Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Backflips and Nerds, the Baseball podcast
Speaker 1: with a British twist. I am Darius Austin and we
Speaker 1: are here with our slightly belated twenty twenty six preseason
Speaker 1: prediction extravaganza. Yes, I know some of you may point
Speaker 1: out that the season has started to that. I say,
Speaker 1: I don't like to look at the standings until May.
Speaker 1: So does it really matter? Probably not. I was going
Speaker 1: to go back and look at who was in first
Speaker 1: place on four games into the season last year, but
Speaker 1: it really doesn't matter. I couldn't be bothered. So let's
Speaker 1: just say we haven't learned anything about the teams. The
Speaker 1: Nationals are not great. I'm not going to come in
Speaker 1: and say the Nationals are winning nine five games. That's
Speaker 1: my point. Anyway, in the background, you can hear the
Speaker 1: one egg spur I deemed worthy enough to join me
Speaker 1: on this podcast. I've cut these the dead wood. I've
Speaker 1: just recruited our number one prognosticator, austral Damas as he's
Speaker 1: called himself. How's okay?
Speaker 2: Also, the nostrils are are being absolutely decimated by early
Speaker 2: early season hay fever. I feel dreadful today, which reminds
Speaker 2: me of when I was in San Francisco a couple
Speaker 2: of years ago, and so I died to stay on
Speaker 2: Powell Street because it is tree pollen that gets me,
Speaker 2: and and there were some very very pretty blossoming trees
Speaker 2: down there. And I feel as dreadful now as probably
Speaker 2: the San Francisco Giants do after the very short start
Speaker 2: to the season. And what that's taught me is, don't
Speaker 2: ever go to Washington because I feel dreadful right now.
Speaker 2: And you know, they're pretty into their blossoms there, I've heard,
Speaker 2: so I'm going to stay away from that.
Speaker 1: That is the word on the street. I'm good, thank you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've not been to Washington. They did have that whole
Speaker 1: jersey that was themed around the blossom, so I think
Speaker 1: it's a pretty big thing to look at it today,
Speaker 1: and I hated it. I looked at it thinking, you bastard,
Speaker 1: to stay away from me. You've felt allergic looking at
Speaker 1: the hat I did.
Speaker 2: I did. Yeah. Fantast sporting Milwaukee Brewers today in honor
Speaker 2: of the team that did the best last year with
Speaker 2: the old record, I've got the lovely blue and gold
Speaker 2: uniform which was which is a gift from a recent birthday,
Speaker 2: So yeah, I'm ready to prognosticate.
Speaker 1: It's a beautiful looking uniform. I'm sure we were all
Speaker 1: wrong about the Brewers last year, so we will obviously
Speaker 1: agree with it. To remind people, if you've not seen
Speaker 1: one of these before, we've been doing this for quite
Speaker 1: a few years now. But we are going to go
Speaker 1: through and we're going to predict win totals for all
Speaker 1: of the teams. If you are watching this on YouTube,
Speaker 1: you will see the little spreadsheet we've got together here.
Speaker 1: The number at the top you see, twenty four hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty. That is how many wins there are in
Speaker 1: a Major League Baseball season. And we're going to go
Speaker 1: through and we're going to allocate some wins to everybody.
Speaker 2: And once we really learning.
Speaker 1: Are writing that down there we go. I believe you're
Speaker 1: that we used to have an A team and a
Speaker 1: B team. Podcast rob was on the B team. We
Speaker 1: won't comment on who normally did better, but I don't
Speaker 1: think you had this restriction, did you. Robbie used to
Speaker 1: just throughout the winters and it didn't matter what they
Speaker 1: had up to.
Speaker 2: Absolutely it didn't matter, you know, because because it's all
Speaker 2: about breaking the boundaries man, and you know, like like
Speaker 2: finding your way to victory and glory, you can't be
Speaker 2: constrained by numbers. Well, welcome, we can because of the CBA.
Speaker 2: But you know that's fine.
Speaker 1: Where we are constrained by numbers, and I will be
Speaker 1: rigidly enforcing this number to make sure we get to
Speaker 1: exactly zero wins remaining at the end. So what we
Speaker 1: normally happens is we get to the end and we
Speaker 1: are out in one or the other direction, normally over,
Speaker 1: but we have been under in the past, and then
Speaker 1: we have to go through and say, you know what,
Speaker 1: the Rockies are a you know, forty win team. Let's
Speaker 1: just take some off then and then we're done. So
Speaker 1: that's the aim of the name of the game. We
Speaker 1: will go through. We'll just randomly pick teams each and
Speaker 1: at some point we believe that mister ben Carter may
Speaker 1: turn up, probably just to talk about the Mets for
Speaker 1: a few minutes and give them one hundred and five wins.
Speaker 1: So if he joins us, he joins us. If not,
Speaker 1: it would just be me and Rob arguing over whether
Speaker 1: we think our respective predictions are really good or not.
Speaker 2: That's it. Can I add something we could do this.
Speaker 2: This is us us working this out on the fly,
Speaker 2: rather than having a proper meeting before to discuss the format.
Speaker 2: The B team we used to have our tiebreaker game.
Speaker 2: I've got that up my sleeve if we need to,
Speaker 2: I've got my random number generator. And what we can
Speaker 2: do is we can if we really cannot agree on
Speaker 2: a number, we can hit that random number generator, hit
Speaker 2: a random stat and then whoever gets closest to that
Speaker 2: stat and can have their prognostication to be the defining
Speaker 2: one until we have to make it up at the end.
Speaker 1: Sure that sounds like probably, especially in this situation where
Speaker 1: there are only two of us, may be quite a
Speaker 1: sensible idea. Because we don't it doesn't sound sensible at all. Actually,
Speaker 1: given that this is you, Darius, and I'm doing this
Speaker 1: based on vibes, Yeah, well, vibes are very important in
Speaker 1: the Prediction Pod. We don't base it on a lot
Speaker 1: of data. Generally speaking, you can embody the spirit of
Speaker 1: mister Pringle on today's episode. So, without further ado, I
Speaker 1: guess we should pick a team and I'll let you
Speaker 1: go first. Rob, you can pick. You've got all thirty
Speaker 1: to choose from who do you want to predict?
Speaker 2: Well, you know what humans are like when they say
Speaker 2: you shouldn't actually give people a choice, because then they
Speaker 2: can't do it. I'm now I'm now spoilt for choice,
Speaker 2: but I'm going to go with a really popular choice
Speaker 2: of the Minnesota Twins. How exciting. What a way to
Speaker 2: kick it off a Minnesota.
Speaker 1: Keep people hooked for this episode by bringing up the
Speaker 1: Twins first.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, we're burying the lead here. I reckon
Speaker 2: the Minnesota Twins are going to win, and win is
Speaker 2: probably a strong word. Seventy games because I am feeling
Speaker 2: generous to start the day off.
Speaker 1: Cently seems like the right ballpark to me. I don't
Speaker 1: have any confidence that they actually want to do anything
Speaker 1: with this team. I know they keep saying, the owners
Speaker 1: keeps saying they want to win, but everything they've done
Speaker 1: around that suggests they don't want to win. So I'm
Speaker 1: not going to fight you on seventeen. I think we
Speaker 1: can start off with seventeen.
Speaker 2: That's fine. And basically all they've done is they've they've
Speaker 2: done what every losing team does, is they've passed Josh
Speaker 2: Bell around, and hey, look, Josh Bell, I'm sure he's
Speaker 2: a great chap, he's a serviceable major league player, But boy,
Speaker 2: does that guy seem to find the team that is
Speaker 2: going to suck that year. So I think mister Bell
Speaker 2: being there is a bad sign. And they've done sweet
Speaker 2: fa all else all off season, so I think, well,
Speaker 2: let's start with seventy, A nice, happy round.
Speaker 1: Seventy nice seventy. I'm going to put in the seventy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Josh Bell is fascinating case. I'm sure he must be
Speaker 1: in the top ten of players likelings to get traded
Speaker 1: and the deadline, so that's fascinating scenario. They've cooked themselves
Speaker 1: up there. Let's go get Josh Bell.
Speaker 2: There's a man who's eard an awful lot of money
Speaker 2: by doing not particularly that.
Speaker 1: I presume he's a tremendous clubhouse guy. Must have had
Speaker 1: a great reviews because everybody wants to sign him, and with.
Speaker 2: The money he's got, at least the drinks will will
Speaker 2: certainly be on him now at some point, because again,
Speaker 2: the guy's got cash are probably more cash than the
Speaker 2: entire rest of that Twins Twins lineup has. So yes,
Speaker 2: the Minnesota Twins, let's not dwell on them too long.
Speaker 1: Let's not I'm going to do get this out of
Speaker 1: the way, because they are the most mid team in
Speaker 1: the history of baseball, the San Francisco Giants. Let's just
Speaker 1: give them eighty one. That is what they are, that
Speaker 1: is what they have been four years. They didn't really
Speaker 1: do anything to disabuse us of that notion. This offseason.
Speaker 1: They made the Adrian Howser signing, for example, which is
Speaker 1: about as mid as you can get.
Speaker 2: Quite like Tadrian Houser. Yeah, I like all of the
Speaker 2: all the Giants.
Speaker 1: I quite like them all that that that's the whole
Speaker 1: point that they're not terrible. You know, they're not going
Speaker 1: to lose a hundred games. Outside of that one miraculous season.
Speaker 1: They have basically been a five hundred team for about
Speaker 1: the last half decade.
Speaker 2: I mean, you say they're not one hundred games, but
Speaker 2: I think they're on course for zero sixty two at
Speaker 2: the moment, are they not?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 1: They won, they won last night. So who do they
Speaker 1: play Padres?
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, they're not very good either. Maybe we'll come
Speaker 2: to that later.
Speaker 1: H Hot hot take preview for Rogunnett and do you
Speaker 1: have do you want to argue with eighty one or
Speaker 1: is that fine.
Speaker 2: I mean you really can't with the with the Giants,
Speaker 2: they've gone from being like this really really interesting, ever
Speaker 2: present gonna win every other year. Franchise two also runs.
Speaker 2: I mean they are they're just dumb, but they're not bad.
Speaker 2: They're not bad. They are fine. That is that I
Speaker 2: quite like, you know, William Damas is an interesting player,
Speaker 2: and then there's some other guys and that's about it really.
Speaker 2: And yeah, so I can't argue with eighty one. I
Speaker 2: think we should. We should lock them in for eighty one.
Speaker 2: And I really don't see that one budget much.
Speaker 1: Okay, well lock them in for eighty one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't.
Speaker 1: I can't say moving any it direction on that, but
Speaker 1: we can always come back to it. Where would you
Speaker 1: like to go next?
Speaker 2: So we've started with two really exciting teams. Just couldn't
Speaker 2: be more exciting. So I think I am going to
Speaker 2: move on to the Marlins. So the Miami Marlins, I
Speaker 2: think last year they run differential indicated the team they
Speaker 2: really were, and their record really flattered them. And they
Speaker 2: did seventy nine wins last year. It's only going down.
Speaker 2: People seem quite high on them. They've actually done all
Speaker 2: right in the first three games of the season, but
Speaker 2: I've got them for seventy three and that might be
Speaker 2: generous by the time we come to the end of
Speaker 2: this and we've predicted far too many wins.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there are bits of the Marlins that I like.
Speaker 1: I love Aary Perez. I think there's a lot of
Speaker 1: pitching potential there, and they've got some more pitches on
Speaker 1: the way. I think the lineup is pretty bad, and
Speaker 1: I don't trust them to not blow it up. Last
Speaker 1: year it wasn't going that badly, so they didn't completely
Speaker 1: tear it apart. But you know, there are guys in
Speaker 1: this team who are definitely getting traded at the deadline
Speaker 1: if they're you know, ten games under five hundred.
Speaker 2: Yeah as hell. Wasn't it like they were? They were
Speaker 2: like minus eighty something, weren't they like their pithag Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was a lot way off. I mean, what do
Speaker 2: they do Pete Fairbanks and Christopher Morrell. I mean, it's
Speaker 2: all good having a closer, but if you're not getting
Speaker 2: to the winds, then there's no point in Christopher Morell
Speaker 2: a bit of a joke that's been passed around the
Speaker 2: last couple of years. So is there anything less left
Speaker 2: in San Dielo, Cantara. Who knows. But what do you
Speaker 2: have for the What did you have for the older Marlins?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I was in the low seventies as well. I don't
Speaker 1: think they're the worst team in that division. We can
Speaker 1: get to that, but I definitely, yeah, don't think they're contenders.
Speaker 1: And even Christopher Morel is hurt already, so is he?
Speaker 2: I mean that's no downside really, I mean he won't
Speaker 2: swing and miss. So yeah, I'm just looking up the
Speaker 2: Marlins pithag from last season. Where are we seventy two
Speaker 2: and ninety?
Speaker 3: So?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I think seventy three is fine. I
Speaker 1: think Peter Bendix is doing some interesting things. But it's
Speaker 1: a slow burn over there.
Speaker 2: Oh he's not. He's just recruiting old Rays. It's the
Speaker 2: oddmost obvious gig in the entire majors.
Speaker 1: Hey, there's a reason that Ray's employees are in every
Speaker 1: front office in the leage.
Speaker 2: Probably, yeah, but maybe maybe not that one. Yeah, so
Speaker 2: we stick on seventy.
Speaker 1: Three, then let's stick on seventy three. I'm going to
Speaker 1: fight about seventy three.
Speaker 2: I think they might go down towards the end.
Speaker 1: Okay, where shall we go. I feel like I should
Speaker 1: pick somebody also not very exciting, just to keep this
Speaker 1: run going. Who is who is the least exciting team
Speaker 1: left on the board.
Speaker 2: I'm not.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to say the Rocket. Someone will save them.
Speaker 2: See if Ben turns up absolutely interesting to the Chicago
Speaker 2: White Sox, Ah, to the White Sox credit they are
Speaker 2: more interesting this year than they were last year because
Speaker 2: last year they didn't even had the interest of potentially
Speaker 2: being the worst team in baseball history.
Speaker 1: They were just kind of bad. Now they've got Murakami
Speaker 1: who's homering all the time. We'll see how many times
Speaker 1: he strikes out. I think he might have a run
Speaker 1: at the old strikeout record, which will be interesting. And
Speaker 1: there are some guys, some young guys. Yeah, Miguel Vargas
Speaker 1: has stared hot. Maybe he figures it out this season.
Speaker 1: You know, they've got some pitching prospects on the way
Speaker 1: and the miners. It's it's looking it's looking up for
Speaker 1: the White Sox. Low bar, but yes, very low. I
Speaker 1: mean the guys on the team that you know, five
Speaker 1: years ago would have been all they're interesting but never
Speaker 1: quite turned out that way. I mean, how much you're
Speaker 1: getting from Suranthony Domingos.
Speaker 2: At this point, but uh yeah, I mean they lost
Speaker 2: Mike Tauchman, so points off for that, I guess, yeah.
Speaker 1: But yeah, cos Montgomery is interesting. I think the Catchers,
Speaker 1: you know, Carr and Kyle teal his hamstring at the BBC,
Speaker 1: But I think they've got some potential to be part
Speaker 1: of the next good White Sox team. There are some
Speaker 1: pieces here. A couple of years ago you just looked
Speaker 1: at seemly thought there is literally nobody here who I
Speaker 1: think is going to be on the next good White
Speaker 1: Sox team. And that's not true anymore. That said, they're
Speaker 1: still very bad basketball too, and I think that the
Speaker 1: going to win an awful bad now dull bad, like
Speaker 1: I reckon, like sixty six wins bad. What's happening here
Speaker 1: is we're not having enough discourse because these are our
Speaker 1: our predictions are far too close. I had him for
Speaker 1: sixty five, so yeah, happy to settle on your sixty six.
Speaker 1: Settle Okay, well, coming rop, you've got a pig sign
Speaker 1: controversial then wait.
Speaker 2: Okay, I did have a couple. Yeah, yeah, I'm going
Speaker 2: to fuck you about the Brewers. Okay, I'm wearing the
Speaker 2: Brewers let's do the Brewers. I think the Brewers were
Speaker 2: all smoking mirrors. I think their ninety seven was alone rubbish.
Speaker 2: And I think the Brewers this year are going to
Speaker 2: end up on still very good eighty nine.
Speaker 1: I thought you were going to go way lower from
Speaker 1: that intro.
Speaker 2: Oh, and I mean eight wins the season.
Speaker 1: Yeah, honestly, I could see them being worse. I know
Speaker 1: what you mean about the smoking mirrors. It feels like
Speaker 1: the pieces are never that impressive. I still look at
Speaker 1: that lineup and go doesn't really make any sense.
Speaker 2: Where's it going from?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it didn't like, how did they score that many runs?
Speaker 1: That like just couldn't figure it out?
Speaker 2: And cheerios as well. Now, yeah, I could I could
Speaker 2: go lower. I could go lower on the Brewers. All right,
Speaker 2: let's just do it. Let's go crazy.
Speaker 1: I've been such a number. The number is eighty four.
Speaker 1: Eighty four is rough, eighty four is split difference. Uh no,
Speaker 1: you know what, Let's stay bold, Let's stay let's let's
Speaker 1: see the look on Ben's face when he turns up,
Speaker 1: if he turns up when we approach with eighty four,
Speaker 1: eighty four on the Brewers, throwing shade here, Okay, it's in.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's still the best thing we've projected so far,
Speaker 1: so it might have been enough to win that division too. Well,
Speaker 1: let's talk about the Cubs. I think the Cubs are
Speaker 1: going to win this division. I think the Cubs have
Speaker 1: got the much better lineup. I still have questions about
Speaker 1: the pitching, but I really like Kate Horton. I think
Speaker 1: he's got a lot of potential. And yeah, just that
Speaker 1: the depth of that lineup is is pretty incredible. Incredible
Speaker 1: defensively as well. You know, having dance by Swanson and
Speaker 1: Nico Horner and Pete Kramstrup in the middle, that.
Speaker 2: Is incredible stuff.
Speaker 1: And yeah, that's that's the question.
Speaker 2: With the bat, he obviously looked like an MVP candidate
Speaker 2: for the first half and then like a guy they
Speaker 2: were platooning by the end of the season.
Speaker 1: That's a concern. But his defense in center field maybe
Speaker 1: the best in the league, and you can get away
Speaker 1: with a lot. You know, he doesn't need to be
Speaker 1: a superstar with the bat. You know, you watched Kevin
Speaker 1: kim I for years. Kevin kim I didn't have to hit,
Speaker 1: did he He did not. He was still he was
Speaker 1: still a four or five win player, even when he
Speaker 1: didn't really hit very much. So I think Peak Crimestrung
Speaker 1: could be like that, but with a bit more power.
Speaker 1: That's that's the possibility. I think he's probably going to
Speaker 1: be like Haby Buyers, really but in center field, and
Speaker 1: some he's going to have like incredible seasons. In some
Speaker 1: years you're going to be really annoyed about how much
Speaker 1: he swings at things outside the zone.
Speaker 2: They've give him a fair bit of cash for someone
Speaker 2: with a lot of a lot of years left on
Speaker 2: his contract, So let's give him a fair bit of cash.
Speaker 1: I think I think they believe, so I think they've
Speaker 1: got to believe in something. Yeah, So I believe in
Speaker 1: the Cubs, and I think they're going to win nighty games.
Speaker 2: See they did ninety two last year, and yeah, essentially
Speaker 2: the only real thing that's changed on that team is
Speaker 2: we've exchanged Kyle Tucker for Alex Bregman. Do you think
Speaker 2: Carle Tucker is only two games better than Alex Brogman.
Speaker 1: Well, Krtucker was hurt, so.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's a fair point.
Speaker 1: So maybe over a full season, maybe maybe not. But
Speaker 1: Alex s Bragman's a pretty good player as long as
Speaker 1: a thanks breakman stays in the field, he's probably a
Speaker 1: four when players.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, all right, I can see it. Yeah, fine, okay,
Speaker 2: let's go, let's go, let's go. You said ninety, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I said ninety. I had it a couple less than that,
Speaker 2: but I can go with ninety. Let's let's put that
Speaker 2: in there, but put a pin in it because I'm
Speaker 2: pinning it. I'm willing to drop that a couple when
Speaker 2: we need to. It was greed on your little little
Speaker 2: chart there. I'm now fully understanding the color the color
Speaker 2: system for those of you who audio only format, we
Speaker 2: have red teams with low numbers, gray teams in the middle,
Speaker 2: and green teams at the top, which of course is
Speaker 2: completely normal thing to do. But I hadn't understood what
Speaker 2: the colors weren't, and I think I apologize it.
Speaker 1: It's not very color line friendly. But this is also,
Speaker 1: you know, the default color scale in Google shoots good
Speaker 1: old default, and yeah, it does does visually do the job.
Speaker 2: So so we had ninety for the Cubs, we had
Speaker 2: eighty four for the Brewers. Okay, right, let's try and
Speaker 2: talk about somebody a little bit more interesting. I like
Speaker 2: the red Sox. I think the Red Sox have had
Speaker 2: a really fun off season. I think watching that documentary
Speaker 2: about them, the most boring man in the front office
Speaker 2: has done a decent job. So I really like the
Speaker 2: moves they've made. I like Sunny Gray. I think has
Speaker 2: been quite underrated since he flopped with the Yankees, but
Speaker 2: outside of that, I think he's been pretty damn good
Speaker 2: the whole DWN time. I like Wilson Contrerez. Ranger Suarez
Speaker 2: is a really good pick up for them. I think
Speaker 2: they were a team that did quietly did quite well
Speaker 2: last year, Like it wasn't not a fanfare about it,
Speaker 2: and I think they've got better. Yes, they've lost Bregman,
Speaker 2: but that's really the sort of the headline there. So
Speaker 2: I'm in on the Red Sox last year at eighty nine.
Speaker 2: This year, I'm I'm gonna see I'm gonna see ninety two. Hmmm.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I do agree with you that I like a
Speaker 1: lot of what they did. I mean, the rotation looks great,
Speaker 1: and the depth is incredible as well, Like it's really
Speaker 1: hard to fit all these guys onto their depth shop.
Speaker 1: They've got so much depth, which I like a lot.
Speaker 1: I guess the infield is the question is kind of
Speaker 1: Durbin really that good? What's happening with Meyer? What's happening
Speaker 1: with Christian Campbell? If he materializes? But the outfield is stagged?
Speaker 1: And yeah, I like Contrellas too, so yeah, the biggest I.
Speaker 2: Had was no first basement. Now they have a decent
Speaker 2: first basement.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, who knows what's happening with Dress
Speaker 1: and Cassas as well, But maybe they just trade him
Speaker 1: for something that they need at some point during the scene.
Speaker 1: It's a It's a good problem to have, So yeah,
Speaker 1: I can see it. This is going to be a
Speaker 1: tough division to shake out, I think, But I don't
Speaker 1: hear ninety two and think there's no way the Red
Speaker 1: Sox are doing that. So let's go with it and
Speaker 1: then we can fight about the air at least later maybe.
Speaker 2: I think we will. I think we will fight about
Speaker 2: the air least. I think they're all good. I think
Speaker 2: they're all good. Yeah, that's the problem with the aarlist.
Speaker 2: I mean all of them, all of them, not the
Speaker 2: way everyone else is predicting it, all of them.
Speaker 1: I thought the Blue Jays were the least goods last season,
Speaker 1: then they ended up winning the division. So but I
Speaker 1: think I think we maybe did have them all that
Speaker 1: or over five hundred when we did ours last year.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's it's tough. Why don't we Why don't
Speaker 1: we stick around in there? The Oriols are staring right
Speaker 1: at me, So I'm going to talk about the Oriols,
Speaker 1: and I think I think they're going to get better.
Speaker 1: Pitching still disappoints me a bit, but I think I
Speaker 1: think they'll be above five hundred. I think they're going
Speaker 1: to be in that wild card mix. I'm just not
Speaker 1: quite sure they've done enough on the on the pitching side,
Speaker 1: I still think they might not could be really really
Speaker 1: really good. But yeah, maybe Trevor Rodgers is great, and
Speaker 1: maybe Kyle Bradish can go back to being great. You've
Speaker 1: watched a lot of shame pars and the Oils extended him,
Speaker 1: so I guess they think he's going to be goold.
Speaker 1: But uh, yeah, I know, Chris Bassett kind of washed.
Speaker 1: Maybe Zach Eflin wasn't up to most last season. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it gets thin real fast here, and you could easily
Speaker 1: look up at this team in August and go, what,
Speaker 1: They've got one good starter and then nothing.
Speaker 2: So they'll have pictures, which is an improvement on last year.
Speaker 2: I think what they've done is they've significantly increased the floor,
Speaker 2: which was dire, and now it's just bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I want to say, like eighty six, I
Speaker 1: think that'll get him in the wildcard mix, but maybe
Speaker 1: a little step behind the guys who are going to
Speaker 1: be in the division mix.
Speaker 2: Bit rich for my blood. I mean, Peter Alonzo, I
Speaker 2: think I just can't look past how bad he's you know,
Speaker 2: it's right there the day comparison, like it's it's staring
Speaker 2: me in the face.
Speaker 3: I think it.
Speaker 2: It hinges a lot on that man, and I think
Speaker 2: I just can't see it. I think it's going to
Speaker 2: be a delicious, delicious failure. I think it's going to
Speaker 2: go bad straight away, like immediately, bad straight away, immediately,
Speaker 2: absolutely immediately. Look like the first like three weeks are
Speaker 2: going to be spectacular and then like nothing. That's that's
Speaker 2: the prediction. And I think that leads the Orioles to
Speaker 2: an eighty two win team. In my mind, I've still
Speaker 2: got them as a winner. Eighty six, eighty six, should
Speaker 2: should we do it?
Speaker 1: Can we go eighty four?
Speaker 2: Can we we split? Let's do a tie break. Let's
Speaker 2: do a type break.
Speaker 1: Let's use your type break. We've got it, so right, let's.
Speaker 2: Let's you know. And now now in the this is
Speaker 2: going to seem really seamless as I as I work
Speaker 2: this out. So I've got a random number generator. You
Speaker 2: pick a stat, and then I will pick a random player,
Speaker 2: and then whoever gets closest to that stat is the
Speaker 2: winner on their baseball reference page or whatever like well
Speaker 2: that you have to find it because you're the stat man.
Speaker 2: So I'm going to find a player first, so I
Speaker 2: can't see the stat by mistake the player one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Okay,
Speaker 2: So you are looking for an outfielder. Pick pick an
Speaker 2: outfield stat that you can look up quickly and out
Speaker 2: any outfield stat like a different any any field, any
Speaker 2: lineup stat, any stat.
Speaker 1: For a hitter, any stat for a hitter. Okay, stolen bases,
Speaker 1: stolen bases.
Speaker 2: Okay, right now, I'm going to tell you the name
Speaker 2: of the bloke, and it is uh Colby Mayo, Coby Mayo.
Speaker 2: So now you need to you need to get it
Speaker 2: before you look it up. And we'll pick a number
Speaker 2: each and whoever is closest is the winner, and we're
Speaker 2: working career No last season, last season? How many stolen
Speaker 2: bases Coby Mayo get Yeah? Did he did he play?
Speaker 2: He barely played? Didn't he Well, it doesn't matter which
Speaker 2: to vision, like, maybe it was in the miners. Who knows,
Speaker 2: oh mine league counts? What last year? Wherever he was?
Speaker 2: How many bases.
Speaker 1: Wherever he played?
Speaker 2: Wherever he played?
Speaker 1: Okay, I'll say three. Then if we include three, I'm
Speaker 1: going to.
Speaker 2: Take the over. I'm going to go four. How many
Speaker 2: did Kobe Mayo? For? Look, this is this would be
Speaker 2: better if I had stolen bases? Aha, stolen bases in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty five, you had its spot on the ad three.
Speaker 2: So well done, you win? Will you go with your
Speaker 2: your estimate?
Speaker 1: Okay, so we're going eighty six on the Orioles thanks
Speaker 1: to Coby may.
Speaker 2: See, it's a really non clunky game. You see that
Speaker 2: looks really really seamless, especially when it's all live.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: Okay, you go eighty six on them, scoot to the
Speaker 2: other end and let's do the Reds. Another exciting team.
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure Gav will say that they were on
Speaker 2: for a hundred wins or something crazy, because Gav likes
Speaker 2: to go hard on the Twins. I'm saying they are
Speaker 2: a pretty boring eighty They've done nothing. There's nothing's happened
Speaker 2: there Like this. This team is basically the team they
Speaker 2: had last year. They weren't very good. It's it's a
Speaker 2: little bit better. They've all got a little bit more
Speaker 2: sort of improved. But they've they've you know, they got
Speaker 2: rid of the likes of Nick Martinez, who was okay,
Speaker 2: Gavin Lux you know, who was potentially okay, never really
Speaker 2: really became anything. And they've not done much other than
Speaker 2: add a Henio Suarez. So like it's it's a a
Speaker 2: bit better than last year's results, which was maybe not
Speaker 2: actually better. Maybe I'm wrong. They did eighty to three
Speaker 2: last year. I just saw that. Okay, I'm gonna revise
Speaker 2: it to eighty three. They're going to repeat it's eighty three.
Speaker 2: I don't think they did enough. It's just it's just
Speaker 2: a blat. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I like the pitching, like, I mean, it would help
Speaker 1: if Green hadn't got hurt. Yes, I like Chase Burns
Speaker 1: a lot. I think Andrew Rabbit is good. Nick Midelo,
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe had his career year last year.
Speaker 1: But it's a lot of potential on the pitching side.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it's just I think the bullpen is bad.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of the lineup is bad. You
Speaker 1: know Ellie's side. I mean, I know will hit home runs,
Speaker 1: but it will be in a weird up and down
Speaker 1: frustrating way.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I don't feel strongly enough about the Reds to argue
Speaker 1: with eighty three. I don't think I might be a
Speaker 1: bit high on that.
Speaker 2: Initially had eighty and then I realized I'd said that
Speaker 2: they did nothing, and so they've they've maybe a little
Speaker 2: bit better, but then realize that I've actually predicted them less.
Speaker 2: So I had eight in my head. But I mean,
Speaker 2: if we stick with eighty three, there's there's some right
Speaker 2: pickings for some wins we need later on.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'll stick with eighty three. You can argue that
Speaker 1: the Pirates are like maybe a bit better than last year,
Speaker 1: and so that might contribute.
Speaker 2: I don't know. All right, let's do the Atlanta Braves.
Speaker 2: Who are good? Who are cursed? I think I think so. Yes.
Speaker 1: What entertains me about the Braves is that even though
Speaker 1: they seem to keep having all these tragedies before them,
Speaker 1: all the projection systems still really even though it's like,
Speaker 1: well half their rotation is falling apart, and yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: who's pitching at this point? Who's who's pitching at this point?
Speaker 1: You know, one of one of the guys who's not
Speaker 1: her is Chris Sale. You know, I hope Chris Sales
Speaker 1: stays healthy. But usually usually there's some sort of time
Speaker 1: needs a couple of weeks at least, then it's yeah,
Speaker 1: like Bryce Elder, like, what we're doing here. It's not
Speaker 1: it's not good, it's strided done. It doesn't look like
Speaker 1: old Strider anymore. Rain had a Lopez throwing eighty nine.
Speaker 1: But then you know, you also say this line up
Speaker 1: was like maybe the best line up or time, like
Speaker 1: not that long ago, and they've still got most of
Speaker 1: those guys. So yeah, I just I feel like they're
Speaker 1: going to fall off, but maybe not as much as
Speaker 1: like you'd think from all the tragedies that performed them
Speaker 1: so to like eighty eight, yeah, I mean where it's
Speaker 1: an improvement on last year. But last year was like
Speaker 1: a real like injury disaster.
Speaker 2: I had the blessed, I had the blessed. I thought
Speaker 2: you were going to go go lower than that, And
Speaker 2: my rationale was was, yeah, they they're all injured to
Speaker 2: start with, but then sort of second half they're going
Speaker 2: to come back a bit because they do have a
Speaker 2: decent team and you know decent like healthier Kunya, healthy
Speaker 2: Murphy like that, they could really make a bit of
Speaker 2: a difference. So I had them way lower, but let's
Speaker 2: let's go somewhere in the middle. Then I can see
Speaker 2: maybe eighty five scrape into a world car position.
Speaker 1: Maybe they're eighty five too bothered about that?
Speaker 2: Would you be happy if you were a Braves fan
Speaker 2: with eighty five though? I mean, given the way they've
Speaker 2: been handing out contracts over the you know, long term contracts,
Speaker 2: we should be right in the middle of their like
Speaker 2: their heyday now, and it's it's just not happened. I mean,
Speaker 2: it's lucky they've had they had that World Series because
Speaker 2: they've not got as much to show for it as
Speaker 2: they really should have done.
Speaker 1: I think there's a lot riding on this year, isn't there.
Speaker 1: Like a lot of these guys they signed to long
Speaker 1: term deals, you want to see them bounce back, Like
Speaker 1: if Riley's not any better and Harris isn't any better
Speaker 1: and Stryder doesn't look like he's going to get back
Speaker 1: to his best, and you can't like, well, now we've
Speaker 1: just got a lot of guys on long term deals
Speaker 1: who would like maybe their average players, and we're kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, a bit restricted here. I think it's going
Speaker 1: to be a pretty interesting year from them in that regard, because, yeah,
Speaker 1: when they were locking all those guys up, it it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: they're just you know, it's unfair.
Speaker 2: How can they have all this talent? And now a
Speaker 2: lot of that talent, you know, we have a lot
Speaker 2: of questions about and there's going to be a lot
Speaker 2: of Mauricio Dubonne early in the season, which there's a lot. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's a lot, you know. And like the pickups, well,
Speaker 2: you know, Mike Yastremski, joonah Heim, like these aren't Braves
Speaker 2: level exciting pickups. These are very very like everything's falling
Speaker 2: apart and here's some guy all for the whole kind
Speaker 2: of signings. And I wasn't overly impressed with their with
Speaker 2: their off season personally.
Speaker 1: No, Kim Kim getting hurt was unlucky. But yeah, last
Speaker 1: year anyway, a load bearing part of your team is
Speaker 1: concerning and They seem to have contented themselves to just
Speaker 1: not have anybody that good in left field, which is
Speaker 1: a choice that I probably wouldn't have made.
Speaker 2: Eighty five. That'll do, Okay, you are up, I am up,
Speaker 2: and I am going to take the.
Speaker 3: Oh.
Speaker 2: The Detroit Tigers. They're an interesting, interesting option this year.
Speaker 2: They had a really weird one. Last year. They were
Speaker 2: the best team in baseball. They were the worst team
Speaker 2: in baseball, and they were just about enough of the
Speaker 2: team in baseball. And it's really really hard to see
Speaker 2: what these guys actually are. I think the team is
Speaker 2: probably reeling from the insane deal that has been signed
Speaker 2: by one Tariff Schooble. I imagine that's probably hamstring them
Speaker 2: a little bit in what plans they maybe had. They
Speaker 2: kind of have this horrible decision. Now it's it's do
Speaker 2: we do we back that for all that money or
Speaker 2: do we get rid of it. You talk about recreating
Speaker 2: players in the aggregate, and most of the time that's
Speaker 2: a load of rubbish, which is an excuse for getting
Speaker 2: rid of some big wages. But with that kind of money,
Speaker 2: you really genuinely could do an awful lot. And they've
Speaker 2: they've they've seemingly backed him with the Vowders signing was
Speaker 2: it was a nice one for them. So I think
Speaker 2: they are on the up. I think you've also got
Speaker 2: a young team that is stabilizing a bit. Perhaps they
Speaker 2: will know how better to pace themselves. Maybe they'll find themselves.
Speaker 2: You know, they won't quite have the highs, but they
Speaker 2: certainly hopefully won't have those ridiculous lows. I could see
Speaker 2: them being a mild improvement to an eighty eight winter. Yeah,
Speaker 2: like what who are the real Tigers?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm still unconvinced by lots of parts
Speaker 1: of this team. Yeah, I'm sure Kevin McGonigal will be
Speaker 1: good at some point. I'm sure Max Clark will come
Speaker 1: up and we will place Parking Meadows of Parking Meadows
Speaker 1: is no good. Riley Green just strikes out a lot.
Speaker 2: He was going to be so good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and I think he still can be good.
Speaker 2: What's by it? You know, as is there anything left
Speaker 2: in the tank for Verlander? You know, Yeah, it didn't
Speaker 2: look like it.
Speaker 1: Last night for Verlander, that's for sure. But then they
Speaker 1: have scooball and they have rambas so that that helps
Speaker 1: quite a bit. If you can get thirty plus starts
Speaker 1: out of those two guys. That will take you a
Speaker 1: long way. And the division is bad. Yeah, eighty eights
Speaker 1: sounds fine. You know they can take those wins off
Speaker 1: the Twins and the White Sox pretyvious. They can't they
Speaker 1: Kevin McGonagall sounds like a Harry Potter character. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: throw that out there, one if that dozen things of
Speaker 1: the Characulus, like that's quite on vogue at the moment
Speaker 1: they got that series coming out.
Speaker 2: Wasn't there the professor McGonagall, that's the one. There you go.
Speaker 2: I knew i'd read that somewhere. There we go. The
Speaker 2: comparison is not as good as I thought it was
Speaker 2: fair enough. Okay, we'll take one off then in eighty seven,
Speaker 2: not eighty eight.
Speaker 1: Eighty seven eighty seven for that because of.
Speaker 2: The lack of appropriate Harry Potter adjacency.
Speaker 1: That is what they got last year. So I don't
Speaker 1: think that it's crazy, I believe. So I think they're
Speaker 1: going to be better.
Speaker 2: That come on. I mean, sure they're gonna they've got
Speaker 2: to be better. They've got to be a bit of
Speaker 2: maturity gone on there, surely.
Speaker 1: But what it's better mean because they played way over
Speaker 1: their heads winning winter at the start of the year,
Speaker 1: and then they like had the world's worst collapse at
Speaker 1: the end of the year.
Speaker 2: That collapse was quite short, wasn't it. Mhmm, oh, I
Speaker 2: believe do I spy a third window?
Speaker 3: Hello?
Speaker 2: You do? Here? He is joining us? Now?
Speaker 1: Is mister Ben Carter damage assessing the damage? Tell us
Speaker 1: here we are Ben live reaction. Which number are you
Speaker 1: most horrified by?
Speaker 2: That?
Speaker 1: You can't believe we've done?
Speaker 3: Just scan those.
Speaker 2: Numbers, I mean, looking at the graphic. I think I
Speaker 2: think the merge of the Dodgers and the pad was probably.
Speaker 1: Don't know, why does that we should do one of
Speaker 1: them next, just so that it cleans it up.
Speaker 3: I think he's been nicer Cincinnati by the rest of it.
Speaker 2: I don't really have a problem with I did say that, Yeah,
Speaker 2: Rob wanted to go lower on the Reds, and then
Speaker 2: he realized he was predicting them as being worse than
Speaker 2: last year, and he said they hadn't changed, so then
Speaker 2: he changed his mind.
Speaker 3: That I like, But I just can't in my head
Speaker 3: get the Reds being good to sit right, I.
Speaker 2: Guess you know it's not bad, But if we need
Speaker 2: to lose them later. We definitely know where we're going. First,
Speaker 2: we thought were horrified that we that we nursed the Brewers.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we could have been nice Clebritors. So I'm good.
Speaker 3: Sorry for crashing your two man party.
Speaker 2: Hey, let's getting a bit intimate in here, so you know,
Speaker 2: it's it's always good to spread out. But you know,
Speaker 2: we were we were agreeing far too much.
Speaker 1: We need more discourse because Gav's not Gave would have
Speaker 1: come in here and said the Yankees are a seventy
Speaker 1: win team, and then we could have had a good argument.
Speaker 1: You know, we have savdyes of Rockies and the Mets.
Speaker 3: Ben, so yeah, the fun stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, on purpose.
Speaker 1: So yeah, we just did the Tigers. I guess I
Speaker 1: guess it can be your go, Ben. If you want
Speaker 1: to pick a team, then let's do it.
Speaker 3: Okay, let's well we haven't you haven't touched the Al
Speaker 3: West yet. Should we do a team from there?
Speaker 2: How do we not do that?
Speaker 3: How about the Mariners? It was deliberate, you were leaving
Speaker 3: that one till last.
Speaker 2: No, not.
Speaker 3: To the World Series? Right'll be good again?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 1: Not quite but close.
Speaker 2: No, nearly.
Speaker 3: They went to the World Series. They didn't win it,
Speaker 3: but they were in it.
Speaker 2: They didn't work. Yes, fans then just did a rob.
Speaker 3: Maybe this year they will win it. No, I I
Speaker 3: think they're going to be good again. Also, how great
Speaker 3: does the atmosphere look at that said already? I feel
Speaker 3: like that opening series just seeing the like crowds there
Speaker 3: for like game one of one, six two, that was amazing.
Speaker 3: I feel like it's so that such a fun crowd
Speaker 3: when that team is good, which hasn't been very often lately.
Speaker 3: But I think they're gonna be good again this year.
Speaker 3: I think they win eighty eight games and maybe they
Speaker 3: do make it to the Word Series this year. And
Speaker 3: I'm just early not wrong.
Speaker 1: I would I would get higher.
Speaker 2: I'm going to go lower.
Speaker 1: Okay, now there we go. Benet immediately got an argument.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we've got a fight on our hands. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 2: I had. I think they're clearly the best team in
Speaker 2: this domnion, Like, I don't think it's that close clearly.
Speaker 2: I don't think it's clear. I think they're close.
Speaker 1: I think it's I think it's whole central everywhere else.
Speaker 1: You look at the other teams and I'm like, look
Speaker 1: at the Astrois and some guys the Astrois are playing
Speaker 1: and like, what are you doing? This is not the
Speaker 1: old Astros. There's some really bad spots in that line.
Speaker 3: Some quite old line, which is anymore.
Speaker 1: Yes, no, and agree with their outfield is Bryce Matthews
Speaker 1: and Jerry Locafida are in a platoon out there like
Speaker 1: it's it's not yeah exactly, and yet here we are.
Speaker 2: What did the Mariners add though? I mean they they've
Speaker 2: lost Polanco, who had a fantastic year. Yes, he played
Speaker 2: above his above his you know is his skills, but
Speaker 2: he's gone and they haven't got Suarez anymore. So they've
Speaker 2: lost some power there in a in a notoriously difficult
Speaker 2: to hit home run run park, a bloker could do it.
Speaker 2: And they picked up what like Brendan Donovan and Rob
Speaker 2: ref Snyder, Like, how is Rob Refsnyder still a major leaguer?
Speaker 2: The bloke has been the most the most background, like
Speaker 2: twenty sixth man roster for the for the last ten years.
Speaker 2: And that's what they're hanging their hat on. I mean, really,
Speaker 2: is that is that what we're doing?
Speaker 1: The pinching was very hurt last year and they still
Speaker 1: won night agains. That's that's not what I.
Speaker 3: Think they're hitting was a lot better than people thought
Speaker 3: last year. Is Carl Raally doing that again?
Speaker 2: Maybe here is no, absolutely not.
Speaker 1: They've got a full season of Josh Nayler this year.
Speaker 1: We sho didn't have Taylor Mega deal out to cole
Speaker 1: Almon Emerson, who I think is going to come up
Speaker 1: and be good for them.
Speaker 2: And pray though, isn't it.
Speaker 1: I'm going to give you some Rob Refsniders. That's what
Speaker 1: everyone was shouting out for. No, I'm just gonna I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna tell rot. I think the big problem the
Speaker 1: Mariton has had was that this line up is pretty
Speaker 1: lefty heavy, and so you know there is a concern
Speaker 1: when they face left handed pitching. Rob Refsnider's career career
Speaker 1: batting line against left handed pitching two eighty three, eighty one,
Speaker 1: four forty. That's an eight twenty two aps. So now
Speaker 1: only your twenty six man nonsense. This is quality platoon.
Speaker 2: Bat respects very platoon like. He never does a full
Speaker 2: season anyway. Does it mean yeah, maybe at the Red.
Speaker 1: That's not not what he's there for. Is there to
Speaker 1: hit left handed pitching?
Speaker 2: Okay, I mean I had him at eighty five. I
Speaker 2: said a slight regression. I thought they had a mammoth
Speaker 2: year where everything went right for them. I didn't see
Speaker 2: it going quite as right this year, but I can.
Speaker 2: I could probably see to Ben's middle ground. I'm certainly
Speaker 2: not going higher than that without without a fire, okay
Speaker 2: with I don't think everything went right after all of
Speaker 2: them last year.
Speaker 1: Gilbert was hurt, Kirby was hurt. We all looked the
Speaker 1: rotation and went, oh great, And actually I didn't get
Speaker 1: a lot of innings out of the guys you thought
Speaker 1: they were.
Speaker 2: Can get a log any cub anyway, Darius, I think
Speaker 2: I had the Tigers. I think it's your go Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think it is me. Let's stay here, let's do
Speaker 2: the Angels, and let's say that the Angels are finally
Speaker 2: going to do it. They're finally going to lose one
Speaker 2: hundred games for the first time in their history, sixty
Speaker 2: two wins. I think that's a bad baseball team. It's
Speaker 2: a bad this is the this is the team now
Speaker 2: that I'm like, what are they doing? Even the Rockies
Speaker 2: sometimes now I'm like, oh, I kind of liked what
Speaker 2: they're interesting. They're trying some things. The Angels, I don't
Speaker 2: know what, like Adam Frasier. What the Angels trying to do?
Speaker 2: I have no idea what the Angels are trying to do.
Speaker 2: It seems directionless, completely pointless.
Speaker 3: I have them a bit of men, yes, a little bit,
Speaker 3: not a lot. Yeah, I do feel great getting on
Speaker 3: a pedestal and vouching for the Angels.
Speaker 2: Like mid sixties you mean, yeah, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3: I think I just saw healthy mic travel three games
Speaker 3: and I was like, Wow, they're going to be great,
Speaker 3: because isn't he good?
Speaker 1: And I have not left he definitely plays full season.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know. It's kind of crazy. You look
Speaker 3: at some of the like the players they had last
Speaker 3: year who had like really good seasons and they were
Speaker 3: still dreadful. So it's not hard to see them being
Speaker 3: worse this yearn't I don't know if I could name
Speaker 3: you many of their pictures, so.
Speaker 1: That, yeah, pitching is real bad.
Speaker 2: I think boring is right up there, right up there,
Speaker 2: addy though, Isn't it like they've they've finally not got
Speaker 2: the big stars where everything was going wrong and every
Speaker 2: single year we all predicted are this is the year,
Speaker 2: this is the year. So I reckon this year won't
Speaker 2: be the awful year because because we can't predict that.
Speaker 2: So I had, yeah, mid mid sixties, like sixty six,
Speaker 2: sixty seventy. I don't see they're worse than that. Come on,
Speaker 2: you've got rubbish Grayson Rodriguez, because he's clearly brilliant. So
Speaker 2: you want to do sixty six?
Speaker 3: Is that?
Speaker 2: Is that what we say?
Speaker 3: Let's do sixty four.
Speaker 2: I won sixty sixty four. All right, I'll accept that
Speaker 2: for now. Again, I know where I'm I know where
Speaker 2: my losses, where my winds are going.
Speaker 1: They're's gonna tell us we're too high.
Speaker 2: Okay, let's look at at that we need. Let's do
Speaker 2: the San Diego Padres. So can even that out on
Speaker 2: the on the graphic there, the San Diego Padres have
Speaker 2: got worse. I think that's fairly fairly obvious. They're just
Speaker 2: getting a little bit older. Those stars haven't really starred
Speaker 2: like your Bogarts is and your you know, yeah, your
Speaker 2: Machiados aren't aren't the power force. They're still decent players,
Speaker 2: They're still going to be a good team. I don't
Speaker 2: think they've got better. I think they've got a little
Speaker 2: bit worse. There's obviously weird stuff going on behind the
Speaker 2: scenes there with with with your ownership. So I think
Speaker 2: they take a step back from their ninety win season
Speaker 2: last year and they go down to eighty five, and
Speaker 2: that might be a bit generous.
Speaker 1: I could have been talked into anything between eighty and
Speaker 1: eighty five.
Speaker 3: I think had eighty five. I feel like they're really
Speaker 3: high variants. Like, if you told me they won seventy
Speaker 3: five games, I wouldn't be that shocked. If you told
Speaker 3: me they won ninety, I'd be a little bit shocked
Speaker 3: they won ninety five. But like that upside is pretty clear,
Speaker 3: but also it feels like it could all bottom out
Speaker 3: this year. But I like them to mostly be good
Speaker 3: because they have enough good players.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think they're a team that like if another
Speaker 1: starting pitcher gets hurt, I think it's going to go
Speaker 1: bad real fast.
Speaker 3: That's good.
Speaker 2: No, they signed a lot of guys, but I don't
Speaker 2: think any of them are any good. So it feels
Speaker 2: like a like a red flag. That's that's the ViBe's
Speaker 2: flag for me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, healthy Jackson Merrill is really good.
Speaker 2: Yeah he's obviously this is really good, which maybe still good.
Speaker 2: The red hot takes that he's good. That is good.
Speaker 1: Bullpen is bullpen is absolutely fire. I'll give I'll give
Speaker 1: him that, not just millions, the whole lot is incredible.
Speaker 2: On league minimum is by any normal measure, a really
Speaker 2: good deal. But it's the age. I don't know, I
Speaker 2: don't think it.
Speaker 1: Do you want to pay a guy who is not
Speaker 1: actually like good player anymore? Any money enough to give
Speaker 1: point eight war last season?
Speaker 2: But he could be good. He could have been fip
Speaker 2: because he can be good.
Speaker 1: The vibes though, yeah, the vibes are not great if
Speaker 1: they don't ask him to field and maybe platoon him
Speaker 1: a bit like, yeah, it could be all right fully minimum,
Speaker 1: you might as well find out.
Speaker 3: If it is right.
Speaker 1: Let's not go over.
Speaker 2: Like the Mighty riff Slider.
Speaker 1: You laugh. But Rob Refsnyder has been out here in
Speaker 1: Nick Castianus for a while now.
Speaker 3: Depressing.
Speaker 1: Anyway, this isn't the rod Refiner the podcast.
Speaker 2: Apparently. I'm just gonna say the name Bradley Rodriguez because
Speaker 2: he's my my reliever guy this year in the pres Wallpen.
Speaker 2: And it looks like a made up name. It looks like.
Speaker 1: Somebody type O Bradley, but that is actually his name,
Speaker 1: brad and he's great.
Speaker 2: So if you get a chance, go go watch him. Anyway,
Speaker 2: We've done the Padres and it's back to Ben.
Speaker 3: To me on, then let's do the Mets. Everyone's waiting
Speaker 3: for me to throw them out there.
Speaker 2: Meet the Mets. Here we go. I reckon, there's some
Speaker 2: variants here.
Speaker 3: You guys are going to believe this. But I've got
Speaker 3: the Mets winning the NA least. I think it all
Speaker 3: went wrong for them last year. Surely it can't all
Speaker 3: way wrong for them again this year. They've spent a
Speaker 3: lot of money, brought in some good players, brought in
Speaker 3: some squint and maybe they're good players. And I still
Speaker 3: have question marks about about the rotation. And they're puting
Speaker 3: a lot on Nolan McLean Shoulders, who seems to be awesome,
Speaker 3: but he is still I believe rookie eligible and asking
Speaker 3: him to be your ace seems like a big I guess.
Speaker 3: I know with Pearlton now he doesn't have to be
Speaker 3: the ace, but I think he still has to be
Speaker 3: very good for them to be good. But the lineup
Speaker 3: is is legit. If Lindaor's how many injury isn't anything serious,
Speaker 3: which I don't think it is. I love them getting
Speaker 3: Lewis Robert Jr. We all know what one Soto is,
Speaker 3: So yeah, I can't. I just can't quit this drug
Speaker 3: that is in New York Mets and I think they
Speaker 3: win ninety games and the division.
Speaker 2: I mean what I see is a team gone like
Speaker 2: oh I didn't go get rid of everybody, get a
Speaker 2: whole what do new people who are basically the same
Speaker 2: kind of like ah, like you know, and we're just
Speaker 2: we're just doing the whole thing again, like ah, everything's mad,
Speaker 2: It's just make it all happen all the manza. And
Speaker 2: I don't I don't actually think that the result is
Speaker 2: going to be any different. And I have them down
Speaker 2: for the exact same results as they had last year
Speaker 2: it was eighty three wins and just missing out in
Speaker 2: the playoffs. I just don't see it, Like what's you know,
Speaker 2: like for every guy who had added, they've taken someone
Speaker 2: away who who is you know, or a couple of
Speaker 2: guys away to add up to the same kind of
Speaker 2: kind of kind of results. So like that weird, weird
Speaker 2: deal with Semian and you know what was that all about?
Speaker 2: Like so and half of these guys are going to
Speaker 2: be playing out their proper positions as well, because because
Speaker 2: it just doesn't add up. It's like they've just sort
Speaker 2: of swept the floor for like whoever happened to be
Speaker 2: around it, or you'll do. There was no kind of
Speaker 2: direction to it. It's just like I'll have that one,
Speaker 2: I'll have that one. I love that one. I love
Speaker 2: that one. I don't. I just don't see the plan.
Speaker 2: It doesn't feel like a team with a plan. It
Speaker 2: feels like a team desperately scrambling at the last things
Speaker 2: on the shelf before the hurricane hits. And I don't
Speaker 2: think it gives them anything better.
Speaker 3: I don't disagree, but maybe it worked.
Speaker 2: Maybe I think I lean more on Ben's side here.
Speaker 2: I think they're probably going to be top five in
Speaker 2: the league and run scored. Whether the pitching falls apart
Speaker 2: is the question that's that's a very real possibility. But
Speaker 2: you know, I think I look at this line up
Speaker 2: and I think they're going to score a lot of runs.
Speaker 2: It's kind of kind of insane the names they've got
Speaker 2: in this line up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the defense is probably going to be terrible, and yeah,
Speaker 1: if Nolan McClain isn't any good, then I don't know
Speaker 1: who we relying on here. Clay Holmes ready Parolta code,
Speaker 1: I think it. Yeah, it's just ready Parolter, isn't it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: But again, you know they have a lot of depth.
Speaker 1: They have some interesting guys in the minus two I
Speaker 1: think could come up and fill in. I don't disagree with.
Speaker 2: Your anyway, should be brilliant. And he turn that to
Speaker 2: be an absolute disaster. After one good start.
Speaker 1: Young guy, you're gonna have to narrow it down for
Speaker 1: the better.
Speaker 2: And hearing lies the problem. But yeah, I would go
Speaker 2: more towards the ninety than the eighty three.
Speaker 3: Come on, Rob, get on the bandwagon. There's so much
Speaker 3: room on the bandwagon.
Speaker 2: It's lovely, so much m ninety three for the for
Speaker 2: that New York mets I said, I said ninety and
Speaker 2: I had what eighty three? Okay, well let's let's let's
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously there's two of you, so it should
Speaker 2: pull slightly harder that way. So what like eighty eighty eight?
Speaker 1: I could do eighty eight.
Speaker 3: That seems fair.
Speaker 2: All you're gonna do is chip it away when we
Speaker 2: need We need wins at the end, so that, yeah,
Speaker 2: I know what we're gonna what's gonna happen here? Don't
Speaker 2: don't think I don't see what you guys are.
Speaker 1: We haven't been very aggressive on anybody yet, so it's
Speaker 1: possible the alternative will be true.
Speaker 2: Rob what how do you name that? You was just picture?
Speaker 1: Tell you what. Let's let's let's sort this out now
Speaker 1: and be aggressive on somebody and did the Dodgers, who
Speaker 1: I think pretty dramatically underperformed their talent last season and
Speaker 1: won the Mod Series. And I'm just gonna say a
Speaker 1: hundred because it's the Dodgers and it's the ludicrous.
Speaker 2: What else is that to say we're not getting younger?
Speaker 2: Are they? That's you have to see a problem with them.
Speaker 2: I mean, not many of us are to be to
Speaker 2: be honest, that is that is a truthful fact. But
Speaker 2: uh yeah, yeah, yes they're They're easily the best team
Speaker 2: out there. There's there's no denying it. I think one
Speaker 2: hundred is a bit high after what they had last year.
Speaker 2: They haven't got I mean, they've added Kyle Tucker. That
Speaker 2: is obviously a big, big, big improvement. I think Mookie
Speaker 2: Betts shouldn't be underestimated this year is obviously last year
Speaker 2: he had that horrific wasting disease to start the season,
Speaker 2: and if he comes back at anything like sort of
Speaker 2: regular fitness. That that that's three four wins added immediately,
Speaker 2: so I could see him going up hundreds a bit higher.
Speaker 2: I had ninety eight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I also had ninety. I think, like Rob said,
Speaker 3: you can kind of squint and see how it could
Speaker 3: all go wrong in terms of an aging lineup and
Speaker 3: a rotation that is prone to injuries. But it's still
Speaker 3: the Dodgers. I am not concerned about them being bad.
Speaker 3: I just think I probably am a bit lower, and
Speaker 3: then then I have been in years past because of that.
Speaker 3: But yeah, if you want to say a hundred, I
Speaker 3: think they had the likeliest team to win a hundred,
Speaker 3: So wouldn't I wouldn't fight it that much.
Speaker 1: By Yeah, you both said ninety eight, so we can
Speaker 1: do ninety eight.
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna that's the guy I was thinking of.
Speaker 1: If if Jena Tom's good or not, do we it's
Speaker 1: not really have very much experience.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think he came up, did a fantastic first start.
Speaker 2: Everyone's like, Wow, he's going to be brilliant, and then
Speaker 2: he ended up like a seven or eight e ra A. Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 2: it definitely went bad after the first Yes, but I
Speaker 2: think did he only make it six or seven starts
Speaker 2: like it wasn't It wasn't.
Speaker 1: I wasn't very many.
Speaker 2: And he's quite young. Anyway, Moving on it, why I go,
Speaker 2: it's your game? Which division are we short on? Let's
Speaker 2: talk about the Texas Rangers, because everyone loves it when
Speaker 2: I talk about them. They're pretty parents. I don't think
Speaker 2: there's much interesting to say about the Rangers. I don't
Speaker 2: think they're going to be very good, but they're not
Speaker 2: going to be very bad either. I think we're looking
Speaker 2: at a in the range of seventy eight to eighty wins,
Speaker 2: so I'm going to say seventy nine. They've not done
Speaker 2: anything particularly spectacular. They've taken on some right wing guys, which, hey,
Speaker 2: if that's your poison, then crack on with that. Uh,
Speaker 2: that's kind of it. Really, there's not There's not an
Speaker 2: awful lot to get excited about with the Rangers, so
Speaker 2: I think they sort of just dip a little bit
Speaker 2: and we end up with a seventy eight seventy nine
Speaker 2: man team.
Speaker 1: I think they're a bit better than that, but I
Speaker 1: was going to say like eight three. I like quite
Speaker 1: a few of their guys, but I don't think the
Speaker 1: complete package is there yet.
Speaker 2: I don't like the mascot. That really putting me off.
Speaker 2: I think there's something that a horse had really doesn't
Speaker 2: work for me. I don't I don't like the mascots.
Speaker 2: So they definitely lost a win for the mascot because
Speaker 2: some of them are going to be stood there looking
Speaker 2: at and thinking that although they don't have any trees
Speaker 2: really in Texas, in the desert, and as we discussed
Speaker 2: earlier in this sufferers of hay fever will not be
Speaker 2: as affected. So you know that there's a place whereby
Speaker 2: they're playing against teams in California which do have hay
Speaker 2: fever issues, and maybe in the desert they will escape that.
Speaker 2: So there you go. Then I suspect to do with
Speaker 2: hay fever.
Speaker 3: I was about to make that same point. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: had them down for eighty two, so I was close
Speaker 3: to Darius. I like some of the pitching, especially, I
Speaker 3: think that says more about me than that the pitching
Speaker 3: actually being good. But you know, some of the guys
Speaker 3: I just like to watch, like the Graham and Yourvaldi
Speaker 3: and Gore, and then like Jack lights King Rocket might
Speaker 3: be something.
Speaker 1: But I think I think Jack Lighte is gonna be
Speaker 1: pretty good. Actually, yeah, I quite like.
Speaker 2: Jack if I'm honest.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but also all of those names I just said
Speaker 3: somewhat prone, if not very prone to injury, so you
Speaker 3: can easually see it falling apart two. So yeah, I
Speaker 3: don't think they're a playoff team, but I probably have
Speaker 3: them above five hundred, just or around that mark. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm not gonna argue it too much.
Speaker 2: They lost quite a lot, but I mean, looking at them,
Speaker 2: they weren't they really weren't great last year. The guys
Speaker 2: they lost. I just I just looked at John Gray,
Speaker 2: who had a bit of a disaster of a year.
Speaker 2: I didn't realize he'd fallen quite that far. So you know,
Speaker 2: maybe maybe it's it's addition by subtraction a little bit
Speaker 2: for these guys.
Speaker 1: And and what could be better for Vibes than starting
Speaker 1: Andrew McCutcheon.
Speaker 2: M hm, absolutely, yes, point, what's that?
Speaker 1: What do you accept? Eighty two or is that?
Speaker 2: Is that too rich? It feels like a real push.
Speaker 2: I can maybe get up to eighty two is a
Speaker 2: lot for that dreadful, dreadful team. That's just just an
Speaker 2: average tape, average dreadful and popular awful team. That was
Speaker 2: very lucky to get to the World Series. Uh, let's
Speaker 2: play a tiebreaker. Let's do a tiebreaker because that went
Speaker 2: so well last time we did it. All right, let's
Speaker 2: do a TIS.
Speaker 1: But we're doing tiebreakers now, right?
Speaker 2: What to explain this for the listeners again, because it
Speaker 2: wasn't very clear first time as we we muffled the
Speaker 2: way through it. Uh, we will use a random non
Speaker 2: regenerator to pick a player. Darius will pick a random
Speaker 2: stat or pick a stat and then whoever gets closest
Speaker 2: to that stat for that player gets their their their
Speaker 2: shout wins. So I'm going to do a random number generation.
Speaker 2: It will all become clear. This is what we used
Speaker 2: to do on B teams. So our player is number eight,
Speaker 2: is one, two, three, four, five, six, seven eight. I
Speaker 2: know who the player is. Pick a stat, Darius. We're
Speaker 2: looking for for someone in the lineup again, nother hit her? Okay,
Speaker 2: and any stat let's do ops last year ops? Okay,
Speaker 2: we are looking at Evan Carter ops. So I'm gonna
Speaker 2: say Evan Carter's opia or Christ. He wasn't very good
Speaker 2: last year, was he? Let's maybe it's better than I thought.
Speaker 2: Through three twelve.
Speaker 1: Three twelve. Wow, that's slow. Ops.
Speaker 2: Oh so sorry, Okay, I thought you said obp okay, ops,
Speaker 2: let's go. Let's let's go for around five hundred, five hundred.
Speaker 3: I think it was bad, but not that bad. I'm
Speaker 3: gonna say six ten.
Speaker 2: Am I also guessing heroes, this just between you two. Yes,
Speaker 2: you've got a guess too.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Whoever's closest gets the Yeah.
Speaker 1: That's the pick I think he got. He was hurt
Speaker 1: most of the year, so he probably wasn't as bad
Speaker 1: as you think. But you also didn't do very much.
Speaker 1: But I think it was six eighty. Put it's terrible.
Speaker 2: Go on what we got then, oh, maybe I can
Speaker 2: find him. This is this is where it's really seamless.
Speaker 2: Then you see it's really smooth, and we go straight
Speaker 2: to it and it's you know, b tam shenanigans.
Speaker 3: We've never put up of this usually.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it's it worked better way when Russell
Speaker 2: Steve Veto's and everything, didn't you we had, we had
Speaker 2: all sorts going on. I've now even forgotten who was
Speaker 2: looking for. I've just accidently looked up Chris Carter rather
Speaker 2: than Evan Carter. I can tell you his his ops
Speaker 2: wasn't great at all last year. Oh okay, fine, it
Speaker 2: was better than we thought. Twenty five. Oh ps was
Speaker 2: seven twenty eight. I did not think he was that good. Okay,
Speaker 2: But I mean that means Darius, you had the highest one,
Speaker 2: didn't you? So you win? And you said eighty two?
Speaker 3: Did you? I did?
Speaker 2: So that's do eighty two? Okay, eighty two? It is.
Speaker 2: You see how seamless that was, Ben It was. It
Speaker 2: was like magic, you know, like the listeners won't know
Speaker 2: anything was chaotic about that whatsoever.
Speaker 1: You should have seen Rob's face when I told him
Speaker 1: we were going to make all these totals that up
Speaker 1: to twenty four hundred and thirty. It was like a
Speaker 1: blown his mind. But they never did that on the
Speaker 1: B Team show.
Speaker 2: We didn't didn't care for the rules. Yeah we won anyway.
Speaker 2: System I say we one one every year, carry carrying
Speaker 2: straight on.
Speaker 1: Russell absolutely ragged on the Blue Jays last year. I
Speaker 1: remember that distinctly.
Speaker 3: I didn't backfire at all. Yeah, I just do the
Speaker 3: Blue Jays. Now there is a team that did make
Speaker 3: the World Series last year. If I call correctly yes,
Speaker 3: to correct my earlier comment, I do think they're going
Speaker 3: to be good again. I do think that is a
Speaker 3: very hard division this year, as always, I suppose I
Speaker 3: think they will be better than the Orioles, but worse
Speaker 3: than the Red Sox. In fact, let's I'm going to
Speaker 3: split the difference between those two and put eighty nine.
Speaker 3: I had them a little bit lower in my own
Speaker 3: projections at eighty seven, but if we're doing Oriols eighty six,
Speaker 3: then maybe we give them an extra couple of wins.
Speaker 2: I had ninety, so I'm not I'm in the same
Speaker 2: bracket as you there. I think there was there was
Speaker 2: a bit of momentum with them last year, maybe not
Speaker 2: quite as good as they ended up, but there's no
Speaker 2: doubt that they are a very good team. And you're
Speaker 2: absolutely right. This whole division is going to chip away
Speaker 2: each other and and course and damage. So I had ninety.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I like eighteen nine ninety. That seems fine to me.
Speaker 1: I think they were a little bit lucky last season
Speaker 1: to get as many wednesd as they did not and
Speaker 1: I didn't they were a good team. Like the off season,
Speaker 1: will pen is bad. Don't like the corp ass all,
Speaker 1: so that could be a problem. Yeah, I think I
Speaker 1: think eighty nine is fine.
Speaker 3: We should also factor in that they got absolutely boat
Speaker 3: raced by the Rockies last night and Cody Potts got injured, which.
Speaker 2: Yeah, great that as far as days going, Yeah, you don't.
Speaker 2: You don't want to see that getting boat raced by
Speaker 2: the Rockies. It's Do you like how we spent about
Speaker 2: ten minutes talking about the Rangers and then we've we've
Speaker 2: we've agreed on the Al Pennant winners in about thirty seconds.
Speaker 3: Well, they're going to be good. That's a good thing.
Speaker 3: We all agree. Yeah, they're good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, you started that with the Rangers rocking.
Speaker 2: That's you're.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: Let's pick a team that we might have some disagreements over.
Speaker 1: I'm going to take the A's, the Sacramento A's, Yes,
Speaker 1: John Fisher, I am going to call them that you're
Speaker 1: right to do.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're going to score a lot of runs and
Speaker 1: they might allow a lot more runs because the pitching
Speaker 1: is still real bad. So I think they're going to
Speaker 1: be like a seventy seven win team, not a lot
Speaker 1: of fun. Yeah, not not playoff contenders or anything.
Speaker 2: Key editions of Jeff McNeil and Adam Aaron Savali don't
Speaker 2: really feel you with confidence, but god, I fear Aaron
Speaker 2: Savali in the summer in Sacramento that is going to
Speaker 2: get may that said, I think they maybe were a
Speaker 2: little bit under their expectations last year. I think possibly
Speaker 2: partly adjusting to you know, using a greenhouse as are
Speaker 2: the dressing room. But I think maybe there's a little
Speaker 2: bit of that adjustment period and this is going to
Speaker 2: come up later again with the Rays. I think maybe
Speaker 2: perhaps that shock of playing that first year in that park,
Speaker 2: they kind of get over that a little bit. They
Speaker 2: understand it a little bit better. The players who are
Speaker 2: playing there maybe a little bit more prepared for it.
Speaker 2: So I don't think they're all that awful. I think
Speaker 2: they're a little bit better than last year. I had
Speaker 2: them for seventy nine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I felt similarly. I think I had them for
Speaker 3: seventy I hadn't for eighty. I really want to believe
Speaker 3: in them, because, like you say, the lineup is really
Speaker 3: good and it has a lot of players that I
Speaker 3: like in it. So it feels like they're going to
Speaker 3: be quite a fun team to watch bat. It's just
Speaker 3: they're going to be a really not fun team to
Speaker 3: watch pitch, especially in that ballpark. So yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3: It feels like they're kind of a trendy like dark
Speaker 3: horse playoff team again this year, aren't they which they
Speaker 3: were last year? And maybe things go better this year,
Speaker 3: but I I don't want to predict that to happen.
Speaker 3: So I've got them to eighty. But don't feel strong me.
Speaker 2: What did you have, Darius?
Speaker 1: I said, seventy seven? Okay, seven world class together.
Speaker 2: Let's do that. Yeah, seventy eight okay, Oh, it's my goal. Right.
Speaker 2: Let's look at the well, let's look at the Cardinals.
Speaker 2: I've seen a bit of them over the weekend. JJ
Speaker 2: weather Hot looks like he's going to be good. And
Speaker 2: that's about all I can say that's good about the Cardinals.
Speaker 2: That they're fine, They're they're okay, They're they're a little
Speaker 2: bit less good than okay. I don't think they're massively
Speaker 2: less good than okay, but they're not uprooting any trees
Speaker 2: and exciting us this year. But but hey, weather Hop
Speaker 2: does look good. I'm not gonna he really does look good.
Speaker 2: So I'm gonna say maybe a sort of seventy nine,
Speaker 2: seventy eight, they're just a bit under good in a
Speaker 2: I don't think it's going to be a particularly rewarding division.
Speaker 2: I think I think middling is what most of this
Speaker 2: division is going to end up being. So I think
Speaker 2: they're gonna they're gonna be the bottom end of the middling.
Speaker 2: So maybe maybe a little bit. Le's maybe he's seventy seven,
Speaker 2: seventy six. I can't see him going much lower than that.
Speaker 2: They're they're fine, They're okay, They're not bad. The pitching
Speaker 2: is a worry.
Speaker 1: I think they're pretty bad. Yeah, yeah, okay, the pitching,
Speaker 1: I think I think a worry is understanding it. I
Speaker 1: think the pitching is dreadful. It's pretty dreadful.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean their opening day Star Tours
Speaker 2: Matthy Librator.
Speaker 1: Which, yeah, it's done some like interesting things maybe, but yeah,
Speaker 1: Dustin May got absolutely shill act over the weekend was
Speaker 1: ugly to watch, and the lineup is not really like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree with you about weather hot, I think it's
Speaker 1: gonna be a great player, wins could short stop, and
Speaker 1: then it's a lot of do we have anything? I
Speaker 1: think is the rest of the philosophy for this Cardinals lineup, Like,
Speaker 1: let's just give it a try and see what happens
Speaker 1: is good bursting. Yeah, Burleston's solid. Yeah, he's a good thing.
Speaker 1: But there's there's there's a lot of we're trying it out,
Speaker 1: you know. No, No, Don Gorman can't hit k like
Speaker 1: you know, it's not happening.
Speaker 3: Again in year fourteen of the this is the year
Speaker 3: Jordan Walker breaks out. At least that's what it feels.
Speaker 1: I've been burned too many times spent by Jordan Walker.
Speaker 1: It's still probably like twenty four, isn't he?
Speaker 3: He probably is really young. Yeah, he's twenty four.
Speaker 1: It's twenty three.
Speaker 2: See hey, twenty four season. Yeah, this is what happens
Speaker 2: when you come up with like nineteen or whatever it
Speaker 2: was he was.
Speaker 1: Was he twenty one? Maybe he was twenty one ready, Yes,
Speaker 1: I think it was twenty. Wasn't it because he came
Speaker 1: up by an opening day or close to it? Anyway, No,
Speaker 1: I don't believe.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I had them for seventy. It feels weird predicting
Speaker 3: the Cardinals be bad because they always seem to be
Speaker 3: kind of in and around the mix or at least
Speaker 3: five hundred. But this I think this is the year
Speaker 3: it bombs out a bit for them, And I think
Speaker 3: they kind of know it. I don't think they're really
Speaker 3: trying to compete. This isn't a roster that looks like
Speaker 3: one that would compete. So so yeah, let's see what happens.
Speaker 3: Maybe a few of these guys, do you know, break
Speaker 3: out and you've got something. But I don't think it's
Speaker 3: the year that they shock everyone and make a run
Speaker 3: in that division. So I had him a bit lead
Speaker 3: than you're Robert at seventy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I'm bloom is very much looking at
Speaker 1: future years. I do not think he is planning to compete.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I suppose they lost Contreras, Michaelis, Aeronado Gray. They
Speaker 2: was significant what went out. I maybe didn't consider that
Speaker 2: quiet enough. I can come down. I can come down.
Speaker 1: When do you go to seventy or seventy?
Speaker 2: Ok? No, that's too low. Seventy three?
Speaker 1: Are we playing a game?
Speaker 2: Then? Fine, we can play the game. Let's let's play
Speaker 2: this really seamless exciting game again.
Speaker 1: Okay, right, break, this is the third time. Now Robbie
Speaker 1: should be flowing on this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, Hey, Hey, pick me a start. I'm rolling
Speaker 2: the numbers.
Speaker 1: Are we picking a hit a stat again or Pat?
Speaker 2: That's a good point one, two, three, four. But this
Speaker 2: is really technical five six, seven, eight nine, nineteen twenty. No,
Speaker 2: we are looking at for a picture picture any pitching
Speaker 2: stat Okay, that that be shuld want to pick h
Speaker 2: Let's do strikeouts? Why not strikeouts? Okay, and we're looking
Speaker 2: for Jojo Romero. Okay. I quite liked him. I think
Speaker 2: I had him on my fantasy team last year.
Speaker 1: He pitched pretty well, didn't he. I think he was
Speaker 1: quite good.
Speaker 2: I think it was quite good. It was quite a
Speaker 2: good main setup guy for that and he got he
Speaker 2: got some sayings once they traded Hellsley to the nets
Speaker 2: as well. He throws, he throws hard, So I think
Speaker 2: I think it's he's he is a strikeout guy. I think.
Speaker 1: I think he pitched all year. I don't remember him
Speaker 1: being hurt.
Speaker 2: So let's say he probably got through sixty seventy innings.
Speaker 3: I'm going to say eighty four.
Speaker 2: Feels low to me.
Speaker 1: Wow, you really think he's a strikeout guy, don't you.
Speaker 2: I think he's a strikeout guy. I'm gonna go for
Speaker 2: for ninety five.
Speaker 1: Wow, I'm going to go for sixty seven.
Speaker 2: For the kids of Churus. I really should have been
Speaker 2: looking this up last I also did this. Okay, twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: This is great, this is brilliant. It's not even as
Speaker 2: if this is a difficult one to find. Strikeout. Okay, yep,
Speaker 2: he wasn't as good as we thought. He was only
Speaker 2: fifty five. He pitched sixty one innings of fifty five strikeouts.
Speaker 2: So yeah, that's that's a Darius win. Again, we were
Speaker 2: down to seventeen for the Cardinals. So why did I
Speaker 2: pitch this game? Which I'm terrible at when I'm playing
Speaker 2: against Darius. This is ridiculous.
Speaker 1: I was all prepared to just do it the normal way, Rob,
Speaker 1: and then you came in with you my b team.
Speaker 2: Craziness be seen.
Speaker 1: Craziness All right, Ben?
Speaker 3: Did you do that?
Speaker 2: Or did Rob do that?
Speaker 3: Yeah? It's my turn, I think, So let's let's do
Speaker 3: the Washington Nationals. They're going to be bad, aren't they. Yeah?
Speaker 3: I know some people think they might be the worst
Speaker 3: in the base Way. I think the Rockies will be worse.
Speaker 3: I probably think the White Socks will be worse too,
Speaker 3: but I don't think they're going to be tearing up trees.
Speaker 3: I had them down for sixty four, just avoiding the
Speaker 3: one hundred lost Mark, So I think you're like enough
Speaker 3: guys that are like kind of interesting. Again, it's a
Speaker 3: little bit similar to the Cardinals, but worse than the Cardinals,
Speaker 3: but kind of like seeing what some guys have. We
Speaker 3: obviously know James Wood is good, despite my protestations, But
Speaker 3: side of that, it's a bunch of like, maybe we've
Speaker 3: got something, you know, maybe we don't. Hopefully we see
Speaker 3: some playing time for Harry Ford, yeah, which would be
Speaker 3: final though shame he didn't make the opening day roster.
Speaker 3: And yeah, I think some of the like Joey Vema
Speaker 3: has been enough to a nice start. What saying that?
Speaker 3: Like Wema Via anyway, he's enough to a nice start. Like,
Speaker 3: there's some guys that I think could be quite fun,
Speaker 3: but I still think, Yeah, I think they're gonna ultimately
Speaker 3: be bad, especially because they traded away Gore. I don't
Speaker 3: even know if their rotation has got anyone good in
Speaker 3: it at this point. So yeah, sixty four for me,
Speaker 3: and that might even be generous.
Speaker 1: What are you saying about a friend of the podcast,
Speaker 1: Miles Michael has Ben.
Speaker 3: I love Miles michaelas but buddy, hang them up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's bad.
Speaker 1: Weamer, I believe it.
Speaker 3: Is wema. Is it okay?
Speaker 2: Jerry Weimer him a bit too German, he went, He
Speaker 2: went on that here.
Speaker 3: I was.
Speaker 2: I was in the same area. I was sixty six
Speaker 2: had them repeating last year. But yeah, I'm in certainly
Speaker 2: in the same area for what is a quite bad
Speaker 2: team off the charts because you know all that cherry blossom.
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's it's the hay Fever's going to be
Speaker 2: what what kills them? All Right?
Speaker 1: I'm docking them a point for the hate fever. Rob
Speaker 1: so and keep the difference. Okay, let's have a look.
Speaker 1: Why don't we do what you mentioned the ben Let's
Speaker 1: just do the Rockies. I was I was disappointed that
Speaker 1: they didn't end up with the worst record last year
Speaker 1: because they were definitely the worst team in the history baseball.
Speaker 1: Have they improved a little bit? Yeah, probably a little bit,
Speaker 1: which probably means they're going to win.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Can we give them fifty five wins?
Speaker 2: Is that is that fair? I think that's bold. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I had them lowered two. I had them improving, but
Speaker 2: not by that much that I mean that they had
Speaker 2: forty three wins last year. That's that's quite a leap.
Speaker 2: And I mean, what have they added.
Speaker 1: A bunch of random stuff? Yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 2: Have a look. Who's the highlight here?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: Who is a Kintana? Yes, the the aging home run
Speaker 2: merchant is going to do really really well in cause. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 2: I'm not feeling that much. Willie Castro, he was almost
Speaker 2: good ten years ago. Nope, So no, I'm I'm more
Speaker 2: on the ben end of the scale of j Well.
Speaker 3: I was going to put the now for fifty, but
Speaker 3: then I was so impressed by performance last night. I'm
Speaker 3: giving him fifty one.
Speaker 2: I had fifty as well, so I will go to
Speaker 2: your fifty one.
Speaker 1: I'm going to go to fifty one. I'm happy to
Speaker 1: end fifty one. I'm never going to because anybody whoays
Speaker 1: the lower on the rockets, I will.
Speaker 3: Say, like, I think the new front office maybe knows
Speaker 3: what they're doing. I'm somewhat optimistic about the long, long,
Speaker 3: long term future of this team, but as of right now,
Speaker 3: they are bad.
Speaker 2: You you keep you keep your pecker up that you go, Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 2: good luck to you.
Speaker 3: I think is a good baseball player.
Speaker 1: What I will say is it's encouraging that they've actually
Speaker 1: got and hired somebody from outside the organization. That's that's
Speaker 1: the thing that gives me some hope that they've realized
Speaker 1: that they are doing things wrong, because for most of
Speaker 1: the previous decade it didn't seem like they had realized,
Speaker 1: and so they just kept getting worse.
Speaker 3: It is hilarious that Kyle Freeland was the opening day
Speaker 3: starter again. I think he's a record holder for the
Speaker 3: Rockies now and he's just I'm just gonna do it forever,
Speaker 3: isn't it getting worse and worse and worse.
Speaker 1: Him and Senseer Teller are just incredible out there, like
Speaker 1: just out there every week, doesn't matter.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the heroes, heroes for turning up that cheery note. Rob,
Speaker 2: it's you. Well, let's we we just did Ben, Let's
Speaker 2: go to mind. I'm going to take the Tampa Bay Rays,
Speaker 2: who I don't think are as bad as everyone is
Speaker 2: kind of making out. I think they're the forgotten part
Speaker 2: of that division, and I alluded to it earlier. I genuinely,
Speaker 2: having sat in that horrendous stadium last year, think the
Speaker 2: heat was a major factor for that team. There was
Speaker 2: also a little bit of social media they did on
Speaker 2: when they were all walking in saying, oh, what are
Speaker 2: you looking forward? To much about the Trump. Every single person,
Speaker 2: to a man said the AC And now I think
Speaker 2: they started okay last year and they died, died of
Speaker 2: death as it went towards summer, because I think that
Speaker 2: heat was draining. I sat in that stadium for two games,
Speaker 2: one of them was a day game, and I can
Speaker 2: tell you I have never been hotter in my life.
Speaker 2: I've never sweat so much in my life. Like I
Speaker 2: ordered an ice cream and like it didn't make it
Speaker 2: back to the sea. It was horrendous. There is no
Speaker 2: shade there, there is no breeze there. It was a
Speaker 2: hellish healthscape of a place to play baseball. Baseball should
Speaker 2: not be played outdoors in Florida. It was an absolute no.
Speaker 2: And it wasn't just hot, it was humid beyond d
Speaker 2: And I just I think if anybody is trying to
Speaker 2: play in that game after game after game, that cumulative
Speaker 2: effect of that it was draining, and it cannot be
Speaker 2: good for performance of an athlete over the long term.
Speaker 2: Now I'm gonna say most of them, I would imagine,
Speaker 2: are probably slightly fitter and healthier and more able towithstand
Speaker 2: it than me. But over eighty games in that stadium.
Speaker 2: It was not the way to go. They had to
Speaker 2: move away from the stadium and the heat in the
Speaker 2: middle of summer because it was so bad. So I
Speaker 2: think the Rays are gonna have a bit of a
Speaker 2: bounce back. I don't think the moves they made her
Speaker 2: any good. I think getting rid of brand allowed for
Speaker 2: Gavin Lux was a bit of a disaster move. I
Speaker 2: don't think there's any power in the team whatsoever other
Speaker 2: than junior Cameronero. They're hitting brilliant for average right now,
Speaker 2: and hey, maybe that continues, but I still think they
Speaker 2: are going to be slightly better than their were last year.
Speaker 2: I'm not seeing them tearing up any trees or anything,
Speaker 2: but I am. I'm having them back to evens on
Speaker 2: eighty one.
Speaker 1: Sounds fine.
Speaker 3: I had them quite a lot lower. I think they're
Speaker 3: just as bad as last year, if not worse, but
Speaker 3: with their conditioning. So I haven't done for I haven't
Speaker 3: down for seventy three, which is harsh, but I just
Speaker 3: like the rest of the division is really good. I
Speaker 3: don't think the are like some someone's going to get
Speaker 3: beat up on a little bit, and I think I
Speaker 3: think it's the race this year. Like you said, I
Speaker 3: don't hate their team, but a lot of the good
Speaker 3: pitching's gone. Mclanahan's going to be hurt soon. There's a
Speaker 3: few decent infielders like Camonero is fun, but you know, I, yeah,
Speaker 3: I don't don't see it for them. But maybe I'm
Speaker 3: being mean. Maybe the AC will have more of an
Speaker 3: effect than I realized. That's good insight.
Speaker 1: Come to George stein Rederfield everybody.
Speaker 2: I couldn't. I didn't upload it in the end because
Speaker 2: because it was too much of a hack job. But
Speaker 2: I sat there and I tried to film some some
Speaker 2: of me sat there. It was, it was suffering. It
Speaker 2: was a horrible, horrible place to watch baseball. I genuinely
Speaker 2: would rather have not gone. I mean, it didn't help
Speaker 2: that we got absolutely honked twice by the by the
Speaker 2: the Royals whilst I sat there, But it was it
Speaker 2: was a vicious, awful place to watch baseball. Had Yankee
Speaker 2: stuff everywhere, so you know that really didn't help.
Speaker 1: Sounds terrible, so said, so what.
Speaker 2: I mean, we've got eighty eighty one and you're saying lower,
Speaker 2: So we're going to repeat on seventy seven?
Speaker 1: Will do you go seventy seven?
Speaker 3: Back?
Speaker 2: I think it's low. I think it's low. But okay,
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna play that damn game again.
Speaker 3: I could skip the time and that Darius Cheers, couldn't.
Speaker 1: We Yeah, I've put in seventy seven. That's fine.
Speaker 3: And right, Okay, we're gonna probably have an argument about this,
Speaker 3: but let's do the kinds of City Royals. I they're
Speaker 3: my team for this year. You don't want to hear
Speaker 3: that if you're if you're a Royals fan, because I'm
Speaker 3: terrible at picking teams. But I think the Royal is
Speaker 3: going to be good this year. I think they've got
Speaker 3: an MVP candidate in Wirre. They've got a bunch of
Speaker 3: other players in the lineup that I like a lot.
Speaker 3: You know, mikel Garsia was like the top five of
Speaker 3: their basement in baseball last year. Paspentino's fun. I think
Speaker 3: Caglione shows life this year, and then the pitching, if
Speaker 3: it can stay healthy, big if. I also think is
Speaker 3: really good and underrated and has depth. So call me crazy,
Speaker 3: but I think the Royals win that division. I think
Speaker 3: they win ninety.
Speaker 2: Games, ninety ninety good lord, Yeah.
Speaker 3: I said I like them, and they're gonna end up
Speaker 3: coming down from that.
Speaker 1: But I just went on, you want to plant the flag? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think they'll make it close for the Tigers. I
Speaker 1: have the Tigers just ahead. But I was on eighty
Speaker 1: five eighty six for the Morris.
Speaker 3: I was.
Speaker 2: I was slightly lower. I was in eighty three just
Speaker 2: because of the scarring memory, which just I just explained
Speaker 2: from watching them in Camper. But I can come up
Speaker 2: to Darius's level. I can't see ninety. If they've sorted
Speaker 2: out their outfield to an extent, but it's still a
Speaker 2: little bit weak on the hitting side. I mean, the
Speaker 2: pitching's okay, but it's it's not right home about so
Speaker 2: ninety seems heavy for me?
Speaker 1: Are you are you accepting it in the middle? I
Speaker 1: do you want to do you want to have a
Speaker 1: tie for the division?
Speaker 3: Ben?
Speaker 1: Is that what you're saying?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Can you put them in a tie with the Tigers?
Speaker 1: Fine? I have no strong feelings like I would not
Speaker 1: be shocked to feel them the Tigers or the or
Speaker 1: else on the central That would not surprise me.
Speaker 2: We'll get to finish the division, Darius, that's your pick.
Speaker 1: Let's finish a division. I'm trying to think who's gonna
Speaker 1: be most entertaining to leave them to the last. Who's
Speaker 1: the least entertaining to leave until last?
Speaker 2: Well, obviously Cleveland.
Speaker 1: It's obviously Cleveland. Let'st of Cleveland. Why why are they here?
Speaker 2: What is the point of Cleveland? Just to annoy us?
Speaker 1: That playoff experience watching that Cleveland lineup in the playoffs
Speaker 1: was just like this. This front office should not be
Speaker 1: allowed to continue getting away with this. I hope the
Speaker 1: Tigers and the Royals just eliminate them from this. And
Speaker 1: I don't think they'll hang around because it's it's Cleveland.
Speaker 1: But I'm just going to say eighty one because they're
Speaker 1: really dull and I don't think they're any good. Really,
Speaker 1: They'll just you know, Cleveland their way to a mid season.
Speaker 3: Yeah, agreed. I mean Chase the latter is Barry Bonds.
Speaker 3: So maybe we should advise.
Speaker 1: That they have they have a hitter.
Speaker 2: I'll give them that. That's a good, good improvement. I
Speaker 2: haven't forgotten. I reckon they're the anti Angels. I mean,
Speaker 2: like every year we say, oh, this year there's the Angels.
Speaker 2: They're gonna be good. We keep saying this is the
Speaker 2: year that they drop off. Then they're not good anymore.
Speaker 2: They keep doing it, I think they'll be fine. I
Speaker 2: think you know, they've lost two guys who are throwing
Speaker 2: balls the wrong direction on purpose, so you know that
Speaker 2: that's better. So you know, I think you know, they
Speaker 2: won eighty eight games last year, and I don't see
Speaker 2: that they particularly got any worse. And maybe the division's
Speaker 2: got a little bit better around them, but like the
Speaker 2: Twins have got worse, the Royals and the Tigers probably
Speaker 2: about where they were. Maybe the rules are a bit
Speaker 2: better and the White Socks are maybe a little bit better.
Speaker 2: So okay, I can drop a couple of couple of wins,
Speaker 2: but I just there's something about them and they just
Speaker 2: keep finding their way. So I was more like an
Speaker 2: eighty five win, Yeah, I mean that what was the
Speaker 2: pithag last year in eighty two. That's the kind of
Speaker 2: team the Guardians were last year.
Speaker 3: Not a rationalized the Guardians exactly to explain them. So
Speaker 3: your boy never heard of up being.
Speaker 1: And you agreeing with robbed now then eighty five, Well, no,
Speaker 1: I still.
Speaker 3: Think they're below five hundred, but maybe like maybe five
Speaker 3: hundred exactly, which is what I said, like pure mid
Speaker 3: we found it was that what you said find five
Speaker 3: years to get down.
Speaker 2: But mark my words, the the Guardians will be better
Speaker 2: come the end of the season. I'll die on this hill,
Speaker 2: this really boring hill.
Speaker 1: Just on principle, because they never do anything.
Speaker 3: I don't.
Speaker 2: It's more of a gentle slope. Yes, obviously they'll win
Speaker 2: the division, but I'm not giving them predy. Okay, rob Oh,
Speaker 2: Let's talk about the Phillies. I think the Phillies are
Speaker 2: just getting old, and that really is all that the
Speaker 2: story is about the Phillies. The Phillies are still pretty good,
Speaker 2: but you know, the vibes have turned from well, aren't
Speaker 2: these guys crazy? You're having a lot of fun to
Speaker 2: aren't they a bit weird? What's going on with all
Speaker 2: that blood play? That's not okay? Yeah, it's all got
Speaker 2: a bit strange in Philly. I think a lot of people,
Speaker 2: I think a lot of the projections you see have
Speaker 2: their being a bit harsh. If I'm honest, I think
Speaker 2: the they are going down. They're They're not the team
Speaker 2: they were over the last couple of years. I think
Speaker 2: they've kind of almost missed their peak. It is done,
Speaker 2: but I don't think they're dropping off that much. They've
Speaker 2: still got some good players in here, So where do
Speaker 2: I have them as I had the Phillies if we
Speaker 2: work out which division are in drop they were ninety
Speaker 2: six wins last year. I'd been down to ninety this year,
Speaker 2: Like that's a big drop off considering they haven't lost
Speaker 2: that much from this team. So yeah, ninety wins from
Speaker 2: what was a ninety six win team and I'm I'm
Speaker 2: that's me on the Phillies.
Speaker 1: Still good when you accept this slander against the Mets.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I didn't have them winning the division, but then
Speaker 3: I don't think I realized that they won ninety six
Speaker 3: games last year. That it's a lot of games, isn't it.
Speaker 3: But then I don't know. I feel like it all
Speaker 3: kind of went right for them last year, like all
Speaker 3: the old guys stayed mostly healthy, the rotation had a
Speaker 3: career year from some chairs. Wayne of Suarez was there,
Speaker 3: he's not there anymore.
Speaker 1: And also at Lantern the Mets were completely useless and collapsed,
Speaker 1: which helps.
Speaker 3: It was fully healthy. We have no idea what he's
Speaker 3: going to be when he's back from injury.
Speaker 2: He's exactly going to be tearing it up this year?
Speaker 2: Are they with no pitching? You know that's still that's
Speaker 2: still a factor.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know. I had him splitting the gap
Speaker 3: with eighty seven between the Mets and the Braves, that
Speaker 3: that might be too harsh and my Mets bias might
Speaker 3: be blinding me. There.
Speaker 1: Well, Robin players game again?
Speaker 3: So where did you have them, Doris? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I have them closest to where we have the Mets, certainly.
Speaker 1: I think it's tossed up between those two to the division,
Speaker 1: I think ninety not million miles away.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's give him eighty nine. I think we can't
Speaker 3: predict the Mets to win the East again.
Speaker 1: Okay, there we go. We're giving them nine.
Speaker 3: Did we even do that last year? I don't know.
Speaker 3: I predict it every year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know if we last year, but it's
Speaker 2: entirely possible.
Speaker 3: Ben.
Speaker 2: That was me, so right, yeah, Ben, Yeah.
Speaker 3: Let's do I still want to take the Yeah, I
Speaker 3: don't take the pirate. So see, the Diamondbacks I had
Speaker 3: sort of a bit stuck in baseball purgatory, aren't They
Speaker 3: were like they're like good enough to always be like,
Speaker 3: oh this is be a bit different for the Diamondbacks
Speaker 3: this year, but not really good enough to like ever
Speaker 3: compete with the Dodgers, so sort of like, will they
Speaker 3: be good enough to compete for a wild card? I
Speaker 3: tend to think yes, I don't know if I'll actually
Speaker 3: get one, but I have them in that like eighty
Speaker 3: five ish win range about the same as the Padres.
Speaker 3: You know, the lineup has the potential to be good.
Speaker 3: I think it kind of always seems to be good
Speaker 3: no matter who's in it. But they just seem to
Speaker 3: be good at producing runs. They're not always so great
Speaker 3: at getting out. But yeah, this feels like a year
Speaker 3: that they kind of do what they've done tick along
Speaker 3: with Yeah, eighty five eighty six wins, compete, but not
Speaker 3: really good enough to be, you know, a proper contender
Speaker 3: or with the Dodgers. Doesn't fill me with optimism. That
Speaker 3: no Arnado is getting at that's there. I love Nolan,
Speaker 3: but another guy who, yeah, should not be getting at
Speaker 3: that's for a serious team. Yeah.
Speaker 1: They got some some real obvious holes here, haven't they.
Speaker 1: First base is a problem, third base is a problem,
Speaker 1: The rotation is a problem. I think they're worse than
Speaker 1: the part Rads in the Giants area in the low eighties.
Speaker 2: I would say split the difference from me, So let's
Speaker 2: can we can we eighty three them?
Speaker 3: Can?
Speaker 1: I you shreedom.
Speaker 2: Definitely going to have something, So maybe maybe that's where
Speaker 2: it will go. As saying, we've been very we've been
Speaker 2: very conservative so far. Unless somebody loves the Pirates, I'm
Speaker 2: going to take the Pirates. Don't take the don't let
Speaker 2: don't let the l Yankees have the go last. No, please,
Speaker 2: we haven't on the asterisk? Good fine, lovely, Well that's fine.
Speaker 1: We can leave them, so maybe we won't have any left.
Speaker 1: We'll see how OOPSI sick we are the Pirates, Like,
Speaker 1: I just don't trust them to do anything right, even
Speaker 1: if they're good. But they're just not going to spend
Speaker 1: any money, are they Like they're like, oh, we really
Speaker 1: tried this offseason and what they do They signed like
Speaker 1: Ryan O'Hearn, who's it's fine, Like it's a fine player,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I don't surely yeah, but I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: they have arguably the best starting pitcher in baseball. Well
Speaker 1: they can all his first start that was a bit.
Speaker 2: Of the fleeing. He didn't finish.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the young, the young starting pitching is really exciting,
Speaker 1: and presumably we will see Connor Griffin at some point,
Speaker 1: hopefully a point that's like not too far in the future,
Speaker 1: but is the Pirates. So I don't want to like
Speaker 1: make any guarantees. But the rest of the lineup is
Speaker 1: is pretty bad. The Low deal was good. Sorry lao low,
Speaker 1: Yes is loud.
Speaker 2: Yes, it's low. That's the Lao, not the Low. But
Speaker 2: I think they're still like a you know, seventy six
Speaker 2: twenty I had seventy seven.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's fine by me.
Speaker 2: I think people are a little bit too high on
Speaker 2: the mills.
Speaker 3: I really do like their pitching, but yeah, the lineup,
Speaker 3: it's just there's not a ton to be excited about.
Speaker 3: Unless Griffin turns out to be amazing, which he might.
Speaker 1: I think he will be very good at some point.
Speaker 1: But yeah, do they try Do they try and surround
Speaker 1: him with any talent at all? If it comes to
Speaker 1: the deadline and they're like moderately unit is well, nothing
Speaker 1: going to say, let's spend some money. No, no historical
Speaker 1: reason to believe that is there.
Speaker 3: I have to spend money. They've got Ryan and her mate.
Speaker 2: Yeah there we all right, right, mean, isn't it? Yes, Well,
Speaker 2: I'm going to take the New York Yankees, and they're
Speaker 2: pretty good. I don't think we can say that the
Speaker 2: Yankees are going to be awful. It's a bit of
Speaker 2: a reliant on the likes of gian Carlo Stanton staying healthy,
Speaker 2: which is a fool's errand of course, But I mean,
Speaker 2: they were good last year, they'll they'll be good this year.
Speaker 2: I think they had a bit of bad luck last year.
Speaker 2: They haven't done particularly much. I think just for a
Speaker 2: bit of reversion to the mean, I reckon we'll see
Speaker 2: a ninety two win team. They'll be right up there
Speaker 2: with the Red Sox to revitalize the old old classic rivalry. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I had them right in the same range as the
Speaker 2: Red Sox. I think it will be pretty close between them.
Speaker 2: I'm happy to go with ninety two.
Speaker 3: Ben Yeah, I think that makes sense. I probably have
Speaker 3: the rest sort of take ahead, so maybe more than
Speaker 3: the nineteen ninety one range. But like that's yeah, I'm
Speaker 3: not going to squable over one or two wins. They're
Speaker 3: just a really good, deep team that it's hard to
Speaker 3: see how it all goes wrong for them like it
Speaker 3: has in the past. I hope I'm cursing them by
Speaker 3: saying that, But a lot of yeah, just a lot
Speaker 3: of really good hitters throughout the lineup, depth and the pitching.
Speaker 3: At some point, hopefully Gerret holes back, Like I yeah.
Speaker 1: I think Carlos John to come back again.
Speaker 2: It looks great. Want to come back really great.
Speaker 3: It looks unbelievable. Yeah, Freed has been a revelation, well
Speaker 3: not revelations. He's been good, but like he's done everything
Speaker 3: they could expect. So yeah, I think that's.
Speaker 2: Fair good tea. Yeah, all right.
Speaker 1: The question Ben is do you want to give ninety
Speaker 1: wins to the Houston Astress.
Speaker 3: It's yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2: You don't know.
Speaker 3: I think I'd probably higher on them than you guys are,
Speaker 3: or maybe the Consentus, because I just it's one of
Speaker 3: those teams where it's like it feels icky to be
Speaker 3: like the Astros are bad now because they've been so
Speaker 3: good for so long. But the like writing was on
Speaker 3: the wall a bit last year you could see the
Speaker 3: cracks appearing. There is an aging lineup and you know,
Speaker 3: their best hitter your now Rez can't stay on the field,
Speaker 3: and the pitching has got cracked to the back of
Speaker 3: the rotation, maybe even at the front of the rotation too.
Speaker 3: So I haven't done for eighty five, which I mean,
Speaker 3: it's not a bad year by most teams measure, but
Speaker 3: I think for them it'd be a slight sit back,
Speaker 3: and I imagine that might even be on the high
Speaker 3: side for what you guys have got them down for.
Speaker 2: I had eighty four, So I'm exactly in the same
Speaker 2: kind of way, same place as you. You know that
Speaker 2: they are getting it older again. You know, they've they
Speaker 2: have slid slowly, but not not disgustingly disgracefully from from
Speaker 2: the dominance, and you know, with the you know, angels
Speaker 2: A's Rangers division, there's still plenty of wins to play
Speaker 2: for for them, so they're still going to be towards
Speaker 2: you know, they'll they'll be talking about the wild card
Speaker 2: come come September if they don't even quite get there. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: I had them on eighty four.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm okay with eighty four. It's not the Astros evolved.
Speaker 1: I think they've got a lot of cracks, but they've
Speaker 1: still got some very good players as well. And I
Speaker 1: don't think you know, this division is crazy good. I
Speaker 1: think that's going to be some free wins to be had,
Speaker 1: So I'm okay with eighty four. Four, Okay, six wins.
Speaker 1: It's pretty good, pretty well one of our better efforts,
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 2: Okay, I mean so me. It's immediately two on the rays.
Speaker 2: Do you want two?
Speaker 1: Two on the Rays?
Speaker 2: Yeah, but they're better than seventy seven. We're saying that
Speaker 2: the Rains are only one game better than the Pirates.
Speaker 1: Come on, fine, two on the Rais.
Speaker 3: I'll trust Rob on this one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's the eight factor.
Speaker 1: You've appealed to my anti Bob nothing sentiments and one.
Speaker 2: So I think possibly that NL Central, top of the
Speaker 2: NL Central may be a little bit light. We've got
Speaker 2: the you want more nineteen Brewers on eighty four? A
Speaker 2: win or two and one one each other? Think it's
Speaker 2: probably about right?
Speaker 1: Okay, well good, I'm happy with one on each of them.
Speaker 3: I think the Brewers will be better than that. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Do you want to put another one on the Brewers?
Speaker 3: Ben? I probably would.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think I think a wild card team right? Six?
Speaker 2: Okay, I can see eighty six for the Brewers that
Speaker 2: that's not not crazy. If we have one.
Speaker 1: Do we want to break a tie?
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll flip flip a coin between the Tigers and
Speaker 2: the and the Royals. We'll play one more tie breaker
Speaker 2: play one more?
Speaker 1: Shall I? Shall I run the tiebreaker and you two
Speaker 1: have to guess and then Robert have to look up
Speaker 1: and down.
Speaker 2: But yeah, fine, it's a tiebreaker.
Speaker 3: Yeah, any time my wins.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, that's that's a good point. What if we
Speaker 2: tyebreak we both have the same answer. I'm tie breaking
Speaker 2: for the for the tie, I reckon the Tigers are better, and.
Speaker 1: We know Ben thinks the Royals are better.
Speaker 3: For the Royals, this is it the fate of the
Speaker 3: al centrals in our.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're Central's in your hands. Okay, I've got a player.
Speaker 1: It's a hitter. Does I don't know who wants to
Speaker 1: pick a stat? Somebody pick a stat.
Speaker 2: Home runs, keep it nice and easy, home runs.
Speaker 1: I want to know how many home runs did Michael
Speaker 1: Garcia hit in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: He was quite good.
Speaker 3: He was really good. I don't think he had crazy
Speaker 3: power though. Okay, I'll go in the twenties.
Speaker 2: I was going to say that that sucks, like I'm
Speaker 2: just copying you, okay, which we write down on numbers
Speaker 2: so that we can't be accused of.
Speaker 1: Write down a number so nobody can over run there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, papers, So I'm gonna have to note ap it
Speaker 3: like I'm apologize to it.
Speaker 1: This is great podcast content. Yep, just phenomenal.
Speaker 3: Can I make this text any big?
Speaker 2: Please please play along at home every as well. Write
Speaker 2: down your answer. I won't see them, but just vindicate.
Speaker 2: You'll be vindicated when you get it right. We pick
Speaker 2: a tiger and then we have to go with that
Speaker 2: guy instead of the same the same category. Right, yes,
Speaker 2: many go four yep, twenty four.
Speaker 1: Incredible.
Speaker 2: Pickause a random tiger, Darius, So you guys.
Speaker 1: Are too optimistic and Michael I said, I hit sixteen
Speaker 1: home runs. He was very good, but not because he
Speaker 1: hit not because he hit a lot of home runs.
Speaker 1: A random tiger also home runs for tigers.
Speaker 2: Yep. If there's a picture, we're going to draw again
Speaker 2: because it will be zero, will be zero.
Speaker 1: Well done, that's good. I want to know how many
Speaker 1: home runs did the actually named Dylan Dingler hit Dingers
Speaker 1: from Dinger.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 2: I feel like there was hype about him, but he
Speaker 2: didn't quite him up to it.
Speaker 3: Could maybe it look stupid.
Speaker 1: That was the point of this game. I can't believe,
Speaker 1: can't believe the al Central is riding on. Who knows
Speaker 1: how many home runs did and Dingleer here.
Speaker 3: You ready, Okay, I've got my answer. Yeah.
Speaker 2: See the answers seven from Ben twelve from The correct
Speaker 2: answer is thirteen congract No, congratulations, destroy Tigers. That's the
Speaker 2: first time in four years I've won one of these.
Speaker 2: That the winners of the AL Central in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 2: Sorry Royals, better like next year.
Speaker 1: I hope you send a handwritten an apology card to
Speaker 1: Bobby Witt Junior Ben for this travesty.
Speaker 3: Damn you Dingler.
Speaker 1: So there we have it. We're done, We've finished. I
Speaker 1: can I can read the titles out because people who
Speaker 1: are listening to this as a podcast will not actually
Speaker 1: be able to see any of this. So in the
Speaker 1: NL West we have, in a shock decision, the Dodgers
Speaker 1: winning ninety eight games, Padres eighty five, i'ming back to
Speaker 1: eighty three, Giants eighty one, Rockies fifty one, and our
Speaker 1: Central Cubs ninety one, Brewers eighty six, Reds eighty three,
Speaker 1: Pirates seventy six, Cardinals seventy and the NL East Phillies
Speaker 1: eighty nine, Mets eighty eight, Braves eighty five, Marlin's seventy
Speaker 1: three Nationals sixty five L West Jerry Depoto's Seattle Mariners
Speaker 1: eighty eight wins, the Astros eighty four, Rangers eighty two,
Speaker 1: six seventy eight, and Angels sixty four. The Ale Central
Speaker 1: as you just heard, the Tigers are winning the division
Speaker 1: with eighty eight, Royals eighty seven, Guardians eighty one, twins
Speaker 1: seventy and White Sox sixty six. And finally in the
Speaker 1: Al list, we have a tie again. Will the Yankees
Speaker 1: lose out? We didn't actually decide the tiebreaker, but both
Speaker 1: the Red Sox and the Yankees on ninety two wins,
Speaker 1: the Blue Jays at eighty nine, the Areas at eighty six,
Speaker 1: and the Rays at seventy nine.
Speaker 2: There we have it. Those are the totals.
Speaker 1: Bob, you did say that you have some bold predictions
Speaker 1: that you wanted to get offs concluded.
Speaker 2: Okay, what so I've got I've got four Someone's going
Speaker 2: to accidentally trigger a challenge, so you know, they're just
Speaker 2: someone's challenge that and it's going to be a ball
Speaker 2: by a mile or whatever. Yeah, so accidental challenge, a fire,
Speaker 2: will delay, cancel on, be notably visible in the game.
Speaker 2: I'm thinking, you know that's got White Sox written all
Speaker 2: over it. The Rockies All Star didn't start the season
Speaker 2: on the roster, I reckon and last year I've written
Speaker 2: down here mascot sex scandal? Is that what you will?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I don't want to delve into that one anymore. And
Speaker 1: who will the Rockies All Star be that? Who is
Speaker 1: not on the roster.
Speaker 3: At the moment, not currently on the roster at that
Speaker 3: on the.
Speaker 2: Active twenty six man as well? I mean who the
Speaker 2: twins going to DFA.
Speaker 3: Did? Did Mickey Moniac? He's not the I l because
Speaker 3: if he did, then he's probably the one, isn't he
Speaker 3: I think he did? Yeah, so Mickey Maniac, he might
Speaker 3: be right on that one.
Speaker 2: That'd be interesting.
Speaker 3: I'm going to say, yes, sex Scandal has got mister
Speaker 3: met written all over it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, he does look like an offender.
Speaker 3: Well exactly.
Speaker 1: You heard it here first. Yeah, I could buy the
Speaker 1: Rockies one. Mickey Mania might be their all Star? Who else?
Speaker 1: Is it good Ran? I suppose isn't it the GA?
Speaker 1: It was it was good Man last year?
Speaker 2: Right? Was it last year?
Speaker 3: It was good Man?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Good Many Actually kinds of easy position to get in,
Speaker 3: isn't it good player? If you hits and he does?
Speaker 2: So there we have it.
Speaker 1: The predictions are in the book. We only slightly cheated
Speaker 1: this year, and I don't think it actually influenced many
Speaker 1: of our expectations at all, So we'll be fine. We've
Speaker 1: not cheated. We've not given the Angels loads to wins
Speaker 1: because Mike Trout's healthy, even though Ben wanted to, and.
Speaker 3: We gave ourselves a bit of a head start by
Speaker 3: watching the first three games of season and then doing this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I don't. I don't think it changed my
Speaker 2: opinion about anybody at all. But then I don't like
Speaker 2: to be rubbish, But now that that did change my mind, Ben,
Speaker 2: Ben did give the Rockies an extra win because they
Speaker 2: they won a lot. You know, that's that's a lot
Speaker 2: when they get fifty wins. I'm going to remember this.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna blame you, Ben for us not getting that
Speaker 2: total correct.
Speaker 3: That seems that I've been carried away.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1: That is the end of the prediction extravaganza. Thank you
Speaker 1: everybody for listening. We will often be back soon with
Speaker 1: content about the actual baseball season that's happening right now.
Speaker 1: Lots to talk about abs. We'll be watching out for
Speaker 1: those accidental challenges and much more. Until then, we will
Speaker 1: catch you next time.