- 5 hours ago
ICYMI yesterday, Nats President of Business Operations Jason Sinnarajah joined The Junkies to discuss how business is BOOMIN' at Nats Park!
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00:00jason sinaraja who is the president of business operations for your washington nationals welcome
00:07jason thanks for coming in man we appreciate your time yeah good morning uh thanks for having me
00:11yeah of course i bet he's been to more countries than you've been to are you trying to say i'm
00:15not
00:15worldly jp why why do you have to start off just making a topical because i just saw you
00:19were you from toronto yes jason was asking him a bunch of like resume questions he's like so
00:24you work at google that's what i do after that boom boom boom boom boom boom i like to find
00:28out
00:28backgrounds well his background is he's from toronto yeah yeah and so that's one country
00:33cakes canada i've been to canada he's here in the u.s just we had a discussion of how unworldly
00:40we are
00:40yeah how many countries have you been to uh 58 i think i actually when i worked at google i
00:46worked
00:47uh in apac as well yeah i worked in japan and all that so yeah oh i've been blessed to
00:52have yeah i've
00:53got a long way to go to catch our guy jason tell him what you were on i think i'm
00:57on five or six
00:58i think i'm in that range well the beauty of dc is you get exposed to a lot of things
01:01so yeah and
01:03i'm way older than he is so i'm like i'm really i'm really behind the age so kind of summarize
01:08what
01:09you were talking to jason uh about so you're a guy who i think you got your mba yes and
01:15then you
01:15worked at google but you end up in the world of sports how did you end up here in washington
01:19yeah you know so i got my mba at university of virginia so shout out to them at darden uh
01:23not too
01:24far i met my wife there as well so uh it was a good experience on multiple fronts but uh
01:29i did
01:29go to google and then um i did what most people do which is hard networking just sending out letters
01:35sending out notes sending out linkedin notes and i got a job at the cleveland indians and
01:39uh they were called indians at the time and uh one thing led to another and here i am
01:44forced four teams later and so for us he's the jvs so jvs on the show is jim vanstone
01:51and you've had this relationship with jim vanstone for years over at monumental you're the jvs of
01:57the nationals uh yeah you know i don't like to make any comparisons i mean they've done a great
02:01job over there we're really uh you know they've been yeah they've been great partners and talking
02:07to them about learning the market and things like that but uh yes i have a role that covers all
02:11the
02:11business side and uh very excited to be here the nationals um the last couple seasons based on
02:19really the the losing after the world series um it hasn't been a hot ticket necessarily tell us why
02:27fans should be coming back to the ballpark obviously we're into the team kind of turning it around on
02:32the field but also what they're getting at the ballpark these days well i mean first off i mean
02:38that you mentioned the team um and again that's paul's uh purview and he's done a great job i think
02:43but
02:44it's an exciting team right i mean even yesterday james wood let off the game with the home run i
02:49can't remember how many games but it feels like every game he's leading i've done a few times there's
02:54an excitement right and our record is what it is we're 500 um we had a tough week last week
02:59uh here
03:00at home but the team is playing exciting baseball so first and foremost the product i think is pretty
03:06exciting for our fans um you got exciting players like cj abrams you know hopefully we vote him in
03:12into the all-star game so vote every day through july 2nd for the all-star voting but you know
03:17we've got caper juiz luiz garcia had a uh he's having a bomb great great weekend player of the
03:22week i believe in the national league curtis mead has been a surprise uh foster griffin's been a
03:26great pitcher so there's the product on the field i think is great so um that's paul's world then in
03:31my world uh or the world i kind of oversee on the business side is we're looking at the game
03:36day
03:36experience and how do we make it better and i've spent a lot of time listening to feedback from
03:41fans listening to our staff uh and trying to find improvements that we can make every day
03:46and every game so that the experience gets better are we perfect absolutely not right there's still
03:51things i hear from fans etc that we can be better but you know things like getting into the ballpark
03:57easier for fans we've moved our season plan holder gate to left field um we've improved our go at
04:03entry which is facial authentication to make it a lot faster we've improved or tried to improve
04:08the food experience i'm sure your listeners have probably have their views on that right um listeners
04:11by the way welcome to call and ask you questions 800-636-1067 as we're joined in studio by jason
04:18sinaraja who's the president of business ops for your washington nationals just to just to um stick to
04:25the food options and the the um you know i don't usually if i go to a game i just
04:32i'm pretty
04:32normal i get a hot dog maybe get some nachos but what were you hearing from the fans regarding the
04:37food was it just because the prices were too high the food wasn't good enough like what changes did
04:42you want to make yeah all of that i mean like first and foremost like we heard that the beer
04:45prices were
04:46the highest in in baseball sports right and so when you looked at it we were offering for the most
04:52part
04:52one size of beer so naturally it's a big beer it's i think it's 25 ounces that's a big dog
04:57yeah
04:57right and so the practicality of that of drinking that much beer at one sitting when it's hot outside
05:04etc probably didn't make a lot of sense and that's what the fans were telling us so we introduced a
05:0816 ounce beer at 8.99 so we could at least have a lower price beer options and i think
05:12that's been
05:13received well but those are the little things right um jason that we're trying to improve upon and and
05:19make those little adjustments our lines of the concessions can be better we have gotten better
05:23we've timed it but we still have a long ways to go and when we have big series like we're
05:27going to
05:27have against the yankees or fourth of july you know those things are exasperated so we're looking
05:31at ways to to improve that so i know one thing i've heard on on several of the ads kids
05:36eat free
05:37or is it that during all games that certain games out at nationals park that's that's attractive for
05:42people who are bringing you absolutely kids to the ballpark so so again i you know i know we were
05:45talking all fair about you know i have kids 14 11 so i'm very sensitive to parents who have kids
05:50coming to a ball game you know the cost the affordability we've had kids eat free over the
05:56years here we've we've offered it now this season from the end of may and we'll offer it um through
06:01september and we are the only team in major league baseball that allows that wow right like when i
06:06learned about that i i you know admittedly i was like very surprised about that but but it is a
06:11great
06:11option right to get a hot dog to get water to get a bag of chips for for families and
06:16their kids
06:17to some families send their kids up and order like eight sausages well you gotta have limits jp
06:24like uh the families have to be respectful of the offer i understand i'm saying you know there's
06:29you know people trying to grasp uh you know like anything right the best intentions sometimes are
06:35taken advantage of right uh you know i mean this happens across all the sports tickets whatever
06:40where you try to have good intentions of affordability and things like that people take
06:44advantage like brokers and stuff like that it happens um i can't say i've witnessed that um
06:49but you know i can't say it hasn't happened but did i see five dollar tuesdays is it five
06:55dollar tuesdays yeah great so so we've had five dollar tuesdays for a little while and we've brought
06:59it back this year they've been very very successful so five dollar five dollar beers five dollar hot
07:03dogs there's a lot of items that are every day five bucks yeah for five bucks which is which
07:08is great right from an affordability perspective the focus groups i've done uh with single game
07:12ticket holders uh they love it on tuesdays and if you've noticed you know our tuesday attendance has
07:16been uh higher than monday and wednesday good tells you that maybe it's working yeah what have you seen
07:21in the attendance overall since the team has played better than expected because i don't know if you
07:27pay attention to this you're a business guy i hope you do but the the team total wins expectation
07:32was about 65 and a half and you're already at 43 so you're gonna i think you're gonna skyrocket
07:38over the 65 and a half but what have you seen in the attendance since the team is playing better
07:42uh so i do pay attention to those win totals i know because we have to do our predictions and
07:46our
07:46modeling uh toward attendance projections uh look it's picking up right i think our month of june
07:52not only with the opponents but also just the middle of the week if you looked at last week
07:56i think we averaged and forgive me if i'm off by a few thousand here but i think we were
08:00averaging
08:00about 28 000 midweek right monday to thursday now granted we were playing the phillies and so forth
08:04but i think that was a great sign of fans coming out schools ended more kids out there's a lot
08:10of
08:10buzz and energy in the ballpark um and i think that really kick-started guys you know if you
08:15remember mid-may we did that hot dog uh promotion on a friday night against the orioles bad day to
08:21be a
08:21bad day to be a hot dog thank you hats were hot they were i saw them going on ebay
08:25for like 300
08:25um but you know it started off there with a very collaborative effort from our organization
08:32to put out something that would be electrifying for our fans and it created an event and if you
08:37were in the ballpark that day the energy was amazing uh and that whole weekend and i think
08:41once that happened it's really kick-started a kind of a resurgence of attendance and the tarps off
08:46thing has become a huge deal yeah yeah and that's an organic thing right we don't i mean we're not
08:51a
08:51part of that we're not encouraging people to take off their shirts or anything like that but
08:54we're also not discouraging that movement i think the the big thing that we saw last week
08:59just a reminder for our fans is you know keep it clean right we want we are a family you
09:03know
09:04atmosphere we want to make sure that the energy is brought by those guys but also in a very very
09:09possible maybe you brand like self-tanning or something for those guys with the charts off maybe
09:13that's a sales opportunity we have talked about that i you know i've i've gone up there to sit
09:17i haven't taken part of it but okay um uh yeah i've been advised not to do that but i'm
09:23sure uh but
09:23you know it looks like fun but there's a lot of energy and you go up there and you actually
09:27look at
09:27what's happening and i told uh grand danny this last week when i was on you know it was striking
09:32to me a couple times i've seen families walking up there okay dads or the kid the boys are going
09:36up there taking their shirts and the mom or the daughter taking pictures it's created a nice
09:41buzz and a nice opportunity for fans and again it reminds you that yes wins and losses obviously are
09:46you know key but we are in the entertainment business and the experience business and fans want
09:52to see that i'm guessing a good amount of those 899 16 ounce beers being consumed in the
09:56the tarps off section probably some of the 25 ounces i hope so i hope so i hope everybody's
10:02having just a good time and and being entertained the way they they want and and enjoying it and
10:08we're trying to facilitate that with our amenities so let's talk about the the stadium itself yeah
10:13it's not a super old stadium but it's not a brand new stadium are you guys looking at improvements
10:18on the stadium itself yeah um you know the ballpark is uh i believe 19 years old now um it's
10:25that old
10:26already yeah yeah almost 20 years old yeah and so oh my god you know look i think the bones
10:30of it
10:31are very very good yeah um you know the city's been a great partner events dc has been a wonderful
10:35partner but we are looking at how do we improve the experience right and it it always goes back
10:40to the fans like what's best for the fans from the vvip fans to the everyday fans the value-seeking
10:46customers i think the things that have changed in sports over the last 10 15 years especially in the
10:52last maybe seven eight years is that fans want almost personalized experiences and you can't just
10:59offer a seat a club and a suite right and that's the way a lot of these stadiums were built
11:06so we've
11:07got to look at how we can um create zones if you will or districts of the ballpark that appeal
11:13to
11:14different segments of the fans the family side the value-seeking person the social-seeking fan
11:19um the vvip like i mentioned somebody who wants to just score what is a vvip i'm not familiar with
11:26like you know there's a whole trend very valuable is that what it is yeah the the the trend in
11:31sports
11:31if you look at monumental for instance you mentioned you know they have the vault right and creating that
11:36very very high-end premium experience for those fans who want that equally as important is the fan
11:42that wants to just have a beer and have a hot dog and score the game all right equally as
11:47important
11:47as somebody who wants to just be out there maybe casually watch the ball game but just be out there
11:52with their friends so we're trying to create experiences for everybody and that's part of
11:56what we have to think through um with the redefinition of our ballpark all right jay we do have a
12:01call
12:01okay we have a fan josh he's calling from upper marlboro let's see what josh has to say
12:06let me pull him up real quick here in the town glad that you're here hey hey hey glad that
12:12you're here
12:12welcome to town thank you a couple quick things man so in one just investing in the team is
12:17essential i was a season ticket holder from 2018 to 2021 and then once the team started disinvesting
12:23i canceled my package this is my first season back with you guys and it's been a good one i
12:27bring my
12:27wife and my three kids there um but please continue to invest in the product on the field when you
12:33guys
12:34disinvest the fans disinvest and then real quick things to improve the family experience and it's pretty
12:39great overall i love the old folks who are there the 70 80 year old like you know attendants who
12:44are just welcoming the kids um a couple quick things that will help one is same day ticket swaps for
12:50us
12:50season ticket holders right now you got to call the nationals if like you're off of work and you want
12:55to move another games ticket to that day you can't do it in the app and so if you could
12:59do same day that
13:00would be helpful and then two small things for the kids one is more autograph time they want to get
13:05their balls signed and so forth and right now it's it's almost impossible to do that and so
13:10except for very very occasionally and then finally t-shirt cannons right now these guys got to try to
13:16heave them up to the top of the stands get some t-shirt cannons so they can move those t
13:20-shirts to
13:21the kids in the in the back a little bit more we're club season ticket holders we love the product
13:26so
13:26far but those few things might make it better thank you josh thanks josh appreciate it man jay what do
13:30you
13:30he came with an agenda yeah yeah bullet points listen you know i've been doing focus groups with
13:35our fans including season plan holders and it's very consistent there's a lot of feedback that's
13:39very similar to what that caller provided so thank you and we'll take that down and uh we're always
13:44looking to improve and the t-shirt cannons uh it's actually something i've noticed as well so thank
13:47you for that all right we'll take more of your calls next for jason sinaraja the president of business
13:52ops for the washington nationals and when we come back i want you to tell everybody what you have on
13:57on deck for the pirate series during july 4th weekend i want to talk about the yankee series too
14:02we can do that as well it's gonna be a big one we'll be right back here on the fan
14:05welcome back to the junks we're joined in studio by jason sinaraja he is the president of business
14:12operations for the washington nationals you're welcome to reach out to him at 800-636-1067
14:18if you have questions about the washington nationals and the way their business is run
14:23you can bounce some stuff off of all right jason he's the expert he is so before we talk to
14:28another
14:28caller another fan you wanted to ask him about the pirate series which is yeah we're gonna finish up
14:33in boston right this week and then july 3rd 4th and 5th the pirates are in town i know there
14:38are a lot
14:38of plans for that series is paul skeins skeins pitching in on wednesday oh he is gonna miss him
14:44yep oh so you're gonna miss him all right that's good that's good from a baseball perspective i mean skeins
14:48might bring some more fans because they want to see him but you want to miss him in terms of
14:51it's better
14:51he's in the dugout yeah he's the dugout during the series that's some fans want his girlfriend
14:56to show up that's fine if he don't can show up and sure jason would have a nice seat for
15:00her
15:00yeah somewhere in the pirate section or maybe in a suite put another 15 000 fans in the seats
15:05he's all in of course uh i think you guys said it all that's great uh no but look this
15:10is a big
15:11weekend i mean obviously fourth of july um you know the third we have fireworks which is always a
15:16nice night fourth is our traditional 11 a.m game we'll be giving out american flags um there's
15:22every fan will get a free budweiser courtesy or if they you know obviously you have to be of age
15:29but uh you know budweiser has uh sponsored that for fourth of july so we're very grateful to our
15:34partner and then on the fifth um we have a patriotic t-shirt that says here for the fireworks
15:39um i do want to call out on the third uh we have a very special guest throwing out the
15:45first pitch
15:45okay aj debansa oh uh we're excited about that i knew he was the wizards yeah i knew he would
15:50do
15:51that yeah and then because you're not upset that he threw one in boston already yeah because he was
15:54he's from boston yeah um tell him not to lob this one okay i didn't see that um and on
16:00the fourth
16:00we have the uh the crew of the artemis ii throwing out the ceremonial first pitch so they'll be around
16:07i mean that is big time but i'll be honest aj debansa's accomplishments greater than the artemis
16:13crew that's just my opinion that's my personal opinion i know again i think going to space is
16:19rather interesting i'll give that but that's not both of them both are very special debansa's
16:24going to retire with more money in his bank well that's yeah both are very special but it's going
16:28to be a huge weekend you know the pirates and us are battling it out here right now we're very
16:32close in the standing so you know we ask everybody to come out i i do i do want to
16:36shout out
16:36that it's going to be very hot i know yeah draft t-shirt our producer is very concerned that it's
16:41going to be super hot so he wants to make sure that everybody at nats park you know like they're
16:44staying hydrated we will have cooling stations we will have um sunscreen available for our fans not
16:51in the traditional dispenser but you go to guest services so we are getting prepared again it's all
16:55about being there for our fans and trying to be proactive uh and trying to make it as hospitable as
17:01it
17:01can be i mean we can't control the weather but um we are very very uh aware that it's going
17:07to be
17:07super hot this weekend and we're going to try to take care of our fans we should have a lot
17:10of people
17:11there and then the weekend after that right before the all-star break the yankees come to town
17:15and that's yeah yeah that's gonna be a huge one i mean we have the astros next week too so
17:19let's not
17:19forget about the astros and then the yanks but we have the yankees uh july 9th to the i think
17:25they're 10th to the 12th excuse me on the 10th which is the friday we have a captain america
17:30bobblehead which is uh one of one of a kind and should be a really cool giveaway but yeah look
17:35it's the yankees there's gonna be a lot of people i'm sure uh there maybe not wearing nationals gear
17:41so i'd ask all of our great fans wearing navy on friday city connect on saturday and the red on
17:46sunday
17:47to really support us and give us that boost as we go into the all-star all-star break i
17:52mean it's a
17:52huge nine game stretch right so it's a big stretch come out and uh support the team please all right
17:56let's go to the yankee fans i'll spend money too jay let's go to neil neil's calling in from
18:01columbia you're welcome to call in at 800-636-1067 if you have a question for jason neil you're on
18:09with the junks and jason sinaraja good morning hey hey junks good morning thanks for taking my call
18:15sure i went to i went to a game last week for the first time in a couple years and
18:20uh i had it at
18:22lunch i was really hungry i was really disappointed in the food options it seemed to have really got
18:26gone downhill um my go-to is ben's chili bowl half smoked with i couldn't find jen ben's chili
18:32bowl i walked around like 80 percent of the lower bowl looking for it was just a lot of basic
18:37stuff
18:38like pretzels and hot dogs and popcorn and chicken tenders and nachos and nothing nothing that would
18:44really fill me up or was uh particularly interesting so those are the basics for a baseball game by the
18:51way let me just defend that those are things that you want at a baseball game i love it a
18:56lot of those
18:56things that he's just taking off like so so he wants he wants more options as i guess is what
19:01he's saying yeah i appreciate that call um thanks neil the ben's chili bowl is not that hard to find
19:06yeah ben's chili bowl is in 231 just so you know um in the right field area uh on the
19:11second level but
19:12um you know i think it's something that i have been noticing as well right we've got to mix
19:18to the caller's point we've got to mix in some variety some local flair with the traditional flair
19:25um you know not to make excuses i came in in january i did notice some of the things that
19:30the caller is mentioning there's some things you can adjust very quickly there's some things that
19:34are a little bit harder to adjust that's one of them we are working very very hard with uh our
19:39food
19:39and beverage partner levy to expand the options you know i focused a little bit more on the
19:44affordability angle when i first got here um but variety has come up in our in our fan feedback um
19:51it is
19:52noted and it's something we're gonna hopefully improve on as we go through the course of the
19:56year but certainly for 27 what do you think of the the model that some teams have adopted i think
20:01the
20:01falcons were the first team to adopt it where it was like boom these are five dollars yeah like a
20:06value
20:06menu type approach so it's funny you mentioned that actually because that idea actually came from the
20:12indians way back before that uh we actually introduced four that's yours one i wouldn't take it just
20:17mine i mean it was a team effort but you know i think the point of the value options every
20:22day
20:22is something that i launched in kansas city obviously did it in cleveland uh it's very much top of mind
20:29for
20:29me and it's something that is you might see something coming down imminent yeah nice well you know every
20:35we had the five dollar offering right now we've got to work with our partner but i do think having
20:40that
20:41um having that option for our fans is really really important um because the experience you know i mean
20:48obviously it it's it has gotten expensive life has gotten expensive and we have to be sensitive to
20:53that as well now you played baseball in college you went to bc you played some baseball in college so
20:59you know you're not just a business guy you were an athlete you know the game i know it's been
21:04a little
21:04bit of a rough stretch with the bullpen blowing some some leads um but just on the positives some
21:11of the numbers i mean you kind of brought some of these guys up so luis garcia's numbers are crazy
21:16compared to what he's done in his in his past i think his career high was 18 bombs he's got
21:2016
21:22james wood's going to be a star for years um if he's a leadoff hitter for the rest of his
21:26career
21:26he's going to be one of the best ones just in terms of just in terms of his power but
21:31curtis mead
21:33i mean i know his average isn't great but the fact that they just plucked him what a find and
21:37he's got 14 bombs already and he's hit some big ones um on pace for you know in the 30s
21:43i mean some
21:44of his numbers and kind of credit the the coaches the the batting coaches uh and paul for for and
21:50his staff for finding these guys but some of the numbers that some of these guys who weren't putting
21:53up these numbers before are kind of impressive especially with garcia and mead yeah you know like
22:00i don't get to i don't get to watch every any of the game because i'm walking around usually but
22:04i'll watch every night i i watch the condensed game so i can see the game i listen to the
22:09different
22:09podcasts that cover us i mean it is it is really incredible i'm glad you brought that up and you
22:14look at the stats and you look at the numbers um again you know i leave the baseball to paul
22:18and his
22:19guys but they've done a great job in my opinion and in what they're doing and getting the most out
22:24of
22:24the players and blake and the staff have really utilized everybody in my opinion very very well
22:29so yeah like i said there's a lot of excitement around these guys i know sometimes they're not
22:33necessarily household names right away but i think we're building something very very special i mean
22:37we could have 300 rbi guys yeah with james cj and luis yeah and to and probably going to lead
22:47the league
22:47and run scored this roster if you would have told me this roster is going to lead major league
22:51baseball and run scored i would have laughed at you i think we're on pace maybe i have it wrong
22:56that we're one of the i think we're going to be scoring the most runs in team history or something
23:01close to that if i recall so so it's pretty remarkable again first inning i i i you know i
23:06say
23:06this on purpose too because you know ask our fans to get in the ballpark earlier too to help
23:10uh get that energy going but it seems like every first inning when james comes up there's a whole run
23:15so uh you don't want to miss that as well what's your relationship like with paul like you guys like
23:21intersect a lot like your daily routines are you guys like ever in the same offices like how does
23:27that work or you guys just like in different parts of the building all the time no we're on the
23:31same
23:31floor uh i have an hour-long meeting with him and coming up in an hour here okay we talk
23:36pretty
23:36regularly um again you know having been in baseball and having been around some of his you know
23:43counterparts at other teams and being trained really well by those like i i you know i leave the
23:47baseball to those guys obviously but it's important to have a dialogue and i i've told him and you know
23:52say it again here you know we're here to support the product which is the baseball guys and so we
23:58do
23:58everything and everything i think about is usually supporting him and supporting the team and um i think
24:03he would say the same thing on the business side and he's been amazing in terms of supporting us
24:07uh and coming out to different functions where they're talking to our uh ticket our season plan
24:12holders to get them excited um going to various events uh you know he's been a great partner and
24:20i'm really thankful for the opportunity to work with him now you had the mgm sports book there for a
24:25while right yes is there plans to bring a sports book back uh you know so right now we're evaluating
24:32that space that mgm did make the decision to close that sports book to your point uh and so uh
24:39right now
24:40it is a uh i don't want to call it dead space but it's a it's a space that could
24:44be utilized
24:44differently we're exploring options it's in transition it's in transition mode i mean bed
24:48mgm is a great partner yeah so that's again i just want to be clear that was their decision but
24:52at the
24:52same time we're we're working hand in hand with them and we're very supportive of of the signage and
24:57obviously the partnership um so we've got to figure out what we want to do in that space
25:02cakes you can bring back your vending machine business no it's a failed business it's too big of a
25:07space yeah i mean look i mean i i try to focus on what go you know the rest of
25:11the ballpark right
25:12now but you know everything's on the table there nice they've got plenty they've got plenty of
25:16vendors they don't need me mucking up the works over there at nationals park well jason we want to
25:21thank you again for taking some time out of your day to come and join us in studio we appreciate
25:26it we
25:26know you've got a lot going on at the ballpark he just moved yesterday i know oh you're bouncing back
25:32he moved yesterday closed yesterday okay well he had he had people moving him you think oh of
25:38course i think a man of jason sinaraj's means and importance is moving a bunch of boxes from one
25:43house to the other i don't think actually i did but uh no no i yeah we i i did
25:48move my family yesterday
25:49uh they are now here we're really excited to be a part of this community it's awesome
25:55coming up you've got the pirates on the third fourth and fifth on the third you've got the freedom
26:00fireworks presented by budweiser then you have the 1105 start on july 4th and of course on the
26:06fifth you have the nationals patriotic shirt giveaway so lots of great things for nats fans
26:11to take advantage of and then the astros and the yankees are in town yes after that so super busy
26:16thanks for the time we really do appreciate it thanks guys thank you your washington nationals
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