The Roundtable | 2010's Baseball Nostalgia & Are the Mets Back?

Summary

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The Windup: The Roundtable | 2010's Baseball Nostalgia & Are the Mets Back?

Episode #172 — August 29, 2025
Hosts: Grant Brisbee, Sam Miller, Andy McCullough

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Overview

This episode dives deep into baseball’s era shifts, the elephantine grip of nostalgia, the evolving identity of fandom, and a lively check-in on the suddenly surging New York Mets — with special attention to rookie pitcher Nolan McLean. The hosts dissect their own baseball love through the lens of memory, process how technology and strategy have redefined the sport, and consider what makes a team or a moment truly compelling. Along the way, they celebrate the game’s surprises (and its mundane firsts), lament what’s lost in the modern media world, and share plenty of wry, self-aware asides about both baseball and themselves.

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Episode Breakdown

1. Baseball’s Eras, Nostalgia, & the Nature of Fandom

The Power (and Peril) of Nostalgia

• Andy McCullough kicks off with a reflection on unsettling AI-generated “the 80s miss you” videos, using them as a springboard to analyze how we attach meaning to the “eras” we invest in.
• He identifies clear breaks in baseball’s recent history:
  • 2010s: Tech and data revolution, culminating in the Astros scandal and COVID-shortened 2020.
  • Post-2020: New rules (pitch clock, DH, ghost runner), labor strife, looming changes like expansion/realignment.
• Key question:

  "Is evolution in baseball a feature or a bug?... Does its importance to you stem from foundational memories, the present enjoyment, or curiosity about the future?"
  — Andy McCullough, [07:31]

Responses & Reflections

• Sam Miller: Nostalgia is central, but it’s recent nostalgia — “I would rather look at a 2008 top 30 and see what went haywire than to look at a current top 30 and, like, forecast all the unpredictability inherent within it.” [11:26]
• Grant Brisbee: The best thing about baseball, across every era, “is its capacity to surprise. And that hasn't necessarily changed.” The present always offers something new, even if nostalgia is seductive. [09:48]
• Memorable exchange:

  “Our identities are just sunk costs and we're bound by pride to keep being more ourselves with each passing day. I think that's true with our interests too.”
  — Sam Miller quoting Patrick Dubuque [13:14]

Era Naming & Dividing History

• Sam floats the idea of official era naming — like in science fiction, to create boundaries (and new records) for each “age.”
• They recognize baseball already has de facto eras ("the 70s", "the 80s", the "Mitchell Report era"), but naming them explicitly might deepen fans’ emotional attachment.
• Andy: “We are deeply loyal to our eras for some reason...and I would like baseball to lean into that even a little bit more than they do.” [19:07]

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2. The Flaws and Highs of 2010s Baseball

Least Favorite Parts

• Tanking & Its Consequences:
  • Sam: The “inevitability” of tanking leading to World Series wins (Cubs, Astros) and his enjoyment when that model started failing. [22:09]
• Playoff Formats:
  • Grant: Loss of the “perfect playoff format” — the tension and drama of the one-game wild-card (“that was the pinnacle of 2010's baseball...it doesn't get better than that”). [23:01]
• Ball (Equipment) Drama:
  • Andy: Constant equipment complaints and needing to care about the baseball itself. [21:43]
• Front Office Obsession:
  • Andy: Previously, stories about front office processes were illuminating, but now provoke reader backlash ("That's McKinsey garbage" etc.), even when they’re descriptive, not valorizing. [24:19]
  • Sam: The initial “expansion” of the world after Moneyball eventually soured, as front office types became less compelling. [25:16]

Favorite Aspects

• They all circle back to the thrill of baseball’s unpredictability and the way a single game (2014 A’s–Royals Wild Card) can become instant legend.

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3. Are the Mets Actually Back?

State of the Race

• Sam Miller: After a sweep of the Phillies, the Mets look revitalized, but the playoff chase is underwhelming (“only a sliver of drama left”).
• Met’s postseason spot now looks secure; other races are tepid.

Nolan McLean’s Debut

• McLean, rookie pitcher, wins his first three MLB starts — the first MET ever to do so.

  “Mathematically, he should be their third or fourth pitcher who's done it, and he's the first.” — Sam Miller [29:57]

• McLean is “extremely pleasant to watch,” “making hitters look like they’d taken mushrooms.” [31:17]
• The hosts discuss how much fun baseball’s “never happened before” moments can be (see also: Padres’ long no cycle/no no-hitter drought). [31:41]

The Mets’ Rotation

• The emergence of McLean (and upcoming debut of Jonah Tong) means the once-unremarkable staff is “all of a sudden...very watchable.”
• Grant: For fans, the excitement of a hotshot rookie can flip quickly to fear ("what happens when he can’t find the strike zone?...As a general baseball fan it’s fun, as a Mets fan, I’m kind of scared"). [33:07]
• “Their non-youth infused rotation... quite simply walk too many fellows — and eventually death comes for that sort of staff.” — Andy McCullough [33:19]

Mets Culture & Vibes

• The team’s new meme: Alec Bohm’s microphone frustration, which delighted the fanbase and provided a rallying point.
• Sam and Andy: Having memes is almost essential for a postseason run.

Juan Soto’s Season

• Grant and Sam analyze why Soto remains great despite a misleading narrative — “It’s Juan Soto, like by the expected statistics, by exit velocity, all that stuff. He is having the most Juan Soto season ever.” — Grant [34:33]
• His value isn’t flashy in RBI or narrative terms because much production is coming with the bases empty.
• The park effects are discussed; Yankee Stadium’s reputation as a tough hitting environment is revisited.

Why Did We Ignore the Mets for So Long?

• The panel discusses both the slow-burning tension of the Mets season and the lack of pressure from other (especially NL) teams.
• Andy: “I've never felt that they were not a good baseball team. I never felt that they were like the best team in baseball...you just, like, don't really pay attention to it and just, you know, trust that it will meet sort of what the expectations are." [36:26]
• Sam notes the year lacks a lively set of chasing teams, so it’s hard to get worked up about the Mets’ midseason lulls.

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4. Playoff Format Frustrations & the Illusion of Fairness

• Sam and Andy recall the years when playoff formats produced both outcry and, at times, perfection.

• “If we add five playoff spots, this year would be pretty interesting. If we had four, this year would be pretty interesting. It just happens to be the wrong year for exactly six...” — Sam Miller [39:27]

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5. The Endgame: Facial Hair, Memory, and Identity

A Lighthearted Finale

• The trio digresses into the aesthetics and self-consciousness of facial hair: why 1990s baseball goatees are best left in the past, and their own failed/successful beard attempts.

  “I don't think there is anyone who looks good in the 90s goatee in a baseball context, like Ken Caminiti, maybe...” — Grant Brisbee [41:08]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Andy McCullough:

  "Is evolution in baseball a feature or a bug?... Does its importance to you stem from foundational memories, the present enjoyment, or curiosity about the future?" [07:31]

• Sam Miller:

  “Our identities are just sunk costs and we're bound by pride to keep being more ourselves with each passing day.” [13:14]
  “I would rather look at a 2008 top 30 and see what went haywire than to look at a current top 30 and, like, forecast all the unpredictability inherent within it.” [11:26]

• Grant Brisbee:

  “My favorite thing about baseball is its capacity to surprise. And that hasn't necessarily changed.” [09:48]
  “That 2014 A's Royals game, that is the pinnacle of baseball.” [24:12]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Era/nostalgia discussion begins: [02:35]
• Baseball’s evolution & nostalgia: [07:31]
• Prospect handbooks & investment in storylines: [11:26]
• Patrick Dubuque ‘sunk cost’ quote: [13:14]
• Era-naming discussion: [17:29]
• Least favorite things from 2010s baseball: [21:17]
• Wild card game “pinnacle” argument: [23:01]
• Front office/media discussion: [24:19]
• Mets’ resurgence & playoff picture: [26:10]
• Nolan McLean’s historic debut: [29:57]
• The beauty/absurdity of baseball’s "firsts": [31:41]
• Mets’ rotation/season vibes: [33:07]
• Juan Soto, stats, and narrative: [34:33]
• Why the Mets got overlooked: [36:06]
• Playoff format, fairness, and drama: [39:27]
• 1990s facial hair & personal anecdotes: [41:08]

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Summary

The episode is a thoughtful, entertaining meditation on why and how we love baseball: how our attachment to eras shapes perception; how the sport’s continual churn either excites, annoys, or reassures; and how, through all the nostalgia, anger, and change, there’s still always the promise of something new and weird to make us fall for the game again. The Mets — on a rare upward trajectory — serve as the week’s perfect symbol: sometimes, even the most familiar of teams can still surprise.

Transcript

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Throw out all your other clothes.

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[Grant Brisby]

This is the wind up. Welcome to episode number 172 of the Roundtable. Grant Brisby here, Sam Miller and Andy McCullough. Today we're going to be talking about mets phenom Nolan McLean. We're going to be talking about those. Those nostalgic. Nostalgic pinings for your. I'm not sure if I use that right. Sam, how you doing?

[Sam Miller]

I'm good, Andy.

[Grant Brisby]

How are you doing?

[Andy McCullough]

I'm. Wow. I'm kind of shocked to be in the.

[Grant Brisby]

Andy, the closer. What is your favorite color of skittles?

[Andy McCullough]

The sour green ones.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Grant Brisby]

That's pretty good. That's pretty good. All right, we're gonna. We're gonna talk about some. Some baseball here. We're gonna talk about Andy. I'm not going to read it verbatim, but what he put in the. Our little working. Working list of what we're going to cover. He put it in there and it was very, very. How would you describe it, Sam? It was like ominous, like the way he was describing these videos. Ominous is good.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah.

[Grant Brisby]

Mysterious. All right, Andy, momentous moment. Explain.

[Andy McCullough]

I've been working on a sort of long term Very, very in the future or very far in the future book projects that is forcing me to try and think a little bit deeper about some things. It's become clear that I am an idiot and should not think deeply about things. So maybe this segment won't work and maybe this will be a disaster and I apologize to the listeners and maybe I'll just quit the business and, you know, go work on Mark to share his congressional campaign or something. But you guys are. Yes, Sam, that's the thing that's happening. You guys are no longer on X, the Everything site.

[Grant Brisby]

I'm not.

[Andy McCullough]

I'm like a non existent poster, but I'm still fairly consistently like lurking just because I get a lot of news from there. But anyway, there's been these videos kind of floating around. I think they're just made by one guy, but they're like AI generated videos. And the one that's like one from the 80s and one from the 90s, and the theme is like the 80s miss you. And it's like kind of in a hazy, sepia toned footage of like AI generated people with feathered hair, very dystopic, very sort of unnerving and uncanny. And it's like there's a Tears for Fears song playing in the background, as people say, like in the 80s. No one's staring at their phone wondering what the point is. They've got, we've got mixtapes and we're cruising to the drive in and you know, and it's like, it's really sort of. It does not feel good to look at these things. Right. They did sort of like hit the wind chimes in my head with regard to the idea of sort of memory and nostalgia. And a couple episodes ago, Sam was talking about feeling like he was a 2010 baseball guy, you know, and that really resonated with me. Like, I think I myself as a person who identifies with the 2000 and tens of baseball because that was really the period of time in which I was like most invested in the sport. I didn't really watch it as a kid. You know, I wasn't like a big fan up until I got started covering it. But like, so I. But I feel like that period of baseball really resonates with me and I feel like I can tell a coherent story about that era of time. Right. And kind of the through line of that period of baseball was like the usage of technology and data to enhance performance, pushing to a point that created moral quandaries in a variety of ways for all the participants. Right. And that era very definitively ended with the COVID season in 2020. Now, it just so happens that the decade ended actually when the decade ended. It doesn't always work like that, but, like, very clearly, right? You have the Astro scandal, which is like the, you know, kind of the capstone of that period of time. And then the COVID season happens, and that really ushers in a new era in which the two dominant sort of themes are the new rules, right? Like the willingness to change the. The way the game is played in order to make up for what had happened in the previous era and the way the game had sort of, you know, been evolved and been distorted. So you think about the universal dh, Ghost runner, base running rules, the pitch clock, like, all of those really start in 2020. And then also the other dominant theme, starting with the COVID season, is like labor strife, right? Like that's now the drumbeat about everything in a way that it was not in 2015. Even though there was, you know, obviously, like, CBAs and things like that being negotiated, it was not the dominant theme anyway. Then the next era, which I don't know when exactly it will begin, very clearly will be based around expansion and realignment, right? Like, the sport will look very different than it did in 10 years. I think, you know, the sport will probably look very different in 10 years than it does now in terms of, like, how the schedule works and how media rights are done and how you can watch teams and, you know, what rivalries are and what the divisions are. Is there a National League and an American League? Like, all of those things are feel like they're on the table, right? I guess what I've been maybe struggling with a little bit and thinking about this is like, I find there's a lot of times where in my head there's a voice going, 2010's baseball misses you. Here we've got David Freese and pitchers still go on short rest and all those sort of things, right? And I guess what I've been wondering is, like, evolution in baseball is inevitable. Is it a feature or is it a bug? Right? And I guess maybe the question that I'm thinking as one, for you guys who have spent more time watching baseball, like, when you think about the sport, is its importance to you, does it stem from the memories that you have of it that are foundational for why you care about it, enjoying it in the present or wondering about what it will become? Does that make sense?

[Grant Brisby]

It does.

[Andy McCullough]

All right, so I'll be back next week on the. Sorry, I Don't know if that makes sense, but I've been thinking about that a lot.

[Grant Brisby]

Sam, I want you to go first because whatever I say is gonna sound stupid after you.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, it's an interesting question. I would say that wondering what it's going to become is never really on my mind. That that's not a priority for me, for my attention. Sometimes I. Sometimes I do wonder about it. After I wrote my book, I thought about whether I wanted to write another book. And one of the ideas that I had was like a futurist's guide to baseball and figuring out what, say, the next 80 years. I think I had pegged. 80 years is when I thought the sport would die and so what the next 80 years would be like. And it didn't appeal to me enough because I1 just couldn't really. I didn't have any grounded ideas at the time, but also, I wasn't that interested in it. 2080 baseball doesn't really appeal to me. What I find meaningful is the culmination of storylines. And so in that sense, it's. It's a little bit of the present, but it's bringing forward the meaning that I put on the past. I'm more of a nostalgic, I would say baseball fan, but the nostalgia can be like as recently as three years ago. And I just want to see when, you know, how the thing that I cared about three years ago or how the thing I cared about, you know, when so and so got drafted. Like, I probably more than the average person, I still care a great deal about how Bryce Harper pays off the Sports Illustrated article, you know, that was written about him when he was 14 or 15. When I think, what should we talk about this week? My brain, the first thing every time still is Mike Trout and like, his pursuit of. His pursuit of legacy. And that's kind of like a dead story to most people. But like, the grooves in my brain are like really strongly rutted to certain stories that are not quite resolved yet.

[Grant Brisby]

Okay, that's good. My baseball appreciation is fairly consistent across eras because my favorite thing about baseball is its capacity to surprise. And that hasn't necessarily changed. So, you know, in 2008 there the. Andy Baggarly wrote up the Giants top 30 prospects for baseball America. He listed 30 guys of whom, I don't know, eight made the major leagues, three had some sort of success, lingering success in the major leagues. Unranked was Pablo Sandoval. Later that summer, he comes all the way up from abol into the majors. Never leaves starts. He's one of the parts of that Giants era that is a capacity to surprise. That could still happen today. That is something very basebally that could have happened in 1962. It could happen in 2022. Hopefully it'll happen in 2082. Right? Just the idea that you're waiting for the baseball to come to, and it always delivers. Like, there's always just some baseball that you weren't expecting. And some of it can get dumb, some of it can get, oh, there's too many strikeouts or there's not enough balls in play. And I get that, and I empathize that. I'm not saying that baseball is always at an equilibrium or always perfect, but as long as it has the capacity to surprise, I'm not bogged down in nostalgia. Like, I think back to the 60s with the Giants, right? They have Mays, Marischal, Perry. They've got McCovey. They've got all the hall of Famers Never drew over 2 million once. They had three seasons in the 60s where they drew under a million, right? They're like 700 to watch Mays and McCovey. So people who are looking back at the good old days of baseball, they didn't think they were the good old days back then. They had other crap to deal with. So just keep it moving forward. Give me stuff to be surprised about, and I'll still love the sport.

[Sam Miller]

I appreciate the surprises that have already happened, though, more than the promise of a new Like, I would rather look at a 2008 top 30 and see what went haywire than to look at a current top 30 and, like, forecast all the unpredictability inherent within it. Like, I love looking at a 2003, you know, baseball America prospect handbook.

[Grant Brisby]

Those are the best.

[Sam Miller]

I never buy a 20. I don't buy the 20, 26 one. I'll buy a 2003 one.

[Grant Brisby]

I had stacks of them getting ready to go to the Goodwill. I just don't have enough space. And I started flipping through them, and then I based an article on them, and it's like, I can't. I can't get rid of these. When's the next time I'm going to think about Corey Patterson? Like, right now?

[Andy McCullough]

Sam, you should. You should buy the current handbook now and treat it like the Mitch Hedberg a joke about a baked potato. Because, like, you don't want to read that handbook now. But when it's ready, who knows? You might want that.

[Grant Brisby]

Frozen bananas and potatoes.

[Sam Miller]

Frozen bananas.

[Andy McCullough]

Is that what it was? It wasn't a baked Potato.

[Grant Brisby]

No, but there's also baked potatoes. Always got one in the oven.

[Andy McCullough]

But yeah, it's like it's, you have the book and it's like I, I, I'm, that's sitting here and I'm going to look at it in five years and I look forward to laughing.

[Sam Miller]

There are a thousand players in Major league baseball and expecting me to care about. If you went away for 15 years, if you just Rip Van wrinkled and you woke up. Yeah. And you woke up in 15 years and you didn't know any of the players at all. You had no emotional connection to any of the players. It would be overwhelming and not really that much fun. It to care about something. It usually requires that. I don't know how to put this exactly, but there's a continuity between the things that you used to care about and that you still care about. And you're really relying on like your past selves work, the work that your past self did to invest caring and things like nine year old, you invested in a bunch of stuff. You're paying that nine year old self off, paying them back by continuing to care about them. And that's just a continual process that's happened. That's. If I started now, would I be able to start now? I don't think so. I mean, I don't have new interests as a, you know, person in my, as a 45 year old person. I, I'm not picking up new interests. It's like just Patrick Dubuque had this great line in a baseball Prospectus article the other day about Blake Snell. It's about identity and continuity of self. And he writes, perhaps our identities are just sunk costs and we're bound by pride to keep being more ourselves with each passing day. I think that's true with our interests too. Our interests are sunk costs and we're bound by like kind of a sense of obligation to our past self to stay interested in them. It's very hard to like quit a TV show once you've started watching it, no matter how frustrated it makes you.

[Andy McCullough]

What a beautiful way to describe why this guy can't throw strikes.

[Sam Miller]

He can throw strikes. That's the, that's the, that's the inherent Snellness is that he absolutely can. He just chooses to.

[Andy McCullough]

I was in, I was at Cooperstown earlier this summer and at the hall of Fame and they have this video that they play as kind of like the intro to the museum. You know, it's like, watch this and then go look at the museum. And in it Bill James, they, they talk to a ton of people. But like Bill James says, something where it's like baseball is meant to be enjoyed. And it's the idea that whatever it is you're really interested in, you can find a way to use baseball as that canvas, you know, essentially is like, you know, if you like, you know, if you like numbers, buddy, we got numbers. You know, if you, if you want to be like a, you know, a movie director, buddy, the cinematography here and, you know, so it's like for writers a lot of time, it's like literary ambition. Baseball is a wonderful canvas to work from and I guess. But what I feel that in that vein, there's like a compression and sort of loss of interest from the public in the things that Sam was talking about, like, will Bryce Harper, you know, fill out like, you know, will he live out the, the promise that was, you know, written about him in 202009 or whenever. And I was, when Tom Berducci wrote that story, you know, and that's like a thing that like, used to matter and it mattered for a really, really long time. And it's kind of stopped mattering during our times within the sports media. And it's a, it can be a challenging thing to sort of grapple with is you're trying to figure out just like what to write about, what you know, to try and be interested in when the things that maybe drew you in are just like, less relevant to the public.

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[Sam Miller]

So we all know that baseball has these different eras. We can kind of identify them unofficially in our heads. Years where seem like everything changed years. We're looking back, we think, well, that's not that much like the year, you know, the years before. But we have only one continuous timeline, right? Like, we don't name these eras officially. Baseball doesn't name these eras officially. And lately I've started thinking that I wish they would. I actually wish that the eras were kept separate from each other in a way, like in the Three Body Problem. I don't know if you guys have read the Three Body Problem, but they have these different eras once they contact aliens and the clock actually like, they refer to the years differently is like what era you're in, the year within that era. And I feel like, I almost wish that baseball really leaned into the different eras more and had different records for each era so that you could be, you know, the record holder for home runs in your era or the winningest team in your era. I don't really know how to do that because a lot of times these eras don't become known until well after the fact that. And then a lot of times they're not that clear. And only, you know, only I can declare definitively when an era started. And everybody else is like, what are you talking about? But it does seem like, I don't know, splitting baseball up into its eras would actually make me happy and give me maybe a sense of ownership over the era that I grew up in. Like these creepy AI 80s 90s videos. I have to admit, the creepy AI 80s 90s videos, they actually sort of worked on me. And I.

[Grant Brisby]

That's.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, that's why they're creepy is they are effective.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, they are effective. We are deeply loyal to our eras for some reason as, as people, as, you know, as nostalgic creatures. And I would like baseball to lean into that even a little bit more than they do.

[Grant Brisby]

I think it is sort of by default set up into eras in the same way that the videos are. You've got the 70s, you got the 80s and you can start, you can go back to the 80s and you're already thinking different things, whether it's rabbit ball or whether it's stolen bases with Vince Coleman and Ricky Henderson, right? And you go back to the 70s and you're thinking, so I think that there is sort of like a De facto era. But I know what you, you're saying you want the Speed era, you want the, the power, the like the Mitchell Report era, for lack of a better term, which totally I, I get that what these videos are excellent at doing is just stripping away everything you didn't like. If it's an 80s video. Yeah, man, there was a lot of stuff in the 80s that if you were someone that isn't the target audience of that were not the best decade, they might have been the worst decade. I mean, it was just every decade has all its things and you strip them out and you've got pure nostalgia. That's, that's why it works. And you can do that with baseball too.

[Andy McCullough]

And that's sort of how, like I'm thinking about 2010's baseball. A period of time when my friends will tell me I was abjectly miserable covering it and like angry every day. But now it's just like, oh man, I miss getting yelled at by Gerard Dyson, you know, and there will come a time probably when people look back at like this era when they're like, oh man, I missed the first time I saw the Ghost Runner. Like, that was wild, you know, And I guess that's just like the nature of how time moves. Like, you know, like evolution in general is, is a good thing. It's just interesting for a sport that is. So part of its importance is the historical connection. You know, it's like the idea that there's some sort of continuity. I don't think anyone really cares about the continuity of like basketball or whatever. Right. Like, so again, this might have just been a dumb thought, but it's been banging around in my head as I've been just trying to get those really horrifying videos out of it.

[Sam Miller]

What was the worst part of the 2010s to you guys?

[Grant Brisby]

Melvin Moore. No, I don't know. Sorry, that's not true. I'm sorry. Melvin, if you're listening, nothing burst.

[Andy McCullough]

What did I dislike the most? About 20.

[Sam Miller]

Baseball wise?

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, baseball wise.

[Grant Brisby]

I didn't like how it would careen from like 1968 style pitchers dominating to whoopsie doodle. The ball is hopping now and so you didn't know what to expect.

[Andy McCullough]

Having to care about the equipment is probably the thing that annoyed me the most. You know, having to like every for. For. And it's still ongoing now, but like that period of time where a week would pass and like three guys would like kind of whine about the balls and it's like a national Story rather than just people going, shut up, loser. Like, throw strikes, you know. That was a frustrating period of time, I think, to write about baseball for me.

[Sam Miller]

I think in retrospect and a little bit at the time, but in retrospect too, it was just. It felt like it was too easy to tank and then win the World Series. The inevitability of the Astros really kind of got to me by the time they won the World Series. Tanking was it like really graded. It really curdled quickly when the Cubs and the Astros were like gleefully losing games and going, we're gonna win it all soon, dummies. And then to see them actually, like, get it to win the World Series was kind of grating. And I liked it when the tanking model started to. To collapse and like, teams would just tank and then, like, stay bad. I enjoyed that. Like, I started rooting against tanking teams mid decade, and it took a few years before reality caught up to the tankers. I had to watch them thrive. It annoyed me.

[Grant Brisby]

The thing that I liked the least about the 2010s is that we were given a vision of heaven. We were given the perfect playoff format. We were given. It was there. It was the one wild card. The you're in or you're out. And it gave us like the greatest, greatest baseball game of all time in 2014. The. The A's Royals wild card game. As good as baseball can get. What else do you want? You've got comebacks, you've got back and forth, you've got big time home runs, you've got strikeouts, you've got wacky plays. And to me, that was like the pinnacle of 2010's baseball. It doesn't get better than that ever since then. Now you got buys, you've got the best of fives and stuff like that. Okay, I get why, but that's what I look back and I feel like that was the opportunity that was passed over is having that one perfect game every year or two, I guess every. Every season.

[Sam Miller]

I loved that game too. And I loved what it did for the regular season. I agree. I thought it was great. And I know that it was the most frustrating thing in the world and everybody also hated it if they lost. But that's what made it good. But you're right, that. That 2014 A's Royals game, that is the pinnacle of baseball.

[Grant Brisby]

You can just make the whole AI video after that. Like just the whole thing is just plays from that.

[Sam Miller]

Everything about that game was amazing.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, that was a good baseball game. As I recall being in the building, this was maybe a byproduct of the 2010s, kind of with tanking the Astro scandal, all that sort of stuff. I liked being able to write about what front offices did without being called like a bootlicker, I guess. You know what I mean? Like, it's not even like valorizing it, but just like describing how teams think about the world in a, you know, as an. In an objective setting. You kind of used to be able to do that and now it's like if you try and write those process type stories, there's the sort. The readers who really appreciated those now I feel like instinctively push back and are like, that's gross. That's McKinsey garbage. I don't want to read that. It's like I'm not really putting a value judgment on it. I'm just trying to explain how these guys see the world and how they're making decisions, if that makes sense.

[Sam Miller]

When the fixation on front office processes began with Moneyball, it felt like an expansion of the world. Like we had this sport that was pretty narrow, narrow on the field. And all of a sudden like you're like Tony Gilroy coming in and writing andor and you're like, wow, like they've expanded the universe, the drama, etc. And then over the years those front office guys kind of just became. Well, I mean, I don't know why people hate them now. I think there's a lot of reasons hate those articles, but partly they. I don't know, they all sort of. Well, I don't want to get into why Andy's pieces aren't satisfying to people.

[Andy McCullough]

We'll talk about that off air.

[Grant Brisby]

I guess let's move on to. We're gonna, we're gonna talk about some good old fashioned phenoms. We're gonna. We're gonna talk some Mets. Sam has a few minutes that he would like to talk about the Mets and Nolan McLean. Sam, you're up.

[Sam Miller]

Two different topics happened yesterday. One is that the Mets swept the Phillies. Very enjoyable series, really. I had a great time with that series. The Mets looked like they were playing good ball. The problem with that series was that while they were doing that, they were pulling away from the Reds. And I don't know, like, I don't want to quite call it a wrap, but the tension between those two teams over the last playoff spot has gotten pretty slack. The Mets are like four and a half up and probably the better team. And if you just look at the standings now, all the teams that are not currently in a playoff spot combined, all of them combined throughout Major League baseball have a 16% postseason odds. So it's like six out of seven chances that the playoffs are set as they are. The Mets, Reds was really kind of the last close race. And, you know, like, again, it's not totally over. But I'm not eagerly tuning in today to see what the Reds do, really. The playoffs, the drama, if there's any heat at all, it's down to one buy spot. Will the Dodgers, Padres or Phillies get the last buy in the nl? Maybe Red Sox, Blue Jays, maybe, but that's not that close. Maybe Royals, Mariners for the last AL playoff spot, but that's not really close. And then you're talking about seedings between like, 3, 4, 5, and 6, which aren't really that important. So I kind of mourned a little bit. It was a fun series. And the Mets look like, oh, well, now they're getting back to being interesting. And we can talk about them as a World Series contender for reasons that we'll get into, but sort of prepared me for a pretty mild September. The other thing that happened is that Nolan McClain, the Mets young rookie pitcher, won his third start in a row to start his major league career. I don't know if you guys saw the fun fact that he is the first MET to ever win the first three starts of his career. That blew my mind. I couldn't believe it. And I. I mean, I don't know how many you would think would, but, I mean, the Mets have had 116 players make the first three starts of their career for them. And you would think winning three starts in a row doesn't seem that hard.

[Andy McCullough]

I would put it at more than zero.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, you would think.

[Andy McCullough]

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[Sam Miller]

Generation K. Grant talks about surprises and it's always fun when baseball surprises you with something like that you never thought could happen happens. But I also am a sucker for like totally mundane thing has never happened. And like how can it be? How can we have been playing baseball in New York for 63 years and no one's done this pretty simple task. It's harder than you'd think to win three games, your first three games. But mathematically, I did a lot of math this morning. Mathematically he should be their third or fourth pitcher who's done it and he's the first. And he's not only is he now historic, but he is extremely pleasant to watch. The movement on his ball is like nothing you've ever seen. He was making hitters look like they had taken mushrooms. Like it was like how could you swing at that? How could you take that back and forth doing that repeatedly the whole time? And the least interesting thing about the Mets was that their pitching staff was really under invested in. They had a a bunch of threes and fours. And now you have McLean, who's up, who knows? He's already an ace according to pitching ninja Bonafide. Ace Andy Bonafide.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, right.

[Sam Miller]

Also according to pitching ninja freaking ace. So that's the highest level there is. I don't know what he'll be in October, but he will be interesting. And then they've got Jonah Tong, their top pitching prospect coming up. He's starting on Friday and all of a sudden the Mets have got a very watchable team. So I appreciate that good series. As far as impressing me, I will.

[Grant Brisby]

Say just before I get into the Mets, Anne McClane, is that going back to your idea of the mundane? I loved loved that the Padres at one point didn't have a no hitter or a cycle. And it was not because I disliked the franchise.

[Sam Miller]

I just thought it was or a World Series title.

[Grant Brisby]

Well, okay, so that's a little meaner. But like these things, even when you can't a championship, like you get a no hitter thrown your way every, every couple decades, right? Like that's just something that have a cycle. They're not even that exciting. They're kind of stupid. But you Just want one. And so for years them not having one was secretly thrilling to me going back to, to McLean. So there's two different points that you're making is that they are now exceptionally interesting to watch on the pitching side, whereas before they weren't. And I agree with that. I think that works best if you're not a Mets fan because I think interesting can cut different ways.

[Andy McCullough]

Right.

[Grant Brisby]

As someone who is looking at a young hotshot, he's a sinker baller. He's got, he had some command funkiness in the minors, but overall just a dominant guy who can spin the ball, get ground balls. Like I'm watching this guy and going like, yeah, what happens when he can't find the strike zone? What happens when a few ground balls find those holes? How does it react? You know, I'm looking for his development as a pitcher. I'm not sure if that's going to be the best in the postseason or it could be. I mean that would be fun too. But if I'm watching this and being entertained, it's as a general baseball fan. If I'm a Mets fan, I'm kind of, I'm kind of scared.

[Sam Miller]

You'd rather, I mean you would rather the top prospects come up and shove then?

[Grant Brisby]

Sure.

[Sam Miller]

Then, then, then commit yourself to, you know, game two starter David Peterson.

[Andy McCullough]

Their non youth infused rotation and pitching staff in general has the same problem as last year's, which is that they quite simply walk too many fellows and that is eventually death comes for, for that sort of staff. I will say also with this, with this series with the Phillies, the Mets authored a sweep, got themselves back in the race, all that sort of stuff. They also picked up something they had been severely lacking in this year, which was a weird meme that all their fans can rally around. And of course I'm talking about the parabolic microphone that Alec Bohm seems so frustrated about that caused a lengthy delay in one of the early games. You know, the Mets, I mean, I guess basically all baseball teams that, that go on a kooky run are meme based. They had probably too many memes last year. They had too much stuff going on. The pumpkin was not necessary.

[Sam Miller]

The memes were the meme though. They became a meta meme.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, I just thought the pumpkin was unnecessary, but I understand. But now they've got the microphone, so that's good. You know, you can see a lot of things flowing from, from here. They still have Juan Soto. Still, still quite good.

[Sam Miller]

That Juan Soto MVP candidate in my opinion.

[Grant Brisby]

Have you guys Checked the expected batting statistics, the biggest gaps between like ex WOBA and WOBA and all that stuff. It's Juan Soto by a mile. It is Juan Soto, like by the expected statistics, by exit velocity, all that stuff. He is having the most Juan Soto season ever. It's just not translating into the majors.

[Sam Miller]

He has huge numbers now. Like, he's, if you look up his like WAR or his OPS plus, he's like a top five player. I'm joking. He's not an MVP candidate because it's a narrative award and also because it just so happens that all of his value, all of his production has come with nobody on base this year. And so he does have kind of a choke problem in his narrative. So that's there too. But he's been himself besides the expected. He's been himself. The expected just makes you think, oh, wow, like he could be even better. Like he should be even better than this. But I mean, he's having a huge.

[Grant Brisby]

Year compared to, you know, in the previous two years. His, his on base percentage starts with a 4. His slugging percentage starts with a 5. This year it starts with a 3, starts with a 4. And I think the difference is nothing. I think it's just sort of, you know, how, how the ball flies, so to speak.

[Sam Miller]

Sort of literally too. It's partly. It's the park, you know, he's, he's gone to a much more difficult park than he was in last year.

[Grant Brisby]

Still. 151 ops plus. That was the point I was making.

[Andy McCullough]

So Yankee Stadium's hard to hit in.

[Sam Miller]

So Yankee Stadium's hard to hit in. Well, what do you want to say about the Mets, Grant?

[Grant Brisby]

The Mets are fascinating to me because they have gone, undergone a lot of different storylines that we haven't necessarily talked about on the roundtable. And I wanted to ask you guys, did we ignore the Mets because there was just so much else going on or was there a sense unspoken among us? This will pass. They're not actually going to get caught by the Reds.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, I've never felt that they were not a good baseball team. I never felt that they were like the best team in baseball in the way that they played early in the season. But like, it's hard when you just. This has been an issue for a lot of good teams in recent years is the season is very long and so getting really too invested in any, you know, two week stretch, you can distort your perception of things. And so a lot of the way that I try and analyze teams that I think are pretty clearly good or is. You just, like, don't really pay attention to it and just, you know, trust that it will meet sort of what the expectations are now. Sometimes, like, I think we were probably less willing to, like, shovel dirt on the Braves this year.

[Sam Miller]

Right.

[Andy McCullough]

Because of that. Because it's like, well, they're the Braves. They're good. Like, they can't be this bad. And with Baltimore, I think we had a. We're probably a little bit. I don't know, it was a little bit different just because that division stuffer. But anyway, all this is to say that, like, yeah, when they've gone through bad stretches, it's like, okay, but they still have Francisco Lindor and Juan Soto and Pete Alon, like, they're. They're a good baseball club with really good players. And I just never really felt their blips were all that worrisome, if only because it's like, yeah, they're good. Players aren't playing great right now. I don't think that that's a flaw of design. I think that's just how the sport functions.

[Sam Miller]

There's not a vibrancy of teams right below them. There's no energy pushing upward. I think if, you know, if the Braves were close and we could say, oh, well, you know, they could really get hot and push the Mets, we probably would have paid more attention to the Mets sinking. I mean, if the Diamondbacks had stayed in it, we probably would have paid more attention to the Mets sinking. But instead, it just felt like they never really were getting to that hinge point where, like, today's game matters. That's a good way to put it. It got close. Like, I would say that a week ago. I mean, I started paying a lot more attention to the Reds and the Mets in the last, like, two, three weeks. We weren't there for most of the year, and even still, like, now they're better. But I don't feel like I want to talk about them any more than I want to talk about the other 11 playoff teams. It's. This feels like. I mean, this whole season just kind of feels like, all right, let's go. Let's get there. Let's get to the playoffs. Let's go. This is. This is taking long enough. Let's start the playoffs.

[Andy McCullough]

Now, when you're watching this season, do you. Do you ever hear, like, a voice whispering in your ear, 2010 baseball misses you here in the 2010s, we don't have an expanded postseason. We've got a wild card game. You can win.

[Grant Brisby]

That does appeal to me.

[Andy McCullough]

You can win 97 games and lose in one night and your season is considered a failure. All because you play in the same division as the Astros and you happen to be the Oakland Athletics. So good, everyone will say you squandered a great team, when really you were cursed by geography.

[Sam Miller]

Wasn't there a year. Wasn't there a year when the three best teams in the NL all played in the same division so the second and third best teams had to play the wild card game? We probably thought, this sport is irreparably broken. Why won't they do something about this? And then they do, and we're like, yeah, too many playoff teams. It's boring. I would not want to be the person who has to decide what the playoff field is, because just some years, every format looks perfect. In some years, every format is perfect. For some years distribution of wins and just horrible for another year's distribution of wins. If we add five playoff spots, this year would be pretty interesting. If we had four, this year would be pretty interesting. It just happens to be the wrong year for exactly six because there are exactly 12 decent teams. And I use the word decent. I underline the word decent.

[Grant Brisby]

One last thing on Nolan McLean before I go. I can picture not an AI video, but just a video, and it's Nolan McClain looking straight in the camera going, in the 90s, people had goatees like this. And I got to tell you, I watched the mustache craze go and kind of. I think it's at its peak right now, and I'm kind of into it. Like, you know, you can tell the difference between guys who should have a mustache and guys who shouldn't. I don't think there is anyone who looks good in the 90s goatee in a baseball context, like Ken Caminiti, maybe. But I think it's just. That is just one of those things that is not going to be in one of those nostalgia videos is the facial hair of the 90s. I'm against it. I'm sorry. I don't want to be rude.

[Sam Miller]

Do you ever have a goatee?

[Grant Brisby]

No. Never had a goatee. Never had a. I tried, you know, in college. I couldn't really grow a beard yet. And so I tried to grow, like, the Chia Pet thing on your chin. Boy, I was single.

[Sam Miller]

I never had a goatee. I did. I did the soul patch in college.

[Grant Brisby]

I went away on my honeymoon and I had a week's worth of stubble when I came back. And no job because I was starting. I was going back to college and I said, well, I got nothing going on. Let me. Let me see about this beard. And I could actually grow one. And look at me now. It's like 16 years later.

[Andy McCullough]

I have a lot of issues with how I. How I look. And the inability to grow a beard is pretty close to number one. I would really like to have a beard.

[Grant Brisby]

Just some glue and gosh, why can't I remember your cat's name? What's your cat's name?

[Andy McCullough]

Harry.

[Grant Brisby]

That's exactly what I'm going for, too. Why not just, like, put some glue and some hairy fur on you?

[Andy McCullough]

Just put the cat.

[Sam Miller]

What happens. What happens if you just stop shaving?

[Andy McCullough]

I tried during the pandemic. Well, okay. What currently happens when I stop shaving is my wife says, when are you shaving? So that, that is. That's the current thing that happens. But during the pandemic, when I was still living alone, I tried. And it just. It's like patchy. And it just kind of look patchy. It doesn't look like a beard. It just looks like kind of overgrown stubble. I don't know. It does not have a coherent. It does not have cohesion. It's like missing follicles.

[Sam Miller]

So the patches are within the main body.

[Andy McCullough]

It grows in all the places that a beard grows, but it does not become a beard. It just looks like sort of it stops.

[Sam Miller]

It stops.

[Andy McCullough]

It keeps growing. It's that there's spaces, there's patches. Like it is not. Is not. It's like I'm missing half the hair.

[Grant Brisby]

I feel like your boy Clayton Kershaw went through this early in his career, only to come out the other side with a pretty, pretty good looking beard. But I guess that's why he's the last of his kind.

[Andy McCullough]

I don't know. I would like to grow a beard at some point, but that might require divorce, and I'm really not interested in that. So.

[Grant Brisby]

All right. This has been episode 172 of the roundtable. We will be back. Hold. Hold on for this one. We'll be back next Friday. Because we are a pro union, pro labor podcast, we honor Labor Day. Friends, I encourage you to honor Labor Day. We'll be back in about a week. See you then. Thanks for listening.

[Andy McCullough]

I was very wrong.

[Grant Brisby]

Sweet Christmas.

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