MLB rule changes & NL preview

On the TTO podcast this week, we talk about the MLB rule changes, and the implications for Scoresheet. We also preview the NL, each in our own way. Of course, we also go over the best thing we saw this week (since the last podcast).

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Howdy and welcome to the Three TrueOutcomes podcast, presented by Baseball Perspectives.
I'm your host, Ian Leftqwitz andjoining me as always from suburban Michigan.
It's Ben Murphy. Ben. Howare you doing? Oh far, well,
Mama, I blame Okay, it'sa good bet good Okay, I'm

(00:25):
doing Willie, And how are you? Yeah, No, we're doing well.
We're exploring some cookie noises and somesome mouth sounds for podcast listeners.
Will uh just wipe that in later, I guess. Um. Meanwhile,
from our nation's capitals, Jared Wisedared, how are you doing? Sadly
devoid of cookies? Other than that, I'm doing well though. Um did

(00:46):
you guys see the the Sesame Streetmeme? Which good job to the sesame
Street content creator of being abandoned ondeserted island? Who do you keep with
you? Oscar Grover Elmo or cookieMonster? Just in case you missed that,
I saw that, But then Isaw that the replies were starting to
get pretty dark, and I don'twant that. Yeah, well, okay,
so two things. One like Twitterhas to be deleted, right,

(01:07):
because yeah, that's like it's sesameStreet asking about like cookie and you don't.
You don't need to take this intocannibalism. That's fine. Um number
two, we decided the answer hasto be Grover. Um. I don't
know, I don't know where youall landed, but why Grover Um?
Because I can deal with anxiety,but everyone else is like gonna be too

(01:29):
much for an island, like almosttoo perky, and cookie Monsters too cookie
and Oscars too crutchy. Yeah,and I think Paula Popkins had a right
opinion about cookie Monster, which islike if he cut off the cookies,
what what's sobere cookie Monster? Like, I don't know. Did you read
Cookie monsters ama on Reddit? Heseems like a pretty good dude. Okay,

(01:53):
okay, Well that's uh a lotto think about. So So in
today's focused episode, um, wehave we have some so of exciting stories
coming up. We are interested intalking about the new rules like everybody else,

(02:20):
but maybe thinking about them with thescore sheet perspective. Um, we
will little Uh yeah, didn't youhear do a lipis on? No?
I mean that's a that's a twopercenter? Yeah? Yeah, sorry,
I should know my audience a littlebetter. Um. We also have h

(02:40):
well, our version of a NationalLeague preview, which is like the others
but worse, and uh then we'llget out of our hair. Mail back,
captain. Is today a quiet weekfor for us? It's a super
quiet week. It's said, I'mlonely. Do you feel like cookie monster
without cookies? Actually? Yeah,that's probably an aped analogy. Okay,

(03:02):
so how how can you how canwe best remedy the situation? You can
also send me cookies, that'd beokay, or you can send an email
to scoresheet at Baseball Perspectives dot com. All right, Oh, and before
I forget some site news, Iguess we have ads now, yeah,
we have ads. We should havedefinitely definitely warned you about that. Holy

(03:24):
holy cats, they're loud. We'relooking at it, at it, and
we want to kind of figure outI think if it is worth it for
us and particularly Ben, if itis paying for itself. So we'll find
out. So I will be strangelycut off mid sentence a little later in
this podcast, and we'll figure thatout later. Thank you for joining us

(03:46):
on this journey. If any ofthe listeners are audio engineers and want to
help out, that would be wonderful. Yes, Oh, for sure.
Yeah, I don't know lead likecasual tips for like I just usually throw
stuff in audacity and I'm sure it'sgot some kind of audio leveling in there,
but I don't know how to findit, and I'm too lazy to

(04:10):
search for it myself. What isit Every third person has a podcast at
this point. Maybe you're one ofthem. Let us know. Um oh,
and I have I have one morenote. Um, So, I
don't know if you've been looking throughthe Baseball Perspective slack channel, but one
of the things that they have puttogether that I was just reading because I

(04:32):
am an exciting person right before thispodcast, they have they shared the twenty
nineteen Player Name and Pronunciation Guide MLB. Oh that's good, which is super
fascinating. Yeah, you should probablyhave it for like life. Yeah yeah,

(04:55):
good for talking about baseball players.Um. The thing that strikes me
as very apparent, and we mayget to this later in the nationally preview
as well. Um boy, theyare really counting on people to have English
as their first language, is Spanishas a second. Just Elby is like,

(05:16):
um, you know, they don'thave like Sharber in the pronunciation guide,
but they have like Perez or Panisor like hayeseus, like I know
how Louise is pronounced. At thispoint, it is twenty nineteen, I've
experienced that name. Um. Theone that got me was like right up

(05:39):
early on. Um, so StefanCrichton. Um. They do a pronunciation
guide for his name, formerly ofthe Baltimore Reals now Arizona Diamondbacks. Um,
but only Stefan. So I wasjust wondering, do they think that

(06:00):
everybody in baseball has read Jurassic Park? Seems plausible? I buy it.
So yeah, definitely, um,definitely the most exciting document I read today.
Oh yeah, that's pretty good.I like this. Um, so

(06:21):
we can we can continue throughout throughoutthe podcast with that. But before we
do that, let's, uh,let's move on to the rules. So
everyone like, we're not breaking newsfor anyone, right, Uh. I
totally didn't just be we're probably breakingI definitely didn't look them up while you

(06:44):
were just ranting about whatever the pronunciationthing was. I was MLB cut for
summary. Uh that's not open onmy browser right now. So for right
audience of one, I like tothink I'm the every man here. Yeah,
that's that's fair that I think youprovide right, you provide the every

(07:11):
man perspective that this podcast is sorelylacking. Um yes, uh okay,
So I guess we should introduce therules, the role changes. I think
everyone knows, but UM do wejust want to like quickly talk about our
feelings about them. So just theextremely quick breakdown, right, is that

(07:38):
UM. In twenty nineteen, soaning breaks are going to be shortened,
the waiver tread deadline is eliminated.UM all starting home in Derby nonsense.
Mountain visits are reduced from six tofive, which you know will change everything.
Twenty twenty there will be bigger changes. So the active roster is going

(07:59):
to grow from twenty five to twentysix. The September roster is going to
go down from forty to twenty eight. Players are going to have to be
fielders or pitchers, and a certainamount of pitchers are going to be capped
as an assigned to the roster.The injured list which is the former DL,
and the option period is going fromten days to fifteen, so you

(08:22):
can't screw around with options in thesame way, and the three batter minimum,
so relievers are going to be forcedto either complete inning or finished three
batters. Um. So, Jared, you have time. You've had time
to digest this, so while Benis having time to digest cookies. What

(08:48):
was your take when you first heardthese rules coming down the pike. Um,
I guess it, generally speaking,I was kind of surprises, to
be honest, I don't know.I think in the sense that baseball tends
to not have rule changes much lesslike that other significant but like notable ones

(09:09):
all at once. So I guessI was surprised to see him. I
don't know that it moves the needleor anything that much, but I was
surprised to see baseball taking any sortof action. Yeah, you mean other
than like forming exploratory committees right forthe next decade, right, Yeah?
Yeah, we will see if steppingout of the box is okay, and

(09:30):
we'll study that for fifteen years.Yeah. You know, I'm of two
minds about this. As we talkedabout I guess you know past podcast is
I am probably a little less preciousabout the rules than most and more into
the burn it down and fix everythingterritory, move fast break things. Yeah,

(09:54):
but like to me, this feelslike fiddling in search of an answer.
It doesn't seem like the fixing thething that is actually broken. You
know, I didn't hear you mentioned, but in the thing that I was
totally not just reading, they saidthat as part of the active roster going
up from twenty five to twenty sixth, there is an um as yet undecided

(10:16):
cap on the number of pictures thateach team can carry. He mentioned that,
Okay, okay, yeah, andthere are there are some scoresheet implications
behind that, so you know,we can get into that briefly. Um,
I think we should finish with theMLB level implications. Yeah, I

(10:37):
guess. I was also surprised athow um they at least seem on the
surface like they might be like meaningfulchanges, right. I think some people
have quantified some of them and saidlike, oh, that's probably not going
to impact as many situations as youthink. But um, like Jared,
I was a little surprised at howum more, how much more they were

(11:00):
than I'm used to baseball being aslike an institution or whatever. The other
thing I was wondering, And Iguess I don't know if you guys are
familiar or not. Had they doneanything to try to themselves quantify or prospectively
like as these things come up,like try to measure and evaluate the impact

(11:22):
of these changes, or is itlike as as much as it seems just
sort of like shooting in the dark. I don't know exactly how to answer
that, but I think the onethe answer I have off the top of
mind is yes, they have basicallyentered into a partnership with the Atlantic League

(11:43):
and forced the Atlantic League to startdoing more severe changes and are going to
use it as a test kitchen forthem going forward, Which is not to
say that these changes have been evaluated, but yeah, I think any in
the future will be. It seemsweird to say, oh, you need

(12:05):
to have a place where we cantest some of these things before implementing them.
But oh, by the way,here's like eight real changes that we
haven't tested yet that we're going toimplement in the next two years. And
it's very fascinating because like, um, you know, as a effectively wild
a podcast you should probably be listeningto in addition to Slash instead of this

(12:26):
one mentioned some of the language onthis is like a little slippery and I
haven't quite like locked down like someof the what they mean, like you
know, there will be pictures.Some of the players will be pictures.
There will be a cap on them, and we'll talk about the cap later,
like, okay, well what's apicture? Yeah. I do sort

(12:48):
of wonder if that's intentional, though, Yeah, it says on this one
that so again I'm reading the MLBcut for so many teams will have to
designate players as either fielders or pitchersor if there's someone like Shahiotani a two
way player, otherwise their rules andwhen a fielder can enter the game as
a picture. So they're basically tryingto make sure that pictures are less specialized,

(13:09):
basically like less effective as a US. Right. Well, it's interesting
to me because I don't I don'tquite see the point of it yet other
than there was like a scourge ofposition player pitching uh last season, which
is, you know, awesome.Yeah, I was gonna say, it's

(13:30):
so entertaining. So I guess theinterest is in making baseball like slightly less
awesome by adding twenty game arbitrary rules. And I mean I may have talked
once or twice on this podcast abouthow I feel about arbitrary twenty game requirements,
So I don't yeah, I wasn'tlike a super fan of that that

(13:56):
particular distinction. I think it likeit makes more sense and concert if they
are going to try to ratchet downthe number of pitchers who have spots and
maybe force more two way players,which seems exciting. But a number of
two way players, then like,why wouldn't you just designate the like for

(14:20):
position players that are your best garbagetime pitchers as two way players or whatever?
Right, So this is saying theyhave to actually pitch. You can't
just destignate them. Yeah, that'sfine. So you just make sure they
get in some kind of garbage timeat some point so that they keep their
designation. But they would have tobe in twenty games, I suppose.
Okay, So it's it's a chaldright. It's one of those things that

(14:43):
like it's hard for me to understandhow Shoheo Tani ever becomes a two way
player again, because it seems likethere's a lot of pressure for him not
to be once he has become likea DH this year, because then he'll
will have to be designated as aa field or a pitcher next year,
and then you know, based onthat there will be restrictions on when he

(15:05):
can come in or play. Isit possible that baseball hates fun? I
think I think the love and hateof fun is tangential to the rule.
It's like not a consideration one wayor the other. Yeah, Or they

(15:28):
are trying to think about fun inthe sense of maximizing like play per minute
as opposed to like, you know, cool stuff happening during the game,
which is a little longer. Soyou know, that's definitely an angle.
But they are I think laser focusedon pace of play. I for me,

(15:54):
you know, I think some ofthe manipulation around pitching is interesting,
but I feel like they are justgoing to be a little less dra conient
about it than I want, andit's actually going to cause some negative repercussions.
Like I think I have a feelingthey are going to force every team
to have thirteen pictures from now on, and it doesn't feel like that's the

(16:15):
answer. That's what Nate Silver thoughtwe should do, like not thirteen specifically,
but right it wasn't that thing thathe run on five thirty years about.
Yeah, Well, I think theyshould restrict pictures or the number of
pictures in a game as well,or well, I think they shouldn't actually

(16:36):
restrict number of pictures in a game, which I haven't seen people talking a
lot. But to me, itseems like the actual problem, and it
seems like the answer to a numberof related problems, which is too many
one pictures, which I think ismore insidious than too many one batter pictures.
I think too many breaks, toomany anonymous relievers. I think if

(16:59):
we are more restrictive of pictures pergame, that seems to get more at
the answer. But I think they'remore interested in pictures on the roster at
one time. Do you think Iwas thinking five or six, with maybe
the other pictures designated for um likeextra endings. If a game goes extra

(17:22):
endings, you can the rest ofthe roster can play. What if it's
like a blowout and dudes are justgetting shelect okay, yeah, but like
okay, you need some kind oflike exception for that, just like for
extra endings, yeah, or somenegative like what is the negative consequence if

(17:44):
they have to blow the well,like I think at some point you get
an allowance for more pictures available ifa single picture has like pitched a certain
number of pitches without getting outs ormaybe just a number of pitches in total,
but like or batter's faced or whatever. Yeah, yeah, they're not

(18:10):
going to do it. It's it'sinteresting, but to me, that feels
more like the thing that they aretrying to maximize and like putting pressure on
the roster to be like we're goingto force thirteen or eleven or ten pitchers.
Just it doesn't seem to quite getat it or a little more tangentially,
and I feel like the twenty sixman roster with thirteen pitchers is going

(18:33):
to be actively bad in some waysbecause not every team has thirteen pitchers now
and it's just bringing in bringing inroom for one more like one inning pitcher,
which again, these are generally likeanonymous players who are striking out everybody.

(18:55):
And I do think that is kindof the scourge of the game.
And I think that wasn't the NMEslver article. I kind of agree with
that, and you know, Ithink we could pivot to the scoreshet implications
soon too, and it is it'sinteresting there as well. I don't know
if anyone has any other thoughts aboutthe rules as they stand. No,

(19:25):
Yeah, so you know, Ithink thinking about this from a score sheet
perspective, it's the roster stuff isreally the most interesting to me because it
does it is going to change thegame that we play, maybe somewhat imperceptibly,
but probably a little bit more thanthan even in real baseball, just

(19:49):
because again, real baseball, theyhave the option lists, and they have
minor league and farm systems and independentleagues, and they can get an infinite
supply of players and we can't.So as the active roster grows, it's
going to change the game a littlebit, I think certain in certain ways,

(20:10):
probably ways that we would like.In certain ways, it'll make things
a little harder. So you know, I think, first of all,
moving from twenty five players to twentysix means obviously that more innings and at
bats are going to be leached outin the system, right, which is
kind of already a problem. Likeif you look at the way, what

(20:34):
is it like a third more pitchershave pitched in two thousand nineteen than like
twenty years ago. It like this, I don't have the study in front
of me, but it's spiked prettysignificantly even recently, and so you have
all of these innings like just leavingthe system and in the meantime, you

(20:56):
have benches shortening and shortening, andyou have at bats leaving the system,
and you know, like we werelooking today at drafting a second baseman in
one of our leagues, and therewere no second basement left. You know
that there just aren't like backups atany position, so you just like draft

(21:18):
the guy in triple A and hopethe starter gets hurt. I guess.
So I think in that sense,moving from twenty five to twenty six may
help. You know, are wegoing to see more? I guess the
question is what are we going tosee out of that twenty six man?
Right? Like, as benches growby one player, because most teams I

(21:44):
think have thirteen pitchers at this point, which is depressing but true. So
if the benches themselves grow by oneplayer, does that mean we are going
to see more defined roles? Iguess, Like will we go back to
infielder, outfielder, catcher, personwho can hit, or will teams just

(22:10):
take you know, like every day'sgonna go Yeah, I get to keep
my third emergency catcher and then callit a day. I think it's going
to be a mix of stuff,depending on the players that are available and
the teams. Yeah, it's gonnasay. I think this savvy of the
front office is going to play afactor there, and you're gonna see some
differentiation early on and then probably someconformity after you know, season yeah two.

(22:40):
Yeah, And you know, Ithink there's an aspect to this that
is exciting. Like it has gottenmore and more difficult to find platoon partners
for your left handed hitting players,you know, especially in fielders, but
also outfielders, you know it,it's more difficult to do some of that
eighty style roster management with the teamthese with teams these days, and maybe

(23:06):
carrying an extra position player is goingto allow you should be a little more
artful about taking players out, abouthaving pinch hitting, you know, like
it's the things on the margins thatare like extremely impactful to a game,
like score sheet, you know,which is kind of based on I'm not

(23:30):
sure if I agree with it,but I don't have any evidence to back
it up. It doesn't feel likepinch hitters and like lead any defensive replacements
have that much of an impact.But I no, I think that's fair.
I think it's more I would say, more impact on your roster construction
than impact on the game like youcan as a manager. I think you

(23:52):
will be able to make more choicesin season. I think that would be
true if the in game controls allowedthat sort of flexibility. I think the
problem is that like in game controlsdon't allow you to really have like finite
control over like give you enough specificityin those different situations to be able to
like use those extra assets in away that's that impactful, like so that

(24:18):
it wouldn't the fact that you can'tmake those in game tactical decisions in real
time means that it's much harder toleverage the value that those like roster construction,
flexibility, whatever would give you.And like, I don't think.
I don't think that would be likethe place where it changes. I think,
like I agree with what you're sayingabout like playing time and the other

(24:40):
opportunities, but I think, youknow, in terms of the like more
nuanced stuff, I don't. Idon't know. My hunch would be that
I wouldn't have that big of animpact, Like I said, I have
no evidence for that. Yeah,none of us do, including all By,
So I don't know. So there'salso you know, moving the minimum

(25:03):
injured list an optional list, whichis happening now from ten days to fifteen.
Again, I think like by restrictingthe set of relievers a little bit
more and trying to rain that ina little bit, I do think it
will make scoresheet a little better.I don't like, I think the game

(25:25):
works better if there are fewer relieversgetting innings per season. Yeah. I
don't know if this is going tohave a big impact on that, but
you know, every little bit helps. I guess it's part of the decrease
of the forty person arrester to makeit so that it's harder to use the

(25:49):
injured list as like a shuttle taxisquad type of thing. I think they're
unrelated, but I do think,yes, I think by and large,
yeah, the twenty cutting the fortyman roster to twenty eight is only four
September, and that's only the majorleagues. Um yeah, but yeah,

(26:10):
I think gets to prevent the LosAngeles Dodgers from using their team like using
their farm system like a Texas squad, and maybe other teams as well,
but really the Dodgers. Yeah,Um, cutting from forty to twenty eight
in September is to me a mildbummer but they are not playing. They

(26:37):
like MLB does not really care aboutlike my love of seeing like a Koy
Dixon and John Lindsay get three atbats in September and finally make the major
leagues. That's not like other otherthan me, and like the families of
those players. I guess no oneis really caring. But I like I
do like cups of coffee. Ithought it was fun. Um, I

(26:59):
didn't think it was a big packedon the game, but yeah, I
mean I agree, I think itis fun to heather, there's that,
but I don't know. I thinkit's It's always been crazy to me that
the September Rusters are just so different. I think from a game perspective,
it doesn't make sense. That's fair, that's fair by September. I'm like,
bring on the thing that is different. But sure, yes, I
can see if you actually care abouta team that is in contention back getting

(27:22):
annoying. Fortunately none of us have. That's too much experience in that matter.
So the three batter minimum I thinkhas gotten the most the most play,
even though I don't think it's themost impactful of these by far.

(27:45):
But I guess it's the one thatwill have the most impact on an individual
game. And there are a coupleof questions here about how scoresheet is going
to handle us, Like one,you know, do we think the real
life rule is going to affect scoresheet? And to how do we think
scores sheets should implement the real liferule? Um? So just to take

(28:07):
them out a time? Um?So do you do either of you think
this will change scores sheet anyway?Moving by team scores sheet? Um,
do you think like fewer lugi's isgoing to impact roster construction? I don't

(28:33):
think materially it will. I thinkto find the best relievers that Yeah.
Yeah, I kind of agree,And I kind of think this is true
even in real life. I don'tthink that many players are going to like
lose their jobs or have their jobschange. This seems like a very mild
um position to me, especially sinceyou know, if there are two outs,

(28:56):
you can put in your lugie.Right. Yeah, the part of
the role seems weird to me,But I mean, you're good all teams
are going to have the left inthe bullpen or like the second length the
bullpen. I don't Yeah, Idon't think this changes that much. Yeah,
right, And I don't think midating pitching changes were really like the

(29:17):
You know, I guess right,just because something is not at the biggest
problem doesn't mean you can't fix it. But sure, I didn't really see
the sense of problem at all,to be perfectly honest, No, I
agree. Now let me ask,So, I've heard some people talk about
liking it because it adds additional strategyto the game in terms of managers.

(29:38):
Now I'm making having to make moreor different decisions about pitchers. Do you
agree that, and does that impactyour view of this change? I guess
I haven't actually thought of it thathard. I suppose it is. Maybe

(30:00):
it will. I guess what isthe implication that they're managers are going to
have to decide whether going that puttingin a player is worth it if they're
facing two lefties and the third righty. Yeah, or you know, there's
two outs and you put your leftyin, but he doesn't get that out
and then stable for the manager tohave to consider. Yeah, yeah,

(30:22):
I could see that. I right, it's probably a different set of constraints,
right, it's not like a betterone, but maybe it is.
I think it'll make like top tierlefties marginally better, or lefty hitters marginally
better, which is good. Iguess many of the best hitters, or

(30:45):
like a disproportionate number of the besthitters, are left handed, so it's
probably better for MLB to get theirnumbers slightly higher and to have them,
you know, have more impact inbig situations. But you're probably still gonna
like angle things to have the lefthanded hitter face Jim Tommy, if you

(31:06):
know what I mean. It alsoseems likely that amongst the managers, it's
not going to change how we differentiatethem, Like the savvy managers are going
to be able to handle it,and the Mike Matheinis are going to bungle
it, just like you would expect. And it's just another maybe data point
in how you would build evidence aboutwhether a manager was competent and you know,

(31:27):
capable of handling the strategic opportunities infront of him. But it doesn't
seem to me like it's gonna drasticallychange some of that math for people,
right, It's true, I guesswe have a different set of managers now
like the managers are ten years ago. Like a couple that would lars out
there and two outs, just likewalking to the mound without like before realizing

(31:52):
m Yeah, Like, I don'tknow. I think this is one that's
a little wait and see. SoI guess my next question is, should
scores sheet do this? Yes,scores sheet should do this, okay because

(32:15):
you think it would mirror real lifebaseball. Yes, because that's scores sheets
if not stated at least implied intention. Yeah, but would you really put
this ahead of other things on thelist of things that you would want to
have scoresheet implement. I mean,I guess it depends what else is on

(32:37):
the list, but it seems prettyimportant based on what scores Sheet is now,
right, So you're saying it's probablymore important than even some of the
changes we'd like to see scores She'dmake, just because it's a fork from
the rules of baseball. Yes,that's less fun than other changes, don't
get me wrong, and parting wewould rather would have more fun with similar
stuff. But I think so longas scores sheet is going to be attempting

(33:00):
to murror baseball, then it shouldattempt to murror baseball. Okay, And
like to you, having the abilityto hook at point two five is just
not like it's not worth the mthat advantage, or I guess the hook

(33:20):
at point two five could just endafter three batters, right, yeah,
that no matter what? Or threebatters at the end of the half ending?
Yeah? Um. Does it feellike you would have less control?
As Ben said, like the controlyou have over your in game decisions is
a little bit like second order,right, Like you don't have immediate tactical

(33:44):
control over the team, but youcan set preferences that the simulation then kind
of implements. I think second ordersagree we describing that. I like that,
Thank you m right. Do youdo you feel like this will add

(34:04):
another constraint, like distorting the impactthat you can have setting the lineup sheet?
Sure? Yeah, maybe a littlebit, but I mean that's that's
how the system is set up rightnow, right, So that's just the
way it is. Yes, itdoesn't mean I'm happy about it, but
some things will never change. Doyou think it's just a difference in how
you set your hooks or do youthink it's like an actual, like new

(34:28):
parameter about like does this picture enteran ending with you know, less than
two outs or whatever? This reliever? Jared, I think the way you
were saying it was a parameter,right, Yeah, that rather rather than
like put the control on the user'sside and like force the user to have
minimum point seventy five, just likecreate a rule that even if the hook

(34:53):
is point two five, even azero, if the picture comes in they're
facing three batters or until that intothe happening. Yeah, I meant more
that it would change how you thinkabout setting the hook numbers because you know
that the picture has to face theminimum of three batters, like you might

(35:14):
hook oh pictures lower when you're enteringthe hook numbers because the assumption is that
they're probably gonna end up facing morebatters in general than you would really want
them to. Yeah, that's agood point. I would do that.
Yeah. Yeah, that sounds likea really good idea. Free advice,

(35:34):
all right, Hot tips for twentytwenty. Just have to implement it in
scoresheet and then we've got some greatadvice for you to have to play the
three edible game that does not quiteexist yet. That's what I'm here for.
That sounds like sounds like my calling. Yeah, it sounds like a
good idea. Yeah. So anythingelse about well, yeah, I mean

(36:04):
I think we don't talk about toomuch. You can say for anything.
But I think to me this raisesa couple of interesting questions. Is one
of which is, you know,what what do we or what do people
want out of a sim? Dothey wanted to mirror Baseball exactly? Or
do you want the option of playingaround with your own changes like this um?
Or are the ones you know,UM subtle or large? Because you

(36:25):
can imagine sim where you have theoption of changing this rule not or changing
whatever other rules? So this shouldyou know? Do you do people want
a sim exactly like baseball or doyou want the ability to play around with
stuff? Right? And I guessthe example would be in particular, Out
of the Park seems to be thelike dominant simulation in this sphere, being

(36:50):
able to change a bunch of rulesoff and on both I guess in terms
of like lineup and roster construction,and also um, you know, I
think rules about how the game isplayed. If I recall, they have
a pretty experience setting screen that isfilled with a lot of I was gonna

(37:10):
say, I tried to get intoOut of the Park and it was kind
of overwhelming. So I think mybest case scenario for something like this is
that there's options for customization, butthe defaults are available to let it just
run like MLB, and there's likesome depth to how the different parameters are

(37:32):
defined in the different options for customizinghow it works, so that there's like
a you know, like beginner sortof level of like here are some of
the tweaks that you might want tomake at first, and there's like a
spectrum that starts there at the beginningof level, then goes to something more
complicated or sophisticated, you know,at the other end of the spectrum,

(37:52):
and that you know, the simsshould sort of guide somebody through the fact
that not all of these options arecreated equal and it should be easy for
somebody who wants to have it beas close to Major League a small as
possible to just sort of dive inand have that experience. Right. I
think one of the things to thinkabout is that I think every customer,

(38:16):
every customization that you add, meansyou have to like test the range of
customization, so it like it's asimple choice that makes the ultimate algorithm much
more complex and then also provides humansa the possibility of gaming the system a

(38:37):
little bit more easily. Yeah,I think developing something like that would be
very onerous, right, like whatI described, Sorry, developing the thing
that I described would be very timeconsuming. But yeah, Jared's question was,
like, what do you want tosome of them? Because like right,
well, because like Out of thePark is heavily on customization side.

(38:59):
Yeah, but um, I canalso like destroy the computer in that game
over probably like you know, aseason or two and I'm winning one hundred
ten games a year. It wasjust smarty pants over here. Yeah,
it was the last time you hada squashy team in that mini games.
Maybe we should start a different podcasttwo seventeen, right, our Murphy team

(39:22):
won one hundred and eight. Gonnahang out to that, okay, right,
yeah, my points. Yeah,it's my second question though, do
you think um so you talked abouthow MLB is using the Atlantic League for
testing out some of these changes.Do you think for something like say the

(39:45):
the three better rule that MLB hasa sim or tested out in something like
and out of the Park or somethingrelated or in do you think that is
something that is worth considering for away to test some of the stuff out.
That seems amazing and I want toplay it. I think that's a

(40:06):
good idea. And it comes fromlike the business side of your head,
not the like baseball fan side ofyour head, because the baseball fan side
of your head would realize that,like that's not how they rule. But
yeah, I think I think itmakes a lot of sense. I would
be surprised if they had taken thetime or been able to find something that

(40:29):
allowed them to like look at theconfluence of all these things, because I
think I think the thing that makesit difficult is not that any one of
these things is a challenge to quantifyor understand. Right, you can look
and see, like how many picturesface fewer than three batters. That's very
trivial. The thing that's difficult islooking at when you do that and you

(40:49):
change the roster size, and youchange the cap on number of pictures on
the roster, and you change youknow, whatever else. It is like
as those things accumulate and like startinterest secting, that's where it becomes complicated,
and that's where like the unintended consequenceshappened. I don't think I guess
I say this without knowing exactly whatyou can do and outside the park,

(41:10):
but like I'd be a little bitsurprised if Emily be Head gone to that,
to that like that's a good idea. Yeah, Like maybe they might
have done it just the way youwould like create a situation and AlSi because
it seems to me less like simulatingthe game of baseball than more like just

(41:35):
thinking about the ramifications. So Iam just imagining a whiteboard and a lot
of post it notes. Is itone of those like actual white boards or
is it one of the like clearglass boards like the people in Numbers had
like fifteen years ago numb three yearsnumbers. Yeah, the television show.

(41:55):
Um, yeah, great question.I think it's probably more sophisticated than post
it notes on a whiteboard. Butyou know, I don't think it would
have been easy to look at theconfluence of all things. I think they
probably did quantify what they think theimpact of each of the things would be,
and they sort of held their thumbup and we're like, Okay,
that looks like it's going to beabout enough of an adjustment for what we

(42:20):
want and not too much, andlike we're not worried about them, you
know, creating some kind of unintendedsituation. But that's just my hunch.
Okay, Yeah, I mean it'sinteresting. There's a lot to come,

(42:40):
and you know, I look forwardto seeing how these changes affect both the
real baseball game and our fake baseballgame, both of which we left.
Yeah, before we move on,just one note. I did scroll down
in the Cut four to the featuredheadlines, and the top headline currently on

(43:02):
Cut four is Greg bird homeward offJalen Beaks in True Avian Showdown. So
I just wanted to give cut fullerprops for for that headline, which may
be the headline of the year andit's only March. Yeah. Sorry,

(43:28):
you just bring that up because youwant to us to talk about fantasy birding.
Oh sure, Um, where didI see this? I sent this
to you and I forgot already wherewe found it. Oh dead Spin,
Yes, dead Spin. If youmissed this, Google go to dead Spin
and search for fantasy burdening, whichis a thing. Um. I don't

(43:52):
know if it's quite as strange asa Fantasy SNL league, which we are
in, but definitely fantasy birding isis a pretty close approximation of my work
life and home life. So it'sconfusing to me. Um, I will

(44:15):
say, uh, and yeah,if you're if fantasy birding sounds like a
thing to you. It does soundlike about the best game fantasy birding that
you can possibly make. So yeah, God bless um. So meanwhile,
I think we wanted to briefly doseason previews over the next couple of weeks.

(44:39):
UM. But because we are youknow, probably not your first option
for season previews, we will probablybe a little quicker and a little more
loose about it. Um. AndAnd to start, I think we wanted
to go by league this week.We want to talk about the nationally because,
as I say, saved the bestfor last UM, So we wanted

(45:02):
to just briefly talk about you know, what have you, what we're looking
forward to? UM, what wethink have we think the season's gonna go.
Um. And to start kick usoff, I think we're gonna go
to our man on the street,the average the average fan's opinion himself.
What are you? What is yourNation league preview? UM? So when

(45:25):
I look into a season preview,I like to keep it at a high
level. I'm not a fan ofanyone particular team, but as much as
I'm a fan of baseball, Ilike drama and excitement, So I'm looking
for situations where there's gonna be,especially like late in this season, really

(45:47):
exciting pennant races or you know,divisional wildcard races. And that's why I
think the National League is so fun. Um. I know, last year
it was like super intense and atleast at times and then obviously resolves by
the end of the season, butalso like a lot of unexpected things can
happen. And one of the thingsthat I've noticed is that the projected standings

(46:09):
depending on where you go, verypretty wildly in a lot of situations.
I think almost everybody has the Dodgersin the West, but you know,
in the Central and the East,projection and systems are sort of all over
the place in terms of who theythink is going to be the best team
and how good they're going to be. And you know, I think there's
sort of a consensus that the whateverteam wins each division, it's going to

(46:30):
be somewhere between you know, likeeighty six and ninety wins or something like
that. But you know, dependingon where you look, you'll see,
you know, in the Central eitherCubs or Cardinals or Brewers obviously in the
East, Phillies or Nationals. Ieven saw Braves in a couple of places.
So I just think, like,from the highest level perspective, the

(46:51):
National League will be pretty exciting tosee how all those different teams shake out.
And you know, whether the Cubsend up proving pacoda or wrong.
Uh, you know how the Phillies, um, you know free agent rebuild
went, how the youth coming upfor the Nationals ends up doing all those
kinds of things. I think,um, you know, I'd be interesting

(47:14):
to see it. And that's that'ssort of the extent of my National League
preview. And I think that's that'sa good sort of one minute take for
the casual almost fan used to befan, has has has been fan.
We need to amalgamate that into somethingmore clever. But you get what I'm
saying. That was a surprisingly upeat. Well you expected it to be more

(47:38):
sour and cynical. I don't knowwhat I expected. But the world is
ending in the National League is trash. The Dodgers are gonna win. Yeah,
Dared just thought I was going tobe more down on things. That's

(47:59):
how I feel. Um, yeah, no, that I think that's true.
I think there's a lot too.Uh, there's lots like about the
National League, which leads me tomy first question. I think you were
talking about different protection systems. Um, what would like annoy Cubs fans the
most this season? Like, doyou think they should end the season?

(48:21):
I'm thinking last day of the season, like they have seventy nine wins and
they should like actually have to figureout whether they want to win eighty and
then they can go like see toldyou so, which I feel like would
be really so many jokes some onYeah. I mean. The other thing

(48:44):
that's interesting is like a lot ofthese projection systems have the gap between the
best team and the worst team exceptfor the Marlins. I guess, um,
maybe like the worst team in theWest, you know, especially in
the Central like five teams all prettyclose together. If it ends up being
that, like five teams are separatedby ten games at the end of the
season, that's going to feel like, I think, a pretty exciting run

(49:07):
right down to the finish. Soright, I think you can like fourteen
teams are currently going for it,yeah, which is um which is probably
on the part of some teams,but yeah, totally um So, Jared,
any high level thoughts do you wantto start going division by division?

(49:29):
H yeah, I mean we canjust I mean, the only division thing
is I don't even I was gonnasay this is a warm take, but
I don't even know if it is. And maybe I'm just it's because I'm
in the uh the Naly's territory.But I sort of going to say that
the Central is going to be moreexciting than the East. Yeah, I
think the ESSENTI will be more excitingthan the East. Two. Um,

(49:49):
it's interesting. I don't know thatI agree with that. I think it's
going to be probably tighter race.I feel like, wait, what do
we mean by exciting then? Tome, well, to me, it's
not just the race. I thinkthe NALY East has the more fascinating teams.
To me, the better teams,like the more talented teams, more
talented and perhaps more flawed, um, and easier to troll fan basis,

(50:16):
So in that sense, like somebodyis going to be miserable, so somebody's
easier to troll than Cubs fans.Those kids are not that easy to troll
because they have expected losing for avery long time and now they expect winning
for a very long time, andit's just it's hard. I think I

(50:37):
believe in you. Yeah, you'vegot a lot of practice trolling baseball fans.
Thank you, Jared. With anyparticular storylines that you thought of for
the NL Eastern Central um that madeyou decide that, like your warm take
was that the Central would be moreexciting, Um, I mean, I

(51:00):
don't. I don't know about thestorylines in general. Just I guess I've
been hearing a lot of how anyteam can win the in the least,
but I think that Marlins can.But any team could win the inal Central.
H Wait, the Reds could winthe Innal Central. Yeah, I'm
not saying they will, but Ithink I could build a reasonable case for

(51:21):
it without like I think able thereason the case for it that that's not
totally insane. Yeah, I thinkit's easier for me to build a case
for the Reds and the Pirates atthis point. Actually, that's fair.
I'm seeing a couple of people havethe Pirates worse than the Reds, but
like a bunch of a bunch ofplaces have like all of like both of
them in the well and whatever theother that third place team is like right

(51:46):
around five hundred. Yeah, Ithink the Pirates probably have a higher four
than the Reds do, but maybea lower ceiling. So I think I
could see a way that the Redsbreak out basically if they're pitching just all
comes together at once, um,which does not seem likely. But you
know, no, But I meanthat's why sometimes I think it's it's more

(52:07):
useful to think of these things insteadof even looking at just projected when the
losses is like the distribution of possibleoutcomes, and something like the Reds I
think has a much much more variation. You know, it's got a wider
distribution than some of these other teamsare. Yeah, are there any teams
that you like more or less thanlet's say your standard projection system or consensus?

(52:37):
I have some in the chamber.Yeah, if that works. Um,
I don't think the Rockies are goingto be very good this year,
and I think I don't know thatthat's such a what is your barometer for
very good? Yeah? I thinkI think there are. I put it

(52:57):
this way, I think there area lot more ways that things go wrong
and right for them, because ifyou look at what the Rockies are fundamentally
is just like a team based aroundthe success of young pitching. And to
me, that does not seem likea super long term strategy for success,
particularly course fields. But you doit because it Colorado, because it's young

(53:21):
pitches, because I mean a lotof people are high on Marquees and Freeland
was you know good. So whydo you think that I just remember the
Mets from twenty fifteen or even theBravest from a couple of years. It's
just, you know, if youhave strength and young pitching, that like
the thing the simulation can't really projectis like how many arms get shredded in
a season? Oh? I good? But yeah, yeah, like it

(53:45):
I'm short, right, Like ifyou do Monte carl like you can,
and I'm sure there's more variability inthe Rockies performance. But you know,
I like, I think the armsin general, and I think these arms
in particular. It it seems worryingto me. I think I kind of
like the Diamonbacks better. Um,the Diamondbacks who have like essentially forgotten to

(54:12):
fill a couple positions. But um, but I don't see the NLST as
being super competitive. To be honest, I don't know if there's on the
Diamondbacks though, right It's it's agood question. I think, Um,
we will talk about that a littlebit. But like in terms of breakout
players, I think could tell Martemight be a player that I like.

(54:37):
Um, I think I could seeDavid pral To holding his games. Um
it's you know, it's hard toimagine like a really great experience for them,
But I think they have enough playerswho I think are interesting enough.
I could see Weaver and John Duplantiercoming up perhaps being interesting. I think
they are kind of volatile players withsome skills. I think Robbie Ray could

(55:02):
be great. You know, hestruck out I think the most players in
spring training. I think he's walkedamong the most players in spring training as
well. So maybe it's the fullRobbie Ray experience, but I think he
was, you know, severely undervalued last year. I don't know.
I'm not gonna talk myself into theDiamonbacks so much as I think both teams
are gonna be about five hundred andI think people have more hope for the

(55:23):
Rockies than that the Diamondbacks got apretty great new outfielder. Uh oh yeah,
no, that took me a second. I don't know if I'm going
to get used to that yet.Um, So that that is Adam Jones,
formerly of the Baltimore Orioles. Alwaysat the Baltimore, always in the

(55:46):
Baltimore Orioles. Yeah, formerly ofthe Seattle Mariners. That's very get out
of here. Um. And interms of like teams that I see outperforming
their projection is it is a ghostto say the Cubs depends on which projection.

(56:10):
Um. Yeah, what about theCardinals. Um, it's a good
question. Like if their young pitchingstays healthy, it seems like their offense
is gonna be good. Right,Yeah, I agree, And there's like
there's a lot that's good about theiroffense. And the Cardinals as always have

(56:34):
like forty players waiting the wings whoare just like sixteenth round picks from like
Iowa State, who are like twentysix and ready to hit like thirty home
runs. I don't know exactly howthat happens, but I do. Like
I saw Edmundo Sosa it spring training. I was like, oh, you
know, I like him a littlebit. Oh god, they just have
a thousand of these players or likeGyramunho is sitting around like too deep and

(57:00):
like, yeah, he could bea starter. M Tyler O'Neill. Right,
they are just like a bunch ofplayers who are good, good,
and deep. Um. I don'tlove Miles Michelis. I don't really love
Adam Wayne, right. I thinkCarls Martinez is kind of hurt. I
think Mike Waca is on the wayto being hurt. Um. You know,

(57:24):
I don't think that's a surprise.I think that's why the Cardinals aren't
like locks to win this. Butit does seem like I was gonna say
house to Cards, what's a whatis the thing I should say? Instead?
Okay, it doesn't seem great forthem to kind of hold that pitching

(57:47):
depth through the season, and wemay see a lot more picture to play
than we want out of this team. It's been a few years since I
paid real attention to baseball, andI was pretty shocked that Adam Wainwright was
still in the rotation for the Cardinals. I was shocked, and I have
you could have got got me abead decent of sum of money that he
was not pitching anymore. He's thirtyseven now, yeah, thirty seven yeah,

(58:16):
And I mean he's probably there,you know, for some of the
season for like leadership, because theend of his season was not as bad
as the beginning. Um, youknow, I don't think he's going to
necessarily end the season on the team. But you know, they I don't
think they have as much depth asI might expect. But obviously we haven't

(58:42):
talked about Jack Flaherty, who isI think everyone's favorite breakout pick and third
round Uh you know Fantasy Baseball pick. You hit at him too, You
just like killed the rest of therotation. No, I mean I agree
with everyone else, like he's veryexciting to watch, but yeah, the

(59:02):
rest of the occasion is not reallyGuys who I am tracking or enjoyable,
find enjoyable, um, anything else. I you know, one thing I
wanted to do is go around theleague quickly. I worked out some players
that I feel like are my playersfor each team? Oh boy, Yeah,

(59:29):
and just just to go team byteam and like a quick team preview
for each um and what we thinkof them. The Brave maybe just me
crushing their announcing teams because I havenow finally watched every team in spring training
announcing. It's just it's just badthis year. I do need to talk
about this somehow. Um, theBraves are I you know, I don't

(59:54):
think the Braves set themselves up verywell this offseason. But um, I
I think they're young. Pitching ishas been looking good so far in spring,
so much as that means anything,But you know, they have so
much depth and a lot of playerswho I'm who I'm liking. I think
Kyle Wright has looked better than Ithought he was. Um. I have

(01:00:16):
been tracking Bryce Wilson all spring.I think he might actually be the best
of the Braves young starters at thispoint. I'm looking forward to him.
The Marlins have a really interesting rotation, and I think I'm going to end
up liking about four fits of theirrotation by the end of the season.

(01:00:37):
I know, well, but thereis something to it. I don't think
they are a dismal team. Wewill get to those tomorrow or next week.
Um, there's like the offense isjust a train wre It is just
a real nightmare. I don't thinkthere's anything worth talking about there. But
um, you know, I dolike Trevor Richards quite a bit, and

(01:01:00):
I you know, we drafted CalebSmith in the mock and I think there's
some potential upside there. I havereally liked what I've seen from Pablo Lopez,
who it looks like he's going towin a spot of spring training perhaps,
you know, I think that couldbe three fists of an interesting rotation.

(01:01:21):
I think Nick Nidert is a playerwho have been tracking pretty closely since
he came over, kind of acontrol type pitcher who I think has actually
performed at the upper levels, whoI'm pretty excited by. You know,
again, like I said with theRockies, you're not going to do great
if the strength the core of yourteam is in young pitching. But I

(01:01:43):
do think they have a bunch oflike number three starters that might prevent them
from being like truly horrible this year. The Mets are I don't know what
to say about the Mets right thatthat has been a strange team. They

(01:02:04):
they they do not strike me asa team that has put together all that
well. But you know, likea kind of a fantasy version of like
let's just accumulate assets and see whathappens. M So, you know,
I think there's a lot of playersplaying the same position, players who are
going to be out of position.Um very bizarre. I am curious about
I'm at Rosaria, who I havebeen down on, but I will track

(01:02:28):
him very closely. Uh, thisseason. You know, I think there
is um some breakout power potential.Um. You know, he's not a
very good defender in score sheet,but maybe that will go up a little
bit as well. Um. Youknow, and I think he's one of

(01:02:49):
the few Mets with like a solidjob and position at this point. So
uh, you know it's interesting.I would be, um, I'm curious
if he breaks out, and youknow, I would kind of bet the
under on it, um, butI'm willing to be wrong. Uh.
The Nationals. What do you thinkof the Nationals as a nearby resident?

(01:03:13):
Or it doesn't seem like anyone isthrilled about them this year? The Nats
fans are, Um are they Dothey feel like they have lost her?
Like I know we did talk aboutthat a little while. Guys. Do
they still feel confident like we gotthis division? Yeah? Well I don't
know about confident, but yeah,I don't think I think they're they're they

(01:03:37):
would generally say they're cautiously optimistic,okay, always always the state you'd like
to get their pant bais into itsright. It's the pitching for them,
I think, yeah, not theoffense necessarily. Yeah, I mean it's
interesting because they have like the topend pitchers as as always, and they've

(01:04:00):
kind of filled the back end thisyear with like Jeremy Hellickson Annibal Sanchos.
According to this um, there's somethinginteresting about Adimal Sachas. He had he
had like a sneaky good year lastyear, and I guess anyone could be
good now is the lesson I wentinto a hyperbaric chamber. I looked at
whatever it is that like Steve Rodderlooked at in Captain America, and now

(01:04:21):
I'm like a number two starter.Great, Okay, cool? Um.
I feel like for me, likea lot of this team is riding on
Victor robe Less being good, andI'm very curious to see if that is
the case. I feel like we'llfinally have a season with him, and
he's the player who I would betracking from the nationals. Um. You

(01:04:45):
know, like I think some ofagain what the MLB stack Cast podcast people
were saying about kind of poor exitvelocities, like does he truly have any
power whatsoever? Um, you know, that could definitely put a limit on
his ability. He's he looked inspring when he hit with some power,

(01:05:08):
but I'm curious what he would dowith like a solid three hundred fifty of
bats. Yeah. Um, thePhillies, Um, you know, they
some big players who I am curiousabout how they're gonna do. But I
like, basically know how Bryce Harperis gonna He's gonna be good, right,
He's Bryce Harper. It'll be good. Bold statement. Yeah. Um,

(01:05:32):
you know, I feel like NickPavetta is the hipster pick. Everyone's
talking about Nick. Everyone loves NickPavetta. I like him too. I'm
gonna so I'm gonna say, liketracking him, but I'm curious about I
feel like this is a real makeor break season for Vince Velasquez as well.
And um, I I have alwaysliked him a little more than consensus,

(01:05:55):
but you know, my hopes havebeen fading. I feel like,
you know, this is the yearwhere getting side once and for all.
If he is like a playoff caliberstarter, or if he is just like
a setup guy who is you know, clockey innings for a while, or
Daniel Cabrera. Um, you know, I think I feel like there's more

(01:06:15):
there, but it just hasn't been. Um. I had totally forgotten about
Daniel Cabrera. I was like Iwas, I had my microphone music because
I've been coughing. But I didlike a whole like head explode moment when
you said Daniel I don't remember.Oh yeah, he's alive. That was
from like when I used to payattention. So he's gonna put it together

(01:06:42):
one of these seasons. Um,the in the central I you know,
the Milwaukee Brewers are I don't know, you know, I think the hitting
is obviously going to be pretty solid. Um. I don't feel like there
are a lot of players who likeI have particularly been drafting on a lot

(01:07:03):
of teams in scoreesheet from the Brewers. UM. On the pitching side,
I feel like there's a little bitmore action going on year. I feel
like Brandon Woodruff has ended up onour teams. I think Corbyn Burns hasn't.
But is interesting. I am curiousto see, uh, you know,
if the starters take a step forward. UM. I saw Adrian Houser

(01:07:27):
was sent to Triple A to bea starter. I'm curious about his future.
I could see the Brewers having likefive different starters by the end of
the season than they do right now. Um. The Cardinals we just talked
about, I don't none of theirplayers have ended up on our teams really
or are players who I think weare that interested in? Um, I

(01:07:49):
guess Tyler O'Neil is somebody who is. So I was muted. Um I
was gonna ask you about Jimmy Neilsonon the Brewers. It seems like,
yeah, he's coming back on anUFN of his before. Do you think
we're gonna see a return to formthere as he looked in this spring?
He's behind, but I think hejust started pitching. I think he got

(01:08:11):
into a game last week and he'sgoing to be a week or two behind.
I do like him as a pickthis year again, like I feel
like for four starters you want,you wanted enough of them that you're you
had don't have picture triple A,right, so sometimes you have to take
like your potted plant like Dan Stralisof the world. But I you know,

(01:08:33):
I think I also like some homerun picks, and I feel like
Jimmy Nelson would be a pretty goodone at this point. But so sorry,
so the Cardinals again, like TylerNeil Harrison Bader, I'm interested in
if he can keep this up fora season. I always liked the cut

(01:08:55):
of his jib, But you knowit's a veteran team. We know what
they are, and like I said, I'm fading almost all of their starters,
so I don't know. I thinkthey will probably win the division and
bore me the Cubs. Speaking ofboring teams, at this point, I

(01:09:16):
don't think there's a lot of mysteryleft to the Cubs. You know,
like they are not super exciting anymore, and I guess they're still young.
They still have fun players, butI don't think they have a lot of
surprising players left. I am mostlycurious about their rotation and if you Darvish

(01:09:40):
in particular, who's ended up ona lot of our team has bounces back
the spring has not been particularly hopeful. I think he had one bad start
where he like walked the park,which is always concern of his, but
I feel like that was one before. I feel like from what I've been
hearing some of the velocities back,I'm I feel like he's somewhat undervalued.
I feel like Anatana has been somewhatundervalued, and maybe even Cole Hammils,

(01:10:03):
And obviously that means I am probablycloser to other projection systems than Pacoda,
which is unfortunate because obviously I wouldlike the Cups too poorly. The Pirates
have become like a deeply boring teamas well. This is what I was
talking about with them. With theCentral Division, I feel like the teams

(01:10:28):
are less interesting, probably except forthe Reds, because they've just stayed in
stasis for a while, and teamsthat Saint Stasis don't interest me quite as
much. I am curious about ChrisArcher. I feel like he's been a
player that we've been targeting, andI feel, you know, I guess
the question is whether like he's hada couple of seasons in a row where

(01:10:55):
he's kind of severely underhit his FIPand you know, like when a player
does it three times a row,sometimes they were like, well that's who
he is now, but sometimes itmight actually be just rolled tales three times
in a row. I do thinkhe has probably a bad fastball, But

(01:11:15):
you know, also maybe getting outof that Fuddy Duddy Rays organization and into
the Pirates Progressive organization is really gonnachange things for him. Is that a
control? I don't know. TheReds have been the most fun in the
mission by far, just they've beenthe team I've been interested in, you

(01:11:39):
know, exciting young players everywhere theyhave. Their pitching is not so hot,
but I feel like they have awave of pitchers coming behind this one.
You know, I think a lotof players who haven't been on the
stage for a while. I don'treally think it's going to work out for
them the way they think it is, but I'm I'm glad to see that

(01:12:00):
they're actually going for it. Itfeels fun and different. The player I
marked for them, obviously is JesseWinker, whom we have been tracking for
a breakout for some time, andI think that'll do it. Not Queak,
Yeah, hel Pueak is great.He is fun. I have not

(01:12:23):
gotten used to seeing him in Redyet, and I don't know that I
ever will. Yeah, especially sinceI think there's like a seventy percent chance
the Reds are gonna be like threeyand thirty five and he's gonna be traded
by June. But you know,he's a person who deserves a bigger stage.
But I don't think he's like asunknowable as a player. I think

(01:12:44):
there is a version of Jesse Winkerthat just like the power finally comes and
he's a superstar. I wish I'dbe excited to see diving backs we talked
about. I do think could tellMarte is a breakout pick. I like
leek Weaver in the rotation, andlike a few other players. I think
they have some upside again, likeprobably upside from a lower base in the

(01:13:10):
card, and the Rockies have moredownside from a higher start. So I
do think they'll end up in roughlythe same place. But I would rather
be the Diamonbacks organization at the moment. The Rockies are. They're they're fun.
I'm looking forward to seeing Harmon Marquezpitch, but I don't feel like

(01:13:31):
that is one of our players necessarily. I would like to see what Ryan
McMahon does with a series of atbats, and I don't know if he's
going to get them because Garrett Hampsonis running for his job. Literally,
he's very fast, and Brendan Rodgersis coming up behind him. Obviously,
then you'll still have room at firstif Daniel Murphy gets hurt again. But

(01:13:55):
I just want to see what RyanMcMahon is and I feel like this year
will go a long way towards plainingit. And I have just thought like
the millennial version of Kelly Johnson.H yeah, which would be a fun
player. I've always liked Kelly Johnsonmuch more than consensus. The Dodgers are

(01:14:16):
always fun, right yeah. Umtheir best player is a triple a claim
that they had this year. Who'sgonna come up mid season and hit like
forty home runs or strike out thirtyand like, well, I didn't think
Felix pa was good, but Iguess I guess that's just how it happens

(01:14:39):
now. Um. You know,other than the obvious things, like you
know, Walker Bueler is going tobe fun to watch for however many games?
Um, And you know, Iwould like to see what most of
these players are. I think theyhave a lot of exciting stories. Um.
I am curious about Ross trip playingin particular who Um I think friend

(01:15:01):
of the Pod Night Stevens has beendrafting steadily in every league I see unate.
Um. I you know he rusterPlay made the All Star team last
year, so I guess that's notquite a breakout. But um, I
do think there is an aspect wherehe has been underdrafted because he's kind of
a swing man. But he probablycould have a job by the end of
the year. You know, it'salways hard to say. It's always hard

(01:15:25):
to say whether being a starting pitcherfor the Dodgers is like a good thing
or not, because they'll just throwyou into like the sixth inning in the
playoffs. Anyways, Like, oh, well, the world has changed.
The Giants are so depressing. Yeah, I feel like they are the most
depressing team in baseball. Uh,it's okay. You guys won three World

(01:15:45):
Series. You you can have aboring team for a few years. But
there's just like, at least atleast the Orioles are like hilariously dismal,
Like this team is just like oldand bad, and like maybe there's a
way in which they like pull it, like they don't have you know,
I could see a world where likeBuster Posey and brand Crawford and Evan Longoria

(01:16:10):
stay healthy for a year and likethey surprise a little bit, but then
they're just like old and good orold and Okay, I don't see I
don't see a world where they're likeexciting. Who is that is that a
ghost of Evan Longoria? Yeah,well you're talking about how they won a
bunch of World Series. I waslike, yeah, but Evan evn't didn't

(01:16:31):
win any World Series. Oh boy. Um. Yeah, so I had
a really hard time finding a playerthat we've been drafting a lot of leagues
from them. I like Brandon Crawford. He's he is our backup shortstop at
a bunch of leagues, just because, um, you know, Scorre sheet
over values or perhaps correctly values hisdefense. I think over values his defense

(01:16:56):
in particular. But um, youknow, I like he is a starter
who still has maybe some ability.Um, We've been ending up with Drew
Pomerans in a bunch of leagues,um or at least one that I know
of, and I think target himin a couple others. Uh. I
Again, that's just kind of theinnings and like a little bit of upside.
There's just not a lot going onthat I'm excited about here. But

(01:17:19):
that brings us to our last team, the Padres. Uh. And I
just had as my notes for thisteam, um, the San Diego Padres.
I am excited and all I planon watching them a bunch of this
year. This is it's a funteam. They have so many, um,

(01:17:40):
talented and young and exciting players.I don't know that they're good yet,
Um you know, they could bea year away. They could be
the Cubs. There's of twenty fifteen, you know what I mean, or
the Astroid Like there there's a lotto look at, and you know,
I think we're gonna learn a lotabout you know it, Frenchie Cordero,
is it, fronmil Reyes, isit? Areas? You know? Who

(01:18:04):
is going to break out? Ithink Francisco Mahia is a player who we
kind of bashed a little bit inthe mock draft and then he just hit
the terror out of the ball thespring. I don't know, there is
a version of him that's really good. And the pitching side like they're like,
I don't know, Like obviously noone else has seen Chris Paddock the

(01:18:26):
spring, but he's so fun.He's so fun. Master Rama is really
good. This is gonna be areally good team. And they just have
like players out there. Ear doyou remember to Nelson Lamet, Yes,
he's back. He's just gonna bepitching for them again and like maybe a
number two starter. Who knows theyhave like eight of them. Um,
there's a lot going on. There'seven more beneath the surface. And if

(01:18:49):
they ever get boring, like FernandoTatiste Junior is like a couple months away.
I'm not, like, I don'tthink I'm a biggest fan, but
like, you know, so you'regonna have the best player at that point
in the miners come up mid season. That's always exciting, very much.
Looking forward to the season. Ican't wait until they get the brown and

(01:19:09):
mustard uniforms back. Padres Forever,Padres for life. That's it. Oh
yeah, what a quick whip around. Yeah, so hopefully. I don't
know if that's a good analysis,but it certainly filled time. Any other

(01:19:30):
remaining thoughts, I have exhausted mynotebook. No, thank you. I
think it was good. Okay.I think, after all, the Padres
are the team that I'm most excitedto watch. Yeah, I think that's
fair. It's not because I wasborn there. I think like all the
like, it sounds like there's awide variety of possible outcomes for them.
That's exciting, right, And there'sa version of them that wins like sixty

(01:19:55):
games too, which is exciting.Well, yeah, there's a lot of
ways to be exciting. Or aversion that wins forty seven games and that's
exciting in its own life. Yeah, there's no version that wins forty seven
games. It's unfathomable. Yeah,you have to be trying to be that

(01:20:17):
bad. We'll get there next week. We just have to figure out how
we're going to remember to preview theother fourteen teams as well, do an
hour just on the Orioles deep looking. Um. But with that, UM,
what is the best thing you sawthis week? I feel like we

(01:20:40):
could all answer this roughly the sameway since the last time we recorded.
It's possible. I would say there'sone thing that almost made it for me.
Okay that I want to mention.Um. So, as I was
poking around as you do, doingwhat i'll loosely called research, I found
this story. This is uncut forwith a clip of each Row. I

(01:21:04):
don't know if you've seen this clipor heard of it. So he's forty
five years old now, and basicallythe clip is just of him throwing a
laser beam from right field. Ithink it's, you know, into third
base. It looks like on arunner, this like trying to tag in

(01:21:24):
advance. And as like, asfar back as my baseball fandom goes,
I was like rooting for the Marinersfor a long time as a kid,
and Ichi was always really exciting andhe was the kind of player that was
super easy to root for. Soit's kind of sad that his like major
league career is over, but it'sreally amazing to see him still out there

(01:21:47):
like doing awesome stuff. And yeah, I will concur I've been watching the
Mariners a lot more than I expectedto this spring, just because like,
I don't want to let it go, you know, um, and you're
now I I am definitely gonna watchat least the second game in the series
just in case. Um, youknow, I think there have been better

(01:22:13):
players than Cho in our lifetimes,but I don't. I don't know that
there's been one more fun. Yeah, that's a good way to say.
Um, so I am, um, you know, sorry to see him
go. Uh we assume. Yeah. Part of it also thinks he'll just
play until sixty five somewhere. Butum, but you know, I'm excited

(01:22:36):
to see the next couple of games, and I hope it's a tribute to
one of the greatest and most extraordinaryplayers of our lifetime, the reason why
baseball is good. Yeah, it'slike, uh, I was gonna going
around about baseball being fun again,but I'll save it. You can imagine

(01:22:56):
what I was gonna yeah, umyeah, so anything else I can.
I can talk about the best thingthat I saw this week. Yeah,
it might be the same thing,like, yeah, yeah it was you
guys. Oh I was gonna sayin New York. Oh no, yeah,

(01:23:19):
I mean you guys were cool.Yeah. We record, we record
together, but we don't, youknow, see each other. That's why
we do a podcast, Um,scheduled time to talk, but um,
you know, it's occasionally good tosee each other. We do it around
a score sheet draft, of course, which is at once the best and

(01:23:40):
worst reason to be together because itis a It is a seven and a
half hour live draft that used tobe longer. Thank you to everyone for
shortening it. Um. It islike a sweet pain, and it is
something that I'm glad to be ableto do with friends. So it is

(01:24:03):
also a great reminder as to whywe don't draft scoresheet teams live. Usually
you all should be very happy forthe draft feature. There are just so
many players. There's so many players, and so many of them are bad.
And then you're in like the thirteenthround and you're like, oh my
god, there's twenty two rounds moreof this, and we just took like

(01:24:24):
orgieslair, like where you know itis. It gets dismal and you're like,
oh, we're just gonna be herefor six more hours looking through depth
charts of the Chicago White Sox middlerelief. It's not great. Yeah,
that was totally thing I did.I took a nap during this draft job
because it was so clear that Iwas going to be worthless, and like,

(01:24:47):
let's be honest, I was tired. I don't sleep enough. Yeah.
I set up like the spreadsheet thatallowed Ian to feel like he was
informed or informed enough, and thenpast out on the couch for a little
while. And I only missed twodraft picks. I only missed two draft
picks in like I don't know,yeah, yeah, something like that.

(01:25:11):
It's it's it can be rough sledding, but I was glad y'all were there,
So I don't know if that's thebest thing you Also this week,
I think it's worth shouting out likesome of the stuff we did in New
York because I had a specific thing. But what was your um? I
guess it was probably the video gameexhibit at the US moviming picture. I

(01:25:33):
mean, I figured that was,um gonna overlap with yours, so I
was hesitant to user. But um, you know, the one thing I
would say is like it was basicallyjust like a giant trip of nostalgia.
So it wasn't necessarily that I'm saying, like the exhibit itself was amazing.
I thought it was like solid,not amazing. UM, But you know,

(01:25:55):
it's basically just like they took abunch of video game systems that they
bought of eBay and like put themdown so everybody could play on them.
And that's that's fine. Every museumdo this exactly, It's like, and
there were so many more people interestedin that exhibit as a result. Right,
they could have very easily botched thatby making it I'd say, more

(01:26:19):
museum, but instead they didn't,and I think that was part of the
brilliance of it. Um. Themet has so many rooms and all of
them are filled with art. Fullof them, not even one of them
to save for sports games from thenineteen nineties and late eighties, Okay,

(01:26:39):
can we speaking of that? Thehuge like oversight was that there was no
RBI baseball at this ye and Ithink we should set up the exhibit for
a second, just so everybody,um it is they were doing it and
it was the last day was ofthe exhibit was the day we were there.

(01:26:59):
So check to see I don't knowwhere it's going next, but check
to see if it travels. It'ssomething like sports the history sports video games,
um and oh boy, there wereso many of them except oh,
there's also no Techmo right well,there was no playable Techno. I guess
there was like a shout out toTechmo on the wall, but I would

(01:27:23):
have played nothing else in Techmo superBowl. Some people like Techmobo Bowl and
Techmobo Tacks and that was like beforeby time. I think Techno super Bowl
was where it really shined. Youcould pick every team. They had eight
plays instead of four. I wishthey had ice hockey for a tari Ice
hockey was a great game, Likewhat do you have an ice hockey lineup?

(01:27:50):
So nothing nothing Nintendo's Nintendoom Sceny guysare the fat chevy guys are the
guys in between you were playing withyou as kids, Jared, Yeah,
no, I mean that's a fantasticgame that should have been there. Two
game me wrong. I suck youfor Atari was I think two v two
but it was Atari, so therewere there were no attributes to the players.
It was just TV two. Itwas amazing. Um yeah, so

(01:28:15):
you do you all have a gamethat you were most nostalgic for, perhaps
that you saw there I think outof ones that I saw so he didn't
actually get to play it, ButNBA Jam was there. I thought that
was a good a good catch,like it would have been a huge oversight
if that hadn't been there. Um. And I also really liked NFL Blitz.

(01:28:36):
NFL Blitz was always like like Ithink all my friends preferred Madden and
I was like, no, likeI don't need any of that. NFL
Blitz was exactly the football game thatI wanted, and it was just as
fun as I remember. That's great. It feels like sports games have gotten
away from that so severely, andlike just there is something to like tech

(01:28:59):
siber Ball or NFL, but justlike you know, and maybe there is
like some lesson for our for likea sim to just like pare it down
to the essentials and just like crushit make it fun. Yeah. Yeah,
I feel like Rocket League did that. Yeah, that's yeah, that's
a good point. Um, Jared, did you have a favorite or most

(01:29:20):
nostalgia game? Uh? Well,might have been a Gritski sixty four.
I put a lot like going.Uh there's also that handheld baseball game with
the buttons by your left and rightthumbs. What is it? I feel
that's called as my mantel? Right, Yeah, it was it the the
yeah electronic baseball let. Yeah,um, yes, it's I don't know,

(01:29:45):
like I can't say you were excited, but I can say you were
as excited as I see you tosee that it was really No, it
was like a special moment because Ididn't have that connection you just I just
I was like, oh wow,it was like something visceral yet that I
hadn't seen it. I mean itmust have been man, you know,

(01:30:08):
like twenty five years at least more. Yeah, exciting. Um for me,
definitely NHL ninety four the game thatcemented my bizarre and um inexplicable Vancouver
Canucks fandom. Babel Burret was sogood, Trevor Lindon, Courton Hall bro
it was. It was good.What a good team. Um. And

(01:30:31):
I will also give a shout outto base Wars certainly my favorite baseball game
of the Nintendo era. Um ohand sorry, yeah I was. I
was. It turns out I wasno longer good at the game, but
when I was six, I wasreally great at it because I didn't play
it as a baseball game. Iplayed it as essentially Mortal Kombat, where

(01:30:54):
I got a So the caceed ofbase Wars. If you haven't played it,
it is bonkers. I suggest youget an emulator just for it.
It is a game where robots playbaseball and if they ever end up,
tags have been outlawed. Instead oftags, the teams, the players just

(01:31:15):
I don't know, like shoot eachother, as though Rugnette Odor had taken
over the league and had decided,like, this is how we're doing it
from now on, We're just goingto yeah, no tags, just like
violence. So you have like differenttypes of players, and I forget what
it was. There was one likethere was one of the types of robots

(01:31:39):
where you could just I think itwas like a sword or you could just
like corner a player and just gethim into the corner and like just defeat
them. And so what I woulddo as a six year old is I
would get a team of that typeof player eventually and just like get into
rundowns until I defeated all of theother robots enough that the other team exploded,

(01:32:09):
which again like, maybe not greatfor pace of play, but I
do think rob Manfred should form andexplained that that. Sorry, there's one
other thing I remembered those goes myown in the middle of your thing.
Was no King Grify Junior pssess MajorLeague Baseball. I was disappointed about that

(01:32:31):
too. I felt like, maybeit's just me because I was like the
peak of my Mariners fandom. Um, but yeah, I was like,
no, not having that game wasvery very sad, very sad. So
yeah, so sadness your favorite sportsvideo game in memory. If this is
setting you down to stout delaying andyou made it this far, God bless

(01:32:54):
um squirrels, exhibit like you're saying, and check out the exhibit if you
can. It is the best thingyou can do other than see each other.
So we won't keep you any longer. We'll be back soon next week
with an American League preview where wecover fourteen teams in some detail and fifteen
teams and just a great amount ofthing. Until then, I'm Leftwood's on

(01:33:20):
behalf of Ben Murphy and Jared Wise. Thanks again for listening and have a
great day.