The Case of the Missing Innings

Episode Transcript
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(00:24):
Welcome to the podres hot Tub,everybody, Craig Elston, Chris read Rayfie
Kanter, even when they don't hearthe music, they do throw the dances.
Are sure. I play it inmy head before. When you start
recording, every single time it isa jam. It'll never not be a
jam even when it's not playing.You know, it's amazing. Bobby's theme

(00:44):
song for us is so good thatit's still a jam at one point two
five eggs. In fact, i'dargue it's maybe a slightly better jam at
one point two five eggs. Itstill plays at one point five. It's
still fine. It's a little it'sa little caffeinated at two X. But
however, you enjoy the podcast.If you are listening, you know,
we thank you for being here.And if you're watching us on YouTube and

(01:07):
you heard it at one X,I guess you can speed up YouTube videos
too, you Okay, Well,I'm gonna start doing that now too,
because I always get freaked out whenI hear it back at regular speed.
Now because I'm just I'm a onetwo five guy. That's that's just where
I am. I pep it upa little bit and I get get through
the work a little bit faster.Love it? So what episode for our

(01:32):
YouTube commentators that want me to turnoff my camera? Never gonna do it.
This is what I do for money. I've been doing this for money
for a decade. This face neverchanging. Appreciate that. All right,
We're gonna talk about pitching in thebulk of the episode, and we're gonna

(01:52):
try and put some numbers up andfigure out if we can solve an equation
to allow the Padres to finish nextseason. In other words, can we
conjure up enough innings for the SanDiego Padres starting rotation. We have potentially
some breaking news, some bombshell newsfrom mister Reid. We'll sort through that.

(02:15):
We need to sort through some falloutfrom Bob Melvin as well, and
we'll do that up top. Butfirst, some quick housekeeping. Again,
if you haven't checked us out onYouTube, please do like and subscribe.
If you're watching this video, pleaselike it, please subscribe. We definitely
appreciate that. Approaching one thousand followerscontinue to grow. Big ups to Raye

(02:37):
for the latest pods above replacement videoon the most unclutched team ever. Great
great video, Super well done.You've gotten a lot of ups for it,
but that came out after the lastfull show, so we teased it
last time, but absolutely worth thewatch. If you haven't gone back to
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(02:59):
so on and so forth. That'show the algorithm finds its rhythm.
We had another fun thing for ourpatrons last week, being that it's the
off season and we don't have padresteams to do watch parties for and have
Tevin ruin them. We instead dida movie watch party this past week,

(03:20):
and Tevin didn't ruin it at all. He didn't actually participate, so who
knows. Maybe he would have beenjumping in telling us that actually Cameron Crow
is terrible at things for reasons andwhatnot, and the fourteen year contract he
signed was a huge mistake. Idon't know. But what we did instead
was we talked about Cameron Crow's nineteeneighty nine film See Anything. We all

(03:43):
watched it together, we click play, and then we put up the watch
party. That's one episode down evenon the free feed. I mention it
not only because we had a lotof fun, but because our patrons are
going to have a chance in thenext week to pick our next movie that
we will do. You know,the first one was definitely I think Struck
because of the whole situation of mehaving watched it so much and not you

(04:05):
guys not having watched it. Butwe're gonna have the patrons pick on the
next flick. So how can yoube part of our fun? Patreon dot
com slash Padre's hot tub. Ifyou do enjoy this show and you're a
free patron, consider supporting the show. I'll be becoming a Patreon member.
Patreon dot com slash Padre's hot tub. I'll just throw it out there.

(04:26):
Patrons had the opportunity to go tothe US women's national team this weekend because
a couple tickets dropped in my lapand I dropped them in the discord slap
and said, hey, who wantsto go first come for a serf boom.
It was a five dollars patron whopicked those up. Padre Poppy went,
sat in the one hundred section,sat in some great seats to check
out a US women's team thumpin Columbiayesterday three nothing so hey things happened.

(04:51):
Padre tickets come all the time,all the fun different things we have,
all the different benefits. Check themout. Find out for yourself. Patreon
dot com slash podreis hot tub membershipcan be as low as five bucks a
month. It's a bargain, Okay. We did two episodes last week essentially

(05:15):
on Bob Melvin leaving, so there'sa lot of ground that we've covered that
I definitely don't want to repeat andrecover. Since those episodes came out,
some reporting came out from our Podresreporters, Kevin Ac and Dennis Lynn,

(05:36):
much of which I would describe asthe Padres front office, trying to put
their spin on things and make surethat if you're going to be out there
ripping everybody to know, hey,Bob wasn't all he was cracked up to
be. There might have been someproblems here with old Bob, and if
you knew more, you might notbe as excited at us, and you

(06:00):
might be more thinking that we didthe right thing. I shared some of
those clips with you guys in ourdiscord and just kind of going through it
real quick because then I had acouple people, one in particular, but
you know, you know how Xis especially more than Twitter. Twitter was

(06:23):
bad, X is worse, andso people just like, no, Bob
Melvin is just the worst manager.You don't understand. Bob Melvin is was
a terrible manager who had a terriblerelationship with the front office. And we
should be thrilled that he's gone.He just couldn't work here. And the
thing that was pushed at me wasthe reduced version of Bob Melvin denied analytics

(06:48):
to his team. He would beoffered analytics, and he would not let
the information get to his team.He would not let the analytics people talk
to the players, he would notallow it. He was denying them,
denying them the information that they neededto win games. The stuff that we

(07:08):
were yelling about in the season atthe beginning, in the middle, and
the end, and everywhere in between. Say why aren't they better prepared?
Why don't they do they have allthe info? Are? Are they the
worst analytics department? So Kevin Aceyput out a couple of three different articles.
Dennis Lynn did a mail bang wherehe went through some things, and

(07:32):
I'm just gonna kind of go throughthis real quick. The first two are
ac The second one is Lynn.Okay, AC members of the front office
have expressed frustration at what they perceiveas Melvin, often balking at their input.
This pushback, people involved, contendhas only increased as the tensions between

(07:55):
Melvin and Preller have escalated. Thiswas from a piece written the week before
they let him go, or theone you know, like he did the
big thing solving the AJA Melvin rift. Melvin, for ten plus seasons managed
the A's one of MLB's most analyticsdriven organizations, and was able to coexist
with a stringent front office. Thedifference here, people familiar with the back
and forth between the parties said couldlargely be in the type of information Melvin

(08:18):
receives. Again AC, by theend of twenty two and throughout twenty three,
there was a perception among those inbaseball operations that Melvin did not want
input. Those people felt there wasat times no collaboration virtually no collaboration between
the manager and certain members of hisstaff and those in player evaluation and analytics.

(08:43):
Some close to Melvin indicated at thetime there was a difference of opinion
on the value of the input beingprovided. Okay, so from those two
before I get to the len partof this, and then another thing from
the outside that I thought might helpunlock it the thoughts there from what AC
is putting. Then Okay, whatyou're missing is we were trying to offer

(09:05):
stuff to Bob Melvin and Bob Melvinwas saying no, and or his staff
was saying no. How do youguys take that at the value of which
it was presented. I take itas what you introduced to that, which

(09:26):
is the front office putting their spinon the situation. Uh. Yeah,
that was why when when you hadtexted THEO screenshots to us, I was
like, are these all coming fromAC? Or are these all? Are
some of these lin and everything?And the fact that these two are coming
from a c It's okay, thisis AC the mouthpiece again, you know
what I mean. We've seen manydifferent iterations of Kevin this year, and

(09:50):
I will continue to shout out hisnewsletter It's fantastic in season stuff. And
I think one of the criticisms hesays before has been being a mouthpiece for
certain people of the organization. Itwas Ron Fowler for a certain amount of
time, and then you know,it has shifted and morphed and now it's
the front office that they're giving himhis spin, and of course he's going

(10:11):
to report what is being, youknow, being told to him. I
don't put a ton of stock intothis narrative that's being spun of like if
you only knew, if you onlyknew, because I don't think that that
was any reporting that we had gottenfrom Melboyn, who had a serious track
record as a manager before this,that he was uncollaborative or unwilling to to

(10:35):
to work with front offices. SoI also think again, like they're going
to benefit a lot from this narrativebeing out there, so I'm always going
to take it with a much biggergradive salt. So no, I don't
put a lot of stock into it. Uh, We're going to talk a
lot about spin. And basically allthe screenshots you shared have like agendas behind

(11:01):
them that are are opaque and hardto get at. It comes down to
the reporting that we've heard all alongthat these dudes didn't like each other or
like styles habits, work habits,work life balance habits, and that's what
I think it comes down to.So the finger pointing that has existed for

(11:24):
the last half of the season andcoming out of Bob Melvin's departure like it
all just feels like noise, andI don't want to get too into it.
I want that I want that noiseto go away, and I'm hoping
that I would like to see itnot exist at all, because it's not
the first time we've heard about Padre'splayers having problems adopting analytics a certain first

(11:50):
basement famously, you know, whetherthrough stubbornness or bad information, refused to
do it. So it's it's nota new story in Padre's land that analytics
isn't being used to the best thatthe team could use it. I want
to go back to the second act, the second half of it, because

(12:13):
I think it's more getting to theheart of the matter and alter to what
you're speaking about, Chris, andI'm just quoting from Macy's piece one more
time. Preller runs on input andcollaboration. His desire for information is seemingly
insatiable. He surrounds himself with advisorsand they're liable to talk all hours of

(12:37):
the day. It's not all thatrare for someone to get a text or
call from Preller at three am andthen again at six thirty am. The
topic of conversation maybe a trade that'sabout to happen or could happen, or
about a certain players need to workon one thing or another. Preller wants
that from everyone around him, andhad to accept that there were certain hours

(12:58):
and topics that Elvin, who spenttwelve hours a day at the ballpark,
was not interested in engaging. Uhyeah, if I'm at the ballpark at
noon and I'm there till midnight,and then I get home and I finally
gone to bed, and then myboss is pinging me at three and it's

(13:20):
six again, like and meanwhile,Preler's just like this motherfucker's left me on
red for six hours. This isthe part of the article where I that's
why I kind of was like Dacy'srunning into mouth the story towards territory again
quote Preller runs on input and collaborationall the time, literally runs counter to

(13:46):
every single piece of reporting, includingAce's on reparding like oh the last like
from before Bob Melvin was manager,from like the twenty twenty one Lynn Rosenthal
piece that spoke of the toxic wordculture, Like it's completely completely to that,
and I I love the idea oflike, hey, what has AJ

(14:07):
been doing in those three hours?By the way, is that when he
sleeps or is that when he likereally gets his best work done, or
is that when the basketball game islike maybe the pickup games at four thirty?
So, like he texted at three, then he went, he got
his sneakers, he warmed up,he played in the game, he came
back, he taled off. Stillhasn't answered another text or call. You
know, maybe I'll call this time. It's like, dude, no,

(14:30):
I worked twelve hours, were onthe road. I just fell asleep at
two in the morning, Like I'msixty one. That's it. He's a
sixty one year old dude who's beenin the league for frigging forty years.
Like, come on, he didn't. And maybe that's where the micro managed
thing. Maybe it's not AJ tryingto make decisions for his manager. Maybe
it's just him bombarding him with informationin a way that's like, dude,

(14:54):
you hired me, Let me domy job. I uh, I did
find it interesting that and I wantto know where this was on the timeline.
AJ Preller famously through Kevin ac underthe bus in the past couple of
weeks. Right, he said hewas not credible. Correct, Well,
yeah, they've had their thing.But he said it's not credible, Which

(15:16):
if you say that about a reporter, you're basically, you know, throwing
a lethal insult at them. Ashe can that I'm doing that to my
child. It's not a gesture,ancient Italian curse or anything like. That's
the worst thing you can say abouta reporter is that he's not credible.

(15:39):
That strikes to the heart of hisjob. That's like saying AJ Preller doesn't
know what a good swing looks like. You know. So I did listen
to Hot Lava this past week forthe first time in quite a while,
and Ac brought that up, saidthat he called him out on that.
So we'll see if the tone ofthe reporting changes over the coming off season.

(16:00):
It's the tone of the press conferencethat Aj took certainly seemed to be
different than what we have seen inthe past, and that goes to the
next thing we're gonna look at inthe bottom right screenshot, Craig, Yeah,
so okay, I just want tocontrast this and this isn't necessarily a
kill acy segment, although there's gonnabe a piece I'm gonna kill him on

(16:22):
a little bit later, this islike, this is his reporting, But
it does surely seem like maybe hisreaction wasn't to get a little bit tougher.
Maybe his reaction was to get sixor seven quotes from Yo, what
was the guy? What was Trump'sfake press John Baron or whatever? You
know John Baron? Hey, yeah, no, yeah no, actually here's

(16:48):
here's the real scoop. Yeah no, yeah, I know. Like,
so it seemed to go the otherway. Dennis in his last mailbag,
the first, the very first thingat the top is a big question mark
on Preller's credibility. That's the firstquestion asked and answered in the mail bag

(17:08):
was like, does aj Preller evenhave credibility? And the answer was kind
of like, well, doesn't reallylook good right now? Yeah, like
and basically lays out all of theHe said that all of this was bs
and then look what happened. Soyeah, not a great look for you,
a J Bow. So you know, it was a little victory lab
for Dennis. That's fine, okay, But another big part of the same
mail bag was about what about Melvin'sculpability in this? Okay? And here's

(17:33):
where he got into the issue ofanalytics and Melvin all right, this is
now from Lynn Preller. In recentyears is added to his research and development
department by hiring from, among otherplaces, Fan Grafts, Tampa Bay,
and Cleveland. The Potterys will soonopen a pitching lab at Point Woman Nazarene.
Current and former staffers have said theamount and quality of in game information

(17:56):
is more than sufficient and not nearlyas archaic some outsiders perceive. According to
some team members, Melvin at timetook issue with the type of information he
was receiving or how it was beingpresented. Okay, so just pausing there
for a second, I feel likethat lines up with what AC was reporting

(18:18):
as well front office present at threeam that Jake cronin Worth isn't trying to
put the ball into the left sideof the field anymore, right. Yeah,
However, it was whether they're givinghim, you know, giant books
filled with crayon or you know etchof sketches. Every time it's an etch
of sketch exactly lined up to theintricate plan that they hand it to him,

(18:41):
and he's like, I just shookyou assholes. I never get it
right from you. Whatever it is. Somehow the methodology was an issue,
and it seems to me like itcould have been an intrusive methodology from the
front office that Bob Melvin was wastaking issue with the second paragraph of what

(19:03):
len rites is Still those who knowand work with Prelers say he continues to
run a more scout driven organization thanmost. Many of Preller's most trusted advisors
are executive with relatively traditional scouting backgrounds, and the padres with a top heavy
payroll and more future financial commitments thanany other team continue to lean heavily on
their scouts when debating and deciding whichplayers to acquire or shed. Outside of

(19:26):
games, The overall influence of theanalytics department likely remains limited when compared with
many organizations. All Right, SoI just wanted to add that to get
back to my favorite way to analyzesomething when you have in complete information,
which is Awkham's razor, the simplestexplanation is the most likely to be true.
Is it more likely that Bob Melvinwas embracing of analytics for ten years

(19:56):
in Oakland with a GM who's knownto be you know, at least somewhat
intrusive in Billy Bean and agreed totake the job in San Francisco, which
is the second most analytically driven organizationonly to Tampa Bay in the entire league,

(20:18):
has the most coaches, and isgoing to be the most intrusive with
their analytics and their information. Butin between those two places for two years,
he turned into an old hard asswho said, keep that analytics away
from me and away from my clubhouseand my coaching staff. Does is that

(20:41):
more likely or is it more likelythat he actually embraces analytics and wants it
but wants it done in a functional, incoherent way, which occurred somehow in
Oakland and is likely to occur inSan Francisco, which is what he's running
too. And what he's running awayfrom is the guy who's texting him at
three when he gets into the hotelroom at one thirty, after he's been

(21:06):
at the after he didn't get anythingfrom him for twelve hours while he was
at the ballpark. Like which isthe more likely of the two scenarios,
I'll let you the viewer slash listenerdecide for me. It's that Bob Melvin
is looking forward to being in amore professionally run organization in San Francisco and

(21:29):
that's what he's been coveting in additionto his you know, long standing San
Francisco sports roots and all the shitthat Andrew Baggerley's writing about this week,
Like it's that he just wants toget away from the chaos of what he's
dealt with the last two years.Yeah, uh, you know. Again,
to further emphasize the point that you'remaking, Craig Farhans, aiety is

(21:49):
descended from the Billy Bean, Iguess, not Coaching Tree, GM Tree,
like whatever you want to say,Like it's the same school of philosophy
that was happening in Oakland. That'swhere they met, for God's sake.
So I mean, I yeah,again, we'll let the viewer decide.
I have a theory that I wantto get to. But Craig, you
had pulled some quotes from Joe Maddenwhich I think will speak to what I

(22:11):
want to say, which I thinkgoes dives into this dynamic between manager and
front office that I want to exploreprecisely. And hey, you know,
video folks on the YouTube, maybeI assume you're seeing all these quotes as
well. So this is from KenRosenthal. No, pardon. Jason Stark.
He did an interview with Joe Maddenon The Athletic that ran like four

(22:33):
days ago. Joe Madden, whosince leaving the Angels hasn't had another baseball
job, but he wrote a bookin which after he wrote it, everyone's
like, well, he's never goingto work in baseball again. And now
Joe Madden would like to tell youthat, yes, he'd like to work
in baseball again in some capacity,but he'd like to do it like his
way, and in particular, oneof the areas that Joe Madden had a

(22:56):
big issue with was communication of analyticsand analytically driven information from the front office
to the team. All right,Now, he has since said like he
wants to work for an organization thatunderstands kind of the right way to do
this. And here's how he talkedabout it. Okay, these are Joe
Madden's quotes. Now, he said, at the end of the day,

(23:19):
and he's talking about his coaching staff, you're in charge of the hitters,
meaning he's hitting coach. This dudeis in charge of the pitchers, the
pitching coach. This guy's got defense. So if you have anything to say
about any of those things, yougo to the department head and let him
bring it to the player. AndI want that done earlier in the day.
I want fewer people in the clubhouse. I want the clubhouse to be

(23:40):
the player's domain. And yes,I want all kinds of input, but
I want nobody in my office anhour before the game. I don't want
that. I don't think that's appropriatebecause I've got to get my stuff together.
Now. If in fact, youdon't want the manager to get his
stuff together and you want to tellthe manager what his stuff is, that's
a different story, and I can'twork under those circumstances. I want your

(24:00):
input, I want collaboration. Iwant all the intel you want to give
me. I want all that,and I promise you I'm going to ask
a lot of questions. I am. So he's talking about a world where,
yeah, there's all this information,but instead of it going through the
chain of command and the hitting coachbeing looped in and then the hitting coach
presenting to the players so that theplayer has the trust of the hitting coach,

(24:23):
it's the hitting coach is telling theplayer something. Now. The analytics
guy is walking on the field tellingthe players something. Now they go back
and there's a brief in their lockerthat's telling them something and it's too many
cooks in the kitchen, and hey, look, I mean, I can
respect that as a point of view. I mean, Joe Madden may be
antiquated in a lot of things,but I kind of feel like when I

(24:45):
read this, Rayfie, it feltlike an unlock to me of what might
have been part of the heart ofthe Melvin prelar concern, Like here's another
guy kind of cut from the samecloth Madden and Melvin, who both were
considered innovative skippers for the previous decade, and arguing about not the information but
the way the information is starting totake over the process of coaching a team.

(25:07):
It's all part of the larger trendin baseball of the dwindling importance of
the manager. You know, Ithink that it's been universally recognized over the
last twenty years that we just don'tlook at managers the same way as we
did because of all the information thatwe have now. The issue is is
that there's two ways to handle that, which is there's a respectful way and

(25:30):
there's a disrespectful way. And therespectful way I think we've seen and I'm
just going to bring them up.I know we constantly bring them up on
this podcast, but somewhere like LAwhere I don't think anyone who's a Dodgers
fan is like necessarily like stoked onDave Roberts, where they're like, Dave
Roberts is the greatest manager. I'veseen plenty of Dodgers fans call for Dave

(25:55):
Roberts to be fired because of theircontinued black postseason success, but he's never
gonna be fired because he knows hisrole in the pecking order. And also,
Andrew Friedman has an certain amount ofrespect for what Dave Roberts does.
I believe, which Dave Roberts knowshe's the vibes guy, he's the tone

(26:15):
setter. And so because he isthe tone setter, Andrew Friedman knows he
cannot be that guy. He cannotbe in the dugout every day with those
guys doing it. So he insome ways he needs someone like Dave Roberts.
But also, unquestionably Dave Roberts isgonna pull the picture out of the
game when the spreadsheet tells him todo it. You know what I mean,

(26:37):
there's now also a disrespectful way ofhandling that, which is aj Preller
and him basically not only saying throughyou know, kind of thirty thousand foot
view that he doesn't really think themanagers all that important, but also through
his direct actions by constantly micromanaging andhaving a no respect for the role that

(26:59):
the man does serve in the moderngame, which is the vibe setting,
which is the translation of information fromthe front office to the players. And
so if you don't, I thinkyou can acknowledge what the role of the
manager is in the food chain whilealso having respect for it as a general
manager, president, baseball ops,whatever. It's just clear that Aja doesn't

(27:21):
really have the respect, and allthe reporting says that he just thinks he
can do everything the best himself.I think he does. I think that's
why you hired Bob Melvin. Idon't think you go out and get a
respected guy with two Manager of theYear awards if you don't respect the position
to an extent. Let's talk aboutJoe Madden. He's been bitching the exact

(27:42):
same way about how his tenure withthe Angels ended. Basically after the day
after it happened, he gave aninterview that was very similar to this quote,
literally twenty four hours after he gotfired, and he got fired after
shaving his head. I want tosay, like, he didn't even have
time. He was gonna be theViBe's guy, to the point that he

(28:04):
shaved his head so that he wouldwalk in the clubhouse being like, look,
guys, he shaved my head,and somebody showed up from the team
to tell him, no, you'renot. Phil Nevin is now the manager.
So, like Joe Madden, youwant to talk about friggin chips on
the shoulder and agendas at play,and you want to talk about managers that

(28:26):
might have a little too much ofa self importance complex for today's game.
Joe Madden is that. I don'tthink Bob Melvin is that. I think
he's adapted to the modern game prettywell. He seems to have much more
Bruce Bochie vibe with him. Youknow, the front office does their thing.
I do my thing. I'm notsure that ag manager was micromanaging on

(28:47):
an in game level. I don'tthink Aj Preller was sending Bob bullpen orders.
You know, I just I've neverI've never got that at all.
What I think Bob Melvin's big comeplaying with AJ is style and probably just
the job he did, and likefuries on how a roster should be built.
Look at Matt Carpenter, you know, I just Perry Manassian was Joe

(29:12):
Madden's boss. Perry Manassian hasn't comefrom one of these saber metrics analytics driven
orgs. He comes from the Alexanthopolisscouting base. Build a team that's economical
and reasonable, and that's how youdo it. So there is a change
in how managers go right now,and I don't think Aj Preller is going

(29:37):
to be the best at adapting tothat, just because he seems to have
an idea of how one should dedicatethemselves to winning a championship, a little
bit different than people who have playedbaseball their entire lives and then gone on
to be the field general of ateam. Yeah. I just have a
fundamental different understanding of why Bob Melvinwas brought in than you, Chris or

(30:00):
in my which is that I hadinterpreted it as Hey, I'm Aj Preler.
I've hired three managers. They haven'tworked out, so I now need
to bring in someone who has respectso that I can gain credibility and extend
my role in this position. AndI thought that the implication when Bob Melvin
was hired to a certain extent wasthat Bob and AJ's fortunes were tied to

(30:25):
one another, and if Bob Melvindidn't work out, that was like AJ's
last best hire, and it wasbasically brought it in desperation. I'm with
you there, like it seemed allthis season that it was going to be
an either or right or both right. I think I was in the same
place. But I also think thatit comes from a legitimate place of learning.

(30:47):
To an extent, like gms changedtheir performance the same way players do.
It's not based on their health ortheir body, but it's based on
experience. And I think, goingfrom Andy Green to Jase Tingler, what's
the exact opposite of that spectrum.It's somebody with loads of experience and it
has been around a lot. AndI'll always think this came down to personality.

(31:12):
And AJ's personality is extremely set andit's not fluid, and that's why
we hear he has trouble working withfolks and why he surrounds himself with you
know, sick of fanc or voicethat are locked minded, because he has
this personality that I wouldn't want toget called at three am, you know.

(31:37):
And I'm sure there's very few managerswho like have egos and have careers
and resumes that want to, youknow, that want to put up with
that, that want to be treatednot like children, but like like subjects.
Well, and I think in retrospect, when you put this filter on

(31:59):
it, it makes the Andy Greenand the Jace Tinkler hires so much more
understandable. And it gives you afilter for this next tire too, because
the whole article AC wrote about like, well, here's where Preller and Melvin's
philosophies are different. And here's whatagent basically reciting everything AJ said in his
Wednesday zoom. You know the thingyou take away from that is, you

(32:20):
know, Preller is saying to theseguys in meetings, Hey, listen,
you know I'm that guy. I'mI'm gonna go to Denny's after the game
and I'm gonna eat and I'm gonnathink about it, and then I'm gonna
text you at three and then I'mgonna go play basketball. And you know,
I'm I'm all in twenty four toseven, three sixty five, Like
he says things that probably other peoplehave heard as bromides, you know,

(32:43):
is just old saws. Hey,I'm twenty four seven three sixty five.
If you're working for me, you'reworking for you know. We're going all
the time because we have one goal, and that's to win the championship.
And Andy Green's like, hell,yeah, I'm in. I'm the same
guy. You know. When welose, I can't stand it. I
stay up all night, I rewatchthe film, I do this, I
do that. And Jays Tinkler's like, yeah, bro, anything you need,
man, I'm ready to go.I'm here to go with you.

(33:05):
You go hard, I go harder. And Bob's like, yeah, we're
all here to win. Yeah.But when it comes to actually taking that
text at three, he's gonna fuckinganswer it after he has his eggs at
nine, you know, yeah,or maybe when he gets back. What's
that he has oatmeal with raisins oricons. He's not eating cholesterol laden eggs.

(33:28):
Come on, it's smart. Yeah, long season, You're right a
friggin monster energy drink. So Imean, I see that as very understandable
and also very scary because I thinkRyan Flaerty's going to tell him to f
off. Frankly, Mike shild mightbe at the point where he just wants
a job so bad that he's like, cool man, whatever you want.

(33:51):
You know. It seems like he'splayed the politics game to get rehired pretty
well. And if he gets rehired, I think we're all going to rally
around Mike Shildt to be very honestwith you and hope that he's kind of
like a Walmart Shilwalter. You know. Really that might be our betraying Jesus
is getting behind Mike shilt I've alreadyfelt myself starting to get there. You

(34:12):
know, he's a manager of theYear. I mean, he turned around
a team that was ugly and hadup front office dysfunction, and since he's
left that team, that dysfunction hasjust come right back. So maybe maybe
the part where I portrayed Jesus interms of Mike Shilt is there's some narrative
that was out there about how hereally wants to be a baseball lifer,

(34:36):
like that's how what he's into,and they noted that he's like unmarried and
like he just like he just wantsto just like, which is a weird
thing. Like I don't even havea white that's how much I love baseball.
You know, I'm married to thegame. I'm married to the hustle.
But also it goes back to whatTevin was talking about, you know,
whenever we had our last group therapy, which was like essentially, did

(35:00):
you want someone who was on thatsame wavelength, just like you were talking
about with Andy Green, like tobe managing the team? Like and so
if if if this guy's like it'sa j and Mike Shill, it's just
two confirmed bachelors just running, runningthe padres. It's like, we don't
we don't have time for anything else. We're just gonna be in the basement

(35:20):
playing OTV figuring it out together.Maybe that is the best thing for the
team. I don't know. Idon't know, man, you just creep
me out with the two confirmed bachelorsbecause I'm like, yeah, they're both
running. Where where else are theyrunning? Where are they? Maybe they're
running? Maybe that's how they probablymaybe that's his wingman, you know what's
with old shilty by inside That's whereI think there's some good fan fiction we

(35:43):
could be writing. That's this iswhere act the money actually is. Can
you please get on this for us? Which particular clubs on the road?
I think Proler walks in with ann DA. He just he just walks
into the club with NDAs and startsending them out like, yeah, I
know you're gonna sign this before wego into the platinum room. Okay,

(36:04):
all right, let's be before weget to the uh, before we get
get to what's supposed to be thebulk of it. But I I'm sorry,
I just I absolutely have to.There was a story in the ut
UH since our last show about thereport that was out there somewhere. I
forget that the Yankees and the Ithink it was in the Post or something.

(36:28):
It was in some y some NewYork outlet that the Yankees and the
Padres at some point had a preliminarytrade discussion about Juan Soto when we don't
know for what, we don't know. You know, Lynn and his piece
said, you know, like GM'snever spoke, So what Steinbrenner and Sidler
get together a long time ago?Uh, Well, like what's going on?

(36:53):
So Ac writes this piece and thenlike in the middle of the piece,
at the bottom of a paragraph,he just drops, just drops a
little nuggy. So now quoting againfrom acy foremost, the Padres planned to
trim at least fifty million dollars fromtheir payroll, which could involve their moving

(37:15):
left fielder Juan Sodo. A reportout of New York on Wednesday said the
Padres and Yankees have had preliminary discussionsabout Sodo. A Padres source said the
sides have not talked this off season. Two different sources said previously the Yankees
were among the teams that expressed interestin Soda before the trade deadline, and
it was fairly common knowledge within theorganization that Melvin favored trading Sodo. What

(37:39):
what can I want to add alittle bit of context that I heard on
his podcast? Kevin e c saidthat he is very clinical and deliberate about
when he releases information, like hewants to time it to the point where
it's, you know, it's pertinent, because he doesn't want it to be

(38:00):
all about him. You know,he doesn't want to be the story.
So he'll hold on to some informationand not report it when maybe other people
want to win the press conference.What the actual what so? What?
So I literally treat this as theway how Padrey's Twitter started that Pete Alonso

(38:22):
supports isis like that is like thelevel of credibility, which I give this
too, because it's literally, again, this is in an article. I
believe it's the same article talk thatthe front office quotes are in, right,
Craig the same or it could havebeen the second one. I'm not
sure, Okay, okay, Ithink it was a different about it.
I think it was a different oneregardless of all the same writer, all
in the same week. It's it'sit's literally someone in the front office saying,

(38:45):
like, what's the one thing wecould say that would turn Padres fans
against Bob Melvin the most? Right? Oh, that he wanted to trade
one. He wanted to trade hisbest player, the only guy who like
I think gave a ship at certainpoints of the season when Hassung Kim was
maybe okay, and then let's goon, let's go ahead and play the
game of Like that means there's anagenda behind it. But what are you

(39:09):
trying to accomplish by planting this information? Are you saying, well, now
we're not trading Bob Soda. I'mon on Soto because the loudest voice advocating
that is now out of the organization, So now we definitely don't want to
or is this kind of like eventhe guy that we've left wanted to do.
I do not understand if Kevin acis so deliberate about when he releases

(39:32):
information, why this is here.It blows my friggin mind. I can't
even begin to speculate on it.I have to dig into the micro of
this, Okay, So I'm goingto start with the fact that this sentence
starts with the word. And Iwas taught in high school you never start
a sentence with the word and that'sthe like the wrong thing to do.

(39:53):
That that's conversational, but that isnot proper written English. So this is
the last senten of a paragraph.It starts with the word, and the
next four words it was pardon mefive. It was fairly common knowledge.

(40:14):
It was fairly common knowledge within theorganization. It was fairly common knowledge within
the organization. Common knowledge. Sothat's something everyone knows, right, fairly
not no, fair fairly so okay, fairly common knowledge. So a lot
of the people, many some yes, some plurality to majority sub section of

(40:42):
people knew that Bob Melvin wanted totrade Juan Soto, And the first time
that we ever hear about it isin the last sentence of a paragraph halfway
into a story that's really working offsomeone else's story that starts arts with the
word and and is And it's fairlywhat are you doing? If this is

(41:07):
a story, if at the tradedeadline when the team was struggling and the
question was by or sell, ifthe manager was saying to the general manager,
we need to sell this guy.You know how we're gonna win,
get rid of one Soda, andI'll tell you why X y Z right,

(41:29):
Like, if that's a real thingthat happened, Man, that's a
huge story. I want to knowevery part of that. Why does Bob
Melvin not think one Soda is partof a winning team? Why does he
Wantjan Soda to be traded? Whatare the specific reasons? Why? Why
does three am text trade proposal?Was he given that that that incited this

(41:52):
belief? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, it's it's laid the other way,
like Bob Melvin's never coming up withideas. Then it's like, oh,
what it is fairly common knowledge hewanted to trade one Soda? What like
this is this is bad man.I'm sorry. Like Kevin, I got
a ton of respect for you,Like, this is bad. This is

(42:12):
bad. You had you either hada story that you sat on and squashed,
in which case you should have keptit squashed and only told your buddies
over beers. Hey, by theway, Melvin wanted to trade you gotta
know this and that and the otherthing. But to throw it in is
just it reminded me like Jennifer JasonLee, you know, miss Parker,

(42:36):
Like in the salon, by theway, it was fairly coming knowledge.
Everybody knew, but Melvin wanted totrade one soda by the way, Oh
you didn't know it was fairly comingknowledge. Yeah, yeah, Like I
just don't understand. Honest to god, I don't understand. And I think
he's done a great job covering theteam this year, but this is like,

(42:59):
I don't get it. That's notone line. That's a story,
man, that's c one is BobMelvin wanted to trade Juan Soto. Let's
report this out. You can't putit in as heure, like it's literally
written as hearsay. No, whenthe entire fan fan base is anxious about
losing their best player this offseason becausehe and others have reported that Major League

(43:22):
Baseball is requiring the Padres to lowertheir payroll. You can't put that in
for a fan base that's on pinsof needles, just trying to be optimistic
about anything, trying to convince themselvesthat my child is going to turn things
around. You can't do it.It sucks, just simply, I don't

(43:43):
understand. Like, it's a storythat's absolutely one worth reporting at the time.
If it's true, if it's somethingthat needs more sourcing, put it
in your book and have it bein your book. Like and that's a
great thing in a book that I'dwant to pick up. And like if
you told me Kevin Acy wrote thisbig story about a J. Breller wrote

(44:04):
a book and then it's it's gotthis bombshell about the time that Bob Melvin
wanted to trade Wan soda and it'sgot quotes and it's got corroboration. Like,
I want to read that story.Man, that's a great story.
That's great reporting. That's what areporter does. But the thing is,
we live in the age of accessin exchange for your soul, access in

(44:24):
exchange for you for you for yourpractices. And I'm not accusing Kevin a
CM malpractice. I know he thinkshe's very clinical about the way he releases
this stuff. You said, soyou said what he said? Right,
I didn't hear, but you toldme he said it. That's hearsay.
So where was it on this?Where was it on this? If it's

(44:47):
a throwaway thing, don't throw itin the article. If it's something that
the response to this is, oh, Craig, you're overreacting. It's nothing,
it's nothing, then don't put itin the article. But like when
you put it in the article,it was fairly common knowledge. That makes
me feel like the idiot, Like, well, why didn't I know that

(45:07):
Bob Melvin wanted to train one?So it was fairly common knowledge within the
organization? What why hasn't it beenreported, you know, half a dozen
times by now if it was suchfairly common knowledge or was this not common
knowledge? And now what is it? I don't understand. I feel dumber

(45:28):
having read the sentence because I justdon't understand any aspect of it. And
by the way, of course,it doesn't matter. Maybe Bob Melvin wanted
Juan Soto to be traded to theGiants because he's about to go there.
You know this much, I canmake it anything I want, right,

(45:52):
Like, it's crazy, so Idon't know. Man, a lot of
good stuff, but this was justlike what what the what? What?
Yeah? Okay, Now for ourmain topic after this print, all right,
this is what we were going totalk about a week ago. You
know, off season, we're tryingto figure out the nuts and bolts of

(46:14):
how we get there, because atthe end of the day, we want
the Padres to be great again.We want the Padres to be back in
the playoffs. And even if thatmeans that we have to deal with another
eight different aj Preller press conferences thatare going to make my brain effectively shrink
by a small percentage, you know, we'll we'll deal with the fallout of
all of that. To get there, we're gonna need pitchon and guys,

(46:39):
you know, one of the thingsabout last season that I feel like is
the ultimate waste is that aj Prellerput together a pitching staff that was by
and large up to the task,and in particular, a starting rotation that
the starters, the planned pitchers inthe rotation, We're up to the task.
Blake Snell won the Scion. He'sgonna win the Scion, had,

(47:05):
you know, the best year ofhis career or the second best year of
his career, depending on how youwant to look at uh. You Darvish
was a little down, Joe Musgrovewas in and out, but Michael Waka
gave you just what you wanted,and Seth Lugo gave you way more than
you could have possibly expected. Andin the end, the Podres were I'm
right, rayfe aren't I had topten team when it came to the rotation,

(47:28):
their top five or top three accordingto fangrafts they are. They were
the fourth most valuable rotation according tof wour if you you want to just
do it. Based on FIP theywere the sixth the best starting rotation.
From a pure er standpoint, theydid have the literally the lowest ERA by
a considerable margin of any starting rotationat three point six y nine e RA

(47:52):
as a starting pitching staff, andthey were incredibly good at limiting home runs.
I mean, that was a bigpart of why they did it.
They were the second lowest home runsper nine home runs per nine at one
point one four And listen, uhThis isn't gonna be a surprise anyone to
watch Blake Snell pitch the season.Uh, they did walk a decent amount

(48:12):
of guys, but really it wasBlake Snell who did like all of the
walking. Because Blake Snell had afour point nine to five walks per nine
ratio and the second highest after himwas Michael Walker at two point eighty eight.
So when I say that the Padres, you know, were the ninth
worst in terms of walking guys asa starting staff, it's really it's just

(48:37):
Blake Snell. Everyone else was wasgood to very good. You know,
they they struck out guys, theywere they were ninth in kper nine.
Like again, it's like all ofthe metrics are fantastic. They left the
most guys on base percentage wise,you have that big of a sample.
Yes, some of that comes downto luck, but a lot of that
comes down to having a good defensebehind you, generating a good amount of

(49:00):
ground balls, a lot of otherfactors. But you know, anyway you
cut it, they were a goodstarting pitching staff truly. Okay, So
here's the thing, Uh, thatadded up eighty two wins because one of
the least clutch teams in history andoffensive dysfunction and watch our YouTube channel on
Raphie's breakdown on the least clutch teamin history. Absolutely. Uh So,

(49:24):
now here's the problem. You gotto find a way. You don't have
to recreate exactly that. You don'thave to be fourth bets number one era,
blah blah blah. But you've gotto match the innings. You you've
got to match the workload. Andyou're gonna have to do that in a
situation where heading out the door,for sure, Blake Snell, I mean

(49:47):
I say for sure, for mostlysure, Blake Snell, Seth Lougo,
I'll say it. Yeah, youdon't have to you don't have to add
a caveat there He's gone. Dude, I never thought they'd Xander Boguards this
time last year, you know whatI mean? Like, just who knows,
maybe maybe Sidler pops up like thedude in the Gift, you know,

(50:08):
on the in the coffin that's onthe back of the flatbed truck and
just pops up and starts dancing.Where are you putting Peter Coffin? Where
are you doing I'm having him dancingon the back of a flatbed truck.
That's what I'm mapping. Okay,he was in there for the act.
He was in there for the act. It was it was all for the
gift. Snell and Lugo gone andlikely, you know, likely out the

(50:32):
door, not to be replaced.Michael Waka. We have an option,
Nick Martinez, there's an option.Both of those options are a little bit
dicey. I think we've discussed inpast episodes that we've come to the around
of the font to like Waka likeprobably okay to pick up that option,
and Nick Martinez probably should be okaywith his eight million dollar player option if

(50:55):
if the Padres decline. But whoknows. Okay, that's that's a lot,
that's a lot. Smell and Lugowere one two on the team and
innings pitched? Were they not?Right? Three hundred and twenty six combined
Blake one hundred and forty six forseth Mister Reid, I was asking Rafie

(51:17):
the question, I'm kidding, kidding, you were that kid in class?
Though, huh? What kid?The one that Pop has been enough to
say occasionally, yes, the numberthree is is Waka? He he could
be out the door as well.If Darvish had a couple of warnings.

(51:37):
Okay, so you're right there,Darbyshire Range. Yeah, and you're the
teacher that was drinking vodka out ofhis coffee. I came with a guitar,
but the guitar had a bit offireball at it. Hey, kids,
today, we're gonna play a videoand then we're going to play it
again. Tell me the difference isnever right. Okay. So we got

(52:04):
to figure out how to get fromhere to there. And there are two
players that we know will be onthe San Diego Padres next year. That's
you. Everyone else no for this, for this rotation, we know Tatis
will be there and if he cangive us one hundred twenty strong, then
we heard. I mean, ifwe have an Otani in our mix,

(52:27):
let's do it. So let's startrafe with you, Darvish where he was
obviously last year. Some injury issuestwenty twenty one, some injury issues for
you, Darvish twenty twenty, twentytwenty two, completely healthy. Twenty twenty
doesn't count. It was a miniseason. So what does it look like

(52:49):
just statistically in terms of what weshould be realistically expecting from you, Darvish
in twenty twenty four. So Idid this for Darva, Schmuskrogan Waca,
so I'll get to them in order, but I basically just took their innings
counts from their careers. I tookout twenty twenty for obvious reasons, because

(53:12):
that'll fuck up the sample. Andfor Darvish I also took out twenty fifteen
because he didn't pitch. He wasrecovering from Tommy John and I didn't want
to just have a giant zero inthere. So you know, assue me,
it's our show. We're gonna doit this way. So ten seasons
that are non TJ, non twentytwenty seasons for you Darvish in Major League
Baseball, He's put up an averageof one hundred and fifty five innings in

(53:36):
those seasons, and the standard deviationon his totals is fifty two innings.
It's quite high because in twenty eighteenhe only put up forty innings, in
twenty sixteen he only put up onehundred innings, and then this season he
only put up one hundred and thirtysix. So basically the low end,
you know, one standard deviation oneither side, the low end of a

(53:59):
reasonable out come for you, Darvisis a one hundred and three inning season.
The high end would be two hundredand seven innings. That would be
the second most he's done in hiscareer. So you know, that's kind
of the range wherein that's a that'sa huge range. When we get to
Musgrove and Walk it won't be thatbig. But Darvish for me, is

(54:20):
is the biggest unknown, Like he'sthe not only because the data says he's
the biggest unknown, he is thebiggest range, but also because he could
be totally healthy by spring training andwe can be great, or he could
like literally need elbow surgery and beout the entire year. So isn't he
having elbow surgery? He had,But I think very very minor, Like

(54:43):
I'm talking more something more significant.He's not. He's not scheduled to miss
time, is what I'm is whatI'm saying. Now. He could soon,
you know, we could soon findout that he could be scheduled in
miss time. So Darvish is forsure the biggest question mark for me going
forward. He's also the one guythat you have to have. I mean,
I think these next two guys,Darbysh and Muscrove you have to have

(55:07):
you have to have them operating atat least their eightieth percentile, if not
higher. But Chris, if Iwas going to put an optimistic case together
for you, it would go somethinglike this, going to lean on a
crutch. I accept that I'm leaningon it right away. But instead,
this is a guy that's all aboutroutine. This is a guy who is

(55:30):
all about a meticulous plan that he'sworked on and crafted since he was a
teenager to now in his late thirties, and last year his routine was completely
cattywampus. He started in Japan earlyin a camp, ramping up as if
he was going to be a starter. Then he got over to America for

(55:52):
just an eyeblink, and then it'sinto the World Baseball Classic, and is
he a starter? No, Hegets his first outing that would be kind
of the equivalent of a regular firstouting in spring training. Everything else is
out of the bullpen. He's sparinglyused. He never ramps up. Then
he has to take a little timeto ramp up before the start of the

(56:15):
season. He took like what fouror five days or whatever, and then
he came into the rotation and maybehe was never quite exactly right, Like
he found his rhythm at one pointin the year, then he's lost it
somewhere in there. He gets alittle bit hurt. It reminds me of
twenty twenty one. Like, ifthis guy stays healthy, he's still really
really good, He's still creative.He's a physical presence, you know,

(56:38):
that's one thing about you, Darvish, Like he is a huge man.
He is a real physical specimen.He's not as breakdownable as someone else,
that's not a word. He's notas fragile as someone else. You know,
there's a reason that betting on himwasn't a completely ridiculous bet for the
end of his career. So ifhe's not nagged by something, and he

(57:06):
has his whole off season to getback and he has a regular routine,
I kind of feel like we couldput one hundred and seventy innings down as
a reasonable number to get from you, Darvish, and hope that he goes
past it and approaches two hundred.Yeah, if it's one sixty, I'm
definitely betting the over, just toput it in layman's terms, right,

(57:30):
And like you alluded to, there'slots of reasons to kind of write off
twenty twenty three, especially when itcomes to his innings total as just being
a little bit anomalous and outside ofwhat you should expect for you, you
know, with the reasons you mentionedWorld Baseball Classic, not getting a starting
position locked in, and his normalpreparation. No, we're near a normal

(57:53):
spring training. And also you andyou said it, Craig, mister Darvish
is a meticulous, routine guy.Pitchcock first time in his career he's ever
had to deal with that. Sothere are a lot of factors that would
lead me to dismiss twenty twenty threeas what you would expect from him going

(58:14):
forward. His resume is robust.He has a track record that the Padres
felt was sufficient enough to make thelong term investment. I cheerleaded the long
term investment. I think he's agreat guy to have around And yeah,
man one hundred and seventy, Yeah, he was gonna do that. As
long as we hear good news aboutthis elbow, I am going to take

(58:37):
the counter position and just say onlyfor the act the sake of As people
have noted, pitchers don't they don'thave an aging curve. They tend to
fall off a cliff at some point, and I don't What I will say
is, I don't think that that'swhat's happening to you, Darvish right now,
that he's falling off the cliff rightnow, I would just say that,

(59:00):
as someone who is currently thirty sevenyears old and is going to be
turning thirty eight in August of twentytwenty four, we're not going to just
see a magical resurgence. I thinkof anything that we've seen before, I
think we're going to start seeing thatdecline until one day, probably in twenty
twenty six or twenty twenty seven,he falls off the cliff, uh and

(59:22):
then which, by the way,the pajects will still be paying for his
extension at that point. So Ithink if one sixty is the line,
I think that he'll if I werebetting, I'd say he'd go just under
that, maybe like one fifty,Like when mid one fifties, high one
fifties as my most probable outcome,just because I think that this injury is

(59:47):
so unknown and we're so obvious gatedby uh, you know, the padres
clinically being incapable of telling the truthwhen it comes to the injuries, Rafie,
this was a big boyfriend conversation.I'm sorry, but I can relate
more to you in this regard.And my shoulders are falling off. Okay,

(01:00:08):
So somewhere in there, all right, one hundred and fifty to one
hundred and seventy innings is what wethink we can either conservatively deliberately expect from
you, darbish, with a chance, of course, for him to either
get injured and give you nothing,which we can always say about anyone,
or because he is you darbish,for him to push for another classical year.

(01:00:30):
You know, go look at BurtBlylevin's career and all the number of
good years he had in his lateLike there's big guys who are incredible can
pitch later in their careers. He'shad a lot of mileage, but he
also could keep going. So I'mI don't know, let's talk about that.
Let's move this line so to speakto Joe Musgrove, because on one

(01:00:52):
level, I'd say I should beless concerned about Joe Musgrove. Like Joe
Musgrove is much younger, he's verymuch in the heart of his career,
and of anyone who needs to writeoff a year it's Joe Musgrove in twenty
twenty three, from kettlebell to rehab, start crank your shoulder to burn your

(01:01:14):
feet in Mexico. You know,like everything that could go wrong for Joe
Musgrove went wrong this year, andbefore his shoulders started hurting, he was
pitching great. However, all thatother shit is why his shoulders started hurting.
So Raphie, I feel like thisone is kind of a leap of
faith situation. You have to believethat that the story we've been told is

(01:01:37):
true essentially, and Oukham's razor,which I already talked about, allows me
to do this, to point atall the things that happened this season and
say, these things led him tothe verge of getting hurt, but they
shut him down at the right time, and now he's going to be able
to come back without his toe hurting, without his you know, like back

(01:01:59):
to his proper mechanics, and witha full offseason of rest, he should
come back and be himself next year. Uh yeah, I would think so.
I mean, I do want topoint out that not too long ago
you were saying it's fifty to fiftythat Joe Busgrove doesn't play for the padres
at all in twenty twenty four.It's a shoulder. I mean, I

(01:02:19):
don't know none, none of usknow anything. I'm saying if you take
if you take that at its facevalue. Just first he hurt his toe,
then he tweaked his shoulder coming back. Then he was adjusting for the
toe as he was pitching. Hegot to a spot that it worked for
him. He was super successful indoing that. He torked his shoulder a

(01:02:40):
little bit. They shut him downat the right time. Like, if
you take that, then you canaccept he'll have a great He'll he can
come back and he can be aone one hundred eighty inning Joe musk Grove
in twenty twenty four. Yeah,so over the course of his six full
seasons in MLB, he's one hundredand forty nine innings on average. Obviously

(01:03:02):
this year and his first year intwenty seventeen, when he you know,
wasn't quite a fully formed product yet, you know, kind of drag that
total down the standard deviation of thirtyseven innings. So on the low end,
you know, that puts us aroundthe one hundred and twelve inning range.
On the high end, that putsus at one hundred and eighty six,
which would be a career high twentytwenty one is currently his career high

(01:03:24):
at one hundred and eighty one inthe third innings, and he's someone who
I think, if he's healthy,he can absolutely hit that mark. He
hit it in twenty twenty one,and in twenty twenty two he had almost
exactly the same amount of innings pitch. So if the shoulder, I feel

(01:03:45):
there are less question marks with JoeMuskrov than with you, Darvish, because
Joe's in the prime of his career. He's kind of a known entity.
He's definitely someone who's going to workhard and be out there if he physically
at all can pitch. So youknow, if if we are taking everything
that's being provided to us on facevalue, yes, I would say you
could pencil in Joe Musgrove for atleast one hundred and seventy innings next year.

(01:04:08):
Well, twenty eighteen was his secondyear as a full time starter,
and he missed time with a badshoulder, and that's what he's balanting right
now, is that shoulder capsule information. But like you said, Rafie,
every other time it's one hundred andseventy innings, plus he's been posting workout
videos famously or somewhat infamously on hisInstagram. Dude does look fit. We

(01:04:32):
know he's going to put in thework. So if dude's healthy, I
would expect a career year. Iwould expect, Like, if we're doing
our season predictions and it's February twentysecond and Joe Musgrove has a clear beer
of the bill of health, I'mgonna predict more innings than he's ever pitched
in his life. I'm just goingto be really simple and draw a red

(01:04:56):
line right here before we get toanyone else with these two players. If
Joe Musgrove can't deliver a full qualityseason for the Padres in twenty twenty four,
and you Darvish can't deliver a fullquality season for the Padres in twenty
twenty four, the Padres are notgoing to be good in twenty twenty four.

(01:05:17):
Like, it's pretty hard as wecontinue down this equation to get from
here to there if the first twovariables fail, Like, it's pretty hard
to get to where we need toget, which is over eight hundred innings
pitched from the starting rotation. Ifthe first two guys, the only two

(01:05:38):
guys that you can quote unquote counton, are not going to be a
part, not going to be asignificant part carrying the load, you know,
doing the heavy lifting in this equation. So you know, take it
for what you want. If youwant to say Joe Musgrove is going to
have a bad shoulder and he's notgoing to succeed, that was me three
weeks ago. Hey, hey,me three weeks ago. If you want

(01:05:58):
to say that, you're probably justsaying Pottery isn't going to have a good
year next year. So take itfor what it is. To me.
It's like it's in the bucket ofit's got to be like it's got to
be this way. Muscove has gotto be healthy, Darvish has got to
be healthy and productive. They've gotto live up as the numbers three and
four starters that are masquerading his numberone and two starters in our rotation for

(01:06:23):
us to have kind of like anychance. Now, let's get to Michael
Waka because I feel like Michael Wakatoo. Rafie has developed a pretty standard
line in terms of what you shouldbe able to expect from him if you
bring him back next year. Yeah, Michael Waka again taking out twenty twenty,

(01:06:45):
he's had nine seasons in which he'saverage one hundred and thirty two innings.
His standard deviation is twenty nine innings, So again that's the lowest of
the three. Because he's incredibly consistent, is you know, he posted one
hundred and eighty one innings in twentyfifteen and one hundred and sixty five and
two thirds and twenty seventeen. Butother than that, like the last four

(01:07:05):
years, his line has been onetwenty six and two thirds, one twenty
four and two thirds, one twentyseven and a third, one thirty four
and a third. So I thinkit's pretty safe to say that if you
sign Mi Kawaka, you can pencilhim in for one hundred and twenty innings
next year at least. I thinkI think you can count on that with
upside for more. So, Iyou know, I think I'd probably take

(01:07:30):
the over on that. Frankly,you know, not by much though you
know his his if you go onestandard deviation in either direction, his low
end is one hundred and three andhis high end as one sixty one.
So it's it's it's not very likelythat he's going to push more than one
hundred and sixty innings, So Uif you get a buck forty out of
him, that's awesome. But youknow one twenty is my kind of line,

(01:07:51):
and that becomes like a question ofis that worth the sixteen million dollars
this year and next? Right?And you guys know my opinion, everybody
listening does spot track people who aremuch better at it than I am.
Put his average annual value at abouteighteen million. And if you're a team

(01:08:12):
looking at your two top guys inDarvish and Musgrove, having big question marks
hanging over your head, I thinkwalk up becomes even a little bit more
valuable. You know that eighteen millionis a little bit that's to your basic
everyday team. If you're the teamholding the contract and the decision that option,

(01:08:34):
I'm going right back to where Iwas in May, But it's looking
like that option is becoming an easydecision on the pick up. Yeah,
I think when you factor in well, if not him, then who then?
And we're going to kind of godown that road here momentarily it gets

(01:08:55):
really cloudy really quick. But whereare we at total? And he's wise
now already. I was just goingto say, if you just want to
to kind of go there, ifyou put Darvish at one sixty, which
was in between our one fifty andour one seventy, if you put let's
just put Musgrove at the same thing, just to mix in a little bit

(01:09:15):
of uncertainty there, right, Thatgets you to three twenty. And then
if you put another one twenty ontop of that for Michael Waka, you
get to four hundred and forty innings. Now, last year, the Padres
starting rotation, uh Rafy did thisresearch before the show, eight hundred and
sixty three innings pitched from starters,and that was ninth best in Major League

(01:09:40):
Baseball. Now, the best wasSeattle and they were just over nine hundred.
So the old thing about getting onethousand innings from your rotation, like
that's that's one hundred innings away frombeing true in modern baseball. So like
eight hundred, eight hundred and fiftyinnings, you know, I think it
was like eight thirty was the average. I think it was like an go
back to right, eight thirty twoI think was the average. Yeah,

(01:10:01):
eight thirty two. Yeah, Soanything around there, eight hundred and fifty
eight hundred and thirty. That's anormal starting rotation. That's not destroying your
bullpen in the modern game. Giventwo guys that we put in a bucket
of well, we're kind of ftif they don't do it, and one
guy we're just kind of giving himhis normal mark. We're at four forty,

(01:10:27):
so you know, we're halfway toeight fifty. We've got two spots
left in the rotation, so webetter sign Fill and Joe Nicro come on
down two hundred and forty innings each, and we've probably pitched still right,
he's still still there. Well,I forget to look at it this way.

(01:10:48):
Your four spot has to go toa backend workhorse, and your five
spot is some combination of Waldron ofVilla, like any of the other guys
that are kind of simmering in tripleA. I mean, I don't know,
Jake Groom, Like I know,we're just kind of throwing shit at
the wall here, But like A, you're not gonna have the money to

(01:11:09):
bring someone else in based on allthe reporting that we've heard so far,
and B I don't really think thatyou have it another choice other than having
some of these guys kind of simmerup for mel Passo. I'll just go
ahead and say they are fucked ifthat's their five, like that needs to
be. There's six option, youknow, and I know the payroll limitations

(01:11:30):
as good as anyone there. Ourwonder can GM has been known to make
some exceptional trades in the off seasonfor starting pitching. So that is gonna
be the key that like that numberfive spot cannot be Matt Waldrin j Groom
and Pedro Ava lat on a rotationlike maybe one of them picking up that

(01:11:56):
fifth spot. But we're in thesame boat, man. They need two
starters, just like they did lastyear. Well we've skipped the guy.
We skipped Nick Martinez. Oh I'mso sorry. So so Nick Martinez last
year gave the Padres, what onehundred innings and that yeah a starter,
Yeah okay, so gave them alot of bulk relief and then at the

(01:12:19):
end of the year, in thevery beginning of the year, gave them
some starting rotation time. Sixteen millionfor the next two years is a lot
for Nick Martinez. But at thesame time, the Padres need his innings,
and it's a difficult situation to saythat the right path is to play
hardball with Nick Martinez. Poker facehim, say that you're not going to

(01:12:43):
pick up the team option. Counton him not to get a better offer,
or not to feel spurned by theteam option not being picked up after
he was such a team player eachof the last two years, you know,
vaulting back and forth from the bullpenand the starting rotation. Count on
some other organization not giving him hima three year deal as a guaranteed starter
to come in that he's going topick up that player option, and then

(01:13:08):
when all of that happens, whenyou get through all of that, to
actually use him as the starter thatyou might have paid him sixteen million for.
If he comes in and throws onehundred and fifty innings, y know,
and or one hundred twenty five inningsand does the job as a starting
pitcher next year. It's a stickywicket and the only simple way to solve

(01:13:29):
it is to just pick up hisoptions. And that's a little more than
we want to spend on Nick Martinez. It also makes you have to put
him in the starting rotation. Well, it's way more because his player option
is eight million, right, andisn't the team option sixteen s the same
as the same as Wackett. We'renot going to We're not going to give
that to him. And by theway, Nick Martinez, even dating back

(01:13:54):
to his run with the Rangers beforehe spent significant time in Japan, his
highest innings he ever threw was onehundred and forty and a third in a
season and he wasn't good, Likeyou know, I mean you had to
go to Japan. I mean,he just he wasn't good. So,
you know, the last two seasonswith the Padres, he's thrown one hundred
and six and a third and onehundred and ten and a third. I

(01:14:15):
think even if he everything goes hisway and he comes in and he's a
starter and he's healthy and he doesn'tmiss time, I think it's not realistic
to expect more than one thirty fromhim, like and to count on that,
because you know, that would bethe most he's thrown in almost a
decade. You know, So Ilet me just do it. Let me
just do a Devil's Advocate type thing, or just it's sprung into my head

(01:14:40):
when we say Nick Martinez for twoyears, thirty two million, I'm like,
wait, I would offer seth Lugotwo years in thirty two million dollars
as a free agent to come backto my team. But now let's say
that I did that, and thenI did sign seth Lugo to a two
year, thirty two million dollar deal. Wouldn't we be arguing that his likely
starting's pitching is starting pitching innings loadwould be around one hundred and thirty because

(01:15:02):
he got to a high number lastyear, and the likelihood of him taking
an injury next year would be highenough that we'd have to bake that into
the projection, and so we'd probablypark him at a number not higher than
what he had thrown before. Sosure, if not, we were right.
So when you go down that road, then Martinez almost starts to make

(01:15:26):
a little bit more sense in termsof the in house close to us financially
certain available options. The question thenbecomes, Okay, so let's be optimistic.
We were at four forty as avery reasonable number for three spots.
Let's just say Nick Martinez exercises hisplayer option is in the starting rotation,

(01:15:53):
and we'll give him one hundred twentyinnings to be fair. Again, Right
now, we're at five sixty,right Yep, we're five sixty. How
many innings can we possibly assign toWaldron and Avala next year? One hundred,
one hundred combined. Yeah, that'swhat it comes to my mind.

(01:16:16):
Yes, that's a best case,Yes, correct, six like that.
That's that's Avola being a guy foruh March through June. You know.
No, wait, if they eachget fifty innings, that means that they
both filled in at some point forsix to eights. Yeah right, I

(01:16:40):
don't like, I'm not I'm notpositive Mat Wauldron's going to be able to
last. But yeah, we sawhim do it, so let's say he
can. Matt Waldron started uh sixtimes this year and through thirty one and
two thirds innings, and Pedro Avulasstarted also six times this year and through
twenty five and two thirds inning.So we're talking about less than five innings
as a start. Well, that'sprobably down a reliever, you know,

(01:17:04):
like he did have to do.This is just as a starting pitcher.
This is just as the starting pitcher. With these stats, Well, I
like, where where has he beencareer wise as like being a starter the
whole year, like even to theminors. He can't have in the miners
they never let you pitch more thanfive these days, so I mean,

(01:17:28):
I feel like those numbers get artificiallycapped anyhow, It's not like the old
days where you could throw two hundredand thirty innings in the minor leagues.
Well, I got it. He'sdone one hundred and thirty innings in the
minors, you know, years andyears ago. But like that was when
he was a built up, fulltime starter, and it's been a minute
since he's had that. Okay,so at yeah, go ahead. I

(01:17:51):
was just say Avla has In twentytwenty two he started twenty four games in
El Paso, he threw one hundredand twelve innings, And in twenty twenty
three he started fifteen games Il Passoand through fifty five and two thirds,
So he's not there's no length therethat includes. Yeah, the fifty five
and two thirds includes four relief appearances. Way, I'm cutting ten off of

(01:18:13):
each guy. Let's get forty inningsto each guy, all right, So
that brings us to six hundred andforty or at six six hundred and forty
innings, and we are two hundredand ten innings away from last year's starting
rotation. Contribution. Okay, whathave we just learned with this, with

(01:18:35):
this quick and dirty, you knowmath equation on the back of a napkin,
we've learned that you can't do itwith this group. Yeah, it's
you cannot get there with this groupof guys. The padres must go outside
the organization in order to fulfill thestarting rotation to get to a number that

(01:18:55):
will allow them to compete in twentytwenty four. So that brings us to
what can they afford to pick upin a trade? What can they afford
to pick up in free agency?And it's different affordability. Free agency is
fighting against debt reduction, and youknow, a payroll that is already mostly

(01:19:16):
committed. You know, that's theone thing. When everyone goes well with
the two undred million dollar payroll,you should be able to compete. We're
dealing with most of that payroll goingto like six dudes or seven, and
then it's how do you fill outthe rest of the entire roster at sixty
million, you know, in orderto get there. So I I'm sorry,

(01:19:43):
we do this thought exercise, andit just brings me to the reports
out of the Arizona Fall League abouthow well Jacob Marcy and Graham prow League
are hitting and that these dudes arefuture someone else's you know that they're going
to go. So they're either goingto go for Shane Bieber or for Corbin
Burns, or for some picture that'sout there that that could be acquired for

(01:20:09):
top prospects out of the hot lavapod or the hot lava that's bubbling up
out out of the system. Again. Yeah, like that's the the unic
Corbyn Burns is in his last yearof arm. That's what they're going to
be targeting somebody who is not ata free market salary for top market prospects

(01:20:31):
and we're gonna lose guys. Wedon't want to under this path. Is
there another way to do it?Rafe? Yeah, there is. There's
the nuclear option, which I don'twant them to take because I think it
makes the team worse. But it'sthat they trade Won Soto that that's going
to get you multiple You could get. You could get good pre orb arms

(01:20:53):
that will be with the Team Sheepfor a while by trading Won Soto at
least, you know, obviously youcan get one really good arm, or
you could get a couple guys thatyou know, maybe the team determines that
that's where the the best use ofour resources is. You know, I
don't agree with it, especially becauseyou know, again if you if you

(01:21:15):
watch the clutch video, you knowyou talk about the offense. This is
an offense that is going to bebetter next year. I just I know
it will be just by the factthat this was truly not you couldn't even
say a first percentile. It waslike a one, you know, zero
point one percentile outcome for this offensethis year, you know, historically unlucky,

(01:21:38):
and just by virtue of keeping theoffensive unit together, the team will
be better next year. In thatspect. It's just basically how much performance
can you retain from the pitching staffthat will allow you to you know that
that will be there to take anyhit. Basically of you know, we're

(01:22:00):
gonna get better on offense. I'msaying this poorly. We're gonna get better
on offense. How much worse canour pitching get is what I'm trying to
say for us to still be successful. And that's the question around this.
How we get to any of thesethings without trading one soda? I mean,
I think so many of these thingswe're going to get to thought exercises
where oh, well, if youtraded one Sodo winds up being a viable

(01:22:23):
solution, and if they're doing thesame, team is worse. The team
just works. It's just a worstteam. Like I just I don't believe
that you can make the twenty twentyfour team better in trade one Sodo.
I just I do not see itat all. And so if the goal
is to win in twenty twenty four, you have to keep one Soto,
and so therefore you have to dowhat black magic to make the rotation work.

(01:22:46):
No, you've got to got yourfarm system that you've just built back
up to trade for one Soda,or you have to spend money. Correct
No, correct, right, ABCright. If if it's not going to
be Soto, it's got to beone of the other two things or else
it's you're telling us that Pedro Avilais actually good for one hundred thirty innings

(01:23:08):
in the major leagues next year pitchingjust like he did for thirty innings,
and that Matt Waldron is actually ra dicky and just he's needed time to
develop, but now he's going tocome out and have a cy young season.
And he's going to throw two hundredinnings of way above average ball because
he's al a dicky, Like it'sridiculous. Jay Groom is going to come

(01:23:28):
out of nowhere and he's going tothrow one hundred and twelve innings for the
team. Well, we need somebodyto make up those blake snow walks,
Craig yep, yeah, or youknow, hey, I'll throw another thing
out there, non roster in vit. So go go pick your favorite hardhold
right exactly the Summer of Coal parttwo. You know, let's try again,

(01:23:50):
you know, pick whoever has justwashed out. Pick someone who's just
gotten bombed out of the league,Rich Hill. You know, we're climbing
dig mountain again. Boys, absolutely, you know, like if you want
to tell me that this is howthe Padres can patchwork it to get to

(01:24:14):
eight hundred and fifty innings, orthat they're going to spend a whole bunch
of money on their bullpen and they'regoing to count on throwing seven hundred and
eighty innings next year. But havingthe bullpen, you know, pick up
the slack because they're going to puta big investment into that. Like,
I don't know, can I givehim a free agent name that is not
like hot Stove, but it's aname that I've said before and is now

(01:24:34):
we don't have to trade for himbecause he's a free agent and he's a
profile that fits with the Padres whothat Brad Keller Kansas City famously the guy
who broke Manny Machado's hand. Perfectbringing it, You're gonna make for an
awkward conversation, but this guy putsup one hundred and thirty innings every single

(01:24:55):
year. I feel like he's thetype of guy that Rubin the ABLA could
fix. SPA track has him makingless than four million dollars annually, which
means it's probably just gonna be aone year, prove it deal. That's
the type of guy I need,and that's the name I have for this
type of person because the market doesn'thave a lot of these guys on the

(01:25:15):
market. He's the youngest available freeagent starter. He's been in the league
the longest as a young man.So that's what if I'm looking at the
options and it's trade one Soto ortake a risk on a guy who might
have a five point five eer,but get me those one hundred and thirty

(01:25:35):
innings. That's the option I'm goingwith, man, and I'm hoping that
Juan Soto makes up the difference offensively. I'm never going to pitch my fork
down into the salad until I knowexactly what I'm mean. So I don't
know what we're trading for. SoI'm not going to say we should trade
for or against. If the nexttwo Theo Rodriguez is waiting and we could

(01:25:57):
trade one Sodo for him, Iwould say let's do that. What about
Julio Urius noted free agent? Ithink I think pass. I think maybe
pass. I mean he provides someinnings, you know what. Yeah,
for that matter, Trevor Bower isavailable. Should we go sign Trevor Bawer
and Mike Levenger all that we canhave the triumvirent of just sick. There

(01:26:19):
you go, the nasty boys,nasty boys coming to I don't like this.
This is dumb, dumb. Heywe got hey. Jake Arietta is
sitting on a lazy boy somewhere.He says he's been he's been just marinating.
Yeah, and we're waiting for thatshot. He's getting waiting for a

(01:26:40):
call either from a general manager orfor January sixth, Part two. So
it's one of the other. He'seither going to be Storm in Peoria or
a pizza restaurants Washington, d C. So what's it gonna be. This
is where we're at, Rafie.We need those innings. There's two hundred

(01:27:00):
of them. There, they arethere, they all are. Okay,
let's uh, let's let's end itthere, let's put it, let's put
a pin in. I think atrade's coming. Bottom line, I think
a trade's coming in the off season. I think we're going to have to
gobble up saying those old things again. They're all suspects there. None of

(01:27:21):
them are prospects. Look at theSnail trade, Look at the Musgrove trade,
look at the Darvish trade. Wewould do every one of those trades
again. Why wouldn't we repeat theprocess? Why wouldn't we keep it going?
And and honestly, who other thanwhat Bednar out of those trades would
have been on our team at anypoint the last three years, Owen Casey

(01:27:45):
wouldn't. I there wasn't a singleperson in the Cubs trade that would a
in the Tampa trade. They mightthem all, they might start to get
some dividends from that. So there'splenty of trades that make plenty of sense,
that add absolute value, but theywill cripple the depth of the organization.
They will force the team to stockthe back half of the roster with

(01:28:09):
the Rube Nettodors of the world.The non roster invitees, the quad A
guys, the aging veterans, youknow, the NBA roster minimums, so
to speak. And that's the priceyou pay if you don't break the cycle.
This is this is how we thisis why we did the how do

(01:28:30):
you break the cycle without breaking thewindow? Podcast? The number one answer
was spend through it. So ifyou can't spend through it, it's it's
a really there's there's two other waysto go. You either don't break the
cycle, or you do it thehard way, which is by chewing through
a year of really bad starting pitching, like just not having it. And

(01:28:55):
we don't have Well, that's thelast thing I guess I want to have.
We completely ignored the farms system.Is there is there a number of
innings pitch that we should assign toup and coming players, Like I'm terrified
by all of them because the guysthat you want that that have the stuff

(01:29:17):
and the pedigree are too young,they're too raw, and you don't want
to launch them in unless they comeinto the spring. Like. But yeah,
like we've seen some guys come straightfrom college though. You know if
Dylan Dylan Lesko's fully healthy, wellyeah, LESCo is the guy out of

(01:29:38):
college and Snelling is the high schoolkid. Right Uh Snelling, Snelling and
less Goo are both high school guys. Oh no, never mind, Am
Masers a college guy there. Itis college guy there, It is college
guy. Yeah. Could add Ammazerthrow seventy innings for the Sane Post.

(01:29:59):
Probably not, but we're seeing it. We're seeing it happen all around baseball.
These these young twenty to twenty threeyear old pitchers come up and not
be amazing, but at least contributeto that innings load. Yeah, I
mean Adam Maser only through let's seehow many innings you throw fifty eight plus
thirty through ninety six innings last yearacross two levels of baseball. So that

(01:30:23):
would require him, you know,starting the year maybe in El Paso,
which he's never performed at before,throwing you know, a month there,
performing well, and then coming upand spending the rest of the team that
you know, bits and pieces ofthe team of the season with the team.
Basically, just never send anybody toEl Paso Opasso's horrible. What picture

(01:30:44):
is like the the use of theusefulness of el passa baseball? Sure?
Yeah, man, like nobody's comefrom there and done anything. I do
want to circle back, just tofinish up and ask you a question,
Craig, because our beloved patron,doctor Cosmo did put in the discord.
How are you feeling about Joe Mennonas the manager? No, thank you,

(01:31:11):
Hey, six years ago he wasyou know, or maybe ten years
ago he was the Cats. Meout. Honestly, I could never get
over the way he managed Game sixand seven of the World Series when the
Cups won it. He was sobad. I was screaming at the television,
screaming, screaming the bunt, thebias. But oh my god,

(01:31:34):
just kill me now. So likeI feel like Joe Madden's long jumped the
shark. Bob Melvin was the guyI wanted for the veteran managerial archetype beyond
that Buck Showalter because for one yearhe whips the whipper Snappers into shape and
if there was one guy that wouldmagically conjure eighty innings out of some random
ass picture that I'd never heard of, it'd probably be a guy like that.

(01:31:58):
But we're gonna get Mike Schilt.We're gonna be and we're all gonna
love him, and we're gonna believein him. We'll believe in the Shilt.
We'll all have Shilt sandwiches and we'lleat them with smiles on our faces.
He's got a sandwich in Saint Louis. It's one of the best delis,
the shilt sandwich. I did notknow that. I will look it

(01:32:21):
up and I just made it up. Coming soon to Chiba hut oh Man,
to the cheese shop, down inu down in the La Joya Cove,
the shilt sandwich. Who knows,who knows? Okay, this has

(01:32:42):
been Padre sat We've gotten into somevery bad things at the end, and
we'll try to do better next time. Take you to the seven of you
who listened to the end of theshow. I really appreciate that. By now,

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