Latest / Cards & Categories / Ep. 138 : April Players Of The Month PC

Transcript

Ep. 138 : April Players Of The Month PC · Cards & Categories

• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Hello, end, Welcome everybody to episode one thirty eight of
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Cards and Categories.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I'm my cool Aide from.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Baseball Prospectus, joined as always by my very good friend
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Jeremy Brewer from a ras Ball.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: How you doing tonight, Buddy.
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: Doing just great? Ready to talk. I'm so excited.
• 0:32
  Speaker 4: It's been feels like it's been forever since we've had
• 0:34
  Speaker 4: a Player of the Month card PC edition. So I
• 0:38
  Speaker 4: know I'm already getting into our deep dive, our topic
• 0:42
  Speaker 4: for the day, but I'm excited about it's been a while.
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: So my PC's been itching for some ads.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's been roughly six months. We took
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a break in the off season
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: two in terms of the awards ones, probably the last
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: time we did any PC additions. And we've got some
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: fun ones here this time, because like, not only do
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: we have some repeats, but we've got one super odd
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: ball wish is going to be.
• 1:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I've gone off the reservation on one of them,
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: but yes.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: And so if you haven't been around for one of
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: these PC pods that we do, make sure you go
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: into those show notes because we'll have a link to
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: the Rasball post that goes with this podcast that will
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: send you right to where you can see pictures of
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: these cards that we're about to talk about for.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: April Player of the Month winners.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: And so what we do every time is we go
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: through the hitter, the pitcher, and the rookie from each
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: league and put a quote unquote PC card, a personal
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: collection card into our list of cards. Just a little
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: fun exercise that it runs the game, and we've got
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: a we're doing again in this time. We've got a
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: few that run you a few thousand bucks and a
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: few that you can pick up for a dollar. So
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: a little bit of everything for everyone. And if you
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: wanted to follow along with the cards and categories PC,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: hit us up at Cards Categories at gmail dot com
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: because I want to know if somebody has actually been
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: doing it. It's been tempting to do it myself, but
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: I just haven't fully pulled the trigger. It would be
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: something to really round out some Maybe that's a that's
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: a good shutout or like shut out locked out, lockout
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: activity in terms of when we go on strike next year,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: that trying to put together that Cards and Categories PC.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I'm already starting to plan things out. That shows you
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: how hopeful. I am.
• 2:25
  Speaker 4: I think you need to start the bottom of the
• 2:26
  Speaker 4: PC list. It's start of the top. Might take a
• 2:29
  Speaker 4: while to get there. We got we got some uh,
• 2:31
  Speaker 4: we got some high high, high high wrung, high value
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: cards here.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Yes, exactly well, and some that are unattainable but maybe
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: getting like affect simily of that card or something. Anyways,
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: we're talking here on Tuesday, May fifth. It is Cinco Demayo,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: So put that Margarita down brew and we're gonna dive
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: right into our news and notes for the rest of
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: the league and see how they're impacting us from our
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: fantasy team. So it's another pretty significant low of injuries
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: compared to what we've been.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: Seeing the past couple weeks.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Including we've got two injured first rounders from fantasy leagues
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: all across the board. First one treeks Scooble starting pitcher Ragining,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: two time Sight Young Award winner from the Detroit Tigers,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: is down with loose bodies in his elbow. Had surgery,
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: I believe today, but we're still kind of getting some
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: information as it's coming. It really cropped up quickly in
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: terms of yesterday Monday afternoon. There's like a John Hayman
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: tweet that they were saying that he was saying that
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Treek Scooble was taking a little time to recover and
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: but they expect him to be fine. And then Cody
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: staven Hagen, I believe from the Detroit Tigers beat then
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: came out like ten minutes later said, oh, Scooble down surgery,
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: loose bodies in the elbow. This is exactly what Edwin
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: Diaz had on his right elbow pretty much. In what
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: it is, it's mostly going up and cleaning up bone
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: spurs that are created from colstium deposits just from the
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: wear and tear of pitching. And so Scooble underwent that
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: surgery or is undergoing that surgery. The timeline to return
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: can vary, so it could be two to three months.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: And with that, he's also a pending free agent after
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: this season two, so that's an impact here that he
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: wants to get back on the mound and show what
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: he can do. And on top of it all, the
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Tigers are in the middle of a dog fight for
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: the Al Central as well as This piece will be
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: coming out pretty soon on VP. For me is I
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: did a dive into all of the league's depth charts
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: from a pitching perspective to build a watch list, Detroit
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: Tigers have one of the weakest systems in terms of pitching.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: And it's all been hurt that I made a joke
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: within that piece that honestly, they're pretty close probably to
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: signing Tyler Anderson too, a minor league deals, like the
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: last kind of free agent that you would allowed.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: The innings that's out.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: There from ber Valdaz got blown up tonight. Things are
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: dire in Detroit. So what is your read here on
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: the schoobl situation. Are you worried from long term perspective too,
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: or is this maybe a window to buy on a
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: dynasty perspective to get Schooble while he's down with injury
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: for two or three months.
• 5:11
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I feel like this is probably the
• 5:13
  Speaker 4: best type of injury scenario with an arm for Schooble.
• 5:17
  Speaker 4: Like it's it's not attendant, it's not a shoulder issue
• 5:21
  Speaker 4: like loose bodies is not good. But it doesn't seem
• 5:24
  Speaker 4: like it was severely impacting him. It's just something that
• 5:27
  Speaker 4: kind of had to be done cleaned up, because otherwise
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: it was going to start to impact and could risk
• 5:32
  Speaker 4: further damage. So it's probably best case scenario. Am I
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: downgrading him a little bit for future value? You have to,
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: but it's still Tak Schooble. I'm also seeing that we
• 5:45
  Speaker 4: should get another look at him the rest of the
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: season and probably get a few more months and be
• 5:49
  Speaker 4: certain that he is healthy.
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: So I do look at it is a.
• 5:52
  Speaker 4: Little bit of a buy an opportunity. I would be
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: a little cautious. I don't want to pay like top dollar,
• 5:57
  Speaker 4: Like I'm not paying for Cygung School here. I'm for
• 6:00
  Speaker 4: like top ten starting pitcher Treek Schooble, maybe top fifteen,
• 6:04
  Speaker 4: like is the price that I want to pay, So
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: if I can get a little bit discount.
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: I'm willing.
• 6:08
  Speaker 4: This is really the type of guy to go after
• 6:11
  Speaker 4: in like a dynasty type league where you're falling out
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: early in the season and you just want to, you.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: Know, cash in some chips.
• 6:19
  Speaker 4: Another team's out there, They're out there ace for the
• 6:20
  Speaker 4: next two three months. That's probably the situation that I
• 6:23
  Speaker 4: would be chasing them. But I think he'll be back.
• 6:26
  Speaker 4: He's he's a fantastic pitcher, doesn't really have a major
• 6:31
  Speaker 4: injury history. He's got a few Nixon here and there,
• 6:35
  Speaker 4: But I think he's gonna come through this all right.
• 6:38
  Speaker 4: At the end of the day, he had to get
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: this done before a free agency, so you know, I
• 6:42
  Speaker 4: think it's as soon as they kind of saw something there.
• 6:44
  Speaker 4: For everybody's sake, he had to get it fixed. Tigers
• 6:48
  Speaker 4: had to get it fixed. So if they want a
• 6:49
  Speaker 4: chance to ever resign them, if they made him pitch
• 6:52
  Speaker 4: through this or something, they would never never have a
• 6:54
  Speaker 4: chance to resign the guy.
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I mean it's impossible to replace him from
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: a fantasy perspective, but I mean you're right on the
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: precipice of where things are about to totally run out
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: on the waiver wire. So this almost kind of it's
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: a blessing in disguise. This didn't happen another week or
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: two if.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: You had school.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: Because there still are a few names like Kay Cavali.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: I'm looking at CBS roster ship is only at sixty
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: three percent now Logan Henderson's at fifty six percent. Those
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: guys are pretty good upside in terms of strikeouts and
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: young enough while putting together more of their craft that
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: they could still unlock something within the season. Otherwise, like
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Jansen Junk has been pitching pretty well and you can
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: ride that train for a little bit. Same with Froster Griffin.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: I was watching one of the matchups I watched this
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: weekend because I'm a pitching sicko, was Foster Griffin versus
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: Kyle Harrison, and it was a masterclass. And if you
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: like southpaw pitching, that Foster Griffin has the moxie to pitch,
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: and so I've been picking him up where he's available.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: After that, it's really going to start thinning out. Like
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: you probably missed the Davis Martin train, and even that
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: a little bit shaky. So just kind of like maybe
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: you hold on to a Jerry Jones, Like maybe you
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: stash Jerry Jones away on your bench too. So like
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: there's a few names out there as well as like
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: Braxton Garrett and stuff should be coming up, so there
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: will be a way to navigate it. If you have schooble,
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: because everybody else is doing it, they all have an
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: injury pitcher. It's just gonna hurt a lot more because
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: it was your first round pick and so that really
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: impacts your team going forward. The other first round pick
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: that got hurt is Ronald Lucunia Junior so we saw
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Spencer Schreider come back and get shelled in Colorado but spent.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: But during that weekend series, Ronald Lacuna also pulled up
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: lame bad hams or not a bad hamstring injury, just
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: a grade one so hopefully isn't too severe. But I
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: mean he was off to a pretty solid start. He
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: was actually running. The power was not kind of coming together.
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: But then again, I mean Acunia is a little bit
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: more of a streakier hitter than people I think are
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: used to.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: It's a little bit more of.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: Like a Julio Rodriguez build where comes in bunches in
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: terms of the power and everything. So what have you
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: seen so far from Ronald Lacunya. Has he been back
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: to kind of like his peak ish level for you
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: in terms of maintaining first round status? And how worried
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: are you going through the rest of twenty twenty six
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: considering it's another lower body body injury to add to
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: the total for Ronald Lacuna Junior.
• 9:22
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I already had Akunya kind of falling
• 9:26
  Speaker 4: down a little in the ranks. Ironically, I posted my
• 9:29
  Speaker 4: top one hundred hitters like I submitted to the editor
• 9:32
  Speaker 4: like thirty minutes before before this happened, and so I'm like,
• 9:36
  Speaker 4: I'm not I'm not going back and trying to redo
• 9:38
  Speaker 4: all the ranks based on like the replay alone without
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: any news.
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: I'm like, now I'm we're leaving them.
• 9:44
  Speaker 4: But I actually from a hit of respective item as
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: my number eleven hitter, and so you just have to
• 9:48
  Speaker 4: assume a picture or two that's that's bumping out of
• 9:52
  Speaker 4: the first round type of category there. And really it's
• 9:56
  Speaker 4: coming down to he's been so beat up and in history,
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: like is is telling me that it's going to continue.
• 10:04
  Speaker 4: So I'm starting to downgrade him, even though the skills
• 10:07
  Speaker 4: continue to be there. He also has not been terribly
• 10:08
  Speaker 4: efficient on the base paths. He was seven for eleven
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: on the base paths and to your point, only had
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: two home runs. The hard hit rates were down a
• 10:18
  Speaker 4: little bit. Things just didn't fully look like you know,
• 10:23
  Speaker 4: the Ronald Lukunya that really we've come to love now.
• 10:27
  Speaker 4: He had some bad luck, so you'd expect some of
• 10:30
  Speaker 4: these things to bounce back. The homers I think is
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: mostly a luck thing at this point. But yeah, I'm
• 10:34
  Speaker 4: looking at him more of a second maybe even third
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: round talent like because of the injury risk, and if
• 10:41
  Speaker 4: this continues, I have to think I'm gonna even continue
• 10:45
  Speaker 4: to lower that down because if the speed like dust
• 10:49
  Speaker 4: just drops off completely, then I mean, what are we
• 10:52
  Speaker 4: talking about a guy that he you know, you can
• 10:55
  Speaker 4: hope hits two sixty and hits twenty five to thirty
• 10:58
  Speaker 4: homers and hopefully stays in the field. Like, that's not
• 11:01
  Speaker 4: the Ronald Lacunya you signed up for. So I'm actually
• 11:04
  Speaker 4: fading Ronald Lacunia right now, even though I know I
• 11:07
  Speaker 4: got lashing last time I posted my article that I
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: didn't have him high enough. At this time, I lashed
• 11:13
  Speaker 4: because I have him too high because of the injury.
• 11:15
  Speaker 4: So you can't win. But I'm fading Ronald Lacunia at
• 11:19
  Speaker 4: this point.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think that's all very fair, and
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: it is just one of those things when you just
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: you look at the Savant page too, and it just
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: doesn't kind of hold water with the rest of those
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: first round talents, And so yeah, I think I'm there
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: with you. It's not somebody who I acquired many pieces
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: of that. I think the only spot I've got Acunya
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: is in the RCL league that I'm in and so yeah,
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: it's not somebody where I'm usually the high man on
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: him because I wasn't sure about the stolen bases. And
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: then the power still seems to be coming. And I
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: do also wonder if that it does come from the
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: knee injuries as well, that if you don't have the
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: base behind you or underneath you, as a hitter in
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: the box, putting together a good streak of power is
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: very difficult to do. Okay, Well, another thing that I'll
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: make hitting for power difficult is a Lombard disc herniation,
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: which is what Louise Robert Jr.
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: Is currently dealing with.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: The Mets placed him on the eyel and said that
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: he's probably only going to miss the minimum for this.
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: He also received an epidural for this to be able
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: to like, yeah, exactly right, and on top of it,
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: it's Lombard disc herniation. I've never known anybody that's gone
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: through this or heard of a player go through this
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: where it's an easy, quick two week thing and your back.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: This has like season wrecking, some sort of surgery written
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: all over it.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: For Louise Robert Jr.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: I am not taking any of the words that the
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: Mets are spewing out on this that, especially when you
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: consider it the season lost for them already. I mean,
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: it's going to be really tough for them to dig
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: out the hole that they're in eleven and a half
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: games back right now with the Braves. And I think
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: this is exactly why we were worried about Luis Robert Jr.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: That he was not the paragon in health, and then
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: on top of it, you send me to the Mets,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: which has not necessarily handled injuries completely well. Any I actually, like,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: I don't see any point in holding onto Robert Junior unless,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: like you actually have space on your eye olt. But
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: if you are, I don't know how you've avoided every
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: land mine that's existed in Advancing Baseball this year because
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: all my injury spots are filled up.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: What about you?
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: Are you on board with cutting Robert outright?
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: I fully am.
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: I was actually just looking at my rankings. I always
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: get the question of where's this guy ranked, like if
• 13:49
  Speaker 4: he's not on the list, because everybody assumes I keep
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: like a three hundred player deep ranking and it's just
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: impossible to do that. But he was actually like one
• 13:56
  Speaker 4: oh four on my ranking coming in like as this
• 13:59
  Speaker 4: was going on because I was working on my rankings
• 14:02
  Speaker 4: like when he the announcement came out, and so I
• 14:05
  Speaker 4: already had him off the rankings before the news came out,
• 14:09
  Speaker 4: and I just like, no, it's I'm not even adding him.
• 14:13
  Speaker 4: And folks out there starting to put in like as
• 14:15
  Speaker 4: the top like seventy or sixty hitter, and I'm like,
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: I didn't even see that with where he was at
• 14:22
  Speaker 4: just healthy and this this is like, Uh, Christian Yelich
• 14:25
  Speaker 4: is like every year like hurts his back and they're like, uh,
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: this sounds one hundred percent worse than that, Like this
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: sounds like something that just completely popped out and this
• 14:34
  Speaker 4: guy might never walk again. This is kind of the
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: vibe I'm getting. So I like, the performance has not
• 14:40
  Speaker 4: been there. Uh he's a batting average drain when healthy,
• 14:43
  Speaker 4: and just nothing about this uh is too too great.
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: And I still don't understand how he can't miss much
• 14:50
  Speaker 4: more than a minimum time and you need an epidural
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: Like those two do not match. He has to be
• 14:56
  Speaker 4: in so much pain unless he's got like the world's
• 14:59
  Speaker 4: best chiropractor. I don't know what's going on here, So
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: I'm I'm fully I don't want to Louise Robber on
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: my team.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just like, I've never seen such a confluence
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: of circumstances for an injury, and they're like, yeah, it's
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: just gonna be off for ten days, and so it's not.
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: I don't think that's gonna happen. And it's just there's
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: a lot of red flashing lights there.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's get to the next injury.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: It is a pitcher.
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: Minnesota Twins' number one starter, Joe Ryan departed his last
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: start just through to two batters and then left with
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: an elbow injury. That's never good, but apparently he had
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: then the imaging done, came back today, it's clean. They
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: haven't even placed him on the il. He's still slated
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: to start this weekend against Cleveland, which seems a little
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: ballsy to me considering I mean, I guess the Twins
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: are still in the playoff race technically, but I don't
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: know why you don't hit the kind of like time
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: out pause button for maybe just like ten days on
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: Joe Ryan and let him see if the elbow soreness
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: have subsides and you can get some of the swelling
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: down and so on and so forth. But I guess
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: we'll see how this develops over the next couple of days,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: because they do have Zebbie Matthews ready to go in
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: the miners. He has been better of late, but I've
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: been starting to sour a little bit on Zebbie Matthews
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: that this is actually going to come up in my
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: bppiece as well.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: That it reminds me of sure a lot of like.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: What Bailey Ober has been doing, where they juiced more
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: vlo out of Bailey Ober at the cost of him
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: actually knowing where it was going, and it was creating
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: a lot more walks, a lot more homers, And I
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: think they've done the same thing with Zebbie Matthews, where
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: that was what was creating the additional walks, the inability
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: to control where the pitch was going, creating a lot
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: more of the homers. They dial that back, but then
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: it becomes a much less exciting arm because that and
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: you can just see exactly what Bailey Ober is done
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: this year and turned into a very boring option. But
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: let's get back to Joe Ryan, what do you do
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: in situations like this, because especially, I mean, you missed,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: we missed the cutoff time for like doing weekly lineups, yesterday,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: but he would have like still been on that kind
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: of like threshold of Actually you probably thought he was
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: going for Tommy John surgery around this time yesterday. Now
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: it looks like he actually might make that start, So like,
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: is he worth keeping around your roster? You maybe trying
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: to shop him if you can, just because people maybe
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: if they miss this blip, they don't know what's up
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: with the elbow.
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: Or is it.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: Like, Man, I'm really hoping that he can make it
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: through more than at batter on Saturday against Cleveland.
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think you got it right there is that
• 17:38
  Speaker 4: I'm I'm crossing my fingers and my toes for Joe
• 17:41
  Speaker 4: Ryan because if I look at this profile kind of
• 17:45
  Speaker 4: underneath the covers, I like a lot of the things
• 17:48
  Speaker 4: that I'm seeing from him, like his you know, actual
• 17:53
  Speaker 4: underlying metrics are some of the best of his career.
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: He's really seemed to improve, like he's actually had some
• 18:00
  Speaker 4: poor luck. And I think there's a better Joe Ryan
• 18:03
  Speaker 4: than we've already seen this season. Uh, there's a three
• 18:06
  Speaker 4: seven two e ra a, you know, more than the
• 18:08
  Speaker 4: K for nine. I think we're talking about a guy
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: that gets into the low threes and he could you
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: know it's the Twins, so win double digit games, I guess,
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: But like, I think there's a lot to like there,
• 18:19
  Speaker 4: and so I'll just cross my fingers because you can't
• 18:22
  Speaker 4: trade trade the guy you don't want to cut the
• 18:24
  Speaker 4: guy that could be completely healthy. You just have to
• 18:27
  Speaker 4: wait and see. And I'm a big Joe Ryan fan.
• 18:30
  Speaker 4: I think he can do amazing things. I really hoping
• 18:33
  Speaker 4: this is just like a slept my elbow wrong type
• 18:36
  Speaker 4: of thing.
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: And we're back at it.
• 18:37
  Speaker 4: But if the imaging's clear, you gotta give him the
• 18:40
  Speaker 4: uh kind of the workhorse motto and go as He's
• 18:43
  Speaker 4: always been a guy that goes. I mean, he's been
• 18:46
  Speaker 4: nicked up here there, but he generally makes most of
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: his starts. And so I'm locking loaded. If he's gonna
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: be healthy and pitching, I'm gonna be running with him.
• 18:54
  Speaker 4: So uh, giving give me my Joe Ryan shares and hope, hope,
• 18:58
  Speaker 4: hope he stays healthy.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, everybody's gonna be watching that radar gun for Ryan
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: this weekend. If he does make it to the mound.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: I would say that, like, this is an opportunity where
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: if you're in a league where you know that the
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: other players maybe aren't like glued to the news twenty
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: four to seven baseball wise, where after, like if he
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: does come back and make a couple of starts, this
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: injury will really be lost in the wash of like
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: the player page on Fangrass for Joe Ryan, because it's
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: not going to pop up on like the transaction tracker
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: where there's an iel stint built in. Probably, I mean,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: I'm looking at like the article titles, there's nothing that
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: says like Joe Ryan elbow issue. So it's kind of
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: it might become buried in a couple of weeks time,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: and that's something you consider. Especially if you see like
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a dip and vlow or a
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: little bit of a loss of control that kind of
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: indicates more injury, you might have a little bit of
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: a selling window that you can you can pounce on.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: But yeah, it is going to be a precarious situation
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: as we watch Ryan over the next couple starts, speaking
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: vicarious situations and also another confounding injury in terms of
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: the way the team is handling it. Brandon Woodruff left
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: his last start because the velo just totally fell off
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: a cliff. He could barely get it above the mid eighties,
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: and I'm surprised they even let him throw like as
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: many pitches as they did when he was sitting in
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: the mid eighties. That it wasn't like, let's get him
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: out of there immediately. They're currently diagnosing it as like
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: a dead arm or like a little bit of a
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: stiff shoulder. They haven't been exactly completely forthright in terms
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: of what the actual injury is because the team saying
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: that it could be another minimum Aisle Stint Woodruff is
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: coming off of last year dealing with thoracic outlet surgery
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: and that entire like recovery process. So what are you
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: doing with Woodroff, Because like this is also bizarre that
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: like it's not like a much more alarming situation for Milwaukee.
• 21:01
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, it's it's not too different than the
• 21:03
  Speaker 4: Joe Ryan situation. Right, this is a guy that had
• 21:06
  Speaker 4: shoulder issues.
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: And he came back from it.
• 21:08
  Speaker 4: Now he's more acclaiming as a dead arm, which is
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: kind of like the Tatsuo my type situation. And you know,
• 21:15
  Speaker 4: the the metrics, he's he's pitched fine, he hasn't been great,
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: he hasn't been you know, terrible, he's strikeouts. You wish
• 21:22
  Speaker 4: we're a little higher, You wish I veloss he would
• 21:24
  Speaker 4: come up. But if he's been struggling with some dead arm,
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: it would make sense, like the storyline works. But this
• 21:29
  Speaker 4: is also a guy that's had shoulder problems in the
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: past and he's been trying to come back from that.
• 21:32
  Speaker 4: So like, that's why I feel out of both sides here,
• 21:35
  Speaker 4: is like I want this.
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: To work out. I don't.
• 21:38
  Speaker 4: I don't see a reason that they're they're they're like
• 21:40
  Speaker 4: the Brewers, but usually pretty transparent. I don't see a
• 21:42
  Speaker 4: reason that they wouldn't be giving us the clear information here.
• 21:47
  Speaker 4: But nobody's gonna trade for Brandon Woodriff, And if he
• 21:51
  Speaker 4: truly is healthy, he's a good mid rotation fantasy starter,
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: and so like you can't just drop him, like you're
• 21:57
  Speaker 4: in a rock and a hard spot. So like, if
• 21:59
  Speaker 4: you are like me who has Joe Ryan and brand
• 22:01
  Speaker 4: Woodruff on the same team, you're just sitting here hoping
• 22:04
  Speaker 4: for the best and picking up random guys off the
• 22:06
  Speaker 4: waiver wire and try to patch it through until you know,
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: like you know, give it, give it two three weeks,
• 22:12
  Speaker 4: and you know, hopefully you know that gives you maybe
• 22:14
  Speaker 4: two starts from both of these guys and you kind
• 22:16
  Speaker 4: of have an idea of what you're looking at. Velosity
• 22:18
  Speaker 4: comes back things like that, then hey, move on. But
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: both of them for me, are in that kind of
• 22:25
  Speaker 4: cross your fingers and hope for the best. But you
• 22:28
  Speaker 4: don't overreact in jettison off, especially in Ryan's case, a
• 22:32
  Speaker 4: good starter Woodruff, like I said, more of a mid
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: rotation guy at this point in his career.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think that's all very fair. Okay, We've
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: got another sore elbow to deal with here, and it
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: is in Baltimore. It's for the closer, Ryan Helsley, who
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: it was actually kind of an odd ball injury because
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: it came out of nowhere and even in his last outing,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: the vila looked fine when you're looking at kind of
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: like the running daily game logs right in the range where.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: He usually and honestly, it feels like Ryan Helsley.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: Goes through this once or twice every year, where like
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: the elbow starts barking on him. And I've talked about
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: it before on this pod, where he is one of
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: the most violent pitching actions I've ever seen.
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: And so you're not terribly.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Surprised that it always feels like it's gonna break and
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: even though, like I mean, actually he doesn't have too
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: many Iyel stints on his history, but it does crop
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: up just from being a Cardinals fan that like it
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: always felt like it would bark on him every once
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: in a while. So I'm not white is concerned here
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: with Helsley, considering he's kind of he has these ebbs
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: and flows, and the velo looked fine. So I think
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: I want to focus mostly on who you might be
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: chasing for saves and the Baltimore bullpen in the meantime,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: because the bullpen's been pretty solid. The Ools are five
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: games blow of five hundred now after a rough weekend
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: series against the Yankees, but they've had some pretty good
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: relievers in the back of that bullpen. So who excites
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: you the most that you'd be chased for a couple
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: of weeks worth of saves?
• 24:03
  Speaker 4: Yeah, this is an interesting bullpen, Like you know, Russ resources,
• 24:07
  Speaker 4: Rico Garcia.
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: Rico Garcia as the the guy and the closure.
• 24:11
  Speaker 4: I don't know that I see him as the guy necessarily,
• 24:15
  Speaker 4: like his stuff's been decent. He's pitched well this year. Uh,
• 24:18
  Speaker 4: but I you know, I always have to look at
• 24:20
  Speaker 4: you New York Cano and Andrew Kittridge. I think those
• 24:23
  Speaker 4: are the guys that like, Honestly, if there's one guy
• 24:26
  Speaker 4: in this bullpen, I probably trust and I don't.
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: I don't know that.
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: It's fair from his results this season have been a
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: little bit chaotic, but it's Andrew Kittridge, Like he's a
• 24:35
  Speaker 4: guy that just seems to always get things done. The
• 24:37
  Speaker 4: reason I say it's questionable because he's he's running in
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: uh what what's his era here? It's ridiculous if I
• 24:43
  Speaker 4: recall it in eighteen nine era and so. But behind
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: the scenes he got an xd ERA of two fifty
• 24:50
  Speaker 4: six XPIP of three thirty five, like he's just had
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: some absolutely terrible luck and three and a third of inning,
• 24:56
  Speaker 4: so like just ignored that. But he has always been
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: a guy that comes through and deliver. So, like, am
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: I chasing any of these guys? Probably not. I just
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: I don't think there's anything overly exciting here. I think
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: it's gonnaet spread between Garcia, Cano, Kittridge. Maybe even Aiken
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: might get a few saved, but I think they're gonna
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: play the matchups until Hellsley's back.
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: I mean, I actually I do like Rico Garcia. He's
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: got one of those profiles where, oh wow, he's five nine,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: two fifteen. I didn't I didn't realize it was such
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: a little tiny guy. But he's got one of these
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: profiles where you're just like, yeah, that's it's gonna be
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: a Rico Garcia career year. He's gonna just like kind
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: of put it all together and out of nowhere and
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: maybe make an All Star team. And he's just kind
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: of got that magic to him right now. So it's
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: a pretty mediocre profile overall, but it's a nice little
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: four pitch mix that he can spot up decently well.
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: And yeah, it's working right now.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: So I'm I like Rico Garcia, but I think, you know,
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: he's probably somebody where it could fall apart pretty quickly,
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: and I don't. I'm not like endorsing him heavily. I
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: just like him out of the options there there.
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: I gret nothing like.
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: A guy with a zero BABEIP and a one hundred
• 26:09
  Speaker 4: percent left on base rate.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: Hey, it's a good ground ball right though, So that'll work. Okay.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Next piece of news we have is Anthony Volpi has
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: expired on his time to rehab, and with that, the
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: Yankee sent him to Triple A, so he lost his
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: big league spot to Jose Caballiro. So congrats out there
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: to everybody who had Cabaliro on the cheap because he's
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: qualified just about everywhere for fantasy and is well on
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: his way to another like fifty y ish stolen based
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: season and just racking him up little by little, and
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: every time he's on base, he's usually stealing a base.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: So great for Cabairo owners out there. Volpi was okay
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: on his rehab stent two fifty three h six three
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: eighteen slash line over thirteen games and forty nine plate appearances.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: Is coming back from that torn labrum shoulder surgery that
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: he played through the torn labrum a lot last year,
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: which is why he really drove down his line to
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: an eighty three WRC plus career not a career wor
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: strike out right of twenty five percent last year, but.
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: Not a great strikeout rate.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: And this is a guy who has had a lot
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: of hype and certainly had a lot of value placed
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: on him in terms of the overall prospect lists and
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: was a hot name when he was debuting back in
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. From a fantasy perspective, we've seen some
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: decent years out of him. What are you doing with
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: Anthony Volpe going forward, who is now twenty five years old.
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: Yeah, this is a confounding one for me because even
• 27:41
  Speaker 4: those whole career has been confounding, Like the guy he
• 27:44
  Speaker 4: was in the miners is not the guy that we've
• 27:46
  Speaker 4: seen the majors. And that's that's why I've always truggle
• 27:48
  Speaker 4: with Anthy Volpai because if you look, he hit for
• 27:51
  Speaker 4: power in the miners. He was a flyball hitter in
• 27:53
  Speaker 4: the miners. He's hit the majors, he's hitting all kinds
• 27:56
  Speaker 4: of ground balls in barely hitting line drives. Even he's
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: putting the ball on the ground, he's not lifting the
• 28:01
  Speaker 4: air like it's just he changed his approach. And so
• 28:04
  Speaker 4: because of that, like I just I can't really get
• 28:07
  Speaker 4: over the fact that, like if that was just half
• 28:09
  Speaker 4: a season, even a one year, like three years now
• 28:11
  Speaker 4: where he's been the same guy. So I have to
• 28:14
  Speaker 4: say there's a ton of talent there. But I even
• 28:17
  Speaker 4: though he's still just twenty five, I think this is
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: the time you kind of have to move on now.
• 28:21
  Speaker 4: Watch lists just kind of keep an eye on it.
• 28:25
  Speaker 4: Those things start to turn around. I'm willing to give
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: it a go because there's the rest of the profile seems.
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: Like it could work.
• 28:30
  Speaker 4: It's just he he became like a slap hitter out
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: of nowhere, and you know, the next Derek Jeter just
• 28:37
  Speaker 4: never never came to be in the Bronx. So, yeah,
• 28:40
  Speaker 4: this is unfortunate. I do think he'll be back up
• 28:42
  Speaker 4: with the team like he's He's better than a minor
• 28:44
  Speaker 4: league player for sure, but they're gonna give him his full,
• 28:48
  Speaker 4: full go to make sure he's fully comfortable. He needs
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: a full spring training, that's for sure.
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and you do wonder. I mean, labron surgery is
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: not an easy thing to get over. So I will
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: say that, like if you have been into the Anthony
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: Volpi profile, and I haven't traditionally, just because it's not
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: quite enough contact, and just like the overall approach is
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: a little worrisome that I need a little more batting
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: average the way I built my teams out of m
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: I shortstop than what Vulpi usually offers. And so if
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: you are into him, I would certainly say that this
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: is probably the time to start monitoring and maybe picking
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: him up in those dynasty and keep your situations if
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: you can, because it's probably a low ebb in terms
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: of his value between this kind of brutal demotion and
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: any of the stats that are probably coming out are
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: going to be a little bit altered from the fact
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: that he's still working his way back into shape from
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: that surgery. Even if they say he's healthy and he's
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: on the field and playing, recovery from those types of
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: labor surgeries don't happen quickly, and I think it's going
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: to be something where you're going to see his game
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: still develop throughout the rest of twenty twenty six. Okay,
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: we're to stay in the Al East for a next
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: injury because I mean, it's a pretty easy straightforward an
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: answer with him. Ryan Pepio had hip surgery is out
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: for the rest of the season.
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: This is actually a big time w.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: For our boy, Marmo's dad, who had him as the
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: cell when we sold Chandler Simpson on the rays, which
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: we'll see how that one still works out, because the
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: lack of power is going to start hurting you with
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: a long run for Chandler Simpson, but the batting average
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: has certainly been great. What are you doing with Pepio
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: and dynasty keeper situations? Because when we were talking to
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: Marmos Dad about this, I don't think either of us
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: were really big Pepio guys either, just like it's not
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: enough strikeouts for the lack of command and control for me,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: that like, the upside is just never quite there compared
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: to where the downside has always been in Pepio's profile.
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: But is there enough upside that you are interested in
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: him going into twenty seven?
• 30:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I probably would say no. I just
• 30:58
  Speaker 4: I he's been a guy that I just can't get
• 31:01
  Speaker 4: on board with. He he flyball pitcher, home run issues,
• 31:06
  Speaker 4: control issues like and none of them are like major
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: red flags. They're just on the wrong side of average.
• 31:14
  Speaker 4: The control's average ish, like I said, the the his
• 31:19
  Speaker 4: ability to hold the guys on doesn't work like it's
• 31:22
  Speaker 4: just he has a lot of red flags. And he's
• 31:25
  Speaker 4: also just never been healthy. And I think we even
• 31:27
  Speaker 4: talked about this in the offseason. I'm not I do
• 31:31
  Speaker 4: trust the Rays a lot, but another team I trust
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: a lot of the Dodgers, and the Dodgers had no
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: interest in keeping him around even with all the injuries
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: and arm stuff that they had going on. They were
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: very willing to just him off the off the team.
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: So yeah, I'm I'm not really too and this is
• 31:50
  Speaker 4: more of in general, it's just not the kind of
• 31:52
  Speaker 4: guy that I'm excited about.
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: And even.
• 31:56
  Speaker 4: You know, even next year, if he's fully healthy, I
• 31:58
  Speaker 4: think I'm gonna steer clear.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I mean, if you do want to watch,
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: Griffin Jack still might be back on waiver wires again.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: They're stretching them out in Tampa that they're slowly but
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: surely getting them back into being a starter that I
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: don't know if the plan is to make them a
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: full starter again or if it's gonna be more of
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: like a an opener. Will kind of have to come
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: up in front of them, but like someone to watch,
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: because we've never kind of seen fully deployed starting pitcher
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Griffin Jacks with his new repertoire. If the race can
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: make it work, it could become an interesting arm. You're
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: just never gonna get more than five innings out of him,
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: even if he ever gets to that point where it's
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: a lot like twenty twenty five Dirasmus impossibly.
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's a really good colm.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, next move that we have and actually we've got
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: all promotions from here on out, so we've got some
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: happier news giants a bringing up Bryce Eldridge. They also
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: called up Hayesus Rodriguez, who is gonna be more of
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: a really deep NL only type name where it's a
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: backup catcher, but he also plays in the field too,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: So keep that mind. Keep that in mind if you
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: are in a super deep and only league that if
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: you're hard up for a second catcher in one of
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: those leagues, Jeses Rodriguez might be somebody to check out,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: just because he might get playing time on the infield
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: as well as catching every once in a while. Bryce
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: Soldiers is obviously the name to pay attention to. He
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: will enter into a strongside platoon role at DH with
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: the surprising Casey Schmidt, who never thought I'd be seeing
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: Casey Schmidt needing DH at bats. But the start to
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: the season for Eldridge had been solid at triple a
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: three thirty three, four forty five five eighteen slash line
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: that's a one fifty nine WRC plus with five homers
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: in one hundred and thirty seven played appearances. Certainly, the
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: strikeout rate is still there. It was around thirty percent,
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: but the walk rate was also still there. So it's
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: it's gallo ish, which you know everybody kind of leans on.
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: But the nice thing here is it's at first base,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: so it's a little bit more expected with upside.
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: He's only twenty one in the major leagues.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: So what do you think you can get out of
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: Eldridge the rest of the year here with the San
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: Francisco Giants.
• 34:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think this is a guy that is going
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: to be kind of a low average, big power type
• 34:18
  Speaker 4: of guy. So if you're looking the rest of the
• 34:20
  Speaker 4: season at twenty homers, you know, maybe hitting two forty
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: something like that, that's probably what you're hoping for. This
• 34:29
  Speaker 4: is not the ballpark that's really going to play to
• 34:31
  Speaker 4: his strengths, and so I think that might drag him down.
• 34:34
  Speaker 4: Line up, especially dever, struggling is not the strongest to
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: really protect him.
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: So you just remember, this guy's young. He couldn't be exploited.
• 34:40
  Speaker 4: He's probably gonna find some holes, and so I don't
• 34:43
  Speaker 4: think you should be thinking about the best outcome here.
• 34:46
  Speaker 4: I'm thinking I'm looking at medium, you know, projections, and
• 34:49
  Speaker 4: hoping that he really holds those strikeouts and figures things out.
• 34:53
  Speaker 4: He's a guy long term I'm really interested in. But
• 34:55
  Speaker 4: short term I think there's gonna be some some growing
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: pains for.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: Him for sure.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think that's all very fair. Okay, next
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: promotion we had and he's actually already been sent down
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: that he only made a like a one outing appearance
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: before getting sent back down, and it was a rough
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: one against the Yankees. Just over the weekend, Trey Gibson
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: from the Baltimore Orioles came up and pitched four and
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: two thirds innings.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: Looked okay.
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was a an MLB debut, so you
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: can't give him full kind of like analysis from that.
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: But the fastball sat in the mid nineties, the slider,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: which was his most used pitch, looked pretty solids. A
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: dude who has a five pitch mix actually six foot
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: five to forty, big old guy and was also an
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: undrafted free agent back in twenty twenty three. So that's
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: how far that Trey Gibson has come along. Looks like
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: he's going to be the number one option for when
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: the Orioles need somebody to shuttle back and forth from
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: TRIPLEA from here on out. They're also dealing with the
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: Trevor Rodgers illness, which they said they were kind of
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: they didn't say too much about, but it sounds like mono, honestly,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: Like whenever you see something like that, it's usually mono.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: And so we've got a little bit of a daylight
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: here though for Gibson in terms of the actual rotation
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: going forward, because Brandon Young has been less than spectacular,
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: Chris Bassett has also been a little bit rough. So
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: what do you think about trick Upson going forward? Is
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: he someone you are interested in in twenty twenty six
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: or is it more of like a longer term situation
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: and it is good to see him on the mound
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: here in twenty twenty six.
• 36:37
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think for me, he's probably a longer term
• 36:39
  Speaker 4: situation here. I really think Gibson's one of those guys
• 36:42
  Speaker 4: that has really good stuff. He just hasn't quite figured
• 36:45
  Speaker 4: out how to be a good picture yet, like I.
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: And that's no disservice to him. Big body, to your point,
• 36:52
  Speaker 4: good good repertoire, but still walks a few too many
• 36:55
  Speaker 4: guys and I don't see him really getting out of
• 36:58
  Speaker 4: you know, jams and things like that as well as
• 37:01
  Speaker 4: he should be. I think he's the guy that kind
• 37:03
  Speaker 4: of take a while to find his own in the
• 37:05
  Speaker 4: big leagues. So I think this is the kind of
• 37:07
  Speaker 4: guy that, you know, he might be a four or
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: five starter if he doesn't, you know, really figure things out.
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: He might.
• 37:13
  Speaker 4: If he does figure things out, he's maybe a mid
• 37:15
  Speaker 4: rotation guy at best. But again, he has to strikeout
• 37:19
  Speaker 4: upside and that's something that our fantasy game needs. And
• 37:22
  Speaker 4: so he's probably a really good streaming.
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: Option to keep an eye on. And then I think that.
• 37:27
  Speaker 4: There's something more that can develop here. But I really
• 37:29
  Speaker 4: want to see from a watch perspective, how he does
• 37:32
  Speaker 4: the rest of this year. And to your point, I
• 37:33
  Speaker 4: think he's gonna be shuttled in and out. He's gonna
• 37:35
  Speaker 4: be that first guy when injuries happen to kind of
• 37:38
  Speaker 4: be be called upon because there's not much more for
• 37:40
  Speaker 4: him to do in the miners. It's really question if
• 37:42
  Speaker 4: you can adapt to the majors.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we had another call up for an arm in
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: the Al East. It's Jake Bennett from the Busting Red Sox.
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: He's actually gonna get a couple more turns just while
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: Sonny Gray is still recovering, although he should be back
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: relatively soon, and Garrett Crochet is also on that eye.
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: But Jake Bennett was pretty solid in Triple A before
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: his call up a point eighty six Era A two
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: sixty nine to FIP in twenty one innings with a
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: k rate just over twenty percent, So it just ticked
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: over twenty point three percent, and he was not really
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: much of a strikeout pitcher coming through the last couple
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: of years with the Nationals. Ever since he went down
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: with the Tommy John surgery. He was swapped for Luis
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: Parles in the off season. This is a guy who
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: I've kind of liked because I like command and control
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: lefties as well as like, if you've been listening to
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: this pod, you know that you and I both have
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: something for dudes who were just six foot four in
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: taller that Bennett fits that profile at six foot six
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: and it's just a.
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: Mix for an awkward arm angle. What do you like?
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: Do you like Bennett in Boston for the rest of
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: the year, because it is another situation where he might
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: get more turns as the season wears on, especially if
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: we see more injuries or trades that open up spots.
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: For him in the rotation.
• 39:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's a situational guy.
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: And I I just was waiting for you to make
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: the comp because is he not just your left handed
• 39:12
  Speaker 4: Michael McGreevy is Yeah, And so like I was waiting
• 39:16
  Speaker 4: waiting for that, and like, I think that's what you're
• 39:18
  Speaker 4: looking at here. And so if you look at McGreevy,
• 39:21
  Speaker 4: I think the same thing applies here. Is this is
• 39:23
  Speaker 4: a guy that he's not your first rodeo. He's not
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: the guy that you want to angle in on, but
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: if you're looking for innings and you're in a good matchup,
• 39:31
  Speaker 4: he's not gonna blow up on you. He's not gonna
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: be a big problem for you. So I think there's
• 39:34
  Speaker 4: value it, but it's just it's situational value. And I
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: think that's what we see with Bennett because he's never
• 39:39
  Speaker 4: going to be this big strikeout guy. Maybe over time
• 39:41
  Speaker 4: he develops into something there, but for now, he's the
• 39:44
  Speaker 4: guy that isn't gonna blow up.
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: He's gonna give you some decent innings and.
• 39:49
  Speaker 4: Pitching in the you know, al East, there might not
• 39:52
  Speaker 4: be the spot where you really want to cut your teeth,
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: but that division is not what it always has been,
• 39:57
  Speaker 4: so I think there's some use for Bennett, but maybe
• 39:59
  Speaker 4: not a guy that I'm running out to grab a
• 40:02
  Speaker 4: lah Michael McGreevey.
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: Yep, I think that's all very fair, all right, last
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: transaction we have, and it's a little bit of a
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: surprise that the Marlins went ahead and sent down Augustin
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: Ramirez and called up Joe Max so that he could
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: make his MLB debut.
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: And Mac before the call up was hitting.
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: Two forty four, three eighty eight, three seventy eight. That's
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: a one to sixteen w RC plus down in triple
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: A for those Jacksonville jumbo shrimp with three taters, almost
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: an equal walk in k rate at nineteen percent on
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: the walk rate, twenty one percent on the k rate.
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: That was over one.
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: Hundred and three plate appearances. And so he should step
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: in immediately as the everyday catcher. He was a pretty
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: big prospect for the Marlins coming into this season, less
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: of a bat and more of a glove, kind of
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: a little bit of like a I get Mike's and
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: Nino vibes from it, honestly, where it's like it's a
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: pretty power forward bat where the glove and the arm
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: are gonna be major league everyday quality, and we'll see
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: if the bat can kind of catch up to that.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: For Mac, also helps that he is left handed, so
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: he'll get the platoon advantage a lot. Augustin Ramirez, I mean,
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: part of the reason he did get sent down is
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: because the glove is was awful, Like it was just
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: one of the worst that we've seen behind the plate
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: in quite some time, especially in this era of catcher
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: defense revolution. On top of it, you could just run
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: at will on Augustin Ramirez that people were certainly streaming
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: against the Marlins for stolen bases because the bat was
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: fine for a catcher, but that is the key for
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: a catcher. Two thirty three, eighteen three forty five with
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: two homers and three stone bases over one hundred and
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: twenty nine play appearances for Ramirez. So this is I
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: think a little bit of a fork in the road
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: for him. Honestly, because Mac is one of the top
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: mare Orland's prospects. I don't see him losing this job
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: unless he just totally craps the bat and doesn't hit
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: anything in the majors. Because the defense was already major
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: league quality from Joe Mack and if Ramirez can't develop
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: any defense down in Triple A, I don't know if
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: he's got the bat to DH or play first base,
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: and then he ends up in limbo land.
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: So what do you see for.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: Mac going forward in Miami? And what are you doing
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: with Ramirez in this wake up call that he's getting.
• 42:32
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think you hit it pretty well at least two.
• 42:35
  Speaker 4: Can't be further apart from a skill set perspective as
• 42:38
  Speaker 4: far as defense versus offense. Ramirez can run. He does
• 42:43
  Speaker 4: have some power. Mac has power, but I don't know
• 42:45
  Speaker 4: if it's gonna play as well in games as people think.
• 42:48
  Speaker 4: I know he's stolen some bases. I just don't think
• 42:50
  Speaker 4: that he's gonna steal me. So I think he's gonna
• 42:52
  Speaker 4: be a decent average, middling power, really good glove catcher,
• 42:57
  Speaker 4: and there's a ton of value for that in the
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: major leagues. But he's more of a catcher two or
• 43:03
  Speaker 4: bottom catcher two kind of guy that you're you're looking
• 43:06
  Speaker 4: at here long term. I think the question is really
• 43:09
  Speaker 4: for Gustin Ramirez is can he like he's got value
• 43:12
  Speaker 4: as long as he can retain that catcher eligibility. It's
• 43:15
  Speaker 4: kind of like uh, and don't take this as a
• 43:16
  Speaker 4: true comp but it's the situation of Ben Rice, Like,
• 43:19
  Speaker 4: is this a guy that can come up in DH
• 43:21
  Speaker 4: play first base, fill in and be the backup catcher
• 43:24
  Speaker 4: and maintain that eligibility and then somehow break off twenty
• 43:26
  Speaker 4: twenty seasons, Like that's what you're you're hoping for with
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: his profile, And I think this is the wake up call.
• 43:32
  Speaker 4: This is we gave you a full run last year.
• 43:35
  Speaker 4: You put up some pretty good numbers, but you were
• 43:36
  Speaker 4: terrible on defense. Go down, figure your bat back out,
• 43:41
  Speaker 4: and we'll bring you back and see where you fit.
• 43:43
  Speaker 4: So I don't think it's the end of Augustin Ramirez here.
• 43:45
  Speaker 4: There's there's too much value and his skill set, and
• 43:50
  Speaker 4: especially for a Marlin's team who can has up bats
• 43:54
  Speaker 4: for that type of type of guy.
• 43:55
  Speaker 3: So I'm I'm.
• 43:57
  Speaker 4: Probably moving on from Agustiner Ramirez definitely in reader leagues,
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: dynasty leagues. I'm actually holding him until he gets that
• 44:03
  Speaker 4: callback that I think is gonna happen, and then I
• 44:05
  Speaker 4: will look to move him once he gets hot, because
• 44:07
  Speaker 4: I just think long term, I don't this profile is
• 44:10
  Speaker 4: really really odd and I don't know where it fits.
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think I'm maybe a little bit
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: more worried about Ramirez than you are, because the Marlins
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: are in the middle of.
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: That wild card hunt and they can't have.
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: Ramirez developed at the big league levels. So I think
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: this is going to be a pretty important kind of
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: stretch of maybe a month or two in the minors
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: for Ramirez. And if he can't show that he can
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: make the bat, play at first base or DH, I'm
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: not sure he's got a major league role, So something
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: to keep in mind for him going forward. The other
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: thing to call off with the Marlins is Chris Paddock
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: was DFA today. I did mention Brax and Garrett He's
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: probably gonna come up and make the start. It's an
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: embarrassment of riches in terms of the starting pitching options
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: I have. It's just that Garrett's on the forty man
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: roster and honestly has been lights out at Triple A.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: I mean, maybe not as many strikeouts as Robbie Snelling
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: or Thomas White, but it's kind of nuts that the
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: Marlins even put Paddock in the rotation over Garrett to
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: start this first month, let alone like not giving him
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: this opportunity. So certainly somebody that I think is viable
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: in every league out there when he gets up is
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: Brax and Garrett.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: But free Robbie Snelling please.
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's gonna happen, because I mean, well,
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: Janson Junk has been fine. I almost wonder if they
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: trade Sandy o Contra for a bat and actually like
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: make a co competitive trade to be like stay in
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: the wild card in Miami.
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: That would be very.
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: Fascinating if they could match up with like a Detroit
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: team that's out of pitchers, a Toronto team that's out
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: of pitchers, and try to get a bat into the lineup,
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: because that would benefit both teams and allow the Marlins
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: to make use of all those minor league arms. Yep, Okay,
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: Well check out those show notes for the Baseball card
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: release calendar because there have been updates since last week.
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: We've got more pre orders that have gotten onto the schedule,
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: including twenty twenty five tops Inception.
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: That's right, I said, twenty twenty.
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: Five tops Inception, which I'm also surprised by that like
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: Inception was one of the card sets that I thought
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: they had cut.
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: But I mean I get it.
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: It's a very popular set, but last year's edition was
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: not exactly like a mega hit because the price point
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: didn't necessarily value what you got very well. It happened
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: recently with Tops Chrome Black too, where like I just
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: saw so many videos of people ripping it and being like,
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: well I just burnt four hundred and fifty dollars, and
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: I think that's what you're gonna get with inception, so
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: be careful with that. I know there were some issues
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: with people trying to order Tops Chrome Platinum fifty five,
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: which went on pre order today and welcome to pre
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: ordering from Tops dot com in twenty twenty six.
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: That's the way it works.
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: And we've all also got pre order set up though
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: for Top to Dynasty twenty twenty six that is on
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: May eleventh as well. Bowman's coming out next week, so
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: that's gonna be the focus of our show next week.
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: Any of these.
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: Sets that you're trying to get in on the pre
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: order and anything that's really like standing out to you
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: on the calendar right now.
• 47:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean if I was, I'm not, just because
• 47:18
  Speaker 4: the price points at this point, like it's just much
• 47:20
  Speaker 4: better to be in the singles resale type of market
• 47:23
  Speaker 4: or you know, pick something from for for For retail,
• 47:27
  Speaker 4: if you have the funds, you absolutely have to go
• 47:29
  Speaker 4: after Dynasty because it's an amazing set. But for the
• 47:33
  Speaker 4: average human, I think this is one where you know,
• 47:36
  Speaker 4: Top Series two is going.
• 47:37
  Speaker 3: To be a decent, decent one.
• 47:40
  Speaker 4: But I'm probably looking at Bowman right now is it's
• 47:42
  Speaker 4: just such a fun product. There's so many kind of
• 47:45
  Speaker 4: wild cards in there. I'd love to pick up a
• 47:48
  Speaker 4: few retail boxes of Bowman to see what that what
• 47:51
  Speaker 4: that can bring because I think there's some pretty big
• 47:52
  Speaker 4: names to go chase and give me some some Ethan
• 47:55
  Speaker 4: Holliday there.
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think.
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: That's all very very good to and I mean we'll
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: get more into Bowman for next week that I think
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: it's going to be a pretty exciting set. But as
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: we've seen with Bowman over the past couple of years,
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: it's always a price point kind of question, so it
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: will be good to see it in retail environments to
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: be able to rip that. But we'll go through that
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: next week. Of course, we're going to take a short
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: break then we're going to come back with our PC
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: picks for the April Players of the Month. So stick around, everybody,
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: Welcome back, everybody. We're going to get into one of
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: our favorite monthly segments that we cover on this pod.
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: It is the Player of the Month PC picks. So
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: if you're not familiar with what we do, we go
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: through the awards that were granted to the April players
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: of the Month at MLB, typically the hitter, the pitcher,
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: and the rookie of the month from each league, so
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: that's six total players. Then we each pick a card
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: to put in our quote unquote pod PC to represent
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: for the player's achievements in April. If you're looking at
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: what we've collected over the years in this PC, it
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: is quite the vast list. It's in the show notes.
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: You can click there to see what we put together
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: over the years. When you're down there, you can also
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: click on a link that will take you to rasball
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: dot com so you can see the post related to
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: what we're about to talk about.
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: You'll get pictures of all the cards there.
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: Assuming unless you're like five six years in the future, haven't.
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: I checked the links every once in a while when
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: I go back, But like after a couple of years,
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: the link rot really starts to kick in and you
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: can google yourself.
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: But if you're listening to this fresh.
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: You'll actually have a link with the cards on the post.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: So we've had a fun April here that wrapped up.
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: We've got some returners to our list, and we've got
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: some brand new names and someone's I don't think anybody
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: ever expected we'd have to make card selections for so, uh,
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: brew you ready, just get right into it. I know
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: you're itching.
• 50:11
  Speaker 3: I'm lichin. Let's go. Let's go.
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: There's some fun name. There's a lot of fun. This
• 50:15
  Speaker 4: is this is a fun one this month.
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: Yes, exactly.
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: So we're gonna start off on the al where the
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: Player of the Month on the hitting side was Jordan
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: Alvarez from the Houston Astros. Even though things are going
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: very wrong in Houston, things have gone very right for Jordan,
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: who started off with a three fifty six for sixty
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: two seven thirty seven slash line in April with more
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: walks than strikeouts, and he hit twelve homers, which isn't
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: leading the majors anymore. So he's lost the home run
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: lead in the Majors to Aaron Judge and Moritaka Murakami,
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: who somehow did not win one of these Players of
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: the Months, which is pretty impressive that.
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: Would have been a fun one too. So yeah, is
• 50:59
  Speaker 3: his time coming?
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: Yes, exactly, I think so. And when we get to
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: the Rookie I think you'll know why. But for youurd
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: On Alvarez, it's his first time on this PC list,
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: surprisingly that he's never put together a full month of
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: help to be able to do this while in the
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: air and judge era that we've been doing these Player
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: of the Month PC picks. So where are you going
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: brew to put in your first Jordon Alvarez card?
• 51:22
  Speaker 4: You would think I actually planned this out because we
• 51:24
  Speaker 4: just talked about Tops Dynasty being released, and I'm going
• 51:28
  Speaker 4: with Tops Dynasty. I'm going with Jordon Alvarez is twenty
• 51:31
  Speaker 4: twenty Tops Dynasty Rookie Patch Autumn out of ten.
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: It is a beautiful card.
• 51:36
  Speaker 4: If you don't get into Tops Dynasty. It's kind of
• 51:40
  Speaker 4: some chromatic imagery that they give on card autos with.
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: A very very good patch.
• 51:47
  Speaker 4: It's always a like three or four four multi color
• 51:50
  Speaker 4: patch that come in all these cards, and these are
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: highly highly sought after, very very low print runs. And
• 51:57
  Speaker 4: it's not one of those where it's like, hey, this
• 51:58
  Speaker 4: is out of ten. There's an out of twenty five
• 52:00
  Speaker 4: fifty version, Like, there's very few of these available at all,
• 52:04
  Speaker 4: and just to get one Tops Dynasty card into your collection,
• 52:08
  Speaker 4: it's gonna like of any player that like just fell
• 52:10
  Speaker 4: off the face of the earth, it's probably like a
• 52:11
  Speaker 4: seventy eighty dollars card. This Yordan Alvarez can be yours
• 52:15
  Speaker 4: for a small fee of thirty five dollars is a
• 52:20
  Speaker 4: PSA ten. The version that I've got linked in the
• 52:22
  Speaker 4: show notes. But I absolutely think Tops Dynasty is a
• 52:27
  Speaker 4: must have in a PC.
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: And even this one.
• 52:30
  Speaker 4: Got to give your Don Alvarez credit. He's looking good
• 52:33
  Speaker 4: on this card. He's he's got the nice beard going,
• 52:36
  Speaker 4: he's got a half smile, he's posed in that kind
• 52:39
  Speaker 4: of like you know, Tops nineteen seventies esque type pose
• 52:44
  Speaker 4: going on. It's it's just a beautiful card in my opinion.
• 52:47
  Speaker 4: So that's why I'm add to the PC. Costs me
• 52:49
  Speaker 4: a little bit, but I'm gonna make it work.
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: Yep. I think this is a great pick.
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: Twenty twenty Dynasty is also kind of funny because they
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: put all the cards in this like white motif with
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: the player in like a black and white or a Sepia,
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: And honestly, it makes them look dead. It looks it
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: looks like it's like a memorial card. The one you
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: also picked is also funny because the PSA label is wrong.
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: It says twenty twenty one Tops ninisty on it. It's
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: a twenty twenty Tops ninasty. You can find other cards
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: which maybe this one's surface because the patch on it
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: is certainly less impressive than some of the other ones
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: that are in this set. But you can't go wrong
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: with a Tops Dynasty Rookie patch auto.
• 53:33
  Speaker 3: No, absolutely can. So all right, where'd you go with
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: Jordan Alvarez?
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, since it is our first cards and
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: we had all of the twenty twenty rookie cards for
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: yard on, it's pretty much impossible for me to not
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: go to one of my all time favorite sets, which
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: is twenty twenty Top Stadium Club Chrome, which is the
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: set Stadium Club Chrome, not the Stadium Club Base, because
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: I'm going for the refractor card number sixty nine. But
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: this is also a special card for me because I
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: own this card. I pulled it when I was ripping
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: lots of twenty twenty Top Stadium Club Chrome back in
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: the day. So if you're out there and you want
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: this card I will sell to you. Reach out to
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: me on my socials because it's one of those cards
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: where I've been meaning to move it, but I've also
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: never really wanted to pull the trigger on paying the
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: eBay fees for it. So if we can figure out
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: something mutual, let's go for it. But it's a perfect
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: card because not only is twenty twenty Stadium Club chrome
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: just like an all timer set with the lower not
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: the capital letter, the lower letter, the lower case letter.
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: That's what I'm looking for. That's the word I'm looking for,
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: lowercase letter on the front, with the little like boxes
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: of colors for the teams.
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: It's just so clean.
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: The pictures are absolutely outstanding, and this is one of
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: those where you just get a full on photo of
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: Jordan Alvarez in the World Series just cranking a ball.
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: I don't know exactly what swing this was, but it
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: is just a majestic side picture of Jordan Alpharez's beautiful,
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: beautiful swing in front of a full World Series crowd.
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: Then you add on the refractor layer, which you can
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: see it a little bit in the cards from eBay,
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: but the refractors are beautiful from this set in person
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: that they were some of like the finest work that
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: I've seen from Tops in terms of bass refractors ever
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: put out.
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: So you can't go wrong.
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: You can also get just the base card of this
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: for like somewhere between five and ten bucks, So if
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: you want to go that route, you can, and if
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: you want to pay a little bit more, it's usually
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: about a forty to sixty dollars card on the refractor.
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: Just clean, clean, clean, clean clean.
• 55:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah, there's really nothing you can do wrong with twenty
• 55:48
  Speaker 4: twenty Stadium Club Chrome Like these are the cards I
• 55:51
  Speaker 4: like pick up randomly when like, oh, when I run
• 55:53
  Speaker 4: to like a run of them in like a dollar
• 55:55
  Speaker 4: box like that, I'm like, oh, what am I gonna find?
• 55:57
  Speaker 4: Because they're like even just like a no name play
• 56:00
  Speaker 4: your photography is wonderful, and then you bring it to
• 56:02
  Speaker 4: somebody like Jordan Alvarez rookie throw the refractor on there
• 56:06
  Speaker 4: that that card just hits differently than a lot of
• 56:10
  Speaker 4: other sets. You and I've expoused the wonders of Stadium
• 56:15
  Speaker 4: Club Chrome sets and kind of our dismay at Tops
• 56:18
  Speaker 4: moving away from that.
• 56:19
  Speaker 3: Maybe not, maybe they're.
• 56:19
  Speaker 4: Gonna do a twenty twenty five Stadium Club's Chrome in
• 56:23
  Speaker 4: like October of this year or something like that, knowing
• 56:25
  Speaker 4: that whether the printing presses are going. But yeah, this
• 56:28
  Speaker 4: is a great pick, great out of the PC. And
• 56:31
  Speaker 4: again it actually is affordable and manageable and like what I.
• 56:34
  Speaker 3: Tried to do.
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, there's gonna be two do you know. Everybody's
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: got different prices for everything. So okay, here's where we're
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: gonna get into the fun one. Because your player of
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: the Month in the NL for April was il Tomato Vargas.
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: On the batting side, so he is a thirty four
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: year old infielder from the Arizona Diamondbacks started the season
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: with a twenty four game hit streak that he pushed
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: to twenty seven when you kind of like wrapped it
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: around the year. He's now leading the majors in batting
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: average as well. It's kind of like a Luisa Rise profile,
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: but he's got popped and it's kind of all coming
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: out of nowhere for old Tomorrow Vargas here this year,
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: the April stat slash line was a very very nifty
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: three seventy eight, three ninety eight, six point eighty nine.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: That's a two to one WRC plus and that also
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: came along with six homers, nineteen runs, twenty rbi. If
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: there's some league out there where somebody rostered him from
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: the get go, they're probably in first place because it's
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: come out of nowhere. Uh certainly is starting to get
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: hoovered up finally in leagues as people have just kind
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: of like he's just playing every day for the Diamondbacks,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: and I don't He's obviously not going to keep this up.
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: This is a very much a blit for Vargas. Uh,
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: like the hot streak of all hot streaks. But you
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: can't ignore that he's actually playing and putting up the
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: volume right now from a fantasy perspective. But did you
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: you covered him a little bit in your piece this week.
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: What do you make of Vargas's hot start?
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it is exactly what you said it.
• 58:07
  Speaker 3: It's a hot start.
• 58:08
  Speaker 4: There are so many indicators that like this will not continue, Like, yeah,
• 58:12
  Speaker 4: maybe he can make himself useful, but this this definitely
• 58:16
  Speaker 4: reads as a number of other guys that like all
• 58:17
  Speaker 4: of a sudden, have power out of nowhere, and like
• 58:19
  Speaker 4: it's just he's getting incredibly lucky with a number of things,
• 58:23
  Speaker 4: and he's hitting the ball well on top of that,
• 58:26
  Speaker 4: So it just it just the stats just come out
• 58:28
  Speaker 4: oozing out when that happens, and so it's an overall
• 58:31
  Speaker 4: hot streak. But to your point, like, there's something to
• 58:34
  Speaker 4: be said in our fantasy game of just riding the
• 58:37
  Speaker 4: hot streak when it's happening and knowing when to get out,
• 58:40
  Speaker 4: and there's value in doing that. So do I see
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: a lot of value long term? No, if you have
• 58:44
  Speaker 4: his card to sell him now, like kind of things
• 58:46
  Speaker 4: never gonna be hotter. But at the same time, it's
• 58:49
  Speaker 4: a fun ride.
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I mean when you just see like this
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: et profile whenever you're getting like the blue bar on
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: the barrel rate and the hard hit rate and the
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: bat speed, but the squared up rate is all the
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: way slid into the right.
• 59:02
  Speaker 2: That is just pure hot streak.
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: So we've seen it over the years with Savant and
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: so I'm not expecting Vargas to keep it up. But
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: second base has been so brutal for fantasy that he's
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: a cromulent second base and in a twelve team or
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: even right now, So write it while you can, and
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: do not expect it to last.
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: With that he debuted.
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: So long ago in twenty seventeen, and he's been around
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: kicking around in the miners much longer than that. You know,
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: he was in the Cardinal system back when we were
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: still in high school, well not high school, college. Two
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: thousand and eight is when he was in rookie ball
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: for the Cardinals. So Vargus has been around for a while.
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: We had more cards.
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: Than you would think because he's just been around for
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: so long, and he's an easy person to fill up
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: a lot of update sets too. So where did you
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: go to pick an il Tomato Vargas card?
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: Should be stated?
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: These are our first build Tomorrow Vargas cards in our PC.
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: Maybe are only ones.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 4: It may it may be the last, but I wanted
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 4: to go something fun that cards. I don't think I
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 4: actually ever owned one of these, So I'm going with
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 4: his rookie from twenty eighteen tops update, but I'm going
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 4: with the clear acetate version, which is out of ten.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 4: So these, for those that don't know, they are kind
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 4: of clear plastic cards that you know on the backside
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 4: of the card is just a reverse image of the
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 4: front side, but more on kind of that black and
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 4: white kind of kind of view, So very rare. There's
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 4: only ten of them in every set for the rookies.
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 4: But it's just a fun, fun unique card that I'd
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 4: like to add to the set. So nothing beyond that.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 4: It's a nice little swing from Vargas, and to the point,
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 4: it's in the Dvax jersey, so it kind of still
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 4: fits very very well for him. So just going with
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 4: a simple tops uptate Rookie, just a more expensive version
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 4: of Out of ten yours on eBay four hundred dollars.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, great choice. I don't know if we have
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: an acetate card in our.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 3: I don't think we need right now.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: That yeah, early one of the acetate parallels at least,
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: which is also fun because the back like you don't
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: get any of the stats or anything. It's just like
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: a see through of the card, which sometimes you do
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: a little bit more so now where I think I've
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: seen versions where they at least put like some of
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: the biographical information, but you don't get the stat lines
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: and stuff because there's not enough space.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: But yeah, great, great choice.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 3: Here, all right, where did you go with Vargas?
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: I am also sticking in twenty eighteen to get one
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: of his rookie cards, but I'm going to go with
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: twenty eighteen TOPS Gallery the autograph because partly because twenty
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: eighteen TOPS Gallery. If we had a segment ever on
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: Ugliest Cards of an All Time, twenty eighteen TOPS Gallery
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: might end up there.
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: Because some of the paintings.
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: If you're not familiar with what TOPS Gallery was, they've
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: since gotten it. I think the Julio years were his
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: Rookie card was maybe one of the last times they
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: did TOPS Gallery because they've always been traditionally ugly that
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: like there's just something about the cards where what they
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: do is they have artists actually like paint pictures of
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: the players and that becomes the card. It just never
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: translates well or I don't know if like there's some
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: artistic interpretations.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: Going on or something.
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: But like, surprisingly the Vargas one is not bad, but
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: like some of the ones from this twenty eighteen set
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: were really, really terrible, and I especially love them because
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: they're just like so ugly. They're cool, and then you
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: get like the actual like design around the card too,
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: and it's just awful. And so that's why I had
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: to go with this as well as like this card
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: and that Ascetate card too. This is in dollar boxes
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: at all sorts of card shows that, like, you've got
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: a couple more weeks to do through dollar boxes in
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: the d back section to find ol Tomorrow Vargas rookie
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: cards and autos. He's in lots of products actually from
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, so if you can unearth it from a
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: dollar box, you can flip it pretty quick. Because this
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: auto actually, when I found it earlier this week, I
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: think it was going for fifty bucks, but since the
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: Player of the Month like awards have gotten disseminated on
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: a wider broadcast, it's already up to seventy five bucks.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: This is a dollar card, so like it's going to
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: be back to a dollar within no time. And so
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: find those Vargas cards while you can and move them
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: while you can, because it's a fading comment, that's for sure.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I love your comment here about this set because
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 4: I'm gonna ignore Vargas completely, but because the premier card
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 4: in the set, in my opinion, well there's a Otani.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: Don't get me wrong, but which is also ugly.
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 4: It is, but the one Soto in the set is
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 4: actually really really good. They actually did a good job
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 4: on that one in my opinion. But then as I
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 4: was looking for the Soto I ran across. Like the
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 4: Reee Hoskins card. It is literally like a kid drew
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 4: with cramp. It is so bad.
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 3: I don't all kind of just ramble so you can
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 3: pull it up with when you look it is. It
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 3: is very rough. I don't know.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 4: I have no idea to describe it. Besides, it looks
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 4: like somebody some kid drew while the air.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: McDonald's but pick nos.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's rough.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 4: So I guess if if Reese ever makes it back
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 4: into the Player of the Month or somehow into our
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 4: PC collections, this is this is my pick for sure.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: I like it. Well, yep, we can already slot it.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: Reee Hoskins please get hot for those Cleveland guardians out there.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 3: I really love it.
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: Okay, let's get into the pictures.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: On the al side, it's none other than Jose Soriano
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: that certainly we've already seen the regressions starting to happen
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: thanks to the Chicago White Sox pounding him, but it
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: was good bound to happen.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: He still a solid picture going forward.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: You just have to know that he's not going to
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: be the elite level ace that he was in April
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: when he put up a point eighty four ERA over
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: forty two and two thirds innings forty nine k's to
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: sixteen walks. That is a K minus BB ultimately of
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: twenty point two and thirty percent strikeout rate. It was
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: fantastic all the way across the board, especially he was
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: pretty much free I think at the end of most drafts,
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: where honestly most projection systems were kicking out value. And
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: I've been interested in Jose Soriano in the past. I've
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: liked the mix, but like he was such a whip
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: murderer with the Angels defense behind him and the sinker
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: that unlocking that forcing fastball with Mike Maddox on the
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: Angels has really unlocked something here for Jose Soriano. All
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: that said, also his first time being a PC pick
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: here for the pod. So where are you going?
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 4: Yeah, so this this is the we kind of alluded to,
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 4: you know, opening the show. Here, I think we can
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 4: purchase our entire PC of Jose Soriano for about ten
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 4: bucks and there. I don't think I've yet to actually
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 4: just buy one of these right after the podcast recording,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 4: This one is close and I'm I'm going to go
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 4: to you know, one of our our favorite things, which
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 4: is the minor league cards. So this is my league
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 4: choice from twenty twenty three from Jose Soriano when I
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 4: believe it's a double A for the Angels and he
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 4: is with the Rocket City trash Pandas, and you know
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 4: that's all that's I don't need to describe the card
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 4: anything else. It just is Rocket City trash Pandas across
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 4: the top, got his nice Rocket City jersey on. He's
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 4: about ready to deliver a pitch. He has me mugging
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 4: pretty good. The bat at it there, so you know,
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 4: you can see how this is a guy is a
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 4: menacing piece sending at six to three. But I just,
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 4: I just I love the the intricacies of minor league cards,
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 4: and what better team name than Rocket City trash Pandas,
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 4: So I gotta add that to the PC.
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, this one's gone up in value a little bit.
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: I mean, most of the other.
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: Cards from that set are trading pretty cheaply or you
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: can even get the whole set. But yeah, it's five
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: to ten dollars card. Great choice.
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: I also like the back because.
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: It gives you a little bit of like the humble
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: beginnings of Siano where the way that he got on
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: the Angels was that he was a Rule five pick
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: from the Pirates or the Pirates took him as a
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: Rule five pick yep. Then he had Tommy John surgery
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: with the Pirates and the Pirates has sent him back
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: to the Angels so allowed him to develop himself and
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: turn into what he is now, which is going to
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: be an all star pitcher for the Angels.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 4: And I also like they have a QR code on
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 4: the back of the card for his career stats, and
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 4: so I'm actually scanning it right now. I'm just curious
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 4: and it just it does just go to his minor
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 4: league player pagelb dot com player page for Jose Soriano.
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 4: So it's actually a card that continues up to itself,
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 4: which is pretty cool.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: Nice no broken links there, nope, Okay, Well I went
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: with another defunct card set because I was just on
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: a defunct card set kick this week as we were
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: banking our PC selections. So if you're looking for rookie
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: cards of Jose Soriano, they're actually all in twenty twenty four.
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: You can go back to the podcast from when series
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: one of twenty twenty four came out to figure out
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: why I'm not picking any of his flagship or Tops
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: Chrome cards because I absolutely hated the twenty twenty four.
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 2: Design and I just couldn't do it.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: I kept looking at it with the Soriano cards, and
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: it makes me even more hateful towards that set that,
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: like the incongruent fonts on it just drive me wild.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: So I went with another unked set here Tops Big
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: League Baby, and this is you can get this card
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: for a dollar even less. You can find it in
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: dollar boxes and you probably like find it in boxes
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: at card shows where like the dudes are sorting through
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: and getting like ten for a dollar. I'm sure this
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: card's in there. Big League is not known for anything
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: and it never holds any value, and you've just got
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: a great photo of Jose Soriano pitching. And the design
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: for this Tops Big League, I don't know, it's like
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: Americana ish, but like if you just kind of randomized
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: what the American flag was and then put it into
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: a design with the Big League logo on it, that
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: it was a terrible design, but it works with this
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: card that like the red and blue background works really
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: well with the Angel City Connect jerseys, which are just
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: some of like the best city connect jerseys, and you've
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: got Soriano rearing back to throw a pitch. I also
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: like the back of these cards too. They're pretty solid,
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: like in terms of just the space and breadth that
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: they give to the actual stats on Big League where
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: it's actually like flagship where I appreciate like having biographical
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: details and stats and all that kind of stuff.
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 2: So it's just a fun.
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: Little card where the big League design actually matched up
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: with the pitcher and it all works together. So I
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: couldn't I couldn't resist going with a one dollar card
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: for Jose Soriana.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 3: I feel like there's a high likelihood this might be
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 3: the only Big League card that we have.
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 4: In the PC, not just already for a while. Let's
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 4: just let's just say it that way. But you're right,
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 4: like there's probably very few that it works for.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 3: But this not just.
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 4: The fact that it kind of does it kind of
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 4: a general color match. The whole kind of background cut
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 4: out of the card is like an angled and it's
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 4: perfectly angled with how he's pitching, like his shoulder angle.
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 4: It's just like it's almost like perfectly framed photo of
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 4: Josi Sarroriato.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 3: So like this is just a cool, cool car.
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I like it.
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: So it's a like I said, it's a weird design
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: for the set because it doesn't work with most other teams,
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: but some red and blue teams that it works very well. Okay,
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: the picture on the NL side, we've put him into
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: the PC about a million times at this point, show
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: hey Otani coming through and getting his first Picture of
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: the Month award, and he came into the season where
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: like one of the things that Otani said he wanted
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: to do eventually was win a cy Young Award, and
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: certainly he looks like he might do that and wrap
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: up another MVP here in twenty twenty six if he
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: keeps pitching like this.
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 2: April a point.
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: Six ear ra over his first thirty innings with thirty
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: four k's and nine walks. If you've watched it in
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: the starts, it looks totally untouchable, like it's you wouldn't
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: even like know that this dude was also the best
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: DH the best bat in the entire world. That like,
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: every time I watch Otani, it makes me feel fine
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: holding onto all the cards I have of this because
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: like it's just it ratchets up, and it ratchets up.
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: I don't know how to explain how the best player
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: in the entire universe and history of baseball just keeps
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: getting better and better, But he is by adding this
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: Player of the Month pitcher award to his belt. So
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: we've already got lots of Otani cards on the PC,
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: but there's still plenty of space for more.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 2: Where'd you go?
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, he did win for a Pitcher of
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 4: the Month, and I should have probably just gone for
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 4: a card of Otani pitching, but I didn't. I wanted
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 4: to go something a little bit more unique, harder to find,
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 4: So I went with his twenty eighteen tops what they
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 4: call hand on helmet super short print rookie card. And
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 4: I believe this is from series two, and you know,
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 4: approximately a probably i'll call it a ten thousand dollars
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 4: cards somewhere in that in that range. And it's it's
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 4: just a it's a very young Otani in the Angels uniform.
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 4: He's got the sliding mitt on his hand, just like
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 4: he's gonna be stealing all these bases, and it's I
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 4: really like the twenty eighteen design.
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 3: It's it's just simple but it works so well.
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 4: I just love the fact that you almost have a
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 4: full picture if there's not a border on it anything
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 4: like that. So it's kind of almost some of those
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 4: true photo variations that we see today. So I really
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 4: like this card and it's one that you just do
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 4: not see of Ovotani.
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 3: It is very very rare.
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 4: You can probably find one at any given time on eBay,
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 4: so very very rare. Currently one up for auction ten
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 4: thousand Canadian with like four days left here, so we'll
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 4: see where this one goes.
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 3: But this is what I'm matt the PC. It's very
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 3: very unique Otani.
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's a great choice.
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: It's also a good choice I think still for pitching
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: because it's got his pitching record on the back because
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: the numbers of a one hundred card of Series two
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: was the one where he's pitching on the front, so
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: it's still got the pitching numbers on the back and
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: talks about him being a pitcher, so I think.
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: It still fits.
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 3: Good choice. Yeah, So I stuck in on the back
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 3: side of this one. So how about you.
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 4: There's very few options out there in the marketplace if
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 4: you haven't noticed for Awani, So how'd you narrow down
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 4: the list?
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: Well, I was actually originally going to do the Otani
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: all Aces from twenty twenty three. That is a regular
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: insert that every time I check in on it it
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: keeps going up that I think it's almost like a four.
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 2: Hundred dollars card.
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: Now people are straight up ripping twenty twenty three update
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: just to find this card. And you can find twenty
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: twenty three update very very cheaply, so if you're still
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: sitting on some rip it because the chance of that
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: basic insert being in there pretty good.
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 2: Except that we.
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: Put that into our PC already, so we had already
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: chosen it back when it was maybe only a fifty
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: dollars card and we were remarking on how crazy price
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: it was, so something to check out there. I did
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: go with a pitching card for the Dodgers, the twenty
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: twenty six tops Series one T ninety one dash one
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: hundred of the nineteen ninety one throwback inserts.
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 2: I'm going with.
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: The blue of one fifty version, which will run you
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: about two hundred bucks, and the base version will run
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: you like five bucks or less. It's a base version insert,
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: but it's just.
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 2: A really really clean card of Otani pitching.
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: You get a good side angle view of him with
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 1: the kind of like blurred out background in Dodger Stadium,
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: and part of it is just like, I don't know
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: what it is with the Dodgers, but on the nineteen
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: ninety one Tops design, it pops for me. And there's
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 1: just such a huge nostalgia factor, as like the ninety
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: one Tops was one of the most ubiquitous cards of
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: our childhood. It is unfortunate, as we've remarked, when they
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 1: put this design out, that it doesn't come with the
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: dole pretty much straight up cardboard feel that nineteen ninety
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: one Tops had. That it's back to a glossy, normal
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: modern card, but you still get the feel on the back.
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 1: You get that that pinkish reddish back with the stats
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: on it. So I couldn't resist when I saw this card.
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: It's it's a beautiful card and it's a well framed
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: up Otani card.
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right, it is a beautiful card.
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 4: I love the color match, love them the pitching in
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 4: the Dodgers' uniform, and to your point, they even like
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 4: looks like they can kind of mimic the feel in
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 4: the back design like it looks like it should be
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 4: rough to the hand, It looks like it should be
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 4: that old card stock.
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 3: It just isn't.
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 4: But this is a great, great card. But it's also
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 4: just emblematic of where Otani's market is these days.
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 3: You know, sold for two hundred bucks for a card like.
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 4: This, Like that's anything Otani, anything color match is just
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 4: it is so unbelievably a hot market. And I just
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 4: I don't know when it's gonna ever stop. I just
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 4: I just can't see it. He just keeps getting better.
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 1: No, And I mean the other factor too. We've talked
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: about it actually more offline than we ever have on
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: the pod. But if you are gears as to why
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: it keeps going up, it's because the Chinese market is
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: in on Otani cards, and so that's pretty much an
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: untapped two billion people, you know that, Like yep, it's
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: a lot of buyers. And so that's why the market
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: just keeps steadily going up. And I think it's only
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: gonna keep going up because people will just know him throughout.
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 2: The world as the greatest baseball player it's ever lived.
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 1: So I feel pretty good about where the trajectory of
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: Otani cards is going because everybody wants them, and even
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 1: people that don't collect baseball cards want them.
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 4: If you can get three massive markets Japan, China and
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 4: the US, I think you're gonna.
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 3: Your cards are even if they're overproduced, are going to
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 3: do just fine.
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. Okay, let's get onto the rookies.
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: So the AL rookie of the Month it was not
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: Munataka Makami.
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 2: It was Kevin McGonagall from.
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: The Detroit Tigers, who put up a slash line of
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: three twenty eight, four, twenty six.
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 2: Five h nine.
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: And I mean he was just hot out the gate.
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: He opened up the first day of the season with
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: hits and he just keeps going. He's got an endless mowner.
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 1: He's a just an absolute baseball player. Gonna also be
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 1: like a Fantasy most valuable hitter. I think, considering now
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: that he's qualified at shortstop and third base in pretty
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: much all leagues, that when you put that up to
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 1: he's probably gonna hit like fifteen fifteen with a two
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: seventy ish average is where I would well from here
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: on out. And so you add that to what he
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 1: already did in the first month, he's gonna end up
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: with like a two eighty ish batting average. Considering his price,
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: that's gonna be a steal when you get in the
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: dual eligibility. So, uh, first cards that we're putting together
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: here for Kevin McGonagall into our pc U. But there's
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: still a pretty robust market because he was a hot
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: prospect coming through the miners.
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 2: Where are you going for your pick?
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 4: Grew Yeah, I I this McGonagall. I really wanted the
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 4: first Bowman auto. I don't know why. It's just it
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 4: feels like that's what he deserves. And maybe it's with
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 4: all these other guys and kind of find their way
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 4: into this list from different angles, and they weren't really
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 4: like big prospects in those Bowman sets, and so McGonagall
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 4: I wanted to go there, but I wanted to go
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 4: a little bit different and go into the sapphire sets
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 4: because I absolutely adore uh sapphire and yes it's a
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 4: little little pricey, and I almost put the traditional blue
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 4: sapphire in until I saw the orange and in the Tigers,
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 4: Like they don't put a lot of orange on your uniform,
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 4: but somehow it's still a color match. Just to the
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 4: little aspect of the logo that has that and this
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 4: card just hits different And I'm almost sitting here thinking
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 4: the Tigers color match with orange is almost as good
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 4: as the Orioles color match with orange. Like and maybe
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 4: that's blasphemy, but it's working. It's kind of McGonagall card
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 4: is a I wish you had a little bit better
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 4: of a signature because it literally is a scribble.
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 3: I think there's a K in there and maybe it
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 3: ends an M.
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 2: I think I think it's it's Kevin.
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 3: You sure doesn't say kip M. I don't know, but
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 3: absolutely studying card.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 4: It is also one of those ones you take a
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 4: picture on the right light, it's just gonna be an
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 4: absolute sparkle of a card. So got add of the
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 4: PC this this one, like he says, out of twenty
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 4: five the orange version Audibay right now for roughly six
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 4: thousand dollars in this.
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 3: P s A nine version. I'm sure you can have
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 3: it for less than that.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 4: But still with the trajectory how he's playing, I think
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 4: you know, none of these guys like McGonagall are gonna
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 4: hold the value they have right now.
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 3: They are going to go down.
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 4: Uh, just the kind of the way the hype works
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 4: with with prospects when they first get debuted. But this
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 4: is the card like next offseason, pick that up. It's
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 4: it's gonna be the kind of card you want in
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 4: your PC long term.
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, you can't go wrong with this. I'm
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: my hot take too, is I think I'd actually rather
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: have this than the super that it looks better when
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: you get that color match, and especially just tigers and orange,
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: and honestly, at six thousand bucks, this is kind of
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: a steal that. Like, I'm surprised it's priced that low.
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: You're looking at some of the recent or like the
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: cards that suggest for you. Underneath this, there are awesome
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: McGonagall cards that are not even sapphires, and they're more
• 1:21:25
  Speaker 1: expensive that I mean, some of them are tens where
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 1: this is a nine. But it's way prettier, and you
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: can't go wrong with the color match like this, especially
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 1: with an orange Tigers, like you said, so perfect to pick.
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 3: All right, where'd you go with Kevin McGonagall?
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: Okay, well I went with twenty twenty five tops Pro debut,
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: and I had no idea this set of cards existed.
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 2: It's relatively cheap.
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: You're looking at about a forty ish dollar card now,
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: But I mean, you probably could have gotten it way
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: cheaper before mc really took off, and he'll probably fall
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: back down a little bit after the hype settles a
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: little bit.
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 2: But the card is called called Stars of MLB.
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: And if there's one that I would look at when
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 1: you're in those show notes, it'd be this one because
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: it's really tough to describe. It is just a picture
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: of the flying Tigers Lakeland Tigers logo in the background
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: with McGonagall on on the front of it, which great
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: photo of McGonagall. He's focusing on trying to catch a ball,
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: and look how much dirt is on his uniform. That
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: if there's anything that I like think about when I
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 1: think about Kevin McGonagall, now it's just dirt on a
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: white uniform that this dude's always down, sliding, hustling and
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 1: just giving it is all to be able to win
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: a baseball game. And then you get that beautiful flying
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: Tiger logo in the background that that's all the background is,
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: and it says Kevin McGonagall. You don't get cards that
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 1: are much cleaner than this instant PCs. If you're a
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 1: Tigers and Kevin McDonald fan, yeah, I did not.
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 4: Realize this one existed either, and just looking at him, like, yeah,
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 4: this is an absolutely fantastic card. Uh, definitely one that
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 4: you want to kind of sneak into the PC there
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 4: just because it's gonna it pops in a weird way.
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 4: It almost feels like it should be in Big League
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 4: or something like that, and it's it's not. But I absolutely,
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 4: I absolutely love what you picked here.
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: All right, well, thank you. Let's get into our last dude.
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: N L Player of the Month for the rookie was
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: Sal Stewart and uh, don't look at anything that he's
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: been doing so far in May.
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 2: We'll focus on.
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: His April stats because it's fallen off pretty quick. But
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 1: I think that's who salth Stewart's gonna be. It's gonna
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: be a very hot and cold hitter. It was extremely
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: hot in April with a two eighty one, three seventy three,
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 1: five seventy slash line during which he cracked nine homers,
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 1: twenty runs, twenty nine RBI with.
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 2: Seven Stonlem bases.
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: Is as for why the Reds are where they are
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: in the standings right now.
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 2: Like I said, he's already starting to fall back to earth.
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: It's been pretty.
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: Tough over the past week or so, as he's already
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: backed down to a two fifty two average in a
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 1: one twenty six WRC plus, you can see how quickly
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: it can unravel from a April performance. But let's focus
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: on some cards. For salth Stewart, it is his first
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: time going into our pod PC.
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 2: Where did you go?
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 4: Yeah, so if if you already pulled up the card,
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 4: you my went to refresh because I up to the
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 4: links that didn't go to the right card. But I'm
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 4: going to one of my favorite sets, which is Leaf Trinity.
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 4: Leaf Trinity has some of the best UH patch autos
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 4: from a minor league perspective. These are unlicensed, which is
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 4: usually not my thing, but they do a fabulous job.
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 4: And the reason I picked this card this is twenty
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 4: twenty two Leave Trinity. They call it rookie patch autos.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 4: Not really as rookie uh but it's out of ninety nine.
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 4: It does have a sticker auto, so not as ideal.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 4: But the thing about this card is it is the
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 4: patch of mister Red Legs from the Cincinnata Reds and
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 4: it is just his face in his hat and it's
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 4: just like he's peering through the patch a window of
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 4: this card, which is just an unbelievable patch. Like, you
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 4: can't find a better patch than this for almost any
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 4: team because you don't have most logos don't have like
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 4: somebody looking at you and the way they got just
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 4: a little bit of the mustache, a little bit of
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 4: the hat and just his eyes sticking through. I don't
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 4: know who manufactured this one, who like picked this patch.
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 4: It is the best one, and somehow it's on a
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 4: card out of ninety nine. This is the one that
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 4: goes on like the one of one. This is what
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 4: goes on the number ten and but the market adjust
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 4: that I don't know exactly what sold for is list
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 4: for five hundred best offer it did sell. But these
• 1:25:48
  Speaker 4: are the kind of things where like numbering doesn't matter,
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 4: that patch matters, and it is just absolutely unbelievable. There's
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 4: other ones that have like the bottom part of mister
• 1:25:55
  Speaker 4: red Legs or things like that, that's not what you're
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 4: going for. This is the one to go for.
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think this is a great choice. This is
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: actually like when mister red Legs ends up on patches
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: like this, like you can't ever go wrong, because especially
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 1: when it's this with just his eyes. Dude looks unhinged
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 1: with like the white pupils on top of like everything else.
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 1: Just like man, great card, great find that no notes,
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 1: you can't go wrong with a mister Legs.
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 4: You just just please go to the show notes, find
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 4: the link, take a look at it. That's we can't
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 4: paint the picture of this one well enough, so I'm
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 4: gonna leave it to you. Close us out see if
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 4: you can beat this one.
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 1: So, I don't know if you noticed this when you
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: were looking at South Stuart cards, but dude, it does
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: not look great on a baseball card. He's not exactly
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: the most photogenic person I've ever seen. And I can
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 1: also see why he has that mustache because uh, Tops
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: did him dirty on a lot of his cards throughout time.
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: His first bowman looks. It's not it's not act without
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: the mustache he was in twenty twenty six Tops chrome black.
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 2: That picture is also brutal.
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: So like, there are gonna be more rookie cards for
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: salth Stewart coming out this year, and we will hope
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: that they are better because they do not have a
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 1: lot of him with the mustache that he so desperately
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 1: needs on his face to kind of make everything work together.
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: So given all that, I went with the card that
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 1: maybe makes salth Stewart look the most ridiculous, and that
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: his twenty twenty four choice Dayton Dragons card from the
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 1: minor leagues.
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 2: He's wearing this.
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 1: Super ridiculous chain, his eyebrows are totally unkempt and look
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 1: like mustaches. He's got a five o'clock shadow, even though
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: I'm sure he only shaved like two hours before, because
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: he strikes me as a guy who probably shaves three
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: to four times a day to be able to keep
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 1: anything from growing on his face constantly.
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 2: And then you've got just like.
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: The weirdest little like haircut that it is like coming
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: through the ball cap with the flip in the back.
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: It's a fresh fade, but it's not a very like
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: attractive fade. And so add all that together, I'm putting
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: it into the PC for you, South Stuart, because I
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: already know you're not a very photogenic dude. It looks
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 1: like and you know that based on this portrait as well,
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: So let's just lean into it. Let's use this card
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: from your time in Dayton and Dayton. Sorry, I think
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: I said daytona earlier, but it is Dayton Dragons in Ohio.
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 4: I'm just trying to figure out the chain he's wearing.
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 4: It looks like it should be an sp for like
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 4: Salar Stewart, but it looks like the number five and
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 4: he's number eleven in the jersey, Like I really trying
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 4: to figure out, like, and he's also not doesn't even
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 4: wear his cap all the way on his head. And
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 4: this photo is like it's literally like sal Stuart like
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 4: rolled out of bed for team picture to day is
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 4: like what can I wear? This most ridiculous and also
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 4: meet like all the requirements of the team gave me,
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 4: So I'm gonna give myself a.
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 3: Really bad haircut.
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 4: I'm gonna like, I don't know what the eyebrowser something
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 4: else in this one grabs the gaudiest chain, like this
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 4: is a fun card, Like I'm looking at the price point.
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 4: I'm only the one you kind of tagged fifteen bucks,
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 4: Like I feel like how bad it is for salth
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 4: Stewart deserves the fifteen dollars price point, Like kudos kudos
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 4: to to to choice cards.
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah exactly, and so especially if South Stewart wins
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: any more of these Rookie of the Month aboards.
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 2: Hopefully we'll have some more to.
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 1: Look at as Tops comes out with more that include
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 1: his mustache, because that dude needs it on his face,
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 1: that's for sure. And so with that we're gonna wrap
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 1: up our April Player of the Month PC picks. Brew
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 1: Everybody know where they can find you on socials and
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 1: read your work.
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 4: Yep, find me Twitter, ex Blue Sky, Jay Brewer one seven,
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 4: find me with rasballs oone the weekends and Top one
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 4: hundred hitters and hitter profiles.
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 3: Coolie. Where can fikes folks find you?
• 1:29:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you can find me on Blue Sky at m
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: cool seven spelled c ill like my last name, and
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 1: you can read my work on Baseball Perspectives, so doing
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 1: starting pitching coverage over there and just odds and ends
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 1: as we get call ups throughout the season as well.
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: So either way, support your independent baseball media out there.
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: Get a rasball subscription that will be in the show
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: notes where you can get the link to sign up
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 1: and get the streaminator and the hitter Tron tools, support
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 1: Baseball Perspectives, support Fangraphs, anywhere else that you're getting media from.
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 2: It is greatly appreciated.
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: You can also follow the podcast on Blue Sky at
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 1: Cards Categories or email us at Cards Categories at gmail
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 1: dot com. When you're in those show notes checking out
• 1:30:40
  Speaker 1: the pictures of these cards, you will also find links
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 1: to cards and categories gear, some hats, some coffee mugs,
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: some baby onesies. If we can slap a Cards and
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: Categories logo on it, I certainly have. So thanks everybody
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: for checking out this podcast, rate and review wherever you're
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: listening to us, whatever podcatcher you're using, we greatly appreciate it.
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: And with that, we're gonna wrap it up for this week.
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 1: We'll be back next week Talk twenty twenty six Bowman Release.
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: So if you are a card ripper, you're gonna be
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: a great pod next week.
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 2: We'll see you then