Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 1880: The 10th Anniversary Interview

Episode Date: July 22, 2022

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley wrap up the podcast’s 10th anniversary week by doing a dozen listener-inspired Stat Blasts and then (51:53) talking to 42-year-old Red Sox starter and podcast legend Rich Hill about how the game and his game have evolved over his long career, plus (1:31:18) a Past Blast from 1880/postscript. Audio intro: Silk […]

I took a little something to get here, yeah, yeah I got a little more, if you're ready, we can have it all Oh, let's tiptoe to a magical place Blast off and kiss the moon tonight We'll watch the world go crazy from outer space Burst off into the sky Hello and welcome to episode 1880 of Effectively Wild, a Fangraphs baseball podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters. I'm Meg Raleigh of Fangraphs and I'm joined as always by Ben Lindberg of The Ringer. Ben, how are you?

I'm doing all right. I'm excited because we're closing out our 10th anniversary week with an extra episode. And as a result, we are fittingly ending the week on an episode number that's a multiple of five for old time's sake. Yeah, look at that. How convenient. Well, I'm happy with how it's gone. It seems like people have enjoyed these episodes. And the plan, which has been ever shifting right up until this moment for Anniversary Week,

was to do one retrospective episode with trivia and clips and tributes, which we did, and then one draft episode with old hosts and friends, which we did. And then the idea was to do one interview episode where we would talk to some of the baseball players or people we've talked about most often over the course of the show. Now, we struck out with a couple of those people, at least for now, though those doors aren't closed forever. We can revisit that idea. And another of those people agreed to come on, but couldn't make it work for this week. So stay

tuned. We hope that conversation will be coming sometime soon. So in that sense, the 10th anniversary celebration spirit will continue. However, we were able to land one of our most wanted guests in time for this week, Rich Hill is here. Rich Hill himself, podcast legend, Red Sox starter, Dick Mountain in the house, the second oldest active major leaguer, the oldest pitcher, the oldest American leaguer, not to pick on him. Sorry, Rich. Yeah, geez.

We had a great conversation with him the day before his most recent start, in which, I guess appropriately, given how old I was just calling him, he hurt his knee. Yeah. But he didn't hurt it too badly, and he's about to be back. has changed since he made his debut and how he's changed and kept up with the times and how he's seemingly conquered his blister problem and much more. But it was just a joy. We've talked about Rich Hill so many times over the years that it was great to have him on and talk to him and kind of convey to him what he has meant to the podcast over the years. And we just hope that he keeps pitching for as long as possible.

But we're really glad to have him on today. Yeah, the once and future Dick Mountain. Yes, indeed. So to compensate for having only one great guest, one mere podcast legend on this episode, I came up with one way that we could introduce Rich or do something anniversary appropriate here to lead into this interview. So I have a big StatBlast backlog. Yeah. I didn't realize quite how big it was.

Yeah. Because frequent StatBlast consultant Ryan Nelson has been busily StatBlasting and we've been busily doing anniversary stuff and talking about the All-Star Week and other things. And so I've just had more and more StatBlast build up here. Ryan actually went on vacation for a couple of weeks and he came back energized like in StatBlasting withdrawal. And so he's just been stat blasting non-stop ever since he got back and it turns out that i have enough stat blasts completed here to do a stat blast for every year of the podcast it's a 10th anniversary episode we're doing 10 stat blasts here we'll see how it goes i the reason we're laughing is because you were like you you said a lot of that to me in in chat before we started recording and i was just you were like if you'll indulge me i'll do 10 and

i was like sure here we go hopefully everyone will indulge me and us here but yeah yeah this is like a stat blast barrage this is is a stat blast fusillade. But really, stat blasts and whatever we were calling them before stat blasts have been a very big part of this podcast history. And we get to bring you some fun facts and some stats about baseball that you probably won't get anywhere else. And I think all of these were inspired by listener questions. So it's appropriate in that sense, too. And just got to thank Ryan for just churning away in the stat blast minds here over the past few weeks. And again, I encourage everyone to follow him on Twitter at RSNelson23.

And as always, our stat blast segment, which this might be more than we could call a segment, but it is sponsored by Baseball References StatHead tool. And as always, we encourage everyone to go to StatHead.com and use the coupon code WILD20 to get a $20 discount on an $80

one-year subscription. They don't just do baseball. They do other sports and leagues too, but we will just be sticking to baseball here. So are you ready? Are you prepared for double digit stat blasting? You know, I don't know that I am, but I'm going to do my very best. Okay. All right. We're just going to empty out the SnapLest archives here. Some of these will be quick. So this one, I'll just go back to June 8th. This one was sent in by listener Sean.

And he wrote, Yesterday's Guardians Rangers doubleheader was split 6-3 and 3-6, respectively. How many times has a doubleheader been split with mirrored scores like that? Sometimes I'll hear people say that a split doubleheader almost feels like a waste. It's like you wake up and you have the same record relative to 500 that you did that morning, except you had to play two games. I guess it's silly to look at it like that because you got two games off the schedule and you're two games closer to completion.

But maybe it feels unfulfilling if you played six or seven hours of baseball and at the end of it, you won one and you lost one. And maybe even more so when the score was the same in each of those and you were on the winning end once and the losing end once. So Ryan's answer, and as usual, he has used his RetroSheet database to determine much of this, but it happens in approximately 1% of doubleheaders on record. So 186 times in total, there have been split doubleheaders with mirrored scores. The five most recent before this one, well, the most recent before this one was July 28th, 2021, when the Blue Jays and Red Sox had a 4-1-1-4 split doubleheader. It happened last June too

with the Phillies and the Mets in 2-1. And then it happened August 15th, 2020, the Royals at the Twins, 4-2, 2-4. April 20th, 2018, Royals and Tigers, 3-2. And July 16th, 2017, Yankees and Red Sox, 3-zip, zip-3. But before those, it hadn't happened since May of 2008,onto and cleveland three nothing nothing three and before that you had to go back to april 13th 2005 the padres and the cubs and they had a pretty extreme one of eight to three and those seven are all the examples this century but the most extreme mirrored score would you care to guess the most extreme mirrored score. Would you care to guess the most extreme mirrored score that has actually happened?

Oh boy. Let's see. It makes me think, what do I understand the frequency of scoring to be? What is the distribution of scores as I understand it? It's been a step less before, I think.

What hasn't been a stat blast at this point. I'm going to say 15 to 1. Not too far off. 13 to 4. OK. I feel like I, you know what? That was a respectable guess. Yes, it was.

I did not embarrass my family with that guess. Yep. St. Louis Browns at Philadelphia A's, June 25, 1936. There was a 13 to 4 with each of those teams winning one of them. And I will just say the data for most or all of these stat blasts will be linked as usual on the show page, on the podcast page, or in your podcast summary in your podcast player. Okay. That was stat blast number one. Stat blast number two comes from Michael. Now, this was sent June 14th, and his email started, I've just noticed something that screams Orioles baseball.

Oh, no. Yeah, now on June 14th. Yeah, I guess that was, you know, a happier feeling now than it was on June 14th, probably. But Michael wrote, the Orioles starting lineup on that night featured a cleanup hitter with zero RBI on the season. It was Adley Rutschman, who had 78 plate appearances. And Michael wrote, he's had a few extra base hits and has scored some runs, but is one for 27 with zero runs batted in with runners on base. It's the first time this season, no career, which is the same in his case, where he's batted fourth. So Michael said, I have to wonder if this is the latest in a season a player like this, say 50 plus plate appearances or more, has ever been written into a batting lineup in the cleanup spot. Now, Rutschman did not get an RBI that day. He got his first two the next day, June 15th,

when he was once again batting cleanup. But Ryan looked into this, and this is not a record. So Ryan did it by plate appearances into the season rather than games, since that seems more interesting. If we went by games or dates, he says we might get a September call-up who just happened to get 50 or whatever arbitrary minimum plate appearances before getting an RBI. So he actually went above and beyond, as he often does,

and he gave me the most plate appearances entering a game without an RBI on the season for every slot in the order. without an RBI on the season for every slot in the order. So the most is for the leadoff spot, which I guess makes some sense because leadoff batters tend to get fewer RBI because they don't have good hitters hitting behind them or ahead of them. So Whitey Witt, June 17, 1917, he was batting leadoff and he entered that game with 151 total plate appearances. He actually got an RBI that day, but that's the most for any lineup spot entering the game without an RBI.

The next most is the number nine hitter, which again, I guess makes some sense. Again, I guess makes some sense. And this was recent. Last July 24th, Magnuris Sierra entered batting ninth with 139 plate appearances on the season. No RBI. Then it's the eighth spot. Again, makes some sense. And this was September 23rd, 2016. And this was Caleb Joseph.

And I remember that being a thing that year. Caleb Joseph and his like RBI-less streak. But he had gone 138 plate appearances without one. Then you have to go to the number six slot, and this was Magnuri Sierra again. Last July 22nd, he was in the sixth spot that day, and he had 134 plate appearances. Then we go to the cleanup spot. So this was the original question. And the answer is, yet again, Magnurice Sierra, who last July 19th, he started a game in the cleanup spot.

And he had 129 plate appearances entering that day without an RBI. And as we know now, he still had some RBI-less plate appearances to go. But that was the cleanup spot. So that is the answer. It was not Adley Rutschman. without an RBI. And as we know now, he still had some RBI-less plate appearances to go, but that was the cleanup spot. So that is the answer. It was not Adley Rutschman. It was Magnurice Sierra, most plate appearances entering a season at the cleanup spot with zero RBI. Then the seventh spot, it was Herb Adams, June 11th, 1950. He was batting seventh and he had 125 plate appearances without an RBI. Then the fifth spot, Caleb Joseph again. That was September 2nd, 2016. He was batting fifth and he had 121 plate appearances entering that day with zero RBI. In 1959, Manny Mota, he was batting second that day, and he had 119 plate appearances without an RBI, so that's the most for a number two hitter. And finally, the most for a number three hitter without any RBI. So this is not, as far as I can recall, something that we talked about last year with Magnarice here, but he had some RBI issues last year with the Marlins. He ended up with five in

225 plate appearances. So he got some eventually, but you know, yeah, rough. All right. So that was stat blast number two. Stat blast number three comes from Jimmy, Patreon supporter, July 6th. Now, this is interesting. He starts, I'm watching my local newly exciting Orioles while watching. So see, there's the difference between mid-June and early July. Suddenly it was not, oh, woe is us, Orioles baseball. It was, look at us and our newly exciting Orioles. Yeah, real narrative arc there.

Exactly. He writes, yesterday's Orioles broadcast led off with the fact that the Orioles have four non-hit walk-off wins, two by error, one by walk, and one by hit by pitch on Monday. According to the broadcast, they lead the league. The Padres and Diamondbacks each had two and 11 others had one. I have to wonder now, how rare is this? And are they on pace for a record in a season?

To state it briefly, what's the record for non-hit walk-off wins in a season by a team? Should I now be rooting for non-hit walk-offs? Should I now be rooting for non-hit walk-offs? So Ryan has determined that the record is six non-hit walk-off wins in one season, which has happened five times since 1916. The 1935 Tigers did it twice on walks, three times on sack flies, which wasn't technically a stat at the time, and once on a ground out. And then the 1977 Dodgers did it on three sack flies, one walk, one pass ball, and one ground out. The 1990 Orioles did it on three sack flies, two walks, one error, a throwing error with the bases loaded. And the 1991 Cardinals did it on two walks, one sack fly, and three errors. Lastly, the 2000 Brewers did it on two sack flies, four errors.

And he also notes that the most without a sack fly is five non-hit walk-offs, which has happenedby-pitch walk-off, a passed ball walk-off, a bases-loaded E5 walk-off, and an E1 walk-off on a bunt, allowing the runner to score from first. That's a wild one. So yeah, that's the record. So the Orioles, I don't know if they have gotten any since then, but they were and probably still are on pace, I suppose, to break the record. So yeah, I guess, to break the record. So, yeah, I guess if you're an Orioles fan, you should probably be rooting for any kind of walk-off win, but especially a non-hit walk-off win because, yes, they are on a somewhat

historic pace when it comes to that. Yeah, geez. And then you're like, which of the ones, if you're an Oriole, I mean, like the non-hit ones, like you're like, don't let it be a hit-by-pitch walk-off win. That'd be the worst kind, right? Because then you have to be hit by a pitch. How would you order them, Ben? In terms of most fun or most desirability?

From the player's perspective, though. I guess it's really just hit-by-pitch and then everything else, right? Because otherwise, you're like, though. I guess it's really just like hit by pitch and then everything else, right? Because otherwise you're like, whatever. Yeah, I guess I would want to walk just so like I get the walk in my stack column. I get an RBI. I mean, the same with it hit by pitch, except you don't have to get hit by the ball. Get hit by the pitch, yeah. You get spare at bat. Yeah. And then if you have like a pass ball or a wild pitch, like you don't get any credit as the batter. Right. So and maybe like if it's a if it's an error, if it's like a ground out, I could see how that might be exciting for fans because it looks like, oh, no, like it's the last out. It's just a routine grounder or something. And then, nope, it's surprise.

We actually win because he threw the ball away. So I can see how that might be maybe the most exciting. Maybe like the sack fly too just because sometimes that can be a close play. That can be an exciting play, right? Like a walk, not super exciting. A hit by pitch, you don't get any time to anticipate it. It just happens. And if it's a sack fly, depending on how deep it's hit and who's on third, like you get some drama, right? Like there's some suspense, you know, okay, he's got to be going and there could be a play at the plate and sometimes it's a photo finish. So that might be the most exciting way to make it happen, I suppose. Yeah, fair enough. I think I agree. All right. Number four. This is from Max, who says, The next pitch was wild, scoring Piscati. Brown took too wide a turn at third and was picked off by Martin Maldonado, emptying the bases.

My girlfriend Beth immediately pointed out that Noisy had come to the plate with the bases loaded and had the bases empty before his plate appearance had ended. It's pretty wild, right? So you had a passed ball and then you had a wild pitch and then you had a pickoff and suddenly he's still at the plate, but the bases are empty now. So he says, what else could even prompt this? Three box and a plate appearance, a pickoff gone horribly wrong. Has this ever happened? In Retro Sheet language, Max is asking if there has ever been a bases loaded game state that has become a bases empty game state without a batter event. Max's example required two separate events to clear the bases, past ball and wild pitch.

Ryan says there have been 14 times since 1916 that the bases have been cleared in a single event. So it could be a pass ball and an error, or it could be a steal of home, and then there's a pickle. It could be a pickoff. I'll put a link online, but there's a long list of things that could happen here. Ryan says there have been nine times since 1916 that the bases have been cleared on two events not involving the batter. So for example, Detroit at Philly, July 14th, 1936, there was a wild pitch and then the runner from third scored and then the runner from second goes first to third and then there's a pickoff and an error, and the run scores from third. So a couple of things can happen, and suddenly the bases can be empty. But perhaps most interesting, there have been two times that the bases have been cleared on three events without involving the batter.

So September 10th, 1954, the Reds at the Giants. There was a pass ball. The run scores from third. The runner on second goes to third. The runner on first goes to second. Then there's another pass ball. The runner from third scores. The runner from second goes to third.

Then there's either a pass ball or a wild pitch. It wasn't clear which, and the runner was out at home. So just a whole lot of pass balls and or wild pitches and runners scoring or runners being out at home. And I would feel a little bit cheated probably if I were the batter. It's like, let me drive these guys in. I mean, I guess you're happy to have cleared the bases and scored all those runs or scored two of them at least. But it's like, I didn't do anything. I didn't even get a chance to do anything.

And the other example was July 17th, 1977, Minnesota at Oakland. Wild pitch. Run scores from third. Runner at second goes to third. Runner at first goes to second. There's a pickoff and an error on the catcher, it looks like. The runner scores from third and the runner at second goes to third. And then finally, there was a wild pitch and a run scored from third. So all three runs scored. And again, the batter didn't do anything. It just

would feel unfulfilling in a way, even though the best outcome you can hope for is that all those runs score. But again, the batter played no part. That would be really weird. I'd find that disorienting, you know, and it's not like you, you know, if you're a batter, you go up to the plate with the bases empty all the time. I mean, not all the time, but that's not an unusual event for you to go up there and be like, I don't have any of my friends with me. I'm all on my own. But when you start with friends and then you lose them, I'd find that to be disorienting, although I would be really happy about the scoring part.

Like that would be, and you have to keep getting out of the way. That's the other thing, right? Yeah, that too. You have to, you're throwing off your rhythm, I would imagine, because you're like, I got to get out of this guy's way or I'm going to prevent him from scoring and then I'll have no friends but for a different reason. Yep. Yeah.

Well, you could take some credit maybe for so intimidating the pitcher. Yeah. He's just throwing wild pitches left and right. And maybe you were directing traffic, you know, like telling the base runners. You're doing the arms. You're doing the get down move. You know, I'm doing it, but you can't see. And neither can our listeners. But you can imagine it because you've watched baseball before.

Yeah. So yeah, you were kind of involved. You played some small part. You were there. There had to be a batter in order for those things to happen. So you were the batter. Right. It's not that you did nothing. It's number five comes from Dennis. This doesn't seem like some kind of esoteric question, so I'm surprised I can't find an obvious answer online. Which manager has managed the most MLB players in their career? The most obvious answer would be Connie Mack because he's managed almost 2,500 games, more than the second place guy on the list. than the second place guy on the list, but he managed at a time when rosters and player pools were smaller and he managed all but two of his 50 seasons with one franchise. Is his sheer volume of games enough to make up for those facts? So Ryan was able to look this up and this is players who played in a game since 1901. It does include playoffs. So if you were on a roster and did not get into a game, I think maybe that would not have counted because we don't have roster data going back far enough to do it, really. But here's the top 10 entering 2021. It was Leo DeRocher with 486 players managed.

Actually, tie between DeRocher and Terry Francona. So Francona presumably has managed some new players this year and has gone above DeRocher. Then it was Buck Showalter at 506. And he has added quite a few to that total, I would imagine. And then it was Dusty Baker at 519. He's probably added some too, but Buck maybe has leapfrogged him, I would think. I have not counted. Then Bobby Cox, 538. Lou Piniella, 556. Bucky Harris, 563. Bruce Bochy, 588. Joe Torre, 589. Bruce Bochy, 588.

Joe Torre, 589. And then we get to the top two. Tony La Russa, number two. He entered the season with 619 players managed. And by Ryan's count, he has had 13 new ones with the White Sox this year. So he's up to 632. But the number one is the obvious one, Connie Mack. Yeah. He managed 720 players., Connie Mack. Yeah. He managed 720 players.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Including our former guest, Bobby Shantz. His last living player to be managed by Connie Mack. But he had 720 of them. And I guess that record is safe. Maybe not quite as safe as his games managed record. But unless La Russa, like anyone else but La Russa might have been let go already.

Although maybe the White Sox are picking it up and maybe they will win that division after all. We will see. Maybe. I don't know. It depends. Like maybe as long as Jerry Reinsdorf owns that team, Tony Russo can keep managing if he wants to. So if he's up to 632 now, I don't know how many more seasons he would need to manage to surpass 720. Because if you're not changing teams, then most of your players from one year to the next are holdovers and you're not adding to your count here.

But there are just a lot of players used every season in this day and age. So I guess fewer maybe now with some restrictions on how many pitchers you can use and how long they have to be in the minors if you demote them. But yeah, unless La Russa has yet another act in his career where he catches on with another team, which seems unlikely. I guess you can't count him out. But unless he does, then I think Connie Mack's record here is probably safe. But 720 seems to be the tally. Wow, that's a lot. That is a lot.

All right. Stat blast number six. Oh, my gosh, Ben. They're going. They're going. Decent pace of stat blast here. Yeah. So Tom says, I often hear a game announcer use the phrase, the pitcher faced the minimum in an inning or in the game to that point.

The phrase is used to signal that one or more batters have reached base but were subsequently eliminated before the inning ended by a double play, a pickoff, a toot plan, or some other mechanism. I don't think a full game of the minimum faced, which isn't a perfect game or a no-hitter, has a name, a no left on base shutout. So a couple of questions from Tom. How often does a no left on base shutout occur? What is the most base runners in a game where the minimum has been faced? And what is the maximum total bases allowed in a no left on base shutout? So Ryan notes that this one is stat headable. Many of our stat blasts are not.

But this one, you can use that coupon code WILD20. You could answer this one yourself. And you just have to set some statistical filters in just such a way to do this. So you have to have eight or more innings pitched. You have to have three batters faced times innings pitched. You can select that in StatHead. And you have to have greater or equal to one base runner allowed. So if you do that search, you get 91 results.

But 14 didn't finish the game. And one, Ryan points out, looks like it's probably a data error. Dixie Davis on September 19th, 1920 has a line that seems odd. Ryan says, not sure how you could pitch nine innings facing 27 but allow a run. That shouldn't possible there's no play by play for this game so it's probably a mistake heads up retro sheet but that leaves 75 times when it does seem to have happened the most base runners allowed that can be verified with play by play is five which has happened twice so april 23rd 1989 bob Bob Malachy, Baltimore had five base runners, three hits, two walks, and the outs were on four double plays and a caught stealing. Malachy was pitching for the Orioles, that is. And then the second is August 3rd, 1946, Orville Grove pitching for the White Sox. His five base runners were on three hits, one walk, and one error, and the outs were on five double plays.

So Orville Grove was a double play machine that day. The most total bases allowed in one of these starts is four, which has happened three times. Once on May 29, 2014, Josh Kullmenter for the Diamondbacks. He allowed a double, two singles, and he got three double plays. The hitter who got the double was thrown out trying to advance to third on the fly out. Then July 25th, 1982, John Candelaria for the Pirates. He gave up four singles and he got three double plays and one caught stealing. And then June 29th, 1916, Epper Rixey for Philly. He gave up four singles and a walk and he got three double plays and two caught stealings. And then one other interesting note,

no one has done this while allowing a home run, obviously, or it wouldn't be a shutout or a triple. Only three times has someone allowed a double and done this? Once was that Cullmenter game. Once was August 23rd, 1942, Lon Warnicke for Chicago. And once was June 10th, 1913, Walter Johnson for the Senators did it. So I think you could take some pride in facing the minimum, even if we don't have a name for that necessarily. Maybe we should have a name for the no left on base shutout. I guess that is Tom's suggestion here. But that's something I would feel proud about that because especially if you are erasing those runners yourself, like they're not just running into outs, you're getting double plays or maybe you're picking them off or you're playing some part in the caught stealing at least. It's not the conventional way to face the minimum,

but hey, however you get those outs and erase those runners, it counts. Yeah. I feel like that would be a performance that would be written up favorably. People would say you had a good outing if that were the line that you put together and certainly if that were the results of it. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Stat blast number seven.

Christian, I was bored at work today watching the Royals play the Tigers when effectively wild friend Vinny Pasquantino hit his second career home run off of Michael Pineda. The unusual part is that his first career home run was also off of Michael Pineda. Is this interesting or noteworthy? Is it made more rare by the fact that they were in separate games? Has anyone else done this or done better and gotten their first three or four or five career home runs off of one pitcher? I just love the idea that like so rapidly a guy could be like one of the hitters where when a pitcher comes up, he's like, screw that guy. Yeah.

Get this guy out of the league, please. Get him out of here. I hate that guy. So Ryan says there have been 133 times that a batter's first two home runs have come off the same pitcher. Of these 133, 76 players did that in the same game and 57 did it in separate games. Some interesting examples of separate games, the longest gap between two games was just shy of six years.

Willis Hudley, a pitcher, hit his first career home run against Rube Wahlberg on August 3, 1927. He hit his second career home run also against Rube Wahlberg on July 12th, 1933. So he couldn't hit a home run against anyone else, but he had Rube Wahlberg's number. Rube Wahlberg. Now Brunson Arroyo, the pitcher, again hit his first two home runs in his career in his first two starts of the 2006 season, his seventh season in the league. That's weird. And both of those homers were against his starting pitcher opponent, Glendon Rush. Now, Adrian Hauser did almost the exact same thing, hitting his first two homers against the same pitcher, Daniel Castano, only a week apart in his fifth season. Hauser was also the most recent player to do this,

also the most recent player to do this coming into 2022. Pitcher Marty Patton hit his first and only two home runs in his career against Bill Parsons approximately three months apart in 1972. Louis Tiant, yet another pitcher, who by the way should maybe be in the Hall of Fame, that is Ryan editorializing there, I'll allow it, did this almost a year apart against Jim Bouton. Tony Walker was a center fielder who only played one season and only hit two homers, one in May 1986 and one in July 1986, both against Shane Raleigh, who was an all-star that year for the only time in his career. Tony Walker is probably thinking, if I could have faced only Shane Raleigh, I might have lasted a little longer. And some other notable players who did this, Ernie Banks against Jerry Stanley, Norm Cash against Frank Larry, Carl Crawford against Sean Sedlicek, Joe Medwick against Freddie Fitzsimmons, who has come up on the podcast before. He was out to lunch when necks were handed out.

That was something that was said against him, I believe. When necks were handed out, that was something that was said against him, I believe. Red Shane Dienst against Bill Voiselle. Archie Vaughn against Bill Walker. And Robin Yount did it also versus Ross Grimsley. Now, only one player ever hit his first three homers against the same pitcher. Oh, my gosh. Connor Jackson, who was a first baseman and left fielder for the Arizona Diamondbacks, hit his first two career homers on August 6, 2005,

his sixth career game against Rocky starter Jeff Francis. Francis allowed four homers that game. Jackson played in 34 more games that season but did not hit a home run. The next season, 2006, Jackson hit his third homer of his career on April 12, his seventh game of that season, again against Jeff Francis, still of the Colorado Rockies, although all of those homers were in Arizona, not Colorado. Jackson would eventually hit a fourth homer off of Jeff Francis on September 28th, 2007, this time in Denver, but he had hit 28 homers in between.

So that's the most. The first three is the most that anyone has ever done it against the same pitcher. Wow. All right. That takes us to stat blast number eight, I believe, if I haven't lost count. So Jason noted earlier this year, last night, the first MLB player from Palau debuted for the Pirates in Bly Madrys. From memory, the Pirates also debuted the first South African player, For memory, the Pirates also debuted the first South African player, Gifton Gopay, and the first Lithuanian player, Dovidas Nevarauskas. And a little research brought up the first U.S. Virgin Islander, if we're counting that as well, Joe Christopher, was a Pirate.

I'm guessing this isn't the record, but that got me thinking, what is the record for the franchise that debuted the most countries into MLB? Cool. Yeah. So a few caveats from Ryan here. This includes all non-50 U.S. state locations. So it's other countries, but it also includes Puerto Rico, Guam, et cetera. Just like historically in a baseball sense. Yeah.

Those places have been listed separately, rightly or wrongly. And so if you look up these things on baseball reference, they're kind of a separate category. And there are also some places here that may or may not be considered countries depending on who you ask, but we won't get into the politics of all that. If baseball reference listed them, Ryan included them. And he notes that one of those places is at sea. And famously, Ed Paré, who played for Buffalo's Federal League team in 1914, was born in the Atlantic Ocean in 1888, or not in the Atlantic Ocean. I was going to say probably like on a ship in the Atlantic Ocean, right? He's not an Atlantean or a merman or anything. Like on the Atlantic Ocean.

I'm going to have to make a new shirt. Yeah. On the Atlantic Ocean or, yeah, more precisely, I suppose, on a ship that was on the Atlantic Ocean. And the other was Frank Thompson, who played for Brooklyn's National Association team in 1875, is the only player born in Portugal. team in 1875 as the only player born in Portugal. And those are the two countries that had only one player and they were non-AL or NL. And this is also not counting the Negro Leagues yet. And Ryan notes, this is also only counting a debut if it was for a currently operating MLB franchise, but including past incarnations of that franchise if it changed teams or city names, etc. And I will add another caveat,

which is that Bly Madris is the first MLB player of Palawan descent, but he was born in Las Vegas, so he doesn't actually show up here because this is just birthplaces. We cannot do dissent, unfortunately, via baseball reference. But 11 franchises have never debuted a player who was the first to be born in that country. So the Rays, the Mets, the Phillies somehow, even though the Phillies have been around forever, they've never had one. That's surprising to me. It is. Yeah. The Nationals, which includes the Expos, but even so, they haven't. The Brewers, the Royals, the Tigers, also surprising because they go way back.

The Angels, the Mariners, the Diamondbacks, and the Rockies. And so if we're going to give you the most ever, it's the Cubs. The Cubs have had seven players who were the first to be born in a place, according to baseball reference. So Csik Pedroes, although apparently his name may actually have been Csik Pedro, was the first Cuban-born player and debuted in 1902. And then we have John Stadronsky, who was the first from the Czech Republic. He debuted in 1879. And John Hausman, first from the Netherlands, debuted in 1894. Skel Roach debuted in 1899. He's from Poland. Iran Beathorn, of course, from Puerto Rico. He's 1942. He played for the Cubs.

And then Robin Jennings, first Singapore-born player. He debuted in 1996. So those are the Cubs. And then you have the Yankees, Orioles, Giants, and A's with five apiece. The Braves with four. The Twins, Pirates, and Guardians and Dodgers with three apiece, the Braves with four, the Twins, Pirates, and Guardians and Dodgers with three apiece, and then you can go down the list. But I will link to that spreadsheet too if you want to see your team or you want to see

who counts or doesn't count here according to baseball reference, and you can parse it whichever way you want. Interesting. Yeah. It would be kind of cool to be the first from your birthplace or birth country. I think that would be a nice honor to have. I agree. All right.

Stopwatch number nine. Davin, Patreon supporter. In the Braves and Dodgers game on Sunday, this was a little while back, both of the closers ended up blowing the save. This was a little while back. Both of the closers ended up blowing the save. As you may know, both of those closers are the all-time saves leaders for the team they were pitching against. So this was Craig Kimbrell and Kenley Jansen.

So Kimbrell now with the Dodgers, Jansen now with Atlanta. But Kimbrell is the all-time saves leader for the Braves and Jansen is the all-time saves leader for the Braves, and Jansen is the all-time saves leader for the Dodgers. And they were each facing the respective team that they are the all-time saves leader of, but they are no longer with that team. So Davin wanted to know, is there any precedent for this? Has there ever been a situation where both of the all-time saves leaders pitched against the team they held the record with and subsequently blew the safe. So not only is there no precedent for that, by Ryan's count, this is the only time in history that two all-time saves leaders faced their former teams in the same game, period.

Oh, wow. So, yeah. And as far as Ryan could tell, and I didn't see any examples of this, but it seems like no one noticed this or pointed this out. There were a lot of people noting that Kimbrel blew the save against the Braves and Jansen blew the save against the Dodgers. Right. But it doesn't seem to have been noticed. The fact that they appeared at all in this game together was unprecedented. So that's kind of cool, kind of a fun fact that that was the first time that that had happened. And some other somewhat

fun facts that Ryan noted, the player who has the most appearances against a former team as that team's all-time saves leader is Tug McGraw. He played for the Mets from 1965 to 1974 and pretty quickly became the saves leader for that franchise, which was young at the time. He then played for the Phillies for 10 years and was the Mets all-time leader for the entirety of that time. And he faced the Mets 59 times. And then he played for the Mets through 2004, the same year that Danny Graves passed him to take over the Reds record. But in the meantime, he faced the Reds 45 times. In all, a franchise leader in saves has faced that team 788 times. But two players have never done it in the same game until now. Who knew?

Wow, that's wild. All right. Step last number 10. Matt says Luis Urias just struck out twice in the same inning. This was June 15th, the top of the fifth. And he did so for the second and third outs. How often has one player been responsible for two outs in the same inning? And how often have those both been strikeouts?

And how often have those been for the last two outs of the inning? It seems like an incredible feat of failure. And I pass this on to Ryan and I said it's not that unusual for one player to make two outs in the same inning, but it did seem somewhat unusual to me for those to be the last two outs of the inning as opposed to, say, the first and third. You'd think that just given the way that batting orders work, that that would be more common. So Ryan says no one has ever come to the plate three times in the same inning and gotten all three outs. There have been players who have batted three times, but they haven't made all three outs. That hasn't happened yet. We can add that to the list of things that have not happened in a game that would be kind of cool to see.

Not cool for that player. There have been 4,442 times, I suppose, entering this season where a player has been up to bat two times and caused outs both of those times. 4,385 of those 4,442 times the player got one out in each plate appearance. Of those 4,442 times, the player got one out in each plate appearance. 57 of those times, the player was in some sense responsible for all three outs because one of the plate appearances was a double play. So that has happened almost 60 times. Of the 4,385 times that the player has made two outs and two plate appearances, 3,904 of them were the first and third outs, which is what I was suspecting. 247 times the player made the first and second outs, and 234 times the player made the second and third outs. So that is pretty uncommon. The most recent examples of a batter

getting the second and third out in an inning before this year. I'll just give you the last one. It was Tyrone Taylor last June 28th in the eighth inning. He did that. And actually, Raphael Devers and Tommy Edmund did it last year, too. But that has happened 70 times this century. So to recap, it is not that rare to make two outs in an inning. It is quite rare to be responsible for all three via a double play, and it is pretty rare to make consecutive multiple outs in an inning, either first and second or second and third. All right. And now I have gotten to the end of this.

I see that I'm not quite done. I'm almost done. I've got another one here. I'm just cleaning it out. I might as well. I'm just going for the completionist here. And Reddit user, Twitter legend, except this was on Reddit, our Effectively Wild subreddit, our slash Effectively Wild, noted one of the recent podcasts discussing all-time strikeout leaders and specifically Adam Dunn reminded me of something from when I was in high school. We were Reds fans in Cincinnati and we would discuss what we had dubbed the Adam Dunn cycle. The Adam Dunn cycle is pretty simple and is obviously composed of four distinct outcomes. Strikeout swinging, strikeout looking, walk and home run. Question is if there's a way to look this up and see if Adam Dunn is one of, if not the most prolific players to hit for this made up Adam Dunn cycle, or if it should actually be named after someone else. Are there any other players who have a unique style that could lend their names to another version of the cycle?

Chen reminded me that back on episode 1722 through 1725, we discussed some alternate cycles. So you could go back and check some of those out. But the Adam Dunn cycle specifically. Now, I guess this is not completely comprehensive because we probably don't have the distinction between looking and swinging strikeout for all of baseball history. Although it does go back a bit because we know that Babe Ruth had eight of them on record, at least. So this is confirmed Adam Dunn cycles. Adam Dunn had nine of them, and that is not nearly the most, actually. We have pitch-by-pitch data, at least completely going back to 1988. So I would guess that there is some bias toward recent years and also because there have just been more strikeouts. Sure.

I guess more of all the true outcomes in general. But the Adam Dunn cycle really should be the Jim Tomey cycle. Oh. So Jim Tomey did this 26 times. Wow. He had a swing strikeout, a looking strikeout, a walk, and a dinger in the same game. 26 times. No one else has had even half that many confirmed Adam Dunn cycles or Jim Tomey cycles, if we are renaming it here. So Curtis Granderson is second with 12. A-Rod had 11. Chris Davis, Mark McGuire, and Justin Upton have

10. And then Dunn is tied at 9 with Bonds, Sammy Sosa, Frank Thomas. And then at 8, you have Carl Speltron, Bobby Bonds, Jose Canseco, Carl Stalgato, Ryan Howard, Mike Trout, and

Babe Ruth, who may have had more in actuality. But yeah, we got to rename this. I think it's not the Adam Dunn cycle. It's the Jim Tomey cycle. Wow. Well, you learn something new every time you do 10-step lasts. 11, actually. 11.

Oh, no. Wait. Oh, no. Wait. Isn't it just 10? It was. I thought it was. I miscounted.

That was the 11th. OK. Okay. Yeah. Okay. That was one for every year that the podcast has been in operation, let's say. And one to grow on. Yeah. Well, no, I guess if we count every year that we have been podcasting, it's 11 years, I guess. This is the 10th anniversary, but this podcast has existed in 11 distinct years. I am horribly confused. That was a stat blast about how, if you count from 2012 to 2022, that's 11 different years. It's like how you're going into the next year when you have your birthday.

Right, exactly. But I will give you one last to grow on because I've got another. Oh my gosh, Ben, you're out of control. I know. It's from Clohinks on the Discord group, the Effectively Wild Patreon Discord group. So we're pulling these from all different social media. He said, what's the most consecutive no-hit innings by a single pitcher against a single team?

Oh. And Ryan reports that it is Neftali Feliz did not allow a hit in his first 19 and two-thirds innings against the Mariners. Wow. That's the record. Yeah. So he gave up no hits in one inning in 2009, no hits in five and two-thirds innings in 2010, no hits in nine and a third innings in 2011, and no hits in three and two-thirds innings in 2012. Then he finally allowed a hit in the fourth inning he pitched against the Mariners that year. So he went 19 and two thirds without allowing his first hit to the Mariners. And top

of the leaderboard, it's mostly relievers, but you got Dazzy Vance, second. He went 18 innings hitless against the Phillies. Billy Wagner, 17 and two thirds against the Pirates. Chris Bozzio against the Red Sox, 16 and two thirds innings. John Montefiusco, 16 and two-thirds against the Pirates. Chris Bozzio against the Red Sox, 16 and two-thirds innings. John Montefiusco, 16 and two-thirds against the Braves. And then Francisco Cordova with 16 and a third against the Astros. Wow. Now I am finally finished. My goodness.

Yeah. So that's a dozen stat blasts I guess I ended up giving you there. I think we have exhausted our stat blast material and possibly all of our listeners. Well, look, I mean, as we have highlighted several times on this podcast, both in terms of ourselves and the guests that we tend to have on, we are completists by nature. That's why we are the way we are. It's unsurprising. Yeah. Blasted some stats.

We sure did. All right. and that's just the beginning of this episode because now we will take a quick break and we'll be back with rich freaking hill on the podcast how about that how about that i was young on this mountain but now i am old mountain but now I am old and I know every hollow every cool swimming hole And I woke up to find That my childhood was over I went back down in the mine Well, we are joined now by a podcast favorite, the man, the myth, the mountain, a pitcher for the Red Sox who was once described by our friend Annie McCullough

on an episode of this podcast as the best pitcher I have ever seen. Rich Hill. Hello, Rich. Hey, guys. Thanks for having me on. Andy's seen and covered Clayton Kershaw. So for him to say you're the best he's ever seen, that's something. That's a nice compliment. Yeah, Andy's a great guy.

Yeah, I really enjoy talking with him as well. Yeah. So we have enjoyed talking with him as well. just going all the way back to the beginning, because I don't know when I first heard this, but I was fascinated to read that you were a natural right-hander and your brother John converted you into a lefty, forced you to be a lefty basically, because he thought it would help your chances of being a big leaguer. And that seems to have paid off. Although I guess we will never know the alternate history where that doesn't happen. Is there a scenario in your mind, do you ever think about this, where you're not known as maybe the more finesse-oriented lefty Rich Hill, but the power righty Rich Hill? You know, I got an opportunity to play with Pat Venditti, and obviously ambidextrous and, you know, great person, great player.

And I was always amazed by you know his ability to be able to face a righty righty on righty and then you know flip the glove over and face a lefty lefty on lefty so I yeah I never really I haven't I haven't put too much thought into it although every time you know I watch watch guys pitching and the velocity now is just creeping up and creeping up and right up and guys are throwing harder and harder. You know, I think if that's one thing that I would have loved to have had is, is a, you know, a big power fastball, but that's, you know, I have what I have and then, and I'm thankful for it, but yeah, that's, yeah, I don't, I don't put too much thought into it.

Yeah. Well, no need to, when you have a really long and successful career, I guess you don't have to worry about what would have happened. But if you try to throw righty now, is it like as awkward as a natural lefty trying to throw righty? Or does it still look semi-natural? No, no, it's awkward. Yeah, awkward, terrible, never worked on it. Yeah, yeah. So nothing, you know, it's funny.

Everything else that I do, if I kick a soccer ball or I shouldn't say hit a golf, I hit a golf ball left-handed or swing left-handed, but I right right-handed, you know, and kick, like I said, kick a football or a soccer ball. I kick it with my right foot. So, yeah. Which, which are you holding the phone with right now? My right. Okay. Right. That's pretty funny.

Yeah. So even, you know, eating, eating, I eat with my right, you know, fork in my right hand and right, right handed. So, yeah. Ben mentioned the longevity that you have had over the course of your career, which I imagine you might be sick of hearing about at this point. But I wonder if you can talk a little bit about how player development has shifted in your time in affiliated baseball, because you came in sort of at the very beginning of the sabermetric revolution and player development has gone through, you know, so many iterations since then. How have you seen that trend sort of change in your time in affiliated

ball? Yeah, I think when we look at, we talked specifically about the major leagues, you know, guys are coming up at a younger, it seems to me anyway, I know obviously getting older and everybody's still, you know, getting younger, but they're coming up at a younger age and having the opportunity in a lot of cases to develop at the major league level, which, you know, you would very rarely see from what I saw coming up when I was younger. You know, guys would have to prove, you know, and they still do. They have to prove that they're, you know, done with that level,

a double-A, A ball, or even triple-A, whatever it is. Like, you've accomplished everything that you, you know, hit, all the markers, fully qualified to move on to the next level. And that was basically how guys were judged or moved up to the next level based on performance and showing the capability of being able to, you know, from the pitcher's standpoint, command a fastball or, you know, be able to throw a secondary pitch consistently for strikes. And I think now a little bit, you know, guys are getting pushed through the system sometimes, you know, for many different reasons.

It could be for value, trade value, or just to get guys up there to get the sheer experience of being in the big leagues because they're part of a longer-term plan for the club. And they, you know, depending upon where the club is on that year, they want them to gain that experience for, you know, a year down the road or two years down the road when their club is ready to really fight for a championship but i think overall the analytics side of the game obviously has changed a lot the way we look at you know hitters and pitchers as well if we talk about you know exit velocity or just spin rate in general for pitchers or,

you know, vertical and horizontal movement on the ball and trying to see how the ability is there. But now in order to get the finish, that's, that's really the big, you know, test.

And that's why we can't just have the game be you know completely analytically based because we have to have coaches who can polish that player and have that player have the finish that is required at the major league level so whether that be pitching coach mental skills obviously a combination of both and then the experience from the coaching staff and or veteran players to help that player along in their journey to find consistency in their routine and find consistency to be successful at the major league level. And that's something that just doesn't happen overnight

and takes, you know, in some cases, many years to refine. And sometimes you, you know, you're continuously refining it. And I think that's what, you know, in my case, pushes me to stay relevant at the major league level and have success. I think that all of our listeners will be familiar with your story and how changing the utilization of your curveball really unlocked things once you came back from IndieBall. I wonder if you, as you look back on your career and some of the people and pitchers

who you came up with, if there are guys who you can think of who might've had very different careers if we had known now what, you know, if we had known then what we know now about pitching development and analytics, are there guys who you think might have had a successful career either because they had traits that we didn't know to value then or didn't know how to unlock? Yeah, no, absolutely. I think that, you know, with the ability to measure, you know, like I said, movement on a pitch, instead of just looking at straight velocity,

you can find the value of what that pitcher can potentially do at the major league level because of the ability to measure what they, you know, what we see on a radar gun. It doesn't tell even the full story as we know now, but that's what was basically the main tool back in pre-2012 or 2015. But yeah, I think that there were a lot of guys that, for whatever reason, got overlooked and didn't get the opportunity to get to the big leagues and had very successful careers in the minor leagues.

But for whatever reason, just never got the opportunity to prove it at the major league level. And then, of course, if some did, their leash to have failure was very short. did, their leash to have failure was very short. And again, at the end of the day, it comes down to the player because you have to continue to keep fighting and keep trying to find a way to make it work and be successful at the level that you're at, first of all, but then with that goal in mind of playing in the big leagues and playing at the highest level, you know, the, the failures and the ups and downs or the, you know, DSAs or whatever it is,

just really reinforces how badly you want to continue to pursue the goal of pitching at the major league level and being successful. But, you know, definitely guys were overlooked and fortunate with, you know, obviously the measurement tools that are in the game right now. But I don't think, you know, the other side of it, too, is being able to measure everything

doesn't necessarily mean it has to be measured. Sure. And I think, you know, we got to look at the game. And it's starting to come back towards the middle. I think next year we're going to see a little bit of a design change on the shifting that's been happening, I think, to open up the offense a little bit more in the game. And then also being able to strategically come back to the hit and run, you know, sacrifice bunts, you know, sack flies, playing the game almost the station to station game as opposed to, you know, home run derby.

That to me is a much more exciting game when guys are hitting doubles and triples as opposed to the occasional home run mixed in is great. But I think what we've seen over the last five years with the baseballs being much more jumpy than they've been, it's not as appealing, I think, as Major League Baseball thought it would be. So with all that, I think we're going to end up back somewhere in the middle. And I can see it slowly going that way. But yeah, back to the original question.

Definitely, guys, we're overlooked. And hopefully now, with the tools that we can measure, if a guy has a below-a average fastball, so to speak, on a radar gun, but has, you know, great vertical movement and is proving to have a lot of swing and miss in there, we now know why, as opposed to before. Right. It would always be, well, I don't think it's going to work at the next level. Well, I don't think it's going to be, you know, quite enough, you know, velocity on the fastball or, you know, that curveball. I don't think it's going to work at the next level. Well, I don't think it's going to be quite enough velocity on the fastball. Or that curveball, I don't know if that curveball. We never talked about mirroring pitches before.

But we would talk about maybe not using the term mirroring, but having them out of the same slot. Having your pitches come out of the same, Greg Maddux would describe it as like squares behind. If the hitter is looking at the pitcher, you have a whole sequence of squares behind you. And you can have your hand coming out of the same square with every pitch. The same thing as mirroring, but it was just kind of coined differently. So, yeah, but the measurement tools are great.

I think we need to look at it for what it is. But then also the other side of it is the performance-based mentality that comes into playing, which you can't necessarily measure, which is something I know, or at least I've heard teams are trying to figure out and put a number on the intent behind the player. Because you can't measure intent. You don't know what a person's intent is or what their level of want when they're in certain situations or during the game or the course of the season. So I think that's the next big step. If clubs can measure that, I think it's going to really change the way we look at players. So you've been talking about this total revolution that has happened in pitch design and just the amount of information that is available about pitching and just the resulting increase in stuff. And I think maybe the average velocity is up about three miles per hour since you first entered the

league. So how is it possible that all of that has gone on, everything has changed, the stuff has really ramped up, and yet you are the constant. You were there in 2005, you're here in 2022, and you're still pitching effectively. I know you've undergone various evolutions and adjustments over the years, going from the bullpen to the rotation and back and changing your arm angle and changing your pitch mix and all of that. How do you keep up with everything? Well, I think the other thing is just like, you know, pitching and real estate, it's all about location, right? So it's not so much about stuff. I think stuff, yes, you do need a certain level of stuff, although it will diminish as you continue to get older. However, being able to understand the pitching aspect of pitching is not, you know, about throwing. And that's one thing that I've been able to

develop as I've gotten older is the understanding of pitching as a whole, being able to read swing, being able to see you know what a hitter is doing before they get into the box or you know the behaviors of kind of controlling the ebb and flow of the game so there's all these other things that are going on even before you throw a pitch but then when you're executing a pitch it is still about location so all velocity does is help you make more mistakes and get away with them. And that's, you know, it's obviously an unbelievable tool to have. But with that tool, how can you take your velocity and learn how to pitch with that? Because now,

you know, as we've seen over the last decade and a half where you have guys like Scherzer, Kershaw, Verlander, these guys have and do have elite stuff, but they also really understand pitching, which is, you know, something that I think for me, that's what's kept me around. And I think also the willingness to just be creative and, and be okay with failing and understanding that, you know, the number one thing is when you get out there, it's about your effort. It's not about anything else, how you feel that day or what you've done or, you know, how you prepared. But going out there and stepping on the gas, so to speak, and not letting off until your final pitch is thrown. So it's really the mentality side of pitching is so great. And I think the mentality side of any sport is it's very difficult to measure again, right?

Because as I said before, it's like we're trying to measure intent and how do you measure somebody's intent? And I think that's one thing that has kept me around and just the passion and the intensity. I talk about it all the time, but making that decision and that choice to flip a switch as opposed to focusing in on the results and just focusing on the moment. And the pitch at hand has done wonders for my career. I was going back and looking at some early scouting reports on you from the Baseball America Handbook 2004.

You were rated the 27th best prospect in the Chicago Cubs system. I think you surpassed expectations. But it says, while he has no trouble missing bats, he has problems missing the strike zone. He has given up nearly as many walks as hits since turning pro, and his control was off so much last year that he had to be demoted from low Class A at age 23. He's going to have to throw a lot more strikes to have a chance at being even a big league reliever. The Cubs think his control is more mental than physical. Hill's pitches move so much that he gets himself in trouble by trying to paint the corners rather than challenging hitters. So is that what you were saying there, that you had to learn how to handle your stuff?

Or was it more of an approach issue? Is it true that it was more mental than physical? I mean, I definitely think that that would be a correct statement. I would not shy away from that because I think, you know, part of it is the understanding of, you know, do I belong? What, you know, how, what am I? I didn't even realize, you know, or have any understanding of what kind of pitcher I was or, you know, anything about attacking hitters or having a game plan.

It was just kind of, you know, floating, not floating, but like trying to figure it out as, as, you know, in a young career and being younger, so to speak, but really not obviously younger when you had called up the big leagues at 25, I would say things kind of rapidly moved quickly after, after that 2004 season. But I did a lot of homework and a lot of mental conditioning that 2005 or 2004 offseason and came into camp throwing the ball well and felt great and just

tried to carry it over into that 2005 season. But it was just such a young mindset as opposed to the mindset of somebody who's had the experience and understands how to orchestrate a game, which I saw from other players that I was fortunate enough to play with in a Maddox or in London Rush, Kerry Wood, Ryan Dempster, all these guys that the passion and the intensity of a Carlos Zambrano. So all those examples that I got to see coming up as a Chicago Cub definitely helped me along the way at some point. But again, at the end of the day, it's up to, up to you as the pitcher, as the individual,

as the athlete to do the work. So, yeah. So I think, you know, the one thing about with the command and being able to, you know, kind of rein that in had a lot to do with strength. So that's a whole other aspect of this topic, I guess, for myself would be, you know, understanding how to put my body together, have a really sound shoulder program. And all that led into, you led into confidence and conviction on being able to command the baseball. And that was something that only going through those ups and downs of having command issues, the strength part of it really got me back into the zone. And I was able to command my pitches a lot better because of that.

So one of the sort of famous stopovers for you in your career was your time with the Long Island Ducks. I know that as Indie Ball teams go, they tended to attract more established big leaguers like yourself who had had some big league run. But I'm curious what you think of Indie Ball as a development environment, especially now that Major League Baseball is using Indie Leagues as partner leagues to try to offload some of their development work with the contraction of the minors? Yeah, I mean, I don't think that, you know, one thing that's disappointing is that retracting these teams, you know, ultimately is cutting down the opportunities for kids

to get the opportunity to play in the big leagues and also professional baseball. So I don't like the fact that, you know, minor league teams were cut because really you're trying to promote the game. And by cutting minor league teams, you're really doing the opposite. I understand that these are other, you know, organizational or not organizational, but clubs that are picked up by major league baseball and some kind of, you know, fantasy league, you know, in my opinion, I just think that you're, you're missing, you're missing the opportunity to grow the game. And, you know, the game wants to be grown in the inner cities and you're going to tell kids that, Hey, you have an opportunity to play major league baseball, but yet we're going to cut the draft

and we're going to cut minor league teams. It doesn't make sense to me. So I really think that, and again, the other side of it too is that when we look at minor league teams and you look at the draft and you look at college, it just continues to get smaller and smaller up to the peak of even making it to one day in the big leagues. The guys that love the game and are playing the game have an opportunity to go to major league camp, learn from Hall of Famers, learn from All-Stars, learn from great coaches.

And now those opportunities are going to be missed. And when they're not getting those opportunities and you're not being able to absorb the knowledge, you can't bring that back to your hometown. You can't teach the kids the right way to play the game, or at least you're missing the mark, I believe, on the opportunity to be able to have that development from a guy that might've been drafted in the 25th round, loves the game. Yeah, they have an opportunity to make it to the big leagues, but if they don't, the amount of knowledge that they've gained through spring trainings and having really, really elite coaching

at the professional level, again, is going to be missed. And I think that's one thing that doesn't sit well with me because we're here trying to, we want to grow the game of baseball. We want to make it more accessible for everybody. And the final point I'll make is that, you know, when you have, you know, guys that again, like get drafted later or, or even get drafted early, but you know, for whatever reason, it doesn't pan out. They end up becoming great coaches. They end up becoming, you know know great front office people yeah and I mean it's me that that you know is going backwards but for the opportunity to guys

again to have independent ball and to be able to continue on to see that dream fulfilled or the opportunity that you want to make of playing an independent ball is it's great that it's there. And, um, you know, it really is a lot of fun if, you know, people can get out to a game that there's a, if there's an independent, you know, club near you, well, you know, especially with I enjoyed my time with the long Island ducks and, you know, guys are really, you know, I'm not saying guys at the major league level. Of course, everybody's passionate about playing the game, but basically playing the game for free in independent ball

and it comes out and guys, you can see it in the way that they play and have fun playing the game. One team that I get a kick out of is the Savannah Bananas. I think we all do. Everybody at the major league level is like, wow, that looks like that would be fun to play with those guys. Yeah. So that 2015 season when you were with the Ducks and you were also in AAA in Syracuse and then Pawtucket, and then you came up at the end of the season in Boston and you just shocked everyone. And that's really when you came up on this podcast very frequently because we had a listener email us just after your first couple incredible starts for the Red Sox, just saying

like, hey, Rich Hill's about to be a free agent. What kind of contract would you give Rich Hill right now, just based on how incredibly good he has been in this two, three, four starts it was. And I wonder whether you were thinking the same thing, whether you were surprising yourself. I mean, you had been bouncing back and forth between the big leagues and the minors. You'd been mostly in the bullpen. And then here you come out and you go from indie ball

to being just one of the best pitchers in baseball at the end of that season. And it really just transformed your career and your life, I'd imagine, because I don't think we have the data to calculate this for all time. But if we could figure out just like the highest fraction of career earnings made after age 35, you would probably be up there. So I wonder just like how that has changed your life to have that big breakthrough come fairly late in what was already a long career at that point. Well, I think, you know, for anyone who's listening or out there and is playing, it's just don't give up on, you know, yourself. First of all, if you believe that, you know, there is an opportunity there and we can always say like, well, it's easy for you to say, you know, hindsight's 20, 20, whatever, but you know,

going through it and, and working through it and understanding what survival is and how badly you want to continue to, you know, break those walls down that are going to continuously be put up is up to you as an individual, you know, don't point fingers and don't say, you know, I'm not where i should be because of this person or that person it's it's really looking at yourself in the mirror and understanding how can i become the best player that i can be and you know a lot of it for me and

i'll go back to it is the mentality side of the game and understanding that you know going to independent ball and then being able to see that hey i got nothing to lose i'm going to independent ball and then being able to see that, hey, I got nothing to lose. I'm going to go out and make the most of it. And I'm not saying that I didn't do that when I was younger or, you know, but I didn't have the understanding. I didn't have the understanding of, you know, what that really took without the experience. It's just like telling somebody or giving somebody advice that isn't seeking advice. took without the experience. It's just like telling somebody or giving somebody advice that isn't seeking advice. Their ears aren't open and you're telling them and trying to give them advice. They're not receiving it because they're not asking and not seeking it. So a lot of this stuff

is just being able to understand the process of being in the moment and understanding truly what it means to be in the moment. And you don't start looking at results or outcomes or looking back on outings. You're just looking in the moment, not even forward. You're not looking to the next day. You're just looking at what you're doing in that period of time. And then I know a lot of people talk about it, but it is very true. It's just the concept of time and understanding that we have very little of it you want to make the most of it while we're doing it so you know what do we have to lose when you actually think about that especially playing the game of baseball it's just that's that's what makes it fun and that's what I think was able to really you know unlock a lot of this ability that has always been in there uh however it's just you

know the act of attrition and and being able to be creative by going into the bullpen and understanding that when i did drop down i still had something to give and i knew that it was good and wanted to make the most of it and from there know, continue to find opportunities and made phone calls, talked to, you know, in that 2015 summer, I just called everybody in my phone that I had, you know, relationships or played with in the game that had any kind of connections or contacts to front offices. And that advice came from Ryan Dempster who, you know, he goes, I know this is going to sound crazy, but you're at an age now that people are going to be questioning whether you really want to continue to play. I thought it was crazy because I was like, of course I want to play. I just don't understand why nobody else will, you know,

understands that I want to continue to keep playing. So that was, that was a really, really great piece of advice, you know, just to say, Hey, make as many phone calls as you can. So I started calling everybody. Michael Barrett, who obviously caught me in Chicago. Mark Pryor, who was with San Diego at the time. London Rush. A lot of the guys that I played with in Chicago

because they were guys that had finished their playing career and are now still in baseball and obviously are influential figures for clubs. So yeah, I think that's the 2015 kind of carryover of being able to understand how the ball was coming out of my hand and being able to backspin the ball the way that I wanted to and end up having that fearless mentality that it took to be successful at the major league level. Yeah. Well, I did want to ask one question about your mentality

because we are talking to you on a day before you are scheduled to start. And from what I understand, if we were talking to you on that day, you would be a very different person and you probably wouldn't want to talk to us on that day because you're known as a laid-back, easygoing guy most of the time, but not when you're in the game. You're an extremely intense competitor. And so you talked about teams trying to measure personality and all of that. I mean, you would get a very different reading on non-start days for you than start days. So I wonder like how that sets in. I mean, will you wake up the next day and you'll just feel that coming on?

Is it like a Hulk-like transformation when you get out there or is it gradual? No, I think, you know, and this is the other part of, you know, the work that goes into being able to, in any sport or business or anything that you're doing that you're preparing to you know let's say go give a speech or whatever it might be the ability to take it from you know the preparation from uh let's say it just starts you know you mentioned like in the morning and then it carries on through the day and then you're trying to get to the start. Let's just use seven o'clock as a start time as opposed to making, you know, but that is in the beginning,

how it starts out for me anyway, as a beginner is kind of mindset. And then the closer you get, uh, throughout or the more experience you gain, the smaller that window becomes to be able to have that light switch mentality. So kind of like being in the mindset of being able to, you know,

be ready to turn it on or, you know, be pleasant and cordial at the same time. But you have that mentality to be able to like, hey, I have it. If I need it right now, I don't need to go through a certain protein shake or something to eat. Or did I get enough sleep? Did I stretch? Did I do all this? There's a lot of that. Yes, I'm not saying it's not necessary.

It's not treating your body the way they should, preparing, and all that stuff feeds into it. Simply, when it comes down to the bare bones of it, it's that you should be able to have that mindset. If somebody calls you, you know, in the middle of December and says, Hey, you got to pitch a game tomorrow. Mentally, you can go to that spot and say, okay, I'll see you tomorrow. I'll be ready. Thanks. No, there's not, you know, Oh, well, I don't have this. I don't have that. I can't get a massage. I can't, you know, and, and, and going to independent

ball that that that's one thing that it taught me is that you need to be able to be ready with your glove and your cleats and that's it so you know any of the modalities or you know equipment that we it's just trying not to become someone who relies on a lot of these things that could become pacifiers as opposed to understanding the intensity and the aggressiveness is what you need to go out there to perform along with the mindset of being in the moment and you know because everybody has the ability and the ability is there for everyone it's what's going to be the separator and you know honestly i feel like that's that's one thing so for me no i don't i don't wake up and you know rip open the curtains and

start yelling yeah so much it's a very uh very shortened uh window on the day now when i when i start so it doesn't uh it's not really this big anticipation or buildup. And plus the other thing is thinking about something that hasn't happened yet is really just wasting energy. So as opposed to, you know, being able to understand that, you know, whatever you're feeling before a game, whatever anxieties you're feeling or whatever, you know, if you don't feel good, you feel good or you feel too good. you know if you don't feel good you feel good or you feel too good it's all it a lot of that stuff is is it all melts away when you summons up that aggressive

mentality and you know obviously not to there is uh i'm not going to disregard the work because that is very very important and that is a huge part of the preparation to get ready to go out there and perform you know every five days or every day or whatever your position might be. But at the bare bones of everything and when you strip everything down, it is, you know, the mentality and the effort. Well, last question for you. You know, you've had various injuries over the years, as has any pitcher who's been around long enough. But it seems like your nemesis, at least for a while there, was the blister. And I almost hesitate to bring it up.

I don't want to jinx anything. But it seems like you have hopefully conquered that, that that is behind you. And I know you've been able to help out some other pitchers like Walker Buehler when they have developed that issue. And I know you tried everything up to and including the urination method. So tell me and anyone else who's out there who has had blister issues, what finally fixed them for you? What is the Rich Hill remedy for blisters? Well, I think one of the things is being able to monitor your throwing,

especially in humid conditions, you know, if it's a day that you're starting. You know, what I mean by that is that if you feel something coming on, you know, it's better to jump out of it and catch it before it actually gets worse because, you know, you can cool down the layers of the skin and be able to obviously promote the healing earlier as opposed to trying to pitch through it and then having it break open. And then, you know, now you're in a real bad situation tough situation but you know overall we have one of the modalities that helped out a lot for me is is using uh a laser laser treatment and i think all 30 clubs have it and a lot of i'm assuming but i'm sure a lot of colleges have this

you know laser therapy that actually promotes healing after you know wound is kind of incurred right so if you cut yourself or your slide into you know a base and you get a huge raspberry or on your knee or whatever on your hip you can kind of promote the healing and it just promotes more blood flow to the area so that that's that's really what helped me out a lot and then also like i said before is just the consistency of playing catch and the consistency of kind of keeping it callous over the course of a season has really been beneficial for me. Yeah. Lasers sounds slightly more scientific than the urination method. I don't want to discount the remedies, but... No, yeah. Or pickle juice. Something just to keep it kind of dry but really

to promote healing and it is tough during the season because it's like hey i don't have you know three weeks to be able to let this thing completely heal i have to get back and i have to pitch so i think one other thing that is is beneficial is just you know being able to put a sleeve or something over your finger and continue the throwing process. So you don't have to shut down because if you shut down now, all of a sudden, every day that you miss, it's the day that you have to make up to get back and be on top of your game. So those are, you know, a couple of things that definitely are extremely beneficial, whether you use some kind of like flex tape, uh, around your finger, just to cover it up and

make sure that you're not, you know, beating it up anymore. But at the same time, you're keeping your arm going. Yeah. Well, we wish you well with that and with everything else. It has been such a pleasure to follow and discuss your career. And I know that a lot of our listeners will be happy to hear you here. We figured out at some point that you had signed with the Red Sox as a free agent seven different times. I know you've had four separate stints with the team, but you've signed as a free agent with them seven times, which I believe is the most any player has ever signed as a free agent with one team. So it's been nice to monitor that on again, off again relationship too, and see it be on again at this stage of your career. Yeah, they've been incredible to myself, my caitlin and and our son bryce and and for uh our late son brooks where

you know they were just tremendous as an organization and and completely supportive and just you know overall first class organization through all the regimes that have been here the one constant has been you know, the support of the players. And I, you know, obviously have been around a lot of organizations and I can attest to it. So I'm grateful that, you know, Boston has, one, it's in our backyard, and two, have been extremely generous and inviting for myself and my family.

So it's been great. Yeah. I mean, you've seen it all. You've been with, what, 11 teams at the big league level and more than that at the minor league level, I'm sure, and eight different uniform numbers. It's just a long and interesting career. And you have a lot of fans out there, I think, just maybe partially people who are maybe in their late 30s, early 40s and

look to you as a hero as long as you're out there. They don't feel old because they could still, in theory, be a big leaguer. Yeah, never give up. You can't give up. You can't quit. There's always something else you can do. So keep pushing. I've talked to a lot of guys that have continued to stay in the game and ask me what I've done and why and whatever, all the questions. And I'm happy to answer them for everybody. But the one thing that I always say is that if the ability is still there, don't put the glove down. Yeah, that makes sense. And you've become kind of a meme.

We have a Facebook group for our podcast. And when people put polls in there, every poll gets sabotaged because someone will write in Rich Hill as a response and then everyone will vote for Rich Hill and it just derails the poll results. So you've become a meme whether you knew it or not. And your former teammate, Williams Estadillo, is also sort of a podcast favorite. And so when you pitched to him in Minnesota, that just broke everyone's brain. Oh, I loved it. Some of the most fun I've had on the mound was pitching to Sadio.

What a treat. He's an awesome player and loves the game. And just being out there made it feel like we were like we were in the, in the, you know, Sandlot playing, playing baseball again. Well, thanks so much for your time. This has been a great conversation and we wish you well the rest of the season and the rest of your career, which we hope will last forever, frankly, and that it'll be you and Tom Brady out there pushing the limits.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, well, thank you guys for having me on. I really appreciate it and anytime anytime all right thank you rich all right all right i'll talk to you goodbye all right let's take one more break and i'll be back to wrap things up with a past blast and a few closing thoughts How long to hear The only place Our love so dear

Feel the wind On the mountaintop How can I stop How can I stop All How can I stop? All right. Well, I hope you enjoyed that dozen stat blast salute, followed by an audience with the one and only Rich Hill. But before we end this anniversary week,

and I treat myself to some Friday night two-way otani, we have to conclude with the past blast. This is episode 1880, and so we are journeying back to 1880, which is before even Rich Hill debuted. Sorry, Rich. As always, our past blast comes from Richard Hirschberger, historian, saber researcher, and author of Strike Four, The Evolution of Baseball. And he brings us back to June 12th, 1880, Cleveland at Worcester, another quaint former National League club. Worcester wins

one to nothing in baseball's first perfect game. Back in episode 1878, we saw an ambiguous possible unassisted triple play. The 1880 accomplishment is gratifyingly unambiguous. Worcester pitcher Lee Richmond had thrown a no-hitter less than two weeks earlier. Here he tops that. As reported in the Worcester Daily Spy of June 14th, in Saturday's game, but 27 of the Clevelands went to bat, and but two fair balls were knocked out of the reach of the infielders, one of which fell into Corey's hands, and the other, a sharp ground hit to right field, was sent to first by Knight in time to cut the runner off. Richmond was most effectively supported, every position on the home nine being played to perfection. So that account didn't call it a perfect game, it sounds like. That wasn't a

thing yet, but it was played to perfection. So I suppose the name suggested itself. The New York Clipper of June 19th writes of the end of the game, Hanlon came up looking determined, hitting the first ball pitch to Irwin, who threw him out beautifully at first, ending the game amidst loud cheering by the assemblage, as it had fallen to their lot to witness the greatest game of the season. Richmond was unable to get off the field for a few moments owing to the crowd that surrounded him and showered congratulations on him. Richard writes, here in 1880, pitching had progressed to the point where it could dominate hitting. Sound familiar? Ten years earlier, a game like this would have been unimaginable. Pitchers by 1880 had curveballs in their arsenal, and while the

delivery was not quite full overhand, neither was it full underhand anymore. Dominant pitching was not universally welcomed. How low could scoring go? This one-nothing game was impressive, but also worrying. Most rule changes into the 1890s were aimed at increasing offense. On the other hand, a game like this was quick, coming in at under an hour and a half. And I will note that the next season, they moved back the minimum pitching distance, I believe from 45 feet to 50 feet. It was not a mound yet. It was just a pitcher's box. And they changed where the front line of it was.

Richard says that was not in direct response to this perfect game or the one later in the season that John Montgomery Ward threw, but to the general decrease in offense. There also was a trend over the next decade of gradually reducing the number of balls for a walk. Of course, 1884 was the first season in which pitchers were allowed to throw overhand, though they had been testing that prior to that point. And 1893 was when we moved to the current pitching distance. That was a long time ago. But almost from the start, baseball has been a pitcher-batter battle.

Initially, it was more of a pitcher-batter battle. Initially, it was more of a batter-fielder battle because the ball was supposed to be put in play, but it didn't take long for it to evolve to more of a confrontation between the moundsman and the batsman or the batter. And that's where we are today. The battle keeps raging. One side takes the lead. Typically, the pitchers, rules change, hitters catch up, and then we repeat the whole cycle again. And of course, we repeat the cycle of thisters catch up, and then we repeat the whole cycle again. And, of course, we repeat the cycle of this podcast every week, and we are happy to do so. I noticed on Thursday that the San Francisco Giants had signed Trevor Rosenthal to a one-year $4.5 million contract. He's been absent from the majors for a while.

He's had a whole lot of injuries, but he's back or about to be, it seems like. And I think that is fitting because Trevor Rosenthal is one of two major league players to debut in the big leagues on the same day that this podcast debuted, July 18th, 2012. Pedro Hernandez debuted that day for the White Sox. He has not lasted as long. He posted a career ERA over seven and just a little more than 60 innings pitch and has not been in the big leagues since 2014. But Trevor Rosenthal keeps on trucking and he's making a fresh start for himself, which is inspiring, I think. There is that Bill Walsh, Theo Epstein saying about how coaches and executives should change after 10 years with the same team. They should go somewhere else.

Epstein cited that when he left the Cubs. The idea is that both the person and the organization benefit from a change after they've spent a decade together. Well, we are, I suppose, ignoring that advice and we're not going to call it quits after 10 years. We're going to be back next week and we will keep rolling. But we have had plenty of change. The show itself has changed, the co-hosts have changed, the formats have changed, and some of the listeners have changed, although some have been with us from the start. So I hope we are bringing you the benefit of experience and also managing to keep things fresh. And I can't thank all of you enough for listening to the show, supporting the show. I hope you enjoyed this week's episodes. You've all made this a very rewarding decade for us

folks here at Effectively Wild. So I will say for myself and on behalf of Sam and Jeff and Meg and Dylan, thank you very, very much. And thanks to those of you especially who support us on Patreon and make it feasible for us to keep going. We would not have made it this far without you. You can support the podcast on Patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectivelywild. I see a good number of you have signed up this week, perhaps in honor of our anniversary, and I thank you for that. the following five listeners are among them. They have gone to patreon.com slash effectivelywild, signed up, pledged some monthly or yearly amount to help keep the podcast going, help us stay ad-free aside from our StatHead sponsorship, and get themselves access to some perks. Crust Young, Perry Vargas, Larry Hawley, Liam, and my friend and ringer colleague, Zach Cram, who just got married.

So congrats to Zach our Patreon supporters get access to the Effectively Wild Discord group now more than 700 members in there chatting baseball all day they also get access to monthly bonus episodes one of which will likely be coming along next week as well as discounts on t-shirts

don't forget to go get our 10th anniversary shirt that became available this week and play off live streams later in the year. You can contact me and Meg via email at podcastwithfangraphs.com or via the Patreon messaging system if you are a supporter. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group slash effectively wild. You can rate, review and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and Spotify and other podcast platforms. You can follow Effectively Wild on Twitter at EWpod. And you can find the Effectively Wild on Twitter at EWPod and you can find

the Effectively Wild subreddit at r slash Effectively Wild. Thanks to Dylan Higgins for his editing and production assistance and his appearance on the podcast this week. We hope you have

a wonderful weekend and that you'll join us for the beginning of the next 10 years next week. The power in the naming The story is the telling Potential in the naming The story is the telling Potential in the waiting

Movement is deciding Forward is the doing Keep going.