Bobby asks Alex whether or not he has any other grand predictions (after predicting Freddie Freeman’s huge Game 1 moment in the previous podcast). Then, they discuss the Dodgers winning Games 1 and 2 of the World Series and whether the Yankees have a chance to come back, plus the performance of Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Juan Soto, Aaron Judge, and more. Finally, they review Rob Manfred’s pre-World Series press conference, discuss the state of the Tampa Bay Rays’ stadium, and react to another year of baseball’s revenue increasing.
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Tipping Pitches features original music from Steve Sladkowski of PUP.
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, I’m gonna start this week’s episode by doing something I don’t think I’ve ever done, but honestly, over the seven years, I probably have done this before. I’m gonna start by playing a clip from our own podcast.
[music]
ALEX: All right. This is—
BOBBY: You’re on.
ALEX: Does that kick it back to me? Okay.
BOBBY: Yeah. Yeah.
ALEX: Bobby Wagner, true or false, Freddie Freeman etches his name into Dodgers history with— with a storybook hit. I don’t necessarily know the— the— the fashion in which it comes.
BOBBY: Hmm.
ALEX: Maybe I’m not [1:05] I’m already ba—
BOBBY: We’re [1:08] no, we’re good.
ALEX: I’m already ba— I’m already backing myself into a rock and a— a hard place here.
BOBBY: Yeah. Yeah.
ALEX: That’s for— that’s for the real heads.
BOBBY: Yeah, it is.
ALEX: You know, maybe he has a night off, rest the ankle,
BOBBY: He’s had—
ALEX: Comes up—
BOBBY: —five nights off.
ALEX: Comes up in a big pinch hit.
BOBBY: Fi— this is the Five Nights at Freddy’s that everyone’s been talking about, right?
ALEX: Nice.
BOBBY: Thank you. I’m here all week. Actually, I’m not, because I don’t have a voice.
ALEX: And it clinches a really— an emotional series for him. On— on the field, off the field, he gets his moment. He gets his Kirk Gibson fist pump, rounding the bases, and Dodger legend forever. What say you?
BOBBY: So just so I have this clear, the true or false here is that Freddie Freeman, while hobbled, has a walk-off World Series winning hit, or just—
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: —like a game-winning hit?
ALEX: Yeah, yeah. Or— or I— it’s— look—
BOBBY: This is an— this is an accountability moment for me.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Because, clearly, you can hear there, clearly, I was kind of making fun of you for that being the thing—
ALEX: You were, yeah.
BOBBY: —that you predicted.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: That Freddie Freeman has a walk-off. Seemingly, unlikely thing for someone who was very injured. And even still, if he wasn’t injured, it’s sort of hard to predict that any one player might have a walk-off hit—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —in the World Series. Even harder to predict that that walk-off hit would be the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history. So I’d just like to give you an opportunity, is there anything else you’d like to predict or let our listeners know is definitely going to happen, since you’ve seen into the future?
ALEX: Right. Kamala is gonna win in about two weeks.
BOBBY: Wow.
ALEX: I’m seeing what I can speak into existence.
BOBBY: Even without my vote? Which I punched in for Joe Biden early, a week ago when the polls opened.
ALEX: Right, right. You— you wrote in Alex Rodriguez. Honestly— ooh, I just gave myself an idea. Anyway—
BOBBY: For mayor of New York City, right.
ALEX: For mayor of New York City, yes.
BOBBY: Here’s a question. Race, when did we—
ALEX: It’s an— it’s an open race.
BOBBY: —when did we get to vote on that?
ALEX: I was—
BOBBY: I never got to vote for— I never got to vote for mayor, I don’t think.
ALEX: Oh, because you— were you not living here at the time of the election?
BOBBY: I don’t think so, no.
ALEX: Got it. Yeah. That was 2022, so— so yeah, things are going to start kicking into— into gear over the next few months. Get ready, brother.
BOBBY: Seems like they already got kicked, you know? There’s a lot of open spots to fill.
ALEX: Well, yes, that’s for sure.
BOBBY: You did it. Good job. You did it. You predicted that Freddie Freeman would have his Kirk Gibson moment.
ALEX: I did.
BOBBY: Little did you know you were so right.
ALEX: Little did I know. And look, hey, it was— it was right there, right? Like the narrative was— was, I feel, like right there for anyone to grab.
BOBBY: Why didn’t anyone else say it?
ALEX: I— I just— exactly. I just happened to be the one to grab it.
BOBBY: You take your easy wins.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Take your walks.
ALEX: You still got to hit the ball, you know?
BOBBY: He gets on base. That’s you, with your predictions.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Take the easy ones.
ALEX: So, yeah, I’m feeling good. I’m taking the rest of the month off. That’s—
BOBBY: That’s news to me.
ALEX: Four days.
BOBBY: Three days.
ALEX: I won’t even miss an episode.
BOBBY: It’s that they don’t tell you about taking vacation when you’re an adult is that it’s like— it’s kind of like— you take a vacation when you don’t have any other work to finish.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And if you do take a vacation, you have to finish all of the work in advance or the week after you come back. So it’s really not a vacation. It’s more like a reshuffling.
ALEX: Right. Exactly.
BOBBY: You know?
ALEX: You’re just giving yourself more days in the week, right?
BOBBY: Right. It’s like— well, here’s the other video that I was gonna play for you, and I was gonna make this joke, oops, accidentally played the wrong saved video that I had on my phone.
ED: My day is 6:00 am to noon, and I’m not crazy. You’re crazy for thinking it takes 24 hours, just like some dude in a cave did 300 years ago. My second day starts at noon and goes ’till 6:00 pm, [snaps fingers] that’s day two. And then the next day is 6:00 pm to midnight. What I’ve done now is I have changed a manipulated time, I now get 21 days a week. Stack that up over a month, I’m gonna kick your butt. Stack it up over a year, you’re toast. Stack it up over five years, my entire life is different than it would have been otherwise.
ALEX: Comes up on my feed every couple months, and I watch it 20 times every single time.
BOBBY: I retweet it every time I possibly can, every time it makes sense. For listeners who don’t at home, this is like some motivational— I don’t know, like life motivation guy, and he’s talking, as you can clearly hear there, in a rather deranged manager— manner about the passage of time and what it actually means.
ALEX: I love— I love how you’re, like, attempting to explain the lore behind this clip.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: Like, I don’t even think I dove any deeper than— than the insights that he was sharing, right? Because it’s not about the messenger, it’s about the message.
BOBBY: Well, you know that when A-Rod sees that clip, he’s like, “Fuck, I wish I thought of that.”
ALEX: Yep.
BOBBY: “That’s good right there. That’s good stuff.”
ALEX: Uh-hmm. He’s like, “Four-hour days?”
BOBBY: That’s how I— that’s how I feel whenever I, like, travel for work or go on vacation and have to finish a bunch of work beforehand. I’m, like, stacking it up over three days in one day. That’s me.
ALEX: Yeah. Well, I mean—
BOBBY: Three pods a day for two weeks so that I can take two weeks off from doing pods.
ALEX: It’s how I feel flying from, basically, the east to the west, anywhere I am.
BOBBY: [6:00] three hours?
ALEX: I’m just like— I’m just like, “Oh, I— I just got a whole other day.”
BOBBY: I got something for you, life hack. “Be born on the East Coast, then at some point in your life, mo—” this is already a moot for you, unless you want to move to, like, a totally different hemisphere. “But be born on the East Coast, someone in your life move to the west coast and don’t come back.”
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: That’s three extra hours in your life right there that you wouldn’t had otherwise.
ALEX: That I wouldn’t have otherwise.
BOBBY: You would not have had those three hours. You cheated God.
ALEX: You stack that up over a week, that’s another movie I can watch. You stack that up over a month, that’s still probably one movie that I can watch. You stack that up over a year, There Will Be Blood is gonna hit.
ALEX: I’m really glad that you mentioned movies. What was the last movie you watched?
ALEX: Let’s see. Last night, we did— actually, I packed it all in. I’m a little under the weather right now.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: So— so I didn’t—
BOBBY: It really grinds my gears that you don’t log on Letterboxd. I want to know these things, bro.
ALEX: I know.
BOBBY: I want— I want to see them. You don’t have to log them. You could just shoot me a text.
ALEX: All right. I’ll shoot you a text.
BOBBY: Voice memo like a— like a walk and talk cinema Joe style. When you finish a movie, I just want you to be like, “Hey, man, just finished, you know, Holes.” Really thought it was an excellent performance, Jon Voight, Mr. Sir. I know he’s canceled, but art from the artist. Am I right?
ALEX: The original Letterboxd. I watched Cure yesterday, the Kurosawa film.
BOBBY: Okay, all right. Film bro.
ALEX: Yeah. Uh-hmm. We did Remember The Titans after that.
BOBBY: Okay. Naturally.
ALEX: Naturally.
BOBBY: Two equal products.
ALEX: I think that was it. We started Knives Out because my partner has not seen it.
BOBBY: That’s surprising to me. She would like that.
ALEX: It was surprising. I still don’t believe that she hasn’t seen it.
BOBBY: I— unreliable narrator.
ALEX: Not that I don’t believe women, but—
BOBBY: You do believe women. It’s just you sometimes don’t believe this one woman.
ALEX: Sing— singular.
BOBBY: And that’s fair, you know? Knives Out, good movie. Knives Out 2, eh, eh, eh.
ALEX: Didn’t need it.
BOBBY: It was a tough time for art.
ALEX: Okay.
BOBBY: You know?
ALEX: It was a tough time for art.
BOBBY: I’m excited for Knives Out 3.
ALEX: For all of us.
BOBBY: No, I think the pods we were making were good. Bad for movies, good for podcasts.
ALEX: That’s—
BOBBY: “Cause of the COVID-19 pandemic.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I don’t— maybe listeners don’t know this, but the World Series is going on. What do you say we talk about that on this episode? You think that’s a good idea?
ALEX: I think we should. If there are any more predictions we need to get out there, now’s the time to do it. This segment—
BOBBY: I have a prediction— here we go, wait.
ALEX: —is sponsored by FanDuel.
BOBBY: Here we go— okay. No, it’s not. Don’t say— you can’t say that. You can’t— you can’t say that. They pay my salary. I have a prediction for you. Aaron Judge is going to strike out a few more times in this series.
ALEX: Oh, wow.
BOBBY: We’re going to talk about games one and two of the World Series. Rob Manfred gave a press conference this past week as sort of his state of the game, which he does, I guess, right before or right after, basically, every World Series. Also at the time of the GM meetings, he revealed that MLB is revenue is up. Shocker. He talked a little bit about Tampa Bay and where they plan to play. Spoiler alert, they don’t know yet. So we’re going to talk a little bit about that press conference. We’ll put that at the end of the episode after we talk World Series and give our predictions for the rest of the series. Before we do all of that, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I’m Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: And you are listening to Tipping Pitches, the only podcast that predicted the Freddie Freeman Grand Slam. I gotta say, I— I haven’t seen anyone else do it. It’s just us. It’s just us. Thank you for listening. Okay, here we go. Music.
[theme]
BOBBY: Thank you to this week’s new patrons, Tara [9:48], potentially Tara. I’m really sorry. It’s one or the other. I said it both ways. You reach out, let us know. Deborah and Matthew. A lot of people signing up for the free version of the Patreon. You know, just get in the community, just—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —sort of like putting down a stake, being like, “I might pay for this at some point.” Appreciate all of you folks, too, you know? But you don’t get the shout out until you fork over the cash. Thank you to all the people who also bought our last couple episodes a la carte just to try it out. I hope you liked it. Maybe you did, maybe you didn’t. We’ll never know unless you sign up, patreon.com/tippingpitches. Three different tiers, the top one gets you access to our entire back— back catalog of bonus episodes, and, of course, the bonus episodes that we put out in the future every two weeks, as well as a bunch of other really good stuff. Different stuff at the lower tiers as well. Every tier gets you access to our Slack, which, for my money, to be clear, I’m not paying for it because we created it. But if I were paying for it, it would be the biggest bang for your buck as a place to hang out online and watch the Major League Baseball Playoffs, which conveniently happened to be going on right now in the form of the World Series. Alex, between the two most premier franchises in Major League Baseball, Shohei Ohtani injured, Freddie Freeman, Mookie Betts, Aaron Judge bad, Gerrit Cole, Juan Soto, the biggest stars in the game, shining bright—
ALEX: Anthony Volpe.
BOBBY: —on the biggest stages. Anthony— who is he?
ALEX: It’s your World Series MVP right there. Remember we established— well, we established in the last episode that the World Series MVP does not actually have to go to a player on the winning team.
BOBBY: Correct. Except in that case, we established that it was going to be Teoscar Hernandez, but the Yankees were going to win. Still possible in your mind?
ALEX: I’m just casting a wide net.
BOBBY: Okay, great. Well, so as Alex is referring, we did World Series True or False. So each of us made predictions. The other person said true or false on our previous episode. That is the clip that you heard at the top of this show. That was a fun episode. I would say my voice was doing about as well as the Yankees have done through games one and two so far. And now my voice is doing much better, more— looking more like the Dodgers have— have performed in games one and two. It is 2-0 Dodgers. Game one, gotta say, I believe that the Yankees let it slip. They had multiple opportunities to extend their lead to prevent the Dodgers from tying it and putting more pressure on the Yankees bullpen. They did not do that. They made a few errors in the field that allowed the Dodgers to score their first two runs via sacrifice fly. Really interesting World Series game where you score six runs, your first two are sack flies and the next four are via grand slam. Baseball is a really interesting sport in that way. And they stole the coal game when the Yankees had a pretty big starting pitcher advantage, even though Jack Flaherty looked good, he’s been up and down this season. And really this postseason. And really the last, like, four seasons, three, four seasons. And then game two, Yamamoto versus Carlos Rodon. Rodon was not good. He is— has been in somewhat turbulent pitcher throughout this postseason. A couple of really good starts, a couple shorter starts where his motion kind of burned hot, but not for very long. And the Dodgers take that one on the back of a big game from Tommy Edman, a homer, a double. Teoscar Hernandez home run, another Freddie Freeman home run. And some bend but don’t break bullpen work towards the end of that game. Blake Treinen has made my prediction of Treinen and Kopech not giving up any more runs in October, false. However, it did lead to a Dodgers win. So 2-0 Dodgers, they hold home field advantage. My question for you, there’s a lot of different ways we can go with this, but my question for you is, are the Yankees cooked?
ALEX: I mean, if you believe in momentum, whatsoever, the— the tiniest ounce of momentum at all.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: Then, yeah, it doesn’t look good, right? They have not— to your point, they have had some miscues in the field. Aaron Judge, who is, you know, the taller half of the most dynamic duo in baseball has not shown up.
BOBBY: Let me just say real quick before we get to the rest of this episode. I do believe Aaron Judge is the best hitter in baseball. So all of the jokes that I make throughout the course of the— however long we record for this episode, let’s just put that fact out there first. That’s the foundation that we’re working off of. It’s fun to make fun to make fun of, but I do believe he is the best hitter in baseball. Sometimes there are statistical aberrations. It seems like those happened to him often in October. That’s my take.
ALEX: It’s a good take, but good clarification. He is very good at what he does.
BOBBY: Which is strike out in October.
ALEX: I would [14:36] and we’re back. Yeah. I mean, it’s— game one was a really good baseball game. That is one of the most fun World Series games— or— or frankly, baseball games, period, that I have watched. Now, obviously, the stakes of it make it feel much more important and really pull you into every swing of momentum ,of success. But if you are— were a fan of one of the 28 other teams and you were watching this game, I think you probably had a really enjoyable time. I— it’s really funny to think that this series is going to be won and lost on defense and— and bullpens in— in a series that features names like Judge, Soto, and Ohtani. But, like, you know, here we are. The Dodgers just grind, man. I— they, like— you can’t count them out. And I know that feels just like sort of talk radio hand wave of— of their success. But that’s a resilient team that has— that was able to grind at-bats and take the little wins where you could get— you know, you don’t need to swing for the fences. Shohei Ohtani can hit a little double and— and he’ll take the sack fly.
BOBBY: To be clear, it looked like he was sort of swinging for the fences and just missed.
ALEX: Shoot for the moon, land among the stars.
BOBBY: Shoot for the moon, land two feet down the fence at Dodger Stadium, and hope that there’s no fan interference.
ALEX: What were you seeing over these first couple games? I mean, did you think that it kind of lived up to— obviously, the narrative around the league and among, I think, most normal offline baseball fans is, “Wow. Two big, storied franchises who haven’t met in a few decades. You know, this is going to be one to watch.” Do you think it has sort of lived up to the expectations that have been set around it in— in large part by the league itself?
BOBBY: Yeah. I mean, I think that the first two games have both been incredible games, but for different reasons. The first game was more of a traditional pitcher’s duel with both starters giving length and both looking really strong and keeping the game tight, and then turning it over to the bullpen in a more traditional fashion. I think that game two was much more of a— what’s much more in line with how we’ve seen recent playoff baseball play out, where it’s like, okay, at least on the Yankee side, like, starter doesn’t have it, [17:14] turn it over as early as feasible for our bullpen, which is not quite as deep as LA’s bullpen. But, you know— and Yamamoto looked— that being said, Yamamoto looked amazing on the Dodgers side, and pitched about as well as you could possibly expect him to. I believe he went six innings all the way through the order three times, one run, only one hit on the solo home run. I think that— and then, you know, I joked about this after game one, which, by the way, I didn’t even really get to watch. I, of course, caught up on highlights and stuff, but I was listening to it on the radio. I was on the plane for the first six innings of game one. And then when I landed, I turned it on the radio and was just listening to it and trying to follow along. And the thing that really stuck out to me— again, and I joked about this on Twitter, but this is, like, actually something that I believe is, like, the difference in the game. It’s not like a hot take, like Aaron Judge can’t do it, but they walk— intentionally walked Juan Soto to get to Aaron Judge with multiple men on. I don’t think the— were the bases loaded for him in game one? I can’t remember. But with multiple men on, and Aaron Judge flew out. And I know that’s not like— the whole game wasn’t decided at that point, but, like, three-run home run, grand slam right there, Yankees win. And then they do the same thing with Mookie Betts to get to Freddie Freeman and Nestor Cortes facing him, which, by the way, I know, like, many people have said this at this point, it’s a crazy decision to put Nestor Cortes into that situation.
ALEX: It’s pretty wild.
BOBBY: Like, I know that there’s a— the— the reason that he’s on the roster is because, like, you just put all your best pitchers on the roster and you just sort of throw situation out at this point. But, like, I don’t know, man. That’s a real, like, use your head. Like, common sense. This guy hasn’t pitched in five weeks. You have a lefty in your bullpen who’s, like— gonna have to get left-handed hitters out in high leverage situations if you want to win this series, and you’re not going to go with him in game one. You know, having Cortes like— might have been a luxury if this game went, like, 11, 12, 13, 14 innings, because he’s more of a starter and couldn’t give you length and extra innings, once the rest of the bullpen has been used up. But, like, my take is use your relievers as they’re designed to be used as relievers, and the guys that you send into the bullpen as starters. Maybe try to not put them in the most stressful situations as possible straight out of the bullpen, because, like, they are still humans at the end of the day. And what does he do? He throws a middle-middle fastball to Ohtani, gets him to pop out, kind of lucky. He— and then he throws a middle in fastball to Freddie Freeman, the only place that his power is still there with his damaged ankle, and he puts in the stands, so that’s what happens. And again, back to the Aaron Judge thing, they intentionally walk Betts before Freeman, and he makes them pay for it. And that’s really the difference between game one. Like the rest of— the rest of the game was completely neck and neck. And part of that is like, okay, that aligns with our narratives. But part of that is just, like, sometimes this happens in baseball, you know? Sometimes you get the exact scenario. I just watched it happen with the Mets and Dodger series. The amount of times that the Mets ground— grinded out at-bats, got guys on. It came up, bases loaded, one out. Bases loaded, two outs. They didn’t get the hit, you know? The Dodgers did. They are playing better. They are better, you know, than the Mets were. They are playing better than the Yankees are. Sure. Can they turn it around? Of course, especially coming home for three games, like— especially with everything we’ve talked about, the usage, the taxation of the Dodgers bullpen at some point, that could— the bottom could totally fall out from that. But what I’ve seen so far is, like, it’s not situational hitting in the way that, like, A-Rod and Jeter and them talk about it all the time, where it’s just like, all right, choke up and shorten it the other way, because the Dodgers are getting it done via home run. What it is, is like they just don’t give away any at-bats at all, top to bottom. They grind out every at-bat, like you’re talking about. They work the count. They put stress on every pitcher, whether it’s starter or reliever. They get on base via walk. They— everybody in the lineup has home run power for the most part, like Edman hitting home runs, hitting ninth. Edman hitting home runs, hitting cleanup. It doesn’t really matter. And that’s incredibly demoralizing to deal with as an opposing pitcher and as opposing pitching staff, you just get no free outs. And the difference between the Dodgers and Yankees, they— they do it in different ways. The Yankees are a stars and scrubs lineup. There are free outs in the Yankees lineup. In fact, there are several of them, depending on what the construction looks like and depending on the slumps that individual guys look to be in. Like Volpe, no offense, he’s a really young guy, but like for a righty on righty matchup, he’s some— he’s basically a free out in comparison to the— the Dodgers lineup. And Gleyber’s hitting really well right now. Soto is Soto. He’s always— he’s never been an easy out in his whole career. Stanton is incredibly hot, but that’s like three out of nine, and that’s not really good enough against a lineup that has, like, seven out of nine, or, at times, not eight out of nine or nine out of nine, that are just like tough outs. And the big gap there is that, like, Judge is the swing point. If he’s not Aaron Judge, then, like, your lineup suddenly looks like scrubs and stars—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —versus stars and scrubs. And that’s like— that’s what I’ve seen through two games. Maybe he hits four home runs in the next three games and the Yankees go back to LA up 3-2. You never really know. I don’t think they’re cooked, but like, they’re in a tough spot. They’re in a tough spot. And the Dodgers, all the injuries, lack of pitching, Ohtani hurting his shoulder, like that’s still a huge unknown. Maybe this was the death star we thought it was all along—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —to be honest.
ALEX: Yeah. I mean, I think you’re completely right. This lineup was never the question around the Dodgers, right? And the fact that they have the— essentially, the— the, like, second team players, right? They’re not the— the Betts or Ohtanis, but the fact that Teoscar and Tommy Edman are showing up, Teoscar Hernandez, that’s World Series MVP to you, is huge for them. You know who’s been huge for the Yankees? It’s Jazz Chisholm, I just want to say. Three hits so far, defensive wiz at third base.
BOBBY: Yo, I gotta give a shout to Jake Mintz from Céspedes Family BBQ, because he suggested on their World Series preview episode that the reason that Jazz has looked so bad this October so far is because he’s never played baseball in the cold before. He’s from the Bahamas, and he spent his whole career with the Marlins.
ALEX: The Marlins, yeah.
BOBBY: And this is the first time he’s had to play series meaningful baseball games in the cold and he was like, maybe they go to Dodger Stadium and he looks great in games one and two, because it’s 75 and sunny. And look what happened. Exactly that.
ALEX: Yep.
BOBBY: We should stop with all his analytics bullshit, and we just be like, “Is he comfy? Is he happy?”
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Right.
BOBBY: Does he like the cold? Does he hate the cold, you know?
ALEX: Is Mercury in retrograde right now?
BOBBY: Exactly. It’s like maybe more predictive, you know?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Has his Saturn returned yet?
ALEX: Right. What’s his moon sign? [23:57]
BOBBY: I’m just— I’m just saying stuff. Some— someone said that to me recently.
ALEX: Right [23:59]
BOBBY: His Saturn— Saturn is returned? I don’t know.
ALEX: Uh-hmm. Yeah.
BOBBY: I don’t mean this to be dismissive. I’m just not good at remembering what all the different terminology is. I believe in this just as much as I believe in anything.
ALEX: Which is to say a little.
BOBBY: It’s a toss-up. It’s a toss-up.
ALEX: We’ll see.
BOBBY: If it serves me at the moment, sure. I told someone my— my sun, moon and rising once.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: And their response was, “Woof.” They were like, “That’s tough.” I was like, “That’s me you’re talking about.”
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: You know, like I’m the person here. And they were like, “You’ve overcome a lot.” I was like, “Okay.” This just turned—
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: —into, like, cognitive behavioral therapy all of a sudden.
ALEX: That’s how you wrote your college applications, right? You were like, “So this is my sun, moon and rising, and this is the— the trials and tribulations I’ve had to overcome.”
BOBBY: What did you write your college application essay about?
ALEX: I genuinely don’t know.
BOBBY: I’m gonna dig that up for you.
ALEX: I was like, “Well, I’m an A’s fan. No, we’re not starting from a good spot.”
BOBBY: You definitely didn’t write it about that, because that would not have gotten you into New York University, bro.
ALEX: No, not special.
BOBBY: They would have been, like—
ALEX: Not special, whatsoever.
BOBBY: —”A’s? A’s?”
ALEX: Oh, I thought you were— I thought you were making a— making a Bay Area joke.
BOBBY: No, I was making a joke about how no one at NYU knows about sports. My co-workers last week were like, “You don’t follow football, do you?” And I was like, “No.” And they were like— “But I did when I was younger.” And they were like, “When did you give it up?” And I was like, “Pretty much the moment I got to college,” and—
ALEX: At NYU.
BOBBY: —everybody was just like, “What?”
ALEX:
They were like, “You mean the CTE is a feature, not a bug?”
BOBBY: If you had been wearing a 49ers hat in our college journalism class, there’s a very real possibility that, one, I would still be a football fan, and two, that this podcast would be about the NFL. We take the wins where we can get them, you know?
ALEX: Uh-huh. Seriously. One invisible string.
BOBBY: Anyway, we were talking about, what, Jazz?
ALEX: Something like that. Took a class on jazz at NYU.
BOBBY: Did you? Is that where you learned about John Coltrane?
ALEX: Yeah. I was like, “Who is the schmuck everyone keeps talking about?”
BOBBY: Professor on the first day is like, “Why— what— what made you interested in this class?” And you’re just like, “I gotta get to the bottom of this John Coltrane thing. Everybody keeps telling me about it.”
ALEX: What is this love and why is it so supreme? The World Series, right, yes.
BOBBY: I don’t think the Yankees are done. They’ve been close enough to win both games.
ALEX: Yeah. I mean, they’re going to their home ballpark, right? I— I— I don’t know how much you believe in that, but there’s something to be said about playing in front of a— a stadium of fans who are rooting for you. I think that changes the atmosphere a lot. And I don’t know, Shohei couldn’t handle the bright lights before, right? That’s why he went to play in LA.
BOBBY: He couldn’t handle the bright lights before?
ALEX: Of— of New York, you know?
BOBBY: Oh, that’s why he didn’t choose to go there?
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: I think, if anything, it had more to do with the cold. Again, back to the jazz—
ALEX: You’re telling me all these baseball players are like, “No, but it’s too cold for me out there.”
BOBBY: I have a question—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —if you were rich, like Ohtani rich, would you rather live in LA or New York?
ALEX: Probably Long Island.
BOBBY: No, but MS-13—
ALEX: Hudson Valley? Oh, true, true. That’s—
BOBBY: MS-13 has overtaken Long Island. You’re leaving that part out.
ALEX: I forgot about that.
BOBBY: Hudson Valley? Guess it’s easier to get to the Bronx from Hudson Valley than it is, like, to Queens. But, like, put yourself in, like, rich [27:46] brain.
ALEX: Yeah, I get it. I know. Yes, yeah.
BOBBY: Rich athlete brain.
ALEX: You can get your little house in Malibu.
BOBBY: Which all of the stuff that you like about New York, walkable city, you know, proximity, the community, that’s what rich people want to get rid of.
ALEX: Right. Just things that they don’t have any interest in engaging with.
BOBBY: Exactly. They said on the broadcast last night, bro, that Ohtani, when he was like five, sat down and planned out his whole life. Did you hear that?
ALEX: No.
BOBBY: He— he— they said that he sat down and plotted out the age that he would be at the various different life goals that he has. One of them was, you know, winning Koshien. One of them was winning MVP in the— in the MPB. One of them was going to Major League Baseball. One of them was winning his first World Series and what— and then he said that he would retire at 40 and have three World Series rings. He’s 30 now, two wins away from his first World Series ring.
ALEX: Is this—
BOBBY: I sat there and I listened to them talk about this. This was like— this was Joe Davis and John Smoltz talking about this. And I was like, “This is not the only reason that him and I are different, but like, this is a really good example of why I can never be any form of— this good at anything.” Because that— the drive to do that, the ability to just, like, decide what you want and set your goal to it, it’s not there. Not present for me.
ALEX: I feel like— isn’t this in, like, the intro to MLB: The Show? That Ohtani was the cover star on? They have the little intro video and he like—
BOBBY: It’s been, like, five years since I bought a copy of that.
ALEX: Well, that’s— that’s fair.
BOBBY: The game’s just the same. If you don’t play online—
ALEX: It is.
BOBBY: —the game is the same every year.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: It said in there that he predicted when he wanted to find a wife, what year he wanted to get married. I was like, “Dawg. This is bordering on—” like this is— this is right on the line between, like, cool and interesting and, like, American Psycho level.
ALEX: Yeah. I mean, did—
BOBBY: [29:35]
ALEX: Did— did it work? Like, did we go back and—
BOBBY: Seems like it did. I don’t know. I don’t have the exact diary entry.
ALEX: Hmm. Okay. If you’re listening to this, have Shohei Ohtani’s diary.
BOBBY: Ohtani probably listens to this.
ALEX: Keep it— keep it to yourself.
BOBBY: Don’t dox him.
ALEX: I don’t care.
BOBBY: Do you think Ohtani listens?
ALEX: Uh-huh.
BOBBY: Does he like music? What does he do?
ALEX: What does he do?
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: I don’t know.
BOBBY: This is— I could be a great beat reporter. I would just walk up to guys and be like, “So what do you do?”
ALEX: So what do you do?
BOBBY: “Like, what do you— if you weren’t here, what would you be doing?”
ALEX: Right. Like, where are you off to right now?
BOBBY: Exactly.
ALEX: What are you doing with the rest of your evening?
BOBBY: Right. What was the last album you played straight through?
ALEX: I mean, I think it was Rosenthal—
BOBBY: Coltrane?
ALEX: —who talked to— talked to Freddie Freeman before game two and was like, “So what was the rest of your night last night?”
BOBBY: Uh-huh.
ALEX: “Like— like, what did— like, was it hard to go to sleep or whatever?” And he was like, “Honestly, I went home and had to be on dad duty. The kids did not want to go to bed. I got, like, two hours of sleep last night. There was a lot of screaming.” I’m like, “That’s— God. They’re just like us, really.”
BOBBY: Now, that you put it that way, like being able to perform on two hours of sleep, maybe I could be a professional baseball player.
ALEX: The data points grow.
BOBBY: Pros and cons. So, okay, let’s talk about games three and four. Game three will be Walker Buehler versus— who’s pitching for the Yankees?
ALEX: Clarke Schmidt.
BOBBY: Clarke Schmidt. And game four will be Luis Gil at the beginning for the Yankees. Not sure how much length they’re looking to get out of him, since he’s only pitched, I believe, once since returning this October, since returning from his injury, versus a bullpen game for the Dodgers. Now, the reason that I know that— that the Dodgers aren’t going to sweep is because the baseball gods can’t allow the Dodgers to close out the World Series on a fucking bullpen game, dude.
ALEX: On a bullpen game. No chance.
BOBBY: Despicable. Despicable. Kevin Costner is going to call up some of his friends out there in the Field of Dreams, gonna say, “Don’t let it happen.”
ALEX: Gotta get the ball back to Cole, you know?
BOBBY: Yeah. Buehler versus Clarke Schmidt is a really interesting pitching matchup.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I’m fascinated to see this because Clarke— Clarke Schmidt is kind of like the younger version of Buehler. It’s like sort of nasty stuff. You know? They kind of look alike.
ALEX: Yeah. A little bit.
BOBBY: In the sense that they’re sort of bland-looking white dudes, so you would walk past the street and not notice that they were professional baseball players.
ALEX: Right. Clarke— Clarke Schmidt looks like if you let Walker Buehler proof for too long before baking him, you know?
BOBBY: But Buehler has been—
ALEX: Proof, proofed.
BOBBY: —ravaged by injuries and is not like his fullest self. However, he looked a lot better in the championship series than he had in the previous round, and really throughout this whole regular season. And as a guy who I would say thrives off of the competition, thrives off of the negativity. And so pitching on the road in Yankee Stadium, I expect him to sort of have something to prove and be invigorated by that, versus like Rodon’s first start at the playoffs where he had something to prove and sort of put too much of himself out there early, hit a wall. I don’t think that will happen to Buehler. Plus, the other element of the pitching matchups is that even though the Dodgers are going to have a bullpen game in game two and have to navigate that— game two at Yankee Stadium, game four overall. Not really sure why I said it that way, but anyway, we— nevertheless, he persisted. And the Dodgers were left to navigate that. The other thing is that Dave Roberts has been pressing every button exactly perfect this whole October. I’m sure at some point, we will get a baffling decision from him, but it hasn’t happened yet. It happened to Boone on the other side. It has not happened to Dave Roberts yet. Every reliever that he has called to, even if they didn’t look great, ended up being the right guy. In the Mets series, he effectively preserved his high leverage guys for the exact games that he wanted to use them in, and the low leverage guys were able to keep them in games in ways that were surprising to some. I not only trust him more than I trust Boone with the bullpen management. I trust the guys that he’s actually going to more. So it’s a fascinating uphill battle for the Yankees as we head into game three. Metaphorical gun to your head, Alex, do you think this series comes back to Los Angeles?
ALEX: I don’t think so.
BOBBY: Wow.
ALEX: I think Dodgers end it out here.
BOBBY: Damn. Should they just start the parade in Brooklyn?
ALEX: They should.
BOBBY: Just for old times’ sake.
ALEX: That’s— I thought you were just saying that ’cause— so we would be able to see it.
BOBBY: Hmm. Yeah. I think that that’s what Mark Walter was thinking. Did you see the John Sterling call that I retweeted from the Tipping Pitches account?
ALEX: I— I just heard your description of it to me via text.
BOBBY: Where he recounted— no, this is a different thing.
ALEX: Oh. Oh, no, I didn’t. Oh, my God, there’s so— see, there’s so much Sterling content.
BOBBY: I’m just gonna— I don’t think that I can do it justice. I’m just gonna play it here for us.
ALEX: Okay. All right.
JOHN: The pitch to Volpe is outside. I read a book about the Dodgers, the history, and at the end of the book, obviously, they— they’re moved. And two of the great newspaper men in New York, Pete Hamill and Jack Newfield, were out having dinner. There’s the one ode [34:59] to Volpe. Breaking ball strike. Volpe 9 for 33, no homers, two RBIs. So the dinner, Newfield says to Hamill, “Write down the three worst human beings in history, and I’ll do the same thing.” And here’s the 1-1 to Volpe. Lined hard to centerfield, and it is caught by Edman. That ball was really hit, and it kind of dipped, but Edman stayed right with it. Anyway, the upshot is they both wrote the same three names in the same order, Hitler, Stalin, and Walter O’Malley.
[laughter]
ALEX: Great payoff. I— at first—
BOBBY: [35:56]
ALEX: —I was like, “Wow, he’s really dragging this out.” But honestly, it hit better that way.
BOBBY: I like how he had— said Hitler, Stalin. Sure. We got— we knew who he was talking about.
ALEX: Put a little English on it, yeah.
BOBBY: Yeah. We knew who he was talking about.
ALEX: Better or worse than him saying, “Tommy Edmans.”
[laughter]
BOBBY: Put a little English on it.
ALEX: Called him Stylin’ Stalin for a reason.
BOBBY: He was pretty styling early on.
ALEX: Yeah, he was. He was getting fit [36:27]
BOBBY: I guess right towards the end, too.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: He’s just wearing the same thing for the most part.
ALEX: Right. Oh, it’s very cold over there.
BOBBY: Jazz would not do well.
ALEX: Jazz would not— would not cut it in the USSR.
BOBBY: The USSR Baseball League. Walter O’Malley.
[laughter]
BOBBY: Oh, boy. All right. Anything else on the World Series? I think it’s gonna go back to LA. I think Yankees game three, Dodgers game four, Yankees game five, Dodgers in six.
ALEX: Hmm. So you think that Schmidt is gonna out-Buehler the Buehler?
BOBBY: I think it’d be a wash, you know? I just— Buehler can’t go more than, like, four and a third, you know? Maybe he will.
ALEX: Not if— not if my prediction has anything to say about it. This is his— this is shove time.
BOBBY: Well, fuck, now that I remember that you said [37:22]
ALEX: [37:22] scoreless, yeah.
BOBBY: Jesus. Okay. 1-0, Yankees win.
ALEX: All right. There you go.
BOBBY: Okay. Soto solo shot.
ALEX: Aaron Judge over.
BOBBY: Bro, Soto— I believe that you shared the opposite take is this, but I’m— I’m not afraid to disagree with you here on this podcast. Some people might feel that I am afraid to disagree with you, and that we just spend an hour and a half agreeing every week. That’s not the case. Soto looks horrible in a Yankees uniform and it takes away all of his charisma and sauce. I think he looks ridiculous. Ridiculous. All of his fun stuff that he does— when he does it in the Yankees uniform, it’s sort of, like, the hot guy hitting on the woman at work, and it’s like, “Okay, it’s fine.” And then it’s like not— not as attractive-looking guy hitting on her, and it’s like, “HR.” That’s how I feel about Soto in a Yankees uniform.” I’m calling HR on him. It’s horrible. It’s wrong. It’s wrong. All the Soto shuffle stuff, all of the loud celebrations, it’s anachronistic to what it means to be a Yankee.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Like you should be wearing a quarter zip, you know?
ALEX: So you’re saying he should fall in line and conform?
BOBBY: I’m saying we need to free him.
ALEX: Hmm.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Well, what if we free the franchise? What if he is trying to be the— the change from within?
BOBBY: Okay. So you’re saying like—
ALEX: And he said if he can’t beat them, join them, and change the system from the inside.
BOBBY: Right. So what you’re saying is, like, Bernie should run on the democratic ticket to try to push the party left?
ALEX: Why do you do this?
BOBBY: Why do I do what, the podcast? Make jokes our listeners will appreciate. Free him. Free Juan.
ALEX: I don’t hate it. Did I— did I say he looks good in a Yankees uniform? That does sound like something I would say.
BOBBY: I think that you— your observation early on, when he was traded before the season started, was just like he just stepped right in, you know? Sort of hit the ground running, looks natural— natural fit—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —for New York. I would argue there’s a more natural fit that he could have in New York, but that’s for the offseason. Send me to the pitch, Mr. Cohen.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: I’ll say stuff like, “You don’t want to be stuck in the Democratic Party of Major League Baseball.”
ALEX: Right. Well, you want to go to the— to the— the working class team, right? Do you want to do this?
BOBBY: Do I want to do what?
ALEX: Which teams are working class?
BOBBY: Rank all 30 teams—
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: —but not working class there? Yeah.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: I do. Okay. Number 30, the Yankees. Number—
ALEX: Number 29 to one—
BOBBY: —29, all the other teams.
ALEX: —just all the rest of them. They’re all right there. They’re all the same.
BOBBY: Precisely. 29-way tie. And the Yankees are the least working class team.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: That take was written by someone who’s never been to Yankee Stadium, because you walk in there and you’re like, “This is not working class. This is Bank of America with a field in the middle.” Incredible— incredible [40:15] though.
ALEX: Yeah. Yeah. It feels like I’m walking past NYU Stern, the business school. Just like, “Al right.”
BOBBY: Damn.
ALEX: Didn’t even feel like changing out of your suit. Come on, man.
BOBBY: This is like our fifth NYU joke.
ALEX: I get it. I know.
BOBBY: And people are leaving in tropes.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: The Columbia listeners are leaving in tropes. Okay. Do you want to talk about Manfred’s press conference?
ALEX: Yeah. He said some words. We usually like when he says words. I think we should talk about those words.
BOBBY: This is from Evan Drellich’s article in The Athletic, “Rays expected to have stadium situation figured out by Christmas. Rob Manfred has late December in mind as a target for the Tampa Bay Rays to know what stadium they’ll call home to open 2025.” Always love to have, like, three months where I know what team— what place my team will be playing.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Quote, “I think by Christmas they gotta have a pretty good plan in place, and there’s a lot to that. We can make it work in a minor-league park. I think there’s some flexibility in terms of what we do with the big-league schedule. They’re in the damage assessment mode.” I would say so, Rob. I would say that is the mode that they’re in. Damage assessment mode. Bro, this guy turns out quotes like— he clearly knows how to talk, right? Like, he clearly knows how to communicate.
ALEX: Yes.
BOBBY: It’s not like his quotes are like— or not eloquent or like are— are inefficient or, like, nonsensical. They communicate the idea that he wants to communicate, but it’s almost as though he’s never— he’s only ever spoken to someone without being able to see their reactions, because he says stuff. He says stuff where it’s just like, “Read the room, dude.”
ALEX: I feel like he talks like he’s using auto complete. Like, you’re right, he is eloquent. Like, so eloquent that his words mostly managed to be devoid of any and all meaning. It’s a little bit of the Rubenstein factor, honestly. Where it’s just kind of like you’re just sort of saying things, and maybe eventually you’ll stop saying them.
BOBBY: So that’s part one. Rays don’t know where they’re going to play yet.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: They’re in damage assessment mode. He doesn’t have— he didn’t have the ratings on the game, on World Series game one, the international ratings yet, so we didn’t want to comment on that. He said he hopes it’s a really good number. Here’s the other piece that was semi-interesting and also not surprising to us. Here’s what he said, “I don’t have a number that I’m prepared to use right now,” when asked about MLB’s revenue in 2024 compared to 2023. Bro, that I’m prepared to use right now. He’s like, “I have some numbers but not [42:43]”
ALEX: He’s like, “I do have some numbers.”
BOBBY: “I haven’t massaged it through all of the different PR people yet.” “It will be impacted by this, certainly will be impacted by this, in a good way,” referring to the World Series. So he did admit that the league made more money than it did in 2023. That figure was 11.6 billion, depending on, I guess, how the World Series closes out. It will be somewhere within a few 100 million of the number that they’re currently working off of, which is, again, greater than 11.6 billion. Anything of note in there that you want to expand— expound upon here on the pod in the last few minutes?
ALEX: Well, actually, I’ll— I’ll read a supplement— a supplementary quote from Manfred and this is from Sportico, when, again, talking about revenues, he’s talking about how the World Series between these marquee franchises would make a big difference. And he said, “Oh, yeah, we’ve had a good year. Our business was strong.” Like, oh, really? You don’t have a number you’re prepared to share, but you— certainly that number was flashing in his mind. To your— to your point, revenues are going to be up from where they were last year, which were already up about a billion from the year before. There was a report that—
BOBBY: Is it good— hold on. Is it good when your— when your business makes, like— increases in revenue about a billion dollars every year? Does that keep up with inflation, do you think?
ALEX: I think no. Well, you haven’t thought about the fact that they are buying so much avocado toast—
BOBBY: Hmm.
ALEX: —and—
BOBBY: Hmm.
ALEX: —and the iced coffees.
BOBBY: Is this number sort of like offset for all the real estate costs that they have to buy from, like, becoming the biggest landlords in every city that MLB teams are located in? Or, like, is that—
ALEX: Look, you’re thinking— you’re thinking too hard about this, Bobby.
BOBBY: Okay.
ALEX: He said he’s not ready to share a number.
BOBBY: All right.
ALEX: He will— he will pass the word down from on high when he’s ready.
BOBBY: When the line goes up, that’s bad?
ALEX: Yeah. Well, because then you have to contend with all sorts of other factors and implications.
BOBBY: Right. Like taxes and stuff?
ALEX: You know?
BOBBY: Or— wait, do they pay those?
ALEX: Look, it’s tough, because then there’s more dollars that you have to account for. And frankly, I don’t envy that position.
BOBBY: Yeah. It’s easier for us where it’s just like money come in, money go to landlord. Net— net zero.
ALEX: There— there was also a report that came out in the last couple days, talking about league-wide sponsorships, right? And it was like kind of looking on a team by team basis, but— and— and calling it altogether. Those sponsorships are up like 20%. They pulled in, I think, like 2 billion this year. Again, concerning.
BOBBY: Hmm.
ALEX: Where does all this money go?
BOBBY: Right. There are so few players that are worth it.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: And certainly, we can’t possibly pay the employee— team employees anything more than $18 to $22 an hour. I got a final quote for you, unless you want to talk more about revenue, which we don’t have, like, a good number for and we have the whole offseason to talk about.
ALEX: No. What you got?
BOBBY: Rob Manfred was asked why a true American tradition is not taking place this year. And Alex, I’m talking about Steal a Base, Steal a Taco. Taco Bell has not stepped up to the plate this season, and someone wanted to know why. Rob Manfred had this to say, “All things come and go, I guess is the best answer on that one.” “All things come and go.” Honestly, honestly, let him cook with that one.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: He just— when I thought I was out, Rob pulled me back in. Existential Rob is a sick character in the universe of this podcast.
ALEX: I know. [46:19] poetry, when? I appreciate that someone asked him about that.
BOBBY: Yeah. The people want to know, dude.
ALEX: They do.
BOBBY: What the fuck is up with that?
ALEX: I mean, I think what’s up with it is that Taco Bell is just no longer a league sponsor.
BOBBY: Some things are bigger than corporate branding and partnerships.
ALEX: Exactly. Yeah.
BOBBY: But this is— this is America. We still have hotdogs at games, you know?
ALEX: Well, it is pretty funny when, like, you have these quirky promotional campaigns that sort of take on a life of their own. Not entirely unlike a certain purple mascot that dominated a certain New York team’s season. When it’s like— when it’s like, yeah, it’s— it’s not even about the promotional first pitch anymore, right? We have— we have seized Grimace, we have seized Steal a Base, Steal a Taco into the public domain. And I think— I think that fans should consider doing something similar with this.
BOBBY: Steal a Base, Steal a Taco is only over if you allow it to be.
ALEX: Exactly. Well, I celebrate it every—
BOBBY: You can walk right in Taco Bell right now.
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: Give me a fucking taco.
ALEX: You know who would have gotten you that taco, right?
BOBBY: Who? Jazz Chisholm.
ALEX: Jazz. Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Goddamn it.
ALEX: He stole, like, three bases in game one.
BOBBY: I’m conflicted about that.
ALEX: About having to admit that you were wrong about him?
BOBBY: What was I wrong about? All right, two good games. Should we put Tommy Edman on the cover of MLB: The Show next year?
ALEX: Maybe. You mean Tommy Edmonds?
BOBBY: Oh, right. Yeah. Is he related to Jim Edmonds or—
ALEX: I think so. Dude, Smoltz was doing the same thing on the broadcast last night. This is unforgivable.
BOBBY: They also call— they also call Kike, Kiki, Kiki Hernandez.
ALEX: Yep.
BOBBY: Kiki. Smoltz does that on the podcast.
ALEX: I know. I know.
BOBBY: And— and Sterling does it too, which is like, okay, that’s one thing. He’s just trying his best.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: But Smoltz doing on the broadcast, bro, my— my brother, the man sitting six inches to your left is the Dodgers play-by-play guy. He can tell you how to pronounce it. Kike.
ALEX: I’m also just like, “This is your job. You show up for a couple weeks every October.
BOBBY: Well— okay. Let’s not get carried away here. Don’t put this level of scrutiny—
ALEX: About what?
BOBBY: —on my work. You want me reading line by line and all those posts you’re making on LinkedIn, bro? Copy editing your LinkedIn posts?
ALEX: Honestly, would you like to? That’d be really helpful.
BOBBY: I like how in the conception of the show, like the whole thing that you do for work is just post on LinkedIn.
ALEX: I post on LinkedIn, yeah.
BOBBY: That’s all you do.
ALEX: That is all I do.
BOBBY: Like, you’re A-Rod’s assistant, just posting on LinkedIn.
ALEX: I do [48:57] and partnerships for— for LinkedIn, yeah.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: That’s why I’m so deep in his comments.
BOBBY: How are the engagements doing over there? Like, can— do you— do you find that when people fled from X, the everything app because it wasn’t functioning very well anymore? Do you think most of those people landed on LinkedIn?
ALEX: No. Frankly, I think it pulled all the LinkedIn influencers—
BOBBY: Over the X, the everything app?
ALEX: —on— on the X, the everything app.
BOBBY: That hurts.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: So you gotta start cross posting on, what, like Threads, Bluesky?
ALEX: We’re in a dark space.
BOBBY: What are they called around Bluesky? Are they, like, called like tweeps or something like that? Or is that a different one, that people started trying to say was going to be the thing that replaced Twitter? Fleets? No, that was something that [49:41]
ALEX: That— that was different. Yeah.
BOBBY: I don’t know. There’s one of these alternative ones where they were called something really dumb.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: Do you have a Bluesky account?
ALEX: I think so. I don’t know. I did what everyone else did around that time, which is like, “I’m gonna go—” everyone except for you, right? You said, “I’m going down with the ship.”
BOBBY: Yeah. I wish I would— I wish the ship would— would have sunk.
ALEX: You said, “I will be here singing Nearer, My God.”
BOBBY: No, no, no. I was singing Proud to be an American.
ALEX: Never change.
BOBBY: All right. World Series, good series so far. I hope it continues to have barn burner games back and forth. Hope the Dodgers continue to win. Thank you for listening to this week’s episode of Tipping Pitches. We’ll be back when the World Series is over, whenever that is. So if the Dodgers power through and make this a short series, we’ll come back after that with the reaction pod. If the Yankees extend it, I believe the— the eventual game seven would be Saturday, so basically, right in line with when we usually record on our Sundays, so we’ll see. If you’d like to reach out to us, the email is tippingpitchespod@gmail.com. If you’d like to send us a voicemail and have that voicemail played on the episode, the number is 785-422-5881. You can find us on X, the everything app @tipping_pitches. You can find Alex on Bluesky @arodluvr, that’s L-U-V-R, 13—
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: —.bluesky.org.
ALEX: That, and Official John Fisher, either one of those accounts, I manage both.
BOBBY: I— I— I manage Unofficial John Fisher, it’s where I— it’s a parody account satire. Please don’t delete it. Anything else to leave the people with? Any other predictions? Are there any, like, companies that are going to go out of business in the next week that we should, like, sell high on?
ALEX: You want to do some insider trading here real quick?
BOBBY: Don’t joke about that. I actually can do insider trading.
ALEX: You— you— you could do insider trading. I want to talk about the—
BOBBY: It’s one of the things, like, SEC does not like jokes, you know? The SEC, they’re just like, “Nope. That’s not a bit.”
ALEX: No, they don’t. They read it— they read it back to you, and you’re like, “It does not sound as good when you say it like that. No.”
BOBBY: That would be like— that would be like Cousin Craig in Succession. And he said to you then, “Do you want to do insider trading?” And you said back, “Sounds like a good idea.”
ALEX: And you— you laughed.
[laughter]
ALEX: All right. This is— this is [52:14]
BOBBY: Can you show me where you weren’t doing the insider trading?
ALEX: Join our Slack.
BOBBY: Oh, yeah.
ALEX: Where we— where we can talk about insider trading. That is—
BOBBY: The Slack is sort of like—
ALEX: This is considered intern— international waters.
BOBBY: Right. The Slack is just sort of like, “That’s insider trading already. We’re already talking about business secrets, about our business, about the Tipping Pitches business.”
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: About our eventual IPO, which is definitely coming. We— we do have plans to merge with another— a different A-Rod spec.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: It’s gonna be great.
ALEX: And we’re gonna use those returns to buy a quarter’s sake of the A’s from John Fisher. Help get— help get this ballpark built, baby.
BOBBY: Right. That and a soundboard. Priorities— priorities one and two. All right, good stuff. Thanks, everybody, for listening. We will talk to you soon.
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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