Alex and Bobby dig into the strange legal battle that Mark Attanasio has found himself ensnared in, then check in on an NIL lawsuit involving the Pirates’ new Sheetz jersey patch, try and make sense of a possible six-inning minimum requirement for starting pitchers, and rank the 10 Bill of Rights amendments (yes, seriously).
Links:
Mark Attanasio accused of stealing sand
MLBPA files lawsuit against Pirates, Sheetz
Six inning minimum being floated
Join the Tipping Pitches Patreon
Songs featured in this episode:
Booker T & the M.G.’s — “Green Onions”
Transcript
Tell us a little bit about what you saw and be able to relay that message to Cora when you watch Kimbrel pitch 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 all about? That’s amazing. That’s remarkable.
BOBBY: Alex, flip over to the Los Angeles Times with me.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Headline—
ALEX: Sorry, I’m just looking through the paper— paper real fast.
BOBBY: You’re doing some sound effects?
ALEX: All right. I think I’m on the right page. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Should we start doing sound effects in— in our podcast? Like, it’s like a—
ALEX: [0:48]
BOBBY: —old timey movie, you know? Or, like— like, a black and white cartoon.
ALEX: Oh, and I thought you were just saying like— like, do sound design. Like, make it sound, you know, like we’re— the story we’re about to talk— how— talk about, maybe of sounds of ocean waves lapping against— but— but you are— you were thinking more like a—
BOBBY: Spoiler alert, spoiler alert.
ALEX: —like a— like a train horn or something like that.
BOBBY: Yeah. Can you do your best train horn for me?
ALEX: No, I can’t.
BOBBY: I did my best train horn for you yesterday, when I was feeding you fries like the choo-choo train at dinner.
ALEX: That’s true. That was your best.
BOBBY: Wow. Wow. All right. You did the airplane and I didn’t hear any, “Wrrrr.” I didn’t hear any of that. You were just doing the airplane.
ALEX: No, it’s— it’s why you didn’t need it. You were like, “I don’t know what you’re doing. I don’t know what to do with this. There’s no runway here.”
BOBBY: Smashing it against my face like, “Eat the fry. Eat the fries.”
ALEX: Sorry. Traffic Control said this is closed.
BOBBY: We’re really mature at restaurants, I would say.
ALEX: Yes, we are.
BOBBY: We handle thi— we handle ourselves like adults, in all circumstances. No, Alex, let’s flip over to the Los Angeles Times. Headline, “Billionaire accused of stealing sand from Malibu’s Broad Beach, lawsuit says.” Now, listener, you’re at home, this is— this article is by Jack Fleming. Want to make sure we give proper credits here. Now, listener, you may be sitting at home thinking normal billionaire behavior. Why is this relevant for a baseball podcast? You’re about to find out. “California’s beaches are public, but on the sands of Malibu, one billionaire has been accused of stealing a slice of paradise, or at least a few scoops of it for himself.” Good lead.
ALEX: Great lead.
BOBBY: A lawsuit filed last week alleges that— drum roll, please. You’re the sound effects guy. Come on, give me the drums. Drums, drums, drums.
ALEX: Can you hear it? No?
BOBBY: Bo, I can’t, but maybe the listener can.
ALEX: Really?
BOBBY: This is how you do sound design. Actually, it’s that the people who are performing can’t hear it, but everybody at home can.
ALEX: That’s true.
BOBBY: “A lawsuit filed last week alleges that Mark Attanasio, a billionaire businessman and owner of the Milwaukee Brewers baseball team, has been using excavators to dig up sand from Broad Beach and carry it back to his house as part of an ongoing construction project.”
ALEX: Same. Average problem.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: I always have to dig up sand on a beach to shore up my seawall to protect my beachfront property. That’s a normal thing to do.
BOBBY: I feel as though the phrase, “This is my Super Bowl,” is maybe a little overused these days, including by— by yours truly. I call a lot of things my Super Bowl, like Sweet Pill covering a Wonder Year song, this is my Super Bowl.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: This— this actually could be our Super Bowl. Quote, “This case is about a private property owner using a public beach as their own personal sandbox.” Wow, they really thought they snapped with that one. “And the disturbing conversion of a public natural resource for a nearby homeowner’s personal private use, the lawsuit says. The suit was filed by Attanasio’s next door neighbor,” hang on tight, “James Kohlberg, son of Jerome Kohlberg who founded the global investment company, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., KKR, the world’s biggest investment company.”
ALEX: Oh, my God. Come on. Come on.
BOBBY: “Kohlberg’s lawyers accuse Attanasio’s construction team, JILK Heavy Construction.” Jilk, I’m assuming that it’s pronounced Jilk, it’s J-I-L-K, in all caps, JILK Heavy Construction, “of operating enormous excavators in tidal zones, leaking oils and exposing local marine life to potential—l to potentially hazardous byproducts. The suit alleges that the construction restricted public access to the entirety of the beach.” We’re in real mad libs zone. We have—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: We have billionaire Milwaukee Brewers owner who lives in Broad Beach Malibu, California, digging up sand, annoying next door neighbor, nepo baby son of KKR investment firm founder, digging up the sand with his construction company called JILK Heavy Construction. Just for everyone keeping track at home. Okay?
ALEX: We could have made a bingo card out of this one story, I think.
BOBBY: It’s about to get more fun. “Attanasio bought the Broad Beach home for $23 million in 2007. A decade later, he picked up the neighboring property, an empty lot for $6.6 million.” You know, when you pick up the neighboring property an empty lot for $6.6 million.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. There are empty lots everywhere with— for those with eyes to see.
BOBBY: There are empty lots everywhere for those with excavators to dig. “In March, the Brewers owner obtained permits to repair a damaged section of seawall, according to the lawsuit. In June and July, excavators allegedly began dragging sand from the beach onto his private property and also left gasoline residue in the water and sand. Attorn— Attanasio’s attorney Kenneth Ehrlich said his client’s company,” now wait for this, Alex, “his client’s company, 2XMD Partners LLC has acted in 100% compliance with all of its permits.”
ALEX: You know 2XMD,
BOBBY: My 2XMD Partners LLC has acted in 100% compliance with all of its permits shirt has people asking a lot of questions already answered by my shirt. “2XMD is in the midst of a fully-permitted emergency repair of the property to protect it from ocean forces. It has secured all permits necessary for the repairs from the city of Malibu and LA County, as well as thoroughly vetted all contractors and subcon— contractors involved in the project, Ehrlich wrote in a statement. The lawsuit, which accuses Attanasio of public nuisance, private nuisance and violation of the California Coastal Act, calls for a stop to the construction, for the sand to be replaced and for fines to be issued.”
ALEX: Can I say public nuisance and private nuisance is kind of so goated? [7:09] You’re like, “Yeah, you’re bothering everyone else, but you’re also really bothering me, specifically as your neighbor.”
BOBBY: Now, the rest of the article, it goes on to give a little bit more— as most of these kind of articles do, starts with the news, then gives a little bit of context on, you know, the below the surface level, why is this relevant? What are the background details of this place? This is happening in Broad Beach, which is just east of Lechuza Point, which is actually where I used to go to the beach when I lived in Los Angeles, because all public— all beach in California is public, so I’ll go there, and I’ll use the rich people’s public beach. I’m not afraid. Why should they get to have the nicest beaches? And Broad Beach, specifically, is a— is a very popular destination for celebrities, and this article goes on to talk about all of the damage that climate-related events have had on Broad Beach in the last 10 or 15 years. Surprise, surprise. Do you think this checks off the bingo card, climate-related event or no? Little bit of a stretch?
ALEX: A human-made climate-related event, actually, I guess that’s kind of the nature of most climate-related events these days.
BOBBY: Most of them are. [8:18] The article talks about all of the— the rich and famous celebrities committing to restoration projects and the exorbitant home prices. There was a home sold by Oakley founder James Jannard, sold for $210 million earlier this year. That’s one home, $210 million.
ALEX: Normal price.
BOBBY: And then it closes by talking about, you know, the ongoing California debate about development versus preservation, which is definitely a debate in which reasonable people are seeing both sides of.
ALEX: Right. Well, it’s something that I think Attanasio and Kohlberg specifically are very invested in. Look, Kohlberg got his MBA from one New York University, I just want to say, so this is the kind of ingenuity that great school breeds.
BOBBY: Please don’t talk about New York University. You’re going to wish that you didn’t mention New York University, because in five minutes from now, if we keep talking about NYU, I’m going to start talking about the board members, I’m going to talk about who’s in the seat. [9:19]
ALEX: I know, I know.
BOBBY: You know how it goes with— with NYU. Billionaire owner of the Milwaukee Brewers who’s crying poor and can’t afford to extend his Cy Young winning pitcher Corbin Burnes and instead trades him to the Baltimore Orioles, buys $30 million home and digs up sand illegally. Could this be any more tailor-made for us? Could this be more suited for us?
ALEX: There’s a lot in this lawsuit, right? As you— you kind of mentioned the laundry list of things that Attanasio is being accused of. And there’s a lot of like, again, environmental stewardship claims or— or lack thereof, like claims being levied against him. And it’s one of those things where I’m like—
BOBBY: Right. Which— which Kohlberg definitely feels really strongly about, and this definitely is not just like a personal, “I don’t like to listen to the sound of excavators all day,” thing.
BOBBY: Well, exactly. It— it feels like kind of Trojan horse in your Trojan horsing in— you know, that phrase that we’re all familiar with and use frequently.
BOBBY: Right. The way Kamila is doing— Kamala is doing with communism?
ALEX: Exactly, yeah.
BOBBY: According to Elon.
ALEX: That’s that— that’s the blueprint.
BOBBY: Sorry. Oh.
ALEX: Right. Saying— saying I have a— I have a petty grievance that probably looks a lot more legitimate if I say, “Hey, look, this is impacting everyone else, too,” which, to be clear, it seems like it probably is. If he’s leaving gasoline residue on the beach. What? Like—
BOBBY: The way that you say he’s leaving the residue, as if he’s like down there digging up the sand.
ALEX: He is the one operating the exca— excavator.
BOBBY: Have you ever operated an excavator?
ALEX: No. I don’t know the circumstances under which I would ever be able to do that.
BOBBY: If anyone at home is listening, has the pow— the power to allow us to operate an excavator, I would like to try.
ALEX: You’re gonna get the picture of me like— I’m like Trump behind the wheel of that big rig, you know?
He’s like a little kid.
BOBBY: That was the happiest he ever was?
ALEX: Like, can I— can I pull the horn? It was all downhill from there.
BOBBY: I mean, literally.
ALEX: Look, Bobby, you seem to be forgetting the Kohlberg and company leverage ESG considerations in ways that are consistent with their mission. They make investment decisions based on a full set of risk-reward factors, and view ESG considerations as part of important inputs [11:42]
BOBBY: Am I forgetting that, or am I just supporting an American small business like JILK Heavy Construction? You would have the JILK Heavy Construction workers go out of business because of this.
ALEX: Should we set up like a— like a GoFundMe for, you know, like—
BOBBY: You would— you would put 2XMD LLC in jeopardy because of a petty complaint of another billionaire?
ALEX: I stand with JILK.
BOBBY: Nobody had a note for that name? Nobody sitting around the table? Nobody was like, “Maybe not JILK.”?
ALEX: Oh, I don’t know, man. What—
BOBBY: Do— can we do— file a DBA at doing business as JILK Productions LLC?
ALEX: Yes, you can.
BOBBY: JILK— JILK Media, JILK Media maybe?
ALEX: JILK— JILK Media actually kind of sounds sick. It, like, doesn’t mean anything, but it rolls off the tongue. Maybe it does mean something. We haven’t looked into this.
BOBBY: It’s—
ALEX: Is JILK like a family name?
BOBBY: It’s just all caps, so I assume it stands for something.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: What do you think it stands for? Let’s trade back and forth. You do the J, I’ll do the I.
ALEX: Jesus.
BOBBY: Is.
ALEX: Took the easy route on that one. Lord.
[laughter]
BOBBY: I thought— I was hoping you would maybe go for—
ALEX: Kavior.
BOBBY: I— I was may— I was hoping you would maybe go for loving, and then I could do kind. Jesus is loving and kind.
ALEX: Oh, nice.
BOBBY: But you went with Lord, which is fine.
ALEX: Jesus is Loving and Kind Construction.
BOBBY: Jesus is Lord Kid, Kid. It’s like a new Taylor Swift song.
ALEX: It’s—
BOBBY: JILK for short. You have a sort of look on your face like you’re looking up what JILK is short for, and I don’t want to know.
ALEX: I know.
BOBBY: Don’t— no one at home wants to know. They prefer to think of it as Jesus is Lord Kid.
ALEX: Well, you might be confused, because they are— they were formerly known as John S. Meek Company, which is how—
BOBBY: Oh.
ALEX: —I was introduced to them years ago.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: For my own beachfront construction projects.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: Just making sure I follow them on LinkedIn so I can see what they’re up to.
BOBBY: Do you think they’re sort of like a one-stop shop for all of these people who need to get, like, construction companies to do their evil destruction of the environment? Like, do you think—
ALEX: Yeah, they’re like your— your [13:57]
BOBBY: —they call the same phone number that John Fisher called to his de— deforestation?
ALEX: No. Put some respect on John Fisher’s name. That was a family-owned deforestation business.
BOBBY: Passed down generations. Where do you think they’re gonna get all of that— all of that packaging for those Gap Kids, packages that need to be shipped out to keep that stock price—
ALEX: Right. That’s—
BOBBY: —up so that Fisher can afford to move the A’s to Sacramento. Sorry, to move A’s to Sacramento.
ALEX: Right. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: 2XMD Partners LLC kind of rocks. How big— okay. Here’s my final question about this, and then we can get into the episode. How big would this story have to get before Rob Manfred answered a question about it in a press conference?
ALEX: I mean, I think he would have to lose the lawsuit, right? Like, at the very least. This feels like one of these things that— it’s a— this is a personal issue that has nothing to do with Major League Baseball. I feel like it would only come up if like—
BOBBY: Live from prison, the Brewers have signed Juan Soto to a 12-year-deal and we cut to Mark’s—
ALEX: Unless Kohlberg takes him for all he’s worth, and people are like, “Wait, who— does anyone own the— like, unless Kohlberg sues for the Brewers. You know, it’s like, this is part of your assets.
BOBBY: Wow. That’s intriguing. Now, we’re talking. That’s spicey. [15:26]
ALEX: I don’t know— I don’t know if that’s allowed, definitely not. I mean, the Brewers are probably protected through some Shell company that’s in—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: On an offshore account somewhere that we’ve never heard of, and then there’s another Shell company that owns that Shell company, and those Shell companies are redistributed through JILK or something like that. I don’t really know.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: 2XMD Partners is actually what owns the Brewers.
ALEX: I don’t know. This is the kind of thing that inevitably gets settled out of court, right? No billionaire is interested in being—
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: —like, “Yeah, let’s see— let’s see how the courts play this out.”
BOBBY: Neither billionaire.
ALEX: “I have— I have faith in the justice system.”
BOBBY: Neither billion— not— not Kohlberg and not Attanasio.
ALEX: No. They have better things to do, like ESG investment, you know?
BOBBY: It’s just— it’s actually so funny that Attanasio is like the new money guy who comes in and everyone is pissed.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. I mean—
BOBBY: These guys are all the same. They’re all the same.
ALEX: He’s just an investment banker, right?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: By way of New York.
BOBBY: Not wanted in Milwaukee and not wanted in California, must be hard. Come home, Mark.
ALEX: What does a billionaire to do?
BOBBY: Come back— Brooklyn’s Nice. Everyone’s moving to Brooklyn these days.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Do you remember— I asked the question like, how big would it have to get for Rob Manfred to comment on it? And then I remember that, literally, Arte Moreno was actively named in a bribery case that was handled by the FBI, like, less than—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —18 months ago and—
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: —we still didn’t get any information about that.
ALEX: Nope.
BOBBY: A federal bribery case. That’s real. That’s something that happened in the sport that we love.
ALEX: Yeah. I mean, we talked about that a ton, and it still feels like we didn’t talk about it enough.
BOBBY: All right. Well, do you want to spend the rest of the episode talking about it?
ALEX: Yeah, let’s do it.
BOBBY: Okay, great. Well, we’re gonna spend the rest of the episode talking about the Arte Moreno bribery case, but before we do, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I’m Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: The alleged, alleged Arte Moreno bribery case. Just like Mark Attanasio was allegedly using JILK Construction via 2XMD partners to steal sand from Malibu.
ALEX: I’m pretty sure the Moreno one is not alleged, like that was—
BOBBY: Don’t want to get us— please don’t get us sued in the middle of the intro, Alex. We’re about to say our names here. Okay? We’re identifiable. I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I’m Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: And you are listening to Tipping Pitches.
[theme]
BOBBY: So we’re gonna start with the discovery from the Arte Moreno FBI federal bribery case.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: So you’re gonna do— you’re gonna do opening statement. I don’t know how long I can keep this bit going. I’m just saying a bunch of court phrases. I just watched Presumed Innocent.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I don’t know.
ALEX: Objection.
BOBBY: [18:09] ooh, good one. Good one. Can we introduce a sort of objection— objection style to this podcast? Where, like, if you’re saying something that I don’t agree with, or I’m saying something that you don’t agree with, or if either of us are saying something that we don’t think fits in the confines and rules of the world that we’ve created here.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Objection. I don’t know who would sustain it.
Maybe the listeners—
ALEX: I feel like we need to— we need to put some guardrails on it, though, right? Like, there’s a— do you have unlimited objections?
BOBBY: Objections. Objection. No guardrails. Dream bigger.
ALEX: I just feel like this probably needs to be talked over and ratified—
BOBBY: Objection.
ALEX: —before this— a rule like this is implemented.
BOBBY: Become ungovernable, Alex. You can object whenever you want. Can you tell that the coffee that I just started to have before we started recording is hitting right now?
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Yup, I can tell.
BOBBY: Before we start the rest of the episode, I just wanted to give a quick shout out and say thanks to everybody who came out to the Wrigley Field meetup yesterday in Chicago. This is our third Tipping Pitches meet up, two at the Brooklyn Cyclones, one at the Chicago Cubs. My first time at Wrigley, Alex, and I gotta say, pretty sick.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: The stuff you hear is true. Unfortunately, I’m here to confirm. This—
ALEX: I— I love that— I think the first observation about it, you said to me was like, “Wow, it’s just like, so small. Like, the footprint of the ballpark.” And I’m like, “That’s— that’s Tipping Pitches brain right there.”
BOBBY: Oh, actually—
ALEX: Talking about real estate and footprints of stadiums.
BOBBY: Well, it’s— it’s nice, because—
ALEX: But— but you’re right, it’s cool.
BOBBY: It’s cool, and it’s nice, and it’s functional, because the ballpark only takes up part of the block, and so that way you have room for something like the DraftKings sports book, which is—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —to the outside of the stadium. And, like, what else are you going to do before, or after, or during a game without the DraftKing sports book there?
ALEX: Especially with multiple rain delays.
BOBBY: Do you think they would let us leave and play some bets and then come back in? It would be like, “I— I promise—”
ALEX: I feel like we explain— yeah.”
BOBBY: “—I’m only trying— I’m only trying to play some wagers.”
ALEX: I— I would think so.
BOBBY: Get Mr. Ricketts on the phone. I don’t know which one owns the team. Clearly, I host a baseball podcast, which frequently talks about owners, and I don’t know which one actually is, like, the chairperson. And I— I don’t even know their real names. I think it’s Pete and Tom.
ALEX: Those are two Ricketts, yes.
BOBBY: Okay. And the one who is the chair, the control person is—
ALEX: Come on, come on.
BOBBY: —Pete.
ALEX: Dude, yo, really, is this a bit?
BOBBY: Actually, it’s not a bit. It’s Tom?
ALEX: Yes, because Pete’s the one who we’re waiting on that campaign finance scandal from.
BOBBY: I thought that was Tom.
ALEX: No. Come— bro.
BOBBY: What— so he’s what? He’s like a senator or something, or like a state senator?
ALEX: Yeah, he’s a senator from Nebraska.
BOBBY: A United States Senator?
ALEX: A United States Senator. You know the senate—
BOBBY: He’s one of the 100 United States senators?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: That’s crazy.
ALEX: Well, he was the governor of the state before that, so it’s a lot of the next step for him.[21:26]
BOBBY: Nebraska— Nebraska, you said. I gotta say—
ALEX: That’s why I supported his election campaign.
BOBBY: —Tom sounds like a stronger politician’s name, the father, whatever his name was— don’t even introduce another name for me. Just don’t even tell me.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: The father should have steered him into politics, and should have steered Pete into baseball ownership.
ALEX: Right. Uh-hmm. That was good.
BOBBY: See, I got it right that time. I got [21:46]
ALEX: You got it.
BOBBY: You can’t accuse me of not trying.
ALEX: Right. I mean, Pete is involved in the ownership group, right? I think it’s like a— you know, he doesn’t have an active role, but the Cubs are family-owned, right? So he—
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: —necessarily has a stake in it, although it’s not any sort of like— I don’t think he wields influence. Again, he’s not the control guy.
BOBBY: Aren’t you supposed to, like, invest from your [22:10]
ALEX: When they— when they cash out, he will get a payday.
BOBBY: Hmm. Was it— doesn’t that a whole thing with, like, the Trump hotels, and it’s like all the diplomats were saying, “What if the diplomats come to Wrigley Field? Then what?”
ALEX: That’s a good question.
BOBBY: There’s probably not another human on Earth who’s ever asked that question, but that’s what you come here for. All that to say, Wrigley Field was a lot of fun. Thanks to everybody who came out. And, you know, but like, before we get too far off of the meetup, I just wanted to say, next year, we hope to have them planned much further in advance. This year kind of got away from us, and some of the planning had to happen on short notice. But next year, we’re going to try our best to, like, have them planned at the beginning of the season, so that if people want to travel, or if, you know, people want to come to New York and— and go to the Brooklyn one, like they’ll have a little bit more of a heads-up to be able to organize those travel plans. And it’ll be, I think, in all likelihood, we reserve the right to change this, if we need to, for whatever reason. It’ll be one Brooklyn one and then one at a different location, like it was this year, but it will not be Wrigley Field again. We kind of want to mix it up. It was convenient to do at Wrigley this year, but next year it will not be quite as convenient.
ALEX: Yeah. It was a really fun time. We got to hang with folks before the game, after the game, during the game even, you could say. As I mentioned, one or two rain delays did not—
BOBBY: I don’t remember a rain delay.
ALEX: —did not dampen the [23:45] whatsoever.
BOBBY: I remember— I remember perfect weather.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Some of our greatest moments have happened in the pouring rain, I will just say.
BOBBY: You and I?
ALEX: We saw Taylor Swift.
BOBBY: Okay. Any others? You’re making it sound like we had a notebook moment where we made out down by the lake in the pouring rain.
ALEX: I’m not refuting it. I’ll leave that to the listeners’ imagination.
BOBBY: The Bobby and Alex shippers win again.
ALEX: Tipping Pitches fanfic win.
BOBBY: Dude, you can’t prove that it doesn’t exist already.
ALEX: You’re right.
BOBBY: You—
ALEX: That actually horrifies me a little bit.
BOBBY: I feel like we got rained on in one of our college intramural softball games. Do you remember that?
ALEX: I— I don’t remember the specific instance you’re referring to, but—
BOBBY: I just remember we played on cement, and it got, like, really slippery because of the rain.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I was like, ” think I might actually injure myself seriously.”
ALEX: Yeah, it was a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone for coming out. And, yeah, we’re gonna do some— we’ll do some more next year.
BOBBY: Yeah. And thanks to Pete Ricketts for donating those tickets to us in exchange for all of the money that we gave him for his campaign to get reelected.
ALEX: Right. So he is— we should note, he’s— he’s seeking reelection this year because he was— he was appointed to the Senate, right?
BOBBY: What?
ALEX: And that’s why—
BOBBY: What?
ALEX: Hey, can— can I just— can I just— real quick, real quick. This is straight from the horse’s mouth.
BOBBY: Okay. We’re 33 minutes into the pod.
ALEX: My top three priorities be—
BOBBY: 33 minutes into the pod.
ALEX: —if reelected— uh-hmm. Yeah. My top three priorities are securing the Southern border—
BOBBY: In Nebraska.
ALEX: —reducing federal spending, and making government more efficient and less bureaucratic. Because here’s the thing, Kansas poses a real threat to the livelihoods of Nebraskans, and so securing that Southern border, I agree. You have to—
BOBBY: Oh, I couldn’t tell if that that was still a quote from him. Objection, Your Honor. I don’t think the Southern border of Nebraska needs to be secured. Have you ever been to Nebraska?
ALEX: No, I don’t think so.
BOBBY: Of course, you haven’t, you coastal elitist. You move straight from the Bay Area to New York.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: And now, what? You masquerade in Chicago at Wrigley Field, acting like you know the place.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I don’t think I’ve ever been to Nebraska, either. I have been in Kansas, as I know you have.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. I mean, that’s where we do our— that’s where we meet up with voters and diners to— to hear about them, to say, what do you think of Rob Manfred?
BOBBY: Are you worried about your Northern border and Pete Ricketts getting reelected? So he was appointed by whom? That takes the juice—
ALEX: By the governor.
BOBBY: That takes the juice out for me.
ALEX: Also, just really funny—
BOBBY: What did the governor go to do?
ALEX: What?
BOBBY: What did the governor go to do?
Why was he appointing a senator? We’re doing real, like, how a bill becomes a law chat.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Well, because the— the former senator resigned, stepped down, and so I think it was like, you know, you appoint someone to fill the seat until that term ends, which makes a ton of sense, right?
BOBBY: That feels like a hack.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Also, he was the— yeah. Like, Ricketts was the governor before, until you leave. You get a new governor in there and say, “Hey—”
BOBBY: “Appoint me to the Senate.”
ALEX: “—Can you— can you do me a solid?”
BOBBY: Should we move down to Nebraska in primary Pete Ricketts?
ALEX: Are we— are you asking if we’re gonna flip it blue?
BOBBY: Well, not if we primary him.
ALEX: Could we be able to do that?
BOBBY: No, we have to go to the Republican side. We’re Trojan horsing communism and then the—
ALEX: Oh, I see. Okay.
BOBBY: —Republican take him [27:30] to Nebraska. It’s fucking crazy to me—
ALEX: I think they might have an open primary, though. I think we could primary him as a—
BOBBY: Oh, from the left?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Awesome. It’s fucking crazy to me that Pete Ricketts holds the same title as like Chuck Schumer.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: That’s fucking crazy.
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: As Bernie Sanders. What the hell?
ALEX: Look, as always—
BOBBY: Have we not led every podcast from this?
ALEX: —Pete Ricketts is more than welcome to come on this podcast and talk about his positions, talk about the threat that Kansans pose to Nebraskans.
BOBBY: Securing the Southern border. I would let him do securing the Southern border chat on the pod.
ALEX: Yeah, yeah. Me, too.
BOBBY: We were talking about this with some friends last night, but there’s pretty much— there’s, like, only a select few people who we would not come on the pod and try to, like, pretend like we were interested in their schtick as a bit, to see how long—
ALEX: Hmm.
BOBBY: —we could keep it going. And he’s— he’s not on that list. So—
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: —Pete, you’re welcome on. Rob Manfred, you’re welcome on. Morgan Sword, let’s chat.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Let’s chat, brother.
ALEX: Or drop us a voicemail, 785-422-5881.
BOBBY: I’m so glad that that you know the voicemail number now, though. For a long time, you didn’t.
ALEX: I know.
BOBBY: And that’s in— that’s— well, he’s not going to call that number. He’s afraid of Kansas.
ALEX: That’s true. That’s true. That’s true. Should we set up a— a Pete Ricketts voicemail line?
BOBBY: You’re starting to make it sound like a honeypot operation for Pete Ricketts.
ALEX: Right. Can we entrap— if we entrap Pete Ricketts into a campaign finance scandal, does that count on our bingo card?
BOBBY: Well, actually, don’t tell people about this, because I’m working on a script for trap two to get Pete Ricketts to come on the podcast. And [29:18] is really excited about it. He wants to facilitate my creative vision.
ALEX: This is great. We— I’m so glad we have nothing else to talk about on this podcast.
BOBBY: Okay. Two meetups in the span of one month. I’m just proud of you.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: For the energy, for the excitement, for the personability. Great work from you.
ALEX: Thanks, Bob.
BOBBY: You’re welcome. Let’s talk about another lawsuit.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: It’s not just Mark Attanasio getting sued. Tough week for NL Central teams who claim that they can’t afford free agents, Alex. Bob Nutting and the Pittsburgh Pirates are also being sued by the Major League Baseball Players Association. Would you like to share the details of this?
ALEX: Yes, absolutely. The MLBPA—
BOBBY: Since we are the foremost scholars on the jersey patches, we could not possibly let this go by.
ALEX: Of course. The MLBPA— actually, sorry. MLB Players Inc., which is the corporate subsidiary of the MLBPA, brought forth an action for injunctive release— relief and damages.
BOBBY: You know what injunctive means, right?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And everyone at home does, so we’re— we’re just gonna go right along.
ALEX: Yup, yup. I know the difference between injunctive relief and damages, too. Those are two separate things.
BOBBY: Objection, Your Honor.
ALEX: Sustained. No, sorry, overruled.
BOBBY: Keep going, then. Wait, a judge who, like, says the wrong thing all the time by accident is really [31:06] like, the way that sometimes when you’re ordering and you say the wrong thing, and then you just have to be like, “Wait, no, I didn’t mean that.”
ALEX: No, sorry.
BOBBY: Scratch that.
ALEX: Sorry, it’s been a long day, guys. Anyway, keep— keep going with your witness or whatever you do.
BOBBY: Like the courtroom scene in A Few Good Men at the end when Kevin Bacon screaming objection, and the judge is like, “Wait, sorry.” I’m sorry, I just didn’t get a lot of good sleep last night. Overruled.
ALEX: Right. My ca— my caffeine hasn’t hit yet. It’s okay. The complaint— I’m reading from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette here, the complaint states that both the Pittsburgh Pirates and Sheetz misappropriated the name, image and likeness of multiple MLB players for the promotional campaign without a license agreement or proper authorize— proper authorization. It basically says the Pirates do have the right to license space on the players uniforms, right, for these corporate sponsorship patches. They do not have the right to license the name, image and likeness of three or more players in the calendar year, either to promote the Pirates and Sheetz or for any other commercial purpose. And basically, at hand is the fact that they were tweeting out pictures of the— of Pirates players in uniform, like pointing to the patch. You know, they were like, “Okay. Look excited. Like, look like this is the coolest thing since sliced bread.” And that effectively runs—
BOBBY: A sliced bread, to be clear, you can’t get at Sheetz.
ALEX: That runs afoul of these name, image and likeness rules. Now, the players have become a part of this marketing campaign, rather than just the uniforms themselves. It feels like a— a weird gray area, but like, I’m so glad that there’s someone in the players association’s office who was like, “Have you guys seen these tweets? Like, they can’t do that, right?”
BOBBY: This definitely started as a text message that was just three question— a picture of it and just three question marks. [33:17]
ALEX: Yeah. So it’s worth noting that they have since reached a, quote- unquote, “verbal agreement” on this, and are expecting—
BOBBY: Hmm.
ALEX: —the Pirates are expecting the lawsuit to be withdrawn. I think that makes sense. As we stated earlier, this is not the kind of thing that teams are interested in taking to court. I think it looks bad for most of the parties involved. It just feels like not the kind of thing that you want to be doing in the middle of the baseball season. Although it’s not like the Pirates are playing much baseball these days, so—
BOBBY: Yes. This feels very much like the type of thing where they violated the [33:59] and didn’t even realize it. And then when it was—
ALEX: Yes.
bobby: —brought to their attention, they were just like, “Oh, fuck. We’ll fix that.”
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: “And we’ll pay, like, some damages in the meantime.”
ALEX: Right. That’s compensatory and punitive damages.
BOBBY: And to be clear, so you know the difference between those, because I— I know the difference also.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: All right, cool. So if both of us know the differences, probably our listeners already know the differences and we don’t even need to talk—
ALEX: And we don’t need to explain it, right.
BOBBY: Right. I’m just glad that they filed for the injunctive motion—
ALEX: Yes, exactly.
BOBBY: —because a lesser lawyer might have filed for a different kind of motion.
ALEX: Perhaps adjunctive motion.
BOBBY: An unju— well, the unjunctive on— on the table too, right. The injunctive one.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Yeah. But they seem to know what they’re doing. They have that under control.
ALEX: Right. I trust the Players Association. They have some good folks over there.
BOBBY: Can you explain to me what the Players Association Incorporated is, or the MLB Players Incorporate? What’s the— that’s just like—
ALEX: I mean, I think it is just like— it’s like the marketing and, like, branding subsidiary—
BOBBY: Okay. All right.
ALEX: —right? So when you see like—
BOBBY: Then when they do the deals on, like, merchandise and stuff, like that’s [35:12]
ALEX: Right, exactly. And they have, like— that’s the little tag the MLB players— yeah. That is what is licensing out, essentially, the players [35:23]
BOBBY: You get an LLC, you get an LLC.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: You get an LLC. We have an LLC.
ALEX: Should we— should we create our own subsidiary, a corporate subsidiary?
BOBBY: A corporate subsidiary of our two-person limited liability corporation?
ALEX: Well, yeah.
BOBBY: We already have a corporate—
ALEX: That’s how you limit the liability.
BOBBY: Well, we already have a corporate subsidiary. I guess it’s not a subsidiary. It’s just a corporation.
ALEX: So that’s what I’m saying, you know? I feel like we need to formalize things a little more.
BOBBY: Do you think for our next episode on the Patreon, we should do a live read of the Tipping Pitches constitution?
ALEX: Sure.
BOBBY: The LLC constitution that we had to file with New York State when we became a business.
ALEX: The, like, template we filled in? We were like, “Yeah, this looks good.”
BOBBY: Did we put anything in there that was like, unique to us? I actually don’t remember. Like, is there anything about Alex Rodriguez in there? Is there anything about—
ALEX: Well, we did— we do— we offered chairs to him that he can claim at any time.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: But otherwise, no.
BOBBY: His shares automatically convert if he appears on the podcast.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: And we gave him, what, 13% of the company?
ALEX: Yes, exactly. Uh-hmm. That’s good.
BOBBY: Anything else about Sheetz? Would you like to go back and reassess where you put it in the rankings, just while we’re here talking about it?
ALEX: That— where did we— where did we land with them? Do you remember?
BOBBY: They were, like, 17th or 18th. They were pretty low.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: So they were not evil.
ALEX: Correct. I— I understand, now I know.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: This is the question every time we log on is, does Alex understand the how these bits work? And does Bobby know who owns the Chicago Cubs? It’s always an open question.
BOBBY: Don’t forget, do all of the listeners know what injunctive is and the difference between—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —compensatory? And what were the other kind of damages?
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Punitive.
BOBBY: Well— oh, exactly.
ALEX: Right. The answer, obviously, is yes.
BOBBY: Have you ever been— I’m wondering if you’ve ever been awarded punitive damages from all of the many people that you filed lawsuits against, Jomboy, Jeff Passan, and Jon Heyman.
ALEX: Well, actually, my beach house is next to the vacant lot.
BOBBY: [37:42] John Fisher.
ALEX: It’s on the other side from— from Kohlberg’s house, so not yet—
BOBBY: Oh, okay.
ALEX: —but it’s coming.
BOBBY: So you’re next to the empty lot that he bought, that was between you two? You were in a bidding war over it, and that’s why it went up to 6.6 million? You were like, “I can’t—”
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: “—go above 6.6.” And Attanasio was like, “Done, 6.6.”
ALEX: Exactly. I want to point out also, he hasn’t done anything with that lot.
BOBBY: I know, it’s just like [38:05]
ALEX: Like, took a [38:04] picture of it.
BOBBY: Haha.
ALEX: And it’s just like sitting there empty.
BOBBY: What do you think he’s gonna put there? Like, maybe a bocce court?
ALEX: Pickleball?
BOBBY: Maybe that’s what he had the sand brought in for.
ALEX: Hmm.
BOBBY: He had to smooth out the bocce court.
ALEX: Maybe.
BOBBY: Pickleball. Honestly, probably.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Do you think this is the episode where you should reveal to the listeners that you play in pickleball tournaments every weekend? You, like, fly all over the country on Tipping Pitches’ dime.
ALEX: Stop. Objection.
BOBBY: This has become a thing—
ALEX: Objection.
BOBBY: All right, fine. Sustained. Let’s talk about the six-inning starting pitcher minimum rule.
ALEX: Oh, my God. Yeah. Let’s do it.
BOBBY: Which was floated to—
ALEX: The— the third most important story in this week’s episode of Tipping Pitches.
BOBBY: You know what we got this past week? We got a fucking trial balloon. I love when we got a trial balloon.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: MLB loves to toss—
ALEX: Yup.
BOBBY: —out trial balloons. What is—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —a trial balloon, Alex? What is that? Where does that phrase come from?
ALEX: Well, it’s like before you release all your balloons, you put one up there, right? Make sure it floats. And frankly, I think that makes this segment three for three on court adjacent news stories, right? Given that— that’s [39:14]
BOBBY: Is trial balloon court [39:14]
ALEX: Oh, trial.
BOBBY: Boo. Three out of 10.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: Objection. A
ALEX: Are you just looking up the etymology of trial balloon right now?
BOBBY: No. The term trial balloon— I’m reading the AI overview, of course. Actually, I’m not going to read that.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Because we need to stop normalizing the AI overview.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: The term is of French origin. Trial balloon translates French— I’m not going to try to say this in French, because there’s people listening who are going to be like, “Stop.”
ALEX: That’s an affront.
BOBBY: The only accent work—
ALEX: For my people.
BOBBY: The only accent work I’m willing to do is Long Island, Strong Island.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Delco, and that might be it.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I know I never delved into British. That’s— you’re sort of our cockney guy on the pod.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Translates from a French phrase, which was a small balloon sent up immediately before a mannered ascent to determine the direction and tendency of winds.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Its earliest use in English is figurative.
ALEX: So there’s never been a literal trial balloon?
BOBBY: I think that the French were trial ballooning all the time.
ALEX: Oh, okay. But— but—
BOBBY: In English, we did— they didn’t use that phrase.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: What do you think they called it in English? Tap into the accent. Oy.
ALEX: Keep going, keep going.
BOBBY: No, no, go for it.
ALEX: You had it.
BOBBY: You got it.
ALEX: You had it.
BOBBY: No, you got it, bro. This one’s on you, bro.
ALEX: No. What was this trial balloon for, Bobby?
BOBBY: I don’t know. We just— we just randomly started seeing stories. I think the first story that I saw was from Jesse Rogers and ESPN.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: This past week about how Major League Baseball is exploring the idea in an effort to— as they have been, audit the entertainment value of the game in the last five or so years, ever since Theo gave up the reins to Jed Hoyer and stepped into The commissioner’s office, try to bring this beautiful game back. They’re trying to make changes to the game to make it more entertaining, more watchable, to adapt with the times. Of course, the pitch clock was one of those, banning the shift was one of those, even though that hasn’t worked at all, and offense still sucks. And now, they’re talking about the idea of a six-inning minimum requirement for starting pitches with caveats. Now, we’ll get into those caveats in just a second, but the trial— this is— this is where the or— this is where trial balloon came from. This feels very floated out into the universe to almost in, like, a focused market research kind of way, see how people react. This is so—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —far away from being on the table in any meaningful way. We’re years away from a new CBA. Now, really, we’re only, like, two years away from negotiating a new CBA, which is actually kind of wild.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And I’m too tired to think about that. But we’re kind of in that zone where the tinkerer in chief, Rob Manfred, is considering, “What can I do next? I gotta chase that high. I gotta get my fix back. I gotta change the game. I gotta mold it into the way— I have to put in all of these technocratic rules to mold it back into the way that it used to be back when baseball was at its peak.” And I saw mixed reaction to this. I think it’s pretty safe to say that the majority of fans, even in the sabermetric world, who understand the value of the third time through the order, penalty of bringing in a fresh reliever, of— of throwing max effort and not worrying about your pitch count early in the game. I think still that— that group of which I would consider myself and— and yourself amongst them, I still— think still esthetically yearns for a time when a starting pitcher really was the main character of the game and went—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —deep into the game, and you could reliably count on multiple opportunities of having tents, will he? Won’t he get out of this moment throughout the course of— of— of one start? We ju— we sort of like, don’t have that at all anymore. There are very few moments throughout the course of a starting pitcher’s day where— and this is not to diminish what a starting pitcher does, or this is not to diminish the pressure that a starting pitcher is under to perform well, but there are very few moments where, like, things are hanging in the balance, and it’s up to him to decide. And that is the tension with which we come to baseball for, things are hanging in the balance. There’s no one out there to save you. It’s just you one pitch at a time to get it done. There’s no clock. You can’t milk it. Like, you just have to do it. And we don’t have that anymore, because managers will just replace the starting pitcher with someone who throws one-on-one with movement. And that is a function of the way that baseball has been developed, this function of the things that have been prioritized about baseball in the last decade. And we can understand those things in the micro, but I think when you look back at it from a macro perspective, it’s kind of a bummer with the way that the changes have unfolded. So all that to say, I’m slightly more sympathetic to the reasoning and desire behind a change like this than I have been to some tinkering tendencies in the past. Now, I— I’ve assume everyone at home probably saw this article and saw what the— the caveats would be to this rule, but I think for the sake of the rest of the conversation, we should probably [45:00] this out now.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Do you have it in front of you?
ALEX: Well, so I think it’s— right. You have to stay in through the sixth, unless the pitcher is at 100 pitches, unless they have given up four or more [45:16] runs.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And— and then the other one, which is not necessarily a qualifier, but it says, you know, you can come out for an injury, but if you do come out with an injury, there’s a mandated IL placement.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: So that’s what, you know, managers and players have to work with a little. You— you know, you are not going to have a guy out there who can’t get out [45:40]
BOBBY: Who, like, shredded his arm.
ALEX: —and just running them up to, like, 120 pitches.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: I don’t know. I— unlike some of the other rule changes, this is not necessarily, you know, a solution and source of a problem. It’s very clear, sort of what they’re attempting to accomplish with this. You know, you don’t get pitchers throwing 200 innings in a season anymore, right? But that’s just the way the game has gone, the specialization that we see. And it’s— and it’s meant that, you know, strikeouts are way up, action is—
BOBBY: Still down.
ALEX: —I guess down. And so I— I—
BOBBY: Action, like that’s such a loaded word, though, because I know you— even amongst you and I, we appreciate different things about watching a baseball game, so I can only imagine all of the people at home listening. I think it’s more useful to think of it in terms of, like, the power balance between pitchers and hitters, it’s still out of whack. It’s still on the side of the pitchers. And so that’s why I was sort of, like, I’m sympathetic to the direction of this trial balloon, the— the way the wind is blowing, if we’re going to beat this analogy into the ground . because this is something that’s going to make it harder for pitchers. I think pitchers have been enjoying the benefit of player development a lot more than hitters have in the last 30 years. And so if you are going to tinker, at least tinker in a way that directionally makes sense. We can talk about whether or not this would actually work, which my answer is no. It would not work.
ALEX: No, it would not work. And I also think it’s ultimately misguided. Like I understand what they’re going for, but it feels too so—
BOBBY: [47:21]
ALEX: —so prescriptive, you know?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: I’ve seen other people talk about— how about you, you know, change roster limitation—
BOBBY: Great— I don’t meant to interrupt, but great word. Great word for it. That’s the perfect word to describe what this rule feels like, prescriptive.
ALEX: Yeah. I just— part of what we love about the game, to your point, is the will they, won’t they, is seeing how teams and players can get creative within the confines of the game. And— and that’s how we’ve seen some of the, you know, the game’s biggest innovations over the last two decades or so, is team saying, “Okay, we found the bounds of the rule, let— how can we sort of push against this?” So— so folks have talked about saying, “Oh, you can carry fewer pitchers on a roster, right? Which maybe seems— which— which would tackle the same issue, but you would at least see teams changing how, you know, it’s applied.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: It’s not that every team is going to carry the exact same number. I mean, I— obviously, you would get to a point where, like, there’s a consensus on the— on the best way to deploy.
BOBBY: But this is what I was talking about a couple weeks ago with the trade deadline. It’s just that they would wait six months to see whatever the Rays did, and then everybody would follow that. That’s how—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —front offices operate now.
ALEX: I just— especially at a time when we’re confronting like an epidemic of arm injuries—
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: —this feels—
BOBBY: Desperate.
ALEX: Yeah. And— and— look, this is not something that would be implemented overnight, like some of the other far-reaching rule changes like the—
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: —automated strike zone or challenge system. It’s likely that this is something that would be implemented in the Minor Leagues first so that players can acclimate, you can sort of work out the kinks a little bit. And— and then hopefully by the time the rule change is implemented like, you know, most of the players have experienced it to some degree.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm. And been developed under it by their Major League organization.
ALEX: Exactly. And— and that’s something that like is— is a factor, too. You already have— you already have executives talking about how, you know, this would change how they develop pitchers, right? And they may even change how you draft pitchers if— if Matt—
BOBBY: Sure.
ALEX: —Shepherd is not the— I mean, sure. Yes, whatever.
BOBBY: That— I— I’m not trying to be dismissive of— of what you’re saying. I’m being dismissive of, like, the anonymous executives in this ESPN story saying that shit because, like, it’s really convenient to say, “Yeah, we would change the development of our pitchers to be much more entertaining for the value of the fans.” When in reality, what they do every single time is say, “Throw harder and get more strikeouts.” And that’s the only thing that they have cared about— about pitcher development for the last 10 years. And they have—
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: —created the exact epidemic that this rule is trying to address, whether it’s the epidemic of the arm— arm injuries or whether it’s the epidemic of the entertainment value. The power imbalance between pitching and hitting, they have created it. They have valued it above all else. They have glorified—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —it and put it on a pedestal.
ALEX: Well, and that’s why this rule seems like it comes into conflict with just so much about how teams approach the game right now. Are teams—
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: —going to say, “Don’t throw as hard because you need to get through six innings.”?
BOBBY: Be slightly worse.
ALEX: Be slightly worse. I don’t think so. It’s— I mean, the other element of this that I’ve just been kind of thinking about is, like the literal labor element of this. Like pitchers are— would have to do more work, broadly speaking, than they do now, right? I think the average start is, like, just over five innings, right? And so—
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: —you’re— this would radical—
BOBBY: Well, I think it’s just under six. I think last year was the first year—
ALEX: Okay, okay.
BOBBY: —that the average start dipped below six, and that was sort of—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —like, “Okay, alarm bells are going off now. Like, it’s not even two-thirds of the game anymore.”
ALEX: But this would pretty radically reshape the roles of not just starting pitchers, but relievers as well, right? The guys, the— the, you know, bridge relievers, who maybe are— couldn’t cut it as a starter, but have found a home as a two to three-inning guy, you know?
BOBBY: Uh-hmm. Uh-hmm.
ALEX: Once again, because they’re able to— to go max effort there. This would kind of necessarily raise the value of starting pitchers who can actually do this. Would that raise how they’re compensated? Maybe. But, like I— I feel more inclined to think that pitchers are going to get paid the same— or the starters are going to mostly get compensated in the way that they have been, and relievers are going to lose value, right? Because you don’t need as much of them anymore.
BOBBY: Yeah. And relievers are the group within Major League Baseball who can afford to lose value the least, by the way. Starting pitchers are the ones—
ALEX: Right. Yes, exactly.
BOBBY: —who are still exactly— top end starting pitchers are the ones who are still getting compensated better than you might expect in a down market. They overperform, I think, the, like, direct projection expectations, because clearly teams see a value in having an ace, whatever that means, in the aggregate, or having two very good starting pitchers. Like, they— they’re still getting paid. Quote-unquote, “smart teams” are not paying $25 million a year for relievers. The Rockies are doing that, you know? And pretty much no one else. And, you know, occasionally, smart teams for, like, a back end of the bullpen closer who you know is, like, exceptional and who has earned it. The other labor element of this that I kind of wanted to talk through a little bit, but I’m sort of unclear on, and maybe I should be more clear on it, but like, you know the— the Jesse Rogers story, it mentions about two-thirds the way down in the story about how, you know, clearly there would be pushback. You float something like this two years before a collective bargaining agreement expires in the hopes that it starts to germinate. the Players Association can ruminate on it. You like that germinate and ruminate back-to-back?
ALEX: That was good. That’s good.
BOBBY: Come on now. Come on.
ALEX: I hate when I’m trying to germinate and I end up ruminating instead.
BOBBY: That’s like— it’s like— it’s like the yin and the yang of life. You know, you’re either germinating or you’re ruminating. It’s a push-pull world we live in. Anyway, in the hopes that, I think, like a Commissioner’s Office releases this because you start to normalize the idea and—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —therefore, players would be more open to it. I’m, like, slightly unclear on whether or not Rob and them could just get away with implementing this idea in the first place. I mean, the article implies that they couldn’t. Like, that this would have to be collectively bargained over. And, you know, you and I were talking about this yesterday, I think the reason behind why this rule change would have to be collectively bargained over is because it is— it directly affects players’ health and safety, and so those elements of rule changes are slight— governed slightly differently by the collective bargaining agreement. But, like, in my mind, I’m— I’m sort of like, “Well, then, why isn’t that the case with the pitch clock?”
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And I know that the Players Association said that at the time and that they were sort of—
ALEX: Right. Well, they all voted against it, and the rule still passed, right? On the Rules Committee, there’s— I think—
BOBBY: I mean, that’s how the Rules Committee works. That’s how the collective bargaining agreement is fucking written.
ALEX: Right, exactly. There’s— there’s four players, there’s six people from, you know—
BOBBY: The league side.
ALEX: —MLB side of it, and then one umpire, just— who’s just there for fun, I think.
BOBBY: Yeah, but the day that that empire is the tie-breaking vote, they’re gonna [55:01]
ALEX: Uh-huh.
BOBBY: Come on now. Come talk to me. Make something happen. It’s just Joe West in there acting like LBJ, master of the Senate. It’s like, “What are you gonna do for me?” I think that— I mean, that’s what part of why I was, like, relatively critical, compared to how I usually talk about ML— the MLBPA on the podcast and on social media and stuff about the rule changes in specific and the language that they were willing to agree to on rule changes.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: and I know that they were coming from place where, like, they had no say on rule changes prior to this, and now they at least have a committee to document their opposition to a certain rule change and the reasoning behind it. And so it is sort of like a marginal step towards having a little bit more parity when it comes to rule changes, where in the past, they had no— no power at all in that realm. But, like, if you really felt that allowing a commissioner’s office that has a propensity to want to change rules radically overnight, if you really felt that allowing them to do that was going to put your players in danger, was going to end careers, was going to upend the way that players’ career outlook looks, because they’re just going to get injured a lot more, then you shouldn’t have signed off on this collective bargaining agreement. And now, I know that the executive committee didn’t. I know that they all voted against it. But it just— a little— it does— a little bit take the teeth out of the argument a year later or two years later. And so, we have yet to see what the Players Association thinks about this rule change. They had— they do— did not comment in this article. I would guess that they will not comment in this article. You might hear rumblings from like labor-connected reporters like Evan Drellich about how they’re feeling like things like this, or maybe even like Ken Rosenthal, because he’s so well-connected and could actually pull answers out of them. But, like, they’re going to need to, like, aggressively be like, “No. We will not do this. We will not talk about this. We will not agree to this.” Or else, it will start to get momentum and it will function exactly the way— from a labor perspective, I’m— I’m leaving the entertainment value aside of this.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I’m leaving whether or not you like the pitch clock personally as a fan. I’m leaving that out. I’m— I’m talking about the labor management dynamic. It will play out exactly the way that the pitch clock did, which is to say that the players did not want it. They all voted against it. They thought it was a bad idea. You know, with the exception of, like, a bunch of players, I’m sure are just, like, indifferent or fine with it, or like it just fine. But the pitchers—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I don’t want to you say whining, but the pitchers were raising reasonable concerns about the pitch clock for a while, and still do. It’s gonna play out exactly like that, where it’s like, if you don’t stand against it, and you don’t organize around it, and try to come up with a better option, or try to align everybody on why it shouldn’t happen, it’s just gonna happen, and then everyone’s—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —gonna be mad about it for the next four years. And— but still have nothing to do with it.
ALEX: Yeah. There’s definitely a lot of negotiation that will happen over this. I mean, the players don’t need to agree to it for it to pass, but they do need to be included in the conversation, right? It’s like this— I think the language is that— you know the committee is responsible for recommending and adopting rules that significantly affect terms and conditions of players employment, which like this absolutely would fall under that, right? It’s not something that— like, this does significantly change the terms and conditions of every pitcher’s employment, not just starting pitchers.
BOBBY: Right. So at the very least, they would have to go to the association and say, “Hey, we’re thinking of doing this. We want to talk through with you, because—” I mean, you don’t want the players to resolutely just say, “No, absolutely not.” Right? You want to get them to a place where maybe they feel comfortable with it, you know, and— and maybe, again, we talk about this in the context of bargaining, like the players can say, “Hey, you’re— if you want to implement XYZ rule change, here’s what we’re asking for in return.” Right? It doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
BOBBY: There are things that, like, on their face value, it would seem like a collective bargaining agreement allows you to do because it’s not specified that you can’t do it. But what you’re talking about terms and conditions of employment, if you make changes about that, that materially change what the job is or how it’s performed. There are certain things that— and it’s weird, because baseball is like its own unique market, and this is not a job like other jobs. But there are things that if they rise above that level, the National Labor Relations Act dictates, mandates, which we might not have in five years anyway, but—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —that’s an entirely different conversation. Dictates and mandates that, like that the employer is required to bargain separately because they’ve changed the conditions of the employment so much. And I think I guess that is what they’re implying here, or really the— the Rogers article is implying just that, like, they would not agree to this language about rule changes in the next CBA—
ALEX: Uh-hm.
BOBBY: —if they felt that a rule change this drastic was on the horizon, is another potential possibility. Because they’re not going to put this six-inning starting pitcher minimum in play before this CBA expires. They just won’t do it. So this will—
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: —be on the table as like— it’ll be out in the ether as, like, an idea that the players would know to bring up in the context of bargaining, to maybe bargain—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —specifically over this rule and exclude it from the way that the usual Rules Committee works, or just change the language on the Rules Committee entirely and not agree to a CBA that doesn’t give them veto power.
ALEX: I also, like— like most of the rule changes, there’s so much about this that just feels arbitrary. Like, why is your line 100 pitches? Is that based on science, based on data, or are we just— is it a nice, cute number that we feel good about? Oh, 100 pitches, that’s when starters are reaching the end of the rope. What is it? Is it? Is like— is that— dude, do injuries rapidly rise after the 100-pitch mark? Like, no, I don’t— I don’t think so. It has much more to do with the broader context of the— the player themselves, right? So I don’t know. It remains to be seen how all this shakes out. Whatever form it does come in, if it comes, will likely not look exactly like this. But I don’t know, man. I— I know that Rob is like— he’s working off borrowed time at this point, you know? He’s— he’s like, “I gotta get all my— all my tweaks in.”
BOBBY: He’s like, “When I’m on a beach in Cancun, I’m not gonna be able to do shit like this.”
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: Where do you think— where do you think Rob vacations?
ALEX: Secaucus?
BOBBY: At the instant replay review room.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Sorry, the NBA’s instant replay review room is in Secaucus. MLB, they go to Sixth Avenue.
ALEX: I feel like he’s probably— hmm, do you think he’s a Florida guy?
BOBBY: Hmm. No, I think he’s like a Cape guy. I think he goes up north.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: Like Cape Cod.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Martha’s Vineyard. Imagine we’re at Martha’s Vineyard, and we just run into Rob Manfred.
ALEX: Right. I mean, we spend a lot of time there. That’s where our satellite office is.
BOBBY: We famously have studios all over. There are— there are Tipping Pitches studios everywhere for those with eyes to see them.
ALEX: Do you have anything else on this— on this rule?
BOBBY: No. Florida? No, no. Florida for Rob? No.
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: He seems a little sensitive to the sun.
ALEX: Maybe. But— but the thing is, he likes to golf, right? Like—
BOBBY: True.
ALEX: —he’s a— he’s a golfer, so I’m thinking of, like, what are the— I don’t think of the Cape as—
BOBBY: What I’ve learned is that the Midwest is great for golf, though. I think the— I think Cape— the Cape has good golf.
ALEX: Does— does it?
BOBBY: Name three golf courses. Like, we’re not the— we’re not the guy. I will never become a golfer for a number of reasons. One, I think golf courses are a heinous— heinous use of public space that should be—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —used for other things. Two, I have pretty bad back problems as it is. Don’t need to add that rotational element into my— into my athletic diet. Three, it’s just mentally not the game for me, or a person like me.
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: Oh, you mean a sport where I have nobody to blame but myself? Yeah, I call that Tuesday.
ALEX: Oh. Oh, my God.
BOBBY: How did we get talking about golf? Oh, Rob, his vacation destinations.
ALEX: Man— Manfred. Uh-hmm. He’s given no indication that I can find on where he might spend his days in retirement.
BOBBY: Where is he from?
ALEX: If you, the listener, know—
BOBBY: Oh, Rome, New York. Of course.
ALEX: Yeah. If you, the listener, have seen Rob Manfred on vacation?
BOBBY: Do you think Rob Manfred was at Woodstock ’99?
ALEX: Maybe. Yes, sure. Yeah, let’s start that.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: I’m sure we can generate an AI image.
BOBBY: Rob comes on the pod. First question, Rob, were you at Woodstock ’99? We’re gonna get into the baseball stuff later, but—
ALEX: Rob— I don’t know, Grok. Grok and Gemini generate images now, I’m just saying. Maybe it’s time to leverage our— our Twitter blue subscription— sorry, our— our X premium subscription.
BOBBY: If you—
ALEX: From X, the everything platform.
BOBBY: If you use Grok, I do feel like that is grounds for termination from our partnership.
ALEX: That’s bad news for you.
BOBBY: This whole podcast has been Grok, you’re not actually here. You’re vacationing in the Cape, golfing. Do you have anything else to add about this six-inning starting pitcher minimum trial balloon?
ALEX: No, I mean, like we— we—
BOBBY: Any more balloons to trial?
ALEX: I think we’ve covered our concerns about it and feelings about it. There’s more to come. Again, this is certainly not the last time we will hear about this, and it’s going to be negotiated over in the— in the months and years to come.
BOBBY: Yeah, in public and in private, I’m sure.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Sort of like a public nuisance and a private nuisance.
ALEX: Exactly. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: All right. You want to do ranking pitches?
ALEX: Let’s do ranking pitches. I’m ready.
BOBBY: The closer, extra innings, lineup construction.
ALEX: Oh, my—
BOBBY: Collective bargaining. These are all the names.
ALEX: Right. I thought this is what I was being asked to rank. It’s like, the closer versus extra innings? Good God, I don’t know.
BOBBY: Real apples to oranges situation.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It’s like trying to compare the closer and extra innings. Alex, this week, I would like you to rank the United States Bill of Rights, the first 10 rights outlined in the Constitution of the United States of America. Now, for listeners—
ALEX: Are you going to give me— are you going to give me the— the— the rights?
BOBBY: Well, I was— yeah. I was going to give you the rights, just for good measure, because, like, you know the rights, and clearly, I know the rights.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: And the listener at home, much as they might know about injunctive proceedings and compensatory damages, they know the rights. But maybe we have some international listeners, and they don’t really give a shit about the United States Constitution. So I’m just gonna run through them real quick. I’ll give you, like, the Spark Notes of the United States Bill of Rights, which in and of itself—
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: —is sort of like the Spark Notes of the rest of the document. So I’m gonna go to go to calpoly.edu and read the Bill of Rights, the really brief aversion. This feels like something that Taylor Swift would release. The First Amendment is the freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly and petition. The Second Amendment is the right to keep and bear arms in order to maintain a well-regulated militia. The Third Amendment, no quartering of soldiers.
ALEX: Number one.
BOBBY: I mean, I’m not— let’s not do the debate before the debate.
ALEX: Yeah. Okay, okay.
BOBBY: Number four, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. Number five, the right to due process of law, freedom from self-incrimination, and double jeopardy, as we were just talking about. You know everything that there is to know about the courts, so you already knew about number five, of course.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Number six, the right of accused persons to a speedy and public trial. Number seven, the right of trial by jury in civil cases. Number eight, the freedom from excessive bail, cruel, and unusual punishments. Number nine, other rights of the people is what it says here. Number 10, powers reserved to the States. That was a pretty bad summary of number nine and 10 in my professional opinion.
ALEX: All right. That’s them. That’s all 10, right?
BOBBY: The Ninth Amendment— the— of— in the Bill of Rights is literally just an amendment that is, like, these are not the only rights.
ALEX: Right. And— and also everything else we forgot.
BOBBY: And then there was still one more in the Bill of Rights after that. The Ninth Amendment was James Madison’s attempt to ensure that the Bill of Rights was not seen as granting to the people of the United States only the specific rights it addressed. It literally was just comma, et cetera. Okay. And the Tenth Amendment was basically just like states’ rights is the Tenth Amendment. The powers not—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Could have used Grok to edit that one, in my professional opinion. But let’s get to rankin’. I’m so glad I left this 28 minutes here before your heart out, because it might take you all 28.
ALEX: Yup. So this is really hard.
BOBBY: When we joked about doing this as a bit yesterday, you were all like, “Oh, my God. That’s so funny. We should do it.” And now, you’re sitting here, past you did not do current you any favors.
ALEX: No, not at all.
BOBBY: Future me hates me by the best. I’m gonna give you an out option here. Are you ready for your option?
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: You can either rank all 10 in ascending order, or you can give me the five worst.
ALEX: The five worst?
BOBBY: Yeah. Rank the five that you need the least.
ALEX: No. I’m— I’m not a coward.
BOBBY: Oh, my God. You say yes to the six-inning minimum? You’ll go back out there? I’m not afraid of your third time through the order—
ALEX: All right. The—
BOBBY: —Erik Neander.
ALEX: So is this just, like, whatever I think, whatever I like?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: You can rank it based on any criteria.
ALEX: Okay, wonderful.
BOBBY: How well they’re written.
ALEX: Oh, I don’t actually have the text up in front of me.
BOBBY: How often you’ve—
ALEX: I use it?
BOBBY: —benefited from them. Right, exactly.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: How many soldiers have you quartered?
ALEX: I— you know, more than I should have.
BOBBY: I mean, a lot of social justice warriors have been quartered by you. That’s for sure.
ALEX: All right. Here we go. The Bill of Rights ranked.
BOBBY: This is awesome. Where would the California Coastal Act ranks in the Bill of Rights?
ALEX: So, I mean, what makes this hard is, like, most of these are pretty good. I— most of these are probably good. They— like, I don’t know that I’d be able to pick the five worst.
BOBBY: This is the thing about when the US wrote the Constitution, they were really just, like, synthesizing a lot of decent ideas about democracy that had been hard fought and hard won over the last—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —150 years before that. They were really just—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: What I’m— all of that to say, TLDR, they were coasting.
ALEX: Right. Everyone had done the work for them already.
BOBBY: Right. They stand on the shoulders of giants. And those giants—
ALEX: At 10—
BOBBY: —are John Cocke.
ALEX: At 10 on my list, I’m gonna go the Ninth Amendment. That’s the— the catch-all.
BOBBY: [1:11:50]
ALEX: Unenumerated rights. I— I respect it—
BOBBY: I like the Ninth Amendment. No, I’m in on the Ninth Amendment. That would have been in my top five.
ALEX: I respect it, but it just feels a little lazy.
BOBBY: It’s the type of thing that— but you have to make— be sure to be specific about it, because dumbass idiots like Antonin Scalia, 200 years later, are gonna be like, “Well, they didn’t specifically say that this isn’t all the rights. Therefore, this is all the rights.”
ALEX: Right. Right.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: I see where you’re coming from, though. It’s the least I can do.
ALEX: I just— I— it’s— it’s— it’s not very sensitive, and— and frankly, leaves a lot of wiggle room anyway. Yeah. Like, so any right that’s not listed there doesn’t mean I don’t have it? So how— right to a podcast, is that covered in the Ninth Amendment?
BOBBY: It shouldn’t be. The— the right to ride a train to a baseball game should be covered in the Ninth Amendment.
ALEX: There you go.
BOBBY: That’s right.
ALEX: Yes, absolutely. All right. At number nine— this is gonna get really confusing. At number nine, I’m gonna go the 10th Amendment, States’ rights.
BOBBY: I would have put— I would have put— I would have given decent odds on that being the worst one, because of how— the ways that it’s been abused.
ALEX: It’s not great, I suppose, but, like, probably good.
BOBBY: It’s like the legal justification for basically every bad thing that everyone’s ever done in this country.
ALEX: Yes, exactly.
BOBBY: So it’s tough.
ALEX: Good idea, poor execution. I— look, I know, I know, you wanted to look out for the little guy, keep that— keep that government small, man.
BOBBY: We want to— I mean, we all want [1:13:29] right, exactly.
ALEX: This is how you avoid tyranny, yeah.
BOBBY: But we’re just gonna turn ourselves over to kings again?
ALEX: I would.
BOBBY: I mean, you already touched—
ALEX: Number—
BOBBY: When you were in London for the Mets series, you pledged fealty to Charles.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Bet on the wrong horse, by the way. That was a Charles is gonna die joke for everyone at home.
ALEX: Number eight, I guess number eight, I’ll go Second Amendment.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Right to bear arms. Frankly, I saw what they were going for.
BOBBY: Okay, but yes—
ALEX: Like, I saw the vision.
BOBBY: —yes, however, it would have just been better if they said nothing about it. Because now that they put it in there that way, again, much like States’ rights, saw that they were going for, but it’s the legal justification for, like, a lot of really heinous—
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: —things that have been done in the history of this country—
ALEX: 100%.
BOBBY: —if they had just said nothing. And I know that they were even going for a minimalist approach to this constitution, to leave it up for interpretation. Come with me on my day of writing a minimalist text to be interpreted by the next 300 years of rich white men.
ALEX: Very cute, very demure.
BOBBY: First, I blend a green smoothie— anyway, if it just said nothing, then everybody would have assumed that they have the right to bear a [1:14:51], of course.
ALEX: Right. But now [1:14:53] people see it—
BOBBY: Human history has dictated people to have the weapons, yeah.
ALEX: People see it as like a mandate, right?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: It’s like, “Well, it’s in there, so I have to [1:15:01]”
BOBBY: Like, literally, like, the mandate of heaven, essentially.
ALEX: Yes. Uh-hmm. Yeah. So— so [1:15:08] theory—
BOBBY: But only for white people, by the way, when the Black Panthers are, like, Second Amendments. They’re like, “Okay. Wait, actually, where’s the Constitution anyway? Can we set it on fire?”
ALEX: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that’s— we’re— we’re gonna move on from this. I don’t— we’re not talking about the Second Amendment here. That’s why it’s eighth on the list.
BOBBY: So, the second— so then [1:15:24]
ALEX: Seven—
BOBBY: So far— just for the people at home, we have nine—
ALEX: Uh-huh.
BOBBY: is number 10. We have 10 is number nine, and we have two is number eight.
ALEX: Seventh on this list, I’m gonna go Third Amendment.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Really cool for its time.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Doesn’t— doesn’t impact me.
BOBBY: Right. Yeah.
ALEX: I— look, if I lived in the 1700s, this may have been number one for me. This may have been, like, the most important thing on my mind every day, is— is whether I have to let in the battalion that’s on my doorstep.
BOBBY: This— this amendment is kind of like the Battleship Potemkin mo— the movie made in the 1920s of the Bill of Rights, where it’s like at the time, undeniable, all-time classic.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: You still have to watch it in film school, but now it just doesn’t hold up.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: It doesn’t pass the test of time.
ALEX: It doesn’t, and that’s fine. You know what? Some rights go in and out of favor. That’s for sure.
BOBBY: Sure. Okay. What’s number six?
ALEX: This is where we get into, like, the— the— the ones that are, like, kind of unquestionably pretty solid.
BOBBY: Right I think it’s useful to think of these as sort of tiered. Like, we just finished the bottom tier, I think.
ALEX: Yes, I think so. And I think maybe you can even put the Ninth Amendment in its own tier. That’s, once again, the— the everything else amendment.
BOBBY: [1:16:58] right. The and so on and so on amendment.
ALEX: Exactly. Okay. So what— we’re up to six. Let’s go the Seventh Amendment.
BOBBY: Right to a jury in civil cases.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Sounds good.
BOBBY: We’re— we’re entering in the zone, in the five, six, and seven zone, where they were like— well, five, six, seven, and eight, really, which we’re—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —we’re about to get to. I think, if I’m assuming that your rankings are going to follow the general pattern that mine would follow.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Since our politics are pretty similar. Renting the zone where they were like, “We’re going to write a lot of these rules, but also we’re going to leave a lot of wiggle room for a lot of different places to not follow them very well.”
ALEX: Uh-hmm. They were really, like, on one about trials—
BOBBY: I mean, yeah.
ALEX: —which— look, hey, man, great ranking, great ranking segment for this here podcast.
BOBBY: But, like, this is what liberal politics have been about for the entire history of liberal politics. It’s essentially just we are going to try to legislate ourselves away from the divine right of kings. And so we need a bunch of shit about the courts.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. This— the— the Seventh Amendment is, like, I think the least cool of all the court related ones in here.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: Right to a jury trial in civil cases. Okay.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: That’s— I mean, maybe Mark Attanasio is feeling really good about this one right now.
BOBBY: He could be tried by his peers. We could be his peers.
ALEX: We— I think we are his peers.
BOBBY: Technically, under the court of law, although we don’t live in California. Although technically, the— the address on your license is in California.
ALEX: That’s for sure. It is. No, the address is New York, even though it’s a California license.
BOBBY: Oh, wait, it’s— fuck. See, this is like the Pete Ricketts thing. I can’t keep track.
ALEX: All right. So Sixth Amendment— no, sorry. Sixth on the list is—
BOBBY: Is the Seventh Amendment.
ALEX: —Seventh Amendment.
BOBBY: Right. Jesus Christ. Back to sevens.
ALEX: All right. We’re in our top five now.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Top five, this is where they cooked.
BOBBY: Yeah. This is where we separate the weed from the chaff as they say. This is where I separate the closers from the extra innings.
ALEX: Fifth on this list for me is the Eighth Amendment, which is the— the one that is essentially protection against cruel and unusual punishment.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: That’s a good right to have.
BOBBY: Yeah, I agree.
ALEX: The— the government can’t impose excessive bail and crazy fines. I mean, how well this is executed and carried out in today’s day and age may be up for debate.
BOBBY: May?
ALEX: Maybe, just a little.
BOBBY: Potentially?
ALEX: But it’s— it’s probably a good one to have in there, if only for posterity’s sake, you know?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: Because then you can go to the— the government and say, “Hey, this feels like cruel and unusual punishment.” And they can just be like, “It’s not, because we’re not allowed to do that.”
BOBBY: Right. And they can also say things like, “How unusual as it is, we’ve been doing it for the last 50 years.”
ALEX: Exactly. It was pretty usual to me. But it’s good. I’m glad— I’m glad they slipped that one in there. Number four—
BOBBY: Did you know that this was inspired by the case of Titus Oates, who after the ascent— accession of King James II in 1685 was tried for multiple acts of perjury that had led to executions of many people Oates had wrongly accused. So this man went around wrongly accusing people of perjury, and King James was— just murdered the people that he accused of perjury. This feels like a reasonable reaction to that case.
ALEX: Uh-huh. What— was he just like— he his neighbor was, like, digging up sand on— on the— on their beachfront property and so he would be like, “Well, that guy over there is doing perjury.”?
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: And then we’d be like, “All right, I think we should kill him over it.”
BOBBY: Literally. Members of Parliament at the time characterized the punishment in the Oates case as not just barbarous and inhuman, but also extravagant and exorbitant. I would say barbarous and inhuman—
ALEX: Wait, so—
BOBBY: —are higher on the scale of severity than extravagant and exorbitant.
ALEX: Yes, I agree. So— so I want to be clear, though, is— Oates was the one who was accusing other people?
BOBBY: Correct. And then they put him on—
ALEX: So was the cruel and unusual—
BOBBY: The cruel and unusual—
ALEX: [1:21:55]
BOBBY: —punishment was that they were giving— imposing the death penalty on the people that he was accusing. And then they—
ALEX: Got it, okay. Yes.
BOBBY: Then he went to trial for having multiple people killed by falsely accusing them.
ALEX: Understood. That’s— yeah.
BOBBY: See how it feels to have shoe on the other foot.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Sort of.
ALEX: Someone should have just accused him of perjury. Why didn’t no one think of that?
BOBBY: It sounds like they did, and then it went to trial. And talk about trial of the century, I mean, this is OJ level stuff here.
ALEX: I know, people were— people were tuned in. I remember this one. Okay. Do you— I mean, do you have anything else you’d like to say on the Eighth Amendment?
BOBBY: I don’t.
ALEX: At number four—
BOBBY: Do you think there’s any constitutional lawyers listening to this?
ALEX: Like, absolutely losing their minds. I— I think we probably lost them when we said the word unjunction, so we’re probably safe.
BOBBY: Objection. Overruled. They thought that was funny. I did it. I finally broke you.
ALEX: Like, you just overruled your own objection.
BOBBY: Right. I should have said objection sustained.
ALEX: Number four—
BOBBY: Overruling your own objection is basically what MLB owners have been doing for the last 50 years.
[laughter]
ALEX: Wow, this is really hard. See, I— again, we’re— we’re— as we’d said before, we’re in the tier of like— of— of good ones. So I don’t— I just want to say that before going any further, that I think these are all decent— decent rights to have.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: Probably pretty good that they laid them out.
BOBBY: I think just— I think just knock them all out in a row, like how you would order the— the rest of these court ones, so that we can talk about them in totality.
ALEX: Okay. All right. I’m gonna go Fifth Amendment.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: This is right to due process, basically. Oh, right. We’re just— we’re just doing them out. Okay, Fifth Amendment, that’s fourth.
BOBBY: Naturally.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Who’s on first?
ALEX: At third, we have the Fourth Amendment.
BOBBY: Great one.
ALEX: Yeah, this isn’t— honestly thought about ranking it higher, but again, this is protection against unreasonable searches and seizures, and that’s a pretty damn good one to have.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: At number two, Sixth Amendment, right to a fair trial. It feels like the baseline of any functioning society. And either—
BOBBY: You can’t have the others without the fair and speedy trial. Like—
ALEX: Exactly, yeah.
BOBBY: You can’t self-incriminate yourself at a trial that doesn’t happen.
ALEX: At number one, look, I— this— it feels a little like being like, “Oh, Pet Sounds is the greatest album of all time.” It’s like, “Right. I know.” Like, it’s a little— a little on the nose, you know?
BOBBY: This guy thinks a day in the [1:24:46] song.
ALEX: But it doesn’t make it less [1:24:46] the First Amendment, man, mostly because— if they had left the press out of it, I wouldn’t have given a shit, you know? But they were, like, right to a free press. That’s true. That’s actually the podcasters’ right.
BOBBY: Literally.
ALEX: The First Amendment is why we are sitting here having this unhinged discussion right now.
BOBBY: You becoming like a big First Amendment guy would be an awesome turn for the podcast seven years in.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Like every episode right after I thank the patrons, you thank the Founding Fathers for writing the First Amendment. I do think—
ALEX: You mean like a— a land acknowledgement or—
BOBBY: The amendments.
ALEX: The amendments.
BOBBY: I do think like— they just wanted to write this one, and they were like, “But you can’t just write one amendment—”
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: “—to the Constitution, right?” So they were like, “Let’s think of nine others.: Couple of these probably could have been consolidated, but they wanted to go round number.
ALEX: Yeah, that’s fair. Who among us? This is— this was the— the— 100 pitch limit of their day.
BOBBY: This was the BuzzFeed article of their day. This is basically a listicle—
ALEX: Yes. Of— of everything you get in this country. You think people were, like, tuned in on this? Was it— like, when it dropped, was it like, “Holy shit.”? I mean, I guess it didn’t drop all at once, because they were amendments, and they figured it out over time, right? Like—
BOBBY: It’s my understanding that the Bill of Rights was sort of like a package deal, and then all the other amendments happened separately, but I could be wrong about that.
ALEX: Okay. Okay. All right.
BOBBY: I think they— they weren’t, like, all on the same day, but they were all part of the same constitutional amendment project.
ALEX: Right, right.
BOBBY: And then after that, it took them a while to be like, “We need to add more than just 10.”
ALEX: Right. So this was probably the talk of the town when it dropped. You were like, “Did you hear what we were just endowed with?”
BOBBY: I think the— over at the well, pulling up water. Like, “Dude—
ALEX: Like, “Holy shit.”
BOBBY: “—we don’t have to quarter soldiers anymore.”
ALEX: “I can— I could kick those troops out of my home.”
BOBBY: I think the whole thing was, like, it wasn’t the talk of the town. They were just doing this in a room somewhere, and no one else gave a fuck at the time.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: It took, like, 100 years to institute any societal systems that actually used any of these things, and by then, the evil people in the room had already figured out how to subvert them. That’s the history of America right there.
ALEX: Yup. Let’s fucking go, baby.
BOBBY: The young— young Howards on the pod.
ALEX: Welcome to Tipping Pitches Podcast. I— how do you feel about the ranking?
BOBBY: I think you did— no, I think you did good. I think you did really good.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: I might quibble with the order of, like, the last few, but everything else, I think you nailed—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I think you nailed it.
ALEX: You think— quartering troops, You think that Third Amendment should have been higher? Are you a big States’ rights guy?
BOBBY: I mean, I think— I think that— no comment.
ALEX: [1:27:44] Ricketts has power.
BOBBY: I think that I’m— I’m more of a Commonwealth rights guy, since I’m from Pennsylvania.
ALEX: Fair.
BOBBY: I’m just gonna soar through the Pete Ricketts thing because I don’t want to get back on that. I think that the quartering soldiers thing is huge. I think there’s a lot of parents in this country who are like, “I’m sick of my son who’s trying to join the Marines and can’t pass the test. I’d like to not quarter him anymore.”
ALEX: Wow. Did you just find a— a loophole for kicking your son out of the house?
BOBBY: I think I did.
ALEX: Like, legally?
BOBBY: Yeah, right. Exact— this is my constitutional right.
ALEX: Well, that’s odd.
BOBBY: Unpack your shit up and throw it out.
ALEX: This is amazing. Thank you for forcing me to consider all of these.
BOBBY: I think every once in a while, we just have to remember what this great country that we’re a part of.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: And this great country gave us baseball, but without these rights, we couldn’t have such wonderful things as the six innings starting pitcher minimum rule.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: These are the foundation for more rules and regulations on top of that. Boy, really, it’s just a round— round of applause for lawyers as we wrap up here, everyone. Thanks.
ALEX: I’m not clapping for no lawyers.
BOBBY: And a round— the good cop, bad cop. One guy’s pro lawyer, one guy’s anti-lawyer. Thank you, everybody, for listening to this very, very fun podcast. We really appreciate it. Thank you again to everybody who came out to the Tipping Pitches Chicago meetup at Wrigley Field. A lot of fun— really fun for— for— for me to check out that stadium for the first time and just have perfect weather all day long. I did eat two Chicago dogs over the course of the two rain delays, and I’m really satisfied with that experience. Chicago dog, superiority.
ALEX: That’s right, brother.
BOBBY: I think we may be coming out with another Patreon episode later this week, because then we have to take a couple weeks off, because of travel schedules. But we’ll let everybody know once we figure out what’s going on with that. In the meantime, thanks for listening. We’ll be back here on your feeds in just one week’s time. If you’d like to email us, tippingpitchespod@gmail.com. Send us a voicemail, tip— send us a voicemail, 785-422-5881. And really, just— in your free time this week, just go— go dig into that Mark Attanasio lawsuit. There’s a lot of really good— good bits in there.
ALEX: Was that— was that in— did you do that on purpose? Dig into it?
BOBBY: I didn’t. I just can’t help myself. Thanks, everybody, for listening. We’ll— we’ll see you next week.
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!
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