2 Guys Talking Baseball
Dallas Danger and Brian Logan discuss the game of baseball. Two fans, two personalities, Two Guys!
2 Guys Talking Baseball
The Golden Comeback!
Can you imagine a baseball rule change involving M&Ms? In this week's episode of Three Crows Studios, we kick things off with some holiday movie chatter and a Hallmark film cameo by none other than Travis Kelce's mom and Taylor Swift. We then embrace the baseball offseason blues, eagerly awaiting winter meetings and juicy updates on players like Juan Soto and the Dodgers' latest pitching powerhouse, Blake Snell. As we navigate streaming app chaos, we're left wondering if holiday movies can soothe our baseball withdrawal symptoms.
Our baseball banter gets serious as we examine the Dodgers' strategic signing of Blake Snell on a five-year, $182 million deal. With a pitching lineup featuring stars like Shohei Otani and Mookie Betts, Snell's arrival adds excitement and pressure to LA's championship ambitions. Meanwhile, the Angels are making moves of their own, bringing in talent like Jorge Soler, though we can't help but question whether their efforts will pay off in a tough division. If you're a fan of quirky contract stipulations (think M&Ms), you'll appreciate our light-hearted take on these offseason developments.
We wrap up with a spirited discussion on potential baseball rule changes, like the controversial "golden hitter" rule and its perplexing impact on the game. Our nostalgia for early 2000s baseball shines through as we reminisce about the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry, the Moneyball era, and Theo Epstein's legendary trades. With humor and camaraderie, we promise listeners an engaging blend of insights, nostalgia, and a touch of holiday cheer that might just make the offseason a bit more bearable.
Hello, hello, hello. Welcome inside the Three Crows Studios in Morristown, tennessee. This is Two Guys Talking Baseball. We are back from our little mini-vacation for the Thanksgiving holiday. We hope everybody had a nice Thanksgiving and all that and hope everybody is doing okay with the longer, darker days and the cold weather and all that and the lack of baseball. But my name is Dallas Danger, of course, and I am joined as always by my best friend and colleague, the sea lion, brian Logan.
Speaker 2:It could be a great week for baseball if we had any. That's a valid point it would be, I mean it would be fantastic. I mean I'm that's a valid point, it would be. I mean it would be fantastic. I mean I'm begging for a winter league.
Speaker 1:There are winter leagues.
Speaker 2:Are they televised Somehow, yeah, to my living room? I think so. Okay, well, I need to find that.
Speaker 1:I know last year MLBtv did one of the winter leagues. Okay, I don't know if it was every game, but you could watch it. You know, right, right right, there are ways. If you really want some baseball, there are ways. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're just lazy.
Speaker 2:Well, I don't like going looking through many apps. I have a lot, my wife has a lot of apps and I have like two I use.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, and she's all over the place with, oh, let's find this to watch, let's. She wanted to watch christmas movies the other night and she had to go through 18 apps to find the right movie and I was just like, uh, I think we own it. She's like, yeah, but I don't want to use that. I want to stream it through an app. And I was like, okay, that makes perfect sense. That's why we bought it. Uh, well, don't go getting heat. Yeah, well, no, I sat there and I watched it. Speaking of christmas movies and I know this is way off topic, but we got to talk about we got to fill some time, so go for it.
Speaker 2:There is a new holiday movie that is made by the hallmark channel. That is about two fans falling in love at a chiefs game and it has all the chiefs players.
Speaker 1:It's got kelsey's mom and uh taytay in it well, I was gonna say it sounds like a taylor swift song it is.
Speaker 2:It's probably based on it one. I'm not saying it is, but I'm saying it. It has potential right. This thing looks so terrible and so mundane and so girlish. I got to watch it.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's like a tractor beam pulling me in.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:When they said that Kelsey's mom was going to be on there, they had me. Yeah, because she's just a pleasure to just watch her goopiness. And then when Tay-Tay was going to make a cameo, then you know how much you want to bet. She's on there for less than 10 seconds.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, to make a cameo, then you know how much you want to bet. She's on there for less than 10 seconds. Oh yeah, yeah, it's. I mean 30 seconds tops me, during the hallway or something. No, no dialogue. It's like her on stage or something.
Speaker 2:You know it's, it's not nothing she had to work that hard for yeah, yeah, but no, I'm gonna. I will research the name of it and I may have even watched it by the time we get back next week.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay. Well, that would be something for next week.
Speaker 1:Listen, the winter meetings start this weekend. I'm just really hoping that we start getting some news. And it's not been a particularly slow offseason Compared to last year. It's night and day, you know, but it's just that time of year, you know, and I think everybody's waiting to see what kind of contract soto is going to get, and there's now reason to believe that, um, he's close to a decision, right, or he's at least starting the narrowing down process. Offers are on the table. He's close to a decision, right, or he's at least starting the narrowing down process. Offers are on the table. He's eliminating teams is what's being reported, because that's going to open the floodgates for everybody. And we'll talk about Blake Snell and the shock of how early he signed, but that's kind of. The pitchers are signing. There's been a lot of pitchers come off the board and, and the cubs signed a pitcher this week too. Yeah, you know. So there's stuff happening. It's just, um, you know the big the big names are are still there, and once the big names come off, the ever, everybody's going Right.
Speaker 2:They'll fall off one by one.
Speaker 1:Right, because you know agents aren't going to accept a contract until they know what the top guy in the market gets. Right, you know per year and all that, and you know the weird quirks of his contract they're going to want in their contracts and all that good stuff. Plus, you know nobody wants to work that hard during the holidays well, it makes me harken back to my contract with this show.
Speaker 2:You know I had a lot of writers in my contract. You know, no m&ms. And I mean, do you see a single m&m around here? No, I mean, I've never seen an m&m in your house. It was in my, in my. No M&M.
Speaker 1:Okay, here's the real question. Obviously, I've analyzed that contract twice over. What is your personal problem with M&Ms?
Speaker 2:Well, they do actually melt in your hands, so they will melt.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then you got a mess.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I ordered. Do you guys? Have you been in freddy's? I mean, we're really, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, so, uh, this had nothing to do with baseball, but anyway, I ordered, uh, a large, uh hot fudge sundae from them one time, with with m&ms on it. Okay, it was delicious, but it was frozen solid and it was about the size of a five gallon bucket. Oh wow, it was huge. It was well worth the money, yeah, but it took forever to eat those frozen m&ms yeah and I just won't have it.
Speaker 2:I just simply won't do it, yeah no, believe me, I mean I might have one on like a sunday afternoon when when I'm watching a football game.
Speaker 1:So what you're saying, is you simply will not freebase m&ms I will not freebase m&ms.
Speaker 2:No, I mean, I may have one on like a tuesday, after you know the price is right or something, but I just simply won't have it on the podcast.
Speaker 1:I just simply won't do it while we're on m&ms um. We went to the grocery store earlier, um, and they have peanut butter and jelly M&Ms now. Ooh, that sounds good. Yeah, I eat a lot of peanut butter and jelly. Jen was fine with them. You know she's into weird flavors, so PB&J wasn't going to make her real happy to begin with. Right, but I've got my bag sitting at home waiting for the munchies later. Nice, it's going to be a good little munchie snack.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you'll have to tell me how that does, because I really am a big PB&J fan.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think the greatest M&M of all time is the peanut butter M&M. To begin with, peanut butter M&Ms are good. I mean, that's the, you know, of the flagship flavors, that's the one yeah.
Speaker 2:So we'll see. I don't know. I will report back. Have you tried the pickle juice immanu? I have not and will not. Well, that just sounds nasty, doesn't?
Speaker 1:it, I just okay. Look, pickle juice is fine, it's, it's, it's, it has its place. Uh, I'm never gonna drink it, just to drink it, um, and I don't understand why everything's got to be flavored like it now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, that's the male version of the pumpkin spice latte. Speaking of pumpkin spice and Tay-Tan, go on. Well, I just I bet she's a big pumpkin spice drinker.
Speaker 1:She looks like she would. She seems like the type. Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I have to ask Jeff Jarrett. Well, it wouldn't be Karen, it would have been his other wife, so we can't do that. So we'll have to ask Jeff if Tay-Tay was a big pumpkin spice latte drinker back in the day. I'll get him on the phone, yeah, because he takes our calls immediately. Well, you'll just bump into him.
Speaker 1:I will. I will hit a random waggles. Here's a great question. What the fuck are we talking about? We're just rambling.
Speaker 2:Just rambling, Just I mean, it's eight minutes of nonsense.
Speaker 1:So, if you're still with us, the Chicago Cubs, brian's beloved Cubs did make a signing this week, I thought a rather interesting signing, and that was former Tigers, mariners and, most recently, guardians pitcher Matthew Boyd Not a top-of-the-rotation guy, but pitching is a need for this Cubs team and he had a pretty good year last year. I mean, you look at his numbers, they're nothing to you know. He was an above-average starting pitcher last year for Cleveland and I don't know what do you got.
Speaker 2:I feel good about the Cubs pitching this coming season. Their rotation's looking good. It all boils down to the same thing we say every episode Will they stay healthy? But on paper they're looking really good. If they still have their bullpen they had from last year, Right, I mean they're sitting pretty good.
Speaker 1:Pretty good. Yeah, that's not a bad-looking rotation. I mean, you've got Imanaga and Justin Steele at the top and, you know, Jameson Tyon. I think there's still more there that we haven't quite tapped into yet since he went to.
Speaker 2:We may be getting the other Japanese player. You're good on their names, I'm not good on their names.
Speaker 1:Are you talking about Roki Sasaki? Yes, yeah, see, that's the thing about Roki Sasaki too, is I think everybody at least feels like they're in it with him, because it's not a matter of who's got the most money, because he was smart, he's waiting until the new signing period, so everybody's got money, so he can kind of now go where he wants to play. Yeah, and you know, imanaga and Seiya Suzuki both seem to love playing for the Cubs.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So you know, and I'm sure he has a relationship with those guys, just like he does with everybody else.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, and he wants a buddy to play with.
Speaker 1:You know and that's the other thing too we don't really know if he wants to team up with other Japanese stars or if he wants to be the Japanese star Right.
Speaker 1:Well, I think the Cubs is a good place for him to be both. Yeah, but I don't know. Man Imanaga made a big splash last year. Seiya Suzuki, what was that a year or two before? Yeah, made a big splash and he's a younger guy. So, you know, is he? I don't know. I think he's got a star written all over him. I think the fact he's coming over as young as he is is going to help that. But you know, does he want to be the Japanese star? Yeah, does that mentality exist anymore? Yeah, because you know there's other Japanese players still to come over from that great World Baseball Classic team. You know that won it all a couple years ago and and, and it's gonna get down to. There aren't gonna be a lot of teams left without a japanese star, of course, unless you know the dodgers and the cubs and these other teams start to really, you know, stockpile the japanese star power.
Speaker 2:yeah, you know um which just could be coming very well in its own.
Speaker 1:It could. Yeah, I agree, I agree, and that's going to make it really interesting. You know when the Cubs and Dodgers start the season in Tokyo.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, in the spring that's going to be a lot of fun. You know, even if Roki Sasaki goes somewhere else, you know that's going to be. You know you're looking at. You know otani and yamamoto on one side, imanaga and suzuki on the other side. You know there's there's plenty, plenty to sell tickets locally. So absolutely. But matthew boyd I think he makes the cubs better, I do too. I think he lengthens that rotation and as long as he stays about where he was last year, he's more than serviceable again. He was above average. He's more than serviceable Again. He was above average by almost every measure for starting pitching A good replacement for Hendricks.
Speaker 1:Yeah, get a little younger, get a guy that's got something left in the tank. Not that Kyle Hendricks necessarily doesn't have anything left in the tank, but you know he's this, this contract he signed with the angels might be his last contract well, you know he's out there in witness protection.
Speaker 2:He's just going to collect his money and play out his games and that's good for him more on the witness protection comments later. We are going to cover the aggressive angels of anaheim in a little bit well, just because they're, because they're clandestine, doesn't mean that they can't be vigorous in their pursuit of a good club. Did you just say vigorous?
Speaker 1:with a, b, vigorous, vigorous. Yes, google that one. Folks. See what comes up. Add that to the Loganese chart. You got anything else to say on the Cubs no go, cubbies, we just can't wait.
Speaker 2:Please come home, we miss you all right.
Speaker 1:So a little bit of news for the dodgers as well. Um, chris woodward is now the first base coach. Yeah, he, he was the third base coach. He goes and manages the rangers. They replace him and win a World Series. He comes back to the Dodgers organization and he's been sort of behind the scenes. I don't remember what role he had, but I think he might have been in player development or something to do with the minor league program.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And now he's back coaching first base and well-liked guy, you know, and a lot of experience in the Dodgers organization. So, um, right guy for the job, I would say, after Clayton McCullough takes the Marlins managerial position. So that's exciting, you know. Yeah, we, like Woody, I was very happy to see him, not just happy to see him lose his job with the rangers, but when he came back to the dodgers, for me that was the moment where I went. Clayton kershaw's never playing for the rangers, yeah, you know, because they have a really good relationship and, you know, as long as he was with the rangers I felt like there was at least a shot that kershaw did a year or two to finish it out in Texas. But the big news for the Dodgers, big news and really the biggest news we have to talk about this week at all, larger than other news, it is larger than other news.
Speaker 1:Blake Snell, five-year deal 182, I think, was the final number um on that contract, um by a lot of measures. The best starting pitcher on the market, two-time Cy Young winner, you know, has a track record that speaks for itself. Uh, there are some questions. Not a guy that gives you a lot of innings. The walk rate is a little high. But you know, a lot of analysts are basically saying, look, he'd rather walk a guy if he gets a three ball count. He's not giving them something they can hit just to get a strike. He's going to put him on base and deal with the next guy and the next count yeah um, which there's merit to that.
Speaker 1:You know he doesn't give up a lot of home runs and that's part of why, because you don't get that 3-1 fastball that a guy in AA could hit into the stands that a lot of pitchers kind of get kind of forced into, I guess is the best way to put it Lazy pitching. Well, I don't know if it's lazy, it's just, you know. Why not put the guy on first, right?
Speaker 2:I agree, I agree, no I think that's what you do.
Speaker 1:You get to the next guy so, but for the dodgers, I think he's a really good fit, um, and I think that's why this deal got done before thanksgiving, because that was the most surprising part, not that he went to the dodgers, not that's why this deal got done before Thanksgiving, because that was the most surprising part. Not that he went to the Dodgers, not that he got the deal he got, not that there were deferrals in this contract, right. The surprising part was that this deal got done very quickly and he got asked about that at the introductory press conference the other night and he kind of shooed it away. But the fact that he was in free agency last year, didn't sign until spring training and only got a one-year deal had to have something to do with how quickly this got done, right.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, I would say that.
Speaker 1:And I think the Dodgers knew that. Whether anybody listening to this likes it or not, the Dodgers are a very smart organization. People try to frame it that all they do is spend money, but if you know ball, you know the game. That is not the case. They do spend money.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But it only looks like they're spending money at the level they are because nobody else is doing it. Nobody else is spending the money that they're willing to spend. But this is also an organization that develops really well, that drafts really well, in spite of never having a high draft pick in the first round. I just feel like they were smart enough to go. You know what we want this guy. Why don't we just go ahead and put the contract on the table and see if he takes it?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And here's the thing If you're Blake Snell or anybody else in free agency right now and the Los Angeles Dodgers make you a reasonable offer, you should take it. Why wouldn't you? Absolutely? Why wouldn't you take that? Yeah, I mean mean, you know, that's the thing. This dodger team, it's where everybody wants to play. Whether they admit it or not, whether anybody likes it or not, players want to go to dodger stadium. Of course they do. Why, why wouldn't you want to play with Shohei Otani and Mookie Betts?
Speaker 2:and Freddie.
Speaker 1:Freeman and all these other guys. I could name the whole roster and it's just top to bottom. It's the best roster in baseball. It's the best organization in baseball. You get to live in LA at least a good chunk of the year, play your games in front of a packed house I mean Dodger Stadiums packed on a tuesday night. Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know and that was something that blake snell talked about in his presser was you know? Look, you know, I'm looking forward to playing every game in front of a packed house. Yeah, because even when the dodgers are on the road, they're drawing a big number. Yeah, you know, the attendance numbers for the dodgers on the road are are higher than anybody, yeah. So, yeah, I think this is a good thing for the dodgers. Um, for me personally, as a dodger fan, I've never really liked blake snail, but I think he's just one of those guys that you, you, you, you only like him if he's on your team. Right, he's very intense.
Speaker 2:Like Craig Council, jed Hoyer.
Speaker 1:Is that why you hated the documentary? Because there was so much Jed Hoyer. That's part of it. We'll get to that in a minute too. But yeah, I mean the Dodgers just just keep. I mean, and and kudos to andrew friedman and brandon gomes and that whole front office and the ownership and everybody, because how many teams have gotten to the level of the dodgers and just tried to keep that same team together? Yeah, and that's why, at least in part, nobody has repeated as world series champions in 20 years. Yeah, because they're moving the pieces out well, more than that.
Speaker 1:I think they're just not getting better. They're saying, well, we won one with this group, let's try to win another one with this group, rather than saying guys come and go. I mean, as soon as the Dodgers won the World Series in 2024, two guys retired on the spot. Yeah, you know. So that's two spots on your roster automatically, one position player with Kiermaier and one pitcher with Daniel Hudson. So now it's like, okay, let's go fill those spots with the best guys we can and make our team better, win a World Series and get better. It's a novel concept and I don't understand why. Why would you not want to keep striving, to keep getting better?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you would want to rebuild in a way that propels you several steps forward instead of just taking one sideways yeah, and a lot of teams do that, they take sideways steps.
Speaker 1:And again, snell is on a five-year deal now. He's a Dodger for five years. So this window that we talk about all the time, you know where Freddie Freeman's contract is up in I think 2027. Where Freddie Freeman's contract is up in I think 2027. But now you've got so much locked up beyond that that you can almost.
Speaker 1:If Freddie Freeman retires or moves on or goes back to Atlanta for his farewell run or whatever he does at the end of this deal, you can live with it because you've got this extremely strong core for the next five, ten years right it's uh I really don't want to see freddie go back to the braids for a end of career deal okay, here's my thing, and I get how unrealistic this is the way the dodgers handled freddie freeman's personal stuff last year and his family stuff with his son. I want to see Freddie finish it out with the Dodgers, whatever that looks like. Yeah, and I really would love he's not going in the Hall of Fame in a Dodger cap, but I would love to see him go in with a blank camp just to stick it to Atlanta. Just, you know, because Freddie's such a nice guy and he would never say this publicly. There's got to be some sour grapes over that. Still, yeah, got to be. Yeah. I mean, the guy was downright emotional the first time he went back to Atlanta. He didn't think he was ever going to play anywhere else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and now, look, he's a part of this great team that could go down as, as I mean and this was said um, during the blake snell, you know media circus when he got introduced the dodger organization they want, their goal is to make this team that we have right now. They want this to be a golden era of Dodger baseball and that is a high bar. Yeah, definitely, the Dodgers are responsible for the boys of summer, for crying out loud. I mean, that's the golden era of Dodger baseball, right as it sits right now. But you're looking at the consecutive years in the playoffs, playoffs. They're getting closer and closer to that record, you know, with the great Braves and Yankees teams of the 90s and 2000s. Um, why not? Why not go for it? Why not go all in? And I think Blake Snell is just another piece of that puzzle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think he is too. I think it's a good get.
Speaker 1:And you know, if there was a need on this Dodger team, it was pitching, because you know what's going to get lost to everybody but Dodger fans. I think, everybody but Dodger fans. I think, as we talk about this team, further and further separated from this team being an active thing is the fact that the Dodgers were just taping guys together to throw an arm out there every day in the playoffs. A lot of bullpen games, a lot of big performances from the bullpen. There's a reason they called them the dogs because they showed up every day. They didn't care about what inning they were in, they didn't care about what hater hitters they were facing, they just, they just went and did what was asked of them right every single day. You know, and you've got, you know, you've got blake trinan throwing like 50 pitches in that last game. You know, game five of the world series. It's, you know, um.
Speaker 1:So if there was a need, it was some depth in the pitching and I think snell gives them that um. We'll see how it goes. You know it's going to be interesting. Uh, if he stays healthy, he's a cy young contender. I mean plain and simple. I mean you can say what you want about his innings and the other stuff, but when he's on the mound there's not many better, if any. It's a short list of guys you could even argue are better just from an overall stuff. What they do with it, command all that, everything that goes into pitching in the major leagues. He's at the very top of the list and now the pressure's on. Yeah, he's not in San Francisco anymore.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:He sure as hell not with the Tampa Bay Rays anymore. No, you know, this is the real big leagues now for Blake Snell, and I'm excited to see how he does.
Speaker 2:Me too. I can't wait to see him pitch. I wish we had a game coming up this week.
Speaker 1:Yeah, me too. Me too, All right. So, brian, you have made it a point, every time the Angels come up, and sometimes, when they don't come up, of referring to playing for the Angels as witness protection in California.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're out there playing their hearts out and nobody is there to see it. So here's the thing If a home run happens in Anaheim, does it really happen at all?
Speaker 1:Well, there's cameras everywhere, for one.
Speaker 2:Okay, even in.
Speaker 1:Anaheim Okay.
Speaker 2:They're all dressed as seats. They're all dressed as seats.
Speaker 1:The Angels Of all teams have been Called the most aggressive team this offseason. Yeah, now, they're not gonna go Get Juan Soto. No, they're probably not going to go get Corbin Burns or Max Freed even. But I mean, the World Series parade hadn't even happened yet and they go trade for Jorge Soler. Yeah, so right. As soon as they could started trying to make this team better, they add Kevin Newman and Travis D darno, who are not star players, but they're difference makers.
Speaker 1:Kevin newman kevin newman is coming off a a resurgent year with the diamondbacks and darno is a guy you want in your clubhouse, right? You know, yeah, he's, he's probably a backup catcher. Um, you know, logan ohopapi is there as sort of the star catcher, but you've got Darnot. When he's not there, darnot, he's solid to have as a pinch-hitting option off the bench and to have around your pitching staff. Then the Angels go out. They got Kyle Hendricks, which, again, is not a big move, but it's a move. And now Yusei Kikuchi talking about these Japanese stars, he is signed with the Angels to add to that rotation.
Speaker 1:It's really interesting, really really interesting, that they gave up on Otani. Basically, they just accepted he wasn't going to be back and now they're really, really trying to like money, ball this thing together. Yeah, in a really tough division to win, I mean, you've got to contend with the Astros and the Rangers and the Mariners aren't going anywhere with that young pitching staff they've got. You know, they, the Mariners, need a bat and and there's and they've been in some trade talks about maybe trying to get some more offense. But that's not a division. You can add Soler, newman, darnot and Kikuchi and just automatically be a favorite. They're going for it though.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're trying. I mean they're trying to dig themselves out of witness protection, but I just don't know if they're going for it though. Yeah, they're trying. I mean they're trying to dig themselves out of witness protection, but I just don't know if they're going to do it. I mean, just because you can go out and get a couple of players don't mean you're going to get the attendance up.
Speaker 1:No, and that's a different conversation, I think, than we're having here. You know, I think it's just about you know, how many more years of Mike Trout do you get, and what are you going to do with those years?
Speaker 2:Six and a half.
Speaker 1:I don't think he's got anywhere close to that. Maybe he does, I don't know, two maybe. How old is Mike Trout? Vamp for him.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we don't know how old Mike Trout is, but I mean he's healthy, he's doing okay, you know so he should be there for a couple more seasons.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's 33. Yeah, you know he might have five, six, seven years left in him if he stays healthy, which has been the. The question, you know, the last couple years, is his health. Um, I mean, they got to get somebody else to um generate some runs. Well, no, he's, they gotta get um. Sorry, I lost my train of thought. They gotta get somebody else to play center field is what I was gonna say yeah um with the, with the injury issues trout has had.
Speaker 1:He's got to accept at some point he can't play center field in the big leagues yeah, you. You know like he used to be able to? Yeah, I think he's still serviceable out there. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying he can't do it, but if they're serious about building around him while they've still got him, you know they got to talk him out of center field.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And get him in left. Let him DH some, you know, because the bat is what you really want with Trout these days. Yeah, not the fielding. Yeah, I mean the fielding was there as a young guy. Again, it's still there to a degree, but I think, you know, with the roster construction the Angels have, they could put a defensive specialist in center field and get more at bats a year out of Trout.
Speaker 2:That's true.
Speaker 1:DH and him putting him in left. Like I said, I don't know. It's interesting, though it's very interesting, I mean, and while we're on teams that are doing sort of unexpected things, right before we went on the air today, the A's I almost said the Oakland A's they ain't in Oakland no more.
Speaker 2:The city-less A's. They ain't in Oakland, no more.
Speaker 1:The city-less A's.
Speaker 2:We ain't in Kansas, no more.
Speaker 1:Have signed Luis Severino to a franchise record $67 million guaranteed. Yeah, and there were all these rumblings. When we talk about the A's, we're talking about John Fisher and the stadium problems and the fact that they're playing in Sacramento in that heat in a minor league park. It's kind of gotten lost that the A's have made it clear they're going to up their payroll, or at least try to up their payroll this year. This is a step in that direction. What else are the A's going to try to do this offseason? You know? And if the A's can get interesting, that's going to be a gauntlet of a division. Oh yeah, five teams all going for it. Yeah, my goodness, I mean, it's been tough the last few years anyway, with the Angels and the A's kind of in the cellar. You know just those other three teams Seattle and Houston and Texas. But if the Angels and A's go for it and get a little bit more competitive, I don't want to be in that division, good grief that'd be tough very tough, I mean unbelievably tough, yeah, in a way.
Speaker 1:So uh, so you're sticking with the witness protection comment, you're not, not?
Speaker 2:backing down. No, I've not seen anything that gets them the big news or the big result yet. I mean, it's good that they're making moves and you know I'm happy for that. They're trying, but they got a long hill and a long road to hoe.
Speaker 1:That's fair. That's fair because all this doesn't at all equal results necessarily. That's a whole different thing. You know, All right. Well, we'll keep an eye on the Angels as things move along this offseason and as we get into what did we say? Today is December the 5th December, the 5th December the 5th, so we still got about two months to change really, I think it's 100 and some days until catchers report.
Speaker 1:Yeah, see, and that's the thing too is everybody talks about the countdown to pitchers and catchers. I don't care about that. Yeah, nothing changes when pitchers and catchers report. I want to know how many days till we have games to watch. Right, even if they're spring training games, there's still games to watch. Yeah absolutely, and I watch every spring training game just like I watch the regular season.
Speaker 2:Oh, I do too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it's a good warm-up for the year.
Speaker 2:And it usually goes like this man, we look good today.
Speaker 1:Well, it doesn't fucking matter because it doesn't count. Well, okay, fine, then we look like shit. But it's also nice. You know we follow our teams pretty closely. It's always nice to see the younger guys that are coming up through the pipeline, and you know there's always. You know, for the Dodgers at least there's always one guy every spring that grabs people's attention, or at least grabs my attention, you know, so you know that's a lot of days, though. That is a lot of days, a lot of cold, dark days.
Speaker 2:Yeah, winter hasn't even came yet and it was already cold this morning when I went out. Yeah, it's been real cold, but it'll be all right, we'll get in our little cubby blankies and everything will be okay.
Speaker 1:When it's warm out I still have my Dodger blanket on the couch, of course. Got to, I like it cool in my house. Yeah, nice and cool. Yeah, I like it. Cool too. One of the big topics of conversation. More like brisk, I like it brisk. Yeah, brisk is nice Brisk and a little chilly. Yeah, brian knows I wear a hoodie pretty much 24-7. Yeah so you know I like it nice and cool, so I'm comfortable in a hoodie.
Speaker 2:Well, and I bought these wonderful T-shirts, so I wear one every day. I've got like six dozen.
Speaker 1:You really do. There's a hole in the running out of those shirts.
Speaker 2:That's all right. I got a whole bunch of them on my porch. Do you really still have a bunch of those? Oh yeah, I got dozens upon dozens.
Speaker 1:Now we're just talking to ourselves.
Speaker 2:We are.
Speaker 1:Nobody even knows what the hell we're talking about.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're like we can't see the shirt. It's official Brian Logan winter shirt.
Speaker 1:It's very cool. Listen, it's the off season. We're just trying to put our time in and you know we have responsibilities. Now we're on a network for crying out loud. Yes, pirate Flag Radio is expecting an episode.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we have to produce. So we'll talk about the weather and the shirts that you can't see.
Speaker 1:Well, let's talk about this, Because this has been a big topic of conversation amongst the baseball community this week. Okay, rob Manfred has said that there is a rule change being discussed. He did not say at what length, he did not say whose idea it was, but it has been discussed amongst the owners the golden at-bat rule. And if you are not familiar with what we're talking about, this would be once a game, every team would be able to basically substitute any hitter they wanted for one at-bat, without using up a bench player, without changing the batting order. Here's the deal ninth inning you're. You're down a couple runs, you've got the bases loaded with two outs and you've got your number nine hitter coming up. You could say well, we've got shohei otani, we want to put him here yeah, that's called cheating well, I have not seen very many people defend it.
Speaker 1:I've seen a lot more people say it's the worst idea they've ever heard.
Speaker 2:It's a terrible idea.
Speaker 1:Terrible and Brian, believe it or not, has some opinions. Yes, I mean it's just terrible.
Speaker 2:I mean, you don't even do that on a sandlot because you get your ass kicked. You know you can't do that in the pros, but but I I talked to him myself and and I have proposed some new rules okay, let's hear it, would you?
Speaker 1:like to hear my new rule all right, here's brian logan's new rule change proposals.
Speaker 2:If we do the golden at bat, if we do the golden at bat rule, then all major league games are only three innings long. Each team's best hitter hits every at-bat, Starting pitchers have a 12-pitch limit and all innings start with three ghost runners and if anybody, any player caught causing a delay executed on sight.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you got to wait for the draconian rule, but you knew it was coming.
Speaker 1:You knew somebody was getting publicly slain for something. Yeah, I want to start this by saying I've been very open to the rule changes. We've talked about them a lot on this program. We have about them a lot on this program. We have If you go all the way back to 2022, patreoncom slash 2GTB and listen to when we talked about these the pitch clock and the bigger bases and the things that have already come and been put in place since then. We had some ridiculous talks then too, right, but those rule changes, brian, have made the game better and easier to watch, as people that watch it every day during the season multiple games in your case. Yeah, they've been great for the game of baseball.
Speaker 2:You're right they have. Let's break this rule down. So it's the seventh inning. This would be your third at bat seeing the pitcher. It's the seventh inning. This would be your third at bat seeing the pitcher. Base is loaded and you got to put you. You don't want to put uh, your number nine hitter, so you want to put in shohei otani. He's seen the picture the third time, but he waffles and strikes out. Next inning, you got the same scenario, but you want to use a good hit, but you've already used your golden hitter rule, but he's up naturally in order. It's too confusing.
Speaker 1:That's the other thing. Shohei Otani is going to be the Dodgers' leadoff hitter. If you golden at, bat him for the nine hitter and he gets on base, does the nine hitter go on base. So Shohei Otani can hit two at-bats in a row. Yeah, see, that's cheating.
Speaker 2:That's asinine, right, that's completely asinine Again. That's why every good player bats every at-bat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I just don't like this one.
Speaker 2:We will extend the designated hitter to one dude. He has to bat 27 times hitter to one dude.
Speaker 1:He asked about 27 times. The other argument I've consistently seen against this since since manfred's um comments about it is there are bigger things to worry about, rules wise right now. Yeah, this umpiring crew is the worst it's ever been.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is, it's ever been.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is, it's terrible we are. I mean, we've got guys consistently every night missing calls just on balls and strikes the sheer basics of the game of baseball and they can't get it right. And we already have the technology to make sure we get it right. I know and I understand if you don't want to take the humans out of the game completely and you just do the challenge system, I'm okay with that because that's working in the minor leagues right now. Yeah, good, put forward, let's worry about that. Yeah, let's get balls and strikes right consistently first, and then maybe we can go with this cockamamie bullshit. Yes, because that's what it is.
Speaker 2:It's cockamamie bullshit, I mean I think they all have to eat a green m&m before every at bat. New rule green m&m rule okay.
Speaker 1:So one of the things that makes baseball in in, in my humble opinion and I don't have a football podcast or a basketball podcast or a hockey podcast, but what makes baseball better is the fact that that number nine hitter can come up in that situation and be the hero, yeah, any night of the week, mm-hmm. So why are we taking that away, just to make the game more like other sports?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's crazy. I think it's going to cause way more problems than it solves.
Speaker 1:Because remember, in the postseason, when Aaron Judge was struggling, we said that's the difference. Tom Brady never threw four interceptions in the Super Bowl. Lebron James never scored three points in a finals game. But in baseball everybody slumps, but everybody has the opportunity to get out of that slump and do something special. Yeah, one through nine, every lineup, every night. Everybody, you still got to get him out. Yeah, doesn't matter what his batting average is, doesn't matter who he is, you still got to get him out.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Doesn't matter what his batting average is, doesn't matter who he is, you still got to go up there as a pitcher and get him out and get out of that bases loaded jam that we keep going back to as a hypothetical here. Yeah, you know, because, as we always like to say, that number nine hitter, he drives a nice car too, and it ain't because he he's, he's a good investor, it's because he can hit a baseball, yeah, better than a lot of people in the world can. So you know again, I'm open-minded to rule changes if they're going to make things better, if they're going to fix a problem.
Speaker 2:This is a solution looking for a problem it is a solution, looking for a problem that's very well put. Well, well, I stole it. Well, that's okay, we steal a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1:So shout out to Jeff Snyder from the Locked on Dodgers podcast I might have stole those rules. Are you going to give anybody credit? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Kyle Corwin at Kyle Corwin Takes. That was pretty clever pal yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, look, if you're going to go that far, you might as well keep going, right, of course, you know, I just don't like it. And I tried, I didn't hear it and immediately go fuck that. I tried, I tried to think of a way that this worked and made the game better, and I just don't think it does. Yeah, I just don't think it does and it just I just I don't know man, I don't think it's going to get anywhere.
Speaker 2:I don't think it'll get any traction whatsoever, because this backlash.
Speaker 1:you know, here's the thing. You can say all you want about Rob Manfred he's not an idiot, he's not an idiot. A rob manfred, he's not an idiot, he's not an idiot. A lot of things have happened during his time as commissioner that have made this game better, have made it more appealing to the casual fan and, frankly, have made it more appealing to the best athletes in the country coming up trying to decide what sport they're going to play professionally what if we do this?
Speaker 2:What if we take a trash can, a metal trash can, and we paint it gold and we put it out there, say by the big hat in the Met Stadium, you know, the one that moves up and down. You're talking about the apple. The apple, yes, okay, and if he can get it in the can, then he can bat anytime he wants.
Speaker 1:Okay, let's be serious for just a minute.
Speaker 2:I don't recommend it, but okay, okay.
Speaker 1:Would you be open to this in the All-Star game?
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, yeah, game. Well, yeah, yeah. And then what happens? When, the, when you, the player decides that he wants to see it's a player call, so the player decides, nope, I don't, I don't believe in number 12, so I'm going to go back for number 12, and then we play off how mad 12 is at number 18 for taking his act back. The, the reality show ramifications are just have real world applications that are just incredible, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well that was a lot of words strung together. Of all the words I said today, that was the biggest.
Speaker 1:But you did it. Oh yeah, I mean, that was impressive, it was, that was actually English and not Loganese it was. Oh my goodness, how much more time do we got to get out of?
Speaker 2:this oh, we got to get about 15 yeah, we're good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think we'll be all right. Uh, do you have anything else to add about the golden at bat rule before?
Speaker 2:I just don't like it. I just think. I think, if that is that, the what is he doing with his days? If that's what he comes up with?
Speaker 1:See, that's the thing, though, is everybody is dunking on Manfred, and he never said it was his idea. It was just somebody's idea. You know, this could have been John Fisher's fucking idea.
Speaker 2:I think it's Jed Hoyer's idea, and that's why it sucks.
Speaker 1:Speaking of things you didn't like. Specifically because of Jed Hoyer, we watched the Comeback this week. Yeah, we sure did. The Netflix documentary about the 2004 Boston Red Sox, who were, to date, the only team ever in baseball history to come back from a 3-0 deficit in a seven-game series and win that series First. Okay, the first thing I want to say is Netflix is really good at this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're very good at their documentaries.
Speaker 1:They do documentary work head and shoulders above everybody else trying to do it. Yeah, and that's not to take away from anybody else. There have been great documentaries that Netflix had nothing to do it yeah, and that's not to take away from anybody else. There have been great documentaries that Netflix had nothing to do with, right. But right now I want them to do more baseball stuff, mm-hmm, because this was really well done. They had a lot of talking heads, and I mean a lot, a whole lot, but they placed them all perfectly. They knew who to put where, what, what comments to put where. Uh, they they a lot of quick cuts. They weren't stuck on anybody for too long at one time, which you know. Sometimes in documentaries it gets a little boring and yeah, it wasn't a ken burns affair oh god, no, it was only three parts in about three hours.
Speaker 1:Ken burns would have taken this and it would have been 36 parts. Nothing, nothing wrong with ken burns.
Speaker 2:I mean, he's a great documentary he just draws it out every now and then he needs a golden hitter. It's episode 14 and you're just in 1979. We need to speed this up a little bit.
Speaker 1:But, yeah, great documentary series. I thought no-transcript, uh topic, a little differently than you do, brian. Um, I apologize, it's been a couple years since I read your book. I don't know what you were doing in 2004, but, uh, I was indisposed yeah, yeah I didn't want to bring it up.
Speaker 1:I thought that might be the case, yeah um, yeah, I just you know, I remember this, this era of baseball, very fondly, that the early 2000s was very much for me, kind of the peak of my baseball fandom as a kid. I'm a bigger baseball fan now as an adult, but I think growing up I was very into football and basketball and baseball was there and I liked baseball. But it was around 2001, 2002 where I really started to fall in love with baseball and start to realize what made it special compared to the other sports. So I remember these games, these moments, these players and these teams really, really well. And for me it was great to go back and remember like, yeah, billy Bean, they almost got Billy Bean away from the A's right in the thick of the Moneyball era.
Speaker 1:And you know that offseason where it was like every free agent was either going to the Yankees or the Red Sox. There was no competition, they both were just trying to beat each other. Yeah, you know, the Yankees were trying to stay on top, the Red Sox were trying to, you know, bridge that gap and get over the hump, and the hump was the Yankees at that point.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:They were an unstoppable force in that division, but the Red Sox were right there nipping at their heels the whole way.
Speaker 2:They never gave up. They never gave up. They had a goal and they tried to achieve it, and they did, and this was a good ball club.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean that Red Sox team was put together and the balls, the balls of Theo Epstein, to, in the middle of all of it, trade Nomar Garcia-Para.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And make his team better. Yeah, he traded away probably his most recognizable star and made his team better yeah and they won a world series, yeah, you know, um, and then they went on to win a few more I love the old footage of the bill buckner going through the legs again.
Speaker 2:I I can't get enough of that. Wow, incredible right what?
Speaker 1:what was the quote? That for New England sports that was the Kennedy assassination? Yeah, like everybody remembers where they were when it happened.
Speaker 2:You know, yeah, yeah, and it's just I got to stay up late for that one and I was like, oh my God, I can't believe it.
Speaker 1:just you know, and as a kid you're like, well, I'd have got that ball you know, I loved that throughout the documentary, when they were showing game footage, they would put the win probability up. Yeah, yeah, yeah and it would change. That was very cool. It was very, very cool, you know, because the Red Sox, they had it in the bag. Yeah, they had that World. Series in 86 in the bag, yeah, and then just poof, it went the other way. It was gone, man, just heartbreak after heartbreak. You know 80-some years.
Speaker 2:They were masters at stealing defeat from the jaws of victory.
Speaker 1:They really were. I mean they really were and it was just over and over and, as a fan, you've got to be going. Come on, like you know. I mean, how many people stopped supporting the Red Sox during that long stretch where it was just and it's not like they were a last place team for 86 years. They were in the thick of it for a lot of that 86 years and, like you said, they were just dropping the ball or letting the ball go through their legs or whatever it was.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was just silly mistakes.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:At the most inopportune moments. It was a curse.
Speaker 1:It really was a curse and I'm not trying to take anything away from the Cubs winning it in 2016. But compared to the curse of the Bambino, the Cubs just were kind of bad for 100 and some years and then got good. Yeah, you know there were flashes. You know they had some good teams in the 80s, but they weren't as good as the Mets in the 80s.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know Well, they didn't have the cocaine that they had.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean that Mets cocaine is like the strongest cocaine In the world In recorded history Cocaine.
Speaker 2:What show am I on? They all run together.
Speaker 1:If you're, uh, if you're not already, please check out the danger zone on pirate flag radio. Um, but I okay, so I I know that you, you were kind of meh lukewarm, well, it was a good documentary.
Speaker 2:It was filmed very well. The cinematography and the editing was exquisite. Uh, it was good. Uh, I enjoyed it from a documentary standpoint. All the pieces were excelled where they were supposed to be at. As a filmmaker myself of documentary films, I appreciate the effort, but the topic wasn't my topic, right, you know. I mean it was put together great, yeah, and the talking heads were excellent, that there were so, so many points and that they had the footage of everything they talked about. That's something that when you go to make a documentary, um, you gotta make sure you got all the footage before you start interviewing people. Yep, because you'll they'll say something you'll be like well, we can't use that because we don't have the footage. Yep, you know somebody on your team will be like well, we have to use it. And you're like no, you like no, you don't understand, motherfucker, we ain't got the clip Right, we can't use it.
Speaker 1:That's it yeah, and they had it all, they had all the game footage they had the sports center and the radio.
Speaker 2:I did notice, though, the first time he said he pulled out the Jack Daniels, it was actually Crown Royal, and I thought, ah, nobody, nobody smartened him up. But by the time they worked it back around, he had the Jack Daniels.
Speaker 1:Right, right. Well, maybe it was crowned at first and then they got Jack the next night. Yeah, I don't know. We shouldn't let the truth get in the way of a good story.
Speaker 2:No, no, no. I have never done that. I live my life by that. Just ask my wife Take my wife, please ask my wife, take my wife, please.
Speaker 1:Um, so I, I loved that they. They told the the bunch of idiots narrative, because that's what that team was. I mean, here's the yankees, the, the, the trillion dollar clean cut, classy. You know tradition, 20 some time world series champion george steinbrenner refuses to do anything that's even close to losing. Um, and then you've got this bunch of idiots, yeah, that are just showing up to the ballpark and are old school guys and you know. And then you've got this new school way of thinking in the front office that put this team together. That again was really ballsy because it bucked everything that every other organization sans the A's were doing at that point. So, you know, it kind of turned into Moneyball with a lot bigger budget.
Speaker 2:Oh, and their coach? What's the coach's name? Lefty? Oh, grady Little, grady Little Boy. He did not like the analytics, did he? He was like I go by my gut. I thought, yeah, that's why your team was terrible.
Speaker 1:Was it Grady Little? Yeah, I think it was. I'm going to look it up.
Speaker 2:Okay, look, team was terrible, was it grady little? Yeah, I think it was. I'm gonna look it up. Okay, look at it. But yeah, he was like you know, I'm, I'm, I know what a man can do versus what the statistics say, and I thought you don't know shit. But uh, he was. He was the only one that came across as bitter in the whole thing and, of course, he lost his job, so that's why well, I have heard they tried to get some of the Yankee personnel and none of them would talk about it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so there had to be a villain Right Somewhere, Right, Right, Right. And for me one of my favorite quotes of the whole series was John Henry, the Red Sox owner, saying yeah. I looked over at my partners in the middle of that game and said can we fire him now or do we have to wait until this is over?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I'm sitting there watching this and they're rehashing everything, leaving Pedro in and you know, pedro, of course, is like I'm not going to tell him I'm coming out?
Speaker 2:Well, of course not. That's not his job.
Speaker 1:That was the culture of the game back then. He was like I'm a warrior. A warrior's not going to say take me out of battle, but I'm sitting here going. Yeah, I remember that game, and as a kid. I'm a kid and I'm thinking what are they doing? Get him out of there? Yeah, you know, go to your bullpen.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it just, it was a bad choice and it just was a bad choice. It was just bad, it was real bad. And you know and I'm not bad-mouthing Grady Little as a person, I don't know him- no, I don't either.
Speaker 2:I'm sure he's a fine guy.
Speaker 1:And a hell of a coach. He was the symbol of what the Red Sox left behind in order to have that success. Yes, and that was the well. I'm just going to go by my gut and the eyeball test and I'm the manager, so I know better. And we fast forward. Now, 20 years later, every organization in the majors is not viewing it from the well. The manager knows best because he's the manager.
Speaker 2:Yeah it's the analytics.
Speaker 1:You know it's a team effort, even beyond the guys on the field. You know it's a team organization. You know wide effort to figure these things out and go well. I know you like this guy and I all everybody else likes him. But against left-handed pitching he's terrible. Yeah, or yeah, he hits home runs, but this guy gets on base way more right instead of going with.
Speaker 1:Well, he's due, he's due yeah, exactly, it's just, it's two different ways of thinking and, and you know, theo, I didn't realize how young he was 28 years old, yeah, and had what a year or two of assistant gm experience a year yeah, and they're like well, we didn't get billy bean, you're the guy for the job I felt bad, they didn't give him champagne, though maybe he was too young did they not give him no?
Speaker 2:they even asked and he was like, did you crack the champagne over him? And the owner.
Speaker 1:The owner was like no, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that was an interesting one too. No, we didn't and I got the vibe of like we made the mistake of celebrating too early. We weren't going to make that mistake again and lose Theo, because again we're talking about a team that was literally cursed. They had to break a curse to beat the Yankees and to win a World Series. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And every time I saw Jed Hoyer I was like, well, brian hates this.
Speaker 2:Yep, nope, I did not enjoy him on there at all, acting like he knew what he was talking about.
Speaker 1:If you are new to Two Guys Talking Baseball. Brian is not a fan of Jed.
Speaker 2:Hoyer Nope, nope.
Speaker 1:I wish I could remember what episode the Jed Hoyer rant was on. I think it was 11. Just to give people the Just go, listen to all of them. At some point Brian goes on this epic rant about Jed Hoyer and it's one of the few times in my history of doing anything with Brian Logan where I just said go for it, gloves off, let him have it off, let him have it just let him.
Speaker 2:I felt a little bad about I, was a little hard on the beaver that night and uh, you know I mean he, he's not even fully developed yet, and I was making fun of him what do you mean? He's not fully well he's hoping to hit five five this summer. I mean I should at least wait till he can look me in the eye after he gets up on that apple crate before right, where I put it right, put him down but um no, I really liked this and, and, and, and.
Speaker 1:I did think of you in another way. You know this, that was a rivalry. Yeah, that was some smash mouth baseball which is your favorite brand of baseball?
Speaker 2:Now, that I loved. I love the, the clips of all that stuff of playing hard and all that you know. But I mean, when you come out and ask a pitcher and I may be setting my ways, but I want my pitcher to have his arm falling off onto the ground and going, no, I got one more in me. Yeah, and then let me make the decision not to do it. Yep, Not, oh, yeah, I'm done. I don't want to hear that.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, we haven't mentioned Dave Roberts yet, yeah, who was a pretty, you know, not a big part, but he was a part of this because of the stolen base, which is famous and was sort of the spark that led to the first win, that led to the second, to the third, and then they win the series and it's history. Yeah, um, you know, I've said, you know, I've said for years, and I don't think it's inaccurate dave roberts will never pay for a meal in the city of boston ever again, ever ever, but let's talk about this year's world series okay
Speaker 1:blake Trinan, who is a one inning guy traditionally, is stretched to his absolute limit. And Dave Roberts goes out and when he's asked about it, he says I wanted to look in his eyes. Yeah, I didn't ask him and go with what he said, because Blake Trinan is going to say I got one more in me. Well, of course, that's what he should say, because, again, yeah, that's what he should say. But Dave Roberts said I wanted to feel his chest so I could feel his heartbeat, and I wanted to look in his eyes. Yeah, not, I'm going to go ask him and that's the answer. I want to see. I want to see for myself what's he got left. How's he dealing with this moment? Absolutely and that's why he made the decision Very different ways of thinking. And look at Dave. In this new era, where that new way as it was in 2004, has spread to the whole league, is there a better manager in baseball than Dave Roberts? No, you can argue, maybe that somebody's as good.
Speaker 2:It ain't the Brewers.
Speaker 1:His name's Pat Murphy. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:You know Patty Murphy Down at O'Grady's Bar.
Speaker 1:You know, and talking about the fights and the intensity of that rivalry in those days, I am in no way a Red Sox fan. I never have been. I liked that team, uh, because everybody did, because they weren't the yankees. But uh, don zimmer's ass going to the ground, yeah, one of the greatest days of my life, yeah, to this day. And they just kept showing it and I was like man, I remember seeing it happen, live and just laughing my ass off.
Speaker 2:I love Don Zimmer man he was classic yeah.
Speaker 1:Former Cubs manager.
Speaker 2:Don Zimmer, the skipper.
Speaker 1:The skipper Don.
Speaker 2:Zimmer.
Speaker 1:But yeah, man, I thought this was really well done. No new info. If you were looking for new information, you're not going to get it out of this. I don't think, If there was anything new, it wasn't shocking the idea that John Henry is literally in the stands going can I fire this guy in the middle of a game. That's not surprising to anyone who was there and saw that game live. To anyone who was there and saw that game live, Right, Because it was just another in a long line of things that happened to the Red Sox during the era of the curse. That just made you kind of scratch your head. But again, Netflix is so good at this. I just want to see them do more baseball-related stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that would be good and I think they're going to be coming out with a lot more because they're getting more sports-oriented.
Speaker 1:They are and that's really exciting. That's really exciting. And say what you want about that fight and the issues or whatever, we're not here to discuss that, but Netflix is getting into the sports game, oh yeah, and and that's a good thing, because well, it didn't buffer when I watched it well, I had a little bit of trouble, but not I mean I'm not going to sign up for a class action lawsuit, I already signed you up oh, thanks, yeah, thanks at dow's danger if they try to send me big tires, I'm gonna, yeah, hurt you.
Speaker 1:That's Danger. If they try to send me big tires, I'm going to hurt you.
Speaker 2:That's what you get. You get six sets of big tires.
Speaker 1:And we're back to inside jokes that nobody knows what we're talking about.
Speaker 2:That's all right, but it's been a great week, man. It's been good.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And we enjoyed the documentary. It was better than a stick in the eye.
Speaker 1:It was definitely better than a stick in the eye. I mean, that would have been a bummer. I got to get that done Wednesday, oh goodness. Well, have we put in our time? Yeah, we're good, I think we've put in our time this week. I hope you've enjoyed our incoherent ramblings.
Speaker 2:Bear with us. It's getting very thin in the off season, but that's okay, we're gonna try to be entertaining we are, we are, I don't know what the hell we'll talk about, but we'll, we're still gonna do it. We're still gonna do the show well, we're, we're.
Speaker 1:I think we need some. We need to do some movie reviews yeah, you know coming up, so maybe, maybe we need to go revisit. Uh, you know, I was thinking the other day it's about time to go revisit Bingo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, got to go watch that again.
Speaker 1:That'd be awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Bingo Long and the Motor Kings and Traveling All-Stars whatever that long title is. Yeah, great flick yeah. So you know I almost put Bull Durham on the other night.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't remember why I didn't, but I but I almost did, so that's probably coming soon. Yeah, major leagues. Oh yeah, we, we got it. We got to have a debate, you know, because I I would love to spend some time on this show um explaining why I think major league two is the best major league movie yeah and hey at dallas, for all your hate mail about this.
Speaker 1:Major League Three is an experience. Yeah, Back to the Miners is a fucking experience of a flick. Yeah, twists and turns and ups and downs and the higher you are the better it gets. Yeah, in my personal experience anyhow, that's a good one to get really stoned and watch because, holy cow, what a crazy ass movie. Yeah, that has pretty much nothing to do with the first two yeah, it's a standalone, it was a different uh studio oh, it was.
Speaker 1:It was I mean outside of having bob euchre and uh, corbin bernson. Uh, totally, brand new scott baio is in that fucking movie man yeah he's like the star of that movie. Yeah, so, yeah, so we'll probably watch some movies or some old games. I know we keep saying that, but I think we're about to get to the point in the offseason where we're going to need it. Yeah, we're going to need to start that next week. We kept this documentary in our back pocket for as long as we could.
Speaker 2:Well, and that made me want to see the 78 playoff, with the one-night playoff between the Yankees and the Red Sox in 78. I love that. Oh yeah, the Bucky Dent game. Yeah, I love that whole series, so maybe we can watch that and revisit it, one game at a time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that might not be bad. Yeah, might not be bad at all. So we got ideas we're going to keep. Here's what I'm trying to say we ain't stopping, we're going to pull a show out of our ass every week. You can't get rid of us. You really can't, you really can't. So you know, and we're going to talk baseball even if there's no baseball, I don't know, maybe I'll look into the Winter Leagues and we'll get involved in the Winter Leagues. Okay, I don't know, we're going come up with something each and every week. Just, uh, yeah, man, because we've, you know, we feel like we got to. We gotta out of a sense of obligation for all of you listening by our tens of fans are all tens of you. We love you, we do love you and we appreciate you listening. If you like what you hear, we have some merchandise available 2gtbstore, um. You know hats, t-shirts, sweatshirts, stuff for your pets, a lot of practical gifts. It is stocking stuff for season and it's free to take a look.
Speaker 2:Yeah, come on over and we'll stock your stuffings.
Speaker 1:We will stock your stuffings, it's true, and we've been pretty lax on the Patreon, and that's you know. I'll admit that. But Patreoncom slash 2GTB, our original episodes from 2022, some other fun stuff that we've done there, and we're going to get back to adding to that at some point. I'll just say my schedule personally has gotten crazy and so I haven't had time to think, and you've got to think up these ideas to do extra stuff in addition to the weekly show, so we're going to start working on that again.
Speaker 2:I'll be doing all the thinking for the podcast. Thank you very much.
Speaker 1:And that's the zinger of the day the idea that you're the brains behind this operation.
Speaker 2:Next week's format will be a variety format.
Speaker 1:Maybe that's what we'll do next week. Brian, you write the format. Yeah, I'll just show up and fucking do whatever it is you do.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Some weeks, I don't even know what it is you do around here.
Speaker 2:I'm the sea lion, damn it.
Speaker 1:I do a lot around here you push the buttons, real good.
Speaker 2:I'll say that I am a good button pusher.
Speaker 1:Brian is an expert button pusher. Yeah, all right, so I think that's going to about do it for us this week. Thanks as always for listening, and we'll be back next week with God knows what. Hopefully some people sign and get traded during the winter meetings, or we're just going to be talking about peanut butter and jelly M&Ms.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we might make up some shit too.
Speaker 1:And yeah.
