Latest / Sports Card Clubhouse / Organic vs Manufactured Scarcity- Is The Hobby's Opinion Evolving?

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Organic vs Manufactured Scarcity- Is The Hobby's Opinion Evolving? · Sports Card Clubhouse

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In our massive country, there are card collectors throughout
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the land participating in the hobby.
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There's Mike of Junk Wax Hero and Greg of Midlife Cards, and
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while distance may separate them, here is where they come
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together to talk cards. Hey buddy, how you doing?
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Oh man, I have never been better.
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Really. That's exciting, yeah.
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This moment right here, you've seen it.
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Wow, wow. OK, I'm going to leave it alone,
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but that's great. I'm excited to be a part of this
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moment then. It's because of you.
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Oh. Well, now it's all starting to
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make sense. How has the week gone?
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Any pickups? Any new cards?
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Anything super exciting? Well I'm glad you asked.
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That wasn't really prepared. I have not bought a card in a
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while. Well, I, I, I just showed my
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pickups yesterday with Diana Taurasi, but that was, I almost
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said Diana Ross, Diana Taurasi with that.
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I bought that a couple weeks ago.
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I'm saving up for the, the New England national.
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I'm, I'm now calling it the New England national, the Shriner
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Show, which is a massive, massive show just outside of
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Boston, Wilmington, Mass. That is on the day that this
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podcast airs audio version Saturday.
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I'll be there Saturday. I'm very excited about it.
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This episode of Surface Issues is brought to you by Chris
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Sewell of YouTube. Collector, investor, dealer, in
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that order. Chris Sewell here Baseball card
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collector, investor dealer in that order.
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If you have a collection for sale, whether it be a large one
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or a small one, consider Chris Sewell.
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He always offers share prices on your collection and is always
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looking to buy. I mean, I don't feel left out or
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anything. It's like a bunch of my favorite
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people are going to be there and me too.
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Saturday. You know what though?
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I'm setting up at a card show with my dad.
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We've got a table. Well, he's got a table and I'm
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tagging along. So we're going to have a fun
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time on Saturday. So I'm excited about that.
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What a great experience. Yes, yes, he's, I got a few
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things to sell, but we'll just be hanging out talking cards all
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day with my dad and I have a pickup that I don't think I've
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mentioned it on the channel. I I have it.
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I didn't, I didn't get it out, but it actually fits perfectly
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with today's topic. So as you know, a former student
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of mine, Matt Manning, was drafted #9 overall from to the
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Tigers. And I had him spring semester
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that year. We're on a block schedule so we
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have four classes. He had me for first and second
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period. Matt did and then I know.
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And then in June he was drafted by the Tigers number 9th overall
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and got a three and a half million dollar signing bonus.
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So a month after leaving my classes he gets this huge bonus.
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Anyway, so his rookie cards are 2022 and about six months ago
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his tops Chrome super fractor 1 of 1 from 2022.
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His technical rookie year came up for sale and I bought it.
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And then I was like, man, it would be really cool to have his
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Panini black finite, one of one the, you know, the cousin, first
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cousin of the Super fractors, the black finite.
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And there was one for sale and the guy wanted like 250 bucks
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for it. So I just like watched it on
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eBay and I just watching, watching, watching, watching.
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And finally the other day I'm like, he's not in the news.
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He's not affiliated with the team right now.
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I'm just going to throw this guy like a $40 offer and I got it
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like 40 bucks. So I have Matt's best bass
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rookie card, the black finite from Panini, and his best bass
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rookie card, the Super factor from Tops Chrome and I am so
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excited to have both of us. Are you going to get them
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autographed? You know, some people have asked
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me that and some people have, you know, I've also talked
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about, well, because Matt just had a son like 3 or 4 months
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ago, he had his first child and I was at a wedding that he was a
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groomsman in, in like February and his wife was there and she
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was pregnant. And I was like, how cool would
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it be to maybe gift him a couple of special cards or something?
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So I was looking through my double S the other day.
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So I think eventually I'm going to gift him some like a like a
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binder filled with some pretty cool stuff for his son, maybe
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like his son's first birthday or something.
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But I, I don't, I, I don't think the move is to get him
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autographed. I don't think it is.
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Yeah, could be. Depends on.
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What you use As for a writing instrument.
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I mean I guess I I just think those cards are his best non
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auto cards. He has a first Bowman, one of
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one auto. He has a tops Chrome, you know
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rookie auto. He has a one of one auto in
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paninis. These are like his best 2 cards
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that aren't auto cards. I don't, I don't think, I don't
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think you ought of them. Important question for you that
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will tell me how well you knew your student.
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OK? What was his ERA his senior year
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of high school when he was a student of yours?
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I mean, it was low, but it wasn't as low as you'd think.
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Well, California is much more competitive than Maine.
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California high school baseball is pretty high quality baseball.
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Yeah, I would expect it to be in the ones probably.
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I think it probably was. I went to a game and there were
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15 scouts behind home plate and I kept walking over to see what
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they were clocking him at when he was a senior and he was
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hitting 9495 consistently. And then the second he came out
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of the game, they all left. Yeah, I mean that.
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But anyway, so that the topic today, the topic is, you know,
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manufactured scarcity, which I kind of feel like is said and
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sometimes sort of like, I don't know it, it's not said in a very
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loving way at times, like, oh, it's just manufactured scarcity
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versus organic scarcity. And there and the reason this
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came up and I was thinking about it is Theo does that series of
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dealer, collector and investor and he has, you know, one of
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each give their opinions and then change shoebox legends.
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The other day he gave this really good conversation piece
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starter. I think.
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I mean, it was a really good argument for manufactured
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scarcity and a lot of people in the vintage community have long
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been anti manufactured scarcity and for a long time I leaned
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that way too. But I feel like I'm starting to,
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I'm starting to change my opinion.
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So let me start with this. Where do you stand on the
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numbered manufactured scarcity? Again, I do not say that in a
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detrimental way or a derogatory way.
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I should say, where do you stand on this?
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Well when you talk about let's say pre war cards and the
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scarcity of pre war cards, you know that if you invest in the
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highest grade of a card, if you think about the Black Swamp,
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fine for instance, you invest in the highest grade of a card, you
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pay a ton of money for it. There could be a find of more of
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those cards down the road that significantly devalues yours.
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If you have the only PSA 8 or only SGC 8, somebody might find
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10 of them that are perfect and all of a sudden there are a
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bunch of SGC nines and 10's and yours is worthless.
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That is never going to happen with a super factor.
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There's only one. Well well I say that, but there
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are many examples where tops somehow produced multiples of
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one-on-one one of ones. But I am still not out there
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chasing one of ones, number to 10, number to 20.
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If I see one and it's the right price, I would consider buying
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it for the right player. But there's I'm not, I'm not
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ripping packs. I'm not doing anything like
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that. It's pretty rare that I'm going
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to buy a numbered card as a single.
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It's just it's just not something I'm interested in.
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What I am interested in is a different kind of scarcity,
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which is your iconic card. Let's say a 1954 Topps Hank
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Aaron rookie card. That hat is in a 1.5 and looks
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like A5 the great I Appeal vintage card.
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So, OK, so you are you are not a fan of the numbered manufactured
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scarcity thing in modern cards, is that what you're saying?
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I don't want to put words in your mouth.
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I just want to clarify. I'm not not a fan of it.
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It's just not necessarily for me.
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I have some numbered cards for sure.
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I have a, we're looking, I'm looking right now at a numbered
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Jayson Tatum rookie card that I have.
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But it's just not something that gets me up.
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That makes me, I mean, when I'm going to the show on Saturday,
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I'm almost exclusively thinking vintage.
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I'm thinking 90% vintage about my targets and then if they have
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the right Roman Anthony card, if they have the right or Nomar
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card which are cheap, or a nice Pedro card.
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But even though it's probably wouldn't be numbered, at least
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not very low numbered. But I understand the appeal of
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them. I totally get the appeal, it's
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just not something that is high on my list of things to obtain.
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So in your collecting, in your collection, that's not something
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that gets your juices flowing, but you understand why it would
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get someone else's juices flowing.
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Absolutely. See, because I, I was kind of an
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anti anti number scarcity guy for a long, long time.
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I, I collected some soccer cards back in like 2020 and I was, I
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was kind of into getting some of the lower numbered ones.
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That was pretty cool, but then it felt what it felt like to me
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is, do you know who Thomas Kincaid is?
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I know the name. So Thomas Kincaid is an artist
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and what he started doing was opening up lots of galleries all
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over the place with numbered prints that had like touch up
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work on them on canvas and became like a mainstream artist
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with a very wide array of nature and night time and cabins and
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lighthouses and and he became fairly popular.
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And what happened was he kind of just kept creating new
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parallels. Like he would go, well, there,
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here's the cabin in the mountains out of 25 and here's
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the gallery print out of 10. And this one's hand signing.
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And he was doing things like that.
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And then eventually now, like you go to an estate sale and
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everybody has a Thomas Kinkade for sale and they're not really
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in high demand because the market kind of got flooded
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versus like an original Picasso or, you know, Renoir or
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something. It's like that's priceless
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because there are so few of them.
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So I think where I have gotten because when I got Matt's Super
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factor, one of one tops Chrome and I held it.
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I'm like, this is really cool. Like this is really cool.
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There's the attitude 50 and out of 150 out of 99, all the
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different numbers. But there was one of these and
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it was put somewhere in a pack. Somehow it got found like the
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golden ticket in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and it
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surfaced and then I was reunited with that one like it was really
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cool and this black finite. I feel that way about two and
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here's here's my hypothesis or or here's my thought.
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I want to run it by you. You and I are very similar age
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and we grew up through the late 80s and early 90s collecting
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cards, you know, the high population era, the junk wax
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era. And we were told, hold on to
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that Jose Canseco card and that Mark McGwire card.
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It will be worth something someday.
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And most of that stuff isn't worth anything, like anything.
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So we literally were told this is going to be valuable and it
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has no value. And as a result, I feel like
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there's this, like we touched the stove, you know, like you
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reach up and you touch the stove and you go, ha, it's hot.
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And then the little kid from that point forward isn't going
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to reach up on the counter 'cause it might be the stove
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again. And I think that there's some
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PTSD from people our age about modern cards, that all modern
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cards are a scam because we lived through the greatest scam
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that there was when there were just pallets of 1989 Donrus at
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Costco and Price Club that we were told, Nope, you got to pull
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the good cards, hang on to it, keep it in mint condition.
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It'll be worth a fortune someday.
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And now we don't believe that that could be true.
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But the the hobby now for modern is so much different than it was
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in 1990. It's it's not the same thing.
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And I think some of these modern parallel cards are legitimately
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different in a good way then when we grew up.
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But but a lot of us just refused to believe it because we touched
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the stove. Well, this goes back to what we
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talked about. Was it last week or the week
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before that when we talked about the the modern cards to chase
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and you were starting to explore ultra modern cards.
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And I said if you stick to certain types of cards, you're
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going to be fine in the long run.
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If you care about value, and you know most of us do care about
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value, we would like our cards to go up in overtime.
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The vast majority of cards right now, ultra modern 2025 cards
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will be worth nothing many years from now, right?
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But some of them are going to maintain their value and some
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most parallels, there are millions of parallels.
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Most parallels are worthless. You know, you get a like AI
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don't know those weird design pumpkin or Halloween parallels.
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Whatever they are, there are 1,000,000 of them that are just
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weird parallels that will never ever mean anything.
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Numbered to 99. So and so means nothing.
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But if you collect very specific numbered parallels, even
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unnumbered parallels, I think you're good.
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And This is why the 90s refractors and early 2000s
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refractors are so popular. Also why early patch cards from
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the 90s, early 2000s, or patch cards are are popular and still
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valuable because they meant something and there weren't a
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million of them at the time. And you know, you can get a 90s
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refractor, maybe 4 different variations or three.
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Probably not even that many in the 90s.
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But in the early 2000s there weren't that many variations.
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And I think that for the most part you're looking at the same
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thing now. So I just saw a post on maybe
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Reddit, I'm not sure where I saw it, where somebody thought they
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were buying a true green parallel, true green refractor
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of a player. And when they received it in the
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hand, it was actually the I don't even know what the
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parallel was. It was a bizarre green OH Green
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Wave parallel which is far less desirable than the 2 green true
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green. And they, they paid true green
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value for this Green Wave parallel.
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And that's they're this number to the same, I think it was like
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number to 99 or something like that.
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Both of them have the same numbering, but the true green is
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worth a lot more, just like the true gold is always going to be
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worth more because some parallels are a lot more
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desirable to collectors. Well, a lot of it, I think it
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has to do with the consistency of it.
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It it's, it's been, you know, the black finite from Panini for
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a long time. It's been a Chrome super factor
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for tops for a long time. And and you go that hasn't
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changed. The, the the gold out of 50 have
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been the gold out of 50 for a while.
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You know, the red out of five has been like that for a while,
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but the red out of five, geometric red is like will that
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probably doesn't have staying power.
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And so the consistency of it matters.
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So the original design and their original philosophy behind it,
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because that's one of the things I get confused with this.
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I'm like, well, at one point gold's in Chrome weren't
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numbered and then they were numbered out of like 450.
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And then they started being numbered out of like they were
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like jersey numbers and then there was like out of 50 and
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then and now they there has become some stability.
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And I think those cards that have that stability are the ones
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that are going to have the staying power, like the new, you
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know, snakeskin parallel out of 50 or the big baller out of 50
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is not the same as just the regular gold out of 50 like
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that. But, but I just think, and I'm,
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I mean, I know I'm not preaching this to an audience or to many
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people who are collectors of modern, but I just think that I
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think that it's different. I think that it's different than
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it was. And I think that people need to
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accept that not all modern and not all numbered stuff is a scam
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just because the cards in the late 80s and early 90s were
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mostly a scam. I just don't think that that's
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the case. Well, well, help me understand
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what was the scam in the late 80s or in the early 90s?
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Weren't you told, oh, this 87 tops Jose Canseco rookie Cup,
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you keep this at for a long time, that's going to be worth
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something. This Brian Taylor, you know who
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the Yankees drafted, he's going to be a superstar.
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That's going to be worth a lot of money.
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And we were told that those cards, if you keep them and you
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keep them nice in a long time, they'd have value and and none
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of them do like. There's no 89 TOPS card that has
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any. Value, right.
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But was Tops saying that or were our parents saying that?
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I think the hobby was saying that.
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Right, but I I think a scam would be if TOPS were saying
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that and Tops knew that they had printed 1.3 million of every
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single card. I think that yes, you're right.
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It, it, it's not I, I'm not blaming tops for this.
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I'm blaming I, I, I think that it's just that, that the people
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our age, the, the people who are kids around our age at this
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time, there's a bit of drama that we're not going to believe
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that modern is any good because we've been told before that
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modern was good when it wasn't. And, and now that's got to still
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be true. And I don't think that all
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modern that's true. I do think the base card from
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tops one flagship, the base card, the paper is not going to
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be worth really much of anything.
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But there are cards coming out of that product that I do think
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are legit collectible items that have long lasting collectibility
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and value. And, and I, I just don't think,
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I think that some people don't believe that.
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And my dad is a person who is big time against manufactured
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scarcity. And I understand that.
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I mean, we've all been to people's houses who have those
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little, those little statues, not starting lineups, but the
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like porcelain, Well, the Hummels too.
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And I was thinking like the baseball ones, like, you know,
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or it's like Hank Aaron, what do they call them?
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Mcfarland's. I guess I don't know.
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And, and you know, it's like, oh, I've got still got the
22:21
original package over there and stuff.
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And they're numbered. This one's numbered out of 150.
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And you know, people buy the little Disney statues and, and
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you these are going to be worth something.
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And they're this one's a limited, ultra limited edition.
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And and so a lot of manufactured scarcity isn't really all that,
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but I do think some of these consistent cards I really think
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have long term value and not the Matt Manny.
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Don't get me wrong, like I love Matt, great guy.
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If you ever met him, you'd go totally awesome dude.
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That's not the card I'm talking about.
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But I do think some players it's legit card.
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No, yes. No, I I agree some players and
23:12
some parallels have staying power but but it's few and far
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between. Well, there's a difference
23:20
between collecting prospects and collecting superstars.
23:26
Like, and I said this the other day, that's one of the issues I
23:29
have with your boy Jeff. Is that he's do not.
23:34
He he gives investment advice about an unproven prospect and
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that's not an investment that is that is going to the casino and
23:46
spinning the wheel. And one of those has a jackpot
23:50
and all the others have $2.00 and it was a $50 buy in like.
23:55
But we can agree that Freddie Freeman's going to the Hall of
23:57
Fame, right? I would think so, yeah.
23:59
Are his cars going to be worth anything in 20 years?
24:02
They'll be worth something, right?
24:05
But if you buy his cards today on the high of him winning
24:08
another World Series game with a home run, walk off home run,
24:12
will it be worth accounting for inflation more or less in 20
24:17
years than you buy it for today? And we're I mean, are we talking
24:24
about an out of 150 rookie or are we talking about a rookie
24:29
super factor autographed card or are you saying either?
24:33
Either any card. I mean, I, I see where you're
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leading me. You are leading the witness,
24:44
Your Honor. I, I think they'll probably not
24:50
be worth as much as they are right now, but that that's not
24:53
for sure. Because if you had asked me five
24:56
years ago, would these Jordan 90s refractors, you know, or
25:02
early 2000s refractor insert cards numbered out of 50, I
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would have said there's no way that they'll keep this value.
25:10
But they've gone bananas. So I think Freddie Freeman is
25:16
different than Jordan and I think I think these cards are
25:21
different. But I think that there's a
25:24
strong possibility that an out of 50 gold Shohei rookie Otto is
25:33
worth more in 15 years than it is now.
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I think that's possible, but Freddie Freeman?
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Probably not. Right.
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I agree. There are probably fewer than a
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handful of players right now whose cards will be more
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valuable in 20 years than they are today.
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And that's terrible to say. I love Freddie Freeman.
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I think Freddie Freeman is amazing.
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He is virtually a lock for the Hall of Fame in in my Hall of
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Fame he is in and probably was a year or two ago, but he doesn't
26:04
have the staying power and the hobby requires staying power.
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He helps with. He's the, I think, the only
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player in history to have two walk off World Series home runs
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and that helps. You're just taking salt and
26:15
you're just rubbing it in so deep.
26:17
You're just saying, oh, what were the teams that happened
26:20
against? The Toronto Blue Jays and who
26:25
did they play last year? The team from the American
26:28
League that made the World Series?
26:30
I can't remember. Who was in the World Series?
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Oh, the New York Yankees. Oh, I forgot.
26:34
You're kidding, right? I'm not.
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Yeah, I I just didn't care about the World Series last year.
26:40
I followed it because Shohei mostly, honestly, Shohei and
26:45
Aaron Judge are maybe Acuna if he can make a big comeback and
26:50
have like 6 or 7 huge seasons. But there's nobody else that has
26:57
Mookie Betts. Yeah, but he's already amazing
27:00
and and there's really not much of a story.
27:02
Like Mookie Betts is kind of a poor man's Albert Pujols.
27:06
People appreciate him, but he's not one of the there's not much
27:12
of a story behind him. He's kind of vanilla and I love
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Mookie, one of my all time favorite players.
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So this isn't a knock on any of these guys.
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Just thinking about what does the hobby care about?
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What do future long term values care about when it comes to a
27:26
baseball player and its long standing stories?
27:30
It's legends. Judge has them, Shohe has them.
27:37
Does Ichiro have that? Each row does, and he also has
27:41
the benefit of a massive global market.
27:44
What about pool holes? Does he have it pool?
27:46
Holes does because he his top, his first ten seasons were
27:50
absolutely legendary. He also topped 700 home runs.
27:55
He, yeah, I mean, he's, he's up there, but he's certainly not a
27:59
big one. Did pool holes take performance
28:03
enhancing drugs? Absolutely.
28:08
Don't you think so? I, I think that he, I think that
28:12
if I had to place money on if he did or didn't, I think that he
28:20
probably did. But somehow he was able to not
28:24
be on any lists. Therefore, he gets to be in the
28:28
Hall of Fame. Right.
28:31
But David Ortiz, we know he did steroids or performance
28:34
enhancing drugs. He made it into the Hall of
28:36
Fame. There are a.
28:38
Lot of them should bury bonds, be in the Hall of Fame.
28:40
Oh, we're getting into some, some big territory with that.
28:43
It's going to really upset some listeners here.
28:45
And I'm, I'm a believer that all of the PED guys should be in if
28:51
they if they, if their career was enough to get in, even with
28:58
the steroids. And we know Bonds would have
29:00
gotten in without them. Clemens, your guy would have
29:03
been in without them. Would Rafael Palmero?
29:07
Probably not. I would not penalize a guy
29:10
because he took steroids, but if I don't think he would have made
29:13
it in without them, I I wouldn't let, I wouldn't put them in.
29:17
Would pool holes have made it in without them?
29:21
That's a good question. I think so.
29:22
I don't know that Pool Holes was taking them in 2002, but you
29:28
can't give a guy steroids and have him go from mediocre to 710
29:33
home runs or however many home runs he hit.
29:36
Have you ever heard of Sammy Sosa?
29:39
That sounds so familiar. Didn't he go from regular dude
29:44
to he man? But he, well, Sosa was young
29:50
when he all of a sudden got really, really good.
29:52
And I think that Sosa, if you look at his career, he had the
29:56
typical trajectory of a guy. Yeah, you're looking up his
30:00
stats right now. I think he he went from pretty
30:05
good to amazing. There was certainly no Brady
30:10
Anderson in in Sammy Sosa, right?
30:13
Luis Gonzalez. Luis Gonzalez, another example,
30:16
but I think if I remember correctly, Sosa hit like 29 home
30:19
runs the year before his big breakout.
30:25
So home runs the year before, I don't know what we would call
30:29
the year, the big breakout. So he went
30:32
1510833253640366663506449403514. Yeah.
30:44
So this makes my point. The 33 home runs I just pulled
30:47
it up to was at the age of 24. That's not unreasonable.
30:52
And the year before that, in fact, that was only his second
30:55
full season in baseball. The year before that, he only
30:59
had 67 games. So if we if we go to his, I'm
31:05
doing this blind because I've never looked at his minor
31:07
leagues before, but he was a home run hitter.
31:12
Let me see here. He hit.
31:14
OK, so he wasn't a home run hitter in the minor leagues, but
31:16
he was also only 1819 years old. So I think perfectly reasonable
31:23
at the age of 2324 to hit 33 home runs and then 3325364036
31:33
and then at the age of 29 he hit 66.
31:36
We should do an episode one time.
31:39
If you follow Jose Canseco, he's.
31:42
Crazy. If you take Jose Canseco and you
31:46
follow the teams that he played for and then the other players
31:51
on his teams and what happened to those players when he showed
31:56
up, it's like, it's like you could write a book on it.
32:02
What happened to the Rangers? What happened to the Blue Jays?
32:04
What happened to the A's? Like just follow Canseco and his
32:08
path and there's just like this power boom across the lineup.
32:13
Yeah, and he's talked about the guys that he injected.
32:17
Yeah. Like Yvonne Rodriguez?
32:19
Yeah. So let me ask you this.
32:22
He said Clemens didn't do anything, but he threw everyone
32:24
else under the bus. But he didn't throw Clemens
32:26
under the bus. What do you think he just didn't
32:29
know about Clemens? Or do you think Clemens paid him
32:32
off? Or do you think Clemens is
32:34
innocent? Clemens is definitely not
32:36
innocent. Come on.
32:38
You know he's not right. Oh.
32:42
I mean I. Or the record for those of you
32:46
who are listening? Greg shrugged.
32:49
I did. I.
32:51
I will say this, I was, I was in a jury box one time and this is
33:02
a true story. I had jury duty and I'm sitting
33:03
in there and they're talking about, you know, they're going
33:06
around asking the I get called, I'm in one of the seats.
33:09
And the judge says, Mr. Miller, is there any reason that you
33:15
think you couldn't be a fair and impartial juror?
33:19
And I said, I kind of have this thing where unless I'm certain
33:24
about something, I'm not like going to say definitively
33:32
anything. Sure.
33:33
And he and the judge says, well, don't you think everybody feels
33:36
that way? And I said, your Honor, I'm not
33:41
fully convinced that OJ did it. And they go, Mr. Miller, you're
33:46
excused. And I'm like, I wasn't trying to
33:48
get out of it. I was just being honest.
33:51
Like, do I think OJ did it? Probably, but I wouldn't bet my
33:56
life on it. He admitted it.
33:58
No, he didn't. He did.
34:01
OJ. He wrote a book called.
34:04
He said if I had done it, this is how I would have done it.
34:09
I I just, I am a person who doesn't like to make claims
34:15
about others if I'm not certain about it.
34:18
That's how I am. I'm, I'm now adding in to our
34:22
group chat, our our text chat. Greg thinks who OJ was innocent.
34:29
No, I didn't say that. That's not what he said.
34:31
I said I'm not convinced. I'm not fully convinced that OJ
34:38
is guilty. I think that he did the do I
34:41
think Bonds took something. And here's another thing.
34:46
OK, so I was on a trial, one I was in not on a trial.
34:50
I was on a jury. And there was a guy who was on
34:54
trial for long story, but Long story short, he was in
34:57
possession of stolen license plates.
35:02
And in order to convict him, it had to be proven not just that
35:07
they were stolen, but that he knew they were stolen.
35:11
Right. So part of my thing is, I think
35:15
it's possible that some people were injected with things or had
35:23
creams rubbed on them or whatever, where they thought
35:27
they didn't know for sure what it was.
35:29
They just said, hey, I've got this new drug.
35:34
It helps boost strength. You want to take it, it's, you
35:38
know, put it on. Yeah, let's try it out.
35:41
Or they had a Chipotle burrito that somehow had nandrolone in
35:44
it. I just think that's possible.
35:48
I think it's possible that there are guys do I do I think Bonds
35:54
took stuff. I think he probably did.
35:56
I'm not certain. I think he probably did.
35:59
But what about feminists? Hold on.
36:01
And I think it's possible that Bonds didn't know that he was
36:06
taking something he wasn't allowed to take.
36:09
I think that's possible. I think Clemens knows he was
36:12
getting injected with stuff. I think Clemens was getting
36:16
injected with stuff. I don't know if Clemens knows
36:20
what he was being injected with, and I am not certain that he was
36:26
being injected with something he wasn't allowed to take.
36:30
Do I think he probably was? Yes.
36:33
Do I think that he knew It may. I'm less certain about that.
36:37
I think these guys say to their trainers give me what I need,
36:42
make sure I'm good, and they don't know what it is.
36:46
I think that's possible. Have I just lost all credibility
36:50
because what I'm being, I'm not trying to be funny.
36:52
I'm not trying to defend. I'm not trying to defend
36:55
anybody. All I'm doing is what I'm saying
36:57
is I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt.
37:01
I've said you many times in chats.
37:04
You know, I don't know if that guy meant to do what he did.
37:07
He's a really nice guy. You've heard me say that a
37:10
million times. Yes.
37:12
And I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt, and maybe
37:16
that's a fault of mine, but that's just how I am.
37:18
Because I hope that someday, if anybody ever hears me say
37:22
something or sees me do something and they go, what?
37:26
They give me the benefit of the doubt because most likely I
37:29
didn't mean to do whatever it is that I did.
37:33
Yeah, I give Ben. You know, I'm probably just
37:36
behind you in terms of giving people the doubt.
37:39
And anytime we're in this in a group chat and somebody's upset
37:43
with somebody, yeah, I'm, I'm right there with you.
37:47
Maybe not quite to the same level as you of giving people
37:50
the benefit of the doubt, but I'm pretty close behind.
37:53
But I am sure that Bonds and Clemens knew what they were
37:57
taking. I think, OK, just for final
38:01
putting this to rest, I and the fact that we're only talking
38:07
about Bonds and Clemens right now is a little annoying to me
38:10
because Mookie's out there listening to this and we're not
38:14
including Piazza or the others. But I will say this about Bonds
38:18
and Clemens specifically, I think over 95% that they both
38:27
took something. I would go, I would say 97% that
38:31
they took something. That's what I think.
38:33
That you knew they took something.
38:34
No, no, no, no. That they took something, OK.
38:37
I think both of them, I think 75%, they knew that they were
38:46
taking something. I think there's a good 25% that
38:50
they had something injected and they didn't quite know that what
38:54
it was was legal or illegal. I think they said, don't tell me
38:58
what you're giving me, just give me what I need.
39:00
I think that's possible. I think there's about a 25%
39:03
chance of that. That's my official stance.
39:06
And if people are out there listening, they go, Greg's a
39:08
lunatic, that's OK, That's OK. I'm just being honest.
39:13
I'm just being honest. And it bugs me that one of the
39:16
best hitters of all time and one of the best pitchers of all time
39:20
are not in the Hall of Fame when we have multiple people who we
39:23
know took stuff, who tested positive, who are in the Hall of
39:29
Fame. That makes as soon as Ortiz was
39:32
voted in first ballot. Now Yogi Berra, by the way, is a
39:36
second ballot Hall of Famer. David Ortiz was a first ballot
39:40
Hall of Famer and he tested positive.
39:45
But Clemens and Bonds aren't in I.
39:48
I have a hard time with that. I have a hard time with that.
39:52
I agree. Put them in.
39:54
I I think Ortiz deserves to be in.
39:56
I think Bonds. I think Clemens, I think Piazza,
40:00
Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa. You think Sosa should be in?
40:05
I do, yeah. Wow.
40:07
That one How did we get here my. I have no idea.
40:12
We're 40 minutes in. It's a great discussion.
40:16
I didn't, we didn't expect this, but I'm we are going to promote
40:20
the heck out of your crazy opinions.
40:24
I think this Darren and I tend to go off topic, but today we
40:30
took such a hard right hand turn when Siri was saying continue
40:35
straight on the route and we just took a hard right and here
40:39
we are somewhere like in Coming to America where they're
40:43
stealing the hubcaps off of the wheels because they are not in
40:48
the place they're supposed to be.
40:50
It's a great movie, by the way. I haven't seen it in too long.
40:54
It's a great I've seen that movie 150 times.
40:59
All right, well, we have to go because we have another thing
41:02
we've got to take care of. It's 41 minutes in.
41:06
This was fun. I mean, I hope that people don't
41:09
think I'm a lunatic, but this is the thing I've said from the
41:13
beginning. I am who I am.
41:15
I don't hide behind my opinions. Some people will agree with me,
41:20
some people won't. I don't say what I think people
41:24
want to hear. I say what I think.
41:26
And am I naive? Possibly that's possible, but
41:33
that's just that's just where I'm at.
41:35
Next week, we'll talk about why Jack Morris doesn't belong on
41:38
the Hall of Fame and why Harold Baines does.
41:40
Oh my gosh, that will be a horribly boring conversation.
41:45
Yeah, we won't be talking about that, OK.
41:48
All right, buddy, thanks for hanging out with me for 41
41:51
minutes and 30 seconds. You too.
41:53
All right.