No Crying In Baseball

Patti 0:00
Hi and welcome to episode 427 of No Crying in Baseball, the Baseball is Hard Episode. My name is Patti. I'm here with my friend, Pottymouth. Hey, Pottymouth.

Pottymouth 0:26
Hey. So here we are. We survived the wild card mess

Patti 0:30
well, and we didn't, but we did, well, yeah, we did. Have you personally did, like multiple people express condolences. I've had people say, How you feeling, yes. Pottymouth, yeah. Like people are concerned about us, and I appreciate that.

Pottymouth 0:43
I totally do. I was, of course, concerned about my dad. My dad's hanging in there. You know, definitely disappointed, but ready to switch sports into the winter sports Sure. You know, there's always next year kind of thing, yeah? But you know what really got me was when the Yankee fan, whom with whom I work, came up in full Yankee regalia, like shirt hat, big honking necklace, you know, one of the and had an extra necklace that he offered me. And I just giggled because, you know, I had sort of done the same thing after game one, and, you know, play and

Patti 1:20
all that. If you're gonna dish it out, you

Pottymouth 1:22
got to be able to take it. So I did you take the necklace? Did you wear that? I did not wear the necklace, but I did take a selfie of the two of us and sent it to my other Yankee fan friend to say, see what I have to put up with all day. You would be happy. And of course, my other Yankee friend friend was very happy that I had to go through that shit. But you know, that's the way it goes. That's sports.

Patti 1:41
That's sports. Yeah, and, you know, we both grew up with, well, there's always next year. Yeah, we can say that

Pottymouth 1:47
again. Yeah, I do have to say, though, however, that the timing, like, super, super, super sucked, because it was literally the worst Yom Kippur ever, because, and we had talked about this maybe last week, that that the the Red Sox Yankees games were book ending Yom Kippur. So it was starting the fast and ending the fast, and that was game two and game three. So I started the fast with a painful loss, like game two. There it was, you know, they lost by one so many fucking opportunities, so painful. And that's supposed to be like, you know, I was hoping that I would be going into Yom Kippur with a little bit of positive energy, but it was like a drag down. And then the next day, we actually left a little bit early, because there was a lot of baseball to watch that was like, you know, we made it through. Yes girl, I felt like that counted. Came home every fucking game my team, the team that I was, like, actively rooting for, especially to distract myself from hunger lost. So it was like first Cleveland, then San Diego. It was just the whole thing was super painful. And then it ended with that just sad, sad Red Sox game that I know we'll talk about a little bit more

Patti 2:55
share with the class how you broke your fast. I got a photo, yes.

Pottymouth 2:59
And then we broke the fast with a shot of tequila, and then I had a beer with dinner, but I was really thirsty. I did try to drink water first, because, like that, you know, that's the worst thing from Yom Kippur, but I know that more beer went in at a faster rate than food, and that was actually like, what really like, tanked me for that Red Sox Yankees game. So like, at the beginning of the game, chug the tequila and the beer a little bit, and then I started feeling woozy. Like, right when things got woozy, like the fourth inning, I got woozy also it was and, like, usually a shot in a beer isn't a bad but if you haven't been eating or drinking for 24 hours even later, yeah, yeah, it was kind of with the beer, but not I did not stage it well enough. So yes, the moral of the story is stop. Next year, I will stop after the shot of tequila and eat before any other consumption.

Patti 3:55
I think that's wise. And the nice thing is, we have this recorded, so we make sure we play this back, play this back before Yom Kippur next year. So you lessons learned can actually be shared, yeah, and acted upon. I like it. Timing is important. Yes, we had a lot of fun yesterday our our little hometown had their their street festival. So there was a lot of light music and snacks and, you know, friends making art and all kinds of things, yeah. And so we bumped recording yet again to Monday yet again, which means we got to watch yesterday's games and have not seen the Monday night games, so we don't have the National League game the game two. Yeah, right, yeah. But so that's what you'll hear about, and you'll know a little more when you listen to this than we do when we're recording it, which just seems to be always the case, yeah?

Pottymouth 4:41
But that's you guys have stuck with us through it. So here we keep going. We're used

Patti 4:45
to these things. Hey, we're drinking a delicious beer. Yes, I wasn't. It was an Oktoberfest beer from elder pine.

Pottymouth 4:51
Yeah, right. It's called autumn awaits. But it's really not a waiting

Patti 4:54
we're really Yeah, and it's very good. I'm very happy with this one, yeah.

Pottymouth 4:59
And then we're, well, I. We'll announce it when it comes we have another Oktoberfest. We're pretty close to it, but we're not there yet. Absolutely. Speaking of people sticking with us, though, I want to give a big shout out. Thanks to Aiden, our newest Patreon friend, who joined at the teammate level, and much appreciation there. And we will tell everybody else how to do that at the end of the show, welcome Aiden.

Patti 5:21
All right, one more sip. Okay, one more sip. So we're gonna talk about boyfriends. Who are the guys that we pick in the off season? I'm letting letting you know potty mouth finish the beer while I chat. So we each pick one guy per team based on anything that we want to base it on. Really, the bottom line is, is it somebody we would like to sit and have a beer with and talk to? They may be great at baseball, they may have a good backstory, they may have excellent philanthropy or things that we really care about, but anyway, we're following them, and now there's fewer and fewer, because we're in the postseason.

Pottymouth 5:48
Yeah. So what do you got? So I just wanted to point out that last year, only one of the wild card matches went to three games, and this year only one of them didn't. And of course, that was LA and the poor reds. I do feel bad about how that went down, but everybody had pretty much predicted it. So boyfriends left standing. So these are the guys that we had picked who are on teams that are still playing for the American League. I have been fucking rice and I am bitter. So this is my Yankees boyfriend, because he's doing great. He's doing really well. I picked him for a lot of really good reasons. He does have a lot of character. And actually one of the reasons was he's a gringo who speaks Spanish, which I can identify with and and there was an interview of a beer soaked him speaking Spanish very well. So yay. Ben rice,

Patti 6:40
however, like him as a human,

Pottymouth 6:43
yeah, I do. I mean, I think that's kind of the thing about most of these Yankees. Oops. That's, there's a lot of foam in that. It's controllable,

Patti 6:51
is it? It's going back down, all right, that's gonna say there's a start my second beer

Pottymouth 6:55
towels nearby, but they're over there, over there. So Ben rice speaking Spanish, I blame him. You know, there's a lot of blame to go around, but because he's my boyfriend, and you know, you can always blame the folks that are closest to you, I blame him for the beginning of the downfall of the Red Sox, because he's the one who really set the tone in game two and hit the two run home run off Brian Baio to just like, shift things, and I feel like that's where the momentum went. And you know, if I'm gonna blame someone, might as well blame my boyfriend. So sure there's Ben rice. I think that, you know, he showed Aaron Boone that skipping him for Game One was a big mistake. And you know, we'll see what happens. But Toronto seems to be doing okay against him. Andy abanez is my Detroit boyfriend, and I did not have high hopes for him. He's kind of a utility and he spent a lot of time this season in triple A June and July. And the result of that, actually, is when he finally got brought back up at the end of July. He played three games at the end of July and got five hits on eight at bats with two RBIs. So his July stats, when you look at the splits, look crazy amazing. 625, average, 1.875 ops. But you know, then he started playing more games, and things evened out back down to sort of mediocre. Low two hundreds, high 500 Ops is so that's really not great for August and September. So I didn't think he was going to be much of a presence in the postseason, and he played in the game three of the wild card didn't do anything, but at least I got to say, hey, there's my guy. And sometimes that has to be enough. Yeah, so that's it. We'll see if he shows up anymore in the he's still on the roster, so you never know. Ernie Clement, I am super happy with and you know, some of my poor performance in our fantasy league that we made out of our baseball boyfriend could be due to, you know, the guys themselves. I could blame them for underperforming. Part of it could be me doing some poor management, me and Aaron Boone, right, sorry, poor

Patti 9:01
management, not poor in management. You

Pottymouth 9:04
were managing, but

Patti 9:06
yeah, I just

Pottymouth 9:06
want to make sure, no, no, no, yeah, right, absolutely. Poor, poor management. Yeah. Ernie Clement, I ignored for way too long. He should have been on my roster much earlier. He had his career best season this year with Toronto's Best season in 10 years. So there might be a little bit of correlation there. He looked like in the beginning he was going to be just potential, just but, you know, very utility. Utility guy can play all over the infield. He ended up playing 157 games. 89 of those were at third base, where I had him slotted in. But you know that versatility I should have taken advantage of a lot more, because he also played 60 at second, 29 at short, and 15 at first. He led the American League in defensive war, which is crazy. It's crazy, especially for somebody moving around. Much offensively, he didn't do too badly either. 277, average, 711 ops. And most importantly for baseball, boyfriend cred, he got the heart and hustle for Toronto. He started the fun in game two against the Yankees with a two run home run in the bottom of the second and went three for four with three RBI, so I'm hoping that game three he shows up tomorrow night, and can add to that, those accolades, Jackson chariot in game one yesterday. So this is my brewers guy, the Youngin. He went three for three with three. RBI, three is that magic number in two innings. First inning, he actually got to bat twice. He had the lead off double, and then at the end of the inning, two RBI single, and then he was out with a hamstring injury. And he was out most of August with a hamstring injury. So this, you know, put up the antenna. Lot of worry here, especially, you know that mom, like, you don't want it, because they were saying, Well, maybe he can be right back. And you don't want him to play and get it. Make it worse, I think

Patti 11:11
it's important to say this is the same hamstring. Yes, this is the previously injured hamstring.

Pottymouth 11:15
Injured. All over again, it is the exact same one on the on the bright side, he is the first player in MLB history, at 21 years of age with three hits in the first two innings of a playoff game. So I just checked before recording, and he is playing tonight. Yeah, he's playing. They're having him lead off. He's also it's not DH, he's playing right field. I think he's on a very short leash.

Patti 11:40
I'll know pretty quickly if he's leading off, if he's okay, right? Yeah, I really

Pottymouth 11:44
hope that this is okay, because I don't, you know, it's only the second game. I don't know if it's worth it, but, you know,

Patti 11:51
important vocabulary, Jackson cheerio, with his second at bat in that first inning, that was when you could say the team has batted around, right? It doesn't mean they've gone through the batting order once. It means they've gone through the batting order and started again through the batting order so that that lead off hitter has to bat again for you to be able to say they batted around, which

Pottymouth 12:14
means they did really well. It does. Good job guys. Good job brewers. Yeah, I'm actually kind of like quietly hoping for brewers, mariners at this point, for World Series. Yeah, it'll be really cool. But you know, there's one more guy I have who is still out there that's in the package, who is on the Dodgers, the absolute favorites. But you know, you never know. We'll see what happens. He scored the tying run in game one, which was that big upset over the Phillies in Philadelphia. He was on second based when Teo te Hernandez hit the three run home run. So he had gotten a single he advanced to second when Will Smith got hit by a pitch. And there was a little bit of rumor that he caught Matt Strom tipping pitches and that he signaled to Teo from second base. Now, if he did that power to him, he's on second. It's like there's no trash cans involved. There's no video involved, no watches. You see if Matt Strom is tipping pitches enough that the guy on second can relate to home base. You know, that's fair game, fair by me. So we'll see what happens with that matchup. I could have had more boyfriends in the finals, because we also have three more teams. I haven't mentioned Seattle, cubs and Philadelphia, but all three of my picks from those teams were released. So this goes back into my bad management and my bad decision making. Donovan Solano, I picked from Seattle. He was released September 1. He was actually picked up by the Rangers on a minor league contract. He's 37 years old. I'm thinking he might be done this off season. Alexander Canario, on the other end of the age spectrum, very young. He was traded from Chicago to the Mets in February, dfade, and then picked up by Pittsburgh in March. He's still pre arbitration, so he'll be in Pittsburgh, and I hope the best for him. Probably could still be sent down a little bit. We'll see how it goes. He was, you know, kind of struggling to keep the numbers up there. Cody Clemens, of the last name fame. He went from Philly to the twins in April, and did much better with the twins. He was on, I believe, a one year contract with the Phillies. So I'm not quite sure where that leaves him for next year, because he's still also pre arbitration years. Gonna be on one a one year contract, if it's pre arbitration. Don't understand, I don't know. I saw that it was, yeah, yeah, there's, there's some issues. Yeah, he's been around for a while, like, maybe that's it. That's been, like, multiple years, but he still hasn't put in enough appearances, I think, to be fascinating at the point where he's a free agent. So I don't know that's, that's me doing, like insufficient research yet again, and I'm just gonna open a beer and listen

Patti 14:51
to you. All right. Oh, we have another beer. We are, yeah, we're on our second October. We're, we are taste testing, actually, very fluffy, very fluffy. See Oktoberfest beers. This one is from seven Lux. We have the same one the seven Lux Oktoberfest with a very lovely beer bear on the label, and it's also quite delicious. Yeah. So yay, yay for local brewers with their Oktoberfest beers. All right, my boyfriend's left standing for the American League. Jason Dominguez, for the Yankees, is on the roster. He's on the postseason rush. He was on for the wild card. He is still on for the ALDs. Has not seen a lick of playing time in that series or in this one, yet. I kind of think he's there in case somebody else goes bad.

Pottymouth 15:33
Yeah, you know, actually, you have another guy on the Yankees. You have Jose Caballero, who you picked for Tampa, and he's been doing some third base for the Yankees, and he's doing pretty

Patti 15:42
good. Interesting, yeah, well, you know, it's too late in the season for me to swap out the big friends. So there you have there you have it. All right, National League, however, interestingly, my two guys there are playing each other, so only one of them will survive, but you get to win, but I'm gonna win no matter what. And yeah, I don't know which way I'm gonna go on this. So my PCA report, so Peter Armstrong, with the Cubs, did you have Carlos? And I don't think either of us had Carlos Santana as a boyfriend, but he was, I loved him when he was with the Cleveland team, and then he went other places, and he went back to Cleveland, and then he went to the Cubs, and he's like the elder statesman, and he has kind of taken Pete Crowe Armstrong under his wing. And I think we may have talked about this before a little bit. And, you know, Pete had a, you know, this first half of the season, everybody was talking about him, like, how high is the ceiling? How hard, you know, how can he go? Whatever. And Carlos Santana, like, buddy up to him and said, play your normal game. Try to end it strong. Don't let the emotions control you, because the team needs you, and you're one of the best players. So he's trying to help him, because then he started slumping and all of that. And in fact, in the to the wild card games versus San Diego, the first two games, he went over six, good, not good. But in game three, okay, between innings, as Carlos Santana saying between innings when he fails and I see him a bit loco,

Pottymouth 17:04
I tell him, I tell him,

Patti 17:07
Hey, what did I say? Remember, remember, remember, right? And so in game three, he ended the first inning with a sliding catch, then he had his first postseason hit, which was a single with the bases loaded to score when he ended up that game going three for four, and it was his first three hit games since August 15. He also caught the final out, which was like, when they clinched right, it was like, Okay, we just won the wild card. And he took a second, like, he didn't just like, rush in to jump on his teammates. He took a second to turn it in the outfield right. He turned around and looked at the fans and thanked the fans, before he, like, jumped back in and he said two things. One is Carlos Montana, said he put it into practice. It's not how you begin, but how you finish, and that's how I helped him. And then Pete said, kind of about the, you know, looking at the fans. He had said, you know that the fans have been there the whole time. It matters. We do it for them. We do it because with their help and all of these things. And he said, but, yeah, baseball is hard. I showed you all that. Right? Remember, he slumped. He did great. And then some of the base I showed you all that we've all shown you that that's no secret. These are the moments we work for, but we also work to continue playing through this postseason. So, you know, he had a great first half. He slumped a bunch. He had some clutch things at the end, but he has that attitude that I could see him in like five or six years of being that clubhouse guy that like the B and being the Carlos Santana guy, right? Taking the younger guys, like, under their wing, and saying, okay, all right. Here's your perspective. Here's how you think about it, all right, my other guy, Sal free look from the Brewers

Pottymouth 18:45
on that other side. Yes.

Patti 18:47
So the game the potty mouth reference the Milwaukee Cubs game. They had a six run first inning. The Milwaukee did. It was the most in Milwaukee postseason franchise history, the most runs in an inning, six, six runs right, and then they kept going right. So we had a little boyfriend and boyfriend action here, because Sal, in that inning South freely reached on a Nico Horner error, and he goes one of my past boyfriends, and that scored Contreras here you need to know that an error doesn't get you an RBI. So he scored on an error and salary based on an error, but that didn't that RBI. That wasn't an RBI, right? Even though a run scored because of that hit an REI. So that's where we get all our hiking, right? Okay, so, so if Nico Horner had played, had made that play, it would have been an ending, an inning ending, double play. But it was not so the flood gates remained open, and you know, the rest of the six runs scored, and Sal scored one of those six, so he was a piece. Of that. I also have the Philadelphia pitching, my pitching flock, so a good thing. That's a good thing. So Christopher Sanchez is one of my guys, and so in game one, there was a five end of being a five, three loss. That was a heartbreaker. It was a heartbreaker, but he struck out eight, pitched five scoreless innings. It was until they got into the six that he gave up two runs. And it was interesting, because they're, you know, he's getting the press saying, Oh, my God, you were fantastic. You had like the five, you know, and the scoreless innings, and then, you know, look at the team that, you know, this was the Dodgers, right, yeah. And you kept them to like, zero for, you know, no runs and the first and the first five innings and but Sanchez is like, No, it's not individual things here. He said we lost tonight. So personally, I don't care about how I did individually. If we lose, then I don't feel good. One pitch changed the game for us and for me personally. So, yeah, I mean, so, but, but I like the we're in it together. You know, it doesn't matter that I struck out eight guys if we didn't win. Yeah, I had a good night, but not good enough, because then I gave up that they know, the two run double and, you know, but they're, a team, and I really like to see that they're a team.

Pottymouth 21:23
Yeah, they're playing as we speak right now. I'm really sending good vibes to to the Phillies wearing my cow Schwab shirt. Yeah, you are okay. You're gonna do your outs.

Patti 21:36
Oh, you did your outs already. Okay? So my guys who are out now, so I'm Brian playoff rockio From Cleveland.

Speaker 1 21:43
He deserves to be in the playoffs. Yeah. So adorable. So um,

Patti 21:50
cheers, yeah. Cheers. So, you know, in game two of the wild card in Cleveland, in Detroit, it was tied one one to the bottom of the eighth. Jose Ramirez, here we go again with the, you know, the veteran, the elder statesman, talking to the kid, and said, with two strikes, look for the fastball in. Swear to God, two strikes, look for the fastball in, and hit the home run into the wind, coming straight in from center field and kicked off. You know, we hit that home run, kicked off a five run inning to come back and win six to one. So very exciting. It's the first time in team history that a player hit a Go ahead homer in the eighth inning or later when facing elimination.

Speaker 1 22:29
Wow. Yeah,

Patti 22:32
it he also hit the fifth fastest pitch that any Cleveland player has homered off in the pitch tracking era, regular or postseason, that's back to 2008 it was that hard a pitch, and he whacked that puppy out of the park. He did score run in game three, but that wasn't enough, because Detroit, who I'm not excited about, also out of the playoffs. Say, Don Rafaela, my Boston guy that I'm not excited by, no, he scored runs in both wild card games one and two. He also, however, popped out to the pitcher instead of laying down a routine bunt in the seventh inning with two runners on and the game was lost by one run. So had that bunt gone the way bunts should go, it could have made the difference in the game.

Pottymouth 23:17
Well, I absolutely lost my shit on that bunt because it was so bad. I mean, it would just went the wrong direction, and it was the wrong thing at the wrong time, and that one run made the difference. Yeah, I earlier blamed this on Ben rice, but this also right? Oh, it was so hard, so hard, yeah.

Patti 23:36
And honest to God, a lot of the commentators have been talking about bunting because it's kind of gone out of fashion. But there are places we need to do it. And yeah, that the general consensus from behind the microphones, you know, from like the TV broadcasters, is they need to practice that more. Yeah, they need to be better at the bunt. I agree.

Pottymouth 23:53
I like this mom ball, all right. I, you know, couldn't let a postseason episode go by without mentioning Kike Hernandez, because he is Mr. October. He is back for October. So after three games, at the time of recording two wild card in game one for the NL, he's batting 500 sure is he had a double in the top of the six in game one to get the Dodgers on the board. So that's when, you know, they were trailing in Philadelphia against the Phillies, and Kike does his Kike thing, gets the Dodgers on the board. And then cousin Teo. They're not really cousins, but you know, Step Brothers, right? They have that step brother like meme thing going. Finished the job with the three run home run previously mentioned in the seventh inning. Other things to love about Kike. So he is all in for October. He is known as doing much better in October than previously in the season. And one thing that I kind of noticed was his QR quality hairblood replacement. It trademark Ollie, getting pretty impressive. And even Mr. Potty mouth noticed it, yeah, mentioned it. And then I saw a post game interview with him. Apparently others are noticing the Q heart. And he actually said that it's starting to bug him and that he wants to cut it. However, he promised his daughter Penelope that he would be Flynn Rider, for how? Yeah, I had to look that one up. I knew it was a Disney something, but I don't know. I don't know it's Rapunzel. I guess I got to see it, because now I got to see Flynn Rider, yeah,

Patti 25:32
you really do. And, yeah, resemblance, he's, he's a good hero. I could see why Penelope would want that.

Pottymouth 25:40
Yeah, and, and baby number two is due to drop, I think, mighty soon, like I

Patti 25:44
want to say, drop. We don't drop. What? What is that? We don't drop babies?

Pottymouth 25:49
That's, I guess, in the position you're in. But yeah, you, I mean, to make its appearance into the world. Let's see, yeah, I think

Patti 25:56
next up delivery, not in the context of holding a baby and then dropping. That's context is key, exactly,

Pottymouth 26:02
yeah, the Hernandez are going to have another baby, Hernandez. Hernandez. The other thing I found interesting that actually came out quite a while ago, but was referenced again recently, is Kiki has mentioned his ADHD as a factor for his postseason performance, because he says that in the regular season, there are way too many distractions. There's a lot going on, whereas in the postseason, it's easier to focus. You've got you know your specific route, your specific opponent, and you can sort of lock in and you're gonna play that team over and over again for a little bit. Yep, yep. So, so he said it was last year, 2024 that was last year. Um, last year on base with Mookie Betts, one of my favorite podcasts. He said, quote, my brain. I think my superpower is also my kryptonite, and that's called ADHD. So during the season, my brain is just everywhere. In postseason, it just brings out, like hyper focus, I just go into complete mode. So, all right, power. Tune.

Patti 27:01
Fascinating. All right, for police blotter this week, and we've been kind of highlighting fans behaving badly. I'm sorry about this one, but um, part of why I'm doing it is because I wanted to say cam schlittler.

Pottymouth 27:18
There, there. There have been so many good plays on his name.

Patti 27:22
Broadcasters have been having been doing a lot of bits about him. Like, yeah, how do you so? Like, he's one of the guys that is often referred to by his first name instead of his last name, in order to avoid, you know, fines from, you know, FCC. And also, oh yeah, it's, you know, the big guys coming in or whatever. But we can do it. It's schlitter. Schlitter. We can do this. Okay, so here's the thing. He got messed with by fans online, and so did his family, yeah, and he's especially ticked about it, because he's actually kind of from Boston. He is from Boston. He's from Boston. So we all say, is a Walpole? Am I say, how do you say

Pottymouth 28:01
Walpole is very good. Yeah, it's not technically, in Boston, miles away, according to what I've read. But we also, like, I'm not from in Boston. But I said, Yeah, Boston, like, yeah. So he, you

Patti 28:12
know, he grew up close to Boston, he went to Northeastern, and he lives in Boston in the off season. Yeah, Northeastern is, these are his people, right? So he was really disappointed by online harassment from Boston fans toward his family. His mother had to take her accounts, her social media accounts, private because she was getting so much crap dished to her. And so what he said was, I think if it was a different fan base coming at them, I'd probably be a little bit more okay with it. I think it just being Boston was a little bit more disappointing, but then he said it also fueled the fire. I mean, he had a historic performance in Wild Card Game three. It was his playoff debut. He became the first pitcher to throw at least eight scoreless innings with 12 strikeouts and zero walks in a postseason game, he threw his career high 107 pitches. He said his friends and family are Red Sox fans, he said. He said, You know, they they were bummed. You know, they were kind of supportive of me, but they were bummed because that, you know, that's not their team. They're Red Sox fans. But I like what he said actually refers to what you said moments ago. He was like, they'll get over it. Hockey season's coming up, basketball season's coming up. I'm sure they've got other things to distract them. That's how they roll in Boston. So, yeah. So he was, again, he just disappointed that it happened, but has a pretty good outlook, and he managed to use it. It reminded me of when Harper would come up to bat and people would yell things like, overrated to him, and he's like,

Pottymouth 29:34
you know, yeah, yeah. So there was something about when he got picked up by the Yankees, because his family and he were lifelong Red Sox fans, and he said, you know, as soon as I got picked up by the Yankees, they all changed their wardrobes. And my, you know, my family started wearing Yankees gear, but not really outside in Boston, because people you know, are gonna judge because they're like that. But there is zero excuse. I mean, there's one. Thing to do, the Yankees suck chant, that's, you know, expected, that's just recreational, really, really, or, you know, to mock Yankees fans walking down the street in Boston. But the online harassment, there is zero excuse for and good people's families. Not okay, not okay, never okay. No matter the fan base, no matter the situation, better you better fan base. So I will be an exemplary Boston fan for you all to follow the model, more or less, more or less actually, actually, in school this week we have, this is potty mouth going on another tangent. It's in a caritage month. And so we have, like, a week with, like, all sorts of theme days. And so today was Flag Day, and you love a theme day? Oh yeah. I mean, I will dress up for you know, it's a good excuse to wear something creative to work. So today was Flag Day. I wore my Ecuador shirt because it's flag colors. Tomorrow is dress up as a Hispanic celebrity day. I'm like, Who thought of this? But whatever. And I'm thinking, I'm thinking, and I thought of somebody that I can dress up very easily. Big Poppy.

Patti 31:01
Does that involve accessories?

Pottymouth 31:02
So I need to get every fucking chain that I own and wear them. Mr. Potty mouth has an Ortiz jersey. I'll wear a hat backwards and yeah, done. I think you know, we had those beards from 2013 Halloween when I was Mike Napoli and Mr. Potty mouth was Shane Victorino. And I'm wondering if the Victorino beard is close enough to big Poppy now it's kind of it's, yeah, definitely not the Napoli beard that was huge, but the Victorino beard might work.

Patti 31:29
One of my fondest memories of when we volunteered at the at the All Star Game festivities in Cleveland was meeting Napoli, and I got to say, she dressed up like you for Halloween.

Pottymouth 31:41
That was the best. That was absolutely the best. That was already an athlete. You do have that picture, folks back by popular demand, if anybody wants to see

Patti 31:51
Oh, my God.

Pottymouth 31:54
Oh, it's so good to laugh before we go into shit, right? It's my turn to talk. Yeah, alrighty. I want to mention a little bit of a conflict going on with the Los Angeles Dodgers. And this is nothing super new. Back in episode 412, 414, we talked about immigration issues around Dodger Stadium. We talked about, and that was when, you know, way back when LA was being invaded, as opposed to the shit going on in Chicago now, and the stuff that we've been dealing with in DC, this is crazy. Folks, like, we all know that this is fucking insane. It's not normal. No, it's and it's horrific. Like, Chicago is horrific, absolutely fucking horrific. And if you don't know somebody in one of these cities, like, really make sure you're getting the the full picture, because the right wing press is fucking nuts on this. And when the shit started going down in LA, we had mentioned how the soccer teams, especially the women's soccer team, had really come out strong for immigrant rights. And we have, thanks to Patty, we have our immigrant city shirts that Los Angeles is para todos on the back. We mentioned when Neza sang in Spanish, the anthem, even though they told her not to. And then there was this whole kerfuffle when ice was trying. Maybe it was ice, maybe it was the CPB, the maybe it was DHS, maybe it was what, the fuck, who knows, trying to use their parking lots and actually being turned away. So there's been a lot of like, where did the Dodgers lie on this? They were very late to make a statement, and when they finally made a statement, they said, you know, we're donating a million dollars to good causes, but they never said anything critical about what was happening because of ice in Los Angeles. What I failed to mention, and I wasn't aware of at the time, but this past week, a couple of things brought my attention to. This is Mark Walter, who's the principal owner of the Dodgers is also the CEO of Guggenheim Partners that has over $12 million invested in GEO Group. Geo Group might not ring a bell, but maybe Wackenhut does for people who are of our age and you remember the Wackenhut many. What do you call those suits, lawsuits against bad treatment and rack and rack and hut run private prisons and international horrible things happening. So GEO Group now is currently the largest private prison organization that contracts with ice. So you know, just to be clear about the chain of what's happening here. So he's CEO of Guggenheim Partners that invests in this group, so he's not directly making these contracts. However, there is a serious level of responsibility there. They earned $1.5 billion from ice contracts in GEO Group. That is in 2022 per this really good new book that I just got immigration detention, Inc, the big business of locking up immigrants. And this was I happened upon, because at people's book here in Takoma Park, the authors had a book talk Friday night, and we went, and it was fantastic. And I've already gotten through about half of the book. Highly. Recommend, because it's not easy to find data on what's happening with detention. It's covered up. There's a lot of redaction when the actual documents get released. And these women, 10 years went into this research, because a lot of this stuff was really slow coming, but it's really fantastic. What they've come come up with. The lobbying is a huge fucking deal. In 2023 GEO group spent $1.25 million money lobbying because detention is profitable

Patti 35:34
big business. It's such a freaking big business and it's a private business. Exactly. A lot of people don't understand that. I think a lot of people assume that, you know, somehow it's a government control of prisons. It is not you this all. This is just lining the coffers of gigantic business owners, absolutely.

Pottymouth 35:51
And then it's private contract on top of private contract. So like GEO Group will get the center, but then they'll do private contracting to other organizations, like Aramark that we'll talk about in a minute to provide food or health care, and it all goes to the lowest bidder. So it's, you know, who can do what on the cheap, and there's like, zero quality control anywhere. And it doesn't stop there. Walters also leads another group, you know, it's sort of like these multi millionaires. I don't know how much money this dude has get their hands in all sorts of corporations, TWG global, another group that he's involved with in May, announced partnering with Palantir technologies on AI platforms. Now, Palantir, just this past week, has come up with an immigration OS platform, or it just got released, like this past week, which uses AI and data mining to identify and track immigrants with the goal of deporting them. So this is like looking into people's social media, looking into any sort of public, semi public records about people to sort of zoom in and capture

Patti 37:03
them and remember we're supposed to be, you know, you know, deporting the criminals. Remember that? Remember where we oh, we're only deporting the bad guys, the criminals. I'm like, This just tells you they're immigrants. Yeah, that's all it tells you.

Pottymouth 37:19
So, you know, yeah, and the Supreme Court has basically said that it's okay to use race based, you know, short characteristics for finding people. Hey, you speak Spanish, you're suspect. You're out here, pretty much. So this just started last week, last week of September, and they have a $30,000,000.02 year contract for this platform. Coincidentally, Apple just stopped allowing people to use ice block, which was an app to let people share information about where ice was, so that is officially out of the Apple App Store, and now immigration OS is being used by these platforms. So it's very, very fucked up. Palantir sort of ring a bell. Who else has a stick in it? Stephen Miller, I heard him. Yeah. So Palantir has been developing technology used by ICE since 2013 but then it gets complicated, and this is where I was kind of fascinated about how the different sources that I used focused on different things we did talk about when there was that, not the Dodgers, not letting ice use their their parking lots, that Stephen Miller filed a complaint saying, Oh, the Dodgers did something that wasn't according to their anti di stuff, and it went to the EOC, and I don't know where it went from there. And they were saying at that point, I'm trying to think, I think this was the New York Times article that part of that retribution by Miller to Walters was that Walters had donated to Obama, and that was cited as a potential reason. So this is the guy who is also heavily invested in organizations, or heavily, you know, directing organizations that are heavily invested in ICE detention, and that kind of goes back to one of the main themes of this book, which is that things didn't really before right now, things didn't really change that much between Republicans and Democrats, right So Obama, historically, you know, deported a shit ton of people. Biden also was, was very much into, you know, sealing the border, and there's not, there was not a lot of differentiation until right now, where we're just bat shit crazy. But nobody's been doing anything really great. I thought one quotation that I saw in I think it was a shit. I should really record things better. I think it was a Times article, one of the LA community organizers talked about comparing what's going on now with, you know, with Walters being involved in the ice situation, with how the Dodgers stadium originated by decimating a Mexican neighborhood. And he said, quote, it's not bulldozers. Now it's surveillance contracts and ice beds. So fans are super conflicted. There is on one side some really positive history with the Dodgers. There's Jackie Robinson. You know this history of inclusion. They had the first Spanish language broadcast, which I didn't realize that was done by an Ecuadorian Jaime Carlin from 1959 to 2022 and then, of course, Fernando Venezuela, you know, fucking in the in the the wild card, Joe Kelly shows up in the mariachi jacket, right? So there's a lot of celebration about Latino culture. And according to New York Times article, and that's one of the links, more than 40% of the fan base is Latino, but the article also talks about these people being super pissed off and disenfranchised, especially with with what's going on with the ice investments. Miggy Miggy row. Miggy Rojas was interviewed, and he said quote, and as soon as the game is over and the lights are off when I take my car and drive to my place, I'm an immigrant too. So you know, it's not just the fans, it's the players. Because, you know, not every cop is going to know what the players look like when they're pulling out of the parking lot. And if

Patti 41:16
you remember, we talked about this before, where players who are immigrants are who have been instructed by the players union carry your documentation on you. Yeah, it may not fucking matter, but carry your documentation stuff that you never had to worry about before you have to worry about. Because Miguel rose in his car driving home, and he's just, you know, a Latino guy behind the wheel of a, probably an expensive car, and that's suspicious because WHAT

Pottymouth 41:41
THE HELL YEAH, Holy fuck. And, you know, and this is like a team that's well into the playoffs and probably going to keep going just to shit a little bit more on on this situation. Aramark is one of the food contractors that has approximately and this is, again, because the data is really hard to get to, but according to this book, 100 detainment facilities use Aramark, 100 most of them. Aramark got the the the winning bid. Because they bid, they bid the lowest. They're spending $1.50 a meal per detainee, $1.50 so think about, like, what you can buy for a buck 50, if even, I mean, you're cooking yourself. There's a lot of incentive for Aramark to be this invested in food contracting with prisons and with ice facilities, because it's stable. There's the demand there, and that's the go back to the lobbying. That's why they're lobbying for this, because they want to keep people in prison or keep people detained, so that they have their business. They also have very low cost on labor, because a lot of the detainees work for wages that are from one to $3 a day, and those wages are paid by the facility, and there's zero quality control, and the chapter on food in this book is nauseating, absolutely nauseating. But beyond that, Aramark is in eight major league baseball stadiums, including Fenway Park, so you might want to let the Aramark people know that maybe you don't approve of their acts in ice facilities. Fenway Park has some different issues with Aramark, and it's sort of like, you know, a company that's of this caliber, you're not surprised when they do shit like take advantage of their employees. And Fenway, Fenway Park, they had a three day strike that we talked about a little bit at the end of July, ended with no contract, not quite sure why. They went back on contracts still being negotiated. 1000 workers walked off for those three days. They've had two bargaining sessions so far, and aramarks not budging on the union requests for higher wages, limits on automation, fair scheduling and increase gratuities for the folks who work in those premium spots in the park with the VIP folk. Just last week, the union at Fenway filed a complaint with the national relations Labor Board for retaliatory retaliatory activities. So it's reported that Aramark is doing things like interrogating employees about their union activities and what happened that's against a lot video recording employees without their knowledge, making workers take off their hats that have the union logo on it, and suspending folks. So at least there were. There were two specific incidents that I read about. One was a 50 year employee been working at Fort Aramark at Fenway Park for 50 years, was suspended on quote, unnamed allegations from a stadium visitor during the strike. This guy's super popular and surprise, surprise, was very active in the strike. His face was on baseball cards that the. Union distributed beautiful during that time. Oh, I like that. He was reinstated, sure. So you know, that's what happens when you complain about shit that's happening. Aramark statement is, quote, We are disappointed that the union has chosen to file frivolous grievances and then tout them to the media, rather than putting effort into negotiating a settlement that works for all

Patti 45:21
end of my rant, all right? And wow, thank you for taking the the labor rant. That's usually like, you know, yeah, it kind of just kind of like they really did, they float. I did not know about the prison connection. I knew about, you know, all the ballparks.

Pottymouth 45:33
Yeah, that's fascinating. Once I started, like, diving into that, it was a really big rabbit hole.

Patti 45:39
Can I just say I learned stuff from potty mouth all the frickin time. Oh, yeah, I really do you're Yeah, I'm glad so like, thanks for that. Thanks. So meanwhile, I'm gonna distract you with things that Aramark does, that, you know, endear them to the crowds so they, you know, sure, think about, oh, wow, you are just treating your workers so, so badly. Yeah, this started in a happy place. This started with a joke about how Philadelphia fans are known for their moderation. Do you know the 999 challenge? The baseball park? 999 challenge? No. How did we miss this? The challenge is very expensive, really. The challenge is drink nine stadium beers, eat nine stadium hot dogs in a nine inning game.

Pottymouth 46:26
So that's one beer and one hot dog per inning per inning. Wow, right? One person.

Patti 46:32
So that's crazy. So Aramark is your friend?

Pottymouth 46:39
What making little bears. So, yes, okay, yes, but they're probably charging full price.

Patti 46:45
So, well, not, not standing in for they're charging a lot. But anyway, so you know the bank, right? They know Philadelphia ballpark is helping you be moderate in your attempt to, you know, complete this 999, challenge. So Aramark, in fact, is their contractor. They've been, they have been on strike in the past at the bank. They're selling a, like, a carton, like, you know, packaged up nicely for you, nine quote, fun size hot dogs, nine petite beers, which are about, like, shot glass, size, okay, and a score card on the side of the box so you can, like, check off that you've done each of these things. So it's like $55 yeah. Dollars for that. You know,

Pottymouth 47:26
I depends on how many ounces you're talking about, if they're that, yeah, no, years

Patti 47:31
it's gonna, I mean, everything in the ballpark is expensive, and clearly, I mean, Aramark is obviously trying to take your money to keep and not to pass down to their workers. So there's that, but it's only in Section 128 so if you go to the bank, you go section 128 if you want to get the fun size, way to beat the 999, challenge. Also special for the playoffs in Philadelphia are, you know, one of my former boyfriends, HARRISON BADER, has been actually performing very well. Yeah, the Phillies, so they have Bader tots, which I love. That's so cute, right? And I get that that makes sense. That's the thematically appropriate. They also have s'mores espresso martinis on their postseason menu.

Pottymouth 48:15
Oh, why? I mean, why not? I mean, okay, sure, it keeps you up during the game, right? Little espresso to keep you going.

Patti 48:25
I'm guessing that it doesn't go along with the Vader tots or the 999 challenge. I don't think you should not mix your s'mores espresso, Martin, but I can't find the thematic piece. I think is what I'm looking for. Why is that a postseason menu? What about that? I don't know.

Pottymouth 48:38
But anyway, it fires when the weather gets cooler, and don't

Patti 48:43
try that. Okay, anyway, so that's, you know, that's, that's the shiny things, sure that Aramark is doing. But I like the idea that it's, you know, Philly's helping you be moderate. Sorry. Sure. Cross training today, I want to thank our intern and friends of our intern who currently live in Seattle who looped us to this so we can cross train with, with, you know, with elections, with, with political campaigns. Katie Wilson is running for the mayor of Seattle. She has been called the Zara mandani of Seattle. Oh, yay. So we love her already. She was the founder of the transit riders union. Like, she's all in for, like, the, you know, people first she like, I've been reading her stuff since this came to my attention her platform. A lot of it is like, help for the unhoused. One of the things that she said is not just for that population, but will benefit everyone is more accessible, clean and safe public bathrooms, including, you know, in parks, in play, in wherever, but also working with businesses to give them an incentive somehow, to open their bathrooms so you don't have to be like only customers or whatever the baseball connection here. Her is her poster say the big dumpers city needs public bathrooms that alone would get me to vote for Katie Wilson. So if you are registered as a voter in Seattle, just I'm going to speak for you, I'm guessing that Katie Wilson has the endorsement of no crying in baseball and thank you Seattle friends and our intern for bringing that to my attention. Stamp of Approval, right, right? Oh my gosh. So we've got games happening now. We've got games happening later. We've got games happening all week long. Okay, so, yeah, so, so, okay, so you're coming, either you think Milwaukee over the Cubs. Is that what you want, or is that what

Pottymouth 50:40
you think? Um, I guess it's, I think it's what I want. I just feel like Milwaukee, Seattle would be such a fun World Series. Yeah, they're both. I haven't seen them in the World Series. Like, personally, I haven't seen them,

Patti 50:54
yeah, so definitely I want Seattle on the American League side. I mean, are you going Cubby? No, I'm going, here's the thing, okay, Philly over the Dodgers, okay, for sure. Sorry, Cub friends, I know we have lots of you out there, but brewers over the Cubs, I'm not, I kind of want the Brewers to do it, because, you know, they've come from like almost nowhere, right? And I like that a lot. I wouldn't be sad about the Philly so I want to see Seattle make it, but I'm probably going to end up on the National League side for the actual World Series.

Pottymouth 51:31
I don't know. I think the management dynamic is really weird with the Brewers cubs thing, right? With Craig Council, yeah, moving over. And I kind of like the idea of the Brewers being like, yeah, we're fine without you. We're good, right? We got this all down. So I like that. But also, Mr. Potty mouse partner, business partner is a big Philly fan, so, right? I kind of do understand, like the, you know, and that was literally the only t shirt I have of somebody still in the race. Is this cash web from wall, fam, yeah, Patty,

Patti 52:01
you betcha. You betcha. So i What are you doing this week? Besides watching a lot of baseball,

Pottymouth 52:06
you know, I think that's pretty much it. I Not, not, not much else in the in the sites right now. I'm very appreciative of Canada, and I think Canada and Toronto, I know, notably, I didn't say I want Toronto there. I just love the Seattle story. However, I do have this, like, back of my mind question that, if Toronto wins it all, do they go to the White House? We got something better up here. We don't need their fucking white house. They don't even have to make an excuse about, right? That's beautiful. Oh, maybe, wouldn't that be cool? Like, if they did that and they went Canada instead of us?

Patti 52:49
I mean, of course, for leaders, wow, oh, I may have to rethink my Oh, that would be, that would be epic, that that alone is pretty, pretty darn good. Yeah, I looked at my calendar, and I have a couple of social drinking engagements this week, but they're early enough that I can, you know, make the later games.

Pottymouth 53:05
I mean, that's the advantage, like looking on the bright side of our teams being eliminated now it's much more casual, like we don't have to change plans. We can watch baseball, and when it's good to watch baseball, it's less

Patti 53:16
stressed. I'm really, very much less stressed. I gotta say,

Pottymouth 53:19
I was fucking pacing in the kitchen with whiskey like, yeah, I was in with whiskey. Wreck. I was a wreck.

Patti 53:25
Yeah? No, I get that. I get that. All right, friends, tell us who's I'm still in for you. Do you have any predictions or desires for who you want to see make it through in the postseason? Please tell us on social media. Where can they find us? Body, mouth.

Pottymouth 53:38
Sure you can find us on the blue sky or the dark Twitter at nciv podcast, Facebook and Instagram, or no crying and B ball. Join our friends on Patreon, P, A, T, R, E, o n.com/no, crying and B ball and it just we have very, very reasonable rates. It's like a buck a month just to get in. And that way you get a little bit of extra stuff, you get a little easy way to contact us, and you make sure, most importantly, you make sure that we can keep doing what we're doing, because we are completely supported by you guys. And I love that. It's a bunch of people doing a little bit, and it keeps us going.

Patti 54:18
That's a community organizing. Yeah, look

Pottymouth 54:20
at that grassroots. Look at

Patti 54:23
that. That's that's so fun. All right, my friends, here's what you need to do. You need to get boosted. If you can. I have

Pottymouth 54:29
my appointment tomorrow actually. Oh yeah, yeah, good for you. Finally did

Patti 54:33
it. Excellent. I'm glad about that. You need to fight the man because, oh my god, there's nothing more important you can do than fight the man right now. Send your game balls to Meredith and until next week, say

Pottymouth 54:43
goodnight. Goodnight. You.

It's, I, it was, it's really nice that like sound is not an issue anymore. It's just knocked on. It hasn't been an issue, right? Perfect. So far so good. I.