how
he tried to add a sweeper, you know, and I
think he had it, I guess early in the season,
and then it was lowering his armslot and he felt
like it was messing up his other pitches. How often
are you seeing that part of the equation where it can. Actually,
I mean for the most part it's it's producing some
(07:58):
really cool results for a lot of starters, right, but
it could mess you up and like not just be
a try and it's like, oh, passer fail, right, and
then I'll throw this pitch out. It could be like, oh, wait,
this is throwing my entire game off and now I'm
in a rut. And then he's picked it up after
he ditched that. But what do you think about that
side of the equation.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
It's definitely a thing like you have to monitor it.
It's pitcher specific, like some guys will manipulate the ball
a little more and then they're tipping it or it's
not coming out at the same tunnel that their other
pitches are. It's just easier to pick up. Like a
sweeper works for some guys, it doesn't work for other
guys because it looks so much different from the rest
of their pitches that a hitter can say, you know,
they're not necessarily even seeing the spin axis of a pitch.
(08:39):
They may be saying, oh, that looks different from everything
else I'm seeing, so I know this.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Is that pitch.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
But some guys, I think Paul Skins does a great
job of just being robotic almost and throwing different pitches.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
Seth Lugo.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
He can even very armslots like you have guys that
totally very armslots that are successful. Chris Bassett's another guy.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
But there are other.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
Guys where it's just one that that's an outlier, and
then you can pick up on it. Even if it's
nasty metrically, it doesn't mean it's nasty.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
In a game.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
You make several very good points there. I also have
some experience in basically showing some numbers on a pitch
when I'm trying and they're like, it looks really nasty.
I'm like, okay, I'm gonna throw it all the time
and not really thinking about all the other things that
are gonna come along with it. That was a splitter
ended up hurting me, and it actually ruined every other
pitch I threw to where I could only throw a splitter.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
That wasn't what I wanted.
Speaker 4 (09:32):
But two things you mentioned. We're talking about grabbing a
new nasty pitch and deciding when to use it and tipping.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
And there's a guy that.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
Has a new nasty pitch but may have had a
couple of different times this year tipping, and I want
your opinion on it. Jesus Azario added a sweeper, which
is he could not throw a slider for life of him.
Now he has one of the nastiest ones in that staff,
even that has a lot of good pitches. But I
think once, maybe even twice, he is I had some
(10:00):
trouble with tipping his pitches and having them relayed to
two hitters. Were you able to look at any of
Jesus's outings around this time and did you see any tips?
Did you see anything you're picking up? I have my opinion,
but I would love to hear yours.
Speaker 2 (10:14):
I did it.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
I'm trying to remember what it was because I did
a video comparing the two and everybody was like, oh, yeah, god,
it's on, It's on X and I did the video
and I can't remember it because I later did one
on Mick Abel too, who was also I think tipping,
which is why teams were teeing off on him as well.
There's just little things like glove position, when you're lifting
(10:35):
up your glove and one's going over his shoulder, ones not.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
I forgot what I think it was tapping his glove, ye.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
His glove really far too, so that you can almost
he's almost showing his grip to every time.
Speaker 4 (10:51):
Yeah, yeah, I think that's what it was too. I
was hoping you saw that as well. He's spiking that
a little bit too, so you can see the knuffle.
And it's funny because in that outing you look and
on his face he's like, I know they can see it.
I can't stop tapping, like this is not something I
can start doing, which is an interesting, interesting situation.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
But it's one of those pitches. He's still threw it
and it was still really good. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
One of those things along those lines is like, as
you know, people are blaming your pitching coach or whatever,
but sometimes it's tough to pick up, like you're.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Seeing a nasty pitch.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
You can't see everything a pitchers doing consistently, but the
opposing team often does because they're game planning for something.
Then it's a cat and mouse game. You have to
stamp it out once you see it.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
There got one for you on a struggling pitcher, not
necessarily to probably not. I don't think he does that,
but I think there's a little blister issue causing no problem.
We got a fan question from John in the chat saying,
what does roph think about Max Freed and the ridiculous
start to the season that really halted in July and
we haven't seen him pick back up. So have you
(11:54):
noticed anything about him compared to what you were seeing
at the beginning of the.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Year, not tipping wise, but you know, he introduced some
new pitches. He introduced new wrinkles on his pitches that
I believe his sinker is different and he's throwing a
little cutter thing that's a lot more exaggerated, and I
think this hitters are able to game plan it off,
you know, over time, and he's been a little.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Just less sharp.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
But also I believe he had a blister issue and
that that definitely causes problems as well. But you know it, hitter,
pitchers add pitches. Hitters are like I've never seen that before.
It doesn't compute, it's not on the scouting report, and
then later on it is on a scouting report and
you can practice against it, so the league can catch up.
And that's up to him to make adjustments to stay ahead.
But he's great, like Max Read is awesome.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
I agree. I agree.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
Speaking of another guy who is now coming back and
is part of a team trying to make a push here,
maybe even for their own division. That's andygo Padres, Michael King,
we got to see we got to see the east
the East West guy back at it.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
What can we expect from Michael King?
Speaker 4 (12:54):
What is something you would look forward to as maybe
a benchmark to see how sharp he is coming.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Off the aisle?
Speaker 3 (13:01):
Yeah, I mean just making sure his his velo is
back where it was and the East West movement like that.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Dude is absolutely film. He's made for pitching. Ninja Like.
His stuff is just gross both ways.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
I mean he's throwing He's throw sweepers at break like
well over two feet and sinkers that come back the
other way breaking two feet like It's it's absurd stuff.
So if he has that type of command, he is
an incredibly valuable pitcher. I love watching that guy pitch.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Okay, so this is perfect for me to finish up
with my last question. We're hitting Padres. Padres fans are
pumped with everything they picked up at the trade deadline,
and then you don't even have King for a while.
Here comes King this weekend. What about the other side,
the Dodgers Otani specifically, What are you seeing from him
on the mound this year?
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Oh my god, Like, he's a guy I can I
can talk about for the next hour and a half
if you want me to. But uh, dude, he adds velo.
You know, he's throwing one oh one top to one
oh two. His his sweeper, I think has probably got
a little less horizontal break, but he's throwing a little harder.
(14:07):
His stuff is just it's obscene. His slider's been really good,
like just the pure slider, the thing that drops off
the table. Has been an eye opener for me because
I didn't view that as one of his better pitches
just in my head.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
I hadn't looked metrically, but he.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
Dominated last game with that and then also hits four
hundred forty foot bombs. Anybody that thinks that dude shouldn't
pitch send him to me, because that guy is mean.
Is he not one of the filthiest pitchers in baseball?
Is he not one of the best pitchers on that staff? Like,
what are we doing?
Speaker 1 (14:44):
Yeah? I mean, maybe whoever's saying that doesn't want the
Dodgers to be competitive in October. I mean it could
be a little troll thing, but no. I mean, I've
seen it too. It's crazy, you know, and I get it.
There's concern. We've had players on our show, right my
Buddy's krats and age. I have at least brought up
how is it going to affect the effect the offense
as he gets older, as he gets hurt. It's like,
(15:05):
I get all of that, but not if he's pitching
like a one. If he's a five, okay, and the
offense is dipping, okay, you want to make that case cool.
But he's a one and he homered the other day
when you pitched. So I'm with you, Rob. I don't
really see what you're gonna do now. If he gets
hurt in a major injury again, we're gonna have to
have this discussion again. But right now, you don't mess
with anything, right.
Speaker 3 (15:26):
I think people forgot how good a pitcher he is
because you cannot tell me he's not one of the
best pitchers on that team. I had a projection the
other day, just a crazy thought that what didn't break
baseball if like he closes out the World Series for
the Dodgers.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
Like he did in the WBC for Team Japan, Like
if he did that, what like what do you do?
You just like have to bow down to the guy.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
It's funny you mentioned that that was me in the
second half of last year. I'm like, will he do it?
Just because he would?
Speaker 2 (15:57):
Right?
Speaker 1 (15:57):
I mean the Dodgers eventually shut down the thought process there,
but I was like, could he just pop up for
I don't know, the World Series he was going through
his rehab. I like, could they snag an any or
two out of him? And then of course you're getting
the pushback like, oh, they're not going to need that,
and then Walker Buehler's closing out the World Series and
you're like, no, they would They would have. They would
have used a few innings there from showeo Tani even
(16:17):
eighty percent of Showotani. So I'm with you, do I
hope we see it.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
I hope we do too, like legit, like that would
be absolutely amazing. And the Dodgers are fully reloaded now right.
They got trning back, they got they got a glass
snell back, snell back. I mean that's a scary team.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Yeah, this is the good stuff. Next Dodgers Padres matchup
is circled on the calendar. There's two of them back
to back, weekends. I think it is coming up in
mid August. Here. So Rob, this was awesome man, great
nerding out on pitching with you everyone. Check out all
of the Pitching Ninja accounts, YouTube, Twitter, et cetera. We
showed a little piece of that Michael King sweeper. There's
a lot more where that came from if you check
(16:56):
out Pitching Ninja. Rob. Thank you man, good catching up.
Have a great weekend.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
Thanksy. Take care.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
Mace Blaining one of the most popular segments in baseball.
You can find it on May Day. You can watch
that show hour one on the FT network on Wednesdays
three o'clock Eastern and an hour two on Trevor's channel
on YouTube four o'clock Eastern. Okay, so I got two
topics for you. Let's start with Baseball America's senior editor
Josh Norris putting out an article in a tweet about
(17:23):
the last three weeks him witnessing not one but two
sixteen year olds throwing one hundred miles an hour, Kevin
de Frank and striker Pence, which is an A plus name,
that's an eighty grade name. But I'll focus on Pence
because it's Hunter's nephew. What do you think about youngsters
throwing a hound o plus? I don't know these guys obviously,
(17:44):
I haven't even watched video. To be honest, I didn't
do much homework on this, so you know, and not
that I'm going to even be able to chime in
much on the delivery, like is it easy gas? But
what do you think of a hundo plus from sixteen
year olds?
Speaker 4 (17:58):
It's too hard, probably, but there's one. There's a few
things that I think I get lost in translation and
talking about these subjects now. And I also agree striker
Pence is an elite name, and a guy throws one
hundred named striker, come on, you know he's either going
to pitch in the middle least or be a fire pilot.
So I think getting back to kind of talk how
(18:22):
pitching development is like hunting velocity, not new very much,
not new every pitching cut, every baseball camp I went
to as a kid in the nineties and the early
two thousands, we could not wait to get to the
station that had the radar gun. Who was a conversation
between which guns are more accurate, stocker guns or drugs guns.
(18:44):
Drugs give you more velos, So we like to have
those ones like we all knew about all this stuff.
You saw a gun behind the behind the backstop, you
were you were jazzed up.
Speaker 2 (18:53):
You wanted to know what that number.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
Told you, like going out the days of going out
there not knowing how hard is rung. They're all they've
been over for a long time because technology has come
a long way. So of course now that that information's
more readily available, it is just it's a comparative stat
to other people your age, like its teenagers are they
struggle with that with everything it can always comparing themselves
to everybody, and so this is another thing on the
(19:18):
baseball field that you can show that I am I
am good, I'm really good, or I'm better or whatever.
So that hunt for velocity has always existed, and of
course it's going to exist.
Speaker 2 (19:28):
The problem is we.
Speaker 4 (19:29):
Now know how to get it, and we know how
to optimize guys to get the maximum velocity. And when
you're sixteen years old, you optimizing a sixteen year old's
body doesn't make sense because it's going to be different
in a month. So that's I think where the where
it becomes not the greatest thing in the world, because
(19:50):
you're optimizing for a person who has not done growing,
very likely unless they're very early mature, and that could
completely derail the whole thing. Anyways, to where that one
hundred and sixteen is now ninety one at twenty one,
and because they just simply can't, like something broke down
and just didn't heal as they were growing, didn't heal
(20:12):
the way they needed to heal, and they didn't max
out at the right time. It's called peaking early. And
I've played against some guys when I was young. There's
a couple of sixteen year olds in my league that
through ninety six ninety seven they were absolutely insane, and
then when they went to college they were down eighty
eight to ninety one because they had to deal with
some stuff. So it is just part of the way
(20:34):
it happens. And I think that what we're trying to do.
It doesn't mean like let's focus on command. It's just
maybe don't only focus on velocity, and maybe learning different pitches,
learning other positions, playing, don't become a pitcher only. There's
a lot of ways to I think, mitigate this stuff,
but there's no one way. I think it's just it's incentives.
(20:57):
It comes down to incentives. What are we incentivizing. Do
we want this guy to pitch long term with them
optimizing him right now? You got to leave some potential,
some some ceiling here to when they are a grown adult,
to then peak when it matters.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
And I think the.
Speaker 4 (21:11):
Only chance, only time that chancing this type of e
LO is worth it is in the major leagues.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
What if you know, a sixteen year old's like, oh,
it's just coming out of the hand like this, Like
how easy is it to take a lot off of
a pitch. Like what if you're someone who's just feeling
like naturally, maybe you're not throwing a hundred, but you're
pumping well into the upper nineties. How do you coach
someone through that?
Speaker 4 (21:36):
Then it comes down to if that person's naturally if
they're a Jacob de Gram type and they're just naturally
adding velocity because something is clicked for them physically and
they don't really know what it is, figuring out what
that is, and then building all of the your apparatus
around it, your mechanical stuff around it, strengthening every part
(21:57):
of that chain to protect them and allow them able
to do it longer. It's just about getting stronger and
stronger and stronger while and then just letting them keep
just doing it naturally. So it becomes on the back end,
like we're not worried about you getting like, it's not
about trying to get you to slow down or take
your foot off the gas if you're not putting your
foot on the gas. But if you're out there with
(22:18):
intent to throw one hundred percent, that's when you're like, like,
maybe we throw change ups at one hundred percent, right,
maybe we mix in more change ups because naturally they're
just easier on the arm. Overall, there's just not as
much pressure going on the forearm and the elbow. There
are ways, but again, like if it's natural and they're
doing it naturally, not necessarily trying to throw out as
(22:38):
they can, then you just build them physically to be
able to operate in that space and do the work
necessary to maintain.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
Yeah, the part that really struck with me was, Hey,
you either played with or played against some guys that
were you know, ninety six ninety seven high school and
then they're in college and they're not throwing hard and
they're on through injuries. I mean, anyone that's been in
baseball for a long period of time. Even someone like me,
a broadcaster, has met a ton of people who say, hey,
(23:09):
I was in high school, I was the man homie,
right like, hey, I was throwing ninety five plus all that,
And then you're like, what happened? And some of them
are probably inflating their statistics, but some aren't. There are
those ridiculous players. I mean, I remember a kid in
my high school was like that, ended up playing college
baseball but kind of flamed out and had the build
(23:29):
you thought, oh, this guy's probably gonna make it. Now,
shoulder injury
All right, we've got Robman aka Pitching Ninja back on FT.
It's good to see Rob. It's already August man. I
looked down. I'm like, man, we haven't seen Rob Freeman
in a minute. How you been. I've been good.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
I miss you too.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
We like these combos, and I don't know if we've
had Trevor on for these combos, but obviously we can.
We were nerding out a little bit more than usual today.
You know, some of the frat boys are off the
show today, so Trevor and I can just nerd out.
But let's start off this way, nastiest pitch that you've seen,
and I'll put it in two directions, One like the
actual pitch, like in one particular game one pitch, but
then also just in general, like, which pitch are you
(00:38):
enjoying watch watching from a starter or reliever on the
mount this year.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
That's a great question.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
I think I can come up with two that just
hit me off the top of my head as far
as nastiest pitch. One is a Joe Ryan sweeper that
was originally measured at like thirty inches and I think
they scaled it back to twenty eight inches of break
or something like that that was insane. It's just all
the right elements happened and the thing just broke like crazy.
The other one I was thinking of is Jacob Mazerowski
(01:07):
against Willie castro with that was a ninety six mile
an hour slider that sent him to the nether world.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
That was pretty sick.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
And as far yeah, I mean as far as guys
like I think he might have just the most eye
opening filthy stuff, like you have to watch every pitch
that he throws because you might see something you've never
seen before.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
But there are a lot of filthy guys out there.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
We asked that question. Now, I'm like, over here, I
kind of want Scott to interview both of us, just
get the same questions from both, because I was going
to say, he's going to say the Joe Ryan sweeper
if I remember correctly too, I saw it on your account.
He also like ran off of the camera screen, and
I was like, he kind of went with the ball,
which also I think added a little bit another question
(01:53):
along the lines of nasty pitches. I want to stick
to rookies because I feel like you have a pretty
good idea all of the rookies that come up we
include Miserowski too. Is there any pitches that you did
not anticipate to see that surprised you when you're like, WHOA,
(02:13):
I didn't know we had that. Is there anyone who's
come up this year that has actually blown your mind
with the pitch?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Well, there are two guys. I don't know if they
surprised me. Miserowski's one of them. Like, I didn't expect
his command to be as good as it had been,
Like he looks like a taller Jacob de Gram at times,
and that's ridiculous. The other I mean Chase Burns. I
knew his slider was really good, but his slider is
mid may arguably end up being one of the top
sliders in baseball. Like he is certified electricity when he's
(02:43):
on the mound, and I wish more people would watch that.
They pay attention to the runs, which he's had some
bad luck, but if you look at his pitches and
his strikeouts and swing and miss stuff, you can't miss
that guy.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
I've got a rookie for you that a lot of
the world maybe has forgotten about because he's been missing
for most of the season, But it sounds like he
might come back soon, and he's experimenting with a two seamer.
Did you see the recent comments from Roki Sasaki? And
do you think that he's going to work on adjusting
so that he can pitch in the big leagues. Not
that he couldn't, right, he got hurt. That's really why
(03:19):
he's been missing time here. But I thought it was
fascinating for him to take us inside. You know what's
going through his head as he's going to rehab here.
He thinks that he needs to remodel his game a
little bit, which every pitcher does to an extent. What
did you think?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
I think he's probably right.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
So his fastball doesn't have like it's fast, but it
doesn't have amazing characteristics. And hitters are waiting for that
fastball because they can't hit his fork ball, slash split
or whatever he calls it. That pitch is virtually unhittable.
But if you eliminate it and you sit on a fastball, yeah,
so you can have some pretty good luck. But adding
another fastball variation, you've seen it work with other guys.
(03:55):
I mean Hunter Brown just took off once he added
that two seamer. I think it might help him just
keep hitters off that kind of flatish fastball, and you
know he's got he's young, he's got amazing talent. And
I left him out because yes, his forkball, which it
really is, is one of the filthiest pitches in baseball.
(04:17):
But adding that other weapon I think is going to
be really important for him and could help him succeed
in the majors. I think he was caught a little
flat footed by the dropping velo because of the injury.
But also hitters, if they eliminate a pitch I know
one hundred mile an hour fastball's coming, it's easier to hit.
Speaker 4 (04:37):
You. Brought up a great point about the two fastball,
kind of to use a gaming term meta, and I
feel like this is something a lot of guys are doing,
Like Paul Skeen's talked about adding a sinker and a cutter,
just because even though he was as good as he can,
because he knows what he's going to need as things change.
And Roki this is a great example. I thought I
(04:59):
said this early in in the year too. I'm like,
he's going to need something that goes either that way
or that way at some point in order to get
lefties and right He's out and get away from produced bits.
So what is your opinion on do you think this
is a the having two fastballs? That is, do you
think this is a trend that is going to stay
(05:19):
become more necessary and stay necessary for a long period
of time, or is this going to be a you know,
one of the trending pitches kind of like everyone through
a sweeper and now we've some of the guys you
can throw a sweeper have kind of stopped and now
we've it's kind of evened out. What do you what
is your opinion on the idea of throwing more than
one fastball?
Speaker 2 (05:36):
I mean, I think that's a great question to me.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
The more pitches you have that you can command, the
better off you are for even things like tipping pitches,
like if you have if Paul Skeins has eight pitches,
even if he's tipping a little bit, because everybody has something,
it's really hard to figure it out if you have
eight different variations of different pitches. So I think that
the trend towards more pitches is going to keep going
(05:59):
because it's going to be all so easier to pick
up tips. Where we have biomechanics basically on the field
with Hawkeye stuff. You can run it through AI and
figure out what guys are doing differently on different pitches,
even if it's a tiny bit different. But if you
have to remember eight different things and remember slight variations,
I think it's tougher. So I do think there's a
trend towards that. Whether it's all gonna be sinkers, I
(06:21):
don't know, but we're calling them sinkers.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
They're not not.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
I mean some of these aren't even designed to be sinkers.
There are two seamers that designed to kind of stay
up in the zone as opposed to your traditional sinkers.
So there's so many different variations. I think the trend
is more two more pitches that guys can command.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
AJ I'm on my phone right now in Arena Club,
and I'm looking at the Emerald slab packs, and I
see in the grail a Bobby Witt Junior twenty twenty
Bowman Chrome Prospect Auto Gold Refractor card. Give me that.
Give me your phone. I'm gonna I'm gonna get you
to buy it to me.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
I don't have it.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
You get a slab pack, No, I don't have that,
And give me your slab pack Card's worth.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
You buy me slab pack, Scott, so I can get
the Bobby with Junior Gold Refractor twenty twenty Bowman Chrome Auto.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Because that sounds.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Awesome and it's worth a lot.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
It's worth a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
He's a stud, he's not going down.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Get a grill.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
Get a grill. I want a grail, Scott, give me
the holy grill.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
You do it.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
To do that, you must get yourself a slab pack
in Arena Club or if you want to get it
for a friend, you can do that too. And right
now you can get twenty percent off your first slab
pack or your first card purchase if you're going on
there and just like, hey, I want a specific card,
I find it there on to grab it for my showroom.
Arena Club dot com slash foul and use the code foul.
(07:38):
I'm just curious. Just a quick side question for you.
Did you see the you say Kukuchi story about how
he tried to add a sweeper, you know, and I
think he had it, I guess early in the season,
and then it was lowering his armslot and he felt
like it was messing up his other pitches. How often
are you seeing that part of the equation where it can. Actually,
I mean for the most part it's it's producing some
(07:58):
really cool results for a lot of starters, right, but
it could mess you up and like not just be
a try and it's like, oh, passer fail, right, and
then I'll throw this pitch out. It could be like, oh, wait,
this is throwing my entire game off and now I'm
in a rut. And then he's picked it up after
he ditched that. But what do you think about that
side of the equation.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
It's definitely a thing like you have to monitor it.
It's pitcher specific, like some guys will manipulate the ball
a little more and then they're tipping it or it's
not coming out at the same tunnel that their other
pitches are. It's just easier to pick up. Like a
sweeper works for some guys, it doesn't work for other
guys because it looks so much different from the rest
of their pitches that a hitter can say, you know,
they're not necessarily even seeing the spin axis of a pitch.
(08:39):
They may be saying, oh, that looks different from everything
else I'm seeing, so I know this.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Is that pitch.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
But some guys, I think Paul Skins does a great
job of just being robotic almost and throwing different pitches.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
Seth Lugo.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
He can even very armslots like you have guys that
totally very armslots that are successful. Chris Bassett's another guy.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
But there are other.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
Guys where it's just one that that's an outlier, and
then you can pick up on it. Even if it's
nasty metrically, it doesn't mean it's nasty.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
In a game.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
You make several very good points there. I also have
some experience in basically showing some numbers on a pitch
when I'm trying and they're like, it looks really nasty.
I'm like, okay, I'm gonna throw it all the time
and not really thinking about all the other things that
are gonna come along with it. That was a splitter
ended up hurting me, and it actually ruined every other
pitch I threw to where I could only throw a splitter.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
That wasn't what I wanted.
Speaker 4 (09:32):
But two things you mentioned. We're talking about grabbing a
new nasty pitch and deciding when to use it and tipping.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
And there's a guy that.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
Has a new nasty pitch but may have had a
couple of different times this year tipping, and I want
your opinion on it. Jesus Azario added a sweeper, which
is he could not throw a slider for life of him.
Now he has one of the nastiest ones in that staff,
even that has a lot of good pitches. But I
think once, maybe even twice, he is I had some
(10:00):
trouble with tipping his pitches and having them relayed to
two hitters. Were you able to look at any of
Jesus's outings around this time and did you see any tips?
Did you see anything you're picking up? I have my opinion,
but I would love to hear yours.
Speaker 2 (10:14):
I did it.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
I'm trying to remember what it was because I did
a video comparing the two and everybody was like, oh, yeah, god,
it's on, It's on X and I did the video
and I can't remember it because I later did one
on Mick Abel too, who was also I think tipping,
which is why teams were teeing off on him as well.
There's just little things like glove position, when you're lifting
(10:35):
up your glove and one's going over his shoulder, ones not.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
I forgot what I think it was tapping his glove, ye.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
His glove really far too, so that you can almost
he's almost showing his grip to every time.
Speaker 4 (10:51):
Yeah, yeah, I think that's what it was too. I
was hoping you saw that as well. He's spiking that
a little bit too, so you can see the knuffle.
And it's funny because in that outing you look and
on his face he's like, I know they can see it.
I can't stop tapping, like this is not something I
can start doing, which is an interesting, interesting situation.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
But it's one of those pitches. He's still threw it
and it was still really good. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
One of those things along those lines is like, as
you know, people are blaming your pitching coach or whatever,
but sometimes it's tough to pick up, like you're.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Seeing a nasty pitch.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
You can't see everything a pitchers doing consistently, but the
opposing team often does because they're game planning for something.
Then it's a cat and mouse game. You have to
stamp it out once you see it.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
There got one for you on a struggling pitcher, not
necessarily to probably not. I don't think he does that,
but I think there's a little blister issue causing no problem.
We got a fan question from John in the chat saying,
what does roph think about Max Freed and the ridiculous
start to the season that really halted in July and
we haven't seen him pick back up. So have you
(11:54):
noticed anything about him compared to what you were seeing
at the beginning of the.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Year, not tipping wise, but you know, he introduced some
new pitches. He introduced new wrinkles on his pitches that
I believe his sinker is different and he's throwing a
little cutter thing that's a lot more exaggerated, and I
think this hitters are able to game plan it off,
you know, over time, and he's been a little.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Just less sharp.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
But also I believe he had a blister issue and
that that definitely causes problems as well. But you know it, hitter,
pitchers add pitches. Hitters are like I've never seen that before.
It doesn't compute, it's not on the scouting report, and
then later on it is on a scouting report and
you can practice against it, so the league can catch up.
And that's up to him to make adjustments to stay ahead.
But he's great, like Max Read is awesome.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
I agree. I agree.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
Speaking of another guy who is now coming back and
is part of a team trying to make a push here,
maybe even for their own division. That's andygo Padres, Michael King,
we got to see we got to see the east
the East West guy back at it.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
What can we expect from Michael King?
Speaker 4 (12:54):
What is something you would look forward to as maybe
a benchmark to see how sharp he is coming.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Off the aisle?
Speaker 3 (13:01):
Yeah, I mean just making sure his his velo is
back where it was and the East West movement like that.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Dude is absolutely film. He's made for pitching. Ninja Like.
His stuff is just gross both ways.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
I mean he's throwing He's throw sweepers at break like
well over two feet and sinkers that come back the
other way breaking two feet like It's it's absurd stuff.
So if he has that type of command, he is
an incredibly valuable pitcher. I love watching that guy pitch.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Okay, so this is perfect for me to finish up
with my last question. We're hitting Padres. Padres fans are
pumped with everything they picked up at the trade deadline,
and then you don't even have King for a while.
Here comes King this weekend. What about the other side,
the Dodgers Otani specifically, What are you seeing from him
on the mound this year?
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Oh my god, Like, he's a guy I can I
can talk about for the next hour and a half
if you want me to. But uh, dude, he adds velo.
You know, he's throwing one oh one top to one
oh two. His his sweeper, I think has probably got
a little less horizontal break, but he's throwing a little harder.
(14:07):
His stuff is just it's obscene. His slider's been really good,
like just the pure slider, the thing that drops off
the table. Has been an eye opener for me because
I didn't view that as one of his better pitches
just in my head.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
I hadn't looked metrically, but he.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
Dominated last game with that and then also hits four
hundred forty foot bombs. Anybody that thinks that dude shouldn't
pitch send him to me, because that guy is mean.
Is he not one of the filthiest pitchers in baseball?
Is he not one of the best pitchers on that staff? Like,
what are we doing?
Speaker 1 (14:44):
Yeah? I mean, maybe whoever's saying that doesn't want the
Dodgers to be competitive in October. I mean it could
be a little troll thing, but no. I mean, I've
seen it too. It's crazy, you know, and I get it.
There's concern. We've had players on our show, right my
Buddy's krats and age. I have at least brought up
how is it going to affect the effect the offense
as he gets older, as he gets hurt. It's like,
(15:05):
I get all of that, but not if he's pitching
like a one. If he's a five, okay, and the
offense is dipping, okay, you want to make that case cool.
But he's a one and he homered the other day
when you pitched. So I'm with you, Rob. I don't
really see what you're gonna do now. If he gets
hurt in a major injury again, we're gonna have to
have this discussion again. But right now, you don't mess
with anything, right.
Speaker 3 (15:26):
I think people forgot how good a pitcher he is
because you cannot tell me he's not one of the
best pitchers on that team. I had a projection the
other day, just a crazy thought that what didn't break
baseball if like he closes out the World Series for
the Dodgers.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
Like he did in the WBC for Team Japan, Like
if he did that, what like what do you do?
You just like have to bow down to the guy.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
It's funny you mentioned that that was me in the
second half of last year. I'm like, will he do it?
Just because he would?
Speaker 2 (15:57):
Right?
Speaker 1 (15:57):
I mean the Dodgers eventually shut down the thought process there,
but I was like, could he just pop up for
I don't know, the World Series he was going through
his rehab. I like, could they snag an any or
two out of him? And then of course you're getting
the pushback like, oh, they're not going to need that,
and then Walker Buehler's closing out the World Series and
you're like, no, they would They would have. They would
have used a few innings there from showeo Tani even
(16:17):
eighty percent of Showotani. So I'm with you, do I
hope we see it.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
I hope we do too, like legit, like that would
be absolutely amazing. And the Dodgers are fully reloaded now right.
They got trning back, they got they got a glass
snell back, snell back. I mean that's a scary team.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Yeah, this is the good stuff. Next Dodgers Padres matchup
is circled on the calendar. There's two of them back
to back, weekends. I think it is coming up in
mid August. Here. So Rob, this was awesome man, great
nerding out on pitching with you everyone. Check out all
of the Pitching Ninja accounts, YouTube, Twitter, et cetera. We
showed a little piece of that Michael King sweeper. There's
a lot more where that came from if you check
(16:56):
out Pitching Ninja. Rob. Thank you man, good catching up.
Have a great weekend.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
Thanksy. Take care.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
Mace Blaining one of the most popular segments in baseball.
You can find it on May Day. You can watch
that show hour one on the FT network on Wednesdays
three o'clock Eastern and an hour two on Trevor's channel
on YouTube four o'clock Eastern. Okay, so I got two
topics for you. Let's start with Baseball America's senior editor
Josh Norris putting out an article in a tweet about
(17:23):
the last three weeks him witnessing not one but two
sixteen year olds throwing one hundred miles an hour, Kevin
de Frank and striker Pence, which is an A plus name,
that's an eighty grade name. But I'll focus on Pence
because it's Hunter's nephew. What do you think about youngsters
throwing a hound o plus? I don't know these guys obviously,
(17:44):
I haven't even watched video. To be honest, I didn't
do much homework on this, so you know, and not
that I'm going to even be able to chime in
much on the delivery, like is it easy gas? But
what do you think of a hundo plus from sixteen
year olds?
Speaker 4 (17:58):
It's too hard, probably, but there's one. There's a few
things that I think I get lost in translation and
talking about these subjects now. And I also agree striker
Pence is an elite name, and a guy throws one
hundred named striker, come on, you know he's either going
to pitch in the middle least or be a fire pilot.
So I think getting back to kind of talk how
(18:22):
pitching development is like hunting velocity, not new very much,
not new every pitching cut, every baseball camp I went
to as a kid in the nineties and the early
two thousands, we could not wait to get to the
station that had the radar gun. Who was a conversation
between which guns are more accurate, stocker guns or drugs guns.
(18:44):
Drugs give you more velos, So we like to have
those ones like we all knew about all this stuff.
You saw a gun behind the behind the backstop, you
were you were jazzed up.
Speaker 2 (18:53):
You wanted to know what that number.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
Told you, like going out the days of going out
there not knowing how hard is rung. They're all they've
been over for a long time because technology has come
a long way. So of course now that that information's
more readily available, it is just it's a comparative stat
to other people your age, like its teenagers are they
struggle with that with everything it can always comparing themselves
to everybody, and so this is another thing on the
(19:18):
baseball field that you can show that I am I
am good, I'm really good, or I'm better or whatever.
So that hunt for velocity has always existed, and of
course it's going to exist.
Speaker 2 (19:28):
The problem is we.
Speaker 4 (19:29):
Now know how to get it, and we know how
to optimize guys to get the maximum velocity. And when
you're sixteen years old, you optimizing a sixteen year old's
body doesn't make sense because it's going to be different
in a month. So that's I think where the where
it becomes not the greatest thing in the world, because
(19:50):
you're optimizing for a person who has not done growing,
very likely unless they're very early mature, and that could
completely derail the whole thing. Anyways, to where that one
hundred and sixteen is now ninety one at twenty one,
and because they just simply can't, like something broke down
and just didn't heal as they were growing, didn't heal
(20:12):
the way they needed to heal, and they didn't max
out at the right time. It's called peaking early. And
I've played against some guys when I was young. There's
a couple of sixteen year olds in my league that
through ninety six ninety seven they were absolutely insane, and
then when they went to college they were down eighty
eight to ninety one because they had to deal with
some stuff. So it is just part of the way
(20:34):
it happens. And I think that what we're trying to do.
It doesn't mean like let's focus on command. It's just
maybe don't only focus on velocity, and maybe learning different pitches,
learning other positions, playing, don't become a pitcher only. There's
a lot of ways to I think, mitigate this stuff,
but there's no one way. I think it's just it's incentives.
(20:57):
It comes down to incentives. What are we incentivizing. Do
we want this guy to pitch long term with them
optimizing him right now? You got to leave some potential,
some some ceiling here to when they are a grown adult,
to then peak when it matters.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
And I think the.
Speaker 4 (21:11):
Only chance, only time that chancing this type of e
LO is worth it is in the major leagues.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
What if you know, a sixteen year old's like, oh,
it's just coming out of the hand like this, Like
how easy is it to take a lot off of
a pitch. Like what if you're someone who's just feeling
like naturally, maybe you're not throwing a hundred, but you're
pumping well into the upper nineties. How do you coach
someone through that?
Speaker 4 (21:36):
Then it comes down to if that person's naturally if
they're a Jacob de Gram type and they're just naturally
adding velocity because something is clicked for them physically and
they don't really know what it is, figuring out what
that is, and then building all of the your apparatus
around it, your mechanical stuff around it, strengthening every part
(21:57):
of that chain to protect them and allow them able
to do it longer. It's just about getting stronger and
stronger and stronger while and then just letting them keep
just doing it naturally. So it becomes on the back end,
like we're not worried about you getting like, it's not
about trying to get you to slow down or take
your foot off the gas if you're not putting your
foot on the gas. But if you're out there with
(22:18):
intent to throw one hundred percent, that's when you're like, like,
maybe we throw change ups at one hundred percent, right,
maybe we mix in more change ups because naturally they're
just easier on the arm. Overall, there's just not as
much pressure going on the forearm and the elbow. There
are ways, but again, like if it's natural and they're
doing it naturally, not necessarily trying to throw out as
(22:38):
they can, then you just build them physically to be
able to operate in that space and do the work
necessary to maintain.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
Yeah, the part that really struck with me was, Hey,
you either played with or played against some guys that
were you know, ninety six ninety seven high school and
then they're in college and they're not throwing hard and
they're on through injuries. I mean, anyone that's been in
baseball for a long period of time. Even someone like me,
a broadcaster, has met a ton of people who say, hey,
(23:09):
I was in high school, I was the man homie,
right like, hey, I was throwing ninety five plus all that,
And then you're like, what happened? And some of them
are probably inflating their statistics, but some aren't. There are
those ridiculous players. I mean, I remember a kid in
my high school was like that, ended up playing college
baseball but kind of flamed out and had the build
(23:29):
you thought, oh, this guy's probably gonna make it. Now,
shoulder injury
Popular Podcasts
New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.