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- [00:00]
Sam Miller
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Grant Brisby
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- [01:38]
Grant Brisby
This is the wind up. Welcome to episode number 175 of the Roundtable. I'm Grant Brisby. I'm here with Sam Miller and only Sam Miller. Sam, what's the meaning of life?
- [02:03]
Sam Miller
I think the meaning of life is that when you're 10 seconds away from your own death and you're facing that mortality that you feel at peace with it. I think that's the project of life is to be ready to go when it's time.
- [02:14]
Grant Brisby
Okay, see, now I gotta bring the questions back because now you drop some like actual quality on us and people are going to ask for it. So good job restoring the bit.
- [02:24]
Sam Miller
Like the key thing is that it takes a lifetime of work to get to that point, right? And so I think that's what the, that's what the struggle is.
- [02:30]
Grant Brisby
I'm with you. I'm 100% with you. Wow, that is a perfect segue into the Mets. Mets are in some tough times, right? They just got swept by the Phillies. It was not a hard fought swept. It was not a hard fought sweep. In a lot of cases it was punishing. Jesus Lozardo punished them. They did not feel good. After the series was over. Mets are in trouble. And this is the best part. Sam hasn't told me his thoughts on the Mets. He just says, bring up the Mets and I'll cook, baby.
- [03:02]
Sam Miller
I mean, I want to hear more of your thoughts about the Mets, but it is kind of wild that this team that over the last 81 games has played at a like a 68 win pace. I think the last half season is going to still probably make the playoffs. And to be honest, not a bad team. Right, right. Like the mystery is, is not how are they still going to make the playoffs. The mystery is just like, well, how do you explain a pretty good team that has pretty good players can play this bad for half a season straight? And what does it tell us about them? I mean, if you look at the Mets, they're above average at every position except one. They have one of the three best players in the National League this year in Juan Soto. Their pitching staff, their starting rotation, they're not guys that I trust tomorrow, but they've gutted through it, you know, just in terms of preventing runs. The pitching staff hasn't been a disaster this year at all. In fact, given how little they invested in that pitching staff, you'd have to consider it a success that, you know, Clay Holmes and David Peterson and Griffin. I know his first name. Griffin. No, that is his first name. Griffin Canning, who is. No, I don't think he's pitching anymore. But he, you know, he did his thing. Yeah, you would like. It's not easy to identify the huge, I mean the bullpen's been a little down, but a, it's like a league average bullpen. And they went out at the trade deadline and seemed to make it way better or they tried to make it way better. They invested in it. So you wouldn't even be like, oh well, lol. Metz, here we go again. Except that that's exactly what they're doing. They're just, it's a complete collapse. We've talked about how every team that we think is good goes through a long term period where we're convinced that they're cooked. And it's just timing with the Mets. Right. You just like the goal this Year seems to be to time your peaks and valleys so that they're not coming at the worst possible time. But I guess there's been a. It all, it all really does even out. And the Mets probably still will, probably still will make the playoffs, right?
- [05:14]
Grant Brisby
Probably. I mean, it's where I'm sitting. It's when I see, okay, the Mets are struggling and this is what it's like to do a 10,000 foot view is when you're a national baseball writer. I'm not in there and I'm not living and dying with like, oh, what's, you know, what's Mark Vientos OPS this month? You know, I'm not doing that, so I get to fly over every so often. And when I looked at the standings and I see, okay, the Mets, they still have a positive run differential, right? And they, they have a better run differential than the teams chasing them. I'm looking for all these little signs that I'm used to picking up, but one that I noticed is that they have allowed a lot more runs than most teams, that they have allowed more runs than the brewers, than the Phillies, than the Dodgers, than the Cubs, than the Padres, than the Reds, than the Giants. Right. And that took me back as I remember. Wow. There was a point where we were talking about the Mets like they had figured out the secret of free agency on a bargain, that they had gone out and done all this stuff. So something must have changed. And boy has it, because in June, July, August, their team ERA is much closer to 5 than it is to 4. And it just seems like everything has collapsed. And so while on the outside I was treating like, ah, you know What? The Nolan McLean is, is just like this great story. Wow. The Mets are, are going to go after it with some phenoms and it's, it's going to be great. And you've got, you've got Jonah Tong and he's great. And they, they're going after it with these rookies and this is a little pep of energy and I think it's more desperation at this point. Like, I think they're, they're trying to catch lightning in a bottle. And I mistook it for trying to be arrogant with all the pitching options they had.
- [06:50]
Sam Miller
That's a good segue. But before, real quick, before we do the Segway, Mark Viento's OPS in the last month is over a thousand. Mark Vientos has turned his season around.
- [06:58]
Grant Brisby
That's why I would check. I was like, I saw it. It's like he's got a 107 OPS plus and I was like, man, he must have been hot. And he is.
- [07:03]
Sam Miller
Yeah, it really is like a whole jumble where, like, you can find all sorts of reasons to feel good about this team while they're losing three out of four games. And yeah, Sean Mania, who's supposed to be a stabilizing force in the, in the rotation, everything he throws is finding the barrel right now. Kodai Senga, who was supposed to be the team ace, he's in Triple A, had to be optioned, he was pitching so poorly. And at the same time, they're in this transition phase where they've brought up three top pitching prospects. And those three top pitching prospects in the aggregate have so far pitched really well. Eight starts so far, 13 runs, no disasters. And McLean has been, you know, like, kind of like a, like a short term phenom thus far. And this is what I want to talk about. Obviously, I think the best thing that you can be as a playoff team is like better than the other team. Just all around, like win more games, have it be very clear that you're better than them. But we also have always long had this fascination with the idea that some teams are built for October or some attributes are better or worse in October. And there are a few of those that are out there in the majors right now that I think are worth talking about and that I want to get your thoughts about. But one of the most prominent ones is right here with the Mets, where they have three rookies who have been called up to stabilize the team, settle everything down. And I don't know how many of those rookies would be in the playoff rotation. I definitely think there's a case for all three of them that it would be, you know, unless Senga settles down. And I don't know how he's been doing it aaa, but unless he settles down quickly, you can make a case that it's Peterson and the three rookies that that's their best rotation. And I'm curious to know what your sort of like snap, visceral reaction is to that concept of having three rookies in your postseason rotation or even two, or even, you know, even depending on. Even depending on one to win a, you know, a win or go home game or a game one of a series. Is your sense that this is an attribute that is undesirable, all things considered Equal?
- [09:18]
Grant Brisby
Yes. And also. No. Just. Just first, in case you're wondering, Senga, double A1 starch, four runs and 3.2 innings, not ideal When I hear rookie pitcher in the postseason, I cringe. And that. I do believe that that is somewhat antiquated. Right. Because it is. What are you worried? What am I worried about as someone who's, you know, pushing 50 and has all these memories from the 90s, 80s and 90s. Right. Gosh, the pitcher's going to come out there and he's only going to give him, like, five innings, and he's going to be erratic and throw 100 pitches by the fifth, and they'll need to get him out of there. Well, yeah, that's the plan, man. That's the plan for everyone. Now, that's like, you know, if you're not Logan Webb or Tarek Skubal, you know, so it's almost like you just want the best possible stuff you can have. And if the pitching comes second, maybe that's better than just having someone like, the Mets have had quite a few veterans who are using daring do and chicanery and subterfuge to get their outs and maybe the postseason's war. You just want raw octane and let the chips fall where they may.
- [10:23]
Sam Miller
Yeah, that's a really good point. This stuff tends to skew to the young, and then daring do tends to skew to the old, and daring do it's not. I guess daring do can be a youthful attribute, too, but moxie. Moxie, yeah. You grow into your moxie. So, yeah, that actually makes sense. I mean, if you're. If you're. Basically, everyone goes into every postseason start, every postseason game, pretty much prepared to get six innings out of their bullpen. So if you're only really looking at, can we get through the lineup 1 1/2 times with our starter and he shuts them down, then that would be a success. Do you have a rosebud as far as, like, what you think of when you think of rookies pitching in the postseason?
- [11:05]
Grant Brisby
Oh, boy. I mean, baked into my brain as a Giants fan, this isn't even the postseason. It's the old myth of Solomon Torres. Right? You leaned on Solomon Torres in 1993, which is very, very unfair in, like, 20 different ways. But that's how I grew up. It's like, man, you counted on this rookie. He wasted it.
- [11:23]
Sam Miller
You know, I've been wondering all week. Actually, you mentioned something about rookies in the postseason a couple weeks ago, and I wondered whether it traces back to Solomon Torres, who pitched the last game of the season. In 1993, the Giants and the Braves were tied with 103 wins. They needed to win that game and Torres got blown up by the Dodgers. And not only did the Giants miss the playoffs entirely, but Solomon Torres was never the elite pitcher that the elite prospect was supposed to become. It's as close as you can get to a postseason game without it being a postseason game. And I wondered how much that stuck with you. I also though wondered whether you specifically would have had your rosebud could have very easily been John Lackey in 2002.
- [12:07]
Grant Brisby
See, but that did, that didn't. That doesn't register because it's just. He was just guy delivering the pain. He could have been 57 years old, you know, so he's just a figure, a shadowy figure. He's not a. He's not. He doesn't represent rookie in my mind.
- [12:20]
Sam Miller
Okay. Yeah. So John Lack. John Lackey. His rookie year he started Game 7 for the Angels in the World Series against the Giants and he pitched really well. He had a nice calm, solid five inning start and the Angels won a pretty comfortable game. I wondered about this rookies in the postseason, how whether there's anything striking about them as a cohort or not. I did put together a spreadsheet. Yes, since 2000 there have been 139 starts by rookies in the postseason. It's slightly more than that. I threw out anybody for complicated reasons. I threw out a few starters who mostly pitched in relief. You know like they'd have like nine relief appearances and one start. And I threw those out because they were messing up the data. But139 starts from primary rookie starters. Do you have a guess like good, bad or totally non memorable?
- [13:13]
Grant Brisby
There's going to be a selection bias because if this rookie is pitching in the postseason, they've probably proven something to their manager a little bit more.
- [13:22]
Sam Miller
Yeah, exactly. Not just proven something, but probably a higher bar. They've probably, you know like Nolan McClain has to prove a little bit more than than Sean Mania has to just by nature of the experience level and you know, probably an anti rookie bias. So we are probably talking about pitchers who have proven 10% more than they needed in order to get these starts.
- [13:47]
Grant Brisby
I will say that it comes out coin flip totally even.
- [13:51]
Sam Miller
You are awfully close. They are 40 and 41.
- [13:57]
Grant Brisby
Yeah.
- [13:58]
Sam Miller
So if not for. Let's see who is the last one if not for A.J. smith Shover.
- [14:04]
Grant Brisby
Oh yeah, you remember that one.
- [14:06]
Sam Miller
Obviously.
- [14:07]
Grant Brisby
Well, he was on my fantasy team which tells you how how good I.
- [14:10]
Sam Miller
Am at fit your postseason only fantasy team. So he got bombed last postseason and lost the game. If not for him, they were 40 and 40. Their ERA collectively is 4.05. All pitchers in the postseason since the year 2000 have a postseason ERA of, I think, 3.98. If you adjust a little for the fact that relievers have better eras, then that's just about average. They have just about an average era, just about an average winning percentage. They are just about average. So, again, this makes sense. You're going to choose your best option. And relievers aren't chosen at random. They're chosen because the manager deems them the best option. So something like average would be pretty expected. But they have not been a liability like a rookie is not an automatic liability. And, you know, anecdotally, I could refresh your memory on any number of great rookies who had great postseasons, and we thought, well, that sure worked out for them.
- [15:09]
Grant Brisby
You're just staring at a spreadsheet with all these names, and it's just like you've got the suitcase from Pulp Fiction. You've opened it up and the glow is on your face. And I'm just back here going, man, who are these rookies? Give me a couple of them.
- [15:22]
Sam Miller
Ian Anderson. I don't know if you remember Ian Anderson.
- [15:26]
Grant Brisby
Jethro Tool.
- [15:26]
Sam Miller
Yeah, was a great rookie, of course, Madison Bumgarner, in 2010. That was his rookie year. Oh, here's one. Here's. I don't know if you remember this guy. Twins pitcher, 2006. Boof bonser.
- [15:39]
Grant Brisby
Haven't you haven't heard the name. Still waiting. Still waiting. He could contribute to the Athletic. You know what I mean?
- [15:44]
Sam Miller
People probably all know that Grant Brisby started his career with a blog called Waiting for Boof. Grant, is there any chance that if Boof Bonser had gone by his given name, which I assume is like Jordan or something, is there any chance that you just never would have blogged that you wouldn't have been a blogger at all?
- [16:00]
Grant Brisby
Honestly, I mean, it's not unthinkable. I was so tenuous on getting motivation to write back then and just trying to figure out anything. My now wife was in college at the time and was reading Waiting for Godot in a class and that's where I got the name. And just boof is funny. I wanted to do something with Boof. That's a funny concept that you're waiting for. Minor leaguer who doesn't show up. So, yeah, I think, like, at first. First it's. I'm trying around, like, with names as creative as, like the blog about the Giants and Giants. Blah and baseball bloggy time in San Francisco or whatever. And none of it works. So if I didn't land on it very well could have just said screw it.
- [16:37]
Sam Miller
I forget who it was, but someone said that if you get the right title, the book writes itself. And the example they gave was Bleak House. If if Dickens had not come up with the name Bleak House, like who's gonna probably never comes comes through with that book.
- [16:49]
Grant Brisby
That's such a funny example. AI had the time of my life A I never felt this way before.
- [17:04]
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- [17:16]
Grant Brisby
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- [17:35]
Grant Brisby
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- [18:24]
Sam Miller
Here's a name on here, and this might be Honestly, people who are, like, skittish about rookies in the postseason, who are scared of the idea of throwing three rookies out there. The first name they might think of is Rick Ankiel, who was a rookie in the postseason and, you know, got the yips mid postseason and had just.
- [18:44]
Grant Brisby
Never came back as a. As a pitcher.
- [18:46]
Sam Miller
Never. Never. Right? Exactly. Complete collapse. And was pitching in low A not long after because it got so bad and everybody watched it. Of course, there's also the the fatigue factor. Almost every rookie is probably pushing their career innings max or well past it by the time October comes. Fatigue is an issue for anybody so you could imagine that it was, it would be even more of a fatigue, fatigue factor for rookies. So I'm not saying that the Mets need to feel like totally confident, but no huge red flags here. I would say, and I think those are arguably their three best pitchers right.
- [19:20]
Grant Brisby
Now and what are we doing here? But we're using rookies as just a shortcut. And the shortcuts for us, right, you're using them as we're classifying so that we can have an easier time explaining, predicting, doing all that stuff. But it's really, how is this guy feeling right now? How is this guy pitching right now? And when you brought up Madison Baumgartner instantly brought me back to 2012, right? So you have the 2014 postseason where bum Garner is just the guy. He's the sportsman of the year in Sports Illustrated, right? That's his big breakout year, 2012. The Giants had a problem. They had the Cardinals that they were facing and they had just a ton of right handed bats that punished left handed pitching. And so they, they needed a start. The only two guys who were close to rested or were rested were Barry Zito and Madison Bumgarner. The Giants chose Zito because Baumgartner was so bad, so tired, so gassed, and nobody complained. Giants fans were not like, how could you do this? What's going on? Since August, it was clear he was not the same pitcher. And Giants fans are like, yeah, it's got to be Zito. It's tough that it's come to this, but here's. And then two years later, that pitcher is now the pitcher that was passed over rightfully so he came back and had a good World Series start, but still rightfully so. Passed over. He comes back and now he's the postseason God. How he's remembered to this day is as the postseason God. It makes me realize that it's really just about the moment. And not the overarching category, the halo over a certain guy. It's how is this guy feeling in October 2012. Right. More so than the mythos of Bumgarner. And that's how it's going to be for the Mets. You go up and you get to the postseason, you're looking for guys who have, yeah, I feel great. You know, I'm only throwing 100 innings in the minors. Like this guy's throwing 180 in the majors. I'm rolling. Go with me, Skip. And I mean, this is all implied. He's not actually saying this in the dugout, but it's more about just who's in the moment rather than this broad categorization of rookies and all that.
- [21:15]
Sam Miller
Okay. All right, so I want to talk about another team with a notable attribute, the Yankees. There was a little bit of, a little bit of a thing this week where the Blue Jays color commentator Buck Martinez was just like ripping them on the broadcast, said, oh, I'll give you the full quote here. You know, the Yankees, they're not a good team. I don't care what their, I don't care what their record is. They make a lot of mistakes in the field. They don't run the bases very well. If they don't hit home runs, they don't have a chance to win. And that last part, if they don't hit home runs, they don't have a chance to win is a key thing. Because the Yankees hit so many home runs, they really are like an elite home run hitting team. And this is a criticism that comes up about postseason teams, I think every couple years that people really hate home run hitting teams going into the postseason. Not every, not all people, but a lot of people hate it. They think that, well, home runs are harder to come by in the postseason. You're going to be scrapping out. They envision a lot of three, two games and if you can't scrap out that run in the eighth, like what hope do you have? You can't. You're just going to swing for the fences in this high variance event and then like hope that it, hope that it lands at the right time. Like there's a real anti home run bias. And it's, I think, particularly a factor with the Yankees because this narrative has come up with them years past and also because this year, like one of the big storylines has been that they are really super sloppy as a team. They do make a lot of mistakes. They have made a lot of very visible mistakes in the fundamentals. And you wouldn't really identify a strength of their team other than the fact that they have like eight guys who are going to have 20 home runs and two of the greatest power hitters of the last 25 years in the middle of their lineup. So what's your emotional sense about too many home runs?
- [23:06]
Grant Brisby
Ah, see, this is one that's good because I am a con. I've been converted. Right. I used to have a feeling that, okay, once you get in the postseason, all these power hitters that feast off mistakes, they're going to see fewer mistakes. Again, selection bias, because you have more quality pitching staffs by definition, in the Postseason, and you have more attention paid to their weaknesses. You are able to do a Manhattan Project on Aaron Judge and say, here, no, really pay attention to this in this sequence, in this. Right. And so you have all of these reasons why you should shut down power. My conversion moment came when I just looked at Giancarlo Stanton's baseball reference page. You think the Guardians don't have good pitching or preparation? He crushed them. You know, he went out there, he hit four home runs and 21 at bats. Every time Stanton's up, you're thinking he's going to hit home run. And you know, almost a fifth of the time, it's like, yep, that's what I do. I'm Giancarlo Stanton, baby. What are you going to do about it? And I mean, so to me, that just says, okay, great theory, guy. But sometimes, you know, now you're talking about tired pitchers. Well, tired pitchers, maybe that's the equalizing factor. They're going to tire to fastball right in the middle of the zone, or tired a hanging slider to where even Giancarlo Stanton's just going to whomp it over the fence. So I think even is where I'm.
- [24:21]
Sam Miller
Going for Dan Simborski of fangraphs, who does the zips projections, has done some work. He's always trying to project things, and so he's done some work into whether there are attributes that project better in the postseason and for the most part has come down with, you know, best team. Generally, regardless of character traits, best team is the best bet. And I think what I've read, he's probably written more than this on the topic. So I. I'm not conclusive here, but from what I've read, he has identified a couple of factors that do seem to play well in the postseason. One is, I guess I would describe it as being like a little top heavy with your roster. Just because you're not using the whole 40, man, you're not even really using the whole 25, man. Guys aren't taking, you know, days off for breaks to keep their legs fresh. You're really leaning into your, like, core 16 players or whatever. So if your core 16 are better than the other team's core 16, you might have struggled with depth throughout the season, but in the postseason, that's not going to be as much of a factor. The second thing is that he did find that home runs correlate to success better than other offensive events like 294 win teams, but one of them hits a lot more Home runs is a little bit better bet in the postseason, and I think there's a real logical reason for that. Well, I guess it's a. It's kind of two sides of the same thing, but one is that it's better pitching, which means it's going to be a lot harder to. I mean, it's harder to hit home runs against a great pitcher, but it's also harder to get three hits in a row, to string three hits in a row together. And it's arguably more harder to do the three hits in a row than it is to get the home run. And I think if you look at great pitchers versus less great pitchers, the great pitchers usually will strike out way more batters than mediocre pitchers, and they'll walk way fewer batters than mediocre pitchers. The difference in home run rates isn't quite as. As vast. So you do have a lot of great pitchers who are not particularly skilled at suppressing the home run. You know, that maybe is where great pitchers are a little more vulnerable. Now I totally understand why people think that a home run hitting team that is not hitting home runs at the moment is like, fatally flawed and has a bad plan. Like, there probably is some fallacy for this that needs to be named, but I think that there's a real. Like, the human brain prioritizes frequent success over high reward success, if that makes sense. Yeah, like if you have a strategy that's not very useful but that you can do it almost every time. Like the sacrifice bunt, for instance. The sacrifice bunt doesn't do that much to drive your offense, but like, you can sacrifice with a pretty high. Like, pitchers used to do it pretty well. And so it always looks like, oh, well, the manager called a play and it worked. And you don't really interrogate, well, how much did it work? How much value does it actually have? So I think when you're observing a team, you kind of want to see, like, lots of success, like, steady. Like, most of the time they go out there and they do what they want to do. And a home run hitting team, most of the time they go out there and they don't hit a home run. Like, it's just failure after failure after failure after failure after failure. And then Nestor Cortez starts a game and they score 26 against them. And then like, you know, a whole bunch of, like, Kyle Schwaber is one of the great home run hitters in the game right now, and he just went like a month without a home run or a Long time, half a month. I don't know. It happens. It's a high variance event. High variance events are going to go through stretches that they don't happen. And it looks like something's failing. Like, it's hard to tell your brain like, well, this is just the math. This is just like I see this with three point shooting too. Like, people hate three point shooting teams because they shoot under 50% on threes. And it's like it looks like they're choosing a failing strategy. But of course we know the math works out. So anyway, that is all to say that, like, I understand why a home run hitting team makes you feel like they're just perpetually wandering in the desert looking for the one home run that's out there. But you know, home runs, man, they're worth so much more.
- [28:49]
Grant Brisby
It's almost like things automatic run or more.
- [28:53]
Sam Miller
Yeah, up to four, sometimes four. Yeah, four runs in one swing.
- [28:57]
Grant Brisby
I love it because you're making a. You're making the baseball fan sound like a rat in a cage pushing a lever for a tell it. And in some respects that's what sports fans are. And so it's easy to wax rhapsodic about like the 2015 royals because when they would go, when they would get a runner on first, it was like something good was going to happen, man, they're going to go first to third, they're going to steal a base. They were going to put pressure on the defense by laying a bunt down and making you get that throw off perfectly. And that is something that's going to happen more regularly. Especially in the postseason when you're paying more attention to every game and you're, you know, it's life or death every, every time you, you're going to be like, okay, if they can just get a runner on, man, and they do it and you get that pellet, you've pushed that pellet and you're like, this is the best postseason team I've ever seen. Whereas like you said, guy wandered in the desert and then woo, he found a home run. Okay, I'm impressed. But can you do it more regularly? But I get your point. That's not the point of home runs.
- [29:51]
Sam Miller
Right. I think it almost looks fluky.
- [29:54]
Grant Brisby
Yeah, people, perfect description.
- [29:55]
Sam Miller
Yeah, he just closed his eyes and swung hard.
- [29:58]
Grant Brisby
Oh man.
- [29:59]
Sam Miller
He just reliably homers once every 23 at bats. Big deal. What about the other 22? The other thing too is I think that there's a sense that people have, observers have, and I definitely Think I fall into this trap too, where you, you want to put a lot of pressure on the, on the other team's pitcher, on the other team's defense. And there's the sense that you put the pressure on by having runners on base, by grinding out at bats, by fighting off, you know, to strike pitches and making them work hard, and by, you know, making the defense make plays. Like, those are all ways that you put pressure on the other team. But there's another way you put pressure on the other team, which is like, sort of silent. It's like a silent pressure is just having the threat of a dinger at all times. If the pitcher has to treat every pitch like he's walking on a ledge, and if he stumbles a little, it's three runs or it's even just one run. If the number eight hitter is going to hit your mistake 430ft, that's a lot of pressure that, like, you can't coast. You can't, you know, like, well, I'm going to save my best bullets for the number three, four hitters because every single guy in the lineup has the potential to take me crazy deep. That is also an amount of pressure on the pitcher. And I think that, my guess is that somebody could prove mathematically that it puts more strain on the pitcher, that pitchers fatigue more for, like, deeper lineups, lineups that are, like, strong up and down and that have a lot of power, where every pitch is, again, potentially a disaster for you, rather than like, oh, well, you know, there's two outs, there's nobody on. What are the chances they're going to. If I just pump strikes in here, what are the chances this, like, slap hitting team is going to get three hits in a row before the inning ends? You know, that's a little bit of a breather for the pitcher.
- [31:50]
Grant Brisby
Yeah, I want more proof for that. At the same time, it sounds completely intuitive to me, and especially when you're talking about a best of seven series. My stars, because you're. You're not just using your bullpen, you're using, most likely your bullpen in that permutation where you have it set up through the whole season. You've got your seventh inning guy in the seventh inning, your eighth inning guy. You're not resting, you're not mixing and matching. And if you're telling these guys to get that sort of lineup out, where you've got an 8 hitter who can put the ball over, seems like that would accumulate. I mean, that, that just makes intuitive sense that over a best of seven series that you've got guys who are not just physically, but mentally straining a little bit more to make the perfect pitch. You know, maybe they do, but I It just feels like it would be a little bit more of a strain.
- [32:40]
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- [33:34]
Sam Miller
The opposite the opposite. What is the opposite of team that hits a lot of home runs?
- [33:38]
Grant Brisby
Grant the team that doesn't?
- [33:41]
Sam Miller
It's the ground attack, right?
- [33:43]
Grant Brisby
The ground attack, please. Yes.
- [33:45]
Sam Miller
The brewers, of course, are famously this year's ground attack team. Andy and I, and you, you were there too, have talked about the brewers offense, which according to, you know, batted ball data, stat cast data, they don't have the profile of a strong offensive team. They don't hit the ball that hard. And yet they were maybe they still are leading the league in scoring. And Andy said something to the effect that if you make the other team get 28 outs a game, then that, you know, that's a pretty good way to win. And I at the time I was a little bit skeptical that it could really be an out per game that the brewers forced the other team to make. I thought, sure, the other team makes some errors, they pressure the other team into making a few errors. Not that many, right? Couldn't be that many. So I did do a post on this because I was so skeptical of the brewers and I looked at what Andy was saying and Andy was right. It's like basically almost an out per game that the brewers get strictly on infield hits, infield errors and double plays not turned compared to the rate that other teams hit into double plays. The brewers hit into a lot fewer double plays so, just to restate that, the brewers are first or second in infield hits in the majors, they're first or second in errors that the other team makes, and they are first or second in double play rate. They hit into the first or the fewest or the second fewest double plays. And that adds up to about an out per game that they get on a ball, hit to an infielder on a ball hit that an infielder gets to and yet doesn't get an out. And if you look at the brewers offense and the value of those hundred plus outs that they've avoided, those 100 plus outs basically explain their season. It doesn't seem like that much. 100 infield hits, double plays beat out in errors, doesn't seem like that much. But it's the difference between an average offense and the best offense in the league, it turns out. So I have come to love the Brewers. I have accepted that what they're doing is, in fact, notable and real. I still, though, do have some skepticism about whether this is an attribute that plays well in the postseason. And I think it's an attribute that people would say plays well in the postseason because again, people love the idea that every game's two two in the seventh and that you need to be able to scrap out a run. But is making the other team make errors as reliable a strategy in the postseason, when presumably you're going to have a better average defensive team on the other side, and presumably a team playing with more urgency? So a lot of the infield hits, like you watch them, and it's just like, oh, wow, the brewers ran it out and they ran hard and the other team took a beat too long. But if they're playing with more urgency, will the other team not fall prey to some of those hustle singles? So this is why I'm a little skeptical. I'm a little worried about building an offense on the hope that the other team will kick the ball. On the other hand, we're 145, 150 games into the season. The brewers have demonstrated this as something like a real skill, repeatable from month to month, and they've got the best record in baseball because of it. So do I need to just get over my Brewer skepticism? Am I still just looking for reasons to be skeptical of the best team in baseball?
- [37:12]
Grant Brisby
My first reaction is that I'm going to spoil my postseason predictions by just saying I'm out on the brewers, because every year I'm like, oh, that would be fun to watch in The World Series, trying, you know, to win the first one for the franchise. And they never do it. They always disappoint me. So I just, I'm Brewer's skeptical by nature. The other thing I think about, and I have no evidence to support this, but to me, beating out infield hits, forcing infield errors, it feels to me like it's in the same category as batting average and balls in play. Babip it feels to me like a team with a really good one run record where back when there were two teams and I'm not going to remember the years, but the Rangers had one of the teams and the Orioles had one of these teams. Just incredible one run records. Right. They were just every one run game they were coming up top in. The consensus is yes, this can be a skill to some extent if you have a dominant bullpen. Right. The bullpen can make a huge difference in one run games in general though, it's evidence if you're winning more one run games, it's evidence that you are benefiting from some sort of hidden luck or behind the scenes roulette t in your favor. And every time like the Orioles and Rangers fans at the time are like, no, no, no, no, no. I've watched these games. I've seen these games. I see how they play out. They make sense. While I'm watching them, these teams are fine. And then the next year with the same bullpens, they completely regressed and went back to, to 500 in one run games. That's what this feels like to me. Beating out infield hits. You say it's a provable, repeatable skill and maybe it is. From my, to my uneducated mind, it feels bab epi.
- [38:45]
Sam Miller
I also feel nervous about it just because these are plays that, I mean, it's like an inch, an inch determines, you know, a home run. I guess technically a home run is determined by an inch. Like the inch on your barrel that you hit it. But most home runs, they're out by 40ft. But these infield hits, it's like you're counting on a lot of half inches to go your way.
- [39:10]
Grant Brisby
Yeah.
- [39:11]
Sam Miller
And for, you know, the replay review to get it right. And I don't know why that would seem any less real to me. I mean those are just like the scale. That's just the scale that that particular game is played on. If you had the world's fastest snail and the world's second fastest snail, you'd win the race by a half inch every time. But it would be real so you have to make allowances for the fact that that's just the milieu were in their infield hits. They're gonna be close, but they all do feel it. Like. I guess what I'm saying is that every. Almost every infield hit that you watch, you think that could have gone the other way. I guess not. Infield hits, infield hits are a little different because they're like. A lot of times they're in the hole. But you know, every error you see every infield hit in front of a fielder where it's like a swinging bunt, all of those types of. They all feel like, well, that could have gone the other way. There was nothing faded about Jackson Cheerio being on first base in that play. He didn't do something that he was even trying to do. Jackson Cheerio is never trying to ground it to the shortstop. He's trying to hit it over the wall. So there feels. It all kind of feels contingent. It feels lucky. It feels like an accident. It all feels accidental. I don't want to make arguments against the Brewers. They've proven me wrong. Have they not? Why am I not. Why am I not just jumping in the water and saying, ah, yes, finally I'm here with you.
- [40:39]
Grant Brisby
It is that. That sense that Jackson Cheerio is doing something wrong, he's not doing what he wants. That's how I think of a swinging bunt is that it's a batter whose outcome is less than desirable, but they have other skills to make up for it. And that's probably just as real as lacing a line drive to the gap. Is that if you have a preponderance of players beat out that infield hit. Yeah. That elevates that one bad outcome into a good outcome. And that could probably stack up.
- [41:09]
Sam Miller
It feels like if a team's. If you found that a team's success was largely dependent on how many home run robberies their outfielders.
- [41:18]
Grant Brisby
Yeah. Oh, you gotta watch these guys like once every.
- [41:21]
Sam Miller
They are athletic.
- [41:22]
Grant Brisby
Yeah.
- [41:23]
Sam Miller
You know, they've got athletic outfit. You wouldn't deny that those are athletic outfielders that can make some amazing plays. But do you really want to live two feet above the outfield wall? Do you want to put your season two feet above the outfield wall over and over and say, this is our. This is where we thrive. It's risky.
- [41:40]
Grant Brisby
At least I can throw a bone to Mets fans and mention Andy Chavez. Yeah, it does feel a little bit more precarious. But the larger point that I think that you are speaking into the Universe is Brewers, Yankees, World Series, Brewers, Yankees. That would be funny.
- [41:58]
Sam Miller
Yeah.
- [41:59]
Grant Brisby
The narratives abound.
- [42:01]
Sam Miller
Yeah. What, is there a funnier one? Is there. Can you come up with something funnier?
- [42:06]
Grant Brisby
Padres, Mariners is pretty funny just because of the Vetter cup thing. And those have always been teams sort of on the sidelines to more exciting, funnier division rivals.
- [42:16]
Sam Miller
So the Padres and the Mariners play a season series. They play an interleague series against each other called the Vedder cup because Eddie Vedder was surfing in San Diego when he got recruited to join Mookie Blaylock. They play six games, right? And the winner of the Vetter cup gets, I think, a guitar and six games, you know, like, notoriously even number right. One of the most even.
- [42:42]
Grant Brisby
Tied for the most even even.
- [42:44]
Sam Miller
So what do you do if they split, right, and the. The tiebreaker is. I think it's most runs in the six games. But then do you know what the tiebreaker for the tiebreaker is? It's team exit velocity, because exit velocity is abbreviated EV for Eddie Vedder. Do you see you follow that?
- [43:04]
Grant Brisby
Yeah.
- [43:05]
Sam Miller
EV is the tiebreaker for the Eddie Vedder Cup.
- [43:08]
Grant Brisby
I just got an Internet comment the other day that I was too cute by half, and I'll cop to that. I'm too cute by half. That's too cute by half. You know what I mean? That's the Grant Brisby of tiebreakers.
- [43:19]
Sam Miller
I like it. I think I would prefer it was the first tiebreaker. I think making it the second tiebreaker is too cute. I have, like, have some faith in your pun. Have the courage of your punvictions. I also love that the Vedder cup is between two baseball teams who are not the team that the real Eddie Vedder is famously a humongous fan of. Right. Eddie Vedder is, like, associated with the Cubs now.
- [43:45]
Grant Brisby
Cubs.
- [43:45]
Sam Miller
It's. He is ashamed of both of the other teams. Why are they trying to connect him to them?
- [43:51]
Grant Brisby
That actually does open up, like, an alternate universe where the Padres have the superstation and you've got the superstation in San Diego just blasting Kurt Bevacua into the brains of America in the 80s, and who knows where they are now.
- [44:05]
Sam Miller
You know, if the Padres had come around 20 years earlier, you could actually envision a situation where a, like, Wolfman Jack situation where there's, like, a pirate radio station just across the border pumping out, like, 500,000 watts throughout the country. Radio station that reaches, you know, Vermont in the evening, and it's just doing Padres games, and the Padres are the national team for that Reason. Right. But they weren't there for the pirate radio or the. Whatever, the border radio, I guess. Is it pirate radio? Border radio. Boom. And so by the time the Padres became a franchise, the opening wasn't there anymore. It was a tv. TV sport by then.
- [44:45]
Grant Brisby
Now I want to write a movie that's Half Pump up the Volume with Christian Slater. And like, half is just this baseball period piece where I am Christian Slater and Pump up the Volume. And I AM broadcasting the St. Louis Browns, Philadelphia Athletics to the masses and just be like, baby, this is where it's at. You want to be on the ground floor when the Athletics are good again or when the Browns are good again. And yeah, who's in it? It's clearly going to be. Who's the guy that's in everything now?
- [45:13]
Sam Miller
Timothy Chalamet.
- [45:14]
Grant Brisby
Yeah. Pedro Pascal.
- [45:15]
Sam Miller
Pedro Pascal, yeah.
- [45:16]
Grant Brisby
He's going to be a tough luck bullpen coach.
- [45:19]
Sam Miller
I think I just watched Pump up the Volume last week.
- [45:22]
Grant Brisby
Did you really? Oh, because it's on Criterion, isn't it?
- [45:24]
Sam Miller
Yeah, it's in the criterion 90s soundtrack movies collection.
- [45:29]
Grant Brisby
I watched that movie probably 10 times in high school because I had someone pirated. It was a Heathers Pump up the Volume VHS cassette. And they gave it to me and they said, here, man, I can make more of these. I've got the whole setup. And he was from the future, I guess, but I watched Pompa Volume a lot and I haven't watched it since. And I'm actually really excited to dive back into it because it's got to be bad, but also good. Like, I'm sure I didn't forget the good parts. That made me love it so much.
- [45:57]
Sam Miller
Structurally, it's horrible. Within the confines of that bad structure, it's pretty expertly done.
- [46:03]
Grant Brisby
Okay.
- [46:03]
Sam Miller
I didn't find it. I didn't find it that satisfying, but I admired parts of it. It was the first R rated movie I saw. Oh, my sister somehow had smuggled it into the house. So I watched it and forgot about it. Never saw it again until last week. And there is a scene at the end where the principal is hung in effigy at like a. Like they're all. All the teenagers are gathered and they've hung the principal in effigy and like, burned the principals, you know, like, whatever. They're burning it. And that image, which I had not thought about in 40, 35 years, I saw it and immediately, immediately realized, like, that image has been in my psyche ever since. Like, that is really. That is the archetype of like lawlessness in my head. It really stuck deep. I saw it and like just, it was like totally familiar immediately. Again, I don't know if I'm conveying this right, but it's been there. It's been there. Like, it was like a smell that I realized was extremely familiar with me, even though I hadn't thought about it in a very long time. And I was like, sort of like, wow, that's the thing. That's the thing that I've been, that my psyche has been like grappling with for 35 years. That's the picture that goes deep.
- [47:18]
Grant Brisby
Because that probably explains why I feel uncomfortable when I see Michael J. Fox. Because the first time I saw full frontal nudity was in Doc Hollywood with my parents sitting next to me. And you can't unlearn that. Every time you see Michael J. Fox, it's like, ah, I'm uncomfortable. I don't know why. It's not, you know, the family, Thai stuff. Maybe it is. I don't know. All right, next week we'll talk. We'll talk all of Christian Slater's Oof. I've never said this word out loud.
- [47:43]
Sam Miller
Woover I you have. You've said that word out loud in podcasts with no way. Weaver. I bet you anything.
- [47:50]
Grant Brisby
Weaver Woovery Owen. All right, we'll be back. Episode 175. We'll be back on Monday. It might just be Sam and I. We might have a guest. Might be the very long table. Might be a round table. Could be trapezoidal. We'll see you then. Thanks so much for listening.
- [48:09]
Sam Miller
I have a take about Andy's take that I think is a take about all the takes. I was very wrong.
- [48:23]
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