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Additional taxes, fees and restrictions apply. See Mint Mobile for details. This episode is brought to you by our good friends at NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV. I'm sure by now you've all got back into your Sunday routines, but they could be even better. With NFL Sunday Ticket and YouTube TV, you get the most live NFL games all in one place every game every Sunday and you can even watch up to four different games at once with MultiView, one of my favorite inventions of this decade. It's exactly what you need to catch all the action. Make your Sundays more magical and also YouTube TV is great. I got it this year. It's awesome. Sign up now at youtube.com/bsdevice and content restrictions apply. Local and national games on youtube TV and a false Sunday ticket for out-of-market games excludes digital-only games. Walk the rates barrels. It's Tuesday, August 13th. Derek Van Ruyper, Enosaris. Britteroli here with you on this episode. We dig into a few pressing questions, including who would be on a team USA roster for the 2028 Olympics if we can build it with major league players. Maybe it's a pipe dream, but there are some stars that want to happen. We figured we'd go through the process of actually putting together a lineup of who could be on that team four years from now. We're going to check in on the NL West, which is going to be a battle over the final month and a half of the season, and we're going to take a look at the possibility that few teams follow the Angels lead from last August and cut payroll using the waiver wire during the second to last month of the season. Kind of a new thing we saw last year in mass, maybe one or two teams could try to follow that this year. Let's get right after it though. Team USA in 2028. When I bring that up, Brit, who are the first few names that pop into your head as current stars that will still be good and are very likely to be on that team if we do, in fact, see major leaguers in the Olympics four years from now? Yeah, well, I think we're lucky in the games at a place where so many of these young stars are up here already. It might have been very difficult to predict even 10 years ago, but I think of Bobby with junior. I think it's Jackson Holiday. I think a Gunnar Henderson, Adley Richmond, but I think of all these guys who have yet to hit their prime, and they could be in their prime years when we look down the road four years from now. I think, and we did this yesterday, spoiler alert, this all came out of our pre-podcast show yesterday. As you guys know, predicting pitchers is very difficult. Outside of Paul Skins, who if he stays healthy, I think we all know could be one of the best pitchers in baseball. You can make that case probably already, but so difficult to predict what these young arms are going to do. Guys in the minor leagues, guys who haven't really figured it out yet, we see this every year, will all of a sudden add a new pitch or add 15 pounds, and Mason Miller with the A's is a great example and kind of almost come out of nowhere, and all of a sudden they're in the All-Star game. So I have a really difficult time with the pitching side of things. I think there's so many young position players in the game that you can fill out a pretty good roster for talking about TMUSA guys, and then you can make the case for some of these veterans that I think need to be in the Olympics, whether or not they're in their prime. Even if it's a reserve bench spots, I think some of these guys who are stars today should be in the next Olympics if they want to. And I think there's a pretty big push for players that want to play, big league players that want to find a way to play in LA in 2028. Yeah, I think there's some precedent for this. In other sports, Diana Tarasi, I believe just got her sixth goal or something. So I don't think she played at all. I was even surprised to see her in uniform for women's basketball, but she was on the team. And so you're kind of your own personal Snoop Dogg in a way. You could have Bryce Harper, Aaron Judge. Also, the way the baseball works, it's so great with DH and first base. You can likely have somebody that's a little bit older that kind of represents that energy. And I think if we're building this lineup, even if Bryce Harper, he does project and we got these projections that are kind of fun from Dan Zumborski. Thank you very much, Dan. These are Zips projections for 2028, sorted by war, and then with a focus on American players. And what you see here is Bryce Harper is projected to be a below average player in 2028 with an above average OPS, but no defensive value. Same thing for Judge. And so, you know, in those cases, I think Harper talking about wanting to do the Olympics, being some energy behind it. Yeah, you put him on the team, even if, you know, theoretically, you could have Michael Harris playing first base or something stupid, you know what I mean? Like, you know, it doesn't make sense to keep some of these people out, even if whatever the projections are. But to your point on pitching, and this is just to read this off for people who were listening, the projections for 2028, say Gunnar Henderson, number one, Bobby Wood Jr, number two, I think that's not a surprise. And that's going to be the foundation of the team, if they if they allow this to happen. But there are some surprises below. Riley Green is third. Kobe Mayo is fifth. Jackson Merrill would be the center fielder for this team. Corbin Carroll tied with Jackson Merrill with four wins projected in 2028. Mason win might be the backup shortstop on this team if we just go by projections. But there's Rochman. Carson Williams is the prospect on this list, along with Kobe Mayo. So that was just it's harder for me to believe because there is a bust rate associated with prospects. And, you know, this is the projection system just liking something about them as prospects. But, you know, Jordan Westbrook, Pete Crow Armstrong at the bottom, that's those are fun couple of names that have defensive value are pretty solid players. And you have to kind of imagine yourself four years from now, there's going to be some growth in some of these players, five Orioles position players on the top end players generated by zips. Yeah, really cool that Dan sent that over because it just gives you an idea. Like, we like to assume that the stars of today will be the stars of tomorrow and the stars of four years from now. But everyone ages a little bit differently. And even if you go from elite to very good or very good to good or good to just average, that's going to make a difference over time, right? I find that the most difficult players to predict aren't necessarily the young guys. I'm with Brett. Like, Whit Henderson, they seem like locks. I think you'll have guys like Harper and Judge kind of anchoring it from a veteran perspective to they'll be in their mid 30s by then. I think it's looking at someone like Austin Riley, who's reeled off a stretch of three straight five war seasons prior to this year. This is a down year for Austin Riley. He's 27 right now. When he's 31, what kind of player is he going to be? Is he still going to be a three or four win player? Could he actually make this team? So you look for those middle guys, they could be tough. I think Kyle Tucker is still going to be a really good player for years from now because there's not a swing and miss in his profile. So I think that's the type of stuff that I'm always looking at is like, what kind of hitter are you? And how does that usually age? Does that give you enough of a chance to still be good enough down the road? The pitching thing brought up, you know, we'll spend more time on the hitters today because that's that's the bulk of the focus. The relievers are almost impossible. Who's going to be a good reliever for years from now? Like the best relievers in the game right now, four years ago, largely were irrelevant, not entirely, but there are some major pop up guys every single year. And as all pitchers do, they break down, but they also have their stuff deteriorate pretty quickly because they rely heavily on one or two pitches in most cases. So what works today doesn't necessarily work three and four years down the road. I was thinking about this. There's no like Mariano Rivera, right? Or we're going to see like a 10 year stretch of excellence, right? Like I guess Janssen is our guy now, but we're not going to we're not putting him on the team four years from now. Wouldn't be on Team USA. It's weird. There's not like one automatic guy, right? But I can't even tell who's going to be a good reliever next year. Like managers would tell you that bullpens are so cyclical that if you have a good reliever one year, you're almost better like dumping them because chances are he's not going to have that year again. That's kind of seems what the Rays do. Kind of like a big baseball carousel. But yeah, many people feel that way that like you got somebody will sell high because you don't think he's going to sustain it. So if we have trouble projecting the bullpens for next season four years out, it's just wild, right? I think you can maybe look at starters like we mentioned schemes, but how many false schemes are there that we're like, this guy's good. He's young. He's going to be a star for a while as long as he stays healthy. Not that many. I think it's it's I know 2020 is was a weird year. But it is four years, you know, from from now. So backwards. So I just thought it would be instructive for me to just read out the top 10 relievers in 2020. Liam Hendrix, Devin Williams, Risole Iglesias, Brad Hand, James Corincik, Mike Myers, Evan Marshall, Edwin Diaz, Jose Cisnerro, and Trevor Rosenthal. So how many so Devin Williams is still playing Liam Hendrix might get back on Risole Iglesias. So the top three were still they're still around. But then you hit, you know, basically you're almost 0 for 7 after that in terms of, you know, 1 for 7 after that. And how many of those guys are making like a quote unquote all star team? Right. Yeah, that too. I mean, Liam Hendrix might come back and pitch again, but is he going to be Liam Hendrix the same way? That's irrelevant for the American team, probably, but still just giving you the idea and I'm not on the starting pitching side just as bad. But you could have your sort of Bryce Harper of pitching where somebody, you know, the name I put forth for us is Zack Gallon is like somebody who will be in his early 30s, but I think might age okay because he has lots of different pitches. He has good command. And you know, if Zack Gallon is still pitching and he's interested in this, then you could have him as sort of the professor emeritus. Even if you if you if you you you have mostly younger people on the team other than him, but this is the top 10 pitching in 2020. Shane Bieber, you Darvish, Jake de Grom, Trevor Bauer, Denelson, LeMett, Luis Castillo, Jermán Marquez, Zach Ranky, Dylan Bundy, Kenta Maeda, can drop a little Brandon Woodruff and Lucas Gileto on there at 11 and 12. I mean, injuries in pitching are just it's a big part of the chaos there. You just don't know who's going to age gracefully in terms of ligaments and muscles and all those things. So that's I mean, you know, the bottom of that list was all full of injury. Woodruff with the, you know, the thoracic outlet, Dylan Bundy just lost all his view low pretty much, you know. Ranky was nearing the end of his career, you probably wouldn't have picked Ranky to be good four years from then. But, you know, it's not a great list. It's and then that's part of the problem too is like gone are the days of like the Scherzer Verlanders where you get this 10 year run who I think we can both, you know, all admit are not making the next Olympics. They'll be well past their prime, but they had this like really long stretch of consistency that just is not how the game operates. Or if it is if it is not gone, then it's not super obvious to us right now who is the next Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer. You know what I mean? I think it's more of that. Yeah, I don't think the pitchers are gone, but I think you don't know who they are until they kind of weather a storm in their early to mid 30s and then come out of it on the other side still pitching well because there was the point where you thought Justin Verlander was done. Remember when Verlander had the core muscle surgery had kind of backed back rough years in Detroit, it looked like it might have been the beginning of the end for him. And then of course, he's had amazing run in the time since then, mostly in Houston. But if you look at Corbin Burns right now, he's 29. Okay, four years from now, he's 33. It's unimpossible that Corbin Burns is still good enough to be on this team four years from now. It could still be dominant. I mean, it's gonna, it's gonna mean a lot about his velo. Does he keep his velo and does he, and does he not get hurt? You know, if he did both of those things, then he might still be as dominant. That's a fair point. He had 167 in 2021, 202 in 2022, 193, 193 innings, 193 innings and 23s at 149 and two thirds. I mean, he's a he's a horse in today's standards. Right. Like, so he's at least kind of like ticking those boxes where top end performance workload over a pretty long stretch. But if you had to wager on it, you'd say, don't know if I'm betting on guys in there. I believe when I see it sort of deal. So you skew younger when you're looking at pictures like those skins and Spencer Stryder coming off of elbow surgery. You know, if he's still healthy, we could probably assume he has a role hunter green. But there's some risk with skiing, Stryder and green that we, you know, there's that, there's that either you take injury risk when you're trying to project four years out and you take like older guys or you take some take on some risk that you don't even actually know exactly how good you guys. We all think we know exactly how good Paul schemes is, but we're not sure. Yeah, we have no idea. We all think we know a lot more than we think we actually do. But let's see you listen, let's podcast. Why? I mean, if you look at how much Spencer Stryder has been dominant, but like for how long, you know, like, just think about hunter green. We put we have hunter green as a possible on this list because he looks really good right now. But the last two years, he wasn't that good. Would he have been somebody we want on the on the team? If you're talking about the top five starters, American starters in America in America and MLB right now, you might not have put them on there before. So there's like, there's like, you know, talent risk and then there's injury risk and that when you're trying to evaluate pictures for years out, it's just the combination of two is, is, is really tough. I'm surprised that anybody gets a six year deal, you know, as a pitcher. And this is why it's hard to draft pitchers too. I think you, I think even making this list gives you a new appreciation for like team's drafting pitchers, doesn't it? Because it's like, well, I don't know. And I have to, it's almost like I have to do it, but like, I don't know that any of these are going to work out. Like we have some prospects that we might put on this list, but you know, geez, I think Jackson job is awesome. But I, you know, what do I know? It's just sort of baking into the expectation similar to the 2028 zips hitters where you say, okay, there's gonna be some names on here. We haven't seen in the big leagues yet, because that's just how it works. Like if we went back just a year or two ago, we wouldn't have necessarily expected Gunnar Henderson to be a lock on this team two years ago. But now he looks like he's clearly going to be one of the best players in the game, even four years from now, because he's already ascended to that level. I took the initial run at the first 13, are there any names I put on there, younger names, where you were like, ooh, that's interesting, but I'm not sure. James Wood, Wyatt Langford, Royce Lewis, Jackson Holiday, you mentioned him, I think he's pretty safe as much as you can say that about a projecting a guy that's barely been in the big leagues. But who of that group gives you the most pause because we've seen so little of most of them at the big league level? We have such like recency bias though, because a month ago, we have said Jackson Holiday was a lock. It would have been in the category of he's done amazing things in the minors, the projections are going to spit out some really good numbers and it'll have time to reach that level. I think that those pieces are still in place, even with that bad 10 game run, because he's been great in the minor league. The elite of the elite age to level production at every stop. So I think we still wouldn't excite it, but I think we have a little more confidence in the heat of a recent return to the big leagues where he's having that success now. I think that's fair. I thought your list was good. I think honestly, it's such a guess. I think we all kind of came to the same sort of agreements on most of these position players. I think for people listening, wondering like what we did roster wise, I think we assumed 26 because I think if MLB does agree to let baseball players, pro players, guys not on guys that are on 40 man rosters, which hasn't been the case lately, I think they're going to push for that 26 because they will in theory keep these guys a little bit healthier having the extra picture, having the extra position player. The last time in the last Olympics, there was only 24 on every roster, right? So that changes what we're doing if you're going to lose a picture, lose a position player. I do think, again, for people listening wondering like why are we wasting our time? There's a huge push by Casey Wasserman at CAA to get players that are currently on a big league team to play. Bryce Harper has been very vocal about it. Many stars have been very vocal about wanting to play and it actually could slot in people think in the all star break. They'd have an extended all star break. LA obviously already has the facilities that was the issue in Paris with Dodger Stadium. So there is like a real chance that this happens and we know baseball is in at least the next two Olympics. And if you need to have a bunch of games on a couple of days, like you could do Anaheim too. Yes. And they have talked about having quality WBC, the next WBC, which will be one in the interim in the 2026. Is that the next WBC? They will talk about having qualifiers there so that it was a very condensed schedule so that players are playing it would only be gone for a week. It's not a three week sojourn like some of these Olympics. Yeah, we talked a little bit about this and I think you'd have to have it so that there was only eight teams that make it or something. Yeah. And maybe you could do something with a loser's bracket so that eight teams, you could lose once and still win the whole thing. And you would think they would want to do it though because if you're the IOC, Shohei Otani, you know what Shohei Otani to play in the next Olympics, right? Like they call these huge stars. We're talking about US here, but obviously there's huge stars everywhere. The Dominican. I think for baseball, the value judgment is a little bit more complicated because they wouldn't want Shohei Otani, for example, to be injured playing in that. But like we said, you know, injuries can happen anytime. And also there is, I think, a lot of value for baseball to be in the Olympics in terms of like, you know, you want to grow the game that the world watches the Olympics, you know, not being not having your best stars in there is meaningful. Why do you think, you know, all these soccer players are allowed to play in it because soccer knows that this is a good thing to have to have their best players in it. Yeah, hockey lets it happen. Don't they build in a break? Yeah. Yeah, I don't think this is impossible. And it seems like there are enough forces behind it where it's less of a pipe dream than it's been in the past, right? And you have the right kinds of players on board want to be a part of it too. You know, we love talking stats here at the athletic. Here's one that's super simple to remember. Discover automatically doubles the cashback you've earned on your credit card at the end of your first year with cashback match. That means with discover, you could turn $150 cashback to $300. That's right. You could put it towards some memorabilia you've had dry on or treat yourself to a premium sports network. You earn and discover doubles. See terms at discover.com/creditcard. Aaron judge is a fascinating case because he is doing things right now that are, you know, unusual for even a great power hitter, right? He might make another run to the 60 home run range. He hit 62 two years ago. He's got a shot to do the same thing this year. He's going to be 36 years old for years from now. There's a big question about judge in general, like, how is he going to age? And there've always been questions about as a bigger player, is he more susceptible to injuries? But sometimes I think we get so caught up in those questions with judge that we're not fully enjoying what he is doing on the field. He's just been ridiculous. This is the third consecutive season in which Aaron judge has had a barrel rate above 25%. That is absolutely absurd. So my question for both of you is, how do you think Aaron judge is going to age? And does he just kind of fit into that Bryce Harper bucket of? Yeah, even if he's not this version of judge, he's such a star and such an important part of USA baseball air quotes. So as we kind of try to project this, that he's there even if he's not one of the five or seven best position players on the team anymore. I don't know one thing of just about the quality of his play. Since free agency began in 1974, we've had 10 seasons where a player had a WRC plus of 200 or better. That means that they're twice as good as the average player. I mean, they're 100 points better or better. And so in that group, there are two people who have done it twice. We all know one of them, Barry Bonds. Yeah, four times. But Aaron judge is in the middle of doing it his second time. And that and he basically him and Barry Bonds are the top six. Then you have Jeff Bagwell, Frank Thomas, Mark McGuire and Juan Soto rounding out the top 10. So you know, judge, you know, deserves all of the flowers. In terms of how you'll age, I think that what we'll see is most likely something along the lines of Mike Trout, where it's harder for him to stay on the field. But when he's on the field, he's hitting well. And he's sort of, you know, at some point, maybe at that point, he'll be a DH defensively. But I think he'll still be able to like, you know, be your DH and slug you 35 homers or whatever, still, you know, eating at that age. That's that's kind of how I see it. Yeah, I agree. I think he's on Team USA. If he wants to be in 2028 and he's the DH, he may be the captain of the team. Harper made a captain of the team, right? Then maybe the heart and souls of that squad. But I think both of those guys, like we said, are more, I don't want to say figure heads, but are also there for an element of nostalgia and stars. And I still think he's going to be, I think both of these guys, especially judge, are still going to be like, Hey, you make a mistake, he will make you pay for it. But we all know that defense and base running declines first for players. Those are the first skills that they lose. So I do think in four years, you know, you're looking at Aaron judge as, you know, purely a hitter. When you are, when you are talking about him versus, he's, he still may play the field for the Yankees on occasion. He still would play it a lot. I mean, I'm not really sure how their roster shakes out in 2028. I haven't given it a lot of thought. But I think for the best of the best, he's a bat and Harper is a bat slash first base. And those guys are still scary hitters. They're lethal hitters. They're like Albert Puhlhose, right? You couldn't make a mistake to Albert Puhlhose at the end. He actually hit really well. But he was, it was not the Albert Puhlhose of yesteryear. That's kind of how I see those two guys. And I think, you know, four years ago, the batting leaderboard tells us a pretty different story. It tells us that if we're underrating anybody for this roster, it might be a veteran. Because four years ago, Fernando Tatiz Jr, Jose Ramirez, Freddie Freeman, Freddie Freeman was a third-best hitter four years ago. Jose Obrayu, of course, there's our loss. But Mookie Betz, Trey Turner, Manny Machado, Marcello Zuna, Anthony Redone, another loss, Mike Trout, 10th. So that eight out of the 10 very best batters in 2020 are still really good batters now. And so we may find that if we are undervaluing anybody in this search for who's going to be great in 2028, it's somebody who ages gracefully. And it could be somebody like Jodger Harper, or there could be somebody else that we're not necessarily thinking of this year. We're looking, I guess, it would be maybe for players that are like 27 to 30 right now that are just going to age better than we think. You know, guys on that list include, let's see here. Jaren Duran, Brent Rooker? No. No, well, here's my question. Freddie Freeman is probably going to play for Canada. Yeah. But is Mookie Betz too old? What would he be 34, 35 when Mookie Betz be on Team USA? Yeah, exactly like that. He's another guy. Yeah, he'll be 35. Same kind of situation as Harper and Judge in a lot of ways where it's like chances are, yeah, actually, just based on what he's done up to this point and how he's getting there. How, of course, eager age, like, we think he'll just be injured a lot, but you know, what if, you know, he's just a he's just a good first baseman or something at that point. So there's there's there's some names on this sort of veteran list that that will be surprising and will still be really good in four years. Yeah, fun exercise though. Nonetheless, and more to come on that front here as the weak unfold, Brent Rooker. No. I mean, I'd love it just from the I'd be happy for him. It'd be amazing. It would be surprising. But the biggest thing, so I think the for me, the tactical part of this exercise, if you're using, you know, projection brain, fantasy baseball brain, you're looking at swing and miss at how poorly swing and miss will age over four years and even doing all the damage that he's doing right now, Brent Rooker is sitting with a 29.9% k rate. And he's already 29 years old. That's part of why Mookie might be a better bet. It's like he'll at least be making contact. And since he runs well now, even if he runs a little bit worse, like he still won't be like a plotter, you know, right? That's why the Mookie and Kyle Tucker are, I think, are a little bit easier to project as still being good productive hitters. Like Mookie versus Jackson holiday at second base is a really interesting one, I think. Because with Jackson holiday, we're baking in so much he hasn't done yet, you know, and we're just assuming that in four years, he's gonna be great and not like a historic bust, which I'm not saying he is. Right, right, he could be an average player. And Mookie could just be declining super gracefully and still be better than Jackson holiday, even though there's a huge age difference. It's possible. I think the name I put on the list that I'm unsure about just because of poor health is Royce Lewis. Oh, I had that circled. I was thinking Mason when would make a better group thing there, because, you know, there is going to be somebody who makes his team for defensive reasons. You know, and I know you have Bobby Whit and Gunnar Henderson that could both be short stops before years from now, they might not both be short stops. Yeah, that's a fair question. I had a backup catcher at Patrick Bailey on the air. Right, that makes sense. He may not be a star, but you need a good American backup catcher, you know, and who are you going to pick that fits the bill right now? So I think that's my Mason win is my Patrick Bailey for this team. It's like going to be a short stop going to probably be a good defensive shortstop, you know, may want to have that arm on your bench too. Why did he put Royce Lewis on there? 32 homers in 440 played appearances as a big league player. That is a difference maker with the bat, if he can string together a few years of better health in multiple torn ACLs. It's just horrible luck, but there's a component of that that's just unbelievably bad luck. We'll see if he has hamstrings and quads, which, you know, there's other soft tissue stuff. If that's the problem, he still has hamstrings and quads. Yeah, we'll see if he still has them four years from now. Four years are now we'll all have bionic hamstrings. Maybe we'll have better treatments, better replacement quads and hamstrings available for these nagging injuries, but yeah, more to come on Team USA in 2028. Hopefully some kind of confirmation at some point. I don't know in the next year that this will actually happen because we'll get fired up about it when it does. I missed the Olympics already, by the way, I just, I loved it as something different to watch, especially with the time change, you know, being in the Midwest, the games being in Paris, you could wake up, turn on, watch live stuff. I didn't even care when it was on. It was amazing. Every event I watched was fun. It was kind of fun to see bizarre sports. I mean, break dancing. We watched some ping pong, you know, just turn it on. Enjoy it. Handball. I watched a field hockey final. One thing I really did, this like though was it was really hard to find something you actually want. Like if you wanted something specifically, it was very hard to find. I found, I don't know if there's a Hulu interaction thing, but like, yeah, I had peacock and they had all these like gold medal highlight channels and stuff that you could like really easily. I felt like sort through. Yeah, dude, it NBC's had the Olympics forever. peacock was built for the Olympics. You could watch every event. It's entirely. I was watching surfing one night and I actually got the kind of bored because they have to wait a long time for a wave. It wasn't edited. It was like a five and a half hour presentation of surfing. So it was actually very relaxed. It was almost like a screen saver. Very, very common. Peacock next time, you know, it had like, you could skip to just the US gold medals on one channel. You could watch the gold medal highlights. They had primetime in Paris every night, snoop had a show. It is also very sort of American centric. Maybe that was part of my problem. I was trying to watch a basketball game that was America was not involved in. And so I just couldn't find it, you know, and I, yeah, maybe, maybe it was just me. Maybe it was user error, but I think it was user error in this instance. Let's move on. Let's talk about the N.O. West for a bit. I think last week we were talking about the possible best teams in baseball right now. I threw the Dodgers out there as my pick. I think it's a fun question because we named three teams brought up two more and maybe still didn't even hit the best team in baseball. River Ryan got hurt in the time since then. I know I'm not going to throw back my statement that the Dodgers are the best team in baseball right now because I think the key still is Yoshi no Biamamoto. They just got Mookie Betts back last night. Homered right away. So Dodgers are doing Dodger things and Clayton Kershaw even working with the diminished velocity still looks like pretty darn good Clayton Kershaw to me. Like it's so easy to underrate him. Here's my question for both of you. Where does Clayton Kershaw rank in ERA going back to the start of 2022? I set the minimum innings to 250 innings. So that way he has enough innings to qualify. Where would you say Kershaw ranks in ERA? That dude. Third. Top 10. First. He's first by almost a quarter run. Like not just first by a little. Where do they get ranks in whip? He's such a legend dude. Well now I'm first. He's tied for fourth in whip. I know you can't rely on Clayton Kershaw for 30 starts year over year. Right. But when you have him he's still just about as good as anybody. It might not be overpowering. It's not fire breathing Paul Skeen's electric stuff. It may not be your opening their first playoff starter or your playoff ace. That's the thing. Yeah. He hasn't been good in the playoffs and that I think that has tarnished how his perception a little bit. I mean that's kind of ridiculous though because it dismisses the value he still brings to the table. Like there's a lot of ridiculous but I think that's where part of the. Got to be. But it's so weird. Just like you know we're we see a lot of velocity everywhere else and he's got none of it. No but it's still working. It's still working. He's down like a half tick-ish from where he was a year ago but kind of a similar pitch mix. You know it's not as he's not it's not like he's throwing 50% four seam fastballs at 90 miles an hour. Like he's he's adjusting. He's doing all the things that a great aging pitcher should do to continue making it work without the stuff that he used to have. So anyway I think Kershaw's return even though it's been a little bumpy at times that's still a big lift for them. What do you make of this race right now? I think one takeaway from last week was I thought they'd have to sweat to win the division and that looks even more true a week later because the Diamondbacks are playing well. The Padres are playing well they just got Joe Musgrove back and the Giants they're in the rear view mirror they're pretty far back they're probably not coming back to win the division but they're hanging around and they're pitching as we saw again with Blake Snell on Monday night they're starting pitching as a problem. Yeah you know it's really interesting that if you take the last 30 days and just look at team trends in this division it looks like there's a very clear best team in this division that's not the Dodgers and if you sort by WRC+ over the last 30 days the San Diego Padres are 6th with a 126th WRC+ the Dodgers are 10th with a 108 and the Giants are 17th with a 102 by Arizona and oh yeah you're right Arizona 2nd 143. Oh my god Barry and Lily they're cooking right now the Diamondbacks are just on fire. On the pitching side oh no damn you Arizona on the pitching side Arizona 2nd San Diego 3rd so there's we're making the case here for Arizona and San Diego both being better than Dodgers. Dodgers 15th in in pitching war over the last 30 days so and that's the full staff um so but it's hard to know exactly what to make of this in sort of 30 day trends because A we've also seen we've seen good teams like the Yankees look terrible for stretches so there there are there are just terrible stretches in every in every good season there's still terrible stretches the Dodgers could be just going through one of those and then secondly you know these rosters are dynamic and they're changing all the time and what what sort of Dodgers team will we be looking at in the last 30 days and is that the next 30 days that gonna be the same roster and so I think that's a big question you like for example you're getting Clayton Kershaw back you know but the Padres got your own must grow back last night you know well the Dodgers are gonna get Yamamoto back yeah I know but like the Dodgers aren't the only team that's hurt that's true Garvish also could be pitching for San Diego at some point in time Dennis Lynn reported yesterday with Ken Rosenthal that he's been throwing bullpen so I know the Dodgers have a lot of injuries a crazy amount of injuries but I think it's also crazy to not assume that Arizona and San Diego could also either keep this up or get slightly healthier too right back it's not a crazy thing I'm I'm surprised to tease and Joe Musgrove are leading the pot like no I'm personally surprised that Arizona is second in the last 30 days in pitching war because you know they some of the components don't look that great they don't have the greatest strikeout rate they don't have the greatest walk rate they have been suppressing homers really well but best in baseball so maybe they have something there or maybe that's just luck I don't think the Arizona pitching staff is that great but they are healthy now and they have six starters right now so they can even go to a six man rotation to maybe keep their guys healthy or they can play around with matchups or you know make Ryan Nelson like a super sub you know kind of a utility pitcher you know I don't know what is what they're going to do but they are the healthiest of the squads and somehow second best in baseball it's they are weird for me I just when I look at them I'm like it's an okay team you know I see him a lot of you forgot about him I see I just even look at them on the board I was like about to do a whole Padres thing we talked about Ryan Nelson a bit on Monday's show Brendan Faught's been pitching pretty well Zach Galen is just Galen he's their ace even if he's not a top 10 guy League wide he's probably easily still a top 20 pitcher so they they just get underrated I underrated their offense like a month ago we were looking at lineups and talking about different matchups we were trying to stay away from with our pitchers and I thought Arizona was a matchup you could kind of mess with with your kind of mid rotation starters and live to tell the tale no they are consistently actually very good I think what I did is I was projecting the struggles of Corbin Carroll across the entire lineup but they've been really good the injury the Christian Walker has six homers in the last month and a 577 slugging you know maybe he's putting it back together and then they bring in Josh Bell on waivers to step in for Christian Walker it's working he's got a 181 R's WRC plus as an Arizona diamondback and then you've got jock Peterson and katal marte who are white hot they're both hitting over 340 with 400 plus slugging and 800 I mean 800 slugging 400 plus OBPs together I mean that's a great duo to have in the middle of your lineup and you know jock Peterson what did they sign him for like one and four he gets underrated a lot because it's a big Cyplatoon it was 12 and a half it's still it's not yeah not that much for what he brings the table with the bat and then katal marte he's on pace for a possible 40 homerun season who the heck had that written down anywhere doesn't isn't he kind of like back end MVP status at this point I mean he should get at least a few votes yeah I mean it's crazy because if you had said which division might be a blowout in spring training we might have said the west because the Dodgers did so much and the Padres traded away Juan Soto and no one really bought that Arizona could could repeat what they did right so if I told you the Dodgers are double digit leaders in the NLS back in February you two have been like probably yeah right like it's not a crazy one of them had a crazy thing if we had picked the Dodgers as having this double digit lead because they've had double digit leads in the NLS before and they went and created a super team so it's wild to me and credit to Arizona and San Diego for putting the pedal to the metal at pretty much the the right time here and I you mentioned Arizona being very healthy so there may be a little regression there but San Diego in particular are winning games in all kinds of ways Jackson Merrill looks like a guy who could be rookie of the year he's he hits big home runs for them he makes big plays for them he does not look like a guy who's in his first season in the big leagues and I think that's been huge and doing you saw last night in Musgrove's debut he didn't even go five innings but it doesn't matter because their bullpen is so good that they can introduce Musgrove back into the game he could throw like 60 pitches and they win that game two to one because they can trot out their like five-headed relief monster out of the bullpen so they're a scary team I think if they make it in because like I said they could only they could get help they could get hurt also but they could get healthier here they could have Darvich they could have Musgrove more more stretched out Fernando Tadees could carry a team for a week or two like they're a very scary team and I think the more you watch them the more you're like one how is this team so bad last year and two if they get in they're going to be a hard team to beat because of how we've seen how much the bullpen and how much that can matter when it comes to the postseason right how much having those four or five guys to shorten those games up can have you steal games that you have don't business winning especially if your starting rotation is thin and their starting rotation is still pretty thin yeah the the other thing that is kind of kind of cool about and this is on the offensive side there's a Dennis Lin piece about how they you know in San Diego they really wanted to improve their contact Jackson Mariles in the middle of this as a really good contact player but you know I think the added dimension later in the season for Marile has been the power and marrying that strikeout rate with power is really the way forward because what you see at the top of the strikeout rate leaderboard over the last 30 days is the royals with the best strikeout rate that in the Padres tied with them basically and then Arizona third all three of them have above average power because there are people on this strikeout rate list like Washington is fourth and you've got Cleveland seventh always and and you've got the angels twelfth these are teams that are striking out less than average but don't have that power aspect along with it and if you pair power with a low strikeout rate then you are one of the best teams in baseball offensively the Dodgers by the way a 25.7% strikeout rate over the last 30 days and that is 25th in baseball basically tied with the Giants so you know and there are teams on that side of leaderboard that are still okay offenses the Dodgers still have a dope 108 RwRC plus Atlanta strikes out more than anybody other than the Colorado and they have a 107 RwRC plus but it puts a lot of pressure on your power on that side too and you have to they also you have to walk a lot you have to do all the other things if you're going to strike out that much this is a weird scenario that could unfold now but it would have helped if the Giants had found a way to win last night and that snell sale matchup but the Giants could be the last wild card we could be in a scenario where all four of these NLS teams Dodgers Padres DBACs and Giants all make the playoffs it's lining up where it's at least possible and the Braves have that position right now but it's going to be close at least it looks like it's going to be close the Braves are struggling are three and seven in their last 10 they're up two and a half on the Giants for the last wild card spot right now Cardinals are in the mix there the Mets are one back there's other teams there because the NLS been like that all year what's really interesting if you look by run differential at the other teams jockeying for that spot the Reds even though their four and a half games back of the last wild card are a plus 45 in run differential they have the best run differential of any of the teams below that line right now that don't have a playoff spot so I guess if I'm looking for a team that is not part of this NLS picture that could find its way back in the Reds might be the one that looked close to dead on paper that still have some life left yeah the end of season projections on fangaraffes have the Braves with 86 wins the Giants with 82 but you know there's a there's a hot stretch in there that could change things Padres with 90 Dodgers with 95 still so that's the that's the kind of silver numbers based approach but you know a lot of this I think still looks at season long trends and says oh well the Dodgers have a 100 run differential and have done this over the full season and they aren't looking at something like I'm looking at like a last 30-day split and that makes sense for a projection system to look at the full season and look at the full quality of the team but I think it also makes sense as humans to like look at the last 30 days and say well this roster over the last 30 days has performed this way it's not like 30 days is a tiny sample it's like a full month of kind of mediocrity from the Dodgers so you know after being a superlative team that looked like they were going to win 115 or something this year now now they've come back to earth so you know anything can really happen over these last 45 days or so but that's that's what the projections say Dodgers easily over the Padres and 90 wins for the Padres and 89 for the Diamondbacks and those are the two wild cards along with the Braves to me the current margins a little smaller than the projected one and that's just you know separating the current gap a little bit over the time I don't know if I can buy that I think it's gonna be a sweat I think it's gonna go down to the final week at least for the division in the West which is more exciting than a lot of years when the Dodgers have been able to get enough separation to kind of coast into the postseason I always wonder too though across all sports are you better prepared for the postseason if you've been playing games that matter for several weeks or even a possible like couple of months consecutively like do you just have the the right focus the right mindset going in it's not just a baseball thing necessarily I found very little correlation in the numbers angle very little correlation September records and and October records but wild card teams do well in the playoffs wild card teams historically have fared well in the playoffs so maybe it's not so much September record as it is just getting in or mentality of just getting there's a schedule component to that wild cards have different schedules they play they kind of play all the way through without resting yeah that's that's why I wonder if it's the the rest component maybe getting in having to play the games that matter and being a wild card is a little sweet spot where yeah the time off is good and you already you know advanced through that first round but you have everything just synced up the way it needs to be going in when you earned that spot through the final baseball is such a daily game there's something about it it's like so you know the other sports have days off more days off they have different schedules they're more and more likely you know you almost never ask in baseball do you have a game today you know like you show up and you're like oh oh there's no game today sweet turn turn the car around go back home yeah there's a very much like uh it's like an everyday thing and you kind of have to get into these grooves and that's why I think teams also fall out of grooves and fall into grooves and it's something that you can't numbers are not gonna be or say are gonna say no teams don't have hot hands because you can't you can't pinpoint the beginning and end of a hot streak like you can't predict it but you can be in one you can be in one you know you talk to any of these guys who are on a hot streak and the ball looks like a beach ball let me just look at the Texas Rangers last year like they were they the best team in baseball for the full season no but like they were you know during the playoffs yeah the time it mattered the most of the part that you still can't yeah you still can't quantify the momentum factor I think and we see that in other sports you see that in March madness right you see that you know a little bit in you know other venues but yeah so me baseball is such a it's because they play every day I think basketball most often crowns the best team as the champion because they have full series yeah full seven game series yeah definitely not the Super Bowl because I don't think so I think how did what team showed up that you know and there's also a big matchup question I think in football because whoever you play in the playoffs it's not like you know you could just be playing a week slate to get to the Super Bowl and then you know Thor has some strong opinions today I know you guys hear him his dog walker is coming oh he's excited he's not he's not even I know he what's funny is like that the dog walker will still have to drag him out of the house like he's almost 10 like he acts like a tough guy behind the door once they come in he's like oh are we walking he knows what he wants like yeah yeah is he a rare cameo from Thor usually doesn't have the energy usually don't hear a peep out of him the key question here is if we had to make the call today are you sticking with the projections and saying it's the Dodgers you know and I'm staying with the Dodgers I'm not moving off them I just think they're gonna have to sweat it out closer than the projections say do you think the Dodgers win the division and how many other teams out of this group actually do make the postseason yeah I want to stick with the Dodgers I just think that when you you know when you do look at those there's last 30 day splits too closely you start you just forget how good this team really is and getting mookie and Freddy back I think is is huge there was a little you know in that time period mookie was hurt and there was some Freddy missing so you know when you look at that line and you say oh the bottom four aren't great well now replace some of that bottom four with mookie bets and Freddy Freeman you know how does the line of looking at now you know and what and what recently with both you know with with both these guys in I feel like you start to be like how do I pitch this line up like how do I get through this lineup it is a really good lineup and so and in the in the meantime while they've been crappy you know Gavin Luxe has been getting a little better and like some of their they've been sorting through some other pieces and they acquired some pieces of the deadline so if this go lineup the worst players in the lineup are Gavin Luxe and Tommy Edmond I'm starting to think like this could be the best lineup in baseball again Britt what do you think I mean Dodgers to win the division but other two teams still getting in behind them I think so like I want to disagree just for contrarian sake also because like let's let's face it we're not even into September we've seen some crazy stuff happen in September we've seen collapses we've seen team storm in uh and it I don't buy the projections that this is going to be at a coast at all like mainstream DVR um I think it'd be pretty cool if a team that wasn't the Dodgers won the NL West at a hard time seeing the Dodgers now that they're getting healthier like kind of continue to spiral and give away that lead but I very much think uh that the Padres could win this division it wouldn't surprise me um so you know I'm just going to go with the Padres just to be a little bit different I think I think they're confident I think they're playing with the momentum we talked about and they have the potential to get even healthier and better tatice is a big piece I mean if they can tatice is a huge thing to get him back it could change things so I line up yeah I'm gonna go with them because it's it would be so boring if we just saw the Dodgers Dodgers mark to an NL West title and like Arizona it's funny we're like counting out Arizona which the world series last year and apparently has the second best pitching staff and the third best hitting over the last three days okay and this this again speaks to me like let's just make it AL and NL and the top teams get in because it's like just wild if we get three teams maybe even four teams in from that that NL West that's not probably how people perceived it going into the season I don't think I think people thought that there'd be one there'd be one uh wildcard coming out of there most I think for trading away Jorge Salera the Giants deserve to come up short the spirit of it it's like your lineup's not that good keep the guy that has game changing power that can just go red hot it's so it's such a farron move but we found Jarrar and Karnas Jung who's hitting the ball really hard and kind of looks like Jorge Salera and he costs you know 15 million hours a year less so no I don't like it I'm not rooting against the Giants but I'm more just looking at saying hey you know that's like the wrong thing to do if you're trying to make up ground and your problem is largely scoring runs don't try to have your cake and eat it too it's not that big of a deal to keep Salera I think that there's gonna be some leaner times coming from Elliot Ramos and Tyler Fitzgerald at the top of that lineup just because they're swinging this so you know I know that they're they look great right now but they're putting them one two in the lineup and you know that means they they want every played appearance they can to go to those two guys and I'm not sure it's gonna work out that well the series lineup kind of nice the end of the season so the second to last series of the year for the Padres on the road at Dodger Stadium that could be the series where one of those teams potentially clinches it or it could be Padres D-backs in the last series of the season in Arizona for the division or just to make the playoffs so I like the way the schedule shakes out I'm glad the schedule worked out that way the Giants do not play the Dodgers again but they do play Arizona I think six times yeah they've got them in the first week of September Giants are a little bit more you know almost in the spoiler role possibly right or the Giants Cardinals could be looking for the last wild card spot final weekend of the year that's a home series for the Giants too so I don't know a lot of different ways this one can play out it's more fun and a deeper division than we expected going in but one more question for you before we go we saw the angels by and then purge trying to get below the luxury tax threshold last year using August waiver dumps to do that and it was weird the Guardians kind of reap the benefits of that even though they didn't make the playoffs Kenrose and Thor wrote about the possibility the Rangers may be shedding a few players to save some money before my guys their next hers are be a waiver dump I don't think Scherzer was in that but it's guys like David Robertson Andrew Heaney maybe Nathan Evaldi it won't might not be quite as extreme as the angels but do you think whether it's the Rangers or other teams this is something that more clubs might employ because now you have this extra monthly play since the deadline if you were kind of a bubble team 15 20% chance of making the playoffs at the deadline you stayed in you didn't sell you can at least save four five six million whatever it is in payroll for the final month of the season because if this is the norm the way the players are awarded is frustrating the fact that Cleveland just got three roster upgrades even though they have to manage the roster and DFA and push guys off the 40 man it's just kind of weird it's it's like being in a fantasy league where someone who's out of it just drops a bunch of players three weeks before the end of the season and then worst one person gets the power team with money the worst wall card team with money gets to pick them up basically very odd I think that there is a calculation the team has to make that goes beyond just how much money we can save I'm not sure exactly what it is but I I do think that you can poison yourself a little bit as a free agency destination if you just cut guys like this you know what I mean like you're not for the player you're not trading them to somewhere where they know they're going somewhere you're cutting them from your team and then the player has to find out where he's going you know what I mean like they're in limbo I bet you that it didn't make the angels a a nicer place to go for play for players you know what I mean I bet you players roll would roll their eyes at it like if the Rangers cut everybody and then they went to into free agency next year and somebody got an offer from the Rangers and an equal offer from somewhere else they might take the other offer is what I'm saying I think there could be some tarnishing of your legacy as a team if you just put six players out there like let's say it is Max Scherzer you put Max Scherzer and Nate Yavaldi on waivers right is there nothing nothing resonates with us what do you think I know still I just flat out don't like it but I'm with you on the especially if you're starting a one-year deal you know oh okay this could put me on waivers it's usually guys who are expiring right we don't see this with players that have years of control left oh yeah totally it's pending free agents guys that you wouldn't give a qualifying offer to that but one-year deals are our life lifebloods of some teams like most teams would love to finish like two or three roster spots of one-year deals like the Giants love it you know like you know certain teams love it the only reason I would wonder if it doesn't make a big difference is because if we're talking about guys on one-year deals they're probably looking for their next home anyway and you're talking about a month where they live in a hotel and possibly go play for a better team so maybe the pros outweigh the cons the hassle the inconvenience like you knew the situation going in on a short-term deal so I would make it a priority to talk to the players sure as an organization I'd be like listen we could save some money here you could go somewhere better do you want to I would ask them what do you think brit more of this to come or was that just a blip last year with the angels being that aggressive about shedding payroll i think i'm gonna be going to change the rules so i don't think it's worth a whole lot of debate is what i think they don't really they don't like that they didn't like that look no it's going to change can rose in the world about for his piece today it's just like optics of defending champions doing this that's kind of a strange vibe as well i hope it's not a trend but i did realize when ken wrote them like oh yeah we're kind of in that window where there might be a team or two that thinks about doing that to save a few bucks we are going to go if you'd like to save some money on a subscription the athletic you can do that at the athletic dot com slash rates and barrels you can find you know on twitter at you know serris find brit at brit underscore drolli find me at darrick unriper find the pot at rates and barrels that's good to do for this episode rates and barrels we're back with you on thursday thanks for listening you [BLANK_AUDIO]
