Just got my first look at the inside design of FIFTY SEASONS … a little inside publishing: these are called the “first pass” pages, and they’re more or less my last shot to find the embarrassing little mistakes before they live forever. But they’re also my first real chance to see how the book will look and feel, and our awesome folks at Dutton pulled off some really cool design features for this one.
I’ll say it again: I’m so excited for February 2, when FIFTY SEASONS comes out. Of course, I’d love for you to preorder — you know how important preorders are to the success of a book — and if you preorder from Rainy Day Books, you will get a signed copy that I will personalize any way you like. But no matter where you preorder, you can now get a special FIFTY SEASONS gift that includes the full list of seasons in the book PLUS a bonus chapter on the invention of batting average.
Molly Knight and I had a blast doing a live video chat during the Yankees-Red Sox game on Tuesday — so much fun that we’re going to do it again tonight, starting at 8 p.m. Eastern, as part of our The Joy of Baseball project (we’ll send out a not when we go live). We’re still figuring out exactly how all this is going to go, but for now we’re going to do these for everyone … and ask that if you like being a part of things, that you subscribe to The Joy of Baseball, kind of like an NPR thing.
We’re even talking about creating The Joy of Baseball tote bags.
Speaking of TJOB: I hinted at this yesterday, but this week’s podcast is extra-special — we were joined by my friend and lifelong hero Bob Costas, who spoke at length about his love of the game, shared memories of his now legendary interviews with Mickey Mantle and Mark McGwire, and talked a bit about the bittersweet way he believes it all ended for him as a baseball announcer.
You can hear a bit of that here:
On the podcast, I also tell my Bob Costas story, which sounds unbelievable but is entirely true.
There was a moment during the White Sox-Astros broadcast that I cannot shake. I guess it happened in the bottom of the fifth inning; the White Sox were up 5-0. Those Astros: Whew. That’s a rough baseball team. I mean, Yordan Álvarez is the best hitter in the game right now, but the rest of the team … whew … it all feels like the reunion days of a once-great band. Only one original member remains, and they’re doing festivals in Sheboygan (a great town, by the way), and they’re playing the band’s biggest hit four different ways because that’s the only thing the fans want.
Oh no, if I’ve told them once, I’ve told them a hundred times: put Spinal Tap first, puppet show last. … We’ve got a bigger dressing room, though.
But that’s not what I can’t shake.
They came back from a commercial break showing Houston rookie Lucas Spence in the on-deck circle. That alone was weird. Why Lucas Spence? He’s a 23-year-old rookie who has played 19 big-league games. He’s an undrafted free agent out of Black Hawk College in Moline, IL — I guess he’s the first Black Hawk College alum to play in the Major Leagues, which is, you know, kind of cool.
But they weren’t showing him as an homage to Black Hawk — whose most famous alum before Spence might be Richard Kauzlarich, the former U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan.
No, it turns out Lucas Spence was the featured player in the Fan Duel Same Day Parlay!
If we hurried, the broadcaster told us, we could still bet on HOW MANY PITCHES LUCAS SPENCE WOULD SEE. Wow! The over/under was 3.5 pitches. So we could bet the over, bet that Spence would make Chicago’s Jordan Hicks work a bit, or we could bet the under, bet that Spence would be aggressive and go after an early pitch.
And then, seconds later, the bet changed because the White Sox pulled Hicks — I guess he’d reached his pitch limit or something — and brought in Sean Newcombe.
Whoa! A whole new scenario for how many pitches rookie Lucas Spence would face!
And I thought to myself, not for the first time but probably the loudest time, that MLB has taken our beautiful game and turned it into a tawdry, cheap, and corrupt slot machine. To think that there were people out there who lost actual money because Lucas Spence faced five pitches in the bottom of the fifth inning of a 5-0 wildcard game before singling off Sean Newcombe makes me so sad.
To think that MLB encourages — practically begs — its fans to make that bet hurts my very soul.
Our big hero on Day 1 was Atlanta’s Austin Riley, who hit a three-run home run off Jhoan Duran in the bottom of the eighth to give the Braves a 5-3 victory over Philadelphia.
There was a lot going on in this at-bat. For one thing, the Phillies took a huge chance by bringing in their dominant closer, Duran, in the seventh inning. He’d only pitched more than one inning once all season — back on August 29 — but Phillies manager Don Mattingly figured he had to go all in to try and win this game. I can’t exactly blame him for that.
And it could have worked. Duran went 1-2-3 in the seventh and got the first two outs in the eighth. He then gave up a soft ground ball up the middle to Michael Harris II. Off the bat, it looked like the third out. But shortstop Trea Turner, who really struggled defensively this year, didn’t seem to get a great jump on the ball, and once he got there, he threw it away. It’s possible that Harris would have beaten the throw anyway, even if that was Ozzie Smith out there. We’ll never know for sure.
Then on a 3-2 pitch to Ozzie Albies, Duran threw a knuckle curve in the dirt that barely glanced off Albies foot and rolled all the way back to the screen. It was ball four either way, but the Braves actually challenged the HBP call because Harris had advanced to third on what would have been a wild pitch. But the hit-by-pitch was confirmed on replay.
First and second. Two outs. Up stepped Riley.
Austin Riley’s decline is utterly inexplicable to me. From 2021-2023, he had three consecutive six-WAR seasons. He was one of the best players in baseball. Over those three years he hit .286/.354/.525 and averaged 36 homers per season, along with 100 runs and 100 RBI. He also played a good third base.
And then the last three years, in part because of injuries, in part because of that inexplicable thing I’m talking about, he has become barely more than a replacement-level player. This year, he played 159 games — and posted an 80 OPS+. His on-base percentage was .290. He didn’t even slug .375. It’s mind-boggling.
And then you watch him play and — this will sound terrible, but it’s true — you can’t figure out how he was ever good in the first place. In the sixth inning, he came up with a runner on third and one out. The Braves had just taken the lead; even a sac fly in this situation would put the Phillies in dire straits. Riley was facing a shaken Alex McFarlane. The Phillies infield was in.
The first pitch was in the dirt — Riley took it for Ball 1. The crowd was alive.
The next pitch was a 99-mph fastball up and out of the zone. The count was 2-0.
The third pitch was a slider, way outside and in the dirt. Riley swung feebly at it. I have no idea what he was thinking. McFarlane was on the ropes. The pitch wasn’t close. Why in the world would Riley bail him out there by half-swinging?
The next pitch was a 101 mph fastball, and it probably wasn't a strike either; it was probably outside, and Riley chopped it to third for a harmless out, and that was that. It was just one of those bad at-bats that pile up when your confidence is shot.
Then came the bottom of the eighth, Duran on the mound, Riley at the plate, and on the first pitch, Duran came blazing with his 100-mph fastball. It was middle-middle, but again, it was 100 mph. Only this time around, Riley swung aggressively and confidently and blasted the ball over the right-field wall for the game-winning home run.
THERE’S THE AUSTIN RILEY WE REMEMBER!
Baseball is such a wild and wonderful game. Slumps come and go. Hot streaks come and go. Belief in yourself comes and goes. Austin Riley spends six months in a fog. And then he has one moment back in the sunshine, and everyone will remember that moment, maybe forever.
“That’s the beauty of the postseason,” Riley told reporters. “You get a clean slate.”
Now we wait to see: How many of these series will actually go to a third game?
Obviously we can’t know for sure, but I’d rank the chances in this order.
Astros force a Game 3 after looking awful in their loss to the White Sox in Game 1. The Astros’ chances hinge on Yordan being Yordan and the White Sox not being very good. Plus, they’re at home. Plus, they do have their best starter in Hunter Brown on the mound. It could happen. There won’t be a huge crowd to see it either way.
Phillies force a Game 3 after losing in dramatic fashion on Tuesday. The Phillies do have a couple of advantages. For one thing, they have Cris Sanchez on the mound. For another, the Phillies are such a weird team that you never know what you’re going to get out of them.
Cubs force a Game 3 after getting blown out in Game 1. I actually don’t feel great about the Cubs’ chances, but I mean, they did lead all of baseball in runs scored, so you would think they’d rebound after getting suffocated by three Padres pitchers (and Mason Miller wasn’t even one of them).
Red Sox force a Game 3 after losing 9-0 to the Yankees. I don’t think there’s much a shot of this happening because the Yankees are throwing Max Fried, and the Red Sox lineup looks absolutely punchless, and the game will be at a raucous Yankee Stadium. But, hey, that’s why they play the game. The Red Sox are throwing Sonny Gray, so, you know, he was good this year.
The BetMGM sign on the outfield fence at the Field of Dreams game tells you all you need to now about what Rob Manfred thinks about the game.
Beautiful Joe - but here’s the BEST thing you wrote:
“And I thought to myself, not for the first time but probably the loudest time, that MLB has taken our beautiful game and turned it into a tawdry, cheap, and corrupt slot machine. To think that there were people out there who lost actual money because Lucas Spence faced five pitches in the bottom of the fifth inning of a 5-0 wildcard game before singling off Sean Newcombe makes me so sad.”
A pox on all the owners and the others who supported this, in pursuit of the almighty $$. And all of ours.