00:00Do you think it accomplished something when it comes to interest in baseball,
00:05at least during this time of the year?
00:08It is impossible to think of anything bad that would come of this.
00:11I think there's a lot of people that may have not been engaged.
00:14Also brilliant, the night before the tournament really ramps up for March Madness,
00:18so it's kind of a sweet spot there where I think it's going to do a big number.
00:22Baseball is flush with young, interesting, talented players.
00:26It would be really hard to F this up, but don't underestimate baseball's ability to do just that.
00:32Yeah, I mean, they'll, like, Curtis is right, they'll probably have their lockout
00:36because the good thing about MLB, the Players Association and Major League Baseball,
00:42is that they got no problem with being like, nope, we're willing to lockout, we don't care.
00:48And that's why they're probably one of the strongest unions in all of sports,
00:51but that also is going to lead to potentially a lockout because the owners are not going to budge
00:57and the players are not going to budge, so, you know, it's something that's going to happen.
01:01But I think ultimately, you know, people will bounce back and go back to watching it once a deal.
01:08If they miss an entire year?
01:10I think once a deal gets done.
01:11Do you think it'll go that long, Curtis?
01:13I don't, I mean, Mago, I don't know how this is solved because the Baseball Players Union
01:21is the strongest union in professional sports, and it is a badge of honor that they were the first to
01:27have free agency.
01:28I would be shocked if they allowed a cap.
01:32Like, I just, I don't know how, where could you meet in the middle of no cap?
01:37I guess the NBA model, maybe, with the aprons, but I don't even know how, I have no idea.
01:42So there's some kind of a penalty when it comes to those that go over it, but it's not a
01:48financial penalty.
01:50It's a, you know.
01:52Well, the NBA is mostly financial.
01:54They act like there's big basketball things, like you lose the mid-level exception in seven years.
01:58Oh, the horror.
01:59Like, it's just a way for owners to pay their players less.
02:03It's legal collusion is what it is.
02:05Well, I think for baseball, it's just unfortunate because they have made such grounds in the changes that they've made.
02:14Like, for as old and stodgy as baseball is about so many things, being innovative with the pitch clock, however
02:21you feel about ABS.
02:22Sped the game up.
02:23And all the things that they're trying at the minor league level to make, and then bringing up to the
02:28major league, if it works, to make the game more attractive and just a better product.
02:32There's not a lot of other leagues that are doing stuff like that.
02:35And for me personally, like, my favorite league is NBA.
02:38And I've been sitting here for years going, you guys, like, are focusing on the wrong stuff.
02:44Like, you're sitting there talking about stopping teams from tanking, but what about the night-to-night product that you're
02:50putting out there?
02:51And one of the things to me that's...
02:53They want less games while, you know, the NFL season is starting on a Wednesday this year.
02:59Right.
02:59To me, it's like, you know, I do feel like, okay, if people are complaining about your MVP getting to
03:07the line so many times a game, that's something you should look at.
03:11And if people are complaining about the three-pointers have just changed the analytics to a point that the game
03:18is not attractive to casual fans, as much as I can be defensive about that as a basketball fan, like,
03:23that is something that the way that baseball looked at the shift, that the NBA should look at their own
03:29game and say, maybe this is a problem where it's alienating casual fans.
03:33Right. And I think the thing, and the reason why I kind of say that, and I wanted to just,
03:37you know, make sure I did the research on it, is that the bounce back will come if people, if
03:43Major League Baseball comes back and it's interesting, and it's like you said, it's all these changes and the game
03:48bounces back.
03:49Because the last strike that went for a long time was the 94-95 season, Curtis.
03:56That's right.
03:56And then a couple years later was the Maguire, Sosa, Barry Bonds, home run, chase, and that kind of thing.
04:03And there was nothing wrong with that at all.
04:04Yeah, so, well, no.
04:05Nothing ever.
04:05No, no, no, no.
04:07Regardless of the steroid era, I think the sport, people are enjoying it.
04:10I think Curtis is right.
04:11There's a lot of young talent.
04:13So people will be pissed if they do lock out.
04:15But once they come back, I think they'll get those people down.
04:18But you're missing, that's sort of my point.
04:19They had a historic, known cheating going on as a means to get fans back to the sport.
04:27The summer of 98 is one of the great seasons of any sport in the history of sports in America.
04:31Right.
04:31It's not going to happen again.
04:33Like, to bank on a summer with two guys going after the most hallowed record in sports is not going
04:38to happen because they ruined the record because they were all cheating.
04:41No, no, I'm not talking.
04:42I'm just talking the way that people's interest levels are.
04:45Right.
04:45It required a once-in-a-generation season.
04:4815 minutes and then we're on to the next.
04:50So if baseball does come back, it's like, all right, they had their lockout.
04:53And then people will jump right back into it and be like, all right, I'm enjoying it for whatever reason
04:58it might be.
04:58It might be a race in the division.
05:02Yeah, yeah, yeah.
05:03I think that's the way people are.
05:04The only question really for the WBC is the timing of it.
05:09Does the timing change?
05:10And we talked about it earlier, but Mark DeRosa, what was his exact quote?
05:18Who had that chime?
05:19Was that?
05:20Nightingale has it.
05:21He says, they would be more prepared and more dialed in.
05:24We'd be dealing with way less restrictions and way less guidelines on the pitching if it was moved to midseason.
05:29No question about it.
05:30Now, you can argue that that is very similar to the Canadians whining about the format when it comes to
05:39the Olympics.
05:39But he may have a point, which is that you may get, whether it's Garrett Crochet or Mr. Upton or
05:48whoever,
05:49you may have those who would be more willing to do it if it were happening at a different time
05:54in the season.
05:55And get, with what we talked about all week about the NBA potentially cutting the number of games,
06:00what if every four years you do the World Baseball Classic in the middle of the year and you shrink
06:0520 games off the schedule?
06:07Yeah.
06:07So instead of, like, where are they going to fill in all these games, you do 142, and then you
06:12do that July whenever.
06:14And you skip the All-Stars.
06:15You skip the All-Stars.
06:16You can elect All-Stars.
06:17Because they get, because the players would want to be, because they have a lot of bonuses tied in.
06:22Money on the line, bonuses on it, yeah.
06:23But, like, you figure that out, and then you do, July is the World Baseball Classic, and you rejoin it
06:28in August, just like the NHL did.
06:30Yeah, I mean, that would be an easy thing to do.
06:32Or the other thing that you had mentioned, Curtis, where you just go, all right, you do all the other
06:37rounds in spring training,
06:39and then basically it's the final four teams that you do during the season.
06:44And, you know, people can kind of chime in there, and some of those guys would be willing to play
06:48during that time, and then it's not as long.
06:50Right, and the brilliance in the Twitch chat wonders how they would be okay with taking those games from the
06:55players.
06:56Yeah, my guess is the revenue you would gain for those games in the All-Star break would be more
07:02than enough to compensate the players,
07:04that it would be back to even.
07:05You split the revenue, the players get it, the owners get it, everybody's made whole.
07:09Well, this might be stupid, but my question, and it goes to any league that is talking about cutting as
07:13many as 20 games,
07:14is what about the revenue around the TV rights and the streaming rights and everything that you've sold against that?
07:21Like, they plan that out years ahead, so what do you do about that money?
07:26Because money is going to be what drives any of these decisions.
07:28It's not going to be like, hey, in the big picture, this is going to make the season better.
07:32I think right now it would be a good idea to go to the streaming agencies and say,
07:36in four years we're going to do it in July, get into a bidding war, and say who wants to
07:39cover it and who's going to play the games.
07:41I mean, it's not because we have to decide for tomorrow.
07:44Well, no, but I guess to Mago's point, if there's, like, deals that are, I don't know,
07:48didn't ESPN or somebody just do a baseball deal or something like that?
07:53Or your NBC and you said, we've been guaranteed this number of games because of the schedule now,
07:58and we have our Sundays lined up and our talent and everything for the next four years or whatever it
08:03may be.
08:04Like, how do you then change that deal?
08:08But Netflix has a seal.
08:09They have the Yankees home opener this year on Netflix.
08:12I'm sure you could, just like the NFL, the Netflix play like a billion dollars for the Black Friday game.
08:17You could get them to pay specific games in the World Baseball.
08:19But don't you think eventually fans are going to revolt when it comes to paying for games on 10 different
08:27platforms?
08:28It's crazy.
08:29Like, it's ridiculous.
08:30But what are they going to do, though?
08:32It's like flying, right?
08:33No, eventually people are going to say, I can't, they just can't pay it.
08:38Like, it just, it's just, you know, and thank God the games are free here, every game.
08:47We're seven sleeps away from opening day, and every game is free on the Odyssey app and free on the
08:54radio.
08:55But it's just, you have to have 10 different platforms if you want to watch every single Red Sox game.
09:02And the NFL is doing it, too.
09:05Everybody's doing it because they know.
09:09They know if you want to watch it, you're going to have to pay for it.
09:12And people, if they are interested and they want to watch it, they know, all right, I'm willing to pay
09:16whatever that streaming service is because if I want to watch it.
09:19It's, it's no, that's why I said, it's no different than the airlines.
09:22They know we have to fly.
09:23And it's the same way, how many people are going to be like, all right, I'm not watching baseball because
09:28I don't want to get this streaming service.
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