This week, Bobby and Alex commemorate the fifth anniversary of the show by each making five predictions about the next five years of baseball. Lots of fives! Thanks to everyone for making it all possible.
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Songs featured in this episode:
Noah and the Whale — “Five Years Time” • 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, we have a very special episode this week. The listeners of the Tipping Pitches Podcast, it is our five year anniversary. And so of course, to commemorate this wonderful milestone, we’re going to do something a little bit different. We’re going to try to predict the future of baseball, five years from now. Before we do that, I wanted to ask you, in your heart hearts, my good friend, please be honest with me. Did you think we would get here? Did you think we would make it?
ALEX: I suppose, so you’re operating under the assumption that we have made it? Like this is, this is making it?
BOBBY: No, no, no. No, no. I mean, did you think we would make it to five years? Not make it like a star is born, make it, like make it five years from the time that we sat down and recorded the first episode until now?
ALEX: No, absolutely not.
BOBBY: No faith, you have little faith. So if not five years, then how long did you think we were gonna do the podcast?
ALEX: Well, I really don’t know. I just, I, you know, looking back, did I think that us just talking about all time assholes throughout the game?
BOBBY: Good segment.
ALEX: Great segment. Would–
BOBBY: There some, there’s some good stuff early on there.
ALEX: We burned a lot of good ideas. Yeah. When we had–
BOBBY: Did we burn a lot of good ideas? Or did we show promise on our first album, with poor production?
ALEX: Right. We flashed to the tools.
BOBBY: Yeah, it’s like low–
ALEX: We’re still, we’re still a–
BOBBY: [2:04] Tipping Pitches.
ALEX: –little low, low raw, but we had a, I think people–
BOBBY: The label.
ALEX: –people saw potential.
BOBBY: So you’re, you’re just talking about baseball players? And I’m talking about–
ALEX: You’re talking about music.
BOBBY: –perfect, perfect representation of what this podcast has been for the last five years.
ALEX: All that to say, a lot has changed since then. Both, both in the way that we have approached doing this podcast, but also the sport, you know. Like, I don’t even think I could have predicted kind of what the landscape would look like, that we would be kind of operating in, in this sport that we love to hate and hate to love. I think you and I have certainly developed sharper, more kind of calcified views on the systems that define the game, economic, cultural.
BOBBY: It’s a really nice way of putting it. Thanks for being kind to our undeveloped stakes.
ALEX: And that’s why, that’s why I’m so excited to do this exercise, because it’s obviously it’s an exercise in futility, right? No way we can actually predict the future. But–
BOBBY: You might feel that way.
ALEX: You, I know you are our field and rock solid about all your takes.
BOBBY: Yes, I am. It’s the only way to do it.
ALEX: You got to say it with your chest.
BOBBY: Yeah, if there’s one thing that we’ve learned over the last five years, it’s how to say things with our chest. For sure, the way that we delicately weave in and out of 45 minute questions–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –for, for people that we bring on the podcast.
ALEX: Hey, we’ve had our fair share of rants.
BOBBY: That’s true.
ALEX: I know, I know you are, you are all too familiar with that headspace.
BOBBY: I’m prone to the rant.
ALEX: We’re prone to the rant, it’s okay. Someone has to do the work.
BOBBY: I, the Philadelphia SportsRadio was kind of like vaguely on in the background of most of my childhood. And even if I wasn’t actively listening, I think that that, it didn’t not weren’t my brain, let’s say that.
ALEX: Right. There was a bit of nurture going on there.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Your childhood development. It’s obviously an exercise in futility. But I think you and I have learned enough in the last few years kind of doing this podcast and talking with the people that we have that I’m kind of excited to hear what you come up with. What you see as being the future of baseball. Because it could go in a lot of different directions. I think a lot of them will probably be very predictable to listeners of this podcast. I think there’s going to be some common themes. Nothing, nothing new here, exactly. Although we may throw one or two curveballs at you.
BOBBY: Nice, nice Taylor Swift, Phoebe Bridgers reference. My goal is to make this our last pod to annoy you enough on this podcast that you [4:45].
ALEX: We’re never, we’re never gonna get there–
BOBBY: We’re not gonna make it to the next 5 years.
ALEX: –[4:47] so long. I don’t know, should we just like, should we just do the damn thing?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Do you, do you have anything else to say to the listeners before we get into it?
BOBBY: No. I, I don’t want to be too navel gazing. But I, it’s sort of mind blowing to think about how much this podcast has gone through. And how, how profoundly unlikely it is that we’ve continued to put a podcast out every week since that, since five years ago. You know, 2017, we were still in college, we were going to mirror crashing in our student radio station on the weekends, so that we wouldn’t be taking up the time of any of the actual shows that we’re running an airing on 89.1 WNYU. The podcast was lightly edited. And by that, I mean, I made poor edits to it, that if I go back and listen to now, like, I actually cringe, like I get sore from clenching so hard while listening to how bad it sounds. And then I moved to Los Angeles, where I am right now, it’s actually kind of ironic that we didn’t remember that our five year anniversary is coming up. And we didn’t think to do this in person before I left New York. And yet, somehow, basically every week for that whole time, we got on the Zoom. And then since moving back to New York, we met up in my apartment and we have put out a podcast. It’s, it’s startling to me, but it’s not lost on me how much the show has changed, but more so how much the community has changed around the show since then. And so before we even start this funny little exercise for our five year anniversary episode, I just want to say thank you to everybody who has started listening along the way. No matter what point you started listening at whether that was this past offseason and all of the CBA coverage that we were doing. Or whether that was as Alex was talking about the much discussed all asshole episode early on in the podcast. We’re so appreciative. And, you know, I joked with Alex, did he think it was gonna make it to this five year mark? Well, now that it has, and now that people have shown their overwhelming support for us, I feel much more confident that I will make it five more years than I did that it would make these five.
ALEX: Yeah, the sky’s the limit now, right?
BOBBY: Yes, the sky- that is always how I describe us, the sky, we’re really sky’s the limit, guys. Okay, we’re gonna do five predictions for five years from now, on our fifth year anniversary. But before we do that, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I am Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: You are listening to the fifth anniversary of Tipping Pitches.
[7:21]
[Music Theme]
BOBBY: Okay, Alex, it’s time, we got all the thanks. We got all the navel gazing out of the way. It’s time to make our predictions about the future of baseball. We’re the arbiters and–
ALEX: We are arbiters.
BOBBY: –we’re gonna press these levers. And we’re gonna make these things happen.
ALEX: There’s a reason we don’t usually traffic in predictions on this show.
BOBBY: Because we’re stupid?
ALEX: Yes, that’s mostly it. But what better time to, to show our acids than on our five year anniversary, right? I feel like if not now, when?
BOBBY: True. I completely agree. So do you want to go first? Or do you want me to go first?
ALEX: I can, I’ll kick it off.
BOBBY: Oh, yes.
ALEX: I’ll give you the old college try.
BOBBY: Let’s go!
ALEX: Prediction number one, it’s kind of low hanging fruit. And that’s that we are going to get two expansion teams in Nashville and Las Vegas.
BOBBY: Oh, yours, you’re putting them in the cities?
ALEX: I’m, I’m putting them in the cities, baby.
BOBBY: Okay, big man.
ALEX: That’s what our predictions for if, if not to get–
BOBBY: Not to be hilariously wrong [8:39]
ALEX: –hype, hype civic and get, get very wrong. Yes, exactly. I think that the, there’s obviously there’s plenty of movement in Nashville for a baseball team. And it feels like the, the most logical choice for expansion right now. Just because of the financial support between the, the, the Nashville baseball project. The involvement of people both inside the game and outside of the game, obviously. There are some large names attached to it like Dave Stewart, Bob Kendrick, our good friend Tony La Russa as, as well as one former attorney general that we, that we spent a lot of time talking about a few, a few months ago. It just feels like the groundwork is, is set for that sort of thing. And as far as Las Vegas goes, I think the A’s probably end up staying in Oakland. Because they don’t want to take that expansion location off the table. Las Vegas makes perfect sense for baseball team with the, the booming industry of sports betting. And the desire for more baseball out on the, the western side of the, of the country.
BOBBY: Have you thought about how the hell we’re going to cover that when it happens? Because I’ve been thinking about that in the last couple of weeks, as you know, expansion has become a topic in not just baseball but in basketball. And so as you know, as you read articles about what the NBA thinks, you think like, is this going to come with a wave of professional sports expansion? Is MLB going to get in at the same time as this? Are we going to kind of use this as an opportunity for the country to, Oh, welcome expansion teams with open arms no matter what that means, for the locales, and the city governments of these places that they’re expanding to. I don’t, I don’t know. I feel like we might have to do some, some original Tipping Pitches reporting for MLB expansion.
ALEX: We’re definitely gonna get fed a lot of carefully, concocted rationales of, of why the cities are the cities that deserve baseball. And why it’s imperative for the future of the game to include these cities, in the game’s next chapter. But, but you’re right, that I think we haven’t entirely reckoned with what that’s actually going to look like, while it’s happening on the ground for the people of, for example, Nashville, and Las Vegas, or, or, or whatever it might be. And, and how it will also alter a good portion of the game, right? If there’s a decent–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –chance that this comes from, that this comes with some sort of realignment of the divisions as well. I think that like, just the makeup of the league is going to look very different as a result of this. Not to mention just what happens with expansion and an expansion draft, right. I think that’s maybe something that I have not fully mentally prepared for. Although I’m not too worried at the moment about losing any players. That’s what is, what it is really is.
BOBBY: This will just be two more teams that the A’s could trade all their good playing.
ALEX: Right, exactly. Yeah.
BOBBY: It make it easier for Billy Beane. I think that the league is ready for it. Like I think–
ALEX: I think so too, yeah.
BOBBY: –from on its face, I think that it would be good to bring baseball to to new cities. So I withhold my prediction about how it will actually play out because I know that MLB has a knack for ruining most good things. Like the sport in general. Okay, my first prediction is that, so if there are going to be two expansion teams, to Las Vegas, and to Nashville, Alex, you would think that there will be two more markets that are blacked out from watching Major League Baseball.
ALEX: You would think?
BOBBY: Nope! Blackout restrictions are going to be done in the next five years. That’s my first prediction.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: This one feels too obvious. You said low hanging fruit, this is lower hanging fruit. This fruit already fell to the ground, and we’re just picking it up. Because we’ve talked about how Rob has hinted at blackout restrictions going away. Has hinted at a Major League Baseball, independent streaming service where you could pay for it sort of ala carte, even though they already have that. It’s called MLB. TV, and they just choose to blackout some of the games on it to make regional cable executives happy. But I think in the next five years, it just feels so, it feels like no one he wants this. Even the people at the league don’t want the blackout restrictions. They just feel like they’ve backed themselves into a corner. And so they have to uphold those blackout restrictions, because they’re afraid of their cash flow. And to that last point, I think that the financial obligation for getting rid of blackout restrictions is just going to be passed on to you and me, brother, you me and the people listening to this podcast, the people who are actually paying for the service will make up the difference in their money by them raising the prices. And I think they’re ultimately going to come out in the black on this. I don’t think that they’re going to lose money. They’re going to wait until that critical point where there’s a, where they know that the, the cable money is trickling out just enough, and people are just okay enough with paying more for streaming services, that they’re going to jump right into that. It’s a really delicate needle to thread. But I think that they’re gonna do it.
ALEX: Yeah, I’m in agreement with you on, on this one. I think this was when we briefly discussed our choices before recording. This was the one that, that we had real overlap on. I’ve, I think that RSNs are going to fall out of favor. They’re already kind of sputtering a little bit–
BOBBY: Dinosaurs, dinosaur.
ALEX: –right? Yeah. Valley Sports who?
BOBBY: In five years are people gonna be wearing ironic t shirts that say Valley Sports [14:29] on them.
ALEX: This is, it’s time to get it on the ground floor. That’s why I have my Enron Field hat, you know?
BOBBY: Exactly right, exactly right.
ALEX: No, I, yeah, Major League Baseball’s hand is going to be forced. I mean, it, it’s already kind of at a breaking point where these are discussions that are like you said happening not only amongst fans, but amongst front office executives. Uhm, you know, within the commissioner’s office in broadcast booths. It’s such a wildly unpopular business model that it just doesn’t seem viable. Especially when you are trying to expand the game, both literally to two new markets. But also to a new generation of people who–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –are, who are casting off cable entirely. It, it just feels untenable for them to stick with the status quo.
BOBBY: I can’t wait for like the TikTokfication of the Major League Baseball streaming service. Where there’s gonna be like a, a feed that you can swipe through highlights, you know. And every once in a while you get to a TikTok live and it’s just a game. It’s just like a baseball game that you can watch.
ALEX: I, I, I don’t know if you’ve seen that, ironically, or not, but I genuinely cannot wait for that.
BOBBY: I’m saying it–
ALEX: That, that will be amazing.
BOBBY: –kind of ironically, but also like–
ALEX: I think it’s gonna happen.
BOBBY: –also a good idea. Yeah, that’s gonna happen. I think it’s, I think it’s a good idea.
ALEX: We’re already there.
BOBBY: [15:46] probably hurt my brain to consume it.
ALEX: The Yankees are, are good on TikTok. It brings me no pleasure to admit it.
BOBBY: If only plays when Yankees are good. Yeah. Run on the field, bro.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
BOBBY: Let’s put them in the fucking body bag. Let’s go! Let’s go! Yeah, blackout restrictions, goodbye. It’s gonna take away so many easy jokes that we make on Twitter. We’re gonna have to fill the void with something else.
ALEX: I know. Yeah. It has been a very kind of unifying issue for many baseball fans. So–
BOBBY: We need more of those.
ALEX: Maybe a union for fans?
BOBBY: You got any emails on that front recently?
ALEX: I haven’t. I actually went and checked on their like website and social channels the other day, because I was curious. I was like, I haven’t heard anything from you. I was, was putting my my boots on. I was ready to like, go out and do some direct action.
BOBBY: Do you think they’re just like reassessing, you know, the, the landscape?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And they gonna make their move soon?
ALEX: Right. I think they’re trying to figure out a,a, a dues structure.
BOBBY: Right. Organized, I mean, organizing is, is it’s definitely tricky, especially in–
ALEX: It is.
BOBBY: –our society, you know?
ALEX: Yeah. But there’s some good blueprints out there that I think they can kind of take a cue from.
BOBBY: Right, the ALU, Starbucks workers united. And the MLB Fancy.
ALEX: Exactly. These are the bring- bringing us into the future.
BOBBY: The modern labor movement. Okay, what’s next for you? Good bit, nicely done. Golf Club.
ALEX: If you thought we were overloaded with advertisements and marketing within the game now that, that shit is only going to ramp up, man. I, we already know that, like advertisements on uniforms are coming. We’ve already talked about that. I think may–
BOBBY: [17:28] slope me right now?
ALEX: No, I’m not. But I just think we’re not prepared necessarily for kind of the, the way in which the game is going to be auctioned off to the highest bidder, so to speak, right? I think that probably means we see the end of the names of some historic ballparks in the league as well, right? I, I think Wrigley Field is probably not long for this world. Fenway Park, maybe in the same boat.
BOBBY: Do you think they’ll keep those names and then it’ll be like Fenway Park–
ALEX: Yes. That–
BOBBY: –Presented by Amazon?
ALEX: Right. Yeah. Fenway Park at, at FTX Field, you know? Or, or vice versa, right.
BOBBY: Wrigley Field at Bank of America Stadium.
ALEX: Yeah, yes. Lit- but like literally.
BOBBY: No!
ALEX: And everyone will–
BOBBY: I’m with you dude!
ALEX: Everyone will colloquially call it Wrigley. But it is, it is going to be the, the be of a.
BOBBY: Sometimes we get into, Jesus Christ. We get into this rap parte where we’re just making jokes. But it’s also reality, like–
ALEX: Or–
BOBBY: –reality is too hard to parody.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. I don’t know, I don’t have anything more profound to say on this. But I you know, it’s not going to stop there, either, I don’t think.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: We’ve already seen more like more of the in game commercials, you know. During like a, a pause in the action, that only ramps up.
BOBBY: I think you’re right. And I think that, I was thinking about putting something like this someone list too. And the reason that I didn’t, it’s because I couldn’t like hone in on the, on the one thing that would make for a good list item. Because I just think that the general arc of like all major corporations and MLB in this instance, is a major corporations, it’s really 30 major corporations that are colluding together. But all, the arc of all major corporations is just itemizing and dividing every little individual piece of your business and charging people for it. And I think that MLB is no exception to this. I thought about it, I flirted with the idea of putting something on here. That was like in the next five years. Your ticket will be, your ticket to get into the ballpark, you will be charged by inning that you actually want to stay for. But that was a little too dark for me for this fun five year anniversary episode.
ALEX: I thought you were gonna say you were going to be able to start making ticket purchases through like Amazon, for example.
BOBBY: That’s just, that’s in the bag, bro.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Definitely happening.
ALEX: NFT ticket?
BOBBY: That, yes! That someone will try to market it as you, we put it on the blockchain. And then you can much more easily determine how some, how long someone was there. The time of transaction on the Silk Road or whatever the fuck and–
ALEX: Silk Road…
BOBBY: You can tell that I don’t know anything about NFTs. Uhm.
ALEX: This is vaguely related to like the blockchain.
BOBBY: Yeah, it just [20:25]–
ALEX: A drug market.
BOBBY: You joked about whether you’ll be able to buy your ticket through Amazon, you might have to buy your ticket through Amazon, bro. Amazon might buy Major League Baseball.
ALEX: Where they’re scooping properties up? Yeah.
BOBBY: Did you see Amazon’s health care? It’s back in business.
ALEX: One Medical, baby.
BOBBY: That’s cool. I support that.
ALEX: I do. I want Amazon knowing what, what happy pills I’m taking at all times. So that they can more effectively market products that may increase my well being. Or may be a detriment to my well being so they can continue to sell me those happy pills.
BOBBY: No, they would never do that to you. They would never do that.
ALEX: That’s true.
BOBBY: Amazon’s looking out for you.
ALEX: For the little guy.
BOBBY: Exactly.
ALEX: What’s next on your list?
BOBBY: Next on my list, Alex, no we gotta get going on this one, dude, we gotta get going. Next on my list is that Bernie Sanders will appear on Tipping Pitches in the next five years. Bernie if you’re listening–
ALEX: Hell yeah!
BOBBY: –if you’re listening brother, or anybody associated with Bernie Sanders in any way, shape, or form, who could maybe send an email.
ALEX: Right. As the call always goes.
BOBBY: Maybe drop a note, you know. Maybe write it on a little steno pad on his desk. Tipping Pitches Podcast appearance. 1:30 pm, any Sunday. Just dropped that in there, just dropped that note. This one is, is sort of tied to my next one. So I’m not going to spoil that next one too much. But we just have to do it. We just have to do it.
ALEX: Yeah, I think you’re probably right about that. If we’re being quite honest.
BOBBY: So optimistic.
ALEX: I can really talk myself into it, you know, you know, the easiest way to do this is to like, go to Vermont and–
BOBBY: Yeah, I love Burlington.
ALEX: –hang, hang out, hang out at his local grocery store, because he’s going to come through. Like–
BOBBY: And you, we have to like wear Unionize the Minors shirts, you know.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And it seem to make small talk. And we’re like, you know, actually, actually, I happen to have this Pelican case right here with three microphones in my right now.
ALEX: You can go out back in the parking lot.
BOBBY: There’s a little Zoom H6, you know, maybe get some folding chairs just sit in the parking lot.
ALEX: He would be so confused as to what’s going on.
BOBBY: I don’t think he would, I think you’d be down. Weirdly, I think–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –you’d be down. So do you think he retires from the Senate within the next five years? He’s 80 years old. And if so, do you think that makes it easier for us to get him on the pod or harder for us to get them on the pod? Because he no longer, he no longer is busy as busy as he was. But he also no longer needs to come on to talk about things for the greater good.
ALEX: Right. He’s no longer sitting at the levers of power. But I also–
BOBBY: Yeah maybe it makes it easier.
ALEX: Right. Well, I mean, he strikes me as the kind of guy who like isn’t going to slip into obscurity, you know. Isn’t going to be like, nah, my work here is done. I did my best. I don’t really, I’m 85, planet is gonna be underwater soon. I don’t really give a shit what you guys do.
BOBBY: No, planet–
ALEX: That doesn’t–
BOBBY: –be underwater, due. Joe Manchin came sweeping in so [23:38]
ALEX: So true!
BOBBY: Thank you, Joe. Thank you.
ALEX: The savior of the world.
BOBBY: Just two guys named Joe saving the planet.
ALEX: I feel like he probably does retire.
BOBBY: Yeah, I think so too. Maybe for his retirement or he can come on Tipping Pitches.
ALEX: There you go.
BOBBY: That’s how we sell it.
ALEX: All right. We’ve got we, it’s in the works.
BOBBY: You know what–
ALEX: We’ve got the, we’ve got the ball rolling.
BOBBY: The more we talked about it, I feel better. I feel like he’s–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –gonna come on. Yeah, I feel like he is.
ALEX: Who’s optimistic now?
BOBBY: No, because I think about all the other podcasts that I’ve been listening to for five or more years. They’ve gotten there, they’ve gotten there white whales. You know, like, The Rights To Ricky Sanchez Podcast. They talked to Sam Hinkie. Effectively wild. They talked to Rich Hill.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You know, like these, these, if you do it long enough. It’s just you stumble into the opportunity.
ALEX: It happens. Yeah, yeah.
BOBBY: So, I’m speaking it into existence. All right, what’s next for you?
ALEX: Next for me is maybe a bit more of a downer than your, than your rosy prediction that you just–
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: –made for 2027.
BOBBY: Yeah. Rain on this parade.
ALEX: Oh, yeah. Baseball is going to become more expensive.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: It’s the trend has begun and it’s not going to stop. And there are a few different factors that are going to contribute to that. We’re–
BOBBY: I’m over here like we’re going to talk to legend, legendary Senator Bernie Sanders and you’re over here like Rob Manfred will be stealing more money out of the good people’s America–
ALEX: Single handedly bankrupting families.
BOBBY: Are you certainly running for president of the MLB, MLB Fans Union on this podcast right now? Is that what you’re doing?
ALEX: I am, yeah. I think as TV revenues start to level out, right? Which we talked about before, as cable becomes less relevant to the overall broadcasting of the game. As the trend of minority owners, taking stakes in teams, as investment vehicles continues to grow. And it, and it opens up baseball to the broader movements of the global market, as it just becomes another–
BOBBY: [25:46]
ALEX: stock folio. And, frankly, and I know you have a point about this, but as, as minor league pay grows, as the fight for minor league pay continues and sees victories, I think team owners, and the league, writ large, will use these factors to justify the increasing cost of games. Not to mention that salaries will keep rising et cetera, et cetera. I think a lot of these losses that–
BOBBY: We’re going into the wage price spiral in Major League Baseball, dude?
ALEX: We literally are. MLB is entering its recession era. I think there are a lot of good things that are coming for the sport. And I think that some of them may have these sorts of unintended consequences. Or at least unintended on our behalf.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Unexpected consequences.
BOBBY: You know, when I sat down, to write down my list or to, to brainstorm a long list or whatever, one of the things that came into my mind was, will there be any sort of motion towards any kind of publicly owned or run team? And I thought, in the next five years, no.
ALEX: No!
BOBBY: And then I asked myself, what time period would we have to put on this exercise for me to feel confident about putting that on the list? Or not feel confident about it, but like, that it could be reasonable. If it was going to happen, it would happen within X time period. And I was like 10? No, 15? Nah!
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: 20? 2042?
ALEX: Spoke too soon.
BOBBY: No. I think it’s like 30, I think 30. Within the next 30 years, you could see a push at a publicly owned team. Not the whole league publicly owned, not the nationalization of baseball that we sell off and dream and fantasize about on this podcast. But just one effort at a San Diego Padres style thing, where the G.O.A.T. Joan Kroc tries to sell the team to the city. I think in the next 30 years that will happen. And so because of that, because there’s no motion towards anything like that, which would be pro-fan, pro-citizen, pro-letarian. I completely agree with what you’re talking about. They’re just going to nickel and dime us, bro. If we had Bauman here, he’d be yelling about how this is just like cable or just like electric cars.
ALEX: Right, exactly. I mean, this is, when we talk about the way that corporations not unlike Major League Baseball kind of line item, each aspect of their sport and put a price on it. That applies to advertisers, but it also applies to fans, I think. Because they know that, they know that they have a stable base. I’m not sure they’re as interested with actively growing the game to bring in new fans as maybe they say they are. Now that might lead to a shifted mentality as baseball’s main demographic continues to grow older.
BOBBY: It can’t win until we’re in the main demographic and we’re old.
ALEX: I know.
BOBBY: That’s gonna be sick. I feel it’s like a coronation for us, you know. We’ve been a, we’ve been the young fans that they don’t care about for so long. I can’t wait to be the old fans that they do care about.
ALEX: We’re going to be calling the shots.
BOBBY: Yeah, exactly. I feel like you can throw your weight around a little bit more. Rob. I’m in the main demo. You lose me you lose it all.
ALEX: Yeah, the wokeupfication Major League Baseball.
BOBBY: Exactly. Let’s get them.
ALEX: What is, what’s next for you?
BOBBY: The next one is that I think there will be a minor league union. I’ve wrestled with this one. I, I think five years feels fast. But then I thought about it. And I thought about how quickly everything has changed in the last two years. And how unionization efforts when they happen, though the process takes long when you’re in it, and it feels long. And the bargaining of union contracts, especially the first union contract can take years and years and years. Which is too long in real life terms. For the people who are being affected, of course. The calculus of these things changes very quickly, and it feels like we’re in the middle of it changing. And so if it doesn’t happen within the next five years, I think it’s going to take a pretty long time after that. Because that will have meant that the collective energy, the structural changes that we’re making right now, that means that that will have not been parlayed into a union. And we’ll have to make a whole nother run at it 10 years from now, or 15 years from now. When it’s politically favorable again, so to speak. And it’s fucked up that that’s the way that we do it in this country. It’s fucked up that there’s so many hoops that you have to jump through. But if you look around at the rest of society right now, and joked about the ALU, Amazon Labor Union, and Starbucks Workers United, those things happened in like a year. And it’s obviously much different circumstances because it’s more workers going against a smaller corporate structure, versus the corporate structure of Major League Baseball. There’s like more executives than minor leaguers. So it’s, it’s a little bit out of balance. But if I were to predict that there will not be a maj- a minor league union in the next five years, I think what I would be predicting is that Major League Baseball won, briefly, momentarily. And I just don’t, I don’t think that’s going to happen. I, I think that the minor leaguers are going to win.
ALEX: I love your faith. Again, set it with your chest. My only worry is, again that Major League Baseball will make small concessions that will be meaningful upgrades to the quality of life for minor leaguers. But that will also stymie efforts to unionize as conditions do improve. And players feel less inclined than to put themselves on the line by, by publicly coming out in support of the Union. So I, I mean, I don’t think it’s out of the question in, in any regard. And it kind of hinges in part on how obstinate Major League Baseball wants to be in these negotiations. Because the more they dig their heels in, I think the more the more of an urge there will be to create some sort of union like this, right? So I–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –certainly the next couple years are going to be really important, and will dictate which direction that movement goes.
BOBBY: See, the reason I feel better about it is because if it was happening in a vacuum, I don’t think would happen in the next five years. But it’s also happening underneath the shadow of what’s going on between the MLBPA, and Major League Baseball. There was a, there was this lockout, all these people were talking about labor relations in baseball, what it means, how strong the union is holding firm, and it just seems like they’re the the Players Association, the Major League Baseball Players Association, as younger people get into it, is, is getting more militant. And so you would think that the climate of labor in baseball is trending in that direction, too. And you have to imagine that the minor leaguers are looking up to what’s going on at the Major League Baseball Players Association and taking cues from that. And if they say, we think that you guys should make a run at minor league unionization. And they put their effort behind it, because they think that it will make the wider players block stronger, then I think it will happen. But that part of it is very optimistic by me because the MLBPA has, honestly, not to overstate it but never really given a shit about the minor–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –leaguers and the, and their collective power. So it things will have to change. I’m just choosing to be optimistic about those things changing.
ALEX: Yeah, well, and there’s, there are also–
BOBBY: Make- makes it so much easier for the MLBPA if the minor leaguers also have bargaining power and leverage against Major League Baseball. It’s the same–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –way that like, it makes it easier for me in the Writers Guild to also have the news guild bargaining against the executives in media.
ALEX: Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think the trick is going to be how can MLB throw their support behind that without actually giving up leverage? Because I don’t think they’re inclined to do so, right? I don’t think they’re–
BOBBY: Strike.
ALEX: –going to do anything–
BOBBY: Strike, strike.
ALEX: –that would, that would set–
BOBBY: Strike, strike.
ALEX: –themselves back.
BOBBY: Strike, strike.
ALEX: I don’t know, man.
BOBBY: Start pushing cars into rivers, bro. Let’s do it.
ALEX: Max Scherzer just throw in his, his shoulder into it.
BOBBY: Yeah, exactly. Max Scherzer could push a car into a river after an inning and strike out, that’s for sure.
ALEX: Absolutely. Yeah.
BOBBY: Okay, You’re up! I believe we’re on to #4?
ALEX: Yeah, I think we’re, I think we’re on to #4. I’m gonna say something that’s going to happen on the field.
BOBBY: Nah.
ALEX: Are you ready?
BOBBY: The A’s are gonna win a game–
ALEX: Wow!
BOBBY: –in the next five years.
ALEX: Wow!
BOBBY: Coming off a sweep of the Astros, how you feeling? Good? This is where we turn it around.
ALEX: This is yeah, uh-hmm, this is where we turn it around feeling very good. Definitely has nothing to do with a sample size.
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: Yeah, I think they’re in a good position to, to make a push for October. Here’s the thing is that baseball players are really good. I know if you’ve heard this, but they’re better than they ever have been before. A lot of that is due to advancements in biomechanics technology that’s able to better understand how players are able to do the things they do and how you can then teach other players to do those same, same things to increase their capabilities as baseball players. And that’s a trend that is already in motion. But I think we’re only going to see more of the kind of scientific deconstruction and construction of baseball players. And it’s going to mean that pitchers are going to continue to get better, right? Pitchers are going to, you’re going to see more pitchers who are hitting 100, right? More starters, who are able to get up to that. And batters will have improvements as well. But pitchers always just kind of have the upper hand, right? Because they’re the one who control the game. They’re the ones who start with the ball and, and put it somewhere, right? They’re the ones who start the chain of reaction. And it’s the batter’s job to respond to that. So I think with this, so I think with this increase in ability for, for pitchers, I think it’s going to be time for Major League Baseball to do something that shifts the balance of power back towards hitter, hitters in some way. Whether that’s lowering the mound, or moving it back. It just feels overdue at this point. I know they’ve done all this tinkering with the balls. I don’t even want to touch that–
BOBBY: Allegedly, allegedly, allegedly.
ALEX: –allegedly, allegedly. But like that’s not a long term solution, I don’t think. Maybe Major League Baseball sees it that way. But I think they’re going to need to do something that more effectively changes the way the game is played between the pitcher and the hitter. Because we’re like, the pendulum has swung too far, even now, right? Strikeouts read an all time high, it’s time. 2027 is when batters come back into vogue.
BOBBY: Yeah!
ALEX: That’s gonna be a fun ass time too.
BOBBY: Let’s go! I was talking to two co workers this past week. And one of them is the other one is like, oh, if we made you commissioner of baseball, what would you do? And he goes, he goes, first of all, I’d be in the shift. I was like, alright.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: We’re off on a tough, tough foot, tough sledding. And he was like, second of all, I will make runs that were not scored via the home run worst to. And I was like, that is the most ridiculous idea I have ever heard. But I see what you’re saying.
ALEX: I love it, bringing galaxy brand energy to this discussion.
BOBBY: We got to bring line drives back, we just got to bring mind drives back. And it’s sort of what you’re talking about in that, I don’t think that that would be the best way to do it. But to bring balance back to offense that leads to sustained action within the sport. Which you’re not going to get unless you change the chain of reaction that you’re talking about. Because right now it’s so heavily favored towards pitchers. And this was, this was a very popular conversation in the offseason. I feel like less so in the middle of the season, but it’s still going on. It’s still, it’s still there are very few teams that are stringing together hits to score runs.
ALEX: I’ll say that. Yeah, bring back station to station baseball, baby.
BOBBY: That’s exactly right. Big fundies.
ALEX: Big- ever heard it, ever heard it Derek Jeter?
BOBBY: Ever heard of–
ALEX: Ever heard of going the other way?
BOBBY: Yeah, hitting it the opposite way. Hit him where they ain’t. How about that, Alex?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Ever try that?
ALEX: [38:46]
BOBBY: If you’ve tried that you might still be playing.
ALEX: To see ball hit ball? Ring, ring a bell?
BOBBY: Eyes on the prize.
ALEX: Just keep on going.
BOBBY: Swing inside the ball, still don’t know what that one means.
ALEX: Right. Yeah, inside out.
BOBBY: If I didn’t know what that means, I might be in professional sports. I feel like–
ALEX: That was the thing that was holding you back.
BOBBY: –there are only like 300 people on Earth who really understand what that means.
ALEX: Okay, what is, what is your fourth prediction for 2027?
BOBBY: I think by 2027 there will be 1, 2, 3 maybe multiple billionaires who will have tried to play baseball in space. They might be Major League Baseball owners. They might be Elon Musk types. But it just seems like the invoke thing to do for weirdo billionaires is to go to space for no reason. And I think that they’re going to start doing increasingly complicated tasks in space just to say that they were the first person who did it. And I think within the next five years, Major League Baseball is going to partner with one of those billionaires. I gotta say it’s probably Elon Musk, and they’re gonna be like we played a baseball game in space. We made one pitch, and there was one swing, and we did it in space. I think that’s happening within the next five years.
ALEX: And it’s not going to matter at all.
BOBBY: At all! At all!
ALEX: They’re going to do it, it’s going to take like 14 minutes, it’s going to cost like $7 billion.
BOBBY: All that money that they use for this could have solved the entire minor league wage crisis forever, forever.
ALEX: But why do that when you can be a pioneer–
BOBBY: That’s true.
ALEX: –of the next frontier?
BOBBY: Well, I didn’t, I didn’t think about that. I didn’t think about that. And you don’t even have to get dysentery to do it. I have a question, though. Are you gonna watch the space game?
ALEX: I mean, yeah–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –right.
BOBBY: Should we livestream it?
ALEX: But when you say game, they’re not going to play a game, right?
BOBBY: No, no, no, they’re gonna–
ALEX: It’s gonna be, it’s gonna be two astronauts up there. One is going to, I don’t know, they can’t, you can’t throw a ball in space. I mean–
BOBBY: You can’t?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I think you can.
ALEX: I mean, you probably could, but it’s not going to pick up velocity, right? Like–
BOBBY: Well, it’ll have the same velocity as it when it left your hand, it’s not going to lose velocity. It depends on how far away from Earth you are, because there’s gravitational pull from Earth. So this, there’s a lot of astrophysics, frankly, that go into it, Alex.
ALEX: Right, which you and I are both very well-versed in.
BOBBY: I was pretty good at mechanical physics, never got to, never go to the astrophysics level.
ALEX: I don’t even really know what mechanical physics are.
BOBBY: Wow. Wow.
ALEX: So–
BOBBY: Wow.
ALEX: –that’s why I have a baseball podcast.
BOBBY: That’s a lot of mechanical physics in baseball. Uhm, yeah, maybe not, maybe not have full game, of course. Yeah, like you’re saying, they’ll, they’ll like play catch.
ALEX: Get me catch would be fun.
BOBBY: Let me ask you this, Rob Manfred and Elon Musk, they’re sitting in a room listening to Tipping Pitches, they hear this segment.
ALEX: And say, hey!
BOBBY: And they say, hey! That’s a pretty good idea. And they hit us up at tippingpitchespod@gmail.com. Maybe they even sign up for the Alex Rodriguez VIP Club tier of the Slack. And they decided to pop in there and they asked us a question. And they say, do you guys want to be the guys to do it? We say what?
ALEX: No free labor, Rob. What’s the [42:18]
BOBBY: Yeah they gonna need to sign up for more than A. Rod. tier.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: [42:21]
ALEX: Sorry, sign–
BOBBY: [42:22]–
ALEX: –sign up for us a month and gonna cut it.
BOBBY: –space tier.
ALEX: I mean, because like I initially was going to ask, okay, like, who does it? Like who are the major league players to do it> But there’s not a single major league player that’s going to do that sort of thing.
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: Because there’s so much risk involved going to space, there’s no way you subject yourself to that, right? So they’re going to pull like two independent baseball players.
BOBBY: Force them to do it?
ALEX: Well, or like, don’t want–
BOBBY: Hey–
ALEX: –to miss the opportunity–
BOBBY: –do you want to be on the–
ALEX: –like–
BOBBY: –on the team next year? Go to space.
ALEX: Well, I mean, I think they’re going to turn to players who have far less to lose, right?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: And, and far more to gain by raising their profile and doing this.
BOBBY: Can you imagine you go to space, you have the first catch in space, you play the first game of catching space. And you come back down, and everybody’s paying attention to you now, but you just suck like you’re not good. There’s like local news crews, there’s like National reporters flying in to do TV segments on you. And everybody’s going to cover your first game after you went to space. And you just go like, 0 for 5 with 4 k’s and grounded into a double play.
ALEX: Yeah, that’s how you can still get a book deal out of it, honestly.
BOBBY: Oh, yeah. Oh, you definitely get a podcast out of it.
ALEX: There’s going to be someone who is the, like, third player up there, right? Who kind of doesn’t really get recognized. Like he gets to say he was the, the third person to play baseball in space.
BOBBY: Yeah, he’s not Neil Armstrong or Buzz Aldrin.
ALEX: Right. He’s Michael Collins, who like drove the ship. But no one fucking knows about this, dude!
BOBBY: That’s so important. He drove the ship.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You know, you can’t get there–
ALEX: [44:06] matters.
BOBBY: –you can’t get there without driving the ship.
ALEX: Right. Someone’s gonna be the guy who rubs the space mud onto the baseball’s, you know. Or goes and, goes and retrieves the bullpen catcher who goes and retrieves the overthrow.
BOBBY: If we do it on Mars, they, they rub the like rust that makes it red and colored onto the ball.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: God, that’d be sick. I’m kind of in on it now. I’ve been out on space travel for a while. But if we’re rubbing up baseball’s with Mars dusts.
ALEX: Mars dust.
BOBBY: Come on, who says no, nobody says no to that.
ALEX: Not a single person.
BOBBY: Okay, your fifth and final prediction.
ALEX: My fifth and final prediction–
BOBBY: Of all of these predictions that are definitely 100% going to happen.
ALEX: Yeah, this one’s going to happen the most. This one’s the most, the most happen, happening. We know that offense is going to go back up. Baseball will make shifts perhaps by eliminating shifts.
BOBBY: [44:57]
ALEX: And it will be in part what enables Julio Rodriguez to have the first 40-40 season since Alfonso Soriano into 2006.
BOBBY: Nice! I like how you came into this and you’re just like baseball referencing it. I love it. This is a good one.
ALEX: Like if there’s a player in the game, who is most likely to do that right now it’s him. No doubt, right? Like he–
BOBBY: Well, I think Acuña, but yeah.
ALEX: I agree, although I think he’s, he’s a little bit older, although not really about that much. And I, his injury history is not pristine. So I certainly think like, like health aside a Acuña is, is the other plausible option there, absolutely. But Julio is going to sniff 30-30 like this year. Just insane to me! That’s insane to think about! So I think he’s going to do it.
BOBBY: I love it.
ALEX: As, as hitting the other way becomes more fashionable. He has more opportunities to–
BOBBY: To get on first base.
ALEX: –to get on first base. And he’s not going to stop hitting dingers, he’s fucking Julio Rodriguez. He’ll have three Home Run Derby titles under his belt by then.
BOBBY: Well, he would have to get one first. I’m still better that he eliminated Pete.
ALEX: Yeah, that’s my prediction. I mean, dude is gonna be a superstar. We already–
BOBBY: It’s already, it’s already–
ALEX: –know this. This is no, this is not news to absolutely anyone. But if you talk about like, the once and future king of baseball, it’s, it’s right there. It’s there for the taking if he wants it.
BOBBY: I support this for a couple reasons, I like Julio. I want our prediction about him making the Hall of Fame to be right. And the third reason, Alex, I’m sticking this claim out now I’m gonna be the first person to say it. Julio Rodriguez future Met. Oh, you think the Mariners are gonna outbid the Mets? Oh, you think, you think Jerry Dipoto is gonna get it done? Nah! Uncle Steve’s coming in, he’s getting Julio, he’s getting Juan, He’s getting Juan Soto.
ALEX: Right. Both of them.
BOBBY: Who beat Julio Rodriguez in the Home Run Derby need I remind you?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I don’t know who else is going to be on the team by then. But Julio Rodriguez 40-40 season. It’s happening in Queens brother.
ALEX: I, I don’t want to know what that says about the Mariners playoff hopes at that point in time.
BOBBY: Geesh. I don’t, are they’re gonna make the playoffs in the next five years? We should, one of us should have chosen one of those. One of us, one of us should have chosen the Mariners will or will not make the playoffs as one of [47:40]–
ALEX: I think they, I think they, they will.
BOBBY: Are you sure?
ALEX: Yes, I am.
BOBBY: Especially with–
ALEX: Full 100%. Especially with expansion. But I think like Kelenic will be a hitter by then. Like he’ll actually know how to hit a baseball, maybe?
BOBBY: That I’m not sure about.
ALEX: I know.
BOBBY: I use to be sure [47:58]
ALEX: Kind of, go out on a limb here. Now we’re just like talking baseball. This is, this is a real throwback to our–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –our early days, right? Because it was just naming players and saying, no, he’s gonna be really good.
BOBBY: Prospects pods.
ALEX: It’s kind of crazy that he’s like, the things he does.
BOBBY: It would have been a really good bit to just come on this pod. And just spend an hour and 10 minutes talking about prospects. Fifth year anniversary wanted to give you some different, MLB top 100 prospects.
ALEX: The outlook for Druw Jones.
BOBBY: Man, it’s so sad that he fucked up his shoulder.
ALEX: I know, I know.
BOBBY: I know, he’ll pro- while he’s, while he’s rehabbing his shoulder, he’ll probably like learn some core exercise that turns him into the greatest baseball player of all times. They’ll remake his swing and suddenly he’ll have Albert Pujols power, Druw Jones’ speed and defense, Andrew Jones the speed and defense. Yeah, I don’t know.
ALEX: Frankly, not fair, just to be the son of baseball player, too much nepotism in baseball right now. I’m just gonna say it.
BOBBY: This is maybe the only example where nepotism, it helps you. But it doesn’t seal the deal for you.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I think people want to think that about like actors. But it does seal the deal for you, if you’re an actor. If you just look like your parent, you’re gonna get, you’re gonna at least get a role. You might not–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –get more roles after that. But you’re not going to make it to the majors just because you look like your father.
ALEX: Yeah, I think teams aren’t willing to–
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: –to, to go that far.
BOBBY: And even in the NBA, they’re gonna sign Bronny James because they want LeBron to come to their team. Okay, are you ready for my fifth and final prediction?
ALEX: Yeah, give it to me. Bring it home.
BOBBY: Tenth and final prediction on the Tipping Pitches. Five year anniversary pod. Alex, the Mets are gonna win the World Series! In the next five years.
ALEX: Uh-huh.
BOBBY: Put it in the books?
ALEX: Don’t put a year on it.
BOBBY: Nope.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: It’s just gonna happen in the next five years.
ALEX: All right. I’m about it!
BOBBY: A question for you. Are you Be prepared for who I’m going to be after the Mets win the World Series?
ALEX: No, no, you’re going to be insufferable.
BOBBY: Am I going to be insufferable? Or am I going to be at ease? Like, am I going to just everything clicks for me? You know, sometimes they’re like, oh, you know, sometimes they say about people like, they, they seem so turbulent. And then they had a kid, and everything just clicked into place. Are you prepared for that shift to happen with me and the New York Mets winning the World Series?
ALEX: Do I think that the Mets winning the World Series will ease your pain? I, stranger things have happened. But, but isn’t that part of being a baseball fan? Part of being a Mets fan?
BOBBY: The pain?
ALEX: The pain.
BOBBY: Yeah. Well, I mean, if they win the World Series, it’s not like I’m not going to care about them the next year.
ALEX: No, of course not. But I don’t know, I think that’d be too easy.
BOBBY: Oh, come on. I mean, can I have something?
ALEX: You could have the fucking world series!
BOBBY: Oh, okay. So–
ALEX: That’s–
BOBBY: So–
ALEX: –that’s yours. But, but I don’t think, I think that the–
BOBBY: They’re still going law Mets after that?
ALEX: I think a year later, when they, you know, are are favored to win the division and barely missed the playoffs or something, it’s going to be back to business as usual.
BOBBY: See, I don’t think that’s true. I think that there’s like an alternate reality where the Mets win the World Series in 2006 instead of the Cardinals. And then that leads them to organizational success for the next five years after that. And then that alternate reality, I don’t think we do this podcast. I’m being totally honest, like, if–
ALEX: I, yeah.
BOBBY: –the Mets were successful, when I was 10, 11, 12. Got to high school 13, 14, you know, like if they were having a good time, and I was enjoying baseball–
ALEX: You have a level of optimism about like the sport itself
BOBBY: I don’t think I would have developed this deep, deep, deep desire to fix the sport. To me, it would have been fine as it was. I would have been like a Red Sox fan. You don’t see a lot of Red Sox fans going around doing podcasts about making the sport better. You don’t, you just don’t. They don’t care about–
ALEX: Real–
BOBBY: –labor.
ALEX: –real, real baseball therapy hours right now.
BOBBY: It is, it is. But they’re going to do it in the next five years. Steve Cohen predicted they’re going to do it within the next three years, including this year, so two years from now.
ALEX: And, and Brodie Van Wagenen predicted they were going to do it every year. So–
BOBBY: World Series now and every year the future. You know, Brodie Van Wagenen was right. You know, he was right about? a trade in–
ALEX: Edwin Díaz?
BOBBY: –Jarred Kelenic for Edwin Díaz. Yes.
ALEX: Yeah. Yeah.
BOBBY: BBW masterclass, thank you, Brody. I just want everybody to know that if the Mets won the World Series, we will do a live pod from the World Series parade. As it goes by, I’ll be yelling, turn my microphone towards Pete Alonzo, the Pete, what do you have to say to the fine folks who care about minor league unionization?
ALEX: I think he may just stare through you. I’m not sure he’s, if, if he doesn’t have a thought in his head right now. Can you imagine him after he wins a World Series and has like a bottle of champagne in his hand?
BOBBY: Here’s the thing. I think he has thoughts in his head.
ALEX: You think [53:14]–
BOBBY: I just think they’re not–
ALEX: –not to share them?
BOBBY: No, I think that they’re just not thoughts like you and I have. Their like thoughts that are on a different plane–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –the thinking that we do. And so when he tries to communicate them, it seems like he has no thoughts. But to whatever, whatever plane that he’s on, if there are other people like that in the world. He’s speaking directly to them.
ALEX: Yeah, but I think he’s weird even among baseball players.
BOBBY: Yeah. He [53:39]–
ALEX: Like, I think he’s still like, he’s on a different plane from that, like only slightly right. He speaks their language. But dude is out there, man.
BOBBY: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I think there’s a chance that when he gave that interview on SportsCenter a few years ago, to Kenny Mayne where he was talking, where Kenny asked him, you’re a member of the Las Vegas 51s when you’re ever driving to the park. Do you ever see anything that’s weird? You ever seen the UFOs? I think there’s a chance to he had already been abducted by them, and replaced by the Pete Alonzo, extra terrestrial. And everything that has happened then suddenly clicks into place to start to make more sense. All of the weird like bopping around during the Home Run Derby while the kid was getting carried off [54:23]–
ALEX: Right. [54:23] alien thinks of like human baseball player like what’s like.
BOBBY: This is what a power hitter does. These are the things that a power hitter does. Deadlifts during the Home Run Derby rounds.
ALEX: That interview is maybe one of the greatest pieces of art of all time.
BOBBY: It’s, it’s–
ALEX: I just want to say that.
BOBBY: –it’s up there among like anything Nathan Fielder, or Sacha Baron Cohen has ever done, except it’s just Pete Alonso being himself.
ALEX: Life imitates art. Well for your sake, I hope this comes through. I want you to have have that joy, I will live vicariously, because I’m not sure I can say the same about the A’s in the next five years?
BOBBY: Please know that if the Mets make it to the World Series, we’re putting it on the Tipping Pitches business card, and we’re going,
ALEX: Yeah, that’s what that’s what your Patreon money’s going towards folks.
BOBBY: It is!
ALEX: Beers at the World Series.
BOBBY: I don’t think that I could, I’m afraid of drinking at the World Series.
ALEX: Explain.
BOBBY: It’s just gonna make me emotionally unstable. Because I’ll be nervous, I’ll be drinking it too fast, you know. By the fourth inning, I’ll be like, I don’t even know who’s pitching anymore.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah, you’re already going to be drunk off vibes.
BOBBY: Exactly. Exactly. It’s a dangerous game that we play. That’s it, that’s it, Alex, five predictions from each of us. For our five year anniversary. About five years into the future. I hope that this was enjoyable for people. It’s enjoyable to do, much as this podcast has been enjoyable to do, for the last five years. Has doing this exercise at given you any added perspective on Tipping Pitches in the present? Do you think we should pivot to astrophysics now?
ALEX: That in linguistics–
BOBBY: We’ve already made that pivot.
ALEX: –we’re, we’re really we’re really branching out, I gotta say. No, I mean, I think if nothing else, this sort of perspective really helps kind of see how quickly the game changes. Because I think when you’re in it, it kind of plods along, change feels very slow. But if you look back to where the game was, when we started, it was in a radically different place. And so some of these may seem obvious, and some of them may seem outlandish, and unrealistic. But baseball has a funny way of catching you off guard. All that to say, I do want to thank everyone who’s been coming along with us in this journey over the last five years. And to everyone who, who may join us on the journey in the next five years and beyond. Because it’s been a joy to do this every week. And frankly, to get to know so many of you, our listeners. The community that has blossomed over the past few years, and especially in recent months, have has really just brought me a lot of joy, and made my baseball watching experience and baseball consumption experience. Like immeasurably more exciting. And it makes it easy to log on here every week. And, and talk with you about this shit. And I want to thank you, Bobby–
BOBBY: Yeah!
ALEX: –for, for sticking around.
BOBBY: Yeah! Not spinning off and doing my own solo endeavor.
ALEX: Right. Exactly.
BOBBY: Tipping Pitches singular.
ALEX: Right, if we split up who gets Tipping and who gets Pitch- Pitches?
BOBBY: If we split up I want Bazeley in Bazeley-Wagner productions.
ALEX: Okay, sounds good.
BOBBY: You can have Wagner. And I want the A. Rod. outro, that’s mine.
ALEX: All right. That’s all you.
BOBBY: You can have, you can have green onions. I want the A. Rod. outro. That’s my, that’s my baby.
ALEX: Good God, we’re planning for the divorce, that will never happen.
BOBBY: Yes, I, I want to say thank you to you as well. And of course, to the listeners who have supported us so much since we launched the Patreon. But also, even before that, like we would have never even gotten to this point where we would want to launch a Patreon where we would feel this passionately about doing the show. It started out as like a time management tactic where we could like just sit down for 90 minutes and not have to talk about all this stuff for hours and hours and hours. The rest of the week, we could talk about other things that weren’t making us so upset, like Major League Baseball. And so for it to have grown and morphed into this weird and wonderful thing with all of you people supporting us so much. It’s, it’s more than we could have ever imagined. Speaking of the Patreon, Alex, a quick and sincere thank you to all of the new patrons who have signed up this week on our five year anniversary. Great timing from all of you. Thanks to Michael, Joey, Danielle, CJ, and Dhara. And thank you, of course to the five members that we shout out at the end of every episode for being members of our Alex Rodriguez VIP Club tier. Those members this week are Chris Dante, Patrick, Shakeia, Logan, and Alex. Once again another Alex, you in the Alex [59:16]
ALEX: Yeah, the brand is strong.
BOBBY: Keeping the brand strong, keeping the support going.
ALEX: Before we leave you just a programming note. We’re recording this a few days in advance of when it’s going to come out. Next week’s episode is also pre recorded. I am going to be not in this country, which makes it a little harder to, to do some, some baseball podding. So–
BOBBY: You’re going to the Maldives with Alex Rodriguez?
ALEX: Yeah, exactly. Going to the Cayman Islands to check out his, his tax haven.
BOBBY: Portfolio? He’s teaching you how to set up one for us?
ALEX: Yes, exactly.
BOBBY: Damn! That’s good. We need that.
ALEX: So I hope none of you expect any instant reactions to the trade deadline because it’s not going to be here. You can keep the Twitter feed @tipping_pitches.
BOBBY: If there’s something huge that happens, it’s time for me to mono pod.
ALEX: Yep. As we, we’ve–
BOBBY: The breakup starts.
ALEX: –we’ve joked about it for years, but this might be it.
BOBBY: Oh, I could be me and you?
ALEX: You could do that too.
BOBBY: Okay, cool. I’ll work on my Alex. It’s pretty honed already to be honest.
ALEX: Yeah, I think it really, I mean, there was very little difference to begin with anyway.
BOBBY: Thank you, everybody for listening. now and in the past, and hopefully in the future. We appreciate it so much. We’ll talk to you next week.
[1:00:30]
[Music]
[1:00:40]
[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!
BOBBY: But before we do that, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I am Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: You are listening to the fifth anniversary of Tipping Pitches.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah. Like the crowd goes wild!
BOBBY: Woooo!
Transcriptionist: Vernon Bryann Casil
Editor: Krizia Marrie Casil
Tipping Pitches 
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