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Ep. 13 : Playoff Picks and Investments · Cards & Categories

• 0:16
  Hello, and welcome everybody to episode thirteen of Cards and Categories, and we
• 0:21
  have officially entered the post twenty twenty three season. Fantasy seasons are over and
• 0:27
  we're officially recording on Tuesday night, the third, October third, the opening
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  nine of the playoffs. So, Brew, how is your Playoff Opening Eve
• 0:38
  going so far? Playoff Opening Eve is going very well so far, exciting
• 0:43
  games already. I was wondering if the pitching was going to rule the day
• 0:48
  in the playoffs as usual, and I think that that has continued. So
• 0:52
  exciting to see things going well early in the playoffs. I think, what
• 0:57
  we're two and a half games in to the playoffs as we record here,
• 1:02
  sure, maybe three if you add the two half games that are playing right
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  now. Yeah, I guess we should up pay people we are talking.
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  I'm looking at my phone right now is the bottom of the fourth inning during
• 1:11
  the Arizona Milwaukee game, and the Phillies and Marlin's game just started. So
• 1:18
  we are still going to go rattle through our picks real fast. That like,
• 1:22
  at least we have only missed, like you said, two and a
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  half ish games so far, so I think the brackets can still hold up.
• 1:30
  I know that you officially put one into the app, so yours is
• 1:33
  a little bit more set in stone. I can't like point to one.
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  You just have to believe that these were my picks before the game started.
• 1:41
  I don't know how much you're actually going to believe that though, I personally
• 1:45
  believe it not at all. But that's just because one of mine's already in
• 1:49
  danger after some of the early games. So that's mostly out of spite than
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  anything else. Okay, well, we'll start with the early matchups because we
• 1:59
  are if you go and google, just like a standard MLB postseason bracket,
• 2:04
  all also linked to one obviously in the show notes. That's kind of what
• 2:07
  we're looking at to pick your bracket out. And don't I'm not too concerned
• 2:10
  with number of games, so it's a little bit too complex, but let's
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  just kind of pick our head to head guys. And so we'll start with
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  the first one of this afternoon, between Texas and Tampa. Who do you
• 2:23
  think is going to win that series? Yeah? I have Tampa coming out
• 2:25
  of that series, which is one of the one the blemish I have to
• 2:29
  start the day here. I wasn't sure how well Texas pitching would hold up,
• 2:32
  but unfortunately Jordan Montgomery had other things in mind. I still do like
• 2:38
  Tampa even down one. I think they are the better team overall to win
• 2:43
  that series. It is just the danger of the short series that is the
• 2:46
  biggest risk for them. They are a much better team and a longer series
• 2:51
  than they are in a shorter series without Shane McClanahan. Yeah, so I
• 2:55
  got to raise that one. How about you. I actually I was picking
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  Theers before, and they obviously won the first game here. I think,
• 3:02
  mostly for me, it's just about the offense, and I think that showed
• 3:06
  in the first game. Even that the Rangers can manufacture runs pretty well.
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  They just had a really solid lineup durround the entire year that throughout twenty twenty
• 3:16
  three they were keeping pace with the Braves the top of like the WRC plus
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  leader boards until the Braves pulled away late at the end. And so that
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  along with I think what the Rangers can also do is their bullpen has been
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  bad and unsteady, but you can condense that in the playoffs and you can
• 3:35
  look back to what the Nationals did in twenty nineteen. That that's what I'm
• 3:38
  liking about the Rangers to be able to come through against the Rays in this
• 3:42
  series. And then the other series that we have that started this afternoon was
• 3:47
  Jays versus Twins taking place in Minnesota, and the Twins pulled off the first
• 3:53
  win in the series just a little bit ago that they broke the streak of
• 3:58
  I think it was eighteen straight losses in the playoffs, which is absolutely absurd.
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  I was listening to Effectively Wild this week, and the guy there was
• 4:06
  a Twins fan that calculated out like the probability of that, and it's like
• 4:11
  the most improbable thing ever, like just about it was like six hundred and
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  thirty billion events to like have it happen. And so I'm glad that the
• 4:24
  Twins pulled it off. And you're gonna be angry with me that I'm I
• 4:28
  would have picked the Twins in this series because for me, it's it's the
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  starting pitching strength and it's a little bit of like this was probably the one
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  series and getting into the Philadelphia one that like those two were the ones where
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  I thought the home field advantage would play the greatest role. That like,
• 4:48
  these Twins fans are pretty rabid and they were pretty hyped up to end that
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  losing streak because they saw the opportunity here. And I think this Blue Jays
• 4:59
  team is just a little stale coming down the stretch and a little disappointed and
• 5:02
  floundering. So I like the Twins to come through in this matchup. And
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  you'll also you'll see in the future why I also like them to come through
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  in the matchups. So it's not just Twins one today, I'm picking them
• 5:15
  for this series sort of thing. Okay, well, nice foreshadowing, And
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  I might be along on the same bus with you here because I also had
• 5:24
  the Twins in this series, and very much for the same reasons that you
• 5:28
  called out the pitching with Hory Lopez, and you know, I'm a sunny
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  gray homer Is. Especially in the short series, like they can just win
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  thing for them, that's all. That's all. They need a few good
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  starts and they have a really, really solid bullpen that can take them through.
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  And really in the playoffs, the teams that have that nice little pop
• 5:46
  in the lineup, just the guy that can hit two or three home runs
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  in a game and you can make it happen. And that's what Royce Lewis
• 5:54
  did just today. Just give them enough power to get by with the pitching.
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  So I think that they're really well set up in this series and potentially
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  beyond as well. So I'm right there with you. I got the twins
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  in the series, and I was excited to see them them pull it through
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  in the first game. Yeah, and you meant Pablo Lopez not Jorge Lopez,
• 6:14
  right, It's just fun to make sure, okay, yeah, because
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  I was like, yeah, they traded Jorge Lopez a few months ago.
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  Bro, see you can't. You can't have too many. Lopez is on
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  a team for me here, but yes, okay, and then we'll move
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  on to the NL. Now with the game that is mid way through.
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  Right now, I think it's still four to three, and that is Diamondbacks
• 6:38
  versus Brewers in Milwaukee. And maybe I would have changed my answer if I
• 6:43
  had known that during this Milwaukee series that front row Amy Marlin's man and Eminem's
• 6:48
  guy would be sitting front row all together behind home plate, which I hope
• 6:53
  that they keep up. But I have to take the Diamondbacks in this series.
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  They're just a little bit more dynamic for me, like they have the
• 7:01
  offense to be able to execute and just get through big situations, even if
• 7:08
  Corbyn Carroll, their main guy is a rookie, Like he just has that
• 7:11
  swagger and he has that mojo to him. And I think maybe, like
• 7:15
  my answer would have been different if the Brewers had Brandon Wooddriff. But that
• 7:18
  was the one thing that could have carried them through in this series is starting
• 7:21
  pitching and without Wooddrift, now like that does really hurt their chances. I
• 7:26
  think, yeah, it does really really hurt them. I still I still
• 7:30
  have the Brewers and my picks, and I was really counting on this first
• 7:34
  game being in their favor with Corbin Burns facing Brandon Brandon was it fat?
• 7:42
  And I spelt saying that right, And you know, I just looked at
• 7:46
  that matchup was just a juicy matchup for the Brewers, you know, expecting
• 7:50
  burn to be able to hold them to two or three runs and you know
• 7:54
  that's not gonna be able to hold the Brewers back. And generally that seemed
• 7:59
  to be true on the side of the Brewers scoring the runs. But Burns
• 8:03
  doesn't look like he's holding up as well as I was expecting in this one.
• 8:07
  So I had the Brewers. I really to me, like I said,
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  it came down to that first game. I thought there's a really good
• 8:13
  chance that the Brewers were better set up to win that opening game, and
• 8:16
  then it was just a matter of splitting one from there. So it was
• 8:22
  I'll say it was not a deep analysis on this one. I had faith
• 8:24
  in Corbyn Burns. Maybe misguided, but simple enough. Yeah, I hear
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  you. I mean I think that's fair that like that is their strength and
• 8:31
  the bullpen, like the bullpen in Milwaukee, is much stronger that that could
• 8:35
  help them pull. Yes, well, now that's not a team I can
• 8:37
  see going deep even if they do win. I do think that to your
• 8:41
  point, the Diamondbacks are a better team over a longer series. So it's
• 8:45
  kind of one of those dynamics of that three game series. It is so
• 8:50
  predicated on what you do in that very first game. Yeah, definitely.
• 8:54
  And then the last series that we have starting tonight that just started is Marlins
• 8:58
  versus Phillies, and my heart wants the Marlins. I want the Marlins.
• 9:03
  I expecting you to pick the Marlins just just because even no analysis needed for
• 9:09
  that. No, And I can't like even just watching like the first couple
• 9:15
  of innings like this Philly crowd is absolutely crazy. They're raucious and really to
• 9:22
  just lose their their minds at every single swing. So Philly is a better
• 9:28
  team. Philly's got the home field advantage. Like it's the I have to
• 9:31
  pick Philly. Yeah, it's it's Philly. There's really not an argument here
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  to your point. They have They have good enough pitching, they have a
• 9:43
  good enough bullpen. Uh, they have really a good lineup. Does it
• 9:46
  always click all the time, No, but it's one of those that there.
• 9:50
  It is pretty star studded from top to a generally, it's just a
• 9:54
  matter of that are they clicking, and they have been clicking more as of
• 9:56
  late. So to me, yet, I with you on this one.
• 10:01
  I wanted to pick the Marlins. I wanted to see that story. It's
• 10:03
  the Phillies. Yeah, all right, I think let's snake back. Actually,
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  so let's finish off the NL and then go to our al picks.
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  So between Braves and Phillies, who you leaning here? Yeah? Between Braves
• 10:18
  and Phillies. For me, it's a pretty easy one. Braves. The
• 10:20
  Braves are I arguably want the best team in either league at this point.
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  They have top and pitching, they have a incredible deep lineup, they have
• 10:31
  good defense. There's just a lot to like about the Braves. You know,
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  I don't see anybody at least in that division series really giving them up
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  run for their money. So Braves in three, oh wow, very quick,
• 10:48
  I'm actually gonna take Philly, And I think this will actually end up
• 10:50
  being probably like the best series of the playoffs, Like these teams might just
• 10:54
  about be the two best teams on paper, like looking at everything right now,
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  the Phillies have the experience from being their last year, but the Braves
• 11:05
  obviously were there in twenty twenty one and have been there constantly. So I
• 11:11
  think the big edge is I don't know if Max Freed and Charlie Morton are
• 11:16
  coming back to be healthy enough for this series, and so that gives a
• 11:24
  little bit of an edge to the Phillies in my mind that I think that
• 11:28
  it's one of the offenses that can go pound for pound with the Braves and
• 11:31
  the Phillies. Bullpen, although it's been much maligned over the years, it
• 11:37
  is really solid this year, and with the content schedule, they're able to
• 11:41
  push some of those back end starters into the bullpen as well. So I'm
• 11:46
  going to take Philly over Atlanta and so push them into the NLCS. All
• 11:50
  right, that's a bold move, Cotton. We'll see it all plays off.
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  And then the other one, I mean, I don't even do we
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  need is this Dodgers, Right, it's the Dodgers. Yeah, it doesn't
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  matter who's coming out of this other one. And I don't I don't want
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  to say that's a necessarily reflection of the Dodgers here. I think it's a
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  reflection of the two teams going into that game. Both exciting teams, both
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  fun teams to watch things like that, but they just don't hold the candle
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  to the Dodgers or the Phillies or the Braves. Uh in my mind,
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  so uh don't not deep enough on the pitching, can't score the runs the
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  same way, and not having the home field advantage. It it's just it's
• 12:30
  stacked against them. Yeah. And I think on top of it too,
• 12:33
  if there was one team that probably benefited from any buys, it's actually the
• 12:37
  Dodgers because they are a little bit of an older team. You know,
• 12:41
  you have Freeman and Bats who are you know, thirty ish and very yeah,
• 12:48
  Kershaw. I don't think anything is gonna help Kershaw in terms of any
• 12:50
  sorts of rest. So the rest for some of those other bats and their
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  bullpen and stuff, I think really benefits the Dodgers more than anybody else.
• 13:00
  Oh yeah, all right, in the NLCS, I have Dodgers Phillies,
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  you have Dodgers Braves. I'm going to go. I was really torn on
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  this one, and so I think I'm gonna have the Phillies run it back.
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  Though I think I like the Phillies a lot, but like, the
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  pitching staff is really great, and Bryce Harper's will have been coming on late
• 13:22
  and just everything kind of clicks, and I like their crowds. Their home
• 13:28
  crowds are incredible that it feels like they're on the road to something. And
• 13:31
  if it hadn't been for the Braves being around this year in their division,
• 13:37
  like, I think this team would have really steamrolled to a division title and
• 13:41
  been able to really put themselves into the pantheon of just great teams. And
• 13:46
  so I'm gonna go Phillies coming on the now. Yeah, I'm gonna give
• 13:48
  you credit for calling probably the Braves Phillies series is maybe one of the best
• 13:52
  series. I'm gonna go with the Braves. I think the team coming out
• 13:56
  of that series is going to be the better team to capture the pennant in
• 14:01
  the NL. The Dodgers to your kind of your sugarn earlier of the age,
• 14:07
  I think they're just not the Dodgers teams of the last few years.
• 14:11
  I think they are slowing. They've lost some star power and they've lost some
• 14:15
  pitching. Like they're just not as good of the team that they've the juggernauts
• 14:20
  that they have built. So I think you're right, the Braves Philly series
• 14:24
  might be a little harder. I know I'm going Braves and three because I'm
• 14:28
  just being bold, but I think either team that comes out of there I
• 14:33
  think stands a very fair chance against the Dodgers. So I like the Braves
• 14:37
  representing the NL. Yeah, okay, then let's move our way back to
• 14:41
  the al and so we'll start kind of at the bottom of the bracket,
• 14:46
  which is the one seed with the Orioles. I would have them hosting the
• 14:48
  Rangers. You would have them hosting the Rays. Are you who you picking
• 14:52
  between Rays and Orioles from your side? Well, this is kind of like
• 14:56
  the NCAA bracket going bad in the first day. But I've got the Rays
• 15:01
  taking the Orls. And it goes back to what I said earlier is I
• 15:03
  think the Rays are just a better team and a longer series. I do
• 15:07
  love the Oorls. I think that they're a great team to watch. And
• 15:11
  I hate to say, and it's not like this is nothing statistical. I
• 15:15
  think it comes down to experience. I really think it comes down to experiences
• 15:18
  who can handle on that stage. I think that campingy Yards is going to
• 15:22
  be hopping. I think it will be incredible. I don't know if if
• 15:24
  Candam Yard's ever been hopping. Last time I was there, there's like seven
• 15:28
  thousand people, But I think that that's the Rays. You know. I
• 15:33
  think they're gonna be able to sneak Bye bye Texas. I do still think
• 15:37
  that they'll do that even after their loss, and if they do, I
• 15:41
  think that they have they served themselves so much better in that longer series.
• 15:48
  Yeah, and I actually I think I agree I picked Texas over Baltimore that
• 15:52
  like a little bit of the same things you were talking about. There is
• 15:54
  just the Corey Seeker factor for the Rangers is going to be I think really
• 15:58
  huge about this playoff run. That Seeger has cemented himself as just a really
• 16:03
  good clutch playoff player with the Dodgers, and this will be his time to
• 16:07
  shine with the Rangers. I just don't know if the Orioles have enough pitching
• 16:11
  to get it done without Felix Bautista. Yeah that really hurts them. Yeah,
• 16:15
  exactly because it just it really that was their key was they were able
• 16:19
  to shorten the game to maybe six innings and just like not worry about it
• 16:23
  after turning it over to columbae Cano and then Bautista. But without having that
• 16:30
  kind of three headed monster at the back, it really changes the dynamics of
• 16:33
  that team. And honestly, I think it'll also show Michael Lias that this
• 16:38
  team does need free agent help, that they need pitching help, and like
• 16:42
  this is a great fit for Aaron Nola in the offseason, this is a
• 16:48
  spot for Jordan Montgomery. Like they just need arms to come in because they
• 16:52
  don't quite have them throughout their system, and they can develop bats like they're
• 16:56
  nothing apparently. Yeah, you're absolutely right with like breat and Grease and Rodrigue
• 17:02
  is there. If you have those guys there and then you had one or
• 17:03
  two really good pitching that is a scary team was a scary team and one
• 17:07
  year of development on basically the entire offense, because I think they're all nineteen
• 17:11
  years old, if I recall, is a very young, very young offense.
• 17:17
  But all right, so see them go get like hater or something off
• 17:19
  season two like to Replacesta, like you just like really go all out,
• 17:23
  and it's going to be a gauntlet to win the East again. And so
• 17:27
  yeah, I know you're trying to transition us. So I tried. Failed,
• 17:30
  It's okay, so transition us over. We both picked the Twins Twins
• 17:36
  against the two seeds of the Astros. Who you got, I'm taking the
• 17:38
  Twins here. So I think the Twins have been better than people give them
• 17:45
  credit for that. I think that the second half, playing against the al
• 17:48
  Central, they were allowed to coast a little bit. The Guardians didn't give
• 17:53
  them much of a fight, and so even though like Buxton and Korea aren't
• 17:59
  healthy, they rested people more than it looked like down the stretch. And
• 18:03
  so that staff is just I think it's really underrated. Between it looks like
• 18:08
  my Aida is going to be moving to the bullpen for the playoffs, and
• 18:12
  I really like Joe Ryan, I like Paplo Lopez as well, that I
• 18:18
  think they're gonna be able to outpitch Houston, and I think this will be
• 18:22
  a little bit of a trying time for Houston because I think some of the
• 18:26
  the treads coming off the tires on this Dynasty run and they might have to
• 18:30
  figure out what they're going to do to be able to support Kyle Tucker and
• 18:33
  Jordan Alvarez going forward, because I don't know if Alex Bregman is the answer.
• 18:38
  And the one expector though, is going to be Justin Verlander and seeing
• 18:45
  like what he can do. He showed up against the Mariners the other week
• 18:48
  and so I could see him being a little bit of a difference maker.
• 18:52
  But I like the Twins. This is, I know, crazy, but
• 18:55
  I'm going with the Twins after I'm feeling strong, after they've won their first
• 18:59
  postseason game, and eight years or whatever, you are going crazy, and
• 19:03
  I'm coming with you Minnesota Twins over the Houston Astros that I'm right there.
• 19:07
  Everything you said, I Jorge Lopez, Pablo Lopez doesn't matter. They are
• 19:15
  I think that they are the team to beat on that side of the bracket.
• 19:19
  Which just it feels almost crazy to see to say that, and to
• 19:23
  look at the matchups almost kind of broke very favorably for them. I don't
• 19:29
  think they could have gotten a better draw through this bracket because I think that
• 19:33
  they would have struggled against uh, clearly Texas or Tampa. I think they
• 19:38
  would have may have struggled against the Orioles even getting they got like the draw
• 19:44
  that was ideal for them. So I'm right there with you. I've got
• 19:47
  the twins, and I think you call it right, the Astros and Dodgers
• 19:51
  dynasties that some shrine may come off of them this this postseason. Yeah,
• 19:56
  And I don't know if it's necessarily that they'll collapse, but it will just
• 20:00
  be more a showing of like they've got to do something to be able to
• 20:04
  keep the Juggernuts going. There's a chink in the armor. Yeah, we'll
• 20:08
  be seen. And so I think in the long run, the Dodgers will
• 20:15
  be able to handle it a little bit better because they just kind of strike
• 20:18
  me as far too Yeah, and they strike me as being a less stubborn
• 20:22
  organization overall, so that like they will be willing to adapt and Honestly,
• 20:29
  I don't think they're going to fall that short. Like they're going to push
• 20:30
  Philly all the way to the end and they're going to still be a really
• 20:34
  solid team. But let's get to our ALCS picks and who's going to come
• 20:41
  out of the al So in my ALCS, I have the Twins versus the
• 20:45
  Rangers, and you have the Twins versus the Rays. I am going to
• 20:51
  go with the Twins again. So I'm putting them all the way through.
• 20:56
  And so I told you that the Twins pick at the beginning with it is
• 21:00
  not for the faint of heart, But there is just something that I like
• 21:03
  about the way that they're put together from the pitching side, and I think
• 21:07
  they've got enough bats to be able to carry them through. I think by
• 21:11
  the time the ALCS ALCS rolls around, some of that Texas pitching will get
• 21:18
  tired and some of it will be overexposed. Especially Chapman doesn't strike me as
• 21:23
  a guy that you can throw in too many back to back games and give
• 21:26
  teams too many looks against him, saying with jose La Clerk saying with Will
• 21:30
  Smith, And so I think that's where it kind of will fall apart that
• 21:33
  the Rangers offense can pick them up and get them to the ALCS, but
• 21:37
  I don't see them lifting them all the way of the World Series. Well,
• 21:41
  I'm gonna have to say I got off the Twins mandwagon here and I
• 21:45
  did go with the Rays. I might be regretting at just starting tomorrow if
• 21:52
  the Raiser A knocked out that quickly, But I, like I said,
• 21:57
  I think that the Rays of all the teams in the al are the most
• 22:02
  complete team and built for those longer series. I think that they anybody in
• 22:08
  the lineup can score. There's nothing almost any of their pitchers can, you
• 22:12
  know, really go go and make an impact. And from a managerial perspective,
• 22:18
  they're not shy about doing the things in the playoffs that they have to
• 22:22
  do to win games. Like They're not going to be the ones that goes
• 22:26
  well. Starters got to get five innings. Now, Starter looks quote questionable
• 22:30
  at two, He's coming out. Blake Snell will tell you that that he
• 22:34
  is. They are coming out right. So I do. I do like
• 22:37
  the Rays making it to the series there. Like I said, if we
• 22:42
  were recorded this last night, I would have felt a lot better about that.
• 22:45
  When I actually made the pick. Yeah, I guess that's what happens
• 22:48
  when we have to record a day early. But so World Series, I've
• 22:53
  got Twins versus Phillies, and you've got Rays versus Brays, So give me
• 23:02
  your pick first. Yep, I'm rolling with the Braves. I kind of
• 23:06
  alluded to it earlier. I think the Braves are by far and away the
• 23:08
  best team in all of baseball right now. They've got Ronald Acuna, who
• 23:12
  very well could just win a game by himself. I'm not surprisable to be
• 23:17
  pitching later. He might go to the Otani route, but I think that
• 23:22
  they are the most complete team. You make a good point of will be
• 23:26
  healthy enough? I think that that is a question. But the playoffs are
• 23:30
  longer than we sometimes remember, and I think that that will they'll get some
• 23:34
  rest, and you know, especially with having their early buy, I think
• 23:40
  they're gonna be just fine. So I've got the Braves, and I really
• 23:45
  think that it won't be too close. Okay, Yeah, and I'm going
• 23:49
  to take the Phillies over the Okay, thank goodness, I couldn't believe we
• 23:53
  didn't go with the Twins again. But yeah, and so I will take
• 23:56
  Phillies over Twins honestly for a lot of the reason you just picked the Braves,
• 24:00
  and I think we alluded it to it when we hinted at the DS
• 24:07
  matchup between the Phillies and Braves that we're foreseeing like that being the biggest crux
• 24:11
  of the playoffs, because I do think who wins that series wins the wins
• 24:17
  at all, because I think these are the two best teams kind of heading
• 24:21
  in and I think what we'll give Philly the edge in the end is again
• 24:27
  kind of what I was emphasizing earlier, is that the Phillies pitching staff is
• 24:32
  really underrated in between having Wheeler sitting at the top and even though Nola had
• 24:38
  a pretty poor roto Fantasy season, he won a bunch of games and just
• 24:45
  kind of is that type of pitcher that, like I think, can shine
• 24:48
  in the moment. He's obviously playing for a contract and so he could be
• 24:52
  making himself millions and millions of dollars with a nice run. We'll cover this
• 24:59
  guy a little bit one of our next sections. Ryan Kirkering is fantastic looking.
• 25:03
  He could go on a k Rod like run and then that's not even
• 25:07
  counting Sir Anthony Dominguez and Craig Kimberrell and Soto and Taiwan Walker is gonna be
• 25:15
  in the mix here along with Ranger Suarez, and I just like the different
• 25:19
  mixes of that pitching. The one downfall of like what I could see holding
• 25:25
  the Phillies back is the defense. But the star Bats are just like Trey
• 25:30
  Turner, Bryce Harper, Kyle Schwarber, even Bryce and Scott Alec Bohm,
• 25:34
  like these are Sastiano's. Yeah, these guys have all been there over the
• 25:40
  past year and so they I think they know what they're doing and they'd have
• 25:45
  just the cold blooded kind of nature to be able to move the way through
• 25:49
  this playoff run. Yeah, I think that the Phillies are one of those
• 25:52
  teams if if you look at teams, I'm not going to say that they're
• 25:56
  the most complete team necessarily, but they are one of the more dynamic teams.
• 26:02
  And so I could you know, if they get hot, and I
• 26:04
  think, like I said to your point, if they beat the Braves,
• 26:07
  I think they're coasting from there, Like, I think that that gives them
• 26:11
  what they need, shows them who they can be, and they just fly.
• 26:15
  I think that's really what it comes down to is they could get hotter
• 26:18
  than almost anybody else in the playoffs, and really sometimes all it comes down
• 26:22
  to in the playoffs is who's going to be hot long enough to make it
• 26:23
  to make it as the series. Yeah, exactly, And so I hinted
• 26:27
  at this with the Irian Kirkering mensine there, and I just the mouthfeel of
• 26:33
  Orion Kirkering is great. I like saying that a lot. But our section
• 26:37
  for the back end of this pod, we're going to fuse the cards and
• 26:41
  categories together and we're going to go over guys who we think could see boosts
• 26:47
  and value from this playoff run and be looking to add them for fancy purposes
• 26:52
  or investing in them from a card perspective. So we'll be back with that
• 26:59
  in a little bit. But we wanted to dive into some more news because
• 27:02
  we have been covering what I think has been one of the bigger stories that's
• 27:07
  really come out of Baseball cards in recent memory, and that is the Bowman
• 27:10
  Chrome super Fractor fiasco fiasco. Yet well, I will say I will already
• 27:18
  gave voice to all of the conspiracy theorists out there that are thinking that if
• 27:25
  Okay, also rewind it if you haven't listened to the past few pods that
• 27:30
  Bowman Chrome has been discovered that in the Prospects set there have been duplicate super
• 27:36
  fractors, which is the one of one gold vinyl parallels of each of the
• 27:40
  cards in there. It's only affecting the non auto versions of the Prospect cards.
• 27:45
  And so this week TOPS admitted that there are two super fractors of every
• 27:52
  Prospect card out there. So I think the most significant one affected by this
• 27:56
  is going to be the Ethan Sallas first Bowman Chrome Prospect card which is out
• 28:02
  there, so he's going to be the biggest guy from a set. And
• 28:04
  so what TOPS did was they decided to essentially put out a bounty for each
• 28:11
  one of these super fractors and are paying well and excess of market value to
• 28:15
  be able to reel one in. So if you open one, you can
• 28:21
  and you get one of these super fractors, you can go on tops dot
• 28:25
  com and be able to apply and say you claim that that bounty and then
• 28:30
  you would send into the superfractor top sends you the money. Then the other
• 28:34
  one would still exist somewhere out in the market because TOPS will hopefully only allow
• 28:40
  one to be claimed for each card, and so it's gonna add just another
• 28:47
  interesting twist to all this. I think it does finally put everything kind of
• 28:51
  to bed, although I kind of I don't know, I could see this
• 28:55
  going a lot different ways, as this could also be screwed up again,
• 28:59
  but should kind of put some resolution on these cards. And honestly, like,
• 29:03
  I think it's gonna push a little bit of what I was saying last
• 29:06
  week, that like, now is the time to open twenty twenty three Bowmen
• 29:08
  Chrome because these bounties will make it worth it if you get to one of
• 29:12
  these super fractors. Yeah, and I don't think you mentioned the actual the
• 29:18
  level of the bounties. No, I figured you were ready for that.
• 29:22
  I'm ready. Yeah, you indicator that they are high. I mean you
• 29:25
  look at just I'm gonna say, any old prospect not a first something like
• 29:27
  that, they're like three thousand dollars bounty they're putting out, and that those
• 29:32
  you know, super fractors generally are two three hundred dollars for those prospects that
• 29:37
  aren't first, and so you're talking like a ten x on those. But
• 29:42
  you know, let's let's look at Ethan Sallas, the number one guy in
• 29:45
  this in this series. They put a buy back bounty on them of seventy
• 29:51
  five thousand dollars. That is insane. And I was looking at the list
• 29:55
  and they've already had four of the group that have been purchased back by Tops
• 30:00
  fanatics, so you know, people are turning this in. I also saw
• 30:04
  some controversy of you know, cards that were bought at eBay getting like intercepted
• 30:10
  in the mail because people were you know, trying to recall their mail and
• 30:14
  things like that. So it's going to cause a little little tiff here and
• 30:17
  there, especially if anything is like I said, out on eBay. But
• 30:22
  and I did see that. I'll have to find the exact details, but
• 30:25
  I do remember it was there was one that was sold for just a few
• 30:30
  hundred bucks on eBay, and then when the bounty came out like it was
• 30:33
  in, it was after the auction had ended, so it was like in
• 30:37
  between the period of when it was supposed to ship and the bounty came out
• 30:41
  and put I think like a three thousand dollars price on the card, and
• 30:44
  so the seller was a jerk and canceled the order pulled it back from the
• 30:48
  mail because obviously it was worth you know, about twenty times what he had
• 30:53
  just sold it for. I've also seen another story of that happening and the
• 30:59
  buyer actually sending it on with like a note that told the the seller sending
• 31:03
  it on to the buyer with a note saying, hey, like, here's
• 31:07
  where you redeem it, and here's how you you do it. Congrats on
• 31:11
  this huge windfall that like, so you'll see a break both ways, and
• 31:15
  that's I think that's also a little bit of like a reflection on the hobby
• 31:21
  that feels like people are very black and white and that like, yeah,
• 31:23
  some people do the right thing and then some people just do the totally wrong
• 31:29
  thing all the time. It's kind of like the MVP buyback of last year
• 31:32
  on steroids. Uh So it's it's interesting to see that. But I think
• 31:37
  the interesting thing overall in this like, uh, you know, I saw
• 31:40
  some conspiracy theorists like ah fanatics tops they did this on purpose to greet publicity,
• 31:45
  Like I don't believe that they did in any way, shape or form
• 31:48
  that said, this move is brilliant from them, Like the this is the
• 31:53
  only way I could conceivingly see them like all of a sudden, creating hype
• 32:00
  for their product and for their mistake. They put massive amount of money out
• 32:04
  of what needs to come back, but it's nothing compared to the number of
• 32:07
  boxes of these cards that they're gonna sell over people chasing these cards. And
• 32:13
  it also saves face two degrees say yes, we did mess up, but
• 32:15
  they are now by buying them back, they are kind of resetting the market
• 32:19
  to where it would be. So ten years from now, when Ethan Sallas
• 32:22
  is in the middle of a Hall of Fame career, there's not a controversy
• 32:27
  of two superfractors out there of his first So I think that this was probably
• 32:31
  the best move that they could have possibly made in this scenario of the other
• 32:36
  movie Don't do it to start with, yeah, and I mean, I
• 32:40
  will admit that it does raise my eyebrows a little bit now that this has
• 32:45
  happened two straight years after the MVP buyback being determined last year, because they
• 32:52
  didn't put those short print refractors of Julio and Wander, which is kind of
• 32:57
  funny and retro. They have the playbook out of this point and so like
• 33:00
  it is a little suspicious from that that, Like, I guess it is
• 33:05
  a little bit of like the opposite that they accidentally put two in. But
• 33:08
  there is only so many times you can go to this well as gimmick before
• 33:13
  it really confounds everything, And so I'll let this might be the last one
• 33:17
  though, Like if there is another sort of screw up on that level of
• 33:22
  not including the rookie short prints or of sending out dupe superfractors, then I
• 33:28
  think, what else can you do? Is this? Is this like print
• 33:30
  two guys on the same card, like miscut it so badly there's like two
• 33:34
  cards on one. I don't I don't know what else that they can screw
• 33:37
  up if you don't include something, you include double it, Like I mean,
• 33:40
  I guess it's just a repeat of that, right, Like yeah,
• 33:45
  of that version of either forgetting to include something or including too much of something.
• 33:49
  The only other thing I say is like massive, terribly holding control on
• 33:52
  like the most sought after cards, like right, it's the first of Ethan
• 33:57
  Sallas. It literally it's so of center that the like the first is barely
• 34:00
  printed, like that's you know, it's like, well, why why do
• 34:04
  we even want this? It just looks dreadful, so which is probably why
• 34:07
  they print too. Yeah, if goes wrong, they're they're not stuck in
• 34:10
  that situation. All right, Well, we'll see if that goes anywhere else.
• 34:15
  I expect it to go somewhere else, especially if word breaks so that
• 34:21
  one of the Salas refractors being redeemed that like, it will be interesting to
• 34:25
  see kind of where the market for the other one goes, because does it
• 34:29
  make the other one even worth more because it's already got a seventy five thousand
• 34:34
  dollar floor. But there are plenty of breakers, I'm sure out there already
• 34:37
  buying up all the twenty twenty three Bowman Chrome stock and trying to hunt this
• 34:42
  down, because I think that's exactly where this is kind of headed, because
• 34:46
  like those people or breakers in general, have like just the wherewithal to buy
• 34:52
  the boxes and then will want the bigger bounties on these. So it is
• 34:57
  a little sad from that perspective, But I'm also not terribly heartbroken because I'm
• 35:01
  not the biggest Bowman Chrome person. So yeah, this has not changed my
• 35:06
  approach to Bowman Chrome whatsoever. I have not bought into the breaks or anything
• 35:10
  like that, So yeah, it's interesting to watch them far on this one.
• 35:15
  Yeah, I agree. And then there was another piece of crazy baseball
• 35:19
  card news that broke this week that again like it's almost like a once in
• 35:23
  like a decade sort of thing, and it broke on Reddit in regards to
• 35:30
  some Jackson Merrill cards and brew. I'll let you break it down and tell
• 35:34
  the listeners what's going on with Jackson Merrill and his Panini immaculate cards. Yeah,
• 35:38
  so Jackson Merrill Paninia a mac that which, first of all, I
• 35:44
  love the immaculate set. There's always a very very good set, thick cards,
• 35:47
  wonderful patches, clean autos minus a sticker aspect to a degree on some
• 35:52
  of them. But this is the number nine prospect in all of baseball for
• 35:58
  the Padres. And there was somebody that was working in an apartment complex where
• 36:05
  a number of minor league players are housed. And as the story goes,
• 36:10
  this guy was going to check on the trash compactor and there's a number of
• 36:15
  boxes of things messing it up, and so he was trying to clear it
• 36:17
  out and he found what appears to be three or four boxes of cards just
• 36:24
  sitting there, and you know, he didn't know anything about the cards,
• 36:29
  and so he you know, opens him up, takes a look at it,
• 36:32
  posts it on on Reddit and says, hey, what's going on?
• 36:36
  And they turn out to be all Jackson Merrill cards that were sent to Jackson
• 36:40
  Mary Merrill for his autograph, and so it is the entire redemption lot of
• 36:46
  Jackson Merril cards. Why they were there? Did Jackson Merrill put him there?
• 36:52
  It was his agent or somebody that's you know, club He's supposed to
• 36:54
  get them to him and was moving and left them somewhere. Nobody really knows.
• 37:00
  But the other funny thing about this is it wasn't just the cards.
• 37:02
  These are sticker autos, so all of the official Panini stickers that anybody could
• 37:07
  sign. And I was seeing jokes of well, looks like you just had
• 37:09
  all the show tany autos that you need for the rest of your life,
• 37:14
  like you have all these official stickers for that. So, you know,
• 37:19
  I haven't really seen I couldn't really find what happened was the resolution. I
• 37:22
  did see on x Twitter that one of the bigger breakers out there, Midwest
• 37:29
  box breaks, have been in contact with some family of Merrill that had pitched
• 37:32
  out and was trying to help essentially broker a deal to get the cards back
• 37:37
  to where they need to be. I did not see the, like I
• 37:39
  said, the resolution of that, so it looks like there was still some
• 37:42
  attempt to get back. But there's also a lot of people reaching out to
• 37:45
  purchase this lot, which is very interesting. So that's a big, big
• 37:51
  staff foo on Panini's part to let something like that get out there. And
• 37:54
  at the end of the day, now we know why some redemptions do not
• 37:59
  ultimately fulfilled because they're in the trash. And I really wish I knew what
• 38:04
  the the requirement is the you know, the payment they get comes to be,
• 38:10
  So I don't know, Like, what's what's the thoughts that you have
• 38:15
  on the Jackson Merrill experience? Well from the Reddit thread, I also enjoy
• 38:22
  that the one of the jokes that like was going on was just that like,
• 38:30
  well, obviously it's the easiest rainbow that you could ever put together the
• 38:35
  craziest patches, Like I can't only imagine looking into that box and seeing all
• 38:39
  the patches in terms of how they're all cut, and like all the printing
• 38:45
  plates were there as well, that like it's every single card from the realm
• 38:51
  of immaculate. So it's just really fantastic to see them all together like that,
• 38:54
  even though they're unsigned. So that's I think you can always like imagine
• 39:00
  that in your head, like when you are pulling these autos, and like
• 39:02
  it's just kind of cool to see that behind the scenes of like all the
• 39:07
  stuff all together at once. In the reddit thread, there was actually an
• 39:10
  eaty person that reached out to the original posters, so I have a feeling
• 39:15
  that they'll be negotiating to get this back at the end of the day.
• 39:20
  But my favorite part of the reddit thread is definitely that somebody posted that I
• 39:24
  think it was one of the twenty five autos is on eBay right now,
• 39:29
  like one of the redemptions, and so somebody was like, well, I
• 39:31
  wouldn't bid on this because you're not getting this redemption I've seen, and so
• 39:37
  it is funny to like also see that those mechanics work through as you explained
• 39:43
  that, you know, we see a little bit of the inner workings of
• 39:45
  how these cards are sent and just what fiascos can be created when things aren't
• 39:52
  followed through in a complete manner. So y, I think it's great.
• 39:57
  I think it's great and you're right. The scene through is actually most of
• 40:00
  the letter that he was sent to him that has the details of it.
• 40:02
  And I don't know if you caught this, but I think this was one
• 40:05
  of the most interesting things about this whole thing was in the letter, it
• 40:08
  says, here's how many cards you have? Ninety nine cards of this,
• 40:12
  including extras for damages. So if something happens is an extra card, which
• 40:15
  we also have kind of talked about the pod before about how a lot of
• 40:19
  times players get extras of their cards they signed for their personal collections. But
• 40:22
  what I thought was really interesting is you get down to the printing plates on
• 40:27
  this and it, you know, says one card the you know, prospect
• 40:30
  patch autograph printing plate, you know, magenta yellow, whatever, including extras
• 40:35
  for damages. The one of one printing plates have extras for damages, please
• 40:42
  explain, you know. I know that they probably have multiple printing plates and
• 40:46
  things like that, but it kind of takes, you know, points out
• 40:49
  the fact that like these really aren't one of one by any shape or form.
• 40:52
  They probably was like the production proof printing plate, and then they used
• 40:55
  a whole other one which just is completely destroyed with it. But I thought
• 41:00
  that was really interesting that all the one on ones had extras for damages,
• 41:04
  so they're not really once of ones. That's why you have two super fractors.
• 41:07
  Yeah, and I don't like you did mention that there's speculation on who
• 41:13
  threw these cards out that I will say. One of the things that doesn't
• 41:15
  help Jackson Merrill is in the threat they also Mike shilt a personal letter from
• 41:21
  Mike Shildt is included in the box of like the trash stuff that the person
• 41:25
  found. Because Jackson Merrill, if you recall, back in the spring,
• 41:30
  he was pretty close to making the club out of camp, like according to
• 41:36
  a j preller and media reports, because he had a crazy camp down in
• 41:40
  Arizona, and so Mike Schiltz letter was praising him for that, and it
• 41:45
  is really I don't know how like his agent would have a hole of that
• 41:50
  or like kind of how that got mixed in. But it's another funny piece
• 41:53
  of memory. But it feels like it was kind of like a moving company
• 41:57
  or something right like he had left, you know, the for the season,
• 42:00
  and hired a moving company to clear out the apartment for wherever he's going
• 42:05
  to be next and they're like, Eh, don't really need this stuff?
• 42:07
  Yea, yeah, Okay, Well, what other new sets do we have
• 42:15
  coming out? I know we didn't update last week, but there's a few
• 42:19
  new ones on the dockets. I'll let you run through what we've got coming
• 42:22
  out over the next few weeks from a perspective, we'll do the quick run
• 42:27
  through here. So coming out about a week from now on the eleventh,
• 42:30
  we have Tops Update. We also also have a Penninia Select for those of
• 42:34
  these who are the non licensed Select product. Also have Leaf Exotic coming out
• 42:39
  on ten thirteen. I'm not a big Leaf guy necessarily, but it's an
• 42:45
  interesting set. And then we were wrapping things up, as we've talked about
• 42:49
  a few times on here about ten eighteen, how in the world Tops is
• 42:52
  putting out three products, let alone three pretty good products on the eighteen.
• 42:58
  On the eighteen Tops Protein Debut, great entry level product if you have not
• 43:02
  ripped Tops proteybut I strongly recommend it. Hobby boxes usually like fifty bucks,
• 43:08
  some good color, some really good young names. So that's a fun one.
• 43:13
  Tops Tier one also another fantastic product. Kind of quality does actually kind
• 43:16
  of remind me a little bit of immaculate to a certain degree. And then
• 43:22
  a fan favorite of this pod, top Stadium Club, is also coming out
• 43:23
  on the eighteenth. I know at least one of us has already purchased a
• 43:27
  few of those boxes on pre order. The other was alarm did not go
• 43:30
  off and happened to miss them. So we'll be uh, we'll have to
• 43:36
  have a discussion of how the results of those go when you open your boxes
• 43:38
  later and I'm looking on the secondary market. Yeah, it'll be good to
• 43:43
  open those one crying over my twins and Phillies losing the first round in the
• 43:46
  playoffs, well yeah, that's good. That's gonna be an interesting thing to
• 43:53
  go through. So I our picks may be questionable. At least the Phillies
• 43:58
  at this point are a three to zero in there in their game's night,
• 44:00
  so okay. At least you're not an aj Puck's pitch in the fifth so
• 44:04
  who knows what happens from here, So okay, Well, like I said,
• 44:07
  we'll be back with some of the discussion on what investments will be making
• 44:14
  from cards and fantasy perspective and going through those players as we think they could
• 44:20
  have some hot playoff runs ahead of them. Stick around, Welcome back everybody
• 44:40
  to cards and categories, and we're going to go through some players that we
• 44:45
  really like for the upcoming playoff run to invest in from either a fantasy dynasty
• 44:51
  perspective or from a baseball card perspective. So these are guys that we think
• 44:57
  that their values are going to be going up as things happened in the playoffs.
• 45:00
  And I think what really inspired this was, especially during twenty twenty Randy
• 45:07
  Rose Arena. That run that he had took him from an absolute nobody to
• 45:13
  a superstar overnight and caused his card values, especially to shoot through the roof.
• 45:17
  And I think from a dynasty perspective, moved him from somebody no one
• 45:22
  had on any of their boards to such an easy like top forty asset just
• 45:29
  boom like that at the snap of a finger. So I don't think any
• 45:32
  of our guys are maybe going to have a Randy Arosa arena setting an all
• 45:37
  time record and hits run in them. But I think a lot of these
• 45:42
  guys we've actually covered here and there in other dynasty perspectives is suggesting guys that
• 45:49
  we're looking at, So I think they'll be a little crossover there. But
• 45:52
  in general, we like their skills, we like their situations, and we
• 45:55
  like their ability to bloom into bigger players, either from a fantasy perspective or
• 46:00
  an investment perspective. For cards, Yeah, I think most of these players
• 46:05
  we're gonna be talking about are on the younger side. I really think with
• 46:08
  the playoffs for both fantasy and collecting, a good playoff run can up the
• 46:15
  value regardless across those two disciplines. But the bigger swings are gonna happen with
• 46:22
  those younger guys that are still establishing themselves and like burst onto the stage to
• 46:28
  your point a la Randy Rose arena. A Rose arena also had something going
• 46:32
  from which one of the best autos in all of baseball, uh, one
• 46:37
  of the prettiest signatures that can be found in the card. So he had
• 46:42
  two things going for him. But the other thing, specifically to I'm gonna
• 46:46
  say card collecting doesn't play at all on fantasy is also personality, and that
• 46:52
  is really on the true stage on the playoffs. When you are on you
• 46:57
  know, network television, national television, or you know most of the games,
• 47:00
  you're in the spotlight. Playing well and having personality is going to play
• 47:06
  a big role as well. So those are the kind of things that we'll
• 47:08
  be working through. So with that, let's jump in. Who do you
• 47:13
  have A was one of your first picks here of intrigue to look at the
• 47:19
  in the playoffs. So yeah, I know I opened this way explaining these
• 47:22
  are guys that we're looking to a buying because we see their stock going up.
• 47:29
  But I think my first pick is actually a little bit of a buying
• 47:32
  opportunity because I think his stock might dip a little bit. And that is
• 47:37
  Junior Camonaro from the race that between his seven games down the stretch when he
• 47:45
  was called up and really like I can't believe that he came up from Double
• 47:50
  A to join the Rays here at the end of the season and he started
• 47:53
  today in their playoff game batted ninth. That the last week of the season
• 48:00
  and maybe just some poor performance in the playoffs here could put a little bit
• 48:06
  of a dent into a stock as people just kind of have that bad taste
• 48:10
  in their mouth that they don't see the rise of stardom that Randy Rose Arena
• 48:15
  had. But if anybody is going to be giving any inches to you from
• 48:20
  a fantasy see perspective, because of that on Junior and Camanaro, I would
• 48:22
  be buying that. He obviously flew to the top of lots of people's Dynasty
• 48:28
  boards and became the top five, top ten, top three asset and a
• 48:31
  lot of people's lists. And you can see why from the season they produced
• 48:36
  in eighty one games down double A this year he slashed three h nine,
• 48:39
  three seventy three, five forty eight. The slug is crazy, that five
• 48:44
  forty eight. That's good for a one forty WRC plus as a nineteen year
• 48:49
  old. So he's really come on and it's the age to level that has
• 48:53
  really shown what he can do. And the Rays, I trust our track
• 48:59
  record of bringing eyes like this up with Obviously Wander Franco went a different way,
• 49:04
  but you can't deny the talent that he had in the bat and I
• 49:07
  think I liked that here with Junior, camer and Arrow going forward that he
• 49:10
  should be able to solidify a spot at probably third base next year. And
• 49:16
  you can see how much the Rays even like Cameron Arrow compared to Curtis Mead
• 49:20
  as they kind of jerked Curtis Meat around that they've just kind of given Cameron
• 49:24
  a full run to being able to take a spot for himself. And so
• 49:30
  because of like all those factors, I if anybody sees, you know that
• 49:35
  two thirty five batting average down the stretch from camer and Arrow in the major
• 49:38
  leagues and a little bit iffy on him, I would be buying all day
• 49:43
  because his k rate even when he had those thirty six plate appearances down the
• 49:47
  stretch was twenty two percent, and all of the hard hit data looks really
• 49:52
  really good. Yeah, I think you have a really good point there,
• 49:58
  Camin Yarrow. I think you know he unfortunately has only played appearance today he
• 50:01
  struck out as in a pinchhit appearance. But he is a young young kid
• 50:08
  playing at a very very high level, and there's a lot to like about
• 50:14
  what he has done and the way he's handled himself. And I think you
• 50:16
  make a really good call. With the way the Rays are trusting him,
• 50:21
  that says a lot. They have taken a few good prospects. I'm gonna
• 50:24
  say Nate Low, brand Low, Chris Mead and a few others that they
• 50:31
  really Josh Low. How many Lows can we put on the Rays, by
• 50:36
  the way, and some of them Low Low, So it's it's it's it
• 50:44
  says something when they fully invested in the other thing. I think it's interesting
• 50:47
  and it does tie into the Wander Franco situation here is he actually played shortstop
• 50:52
  and third base in his short time up there, and so it'll be interesting
• 50:57
  to see where he he ultimately lands. Does he end up getting more time
• 51:04
  at short does he get more time at third? Does he end up splitting
• 51:07
  a little bit as you know there's the team gets healthier, maybe Wander does
• 51:10
  somehow make it back. I don't know. So you know clearly that they're
• 51:15
  trusting him in the thick of the playoff race and a really important spot,
• 51:21
  and you know, I have to think that you're not going to have anybody
• 51:25
  holding him back next year. So it might take a year or two from
• 51:30
  really grow into things, but especially from a dynasty format, you gotta love
• 51:32
  Junior Kevin Yarro, Yeah, absolutely, And his first cards came out in
• 51:39
  the Bowman set, just regular Bowman that came out this year, so he
• 51:43
  was in the Prospects set. So there should still be twenty twenty three bowmen
• 51:47
  around to rip if you want to look for some Junior Caman arrows and my
• 51:53
  favorite cards of his that came out of that set. Even though I have
• 51:58
  emphasized a few times a nine huge of the twenty three Bowman this year is
• 52:02
  just his base autograph. His base autograph is nice. It's a picture of
• 52:06
  him kind of being ready to feel the ball, and he's got a pretty
• 52:10
  decent signature that The price on his base autograph, his chrome autograph is running
• 52:15
  two hundred to two fifty right now. It fluctuates a lot depending on kind
• 52:20
  of the different auction and who's selling it and the timing and stuff. So
• 52:24
  I don't that is maybe a little pricey, but if it started dipping below
• 52:30
  two hundred, I think that's a good place to invest. But my favorite
• 52:34
  card of his is actually the Sparkle Refractor that I love the sparkle refractors from
• 52:37
  Bom and Chrome this year with the it looks like glitter but like rainbow glitter.
• 52:44
  On the card. It's number to two hundred and ninety nine, and
• 52:49
  that one's selling roughly around one hundred bucks, like some of them have been
• 52:53
  down in sixty some have been up to one twenty and so I think that's
• 52:57
  a nice little card to invest in, a little rareer than the base refractor
• 53:02
  and gets you a nice numbered card. Yeah, I think that those are
• 53:07
  both great, great picks. You know how I feel about Bowen first,
• 53:14
  So that's where where I would go with a guy like junior Cameron Hierrow that
• 53:17
  said, now is probably not the time to be grabbing his his first.
• 53:22
  You know, those those really spike at the DEBUTU and then they slowly come
• 53:27
  back down. So I think, you know, waiting to pick up something
• 53:32
  else or pay we picked that up in the off season probably is the way
• 53:37
  to go. Okay, well, let's move on to our next guy,
• 53:42
  and he you want to talk about spiking, I'm guessing he's probably spiking a
• 53:45
  little bit right now as he HOMEERD twice today for the Twins, and that
• 53:50
  is royce Lewis. As we expounded the virtues of royce Lewis when we were
• 53:55
  going through second half breakouts last week. So there's lots of things that we
• 54:00
  really like in this profile and like from him going forward. Obviously it's going
• 54:05
  to be a matter of health, but I think this offseason will be big
• 54:08
  for him to prove that and brew. What are your favorite aspects of Ryce
• 54:13
  Lewis and kind of where do you think his levels can be going into twenty
• 54:16
  twenty four. Yeah, Royce Lewis is showing everything and more than really what
• 54:22
  we thought he could be. The power I think is just I don't say
• 54:30
  come out of nowhere, because it didn't really come out of nowhere, but
• 54:32
  he's showing much more game power than I thought he was going to be at
• 54:37
  this point, especially with all the health issues that he had, So it's
• 54:43
  it's going to be interesting to see how much that that stays up. But
• 54:45
  I really think that he is one of those guys that can hit for average,
• 54:50
  can hit for power. He's not going to be necessarily lighting the base
• 54:54
  pass up, but he could, you know, give you a double digit
• 54:58
  steals and so very very very well rounded profile. And he's one of those
• 55:02
  that since he doesn't hurt you anywhere and he's going to be above average in
• 55:05
  probably three categories, that's really really exciting. So I just released my top
• 55:13
  one hundred hitters for twenty twenty four and had him in the early second half
• 55:19
  of the top one hundred, but definitely with some some room to grow at
• 55:22
  that point. So I really like Ryce Lewis. He may be taking out
• 55:28
  all of the potential profit for next year with the way that he started the
• 55:31
  playoffs. That is the one The danger with guys doing this in the playoffs
• 55:37
  is that they actually overhype themselves. So that'll that'll be interesting to see,
• 55:43
  you know. I translate this to cards. I know you have a card
• 55:49
  that you were like of Lewis, but I'm just going to call out a
• 55:52
  card of Lewis, not because I like it, just because I find it
• 55:54
  kind of funny. The twenty twenty two Top Platte Royce Lewis, so for
• 56:00
  those that don't know, Top Platinum for whatever reason, comes out like insanely
• 56:07
  late, comes out like the wrong year. Essentially, it just came out
• 56:09
  on a month or so ago. And if you look at the Royce Lewis
• 56:14
  card there, this is like the yearbook photo as a kid, and you
• 56:20
  go, why did they pick that photo? And this is just dreadful a
• 56:25
  picture of Royce Lewis. I don't know how to describe it. We're gonna
• 56:29
  link to it in the in the right up. But it is not the
• 56:32
  most flattering photo. It's not an action photo. These are more of those
• 56:37
  posed images and I can't describe it. It's just it is not a flattering
• 56:43
  photo, and I just find it hilarious that that Rookie card out there is,
• 56:49
  you know, probably going for five bucks each at this point, and
• 56:52
  they are something to behold. So, Mike, what about you? What
• 56:57
  do you think about royce Lewis's cards? Which one would be you'd be looking
• 57:00
  for. I'm looking at it from a hilarity perspective. One of the cards.
• 57:06
  It's just kind of funny to look at. What about you something that
• 57:08
  actually is interesting beyond the unfortunate picture that I found. So rayce Lewis,
• 57:15
  I'd like his Rookie cards from twenty twenty two. He's got lots of pretty
• 57:21
  cheap ones. They're very affordable because he came out an update and Pops Chrome
• 57:24
  Update or like his base as well as his Bowman Chrome Rookie is also pretty
• 57:34
  good looking. It's a lot more dynamic than the Platinum Anniversary when you're talking
• 57:37
  about and it looks pretty good in the Bowman Chrome Sapphire as well when you
• 57:40
  get the blue, kind of mixing with the twins. Overall, though,
• 57:45
  a lot of his cards are kind of boring because it uses this like really
• 57:50
  undynamic stance of like him standing in the box and so I don't like some
• 57:57
  of those cards that have been produced of him that have that, but one
• 58:00
  that I do like, and it actually mixes it up because it's one of
• 58:02
  the only cards that has him in a Red Twigs jersey, which is a
• 58:07
  nice little twist, but it also celebrates his first home run, which is
• 58:12
  was a Grand Slam, and as we discussed last week, Royce Lewis is
• 58:15
  the Grand Slam like champion after being the quickest of five Grand Slams in a
• 58:20
  career, but his first homer was a Grand Slam. Tops Now produced a
• 58:24
  card of it in twenty twenty two and it trades, you know, somewhere
• 58:29
  between five and eight bucks, so it's really affordable. I really like it
• 58:31
  that between the link of Grand Slams with Bryce Lewis the red jersey, I
• 58:37
  think it's probably the best one that you can pick up from his twenty twenty
• 58:40
  two sets. Yeah, I think Roch Lewis does have something working against him
• 58:45
  that he has had some injury issues in the minors and so he just doesn't
• 58:47
  have as many games and therefore tops is cou watched as many good game photos
• 58:52
  of him, and so they've maybe collect against the bottom barrel lad is a
• 58:57
  very nice to tops now card all right, who's your next guy on the
• 59:00
  list that you're thinking return some value for us, either fantasy or card wise
• 59:05
  with the playoffs? Okay, and this guy still has a few days before
• 59:08
  he can really ruin it for us because he's on the Astros and has the
• 59:13
  buy games, so you can get in on some investments now. And that's
• 59:17
  Jan your Diaz, the catcher from the Astros, and I really like him
• 59:22
  going forward, partly because Martin Maldonado isn't signed for twenty twenty four right now.
• 59:28
  I would kind of expect the Astros to bring him back in some capacity.
• 59:31
  But Diaz started picking up more at bats down the stretch at catcher DH
• 59:37
  first base as they tried to get his bat into line theum, which is
• 59:40
  really easy to see why. You know, he put up a one to
• 59:44
  twenty seven WRC plus on the year. He's only in his year twenty four
• 59:49
  season. He turned twenty five just on September twenty first, not very long
• 59:54
  ago at all. And again this is another guy where all the bad ball
• 59:59
  data looks really, really fantastic. He's got a forty four percent hard hit
• 1:00:02
  percentage. A twelve percent barrel rate and he was able to craft twenty three
• 1:00:08
  homers in the year. It really helps that he's hitten towards the Crawford boxes
• 1:00:14
  that I think this is a guy that could be just a really, really
• 1:00:17
  fantastic catcher, and honestly, he already was. He put up a two
• 1:00:22
  eighty two, three zero eight, five thirty eight line with twenty three homers,
• 1:00:25
  fifty one runs and sixty RBI, which doesn't sound like much, but
• 1:00:30
  when you're talking catcher, that's a really fantastic line. And it was free.
• 1:00:34
  Like when I was writing my Waiver Wire articles all year, it took
• 1:00:39
  until late July for him to be owned enough for me to not mention him
• 1:00:45
  every week, and he just kept blasting homer after homer after homer. That
• 1:00:50
  Yan Yourdeaz, I think has a really bright future down in Houston. And
• 1:00:54
  when they were kind of going through the past few deadlines, they made sure
• 1:01:00
  to stick with him, you know, they didn't deal him away when he
• 1:01:02
  was doing pretty well down in h A double A, triple A, and
• 1:01:07
  they wrote them all the way through the miners that I think there's something the
• 1:01:10
  Astros really like about Diaz going forward. And so do I. I would
• 1:01:15
  be buying at a pretty decent price in dynasties right now because I don't know.
• 1:01:20
  I think there's probably owners out there who don't believe the season and think
• 1:01:25
  that don't that he can't get that number of at bats again. But I
• 1:01:30
  think he's going to be in line for warn next year. I think you're
• 1:01:34
  right. And I was looking into him as I was putting together rankings early
• 1:01:38
  early for twenty four here, and I was just surprised because he was a
• 1:01:44
  guy that I was not heavily on. Clearly did not read enough waiver wire
• 1:01:49
  articles mid season. But if you just look under the covers, he just
• 1:01:53
  there's not something that jumps out of Hey he got some certain look hey,
• 1:01:59
  or something like that. It was just very solid there. Like I said,
• 1:02:02
  there wasn't There's not a part of his game that's really great. There's
• 1:02:06
  not a part of the game that's really bad. He does have some pretty
• 1:02:08
  decent power that will play to your point, He's in a great ballpark for
• 1:02:13
  for his swing. So yeah, I think he's cracking the potentially easily the
• 1:02:17
  top ten, if not the top five at catcher. And that's not the
• 1:02:22
  biggest bridge to get there in the catcher market. So that said, I
• 1:02:29
  if you look at the card side of things for jan Ar Diez, I
• 1:02:32
  don't have a specific card to call it, and maybe you do, but
• 1:02:37
  I do think that he's one of the guys that has less upside from a
• 1:02:42
  card perspective. In the playoffs. It really comes down to the position he
• 1:02:46
  plays catcher for for whatever reason, not right or wrong, it does not
• 1:02:52
  seem to garner the same fanfare. Maybe that you don't play every day.
• 1:02:55
  Maybe it's it's hard to show the personality, whatever it may be. But
• 1:03:00
  all the great catchers that we've had over the years, you know, they
• 1:03:05
  those prices do go up, they don't stay up. They're not that significant.
• 1:03:08
  They're the pictures of hitters. If you won't want to say, make
• 1:03:13
  that really really poor analogy. So I like Diaz from a fancy perspective.
• 1:03:20
  I don't think he might get a spike if he has a really good playoffs.
• 1:03:22
  Here a to your point, but I don't think it stays there.
• 1:03:24
  And so he's kind of a cell high candidate in my book. Yeah,
• 1:03:30
  And I think maybe I'm also looking a little bit kind of for the long
• 1:03:34
  run. Here is that that's when catchers value really boosts that like, and
• 1:03:39
  especially I think about with Yanni or Diez, and I'm just kind of looking
• 1:03:45
  at early sal Perez, Like early sal Perez showed a lot of power.
• 1:03:51
  He had probably much better glove than Diez does right now, but similar sort
• 1:03:55
  of aggressive approach. And if that is kind of like trajectory, Dias can
• 1:04:00
  get himself on that. Like, especially what I like doing with guys is
• 1:04:05
  investing a little bit and then if they make like one or two All Star
• 1:04:09
  Games, then moving on. Especially, I think what I like with Diaz
• 1:04:13
  here down the stretch is we didn't move the Astras along in our brackets,
• 1:04:16
  but like the Astras are a pretty good shot of winning the World Series and
• 1:04:20
  then at that point they'll be two underneath his belt. And because he was
• 1:04:27
  technically on the team last year, so there's just a lot of kind of
• 1:04:30
  things going right at the beginning of Yannier Diaz's career here that the prices are
• 1:04:36
  also pretty low. So that's part of it too, is it's EASi invest
• 1:04:40
  in. He came out in sets this year, so he's in Tops Chrome,
• 1:04:44
  he's in Top Series two, and my pick for a card is from
• 1:04:47
  Top Series two. It's a color match with the orange foil of two ninety
• 1:04:51
  nine trade somewhere between fifteen to thirty dollars. I think it's just like a
• 1:04:56
  great color match of getting the orange with the astra and then it creates a
• 1:05:01
  little bit of rarity, so like, it's not the hardest card, hardest
• 1:05:06
  card to get your hands on, but it is a numbered card. So
• 1:05:11
  that's where I'm going to go. Is the Series two orange foil for Yani
• 1:05:14
  r. Diz. Good pick, good pick, and I think you're right,
• 1:05:19
  Yan here is gonna be a fun one to watch. Love much better
• 1:05:23
  in the fantasy world than the card We're world. So all right, I'm
• 1:05:26
  gonna jump on to another guy that I'm actually really high on prior to the
• 1:05:30
  playoffs, but an injury really kept him kind of off the board for a
• 1:05:34
  good part of the second half, which is Josh Young out of Texas and
• 1:05:41
  luckily your brack, he's gonna get to play a lot on like mine.
• 1:05:46
  But Josh Jung, you know, as I look at young hitters, there's
• 1:05:50
  a number of things I look for, but kind of the trifecta of what
• 1:05:55
  I'm kind of looking for are guys that hit the ball heard, guys that
• 1:06:00
  were drafted high, and guys that meet the eye tests like that's very unofficial,
• 1:06:06
  but Jung was a you know, first round pick. He was number
• 1:06:11
  eight overall for the Rangers. He hits the ball very hard. He's top
• 1:06:16
  quarter league and hard hit barrel rates X of l X, slugging, all
• 1:06:21
  of those things. Uh ninety eighth percentile in the sweet spot utilization. Uh
• 1:06:28
  there, does not have the best i'd say plate patients, but I think
• 1:06:33
  that that's something that can still develop over time because he's still young figuring things
• 1:06:36
  out. So, you know, across just over five hundred plate appearances this
• 1:06:45
  this season, you know, he did blast twenty three homers and he is
• 1:06:49
  an all fields hitter. He really does spray the ball very very well,
• 1:06:56
  and that's actually improved from you know, his rookie debut last year. And
• 1:07:01
  he's shown really good line drive rates. So again, just a really good
• 1:07:08
  ballplayer, and he's he's one of those guys that just get a little luck
• 1:07:13
  in the baby category, put a little extra launch angle on things, and
• 1:07:16
  it's not would not be a shock to see him hitting thirty thirty five home
• 1:07:23
  runs in the middle of that Texas lineup for a number of years. So
• 1:07:27
  I really really like Josh Jung. I'm going to be higher on him than
• 1:07:31
  most. And I think he despite a little high strikeout rate, I think
• 1:07:38
  that's going to improve as he's still you know, he's just twenty five.
• 1:07:41
  So I love Josh Jung. I think, you know, he it'll take,
• 1:07:45
  you know, just a few good games in the playoffs for him to
• 1:07:47
  be uncovered as a potential gym and fantasy So, yeah, do you think
• 1:07:56
  about Jung? I agree there too, And a part of it is that
• 1:08:00
  I think with that injury late in the season, it kind of captis production
• 1:08:04
  and so it kept him from hitting that vaunted thirty home run milestone. So
• 1:08:11
  I think that will suppress his value a little bit in drafts, that he
• 1:08:15
  came through the miners with a shoulder injury and just kind of has a little
• 1:08:20
  bit of that tracker gurd of being injury prone. But I don't know if
• 1:08:26
  I chalk it up to that that like if it would had been another shoulder
• 1:08:30
  injury, I would be concerned, but it was a flu kit by pitch
• 1:08:33
  that or no, it was actually in the field right, like he fielded
• 1:08:36
  the ball and broke his hand, and so that's not going to happen terribly
• 1:08:42
  often. This is also a guy that like he's going because of that k
• 1:08:47
  rate. I think he'll also scare people away from that too. But the
• 1:08:50
  power is sogit, so I can easily see him making the argument against something
• 1:08:55
  like I'm really making the argument for him. But if you want to take
• 1:08:58
  things out of context and be like, I mean, the guy hit two
• 1:09:00
  sixty six is he's probably a two forty two hipsy hitter. He strikes out
• 1:09:03
  thirty percent of the time. Yeah, you know, like you can easily
• 1:09:06
  make that case. It's like, oh, he's just getting heliumcause he's been
• 1:09:10
  a great lineup and they made the playoffs. Like, you can make that
• 1:09:13
  case, and I think your point that will cap his his value. He's
• 1:09:18
  he's one of those guys I do not see actually getting a lot of helium
• 1:09:21
  in the offseason, like Royce Lewis, Like, if he has one more
• 1:09:25
  game like this, I'm not gonna buy him at all next year just because
• 1:09:28
  I won't be to Ford the guy and he's he's gonna vaunt right past where
• 1:09:32
  his value actually ends up being. Yeah, And in terms of cards from
• 1:09:38
  Young too. I think what I like is he's also a twenty twenty three
• 1:09:42
  rookie, so he's got cards and tops Chrome. He's got them in all
• 1:09:46
  sorts of sets this year that I don't think you can go wrong. This
• 1:09:50
  is a great pickup, I think. For I know, we poo pooed
• 1:09:55
  the Tops Cosmic Chromes just a total in terms of investing and ripping, but
• 1:10:02
  going and getting a single of a Josh Young card, even like a parallel
• 1:10:06
  of it to match the jersey on his card in the blue, you know
• 1:10:12
  that like that, I think that would be a fun choice. So the
• 1:10:15
  Rangers do have a really good array of jerseys. They have the blue,
• 1:10:18
  they have the red, that they have the white. So like color Manchin
• 1:10:23
  is real fun with the Rangers. Yeah, you can go lots of different
• 1:10:25
  directions, and so I think that's a really fun piece to put on Josh
• 1:10:30
  Young because I think it also is a little bit emblematic of him as a
• 1:10:32
  player that he's almost like a right handed Schwarber that doesn't walk, and so
• 1:10:40
  it's like, yeah, all power cosmic chrome. It looks kind of nice
• 1:10:43
  together. I think if you were to pick out I think he's one of
• 1:10:45
  those ones that it's always fun to look. We talked about pro debut just
• 1:10:49
  briefly earlier. He has a twenty twenty one Tops Pro debut. I'm looking
• 1:10:54
  at the chrome refractor. But he played on the Crawdads and so it is
• 1:10:59
  just a fun you know, they have a fun jersey, he has a
• 1:11:02
  fun card, and that's part of the beauty. Like I said, the
• 1:11:04
  Top Pro debut is kind of a fun product for something like that. So
• 1:11:09
  I think that circling backgrounds, like I plant that just young pro debut cards
• 1:11:15
  are or where they're at. Okay, yeah, all right, you want
• 1:11:18
  to get into some pictures now, Yeah, let's let's jump into pictures.
• 1:11:24
  How about you? How about you pick one to start with. I I
• 1:11:28
  was just went on a Josh Young a soapbox. So who do you want
• 1:11:32
  to start with? Yeah, I'm going to go a little bit unconventional because
• 1:11:36
  obviously we've been talking about some really young prospectee type guys here and I'm going
• 1:11:44
  to go the total other end of the spectrum and pick the forty year old
• 1:11:49
  Justin Verlander actually just because his stock from a fantasy perspective is super low,
• 1:11:57
  and obviously it is skill spaceed as his average fastball has dipped down to about
• 1:12:02
  ninety four, But maybe I'm just also really swayed by that performance he put
• 1:12:11
  up in Seattle the other night in terms of closing out the Parners, and
• 1:12:15
  just he looked vintage. You could tell that the fastball speed in velocity wasn't
• 1:12:23
  there, but Justin Verlander knows how to pitch and was just absolutely working everybody
• 1:12:28
  in that Seattle lineup. I think that he feels really comfortable down in Houston,
• 1:12:32
  and moving out of New York down to Houston. I think he's gonna
• 1:12:36
  He's talked about playing till he's like forty five, and I think he's gonna
• 1:12:41
  really push it. And so I think next year, I don't think you're
• 1:12:45
  gonna see like twenty twenty two Justin Burlander come back, but like what was
• 1:12:50
  wrong with like twenty seventeen Justin Ferlander with the three thirty six RA fifteen wins,
• 1:12:58
  nine and a half K nine. I think he can get back to
• 1:13:00
  a level like that, and he will be at that point like probably that's
• 1:13:08
  probably like what like a top fifteen ish pitcher. I don't think anybody's gonna
• 1:13:13
  be buying him at that level, and so he could be bought as like
• 1:13:16
  a number two and produce maybe number one levels of value because he just has
• 1:13:23
  that motor that wants to push him towards the Hall of Fame and especially and
• 1:13:28
  this gets a little bit into buying from the card perspective too, that if
• 1:13:30
  this astro steamroll here and can like go through the playoffs and win another World
• 1:13:35
  Series, the prices on Justin Verlander cards are also going to skyrocket, you
• 1:13:42
  know, with that second World Series, and he's just gonna enter a different
• 1:13:45
  pantheon of the Hall of Fame if he's able to continue out here in his
• 1:13:49
  career and go a couple more years and maybe add a World Series ring or
• 1:13:53
  two. Yeah, I think he's absolutely a Hall of Famer in my book,
• 1:13:57
  and I think he will be the most most looks. But I think
• 1:14:00
  you're giving a point. I was arguing against it, but it's just like
• 1:14:02
  it's there's a difference from going like it's almost like going from John Smoltz,
• 1:14:06
  Greg Mannox. You know, like there's yeah, are you a first ballot
• 1:14:10
  Hall of Famer or are you just a Hall of Fame? Exactly? There
• 1:14:13
  is there is a difference there, and I think you make a good point
• 1:14:16
  that some of the shine may have come off of Verlander. Part of that,
• 1:14:20
  actually, I think is the is the trade that leaving New York,
• 1:14:25
  it's almost like he was cast off of New York, even though he went
• 1:14:29
  back, I was like back home to Houston's maybe not the right term,
• 1:14:31
  but he went back to Houston where he really was a dominant pitcher, and
• 1:14:35
  he's yeah, he's not been as good, but he's still been really good.
• 1:14:41
  And so I think people will sour on him. They'll look at the
• 1:14:44
  age and I think he's that workhorse and he's going to find out how to
• 1:14:47
  get get it done. He can will himself to to victory at a number
• 1:14:51
  of times. But from a card perspective, I know, I kind of
• 1:14:57
  uh poo pooed on the pictures earlier, and sorry, I'm just very proud
• 1:15:02
  I was able to get the word poo poo into a podcast, but we're
• 1:15:08
  gonna have to edit that later. But more the Verlanders cards actually hold some
• 1:15:16
  really really good value because his rookie cards were in those early two thousands,
• 1:15:21
  I think it was two thousand and five when you were after kind of the
• 1:15:26
  boom of cards of the eighties and nineties kind of, so they weren't nearly
• 1:15:30
  as overproduced, but they were just starting to get into some of the early
• 1:15:35
  numbering autos things like that. Was just starting to get into that. The
• 1:15:41
  rarity of those things is a little bit more. So. I really think
• 1:15:45
  he's one of those guys that if he does have even a rough postseason,
• 1:15:48
  it might be a buying opportunity. Even a good postseason, it might be
• 1:15:53
  because I think he's gonna hold some value on the card market and then he's
• 1:15:57
  going to get a boost five years after he retires. Yeah, I agree.
• 1:16:00
  And the card that I would pick that like, if I had to
• 1:16:03
  put some investment into him, is you were right. The two thousand and
• 1:16:09
  five is technically is rookie. It's label his first year that his two thousand
• 1:16:13
  and six cards still say like rookie card on them when they used to have
• 1:16:16
  that goofy brown and yellow rookie card logo on them. But he was in
• 1:16:21
  two thousand and five Tops as a first year like post draft player. So
• 1:16:28
  he has a Tops chrome two thousand and five first year auto, and the
• 1:16:33
  base of that sells somewhere around four hundred dollars, which I know it's the
• 1:16:38
  most expensive card we've stated here, but that's in the grand scheme of things.
• 1:16:43
  Four hundred dollars for a first auto essentially of a Hall of Famer,
• 1:16:47
  especially on Justin Verlanders's level is not bad and that's not going to go down
• 1:16:55
  anytime soon. That the basement is probably about four hundred bucks unless you know,
• 1:17:00
  he does something really weird in his personal life, and so that's not
• 1:17:04
  it's sad that we have to cave out these things. Yeah, it's kind
• 1:17:09
  of happened too much of late that we've been burned that we had to bring
• 1:17:12
  it up. But it's also like it's crazy. I'm looking at statline from
• 1:17:16
  this season again, and if you told people drafting Verlander at the draft table
• 1:17:23
  that they would get a three twenty two ear arra a one thirteen whip and
• 1:17:29
  thirteen wins over one hundred and sixty k's. Okay, so the or one
• 1:17:33
  hundred and sixty innings. The k's are a little bit low. He has
• 1:17:35
  only one hundred and forty four k's, But if you told people that when
• 1:17:39
  they draft him that that's the production they would get, that's pretty solid,
• 1:17:44
  even for where he was going because the risk band on pictures is so large,
• 1:17:47
  Like just look at what Grahm and sures to gave you that Verlander was
• 1:17:51
  going right in that range with them and still produced a pretty decent year for
• 1:17:56
  you. Yeah, I absolutely agree, and I think it's I have a
• 1:18:00
  ten I am a sucker for injured guys, old guys, whatever is at
• 1:18:05
  the fantasy draft table because I just love to find the deals and aggregate.
• 1:18:10
  I probably lose because I buy two of many of them. But I think
• 1:18:13
  Berlander definitely fits into that to that pocket, especially next year. I think
• 1:18:17
  I think he's going to be looked at as a top twenty pitcher and uh
• 1:18:24
  every year in the pitching and especially even in the fantasy I'll i'll call us
• 1:18:29
  experts category. There's air quotes in there in case the listeners did not catch
• 1:18:33
  that, but you know, tend to i'd say over index young upstart pitching
• 1:18:43
  or cy young years. Like I think Blake Snell is going to be vastly
• 1:18:46
  over valued next year after what he just did this year. I remember was
• 1:18:50
  it Robbie Ray was vastly over overvalued a few years back, because like that,
• 1:18:59
  it was like a we sometimes take a year out of context where they
• 1:19:02
  have a good year and we see this growth versus an outlier. So it's
• 1:19:06
  it's interesting to see. But I think Verlander is just going to be solid,
• 1:19:12
  So I really like him next year. So I'm gonna I'm gonna jump
• 1:19:15
  us onto a another I'm gonna go to the opposite into the spectrum. We're
• 1:19:19
  gonna cut Verlander's age and roughly half and his innings to almost nothing. And
• 1:19:27
  uh, we're going to make a harkening back to something we said earlier in
• 1:19:30
  the Philadelphia Affillies for Orion care careing. Sure, I'm butchering that to a
• 1:19:34
  degree, as I tend to do with names. But Orion has a total
• 1:19:41
  of three innings pitched in the Major League with a robust for k rate,
• 1:19:50
  So let's put zero stock into what he's actually done at the major league level.
• 1:19:55
  But this is a guy that that pumps roughly ninety nine one hundred,
• 1:20:00
  has one of the filthiest sliders already in the major leagues. From a spin
• 1:20:05
  rate perspective, it is one of the highest spin rate pitches and that thing
• 1:20:10
  can move. So he is one of those few pitchers that comes through the
• 1:20:15
  miners as a reliever meant to be a reliever, and it's going to be
• 1:20:18
  a reliever. And you know, if you've been paying attention, maybe you
• 1:20:24
  live out east and pay attention to some of the miners out there. He's
• 1:20:29
  been kind of making a name for himself, and I think you alluded to
• 1:20:32
  earlier he is potentially in these playoffs on the k Rod route where he could
• 1:20:38
  really you know, burst onto the scenes because you know, recognize, you
• 1:20:42
  know, he shouldn't even really be on the playoff roster. I say that,
• 1:20:47
  you know, he's clearly eligible, but I look at this way as
• 1:20:49
  the Phillies are kind of using the rules to get him in there, because
• 1:20:53
  they are using an injury replacement to get him into the playoff roster since he
• 1:20:59
  was not on the activisial league roster as of September first. So I think
• 1:21:04
  that he really has a chance to burst onto the scene, make a name
• 1:21:09
  for himself, establish himself as a high octane back into the bullpen reliever,
• 1:21:15
  and I think he could be a future closer for the Phillies. Will that
• 1:21:19
  be next year? I don't know. I think that they probably want to
• 1:21:25
  give him a little more time to develop unless he just bowls through the playoffs
• 1:21:28
  here, But what are your thoughts, Mike on O Ryan Keran here?
• 1:21:34
  Well, I mean, I'm gonna plant this like because I'm the only person
• 1:21:39
  who has ever tagged or Ryan Kirkering in an article on Grasball so far.
• 1:21:44
  I did it back on June third. I think the victory laps are yeah,
• 1:21:48
  baby. I suggested him for pickups in only leagues because he could just
• 1:21:55
  be a monstrous believer down the strets. And I will admit that this is
• 1:22:00
  probably one where I'm definitely buying for fantasy but not for baseball card reasons.
• 1:22:06
  And I'll let you cover the card in a little bit. But the card
• 1:22:10
  prices are a little bit high because he just got called up and so they're
• 1:22:14
  inflated from that perspective from fantasy. Wow, this guy is probably one of
• 1:22:20
  the better relievers to be investing in over the offseason because Craig Kimberl Michael Lorenzen,
• 1:22:30
  they're both free agents. Alvarado will still be around another year and Deman
• 1:22:34
  guys will be around another year. But there's a really, really good chance
• 1:22:41
  that the Philly is just Handkirkering the keys to the closer role if he's good
• 1:22:45
  throughout this playoff, these playoff runs, that his stuff just pops and it
• 1:22:51
  doesn't take too long to see it, like everyone has seen it. In
• 1:22:55
  just a couple of innings, he's pitched already that pitching Ninja gift just about
• 1:23:00
  every one of his sliders and he's touching one hundred. That the Phillies moved
• 1:23:04
  him up all the way from High A this year so he blitz through the
• 1:23:11
  minors because I think they saw just how crazy these pitches can be out of
• 1:23:16
  his arm and how electric he is. That Ryan Kirkering is a great investment
• 1:23:23
  point for looking to find a really hot closer on a really great team going
• 1:23:30
  forward, because I think Kirkering could take that closer job in Philly going into
• 1:23:33
  the spring. Yeah, I think you're right, And I'm already kicking myself
• 1:23:38
  in a few dynasty formats of not investing prior to the off season here.
• 1:23:43
  But to your point in the card realm, it's really he's really interesting because
• 1:23:47
  he to your point, he's a reliever by trade to not the you know,
• 1:23:53
  first you know player the top or Panini anybody is picking up to be
• 1:23:59
  like, let's make them a first you know, Bowman Auto or something like
• 1:24:02
  that. And so he really doesn't have a whole lot in the marketplace at
• 1:24:05
  this point in time, and it's evidenced by the prices. And so as
• 1:24:10
  you look out there from like an auto perspective, he really has one auto
• 1:24:15
  on the marketplace. There's just one and maybe maybe I'm not searching well enough,
• 1:24:21
  but I found one. It is from twenty twenty two Elite Extra Edition.
• 1:24:25
  As a Panini product, I would say not a high end product.
• 1:24:30
  And generally those autos, even if the best players and the extra audition are
• 1:24:34
  like what fifteen twenty dollars at the most, the cheapest one you can buy
• 1:24:41
  today on eBay is forty five dollars for Wrytan care Career's And that's the base.
• 1:24:46
  And if you want to jump up into the numbered realm you start to
• 1:24:54
  you have to be paying almost one hundred dollars for his auto at this point.
• 1:24:59
  And so he's all already like got a cult following and a supply and
• 1:25:02
  demand. Let's go economics here, there is no supply out there of his
• 1:25:06
  cards, and so if you want to grab him, you have to pay
• 1:25:11
  for it. And so that that could give you buy an opportunity, Like
• 1:25:15
  if you know you can find him at a card show, he's probably one
• 1:25:18
  of those guys that's in the dollar boxes because you know he wasn't He's not
• 1:25:24
  a household name. Even just the feunings he's pitched, he's not gonna be
• 1:25:27
  that, and so you could actually find some value there. I would not
• 1:25:30
  buy him on eBay, buy any any realm of imagination. And if he
• 1:25:35
  gets hot in the playoffs, it's they're just going to go higher at the
• 1:25:40
  end of the day. Like, what closer have we ever seen that has
• 1:25:45
  like a really hot card market that has maintained the value. I can't think
• 1:25:49
  of a single closer. I'll say maybe Marianna Rivera that actually has a decent
• 1:25:56
  card market. So let's let's say, well, Lee Smith, you know,
• 1:26:00
  Trevor Hoffman, Like nobody's going out and investing those closers. So yeah,
• 1:26:05
  he definitely could do some damage to the wallet in the card market with
• 1:26:09
  a really really sexy postseason here, and I think it's of all the guys
• 1:26:14
  we're talking about, I think he can do it because he can be a
• 1:26:16
  highlight reel all to himself. So he'll be fun to watch I will not
• 1:26:23
  own any of his cards. Yeah, and we'll see. Maybe he will
• 1:26:26
  be in the next Bowman set early next year to be able to try to
• 1:26:29
  get some of his first and autos and stuff. And yeah, it is
• 1:26:33
  possible that, like if you did rip some twenty twenty two Panini Elite Extra,
• 1:26:41
  that it's just kind of buried in stacks of what you got because he
• 1:26:45
  wasn't the biggest prospect coming out of the draft, like people knew a little
• 1:26:48
  bit, but his metioroc rise has really changed the fortunes of what his card
• 1:26:55
  market is doing. So something you can just go buy a hobby Box flex,
• 1:26:59
  you know, seventy bucks. I believe it's extra. He might have
• 1:27:01
  been one of the hottest things in there. Yeah, not even like not
• 1:27:04
  even seventy plucks. Maybe. All right, I'm going to wrap up with
• 1:27:09
  one more pitcher here, and it's going to be I think a pretty big
• 1:27:15
  prospect that like he kind of faded a little bit at the beginning of the
• 1:27:19
  year and then bounced back as the other guys kind of fell down around him.
• 1:27:24
  And that's Bobby Miller from the Dodgers that I've just really liked what I've
• 1:27:29
  seen from him all year that he has been able to muscle through a career
• 1:27:33
  high in innings and posted one hundred and twenty four of them at the major
• 1:27:39
  league level, which is really impressive considering he hadn't been higher than ninety one
• 1:27:45
  innings at any level, and that was twenty twenty two Double A before coming
• 1:27:49
  into this year. And I just like the moxie that Bobby Miller pitches with.
• 1:27:56
  And when you're pitching in a big market like LA with a team like
• 1:28:00
  the Dodgers, this is totally somebody that the wave can gain a lot of
• 1:28:05
  steam really fast. And so if the Dodgers have a good postseason, I
• 1:28:13
  think it's gonna happen because somebody like Bobby Miller and maybe like Brian Pepio really
• 1:28:18
  puts this team on their back and pulls a little bit of like a Tony
• 1:28:21
  Gonslin did previously in the past few years and kind of popped up and came
• 1:28:28
  on people's radars. But Bobby Miller's actually got way better prospect pedigree. You
• 1:28:33
  know. He came out of Louisville, was the twenty ninth overall pick.
• 1:28:38
  He's six five to twenty. He's a horse that, like you just see
• 1:28:43
  him on the mound and you're like, Wow, this dude is a Dodgers
• 1:28:45
  pitcher through and through. And so even though like for some reason, like
• 1:28:53
  I have him in my mind that he had a poor season, but he
• 1:28:57
  still posted a three seventy six year ARRA with a one ten whip. Over
• 1:29:00
  those one hundred and twenty four innings, he picked up one hundred and nineteen
• 1:29:02
  k's. Like he pitched really well and there were a couple of blow ups
• 1:29:06
  in June, but like he was really strong down the stretch and was just
• 1:29:12
  clutch for the Dodgers to be able to finish out their divisions. So I
• 1:29:16
  like him going forward to be I think you can draft him almost as like
• 1:29:20
  a fantasy number four. Don't you think like a four? And like I
• 1:29:25
  do, it's just surprising for a for a guy, what of what he
• 1:29:30
  can show for the Dodgers. Yeah, Like I don't understand it. And
• 1:29:32
  I actually have you looked at on his his baseball savant comparisons. If if
• 1:29:40
  you have it, don't look here. I'm gonna I'm gonna quiz you down.
• 1:29:42
  No, I haven't a baseball savant. For those that don't know,
• 1:29:45
  compare pitchers based on their pitch velocity of movement, and then also on kind
• 1:29:53
  of their bat ball profile pitch tracking. And so we're just gonna look at
• 1:29:58
  what I'm gonna call the the pitch like the stuff, which is that Veloscian
• 1:30:02
  movement. And I'm gonna go they compare him to five pitchers, and I'm
• 1:30:05
  gonna go from worse to first on this comparison here, Okay, worse Louis
• 1:30:11
  Severino, Okay, well talented, we have talent, good stuff. Fourth,
• 1:30:16
  Hunter Green mm hmm, pretty talented. I think we would we would
• 1:30:20
  all agree. Pretty talented and I can see the body of work. Third
• 1:30:27
  Jacob de Gram. Yeah, we're talking third comparison here and talent. I
• 1:30:33
  don't know what to do with the top two here. I'm gonna say second
• 1:30:38
  is Spencer Strider and number one is Garrett Cole. Wow, that is the
• 1:30:44
  comparison that he makes with his stuff. He is a forcing basketball pitcher,
• 1:30:48
  a sinker guy, a careful guy, slider guy, change up. He's
• 1:30:51
  a five pitch pitcher, and all of them seem to have pretty good tight
• 1:30:57
  uh pitch uh locate. So he has an incredible arsenal. So I think
• 1:31:02
  you're right, Like, it's weird that you feel like he can get him
• 1:31:05
  as your fourth pitcher. Maybe he's gonna get some helium. But I really
• 1:31:11
  really like what I see from from Bobby Miller, and I wish i'd owned
• 1:31:16
  more shares already. Yeah, exactly. And it's a lot of like the
• 1:31:20
  frame too. He's got such a big frame that I think there's probably a
• 1:31:26
  few good years that you can write in him before it kind of like blows
• 1:31:30
  out, because he obviously does sit at ninety nine and that's part of why
• 1:31:33
  that stuff comparison is so fantastic. But like, yeah, he's it's electric
• 1:31:40
  stuff, and I think there's more ks to come in his game. He's
• 1:31:44
  only striking out guys at eight point six K nine this year, and so
• 1:31:48
  I think there is helium there that I think I could be ending up with
• 1:31:53
  a lot of Bobby Miller shares next year because I think, especially in just
• 1:31:57
  like standard drafts, he's probably going to be maybe like low teens, and
• 1:32:00
  I would push that up to be able to just try to especially if you're
• 1:32:03
  in a five five five league and you've got a guy like this on the
• 1:32:06
  Dodgers. He went eleven and four this year in twenty two starts that this
• 1:32:11
  is exactly the type of guy that can really come up big in fantasy leagues
• 1:32:16
  because of the extra wins playing in LA. I can see Walker Bueller and
• 1:32:20
  Bobby Miller next year just being nasty one two out in LA and I love
• 1:32:26
  it. What's crazy, though, is even though Walker Bueler is coming off
• 1:32:30
  of the TJ, I think Walker Beeler's gonna get picked over Bobby Miller a
• 1:32:32
  lot or he will. He one hundred percent will. He does have a
• 1:32:36
  fantastic track Reorkord, don't get it wrong. But like, yeah, Walker
• 1:32:40
  Bueller coming off Tommy John is going to a second time of John good Call
• 1:32:45
  is going to be drafted ahead of Bobby Miller. And I would not be
• 1:32:49
  shocked at all if Bobby Miller had a better year. Yeah, I agree.
• 1:32:54
  And so from a card perspective, this is another guy that is in
• 1:32:57
  twenty twenty three sets with rookie cards, so in late too. So his
• 1:33:01
  update Rookie card will be his first flagship rookie card and that's not coming out
• 1:33:05
  until next week. He's currently in Bowman Chrome that We've talked about that a
• 1:33:11
  couple of times. It's actually not a bad looking card. It's kind of
• 1:33:15
  him framed up and throwing a pitch that it really pops in a blue So
• 1:33:19
  you can't really beat a Dodger's blue refractor. That the value of them holds
• 1:33:26
  really well too, just given the number of Dodgers collectors out there in the
• 1:33:30
  market between from back when they were in Brooklyn and now being in LA that
• 1:33:34
  I think Dodger collectors also really appreciate the color match that I've moved some blue
• 1:33:42
  Dodgers over the years just because they do really pop. And so I really
• 1:33:46
  like his Bowman chrome and the blue refractor or also there I found one.
• 1:33:50
  It's a blue Wave refractor number two hundred, but it's not very blue at
• 1:33:56
  least in the photos that looks like a regular waiverctor. But that's currently listed.
• 1:34:01
  It's the only one that's been pulled so far. I'm guessing more will
• 1:34:04
  be pulled as more Bowman Chrome is ripped due to the super fractor circumstances we
• 1:34:11
  explained. But that would be I think a nice little spot to start,
• 1:34:15
  and especially he reminds me a little bit of like Yanni ideas, where like
• 1:34:19
  Catcher and Pitcher Marcus for cards are obviously bad and deflated. But if you
• 1:34:26
  get a guy like Bobby Miller, who you know, could stick around in
• 1:34:30
  LA and is young and could have a pretty good career and maybe rattle off
• 1:34:34
  a couple of championships in LA, his market could really solidify, and you
• 1:34:40
  know, you could see the prices increase, but the bottom could fall all
• 1:34:44
  the way out just on the next shoulder injury. Yeah, I mean,
• 1:34:46
  let's let's go back to Walker Buehler. Great example in that Buehler's card prices
• 1:34:51
  were very elevated, you know, you know, they was during the pandemic
• 1:34:56
  time frame where everything was elevated, but like you you know, his these
• 1:35:00
  rookies were you know, three to five dollars for Walker Buhler when he was
• 1:35:03
  doing his thing, and now it's like fifty cents a pop, you know,
• 1:35:06
  because when he's he's been injured and he's still the same player. So
• 1:35:13
  all right, well, I think that gives you a few guys to look
• 1:35:15
  at when you're going through these playoffs in terms of what you want to make
• 1:35:20
  for fantasy trades and your dynasties, and maybe pick up a few cards that
• 1:35:25
  if you've got any other ideas certainly shoot them our way at cards categories on
• 1:35:30
  x slash Twitter, cards categories at gmail dot com. That's where you can
• 1:35:33
  reach our podcast. I realized I didn't introduce us at the beginning of the
• 1:35:38
  podcast. I was so excited about the playoffs and like getting to talk about
• 1:35:42
  playoff baseball that I forgot to explain. I'm Mike cool Ard from Ranswall as
• 1:35:45
  always, and you can find me on Twitter at m cool seven and I've
• 1:35:50
  been joined here by Jeremie Brewer from Ramsball. Jeremy, let people know where
• 1:35:56
  they can find you during the off season here, yep, find me over
• 1:35:59
  on x dolor Twitter j Brewer one seven. Uh. And for those that
• 1:36:01
  don't know, uh, rasball baseball content is going to go on into a
• 1:36:06
  hiatus uh for for the fall. So we'll have probably you know, one
• 1:36:11
  post to day UH type type of thing. Uh. You know, Gray
• 1:36:15
  will be up for posting as usual, with the majority of the rest of
• 1:36:18
  us will be taking a little bit of hiatus. I think what I think
• 1:36:23
  it was off season conditioning is is what I think it was. And so
• 1:36:27
  I don't know about you, but I'm feeling like I'm gonna be in the
• 1:36:29
  best shape of my life. Uh, coming into the off season here in
• 1:36:32
  January when we start writing a lot of finger exercises, so we don't have
• 1:36:39
  you know, because Tommy John is just carpal tunnel for us. So looking
• 1:36:43
  forward to the off season, but reach out on XP or Twitter for us.
• 1:36:47
  We'll still be doing the pod, uh throughout throughout the off season,
• 1:36:50
  talking about all the moving parts because just another fun dynamic. The in the
• 1:36:55
  card market, fanacy market for us never stops. Uh, So we will
• 1:36:58
  be here. Yeah, I was gonna say, don't worry about this pod
• 1:37:01
  going on hiatus. We'll be here all winter because, like you just said,
• 1:37:05
  there's lots of new releases coming down the pipeline here in October. There's
• 1:37:10
  going to be more in November born December as the holiday season hits. So
• 1:37:13
  plenty of cards cover plenty of Dynasty moves. And I'm really looking forward to
• 1:37:17
  how badly our brackets get blown up here during this playoff run. Yeah,
• 1:37:21
  I'm pretty sure. I'm pretty sure it's gonna looking poor. Already my Brewers
• 1:37:28
  are about to lose in the ninth so fingers crossed. But by the time
• 1:37:31
  we talked next, I might be listening to half of my bracket. Yeah,
• 1:37:36
  we'll see so everyone enjoy the MLB playoffs out there, and we'll see
• 1:37:41
  you next week. Take care,