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The Dodgers vs Bluejays: World Series Preview with David Pivnick of McGuireWoods LLP 10-22-25
00:16:07
In this episode, Scott Becker talks with David Pivnick, Partner at McGuireWoods LLP, for a lively World Series preview.
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Transcript15 lines
- [00:00]
A
This is Scott Becker with the Becker Private Equity and the Becker Business Podcast. Today is is a special day for the the podcast. We're joined today by David Pivnick. David's brilliant was valedictorian of his law school class. He was also featured this month in October as Lawyer of the Month at the Becker Private Equity and Business podcast. We talked him often, sometimes about leadership and serious subjects, other times about sports. He's also on top of being brilliant. He is a resident expert on all things Canada as he grew up in Toronto, which is actually part of Canada. Not French Canada, but Canada. David, let me tee it up. Tell us what's going on. The Toronto Blue Jays and nobody cares, but you have made it to the World Series. Tell us what you're watching in baseball and do the Blue Jays, can they beat the Dodgers? And what do you expect here? What do you expect to see?
- [00:58]
B
I mean, first of all, it's great to be here. Thrilled to talk about the American League champion Toronto Blue Jays on their way to the World Series. Soon to be, I hope, the World Series champion Toronto Blue Jays. I find it offensive that you would suggest that nobody cares about the Blue Jays. That's just a ridiculous statement. It's something I would expect from you with your particular takes on sports. It's not surprising. It's just so far off the mark. The Blue Jays are beloved across the entire country, Canada, but also all right minded Americans are cheering against the Dodgers who are the new evil empire in the league. So I think there's a lot of people who've come together to support the Jays. And based on their crushing defeat of the Yankees and then literally ripping the hearts out of the Seattle Mariners and the folks who live in Seattle, I think there's a lot of people who really care about the Jays. It's a fun team, they got a lot of talent, they really seem to like each other. And I'm going up to Toronto this weekend to watch him play in the World Series, which is more than you could say about any of the teams you cheer for.
- [02:01]
A
So how cool is that that you're going to the game in Toronto. How nice is that? I know that the Pivnic family hails from Toronto. I hope you're letting your parents know that you're coming to see the game and that you're going to see them as well while you're there. Any thoughts on that?
- [02:18]
B
They're going to learn about my visit when they listen to this podcast. So I guess it really depends on how soon you get the Podcast. I know they're aware. They're aware that I'm coming up and bringing my sons and you know, we'll spend some time with my parents and spend more time at the Rogers center watching the Jays, but it'll be a nice little quick, quick visit.
- [02:41]
A
That's remarkable. And when you say that the Dodgers have become the evil empire, they spend money. Are they the highest paid team in baseball or they. Is that where they're at? Are they like the Yankees or they spend so much money and I know they got Shohei Otani who's just remarkable. But what is, what's your sense? Have they become sort of the evil empire or they're so favored that people just want to see them lose? Is that, is that right?
- [03:04]
B
I think that is absolutely where they're at. They spend it and to be clear, full credit to their ownership. They've got a great TV deal, they make a ton of revenue, more than most other teams, notwithstanding revenue sharing dynamics. And they spend the money. And I, I say it partly tongue in cheek what I criticize them for, but full credit to them and their ownership for investing heavily in the franchise. They've also convinced players like Shohei to take deals where they're getting paid a massive amount of money, but with significant amounts of deferred payments. I think Shohei's contract, I don't remember exactly, but I want to say it's like 80 or 90% his deferred payments. I think he'll be getting paid until his great grandchildren's great grandchildren are on this planet. I think they'll still be making payments to him, but they spend money. They, every year they go out and they get two or three of the top free agents on the market. They trade for guys like Mookie Betts and sign them to big deals. They sign Freddie Freeman to a huge contract. Shohei's got, I think the at the time was the biggest contract in baseball. I think it's now second. They signed Yamamoto for 300 million. Blake Snell's got a nine digit contract class now is well paid. So, you know, they've built an incredible roster. There's a reason why they're a prohibitive favorite in the World Series. But I think the Jays are a different team than the brewers who they just crushed in the nlcs. I think there's a massive talent level difference between the Jays and Milwaukee. And I think it'll be interesting if we can at least put up a better fight for it and make them work a little harder in the world. Series.
- [04:38]
A
And so the Dodgers won it last year too. They didn't win it the year before. I, they ended up this year. Where'd they end up? They ended up with 93 wins during the year. So they did, they, they, they got the 90 plus wins. They obviously got what they needed to get to get into the playoffs, but not to clinch home field advantage all the way through. But at the end of the day, regardless, your perspective is they're that good. I mean, the blue jays won 94 games this year. What, 96. I believe I got 94 during the regular season. I, I have 94 during the regular season. I, I, 94 and 68, unless I got this wrong. But I think that's right. But so I'll take your word. So, so at the end of the day, in the Dodgers, it's so they had at least really equivalent actual years. What about pitching? How do you break down the pitching? Dodgers versus the Blue Jays. And is that determinative of, is that, is that a big factor in who can, who can win?
- [05:38]
B
Yeah, clearly a factor. The edge clearly goes to the Dodgers. They're going to run out four outstanding starting pitchers. Sounds like they're going with Snell and then Yamamoto and 1 and 2 in Toronto and then they'll come back with Shohei Ohtani and Tyler Glass now in games three and four in some order. So they're going to throw out four excellent starters. They've got, all of them have elite arms. All of them strike out a lot of hitters and all of them pose problems. They obviously absolutely dominated the Milwaukee bats in the nlcs. The good news for the Jays is we have the number one offense in baseball. We don't, you know, none of the hitters in our lineup strike out a lot. We'll see how that goes. But you know, an interesting stat. The Mariners didn't go five games in a row all season without striking out at least eight hitters in one game. And then they went seven games against the Jays and didn't strike out eight hitters in any of those games. So I think the Jays are a different lineup. Maybe it's my optimism, but I think that that's going to give us some help here. But the Dodgers pitching is elite, period, 1 to 4. All the starters are great. Their bullpen is definitely weaker than their starters. I wouldn't say weak, but it's definitely a softer spot on the team. But the starters are all excellent and tend to go late in the game. So how much we actually get to see and hit against Their bullpen is a whole different dynamic, you know, as for the Jays starters, it's a little bit more of a mixed bag, but there's some reason for optimism as well, you know. Well, we haven't announced our rotation for the World Series, but I suspect pretty strongly Kevin Gossman will start Game one. You know, he's our most consistent and best pitcher. He's as good as it gets when he's on, and he is usually on, so I think that'll be a good pitching matchup. Game two will have, I think, Trey Yesovich. You likely haven't heard of Trey, but that's not your fault. He's been in the big leagues for a total of like, six starts, including the playoffs. So he's. He's real young, 22 years old. We drafted him in the first round last year. He's come up very quickly, started in a ball played in five levels this season, so he's really moved up slowly through the ranks. Great story. His parents will be in Toronto from Pennsylvania to watch the games, and he's. He's just filthy when he's on. He is utterly dominant. Strikes on a lot of batters. Crazy good movement on his pitches. If he's off, and if the Dodgers have been studying film, he's only got a little bit of out there. We'll see. But I think he's got a lot of potential. And then games three and four will likely go with Shane Bieber and Max Scherzer. So both guys have struggled a bit this year, and they're both not in their prime, per se, but they're both former Cy Young Award winners who, you know, have a lot of talent. And so I'm hoping we can harness it and put it together. I think the Dodgers have an edge, but I think the Jays have a lot of talent on that, on the pitching side of the ball as well. And our bullpen arms, you know, we have a lot of them. I'm not sure there's a lot more I would say about it that we have a lot of them. I like Jeff Hoffman as a closer more than most, and otherwise, you know, our manager is going to have to carefully navigate how to deploy the bullpen, which is not been his forte, but that's going to be something he has to really be careful with in this series, you know, to keep innings under control.
- [08:51]
A
No, absolutely fascinating, actually. And so I was looking at payroll, and I want to talk about Shohei Ohtani for a second, because that's really a magnificent story, too. The. The Payrolls the Dodgers spent 394 million this year on their payroll, which is numbers that were unheard of not that many years ago. Interesting enough, the Blue jays are number five in that, in that Major League Baseball spending about 240, 250 estimated, which is still a huge number. That's a big difference. And obviously if you're spending 400 million and you spend it well, you tend to do pretty well. That, that's an amazing number. I mean, and we could contrast it to nil deals in college where you could spend a lot of money and really strike out. Whereas in Major League Baseball, in the pro sports, there's more confidence that you know what you're getting when you spend that money.
- [09:38]
B
Yep, that's exactly right. I mean, this is ultimately both, both teams are spending gobs of money and investing in the teams. I think the Jays get criticized a fair amount for not spending sufficiently. I think there's a lot of fans who are disgruntled at the level of spending on in the Jays organization, but I think they do spend a fair amount. They invest in the teams they've given management authority to go out and make. You know, we were the runners up for Shohei and obviously this World Series may be happening either way if we got Shohei instead of the Dodgers. But clearly, you know, who's viewed as the favorite might look very different if Shohei was, was in Blue Jays Blue instead of Dodger Blue. But the management has certainly invested in the team. They're trying to put the best team forward. And I think they give, you know, the general manager and the president, Ross Atkins and Mark Shapiro, what they need to operate and build a good team. I don't agree with every decision that's been made, but I think the investment has generally been there. And the Dodgers spend more than anybody and will continue to spend more than anybody for the foreseeable future. Their ownership is all in and unless and until there's a salary cap, they're going to keep spending. And I think the more important move probably for baseball is to implement a salary floor because I think it's a shame when a team like the Milwaukee brewers, you know, they have one truly elite starting pitcher right now, Freddie Peralta. He's got an $8 million option next year and they're looking to trade him. So they've got a first place team and they're looking to trade their best pitcher who's on a steal of a contract next year because they know they can't afford or don't want to afford his next contract after that. And I think that's more of a problem, frankly, than the Dodgers. But the Dodgers spending, you know, five times as much as many other teams, you know, also makes it difficult for, for teams to believe they can truly compete.
- [11:27]
A
Yeah, but when you look at the brewers small market team, I take it they make a lot less money than some other teams that there's, I mean, I, I assume there, there's got to be some empathy for them having to play sort of small ball in the salary and play the old, the money ball game to try and keep those competitive, but it's very hard to win. And you've got a different problem too, in that the equity value of the Dodgers has got to be insane, and the equity value of the brewers has got to be a lot less insane. So it's very easy to spend into that, knowing that the Dodgers are so valuable that you're basically, as owners, you know, you've got so much equity there. I mean, it's, it's, it's a fascinating situation. Do we know what I can check with the Brewer spent, but that's a fascinating situation, I think. Right. The Ohtani payroll is almost bigger than the, the brewers payroll. I mean, it's really a fascinating thing. And talk about Shohei. Is this a once in a generation type of athlete? Three home runs and 10 strikeouts in one. Is it just that, you know, there's hard. There's hardly anybody left. I don't know who else pitches and plays the field today and how much they risk injury with that. How do you look at that to show a sort of how great he is? How do you, how do you look at that? And how do they keep him healthy?
- [12:43]
B
Yeah, I mean, keeping him healthy will be an interesting challenge. You know, it wasn't clear to me that they'd want him to pitch again after he had the UCL issue last year, but they brought him back, you know, to your broader question, I don't know how they keep them healthy other than trying to be careful and diligent in using every bit of modern technology and medicine they can. But on the historical context, I mean, look, the game last week was probably the best game ever that any, any baseball player has ever played. Certainly nothing I can think of comes even close to, you know, six shutter innings, ten strikeouts, and three home runs hitting. You know, one of the things that's interesting is people bring up Babe Ruth as a historical precedent because Babe Ruth was an elite pitcher before he focused on hitting. But it's noteworthy that Babe Ruth, when he was pitching, wasn't putting up elite hitting stats. There weren't games like that. Typically this, you know, putting aside that it was in the playoffs, in a clinching game in the International Championship Series, truly a historical game by Shohei. I think he will go down as one of, if not the best baseball players ever. And I don't think that's hyperbole. I mean, he does it at such an elite level on both sides where he is, you know, one of, you know, easily one of the top five hitters in baseball right now, if not the best. And pitching, he's an elite pitcher. I don't know that he's a top five pitcher, but he's in that stratosphere. He's an ace on basically every other team except maybe the Dodgers, because they have two other aces. So he. He is historically great. What he's doing is incredibly incredible to watch. And again, I mean, I genuinely thought he was coming to Toronto two years ago. So it disappoints me still that he didn't and knowing that the team made a good, real offer to get him. But it's still incredible to watch what he's doing and, you know, a fun athlete to watch, hopefully. Hopefully a fun athlete to watch as he doesn't win two World Series in a row right now. But hard not to cheer for the guy all the same.
- [14:39]
A
But I could see where you start to say, like, with the Dodgers having almost a $400 million a year payroll, I could see where you start to see people really chee them because nobody likes to have to compete against that. It's like gambling in a cool poker game with somebody that's got so much more money than you. It's no fun. It's just not a fair situation. So that is, I could see where they become. Where Toronto becomes sort of the. The fan favorite. It. It feels like even though they're spending 250 million a year, which is a lot compared to most franchises, they do become sort of a. A bit of an underdog. We know they had as many wins this year as the Dodgers. Like, I could see where you're coming from on that and understand it. No, I think that Shohei, Michael Jordan, David Bivnick all have a lot in common. Both tremendous at their craft, some of the greatest of all time. David, don't let that go to your head. That's more for anybody who's listening from Toronto than it is for you. But David Pivnick, certainly one of the best of all time and our lawyer of the month at the Becker Private Equity Becker Business Podcast. Shohei is our baseball player of the month. We've not have it on the podcast. Anyways, David, thank you for joining us today. Thank you to our wonderful producer Chanel Bunger as well. Thank you everyday for the work that you put in. And thank you folks for listening. I hope you enjoyed this. You know, this is really Blue Jays vs Dodgers preview. Thank you for listening.
- [16:03]
B
Thanks for having me.
- [16:04]
A
Scott.