The Roundtable | Get ready for an exciting weekend of baseball!

Summary

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The Windup: The Roundtable | Get Ready for an Exciting Weekend of Baseball!

Episode 179, September 26, 2025
Hosts: Andy McCullough, Grant Brisbee, Sam Miller

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Episode Overview

This week’s Roundtable dives deep into the frenetic final stretch of the baseball regular season, where playoff races tighten and narratives crystallize. Grant Brisbee, Andy McCullough, and Sam Miller dissect the chaos of the pennant chases—with a spotlight on the Guardians and Tigers—debate the state of the Dodgers bullpen as October looms, and argue over the closest MVP race in years. The episode is filled with playful banter, honest self-reflection on being “gassed” at season’s end, and the group’s trademark blend of humor and sharp analysis.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. End-of-Season Exhaustion & Getting Old (01:16–03:20)

• Bantery Open: The hosts open up with candid laughs and personal admissions about fatigue, pickup basketball injuries, and feeling the aches of aging, drawing a parallel to the baseball grind.

  • Sam Miller admits: “Yeah, I’m a shell of a man.” (01:41)
  • Andy McCullough reflects: “I was using parts that I don’t use for my daily life of writing missives.” (03:02)

• Aging & Mechanics: The challenge of sports mechanics as you age becomes a metaphor for how taxing a baseball season is on players.

2. Guardians vs. Tigers: Divisional Drama (04:05–19:35)

• Ace Discourse & Mental Errors: Discussion of whether one bad play—a “shotgun snap” overthrowing first base in a crucial moment—dings a pitcher’s ace status. The group debates what defines an “ace” and how momentary mistakes play into narratives.

  • Sam Miller muses about the infamous play: “He had all the time in the world ... It would have felt sort of strangely sure of himself, I guess, if he had nailed it.” (06:54)
  • Grant Brisbee jokes about ace standards: “He’s an ace. He’s an ace.” (05:10)

• Guardians’ Lineup Struggles: A deep dive into Cleveland’s historically weak offense relative to modern standards; shock over seeing sub-.650 OPS hitters at the top of the order.

  • Sam Miller quips: “Number two hitter with like a .610 OPS and you’re like, is that so that he can get the runner over? No, no, that’s their third best hitter.” (15:32)
  • *Andy McCullough: *“Just rank their hitters... Who’s number four? Carlos Santana with an OPS of 650.” (15:59)

• Pitching Hot Streaks: The group muses on what usually drives an unexpected hot stretch—hot bats or hot arms?

  • Sam Miller poses: “Would you guess that their hitters all got hot or their pitchers all got hot?” (18:13)
  • Andy: “I refuse to play your game.” (18:27)

• Spoiler Teams & Final Weekend Dynamics:
  Discussion of how teams out of the race play (spoilers), whether “laying down” is real, and quirks of the final-week schedule. Highlights the competitive professionalism present even in “meaningless” games.

  • Sam Miller: “There’s not really a way to 90% baseball… you can’t do the Pro Bowl defense or the NBA All Star game defense in baseball.” (12:09)

• Personalities & Pickup Basketball: The hosts draw parallels between how a person plays pickup basketball and their personality, further riffing on identity and authenticity both on and off the field.

  • Sam Miller: “I do it as my own personal hero’s quest. It means everything in the world to me.” (09:34)
  • Grant Brisbee: “I firmly believe that a person’s pickup game is very relevant to their personality.” (09:08)

3. Dodgers Bullpen Meltdown & Postseason Pitching Strategies (25:20–40:20)

• Roki Sasaki’s Role: Sasaki’s up-and-down 2025, his disappointing adjustment to MLB, and the surprising possibility he becomes the Dodgers’ late-inning savior as a converted reliever right before October.

  • Grant Brisbee: “He is most likely going to somehow be their highest leverage reliever heading into October, thanks to the utter collapse of their bullpen...” (25:20)
  • Sam Miller cautions about Sasaki: “He threw some pitches where you thought, oh, well, this is a relief ace … He also made a bunch of mistakes.” (27:26)

• Bullpen vs. Rotation Trust: Spirited debate: is it better in the postseason to have shaky relievers or shaky starters (if you must be weak somewhere)?

  • Sam Miller: “I would rather have no relievers… the problem is you’re going to simmer in an uncomfortable state the entire time.” (31:51)
  • Andy McCullough, ever the romantic: “I would rather have the starting pitchers be awful … I just want it out of the way. I want the starting pitcher to give up seven in the first two.” (35:46)

• 2025 Dodgers Parallels to Prior Champs: Reference to the 2019 Nationals and 2023 Rangers as examples where a “bullpen just good enough” or random unlikely heroes (“Josh Spores finds you”) can carry teams to glory.

• Playoff Roster Jigsaw: Creative suggestions for how the Dodgers might piece together their innings with piggybacked starters and relievers, and pondering if narrative momentum can flip after one good game.

4. The AL MVP Race: Judge vs. Cal Raleigh (40:20–50:07)

• Narrative vs. Numbers: The hosts hash out the closest, most hotly-debated MVP race in years: Catcher Cal Raleigh’s historic 60-homer season vs. Aaron Judge’s all-around excellence.

  • Grant Brisbee predicts: “I think that Aaron Judge will receive 20 first place votes.” (41:27)
  • Sam Miller surprises them both: “I would have said Aaron Judge gets like four… Cal Raleigh is just a more emotionally satisfying pick.” (41:38, 42:07)

• What Matters to Voters?
  Discussion on whether voters will default to WAR, narrative, or what feels best in the moment.

  • Grant Brisbee, tongue-in-cheek: “I also think too, though that voters are going to engage in some harm reduction and they do not want Yankees fans to yell at them online.” (42:43)
  • Sam Miller agrees on emotional logic: “In the privacy of their own voting booth, they’re going to do what’s emotionally satisfying.” (42:35)

• The Value of Catchers: Counting stats vs. position, the difficulty of comparing WARs due to framing, volume, etc., and whether voters “just double” catcher WAR in their head.

  • Andy McCullough: “When I look at ... war for a catcher, I just double it. Just double it. They’re doing so much.” (46:20)

• Legacy & MVP Fatigue: Comparison to years when Trout or Ohtani deserved the MVP but lost to another player with a more compelling “story” that season.

  • Grant Brisbee on standards: “For Judge and Ohtani, they have reached a point … where it’s like, they’re the favorite. ... Cal Raleigh has done something really, really, really memorable.” (49:03)

• Memorable (and Silly) Quotes:

  • Andy, deadpan: “Who are you voting for?” [talking to Grant's cat] “More like Cat Rawley.” (46:09)
  • Sam Miller on WAR as gospel: “If you’re within one [WAR], then to me, you don’t know anything about those two players that says one is better than the other.” (50:07)

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Timestamps to Key Segments

| Timestamp | Topic | |:-------------:|------------------------------------------------------| | 01:16–03:20 | Hosts discuss exhaustion, pickup basketball, aging | | 04:05–08:31 | Ace discourse, “shotgun snap” play | | 09:43–19:35 | Guardians/Tigers breakdown, playoff implications | | 21:06–24:56 | Guardians’ offense, “Guards Ball” branding | | 25:20–33:49 | Dodgers’ bullpen panic and postseason pitching debate | | 35:46–39:24 | Starters vs. bullpen dilemma in October | | 40:20–50:07 | AL MVP race: Judge vs. Raleigh—voter psychology |

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Classic Moments & Notable Quotes

• “I am a shell of a man.” — Sam Miller (01:41)
• “If you ever, like, step into a batting cage ... Your obliques will. You'll be able to feel that you have obliques.” — Grant Brisbee (03:07)
• “Just give me that chance. Just put me on there. I can 100% throw a baseball 60 ft 6 inches without embarrassment. Probably, maybe, maybe not.” — Andy McCullough (03:20)
• “No, the problem is ... he had all the time in the world.” — Sam Miller, on a critical in-game error (06:54)
• “It’s tautological for them, basically just be like, yeah, that was Guards ball.” — Grant Brisbee (23:38)
• “You can't find Josh Spores. Josh Spores finds you.” — Andy McCullough, on playoff bullpen randomness (38:22)
• “I think that Aaron Judge will receive 20 first place votes.” — Grant Brisbee (41:27)
• “In the privacy of their own voting booth, they're going to do what's emotionally satisfying ...” — Sam Miller (42:35)
• “When I look at ... war for a catcher, I just double it. Just double it. They're doing so much.” — Andy McCullough (46:20)
• “More like Cat Rawley.” — Andy McCullough, to Grant’s cat Harry (46:09)
• “He just wanted to emphasize he’s an elite defensive catcher.” — Grant Brisbee (46:01)

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Tone & Style

The episode is marked by the hosts’ characteristic blend of analytical rigor and playful humor. Friendly ribbing, offbeat hypotheticals (“if you became a billionaire, would you buy a team?”), and baseball nerdery abound, but always undergirded by respect for the nuances and randomness of the game. The conversation is candid, occasionally self-deprecating, and consistently insightful for both hardcore fans and casual listeners.

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Final Word

This episode is a must-listen for anyone craving both depth and delights at the intersection of numbers, narrative, and the wonderful, absurd tension of the MLB regular season’s closing days.

Transcript

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[Andy McCullough]

This is the wind up. Welcome to episode number 179 of the Roundtable here with Andy McCullough and Sam Miller. Andy, how you doing today?

[Grant Brisbee]

I'm good.

[Andy McCullough]

Sam, how you doing today?

[Sam Miller]

I'm gassed.

[Andy McCullough]

You're gassed like by the regular season or is this, is this a gastrointestinal?

[Sam Miller]

No, I play, I play basketball late on Thursday nights and most and then I wake up early with my, with my wife on Friday mornings and most weeks it's fine. This week's not fine. Yeah, I'm a shell of a man.

[Grant Brisbee]

What's your game like?

[Sam Miller]

It's all older guys, 33 to 48, 49. And it's real high level, real good. We're all awesome.

[Grant Brisbee]

Specifically, what is your style? Like what kind of ball are you playing?

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, I'm a stretch. 4. I'm tall but drink water, but I shoot well. I guess the only thing I'm a. I'm a slasher. Yeah, I don't know.

[Andy McCullough]

I shot a basketball for the first time in about 10 years last year maybe, maybe a couple years ago with, with my daughters. I'm not good at it. What's remarkable is how much effort it takes if you don't have good mechanics or know anything about it to shoot just one three pointer and then you think about like where Steph Curry is, like this is just what I think about as an old man who only cares about baseball. That's hard sport there, Sam Miller.

[Sam Miller]

You're lucky you survived because trying to shoot a three pointer without warming up at our age is shoulder death.

[Andy McCullough]

Like, I was using parts that I don't use for my daily life of writing missives.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yeah. If you ever, like, step into a batting cage and, you know, just even set it on, like softball, you know, because you want to make contact, you. Your obliques will. You'll have obliques. You'll be able to feel that you have obliques.

[Andy McCullough]

See, that's where I'm different. That's where it's. I've been a softball coach for 10 years, 13 years now or something. So I get like. I'm the guy who watches the ceremonial first pitch and goes, like, just give me that chance. Just put me on there. I can 100% throw a baseball 60ft, 6 inches without embarrassment. Probably, maybe, maybe not. We'll see.

[Sam Miller]

I've done it and I. I took it seriously.

[Andy McCullough]

Throwing out a first pitch.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, but it was like it was on a real mound, but it was at a Sonoma Stompers game.

[Andy McCullough]

Right, right.

[Sam Miller]

And it came in high. So I do think you have to adjust for. If you're throwing from the mound, you're probably gonna. You're probably gonna miss high is what I learned.

[Andy McCullough]

Just give me that chance.

[Grant Brisbee]

What do you think would happen if you tried to shotgun snap a ball to first base in the biggest game of the season?

[Sam Miller]

I was wondering about this, Andy, because I know that, you know, Tarik Skubal, he passed the ace test. He got like a 99.9. He is not really.

[Grant Brisbee]

He is an ace.

[Sam Miller]

He is an ace. He made it. If there was a pitcher who had gotten like a 92 on the Ace test and then. And then shotgun snapped a ball in the biggest moment of his life, well, over the first baseman when he had plenty of time. Is that like. Would that knock you to a B plus? Is that relevant to the ace test?

[Grant Brisbee]

I don't think so, because. Well, here's. Here's what I would say is I think if you're scoring at a 92 on that test, you're already borderline. You know, you got to score like a 99. I mean, to be clear, we can just update this now since. Since I do not believe Paul Skeens is going to make another start. He is an ace. Tarex Goble is an ace. Garrett Crochet.

[Andy McCullough]

Don't do it. Don't do it.

[Grant Brisbee]

I'M going to need to see one more year.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, baby.

[Andy McCullough]

Come on, fellas. Got to have standards. Fellas got standards.

[Grant Brisbee]

He's an ace. He's an ace.

[Andy McCullough]

Logan Webb, number two.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yes. He's. Shut up. Stop, stop, stop. It's my least favorite line of questioning.

[Andy McCullough]

It's so funny. It's such a good thing.

[Grant Brisbee]

It really bugs me because I know.

[Andy McCullough]

Move on. Just turning a spotlight onto your peccadillo. Sorry.

[Sam Miller]

Like, in all seriousness. In all seriousness, this does not deserve. In all seriousness, is that a damning play for Ace Records or is it irrelevant? I mean, it's such. He will not have a bigger moment in. In a sense. And like, wow. Like, that was really. Like, that told us something about where his brain is. But on the other hand, it's not pitching. It's unlikely to come up again that exact situation. So I don't know if it is relevant and maybe he learned from it and maybe it'll never happen again.

[Grant Brisbee]

Anyway, it was one of the stranger things I've seen on a baseball diamond, especially done by an elite player in quite some time.

[Andy McCullough]

Pause the video. Like, right if there's a shot that's coming down the right field line. Okay. And so it's. It's just like straight up. You pause it and it's a view of Tarek Skubel's butt. And when he's grabbing the ball, it's like that moment. It's. It's Schrodinger's play where you've got just like one iconic moment that Tigers fans remember. Just the. Where were you when he shotgun snapped this perfect. And the rally died or the other sliding door opened and it is what we saw, the greatness of the play. If he makes it. Are we still talking about it? Is it. Is it twib noteworthy or is it something that we forget the next day? Because it's just, hey, that was a kind of cool play. Remember that? Maybe?

[Sam Miller]

No, the problem is that it was. He. He had all the time in the world. If it were necessary. If it were like a. Like, because. Because there are two famous pitcher snap throws, right? Like Burley, obviously, the great. Like, literally the greatest defensive play of all time was like, literally, you know, of our lifetime. At least I'm not gonna besmirch. Willie Mays is the catch. But otherwise, that was a snap through the legs. And then Bartolo Cologne did it and everybody, like, on the Internet, freaked out and loved it. So those plays are memorable, but in this case, he would have thrown the guy out if he Nailed it. He would have thrown the guy out by 30ft. And you would have been like, why did he do that? It would have felt. It would have felt sort of strangely sure of himself, I guess, if he had nailed it. But not any. Not much more than that.

[Grant Brisbee]

You can look at it from one of two ways. One is that he just kind of panicked, right? You know, under the stress of the moment. Or two, you know, it was Taste Myself Tuesday, and he was just like, dude, I can do anything on this field.

[Andy McCullough]

I would just like to point out that you said that Mark Burley's play was the best defensive play of our lifetime. Right. And I don't disagree with that. However, I think it's funny that you can also make the argument that it's not even the best defensive play that's important to Mark Burley's career. You know what I mean? And like, you could. You could actually be right, like Dwayne Wise's catch. To me, that's my benchmark for the best defensive play I've ever seen.

[Sam Miller]

But yeah, no, I mean, a Mark Burley bracket, A Mark Burley moments bracket, when it gets down to the finals between those two plays would be really something.

[Grant Brisbee]

We were going to start with Sasaki, but we're already on the Tigers and guards, so let's just go. Go there, right?

[Andy McCullough]

Let's just go, baby.

[Sam Miller]

Can I just say real quick before Tigers and guards, because Andy asked me what my game is in basketball, and out of respect to everybody, I gave the 12 word answer. But I just want anybody to know that if you're ever in a room with me and you want to make small talk for several hours, just ask me that question. I have much more to say about my basketball game.

[Grant Brisbee]

I want to follow up on that because I firmly believe that a person's pickup game is very relevant to their personality. And people tend to play like the people they are. I think it's a very honest form of expression, especially if it's people who aren't like. It's like a once a week type thing. You know, if it's not like an obsession or it's like you're doing it for exercise or whatever. I think you can learn a lot about someone just by watching how they play pickup basketball.

[Sam Miller]

I do not do it for exercise. I do it as my own personal heroes quest. It means everything in the world to me.

[Grant Brisbee]

That says something.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah. All right. Guardians, Tigers. Tuesday was the first game of that series. And I will. I would say that Tuesday, the whole thing, the whole Tuesday Everything going on. You had like six games that all had playoff implications and it felt like like all of them were at sort of peak, like the narrative had reached their peak. You had Cal Raleigh and Aaron Judge in the middle of one of, you know, the best MVP race since 2012 and maybe the second best MVP race of our lifetime. And I just think that was the best regular season day of baseball since, was it 2011, the one that inspired the second wild card. That was an amazing day of baseball.

[Grant Brisbee]

Very, very much enjoyed it. A lot of good stuff going on.

[Sam Miller]

A little bit disappointing because that day ended and the season kept going and I couldn't, I couldn't quite get there the next day.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yeah, well, I think, you know, everyone's kind of held serve yesterday and so there wasn't as much, you know, topsy turvy over the next two days and so but it is setting up for a, you know, a pretty eventful weekend. The, you know, the Tigers and Guards are tied as of right now. The Guards have the, the tie break. The Tigers go to Boston to play the Red Sox who have not yet clinched, and the Guards are hosting the Rangers. And this does bring up kind of one of my favorite little quirks of the baseball season is when teams are playing for, with everything on the line versus teams with like absolutely nothing on the line. And look on the last day of the season, you might see, you know, some quick at bats maybe from teams who are out of it for the most part. Like they're professionals, right? Like they're, you know, they're playing for money, they're playing for playing time. Arb, all that stuff, you know, three more days of service time. It was reminded of like a post I had last year where the Royals were playing the Gnats and there's like seven people at Nationals park for the biggest game of Bobby Witt Jr's life. It's like you don't get that in other sports. It's nice. So we have a little bit of that coming this weekend.

[Sam Miller]

I did one time long ago for Baseball Perspectives looked at spoilers and whether they outperform or underperform their, what you would expect them to do just based on their record. And spoilers play about in character. They neither spoil nor, nor, nor, I don't know what the verb is, but lay down for their competitive opponents. Like you say, there are occasions, particularly the last day of the season and I would say particularly with competitive teams that are starting with playoff teams that are like, well, we're going to rest up for the playoffs and there will be a game with serious playoff implications, and one team is just like resting their whole lineup. And that does kind of get to me, but for the most part. I mean, I think we probably have talked about this before, but when you are in the batter's box or when you are on the mound as a player, you want to get your stats and you don't really have. There's not really a way to 90% baseball. You know, like, you can't do the Pro bowl defense or the NBA All Star game defense in baseball. I guess you could, like. Well, no, I mean, you couldn't even really throw. Like, they don't even want, like, what would be the equivalent of like, easing off the throttle? Tyler Heinemann throwing a catcher out there. Like, I mean, you could, I guess you could imagine maybe more aggressive swings. I don't even.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yeah, just kind of first pitch swinging stuff. But that's.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, just.

[Grant Brisbee]

That's. Yeah, like, we've all seen versions of that on getaway day or whatever. But that's. Yeah, even then. Like, see, they're professionals, right? They're. They're trying to hit home runs all the time.

[Andy McCullough]

Sam, if you and I become billionaires is first off. If you became a billionaire, would you buy a team? Try to. Try to get in the club?

[Sam Miller]

Is that even enough?

[Grant Brisbee]

If I had the trust, you could buy the Marlins.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, I think I would.

[Andy McCullough]

Okay, I would, too. So once we're both multi billionaires, we'll each have our own team on this podcast. Let's. Let's shake on it virtually. We will have a game towards the end of the season if both our teams are out of it, where it's just pitchers. And I mean just pitchers. We're talking at the plate, we're talking in the field. Shortstops, first baseman, catchers. Your whole staff is out there. That's it. You in?

[Sam Miller]

Did it. Did it once already with the Sonoma Stompers.

[Andy McCullough]

Did you write about it in the book?

[Sam Miller]

No, it was, I think it was maybe the, like the last day of the first half after we'd already clinched or something like that. And we, we did. We had everybody and it was not that fun.

[Andy McCullough]

I have read both of your books, and so I'm like, always on the lookout for tests, I guess, you know, tests. And so that was just a test. I wanted to see if I had missed that. But no, it's a book. You both have great books. You're both great writers. Good podcast host.

[Grant Brisbee]

Sam's writing career really is like that. That episode of south park where they complained that the Simpsons had done everything so far. Every time you're like, oh, man, I got a good idea. And then you're like, now, Sam wrote that in 2013.

[Sam Miller]

That was. No, that was Grant. You remember? Probably in. In actually in 2013, the joke was that Jeff Sullivan had already done everything.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, I don't even remember Jeff. So I don't remember last week. I remember Jeff Sullivan. I remember any of this stuff.

[Sam Miller]

Let's get back on topic, please.

[Grant Brisbee]

I think he lives at Tropicana Field.

[Andy McCullough]

He's fixing it. He's doing all the repairs himself. He's got a bucket. A bucket with.

[Grant Brisbee]

What do we got on the. On the Tigers? Guards. The guards are. I mean, we. The guards are like a. A familiar team. You write off and then have to remember, right? You're like. You're like, I know these guys. These guys, they don't have any guys who can hit. And then you look up and you're like, well, yeah, but they still really can pitch. And that Jose Ramirez, he's kind of underrated. And it's just like a loop. It's like. It's like the white Christmas episode of. Of what's a Black Mirror?

[Sam Miller]

The lack of hitting, though, is reaching like self parody. Like, this lineup is shocking. It is shocking. When you turn on a game and in the year 2025, you see a number two hitter with like a.610 OPS and you're like, is that so that he can get the runner over? No, no, that's their third best hitter.

[Grant Brisbee]

It's true.

[Andy McCullough]

Just rank their hitters in terms of, like, who is their fourth best hitter. Right. There's obviously Jose Ramirez. You got at the top. You've got. Okay, Kyle Manzardo, he's having a good year. Stephen Kwan, he slipped a little, but it's still close to 100. Opiate. But like, who's number four? It's like Carlos Santana with an OPS of 650.

[Sam Miller]

Carlos Santana got released a month ago.

[Andy McCullough]

That's right. But the Tigers are going to pick him up.

[Sam Miller]

And the reason that he got released is because there was. I mean, Carlos Santana getting released. I mean, I'm sure it made perfect sense. Like, I trust that they knew what they were doing, but basically he got released because there was like a roster crunch. They had too many guys at first base, right field, and dh, and he was the odd man out. And then you look at who they've got playing first base, right field and dh, it's like Nolan Jones is there. He's a right fielder with a.600 on the dot ops and negative 1.1 war. David Fry is there. He is a DH with a.592 OPS and a negative 0.8 war. I mean, I guess you would say that CJ K is probably like genuinely maybe their fourth best hitter at this point. George Valera, I was, you know, like, having some fun with this, but George Valera was the number two hitter in the second game of the series. George Valera, guy I hadn't heard of. 35 career plate appearances, and they stick him in the spot that Mike Trout batted during his peak. Like, that's. That's the, that's the Trout spot. And they've got George Valera there. It's a fun team, right?

[Grant Brisbee]

They have a remarkable number of guys who, when they come up, you're like, oh, Valera's up. It's like, oh, Breivik. Valera, like, he's still going, oh, Arius is up. It's like, wow. Joaquin Arias. It's like, ah, Nailer, Nailer. He's a good player. Wait, that's his brother.

[Sam Miller]

The wrong Nailer.

[Grant Brisbee]

What's going on here?

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, but the pitching is good. The pitching is hot. If you had to guess, if you had a team that was unaccountably hot for a month that they went, they. You didn't think they were a good team, and then they went 23 and four, just curious, would you guess that their hitters all got hot or their pitchers all got hot?

[Andy McCullough]

Is this Guardian specific or are you.

[Sam Miller]

Talking in the, in the abstract?

[Grant Brisbee]

Hitters.

[Sam Miller]

You think the hitters all get hot?

[Andy McCullough]

I think it's a combination thereof. I don't think it's just one or the other.

[Sam Miller]

You gotta have one.

[Andy McCullough]

No, I refuse.

[Sam Miller]

Sucks.

[Andy McCullough]

I'm that guy.

[Grant Brisbee]

I'm playing Refused.

[Andy McCullough]

Answer the. I refuse to play your game.

[Sam Miller]

They're almost a lock at this point. They're, I think, like 97% to make the playoffs. So congratulations to the Guardians. The Astros, they're better than the Astros. I mean, they have three games to. What are they. They're tied, but they don't have the tiebreaker.

[Grant Brisbee]

I believe they're a game back of the Tigers currently, and I'm not even sure about the tiebreaker.

[Sam Miller]

And they have. They definitely don't have. They have no tiebreakers. They lose the tiebreaker to every single team in baseball. That's if. If the Marlins sneak in to the postseason, somehow the Astros don't have that tiebreaker. I want this weekend to be fun. I want this to be tense. I would like them to make the tension last a couple extra days. But Valdez and Brown just pitched that is like an all time spawn insane and pray for rain rotation. You know the the fall off after Brown and Valdez is so majestic that like tourists flock to it. They are really looking bad this weekend. I think it might just be like the Tigers and the Guardians fighting for for home field.

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[Andy McCullough]

So my baseball viewing My habits with watching baseball are different than the common person, right? One because I'm better than them. But two because I spend most of the regular season, right? I'm focused on the Giants and I try to pick up at least one game before the Giants game start at 7. I try to pick up an east coast game, have it on MLB TV in the background, right? And so that's what I'm doing in the regular season. The postseason is when I care about every last player. I am like I have Kyle Manzardo thoughts. I have watched every one of these games and now I am a Guardians expert. And I just remember thinking last year watching the Guardians we don't need to do this again. I don't like watching this lineup. Like, they need to address this. I am personally. You are wasting my time at this point.

[Sam Miller]

The thing that gets me about the Guardians is they have branded their, their offense as Guards Ball. I went back and read a bunch of like, interviews where players described what Guards Ball is, and it's completely incoherent. Whatever they did that day to score one more run than the other team, they say that's Guards Ball. So sometimes it's. Sometimes it's a chopper to Tarik Skubal that he hikes over first base and sometimes it's a three run homer. They don't care. They just call it all Guards Ball. So Guards Ball was the thing. Last postseason, I was pretty, I was pretty impatient with Guards Ball, but it was, it was a one year thing. You're not going to bring back Grimace, right? I read Guards Ball again today. Like, I read there's like a whole thing in ESPN about Guards Ball.

[Andy McCullough]

That's actually the only way to analyze baseball is just have a catch all category for just nonsense and just call it like, hey, that's just the way the cookie crumbles. You know what I mean? It's just like, that's Guards Ball. It's just a bucket of nonsense. And I appreciate that. Guards Ball, as we're trying to do this, less a fan, but just, this is our bucket of nonsense. I'm a big fan.

[Grant Brisbee]

I think the teams just need to have a branding thing, you know, like, the brewers have so many different ways to basically, to basically say, like, you guys think we all suck, huh? You know, like, they, like, you have Christian Yelich talking about being, you know, an average Joe. It's like, are you kidding me? Like, that's your Christian Yelich. You're awesome. And then you look at their, their baseball reference and it's like, okay, everyone here is literally an above average big league hitter. There's no one who's a 150 OPS + guy, but there's a lot of guys who are 110, right? Like, this is a good lineup, but teams just take on some sort of identity, you know, and so the Guardians, like, it is tautological for them, basically just be like, yeah, that was Guards ball.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah.

[Grant Brisbee]

No, we scored no runs tonight. That's. We're just playing Guards ball. We're just setting up for, you know, it's like, you can't be. You can never fail Guards Ball. Guards Ball can only fail you.

[Andy McCullough]

I love that you're bringing up the brewers there because I When I go to the brewers baseball reference page and flip back and forth, I'll even open them in different windows so I can command whatever tilde back and forth just to look at them. Because the brewers are just stocked with above average hitters. It's just like you said. There's. There's no series peaks, but there are no valleys. And so, like, you get it. And then when I flip back to the. To the Guardians page, I look at the hitters and I go, okay, well, at least every single member of the rotation has an ER under three. And it's like, no, it's like, at least the bullpen is as effective as last year. No, like, none of it. Like, it's just a good bullpen. It's not otherworldly like last year. I'm. I'm sorry, Cleveland. I'm sorry, Guardians fans. It's just. It's not. It's not me, it's you.

[Sam Miller]

We don't need to get into this much detail about why the worst team in the playoff race for most of the year is not as good as the team with the most rins in baseball. I mean, clearly the brewers are a better team than the. Than the Guardians are, But there's only.

[Andy McCullough]

10 games separating them. It bothers me.

[Sam Miller]

I mean, it's true. The rotation. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, guard spot, guards, ball.

[Grant Brisbee]

They play in a division that is not particularly good. And the Tigers have biffed it.

[Sam Miller]

In fairness to them, they also did go to the ALCS last year.

[Andy McCullough]

They hated every second of it.

[Sam Miller]

They did do that. I mean, you know, they. Right now, they're pointing at the scoreboard and saying, we're back.

[Andy McCullough]

And saying one to nothing. That's what they're pointing at. The scoreboard is like, see that? That's a run, mother.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yeah, right. Guards ball.

[Andy McCullough]

Andy, you were about to segue.

[Grant Brisbee]

Well, I was going to say, you know, what we like to talk about on this show is all the times I was right. And so, yet again, I nailed it. On Roki Sasaki, a total non factor in the Dodgers 2025 campaign, except for he is most likely going to somehow be their highest leverage reliever heading into October, thanks to the utter collapse of their bullpen and his sudden ability to miss bats again. So Sasaki, as we've talked about, you know, was injured for a good portion of this year. He was fairly ineffective in the majors, you know, wasn't really missing bats. I think he has like a six and a half strikeout rate and like a six walk Rate and went on the IL for a while. Maybe last month he went to Oklahoma City and did not look particularly good. You know, like wasn't missing bats. And those are AAA bats. Those are not as good as big league bats. He was there forever. They found a way to like extend the assignment. And then at some point, maybe like a week or two ago, they're like, what if he tried relief and now no one can touch him whatsoever.

[Sam Miller]

And so yeah, he had one outing.

[Grant Brisbee]

He had one outing. But let me tell you something. If you throw one clean outing, you are the only reliever Dave Roberts trusts. Because literally, like we talked, I think the other day, or maybe, maybe it was talking to someone else, but just about the idea of like, okay, who can Roberts trust right now? It's like, like, well, he's got Vezia and that's it. And then who blew it this week against the Diamondbacks, but Alex Vezier, right? And it's like, look, relievers give up runs, but none of them appear locked in. The younger guys look gassed. Blake Trine and Tanner Scott are very hard to predict right now. Vezia should be fine. Bonda should be fine, you know, in like left on left situations. But they're looking for a guy who can come in late and strike and get some strike amounts and that might be Sasaki. Like they're going to use Clayton Kershaw in relief. Clearly he pitched the ninth inning the other night. It's going to be fascinating to see what they do.

[Sam Miller]

My galaxy brain idea, and I don't know that I would expect anybody to take this seriously, but I think they should move Tyler Glasnau to the bullpen, make him the multi inning closer, put Emmett Sheehan, who's fantastic in the rotation. Glasnow's control this year has really been a problem. Like he's, he's a good pitcher, he's unhittable, but he's throwing way more balls than he used to walking way more. Guys not pitching, you know, struggling to get into the fifth or sixth on his pitch count. And most of us think of bullpen conversions as like, oh, wow, your stuff really plays up. But actually control really plays up too. Like guys who are wild really cut their walk rates a lot. Relievers walk rates are much lower than these same pitchers in starting roles. Maybe because of fatigue, maybe because they can focus on, maybe because their stuff is playing up, maybe because they can cut their repertoire down to just the two or three pitchers they can control. And I think that that would be really fun. But whether that's a sincere proposal or not. I think the point is that the Dodgers have, you know, one obvious, glaring flaw that has made the last month catastrophic for them. And the nice thing for them is that they go into the postseason with potentially three new relievers who have not been relieving for them because they've been starters. Kershaw in some role, Sheehan presumably in some role, and Sasaki in some role. Sasaki is interesting because he threw some pitches where you thought, oh, well, this is a relief ace, and he got through a very impressive inning. He also made a bunch of mistakes, and, you know, like, he left some splitters right in the middle. The fastball still is, like, it's high velocity but questionable movement. So, you know, one inning with some mistakes that he, you know, got away with isn't necessarily, like, convincing me that he's going to be 13 good innings in October, but somehow they're going to have, like, three new additions to that bullpen, which is really a important because, like, you say that bullpen is. Is very gassed. They not only have they thrown a ton of innings. I don't know. You don't really think about this, but when your bullpen is melting down, it means that all your relievers have to throw a whole bunch of innings that they weren't being expected to throw, a whole bunch of pitches they weren't being expected to throw. There's guys who probably thought they had the night off, and then Tanner Scott pitched them into the game unexpectedly in the last month. So they have, you know, they need this punishment. I'm a broken record on trying to be optimistic about the Dodgers, but, like, that's a pretty good sign for a team with one big flaw.

[Grant Brisbee]

I had conversations with some Dodgers people, and, like, sometimes they're like, yeah, yeah, that's right. That makes a lot of sense. And then. But who knows if they actually, like, agree with it. But I was just sort of like, okay, you got. You got Blake Snell. He's going to throw five innings, right? Have Emma Sheen behind him there. There's nine innings. You know, you have Ohtani. He's going to throw five innings. Kershaw's behind him. That's three innings, right? And then you're like, you have Yamamoto, who's the one guy who can kind of go deep, and you can, you know, max out whomever you know behind him. Like, it just. There's ways that you can set up piggybacks when you're writing it on paper that make it seem like, oh, yeah, it does it's just like a math problem, but it's a math problem where the stuff changes in real time. And, like, what if Emma Cheon comes out of the bullpen and doesn't have it? You know, like, what if Clayton Kershaw, who's, you know, sort of big problem this year and in recent years is the first inning? Like, what if he just gives up like a bomb right away? Like, do you want to stick with him through the proposed 60 pitches? Or, you know, it's just last year, Dave Roberts basically had to solve a problem of how do I get through a game where I have no starters? Right? And it led to them, like, legitimately not trying to win certain games. And that strategy led them, of course, to a championship, as we all know, never try. This year. It's like the inverse. And in some ways, it is. I don't know. Which do you think is harder to do? I'm curious. This feels easier to me to navigate, but also the mistakes become glaring right away, I guess. So I'm curious what you guys think the question is.

[Sam Miller]

Would you rather have no starters or would you rather have no relievers? Correct.

[Grant Brisbee]

And you have a really good other half like you have. They had a great bullpen last year. They have great starters this year.

[Sam Miller]

I would rather have. I would rather have no relievers. I don't want to. It's. It's. The problem with no relievers is that then you're going to, like, just simmer in a uncomfortable state for the entire time.

[Andy McCullough]

It's a bad feeling.

[Sam Miller]

It is. It's going to take a psychological toll on you and everybody around you. But not to make too much of one example, but the 2019 nationals had the worst bullpen in baseball going into the postseason. Like, they. I guess they were a tiny bit ahead of the 108 loss Orioles in bullpen ERA, but they were a half run worse than anybody else in baseball. And they got through it. And they got through it partly because, you know, you. You look at who threw yesterday, and you try to draw some clues about who's kind of locking in. You got through it because you extend the players that are pitching a little better. You don't go to your sixth guy, and you find Patrick Corbin on his day off and ask if he's got some. Some throws in him and tell him.

[Grant Brisbee]

We need you, big guy.

[Sam Miller]

We need you, big guy. And you patch things together, and things kind of go okay. And the Nationals won the World Series partly because Corbin was there. Like, he provided some huge innings in relief when they needed him and partly because they managed to take this bullpen with a like a literally a six ERA in the regular season and got out a 4.5. And that was kind of enough. I think that I would feel like I would have some more moves to make. Whereas if your starters are tanking, what are you going to do? Like you just can't do anything. You're just, you just hope there's nothing you can do but hope you don't have another option. You're not going to, you're not, you're not going to bullpen those games and whatever weaknesses in the rotation that you're trying to paper over with your bullpen, that takes its toll on the bullpen. And now the next thing you know, you have a bullpen problem.

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[Andy McCullough]

This is postseason specific, right? This scenario, like what would you rather? Okay, I would rather have the starting pitchers be awful. Not in terms of. Not in terms of strategy. Not in terms of me thinking this is the way to build a winning team. That's what I would rather watch. If you, if you are gearing, if you are guaranteeing me a bullpen or if you're guaranteeing me that one of these is going to be awful, I just want it out of the way. I want the starting pitcher to give up seven in the first two. Right. Or got through five innings, two runs. What a marvel, what a hero to the franchise. And then watch the bullpen take it over. That's right. Like aesthetically, at least.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yeah, there is to that. Like, oh my God, four scoreless from Walker Bueller tonight. Like, what a hero. 90 pitches, one strikeout, six singles, if you get it.

[Sam Miller]

But what's more likely you get that or that, like Wander Suero comes in with runners on second and third and two out and gets one out. And you're like, same thing. It's the same reaction. And he only got one out. I'd bet on Wander Swirl getting one out before Walker Bueller getting 12. The other thing about it, the reason that I prefer having good starters, and I don't know how much this is a factor or not, but teams make personnel change. Teams make personnel decisions within games based on whether they're winning or losing. And there are teams, not every team, but we've seen certainly some teams in our lifetimes where if they had the lead, they were like unbeatable. The Royals in 2014, 2015 are the classic case where if they had the lead, they were going to go to their three unhittable relievers. And not only that, they were going to bring in Jarrod Dyson. It's a wrap. You're not getting any runs when Jarrod Dyson is. Is playing the field. They had like a defensive relief core and then they also had the reliever relief core. The Giants in 2010 when Pat Burrell would. If they were losing, Pat Burrell stayed in the game in left field. If they were winning, Pat Burrow got a defensive replacement. And it felt like, well, you're a lot more likely to beat the Giants if you're already ahead because Pat Burrell is going to be playing left field the whole time, right? So. So if you fall behind against the team because your starters aren't as good, well, guess what? You're getting. You're getting there. You're getting their a plan relievers. Whereas if you get, if you jump ahead, they're just trying to get outs from their mid core and you can maybe continue to build that cushion. You know, does that. Do you get what I'M saying.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah, I get what you're saying. I mean, I know what you're saying about the nationals and how sometimes, like, that's the classic example of a bullpen being just good enough. Right. But then you have the. My recent historical example is the 2023 Rangers, where they weren't just good enough. They actually actively helped push them towards that championship. And the problem with this is that you can't find Josh Spores. Josh Spores finds you. Right. You can't find Tyler Matcic. Tyler Matcick just shows up one day, and with the Dodgers trying this. Because it's the only thing they can do, right? It's like, how else are you going to fix the bullpen on. On September 26th? You're not. You're just going to say, this guy has a rare arm and we're going to try it here. That's all they can do. It. It feels so much different this time to 2020, where they had Julio Arias, they had Kenley Jansen, you know, pitching well, he wasn't lights out. And they just like, no, we're just gonna kind of use this guy as our super stopper, whatever guy. It doesn't feel like that. Now. This is panic, and rightfully so.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah, it's panicky for sure.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah. And I just don't see it working.

[Sam Miller]

The nice thing, though, is that they get to shift the narrative because they have these new famous people that are going to be joining the bullpen. And it's very possible that that game one of the wild Card series or whatever they call it, the bullpen melts down and, like, you know, Shein Kershaw, Sasaki, add nothing and then, okay, it's everything still on fire. But, you know, if they come out and they have a good first game, then it allows you to get past the narrative of the August September bullpen. Like, no one's talking about it anymore. Now people are talking about this great infusion you have in Jack Dreyer stopper. So I don't know how much narrative matters to them or to us or anything at all, but to the degree that we're talking about it, they do have, like, a sort of a. Like a. An escape valve here.

[Grant Brisbee]

Speaking of. Of narrative, do you have thoughts on the American League MVP race?

[Sam Miller]

I have a question I want to ask. There's been a lot of, like, sort of anguish publicly about who should win, who will win, voters, writers, potential voters, talking about how difficult the decision is. Jeff Pass, and I think got the headlines when he said something like, if he had to vote today, he would vote for Aaron Judge, but he would do so with like misery in his heart or something like that. And there have been a couple polls of like executives that show it, like executives are split 50, 50. All indications are we got a 5050 race. And I'm curious, do each of you in your gut feel like it's a 50, 50 race? And let me rephrase that in the form of a question. In your gut, how many votes do you think Aaron Judge gets first place votes out of 30? I'm not asking who you vote for. I'm asking you to. I'm asking you to assess the state of the electorate.

[Grant Brisbee]

I think that Aaron Judge will receive 20 first place votes.

[Sam Miller]

And Grant, how many first place votes will Aaron Judge get?

[Andy McCullough]

I think he'll get 14. Whoa.

[Sam Miller]

Wow. I now this is. I'm glad, I'm glad because this actually now is confirming that it is as close as people say it was. I would have said Aaron Judge gets like four. Like, I think I really feel like Cal Raleigh has had it since like mid August when he started getting hot again and that the 60 homers as a catcher is. I guess what I'm saying is that he's had a series of good headlines that each time it feels like, oh, well, this is it, this is, this pushes him over. But also I just think that, like what Jeff Passen said, I don't think that any voter is going to be that excited to vote against Cal Raleigh that like, it's just, it's not a fun vote to vote for Aaron Judge. And it is a fun vote to vote for Cal Raleigh to vote for, you know, catcher hitting 60 homers. Great story. Fun story. Everybody's enjoyed it and it's new. And I think that when they're in the privacy of their own voting booth, they're going to do what's emotionally satisfying for them and that Cal Raleigh is just a more emotionally satisfying pick.

[Grant Brisbee]

Yeah. I also think too, though that voters, voters are going to engage in some harm reduction and they do not want Yankees fans to yell at them online.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah. That is the main reason I could see Aaron Judge winning is like, what. Which one is easier to defend on.

[Grant Brisbee]

The case for Aaron Judge is he's a better player than Cal Raleigh and he's had a better season. Right. Like by every available metric that we.

[Sam Miller]

Have, that is the case for. That is not the case.

[Grant Brisbee]

Valuable player. Right.

[Sam Miller]

You could. Now that is what the case would be. Yes.

[Grant Brisbee]

What I would say though, and I'm sympathetic to JP's argument. Like the story. We've talked about this before. The story of this season is Cal Raleigh. Cal Raleigh is the guy, right? And it is not dissimilar from a few years ago when Aaron Judge hit 62 home runs and Shohei Ohtani played like Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge won and Shohei Otani had a better season. He was like an 880 ops guy and he finished like third in the CY Young Award. That's better than a Barry Bond season, right? Like, it just is. But Judge won in part because it was like, well, one. I think he was like an 11 win player that year or whatever. Right? But like he won in part because of a narrative thrust and. And Raleigh has that going for him. This is not to slight Raleigh in any way. 60 cat, 60 homers by a catcher is remarkable. But like, that is the pull with all of these things. Like the 2015 MVP race, right. Who was more relevant to the 2015 season? Mike Trout, who should have won, or Josh Donaldson, who did win? It's like, oh, well, Josh Donaldson. I think about. When I think about 2015 baseball, Josh Donaldson comes to mind. Mike Trout is more of an afterthought, even though he was a more valuable player. And I think that sometimes the narrative will kind of offset the math. I think in this case the math is striking enough and frankly, the fear of getting yelled at is enough that Judge is going to win.

[Andy McCullough]

I will push back on the math being super strong because on fan graphs right now, Aaron Judge, 9.8, War, Cal Raleigh, 9. Even that to me is not a dead heat. Not a. Not a tie.

[Sam Miller]

But it is a tie statistically.

[Grant Brisbee]

That's right. Okay, but timeout, time out. We, the three of us know that. Do you think the average voter looks at these two numbers and says, oh, they're the same? No.

[Andy McCullough]

Okay, so we're still in their head.

[Sam Miller]

The average voter or the average person in the world? I think the average voter. I don't. I don't think the average voter wants to see 98 and 90 and feel like he is indebted that he has to choose the bigger one. I think that like, what is the point then? If you can't use your own reason to choose which of 98 and 90 you like more like based on all the context. What are you there for?

[Grant Brisbee]

This is why I don't vote.

[Andy McCullough]

But when you go to Baseball Reference, the gap is two wins, right?

[Grant Brisbee]

Yes.

[Sam Miller]

Because framing is not involved. Right? Framing is not a factor in baseball references. War. And so that explains that gap.

[Grant Brisbee]

But how many voters know that?

[Sam Miller]

I don't know how many voters know that.

[Grant Brisbee]

I agree. Harry, my cat's yelling at me.

[Andy McCullough]

He just wanted to emphasize he's an elite defensive catcher.

[Grant Brisbee]

Harry, who are you voting for? Who are you voting for?

[Andy McCullough]

More like Cat Rawley.

[Grant Brisbee]

He's voting Judge.

[Andy McCullough]

Okay, wow.

[Grant Brisbee]

Why are you voting for Judge? He's just glaring at me like, because he's Barry Bonds, you idiot.

[Andy McCullough]

I think the medium voter might also give catchers a million bonus points because it's not saber metrically sound. But when I look at like baseball reference war for a catcher, I just double it. Just double it. They're doing so much. Just double it, baby.

[Sam Miller]

If you look at the all time, I mean, if you compare career wars for catchers, the greatest catchers are way lower than the other players. If you look at single season wars for catchers in the wars that don't include framing, they tend to be quite a bit lower. You, like, there's just limitations on what catchers physically can produce. Like it's a volume sport and catchers have a big volume disadvantage. I think, I do think people more or less understand that and that I'm not saying that if it were more fun to vote for judge, then I don't think people would go into knots to make these cases for Cal Raleigh. I think that people really want, I think not, not all people. I think of the 30 voters that we get, I think that like 2/3 of them are going to prefer to vote for Cal Raleigh on the emotion and they are not going to have a very hard time adjusting the numbers for the catcher or adjusting the numbers for the narrative or adjusting the numbers for the clutch or adjusting the numbers for the. Whatever you want to do. It used to be very common. Voters would just do whatever they wanted with the information to make it fit who they wanted to pick. And they don't really do that anymore. Nowadays you do that, buddy. You're getting, you're getting replies, right? Like you got to more or less stick to the war. But I think this is the rare case where they're close enough. And Cal Raleigh I think is so satisfying to people as a candidate that we're going to get back into that. Okay, what do I have to do to make sure I vote for Cal Raleigh? That's sort of what I'm anticipating from the electorate.

[Grant Brisbee]

It's not a reasonable sample size. Right. You're not polling every baseball writer. It's 30 guys or 30, you know, men and women, I should say. And they might have just differing opinions on us. You know, like, it's not. It's just hard to. It's hard to know because it is such an idiosyncratic thing. Like, I mean, part of the issue is that it's not exciting to. To vote for Aaron Judge, because this is not the best Aaron Judge season. Right. Like, he's having not as impressive a season as he did last year. And he didn't set the home run record, you know, that. That big American League home run record that we all really cared about, as he did a couple years ago. Right. So it's like, similar to, like, we've talked about this on the show before. Like, why is there not as much excitement about what Ohtani is doing? It's like, well, because he's, like, kind of doing, you know, this is like his fifth best season or something like that.

[Andy McCullough]

Right.

[Grant Brisbee]

And that's the standard that judges said. I feel like for Judge and Ohtani, they have reached a point that Trout used to occupy, that Pooh Holes used to occupy where it's like, they're the favorite. They probably should win. In order for them not to win, someone's got to do something really, really, really memorable. Cal Raleigh has done something really, really, really memorable. And if he wins, like, hey, that's awesome. He's the guy I'll remember the most. I just. I think that in the privacy of the voter booth, people are going to look at the two wars and just default to the bigger number. I mean, that's.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah.

[Grant Brisbee]

I don't know.

[Sam Miller]

That's what.

[Andy McCullough]

I think that's bleak.

[Grant Brisbee]

That's this what the modern history of MVP voting is.

[Sam Miller]

Yeah. I mean, I don't. And I don't think it is necessarily bleak. I mean, you. In a sense, it should usually be the higher war.

[Andy McCullough]

I don't think WAR is nearly as accurate. Accurate enough to have, like, just a straight rule about.

[Grant Brisbee]

I very much agree.

[Andy McCullough]

Yeah. Hard.

[Sam Miller]

I don't know what the margin of error specifically is, but if you're within one, then to me, there's no, like, you don't know anything about those two players that says one is better than the other. I do think that Cal Raleigh should have listened to me. If he had gotten to 20 steals.

[Grant Brisbee]

How many?

[Sam Miller]

We're not having this conversation. He has 14. He just stopped running at 14.

[Andy McCullough]

God, there's still a weekend, baby. Still a weekend of baseball with hitting these homers.

[Grant Brisbee]

He's pre.

[Sam Miller]

Josh Naylor would do it. Josh Naylor needed six. Six stolen bases to win the MVP award. You can bet he'd do it.

[Andy McCullough]

Hell yeah, brother.

[Babbel Announcer]

All right.

[Andy McCullough]

This has been episode number 178 of the round Table. When we come back on Monday, we're gonna know things. Like, we're gonna. We're gonna know who's in, who's out. Let's see, between the Reds, Guardians, and Tigers, we're gonna have to forget about one of them for an entire month at least, right? I'm doing the math. And the Astros. Okay, whatever. We'll know what's going on. We'll see you on Monday, Doc. Playoffs. That's what we do. See you.

[Grant Brisbee]

I was very wrong.

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[Sam Miller]

Parle tu francais? Hablas espanol? Par Liano.

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