Alex and Bobby tie a bow on the Carlos Correa Mets saga, before checking in on some arbitration deadline decisions and examining the state of the arbitration system as a whole. Then, they react to two owners doing their favorite thing (shooting themselves in the foot), before answering some listener questions and voicemails about EGOTs, the three wise men, and Charles Johnson.
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Songs featured in this episode:
Canned Heat — “Going Up The Country” • Tommy James and the Shondells — “Crystal Blue Persuasion” • 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, how are you doing, my friend? How are you? We just set the scene for the listeners rumbling here, just do a little scene setting for you. Alex wearing a Patagonia because it’s very cold in the studio today. Because we were gone for days before this and so the heat was turned off. And he’s coming in with a fresh cut, high and tight, shorter than I’ve seen you get a cut in, in a while, quite a while–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –you’re gonna let the, the locks flow.
ALEX: I was letting the locks flow. I mean, I, I know they say like, if you want to kind of keep your hairstyle the way it is, you know, go in roughly every six weeks or so.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: I’m on kind of like a once every three months I look in the mirror. Or, or someone close to me, gives me a little nudge.
BOBBY: Someone close to you.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Not naming names.
BOBBY: Even the name that you would name would not be listening to this podcast–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –so it’s okay. Well, the reason that I asked you is because I was, I was in the bagel shop earlier today, and a customer came in. He asked the cashier, how are you doing? And the cashier. Really nice guy said, I’m doing fantastic.
ALEX: Wow!
BOBBY: He was like, he was effusive in his praise of his day. I’m fantastic–
ALEX: Did he tell you why?
BOBBY: –I’m fantastic, you know, what he said after that? He said, I’ve never heard another person say this. He said, I’d be worried if I was doing any better. I was like, this is the best day in this guy’s life.
ALEX: I don’t like this. I don’t know, it kind–
BOBBY: He’s at the bage–
ALEX: –it’s all downhill from here, like–
BOBBY: –he’s at the bagel shop on MLK Day. If I was doing any better, I’d be worried..
ALEX: What, what would be the cause for alarm? Did you think if he was actually having a better day?
BOBBY: I wonder the same thing.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: If he was having a better day, like maybe he’d be worried and it wasn’t real.
ALEX: Right, I mean like–
BOBBY: Like the bug was gonna be pullout under him?
ALEX: That’s exactly I was gonna say, like that resonates, right? Things are going a little too good, and you’re like–
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: –you’re like–
BOBBY: Stops something too high, right?
ALEX: –something’s not right, yeah.
BOBBY: He can’t ride this way forever.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I just thought that was so funny. I thought I’d share that with the listeners of the Tipping Pitches Podcast.
ALEX: Yeah, shout out to, shout out to my guy at the bagel shop.
BOBBY: I’d be worried if I was doing any better.
ALEX: I, you know–
BOBBY: Sometimes I feel that–
ALEX: –I, I aspire, I aspire to be like him. I think we all should.
BOBBY: Sometimes I feel that way about the pod. I’d be worried if it was doing any better.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Too many listeners, wouldn’t get the jokes. Okay, we have quite a bit to talk about this, this week. And quite a bit of stuff that’s right in the Tipping Pitches the wheelhouse, so we don’t need to waste any more time. Let’s just get right into it. But before we do, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I am Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: And you are listening to Tipping Pitches.
[3:04]
[Music Theme]
BOBBY: Okay, thank you to this week’s new patrons. Russell and Christopher. You know, I’m not sure Russell if we shouted you out last week or not You’re right on the cusp. But if we did shout you out last week, guess what? You got second shout out. Thank you to Russell, and thank you to Christopher for being new patrons. As a reminder, you can always sign up for the Tipping Pitches Patreon if you’re not already signed up, it is patreon.com/tippingpitches. $5 level, $7 level, $12 level, it gets you various things including must discuss holiday card if you’re at the top level, much, much discussed. Not as much sent.
ALEX: Just the white whale.
BOBBY: I’m just gonna write Ahab at the bottom of all of the cards that I send it out, you know. So people will finally get it, they’ll finally have it. Should we just get the, the elephant in the room out of the way? The elephant in the room being the Mets Carlos Correa jersey that I ordered custom? No, I’m just [4:10]–
ALEX: Ohhhh!
BOBBY: –Mets, stupid! Why would I trust reporters reporting signed term sheets for–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –a guy who already was on the Giants for 12 hours.
ALEX: I’m never trusting a physical again. This is why I have trust issues.
BOBBY: Well, do you go get physicals? Do you have physicals to trust? When was last physical you got?
ALEX: I [4:28]–
BOBBY: You could have played in your ankle too.
ALEX: –it’s been years and this is exactly why.
BOBBY: Right. Like I could be offering you a 13-year deal to stay on the Tipping Pitches team. And it might get failed, it’s your physical. Your vocal cords might be fried by year five.
ALEX: Yes, absolutely. All the, all the years of karaoke have taken a toll on the pipes.
BOBBY: See, in your younger days, you just didn’t care quite as much about maintenance.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And now recovery.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: Tea, Throat Coat Tea, it’s very important for singers, for podcasters. Carlos Correa is on the Twins, just, just as he was last year, he’s back. I saw something really funny that Jake said, Jake Mintz from Céspedes Family BBQ, where he was like, you know, in 25 years there’s going to be some enterprising young Céspedes Family BBQ guys, you know, Céspedes Family BBQ 2.0 looking at the baseball reference page of Carlos Correa and they’re gonna be like, Wow, really good young career in Houston? Made the switch to Minnesota and never looked back.
ALEX: Yep. Yeah.
BOBBY: And they’re not gonna know any of this stuff.
ALEX: Nope.
BOBBY: And that made me feel old prematurely. What the hell happened?
ALEX: I don’t know, I mean, this it really does make me wish. And I’ve, I’ve thought about this before, I would love a database baseball reference, so good, so good at collecting the numbers on, on, on what actually happened, right? That’s kind of their, kind of their stick, you could say. Is just collecting the numbers and presenting them to you. I would like, like a, like a baseball almost referenced for like things that almost happened but didn’t pan out, you know?
BOBBY: Right, butterfly effects, you could say.
ALEX: Butterfly effects, you could say. Those deals that got to the 11th hour and just fell apart. Because those are some of the most fascinating moments to me in baseball history. And this is one for the ages.
BOBBY: Remember when Bryce–
ALEX: Unlike anything I’ve seen.
BOBBY: -remember when Bryce Harper was going to be traded to the Astros? You remember when Max Scherzer was on the Padres for like 38 minutes?
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: I was boarding a flight while that happened. I, when I, when the plane took off, I didn’t know if he was actually going to be on the Padres or not.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Trade deadline, don’t get on a flight on trade deadline day, if you have a baseball podcast. You know, we’re pretty late to this now, because this news was made official, I think, Tuesday, last Tuesday afternoon, which is six days ago now. And one day after we put out our last podcast. So everybody has kind of made the rounds, sharing their opinions on this, sharing how wild they think it is. And also, you know, there was sort of a data dump that happened right after it, which I thought was interesting with some, some choice quotes from Correa and his press conference the next day. Some, some Boras quotes in the tic toc of how this actually went down. I don’t know what I believe. What I know is that the Mets identified the same problem that the San Francisco Giants identified. They talked to the same doctor. And I presume they probably talked to some other doctors too, who shared a not definitive enough opinion, that was different from the doctor who failed Correa’s physical with San Francisco and with the Mets. That they tried to restructure the shape of the deal to be basically exactly half of what they initially offered guaranteed. And the second half to be non guaranteed and based on a certain amount of games played for a certain amount of at bats, which is you know about the same thing. And Correa and Boras didn’t like that. And so instead, they signed a deal that guarantees $200 million for six years, higher average annual value, shorter contract. Although the same amount of time if you were to not hit those Mets incentives, you know. So it’s all very confusing, but at the end of the day, Carlos Correa is a Minnesota Twin again.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: And the Twins are the same team that they were last year?
ALEX: Yeah, right.
BOBBY: So weird. I mean, it’s good, it’s good. It’s good for the Twins.
ALEX: Like I just I–
BOBBY: They clearly wanted them still.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: And they weren’t faking it just so they could tell their fanbase that they want it and still.
ALEX: Yeah. I feel like at least for me, I routinely just kind of forget that Carlos Correa’s really, really good, you know. Like he obviously came up with the top prospect in baseball was great out the gate and really has had not a single down year? Like there’s only, only a year below three F-four was the shortened season and 2020 And like, I feel like there have been knocks on his defense, you know. And kind of how complete his game is, but he’s an actual difference maker.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like a very real difference maker. And I feel like with all of this going on, I, I my eyes kind of glazed over at the fact that like this is someone who actually can significantly move the needle on your team to go Twins, man.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Twins, Twins, Twins is fun, Twins is good.
BOBBY: The whole information drip of this was, what’s the opposite of a masterclass?
ALEX: Like I know this–
BOBBY: A masterclass, like the reporters reporting updates on this every day, just saying the same thing over and over again. Well, it seems very likely, but etc, etc, etc. And then at the very 11th hour, they were like, well, the Twins are back in and they’re serious. Oh wait, actually he signed with the Twins.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Like you could have completely wiped, you know, Heyman, Martino, all these guys who are reporting on this day, day by day, giving us updates. The insiders that we give so much clout on the baseball, in the baseball content landscape. You could have completely wiped them off the face of the earth and we would have had the exact same experience watching–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –this unfold.
ALEX: I mean, it really does make me think kind of like how different it is sort of consuming news as a baseball fan, right? Like 20 years ago–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –you read an–
BOBBY: You wouldn’t, wouldn’t have known any of this.
ALEX: –you read an article in the paper the next day that says he signed with the Twins, the Mets and the Giants were interested. But–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –but the terms fell through. And like that’s it and then you’d move on.
BOBBY: Yeah, and then 20 years later, you’d have somebody saying, You don’t know how close it–
ALEX: Right, exactly.
BOBBY: –really got.
ALEX: –exactly. It was, yeah. Minutes before midnight. Like- no it really, it has changed the way we consume the game and not entirely for the, the better. I just like if nothing else, having access to this much information has aged me so much.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like just tell me what happens.
BOBBY: Remember back in the day, they would just sign Joe Di.
ALEX: Things, things, things are better.
BOBBY: [11:08] the time contract, you say the number of Joe Di.
ALEX: Exactly. They just get, get together behind closed doors, light some cigars and just hash it out. Like it was meant to be.
BOBBY: I just the whole thing was incredibly stupid.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I want to take this moment on the podcast right here right now to ban this from the 2023 Dumbest Things That Happened in Baseball.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: it’s, it’s now allowed.
ALEX: It’s like it’s too, it’s too dumb.
BOBBY: It’s like own thing..
ALEX: Like, yeah.
BOBBY: It’s not even dumb, it’s fake. As far as I’m concerned, none of this happened.
ALEX: It really did.
BOBBY: I’m really excited about it. Speaking as a Mets fan, I am almost completely ambivalent. He was never actually on the team, he never actually played.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I can’t imagine being even 1/10 as upset about this as I am about Jacob deGrom wearing a Texas Rangers jersey.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But people are, people were freaking out about it. But, I mean, they’ll just do something else now, you know,
ALEX: Right, exactly. I mean, that’s the Mets are okay. I don’t know if you’ve heard but they’re, they’re doing all right as far as putting together a team of baseball players.
BOBBY: Being incredible cope for the, for the Cohen heads out here, where it was like, actually, this just resets them back to where they want it to be all along. I’m like, no one fucking does it.
ALEX: Just didn’t.
BOBBY: They wanted to sign Correa. They want- Cohen is quoted in the New York Post saying this is the piece that puts us over we needed this.
ALEX: Uh-huh. Yeah.
BOBBY: And the, the 3D, 4D Chess, 4D Chess, sorry, the 4D Chess of the, the pro Mets reporters and opinionaters out there in the world being like, well, now they get to go back to the original course.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Which was, which was developed young talent and sign older veterans who they know and they could count on whatever for higher average annual value, but not as long. You know, like, that’s not what this is.
ALEX: No, yeah.
BOBBY: This is–
ALEX: Yeah, we didn’t really want Correa anyway. Actually, I broke up with him.
BOBBY: I broke up with you, yeah. No, I broke up with him. Alright, that’s enough about Carlos Correa. Let’s pivot to Collective Bargaining Agreements.
ALEX: Sure. Yeah. Why not?
BOBBY: New Collective Bargaining Agreement, same as the old Collective Bargaining Agreement, as far as I’m concerned.
ALEX: Well, given that it doesn’t exist yet, yeah. That’s, that’s correct.
BOBBY: You’re gonna be storming the gates–
ALEX: I am so–
BOBBY: –of Fifth Avenue.
ALEX: –I’m gonna ask this on every single episode this year.
BOBBY: I’m sure that we’ll get a lot done. I’m sure that that will hammer home to Rob Manfred, but really, we know that he listens. We know that he’s an active listener.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Do you think that we should take some time? Should we do a live Tipping Pitches from the streets on Fifth Avenue where MLB head- MLB headquarters are calling for them to release the CBA.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: Release the Rob cut.
ALEX: I think we could get a handful of people out there with us.
BOBBY: Do you think we would get arrested? We can file for a permit with the city, you know?
ALEX: Yeah. but like, does that, does that take some of the–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –some of the fire out of it, you know?
BOBBY: But does it also prevent us from getting arrested?
ALEX: Yeah, but- I was gonna say how cool would it be?
BOBBY: Not that cool.
ALEX: But, but–
BOBBY: I got arrested trying to read the CBA.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: No one’s [14:07]–
ALEX: [14:07], yeah, no.
BOBBY: So we get the permit then.
ALEX: Can we get the permit.
BOBBY: First, Eric Adams has to come back to New York City and do his job.
ALEX: Reach out to our contacts–
BOBBY: So we’d be waiting for a while.
ALEX: –NYPD, yeah.
BOBBY: Right, yeah. NYPD. The reason I want to talk about the Collective Bargaining Agreement is because it’s arbitration season comes and goes every year, still here.
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: Hasn’t changed at all. New CBA hasn’t done anything to address arbitration really at all. And you know, there are varying opinions on how whether or not arbitration is a good thing. Whether or not it’s the best we can do, I guess I should say. I think it is a good thing in comparison to pre arbitration and minimums and everything. But if you got rid of arbitration, and just went straight to free agency, that would be a lot better. And I think that everything functioning the same as it was before as part of the reason that I was a little more pessimistic on our podcast last week with Baumann. And I just have to say it was proven tremendously right this week and all these great players went to arbitration over just like $100,000 with their team. Let me give you a couple of highlights. So this is from mlb.com article that I was reading before he got here. And MLB record 200 players entered the final day of arbitration without agreements. 33 of those players did not reach an agreement before the deadline, that means they will go to an arbitration hearing. Of those 33 players, I thought some, some notable ones. I’m just gonna run down the list for you here. Hunter Renfroe, recently acquired Hunter Renfroe, Hunter Renfroe, Angels willing to trade for him not willing to give him 650,000 extra dollars. He filed 11.9, and the Angels filed at 11.25, gonna save that cash when Arte sells the squad. Kyle Tucker, he of World Series fame, multiple homeruns in multiple games.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Filed at 7.5 million, this is a five war player 7.5 million. Astro said, we can’t do anything better than 5 million. Corbin Burnes, Corbin Burnes, Cy Young winner, Corbin Burnes.
ALEX: Heard of him.
BOBBY: Best pitcher in one of the best rotations in baseball, Pitching Ninja loves this guy. In the time that it took me to read all of this. He’s tweeted more videos of Corbin Burnes’ back door cutter. 10.75 million he filed at and the Brewers came in at 10.01 million. And we can’t give you the extra $10,000? But we can’t do better than that.
ALEX: I want to, so I want to make sure I heard you correctly, that Astros came in 2 million lower?
BOBBY: Two and a half million lower on Kyle Tucker. Yeah. 7.5 million to 5 million. Yeah.
ALEX: That’s pretty, that’s kind of a slap in the face.
BOBBY: Yeah, a little bit.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I mean, so let me just read the last couple and then–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –give a caveat. Jeff McNeil file, Jeff McNeil batting title winner, above average defender in multiple positions for a 101 win team that is running a $400 million payroll with taxes, it will be half a billion dollars. Jeff McNeil filed at 7.75 million, and the Mets filed at 6.2 5 million. Just goes to show you that the owner doesn’t really matter in all of this. It’s about keeping up appearances of the system. And then finally, I threw this one in here at the end, not because I think it’s necessarily the most egregious but because this guy filed and won his arbitration case against his team last year and is going again, going again. Max Fried, filed at 15 million, the Braves came in at 13.5 million. We’ll see if he wins two for two against the Braves. So I would have to regrettably hand it to him–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –if he does, I actually really liked Max Fried so. So the reason for the discrepancy between these guys, obviously these guys are not all the same level of player. I think I would say Tucker and Fried are a level above. Tucker, Fried, and Corbin Burnes are a level above the other two in McNeil and Hunter Renfroe. The reason that the numbers don’t necessarily reflect that is because in your first year of arbitration, you’re basically worth less than in your second year and your third year. It, it is built to scale up the closer you get to free agency as a way to basically suppress your salary even more. Guys in their final year of arbitration, if they actually make it there without having that bought out, or if they actually go to arbitration. You’ll see them often get up into the best players, they’ll get up into the 20s. Even Shohei Ohtani set the record earlier this year, they didn’t go to arbitration. They agreed on a one year deal before, basically before the season even ended, I think or right after the season ended. And he will make $30 million for one year, and it is his final year of arbitration. So there are some caveats to how the system works. I just chose these guys because they’re such good players that every time arbitration rolls around, seeing a player this good, I can’t, it’s hard for me to remember and understand how it can be worth a team to haggle over $600,000 the salary of a league minimum player. With a guy who is as good as Jeff McNeil, or as good as Corbin Burnes. You know, this is a guy who had a sixth war pitching season, you know, in like 135 innings. It’s just, and, you know, I’m reminded of our episode last year that we did with Jerry Blevins and Kevin Goldstein about why arbitration became the way that it is. How it functions? What each side is motivated for and why? And I don’t know, I just felt like given that we’re in the doldrums of the offseason this was something that was worth talking about.
ALEX: Absolutely. And I think that point that you made when mentioning McNeil and the Mets decision to take him to arbitration about it being about keeping up appearan- appearances. I think that’s a really important one, right? Because it’s not that these, these teams have a finite pool of money that they are, are pulling from for arbitration and all this stuff. And they need that $650,000 so that they can spend it elsewhere. Right, like that’s just getting, you know, quote unquote, “reinvested back into the team”. But you’re never going to see that money, like that money is not going to be immediately turned around and, and put onto the field in the form of another–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –player.
BOBBY: If the Mets win their arbitration case for an extra 1.5 million for Jeff McNeil, they’re not going to go sign a reliever for $1.5 million.
ALEX: Right, yes, exactly. And–
BOBBY: Because if they want that reliever, they’ll just sign them either way, whether they win or lose. This is on principle.
ALEX: Right. And, and because you can’t let the player walk in and ask for whatever salary he wants. Because then every other player will start to do the exact same thing, right? So–
BOBBY: Right, and then he wouldn’t ask for 7.7 5 million, you just say why not 10?
ALEX: Right, exactly.
BOBBY: Why not 30?
ALEX: So like they–
BOBBY: Greedy players.
ALEX: –this is, yes, absolutely. This is probably the starkest form of collusion that has been codified by the CBA, right? Because it’s the owners collectively well.
BOBBY: Maybe they collect the Competitive Balance Tax might be a little more stark. Hey, guys, listen, no one’s gonna spend over this. Steve Cohen’s, like, what? I can’t hear you! Money, it’s walking all my ears.
ALEX: But–
BOBBY: I know what you mean.
ALEX: –you know, this is the, the 30 owners got together and basically said, so this arbitration system is set up like this, right? The first year of arb, you’re gonna get paid, you know, 20% of your market val- value, and then it’ll go up to 4th year, it’ll go up to 6th year, or whatever it is. But one team can’t step out of line there because it sets a precedent, right? And you–
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: –can’t have that precedent being set, because that’s how salaries skyrocket year over year, and we can’t have that. We simply cannot have skyrocketing salaries because that impacts me, that has a trickle down effect.
BOBBY: You personally?
ALEX: Yeah. Well, I’d like if–
BOBBY: In your capacity as a fan or in your capacity as the financial advisor to John J. Fisher, owner of the Oakland Athletics
ALEX: Well in my capacity as someone who benefits from the work that all the billionaire owners put into society, you know, like the Lerners–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –are, are trying to sign Juan Soto, that means there’s less money to put into the real estate business, right? All of a sudden, my apartment does–
BOBBY: The learners are not trying to sign Juan Soto.
ALEX: No, no, no. But my, my point is, it has a trickle down effect–
BOBBY: Oh, my God.
ALEX: –you know?
BOBBY: You know what, I just realized that we didn’t write down on our list of things to talk about how no one wants to buy the Mets?
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: Did you see the story?
ALEX: I did, yeah. So they’re–
BOBBY: I–
ALEX: –looking for minority owners at this point, right?
BOBBY: Yeah. Because nobody wants to buy their team.
ALEX: That’s weird.
BOBBY: I didn’t even really read the details of this, though. Did you?
ALEX: Well, I, my, my top level, kind of look at it revealed that they are looking for minority investors at this point. Which would give them a sort of, you know, cash injection that they need right now. Because they’re, I mean, the bank accounts run it a little bit low.
BOBBY: But why, why can’t they sell it all together? Because one of their main sponsors, Tara Crypto went completely out of business or something like that.
ALEX: Right, I mean- right, yeah, I heard of them.
BOBBY: Amazing. No actually, not really.
ALEX: Right. I mean, there’s kind of a litany of financial scenarios that make the Nats situation a little bit more precarious, right? They, they don’t have a sponsor for their ballpark, right?
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: It’s Nationals Park. They are in a bit of a contentious–
BOBBY: They could get George Santos to sponsor one of his many successful companies. Full of topical political humor for you.
ALEX: They also have been in a back and forth fight with the Orioles about the–
BOBBY: Oh, right.
ALEX: –media rights.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Right. And the, and the revenue that comes from–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –the RSN. So–
BOBBY: If he wants to buy a team if you don’t know. If you don’t have a guaranteed source of revenue from streaming.
ALEX: Right, exactly. Gotcha.
BOBBY: Maybe they should figure that one out.
ALEX: You know, yeah.
BOBBY: Well, deeper dive on that in the future. Back to arbitration, I suppose. I’m always, I’m sort of two minds about the concept of arbitration. I like, it’s frustrating to watch it happen. Like you’d wish that teams would just meet at a fair number, and that players are happy with. But at the same time, I enjoy the players who take it there. Because to go that far to actually go to an arbitration hearing as Jerry laid out last year on our pod. You have to be committed to the cause of knowing what you’re worth, knowing that the next guy that comes to an arbitration is going to compare his numbers to your numbers. And you’re confident enough that you had a good enough season and you’re worth this much money, and you can convince a neutral arbitrator of that fact. And so, I kind of can’t ever tell if I’m like, Yeah, arbitration time! Or if I’m like, damn arbitration time.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You know what I mean? For the purposes of Tipping Pitches, do we support arbitration?
ALEX: I mean, systemically, no, right?
BOBBY: Yeah, right.
ALEX: It’s a check on the wages that the players can, can actually make. But as far as the system goes, I mean, players should do whatever they can to maximize their, their earnings, you know,
BOBBY: I think just like the coolest thing that’s happened in labor, not actually. The coolest thing that’s happened in labor, besides all the other cool things that have happened in labor that are like monumentally more important than this. But that caveat aside, the coolest thing that’s happened in labor in the last five years was when Mookie Betts was like, hell no, I’m going to an arbitration hearing and I found it 27 million, and the Red Sox filed at like 19, which was the biggest gap in arbitration hearing history. And Mookie Betts, who had just won MVP the year before, won that arbitration case and drastically raised the numbers for the following years arbitration pool players. that was so cool.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And that was a player who knew, you know, I’ve already cleaned up in arbitration the last few years to the point where I have, basically generational wealth, and I haven’t even hit free agency yet. Because I’m so damn good at baseball, that I might as well shoot for the moon, and try to get it.
ALEX: Yeah, no, he knew his value both to the team, but also to the class of players coming up behind him, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And he recognized that he could set the market for them.
BOBBY: Yeah, Mookie Betts school.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: Just in. Cool guy.
ALEX: Yeah, good guy. The, the last thing I want to note on arbitration unless you have anything else, was that I did see that the Commissioner’s Office paid out their, their 50 million for the, the pre arb bonus pool of players this happened late last year.
BOBBY: Those, those checks cashed?
ALEX: Late last month, those checks did cash.
BOBBY: From what I hear, the Commissioner’s Office has many checks that can cash, from what I hear about the state of revenue–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –in Major League Baseball. However, there are a few owners who maybe don’t want you to, to know that fact. And we are going to talk about those owners right after a quick break.
[27:24]
[Music Transition]
BOBBY: Alex, fuckin’ Phil Castellini’s back, baby!
ALEX: He’s doing it again. He’s the real content creator, you know. We need to, he should send us invoices, ’cause he’s given us a lot.
BOBBY: He’s creating arguably better content than we are.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: So now’s the part where we talk about MLB owners shooting themselves in the foot. We’ll start with Phil Castellini, but there was also a case, case of this from Peter Angelos as well. Peter Angelos? John Angelos?
ALEX: John Angelos.
BOBBY: John Angelos, Peter Angelos is not doing any speaking engagements anymore these days. Is he alive?
ALEX: He is.
BOBBY: He’s alive?
ALEX: I mean, technically, I don’t know if anyone seen him awhile.
BOBBY: Right, okay, so, so right, because his, the Angelos family–
ALEX: We, we can–
BOBBY: –lawsuit is sort of about the state of the finances Once Peter Angelos is–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –no longer with us.
ALEX: Yes, exactly.
BOBBY: Okay, how we split up that modest sum of cash?
ALEX: Yeah, I mean, there’s–
BOBBY: [28:32]
ALEX: –there’s a decent chance that one of the sons hasn’t propped up like Weekend at Bernie’s style, you know.
BOBBY: So insensitive, which one of our kids is going to sue the other kid for the Tipping Pitches empire. I want to know which one is going to be the aggressor, the sewer. what is that, what is that called in, in the court of law?
ALEX: The, the plaintiff?
BOBBY: Tha plaintiff? Right, which one is going to be the plaintiff?
ALEX: So you’re saying between my kids, and your kids?
BOBBY: You know, God willing, you guys have kids one day. God willling I–
ALEX: God willing, yeah.
BOBBY: –kids one day. Which one is going to try to take all of it from the other one in an aggressive succession style takeover of Tipping Pitches media conglomerate? Which by that time will have merged with Subway?
ALEX: I’m done. That’s a really good question. I mean, there’s not a lot of litigious history, I think, in, in either yours or, or my pasts. I, I do, my partner did sue her landlord.
BOBBY: Wow.
ALEX: So–
BOBBY: And one.
ALEX: And one. So you got to–
BOBBY: I fought–
ALEX: –you got to watch out.
BOBBY: –I fought a ticket once and one. So we’re both undefeated–
ALEX: Hell, yeah!.
BOBBY: –about it. It was, it was the most exhilarating moment of my life.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s not worth telling the full story. But–
ALEX: No, but it’s [29:55]–
BOBBY: I, I want to know, ladies.
ALEX: –I’ll just, I’ll just let the listeners know, it’s a good one.
BOBBY: You know the story, right?
ALEX: I do.
BOBBY: Okay, great. Really captured her landlord.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’s based
ALEX: That it was, it’s the coolest thing I think anyone I know has ever done.
BOBBY: So we just saw our landlord just because?
ALEX: I think you could probably find a reason.
BOBBY: Oh, my God! Yeah, of course I could find a reason. Anyway, back to Phil Castellini. He was speaking at the, we’re just gonna talk about these two things in conjunction. The Castellini comments, and the, the John Angelos comments as well. I think the Castellini comments are on a different level than the Angelos ones, honestly. Phil Castellini was at the Rosie Reds Luncheon, which is a yearly event for the, the Rosie Reds, which are it’s, it’s basically a philanthropic group of Reds supporters that was founded in the 1960s, I will of note is that the Rosie Reds were founded when the team was threatening to leave Cincinnati. And they were founded as sort of an advocacy group to keep them there. And they’ve evolved into sort of a philm- philanthropic group, from what I understand. Most of this information, I was gleaning from a, an article in The Athletic from C. Trent Rosecrans, who’s a wonderful, I guess, Reds beat writer for them, still. And I know that’s what he started at, but I don’t know if that’s what he still does. Anyway, Phil, basically used this opportunity to go on a tirade about the Reds and their finances and the state of the team. Of course, like there’s an anticipation and expectation that when you have these sort of charity or supporter events, you’re going to talk about the state of the organization, the state of the team. You’re going to, you know, put on a good political face and make overtures to the fan base and make it seem like you’re trying and you’re doing your best. And Phil Castellini, as we know from his comments last year, as we know from the song that was made, which I will play right now for the Tippin Pitches Podcast.
He’s got carrots and lettuce and mushrooms, porcine, vegetable King Bob Castellini.
BOBBY: We know Phil Castellini isn’t really worried about keeping up appearances. Because where are you gonna go?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And so Phil Castellini called the Reds, he said the Reds operate quote, “like a nonprofit”, and said, quote, “baseball is an industry in crisis”. He joked that quote, “of course, the Reds will lose their up and coming prospects in free agency”. Just getting out ahead of that one and not even in the Majors yet.
ALEX: See, I loved his little PowerPoint that was like, actually, most baseball teams are bad right now. So I don’t know why you’re mad at us. You know, he’s like, actually, 70%, 75% of baseball teams are out of contention by opening day. which is not true. That’s, I don’t know, I think his barometer was like, less than a 30% chance of making the playoffs or something. Which is still a huge chance of making the playoffs?
BOBBY: Also, so what’s his point?
ALEX: Ri- I, exactly, I know! That’s it, right?.
BOBBY: That no one is trying and that’s, that makes it okay?
ALEX: Right. Is, is he pointing out that you baseballs economics are fa- is he acc- accidentally making a based argument that no one wants to work anymore, you know?
BOBBY: Yeah. I think if we had Phil on the room with us, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: I think basically what he’s saying is, in this era of the big spending teams, the Steve Cohen’s of the world, the Steinbrenner is of the world’s, you know, the Dodgers, big markets. How can we afford to keep up little old Cincinnati? Little old Cincinnati. Of course, this argument carries almost no logic. Like they made the playoffs two years ago.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And then systematically dismantled their team.
ALEX: It’s not like they got a ton of competition over there in the NL Central right now.
BOBBY: Exactly. Exactly. It’s not like their market is significantly different than any of the other teams in the NL Central.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: Like who is the huge spending team in the NL Central, they’re trying to keep up with?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: The Cardinals? I mean, you know why they are, quote, unquote, “bigger market team”? Because they actually try and have a fan base that comes and supports them and gives them gate receipts, and they’re able to market their team because they’re a classic, Major League Baseball franchise that tries and wins.
ALEX: Bobby, you do not under any circumstances have to handle.
BOBBY: Unfortunately, I do.
ALEX: No, you’re right. It’s like they consistently put a good product on the field. And that’s why their market–
BOBBY: That’s the brand.
ALEX: –bigger, so to speak.
BOBBY: The brand is the Cardinal, the Cardinal way.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’s literally what they call it. And the Cardinal way is winning baseball games.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: There’s nothing else that the team does, that is marketly different financially than how other teams operate. Now, you might say, the Cubs could outspend all of those other teams, but they’re not! They’re not! They intentionally took a step back for reasons that I don’t really would derail us to get into right now. And yet, Phil Castellini is operating in a fantasy land. And I, this event was supposed to be close to the public, but I, I gather that he pissed off the Rosie Reds group so much that they were just filming him and tweeting the clips of him.
ALEX: Which is always good when you go in front of your boosters to just like, get a little moral support, and they end up turning on you and posting it on social media.
BOBBY: Just imagine they like the SpongeBob talent show, and people are like throwing tomatoes at him.
ALEX: Yeah. He really thought he was cooking up there, you know, he came in so ready. He’s like, he’s like, I’m really going to change the mind today.
BOBBY: He came in like, you know, like, the asshole kid on the debate team comes in, and he’s like, No, I’m gonna win it with logic.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: He’s like, wait till they see this PowerPoint in about 75% of teams are out of contention by opening day. He’s like, they’re just gonna have to give it to me. And, you know, I have to say, fans are so much better than they used to be with this stuff.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Like fans are not willing to listen to this crap anymore in almost any circumstance. Because, partially because of the, the quote unquote, “information age”, that we live in. Where we can look around, and we can see, or we can fill in the gaps of some of the knowledge that we had about the financials of these other teams. Like we know, there shouldn’t really be that much difference between the Padres and the Reds, financially. And yet–
ALEX: And yet.
BOBBY: –the Padres are over the Luxury Tax, and the Reds are talking about losing prospects that haven’t even debuted yet. At booster events.
ALEX: I do gotta hand it to Phil.
BOBBY: He’s a specialty type.
ALEX: He is a special man.
BOBBY: I live long and prosper, Phil, you know, keep giving us content. Actually, you could sell a team, but if you’re not going to sell the team, at least keep talking. Don’t keep the team and stop giving us content. That’s the worst possible outcome. You know, I don’t know how much longer the Angelos family is going to own the Baltimore Orioles. But they are as culpable in some of this, like small market BS thing their way out of spending and competing as essentially anyone and they’re using the cover of a, of a tear down rebuild Astro style to keep people off their backs. But I think that they’ve as evidenced by this past week where John Angelos was speaking at a community event to talk about a new scholarship foundation, or a new scholarship that was set up for Baltimore students, Baltimore youth. Along with the mayor and some couple, a couple other people in the Baltimore area. And Angelos was asked about the team at this event. Which he, he took exception to it, this was taking place on Martin Luther King Day. And he said, you want to talk about the Orioles in the other day, that’s fine. Don’t ask me this on Martin Luther King Day. But I think the, the point of the question still stands in that your role as a, as a baseball owner in the community starts to get a little hazy when you don’t want to talk about the role of, you don’t want to talk about the performance of the baseball team. You know what I mean?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Like, and, I guess Angelos has the right to not answer baseball questions when they’re, when they’re doing this scholarship event that’s pursued perfectly fine. But it’s not like he’s divulging all of this information all of the rest of the time.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And so if you’re not going to be transparent about the Orioles finances, the other 364 days, but then you want to come out once a year to celebrate the scholarship, which is a good thing for the community. What else are you, when or else when else are you expecting to be asked about the Baltimore Orioles who are running a sub $60 million payroll while saying that they’re going to really accelerate their window of competition? All while, by the way, being part of this lawsuit, which will determine the future of the Orioles. And who runs them and who owns them? And who is the control person who has the majority voting share? So do I think that this was maybe the best time to ask this question? No. But am I curious about the answer to the question? Absolutely, yes. And I don’t know when else he’s going to answer it.
ALEX: Yeah, so just a little context. As you said, they’re at this press conference. They’re talking about this new scholarship and, and Dan Connolly, who’s the, who covers the Orioles for The Athletic is the one who asked John Angelos this question, which, which was basically, I mean, it was, it was not directly about the scholarship. But it’s broadly about the family’s commitment to the city, and their desire to keep investing in the team and maintain the ties that they have, you know, cultivated over the last few decades. And there’s also a question in here to the mayor about, you know, does a potential change of ownership. Change any of this that you guys are talking about your, you know, projects, you might be working on. That the idea of that looming over all of this as a cosmetic concern, right? Which, again, you, you may or may not agree that this is the right venue to talk about the, the team’s ownership. But it’s going to come up, you just, you have to understand that. And Angelos’ responds very easily could have been. Look, I’m not here to talk about that today. We remain committed to the city, blah, blah, blah. But let’s talk about the scholarship, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: But he really takes Connolly to task as a result of this. Invoking Martin Luther King Jr. repeatedly. Like being like, frankly, it’s disrespectful to talk about, to talk about this on MLK Day, you know. Like, like, he says, like, you know, I find that to be highly inappropriate. And I think that, I find that to be highly inappropriate. I think your focus is completely out of touch and has no perspective whatsoever on what real world people face and what the real pillar and role of an organization like the Orioles and Ravens ought to be. John Angelos famous for being in touch with the, the working man.
BOBBY: John Angelos, the son of the guy who actually made the money. So- wow, that quote is interesting.
ALEX: Yeah. And then, and, and it goes on. I mean, it’s a really long, we’ll post the link to the entire exchange.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: And then–
BOBBY: And, and I’ll probably play a little bit of that–
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: –right here. Particularly the back and forth about him, saying you can come down here any day and ask these questions.
ALEX: Right. I–
BOBBY: I thought was like, maybe just like, not true?
ALEX: Right. He was like, if you want to come down here next week, I’ll show you the Orioles financials, like no, you won’t.
BOBBY: Yeah, exactly.
ALEX: No!
BOBBY: This is what I’ve always, this is what always frustrates me so much about these owners is that they are perfectly fine grandstanding on their role in the community as an organization until they have to actually explain what that role entitles fans to. Do you know what I mean? Like this Angelos quote, and this whole, it’s like a 15-minute video, basically. Going back and forth at this press conference. And not only between him and Dan Connolly, like he’s asking answering other questions, too. But like, you are only a baseball owner. Like that is what you are. Can that be more? Can that mean that you make scholarships like this? Yes. Can that mean that you reinvest in the community? And you, you know, help local little leads get access to the game? Yes. But you’ve gotten rich off of baseball, and baseball fans. And so basically, anytime they see you, they should be able to ask you about the team. Do you know what I mean? Like, it’s not like he was coming here on like, a sad day, where he wanted to talk about the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. He was coming here to talk about a scholarship that was formed, and I presume, announced, because it was MLK Day, right?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But I, I don’t know, there’s something that it just doesn’t say it right about that with me.
ALEX: Especially when this is the second press conference you’ve held in four years?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like, I don’t know–
BOBBY: The first one since the lawsuit became public–
ALEX: Right, like–
BOBBY: –about who will actually own this team and how long will that actually be in effect?
ALEX: Like, you got to expect that at a certain point, or at least just come up with a better boilerplate, like rejection of the answer. Don’t go on a tirade about how it’s completely disrespectful to Dr. King’s legacy to talk about, you know, this, this baseball team on, on this day, you know. And I’m like, you, you set the date, bro. I’m like you set the date and invited all the reporters. I don’t–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –really know what you expected.
BOBBY: Also, it’s just, man, I know I can’t let go of this, but like him saying, you can come down here any other day and ask these questions. And I’ll show you the Orioles financials. No, no, you can’t. No, I can’t.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Dan Connolly can’t. If we could, we wouldn’t need to ask you these things. And the only day that you hold a press conference while you use your $5 million scholarship, despite the fact that you’re a billionaire now, ’cause of this baseball team, use your $5 million scholarship as a shield to not have to answer to any of these things.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And not have to talk about the lawsuit, to not have to talk about the 10s of millions of dollars of public funding that you’ve used to build the stadium that you get rich off of. Like, I don’t know, man, John Angelos could fuck off, frankly.
ALEX: I mean–
BOBBY: All owners can fuck off, but like–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –this is, Castellini is like, comically bad. I think the Angelos family is not quite that bad. You know, like that, famously, Peter Angelos made his money from a class action lawsuit that netted him hundreds of millions of dollars that he won because of I think asbestos exposure for city workers. So like, and we talked about this on the episode of Céspedes Family BBQ where we list terrible owners. Like, of the ways you could make enough money, cartoon villain money to buy a baseball team, that’s like, as good as it gets. Pretty much, you know? And so I think that I am open to giving the Angelos family the benefit of the doubt, in a way that I am less open with, say, John Fisher, or Steve Cohen, or the guy who owns the Rangers, what’s his name, Sherman? Who made his money in, in propane.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Like, I expect more from the Angelos’. I know I shouldn’t, but I do. And I don’t know.
ALEX: Well, it just feels like John has kind of skating off his family’s legacy right here.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like, the people of Baltimore don’t owe you anything. They don’t know you!
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: What have you, what have you done? So to come in here and be like, look, I’m the respectable face of the organization. I’m the guy who’s answering the questions. Like, you kind of got to put your money where your where your mouth is a little bit. And I understand that’s kind of what he was trying to do with this, right? With this sort of scholarship. But you have to understand that owners relationship with their teams and the cities that they occupy is really strained as of late.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And you got to recognize your role in that, sorry.
BOBBY: Yeah. And I think it’s, I think it’s a valid question, by the way. I just want to make that clear. I, I think, given that the, the proposition of hosting this event at all, and talking about the scholarship and bringing light to the scholarship is that the Orioles want to be invested in the community, right? The Orioles got $600 million of public money over the course of building the new stadium, whatever. Redeveloping the new, the new land and making the infrastructural changes needed to build Camden Yards, which was, you know, the first of the downtown ballparks. Revolutionized building stadiums and taking money from public funds. A new for- a new forefront in this nature. I. I just because you do a scholarship doesn’t mean like, that doesn’t, it’s not like, alright, that was an equal deal.
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: You know what I mean? Like, I don’t know, I’m not saying don’t do scholarships, I’m saying don’t think that that gives you the right to not have to do other stuff.
ALEX: Right. That doesn’t shield you from any other form of public criticism about–
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: –your role in running the baseball team.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like also, also, it’s like $5 million, dude. Like, I don’t–
BOBBY: That’s what I’m saying!
ALEX: –know, like, really?
BOBBY: That’s what I’m saying.
ALEX: If you want to be insulated–
BOBBY: You got 120 times [47:26]–
ALEX: –from, from public criticism.
BOBBY: –from the public funds.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: We should, we should probably do. I mean, to the extent that we even can find more information out about this. Like a longer conversation with, with somebody about the state of the Orioles ownership. And what the lawsuit actually means, and how we think it might resolve? Because I mean, as far as I’m concerned, this is like a ticking time bomb.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And I think that if I, like if I’m Rob Manfred, I’m looking at that and I’m saying, Yeah, we should probably tie this one up before we do something like league expansion. Which there was a whole series in The Athletic also, I think that just started today or yesterday. Talking about likely expansion sites and that MLB intends to expand league. But like, there are enough, there’s enough turbulence leaguewide that I think that they need to figure some of that stuff out. And I think that the A’s, and the Rays, and the Orioles are right at the top of that list. And I think maybe the Orioles fall by the wayside a little bit more. Because when you think of the Orioles you think of them being stable in Baltimore. But this ownership group is far from stable.
ALEX: Yeah, completely. And, and again, if your Manfred, you’re really holding out hope for Peter to, to hold on, right? Because like, like, I’m just sayin’.
BOBBY: Yeah. Because I think that Manfred is very aware that a lawsuit here, anytime this stuff gets put into the courts, you know, there’s people that are going to FOIA this the day that this, this–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –lawsuit actually–
ALEX: All of the sudden you’ve relinquished a lot of control.
BOBBY: Yes. And I don’t think they want to do that. So, you know, I’m interested in having long conversation about this. At this point, I don’t know how much we know, and how much is worth talking about, but something to monitor. Okay, shall we do some listener questions?
ALEX: Yeah, let’s do them. All right, this first question comes from Nick, in the Slack. He wants to know what is the baseball equivalent of an EGOT, right? that is the, the vaunted Emmy–
BOBBY: Grammy.
ALEX: –Grammy, Oscar, Tony.
BOBBY: Oscar, Tony.
ALEX: Yes. Yeah, it’s very rare. I think like 17 people I think you’ve ever, have ever been able to, to [49:52] that, it’s hard! Rarefied air.
BOBBY: Has Gaga gotten it yet?
ALEX: Does she have a Tony? Or does she have an Emmy?
BOBBY: Research suggests that she does not. However John Legend has an EGOT, that’s wild. Rita Moreno earned.
ALEX: It is kind of wild.
BOBBY: Audrey Hepburn, dope. Mike Nichols, let’s go!
ALEX: My, my take is, is that if you’re going to win an EGOT you can’t win like an Oscar for like the best song. Like the point is–
BOBBY: Alright, now you just [50:28]–
ALEX: Well we get it, you can write music for different types of mediums.
BOBBY: You know who has EGOT?
ALEX: Who?
BOBBY: Who we should vanish from the face of the earth. Scott Rudin. So this is a good question, however, when I thought about it, I thought how different is this than when we made that new triple crown?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But then the more that I thought about it isn’t an EGOT more of a career–
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: –accomplishment and not–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –a single season accomplishment? Like no one EGOT in the year. Although if they did, then they we just renamed the EGOT for that person.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. So I’m thinking–
BOBBY: I don’t know, what do you think?
ALEX: Well, so there were some really good discussions in the Slack about this, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And ones that, that you know, came up over, over and over for to be considered for inclusion were ones like the MVP, the Cy Young. I don’t know if anyone mentioned Rookie of the Year but I wrote that one down as possibility as well. Obviously ones like Gold Glove, Silver Slugger. I, when, when trying to put mine together. I excluded Gold Gloves and Silver Sluggers, because I feel like too many people get those awards every year, you know. It’s like you were one of the best players in one of the leagues. Like–
BOBBY: Sure. Yeah.
ALEX: Like I, that’s what I like about MVP- okay, so here’s what I’ll say, I went and scraped a lot of the awards data from Major League Baseball website and like kind of set up a, like a Spreadsheet with the, with the players names and kind of for, for a collection of the categories. And what I–
BOBBY: Alex Bazeley’s middle name is researched.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Damn. Now I feel bad.
ALEX: What I, what I started to realize is that it’s really hard to actually win a lot of, a lot of awards.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: It’s, it’s pretty damn difficult actually.
BOBBY: It’s pretty much the guy who you think won all the awards.
ALEX: Yeah. I so–
BOBBY: Like Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez, Willie Mays.
ALEX: Exactly. But, but even from there guys who are winning like three or four what right? Because you can win multiple MVPs whatever, that, that only checks one box still, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: If you’re a hitter, what else do you have to, to win, right? So I looked at Rookie of the Year because it indicates a sort of early career readiness.
BOBBY: I have to say though, Rookie of the Year, you only have one chance to win that.
ALEX: You do win an EGOT.
BOBBY: That makes it much harder than EGOT. Absolutely. Because that’s like, if you could only win the Emmy in your first project, which would that never happen.
ALEX: Sounds like you better have a good first project, then.
BOBBY: But only two people win Rookie of the Year.
ALEX: I know, I know, I know.
BOBBY: You know, plenty people win Emmys, you know, My, my friend Jason Concepcion has an Emmy.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: He can ease quarter the way to an EGOT.
ALEX: I, I also thought about including the, the Comeback Player of the Year and the Roberto Clemente Award. Both ones that–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –are not directly tied to you just being the best player, but are a little more contextual, right. Comeback Player of the Year is looking at, your [53:53]. You came back and you did better than you were. You used to be good–
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: –and you weren’t. Now you’re good again. Robe- Roberto Clemente Award.
BOBBY: It’s for any reason.
ALEX: Yeah. Roberto Clemente Award is obviously about character, right?
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Which, which I liked throwing that in there, you know.
BOBBY: It’s, it’s, yeah, as subjective as the Oscars.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: You know, like, what are the criteria? I don’t know you were a good guy?
ALEX: Yeah. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Do they usually do a good job with that award, I have to say.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Yeah, I feel like the, the basic baseball answer is MVP, Gold Glove, Silver Slugger, and, wow, I don’t know.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: The fourth one is hard, batting title?
ALEX: Right. So that, you, this, this is just for hitters, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: But then I, I do, so Kate in the Slack mentioned, the thing that’s so special about EGOT is that it’s so rare because the crossover between those four things. Tony is music, Tony, Tony is theater–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –rather. Oscar is obviously cinema. Grammy is me music, and an Emmy can be TV or movies. But it can be movie, it can be music within that, which is kind of what you were talking about with John Legend.
ALEX: Right. Yeah.
BOBBY: Where his Oscar is like, it’s not he was in a movie that he won for it.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: He wrote the song for, I think Selma–
ALEX: Yeah. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: –that he won for. And so Kate came into Slack and said, for me, it would need to be someone who is a multi sport star, or a multi positional player. So you’d have to include MVP, and Cy Young. Which I’m interested, that’s intriguing.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Because that basically narrows it down to like about the same amount of people who have won an EGOT. All the people who have won an MVP and Cy Young, hitters who have done that.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But then you just eliminate hitters and so–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Then it’s like–
ALEX: Well, then it’s like, then it’s just like the best pitching years.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Right?
BOBBY: Yeah. Multi sport is intriguing, though. But nobody ever wins awards and multiple sports.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Like, you might be like Deion Sanders, for example, or, or Bo Jackson. Like they were better at football. It was amazing that they were good at baseball, but they were better at football. They were never going to win an MVP in Major League Baseball.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s, I would say impossible to win MVP and Major League Baseball, if that is not your full time sport.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You can be good, you can be really good.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You can be a great player. but you can’t win MVP in two different leagues.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: So I don’t know. Maybe something to do with like, yeah, but nobody really cares about high school or college. Like, you know, something to do with like, did you win an award? Did you win National Player of the Year in college? Did you win whatever that’s actually called it.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: That’s what it’s called another college sports, I don’t know if that’s what it’s called in baseball. Because ironically, I’ve never watched college baseball. Man, there’s not a good answer.
ALEX: There’s not a good answer. I mean, what do you think about playoff awards? Because like obviously, it’s super dependent on your team, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: If you don’t make it to the playoffs you never have a chance.
BOBBY: All right, Pete Don Mattingly.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You got was gone before even started.
ALEX: Not, not literally but.
BOBBY: No, did you see Don- Donnie Baseball going over to the Nashville group?
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Yeah.
BOBBY: He’s going to be a senior baseball consultant.
ALEX: Sure.
BOBBY: That’s just the guy who gets paid.
ALEX: Yep. To just talk baseball.
BOBBY: Or to have his name on the piece of paper that your hands investors.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Like this guy. That’s fucking baseball. Let me tell you one thing, his nickname is Donnie Baseball.
ALEX: Yeah. Yeah.
BOBBY: Good for him, for his future franchise.
ALEX: Yeah, I’m excited Nashville Stars, let’s do it.
BOBBY: Yeah, that’ll be intriguing if they actually get that bid go through with that name, what their involvement sort of is in resurfacing the history the Negro League history of the Nashville Stars. Anyway, tangent. So you’re saying playoff success?
ALEX: I’m saying playoff success, right? Either so maybe it’s a ring? Or maybe it’s MVP and either the, the CS or the World Series.
BOBBY: So I kind of like ring.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: MVP, Gold Glove, Silver Slugger, and World Series ring. So but you’d have to do Silver Slugger or Cy Young or something. But Cy Young is way harder to win Silver Slugger.
ALEX: Right. Well, and again, if you’re-
BOBBY: But if it’s MVP, or Cy Young.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Silver Slugger, or ERA Champ? But then Silver Sluggers are the same as ERA Champ. Like there’s not enough word.
ALEX: Right. There’s not a perfect comp.
BOBBY: We gotta give the axe to hitters or pitchers. We got to make a decision here.
ALEX: Can I just, can I just say two names kept popping up when I was looking at this.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: They are Albert Pujols, he’s won an MVP, who was Rookie of the Year, was Comeback Player of the Year, CS MVP, and won the Roberto Clemente Award.
BOBBY: Oh, it’s got in the bag bro.
ALEX: He’s got it in a bag. And–
BOBBY: He Albert, he Albert did.
ALEX: –one Justin Verlander.
BOBBY: That’s New York Mets, Justin Verlander.
ALEX: A New York Mets, Justin Verlander. Yeah, who’s got the MVP Rookie of the Year, Comeback Player of the Year, Cy Young, and CS MVP.
BOBBY: Yeah, you know, I almost feel like Mike C from the Slack here mentioned that it could be all star appearance.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: That would cover a pitcher or hitter. So MV- they said MVP all star. They said Gold Glove and Silver Slugger that would kind of defeat the purpose of trying to–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –include so we could do it as MVP All Sta, World Series ring, and what was, what would be our fourth? I don’t like Rookie of the Year.
ALEX: No, we–
BOBBY: Because that, that basically no one will ever do that, besides the [59:41].
ALEX: Yeah, honestly.
BOBBY: One guy.
ALEX: Wait what, MVP–
BOBBY: All Star appearance.
ALEX: –All Star appearance.
BOBBY: World Series ring.
ALEX: World Series ring. See this feels easy to me.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: MVP All Star, World Series.
BOBBY: Dang, you’re right. That’s like 100 guys.
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: It’s like–
ALEX: So, okay, so and we’re, we’re going really long on this.
BOBBY: The problem is MVP and All Star are, are overlaps. If you win–
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: –the MVP, you’re going to be an All Star.
ALEX: Yes, exactly. So what do you think about including manager accomplishments, okay? So maybe it’s a ring as a player and a ring as a manager.
BOBBY: Hate it.
ALEX: Or, or- hate it? Or Manager of the Year.
BOBBY: That’s the scab award, bro. We’re gonna work for the big man.
ALEX: It’s, it’s crossover, bro!
BOBBY: I think there’s no answer.
ALEX: I mean, no.
BOBBY: What would be like the bizarro version?
ALEX: Like the bat? Lizzy asked about what’s the bad EGOT equivalent?
BOBBY: Yeah, I meant like, what would be like the Tipping Pitches EGOT of the day. Like won an arbitration case.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: 10 years of service in Major League Baseball. Was on the players executive committee.
ALEX: Yeah, exactly what I was gonna say.
BOBBY: Yeah? And what, what can be the fourth? Comes on the pod.
ALEX: Right, follows us on Twitter.
BOBBY: Right. Yep.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Is that anyone? Doolittle got 10 years of service, right?
ALEX: Yeah. And he’s won an arbitration case.
BOBBY: Oh, my God, we got it!
ALEX: That’s it.
BOBBY: We did it. We did it. We’ll call it the Do.
ALEX: The Do.
BOBBY: The Do,
ALEX: I like that.
BOBBY: All right, we got, we finally got somewhere productive. All right, next question.
ALEX: This next question comes from Becka. Before meeting with Marvin Miller, the committee that put together the Major League Baseball Players Association met with one Richard Nixon.
BOBBY: That’s my guy
ALEX: What if Richard Nixon was the first–
BOBBY: Big baseball bat–
ALEX: –executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association? What if, Bobby–
BOBBY: I feel like that like wasn’t in the cards.
ALEX: I feel like it was a lot closer than people thought. Because he, he–
BOBBY: Sounds to me like a Baseball Butterfly Effect episode.
ALEX: God. Seriously, yes. So I think that’s partially what this was referencing.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Because things are radically different?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: I mean, I can’t even wrap my head around what baseball would look like. But he was notoriously–
BOBBY: But also isn’t Richard Nixon, then never president? Like the head of like a labor union?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: He’s not gonna go then represent the Republican Party in the 1970s.
ALEX: Right. So Watergate never happens.
BOBBY: I mean, we need to save this for a future episode.
ALEX: I mean, there’s–
BOBBY: That’s a good question.
ALEX: There’s obviously no strike, because I don’t think they’re ever militant enough to get to that point.
BOBBY: Isn’t it? But also, though, isn’t it funny how much further left Richard Nixon is then like, 80% of current day Democrats?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s like policy wise, with the stuff that he put in to effect. Not, not to handed–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –literally Richard Nixon. Like criminal as a president, but like, that just goes to show how much society has degraded in the last 4 years.
ALEX: Yup. Yeah, I mean, he was notoriously very tough on drugs and actually partnered with Major League Baseball at one point was, was cozying up to then Commissioner Bowie Kuhn to, to get.
BOBBY: Yeah, a real book word, good guy.
ALEX: Yep. Uh-huh. To get players on board. To basically help fight the war on drugs.
BOBBY: Right. They were fighting that two front war in Major League Baseball. On the field and off the field.
ALEX: Well, Nixon actually served as an arbitrator for a dispute between the umpires and Major League Baseball in 1985. The umpires wanted a raise for the postseason. Because the postseason had recently expanded. And they, and they wanted more money in this sort of special events pool that split among the umpires. And Nixon, Nixon got it done. Got them a four thou- 40% raise.
BOBBY: Wow, he sided with the umpires.
ALEX: He ultimately did side with the umpires that the Major League Baseball wanted to pay him an extra 2500. The umpires wanted 5000 and he gave him 4000.
BOBBY: One thing you can always say about Richard Nixon, fair guy, always listen to logic.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: He, I gotta say most fascinating president by far. What a weird career.
ALEX: Just what a weird dude.
BOBBY: What a weird life, what a strange paranoid man. Strange little man with a really mixed record.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Really mixed.
ALEX: Exactly, yes.
BOBBY: As mixed as it gets, you know.
ALEX: So when you say mixed, are there like good things that like you’re thinking of in your head? That are like, well–
BOBBY: There were like public works programs that were legitimately more beneficial for the human beings living in the United States than anything that’s happened that happened in like the Clinton administration. And people fucking love Bill Clinton obviously until he was outed as, you know, a sexual predator.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But like, people loved him for nothing. He wasn’t doing anything for anyone.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Richard Nixon, actually was doing–
ALEX: He even sold Nixon’s war on drugs be, you know, like–
BOBBY: Literally! All I’m saying is slippery dicted at first.
ALEX: You know, he set, he set the precedent, you can say that.
BOBBY: He did, he literally did. Alright, next question. Save that for a future baseball what if.
ALEX: Alright, we got a couple of voicemails to listen to. This first one is from Danielle.
VOICEMAIL 1: Hi, Bobby. Hi, Alex. This is Danielle from the internet. It is Christmas, Merry Christmas. I was just wondering if you’re one of the three wise men bringing gifts to Baby Jesus when he was born, the you know the gold, the frankincense, the myrrh. what is the baseball related gifts that you would bring to Baby Jesus? Happy holidays! Bye!
ALEX: So in, in true us fashion, we’re answering the Christmas question, three, four weeks late?
BOBBY: Christmas is a state of mind. I just have to say something really quickly before I answer this question.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: I’m going to vamp–
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: –a few time to answer the question.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: You famously raised Catholic, Catholic school. You know all about the three wisemen?
ALEX: I learned what like frankincense was like last year. I just didn’t, they were like, yeah, the, the three–
BOBBY: They fuckin’ put it in church all the time.
ALEX: I didn’t go to church!
BOBBY: They didn’t make you go to church at Catholic school?
ALEX: We did like liturgy.
BOBBY: That’s the least fun part.
ALEX: It barely, it barely counted. Yeah.
BOBBY: So you were never there when they were just waving around the frankincense and myrrh?
ALEX: I mean, maybe I was, I didn’t know what I was looking for.
BOBBY: You know what gold is?! Anyway, back to Christmas, back to the concept of Christmas. Back to Christmas being a state of mind. I would like to say for the record, on a podcast, this is my only outlet to say this. That a number of folks at The Ringer podcast network have been sharing the opinion that Home Alone is not a Christmas movie. And I have to state without saying any specific names. I have to state that that is one of the worst movie opinions I have ever heard. And that Home Alone is not just a Christmas movie? It is the Christmas movie. Bar none.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Fully Christmas. Okay? Now that I’ve vamped, now that I’m on the record, for the pub- for the future curators of the history of podcasts. Now that me, longtime Ringer Podcast Producer, Bobby Wagner, on the record, as Home Alone is a Christmas movie. Now we can continue the podcast. Danielle, thank you for calling. Sorry for answering your, your question three weeks late. Frankincense, myrrh, gold, what are we bringing the baseball players?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Likely chew? Greenies?
ALEX: For Baby Jesus?
BOBBY: Oh, right, right. The question is what do we bring–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –baseball related gift for Baby Jesus.
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: Not what we are bringing–
ALEX: I was like-
BOBBY: –baseball players.
ALEX: –I was like, damn! Okay.
BOBBY: Uhm, what do you call like the little toys that you hang above a crib? There’s a word for that.
ALEX: Like a, like a mobile?
BOBBY: Yeah, a mobile. I feel like a, like a baseball diamond mobile. Where you, the, the baby as it gains Baby Jesus.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: One of the three parts of the Holy Trinity. As he gains fine motor skills, you know, some little things he can move around some players that he can move from home to first on the mobile. You know, spinning around, maybe a ball connected to a string, connected to a bat.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’d be a good gift for Baby Jesus.
ALEX: That would be a good gift.
BOBBY: Right, that’s one. Now, you’re up.
ALEX: Well, so I was, I was thinking about this, I realized it has to be something it’s kind of useless, right? Because, the three–
BOBBY: Spoken by someone who never saw the frankincense.
ALEX: Okay, what was Baby Jesus doing with that? Like dragging it around his, his house? What was he doing with a little piece of gold?
BOBBY: Well, first of all, frankincense oil seems to kill some types of bacteria and fungi. They had a lot of bacteria back then.
ALEX: That’s, that’s true. Yeah, because they didn’t have Clorox.
BOBBY: What Baby Jesus was doing with it was blessing people with it. You know, the scent of it calming. I don’t know. Just choose something! Grass, from the outfield!
ALEX: That, so the first thing my mind went to is like grass aroma?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: You know?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Maybe like a–
BOBBY: Grass seed oil.
ALEX: Right, like a little candle–
BOBBY: That’s pretty good.
ALEX: –something. The candle would be good, actually.
BOBBY: So now mine seems silly, now mine seems like a token.
ALEX: Or something maybe that’s like, vaguely insensitive, you know, like a cross but like made out of baseball bats or something like that.
BOBBY: These things need to be like symbolic and you know they need to be like one ingredient. You know, like–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –it can’t be a toy. So my answer is not very good. So I like your answer like grass, scent of grass oil.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: We can come up with a better name, Frankincense is made up by the way.
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: That’s a made up name.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: We can come up with something better.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I like that, that’s a good one. Number two–
ALEX: We’re gonna, we’re gonna all three.
BOBBY: Yeah. Oh, we’re only we only get to bring one. Well, we’re two Wiseman, we can bring two gifts.
ALEX: Yes. Yeah.
BOBBY: Right. We’re two of the three Wiseman.
ALEX: We two for three–
BOBBY: The third being Sean Doolittle because he’s the only one who’s EGOTed.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s, it’s probably like Cracker Jacks, right?
ALEX: Yeah. Yeah.
BOBBY: Or peanuts. Like a little bag of Cracker Jacks. Jesus would see what we’ve brought on the world and be like, what are you guys doing?
ALEX: Lord, you put these–
BOBBY: Beer?
ALEX: –people on Earth to forage and they’ve, they’ve made sugar corn.
BOBBY: He’s all knowing, he knew we were gonna make it.
ALEX: Exactly, I know.
BOBBY: He’s like, he’s omnipotent. That’s a good answer. Cracker Jack–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –and scent of grass oil.
ALEX: Scent of grass.
BOBBY: We’re taking submissions for names for that.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Okay, we only have time for one more voicemail.
VOICEMAIL 2: Hi, Bobby, Alex, how are you? I have a lot of questions. First of all, how dare you? And by you, I mean for anxiety. And the new GM Pete guy from the Astros and Charles Johnson. But also give Steve Cohen. Which brings me to my actual real question, which is, how, how is one supposed to be a fan of multiple team? Because I moved to New York for college. And I said, this is gonna be so great. And I’m going to adopt the Mets, because of the history with the Giants. And, you know, what am I going to do? Switch to the American League, yet alone at the Yankees? Gross! But I am feeling quite at en at the moment and extremely mad about the Mets. And I don’t know what to do. So any advice would be appreciated. And also seeing this how this is the beginning of my villain origin story. Any suggestions for what my villainous acts should be? I will take them. Also, this is Jesse if it wasn’t abundantly clear.
BOBBY: So okay, we waited long enough to answer this, that I’m off the hook. In the time that it took us to respond to this voicemail, the Mets have stolen Correa and had Correa stolen from them.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: So you know, watch your own back. I guess I would say to myself. This is an easy answer, all teams are bad. You just have to choose which teams you like, for completely arbitrary reasons and stand by it for in a completely hardheaded way.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’s my answer, that’s my advice. You like the Giants, now you like the Mets. Because you’re here you get to go to games. That’s fantastic.
ALEX: I mean, my earnest take about sports fandom is that bandwagoning is probably the most fun way to enjoy a sport. Oh, you just, you just get to watch the team when it’s good. Sounds like you’re just always watching good baseball.
BOBBY: No one wants to work anymore, that’s my take. No one wants to do the hard work of suffering–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –through years and years and years of baseball fandom.
ALEX: Yes. Yeah. Unionize the fans, man.
BOBBY: We already did! We already did! You know, I’ll say after the Giants deal with Correa exploded, there was a, Tipping Pitches themed catharsis therapy session in a Twitter space. Which Jesse was a prominent member of. I think it was actually organized by Nick, who asked a question earlier in this listener voicemail segment. So you can see who are the real power users of the Tipping Pitches, extended universe. And Giants fans were down tremendous in that Twitter space. They were down so bad that you would think they were the Cubs after not winning a World Series for over 100 years. And I just have to say the Giants fans, though I sympathize with you all in that moment. And though I sympathize with you over the experience of losing Carlos Correa, I’m just gonna need you guys to give it like 10, 20 more years before you start playing again. Three World Series, three, three World Series, three. Jesse you said you just came to New York to go to college? That means that your team won the World Series that basically every good year that you would want your team to win a World Series while you were a child. So though the Giants are going in an alarming direction and their ownership is God awful. And for anxiety seems to have bitten off a little bit more than he can chew with being able to do it all homegrown and then attract the one big star. I think the Giants are okay, I think the Giants are okay. This is my Ben Lindbergh Mets fans complain too much moment.
ALEX: What I would give to be able to complain about my team being in a tough spot.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like, not even a, like a decade after our last World Series.
BOBBY: You’re just, you’re beaten down. You, you haven’t even worse than me.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Because your team hasn’t won and isn’t going in the right direction.
ALEX: Right. Yes!
BOBBY: Or at least going in the right direction.
ALEX: Right. We have no past, present or future at the moment.
BOBBY: What are the three Wisemen say about the A’s? They bring you guys anything?
ALEX: They brought us kitty litter.
BOBBY: For the feral cat.
ALEX: For the feral cats a, a wrench to fix the leaky pipes.
BOBBY: Right. And like a Marlins jerseys to start rooting for a new team or something.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Or like a little sheet hanging over the, the pair of fans who are getting it on in the upper deck.
BOBBY: But maybe a paper bag to put over your own head out of shame–
ALEX: Yeah, yeah.
BOBBY: –for supporting the team.
ALEX: I already have one, but it’s getting a little old. So I could use a new one.
BOBBY: Okay. I, I dig the dual fandoms, though from Jesse, that’s cool. I personally do not often gravitate to other NL teams, because of the, the conflicted rooting interests that it might present in the playoffs. But then again, how likely is that really? The tier two teams are going to face off? And if so you probably know who you want to win more.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: So more power to you.
ALEX: Yeah. And again, I just want to reiterate, more fans should feel comfortable, like not watching their team when the owners when you’re fed up with ownership.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Like you don’t have to be beholden to your corporate overlords.
BOBBY: Whatever you do, don’t go to a press conference and ask them whether or not they’re reinvesting in the community.
ALEX: Oh, yeah.
BOBBY: Not the Charles Johnson is going to be hosting press conferences these days.
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: It’s got a lot of dark, dark money to throw around and political races in the greater United States. Okay, that does it for another episode of Tipping Pitches, a full one, a full one. Classic episode, complete with listener voicemails, tremendously deranged owner quotes, and a lot of talk about the Mets. Thank you to you, Alex, thank you to the listeners of this podcast. I don’t know if you notice this, but the baseball season is kind of getting close. We’re one month from pitchers and catchers.
ALEX: I gotta be honest, I didn’t notice it.
BOBBY: So, so I don’t know what we’re, what we’re going to talk about until then. But I do know that I’m excited for preparing for the 2023 season, both on the pod and in my own personal fandom. And I hope everybody else does too. And I hope you enjoyed listening to this episode. I think that does it unless you have anything else to add for people?
ALEX: Nothing else to add except for our phone number, which is 7854225881.
BOBBY: Forget about to read my phone number. So for our personal phone number is where you can text us or call us for any of your needs in the baseball world, for any of your discussion about frankincense, myrrh, or gold, whatever.
ALEX: You can do that too.
BOBBY: Sorry, I interupted you.
ALEX: If you DM me–
BOBBY: 785–
ALEX: 422–
BOBBY: 58–
ALEX: 81.
BOBBY: That was really cute. All right, everybody. We’ll talk to you next week.
[1:18:14]
[Music]
[1:18:26]
[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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