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Tucupita Marcano Under Investigation For Betting On Baseball

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Padres infielder Tucupita Marcano is under investigation by Major League Baseball for betting on baseball while a member of the Pirates, according to a report from Jared Diamond and Lindsey Adler of The Wall Street Journal. Marcano is facing a lifetime ban. Four other players are under investigation for betting on baseball while in the minor leagues as well, though the identities of those others are not known. The report adds that there’s no evidence at this point of games being manipulated.

Marcano, 24, was placed on the injured list by the Pirates in July of last year and eventually underwent surgery to repair the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee. The Padres claimed him off waivers in November and he has been on the injured list for all of 2024 so far, still recovering from that surgery.

Per the report from Diamond and Adler, Marcano “has been accused of betting on games involving the Pittsburgh Pirates last season while he was on the injured list for that team.” Per the report, the league and the MLB Players’ Association are still discussing Marcano’s ultimate punishment but, as mentioned, a lifetime ban is on the table. Marcano, the league and the union all declined to comment for the piece, though the Padres released a statement:

“We are aware of an active investigation by Major League Baseball regarding a matter that occurred when the player in question was a member of another organization and not affiliated with the San Diego Padres. We will not have any further comment until the investigative process has been completed.”

Brian Warecki, Pirates’ senior vice president of Communications, also issued a statement, relayed by Noah Hiles of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on X. “We are aware of the matter that’s under investigation and are fully cooperating. We will refrain from further comment at this time.”

As relayed by the WSJ piece, the league’s gambling policy is prominently displayed in all clubhouses. Baseball players are legally allowed to bet on other sports but not on baseball. A player betting on teams other than his own faces a one-year suspension but betting on a game involving his own team results in a lifetime ban.

Gambling scandals have been around almost as long as baseball itself. Most famously, the “Black Sox Scandal” saw eight members of the 1919 White Sox were banned for life after being accused of taking bribes from gamblers to throw that year’s World Series. MLB’s all-time hits leader Pete Rose also received a lifetime ban in 1989 after accusations that he gambled on the Reds during his time as a player and manager.

More recently, gambling scandals have come back into the spotlight, thanks to a 2018 Supreme Court decision that opened the door for states to legalize the practice. Ippei Mizuhara, the former interpreter for Shohei Ohtani, is in the process of pleading guilty to bank fraud and subscribing to a false tax return in relation to a gambling scandal. To this point, the evidence of that case suggests he didn’t bet on baseball. However, he did make bets with an illegal bookmaker in California, where sports betting is still illegal. He is alleged to have stolen millions of dollars from an account in Ohtani’s name in order to pay off his debts. David Fletcher of the Braves is also under investigation for placing bets with the same bookmaker as Mizuhara, though Fletcher isn’t accused of placing bets on baseball either. Gambling has also been an issue in other sports, with Jontay Porter receiving a ban from the NBA for gambling violations while playing for the Raptors.

Mizuhara and Fletcher both bet on other sports in a state where it’s illegal, while Mizuhara is also alleged to have committed several financial crimes. MLB commissioner Rob Manfred discussed those situations last month and said the league would be taking a hands-off approach until the legal process played out.

The Marcano situation would appear to be a different matter. If the accusations are proven to be true and he did indeed bet on the Pirates while a member of the team, it would appear to be a straightforward case where a lifetime ban will be the result. Further details on this case, and the cases of the other four players, will undoubtedly be forthcoming in the future.

Padres To Select Adam Mazur

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The Padres are promoting pitching prospect Adam Mazur, as first reported by FanSided’s Robert Murray (on X). The right-hander is listed as the probable starter for tomorrow evening’s matchup with the Angels.

San Diego selected Mazur in the second round of the 2022 draft. The University of Iowa product worked to a 2.81 ERA in 96 innings during his first professional season. Baseball America ranked the Saint Paul native as the #6 prospect in the organization over the winter. BA’s offseason scouting report credited Mazur with a mid-90s fastball and a plus slider to lead a four-pitch mix. The outlet also lauded his plus-plus (70-grade) control, no surprise for a pitcher who walked a minuscule 4.3% of batters faced a year ago.

The Padres started Mazur at Double-A San Antonio this year. He breezed past the level, working to a 1.95 ERA with a near-27% strikeout rate while issuing only five walks in his first six starts. He’s had a tougher time since being promoted to Triple-A El Paso last month. Over four appearances in the Pacific Coast League, he has been tagged for 15 runs in 19 innings. Mazur has given up four homers in a tough setting for pitchers, but he has fanned 18 opponents (22.8%) against four walks (5.1%).

Despite Mazur’s lack of Triple-A experience, he’ll get his first look at major league hitters in Anaheim. The Padres lost both Joe Musgrove and Yu Darvish to the injured list over the weekend. That left a pair of vacancies behind Michael King, Dylan Cease and Matt Waldron. San Diego recalled right-hander Randy Vásquez for a start against the Royals on Saturday. Mazur will get at least one start and could take a couple turns through the rotation. The Padres don’t have an off day until June 13.

San Diego’s 40-man roster is full. They’ll need to make a corresponding move to select Mazur’s contract, though that’ll likely be a procedural transaction. Glenn Otto and Tucupita Marcano have been on the injured list all season and could be moved to the 60-day IL without impacting their eligibility to return. (Marcano is reportedly under MLB investigation for allegedly placing bets on baseball last year.) The Padres will need to option a pitcher as a corresponding active roster move once they officially call Mazur up.

Padres Place Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove On 15-Day Injured List

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1:18PM: The Padres have announced that both Musgrove and Darvish have placed on the 15-day IL.  Musgrove’s injury has been termed as right elbow inflammation and his placement date is retroactive to May 29, while Darvish has a left groin strain and a May 30 retroactive placement date.  Vasquez and Logan Gillaspie have been called up from Triple-A.

Darvish lasted only three innings before his hamstring forced him out of his start against Miami last Wednesday, though the injury has now been diagnosed as a groin problem.  This could be a new injury stemming from the initial issue, or simply a clearer diagnosis after a couple of days of testing.  The Padres listed Darvish day-to-day at first, so it seems possible that Darvish might be back after only 15 days if the injury is somewhat minor in nature.

12:30PM: Joe Musgrove has been scratched from his scheduled start today and will instead be placed on the Padres’ 15-day injured list.  According to Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune (X link), Musgrove is again suffering from the triceps tendinitis that already sent him to the IL at the start of May.  Right-hander Randy Vasquez was recalled from Triple-A El Paso to take Musgrove’s spot on the active roster and to start today’s game against the Royals.

Somewhat ominously, Acee wrote that Musgrove’s triceps issue “is not believed at this time to be a season-ending injury.”  While this is positive news at the moment, the fact that there’s enough uncertainty over this lingering injury that an early end to Musgrove’s 2024 campaign is even a possibility is certainly not a good sign.  Even if no structural damage is found, even relatively minor cases of inflammation or tendinitis can lead to lengthy layoffs, if a pitcher simply continues to feel discomfort when throwing.

Musgrove looked pretty good in the two starts since returning from the first IL trip, posting a 2.16 ERA over 8 1/3 frames.  After laboring through three innings in his first outing on May 21, he looked much sharper on May 26 when tossing 5 1/3 shutout innings against the powerful Yankees lineup in a 5-2 Padres victory.  Considering how Musgrove had a 6.37 ERA in his 41 innings prior to that initial IL visit, it seemed as though he was over his triceps problems and back in his normal form as a frontline member of San Diego’s pitching staff.

Vasquez is a logical fill-in candidate while Musgrove is out, yet Vasquez doesn’t have much big league experience, and his 5.82 ERA over 21 2/3 innings this season indicates that he might not be an ideal choice as a longer-term rotation patch if Musgrove has to miss a significant amount of time.  Even beyond Musgrove, Yu Darvish is also dealing with a hamstring injury that forced him out of his last start, and it isn’t yet known if Darvish will be able to make his next start or if he might also need to visit the 15-day IL.

The Padres’ next off-day isn’t until June 13, plus the rotation has some depth question even with Darvish and Musgrove both healthy.  Dylan Cease, Michael King, and Matt Waldron have settled into rotation roles, and that trio plus Darvish, Musgrove, and Vasquez have accounted for all of the Padres’ starts this season.  Ryan Carpenter or Jackson Wolf could be the top Triple-A depth options, though even accounting for the Pacific Coast League’s hitter-friendly bent, Carpenter’s 8.74 ERA and Wolf’s 6.69 ERA are cause for concern.  (Vasquez also has a 7.45 ERA in 19 1/3 innings for El Paso.)

Jurickson Profar Is Rewarding The Padres’ Faith

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The Padres overhauled much of the roster as they navigated payroll constraints last winter. The outfield was more stripped down than retooled, as San Diego traded Juan Soto and Trent Grisham to both offload Soto’s massive arbitration salary and address a pitching staff that lost four possible starters to free agency. While San Diego subsequently poked around the free agent and trade markets for outfield help, the payroll limitations led them to enter camp with two question marks alongside Fernando Tatis Jr.

Within a couple weeks of exhibition play, it became clear the Padres were going to turn left and center field to Jurickson Profar and Jackson Merrill, respectively. San Diego signed Profar for a barely more than the league minimum in mid-February. Merrill was a 20-year-old shortstop prospect who had never played above Double-A nor logged any game reps in center field before Spring Training. That outfield alignment at least carried ample risk. At worst, it might be the difference between making and missing the postseason for a fringe Wild Card contender.

Through two months, San Diego’s outfield has instead been its biggest strength. Tatis isn’t the same player he was before injuries and a failed PED test wiped out his 2022 season, but he’s an above-average regular. Merrill is hitting at a league average level and playing plus defense at his new position, remarkable work for a player less than three years removed from high school. Yet it’s Profar who has been by far the biggest contributor. He has not only been San Diego’s best player, he’s one of the top performers in the National League.

Profar is hitting .323/.421/.495 across 233 plate appearances. He has hit eight home runs, one shy of the total he managed in 125 games between the Rockies and San Diego last year. Profar is drawing walks at a personal-high 13.3% clip while keeping his strikeout rate at a customarily low 14.2% mark. He’s hitting the ball harder than he has at any point in his career. This season’s 41% hard contact percentage is almost 10 points higher than last year’s middling 31.7% rate.

There’ll very likely be some amount of regression in the next few months. Profar isn’t going to keep pace with the likes of Soto, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman all season. His career has been defined by wild swings in performance. Profar was a slightly above-average hitter in 2018, ’20 and ’22. His performance in the intervening odd seasons was at or below replacement level. Yet this year’s production is unprecedented even for an extremely high-variance player. Before this year, Profar’s career-best OPS over any 59-game span was an .876 mark he managed in the second half of 2018 while a member of the Rangers (h/t to the Baseball Reference Span Finder). This season’s .916 is 40 points higher.

Profar has already more than made good on San Diego’s $1MM investment. Even if his bat were to completely crater in the next few months, bringing him back would be a win for the Padres. President of baseball operations A.J. Preller has long valued Profar more than the rest of the league (and most outside observers) would.

He made a surprising three-year, $21MM bet on the former top prospect during the 2020-21 offseason. San Diego brought him back last fall after Profar played his way off a Rockies team on its way to 103 losses. They didn’t bring in another left fielder to push Profar to the bench this spring. That’s largely because of financial constraints, of course, but San Diego also balked at what proved to be a $3MM price point for Tommy Pham while spending similar salaries on Wandy Peralta, Yuki Matsui and Woo-Suk Go. Preller certainly wouldn’t have anticipated Profar being the team’s best hitter, but it’s probably fair to say he had higher expectations for his left fielder than almost anyone else did.

San Diego heads into the weekend with a 30-29 record that has them in the third Wild Card spot in the National League. They’re still a borderline contender whose season could go a number of ways in the next few months. It would likely take a major collapse for them to sell at the trade deadline, so Profar should play the entire season in San Diego. He’ll return to free agency next offseason going into his age-32 campaign.

Profar has not previously received a qualifying offer, so he would be eligible for the QO if the Padres hang onto him all year. While it seems unlikely the Padres would put a one-year offer worth more than $20MM on the table, it’s not entirely out of the question depending on well Profar hits in the second half. If he hits the market unencumbered by draft compensation, he could land the biggest guarantee of his career. He’s at least trending toward a two-year deal and would have an argument for a three-year pact in the Jeimer Candelario ($45MM) or Lourdes Gurriel Jr. ($42MM with an opt-out) range if his bat doesn’t wilt down the stretch.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Xander Bogaerts To Miss Significant Time Due To Shoulder Fracture

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The Padres announced that they have placed infielder Xander Bogaerts on the 10-day injured list, retroactive to May 21, with a left shoulder fracture. Outfielder David Peralta was selected to take Bogaerts’ place on the active roster. To open a spot for Peralta on the 40-man, right-hander Luis Patiño was transferred to the 60-day injured list.

Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune previously relayed on X that Bogaerts would be going on the IL and a follow-up tweet provided more information about the fracture. At this point, it doesn’t appear as though surgery is required, though Bogaerts will need to miss time as the bone heals, with more tests planned for today. “Late summer” is floated as a possible return time, which leaves a lot of vagaries about the months to come, though Acee says Bogaerts will be out at least two months in a column at the SDUT.

On Monday, Bogaerts appeared to injure himself when diving to field a grounder off the bat of Ronald Acuña Jr. (video link from MLB.com.) The initial imaging was negative, as relayed on X by Acee on Monday, but it seems subsequent tests have revealed a fracture.

The veteran infielder wasn’t off to a good start this year, currently hitting .219/.265/.316 for the season, but has been far better in the past. He hit .285/.350/.440 for the Friars last year and produced similarly for the Red Sox in the five prior seasons.

The Padres would have been expecting Bogaerts to right the ship in the coming months but that won’t happen now, at least not soon. The club is below .500 at 25-26 but nonetheless currently holds the final Wild Card spot in the National League. They will have to try to cling to that spot without that Bogaerts turnaround in the weeks to come.

The club recently acquired infielder Luis Arráez, largely with the plan of putting him in the designated hitter slot. But he’s played second base since Bogaerts hurt himself and could stay there for the foreseeable future. Arráez is one of the best contact hitters in the game but is generally considered a poor defender at the keystone. Bogaerts just recently moved to the position from shortstop and has -2 Defensive Runs Saved this year but four Outs Above Average.

Offensively, the club may now rotate various hitters through the DH slot if Arráez is going to be playing the field regularly. The past two games have seen Manny Machado and Donovan Solano DHing, with Jurickson Profar in there today.

The 36-year-old Peralta joins the outfield mix alongside Profar, Fernando Tatis Jr., Jackson Merrill and José Azocar. It was just over a week ago that Peralta opted out of his minor league deal with the Cubs, which led to a minor league deal with the Padres over the weekend.

With Triple-A Iowa, Peralta was drawing walks at a 14.1% rate but slashing just .217/.341/.348 for a wRC+ of 84. He’s also coming off a down year in the majors, as he hit .259/.294/.381 with the Dodgers last year for a wRC+ of 82.

But Peralta has hit .279/.335/.450 overall in his career, which translates to a wRC+ of 108. He’s also been considered an above average defender in the outfield, mostly in the corners. His lackluster results last year may have been due to a flexor tendon injury, which popped up around the All-Star break and later required surgery. The Padres will surely be hoping for Peralta to return to his pre-2023 results.

Peralta is in left field tonight as Profar is in the DH slot. As mentioned, manager Mike Shildt could give various players DH time for semi-rest days going forward. Though with the Arráez trade, president of baseball operations A.J. Preller has shown he’s not afraid of a midseason deal, even if we’re nowhere near the deadline yet. Perhaps another move will be forthcoming as a response to the Bogaerts injury. But for now, it’s a tough development for a club in an extremely tight playoff race.

As for Patiño, he underwent Tommy John surgery just over three weeks ago and is going to miss the remainder of the season.

Padres Sign David Peralta To Minor League Deal

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The Padres have signed outfielder David Peralta to a minor league deal and assigned him to Triple-A El Paso, per an announcement from the El Paso Chihuahuas (X link). The move comes just days after Peralta opted out of his previous minor league deal with the Cubs.

Peralta, 36, is very familiar with the NL West after spending all but 47 games of his 10-year big league career in the division. The veteran made his MLB debut with the Diamondbacks at the age of 26 back in 2014 and spent the better part of nine years patrolling the outfield in Arizona. A generally solid left-handed bat who could be relied on for production around 5-10% better than the league average, Peralta slashed a respectable .283/.340/.463 with a wRC+ of 111 during his time with Arizona, which included a Silver Slugger award in 2018 and a Gold Glove in left field in 2019.

Peralta’s Dbacks tenure came to an end at the 2022 trade deadline, when he was shipped to Tampa Bay in exchange for catching prospect Christian Cerda. Peralta’s power disappeared down the stretch with the Rays, however, as he failed to hit a home run throughout his Rays tenure and slashed just .255/.317/.335 in 161 trips to the plate with the club. Despite that downturn in production, the Dodgers rolled the dice on Peralta the following offseason and signed him to a one-year deal that guaranteed the veteran $6.5MM. Unfortunately, a return to the NL West did not revive Peralta’s bat as he hit a paltry .259/.294/.381 in 133 games with L.A. last season.

Looking ahead, Peralta figures to offer the Padres veteran depth in the outfield, an area where they’re severely lacking in reliable options. Fernando Tatis Jr. has locked down right field since moving off shortstop last season while journeyman Jurickson Profar is off to an incredible start for the club in left field and top shortstop prospect Jackson Merrill is taking to the center field job quite admirably while learning the position on the fly. Even so, an outfield mix of three converted infielders speaks to the lack of outfield depth in the Padres organization, leaving bench bat Jose Azocar as the only career outfielder on the club’s 40-man roster.

Given that, it’s easy to see Peralta breaking into the club’s outfield mix at the big league level should an injury the team to make a roster move. Until then, Peralta figures to act as non-roster depth for San Diego alongside fellow veterans Oscar Mercado and Tim Locastro at the Triple-A level, where Peralta. The 36-year-old will hope for better results at the Triple-A level in El Paso than he had during his time with the Cubs organization, as he was slashing just .217/.341/.348 in 20 games before he opted out.

Padres Release Matt Festa

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The Padres released right-hander Matt Festa, who’d been pitching with their Triple-A affiliate in El Paso, per the MiLB.com transaction log.

Festa, 31, has appeared in parts of four seasons with the Mariners. He inked a minor league deal with San Diego over the winter. The former seventh-round pick sports a career 4.32 ERA and 3.93 SIERA with a strong 25.3% strikeout rate against a less-encouraging 10.9% walk rate. Festa’s time with the M’s was split between the 2018-19 seasons and the 2022-23 seasons. He had an elbow injury in 2020 that eventually required Tommy John surgery, completely erasing his 2020 season and limiting him to 25 2/3 minor league frames late in the ’21 campaign.

It’s been a decent start to the season for Festa in El Paso. He’s pitched to a 4.50 earned run average — eight runs in 16 innings — while fanning 21.6% of his opponents with a 9.5% walk rate. He’s typically been a fly-ball pitcher in the past but this year sports an above-average 46% grounder rate. He’s been plagued by a .360 average on balls in play, with fielding-independent metrics pegging him about a run lower than his actual ERA.

Festa has pitched reasonably well, and mid-May is a common time for minor league contracts to include opt-out dates, so it’s possible (if not likely) that such a clause came into play here. The Padres only have three bullpen spots on the roster they can shuffle up, as none of Robert Suarez, Wandy Peralta, Enyel De Los Santos, Yuki Matsui or Rule 5 pick Stephen Kolek can be optioned. That leaves righty Jeremiah Estrada, lefty Adrian Morejon and long reliever Jhony Brito as the only players who could’ve been sent down if the Friars had wanted to select Festa to the big league roster. Each member of that trio has performed fairly well this season, however, and Festa himself is out of minor league options. As such, selecting his contract would’ve only further limited San Diego’s bullpen flexibility.

As a result, Festa will head back to the open market and look to latch on with another club seeking some experienced bullpen depth. He’s not a flamethrower, averaging just 92.6 mph on his heater in his career, but he’s nevertheless managed to miss bats at a high level. His 12.5% career swinging-strike rate checks in north of the league average, and he sat at an even heftier 14.3% in that regard from 2022-23. In parts of five Triple-A seasons (108 2/3 innings), Festa owns a 2.15 ERA, a 27% strikeout rate and a 9.5% walk rate.

Latest On Joe Musgrove

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  • Padres right-hander Joe Musgrove is making good progress in his return from right elbow inflammation, according to manager Mike Shildt (per MLB.com’s Injury Tracker). The 31-year-old’s initial worrisome diagnosis was described as “precautionary” when he was initially placed on the shelf last week, and it appears that description was an apt one as Musgrove has reportedly already begun light baseball activities, including playing catch. MLB.com writes that the right-hander is optimistic that he’ll be able to return “shortly after” the minimum 15-day stint on the IL, which would likely result in him returning to action sometime next week. San Diego is surely hoping that Musgrove will look more like the ace hurler who posted a 3.05 ERA in 459 2/3 innings in a Padres uniform entering the 2024 campaign than he has to this point in the season, as he struggled badly with a 6.37 ERA and 5.96 FIP in eight starts prior to his placement on the shelf.

Sean Burroughs Passes Away

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Former big league infielder Sean Burroughs passed away this week at just 43 years of age, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports. Tragically, the former Little League World Series hero and No. 9 overall draft pick collapsed while coaching his son’s little league game.

The son of former No. 1 overall draft pick, two-time All-Star, and 1974 American League MVP Jeff Burroughs, Sean clearly had baseball in his DNA. He starred on the mound and at the plate while leading his Long Beach team to consecutive Little League World Series wins and eventually went on to be selected by the Padres with the ninth overall pick in the 1998 draft. Baseball America ranked him among the sport’s top-100 prospects in each of the next four years, including top-10 rankings each year from 2000-02. Burroughs represented the United States in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney and won a Gold Medal.

Burroughs made his big league debut as the Padres’ third baseman on April 2, 2002 — collecting two hits in his first taste of MLB action. He struggled through the season’s first two months but returned from a Triple-A assignment to hit .377/.433/.410 in 67 September plate appearances. Burroughs was the Padres’ regular third baseman in 2003-04, hitting a combined .292/.350/.384 in 1142 trips to the plate. He struggled at the plate again in 2005 and was traded to the Devil Rays in a 2005-06 offseason deal that sent right-hander Dewon Brazelton back to the Friars.

Burroughs appeared in only eight games for the Rays plus another 37 with their Triple-A affiliate in Durham. He was out of baseball entirely for several years after that and had since candidly spoken about a subsequent spiral of drug addiction and alcoholism. In a heart-wrenching interview with ESPN’s Jim Caple in 2011, Burroughs described the harrowing experience of spending years living in cheap Las Vegas motels, eating out of trash cans and abusing virtually any substance he could find. “I would just try to fill myself with as much substances as I could, legally or illegally,” he acknowledged.

Despite that low point — which Burroughs likened to the Nicolas Cage film Leaving Las Vegas — Burroughs’ baseball career had a second act. He cleaned his life up, got a second chance from late D-backs GM Kevin Towers (who’d drafted Burroughs with the Padres), and played in 78 games with the 2011 Diamondbacks. Burroughs inked a minor league deal with the Twins that offseason and wound up appearing in ten games with Minnesota as well. Those would prove to be the final games of his MLB career, but he spent the 2014-17 seasons playing between several teams in the independent Atlantic League, as well as in Venezuelan Winter ball and in the Mexican League.

Burroughs’ big league career lasted all of 528 games and saw him bat .278/.335/.355. Despite that modest performance, he’ll be remembered as a remarkable talent — one who was thrust into a national spotlight at an early age and racked up more accolades than most players accrue in a lifetime before he even set foot on a major league field. His tragic passing will bring about immeasurable “what ifs,” but Burroughs also stands as a beacon of perseverance. Overcoming his yearslong battle with addiction to return to the major leagues and spend more than a half decade in pro ball is inspirational in and of itself — the type of story that transcends baseball and has the power to impact a far broader audience.

We at MLBTR offer our condolence to the Burroughs family and to his friends, former teammates and coaches, and countless fans around the world.

MLBTR Podcast: Luis Arráez To San Diego, Other Marlins Trade Candidates And Discussing A Potential Automated Strike Zone

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

Plus, we answer your questions, including…

  • When can we expect to see Paul Skenes called up by the Pirates and when do you think Jackson Holliday will be brought up again by the Orioles? (17:10)
  • I’m looking ahead at robo umps calling balls/strikes. Do you think it will dramatically affect counting stats for hitters while affecting pitchers stats negatively in the other direction? (20:55)
  • What measures can be implemented to stop teams like the Tigers from continually rebuilding and why do the Tigers hesitate to send struggling players to the minors? (31:50)

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

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