Bobby and Alex come together to recap a dominant Texas Rangers run that ultimately ended in a somewhat pedestrian World Series. Then, they expand the scope of the conversation to include some retrospective thoughts on the 2023 season at large, including how pitcher usage is affecting our relationship to watching the sport, what we learned about what “all in” means for teams, and more. Also, Alex shares a very important memory about fonts.
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Songs featured in this episode:
Into It. Over It — “August, GA” • Booker T & the M.G.’s — “Green Onions”
Transcript
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, I broke our— a cardinal rule of mine, about three minutes ago.
ALEX: How’s that, Bobby?
BOBBY: I broke the save it for the pod rule.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You started telling me an interesting story and I said, “Could this be used for the pod?” And you said, “Well, it has nothing to do with baseball.” And I said, “Great, perfect.”
ALEX: Yeah, I’m off a little bit, yeah.
BOBBY: “Sounds like a good cold open.” You started telling me about downloading fonts, and giving your computer viruses, and I immediately regretted not saving it for the pod. So you know what? I’m gonna do the Men in Black—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —flash. Just wiped my memory. I have no idea what happened. Please tell me the story.
ALEX: I appreciate your transparency with the audience, right, that you are not actually listening to this story for the first time.
BOBBY: Well, now I am because I don’t— what story? What this podcast needs is more improv.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: That’s— that’s what people have been saying. You know, like there’s just been a mass exodus, everybody canceling their Patreon subscriptions and— it was weird. Everybody says in the exit survey when you cancel Patreon, “More improv bits.”
ALEX: More bits. They—
BOBBY: Yes. “And—”
ALEX: They’re saying not enough of bits.
BOBBY: “—I will come back if you do more improv bits. Treat this like UCB.” Is this the first Friday night recording we’ve ever done?
ALEX: It’s— it’s a little weird, you know? Like, we— like, we’re both off work, kind of in the post [1:57]
BOBBY: I’m never off work. I’m never off work. I’m always on the clock.
ALEX: I know about you [1:59] you’re either always on the clock or always post-work, oftentimes at the same time.
BOBBY: I’m a man who contains multitudes.
ALEX: You are.
BOBBY: You know this about me.
ALEX: I do, I do.
BOBBY: Some say contradictions. Some say I’m a delicate, little snowflake that looks different every day.
ALEX: That— has that— has that been said about you?
BOBBY: I don’t know. Probably somewhere on the internet. The internet is a wide-and-far-ranging place as I’ve learned—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —as I’ve learned being an employee at The Ringer.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Can you please tell me your story? Actually, can you please tell the listener your story? Listener, singular. Speak to that one listener at home who wants to hear this story
so bad.
ALEX: Right. The one who was content with the amount of bits that we were doing?
BOBBY: No, because they’re going to be mad because there’s more bits to do.
ALEX: Right. Well—
BOBBY: If you’ve tuned in expecting to hear a detailed breakdown of the Texas Rangers winning the 2023 World Series, bad news. Alex has to tell this story first.
ALEX: Well, the— the genesis of this was you called me over to your laptop and you said, “Look at this funky thing that Pro Tools is— is doing. It’s changed up the naming— the— the default naming convention, right, of my —of my files.” And I joked, I said, “What if it’s— what if it’s virus?”
BOBBY: Which is the last thing that I want to hear.
ALEX: Which is the last thing you need to hear.
BOBBY: You know this, that I’d just been so paranoid about all things.
ALEX: I— I— yes, I did not need to plant that in your head, but it—
BOBBY: It crossed my mind already. It crossed my mind.
ALEX: Well, like it was—
BOBBY: So far it’s been a harmless virus.
ALEX: It’s— the best kind.
BOBBY: Honestly, like that’s what the Department of Defense does half the time. They’re like—
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: “—They breached our systems, but they haven’t sent off any nukes yet.”
ALEX: Right, exactly. They can see everything you’re doing, but like they’re not deleting your emails.
BOBBY: Right, exactly. That’s like when you get an email that you’re part of a class action suit, because your Social Security number was, like, exposed to several deep state terrorist organizations and—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —they’re just like, “But it hasn’t been put to use yet. We’ll let you know if it does.”
ALEX: Right. I’m like, “Okay, good.”
BOBBY: All right.
ALEX: “Anything I can do about that?”
BOBBY: “Do I get a new Social Security—”
ALEX: “Do I get a new number?”
BOBBY: “—number if they decide to rip off my identity?”
ALEX: That— I don’t know how that works. Frankly, I’ve thought about that more than I probably should.
BOBBY: Do you want to share your Social Security number just to cut straight to the chase and let people steal it live on the air?
ALEX: Right. And I mean, we’re reducing fresh— friction here.
BOBBY: Exactly.
ALEX: 410—
BOBBY: Is that really the first three numbers?
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: Is there like— like— do all— everyone’s Social Security numbers start with the same three numbers if they were born in the same year?
ALEX: What does your start with?
BOBBY: I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours. Anyway, back to my virus, back to your virus.
ALEX: Right. Well, it was— that— that suggestion was rooted in a kernel of truth, a— a past traumatic experience. As listeners of the show may know and as you well know, I was, you could say, an intrepid kid on the internet.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Some say I threw caution to the wind in my actions.
BOBBY: Like your internet service provider said that once via letter—
ALEX: Like my internet service provider said, unless verbatim.
BOBBY: —that was mailed to your house.
ALEX: Yeah. “Stop torrenting without a VPN.”
BOBBY: Did they say, “Without a VPN.”?
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: Or that was you? Did you, like, red line it?
ALEX: I was reading between the lines.
BOBBY: Did you red line it like you were an English professor?
ALEX: It was like it didn’t have to be said. You know, it was implied.
BOBBY: Right. Right. We wash our hands of this.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: You do what you want with your dirty hands.
ALEX: But I— as you also all know I love— I love fonts. I love fonts, I love typography.
BOBBY: Yeah. You used to download so many fonts just to see if it would make our website look better when we ran our student newspaper.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. It didn’t, but it was fun to play around with.
BOBBY: I think we did a great redesign of our website. This is why people come to the Tipping Pitches post-World Series season wrap-up pod for.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: For us to do self-reflection about our redesign of our student newspaper website from 2016 that has now probably been redesigned four different times since then.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: This is what they want to hear.
ALEX: The red underline on the logo.
BOBBY: Popped.
ALEX: That was me.
BOBBY: It was you. That’s your—
ALEX: I’m saying that’s my legacy right there.
BOBBY: —capital L, legacy.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: So you were downloading some fonts.
ALEX: I was downloading some fonts, you know, going through all the— the right channels for this sort of thing.
BOBBY: How old were you?
ALEX: I was probably 12 or 13.
BOBBY: Peak?
ALEX: Peak. Peak, yeah. I mean, this is when I was— I was in my bag in this era.
BOBBY: This is like 2014 Kershaw.
ALEX: It really is. And at one point on my journey, I said, “Well, I might as well download the Star Wars fun, you know?”
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: I’m sure it was more than, “I might as well.” I think I probably had some sort of intention behind it. I don’t know what it was. Whatever I was creating has not— has been lost to the— the annals of history.
BOBBY: This was definitely like a poster for the band that you’re in or something.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: So you admit that it’s been over a decade of flouting copyright law?
ALEX: I— I do. More than that. We’ll— we’ll talk more off air.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: So I downloaded this font—
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: —not necessarily from— I didn’t— I didn’t purchase this font. I didn’t— I was not going through whatever verify— fonts.com or— or dafont.
BOBBY: Is that real?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Great.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: No free ads. Bleeping all that out.
ALEX: No, these are great resources. I’m a fan.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: You know? But I was going to like— like movie, like, poster designs.co.nz/fonts. You know, it was—
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: —it was a little sketchy to begin with. But I downloaded said font because it was what I was looking for. Just as this story is what the Tipping Pitches listeners are looking for. And—
BOBBY: And then what happened?
ALEX: And shortly thereafter—
BOBBY: Wait, sorry. Yes. And then—
ALEX: And—
BOBBY: —what happened?
ALEX: Yes. And—
BOBBY: Sorry, we’re working on it.
ALEX: I— I booted up my computer one day, and there was the Source font all over everything. It had become my— my system default font, and I couldn’t tell— like it was not reflected in the settings, you know? It was like— it was like you’re looking at Helvetica and I was like, “I think I know what that looks like.”
BOBBY: Right. You’re a big Helvetica guy.
ALEX: Yeah. Clean, simple, smooth.
BOBBY: So you’re a big Hel—
ALEX: Me— me and [8:07]
BOBBY: Yeah. Big Helvetica guy is like being like, “I’m a big water guy.”
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s just the default font that most people use now.
ALEX: Well, some prefer Arial.
BOBBY: Well—
ALEX: If your— if your Google Docs.
BOBBY: What— what is that, by the way?
ALEX: What is Arial?
BOBBY: No. I know what Arial is, but why did Arial become the font that Google Docs chose? That ugly-ass font, that boring-ass font? No, I wasn’t like— I guess my only perspective on the world before that was Microsoft Word, which is defaulted to Times New Roman.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: But I always assumed that just like Times New Roman was the One, the Only, the capital O, One, the capital O, Only. And then I wanted—
ALEX: [8:47] font.
BOBBY: Right. And then I started using Google Docs, and I was like, “This is ugly and bad. And then I discovered Georgia and I’ve never looked back.
ALEX: This is incredible content.
BOBBY: Much like the Atlanta Braves, I discovered the sweet, sweet lands of Georgia, you know? And I just kept getting far out there in them.
ALEX: Yup. Yeah, you went further and further down that rab— rabbit hole.
BOBBY: Exactly.
ALEX: I think I— I held on to this discovery of mine for— kind of a while, because I was afraid that, like, my— my parents were gonna get mad at me that I was like downloading fonts and I had corrupted my system.
BOBBY: Was this, like, on your personal laptop? Did you have a personal laptop or this was on the family desktop?
ALEX: I believe it was on— it was— it was the family computer on my personal account.
BOBBY: Oh, okay. Okay.
ALEX: So it was just my side of things that was affected and so I could— I could hide the [09:38] relatively easily.
BOBBY: It hadn’t bled through the firewall to your mom’s?
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: Do they know about this now, to this day, or are they finding out live right now in the moment in time and space where they’re listening to this?
ALEX: It may have been memory hold this one of a long laundry list of my internet foibles, you know? They may not rise to the top, but for me it made an— made an impact on me. Now, I think very hard about—
BOBBY: Which fonts from— fonts.nz./movies/—
ALEX: Which fonts from— yeah.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: That I— that I’m downloading.
BOBBY: So what— what’s the resolution? How did you get out of it?
ALEX: If I recall correctly, I think I had to wipe my side of things. I think I— I had to start fresh.
BOBBY: Ouch.
ALEX: Which is— which is tough to swallow. But— but it’s also, I gotta say, a little freeing.
BOBBY: So freeing.
ALEX: It’s one of the reasons why— on— on the rare occasions, like get a new phone, I don’t, like, back everything up and then transfer it over. I’m, like, clean slate.
BOBBY: Is that true?
ALEX: That is true. I’ll be like— I’m—
BOBBY: I think people are gonna think that is psychotic.
ALEX: I think that’s quite possible. But I— like, I’m not very good at curating [10:42] the apps. Like, I download apps, and then I just keep them on my screen. I’m like, “It’s on the last page. I never swipe over there anyway.”
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And so I’m like— it’s a nice way for me to like level set, what do I really need? What do I really need to take with me?
BOBBY: I— I could ask a million follow up questions. Like— because you don’t actually go and clean that up. So you’re just saying that you keep all of the garbage until you move?
ALEX: Right. So, like, this is essentially the equivalent of saying, “I bought a random piece of furniture that I didn’t need. And then next time we move apartments, I’m just going to leave it behind.”
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: “Or I’m going to sell it or I’m going to put it up for free on Facebook Marketplace.”
ALEX: Right. Rather than tackling the issue right now—
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: —the issue at hand that I have a piece of furniture that I don’t need. Let’s just put it in the office, have it take up space there, and will worry about it once I’m leaving.”
BOBBY: Which you’ve now been at the same apartment for like four years.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And you’ve had the same phone for seven years?
ALEX: Right. Like, six or seven years maybe.
BOBBY: Yeah. So how’s that strategy working for you? You know what? Honestly, I think a lot of baseball teams do this, too. I think they’re like, “That’s for a future administration to deal with.”
ALEX: Yeah. Right.
BOBBY: These players development that is not going very well, that’s for the next roving hitting coach to figure out.
ALEX: Yup. That’s what— what the Nationals said with Juan Soto. They were like, “We’re not going to own this team for much longer anyway, so it’s not really on us to think about this kid’s future.”
BOBBY: Right. And then every once in a while, you just get a hard reset, like the Texas Rangers did, and they built a champion.
ALEX: Wow.
BOBBY: How’s that for a segue?
ALEX: How’s that for bringing it home?
BOBBY: We’re gonna talk about the end of the 2023 World Series, Rangers in five just as Alex Bazeley predicted. We’re going to do a— somewhat of a retrospective look back on the 2023 baseball season and everything it brought us, and everything it took away from us, Alex. Everything it took from our souls. And then we’re going to answer a few voicemails and questions later in this episode. But before we do, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I am Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: And you are listening to Tipping Pitches.
[theme]
BOBBY: Thank you so much to this week’s new patrons, Lindsay and Matt. Welcome to the offseason content, Lindsay and Matt. Bro, you thought we were about to start talking about the Rangers?
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: Absolutely not.
ALEX: No way.
BOBBY: Absolutely not. Here’s what I want to talk about.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: Did you see the 2022 film Elvis, directed by Baz Luhrmann?
ALEX: I did.
BOBBY: Are you familiar with the Tom Hanks character?
ALEX: I am.
BOBBY: The Colonel?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: So, I— unfortunately, I’m like your colonel and you’re my Elvis. So I’ve been telling people on various internet threads, forums, Slack channels—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —that I signed contracts for you to sing in the entirety of Creed’s Higher—
ALEX: Hmm.
BOBBY: —to start this episode. So we’re just gonna have to pay up, so get— get to it. Start singing.
ALEX: Can I do the Rangers version where you mumble your way through, like, the verses and stuff and then just—
BOBBY: And then you just belt—
ALEX: —hit— belt the one line?
BOBBY: Yeah, go ahead. There’s a truck backing up outside right now.
ALEX: That’s—
BOBBY: That’s like your meter, you know? Sing it slower.
ALEX: So that’s my Metrodome.
BOBBY: Yeah. We want the 43 beats per minute version of Higher.
ALEX: Yeah, I don’t know if that’s gonna happen. Not— not yet at least,
BOBBY: See, now the mob is coming for us.
ALEX: I know.
BOBBY: See, this is what happened with the Colonel.
ALEX: Well, I thought we—
BOBBY: [14:13] I’m gonna start giving you pills.
ALEX: We don’t have any listeners anymore anyway, right? Like—
BOBBY: That’s true. They all defected.
ALEX: We’re not deep enough into the offseason yet, you know? Like, we—
BOBBY: They all— yeah. They’re—
ALEX: We’re— we’re not scraping the bottom of the barrel quite yet. We may get there.
BOBBY: They— they haven’t boomeranged back, so they all left us to go listen to Effectively Wild while the real baseball was on. And now, they’re coming back for the offseason because you know what they want? The sweet, sweet bits.
ALEX: Fonts and Creed, baby.
BOBBY: Fonts and Creed. And don’t forget movie talk.
ALEX: And— and movies.
BOBBY: And emo music.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: More of that coming later in this offseason. Chats with former players, hopefully chats with current players. Maybe chats with current commissioners.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Maybe chats with current heads of unions. You know, just manifesting, manifesting. All right. We got to talk about the Rangers. They’re just— they were just way better than the Diamondbacks.
ALEX: Yeah, they really were.
BOBBY: Proof is in the pudding.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You know what’s weird? They only outscored the Diamondbacks by four runs in total for the whole season— or for the whole series. And the— the Diamondbacks actually outhit the Rangers in the series. Super did not feel like it.
ALEX: Did not feel that way, whatsoever.
BOBBY: The Rangers felt like they— they were even like playing with their food a little bit at times, where they were up 11-1 and they’re like, “Meh, we’ll bring in like the guy that we just called off the roster this— onto the roster this morning. We’ll see what happens. We’ll give up six runs and will not feel that bad about it.” We were doing a livestream for game five when the Rangers won this series, and I gotta say a great baseball game. A pitcher’s duel, everything we could have wanted, Zac Gallen with his A stuff. Nathan Eovaldi, I think with his, like, B-minus stuff but gritting through it, which is truly the Nathan Eovaldi experience. Maybe that’s a good place to start. He’s the one guy I’m happy for on the Rangers.
ALEX: Yeah?
BOBBY: I guess there’s like five guys that I’m probably happy for. I’m like moderate medium happy for Max Scherzer. I don’t know who Jacob deGrom is, so please don’t ask. I’m happy for Bruce Bochy.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Good for him. The hip pain was worth it. Coming back out there. I’m happy for Cy. [16:20] GM.
ALEX: That’s right. Tall— tall people can be GMs.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: I just want to say.
BOBBY: Breaking down barriers.
ALEX: He’s— he’s broken the threshold.
BOBBY: He’s broken the glass ceiling. You were telling me be— when you got here you— that you were really fired up to get on the mics and— and get it cooking, because you wanted to talk about how happy you were for Ray Davis.
ALEX: Well, he’s earned it.
BOBBY: I mean, he did it the right way with dignity. Really, actually, bits aside, what is your, with two days of hindsight, view on the— the World Champion 2023, Texas Rangers? And what, if any, takeaways are there to be had from this October and this season at large that are verified by them?
ALEX: Okay, so some softball questions there.
BOBBY: Yeah, bro. This is the podcast logic that we talked about last week.
ALEX: I know, yeah.
BOBBY: I— I— you can’t just be like, “Hey, Alex, how are you?” I have to be like, “Hey, Alex, there’s this very convoluted question.” And then you have to be like, “Great, great question. Thank— thanks for asking.”
ALEX: Boy, do I have a pissy response for you.
BOBBY: Pissy response. You can keep talking about fonts if you want, or you can make good on all of my commitments for you to sing Higher. Those are your choices, A, B, C.
ALEX: We’re renegotiating my contract next time. I’m just saying.
BOBBY: Should we have contracts, employment contracts with our own company?
ALEX: Right. Like— like who do we submit them to?
BOBBY: Our lawyer. You know our lawyer?
ALEX: Oh, right.
BOBBY: Right, that one.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’s the one lawyer. Do you know any lawyers? I think I know, like, one lawyer. Maybe two.
ALEX: I— I— I know the one who works at my company.
BOBBY: Oh. In-house legal counsel.
ALEX: A guy in— literally, in-house legal counsel, yeah.
BOBBY: I just wanna say I’ve come around, I’m pro lawyer, by the way. You know, because there’s been—
ALEX: Say more.
BOBBY: Well, there’s been a lot of lawyer slander on the pod because of Rob Manfred’s career as a lawyer.
ALEX: Hmm.
BOBBY: And I just feel like lawyers get a bad rap, you know? There are some good lawyers out there.
ALEX: I feel like lawyers get a— get a deserved rap. Like, I feel like they are neither underrated nor overrated.
BOBBY: [18:25] I’m in the final season of Better Call Saul. I’m like— I just believe in the law now.
ALEX: Big rule of law guy over here.
BOBBY: Yeah, I am. Yeah. Read—
ALEX: The justice system—
BOBBY: —read the code.
ALEX: —works.
BOBBY: You just have to— if you want to get out of it, a good outcome, you have to put in the work on the front end.
ALEX: So you’re saying most lawyers just don’t grind enough?
BOBBY: Exactly. Exactly. Maybe find a little work ethic. I have now— now given you so much time to think of an answer to my— to my convoluted question. Okay. It’s time to be pithy, be pithy. Answer the question.
ALEX: Rangers are a good— a good baseball team. They earned it. I think like—
BOBBY: Yeah, they did.
ALEX: Like, they honestly did. They—
BOBBY: With dignity.
ALEX: With dignity. They approached it with dignity with poise rationality, you might say.
BOBBY: You [19:15] yeah.
ALEX: I chime in with a, “Haven’t you people ever heard of”— I— I— the— the way that they constructed their team, I think, is really fascinating and potentially instructive as to how you can invest in your baseball team at key positions, and fill the roster out with young Major League ready prospects and some sort of, I guess, like moonshot guys. Guys like Andrew Heaney and Nathan Eovaldi to an extent, right? Guys who have shown their ability to perform to some extent over the last few years. And you say, “Hey, we have our aces who weren’t really acing.”
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Some maybe not even pitching. But I don’t— I— amid the whole story about the— we talked about this on the livestream, right? The padres who had the story drop about how they took out a $50-million loan to help cover their payroll and— and whatnot.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: And there’s been this year’s long hand wringing over the fact that how can the— how can the Padres afford this? You know? And how can they afford this— especially when they’re not winning. And the— the Rangers just feel like the natural corollary to that, which is, like, sometimes your team just has to mesh a little bit and— and sometimes the ball just has to bounce the right way. And maybe the indictment is not necessarily on spending to try and win, but dare I say, execution?
BOBBY: Hmm. Right. By spending wisely.
ALEX: Right. Yeah.
BOBBY: Being prudent about it. Doing it the right way. Yeah, I mean, I think that a lot of people have sort of twisted themselves in knots, ourselves included, trying to figure out what the Rangers becoming this dominant team for the last four weeks when they look terrible in— in September, says about what it means to build a team. I think lost in a lot of that is that they were one of the best teams in the league, if not, the best team in the AFL for most of the season. The Houston Astros pulled it out at the end, because that’s what the Houston Astros seemingly always do since 2015. But then they went head-to-head and look who came out on top. I mean, there was like a whole bad faith, “You guys bought this AL championship— this AL pennant.” And we’re building sustainably conversation that was going on, on Astros Twitter, which is just an absurd place. But aside from the fact that that’s not even really true, like their payrolls are pretty similar and it— it’s just, like, the Rangers just happened to do it in a concentrated period of time. Like, it wasn’t guys that they internally developed and then extended or whatever for a team-friendly deal like— aside from that fact, I think that the reason that it’s sort of hard to have a— like a capital S, super smart takeaway from watching what the Rangers have done is that— you know, I was on the radio, on— on Sportsnet in Toronto earlier this week, talking about games three and four, heading into game five. And they asked me, they were like, “What— what makes the team so great? Is it like— is it Bochy getting the most out of the players? Like is it— is it the spending? Is it this? Is it that?” And I was like, “Honestly, it’s the fact that Corey Seager is awesome, you know? And Marcus Semien played really well and— who was bad for a lot of October. But, like, if the— if the takeaway is sign the best left-handed hitter in the league not named Jordan Alvarez, like, yeah, I mean, 29 other teams could have told you that. They just didn’t want to pony up the— or 29 other GMs, I guess, could have told you that. They just didn’t want to pony up the cash because ownership wasn’t into it.” If every single ownership group was like, “Yeah, you can have 10 years, $325 million for Corey Seager. Do you want to do that?” Probably, almost all of them would have said yes. Because even if you already had a shortstop, you probably would just put them in second, you know? And that feels really obvious, but it also— you know, we said this when deGrom went to the Rangers last offseason. It’s not just about offering money, you know? It’s about actually convincing players that they have a chance to win. And then once they get there, actually showing them that— that what you convince them of was real. Because if they get there and it’s like, “Well, we sold you on this vision of winning, and we sold you on this vision of commitment, and we sold you on this vision of buying and pushing our chips to the center of the table, making the trades that we need to support this team at the deadline.” Even though those trades didn’t equate to, like, a bunch of players who performed perfectly throughout the postseason, they still did it. And it still fosters this sense of like, “We want to win. And now, we can win. And now, we’re good enough to win. And now, our GM believes in us, our coach believes in us, the rest of the players on the roster believe in this.” And I’ve been, like, really reckoning internally with the idea of what it takes to build a good team, because I used to think, “Well, if you just get the best players, they’re all professionals. And they’ll come in there and they all want to perform the best.” But I don’t really think that anymore, or rather, I don’t always think that, like, building a good team means having a bunch of good players playing well individually. And I’ve been, like, trying to delicately balance between thinking about this concept of, like, team chemistry, or momentum, or loosely— what I’m calling just vibes because it’s like hard to quantify. But honestly, it’s not equal. It’s like— it doesn’t matter equally that you build a good team, and they like playing with each other, and they want to win. But it’s not like as far apart as I— I used to think it was. If it was like— in my head, if it was like 95% the players that you put on the team and 5% whether they like each other or not. Now, it’s a lot closer to, like, 70/30, and the Phillies have convinced me of that. The Rangers have kind of convinced me of that a little bit, even though they don’t just like— they’re not, like, love fest for each other, but they, like, clearly liked playing with each other, and felt that the environment fostered them playing well, and Bochy was a big part of that, honestly. But, like, the failure of the Mets, the failure of the Padres, the failure of the Yankees over the last few years has— has shown me that— that 30% being bad can hurt your team a lot more than I thought it used to be able to.
ALEX: I think one thing that really stood out to me about the Rangers in not only kind of how they constructed their team, but in terms of how it was managed on the field is they really sort of seemed to embody the mantra of like, “Don’t overthink shit.”
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Whether it was, like, the young post-hype guys, and actually giving them a chance to, like, stake their claim, or meaningfully adding to their team throughout the year. Or even just— I— I feel like there’s— there’s a lot of manager discourse, and there’s a lot of discourse around what makes a good manager and what makes a good manager in the postseason. And— and what—
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: —stood out to me about Bochy is that he kind of got out of the way. Like, it didn’t necessarily seem like he was—
BOBBY: Except when he got in the way to put in Jose Leclerc.
ALEX: Yes, yeah. Right. Except for when he got in the way of Jose Leclerc actually coming in and getting his moment at the end of game five, but like—
BOBBY: Such coward stuff.
ALEX: It was— it was so funny. But like where— past postseasons have been sort of dominated by— you know, did David Martinez costs his team? Did Dave Roberts cost his team?
BOBBY: David Mar— crazy David Martinez [27:13] World Series Champion, David Martinez. The answer is yes, Kevin Cash did cost the team the World Series in 2020.
ALEX: I mean, yeah.
BOBBY: Leaving Blake Snell [27:25]
ALEX: Which is not to say that, like, Bochy was checked out, but it didn’t necessarily feel like tinkering at every move, you know? It was like at some— at some point, you have to let your guys play and trust that they’re gonna give you what they’ve told you they can give you.
BOBBY: Well, like, honestly, that part of it was a testament to the Rangers roster.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: For better and for worse, like they didn’t have good relievers to bring in. So there was no overthinking to be done, there was no other players.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Like, Josh Sborz was the only pitcher pitching well and— I mean, and Leclerc, right? And Chapman was coming in because he was their big trade deadline acquisition, who was supposed to help bolster the bullpen, and he sucked when he got there from— from Kansas City. And then in the playoffs, the results were kind of okay, but the process looked very bad every time he came out there. So it was, like, short leash for Chapman, that was obvious to any manager who would have been running that bullpen, and everyone else is just like, “All right. Well, we hope if they’re bad today, then Corey Seager comes up and it’s a two-run home run and ties the game in the bottom of the ninth.” You know? Like, that’s— it’s as simple as that. And the roster was optimized, and not like optimized in the way that they saved as much money as possible. Like, we most of the time talk about optimization. Nowadays, it was optimized as in— he had options. He had the requisite right-handed bats and the requisite left-handed bats to make the lineup hard to navigate for any other kind of starting pitcher out there. Like, there was no starting pitcher who could look at that Rangers lineup and be like, “I can get through this easily tonight, you know? Oh, this is a nice stretch here of 6, 7, 8, or I don’t feel bad about any of these guys.” Like, it’s just a good team. They just built a good team. And it’s not as simple as like, they’ve figured out baseball now, because next year, half of these players might not be as good, you know? Josh Jung might take a step back and Adolis Garcia might not be the world-beating version of himself that he was this season, but— specifically in this October, and then you have to switch it up. But more team should learn the lesson that the Rangers seemingly approach the season with, which is a sure thing is always better than best laid plans. A sure thing is Corey Seager. A sure thing is Marcus Semien. A sure thing is Jacob deGrom being great for six starts and then getting hurt. A sure thing is Jordan Montgomery being a solid pitcher. A sure thing is Nathan Eovaldi being good in the postseason or being a dog and going out there and giving you five or six, even if he’s not a perfect pitcher, even if he’s not pre-arb, you know? So, like, whatever prospects that the Rangers might have had to eventually grow into— to the second base and shortstop positions, doesn’t matter, now they have the World Series rings. So like that— to me, that is the lesson that you take away from this. As sure thing as you can get in baseball, is the best option for competing at the highest level. And I think about that when— when it comes to, like, reflecting back on the season, and maybe some of the other teams that competed at this level that were similarly all-in, were not pushing all-in for things that were as sure as this. Not pushing all-in for players who are around 30 or younger, like the Rangers did. The Mets were pushing all of their chips in the center of the table for two guys who were almost 40. Those are not sure things. And the sure thing that they did push their chips all to the center of the table for, Francisco Lindor. He was fucking awesome this year. He wasn’t the problem. And the Padres, I don’t— I don’t even know what’s going on with them, honestly. None of the pitchers are really sure things. Like that— and they seemingly can’t develop a pitcher to save their lives, or optimize a pitcher to save their lives. So they have, like, bigger structural problems going on, but, like, in contrast with the Dipoto 54% of our games over a 10-year span mentality that I think a lot of teams approach team building with, it’s like— there’s nothing sure about that. You can’t be sure about anything nine years from now. Just like I’m not sure that Corey Seager is going to be good nine years from now, but it doesn’t really matter, you know? Like, you optimize the front end of that, and that’s the bargain you make. That’s the chance you take to give your fans a World Series, and it worked. And we could be sitting here just as easily saying, “It didn’t work. They came up short. The Astros beat them in game seven, and the Astros repeated again.” But even in that alternate reality, to me, it’s like— it was still worth it, just to be in the mix to be seriously contending. And it’s just— to— to use a word that teams love to use to justify cheapness, it was a good process, and then none of them were World Series.
ALEX: It also flies in the face of I think that— that idea that a lot of fans have in their head, which is if you want to build a perennial contender, you’re going to have to build from the ground up, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: You’re— you’re gonna have to tear it down—
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: —and—
BOBBY: Don’t bring in the free agents until you have the cost-controlled core.
ALEX: Right, exactly. And—
BOBBY: The Orioles model.
ALEX: Right, which is not to discount that way of doing things either, because the Orioles obviously had a tremendous amount of success doing that. And, you know, to the— to the Rangers credit, like they were a bad baseball team a couple of years ago, right? And—
BOBBY: They were really bad.
ALEX: Like a really bad— like I [32:52]
BOBBY: Bro, I heard [32:53] on the broadcast that the Diamondbacks lost 110 games two years ago, like, is that right?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: They signed free agents, and then the prospects came.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: It’s almost like the prospects were like, “Well, we believe we can be good now. We’re playing next to fucking Corey Seager and Marcus Semien.”
ALEX: Right. Exactly. It takes the pressure off me a little bit.
BOBBY: That’s true. That’s— that’s a really good point, actually, that like Evan Carter is just like, “Yeah, I can be 21 and just be happy to be here. And doesn’t matter if I’m not hitting .400.”
ALEX: Right. “I don’t have to be Corbin Carroll and, like, be the face of this team as a rookie, because there are other guys who can shoulder some of that weight for me, that emotional weight, that— that weight— and I can figure things out.”
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: I mean, do you want to talk about the— the Diamondbacks at all, sort of how your— if your perspective of them is— has changed at all of this? Are they still fraudulent going into next year?
BOBBY: No, I mean, they’re not fraudulent going into next year. They were never, like, fraudulent going into next year. The contention was never that— and CB [33:58] is just barking her way through this like crazy, because it’s Friday night, and there’s more sounds than usual. So we’re just gonna—
ALEX: You’re— you’re both like unstoppable—
BOBBY: We’re just gonna let it rock.
ALEX: —force, movable object, just—
BOBBY: She’s—
ALEX: —just trying to power through.
BOBBY: She’s pissing me off, but the listeners seem to like it. So the contention was never that they are not building an interesting team.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I think that was true, like, even before the season started. Like, people were— they were like, “When’s Corbin Carroll gonna get here? You guys are gonna be amazed.” And that happened.
ALEX: Yeah. Like we were.
BOBBY: They were like— they were like, “Gaby Moreno, interesting— interesting player on the Major League level as a catcher. He can actually hit. He’s super young. There’s not a lot of catchers out there like him that are ready at that age. That’s a rare thing.” Brandon Pfaadt, the pitcher who they called up early in the season, who did not have as much success as they had hoped, did not carry the rotation as much as they had hoped. And they needed to lean in other places to dip and dodge through this season even to make the playoffs. They needed a— a Cy Young caliber year from Zac Gallen just to even get there. And then once they were there, it was like, “All right, all bets are off. Like, we can start playing— we can play well for four weeks.” But they’re just like— it’s— they’re just incomplete, you know? They’re just— they have not had the full length of their process like the Rangers have. And I think the Rangers were probably a little bit ahead of schedule for— for what some people expected. But I— I mean, I can— I attribute that to just like— the— the league feels super wide open right now. Like, I probably would have put the 2019 Astros or the 2017 Astros— if you put them in this year’s playoff field instead of the 2023 Astros, I probably would have picked them.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: If— if you— if you just like press reset. Even knowing everything I know about how the Rangers performed and how hot Seager was and how hot Garcia was, I still probably would’ve picked those teams. I think they’re better. Same with the 2018 Red Sox. Probably same with the 2018 Dodgers, honestly. But, like, everyone on the— that Astros team is four years older, you know? There’s a lot of injuries to the pitching, and they were like just vulnerable enough that a team built well can beat them, can knock them off. And for the Diamondbacks, they need like for heavy hitters, if they want to be considered at the same level as the Braves heading into the— heading into next year, as the Rangers repeat, as the Astros— I think they would have been similarly exposed heading up against any of those teams in the AL bracket. The reason I felt confident saying that they’re fraudulent was because I really don’t believe that they’re going to do that. Like, who is the big free agent that they’re bringing in to bolster this roster, to bolster the depth of this roster, to bolster the dudes who are here? Like they’re not getting a Trea Turner or a Bryce Harper level, caliber player. Really, their best hope is to, like, acquire, like, another a list starter like via trade, maybe. I don’t even know what that really looks like for them, because they don’t— they don’t play the free agency game. They— they never have. Like, their biggest free agency signing was Madison Bumgarner, and that didn’t work out, and they cut him in recent memory, obviously. And they got rid of Goldschmidt before they were gonna have to pay him the big contract. Like they— and that’s just an ownership thing. That has nothing to do with Mike Hazen?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Mike Hazen. Has nothing to do with Mike Hazen who’s done a great job, you know? Like they clearly— and this is all without even like Jordan Lawlar, who’s another one of their top prospects—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —even really flourishing. So, yeah, they’re gonna be good next year. I mean, they’re not going to be a pushover. They’re going to make it equally as interesting this year between the Dodgers and the Padres, and who’s going to actually come out on top in that division. But I think like the— the, like, smart baseball person takeaway from the season would be don’t get too swept up in what they did in three rounds in the playoffs. All that being said, interesting team, fun team to root for.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I think as a fan of the Diamondbacks, you’re just like, “That was— that was cool. That was house money.” And like nothing I’m saying right now is to throw pour cold water on any of that. Like, I think that that was still a fun thing to observe, and a testament to how worth it, it is to— to even try to get into the tournament, that is the baseball playoffs.
ALEX: I think that’s one of the frustrating things too, about seeing this team and knowing how they act in the free agent market, is knowing that they are a couple moves away from being right back here next year, if they want, right? I mean, they have some key guys leaving the team in Gurriel, and— and Pham, and Nick— Nick Ahmed.
BOBBY: Wasn’t he— he was already cut, I thought lifelong Diamondback.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: They just got to give Pham, like, 10 years, 300 million. That dude is amazing.
ALEX: Do you really— do you want to talk about vibes?
BOBBY: Not my kind of vibe, but definitely a vibe.
ALEX: But— but definitely a vibe.
BOBBY: An identifiable vibe.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Room-changing vibe. He just— he just hit the ball like he was mad at it all October. Everything he made contact with was hit hard. Just locked in, you know? Should the Mets get him back?
ALEX: Right. So go— I’m writing in my notebook, go get players who hit ball hard.
BOBBY: You could do worse as a GM.
ALEX: You could do worse strategy-wise.
BOBBY: For like— for like a good three years, on Effectively Wild, Jeff Sullivan who’s now employed by the Tampa Bay Rays, was just like, “This is the year Keon Broxton breaks out because he hits the ball as hard as anyone.”
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Still waiting.
BOBBY: We’re still waiting, but at the same time, like, maybe sometimes that turns into Mike Stanton, now known as Giancarlo.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Keon Broxton, Giancarlo Stanton, what’s the difference?
ALEX: Yeah, choose your fighter. Do you— do you have any third time through the order takes you want to get off your chest? It’s the— it’s the talk of the town over the last week.
BOBBY: Oh, like, literally— but you’re not doing a bit, like you— you’re not saying like, “Get out all of my takes that we haven’t used all the good stuff in the first time— two times through the order.” You’re saying like literally like you want me to talk about the third time through the order?
ALEX: No, I mean, literally the concept of— I’m— I’m posing the question to you. It came up on our live stream and we— we discussed a bit, right, because there’s— there’s been this proposal [40:32]
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: —about— about should— should MLB limit the number of pitchers that you can roster or the number of— of pitchers that you can send up and down—
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: —from the Minor Leagues.
BOBBY: The answer’s yes. You should only be allowed to roster five pitchers.
ALEX: Okay. Right.
BOBBY: Yeah, I mean, I feel similarly as I— I feel similarly still as I did when I spoke about it on the livestream a couple days ago, which is that— it’s like such a holistic problem that we don’t have as many good starting pitchers anymore, because pitchers are not being asked to do that. Pitchers— even— even like guys who have been in the league for four or five years who are great, like legit, capital G, Great who have won Cy Young. Let’s— let’s— let’s use— here’s two pitchers, Corbin Burnes and Max Scherzer. Those guys could not have more different philosophies about pitching. And they are both great. They’re both similarly valuable two teams or have been for the last four years. Scherzer is obviously, like, getting at the end of the rope here, but— and Burnes is hurt, you know? But if you just take what they were in— for the last five years, similar— similarly valuable because Corbin Burnes is so good on a rate level. But he’s not trying to go to the eighth, because he’s not expecting to be left in until the eighth. He’s expecting to go to two and a half times through the order, depending on what month and what team he’s playing. And the handedness matchup of the lineup that he’s going against. And that’s just how he was developed. And that’s how he was raised. But Scherzer, who’s a guy who is very astute in how he talks about pitching and his philosophy. And he’s a really good talker and thinker about the game. And he likes to talk shop with other players and— and because of that he has had an influence on molding a lot of people around the baseball world, opinion of what it means to be a pitcher. He saves stuff for the second time and third time through the order. He saves pitches. He won’t show a guy a pitch in the first at-bat. He won’t tunnel a pitch the same way in the first time through as he will the second time through or the third time through, because he’s actually expecting to still have the ball in the seventh, eighth, and ninth inning. And that difference in philosophy is, as you mentioned in our livestream, something that you learn at such a young age that, like, by the time Major League Baseball teams get these guys, there’s nothing that they’re going to do to change that. And you know what? They don’t want to change that because they don’t want pitchers who are going seven, eight innings every time through, because in their minds increases the risk for injury for their investment. And more importantly, it makes them more expensive. If you have peak Max Scherzer he is gonna get $43 million on the open market. If you have a guy who only goes five innings, you’re gonna win that arbitration case more likely than not. And it’s much easier for them to have three good starters, like the bare minimum three good starters, like, “Well, we— we actually have to have, you know, a couple people in this restaurant who know how to cook food. But everybody else, we’re gonna bring them in on minimum wage and this is their first job in high school.” And that’s not to be disrespectful to relievers, but like some of these guys are really just, like, shuttled in from the 40-man from time to time, and then sent back down to the Minors, and then they’re not being put in— in positions to succeed as starters and they’re not being put in positions to succeed financially, intentionally. So until there is like some kind of market inefficiency in starting pitching, we’re not going to see that trend to go in a different direction. Now, whether or not you think that Rob Manfred needs to limit the amount of pitchers on the roster to create that market inefficiency, I don’t really know. I haven’t done the work. I haven’t done the research. But I think it’d be nice if more teams were like, “I see a guy who has the potential to be, like, a four or five pitch starter who makes it late into games. And I want to stoke that rather than tell him, ‘No, actually just throw your fastball harder and then throw a slider off of it.’” Because I think a lot of times, it’s going in the wrong direction. And teams have gotten myopic about that kind of thing. And it’s helped them because it’s confirmed a lot of their analytical opinions about what makes a good pitcher, but it’s hurt the game. There are fewer Zac Gallens. There are fewer Zach Wheelers. There are fewer Max Scherzers, and that’s a bummer. It’s a bummer from a narrative perspective, but it doesn’t mean that, like, baseball is not interesting and good still, you know? Like, I can appreciate what relievers are doing when they’re actually good. But, like, the Rangers won the World Series, they were a bunch of shitty relievers. Like—
ALEX: Right. I mean— and I think that, like, that’s—
BOBBY: The sport is amazing, but the— most of the relievers were shitty.
ALEX: The— I don’t know. There’s this real tension right now across the game of, like, aesthetics of what we’re seeing and, like, the actual success of the teams, right? The team might be successful pulling their starter after four or five innings in the playoffs. But aesthetically, it may not be what you were expecting when you tuned in. It may not be the thing that creates that heightened sense of drama that you expect out of the playoffs. And, like, part of the problem is the conversation, I think, gets really flattened, right, because it’s like, “Well, there are two options and that is the pitchers don’t— that starting pitchers go less deep into games and more relievers come in, and that’s less interesting to watch. Or starting pitchers go deeper into games, and that’s fun, because we— we like that, and we recognize their names.” And I don’t— like, part of the problem is like there aren’t enough good pitchers, you know? Like, it’s like—
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: Like, on— on either side of the equation, there’s always going to be that band of guys who are right on the fringe between AAA and the Major Leagues, and who are— who served the purpose of coming in and— and eating those innings. And I feel like there’s a sort of unfounded expectation that, “Well, if we just start limiting the number of pitchers, well, guys will go deeper into games.” And as you’re saying pitchers aren’t being trained to— to do that. Like you’re not— I think what we inevitably would— would see in that outcome is that pitchers just aren’t as good as the game goes on. Like— like asking for seven innings out of the guy who throws five is not just going to give— then give you the same quality—
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: —of— of stuff that he is putting. Now, which is not to say that this is the ideal situation for the baseball fan, per se. But as you mentioned, like there’s a real injury component to this when you start asking guys to, like, radically shift the way they are approaching their job.
BOBBY: Yes. The— honestly— and I would— I would actually love to get into this more in the offseason, because this feels like something that could be a full episode where we talk to people who have different perspectives on this question. But like for— for pitching coaches, like if you give those guys a hammer, then everything is a nail. Like, if you give those guys a mediocre starter at that single— at the high level, then he’s a great reliever. You know what I mean? Like, if— if you give a guy a hard thrower from high school, and you could foster the— the work, the hard work that it takes to see whether or not he can cut it as a third starter, who could give you some length and actually go seven innings. And you put that up against the— the much easier task of saying, “No, throw harder. Go to Driveline in the offseason, learn a hammer slider and become an amazing rate stat single-inning reliever, then I look like a genius because I just turned a bunch of dudes into guys who can be used in the bullpen, a place where our managers always need more guys now at the Major League level, because our front offices are telling them to go to the bullpen earlier. And if they don’t have enough guys to come in and— and fill the last four innings, then— then they’re screwed. And they always want a guy who come— they always want Bryce Montes de Oca. They— you know, like, he’s not a good pitcher. He’s not great, but you know what? He’s gonna get innings at the Major League level because he throws hard and has great stuff. If they develop Bryce Montes de Oca different— and I’m just using him because it’s the Mets and that’s like a familiar comparison for me. But it could— it could be anybody, right? Like Rafael Montero, who’s like the top— he was like the pitching prospect to end all pitching prospects, so— like more so than Jacob deGrom when he was coming up with the Mets. And they were like, “Well, you know, deGrom— you know, this deGrom seems like he’s doing really well and we’ve done a good job developing Harvey, like let’s just see if Montero plays better in the bullpen because he’s had a tough couple of years in the Minors.” It’s like if you— if you tell these pitching coaches, or these roving pitching development guys who worked for teams that you want a bunch of guys who can deliver on a rate basis, single-inning outings, then they’re going to create them, you know? But if you tell them that it’s like— if you tell them like, “We want to have a five-man rotation that looks solid.” First of all, they’re gonna be like, “You’re stupid. They’re all just gonna get hurt. And then you’re cooked and then you have nothing.” But— and that’s, like, because they’ve been developed differently from a young age. If you actually try to make starters, they’re gonna get hurt and— hurt their elbows and stuff. But it’s more achievable to turn a guy into a great pitcher for one inning than it is to turn a good pitcher into a good starter for seven innings. And it’s like part of this larger umbrella thing in baseball where it’s like front offices want to manipulate as many of the variables as they can. And oftentimes, that is financials, and oftentimes that is pitcher usage when— third time through the order. Like these are things that they can say, “We are controlling this variable, so that the uncontrollable var— variables in baseball, which are myriad, more than any other sport besides maybe hockey and soccer. Don’t seem overwhelming to us.” And then if the ball bounces the wrong way, then the ball bounces the wrong way. And, you know, the Diamondbacks are going to the World Series. So— I don’t know. It’s a fascinating conversation. It clearly was a theme of this postseason, and it’s led a lot of people to bad faith opinions about how entertaining the postseason was and why the World Series ratings were what the World Series ratings were. But, like, I— as a person who actually likes watching baseball, which I think a lot of the people who are pining on this don’t. I’m just— I’m kind of interested to see where we go from here, because I think that we’ve kind of hit the logical endpoint of, yeah, you can just make it through with two starters. Like, can you? You know? Like, do you want to? Like, that feels like we’re bullpenning games in the World Series, and that’s a bad beat. So
I don’t know. I’m confused.
ALEX: Well, yeah— well, and as— as listener Nick pointed out to us, right, there’s been emerging research on— kind of other side of the third times with the order, which is like that, you know, increased exposure to your relievers detracts from their success, right? So teams are making all of these calculated decisions. I do think we’re at a sort of inflection point here, and what I would hate to see is a sort of directive handed down from high that says, “Well, you should just build your teams like this.” Like, I don’t know, maybe we should let teams, like, figure this shit out. And maybe the pendulum swings back in the other direction, but it just feels like you’re trying to— you’re starting from an image of baseball that you would like to see—
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: —and then trying to figure out how to, like, reverse engineer that.
BOBBY: Right. Kind of like the DH. Yeah. The rule change ban is over now, right?
ALEX: It is.
BOBBY: Because the season’s over?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: So would you like to spend the next 45 minutes talking about rule changes?
ALEX: Yeah, let’s do it. They didn’t matter. It did not impact my viewing experience, whatsoever.
BOBBY: So I’ve put out a call for things that people would like to hear us talk about and reflect back on in the 2023 season now that it’s officially over. I think we’ve done our— done our part talking about the World Series. And someone— Zack responded and said, “The rule changes.” Now, that we can—
ALEX: Well, I— I was the one who banned them. Is there anything that you would like to get off your chest about them, that you’ve been stewing on for six months? Do you even remember what the rule changes were?
BOBBY: I just think, like, they were overstated in both directions.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Like, people got really horny for them, and people got really anti-them. And I just think that we’re all gonna look back and be like, “Why did we care that much about that?”
ALEX: Right. It’s— I— the thing that I keep coming back to—
BOBBY: It’s like poptimism. Like, we all look back and then we’re like— we were, like, really up in arms about that term.
ALEX: What I keep coming back to is that—
BOBBY: [53:12] Robin. I don’t know. I just— I just— I just wanna watch some baseball.
ALEX: Sports fans, generally, but I think baseball fans specifically hate change. I think that, like—
BOBBY: I love change.
ALEX: —90% of grievances towards the game are just like—
Bobby Are we talking about grievances in the context of the collective bargaining agreement or are we talking about—
ALEX: Right. Yeah. We’re talking bargain.
BOBBY: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, MLB teams hate changing their player salaries to above the league minimum.
ALEX: There you go, yes. Nicely done.
BOBBY: So there are grievances to sort that out.
ALEX: It’s like— I think there should be a moratorium on talking about any changes in the game in, like, the immediate like six-month aftermath.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Like, not just ever— we— because then we— we would not talk about the game of— of baseball, but I’m like, “Oh, I guess we— we— we don’t already.”
BOBBY: We did do, like, 15 minutes to talk with this episode about fonts.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Which was riveting content, by the way.
ALEX: It really was.
BOBBY: There’s nothing left to add about the rule changes.
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: Eric wants us to talk about the absolute con that is playoff home field advantage. See, the Texas Rangers going 11-0. Funny question, Eric. It’s never been done before and it will never be done again. So I don’t think that this is necessarily proof is in the pudding here. They just, like, happen to win all 11 on the road.
ALEX: You’re saying that it’s the exception that proves the rule. Is that a nice pithy way—
BOBBY: I am saying that.
ALEX: —of— of putting that altogether?
BOBBY: It’s just— see, you’re learning.
ALEX: I’m picking— I’m picking up on it.
BOBBY: You’re learning. You’re picking up what I’m putting down. We got two separate questions, one from the garcetti machine, and one from Brendon [54:49] about the Angels and about how this was potentially theirs— their worst year ever, just like in franchise history. Like, they really— they botched it. And I do think that’s true, but—
ALEX: Yeah. I kind of buy that.
BOBBY: I— the stakes were higher than ever because this was Shohei Ohtani’s last year before hitting free agency, and they basically just announced like two years ago that they weren’t going to resign him. So— but they’re going to try. Don’t worry, they’re going to try.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: We’ll see if the mayor can bribe Ohtani’s agent. And if not, then he’s going to walk. I don’t want to— I don’t want to step on Dumbest Things of 2023, because I have some Angels content for that.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: So Brendon, and the garcetti machine, thank you for writing in, but we’ll— we’ll save it for the—
ALEX: It’s— it’s coming.
BOBBY: There’s a couple more in here we— that we don’t have time to get to, but I did want to mention this one from— from Mike. “Pitchers who tipped themselves the most this year.” They nominate Severino on the Yankees. Who are your faves? You know, I have Google alerts set up for Tipping Pitches, the phrase. And one thing about Tipping Pitches is that people at home understand what it’s about.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: But another thing about Tipping Pitches, the actual baseball term, is that anytime someone has a bad performance, it comes up.
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: It’s like, “Well, I might have been tipping.” It’s like, “You’re never—”
ALEX: Yeah, right.
BOBBY: And sort of like how— as a podcaster, you’re never wrong. It’s just that someone is the exception that proves the rule that you said.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: It’s like you never have a bad outing, you just might have been tipping, or you might have just found a mechanical inconsistency and you fixed it.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s beautiful. It’s beautiful. We’re all the same. Everybody is the same. Everybody’s the same. Nobody makes a mistake because of their own shortcomings. There is some external thing that can be corrected.
ALEX: It’s this millennial generation of pitchers who I think just can’t— who— who can’t hold themselves accountable, who— who cannot simply admit that they— they made a mistake. You know, it’s passing the buck along to someone else.
BOBBY: So it’s someone else’s fault.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Get a job, hippie.
ALEX: I guess— I guess in this case, it would be them— themselves [56:53]
BOBBY: No, no, no, no. It’s the— it’s the pitching coach who didn’t identify it.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: You’re telling me that— someone in the film room—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —you’re telling me that you just watched my whole last start and you didn’t see that I was taking my curveball?
ALEX: Right, but John Boyd did.
BOBBY: Right. From like local FM radio host found that out. I love— there is nothing, nothing to be lost in coming out after a guy that you think is good, has a bad start, or a bad reliever [57:19] performance. There’s nothing to be lost and being like, “I think I might see a little tip there.” Because the other team is never going to say, “We had this tip.”
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: They’re never going to confirm or deny it. And it could be months before that actually does come out before, like, another player is like, “Yeah, we had a tip on you. You fixed it, whatever.” That happens all the time.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: More than I— more than I thought. But CC was like— he said one time, he was like, “Yeah, people come to me all the time. They’d be like, ‘We had a tip on you for, like, two years.” And he’s just so good that they can’t hit him anyway.
ALEX: Right. I mean, that’s the thing is, like, you can tip your pitches and still sometimes, it’s like, “What are you going to do? You still have to go out there and hit the baseball.”
BOBBY: Yeah. I mean, we underrate how many circumstances in the pitcher-batter game theory that we have here are the tip— the pitches are already tipped anyway. It’s like— it’s 3-0, here comes a fastball.
ALEX: Yeah, right.
BOBBY: And, like, there are a lot of hitters do damage on that too, but we don’t call that tipping pitches even though you know that it’s going to be that.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: We were going to do some voicemails and we were going to do some— some questions at the end of this podcast here, but we’re— we’re running thin on time. Would you like to— do you want to do like one or two voicemails? Do you want to save the voicemails for next week’s episode?
ALEX: I think we should save it. You know, this week we— we had a choice, Helvetica or voicemails, and we chose Helvetica, so—
BOBBY: Georgia, Georgia, Georgia, Georgia.
ALEX: And that’s— that’s just something to shake out.
BOBBY: How are you feeling, season’s over? Just like personally, you know? Take me into the mind of an Alex Bazeley.
ALEX: I mean, I don’t really know what— like at the end of every season—
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: —clean slate. Every fan, in— in theory has a chance to say, “Well”— you start rationalizing, right? You start saying, “Well, you know, if we could— we could do this next year and we could go and make this free agent splash, and there are things that you can get excited about.”
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: I just don’t know what— what that is in— in my case, you know? Like, I don’t— I’d— it—
BOBBY: Can I put a curse thought on the world?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Like curse for me.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Not curse for you. Shohei Ohtani on the Philadelphia Phillies.
ALEX: Dombroski master— masterclass.
BOBBY: Fucking Middleton masterclass, bro.
ALEX: Yeah. Can we— alright. I just want to say—
BOBBY: I’m— yeah, yeah.
ALEX: Hang on. I’m—
BOBBY: Yeah. What do you want to say?
ALEX: That stirred something in— in both of us.
BOBBY: What do you— yeah, it stirred something.
ALEX: I just want to say the way that John Middleton, like, put himself in the favor of Phillies fans this postseason is like—
BOBBY: Yeah, this is the same John Middleton that’s owning the team for, like, 20— like in 2015, ’16, ’17 when they were like, “They won’t go over the luxury tax. I hate this man.”
ALEX: I know. I know. But— but it’s a testament to, like, the baseball fans short memory and it’s like—
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: —it does not take all that much to please your fan base.
BOBBY: Not [1:00:17]
ALEX: It really doesn’t. My man just like, “God—”
BOBBY: We’re on a tee.
ALEX: What’s that?
BOBBY: We are— we are collectively on a tee. We are ready to be smashed.
ALEX: Yes, yeah. Honestly. Oh, my— the owner is on top of the dugout throwing up baseballs, give me, I want one. My— my inner Zack Hample comes out, you know? It’s like, “I’ll throw bows. I don’t care.”
BOBBY: My inner Zack Hample comes out. I love the mental image of, like, every time we sit down to record this podcast, on one shoulder, you have Zack Hample.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: A mini-Zack Hample. And then the other shoulder, you have like a mini-John Boyd. It’s like, which ones am I gonna be today?
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I guess like those are two similar, like, kind of like annoying baseball media people.
ALEX: Right. Two sides of the same coin.
BOBBY: Right. So on one side, you have Zack and John Boyd, like a two-headed monster kind of situation.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I’m painting a beautiful picture for everybody.
ALEX: You really are.
BOBBY: What do you have on the other side? Like— like Chapo Trap House hosts or something?
ALEX: Jesus. God. No.
BOBBY: Like— like Dirtbag Left podcasters? What— what— this is an awesome question.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: Awesome question.
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: What podcaster do you think that you most closely aligned with, like energy-wise, podcasting style? You are obviously— we are all idiosyncratic as podcast hosts. We are all ourselves.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: We can only do the podcast that we do, and no other kind. I could not host another— another podcast that already exists—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —because podcasts are fake. Uncanny valley pieces of media.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: And idiosyncratic to our taste, this one more than any other. But, like, when you listen to a pod, you’re like, “Oh, I could vibe with that guy.”
ALEX: Well, see, this is— the hard thing is that I don’t really listen to— to pods, so it’s hard—
BOBBY: But like in your— when you did?
ALEX: I— yes, right.
BOBBY: When you did.
ALEX: Like I only listen to Popcast, so it’s like—
BOBBY: You were like—
ALEX: —a— a guy who only listens to Popcast. I’m getting a lot of Popcast vibes from this. BOBBY: A guy who only listens to Popcast.
ALEX: I’m getting a lot of Joe Coscarelli.
BOBBY: I’m a lot like Jon Coscarelli. I don’t— you are nothing like Jon Caramanica, though.
ALEX: No, I’m not [1:02:25] Joe Coscarelli. bro.
BOBBY: Because he’ll come out and just be, like, fucking hater.
ALEX: He is.
BOBBY: Which you will never do.
ALEX: No. You will, though.
BOBBY: He used to be like— you’ll be like— I am a little bit of Caramanica-esque. A little bit. I relate to John. But it’s funny, though. It’s funny that you say that because, obviously, I work at The Ringer so my answer would be, like, an amalgamation of, like, all The Ringer hosts that I’ve worked with in the past. But Shawn and Chris are close friends with Jon Caramanica. And Shawn one time told a story on Big Pic [1:02:50] of Jon Caramanica calling him up and having like a four-hour phone call, teaching him how to be a critic of things.
ALEX: Hmm.
BOBBY: So I’m like two generations removed from that, I guess.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah. You’re well on your way.
BOBBY: Like generational critical trauma. I just need to get a take him [1:03:04] need to be a hater about something first.
ALEX: Right. Well, you only— you only share one Philadelphia fact with me regularly, right—
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: —on this— on this podcast. But what the listeners don’t know is you spend hours on the weekends just regaling me with stories of— of Philadelphia lore.
BOBBY: That’s true.
ALEX: Over the phone, in-person, sometimes via— via the written— the written word.
BOBBY: Writing letters. You didn’t—
ALEX: “My dearest Alex.”
BOBBY: You didn’t answer the question.
ALEX: Michael Barbaro.
BOBBY: Bro, I— think on it. I’m gonna put a poll— not a poll. I’m gonna put up a Q&A for submissions for who Alex reminds you of.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: I can’t wait.
ALEX: Joe Rogan.
BOBBY: You are not—
ALEX: John Boyd.
BOBBY: No. No, you’re not— you’re not Rogan, but you’re getting closer.
ALEX: No, but you’re gonna have to put some options, right? You’re gonna have to direct the listeners.
BOBBY: Like, head-to-head, like original concept for Facebook. You know, the Facebook— face page thing, we have to choose which girl is hotter, which is insane.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: It’s insane.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I’ve been thinking a lot about social network and Fincher recently because the killer came out, saying that Facebook started that way and— and now it’s like everything that it is.
ALEX: Right. And now, it controls elections.
BOBBY: But, like, head-to-head, so—so Rogan versus Barbaro. Rogan wins. You’re closer to Rogan.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: So now we just do that little game, then.
ALEX: No, we just— alright. How much time do we have?
BOBBY: Alright. Rogan versus Kara Swisher.
ALEX: Right. Sorry, guys. We don’t have time for voicemail— voicemails.
BOBBY: Swisher— Swisher versus Bateman. Bateman. What’s next? Bateman versus Bill Simmons. I think Bateman still.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Yeah, but I think I’m more like Simmons.
ALEX: Oh, my God. Absolutely.
BOBBY: This is a great podcast idea for the offseason.
ALEX: This is great. You know what?
BOBBY: This is Patreon content.
ALEX: It’s coming down the pipeline.
BOBBY: Thank you everybody for listening. You know, you mentioned you don’t know where you’ll be headed next season. I know where I’m headed, every single [1:05:01] called I know where I’m going.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I’m going to start using that phrase. Well, I know where I’m going.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Right back to Citi Field.
ALEX: That’s right, baby.
BOBBY: Right back— I’m back in, baby.
ALEX: Right back on the seven line.
BOBBY: We’re 0-0 now. We’re tied for first, tied for best record in the league, the New York Mets. ALEX: Yes, sir.
BOBBY: I’ve been good recently. You know, I’ve only gone on a couple different 35-minute rants about David Stearns. Get ready.
ALEX: Yeah, they’re coming in.
BOBBY: Get ready.
ALEX: Oh, my God. Especially if they hire Craig Counsell. Jesus.
BOBBY: Oh, my God.
ALEX: I shouldn’t have said that. Cut it, cut the mics. I’m buying the Counsell jersey. Let’s do it. We’re back in. Thank you to everybody, for listening. Thank you to everybody for following along during this postseason, and for the whole season at large. We have a lot of fun stuff coming up, of course, Dumbest Things of 2023, which we teased already with our friends at Batting Around. A couple interviews that we were trying to line up. We’re really trying to get Jake and Jordan back on the podcast to do a big blow out idea. Probably about journalistic integrity and whether or not you should quote people from locker rooms.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: because I know that Jake really wants to talk more about that, and really just be on the record as much as possible about that whole situation.
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: We were maybe thinking we could get Arcia on the pod with them. So stay tuned for that. And other than that, it’s just gonna be a great offseason full of dumbshit. So thank you, everybody, for listening and we’ll be back next week.
SPEAKER 3: So, skip to the back and read the index. Put your trust in the dust sleeves of hardbacks, because it’s as fleeting as the feeling of being 18 again. I’ve turned the tables.
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!
Tipping Pitches 
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