Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley break down the six-player blockbuster trade headlined by Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco, touching on Cleveland’s decision to cut costs by dealing two fan favorites and the face of the franchise, how much better Lindor makes the Mets, and more, then banter about NPB ace Tomoyuki Sugano re-signing with the Yomiuri Giants and the latest revelations about the use of foreign substances by MLB pitchers, before bringing on philosophy professors (and Effectively Wild listeners) Justin Coates and Ben Lennertz (53:49) to tackle the ethics of Hall of Fame voting and examine how philosophy can guide voters, the merits of the character clause, how to handle cheaters, the problems of past precedent and differing off-field offenses, and how they would vote.

Audio intro: Margo Price, "Do Right By Me"
Audio interstitial: Paul McCartney and Wings, "Get on the Right Thing"
Audio outro: The Magnetic Fields, "’86 How I Failed Ethics"

Link to Ben on the Lindor deal
Link to Rob Mains on Lindor and Cleveland
Link to story on Steve Cohen
Link to Kyodo News story on Sugano
Link to Jim Allen on Sugano
Link to Harkins foreign substance story
Link to Ben on foreign substances
Link to EW interview about foreign substances
Link to Ken Rosenthal’s Hall of Fame ballot
Link to story about Schilling’s latest comments
Link to EW interview with Jay Jaffe
Link to Craig Calcaterra on the Hall of Fame

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the re-naming of Miller Park and the good and bad of ballpark naming rights, the improbable beginning of Phil Niekro’s career and what it says about the downsizing of the minor leagues, an intriguing projection of the outcome of the Padres-Dodgers NL West race, Boog Sciambi calling Cubs games and the difference in affection for local and national broadcasters, whether the absence of in-game video in 2020 really hurt hitters, the extent to which the rules and rosters for the 2021 MLB season are still in flux, and a questionable baseball-related scene from the new season of the Netflix series Cobra Kai.

Audio intro: Jerry Garcia & David Grisman, "The Miller’s Will"
Audio outro: Dream Wife, "Sports!"

Link to story about American Family Field
Link to story about NHL division sponsors
Link to story about insurance company advertising
Link to Jay Jaffe on Niekro
Link to Craig Wright on Niekro’s origin story
Link to Pages from Baseball’s Past
Link to post about Niekro baseball cards
Link to Ben on the knuckleball’s future
Link to EW interview about the remaking of the minors
Link to Dan on the Padres’ projection
Link to story about Boog and the Cubs
Link to The Athletic story on in-game video
Link to Cobra Kai video
Link to Ben on the baseball scene in Elementary
Link to story about Whitecaps B-roll
Link to Anchorman 2 clip
Link to EW interview about Moneyball and Pitch
Link to EW interview about Twilight
Link to Jay on Foley’s
Link to story about Foley’s memorabilia

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the official retirement of Phil Hughes, the joy of anticipating top prospects and watching them debut, the sobering reality of players their age starting to retire, a report that the 2021 season is likely to start on time, and a control group for their minor league free agent draft, then (31:40) talk to former Dodgers general manager Dan Evans about how he hired new Marlins GM Kim Ng when he worked for the White Sox and Dodgers, how she distinguished herself as an intern and gained greater responsibility, how to stand out in an MLB front office, why Ng had to wait so long for a GM job, how teams can diversify front offices and ensure that more minority candidates are promoted into positions of power, how the GM role has changed, and how Ng will run the Marlins.

Audio intro: The Who, "1921"
Audio interstitial: Mates of State, "A Control Group"
Audio outro: Courtney Barnett, "Kim’s Caravan"

Link to Hughes’ retirement announcement
Link to video of Hughes’ 2007 debut
Link to 2007 BP top prospect list
Link to Andy McCullough on Hughes’ second career
Link to study on top-prospect production
Link to Jon Tayler on Strasburg’s debut
Link to The Athletic report on the 2021 season
Link to minor league free agent draft results
Link to EW interview with Jen Wolf
Link to Dan’s Sports Management Worldwide page
Link to Dan on Kim Ng
Link to Lindsey Adler on Kim Ng
Link to Olivia Witherite on Kim Ng
Link to Marc Carig on Kim Ng
Link to Jen Mac Ramos on Kim Ng
Link to Jake Mailhot on Kim Ng
Link to Rachael McDaniel on Kim Ng

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the experience of podcasting about baseball in 2020, what purpose they think the Hall of Fame serves, and whether they would consider giving up their Hall of Fame ballots, then ring in the new year by extending an old tradition and conducting the eighth annual Effectively Wild Minor League Free Agent Draft, in which they select 10 minor league free agents each and compete to see whose roster will accumulate the most MLB playing time in 2021.

Audio intro: First Aid Kit, "New Year’s Eve"
Audio outro: Death Cab for Cutie, "The New Year"

Link to Craig Calcaterra on the Hall of Fame
Link to Jeff Passan on Hall of Fame voting
Link to list of minor league free agents
Link to Justin Hollander interview episode
Link to last year’s draft results
Link to this year’s draftees

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Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley, and FanGraphs Hall of Fame expert Jay Jaffe (the author of The Cooperstown Casebook) discuss Jay’s experience as a first-time Hall of Fame voter, the case of Curt Schilling, weighing on-field contributions and off-field transgressions, the players on Jay’s ballot, the candidacies of Billy Wagner, Gary Sheffield, Omar Vizquel, and others, adjusting the baseline for Hall of Fame starting pitchers, Jay’s predictions for this year’s voting results, a preview of the upcoming Cooperstown classes, the record number of Hall of Fame players who died in 2020, how to better honor baseball greats while they’re still alive, the Hall of Fame ramifications of reclassifying the Negro Leagues as major leagues, and more.

Audio intro: Guided By Voices, "High Five Hall of Famers"
Audio outro: The Felice Brothers, "Cooperstown"

Link to Jay’s ballot post
Link to The Cooperstown Casebook
Link to Jay on this ballot’s big questions
Link to the HoF Ballot Tracker
Link to Jay on Schilling
Link to Craig Calcaterra on Schilling
Link to Zach Hayes on Schilling
Link to Jay on Vizquel
Link to The Athletic report on Vizquel
Link to Sam on Pettitte
Link to Jeff Snider on Hall of Famer deaths
Link to Jay on Allen
Link to story on overlooked Negro Leaguers
Link to story on reclassification and Cooperstown

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Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley, and FanGraphs lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen convene to discuss the latest epic Padres transaction spree (in which San Diego traded for Blake Snell and Yu Darvish and signed Ha-seong Kim 김하성), touching on A.J. Preller’s penchant for frenetic activity, the Padres’ rebuilt rotation and crowded infield, the prospect packages going to the Rays and the Cubs, the state of the stacked Rays and Padres farm systems, why the Rays traded Snell, what dealing Darvish signifies for the Cubs, salary dumps vs. cost-cutting competitive trades, whether the Padres can catch the Dodgers, and much more.

Audio intro: Bring it On (Original Broadway Cast Recording), "It’s All Happening"
Audio outro: The Posies, "All in a Day’s Work"

Link to Ben Clemens on the Snell trade
Link to Brendan Gawlowski on the Kim signing
Link to Eric on the Rays’ system
Link to Eric on the Cubs’ return for Darvish
Link to Craig Edwards on the Darvish trade
Link to Ben on Preller’s trades
Link to Ben on the formerly nondescript Padres
Link to FanGraphs farm system rankings

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Ben Lindbergh talks to Jacky Bing-Sheng Lee, translator of the traditional Chinese edition of Ben’s book The MVP Machine, Hyunsung Kim, translator of the Korean edition of The MVP Machine, and Brendan O’Connor, assistant professor and linguistic anthropologist at the School of Transborder Studies at Arizona State University, about the challenges of translating a baseball book from English into other languages, how Jacky and Hyunsung got jobs in baseball and became translators, the ascendance of the CPBL and the KBO on the international stage, linguistic “borrowing” in baseball, the cultural conversations surrounding baseball bilingualism, the greatness of Korean baseball drama Stove League, and much more.

Audio intro: Field Music, "Share the Words"
Audio outro: Joel Plaskett, "So Many Words"

Link to Jacky’s post in the Facebook group
Link to Jacky’s baseball blog
Link to Hyunsung’s list of American baseball books available in Korean
Link to Chinese edition of The MVP Machine
Link to Brendan’s ASU faculty page
Link to Brendan’s Sapiens article
Link to Part 1 of Sung Min Kim’s KBO series
Link to Part 2 of Sung Min Kim’s KBO series
Link to stream Stove League
Link to paperback English edition of The MVP Machine

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about why MLB reportedly isn’t interested in short-term expansion and an observation about Tyler Glasnow, Martin Shkreli, and Cillian Murphy, then review the accuracy of last year’s annual ESPN MLB insiders survey, predict and assess the responses to the just-released, latest edition of the survey, answer a listener email about the cutoff for “young” players, and share a Stat Blast about Byron Buxton and the lowest on-base percentages by league-average hitters (plus an addendum on the longest baseball player Wikipedia pages).

Audio intro: Oasis, "Stay Young"
Audio outro: The Just Joans, "No Longer Young Enough"

Link to Stark’s story about Dombrowski
Link to story about NBA expansion
Link to Sam on the Crasnicks in 2012
Link to Sam on the Crasnicks in 2014
Link to last year’s Rogers MLB insiders survey
Link to this year’s Rogers MLB insiders survey
Link to Ben on young hitters and aging curves
Link to lowest OBP list
Link to lowest OBP+ list
Link to longest baseball player Wikipedia pages

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about ballpark renaming, follow up on their discussion about managers getting fired for their actions in a single game, discuss how the history of baseball’s sabermetric movement predicts the trajectory and ramifications of analytics use in football and other sports, and reflect on the significance of the Phillies hiring Sam Fuld as their new general manager, what the return of ex-player high-ranking execs may portend for front-office diversity, and Fuld’s lengthy Wikipedia page, then (51:15) talk to Driveline Baseball hitting intern and college baseball player Luisa Gauci about her multi-continent baseball odyssey from Australia to the U.S., her quest to bring data-driven development to women’s baseball, rewriting the scouting scale, why she’s determined to keep playing baseball, her work at Driveline, hitting technology vs. pitching technology, and more.

Audio intro: Mattiel, "Just a Name"
Audio interstitial: Of Montreal, "It’s Different for Girls"
Audio outro: Neuseiland, "Write it Down (Radio Sonic)"

Link to article about the Coliseum’s new name
Link to 2003 Grady Little article
Link to Ben on revisiting the Grady Little game
Link to EW episode about sabermetrics breaking baseball
Link to EW football vs. baseball analysis interview
Link to football Multisport Sabermetrics Exchange episode
Link to The Athletic on the new Phillies front office
Link to story on the GM demographics shift
Link to Breslow interview
Link to Jalen Rose analytics comments
Link to Jackie Bradley Jr. tweet
Link to article about front-office hiring
Link to Fuld’s Wikipedia page
Link to Lookout Landing article
Link to Luisa’s scouting scale presentation
Link to Baseball For All website

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Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley follow up briefly on their recent Scott Boras banter, then answer listener emails about what a manager has to do to get fired because of a single game, possible scenarios in which Mookie Betts enters the Hall of Fame representing the Red Sox instead of the Dodgers, whether nature excursions could be beneficial to teams, what baseball would be like with weight classes for players, which party or parties to root for in conflicts between MLB and the minor leagues, how many players they could recognize from their mechanics if they saw them only as stick figures, and more, plus a Stat Blast about the most itinerant journeymen.

Audio intro: Super Furry Animals, "Happiness is a Worn Pun"
Audio outro: Jamestown Revival, "Journeyman"

Link to Lucien Favre story
Link to Jay’s post on Betts
Link to Cueto graphic
Link to study on the southpaw advantage
Link to Francona’s comments about Cleveland
Link to journeyman Stat Blast data

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