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Patreon dot com slash padres Hota Welcome to the podres Hotub everybody.

Craig Elston, Chris read Rayfie canter together with you on Monday, December eighth, as the Winter Meetings begin for Major League Baseball.

We may get some more Boris puns this week.

We need he gets the more Boris clients signed this week.

Every once in a while there's a big trade at the winter meetings, you know, like when the Padres traded Juan Soto.

That was around the Winter meetings, wasn't it.

So sometimes there's Padres news, really not much of the last few years, but we're here to grind on whatever we have for you.

Gentlemen.

How are things going, Chris?

Starting with you, what's up?

Things are going well?

Sir, would really love to see an aj Preller extension, but that's definitely not gonna happen till he gets back from Orlando.

Yeah, I think Soto was traded on the last day, or maybe a day or two after.

But you know, there's some movement around the league, but the big chips haven't really falled besides s Dylan c so we knew he wasn't coming anyway.

We're not gonna be cash and any big chips.

Anyway, I'm excited we signed our first free agent.

That would mean the first major league free agent.

That would mean I was right.

Both of you were wrong.

December was the month we were going to sign our first free agent.

And his name was Yeah is what his was.

And we are happy to have you.

Welcome the San Diego Ti ad Cock.

He'll grow into his role.

So like, I can't remember the parameters, Like, was it just that it had to be a major league contract?

Was our major league contract?

Did we not write the task properly?

All the informations in the task I think we may have not written it properly and.

Given because to me, Tay Adcock does not count.

But major league deal it was that we I we clarified it was a major le guaranteed contract.

And guess what that's what our guy got, and he's a trout fisherman.

Tie.

Check out them half day three, quarter full day boats.

You're gonna have a blast, buddy.

Go ahead and book your trip over the All Star Break.

I feel confident you will have the time.

Damn it.

Well, I am excited for the Winter Meetings.

I think that the baseball hot stove is going to be absolutely a blaze.

You know, for folks who don't know, the Winter Meetings are historically the site of the biggest offseason trades.

I mean this is with the time period that said.

You know, Migey Cabrera to the Tigers, Joe Morgan to the Cincinnati Reds was a Winter Meetings trade.

Roberto almar and Joe Carter to the Toronto Blue Jays with a winter beatings trade.

Frank Robinson to the Orioles was a Winter beatings trade, Chris Sail to the Red Sox, Gary Carter to the Mets, the Schureser Granderson, Edwin Jackson three team Tigers, Yankees and Diamondbacks trade.

So anyway, I bring all those up because I do not think the Padres will be a part of any of those.

Unfortunately, well, I don't think that we have any sort of firepower with which to trade be I don't think any of our guys, who many of our prospects, who would potentially elicit some sort of star returning, are good enough or seasoned enough to generate any sort of buzz for a response.

And maybe this can be our transition to the rumor of the day, but I personally am of the belief that none of the guys that we have on the roster who we might be selling would be buzzy enough, team controlled enough to generate a significant return.

And that and that rumor of the day that I'm addressing is the fact that Ennis Lynn released an article this morning that said that the Padres are entertaining quote unquote trade offers for top starter Nick Pivetta as a salary dump slash, you know, like a miniature version of the Sodo trade essentially, like you break the omelet.

No that's not right, that is the omelet, and then you break a couple of eggs, which are the controllable starters who you'd be getting back theoretically.

What is your guys' take on this rumor?

You know, Nick Pivetta had about I don't know eighty five the ninetieth percentile outcome for his twenty twenty five season, but I don't think it's insane that he could repeat it with Pecko Park working in his favor in another season of Reuben Diebla.

But the fact of the matter is the team's greatest need, I don't know the greatest, but one of the most glaring one is one or two starting pitchers.

And if you trade away the guy that I'm fairly certain we all agreed was the most likely to give us the most innings this year, you're really kind of doing a step forward and two steps back.

So you know, aj Preller is going to do some creative stuff, and Pavetta is a quality, established arm and I can see why people would want him, But I don't see how ditching him makes you more competitive in twenty twenty six.

And it seems to me like Aj Preller is mo each and every year, is just going to be as competitive as he possibly can in that given year, and trading Nick Covetta away doesn't do that, So I wouldn't think it's likely.

WILL always say, and I think you guys have heard this from me over the years, you can move anybody.

I will listen to it.

What do you get back?

Right?

The way I read this, and I will offer apologies and reverse if I'm just dead wrong about this, okay, But the way I read this is that Dennis Lynn, who has I think kind of famously burned his AJ Preller bridge in the fall of twenty twenty one with the Ken Rosenthal Dennis Lynn crabs in a pot big Preller piece on the Athletic It kind of the word on the street has been that his front office direct sources kind of dried up after that, and that he has more oblique looks into the organization.

I would very much believe that other gms or other agent or the agent of Paveta has said, hey, like, you know what, we made a call on Paveda and the padres are listening, you know, and that he's getting it from the other side because other teams want Paveta, and AJ famously will talk about anybody on his team.

You will talk to you about anybody.

Oh you want Manny, Well, let's talk about how it would work.

You know, you want Jackson Merrill.

Well, it's you know, this is what the price tag would be if you want Jackson Merrill.

But it's not in order to tear his team down.

It's in order to make a baseball trade to continue to extend the window of competition.

So that's a long winded way of saying, if they make a baseball trade involving the Pavetta that is trying to make this team better in twenty twenty six, I'm here for it.

Show me what it is, Show me who we're getting back.

If they're making a trade of Nick Pavetta because his cash salary goes up eighteen million dollars this year, while there is no competitive effect on the Padres average annual value in terms of the competitive balance tax that stays the same, then they are doing that because they're cash poort and that is a really, really difficult thing to wrestle with.

But I've also got to say, it's the same thing we've been told three winters in a row, and this time every winter now.

And I did look it up.

It was the last day of the Winter meetings twenty twenty three that the one Sodo trade was made.

Usually this time of the year the last three years has always been about getting rid of something, losing something, not doing things, and so far this one is worked perfectly Mike Shilt has left, Dylan c says left, Michael King is probably right out the door behind him.

And the trades we're talking about are a trade cronin Worth trade Pavenna, trade something off the team.

We can't possibly add, payroll, we can't possibly move, and then each of the last two years, by the end of spring training, one way and another, a roster has been put together.

So I'm gonna kind of dismiss this and say that it's not that it's like poorly reported.

I'm sure it's true, but that the only way this comes true is if the Padres are actually going to do the twenty twenty six tighten the belt chastity season, you know where, like we're not gonna sign anybody, We're gonna trade away salaries, We're gonna reduce payroll, We're gonna make do with less.

We're gonna offer a lesser product to our fans.

We know we're going to take a hit at the box off, we know we're going to take a hit in ratings, but we simply cannot continue unless we do these things because financially we can't afford it will go broke.

Like if we're going to actually do that then we'll trade Nick Pavetta for two Double A starters.

Yeah, you know, I get it.

Like just looking at the numbers.

Nick Pavetta's salary was one million dollars last year, and I believe it goes up to is it sixteen or nineteen, nineteen nineteen, because up to nineteen this year.

So I don't know what Nick Pavetta on a one year deal would fetch on the open market.

It would be more than nineteen million, but it wouldn't be a shocking amount more than nineteen million, So you have to wonder how much surplus value you're getting back on that at that point.

And if you're a team that would be in the market for trading for Nick Pavetta, you're essentially you would want him to be worth it.

But then if he's worth it, he has an opt out next year, so you're really just paying for one year.

Otherwise, if he's bad and you trade for him, then you're saddled with the two year remaining on the contract that he could opt into if Nick Povetta has a poor season.

So I just don't really think he makes sense as a trade candidate period.

I don't know why any opposing GM would want to trade for him unless you're like super confident that you were going to get a good year from him.

And even then, what would you be willing to give up for a guy you're getting it almost basically market rate.

It just doesn't really really make a lot of sense to me.

Concur Let's hope that doesn't happen.

Let's just I'm just straight up that shouldn't happen.

And the only way it should happen is if it is a cell high on Nick Pavetta, Like we think we've truly gotten the best year of Nick Pavetta's career and we're going to let someone else take the gamble.

But doesn't make any sense structurally from the organization.

When Ben and Woods talk to me about this this morning, it just made me kind of come back to and I'll just flog the whole one time and move along the fer mean trade, Like how much damage has been done in terms of our flexibility by not having Burgered as a possible option?

And Colok is a backup option?

You know, I don't necessarily know that Stephen Colak's going to be a major league you know, every turn starting pitcher, he looked like that for a little while, and then he really didn't look like that in Kansas City.

But nonetheless, those are two arms that we could be penciling in right now and not worrying about trading Nick Povetta to try and go get something else, sort of free up money to get something else, like you know, And that comes back to do do let's play the old tune.

You didn't get Louise campus Ono in your line up, ever, so you had to go and trade two starters to get a guy named Fredder and I.

Not Fredder.

That's we make up songs.

Here's what we do.

We do makeup songs.

Occasionally.

We have fun.

Yeah, we have fun, you know.

And I don't see like that trade doesn't make it seem like a j Preller was like playing forty chess into the future when he signed paveda to the one to the really really backloaded deal that basically guarantees two years.

You could make the case that maybe the Will Wagner trade is doing so with our beloved Jacob Cronenworth.

But with how Wagner performed last year, I wouldn't feel comfortable slotting him at second base, batting eighth in an everyday championship caliber lineup.

No, no chance, no chance again.

This is this is the bleak Sidler winter.

You know, last year it was ownership dispute.

The year before it was ownership dispute.

Who's going to take over, Who's going to be the control person?

Peters died, Soto's traded, you know, everything's changed.

The year after that is shield lawsuit Sidler Bros.

Sheel which, oh, all the reports are this team's handcuffed.

They can't do a thing.

It's impossible.

Now we're fast forward another year.

Aj Preller still hasn't signed a contract extension.

Still we have gotten beyond.

We are now well beyond the point of oh they're talking, we're past that.

The agreement to get a deal could be done in fifteen minutes and then with the lawyers a couple of days if you had the same terms on both sides.

Yeah, but clearly that's not the case, or it would be done.

And if they were going to get rid of him, they would have just gotten rid of him.

They would have had a mutual parting of the ways.

The idea he would not have hired Craig Stalmon.

That would not have happened.

He hired Craig Stalmon, he was given the latitude and that's clearly a Preller pick, like clearly a Preller pick.

So I continue to lean on that to think that A J.

Preller's goal is to be the general manager of the San Diego Padres, and maybe for a very long time, like his goal is to be a lifetime GM of the San Diego Padres.

And I think he continues to encounter some obstacles in the Ivory Tower en route to that path.

And so here we are, and he's got the leverage here, I think, I don't know, what do you guys think?

Am I wrong?

I think he's got the leverage to be like, hey, if you're not going to give me the extension I want, I can go be Baseball's best GM free agent in twenty twenty six.

And about the only thing, by the way, heading into a labor dispute, about the only thing that a baseball team could actually spend for is the president a baseball operation, something they could actually invest in.

So he might be like literally the only thing on an empty baseball market next year if the Padres don't antiop.

I completely agree.

I mean, I really am just thinking it boils down to they want to sell the team.

They're hoping to get a rich person Steve Balmer or someone else to come and buy the team, and until that point they're kind of frozen because if they don't sell the team in the twenty twenty sixth season, then what they're going to want to do is probably get rid of aj Preler and get some sort of ghoulish pebop GM who will come in and be willing to over see the teardown of the franchise.

So unfortunately, I think that like just calling a spade of spade, like that's what's going on with the team, because otherwise I don't really know why else they wouldn't.

I don't know what kind of price aj Preller fetching his last Do we know how much money he makes a year?

I don't think it's published, just I don't think it scary was never published, but.

It's going to be.

But we knew that he was making like two million dollars a year because he walked away from like they.

Said at least they said at least and that he was in like the upper half of what managers are making.

I mean, our friend AI says.

Reports from late twenty twenty three indicated his contract paid in between seven and ten million annually over three seasons.

No, have you ever heard anything like that?

No, hey, I saw.

Stupid.

AI probably got that from some agri gator who got that from one of those, like one of those Twitter dudes.

A five year deal might have been worth seven to ten million dollars annually in total.

But yeah, you know, yeah, he's not making more than Dave Dombrowski or something like come on, yeah, No, he might want to.

You might want to make more than all of them.

You might want to get a twelve year deal.

I think I think it's probably coming down to years Craig, and that both sides don't feel a need to rush.

You know, AJ's doing his job right now.

He's this is gonna be one of the busier times a year for him, as you know, maybe second only to All Star when he you're doing the trade deadline and you're doing the draft and you have the trade deadline on the horizon, like that seems like a few busy and this seems like a few busy weeks.

But I gotta say it shouldn't take this long.

So like it's up in the.

Air, it's a mystery, and it's one that I don't think is going to be resolved because Aj pillar doesn't talk.

That's why every time you see and again, I'll just go back to the Bavetta thing right at the top of this, like, did AJ say it?

Of course?

Now does it come out of his front office?

No chance, no chance.

Who had Craig Stammon on the Bengo board come on?

No chance none.

So therefore, when you read a report like that, that is a reporter.

I'm not impugning his motive.

He's got to work, he's got to post.

That's his job is to get articles and get news and get reporting out of the winter meetings.

And if you can't get it from the primary source or a secondary source that's close, you go to a tertiary source.

And that's people who are talking to those people and you say, hey, what are you saying to them?

What are they saying to you?

And they say, hey, listen, I read Nick Pavetta could be available.

Yeah, and and then today story, let's write it through and just and discuss why so until it you know, as always, he will work in a veil of secrecy until he reveals what he wants us to know, and then he'll yeah, know his way through it.

Do you see any reason why this is going to change over the course of the winter.

Now they like him reaching a deal.

No, just the Padres being silent, quiet.

No, we're we're in the post Peter Seiler.

It's going to be exactly what what what it's been.

Yeah, we're in the comdown, We're in the comedown.

And and now we're at a point where the the Prospect credit card bill is coming due and the Payroll credit card bill is coming due.

You know, I, I I really resent There's some things in that Dennislan article that I I really grinds my gears.

One of them is the implication the Padres will be forced to consider trading Fernando Tatis Junior.

I like, I annoy that for a couple I'm annoyed by that for a couple of reasons.

One that they will be forced to consider as kind of an absurd the Padres could have considered trading Fernando Tazzis Junior.

Now like it's just purely considering it is like it's like that's like such a purely clickbaity sort of uh you know, phrasing, But I I don't see that the Padres could possibly trade Fernando Tazis junior at least until his contract reaches full maturation and he's making like forty million dollars a year, at which point what team is going to want to trade for him?

You know, because the moment you trade for him, the moment you're the moment you trade, the moment you signal to the fan base we're giving up don't pay first season tickets, which are going up year over year over year.

So I mean, I know this is kind of a roundabout way to answer your question, Greg, but like I know, I just like I don't think that they're like the Levers are kind of stuck because like they can't go into rebuild mode because they would completely alienate their fan base, who they've raised season ticket prices on consecutive years in a row.

And they can't spend because the team's trying to sell and the owners want to keep payroll as slim as they possibly can, so they are they're just kind of stuck.

And I think we're just going to be in a position where we're going to have to see where the chips fall with other free agents like last year and see who we can get from the bargain bin.

I mean, Mike Soroka just signed with the Diamondbacks for seven and a half million dollars.

That's kind of someone who I figured the Padres might be in on.

Those are the type of deals that I can expect, and I would say they might be waiting for the Mike Sorokas of the world to sign so that they can get even the more bargain bin guys.

You know, okay, like who's going to sign for four million dollars?

You know how you saw them pounce on Kyle Hart and me.

I mean, what's not to like?

You know?

I mean, when you've seen what you've seen, sign up for more.

I like, all you have to do to come up with an article about the Padres is go to their payroll page and look who's making a little too much and then you can, you know, add lib your way to the trade.

Like it would it surprise me if they do what they did with Matt Carpenter and unload Matt Carpenter for next to nothing.

Give they gave up Ray Carr in that trade, shed some salary.

It wouldn't shock me if they did that with Yuki Matsuie, Like I feel like that's the type of transaction we could see.

Uh, they've got five spots on their forty man roster.

All we know is that they're going to fill him up, and we can guess that at least one or two of those are going to be veterans that almost nobody else wants, that are promised some playing time and you know, a playoff run, and that's what the Padres have to offer right now.

They don't have a loaded system thirty out of thirty right now, depending on which ranking you look at, maybe twenty nine, but right at the bottom of the league because of the team that aj has built with his prospect capital.

And I don't think they're going to trade Ethan Sallas.

They just promoted Miguel Mendez to the forty man roster, and that's a guy that we might see later in the year, but he's not ready.

So that means you need to fill them with guys who can go now.

And I don't see taking away guys like Paveta helps it all, and so it doesn't make any sense.

You know.

The reason I agree with you that I don't think they're going to trade Ethan Sallas because Ethan Sallas doesn't have enough trade value.

He says, at the lowest he's been probably since he was fifteen years old.

Yeah, it's wish upon his star stuff right now for Ethan Salas.

If you're an opposing general manager or president of baseball operations, it's like, well, maybe maybe this guy, you know, maybe he's on the verge of the thing that makes him an obvious top five prospect again, and maybe that's coming in April and May as he takes the Double A by storm and destroys worlds.

You know, But if Ethan Salas had any value, I would say he's one hundred percent getting traded.

And that literally, anything that's not nailed to the floor is going to be traded by Preller in his last year as GM to try and raise the team's chance of winning as high as he can possibly metrically move it up, and then he bails at the end of the year and leaves the wreckage behind because he knows, as we know, as we've all come to expect accept that at the end of his life, Peter Seidler decided to make some really really ill, faded, ill decided contracts which are now the albatrosses around the neck.

I almost said anchors, but anchors help a ship stay in place.

Instead, they are the albatrosses around the neck of the front office that make it perpetually harder every year to maneuver.

You're always maneuvering around these giant blocks in Machado and Bogart's contracts that don't have value to match their performance.

So because of it, it becomes increasingly harder every year.

And as you said earlier, the credit card on the payroll and the credit card on the prospects continues to be leveraged year by year to push that denumat down the road to the point where we trade major things and just get worse.

So, I mean, that's not to be dumer, it's just to say, like everyone, that's that's the dynamic we're fighting with every single year, is this, Oh, we can't possibly do it, and then by the end of the year probably figures out a way and we do it.

Peter Seiler said he was going to speak from the grave, and for better or worse, that language was, I'm locking down a particular side of our infield, come hell or high water, and like those guys are going to play there for the foreseeable future no matter what.

Uh yeah, absolutely So Look, we could talk about that all day and certain doomers would love to.

Uh, Jake Cronenworth rumors, I don't know, you're opening up a hole that they is Will Wagner going to play second base like Luis Area is not around the corner anymore.

You know, he's the new Jake did Will Wagner pitch?

I know his dad did pretty decently, but I don't know if if Will has it in his background.

Yeah.

I mean the only thing I can think is that they would be signing like sung Moon Song from the KBO and trying to recreate some haw tunkin magic of like, oh, here's a guy who slept on who could come in and you know he's projected to get a two year, sixteen million dollar offer, so eight million a year.

So you're saving four million dollars on Jake Cronenworth.

I guess, you know, for a big risk.

I don't really know that that's that's that's really worth it.

So yeah, and again like if you're if you're the opposing GM, what's your upside on training for Jake Cronenworth.

What are you going to give up to, like lock down, you know, a top twelve second baseman.

Yeah, I mean remaining guys who are projected to be signed in this off season who can play second base, Boba Schett, Jorge Polanco, Luis Arise, Ahmed Rosario, Luis Renifo, Willie Castro, Ramon Marias, Tyro Estrada, even Moore, Isaiah Kiner Falefa, Like it's.

Thank you, it's rough.

I take Jake three years down the road mentioned, I remember when Tyro Estrada had fifteen homers in eighteen steals, Like you know, no, yeah, no, Jake's better than all those guys.

Like he's literally better than every one of those guys.

What was this on base percentage?

Three sixty Can we not trade our highest on base percentage off the team who.

Was hitting seventies to accommodate Luisa Rise anyway?

Three sixty seven on base percentage?

Yeah, three sixty seven seems pretty good to me.

Yeah.

I don't think you can trade Jake Cronaworth.

I don't think you can trade Nick Pavenna.

I don't think you can trade either of those players and try to win.

The thesis statement is if either of those guys go, it's simply because they're trying to shed salary and the team will be worse.

That's it.

There's no I don't think there's an upside to either of those trades.

No, no, So let's please please aj not that you're really.

The only news that's come out other than this so far is that yesterday the Veterans Committee decided to poop out a result of Jeff Kent joining Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame, and that will take place this summer, this summer of twenty twenty six, Jeff Kent will go in to the Hall of Fame.

He'll be enshrined in the Hall of Fame.

And Jeff Kent did hit the most homers of any second basement in Major League history, So there is that, and you can and you know, he drove in a lot of runs, and he played a long time in his career.

He was absolutely a respected veteran.

Lou Whittaker isn't in the Hall of Fame, and the idea that Jeff Kent is going to be in Lou Whitaker isn't is really kind of I don't know, almost like dumb.

It just like doesn't make any sense to me.

And Bobby Gritch isn't in the Hall of Fame, and dal Murphy isn't in the Hall of Fame, and he was on this ballot, and so it's done maddingly And like I think any of those players deserve to go in more than Jeff Kent, who was a really, really good player, but the best part of his career was spent drafting in the wake of Barry Bonds in the Giants lineup, and like having the unique position of a guy with a six hundred on base percent and shitting in front of him, And I just I have a hard time saying Jeff Kent was a Hall of Famer.

I think he's a good Hall of really good, but not a Hall of Famer.

Yeah, I hate it.

I hate it so much.

Like he's he's the definition of an aggregator.

Like he got eleven years of you know, solid all star level baseball, and that's really good, not quite all star, all of them.

But I just can't stand what the Hall of Fame is done, Like you cannot tell the story of baseball without Barry Bonds.

You can't tell the story of baseball.

Without Roger Clemons.

We know what they did, and we know that for generations baseball players were using substances to enhance their performance.

And you know there's guys in the Hall of Fame that did steroids and we don't know about it, and that they're just sitting there wearing their jackets, happy to be in the club while you know these guys go.

I can't stand Barry Bonds as a person.

He seems like a total tool, but so does Jeff Kent.

And if I'm in a root for somebody to like get in, it's going to be the guy who was the best in the game, right, So it's yucky.

I don't like it at all.

For the Fernando Valenzuela didn't even get five votes, so he won't be considered just like Barry Bonds.

And I think you can't really tell the story of baseball without Fernando Vealenzuela either.

And I know his statistics don't merit Hall of Fame consideration.

I know his statistics don't warrant him getting a bust.

But like I said, this is the story of major League baseball, and you can tell that story without Jeff fucking Kent.

But you can't tell it without Fernando Mania or without Barry Bonds.

So I find it really yucky.

You know what, go ahead, Wyfe saying you.

Know what pisses me off.

I think I've made about sixty million dollars playing baseball, and I want this fricking million dollars in this game more than anything.

And it's not even a million bucks.

It's six hundred grand by the time Obama takes it.

I'm a Game seven World Series loser.

You know.

I played the biggest games in the world and the worst games in the world, and this just sucks.

That's what I think about this.

Yes, sir, is exit speech Survivor season twenty six baby or twenty five?

Yes, so he was Philippines, right, that was Hill?

Yes, yes, Malcolm and Denise, Yes.

But yeah, everyone go if you want to just kill thirty seconds, it's great.

Jeff Kent getting voted off Survivor, it's fantastic.

And yeah, I mean, I think I have a question for you guys.

You mentioned Lou Whittaker already.

Do you guys think Chase Utley is a Hall of Famer.

More than Jeff Kent?

Well, yeah, exactly, exactly, But No.

So Chase Utley and Lou Whittaker are right next to each other.

They are twelfth and thirteenth all time in terms of Jaws Score, which is a you know, Ja Jaffies metric for Hall of Famers.

It's like a combination of like seven year peak war stuff.

And right now Jeff Kent is sandwiched in between Ian Kinsler and Marcus Semian in terms of Jaws Score.

Legendary figures just titans.

Do you think Jose Altuve is a Hall of Famer?

Yes?

Yeah, like eventually, well.

I mean he's gonna get.

But do you think even with the cheating.

Stuff, that's the thing, that's exactly the thing?

Like, yeah, I think you will.

If you're gonna think disqualify Barry Bonds, you should also disqualify Jose Altuve for wearing a friggin wire.

You know, unproven, whereas the cream and the Clear is proven from Balco.

Do you think that Dustin Pedroia is a Hall of Famer?

No?

Quick note?

Okay, So Altuve and Paedroya are next to each other, both just ahead of Ian Kinsler, who was just ahead of Jeff Kent by this metric, the highest the two highest second basemen who are not in the Hall of Fame are Robinson Cano who knock it in because of steroids, and Bobby.

Gritch, Bobby Gridch who really should have gotten in but now never will.

Now never will seventy one point one career b war for Bobby Gritch, fifty eight point seven jobs score.

That's eighth all time, higher than Jackie Robinson, higher than Ryan Sandberg, higher than Ni bergs al Mar Craig Bigio, all those guys.

Yeah, that's true.

And you know, you can always go down a slippery slope with Hall of Fame, and at the end of the day, you know, being inducted into the Hall of Fame is getting a plaque in the wing of the museum.

Like there's a Fernando Mania display in the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

So Fernando is in the Hall of Fame, you know.

And there are players who deserve to be honored in that sense that they deserve a display in the Hall of Fame, if not a plaque, you know, and mark the bird.

Fidrich another example, someone who's bloated on the scene and then disappeared just as quickly, but made an indelible imprint on the culture of the sport in the brief time he was outstanding.

You know, there are other examples of that along the way, but the great of the great that get their plaques in to me, Jeff Kent just doesn't rate like he just doesn't rate comparatively.

There were a lot of you know, fifteen Homer seasons with the Mets or the Indians or you know, he was always good.

He was always good hitter, bad defender and dickhead.

But you know, despite the dickhead part of it, I don't know.

All this really did was I heard the boys talking about it on the radio this morning, which led to a discussion with my son because the name Barry Bonds was brought up in terms of where you did you ride the coach tail of Barry Bonds?

And then my son was like, you know, I think Barry Bonds has to be good because Kanye did a song about him.

It's true, but I mean he is a no.

And so then like in the five minutes left in our car, right, I told him the the you know that length version of Barry Bond's story seven MVPs and already a great player in a Hall of Fame track in the nineteen ninety eight home run race, and his jealousy of seeing Sosa and Maguire elevated above him when he was a way better player than either of those players.

And for him to say, Okay, what can I do, I'll not only juice, I'll do it the smartest, I'll get the best I'll you know, get the best available guy to help me.

And then he did.

And then he hit seventy three home runs with a six hundred one base percentage and got seven MVPs.

And then he was banned and everybody hated him anyway, which really helped precipitate his disappearance from the sport.

There and have a great day at school.

Set I'll pick you up at three thirty.

And that's pretty much how that went.

Hey, anything else, padre Way, I'm hoping we have something to talk about next week, but I also know the monkey pap might curl with that, given that the winter meetings are coming and we might have something not so fun to talk about.

But no, I mean, we're this is this is the dog days of the of the off season for sure.

Hey, it's the holiday wonderland at Peco Park now through the twenty three.

Go spend a whole bunch of money.

If you spend fifteen million dollars yourself at the Holiday Wonderland, you know, maybe maybe we.

Got a shot at do we want trade Nick Pavetta?

Maybe we won't trade Nick.

You want Jake Croninworth, Go drop eight figures at the Petco Park Holiday Wonderland.

And you know, wild horses right around the corner too, baby.

That's that's how we build ourselves a roster.

The bleak sidler winter, the cold winters on, it's just here and it's illuminating, a bleakly illuminating our path forward.

But you know what, this is what happens in December.

This is what happens in December.

Will continue to be on the beat for Chris and Rafie.

I'm Craig.

Go Padres, go, go do something about something good.

Go Padres.

M H.

S.