Rates & Barrels - The Yankees Reach the ALCS & Two Game 5s On Tap

Episode Date: October 11, 2024

Eno and DVR discuss the Yankees' series-clinching win over the Royals, and what comes next after big step forward in Kansas City in 2024. Plus, they examine the Guardians' win in Game 4 that brings their ALDS matchup with the Tigers for a decisive Game 5 against Tarik Skubal, and a few offseason news items of interest. Rundown 1:12 Yankees Advance to ALCS with Game 4 Win in Kansas City 5:42 Offseason Outlook in KC 17:07 Chuckles From the Yankees' Postgame Celebration 25:14 Another Smart Bullpen Decision in an Elimination Game 30:38 An Excellent Game 4 in Guardians-Tigers Series 41:09 Offseason Updates: Brent Rooker, Jorge Polanco & Tomoyuki Sugano Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris Producer: Brian Smith Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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It's free and easy to use, and you can get cash back deposited into your PayPal account or sent to you as a check. It's the smartest way to shop, plain and simple. Start your shopping at rakuten.ca or get the Rakuten app. That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N.ca. Look great some barrels. It's Friday, October 11th, Derek the Ripper, Enos Serres here with you on this episode. The Yankees have made it through to the ALCS. We'll talk about how they did it

and we'll take a look at this 2024 Royals team and what is next for Kansas City. There might be some deceiving teams that reach the postseason with the expanded field that trick us. We have higher expectations than we did certainly six months ago for the Royals. Perhaps those expectations are too high in light of their run this year.

A couple of game fives on tap. Of course, we've got the Dodgers Padres. That'll happen on Friday night. We already kind of talked about that game on Thursday, so we won't spend a lot of time on that today. We do have Guardians Tigers coming up though on Saturday. Talk about how we got there and we got some non playoff updates to pass along later on in the show as well. If you haven't joined our discord yet, you can do that with the link in the show description.

Get some lively chatter during these playoff games as we're into that phase where every single pitch kind of has you on the edge of your seat. You know, let's start with the Yankees. They make it through to the ALCS with the win over Kansas City in Kansas City on Thursday night. I think the main thing for me was Garrett Cole. He wasn't great, but he was good and that was huge to see a starter go seven in these playoffs. That's become an increasingly rare thing. He was able to do that despite 12 hard hit balls. I think the biggest one of all was the Kyle Isbell near home run in the seventh inning that would have been a home run in 24 of 30 major league parks, including Yankee Stadium.

I know that there was an on field post game interview where you could sort of see the relief in his face at the time that that ball didn't leave the yard. He was still within 30 minutes or so of that happening. And I think he realized that was a big swing that would have completely changed that game if it had been played in the Bronx. To be fair, if it had been played in the Bronx, there might've been some more homers on both sides.

Yeah. We definitely saw a little more offense in New York than we've seen in Kansas City. But you know, Garrett Cole sitting 96, eight, hitting 99 looked pretty good out there with the V lo the movement wasn't, you know, vintage. And I wonder, you know, for next year and for the future, like how much this injury has affected him. And, you know, what sort of health grades we put on

you know I got to see a sneak peek of a retroactive look at the health grades that Jeff Zimmerman put together and putting an A on a pitcher was very meaningful for how much they were going to pitch this year but grades B through F all were just equally poor outcomes. all were just equally poor outcomes. Wonderful. And so I doubt I'm giving him an A. So Garrett Cole is now at least in terms of health, more, you know, of the group than ahead of the group. And I wonder if that ports over to stuff and outcomes in the future. I guess it's funny to say that after, you know, he throws

seven innings of one run ball with four strikeouts. But that, you know, already you know the four strikeouts, that's not vintage Cole. And then he also gave up like 12 hard hit balls. So it wasn't quite vintage, vintage Cole. But this might be enough considering how other teams don't have that much firepower. And wouldn't you put the Yankees pitching staff up against anybody that's remaining in the in the postseason? I think I think I think so. Yeah, I mean, even with the success the Tigers have had mixing and matching using their bullpen. I take the Yankees staff because you can put a greater number of innings on some pretty established arms that still even if you say Garrett Cole is no longer a top three or top five starter league wide, he's still what? Top 10, top 15 even in this current

form and that health grade that that's more of a longer term concern. And we've talked about Rodin a lot in this postseason. He still looks very good. Clark Schmidt took a big step forward this year. That trio is probably better than any. If we're talking full staffs, I'd probably take the Padres still. Yeah, but in terms of rotations, you know the Yankees are You know right there with them. I don't think that there's like a sort of a clear Team that I guess the Padres but you know cease cease is interesting because he's a little bit more like we're done Then I think we won't admit you know kind of a little bit more of a two-pitch pitcher that can get key

Holden to get in trouble with the homers. So yeah, well, and I think the, you know, the other thing we've seen from Dylan Cease over the course of his career is because of his command, there's a wider range of outcomes with his performance than there probably should be. If you were looking purely at his stuff, like we were seeing another kind of high end outcome in year one with the Padres, kind of like we saw two years ago with the White Sox in 2022, right? These are the, when it's all working type seasons from Cease.

And then you've got on the other hand, like just a year ago, 458 ERA and a 142 whip, like that can still happen for a guy like Cease when the command wanes just a little bit. So that's the downside that comes with Cy Young caliber upside when command is not necessarily a strength. On the other side of the ball with the Royals

just trying to think ahead and wonder where they're going, they obviously need some offense. I mean, that showed up in this game where Tommy Pham had three hits Michael Garcia I'd won Vinny Paskin's here at one and Bobby would had one that's That's not enough for you know one scoring one run We saw that even in the wild card series where they won games I think they won two games scoring like three or four runs. So it's like

You know, they definitely need some help on the offensive side. And I don't necessarily see it coming. The closest prospect that could be of any impact is Nick Lofton. He's graded by Fangrass as a 40 grade prospect, and he's already had a little taste of the big leagues. You know, when I look at his power numbers, I wonder how he gets them. It's possible it's with speed with his legs because you know in the major leagues He's had like a 107 max EV 4% barrel rate, so I don't know if he's an impact bat really necessarily and that's what they need

So as much as they had success this year spending on the rotation and getting a lot out of Michael Walker and Seth Lugo I think that the the best thing for them this year would be to try and get a bat on the open market. Now, I don't know who fits them best. I mean, with Pascantino there, could you also sign Pete Alonso? Not if you're going to keep Sal Perez and not catch Sal a lot during the regular season, because then you've got a log jam at that spot. They I think the name that I thought kind of made sense cost wise and skills wise at first was Teasca Hernandez but I ran into that same problem where I said

well Teasca is not a good defensive outfielder at all. You really want to look at him as more of a DH. I don't think a DH fits. The name that I thought was interesting as far as the highest end outcome for the Royals in free agency if Cody Bellinger opts back out and is for free agent again, I think there's the guy that would actually help you the most because he can play a good defensive outfield and still be a good defensive center fielder, even gives them some thumb, doesn't add a ton of swing and miss if he's the more recent version of Bellinger.

So that might be kind of like the highest end outcome. You look at a group of position players, or outfielders anyway, that Soto's at the top, right? Kansas City's not in the Soto business. That's pretty obvious at this point. But the Bellinger, Conforto, Anthony Santander group, like Santander's not as rough of a defender as Teoscar. So maybe that would be an option for them

as a guy they could put out in the outfield and get some thump from and they could accept some of the swing and miss that comes with that power because that's where I feel like they really fall short. They're below average in terms of their home run output, they're below average by WRC plus, but they're a pretty good team at avoiding whiffs. So they could probably take a little bit of swing and miss if that comes with above average power. So maybe that's the bin they shop in. swing and miss if that comes with above average power. So maybe that's the bin they shop in. One thing that's interesting is you can make a strength here or you can try to address a weakness. Alex Bregman would be a signing that would kind of be let's get stronger. Let's just continue not to make whiffs and just have a lineup that makes a lot of contact. But I do worry about

putting Alex Bregman in that stadium because so much of his power is to that pull side and kind of a little bit park dependent. I wonder if that's the best fit. But he would fit in that lineup in terms of not making strikeouts. He wouldn't necessarily add a lot of top end power, but you could do something like that. You know, you do parse yourself out of a lot of interesting older guys like Jock, Jock Peterson and JD Martinez because because of the DH situation. Right. So unless there was a surprising Salvador Perez trade, which I just I think Sal's going to

retire a royal that that seems like the way that's going to trend. Ooh, how about a Tyler O'Neal? That could also work. And again, it's another profile where it's like, hey, there's swing and miss there, but you can take some. You can take some to get the thing that you need. And when I say swing and miss with Santander, by the way, I'm also assuming Santander is going to get at least a three-year deal. So the sub 20% K rate we've seen twice in the last three seasons

probably isn't what you're getting over the life of that contract. He's not a 28, 30% strikeout machine by any stretch of the imagination. But I do think you have to sort of project for a guy who's at his age, the guy that's gonna be 30 next week, that the K rate's probably gonna start slipping

as he moves a little further into that deal. Yeah, I think that what behooves the Royals is to do something about the offense while supposedly going to work on player development and pitching development behind the scenes, right? So that when, you know, the Seth Lugo contract is out, you've got more internal replacements and you can spend your money on offense in free agency. I don't think, you know, it is interesting to think of. Is it like San Francisco or, you know, hitters don't want to sign there? There was a very public back and forth between Eric Hosmer and somebody about, you know, whether or not it's a pictures park. We know that, you know, it doesn't play like San Francisco. so I wonder if hitters are like no it plays fair enough I'm gonna sign there if they if they give me the right dollar figure you know.

In terms of what they lose off the roster all those guys they picked up at the trade deadline obviously but they're not the hugest part of this. I think the biggest one that they're gonna they're gonna have an interesting situation is Michael Wacha, a $16 million player option. He may want to just get back on the market after a pretty good year and see if he can't get another two or three year deal, but he could also just sign with the Royals and extend that out.

That's the biggest loss they have. Maybe they make a little money off of this run you know that they can spend right now it says that they spent 160 million for the luxury tax this year they have 110 for next year plus arbitration which is probably like 120 so they may have 30 35 million to spend you know if half of that's on Waka and half that's on a bat that, that might, that might improve the team. I don't know how healthy this is under, under, underlying, because the reason I bet on this team was that I thought the young guys would take a step forward bat wise. And I don't know if that's been the case really.

Yeah, that's still the big question. Is there more from Michael Garcia? Is there more from Michael Massey? Injuries were a factor for Massey. Pascuantino missed some time again at the end of this season. I think he could still be even better than he's been to this point because now he's not rehabbing from shoulder surgery. He's just going through a normal off season.

So you can find a couple of players in the roster that you see taking a step forward. But I think we're at the point now with both Kyle Isbell and MJ Melendez where what we've seen in is probably what we're getting going forward, right? If there's more in their bats, we're not going to unlock it. I think even Massey, I mean, he's already 27. You know, we've seen some good stretches.

He's decent, but I don't think he's going to take another step. The only one that I really think could take another step. I mean, I think Vinny Pascantino with a healthy full year could do something we haven't seen yet. So that's going to be important for them next year. That gives them a legit one through four, I think, with Melendez being like a five, six. What could really help them is Mikel Garcia making that jump that he didn't make this year. I know that he didn't make it, but in terms of the K percentage, he was still good. And so I just need him to turn some of that raw power, which is this into game power, get the ball off the ground a little bit and do some damage.

If he can get, if he can hit like 15 homers next year, I bet you he'd be, you know, 10% better than the average with the bat and kind of be that bridge, you know, so that Garcia and Lendez are five, six, and you only have holes 7'8'9, you know, that sort of deal. That could be pretty important to them, especially if they sign another guy and they don't, they only have two holes in the lineup, right? So there is, there is a no holes type of approach, even if there is probably only one superstar in this team or one star. Right. And then I think the other prospect that might be closer than we think, depending on how they want to develop him is Jack. Had you know, he's going to just be a one way player. Maybe he could be on the Dylan Cruz track that we saw this year, whereby August or so he's a consideration, but you're not necessarily looking at opening day in the first half of 2025 and penciling him into a spot just yet.

Right. Like that's way too aggressive and doesn't really align with what we've seen very early on his professional career even if he's going to be an impact player and even if he's their their best prospect by a pretty healthy margin right now. I don't know if they have a lot they could trade that's one of the problem for the Royals. The other part of the equation too is Bobby with junior was a 10 war player this year. There's probably not another level, so there's almost nowhere to go but down unless he can repeat. I mean, you go 30-30, you make even better contact, you walk more than ever. He's 24, so I think he would,

back of the napkin would be like an eight-war season projection. You don't usually project guys for 10 because that's- Yeah, it's just silly, right? So there's also that. You kinda had a couple of things go really well. You had a great health outcome this year with Cole Regans. Waka pitched really well.

Sattelugo pitched really well. So, you know, they still have Singer. Like they're in good shape. And because they made the additions of Ercig and Hunter Harvey at the trade deadline, like their bullpen's not that bad either. It's just like everything kind of fell into place for them to hit this outcome right now.

And it's gonna take a little more than you might think just to hold steady in 2025, even if you want to put the up bearer on the organization long-term because they exceeded everybody's expectations this year even by making the playoffs, let alone advancing through the wild card round. I think a good sign of organizational strength,

improving player development and the types of stuff that will make them better is if we're talking next spring about, hey, look at this reliever that we never heard of on the Royals, you know? I think that could be really important because they had the trade for Hunter Harvey and Lucas Erceg and the acquired John Shriver in trade. So like, you know, if Daniel Lynch just is like blowing everybody away as a reliever and can step in to set up even if Hunter Harvey's hurt, you know, that's the sort of thing that I think would be good.

And then the other one is you're seeing Michael Garcia hit bombs in spring training. You know, if he hits a few bombs in spring training, I'm not saying that he's going to go out and hit 25 bombs during the season. It just means, OK, he's accessing some of that power and that's going to be a big deal for them. So on the other side, with the Yankees, the celebrations were were amazing. I don't know if you saw this, but it was caught on video that jazz Chisholm and Trent Grisham were enjoying a smoke of the other sort on camera. PR sort of ushered him out of view of the camera and Garrett Cole who we don't usually see this side of I think It's pretty hilarious after the game describing the the celebration

In the clubhouse like that. I've saved this audio Fired up had a couple IPA's like with the boys Fransom campaign of it looked like you know, this is the greatest. Yeah, that's not a side of Garrett Cole that we get to hear or see very often. I think it's funny when the celebrations happen after each round, it's something that clearly bothers my wife, she's like, why are there cameras in there right now, like, why do we get to see this?

She's like, and it's always the same. They do the same thing every time you get the shot at a locker room. Like, I don't know, it's just, it's what they've decided. This is a little bit inside baseball in terms of reporting and may not be interesting to some people, but this is their space that we're in. And it is kind of weird that we are there for celebrations

and also when they're in various straights of undress. And so I think in other sports, I think it's basketball. They're pushing to have more interviews outside of the clubhouse and to get it outside of the clubhouse. And I think, you know, it makes sense to me as a human being to be like, yeah, why are we in here when you're in your underwear?

Like, this is super strange. That's very strange. I mean, it goes back several decades, right? So it's always been this way. Yeah, the history of it, but in terms of, every once in a while you're like, record scratch, how did I get here? Yeah, it shouldn't be this way.

But the problem is that the access is always being limited and being limited and being limited, that you need to have a real rock solid concession from the other side to give up anything. It almost becomes like a political battle where it's like another side wants to give it all, you know, without getting. And so if they were gonna give us 20 minutes

in a press conference room, like in a press room where every player showed up and was actually available for 20 minutes. I would actually take that because I spend so much time in the clubhouse waiting for somebody and not getting them or waiting for them and getting them for two minutes or waiting for them and then they tell me that they don't have time for me anyway. You know that if there was more of a like, hey, press time, guys, you know, put on schedule 20 minutes.

You got to be stand out there by the cordons or whatever it is and do press time. I would take that. The only thing that I think we would lose is that there is a sort of conversational tone. You can get to a familiarity with the players when you're in that space with them. But I think in the modern game, that familiarity is has been really lessened because I think the players really see the media as more of an enemy. And they're really guarded with what they say.

Yeah, maybe there is a future where the way that relationship changes can be positively impacted by where a lot of those conversations are taking place Last couple thoughts though just on this Yankees game and there was a benches clearing situation No punches thrown a late Michael Garcia slide and Anthony Volpe which looked like both players were kind of moving past I know Volpe was giving Garcia a few pats on the shoulder Maybe a few too many and then jazz Chisholm said something and that's what everybody started

Run to the field, but I just I thought that was one of those dumb situations were like hey This was 90% over and then it wasn't and it just it was a big time waster There was a a little bit of something in the play, you know having watched it a couple times it kind of looked like Garcia was trying to swat the tag away. Oh, you saw a little bit of a swing at the tag, okay. So he kind of chops his arm down. It could be part of the running, but he kind of chops his arm down in a way that makes Volpe be like, no, I've got the tag, and kind of hits him in the chest with a forearm. So at first glance, I was like, wow, that's a really aggressive tag by Volpi.

If I was Garcia, I'd be mad too. And that's exactly how the Tim Anderson Jose Ramirez thing started was like an aggressive tag at second and in such a similar situation. But when I watched it slowly, I was like, okay, there was a little bit more to this and a little bit less to it, which is just like, it could have just been a play where like you try to chop it out and I that I made sure I got you. Yeah, yeah, and it was a great play by John Bertie from first he stepped on the bag made the throw down it looked like Michael Garcia ran and that's why he

had to make sure he you know that's why he got the tag on he couldn't step on the base. It was a really good play from a guy that doesn't play a ton of first base and it looked to me like Garcia took that route towards second that was identical to Manny Machado from a couple of nights ago in the NLDS where it's like, yeah, that's just how you're taught to run to second base when the balls hit near the bag at first, right? So I think it was a kind of a funny repeat.

We had a debate in the Discord about how often this happens and I didn't say this in Discord, but the way that I feel is that it happens all the time and we don't Register it happens all the time because the throw doesn't hit anybody or it's the stakes are lower The situation just feels different because it's not the playoffs There's some back and forth because the user John I forget his full handle was was talking about We all agree that man. He probably did run into that throw and yes I think we do agree and I think it happens all the time is my sort of response and he was trying to maybe legislate the base

path a little bit better from you know from first to second or just around the base court and say like you can't run on the on the grass or whatever but the the closer you get to legislating that piece the more you actually start to incentiv incentivize the thrower to throw at the runner. You know what I mean? Like if you start making it more, if you weight it more towards, we don't want people obstructing base pass, then as a thrower you'd be like,

shoot, I don't know if I can get him at second, but I can tag him. Yeah. I can throw it at him. Throw him to his backside. Yeah, I can do that pretty easy. He's a big target. So there is a tricky situation there with incentives

and what you want out of the game. Yankees, you know, Gleyber Torres resurgence, 867 OPS in the postseason, you know, was big for them. Giancarlo just give him the series MVP, I guess. The divisional series MVP. And I know who's inventing trophies now. Know who's giving I guess. The divisional series MVP. And I know who's inventing trophies now. Know who's giving trophies for the divisional series? I don't think so.

I like trophies, and I'm still not trying to give those away. Imagine getting the wild card series MVP. Please, no. Let's not even go down that path. So the Yankees are awaiting the winner of Saturday's game five between the Tigers and Guardians will get to the how we got there Just a minute So even with the rest the Yankees will have to wait until game two of the ALCS to bring Cole back Unless they want to throw them on short rest to start the series

Which I don't think they will think little scope Carlos Rodin in one and then the way it would work is Cole because of the off Day would go games two and five and would be on A throw day for game seven which we do sometimes see in these seven game series where one of your early starters comes back around That's how Madison Bumgarner pitched like 38 percent of the innings for the world series for the Giants Given the injury earlier in the year, maybe I don't think that's not the plan with Garrett Cole But it's just the way he'll be available and used as a result. There was a broader trend thing that I saw in this game

that the Royals did that I think is worth talking about, and it didn't work necessarily. It didn't end up leading them to a comeback win, but Lucas Ersegg came in and pitched behind Michael Wacha, right, because it was a tight game. There was traffic. Wacha left before the end of the fifth inning. Ersig comes in for his one on the third.

We saw the Phillies do it with Carlos Estevez. There was a situation where Lindor hit the grand slam. I mean, that's the meat of the order of the top of the third time through. And if that game gets out of hand and you're a team that's struggling to score runs especially, right? And you never used your best reliever,

you're going to be second guest forever, right? You're gonna get the- I like it. It's much better than leaving Zach Britton on the bench. Yes, I don't know if you got to that part of the rundown or if that's the first thing you thought of, but that was the first thing I thought of too, is like we've changed.

Managers have changed a lot. They did not want that sort of- Behind the scenes. I didn't use my guy. That night last night, raw garlic is not my friend, so I have not looked at the rundown at all. See, I didn't think you did. I'm glad we're on the same page though, as far as like, you can't, in these situations,

when you are facing elimination, you cannot have your best reliever either not pitch in the game at all or come in when you're down three or four, when you had a chance earlier in the game to use them in a really high leverage spot that kept the game close. So even though it didn't change the outcome, I think it was great process. And I think we've seen a lot of other teams do that, even in situations where it hasn't worked yet. I think generally this is a great thing for bullpen usage. It does set you up for losing a different way and having to explain

why you had, you know, Sam Long out there in the ninth. And that's why you lost. But you can easily point back to it and say, here was a situation. Here's what we were thinking. And I think you can defend it. People go, OK, yeah, that actually made sense because Airsig came in. You got a couple of guys in the heart of the order out. But you can easily point back to it and say here was a situation Here's what we were thinking and I think you can defend it people go Okay, yeah that actually made sense because airsig came in you got a couple guys in the heart of the order out You got at the jam in the fifth you have your proof of why you did it right there as opposed to the hey

Why don't you use Lucas airsig in a game? The only lost by two runs and you say I don't know I was waiting for a save situation like that's we're not we're not managing That way anymore. That's good. I think one thing I would do if I was running the Yankees and again, this is like the second time I've talked about line up and I'm definitely not a lineup jockey, but I think I might move Wells out of his spot. You know, he didn't have a good September and I mean, he hit one 11 with a 194 slugging in September and he's not having the greatest postseason

and you're having him fourth. So, you know, he's right behind Judge. Why not just have Stanton cover for Judge? I know it's righty lefty, you know, that sort of stuff or, you know, put jazz in. Flip wells and jazz, that's the easiest thing to do. If you're worried about righty lefty and not having a reliever that comes in with some platoon advantages do that put jazz. Yeah, I

Not a big deal, but it also means like your catcher who's young had a long season You're not you maybe he maybe it would be better for him to have one less plate appearance one fewer plate appearances Now we're on the less fewer again and fewer play appearances. Now we're on the less fewer again. Anyway, yeah, that'd be a little thing I do. And I don't think it'll mean much, but I do still have jazz and Volpe circled as they're gonna win a game for the Yankees

in this postseason. It seems like it would be a big, big thing to point back to from the trade deadline if that happens with Jazz in particular. We liked that move at the time, and I'm just glad he got healthy enough to even come back and contribute on the stretch and play in this postseason. Just a quick update, by the way, on Dodger's Padres.

It looks like Freddie Freeman's gonna go in game five, so that's good, and we know it's Yamamoto actually getting the start. They were kicking around a few different ideas. I think it's gonna be a quick hook. We talked about this game in great detail. That's fun. Yamamoto Darvish. I think it'd be a quick hook for both. I actually, I mean, maybe you let Darvish work out of, you know, one jam, but third time through the order with Darvish. I mean, yes, he,

he's okay at it and he has a ton of pitches. And so theoretically you could let him go, but why let him go when you have such a great bullpen? I think you know if he gets through the order twice You'll start to I mean especially because it'll be then Darvish against Shohei for the third time I think you want somebody else in there I think you need a healthy lead for that to be something that they're going to let happen That would be the only scenario in which I could see that really being the path that the Padres choose. And you know, it doesn't have that much length, you know, off the shoulder surgeries.

Anyway, there were there's talk about having an Oprah maybe or not having to go very long. That's what sort of the chatter is right now. And there's some people who are like, whoa, why did you pay 300 million dollars? Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. But still, this is a guy coming off injury. He didn't, you know, it's not like he had a ton of innings after he came back So, you know step off the gas a little bit like, you know, maybe it's okay if he goes three and you know Puts the Dodgers in a place to win He hasn't been able to go more than five since coming off the injury like your expectations just have to be lower But if they were considering a flat-out bullpen game and they've also got Jack Flaherty available for usage Like they don't have to push Yamamoto if they don't like what they see.

It's a situation that they're in on Friday night. We did see a great game four in Detroit, back and forth, tons of excitement. Ended up being David Frye hitting a massive home run off the bench to send the Guardians back to Cleveland with a chance to advance the ALCS. And this one for a few moments, there were a few key moments in the game.

I felt like everything was coming up Tigers, right? Zach McKinstry hits an opposite field home run to tie it. Winsale Perez comes through with the big hit. And when one of your bench guys like that comes in with a clutch hit that gives you a lead, you just feel like everything is lining up exactly the way you want it to. I thought Reece Olsen looked pretty looked pretty good again in that bulk role.

We've talked about how he's come back off this injury and he's not quite himself from a pure stuff plus perspective. But the thing that has always been a question in the profile for Reese Olsen is fastball command. And I think that was kind of on display, even in a spot where he pitched pretty well again in game four, where the secondaries look good and the fastball, I think long-term, if Rees Olsen is going to be a very good big league starter,

it's either gonna be improving the fastball or at least just having it at a level where it's good enough to use it occasionally and you can focus heavily on those secondaries and really be one of those deep arsenal sort of guys. Like that's probably his best path forward if the fastball doesn't get better in the near future Yeah, he was able to locate it both up and down. That's really important because

Depending on the type of hitter you you had you could see that Some guys he really wanted to get a fastball up and then get the breakers down other guys like Naylor He needed the fastball down and the off-speed stuff down just to try and confuse nailer at the bottom of the zone. So yeah, he was pretty good in terms of being able to put it in at least two places and in terms of his stuff, uh, I don't have a report in front of me, but you know, his foreseen fastball velocity, he's one of the few pitchers this postseason that hasn't been up, you know, his year average is 94.2, he's 93.6. The thing that works in

his favor though is three really good secondaries. And that was on display. So a great start from him. We saw some up and down play. I keep waiting for Torkelson to kind of do something and he got on base, but then he kind of made a base running mistake and ran them out of an inning a little bit you're kind of Waiting for Parker Meadows or Colt Keith or Spencer Torquist and one of those guys kind of has to step forward And I know that it's putting a lot on young guys That don't have a long track record and we're up and down even this season but right now it's kind of like Meadows carpenter and and green and But right now it's kind of like Meadows, Carpenter and Green and sort of an amount of praying for that Tigers offense,

I feel like. Well, a couple of concerns coming out of game four. I mean, Kerry Carpenter left early, saw him hobbling around third base and that ended up mattering in a pretty big way. Jace Young ended up getting a matchup against Emmanuel Classe in the ninth that would have been Carpenter's spot

that was with a runner on. So it would have been a rematch of the game to you know big carry carpenter home run and that spot and young got the runner in but you know rolled over and made an out in the process to that was a weird play by the way Josh Naylor didn't cover first base like class a covered it and they got the out but that could have been a disaster for the Guardians if that had gone differently and aside from carry carpenter Jake Rogers was scheduled to have X-rays on his wrist and forearms,

so his status for Game 5 might be in question as well. I guess Bly Madras is available to be added to the roster if needed, so we'll know more about Carpenter's status probably in the time between this podcast was recorded and now an earlier start in Game 5. It looked like a bit of an ankle, and I just, didn't it look like an ankle and I just didn't look like an ankle I

Couldn't tell I think they said hamstring initially as of the report was anyway So hamstrings a little bit worse because if it's if it's just strained and there's not much you can do But if it's an ankle sometimes it's pain and you just you just play through it Yeah And time not on the side of the Tigers trying to recover from those ailments either that game got moved up to a one Eastern start from a one Eastern start from an eight Eastern start because of some bad weather expected in Cleveland later on in the day.

Another bad sign for them is that you finally saw their relievers get touched up. And I think that to some extent is due to use, like heavy use and also familiarity with their stuff now. Especially Bo Briskey, who I really like and has great stuff. Where he was sitting and where he can touch changes the more times he gets used in a row.

The first time we saw him, he kinda came out with more 98s and more high-end Velo. And every time we've seen him kinda do a, kind of do a back to back or back to back to back, he kind of, the VELO goes down a little bit. I mean, he's thrown a bunch of innings. He's had injury concerns in the past. This has been his best season. And I'm not saying he's bad at all.

I was just saying, you know, they've been using them a lot and we've tried to make him the opener and the closer of every game. So the reason is that he's one of their best pitchers, but he got touched up. Tyler Holton gave up a run. Sean Gunther gave up a run. Jackson Jobe, I think at that point was a little bit like, here's our best pitcher that's not Jason Foley to keep us in the game. Have we not seen much of Jason Foley at all?

I don't think we've seen Jason Foley at all in this particular series. I wonder if there's a matchup situation there where they don't like the way Cleveland sees his sinker or if they've kind of just saved him for the next game. I kind of assume that we'll see Jason Foley in game five. What is the pitching matchup supposed to be? So Scoobble's going for the Tigers, so this is a great situation for the Tigers. Scoobble versus TBA, oof. In the TBA matchup, of course, the Scoobble Game 2 matchup opponent was Matthew Boyd.

I assume the Guardians do something similar with Boyd, and then it's just because it's an elimination game, they can bail more quickly if they want to, right? They don't have to run quite as long, because there's no tomorrow if they don't like what they see from him. So interestingly too, we've thought a lot about the schedule with this Tigers team and the way they use their relievers and having a few ball guys and Scoobble and trying to manage that.

If they advance, the Tigers win game five, the ALCS begins in New York on Monday. So regular rest for Scoobble would put him back on the mound in game three of the ALCS The series goes Monday Tuesday off day Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday for games three through five off day Sunday back on Monday Tuesday so you do three and six three and seven would probably be I mean six if six is an elimination game Short rest would be the option otherwise regular rest would be game seven. So three and seven would be your scoobble games.

I think at least with three as a back to back to back, having scoobble start in the first of that is actually one way to take some of the pressure and some of the workload off of those relievers. So it might not be the worst thing, even though you'd like to have them earlier in the series to completely max out his usage, given the way the Tigers pitching situation is right now

It's not a bad consolation if that's how it plays out. Yep, if Cleveland advances, you know, it's still Tanner Bybee I don't think we've seen Gavin Williams. No, that's another series ghost so far Like why haven't we seen any Gavin Williams at all? You know if they do advance it'll be in a large part to Stephen Kwan is in 500 in the series and just seems to get a single every time he's up. I still think it's funny that they're they're playing so many games with the number two spot in the order. It's a really important spot. And I guess they just they just feel like that's a good toggle. And it works for them.

You know, commas are they got a hit. Then it was taken out and David Fry got a big hit. So that's worked for them, but I, you know, I think that teams in the past might have gone Kwon, you know, Thomas Ramirez, Naylor, you know, just put one of your better hitters up there and play around later on. But I think to some extent, the reason they do that

is to force decision making upon the other team quicker, and also be able to react to decision making by the other team quicker. It makes sense, and we talked about some of the aesthetics of the series being different, but it's been a great series so far, and going to game five, I think it'd be weird

to pick against Scoobl. I think the Tigers, this is lining up about as well as it possibly can for them in this series. So they've got the likely Cy Young winner taking the ball. It's going to be just the question of how they finish it out. If Scoobl gives him six or seven, can the relievers hold up behind him? That's really the only question. Good piece up on Fangraphs about how Scoobble is a crafty lefty with Velo and it references that mix and match plus from driveline that I've talked about on this cast and talks about

how Scoobles pitches all look alike to some degree and that makes it really hard to discern between them and that the reason he's turfed his curveball is it's the one pitch that looks totally different than all the rest. And the other thing you might have noticed and we noticed, I noticed this a little bit when I was looking at John Kensky-Noel, he doesn't throw a slider that much. I mean he is a lefty so maybe he just uses the slider more for lefties and we noticed that down and into righties is not his best place.

And that's where you would traditionally put a slider. So maybe this just this is just a honing on on his strengths, basically, and saying I'm going to be mostly fastball sinker change up. That's going to be a really fun game to watch. And I assume it'll be a 2-1 victory for somebody. It has all the feels of being a very tight low scoring game for all the reasons we've seen in this series. Moving on to some news outside of the playoffs, we realized it's been like two weeks almost since the season ended. There's stuff happening.

Players are having surgery, guys are going to the fall league. So we want to touch on a few of these things before we signed off for the week. Brent Rooker apparently was playing through discomfort in his forearm for most of the season. He had forearm extensor surgery so kind of amazing that he played that well while needing to have any sort of surgery. I think the interesting thing with Rooker is kind of a two-parter. It's like one, he's UT only in a lot of leagues for next year because he only played 14 games in the outfield so if you're in an NFBC style league some other formats where you need 20 he falls short there If you're in a league you only need five or ten and sure he's still an outfield

There's some news that he might play the outfield more. Yeah, he will qualify in season Maybe this is related is that he didn't play the outfield more because they didn't think he'd throw That's a really good way to think about it now. Like how much are you buying into? throw. That's a really good way to think about it. Now, like how much are you buying into this improvement at this age? I mean, to have a massive step forward skills wise at age 29 and power was there the entire time. We saw 30 homers in 2023, so it was one away from hitting 40 this year in the final season in Oakland. We've talked about the park factors in Sacramento, expecting that to play more hitter friendly by comparison to Oakland's park. We don't know how much more hitter friendly, even though within the PCL

Sacramento plays closer to a neutral, even a pitcher environment. What do you think 2025 holds for Brent Rooker? Like how interested are you in him as a cheap source of power that cut the carry a little bit and has the underlying power metrics you're looking for in someone that brings regular 30 plus home run pop. One of the biggest difference in his projections is his batting average on balls and play.

And for his career, it's 327. Last season or this season was 362 for Brent Rooker. That's a big part of why he had a 293 hours despite a 29% K-rate. You know, one thing that Rooker and I were even talking about is not only will the park play more fair than Oakland in terms of you know balls and play and and heat and and you know for hitting But the turf may have an aspect of babbitt aiding to it And if you look at his projections, Rooker, you know, the 245 batting

averages come with like a 309, 310 BABIP projection and the 265 batting averages come with a 335 BABIP projection. And I kind of buy that one more, given that you would have some regression in the BABIP department just because 362 is a big number, but given also that his 327 is his career number and he's moving into this kind of a park situation i'm going to take uh i'm going to take rooker for a 260 average 35 homers and seven steals all right so you're probably in if an adp is like pick 75 in drafts throughout this winter like you you would be in on Rooker?

Yeah, I mean, you know, there's always depends on how many outfielders you take in and, you know, what what you're up against there. And sometimes I wait on outfielders just because they're outfielders. In his case, Util with the possibility of adding off, that might take a little bit of value off of him. That might keep the price a little bit in check though too, as far as the ADP goes for Rooker. I saw Jorge Polanco had surgery to repair the patellar tendon in his left knee. The Mariners have a club option for $12 million for 2025 and this year did not go well for

Polanco. It looked like a good addition at the time. I mean, he missed half of 2023 with injuries in Minnesota, but was on more of like a high 20s home run pace that year. This season, only a 355 slug health could have been a pretty big factor in that. We've talked about the difficulties of hitting in Seattle, his first year there especially.

We saw the K rate jump up to 29.2% overall. So I'm trying to figure out like how much of this was the new environment? How much of this is aging? How much of this is health? And if you're in the Mariner situation, are you picking up a $12 million dollar option on Jorge Polanco? Taking out being the Mariners and just should a generic team, you know, do this option,

I would say yes. Because most of the projections get him out of that one, one and a half win place, and the one and one half win player does not get the money that he's quote unquote deserves. I mean you don't necessarily pay 10 million dollars for one and a half win player. It's just not what you usually get. Most of his projections are over clear that to win threshold where at least he's an average everyday player. Yeah I mean prior to this season before 2024 three consecutive years where he were at least 17 percent better than league average by WRC plus. It was just lost time that was chipping away at his value more than actual per

at bat productivity. So I think it's trickier because of Seattle. It really is. I think there'd be plenty of teams interested in Polanco if he does become a free agent. I think they are going to decline it for the reason you mentioned, not because he's not necessarily worth it,

but because it didn't go well in year one and every dollar seems to matter on their budget right now too. So I think that's the other thing they'd be kicking around is maybe they can find someone else for 10 million that the thing is just as good. Yeah, and the aging curve that you mentioned is relevant. We know that bounce back projections,

and he has sort of a 10% above the average type bounce back projection, Polanco does. Those projections are less meaningful once you cross 30. He's going to be turning 32. The fact that Seattle and the fact that he's 32 might matter more than his actual projections. We've talked a few times on this show over the course of the year about the starting pitcher market and expectations for a few guys.

There's one more name to add to that group. Tomoyuki Sugano is expected to sign with a major league team this off season. He's 35 years old. Doesn't have to go through the posting system, but it's a deep arsenal, right? I think it's a 92 mile per hour fastball, but maybe six pitches that he can actually command pretty well. Someone who's won the Salomaro Award, which is the NBB equivalent of the Cy Young.

So like there's a good foundation here. It kind of feels a little more like a mid or back rotation profile, given the age and the arsenal. But what is your interest level in Sugano now that we know there's a very good chance he's coming to North America in 2025? He had an 18% strikeout rate in Japan, and I would assume that that would go down,

but just to give you an idea of the pitchers that were qualified for the ERA title that had less than a 19% strikeout rate last year. They were Colin Ray, Jose Quintana, Tyler Anderson, Jameson Tynan, Patrick Corbin, JP Sears, Griffin Canning, Myles Michaelis and Austin Gomber. So I think you're hoping for a Michaelis situation and that may sound bad, but, situation and that may sound bad, but you know, take this season aside for Michaelis and he's been a quality, you know, kind of two to three win

starter that's been there for bulk. And that could be something that Sugano does. You know, he had 156 innings last year. He's had some injury concerns, only 86 in 2023, but then a good run of hundreds, 150 innings type seasons, basically a six six K for nine, you know, and I don't. I think that takes them out of the running for a big contract. It's going to be somebody that signs them to be their fourth or fifth guy. Gives them like a two and 20 or something.

All right. So we're looking at more of like a park dependent situation where if he were to land with the Cubs, if his teammates with Jameson tie on, maybe that situation is good enough because the home park will help for at least half of those starts. Royals, I would like, I think I'd like him in a Royals, at least the home runs would be suppressed. Yeah, there might be some spots where that works. I mean, some of the pitchers you mentioned

are still pretty useful in deeper leagues, but yeah, the limited K rate would be a bit of a concern, at least as far as capping ceiling. I'd be surprised if he's going inside the top 300 overall from a fantasy perspective with a K rate that low. I think he might be a good draft and hold. If he gets signed, the team is probably going to run him out there as their starting pitcher. So you know you get some innings.

Some injury updates. Tamar Johnson is okay after an early exit from a game in the Fall League earlier this week. He was helped off the field by trainers. It was just a bad leg cramp, I guess. At first, they thought there might have been something else going on because so few reporters at the Fall League, they just got the report of him being helped off. But I think even after the game, he was celebrating on the field with his teammates. So he was already back in the lineup by the end of the week.

The name to click that everyone has been talking about is your hope. The Dodgers 19 year old outfielder hit a ball 111.6, 475 feet at 19 years old, and he's in the fall league, suggesting that he's maybe closer than than it appears in the rear view mirror. So I think that Hope is a guy that I'm not not sure if he's like a redraft stash yet, but he's definitely a guy you got to circle and remember.

Yeah, maybe someone's going to start popping up on auto new teams here in the near future with the numbers popping like that in the fall. I also saw Andrew Painter is out there getting some work in. Nice to see him in game situations again. Probably going to have some kind of role for the Phillies with some significant workload monitoring in 2025. But, you know, guy we were really excited about before he got hurt. Bryce Eldridge, when you get down there, you know,

I think he is a candidate for making the Open Day roster, actually. I mean, he just tore through the minor leagues and they're putting him in the fall league. So that's an interesting thing. The other name Cristian Encarnacion Seranda is down there and he's hitting the ball hard. He looks slow to me. He maybe just is slow. He's just he is a first baseman I think. It's like coming off the injury though. You have this great differently coming off of rehab. It's been a long year or two so even though you're like probably happy you're healthy enough to get your work in

Things probably aren't feeling great in October when your season started back in February So I think that's probably a consideration too for the rehabbing guys that are out there Jeff McNeil's rehabbing out there trying to get Back on the Mets roster before the end of the postseason So we'll see if that actually comes to fruition here in the coming weeks We are gonna go on our way out the door. Reminder you get a subscription to the Athletic for two dollars a month for the first year at the athletic.com slash rates and barrels. You can find Eno on Twitter at EnoSaris find me at Derek from Rhyper find the pod at rates and barrels. That's gonna do it

for this episode of rates and barrels. We're back with you on Monday. Thanks for listening. Had a couple IPAs, like with the boys.