Effectively Wild Episode 2482: The Trade Not Taken

Summary

Effectively Wild Episode 2482: "The Trade Not Taken" — Detailed Summary

Podcast: Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast
Hosts: Meg Rowley (Fangraphs), Ben Lindbergh (The Ringer)
Date: May 23, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode centers around the recent statistical regression of Padres reliever Mason Miller, the peculiarities of MLB and pop culture cross-promotion, and an in-depth exploration of the growing trade buzz around Tigers ace Tarik Skubal as the team falters. The hosts analyze statistical trends, poke fun at media narratives, and break down the trade landscape leading to the deadline, blending humor and technical insight throughout.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Mason Miller’s Regression: From Superhuman to Merely Elite

• Statistical Fall from Grace (00:37)
  • Mason Miller, who started the season with negative FIP and unprecedented dominance, now regresses to more recognizable excellence.
  • Recent outings move his FIP into positive territory (currently 0.32), a shift regarded as both inevitable and a return to mortal status.
• Small Sample Reality Check (02:00)
  • Ben walks through Miller's split stats (first 11 games: 0.00 ERA, -1.16 FIP; second 11 games: 1.59 ERA, 1.78 FIP), noting his elite groundball rate persists but strikeout rate dips, walks spike.
  • “He has still been excellent, obviously, but no longer the Mason Miller we were obsessing over at the start of the season.” (Meg, 02:55)
• Hitters’ Adjustment: A Podcast Conspiracy? (03:16–04:00)
  • Jokingly attribute improved patience against Miller to Effectively Wild’s suggestion: “This suggests to me that some appreciable percentage of the major league population listens to Effectively Wild and was like, you know those two, they got great advice.” (Ben, 03:28)
• Mechanics Behind the Regression (11:51, 13:55)
  • Meg looks at swing and chase rate data, noting a stark decline in the second half of Miller’s season, consistent with hitters laying off more pitches.

Notable Quote

“Regression comes for everyone.… Mason Miller, really, it's really relatable that he has sunk so far.”
— Meg Rowley (05:56)

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Pop Culture and Baseball: The Grogu/Mason Miller Promo

• Disney/MLB Ad Oddities (06:23–11:25)
  • Extended riff on an MLB promo featuring Mason Miller and Grogu (from Star Wars), speculating why Miller (not a huge star) was picked.
  • Points out odd set choices (UC San Diego’s Triton Ballpark) and inaccuracies, wonders if Disney’s proximity to LA should’ve led to an Ohtani/Angels ad.
• Meta-Commentary on Baseball’s Q-Rating (10:05)
  • Ben: “You could have a higher profile pitcher. … Did they try to get Ohtani first and then they couldn't?”
• Amusing Conclusion (11:37)
  • Ben finds the ad “pretty insulting”: “Mason Miller, you actually suck. It's Grogu. Tiny baby of a species we don't even know the name of.”

Notable Quote

“Grogu could do anything. … I don't know if there are bounds to Grogu's force powers.”
— Ben Lindbergh (10:05)

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Trade Season Heats Up: The Tarik Skubal Dilemma

• Tigers Slide and Skubal’s Return (16:06)
  • The Tigers, in freefall (losing 14 of 16), now face growing pressure to contemplate trading ace Tarik Skubal as playoff odds plummet.
  • Skubal is recovering rapidly from elbow surgery (the “nano needle” scope), raising his trade value.
• Industry Chatter (Insider Reports) (17:24)
  • Meg and Ben cite John Heyman and others, who report heavy interest and rising likelihood of a summer trade.
  • Debate the objectivity of Detroit’s FO and whether they’d flip Skubal for a return exceeding the qualifying offer draft pick value.
• Potential Trade Packages & Suitors (20:34–23:51)
  • The hosts dissect which teams have the prospect capital (Padres, Dodgers, Phillies, etc.) and joke about outlandish trade scenarios.
  • Meg: “If you’re a contending club… you try to do it early. … But for a guy like [Skubal], where there’s already been an issue, you want to ramp him back as fast as you can, but you also have to be mindful how you’re deploying him.”
• Rental Risk and Timing (25:05)
  • Ben: “It’s premature because there’s more than two months until the trade deadline.”
  • Both agree that while it makes sense to discuss, full-scale trade action should wait until Skubal demonstrates game readiness.
• The Dilemma for the Tigers (26:27–28:00)
  • Trade too soon and you risk backlash (the “white flag” trade); wait too long and risk diminished leverage or missing a rebuilding opportunity.
  • "You could get such a good haul for him that if you don’t think you have a shot, then it would probably be malpractice not to consider it.” (Ben, 27:46)
• AL Central Context (28:01)
  • Even with low playoff odds, a short hot streak could transform Detroit’s outlook, making the trade-or-hold decision delicate.

Notable Quote

“How many teams that are playoff contenders right now have a better number one starter than Skubal? It’s not many because there aren’t many guys who are better than him.”
— Meg Rowley (23:51)

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Deadline Musings and Lighter Moments

• Trade Deadline Date Weirdness (28:11–30:10)
  • Why is the 2026 trade deadline on Monday, August 3rd? MLB is avoiding trades during games, but it’s late and awkward timing.
  • Meg appreciates the editorial advantages; Ben and Meg commiserate about deadline exhaustion.
• Pants, Underpants, and Tony Clark (28:01–30:35)
  • A running gag about “underpants” leads into a riff on former MLBPA head Tony Clark’s legacy and best quotes: “The universal concern is the pant.”
• Rapid Fire: Craig Kimbrel & Miscellany (15:13)
  • Laughter at a headline suggesting Craig Kimbrel could immediately help four (good) bullpens: “It sounds like a threat right now. He’s lurking.” (Ben, 15:14–15:18)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:37–05:56 — Mason Miller’s Regression: breakdown, stats, and ruminations on dominance and mortality in relief pitching
• 06:23–13:55 — Star Wars/MLB Cross-Promo: Dissecting the oddities of the Miller-Grogu commercial and MLB’s marketing choices
• 16:06–28:00 — Tarik Skubal Trade Watch: Tigers’ woes, Skubal’s value, potential suitors, rental trade logic, and deadline philosophy
• 28:01–30:35 — Trade Deadline Musings, "Underpants" banter, and Tony Clark legacy discussion
• 15:13–16:06 — Craig Kimbrel’s “threatening” post-DFAd status and bullpen utility

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Memorable Quotes

• On Regression and Fame:
  • “Regression comes for everyone.… Mason Miller... It's really relatable that he has sunk so far.” (Meg, 05:56)
• On MLB Cross-Promotion:
  • “Grogu could do anything. … I don’t know if there are bounds to Grogu’s force powers.” (Ben, 10:05)
  • “It’s a weird promo to consent to participate in because it’s pretty insulting. It’s like, ‘Oh, Mason Miller, you actually suck. It’s Grogu. Tiny baby...’” (Ben, 11:37)
• On Skubal’s Trade Value:
  • “How many teams that are playoff contenders right now have a better number one starter than Skubal? It’s not many because there aren’t many guys who are better than him.” (Meg, 23:51)
  • “You could get such a good haul for him that if you don’t think you have a shot, then it would probably be malpractice not to consider it.” (Ben, 27:46)
• On Baseball and Comedy:
  • “Underpants is an underratedly funny word.” (Meg, 28:01)
  • “It is. Yeah. … The universal concern is the pant.” (Ben, 28:11)

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Tone and Style

• The episode mixes technical baseball analysis, statistical breakdowns, and offseason rumor-mongering with frequent tangents, dry humor, and pop culture references.
• The hosts maintain their signature blend of rigorous insight and playful banter, often highlighting the absurdities of both baseball and its wider cultural intersections.

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Summary Takeaway

Episode 2482 delivers both timely analysis and levity amid a pivotal stretch in the baseball season. The hosts dissect the fates and headlines of breakout players like Mason Miller and stars like Tarik Skubal, all while celebrating baseball’s statistical wonders and poking fun at MLB’s ever-awkward embrace of pop culture. Consider this episode essential listening for fans tracking the trade market, saber-savvy statlines, and the evolving narratives that make baseball so weird and wonderful.

Transcript

[A]

Vroom, vroom. Here's your primer on beef, boys. Baseball's end. Roger angel and Super Pretzels Williams, Astadillo and Mike Trout. Hypotheticals waiting for the perfect bat from a volcanic eruption. Ladies and gentlemen, the Effectively Wild introduction.

[B]

Hello, and welcome to episode 2482 of Effectively Wild, a Fan Graphs Baseball Podcast, brought to you by our Patreon supporters. I'm Meg Rowley of fangraphs, and I'm joined by Ben Lindbergh of the Ringer. Ben, how are you doing?

[A]

Well, congrats on the flawless intro.

[B]

First Tech Meg. Never, never doubt. Never doubt at all.

[A]

I have some bad news for you. I have some negative news. Although, actually, I suppose it's positive news from one perspective, and that is that Mason Miller no longer has a negative fip. He's in positive territory now just like everyone else. Just a pedestrian positive fip. Run of the mill. Run of the Miller. That's what they call him. Mason Run of the Miller. And he now has a. A01 FIP on the season.

[B]

Point one. That's almost. That's almost funny.

[A]

Sorry, I. Underrated or overrated? 0.32 FIP. Skyrocketing wash. Yeah. Unsightly. 0.32 FIP for Mason Miller. Yeah, he just went into positive territory this week because he had a couple, by Miller standards, rough out in a row, at least from a fit perspective. And so he was, when this week started, still in negative territory. And now 0.32. Ugh. Yeah, regression has hit him hard.

[B]

Look, he wasn't gonna have a negative hit the whole season.

[A]

No. And in fact, there are only three pitchers remaining with a negative fit on the season, and none of them has more than three innings pitched. So it's pretty impressive that he defied gravity for as long as he did. But ultimately, regression comes for everyone. And if you divide his season in two. So he has pitched 22 games. If we just take the first 11 games and the second 11 games. The first 11 games he had a zero ERA, of course, famously. And a negative 1.16 FIP. And even a negative X FIP. Negative 0.75. And he was striking out almost 22 batters per nine innings, and he was walking fewer than two. And now if we look at the second half of his season, the second 11 games, which is one more inning than he had pitched in the first 11 games. 1.59 ER. 1.78 FIP. 2.4 XFIP. A mere 14.3 strikeouts per nine. And he has walked 5.6 per nine over that spin. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, he's still Getting grounders on 62.5% of his batted balls, even more than he was in that first set. But yeah, he has. He has still been excellent, obviously, but no longer the Mason Miller we were obsessing over at the start of the season.

[B]

My main takeaway from what you just said is that people started listening to me and they were just like, I'm not going to swing, I'm just not going to offer at this point.

[A]

We did have that conversation. Should you just go up there not swinging against visibility?

[B]

This suggests to me that some appreciable percentage of the major league population listens to effectively Wild and was like, you know those two, they got great advice. They said, just see if he's throwing you strikes. And yeah, that's a, that's a notable uptick in the box.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

Do you have an explanation for that? Other than my own self aggrandizement?

[A]

I will look to see if the swing rate has meaningfully changed or his zone rate or anything else, but it's 11 innings or so. It probably doesn't mean that much. But. But that's the thing. We were all obsessing over the small sample and obviously he's been good before. He was great for the Padres last year. He's been good in full seasons before, but he did seem to have reached some superhuman level and wasn't allowing any runs and. And barely anyone could make contact. And we said, well, is this just the best any pitcher has ever been on a per inning basis? And quite possibly that was true, but he can't maintain that forever. We talked to Brad lynch about this. Just about sometimes you have that run where everything's clicking and it's not necessarily that you get hurt or anything, it's just things get a little out of whack or you have a little worse luck or whatever it is. Like no one's as good as Mason Miller is. He's not perfect, obviously. And so all it takes is a. A slight slippage and suddenly you go from being completely unhittable and untouchable to still elite, still excellent, but more in the realm of typical pitching performance, at least, where you're not going to be the subject of many articles and headlines and hypotheticals about can he be the mvp? Can he be the Cy Young Award winner? Could we still give those awards to relievers that was unlikely to sustain itself, that sort of performance?

[B]

Right. This is recognizable excellence. Right. This is something that we are familiar with and know how to categorize as opposed to what we were seeing previously where we were like, we need new FIP math. Maybe, like, this is a version of this profile that is so extreme as to be, again, like, kind of unrecognizable, which is generally a good sign that something is about to regress.

[A]

Yes, exactly. And. And probably he will now get the walks back under control and he'll look a little bit better. But yeah, the just pristine stats that he had going at the start of the season, just a little bit marred now by being immortal and a mere human like the rest of us, you know, just like us. Mason Miller, really, it's. It's really relatable that he has sunk so far.

[B]

Well, you also hang out with Grogu, so it's true.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Maybe that's what happened because you're alluding to a promo that was done to promote the Mandalorian and Grogu, and it implied that Grogu was hanging out in the stands and was using the Force to influence the trajectory of Mason Miller's pitches. And perhaps that reflected the influence of Grogu. And now, yeah, Grogu has forsaken him, and this is just Mason.

[B]

Again, sorry, allow me a quick pop culture digression. Have you. Have you seen this movie?

[A]

Oh, I have, yes, and I've reviewed it.

[B]

Oh, and I imagine you didn't care for it.

[A]

I didn't particularly care for it. It's okay. It's not aggressively bad. It's just pretty forgettable.

[B]

Wow, how the Star wars has fallen. So a question I have, though. I was fascinated by that promotion because. When did they shoot that promotion, Ben? Oh, yeah, because Mason Miller, to your point, good. In the past. Right. You know, there's a reason that the Padres traded for him, and boy, did they give up a lot to do it. But if you were designing, you're sort of sketching out a Star wars ad campaign where you wanted to have partnership with Major League Baseball. And Grou has force powers, I assume, because he's like, from the Y. Yoda's race of Yoda. He's a Yoda. He is Yoda. The Yoda's his name. Yoda is Yoda's name.

[A]

We don't know the name of the species. It's. It's a mystery.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

And yaddle. Don't forget yaddle.

[B]

What is that? You don't have to tell me. I didn't. I didn't watch. I didn't watch the Mandalorian. Okay?

[A]

I'm. I'm Sorry, Yaddle's from the prequels.

[B]

Oh, from the prequels.

[A]

Yes. A fellow member of the Jedi, but a female member of Yoda's species.

[B]

Yoda and Yaddle. Man, he's really phoning it in by the end of that, this wasn't he? Again, Mason Miller, very good reliever, excellent reliever, all star caliper reliever. I just. Why did they pick him? You know? And does it suggest that that promo was done kind of into the season where they were like, well, look at. He's got a negative fip. So clearly we have to use force powers to explain the kind of season that he's having. Because the. The. The funny thing about that promo, which is dumb, is at the beginning, they say, san Diego Padres practice fields. And I'm like, all right, so someone who, again, just. You can just call us, right? Like, it would be a modest fee. It wouldn't be a crazy practice field. Why wouldn't you just. Why wouldn't you. Because they couldn't shoot a Peoria, presumably. Why wouldn't you say, like, spring training facility or practice field? What?

[A]

Well, it does. It says May 4, which is Star wars day. So I don't know whether it actually was.

[B]

But why wouldn't they shoot it at Petco? That part's confusing. You know, they don't have to actually have shot it on May 4th. They can just pretend that it's May 4th, because they're also pretending that it's the San Diego Padres practice facility. And I was like, that doesn't look like Peoria. It's like, if you're gonna say practice facility, say backfield again. Just like, why don't they ever call us? But also, how did they arrive at Mesa Miller? Because Grogu could do anything. Grogu could. I mean, I don't know if there are bounds to Grogu's force powers. Like, is he not as powerful as Yoda or. What was her name? Yaddle? Yaddle. I don't know about that, George.

[A]

Depends on the midichlorian counts, but we don't know. But presumably any pitcher would be effective with. With force powers controlling their pitches, right?

[B]

You could have a higher profile pitcher. Because I think Mason Miller is known to baseball fans, certainly known to Padres fans. I don't know what his, like, Q rating is beyond. Q rating is beyond, like, beyond baseball, Right? Yeah. So my question is, did they try to get Ohtani first and then they couldn't? Because it's also weird for. For Star wars to pick a. A Padre? Like, why Why a Padre? You know, father's famously a fraught category in the canon, so that's weird. But also, why wouldn't you pick an LA team? Because you're like adjacent to that. I mean, they should have picked an angel. Really. Disney's right there. Okay, so that. Yeah, that's actually my question. Why is it?

[A]

Then you'd have to find a good Angels picture anyone had heard of. You could do. You could do much Trout.

[B]

And there's a convenient.

[A]

Or Jose Soriano also had a noteworthy start to the season. You could have done it with Jose Soriano have done Trout because no one

[B]

knows who Jose Soriano is. I mean, like we do, but like he's not known beyond baseball. So. And Trout's having this resurgent season and they could have, they could have had it be. You know, they could have had Mike Trout playing center field trying to rob a home run. But he's older now and Grogu helps him do it.

[A]

Yeah. Or he hits a ball and Grogu force pushes it over the wall. Knows. Maybe that's why the ball was flying so well several years ago. It wasn't lower seams, it was Force users station in the stands.

[B]

It's a weird promo to consent to participate in because it's pretty insulting. It's like, oh, Mason Miller, you actually suck. It's Grouch. Tiny baby of a species we don't even know the name of.

[A]

Yeah, it's a 30 second spot. So I assume that this was a. A quickie made to capitalize on Mason Miller's success to start the season, which was. Was a big story and probably they just had him go to some generic field and yeah, you know, Grogu could have been anywhere, so they probably just had to sync up. Actually, after further research, it appears that this was Triton Ballpark on the campus of University of California San Diego, where the UC San Diego Tritons play. In fact, at the end of the clip, when Miller and Grogu do a fist bump, you can see the Triton ballpark and the UC San Diego text and logo on the scoreboard, which perhaps should have been edited out, but they didn't film this thing on the volume. They really should have done this with my man Matt Waldron, because the Force influence could explain the knuckleball flutter. But then you'd have to explain who Matt Waldron was to everyone. I kind of, I enjoyed it. But now that Mason Miller is returning to being in the realm of regular pitcher performance, albeit still excellent, then yeah, maybe this is. This is a time capsule. We'll look back and we'll remember. This was the moment when they were promoting that movie and also when Mason Miller was absolutely untouchable. So I just looked up the two samples of his performance the first half and the second half. So in the first half, the swing rate against him was 49.7%. So almost half of pitches he threw were inducing a swing in the second half, 42.8%. So a significantly lower swing rate. So perhaps some hitters took our advice and said, you can't beat him. Just try to take. Maybe that's it. He also had a slightly lower zone rate, 44.5 down to 43.3, which makes sense with the walks. But maybe. Maybe it was that he was having such success getting guys to chase and a lot fewer chases. That's noteworthy, too. 46.50 swing rate. That's chase rate. That's the rate of swings on pitches outside the strike zone.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

46.5 in the first half, 34.4 in the second half. So it could be that his stuff just was not as enticing and he was not getting people to swing at it, or it could be that they went in there with a game plan and they said, well, look, we can't hit this lighter and maybe we can just try to take it and force him to throw a strike. And if so, that has helped. So maybe the code has been cracked. Kind of. He's still really good. To be clear.

[B]

I. I love the idea that you think that anyone will remember anything about Grogu at all.

[A]

Well, Grogu, no one will ever forget. But the Mandalorian and Grogu, maybe not so much. Anyway, I wrote several thousand words about the movie, if anyone.

[B]

We had to write several thousand words.

[A]

I didn't have to, but I.

[B]

Was it just that much of an abomination to you?

[A]

I just had that many thoughts. It could have been worse. It's just, you know, it's the first Star wars movie in almost seven years, and what a way to come back to the big screen. Anyway, I will link to that if anyone's interested in additional Star wars thoughts. For me, I just got jump scared by a headline at one of those Sports Illustrated blogs while we were talking about Mason Miller. Craig Kimbrell could help four bullpens right now after Mets dfa. Could he, though?

[B]

That's such a funny sentence.

[A]

It sounds like a threat right

[B]

now. He's lurking.

[A]

Yeah. Craig Kimbrough was contained to the Mets and now he has escaped containment and he could go anywhere. You never know where Craig Kimbrel could show up next. This blog alleges that Craig Kimbrough could help the Reds, the Dodgers, the Rays and the Phillies. I beg to differ. I, I don't know that. What evidence is there that Craig Kiprill could help any bullpen, especially the bullpens of good teams at this point? I don't know. The Mets decided that they would rather have Jonah Tong.

[B]

I mean, I'd rather have Jonah Tong too. Maybe that's the reason that one time that, that Tony didn't specify which handedness because he was like, I can't risk it. I, I need to know for sure he's not out there before I signal. You know, I gotta, I gotta be confident he's not out there.

[A]

Yeah, you could raise your, your hand to call it a reliever and next thing you know, Craig Kim is trotting in uninvited, unbidden or groku. All right, speaking of fit merchants, since we talked about Mason Miller, the drum beat is building for a TER school trade. Because the Tigers have lost six in a row and nine of 10. They just got swept in a four game series by the Guardians. Their playoff odds are way down. We, we talked about them earlier this week, but playoff odds are down to 23.6%. They're 2031 on the season. And yes, it's AL Central, but it's, it's kind of getting late early. Meanwhile, Tarpel is making Scott Boris look prescient in that he does seem to be ahead of the typical timeline for the loose body cleanup. He did a bullpen session, he threw 37 pitches and he got close to whatever his V target was. He didn't specify, but it was a little slower than he throws in a game. But he said it was high end velocity for pen session. So he's pretty close to being back to full strength and he's going to have to either have a rehab start or a sim game. Yeah, but he's, he's getting there. He's obviously just the fact that he's throwing at close to full strength just about two weeks after the procedure, that does seem to support the idea that the scubal scope, the nano needle scope will actually produce a material difference in how quickly he can come back. So Schuyl's on the comeback trail, the Tigers are flailing and thus the Schuble trade rumors have recurred and John Heyman, who as we know seems to be pretty plugged in with Derek Schooble's agent Scott Boris, and was the one to first mention that there was one single relatively small loose body in Squirrel's elbow. Heyman says Tarek Schubel trade chances are rising. Tigers have lost 14 of 16. I could have gone even further back. Yeah, five games out in the wild card race, Tigers have five starters on the IL and Schubal is progressing since the elbow scope. Tigers chances to extend him are nil. So does it make some sense? And this is not just Heyman, who may or may not be in conversation with the skoopal's agent about Schubal's situation, but Robert Murray at FanSided. He did a piece where he spoke to executives about what it would take to Landscoop and Buster only did something at espn so everyone seemingly got the memo. At the same time, it's Terry Skubal trade talk season and one evaluator said of Scott Harris, Detroit's head of baseball operations, he's fairly objective. He's never struck me as a window guy. In other words, the table read on Harris is that he's not going to go all in on a long shot effort to make the postseason if he thinks he doesn't have a good enough team. But Skubal could have enormous value at the deadline and if he can get more than the value of the qualifying offer, then there's going to be an opportunity there. One Ale evaluator set well, obviously he could get more than that I think, but skubal has about 11 million or so due to him over the last couple months of the season. So not every team probably would be willing to take that on mid season when you'd have to go to ownership and say hey, I know that this was our budget for this season, but can we go get Terrik Skubal? Unless the Tigers decide that they want to pay down that salary to get better prospects back. But the consensus seemed to be from Murray's piece that someone like Dave Dombrowski or AJ Preller they they'd be all for it. Someone also said he thinks Andrew Friedman would go get him, which oh my goodness, the Dodgers discourse that would result from the Dodgers acquiring Turks. Please. Anyone else? Anyone else? Literally anyone else. I opt out of that news cycle in advance, but people are talking about just what it would take to get him and maybe a couple top 100 guys and one high top 100 guy and maybe a throw in. Like it would take a significant package even if it is just a couple months and even if he does have a significant salary because he's Derek Skubel. And if he does come back and reestablish himself as the typical Schubel, well, that's obviously a difference maker down the stretch or in October.

[B]

One immediate thought I have is that I'm really just not convinced that the Padres have the prospects to make that trade.

[A]

And I know that we've been saying that for years.

[B]

I know, I know that we've underestimated AJ in the past at our peril. But like, and I guess it depends on how, who you want to talk to, but I think the consensus in, in the public space is that like they are lean at the top. I mean Ethan Salas is their only top 100 guy at least. Least for us. And I think that's true for most of the public sites. Unless I guess you're like really stoked on Cash Mayfield. So they have very limited sort of minor league options there. And you know, not that you can can't like further consolidate and find value there, but it's like is if you're the Tigers and you're sort of thinking about how you configure your roster on a going forward basis this like, I guess it depends how you feel about Lorenzo, but like is a catcher really what you think you need there? I don't know. So. But setting aside the specific fits, it is an interesting sort of value balancing act for, for Detroit to pull off because you know, the, the qualifying offer piece of it does matter here because they would certainly qo scubal if they held on to him. And then do you think that you are getting adequate return such that it exceeds and probably in a in an appreciable way the draft capital you would get from him signing elsewhere, which I think you could probably pull off without too much trouble given the quality of Skubal. The timing of it would be really interesting to me because I know that he's making this like miraculous recovery. But if I'm a GM and I'm about to show ship a couple of top 100 guys for a rental, I want to see what that looks like coming back. Right? Like he has to make God his first rehab start is going to the scout section back there is going to be bananas. I guess that if I'm Detroit one of your main projects and I don't think they'll struggle to do this because there are smart people in that front office. But like one of your main projects is to not be like swayed in either direction by the last two years of your team and like what has happened to you in the second half? You know, you'd be forgiven for being like, I don't know, maybe the rules don't apply to us. We seem to vacillate wildly, and it's one extreme or the other. But I don't know what the. The answer is there, because I think that if you're a club. If you're a contending club, and you're like, look, we're gonna just. We're gonna do this. I think you do it early. You try to do it early, and then it's like, is Detroit really willing to give up yet? But, you know, for a guy like him, where there's already been an issue, you want to ramp him back as fast as you can, but you also have to be mindful about how you're deploying him, because the whole point of acquiring school isn't even really what he does for you in the regular season. Although, boy, is that helpful. It's like, hey, you know, it's fun, Derek. School in postseason just, like, stick that guy. Like, how many. How many teams that are playoff contenders right now have a better number one starter than Skubal? It's not many because there aren't many guys who are better than him.

[A]

No, there's one at most, maybe. So, my God, what if the Pirates

[B]

traded for Derek Scooby? They won't be fun, but that would be so fun.

[A]

Scubal Skins.

[B]

School. Skins. Also, I feel like I need to acknowledge that when we were having our initial conversation about Skooble and the school scope, I was, I think, appropriately, a little bit mean to John Haymon, but was also a little bit mean to Scott Boris and expressed surprise that he would want to popularize a procedure like this by sort of tagging it to one of his clients. Because, you know, that's. That's a potentially fraught space. Like, you don't want to associate your dude with a procedure. You want to associate him with his pitching. But if this works the way that it seems to. I. I was wrong. Like, this is sort of miraculous. The fact that he's, like, back in pitching to the extent that he is so soon is bonkers. That's. Yeah, it's bonkers, Ben. You know, So I was. I was wrong, Scott. I was wrong.

[A]

It's premature because there's more than two months until the trade deadline.

[B]

Well. And he hasn't actually thrown a rehab assignment yet. So, like, I. As.

[A]

As.

[B]

You know, incredible as it is that he is this far along in his, you know, throwing program, having just so recently undergone surgery. Like, I do think that the responsible parties in the rooms should pump the brakes and say like we don't actually really know what it looks like yet and hopefully it looks great and this is very promising and exciting, but we should probably let it like play out to live batters before we go too nuts.

[A]

You know, it's not preposterous to have the conversation now given the Tigers recent performance. And obviously trade rumors were swirling around Spill even heading into the off season, which I didn't think he would be dealt and he wasn't. But we did talk about it on our Tiger season preview segment. Hey, if things go south, if the Tigers are out of it, would they consider dealing him? And I think the answer was yeah, you'd be silly not to consider it at least. So it would be tough if a team came calling as soon as Goble returns, say he's back in a couple weeks or whatever. It would be early enough and the Tigers probably wouldn't be far enough out of it that they would be willing to pull the plug on their season at that point. But you would have to think about it. So yeah, if they take it down to the wire, then it completely depends. Maybe the Tiger season will turn around by the end of July.

[B]

Right?

[A]

But if it doesn't, then yeah, they would certainly have to strongly consider it, I think. Of course it's just two years since the Tigers got a case study in how a team can improve after the trade deadline. Of course, that was after dealing guys, so maybe they think history will repeat itself. We'll trade Scubal and then somehow we'll profit. Underpants gnomes. I don't know. It will work out for us. But yeah, you could get such a good haul for him that if you don't think that you have a shot, then it would probably be malpractice not to consider it. But you kind of hope for the sake of their fans that they make it a clear cut call by then, one way or another. Because even if the playoff odds say they're unlikely to make the playoffs, it's just not that hard to make the playoffs these days, whether you're in the AL Central or otherwise. And so if they're just trailing Cleveland or Chicago or whoever at that point by a couple games or something, well then it's really tough. Then any move you make, it'll go down in history as the white flag trade, as another AL Central squad knows. So yeah, I it's always tough in those situations when we might look at the playoff odds and say, low chance that they'll make it. But you look at the standings and you're like a good series away from maybe being in playoff position. It's really, it's, it's tough to make that kind of call. So maybe the Tigers will make it easy for them one way or another, either by being so bad that they're out of it or being better and being so in the thick of contention that they wouldn't consider trading him.

[B]

Underpants is an underratedly funny word.

[A]

It is. Yeah.

[B]

Underpants.

[A]

It's just very descriptive. That is what they are. Pants that go under other pants.

[B]

Other pants.

[A]

The universal concern is the pant is the underpants.

[B]

On that note, they're still so sure. Also, can we briefly discuss Ben?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Why is the deadline on a Monday this year? Why is it. It's on Monday, August 3rd.

[A]

What? That's the late one.

[B]

Why? Why? Why?

[A]

Well, they like to do it so that games aren't going on during the deadline. Right.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I don't know if the deadline falls on a day game or something, Sunday or whatever. Sometimes it's been early August when they haven't wanted a lot of other action to be taking place, but it's very strange. Yeah, that is quite late and awkward timing.

[B]

So on the one hand, from an editorial perspective, there's some benefit to being on a Monday because then, you know, you have a whole week where you're already publishing and you can just keep reacting if you need to. Right. Like if it's a super busy deadline and we don't get to everything on the day and it bleeds into Tuesday or Wednesday, well, that's fine because that's, that's. Those are. Those are working days anyway. But also, the deadline is exhausting. It is. So it's such a big lift for everyone and then. And then you got to keep working.

[A]

Yeah. When it was announced, the MLB.com piece said by setting the trade deadline on Aug. 3, MLB will avoid the possibility of a player being traded during a game. There's at least one day game scheduled each day from July 29 to August 2, while all eight games on August 3 start at 6:40 Eastern or later. MLP also generally prefers a weekday deadline rather than a weekend, as you were just saying. So, yeah, I guess it's because of a quirk of the schedule and there being some day games. And I know the sickos at least like it when there's one day game at minimum, just so that they can watch or follow baseball during daylight hours. So yeah, it is kind of late though. That's unusual. But that gives the Tigers even more time to evaluate whether they're in this thing or not.

[B]

I guess that's true.

[A]

I wonder where that unforgettable quote the universal concern is the pants will rank in Tony Clark's legacy as the head of the mlppa. Universal concern is the pant. I will never forget that phrase.

[B]

I'll never forget. You know, it probably is. Well, depending on how various federal cases go, maybe even not even like the

[A]

top five, but for me, definitely top five. Yeah.

[B]

Well, and the funny thing is is you know who I hadn't thought about in a hot minute? Tony Clark.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah, he's. That's I guess why he resigned. It was maybe bad for people to be thinking of him. For the PA at least.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Well, I do have several stat blasts to share, but I also have one note about another player who could have been traded and would have been an impact acquisition at previous deadlines, but was not in fact fact dealt. And that is Shohei Otani. That'll do it for the free preview of today's Effectively Wild. Thank you for listening. If you'd like to listen on and hear whatever wisdom and wit await, we would love to have you. You can visit patreon.com effectivelywild to access the rest of this episode and plenty of other exclusive content. Weekly subscriber only episodes, Monthly bonus shows, our Discord group our live streams. Either way, we will be back with another episode soon which will appear in full on this feed. Until then, we wish you well and thank you for your support of Effectively Wild. Whatever form it takes.