Alex and Bobby discuss Rob Manfred’s generous gift to players on Opening Day and a rest stop encounter in Delaware, then break down the news that the Lerner family is exploring a sale of the Washington Nationals, as well as the Baltimore Orioles receiving a whopping $1.2 billion in public funds from the state of Maryland. Then, they run down some takeaways from Opening Weekend, including the arrival of Steven Kwan and Hunter Greene, a downright unfair perfect game in Japan, the Rays’ attendance accounting hack, and more. Finally, they tackle listener questions about a bizarrely-made case to nationalize baseball, the actual mechanics of nationalizing the sport, walk up songs in Washington D.C. and a big team in a small stadium.
Links:
Could Fans Own A Team?
The Tipping Pitches playlist (thanks listener Britt for maintaining!)
Songs featured in this episode:
Modern Baseball — “Tears Over Beers” • Lauryn Hill — “Ex-Factor” • Booker T & the M.G.’s — “Green Onions”
Episode Transcript
[INTRO MUSIC]
Tell us a little bit about what you saw and, and, and being able to relay that message to Cora when you watch Kimbrel pitching and kind of help out so he wasn’t Tipping his Pitches. So Tipping Pitches, we hear about it all the time. People are home on the stand, what Tipping Pitches it’s all about? That’s amazing! That’s remarkable.
BOBBY: Alex, as we get ready to start this podcast, I wanted to take a moment to send a note of appreciation. Being a podcaster is an extraordinary accomplishment, that beyond your remarkable talent. So as your dedication to this great show, along with our clubs, have committed to working together with all podcasters to grow the art of podcasting. I’m excited about the opportunities that lie ahead. And by podcasting together, I know that we can bring the game to new heights. Please accept this gift, as a small gesture of my appreciation for the hard work that comes with being a podcaster. And your respect for our incredible listeners. Thank you for everything that you do in a podcast that has such a rich history and deep meaning to our fans in the United States and around the world. Wishing you the best of luck for, for a successful season of podcasting. Sincerely, Bob.
ALEX: What’s the gift?
BOBBY: Apparently the gift is a pair of Bose headphones.
ALEX: So what you’re saying is, we don’t need to unionize because you’re throwing us a pizza party instead, right? Because–
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: –this is just a great workplace. And this is your way of expressing that generous spirit of yours. Not, not at the bargaining table, right?
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: You don’t need to take it there. But–
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: –but just as as person to person.
BOBBY: For listeners who are very confused as to what is happening right now. MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred put a gift box in the locker of every player before they played their first game this past week. Many of you will have seen that. The Major League Baseball season has started. And Rob Manfred saw that too. And you know what he decided that in light of the animosity that was showed this past offseason. He decided that it’s just, it’s time to go the Derek Jeter route. It’s time to give gift baskets to show your appreciation, instead of actually doing it through actions at words.
ALEX: This doesn’t even qualify as a gift basket, right? Like I think a gift basket requires–
BOBBY: Well, that’s, that’s, that’s a great, that’s a great point, great point. Yes.
ALEX: at least multiple items.
BOBBY: We’ve only had a report of one of the items that was in here. But is there a chance that there was more stuff?
ALEX: I feel like no, like it would be weird that that would be the only thing that was reported.
BOBBY: Maybe that was just the marquee item, a pair of 300- $300 Bose headphones.
ALEX: You know, those don’t come cheap, man.
BOBBY: They absolutely don’t. Are you telling me that if Rob Manfred walked up to you on the street right now, and said I’d like to offer you a token of my appreciation for being such a great and committed baseball fan. In this world that we live in where so many things are asking for your attention. You tell me that you wouldn’t take those phone, those headphones?
ALEX: Those headphones, just proportionally speaking, make up a much higher percentage of my net worth, most Major League Baseball players. I, it would be like him walking up and saying thank you for your service as a podcaster. As my token of appreciation, here’s a notebook that you can use to prepare for your episodes.
BOBBY: I would accept that too.
ALEX: I, I mean, I would, I wouldn’t turn it down.
BOBBY: Is this the first step into a beautiful friendship between Rob Manfred in the MLB Players Association? What do you think?
ALEX: I think so, he’s made it very clear that the, the animosity that defined the offseason is, is not how he’d liked this relationship to be going forward. So, where are we 6, 7, 7 years into his tenure as a Major League Baseball Commissioner?
BOBBY: Which means we’re also 7 years removed from when he said that one of his top priorities was having a good relationship with the players.
ALEX: He’s like, no, at this time, I’m really, I’m really serious.
BOBBY: And to prove that to you, here’s some headphones that you can use on the plane.
ALEX: Right. Unfortunately, they’re only preloaded with the newest YouTube album.
BOBBY: You can get the newest YouTube album, the Buster Olney MLB podcasts. And nothing from Ken Rosenthal.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: Okay, well, baseball is back, Alex. We have a ton to talk about, including our voyage down to Washington DC to see Max Scherzer’s debut with the Mets. As well as Chris Bassitt;s debut with the Mets. Less talked about, but equally as important to you, Alex Bazeley.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Former reformed A’s fan? I don’t know, TBD, you haven’t decided yet. Plus a bunch of stuff that doesn’t just relate to the New York Mets including the fact that the, the team that they were playing this weekend is potentially up for sale. We will get to all of that as well as some listener questions. But before we do that, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I am Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: And you are listening to Tipping Pitches.
[5:32]
[Music Theme]
BOBBY: Okay, I know we have a lot to talk about. But first, we have to do storytime.
ALEX: All right. Do you have, do you have a story cued up, that you want to, you want to grace the listeners headphones with?
BOBBY: Their Bose headphones.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Free from Rob Manfred, universal basic headphones. Yes. Here’s the story. It, the day is Sunday, April 10. You and I, as well as our partners are loaded into a car to drive back up to the great city of New York, more specifically, Brooklyn. Where the four of us all live.
ALEX: “The Big Apple” as it’s known. I’m walking here.
BOBBY: Keep going. You got more of this? If you can make it here, you could make it anywhere. Concrete Jungle.
ALEX: There you go. Where dreams are made of?
BOBBY: Yup! No, we’re in the car. We’re on our way back. And we’re in the great state of Delaware, Alex, and we make a little pitstop. Because, primarily because I had to pee. But secondarily, because we wanted to show some respect for the dignity that has been restored to this country by none other than Joseph R. Biden. And so we stopped at the Joseph R. Biden rest up in Delaware, just outside Wilmington, Delaware. It’s right off 95, they got a Starbucks, that a drive through Starbucks. It was closed, but they did have a drive through Starbucks.
ALEX: To Starbucks, that’s again, this is what Joe Biden is doing to our economy.
BOBBY: Greatest president ever? So we’re standing there, we’re having our photo taken in front of the Joseph R. Biden rest stop sign.
ALEX: Right. I think I wanted, I wanted the sign that, that displayed all the beautiful amenities that graced the–
BOBBY: Right, is different, the different fast food chains that you could attend at the Joseph R. Biden.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Participate in–
ALEX: [7:41]
BOBBY: –give back to the economy via. And I look to my right, as we’re standing there saluting the camera. And you know who’s walking by? Of course, you know who’s walking by, you were there, the listeners. You know who’s walking by? 1986 World Series Champion, first baseman, Keith Hernandez.
ALEX: Yeah, I just like to say, there is a, a picture out there and, and, and maybe we’ll post this on Twitter once the, once this pod drops. I am standing there staring directly into the camera. Just–
BOBBY: Saluting.
ALEX: –in full salute.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: And Bobby is looking to the right. Just mouthed slightly a gape, as he realizes who that is.
BOBBY: I just want to say, it took me precisely .001 seconds to know that that was Keith Hernandez. I had no second, I had no doubts, no second guessing in my head at all. I saw him for a split second. And I looked you right in the eyes and I said that is Keith Hernandez. And you said, what? And I said, that is Keith Hernandez. And I think I pointed at him. Yep!
ALEX: Yes, you did. He was, he was just kind of, I don’t know if wandering is the right word, but it doesn’t feel like the, the wrong word he deserves.
BOBBY: No, [9:01] I would, I would call it a wander.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: It was pretty aimless. If we’re going to be honest.
ALEX: [9:05]
BOBBY: If we’re going to be, if we’re going to be truth tellers here.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: He was looking for the car to get back into to go back to his home, I believe.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: But that didn’t stop me from walking up to him.
ALEX: Nope.
BOBBY: And saying, hey, Keith!
ALEX: And, and I have to admire that he, he did not miss a step. He didn’t slow down.
BOBBY: Nope.
ALEX: It was kind of just an implied like walk with me. The car was act was pulling up at–
BOBBY: It’s like a mound visit. It’s like when- catch her comes and meets the pitcher halfway. They walk back to the mountain together, that’s what Keith Hernandez and I did.
ALEX: Exactly. And I by all accounts, I mean, I was able to witness this interaction. He seemed respectful in the, in the seven or eight words that were exchanged.
BOBBY: Yeah, I think I said, “Hey, Keith!” And he said, “Hey!” And I said, “I’m a big Mets fan!”
ALEX: As, as one does.
BOBBY: What else do you say to Keith Hernandez? What should I have said? I’m a niche leftist, slightly successful baseball podcaster, check me out. Should I have grabbed Keith Hernandez his phone and subscribe to the Tipping Pitches?
ALEX: It’s really unfortunate neither of us actually had Tipping Pitches merch or, or stickers on our persons.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Because that would have been the moment. Hey, Keith, I have a gift for you.
BOBBY: This was the chance to go mainstream.
ALEX: It really was.
BOBBY: However, a couple of years ago, when the New York Metropolitans SNY booth. They had a conversation about unionizing the miners. You’ll remember, between Gary Cohen and Ron Darling, you know who was absent? Keith Hernandez, not sure how you would take into that conversation.
ALEX: Yep!
BOBBY: Not sure. Hey, Keith not to get political but unionize the miners, dude.
ALEX: That whole rest stop just felt like a fever dream. Like–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –I still am–
BOBBY: [10:54] like Hotel California.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: We might still be at the rest stop doing this podcast.
ALEX: Exactly. He turned into this forever just walking to his car.
BOBBY: Keith Herna- there’s a greater than 25% chance that Keith Hernandez saw saluting and taking a photo with the Joseph R. Biden rest stop sign.
ALEX: Do you think that, that would have heightened his respect for us?
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: I don’t think that he would have saluted the sign with us if that’s what you’re asking.
ALEX: If it was the Ronald Reagan rest stop or did have heightened his respect for us?
BOBBY: I think, now we’re talking. Now we’re talking. Okay, let’s talk about, let’s talk about Nats Park. You’ve never been?
ALEX: I’ve never been.
BOBBY: First impressions?
ALEX: Great vibe. Great experience. I, you know, let’s start at the, let’s start at the beginning. So you walk, you walk right in. It’s kind of it’s kind of nice. You can like walk right off the street into the stadium, kind of into that, that centerfield area is open. The gates are right there. We, we took public transit there, it was, it was very easy. And overall, it was a really, really lovely experience. I really, I enjoyed that concessions. I actually have to say, that may be the most I’ve paid for a beer at a ballpark.
BOBBY: Really? How much did you pay? You know what, you know what, I’ll say about the concessions. They don’t do a good job of telling you how much you’re about to pay. I wouldn’t looked at my credit card statement today. And I was like, that is what I paid for that, 16.75, okay, yup!
ALEX: Yeah, yeah, my beer was like $18 or $19.
BOBBY: Oh my God!
ALEX: Which for like a, for Goose Island IPA that felt slightly steep. Like I, I would be able to buy almost two six packs at, at the bodega around the corner from me.
BOBBY: Which is also marked up.
ALEX: Right. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I mean, you have to factor in that in order to keep our, our great capital clean and, and safe, and beautiful. That you just got to pay a little extra, will DC tax for your Goose Isla- Island IPA?
ALEX: Well, I can only assume that my money will be funding the incoming Juan Soto extension.
BOBBY: This is the future that Joe Biden wants? No, your money will be funding, better revenue numbers to put on the piece of paper, the memorandum of agreement when the Lerners sell the Nationals. Which is something that we learned just today that they are interested in doing, according to a Washington Post report. Do you think that it benefits the Lerners more or less? Do you think like, do you think they would have been better off dropping this story before the season? Or do you think that now fans are like yeah, the team is pretty bad. Maybe they should sell it.
ALEX: It’s a little hard to say, they had, just a couple of years ago, said steadfastly that they would never sell the team as long as they were alive.
BOBBY: Breaking News.
ALEX: This is Breaking News. Can someone check on Ted Lerner?
BOBBY: Be careful how much you talk about that, because he’s one of the older owners.
ALEX: I know. It’s kind of tough, because there was, there was obviously a lot of crowing about the financial woes of Major League Baseball over the course of the offseason. So like, when is, when is the right time to drop that you’re about to cash out.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: They purchased the team for a measly $450 million. And the franchise valuation stands at around 2 billion right now.
BOBBY: That’s more than 450.
ALEX: That is, that is a little bit more. Yes.
BOBBY: So do you think that, do you think that Rob Manfred didn’t want them to leak that they were interested in selling the team? To draw attention to how much money they were about to make. Like return on investment from their purchase price? I’m just trying to understand the calculus of why this would come out 4 days into the season.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Seems like weird timing. And obviously I don’t want to put too much stock into the fact fact that this is when it comes out. Maybe this just happens to be it’s tax season. And the Lerners are like, we want to reassess our financial situation.
ALEX: Right. They looked at their bottom line as, as I do every Sunday evening and said, oh shit! I got to dial it back.
BOBBY: Yeah, or, or maybe just they’ve been looking into this for months, but because the, the distractions of the lockout or whatever. I don’t really know, the state of MLB ownership is super weird. Because, a partially, partially because of what you said about the Lerners, I wouldn’t have pegged them to be what they have said themselves. I wouldn’t have pegged them to be one of the people looking to cash out. One of the ownership groups looking to cash out. They are among the more active and present owners in Major League Baseball. They also, you know, to their credit, put a decent amount of resources into the team when they were making their World Series push. Now, there’s a lot to dislike about the Lerners and the way that they’ve owned the Washington Nationals too. Namely, never shelling out for the top top contracts. So the cynic in me says, they don’t want to have to deal with another round of bad PR. The way that they did when they let Bryce Harper walk again with Juan Soto. But that’s just the general cynic in me. That’s actually the optimist in me. Because here comes Steve Cohen, baby. Future New York met Juan Soto. Let it sink in.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: We’re less than 15 minutes into the pod. I’m already fantasized about Juan Soto being on the Mets.
ALEX: Yeah, I think Steve’s presence may have been too much for them.
BOBBY: Wow. Can’t take the heat, get out of the NL East?
ALEX: Yep, pretty much. Who swoops in now? Just one, Jeffery Preston Bezos make a push for it?
BOBBY: The listeners don’t know this, but you had to just stop. pause, and look up Jeff Bezos’ middle name.
ALEX: [16:51]
BOBBY: The commitment to birth certificate accuracy for Jeff Bezos, here on Tipping Pitches, I appreciate that.
ALEX: Sorry. I should have said Jeffery Preston Bezos born Jeffery Preston Jorgenson.
BOBBY: Bezos is not his real last name.
ALEX: No. Well, okay. To be fair, it was his mother got divorced from Bezos’ biological father. And his mother married Miguel Bezos. And I guess Mike, henceforth adopted, Jeff Bezos and, and–
BOBBY: [17:27]
ALEX: –legally changed his surname.
BOBBY: Okay, no ulterior motives here. He just didn’t think that Bezos sounded easier.
ALEX: Right. He was like, I need to have like a weird letter in there.
BOBBY: It’s an interesting question, who buys the Nats? I doubt that Bezos will buy the Nats.
ALEX: Right. I mean–
BOBBY: He might buy the entire league, or is there, I was thinking about this earlier, because people were talking about Bezos coming in and, and buying the Nats. Which would be the ultimate bad beat for Nats fans. We just got the richest owner and, in baseball history, one of the richest owner in sports history. And then Jeff Bezos comes in and he’s worth 100x with Steve Cohen’s worth. Incredibly bad beat that would be for us, for us sickos over here in Queens. Is there, is there like a rule about a conflict of interest, if you own streaming rights for the games, but you’re also an owner? Because I can’t think of any owners right now, who own any stakes in any of the broadcasting companies that currently put Major League Baseball games on TV. However, Ted Turner for the Braves did broadcast a lot of games for a long time.
ALEX: Well, I thought had thought that many teams had financial stakes in the RSNs.
BOBBY: I guess that’s true. Yeah, the Mets own SNY.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But it’s, it’s just feels a little bit like a further reach if you’re the owner of Amazon and Amazon as the exclusive rights holder to streaming Major League Baseball games–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –you know, which–
ALEX: And, and–
BOBBY: –is a possibility in a couple of years.
ALEX: And you also own the, the primary newspaper of, of your locale that covers the team.
BOBBY: This just an Alex and Bobby discovered monopolistic behavior on the podcast.
ALEX: Is he allowed to own both of those?
BOBBY: Wait, he can’t do that. That doesn’t seem right. Somebody do something about this.
ALEX: I will say, I think billionaires owning monopolies surrounding the entire exhibition, and consumption of the sport would make it easier for the government to step in and just expropriate at all, right? Like you’ve fewer, fewer targets to go after.
BOBBY: So you’re saying it has to get worse before it gets better?
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: Any chance that the government just does this anyway with the Nats you know, as a little patriotism?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Here’s a question, here’s a question. Joe Biden executive order, we will be expropriating the Washington Nationals tomorrow, obviously, emergency pod number one.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Number two, do you become a Nationals fan? Just because of that?
ALEX: Are you saying that Joe Biden is announcing on behalf of the country that, that the United States government now owns it?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: Or Joe Biden himself now?
BOBBY: No, no, no, no, no. Joe Biden executive order from the Office of the President of the United States, says, the United States now owns the Washington Nationals. Are you in that span now?
ALEX: I, I don’t even want to think about that possibility. Like all of a sudden–
BOBBY: There’s 21 privately owned teams and one that’s just owned by the US government?
ALEX: Right. All, I mean, all of a sudden that instead of that $19 IPA funding are just lining Ted Lerner’s pockets. It’s like funding drone strikes in the Middle East.
BOBBY: Ohh, wow! You went with drone strikes? I was gonna go with funding textbooks.
ALEX: Is that what you think the United States government does?
BOBBY: Yeah, I’m doing PR for the good old USA right here.
ALEX: Jesus. I mean, it doesn’t even matter because it’s not like Joe Biden would be able to ever do that, you know.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like, like he can’t even pass–
BOBBY: He would need, he would need the house and the, the President’s office, as well as the Senate.
ALEX: Right. Maybe you do it through reconciliation? I don’t really know how that works. I just thought maybe.
BOBBY: it’s just a worst that I’ve heard. All right. Well, food for thought, food for thought. You consider, I mean, you’re looking for a new team.
ALEX: Right, kind of I am right now, yeah.
BOBBY: I’m just giving you some options.
ALEX: I say–
BOBBY: I’m just giving you a path.
ALEX: Right. I, the, the easy, the easy joke here is, I think Walgreens should swoop in and just tie everything together, right? Like–
BOBBY: Right, because of the logo.
ALEX: Because, because of the logo. Famously, I don’t know–
BOBBY: [21:58] logo.
ALEX: –if, I don’t know if you’ve heard about this.
BOBBY: Looks kind of like the Walgreens logo.
ALEX: Looks a little bit like the Walgreens W, yep!
BOBBY: I said we moved the Nats again, get them out of DC. Where are we going to put them?
ALEX: Drain the swamp, am I right?
BOBBY: Okay, speaking of baseball teams at the greater, Washington, DC metropolitan area. The Baltimore Orioles, Alex. They put out a press release just in time for Tipping Pitches today, just in time. I’m really glad that did this.
ALEX: I’m glad we waited until Monday to record this.
BOBBY: Yeah, yeah. Well, when were we going to record it? We were too busy making a pilgrimage to the Joseph R. Biden rest stop.
ALEX: That’s true.
BOBBY: They put out a press release, really excited, just really excited about the fact that they’re going to get $1.2 billion in public funding from the state of Maryland. I think they thought this was gonna go over well. I think they thought they were like, people would just be like, oh, great, $1.2 billion, this place is gonna look so much better after this. And within minutes, it was released in our circles of Twitter. Pretty roundly-mocked for doing a victory lap over taking taxpayer money?
ALEX: Right. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: To build around Camden Yards, which is already in, you know, a nice looking ballpark, which is relatively new. And I think the, the third element of this is that the Orioles are just so bad that any amount of public funding getting directed towards them. Not that there should, there’s ever an instance where there should be public funds but towards the team. But of all the teams that have earned it, it’s not the Orioles.
ALEX: No. Right. So this is gonna go towards, quote, “reinvestment and reimagination” of the Camden- Camden Yards–
BOBBY: [23:39] to reimagined.
ALEX: –sports complex? Yeah, I do have to, there’s a lot in this press release that talks about the last decade or so. last 30 years, really, of the Baltimore Orioles franchise, the various successes? Question mark.
BOBBY: Here’s why we should get $1.2 billion.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Cal Ripken Jr.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. it’s, it’s–
BOBBY: It’s worth 1.1 billion alone, at least.
ALEX: Yes, yeah. They go to great lengths to point out the, the more than $10 billion in economic tourism impact generated by the Orioles.
BOBBY: Economic tourism impact.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: We’re just saying things now.
ALEX: You’re just, we’re just using words.
BOBBY: Any words can go together. If you say them together in a press release.
ALEX: They do point out that they were the winningest team in baseball from 2012 to 2016.
BOBBY: They love that is that.
ALEX: A great span of five years. I am, would they care to share what happened in the next five years?
BOBBY: Oh, the next five years. I thought you were gonna say what they cared us to share what happened in the 2015 AL Wild Card Game. And I was gonna say, please, please show some respect to Mets Manager Buck Showalter.
ALEX: No, there’s, there’s a lot in here about their, quote, “rebuilding” of the team in–
BOBBY: Right, in number one farm system, the state of the art, new player development.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And facilities, they talk a lot about that.
ALEX: I think they just, they mentioned like incorporating analytics, that’s what their scouting, I guess?
BOBBY: Cutting edge, I’m glad to know that you weren’t doing that before. Here’s my favorite part of the statement. On the entertainment front. We followed up hosting one iconic music artist in Billy Joel before the pandemic. With an equally legendary performing force in Paul McCartney, as we aggressively remake the national image of Baltimore. Wow. So they want to rebuild the national image of Baltimore into Billy Joel and Paul McCartney concerts? Certainly a take. An Oriole Park at Camden Yards as a must play destination for every world class tour and marquee event. Olivia Rodrigo comes in rid of Baltimore Park.
ALEX: Marquee spelled just wrong, also.
BOBBY: Oh, you’re right. Yeah, Marquee that was with two E’s.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: I should give them credit, right? They obviously spend the almost the entire press release, talking about things that may- like it ranges from creative interpretations of the Orioles history to just like, outright lies. But here’s what they have to say about how the money will be used.
BOBBY: I’m ready. I’m coming into this with an open heart. I’m willing to be won over by this Peter Angelos.
ALEX: That’s it. That’s what they have to say about it. That’s everything.
BOBBY: That was a good bit. That was good. Good job. Good joke.
ALEX: I don’t know, man. I, I don’t even know how you take this sort of thing seriously.
BOBBY: No, we are such a failed society, like we have failed so badly. It’s not just this either and it’s not just baseball. Like we didn’t even have a chance to talk about because this happened outside of baseball, it also happened at a really important time for like CBA negotiations. But you know, what the Buffalo Bills got from the city of Buffalo and the state of New York? $6 billion in public funding. That is six, with nine zeros after it. From you and I, New York State residence. That is nuts! Like, I mean, I do know how we got here, but I just don’t know how we got here. I don’t know how this is any, anywhere near the politically acceptable window of reality?
ALEX: Yeah, absolutely. Like they, they go out of their way to note that, you know, this success in the mid 2010s is a quote, “Remarkable achievement under Baseball’s unique system. That challenges teams from small and middle markets, in in ways that no other sports league does.”
BOBBY: Now we’re just making up market sizes.
ALEX: So, so you can receive $1.2 billion from the state.
BOBBY: Yep.
ALEX: And just you’re still a small market? Small or mid market?
BOBBY: I love that they’re trying to invent the middle class, but for Baseball market. Like the middle class did so much for, you know, politicians just at all. And so now baseball owners like why don’t we try that? We’re a middle market team.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Pretty soon the Yankees are gonna be like, we’re just upper middle class market or upper middle market, you know.
ALEX: Right. The Orioles are just waiting for that money to trickle down, you know?
BOBBY: Oh, boy. I love that, that’s one of my favorite parts of this too, is is the incredible self-own it is to say that you’re working with less resources. And that you can’t possibly win against all of these, like, against all of these big bad superpowers. And yet, you’re also getting $1.2 billion from the state. It’s like when we talked about with John Fisher. how his underlying argument was trying to heist the A’s out of Oakland, is that it’s not profitable to play baseball in Oakland. And yet, they’re going to get, you know, they’re going to get $12 billion or they’re going to spend $12 billion on building a new ballpark. TBD how much of that is coming from the City of Oakland. But some of it for infrastructural, you know, repairs and development around Howard Terminal. And you’re you’re saying all of that, plus all of the national money that we know that teams get. Plus the local money, which you know, you could make very profitable. Because San Francisco is doing it just across the bay and it’s all about TVs, which I don’t know if you know this, but you don’t actually have to be in person to watch the game on TV. Plus the billions of dollars that you have inherited from the Gap, the Gap, you inherited that money from the Gap. And all of those built in advantages, you still can’t make baseball profitable in Oakland? That just means you’re just bad, you’re just a bad businessman.
ALEX: Yes. There’s a lot of telling on yourself that goes on with MLB owners.
BOBBY: Yes. And that is what this statement by the Angelos family is, to me.
ALEX: The last thing that I’ll say about this, and then we can, I don’t know if you peek, we talked about actual baseball if you want? Or we haven’t really watched much actual baseball. So–
BOBBY: We spent a lot of time watching the Mets and Nationals.
ALEX: Right, yeah, there you go. Is the way it was announced this thing that they’re so very proud of was, like, buried in a link, you know. Like the tweet that they sent out, was just a message to our fans. Like, I had no idea what was going to be behind that link. You know, I was, I was like, this might be early 2000s era like, you know, shock site–
BOBBY: [31:03] trolled.
ALEX: Right, you got rickrolled or something or something much–
BOBBY: Like something jumps out at the screen and yells at you?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: A message to our fans, I wish this was the Mets who did this, because then it would have been a message to our fans and the link would have been .medium.com. Never forget. Okay, do you wanna talk about Baseball?
ALEX: Yeah!
BOBBY: I, I have a couple of things to say about the, the past few days in Baseball the past week in Baseball. But I’ll let you go first. Anything that really jumps out at you? From the first four games of the Major League Baseball season?
ALEX: Yeah, there, there are a few things that have really, really excited me.
BOBBY: How do you want to package the segment? Like what sports radio? Why do you want to do like early overreactions? Speed round from the first week of Major League Baseball.
ALEX: Oooh yeah.
BOBBY: Top 10 things that I loved from the first four games. The players that you need to pick up in your fantasy league. Which one? Just keep me going, I’m like a wheel, I’m spinning just stop me when you hear when you like.
ALEX: Right. Maybe like a, like a over under and we just it’s just a betting segment–
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: –right?
BOBBY: No, no.
ALEX: Odds, odds that, Ke’Bryan Hayes.
BOBBY: Goes to one Major League Baseball park is suddenly a sportsbook odds that Ke’Bryan Hayes is what? Because he’s hurt.
ALEX: Is still on the team by the end of his newly-signed contract. Which was, which was like–
BOBBY: [32:34] odds.
ALEX: –yes. Solely done to just maybe like, indicate that they’re not completely not trying, right? It was like see we this is the biggest Baseball–
BOBBY: [32:44] to which very tradable contract.
ALEX: Right, exactly.
BOBBY: We’ll see about that one.
ALEX: Let’s see, biggest takeaways. Guardians Rookie outfielder Steven Kwan is Tony Gwynn?
BOBBY: Good.
ALEX: He’s a, he’s a real good player.
BOBBY: Sounds like you’re, you, you’ve selected the early overreactions option. I love it.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: Okay. Here’s mine.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Byron Buxton is gonna have a 15 more season.
ALEX: That’s not even an overreaction. I’m here, I’m here for it. I’m on the MVP train.
BOBBY: You’ve been on the Buxton MVP trade for like five years.
ALEX: Right. At some point it’s gonna hit you know.
BOBBY: That’s it. He’s been incredible so far. Joey Votto owns all social media. Man came on social media 10 days ago, and is already better than like everyone in or out of the baseball world.
ALEX: Yeah. I’m, I’m forced to assume that this is the reason [33:36] Elon Musk backed out from being on Twitter’s board.
BOBBY: He was afraid of bottom tower.
ALEX: Because he was too intimidated.
BOBBY: Yeah, that’s exactly right. We dodged the bullet with that Elon Musk thing.
ALEX: Like we’re not even gonna talk about that.
BOBBY: That would have been really–
ALEX: Wow!
BOBBY: –just if Twitter just ended. I mean, I’m not saying the podcast would be completely dead. Maybe it would be freeing in a way we wouldn’t have to tweet. Just do the podcast. On second thought, Elon, come back, come back to the board, maybe buy the Nats while you’re at it.
ALEX: Let’s see Seth Beer with a walk off home run on National Beer Day. It’s a man after my own heart.
BOBBY: Hunter Greene throws hard. And it’s really good, really incredible. I actually don’t know if he’s good. I don’t know if any young pitcher is good.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Even most highly touted pitching prospects. It’s impossible to tell.
ALEX: Well, I mean, that’s the thing, right? There’s no such thing as a pitching prospect. That is, that is the adage.
BOBBY: Pitching prospects are way more fun than, than hitting prospects though. Because every hitting prospect who comes up is, is bad, for a little while, most of the time. Even Mike Trout was bad when he came up. I have a lot of not actual money but you know, clout riding on the fact that Jarred Kelenic isn’t actually bad, but he might be bad. But then when a pitching prospect comes up, you pretty immediately see why they were ranked how they were ranked.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: You see the stuff right away. It’s no, the stuff is no worse than it will be two to three years from now. It’s just command and how they use it as the thing that really changes. Like you grow more mature and you know when to use what pitch and that kind of thing. But the electricity of a pitching prospects and and called up is some of the best shit that we have–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –in this game. And and Hunter Greene, I mean just blown people away with one or two up in the zone. That’s, that’s the good stuff right there.
ALEX: Yeah. Well also, pitching prospects you can actually watch, right? Like there’s actually a decent chance that you will be able to watch them for at least–
BOBBY: Couple of hours.
ALEX: –half the baseball game. You know, like they are, they are the quarterback of baseball. And so you actually get to see them command the flow of things. And that’s much more fun than seeing a guy come up and go like–
BOBBY: Rollover?
ALEX: Yeah. 0 for 4 with a couple pop flies in his debut.
BOBBY: Yeah. That’s why Wander’s debut was amazing. Because he was just spraying it around the field immediately.
ALEX: Yep. It was like, Oh, this thing that everyone says you are the best at, you are.
BOBBY: He’s 21.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: He’s 21.
ALEX: Yep.
BOBBY: That is five years younger than us.
ALEX: Yeah. You want to know who’s, six years younger than us? Is Rōki Sasaki, the 20-year old–
BOBBY: Had, that’s on my list too.
ALEX: –who threw a 19 strike out perfect game in Japan.
BOBBY: 13 strikeouts in a row at one point.
ALEX: Ridiculous! Kerry Wood could never.
BOBBY: Except Kerry Wood did, what you’re talking about? That was–
ALEX: An in 105 pitches.
BOBBY: Like that’s like the stuff of myth.
ALEX: Yeah. Like, how do you even–
BOBBY: Was he just striking out everybody on three pitches? Because 105 pitches in 19 strikeouts, that’s, that’s 57 pitches right there of just the strikes required to get those strikeouts. That’s insane! My first thought, I hate that I’m this ethnocentric of a baseball fan. But my first thought was like, when he’s [37:04] Major League Baseball? I’ll just be honest. Like, he could say an MVP forever, that would be great.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: My first thought was like Mets please sign. I, Steve Cohen, go get him.
ALEX: I think all the other NPV hitters are thinking the same thing–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –to be honest.
BOBBY: Please, for the love of God. Yeah. Couple of things I have written down here, Alex. Carlos Rodon is going to probably win the Cy Young. Because he went to the Giants. And they’re going to somehow find a way to keep him perfectly healthy. And he was obviously great last year. And you know, he’s had a lot of problems with injuries that have affected that have, had something to do I would guess with his varying effectiveness throughout his career. But he’s, he’s always been, he’s always had an amazing he’s always had amazing stuff. He throws 98 from the left side. He has a wipeout slider. I’m like, how did the Giants just keep getting away with this?
ALEX: Like the “Breaking Bad”, it’s just like–
BOBBY: Yeah!
ALEX: [37:58] for me.
BOBBY: I was like Kevin Gausman is gone. I guess just bring back Carlos Rodon. Like, whatever. No big deal.
ALEX: Yeah, I’m, I’m on board with it. I don’t really have strong feelings on him. But it was, it was fun watching him. It’s fun watching him in the playoffs the last couple years, I guess?
BOBBY: That’s Mike Bauman’s guy.
ALEX: Oh, yeah?
BOBBY: Yeah, it goes Lance Lynn, number one. Big Mike Bauman, Orioles pitching prospect–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –number two, because the share name.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Right. But that’s pretty pride and joy of the Oriole way.
BOBBY: Right, exactly.
ALEX: That’s what $1.2 billion gets you.
BOBBY: Bauman probably supports the $1.2 billion in public funding, if I know anything about him is that he thinks that we should take more public funding and give it to billionaires.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Carlos Rodon, number three. And Alek Manoah, number four, because he kind of looks like Lance Lynn.
ALEX: I love that.
BOBBY: Anything else for you?
ALEX: Amazing news from down in St. Petersburg. They sold out opening day! It could be done.
BOBBY: Wow!
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Wow. All the fake news media saying that they’re just no real Rays fans.
ALEX: Right. I, I should mention that it’s because they didn’t open the upper deck. But you know what, that’s, these are just, these are just, this is just counting magic, you know. This is what baseball teams are good at, is just moving the decimal points around.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Moving the goalposts, moving their teams, how the city like.
BOBBY: This is like that scene from (500) Days of Summer, where it’s like expectations versus reality. It’s like the rosy, everybody’s really excited on the expectation side. We’re all having fun down here at Section 110. And then the reality is the camera pans out.
ALEX: Zoom out.
BOBBY: There’s covers on the seats in Section 310. Really tough. I don’t even think that the amount of Nationals fans this weekend would have filled even the bottom row–
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: –of the stadium.
ALEX: There’s probably–
BOBBY: At least–
ALEX: –more Mets fan.
BOBBY: –at least, oh, I think definitely more Mets fans, I think definitely more Mets fans. Last thing, Alex, I’m still anti robo umps. However, if we develop robot umps that can figure out what the hell a balk is, they might get me, they might get me. It’d be like if Joe Biden was like, no, I’m putting in universal health care. Like, I might just be excited about voting for him.
ALEX: Yes, this is the only possible way that they could pass the Turing test is here, you show them a balk, what is it?
BOBBY: That, that, that is passing the Turing test, but also humans can’t do that.
ALEX: Right. It’s so yeah.
BOBBY: It’s like something beyond the Turing test.
ALEX: That’s more like the, the singularity, right? That’s what it is.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: There we go.
BOBBY: That is, okay, okay, we got there. We’ve wat- collectively watched enough sci-fi films between the two of us that we, we saw that joke out.
ALEX: Yep, yep.
BOBBY: Nice work. Okay, this concludes our speed round from the opening week of Baseball. I promise we will actually watch more Baseball by the next time we record. We were just you know, we were at games, so it was hard to watch other games at the same time. We’ll probably have thoughts about K-Rod, which we didn’t get a chance to watch either. The Michael Kay, Alex Rodriguez, ESPN Sunday Night Broadcast will have thoughts about Apple TV+. But currently I have no thoughts about any of those things except for the fact that it’s cool that our friend Hannah Kaiser was on the broadcast.
ALEX: Yep. And you know, regardless of what you think of him, I think it’s cool that Jeff Passan came in with an absolute roast of Michael Kay. In his first 15 seconds on the broadcast. More more guests on broadcast should roast the broadcaster’s.
BOBBY: Okay, let’s take a quick break and when we come back we have a few listener questions to get to.
[41:48]
[Transition Music]
BOBBY: All right, Alex, your listener questions and we’re gonna close it out this week. First listener question comes from Joe. Do the blackout people also get mad when they can’t get wonton soup at Olive Garden? The product, local baseball games is available. Buy it, don’t buy it. Stop acting like the RSN model is something the league is obligated to change for you precious flower. Just kidding. That wasn’t a question that we got in the mailbag. Alex, that was Joe Sheehan having a terrible take about blackouts on the night before the baseball season started. You know what I did not do?
ALEX: What?
BOBBY: Log on to Twitter to defend blackouts the night before the Baseball season started. Did you do that?
ALEX: I thought about it. I did think about it.
BOBBY: Right. You are going to do it from your burner. Because that’s what you really think.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: What you really think is, do people get mad when they can’t get wonton soup at Olive Garden?
ALEX: What?! What an analogy!
BOBBY: I kind of respect the analogy.
ALEX: I do.
BOBBY: Aside from what he is trying to use it for. Sometimes I do want wonton soup while I’m eating another cuisine.
ALEX: Right. Well, and I’m notably this very weekend, we, we were at a, a brunch for a Mexican brunch restaurant–
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: –that had also, I guess just recently opened up a sushi counter?
BOBBY: That’s right.
ALEX: So at this point, I kind of, I am mad, I can’t get wonton soup at Olive Garden.
BOBBY: Thanks for submitting that question to the entire world, Joe Sheehan. Okay, the real questions now, Alex. This first question comes from listener Coco, and an email. Coco asks, “Did you read the article in The New York Times about nationalizing baseball? I really liked the way that you guys have talked about it the past few years, especially in that episode in the spring of 2020. But this feels so wrong. Obviously, it’s The New York Times, so I shouldn’t expect much. But I haven’t heard anyone else talk about it besides you. So I was wondering about your takes.” Alex, did you read The New York Times article about nationalizing baseball?
ALEX: I did.
BOBBY: What did you think?
ALEX: Well, you thought it was a parody. So let’s set the scene that way.
BOBBY: When I first read it, I didn’t think it was a parody. And then I saw someone suggest it was a parody. And then I was like, that makes way more sense. I kind of want it to be a parody, please.
ALEX: It’s, it’s the kind of argument, you know, that, I mean, again, we were behind it. But we dis- disavow this take.
BOBBY: Right. You’re making us look bad in New York Times.
ALEX: Right. It includes choice cuts like Mike Trout’s $426 million contract is effectively being paid by millions of grandparents who just want to tune in to Anderson Cooper or Antiques Roadshow.
BOBBY: Okay. See this is the type of flowery language that it’s, it’s not wrong, but I don’t know what your point is. Why not right? Arte Moreno’s profits are being paid by a bunch of grandparents who want to watch Antiques Roadshow and Anderson Cooper. That’s actually much more accurate.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Mike Trout contract is being paid because he plays baseball and is good at it.
ALEX: Well, and there’s very little in here. There may be nothing in here about anything coming close to historical precedents for this, right? Which we’ve discussed here on this show before about what it might actually look like to nationalize the sport, or at least, you know, have a city government try and snap up a team.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And and it’s not like that has never happened before. But I am not sure that the argument in favor of nationalizing Baseball is broadcasts would be carried exclusively by C-SPAN. Like that’s, that’s–
BOBBY: Get pumped!
ALEX: –your elevator pitch?
BOBBY: Get pumped! C-SPAN here we come! We now interrupt this perfect game being thrown by Shohei Ohtani because Ted Cruz yelled at someone on the floor of the Senate.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. I will say, they probably have the infrastructure for it, right? They do broadcast the Congressional Softball game, every year. So–
BOBBY: Let Shohei Ohtani played in the Congressional Softball game cowards. Well, it’s actually funny that you say that we’ve talked about this before. We get a question from Destin. Who says, “You guys have talked about teams being on publicly by the city or the state. Could you explain briefly or at length, how this would work? Where the money comes from, to spend on players? Is there a board that the team would answer to etc?” I would say that most efficiently for the purposes of being in the second half of this podcast, we will link below to the episode that we did exclusively about this, it’s called, “Could Fans Own a Team?” We did a way back in the first half of 2020, if I’m not mistaken. And we talked about the different models through which Baseball could be publicly owned, or owned by fans. I think we ultimately landed on municipal ownership would be the most moral, I guess?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Being owned–
ALEX: And probably the most effective, right?
BOBBY: The most effective and the most reasonable, being owned by fans is an interesting question. Because how much of it is really being owned by fans? Versus how much of it is a PR coup? Like what the Green Bay Packers have done.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s much more common than like the lower levels of European Soccer for fans to actually own shares of the team than anything in America. There’s not much precedent for it here. So I think all of the questions that Destin poses are good questions that we would have to decide before we actually went through with nationalizing the sport. I mean, where would the money come from? The same place that the money comes from now. It would just the profit would go somewhere else. Namely, back into the state.
ALEX: Which it’s really good!
BOBBY: Yeah. It’s just that, we just don’t have any, like, there are very few examples of things that are owned, publicly owned, that are this profitable. And that’s my intention, call of the things that are this profitable. Got scooped up by the Robber Barons pretty early on, just like baseball did!
ALEX: Yeah. I also, I have to say, when it comes to ultimately finding money in the coffers to pay for things, the government is usually does a decent job of being able to wrangle–
BOBBY: Yeah, dawg.
ALEX: –that all together.
BOBBY: You thought Competitive Balance Tax discourse was bad, way to get to debt ceiling discourse for the Yankees payroll.
ALEX: Jesus.
BOBBY: Just internalize that for a sec.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Nope, sorry. We can’t sign Aaron Judge to an extension, you know why? We’re about to default on our bonds.
ALEX: Yep. Yeah, inflation was–
BOBBY: US [49:00]
ALEX: –making it really tough to compete.
BOBBY: Because Russia started a war in Ukraine. I think it’s safe to say, I mean, this is a conversation that we’ve never really fully gotten into. But if Baseball was nationalized, I think they would be a good argument for the players to make less.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’s not the most popular argument amongst the players. But guess what? It would have brought appeal across baseball fans, apparently.
ALEX: Right. Well, and the argument as it stands now, for players to make what they do, right. Is that they are the labor that is creating the billions and billions of dollars that are coming into the sport, right? And–
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: –better they have it than the already billionaires who run the sport and are not actually producing anything. But if you could make the case that those profits would go towards funding education–
BOBBY: Health care.
ALEX: –health care. Yeah. Now is that where the money–
BOBBY: It’s such a 30 conversation because it’s impossible to know like, what, what form it would take? Would they just become all of a sudden become like, civil servants baseball players? What would that do to Baseball development? Is the reason baseball players become so good and, and devote so much time and money and effort to this because the ultimate payout will be so much. What will that do to the product 100 years from now? These are not questions that you and I have the answers to.
ALEX: No! Absolutely not. We’re, we’re just asking questions.
BOBBY: We’re just sitting in an apartment in Brooklyn just theorizing about what the leftist future looks like. Let’s move on, Alex. Next question comes from Christina, on Twitter. Christina asks, “What was your favorite walk up song you heard from both the Mets and Nats this weekend?” Christina also asks, “Not opening weekend related, when is the Tipping Pitches playlist dropping?” Tipping Pitches playlist already exists. Throw that in the description in the show notes, Alex, please.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: Favorite walk up song you heard? You know, I gotta say, don’t think I could tell you, it’s a single walk up song that played this weekend.
ALEX: Yeah?
BOBBY: Usually I pay attention to these things. However, I pay attention less when I’m at a ballpark. Other than Citi Field. I want to know what the Mets walk up songs are. I don’t really care what the other team walk up songs are.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Plus I was there, you know, they’re with you, [51:28] make friends.
ALEX: Right, it is.
BOBBY: We were, we were loved ones.
ALEX: We were discussing, right? We were enjoying each other’s company.
BOBBY: Holding a Socratic seminar in between every at bat. But the ethics of Major League Baseball.
ALEX: Right. We were calculating win probability, like all the, all of the above. Though, the one that stood out to me if only because it arguably defined the rest of our night was one All The Small Things by blink-182.
BOBBY: Ohhh! That was a walk up song? I just thought you started singing that. I’m serious.
ALEX: Knowing me, it may have been the case. But I believe it was a walk up song. And actually the reason that–
BOBBY: Oh, I felt starting to come into focus. Now the guys on the subway who are also singing it?
ALEX: Yeah, exactly.
BOBBY: I get it now.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah, I will say, so that, so that–
BOBBY: All those $19 beers going straight to the head, I guess.
ALEX: The Friday night game was broadcast on Apple TV, right? And a couple things there, one–
BOBBY: Apple TV+, again. Are you ever going to respect–
ALEX: Jesus!
BOBBY: –Tim Cook?
ALEX: Yeah. Steve Jobs is rolling in his grave.
BOBBY: Seriously, he’s gonna hunt your ass.
ALEX: So a couple things, on, on the broadcast itself, I actually saw that they were putting the players walk up songs in the bottom right hand corner when the players came up. And I think it was like a little, it was like an Apple Music plug, you know, and had the little like logo there, which, you know, once again–
BOBBY: I mean, it’s not the most offensive thing that they’ve put on a broadcast. Nope!
ALEX: Yeah, yeah, insert 30-minute rant about sports betting. Right–
BOBBY: So bad.
ALEX: –right here.
BOBBY: Somehow exponentially worse than it was just one year ago.
ALEX: But, but tying into that they actually made playlists, once again, on Apple Music, featuring the walk up songs of each of the teams. And I’ll say, I think that’s, that’s good.
BOBBY: That’s a good idea.
ALEX: It is a good idea.
BOBBY: Okay!
ALEX: That’s my answer. That’s–
BOBBY: Your answer is All The Small Things?
ALEX: Yeah. I, it spawned a listening session of multiple blink-182 songs. I felt like I was 14 again. It’s a simpler time.
BOBBY: I’ll adopt that as my answer as well.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I don’t think that there was a better song that played that all the small things?
ALEX: I actually don’t think so.
BOBBY: Okay, final question this week. This comes from Rob, who is also a hockey fan. Rob says that he’s not sure if we are following the hilarious situation unfolding in the NHL right now. The Arizona Coyotes are going to be playing in a 5000 seat arena at the Sun Devils campus. That’s Arizona State University for the next few seasons. There are many reasons for this, but the gist is the city or county owns the stadium. And the team is a bad tenant, and has been kicked out. Rob wants to know, says I’m thinking about the MLB. Who’s wondering if we can foresee any situation where the MLB would tolerate a team playing in a 5000 person stadium on a university campus for a period of two to three seasons with no construction started on a new stadium. And if so, what team would have happened to? I think there’s an obvious answer to the second question, Alex. I hate to say it.
ALEX: All right.
BOBBY: But I think it would be the–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –Oakland Athletics. The first question, I, I mean, I guess there is a world like an Armageddon world in which this happens to a team with a completely unforeseen circumstance. But no, I don’t think I could see a baseball team playing in a 5000 seat stadium. As cool as that might actually end up being. Big Rob would come through with the checkbook, the Major League Baseball checkbook. And he would, he would, I don’t know, potentially, in a corrupt manner, lean on the local government to not let this happen.
ALEX: Yeah, well, I, I will say we saw something–
BOBBY: That’s parody, by the way, I’m not accusing Rob Manfred of doing anything corrupt. No racketeering here, Alex. Unless there is, I don’t know, I don’t know if there is or not. This is just parody and joke.
ALEX: Right. We saw something not entirely dissimilar from this in the COVID 19 pandemic, when the Blue Jays were forced to play at their Triple-A affiliate stadium in Buffalo, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And initially, they were limiting capacity to a relatively small number, I don’t know the exact number off the top of my head, right. But when they were 25% capacity, it was in the range of I believe, 6 or 7000 people later on in the year, it was bumped up to like 13, 15,000. Those were obviously different circumstances. The Blue Jays, I don’t think we’re considered a bad tenant.
BOBBY: No, I don’t think so. I think Major League Baseball was considered a corrupt organization by the entire government of Canada. And that’s why they weren’t allowed to play in their normal stadium.
ALEX: Right, right. I don’t think I, I certainly don’t think the league would allow this to happen again, without a viable alternative. Although I do think there are probably a handful of teams that would be okay with just breaking their leases in their current situations.
BOBBY: I mean, then why not? They might get $1.2 billion if they do that.
ALEX: Very well might!
BOBBY: Just for free, or for the amount of bribes that it took to get it, hypothetically, as parody, as a joke–
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: –on a podcast.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: I think you’re right. And, honestly, I’d be open to hearing an argument that it could be more fun from time to time. I don’t think that we should just make every MLB stadium just 5000 seats, and all of a sudden, like way more expensive and exclusive.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And you can actually go because the problem is that not enough people can go and have this experience in person as it currently stands. I don’t want to make that problem worse. But there was something kind of cool about the Field of Dreams game when there was just a few 1000 fans there. And I think that it just creates a different experience. And I’m not, I wouldn’t be mad at varying it. Switching it up, having playing some games here and there at stadiums that don’t just look like the mega amphitheater vibe that we get from every stadium–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –in Major League Baseball right now.
ALEX: Right. Being able to see baseball and not be forced to sit in the nosebleeds would be kind of cool. Even if they were exhibition games. Like I don’t even need to see a meaningful June or you know, August baseball game between the Mets and the Phillies. In a tiny ass stadium, I’m happy to, to go there and see one in March or, or something like that. So I don’t know, I don’t, I don’t hate it.
BOBBY: Just one thing that comes to mind, when you say doing it as an exhibition game or doing it as a one off during the regular season is probably about a year ago or 18 months ago, on an episode of RTC2, CC was talking about how he wants them to play one or two games or one series a year at Hinchcliffe Stadium in Paterson, New Jersey. Which was one of the original Negro Leagues stadiums. It’s where the New York black Yankees played. And it’s being restored right now. And that is like an option that it could host baseball games, once again. That kind of thing would be incredibly cool. It just has to be considered.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Can’t be by accident because you were a bad tenant. I don’t think that that would be good for the league. But there are actually ways to do this in an interesting manner, I think.
ALEX: Yeah, there are ways to actually make it an opportunity to expand the game to markets that maybe don’t actually have access to the game as it currently stands. Now, is the league interested in expanding into markets that don’t have access to the sport? I don’t know! Should we ask Joe Sheehan?
BOBBY: We’ve hit the, this podcast must self-destruct amount of saying Joe Sheehan’s name. So unless you have something else to add about this particular question, or to wrap up this episode of Tipping Pitches, that’ll do it for us this week. If you want to write in or even call in and leave a voicemail for us, you can get us at tippingpitchespod@gmail.com, tipping_pitches on Twitter. You can call us at 785-422-5881. I’m very excited that the Major League Baseball season is back, Alex. Anything else that you want to leave the people with?
ALEX: The last thing I just want to leave the listeners with, some listeners, longtime listeners may know even short time listeners may know that–
BOBBY: Medium time? Medium market listeners?
ALEX: Right. If you, I mean, if you started listening before this past offseason.
BOBBY: Upper middle market listeners? The upper middle term listeners, the middle term listeners, I’m just gonna power through it.
ALEX: You can keep going. You may, you may have realized that there was no–
BOBBY: Powering through is not your specialty. You just start laughing.
ALEX: Yep, pretty much. I just lose my share of thought, it’s fine. There was no Three Up, Three Down this episode, you may have noticed this.
BOBBY: Booo, hisss.
ALEX: Yes, tomato, tomato, tomato. This was the segment where we talked in a little bit of a loose reform, about things that happened around the Baseball world, oftentimes off the field over the course of the past week. And, and it was usually the reason that episodes were more than 90 minutes long. So we, we are gonna bring it back in some fashion. But we’re still working on the format a little bit. So stay tuned for that.
BOBBY: We’re just working on our craft.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: You know, we’re just in the lab trying to get better one pitch at a time.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: One day at a time.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: One bat at a time.
ALEX: We may bring it back once we actually start watching baseball again, I think.
BOBBY: Yeah. That’s, that’s safe to say. In lieu of that I’ll leave the listeners with a, with a little game. Since the topic of the Tipping Pitches playlist and music came up. If, if anyone is so inclined, I’d love to hear people try to guess who picked what songs each week. So if you’re a very dedicated listener, you find yourself writing in an email, you know, maybe just take a stab at it.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Who picked the songs last week? Take a stab on Twitter, whatever that might be. We appreciate everybody who dedicate so much time to listening to the silly podcasts. Thanks, everyone. We will catch you next week.
[1:01:58]
[Music]
[1:02:06]
[Outro]
ALEX RODRIGUEZ: Hello everybody, I’m Alex Rodriguez, Tipping Pitches, Tipping Pitches. This is the one that I love the most, Tipping Pitches. So we’ll see you next week. See ya!
Transcriptionist: Vernon Bryann Casil
Editor: Krizia Marrie Casil
Tipping Pitches 
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