Rates & Barrels - Elly's Pursuit of 100 Steals, Bat Tracking in Scouting Reports & Choose Your Fighter, SP Edition

Episode Date: May 17, 2024

Eno, Trevor and DVR discuss Elly De La Cruz's bid for 100-steal season, how bat tracking info could be used to supplement scouting reports and game plans against hitters, and their choices from a group of a dozen starting pitchers in an effort to project the next few seasons. Rundown 1:06 Keeping a Good Receipt (Don't Worry, We Keep The Bad Ones Too) 2:10 Elly De La Cruz's Bid for a 100-Steal Season 8:25 How Many Stolen Bases Would Rickey Henderson Rack Up with Today's Rules 10:49 Building Scouting Reports From Bat Tracking Info 17:31 How Interested Would Players Be In Utilizing This Angle? 30:45 Choose Your Fighters: Two Starting Pitchers From This Dozen, Next Three-Plus Seasons 50:28 Does Trevor Buy Eno's Plan to Make Ben Brown a Closer in 2024? 55:10 How Much Information Does a Typical Player Consume? 1:01:07 Trevor's Wiffle Ball Update Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow Trevor on Twitter: @IamTrevorMay Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Join us on Fridays at 1p ET/10a PT for our livestream episodes! Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels, it is Friday, May 17th, it's a live one, Derek VanRyde, BarinoSaris, Trevor May all here with you on this episode. We will discuss Ellie De La Cruz. He is making a run at a 100 stolen base season. Helps when you can get four in a game like he did on Thursday nights. We'll talk a little bit about Ellie's pursuit of a number that I don't know we ever thought we'd see again as a stolen base total. We're going to dig into the bat tracking leaderboards

and talk about how we could use those from a game planning perspective, from the pitching perspective. So we'll dig into those some more. And we've got a new segment today where we choose our fighters from a large group of players. So looking forward to unleashing that because we have to try and live up to the bar you set

last week, the two of you Called a Cody Bellinger Homer off of Jared Jones. I mean the situation the pitch Unbelievable, how are we going to top that like Trevor? How many home runs have you predicted like that? I can't really think of any maybe I've done it a couple times. Oh, no, I predicted Brent Rooker's 30th homer last year, which was awesome because it's like his last day be of the year like that way like with the Scouting report I don't think I don't think I can I remember of time. So it's first time you know you I predicted a non no-hitter fast

I think the universe man bouncing out for that Yamamoto call. I'm surprised. I'm surprised the universe wasn't still mad about what you did to Yoshinobu Yamamoto last week. But let's start with Ellie De La Cruz. Four steal game against the Dodgers on Thursday. Went for five. He actually got caught by Austin Barnes the last time, which I think I would have been

just going nuts as I was falling asleep if I'd actually seen that happen too. But a lot has to happen for him to stay on the pace he's on right now. He's on pace for 110 steals this season. He's got to continue to get on base as much as he is and he's got to stay healthy, of course. So pacing it out from the middle of May is always a challenge. But the great Sarah Lang's had this stat on Twitter last night. The only other players with 30 or more steals in their teams first 44 games since 1901.

Kenny Lofton in 1996, Ricky Henderson in 1988, Ricky Henderson in 1986 and 1982, Vince Coleman snuck in there in 1987, Tim Rains in 1981, and Lou Brock in 1974. The first part of this is, are you buying Ellie getting to 100 this year, given what he is showing through the first 44 games this season? I think so. We talked to him before a game against the Giants, and somebody asked him what his favorite tool was.

They were like, you're a five tool guy, what's your favorite tool that you've got in the toolbox? And he said his speed. And he said he's always been the fastest kid and that he just enjoys running. So one of the things that we know about steals is it's partially just an attitude. It's a choice. There are people with 60 percentile sprint speeds that steal 20 and 30 bags. And there's people with 90th percentile sprint speed that don't steal any bags.

Yeah, we know where he sits on that on that grouping. And I think it seems like a personal goal. I think 100 seems like a personal goal. It seems like he's just out there. He's going to do that. I hope this inspires more players to go for that level. I mean, we saw Cunha get up to 70 last year and that was a big deal because we hadn't seen that in so long. But yeah, Trevor, I mean, is this going to become more of a thing?

I think so. I think over here we have Ricky Henderson's totals of years or of some of the years he had. And the way that Ricky got it was he just decided he was going to. The thing with Ellie is he's gonna run, like he's gonna have enough attempts to do it. Like he's gonna continue to tempt them until he gets it. I'm getting that vibe. Ricky had that vibe.

You know, he stole 130, but he ran 172 times once Ricky did. That's a 40, caught 42 times. That's a lot. That would dissuade pretty much everyone else. Everyone but Ricky Henderson. And Ellie's got that like the same tone of voice. Like I'm gonna just run around. If it takes me 200 attempts to get a hundred, I'm just gonna get a hundred.

And I don't know if that's necessarily the best thing in the world. It depends is it'll be, you know, you know, if he's stealing second and stealing third, the first pitch, cause he's having fun with it You'll see some savvier veteran guys like pitchers just like act like they're not paying attention to him and mixing some crazy stuff Especially because of you know, the pickoff limit now and all this stuff like you can so they'll get creative with it There will be times where he probably you know hangs himself himself out to dry in some situations.

Already has happened a few times. Yeah, it's just the way it is. It's going to happen. But yeah, I think it's Andre. He's now set his mind on it. So it's just inevitable at this point. It's not all like super egotistical. I don't think, I mean, it's just sort of, I don't know, I want to like caution against that sounding that way because that team is actually not that good offensively away from home.

Some of the park stuff makes it look like a really good offense, but if you look at their away offense, their 19th, they're slashing 224, 296, 367 away from home. So I think in that case, you, as a team, you say, okay, yeah, Ellie, please run. Please get to second and third because we're not likely to string a ton of hits together on the road. Maybe that changes when Christian Aracanacio and Strand gets healthy and Noel DiMarte gets healthy. But right now, if I was running this team, I'd say, yeah, this probably is good for our team. Yeah, the Reds slugging 363 as a team on May 17th is definitely not something I expected. I mean, Home Park, sure, it boosts the homers, but they've been weirdly

underperforming all season. They have had a few injuries, but I wonder if it's a cold weather start to the season too, being in the Midwest, maybe that's a little bit of it. I'd be surprised if they were still struggling to score runs to this extent later in the year. They will get Noel V. Marte back from suspension in late June. And what happens if you have better hitters in the box

when Ellie's out there? How much do you put the red line on? I don't know, I think he's still getting a lot of greens though, look at Acuna. I would have wondered the same thing about Acuna last year. It's like, okay, the limit's probably 40 back because they got great hitters behind them. But yeah, they just let him do it. I would have wondered the same thing about Acuna last year. It's like, okay, the limit's probably 40-bet. That's right, the Brazers scored on these two bases. Yeah, they just let him do it.

So I think he's got a legit shot at 100. And some of these Ricky Henderson seasons are just absurd. Trevor mentioned the one, the 130 for 172. For his career, Ricky was 80.7% successful. So he ran as much as he should by that career success rate. I'm sure there were years where it wasn't a good idea. Yeah, it fluctuated. But yeah, they were telling a story in the Dodgers booth last night. There was a guy in the booth with the, was saying that he was holding Ricky on first

base and he thought Ricky was talking to him, but Ricky was talking to himself. And Ricky just said something like, Ricky gone. And he just took off. Not a lot of guys like that in the league right now. There's so many good Ricky stories. He's a character. When he saw John Olrude with the helmet on out of first base, he said, you know, I used to play with someone who had a helmet on. And John Olrude goes, yeah, that was me.

Man, unfazed. I guarantee you he was unfazed by that. He's like, oh yeah. And then just like, just continued with his day. Like it was nothing. No sorry about that man or anything. He's like, oh yeah, you're fine. The embarrassment for that would have probably shut me down

for the day. Not Ricky. Not Ricky. Didn't even matter. The question I was kicking around last night is how many bases would Ricky steal with today's rules? I mean, yes, the environment was different than stolen bases were just something teams

were more aggressive about, but there was less power in the game. But think about the pizza boxes. Think about just everything being different. Yeah, catchers are better, pitchers are better too. But let's just port over the baseline skills. Let's just say Ricky's on base as often as he was in his career.

Let's say he's a 401 OBP guy in today's game because he had power. 414 and 83, 420 and 80. What kind of stolen base numbers would he put up today? Would he steal even more bases in today's game than he did back when he played? I don't think the new rules would like have made him run more.

I don't know how much more he could have run. Does that make sense? Yeah, he took advantage of every chance. He ran every single time. Every chance he's on first or second of the runner, he could go. At some point, you're gonna run into the maximum number of times. Yeah, he took advantage of every chance. Every grand every single time. Every chance he's on first or second runner, he could go. At some point, you're gonna run into the maximum number of times.

Yeah, that's maybe true. We'd have to look at, there's probably some stats there on like how many percentage of opportunities. But the one thing that I'm thinking about just in terms of like, kind of like his style and how he was like, like the Ricky Gonn things, like think about the throw over rule and Ricky. I just feel like he would he would love that one where he'd be like, Oh, I got you into two.

Now I'm actually halfway to second phase before you even threw the pitch. The antics would be great. He'd be like counting them. Like he would be doing stuff. Yeah, it'd be like it'd be like WWE. I did know that last year, one of the big stats going out, I don't know if it was like July or maybe, yeah, maybe July, July, the whole league success rate was what Ricky's was for his career. And so that if that puts into perspective, I mean, he might have had 85 90%. I just don't think he would ever got caught. I think that's what would have happened. Like his percentage probably would have went up. Stephen Jizzle. That was his argument in the live hive. he would ever got caught. I think that's what would have happened. Like his percentage probably would have went up. Steven Gesull, that was his argument in the live hive.

He would have been caught less. I think so. I think the way the game is played now with the tweaks that have been made, the success rate would have been. You might be able to estimate it just by looking at what the league success rate is right now versus what it was then.

And look at his success rate over expectation and just like, you know, add that. Extrapolate it. I love it. A lot of love for Trevor's hat today in the live hive as well. success rate over expectation and just like, you know, add that. Strap away to this. I love it. A lot of love for Trevor's hat today in the live hive as well. It is a good hat. Let's get to our next topic. We've got the bat tracking tools. We talked about a little bit earlier in the week. We talked about it just purely from the hitting perspective because, you know,

bat tracking hitters are doing it. So that's where it's coming from. But the other angle of this is trying to develop a scouting report in a game plan that you can use with this information So Trevor, what kinds of things are you looking for in this data that you would actually put together for a game plan? The interesting things are about like like the swing speed I think that there's some correlation there But that would take like I think there needs to be some more aggregate stats that are related or that like swing speed is attached to as opposed to just by itself.

There are some cool bat path visualizations you can do. True Media has like showed me that they can do that now. So you can see guys, like what their swings are looking like mapped onto like a kind of a grid with the actual motions of the bat like drawn on. So it looks like a bunch of scribbles with the actual motions of the bat like drawn on. So it looks like a bunch of scribbles, but you can see kind of where the natural paths are.

Like who has the steepest swing? Who has the flattest swing? Those types of things are interesting because they inform, you know, how well guys can hit something, a high fastball as opposed, because you flatter swings are better getting up there. Josh Donaldson was very, very good at it in his prime

because his swing was almost level up there. And then there's like Freddie Freeman who can go down and like he tried to back foot him, he can get the bat literally almost vertical and still hit the ball. So like that kind of thing I would pay attention to. Length of swing would be important because it directly correlates with width. So it would help me understand why a guy doesn't swing a miss or does or does not swing a miss Which is what I would I cared about a lot and it could give me even a better idea of What types of things I can get those misses on even if they don't miss a lot

You know if a guy's got a short swing like Arias you want to try to get him to lengthen out his swing because that's not what he's normally doing and a guy like Stanton who has the biggest swing, you either want him to continue to try to get longer or, or even if you don't want him to hit the, but he's so strong though, him shortening up a swing, like it might still be a homer. So these types of things, you kind of get an idea. It kind of creates an archetype in your head about the things they're looking

for, the way they learn to hit and the types of pitches they're trying to hit because they've developed a swing that way It's it's really interesting and now we have that information and the last thing It's cool is there's a heat map now for what we're on the we're on the bat the balls hit the most Which is really cool. That's not on Savon either. That's another visualization I can get but like the data is there You can just grab it and tells guys who hit the ball in the ground more Sometimes they're hitting it close. They get jammed more often. The bottom of the ball?

Yeah, bottom of the ball, top of the ball. So you can get like, yeah, guys are fly ball hitters, but you can see actually like, are they popping stuff up closer to them or farther away from them? We didn't have that before, now we have that. So those are types of things that just kind of give you, you can visualize the hitter before you do it.

And that's really, really valuable and gives you a lot of confidence. Like if I I throw it here he still might top it or he still might get under it and that can inform maybe even more specific situations where you might use stuff so I don't know I would I would include it in my report but maybe maybe it's just like a little seasoning on the stuff that I already saw that makes sense. Yeah, it is interesting because you are somebody that wanted the most information, and then there are people who want less information.

This will go in that category. I talked to Freddie Freeman about his bat stats just this week, and he's like, I don't care. I was like, you have one of the shortest swing lengths in baseball. He's like, I didn't need the shortest sweet swing lengths in baseball. He's like, I didn't need a stat to tell me that. Yeah, he's got it locked in though. He's like, yes, I've been doing this for 15 years.

Like, yeah, I know. Because I know like this isn't going to help me already know that. And I look at me. I hit, you know, seven doubles a year. I don't I don't need to change anything. So I'm just going to keep doing it. That was his general point. And I was like, oh, I can't argue with you.

But there were still some interesting things. One of the things is when I talk to hitters, I think one of the times when I get the biggest freeze out and the biggest sort of like, nope, we will not talk about that, is approach. They might sort of talk about, oh, I improved my approach or maybe talk about some things generally, but especially like to strike or like situational approach. They do not want to talk about that because that that feels like something that maybe you couldn't even get from a scouting report or it's just too it's too personal. It's like that's their secret sauce. Yeah, it's

like I'm going to tell you what I'm intending to do. Yeah. But now we can get this. Yeah, we can get at it. Yeah. So one of the really intriguing stuff is the bat distributions. And so the obvious one is Giancarlo Stanton. Like that dude takes his A swing every time. Is there like an A plus swing down there at 85? I don't know, but there's an A swing. In fact, actually, I would bet that little hump down there at 85 is actually location-based. So we just had a question about location. You know, location matters a big deal. So maybe in certain locations he can really get up there to 85. But generally, it's the guy who takes his A swing every time. Now, Paredes is the guy we've talked about a lot. Now, check out Paredes. Whoa, I see an A, B, and C swing. Maybe even A, B, C even ABC and D I find this really interesting because if you put that if you go in likes right now they have over at picture list they have taken swing length and swing and bat speed.

I put them together into like an acceleration stat and that's really important because one that's not associated with with with. So you can have good acceleration and not necessarily have more whiffs, whereas bat speed is correlated with whiffs. So, you know, acceleration seems like the better stat. And then on top of that, on that, because I asked Kyle Bland to do it, he put a count switch. And if you toggle the count for Paredes, it becomes very obvious that in certain counts, he takes his A swings and certain counts, he kind of has an A and B.

And so in certain counts, he has a B. If you look at the Rays as a whole, they lower their bat speed more than any other team in two strike counts. And so, you know, I would take this to you, Trevor May, the pitcher of the night, and I would find that I bet, and this is my question to you, Trevor, is like,

even if you were kind of a lower information guy, don't you think I could come to you with a report that was like, this is his bat speed when you double up on sliders. Or, you know, this is his bat speed in 02 counts after a fastball. You know what I mean? Like, where you'd be like, oh crap, like he's really being defensive there. And then this is also something like people talk about reading swings. This is that. So I guess what I'm asking you is like, how much did you read swings when you were on the mound without a scouting report? And how interested would you be in a scouting report

that seemed to get at their approach from this angle? Guys would love to be able to read swings really effectively. And sometimes it's, it's harder than others to see. For example, a guy who physically could not read a swing if he wanted to, Zach Jackson, because he literally looks at the ground when he throws the ball. So he like, he doesn't look back at the glove until the swing's been done. And so he can't really see, and everyone's different. Like-

Yeah, Matt Brash might have a hard time with that. Exactly, like some of these guys like can't physically see or if they're seeing it at a weird angle, like they can't get an idea of the minutia of of A versus B versus C so this would be huge. Teams will actually do this. Watching those swings? Yeah a little bit but even the catchers like trying to react to the you know guys are throwing a hundred. He can see it a little bit but not really no one really can you can see it on TV but if you have an idea if it's this glaringaring, which it is, it's crazy. I bet you a team that might have a few of these guys too,

worth looking into later is Texas. I think Simeon does, it's probably not as stark as that, but they predict with breaking balls for two strikes, like just they changed everything with two strikes with breaking balls, they crush them. And so there's something there too probably, but knowing this would be interesting I think what teams guarantee teams are already doing I bet you the race already doing

Just bucketing it they're bucketing it and they're not saying hey, here's the swing speed. They're saying like this is a swing They're making their own little metric and saying a swing B swing C swing and they're just saying here's the counts This guy these does these things coax a C swing out He'll see swing in these counts they're making it really digestible easy to remember for most guys probably I would love to know what do you do? What do you throw if he's doing a C swing? That's the interesting thing it's like you probably get closer to them because a shorter shorter kind of a Fight off swing you can get like a jam shot a rollover, you know You don't necessarily want to throw him like a slider alone away because he's doing a C-swing to protect against that.

Exactly. That tells you what he's trying to protect against so you throw him the opposite. Yeah, so maybe like that's the time. That's why we've seen a little bit of the rise maybe of the like foreseen fastball on two strike counts. Yeah, late again. That's coming back. That was big in like 19 and 20 and now it's then the slider took over. And now that we have the slider took over. And now that we have the change up to if I think I see swings coming, then this is the perfect time to throw a fastball. Yeah, let's see.

Let's see if you can catch up to Phallus off. Yeah. It's really interesting thinking about this going the other direction. We didn't really look into how pitchers have different bat speeds, how they generate them or create them by having different pitch mixes. And Ryan Yarbrough is the example we've got out there. All sorts of bumps on there, which I think, like my first thought is, hey, he's got five or six pitches he's throwing. And that's probably why you see a distribution like that against him, because he's just keeping

guys off balance all the time. This is another thing that I wanted to ask Trevor about is the role of location. If you think you know A, B or C swing, I think that location is a big deal because if you look at the lowest bat speeds against Ryan Yarbrough's on it, he's ninth, and I asked him about it and he was like,

well, I try to keep him on their heels, everything is moving, I don't throw that fast. But Robert Suarez is number one on this list and He throws really hard and not everything's moving. He throws basically like 90% fastballs the thing that Yarborough and Suarez have in common is they throw high in the zone and Again, we have this thing here with this location is informing the the bat speed a little bit I think it's just hard to get your bat up to full speed at the top of the zone.

So there is a location component to, if you think of A, B or C swing is coming, you want to throw it to certain parts of the zone, right? Like, is this why like A swings sometimes you wanna throw low in the zone? I guess A swings also have like a location they want it throw low in the zone. I guess A-Swings also have like a location they want it to be in. Like a hitter's A-Swing likes a certain place.

Yes, and it varies per guy because everyone has like an idea of what their A-Swing, where their A-Swing, at least the good ones, there's guys that have no idea, but where their A-Swing performs the best. And so it is common knowledge that over the last like three four years high fastballs have been a big problem for a large you know population of the team of the league and The common thing they think is you get if you get too big meaning you're swinging too hard up there You're you're oh, you're it's it's hard to get to you got to get the barrel you got to block it

It's called blocking and when you block, you wanna get the barrel there as quickly as possible, which then shortens swings up, which probably just naturally slows down the bat, generally. So in order for them to hit it, it's weird, you're like, they're slowing their bat down in order to get to a pitch that's hard and up, that doesn't make any sense, but it's just kind of a byproduct of the intent.

They're shortening it. They're shortening it, and by shortening it, you naturally slow it down. The momentum is the important part. That's why Stanton's is the biggest and also the fastest because of his acceleration and strength. So there's some correlation there, and that's super interesting.

I think Yarbrough is correct in that he has stuff that goes glove side and arm side. He does sinker and cutter. And so he also has stuff that moves both ways. And it's all kind of subtle. So all in kind of subtle both guys, right? Yeah, and it's in varieties. He's just thrown in in in in in in in in in so when you're protecting in two again You're trying to get to the spot which slows it down shorts and shorty short and swing Suarez is interesting though because I think

It's the same thing So he's a hard thrower and throws up but guys are trying to get to the spot again beat him to the spot And so we are bro might have a little bit more of a I can adjust and I guys are trying to get to the spot again, beat him to the spot. And so Yarbrough might have a little bit more of a, I can adjust and I'm just trying to get the barrel somewhere. And Suarez is more like, I'm trying not to miss. Does that make sense? So like it's different types of pitchers, but they're getting the same byproduct of how they adjust their bat, even though they're thinking different things.

I think those are two great examples, opposite sides of the spectrum, of why you would slow down your swing. There's also this conversation of like, this turns it back a little bit to batting, but there's a conversation about VBA, and there's some people who think that VBA is like everything, keeping your bat vertical so that it can hit for power basically,

anywhere in the zone. And then there's somebody like Juan Soto, who is not special by VBA. He has a pretty flat swing. But the thing that is special like Juan Soto who is not special by VVA. He has a pretty flat swing. But the thing that is special about Juan Soto is that with this flat swing, he can achieve high bat speeds high in the zone. So he's really dangerous high in the zone.

Yeah, that's Donaldson too. That was what Donaldson did. That was 14, 15, 16 Donaldson. Yeah, and I think people really misread Donaldson because he talked about wanting to lift the ball and pull fly balls and people were like, oh, he must be a scoop swing guy. He's like a Schwarzer guy.

No, he was a little bit more like Jose Bautista, even Bregman in Korea, like they just turn that bat really fast, be able to get higher bat speeds high in the zone with a flatter swing. And that allowed them to take advantage of like people being like, oh, he must have a scoop swing. I'm gonna throw him a high fastball.

Oops, that was not the right thing. Yeah, and it's strength too. There's some strength involved like Sotos. He's real good when his hands stay back and his lower body goes. He's really so strong there that he can still bring it through. He's kind of special in that way. So there's a little bit of natural talent involved too. Yeah, I would suspect, yeah.

I wonder how much of this is an adjustment over time for hitters. Like you think you can get the A swing off because for most of your career you could. You get to the big leagues and you realize, uh-oh, I have to make adjustments. How many guys have to start breaking that down once they reach the top level

because they weren't tested enough along the way through the minor leagues? A lot. Probably a pretty high percentage, right? Yeah, probably a lot. You just look at the struggles that Bellinger and Schwabber have gone through to sort of develop these B and C swings

in front of our eyes. And our all-time mystery box hitter, Kestenira, like why were you a low strikeout rate guy that looked like you were going to hit everything coming through the miners and you're a 33 plus percent K rate guy in the big leagues? Just like my guess is just had a hole that minor leaguers couldn't exploit, they couldn't control. Or especially if it's like high in the zone, I think that minor league umpires aren't as good. This is sort of a guess. So like if you're throwing high in the zone in the minors,

you can be like, oh, I'm just gonna spit on it. We had Cal Manzaro sort of say that, right? You know, the umpires weren't so good. So you just say, eh. But then with the ABS, he was like, oh crap, now those are being called strikes. I gotta do something about the high fastball. Love the shiny new toys that have been coming out this week.

And I think the Robert Orr piece over at Baseball Prospectus is one of the better ones we've seen so far, too, where you look at some of the things that happen with the pulled balls, you get a longer swing on that because of how it's being measured. So you have to keep that in mind, too, as you start to analyze these things, where a hitter is making contact actually makes a pretty big difference in those numbers as they are presented. One last question for Trevor though, just like if you were looking at these maps,

you would be more afraid of the multi-hump guy than the single-hump guy, right? I'd just be like, you gotta remember more about this guy. Though I think the humps also gives a lot of confidence. Like it's very clear for what Paredes is trying to do like if it's the clearer it is the happier I am about it because then I can just throw some options out the window what one to one this guy swings or one to he swings a C swing I'm just not

gonna worry about this or the swing and miss as much because probably on a status that the whiff rates gonna go way down in that count. So it's easier to make a decision. There's also like different player types like so Mike Kostremski has a similar one hump distribution like like John Carlos Stanton like he's always taking his A swing. You know you'd be afraid of John Carlos Stanton probably. For a lot of reasons. But not maybe as much about Mike Zestrinski. So there's more context.

That's one of the things I would say just generally about these bad speed things is we're in day three or whatever and over time we're gonna get more context. We're gonna get more secondary stats that kind of do a better job of telling the story than these raw ones. It's almost like we got pitch Velo, you know? And it's like pitch Velo does tell you a lot,

it does tell you about like how good this player can be on some level, but it doesn't tell you everything. That's where I landed with the average swing speed. I wanted to see the guys that had low average swing speed to our good hitters and start to figure out, okay, what's going on? Mookie Betts has won, Marcus Simeon's won, he came up a little earlier.

Mookie Betts has won, Marcus Simeon's won. He came up a little earlier. Mookie Betts is like short swing. Simeon and Paradeus are kind of like situational hitters. They did multi-hump guys. I bet you guys like that though, the guys with the humps. I bet you they get more swords because they can hold up more often. Like Stanton, he's not even interested in chest swinging. It's going to his- Yeah, it's all or It's all the way through where he's not swinging.

Like those are the two options. So he probably doesn't sort of sort as much as I just pronounce the W again. I did this yesterday in sword. He probably gets less swords than others. That'd be interesting to know where people learn the check swing, because in the in in Little League, like your coach yells at you if you check, it's like swing all the way through kid. Because there's this little league thing where like you'll do a really slow swing because you made the wrong decision Do just make the decision and swing don't don't do that

Yeah, they're not making videos of swords out of little leaguers. Are they like other kids other times are doing great There's probably some awesome ones You probably see some really crazy ones when the guys swung and then the ball comes in the picture That is ridiculous, so we got a new game. We're gonna play It's called choose your fighters that you get to choose more than one which is a little different than some of the things that are out there. And there's a lot going on here. So what we're looking for is we were looking for a group of 12 pitchers who are all currently

healthy who are at varying levels of big league experience. So as you can see, if you're watching us on YouTube we've got the dozen includes Paul Skeens, Taj Bradley, Christian Scott, Tarek Schubel, Cole Regans, Jared Jones, Hunter Green, George Kirby, Kyle Harrison, Tanner Bybee, Logan Gilbert and Bryce Miller. And the only things these guys have in common, they're pitchers, they have not reached 600 career big league innings, some of them are much lower than that and none of them are currently on the IL. So that's the criteria of who was included. There are some guys that meet that criteria that were not included. You don't have to throw a Freddie Peralta's name out there. Like I know he meets that criteria. We're just picking

out of this dozen because I think it creates some interesting talking points for us. He hasn't got the 600 IP yet. No, because he spent some time in the pen and he got hurt. Oh. But I think he might actually of this group be a tick better for a few reasons. We'll get to that as we move through it. So the big question is if you were choosing two pitchers from this group

and you're looking at long-term value. So from a fantasy perspective we're talking Keeper Dynasty like the next three plus seasons from a real-life perspective you can stretch it out longer than that and just say these are the guys I want in my franchise because I trust them to be good and effective for the longest period of time. You have a lot of launching points. What are you looking for in this group? How do you begin to pair down a group of pitchers like this who are at different stages of their career

and bring some pretty different skills to the table? You know, I'll throw it to you first. I just gonna use my model and use stuff plus. And the thing that I asked of this group is who has a plus fastball and who has a plus slider and who hasn't had TJ. And that narrowed it down to three. That was good enough to really make my choices clear.

So I'm not gonna reveal those right away. I want to hear a little bit more from Trevor. How was your process, Trevor? What I would say, yes, stuff is gonna be like, so looking at the arsenal and the projectability of that, do you have a, do you have a here, here, we both know it's coming, but you still are going to struggle with it type of pitch.

I think that's like gold for a starter, for a lever too, but like if the starter's got one, you're doing good. I would say, so yeah, the ability to miss a bat. And then I would say maybe the advancing, like maybe a trend of developing command because starters are so important. So like if I see the stock rising in terms of, you know, maybe walk rates going down,

they didn't have great control coming up or they had okay control, but then it's improving over time. Then that would be also something that I think would be will they be able to put together their stuff with their ability to pitch and and then third see if I could if by watching them that I can get a feel for there and like I can start guessing their intent in certain certain areas that tells me that they are purposeful when they're picking pitches even if if it's super simple, like I think, for example,

Skeens has a pretty college approach right now, but I think that everything I've heard, like he's the type of guy that that approach just developed because he was in college, and now he's turned 27, professional innings, so who's to say it won't change, that kind of thing. So that's kind of the third part, that's a little bit more subjective,

but you want an idea that a guy's not guessing. That's maybe the difference between a couple of the guys on here. That's pretty interesting, okay. So my thought was similar to Eno's because it's more numbers based. I'm looking for guys that have a lot of pitches, but also do miss bats because I think if you're thinking

about a multi-year situation, you don't want to rely too heavily on fastball velocity. So I didn't immediately just dismiss guys that have lesser fastballs out of this group, and then there's the command component of all this, and it's like, when you put those two things together, how do you not pick George Kirby, right? I mean, because not only does he have the pitches he currently throws,

I think it's easier to look at George Kirby and just dream on any other pitches he'll need as something he can probably get a feel for as well as anybody in this group. So he seems like he might be the one best poised to handle whatever changes or degradations to his stuff just naturally occur over the longest period of time. It doesn't mean he has the highest ceiling, but he might just be the most consistently effective of the entire group. I think that's a good point. I mean, I've liked Hunter Green and he has excellent, excellent stuff and he has the breaking ball and he has the fastball, but the command component is not necessarily there. And the idea of, you know, putting in a new pitch seems like it's tough for him.

Like, whereas Kirby has been like, I'm going to do this with my slider. And then he's doing it. And he's like, I'm going to throw a splitter. I'm going to throw a knuckleball. Hey, you know, it seems like he can do what he wants with the ball, whereas Green is a little bit more of a power pitcher and we know that aging curves are, you know, there are aging curves for Stuff Plus. So what happens as he ages, you know, is he going to be able to be like, hey, and I just added a cutter and I just added this. So I think that's a fair criticism.

My process also brought me to Kirby. The final three in my process got me to Kirby, Bryce Miller, and Jared Jones. Those are the only three that had a stuff plus fastball, plus stuff plus slider, and had not had Tommy John surgery yet. So I was kind of surprised by that, but those are the three guys. And then when I was also trying to decide between those three, one of the last things I did was look at their distance between their sitting Velo and their max Velo. And I was surprised to find that Kirby and Jones

are closer to four and four miles an hour is kind of thought of as a good distance. It was Bryce Miller that was closer to like sort of three-ish between his max Velo and his sitting Velo. I think that's enough for me. I think I'm gonna go Kirby and Jones on this one. I do like Bryce Miller and I do wonder if there's less mileage on his arm, having been a reliever.

I do have a soft spot in my heart for him. So he's, I don't know, the facial hair, the, I don't know, he's kind of a character. I like him. But I'm gonna go Kirby and Jones. All right, you're going Kirby and Jones. So you're picking someone who is smiling in their Choose Your Fighter photo.

It's hard to find a picture of George Kirby where he's not smiling. He seems like a pretty happy guy most of the time. That's a pretty good picture for Gilbert, dude. He always seems stressed. Yeah, and I think the key here too is having a few guys with the gloves up over their faces too because you got different masks and things

the fighters have in Mortal Kombat. But I think the question with Jared Jones, Trevor, Jared Jones as a prospect received low command grades from the scouting community and he's clearly doing better than expected right now. I think the difference between command and control comes back to command putting the ball where you want to and control really avoiding walks.

It's the way we've always thought about it on this show. So maybe it's a little more control than command to this point. But are you willing to make a longer term bet on pitchers that have command as that lagging skill when the stuff is as good as it is for Jared Jones? Yeah, I think the jury's out a little bit on whether or not he can develop that command. And even like I think it's definitely a high what we're seeing from him is improved control. But I wouldn't say that he's like dotting edges of the plate. You know, he's throwing 99 and with a high ride

and a really, really good slider. He's missing spots inside the zone. Yeah, he's missing, he misses spots inside the zone and still gets like, he'll try to go away and then he'll paint one in on accident, but it will catch it nice and it'll still be strike three, but it wasn't where he was trying to throw it. So there's a lot of that, at least early, you know,

so it's one of those things like if it never comes, he'll probably be an insanely good reliever. So, you know, he's got that going. Like he'll probably, he could be a 101, you know, just punching out the world type guy, closer type, but you know, you don't need to do that. He's pitching great right now. And he's got a good change up to that profile as well that he just doesn't use. So I'd say let him use that. But I would definitely be more inclined to a guy who has shown that he has the ability

to command the ball a little bit better. And because like you said, that is so much better for aging than vice versa. And that is careers are getting shorter shorter the way teams make decisions You know, like if your stuff is diminishing you haven't developed a command to stay around like you're just not going to Because that your big shiny tool you had isn't as shiny anymore And there is a kid that you just drafted that throws a hundred too. So it's gonna happen And I feel like that's gonna be more and more important moving forward. We're gonna get a shift back And I feel like that's gonna be more and more important moving forward. We're gonna get a shift back

Towards that way, but that said like, you know, it's still so early in his career that who knows, you know He might just you know find that guys do it all the time So I guess my choice is if I if I need to make them I guys we haven't even mentioned yet. They're on that I'm going the opposite by the way on the on the Tommy John thing I'm gonna have guys who had recently had Tommy John so they have that seven years now Worry about it. It happened. So we're we're good. They're good for three years By the way on the on the Tommy John thing. I'm gonna have guys who had recently had Tommy John So they have that seven years now Worry about it. It happened. So we're we're good They're good for three years flip the hourglass back over and so I'll take I think three scoobal because he is Terrick scoobal sorry He has great stuff. He has shown that he's got his command

He just like like feels like he just like hopped right back on the horse when he came back. I think we faced him last year in his first outing back and he was just dotting. So I was like this is pretty impressive for a guy who's first big league start back and he handles righties well. He works on the inside part of the plate well. He's got a great slider. He throws you can run it up there to 9900 at times. So I'd say he's a guy I'd build a team around right now. And then there's my lefty.

And I go with a righty. Honestly, I was leaning towards Kirby, but I think, man, this is tough. I'm changing my mind now, right now in real time. Scoobal, we'll go with Scoobal and we'll go with, you know, I'm gonna go with George Kirby too. I think that he has the, he's shown the ability to, like he said, he can learn any pitch.

So there's a lot of like, can he do that? Can he do that? And my answer, my natural inclination is say probably. And so there might be something in there that's elite that we don't know about yet. And if there was anyone on that list that I would say would find that quickly, it'd be him. So I do wanna see, I think he's underperforming a little bit for his stuff, but there's a

chance. He kind of does the you Darvish thing a little bit. He likes to mess around. He enjoys pitching that way. And sometimes you like throw stuff because he thinks it's cool and not necessarily because it's the best pitch. So Kirby does that a little bit too. But I think that, you know, he's just this close to like having like a 1-8 season where he walks eight guys all year and strikes out 200. Like he can do

that. That's the only guy on this list I think that could possibly do that. Yeah, it's a fun group to try and dig through. I was stuck on Kirby as a for sure one. The second one was harder for me. I think the reason I wanted Jared Jones also is because of that change-up I think he will have to throw that change-up more sooner rather than later I think as that home run problem that we see in early on this season as that carries on a little longer I think that's gonna be the thing that gets him to throw the change-up more often But then we'll have to see if he can still command it And if what if that was part of the walk rates

and the miners was him working on his change up, you know? It could be, yeah, that's definitely the risk. He could literally have no command of it at all. I mean, Carlos Rodome has a really nice change up. He does not throw it, because he can't command it. Who's gonna do skeins? Are you gonna do skeins? We need the skeins in here, don't we?

Isn't that what we're supposed to do? Yeah, like how's skeins not here? There was a whole bunch of guys. Cole Reagans hasn't even been mentioned by anybody yet. I mean he's fourth by stuff. He has average location. His slider is ridiculous. His fastball is really good. He has a change. Like what's wrong with Cole Reagans? Why does he fall short? I just left the coin between him and Scoobble. That's what. Okay so it was close for you between those two. Yeah it was. It was. I just wanted one lefty and then I wanted the righty. Like I just for arbitrarily for no reason, just just for the for flavor. You know what? Actually, I think Skeens should have made my final four.

You think you should have been in? Plus fastball, plus slider. No TJ, right? No, workhorse too. Skeens should have made my four. Yeah, I prefer the fastballs of I prefer the fastball of Jones to to the fastball of Skeens. And then if it's Kirby versus Skeens That's really interesting because it's that's a little bit of a like a stuff versus command decision there. I

Think I think Skeens is fastballs better than the Kirby's you know, I think we just want to see more out of Skeens Yeah, it's fair start number two is today gets the Cubs again How would you feel about that getting the same team twice for your first two big league starts? Hard enough to break into the big leagues, doesn't it? Give the edge to the opposing team just a little bit since they just saw them. You might as well see what your problems are. I think three of my first five were against the Royals. And they were real good. They're still good. They're still good then, yeah. They were very good in 14.

I've heard from like Mookie and some other people that in the minor leagues at some at one point, I forget which level it is, but I think it's when you get up to double or triple A, you start to have more longer series against certain teams. Like when you have a series, it's a longer series. I think I've heard from hitters that you really start to see what the game plan is against you in a longer series I talked to some people that during the alt site Said like that Lawrence Butler said this like yeah, I faced the same big guys a lot But it really helped me see like it helped me see what the game plan was against me how they were trying to get me

Out and help me sort of extrapolate that to other pictures in the future is like sort of help me develop the like reverse scouting. I'm like, Oh, I see. I see what you're doing. I see what I got you, you know, so on some level maybe it's okay for skeins, you know, because he can see the team again be like, Oh, all right. All right. I see what the game plan is here. Yeah, it's interesting the upper levels, the miners go with that six game series now. So then you could see a team beginning at the end of the series unless you're using a six-man rotation But that seems so much smarter of the million tweaks they could make to the minor leagues It seems like a pretty big one from a travel perspective just cutting that down

Like why not why not play those longer series like cut down a number of bus rides makes all the sense in the world And actually from a problem-solving perspective Do you actually like having to do that, Trevor? Like when you try to develop pitchers, like seeing the same lineup again means you have to have more wrinkles. You have to be able to adjust. Like that, I think that puts an extra challenge on you

that maybe is a good thing in the long run. Yeah, I agree with that. I think it's, you know, it happens to the big leagues too. There's a lot of like three game series, then you get a buffer series and play that same team again. That happens a lot especially if it's like out of out of division, so That's something common there and then it wouldn't comment at all in the minors. So These guys have to face guys twice in a row. There is a certain level of Slog that you feel you're like, oh my God, we're playing the same team again.

Especially for a reliever, you throw three times or four times in a week, God forbid. I mean, that didn't happen in the minors, but maybe in the playoffs. No, he was just saying the high minors is now six. Six game series. What I'm saying is like a reliever throwing four times in a six day period, that rarely happens.

Unless they're like, we need them to be able to do that in the big leagues. But yeah, you're facing the same team three times as a reliever too like you but again you have to do the same thing usually you have those guys you're gonna go face you're gonna have to face the like I would have went and faced the same guy at least all three times it would have been the overlap because that's the guy I need to get out so yeah I think it's valuable for both the hitter and the pitcher to do that for developmentally because you

got to start trying, you gotta go to your third pitch, in maybe a situation you're not comfortable doing it, and you gotta do that in the big leagues, you have to. So, and you generally don't want the big leagues to just punch your face in for a while before you make the adjustment, because then that goes, it goes on your permanent record.

And you don't want anyone to think you suck, just because you haven't made the adjustment fast enough because you didn't learn to do it in the minor. You could delay your own improvement if you do one thing and you go one time through the league and you're like, I'm good. And then, so then the second time through, you're like, wait, what's going on?

And then you aren't as ready to make that adjustment. You have to be able to make adjustments almost on a weekly weekly level some smaller adjustments There's like that's the hardest part is like you got it There's some processes that are good and you've got to keep doing them even if like there's some up-and-down Fluctuation in your performance, but then there's some part of you that has to adjust almost like on a nightly basis Mm-hmm. It's the same thing with facing the lineup a third time in a lot of ways.

Yeah, totally. I always say that a lot about you're not going to get the true ace that's like, he's just dialed and he can get anybody out third day. Just like you can't make the distinction anymore. It's just an automatic no, right, for most guys. And they have to make adjustments. They've got to reach down deep sometimes

to get out of those big situations. That's when you learn to do it. And if you're never given that opportunity, you get less chances to improve. And we were talking about that earlier in the week is one of the fallout of having more quality relievers and understanding more about the third time through the order penalty, which has been the case in the game for the last decade now, is that you have to show more as a starter to overcome that because the fresh reliever is just better than he used to be. And that that's the option many teams turn to, especially when they're talking about mid rotation and back end starters being out there.

Right. It's really different. Friggin Rodriguez. I've never heard of this guy comes up this week and he's he takes over for Keaton win in the fifth inning and he's just throwing a hundred miles an hour with 20 inches of IVB and you're just like What where did I never what where'd he come from? This is ridiculous now We'll take some questions from the live. I've got a few that came in from discord This is actually a question as a follow-up to our show yesterday

actually a question as a follow up to our show yesterday. Wickwack from the Discord wants to know, what does Trevor think of the Ben Brown as a Cubs closer idea that Eno suggested on Thursday? Even if it's not the long term plan, we suggested that we could maybe have the Cubs use him in that role this year and then consider developing him as a starter beyond this season. Comment on that ability too.

Like, whether or not you think he'd be a closer, but then also like, do you think he'd be a closer but also like do you think he could go back to being a starter if he ends the season with like 80 85 innings and was the closer for the Cubs this year I think that's happening more and more often now but he does have he's got an elite curveball that's you know a good indicator no one's touching that thing what is it 170 against yeah he's high whiff 48% whiff rate on the curve ball. That's a good sign for a closer.

He throws real hard. One red flag, I would say long term, when you have one run leads and your average XWLO against you is 94, you're gonna struggle with home runs and the solo shots tying the game is something that is really tough for reliever. So he's a high, he's a high hard contact guy, but also a good swing and miss guy.

So the command becomes more and more and more important when that happens. So I think he could do the job. And I also think that he could, he could move it back into the starting rotation too. This is a, a quality change up. It's hard, but he's got the almost 15 inches of arm side run that you're looking for. How about in terms of like training and mindset and team build? Let's say he's successful as a closer. That's when he gets kind of iffy because then now you're at the mercy, well you're

always at the mercy, but you're at the mercy of the executives, the GM and the manager. I was trying, in 15 I went to the Penn, through really, really well. Then they put me back in the starting rotation in 16 in the spring training and basically at the end, Paul Moller was like, I like you in the Penn. We need you guys in the Penn, so we're gonna go to Penn.

And that's how that worked and then for the next three years I bounced back and forth, back and forth, and everyone, we kept getting new people in the front office and then they changed their mind. And then so eventually I had to be like, I'm a reliever, leave me alone. And so that is what can happen. But it's a team that needs,

gonna need young starting pitching moving forward. And he does have the profile to be a good one. He's got three pitches and he's got the stuff. And he's got Velo, he's got a really good wipeout pitch, all of the things that I mentioned earlier when we were picking our fighter, he's got all those things. So.

Yeah, the command though is lagging, so. So it comes down to it, like how does control develop, then command develop in a starter's role? And you might not. But I think it's worth a shot. Develop the command you need out of him by making him the closer. But they're also, like they're a winning team

and their bullpen's not great. So it might just address a need. And the cool thing is you go and you try to get him a starter and it doesn't work out, then just you know we can do that. So you have a plan B that you feel good about. Yeah, I think the back and forth would be interesting. But I think about the team having a new manager, right? They got Craig Council now instead of David Ross.

So how they approach pitchers could be different. I think about things team having a new manager, right? They got Craig Council now instead of David Ross. So how they approach pitchers could be different. I think about things Council did during his time in Milwaukee. Yeah, different organization. But Freddie Peralta, who missed the cut for our Choose Your Fighter segment, right? It kind of bounced around. It was starter when he came up, mostly a reliever in 19, mostly a reliever in 20. Back to starting ever since. And it's worked out really well

But he was never the closer wasn't never a closer now He was a little more of a like a mid inning bridge guy They like to use them to fireman deal with some of the trying to keep his innings up probably, you know One thing about council did he ever he never had a 91 mile an hour closer? Did he know cuz they've had hater and Williams for maybe they just gave him better options Better relievers I just I don't think I don't think I can do it They've had hard throwers if you want to go back lighter can do it you want to go back to the late 90s early 2000s and talk about some soft tossing Brewers closers. I'm here for that, but I don't think the people want that

Yeah, there's Cory can go back to Joe Borowski Cory can able sorry People want that. Yeah, there's Corey Knable before that. Let's go back to Joe Borowski. Oh, Corey Knable, sorry. Yeah, that guy's in that. Thanks to THPNob for throwing that one in there in the chat, but yeah, I was thinking back, Dan Kolb is probably the worst closer

I've ever seen close for my favorite team. Remember that guy? He did that. Four and a half Ks per nine. And I'm not exaggerating. I think that's about what that number was from Kolb. A couple other questions here. We got, Steve Gizul wants to know,

we hear all the time that players and team already have the information that we have publicly available. Question for Trevor is, how is this information presented? Do players know their percentile rankings for VLO, bat speed, barrel rate, et cetera? How do players consume and use this data? No.

They don't. They do. You can get it data? No, they don't. They do, like you can get it. So the team has it internally, but then it gets a little bit muddy sometimes because some guys want nothing, other guys want everything. And then every team has like a standardized version of the way they'd like to present their data

so that they can keep, so it's supposed to line up with flaw their philosophy of how they win games works It's gotta be simple enough for the simple guys, right? So it's it's like a three or five stat You know like very simple report, right? Yeah, so it's a lot of like, you know, here's here's Go zone here's the throw to the blue Some some people have like kind of taken the codify route a little bit and tried to lean heavier on, on the heat map. Some, some have grids of numbers with usage and stuff.

And it's just based on, so guys, I try to encourage people too, to constantly have these conversations, especially with the guys who prepare them to get their own, like make your own report. So you have to like, think about what you want to know and it's just it's not as locked in as people assume it is but you can get everything you can everything on there. Honestly though the number of guys that I've gone back, hey have you seen your savant page? And they're like huh? It was alarming for a while because like you can see a ton. It's just for monitoring your stuff. There's just a stigma about, we have a saying called keep it simple, stupid.

And that is what every old school guy with a mustache pigeon coach says, all of them still. I've seen like four or five organizations internal player development reports, which are very similar to what you're talking about, but like for younger people, you know, they have a little bit more like goals on them, you know, like specifically stated goals that are like, hey, you know, it's spring training. We're sitting down with you. This is your roadmap for the year.

You know, here are your benchmark stats and here are your goals for the year. Add bat speed or, you know, develop a two strike approach. There'll be some bullet points and every single one of them that I've seen has come from a progressive organization that has a lot of touch points. So they wanna dominate one-oh counts. They wanna do, you know what I mean?

They wanna be oh one, not one-oh. They wanna do this, they wanna do this. And almost all of them to a T have had too much information. So you go from kiss, which is is like I'm not gonna give you much I'm just gonna I'm gonna tell you something that fits my little I'm talking about the time I saw Greg Maddux throw the top of the block So we only care about the blah blah blah and like you're like wow, that's not very useful

And then you go to like the progressive organizations like oh we care about stuff plus But it has to be like it can be I gotta put this in there We gotta have this in there and you have a bunch of nerds in the room We're like no, I have what about what about what about you know, and then then you give them your report You're just like what this is a three page report to a 17 year old, dude I guarantee you that guy stopped looking after the second bullet point I think it would be better to go blank page I guarantee you that guy stopped looking after the second bullet point. You know? I think it would be better to go blank page, drag and drop and stuff and in.

But again, the amount of work, you know, that you got hundreds of guys in your organization. I think on the pros, I think it should be more. You make the team, you should sit down and build your report. I think that would be just. That would be a great meeting, right? So valuable, yeah. That would be like, meeting, right? So valuable, yeah, crazy.

Here are our goals, what are your goals? What do you wanna see? Let's build a report together. That should be with a pro, because the pro has some ideas and knows what he wants to see and all that stuff. But with a 17 year old, I think you need to have like a three metrics,

three bullet points, bam, one page, that's it. If you wanna know more. Focus on them three at a time. Talk to your coach page that's it if you Create a time talk to your coach. That's it Yeah, I think you leave the door open for them to ask for more if they want it and there might be a handful of kids At that age that do but not everyone and that doesn't happen sometimes a lot of times they just say hey do this Do this and a lot of they want they want it to be proprietary They want it to be theirs they want like a lot of it's like I want to prove that my ideas work like I just yeah There's there's politics and ego involved too if I'm a

Analyst I want to get my number on there because that means that I'm a valued analyst in the organization How do players do you know if that would go to someone outside the org to get their info? James is asking if Garrett Cole he's been rumored to be a guy that wants everything and has his own data guide that he sends things to. A lot and I think this depends on the organization. I don't think that like as many Dodgers guys will go outside the organization and say maybe the A's or you know one of the old like Cardinals right they're their old school. Some of that comes from like hey I'm not getting what I need and I'm asking for it and they're being stubborn not giving it to me.

There's also like, sometimes that happens. But I'd say like drive line when it comes to like tread now. Push performance like. Yeah, like now like, and they're doing reports now. It's not like CodeFi did a few years ago where it's just the now it's like reports like they've gotten their hands on how teams do it. They're doing them similarly and trying to make it adjustable that way. Own your own debt. Like maybe you're in an organization. Yeah. That doesn't give you that stuff. So then you need to get it elsewhere.

But also of course that worked with them all off season stuff. Sometimes you work with them all off season. Sometimes you're like, Hey, how am I doing on the stuff that we were supposed to be working on? I got one more here before we go. This one's from Gnostic Baseball. Trevor, how'd you do in Wiffleball this week? Oh my God, I'm so bad. I'm going to be honest, I, at the end of the other day, I pitched the third game. We didn't score. We could not hit. We were just getting dominated. We played the best team in the league. Though they're really good. I was like, oh my God, these kids are,

these kids like, these guys have been playing with ball recently. And I was hitting a little bit better, but I pitched, I finally found some pitches that I can throw. But someone still got me for a homer because I had to throw the straight one because I still can't throw enough strikes. I was getting like, I went quiet, I was mad.

I was like, okay, it was a joke at first. Now I'm like playing. But I freaking played in the major league baseball. I should be able to figure this out. Last year, I got to be the best pitcher in this league. I was just keeping it under 60 miles an hour is impossible. Cause my brain thinks speed up, like throw with gusto. Wait, is that a rule?

Yeah, yes. Because if you just said max, like I could throw 80 and like no one would have sent me. Like no one would even be able to touch that. So it's to keep everyone under 60, which it's still pretty hard. 60 is pretty hard. So they have a gun out there and what happens

if you throw over 60? Yeah, they have the pocket radar behind the thing so we can see it every single time, which is cool. It's an automatic ball if you throw over 60? If it's a foul ball, it's a no pitch. And if it's a ball, it stays, which it's hard to hit. Like hitting's hard sometimes. There's a lot of walks and then it's like a homer, three and's hard to hit. Like hitting's hard sometimes there's a lot of walks and then it's like a homer, three and homer,

that's all the runs are scored. So it's not a big field either. So yeah, I was getting frustrated. I found some stuff though. I actually punched like four or five straight guys out. So they're like, oh, he's starting to figure it out a little bit. So I am excited.

I had a good time, but my God, I need to hit a home run. I had two balls caught at the warning track and I'm like, I don't know how to I don't know how to get the ball out Of here. I don't know how to swing. Well to be fair. You weren't a hitter So and anyone who's familiar with the whoop whoop scores. I had the highest whoop strain score of my life Yeah, I had a 20 strain Standing for like four hours and the game's over and like you play three three innings games You're out in the field near you hit you outfield hit you and there's no rest

I sweated for four hours just sweating pouring sweat What number are you getting on the roof after an outing last season like I was like pitching sick maybe 15 16 But it was like it's only a half an hour long. The ending itself's like 12 minutes. Right. But this was two hours of that. My heart rate peaked at 180 in a Wiffle Ball game. Whoa. You went to 180 in a Wiffle Ball game?

I was really into it. I was getting angry. I was like, throw a strike. Dude, I can run 10 miles and not get to 180. Oh my God, I was freaking frustrated, but it felt good. It felt good to like be like annoyed with my performance and like, now I want to practice. How are you going to practice?

Yeah, we got some, we got some feedback on the coaching. I was talking about what it's like to coach my sons. One interesting feedback that I got was not to sort of have that, that pro toggle, not talk about pros, but just talk about setting goals for themselves, just about improving. And that actually rung really true for me because I used to play a lot of pickup basketball.

And I knew, I'm starting this in my 30s, I'm not gonna go pro. So what was in it for me was just seeing my three point shot improve, just getting better like getting better at something is the point. And I thought that was that was a good piece of feedback. That's why I golf. I'm not good at it. I just need something to get incrementally better at that's outside. Like, that's all I just get a little better every year.

That's hitting hitting a wiffle ball for Trevor. Yeah, it's hitting a ball and throwing one. It's humbling, humbling game, even though I'm Trevor. Yeah, it's hitting a wiffle ball and throwing one. It's humbling. Humbling game. It's fun. We have to go on our way out the door. Just a reminder, you can join our Discord. The link is in the show description. You can find Trevor on Twitter at imtrevormay. You can find Eno at Enosaris.

You can find me at Derek Benriper. Find the pod at Rates in Barrels. You can join us most weeks. We go live on Fridays at 1 Eastern. Next week will be Memorial Day weekend. We go live on Fridays at 1 Eastern. Next week, with it being Memorial Day weekend, we'll go Thursday, probably at 1 Eastern. We'll be sure to tweet about that. So if you join us at the Live Hive, thanks for stopping by. If you didn't make it this week, try to make it next week. That is going to do it for this episode of Rates in Barrels. We're back with you on Monday. Thanks for listening.